for miles, it was all blue green, the dark iciness of the morning. in the distance the jagged mountains stuck out of the earth like angry spires and below their sneakers, the cliffs fell away into the quarry in little spikes. and all of it, every bit of it was shades of blue. what little light there was glinted off the dark quarry water, off the black feathers of the birds nesting in the little caves below. and in the midst of all of this blue, taekwoon felt like he was freezing. it was cold, so cold, cold enough that the edges of his fingertips felt frozen, covered in little bits of ice from the grass they had crawled up on the hill.
it would be coming soon, the morning sun licking the horizon with it’s first little hints of orange and taekwoon was ready for that, ready to feel, to see anything other than blue. something more like the space heater in jaehwan’s room, or the flush of ruddy red at the edges of jaehwan’s face when he had dragged his teeth over his skin. the cold part of him wished that he was back in that bed, underneath jaehwan’s covers with his face pressed into his thigh, fingers rubbing circles into his hipbones. but when he looked up with furrowed brows to express that, the part of him that was heated up too much from the way jaehwan’s thigh was touching his own couldn’t bring itself to speak. jaehwan was staring at the horizon, lips spread into the most pleasant smile as chilly fingers bumped into taekwoon’s nearly numb ones and grabbed onto them. it was frozen hot coals and the quarry felt like it was going to swallow them both, but taekwoon’s chest felt heavy and his lips stayed firmly pressed together.
it took a while, a while of silence, a while of jaehwan’s fingers rubbing at his own until they could just about see it. a spike of light over the horizon, just as taekwoon’s fingers started to warm. jaehwan looked back at him with one of those smiles that could have cracked the sky in half, brighter than the sun, and then it came. it seemed to spill over the earth as it moved, sunlight crawling towards them as it rose. taekwoon should have been watching that, but instead he watched as jaehwan’s face, covered in cold shades of blue caught the sun, the orange light lighting up his features as he stared at the horizon. his eyes twinkled and the sunlight caught his jaw, slid down the bridge of his nose, dripping over his cupids bow and his full lips and taekwoon’s fingers tightened around the fingers laced within his own.
the cold had been worth it, because this was just as good. just as good as the way jaehwan’s neck muscles would contract as he rolled his head back, clutching at taekwoon’s hair. every shade of ecstatic jaehwan made it impossible for taekwoon to hide his smile.
in the dark, with the lights above the dj station shifting, all sanghyuk could see was the way the light caught on jaehwan’s eyelashes. they were pressed up close against the bar, their faces close enough that they were nearly brushing and sanghyuk recalled that the club had seemed loud when they walked in. it was barely a hum anymore. he could still feel the bass pumping through his chest, through his veins maybe, but it paled in comparison to the feeling of jaehwan’s sharp hip against his abdomen. the older man’s face was so close and sanghyuk could see the subtle curve of the bridge of his nose, the roundness of his lower lip, watching as his tongue slipped over it and his eyes flicked to the right. he could feel him, smell him even over the thick smell of the alcohol and smoke drifting through the air. it made him shiver in a way that he had stopped trying to pretend it didn’t a long time ago.
the song changed, a moment of relative silence, a dip in the atmosphere, a strange emptiness almost that hung heavy on the air. but it wasn’t empty or silent for sanghyuk. jaehwan’s fingers slipping up under his shirt just a little bit felt louder than the music ever had been. it hit him with a swift rush, roaring up through his chest and into his throat and his eyes fell shut as jaehwan leaned closer, their cheeks just barely brushing.
“he’s here.”
it was slipped in just before the music started up again, his voice soft and a little high with the nervousness that was making his fingers quiver against sanghyuk’s skin. it was hard to take, paired up with the brush of full lips against his ear, sending little tendrils of electricity through his body. his stomach twisted, jumped, at the thought of what they were doing, what jaehwan was about to do. and once again the terrible dj was drowned out by the feeling of their cheeks dragging together. sanghyuk couldn’t have told you what the song had been or if it had been fast or slow. it was lost, forgotten and reduced to nothing more than a lazy jumble of noises when jaehwan’s mouth was pressing kisses closer to his mouth.
it was agonizingly slow, making him feel like he was burning down into nothing at all as each press of those full lips was bringing their mouths closer together. then in sloppy suddenness they were kissing and sanghyuk forgot how to use his mouth. but it was wet, god it was wet and soft and jaehwan’s mouth was dreamy warm, lips parting as they learned to kiss each other.
if everything hadn’t been drowned out before, it was now, so distant and the last thing sanghyuk could waste his attention on. how could he waste any attention when jaehwan was kissing at his mouth all short and desperate and soft, his fingers sliding further up, sinking into his skin in a way that made sanghyuk tense up and chuckle into the older man’s mouth. he couldn’t waste any time that could be spent licking and sucking at jaehwan’s lower lip and slipping his hands lower, dangerously low on his back, so he could press him close, press him close so he could feel every inch of him.
his eyes kept slipping open between kisses, half blinded by the lights and vision fuzzy as their mouths moved. he’d catch the high point of jaehwan’s cheekbone, the fan of his eyelashes, the way his hair was shaved short close to his ears. then jaehwan’s tongue would push against his own, sending a thrill through his body, making a groan hum up through his throat and his eyes would fall shut once again. just this, this alone was hot heavy heat at the pit of his stomach, between his legs and jaehwan’s hips pushing against his own only made it worse.
“is h— … mmn is he still looking?”
the words were nearly lost, nearly lost in the song, nearly lost between their hungry mouths and sanghyuk wondered if they were lost entirely, if either of them cared about their meaning. it was hard to believe when jaehwan’s fingers were sinking into his abdomen still, but he paused, pulled back, panting and tried his best to oblige jaehwan, to look to see if his ex was anywhere within sight.
his hazy eyes, half lidded, searched the area, impatiently jumping from one half naked bouncing body to the next. he couldn’t even remember what taekwoon looked like when the feeling of jaehwan’s tongue pushing against his own was still fresh in his mind. “i don’t—“ he started, eyebrows furrowed together as he searched half heartedly but it trailed off in a shudder when jaehwan’s mouth, all soft and hot melted against his neck. his eyelids dipped, body swaying and he let his fingers sink into jaehwan’s ass as it happened.
“i don’t fucking care.” jaehwan finished his sentence for him when his lips got up close to his ear again and sanghyuk nodded, panting, heat overwhelming him. his fingertips were burning, burning to get under jaehwan’s clothes, burning to show him just how much he didn’t care, just how much he wanted jaehwan not to care either.
the music started up again loud, making the glasses on the bar behind them shake but sanghyuk was oblivious, panting into jaehwan’s mouth as jaehwan kissed him again, kissed him hard with fingers tugging at his shirt. his fingers sunk deeper into the plush curve of jaehwan’s ass and this was confirmation enough that neither of them cared at all.
later their ears rung, rung from the loud music in the club now that they were back in jaehwan’s room. but it mattered little when jaehwan was on his back, tugging sanghyuk down on top of him by his waistband. it didn’t matter when jaehwan’s fingers found their way around the base of his cock, making a shudder run through him, their foreheads resting together and sanghyuk’s arms shaking as he held himself up. taekwoon was the last thing on his mind as they kissed, slow and uneven and jaehwan touched him, needy little tugs of his wrist building heat and pressure under sanghyuk’s skin until he nearly wanted to sob.
but jaehwan brought him down, brought him down easy, panting against his mouth as he got him close enough and pulled him right over. he came hard, sweaty and shaking on top of him and sanghyuk could feel jaehwan’s smile against his mouth. it was big and wide and they could talk about this later, but for now all sanghyuk could do was share that smile, breathless and useless, nestled against jaehwan’s warm body.
tomato guts • calling corners au • jaehwan/taekwoon, r, 3024 words
warning: blood
—
It was a dark night, the kind of dark night where the moon and the stars were gone, blotted out by thick clouds that seemed to make the world and the sky melt together. It was the kind of dark that always seemed to come with fog, the earth too warm and the air too cold, a strange mix come with fog all thick and heavy and making every source of light glow, eerie in the darkness. The convenience store had closed hours ago, the lights had gone out one by one, then the doors were locked and the employees disappeared in their cars, and now there was no one, not a soul in the area, not anymore at least.
Above the roof, the sign glowed red, spilling it’s light over the parking lot, far enough that it touched Jaehwan’s face, lighting up one half of it as he stood there, leaning against a car that was slowly growing cold. He stared up at the sign, flicking the ash off of his cigarette, and watching the fog roll past it. If someone had walked by, in the red light they wouldn’t have noticed. They wouldn’t have noticed the blood smeared across his mouth and down his throat. They wouldn’t have noticed the boy lying at his feet, what was left of his blood spilling out on the macadam. But it wouldn’t have really mattered if they had. He needed to feed again tonight anyway.
Bringing the cigarette up to his mouth, he took a long, slow drag, and then dropped his hand down towards to his thigh again as he exhaled. The smoke, like the fog was distorted in the red light, lit by it and he watched as it’s tendrils crawled up into the darkness, like vaporized blood curling into the atmosphere. He was still hungry he guessed. The taste was still thick in his mouth. Thick and sweet, just the way this boy had smelled. Young and innocent. They tasted the best like that, so fresh and wet, not thick and riddled with things age and medicine or drugs can push into your blood.
He glanced down at him, his blonde hair matted with it, stained like Jaehwan’s lips, like his mouth. He took another drag, a slight smile pulling at the corners as he watched his blood trickle through the cracks in the pavement. Someone else would be bleeding by his hand in an hour or so. As soon as he could find someone, find someone stupid enough to have left their house. He glanced back up, up at the red sign, letting the smoke expel from his lungs. The rest of his cigarette fell as he walked away, it fell, catching on his pretty blonde hair and smoldering in the cold and the dark, little sparks burning through the strands, but not enough to set light to him.
—
Hours had passed before he got back, he wasn’t sure how many hours, enough hours that he could see the first licks of sunlight at the very edge of the horizon. He was down by the wharf when he started to notice little signs of life and light. And while no, he wasn’t like the monsters of lore, needing to disappear into underground or behind boarded up windows to keep himself from burning alive, he did want to keep himself from getting arrested, what with blood smeared across his face and spilled down the front of his shirt.
He had fed twice, hungrier than he had been in a while. Hungrier than he could really explain, though he was sure back at home Taekwoon would explain it for him. Something about the blood moon, something about his star sign being under jupiter, something about how he wasn’t taking his vitamins. He wouldn’t actually say anything about his star sign but sometimes when he started going on about the things Jaehwan needed to do or try or be careful of, he started sounding like one of those gossip magazines, telling him he’d find his soulmate if he walked counterclockwise and backwards around a gravestone three times under a full moon.
He actually had met Taekwoon in a graveyard under a full moon, but that was beside the point.
With the waves lapping on the boats, he stole away, turning his head as he started down an alleyway so that one of the garbage men wouldn’t notice that blood was drying on his skin. It was a rather gross feeling but he wasn’t about to wipe it on his leather jacket. He’d be home before he’d need to. And one never really did think about cleaning up while they were in the midst of feeding, now did they?
Besides Hakyeon maybe. But Jaehwan wasn’t Hakyeon.
The streets were cold, getting colder as the sun started to rise and a bit of wind started to whip in from the sea. It seemed even colder somehow in the back alleyways where no one would be looking, a kind of wraithlike cold clinging to the shadows that were still heavy on the walls. He shivered, shoving his hands into his pockets and turning left, deeper into the city and closer to home.
As his boots hit the pavement with each steady step, he licked his lips, tasting blood and he thought of the man who had been sitting on the docks only an hour ago, his business suit rumpled and his heart beating fast as he stared out over the sea. No doubt having just come from desecrating his marriage, considering how strongly he had smelled of cheap perfume and hotel soap, with dollar bills still falling out of his pockets. Those dollar bills were in Jaehwan’s pockets now and that man was sinking to the bottom of the sea. He couldn’t help but smile to himself at that thought.
He enjoyed it and maybe that was sadistic, but wasn’t the act of drinking blood sadistic in itself? He wasn’t going to pretend to be some do-gooder who only ate those who were worthy, who only sunk his teeth into those who had done others wrong. But sometimes when it was clear there was very little good about them it was enjoyable to feel them die in his hands. There was no guilt in his chest either way as he headed back, only wishing that he didn’t feel so rushed. He hated feeling rushed.
It wasn’t until he started to round the next corner that he felt it and immediately he staggered to a halt, grabbing at the nearest building to brace himself, eyebrows furrowing deep. All the way up the hill, past all of those houses as the light started to grow, his stomach had felt nothing but warm and heavy from the nights bounty. Now, suddenly pain gripped the base of it, twisting it into a knot and cramping up as he stood there. His fingers were turning white from how hard he was clutching the wall next to him.
“Fuck…” he swore under his breath, gritting his teeth and then rolling his eyes, expression crumpled from the pain. This didn’t happen often but when it did, it was horrible. Not enough to cripple him entirely but close enough. And this was bad, this was a bad place to be in pain. This was a bad place to stop, surrounded by houses, with doors that were going to open soon, people starting their days. If they saw a man, curled up next to their townhouses, with blood smeared on his mouth it wouldn’t be long before the police would be there and he’d be dragged back down town and thrown in a holding cell.
He growled in his throat, pushing himself forward and ignoring the pain. It didn’t seem to be getting any worse, but it would. It would in a couple of hours and then he was really going to want to be inside, otherwise he was going to start vomiting up blood in the road and watching it trickle back down through the cobblestones towards the wharf. He wasn’t really keen on that.
Besides if he stayed outside, it wouldn’t just be a couple of hours in a holding cell. He had done that before, many times before and it wouldn’t be like that this time. Not with how careless he had been with two of the bodies. A man stuck in a holding cell with blood around his mouth and down his shirt? Two dead, both dying of blood lost with wounds to the neck? You didn’t have to believe to find that suspicious. And with Jaehwan’s criminal record and his last court case, it wouldn’t be pretty. Hakyeon was a good lawyer, but he wasn’t that good.
He hissed through his teeth as his stomach clenched again and he picked up the pace, sprinting as fast as he could past the parked cars and towards the fence that Taekwoon had put up around their backyard. He could hear someone down the road, starting up their car and it made his heart thud a little faster in his chest as he crossed the last stretch of sidewalk. He could smell Taekwoon’s herbs from here, the scent strong and overpowering, but welcoming at this point.
He panted, glancing around and back and he knew he only had one option. It would take too long to get around the other side of the house and in the front door. So letting go of his stomach he jumped, grabbing on to the top of the fence - the jagged edges of the wood biting into his hand - hoisting himself up over the edge. It took the last of his strength and then he fell, tumbled and—
“Oof.”
It wasn’t as hard a fall as he thought it was going to be, and for a moment due to adrenaline, his stomach stopped hurting. His heart was still pounding, and he took a moment to stare up at the sky, blue staring back down at him and the edges of the wood starting to glow with the morning light. It was catching on the flowers and the leaves too, all of Taekwoon’s small trees and his herbs and everything in the garden flourishing despite the fact that it was the dead of winter.
Jaehwan chuckled, a smile spreading across his lips because despite the fact that he was going to be in pain any moment, he was safe now and god he loved this garden more than almost anything else. It had been what had broken his fall he found out as he stood up slowly, pain gripping his stomach once more and making his thick eyebrows pull together. They only pulled together tighter when he realized that he had just pretty much crushed Taekwoon’s tomato plant. Although he was really more worried about the crushed tomato that was splattered all over the ass and thighs of his new jeans.
Just then the back door swung open, slamming against the patio railing and making Jaehwan wince. Taekwoon emerged from the house and Jaehwan was once again baffled by the fact that there were people in the world who didn’t find witches menacing. Taekwoon was hulking when he was like this, hulking and huge with his rounded shoulders, eyes dark, almost fully black, with sparks biting at his fingertips. He was ready to fry the first thing that moved and as the only thing in the garden that was going to move, Jaehwan was terrified.
“Whoa, hey!” It was half stage whisper, hissed, one hand still clutching his stomach and the other reaching out to show Taekwoon it was just him.
“Jesus CHRIST Jaehwan.” Unlike Jaehwan he didn’t bother lowering his voice, but the sparks disappeared.
“It’s just—“ It’s just me was what Jaehwan was about to say, paired with a grin spreading across his lips but Taekwoon wasn’t interested in that, cutting him off bluntly.
“Couldn’t you fucking aim for the part of my garden that I wasn’t going to use for dinner tonight?” He asked, eyebrows raised and every word pointed. He turned on his heel then, ignoring Jaehwan entirely and stalking back into the house, leaving Jaehwan to frown and drip tomato guts into the grass.
—
He didn’t bother trying to argue that Taekwoon could fix the tomato plants with magic - he always had something to say about how it didn’t matter because the taste wouldn’t be the same - and instead just apologized the minute he got inside. But his apology was cut short when suddenly nausea hit him and he spent the next half hour in the bathroom, bent over the cold porcelain of the toilet, his head throbbing as he threw up more than half of what he had eaten. He liked blood, but not like this.
Afterwards, he emerged, washed up and shuffling his way towards the couch, his stomach still aching and his head feeling not that great either. When he entered the living room Taekwoon was already in there, sitting on the floor, surrounded by books and two little boxes of herbs on either side of him. After feeling so sick and spending so long out in the cold, Jaehwan felt shaky and messed up and the room with all it’s cozy warmth was everything he wanted.
The lamps glowed soft with yellow mage light that flickered slightly, never staying in just one place. The sofa was huge and slouchy, ready to welcome him into his embrace as he padded over to it and then flopped down at the end, letting his head roll back as he did. He still didn’t feel quite right, but he wasn’t about to sit in the bathroom at the toilet and wait for the rest of it to come back up.
“This is why you shouldn’t hunt and you should get donors instead.”
Without pulling his head up he could see Taekwoon’s furrowed brow of concern in his minds eye, which made him want to open his eyes and roll them but he didn’t have the strength so he just let out an exasperated sigh instead.
“Right now really isn’t the time for an I-told-you-so speech.”
He said pointedly, frowning at the ceiling himself and rubbing little circles into his stomach.
“God forbid I worry about you, Jaehwan.” Taekwoon didn’t even miss a beat. “I don’t want to see you like this and I don’t want to worry that you’ve gotten sick somewhere out there and have to check the police records to see if you’ve been taken in. I don’t want to do that.”
At first anger was boiling up inside Jaehwan again and he wanted to tell Taekwoon to leave him alone, but with every word and the emotional edge that started to creep into Taekwoon’s voice, Jaehwan found guilt hanging heavy on him for the first time that day. He swallowed and then slowly raised his head, opening his eyes and staring blearily at Taekwoon across the room.
He looked small there, next to the fireplace, surrounded by stacks of books, rubbing a hand up one of his arms and biting his lip. He was right. Jaehwan knew he was right but he hated it. He liked hunting more than anything, but how could you ask someone for their blood type before you bit into their neck. He sniffed and sighed, dropping his gaze down towards his stomach.
“I’ll think about it.” He murmured, curling his lip and actually trying not to think about it because giving up hunting was the last thing he wanted to do. But feeling like this wasn’t something he wanted either.
Taekwoon sighed across the room and Jaehwan heard him get up, but he didn’t wait to see where he had gone. Instead he shifted so he could lay down on the sofa, nuzzling his head into one of the cushions. It smelled like Taekwoon, that rich woody smell like sage and rosemary, musky but with a hint of sweet orange and mint all woven through it. There was nothing more comforting.
At some point later, he was roused by big hands on his arms and his shoulders, squeezing and shaking him lightly and he woke, snuffling as he looked up and around and then into the face of Taekwoon who was sitting over him. “Mmm?” Jaehwan’s voice felt thick with sleep and so did his head, everything almost swimming with it and his body feeling strange.
Taekwoon’s fingers were at his mouth then, pushing something against his lips and he parted them and let him push whatever it was inside his mouth. It didn’t matter. He trusted him. “Swallow.” Taekwoon murmured, offering him water and Jaehwan took it with an unsteady hand, closing his eyes as he drank the water and the gross tasting stuff Taekwoon had put in his mouth down. Once the water was drained he handed it back to Taekwoon and shifted to lay on his back, humming in his throat.
He still felt half asleep, everything far away and strange, but Taekwoon was warm so when he started to shift to get up, he grabbed at him, not letting him leave. “Cuddle me.” He murmured, eyes only opened a sliver, watching the way the light moved on Taekwoon’s face. He watched as Taekwoon’s lips pulled up at the corner, then his eyes fell shut as warmth enveloped him, big arms wrapping around him and pressing him close.
He didn’t expect it, but Taekwoon’s mouth pressed into his, licking at his lips soft and slow until Jaehwan’s mouth opened up and they kissed properly, deeply. Jaehwan’s fingers found their way up, tangling in Taekwoon’s hair and he hummed around his tongue, hummed because of how warm Taekwoon felt compared to how shaky sick he still felt.
The kiss ended slow and then Taekwoon’s mouth moved down and he nestled his face into Jaehwan’s neck, making him shiver all the way down his spine. Then he slept like that, blanketed by Taekwoon’s warmth as outside the sun shone and the police department sectioned off two parts of the city with their bright yellow tape.
—
a/n: this is all part of a larger au where vampirism is a magical "disease" that doesn't have anything to do with being undead. because it's a disease of a sort, vampires are human beings who crave and need blood in order to live but not necessarily to have it run through their veins, it's more like potent energy through blood exchange that is craved and necessary. because of this they can clearly get stomach problems (and other illnesses) after drinking certain blood/blood types.
if you guys like this au let me know! i think i'm going to write more in the universe and flesh things out more, because all of the members are present in it anddddd i like it
the first thing he noticed when they walked in was that it echoed. even with rugs lining the floors and the couch that looked so familiar and yet out of place shoved up against the one large wall, the whole place echoed, feeling empty and hollow in the strangest way. it wasn’t like there was anything wrong with it. it was beautiful and new and the windows were large and the kitchen seemed sprawling and big. but it had that lonely feeling, a house that was not yet a home. he stood next to the door with his hands in his pockets and watched taekwoon who seemed not to know where to put his hands in a way that made it clear he felt the same way too.
“it’s big.”
sanghyuk offered, eyebrows going up as he dragged his eyes away from taekwoon’s fidgeting fingers and up towards the ceiling, down and around over the sliding door that led to the bedroom. he could just make out the corner of taekwoon’s bed and boxes and bags strewn on the floor next to it. for a moment he imagined taekwoon last night, drinking his coffee in the midst of all of this emptiness. he felt a small pang of guilt that made his eyebrows pull together.
taekwoon hummed in agreement or acknowledgement and sanghyuk could hear him moving, his eyes flitting back to follow him as he headed towards the kitchen. it was… sterile to say the least. empty with only a rice cooker and a kettle set out, their cords tangled up and glaring, telltale sign of someone who had just moved in. there was something cute about it and sanghyuk felt his mouth twist in a smile despite how much he was trying to control it.
“do you want anything?” taekwoon asked, looking up at him from where he was standing by the counter. he looked small in his coat, dwarfed by it and almost childlike with his hair messy and his cheeks still pink from the cold. his scarf was tangled up and his coat unzipped and he was worrying his bottom lip like nothing was more important. sanghyuk worked harder to fight his smile, his fingers curling up inside the pockets of his jeans as he shook his head.
they stood in silence and the place seemed to pick up on every single one of their movements, their breathing, amplifying it in the space as sanghyuk’s eyes moved from the bare walls to the exposed radiators to the boxes tucked in the hallway where the bathroom was presumably. taekwoon seemed to have nothing left to say, searching the place with his eyes as though he was desperately searching for something to do, as though getting sanghyuk something to eat or drink had been his last ditch effort to not feel so out of place. more guilt seeped in, pushing words past sanghyuk’s lips.
“let’s go to the christmas market.”
he could see the desperation turn into something different just by the look on his face as he nodded and his shoulders relaxed and sanghyuk knew it was decided.
—
outside it was too cold still but it seemed better. there was no echo and taekwoon stuck closer as he zipped up his jacket, their shoulders touching as he shivered and mumbled something about the cold under his breath. it was getting under the collar of sanghyuk’s coat because he had forgotten his scarf, but it didn’t really matter now that everything felt so much more at ease.
it was crowded on the streets and sanghyuk found himself glancing over, checking to make sure that taekwoon hadn’t been pushed behind, but he was always there, close to his shoulder, eyebrows furrowed from the cold and his sleepy eyes jumping from the crowd up to sanghyuk’s face every time he looked back. they caught eyes and then sanghyuk would look away, licking his lips to hide his smile. his chest felt warm, despite the nipping cold.
by the time they got there he couldn’t feel his face though and he grabbed onto taekwoon’s arm, tugging him through the lines to get to the place that sold cider. their bodies pressed close and taekwoon’s breath was warm against his jaw, amongst the throngs of bodies waiting and pushing and crowding together. it was loud, too many sounds and people talking, but all he could focus on was taekwoon’s eyes and twinkling lights reflected in them as he read the signs.
the cider was piping hot in their hands, fingers numb with cold wrapped around them and sanghyuk almost spilled his as he watched the way taekwoon’s pale fingers looked next to his pink lips and his red cheeks. the steam billowed between them, tucked up next to the stall, their bodies too close again as they took their first sips.
it was hot going down, too hot and overwhelming but then it flooded through you, the heat enveloping your stomach. or sanghyuk thought so at least, but he wasn’t quite sure because taekwoon was smiling and not looking him in the eye and that made him feel hot too. he was pretty sure it was about then that he stopped fighting his smiles.
people always thought taekwoon was quiet, and he was, he could be. but when he had something to say he could talk a lot more than people thought. with how loud it was, he leaned in close when he saw something that he liked or thought of something sanghyuk needed to know. his lips brushed sanghyuk’s ear as he listened to every word and taekwoon’s voice, so soft and nearly lost to the crowd, thrummed through his body.
maybe it was the warmth and the cold or the alcohol in the cider or just the busy nature of the crowd or maybe it was the fact that it was nearly christmas and sanghyuk didn’t want to keep pretending, but after they finished their cider, he threaded their fingers together. he didn’t look back to make sure taekwoon was okay with it. mostly because he didn’t have to, not with the way taekwoon’s hand squeezed his.
they walked for a while, sometimes side by side, sometimes sidling together, watching the lights and stopping at some of the stalls to look at everything. but their hands didn’t break apart and sanghyuk liked that. he liked it a little too much. there was one stall selling glass icicles, long and gorgeous, faceted in the light. he watched as taekwoon stared up at them, reaching up with his free hand to touch the smooth glass. he asked if taekwoon wanted one but he shook his head, leaning close again - lips brushing against his ear again - to say that he didn’t have a tree. sanghyuk wanted to say that he could fix that, but he didn’t say anything, just watched him instead, a little bit of a smile on his lips. he watched him until taekwoon’s mouth screwed up and he had to look away.
a little further on there was an ice skating rink and they stood near the edge, watching the kids and their parents skate around awkwardly, couples who were better skating circles around them. but everyone seemed to be having fun. just when he was least expecting it, he felt those lips again, taekwoon asking, quietly if he wanted to skate, their fingers still laced, taekwoon’s thumb rubbing over sanghyuk’s knuckles. it made him shiver, eyelids drooping closed for a second before he turned to watch him and shake his head.
later sanghyuk pulled his hand free so that he could hold his hands up around his mouth and breathe into the air next to a red lamp at one of the stalls. the light caught on the condensation, turning it red and he grinned at taekwoon afterwards who’s shoulders were shaking as he laughed and bit his lip, shaking his head.
“i’m a dragon.”
“i know.”
it was taekwoon who grabbed at his hand then, their fingers lacing back together and sanghyuk’s chest was much more like fire than his breath ever could have been. he decided then that it was time to head back, but not before he tugged taekwoon into the supermarket on the way back.
“do you need something?” taekwoon asked, looking pink and ruffled from the cold again now that they were inside and sanghyuk had his mostly frozen hands on a cart. he shook his head as he started through the automated double doors, reaching back to tug taekwoon along with him.
“nah, but you do.”
they didn’t leave until sanghyuk had picked up a deluxe christmas tree, three strings of lights, ornaments and some other rather gaudy christmas decorations. taekwoon kept trying to dissuade him, telling him it wasn’t necessary and he didn’t want sanghyuk spending money on him. every time he did, sanghyuk would stick another pair of plush antlers on him. he ended up buying four of them and deciding to name them the antlers of shame. taekwoon wore all of them all the way back to his apartment, biting at his lip and trying not to look at sanghyuk because every time he did he started to burst out laughing again and sanghyuk’s smile was so wide that it nearly hurt.
—
it took them a while to assemble the tree - them being a loose term considering sanghyuk kept swatting taekwoon’s hands away every time he got close to helping. “i want hot chocolate, stop being a terrible host and make me some.” he said incredulously from amidst the pool of plastic fir tree branches he was sitting in. he watched as taekwoon sulked his way back to the kitchen, a smirk pulling at the corner of his mouth. then he tried to pretend that he wasn’t entirely lost and that the whole ordeal was a lot easier than it looked, which was absolutely not true.
by the time he was done there were two branches that didn’t have a place to go and he was pretty sure that that was not how it was supposed to be but he just quickly shoved them back in the box before taekwoon got close enough to see. he was holding two cups of hot chocolate - one of them smelling suspiciously more like coffee - and he was eyeing the tree like it might just fall apart any second. sanghyuk did his best to ignore that.
taekwoon sat down next to him, their knees and hips touching as he handed him his hot chocolate and they sat there in silence, staring up at it together as they drank. he felt hyper aware of every movement that taekwoon made, of every little noise and tried instead to think about how he wanted to decorate this tree. but it was hard when taekwoon’s hand found it’s way onto his free one, pulling it up to examine some of the scratches he had gotten from the plastic branches, the pads of his long fingers dragging over the raised skin.
sanghyuk didn’t let him fuss over them for too long, insisting they get the tree finished. but then he pushed taekwoon down as he stared to get up, chuckling in the back of his throat. “you’re in charge of direction! this is your house!” he then tried to be as ridiculous as possible, watching the way taekwoon’s face would drop as he tangled the lights up in the branches and then did what he said backwards. by the end the tree looked like a mess but taekwoon was covering his mouth with his hand, his shoulders shaking and their breathless laughter filled the still mostly empty room. the still mostly empty room that was now twinkling with christmas lights.
he helped him then, helped him take some things out - once they had fixed the tree - and set them around. he took it upon himself to build the coffee table and somehow that took less time to build than the tree had, which made him question the people who made plastic christmas trees. he could hear taekwoon in the other room, opening up drawers and putting clothes away and he wondered what it had been like the night before when he wasn’t here. he thought of him dressing out of a suitcase and even the thought made him feel lonely.
there was a difference between being alone and being alone somewhere that wasn’t home. or wasn’t home quite yet at least. it was starting to look like home with a hot chocolate box on the counter and a coffee table with two mugs and a christmas tree. after a while, taekwoon trailed out of the bedroom wearing a pair of boxers and an oversized t-shirt that ate his shoulders up making them look so much smaller than they normally did. all sanghyuk could think of was how even though he looked small, there was an ease in his face, where there had only been tight unsurety when he had arrived earlier.
he patted the spot next to him, but taekwoon was already heading for it, only taking a detour to turn the lights off. with them off and only the red and white strings of fairy lights on the tree illuminating the room and bouncing off the ornaments, everything felt cozy and warm and perfect. it felt even more so when taekwoon sat down, pressed close to his side.
in the quiet and the dark, first just their hands twined together, lacing like they had at the christmas market, then sanghyuk shifted and wrapped his arm around him, and taekwoon curled against his side until they were nearly occupying the same space, warmth sweet and thick between them. sanghyuk went from staring at the tree to staring at taekwoon, watching the way the light looked on his skin and the way it reflected in his half lidded eyes as they moved.
their eyes met, taekwoon’s head turning just enough, lips parting as though with a question as sanghyuk’s eyes dragged down to watch them. the light caught on the moisture between them and for a long drawn moment full of half breaths catching in time to the beating of his heart he thought about kissing him. then he stopped thinking about it and he did it.
taekwoon made a noise when their lips touched, the kind of noise that seemed to strike a chord deep inside sanghyuk, making his stomach pull and flip, making heat and pressure build. it was still just as sweet and heavy, but a different kind of heat as he kissed him deeper, lips parting, exhaling and letting his tongue push against taekwoon’s lower lip. taekwoon’s mouth opened up for him, wet and perfect and they kissed on the couch, the wet sounds of their mouths filling the room but not quite echoing in it.
they shifted at some point, until sanghyuk got taekwoon on his back, pressing between his legs on the couch, their hips moving slow as their mouths moved slower, and hands searched under clothes and over hot skin. taekwoon kept moaning, little gasping noises caught in sanghyuk’s mouth, or suspended in the air between them as their lips stopped touching for a single moment, no matter how short.
every time sanghyuk caught a glimpse of him - his own vision unfocused and fuzzy, body too busy dragging fingers over taekwoon’s ribs and shifting down until he could get them into those boxers - he was beautiful. messy black hair sticking to his forehead, looking flushed but not from the cold this time, instead from the sweat that was trapped underneath their clothing, from the heat that was caught in their bodies. or at least in sanghyuk’s body he knew.
it throbbed, overwhelming, undeniable as taekwoon’s hips pushed and rocked against his own and he felt taekwoon’s fingernails sinking into his back. his own fingers pressed into taekwoon’s ass, feeling the way the skin gave way, but more than that tasting the moan that spilled from taekwoon’s lips as he arched into it. kisses became more insistent and the room became even fuzzier, the christmas tree illuminating them as they moved.
they outgrew the sofa then, limbs too long, elbows and knees hitting the coffee table and breaking the desperation with breathless chuckling into each others skin and each others mouths. they agreed without really speaking, stumbling out of the living room in a feverish march towards taekwoon’s bed. their hands never left each other and they were panting, hot and heavy until they found the mattress. sanghyuk went down first, on his back, hefting taekwoon on top of him, hefting him straight into another rough kiss.
it wasn’t what he had intended, though all he had intended was a few kisses… hopefully if that had even been what taekwoon wanted, but soon enough taekwoon was between his legs, nuzzling and pressing his mouth against him through his jeans in a way that made sanghyuk forget how to think or breathe. “you don’t have t—“ he started but then taekwoon was sucking at him through the material and he gave up as the words were lost in a moan and a full body shudder, pleasure taking over. instead his fingers found their way into taekwoon’s hair and he let him, let him do what he seemed to want so desperately.
his fingers worked at button, the zipper and every little touch was enough to ignite him because his jeans had been too tight since the first brush of taekwoon’s tongue against his own and it was too much to handle. too much and yet not quite enough. and it was too long and not quite long enough before taekwoon’s mouth was around him, just the tip at first, sucking slow and hot, such a contrast to the cool air in the room.
it was overwhelming, the throbbing mixed with the pure, wet heat and the intensity of every suck of taekwoon’s mouth, taking him down deeper and deeper and then pulling up when his throat started to spasm. sanghyuk’s moans strung together, one after another, fingers curling in taekwoon’s soft black hair. it was too good, too much and he held out, body tight with every drag of that silky tongue. but taekwoon was insistent, humming around him, fingers working at the base and he couldn’t hold out for much longer.
his thighs shook, taekwoon’s name spilling from his lips as he came, body going taut with it and then just as quickly going limps as waves of pleasure rolled through him. taekwoon’s mouth kept moving, going tight for a second and then wet noises filled sanghyuk’s ears until suddenly his mouth was too much, everything too sensitive he almost cried out right before taekwoon pulled off, panting. they stared at each other, hazy and out of it, taekwoon’s lips swollen and his face as flushed as sanghyuk’s felt. a long moment rolled by and then he pulled him up, mouth searching for a kiss.
when it found one, it was a kiss that tasted of cum, salty bitterness thick on the tongue and it made him moan as his own hand worked, sluggish and slow down the front of taekwoon’s boxers. taekwoon’s hand found it’s way down them too, fingers working together and their panting filled the room. in the other room the tree twinkled by itself and the noises didn’t echo so much and sanghyuk hoped - as he swallowed his moans, cum striping his fingers - that taekwoon felt a little more at home now.
when he woke, he woke to warm weight pressing down on his chest, and steady breathing against his neck. he was used to waking up like that, but maybe it was his dreams, or maybe it was something else entirely, boiling up inside him, but today feeling the familiar weight sent a shock of heat straight through him, that pooled up in the pit of his stomach.
they slept together most nights. taekwoon wasn’t really sure when it started, but at some point hongbin’s warm body started finding refuge in his bed and he isn’t about to stop him. maybe it was because all of the times hongbin had migrated into it to watch performance videos with him, their sides just barely touching. maybe it was just a need for comfort that came from both of them. taekwoon didn’t know. but he did know that when he woke up with hongbin’s sleepy body tangled up in his blankets, he liked it.
he let the other members sleep in his bed from time to time. jaehwan when he was scared of this or that, hakyeon when he had been crying, hyuk out of necessity and wonshik just because that was were they both fell asleep. they all had different, calming ways of breathing, and some of them were more pleasant than others. despite how it annoyed him when people took his space without permission, when one of them would ask, ask if they could crawl into his bed, he didn’t have the heart to deny them. it was cute when they were like that. cute enough that it made his chest ache just a little bit.
but the thing was… hongbin never had to ask.
when hongbin fell asleep so close to him, it never bothered him. even if he woke up in the middle of the night to find him passed out on his chest, heavy breath smelling like alcohol and street food, he couldn’t bring himself to be upset. maybe it was because he looked like such an angel when he was asleep, his long eyelashes looking like thick black fluttery fans, his expression placid, his mouth slightly open. there was something so sweet about it. taekwoon wouldn’t have admitted it, but he liked it. liked the way hongbin didn’t just lay next to him, he never did. even in his sleep he pushed like a magnet up against him, pressing close to him, until his face was nuzzled against his skin and needy fingers curled into his shirt. if there was one thing that taekwoon liked, it was to be needed.
where was the line between wanting to be needed, and letting that want and need bleed into everything else?
he was pretty sure he had tripped right over it, somewhere during the months it took for hongbin’s body to travel from next to him to on top of him. he was sure he had missed some detail between the lines and mixed in with a thousand cups of coffee, when hongbin touching him had become something more than just friendly affection. and he wondered above all, if it was anything but friendly affection.
with his dick full and fat against hongbin’s thigh, he had a feeling that what he was feeling wasn’t just affection. it had happened before, but not like tonight. never like tonight. tonight when he woke, hongbin’s leg was between his, thigh pressing right up against him and he was hard, hard enough that he couldn’t explain it away.
he flushed hot, the heat hanging heavy in his limbs and bursting across his cheeks as he became painfully conscious with every passing second and he hoped… hoped that hongbin was still asleep, breathing peacefully and unaware.
but he could hear him, hear the interrupted breathing one had when they were awake, so different from the steady even breathing that filled his ears when hongbin was deep asleep. it made terror grip his chest and he decided he would move, move away so that he could hopefully pretend later that nothing had happened at all. he found himself frozen though, still and unable to shift, too worried that someway, somehow it would only make things worse.
he opened his eyes instead, afraid of what he might see. maybe judgement, confusion or even disgust. instead he found those big wide, dark eyes were staring at him, watching him. hongbin’s full lips were parted, cheeks puffy from sleep and creased from where they had been resting on taekwoon’s shirt and he was watching him like he had been waiting for him to wake. it made taekwoon’s stomach flip over itself and he swallowed, each second seeming to take an eternity as he waited, waited for hongbin to react.
the way he did was so unlike what taekwoon expected, his chest tight and his eyebrows furrowed in almost disbelief because everything felt too soft and warm and surreal to actually be anything but a dream. but it didn’t feel like a dream when hongbin’s thigh pressed up and right against his cock.
it made him tense, a shiver running through him and his lips parted as he stared, meeting that gaze with equal intensity, watching him as he felt the slow, fluid movement in every part of his body. even then he wondered if he was just imagining it, if it had been nothing but hongbin shifting to get off of him. but when he pressed closer, pressed up against his chest until their mouths were sharing the same humid air, taekwoon couldn’t pretend it was nothing anymore.
he had dreamt about this, thought about it, thought about hongbin kissing him before, or touching him or both. it was different though now as it happened, so much more soft and wet and slow. he felt so much eagerness blooming inside him, his stomach wrought tight with it. but there was no rush, no rush in the press of hongbin’s tongue and slow rubbing of his thigh.
there was some shifting though and taekwoon’s mouth fell open slow when he felt just how hard hongbin was too. he felt the way hongbin’s hips moved and then how his dick pushed into his thigh. he rutted against it, slow and deliberate, like he wanted to make taekwoon remember this for as long as he could. he didn’t have to move slowly to do that, taekwoon felt the heat of it, the sensation searing itself into his mind.
it would be hard to forget the languid dragging of his tongue, the hushed and pained noises coming up from his throat and the desperate fingers curling into his shirt, nails that were a bit longer scraping at his skin through it. it would be hard to forget how hard he was and the way his hips moved as he rutted against their bunched up boxers. taekwoon could almost forget how hard he was himself, too focused on the measured rocking of hongbin’s hips and the muffled noises that spilled from sleep swollen lips with every thrust.
it was a hazy thing, like it had been from the beginning. the soft heavy darkness seemed to press between everything, press into taekwoon’s eyelids every time he closed them. it was like sleep itself, calling him back to dreams. hongbin’s mouth and his insistent hips were like the daylight, shaking him awake, reminding him he was conscious. though at times it all mixed together, the wetness of their mouths and the wetness he could feel on the front of hongbin’s boxers, all hot and warm and soft, half asleep and half awake and swirling together until taekwoon wasn’t sure he knew the difference.
would he wake and find he’d been dreaming some elaborate dream?
he thought so as heady pressure built but even that was strange and far away. he thought so until the soft noises falling from hongbin’s mouth became something more pointed, something impossible to disprove.
“taekwoon…”
it sounded breathless and wet, as wet as that spot that kept getting more damp with every push of hongbin’s hips. it caught taekwoon off guard, tipped him over and suddenly he felt it all bubble up, his body going tense, fingers pressing into hongbin’s back as he came in a surge of heat and overwhelming release, his stomach going so tight and then relaxing, as bliss washed over him.
he was good at being silent, quiet, had learned to be living in a house with thin walls and two sisters so close by. he panted then, turning his face to press into hongbin’s cheek, listening to his cut off breathing, feeling his hips still working. it was worse now, more foggy and distant than it had been before, so dreamlike feeling the way hongbin was moving, the way he sounded so close and yet muffled by darkness around them.
his hand found it’s way between their bodies and then between hongbin’s legs, slow. then his breath caught in his chest when he felt him, felt his cock through the dampness of his boxers. he felt hongbin’s breath catch too, felt his hot mouth search for solace as he squirmed like he almost couldn’t take it, couldn’t take being touched because it felt too good.
it didn’t take much, rubbing slow, methodical and then he felt it. he felt the way hongbin’s muscles tensed. he felt the intake of air, felt him come into his boxers, into taekwoon’s palm, little shivers running through his body as he did. he could feel each stage, pressure releasing, pleasure taking over and then energy disappearing and hongbin’s body going limp and lax on taekwoon’s chest.
strange, it was to feel something so entirely and yet not at all because the barrier between two bodies was impossible to breach.
for a long moment, he worried that hongbin would leave, slip out of his grasp and disappear out the door and into the bathroom. he imagined himself watching it, watching the cold sliver of light spilling out over the living room floor and wondering if he should regret this, regret everything that had happened.
but hongbin didn’t move, he clung, melted, like he always did when he crawled into taekwoon’s bed under any other circumstances. his fingers stayed were they were, curled in taekwoon’s shirt and as each moment passed it seemed easier to let the breath he was holding out of his lungs.
his hand slipped up, over the plane of his back, brushing against the uneven bumps of his spine and up until he could slip his fingers into hongbin’s hair. the strands were warm and soft against his fingertips as he dragged them up further, burying the pads of them so close to his skull. he could feel the hum of quiet approval in hongbin’s chest more than he could feel it, as once again sleep started to slip in and fill up all of the gaps, now that there was no more energy to speak of.
as he fell asleep, he listened to hongbin’s breathing go even, the sound mixing in with the uninterrupted sounds of sleep coming from the other boys in the room. but there still wasn’t anyone else he’d rather share his bed with.
the winter and the warmth • taekbin/taekhyuk, r, 10k+ words
this fic is dedicated to taekyangi my stupid bf ♡ i wrote this for their birthday and then i let them read it a day early
A chill was in the air when they first met. The kind of chill that you could see crisping the tops of the heather that spread through the fields, and frosting the blades of grass in the morning as you walked to your car. A chill was in the air and Taekwoon thought almost nothing of him.
It had been a morning to forget amidst a thousand mornings that all looked relatively similar. The only difference was it was colder when he left his apartment, cold enough that his boots kicked up little patches of ice as he trodded through the grass. The sun wasn’t quite up yet, the sky dark and grey still, but he watched as what light there was picked up on the tiny crystals. He breathed out, eyebrows furrowed and watched as the cold air showed his breath, mentally reminding himself he needed to buy gloves for his already frozen fingers.
The walk to school was never very long, the longest bit - across the bridge - was never fun in this weather. Wind howled through the overpass, and straight through the guard rails at the edge and as it did, it ripped right through his coat, making him shiver head to foot as he turned to brace himself against it. He cursed not moving to the city where he could have just taken the subway. But despite that once the wind had died down, he couldn’t help but stare at the way the ice clung to the little spindly branches of the trees.
Salt crunched under his boots with every step as he turned onto campus. The roads and the sidewalks hadn’t frozen over just yet, but they always covered everything in salt so far before. It seemed to cling to everything, the sides of the campus busses and the buildings and up the edges of Taekwoon’s boots. It seemed to form in little patterns, that looked like snowflakes and he found his eyes following them, staring down at the ground.
Startled was the first feeling, when suddenly his shoulder was connecting with someone else, knocking straight into their back. It was jarring, the feeling of hitting someone, after being so serene for more than a couple of minutes. He hadn’t even heard anyone, hadn’t heard any talking, though now it seemed to all flood into his senses, so many noises filling the campus that he had simply not noticed before. But immediately after that, embarrassment flooded in and he shrunk back, bowing with a red nose and redder cheeks, feeling like the biggest idiot as words of apology spilled from his lips. He got a glimpse of him then, tall, a face that seemed familiar, but not one that he remembered.
“No no, it was my fault!” was the response he got, paired with a big smile, lips curving in a way that was almost mischievous, but before he could insist otherwise, the other guy was back engrossed in whatever he had been talking about with his friend, and people were starting to find ways to walk around Taekwoon.
So he fell back into the flow of traffic, following everyone towards the doors until he could feel the warmth of the main building beckoning him in. It was always strange, the winter. How hot it would be inside after you had been so cold outside. The minute he was through the doors he felt overheated, a little noise and a huff of breath expelled from his throat as he reached up to push his hood off of his head. Even then it was too hot, but there wasn’t much he could do about it, except find his way to his classroom and then plop in an empty seat, starting to take off all of his layers so that he could breathe again.
Halfway through his first class, he was cold once more, brows furrowed as he wriggled in his seat, grabbing at his hoodie and pulling it back on. And this was of course, the conundrum of the winter. His fingers shook as he tried to write notes and counted the minutes until he could get away, get a coffee and maybe sit in the lounge by the fireplace.
He was the last one out of class, taking his time to gather his things - despite his excitement to leave - making sure his backpack was on properly so he could shove his hands into his pockets to keep them warm. He had stuffed his ID in there with them and the cool plastic against his skin wasn’t that pleasant, but a warm drink was.
He normally tried not to use his meal plan dollars on coffee. As much as he liked them with a low end meal plan it was better to keep as many of those dollars as you could so when your meal plan ran out you could buy yourself food. But once in a while, Taekwoon liked a treat. He wasn’t about to run home and make himself some coffee to keep his hands warm.
There was a line and on any other day it probably would have bothered him. Irritating, the fact that so many other people wanted something warm to drink too. The little stand was busy, buzzing. Not only with other students but an inordinate amount of employees. It didn’t take much to overhear after a while, and it turned out that they were training today. A bunch of new people learning how to make lattes and watching how the other employees worked.
It only really meant a longer wait, but today Taekwoon didn’t really mind much. He stared up at the high vaulted ceilings with their big windows, watched the way the wind played with the ice laden trees, and then he glanced at the other students in line. He knew some of their faces, knew the faces of some of the employees too.
But one of the faces he didn’t know was the face of the barista standing there as finally it was his turn. And it was a face that he was sure he would have remembered, because it was particularly beautiful. He felt his stomach flip over itself as he walked up, eyes trailing over the square jaw and full lips, over the way he looked soft in some places and sharp in others. He had warm, soft eyes and when he smiled, asking Taekwoon for his order, dimples pulled at his cheeks.
It took Taekwoon a minute to parse his answer, but then he responded, his voice sounding small even to himself as much as he never really thought that. “Latte.” He murmured, and then smiled himself, unable to really help it what with the earnest nod the other man made and then he was turned around, starting to make the drink. Taekwoon watched the nape of his neck, noting the way his hair was cut and how it flipped up a little bit at the back. He wondered if he smelled like coffee when he got home.
But that was as far as his imagination went, his thoughts trailing off into a jumble of notes and reminders about homework he had to do and dishes that needed to be washed when he got home. He took one last look at that smile as his latte was handed to him, and then he turned away and it slipped to the back of his mind, a beautiful thing to remember as he found a place by the fire to cozy down in the midst of the winter cold.
—
It took a while for winter to thaw out, but it also seemed to take no time at all, the chill mixed in with assignments and lost in research and hours spent in the library, until there was nothing left and wrapped in his coat, Taekwoon saw the first little flowers of spring pushing up through the last of the snow. It caught him by surprise when he was leaving his apartment, making him stop stock still and stare, stare down at the way the little blue flowers were curling over themselves in the still cold air. He wondered if it was hard or if for them, this was nothing. The frozen earth was probably a worse battle to fight through, rather than pushing yourself up to thawing snow.
It put a smile on his face as he walked, despite the fact that the dripping snow kept finding it’s way down the gap between his neck and his coat and making him shiver so badly as it crawled down his spine. He huffed, scurrying past the areas with trees and nearly slipping on the wetness several times. He didn’t have class today, a Friday, but he did have a study group meeting and he wasn’t really keen on the idea of being late.
It ended up though, when he pushed into the classroom that they had decided to meet in, dragging his teeth over his lower lip, that he was the only one who had shown up quite yet. He sniffed, half because he was still cold and half because he was annoyed and slumped into one of the chairs, propping his legs up on the table and pulling his phone out as he waited.
He played Tetris until he really couldn’t handle the music anymore and then glanced up at the clock which informed him that now everyone else was late. “Christ.” He sighed under his breath, lolling his head back over the top of the chair and staring at the upside down lecture hall. None of them were going to show up and he was going to get 3 emails hours later telling him that something had come up. He knew it.
It didn’t take long for him to fish his ID out of his backpack, deciding that if he was going to be stood up he was allowed to get himself a coffee. He had gotten peed on by snowy trees, that was reason alone. He decided that with another sniff, pocketing his phone and pushing his hands in his pockets as he pushed through the double doors of the lecture hall.
Outside it was nearly silent, no one around because it was a friday and all of the classes for the day always concluded early. The school was still open of course, due to night classes and all of that, but it was quiet as could be, what students there were, keeping to the quiet corners all huddled and trying to get work done. Taekwoon felt like he had to watch every footstep, careful and quiet as he made his way to the end of the hall.
There was no line at the coffee cart this time, just one man standing there, his back turned as Taekwoon walked up. He glanced around, hoping that ordering wouldn’t disturb anyone. But he wasn’t going to just stand there until the barista decided it was time to turn around.
So he cleared his throat lightly and spoke. “Can I get a latte please?”
The minute he did, despite how quietly he had spoken, the man jumped and turned and Taekwoon was once again faced with that face. That beautiful face. It took Taekwoon a second to remember why he knew it but it made sense quickly then and he couldn’t help but smile a little smile. The man only nodded, something so genuine about the look in his eyes, and then turned around and started to steam milk.
“It’s like a morgue in here.”
A few moments had passed and the way the barista spoke spoke was startling considering the way it seemed to echo. His voice was deep too, deeper than Taekwoon had expected. It made him jolt from his momentary lapse into irritated thoughts about walking all the way to school for nothing. But he nodded when the guy turned back, another one of those smiles making his dimples show.
“It is… it’s weird.”
Taekwoon glanced back behind him, his own soft voice seeming to echo too. There were even less students in the place than there had been before, and outside the huge windows, off in the distance there seemed to be a storm on the edge of the horizon. He couldn’t help but think about the poor flowers outside his place.
“You’ve been my only customer today, so I gave you a medium instead of a small.”
Taekwoon looked back at him, watching the way mischief and mirth twinkled in his eyes as he brought a finger to his lips. Despite himself, Taekwoon could feel his cheeks heat up and he looked down and then back up as he offered his ID to the boy. “You didn’t have to do that.” He said, even softer than he had been speaking before, as though someone might hear their conversation.
The guy laughed softly, that same mirth showing in his huge grin as he ran his card through. “I know I didn’t, but I wanted to.”
He handed the ID back and Taekwoon sheepishly gathered his coffee, glancing at him one last time before he turned around and started back towards the classroom.
“Have a nice day Taekwoon!”
The silence in the place was broken by that deep voice being raised a little bit more, echoing even louder and making a few people look up from where they had been sitting. Taekwoon felt his neck and his ears grow hot and if he hadn’t been so far away from the cart, he might have turned back to ask the beautiful man his name… but instead he just nodded and ducked his way back into the classroom, feeling overheated in his t-shirt.
The minute he got into the room though, he realized that someone else had showed up and he immediately felt like an idiot for taking so long.
“Ah I’m sorry. I thought no one was going to show up so I went to get a coffee.” He explained as he moved down the steps back towards his seat. The other guy it seemed, had taken up a seat a couple of seats from where Taekwoon’s stuff was set out, like he thought they were here for the same reason but he wasn’t sure.
Busying himself with setting his coffee and his ID down, he didn’t look up right away, but the minute he did he was struck with the feeling that he had seen this guy before. Though he didn’t recall him being in his class. Where had he seen him before? He had such a memorable face.
He was met with a chuckling laugh as the guy raised up his hands, shaking his head. “Nah, don’t worry about it. I was the one who was late in the first place… although apparently not as late as some other people.” He grimaced, glancing around the room as he did. Taekwoon had to agree with that sentiment.
The guy stood then, and he was tall, leaning forward to offer a hand to Taekwoon, a smile on his face. He had a wide nose and bright eyes and he looked young, younger than most of the people Taekwoon knew at the school. And as Taekwoon leaned in to take his hand, he realized. This was the guy he had ran into a couple of weeks back. He remembered him in the curve of his mouth as he smiled and the fact that he was tall… even a little taller than Taekwoon himself.
“I’m Sanghyuk.” He offered when their hands met and his hand was warm and big, halfway covering up Taekwoon’s which felt cold and thin at the moment.
“Taekwoon.”
They fell into comfortable silence once the handshake was done, both of them taking their seats once more and Taekwoon taking a sip of his coffee as he decided what the best thing would be to do. The coffee was warm on his hands and in his mouth, not too hot as to scald down the back of his throat, but just right.
“I guess since the rest of them aren’t here, we can’t really do much…” He commented as soon as he swallowed the sip he had taken. Sanghyuk was leaning his cheek on his hand, playing with the tassels on his hat and he nodded as soon as Taekwoon was done speaking, sniffing.
“I’m just so cut up about it, I reallyyyy wanted to spend my Friday afternoon working on school stuff.” Sanghyuk murmured, the sarcasm thick on his voice as a big smile spread across his face and he let out a little snorting laugh.
Taekwoon couldn’t help but laugh too, soft though, lips pulling up at the corners as his fingers moved over the disposable coffee cup. It was warm, warm like Sanghyuk’s hand had been and that was what he needed right now.
“I would suggest we get coffee or something as a post-disappointment treat but… you seem to have already done that.” Sanghyuk tipped his head in the direction of Taekwoon’s drink and Taekwoon couldn’t help but smile at how Sanghyuk had said it. Almost as though he had read Taekwoon’s mind as to his reason for getting the coffee in the first place.
“The coffee cart isn’t that far, you should get yourself something.” Taekwoon said, with a short nod. But Sanghyuk didn’t look all that interested. In fact his expression was something more akin to actual disappointment, though Taekwoon couldn’t imagine why.
After another 5 minutes of waiting, the two of them parted ways, Sanghyuk talking about how he was going to play video games, leaving Taekwoon to bring up that he had a lot of work to do. They headed off in opposite directions and as Taekwoon was heading towards the door he was pretty sure he heard the deep voice of the coffee cart barista in the distance.
He shoved his hands in his pocket, smiling slightly as he stepped into the grey spring afternoon and headed back home, liking the idea that maybe Sanghyuk took his suggestion and got a coffee himself.
When he got back, the little flowers were still there, poking their heads out of the damp ground. Taekwoon stopped a moment, kneeling to take a picture on his phone, and then headed inside to warm his cold fingers.
—
It was a darker day the next day he saw Sanghyuk. One of those days that were made for holing up in the library in a makeshift cave. And that was exactly what Taekwoon had done. He had packed a bunch of things in his bag and headed to the library early, gotten himself one of the smaller study rooms and turned it into his research sanctuary. He had even brought a blanket, something about being away from his own heaters always making him terribly cold. Even underneath his blanket, sitting on the floor of the library study room, he was shivering as he turned the pages, having quite a hard time focusing.
He had two research papers and three essays coming up - all quite a long time in the future - and he wanted to get as much of the work he had to get done for them done before they snuck up on him. Not the most interesting thing in the world, but necessary. However between the cold and the boring reading material, Taekwoon could feel himself drifting with every passing second and it felt like no matter how many coffee cups he piled up next to him, he never seemed to wake up any more. His eyebrows furrowed as once again his eyelids drooped and his lips parted as he sighed. It would have been so nice just so let himself roll over on the floor, cover himself up and drift off to sleep.
But just as he was really giving in to that idea, the door clicked open and he opened his eyes, ready to scold whoever was coming in and remind them that the study rooms had a 5 hour limit and he had only been there for 2. Instead though he was greeted with Sanghyuk’s grinning face, leaning on the doorframe and staring at him like… Well Taekwoon didn’t know Sanghyuk’s usual expressions that well yet but he looked particularly pleased with himself or something like that.
“You awake there buddy?”
Sanghyuk asked then, laughter evident in his voice and instantly Taekwoon curled his lip, his head still resting against the wall. His eyelids drooped again and despite himself a yawn pulled at his lips, widening his mouth until tears gathered at the corners of his sleepy eyes.
“Didn’t think so.”
Another chuckled remark from Sanghyuk. Which had Taekwoon wondering if he should actually like him after all. Post-yawn Taekwoon had meant to open his eyes but he didn’t, he left them closed, until he heard the door click and thought that Sanghyuk had left. But when he opened them the younger man had plopped down in front of him on the floor, still looking like he was enjoying himself.
“I thought I was the only person who made nests like this in these study rooms.”
Taekwoon then realized that Sanghyuk had been there for several minutes and he been the only one talking so far. He got the distinct feeling that Sanghyuk was one of those people who wouldn’t be bothered by that at all. Hakyeon was like that, one of the people Taekwoon had made friends with in one of his classes. Hakyeon didn’t mind if Taekwoon never spoke a word, he’d talk for hours on end.
“I always do this.” Taekwoon said with a sleepy nod, feeling less perturbed and somehow enjoying Sanghyuk’s company all of a sudden, because it was harder to fall asleep when someone was crouching on the floor watching you.
“How much more work do you have to do?” Was his next question and Taekwoon frowned, glancing around at the piles of books he had around him. He didn’t even remember which ones he’d read and which ones he hadn’t anymore. He hummed and started shuffling through them.
“Well… Kind of a lot. This pile—“
He started but Sanghyuk cut him off, grabbing a book from the bottom of the pile. It was a book Taekwoon had noticed on the shelves that looked interesting. Not a research book, but fiction. Something science fiction-y that looked like it was set in a desert world.
“This is one of my favorite books!” Sanghyuk’s excitement was obvious in his voice and suddenly he was moving from crouching to sitting, starting to page through it. He paused though, glancing up at Taekwoon to ask, “Have you read it?”
He replied to that with a shake of his head. “I was planning on it, it looks good.” Suddenly sleep seemed very far away, and he started to sit up slightly, leaning forward. “Is it?”
Sanghyuk nodded with a grin, paging through the first couple of pages. “It wouldn’t be my favorite if it wasn’t good.” It was pointed and once again had that underlying tone of laughter that Sanghyuk always seemed to have. Taekwoon found himself much more interested in the book now. And wondering what else Sanghyuk was into.
They sat there for a while then, Taekwoon eventually asking Sanghyuk what other kinds of books he liked, after the younger man had been paging through the book for a while. That resulted in Sanghyuk talking about manga, most of which Taekwoon had read - which seemed to make Sanghyuk excited - and some that he hadn’t. After that it was anime and video games and that somehow branched off into high school and talking about things that Taekwoon hadn’t really thought about in a long time.
For some reason it seemed so easy to talk to Sanghyuk. Maybe it was because he had this unabashed way of talking about things that most people just never brought up. He’d branch off into topics that Taekwoon wouldn’t have and he was straight forward and unapologetic about himself and his interests in a way that made Taekwoon feel at ease. And the more they talked, the more Taekwoon felt like he had in common with Sanghyuk.
“Ah shit.. I have to go.”
Sanghyuk said abruptly, starting to grab his things and stand up so he could leave. Taekwoon was startled by it, not realizing that he had fallen into such a warm and comforting feeling and now the idea of Sanghyuk leaving wasn’t really one that he liked. But of course he didn’t say that. He just pursed his lips and rearranged himself, starting to sit up. The younger man was up and almost at the door when he stopped and turned back, a grin on his face.
“You should come play video games at my place on the weekend! I’ll call you.”
Taekwoon was just about to open his mouth and say that Sanghyuk didn’t have his number when the boy disappeared out the door, leaving Taekwoon frowning slightly. But just as quickly as he had disappeared, Sanghyuk reappeared in the doorway. “You don’t have my number!” He exclaimed and somewhere in the library a librarian made a loud shushing noise.
They both chuckled, Sanghyuk making a face as he came back into the room and Taekwoon handed him his phone, letting him put his number in. Then there was another quick goodbye and he was gone, leaving Taekwoon with his phone in his hand and a new contact added. It was then that Taekwoon realized they had been sitting there talking for 2 hours. And that Sanghyuk apparently added himself to people’s phones as “hyuggie ^^”.
—
As the earth started to warm slowly, it felt like he should have been spending less time at the coffee cart, finding himself less interested in having something warm, but he found the opposite being true. And somehow he started finding more and more reasons to spend his extra meal plan dollars on coffee instead of saving it like he had been trying to. At first it had been about not having slept properly or having that midmorning crash of energy, but he wasn’t able to tell himself that for that long. He came clean with himself after not that long that it was ultimately because Hongbin, the beautiful barista was… well just that. He was a beautiful barista.
He wasn’t only just good to look at, though he was certainly that. There was something about him, magnetic and charming. He was intelligent and his jokes were almost always funny and he had this way when he was around Taekwoon of making him feel like he was the only person around. At first it was just enjoyable, the feeling of being around him and he’d savor the big smiles that touched Hongbin’s eyes. But it wasn’t long before it was more than that.
He’d hear his voice and something inside Taekwoon would crush in on itself with excitement. He’d find himself staring, watching the way Hongbin’s mouth moved when he talked. He’d watch the sway of Hongbin’s hips and the way he handled things. He took note of the little things, the tremor in his hands, the twitch in his lips, the way he’d furrow his brows when he was irritated and he thought no one was looking - almost comical.
And Taekwoon would find himself gravitating towards him, find his mind flooding towards him as well, thinking of him entirely too often. It was like without warning Hongbin had rushed in, filled in all of Taekwoon’s empty spaces and soon he was overrun by infatuation. He’d wonder what Hongbin thought of his shirt or how he walked or what he talked about. He’d wonder if Hongbin thought of him. When Hongbin’s fingers would linger he’d feel a part of him burning, aching in the hope that it was intentional and not just a mistake.
It boiled up in him with ravaging need. Not enough to pull him from school work or ruin his daily routine, but he fell asleep at night thinking about him and when he’d walk towards that coffee cart, seeing him there he couldn’t help but think... This is the one.
It was a bit silly and naive and he knew that, thinking that of someone whom he didn’t really know all that well. But he’d argue with himself anyway. He did know him. He’d known him technically for months now. He didn’t know much about him but he knew him. And he knew that there was something about him that Taekwoon found himself insatiably hungry for. It was just that he was perfect. He seemed perfect. He was everything that Taekwoon wanted. Or he had become that at least, with every dimpled smile and full bodied laugh that echoed in the tall ceilings of the main room.
“Latte again tall, dark and handsome?”
Taekwoon’s heart stuttered and he nodded, a knowing smile pulling at his lips as he stood there in front of the coffee cart for the second time that day. Hongbin’s smile only grew as he had already started preparing Taekwoon’s order.
“I’m going to have to watch out, you might start bouncing off of the walls with all that caffeine in you. Better take it easy after this one.”
Hongbin chuckled at him then, focusing on the task and Taekwoon remained quiet, worrying his lower lip with his teeth. Maybe it was the way Hongbin had greeted him, calling him handsome but suddenly the need to know if Hongbin was interested, if he wanted to do something with him was an overwhelming one, bubbling up inside him.
There was that possibility, that intense possibility that he wasn’t at all, that all he was interested in was tips - though Taekwoon never gave him any - and he flirted like this with everyone. But Taekwoon never stuck around to find out, more interested in keeping his idea of Hongbin that way.
No one was behind him, the entire place cleared out for the night and Taekwoon wasn’t really sure what had come over him, but before he could really stop himself it tumbled out of his mouth, all jumbled and unsure.
“Can I take you to dinner?”
It sounded more like one word, but considering the way Hongbin nearly dropped the container of steamed milk, his hands shaking as he caught it on the table, Taekwoon was sure that he had understood him. There was a long, agonizing moment then, wondering if Hongbin’s reaction had been good or bad or somewhere in between. But when Hongbin looked up with flushed cheeks and a slightly more bashful smile on his lips, Taekwoon was pretty certain before Hongbin even opened his mouth.
“Yeah, I’d like that.”
It was quieter, his deep voice not as loud as it normally was but Taekwoon could hear him perfectly and that was all that mattered.
—
That weekend it was warmer, warmer than it had been the past couple of weeks, warmer than it had been in a while actually. It was warm enough that Taekwoon could believe that the grasp of winter was nearly gone. But he wasn’t quite sure he wanted to. He loved seeing the buds and watching the snow disappear, watching the world change. He did love that part. However winter was a thing in it’s own, it was strange and beautiful and dark and cozy and he would miss it when it was gone. Not to mention the fact that it had become something he associated so deeply with his infatuation with the beautiful coffee shop boy.
Hongbin was tied in with winter, and winter was the reason they had spoken in the first place. Taekwoon found himself associating the boy’s dark hair and his warm smiles with the fireplaces and the blankets and the coziness of the winter. And every time he thought about spending time with him alone, on the date they were going to have that night, he could feel his stomach turn in on itself in anticipation.
This is where his mind was as he walked to Sanghyuk’s house, a lighter jacket hanging on his shoulders as the still cool wind tried to blow up his scarf. Even though it was warmer, he wondered still if he should have worn one of his sweaters or a thicker coat, the cold still finding a way to go straight through him. They had made plans days ago, texting back and forth between classes until Sanghyuk gave him his address.
It had rained the night before, little streams of water still finding their way down the hills and into the drainage grates as Taekwoon walked. The moisture in the air was thick and as he walked by the park, he could see the river, swollen with all of the excess water. With the road clear, everything calm on a saturday afternoon, he crossed over and stood by the edge for a while, his sneakers sinking into the mud just a little bit.
There were frogs and other wildlife making noises in the trees that lined the water and somewhere far down, Taekwoon could hear children playing, splashes echoing. It was too cold for that and even the idea of putting a hand in the water made a shiver roll through him. But it was pretty enough. He wondered what Hongbin would think of it, if he was there, staring out at it, looking at the way the water moved. He imagined him standing there, his hands in his pockets like they were whenever he stood idly, his smile wide enough to show off his teeth. and his long eyelashes dipping with every passing second.
Taekwoon found his chest feeling all funny and he bit his lip, bit back a smile as he turned back, trying not to think about how it was tonight, that tonight they’d be alone together, on the date that he had been anticipating, hoping for for too long. He headed back to the road, sticking on the riverside as he followed it down and towards another group of houses. It wasn’t long before he was scanning house numbers, eyes moving over each one, unable to help imagining what kind of families lived in every one he saw. They were similar, and yet they each had their own personalities.
When he finally found number 5110, he realized that Sanghyuk’s house had the most character of them all. There were birdhouses everywhere, the trees in the yard thick with them and everything so lush and green, surrounding the house. And the house itself looked the kind of cozy and sweet that you’d imagine was pulled straight out of a book.
Ivy ran all over the sides, curling up over the eaves and around the windows. In one of them there was a cat, it’s tail curling around in little motions as it watched Taekwoon where he stood and suddenly he found himself even more eager to get inside. He couldn’t help but smile, watching it watching him as he walked up the steps and towards the door, and before he even knocked he walked over to the window, leaning down to stare at it through the glass. It stared back at him, it’s mouth opening in a meow muffled by the panes of glass between them and his smile only got bigger.
Before he could even turn to knock on the door or ring the doorbell though, it was pulled open rather loudly and Taekwoon looked up to see Sanghyuk standing there with that lopsided grin on his face. “Did you ring the doorbell? I didn’t hear it!” he exclaimed, stepping out of the door in his socks, wearing a t-shirt from one of the mangas that he had told Taekwoon to read.
Taekwoon’s smile stayed as big as it was as he straightened up, shivering slightly and shaking his head. He was too interested in the cat to even properly answer that. “You didn’t tell me you had a cat.” He murmured, pointing towards the window. Sanghyuk’s eyes followed his finger and then looked back up at him with a chuckle. And just as he opened his mouth to speak, there was a loud meow and another cat appeared at the door, rubbing itself against Sanghyuk’s ankles and making Taekwoon’s eyes widen.
“You never asked.” Sanghyuk said simply, grinning as he reached down to pick up the new arrival, and escort both him and Taekwoon inside.
It turned out that Sanghyuk had many cats. A couple were permanent members of the household and the rest were ones that his mother was fostering. She worked at the animal shelter it and she was always bringing animals home if they were sick or needed somewhere to stay before they were shipped off to a new home. No kill shelters turned out to mean the employees took up a lot of the slack, and Taekwoon liked that idea. He also liked having three cats rubbing against him and two more purring on the windowsill.
It didn’t prove that useful when playing video games though. He wasn’t sure if it was Sanghyuk’s skill or his own incompetence, or the fact that one of the cats kept rubbing into his elbow, but Sanghyuk kept stomping him every time. Taekwoon found himself getting a bit competitive, but it was hard to be that annoyed by it when Sanghyuk’s smile was huge and his eyes were sparkling as he laughed with his mouth open when the cat bumped Taekwoon and he fell off a cliff in game.
“Rematch.” Taekwoon murmured, shooting a frown at the cat who was now making his way towards the opposite side of the room.
“Don’t blame him butterfingers.” Sanghyuk murmured, mirth thick in his voice and Taekwoon wrinkled his nose at him. They played again with no cat interruptions and for once, Taekwoon won. But he realized that Sanghyuk was just better than he had thought. He was also animated, so much so. When he made a mistake he’d growl and huff and when he lost he’d drop his controller and fall onto his hand like he had been mortally wounded, although not quite as dramatic. There was something about nearly everything he did that Taekwoon found so endearing.
After two hours, Sanghyuk disappeared to get them some snacks and when he returned they migrated to the couch, settling in after Sanghyuk changed to a game he wanted Taekwoon to try out. They sat closer then, close so they could share the snacks between them and as they did, Taekwoon began to realize that Sanghyuk was really warm. Their arms would brush, or their fingers and Sanghyuk felt like a furnace, emitting heat from where he sat only a couple of inches away.
He liked it. He liked it a lot, enough that he found himself moving closer without even thinking about it, close enough that their sides were touching, their shoulders, as Taekwoon played. And it was a fun game, beautiful, the landscapes harsh and strange and the story compelling, keeping Taekwoon focused as the sun started to set without his notice and hours passed all too quickly.
When he finally checked his phone again, it was nearly 6pm and he jolted up from where he had been sitting, dropping the controller into his lap. “Ah… it’s late.” He murmured, frowning and hoping he’d have enough time to get back home and change and walk to the bus stop. Sanghyuk made a noise beside him, but Taekwoon didn’t look up, checking his texts to make sure that Hongbin hadn’t texted him.
“Do you have to leave?” Sanghyuk asked, but Taekwoon was so engrossed in reading the text that Hongbin had left him that he didn’t look up and didn’t really notice the disappointment in Sanghyuk’s voice.
“Yeah… I have a date.” Taekwoon murmured with furrowed brows as he typed back to Hongbin that he’d be at the movie theater that he had picked at 7 like he said, hoping he wouldn’t be late. Sanghyuk sniffed and shifted on the couch and Taekwoon could hear him clearing up the snacks. He looked over at him, giving him a small smile. “Sorry about that, I could come over next weekend and we can play more though?” He said hopefully. Sanghyuk wasn’t looking at him though, and then when he did turn, his expression was unreadable, a short shrug pulling up one of his shoulders.
“Text me.” A small maybe sad smile pulled at the corner of his mouth.
—
It didn’t take Taekwoon as long as he had thought to get home and get ready and he arrived at the movie theater 10 minutes early, the sun having set completely by that point and that winter chill back in the air. He stood at the front of the movie theater, shivering in his coat and trying not to think about how warm he had been earlier as he waited for Hongbin to show.
But it took such a long time that he migrated inside, the chill still feeling like it was stuck in his bones as he waited for Hongbin to arrive, staring out the big windows and checking his phone constantly. He ended up furrowing his brow as he looked at the movie times, hoping that they would actually get to see one of them, worried that they wouldn’t. Finally though, finally - and breathlessly - Hongbin arrived, laughing as he jogged up to Taekwoon, his cheeks tinted pink and his smile just as warm as always. Taekwoon couldn’t really find it in him to be annoyed at how long he had made him wait. In fact, it was as if the anxiousness of waiting had been erased entirely.
“Sorry about that!” He exclaimed, panting and dropping his hands onto his thighs as he caught his breath for a second. “I was hanging out with some work friends and… ah time flew.” He said with a shrug. Taekwoon shook his head. “It’s alright, don’t worry.” He replied, and with Hongbin standing there, looking like the embodiment of all things cozy and sweet… it really was.
“What movie did you want to see?” Taekwoon asked then, glancing up at the board and then back at Hongbin. He had been looking at it for the past 20 minutes and had noticed a few films that he wanted to see. And a couple that he wasn’t that keen about.
“Ah… that one action movie looks really good!” Hongbin exclaimed immediately, and Taekwoon tried not to think about the fact that that was the one he had really been hoping they wouldn’t have to see. He nodded though and it was alright, because Hongbin’s arm was brushing his and he looked so bright and excited.
They bought tickets and popcorn and filed into the movie theater, finding some seats near the back and settled down then, burrowing into their seats and it was nice. It was warm inside and the screen was huge and Taekwoon could feel himself relax somewhat, save for the excited nervousness that was bubbling inside him.
Every time he’d send a glance Hongbin’s way it was like a burst of new realization. They were on a date, the two of them. Hongbin, his beautiful boy whom he had met by a chance encounter was sitting next to him, the two of them curled into huge theater seats, their knees just barely touching as the movie began to start, his stomach feeling full of butterflies.
Hongbin would make comments as the movie progressed, his deep voice low and conspiratorial as he leaned closer to Taekwoon. And he was funny, even funnier than when he was working, funnier now that he seemed more relaxed and reacting to the movie as it happened. Taekwoon wasn’t that interested in the movie itself, so instead he started watching the way Hongbin would react. His big smiles, the way he’d jump and frown when something happened that he wasn’t expecting, and his mouth falling open when there was some sort of plot twist. Taekwoon’s heart ached because of just how human all of it was.
Afterwards, they trailed out of the theater, squinting and furrowing their brows as their eyes got used to the light and their arms brushed as they dropped off their empty containers of popcorn. Hongbin was talking about the movie, all excited, every expression more intense than the last and Taekwoon was smiling, his lips curving up just slightly. But it was cold outside of the movie theater, and he kept thinking about Sanghyuk’s couch and his cats, despite himself.
They went to dinner then, Hongbin picking the place because he knew the town better than Taekwoon did. Taekwoon was only living there for school and still knew very little, but it turned out that Hongbin had been living there his whole life. It seemed like the last thing he wanted to do was live there any longer though, and something about that made Taekwoon feel a little bit sad. It was understandable, but he couldn’t help but think that this was one of the most beautiful places he had ever been in his life.
“It’s just really… I don’t know. I want to be in a city you know?” Taekwoon didn’t really know, so he furrowed his brows slightly as he took his coat off and they sat down. He instantly wished that he hadn’t, shivering slightly from the breeze coming in through the door. But he wasn’t about to put it back on.
“I don’t know… I kind of like it. The small town vibe.” He replied, glancing over the menu but then looking up at Hongbin for a moment, gauging his reaction.
He shrugged slightly, also looking at the menu. “I guess I’ve just lived here for too long.” He replied, sounding more subdued than he had been before. They ordered and the candlelight flickered over Hongbin’s face, catching on the bridge of his nose and his cheekbones, but something in Taekwoon felt not right, like his stomach was sinking.
They talked as they waited, but it seemed like the more they talked the more that feeling pulled at Taekwoon’s chest. It wasn’t that there was anything wrong with him. On the contrary, he was one of the brightest and most beautiful people that Taekwoon had ever met in his life. But as they pulled back each layer of each other, it was like they both kept hitting walls that they could have never foreseen. And as each minute passed, as they ate and got dessert, Taekwoon realized, step after step that not everything is as it seems it will be.
They sat in voluntary silence, watching each other as they waited for the check to come and for the first time since Taekwoon had met him, he saw sadness pulling down the corners of Hongbin’s lips and his eyes. And it made his own throat feel a little funny and a little too tight. It was a shame, the kind of shame that Taekwoon couldn’t really put into words. Something snuffed out before it could even start. Because for all of his attractiveness and all of their seeming attraction to each other, there was nothing here in the way of earth shattering or heart pulling. There was nothing here for them both to stand on.
Disappointment felt heavy as they put their coats on after they both paid - Taekwoon had insisted but ultimately the check had been split by Hongbin’s stubbornness - and that disappointment followed them out the door as they left the restaurant. Their arms didn’t touch any more. They stood out there for a moment, the air cold and the wind blowing in, the sky dark and heavy above them. It smelled like rain but Taekwoon didn’t really notice, because his stomach was a bit of a knot and his throat felt full and uncomfortable.
Hongbin turned then, watching him and Taekwoon didn’t look at him for a moment, not really wanting to face it, face this. But sooner or later, he had to. They stared at each other for a long moment and Taekwoon’s eyes pricked a little bit as he watched the sad, but hopeful expression on Hongbin’s face. “I’ll text you sometime, yeah?” Hongbin murmured, his deep voice sounding a little bit funny. It made Taekwoon glance down at his shoes and then back up, giving the shorter boy a tight smile.
Then he stepped forward, wrapping his arms around Hongbin’s shoulders and giving him a tentative hug. He was about to pull away when Hongbin’s arms slid up and gripped behind his shoulder blades, and they held onto each other for one, long moment. It was a taste of what could have been. Maybe if they were a little bit different.
Hongbin left then, and Taekwoon watched him go, feeling more sad than he should have been, his throat feeling tight and horrible as he headed off to the bus stop. He stared out at the blurry lights as he sat on the bus, watching as the raindrops hit and clung to the glass, watching each house disappear and the figures of people as they walked, wishing for things that weren’t possible.
—
Spring slowly began to warm up, the days getting longer and less cold and Taekwoon stopped visiting the coffee cart. He told himself it was because it was getting too warm for coffee and he didn’t need it. But if he was honest with himself he just felt silly and naive for believing there was something magnetic and magical between two people who hadn’t known each other very well at all. Instead he started visiting a coffee shop off campus. He told himself it was because it was cheaper. A whole 5 cents cheaper.
While most people found it harder to focus as the weather got warmer, he found himself focusing more. Only for different reasons. It felt a bit silly, but the disappointment was heavy and strange and he found himself needing a distraction, pushing himself into his projects. Hongbin did text him, like he said he would but it felt a bit empty and strange and Taekwoon couldn’t really bring himself to reply.
He spent time with Sanghyuk though, bumping into him in the library again a little while after. They sat between two of the tall bookshelves, hitting each others sneakers as they both read for class and Sanghyuk read passages out of the book in voice impressions that were just short of terrible. They made Taekwoon laugh anyway, despite himself.
A couple of days later, Sanghyuk asked him over and Taekwoon tried to pretend like he didn’t have a disappointed black cloud floating over him. It was hard to when a cat was licking your forearm and Sanghyuk was trying to impersonate Soul Caliber characters.
“How did that date go?” He asked out of nowhere as they were in the middle of a match. Taekwoon faltered and his character got knocked out, making him grit his teeth. He sniffed and then shrugged, avoiding looking at Sanghyuk as he started up another match. Taekwoon was thankful that Sanghyuk seemed to take that as as much of an explanation as he needed. He also seemed to let Taekwoon win the next couple of matches, despite how much he insisted he wasn’t going easy on him.
They ended up slumped on the couch, Sanghyuk letting Taekwoon nestle against his shoulder. He was warm and he felt so nice against him and every time he’d laugh or make a noise, Taekwoon could feel it through his body. It made everything feel a lot better and for a while he didn’t think about anything else at all.
—
It took a while, but soon Taekwoon didn’t feel himself actively avoiding walking past the coffee cart. In fact he stopped caring about walking past it at all. And when he saw Hongbin, he didn’t try to avoid him as much as possible. A part of him still felt sad, heavy at the thought of something that had seemed so perfect not being possible at all. But he had other things on his mind. Final projects were building up and he was spending as much of his time as possible at Sanghyuk’s because they had chosen to be each others partners for one of their projects.
Besides, Sanghyuk’s house was nice. He had a comfy bed and he had much more food than Taekwoon’s shitty apartment had. Plus Sanghyuk himself was there, with his broad smiles that reached his eyes and back hugs when Taekwoon least expected it, and disappearing when Taekwoon was falling asleep while they were trying to study, only to reappear with coffee and sugar to rouse him.
It was hard to feel sad about almost anything when Sanghyuk was wearing his Naruto headband and striking poses, making faces as the cat tried to bat at his hand. In fact it was hard not to feel really full when they were laying in bed together and Sanghyuk was creating a song to help them remember some of the topics they were learning in class and all Taekwoon could do was laugh until he was nearly drooling on Sanghyuk’s pillow. They stared at each other, tears in their eyes as they laughed, until Sanghyuk’s mom knocked on the wall.
It wasn’t until he saw Hongbin with another guy that he realized that he didn’t feel sad at all. He saw them across the quad as he was walking, Hongbin leaning up against a wall with a smile on his face that was wide and bright as it always was. There was a guy standing in front of him, a guy that Taekwoon had seen around. His name was Wonshik and he was a music student. He had tattoos and the sides of his head were shaved and he was supposed to be one of the nicest guys on campus, albeit a little sleepy.
He slowed down then, watching them for a moment, watching as Wonshik slipped his arms around Hongbin’s waist and leaned in, close, until their mouths pressed together. He could see the way Hongbin just sort of melted into it, his hands coming up to curl into Wonshik’s shirt. He expected himself to feel sad, some part of him, but all he did was look away and smile a little bit, heading off to meet Sanghyuk at the library.
Or well… he had been, until someone walked into his shoulder from behind and grabbed onto his arm. He looked back with a frown on his face, only to see Sanghyuk’s huge smile, and instantly it melted away.
“You’re an oaf.” Taekwoon chuckled, a smirk pulling at his lips.
“I know.”
—
“Stop hitting my foot.” Taekwoon murmured, a couple of days later when they were both in his living room. They had moved to his apartment because Sanghyuk’s mom was having some potential adopters over to view some of the puppies they were trying to find homes. Taekwoon unfortunately wasn’t allowed to take them all home. So they were both sprawled in his living room, trying to cram for some of the tests and the papers they had coming up as soon it would be time for finals, but currently Sanghyuk was hitting their feet together in some kind of weird rhythm and it was making it extremely hard to try to memorize a poem.
“Or what?” Sanghyuk murmured, his voice a little deeper than it was normally, making Taekwoon look up, his eyebrows pulled into a frown. That was when he realized just how close they were, Sanghyuk’s face less than an inch away. They stayed like that, for a moment, the air charged and the room still as they watched each other. He could feel Sanghyuk’s gaze, the way it flickered down to his lips and then back up, and Taekwoon felt his stomach flip on itself as it did. One of those playful smiles pulled at Sanghyuk’s lips and he looked away, leaving Taekwoon to let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.
“Or… something.” Taekwoon replied, trying not to smile, his own face red and that fluttery feeling popping up in his stomach after he hadn’t felt it for a long while.
“Menacing.” Sarcasm was thick on Sanghyuk’s voice, the end of the word trailing off in a breathy laugh, but it didn’t really matter because their feet were just resting together now and Sanghyuk was so warm that Taekwoon never wanted to stop touching him.
And now he couldn’t really stop thinking about kissing him either.
—
Sanghyuk didn’t have lips out of some kind of dream. They weren’t perfect and plush all the time. Sometimes they were cracked and sometimes he bit them and sometimes he licked them too much. But that didn’t mean that they hadn’t become the most enticing thing Taekwoon had ever laid his eyes on. He’d find himself staring every now and then, when Sanghyuk would talk, or when he was reading and they were moving as he silently scanned the page.
The thing was, he was pretty sure that Sanghyuk knew. And he was pretty sure that Sanghyuk had been staring at his too.
Their first kiss was expected in an unexpected way.
Sanghyuk’s parents were out of town again, and Taekwoon found himself packing up and making his way to the younger man’s house so that they could study for finals together. They were coming up next week, the stress of them hanging heavy on everyone’s shoulders. But when Taekwoon got there somehow studying fell by the wayside, and they found themselves on the couch, playing video games.
Their sides were slouched into each other, as usual, Taekwoon taking the liberty to press himself as close to Sanghyuk’s body as he could, to bask in the warmth that he radiated. They had been playing super smash brothers and as usual, Sanghyuk was winning. If anyone asked, Taekwoon would have said it was because Sasuke, one of Sanghyuk’s cats, was in his lap, purring loud enough to cause an earthquake.
Sanghyuk won, his character smashing Taekwoon’s into the ground and Taekwoon watched with a frown furrowing his brows as it spun off of the screen and disappeared in a speck at the edge of the world. “You got creamed.” Sanghyuk said, his words resonating through Taekwoon’s body like they always did when they were close like this.
He turned then, glanced over and up at Sanghyuk, his torso a little longer than Taekwoon’s and the way he was looking at him made Taekwoon shiver. He had that lopsided smile on his face and his eyes were sparkling and he looked more handsome than Taekwoon wanted to admit when he had just gotten ‘creamed’. He frowned at him for a second, and then before he could think about it, or say anything much about it, he pushed forward and kissed him. Their mouths connected hard, and it was almost like Sanghyuk had been waiting for it. Maybe he had. Maybe for a long time.
They kissed and Taekwoon felt Sanghyuk’s hand come up to curl around his jaw, making him push into it deeper, the awkward angle not really mattering at this point. In fact, it didn’t matter at all. Because Sanghyuk’s mouth was soft and warm, just like the rest of him, and his lips were a little bit chapped, but he kissed with tongue in a way that Taekwoon could feel through his whole body, making him surge up, press closer.
Sasuke left at some point, meowing in an annoyed fashion because of the way Taekwoon was trying to press closer to Sanghyuk, and soon Taekwoon was half on top of him, Sanghyuk’s hands traveling down his body slowly as their lips dragged and their tongues pressed and they learned how each other tasted.
“Fuck… why haven’t we been making out this whole time.” Sanghyuk moaned into his mouth and Taekwoon reached up to hit him in the head softly, then his fingers curled into his hair and they kissed on the couch until they were both out of breath.
—
It was finals week then suddenly, rushing and slamming into Taekwoon headlong when really all he wanted to be doing was pushing his hands up Sanghyuk’s shirt as they made out in his bed. There had been a lot of that recently, a lot of heavy petting, a lot of face sucking and more, all of which made Taekwoon feel overheated when he thought about it. But more than that, there had been more video game playing and more laughing and talking, and one development that Taekwoon liked a lot.
“We’re boyfriends right?”
“Yeah, you’re my boyfriend… and my best friend.”
This was said over cups of coffee while they lay in bed and Sanghyuk looked like a disheveled mess, haloed by the morning light, his shirt riding up on one side and his lips puffy and pulling up at the corners with an all too wide smile.
Then it had suddenly been no sleep and too many papers to hand in and Taekwoon getting irritable at all of his professors because he’d much rather have been in bed with Sanghyuk rather than here, cold and annoyed in an exam room. The only good thing was that it went by in a flash, a stressful flash that was overwhelming in ways he couldn’t explain. Suddenly he had handed in his last paper, and he was supposed to meet Sanghyuk at his house for ‘de-stressing’ as Sanghyuk had put it.
He had quite a walk on his hands though, so he headed through the quad, past the trees that were all green and blooming now, towards the main road. Everything seemed alive right now, and it was ironic considering how dead he felt from the lack of sleep. But it was a good feeling, like suddenly almost all of the weight had been lifted from his shoulders.
He still had the nervousness and anxiety of waiting for his results for everything, of getting his grades and of course they had one more week of school left. But in the fresh and warm air, he felt like he could breathe again. He closed his eyes, tilting his head up and feeling the sun wash over him and smiling because he knew that for the rest of the week and the weekend, he got to do nothing but lay half on top of Sanghyuk and sleep as much as he wanted to.
—
“Do you remember the first time we met?”
The light was low in Taekwoon’s bedroom in his shitty apartment, his shades drawn and his eyes half lidded. He felt spent, his entire body warm and damp from sweat, so very naked. Sanghyuk was on top of him, his lips moving against his cheek and everything felt slow and far away and sleepy. It all felt perfect.
“Yeah.” Taekwoon murmured, eyelids drooping shut as the hazy light became a little too bright with the movement of his curtains. His hand moved up to draw slow patterns on Sanghyuk’s naked thigh. “I walked into you on campus.” He continued, his voice getting quieter, as his cheeks warmed at the memory.
Taekwoon could feel Sanghyuk’s lips tugging up at the corners and his head slowly moving in a nod and it made him shiver, a smile pulling at the corner of his own lips too. In the darkness, underneath the sheets, their mouths found each other and pressed into a kiss, naked skin shifting and Sanghyuk’s fingers curling into Taekwoon’s hair.
And it kind of felt like the planets aligned, just a little bit.
—
a/n: for the entirety of this fic jaehwan has been in the bahamas drinking margaritas and sending taek postcards about how he's an idiot and he should have come with him to enjoy the sand and sun. he signed all of them "xx jaewhizzle"
A warm breeze was blowing off the ocean that night when he snuck out the back door of the hostel and padded down the mossy steps in his bare feet. It was cold up on the foothills where he was staying, cold enough that little patterns of ice had been crawling up the windows next to his bed as he lay, listening to the sea calling out to him. But he knew, despite the cold stones underneath his feet, that the moment he got close to the water he wouldn’t even need a jacket. It was always like this during these months they told him, the sea warming up as though it was summer before summer even came, the sun baking the huge expanse and leaving it warm, warmer than your blankets if you dared to slip your feet into it. Hongbin tended to dare. He didn’t listen to the locals, didn’t listen to what his mother had told him about this place… he tended not to listen to much. He had decided a long time ago he’d figure things out his own way. He was stubborn.
The moon was a pale golden pearl tucked into the inky darkness of the clouds, beautiful in it’s own ghostly way. Everything about this town was like that, strange with it’s thick fog and it’s golden lanterns lighting every pathway, some kind of magic woven in to everything and pairs of eyes peeping out at you from the window panes even in the dead of night. It probably should have scared Hongbin off, but he was fascinated, wrapped up in it, despite the shivers that would crawl down his spine. The sea though, the sea was the thing that kept him here. It was what made him pay for another day, another week and yet another month despite the fact that he needed to go back, go back home.
The ocean here was like nothing else he’d ever seen. Some days it was pale blue and clear enough that it felt like it was ordinary, like you could swim in it without a problem at all. Other days it was inky black, even in the day time, the edges green, warning and yet for some reason those were the times when Hongbin felt the most curious. Tonight it was navy green, placid and licking the stones at the very edges of the wharf and Hongbin was out of breath. His camera was heavy around his neck and his body felt heavy with sleep and he wasn’t sure when he had started moving fast enough to lose his breath, but now he was standing there, near the pier, standing there and watching as the sea rolled in and then rolled back out, foamy around the edges in the darkness.
The moonlight reflected off of it, off of the jagged stones and the smooth ones, off of the lanterns that were lined up all the way down the pier until it nearly disappeared into the fog. It was beautiful, grey, blue and green with little specks of golden light shimmering, shifting on the water as the lanterns swayed in the breeze. And it was warm, warm like summer time, warm enough that Hongbin closed his eyes and slipped his jacket off, letting it drop, leaving it at the edge of the pier as he started towards the little steps that led down to the rocks.
When he opened them though, he noticed something, something that made him go still, feet pressing into the wood as a little shock hammered through his chest. He had felt eyes on him this whole time, had felt someone watching him as he moved, as he walked as he found his way through the town. But he had assumed that it was just the townspeople, somehow hearing his padded footsteps even in the middle of the night. That was until he saw the top of a head, a pair of eyes staring out at him from the murky water, watching him with an expression that he couldn’t even place a finger on.
He opened his mouth, dry as a bone, eyes wide and eyebrows furrowing as he tried to warn, that the waters weren’t safe and that this person shouldn’t be swimming in them. But the words died in his mouth as he made a startling realization. This was the reason the waters weren’t safe, these dark black eyes, and tendrils of long wet black hair, matted with seaweed were the reason that you didn’t put your feet in the sea. Another shiver rolled through his body, his chest tight as he felt like prey all of a sudden and he wondered, wondered if the seaweed touching his leg the other day hadn’t been seaweed at all.
He was still, holding on to the railings of the stairs, watching the eyes move closer, fluid through the water like whoever they belonged to was part of the water itself. And then, without any warning, they rose, rose to reveal a thin nose, full lips and high cheekbones, all wet and shimmering in the moonlight. His skin was so pale, unnatural and almost grey, like something dead or something not real. And behind his long dark hair, he could see green scales that seemed to disappear down his neck, and reappear on a wrist and fingers as he raised a hand from the water. They were beautiful, long and thin and as unnatural as the rest of him, as unnatural as this entire experience, green webbing clinging to the inside of each knuckle, and blackened fingernails reaching closer as he got as close as it seemed he could to the dark rocks.
It took a moment, the fog starting to roll in even thicker, feeling like it was rolling straight into Hongbin’s lungs, for him to realize that this creature, this man was reaching out to him, was asking him to come closer. He knew he shouldn’t have. He knew that every pair of eyes staring out at them through the curtains of the houses in the town didn’t want him to. His mother didn’t want him to, his professors wouldn’t want him to. And maybe it was some kind of spell, rolling in thick with the fog, but this man had the softest eyes he had ever seen, and Hongbin didn’t want to say no to him.
His camera made a soft noise on the wood as he set it down and for a second he thought about removing his clothes but there was some sort of silent insistence in the man’s eyes that made him think better of it. So he did what he wanted, what they both seemed to have wanted and he stepped forward, stepped closer and reached down to take his hand. There was no snarling, no biting and no fighting. Not a single moment of struggle. His fingers curled around Hongbin’s and he held on to him gentle, pulling him closer until Hongbin was on his knees. Underneath the pale golden moon, he pulled him in close enough that their mouths touched, lips dragging against each other and Hongbin felt his body give in.
There were no waves, barely ripples as he pulled him down, and stole the last mortal breath from his lungs.
When he woke, he felt heavy, back arching and limbs stretching as though they were weighed down, so slow and deliberate. Eyebrows pulled together deep and everything felt so far away. His fingers searched through the blankets, snaking in between the folds, until he found body heat and pressed into it. Fingers sunk into skin and in a fuzzy haze he pushed his face between Hakyeon’s shoulder blades. He was nearly asleep once more when Hakyeon murmured something, fingers dragging over his skin and he didn’t have the strength to pull himself out of sleep.
Later, he woke again and Hakyeon’s side of the bed was empty, the sheets and blankets neatly rumpled and his fingers mixed in with them idly. With the curtains still drawn, it was dark in their room but his eyes were accustomed to it. He sucked his lower lip into his mouth, dragging his teeth over it as he stared at the space, the shape that Hakyeon made in their bed. He could imagine what he would have looked like if he was still there, if he hadn’t had to go to work. His hair would have been such a mess, his eyes dark with sleep and his lips puffy and parted. He could imagine the way his eyes would have opened and closed so slowly. He was sure that when he had woken up to his alarm that’s exactly how he had looked. He breathed in slow, and then back out, blinking and turning over on his back to stare at the sliver of light that sliced between their curtains.
Outside it was grey, he soon found out. The clouds hung heavy and thick and fog seemed to have gathered like a thick blanket in between the houses behind their apartment building. He stared at it for a while, eyes adjusting to the harsh, cold light and his limbs adjusting to the cool air outside of their blankets. He needed a shower, a sweater and a cup of coffee but instead he stretched his long legs out and stared at the way the fog mixed in with the trees, worrying his lip with his teeth.
After a shower, he pulled open the blinds on their bay windows in the living room downstairs and for a few moments he stared down at the street below, until beeping called him back to the kitchen for a hot cup of coffee. Cars were lining the sidewalk and there were kids playing in the park across the street. If it hadn’t been threatening to rain, he might have gone over there, listened to them play as he scribbled in one of his notebooks. But even the chill inside was enough to keep him in, enough to find him traipsing back up two flights of stairs to get one of the blankets from their bed to wrap around himself. As he walked back down, he pressed his face into it, breathing in deep as his feet padded over the small wooden steps.
It didn’t matter that they nearly smelled the same anymore, what with living together. He still smelled different and he smelled like comfort that Taekwoon searched out without thinking about it. His cup of coffee was nearly forgotten as he settled down on the couch, too busy nuzzling into the blanket to think of much else. Wasn’t as good as the real thing, but it was good enough.
Hours passed and the blanket was discarded, pushed back over the back of the couch. Breakfast was made and then lunch after it and Taekwoon’s laptop moved from the coffee table to his lap, to the floor and then the couch once more, mess growing around him with every passing hour. There were plates and bowls and two coffee mugs, papers strewn this way and that as he worked on essay after essay, trying to get them finished so he could have the weekend off.
After some time the light had changed, gotten warmer and he stretched, arms reaching back and over his head as he did, turning his body to stare out the window. The clouds seemed to have lifted, a pinch of blue mixed in with all of the grey. He stared at the trees and the way the warm sunlight touched the tips of the leaves. It took a while, but he finally decided to go out for a walk. He didn’t really have an aim, but he was sure he could find one. Their place felt stuffy, making his head feel tight and all too full and he wanted to be out in the world, if only for a little while.
It was warmer than it looked when he got outside, but he kept his jacket on anyway, locking their door and slipping his keys into his pockets as he headed down the steps. His earbuds were in as they always were, but for now he didn’t put any music on. Instead he listened to the way the traffic sounded and the laughter of children echoing through their neighborhood. He listened to the sound of the breeze brushing on the trees and music coming from somewhere far off.
He stopped at their favorite cafe first, standing back from the displays and sucking on his lip as he contemplating getting a coffee or not. They had danishes though and even just looking at them made his stomach grumble. He got four and one was missing before he even left the shop, a coffee in hand to wash it down as well.
He found himself in a new shop then, the outside display full of sweaters that pulled him in. It was a quiet sort of place and the only employee was sitting behind the counter with her nose burrowed into a book, which made Taekwoon feel a little more at ease. He hated when people breathed down his neck as he shopped, he hated the way they’d stare as he moved through the racks. She didn’t even seem like she knew he existed, and he was alright with that.
“Taekwoon-ah!”
The voice, deep baritone was unmistakable and also unexpected, making him jump as he had been very intently going through a rack of sweaters. Hongbin had appeared out of almost nowhere, smiling wide enough to show his dimples - as was far too easy to do. Taekwoon saw movement behind him and glanced around him, noticing a guy who he had never seen before, sheepishly hunching himself over a little bit and eyeing Hongbin like he was nervous.
“Hey Hongbin.”
Taekwoon murmured, trying to keep the smirk off of his lips because he was pretty sure that this was the kid from class that was “too tall and too handsome” that Hongbin had been talking about every time he came over mooch off of their dinner. He worked entirely too much and got paid entirely too little, all while going to school too and Taekwoon insisted he never go hungry.
Hongbin turned back then, reaching out to grab onto the boy’s arm, pulling him a little closer.
“Sanghyuk, this is Taekwoon, I’ve mentioned him haven’t I?”
Sanghyuk glanced between the two of them and then chuckled breathily.
“You never shut up about Hakyeon and Taekwoon.”
In that moment Taekwoon decided he liked Sanghyuk, but he kept the smile off of his lips anyway. He introduced himself properly, despite the frown that graced Hongbin’s face, and then the three of them talked for a few moments, before Hongbin started to drag Sanghyuk back towards the door. They were supposedly just going to dinner but it seemed to Taekwoon that it looked suspiciously like a date.
“Oh! I stopped by work and Hakyeon said to make sure you’re finishing your essays.” Hongbin added before they left, to which Taekwoon instantly rolled his eyes.
“And if you see him again, you’ll tell him I am.”
Taekwoon murmured pointedly, causing Hongbin to raise an eyebrow at him accusingly before he was gone, leaving Taekwoon with a very hard choice between a red sweater and a black one.
Hours later he had gotten back home, but not after a quick food shop too, picking up some things to make soup when he got back home. He had done that too, pulling out one of his favorite cookbooks and starting to put together one of their favorite soups, all while trying not to let what Hongbin had said guilt him. He had worked earlier, he had worked a lot, he didn’t need to work all day long.
He had put rice on after the soup was just set to simmer until Hakyeon got back home and then he hadn’t really been able to do anything else to procrastinate, so it had been back to the couch with a new cup of coffee and a frown etched into his brow.
Silence was heavy then as he worked. The soup was turned off and the rice was done and there was nothing left to do but just work, work until he finally, finally heard the lock’s turning signaling Hakyeon’s return. His fingers went still then, but he didn’t move, wanting it to be clear that he had been working. Because on some level he still wanted to impress Hakyeon.
“Hellloooo.”
His voice came from the hallway and then there he was, peeking around the wall and Taekwoon’s eyebrows went up as it was the first thing he noticed.
“You cut your hair.”
He said it quietly, almost reverently. It wasn’t a huge change but it was at the same time, the bangs shorter, the sides shorter and the back was probably shorter too. It framed his face, showing off his eyebrows and Taekwoon could see little bits of hair sticking to his cheeks and maybe on his jaw. Instantly Hakyeon’s hand went up to ruffle the front of it, looking a bit bashful.
“Yeah, do you like it?” He asked, a bit of laughter in his voice but if anyone could see vulnerability in him, Taekwoon could.
“I love it.”
He murmured, voice soft and his heart thudding in his chest lightly, because it was true. He looked amazing. Taekwoon’s laptop was forgotten then, set down on the couch and he stood up, leaving their blanket behind too to get his arms around Hakyeon’s waist and nuzzle into his jaw, uncaring that he might get covered in hair, because Hakyeon’s fingers were under his sweater and he was pulling him nice and close.
It was always like this, no matter how long they had been apart, they came back together like this, pressing close and breathing each other in, as though it was the first time they ever had. Taekwoon liked to think that it was because they both needed it, both needed the comfort of each other. He knew that he needed it and he hoped that Hakyeon did too.
He got their dinner ready then, spooning them out bowls of hot soup and rice, setting everything out on the table, and while he did Hakyeon showered, complaining that he hated how he smelled after he went to the hairdressers.
Then Hakyeon recounted his day as they ate and Taekwoon sat, quiet, his lips pulling up at the corner as he listened to every detail. His eyes followed every one of Hakyeon’s exaggerated movements, and he couldn’t help the way he laughed when Hakyeon did, laughed because when Hakyeon laughed it reached right up into his eyes.
Hakyeon asked about his essays then and Taekwoon made a face, but commented on meeting Sanghyuk at the store, which launched Hakyeon into exclaiming that he had finally met him and how he was exactly as he had pictured.
He kept talking until they were done and until the dishes were done and until they were heading back upstairs, their blanket wrapped around the both of them. And that was honestly exactly how Taekwoon liked it. Hakyeon never talked over him and he never talked about nothing, he talked about everything, shared every detail, filled in every silence and let Taekwoon bask in every word he had to say.
That was until he had no words to say and he was sagging against Taekwoon’s side, his fingers curling in his shirt, half asleep before they even got to bed. Taekwoon pulled him against his chest once they got under the covers, nuzzling into his hair and listening to him breathe as he fell asleep.
It wasn’t until the next day that he actually ran his fingers through it. Saturdays always meant sleeping in, their limbs overlapping and then migrating away from each other, only to migrate back. He ran his hands through it for the first time before they got up. Saturdays also meant eating breakfast at the bay window while their eyes were still heavy with sleep, coffee and tea respectively setting on the windowsill. After that they fell out of each others orbit. Taekwoon worked on his essays until he finally finished them and Hakyeon disappeared into the kitchen with his phone and the rest of his cup of tea.
When he was done, Hakyeon rewarded him for finishing with a kiss that made Taekwoon’s head spin from lack of oxygen and he felt himself sinking, sinking into the way Hakyeon smelled, the way he felt, his hands and then his hair. Hakyeon had been in his lap at first, but soon Hakyeon switched them, tugging Taekwoon into his lap insistently and he obliged, straddling his legs and sinking down against him. His fingers dragged through the short strands, tugging at it as he gasped, gasped from the way Hakyeon’s fingers felt pushing underneath his pants, squeezing his ass, pressing their hips closer, closer until he could feel heat between Hakyeon’s legs.
They were hard, breathless and Taekwoon found himself on his back, everything fading away except the way Hakyeon looked with his new short hair mussed up and pushed off of his forehead. His eyes were dark, heavy lidded and he looked so needy, needy like his hips, the insistent way he rutted against Taekwoon’s thigh and it took Taekwoon’s breath away. He found his eyes falling shut, stomach tight and fluttering, arching his back up against Hakyeon’s chest, moans spilling from his throat as his fingers curled into that freshly cut hair again.
Sunlight streamed through the bay windows as their bodies moved together, not bothering with their clothes, leaving them on as they lazily ground against each other until they came. Taekwoon came first, shuddering underneath him, sinking his fingers into him and gasping into his mouth and then Hakyeon followed shortly after and Taekwoon could feel the warmth of his cum pooling in his sweatpants right against his thigh.
Their clothes were gone then - Taekwoon made sure they made it into the washer despite Hakyeon’s insistent tugging - and they found their way back into bed, naked and slightly sticky and full of too many kisses and fingers searching skin that they already knew so well. It didn’t matter. Taekwoon felt like he could always find some new spot that made Hakyeon shiver like it was the first time Taekwoon had ever touched him.
It was Hakyeon’s turn to be spread out under Taekwoon then, his legs spread as Taekwoon worked two fingers inside him. Taekwoon couldn’t get over the way he looked. Splayed out, eyelashes fluttering with every push of Taekwoon’s fingers deeper, throat working and moans spilling from his gorgeous lips with every thrust. Taekwoon pushed inside him right there in their bed, his fingers sinking into Hakyeon’s thigh as he pulled his leg up. He thrust inside him and breathing in deep, losing himself in the way Hakyeon felt and in the way he smelled. He came inside him, face pressed into his neck, shaking as he did, and Hakyeon cried out, fingernails digging into his back.
It didn’t stop there, but it was all lost in a haze of kisses with too much tongue and Hakyeon’s mouth dragging down Taekwoon’s chest. Then later, basking in each other’s warmth, they both got frantic texts from Hongbin that he had kissed Sanghyuk and Sanghyuk had kissed him back. Hakyeon nestled against Taekwoon’s side as he texted him back, their limbs stretched out underneath the sheets. Taekwoon’s eyes fell shut and he paid careful attention to the sound of Hakyeon breathing, committing it to memory forever.
It was like a wildfire, when Hongbin saw him, one spark caused by a sharp jawbone and the sound of his laugh echoing across the room and like dried out wood, he caught fire. His name had almost been forgotten, his face, all of it washed away by the tide of time moving too quickly, but suddenly there he was and it flooded back through Hongbin’s mind like it had never left in the first place. At first it was just that, the oddity of seeing him here, Han Sanghyuk someone he had known such a long time ago. It was the memory of his face and the difference in it now, the sharper cheekbones, darker hair and the changes that time had made upon him. But it crackled and burnt and before long, it was different memories, memories that Hongbin wasn’t sure that he had asked for.
Before this, before the bell on the door chimed and before he had even known that Sanghyuk lived in this city or at the very least was in it at the same time Hongbin was, the cafe had been quiet. With autumn sunlight bathing the city in warmth and a temperature that was as just right as it possibly could have been, it seemed that today wasn’t a day for coffee. Or at least, not at this cafe. That was precisely why Hongbin had chose it. There was an old tabby curled up in the window and plants hung around it and the sign was hand painted on the glass, wearing down just slightly at the edges. It looked like a cafe that someone’s grandma owned and as he had passed the door, the smell of what seemed like freshly baked muffins curled through the air and ended up tugging him inside.
When he had finally gone in, it was quiet, save for the very faint sound of classical music coming from somewhere up the stairs that led off behind the counter. It had smelled like rich coffee and those tempting muffins all wrapped up into one and there wasn’t a customer besides him in sight, unlike all of the tourist traps that seemed to be around every corner. This seemed more like a cafe back home, more like a cafe he would have gone to if he was still in school, hunching over his laptop as he wrote papers. He ordered the most sugary drink they offered, and then slipped into the corner, tucking himself in a booth near the window and pulling out his notebook.
For a while, it had been quiet. Even the customers who did come in were quiet. They made their orders, got their things and left. One or two lingered, a young girl on the opposite side of the room drinking a latte and playing with her phone and an old man who sat a few booths down from Hongbin, with arthritic looking fingers who began to read the sunday paper, building a paper fortress around himself. But otherwise they came and left and Hongbin soon started to forget they were there at all. He didn’t look up, he just wrote, letting his hand move across the page and his mind jump around through the events of the past couple of days. The train ride, the huge hotel, breakfast in bed, walking through the park and listening to a thousand snippets of conversation.
Then at some point, the bell on the door had rung, and suddenly the place wasn’t as quiet as it had been. Loud, boisterous laughter echoed through the place and someone else was laughing too, talking about something to do with public relations. Hongbin did his best to ignore it at first, focused on writing the past bit of his sentence, busy trying to figure out just how to encapsulate the feeling of this city. But when they didn’t sink into quiet right away, when the loud laughter continued and the talking only got worse, two men trying to talk over each other, laughing amongst themselves, Hongbin found it impossible to concentrate.
The first thing he noticed when he looked up was that the man and the girl were gone. They had been replaced by a couple of older women, sipping tea on one side and a boy trying to pet the cat in the window even though it was just nearly out of his reach. That was when his eyes had fallen on Sanghyuk and with a jolt, it started to flood through him faster than he could handle.
He recognized him in the wrinkles around his eyes, in the tip of his nose, the curve of his lips and his teeth as they showed when he laughed, mouth stretched wide and mirth written in his features. He recognized him in the way he grabbed at his friend, shaking his shoulders as he explained something that Hongbin didn’t quite catch because he was watching his eyebrows move and staring at the sharpness of his jaw. He was brought to the forefront of Hongbin’s memory, his edges crisp and exactly like he had been when they knew each other, but then again entirely different.
He watched, stunned and silent as they moved to the counter, watched as they ordered, watched as they continue to talk and laugh until their orders came. Then just as stunned as he had been the first moment he looked up from his notebook, he watched Sanghyuk walk out the door, coffee in hand and friend by his side. He tried to shake it then, tried not to think about it, about him because memories hadn’t even started to crop up just yet. But he couldn’t quite get it off of his mind, couldn’t get rid of the feeling that had started to clutch at his stomach. He ended up leaving, following the yellow circles of the street lights through the rapidly darkening city, back to his hotel with his notebook under his arm.
It wasn’t until he was back, splashing water against his face, that the memories started to flood in, burning him worse than just seeing Sanghyuk’s face had. It was nothing at first, just a memory of the way he used to hold his arm, grab onto it when he was upset or anxious, the feeling of his fingers sinking into his skin and the comforting feeling of his body close by. But where there was one, there were more.
He remembered it one by one then, the feeling of his mouth on his neck, of his teeth scraping over his skin, how many times they had feverishly made out in the back of his car and the feeling of Sanghyuk’s hips pushing against his own. He remembered the first time he had felt how hard he was and the first time they had kissed, tentative and then suddenly all too hungry. He remembered Sanghyuk’s feet brushing against his own underneath the table at family dinners and the knowing look he had in his eyes when he did it, that shit eating grin. He remembered hands down his pants and up his shirt and pinning him against the wall. He remembered the first time they fucked and how his fingers had felt pushing into him. He remembered the way he had panted against his neck afterward, both of them shaking and how the next day it had been so hard to keep his hands off of him.
He kept trying not to think about it but it just kept coming and coming one wave after another, until he was hard, the heady memories making the room seem like it was on tilt. He leaned back against the bathroom sink, hand pushing between his legs as he thought about Sanghyuk’s lips wrapped around his cock and the way he’d kiss him while he was inside him, like it was all he could do to stay anchored. He touched himself remembering pushing his own hand down Sanghyuk’s pants in movie theaters, jerking him off while he panted into his neck. He came remembering the way his tongue had felt pushing inside him in the badly lit bathroom of a bar.
The high only lasted so long, only until other memories started to roll in, aided by the disgusting feeling of cum cooling, pooled in his boxers. It reminded him of Sanghyuk leaving for work without saying I love you and it reminded him of days where he couldn’t reach him at all and then he’d see him walking home with friends glued to his side, all of them laughing. It made his stomach lurch as he cleaned himself off, thinking about how he had looked at the cafe.
He remembered so many things that had hurt him, and the anger that curled in Sanghyuk’s lip and reached into his eyes when Hongbin had done things he wasn’t proud of to get back at him. He remembered silence between them in the car on the way to restaurants and grunted responses to everything he had said. He remembered going to bed with his sheets cold and his stomach tight and twisted up, listening to the sound of Sanghyuk’s car driving away.
Then he remembered the way Sanghyuk had touched him, like he was fragile and about to break when neither of them could take it any longer. There had been tears in his eyes, the last night they spent together, and more tears on Hongbin’s cheeks. He couldn’t even remember why it had ended exactly. Moving maybe, compromises about not wanting to do long distance, empty promises that neither of them thought they could have fulfilled. Sanghyuk’s arms had been warm around him, the last time they hugged, fingers spanned across his back and sinking into him, like he was precious and he didn’t want to lose him. Hongbin’s fingers had pressed in just the same but still, they had parted and now it had been years, long enough that Hongbin had almost forgotten his name.
Suddenly his hotel room seemed drained and empty, the strangest feelings swirling in his stomach. It was horrible almost, remembering past relationships, remembering all of the things that you could see yourself doing so wrong. He felt sick to his stomach about some of the things he had said, about the way they had fought about nothing, despite the fact that he knew that he was forgetting how it had felt back then. Still, he felt like he was better now, better at this whole relationship thing and he wished, wished that he had been able to be that way with Sanghyuk.
He stared into the velvety darkness of the hotel room, listening to the heater hum and the far away sounds of sirens down in the city below and he wondered what things would be like if he had done things differently. The sheets were crisp and foreign, nothing like home and he wondered if Sanghyuk would still feel like home, still smell like home. He didn’t think so, but he fell asleep wistful all the same.
—
The next morning, the urge to visit the same cafe at the same hours, to sit there and wait and see if he would show up again was overwhelming. It boiled up in him with furious purpose, tugging at his mind as he got dressed, the possibility of Sanghyuk coming back to that cafe and Hongbin getting up the courage to say something to him pandering to the more romantic side of him. But it was stupid, god it was stupid and he was trying his hardest to convince himself, through shaky hands and an unsteady stomach that it wasn’t realistic. There was such such a slim chance that Sanghyuk would even show up at that same cafe, and the possibility that Hongbin would figure out something to say to him by then was even slimmer. It was a little pathetic anyway. What if Sanghyuk had seen him and purposefully hadn’t said anything to him? He would know just how pathetic Hongbin was if he was there the next day.
He swallowed it back, forcing himself to eat breakfast to try and settle his stomach. He tried to remind himself that he wasn’t like this, he wasn’t romantic. He hadn’t dated in a year and he didn’t care, he didn’t need anyone. He had work and money for traveling now, the last thing he needed was to be tied down. Now was a time to be inspired, a time to write, a time to focus on his second manuscript, those were the important things.
Still, he found himself staring out over the buildings, watching the sun glint off traffic far below, watching the clouds rolling through the sky and he wondered where Sanghyuk was and what he was doing, what he was thinking. He could see him, in his mind’s eye, walking the streets with his hands in his pockets, a heavy backpack weighing his shoulders down and those lips spreading into a grin as he glanced over his shoulder. He could remember how he’d used to grin at him like that, so conspiratorial. He’d give him that look and it always made Hongbin feel like he was the only other person in the world.
It was physically taxing, trying to stop himself from heading to that cafe, and despite his wishes he found himself heading there anyway. It must have looked odd to anyone watching out of their windows, to see a man walk halfway up the sidewalk and then abruptly turn, as though he was fighting with himself. And he was truly, he kept changing his mind, kept stopping himself from crossing the street. It took half an hour, but common sense won and he trudged, defeated towards the library.
He had a lot of places to visit before he headed back, he couldn’t be worrying about someone who probably didn’t even remember him anymore. He couldn’t be worrying about relationships that hadn’t gone very well. Or at least, he assumed it hadn’t, despite the fact that while his other relationships remained unmemorable, this one stood out so easily at just one glimpse of Sanghyuk’s face. He stared at the sidewalk, stepping on leaves and listening to the sound of their crunch over the sounds of the world as he tried to console himself, tried to remind himself that the universe was entirely random and it had been nothing but a coincidence.
The light was green when he got to it, gaze moving up at the traffic whizzing by, and then up higher, towards the sky, fingers curling around the straps of his backpack. He was going to write in the library for a couple of hours today, and then go to that museum he kept hearing was so important to see, then there was only one more day until he would be heading back home, back to his studio apartment and his cozy bookshelves. He breathed in deep, shifting on the sidewalk and waiting for the light to change, watching the faces of people in their cars as they drove past. Finally it changed and the traffic stopped and that was his cue, to start across, which he did, trudging to the other side of the sidewalk and thinking about entirely too many things at once.
“Hongbin!”
A first he didn’t really think or believe that he was hearing his own name, even though his head immediately perked up. He knew that voice, somewhere in his head he knew it but couldn’t put a finger on exactly who it was, so he turned slow, glancing over his shoulder and he wasn’t quite sure he believed what he saw either.
Sanghyuk was there at the other side of the street, broken off from a little group of people. He looked tall, huge even, and surprised and the minute Hongbin looked up he started across the street. That elicited a few angry car horns blaring seeing as the light had just changed, but Sanghyuk seemed unfased, sticking a hand out as though he was trying to calm a dog as he sprinted across the street towards Hongbin, a smile spreading across his lips with every step.
Hongbin found himself stuck, frozen solid and just standing there staring, wondering if it showed on his face that he wasn’t that surprised and what Sanghyuk would think of that. Would he think he’d been stalking him? Or that he’d followed him here and was now just waiting around for him to notice? He swallowed, turning towards Sanghyuk and trying to stop the way he felt like he didn’t know where to put his hands or what to say or anything at all.
“Uh, hey.” Was the first thing that he actually got out of his mouth, his voice wavering slightly, even though despite himself he felt a smile that matched Sanghyuk’s pulling at his lips. He was so close now, so close and so tall and looking so much more like the Sanghyuk he had known two years ago, with that easy smile that reached his eyes and the inquisitive way he seemed to be taking in everything that was in front of him, everything about Hongbin.
Hongbin found himself doing the same. His eyes jumped from his neck, down to his broad shoulders, the way his ruffled collared shirt hung over a wrinkled t-shirt. He had always made unwashed clothing look exceptionally good. Hongbin found his heart hammering in his chest.
“You got published.”
It was minutes, minutes that had passed since Sanghyuk crossed the street and they were standing there, on the sidewalk too close but not close enough exactly and that was the first thing that Sanghyuk said. The way he said it, like he was reverent, like he had been wanting to say something like this for a long time - despite how simple the statement - made Hongbin’s stomach start to do funny things.
He chuckled, embarrassed as he looked down and away, reaching up to rub the nape of his neck. It was true, but it didn’t help that it made him feel a little bit silly. It wasn’t his best work, he could do better. But it was still awesome and he was surprised, amazed and honored that Sanghyuk had known, that he had seen and remembered.
“Hopefully you didn’t read it.”
He said, glancing back up at Sanghyuk, who’s smile had somehow gotten bigger. His nose wrinkled in response and he reached out, fingers pressing into Hongbin’s arm, like they always used to when he knew that Hongbin felt a little bit uncomfortable.
“Of course I did.”
Hongbin found it hard to swallow, or breathe or do much of anything besides just feel like a complete and utter idiot as the world moved on, moved around them there on the sidewalk. Sanghyuk’s hand was warm on his arm and across the street he could hear people calling his name but Hongbin wanted to just reach up and press his hand there, keep it there.
That hand stayed there, as Sanghyuk glanced back across the street towards them and instantly Hongbin felt bad, guilty and greedy, like he had stolen him even though it hadn’t been his doing at all. He watched the way they stood there across the street, waiting for him and he couldn’t help but feel a slight pang of jealousy. They knew this Sanghyuk, despite how he may have been the same in some ways. They knew him now, the way he had changed since two years ago. They knew him and Hongbin didn’t know him anymore.
Sanghyuk was looking at him again then, fingers squeezing at his arm comfortingly once more.
“Is your number the same?”
Hongbin struggled to gather oxygen back into his lungs as he nodded, shifted where he stood.
“Yeah, it hasn’t changed.”
That smile was back then, big and wide, spreading across Sanghyuk’s lips as his hand dropped from Hongbin’s arm.
“I’ll call you later then.”
And the way he looked at him, with all of that honesty in his eyes, said that he would. That he definitely would.
“I’ll be waiting then.”
Hongbin replied, smirking and stepping back to let Sanghyuk return to his friends. And Sanghyuk did, but twice while crossing the street of course, he glanced back and Hongbin confirmed to himself that yes... he did still feel like home.
—
Twilight had settled over the city, gold and orange lights twinkling in between the deep purples and navy blues. Through it all the street ran like a golden river, headlights from hundreds of cars moving through it as Hongbin stared out of his hotel room window. The moon was high, shrouded by clouds hanging around the very bottom of it and it reminded him of the countryside. It reminded him of camping trips with his family, lying back in a tent and staring up at the moon, it’s cool blue light spilling down onto the world.
His phone rang somewhere in the middle of his blankets and it was almost as though he had been expecting it, because it didn’t startle him at all. Sanghyuk’s name showed up on the screen and he picked it up with shaky hands and answered, only to hear breathing that imitated silence for a few long moments.
“I missed you.”
Those three words cut through the silence and Hongbin surprised himself by saying them at all. He leaned back, curling into his pillow and listening to the little noise that Sanghyuk made before he answered.
“I missed you too.”
Sirens echoed in the city below and the universe was still random, but sometimes it was random in strangely beautiful ways.
It was dark out still, barely any light making it in through the frost covered windows and into their bedroom because it was too early for the sun to be up just yet. The pale light of their alarm clock was reflecting against the wood of their dresser and casting the very foot of the bed in an eerie glow. It read 5:30 AM in digital letters. And despite himself, despite his wishes, Hongbin was awake, though he didn’t look it. His head was tucked under the comforters, face pressed into one that was thickest of them all and he was half dreaming and pretending that it wasn’t Saturday and he wasn’t awake and Wonshik hadn’t woken him up this early. Outside a sharp winter wind gusted by, the sound muffled through the thick walls of their apartment building and even though he was tucked under covers in a heated room, he shivered, eyebrows pulling together as he thought about what the day would bring. It was supposed to be one of the coldest days so far that fall, not as cold as some places, but too cold for here… too cold for him.
So he did his best to try and pretend that he couldn’t hear Wonshik moving around in the other room, instead clinging to the last bits of sleep that were still hanging around the very edges of his consciousness. He nuzzled his face deeper into the blankets and let his breathing even out, let it slow down, down until he could slip right back to it. His dreams were fitful, strange. The kind of dreams you have when you aren’t quite deep asleep enough to even dream properly. More like thoughts, racing and overlapping and nonsensical, but full of vibrant faces and words and ideas and maybe even wishes that you never actually verbalized. It was like a haze, a haze of sleep and it was broken slowly, but very unkindly by their alarm clock going off.
He tried to keep it, tried to keep that haze pulled over him, just like all of his blankets were, tucked around his head. He tried to pretend and forget that they had to go anywhere, or that it was this early, or that he had only gotten 3 hours of sleep because staying up late was always easy when you weren’t actually facing the light of morning. But it was shattered, his dreams broken and that warm feeling of dreaming was washed away, leaving him feeling colder, even though he wasn’t cold at all. He shivered, shifting underneath the covers and trying to build up the courage to get up, to turn it off. If he did that, it would mean exposing himself to the room, and under these covers it was so much nicer. So he didn’t, instead he shifted and pulled his hands up over his ears, pressing his palms against them and trying to get back those last vestiges of sleep, trying to wrap them around himself.
He slipped in and out of it, the alarm still sounding, until at some point it was shut off. And at some point after that, the bed dipped and a hand smoothed over his back, his mind still lost in the warmth and the half awake half asleep dreams.
“You don’t have to come.”
Wonshik’s voice was rich and deep, even deeper when it was so thick with sleep. It sent a little thrill down Hongbin’s spine, despite him being so lost in sleep. But the words themselves were heavier. It was relieving in some sense. He didn’t have to. Wonshik wouldn’t hate him if he didn’t and he knew that, but it eased something inside him to hear it. Wonshik wanted him to though, wanted him close, wanted them to stand in line together despite how cold it was. And he had promised that after the wait, they’d get hot chocolates and he’d buy him a chocolate croissant. Decisions were hard when your head was filled with fog and all you wanted to do was succumb to lack of consciousness for a little bit longer.
He didn’t though, instead he pulled the covers back, reluctantly, until the cooler air of their room slapped his face, setting his features in a firm frown, though his eyes stayed closed. “I’m coming.” He replied, his own voice feeling scratchy in his throat, deep in his chest and strange, so much so that he cleared his throat. But it didn’t matter, because Wonshik stole anything else he would have said right off his lips with a kiss.
Or maybe many more than one. Hongbin lost count when their tongues pushed together and the coldness of the room was eclipsed by the warmth of Wonshik’s mouth.
—
Later, after they went and after the cold nipped their noses and cheeks and made their teeth chatter no matter how close they huddled together, after the new console was purchased and steamy hot chocolates were enjoyed inside a tiny cafe and Hongbin licked chocolate off of his fingers, after all of that, they were home and they thawed together as Hongbin helped Wonshik set it up. It felt like it took a long time for the icy winter air to relieve it’s grip on his skin, but playing a game with Wonshik helped. He’d never heard of it before and he lost - but that wasn’t his fault.
At some point after the sun had retreated in an orange burst and navy burn out into twilight, Hongbin found his way back to bed. He told himself he wasn’t that sleepy, told himself that he didn’t want to go back to sleep just yet. But despite himself his eyelids kept drooping, no matter how hard he tried to stare at the ornate carvings in the divider they used instead of a door. It seemed like the little patterns were changing shape with every movement of his eyelids. But every time he closed his eyes and opened them back up again, the time would jump forward by 10 minutes, no matter how much he swore to himself that he wasn’t sleeping.
They were closed when he felt hands slipping up underneath his shirt, teasing his hipbones and the lower half of his stomach. It made him tense up, a little noise falling from his lips, warm pleasure spreading from the touch of those fingertips. Wonshik’s hands were dryer than his own, rougher, but sometimes he thought that was what he liked about them. The way they moved over his skin, and the way his skin responded. Like a secret language that even he didn’t understand. The only part of it he did understand was the heavy heat that gathered in his stomach and the crawling goosebumps that rolled over his arms, up his stomach and up the back of his neck. With them came heat, flushing his face as those fingers slipped down and he knew that Wonshik was pulling his boxers down, down just enough.
“Wonshik…” he panted, but he kept his eyes closed. He was too tired to open them and he just wanted to feel. Without watching, everything felt more intense. And he tensed more, with every subtle movement. He couldn’t help the jolts and shivers that crawled over him as Wonshik spread his thighs and then his hot breath brushed over Hongbin’s cock.
Somewhere between that tongue dragging up his shaft and his mouth circling around the head, Hongbin felt himself get hard, and his fingers found their way into Wonshik’s hair. They curled in the strands and it was unclear if he was pulling him down, pushing him deeper, or trying to hold him off. Maybe a bit of both. With every suck, it was like a little shock jumped through him, tugging at his stomach as pleasure grew. It got hotter and faster and Wonshik kept taking him deeper. His eyelids fluttered open here and there and he focused on little things, like the way the lamp light was haloed on the ceiling, or Wonshik’s shirt half falling off the bed, their suitcases at the back of the room. But all of it was fuzzy, hazy around the heat, the pleasure, of Wonshik’s mouth bringing him closer and closer, until he he pulled him right over the edge.
It was a funny thing, orgasms when you were sleepy. Hongbin felt like he had fallen asleep almost, but not quite. He couldn’t with Wonshik’s tongue dragging lazily over his dick. He didn’t want to either, not when little shocks were still rolling through him. But he felt so spent, like he might have just dripped off the bed and onto the floor.
It took some coaxing, but soon he could pull Wonshik up, until his big, warm body covered him, just like the blankets had that morning. Wonshik’s mouth found a spot between his neck and his jaw and they dragged, lips pressing in just lightly, making Hongbin’s body react anew, despite how it was sluggish and too tired to do so.
“Thank you.” it was whispered into Hongbin’s skin, but the warmth and the last of his energy spent on coming, he was already falling asleep. One arm wrapped loosely around Wonshik’s back as he hummed in his throat, and then he drifted back off, to the sound of Wonshik’s breathing and the harsh wind gusting outside.
When he closed his eyes, he could remember the last time they fucked. In the kitchen, against the table and his eyes had been half opened, staring up at the hazy green light as it flickered through the plants. The thrusts had been hard and rough, the table biting into his hipbones. But it felt good and all he could focus on was the sound of the wind chimes and hard breathing right against his ear. Taekwoon had said his name, over and over again, like it was a prayer, repeated until he could believe it. He said it so many times, and with each repetition Hongbin felt pleasure pull at his stomach, until his name got caught in Taekwoon’s throat as he rocked inside him and came.
Hongbin had felt it, felt it deep, felt him shake and he couldn’t remember if he had came or if he hadn’t because it hadn’t mattered. His skin was sticky sweet with sweat and he felt like he was dripping off the table onto the floor, the feeling of it so electric, rolling underneath his skin. The soft song of the wind chimes twinkled on his ear and sun glinted off of the waxy leaves of his spider plant and Taekwoon’s long fingers traced lines along Hongbin’s side and they breathed together, as one.
When he closed his eyes, he could feel Taekwoon’s breath against his neck, feel the strange emptiness when he slid out of him. The table was grainy harsh underneath his fingertips, but Taekwoon’s fingers were long and sweet, pulling him into the warmth of his arms, against the warmth of his chest. They’d stayed like that, chest to back, panting and messy, standing in the kitchen and Hongbin’s vision had flickered in and out as his sleepy eyelids opened and fell shut. Later, Taekwoon made them coffee - 3 sugars in one and none in the other - and they sat in opposite armchairs, watching each other.
He was on the train now, his head resting against the window, listening to the sound of the tracks, listening to the world as it whizzed by, listening to the sound of the bells at each train crossing. But he was thinking about that day, thinking about the way they sat and stared. He was thinking about the way his hands had shaken when he had taken his cup of coffee, despite how much he hadn’t wanted them to. He was thinking about the way Taekwoon smiled, and how he couldn’t really meet Hongbin’s gaze when he did. When their eyes finally did meet, Taekwoon’s had been so soft.
When he opened his eyes, the rain clouds hung heavy in the sky, covering up the sun. The thick raindrops seemed to have stopped falling, but the world was saturated. Greenery crawled it’s way over everything, singing after the rain and wood was stained dark and heavy with moisture. Hongbin could see people’s heads, replaced by umbrellas, bouncing along on the sidewalks and in the streets, like little black raindrops themselves. A couple of seats back, he could hear someone grumbling about the “fucking crummy weather” and he couldn’t help but smile, his forehead still resting against the cool glass.
They hated it, but it was the one thing he loved the most. The cold rain that soothed the heat of hot days, that turned the world wet and bright. People always said that rainy days were grey, but Hongbin begged to differ staring at the saturated greens and the macadam looking it’s blackest. Getting wet wasn’t his favorite thing in the world, but it didn’t matter when the world felt chilly and cozy, the kind of cozy you just want to pair with a huge blanket and a cup of coffee. He loved the sound of the roads, tires splashing around water and he loved the sound of rain on leaves and roofs. It reminded him of the first time they fucked.
It had been raining that day, hail first and then thick raindrops that splattered their coats. They had ran together, without umbrellas, ran from the train station to the book store, only to find that it was closed. Taekwoon’s cheeks had been red like his bit up lips and despite how wet they were, they were laughing. The kind of laughter that reached right into Taekwoon’s dark, sparkling eyes as his dark hair stuck to his forehead. Back at home, they were cold and wet and for once it wasn’t just Hongbin’s hands that had been shaking. He remembered the way Taekwoon had shaken, sitting in his lap. He had looked so sweet and vulnerable, still flushed from the cold and so nervous. But there had been so much more need behind his dark, sometimes unreadable eyes. The look in them had Hongbin’s breath catching in his throat.
His hands had dragged over Taekwoon’s naked thighs, their eyes still locked. They had dragged up to the edge of his boxers and he’d watched, watched the way Taekwoon’s eyelids fell shut, the way his throat moved as he sucked in a shuddery breath. His jaw had tightened just before he ducked his head down, tucking it against Hongbin’s neck. They’d pulled Taekwoon’s boxers down together, their fingers tangled, dragging over each other. Hongbin remembered his breathing had gone so shaky as Taekwoon tugged his sweatpants down and his own fingers, slick with lube had started to work Taekwoon open.
There was a sweetness in the way Taekwoon tilted his head down and the way his eyebrows drew together as he shifted, as they shifted and he started to push himself down. All Hongbin had been able to do was press his fingers into his thighs, his hips, up his back, steadying him and glancing down between them. They shook together, foreheads pressed tight and they had felt it together. Or Hongbin hoped they had. Their breath had caught at the same moments and Taekwoon’s jaw clenched just when Hongbin had been sure that if he didn’t rock up into Taekwoon he was going to break apart and lose himself entirely.
Hongbin remembered the sound of rain pattering on the windows, and the flickery unfocused images of Taekwoon’s expressions as he sunk down and pushed himself back up. He had looked so wrecked and Hongbin remembered his lungs burning, remembered his fingers clutching, remembered pushing him down, hard as he came, came inside him. Taekwoon had been shaking, his lips dragging over Hongbin’s mouth as Hongbin finished him off, fingers dragging over his dick. He could still remember the way it felt, to feel him come. To feel the tension build in his body, in the way his fingers sunk into Hongbin’s arms, and then feel it release, feel him slump against him.
“Next stop—“
The rest of what the conductor said was garbled over the loud speakers, but the sound alone brought Hongbin back from his memories. He knew the train schedule better than most people, anxiety making it impossible to get on the train without knowing exactly when he’d have to get off. He remembered the first time he had taken it, sitting there, stiff and rigid, counting the stops and panicking when the names weren’t exactly the same. Now it was routine and Hongbin found himself falling into memories every time.
Sometimes he thought about his childhood, about his grandmothers house and stealing things out of her cabinets. Sometimes he thought about school and staring out the hazy windows towards the other end of the city, songs about math playing in the background. Sometimes he thought about grey days at the beach, dune grass blowing in the wind and his fingers lost in sticky wet sand. And sometimes he thought about Taekwoon.
He thought about the way he’d stand sometimes, like he was trying to take up as little space as possible, his eyes darting this way and that at the train station, lips pursed and tiny with his dislike of how close people got sometimes. He thought about how he looked in the morning too, sleepy eyes, messy hair, half naked at the stove boiling water and scrambling eggs with his shoulders drawn up as he complained about the cold. He thought about the way he laughed with his eyebrows drawn together when he fucked up at one of their games, or when Jaehwan would get him interested in something just to flick his cheek. And he thought about the curious inquisition that would widen his eyes when he’d notice a cat under a car or when he made a connection while they were watching one of their favorite shows.
From there he couldn’t really help the way his mind would start pulling up memories of how he looked when they had just been making out. Swollen lips and messy dark hair in his eyes, which were glazed, distant, paired with needy fingers pulling at Hongbin’s clothes. He’d look at him like he’d almost forgotten, amidst the kissing, who it actually was he was kissing, and he was freshly blown away by it. Even just remembering the way he stared pulled and tugged at the pit of Hongbin’s stomach, rolling it over as little shivers crawled over his skin.
His eyelids dipped and then opened again, and he stared out at the greenery as the car started to slow and lurch towards it’s next stop. One more stop to go. His eyes drifted shut once more, fingers clutching his phone and his umbrella in his lap. The train trundled and shifted and he let his body move with it, not bracing himself for any of it for it wasn’t necessary. He was going to need coffee when he got home, but he couldn’t help it. He couldn’t keep himself alert. Not when the world was rainy and his mind was trapped in the soft, soothing memories of Taekwoon’s fingers in his hair.
Hongbin could remember a thousand times when all of it, everything just felt trapped in his chest. Everything that bothered him just bottling up until it was a tight ball in his torso. Sometimes he wondered if Taekwoon could see it, could see it in some unknown tell that Hongbin gave off. He didn’t know, but he did know that like magnets, those fingers would find his way into his hair, or up his shirt. He’d look at him with that look, that quiet, concerned look, that asked Are you alright? before his lips even parted to actually say it.
He felt the train start to slow then, hearing the squealing of brakes and it pulled his eyes open. Vision eclipsed by the strange bright light that cut through the clouds, he squinted around himself as he started to stand. The train lurched and he clung tighter to his phone, trying not to imagine it smashing on the floor. Then the train stopped and he slipped out, into the little trickle of people heading towards the doors.
Inside the cars it had been thick stuffy heated air, but outside it was crisp and cool and he breathed out as he stepped down onto the platform. The clouds above were still heavy, threatening more rain but Hongbin didn’t bother with his umbrella, tucking fingers and his things into his coat pockets and starting down the steps. If it rained, it rained. He didn’t mind getting wet, he didn’t mind the rain. He was much more occupied with scanning the faces and heads of people milling about, waiting on the platform and below.
There were so many of them, half lost underneath their umbrellas and Hongbin couldn’t help but wonder if there was something he had forgotten about. A festival, an event, something that maybe he should have been scurrying off to as well. A museum opening maybe, he mused, a thousand little umbrella heads disappearing inside some brand new museum, the perfect place for a rainy day.
“Hongbin-ah.”
Somehow, despite how soft his voice was, Taekwoon never had trouble raising it loud enough to cut through almost any type of noise. It made Hongbin’s heart jump in his chest and he turned on his heel, eyes jumping here and there to try and locate where that voice had come from. Then suddenly he found him, a head taller than most of the people in the crowd, a big, thick scarf wrapped three times around his neck, smiling that smile that showed his teeth. Hongbin couldn’t help but smile too, turning to head around the crowd towards where Taekwoon was standing, half leaning on his big black umbrella.
“For once you’re prepared,” Hongbin quipped when he got close enough, his cheeks starting to burn even as he chuckled. Taekwoon shook his head, lips pressing together, but his smile somehow only getting wider. He looked so cute like that and Hongbin could remember a million times that he had smiled just the same. Sly, bashful, sweet and a million other emotions slipping in to one expression on different occasions. Hongbin felt his stomach flip over itself without his permission.
“Now that you said that I’m not going to use it, even if it starts to rain.”
Hongbin knew he was lying, but that didn’t help him from calling “Yah, Taekwoon-ah!” at the older man’s back as he started walked away. “Hyung,” Taekwoon corrected over his shoulder, leaving a smirk tugging at Hongbin’s lips as he had to jog in order to catch up.
Sure enough the minute raindrops started to fall, the black umbrella went up. Taekwoon stubbornly wouldn’t look at him the rest of the way home though, but he let Hongbin press against his side, raindrops pattering on the umbrella as they walked.
—
The sound of the raindrops was muffled in Taekwoon’s apartment. It was far away, as far away as the sound of the cars on the street below. Above it all was the sound of the wind seeming to be brushing past a few open windows. It smelled like there were some open any way, like the fresh rainy air had followed them inside. After they slipped their shoes off and their coats, hanging them on the rack at the door, Taekwoon pressed a finger to his lips, even though it wasn’t necessary. It had been days and Hongbin knew by now that Jaehwan hadn’t gone back home. He wasn’t going to, not until Wonshik and Sanghyuk got back, not until the apartment the three of them shared wouldn’t be quiet and empty.
Hongin echoed the action though, unable to help the smile on his lips, his dimples sinking in deep as he brought his own finger to his lips. Then they snuck, quiet, Hongbin’s hands on Taekwoon’s hips, past the living room and the stacks of text books and papers that were strewn across the floor. In the midst of it all, Jaehwan slept, using his arm as a pillow. Hongbin knew that Taekwoon was itching to grab a pillow, try and get his head off of the floor, but he didn’t let him, directing him towards his bedroom with his hands.
Taekwoon’s place smelled like coffee always, it smelled like coffee more than anything else. But underneath it there was pine and mint and spicy warmth, all mixed up in the sweet freshness of the rain. It made Hongbin hum as he pressed his face into Taekwoon’s back, once they were in the bedroom and the door was closed and there was no worry that they would wake the sleeping architecture student from his afternoon slumber.
He nuzzled in between his shoulder blades, letting their bodies press together and he could feel Taekwoon relax in his hands. It was like he let out a breath that he had been holding, or his muscles all relaxed at once, ridding themselves of their tenseness. It made Hongbin shiver and he nuzzled deeper, breathing in, until he was sure that he would never be able forget the smell of the taller man.
“Hakyeon won’t be back from work… for another hour.”
Taekwoon’s voice was soft, so much softer than it had been at the train station and the inflection, the way he said it had Hongbin’s lips curving up at the corners. It was a question, a suggestion that made Hongbin’s stomach clench and roll over on itself. He shivered, his hands slipping up under Taekwoon’s shirt, Taekwoon’s hands following behind them. He felt him and heard him let out another shaky breath.
They ended up in bed, socks and shirts discarded, but jeans still on. Hongbin was too impatient, too impatient to deal with buttons and zippers. He much preferred pushing his fingers down the front of Taekwoon’s jeans and making him rock his full hips into his hand. He looked so lost when Hongbin touched him, like he might just break, desperate to get what he wanted. His fingers had gone still between Hongbin’s legs, but it didn’t matter. It didn’t matter when his lips were trembling as they fell open, a breathy moan was making his adams apple bob.
In the other room, Jaehwan slept, unbothered by the sounds they were making. Rain pelted the windows, the sound of it covering everything and their mouths pushed together, swallowing each others moans. Then they lay, their limbs tangled and Hongbin listened to Taekwoon’s breathing and the sounds of the rain slowing and letting up. It couldn’t last forever, but he was glad that it lasted at least that long.
just a little forewarning, this is more of a character study on female sanghyuk than it is a het taekhyuk fic. my best friend came up with the name sanghye for her and i love it and so that's what she is called. if anyone is interested this song heavily influenced this fic
It was too hot to be walking down the train tracks today. The sun was high, close to noon time and the air was thick with humidity and the blaring hum of cicadas loud in her ears as her muddied converse kicked up stones underneath them. She had left before sunup, wanting to get down to the lake and trade with the campers before it got too late.
Now it was lazy afternoon, hot and sticky. But her backpack was heavy and therefore it didn’t bother her too much. It was too hot for walking, too hot for clothes too, though she was wearing almost nothing, just her bikini top and a pair of ratty shorts that did nothing to hide her skinny thighs. She knew her dad was going to kill her when he saw her, but it was too hot for her to care and she had known that that morning.
She was grateful now, for no shirt over her torso. The backpack on her back was enough to leave her skin soppy wet with sweat on her shoulders and down her spine. Her breathing came heavy as she plodded through the burnt up grass, trying to keep her arms away from her sides, lest they make her even hotter. She could hear a dog barking somewhere. Probably the farm dog in the property next to theirs. But she wasn’t concerned with it, instead focusing on her breathing. It felt too hard to catch a breath, the air too thick and disgustingly heavy every time she pulled it into her lungs.
She wanted nothing but to be back under the cool shade by the camp grounds, a cold coke bottle resting on the tops of one of her thighs as she half listened to some of the camp ghost stories that they were always passing around. She’d heard the same ones since she had started walking down here every summer. She knew all of the secrets behind them, but it she stayed quiet, laughing breathily through her nose at the parts that were so obvious.
They called her weird when she did that, but it was hilarious how stupid some of them could be.
A train horn blew way off and it made her head turn back over her shoulder, some of the lazy wind blowing strands of loose hair across her jaw. They stuck to it and her nose, the sweat making it want to stick to everything. There was no train though, just the tracks disappearing off into the woods, into the tunnel. She sighed anyway, moving and traipsing through some bushes to put some distance between her and the train, whenever it decided to come. It was a habit by now, because of the time she’d been standing too close and a rock had strayed, hitting her in the arm. She still had a scar from it.
It wasn’t any cooler away from the tracks and in the scraggly bushes though. The sun still beat down, hitting the tops of her shoulders and despite the smell of sunscreen still being thick on her skin, she knew her shoulders would smart with sunburn later on. It mattered little now, just a distant annoyance as her feet plodded through the scratchy grass.
Half an hour later, still following the broken path back towards her dad’s property, the train finally came. She could hear it before it was whooshing past her. She could hear the steady click of the wheels on the tracks and the horn echoing through the cleared out space of the tracks. It was no longer muffled by the trees behind them or the tunnel. The sun glinted off of the cars and then wind blew up around her as it slid smoothly past. It was a big freight train, the box cars trundling along behind a shiny new locomotive. She watched it as she walked, watched because just as quickly as it had come, it was already disappearing.
The sound of rocks hitting the cars made her flinch and she put more distance between her and the train, her eyes set on the cluster of trees that marked the beginning of her dad’s property.
—
When she woke up the next morning, the trees were full of crows, their black wings making the evergreens look slick and lumpy black with a thousand eyes. She remembered the first time she’d seen it, seen all of them staring down at her, cocking their heads and getting nervous around her. Her dad had never really been able to explain it, why they all came here to this spot. A resting place in migration maybe or the only adequate resting spot in the area. Sanghye preferred the idea that maybe they passed the location of this place down through their ancestry, and it had some kind of magical power that drew things to it.
It made sense. Injured animals seemed to gravitate to their house, even animals as big as wolves. People who were in need always showed up at the cabin door, banging so hard they might knock it down. Her dad wasn’t anything special, not a vet or a doctor, but he could fix people up and she was learning too. He had a short wave radio, a phone and tools to fix almost anything. So maybe it was less that this place was magical, and more that people and animals could sense that they could help.
Magical was the way Sanghye explained it when the crows filled up every inch of the trees.
She stepped outside, the dawn still clinging to everything, the summer morning air ice cold but bright sun shooting through the trees warning of a hot day ahead. It didn’t matter, Sanghye still shivered, pulling her hoodie closer to her body and staring up at the eyes of all of the birds above her. She tried her best crow impression, but their eyes seemed to look irritated then, which sent her into fits of breathless giggles. She abandoned them to find her dad instead, watching as his saw bit through a piece of pine. He was making chairs to sell in town. She said she’d put on a pot of coffee.
As the coffee brewed she leaned back against a chair, her long bare legs resting on the seat and her DS cradled in her hands. The Phantom Hourglass theme song echoed quietly in the confines of the cool cabin. The air conditioner - which her dad had only installed last summer when she threatened never to stay with him again - hummed in the corner, blowing cool air over the rest of the room and she considered turning it off, but it was better to keep it on before the sun started baking the trees.
It didn’t take long for the whole carafe to be filled and she poured herself a cup, watching as the steam billowed up from it and then staring out the window at the spiderwebs that stretched between the house and the porch railing. They were beautiful in the morning, sunlight glistening off of them. She always told her mom that it would have been better to just stay at home each summer. She missed wifi and her dog and civilization out here sometimes. But ultimately she would have missed her dad more if she didn’t come, and seeing things like morning dew glistening on spiderwebs in the sunlight was something she might have also missed as well. Or the sounds of the crickets at night, the magical crows and the cool lake breezes down at the camp.
Maybe she liked it here, a little bit.
—
The sun slid behind the towering trees around the cabin and Sanghye sat on the roof, her feet dangling off of it and her body resting idly near the chimney. It was still hot out, but not as much because the sun hit the trees more than anything else. A coolness came off of the shadows and Sanghye knew that here it was cooler than if she were to walk down to the train tracks and feel the heat coming up off of the baked ground.
It didn’t matter though, because she had a popsicle that she was sucking on idly, watching the birds shimmer and hunker down, gathering around to prepare for sleep. She had told herself that today she was going to try and draw them. Her art teacher wanted to see her draw something from one of these summer trips. But today hadn’t been the day. No today she had consumed 10 popsicles and her mouth felt numb and she was sure it was bright red, stained with dyes.
A cold drop from the candy ice dropped on her thigh and she jerked, making an indignant noise as she did. The crows rustled around, unsettled by a new noise in their environment. She ignored them, rubbing the cold, brightly colored liquid into the tops of her bruised up thighs. Lifting the popsicle up, she sucked on the bottom, hoping to stop it from dripping again. But she only ended up with a sugar dye mess all over her mouth. Not that it mattered, she’d be showering soon and then slipping into bed.
“Sanghye?” her dad called out of the door to the cabin below. “Dinner’s ready.” She bobbed her toes in response, starting to bite into her popsicle as she moved over and shimmied down the railing of the porch. Her long limbs made it pretty easy to get down, but she hissed when she slid a little bit, the wood biting into her palms. It wasn’t enough to leave a splinter. Her long messy hair flouncing around her shoulders and the tops of her sunburnt shoulders.
She could smell frying meat and she knew her dad would have made a fresh salad and suddenly the rest of her popsicle didn’t seem that appealing. She sucked it down though, leaning over as to avoid dripping on herself again. The cold sunk into her brain, making it ache as she crunched on the ice crystals.
—
The walk to the camp was so much shorter in the morning, when the sun hadn’t risen far enough yet to make things heat up. In fact it was nearly freezing and Sanghye contemplating keeping her sweatshirt on when she went. But her dad’s transistor radio had warned of a heat wave. Record highs to be recorded and it stressed that everyone heed heat safety warnings in order to avoid getting heat stroke.
Sanghye was sure it was a bit of an exaggeration. The weather reports always seemed to be. But still, she got up extra early and planned on coming home early as well. Only a couple of hours left to spend on the camp grounds. The boys had promised they’d let her use one of the canoes if she’d show them how to tie some complicated knot. Sanghye’s dad had taught her all of the knots and the boys would get a prize if they could do the knots correctly. It was kind of cheating, she’d be giving them the short way to do it, but she was okay with that if she got to paddle out onto the lake a little bit.
Some of the girls had also promised her some candy and asked if they could braid her hair, and she was more than okay with that as long as she could stay under the shade and email her mom. Her dad had a phone but she had always preferred writing emails. It was easier for her to put down all of her thoughts, rather than be asked a thousand unending questions which were drowning out all of her answers.
She shivered in her bikini top as she padded down the tracks, her beat up sneakers looking more beat up by the day. The sun licked the edge of the horizon, orange just starting to peek up into the blue. Some of the light touched the edge of the tall grass around her, and flecks of it flickered over her legs. It was still and quiet, besides the sounds of the crows behind her, and the sounds of other birds, calling out or calling back or just calling in the forest ahead.
It didn’t take her too long to get there, the walk always looked longer than it was. She entered through the back, where all of the boys and girls cabins were. In some of them she could still hear voices, people who had already come back from morning assembly. The sun was just starting to shine off of the lake through the trees and she straightened her back, tugging her backpack up a bit and setting her mouth into a line as she did.
“Sanghye’s here!” was the first welcome call, from one of the little towers that led up to the tops of the trees. The boys liked to call them watch towers, but really they were meant to educate about forest life in the canopy. She stopped, staring up to the top of one, her head tipped back and her eyes wide as she stared into the two pairs of binoculars staring down at her, a bit of a smirk pulling at the edge of her lips.
After that, they clamored down and some of the other boys were rushing out of their cabins, the girls peeking out the windows as she was led towards one of the old picnic tables in between the trees. All of the boys were already talking over each other, telling her that she had to teach them how to tie the knots. They were all her age, but most of them were just a little bit shorter than her. “Remember, canoe after!” she said emphatically, which was answered with a bunch of sloppy salutes.
Half an hour later she was demonstrating the knots for the 10th time, to a little group of the boys who were all looking very confused. There were two girls behind her, their fingers dragging through her long hair, tucking the unruly strands into messy braids. One of the boys was telling a joke and Sanghye followed loosely, her hands deftly working the rope, until the joke hit the punchline. He had been trying to be dirty, but it just sounded silly.
She let out a little snort through her nostrils, and then it turned into a full blown laugh. Her eyes crinkled at the edges, lips spreading to show all of her teeth. Sunlight glinted off her hair and she was oblivious to the fact that he thought she had enjoyed his joke, too busy thinking about much funnier ones as a breeze blew off of the lake.
—
It was late before she headed back, too late and she knew that her dad wouldn’t be pleased. The sun hadn’t quite set yet, but it never mattered. He’d give her that frown, that frown that said you don’t know what’s out there in those woods. But it didn’t stop her from staying just a little too late. It never scared her. She had a switch knife in her pocket and she wasn’t stupid. She knew how to keep herself safe.
The long spindly burnt up grass tickled her calves as she walked, her eyes scanning the horizon and every so often glancing back, back towards the trees and the darkness of the train tunnel. The night trains would be coming through soon, their horns sounding so much softer and more forlorn compared to the sharpness of the day trains. Her fingers curled around her backpack straps and the sun glinted off her hair as she made the turn and headed up into the grove that held her dad’s cabin.
She could feel her dad’s frown before she even opened the cabin door and it persisted through dinner, through cleaning up and through her changing into her pajamas. So when he decided that brooding in the corner was his course of action, she brewed herself some tea and retreated, retreated to the roof with her blanket, letting her DS charge for a while.
It was dark, the night thick between the trees but even so she could see over the short ones, over them and towards the track, towards the train tunnel. The steam of her tea billowed up in front of her nose and she took a slow, deliberate sip. It was hot, a contrast to the sharp cold of the forest at night. Such a strange thing to feel after the heat that had beat down on the camp until just before the sun crawled behind the side of the earth.
She saw the warm light of the night train amidst the blue of the night before she heard the wail of it’s horn. It turned the edges of the tunnel yellow green and then it trundled out, the solemn call of it filtering through the trees. Even from this far, she could hear the clicking of the tracks, the sound unmuffled by the noise of the day. She sipped her tea and watched the rest of the train crawl by, dark black against the navy of the night time. Then the tail lights appeared and dragged their way past the grove and on out towards the city, glowing warm against the cool night time.
“Come inside Sanghye.” Her dad’s voice filtered up from the cabin door and the warm light down below and she hummed in response, only taking the time to finish off the rest of her tea. She spent the night curled up in bed, the light from her DS lighting her face under the covers, the sound of the trains far away and softer now, mingling with the sounds from her game.
—
The morning came and the crows were back in the trees, their feathers rustling as she stepped out of the cabin into the foggy morning air and stretched her arms over her head, her mouth falling open in a gaping yawn. A couple of them made noises at her, but she ignored them, shivering and pulling her sweatshirt sleeves down over her hands as she went to check the temperature. It was cold, cooler than she had thought it was, but she knew that before long their little clearing would be baking with the morning sun.
“Coffee.”
Her dad’s voice filtered out from inside the cabin, and she turned back, heading in to get her cup. Another yawn split her mouth as she stumbled to the table and the two mugs, one a milky brown and the other all black. Her dad always remembered, no milk but plenty of sugar. Before she even finished her cup of coffee, she could feel the temperature rising, the sun starting to hit the house. Her sweatshirt came off as they ate scrambled eggs and it wasn’t long before she changed into shorts and was fanning herself with the book that she was supposed to be reading for school, her legs hanging off of the bed until her dad turned the air conditioner on.
It buzzed happily in the corner of the room and outside they could hear the birds calling, the restless summer wind rustling the tops of the trees and the buzz of cicadas somewhere far off. Sanghye didn’t know when it was, but at some point she laid her book on top of her face and drifted right to sleep. It was just dozing, slipping in and out of the hazy coolness of the air conditioner hitting her legs. And somewhere in it, she heard the train as it passed by, the horn blowing and the clack of the tracks.
But she wasn’t woken by that, no. She was woken by the sounds of someone calling. It was far off at first, drifty and distant. Then it got louder, a boy’s voice calling something out. She thought she was dreaming until she heard her dad move, his chair scraping on the floor as he got up. Her book fell off her face as she pushed herself up, eyebrows furrowing and her tangled hair tickling her back. She felt groggy and out of it, but alert as she saw a guy out the window moving towards the cabin, still calling out for help. He looked like he was limping.
Her dad was always wary. He was the type of guy who wanted to help anyone, everyone he could. But that didn’t mean he didn’t keep a knife close, didn’t mean he trusted blindly out here in the woods. It didn’t mean he opened the door until he realized that the man limping towards their cabin was nothing but a battered boy who had stupidly fallen off the train.
He was tall, long, a little taller than her dad, but bent over you couldn’t tell. He had a shock of messy black hair that hung in his eyes, eyes that showed all too much shame, and he was battered and bruised, but nothing was broken... hopeful.
Sanghye watched as her dad led him in, shoving her hands in her pockets and taking note of the way he limped. Probably a sprained ankle or a fracture from hitting the ground too hard. Or if he was lucky, just a big painful bruise. She doubted it. She chewed her lip as he explained that he had been planned on getting off the train before the tunnel. His voice was soft, softer than she had expected from the way he had been calling for help, and his cheeks burned red explaining what had happened, avoiding looking at either of them.
“You’re damn lucky.” Her dad murmured as he carefully started to remove the guys boot and sock, gingerly pulling them off. Sanghye grimaced when the boy winced and her dad exposed the red, purple and blue bruise over his ankle. He didn’t seem to want to look at it, and unexpectedly he looked up, looked up at her and they caught eyes.
She got a good look at his face then, soft angles and a red scrape down the side of his jaw. He had plush lips, cracked and reddened from biting them too much she assumed and he looked helpless, more helpless than she had ever seen anybody. She didn’t move, just sucked on her lower lip and stared for a good moment, then dropped her gaze down to his foot.
“You probably have a sprain, son.” Her dad finally said, and his tone was softer now, more gentle and apologetic. “If not a break.” He added on to the end and Sanghye caught the way the boy’s expression crumpled.
“I’m going to call ahead to the hospital and pull my truck up to the cabin, we need to get you to a doctor just to check it’s not broken.”
There was no response, just silence and then a little nod, so her dad left to do just that. He left the two of them in heavy silence in the small cabin. She shifted on her heels, glancing after her dad and then back at the boy in the chair, who was half hunched, pressing his palms into the chair he was sitting on. She frowned, studying his face, wondering if he was in pain.
“Do you want some pain killers or something?” She asked, her voice breaking the still silence and making his head jerk up, as though he was surprised. He stared at her for a short minute, the shame still obvious in his eyes and then he slowly nodded and started sucking at his lip too.
It was something to do, something better than standing there awkwardly as they waited for her dad to be ready. She took the liberty to slip on some shoes then, grabbing the pills and a glass of water. She didn’t mind staying at the house alone, but for some reason she felt compelled to tag along, if only to help.
He looked so helpless, taking the pills and water and avoiding her eyes. He reminded her of the foxes or wolves that would shy away from hands, despite the fact that they were so badly injured and weren’t fighting back. She watched him, watched him take the pills, watched him swallow and watched his lips part, sucking in a breath. Maybe it was silly, silly to be transfixed, but she was anyway.
He was stupid, a stupid kid who had taken a stupid risk. Better than being caught at a train yard she was sure. But stupid none the less. Cute stupid maybe. She couldn’t say it just yet - maybe he liked stupid movies or had bad taste in video games - but she found herself thinking it anyway.
She smiled to herself, taking the glass of water and turning to pour the rest out in the sink.
“Taekwoon… I’m Taekwoon.”
It was funny how his voice, so soft and quiet, fit him and yet didn’t all at the same time. Her smile grew as she poured the water out and set the glass next to the sink.
“Sanghye.” She offered as she turned back and he watched her with those shy eyes, still looking just a bit ashamed. And she watched him too, unabashedly, fingers pushed in her pockets, leaning on the counter. The room was quiet as they tried to figure each other out. Far off, the sound of a train horn filtered towards the cabin in the trees.
he was on his back, legs bent and spread, hand stuffed down the front of his boxers. it was obscene but he didn’t care at this point. his fingers gently rubbed at his balls, ignoring his cock which was pressed against the inside of his wrist. he couldn't stop thinking about hongbin kissing at hakyeon's neck, his tongue pushing against his skin. he couldn't stop thinking about the way hakyeon's fingers had looked pressed into hongbin's plush thighs. he couldn't stop thinking about it and his cock had been aching, hot and hard in his pants the entire time he had been watching and still, still was as it replayed in his head. his long thin fingers dragged up, curling around the base and his eyebrows furrowed, a low moan spilling from his throat as he thought about hongbin and hakyeon's mouths on the inside of his thighs, their tongues and teeth dragging over his skin, sucking and biting and kissing, while he did just this, touched himself here on his bed. his cock jerked in his hand and he brought the other one up, pushing it against his mouth and sinking his teeth into the skin to stop himself from moaning. then he thought about their mouths moving up, tongues dragging over his thick cock towards the head and he let out a muffled cry, groaning and digging his heels into the mattress, a little shudder running through him, his stomach tightening up as it did. he was going to come thinking about the two of them teasing him, thinking about the two of them making out over his cock, thinking about their hot breath so close to his dick.
The overcast morning, with all of it’s surreality was the world at it’s most magical. Or that’s what Hongbin thought. When the veil of night had just been pulled away, leaving dew droplets on the blades of grass and fog hanging dense in the bushes and over the concrete. Everything seemed so unreal. The flutter of birds in the trees, a lone fox standing in the yard, staring at you through the windows, a perfect spiders web in the doorway, not yet knocked down by the busy day time. It had all of the majesty of the night, but light filled every inch of it’s stillness, where darkness covered everything only hours before.
He kicked up fog as he walked, brain too busy for the last few hours of sleep he could have gotten, anxiety building up and leaving his brain ticking a mile a minute. He could have stayed in his room, laying in his bed and thought about the day, but he found himself outside, wandering aimlessly in the midst of the early morning. House lights were still on even though the darkness had gone. The wind blowing through was fresh with salt, with the bite of the sea, so much so that he could almost feel the waves touching his cheeks. But it was only the crisp morning air, before the sun pulled itself from behind the clouds and warmed up the earth.
He told himself, he planned to go walk down by the docks, or by the cliffs so he could see the waves and listen to foghorns echoing back at each other down in the bay. He told himself that maybe he’d go to the corner store, see if they were even open this morning and buy himself a coffee and a bagel, watching their small town come to life. He didn’t end up there. He ended up in front of house number 104, standing in the street staring at it as it slumbered. It was one of those houses that was nothing special, but Hongbin knew every inch of it, inside and out, as though he was the one who had lived in it all of his life.
He reached into his back pocket, fishing into it for his phone, and pulling it out. He’d learned the hard way not to throw stones at windows, no matter how small they were. Breaking windows tended to set off house alarms and he’d never forget the look on Jaehwan’s parents faces when they stumbled out of their house at 5 in the morning. Nor could he forget how much he had wanted to run all the way to the cliffs and jump right off of them. But Jaehwan’s laughing face next to the hole in his window had eased it.
It took four tries before Jaehwan picked up, and Hongbin chewed on his lips the entire time.
“Mmnng…”
“Come let me in.”
“Mh—Hongbin?”
“I’m outside.”
“Mhn—hn.”
With sleepy eyes and messy hair, looking as though he had just crawled out of hibernation, Jaehwan met him at the door. Hongbin waited, standing on the stoop, listening to the way the stairs creaked. The security system made a couple of muffled beeps and then finally the door opened with only minimal protest, heavy with the slight humidity in the air. For a minute, there was just the screen door between them and Jaehwan looked as small as the first day they had met.
Just as small as that first meeting and just as small as the first time he had curled their fingers together. So bold and yet terrified of it all. Hongbin had always been the other half of that. Too cowardly to touch first, but the one to confirm, the one to surge forward when given even the slightest nudge.
A smile dimpled his cheeks as Jaehwan fumbled with the latch of the door and one of the neighborhood dogs started barking at something. Maybe them. Maybe a squirrel. It didn’t matter, because soon Hongbin was crossing the threshold, into Jaehwan’s house, bumping into Jaehwan lightly. The older man was silent, still half dead to the world but he took the bumping as an invitation, leaning on his shoulder and arm, nuzzling into his neck.
It made Hongbin’s eyes droop as he closed the door as gently as he could behind him. Then it was up the stairs like ghosts, or like the fog outside in the streets, silently ascending until Hongbin could shoulder his way into Jaehwan’s room.
It was messy, as it always was, Jaehwan’s scent heavy on the air and the familiarity fit against Hongbin like it always did. He had never really believed in places that weren’t your home feeling like home, not until he realized that this room had become just that. His eyes dragged over the bedsheet and comforter, half dragged onto the floor. But he couldn’t do much about it, not when Jaehwan’s fingers found their way under his shirt and it felt like his sleepy heaviness was fogging up Hongbin’s brain.
Hongbin found his mouth melting into the salty musk of Jaehwan’s thick lips before they even found the bed. Jaehwan always crashed over Hongbin like the sea on the cliffs. Despite all of the haziness, coming from the heat of Jaehwan’s body and the strangeness of the morning, Hongbin’s need burned like a fire in his stomach. Jaehwan did one little thing, those fingertips nudging against his bare skin and it tugged at the core of him, letting loose something desperate.
He was slow, but his mouth was hungry, pushing against Jaehwan’s lips and licking between them. For that simple touch, his fingers responded by gently tugging, tugging Jaehwan’s shirt up, tugging it over his head with only a slow second when their mouths were parted. Jaehwan still seemed so syrupy, as though he was still half lost in a dream. But despite that, his lips were still pulled up at one corner, like he was pleased, pleased to know just what he did to him. Hongbin could taste it on his lips.
He sunk his teeth into his lips, just to pull a breathy moan from his throat.
They met the bed and Hongbin wasn’t even sure how they fell so gently, how their bodies shifted and slotted right together. But he wouldn’t complain, he couldn’t, not when he was the victim of Jaehwan’s thighs spreading, of his fingers sinking into his back, of his sleepy slow kisses you could get drunk off of. There was too much clothing between them even with the tug of Jaehwan’s fingers exposing his stomach so their skin could press together. They gasped together, gasped for air, gasped for more and Hongbin’s fingers started working the last of what was between them out of the way.
Hongbin remembered the first time they bought lube together. Jaehwan’s smile had been cheek to cheek while his face and neck were so hot he could have sworn they were on fire. It wasn’t this bottle, with the blue cap, it was a different one, small and red and the woman at the till had glared holes through them. The look on Jaehwan’s face underneath him when they had used it for the first time that night, his heavy lidded expression, was the same as his expression now. Hongbin may have flushed down his neck, but Jaehwan flushed on his cheeks, a ruddy red like when he was sick. His long eyelashes drooped, his teeth sunk into his lower lip, his body opening up to Hongbin’s slick fingers. Hongbin could have sworn he forgot how to breathe.
He almost did now, sinking his fingers all the way inside him, kissing at the bridge of his nose and pulling back just as Jaehwan’s breath caught. He wanted to watch, watch him come undone, watch him fall apart. And he did. The turn of his head, the shudder of his lower lip, the furrow of his brow. All of it wrapped up in the slick heat inside him, sucking Hongbin’s fingers in. It tugged at the bottom of his stomach, pressure building and his fluttering eyelids stole a few moments from him.
Jaehwan’s fingers pressed into his back hard enough to break the skin when finally…. finally Hongbin pushed up against him. The blunt head of his cock just brushing and then dragging over his hole. It tugged at him again and Hongbin heard himself gasp as that shock ran through him. Jaehwan was steady but just as needy under him. He found those lips again, thick and full, letting Jaehwan’s tongue push into his mouth as he started to push inside him.
And then they both forgot everything. Or Hongbin felt like they did, from the way their mouths fell slack. The tightness blinded him and the heat burned straight through him, hips rocking in shaky thrusts until he was all the way in. Jaehwan said his name against his lips but he felt it through his whole body, felt the tightening of his muscles and then the way they relaxed, all mixed up in their shared moans.
Just like the first time, Hongbin fucked into him until Jaehwan’s fingers were tugging at his hair, until their bodies were slick and hot, still half caught in clothing. Until Jaehwan came, sticky and wet up the front of his shirt, and until all of that tugging pressure built and broke and Hongbin came inside him, curling his fingers in the sheets as his arms shook, their foreheads resting together.
When he slipped out, Jaehwan’s fingers relaxed but stayed, splayed across his back, and finally Hongbin felt his body giving him permission to get those last few hours of sleep. Outside the sun was just starting to shine through the clouds, the fog lifting from the world, leaving behind nothing but ordinary day time. But Jaehwan’s curtains were thick and it didn’t matter at all.
