sgnjongin:
the long way home
jongin is not surprised easily by the people he keeps around him, especially when he’s known them for so long that he’s seen them walk through most of life’s stages by now, but sehun has truly shocked him with this little admittance. and it sounds like the honest truth as well, which is also something new for their friendship, nothing teeming or sly about the idea of him not getting any action on this trip. sehun is a low-effort kind of guy when it comes to most things, but he always manages to hook and reel people in with that sort of technique– there must be some great gravitational force keeping him on a narrow bridge like that.
“really?” jongin asks, not bothering to mask his feelings through his tone, his eyes scanning across sehun’s features as though he could read them, a slow grin spreading across his own lips. “no no, i didn’t fuck anybody on this trip, unless you count fucking people over.” he chuckles, glancing out the window as the bus finally begins rolling out of the parking lot and heading down the road. “yoori asked me not to, said it would cause too big a scandal, even for me.” he shrugs. “i didn’t feel like arguing or proving her wrong, so.” but then he returns his gaze back to sehun, lowering his voice. “what’s with you lately though? what’s your excuse?” either of them neglecting to engage in promiscuous behavior is odd enough, but both of them at the same time? it’s practically unheard of.
jongin’s admission is just as shocking as sehun’s probably was for him, and he’s hit with such a sheer disbelief that it renders him immobile and speechless for a few moments before a loud laughter erupts from his lips, uncharacteristic for him for sure, but certainly not unheard of. he can think of a few people who would never believe him if he told them such a thing had transpired, and more than a handful of them are from cinth. “wait til the boys hear about this one,” he says as his laughter dies down, though there’s no reason they would. there’s an unspoken rule between the two of them that “secrets” like these don’t go beyond their little circle, if you can even call it that. it’s more of a line than any other shape, but it’s a line with a solid foundation that’s hard to break, even if lines things like loyalty have never been a part of his vocabulary.
“just...going through some shit. same old,” he responds to the question asked of him, giving jongin the honesty he so rarely affords others, even if it is veiled in ambiguity. he expected jongin to notice the change in his behavior, and yet he’d still found no real explanation to give him when he isn’t really quite sure of the whole truth himself. usually, he’s not so keen on sharing details about himself, and his past, especially when it comes to his mother, but he’d been holding all of it in so long that he needs to let it out even in his roundabout manner, and jongin has been a part of his life for long enough that he doesn’t feel as vulnerable. “i had an encounter with a ghost,” he says, that feeling of almost finding his mother only to have his hopes slip right through his fingertips suddenly becoming just as vivid as it had been back then. “that’s the kind of thing that’ll shake anybody up.”












