Chapter Text
- FINAL ROUND -
The show must go on.
“There are only four people left in the competition including you,” Jaemin says when Donghyuck makes it to the shooting venue the next day, doesn’t even offer a good morning. “For the final, we’re gonna have two 1vs1 battles. The two winners will face off that same night.”
Cameras on his face since 6 in the morning, Donghyuck screws his dry eyes closed and rubs his fingers against the piercing needles on his temples. He flops down into the couch with a groan, feet screeching over the shiny parquet floor of the practice room when he stretches out his legs. Head lolling against the backrest, he opens his eyes again and stares at the light bulbs squint-eyed, throb-headed, sore everywhere in his blue hangover.
Jaemin’s fingers sting like a punch when he pats Donghyuck’s shoulder. “Are you with me? You’ve been distracted lately.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Donghyuk quivers forward, blinks unfocused eyes until he can properly zoom in on Jaemin’s face, pinched in professional concern. “’M just tired.”
“Well, we’ve got no time to be tired. The final is in two weeks, got it?” Jaemin clutches his knee hard, jerks his hand until Donghyuck’s numb leg burst into a knife-sharp tingle. “It’s the last push, Haechan. Stay with me, yeah?”
No remnants of blue on his expression, Jaemin gets up with a firm clap of his hands that has Donghyuck wincing. He moves around the room like last night has not happened, the lack of a smile as the only hint of Mark and Mina’s absence. Donghyuck guesses it comes with the job, knowing how to keep it together even when a stab hits soft and personal.
Taeyong warned Donghyuck about this, the day he signed up for the auditions.
“Sometimes, it’s gonna feel like playing a losing game,” he’d say over the rumble of the closing gate, painting shadows across the tiled floor of the ice cream parlor. “Even when you win.”
“I know what I’m getting myself into, hyung.”
Donghyuck’s done his homework, but not even 5 years could prepare him for this: an empty practice room, Jaemin’s smile turned upside-down, Yangyang’s smiling face against a whiteboard, Donghyuck’s own picture frowning next to him, a ‘ vs ’ drawn in black between them.
It’s yet one more loss, no matter the outcome of the unbattled battle.
---
“This is not a combat, Donghyuck-ah. It’s a competition.”
“That’s the same thing, hyung.”
“It’s not about winning, it’s about how you win.”
“You gotta end up winning either way. Pretty or not. Otherwise, what’s the fucking point?”
---
Call it what you want.
At the end of the day, Donghyuck’s gonna have to rip up his best friend’s throat on live television, like it or not.
“Will you give me freestyling lessons?” Yangyang asks as he leans against the closed back door of yet another Hongdae club, beer dribbling down his chin and dripping onto his sweaty shirt. “Or you could tweak my lyrics a tiny bit. Whatever suits you, man.”
The bass plays loud and low inside, the door rumbles like a groan under Donghyuck’s palm when he presses an open hand next to Yangyang’s alcohol-flushed face. “As if you need it,” he chuckles, bending down to swirl his tongue around the mouth of the bottle in Yangyang’s hand. “Don’t be a fucking asshole.”
The bottle shakes with Yangyang when he burst into giggles, clanking against Donghyuck’s teeth awkwardly. “You’ve been weirdly mushy lately,” Yangyang reaches for the back of Donghyuck’s head with his free hand. He grips the short hair athis nape to keep him steady and forces alcohol down his throat. “I had to ask.”
Donghyuck drinks with closed eyes and a stuffed nose, head thrown back until his Adam’s apple starts to ache. He pushes Yangyang away with a slap, coughing into his own skin as he wipes his sticky mouth with the back of his hand.
“So, so mushy,” Yangyang coos when Donghyuck flops against the door beside him, his head dropping onto Yangyang’s shoulder. “You won’t go all soft against me, right?”
Donghyuck will rip up his best friend’s throat on live television, like it or not. If he has to, he will drown his least speck of decency with alcohol and force himself to not feel bad about it.
“I’ve spent years waiting for this,” he says, head rolling on Yangyang’s shoulder so he can bite into the sweat-salty skin of his neck. Yangyang bounces away with a yelp, spills beer on the cobblestones, on their shoes, all over their shirts. “I won’t make any exceptions, Yang. I’m gonna eat you up.”
Tattooed fingers drenched in beer, Yangyang sticks his hand between the door and Donghyuck. He thumbs at the hollow of his nape to bring their foreheads together, whispers alcohol-wet in Donghyuck’s face, “That’s my boy,” before his features break into that face-splitting smile of his.
---
It takes Mark Lee going missing for Donghyuck to realize that, in hindsight, they’ve never had anything. Not in a way that counted, at least.
Three days of lonely practice hours and Mark never shows up to claim the wooden bench at the back of the room, because nothing about this competition belongs to him anymore.
Like every other razor-pretty idol that’s ever stuck his nose in underground turf, he tied experience and knowledge to his back and closed the door to never come back. Donghyuck can’t even chase after him because Mark hasn’t left anything behind. No address, no phone number, no plastic wrappers or half-eaten energy bars.
“Stop spacing out, Haechan. You’ve been stuck on the second verse for three whole days. Have you forgotten how to hold a pen?”
Jaemin scolds him like Donghyuck’s a petulant child, condescension trickling down every syllable because his experienced tongue knows too well how to play big egos.
He clasps his hands on Donghyuck’s shoulders, shakes him rough to snaps him out of it, and hisses in his ear, “You miss him? Go find him at SM. But stop daydreaming during shooting hours if you don’t want me to embarrass you on camera.”
Donghyuck doesn’t miss him, he simply thinks he deserves more than radio silence and double-edged memories.
---
Who would’ve told him?
Donghyuck spent months trying to scare Mark away from his streets. Now, he stands in front of a multimillionaire human-toys manufacturer, determined to drag him out and down with him.
The new SM Entertainment headquarters look like a mirror-built jail, a building so tall that you can’t even read the name of the company stamped at the top. It stands firm and proud, stabs the night sky with its million tiny windows turned golden, and makes the trees of Soul Forest look insignificant next to it.
Only money could afford to stand in a place like this—surrounded by the clear water of the Han river, fabricated roots sharing soil with the pretty vegetation of the park.
It ruins the image, Donghyuck thinks as he watches the doors from across the street. He’s leaning back on a billboard wall that advertises parking places for 4.000₩ in the city center, his black hoodie getting white-stained by dried glue, snapback on to avoid the obnoxious red LEDs of the Art Center sign.
“Hey. You’re Donghyuck, right?”
Donghyuck turns around at the call to find Mark’s friends looking at him with matching flushed cheeks. They’ve got their practice bags hanging from their shoulders, their hair damp with sweat, or maybe water from a recent shower.
“It’s Haechan for you,” he points out, looking at them from underneath his cap. “I’d even say it’s Haechan hyung.”
“He knows it’s Haechan,” Renjun digs an elbow into Chenle’s stomach, earning him a giggle instead of the complaint he was probably aiming for. “He watches the program every week, being annoying is just his favorite hobby.”
Pursing his lips together, Donghyuck grabs at the handles of his scooter to stand on his tiptoes. “Where the hell did you two even come from? I was watching-”
“There are more doors than that one, dude,” Chenle dolphin-laughs, stepping closer to clap Donghyuck on the shoulder and dust the white powder off his hoodie. “Have you seen how big this place is?”
Donghyuck stumbles backward and pulls his arm out of Chenle’s grasp, looking around in search of two familiar twinkling eyes. “It’s hyung, not dude.”
“He doesn’t care about honorifics. The sooner you accept it, the better,” Renjun says, twisting his ash-stained hand into the strap of Chenle’s bag to keep him by his side. Donghyuck has nothing to accept, though—it’s not like he’s planning to keep these two, he’s got more than enough with one pretty idol boy. “Mark’s not here, by the way.”
“Where can I find him?” Donghyuck keeps expectant eyes on them as he steps on his scooter, heel pressed to the kickstand and ready to set off. “Give me an address or something.”
Chenle drops his head on Renjun’s shoulder with a loud whine, rubs his forehead on the fabric of his t-shirt, and complains as if Donghyuck isn’t standing right in front of him. “He’s just as dry as the first day, Jun. Can’t even say ‘please’.”
Huffing through his nose, Donghyuck digs teeth into his lower lip to stop himself from biting, hands tight around the rubber handles of the scooter. “Could you please give me Mark’s address?”
“That depends,” Chenle smiles lazy and wide, a shamelessness that shouldn’t look cute on the face of a polite, pretty idol boy. “What are your intentions with my son?”
“What the fuck.”
---
Mark Lee lives on the top floor of an apartment building with no elevator.
He’s is waiting in the foyer when Donghyuck finally makes it up there—sweaty on the forehead and between his arms, shirt sticking to the small of his back underneath his hoodie. Mark is half-hidden by the wood, ringless fingers curled around the edge of the door, pink hair covered by a gray hood, his pale, hairy legs exposed by knee-long sweats.
“I didn’t know you used glasses,” Donghyuck says as a greeting, breathless after twelve flights of stairs. “Nice to see you don’t always look like a robot. You just look like a nerd now.”
The door creaks loudly when Mark lets go of it to push the thick black rim of his glasses up the slope of his proper, thin hawk nose. “What are you doing here?” he asks gravel-rough and tear-stuffed, bare face scrunching up when he sniffs.
“You see, I just met up with your dad,” Donghyuck comments as he leans against the stair rail to keep his distance. He checks his bitten nails casually when Mark pulls a confused grimace, both eyes and mouth open like compass-perfect circles. “Chenle, isn’t it? Made me promise I wouldn’t break your heart. Otherwise, he wouldn’t give me your address.”
Mark finally pushes the door open completely and steps on the spiky welcome mat with ragged blue socks, his left big toe peeking out of the frayed thread. “What’d you need my address for?”
“Your friends said you’ve been weird lately,” Donghyuck says as he walks closer, tangling his fingers in the plastic bag he’s holding. “Said you haven’t been around lately. You’ve stopped training.”
“Your deflecting tactics are really weak and obvious, did you know that?” Mark crosses his arms over his chest and hooks his bony ankles together. He leans against the doorframe, his head falling on the wood with a soft thud. When he closes his eyes, head tilted upward into the homey yellow light of the old, dust-scented landing, the bags under his eyes stick out like fresh-punch bruises. “I’ve stopped training ‘cause they haven’t called me back. Our CEO, he- He told me to focus on the competition, like, two weeks ago. I haven’t heard from them since.”
“So they didn’t kick you out,” Donghyuck tests, the plastic bag rustling in their shared silence when he knees at it. “They are just taking a while to get back to you.”
And Donghyuck has never seen Mark smile like this before, so small and defeated that the word barely suits the curve of his mouth.
“I’ve seen this before, though,” he says, coughing when his words fade toward the end of the sentence. “A million times, actually. Trainees walking out the door one day just to never show up again. Even after years of practicing together.”
Donghyuck’s no expert on goodbyes, but he can’t take a drag without thinking of Mina and regretting the fact that they never exchanged numbers, never talked deeper than rhymes and rhythm. It’s not even been a week, but he knows he’ll miss her ‘till the last day of filming and beyond.
Nothing ties stronger than shared sweat and art, and Donghyuck wouldn’t be able to hug Mina goodbye more than once.
If there’s a lesson on how to comfort people, Donghyuck must’ve skipped it when he was growing up. After all, he spent his childhood walking away from his parents, his teenhood running away from his teachers, and his present hiding away between words.
He’s got careless hands—bitten nails serrated like the edge of a slicing knife, street-dirt gathering between flesh and keratin, a crooked pinkie out of a clumsiness he’s never outgrown. He needs a pen between his calloused fingers to deal with his own emotions, he’s got no soft palms to pamper someone else’s sadness.
What he does have, though, is experience patching up wounds with messy band-aids and cheap Betadine.
“I don’t know if fancy idols like you know this,” he says as he rummages through his plastic bag, rugged fingers wrapping themselves around a cardboard box. “But dyeing your hair is the best way to cheer up. So let me in, pretty boy.”
Mark grimaces, squints at Donghyuck over the rim of his glasses, grumbles I don’t trust you under his breath. He steps aside anyway, all pink cheeks and a smile.
No one masters the art of stealing better than poster-perfect idols, Donghyuck’s got his fair share of experience. He will allow Mark to take his breath tonight, just this once.
---
Maybe the worst isn’t the light, but the noise of a lived-in place.
Mark’s place smells rusty and humid. Dampness lingers in the air like it’s been settled down there since forever, clings to your body when you make your way through the scattered shoes on the hallway and the wet clothes hanging in the middle of the living room. The walls are washed yellow by nicotine stains, and the bitter smell of smoke tickles your nose even in the tiny, brick-made balcony. There’s only one bathroom, locker-room-scented and dripping moisture down the corners, ceiling creased and bumpy with impending leaks.
The lighting, misplaced light bulbs hanging from grandma-styled lamps that flicker every half a second. The ones that don’t flicker are forever off, dead inside.
Mark shares a messy room with Renjun—two single beds with rumpled sheets and breadcrumbs that take up all the space between the four white chipped walls. The light bulb is right on top of his mattress, lie down staring at the ceiling and you’ll get blinded by harsh, violent white.
Donghyuck is kneeling on Mark’s tangled blankets, fingers running through damp just-bleached strands of hair as he holds onto a blue-coated brush. The door is closed, but the loud voices coming from the busy living room bounce on the flaking walls anyway, filling up the small room with uninvited, invisible company.
This place’s got nothing to do with Donghyuck’s one-piece apartment in Hongdae. Just as musty, slightly dustier, definitely darker, the silence that lives between Donghyuck’s walls is the kind that doesn’t hide, impossible to turn down. It seeps through his skin and settles in his head, blasting loneliness on speakers he can’t even afford. He doesn’t even have a TV to turn on and muffled the sound.
Kneeling on breadcrumbs, itchy-nosed by the humid air, Donghyuck still finds things to envy about Mark, no matter how bad he has it. He stands there, old springs creaking under his weight, stuck between wanting to steal from Mark, wanting to replace him, and wanting to glue himself to him.
“My scalp is burning up, Hyuck. You bought the cheapest bleach you could find, didn’t you?” Mark complains, turning his head to the side to stare at his sideburns in the dirty mirror he’s got between his ringless hands. “I was gonna say my hair’s probably going to fall off and the company will get mad at me. But it’s not like they want me anymore.”
Donghyuck fists his left hand into Mark’s golden-blond locks, uneven nails dragging across his scalp. He watches as Mark’s reflection scrunches up his nose in the mirror, his glasses sliding down the slope, but he doesn’t complain.
“Who cares if they don’t want you?” Donghyuck presses the tip of the brush to Mark’s hair for the first time, turning golden into dark blue. “You’re gonna look hot as fuck. They can go to hell. I’ll want you.”
The towel around Mark’s shoulders slips down his arms when he giggles, hollow-eyed and hollow-cheeked, dry lips cracking up by the length of his smile.
“Will you?” he asks once he stops shaking, tugging at the towel to drape it around himself properly. He shifts the mirror in his hands until he can look at Donghyuck through the reflection. Donghyuck catches his eyes through glass, and Mark coughs dryly when his ears go a tender shade of pink that would’ve matched his past hair color. “Break my heart, I mean. Will you?”
Thing is, Donghyuck misses the days he didn’t know Mark had a heart to break. Back when he only wanted to shove him into shape, get his dirty hands all over Mark’s ego until it came undone between his fingers.
“I guess you gotta keep me around to find out.”
---
That night is a nightmare night.
Donghyuck stands backstage and chokes on glittery golden confetti, watching a featureless face take all the glory on billboard-big screens. A nameless person steals his prize right from between Donghyuck’s greedy fingers and leaves nothing behind but a tiny, paperboard rectangle with Jaemin’s name scribbled in dark blue letters. The card cuts through Donghyuck’s rough skin like busted glass, dripping ink inside of his body.
His screeching alarm jolts him awake in a bedroom that isn’t his, body wrapped up in yesterday’s clothes. He rises earlier than the sun, squints in the dimmed air of the room, eyes lingering on the sleeping body next to him.
There are blue stains on the pillow, blue stains on the bedsheets, blue stains on the bundled-up towel that has drifted to the floor in the middle of the night.
Donghyuck steps out of the room in ghost-quiet tiptoes, stares at himself dry-mouthed on the toothpaste-stained mirror of a tiny bathroom. He touches damp fingers to the blue splotches on his chest, dye smeared all over the white cotton of his shirt, and he leaves before anyone else wakes up.
---
Role reversal:
Donghyuck practices until the sky goes midnight-black and his throat turns sandpaper-rough. His dry tongue sticks to the pasty roof of his mouth like superglue and it hurts to yawn, but he’s still getting tongue-tripped past his second verse, so it’s not enough.
Mark sneaks inside and nestles on the wooden bench at the back of the room because he’s always had good connections and Jaemin in the palm of his hand. He carries a school bag with a broken zipper full of sweating Powerade bottles and half-melted Dr.You energy bars. And he always, always drags Donghyuck out at 1 am sharp, candy and ice cream on his mind.
“You need to loosen up, dude,” he smiles, slushie-blue-tinted teeth that match the new color of his hair.
He forces Donghyuck down on the far-right corner of the ice cream parlor, pays for frozen strawberry, and kicks his shin under the table whenever Donghyuck tries to join his boys in conversation.
“A Haechan that doesn’t talk,” Yangyang says, slouched down like a reflection of Donghyuck through a tarnished mirror—voice half as strained but face just as pale. “I’ve never known peace like this!”
And Donghyuck scowls and swallows down his bitter comeback with his ice cream, middle finger up in the air because you gotta take care of that throat, Hyuck. Don’t act dumb, you’re all hoarse. I thought you wanted to get rich? Then keep your mouth shut, yeah?
---
Mark’s got eyes like a snake bite.
Donghyuck should’ve known he was doomed at first glance, when Mark naive-tilted his head at him but still talked back. Now, he’s got a pretty idol boy attached by the neck, the kind of venomous you can never wash off even though Mark is never close enough to sink teeth.
Shame twisting in his guts like cheap alcohol, Donghyuck pushed the door to his house wide open. He’s learning to live through a stomachache so they can do normal.
Normal, at least in his friends’ words.
Donghyuck’s definition of normal is a tongue down his throat so he can’t blurt out sentimental-dumb shit, and a dry hand down his pants so he’s too light-headed to link words together. Shotgunning shared beers after a sweat-soaking gig, shotgunning shared blunts after a no-words scooter drive by the river, communicating through their hips ‘cause pleasure can never say the wrong thing at the wrong time—that’s normal in Donghyuck’s poet brain.
The Mark-labeled box in Donghyuck’s head has grown two twins and they are all soft at the bottom, one useless, candy-sweet fact away from overflowing.
Mark likes to lie down on the left side of Donghyuck’s single bed, blanket up to his knees because it’s too warm to drape it all the way up, but he likes the softness of the thread over his naked skin. He’s stopped counting calories, drinks soda from the bottle, and lives with blue bubblegum under his tongue. Sports anime is his favorite because it’s all about teamwork, Hyuck, and he gets sad-pale and teary-eyed when he realizes he’s losing count of the days it’s been since the last time he’s experienced firsthand teamwork. They watch Haikyū!! until Donghyuck’s alarm goes off, Mark roots for every team with blue uniforms because of course, and Donghyuck never, ever speaks.
They haven’t kissed since the staircase and Donghyuck’s got permanent jelly knees and a time bomb ticking in his chest, half-stiff between his legs almost every day.
“I should take you out on a date,” Mark mumbles into Donghyuck’s goosebump-rough neck during the dead-silent hours of the night. The laptop screen dances sick, blueish shadows around the room. “We’re doing everything backward.”
He has a pale, hairy leg between Donghyuck’s, rubs his bony knee up and down Donghyuck’s thigh nice and slow, but never goes high enough to matter.
Donghyuck curls a fist into the straw-bleached hair of Mark’s nape, throat rumbling when he tries to say, you pay for my ice cream every night.
Mark shushes him, lips gliding over his Adam’s apple, never once kissing. “Don’t talk. You had it worst today. Final’s five days away, be patient.”
A snake bite for eyes, Mark looks at Donghyuck flushed on the face, twinkling eyes piercing through his skull as if he’s trying to steal something important. Donghyuck isn’t even sure if there’s anything else left to steal.
He wonders what’s normal about a bursting heart and poison through the veins.
---
The worst part is the lighting in the tiny storage room of the ice cream parlor.
This small light bulb hangs from a single long, thin cable born in the dirty-grey ceiling. It dangles way too close to Taeyong’s bleached-blond hair, swings sideways like a pendulum, splashing new moving shadows on the wall-tall shelves with each second that goes by.
Stuck-out cheekbones cast dark triangles on Taeyong’s pale face when he sucks in his cheeks, fingers ricocheting on a box of pastry cones. “I’ll try to make it, Donghyuck-ah.”
Donghyuck sticks his tongue into his cheek, eyes rolling in its sockets before they focus on the swinging light. “You said the same thing last week and you didn’t show up.”
“Well, I’m busy!” Taeyong’s fingers halt, hand flat against the closed lid of the box. “Some of us have work, alright?”
“Don’t patronize me, hyung. If you can’t come just fucking tell me. Don’t lie to me and say you’ll try, ‘cause I’ll actually wait for you.”
And when did music fall second place to Taeyong?
Taeyong, who used to bleed poetry, sweat for art. Working shitty part-time jobs just to keep his studio running, he used to carry a pen behind his ear and a notebook on the back pocket of his worn-out cargo pants.
The worst part is the light, illuminating a mirage in melancholic white.
“I’m sorry, Donghyuck. You know I would if I-”
“It’s one fucking night,” Donghyuck cuts him off, voice rough like grit. He walks backward to slip out of the storage room, the dancing shadows closing up on him like the faceless thieves that keep stealing his nightmares. “I thought you’d make an effort for one fucking night. But it’s okay, it’s whatever.”
It’s not like Donghyuck is doing this for Taeyong over himself. It’s not like it’s always been for and about Taeyong. It’s not like Taeyong asked him to go hoarse and raw for him, that’s on Donghyuck and no one else.
He owes too many things to ask for refunds.
Five years ago, Donghyuck wanted nothing but to look at himself in the mirror and see Taeyong instead. Today, he closes the door on a mirage and tells himself that, no matter how he goes down, it won’t be passionless.
---
They eat strawberry ice cream and drink blue slushie sitting on the stone steps in front of Taeyong’s ice cream parlor because Donghyuck is petty and dirty like that. Only good at poorly patching up other people’s hurt, an expert at digging fingers into his own wounds.
Mark pushes his chewed-on plastic straw past Donghyuck’s lips, fingertips wet and cold-red around the cup, and promises, “I’ll be there.”
Eyes drifting shut when the frozen blue burns down his throat, Donghyuck thinks back to his 15-year-old self. Angry at the world like every other teenager, he avoided everything that had to do with the program for two whole years, and he didn’t even own that loss.
“You don’t have to,” he says, in a whisper just so Mark won’t shush him, the straw still tucked into his cheek.
Mark blinks snake-bite eyes at him, smiles poison-blue and sugar-sweet. “I will be there.”
Razor-pretty idol boys, they steal and steal and steal. Listen to them once and they will swallow your heart.
Donghyuck isn’t so sure he wants Mark to spit it out.
---
The night before the final, in the darkness of Donghyuck’s bedroom, Mark’s name shines eye-sore-bright on the screen of his phone.
When Donghyuck picks up, Mark is soft-tongued and clumsy-worded at the other side of the line. He stutters just like he used to do when they first met, back when Donghyuck’s eyes on him got him nervous and amateur-clunky.
“I know it’s not- Like, it’s not the best moment to talk about this, but-”
Donghyuck rolls in bed and groans, raspy and low in his tender throat. “Spit it out already.”
“We’re gonna debut,” Mark says in a rush, syllables bumping into each other. “They called me earlier today. I didn’t wanna tell you anything yet because I didn’t want to distract you, but I couldn’t- I can’t- Hyuck, I’m gonna debut.”
Sitting up on his creaky mattress, blankets pooled around his hips, Donghyuck stares into the darkness and waits for the envy to make its powerful entrance.
He waits still and quiet, phone pressed to his face so hard that his ear is going numb. Donghyuck twists his free hand into his blanket and digs nails into thread, teeth gritted together so the punch won’t hurt that bad.
But it never comes.
The familiar burn of ring-full fingers biting cold and hard into his jaw never comes. He waits and waits and waits for the dirt in his mouth, the busted glass in his lungs, the ache in his gut. Waits for the unfair and undeserved emptiness he’s been carrying around in his fake, puffed-out chest for years, but Donghyuck gets nothing but silence and soft blankets and-
Mark’s breath catching in his ear, mumbling tentative, “Hyuck?”
“Good to know at least one of us already has a win.”
“Are you happy for me?”
Donghyuck breathes in deep and nothing hurts. He runs his tongue along his dry lips and tastes nothing but the metallic flavor of chapped lips.
And he’s no believer, but spoken truths always leave a sacred aftertaste. So Donghyuck talks hushed, mellow-voiced like he guesses one would do at church, and confesses:
“I’m proud of you.”
---
Mark knocks on Donghyuck’s door less than an hour later.
Sweating through his clothes and red on the face, he’s got a pearly forehead and cheap hair dye dripping down his temples as if he wanted it bad enough to come running. Mark cups Donghyuck’s face in sticky palms the second he gets a foot inside, thin fingers interlocked at his nape so Donghyuck can’t escape.
He forgot his rings in his haste, kisses rough and spit-wet in his excitement, keeps his shoes on all the way to the bed and Donghyuck doesn’t even fucking mind when Mark steps on his socked toes.
“I can’t believe I’m gonna have to see your stupid face all over the country,” Donghyuck says into his pillow when Mark pushes him down face-first against the mattress. He lies there like a deadweight, doesn’t even lift his hips when Mark starts to tug at his sweats with impatient nails. “You’re so lucky you’re pretty.”
And there’s a lot Donghyuck has yet to learn about Mark, but he’s half-sure he has never cursed for anyone else.
God’s name chewed between his teeth like a threat, Mark pulls at Donghyuck’s sweats harsh enough to get the seams creaking between his jittery hands. He’s damp all over when he finally drapes his naked body over Donghyuck’s, swearing into his nape as he wraps tight fingers around his arm and waist. The eager grip Mark has on him is strong enough to bruise, as if he doesn’t break bone purely by choice.
Throbbing and leaking, Mark fits himself in between Donghyuck’s quivering thighs. He doesn’t even waste time taking off Donghyuck’s shirt and underwear because he can’t get enough, can’t fucking wait.
Biting cuss words all over Donghyuck’s shoulders, Mark has the headboard clashing into the wall with each push of his hips. He gets Donghyuck so hard and wet, he has to beg for a hand on him, pillowcase between his teeth.
Mark makes a mess when he comes, drips hot and tacky on the sheets and stains Donghyuck’s thighs and boxer shorts white. But he’s a nice boy, polite through and through, licks it all clean afterward, and smiles with pure-white teeth.
And who cares if Donghyuck is dirty when his pretty idol boy likes it twice as nasty.
---
The shooting venue is definitely bigger than the Hongdae clubs Donghyuck is used to, but it’s not even half as big as the pretty stages you see on TV during award season.
Makeup-pretty idols always stand in the center to perform their synchronized military marches in their matching tacky uniforms. They rarely take up the entire stage because god forbid someone will fall out of step in front of the cameras. Improvisation doesn’t look cute, jumping around until you’re sweat-wet and breathless isn’t pretty.
Mnet would never invest that much on the underground. Ragdolls have to make do with two-colour stage lights and a pit the size of a tin of sardines.
“D’you want one before rehearsal?” Yangyang asks as they walk side by side over buckled-up cables, eyes to the floor so they don’t trip in the dim backstage.
Donghyuck swats Yangyang’s tatted fingers away, sends the cigarette toppling to the floor. “You’re batshit if you think I’m gonna get that down my throat now. I haven’t even been speaking. For two weeks, dude.”
“Yeah, I already miss that,” Yangyang giggles, his smile taking up almost all of his face. They just arrived at the venue, but the back of his fingers is already damp with sweat when he pinches Donghyuck’s cheek between two bony knuckles. “A lot nicer with your nasty mouth shut.”
“Fuck off, man,” Donghyuck shoulders Yangyang away, rubbing at his sore cheek with his palm, a sneaky smile puffing out his face.
Yangyang’s laughter rings through the busy backstage hallways until he pushes the black backdoors open.
Outside waits Jeno, sitting down on the curb with Jisung slumped against his side. The late-September sun paints white highlights over their wind-rustled hair. The smell of a dead summer hangs heavy in the air when the warm breeze welcomes Donghyuck the second he steps outside.
“Who wants a blunt!” Yangyang jumps off the curb, careless of the cars that usually drive by now that the streets have been blocked in preparation for the final judgment.
Doomsday’s looking sweeter than Donghyuck was expecting, nice on the skin and sweet to the nose. He’s biased, though. Everything always tastes better with his boys around.
Yangyang yelps when Donghyuck slaps his hand again, a second cigar crashing down, right before Jisung’s sleepy eyes.
“It’s just Marlboro, you fuckin’ killjoy,” he pouts as he shoves his hand into the side pocket of his orange Bermuda shorts to fish out another cigarette. “Plus, Jisungie’s not a minor anymore. You need to unclench.”
Donghyuck looms a silent, threatening hand over the fresh cigar, screwing the tip of his sneaker over the one on the floor to smash it into the asphalt. “Don’t tempt me, Yang.”
“You two bicker like an old boring marriage,” Jeno says, hand shooting out to grab Yangyang’s wrist and pull him down on the curb next to him. He flops his head against Jisung’s, moon eyes drifting shut when he speaks teasing words into blond hair. “If that’s what this epic battle’s gonna be about maybe we should head home, Sung.”
Jisung huffs out a quiet chuckle, the soles of his feet rumbling over the gravel when he stretches out his legs. Squinted-eyed and golden-lit by the tired sun, he looks up at Donghyuck with a tiny knowing smile. “You don’t look too nervous.”
“Maybe ‘cause I’m not. I know we’re gonna smash it.”
Lighter clicking under his thumb, Yangyang only looks up once his cigarette is red and alive. “Sure of yourself and nothing else, right?”
“Sure of myself,” Donghyuck agrees, crouching down to snatch the lit cigar right before it reaches Yangyang’s lips. “And sure of you.”
---
It’s always about the lighting because it has the power to hold memories.
Mark stands under the fluorescent tubes of the bathroom washed by sad grays and pure whites, and he still manages to shine bright pink. He looks just like he did when Donghyuck first kissed him, flushed raw red to the tip of his ears, cherry lips curled into a toothed smirk that looks anything but polite.
The familiarity of that mole on Mark’s cheek, though, has nothing to do with the light. Neither does the way Donghyuck’s thumb fits perfectly in the dip under Mark’s bottom lip. Nor how he can cup Mark’s face with the dumb, impossible certainty that those sharp cheekbones won’t slice his hands blood-crimson.
Donghyuck squirms against the wall Mark has rushed him into, head bumping into the hard tiles when he tries to pull back to meet eyes properly. “How did you get in here?”
“Jaemin loves me.”
Fussy-fingered, Donghyuck fidgets with the collar of Mark’s pristine-white shirt. He tugs until the first button pops open, crumples the thread between sweaty palms, and holds on to tattoo permanent wrinkles into the perfectly ironed cloth, just for the hell of it. And Mark—smooth, clean, poster-perfect Mark Lee—lets him.
Left eyebrow arched in a teasing curve, Donghyuck asks, “Should I be jealous?”
“Wait, hang on. Are we at that stage already?” Mark tightens his grip on Donghyuck’s hips. He’s got round eyes and his mouth drawn in a circle, confused, naive eyebrows knitting together as he walks his nails along denim seams. He slips his hands between the wall and Donghyuck’s body and dips fingertips into his back pockets to tug him closer. “Do you want us to be exclusive? Want me all for yourself?”
Donghyuck frowns down at his own knuckles where his skittish fingers are pulling a second button open when he can’t find his words, heart so swollen that he can taste it underneath his tongue. “I’m about to go on stage, asshole. I don’t have the time for your mind tricks.”
“Don’t make jokes you can’t handle, Hyuck,” Mark says, smiling so sweet his pearly white teeth might have been sugar cubes all along.
“I never said you could call me Hyuck.”
Mark hums, head naive-tilted to the side like the first time Donghyuck saw him. “You never complained, though,” he says, sliding his fingers out of Donghyuck’s back pockets to grab Donghyuck’s right hand in his.
Donghyuck’s never had twinkle-worthy hands. He’s got hard worker’s fists—wears ink stains like scars, scabs his fingers washing dishes for Taeyong, bites his nails out of boredom. He’s got calloused index fingers, crooked pinkies, rough palms about to crease and peel off. But Mark slips one of his expensive-glinting silver rings into Donghyuck’s hangnaily middle finger anyway, and he thumbs over his knuckle as if it looks pretty.
“What’s it mean?” Donghyuck asks, rough and strangled. It has nothing to do with a hoarse throat.
Mark looks up at him with seagull eyebrows, snake-bite eyes open wide, and he shrugs innocent and pure. “I don’t know. I stole it from an MV set.”
And Donghyuck isn’t sure if there’s anything normal about wanting to eat someone whole, but he surges forward anyway.
“You’re so annoying, pretty boy.”
He never lands on Mark’s lips, though.
“I can’t kiss you now,” Mark steps away, index finger pressed hard to Donghyuck’s mouth, smirking toothy with a scrunched nose. “I’ll get cheap concealer all over, that’s gross.”
“You’re honestly so full of yourself,” Donghyuck scoffs, his shirt sticking to his damp back when he slumps into the tiles. “So fucking annoying.”
Mark gets out of the stall walking backward, his smile far steadier than Donghyuck could ever be. “Come find me later, yeah? After you win,” he says when he’s out of sight. “I’ll kiss you as much as you want.”
Donghyuck waits until the door bangs closed. He pads at the ring on his finger and asks to an empty bathroom, “What if I don’t?”
The harsh, white lights flicker, but they can’t get the words out.
---
Yangyang dies in the first round and Donghyuck doesn’t have the time to mourn or celebrate.
One performance away from a 5-year-old dream, Donghyuck stands backstage holding his mic with both hands. His mouth is dry with nerves, but the tip of his tongue tastes glory-sweet.
“No matter what,” Jaemin says when the countdown starts, hands on Donghyuck’s shoulders, lips to his ear so Donghyuck can hear him over the bustling crowd. “It doesn’t have to be the end, Haechan. Keep calm, yeah? You’ve got more options.”
Automatic, muscle memory, Donghyuck can’t stop the words from rolling off his pasty tongue. “I’ll make it. I will.”
He’s got half a second to peak at the crowd from around the corner before he’s jumping on court. His eyes spot every member of the crew—even Johnny has made the time. Everyone but Taeyong.
It’s a close game but, somehow, relief wins the battle over disappointment.
Taeyong may not be there to see him win, but he won’t be there to see him fail, either.
---
Backstage is a deathtrap during showtime.
Five years ago, Donghyuck stood here with root-like wires digging into the soles of his numb feet—eyes too wide for his chubby face and hope too big for this hoarse, pocket-empty dream—and he witnessed Taeyong’s artistic downfall in three acts.
Tonight, heavy-eyed with tears and hope-broken, he topples down clear stairs on his own because no one ever cares enough about a second place to cut through their way.
He tries to spit confetti when it sticks to his sweat-covered lips, but the twinkling paper sneaks past his parted mouth when he gasps for air, sticks to his pasty palate as if trying to steal all the future verses he could (possibly won’t) ever write. He bites down on golden plastic and watches, chin down and heavy-shouldered, as Jisung walks toward him through glitter.
Donghyuck isn’t stupid. Jisung is to him what he is is to Taeyong, he’s always known that. He owns a Jisung smile—a small, fond curve with Jisung’s name written all over the seams—he got it from the way Taeyong has always looked at him.
What Donghyuck didn’t know, though—what hits him like a brick now, dry and ragged like a closed-fist punch to an open wound—is that he is to Jisung what Taeyong is to him.
He doesn’t realize until he’s got Jisung tucked under his chin, his nose digging painfully into Donghyuck’s shoulder when he falls face-first against his chest.
“It’s okay,” Jisung says, nuzzling into the stickiness of Donghyuck’s neck, hands gripping the back of his shirt as if he wants to tear it apart. “I’ll try for you again, hyung. Listen to me. I’ll come back and win for you, hyung.”
Somehow, Donghyuck keeps collecting unfulfilled promises that end up weighing more than every loss he’s ever had to bear. This time, though, he’s not the one who has to keep it. That might be the worst of it all.
He’s got his little brother in his arms, full of naive wishes and the best intentions, and Donghyuck wants to tell him nothing good comes out of promises that don’t depend on you. He wants to tell him to not do anything for anyone but himself. He wants to tell him he’s got nothing to prove, nothing to make up for, nothing to fix. He wants to say, I was supposed to take care of you, not the other way around.
But Jisung pulls away only to cradle Donghyuck’s swollen face between his big, big hands. When did he get so big? Donghyuck has to crane his neck to look up at him.
“I’m ready, hyung,” he says, smiling gummy with gleaming cheeks, long thumbs padding confetti out of Donghyuck’s mouth. “I promise, I’m ready. I’ll do it for you, hyung.”
Donghyuck wants, wants, wants.
But all he can do is slump forward and choke. He cries his eyes dry while Jisung poorly-patches up all his broken parts with genuine grins and big, careful, dirty hands. Role reversal.
---
Confetti on his hair, glinting golden in the middle of the night stained by someone else’s glory, Donghyuck runs.
He runs and runs and runs and only stops once he reaches the one door that’s always open for him, even when he doesn’t deserve it.
Taeyong’s ice cream parlor closes its gate at 00:00 sharp, but the metal slides up nice and easy when Donghyuck tugs at it. The edges bite into the soft skin of his fingers and leave red streaks tattooed across his palms when he lets go of it to sneak inside.
“Pull it down and lock it,” Taeyong’s voice creeps out from somewhere inside the dark store. “The key’s on the first table.”
“You knew I’d end up here, didn’t you?” Donghyuck asks, voice low in its thickness.
Snot and tears clog up his throat as he claws at the gate to push it down. It crashes against the floor with a metallic bang that rattles through his ribs. He’s still wincing when he walks further into the store after locking up.
Taeyong is waiting behind the counter, hands fisted on top of the bar, head hanging between his shoulders as if he’s the one who’s just been defeated. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles when Donghyuck flops on a stool before him. He slides a cup of strawberry ice cream toward Donghyuck with his knuckles, the worry on his face impossible to ignore even in the shadows of the parlor. “I’m sorry, Donghyuck-ah.”
“Shut up. Don’t apologize,” Donghyuck talks into the ice cream, eyes low because he can’t handle the look on Taeyong’s face right now. He’s seen it all before—the sadness, the concern, the pity— he saw it all mirrored on his own features, five years ago. “You more than anyone should know better than to apologize.”
“I’m not sorry you lost,” Taeyong says, sharp-tongued and real, like a band-aid peeled off in one harsh pull, rusty glue tearing the scab off with it. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make it.”
Donghyuck frowns, stuffs his mouth with a spoonful of ice cream. Strawberry melts into his tongue faster than his dreams melted between his fingers tonight, but the bitter aftertaste of the loss remains.
“You’re here now, that’s what matters.”
He eats in silence, swallows fast and hard until his throat goes tight and his gums feel ice-burnt. He swallows and swallows even when the syrupy ice cream blends with the salt of his tears. He swallows and swallows and swallows and Taeyong watches patiently—knuckles to the bar and mouth closed because he knows better than to try to fix the unfixable.
“I should’ve let Yangyang win.” Strawberry slips between the seams of Donghyuck’s lips when he speaks, it dribbles down his chin when he doesn’t bother to catch it with his tongue. “He’s tougher than me. I’m sure he could’ve handled the final better. He would’ve done so much-”
“He would’ve hated you, Donghyuck,” Taeyong cuts in, bending over the bar with one of his yellowish cloths clutched in his right hand. He grabs Donghyuck by the back of his head, tugs at the short hair of his nape with sharp nails, and rubs the cloth over his mouth until Donghyuck’s lips start to tingle. “You know that. Give up for him and he’ll hate you for the rest of his life.”
Donghyuck is roughed up and sticky by the time Taeyong lets him go. The chapped skin of his strawberry lips glue together when he closes his mouth tight, cheeks stinging and flaming even though his entire body started to shake with the first spoon of ice.
“I know,” he mumbles, gummy and sad. He curls into himself and pushes his dirty fingertips into this forearms to try to rub the goosebumps away. Chin falling to his chest, Donghyuck closes his eyes tight, plays pretend, and convinces himself he’s invisible in the shadows. “I know, but I just- I feel so useless, hyung. A fucking waste of time. Maybe my mom was right and I should just- I don’t even know.”
Taeyong knows better than to waste words trying to comfort him. Donghyuck watches through tear-fuzzy eyes as Taeyong throws away the ice cream cup to replace it with a new one, filled up to the brim, dripping pink down the sides.
“You don’t need to figure out anything tonight,” he says gently, picking up some cream with the tiny disposable spoon. He presses the edge to Donghyuck’s bottom lip, pushes until he opens un under the pressure and swallows. At least, this time, the sugar doesn’t taste like tears. Donghyuck might be running dry. “But I’m here to listen to your options if you want to talk about it.”
Donghyuck doesn’t have much to choose from.
On one side, he’s got his parents and buzzcut, artless life in the trenches. Everything he’s been running away from for 5 years.
On the other side, he’s got the stage accompanied with everything he’s always hated. He’s got the music, the art, the creativity—but not really. He’s got a mirage of everything he wants, wrapped up in pretty, empty promises to hide the fact that he’d be selling himself for a chance. It’s not the same, to make a living out of your own music as to live through someone else’s art, hand-tied to a company rich enough to buy your freedom and keep it.
Donghyuck rummages through his pockets with syrupy fingers. Jaemin’s card shakes in his hand once he finally fishes it out. The letters and numbers are half-faded due to the number of times he’s run his thumb over them, eyes closed, daydreaming.
He sniffs waterily through his nose, sets the card down on the bar, and slides it toward Taeyong with sticky fingertips. “Would you accept this?”
“Wouldn’t I?” Taeyong shakes through a baffled laugh, picking the card off the counter with his nails. “PD Na Jaemin. Big words, Donghyuck-ah.”
“I know. I know he’s fucking good. He’s great. And he’s been so, so nice to me, hyung. But I-” Donghyuck stabs the ice cream with the tiny spoon, watches as the melted cream slides down the sides when he presses hard, like an open wound. He picks up one of the droplets with his thumb, sucks into it to bring some sugar to his yet again bitter mouth. “It’s an idol company, hyung. It’s everything I go against. Goddammit, I spent the fucking contest rapping against it.”
“And he still offered you the job.”
“Well, yeah. ‘Cause I’m good even if I don’t feel like it right now. That has nothing to do with-”
The unexpected warmth of Taeyong’s fingers around Donghyuck’s steals the words from his mouth.
“Donghyuck, look at me,” he says, unwavering.
Taeyong works Donghyuck’s fingers open until the spoon falls from his grip so he can link their hands together. Taeyong’s always had hard worker’s hands—crooked and rough and scarred—but his skin is dry and warm when he holds Donghyuck tightly. No sweat or dampness or stickiness. No nervousness or anxiety or fear.
“Look at me,” he repeats, thumb walking over Donghyuck’s white knuckles. He’s smiling when Donghyuck finally looks up at him, teeth shining silver in the dim light of the parlor. “Sometimes—most times, sadly—passion and talent aren’t enough to make a living out of what you love. You have to adjust to the circumstances and make the most of it. That’s just how it works.” Taeyong lets go of Donghyuck’s hand to spread his arms, pointing around him. “But you,” he says, picking up the card again. He flickers it on Donghyuck’s nose, laughs through his teeth when Donghyuck leans away with a frown. “Donghyuck, here you have the chance to live off what you want. It might not be on the terms you’ve always wanted, but it’s better than what most of us get.”
“I kinda feel like a fraud and an ungrateful prick at the same time,” Donghyuck says, speaking croakily into his shirt when he rubs his sticky face on his sleeve. He’s gross, cream and tears and snot all over, eyes so swollen he can barely keep his heavy eyelids open. “They’ll make me leave the crew, hyung. I know the will. Don’t you think the boys will judge me if I leave them for-”
“No one’s going to look down on you for doing what you must to put food on the table, Donghyuck-ah.”
Tears clog up Donghyuck’s throat again, tugging at his neck and pushing his tongue down, threatening to choke him if he doesn’t let go and cry. “Fuck,” he knocks the ice cream cup away with an elbow, leans forward to sink his face between his crossed arms, tasting nothing but salt. “That’s what I’ve been doing to you all this time, isn’t it? I’m a shit friend.”
He breathes hot and wet over the cold surface of the bar, listens to the pitter-patter of his tears falling from his eyelashes, and waits for Taeyong to lash out as he should. But all Donghyuck gets is a breathy chuckle and a familiar hand on his head.
It’s always been like this—Taeyong giving more than Donghyuck deserves, Donghyuck’s affection-hungry self just taking and taking and taking because he doesn’t know how to stop.
“No, you’re not,” Taeyong says, dipping warm fingers into the tense muscle of Donghyuck’s nape. “You just think ice cream is beneath me because I’m the best rapper you’ve ever known.”
It hurts to speak. It hurts to move. But Donghyuck winces and pushes through because he needs Taeyong to know he’s serious when he says, “Well, that’s true. You are the best rapper I know. Always will be.”
Taeyong’s hand falls from Donghyuck’s nape, and he reaches out again to pinch his wet cheek between his knuckles. “You just love me too much.”
“No, I’m serious. I should call Jaemin and tell him to sign you too.”
“Does that mean you’re saying yes?” Taeyong asks with crooked eyebrows, laughing when Donghyuck scrunches up his nose. “Putting up with idols is better than enlisting at 20, isn’t it?”
Donghyuck reaches for the card. He looks down at it through heavy eyelids and sticky eyelashes, tracing its edge with his index finger. “I haven’t told him anything yet,” he confesses with a small mouth. Picking up the card, he touches one of its corners, wincing when the cardboard pinches his pad. “Mark, I mean. I haven’t told him.”
The last time Donghyuck saw him, Mark was lit silver and flushed pink, twinkling-eyed and open-mouthed. Donghyuck couldn’t even fucking kiss him, couldn’t even get a reply out when Mark asked him to find him later.
He didn’t even try to find him later, didn’t have the guts. Donghyuck just ran for his life like the coward he’s always sworn he isn’t.
“He won’t mind.”
Donghyuck arches an eyebrow at Taeyong. “You don’t know that.” He keeps fiddling with the card, his pad getting rough and tender the more he rubs it against the edges, just one more flaw to his already flawed hands. “I’ve given him hell for joining the competition. I was so mean about it because I thought he didn’t belong. And now, here I am, planning to stick my nose in his industry.” It’s so dark in the parlor that Donghyuck can barely see Mark’s ring around his finger, but the weight of it is unbearable enough. “Dude, I’m such a hypocrite.”
“He won’t mind, Donghyuck-ah.”
“How do you even know that?”
Taeyong clicks his tongue, snatching the card from Donghyuck’s fingers. “That boy is just as broke as you are, but he still pays for your ice cream every single night you two come around,” Taeyong snaps, pointing at Donghyuck with the sharp edge of the card. “I told him that your strawberry is always on the house. Do you know what he said? He said that, that way, it wouldn’t count. Whatever the hell that means.”
Donghyuck purses his lips together, hands slipping off the counter so he can ball his fingers into his shirt. He digs white knuckles into his stomach to stop the butterflies from flying up his throat and choking him in the process.
“It’s a dinner date,” he whispers. “You wouldn’t get it.”
---
“Aren’t you going to kick me out?” Donghyuck asks two hours later, halfway through his fourth cup of ice cream. “Don’t you have to open at 7? You need sleep.”
“I’ve been told I should make more time for my friends. So shut up and eat.”
---
Define ‘accomplishment’:
Something that has been achieved successfully.
Does something count as an accomplishment if you’ve never really tried for it? If it wasn’t even your goal?
Donghyuck has only stepped into a recording booth three times in his life, his lines on the paper and Jaemin on the beat. Water bottle in hand for the rash, for the aphonia, he walked in there and did whatever he was told to do for as many hours as it took. Afterward, he packed his shit and drove home, waiting for the next time he got to jump on stage.
That has always been the goal. The stage, the crowd, the sweat.
Does it count as an accomplishment, then, when Jaemin messages him at 7 in the morning? No words, no emojis—just a screenshot of the Melon chart, Donghyuck’s name at the top.
It sure feels like one.
---
Donghyuck opens the door of his apartment building to find Mark sprawled on the stairs still in yesterday’s clothes.
He springs awake when Donghyuck lets the door bang closed after him. Stumbling to his feet so fast that he almost topples down, Mark tugs at his wrinkled shirt with one hand, the other flying to his messy blue hair.
“How did you get in?”
Mark hesitates, frowns down at himself with his hand fisted in the strands of his fringe. “One of your neighbors let me in last night,” he ruffles his hair before he presses both hands to his flushed cheeks, looking at Donghyuck through slender fingers. “You didn’t open when I knocked, so I figured you weren’t home. So I just... I waited.”
Rumpled-up and roughed-out, Mark has never looked any less like himself than today.
He’s got his shirt open almost down to the middle of his chest, milky skin turned strawberry-pink underneath the thread. His belt is open and hanging at either side of his hips, jingling with each jerk of his nervous legs. His high-brand shoes are as clean and pristine as ever, but the shoelaces are spread out over the tiles.
He’s so sweet, wide-eyed under his pretty hands, flushed with embarrassment to the tip of his ears. But he still stands there, cracked open and vulnerable for Donghyuck.
“You look a mess,” Donghyuck says, taking a step closer as he shoves his keys into the back pocket of his jeans. It’s not like he looks any better, swollen and red all over. He clenches his fists at his sides to stop himself from hiding away.
Mark’s hands slide down until the tips are resting on his cheeks, his lips stretching into a tight smile between his pinkies. “You look pretty at the top of the charts.”
“Oh, shut up.”
Donghyuck shuffles when Mark stretches out a hand to him. He rubs his palms against his trousers as he stares at those clean, slender fingers decorated by gleaming rings. He rubs and rubs until his palms go soft and smooth, skin tickling at the oversensitivity, but he still feels stained when Mark comes down a step to catch his wrists.
“I heard the news,” Mark says softly. He looks taller like this, standing a step above Donghyuck and looking down at their hands as he slips his fingers into Donghyuck’s palms, thumb rubbing over the oversized ring around his middle finger. “Jaemin told me you called him this morning. An idol company, huh? When I said you were all bark and no bite...”
“Mark, listen. I’ve been thinking about this on my way here and I just-”
“Hey, slow down,” Mark tugs at his hands, leaning forward until his nose brushes along Donghyuck’s temple. “Try again.”
Donghyuck squirms away as much as he can without letting go of Mark. “I was gonna say that I’m sorry. But, honestly, I’m not. And I don’t wanna lie to you,” lips sucked in, he drops his chin to his chest in a weak attempt at hiding his blotchy face. Mark lets him, squeezes his hands in silence. “I know this is your thing and I shouldn’t barge in and- For a second, I was like, well, he’s gonna debut anyway so it’s fine! But I would’ve said yes even if you hadn’t secured your debut because my career always comes first. That might make me selfish but I-”
“I’ve never heard you give so many excuses for anything before.”
Mark lifts their intertwined hands to Donghyuck’s face, taps his chin softly to get him to look up, and smiles with those sharp-knife cheeks when Donghyuck does. He’s pale and bright red at the same time, heavy-lidded and wide-eyed, smells of dry sweat and saccharine.
It’s always been like this with Mark Lee. A standing contradiction, a shapeshifter. Donghyuck wants to know all the sides he’s got to offer, wants to bite down into every face of him.
“I’m sorry I ran away.”
Mark leans closer again, the tip of his hawk nose rubbing against Donghyuck’s red-tipped one. “It’s okay. And I don’t care about any of this. Like, the whole idol company thing.”
Donghyuck leans away to frown at him, mouth twisted down. “But I was such a pain in the ass to you and now-”
“I would’ve cared,” Mark cuts in, “if you had said no. That would’ve been such a dumb move. And not very Donghyuck of you, I must say. You’re, like, the most ambitious person I know.”
“Still-”
“I'm gonna see your pretty face all over the country, dude. Do you think you’ll get to promote on music shows?”
Donghyuck rips his fingers out of Mark’s grip, throwing exasperated palms up in the air. “Are you gonna let me speak?”
“Because,” Mark keeps going as if Donghyuck hasn’t said anything. He comes down from the last step and hooks his index fingers through Donghyuck’s belt loops, tugging him closer in one sharp pull. “As long as I get to kiss you backstage, I genuinely don’t give a fuck about anything else.”
Donghyuck halts, hands on Mark’s shoulders and breath caught on his throat. “You’re so fucking lame, pretty boy,” he mutters, but he can barely get the words out before Mark is kissing him.
Mark tastes of stale morning breath and yesterday’s beer. For once, he’s got dry lips and one-day stubble. He’s sharp and rough against Donghyuck, kisses hard enough to sting but sweet enough to have him moaning for more. Clumsy and wet in his excitement, he kisses syrupy and closed-eyed, but he keeps clawing at Donghyuck’s hips because he can never get enough.
Backstage is a deathtrap during showtime but, for this, Donghyuck will risk getting trapped every day.
- ONE YEAR LATER -
Define ‘pride’:
A feeling of pleasure and satisfaction that you get because you or people connected with you have done or got something good.
Maybe, it was never supposed to be about Donghyuck.
Backstage is a deathtrap and the stage is death-assured if you aren’t ready, but Park Jisung has walked miles to get here and he’s got words made of gold.
On the day of the final, Donghyuck watches from the pit with a swollen chest and surrounded by his crew.
Mark’s got teens to keep happy and Donghyuck’s got a new number one on the charts to uphold, so they secret-hold hands in the space between their thighs like high school sweethearts would do underneath the table in the middle of a class. Donghyuck gets sweaty-palmed and damp-fingered when Yangyang jumps on stage to open the show as the guest star, but Mark holds on tight until his rings get tattooed on the back of Donghyuck’s hand, and that’s enough.
Once the billboard-big screens announce a winner, Donghyuck throws his head back and smiles when glittery confetti falls all over his sticky face. He doesn’t even try to run to Jisung—knows he wouldn’t be able to get there through the crowd swallowing him up in frantic cheers and congratulatory screams—because everyone always wants to hug a first place.
Park Jisung was already there when Donghyuck first arrived, it’s only fair he reaches places Donghyuck could never make it to.