Archive of Our Own ^beta

Things always happen for a reason. The push and pull of the universe. Or whatever. For every action, there is always a reaction. Good times are always followed up with bad times, and maybe that’s where things started to go downhill, because you see, Minho’s good times have been going on for too long. Much too long.

He and his girlfriend started dating in high school and they both went to the same college. “You’ll break up the first week, trust me” is what everyone told him but it didn’t happen. He loved her and she loved him, and they stayed together their first year, moved into their first apartment their second year. She stayed with him through thick and thin, and after graduation, she even moved with him when he accepted an office position in Seoul, and she’s the one who convinced him to repursue his passion for dance by teaching a few times a week in the evenings.

They say that the right person will change you for the better, and she was definitely that—his person. So why, sitting in an airport lounge waiting for the flight that was supposed to be the start of their vacation, does Minho find himself next to Jisung and not her?

“It says the camellias will be in bloom,” Jisung drabbles, flipping through a pamphlet he got from the front desk. “We should go. And let’s check out Manjanggul, too.” The announcements drone on. Shoes click as people hurry to their gates.

Why is he taking the vacation he was going to use to propose to his girlfriend with Jisung instead?

Their plane arrives and they wait patiently until their boarding group is called. Even as they slowly shuffle into the stuffy plane, Jisung is still nose-deep in his pamphlet. He’s must’ve read it back-to-front a dozen times by now. Minho rolls his eyes and steers them to their seats.

The flight to Jeju from Seoul is extremely short. Barely even thirty minutes of airtime before the pilot announces their descent. Jisung’s long since passed out, though, and Minho snaps his eye mask open and says, “Wake up, we’re landing.” Jisung squints and scrunches his nose and swats him away.

By the time they pull onto the tarmac Jisung is finally awake. Or barely. He pulls his eye mask up his forehead like a headband and blearily looks out the airplane window at the greenery that’s still alive and well despite it being the dead of winter and snowing back home.

“Wha’ time s’it?” he slurs. He’s always been able to sleep just about anywhere. Snap! Like a lightbulb.

“Two.”

“How long to the hotel?”

“About an hour. We have to pick up the rental first.” Jisung blinks slowly and hums. Their plane pulls up to the gate.

When Minho and his girlfriend travelled, they’d just pack one suitcase and bring their backpacks. Obviously, he and Jisung packed separately, so the small sedan he booked is barely able to fit both of their luggage and backpacks.

As they settle into the front seats, Minho in the driver’s and Jisung the passenger’s, Minho gets the GPS for the hotel he booked while Jisung continues to flip through his brochure, still a bit groggy from the plane ride. But he wakes up by the time they get to a grocery store and stop for coffee. Iced americano is Jisung’s go-to order. Minho’s, too. His girlfriend never liked coffee.

They load up on groceries and set off again, and by the time they’re pulling into the front of the hotel, it’s nearly check-in. A bellhop helps them with their luggage while the valet takes the car away.

“This place is fancy.” Jisung admires the wooden façade of the hotel, outfitted to look like an upscale resort where it’s nestled off the winding mountain road a ways and surrounded by trees. It’s supposed to be private and romantic, a place for couples to come to and feel like they’re alone.

So when they walk down the dark wooden halls with a thick runner to dampen their footsteps, the same dark wood lining the ceiling above them, and step into the room with their luggage, it already feels like they’re isolated from the rest of the world.

He’d booked a honeymoon suite because at the time he was planning on coming with his girlfriend. The room enters into a sitting area and kitchen before opening up into the living room with the bedroom past another door to their right. Crystal clear glass lines the entire back wall. On the balcony there are a few lounge chairs and an outdoor bath and an unobstructed view of Hallasan, its peak tinged ever-so-slightly with snow.

Jisung whistles as he drags his suitcase off the trolley. “Is that where you want to go?” He points to the mountain and Minho nods his head, swallows thick once. “Looks cold.”

“It’s a dormant volcano with a lake at the top.” He and his girlfriend planned this trip specifically because they wanted to hike it for the new year. And Minho was planning on proposing at the summit.

Jisung clicks his tongue and says, “You guys sure did weird things for hobbies.” He grabs Minho’s suitcase as well and rolls them off in the direction of the bedroom, stating, “I’m gonna get settled in. Are we staying here the whole time?” Minho nods.

“I’ll go put the trolley away,” he says back. It’s only four thirty. A little early for dinner, but they’ll probably turn in early, too.

He takes the luggage cart back to the front desk and returns to the room and finds that Jisung is still in the bedroom, most likely putting his clothes away so that they don’t get wrinkled. He’s always been a stickler about his clothes. Minho steps into the doorway and freezes. In front of him, Jisung has his suitcase open and is organizing his things on the bed. The only bed.

Fuck. Minho mentally slaps himself. Did he forget to call and ask for a double? Maybe they have a rollaway.

“I can take the couch,” Minho offers. “Sorry, I forgot to call ahead and—”

“I don’t mind.” Jisung shrugs and grabs his toiletry bag. “We used to share a bed all the time growing up. In college sometimes, too.” Whenever they’d have their movie nights at Jisung’s apartment, it would always inevitably creep past Minho’s bedtime and he’d pass out on the couch before being woken up in the middle of the night by Jisung, who would move them to the bedroom so he could keep watching TV and so Minho didn’t wake up with a sore back or a kink in his neck.

They’ve always been close. Like brothers since the moment they met in middle school. For a long time it was Minho and Jisung, Jisung and Minho. And when Minho and his girlfriend started dating in high school, he’ll be the first to admit that he put their friendship on the back burner until he realized it while they were in college. He never wanted Jisung to be a third wheel but Jisung didn’t mind. Even though he was always dating someone, it would never be for long, and after Minho graduated and started working full-time and seeing Jisung less, when they would meet up every couple of months, Jisung would always bring a new man at the dinner table.

Minho knows that it’s not his place, and he does really care about Jisung, but he’s never liked the nonchalant way he’s approached his relationships. If he wasn’t serious about them, why string them along?

“Which sink do you want?” Jisung calls from the bathroom.

The left one.

“I don’t care.” He hears glass clinking as Jisung starts arranging his skincare. He leaves for the kitchen to start on dinner.

Cooking has always been relaxing for him. It’s a time where he’s by himself and can work through his thoughts, kind of like how some people go running or some just sink into the couch and watch TV. He chops up an onion and sets it aside in a bowl to move onto the meat.

Where did everything go wrong?

Thwack! The first slice of the cleaver.

Weren’t they happy? Three cats, an apartment in Cheongdam, not rich but getting by comfortably, and ready to take the next steps. Or so Minho thought.

Thwack! The second slice of the cleaver.

It all happened kind of like a whirlwind that still hasn’t settled. In the morning things were fine, in the afternoon they met for lunch and she told him that they should take a break, and then in the evening she packed a suitcase, told Minho she’d send him the money for the trip, and then she was out the door. And Minho sat on the couch for an hour to think things through before calling Jisung.

Thwack! The third slice of the cleaver.

It wasn’t too late to cancel their flight and the hotel reservation, and while the phone rang in Minho’s ear as he waited for Jisung to pick up, all he thought was we broke up, we broke up, we broke up. But then Jisung greeted him in that same silly manner he used to do when they were in middle school.

“Hello, hyungnim. How are you?”

“Do you want to go to Jeju-do with me?”

His vision blurs and he relaxes his grip on the knife handle.

“Do people normally cut pork belly with such force?” Jisung’s voice pipes up. Minho’s vision returns. He snaps his head to see his friend standing in the doorway to the bedroom with his arms folded across his chest. Minho blinks at him, knife still in hand, and Jisung rolls his eyes and saunters over. He inspects the meat. “It doesn’t even have the skin on it.”

“Force of habit.” He slices the rest much gentler. Jisung eyes him curiously.

“What’re you making?”

“Braised pork belly.” He grabs a shallow pot and gets it warming on the stove. “It’ll need to simmer for an hour or so.”

“An hour!” Jisung’s eyebrows turn up. “But I’m hungry now,” he whines.

“You can eat a snack.”

“You wouldn’t let me buy any snacks at the store.” Jisung grumbles to himself and crosses over his arms petulantly, but he climbs into one of the stools at the counter. Sort of like how he used to sit at the counter in Minho’s childhood home during their high school days and watch Minho’s mom cook and talk with her.

It’s been a long time since they’ve really sat down and caught up just the two of them. When they’d meet up for dinner in Seoul, it was always Minho and his girlfriend, and Jisung and whatever new guy he was dating. Given the circumstances, maybe now is as good a time as any to rekindle that close bond they once had.

“Did you hear that Felix and Channie-hyung are dating?” Jisung brings up as Minho is ferrying ingredients into the hot pan. He nearly drops the pork belly on the floor.

Minho spins around with a handful of raw meat and asks, somewhat incredulously, “Your ex Chan?”

“Yeah.” Jisung chuckles and Minho raises his eyebrows. “It was never serious to begin with. And Channie-hyung’s a nice guy. He deserves someone like Felix. Except if they keep fucking like rabbits I’m going to need to find a new roommate.” Minho snorts and turns back to the stove. He drops in the meat and it begins to sizzle.

Jisung has always been easy to converse with, and Minho is reminded why he liked him in the first place. He doesn’t care that Minho doesn’t always respond or gives him short answers—he babbles on regardless. And Jisung’s always had this weird sixth sense when it comes to Minho and knowing what to talk about without Minho even having to ask.

He tells Minho that Chan got him a position working for a record company, which is a little strange, but if Jisung says they’re on good terms then that’s not any of Minho’s business.

It’s a place out in Yongsang by Namsan Tower. Right on the other side of the Han River is the part that Minho keeps to himself.

“It’s kind of far from my place, so I’m thinking about moving a little closer if it goes well.”

“I thought you were going to kick Felix out,” Minho points out. He adds water to the pot and turns down the heat to let it simmer and leans on the counter across from Jisung.

“Our lease will be up next year. If Felix and Channie-hyung are still dating, they’ll probably move in together, and if I can get my shit in order, I’ll have enough saved up for a deposit. When will dinner be ready?”

Minho snorts. Impatient as ever.

“In an hour.”

“Can we watch a movie?”

There’s an itching question burning between them as they set up on the couch—opposite ends. Minho grabs a pillow to hug out of habit and Jisung curls his legs in and faces the TV as the bright screen turns dim when the opening scene begins to play. It’s a far cry from how they used to sit shoulder-to-shoulder on Jisung’s tiny loveseat in his college apartment, their legs practically a tangled mess by the end of the night, and Minho would be lying if he said he couldn’t feel the tension in the air.

How long’s it been since they’ve sat like this? Watching a movie just the two of them? If you asked college Minho what his Friday nights looked like, he’d tell you something like this: him and Jisung in his friend’s tiny flat that he shared with Felix, a bowl of popcorn somehow on both of their laps, and easy conversations that never stopped despite the movie blaring in the background.

That’s not at all how things are now. They don’t have popcorn, they’re sitting on opposite sides of the couch, and even though Jisung stretches out his legs a little bit and wiggles his feet, he doesn’t try to worm his way into Minho’s space even though Minho can feel that he wants to.

The pork simmering on the stove fills the suite with a rich and savory aroma. Haunting yet warm music hums from the speakers. Minho takes a glance over at Jisung. His eyes are wide and glued to the screen, the soft lighting sweeping gently over his tanned skin and thin eyelashes. His lips are slightly parted and smooth. Minho blinks once.

“We broke up,” he blurts out. Jisung blinks, too. He turns his head to Minho slowly, eyes softening.

“What?”

Minho gulps. “We broke up. Sookyung and I.” Jisung’s brows upturn and now his entire body is facing Minho.

“Hyung.” It comes out worried and sorrowful. Pitiful. It’s not the tone that Minho wants to hear right now.

“Yeah. A-a few weeks ago. I’m not really sure what happened.” He huffs a weak laugh and turns back to the television, but Jisung’s eyes remain fixed on him, the movie long forgotten.

There’s a long pause between them where Minho pretends to be watching the movie but all he sees is Jisung’s reflection in the quick black frames between scenes.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Minho thinks.

“No. Not right now.” He gets up to check on their dinner. Jisung stays on the couch.

They brush their teeth side-by-side in the bathroom. Jisung on the right, Minho on the left. There’s a litany of bottles neatly lined up in the corner on Jisung’s side—serums, perfumes, cleansers, and masks—whereas Minho just has a cup to hold his toothbrush, his razor, and shaving cream. He brought along a couple of face masks that he’s tucked into the drawer, and he just uses his body wash to clean his face. (It’s part of his body, right?)

Jisung talks to him with toothpaste running down the sides of his mouth. He doesn’t ask about the breakup, didn’t even mention it while they ate. He just brushes and talks and rinses his mouth out when he’s done. These little mundane tasks are something that Minho’s become so accustomed to with another person that he hasn’t even realized how quiet his apartment’s become without another body. He took the left sink in their—his place because it’s closer to the door.

“You wanna do a face mask?” Jisung asks, fanning out an assortment of sheet masks he’s pulled from his stash. He looks out over them and blinks quickly. Something he does when he’s trying to get his way.

Minho spits out his toothpaste. “Sure.” He rinses his mouth.

Jisung picks out overnight masks for them to wear because he wants to get up early to go to the camellia gardens. He shows Minho the pamphlet while they settle into the king-sized bed.

“We should go right when they open so it won’t be busy.”

“Will you even be awake?” Jisung has never been a morning person.

Jisung claps his pamphlet shut between his hands and says, “That’s why you’re driving. Hyung, you know I don’t have my license.”

“Still?” Minho sniggers, and Jisung slaps him, causing part of his face mask to slip.

“I’ve been thinking about it! Now, let’s go to sleep. We have to get up early. They open at eight thirty sharp.” He then whirls up a storm of blankets, and when they settle, he’s tucked neatly beneath them on his back, face mask still slipping a bit around his cheeks. Minho grins to himself.

“Fix your mask,” he says before turning off his lamp and crawling under the covers, worlds of space between them.

As expected, Jisung is a pain to wake up in the morning. He sets four alarms and silences all of them, but Minho wakes up for the first one that goes off at seven o’clock and the subsequent ones that ring five minutes apart. And Jisung sleeps through all of them.

“Jisung.” Minho swats him after the fourth alarm goes off. “Turn your fucking alarm off.”

Jisung groans and rolls over to slap his phone blindly, and once the offending noise stops, he rolls back and goes straight back to snoring.

“Jisung,” Minho says again. Jisung grunts. Minho rolls his eyes. “Wake up.” He rocks him gently.

“Fi’e minu’es,” he slurs and then rolls onto his side.

“You’ve had twenty already.” Minho huffs and yanks the blanket down, and Jisung reactively curls into a ball once his arms and legs are out in the open and cold morning air.

He shivers and his teeth chatter, and then he looks over his shoulder quickly to glare at Minho, except it’s more of a squint from the light shining through the curtains, and his face is puffy with sleep and his mask is totally askew. Minho can’t hold back the fond smile that spreads across his lips.

“C’mon. Let’s get up and get coffee.”

Minho shuffles them both into the bathroom and peels off his face mask, which has essentially dried and become an added layer to his face, but his skin underneath is glowing and spongey. He gets to brushing his teeth while Jisung is still wiping the sleep from his eyes.

They both dress easily for the day. Light sweatpants and hoodies. Jisung throws on a beanie and they both put on puffer vests.

“This is kind of like a couple outfit,” Jisung chuckles as they adjust their fits in the mirror, and then his eyes go wide and he stops. But Minho doesn’t want any awkwardness in the day.

“It kind of is,” he agrees with a light voice. He decides not to wear a hat. “C’mon.” He claps Jisung’s shoulder. “Let’s get going.”

They wait out front beneath the heaters as the valet goes to fetch their car. Besides when they first arrived, Jisung hasn’t mentioned anything about their accommodations, hasn’t even once asked why Minho booked such an expensive place when he’s usually very frugal.

“It’s cold,” Jisung grumbles. He zips up his vest so that the collar is covering his nose and mouth.

“We’ll turn the heat on in the car.” The hum of an engine echoes under the roof of the driveway. The valet pulls their sedan around the loop and hops out of the driver’s seat. “Let’s go.”

They stop by a coffee place before pulling onto the highway, and even though Jisung was complaining about being cold, he still ordered his americano with ice.

“You know they sell it hot,” Minho quips as he holds his own coffee in front of him, gently blowing on the steam that wafts from the lid.

“That’s sacrilege.” Jisung holds his cold cup with both of his shaking hands, the ice jostling against the plastic walls. His teeth chatter after he takes a sip.

It’s a short drive to the gardens via the highway, and though Jeju-do doesn’t see much snow at sea level, the little island hasn’t been spared completely from the harsh winters the mainland gets. The skies are overcast and grey and there are brief sprinklings of rain that patter the windshield along the way.

“Did you bring an umbrella?” Jisung asks. He cranks up the heat.

“No.” Minho shakes his head. Hopefully it won’t rain. Hopefully.

The clouds don’t clear up by the time they’re pulling into the lot. Jisung hops out first and stretches his arms above his head and yawns while Minho climbs out of the driver’s seat and grabs his bag from the back. Jisung does the same, and they both pull on their face masks before heading inside.

There’s a little bit of construction going on in the front garden, a sign greeting them and telling them that it’ll be completed by the following fall. There’s a computer model of what the area will look like on the poster.

“Wow. We should come back when it’s done,” Jisung comments. “It looks pretty.” Minho wonders if they’ll ever be as close as they were in college. They head inside to the front desk. Minho pays for their tickets and the women at the counter gives them ponchos in case it rains while they’re out in the gardens, and Jisung snags a brochure from a stack.

“Where to first?” Minho asks as he tucks the raincoats under his arm. He peaks over Jisung’s shoulder to look at the map of the grounds.

“Let’s go to the greenhouse first. It’s freezing out here.”

“Maybe it’s because you drank a cold drink in the middle of winter.”

“Hey. Jeju-do isn’t supposed to be cold.”

“There’s snow up on Hallasan every year.”

“Which is why I think it’s crazy you want to hike up there… when?”

“Day after tomorrow.”

“The day after tomorrow.” Jisung narrows his brows in an unsure way. “And I’m going up there with you.”

“You sure are,” Minho says with a smirk. Jisung sighs dramatically through his nose and turns away, but not before Minho can see the faint uptick on the corners of his mouth.

The path to the greenhouse is shaded by dormant magnolia trees, their waxy white roots jutting out through the ground. There are sparse people around, mainly elderly couples. Somewhere off the path a mother situates her two kids on one of the roots to take a photo. Minho stares at them as he and Jisung pass by, the latter with his nose stuck in his pamphlet but his eyes peaking over, unnoticed.

While they’re walking through the balmy greenhouse, a plethora of camellia shrubs tucked in every available space there is, Jisung stops to read each sign that’s in front of a new grouping. There’s barely enough space on the walkway for two people, but thankfully the place isn’t busy. Minho couldn’t imagine the humidity if it were.

“This one’s pretty.” Jisung points to a short bush right in front of them. “Camellia japonica.” It barely has any branches and looks scraggly with the way the existing ones are twined together to form a makeshift trunk. But despite its haggard appearance, it still has brilliant pink blooms. “It says there are more in the garden.”

“Are we done here already?”

“Certainly not. We still need to read all the plaques!”

“Then stop getting so distracted.”

“I can’t help it. I have a short attention span. So many things to see,” Jisung says as he wanders off further down the path. Minho rolls his eyes and trails after him.

He does get distracted really easily, but that’s nothing new. When they were kids, Jisung would ramble on about one thing before suddenly steering in a completely different direction. It was a little jarring at first and threw Minho for a loop, but in time he grew used to it and has learned that it’s just one of those things that makes Jisung stick out amongst the rest.

He’s easy to talk to. That’s probably why he doesn’t have a problem finding a new boyfriend. Probably the reason why he’s never dated anyone longer than six months or so. In a way, Minho wishes that he could be like that. He and his girlfriend—ex-girlfriend—dated for so long that he feels like he’s out of the loop when it comes to dating. How is he supposed to meet someone when he’s spent the last six years in a steady relationship?

“Hyung?” Minho blinks and Jisung is standing a few meters in front of him holding the exit door open. “Are you coming?” Cool wind blows in from the outside.

“Yeah.”

Camellia shrubs begin to overtake the magnolias as they walk the path towards the gardens. Some of them are huge, practically trees with how they’ve been cultivated, and some remain pruned to keep them small but their flowers large. In the background, there are some grower pots that have even more shrubs.

This is a tranquil place that Minho could see himself taking an early morning walk in, like the bamboo forests back in Seoul that give him some much-needed reprieve from the demanding city. Even though the weather isn’t the best, there’s a bit more of a crowd than when they first arrived. More parents and their children, with the older couples dwindling. And not a drop from the sky.

Keen on their destination, Jisung doesn’t dawdle on the pathway between the greenhouse and the gardens like he did in the beginning. He more or less beelines it with quick little footsteps and his hands curled into fists at his side like he’s marching. Like he used to do in middle school. Minho smiles to himself at the habit as the sound of running water grows closer.

The gardens are traditional. White stone paths that wind and join in a maze of patterns, two large ponds separating them. There aren’t as many camellias here, just a few shrubs planted around the walkways, but the landscape is still stunning, nonetheless. They have some traditional gardens back in Seoul, just not as large.

“This is cool,” Jisung says as he picks a path that takes them to the edge of one of the ponds. Green lily pads float by the shore, little minnows swimming through the thin stems that anchor them to the substrate. There’s a turtle that swims close but flees once it notices them, and Minho sees ripples off ahead from the streamlined body of a carp.

“This looks like the gardens in Japan,” Minho notes. Even down to the white stones beneath their shoes.

“I’ve never been.”

“When you get more settled at work we should go.” Minho says it offhandedly without a thought. A gesture of goodwill that may or may not have any weight to it. He’s not sure if Jisung takes it seriously or not because he doesn’t respond.

He follows Jisung around as the younger man takes them over the wooden bridges and through a gazebo. They spend probably around an hour just slowly meandering, the number of patrons growing as the morning progresses to noon, before taking refuge on a bench underneath a large camellia shrub with leaves that hang over their head. Minho looks up and sees little flower buds camouflaged in the greenery.

“A late bloomer?” he jokes, skimming his fingertips over delicate green buds. Most of the ones they’ve seen have all opened.

“Don’t say that, hyung, it’s blooming on its own time.” Jisung caresses his hand around a bud that’s on the cusp of opening. Pink. “I’m sure it’ll be just as beautiful as the rest when it does.” He tenderly pinches the emerging petals before letting his hand fall onto the bench between them. Minho watches the way Jisung inhales deeply through his nose, then exhales.

“Do you want to stop and get lunch on the way back?”

The day isn’t necessarily a bust. Sure, it’s not how Minho would’ve spent it, but Jisung had a good time. He’s always liked flowers, especially peonies. One time when they were in college and Minho came over, there was a vase of them sitting on his countertop, the lightest blush of pink.

“Where did you get those?” he asked, and Jisung’s faced turned almost the same color.

They return the ponchos to the front desk on their way out, and as soon as they’re in the car, Jisung practically rips his face mask off.

“Arggh.” He wipes at his face. “I feel like my face is so greasy with how humid it was in there.”

“What do you want to eat?” Minho asks as he pulls up the map on his phone. They’ll probably go all the way to Jeju and get something before going back to the hotel.

“I dunno. I’m sick of Korean food.”

“You’re Korean.”

“But there’s so much more out there! Why restrict yourself to one diet?”

Minho huffs a laugh. “Fair enough. You want to get sushi?”

“Will you pay?”

“I bought the tickets for the garden!”

“Fine. We’ll go Dutch, then,” Jisung grumbles and crosses his arms over his chest. Minho shakes his head fondly before pulling up directions for Jeju on his phone and getting them on the road.

“Can you look up a restaurant on the drive?” he asks. Jisung fishes for his phone in his pocket in response.

“Just sushi? Or Japanese?”

“Japanese. See if you can find an izakaya.”

“Right. Nothing too fancy.” He taps away as Minho pulls onto the highway. “Barbecue?”

“For lunch?”

“Sor-ry, I didn’t know we were so picky about lunch.” Jisung clicks away some more.

“Barbecue’s fine if that’s what you want to eat.”

“It is.” Minho knows that it’ll put them both into a food coma.

“Let’s go, then.”

Right on the nose about their meal, the both of them trudge into their suite with full bellies and dwindling stamina. Jisung barely remembers to kick his shoes off as he announces, “I’m gonna take a nap.” But Minho isn’t tired. Or, he doesn’t want to be. Maybe he’ll go to the gym.

“Sleep as long as you want,” he says back. “I think I’m just gonna relax.” Jisung shrugs and drags his feet over to the bedroom, and Minho makes his way to the sofa.

He plays on his phone absently, opening up Naver and finding a few tabs already opened to information about things to do in Jeju-do, flights, and Hallasan.

He and his ex had hiked it for their one-hundred-day anniversary, and Minho gave her a simple ring at the peak while they were eating ramyun to warm up from the cold. They started dating at the end of high school, so that trip was their first by themselves. They stayed in a shittier accommodation, and the ring was so cheap Minho could bend it between two fingers, but she loved it nonetheless.

“This is like out of a movie,” she said while holding her hand out to see the silver band, the sun behind her strong. “I love it.”

Maybe he waited too long to ask her to marry him. Maybe that’s why she just up and left. She always talked about wanting an “American engagement” because she loved American romance movies, and Minho played it off because he wanted it to be a surprise, but in hindsight, that’s probably one of the reasons she left, too. It seemed like he just wasn’t interested in marrying her.

Minho’s finger hovers over the “X” to close out the tab. The pictures show the island in the height of summer during tourist season. Clear blue skies and crystal waters. Not the dead of winter where they’re lucky to see a ray of sunshine for even a second.

He locks his phone and stares off ahead, looks around the room absently. It’s quiet. No wind outside. No noise from the bedroom. Minho looks out on the balcony at the lounge chairs and the outdoor bath.

When he slowly opens the bedroom door, he sees a lump under the covers where Jisung is laying, the top of his head poking out, and his phone screen bright in the dark room. He looks over as Minho creeps in as quietly as possible.

“You want me to make room?” he asks. Minho shakes his head.

“I think I’m going to try the bath outside.” He rummages through his drawer for swim shorts before heading to the bathroom to change. When he comes out, the air of the bedroom cold on his skin, Jisung is still on his phone. “I thought you were taking a nap.”

“I’m relaxing a bit first.” Jisung doesn’t spare him a glance this time. Minho doesn’t say anymore, just grabs a towel from the bathroom and heads back to the living room.

The smart thing for him to do when he decided he was going to use the bath would’ve been to start the water first so he wouldn’t have to go outside in his swim trunks, but he’s only human, so instead he quickly tip-toes out to the bath, turns the faucets in a combination that might be suitable for bathing in, and then rushes back inside before his feet can freeze. He shivers once he’s back in the living room, rubbing his hands over his arms, when he looks up and sees Jisung standing in the doorway to the bedroom dressed in a pair of boardshorts.

“Uh.” His eyes do a quick once-over of Minho’s body. Unmistakable. “I was gonna join you, if you don’t mind.” Minho doesn’t miss the way his Adam’s apple bobs.

“I just started the water, so it’s gonna take a minute.”

“Oh.” Jisung shifts on his feet. He looks a little more muscular than the last time Minho saw him. When was the last time he saw him shirtless? Jisung grows antsy and shifts between his feet, bare on the cold wooden floor. His skin is still that same warm honey in tone and glows even with the lack of sunlight, and his stubble is more visible than it was earlier this morning.

“Did you shave this morning?”

“No? You were in the bathroom with me.”

“Huh.”

“Why?” Jisung asks a little frantic. He touches his mustache hair. “Does it look bad?” His eyes are cartoonishly wide, and his eyebrows upturned so much it makes the lines in his forehead fold.

It doesn’t look bad, though. It suits him. Makes him look older and a little like his father.

“No. I like it. Makes you look more mature.”

“Ah, well, then I guess I’ll have to shave it.” Jisung feints walking back into the bedroom with a goofy smile on his face. He flutters his eyelashes at Minho, and Minho can’t hold back the smile on his face at the ridiculous antic. “Is the water ready yet?”

“I’ll go check.” The air feels a lot warmer than it did. As soon as he dips his fingers in the water, he hears the glass door sliding open. He turns around and sees Jisung standing on the balcony and says, “It’s ready.” His voice is hoarse. Jisung shifts on his feet.

Minho isn’t sure whether to be thankful or not that the bath is large enough for two people and no more. The water sloshes as they both climb in, rising over the lip and spilling onto the bamboo floorboards. Steam wafts around them. Jisung takes the side closest to the edge with the snow-peaked Hallasan behind him, and Minho on the other side with the door to the bedroom right behind him. The sun has made its presence known but still shies behind the clouds, and against the whitecaps, Jisung with his black hair and tan skin looks that much more brilliant.

“This is nice.” He lounges back and stretches his feet along the base of the tub, rubbing Minho’s calves before stilling them just past. Minho doesn’t say anything in reply. His heart is beating in his ears. Why? “What do you want to do tomorrow?”

Tomorrow they don’t have anything planned. Jisung wanted to go to Manjanggul. The day after they’re going up to Hallasan because Minho was planning on proposing there. But his girlfriend isn’t going with him, Jisung is.

“Hyung?”

“Do you have everything for our hike?”

“How long is it? I brought sneakers.” Jisung wiggles his toes above the waterline right next to Minho’s shoulders.

“You need boots.” Minho’s eyes are fixed on the beauty mark on Jisung’s collarbone. “We can rent ice cleats at the base.”

“Is it cold at the top?”

“Yeah. You’ll need a jacket and snowpants.”

“We should eat ramyun at the top to warm up.” Jisung pulls his legs back and turns around to look at the mountain behind him. Minho’s eyes lower in thought.

“Why do you want to hike up Hallasan anyways?” Jisung asks as they get ready to watch a movie in bed. He’s cranked up the heat so that he can wear shorts and a t-shirt.

Minho thinks about lying to him, telling him that he just wanted to do it. But then he thinks about Jisung and the person he is and says, “I was planning on proposing.” Jisung’s entire body freezes where he’s just about to get under the covers.

“Oh shit,” he breathes, and then, just because he’s him, “To me?” The tension dissipates in an instant and Minho rolls his eyes as a smile blooms on his lips.

“Fuck off,” he laughs and climbs into bed, TV remote in hand. “What do you want to watch?”

“Harry Potter. The first one.” Jisung snuggles into the covers.

“We watched that last night.”

“Yeah, but you weren’t paying attention.” Though Minho rolls his eyes again, he still pulls up the movie and hits ‘play from beginning’. Jisung’s right. He has no idea what was even happening.

The opening he remembers. Dark skies, empty roads, and a bright streetlight. Outside, the sun finally breaks free from the cloud cover as it starts to dip below the horizon, below the mountaintop. Two people talk on screen that Minho doesn’t recognize.

“So,” Jisung starts. He wiggles his feet below the blankets. “Marriage, huh?”

“Yeah. Who’s the baby?”

“The main character.”

“I thought he was a teenager?”

“This is just the opening! Shush and pay attention.”

A few more minutes go by and it still doesn’t make a lick of sense to Minho. Isn’t this movie supposed to be about magic and witches? Why is there a birthday party? Whose birthday is it?

“Why are his parents assholes?” Minho whispers.

“That’s his aunt and uncle.”

“What happened to his parents?”

“They died.”

“When did we learn that?”

“Oh my god, hyung! Can you just watch the movie?”

“Sorry. Sorry.” Minho laughs and looks at Jisung out of the corner of his eye. He looks like a gumball with how unkempt his hair is and with how he’s puffing out his cheeks subconsciously.

When the scene in the tower happens, dark storms and waves crashing, wind howling, the sun finishes its descent outside, leaving them in the darkness of the last light of day. The TV screen provides them with a static light source. Minho turns on his bedside lamp. He sees his and Jisung’s reflection in the TV screen.

“You never told me you were getting married,” Jisung murmurs. He’s still looking at the movie but his eyes are glazed over, somewhere distant.

It’s true. Minho never mentioned to Jisung his intention of asking his girlfriend to marry him because the reality is that they aren’t close anymore. Sure, they have dinner every couple of months or so, but Minho has been in a different place in life than Jisung has for the past six years. Jisung dates someone for a few months and then moves on to the next, and Minho prefers steady relationships.

“It was kind of a sudden decision,” Minho lies.

“And you were planning on doing it after a ten kilometer hike?”

“Okay, well, when you put it like that then—”

“How were you planning on doing it?” Jisung asks, and he doesn’t sound demanding or accusatory, just genuinely curious. It throws Minho for a loop for a moment. For the first time since starting the movie, Minho finally looks to his side and sees Jisung looking right back at him, lower lip tucked underneath his front teeth.

“I bought a ring and I was planning on giving it to her like they do in western films.”

Jisung’s eyes go round. “You bought a ring?”

“Yeah.”

Silence, only the audio from the movie surrounding them. Jisung blinks a few times before returning his attention to the screen in front of them. He doesn’t say anything, and the scene changes to a brighter background so Minho can’t see their reflection anymore.

He still doesn’t know what’s happening in the movie. The kid with the scar is the baby from the beginning and he’s the main character, but who are his friends? When did they become friends? Who’s the antagonist? When does the magic come in? Why are they wearing robes and using braziers if this is set in modern London?

It’s anyone’s guess how long they’ve been watching the movie, and Jisung seems to be keeping up just fine. Probably because he’s watched it a half dozen times like the few other movies he’s seen.

“Did you bring it?” Jisung suddenly asks during the scene where there’s a troll in the girls’ bathroom for some reason. His fingers are fisted into the comforter.

“What?” Minho looks back over. Jisung still doesn’t look at him.

“The ring.”

“Yeah.”

“You should throw it over the edge.” He puffs his cheeks out and brings his knees to his chest.

Minho knits his brows in confusion at the statement. “The ring?” he asks for clarification.

“Yeah. I heard it’s cathartic or something.”

“You want me to throw an eight-million-won ring over the side of a mountain?”

“Yeah. What else are you going to do with it? Fuck that bitch. Respectfully, though, if, y’know—if you’re still on good terms.” Minho can’t help but laugh at Jisung’s candidness.

“You’re crazy.” He shakes his head but his wide smile gives him away. He looks over to where his backpack is sitting on a chair by the doorwall. He doesn’t see that Jisung looks with him.

“Only if you’re feeling up to it,” Jisung tacks on. This time, Minho doesn’t respond.

-

Their ascent starts early in the morning, quiet as usual. They spent all day yesterday running around town to get Jisung the proper gear to summit the mountain, and it only took some mild hair pulling for him to agree to get a coat.

“I have a coat at home,” he excused. “I don’t need another. I’ll just wear two hoodies.” When Minho gave him a look, he corrected with, “Three?”

“I’ll buy it for you.” Minho ended up buying him everything.

But he doesn’t mind. Proper winter clothing isn’t cheap, and he didn’t want Jisung to sacrifice keeping warm and dry in order to fit his budget. He dropped everything to come on this trip with him, so it’s the least Minho could do.

They rented cleats from a store at the base run by a nice old man and started their hike just before eight. Jisung asks to stop only ten minutes in to retie his boots, and then they don’t stop for another hour.

“This is nice,” Jisung says as they ascend a wooden staircase. It’s still warm enough at their elevation for the birds to sing. “Is the whole trail like this?”

Minho shakes his head. “There are some parts that are dirt. They’re pretty narrow.”

“Do the trees get thicker?”

“The trees get thinner as you go up.”

“When do we have to put on our winter stuff?”

“Closer to the top when there’s snow. But the man at the shop said that it’s been a warm winter, so we’ll see.”

“I hope there’s snow,” Jisung nearly whispers. He readjusts his backpack straps. Minho pauses and Jisung takes the lead, watches the way the younger man’s legs wobble as he steps over the uneven terrain.

“How are your boots?”

“Comfy.”

Minho’s mouth feels dry.

“Good.”

He takes a swig of water.

Some parts of the trail are wet from an early morning rain, and Jisung points out sparse patches of solid snow leftover from the last storm as they near the summit. The wooden path has picked back up with most of the steps slippery from water, and with the way it cuts straight through some of the steepest parts, Minho’s fairly certain that an easier dirt switchback would’ve sufficed. But Jisung doesn’t seem to mind the nature walk being so manmade; he’s been going through bouts of babbling, stopping only to catch his breath. He always had a bad habit of trying to fill the silence.

“It doesn’t look like there’ll be much snow at the top,” he dejectedly grumbles, hiking his backpack straps further up his shoulders.

Minho just hums absently in response, thinking of the ring box tucked into the bottom of his bag.

Because they’ve come on the offseason, and even a little further from the New Year’s peak, there are barely any people at the top. Certainly far fewer than the last time Minho was here. It’s not particularly cold, but it is wet.

Jisung looks around for a clear overlook. “Should we eat over there?” He points to a small patch of rocks just off the boardwalk. There’s an older couple nearby but not close enough that it’ll be awkward.

“Sure.” It looks like it looks over the ocean.

The air is thinner and cooler than at the base, a nice change from the muggy air the past few days. With a burst of energy, Jisung hops over to the spot he’s picked out and finds a dry patch to sit down on and haul his backpack off his shoulders.

“Oh my god,” he exasperates. “I didn’t realize how heavy that was.” He rubs at his collarbones. Minho stands there until he shakes himself out of his head.

He sets up a respectable distance to begin digging through his bag for his portable stove and the ramyun they brought. But his efforts of having some space are squandered when Jisung cozies up right next to him.

“It’s cold up here.” He shivers and his teeth chatter.

Minho nudges him away with his shoulder and says, “Then put your coat on.” Jisung groans and moves back to his own bag, unaware of the arrhythmia he’s caused in Minho’s chest—unaware that the burning on the tips of his ears isn’t from the cold.

Minho gets the stove lit and some water boiling while Jisung shimmies into his new coat and snowpants.

“Why’re you putting your snowpants on?” he asks with a quizzical look on his face.

“Because it’s cold!” Jisung’s entire body shivers. “Do you have gloves?”

Minho takes one look at him, mind blank, and blinks one time before opening one of his arms. “Come he—” And Jisung dives in before he can even finish his sentence. He shakes like a leaf, and it takes Minho another moment to comprehend what’s happened, but when he does, he doesn’t feel the embarrassment he thought he would. In fact, the heat from his ears dissipates, and he wraps his arm securely around Jisung’s lithe frame, holds him close while they wait for the water to finish boiling, and Jisung soon stops shaking and melts into his arm.

He doesn’t pull away when the water finally boils, and Minho doesn’t ask him to either. It’s nice having him under his arm like this. And it’s not that it reminds him of how he’d sit with his girlfriend—it’s just that it reminds him of when he and Jisung were in middle school and how he’d hold him while they were snuggled under the blankets on cool nights.

Minho opens the ramyun cups while still holding Jisung, carefully pours in the boiling water without letting go, and thinks about giving the younger man one of them to warm his hands with but then thinks otherwise when he realizes that that means he’ll have to let him go. So instead, he gently places them on the rocks by their feet and pulls Jisung closer.

Thank god there aren’t many people around. But at the same time, this is far from out of the ordinary on top of a mountain in the middle of winter. If anyone even cared to spare them a glance, they’d just think that they were cold and ill-prepared for the weather.

Jisung sighs through his nose and rests his head on Minho’s shoulder, and Minho makes the mistake of looking over, of looking at his thin eyelashes fan over his plump cheeks, and of looking lower at the way Jisung’s lips are dried and chapped and a pale pink. His heart skips one, two beats. His fingers tighten. Jisung makes a little noise but wriggles his way closer, eyes never opening.

This is strange, Minho thinks, because he’s always thought of Jisung as being attractive, just never in a way that interested him. He’s always looked at women and Jisung has always looked at men. Is it because he’s lonely? Is that why it feels weird whenever he looks at Jisung? Or is it the human touch that has been in his life so long that’s now missing?

But it’s peaceful, whatever is going on with his head. And Jisung doesn’t seem to mind. He’s always liked being taken care of. But not too much, that’s where things went wrong with Chan.

They eat their ramyun in silence, Jisung making a pained expression every time he slurps up his noodles but biting through the pain because he wants to stay warm. He finishes everything by the time Minho is halfway through.

“Do you want the rest?” Minho asks, handing over the cup.

“No.” Jisung shakes his head but his eyes give him away. “You walked just as long as I did. You should eat.”

Minho doesn’t take no for an answer and thrusts the steaming food into Jisung’s hands. “It’s fine. I’m too hot, and we have snacks.”

“How are you too hot.” Jisung already has a mouthful of noodles when he says it, his cheeks practically bursting at the seams. He turns to Minho who can’t help but splutter a laugh.

“You look ridiculous.”

“Keep your thoughts to yourself.” Minho laughs again and Jisung says, “How long do you want to stay up here? I wanna get back before dark.”

“Same.” Minho looks up and over the edge, at the bright cloudy sky and the blanket of salty air that hazes the base of the mountain. And then he thinks about the ring in his bag. “I brought it.”

“Brought what?” Jisung takes another helping of noodles.

“The ring.” Jisung almost chokes on his helping of noodles.

He’s got broth dripping down his chin and tears in his eyes when he coughs up, “What?” His eyes are wide with shock. “What?”

Minho fidgets in his spot. “Yeah, I….” His words trail off because he’s not sure why he brought it. He wasn’t thinking about Jisung’s words from the previous night, knowing that they were only said in jest. It’s just… while he was packing his bag in the morning, Jisung stepped out of the bedroom and Minho tossed it in without a second thought.

He straightens up and takes a shallow breath. “You said it yourself. What am I going to do with the ring anyways?”

“You could return it?”

“No. I had it custom made.”

“But what if—” Jisung stops himself, but Minho knows what he was going to say.

What if she comes back? What if they get back together? What if everything was just one big misunderstanding and Minho is about to do the most asinine thing imaginable without ever having reached out to her?

They were together for six years. She’s been gone two and a half weeks and hasn’t tried to call or even text. Sure, Minho should give her longer or at least send her one message, too, but he hasn’t. And truth be told, he doesn’t really want to. Nothing is guaranteed. So should he really wait for something that may never come? If she can walk away, so can he. And it starts here.

Minho reaches into his bag as Jisung frantically says, “What if you pawned it? People do that all the time. I think. C’mon. I was just joking, you don’t have to—”

“Jisung.” Jisung snaps his lips tight. His eyes dash to the ring box in Minho’s hands, go wide for a moment before returning. Minho sighs and says, “I’m not doing this because you brought it up. I’m doing it because I want to.”

He’s opened the box a hundred times since he picked it up from the jeweler’s over a month ago.

“She’s going to love it,” the woman at the register told him while she was finalizing the purchase.

“She actually doesn’t know yet.” Minho could feel the way his ears were burning, but he couldn’t keep the smile off his face while imagining Sookyung’s expression when he got down on one knee.

The ring glitters even with the lack of direct sunlight as soon as the box is open. He thought the next time he’d open the box, it wouldn’t be him looking at it, but his girlfriend. But here he is sitting on the top of the mountain he was planning on proposing at staring at the ring that he was supposed to give away. He’s still doing it, in a sense, but it’s melancholic to see something that should’ve been the start of something great being the ending instead.

He holds the box over to Jisung and says, “Want to see?” Because someone else should at least look at it before it gets lost in the wilderness, right?

Jisung’s eyes go round and his mouth drops open. “Holy shit,” he breathes.

“You want to hold it?”

“No.” He shakes his head quickly. “I don’t think I’ve ever held something that expensive before.”

“Well, just wait until you get a car.”

“Hyung,” Jisung whines in a pleading way. “I know I told you to throw it over the edge, but I was just joking. Please don’t do something you’ll regret.” There’s a truth and a lie in his words. A backhanded sincerity like he doesn’t believe what he’s saying. But which part, Minho is unsure. He takes the ring out of the box.

“I won’t regret it.” He curls his fist around the ring, feels the way the prongs dig into his skin. He stands up quickly and makes his way over to the railing that looks over the side of the mountain and he hears Jisung quickly scurrying after him. Minho’s heart races with each footstep that brings him nearer, but it’s not because he’s about to throw away eight million won, it’s because he’s terrified of heights and they’re twenty-five-hundred meters above sea level. The last time he came here, he didn’t even try to look over the edge, just appreciated it from afar.

But the sea breeze feels nice on his skin despite the biting cold. Up here where it feels like he’s on top of the world, everything from the sky to the ground to the foliage is pale from the altitude and the frigid temperatures, but down below, everything is still alive and green. Humidity hangs heavy through the buildings, and distantly Minho can see an airplane taking off for the mainland. He looks down in his hand at the ring whose shimmer he used to be able to see his future in, now just a clear stone with some imperfections.

Jisung looks over his shoulder and says, “Please think about this, hyung.” The way he says it, a little bit of pleading and a little bit of desperation, probably with his eyebrows turned upside down, leaves Minho’s throat dry just imagining it.

He listens to the younger man babble on a little more, the same regurgitated spiel over and over. “Jisung-ah,” Minho calls over his shoulder. He can almost hear the way Jisung’s mouth snaps shut. He’s always listened well. Minho’s heart beats faster. He looks down at the ring again, closes his fist, opens it. Blood pounds through his ears. The light breeze howls in his ears. He can hear Jisung’s words over and over again in his head.

I wasn’t being serious.

Don’t do it, please.

I don’t want you to regret it.

But he also hears that inkling of hope that he’s sure Jisung thinks he’s hidden so well—hope that Minho will do it. He takes one last look at the ring.

“Hyung?”

His muscles burn as he winds his arm. A similar feeling to when he and Jisung used to skip rocks at a fountain when they were kids. They could only find small pebbles and didn’t really understand that the rocks had to be flat, or really knew how to skip them at all, but they’d try to throw them on the second tier of the fountain where the water spewed out from. Minho was the only one ever able to make it, and Jisung chalked it up to not having hit his growth spurt yet, arms crossed and lip jutted out in a pout.

That’s all Minho thinks about when he swings his arm forward, feeling the smooth metal and the sharp cuts of the diamond one last time before he opens his hand. It glitters brilliantly once it’s out in front of him and suspended in the air for a fraction of a second. Never in a million years is this what he thought he’d ever do with an engagement ring. Hell, he never thought he’d buy an engagement ring. But love makes you do uncharacteristic things.

The ring flies out in front of him and spins like a planet out of orbit, going further, further, until it’s barely a speck in outer space. And then gravity pulls it down, down into the thicket of trees tens of meters in front of him, hundreds of meters down. It disappears from view into the pines, and Minho’s chest feels light. Not in regret, but in relief. He turns around with a wild expression, like a kid who’s just been on his first rollercoaster, and looks at Jisung.

“Do you want to head down?”

Jisung remains silent the entire hike down, completely the opposite of when they were heading up. Maybe he’s really worried that Minho will somehow blame him for the ring. But it’s not his fault. Minho is an adult. His own irrational decisions are just that, his own. He’ll have to think of a way to prove to Jisung that he has nothing to worry about. Maybe a cheesecake and some coffee on the way home.

Even when they get to the car, Jisung doesn’t say anything. He sits perfectly in his seat with his knees touching and his hands in his lap picking away at his cuticles, and Minho knows that he blames himself.

“Jisung-ah.” He reaches across the console for the gear shifter and catches Jisung stop fidgeting out of the corner of his eye. “Don’t worry too much. It’s not your fault.” He shifts the car and keeps his hand between them, feeling the way that Jisung so obviously is staring at his fingers. They begin their drive.

This time it’s Minho that’s trying to fill the empty silence with empty words. He tries to talk as they take the winding switchbacks down the mountain, and he’s even rambling thoughts in his head while waiting for their order at the coffee shop while Jisung is in the car. They’ll probably order in tonight, so during the short ride back to the hotel, he’s mindlessly going through the food options around Jeju and even what’s on the menu for room service. And the whole time, the whole drive and even when Minho hands him his drink and cake, Jisung doesn’t look at him.

Tomorrow is the last full day of their trip before they fly back home and get back to reality. They visited the camellia gardens and Hallasan, and Jisung mentioned that he wanted to go to Manjanggul, so they should look up the tour times over dinner.

“Tomorrow’s our last day,” Minho says as he opens their hotel door for them. “Do you still want to go to the caves?” He looks over his shoulder and Jisung looks up instinctively. “Or we could just chill and watch movies.” They could make use of the outdoor bath again. It was relaxing.

The door shuts and Jisung doesn’t respond, and Minho makes a face and turns around, finds the younger man staring right at him with a deep concern in his eyes. “What’s wrong?”

“Hyung?” Jisung’s eyes are darting all over him. It’s the first word he’s said to him in a few hours. “Are you okay?”

“Yes?” Minho makes a face. “I’m fine. What do you want for dinner?”

“Hyung, you’re crying.”

“No I’m not, Jisung, stop—” Jisung reaches out and gently cups Minho’s cheek with his hand, and Minho’s heart skips in his chest, and he feels a cold tear roll down his face. Jisung’s eyes soften and he wipes it with his thumb.

“Hyung,” Jisung says again, and then it hits him.

Everything that’s happened over the past two weeks—coming home from work after a warm winter’s day to find the house flooded with golden light and Sookyung sitting on the couch with a bag by her feet and tears on her face, and words that flowed through his ears like sand in an hourglass; sitting on the couch afterwards with Soonie in his lap asking to be scratched, not knowing what had just happened, and Minho going to bed and waking up the next morning like it was business as usual. It wasn’t too late to cancel the trip. He could’ve called. But instead he picked up the phone and dialed Jisung’s number.

More tears run down his face, hot and burning, and Minho squeezes his eyes shut as Jisung frantically pulls him over to the living room so that they can sit on the couch, the entire time Minho clinging to his clothes like a lifeline. Jisung wraps his arms around him and Minho feels like his chest is about to collapse.

He doesn’t cry very often. Not as a sign of weakness, but because he hates it when people point out how infrequent it is when he does cry like it should be a spectacle or something. And even though he hasn’t cried in front of Jisung in a long time—once in middle school when he twisted his ankle playing football, and then another time in college when he and Sookyung got into their first big argument and he spent the night at Jisung’s to let things cool off—Jisung still holds him like it’s second nature. Like any mother would to an injured or lost child.

Minho chokes down air and grips Jisung’s shirt tighter until the seams strain between his fingers, and then he pulls tighter still. Jisung doesn’t say anything, doesn’t lie and tell him that things will be alright, but he does shush him soothingly, and once Minho’s finally catches his breath, he strokes slow, methodical circles down the curve of his spine.

The sun was beginning to set by the time they made it to the hotel, and by the time Minho’s gathered himself enough to pull away from Jisung, it’s completely dark outside. He sniffles and looks at where his face was buried in Jisung’s shirt, a large wet patch left behind.

“Sorry.” He wipes the snot from his nose and clears his throat. “I’ll buy you a new shirt.”

“Don’t worry about it, hyung,” Jisung murmurs. Minho looks into his eyes and sees starlight gleaming back at him—stars that twinkle a message in binary from eons away. He takes Minho’s face into his hands and asks, “Are you okay?” He doesn’t tease or mask the raw concern that’s so obvious in his voice, his eyes, his words and his body language.

Minho blinks again and feels his throat begin to dry.

“Yeah.” It’s croaked and hoarse and he doesn’t look away. “We should get something to eat.” Jisung’s lips are perfectly pink in the warm lighting of their hotel room. There’s a brief moment where his expression is unreadable. Minho hears static in his ears.

Jisung gulps and his lips twitch like he wants to say something, like he’s trying to find the right words. But they don’t make it out. Whatever was going through his head ceases and he pulls back until he’s sitting upright on the couch, a respectable distance between them.

“Let’s just get room service,” he says and then stands quickly. “I’m gonna take the shower first.” He leaves Minho in the silence of the living room, the soft click of the bedroom door deafening to the ears. Minho waits, head empty, until he hears the sound of the shower turn on before getting up robotically to find the menu.

He finds it in the entryway by the door. It’s extensive by hotel room service standards, but at the same time, Minho’s never stayed in a hotel this nice before. And he’s here with Jisung.

Jisung, who didn’t question it when Minho suddenly asked him on a trip when they haven’t spoken regularly since college. Jisung, who never failed to answer Minho’s texts despite not being as close of friends as they used to be. Jisung, who always showed up to dinner every few months with a new man but not worrying about what Minho thought because it was their only chance to catch up.

Jisung, who is never the one to reach out first, who has been tiptoeing around him since the start of the trip, and whose words have had a double meaning and are always carefully picked.

The words on the menu blur. Minho’s fingers tighten and crinkle it. He heads into the bedroom. In hindsight, he should’ve knocked because he knew that Jisung was in the shower, but instead he swings open the door and is met with Jisung’s bare back. The younger man turns around, skin hot like honey and wet hair being fussed over with a towel.

“Knock much?” he jokes. He turns back. He’s only in his boxer briefs. Minho gulps again.

“What do you want to eat?” Is it the bedroom that’s hot? Must be. From the shower or something.

Yeah. Must be it.

“What do they have?” Jisung wraps the towel around his neck and waltzes over to lean into Minho’s space and look at the menu. He spends a ludicrously long time (or is it short?) scanning over the words in a way that makes his eyelashes flutter like hummingbird wings. “Get me the steak. Please.”

“Sure.” Minho’s throat feels thick. “How’s the water?”

“So nice. We should take another bath later. My legs are sore from the hike.”

“Yeah,” Minho nods, eyes drifting up and down slowly. “Makes sense.”

“Do you wanna order and then shower?”

“Order what?”

“The food? Did the altitude get to your head?” He turns to face Minho. His chest is firm, his arms soft but muscular.

Minho blinks.

“Must’ve.”

Jisung sighs dramatically and snatches the menu from his fingers. “I’ll order then. Go hop in the shower. What do you want?” It’s then that Minho realizes he didn’t actually read the menu.

“You know what I like,” he says, and Jisung shoots him a little smirk before walking off towards the kitchen. Minho takes possibly the coldest shower of his life.

Their room service is just being delivered by the time he gets out. Jisung is setting up their plates on the coffee table as Minho steps out of the bedroom in just his boxer briefs and one of the hotel bathrobes to cover him. He notices that Jisung’s also thrown on a bathrobe, too. They’re probably dressed the same underneath.

“Looks good.”

“This place is awesome,” Jisung notes as he plops down on the sofa. He pats the spot next to him. “I know you had something different in mind when you booked this trip, but I’m glad you asked me to come along. I feel like it’s been a long time since we’ve done anything just the two of us.” He cuts into his steak, red juice oozing to reveal the perfect medium rare. He brings the piece to his lips and Minho doesn’t realize that he watches the whole time—watches how Jisung’s cheeks puff out, how his lips are nearly just as crimson, nearly just as tender.

“Should we watch something?” he asks. Jisung hums and goes in for another bite. It takes all of Minho’s strength to look away.

By the time he’s picking up his knife and fork, Jisung is already halfway through his meal. He scarfs down everything like he hasn’t eaten a meal in days. But to be fair, he did climb a mountain just because Minho asked him to.

At Jisung’s behest, they watch the second Harry Potter movie. Minho still isn’t sure what happened in the first one even though they watched it twice, so he doesn’t bother paying much attention to the sequel, instead focusing on the food in front of him and the way that Jisung’s eyes are glued to the screen, barely blinking. He’s entranced by these movies and Minho doesn’t know why.

About halfway through Jisung’s eyes start to lid and he yawns.

“You want to finish this in bed?” Minho offers.

“I wanted us to take a bath, though.” Despite his words Jisung still stands up and stretches out.

“There’s always tomorrow.”

“Yeah, you’re right. Clean up out here and I’ll get it set up?”

“Sounds good.”

Minho’s mind is static as he methodically cleans up the plates from their dinner and brings them out into the hall. Tomorrow is their last day before they fly home. And then what? Will things go back to normal? Back to them only talking occasionally? Minho doesn’t want it to, if he’s being honest. He loves his cats, but his home has felt like a shell of itself since Sookyung left. Just a place where he eats and sleeps. She was his best friend for six years and now he doesn’t know what to do.

But he does know that he has one more day with Jisung in this idyllic setting where everything has been perfect. They’ve fallen back together like they used to, like they’re in college again, and he doesn’t want to spoil anything. He knows Jisung well enough to know that the younger man will never be the first to reach out not because he doesn’t want to, but because he overthinks everything, and now that Minho has found himself in a situation where he has infinite amounts of free time, he should focus on the one person who’s been in his life the longest.

They say that if a friendship lasts seven years then it’ll last a lifetime. He and Jisung have known each other and been friends for over a decade. They’ve grown apart and come back together so many times that Minho knows that he’d be stupid to ever cast him to the side ever again like he did when he started dating Sookyung. So, whomever comes next, they’ll be second and Jisung will be first.

Minho heads back into the suite and locks the door and switches off all the lights before heading into the bedroom where he finds Jisung laying belly down on top of the bed, still in just his bathrobe. He stares at Minho for a second too long, a lingering glance, eyes moving up and down in a way that can’t be hidden or missed.

“I have it at the spot where we left off,” he says thickly. His eyes are a little glassy. Maybe from sleep, maybe from something else.

“Can we restart?” Minho asks. “I wasn’t really paying attention.” He slides over to the bed and sees the way that Jisung’s eyes follow his legs and the way he nods so absently.

There’s something in the air as Minho settles on the bed next to Jisung, laying flat on his stomach and bringing a pillow over to rest his head on. Jisung fumbles a little rewinding the movie but gets it eventually.

“Are we going to watch the whole series?” Minho asks. It comes out half joke, half serious.

“If you want to. We can just stay in and watch movies tomorrow.”

“And take a bath.” Jisung turns his head, cheeks pulled into a warm smile.

“Yeah,” he agrees. “Let’s watch movies outside.”

“Your skin’s gonna get all wrinkly.”

“We’ll take breaks!” Jisung pushes himself up onto his hands just as the movie opens. His bathrobe falls open just enough for part of his chest to be exposed and Minho’s eyes shift down quickly before coming back up. But Jisung never stopped looking at him.

A silence lays steady over them as the music from the movie quietens to a scene that Minho doesn’t remember. They restarted the movie because he wasn’t paying attention the first time. He’s not paying attention this time, either, and neither is Jisung.

It’s sudden and offhanded when Jisung asks, “Why’d you get an engagement ring anyways?”

And Minho’s words are flat and his eyes are distracted when he responds, “I dunno. She was really into American romcoms. I guess I kind of wanted it to be like something out of one of those movies. For her.”

“Wooow. Romantic.” Jisung jabs his shoulder playfully to break the tension. He falls back to the bed and turns to the TV. It’s too dark to gauge his expression, but he does quick things like that when he’s embarrassed. Minho knows.

He knows that Jisung’s thoughts are racing and bouncing around his head a million kilometers a minute, and he knows that he’ll never make the first move. Why keep asking about the ring?

“Are you still worried about it?” Minho asks.

“About what?” Jisung keeps looking on ahead.

“The ring.”

“No, hyung, I—”

“Because it’s not your fault. It was my decision. If I wanted to keep it, I would have. But I didn’t—want to keep it, that is.” Jisung slowly turns to look at him and his expression is unreadable. His lips are parted perfectly.

He shakes his head and says, “It’s not about the ring.” He’s diverting. Minho grits his teeth. Jisung pushes against the bed again like he’s about to get up and Minho catches his wrist. He pulls him under, pushes him flat against the soft mattress and cages him with arms on either side of his head, knees locking Jisung’s legs in a similar position.

Jisung’s eyes go wide but he doesn’t avert his gaze. Minho asks again, “Then why do you keep asking about it?” His gaze trails.

“Why’d you ask me to come to Jeju-do with you?” Jisung says, but it’s barely a whisper and barely has any real bite.

“Why did you say yes?” Minho retorts. His eyes are fixated on Jisung’s pink lips. Soft and plump and right in front of him. His eyes trail up his face to see that Jisung is not meeting his gaze, attention drawn just a little lower, too. But he slowly brings them up once he realizes that Minho is staring at him.

“Are you seeing anyone right now?” he asks. Jisung shakes his head. His eyes start to fall back to where they were focusing on Minho’s lips. It’s now or never.

Minho dips down quick before his brain can second-guess him. They both inhale sharp through their noses when their lips press together—Jisung’s are warm and soft, and Minho’s are cracked and cold. It’s not anything more than a tight-lipped kiss. Jisung doesn’t make any sounds other than when he breathed in, and neither does Minho.

It’s Minho that pulls away first. He looks down at where his hands are on either side of Jisung’s head, holding him against the bed. But Jisung doesn’t look like he minds the tight space. His eyes are lidded and look like they have stars in them.

He’s breathless and cross-eyed when he says, “I didn’t know you liked guys, hyung.”

“I don’t. I’m not gay.” Minho tacks on the last part for clarification.

“Too bad. You could have anyone you wanted.” He trails a little further from Minho’s lips to where the collar of his robe hangs open. “Men or women.”

I only want you, Minho’s subconscious mind says.

“Stop talking,” he says instead. Jisung’s eyes return back to his, sparkling. It makes Minho’s head spin.

He kisses him properly this time, and Jisung lets out a little whine that has Minho’s fingers digging into the mattress and his resolve melting that much more. Strange as it may be, the thought of him kissing another man has never once crossed his mind all his life, and if he were to think about it now, the thought doesn’t excite him, but it also doesn’t disgust him.

But when he thinks about kissing Jisung, about coaxing more sweet sounds from his cherry lips, thinks about him in the throes of passion with his hair matted to his face from sweat and his thighs trembling and his Adam’s apple stuttering as he sobs out pleasured and broken moans, Minho doesn’t even know where to begin. But he knows that he doesn’t want to stop.

It’s Jisung that licks into his mouth first, asks for permission by tracing his tongue across the seam of Minho’s lips, and Minho lets him in the second he feels the wetness against him. He groans when Jisung sucks on his tongue the moment it tangles with his. He shoves his hands through the opening of his bathrobe, feels toned muscle that gives way like putty under his fingers. Jisung squirms and breaks away to let out a loud moan, and Minho takes the opportunity to nip at the side of his neck.

“Oh my god.” Minho tweaks his nipples and sucks a hard bruise into soft skin. “Minho.” Jisung ruts up and he’s hard. He’s hard. He’s writhing and wriggling and letting out the lewdest noises and he’s hard.

It’s like whiplash. He’s never felt another man’s dick against him, but for some reason, the more Jisung rolls his hips, lets out his little wanton gasps, the more Minho’s own cock twitches in his briefs and begins to strain against the fabric. And soon, through heated lips slippery with spit, Minho is moaning, too.

“Ah, fuck.”

“Hyung,” Jisung whines. He grinds roughly and lets out a choked sob. “Shit. Hyung. Hyung.” It must be hurting him with how solid his erection is. Minho can feel the outline of it through the thin fabric of their underwear.

Jisung wraps his arms around the back of Minho’s neck and pulls him down to connect their lips desperately and tangles his legs around his waist, pulls them together impossibly tight so that there’s almost no space between them. He moans as their tongues flatten against one another, and his limbs go taut.

This is crazy. Jisung’s body is so hot and honest in a way that throws Minho’s entire being off its axis. It’s like when the first person asked well, why does the earth rotate in the direction that it does? and scientists had to scramble for the answer, and Minho is in that same boat now.

He doesn’t know why he’s so fucking turned on by the way Jisung moves or sounds, but he wants more. He wants to be greedy. He wants to keep Jisung in a cage in the corner of his room where only he can admire him like a canary, where only he can listen to his sweet songs.

Jisung brings his hands to clasp around Minho’s shoulders and tugs on his lower lip, biting just hard enough to shock him, and just hard enough to tell him that he wants this just as much as he does.

Minho pulls back for a fraction of a second to see the way that Jisung’s eyes are glazed over and how mussed up his hair is, and then his gaze travels to the younger man’s chest and how his bathrobe has fallen open just enough to give Minho a stark comparison of sun-kissed gold against pristine white.

His hands move on their own, fingers pressed together and slowly smoothing their way up smoldering flesh. He watches how Jisung’s cherry lips part in a delicious gasp at the first contact. He slips under the robe and Jisung’s eyes flutter closed.

“Hyung.”

He’s all pliant and soft-limbed, letting Minho’s fingers mold him into any shape he wants.

“H-hyung.”

His back arches as Minho pinches one of his nipples into a pert bud, rolling his thumb over it over and over.

“Fuck. Hyung, stop teasing.” Jisung pinches his brows together and purses his lips into a pout. There’s a tent in the bathrobe between his legs where his cock is undoubtedly aching. Probably dripping.

“What do you want?” Minho murmurs as he dips down to place soft kisses into his nape. He smirks as the way Jisung’s body reacts with a violent shiver and goosebumps popping underneath his fingers.

Touching Jisung and pleasing him are not outside of Minho’s repertoire. It’s the same as touching a woman, except that Jisung is more sensitive than any girl he’s ever been with. His body is honest and so are his words when he gets worked up enough.

With a high and airy whimper, Jisung pleads, “Touch me, please.” He thrusts up into the air looking for friction, and Minho pauses. Because this is outside of his repertoire. He’s never… touched another man’s dick before. Surely it’s not any different than when he jacks off, but he can’t hide the way that his movements stutter from Jisung’s words, and his reaction doesn’t go unnoticed.

During the split second where he pauses to process what to do next, Jisung’s hands come up to cup his face. “Let me touch you,” he rephrases. He places a tender kiss to Minho’s lips that’s so quick Minho can’t even return it before moving lower to mouth along the column of Minho’s neck and slipping his hands into the breast of his bathrobe. He squeezes Minho’s pecs and groans.

“Hyung,” he breathes again, still waiting for a response. His voice is laden with desperation. It makes Minho’s throat feel thick.

He doesn’t respond with words but rather reaches around his waist to untie the knot holding his bathrobe closed. As soon as he does that, he hears Jisung’s breath stutter and him whisper out a quiet “thank you”.

He has grabby hands that move faster than his brain can keep up, and just as Minho’s robe falls open, Jisung’s fingers are tugging at the waistband of his boxers and wrapping around his dick. Minho hisses and bucks his hips forward, colliding with Jisung’s still-clothed cock and causing the younger man to cry out.

“Sorry,” Minho grits. He pinches his eyes shut as Jisung tugs on his cockhead.

“Oh my god,” Jisung gasps. He hurriedly pulls his own robe open and pushes down his briefs, his own aching hard-on springing out. “Hyung.” He spits in his hand and brings it down to wrap around both of their lengths, the drag subliminal. Minho’s eyes roll back and he can’t help but thrust into Jisung’s hand, press up against his cock in a way that he never even imagined would feel this good. He feels light, his head airy, and moan after moan draws from his throat.

There had never been a moment in time where Minho even imagined that a handjob could feel this good. Hell, he hates jerking himself because it’s just not the same as sex; it doesn’t even compare. But the way that Jisung tightens his grip, brings his other hand into the mix to fully grasp their combined girths, sends pleasure jolting up and down his spine in ways that he hasn’t felt in fucking years.

It’s not like he ever grew tired of his girlfriend, but their love life became predictable, as it does with any established couple. Foreplay, sex, cleanup. Almost like clockwork. Usually it was Minho who would do all the work. And it never bothered him. It was kind of expected. Sometimes Sookyung would take the initiative and ride him, but now all Minho can think about is Jisung on top of him, head thrown back and back arched beautifully, as he rolls his hips and cries out those heavenly moans. And just to be a gremlin, Minho would occasionally meet his movements and send him twitching from the unexpected stimulation.

Minho grinds his teeth and looks down. Jisung’s watching him with such a fucked-out expression that he has to look away before he really loses it. So he looks down instead, down the alleyway between their bodies to the tips of their cocks sliding together. A steady string of precum oozes from Jisung’s slit and pools on his belly, and seeing it and the effect this all has on him causes a glob to leak from Minho’s dick as well.

“I wish I brought lube,” Jisung whines. His hips stutter and his fingers tighten around them.

“Me, too.” Minho can’t look away from how angry red his cockhead looks.

“Ah. I want you to fuck me so bad.” His grip becomes borderline painful. “Fuck. Hyung. Minho-hyung. Please.” Minho’s head swirls.

Fuck Jisung? Like, sex? With Jisung? The thought doesn’t even roll around in Minho’s head before he’s saying, “Next time.” He finds a rhythm to match with the way Jisung’s stroking them. “Next time.” He can feel his climax approaching.

Jisung must be close, too, because his hands are growing sloppy. It’s so slick between them that he can barely get a good grip.

“Promise,” Jisung says. Is the pleasure going to his head, or is this true honesty?

“I promise.” Minho leans in to kiss him square on the lips. No tongues or frills or anything other than a solid press of their lips together. Jisung yelps in the back of his throat and then lets their cocks go in favor of winding his arms around Minho’s neck like it’s the most natural thing in the world. And Minho doesn’t let his head get the best of him this time. This time, he just acts.

He replaces Jisung’s hands with one of his and pumps them both rapidly. He’s so close. Jisung must be, too. He can’t focus on the kiss, can’t focus on moving his hips, too lost in the pleasure. But Minho moves for both of them.

He continues rubbing hard against Jisung’s length, barely any fiction from the mess of spit and precum that’s built up on them. Jisung’s mouth hangs open in a silent moan, barely any noise leaving him save for the occasional whimper or hiccup or soft gasp. Minho gets the same way when he’s close. His pace grows erratic and he grows silent.

Jisung keeps his arms wrapped securely around his neck but stops being able to do anything else—kiss, rut, beg. Minho takes the opportunity to watch the way his brows and his eyelashes twitch as his orgasm steadily approaches. A sight that he makes sure to study long and hard. He wants to take in everything about the moment, staving himself off so that he can watch Jisung come undone.

From the time that they woke up to the time that they got back, Jisung has been yapping nonstop. It’s an endearing habit that’s like white noise to Minho’s ears, but now he’s hyper-fixated on the silence that seeps from Jisung’s lips. His mouth hangs open, wide, and his lips are red as wine, and he grows even more silent the closer he gets.

Where it began with faint whimpers and moans now fades to nothing, not even a hitched breath. Jisung goes completely silent and almost completely rigid until Minho squeezes his fingers on one upstroke, and then the dam gives way.

He finishes with a sharp breath and a sudden jerk in his spine, arching way up off the bed as hot cum shoots from his tip and paints the front of his bathrobe in the white and sticky mess. He rides it out for a few seconds before gasping for air and fluttering his eyes open to reveal them to be glistening with unspent tears, and it’s that mental image that finally sends Minho toppling over his limit as well.

He adds to the mess on Jisung’s bathrobe and more. He doesn’t make nearly as much noise, cutting himself off by biting his lip, and he pinches his brows together so hard that it gives him a mild headache. But a soft stroke to his cheek has him opening his eyes to find Jisung looking back at him like it’s just the two of them in this world. His lips and eyes are pulled into the most serene of smiles. Realistically, part of his mood can be attributed to the post-orgasm bliss, but Minho will take what he can get.

He leans in to kiss him again and taste the smile that’s on his lips. Hotter than a summer’s day and gentler than a winter’s night. Jisung makes the seasons turn and time stop. He doesn’t stop smiling through the kiss, and he doesn’t stop stroking Minho’s cheek even long after they’ve separated.

“Do you want to take that bath?” Minho asks, unable to keep his own smile off his lips. Jisung’s eyes soften and he beams, and he nods and hums a soft yes.

-

The flight is as quick as it was to come. Barely any air time before they’re making their descent. Jisung doesn’t fall asleep like he did before, and Minho pretends to be reading something on his phone screen when in reality he’s swiping through his photos and cursing himself for not having taken more.

When the pilot announces their descent, Minho asks Jisung, “Can I drive you home so you don’t have to take the train?” He’s not really sure how Jisung made it to the airport by the subway with his giant luggage. Plus, he has a car, so it would be rude for him not to offer. Especially after everything that’s happened.

Jisung takes a long time to ponder the question. When he responds, he doesn’t turn to face him. “Sure.”

He hauls their suitcases into his sedan, an even tighter fit than the rental, and opens up his maps app for Jisung to put his address into. It’s a bit shameful that they’ve known each other for so long, live so close to each other, and yet neither of them know where the other lives.

But Jisung doesn’t hesitate or let the awkward air linger. He plugs in his address without a fuss and settles into the passenger seat.

“I can’t believe you still have this car,” he comments as Minho buckles up.

Minho laughs. “What’s that supposed to mean?” He shifts the car into reverse to start backing out into the aisle of the parking structure.

“I dunno. Thought you’d have gotten something nicer.” Jisung shrugs.

“And I thought you’d have your license by now.”

“Hey! It’s a work in progress.”

“I don’t know if you’ve really made any progress, though.”

“This is bullying. Let me out.” Jisung pretends to reach for the door handle just as they’re coasting out of the garage, the cold winter sun doing little to bring them warmth inside Minho’s car that’s been sitting for a week.

It doesn’t feel like they’re back home after a vacation. Minho cranks up the heat when the car’s warmed up and Jisung cycles through his songs to curate the perfect playlist for the drive. He absently points out things on the way back to his place—which cafés have the best coffee, and which ones are worth skipping. While he talks, he types away on his phone, and out of the corner of his eye Minho can see that he’s texting Felix. Because they’re roommates. His hands tighten on the steering wheel.

Jisung’s apartment building is unassuming and short, just a few blocks from the Han River but without a proper view. Minho doesn’t question it when, after they’ve arrived at where the GPS is telling him to stop, Jisung instead takes over and directs him into the underground parking lot and telling him to pull into a specific spot when he could’ve just hopped out on the sidewalk.

“I feel so gross after the plane ride,” Jisung complains as he’s pulling his backpack from the backseat and Minho is lugging his suitcase out of the trunk. “I need to take a shower.”

“Planes always make my face feel gross,” Minho absently comments. He sets down the luggage and the wheels echo loudly around the concrete structure. He looks at Jisung and sees him staring at him like he does when he wants to say something. Lip pulled under his teeth, eyes sparkling, eyebrows slightly upturned.

“Do you want to wash up real quick before going home?”

“Sure.”

He follows Jisung to the elevator.

Whatever intensity was going on at the hotel after hiking up Hallasan returns once the doors to the lift close. Jisung shifts side-to-side and flutters his fingers. Minho looks down and takes one of his hands in his.

“It’ll be nice to see Yongbokkie after all this time.”

“He’s over at Channie-hyung’s.”

Minho hums like he’s surprised. Felix was home. Jisung told him to leave on the drive over.

The elevator dings on their floor. Minho doesn’t pay any attention to the hallway, doesn’t even know which direction they’re walking. His eyes are focused downward on the way Jisung’s hips pivot as he leads them to the front door of his unit. He punches in the code and the door chimes as it’s opened.

“My room is this way.” Jisung kicks off his shoes and shuffles into the apartment, Minho close by. He’s still got the same couch he did in college. It was worn back then, and it’s finally hit that sweet spot where it’s been lived in enough that it won’t show its age.

The living and kitchen are larger than Minho’s, but Jisung’s room is smaller. He’s the first door down the hall closest to the living room, the bathroom right across from him, and Felix’s room on the other side of a shared wall. Good to know.

“I’m just gonna hop in the shower. Make yourself at home.” Jisung tosses his bag on his bed and takes his suitcase from Minho. Minho doesn’t budge. Jisung blinks, he blinks back.

“Can I join you?” Minho asks. He takes a half-step closer.

“I was… gonna clean myself.” Jisung’s Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows thickly, audibly.

“I can help with that. Save some water.”

Jisung crinkles his brows in concern. He asks, “Have you ever done anal before, hyung?” His bluntness catches Minho off guard.

“Uh.”

So he was pretty obvious, huh?

Jisung puffs out his cheeks and turns around to grab some clothes out of his dresser. “You stay here and I’ll be out soon,” he says and then marches off across the hall, leaving Minho alone in his bedroom with his ears slowly burning and his heart racing. He stays rigid until he hears the shower turn on.

Jisung’s room looks just as it did in college, albeit a little emptier. He’s still got his rickety desk with his laptop open and his music equipment roughly organized on it. Two guitars sit on their stands in the corner with a bean bag chair that has an approximate Jisung-sized dent in it. There are clothes and other miscellaneous objects strewn about, but the bed is clean. Pristine, even. Neatly pressed corners and not a crease on the pillows.

Minho flops onto it and rolls onto his belly, comes face-to-face with a reflection of himself. He blinks and his reflection blinks back. Why does Jisung have a mirror on his headboard? It’s not apart of the bed frame. It looks like it’s been stuck on with sticky tack and doesn’t fully reach the ends. Does he use it to get ready? Minho blinks again as he hears the shower curtain across the hall open and close.

Does he watch himself? While he’s….

Images of a fucked-out Jisung looking blearily back at him play through his head: tears staining his round cheeks, mouth dropped open with lips kissed raw and drool running down his chin. He’s staring right back into his eyes, right where Minho is behind him, on top of him, fingers knotted in sweat-soaked hair and holding his head up to see how well Minho fucks him and takes care of him.

Minho grits his teeth. The front of his pants feel tight. He hears a cut-off moan from the bathroom. Jisung. He pushes himself off the bed.

When he opens the door, a waft of humid air hits him in the face. Jisung’s lithe silhouette is visible through the shower curtain. Minho can see the way he’s bent forward and how he snaps his mouth shut as soon as he realizes that he’s not alone.

“Knock much?” Jisung laughs, voice like a windchime that reverberates around the hollowed tiles of the bathroom.

“Are you finished cleaning?” Minho asks. He’s antsy. It takes Jisung a second too long to respond.

“Yeah.”

“Good. I’m coming in.”

“What? Hang on—”

Too late. Minho’s already throwing open the shower curtain. Throwing it open and… and…. His mind buzzes.

Jisung is indeed bent forward. One of his hands is pressed flat onto the tiled wall opposite the shower head, and the other is reached around and grabbing at his ass. Except—except that’s not quite correct. He has two fingers buried deep inside of him, stretching his rim in clear view, and that has Minho brain dead enough to step into the spray of the shower without even shedding a single article of clothing.

He runs his fingers along Jisung’s spine and says, “Don’t stop.” Jisung shudders under his touch. But he listens.

It’s slow at first, probably embarrassment from Minho just barging in, but Jisung has always been fairly confident—or, he’s been good at faking it. In the split second he spends in his head, he must decide fuck it. He pumps his fingers slow and then he presses them in all the way to his third knuckle and lets loose such a wanton sound that it leaves Minho’s skin crawling. He’s never fingered a man, but it can’t be that much different from a woman, right?

Minho grabs Jisung’s wrist and grits his teeth at the little whine Jisung lets out. “Let me do it,” he says with strain evident in his voice.

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” He moves Jisung’s hand and watches as his fingers slowly sink back into him, feels the way Jisung shudders under his touch. Then he pulls them out. Slow. He watches the way Jisung’s back muscles tense and how his head hangs low, and he takes an awful long time to respond despite so clearly wanting Minho, too. Maybe he knows. Knows that Minho’s never been with a man before, never thought about it his entire life.

“C’mon,” Minho urges. He lets go of Jisung’s wrist and comes in closer, presses a light kiss to the top of his spine. One, two. And he traces a finger around Jisung’s stretched rim, circling where the younger man has stilled his own. “Jisungie.”

Knowing what he does, Minho knows that Jisung has his eyes squeezed shut so tight as he’s trying to fight off the urge to give in. And he usually doesn’t have a problem with telling people to fuck off. Unless, of course, they’re Minho himself.

“Okay.” Minho doesn’t see it, but he knows that Jisung is biting his lip as his fingers slip from inside him. They glisten under the bright overhead light of the shower, shimmer and shine even more beautifully than the water drops that rain down on them from above. Minho’s eyes stay glued to where Jisung’s hole visibly throbs while Jisung reaches for a bottle.

“Here.” He grabs his hand and squirts more than enough lube into his palm.

“You keep this in here?” Minho chides with a grin. He spreads the jelly around his fingers. Cold.

“No! I—” Jisung purses his lips and whips back around and sticks his ass out. “Hurry up.”

Minho clicks his tongue and looks back down. “Bossy,” he murmurs, eyes fogging over as he runs the pads of his slicked fingers over Jisung’s rim. Jisung gasps softly and thumps his head against the tile.

Time ceases as Minho slowly, slowly slips in his middle finger. It presses in smoothly and without resistance, and there’s a buzzing in his ears—a ringing—that drowns out all other noise in the bathroom except for the little sounds that Jisung makes. Just little grunts and sharp, cutoff breaths.

“Wow,” Minho says more to himself. His finger glides in all the way until he’s pressing up against Jisung’s hips. He’s soft and wet inside, and Minho can feel the way his walls pulse around just his one finger. It doesn’t feel any different than a woman. In fact, it feels tighter. Minho takes a moment to pump his finger a few times before wiggling in a second.

“Hnngh.” Jisung tenses again. His shoulder blades stick out above his back. His lateral muscles protrude and drive a hard line that accentuates the way his body is curved and pushing back onto Minho’s fingers.

“C’mon, Jisungie,” Minho goads. He thrusts his two fingers more vigorously.

“Hyung.” He hits a spot that feels different. Like a little bump inside of Jisung. “Oh. Hyung.” He arches back and doesn’t try and hide the way he’s rolling his hips against Minho’s hand. “Right there.”

“Here?” Minho purposefully spreads his fingers around the spot. He grins when Jisung cries out louder than any noise he’s made so far.

“Hyung,” he moans. Minho stops moving and Jisung weakly pushes back against him. “Please. Hyung. Don’t tease.”

“But I like hearing you whine.” He thrusts his fingers in again just as Jisung is pushing back, and he grazes over his prostate. Another high-pitched sound drops from Jisung’s lips. Seeing him bouncing back on his fingers leaves Minho wondering if he’d do the same with his cock.

“Ah. Hyung. Minho-hyung.” There isn’t a hesitant bone in Jisung’s body anymore. He rocks back onto Minho’s fingers and doesn’t hold back, sweet sounds and saccharine moans echoing around the bathroom walls.

“Jisung,” Minho grits. He slips in a third finger. Easy. His wet clothes are sticking to him uncomfortably. His pants are too tight. “Fuck. Jisung.”

Jisung twitches under him. Around him. Minho wants to be inside him so. Fucking. Bad. And he and Jisung are on the same page.

Jisung arches back and winds his arm around Minho’s neck, pulling them together in a wet and messy kiss. A little awkward from the angle, but when Jisung continues to moan into his mouth and roll his hips back, a low growl leaves Minho’s throat and his hips kick, knocking Jisung into the cold tile.

He yelps and turns around completely, Minho’s fingers slipping from inside of him, and brings both of his hands to Minho’s head to crash their mouths together again.

“Take this shit off,” he groans. His hands frantically grab at the hem of Minho’s t-shirt and pull it up until it’s bunching around his shoulders.

“Impatient,” Minho tsks. He moves to pull it over his head and Jisung immediately latches onto his collarbone, sucking small bruises along it and running his hands all around his pecs. He squeezes the muscle and this time it’s Minho’s turn to gasp.

“Are you sensitive here, hyung?” Jisung asks. He sounds eager. Minho doesn’t know if he is, but he likes the way Jisung’s hands feel on him.

“Yeah.” He pops open the buttons on his jeans as Jisung dips lower and runs his tongue around one of Minho’s nipples. Minho bites back a groan and Jisung doesn’t let up, sucking until it buds and massaging his chest muscles. Minho’s eyes roll a little until he finds his bearings enough to finish taking off his pants. “Jisung.”

“Hyung.” Jisung moans around him and his hands slip down just as Minho’s cock springs out from the confines of his briefs. He barely gets a moment to relax after being restricted before Jisung’s grabby hands find their way around his shaft. “Hyung,” he says again. His cheeks and lips are flushed rose.

“Jesus Christ.” Minho’s knees wobble as Jisung tightens his fingers around him, stroking him with the leftover lube that’s still on his fingers and making his eyes roll to the back of his head. Handjobs shouldn’t feel this good, yet this is the second time Jisung’s done this and it leaves Minho feeling just as feral as the first time.

“How dare you say another man’s name when you’re with me,” Jisung giggles. He flicks his round eyes up and Minho kisses the smile right off his lips. He bullies his tongue into his mouth and Jisung can barely keep up, makes little noises as his legs start to give out and he has to seek help from Minho’s sturdy shoulders.

Jisung tastes like the sweetest thing Minho’s ever eaten and then some. He’s so incredibly responsive to every little touch that Minho purposefully refrains from doing anything, because he’s also incredibly responsive when he isn’t getting the attention that he wants. But then he’s too shy to ever say anything, too embarrassed to make his voice heard. Unless he’s pushed to the edge.

Minho dances his way across every surface that his hands can reach; around Jisung’s chest, his belly, waist, hips and ass. He can feel the way his hard cock smacks against his stomach when they move, and he can feel the little puff of air out of Jisung’s mouth, feel the way his body twitches. But still, Jisung doesn’t ask for more. It’s not until Minho wraps his hands around his waist and squeezes that he gets some kind of response.

“Bedroom,” Jisung gasps and tugs on Minho’s lip. His hips stutter as he holds himself back from seeking friction. “Bedroom. Bedroom.” Minho lets himself be dragged out of the shower, turning off the water as only an afterthought.

Jisung takes him by the hand and marches them out of the bathroom, into the cold hall, and into his bedroom while water drips from their bodies and leaves an evident trail. Jisung pushes him onto the bed and crawls overtop, kissing him desperately like they haven’t tasted each other in years.

As he pecks down the column of Minho’s neck, Minho chides, “You don’t want to dry off?” He sure doesn’t care. He watches the way Jisung continues to kiss down his body, reaching his lower belly and taking his erection back into his hand and giving it a soft tug.

“I don’t fucking care,” Jisung responds, and then he takes him into his mouth easily, and Minho’s head falls back onto the mattress.

Jisung’s mouth his hot and tight and Minho’s starting to realize that his entire body just might be like that.

Spit pools at the base of his shaft and Jisung moans around him, and Minho sees stars. “Your mouth is insane,” he groans, combing his fingers through soft hair. Jisung hums in response and hollows his cheeks. He sucks harder and when Minho finally finds the strength to open his eyes, he sees the way little teardrops are glistening from the corners of his eyes. He also sees him fingering himself with the hand he isn’t using to hold Minho’s cock.

“Jesus Christ,” Minho breathes again. Jisung whines in protest but doesn’t stop. His fingers are thrusting into him at such an awkward angle that Minho feels a little bad, but then again he can’t tear his eyes away.

The way that Jisung is so eager to have him, to please him, to want him is such a massive turn-on for Minho that he knows that this experience is going to fuck with him. But he doesn’t care. Not when he has someone like Jisung literally fingering himself while sucking him off, like the action alone isn’t just for Minho’s benefit, but for his as well. That giving him a blowjob feels as good for him as it does Minho. But as much as he’d like for this to continue, Minho isn’t in his early twenties anymore and he can’t go multiple rounds without feeling exhausted.

He pulls Jisung off of him by his cheeks, and Jisung’s whine of protest is enough to get his cock jumping, but he eases him up to kiss him a bit more tender than anything so far, and once their lips are pressed together, Jisung stops griping and his entire body relaxes into Minho’s chest. He hums in satisfaction and ruts his hips so that their cocks drag together.

“Hyung.” He shudders and chews on his bottom lip, rolls his hips again and again. There’s something about that way that he gets caught up in the pleasure that makes Minho want to reel him in.

He grabs onto his hips bruisingly hard and stops him from moving. Jisung whimpers and weakly and tries to move but to no avail. Minho’s hold is ironclad.

“Hyung.”

“You just do whatever you want, huh?” Minho growls. He feels Jisung shake under his touch but his body is honest. He’s dripping onto Minho’s belly. Maybe he has a bit of a degradation kink, but that’s a question for another day.

Minho flips them around so that he’s caging Jisung into the mattress like in their hotel room. Jisung blinks back up at him in a similar way: eyes wide and pleading but glazed in ecstasy. His lips are cherry red and begging to be abused. Minho watches the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows thickly in anticipation.

There’s something about the way that they’re situated—Minho cornering him like a leopard, and Jisung his meek prey—that brings out a visceral desire in him to dominate. Maybe it’s the doe eyes, maybe it’s the way that Jisung is so eager to please. But whatever it is it’s exciting for the both of them.

Minho drags his eyes across Jisung’s frame and commands, “Flip over.” Jisung nods quickly and does as he’s told. His honey skin is perfect with little beauty marks speckled around just begging to be kissed, and his back arches and accentuates the swell of his ass.

When Minho says “good boy” it’s more of a thoughtless comment that just slips out, distracted by the sight in front of him. He gently strokes his fingers down Jisung’s sides and relishes in the way that the younger man wiggles under his touch, throat growing dry as he watches Jisung shallowly rut against the bed.

He is good, that much is certain. He listens well and never denies Minho a thing. From Jeju-do to Hallasan to now—Jisung is always seeking Minho’s approval, and it’s with that realization that Minho makes his next move.

“Do you like to watch yourself?” He grabs a fistful of Jisung’s hair and yanks him back so that he’s looking at his own reflection. “See how well you’re being fucked?”

Spit-slick lips with tears cascading down his face, eyes red and raw and mouth parted with begging words dripping seamlessly, desperately. The pictures that run through Minho’s mind are of a messy and disheveled Jisung who begs him to fuck him harder, faster, deeper, all while sobbing through broken moans and barely formed words and with tears running down his face.

And then it dawns on him that he’s never seen Jisung like that, but other men sure have. Other men that aren’t him.

Other men have seen Jisung bleary-eyed and drunk on pleasure, have heard him beg for their cock with bruised lips and an airy voice; they’ve fucked him so hard that the headboard’s dented and banged up the wall and probably has caused countless noise complaints in the building.

Minho grits his teeth and pulls Jisung’s head back, a high whine leaving the younger man’s lips. He sinks his teeth into Jisung’s neck and Jisung chokes.

“F-fuck, hyung, Minho-hyung.” He gasps when Minho rubs himself between him.

“Keep calling me that.” Minho flattens his tongue over reddened teeth marks. He doesn’t know why his chest is burning. He rocks his hips forward and hisses from the friction. “Do you want me to fuck you like this?”

“Yes! Fuck. Oh my god.” Jisung arches beautifully and twists his head around in a way that looks painful. “Hyung, please.” He’s panting heavy into Minho’s mouth. “P-please, hyung, wan’ you, please.”

And he’s being so polite, so good, that Minho can’t deny him anymore. He can’t deny the desire that’s been burning in him since they jerked each other off in their hotel room in Jeju.

“Do you have lube in here too?” Of course he does. Someone like Jisung…. Well, he’s just glad he’s prepared. “Do you want me to wear a condom?”

Jisung shakes his head. “Want you to come inside me.” He reaches deep into one of the shelves on his headboard and pulls out a clear bottle and hands it back. Minho takes it quickly and slicks himself up and slathers some on Jisung’s rim, dipping in the tip of his finger just enough to have him instinctually press back. He likes how eager Jisung is.

Minho lines up and bites his lips. He feels Jisung tense under him in anticipation. They both take a deep breath as he starts to slide in.

Just like he felt with his fingers, Jisung is so soft and so hot. His walls pulse and contract, sucking Minho in further without any qualms. Minho’s mouth stays dropped as he slowly slides in, and Jisung’s hands curl into tight fists. His shoulders shake and he keeps his head low so that only his crown is visible in the mirror.

It feels like an eternity until their skin fits snug together, and Minho sort of wishes that it would’ve lasted longer, and he sort of wishes that it would’ve been done sooner. He lets out a shaky breath as he adjusts to having Jisung wrapped around him, and he also gives Jisung a moment to recoup.

“Doing okay, Jisungie?”

“No— Yes— I don’t know.” He watches as Jisung’s jaw clenches. “You’re big.”

“Big?”

“Yeah, it’s— it’s been awhile since I’ve had someone like you. Shit.”

Someone like you.

Someone.

Like you.

Someone else.

Minho feels a vein in his head throb. “They were big, too?”

“Yeah, but it’s been a long time. Usually I just—”

“You’ve been with other men?”

“Hyung, are you seriously asking me this while you’re balls deep inside me? You know I’m not a virgin, I—” Minho snaps his hips rough and catches Jisung off guard, forcing a sharp gasp from him. He propels forward and the headboard rocks.

“Hyung!” Jisung’s hand shoots back to grab his thigh. “A—a little warning next time.”

“Sure. Here’s your warning.” Minho grips Jisung’s hips firm and slams back into him again, watching in the mirror for his reaction.

Pain first, then the underlying pleasure. Jisung’s face scrunches uncomfortably but his moans give him away. They’re dripping with insatiability, growing louder as Minho gradually works himself up.

There’s not really a rhythm or a rhyme to his movements, he just wants to see if he can make Jisung break. He pulls out harshly and slams back with brute force, hard enough that the slap of their skin rings out in the bedroom and leaves behind an angry red mark on Jisung’s cheeks.

And if it really hurts, Jisung doesn’t protest. His eyes are screwed shut and he hiccups out barely-formed noises that are a mix of pain and pleasure. He tightens around Minho and Minho grits his teeth so hard he can feel the grinding in his skull.

So close. He knows that if he’s a little rougher, pushes a little harder, Jisung will fold right into his arms.

“Jisung,” he groans. He grabs his hair again and pulls him back. “Open your eyes.” And Jisung listens.

Not a damn thing can compare to the image that reflects back to the both of them. Not even Minho’s wildest imagination could ever come close, because Jisung looks stunning as he is.

Sweat-soaked with his hair sticking to his forehead, indistinguishable from the water that still sops, Jisung can barely keep his eyes open. They’re shimmering with unspent tears that threaten to fall from the corners, with long, thin eyelashes holding them back. His cheeks are flushed rosy, and the tip of his nose is red from crying. His eyes flick to Minho and stay there, and he drops his mouth wider and lets out high-pitched moans with each thrust.

There’s just something about it. Something about the way that he begs with his eyes and hangs his tongue out and how his nipples are pert and how the headboard shakes. Something about it all makes Minho want more.

He grinds his hips flush and Jisung cries out, tries to pull away but can’t because Minho doesn’t let go of his hair. But he doesn’t complain or beg for him to release him. He just begs for more.

“Harder,” he gasps and locks their eyes through the mirror. “Harder.”

“Like this?” Minho changes angles and finds his prostate. Jisung reels.

“Right there. Ah, hyung, oh my god. D-don’t stop.”

“You’re unreal,” Minho growls through tight teeth. He tugs harder and feels the way Jisung’s hole flutters around him. Unreal.

It’s insane how good he feels. Minho can barely think. All that consumes him is Jisung, Jisung, Jisung. How he moans, the way his back arches, the push and pull of his body, and just… everything about him—it drives Minho crazy. If Jisung is eager, then he’s greedy. He’ll take everything given to him and then demand more. And Jisung will continue to give, give, give.

Minho rocks his hips shallowly, grinding in a particular spot he already knows will push Jisung towards the edge. He lets go of his hair and Jisung collapses onto the bed in a mess of tangled hair and tear-stricken eyes and immediately takes the opportunity to fist his neglected cock rapidly. He keens and Minho wishes he could see.

“Flip over.” He stops moving and Jisung sobs but still shimmies into position. His face scrunches when Minho’s cock slips out of him and he turns over, shows off the mess of precum that’s coating his dick and belly. His cockhead is an angry red, stark against the brown color of the rest of his shaft. The longer Minho stares the shier Jisung gets, and when Minho places a hand on his knee to spread him open, Jisung’s cock jumps at the touch, and Minho sucks in a sharp breath through his nose. He slides back in and watches how Jisung’s eyes flutter closed and the way his body relaxes, as if this is his natural state. Jisung and Minho. Minho and Jisung.

Minho moves.

His thrusts this time are slower and more sensual, more intimate. He gauges Jisung’s reaction to each one and shifts. A little to the left, a little lower, right there. Jisung is quieter in this position but his noises hit Minho even harder than before. Soft moans and small whines. It doesn’t feel like the first time they’re fucking. It feels like so much more.

Minho rolls his hips smoothly and Jisung keeps his eyes closed to focus on the pleasure that zings through him. He moves back to pump his cock in tandem with Minho’s thrusts and plays with his nipples.

“Ah, hyung.”

“Oh, Minho-hyung. K-keep going. Right there.”

“I—I’m so close.”

He arches off the bed when Minho hits his spot and his skin visibly prickles. His cock continues to leak profusely the closer he gets. Minho can feel that familiar heat building in the pit of his belly but he doesn’t want this to end. When it does, he doesn’t know if he’ll get another chance, if this is just a one-time thing. But surely the chemistry between them can’t be ignored, right? Jisung is so responsive to him.

But what if he’s like this with other men, too? What if his body is just extremely sensitive, and this is nothing out of the ordinary? Just a normal fuck to him when Minho knows that it’ll haunt his dreams for the rest of his life.

He looks down at where they’re connected. Jisung’s sucking him in each time he pulls out, and he hasn’t loosened at all. He’s as tight now as when Minho first got a finger in him in the bathroom.

“Hyung.”

Minho makes the mistake of looking back up and seeing tears in Jisung’s eyes. Stunning. Beautiful. Desperate. He gulps and swats his hand away, takes his aching cock into his own hands and strokes him furiously. Jisung wails and grips the bedsheets so hard his knuckles go white and the fabric strains, threatens to snap.

“O-oh god—! Hyung—hnngh.” He’s spilling large globs of precum onto his belly. Minho’s rhythm falters as he gets closer until it’s just stuttered movements that jostle them both up the bed. He can’t think straight and can’t even focus on Jisung, all he can focus on is the way his hole throbs around him and how hard he feels in his hand, the broken sounds that drop from his shimmering lips.

“Hyung,” Jisung moans. He opens his arms.

“Jisung.” Minho leans in and Jisung pulls them together, so tight that Minho can’t even jerk him off properly anymore, just hold him as he brings them both to their climax.

Jisung pulls him into a hot kiss that’s all tongue with little whines mixed in. His entire body twitches the closer he gets and, just like in the hotel, he grows stiff and quiet. Minho wants to see him come but he can barely keep his eyes open.

He pounds into him in aborted thrusts once, twice, and then he hears a sharp gasp in his ear and feels Jisung’s whole body jerk and shake. Hot cum coats both of their bellies and Minho presses their opened mouths together as he spills over the edge, fueled by thoughts of Jisung.

Jisung whimpers when he comes inside and tries to wiggle free, but Minho holds him firm. He buries himself as deep as he can and then tries for more, careening Jisung up the bed with him not far behind. Minho can feel the way his seed coats plush walls and seeps around him. He leans back and Jisung sprawls on the bed, both of their chests heaving like they ran a marathon. Minho thumbs at Jisung’s puffy hole and slowly slides out, watches transfixed at the way his cum dribbles out down Jisung’s ass and onto the bed. His throat goes dry and he dips his thumb inside, pulls him apart and watches, watches. When he looks back up, he sees Jisung staring at him with stars in his eyes.

He crawls back up and Jisung welcomes him into his arms with a gentle kiss.

They take another shower after. Minho kisses his way along Jisung’s back and roams his hands all along his sides, squeezing at the apex of his waist.

“Why do you keep doing that?” Jisung giggles. He pecks Minho’s lips once.

“Because it’s so small.” Twice, thrice. “Feels like I could hold you down and fuck you into the bed.” Jisung’s cheeks go red.

He sends Minho off with a shy smile and a promise for them to get dinner the next day. To catch up on everything that’s been missed these past few years. A fresh start. Minho drives home with a smile on his face and falls asleep with an angel in his dreams.

-

Being with someone like Jisung is something that Minho has never even thought about, but if he does stop to think, it really does make sense. Sookyung was the first person he dated, so he never really stopped to think about anyone else. Maybe he likes both men and women. What would be wrong with that? He’s not really sure if he can put a label on it yet, but he does know that he likes Jisung as more than just a friend, and he hopes that Jisung sees him like that, too.

He knows that Jisung is gay and has been since high school. He was nervous to come out to his parents but they were happy and supportive of him. Knowing Jisung’s mom, Minho’s sure that she’s been hounding him about when he’ll get married or settle down. It brings a smile to his face. Jisung’s never been one to stay attached for too long, but he’s been forthcoming about Minho’s advances, so maybe this’ll be different. Maybe this time around will be the home stretch.

He knocks on the door with a smile on his face like he always puts on. Jisung loves flowers, so he’s made sure to get a small vase of them for his place. Camellias. Pink. He straightens up when he hears the lock slide out of place.

Jisung looks radiant as ever as Minho greets him with a quick “hey”, but then he sees the younger man’s smile falter when his eyes move to the bouquet in Minho’s hands. He stares at it blankly and his smile wipes away entirely.

“Oh!” The air crackles between them. Minho holds out the flowers. “These are for you. Like a housewarming.” He laughs to try and ease everything but Jisung doesn’t accept them, he just keeps staring without blinking. “Remember when you first moved into your apartment in college and—”

Jisung grabs his arm and yanks him inside. It catches Minho off-guard and he stumbles into the entryway and into the living room. He’s about to object when he looks up and sees how pissed Jisung is. His eyebrows are crossed and his eyes are on fire.

“What do you think you’re doing?” he spits out. Minho pauses and then stands upright, steeling his own expression.

“I was just trying to do something nice since I never got you anything last time I was here.”

“We’re supposed to go out to dinner.”

“Yes?”

“As friends.” Jisung enunciates the word like Minho doesn’t know what it means, like he’s accusing him of having some ulterior motive.

“Forget about these.” He moves the bouquet behind his back. Out of sight, out of mind. “I didn’t mean anything by them.”

“Then why did you bring them?”

“Because I remembered that you liked flowers?”

“Friends don’t buy each other fucking flowers when they go out for a casual dinner.”

Minho furrows his brows and feels the way his chest lightens as anger starts to settle in him.

“What the fuck is your problem?” He crushes the stems in his hand and takes a hard step forward. “I said forget about these. Now can we go?”

Jisung shakes his head. He doesn’t back down. “I’m not hungry,” he states, stands firmly in place. Minho forgot about how infuriating he is when he’s being stubborn.

“Cut the bullshit, Jisung. Why are you so offended I brought you flowers when you’d be happy if I brought them to you a couple months ago?”

“We weren’t—” Jisung shakes his head and takes a step back. The flickering in his eyes is gone. Now, he’s on the verge of tears but still holding onto that tough façade. But he’s got Minho worked up now and Minho’s not willing to let him off the hook so easily.

“We weren’t what?” Minho says it accusingly. “We weren’t friends? We didn’t sleep together? I told you that it wouldn’t change anything.”

“But it has and—”

“Because you’re making it out to be something it’s not.”

“—and you show up on my doorstep with a bouquet of flowers like we’re going on a— Like this is some kind of—” He bites his lip. His shoulders have relaxed. He looks small and meek and like he just wants this to be over with.

“Like it’s what?” Jisung shakes his head. “Say it.”

“A date,” he whispers. His chest rises heavily. Minho sees red.

“It’s not a fucking date, Jisung. And what if it was? What would be so bad about that? Did you not have a good time in Jeju-do?”

“I did, Minho, but—”

“You make it seem like you hated every second of it. Like you can’t stand me or something.”

“No! Minho, that’s not true.”

“Then what is it? Why do you act like going on a date with me is the end of the world?”

Jisung opens his mouth but nothing comes out. He pulls at the sides of his pants. Minho huffs and takes another step closer, caging him into the corner between the door and the wall.

“Do you not like me?”

“No! Of course I like—”

“Is there something wrong with me?”

“Minho, there’s nothing—”

“Then what’s the issue? Is it because I just got out of a relationship? Is that what’s wrong?”

“Minho! Stop!”

“Are you worried about being a rebound? Because I wouldn’t do that to you, Jisung, you know I wouldn’t—”

“Stop!”

Minho freezes. He looks at Jisung, really looks at him: head down, hair covering his face, and breathing heavily through his mouth. He looks exhausted, worn out. Minho takes a breath through his nose and steps back to allow for him to recollect himself. Each breath he takes his labored and shaky and tugs on Minho’s heart.

When Jisung’s finally found his footing, he rubs his nose on the back of his hand and raises his head, but he’s still looking at the floor.

“There’s nothing wrong with you,” he starts, and his voice is barely that of a whisper, a complete turnaround of the volume he’d used when Minho pushed too far.

“Jisung.” Minho tries to take a step closer but Jisung puts his hand out. And then he finally looks up.

His eyes are red and glassy, but no tears fall, when he continues in a steadier voice, “I’m not afraid of being a rebound. I don’t care that you just got out of a relationship.” He sniffles. “I do like you, Minho. I do. A-and—” He cuts himself off and blinks. A million thoughts run through his eyes, and Minho can’t hear a single one.

“I—” Jisung clears his throat. “I don’t date people for very long, you know that. It’s not that people get tired of me, it’s just that… I get tired of them. I don’t know. Waking up next to the same person, having sex with the same person, coming home to the same person every day—I don’t know, it just gets boring. And when I get bored, I just move on. And I don’t want to do that to you.” He shakes his head and looks back down so that Minho can’t see his eyes. “I-I don’t want to date you, Minho, because what if—what if—”

What if I get tired of you?

But Jisung doesn’t say it, and Minho doesn’t press it, because at the end of the day it doesn’t make sense for them to date. The only man Minho has ever slept with is Jisung, and Jisung doesn’t want a commitment. He lets the flowers slip through his fingers.

How does he even know he’s ready for a relationship with a man? Would people look at them funny if they held hands walking down the street? What would he tell his parents? He hasn’t even told them he and Sookyung broke up yet.

Jisung wipes his nose again and looks up, and this time his eyes are dry and stern. Minho knows that look. Indignance. He’s made up his mind about this.

There are countless thoughts running through his mind, countless words that he wants to say, but Minho swallows them instead and swallows the way his heart pulls when he says, “Okay.” And he’s not sure if Jisung expected him to put up a fight, because the younger man’s expression falters. Just a flash, but it’s there out in the open—worry.

Minho looks down at the floor, off to the sides, up at the ceiling. “Okay,” he says again. He takes a step back. Jisung’s knees jerk forward instinctively like he wants to chase him but he catches himself instead.

Minho blinks. “Okay,” he repeats. He swallows. “Okay.” He pushes past Jisung and makes for the door, only the sound of his footsteps hollowed against the wooden floorboards. He grabs the handle and does his best to hide the way his hand is shaking.

“I’ll, uh, see you later.”

If life were like a movie, then he’d hear Jisung’s footsteps behind him. He’d slam the door shut and turn Minho around and tell him that everything would be alright, that this is only another hurdle after a decade of friendship. The goodbye wouldn’t feel finite and would just be a simple farewell.

But life is not like a movie. It’s silent in the apartment. Jisung doesn’t budge an inch from where he’s standing, and the only noise that can be heard is the way that the door creaks as Minho slowly pulls it open, the faint hope in his heart that things will play out differently dwindling as his foot makes it beyond the threshold. He can feel his heart in his throat as he passes through. It’s been a long time since he’s cried, but he’ll at least save face enough to make it to his car.

The hall outside is as quiet as it always is. Jisung should be glad to have such neighbors, but on the flip side, he’s probably the loudest on the floor, so maybe they don’t feel as fortunate.

As the door slips shut behind him, the latch clicking softly into place, it solidifies the reality of things around him. He needs to go home, needs to get something for dinner and get ready for bed so that he can go to work in the morning. Time won’t stop for this, and Minho refuses to be left behind no matter how badly his chest hurts and how badly his muscles ache. He spends only a second more beyond the door to hear the silence around him before he takes the first step through the hallway. He makes it all the way to the door to the emergency stairwell before he allows himself the mistake of looking back down the empty corridor.

Except it’s not as empty as he remembers, because there at the end of the hall, standing right where he had been only a handful of seconds before, is Jisung. Jisung with his messy hair and no socks and no shoes and with his eyes wide and his upper lip tucked under his bottom teeth. It’s like a dream, a visage that Minho’s half-baked mind can come up with to torment him. And he doesn’t blink because he doesn’t want it to disappear. He just stands and watches, lips slightly parting, and Jisung mimics the expression like a mirror.

The door clicks shut again and Minho blinks, and then he sees Jisung rushing over to him, his bare footsteps pounding against the cold floor. He grabs Minho by his cheeks and crashes their lips together so hard that they stumble through the doorway and into the empty stairwell. It’s hungry, and Jisung squeezes his eyes tight and presses harder, and Minho brings his hands up to hold Jisung’s face and lets his eyes slip shut as well, lets the tears roll down his cheeks until he’s tasting them along with Jisung.

The kiss is salty and sweet and neither of them want to break away. Jisung pushes him hard until the metal of the railing is digging into his back and groaning under the pressure. The sounds of their desperation echo around them.

“Jisung,” Minho gasps, afraid that they’ll both topple over the edge but not wanting to stay parted for long. “Jisung.”

“Minho,” Jisung groans. He kisses him sloppy and desperate. “Minho. Don’t go. Don’t go.”

“I have to.” Minho puts his hand flat against Jisung’s chest, stopping him just as he’s about to dive into another kiss. “I have to work tomorrow.”

Jisung’s chest heaves, his eyes lidded. There’s a thin line of spit connecting their lips. He’s centimeters away but it feels like kilometers.

“Okay,” he says reluctantly and then backs off a little. His eyes dart to Minho’s lips before coming back up to his eyes. “Okay.” He wipes the spit from his mouth. He takes a step back and gives Minho some room so that he isn’t leaning precariously over a fifteen-meter fall. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Jisung helps straighten his hair out. “I, um.” Jisung looks at him, shy and expectantly, all of the confidence from the kiss gone.

There’s been a lot of things unspoken between them, only an inkling of faith that they’re able to read each other’s minds. And maybe that’s where things started to go wrong: right when he called Jisung to go to Jeju-do with him. No planning, no warning, no reasons given.

“Do you want to go to Jeju-do with me?”

“Yes.”

Minho looks at Jisung, and Jisung looks right back at him.

“Do you want to come home with me?” It’s not really a question because at this point Minho should already know that Jisung’s answer to him will always be:

“Yes.”

Jisung packs his bag and stays silent the entire car ride to Minho’s place. He’s never visited before, and he’s also the first person that Minho’s had over since his ex moved out. It should be exciting or at least a little enticing to have the company, but all Minho feels is unease as he pulls into the underground parking structure of his building. He parks the car and Jisung tails him into the elevator, all the way to the fifth floor, and watches as Minho punches in the code to his door. They’re greeted by the cats, whom Jisung has also never met before. Minho leaves Jisung to fraternize with them as he goes into his home office to send his boss a quick email.

He barely hears Jisung shuffle into the room with Soonie purring loudly in his arms. “What you doing?” he asks in a soft voice, like his next words could set off an argument.

“Emailing my boss that I won’t be in tomorrow.” Minho fires off the email and spins around, grins when he sees Soonie violently butting his head against Jisung’s hand for more scratches. “He likes you.”

“I like him.” Soonie purrs loudly and Jisung scratches him under his chin. “I thought you had to—”

“I think we have a lot to talk about.” Minho purses his lips in a thin smile. Jisung blinks at him, golden sunlight smoothing out the texture from his face. Neither of them are good about talking about this kind of stuff, but it needs to happen. They both know it. Jisung is his closest friend and he doesn’t want to lose that.

Soonie butts his head one last time against Jisung’s chest before leaping from his arms and landing on the floor with a less-than-graceful thud!, leaving them both alone in Minho’s home office to face what needs to be addressed head-on. Minho watches the way Jisung grows antsy and chews on his upper lip. His Adam’s apple dips when he gulps.

“Yeah,” he finally agrees. A reluctant answer, but Minho knows that that’s only the case because Jisung is so used to running from things because it’s easier. Even if it’s something he really, truly wants, turning a blind eye is less effort. But the fact that he’s responded gives Minho the subtle affirmation that yes, what they have going for them is worth pursuing, no matter the heartache or the hurdles that are yet to come.

His thin smile thickens. He holds his hand out and watches the way Jisung’s unsure eyes fixate on them. And when he brings them back up, his lip tucked under his teeth, there’s a glimmer of something that flashes across them, and he reaches out, too.

Epilogue – 11 months later

There’s a burning in Jisung’s chest that only arises whenever he’s looking at Minho. From the time he first saw him in the halls in middle school to seeing him get ready in front of the mirror—it’s always been the same feeling.

He watches from the bed as Minho ties his necktie, straightens it out and smooths out the front of his dress shirt. He looks sharp in his work clothes. Jisung blinks and his face starts to grow hot.

Minho finishes and turns to look at him with the most shit-eating grin. Like he knew what he was doing. He strides over and leans down to place a lingering kiss on Jisung’s lips, one that has Jisung stretching up off the bed chasing it.

“Cute,” Minho huffs with a laugh. He kisses him again. “I teach a class tonight so I won’t be back till later.”

“And you’re trusting me with dinner?”

“I never said that.” Another kiss. “Text me what you’re feeling like and I’ll pick something up.”

“Okay. Have a good day at work.”

“You, too.” One last kiss for the road.

Jisung allows himself to melt into the bed until he hears the front door close, and then he has to get up and start getting ready for work. Sometimes Minho will set out his clothes the night before on the bathroom counter, so when Jisung walks into their bathroom and sees a neat pile on the right side by his sink, he can’t help but smile. Minho usually coordinates their outfits during these instances.

After he’s fresh and dressed—a hoodie and some jeans—he heads into the kitchen to make himself a cup of coffee and some breakfast. If Minho cooks something in the morning, he’ll usually leave behind a small amount for Jisung, but since he was in a hurry, Jisung just pops a few slices of bread in the toaster.

Their apartment is close enough to Jisung’s work that he can just walk. It would be slightly faster to take the subway, but then he’d be walking in the opposite direction. And Minho said he had jelly legs the other day and Jisung’s determined to prove him wrong. It’s not his fault he doesn’t have muscular dancer’s legs. Not that he’s complaining! Minho’s legs are… well, they do the work for the both of them.

When he gets to the studio he finds Chan already at the helm and with a track pulled up on his computer. He looks over his shoulder when Jisung comes through the door and greets him with a quick “morning.”

“Morning, hyung.” Jisung sets his bag on the sofa and plops into the chair next to his coworker-slash-ex. “You’re here early.”

“You’re always late,” Chan jokes.

“We don’t have set working hours!”

“I just got here a few minutes ago, actually.” He pushes the laptop so it’s between them. He smells like Felix’s cologne.

Minho has a jealous streak about him that, under no circumstances, never fails to turn Jisung on. Sometimes Jisung will do something that he knows will make him flare because he knows that Minho will pound him into the mattress and overstimulate him until he’s quivering and crying, and sometimes that’s just what he needs.

Trying to convince him that Chan wasn’t a threat took a lot of effort.

“I can’t just miss work for a month, hyung,” Jisung told him.

“You can work from home. I have an office, you can work there.”

It took three meetings and Felix’s intervention to finally break down his barriers. Some people would get turned off by Minho’s overwhelming jealousy, but for Jisung, it makes him feel wanted. It solidifies the fact that Minho wants him and will never let him go, and—Jisung doesn’t know, but he really, really likes it.

Chan rearranges some parts of the song and asks, “How’s Minho?”

“He’s good.” Jisung hums and swivels in his chair. What should they get for dinner?

“When’s your trip again?”

“In a few weeks.” Minho brought up the idea to go to Japan for their one-year anniversary a few months back and Jisung kind of flipped out about it.

“Why don’t we just go now?” he said.

“I want to go for a special occasion.”

“But—but—what if—” Minho shushed him by taking his hands in his.

“Hey,” he said, soft as ever. “It’ll be alright. We’ll be fine.”

Back when they first started dating, Minho said that they had a lot to talk about, and they spent the first four months talking through things as they came up. Namely Jisung being convinced that they’d break up at any moment of any day. It’s his biggest fear to wake up one day and be tired of dating Minho, or have Minho be tired of taking care of him, of the nonstop reassurances. But Minho took it in stride, and now every morning when they wake up, he’ll shower him with kisses, and when he gets back from work, he’ll shower him with more. And it’s the most comfortable Jisung’s ever felt with anybody.

Minho’s also been very open with him about Sookyung. If they go somewhere he’d been with her, he’ll bring it up offhandedly, and Jisung will try not to be jealous. She played a big part in his life, so it’s only natural that all of his memories later in life are with her.

“Did you do this with her?” Jisung will ask sometimes when they’re out on a date at a specific spot.

“Yeah.” Minho never tries to hide it. “But I want to do it with you, too, to remember.”

New memories for the both of them. There were blank walls and open spaces on shelves in Minho’s apartment that obviously held photographs before, and slowly but surely he’s been filling them in with photos of them.

“Are you excited to go?” Chan asks. He turns fully to Jisung. “I’ve been a few times and it’s sick. There’s so much good food and things to do.”

To be honest, Jisung isn’t entirely sure what the trip will entail. Minho’s been planning everything. Knowing him he’s probably set aside a day to hike Mount Fuji. But as long as he’s with Minho, everything will be okay.

“Yeah,” Jisung nods. “Minho-hyung’s been planning things for a few months now.”

“How long have you guys been dating?”

“Um. Almost a year.” Chan simpers at that.

“I’m happy for you,” he says.

Minho picks them up tteokbokki after his class. He comes through the front door looking sweaty and wearing joggers and a t-shirt. Jisung is stood in the kitchen doing the dishes from yesterday’s dinner when he walks in and he just stares. Minho flashes him a smile just as the door closes and holds up the food.

“Let’s eat.”

-

It’s been a long time since Jisung’s flown internationally. They both had a hectic morning after his passport wasn’t where they thought it was, and then there was a long line at security that neither of them planned for. But they made it to their gate with twenty minutes to spare.

“Here.” Minho hands him a cup of coffee and a pamphlet. “I found this at one of the information desks.” Jisung takes it and looks at the front. ‘Japan’ is written in bold red letters with a picture of a snowcapped Mount Fuji in the background. He shoots Minho a giddy smile and flips through it while they wait for boarding, and sometime in between, with Minho scrolling on his phone and Jisung nose-deep in the brochure, Minho rests his hand on Jisung’s armrest, and Jisung threads their fingers together and squeezes, and Minho squeezes back.