#half ponytail jinki

[dokbaemline]

PIECE OF SHINE FANMEET

[dlstmxkakwldrlarchive]

230528 Everyday is SHINee Day: Piece of Shine Day II

— Days&Years (ONEW Focus)

[onewfantaesy]

In the middle of third year, Taemin’s Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor has a lesson on boggarts. They all practice the spell and the wand movements, and then they’re all lining up in front of a wardrobe eagerly awaiting the boggart to come out.

The professor plays music, giant spiders turn into sparkly Halloween decorations, snakes into ribbon twirlers, vampires into actors poorly playing Dracula, and sharks start dancing in tutus. It’s fun, it’s exciting, it’s the coolest Defense class they’ve ever had.

Then when it’s Taemin’s turn, his sleeves are rolled up above his elbows and his hair is in a tiny, messy half-ponytail with his robes and bookbag slung over his desk. He’s grinning and his wand is at the ready, but then the boggart practically tilts his head at him, and suddenly their Herbology professor is standing in front of the classroom.

“You filthy little half-breed,” it snarls, and it’s not even really his uncle’s voice, but Taemin can’t move. He’s stomping towards Taemin, and Taemin hesitates and steps back.

The entire class is silent.

“You think I really want you as my apprentice?” the boggart growls. “It’s to keep you from embarrassing me, to keep an eye on you. A fairy ring? You think that’s difficult? A monkey could lure a fairy ring!”

The last comment stings, and Taemin’s wand lowers just a fraction.

“I should have drowned you when you were born, you disgusting little half-breed.”

“Ridikkulus,” Taemin casts, and the boggart turns into a giant singing magical flytrap.

“Great job, Taemin,” the professor says. “Back to your seat. Kai! You’re up next!”

Taemin doesn’t watch anyone else’s boggart. He goes straight back to his desk and starts taking notes in his project journal. He drowns out the entire rest of the lesson, but the professor doesn’t say anything until the class is dismissed for lunch.

“Taemin, could I see you a moment?”

He huffs and shoves his books in his bag and slings it over his shoulder.

“Yes, Professor?”

“You do realize that luring the fairies to create a fairy ring in a specific spot is very advanced?” the professor asks softly.

“Yes, sir.”

“And that Professor Lee is very excited for how advanced your project already is?”

Taemin hesitates, not realizing his uncle thought he was further ahead than he should be for his project.

“Yes, sir,” he says anyway.

“And that there’s nothing wrong with not being a pureblood?” The professor asks in a very gentle voice.

Taemin swallows the lump in his throat, “Yes, sir.”

Taemin leaves before he can be asked anymore questions. He doesn’t go to the Great Hall for lunch, and instead goes straight to his greenhouse. He doesn’t have his apprentice period today, but he skips History of Magic after lunch and stays in the greenhouse the entire afternoon. Professor Binns wouldn’t notice he skipped anyway.

It’s definitely past dinner time when he hears someone come into his greenhouse, but he’s too busy taking notes on his newest hanging plants to bother looking up. It’s dark outside already, the sun just about to set.

“I heard you had an exciting day,” Jinki says.

Taemin turns to see him leaning against the nearest workbench. He looks worried. Taemin turns back his to journal.

“It was alright,” he mumbles. “I’d rather just be in here all day.”

“I didn’t see you at lunch or dinner,” Jinki says. “So I brought you something to eat.”

Within a few minutes Taemin is sitting with his back to a wall of ivy, his gloves sitting next to his journal and his bag and robes still on a workbench somewhere. He’s picking at the sandwiches his uncle brought him, mumbling, “I’m not really hungry.”

“Do you want to talk about your boggart?” Jinki asks.

Taemin takes in a sharp breath. They’re both quiet for a very long, agonizing moment. The leaves are ruffling in the wind.

“It changed,” Taemin says in a shaking breath. “I found one last year on the seventh floor. It was my father.”

“Taemin-“

“I was expecting it to be Father. I was prepared for it to be Father. But then it turned into you, and I didn’t know why or what to do.”

Taemin is shaking and he’s playing with the leaves of the ivy and looking anywhere but Jinki.

“And then the boggart said a monkey could lure a fairy ring. That’s something my Father would have said.”

“You’re beyond advanced at Herbology,” Jinki says softly. “Luring a fairy ring is something most full grown wizards can’t do, and you’re so close. I’m very proud of you.”

“Thank you,” Taemin whispers.

They’re quiet again, Taemin picking crusts off the sandwiches he’s not going to eat.

“I heard you turned me into a singing flytrap.”

Taemin laughs. And he laughs, and laughs, and laughs. His face is buried in his knees and his shoulders are shaking, and even Jinki starts chuckling a bit.

“I couldn’t think of anything else!” Taemin admits.

They spend another hour taking notes and going over any questions Taemin has for his project, then Jinki sends him back to his dorm.

“I love you,” Jinki says.

“I know.”

[alittletournesol]

Kingdom Of Jinju {MinKey} part 24/33

(just one hour late in my country, but happy birthday to our most shining light. ♡)

Chapter 24 : Breathe

The afternoon was calm and peaceful at the palace, with a bright blue sky above everyone’s head. It was that perfect kind of weather that allowed soldiers to make their trainings a bit more entertaining : they had been separated in several squadrons, and while some were doing their daily running with their captain, others were distributed in all three yards to practice their skills. Swords hitting each other could be heard coming from here, shot arrows from there.

It was Taemin’s first time training for hand-to-hand combat, and he was lucky to be with some of his closest brothers in arms in this situation. It wasn’t about brutally fighting each other but developing martial arts’ techniques, offensive and defensive ones. Surprisingly, their mentor for this exercise was a quite old man but he was known as the best in his speciality so they didn’t complain. Especially when he had showed them he was still in good shape !

The show the few soldiers were putting on could seem rather weird : working in pairs, they were attacking each other with their whole bodies, only wearing their pants and shoes. As he was flattened against the ground for the third time in a row, the apprentice grunted, pushing his opponent’s leg away from his body. He lied still, catching his breath and looking at the sky, relishing a moment of peace after suffering so many collisions.

“You’re giving up already ?” His partner laughed, standing by his side and hiding the sun from his face while he offered him his hand. “Come on, I’m going easy on you.”

“It’s easy for you, you’ve done that before.” Taemin ranted although he accepted the help and soon stood up, dusting his pants. “Just let me win once at least !”

“You will never learn that way, you gotta accept to be molested a bit. I’m even making sure you land slowly when I could throw you ! See, I have mercy for an elder.”

“Tell that to the bruises I’ll have tomorrow.”

Jongin laughed out loud and gently tapped his friend’s shoulder before he led him to one of the buckets of water that were dispersed here and there in the yard. As both friends washed their face and drank a few mouthfuls as well, their mentor clapped his hands to announce the end of the training after two hours. The relieved sigh Taemin let out didn’t go unnoticed and he blushed when his brothers in arms turned towards him, some holding their laughter back while others gave him a sort of disapproving yet affectionate look. 

The young man apologized with an awkward smile and was dragged away by his friend, the latter’s grip showing how strong he was as a rather expert in wrestling. The apprentice exaggerated a painful whine but followed without protesting, knowing that it was better for his butt to escape the foot of the master of martial arts. It wasn’t like Taemin was a bad student, it was quite the opposite : but his face was extremely expressive and he struggled keeping it straight. Could it be joy or annoyance, boredom or cheekiness, his features said it all.

Only Jinki had enough power of a mentor to keep him calm and focused, because a certain bond had grown between them. But as soon as the General was out of sight, the eighteen years old soldier dropped his seriousness in favor of some games with his friends. He had been lucky to find a lot of comrades of his age but rare were those who could ignore the fact he had been taken under their leader’s wing. He didn’t mind the ones who couldn’t, after all he understood his special position might look misplaced to some.

However, he had found Jongin and two other soldiers, the four of them making a joyful gang. They had helped him training and catching up for being behind them, seeing their sessions more as meetings than real working moments. He considered he couldn’t have become a soldier without them, and he was endlessly grateful.

At that moment, all trainings had come to an end and recruits were slowly coming out of their respective yards. Taemin and his friend stood there, waiting for the other two to join them by talking about how they could improve their wrestling skills. Only a few minutes were enough for two young men to reach them, scaring them and tapping their shoulders while laughing. They were all sweating from their training, even Moonkyu who practiced archery and had had to shoot while moving today, when Wonsik had worked his dueling abilities.

Joyfully chatting, the four men walked towards the dormitory they shared and prepared their official military uniforms. Their training outfits were all dirty and soaked with sweat, and that was a rule for them to only wear their uniform when they wouldn’t be practicing ; it was more a way to show off who they were, they should always keep it clean. In no time, the friends were heading to their shared bathroom, getting naked without an ounce of shyness before entering their respective shower cubicle.

“How does it feel to live with us now ?” Wonsik asked the newest soldier while rubbing his skin with soap. “Don’t you miss your personal quarters ?”

“Not really, I didn’t like them.” Taemin shrugged. “They were smaller than Kibum’s but so huge for me, it wasn’t really comfortable.”

“It always surprises me when you call the Prince by his name.” Moonkyu whistled, impressed. “Like my friend is close to our sovereign, his childhood friend ! Isn’t it burdensome ?”

“You know, back in Mongje he was a noble so it doesn’t feel that different here. He’s my closest friend before being my sovereign, so if he ever needs me I will immediately go to him.”

“He didn’t need you for their journey ? You went to all of them but not that one, or did the General not allow you to, now that you’re a soldier like us ?”

“I asked to stay, I have some… business, here, while these two are away. By the way guys, I need your help. We don’t have a permission before a week, right ?”

“Yeah, we’ll have a day-off in six days.” Jongin nodded. “You better not propose another getaway, we really got lucky that time. If we’d got caught…”

“Don’t worry, I’m not planning it with you. I have to escape tonight, I can’t wait for six days so… I need you to cover for me. ” 

Seeing the confused look in his friends’ eyes, the young soldier smirked and made them wait for the moment they would head back to their dormitory to put clothes on. He didn’t want to be heard by any curious ears that could wander around the bathrooms, and he knows the recruits tended to do that a lot… especially with the youngest ones, just to scare them even though they didn’t mean any harm by doing so. It was their way to welcome them in the army !

 For sure the three young men didn’t ask Taemin the reason behind his wish to leave the palace by night, when he wasn’t allowed to. They weren’t invasive when it came to each other’s personal life, they naturally talked about themselves a lot to get closer but they knew where the boundaries were. Although Jongin was a bit reluctant at first, the other two’s excitement was enough to convince him to, at least, give this plan a try.

They kept everything secret until night fell, and the curfew rang for every soldier. At that moment, they were all commanded to join their dormitories and get an healthy number of sleeping hours, for their usual awakening was planned once the sun had fully risen. About half an hour after all recruits had went to bed, their supervisor came to check if none of them was thinking of disobeying — the rhythm was always difficult to adopt for the youngest soldiers who had still so much energy to burn.

Once he had left, the four friends raised their head from their blankets and waited a bit more… until Taemin got up, fully dressed with common clothes. While the other three were leaving their bed in their turn but making sure they were wearing their night outfit, the soon-to-be runaway tied his hair in a messy ponytail, strands escaping here and there and covering his forehead and temples. With the discretion they learned to master the past few months, they left the room and quietly made their way out.

Steps by steps, they managed to slip into the gardens, using the trees and several plants to hide themselves from any sentry around. When the lowest outer wall was in sight, they stopped and looked at each other, revising their plan : it was simple, but it called for their acting skills… which they weren’t exactly practicing on a daily basis. As the young men they were, they cheered by quietly doing their secret group handshake, before Taemin left them to discreetly head to the aforesaid wall.

Jongin, Wonsik and Moonkyu waited a few seconds for the other soldier to be far enough before they took a deep breath. Now, it was their turn to create a diversion that wouldn’t get them in trouble. After all, they weren’t in their bed long after the curfew hour… without a word, they decided which one of them would be the best actor and so, the first to leave and be noticed. They couldn’t take too long to decide and it was settled quite fast, Wonsik doing a military salute before he sneaked away from the large bush they were hiding behind.

The young man remained crouched until he was near the closest troop of sentries, and he inhaled deeply before leaving his hiding place. He made sure he seemed to come from the dormitories when he went on the gravel path, closing his eyes and purposely walking slowly and not quite straight. From behind, his two friends watched him and as soon as he had started acting, they followed his path.

It wasn’t long for the sentries to notice them, but when one of them was about to call them, Jongin did a big hand gesture before putting his finger on his lips, immediately imitated by Moonkyu. The elder soldiers grew intrigued and the two who were standing on the ground approached, their comrades still on top of the watchtower and not knowing what was happening. Within a few seconds, Wonsik had almost reached them but was still walking with his eyes closed… pretending to be sleeping.

The other two recruits eventually ran to be at his level and prevented the older man to rudely grab their friend.

“He’s sleepwalking !” Moonkyu whispered, showing his best fake concerned face. “Please don’t wake him up, it could be really unsafe for him.”

“We’re really sorry, he usually doesn’t leave our dormitory or at least the quarters…” Jongin added. “We didn’t wake up in time to stop him. Didn’t the General Lee warn you about him ?”

“Not at all.” The sentry replied. “Why the hell was he sleeping with his sword ?”

“With his… wow !”

All men jumped backwards when Wonsik suddenly unsheathed his blade that was hanging to the baldric he had tied around his night shirt. With his eyes still closed and letting low grunts out, he pretended to hit an invisible enemy, forcing the two soldiers in the watchtower to look at the scene. As the most logical reaction, they left their position and went down the ladders to help their brothers in arms out. It was the signal.

As every single person who could have seen Taemin was now busy trying to control the fighting sleepwalker, the young recruit smirked and climbed over the wall, letting himself slide outside. He made sure no one was making their round near him and smiled before he started running towards the village, not stopping once between the houses and closed shops. The streets were calm at that hour although there was still light in some habitations, but the young man didn’t even notice it.

He only cared about his destination : the school. He arrived in front of the building, out of breath, and held his knees to catch it back. Jonghyun hadn’t lied : it wasn’t easy to go from the palace to his place, but the way was sloping in this direction… it must be even tougher for the teacher to come visit them. The soldier raised his head and sighed with relief when he made out a faded light from the first floor’s window. 

Window that was open, certainly to let the cool breeze of this spring night enter and refresh the room. Taemin studied the house’s structure, taking his time to analyse the potential spaces he could put his feet on or grab hold of with his bare hands. It was an advantage that the building was of an old kind, which meant it had beams here and there to hold the walls. It should be easy.

No sooner said than done, the young man was slowly but surely climbing up the school’s front wall. The ground floor’s windows made some perfect grips for his feet to rest on, while he was using the beams to lift himself higher. At some point, he gained too much confidence and went faster, resulting in his foot slipping on a too frail frame and breaking it. Hissing, the soldier waited a few seconds to make sure he was out of danger ; he really didn’t want to fall to his death, not when he had spent so many months becoming the one he wanted.

As he took a deep breath and started climbing again, it only took him a few seconds to eventually reach the open window. He grabbed hold of the ledge and pulled himself on it, crouching and taking care of not making a mess of his friend’s belongings. He stepped over the desk and sighed when he found himself safe, standing on the wooden floor. That was what we could call a cleared mission !

“Taemin ? What the hell are you doing here ?”

The surprise made the young man scream and he turned over while stepping backwards… leading his own body to fall because of the sudden disequilibrium. His butt hit the floor with a rough sound and he grunted, but it was without counting the way Jonghyun immediately reacted, helping him to stand and even dusting his pants.

“What were you thinking ?” He softly asked. “Do you know I have a door you can knock at ?”

“Yes but I need some challenges, and I climbed really well !” The soldier retorted, sticking out his chest as if he had just passed the toughest trial ever. “This said, my hand hurts.”

“Let me see. Hasn’t the General told you to always wear gloves when you climb up something made of wood ? Here, it’s just a splinter so stay still and let me do my magic, understood ?”

“Yes !”

With a smile, the teacher led his young friend to his bedroom, allowing him to sit on his bed while he rummaged in what looked like a makeshift dressing table. The older man had made himself comfortable even though he wouldn’t sleep before hours, wearing light cotton pants and a loose shirt with a large collar showing a bit of his chest. His blonde hair had grown a lot and since he had let it free after combing it, Taemin noticed it was now at the level of the small of his back.

Soon, Jonghyun was sitting next to him, holding his hands open as he carefully used a small medicinal tool to remove the splinter. His young friend made a face when he felt the slight pain under his skin, but he remained calm and waited for it to be over. It hadn’t been a long time since he had last seen the teacher, but he couldn’t tell why he had missed him so much ; the habit of seeing him almost every day when he was the Prince’s tutor was perhaps still hard to forget. 

“There, it’s out.” The blonde said before standing up to throw the tiny piece of wood away. “Now will you tell me why you literally climbed up my house ?”

“I just wanted to see you.” Taemin replied a bit too fast. “I mean, you barely come to the palace now so…”

“And you’re a terrible liar.”

With a smile that looked quite sad, Jonghyun came back on the bed and stared at his friend. The latter bit his lower lip ; obviously, he had always been bad when it came to lie to anyone, and this was something he couldn’t improve. Or at least, not when he had lived so many years in the company of the two most perceptive men in all the realm.

“Alright, I lied.” He eventually sighed, giving up. “I just… I just want to talk with you, or should I say you to talk with me. Hyung, it really bothers me to see you so…”

“So what ?” The blonde asked, his voice still low but his tone showing a certain discomfort.

“So… lying. Listen, I’ve always observed you and Kibum hyung, I can read your faces like an open book and something changed on yours. I know it has something to do with the General, why do you refuse to talk about it ?”

“Because there is nothing to say.”

“You’re gritting your teeth, hyung, there definitely is something. I don’t want to have to follow you everywhere until you grow tired and spit everything out just because you want me to leave you alone. You can’t keep all of this to yourself… you’re going to burst out one day and it’ll destroy you. And maybe other persons…”

“Don’t you think the General has better things to think about than me ? Your curiosity is being a threat to your soldier’s behaviour, Taemin.”

“Then I would rather not be a soldier and have you being honest with me !”

“What are you saying…”

The teacher frowned and finally noticed the worry in the younger’s eyes. He wasn’t just being curious and trying to play the matchmaker or something, he really was worried about him. And the way he had just spit his last words out had made him feel like the one bursting out at the moment, his watering eyes betraying him. With a sigh combining guilt and a form of surrender, Jonghyun gently pulled Taemin into a warm hug.

The soldier immediately embraced him, his arms which grew stronger holding him tight and showing how he cared for his well-being. The blonde couldn’t deny it, his training and recent appointment had made a man of this teenager, and not only physically. He had also gained in maturity, commanding respect.

“Look at me.” The elder softly said as he withdrew, holding the other man’s shoulders. “Don’t ever give up on your dream, not now that you fulfilled it. You worked so hard, you can’t pretend to lose everything just because of something like this.”

“I just want you to talk with me, hyung.” Taemin replied. “I… I know you dislike these words, but I can see you love him.”

“Love—”

“Doesn’t exist, yes, I know what you think about it. But you’re lying to yourself, do you know how I can know that ? Because you mentioned your parents the other day, and how they… created this hatred for love feelings you have.”

“What do you want from me ?”

“To be honest, to tell me what made you close yourself to something you’re feeling ? You’re hurt, hyung, you can’t hide it. You’re suffering since the day the General broke up with you, or stopped whatever there was between you. He’s not here, he’s far away for a while so you can talk about him. No one will repeat. Please, just let it out…”

Jonghyun listened carefully to what was said to him, never interrupting nor protesting. He knew this day would come, he had somehow been waiting for Taemin to come to him after he had let his parents’ responsibility in his way of thinking slip. The kid had improved his way to observe people, it wasn’t only looking at their movements and anticipating potential danger… it was now about their thoughts as well, those thoughts that could make one suffer and lock themselves up.

Thoughts that could deprive one of happiness.

“My parents… loved each other.” The teacher eventually whispered. “At the beginning, they were in love and that’s the reason behind their wedding. Of course it was a good opportunity for their respective families since they were both nobles but… it was about love first.”

“I’m listening.” The soldier nodded, unwilling to cut his friend off. 

“When I was born, they still loved each other. I think I saw them in love until I was… maybe seven years old ? Then it was just chaos, I was a kid and I just didn’t understand how they could have gone from a precious love to such a raging hate.”

“Did they fight ?”

“No, they never yelled at each other, never hit each other. It was worse because they… they just stopped talking. I’ve never seen them communicate since then, they pretended to still be in love in front of their friends but they never really spoke directly to each other. And you know, Taemin… when there is something wrong going on in a relationship, you should let it out, it doesn’t matter if you yell or stay calm, it… it just can’t be kept to oneself. Because silence is the worst poison ever, it kills you from inside, you… you become a ghost to the other person. It’s like nothing had ever happened, like you never existed in the other person’s eyes anymore. Choosing silence is like choosing the end of everything.”

“But they still talked to you, right…?”

“Of course, but they were somehow taking turns. They never intervened in one’s way to educate me, even if they didn’t agree with this or that. The atmosphere was just poisonous, and when I reached teenage years, it… it got worse. Because I couldn’t breathe at home. This constant silence was oppressing me, and I couldn’t stand how my mother would say that everything was perfectly fine with her husband to her friends. It was all fake.”

“Do you know why they stopped talking to each other ?”

“My mom cheated on my dad. Trust got destroyed and even more because dad found out about it through someone else. I know because mom ended up telling me, after she drank a bit too much. She regretted but she didn’t want to say it, because she had given up. She told me it was a mistake because my dad was working so much he didn’t seem to care about her anymore, until this guy showed up and promised to take the stars out of the sky for her. Truth is that my dad was working relentlessly to get a position with Lord Kim Taehyun, so he could give us an even better life. He succeeded. But he made my mom understand that his success would be beneficial to only one of us : her or me.”

“I guess she chose you… that’s what any mother would do, the happiness of their child comes first.”

“She did. She chose me and sent me as a tutor for Kibum. I left home and was able to breathe, it was like I’d been holding my breath for years to the point I was slowly suffocating. Meeting him, and you… it made me live again. But I promised myself to never, ever fall in the same trap my parents fell in.”

“I see… So… It’s not like you really don’t believe in love, right…? It was just a way to protect yourself, you tried to… how to say it, to believe in your own lie ?”

“Yes. And it worked well at first, I didn’t fall in love with Kibum even though I could have. He was so attached to me, he showed me his love no matter what but I held myself back. I’ve always held myself back.”

“Until you met the General…”

Jonghyun sighed and looked away for a moment, his chest feeling as if it was being compressed from inside by the simple mention of his former lover. He could still remember his touches, the warmth of his breath and the way his voice would always be so comforting, pure honey to his ears. By protecting himself, the teacher had lost more than he had expected. 

“I wanted to protect him.” He confessed, and Taemin widened his eyes when he saw a tear rolling down his friend’s cheek. “I wasn’t only selfish, because what happened between my parents could happen to me, or to the person trusting me. I could have been the guilty one in the couple, and no one deserves to suffer like my dad suffered. I was protecting myself but also everyone who was having feelings for me.”

“You rejected Kibum hyung, but not him…” The young soldier said, taking the other man’s hand in his. “Why didn’t you reject him ?”

“Because he rejected me first.”

The sad smile from before reappeared on the blonde’s face, and he turned his head towards the younger man. His eyes were shining with tears that didn’t want to fall.

“And I was caught off guard.” Jonghyun pursued. “When he left, I’ve never felt so cold in all my life. And it was a cold you couldn’t counter, no blanket was thick enough, no fire could burn enough to get me warm. Because…”

“Yes…?”

“Because he left to protect me, from him. From his feelings for me… He decided to stop everything because he respected my vision. He smiled at me, he kissed me one last time and then left without turning back.”

“Were you angry at him for doing this ?”

“No. I was… grateful. Because he did it for me, he knew he had feelings and he sacrificed them for me, because I’m the one who doesn’t want to be in love. But… it… it…”

“It hurt… because you love him and you can’t deny it anymore, now that he’s gone…”

The teacher remained quiet for a few seconds and ended up nodding, slowly, without looking at his friend. And as soon as he admitted it, even without saying it out loud, he found himself taking the deepest breath he had ever taken, his ribcage opening to let his lungs — and his heart — escape their cell. He only needed to close his eyes for all the tears to fall, and a sob shook his body, hurt twisted his features.

Taemin reacted immediately, approaching his elder and taking him in his arms. The other man just let him do, abandoning himself for the first time ever. And there, in the darkness of the small bedroom, he realized it was now real : Jonghyun was in love with Jinki, and more than that, he admitted it himself.

Minho had just finished getting dressed this morning, after he had been woken up by the unfamiliar noise of a few seagulls. In Jinju, he was used to hear nightingales and robins sing in the trees, but he had to admit the seaside was full of surprise. The air’s scent wasn’t the same either, it constantly smelled of sea sprays, a natural marine fragrance that was always accompanied with the sound of waves throwing themselves on the beaches of white sand.

It felt pleasantly different, a soothing atmosphere seeming to hold him in soft arms, gently rocking him. As expected, the spring weather was mild despite the breeze, thus the King was not wearing his ceremonial coat. Instead, he had chosen a sleeveless jacket above his shirt, an item of clothing that was still just as majestic with its golden ornaments. He had noticed when they had arrived that both rulers let their hair free, dancing with the wind and not suffocating under hats ; it had been a very good pretext for him to let his royal headgear in his quarters.

He was walking in the castle’s corridors, his dark brown hair falling on his shoulders and back, with only a golden diadem being noticeable behind his thick fringe. It was the one the Prince had once made him wear, and even though the contact of cold metal around his head had first been unpleasant, Minho had grown used to it. The fact his husband liked it on him was enough of a reason to wear it proudly.

After a few steps on his own, the young man eventually reached the huge doors of the dining room where breakfast should be served. He waited to be announced before entering, his posture demonstrating his inborn magnificence as he walked towards the long table. Standing at its end, the King of Pugye was smiling at him and stretching an arm to welcome his guest.

“Good morning, your Highness.” He gently yet formally said, bowing with respect. “I hope you slept well, are your quarters satisfying enough ?”

“They are, thank you.” Minho smiled in return before accepting the invitation and sitting.

In front of him, a few plates were displayed and included both savoury and sweet dishes. There were so many that he didn’t know what to begin with, but he was waiting for his host and his respective partners to join them. However, when he looked up, he noticed King Yunho had started serving himself. 

“Shouldn’t we wait for her Majesty and his Grace to join us ?” The King of Jinju asked, cocking an eyebrow.

“Oh, they already had breakfast together.” The other man replied. “My wife is an early bird and she ran into his Grace earlier this morning.”

“It is a pity to not have them with us.”

“His Grace expressed his wish to walk to the sea, but do not worry, he is in great company. We can join them right after we filled our stomaches, if you would like to ?”

“Yes, this is a wonderful idea.”

With a smile, Minho wished his host to eat well before he served himself with diverse dishes. The evening before, when he had arrived at the castle with his husband and their escort, he had been pleasantly surprised by the warm welcome they had received. The Sea Kingdom wasn’t the biggest one in terms of surface area, yet it was counterbalanced by the impressive kindness of its rulers.

Pugye was known for venerating two higher entities : the Goddess of the Sea and the God of the Wind. The old legends said they had fallen in love despite their so different natures, at a period the water was always calm, unmoving and reflecting the sky like an eternal mirror. The wind had first been floating and flying above the clouds, until a hole in one of them had made him discovered the sea, down there. The way the sun was shining on this translucent liquid, making it scintillate, was the most beautiful thing it had ever seen.

It had been how the God had decided to leave the sky and use his power to seduce the Sea. Their relationship had kept growing throughout the years, and their mutual love could be seen every time the wind came down from the clouds to embrace his lover. He was either grazing her or vowed his fiery passion to her, and their shared moments could be seen in the waves that made the Goddess leave her immobile state to move in harmony with her other half.

Following this legend, it had been decided that the Pugye would always be ruled by an imperturbable Queen, with the precious help of a fervent King. For the kingdom was drawing its culture and wealth from the see, it had seemed evident that its inhabitants should venerate the Goddess first, so it was the woman of the royal couple who owned more power. 

And Minho had never seen someone who impersonated the Goddess of the Sea better than Queen Boa. She seemed to have been chosen by the entity itself to represent the place that had been built at the edge of the White Sea. From their very first encounter, he had noticed how Kibum had been extremely impressed by her presence, to the point he had stuttered when introducing himself. 

It wasn’t a surprise at all that the two of them were spending a time together, for the Queen herself had been pleasantly surprised by the Prince of Jinju. As for him, the King had immediately found a brotherly aura in the person of Yunho, Boa’s husband, and he felt comfortable being only in his presence. They were talking like two old friends who had always known each other, and their talking points weren’t only about royal matters.

After a few moments, they were done with their breakfast and stood side by side as they headed outside. They followed the rampart walk until a descending staircase made of limestones, as white as the polished ones that were used to build the whole castle, yet left with a naturally rough appearance. The last step was covered with sand, leading directly to the long beach that was lapped by gentle waves.

“I suggest you take your shoes off from here, your Highness.” Yunho said as he removed his own. “The sensation of sand going in them is terrible, unlike when you walk on it with your bare feet.”

Nodding, the young King followed the advice and let his shoes on the stairs before allowing his feet to graze the sand, warm and deliciously comfortable. It had been a long time since the last time he had travelled to the sea, but the memory hit him as soon as he started walking on the beach, relishing the sensation under his soles, the sound of waves and the salted, marine fragrance.

They only need a few steps to soon distinguish the Prince and the Queen, slowly walking in their direction and talking. They noticed them as well and waved, both duos going a bit faster to reach each other quickly. As if it was a reflex, Minho and Boa immediately switched places to stand next to their respective husband, and they exchanged a smile.

“Did you sleep well, your Highness ?” The woman asked. “I am sorry that we did not wait for you to have breakfast, I guess someone was in a haste to see the sea.”

“I slept well, thank you, and yes, I have been told you had been kidnapped by my husband early today.” The King laughed, his words making Kibum look at him with daggers in his eyes. “I’m teasing you.”

“Her Majesty and I talked a lot about her kingdom.” The Prince told his husband, smiling. “Did you know the castle wasn’t actually built on a simple cliff, but a huge salt mine ?”

“Oh really ?”

“If we hadn’t this much salt, we couldn’t make our seafood come to you in a tolerable state.” Yunho explained. “We are just lucky that it was here, we never lack and it is a real advantage to our business. Would you like to visit it, your Grace ?”

“Can we ?” 

“Of course, I promise you it will impress you. We could show you a lot of places in Pugye during your stay, and also allow you to do a fishing boat ride. Have you ever travelled on the sea ?”

“I have not, but I suppose my first time will happen in your wonderful kingdom.”

Seeing his husband’s enthusiasm, Minho could only smile and let him talk while looking at him and his sparkling eyes. He remembered his uneasiness when they had travelled to Dongjeo, and his extra responsibility when going to Maguk hadn’t let him make the most of his stay there. But here, in Pugye, he was like another man. His face was as fresh as the air and his smile meant everything.

“Before we start our sightseeing, would you please allow me a moment alone with my husband ?” The King politely asked. “We will join you soon.”

“Naturally, your Highness.” Boa joyfully said. “We will be waiting for you in the yard.”

“Perfect, please warn my General about our upcoming walk, I would have coming him with us since he also needs some rest. And if he refuses, do not hesitate to tell him it is an order from you, he will comply more than with me.”

“I see, I will use my power diligently. We will see you in a bit, then.”

Without further words, the royal couple of the Sea Kingdom bowed to their guests and made their way along the beach until they couldn’t be seen anymore. As soon as they were completely alone, Minho turned towards his husband to see him a few steps away, offering him his back as he stared at the sea. The brown haired man slowly approached and smiled when he saw Kibum with his eyes closed, breathing deeply and his long, free strands slightly flying in the wind.

With care, he slid his hands on the other man’s side from behind, until he was circling his waist and holding him against his torso. While putting his chin on the thing shoulder, the King appreciated the feeling of soft hands covering his. Both men stayed like that for a moment, not talking to each other and just relishing this so unfamiliar yet comfortable atmosphere.

“It’s the first time I see it.” The Prince eventually spoke with an emotional voice. “The sea.”

“How do you feel ?” His husband asked, looking at the way the morning sun was shining on the calm water. 

“Appeased. It’s like all the worries that remained in my mind just… faded away, by looking at this view. I wasn’t ill but it feels like I healed, somehow. I couldn’t explain.”

“It’s cradling you in a soothing way. What do you like the most here ? The sound of waves ?”

“The smell. The sound is really working like a lullaby and it feels comfortable but… I’m breathing a new air, so pure and… relaxing. I can breathe, and I feel free.”

“Even when you’re trapped by my arms ?”

“Yes, don’t you dare letting me go.”

Minho laughed with a low voice before he buried his face in the crook of Kibum’s neck, putting a soft kiss on the skin he found. He felt the other man’s thumb caressing the back of his hand and slowly turning his head ; when he straightened up, the King found the Prince’s face close to his, his feline eyes quietly calling him. With a smile, he took his time to approach him, their warm breaths melting into each other before their lips met.

The raven haired man rarely was the one asking for a kiss or starting it, yet this time he was feeling so fine that he had only needed this for his mind to be complete. He kissed his husband with an incredible softness, one of his hands raising to hold Minho’s cheek and keep him close. When he eventually withdrew, he pressed their foreheads together and made the most of this intimate moment, in a foreign place that made him feel at home.

“What do you think about walking in water ?” The King whispered, making the other man open his eyes. “It’s different from a river.”

“Can we ?” Kibum asked, his eyes starting to sparkle again at the simple thought of his feet entering the sea. “Is it allowed ?”

“The sea doesn’t belong to anyone.”

As a way to affirm his statement, the younger man let go of his husband and crouched to grab the hem of his linen trousers. He gently rolled them up before doing the same with his own, and it only needed a knowing stare for the Prince to smile and slowly walk towards the sea. He seemed reluctant at first, after all it was his first time and he had no idea how different it could be from a simple river. Would it be colder ? Would he feel the salt against his skin ?

He remained for a moment at the edge of this beautiful area, the tide still not lapping his toes. However, he heard a familiar sound and when he looked up, he saw Minho with water up to his calfs, foam forming around his skin. And when he stretched his arm to offer him his hand, Kibum could only smile and take it, making his first steps in the sea. He didn’t hold a loud inspiration back when he finally felt it.

It was softer than he had expected, and he stared at his feet which he could see through the translucent water. Without saying anything, he started walking alongside the beach, never going further in order not to wet his clothes. He never let go of the King’s hand, the latter interlacing their fingers as they walked side by side, slowly, taking their time to return to the castle. 

When a slightly higher wave hit them just under the hem of their trousers, the Prince let a tiny scream out and jumped closer to his husband, who laughed and held him by his waist. Minho felt happier than he had ever felt ; witnessing something that seemed so unremarkable as someone walking in the sea had become the most beautiful spectacle. He was beyond grateful to be the one accompanying Kibum in this first experience, for once.

He couldn’t wait for them to take the rest they deserved, together, by visiting this healing kingdom. 

And for sure they did, their smile never leaving their faces by days passing in Pugye.

When their convoy hit the ground of Jinju’s palace again, the King and Prince weren’t feeling as much at peace as they had been in the Sea Kingdom. On their third day in this wonderful place, they had been surprised by a quite violent storm coming directly from the open sea, what the priests had interpreted like a fight between the two divine entities. The God of Wind had then left his lover and was now blowing through the whole kingdom, threatening with anger.

If Pugye’s constructions were all reinforced with stones, preventing them to be destroyed by a tempest, it wasn’t the case in Minho’s kingdom. They had had to shorten their trip for the sake of Jinju’s people, and had travelled behind the storm. The natural disaster had reached their home before them, a dark sky pouring violent rain and the wind only making it even more uncontrollable.

Before they could get completely wet, the two husbands ran from their carriage to the palace, entering the Pearl Room when they were welcomed by the Queen Mother, her eyes showing her anxiety.

“Bless the Gods, you are safe !” She sighed with relief before hugging her son and taking her son-in-law’s hands in hers. “I was afraid you would stay blocked somewhere because of the weather.”

“Mother, we saw this storm in Pugye.” Minho told her while the General was summoning the whole army in the room to wait for their sovereign’s orders. “It was already strong there and will only grow stronger. We can’t do anything against it but we have to protect our people.”

“Was it dangerous back there ?”

“Your Majesty, the wind was powerful enough to break everything that was made of wood.” Kibum intervened. “Every house built with stones was spared so it didn’t did a lot of damages, but here…”

“We need to evacuate the people.” The King decided. “The renovations of the town hadn’t ended and there are some areas with houses that are only made of wood. We have to protect every single person who lives in a place that can be destroyed.”

“What are your orders, my King ?” Jinki stepped in.

“I want two squadrons, the first one will evacuate people whose habitations and lives are threatened and bring them here in the Pearl Room. We will wet up a refuge for as long as the storm keeps going. For the second one, they will split up and go tell every other family to stay in their house, most of them had been reinforced so it will be fine.”

“I will take care of preparing the room.” The Prince added. “Do not let them waste time by taking clothes or blankets, they will have everything here. Also, just in case there are flying debris, take shields and protect yourselves, protect the people you will escort. Do not let them come to us alone.”

As one man, all soldiers answered positively and listened to their General separating them and giving orders to let them go in a methodical way. Kibum couldn’t help but flinch when he saw Taemin in the front row, but the young man looked determined and his older friend tried his best to repress his worries. In no time, the huge room was empty and a few employees were running here and there, moving furnitures away and bringing as much blankets and pillows as they could.

While the Prince was giving his orders in the kitchens to have warm soup ready for the rescued people, the storm grew stronger outside and thunder started rumbling. The dark sky soon was torn up by bolts of lightning, the rain pouring more and more as the wind kept blowing. Panic started invading everyone’s mind but they chased the thought away, making sure to have everything prepared.

When the first persons arrived, a few families with children with one being brought by Jinki in person, they were immediately taken care of by house boys and girls who led them to a space where they helped hem drying themselves. The kids got undressed and wrapped in warm blankets, bowls of soup soon given while the tempest was still raging outside. When the newcomers grew more and more numerous, the King, the Prince and the Queen Mother pitched in to welcome and help, calling for the physician to tend to some superficial injuries caused by debris.

“We are running out of space, your Highness !” Yerim soon said loudly.

And indeed, the Pearl Room was completed invaded when people kept coming. Minho noticed some of them weren’t part of those who must come, but it wasn’t the right time to eject humans who wanted to be safe. 

“Make space in the dining room and in the Council Room as well.” He told the house girl. “This should be enough to welcome everyone.”

Nodding, the young woman ran away to comply to her sovereign’s orders, and the situation was handled with no difficulty. After half an hour, newcomers were less and less frequent, until all soldiers were back in the palace with Jinki closing the huge doors behind them. The latter sent his soldiers to help every single person, man, woman or child who needed help or just reassurance, before he made his way through the sitting crowd.

He grabbed the King by his arm and the Prince instantly joined them, the three men standing in the middle of the room.

“My soldiers evacuated everyone who lived in the south of the town.” The General said. “They passed the word so it was easier for us, I had to intervene with the second squadron because some nobles refused to stay inside when their houses were perfectly safe.”

“You did well to do so.” Minho nodded. “I hope we didn’t forget anyone…”

“My sergeant made his report, everyone should be here and they even checked in the endangered houses to make sure they were empty.”

“Were they injured soldiers ?”

“A few, mostly because of the flying objects, but they were taken care of.”

“Can you tell me something again ?” Kibum spoke in, his eyes scanning the crowd. “What areas of the town had to be evacuated ?”

“Mostly the south, where some shops are.” Jinki obeyed. “The barns, the inn, the school and all houses concerned.”

“The school…”

“It’s the oldest building of the town.” The King frowned. “The most breakable.”

“Wh-Where is Jonghyun ?”

The Prince started turning round and round, searching for the slightest blond strand in the crowd. He ran to the two other rooms they had prepared but there was no trace of the teacher. The General’s face turned white and he called his sergeant to make him repeat his report.

“Did you go to the school ?” He hurriedly asked. “Did you check no one was there ?”

“There couldn’t have been any child in the house at that hour, Sir.” The soldier replied, but he knew he had done something wrong.

“Sir Jonghyun is living above the school !” Minho shouted, losing his temper when he saw his husband become pale as well.

“Have you seen him ?” Jinki pressed his recruit. “He’s fucking blonde, have you seen someone blonde in that fucking town ?!”

“No, Sir…!”

Kibum held onto the King as his legs failed him, the latter catching him and calling for someone to bring him water. What he hadn’t expected was for the General to curse out loud before running between the sitting people, towards the door.

“General !” Minho shouted. “Jinki !”

The soldier ignored the calls, he didn’t even hear them. He was thinking about one person only, fear twisting his stomach. He opened the door and went outside, and before he could be caught back by anyone… he had run away and disappeared in the storm.

next

[taeminuet]

where there is no Echo

Title: where there is no Echo Fandom: SHINee Pairings: Jongyu Wordcount: 12k Rating: PG-13 Warnings: Illness, homophobia, character death (set before the fic), discussion of suicide (set before the fic) Summary: In which Jongin’s older brother is sick.

This is the first of the WIPs I will be posting over the next little bit. Please pay attention to the warnings.

note: I did my best to get almost everything in this fic to at least stage 2 of my outlining process (though I think one section may be at stage 1). That means there are no gaps in this fic. There are definitely areas where the plot is glossed over, where it’s not formatted into a full fic, but there’s about 10k of full-on fic and a few sections later where I formatted it into a very loose shape of what the future paragraphs would be. I’m sad to think that this will never be a fic, but even the editing of this killed me, and I don’t imagine I could write the whole thing.

That said, I will repeat: please pay attention to the warnings. Thank you all so much for your support and I appreciate all of you. <3

“Look, it's not I'm trying to avoid anything,” Jinki defends himself, shifting the phone he has pinned between his shoulder and his ear. It slides dangerously, threatening to fall, and he hisses a note of panic, throwing his hand up to catch it and stabbing himself in the cheek with his pen. Moaning weakly, he scrubs at the spot, more than a little glad that his roommate isn't there to tease him for this not-so-uncommon show of grace. Unfortunately, on the other end of the line, his cousin is already snickering at him softly.

Jinki sighs. “I want to come home,” he goes on, though how true that is when he's being laughed at is questionable, “but it's just not feasible right now. I have exams to study for, and I barely have enough money to buy food. I just can't afford the week off or the money it would take to get there. I'm sorry, Tae. If it was possible...”

“You know mom would give you money if you asked,” Taemin protests, a pout of his own evident in his voice. Jinki can imagine him without effort, sitting in the center of his bed, his long hair pulled into a high ponytail and his lips curled down at the edges as he sulks into the phone. His cellphone model actually has a speakerphone that works, but he probably hasn't remembered to use it, so he'll be leaning in close to the phone as he whines, “Just come home. You know she'd give you enough to get here. She misses you. We both do.”

Jinki sighs again. He really does miss them both terribly, and it's such a tempting offer, the thought of getting to go home and see him making his resolve waver. But, “I don't need the money though, and I don't want to do that to Auntie. She works hard enough.”

“But hyung,” Taemin whines, “I--”

“No 'buts', Taemin,” Jinki cuts him off. He feels mean, but he also knows that if Taemin keeps talking, he'll give in eventually, and he doesn't want to do that. “It's spring break, not the end of the world.”

There's silence for a long moment, and Jinki wonders if Taemin is giving him the silent treatment -- he honestly wouldn't put it past him. But then the younger takes a deep breath, the sound sending a static buzz across the microphone as if to confirm Jinki's mental image. “It's just really lonely here.”

“Oh, Tae...” Jinki sets his pen down and switches the phone to his other ear, fixing his attention more fully on Taemin. Maybe he can't spare a whole week to visit his cousin, but he can most definitely spare a couple of minutes to talk to him properly. At very least he can do that.

Taemin is his entire world most days, and that's only recently changed. By recently, he means when he moved to college, because up until then, it had only been the two of them.

Living out in the country hadn't been a bad way to grow up, not by a long shot, but it had been a little lonely. Most of the other occupants of their town were older couples, their children moved on into the city with their own jobs, and while of course that had meant that he and Taemin had been adored and doted by older grandmotherly types, it also meant that there just weren't any other children to play with.

It wasn't a good place for kids to grow up, really, but his aunt had tried hard. It had to have been hard to have taken on a child that wasn't her own when she was already struggling with bills and raising her own child. Jinki understood now exactly how much she had done for him, but at the time he had been a confused child, struggling with the loss of his mother and struggling harder to understand exactly why he had been left with a woman who he had only met a few times and a toddler who wasn't old enough to keep him company and cried all the time.

Jinki understood now that it had been the only option, but he had been a lonely child until Taemin was old enough to keep him company.

Once Taemin was older though, grown enough to really spend time with him, they had been inseparable. It had been the two of them against the world; Taemin had looked up to him with some kind of hero worship, and Jinki had adored him. Even when the two of them were old enough to be driven almost an hour the nearest public middle school, exposed to more children around, they hadn't really bothered to befriend the other children.

Or, rather, Taemin had been too busy defending himself from the incessant accusations of him being gay to try and actually make friends with the people sneering at him and whispering behind his back, and Jinki had been furious and unwilling to speak to anyone who would dare make fun of Taemin.

He had tried his best to defend him, of course, but it was hard. Despite Taemin being the one to fit all the ridiculous high school stereotypes -- long hair, delicate features, an interest in dance, and the frame to suit it – Taemin isn't gay. But Jinki is, and Taemin refused to let him risk transferring all the torment to himself. Jinki was the smart one, Taemin had insisted despite Jinki’s protests, the one who had always been going on to bigger and better things.

But now that he has, graduated with honors and moved to the city for university, he's left Taemin alone in a small town and a high school where people tease him, and Jinki feels awful for it. He feels even worse for denying him when all he's asking for is some company. Jinki is five and a half hours away from him studying day and night. If nothing else, Jinki owes Taemin a little while to talk to him.

“Tae, I'm sorry,” Jinki apologizes after a long minute of silence. “I'll be home for the summer. If I can pass all of my exams, I won't have any summer classes, and then I'll be home for months while you're out of class.”

“I have to study during the summer, hyung,” Taemin reminds him, but there's something in his voice that Jinki thinks might be a smile. “And I have dance classes.”

“I'll help you then!” Jinki offers, smiling back. “And I'll come watch you dance. It'll be like old times.”

Taemin laughs into the phone and Jinki exhales a breath he hadn't realized he was holding, leaning back in his chair. More than ever now, he wishes that he was going home to visit Taemin for break, because he's been so stressed out about everything that just taking a moment to speak to his cousin makes him feel more relaxed than he's been in weeks. So much so that when Taemin laughs, “God, I hope not. I've gotten tons better this year,” Jinki giggles so hard that he falls backwards out of his chair.

It's just in time for his roommate to walk in and see him sprawled on the floor, but the guy merely rolls his eyes before going to drop into his bed and grab his laptop. Jinki blushes pink and picks himself up and then the phone in time to hear Taemin ask, “Hyung, are you okay?”

“Fine,” he says, stretching out his leg with a wince. “Just not as graceful as you. I'm glad your dancing is going well!”

Taemin laughs again. “Yeah, well, we got a new student, who's actually really nice. We've been practicing together, so...”

“New student?” Jinki asks with interest, perking up. Taemin groans at his tone of voice, but Jinki's too excited to listen to the clear note of fond protest in Taemin's voice. “Is she cute?”

“He, hyung,” Taemin says with a laugh. “And yeah, I guess so, but you know that's more your scene than mine.”

“That's fair,” Jinki chuckles, “Does he live close?”

“You're not hitting on my dance partner, hyung!” Taemin protests, “He's like five years younger than you!”

“I don't want to hit on your dance partner. I'm pretty sure you'll have him corrupted by the summer anyways. I just meant so that you might have some company.”

It stifles the amusement a little, reminding them both of exactly how this conversation started. Taemin's laughter tapers off into a soft noncommittal sound. “His family lives in an apartment in the city right now. They're trying to find somewhere nice, but they haven't gotten a good place yet.”

“Ah,” Jinki says, smiling sympathetically, “Maybe they'll move in close and you won't be so lonely. It'll be okay, Taeminnie.”

“Don't call me that,” Taemin whines, but he sounds pleased. After a minute, he adds, “I miss you, hyung.”

“I know, Tae,” Jinki sighs, and then catches the glare from his roommate. Right. His roommate can't sleep while there's talking. “I miss you too. And I'll talk to you later, okay?”

“Yes, hyung,” Taemin says, and there's an almost dejected creak from his mattress as he moves around.

Jinki frowns. “I really do.”

“I know. Later, hyung.”

“Later, Tae,” he whispers, but the phone line is already dead. Sighing, he plugs his cellphone in to charge and crawls into his own bed just in time for his roommate to switch out the lights, shift around for a minute, and promptly start snoring softly.

Rolling over, Jinki realizes that he might be just as lonely as Taemin.

--

Homework swamps him over the next few weeks, and Jinki honestly does spend most of his spring break in the school library. He also spends the weeks after that, and before he knows it, he's answering the phone to his cousin's voice for the first time since they spoke since before spring break, and it's to Taemin's greeting of, “Happy Easter, hyung!”

Jinki blinks at his calendar for a long minute, shocked and appalled. How on earth is it Easter already? The weeks have flown by, and Jinki realizes that in all his preparations for his upcoming finals, he hasn't really had time for anyone else lately. The thought makes his stomach churn uncomfortably. “Happy Easter, Tae. How's it going?”

“Oh, you know,” Taemin replies, and his voice isn't nearly as upset as Jinki would have expected considering that Jinki's practically been MIA for the last for weeks. In fact, he sounds almost giddy when he adds, “Pretty good!”

“Pretty good?” Jinki repeats, dubiously. It's not that he's not happy that Taemin is happy, but it's just strange when it wasn’t that long ago that Taemin was begging him to come home and confessing in that trembling voice how lonely he was. Still, Jinki's not going to look a gift horse in the mouth over this. He grins, knowing Taemin will be able to tell the expression in his words. “Okay, I'll bite. What happened?”

“Free chocolate isn't enough?” Taemin laughs, but he's quick to add, “You remember that friend I met in dance class? He moved in!”

“Moved in?” Jinki asks, bewildered. “Moved in where?”

“The old house a few blocks over. The one that's been for sale forever,” Taemin says, and then giggles. “You know, the one that we used to say was haunted?”

“Taem, tell me you didn't tell your new friend that he lives in a house full of ghosts!” Jinki admonishes, thoroughly ruining it with a laugh of his own.

Taemin snorts into the phone. “Of course not, hyung. What do you take me for? I told him about the brutal murder-suicide in the attic and let him draw him own conclusions.”

“Taemin!” Jinki says, scandalized, and then pauses for a moment before asking, “Does that house even have an attic?”

“I dunno,” Taemin shrugs. “I don't think so, but I mean, Jonginnie's pretty gullible.”

“Jonginnie, huh? You sure you're not interested in him that way?”

“Hyung!” Taemin yells, and it's his turn to sound scandalized.

Jinki laughs until he can't breathe, and Taemin keeps protesting into the phone until it's time to pass it over to his mother. Jinki greets his aunt warmly, and she does the same thing, telling him about her promotion at her work.

“Now that Taeminnie has a friend,” she says honestly, in that furtive voice that means Taemin is nearby and she’s trying not to let him hear, “I'm not so worried about leaving him to take care of himself.”

“You should be. Now he's just corrupting an innocent,” Jinki laughs.

“Well then,” his aunt counters, “you'll just have to come home and stop him.”

Jinki sighs, clearly caught. “Summer vacation starts in a few weeks. I'll be home then.”

“You better,” she threatens, her voice soft. “It's not the same around here without you.”

“Sorry, Auntie,” he apologizes. “I miss you both, and I'll see you soon, okay?”

“Okay, Jinki. We'll see you soon.”

Jinki hangs up, rubbing his eyes slowly. Taemin has a friend now, but that doesn't make Jinki feel any less worn out, any less eager to get back to his family. He buries himself back in his studying, losing himself in flash cards and facts until his roommate wakes him up with a loud clearing of his throat, prompting Jinki to jerk up in alarm from where his head was laid down on his desk. “You need the light?”

“Oh, uh,” Jinki replies, “no. You can turn it--”

It's off before he finishes his sentence, and Jinki has to feel his way to his bed in the dark.

--

“So, uh,” Jinki says awkwardly, scuffing his foot along the carpet. His bags are in his car, his books have been returned to the school, he has his laptop bag slung over his shoulder, and he's staring across the dorm room at his roommate who is packing up a few more things and not really looking at Jinki. Jinki feels more than a little uncomfortable. “It's been fun.”

“Yeah, sure,” his roommate says, batting his hand in the air. “It's been a real riot, Joonki.”

“It's Jin... you know what, nevermind.” He rolls his shoulders for a second. “I'll see you around.”

He doesn't get a response this time, and he sighs softly, ducking his head as he walks out of the dorm. It's probably the last time he'll see his roommate, considering the size of their campus. Maybe he should feel a little bad, but considering that conversation, he can't say he does. Instead, he scoops his phone out of his pocket and punches in Taemin's number.

It rings a couple of times, and Jinki feels his heart plummet with the thought that Taemin isn't going to answer him. Then the phone clicks and Jinki's assaulted with the sound of music, the bass pounding through the speakers loud enough that he has to pull the phone away from his ear. He's glad he did, because a second later, Taemin is literally screaming into the phone, his voice loud as he hollers, “Hyung? Are you home?!”

Jinki laughs. “Could you even hear me if I was going to say 'yes'?”

He almost doubles over when Taemin's only response is, “What? I can't hear you!”

“Turn down the music, Tae!” Jinki shouts back, earning himself a couple of weird looks from the other students packing up their things to head home for the summer.

“Hold on, hyung,” Taemin says, quieter now, but still too loud, “Jonginnie, turn the music down!”

The music quiets a bit, and Jinki smiles slightly. “You're with Jongin? Are you sure you two are not--”

“Hyung,” Taemin says, and he sounds so honestly mortified that Jinki is actually genuinely taken aback. “I mean,” Taemin adds after a second, “no. You know I'm not--”

“Okay,” Jinki says, holding up his free hand in mock surrender, even if he knows Taemin can't see it. “Okay, I get it. But if I get home and you two are engaged, don't say I didn't tell you so.”

“So you're not home yet?” Taemin asks, and his voice has a little bit of a pout in it.

“No, not yet,” Jinki apologizes, “But I'm on my way. Give me a few hours and I'll be there, okay?”

“Okay,” Taemin chirrups, “I'll see you in a few hours.”

“Alright, Tae,” Jinki says, climbing into his car. “Bye.”

For once, after a conversation with his cousin, he doesn't feel guilty or lonely, and he hums happily under his breath as he tosses his laptop bag and his cellphone into the passenger seat and heads for home. It's a long drive, admittedly, and he remembers about halfway there exactly why he didn't want to do this for spring break, but he has the entire summer now. He'll have some studying to do to keep up with his work, but mostly it'll be free time and getting to spend time with someone who actually remembers his name.

--

Also, apparently, someone who he's never met before, Jinki realizes as he pulls up outside his house a couple of hours later. The sun is starting to dip toward the horizon, and Jinki has to squint into it as he pulls up the street, so he's not entirely sure whether he's going crazy or not when he sees someone suspiciously similar to his cousin standing right next to Taemin, but when he gets out of the car, he just lifts an eyebrow.

Taemin is beaming, long hair tied up in the loose bun that says he's been dancing, and he bounces up and throws sweaty arms around Jinki's shoulders with a grin. Behind him is what appears to be Taemin if he grew a couple of centimeters, got a tan, and cut his hair short. Jinki blinks, and then remembers to make a face of disgust and shrug Taemin off with a soft, “Ugh, Taemin, that's disgusting. Go take a shower.”

“It's nice to see you too, hyung!” Taemin chirps, clinging on closer with an impish grin. “How was the drive home?”

“Long,” Jinki admits. “What's with the good twin?”

“Wait, why am I the good twin?” The boy speaks up, looking bemused. He tilts his head to one side and stops looking quite as much like Taemin, mostly because he now looks a little like a bewildered puppy.

Jinki smiles at him. “Jongin, I presume? Right, well, you should know Taemin well enough at this point to know that he's certainly not.”

“That's...” Jongin starts and then stops and shrugs, “That's fair.”

Jinki laughs while Taemin pulls away from him to frown at his new friend. “You’re a traitor. You’re a traitor, and I don’t need you now that hyung is home.”

The sentence actually takes Jinki aback, and he blinks rapidly, eyebrows knitting and mouth pursing into a tight line. He isn’t sure whether to tell off Taemin first or apologize to Jongin, and so he stands there for a moment, totally off guard.

Jongin bursts into laughter, the kind that makes his mouth gape open and his upper body bounce with the force of it. Next to him, Taemin beams, covering the expression with his hand like that might help hide the fact that his complaint has now turned to nothing but smiles and happiness. Jinki hasn’t seen his cousin this happy in a very long time, and Jinki reaches out without thinking to squeeze his shoulder, a smile on his lips. He’s glad to be home.

“It’s nice to meet you, Jongin,” he says, voice all honestly. “Are you staying for dinner?”

“Nah, I’ve got to get home. I was just walking back with Taemin after practice, and he insisted I wait here until you got here so I could meet you. He's told me a lot about you, hyung.”

Jongin’s smile is sweet, and Jinki nods a little approvingly. Taemin, however, pouts. “Jonginnie, stay. Mom won’t mind, you know. She always says you’re welcome.”

“No, no, it’s alright!” Jongin rubs at the back of his neck a little. “I’ve got to get home. It’s not every night your cousin gets home. This should be a family thing. Besides,” he adds quickly to abate the protest Taemin has just opened his mouth to add, “I’ve got summer school work to catch up on, you know? Moving put me behind, and I don’t want to be a grade behind you just because I’m struggling with some math.”

“Jinki-hyung is great at math! He could help you catch up!” Taemin says, like it’s some kind of bartering system, and Jinki lifts an eyebrow at him for volunteering his services without asking.

Jongin just blinks at him though, suddenly looking a little shy, and asks, “Could you, hyung? I’m just kind of confused by some of it, and I don’t want to repeat a year when I know I could wrap my head around it with a little more practice.”

Jinki caves. Either Taemin has taught Jongin the tricks of the trade for getting Jinki to give in to things or Jongin just naturally has that hopeful puppy look, but either way, it doesn’t bode well for Jinki if Taemin and Jongin ever team up on him.

“Sure, Jongin. It’s not a problem,” he agrees. “Just not tonight? I’m a little tired from the drive.”

“No! No, of course not, hyung!” Jongin says, grinning brightly. “Just whenever you get settled in!”

Jongin and Taemin both look far too excited about this, Taemin’s mouth a proud little smirk like he somehow just brokered the world’s greatest peace treaty instead of some strange tutoring session for his best friend. Jinki fights not to roll his eyes, just grabs the essentials out of his car and tosses them at his cousin’s face. “Help me carry these in?”

--

To his credit, Jinki only breaks two things while moving back in, and that plate had been on its last legs before he even left, so he can’t really be blamed for that. Also to his credit, in the same amount of time, Taemin loses his cellphone (twice), three different hair ties, and somehow, mysteriously, his left shoe. Jinki figures they all have their vices.

It takes him three or fours days, mostly because he keeps getting derailed by the requests to spend quality time with both Taemin and his aunt, who, while her job takes her away a lot, makes a concerted effort to be home for dinner every night, even if that dinner is take-out. Taemin volunteers to cook, but he’s shot down extremely quickly.

Jongin shows up for at least a couple of hours a day, usually to hang out with Taemin, though sometimes he ends up helping Jinki move things, smiling at him and claiming to “really want to help, hyung!” when prompted. He’s a good kid, Jinki decides, and so, when he’s finally finished unpacking, he figures he owes it to Jongin not to put it off anymore, even if he really doesn’t want to do any more math.

Still, high school math can’t be as bad as college level calculus courses, he figures.

He’s wrong.

It’s not that the numbers are harder – if nothing else, Jinki breezes through the equations once he’s got them figures out. It’s that somehow, somewhere along the line, someone hired a batman super villain to write the word problems that Jongin shows him from his workbook. It takes way longer than it should just to figure out what the questions want him to figure out, and usually there’s at least one completely unnecessary number in there to throw him off, because why just teach math when they can easily throw advanced problem-solving into the mix, just in case the students had strange film noire aspirations to their lives.

Jinki doesn’t say any of this though. No reason to discourage Jongin. Instead, he casually mentions maybe not doing all of this today and coming around to help out a lot more. “Easier to do an hour or two a couple of times a week than try and cram it all into a few days and get frustrated, right?” he offers in his gentlest voice.

The look Taemin gives him from the chair across Jongin's living room tells him he’s fooling no one, but Jongin lights up hopefully. “Would you? God, it’d be great not to have to sit down and do five or six hours of math at a time.”

“Of course. And,” he adds, because Taemin has upgraded from giving him a look to giving him a look, and Jinki wants to discourage that right now, “it might make it a little easier to get through if you’re not getting frustrated after a couple of hours.”

“Yeah,” Jongin admits, looking sheepish again. It’s not an uncommon look for him, Jinki’s learning. “I just can’t sit still for a long time or I get really sleepy, you know? It’s like –“

 Jongin stops abruptly, though even if he had gone on, Jinki would have missed it. His head has already snapped around to look up towards the ceiling, the loud thumping noise like something falling making him jump a little. For half a second, Jinki has some weird flashback to him and Taemin joking about this house being haunted, but that’s ridiculous. Besides, Jongin looks more concerned than confused, like he knows very well where the noise is coming from.

“Hyung?” He calls loudly, and there’s a long stretch of silence. Jinki almost jumps when it’s broken by the trill of Jongin’s phone going off. It’s sitting right between them on the table, and Jinki catches a glimpse of the name 'Hyung~ ^^' before Jongin picks it up and swipes the screen, greeting, “Hyung, are you okay?”

Jinki can hear what’s said, but it’s obviously not good because Jongin tenses a little and starts to get up. Across from them, Taemin shakes his head. “Jonginnie’s brother is really sick,” he tells Jinki in a quiet voice. “He doesn’t leave his room a whole lot. It’s why they moved out here – the doctors said the fresh air would be good for him, even if it’s a little further from the hospital. Don’t know if fresh air helps when he doesn’t get outside much, but…”

He shrugs loosely, and Jinki glances at Jongin, but he’s absorbed in the phonecall, saying, “Hyung, if you fell on the way to the bathroom, I can come help… No, I get that, but… Mom’s going to be really upset if you got hurt because…”

It sounds like he’s getting refused at every turn, because he sits back down slowly, protests getting quieter by the minute. Finally he sighs out, “Okay, but if you need me, text me. I’ll be right up.”

He hangs up the phone and sets it down, looking worried. Jinki frowns, empathy stirring up feelings of sadness in his chest. He pats Jongin’s arm quietly, the same as he would for Taemin. “Do you need to go help him?”

“No, he says he’s fine,” Jongin sighs, giving no sign that he’s even remotely upset by Taemin telling Jinki what’s going on. “My mom’s a little overprotective, and he gets upset after a while. Says that he’s sick, but he’s not an invalid. It’s just…”

Jongin shakes his head a little and then shrugs. Taemin reaches out and squeezes his friend’s arm. “It’ll be fine. Do you need to skip dance practice this afternoon to keep an eye out for him?”

“No, my mom will be home,” Jongin says, shaking his head. “We’re good. Can we finish up these two pages maybe?”

It’s an abrupt change of subject, but Jinki’s more than willing to give into it. He probably hadn’t wanted to talk about his mom a lot there at the end either.

“Okay,” he says instead, pointing at a problem, “So they’re looking for which of these could be the total price amount of the coins you have, and you have a ratio of 4:3 with a total of 14 coins…”

Jinki squints at the word problem in exasperation, Jongin looking completely at a loss, and Taemin stands up abruptly, fishing out a handful of coins from his pocket and dumping them out on the table. They’re still laughing and rearranging the money when Jongin’s mother comes home and Jongin and Taemin rush up to Jongin’s room to change into dance clothes.

Jinki smiles after them and introduces himself to the woman as he cleans up Taemin’s money and organizes the workbooks they’d been pouring over. It kind of surprises him when he finds himself being greeted warmly and told to come over any time he’d like, that Taemin is practically a third son at this point and that Jinki is more than welcome any time.

It makes Jinki’s heart swell to hear such good things about Taemin, especially when his cousin rushes back downstairs with Jongin in tow and whines, “Hyung, come on. We’re going to be late!” like that’s Jinki’s fault.

“It was nice to meet you,” Jinki says with another bow as he shoves Taemin’s coins into his pocket to return them when Taemin is once more wearing an outfit with pockets. He gets tugged out of the door before he gets a response, and shakes his head as Taemin and Jongin have a brief scuffle over the passenger seat of Jinki’s car.

Looking back at Jongin’s house, he pauses for a moment at the sight of a short boy in one of the windows, blinking down at them with a look that tugs at Jinki’s heartstrings. He gets distracted when the scuffle ends with Taemin knocking into him, and by the time he looks back, the boy is gone from the window. Jinki stares a moment longer before banishing both of the boys to the back seat under threat of rescinding his offer to drive both of them to dance.

--

It’s the next Tuesday before Jinki has a real chance to go over and help Jongin again, mostly because Taemin coaxes him into taking him into the city over the weekend. It’s not a big deal, really, but they spend most of the day window shopping, visiting arcades, and getting ice cream. It’s all those things that they both wished they could do all the time when Jinki was still in high school, and getting to do them now is nice.

Nice is also more than a little exhausting though, and they spend Sunday recovering, playing video games in their boxers with the blinds drawn and only stumbling downstairs for dinner when Taemin’s mom gets home.

Monday is another lazy day, though this one is because there’s really nothing much to do; Jongin and his family are in in the city this time. There’s probably no ice cream and window shopping though, because Taemin points out that if they’re in the city then they’re probably at the hospital for Jongin’s brother.

That makes Jinki’s stomach drop hard and fast, but Taemin just shakes his head. “He has checkups, like, all the time. Every couple of weeks or so. They’re pretty much trying to just keep an eye on him.”

“Right,” Jinki says, though it doesn’t help any, and when they walk over to Jongin’s on Tuesday for Jinki to help Jongin with his math, he pauses for an extra moment outside, looking up at the window where he had seen the boy looking out. All the rooms upstairs are dark though, and when Jongin opens the door, he explains why.

“Hyung’s sleeping,” he says, voice hushed. “He’s been kind of worn out lately.”

“Do you want to do this another day?” Jinki asks, because he doesn’t want to disturb the sick boy. “It’s fine if you’d rather wait.”

Jongin shakes his head. “No, honestly, it's fine. We just can’t be super loud or anything.”

They follow Jongin into the living room where he has his math books set out along with some spare papers and a few pencils. He starts to sit down and then seems to think better of it, looking at them both and asking, “Do you want anything to drink?”

“I’ll take a beer,” Taemin says in such a deadpan voice that Jinki glances at him for a moment.

“Okay, so you want a soda,” Jongin says in a voice just as deadpan, and then looks to Jinki. “And for you, hyung?”

“Soda would be great, thanks,” Jinki replies, taking a seat, and opens the math book to begin looking over it and making sure he knows what he’s talking about.

Taemin follows Jongin into the kitchen to get drinks for them, the two of them chatting in hushed, amiable voices that Jinki can’t quite make out. It’s nice background noise, and Jinki hums softly to himself as he listens to their quiet voices from the other room, eyes skimming the words. He hears them come back in the room, jostling each other and still talking away, and he looks up to smile and take the drink from Jongin’s hand only to watch in a kind of helpless horror as Taemin knocks against Jongin a bit too roughly, liquid sloshing from the glass he’s offering and spilling sticky across Jinki’s hand and arm, dripping down onto the table as well.

“Oh my god, hyung, I’m so sorry,” Jongin fumbles out at once, wide-eyed and red-faced, jerking away and ending up spilling more soda across the table. From behind him, Taemin snorts with laughter, and both of them glare at the long-haired boy, Jongin hissing out a, “Shut the hell up, Taemin.”

“Jongin, it’s fine,” Jinki says, trying to be kind, because Jongin looks frankly mortified. “It’ll wash out. Just, where’s your bathroom?”

“Oh, god, uhm, it’s… upstairs and to the left. Or, no, second door on the left. Yeah. First one’s a closet, and… should I, uhm, show you, or…?”

“I’m sure I can find it, Jongin,” Jinki says, trying to be as patient as he can. “You might want to clean this up, though…”

“Right, yes, okay,” Jongin says, and rushes towards the kitchen to, presumably, get something to clean up with.

Taemin watches him go, reaching down and plucking Jongin’s math book away from the mess, and Jinki shakes his head for a second and then heads upstairs, taking them as quietly as he can.

The bathroom is easy to find and loosely decorated, the soap dispenser matching the shower curtain and the towels, though both of those are hanging loosely and unfolded from the rack, making it clear they’ve been used recently. It’s a typical bathroom for a teenage boy, and Jinki finds himself smiling slightly as he turns on the tap and starts scrubbing at his hands and arm, trying to wash the soda out of the sleeve of his shirt.

When he’s gotten it mostly out, to the point where it won’t be troublesome when he goes to wash it, he looks around, fishing for a hand towel of some sort. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees something, and when he turns his head, he sees two faces in the mirror, another boy standing behind him in the doorway.

Jinki nearly jumps out of his skin, whirling around with a gasp. “Who…?”

The boy in the doorway blinks at him slowly. “You’re new,” he says, voice soft and light. He has light blond hair and a puppyish face, eyes a little dark like he doesn’t get a whole lot of rest. He’s wearing a thick, soft-looking sweater, fingers curled into it in a clear sign that he’s cold. Jinki can understand that; the air conditioning is running full-blast up here, making the upstairs seem a lot colder than the relatively comfortable downstairs. Still, it seems like a weird thing to be wearing mid-summer, and Jinki hesitates a moment, especially when the boy raises an eyebrow. “You’re… one of, uh, Jongin’s friends, right?”

“Y-yeah,” Jinki says, a little taken aback, and then he remembers the boy he had seen in the window only a few days ago. Jongin’s brother. Jongin had said he was sleeping, but he’d obviously woken up. “I’m Jinki.”

“Jonghyun,” the boy says, sounding almost nervous now. He must not meet very many new people. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Jinki answers, smiling politely. “Sorry, you just startled me.”

“Yeah, I, uh… I get that a lot,” Jonghyun says with a shrug. “I didn’t really think you’d notice me, but…”

 “Well, you were standing in the doorway. It was a little hard to miss,” Jinki points out, and Jonghyun hums in acknowledgement but doesn’t reply. After a second, Jinki adds, “I’m sorry. Did you need the bathroom?”

“Oh, uh,” Jonghyun says, looking like this has just occurred to him, “yeah. Thanks.”

“No problem,” Jinki says with a smile. “I’ll just get out of your way.”

He twists off the tap and settles for drying his hands on his pants, figuring no one will really care. Then he edges past Jonghyun who’s still standing in the doorway and makes his way back downstairs.

Jongin has the soda cleaned up, but he starts in on apologies the second Jinki’s back in the room, and Jinki has to shake his head a little and wave them off with a, “Jongin, it was an accident. And Taemin’s fault if anything. It’ll come out in the wash. Let’s just work on your math, alright?”

Taemin looks offended, putting his hand to his chest like Jinki has deeply wounded him, and Jongin snickers softly and agrees. Leaning in, Jinki starts in on the math with Jongin, not even thinking to mention that Jonghyun is up and about until a while later when Jongin’s mother gets home and asks Jongin how his brother’s doing. Still, it’s been a while, and Jonghyun’s probably gone back to bed, so Jinki lets it lie.

He and Taemin decline Jongin’s mother’s offer of dinner, saying that they need to get home, and they head out soon after, leaving Jongin with his family. Jinki glances over his shoulder out of habit and sees Jonghyun blinking at him from one of the windows. He waves tentatively, and Jonghyun takes a second and then waves back.

“What are you doing, hyung?” Taemin asks, already headed down the street without him. “Come on! Mom’s home, and she said she’s making something good for dinner tonight.”

“I’m coming,” Jinki replies and strides after his cousin, looking back once more to see Jongyhun staring after him.

--

It becomes kind of a routine after a couple of weeks. Fridays are dance for the two younger boys, so Jinki helps Jongin with his math then and then takes the both of them to their class in the evenings. Tuesdays are also set aside to help Jongin struggle through the mess of numbers he has to deal with. The rest of the week is kind of a give-or-take thing, and more often than not, the other days of the week find Jongin with Taemin at every possible moment, thus meaning that Jinki sees quite a bit of the boy. Eventually, after a few weeks, Jongin stops being so shy and openly extends the invitation for Jinki to come hang out at his house as well.

Jinki doesn’t mind doing so, though he doesn’t have the same thing for video games that the two younger boys do. Or, rather, he does, but he tends to lounge on the couch and play games on his phone while the two boys argue playfully and shoot each others’ characters in the face, even when they’re on the same team.

Jinki hasn’t seen any more of Jonghyun so far, but Jongin mentioned something about going to the city every Monday now, citing, “Hyung’s been a lot more tired recently. The doctors say the move just took it out of him and it’ll be a while for him to get back on his feet, but… I dunno, they say a lot of things.”

He sounds moderately sad about it, but he’s also kind of accepting, like he’s been dealing with this for a long time. Jinki thinks it’s probably hard for Jongin to deal with, but, of course, it’s probably hard for Jonghyun as well. He’s the one who’s sick after all.

Jinki doesn’t say either one of those things. Instead he gets up quietly while the younger boys argue over who gets to have a certain type of gun and wanders upstairs towards the bathroom.

He hadn’t been meaning to creep on anyone, but when he finds a door open, he can't help but poke his head in. It’s empty, bed neatly made, curtains drawn. It feels a little sterile actually, unlived in, and for some reason it makes Jinki squirm, a chill going down his spine.

Maybe this is a guest room? There are other doors along the hallway, all closed, and those could easily be bedrooms for two boys. Maybe –

“So you’re here a lot now, huh?” A voice interrupts his thoughts.

Jinki jumps about a mile high, heart starting to thunder in his chest. How he had missed Jonghyun sitting in a chair in the corner, he has no idea, but the boy just scared this shit out of him. Jinki presses his palm to his chest, trying to make sure he’s not having a heart attack or something. “S-sorry,” he fumbles out. “I didn’t mean—“

“You’re fine,” Jonghyun says with a shrug, getting up out of the chair soundlessly and moving to lean against the wall nearer Jinki instead. “I’m not mad that you’re in here or anything. The door was open, so…”

“Yeah, I saw that. I just thought… I mean, I thought maybe I’d say hello?” Jinki tries, a little cautiously. “I didn’t know if you were sleeping or what, but…”

Jonghyun looks baffled for a second, blinking a few times. Then he starts laughing for some reason, a kind of weary sound, and shakes his head. “Nah, I don’t sleep much.”

“But I thought…” Jinki starts, and then clams up. He doesn’t want to be rude or anything. After a second he tries, “Should I leave you alone so you can rest?”

“No,” Jonghyun says, a little too fast. “I like the company. I don’t get a whole lot of it.”

“Oh. Does Jongin not…?” Jinki asks, brow furrowing.

“He’s a sweet kid.” Jonghyun shrugs. “He’s just got too much going on to see me much.”

“That’s sad.”

“Not so much as you’d think. I’m kind of used to it. It’s just kind of a part of… all this.” Jonghyun smiles like he’s got a joke that he’s not sharing with Jinki. “I don’t mind so much. It’s nice to talk to someone though.”

“I can come visit more, if you’d like?” Jinki says.

Jonghyun’s eyebrows furrow. “Don’t go out of your way.”

“I’m not!” Jinki promises, smiling as kindly as he can. “Like you said, I’m here a lot now.”

“Then… yeah, that sounds nice. If I’m around,” Jonghyun says, shrugging like it doesn’t matter. There’s something longing in his face though.

“If you’re around,” Jinki agrees. “It’s really nice to—“ Jinki stops abruptly when he hears Taemin’s voice from downstairs, calling out to him. He turns in the doorway, looking down the hall, and then sighs a little. “I should go.”

“Yeah,” Jonghyun agrees from behind him, and Jinki looks back to see him halfway across the room again, settling back into his chair.

Jinki frowns. “I’ll see you around?”

“Yeah, maybe,” Jonghyun says. “Can you, uh, shut the door behind you?”

“Sure,” Jinki says, stomach twisting a little. That hadn’t been how he wanted that conversation to go.

He shuts the door behind him and goes downstairs to find Taemin lacing up his shoes. “Where’ve you been?” Taemin asks. “It’s time to go home for dinner.”

Jinki thinks about answering, but it feels weird somehow, like he shouldn’t tell Taemin about the loose attempt at friendship he’s carving out with Jongin’s brother. If that can be counted as a friendship.

It doesn’t matter a whole lot. Taemin’s happy to accept Jinki’s shrug and, “Sorry. Lost track of time.”

 “Did you find the ghosts in the attic?” Taemin teases, and Jinki laughs as he pulls on his own shoes and they head home for dinner, Taemin chattering excitedly about his and Jongin’s video game.

--

It becomes a sort of habit for Jinki to try and slip upstairs at some point to see Jonghyun. Not all the time, of course. He still spends quite a bit of time with Jongin and Taemin, sometimes helping Jongin with his math and sometimes just watching the two of them bicker playfully and play video games. But a lot of the times, he manages to find some time to go and visit. He had said he would try, after all, and it’s not like it’s hard to slip away.

Taemin and Jongin are in their own little world, and Jinki finds himself a kind of third wheel more often than not. It’s a little weird, but Jinki doesn’t mind. Taemin’s happy, and it’s nice to see him so open and entirely himself. It’s pretty much all Jinki’s ever wanted for Taemin, and while he originally thought that he might mind the two of them being so wrapped up in their friendship, he’s not.

Part of that is Jonghyun.

He’s not always there. Sometimes Jinki goes up and finds all of the doors shut, and when he knocks softly on the door, he’s always ignored. He figures Jonghyun really is sleeping at those times, and he doesn’t want to disturb him.

Other times he goes up and Jonghyun’s sitting there in his room with the door open, either sitting cross legged on the bed or folded up in the chair. Sometimes he seems to be scribbling things in notebook, but he always hides it away like magic when Jinki comes in. Still, he smiles at Jinki sweetly enough that Jinki has never had room to ask about it, always greeting him with a, “You’re back!”

The first few times he sounded more surprised than pleased, and Jinki had worried that he wasn’t as welcome as Jonghyun had made it seem during their earlier encounters. But Jinki realized quickly that Jonghyun just doesn’t get a lot of socialization. He supposes it’s always either Jongin or Mrs. Kim, and Jonghyun still sometimes expresses how rarely Jongin sees him. Jinki doesn’t have the heart to tell him that that’s probably because of Taemin, but Jonghyun seems to know anyways.

“Your cousin seems nice,” he tells Jinki a couple of weeks into their visits, a wry smile on his lips, and when Jinki’s eyebrows furrow, he continues, “I’ve never really spoken to him. He’s very wrapped up in Jongin, isn’t he?”

“Yeah, they’re pretty close,” Jinki says, shrugging a little. “They spend a lot of time together.”

“I’ve noticed,” Jonghyun says with a snort of amusement. “Jongin’s enamored.”

“What?” Jinki’s eyes widen, flicking downwards like he can see through the floor to the living room if he tries hard enough.

“Jongin’s got a crush. How’d you miss that? He’s always primping before you two come over.”

“But Taemin isn't gay,” Jinki protests, frowning tightly, unhappiness settling into his features. God, if Jongin has a crush on Taemin and it goes badly, Taemin could lose the only friend he has. He doesn’t want to see that happen, not when this is the happiest he’s seen Taemin in a long time.

“Yeah, I know,” Jonghyun says, and something in his voice is chilly enough that it feels like the air in the room literally plummets a few degrees. It pulls Jinki’s eyes back to Jonghyun’s face. The other boy looks pissy, shoulders suddenly set in a way that makes him stop looking as small and soft as he always does. “Your little cousin is as straight as they come. No shame to your family or anything.”

“Woah, what?” Jinki stiffens as well, mentally reeling. Jonghyun sounds so hateful, and it kind of stings to hear that angled at him, but worse is the words he’s using, like he thinks Jinki might genuinely feel that way. “I never said—“

“You didn’t have to. I get it,” Jonghyun says bitterly. He looks away from Jinki towards the window, head turned far enough that Jinki can’t see his expression, and it’s too bright outside for Jinki to be able to get a glimpse of Jonghyun’s reflection in the glass. “It’s written all over your face.”

“Then you’re not very good at reading,” Jinki says, and his voice is tight and controlled. He doesn’t want to yell at Jonghyun, partially because that feels mean, but also because he doesn’t want to get in trouble for being up here and upsetting him. “I don’t give a damn if Taemin is gay or not, and neither does my aunt. But Taemin has always said he’s straight, and that’s for him to figure out, not for anyone else to try and push on him.”

Jonghyun doesn’t look at him for a long time, but when he does, he’s wearing a look that Jinki is more than familiar with. It’s pretty similar to Taemin’s confused face actually, like he’s trying to buffer and process what Jinki just said, and it goes on for just a few seconds too long, making Jinki feel like squirming.

Jinki doesn’t know why, in his urge to break the silence, he admits, “I’m gay.”

“Oh,” Jonghyun says after a second, and then his face contorts into something else entirely, staring at Jinki like he’s never seen him before. “Oh.”

“Yeah, oh,” Jinki says, shaking his head a little. After a moment he pauses and then says in a voice as firm as he can make it, “Do you have a problem with that?”

“No!” Jonghyun blurts out, shaking his head, “No, of course not. I just thought…”

“Yeah, I know. I get that a lot. I’m just not fashionable enough for a gay man,” Jinki jokes in a tone that makes it very clear exactly how much he hates that stereotype.

Jonghyun snorts a little. “I don’t think fashion is much of a deciding factor here. I used to know the most fashionable guy ever, and he was straight as a ruler. And Jongin’s got the fashion sense of a blind frat boy.”

“He’s in high school,” Jinki points out, smiling a little. “He’ll get past it. I hope.”

Jonghyun laughs, and like that it’s a little easier again. They don’t talk about Jinki’s confession, and they don’t really go back to discussing sexualities either. Not that day at least.

Before he leaves though, responding to Jonghyun’s yawn and proclamation of exhaustion, Jinki adds, “Hey, are we, uhm… good?”

It feels like such a lame thing to say, but Jonghyun nods, smiling gently. “Yeah. We’re fine.”

Jinki feels a little warm at the smile he’s apparently earned, and there’s a smile of his own on his face as he closes the door behind him and wanders back down the hallway, humming just loud enough that he misses the shuffling around behind one of the closed doors.

--

The next week is weird. Jongin and Taemin have a dance competition coming up hard and fast, and while they can’t make it out to the studio as often as they’d like, there’s space enough at their house for Jinki and Taemin to push all of the living room furniture out of the way and make space for Taemin and Jongin to practice. It’s fun to watch them for a while, but after about an hour of watching Taemin and Jongin repeat the same verse over and over with only the tiniest of alterations, Jinki’s getting a pounding headache.

His room’s not enough of an escape, and he can hear the base beat thudding through their walls no matter what he does. It’s driving him clearly mad, enough that when he crosses through the living room to the kitchen to get water and some ibuprofen, Jongin’s mouth pulls. The boy follows him into the kitchen, leaving Taemin for a second, and hesitates in the doorway.

“Uhm, hyung,” he says, looking sheepish (or as sheepish as he can look when he’s red-faced and dripping sweat, tank top soaked through and clinging in a way that is highly unnecessary on a kid his age), “I called my mom, and she says you’re welcome to hang out at our house. I mean, my brother’s there, but he’s still sleeping a lot, so it should be pretty quiet.”

“Ah, I wouldn’t want to bother him,” Jinki says to be polite, though realistically, he’s kind of excited at the prospect. Peace, quiet, and maybe getting to spend time with Jonghyun. It’s not a bad deal.

“Well, I mean, he doesn’t leave his room a lot, so I doubt he’d even know you were there. And if he does, you can just say who you are,” Jongin points out, and Jinki realizes belatedly that Jongin hasn’t noticed him disappearing for hours to hang out with Jonghyun either. He wonders if Jonghyun’s ever even mentioned their friendship. The thought is oddly unsettling.

“That’s…” Jinki starts, and then hears Taemin curse and the track repeat. He flinches openly. “That’s probably a good idea. Thank you, Jongin, and thank your mother for me if I don’t get the chance myself.”

“Yeah, course, hyung!” Jongin says, smiling brilliantly and practically wagging his metaphorical tail as he digs his house key out of the pocket of his sweats and hands it over. He and Jonghyun both look like puppies sometimes, honestly.

“Jonginnie, come on! We’ve got to get through this bullshit transition,” Taemin calls from the other room, and Jongin turns his head in surprise and then smiles at Jinki a little softer before returning to his friend.

“Language,” Jinki teases as he slips back through the room and heads upstairs to go get his laptop, in better spirits now that he has an escape.

“Get out, hyung!” Taemin laughs, and Jinki does so, taking his time on the walk to Jongin’s house. The summer air is sticky, a little stifling, but Jinki doesn’t mind. It only makes the constant iciness of Jongin’s house feel better as it chills the sweat beading on the back of Jinki’s neck, cooling him quickly enough that he shivers a little.

It’s slightly strange being in Jongin’s house when there’s no one home. Well, no one but his brother. But it’s always quiet upstairs, in what feels like Jonghyun’s territory, and now the entire house feels like that. It’s oddly silent without Jongin verbally working his way through math problems or Taemin and Jongin arguing over video games. It’s nice though, and Jinki relishes it for a moment as he goes to get himself a glass of water, comfortable enough here that it doesn’t make him feel awkward.

He gulps it down, sets it in the sink, and takes a moment to look out the kitchen window to the slightly overgrown side yard. It’s strange, how it reminds him a little of the way their yard always looked like when he was younger, after he had moved in with his aunt but before she trusted him to run the mower without running over his own feet. He should probably offer to mow the Kim’s yard one of these days.

He’s still lost in thought when he hears a soft noise from the second floor. It’s quiet enough that he’s fairly sure it’s just the sound of socked feet on the floor above him, but it makes him pause anyways. After a moment, he smiles. He takes the stairs as quietly as possible, just in case, but he’s pretty sure that means Jonghyun is awake, and when he slips into the room at the end of the hall, he’s a little disappointed not to see him.

He frowns for a moment, looking around one more time, just in case, and then turns on his heel to leave, only to nearly jump out of his skin when he sees Jonghyun standing behind him in the hallway, where he certainly hadn’t been a moment before.

“Jesus—“ Jinki breaths, pressing a hand to his racing heart.

Jonghyun smiles. “I’m sorry,” he says, taking a step back to give Jinki some space. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“No. God, no, you’re fine,” Jinki laughs, raking his fingers through his hair. “I should have given you some warning. I didn't want to be too loud coming in though, in case you were sleeping.”

“It's alright,” Jonghyun says, smiling. “I'm not sleeping. I wasn't expecting you here is all. I thought it would be-- well, someone else.”

Jinki lifts an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth quirking playfully. “Do you not want me here?”

“I like having you here. It's nice to have someone who actually interacts with me,” Jonghyun says. There's something sad in his face, but he smiles anyways. “I just don't see you much without your cousin in tow. And Jongin, of course.”

“Yeah, they're practicing over at my aunt's place. It's a tiny bit deafening,” Jinki says with a laugh. “They're good, but there's only so many times--”

“Ah,” Jonghyun says, nodding. “It's worse when you can't get away from it. They try not to practice here much, but Jongin plays the same songs over and over and, well...”

Jinki laughs. “He's in high school,” he points out, meaning it as a playful comment on his tastes, but it calls to mind the conversation from the previous week, and that makes him pause.

Jonghyun is obviously thinking the same thing, because he tips his head at Jinki and says, “So, when you said you were gay...”

“I generally meant that I'm attracted to guys,” Jinki says. “The traditional definition.”

Jonghyun laughs weakly. “No,” he says, “I meant... does that work out for you?”

Jinki smiles softly, a little sadly. “It's alright. It doesn't affect too much. I've always been a bit more interested in school and grades than relationships,” he says. He tries not to think too much about how few friends he has at school because of that.

But Jonghyun seems to see right through him. “It's rough, isn't it?” he asks, reaching out for Jinki. He seems to hesitate before touching him, and Jinki realizes abruptly that this is the first time Jonghyun ever has. His fingers are ice-cold and a little clammy, and he pulls them back quickly when Jinki shivers involuntarily. “Sorry.”

“You're fine,” Jinki says. “I know that you're sick. It's okay.”

Jonghyun pauses. “Yeah,” he agrees after a moment. “Sick. Right.”

That seems like a strange response, and Jinki's brow furrows. “Are you--”

Jonghyun only shakes his head. “I should go soon. I'm getting tired.”

“Alright,” Jinki agrees. He's not going to stop him. He needs his rest. “Well, I'll be downstairs if you want to talk.”

Jonghyun nods slowly, moving to one side. Jinki steps out past him into the hallway, letting Jonghyun move past him into the bedroom. After a quiet moment, Jinki moves down the hall towards the stairs.

“Jinki?” Jonghyun says, and Jinki turns towards him in surprise. Jonghyun is standing there, in the doorway, watching him. “I... I'm gay too.”

“Oh,” Jinki says, not sure what else to say. He's not sure if he's surprised or not. “That's--”

“I'm gonna go,” Jonghyun says, before Jinki can get out anything else. He steps back, disappearing out of sight, and the door closes. Jinki stands there for a moment longer before heading downstairs, leaving Jonghyun to his sleep.

 -- Jinki and Jonghyun interact a few more times, becoming friends, and Jonghyun starts hanging out for longer and longer amounts of time.

 -- Jonghyun admits, one day, to never having kissed a boy. Jinki kisses him --

Jonghyun’s mouth is soft, and his hands shake as he makes a quiet noise of disbelief and wraps his fingers loosely into the front of Jinki’s shirt. It’s not a long kiss, and Jinki pulls away after a moment, swallowing tightly. He hopes that that was okay. He hopes that he didn’t just shatter their friendship, because it startles him to realize that he considers Jonghyun his best friend and to think that he might have ruined that is terrifying.

“Was that…” he starts, slowly, and he can hear the concern in his own voice, wavering and unsure.

Jonghyun makes a tiny, sweet little noise and crumples into him all at once, shoulders heaving. Jinki startles, catching him, and for a moment Jonghyun feels almost insubstantial in his arms, like if Jinki squeezes too tight he’ll just melt away. But then Jonghyun makes another of those noises, a little wetter this time, and Jinki sucks in a breath and tightens his grip because Jonghyun is crying.

“Jonghyun,” Jinki says, a little helpless. He’s always been bad at this sort of thing. “I don’t-- I’m sorry if that wasn’t…”

Jonghyun shakes his head weakly, the action rubbing his face against Jinki’s shirt. “No, no, please don’t-- don’t apologize. I… g-god, I just… I never thought… I’ve never been kissed before, and I d-don’t…”

He’s stuttering, stumbling over his words a little, and Jinki should know better, should think more about it, but he doesn’t. He just unravels his arms so that he can catch Jonghyun’s face instead and pulls him up, kisses him again despite the tears on Jonghyun’s face and the way Jonghyun gasps into his mouth.

Jonghyun’s fingers spasm in his shirt, and then he’s tugging weakly, like he’s trying to pull Jinki closer. When Jinki breaks apart from him, Jonghyun whines, tugging pitifully, but Jinki just grins, leaning their foreheads together and breathing slowly, evenly.

Jonghyun curls into him slowly and clings for a long while, the two of them sitting in peaceful quiet before Jonghyun whispers, “This feels so real.”

Jinki laughs a little, confused by the murmur. “Of course it’s real. Jonghyunnie…”

“I know,” Jonghyun whispers but it sounds almost doubtful, almost near tears again. “I just… I want it to be real, and I know it can’t be. I know it can’t… can’t work out or last…”

Jinki bites back his cringe. He doesn’t like to think too hard about it, about the way Jongin always says ‘my brother is sick’ with the kind of tone where ‘sick’ means ‘dying’. He doesn’t like the think about the way the hope rings hollow in Mrs. Kim’s voice when she mentions going to the city or a new treatment. He doesn’t like to think about it, and now he has to, because Jonghyun is looking at him uncertainly, pulling away, and Jinki feels something ice-cold and desperate.

“Why can’t it?” he says, and then realizes how stupid that was. “I know… I know things aren’t perfect, or… or, I don’t know. I don’t want to mess this up. I like being with you. I like being your friend. And I’d be happy with that, I would. But I also… I like kissing you and holding you and…”

Jonghyun makes a soft, strange laugh, a little tense, a little strained. “I do too,” he says finally, biting his lip. “I want-- I want to be with you. However you-- I just don’t want to break your heart.”

That seems a little much, but at the same time, Jinki has a feeling like it’s too late for that. Romantic or platonic, Jonghyun is so important to him now, and one day he’s going to lose him.

He doesn’t say that though. He just kisses Jonghyun again, hands shaking as he moves to hold Jonghyun’s waist, thin and fragile under his bulky sweater.

“Okay,” Jonghyun says finally, and Jinki doesn’t know what that means, but Jonghyun is swaying a little, tired a little, and they rest there a moment longer before Jonghyun says, “Isn’t it time for you to take Jongin and Taemin to dance?”

“Fuck,” Jinki says, jerking suddenly. He lets go of Jonghyun, fumbling for his phone to check the time and then hisses, “Fuck. Thank you, Jonghyun. I gotta-- we can… later, yeah?”

Jonghyun smiles, hesitant and not entirely a happy expression. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be here.”

“Jong…” Jinki starts and leans in to kiss him again.

Jonghyun stops him, hands bracing on his chest. “You’re going to be late,” he says, and then presses up for a tiny kiss, brief and chaste and something that makes Jinki’s heart swoop anyways. “Go.”

Jinki catches Jonghyun’s hand and squeezes before he goes, patting down his pockets to make sure he has his keys and taking the stairs two at a time.

 -- Taemin and Jongin’s team wins their dance competition and are moving on to the next thing, so they start spending more time practicing and Jinki starts basically hiding out at Jongin’s house and just spending a lot more time with Jonghyun. They talk a little more, and Jonghyun never really gives a solid answer on what they are, he just kisses Jinki instead.

 -- Jinki hanging out with Jonghyun, and Jonghyun sitting up suddenly and mumbling something about, “I have to go,” and rushing upstairs and Jinki worries about him and tries to follow him up, but Jongin’s mom gets home then and Jinki says hi and they talk for a moment before she starts to go up and Jinki says something about “I don’t know if he’s feeling well. He kind of…” and her face crumples a little and she forces a smile and says she’ll check on him and Jinki nods and kind of reluctantly leaves her to it and goes so it’s not weird.

 -- Jongin is gone that weekend cuz his family goes into the city. Jinki and Tae scene where Taemin says something about how hard it is on Jongin and then backtracks and is like ‘I’m not saying Jongin’s got it worse, but… he just… it’s hard for him. His family being like this. I just don’t know what to do for him.’ and Jinki kind of frowns and says, “I doubt it’s easy on any of them, but… all we can do is be there. However we’re needed.” And Tae nods and the conversation kind of falls to other stuff.

 -- Jinki and Tae are at Jongin’s house and Jinki’s trying to help Jongin study since Jongin’s been putting it off for dance. Jinki’s aunt calls and tells them that she has to work late and won’t be home until at least 10 or 11, and Jinki is talking to her when Jongin’s mom gets home and Jongin suggests Jinki and Tae stay for dinner. She agrees and Jinki tells his aunt and they make plans and settle in and Jonghyun doesn’t come down for dinner, but another boy -- maybe a year or so older than Taemin -- comes down and grabs some food and goes back upstairs and Jinki assumes maybe it’s someone with Jonghyun and gets jealous, but he doesn’t get a chance until he and Taemin are heading home and then he asks.

“Who was that guy who came down?” he asks, and they’re passing just under a streetlight now, so Jinki gets to watch as Taemin’s face pinches in confusion. Jinki doesn’t know what he said wrong -- it felt like a perfectly legitimate question.

“That’s Jongdae,” he says, and the tone of his voice makes it clear that Jinki should know who that is. After a moment, he says, “You know? Jongdae? Jongin’s brother? Have you not met him yet?”

Jinki is suddenly very aware of his own heartbeat in his ears. Jongdae. Jongin’s brother, Jongdae.

“Then… does he have another--?” But he can’t even finish that question. It’s too ridiculous. How could he have known Jongin for a month and a half and this still be catching him this off guard. Jongin’s older brother. He frowns. “What about Jonghyun?”

“Who?” Taemin asks, and his face is shadowed now. They’ve stopped between streetlights, Jinki frozen on the sidewalk. “Hyung, are you okay?”

Jinki shakes his head.

 -- Jinki avoiding the house for a few days until Jongin has to beg him for help with a problem set and Jinki goes over and the entire house feels uncomfortable now, and Jinki asks how ‘Jongin’s brother’ is and Jongin kind of shrugs and mumbles something about “He’s sleeping a lot more recently. The doctors can’t figure it out. He just says he’s tired all the time.”

Jinki goes upstairs when they’re done and runs into Jonghyun and Jonghyun is staring at him and finally says, “I’ve missed you,” and Jinki doesn’t know what to say except, “Who are you?”

And Jonghyun’s face crumples and he gets angry and asks Jinki why it matters, why he has to care when he hasn’t cared this whole time?

And Jinki asks him again because he thought Jonghyun was Jongin’s brother, he thought he knew, and now he doesn’t and he’s scared.

And Jonghyun sighs really loudly and kind of shamefacedly tells his story. He was this kid who used to live in this house a long time ago and he committed suicide b/c he was gay and being bullied, and Jonghyun -- "It's funny how you never realize how much you want to be alive until you aren't anymore."

Jinki finds out that Jonghyun's the one who's been making Jongdae worse and he doesn't mean to, but it takes energy to stick around and Jongdae is the easiest target. And so Jonghyun takes energy from him and just basically leaves Jongdae passed out half the time and Jonghyun's like, "he's dying anyways! What's worse, for me to make it easy on him and give a second chance to someone who wants it, or for him to be in pain every hour of every day?!" and Jinki's literally so aware that Jonghyun can't do this, but at the same time, Jonghyun just wants to be alive, or as alive as he can be.

And Jinki had to choose between his feelings for Jonghyun and the knowledge that Jonghyun can’t do this because he’s hurting people. And Jinki tries to talk to him but Jonghyun starts getting angrier and angrier and lights start flickering, and Jinki stumbles backwards just as something flies across the room and it shatters against the wall and cuts him.

And he looks down and sees the blood on his fingertips and looks back at Jonghyn who’s looking at him in horror and just “I… I didn’t mean to do that. I didn’t. Jinki, I promise, I didn’t mean-- I don’t know how I did it. I’ve-- I’ve never…”

Jinki drops his hand and just looks at Jonghyun for a long time. “Why are you here, Jonghyun? Why are you staying here?”

And Jonghyun whispers that he’s scared. And Jinki steps in and hugs him and kisses him really softly, and when he steps away Jonghyun’s just looking at him and his hands are shaking and he repeats, “I’m scared.”

And Jinki whispers that he knows, but that Jonghyun, the Jonghyun he knows wouldn’t want to hurt someone. Wouldn’t want someone to hurt because of him.

And Jonghyun kind of laughs bitterly and says, “How would you know? It’s what I’ve been doing all this time.”

But Jinki just shakes his head and says, “Jonghyun, please.”

When Jonghyun pulls away, he’s looking at Jinki’s injury and his eyes are sad and scared and he takes Jinki’s hand and murmurs, “I’m sorry. I wish… I wish that things had been different. I really wanted to love you.”

Jinki just stares at him, something ragged and tight in his chest. “I do love you, Jonghyun.”

Jonghyun just wells up and presses his face into Jinki’s shoulder, and whispers, “I told you I didn’t want to break your heart.”

But Jinki just shakes his head and closes his eyes, pressing a kiss into Jonghyun’s hair. He stays like that for a long time, and he doesn’t open his eyes until the weight of a body in his arms is gone.

 -- Jinki helps Jongin finish his math stuff. He meets Jongdae, who’s feeling a little better now, not as tired all the time. The new treatment is working, they tell them. Jongin and Taemin win their dance competition. They celebrate at Jongin’s house and Jongdae joins them for lunch and talks to Jinki for a bit. He’s a nice kid, and when he gets amused, he smiles like a cat and laughs freely. They could maybe, probably be friends.

Sometimes, at Jongin’s house, Jinki catches sight of something out of the corner of his eyes. Sometimes, at Jongin’s house, he feels a sudden chill of cold air. Sometimes, at Jongin’s house, he finds himself crying for no real reason except the obvious, and he can almost imagine someone holding him.

Sometimes, he’s not sure if Jonghyun is gone or not, but when he can, when he finds himself wondering too hard, sometimes he whispers ‘I love you’ to the maybe-empty house, just in case.

[katrinawritesthings]

Jinki/Minho; honestly the ocean is bullshit; PG

anonymous asked: onho taking a late night walk, fingers entangled and arms swinging, and just talking about everything and nothing at the same time? fluffy if you please, tysm

Minho’s little ponytail bobs behind him and Jinki feels like the half step he stumbled for focusing on it instead of the path was worth it.

“Okay–you can’t say ‘fuck the ocean’ and then say that you’re gonna nut about space.” Jinki lifts his hands to spread his fingers for emphasis as he walks. His right falls back to his side; Minho holds onto his left and waits for Jinki to close his hand again. When Jinki does, he raises one finger.

“One,” he says slowly, “fuck the ocean.” Jinki snorts, bumping Minho’s side with his shoulder. Minho doesn’t even stumble on the little cobbled path they’re walking around the park on. “Two,” he says, “I would allow the entire infinite vastness of space inside of my waiting asshole.”

“Oh my god,” Jinki giggles. He can’t help the laugh that comes out of him, big and loud, so loud in the quiet calm of the night. He almost cuts himself short when he hears it, but with Minho chuckling next to him it doesn’t feel out of place. Instead he lets it fade out naturally, until he can only hear the crickets and their footsteps and the faint vroom of a car in the distance. He smiles lazily at the path and at their interlinked hands. Minho is swaying them back and forth between them gently, squeezing his every time they hit the bottom of the arc. His hand is a warm constant in the shifting atmosphere of chilly winter end breezes. Jinki squeezes him back once before he looks up, flicking his long bangs out of his face as he does so.

“They’re the same, though,” he says. Despite that stunning confession he still won’t accept Minho’s opinion on the matter. “You hate the ocean because we don’t know what’s down there. You like space because you don’t know what’s out there. That makes no sense,” he says.

“Incorrect,” Minho says, shaking his head. His little ponytail bobs behind him and Jinki feels like the half step he stumbled for focusing on it instead of the path was worth it. “The ocean is finite. We have fossils and submarines and little cameras. We don’t know everything that’s down there, but we know that literally all of it is fucked up.” His face twists into a scowl, a scrunch of his nose and a furrow between his eyes. He shakes that expression off after a moment and replaces it with a tiny smile as he looks up at the sky.

“Space, though,” he says. He swings their arms way up to wiggle his fingers at the stars twinkling above them, tiny little dots in a dark blue sky. “Space is infinite. Literally anything imaginable could be out there. Are there some fucked up things out there? Absolutely. But are there also super rad asteroid colonies full of glittery fire and cute older boys that can carry me in their strong arms? Fuck yeah.”

Jinki laughs again, but just a soft chuckle this time. Incredible. Minho really has his priorities straightened out. He guesses that he does have a point, yeah. In the infinite possibilities of an endless universe, anything is possible. That obnoxious voice in the back of his head pokes at him for a moment, tells him that Minho won’t want to keep him because he can’t carry around a six foot tall human made of muscle and pouts, but he manages to push it away with a stern clench of his free hand. He’s just joking around. And Jinki is a cute and older boy. Two out of three is pretty good, honestly.

A sharp little stretch of pain interrupts his thoughts; with a wince, he suddenly notices the gusto with which Minho is swinging their arms now. They’re going back and forth almost as high up as when Minho pointed them at the stars. Jinki’s too old and creaky and chronically in pain for this.

“Hey,” he says softly, flexing a little bit to stop their arms in their path. “Can you, uh. Not?” he says, wiggling Minho’s hand to show what he means. Minho still blinks at him, big, confused eyes.

“What?” he asks, and then, “oh,” he says, when his processing catches up. He glances at their hands guiltily. “Sorry,” he mumbles. “Stimmie.”

“No, yeah, I know,” Jinki says. “Maybe just. Pick another stim, or do that and also keep swinging our arms, but, like more gently.” He slowly rocks their hands together back and forth in an example. He’s okay with little movements and he smiles when Minho squeezes his hand. “Like, a half stim,” he says. “That’s a thing, right?” he asks.

“Listen, I have no idea,” Minho shrugs. “I just do things and if they feel good and don’t give me bruises then I keep doing them.” He shrugs again; Jinki snorts. Alright then. That’s one way to do it.

“I guess I’m just used to Jonghyun having all of his shit organized and labelled,” he says.

“One of those dudes, huh,” Minho hums. An amused little smirk is playing on his lips. “Just immediately pulls out perfect stim for every occasion.”

“Not a dude, but yeah,” Jinki grins back. He thinks Jonghyun has actually said that himself before. He feels like the two of them meeting formally is going to go better than he’d already been expecting. Whenever it actually happens, at least.

“Right, yeah, sorry,” Minho says quickly. His face is a scrunch again at his forgetfulness and Jinki bumps him lightly in reassurance. He’s getting better at it. He watches the ground under them, their shadows moving and shifting angles every time they pass under another lamppost. Minho swings their arms gently, slowly, and pops his lips softly as they walk. After a few minutes Jinki realizes that he’s doing it in between every slow cricket chirp and smiles. He’s cute.

He’s still wrong about the ocean and space, though.

“Mermaids, though,” he says. It’s not exactly a sudden interjection but it does break their calm silence. Minho glances at him, then scoffs and shakes his head.

“Yeah, the scary eats people kind,” he mumbles. Jinki snorts. Of course those are the ones he believes in. He doesn’t think he’s ever going to win this argument. He doesn’t think he really cares, either. Taking his eyes off of the path, he looks ahead to see where they’re going. The parking lot of the park is up in the distance. Hmm.

“Wanna go around one more time?” he asks, pointing with his free hand. “Or do you think it’s getting to be the scary kind of late instead of the romantic kind?” This is Minho’s park, not his. He doesn’t know what the scary time is here. Minho hums, pulling out his phone to check the time.

“We should… go,” he says slowly. “I don’t really wanna go home yet, though,” he adds. He wiggles his fingers between Jinki’s. Jinki nods. He agrees. He’s having a nice time. He always has a nice time when he’s with Minho. And most of the time, he believes that Minho is having a nice time with him, too.

“Wanna go get a snack somewhere then?” he asks. “The shopping center by my place isn’t scary until, like. Two in the morning.” It’s not even nine now, but still. They’ll have plenty of time to eat and get home before that late.

“Mmm,” Minho hums thoughtfully. “Ice cream?” he asks.

“Lactose intolerant,” Jinki reminds him. They took Minho’s car here and he doesn’t have any pills in Minho’s car yet.

“Churros,” Minho offers next, and Jinki gasps softly. He can have churros.

“Churros make me wanna… cheer,” he says. It’s quiet but he’s confident in it, even more when Minho closes his eyes and sighs loudly. He grins wide when the sigh turns into a soft breath of laughter, a little chuckle from a deep voice. Minho’s hand, which he’d moved and almost pulled away like he wanted to let go, tightens in his instead.

“Come on,” he says, tugging Jinki a little faster down the path.

[dokbaemline]

PIECE OF SHINE FANMEET BEYOND LIVE

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230528 Every Day is SHINee Day — Piece of Shine Day II

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EVERYDAY IS SHINEE DAY PIECE OF SHINE DAY II

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EVERYDAY IS SHINEE DAY PIECE OF SHINE DAY II

EVERYBODY (ONEW FOCUS)

[onewfantaesy]

Hi! for dozen au, was there ever a time when taemin was really upset or afraid and went to his parents for comfort but they were too busy with his other siblings?

So I’m basing this off of the way SHINee seemed a little awkward towards Onew during Sherlock promotions and that there was a rumor that Taemin had a fight with Minho? maybe during that time backstage, idk, and just as a disclaimer this is by no means saying that I think SHINee were actually going to disband during Sherlock, this is purely a fictional scenario.

In the middle of Sherlock promotions, Taemin enters his family’s house for the first time in a very long time. His hair is pulled into a messy ponytail - he still hasn’t quite mastered how to manage having long hair - and he shoves away his little brother when he tugs on the back of it.

“Go away. Where are Mom and Dad?” Taemin asks.

“Kitchen,” his brother says, stumbling over to the couch after Taemin shoves him.

“Mom? Dad?” Taemin calls out as he makes his way towards the kitchen. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Not right now, Taemin,” his dad says as Taemin enters through the doorway into the kitchen.

“It’s important,” Taemin mumbles, leaning against the doorway. “Please?”

“We’re busy, Taemin,” his mom says, putting a plate in front of the few kids sitting at the table.

“Are you almost not busy?” Taemin asks.

His voice shakes as the words come out of his mouth, and that’s when his parents actually look at him. They see him standing there against the doorway, one of his hands rubbing up and down his arm and his eyebrows raising in the middle as he stares at them. The toe of his left foot keeps bouncing on the ground, and he looks more worried than his parents have ever seen him.

“Sweetheart, can you go get your little brothers and tell them it’s time to eat,” his mother says to one of the girl twins. 

With that, his parents take him into their bedroom and sit him down on the bed and ask what’s going on.

Even though Taemin can practically feel his siblings all leaning against the door to try and hear what’s going on, Taemin lets out a shaky breath and says, “I think SHINee’s gonna break up.”

“What? Why?” his mom asks, pushing herself closer to his side and holding onto his arm. “What happened?”

“Minho and I had a huge fight backstage the other day,” Taemin tells them. “No one’s talking to Jinki unless it’s being filmed, Minho and Kibum started fighting like they were before debut, and who knows what the hell Jonghyun’s doing nowadays.”

Taemin tells them everything that’s been going on lately. He tells them how one of their managers keeps making everything worse, how there’s more tension between the members than there ever has been, and how there are whispers of them being “another DBSK.” Taemin ends up hyperventilating as his mom hugs him and tries to get him to breathe the right way again.

“What am I supposed to do?” Taemin asks. “SHINee is like, my whole life. I can’t do anything else.”

His parents comfort him as best they can, telling him that he’ll be able to do anything he puts his mind to. When they start telling him the same general answers that all parents say, Taemin bends over with his elbows on his knees and buries his face in his hands.

“You applied to universities, though, didn’t you?” his dad asks.

“This isn’t about university right now!” Taemin argues. 

“Well that’s what you’re going to fall back on, Taemin, that’s what’s important,” his dad reminds him. “Your education is the most important thing.”

“Can you not do this right now?” Taemin begs him. “Please? I applied to universities, okay? I did it, so leave it alone.”

“You should have gotten responses by now, where did you decide on?” his dad asks.

“God,” Taemin gasps, and he stands up from the bed. “I can’t believe I thought you might have actually given a shit about what’s going on in my life.”

When Taemin puts his hand on the doorknob, he hears multiple sets of feet scurrying off in different directions. He opens the door and is half-way into the hallway when his dad takes his arm and says he only wants what’s best for him.

“I’m scared, okay?” Taemin says to them, his voice cracking. “I’m scared, and you’re breathing down my neck about whether or not I’m going to university.”

His dad pulls him close and hugs him, telling him that everything will work itself out.

“I don’t want SHINee to disband,” Taemin cries. “They’re like - they’re like my family, and I know that pisses you guys off when I say it, but I don’t know what I’ll do if SHINee ever breaks up.”

They bring him back over to the bed, and they tell him that they’re not upset with him saying that SHINee is like his family. 

“If SHINee ever breaks up - and I’m not saying that you will, because I really don’t think that’s what’s going to happen - you will do whatever you put your mind to. You’ve already proven that you can do anything you set your mind to, and I don’t doubt that you could do it again,” his dad tells him.

Taemin’s still upset, but his parents actually manage to make him feel better by the time he goes back to the dorm. His mom even takes him into the kitchen and eats ice cream with him before he leaves. When the little twins come in to see if Taemin is okay, Taemin pulls one of them into his lap and puts the spoonful of ice cream in front of their face.

“You’re too big now,” Taemin complains to him. “Stop growing up, you’re making me feel old.”

“You are old,” the one on his lap says before he stretches his neck to take the bite of ice cream. 

Taemin puts the spoon in the boy’s mouth, but he tilts it up so it gets all over his nose, too, and he laughs at the scandalized look on his face.

“Don’t call me old, you punk!” Taemin teases him, but he leans as far away from his little brother as he can when he turns around and tries to get his chocolate-covered-nose in Taemin’s face.

If anything, the little twins are what brightens Taemin’s mood the most. 

[onewfantaesy]

Uwuwuwuwuwu the Pe shirt au is very very kawai! I really love imagining Taeyon as just this adorable cute pocket sized human that everyone adores. Would you be able to write a bit about maybe little snippets of jonghyun over time just loving her size. Because although he's such a sensitive soul, having this tiny human is amazing for I am because he feels so many and talk and strong with her haha. E.g. Her tinsy hands in his and yeah idk

The first time Jonghyun meets his new friend Jinki’s little sister, they’re in sixth grade, and he’s over on a Saturday to hang out. They’re in Jinki’s room playing video games when little feet come running down the hallway.

“Onew!” a little girl’s voice calls. “Onew, I need help!”

She comes running up to the door, but she stops in her tracks whens he sees Jonghyun sitting on the bed next to her brother. Her eyes go wide, her bangs falling into them. 

“Taeyeon, what’s-” Jinki starts, but the nine-year-old runs back down the hallway before he can finish. “Wait, Taeyeon! What’s wrong?”

Jinki apologizes as he pauses the game, and then he runs after his little sister.

“Hey, Tae, what’s wrong?” Jinki asks as he finds her in her bedroom. Taeyeon pouts at him and holds out the little cross necklace she usually wears around her neck.

“It came off and I can’t get it back on,” Taeyeon whispers. “Will you do it?”

Jinki smiles and tells her to turn around, and he clasps the necklace back around her neck.

When their parents insist that Jonghyun stay for dinner, Jonghyun can’t help but smile at how cute she is, blushing from her seat across from him. Apparently, Taeyeon gets embarrassed whenever Jinki brings a friend over. Jonghyun thinks it’s absolutely adorable.

The next time Jonghyun comes over, Taeyeon and her mom are in the kitchen making cookies for a bake sale at the elementary school. An hour into Jonghyun and Jinki playing video games, Taeyeon comes bouncing in with a plate full of cookies. Jonghyun thinks she looks adorable, this tiny little girl holding a giant plate of cookies.

“Onew!” Taeyeon calls. Her ears turn pink when she accidentally makes eye contact with Jonghyun, but her smile is wide as she looks back at her brother. “Wanna try a cookie? Mommy wants to know if they have enough chocolate chips.”

“Thanks, Taeyeon!” Jinki says, taking a cookie.

“Yeah, thanks, Taeyeon,” Jonghyun says, grinning at her. 

Her cheeks go pink, but she’s got a little smile on her face as she whispers, “You’re welcome.”

Jinki immediately tells her that they’re great, but she doesn’t leave until Jonghyun tells her how good they are. She smiles again, squeaks out an, “okay thanks!” and then hurries back to the kitchen.

Jonghyun’s just glad she isn’t running away at the sight of him anymore.

When Taeyeon and Gwiboon become friends two years later, it’s Jonghyun’s turn to be shocked at the sight of someone else in his sibling’s room. He walks into Gwiboon room one Saturday.

“Gwiboon! Did you take my-” he stops when he sees Taeyeon sitting at Gwiboon’s vanity with his sister painting her nails. Even compared to Gwiboon’s hands, Taeyeon’s hands are tiny. They’re so cute.

“I borrowed your speaker so me and my friend could listen to some music,” Gwiboon says. “I’ll give it back later.”

“Hi Taeyeon,” Jonghyun says, waving a bit. Gwiboon gawks at him.

“How do you know her name?” she snaps.

“Hi Jonghyun,” Taeyeon whispers. 

“I’m friends with her brother,” Jonghyun says. “Whatever, just give it back when you’re done with it.”

A couple months later, Gwiboon and Taeyeon are a lot closer, and it’s almost Halloween. When their parents say that the four of them can go to the horror nights at one of the amusement parks. On one condition, of course.

“You have to keep on eye on the girls,” Jonghyun’s mom says as she ushers the boys in her car. “They are not to leave your sight. I don’t care if you run into your friends, but you stay with them tonight. Understand?”

“I understand,” Jonghyun tells her. “We’ll keep an eye on them.”

“Good,” she says. Taeyeon and Gwiboon pile into the car a moment later, and they’re both excited to go to the different haunted houses.

They go through one of the haunted houses, and everything is fine until one of the clowns jumps out from behind Taeyeon and grabs her shoulders. She lets out a short scream, not having expected someone to actually touch her, and she goes to hide behind the person closest to her. 

Who just so happened to be Jonghyun. He holds her close to him, her shoulder pressing into his chest and her head hiding under his chin. She’s so tiny, held up against his side, and he feels this weird need to protect her that he’s never felt with Gwiboon. Maybe because Gwiboon is laughing at the look at Taeyeon’s face. Gwiboon can be a little bit of an ass sometimes. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll protect you,” Jonghyun assures her. 

Jonghyun feels very important as he keeps his arm around her little shoulders all night.

When Jonghyun and Jinki are freshmen and Jonghyun is spending the night, Jonghyun can’t help but laugh at the little pair of shoes that are kicked over by the couch. 

“Oh, those are my sister’s,” Jinki says. 

“I figured,” Jonghyun says back.

Jinki picks them up and takes them into Taeyeon’s bedroom. Jonghyun chuckles when he hears Taeyeon say, “Oh, thanks, Onew!”

She really is so adorable, especially when she comes stumbling into the kitchen the next morning half-asleep, her hair in a messy little ponytail on the back of her head. 

When Gwiboon and Taeyeon start high school, Jonghyun thinks she’s absolutely adorable in the uniform when he sees her on the first day. She looks so cute with her shirt tucked into her skirt, and her socks are just a few inches short from the bottom of her knees, and she just looks so cute.

The day he and Jinki have to wait the duration of a detention in the student parking lot, Jonghyun thinks Taeyeon looks like a doll in the giant PE shirt that could have only once belonged to Jinki. That’s why he gets concerned when she looks so upset.

Jonghyun has just always thought she was adorable.