(one-shot) fire
Title: Fire
Author: fingeredheart
Pairing: JaeMin [DBSK]
Genre: Friendship, romance, angst.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer(s): Standard disclaimers apply.
Summary: (He aches for that normality now, the idea of just being able to sit and watch Jaejoong do those actions without thinking that maybe this is the last time he will be able to, that it isn’t, never really has been for forever, that maybe five isn’t the magical number they’d all panned it out to be.)
A/N: A tad bit outdated because JaeChun have already gone back to Japan, but I wrote this last week and forgot about posting it until today. Please enjoy, and comments are very, very much appreciated, as always! ♥
Papers are scattered endlessly across the tabletop before him, neat print blurring in his vision as he attempts to refocus on the script. His character’s name seems to appear in countless places, and he resists the urge to shove everything off his desk (shove all the obstacles out of his life, perhaps) and breathe, breathe, breathe.
The door opens silently, but the footsteps aren’t completely inaudible. Eyes shutting briefly, he waits for the padding to stop beside him, the presence just beyond the corner of his eye, at his elbow. When he shifts slightly, a bowl of steaming ramen is set down on the table, napkin tucked underneath the edge and chopsticks resting on the rim. It’s almost impossibly perfect, especially considering the immense amount of imperfections falling in place around him, and there’s a dull ache in his heart at the thought.
“You work too hard,” Jaejoong is pulling up a chair, settling glasses on the bridge of his nose as he leans forward to peer at the script laid out on the table. Fringes of bangs push at the rim of his glasses, sweeping in a curve down his forehead. Changmin catches a faint whiff of his familiar cologne, the one he sprays on his wrists and neck every morning in front of the bathroom mirror; figure soft and sleepy against the morning sunlight peeking in through the shades. (He aches for that normality now, the idea of just being able to sit and watch Jaejoong do those actions without thinking that maybe this is the last time he will be able to, that it isn’t, never really has been for forever, that maybe five isn’t the magical number they’d all panned it out to be.)
“You should be sleeping,” Changmin retorts after a breath of silence, a shallow, shortened breath (it gets caught somewhere in the depths of his heart, tangled in branches of uncertainty for tomorrow). “You’re off to Japan in two days.”
Stretching his arms upward, Jaejoong shakes the hair out of his eyes, and smiles a bit wistfully. “Japan’s just Japan,” he replies, emotions flickering in and out of his eyes like a flame (another something Changmin’s gotten used to, after all these years). “The same as always.”
Lips twisting, Changmin raises a skeptical eyebrow, choosing to stay silent. Instead of acknowledging the hint, Jaejoong just continues to smile, nodding his head towards the bowl of noodles. “Your ramen’s getting cold.”
The younger man glances down at the said bowl, hands twitching for a moment in his lap before he reaches up and pushes it away, careful to make sure the soup doesn’t slosh against the sides. “I’m not hungry,” he says, voice pointed with his refusal. This time, Jaejoong sighs in defeat, raking a hand through his hair before leaning forward to prop his elbows onto his knees.
“I couldn’t sleep,” he says quietly, with only Changmin’s silent gaze prodding him onwards. “I saw your light still on.”
Changmin stares at him knowingly, arms crossed over his chest, concern masked. “You haven’t slept much since you came back,” he states plainly, and it is neither sympathizing nor harsh, just a fact he needs to throw out and reel back in, with Jaejoong on the other end of the line. It works, and Jaejoong accepts it with a short laugh that dies down into a long, winded breath.
“No, I haven’t.” He leans forward to press the heels of his hands onto his forehead, elbows digging into his thighs as his eyes flutter closed, the same familiar dread from the past two months sinking inside the depths of his chest. “What am I doing,” he whispers, his own breath hot and unforgiving against his skin (it burns, the way his heart has whenever he steps onstage recently, whenever he skims another article on the lawsuit, another fan letter of support that he needs to, but doesn’t want to deserve). “What am I doing,” he repeats, weary and hoarse (he is drowning, drowning, drowning, submerged into this mess and there has to be somebody who will pull him up).
There’s a shuffle of papers on the table, and Jaejoong looks up, momentarily blinded by the sudden brightness of the desk lamp. He blinks it away to see Changmin putting the script in order, fingers deftly flipping through to double-check the page numbers before straightening them out into a tidy stack.
Just as he opens his mouth to apologize, Changmin interrupts. “Do you really want to know? What you’re doing?”
Confused, Jaejoong closes his mouth, gazes at the youngest for a few seconds. “Yes?” he chances, and then decides it doesn’t sound quite the way he wants it to. “Yes.”
“You’re being selfish,” Changmin wastes no time in directing a blunt answer. “You’re being selfish, ridiculous, whiny douches who have caused a fire and lack the correct technique to extinguish it.” He pauses without looking at Jaejoong, places a hand on his script as if to steady the table (or perhaps himself). “So you’re letting it grow, letting it grab a hold of you, and you’re fighting it the wrong way. The remainder of your family is on the other side of the fire, and you think you can save them all by just killing the stupid fire. But all you’re doing is making it grow. And your family, Jaejoong-ah, is still struggling on their own, just like you have, on the other side of that fire.” Pushing back from the table, Changmin stands, placing a firm hand on the older man’s shoulder. “Good night, hyung.”
The door closes behind him with barely a click, leaving Jaejoong alone, bathed in the harsh, blinding light of the still illuminated lamp. Slowly, with measured movements, he turns the switch off, absorbing the immediate darkness that surrounds him, the lingering feeling of Changmin in the room.
The burning has returned inside of him, an ache that pulls him from the inside and out, and Changmin’s wrong, he thinks, wrong because the fire isn’t what he’s trying to fight. The fire is what is fighting inside him, eating and bursting with greedy, selfish steps to claim the impossible, to be idiotically brave and step out onto a branch without realizing it was broken to begin with.
Head lowering, Jaejoong again finds solace in the cup of his own hands, fingers pressing imprints into his face, his skin as he wills back the tears, the burn rising in his throat. No matter the origin of the fire, he knows Changmin is right about one thing, the only thing that at the end, he truly cares about.
The rest of his family (more than his family, more than his life) is on the other side of the fire, and no matter how hard he tries, he is just being selfish, acting selfish, a foolish display of courage.
(This time, the burn is of tears streaming down his cheeks, sobs in synch with the rhythmic, fearful pounding of his heart.)
---
Jaejoong awakens to a painful throbbing in his temple, a makeshift pillow of folded blankets beneath his head. As he stretches out his legs, another blanket falls into his lap from his upper torso, and he picks it up with both hands, raising his head to survey his surroundings.
He finds himself still in Changmin’s study, legs cramped beneath the desk and butt aching from the hard wooden surface. The bowl of ramen he’d brought in the night before has disappeared, along with Changmin’s script. In replacement, there’s a half-folded piece of notebook paper, scribbled writing that is obviously Changmin’s inside in the lines.
Out. Be back in a few. Don’t start any more fires while I’m gone. The others are still sleeping, too. Thanks for the ramen.
A smile crosses Jaejoong’s lips, and he folds the notebook paper back into half, slipping it into his back pocket before gathering the blankets in his arms. Humming as he pushes open the door, he sets off in the direction of the bedroom to greet the others with a new day.
---
The sound of a key in the lock comes a little more than an hour later. Jaejoong and Yoochun both glance up from their positions on the couch to see Changmin stepping in through the doorway, a red plastic bag dangling from his fingertips, seemingly light-weighted.
“What is that?” Junsu appears with an apple in hand from the kitchen, eyes curiously focused on the red bag in Changmin’s hand.
Without speaking, Changmin offers it out to him, and he accepts it hesitantly, sitting down to let both Jaejoong and Yoochun crowd around him to peer inside. He digs a hand in, extracting a stack of fan letters, small stickers and colors splayed across pages of hearts. Amidst Junsu and Yoochun’s exclamations and Yunho’s appearance interrupting the commotion, Jaejoong looks around to find that Changmin has disappeared from sight.
He stands, quietly slipping away into the hallway to find a sliver of light emitted from the doorway of Changmin’s study, almost invisible in the increasing amount of daylight streaming in through the windows.
When he nears, he pushes the door open without knocking, observing the sight of Changmin’s back hunched over the script. “You work too hard,” Jaejoong remarks casually, watching as Changmin turns around in the chair to face him.
“I thought about what you said.” His voice is low and soft, a serene contrast to the chatter from the living room. Changmin watches the sunlight catch strands of his hair, the elegant contours of his face, along his cheekbones, the outlined muscles in his arm as he rubs a hand down it absently. “You’re on the other side of the fire.” Jaejoong stops, waits for Changmin’s nod of confirmation. “And you think I’m leaving you there.” With a small laugh, Jaejoong looks back up, tossing his head to clear the bangs out of his eyes. “You’re underestimating us, Changmin-ah. You’re underestimating me.”
The look on Changmin’s face changes, as if he is about to speak, but Jaejoong holds up a hand to cut him off. “I just wanted to let you know that no matter what, I’m still going to get you from the other side of the fire. I’ll burn myself and walk through it if I have to. I’m not letting you or Yunho go.” He attempts a sad smile, lips curving upward, a hopeful lift in his eyes. “You’re stuck with me for longer than you think, Changminnie.”
Slowly but surely, Changmin stands, pocketing his hands as he walks towards Jaejoong. He stops a few inches away, and Jaejoong swears the beginnings of a smile are playing across his lips, uncertain and flickering in the brilliant patches of sunlight seeping in.
Unexpectedly, Changmin reaches up and punches Jaejoong on the shoulder. “For being selfish,” he clarifies, and punches him again, “for being stupid,” and again, and again, and again, until Jaejoong is laughing and raising both arms to defend himself against the too familiar attacks.
“Yah,” he laughs as he clamps down both hands onto Changmin’s wrist, meeting the younger man smile-to-smile as he wrestles with the arms struggling in his direction. “You got to express your feelings. Now it’s my turn.”
Suspiciously, Changmin quirks the corner of his lip into another hesitant smile, eyes glimmering as he relents his struggles for a reluctant moment. As he does so, Jaejoong releases the arms in his grasp and pulls Changmin in tight, a sudden, breath-squeezing hug that makes the younger inhale sharply in surprise.
After a long moment, Jaejoong feels arms uncertainly wrapping around his own figure, pulling him a bit tighter than usual. The smile that adorns his lips is involuntary, the burn in his heart a slow flame (of love, not pain). “Thank you,” he whispers, closing his eyes to breathe in Changmin.
Changmin laughs softly, the tightened knot inside his chest releasing (breathe, breathe, breathe). “I know you can extinguish the fire,” he chooses to reply, marking it off as casual (but Jaejoong can hear the sincerity, Jaejoong always can - it’s another normality he’s learned to accept long ago, another normality he might fear missing if the five of them split.
But he smiles to himself, gripping the fabric of Jaejoong’s shirt and breathing in the scent of the daily morning cologne.
Jaejoong always has, he knows, Jaejoong always can. He exhales gently.
And Jaejoong always will.)
Author: fingeredheart
Pairing: JaeMin [DBSK]
Genre: Friendship, romance, angst.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer(s): Standard disclaimers apply.
Summary: (He aches for that normality now, the idea of just being able to sit and watch Jaejoong do those actions without thinking that maybe this is the last time he will be able to, that it isn’t, never really has been for forever, that maybe five isn’t the magical number they’d all panned it out to be.)
A/N: A tad bit outdated because JaeChun have already gone back to Japan, but I wrote this last week and forgot about posting it until today. Please enjoy, and comments are very, very much appreciated, as always! ♥
Papers are scattered endlessly across the tabletop before him, neat print blurring in his vision as he attempts to refocus on the script. His character’s name seems to appear in countless places, and he resists the urge to shove everything off his desk (shove all the obstacles out of his life, perhaps) and breathe, breathe, breathe.
The door opens silently, but the footsteps aren’t completely inaudible. Eyes shutting briefly, he waits for the padding to stop beside him, the presence just beyond the corner of his eye, at his elbow. When he shifts slightly, a bowl of steaming ramen is set down on the table, napkin tucked underneath the edge and chopsticks resting on the rim. It’s almost impossibly perfect, especially considering the immense amount of imperfections falling in place around him, and there’s a dull ache in his heart at the thought.
“You work too hard,” Jaejoong is pulling up a chair, settling glasses on the bridge of his nose as he leans forward to peer at the script laid out on the table. Fringes of bangs push at the rim of his glasses, sweeping in a curve down his forehead. Changmin catches a faint whiff of his familiar cologne, the one he sprays on his wrists and neck every morning in front of the bathroom mirror; figure soft and sleepy against the morning sunlight peeking in through the shades. (He aches for that normality now, the idea of just being able to sit and watch Jaejoong do those actions without thinking that maybe this is the last time he will be able to, that it isn’t, never really has been for forever, that maybe five isn’t the magical number they’d all panned it out to be.)
“You should be sleeping,” Changmin retorts after a breath of silence, a shallow, shortened breath (it gets caught somewhere in the depths of his heart, tangled in branches of uncertainty for tomorrow). “You’re off to Japan in two days.”
Stretching his arms upward, Jaejoong shakes the hair out of his eyes, and smiles a bit wistfully. “Japan’s just Japan,” he replies, emotions flickering in and out of his eyes like a flame (another something Changmin’s gotten used to, after all these years). “The same as always.”
Lips twisting, Changmin raises a skeptical eyebrow, choosing to stay silent. Instead of acknowledging the hint, Jaejoong just continues to smile, nodding his head towards the bowl of noodles. “Your ramen’s getting cold.”
The younger man glances down at the said bowl, hands twitching for a moment in his lap before he reaches up and pushes it away, careful to make sure the soup doesn’t slosh against the sides. “I’m not hungry,” he says, voice pointed with his refusal. This time, Jaejoong sighs in defeat, raking a hand through his hair before leaning forward to prop his elbows onto his knees.
“I couldn’t sleep,” he says quietly, with only Changmin’s silent gaze prodding him onwards. “I saw your light still on.”
Changmin stares at him knowingly, arms crossed over his chest, concern masked. “You haven’t slept much since you came back,” he states plainly, and it is neither sympathizing nor harsh, just a fact he needs to throw out and reel back in, with Jaejoong on the other end of the line. It works, and Jaejoong accepts it with a short laugh that dies down into a long, winded breath.
“No, I haven’t.” He leans forward to press the heels of his hands onto his forehead, elbows digging into his thighs as his eyes flutter closed, the same familiar dread from the past two months sinking inside the depths of his chest. “What am I doing,” he whispers, his own breath hot and unforgiving against his skin (it burns, the way his heart has whenever he steps onstage recently, whenever he skims another article on the lawsuit, another fan letter of support that he needs to, but doesn’t want to deserve). “What am I doing,” he repeats, weary and hoarse (he is drowning, drowning, drowning, submerged into this mess and there has to be somebody who will pull him up).
There’s a shuffle of papers on the table, and Jaejoong looks up, momentarily blinded by the sudden brightness of the desk lamp. He blinks it away to see Changmin putting the script in order, fingers deftly flipping through to double-check the page numbers before straightening them out into a tidy stack.
Just as he opens his mouth to apologize, Changmin interrupts. “Do you really want to know? What you’re doing?”
Confused, Jaejoong closes his mouth, gazes at the youngest for a few seconds. “Yes?” he chances, and then decides it doesn’t sound quite the way he wants it to. “Yes.”
“You’re being selfish,” Changmin wastes no time in directing a blunt answer. “You’re being selfish, ridiculous, whiny douches who have caused a fire and lack the correct technique to extinguish it.” He pauses without looking at Jaejoong, places a hand on his script as if to steady the table (or perhaps himself). “So you’re letting it grow, letting it grab a hold of you, and you’re fighting it the wrong way. The remainder of your family is on the other side of the fire, and you think you can save them all by just killing the stupid fire. But all you’re doing is making it grow. And your family, Jaejoong-ah, is still struggling on their own, just like you have, on the other side of that fire.” Pushing back from the table, Changmin stands, placing a firm hand on the older man’s shoulder. “Good night, hyung.”
The door closes behind him with barely a click, leaving Jaejoong alone, bathed in the harsh, blinding light of the still illuminated lamp. Slowly, with measured movements, he turns the switch off, absorbing the immediate darkness that surrounds him, the lingering feeling of Changmin in the room.
The burning has returned inside of him, an ache that pulls him from the inside and out, and Changmin’s wrong, he thinks, wrong because the fire isn’t what he’s trying to fight. The fire is what is fighting inside him, eating and bursting with greedy, selfish steps to claim the impossible, to be idiotically brave and step out onto a branch without realizing it was broken to begin with.
Head lowering, Jaejoong again finds solace in the cup of his own hands, fingers pressing imprints into his face, his skin as he wills back the tears, the burn rising in his throat. No matter the origin of the fire, he knows Changmin is right about one thing, the only thing that at the end, he truly cares about.
The rest of his family (more than his family, more than his life) is on the other side of the fire, and no matter how hard he tries, he is just being selfish, acting selfish, a foolish display of courage.
(This time, the burn is of tears streaming down his cheeks, sobs in synch with the rhythmic, fearful pounding of his heart.)
---
Jaejoong awakens to a painful throbbing in his temple, a makeshift pillow of folded blankets beneath his head. As he stretches out his legs, another blanket falls into his lap from his upper torso, and he picks it up with both hands, raising his head to survey his surroundings.
He finds himself still in Changmin’s study, legs cramped beneath the desk and butt aching from the hard wooden surface. The bowl of ramen he’d brought in the night before has disappeared, along with Changmin’s script. In replacement, there’s a half-folded piece of notebook paper, scribbled writing that is obviously Changmin’s inside in the lines.
Out. Be back in a few. Don’t start any more fires while I’m gone. The others are still sleeping, too. Thanks for the ramen.
A smile crosses Jaejoong’s lips, and he folds the notebook paper back into half, slipping it into his back pocket before gathering the blankets in his arms. Humming as he pushes open the door, he sets off in the direction of the bedroom to greet the others with a new day.
---
The sound of a key in the lock comes a little more than an hour later. Jaejoong and Yoochun both glance up from their positions on the couch to see Changmin stepping in through the doorway, a red plastic bag dangling from his fingertips, seemingly light-weighted.
“What is that?” Junsu appears with an apple in hand from the kitchen, eyes curiously focused on the red bag in Changmin’s hand.
Without speaking, Changmin offers it out to him, and he accepts it hesitantly, sitting down to let both Jaejoong and Yoochun crowd around him to peer inside. He digs a hand in, extracting a stack of fan letters, small stickers and colors splayed across pages of hearts. Amidst Junsu and Yoochun’s exclamations and Yunho’s appearance interrupting the commotion, Jaejoong looks around to find that Changmin has disappeared from sight.
He stands, quietly slipping away into the hallway to find a sliver of light emitted from the doorway of Changmin’s study, almost invisible in the increasing amount of daylight streaming in through the windows.
When he nears, he pushes the door open without knocking, observing the sight of Changmin’s back hunched over the script. “You work too hard,” Jaejoong remarks casually, watching as Changmin turns around in the chair to face him.
“I thought about what you said.” His voice is low and soft, a serene contrast to the chatter from the living room. Changmin watches the sunlight catch strands of his hair, the elegant contours of his face, along his cheekbones, the outlined muscles in his arm as he rubs a hand down it absently. “You’re on the other side of the fire.” Jaejoong stops, waits for Changmin’s nod of confirmation. “And you think I’m leaving you there.” With a small laugh, Jaejoong looks back up, tossing his head to clear the bangs out of his eyes. “You’re underestimating us, Changmin-ah. You’re underestimating me.”
The look on Changmin’s face changes, as if he is about to speak, but Jaejoong holds up a hand to cut him off. “I just wanted to let you know that no matter what, I’m still going to get you from the other side of the fire. I’ll burn myself and walk through it if I have to. I’m not letting you or Yunho go.” He attempts a sad smile, lips curving upward, a hopeful lift in his eyes. “You’re stuck with me for longer than you think, Changminnie.”
Slowly but surely, Changmin stands, pocketing his hands as he walks towards Jaejoong. He stops a few inches away, and Jaejoong swears the beginnings of a smile are playing across his lips, uncertain and flickering in the brilliant patches of sunlight seeping in.
Unexpectedly, Changmin reaches up and punches Jaejoong on the shoulder. “For being selfish,” he clarifies, and punches him again, “for being stupid,” and again, and again, and again, until Jaejoong is laughing and raising both arms to defend himself against the too familiar attacks.
“Yah,” he laughs as he clamps down both hands onto Changmin’s wrist, meeting the younger man smile-to-smile as he wrestles with the arms struggling in his direction. “You got to express your feelings. Now it’s my turn.”
Suspiciously, Changmin quirks the corner of his lip into another hesitant smile, eyes glimmering as he relents his struggles for a reluctant moment. As he does so, Jaejoong releases the arms in his grasp and pulls Changmin in tight, a sudden, breath-squeezing hug that makes the younger inhale sharply in surprise.
After a long moment, Jaejoong feels arms uncertainly wrapping around his own figure, pulling him a bit tighter than usual. The smile that adorns his lips is involuntary, the burn in his heart a slow flame (of love, not pain). “Thank you,” he whispers, closing his eyes to breathe in Changmin.
Changmin laughs softly, the tightened knot inside his chest releasing (breathe, breathe, breathe). “I know you can extinguish the fire,” he chooses to reply, marking it off as casual (but Jaejoong can hear the sincerity, Jaejoong always can - it’s another normality he’s learned to accept long ago, another normality he might fear missing if the five of them split.
But he smiles to himself, gripping the fabric of Jaejoong’s shirt and breathing in the scent of the daily morning cologne.
Jaejoong always has, he knows, Jaejoong always can. He exhales gently.
And Jaejoong always will.)