Bed of Roses, Chapter Two
Title Bed of Roses
Author: Aquariuslover
Pairings: SungGyu/WooHyun
Rating: R
Genre: Friendship, Love, Humor, Angst
Length: Chaptered
Beta: tahoeturquoise
Summary: WooHyun’s perfect life…his bed of roses is tossed into disarray when SungGyu makes a bold move changing their friendship forever.
Thanks to everybody who comments!!!
“So, have you ever watched the movie Trouble in Paradise?” SungYeol asked WooHyun, who was sitting beside him on a sofa in a private section of the hotel. The manager along with SungGyu had gone to confirm their hotel arrangements. “I heard it’s really good. It’s about this would-be rocker and this clingy, younger best friend of his. They were inseparable in the movie, but then they had this huge fight. It’s a really sad movie.”
WooHyun clamped his jaw together and turned to glare at his tall friend.
“I know that movie. I was never sure what the fight was about though. I wonder what caused it. It must have been really bad,” DongWoo, who was sitting in one of the chairs in the room, quickly added, relieved that somebody had finally found the nerve to broach the subject with WooHyun.
“Why don’t you all just mind your own damn business?” WooHyun snapped.
SungYeol crossed his legs and told WooHyun innocently, “Well, I guess you haven’t seen it, or you would understand our interest in it.”
“No, I haven’t, and maybe you should practice singing more and watching movies less,” WooHyun smart-mouthed back to SungYeol, hitting below the belt.
SungYeol’s air of indifference vanished and his eyes narrowed in on WooHyun’s face, and his quick mind went to work plotting revenge.
“What are you looking at?” WooHyun demanded, self-conscious of Sungyeol’s intense stare.
SungYeol reached out and ran a finger across WooHyun’s cheek and asked, “Is your face starting to break out?”
WooHyun immediately leaned away from SungYeol, and his hands flew up to his face. “No!”
SungYeol continued to stare at him. “Are you sure? It looks like it is…probably all the stress.”
WooHyun stood up quickly. “I’m not stressed! I have to go to the bathroom.”
The minute WooHyun was gone the other four members got up from their chairs and squeezed onto the sofa with SungYeol. The day had started early, at 5am, but not once had the five of them been allowed a minute to gossip together.
“So what is going on?” DongWoo asked as he squeezed in between SungYeol and Hoya.
SungJong, who was squeezed in between the arm of the sofa and L eagerly volunteered, “Whatever it is, I’m sure it was WooHyun’s fault!”
SungYeol, who sat in the middle, shook his head at SungJong. “You are just saying that because he complained about you snoring on the radio show this morning.”
“I don’t snore!” SungJong insisted, folding his arms and openly pouting.
“I think it’s WooHyun’s fault too,” Hoya offered up. Hoya had awakened first this morning, and he had been greatly saddened to find SungGyu sitting in the same position that he had found him in the night before. Hoya was positive their leader had not gotten any sleep at all.
DongWoo turned to look at Hoya with curious eyes, and asked, “But if it is WooHyun’s fault then why does he seem so mad?”
“Because he’s a jerk,” SungJong couldn’t help but answering, still pissed at WooHyun for embarrassing him earlier.
L nudged SungJong’s side, looked down at him and whispered, “Let it go.”
“But I don’t snore!”
“We know that,” Hoya answered for all of them.
“I also think WooHyun must be at fault here,” SungYeol said, grabbing everybody’s attention as they waited for him to explain.
“Why do you say that?” DongWoo asked eager to hear the taller man’s theory.
SungYeol sighed, exasperated; he was surrounded by such a naïve bunch of people, he thought. “It’s obvious. It’s very clear that he doesn’t want us to know what the fight is about. He hasn’t left us alone all day. He only left now because I attacked his vanity. They are always very secretive about their disagreements…they never deem us worthy of the details, but WooHyun never hides the fact that he is pissed with SungGyu. He hasn’t bitched about SungGyu once today.”
“True, he always complains…loudly,” Hoya quickly agreed. “SungGyu always acts guilty and tries really hard to make him happy.”
“Exactly, and he’s never complained once about SungGyu, not last night or today. And neither one of them have made any moves toward reconciliation,” SungYeol continued. “Also, WooHyun sent Hoya to SungGyu’s room not L, and that right there tells me he doesn’t want the managers knowing.”
L, who been listening quietly, turned to the man sitting beside him and asked, “Why do you say that?”
“Because you are the least likely to pry, and WooHyun wouldn’t want somebody talking to SungGyu. He had to bypass you though, because manager Hyoan was staying the night, and he would have noticed if WooHyun was suddenly staying in our room. So WooHyun had to go with Hoya, the second least likely to pry,” SungYeol explained.
“But on the radio show he complained about SungJong snoring…” L paused and then added, “But he never mentioned that they had roomed together recently.”
“No, he did not,” SungYeol concurred, smiling at L as if he was his brightest pupil.
“SungYeol, you are a genius!” SungJong exclaimed. “When I said I wanted to stay with Leader Gyu too, WooHyun got mean! There was no way he was going to let me in their room.”
“Exactly!” SungYeol announced proudly. “There is no way he would have let you, me, or DongWoo near that room, because we would have pried into what was going on.”
DongWoo stood up from the sofa suddenly offended, “Hey, I don’t pry.”
The four other members looked up and him and grinned as one.
“I would have been concerned for my friend! That’s different from being a gossip,” DongWoo protested.
“You are all a bunch of gossips!” WooHyun grumbled as he reentered the room, after examining his face in the bathroom “And my face is flawless.”
DongWoo quickly squeezed back on the sofa. SungYeol looked up at WooHyun trying his best to maintain his straight face and told him, “Somebody has selective vision.”
“You wish you had this face,” WooHyun told his insolent dongsaeng.
SungYeol fluttered his long eyelashes at WooHyun. “I am happy with the one I was born…” SungYeol paused as SungGyu entered the room.
WooHyun swung around quickly to find SungGyu standing behind him, displaying the same emotionless control and calm that they had seen all day. He jerked his gaze away quickly and sat down in one of the chairs, doing his best to ignore the leader. He had gone all day without talking directly to SungGyu, unless circumstances demanded it, and then he kept it very impersonal and brief. During their radio show earlier in the day he had tried his best to ignore him, and he had refused to look at him while they had sung. He had not laughed at any of his jokes, fixed his disheveled hair, or helped him out when the other members dug him into a corner.
WooHyun knew the more observant fans would catch on quick, the members of course knew, and if Geonam hyung had been with them he would have known something was wrong. He just had to remain strong until tomorrow morning, then his point would be made, and SungGyu would not dare try anything again…well, not for awhile at least. The kissing had been nice last night, and so had the…WooHyun immediately reached up and slapped his own face for thinking such thoughts.
“Why did you just slap yourself?” L asked, causing WooHyun to leave his inner thoughts and look back at the sofa full of members, who were staring him down like he was mad.
“There…there was a mosquito,” WooHyun explained, quickly coming up with an excuse. WooHyun looked down at his lap. He could feel SungGyu’s eyes on him.
“I hate bugs…especially those flying bloodsuckers,” SungJong complained, searching the air with his huge eyes for the offensive insects.
SungGyu sighed and looked away from WooHyun to the sofa full of his members. “These are the rooming assignments.”
“Who made them? How many rooms do we get?” SungYeol asked quickly.
“Three rooms and I did the assignments,” SungGyu answered. DongWoo you are with me, SungYeol you are with WooHyun, Hoya, L, and SungJong you have one room.”
“I get my own bed,” SungJong yelled out.
“No, you don’t!” Hoya protested. “You and L are the youngest, you can share.”
“Kids, behave; those are the assignments. If you really want your own bed, then you can room with our new Japanese manager that we barely know-”
“No, it’s fine,” SungJong said quickly. “I don’t mind sharing.”
“More than fine,” Hoya agreed.
L just shrugged and said, “It doesn’t matter to me.”
WooHyun, who had done his best to avoid looking at SungGyu all day, now had his eyes fixed on him. Why had he separated them? WooHyun had separated them last night, but SungGyu was not allowed to separate them…no he was not. He did not have permission to do so. “Why do I have to stay with SungYeol? He freaking snores!”
“Ha!” the maknae shouted, jumping up from the sofa gleefully! “This is what you get for saying I snore, when I don’t! I hope you enjoy some real loud snoring tonight!”
“Those are the assignments and they are not going to change,” SungGyu said firmly, eyeing WooHyun directly, but talking to them all as he pulled out the room keys. “Get your keys and please try to sleep. If you can’t sleep, please be practicing your Japanese.”
WooHyun stayed in his chair, while the other members hurried up to grab their key cards. WooHyun bit his bottom lip as the maknae wrapped his arms around SungGyu declaring, “You are the best leader ever.”
SungGyu smiled down at younger, energetic boy, and hugged him back. “You say that today, but just wait. Tomorrow you will be sprouting off my evils to anyone who will listen.”
SungYeol, who had managed to grab both his key and WooHyun’s, just smiled as he watched WooHyun turn beet red as the leader left the room with the affectionate maknae, wrapped around him. SungYeol knew that tonight was going to be all kinds of fun.
****************
SungYeol was spread out on his bed, lying on his belly, watching a very restless WooHyun repeatedly go back and forth from his bed, to the bathroom, to his bag, and back to his bed. It was very entertaining to SungYeol. “Why don’t you just put your bag on the bed? It will save you some steps?”
“What?” WooHyun asked as he sat on the floor and went through his bag.
“You just keep going back and forth from the bed to the bathroom, from the bathroom to bed, from the bed to your bag, and from your bag to the bed.”
“Oh,” WooHyun said weakly as he pulled his iPod from his bag and got back on the bed. “I just…I just wish I had some better earplugs.”
SungYeol smiled as WooHyun provided an opening for him. “Leader Gyu must be very mad at you to make you sleep with me.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Everybody knows that I snore, and Leader Gyu knows what a sensitive sleeper you are…he must be very angry at you.”
“He’s not angry at me,” WooHyun said, trying his best to sound confident, but the doubt was evident in his voice.
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“He just seemed like he was really mad at you today.”
“Why…why would you say that?” WooHyun asked, aghast. A terrible fear was taking root in WooHyun…had he over done it? Had he miscalculated, and pushed SungGyu too far?
SungYeol sat up on the bed and looked at his older hyung, trying to hide his amusement, and doing his best to look sincere. “He hasn’t spoken to you once today.”
“I haven’t spoken to him.”
“He never once looked at you during the radio show.”
“I didn’t look at him.”
“He didn’t sit with you on the plane.”
“I didn’t sit with him.”
“He put you in this room with me.” SungYeol watched as WooHyun swallowed nervously before offering up his denial.
“He knew I didn’t want to room with him.”
“He just doesn’t seem very happy with you,” SungYeol lastly pointed out, and knew he had hit the bull’s-eye when WooHyun paled noticeable.
“Why do you say that?”
SungYeol couldn’t fight off his smile as he pointed out, “Usually when you two have your little…tiffs he’s always so apologetic. He dotes on you…as if he can’t stand you being mad at him. He’s not doing any of that now. Is he?”
WooHyun stood up quickly. “You really think he’s mad at me?”
SungYeol nodded his head.
“He isn’t allowed to be angry at me!” WooHyun shouted, and was immediately out the door, not bothering to shut it behind him.
********************************
“Just so you know…it isn’t like I’m prying or anything. I’m just a concerned friend, and there is a difference,” DongWoo tried to explain as casually as he could as he sat on the side of his bed looking at his hyung with real concern. “If my friends are troubled I want to know why, so I can be troubled too.”
SungGyu, who was sitting up in his bed, leaning against his pillows, eating chips while he watched a Japanese program on television, turned an annoyed glace at DongWoo. “You know what is troubling me, Dongsaeng?”
“What?”
“You are! I am trying to watch this. It’s hard enough to understand what they are saying without you blabbering on and on,” SungGyu told him, and then he stuffed more chips in his mouth. His appetite had been next to nothing all day, and he was feeding a growling stomach.
“I am not blabbering! I am concerned for you.”
SungGyu turned his attention away from the television, and said in a long suffering voice, “I appreciate your concern, but I’m fine. If you aren’t going to sleep, maybe you should go get some ice.”
“Ice?”
“Yeah, and a soda if they have some in a vending machine nearby…oh and some more chips too,” SungGyu said with a smile. “I know it is too late to be eating, but I’m starved.”
DongWoo frowned. “So you aren’t going to confide in me?”
“Nope, now go be a good dongsaeng and go get your hyung some food.”
“Hyung, it hurts that you don’t trust me.”
“I trust you…I trust that you will do as I say.”
“What about relieving your burdens?”
“I’m not burdened.”
“But aren’t you and Woo-” a loud knocking on the door kept DongWoo from completing his question.
SungGyu eyed the door suspiciously, not moving from his spot on the bed.
“Who is it?” DongWoo asked, getting up from the bed.
“It better not be a member,” SungGyu said in a tone full of warning. “Just ignore it.”
“Ignore it?” DongWoo said in shock. How was he supposed to ignore the loud knocking? Surely everybody on this floor of the hotel could hear it.
“Go to bed,” SungGyu yelled at the door.
“No!” came a very familiar voice through the door.
DongWoo immediately went and opened the door. “WooHyun, have you lost your mind?” he asked as WooHyun flew past him to stand at the side of the bed that SungGyu was on.
“You are not allowed to be mad at me,” WooHyun informed the lounging leader, who was looking up at him none too happily.
“Really?”
“Really,” WooHyun repeated as he grabbed a pillow from behind SungGyu and hugged it tightly to his chest.
SungGyu sat up straight to readjust himself after having one of his pillows yanked out from behind him. “So you are the only one allowed to be angry?”
“I’m not angry…not with you,” WooHyun whispered, very aware of DongWoo in the room watching them.
“You…you…aren’t?” SungGyu sputtered out, shocked at the words coming out of WooHyun’s mouth. “You sure could have fooled me!”
“I’m not angry with you,” WooHyun repeated as he reached out to touch SungGyu’s shoulder.
SungGyu pushed WooHyun’s hand away, and turned toward DongWoo and ordered, “Go get some ice.”
DongWoo, who had been gawking at them, quickly exited the room, shutting the door behind him.
SungGyu looked up at WooHyun completely mystified. “Why come in here? All day you have avoided me. Not to mention you have gone to great lengths to keep the fact that we are fighting from the members, so why come in here now?”
“We are not fighting,” WooHyun insisted, hugging the pillow tightly.
SungGyu shook his head, completely baffled by the younger man. “How can you even say that? Especially after what you said to me last night!”
“I only said that after…after what you did, so you’d stop. I’m not angry at you,” WooHyun explained, trying his best to remain calm. “Just because I don’t want you…doing that kind of stuff, doesn’t mean I’m angry at you.”
“You drive me crazy,” SungGyu groaned, reaching up and slapping his forehead. “I know you, and I know when you are angry.”
“I wasn’t angry,” WooHyun stubbornly insisted.
“Well, maybe you weren’t, but I am!”
WooHyun stopped hugging the pillow and let it drop to his right side. “You’re not allowed to be angry at me.”
“I’m not, am I? You are the only one allowed to be angry?”
WooHyun hit SungGyu with the pillow, loosing his battle to remain calm. “I’m not angry with you! How many times do I have to tell you I’m not angry?”
SungGyu snatched the pillow away from WooHyun and hissed, “So you called me a filthy faggot because you are so happy with me?”
“I did not call you that!” WooHyun yelled, grabbing the pillow away from SungGyu and hitting him with it again.
“Do you think I just imagined it?” SungGyu demanded as he jumped up from the bed to confront WooHyun.
“You must have, because I never called you that!”
“Yes, you did!”
“I did not!” WooHyun maintained not backing down. “I would never say that to you. Never!”
“Do you actually believe what you are saying? I know what I heard, and I will never forget what I heard. You called me a filthy faggot, and you think I assaulted you. Assaulted you!” SungGyu exclaimed, turning away unable to face him. How WooHyun had the audacity to just stand there and lie about what he had said, left SungGyu at a complete loss.
“I shouldn’t have said that…you assaulted me. I let you, but only because it was you. We are so close, and sometimes that confuses me. It was wrong. I don’t want that from you…I just need you to hear me,” WooHyun said desperately to the leader, who couldn’t bear to face him. “Please, don’t be mad at me,” WooHyun pleaded as he reached out to touch the other man’s back.
SungGyu pulled away from the other’s touch and started pacing the room. “Don’t you worry, I’ve learned my lesson. I won’t bother you anymore…not after you told me what you really think of me…that you think I’m a filthy faggot!”
WooHyun huffed in frustration and reached out, grabbing the older boy as he paced in front of him, not letting go. “I didn’t call you that…I just said I wasn’t one. I would never call you that. I don’t think of you like that. You know how much you mean to me.”
Instead of jerking free of WooHyun, SungGyu just stared at him. Was it possible that in WooHyun’s mind he had never aimed such a vile insult at him? The younger man was so immature in so many ways…so young. He knew the real world, and how WooHyun saw the world did not always mesh well with reality. “You need to go back to your room.”
“No,” WooHyun told him, looking like he was going to break into tears at any moment. A sight that was rarely seen as the younger man was not a crier on a normal day. “No, you can’t be mad at me.”
SungGyu did pull away from WooHyun now, fearful that he would pull him into a hug, and cause even more problems if he didn’t. “I’m not mad at you anymore…just go. We need to get some sleep,” he told the younger man as he headed back to his bed.
“You are lying. You are mad at me.”
SungGyu avoided eye contact as he arranged the pillows behind him on the bed. “I’m not angry now. My feelings were hurt, and I just got mad because it’s easier to feel angry.”
WooHyun sat down on the edge of the bed, pleading, “I didn’t call you a…” he stalled unable to even repeat the words. “I didn’t call you a FF. I promise I didn’t.”
“It doesn’t matter,” SungGyu told him. “Just go back to your room.”
“No, I’m staying with you.”
SungGyu looked back at WooHyun, shocked by his statement. “No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am.”
“No, you are not,” SungGyu told him firmly as he reached for the bag of chips he had discarded earlier.
“Why not?”
“Because.”
“Is it because you think I called you a FF?”
“What does FF stand for?” asked DongWoo, who had reentered the room carrying the requested ice.
The voice of DongWoo startled both of the boys, causing them to jerk their head toward the member they had completely forgotten about. “It means…means...it means…it means flat falsetto,” WooHyun stuttered out, searching for a plausible lie.
DongWoo scrunched up his face confused. “Flat Falsetto?”
“Yes,” WooHyun confirmed quickly.
“So you two were fighting over singing?”
“Yes,” WooHyun answered. “I…I…thought Hyung was off during the concert.”
“So the fighting was just over singing?” DongWoo asked again in disbelief.
WooHyun grabbed SungGyu’s bag of chips from him, and tried his best to appear nonchalant. “We take singing very seriously.”
“We do. We are over it. See, no burdens to share,” SungGyu added, having mercy on his lying best friend.
DongWoo put the ice down, along with a Pepsi, smiling with visible relief. “Gosh, I’m so glad that’s all it was. It really had us worried.”
“No need to be worried. Everything is wonderful,” SungGyu assured the big hearted member.
WooHyun smiled and nodded his head, and added, “Since we have mended our ways, I will be staying in here tonight. I hope you don’t mind?”
“No, no, no, I am just glad you two are getting along again! I will happily stay with SungYeol,” DongWoo quickly told WooHyun. “I’m used to his snoring.”
SungGyu’s gazed with narrowed, unpleased eyes at WooHyun, but he spoke to DongWoo, “That isn’t necessary. I already said the rooming assignments were non-negotiable.”
“Believe me, we don’t mind! We don’t mind at all,” DongWoo happily told the leader as he backed out of the room, shutting the door behind him. He was eager to share the good news with SungYeol and the others.
WooHyun smiled back at the leader, who was glaring at him unhappily. “See? Now we can settle this whole thing, plus I can get some sleep.”
“You are not staying in here,” SungGyu told him firmly.
“Yes, I am.”
“No, you are not.”
“Why not?”
“Because I already made rooming assignments, and I’m not going to change them now. DongWoo didn’t even get his stuff.”
“Because he was so happy that we aren’t fighting…you would rather be with me anyway,” WooHyun pointed out as he patted SungGyu’s thigh.
SungGyu gritted his teeth and got up out of bed, planning to get some distance from the younger man, but quickly decided against that. He took a deep breath, walked up to WooHyun, grabbed him by his upper arms, and pulled him up from the bed. “You need to listen to me. You are not staying in here tonight.”
WooHyun frowned, and pleaded, “Don’t be like this. It’s no biggie. I will just take DongWoo’s bed. We always room together. If you-know-what…hadn’t happened I would be in here with you.”
“No, if you had acted in a mat…” SungGyu stopped himself as he heard the harshness in his own voice. “I can’t have you in this room tonight. You can’t stay.”
“You said you weren’t mad at me!”
SungGyu released WooHyun, rubbed his hands against his face, and said slowly and very clearly, “I need you to hear me. I want you to go.”
“I’m not going,” WooHyun said resolutely as he reached out and pressed his hand against SungGyu’s chest.
SungGyu removed his hands from his face, reached down and grabbed WooHyun’s hand that was pressed against his chest. He held WooHyun’s hand with both of his and gently squeezed it. He then told WooHyun in an unyielding voice, “I am going to say things to you…things I will deeply regret saying if you stay. I don’t ever want to hurt you, so you need to listen to me and do what I say.”
“Like I hurt you?” WooHyun whispered, feeling the unspoken accusation.
SungGyu turned his gaze away from the man who meant too much to him, and answered honestly, “Yes, that’s why I need you to leave.”
“I said I was sorry.”
“No, you didn’t, actually. You denied a lot of things, you had a lot of excuses, but I don’t recall you ever saying you were sorry,” SungGyu told the younger man, whose eyes he couldn’t meet, but whose hand he still held.
“I’m sorry…I really am,” WooHyun told him, trying very hard to keep control of the emotions that were about to erupt from him. “Please don’t hate me.”
SungGyu turned his head quickly to face WooHyun, surprised at the other man’s words. “Don’t be stupid. I could never hate you. My feelings for you haven’t changed…I just need you to go. When we get back home we will be roommates like always. I just need a break from you for a little while.”
Woohyun pulled his hand away as if he had been slapped. “A break from me?”
“Yes,” SungGyu confirmed, hating the look of hurt on the younger boys face. “Just go.”
WooHyun squeezed his lips together, trying hard to keep control of his fragile emotions. He turned away from SungGyu, and walked toward the door to exit. But before he left, he turned back to look at the leader. He wanted to ask a million things, he wanted a promise that once they got back to Korea things would return to normal, but he didn’t ask…he was too afraid of the answer he might get.
Author: Aquariuslover
Pairings: SungGyu/WooHyun
Rating: R
Genre: Friendship, Love, Humor, Angst
Length: Chaptered
Beta: tahoeturquoise
Summary: WooHyun’s perfect life…his bed of roses is tossed into disarray when SungGyu makes a bold move changing their friendship forever.
Thanks to everybody who comments!!!
“So, have you ever watched the movie Trouble in Paradise?” SungYeol asked WooHyun, who was sitting beside him on a sofa in a private section of the hotel. The manager along with SungGyu had gone to confirm their hotel arrangements. “I heard it’s really good. It’s about this would-be rocker and this clingy, younger best friend of his. They were inseparable in the movie, but then they had this huge fight. It’s a really sad movie.”
WooHyun clamped his jaw together and turned to glare at his tall friend.
“I know that movie. I was never sure what the fight was about though. I wonder what caused it. It must have been really bad,” DongWoo, who was sitting in one of the chairs in the room, quickly added, relieved that somebody had finally found the nerve to broach the subject with WooHyun.
“Why don’t you all just mind your own damn business?” WooHyun snapped.
SungYeol crossed his legs and told WooHyun innocently, “Well, I guess you haven’t seen it, or you would understand our interest in it.”
“No, I haven’t, and maybe you should practice singing more and watching movies less,” WooHyun smart-mouthed back to SungYeol, hitting below the belt.
SungYeol’s air of indifference vanished and his eyes narrowed in on WooHyun’s face, and his quick mind went to work plotting revenge.
“What are you looking at?” WooHyun demanded, self-conscious of Sungyeol’s intense stare.
SungYeol reached out and ran a finger across WooHyun’s cheek and asked, “Is your face starting to break out?”
WooHyun immediately leaned away from SungYeol, and his hands flew up to his face. “No!”
SungYeol continued to stare at him. “Are you sure? It looks like it is…probably all the stress.”
WooHyun stood up quickly. “I’m not stressed! I have to go to the bathroom.”
The minute WooHyun was gone the other four members got up from their chairs and squeezed onto the sofa with SungYeol. The day had started early, at 5am, but not once had the five of them been allowed a minute to gossip together.
“So what is going on?” DongWoo asked as he squeezed in between SungYeol and Hoya.
SungJong, who was squeezed in between the arm of the sofa and L eagerly volunteered, “Whatever it is, I’m sure it was WooHyun’s fault!”
SungYeol, who sat in the middle, shook his head at SungJong. “You are just saying that because he complained about you snoring on the radio show this morning.”
“I don’t snore!” SungJong insisted, folding his arms and openly pouting.
“I think it’s WooHyun’s fault too,” Hoya offered up. Hoya had awakened first this morning, and he had been greatly saddened to find SungGyu sitting in the same position that he had found him in the night before. Hoya was positive their leader had not gotten any sleep at all.
DongWoo turned to look at Hoya with curious eyes, and asked, “But if it is WooHyun’s fault then why does he seem so mad?”
“Because he’s a jerk,” SungJong couldn’t help but answering, still pissed at WooHyun for embarrassing him earlier.
L nudged SungJong’s side, looked down at him and whispered, “Let it go.”
“But I don’t snore!”
“We know that,” Hoya answered for all of them.
“I also think WooHyun must be at fault here,” SungYeol said, grabbing everybody’s attention as they waited for him to explain.
“Why do you say that?” DongWoo asked eager to hear the taller man’s theory.
SungYeol sighed, exasperated; he was surrounded by such a naïve bunch of people, he thought. “It’s obvious. It’s very clear that he doesn’t want us to know what the fight is about. He hasn’t left us alone all day. He only left now because I attacked his vanity. They are always very secretive about their disagreements…they never deem us worthy of the details, but WooHyun never hides the fact that he is pissed with SungGyu. He hasn’t bitched about SungGyu once today.”
“True, he always complains…loudly,” Hoya quickly agreed. “SungGyu always acts guilty and tries really hard to make him happy.”
“Exactly, and he’s never complained once about SungGyu, not last night or today. And neither one of them have made any moves toward reconciliation,” SungYeol continued. “Also, WooHyun sent Hoya to SungGyu’s room not L, and that right there tells me he doesn’t want the managers knowing.”
L, who been listening quietly, turned to the man sitting beside him and asked, “Why do you say that?”
“Because you are the least likely to pry, and WooHyun wouldn’t want somebody talking to SungGyu. He had to bypass you though, because manager Hyoan was staying the night, and he would have noticed if WooHyun was suddenly staying in our room. So WooHyun had to go with Hoya, the second least likely to pry,” SungYeol explained.
“But on the radio show he complained about SungJong snoring…” L paused and then added, “But he never mentioned that they had roomed together recently.”
“No, he did not,” SungYeol concurred, smiling at L as if he was his brightest pupil.
“SungYeol, you are a genius!” SungJong exclaimed. “When I said I wanted to stay with Leader Gyu too, WooHyun got mean! There was no way he was going to let me in their room.”
“Exactly!” SungYeol announced proudly. “There is no way he would have let you, me, or DongWoo near that room, because we would have pried into what was going on.”
DongWoo stood up from the sofa suddenly offended, “Hey, I don’t pry.”
The four other members looked up and him and grinned as one.
“I would have been concerned for my friend! That’s different from being a gossip,” DongWoo protested.
“You are all a bunch of gossips!” WooHyun grumbled as he reentered the room, after examining his face in the bathroom “And my face is flawless.”
DongWoo quickly squeezed back on the sofa. SungYeol looked up at WooHyun trying his best to maintain his straight face and told him, “Somebody has selective vision.”
“You wish you had this face,” WooHyun told his insolent dongsaeng.
SungYeol fluttered his long eyelashes at WooHyun. “I am happy with the one I was born…” SungYeol paused as SungGyu entered the room.
WooHyun swung around quickly to find SungGyu standing behind him, displaying the same emotionless control and calm that they had seen all day. He jerked his gaze away quickly and sat down in one of the chairs, doing his best to ignore the leader. He had gone all day without talking directly to SungGyu, unless circumstances demanded it, and then he kept it very impersonal and brief. During their radio show earlier in the day he had tried his best to ignore him, and he had refused to look at him while they had sung. He had not laughed at any of his jokes, fixed his disheveled hair, or helped him out when the other members dug him into a corner.
WooHyun knew the more observant fans would catch on quick, the members of course knew, and if Geonam hyung had been with them he would have known something was wrong. He just had to remain strong until tomorrow morning, then his point would be made, and SungGyu would not dare try anything again…well, not for awhile at least. The kissing had been nice last night, and so had the…WooHyun immediately reached up and slapped his own face for thinking such thoughts.
“Why did you just slap yourself?” L asked, causing WooHyun to leave his inner thoughts and look back at the sofa full of members, who were staring him down like he was mad.
“There…there was a mosquito,” WooHyun explained, quickly coming up with an excuse. WooHyun looked down at his lap. He could feel SungGyu’s eyes on him.
“I hate bugs…especially those flying bloodsuckers,” SungJong complained, searching the air with his huge eyes for the offensive insects.
SungGyu sighed and looked away from WooHyun to the sofa full of his members. “These are the rooming assignments.”
“Who made them? How many rooms do we get?” SungYeol asked quickly.
“Three rooms and I did the assignments,” SungGyu answered. DongWoo you are with me, SungYeol you are with WooHyun, Hoya, L, and SungJong you have one room.”
“I get my own bed,” SungJong yelled out.
“No, you don’t!” Hoya protested. “You and L are the youngest, you can share.”
“Kids, behave; those are the assignments. If you really want your own bed, then you can room with our new Japanese manager that we barely know-”
“No, it’s fine,” SungJong said quickly. “I don’t mind sharing.”
“More than fine,” Hoya agreed.
L just shrugged and said, “It doesn’t matter to me.”
WooHyun, who had done his best to avoid looking at SungGyu all day, now had his eyes fixed on him. Why had he separated them? WooHyun had separated them last night, but SungGyu was not allowed to separate them…no he was not. He did not have permission to do so. “Why do I have to stay with SungYeol? He freaking snores!”
“Ha!” the maknae shouted, jumping up from the sofa gleefully! “This is what you get for saying I snore, when I don’t! I hope you enjoy some real loud snoring tonight!”
“Those are the assignments and they are not going to change,” SungGyu said firmly, eyeing WooHyun directly, but talking to them all as he pulled out the room keys. “Get your keys and please try to sleep. If you can’t sleep, please be practicing your Japanese.”
WooHyun stayed in his chair, while the other members hurried up to grab their key cards. WooHyun bit his bottom lip as the maknae wrapped his arms around SungGyu declaring, “You are the best leader ever.”
SungGyu smiled down at younger, energetic boy, and hugged him back. “You say that today, but just wait. Tomorrow you will be sprouting off my evils to anyone who will listen.”
SungYeol, who had managed to grab both his key and WooHyun’s, just smiled as he watched WooHyun turn beet red as the leader left the room with the affectionate maknae, wrapped around him. SungYeol knew that tonight was going to be all kinds of fun.
****************
SungYeol was spread out on his bed, lying on his belly, watching a very restless WooHyun repeatedly go back and forth from his bed, to the bathroom, to his bag, and back to his bed. It was very entertaining to SungYeol. “Why don’t you just put your bag on the bed? It will save you some steps?”
“What?” WooHyun asked as he sat on the floor and went through his bag.
“You just keep going back and forth from the bed to the bathroom, from the bathroom to bed, from the bed to your bag, and from your bag to the bed.”
“Oh,” WooHyun said weakly as he pulled his iPod from his bag and got back on the bed. “I just…I just wish I had some better earplugs.”
SungYeol smiled as WooHyun provided an opening for him. “Leader Gyu must be very mad at you to make you sleep with me.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Everybody knows that I snore, and Leader Gyu knows what a sensitive sleeper you are…he must be very angry at you.”
“He’s not angry at me,” WooHyun said, trying his best to sound confident, but the doubt was evident in his voice.
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“He just seemed like he was really mad at you today.”
“Why…why would you say that?” WooHyun asked, aghast. A terrible fear was taking root in WooHyun…had he over done it? Had he miscalculated, and pushed SungGyu too far?
SungYeol sat up on the bed and looked at his older hyung, trying to hide his amusement, and doing his best to look sincere. “He hasn’t spoken to you once today.”
“I haven’t spoken to him.”
“He never once looked at you during the radio show.”
“I didn’t look at him.”
“He didn’t sit with you on the plane.”
“I didn’t sit with him.”
“He put you in this room with me.” SungYeol watched as WooHyun swallowed nervously before offering up his denial.
“He knew I didn’t want to room with him.”
“He just doesn’t seem very happy with you,” SungYeol lastly pointed out, and knew he had hit the bull’s-eye when WooHyun paled noticeable.
“Why do you say that?”
SungYeol couldn’t fight off his smile as he pointed out, “Usually when you two have your little…tiffs he’s always so apologetic. He dotes on you…as if he can’t stand you being mad at him. He’s not doing any of that now. Is he?”
WooHyun stood up quickly. “You really think he’s mad at me?”
SungYeol nodded his head.
“He isn’t allowed to be angry at me!” WooHyun shouted, and was immediately out the door, not bothering to shut it behind him.
********************************
“Just so you know…it isn’t like I’m prying or anything. I’m just a concerned friend, and there is a difference,” DongWoo tried to explain as casually as he could as he sat on the side of his bed looking at his hyung with real concern. “If my friends are troubled I want to know why, so I can be troubled too.”
SungGyu, who was sitting up in his bed, leaning against his pillows, eating chips while he watched a Japanese program on television, turned an annoyed glace at DongWoo. “You know what is troubling me, Dongsaeng?”
“What?”
“You are! I am trying to watch this. It’s hard enough to understand what they are saying without you blabbering on and on,” SungGyu told him, and then he stuffed more chips in his mouth. His appetite had been next to nothing all day, and he was feeding a growling stomach.
“I am not blabbering! I am concerned for you.”
SungGyu turned his attention away from the television, and said in a long suffering voice, “I appreciate your concern, but I’m fine. If you aren’t going to sleep, maybe you should go get some ice.”
“Ice?”
“Yeah, and a soda if they have some in a vending machine nearby…oh and some more chips too,” SungGyu said with a smile. “I know it is too late to be eating, but I’m starved.”
DongWoo frowned. “So you aren’t going to confide in me?”
“Nope, now go be a good dongsaeng and go get your hyung some food.”
“Hyung, it hurts that you don’t trust me.”
“I trust you…I trust that you will do as I say.”
“What about relieving your burdens?”
“I’m not burdened.”
“But aren’t you and Woo-” a loud knocking on the door kept DongWoo from completing his question.
SungGyu eyed the door suspiciously, not moving from his spot on the bed.
“Who is it?” DongWoo asked, getting up from the bed.
“It better not be a member,” SungGyu said in a tone full of warning. “Just ignore it.”
“Ignore it?” DongWoo said in shock. How was he supposed to ignore the loud knocking? Surely everybody on this floor of the hotel could hear it.
“Go to bed,” SungGyu yelled at the door.
“No!” came a very familiar voice through the door.
DongWoo immediately went and opened the door. “WooHyun, have you lost your mind?” he asked as WooHyun flew past him to stand at the side of the bed that SungGyu was on.
“You are not allowed to be mad at me,” WooHyun informed the lounging leader, who was looking up at him none too happily.
“Really?”
“Really,” WooHyun repeated as he grabbed a pillow from behind SungGyu and hugged it tightly to his chest.
SungGyu sat up straight to readjust himself after having one of his pillows yanked out from behind him. “So you are the only one allowed to be angry?”
“I’m not angry…not with you,” WooHyun whispered, very aware of DongWoo in the room watching them.
“You…you…aren’t?” SungGyu sputtered out, shocked at the words coming out of WooHyun’s mouth. “You sure could have fooled me!”
“I’m not angry with you,” WooHyun repeated as he reached out to touch SungGyu’s shoulder.
SungGyu pushed WooHyun’s hand away, and turned toward DongWoo and ordered, “Go get some ice.”
DongWoo, who had been gawking at them, quickly exited the room, shutting the door behind him.
SungGyu looked up at WooHyun completely mystified. “Why come in here? All day you have avoided me. Not to mention you have gone to great lengths to keep the fact that we are fighting from the members, so why come in here now?”
“We are not fighting,” WooHyun insisted, hugging the pillow tightly.
SungGyu shook his head, completely baffled by the younger man. “How can you even say that? Especially after what you said to me last night!”
“I only said that after…after what you did, so you’d stop. I’m not angry at you,” WooHyun explained, trying his best to remain calm. “Just because I don’t want you…doing that kind of stuff, doesn’t mean I’m angry at you.”
“You drive me crazy,” SungGyu groaned, reaching up and slapping his forehead. “I know you, and I know when you are angry.”
“I wasn’t angry,” WooHyun stubbornly insisted.
“Well, maybe you weren’t, but I am!”
WooHyun stopped hugging the pillow and let it drop to his right side. “You’re not allowed to be angry at me.”
“I’m not, am I? You are the only one allowed to be angry?”
WooHyun hit SungGyu with the pillow, loosing his battle to remain calm. “I’m not angry with you! How many times do I have to tell you I’m not angry?”
SungGyu snatched the pillow away from WooHyun and hissed, “So you called me a filthy faggot because you are so happy with me?”
“I did not call you that!” WooHyun yelled, grabbing the pillow away from SungGyu and hitting him with it again.
“Do you think I just imagined it?” SungGyu demanded as he jumped up from the bed to confront WooHyun.
“You must have, because I never called you that!”
“Yes, you did!”
“I did not!” WooHyun maintained not backing down. “I would never say that to you. Never!”
“Do you actually believe what you are saying? I know what I heard, and I will never forget what I heard. You called me a filthy faggot, and you think I assaulted you. Assaulted you!” SungGyu exclaimed, turning away unable to face him. How WooHyun had the audacity to just stand there and lie about what he had said, left SungGyu at a complete loss.
“I shouldn’t have said that…you assaulted me. I let you, but only because it was you. We are so close, and sometimes that confuses me. It was wrong. I don’t want that from you…I just need you to hear me,” WooHyun said desperately to the leader, who couldn’t bear to face him. “Please, don’t be mad at me,” WooHyun pleaded as he reached out to touch the other man’s back.
SungGyu pulled away from the other’s touch and started pacing the room. “Don’t you worry, I’ve learned my lesson. I won’t bother you anymore…not after you told me what you really think of me…that you think I’m a filthy faggot!”
WooHyun huffed in frustration and reached out, grabbing the older boy as he paced in front of him, not letting go. “I didn’t call you that…I just said I wasn’t one. I would never call you that. I don’t think of you like that. You know how much you mean to me.”
Instead of jerking free of WooHyun, SungGyu just stared at him. Was it possible that in WooHyun’s mind he had never aimed such a vile insult at him? The younger man was so immature in so many ways…so young. He knew the real world, and how WooHyun saw the world did not always mesh well with reality. “You need to go back to your room.”
“No,” WooHyun told him, looking like he was going to break into tears at any moment. A sight that was rarely seen as the younger man was not a crier on a normal day. “No, you can’t be mad at me.”
SungGyu did pull away from WooHyun now, fearful that he would pull him into a hug, and cause even more problems if he didn’t. “I’m not mad at you anymore…just go. We need to get some sleep,” he told the younger man as he headed back to his bed.
“You are lying. You are mad at me.”
SungGyu avoided eye contact as he arranged the pillows behind him on the bed. “I’m not angry now. My feelings were hurt, and I just got mad because it’s easier to feel angry.”
WooHyun sat down on the edge of the bed, pleading, “I didn’t call you a…” he stalled unable to even repeat the words. “I didn’t call you a FF. I promise I didn’t.”
“It doesn’t matter,” SungGyu told him. “Just go back to your room.”
“No, I’m staying with you.”
SungGyu looked back at WooHyun, shocked by his statement. “No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am.”
“No, you are not,” SungGyu told him firmly as he reached for the bag of chips he had discarded earlier.
“Why not?”
“Because.”
“Is it because you think I called you a FF?”
“What does FF stand for?” asked DongWoo, who had reentered the room carrying the requested ice.
The voice of DongWoo startled both of the boys, causing them to jerk their head toward the member they had completely forgotten about. “It means…means...it means…it means flat falsetto,” WooHyun stuttered out, searching for a plausible lie.
DongWoo scrunched up his face confused. “Flat Falsetto?”
“Yes,” WooHyun confirmed quickly.
“So you two were fighting over singing?”
“Yes,” WooHyun answered. “I…I…thought Hyung was off during the concert.”
“So the fighting was just over singing?” DongWoo asked again in disbelief.
WooHyun grabbed SungGyu’s bag of chips from him, and tried his best to appear nonchalant. “We take singing very seriously.”
“We do. We are over it. See, no burdens to share,” SungGyu added, having mercy on his lying best friend.
DongWoo put the ice down, along with a Pepsi, smiling with visible relief. “Gosh, I’m so glad that’s all it was. It really had us worried.”
“No need to be worried. Everything is wonderful,” SungGyu assured the big hearted member.
WooHyun smiled and nodded his head, and added, “Since we have mended our ways, I will be staying in here tonight. I hope you don’t mind?”
“No, no, no, I am just glad you two are getting along again! I will happily stay with SungYeol,” DongWoo quickly told WooHyun. “I’m used to his snoring.”
SungGyu’s gazed with narrowed, unpleased eyes at WooHyun, but he spoke to DongWoo, “That isn’t necessary. I already said the rooming assignments were non-negotiable.”
“Believe me, we don’t mind! We don’t mind at all,” DongWoo happily told the leader as he backed out of the room, shutting the door behind him. He was eager to share the good news with SungYeol and the others.
WooHyun smiled back at the leader, who was glaring at him unhappily. “See? Now we can settle this whole thing, plus I can get some sleep.”
“You are not staying in here,” SungGyu told him firmly.
“Yes, I am.”
“No, you are not.”
“Why not?”
“Because I already made rooming assignments, and I’m not going to change them now. DongWoo didn’t even get his stuff.”
“Because he was so happy that we aren’t fighting…you would rather be with me anyway,” WooHyun pointed out as he patted SungGyu’s thigh.
SungGyu gritted his teeth and got up out of bed, planning to get some distance from the younger man, but quickly decided against that. He took a deep breath, walked up to WooHyun, grabbed him by his upper arms, and pulled him up from the bed. “You need to listen to me. You are not staying in here tonight.”
WooHyun frowned, and pleaded, “Don’t be like this. It’s no biggie. I will just take DongWoo’s bed. We always room together. If you-know-what…hadn’t happened I would be in here with you.”
“No, if you had acted in a mat…” SungGyu stopped himself as he heard the harshness in his own voice. “I can’t have you in this room tonight. You can’t stay.”
“You said you weren’t mad at me!”
SungGyu released WooHyun, rubbed his hands against his face, and said slowly and very clearly, “I need you to hear me. I want you to go.”
“I’m not going,” WooHyun said resolutely as he reached out and pressed his hand against SungGyu’s chest.
SungGyu removed his hands from his face, reached down and grabbed WooHyun’s hand that was pressed against his chest. He held WooHyun’s hand with both of his and gently squeezed it. He then told WooHyun in an unyielding voice, “I am going to say things to you…things I will deeply regret saying if you stay. I don’t ever want to hurt you, so you need to listen to me and do what I say.”
“Like I hurt you?” WooHyun whispered, feeling the unspoken accusation.
SungGyu turned his gaze away from the man who meant too much to him, and answered honestly, “Yes, that’s why I need you to leave.”
“I said I was sorry.”
“No, you didn’t, actually. You denied a lot of things, you had a lot of excuses, but I don’t recall you ever saying you were sorry,” SungGyu told the younger man, whose eyes he couldn’t meet, but whose hand he still held.
“I’m sorry…I really am,” WooHyun told him, trying very hard to keep control of the emotions that were about to erupt from him. “Please don’t hate me.”
SungGyu turned his head quickly to face WooHyun, surprised at the other man’s words. “Don’t be stupid. I could never hate you. My feelings for you haven’t changed…I just need you to go. When we get back home we will be roommates like always. I just need a break from you for a little while.”
Woohyun pulled his hand away as if he had been slapped. “A break from me?”
“Yes,” SungGyu confirmed, hating the look of hurt on the younger boys face. “Just go.”
WooHyun squeezed his lips together, trying hard to keep control of his fragile emotions. He turned away from SungGyu, and walked toward the door to exit. But before he left, he turned back to look at the leader. He wanted to ask a million things, he wanted a promise that once they got back to Korea things would return to normal, but he didn’t ask…he was too afraid of the answer he might get.