The Rainbow Heart (Fic Exchange: for kiccy)
Title: The Rainbow Heart
Author: samikitty
Recipient: kiccy
Word count: 3474
Characters: Changmin, Jaejoong, Yunho, Junsu, Yoochun (OTFamily)
Rating: PG (for language)
Summary: A kind of AU... it's DBSK in a world where people are born with two Hearts, the First easily given to infatuation and the Second traded only with your True Love, but Changmin is born with just one. He learns that giving your only heart to the people who matter most to you isn't such a sacrifice after all.
Author's Notes: soo.... i sort of got carried away with this challenge. it's one story told through 5 flashfics. haha... >_> *cough* hahahaha. also, there's a little bit of lawsuit!angst, but it's a happy ending, promise! ^^;;;; happy holidays!!!
beta'd by the lovely reunionstory
heart under his heart
In a world where everyone was born with two Hearts, one to lose and one to cherish, Shim Changmin was born with only one.
This Heart ‘defect’ actually bothered his parents more than it bothered him.
As far as Changmin understood it, First Hearts were just pretty, sparkly things, made of semi-precious gems and weak metals; easily pulled from your chest and tossed at the first pretty girl or boy that crossed your path. They were fragile things, warm, but quick to cool, solid, but easily damaged. Anything could make them beat faster, a smile, a gesture, or even something so trivial as a fancy bag.
People dropped their First Hearts everywhere. They still held feelings, of course, but you could break them, split them, give them away for free, without any substantial risk or lasting damage to yourself. They were practically disposable.
On the other hand, Second Hearts, Forever Hearts, were solid, stable things, made of impermeable stones and strong metals, reliable, unbreakable, and everlasting. They weren’t always the most aesthetically pleasing things, but they were the core of a person’s soul and their worth was not measured by sparkles and pretty colours. Changmin was glad when the doctors had assured him that his only Heart was strong, sturdy like a Forever Heart.
Because if First Hearts were meant to be casually given to an infatuation where reciprocation was a mere coincidence, Second Hearts were intended for that one person who you could trust to take care of your soul, your True Love. People didn’t give their Second Hearts to just anyone. And no one gave their Second Heart away if they weren’t assured of one from their True Love in return.
Otherwise, you’d be left Heartless.
A fate worse than death.
Changmin’s parents worried desperately that, with only one Heart, he wasn’t properly equipped to go out into the world. What if someone tricked him into losing his Heart? Or what if he gave it away willingly but someone broke it and he didn’t have another Heart to fall back on like everyone else? It was too easy for Changmin to become Heartless.
“You must never let anyone know you only have one Heart. You have to guard it carefully,” they told him, over and over. “And even if you find your True Love, don’t give your Heart away first. You make sure they give you their Second Heart before you even pull yours from your chest.”
They were so adamant in their words that it became a family mantra. Changmin’s mother even cross-stitched that last line onto a pillow for Changmin when he left home.
Changmin dutifully tucked the pillow into his suitcase, but he just rolled his eyes at his parents’ concerns. He was moving into a dorm with four other guys, and he was pretty sure none of them were even remotely interested in stealing his Heart. Confident in his understanding of the way the two-Heart system worked, Changmin was sure that as long as he didn’t fall prey to casual affection and waited patiently for a True Love, then he wouldn’t lose his only Heart.
How hard could it be?
---
sweet simple things
On December 25, 2004, almost one year after the debut of Dong Bang Shin Ki, Kim Jaejoong gave the other four members his Heart for Christmas.
It was a really cute Heart, even by KPop idol standards. It was super round, and a little chubby; pure gold, but it shone silver-white when it caught the light. There were no jewels on it, but it seemed to sparkle on its own somehow. And, when Yunho took it out of the box with reverent hands, it glowed extra, extra bright.
Junsu thought it was the stupidest gift ever.
“You can’t give away your Second Heart like that, hyung!” he blurted out. “You’re going to be… Heartless.” Junsu could barely say the last word.
Jaejoong blinked slowly.
“This is my First Heart,” he said in a small voice, suddenly shy.
Yunho coughed.
Yoochun tried to distract Junsu with a package that had a bell on it.
“But everyone gives their First Heart away in, like, elementary school or something. No one keeps it past high school. That’s so lame.”
This time Yoochun hurled the package at Junsu’s face.
Surprisingly, it was Changmin who bodily hauled Junsu up and out of the living room, the stern look on his face staving off Junsu’s protests. Yoochun quickly patted Jaejoong on the head and assured him that it was a lovely gift, before he scrambled after the two youngest.
There was a long, drawn out moment of silence while Jaejoong fiddled with his sleeves, and Yunho hugged Jaejoong’s Heart.
The Heart glowed happily.
“It’s beautiful, Jaejoong, but--”
“Oh, sure. That’s okay.” Jaejoong held out his hand to take the Heart back. “We can just put it with the ones we get from the fans.”
“Nono!” Yunho looked alarmed as he clutched the Heart to his own chest, turning a bit to shelter it with his shoulder. “I’ll keep it! But just... um... I mean, this is so--” Yunho patted Jaejoong’s Heart gently. “And I don’t have... like... I can’t speak for the others but none of us can even… We can’t just... take it... right?”
Yunho looked so flustered that Jaejoong couldn’t help but laugh. He scooted over and laid his head on Yunho’s shoulder, contemplating his own Heart held so tenderly in Yunho’s broad hands.
“I’m not asking for your Hearts in exchange, any of them,” he said softly. “I gave you guys my Heart because I wanted to let you know that I love you, all of you, all of us, this Dong Bang Shin Ki thing, everything. If even one of you accepts it, then that’s good enough for me.”
They could hear Junsu and Yoochun pretending to gag from the hallway. And Changmin was saying something about how Yunho ought to give his precious stuffed toy, Bambi, as collateral for the Heart.
“Yeah, I promise we’ll take care of it. I’ll look after it myself. We’ll be okay,” Yunho said with a sweet smile and a light kiss to the top of Jaejoong’s head.
Jaejoong gave him a cheeky grin in return.
“I’m sure Changmin will make sure you don’t lose it.”
---
Tears in the Rain
The day before Jaejoong and Junsu were slated to move out of the Dong Bang apartment-for good-Changmin hit a whole new level of anger that he’d never before experienced or ever thought he was capable of experiencing. The emotion burned so white-hot in his chest that even he was a little afraid of it.
After breaking his third mug of the morning (just an inch from Jaejoong’s hand), Yunho sent him out to run it off. He wasn’t supposed to come back until he cooled down, but the way it was going, Changmin didn’t think he was ever going to be allowed back inside.
“You promised!” he screamed into the early morning fog rising over the Han river. “All of you! You promised me that we’d stay together! Kim Jaejoong, you selfish fucker, no wonder you only gave us your First Heart. You wouldn’t give your Second Heart to anyone but yourself! And Kim Junsu, you arrogant bastard, I’m going to tell everyone that you still have your First Heart like a loser! And you’re SHORT! Both of you are short!”
Changmin paused to take a breath.
Far off in the distance, a little tugboat sounded its horn.
“Park Yoochun…” Changmin hiccupped a little. “Park Yoochun, I hate you.”
He was at once startled and yet somehow not at all surprised when he felt himself suddenly being pulled backwards into a tight hug. But instead of the scrawny arms he’d been half expecting, it was a taller, broader body that he found himself leaning against.
“You don’t mean that,” Yunho whispered, voice husky.
Changmin tried to smack Yunho in the face, but Yunho, being leader, was well-versed in the ways of Shim Changmin and he’d pinned the maknae’s arms firmly to his side when he’d grabbed him.
“I do mean it. I mean all of it. They’re lying shitheads who never intended to stay. They can go die in a fire for all I care.”
Yunho pressed a kiss to Changmin’s jaw and held him tighter.
“We’ve talked about this,” he said chidingly. “One, you can’t keep telling people to go die in a fire, because that’s not nice. And two, you can’t bind people to you if it makes them unhappy. That’s also not nice.”
“I am going to rip Jaejoong’s Second Heart out of his chest and I’ll show you that I can bind him to us. All three of them. Don’t think Yoochun can get away from it either, because I know where he lives.”
He felt more than heard Yunho sigh before he was released. He looked down and in Yunho’s outstretched hand was the box that held Jaejoong’s golden First Heart.
“That means nothing. It’s just a stupid First Heart. Those things get dropped everywhere. See?” Changmin kicked at a little sparkly one that someone had left on the sidewalk. “He gave his up because he was in love with being famous, not because he loved us.”
Yunho opened the box and held it out to Changmin.
“Regardless of what’s going on right now, his Heart is still here, with us. But if you really believe that it’s useless, then go ahead and toss it into the river.”
Without hesitation, Changmin snatched the Heart out of the box and wound up to chuck it into the Han with all his might. Yunho’s eyes widened in surprise.
“What use is giving me this piece of junk if he’s leaving me anyway? They’re all leaving me.”
Nothing was said between them for a while, but Changmin’s arm remained cocked. And Yunho remained still.
When Changmin spoke again his voice was so small.
“I don’t want to throw it away.”
And he couldn’t tell if the drop of water on Yunho’s face was spray from the river, or a tear.
He reached up to touch his own damp cheeks.
Or maybe it was starting to rain.
---
snow and dirty rain
There was something wrong with Changmin. Something very wrong.
At first Yunho had attributed it to their comeback concept, the strong, confident, ‘Gods of the East’ image, rising from the ashes like a phoenix, glorious and resplendent. They walked tall, aloof, and proud. They answered uncomfortable questions with smooth, empty words, and they faced accusing glares with flawless, empty smiles. The media gushed over Changmin’s new ‘manliness’ and ‘maturity’, praising him for his coolness and composure. And Yunho tricked himself into believing that that’s all it was, just a public relations act, a mask for the occasion.
No fear, no nerves.
Focused only on that day’s work.
No anger, no resentment.
But then Yunho began to notice little things outside of work, little everyday things that were somehow just a bit off, just a little bit weird.
Like how his dirty socks were piling up in the corner of his room.
Like how the plant in the living room that had followed them from their very first apartment in 2004 was clearly wilted.
Like how every blanket in the apartment was piled on Changmin’s bed.
Like how they ran out of hot sauce a month ago.
Yunho ordered spicy fried chicken from their usual takeout place and asked for extra, extra chili sauce. Changmin caught him squeezing the sauce packets into a spare jar, fingers sticky and a good portion of it shared between the table and his pants.
“Okay, I know this looks bad. But I promise I’ll clean it up,” said Yunho with a bright smile, trying to look reassuring.
To his surprise, Changmin smiled back.
“I guess this is pretty funny,” Yunho said, chuckling.
Changmin made his right eye crinkle up to create his famous ‘mis-matched eyes’ look.
Yet he wasn’t actually laughing.
It was the same fake half-laugh he did for the cameras, except that they were alone in their own kitchen.
Yunho was watching Changmin, his Changmin, the real Changmin, slowly drift away, bit by bit. Sure, he wasn’t angry or sad anymore, but he wasn’t happy, or passionate, or excited anymore either. He didn’t hate anything, but he didn’t like anything. He was just...blank.
It was like living with a robot, a perfect automaton.
“What are you doing?” Yunho asked, surprised to see Changmin by himself in the living room for once in a long time.
“You left the TV on when you went for your shower,” he replied. “I think Jaejoong-hyung and the others started a new group.”
Yunho stared at Changmin, and Changmin stared back. After a little while, Changmin tried a small smile. When Yunho didn’t smile back, Changmin tried a small frown.
“Changmin, are you okay?”
“I broke a glass and cut my finger,” he responded, holding up his injured hand. “I was waiting for you to finish in the washroom.”
Yunho cursed and ran to get bandages, bypassing the bathroom as he remembered a huge box in his own night table stashed there back when Changmin had still cared whether Yunho lived or died. In his panicked state, he all but ripped the drawer off its runners. A small smartly wrapped box flew out, bounced off the front of his dresser and spilled its contents onto the floor.
A little, chubby golden Heart tumbled across the carpet and bumped into his foot.
Slowly, Yunho bent down to pick it up. It was still warm to the touch and it brought a smile to his face to hold it again. But when he went to put it back into its box, he frowned. There was something else buried in the shreds of packing foam that Changmin had once so carefully used to keep Jaejoong’s Heart cushioned and safe.
A chunk of something, like hematite.
A fractured portion of a Heart.
---
Rainbow
Because he’d been born with just one Heart, Changmin had spent his entire life being bombarded with reassurances from doctors, homeopaths, psychiatrists, and all kinds of other professionals that his Forever Heart was just as sturdy as any other Second Heart. As it turned out, a Heart of hematite was not that strong at all, and Changmin found it distressingly easy to pull his only Heart and fracture it into four even pieces. Of course, once the Heart was pulled, the distress quickly faded to a mild concern, which then fluttered away until Changmin could barely even remember why he was tucking pieces of his Heart amongst his group (ex) members’ possessions in the first place.
Many months later, Jaejoong discovered a mysterious chunk of hematite hidden in the stuffing of his favourite travel pillow. It had been well cushioned and he never would have found it except that his cat, Jiji, suddenly decided that the cushion had done him great personal wrong and summarily disembowelled it.
Then Yoochun found a piece of the iron-black stone in the bench of his baby grand piano, and Junsu found a similar stone in an old soccer cleat.
When Jaejoong lined up their three pieces in a certain order he could see where they might have once fit together along their fracture lines. The shape was so familiar, and something thumped in his own chest in response. Jaejoong suspected…
Nevertheless, he was still unprepared when Yunho called him in a panic and stuttered out his worries about Changmin’s increasingly zombie-like behaviour.
“I think I found a piece of Changmin’s Heart.”
Everything fell into place.
“Jung Yunho!” Jaejoong bellowed. “How could you let him lose his Heart? You know he only has the one!”
There was a fairly significant pause.
“I... did not know.”
Yunho was stunned. If Changmin only had the one Heart, and Yunho had found a piece of it in his night table, then that meant Yunho was currently holding a piece of Changmin’s Forever Heart, which meant that Changmin was nowHeartless. A person couldn’t live Heartless, or at least no one had been able to do it for more than a couple of years. Not only did you stop feeling, you stopped caring... about anything. Eventually, you’d just lose your desire to continue maintaining your current state of aliveness.
Yunho’s hand tightened around the hematite fragment and felt calming warmth spread up through his arm to touch his own Heart in his chest. The fragment was still alive. It wasn’t broken, but split.
Somehow, Changmin not only pulled his Forever Heart on purpose, but then managed against all odds to willingly fracture it for the sake of his brothers even as he began to lose the ability to understand why he was doing it.
But… no one had ever split a Second Heart (Forever Heart) before because people only had one True Love so it was unnecessary.
Maybe then Changmin was different. Maybe he wasn’t lost…
A split meant that each portion of the Heart retained a part of the soul that it held. Jaejoong begged Yunho to at least put his part of Changmin’s Heart back into Changmin’s chest until they could figure out what to do. He argued that if there was still some soul in it, then it might help. But everyone knew that once a Heart was given, whether in whole or in part, it could not be retracted.
Together, the four men spent weeks consulting as many specialists as Changmin’s parents had consulted when Changmin was born, but the prognosis was the same across the board. If you could not mend a broken Heart, you could not mend a split Heart. And no one in the world would trade their Second Heart for a mere piece of Changmin’s Forever Heart, if Changmin could even find a True Love in his current state. Or, rather, if one of the guys could even consider re-gifting their piece of Changmin’s Forever Heart. In short, Changmin was doomed to remain Heartless, and he’d done it to himself.
But Yunho, Jaejoong, Yoochun, and Junsu had never known how to bow down to the words ‘impossible’ and ‘cannot’. And Junsu was the first to point out that anything Changmin could do, they could all do just as well.
Changmin woke up to the ugliest Heart he had ever seen just inches from his nose. It was a strange conglomerate of solid grey-black tungsten, sheer white quartz, peachy-pink flecked granite, and deep red ruby. The weight of it dented his pillow almost to his mattress.
He blinked a couple of times, but otherwise remained motionless, staring at the Franken-Heart in front of him.
Yunho rose slowly from somewhere behind the Heart and peeked over the top to stare at Changmin. After a couple of seconds, Yunho reached out, and very, very carefully pushed it towards Changmin’s face. The strange Heart wobbled down the slope of the pillow and bumped hard into Changmin’s nose.
“Oops! I’m so sorry!” Yunho said sheepishly.
But in his hurry to apologize and comfort Changmin, Yunho scrambled fully onto the bed, and ended up pushing Changmin right over the far edge in a tangle of limbs and blankets.
Yunho peered down with a worried expression on his face, but Changmin just blinked at him.
So Yunho held out the Heart and plopped it onto Changmin’s chest.
He smiled hopefully.
“Good morning, hyung,” said Changmin, stiffly, formally.
Yunho looked crestfallen.
From somewhere on Changmin’s left, someone reached over and patted the Heart, forcefully, pushing it hard against his chest.
Changmin’s eyes widened when Jaejoong’s face suddenly appeared in his line of vision.
“Do you feel different yet?”
Junsu and Yoochun peered eagerly over Yunho’s shoulder, and, one after the other, the three of them added their hands to Jaejoong’s over the Heart.
“How about now?”
As one the four held their breath…
“Ow,” said Changmin, a strange look of confusion and amazement on his face. “I think you broke a rib. It hurts.”
… and released it.
Changmin added his hand on top of the others, and then he smiled the tiniest smile up at his brothers, his family. Finally, a smile that reached his eyes.
In a world where everyone waited and hoped and prayed for a single True Love with whom to exchange Second Hearts...Shim Changmin, Jung Yunho, Kim Jaejoong, Park Yoochun, and Kim Junsu each held in their chests, a new Forever Heart that was made up of a rainbow of pieces from the Hearts of the other four.
---
END
Author: samikitty
Recipient: kiccy
Word count: 3474
Characters: Changmin, Jaejoong, Yunho, Junsu, Yoochun (OTFamily)
Rating: PG (for language)
Summary: A kind of AU... it's DBSK in a world where people are born with two Hearts, the First easily given to infatuation and the Second traded only with your True Love, but Changmin is born with just one. He learns that giving your only heart to the people who matter most to you isn't such a sacrifice after all.
Author's Notes: soo.... i sort of got carried away with this challenge. it's one story told through 5 flashfics. haha... >_> *cough* hahahaha. also, there's a little bit of lawsuit!angst, but it's a happy ending, promise! ^^;;;; happy holidays!!!
beta'd by the lovely reunionstory
heart under his heart
In a world where everyone was born with two Hearts, one to lose and one to cherish, Shim Changmin was born with only one.
This Heart ‘defect’ actually bothered his parents more than it bothered him.
As far as Changmin understood it, First Hearts were just pretty, sparkly things, made of semi-precious gems and weak metals; easily pulled from your chest and tossed at the first pretty girl or boy that crossed your path. They were fragile things, warm, but quick to cool, solid, but easily damaged. Anything could make them beat faster, a smile, a gesture, or even something so trivial as a fancy bag.
People dropped their First Hearts everywhere. They still held feelings, of course, but you could break them, split them, give them away for free, without any substantial risk or lasting damage to yourself. They were practically disposable.
On the other hand, Second Hearts, Forever Hearts, were solid, stable things, made of impermeable stones and strong metals, reliable, unbreakable, and everlasting. They weren’t always the most aesthetically pleasing things, but they were the core of a person’s soul and their worth was not measured by sparkles and pretty colours. Changmin was glad when the doctors had assured him that his only Heart was strong, sturdy like a Forever Heart.
Because if First Hearts were meant to be casually given to an infatuation where reciprocation was a mere coincidence, Second Hearts were intended for that one person who you could trust to take care of your soul, your True Love. People didn’t give their Second Hearts to just anyone. And no one gave their Second Heart away if they weren’t assured of one from their True Love in return.
Otherwise, you’d be left Heartless.
A fate worse than death.
Changmin’s parents worried desperately that, with only one Heart, he wasn’t properly equipped to go out into the world. What if someone tricked him into losing his Heart? Or what if he gave it away willingly but someone broke it and he didn’t have another Heart to fall back on like everyone else? It was too easy for Changmin to become Heartless.
“You must never let anyone know you only have one Heart. You have to guard it carefully,” they told him, over and over. “And even if you find your True Love, don’t give your Heart away first. You make sure they give you their Second Heart before you even pull yours from your chest.”
They were so adamant in their words that it became a family mantra. Changmin’s mother even cross-stitched that last line onto a pillow for Changmin when he left home.
Changmin dutifully tucked the pillow into his suitcase, but he just rolled his eyes at his parents’ concerns. He was moving into a dorm with four other guys, and he was pretty sure none of them were even remotely interested in stealing his Heart. Confident in his understanding of the way the two-Heart system worked, Changmin was sure that as long as he didn’t fall prey to casual affection and waited patiently for a True Love, then he wouldn’t lose his only Heart.
How hard could it be?
---
sweet simple things
On December 25, 2004, almost one year after the debut of Dong Bang Shin Ki, Kim Jaejoong gave the other four members his Heart for Christmas.
It was a really cute Heart, even by KPop idol standards. It was super round, and a little chubby; pure gold, but it shone silver-white when it caught the light. There were no jewels on it, but it seemed to sparkle on its own somehow. And, when Yunho took it out of the box with reverent hands, it glowed extra, extra bright.
Junsu thought it was the stupidest gift ever.
“You can’t give away your Second Heart like that, hyung!” he blurted out. “You’re going to be… Heartless.” Junsu could barely say the last word.
Jaejoong blinked slowly.
“This is my First Heart,” he said in a small voice, suddenly shy.
Yunho coughed.
Yoochun tried to distract Junsu with a package that had a bell on it.
“But everyone gives their First Heart away in, like, elementary school or something. No one keeps it past high school. That’s so lame.”
This time Yoochun hurled the package at Junsu’s face.
Surprisingly, it was Changmin who bodily hauled Junsu up and out of the living room, the stern look on his face staving off Junsu’s protests. Yoochun quickly patted Jaejoong on the head and assured him that it was a lovely gift, before he scrambled after the two youngest.
There was a long, drawn out moment of silence while Jaejoong fiddled with his sleeves, and Yunho hugged Jaejoong’s Heart.
The Heart glowed happily.
“It’s beautiful, Jaejoong, but--”
“Oh, sure. That’s okay.” Jaejoong held out his hand to take the Heart back. “We can just put it with the ones we get from the fans.”
“Nono!” Yunho looked alarmed as he clutched the Heart to his own chest, turning a bit to shelter it with his shoulder. “I’ll keep it! But just... um... I mean, this is so--” Yunho patted Jaejoong’s Heart gently. “And I don’t have... like... I can’t speak for the others but none of us can even… We can’t just... take it... right?”
Yunho looked so flustered that Jaejoong couldn’t help but laugh. He scooted over and laid his head on Yunho’s shoulder, contemplating his own Heart held so tenderly in Yunho’s broad hands.
“I’m not asking for your Hearts in exchange, any of them,” he said softly. “I gave you guys my Heart because I wanted to let you know that I love you, all of you, all of us, this Dong Bang Shin Ki thing, everything. If even one of you accepts it, then that’s good enough for me.”
They could hear Junsu and Yoochun pretending to gag from the hallway. And Changmin was saying something about how Yunho ought to give his precious stuffed toy, Bambi, as collateral for the Heart.
“Yeah, I promise we’ll take care of it. I’ll look after it myself. We’ll be okay,” Yunho said with a sweet smile and a light kiss to the top of Jaejoong’s head.
Jaejoong gave him a cheeky grin in return.
“I’m sure Changmin will make sure you don’t lose it.”
---
Tears in the Rain
The day before Jaejoong and Junsu were slated to move out of the Dong Bang apartment-for good-Changmin hit a whole new level of anger that he’d never before experienced or ever thought he was capable of experiencing. The emotion burned so white-hot in his chest that even he was a little afraid of it.
After breaking his third mug of the morning (just an inch from Jaejoong’s hand), Yunho sent him out to run it off. He wasn’t supposed to come back until he cooled down, but the way it was going, Changmin didn’t think he was ever going to be allowed back inside.
“You promised!” he screamed into the early morning fog rising over the Han river. “All of you! You promised me that we’d stay together! Kim Jaejoong, you selfish fucker, no wonder you only gave us your First Heart. You wouldn’t give your Second Heart to anyone but yourself! And Kim Junsu, you arrogant bastard, I’m going to tell everyone that you still have your First Heart like a loser! And you’re SHORT! Both of you are short!”
Changmin paused to take a breath.
Far off in the distance, a little tugboat sounded its horn.
“Park Yoochun…” Changmin hiccupped a little. “Park Yoochun, I hate you.”
He was at once startled and yet somehow not at all surprised when he felt himself suddenly being pulled backwards into a tight hug. But instead of the scrawny arms he’d been half expecting, it was a taller, broader body that he found himself leaning against.
“You don’t mean that,” Yunho whispered, voice husky.
Changmin tried to smack Yunho in the face, but Yunho, being leader, was well-versed in the ways of Shim Changmin and he’d pinned the maknae’s arms firmly to his side when he’d grabbed him.
“I do mean it. I mean all of it. They’re lying shitheads who never intended to stay. They can go die in a fire for all I care.”
Yunho pressed a kiss to Changmin’s jaw and held him tighter.
“We’ve talked about this,” he said chidingly. “One, you can’t keep telling people to go die in a fire, because that’s not nice. And two, you can’t bind people to you if it makes them unhappy. That’s also not nice.”
“I am going to rip Jaejoong’s Second Heart out of his chest and I’ll show you that I can bind him to us. All three of them. Don’t think Yoochun can get away from it either, because I know where he lives.”
He felt more than heard Yunho sigh before he was released. He looked down and in Yunho’s outstretched hand was the box that held Jaejoong’s golden First Heart.
“That means nothing. It’s just a stupid First Heart. Those things get dropped everywhere. See?” Changmin kicked at a little sparkly one that someone had left on the sidewalk. “He gave his up because he was in love with being famous, not because he loved us.”
Yunho opened the box and held it out to Changmin.
“Regardless of what’s going on right now, his Heart is still here, with us. But if you really believe that it’s useless, then go ahead and toss it into the river.”
Without hesitation, Changmin snatched the Heart out of the box and wound up to chuck it into the Han with all his might. Yunho’s eyes widened in surprise.
“What use is giving me this piece of junk if he’s leaving me anyway? They’re all leaving me.”
Nothing was said between them for a while, but Changmin’s arm remained cocked. And Yunho remained still.
When Changmin spoke again his voice was so small.
“I don’t want to throw it away.”
And he couldn’t tell if the drop of water on Yunho’s face was spray from the river, or a tear.
He reached up to touch his own damp cheeks.
Or maybe it was starting to rain.
---
snow and dirty rain
There was something wrong with Changmin. Something very wrong.
At first Yunho had attributed it to their comeback concept, the strong, confident, ‘Gods of the East’ image, rising from the ashes like a phoenix, glorious and resplendent. They walked tall, aloof, and proud. They answered uncomfortable questions with smooth, empty words, and they faced accusing glares with flawless, empty smiles. The media gushed over Changmin’s new ‘manliness’ and ‘maturity’, praising him for his coolness and composure. And Yunho tricked himself into believing that that’s all it was, just a public relations act, a mask for the occasion.
No fear, no nerves.
Focused only on that day’s work.
No anger, no resentment.
But then Yunho began to notice little things outside of work, little everyday things that were somehow just a bit off, just a little bit weird.
Like how his dirty socks were piling up in the corner of his room.
Like how the plant in the living room that had followed them from their very first apartment in 2004 was clearly wilted.
Like how every blanket in the apartment was piled on Changmin’s bed.
Like how they ran out of hot sauce a month ago.
Yunho ordered spicy fried chicken from their usual takeout place and asked for extra, extra chili sauce. Changmin caught him squeezing the sauce packets into a spare jar, fingers sticky and a good portion of it shared between the table and his pants.
“Okay, I know this looks bad. But I promise I’ll clean it up,” said Yunho with a bright smile, trying to look reassuring.
To his surprise, Changmin smiled back.
“I guess this is pretty funny,” Yunho said, chuckling.
Changmin made his right eye crinkle up to create his famous ‘mis-matched eyes’ look.
Yet he wasn’t actually laughing.
It was the same fake half-laugh he did for the cameras, except that they were alone in their own kitchen.
Yunho was watching Changmin, his Changmin, the real Changmin, slowly drift away, bit by bit. Sure, he wasn’t angry or sad anymore, but he wasn’t happy, or passionate, or excited anymore either. He didn’t hate anything, but he didn’t like anything. He was just...blank.
It was like living with a robot, a perfect automaton.
“What are you doing?” Yunho asked, surprised to see Changmin by himself in the living room for once in a long time.
“You left the TV on when you went for your shower,” he replied. “I think Jaejoong-hyung and the others started a new group.”
Yunho stared at Changmin, and Changmin stared back. After a little while, Changmin tried a small smile. When Yunho didn’t smile back, Changmin tried a small frown.
“Changmin, are you okay?”
“I broke a glass and cut my finger,” he responded, holding up his injured hand. “I was waiting for you to finish in the washroom.”
Yunho cursed and ran to get bandages, bypassing the bathroom as he remembered a huge box in his own night table stashed there back when Changmin had still cared whether Yunho lived or died. In his panicked state, he all but ripped the drawer off its runners. A small smartly wrapped box flew out, bounced off the front of his dresser and spilled its contents onto the floor.
A little, chubby golden Heart tumbled across the carpet and bumped into his foot.
Slowly, Yunho bent down to pick it up. It was still warm to the touch and it brought a smile to his face to hold it again. But when he went to put it back into its box, he frowned. There was something else buried in the shreds of packing foam that Changmin had once so carefully used to keep Jaejoong’s Heart cushioned and safe.
A chunk of something, like hematite.
A fractured portion of a Heart.
---
Rainbow
Because he’d been born with just one Heart, Changmin had spent his entire life being bombarded with reassurances from doctors, homeopaths, psychiatrists, and all kinds of other professionals that his Forever Heart was just as sturdy as any other Second Heart. As it turned out, a Heart of hematite was not that strong at all, and Changmin found it distressingly easy to pull his only Heart and fracture it into four even pieces. Of course, once the Heart was pulled, the distress quickly faded to a mild concern, which then fluttered away until Changmin could barely even remember why he was tucking pieces of his Heart amongst his group (ex) members’ possessions in the first place.
Many months later, Jaejoong discovered a mysterious chunk of hematite hidden in the stuffing of his favourite travel pillow. It had been well cushioned and he never would have found it except that his cat, Jiji, suddenly decided that the cushion had done him great personal wrong and summarily disembowelled it.
Then Yoochun found a piece of the iron-black stone in the bench of his baby grand piano, and Junsu found a similar stone in an old soccer cleat.
When Jaejoong lined up their three pieces in a certain order he could see where they might have once fit together along their fracture lines. The shape was so familiar, and something thumped in his own chest in response. Jaejoong suspected…
Nevertheless, he was still unprepared when Yunho called him in a panic and stuttered out his worries about Changmin’s increasingly zombie-like behaviour.
“I think I found a piece of Changmin’s Heart.”
Everything fell into place.
“Jung Yunho!” Jaejoong bellowed. “How could you let him lose his Heart? You know he only has the one!”
There was a fairly significant pause.
“I... did not know.”
Yunho was stunned. If Changmin only had the one Heart, and Yunho had found a piece of it in his night table, then that meant Yunho was currently holding a piece of Changmin’s Forever Heart, which meant that Changmin was nowHeartless. A person couldn’t live Heartless, or at least no one had been able to do it for more than a couple of years. Not only did you stop feeling, you stopped caring... about anything. Eventually, you’d just lose your desire to continue maintaining your current state of aliveness.
Yunho’s hand tightened around the hematite fragment and felt calming warmth spread up through his arm to touch his own Heart in his chest. The fragment was still alive. It wasn’t broken, but split.
Somehow, Changmin not only pulled his Forever Heart on purpose, but then managed against all odds to willingly fracture it for the sake of his brothers even as he began to lose the ability to understand why he was doing it.
But… no one had ever split a Second Heart (Forever Heart) before because people only had one True Love so it was unnecessary.
Maybe then Changmin was different. Maybe he wasn’t lost…
A split meant that each portion of the Heart retained a part of the soul that it held. Jaejoong begged Yunho to at least put his part of Changmin’s Heart back into Changmin’s chest until they could figure out what to do. He argued that if there was still some soul in it, then it might help. But everyone knew that once a Heart was given, whether in whole or in part, it could not be retracted.
Together, the four men spent weeks consulting as many specialists as Changmin’s parents had consulted when Changmin was born, but the prognosis was the same across the board. If you could not mend a broken Heart, you could not mend a split Heart. And no one in the world would trade their Second Heart for a mere piece of Changmin’s Forever Heart, if Changmin could even find a True Love in his current state. Or, rather, if one of the guys could even consider re-gifting their piece of Changmin’s Forever Heart. In short, Changmin was doomed to remain Heartless, and he’d done it to himself.
But Yunho, Jaejoong, Yoochun, and Junsu had never known how to bow down to the words ‘impossible’ and ‘cannot’. And Junsu was the first to point out that anything Changmin could do, they could all do just as well.
Changmin woke up to the ugliest Heart he had ever seen just inches from his nose. It was a strange conglomerate of solid grey-black tungsten, sheer white quartz, peachy-pink flecked granite, and deep red ruby. The weight of it dented his pillow almost to his mattress.
He blinked a couple of times, but otherwise remained motionless, staring at the Franken-Heart in front of him.
Yunho rose slowly from somewhere behind the Heart and peeked over the top to stare at Changmin. After a couple of seconds, Yunho reached out, and very, very carefully pushed it towards Changmin’s face. The strange Heart wobbled down the slope of the pillow and bumped hard into Changmin’s nose.
“Oops! I’m so sorry!” Yunho said sheepishly.
But in his hurry to apologize and comfort Changmin, Yunho scrambled fully onto the bed, and ended up pushing Changmin right over the far edge in a tangle of limbs and blankets.
Yunho peered down with a worried expression on his face, but Changmin just blinked at him.
So Yunho held out the Heart and plopped it onto Changmin’s chest.
He smiled hopefully.
“Good morning, hyung,” said Changmin, stiffly, formally.
Yunho looked crestfallen.
From somewhere on Changmin’s left, someone reached over and patted the Heart, forcefully, pushing it hard against his chest.
Changmin’s eyes widened when Jaejoong’s face suddenly appeared in his line of vision.
“Do you feel different yet?”
Junsu and Yoochun peered eagerly over Yunho’s shoulder, and, one after the other, the three of them added their hands to Jaejoong’s over the Heart.
“How about now?”
As one the four held their breath…
“Ow,” said Changmin, a strange look of confusion and amazement on his face. “I think you broke a rib. It hurts.”
… and released it.
Changmin added his hand on top of the others, and then he smiled the tiniest smile up at his brothers, his family. Finally, a smile that reached his eyes.
In a world where everyone waited and hoped and prayed for a single True Love with whom to exchange Second Hearts...Shim Changmin, Jung Yunho, Kim Jaejoong, Park Yoochun, and Kim Junsu each held in their chests, a new Forever Heart that was made up of a rainbow of pieces from the Hearts of the other four.
---
END