sunday punch - minho/jonghyun - 1/1
1/1
Minho/Jonghyun
R - 4883w
The match was over by knockout in two rounds; whether it was Jonghyun or coincidence, Minho didn't know, but there was no lie in his cheering and fist pumping and after the small crowd waned, when Jonghyun hugged him, Minho let out a breath he didn't realise he was holding.
» Boxing AU
Sunday Punch [suhn-dey puhnch]
noun
-- A knockout blow. A hard punch, knockout punch or KO punch that renders an opponent unable to continue fighting.
Jonghyun was there when Minho won his first gold.
Before Jonghyun joined, all Minho's winnings had been unofficial cash prizes. The match was over by knockout in two rounds; whether it was Jonghyun or coincidence, Minho didn't know, but there was no lie in his cheering and fist pumping and after the small crowd waned, when Jonghyun hugged him, Minho let out a breath he didn't realise he was holding.
That was when it started.
On most days, it didn't make a difference; it only ever did when they were apart. Minho was working on a medicine ball when Jonghyun walked in, school tie clutched in his right hand and backpack in his left, wearing a flavour of distaste one can only acquire through a rough day at school. He threw them both to the side.
Minho was deemed a protégé after he stepped over his first opponent, knocked out cold within the first round, and then snagged up as many names as he did jump rope double-unders every morning. Minho was the kind of guy who would have moves named in his honour, an Ali rope-a-dope or a Robinson sugar cane, stemming humbly from an inside joke and picked up by a journalist with just enough pull. It wasn't rocket science. Jonghyun, on the other hand, boxed because he wanted to- had the money, had the drive, had the fall back plan if this didn't work out. They'd made a pact earlier on when Jonghyun found out Minho had dropped out for boxing: that Jonghyun wouldn't be jealous, and in exchange, neither would Minho.
"Sup," Jonghyun said through his uniform while tugging the shirt over his head; his skin was lighter than Minho's, but only by a shade.
"Hey," Minho spun the ball. "How was the match yesterday?" It wasn't an important one and Minho knew it would be a walkover for Jonghyun but he was still upset about missing it. He considered apologizing again, but he decided Jonghyun didn't need that.
"Eh, tomato can." Jonghyun gestured to the ball.
Minho paused before passing it. "You or him?"
"Ha ha," Jonghyun mocked, hurling it back. "Nah, he actually wasn't bad. Probably would've won if my hands were tied," Jonghyun added, and Minho could tell he wanted to laugh at his own joke. The hallway light caught his hair.
Minho tilted his head. Jonghyun's movements were mostly unplanned but deliberate. He looked like an idiot a lot of the time and it would actually be funny if Jonghyun wasn't so conscious about it, mocking himself as though trying to prove he was okay with being kind of weird. It was a different case in the ring, though: Jonghyun could double bluff on his life because even though Minho was well aware Jonghyun had issues with thinking things through, Jonghyun's opponents weren't.
Jonghyun looked up seriously. "Got called up for ditching again." There was no regret in his voice. The boy had the time to box, too, but still cut class to make more of it.
"Oh."
"Yeah. It's okay though."
Minho nodded. "So how's everything else?"
Jonghyun shrugged. "You know."
Minho didn't, not really.
Jonghyun joined the gym not long after Minho but that was the only thing they had in common. Jonghyun was impulsive, insightful, he was never off the fence. He was a brawler, a swarmer while Minho was the opposite even before he even knew about hooks and jabs, was a man of tradition. Maybe that was why they got along so well, the new boys who learned to orbit each other when nobody was looking, gravitating in between bodily scuffles and mutual kinship.
If Minho had it his way, he wouldn't be here, at least not for the reasons he was here now. Boxing wasn't to him what it was to Jonghyun, the white collared boxer from the other side of town. Jonghyun could feel the adrenaline of boxing without the stakes to rile him up, while Minho played to win because the gold was where his eyes were but the money was what kept his mother fed, and that scared him enough to keep him going, jabbing at his shadow, bandage over bandage.
They weren't the new boys anymore though, and as such, Minho thought his curiosity had gotten a little stale.
Minho wasn't sure when the transition took place and boxing became synonymous with Jonghyun. It made sense, but still. He found himself stitching break times together into a mental spreadsheet of Jonghyun's life, the things Minho could wheedle out of him.
If Jonghyun ever caught on to it, then that was half his work done, especially since Minho's learnt now that it requires a certain kind of intelligence to be oblivious like Jonghyun is.
"Guess what you're doing this Saturday?" Jonghyun asked Minho conversationally.
"What?" Minho replied, as though he didn't already check Jonghyun's match chart.
"Coming to my game," Jonghyun grinned in a half joke. It was the same invitation as it always was, intact with the lurk of distrust because Jonghyun never expected to be wanted. He just hoped, which Minho found ridiculous, because of course he wanted to be there.
What happened at the gym was pretty standard. There were two different charts. Minho's is of matches for the semi professional players with highlighted scrawls under some of the opponents' names, and a range of trainers assigned according to skill level. The other one, Jonghyun's one, was simpler, drawn at the beginning of every quarter.
There was a reason to Minho's constant goading. It almost spoke for itself, the way Jonghyun's nose crinkled in threat, the way he advanced until they were within breathing space just to back off again skittishly. It was sort of cute. Minho sort of loved it, but at the same time hated it, too.
Jonghyun's smiles he reserved for better days, like today. The halls were sparsely lit when less people were getting in their hours, and with the swaying light on him, Jonghyun reminded Minho of the grainy boxing prints inside the head office, raw victory in black and white. Jonghyun looked like that sometimes. Minho would stare at him and think of how Jonghyun made it all seem so easy.
"Alright hyung," he said, and this was what he sometimes waited whole days for, the easy smile spreading across Jonghyun's entire face, teeth held so precariously Minho almost expected a wagging tongue to break free and lap at his face.
It didn't happen, but Jonghyun did puff his chest out happily, which propelled Minho's smile into a full-on laugh.
With Jonghyun, Minho learned spending hours in joint physical exertion didn't equate to a normal friendship. They would always be boxers before they were teenagers.
Jonghyun had told him once, "you don't talk much. As in, I don't think it's because you haven't got much to say." At the time Minho told him lies about his older brother's opinions taking precedence over his own.
Jonghyun had quirked an eyebrow but left it at that. In a move that shocked even himself, Minho clapped chalk into Jonghyun's face until he choked from laughter and squirmed under Minho's weight. He rubbed his nose into Minho's shirt, howling "Not the face! Not the moneymaker!" and Minho gave him a chalky noogie.
Jonghyun took the cue and didn't mention it again.
So maybe they weren't meant to be friends. Jonghyun didn't bring up much of anything after that, probably thought Minho needed space. That was the thing, Jonghyun sometimes forgot not everyone was like him. Space was something Jonghyun needed, not Minho.
And sure, on most days, it didn't make a difference, but on some days it did. The days where as Minho rose with the winter sun and remembered he took the subway to the gym because he couldn't afford long run investments like cars; those things were for people like Jonghyun. Minho fingered the ticket stub in his hand and wondered how it would have played out if they'd met under different circumstances.
It was one of the times when Jonghyun arrived earlier than Minho. Jonghyun staked his claim by extending his arm across at the door and making a robotic noise. "Password." His biceps flexed threateningly.
Minho rolled his eyes. "Feeling brave, today, are you?" He leaned close, smirking down at the boy.
Jonghyun snorted. "Come on, little man, I can take you," he beckoned, patting the doorway with his gloves. And it wasn't funny at all, but shit, Minho laughed anyway, laughed until Jonghyun frowned and rubbed his neck and in a moment of sobriety, Minho took his chance and sidled past him. He ignored the heat of Jonghyun's shoulders on his palms. "Hey!" Jonghyun called, voice echoing into the foyer.
Inside the changing room, Minho closed the door behind him and flexed his hands.
So, yes, he is Choi Minho, small time boxer with big time potential but for now, he's making by whilst crushing on his best friend, though the title wasn't worth a great deal nor was it reciprocated. Jonghyun for his own part didn't ease the momentum of Minho's downfall much, if at all. For example: Jonghyun liked to sing in the showers.
In his defence, Jonghyun was a great singer, which left little room for Minho to dislike the times when he sang bubblegum pop on the days when they trained for long enough to drop their inhibitions. Minho knew the reason Jonghyun never sang ballads was because, hell, who sings that kind of stuff in a shower, but that didn't mean Jonghyun didn't like to, and didn't want to show it off. Minho pretends not to notice his strange inferiority complex towards him.
Except today Jonghyun was quiet. Or at least, as far as Minho could discern. There were those days, too, with both of them on the receiving end of each other's silence because sometimes they were both just too tense, wired too tightly for it. Minho for the most part was too preoccupied with his own issues to care, to think of how he much preferred the way Jonghyun became feverish sometimes. Not the same kind of excitable he became when he knew people were looking, but anxious, though he tried to be cool about it. Minho had long learnt to appreciate the subway nights before a big game where Jonghyun was a ridiculous combination of excitedly flushed skin and bright clothes, languid, pressed against the side of Minho's black shirt.
"You're watching this time, right?" Jonghyun would say, looking like he would probably attach something lame like 'be my moral support' onto the end of the question if he knew Minho wouldn't hold it against him. Minho just assured Jonghyun he'd show up, nodding even as his chin tickled against Jonghyun's hair. It was dyed brown, like Jonghyun was proving to himself that he wasn't a dud and had other interests besides skipping school and boxing. Minho kept his hair short because it was the most practical thing to do, because he was a serious sportsman, but the truth was, Minho could play background if that was what Jonghyun wanted.
So Minho thought nothing of it and flung his towel onto a hook, looking up just in time to see-
Jonghyun. Jonghyun far from tense, Jonghyun, eyes closed with his head thrown back and his wrist flexing up and down over his cock, getting himself off, face contorted painfully and shuddering straight to the hairs on Minho's nape. Feverish and excitable, but not the same as when he knew people were looking. Minho watched the way the water ran over his hands and then back up to the way Jonghyun bit his lip, moan hitching, and the noise was all Minho needed to startle for his towel and hightail the fuck out of there.
Stupid, careless Jonghyun, making other people pay for his mistakes.
It wasn't like it wasn't bound to happen. Minho had had his suspicions in the past about the way Jonghyun would stay in the shower after Minho had left, and Minho wouldn't deny to having jacked off in the communal showers when he was alone. No biggie. Except it was, it was the kind of thing that left Minho deaf and dumb as he situated himself at a heavy bag in case Jonghyun came back out and, god, Jonghyun.
Minho didn't know how long he stood there with his forehead to the leather in a limp-legged and losing battle to just leave, until Jonghyun clapped him on the shoulder and asked if he was ready.
"Yeah," he said.
Jonghyun was in his own stretch of comfortable silence, meaning it was probably best that he was walking in a sprightly pace, with Minho trailing behind. Minho grimaced all the way to the entrance and excused himself before they reached the subway, saying he had to go and buy something for his mother, and that Jonghyun could go ahead without him.
"You sure?" Jonghyun said, adjusting his duffel bag with his left hand - the same hand that - and Minho could barely oblige to a nod before he was walking away. It wasn't like it wasn't bound to happen, Minho reflected, but the same sentiment didn't apply to his reaction.
Later that night after Minho flung off his sweaty covers and angrily jerked himself off to the image of Jonghyun biting his lip and pumping himself under the pelting spray, Minho decided he preferred the curiosity.
It was a particularly reckless Spring night when Minho almost told Jonghyun everything. Not the shower incident, Minho wasn't so stupid where he would jeopardize his dignity, but everything else.
It was late enough for Minho to think he was alone, but their shadows always seemed to find each other, even in the dingier training rooms where the walls were thin and part of Minho's speed bag was bound in duct tape. Protégé or not Minho's gym was still kind of shitty. Jonghyun walked in, freshly changed, and Minho's arms dropped - the punching bag swayed in front of him - watching the other boy head towards the window.
Minho tried to speak, the words shrivelling in his throat as Jonghyun unhooked the latch, looking back at him as though to say if I'm going to stay here with you it won't be in the stench of your sweat. Minho just stared.
"What?" Jonghyun said, and Minho shook his head, nothing, but Jonghyun was too intent on leaning back on the sill and looking at the view to really pay attention. It was only when Jonghyun looked up and noticed Minho was still staring that he pressed on.
"Hey, no really. Is something wrong?" He paused thoughtfully, "'cause, you know, between me and you, we could take down anyone we wanted." It was stupid, but a lot of the things Jonghyun said were stupid so this wasn't way below par. Minho was about to retort but then Jonghyun smiled, unchaste and obviously waiting for Minho to laugh. He didn't. Not that he couldn't help it, he just didn't really fucking want to anymore.
Jonghyun hesitated then, abandoning the view to half jokingly press his hand to Minho's forehead. "You okay, man?"
Fast forward a few days and Minho wouldn't remember much of what he said, he'd called Jonghyun many names. Charming, annoying, clever.
"Clever?" Jonghyun had sputtered. "How could you say that? You're so, I dunno, solid. Jaw of granite and stuff. I'm just a bunch of odds and ends you know? I always have been." Jonghyun's eyebrows were furrowed. He didn't understand. Of course he wouldn't. Jonghyun had mentioned once that Minho would beat him if they were ever to take aptitude tests.This was probably what Jonghyun meant.
If he were to be honest, Minho really only saw him as a bunch of odds and ends too, but not the same way Jonghyun thought. Jonghyun was an open question. He had no problem with playing along to the beat of others: the moodmaker, the foolhardy, the excitable. Minho could play along too, should have from the beginning, but there was no closing a can of worms already open - sometimes he wanted to shake Jonghyun and tell him to quit it, say something real for once. Minho thought he'd have to make do with what he had.
The first time Minho noticed how truly little he knew about Jonghyun wasn't until he was too late to the taking. It was summer and while Minho didn't like the job applications at the bottom of Jonghyun's duffel bag, the real problem was Jonghyun smiling at his phone, bent over the screen as if he had a secret too good to tell, murmuring the last few words of his phone calls. Minho saw a name flash across the screen during one of their late night scrimmages. It was also the first time Minho considered Jonghyun being anything other than straight, and it took him by surprise.
Jonghyun had released him from the headlock and Minho stumbled back, vision spinning. When he looked up at Jonghyun there were black spots in his periphery but he saw the way Jonghyun pocketed his phone, met his gaze in consideration. Slow, like he was wishing for something.
Minho didn't say anything, tried to ignore the defeat in Jonghyun's face when he looked away.
It was like a catalyst. Minho was wired to oscillate around competition, sensitized to challenges, told to eliminate fear until near blindness and then to tackle them. Except Jonghyun wasn't a challenge for his track record, and these things don't happen to Minho. Minho couldn't finish high school, Minho had a brother whose last words to him were "I'm leaving, kiddo," Minho wasn't trained for this kind of game.
It wasn't the same kind of loss, therefore, that bugged him when he didn't say anything, despite the elitism which told him he understood better, had been there longer. Minho knew not to mess with someone else's laurels. Minho knew respect.
He was handsome, Minho admitted upon their first meeting. Not handsome like Minho was. He was refined, with eyes like slate and clothes that smelt of raw prestige. He trailed behind Jonghyun into the training room, smiled when they shook hands, and Minho was surprised when Kim Key-when-I'm-famous Kibum didn't wipe Minho's sweat from his palm.
"You know how to pick them," he said softly when Kibum was gone, and Jonghyun's smile faltered. Minho didn't see, was too busy looking away.
In a spell of confusion, Minho started paying less attention to Jonghyun. Part of it was because when it was just them there were less lines they had to be wary of crossing, but now Minho didn't know what to do. The other part was Minho itching to beat him up for insisting that this didn't change anything.
So he felt kind of stupid when Kibum broke up with Jonghyun, like looking for the keys and realising you'd been holding them whole time. It was a week before college started and Jonghyun took it well, explained it was only a casual thing, though the way Jonghyun looked at Minho when he said it felt like a challenge.
That night Minho had a nightmare where they were in the ring except Minho was naked and Jonghyun was unforgiving and Minho couldn't get a punch in, but then Jonghyun wasn't throwing any either, just breathing loudly over him with a forearm to Minho's neck. The ring lights blinded him awake.
It got quiet after a while.
His neighbour called it 'the count', "meaning, you better hurry the fuck up before you lose for good."
"Don't swear," Minho said, but he knew Taemin was right. He wasn't as perceptive as Jonghyun. In fact, Jonghyun was everything he wasn't, except for the part that mattered the most. Minho thought that had to count for something.
When Taemin left for school and Minho headed to the gym, he decided he wasn't afraid of being wrong. All the drilling discipline in the world had taught him it was only a detour away from being right. It's just that he didn't like it when Jonghyun was around, not when Jonghyun looked at Minho with understanding rather than sympathy, as though he related to him- and even if he did, Jonghyun would never be able to understand, not completely. There were things even Jonghyun, perceptiveness considered, wouldn't understand. He had to be right. He had to be sure.
The seed was planted when Jonghyun's parents bought him a car and Jonghyun insisted on driving Minho home (if Minho didn't mind). Minho agreed, all the while remembering that that meant no more Jonghyun falling asleep on him in the subways, missing the last train home, sleeping on the crash mats, duffel wars, and most importantly that time was running out. At Minho's porch it was impossible for Jonghyun not to have noticed the way Minho's hand lingered as he thanked him. How much will work out for him, and how much did Minho have to earn for himself?
He could hem and haw at his courage until he had enough for just a few words to say to Jonghyun. I like you, hyung, because Minho did. He knew that much. Or he could wait for everything to happen, and that was the problem. Minho was aware of his talent, that boxing didn't come as easily to other people as it did to him, but he wouldn't have considered in the first place if it wasn't a last resort. He didn't know where fate started and where it ended, or if it existed in the first place.
All he knew was he didn't want to wait anymore.
Which only made it worse in the long run. He signed himself to more matches and coaching sessions and it worked for a while, until Jonghyun started noticing. Agitation. Their orbit had been derailed and they were on a collision course.
There were some places in the gym that Minho didn't count as neutral ground. There was the water dispenser where a post-victorious Minho spat a mouthful of water down Jonghyun's face and shirt, to Jonghyun's bewilderment. Jonghyun had retaliated by dumping his half empty can of red ginseng energy drink onto Minho's head and rubbing it into his hair. Jonghyun's eyelashes were dripping as he licked his lips clean of Minho's technical backwash, and with Jonghyun's hands warm at the base of his scalp and his laugh against Minho's jaw, Minho got hard, right there, in the gym foyer. It was embarrassing, and until now Minho wasn't sure how Jonghyun didn't notice the way Minho half-jogged to clean himself off in the showers.
Yet here he was, standing behind Jonghyun, who was filling his painfully large bottle, made worse by the fact that Jonghyun didn't know Minho was there, but there was no point in announcing hi presence anyway. Their circumstance had been concreted now, friendship confusedly undone just as easily as it came together on the first day.
Jonghyun wasn't fast enough to hide his surprise when he turned around, and the uncapped water sloshed out of the rim. Always so alarmable. He casually shied around Minho and tried offering him a smile, which Minho deflected.
He spent the next two hours shaking off his guilt like it was an itch, ignoring the way Jonghyun looked at him.
The boiling point came when Jonghyun punched him in the jaw.
His fist was too tight and the hook was too wide but they were bare knuckled so he looked horrified anyway, that is, until Minho spat out what his 'fucking problem' was: "You don't know me," and then Jonghyun's eyes flickered and Minho was on the floor, Jonghyun's necklace glinting in the light--
The fight wasn't something they talked about.
That was the other problem. He decided a long time ago that it was okay to know the scent of Jonghyun's sweat better than his cologne, the leather drag of his blue everlasts more familiar than the feel of Jonghyun's fingers. There wasn't much he could do anyway. There were times when Minho looked at Jonghyun's hand and imagined it holding Kibum's, texting a reply, curled around his belt loops, and felt lucky. Jonghyun was non-confrontational and pro-equality, the one most likely to give better-said-than-done advice, living like he meant it; Minho thought he was a douchebag.
He remembered the fear and energy leaking from Jonghyun's brown eyes and into the air as Jonghyun stood up; Minho received a split lip and no glance back.
The window was open and their gloves were off. The squeaky mats didn't help Jonghyun's fidgeting.
It was strange, like seeing the moon in the daytime. Looking at it in the most shallow of ways, Minho just wasn't equipped for this brand of disappointment. He wasn't sure what he missed, what he didn't notice to finally arrive at this situation.
"You know Kibum?" Jonghyun began eventually. Minho felt Jonghyun's eyes on him, inquiring, so he nodded. "Well, I'm still friends with him. Somehow," Jonghyun chuckled half-heartedly. "Anyway he told me I was too loose fisted. I don't know if that was meant to be a boxing pun but, I think he's right. He knew, the whole time that I. Minho. Minho look at me," Jonghyun grabbed his elbow, voice stressing. "Can we please stop this?"
It had been weeks. Weeks of goosebumps in close proximity and words which were bitter when Minho swallowed them, and Minho's limbs ached from haymaking.
The chalky residue underneath Jonghyun's nails smeared the crook of his elbow. His grip was tight. Minho thought of how there were so many ways to do something wrong yet so few to do it right but there was no time to think, because you don't stop in boxing unless you can afford a few bruises, and then there was Jonghyun, who did it anyway in spite of this. In a way more courageous than Minho would ever be.
Minho stared at Jonghyun's fingers then at Jonghyun's face and Jonghyun stared back, eyes pleading, looking so tired and more than ready to throw in the towel. Jonghyun punctuated his question with a tug on Minho's hand.
Minho didn't resist. Not that he had time to- he only nodded before Jonghyun was moving, cursing, trailing white dust up Minho's arm and onto his cheeks and brought their lips together, for real, and it was the most hyper-aware Minho had ever been. The room shifted out of focus as Jonghyun kissed him, pulling back in shaky breaths until Minho gripped his waist, "Stop that," nerves flaring at a fever pitch.
Jonghyun bit his lip then, bringing himself over Minho and pulling with the other, closer, their knees rubbing. Jonghyun made a noise when Minho started sucking slowly on his tongue and bringing his hands up the cotton of Jonghyun's shirt.
And it wasn't bad. Minho could probably get used to the strain of Jonghyun's spine under his fingers, warm, thrumming for him, heady as hell.
Jonghyun chuckled when he pulled back, wiping chalk off Minho's cheek with the back of his hand.
"So," he greased, effectively killing the mood and Minho had to fight the urge to shut him up, just because, until he remembered Jonghyun had technically just done all the work here. He squeezed Jonghyun's waist anyway.
Jonghyun spared him a dirty look before taking a breath, "I kind of like you." Minho stilled, noticed the full weight of Jonghyun on his thighs. "I think I always have, and I guess what I meant to say before was that Kibum knew the whole time that I really actually liked you. Which kind of makes me an asshole. Anyway I just couldn't tell if I really did or if it was just you, 'cause. You're sorta awesome. You're the man, you know what I mean?" Not really, but Jonghyun was the type of person to apologize upon rejection and then spend the rest of his days trying to convince you that there were no hard feelings. He was likely heading towards that direction now. Minho looked up, realizing it probably took more than most of Jonghyun's courage to say that, and that the least he could do was to believe him.
Minho grinned, "I like you too, hyung," he said, biting his tongue in the effort it took not to laugh. Jonghyun hit his arm and stood up, offering Minho a hand.
"Come on, I'll drive you home."
In the car, Minho decided to bring it up. "I saw the job applications."
Jonghyun bit his lip. "Okay," and if the way he kept his eyes trained on the road was any indication, it looked like Minho would have to be the mature and assertive hyung here.
"Um. So, Clride."
"I turned it down." Jonghyun refused to meet Minho's gaze as the car rolled to a halt at the lights.
There was a thoughtful silence, and then the bomb dropped. Minho couldn't help his smug grin. "Oh, yeah? Why?"
Jonghyun shrugged, slowly, drumming his fingers on the clutch. "You know."
He did.
a/n: um! while i did try to edit out most of the tone-changes, i spent months writing this so it probably has some inconsistencies anyway. i hope it wasn't too jarring. and um, yeah. haha finally, my true otp!
Minho/Jonghyun
R - 4883w
The match was over by knockout in two rounds; whether it was Jonghyun or coincidence, Minho didn't know, but there was no lie in his cheering and fist pumping and after the small crowd waned, when Jonghyun hugged him, Minho let out a breath he didn't realise he was holding.
» Boxing AU
Sunday Punch [suhn-dey puhnch]
noun
-- A knockout blow. A hard punch, knockout punch or KO punch that renders an opponent unable to continue fighting.
Jonghyun was there when Minho won his first gold.
Before Jonghyun joined, all Minho's winnings had been unofficial cash prizes. The match was over by knockout in two rounds; whether it was Jonghyun or coincidence, Minho didn't know, but there was no lie in his cheering and fist pumping and after the small crowd waned, when Jonghyun hugged him, Minho let out a breath he didn't realise he was holding.
That was when it started.
On most days, it didn't make a difference; it only ever did when they were apart. Minho was working on a medicine ball when Jonghyun walked in, school tie clutched in his right hand and backpack in his left, wearing a flavour of distaste one can only acquire through a rough day at school. He threw them both to the side.
Minho was deemed a protégé after he stepped over his first opponent, knocked out cold within the first round, and then snagged up as many names as he did jump rope double-unders every morning. Minho was the kind of guy who would have moves named in his honour, an Ali rope-a-dope or a Robinson sugar cane, stemming humbly from an inside joke and picked up by a journalist with just enough pull. It wasn't rocket science. Jonghyun, on the other hand, boxed because he wanted to- had the money, had the drive, had the fall back plan if this didn't work out. They'd made a pact earlier on when Jonghyun found out Minho had dropped out for boxing: that Jonghyun wouldn't be jealous, and in exchange, neither would Minho.
"Sup," Jonghyun said through his uniform while tugging the shirt over his head; his skin was lighter than Minho's, but only by a shade.
"Hey," Minho spun the ball. "How was the match yesterday?" It wasn't an important one and Minho knew it would be a walkover for Jonghyun but he was still upset about missing it. He considered apologizing again, but he decided Jonghyun didn't need that.
"Eh, tomato can." Jonghyun gestured to the ball.
Minho paused before passing it. "You or him?"
"Ha ha," Jonghyun mocked, hurling it back. "Nah, he actually wasn't bad. Probably would've won if my hands were tied," Jonghyun added, and Minho could tell he wanted to laugh at his own joke. The hallway light caught his hair.
Minho tilted his head. Jonghyun's movements were mostly unplanned but deliberate. He looked like an idiot a lot of the time and it would actually be funny if Jonghyun wasn't so conscious about it, mocking himself as though trying to prove he was okay with being kind of weird. It was a different case in the ring, though: Jonghyun could double bluff on his life because even though Minho was well aware Jonghyun had issues with thinking things through, Jonghyun's opponents weren't.
Jonghyun looked up seriously. "Got called up for ditching again." There was no regret in his voice. The boy had the time to box, too, but still cut class to make more of it.
"Oh."
"Yeah. It's okay though."
Minho nodded. "So how's everything else?"
Jonghyun shrugged. "You know."
Minho didn't, not really.
Jonghyun joined the gym not long after Minho but that was the only thing they had in common. Jonghyun was impulsive, insightful, he was never off the fence. He was a brawler, a swarmer while Minho was the opposite even before he even knew about hooks and jabs, was a man of tradition. Maybe that was why they got along so well, the new boys who learned to orbit each other when nobody was looking, gravitating in between bodily scuffles and mutual kinship.
If Minho had it his way, he wouldn't be here, at least not for the reasons he was here now. Boxing wasn't to him what it was to Jonghyun, the white collared boxer from the other side of town. Jonghyun could feel the adrenaline of boxing without the stakes to rile him up, while Minho played to win because the gold was where his eyes were but the money was what kept his mother fed, and that scared him enough to keep him going, jabbing at his shadow, bandage over bandage.
They weren't the new boys anymore though, and as such, Minho thought his curiosity had gotten a little stale.
Minho wasn't sure when the transition took place and boxing became synonymous with Jonghyun. It made sense, but still. He found himself stitching break times together into a mental spreadsheet of Jonghyun's life, the things Minho could wheedle out of him.
If Jonghyun ever caught on to it, then that was half his work done, especially since Minho's learnt now that it requires a certain kind of intelligence to be oblivious like Jonghyun is.
"Guess what you're doing this Saturday?" Jonghyun asked Minho conversationally.
"What?" Minho replied, as though he didn't already check Jonghyun's match chart.
"Coming to my game," Jonghyun grinned in a half joke. It was the same invitation as it always was, intact with the lurk of distrust because Jonghyun never expected to be wanted. He just hoped, which Minho found ridiculous, because of course he wanted to be there.
What happened at the gym was pretty standard. There were two different charts. Minho's is of matches for the semi professional players with highlighted scrawls under some of the opponents' names, and a range of trainers assigned according to skill level. The other one, Jonghyun's one, was simpler, drawn at the beginning of every quarter.
There was a reason to Minho's constant goading. It almost spoke for itself, the way Jonghyun's nose crinkled in threat, the way he advanced until they were within breathing space just to back off again skittishly. It was sort of cute. Minho sort of loved it, but at the same time hated it, too.
Jonghyun's smiles he reserved for better days, like today. The halls were sparsely lit when less people were getting in their hours, and with the swaying light on him, Jonghyun reminded Minho of the grainy boxing prints inside the head office, raw victory in black and white. Jonghyun looked like that sometimes. Minho would stare at him and think of how Jonghyun made it all seem so easy.
"Alright hyung," he said, and this was what he sometimes waited whole days for, the easy smile spreading across Jonghyun's entire face, teeth held so precariously Minho almost expected a wagging tongue to break free and lap at his face.
It didn't happen, but Jonghyun did puff his chest out happily, which propelled Minho's smile into a full-on laugh.
With Jonghyun, Minho learned spending hours in joint physical exertion didn't equate to a normal friendship. They would always be boxers before they were teenagers.
Jonghyun had told him once, "you don't talk much. As in, I don't think it's because you haven't got much to say." At the time Minho told him lies about his older brother's opinions taking precedence over his own.
Jonghyun had quirked an eyebrow but left it at that. In a move that shocked even himself, Minho clapped chalk into Jonghyun's face until he choked from laughter and squirmed under Minho's weight. He rubbed his nose into Minho's shirt, howling "Not the face! Not the moneymaker!" and Minho gave him a chalky noogie.
Jonghyun took the cue and didn't mention it again.
So maybe they weren't meant to be friends. Jonghyun didn't bring up much of anything after that, probably thought Minho needed space. That was the thing, Jonghyun sometimes forgot not everyone was like him. Space was something Jonghyun needed, not Minho.
And sure, on most days, it didn't make a difference, but on some days it did. The days where as Minho rose with the winter sun and remembered he took the subway to the gym because he couldn't afford long run investments like cars; those things were for people like Jonghyun. Minho fingered the ticket stub in his hand and wondered how it would have played out if they'd met under different circumstances.
It was one of the times when Jonghyun arrived earlier than Minho. Jonghyun staked his claim by extending his arm across at the door and making a robotic noise. "Password." His biceps flexed threateningly.
Minho rolled his eyes. "Feeling brave, today, are you?" He leaned close, smirking down at the boy.
Jonghyun snorted. "Come on, little man, I can take you," he beckoned, patting the doorway with his gloves. And it wasn't funny at all, but shit, Minho laughed anyway, laughed until Jonghyun frowned and rubbed his neck and in a moment of sobriety, Minho took his chance and sidled past him. He ignored the heat of Jonghyun's shoulders on his palms. "Hey!" Jonghyun called, voice echoing into the foyer.
Inside the changing room, Minho closed the door behind him and flexed his hands.
So, yes, he is Choi Minho, small time boxer with big time potential but for now, he's making by whilst crushing on his best friend, though the title wasn't worth a great deal nor was it reciprocated. Jonghyun for his own part didn't ease the momentum of Minho's downfall much, if at all. For example: Jonghyun liked to sing in the showers.
In his defence, Jonghyun was a great singer, which left little room for Minho to dislike the times when he sang bubblegum pop on the days when they trained for long enough to drop their inhibitions. Minho knew the reason Jonghyun never sang ballads was because, hell, who sings that kind of stuff in a shower, but that didn't mean Jonghyun didn't like to, and didn't want to show it off. Minho pretends not to notice his strange inferiority complex towards him.
Except today Jonghyun was quiet. Or at least, as far as Minho could discern. There were those days, too, with both of them on the receiving end of each other's silence because sometimes they were both just too tense, wired too tightly for it. Minho for the most part was too preoccupied with his own issues to care, to think of how he much preferred the way Jonghyun became feverish sometimes. Not the same kind of excitable he became when he knew people were looking, but anxious, though he tried to be cool about it. Minho had long learnt to appreciate the subway nights before a big game where Jonghyun was a ridiculous combination of excitedly flushed skin and bright clothes, languid, pressed against the side of Minho's black shirt.
"You're watching this time, right?" Jonghyun would say, looking like he would probably attach something lame like 'be my moral support' onto the end of the question if he knew Minho wouldn't hold it against him. Minho just assured Jonghyun he'd show up, nodding even as his chin tickled against Jonghyun's hair. It was dyed brown, like Jonghyun was proving to himself that he wasn't a dud and had other interests besides skipping school and boxing. Minho kept his hair short because it was the most practical thing to do, because he was a serious sportsman, but the truth was, Minho could play background if that was what Jonghyun wanted.
So Minho thought nothing of it and flung his towel onto a hook, looking up just in time to see-
Jonghyun. Jonghyun far from tense, Jonghyun, eyes closed with his head thrown back and his wrist flexing up and down over his cock, getting himself off, face contorted painfully and shuddering straight to the hairs on Minho's nape. Feverish and excitable, but not the same as when he knew people were looking. Minho watched the way the water ran over his hands and then back up to the way Jonghyun bit his lip, moan hitching, and the noise was all Minho needed to startle for his towel and hightail the fuck out of there.
Stupid, careless Jonghyun, making other people pay for his mistakes.
It wasn't like it wasn't bound to happen. Minho had had his suspicions in the past about the way Jonghyun would stay in the shower after Minho had left, and Minho wouldn't deny to having jacked off in the communal showers when he was alone. No biggie. Except it was, it was the kind of thing that left Minho deaf and dumb as he situated himself at a heavy bag in case Jonghyun came back out and, god, Jonghyun.
Minho didn't know how long he stood there with his forehead to the leather in a limp-legged and losing battle to just leave, until Jonghyun clapped him on the shoulder and asked if he was ready.
"Yeah," he said.
Jonghyun was in his own stretch of comfortable silence, meaning it was probably best that he was walking in a sprightly pace, with Minho trailing behind. Minho grimaced all the way to the entrance and excused himself before they reached the subway, saying he had to go and buy something for his mother, and that Jonghyun could go ahead without him.
"You sure?" Jonghyun said, adjusting his duffel bag with his left hand - the same hand that - and Minho could barely oblige to a nod before he was walking away. It wasn't like it wasn't bound to happen, Minho reflected, but the same sentiment didn't apply to his reaction.
Later that night after Minho flung off his sweaty covers and angrily jerked himself off to the image of Jonghyun biting his lip and pumping himself under the pelting spray, Minho decided he preferred the curiosity.
It was a particularly reckless Spring night when Minho almost told Jonghyun everything. Not the shower incident, Minho wasn't so stupid where he would jeopardize his dignity, but everything else.
It was late enough for Minho to think he was alone, but their shadows always seemed to find each other, even in the dingier training rooms where the walls were thin and part of Minho's speed bag was bound in duct tape. Protégé or not Minho's gym was still kind of shitty. Jonghyun walked in, freshly changed, and Minho's arms dropped - the punching bag swayed in front of him - watching the other boy head towards the window.
Minho tried to speak, the words shrivelling in his throat as Jonghyun unhooked the latch, looking back at him as though to say if I'm going to stay here with you it won't be in the stench of your sweat. Minho just stared.
"What?" Jonghyun said, and Minho shook his head, nothing, but Jonghyun was too intent on leaning back on the sill and looking at the view to really pay attention. It was only when Jonghyun looked up and noticed Minho was still staring that he pressed on.
"Hey, no really. Is something wrong?" He paused thoughtfully, "'cause, you know, between me and you, we could take down anyone we wanted." It was stupid, but a lot of the things Jonghyun said were stupid so this wasn't way below par. Minho was about to retort but then Jonghyun smiled, unchaste and obviously waiting for Minho to laugh. He didn't. Not that he couldn't help it, he just didn't really fucking want to anymore.
Jonghyun hesitated then, abandoning the view to half jokingly press his hand to Minho's forehead. "You okay, man?"
Fast forward a few days and Minho wouldn't remember much of what he said, he'd called Jonghyun many names. Charming, annoying, clever.
"Clever?" Jonghyun had sputtered. "How could you say that? You're so, I dunno, solid. Jaw of granite and stuff. I'm just a bunch of odds and ends you know? I always have been." Jonghyun's eyebrows were furrowed. He didn't understand. Of course he wouldn't. Jonghyun had mentioned once that Minho would beat him if they were ever to take aptitude tests.This was probably what Jonghyun meant.
If he were to be honest, Minho really only saw him as a bunch of odds and ends too, but not the same way Jonghyun thought. Jonghyun was an open question. He had no problem with playing along to the beat of others: the moodmaker, the foolhardy, the excitable. Minho could play along too, should have from the beginning, but there was no closing a can of worms already open - sometimes he wanted to shake Jonghyun and tell him to quit it, say something real for once. Minho thought he'd have to make do with what he had.
The first time Minho noticed how truly little he knew about Jonghyun wasn't until he was too late to the taking. It was summer and while Minho didn't like the job applications at the bottom of Jonghyun's duffel bag, the real problem was Jonghyun smiling at his phone, bent over the screen as if he had a secret too good to tell, murmuring the last few words of his phone calls. Minho saw a name flash across the screen during one of their late night scrimmages. It was also the first time Minho considered Jonghyun being anything other than straight, and it took him by surprise.
Jonghyun had released him from the headlock and Minho stumbled back, vision spinning. When he looked up at Jonghyun there were black spots in his periphery but he saw the way Jonghyun pocketed his phone, met his gaze in consideration. Slow, like he was wishing for something.
Minho didn't say anything, tried to ignore the defeat in Jonghyun's face when he looked away.
It was like a catalyst. Minho was wired to oscillate around competition, sensitized to challenges, told to eliminate fear until near blindness and then to tackle them. Except Jonghyun wasn't a challenge for his track record, and these things don't happen to Minho. Minho couldn't finish high school, Minho had a brother whose last words to him were "I'm leaving, kiddo," Minho wasn't trained for this kind of game.
It wasn't the same kind of loss, therefore, that bugged him when he didn't say anything, despite the elitism which told him he understood better, had been there longer. Minho knew not to mess with someone else's laurels. Minho knew respect.
He was handsome, Minho admitted upon their first meeting. Not handsome like Minho was. He was refined, with eyes like slate and clothes that smelt of raw prestige. He trailed behind Jonghyun into the training room, smiled when they shook hands, and Minho was surprised when Kim Key-when-I'm-famous Kibum didn't wipe Minho's sweat from his palm.
"You know how to pick them," he said softly when Kibum was gone, and Jonghyun's smile faltered. Minho didn't see, was too busy looking away.
In a spell of confusion, Minho started paying less attention to Jonghyun. Part of it was because when it was just them there were less lines they had to be wary of crossing, but now Minho didn't know what to do. The other part was Minho itching to beat him up for insisting that this didn't change anything.
So he felt kind of stupid when Kibum broke up with Jonghyun, like looking for the keys and realising you'd been holding them whole time. It was a week before college started and Jonghyun took it well, explained it was only a casual thing, though the way Jonghyun looked at Minho when he said it felt like a challenge.
That night Minho had a nightmare where they were in the ring except Minho was naked and Jonghyun was unforgiving and Minho couldn't get a punch in, but then Jonghyun wasn't throwing any either, just breathing loudly over him with a forearm to Minho's neck. The ring lights blinded him awake.
It got quiet after a while.
His neighbour called it 'the count', "meaning, you better hurry the fuck up before you lose for good."
"Don't swear," Minho said, but he knew Taemin was right. He wasn't as perceptive as Jonghyun. In fact, Jonghyun was everything he wasn't, except for the part that mattered the most. Minho thought that had to count for something.
When Taemin left for school and Minho headed to the gym, he decided he wasn't afraid of being wrong. All the drilling discipline in the world had taught him it was only a detour away from being right. It's just that he didn't like it when Jonghyun was around, not when Jonghyun looked at Minho with understanding rather than sympathy, as though he related to him- and even if he did, Jonghyun would never be able to understand, not completely. There were things even Jonghyun, perceptiveness considered, wouldn't understand. He had to be right. He had to be sure.
The seed was planted when Jonghyun's parents bought him a car and Jonghyun insisted on driving Minho home (if Minho didn't mind). Minho agreed, all the while remembering that that meant no more Jonghyun falling asleep on him in the subways, missing the last train home, sleeping on the crash mats, duffel wars, and most importantly that time was running out. At Minho's porch it was impossible for Jonghyun not to have noticed the way Minho's hand lingered as he thanked him. How much will work out for him, and how much did Minho have to earn for himself?
He could hem and haw at his courage until he had enough for just a few words to say to Jonghyun. I like you, hyung, because Minho did. He knew that much. Or he could wait for everything to happen, and that was the problem. Minho was aware of his talent, that boxing didn't come as easily to other people as it did to him, but he wouldn't have considered in the first place if it wasn't a last resort. He didn't know where fate started and where it ended, or if it existed in the first place.
All he knew was he didn't want to wait anymore.
Which only made it worse in the long run. He signed himself to more matches and coaching sessions and it worked for a while, until Jonghyun started noticing. Agitation. Their orbit had been derailed and they were on a collision course.
There were some places in the gym that Minho didn't count as neutral ground. There was the water dispenser where a post-victorious Minho spat a mouthful of water down Jonghyun's face and shirt, to Jonghyun's bewilderment. Jonghyun had retaliated by dumping his half empty can of red ginseng energy drink onto Minho's head and rubbing it into his hair. Jonghyun's eyelashes were dripping as he licked his lips clean of Minho's technical backwash, and with Jonghyun's hands warm at the base of his scalp and his laugh against Minho's jaw, Minho got hard, right there, in the gym foyer. It was embarrassing, and until now Minho wasn't sure how Jonghyun didn't notice the way Minho half-jogged to clean himself off in the showers.
Yet here he was, standing behind Jonghyun, who was filling his painfully large bottle, made worse by the fact that Jonghyun didn't know Minho was there, but there was no point in announcing hi presence anyway. Their circumstance had been concreted now, friendship confusedly undone just as easily as it came together on the first day.
Jonghyun wasn't fast enough to hide his surprise when he turned around, and the uncapped water sloshed out of the rim. Always so alarmable. He casually shied around Minho and tried offering him a smile, which Minho deflected.
He spent the next two hours shaking off his guilt like it was an itch, ignoring the way Jonghyun looked at him.
The boiling point came when Jonghyun punched him in the jaw.
His fist was too tight and the hook was too wide but they were bare knuckled so he looked horrified anyway, that is, until Minho spat out what his 'fucking problem' was: "You don't know me," and then Jonghyun's eyes flickered and Minho was on the floor, Jonghyun's necklace glinting in the light--
The fight wasn't something they talked about.
That was the other problem. He decided a long time ago that it was okay to know the scent of Jonghyun's sweat better than his cologne, the leather drag of his blue everlasts more familiar than the feel of Jonghyun's fingers. There wasn't much he could do anyway. There were times when Minho looked at Jonghyun's hand and imagined it holding Kibum's, texting a reply, curled around his belt loops, and felt lucky. Jonghyun was non-confrontational and pro-equality, the one most likely to give better-said-than-done advice, living like he meant it; Minho thought he was a douchebag.
He remembered the fear and energy leaking from Jonghyun's brown eyes and into the air as Jonghyun stood up; Minho received a split lip and no glance back.
The window was open and their gloves were off. The squeaky mats didn't help Jonghyun's fidgeting.
It was strange, like seeing the moon in the daytime. Looking at it in the most shallow of ways, Minho just wasn't equipped for this brand of disappointment. He wasn't sure what he missed, what he didn't notice to finally arrive at this situation.
"You know Kibum?" Jonghyun began eventually. Minho felt Jonghyun's eyes on him, inquiring, so he nodded. "Well, I'm still friends with him. Somehow," Jonghyun chuckled half-heartedly. "Anyway he told me I was too loose fisted. I don't know if that was meant to be a boxing pun but, I think he's right. He knew, the whole time that I. Minho. Minho look at me," Jonghyun grabbed his elbow, voice stressing. "Can we please stop this?"
It had been weeks. Weeks of goosebumps in close proximity and words which were bitter when Minho swallowed them, and Minho's limbs ached from haymaking.
The chalky residue underneath Jonghyun's nails smeared the crook of his elbow. His grip was tight. Minho thought of how there were so many ways to do something wrong yet so few to do it right but there was no time to think, because you don't stop in boxing unless you can afford a few bruises, and then there was Jonghyun, who did it anyway in spite of this. In a way more courageous than Minho would ever be.
Minho stared at Jonghyun's fingers then at Jonghyun's face and Jonghyun stared back, eyes pleading, looking so tired and more than ready to throw in the towel. Jonghyun punctuated his question with a tug on Minho's hand.
Minho didn't resist. Not that he had time to- he only nodded before Jonghyun was moving, cursing, trailing white dust up Minho's arm and onto his cheeks and brought their lips together, for real, and it was the most hyper-aware Minho had ever been. The room shifted out of focus as Jonghyun kissed him, pulling back in shaky breaths until Minho gripped his waist, "Stop that," nerves flaring at a fever pitch.
Jonghyun bit his lip then, bringing himself over Minho and pulling with the other, closer, their knees rubbing. Jonghyun made a noise when Minho started sucking slowly on his tongue and bringing his hands up the cotton of Jonghyun's shirt.
And it wasn't bad. Minho could probably get used to the strain of Jonghyun's spine under his fingers, warm, thrumming for him, heady as hell.
Jonghyun chuckled when he pulled back, wiping chalk off Minho's cheek with the back of his hand.
"So," he greased, effectively killing the mood and Minho had to fight the urge to shut him up, just because, until he remembered Jonghyun had technically just done all the work here. He squeezed Jonghyun's waist anyway.
Jonghyun spared him a dirty look before taking a breath, "I kind of like you." Minho stilled, noticed the full weight of Jonghyun on his thighs. "I think I always have, and I guess what I meant to say before was that Kibum knew the whole time that I really actually liked you. Which kind of makes me an asshole. Anyway I just couldn't tell if I really did or if it was just you, 'cause. You're sorta awesome. You're the man, you know what I mean?" Not really, but Jonghyun was the type of person to apologize upon rejection and then spend the rest of his days trying to convince you that there were no hard feelings. He was likely heading towards that direction now. Minho looked up, realizing it probably took more than most of Jonghyun's courage to say that, and that the least he could do was to believe him.
Minho grinned, "I like you too, hyung," he said, biting his tongue in the effort it took not to laugh. Jonghyun hit his arm and stood up, offering Minho a hand.
"Come on, I'll drive you home."
In the car, Minho decided to bring it up. "I saw the job applications."
Jonghyun bit his lip. "Okay," and if the way he kept his eyes trained on the road was any indication, it looked like Minho would have to be the mature and assertive hyung here.
"Um. So, Clride."
"I turned it down." Jonghyun refused to meet Minho's gaze as the car rolled to a halt at the lights.
There was a thoughtful silence, and then the bomb dropped. Minho couldn't help his smug grin. "Oh, yeah? Why?"
Jonghyun shrugged, slowly, drumming his fingers on the clutch. "You know."
He did.
a/n: um! while i did try to edit out most of the tone-changes, i spent months writing this so it probably has some inconsistencies anyway. i hope it wasn't too jarring. and um, yeah. haha finally, my true otp!