Abduction [chapter nine]
Abduction // Changmin x Onew, Jonghyun x Onew, onesided!Onew x Kibum, Minho x Key
Supernatural AU // PG-13
No one knew where it came from. The powers. Some thought there was something in the water, others thought those with them were like freakish mutants or aliens come to rid of them. Needless to say, the normal people aren’t too excited and the need to get rid of the freaks is strong. Rewind time a few years. Those with the powers have to stop the impeding fighting from happening and who better to lead them than Jinki, a telekinetic orphan abandoned at a mental hospital.
00 | 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | 07 | 08 | CHAPTER NINE
Taemin slouches when he walks and he stuffs his hands into his pockets. He turns to Sulli and sighs through his nose, rolling his eyes. She peeks at him through her bangs none too discreetly and it only bothers him because he wishes she would at least try to be a bit stealthier. It isn’t that hard, really. He’d be happier if she just stared at him with no remorse, to be honest. And the way she averts her gaze when she realizes he’s looking at her only makes him angrier.
Grabbing at her forearm, Taemin stops them both. He faces her completely and he suppresses the rising need to laugh because he can see her heart stopping and her breath catching and it’s so cute how afraid of him she is. The amusement is lost just as quickly as Sulli tries to calm herself and Taemin scowls.
“I will gouge your eyes out if you keep looking at me like that. Don’t ever believe for a second that I won’t.” And with a pretty little smile he releases her and continues on, walking faster than before. He doesn’t wait to see if she’s following.
He stops again in the middle of the hallway and he feels Sulli bump into his back. She squeaks in surprise and backs away but Taemin ignores her anyway, pressing the button to the elevator.
Nothing is said as they wait for the elevator to come up from the first floor. Taemin taps his foot in his impatience but it starts to fall into a familiar rhythm and he immediately stops. He almost sighs in relief when the elevator pings and the doors open to the small empty space. He walks in and Sulli trails along behind. He presses the button for the third floor of the institution. As soon as the doors close and the elevator starts to move, he presses the emergency button. The elevator jolts to a stop.
“W-What are you doing?” Sulli asks from behind him.
Taemin sighs and turns around, sliding down the wall of the elevator and bringing his knees to his chest. He buries his face into his knees. “Drop the act. There are no cameras in this elevator.” He mumbles into his legs but Sulli still hears him because she huffs and takes a seat on the floor of the elevator as well.
“Okay, what are we doing here? We’re not going to have much time to talk before they get the elevator working again.”
Tossing his head back, Taemin closes his eyes. “I know.” He taps his fingers idly on the flooring in the rhythm he started outside the elevator. This time, though, he allows himself to play out the song to the end. When he’s finished he reaches behind him and pulls out the pocket knife, throwing it effortlessly at Sulli. He still doesn’t open he eyes but he knows he’s nicked her when she hisses.
“You idiot. If your aim was off that would have gone through my arm.” Sulli curses and Taemin almost opens his eyes to check to see if she’s alright. Almost.
“A knife through your arm is a lot better than the both of us being found out. And that’ll happen if you keep singing that damned song.” Taemin opens his eyes to glare at her before he closes them again. “There are too many variables lurking around here lately. Last thing I need is for you to do something that will cost us our lives, Jinri.”
The girl scoffs. “They’ll find something suspicious in your acting before they question mine. ‘Eat strawberry ice cream with me or I’ll rip off your face, rawr’.” She mocks with a sarcastic laugh. “Someone has obviously done their research on how to be an unrealistic psychopath.”
Taemin takes a deep breath, goes through another round of tapping out their song on the floor.
“I’m starting to think you want us to be found out. I mean, how can you be so bad at this? Seriously?”
“Jinri, you are seriously grating on my patience.”
“Oh, really? And what are you going to do? Throw another pocket knife at me? Oh I’m so scared.” Sulli taunts, sing-song.
Taemin growls, opening his eyes. Something swirls in the space between them.
“Okay, okay, I’ll stop.” Sulli stands abruptly and turns with fearful eyes toward Taemin. “Just calm down.”
All of a sudden the elevator starts up again and finishes its ascent to the third floor. Taemin stands and Sulli falls back onto the floor before he even has a chance to get the feeling back into his legs.
She curls into herself in the corner just as the doors open.
“Taemin! What are you doing in there? You know patients are not allowed to ride the elevator.” A nurse and one of the cleaning staff are standing outside the elevator doors.
Taemin shuffles to Sulli’s side of the elevator to pick up his knife and he pockets it, hoping neither of the two outside saw it. He looks at the girl on the floor meaningfully before turning around to leave, pushing past two outside without as much as a glance.
--
“What does this remind you of?”
Jinki looks at the card in his doctor’s hand and scoffs. He leans back in his chair and doesn’t even let the sharp edges of the wood digging into his skin wipe the smug expression off his face.
“An ink blob.” He says and it’s the cockiest he’s ever been in his life. He thinks he deserves a medal for this feat.
The old man sighs, exasperated and rubs a hand over his face tiredly.
“Cooperate with me Jinki. Please.” He pleads and Jinki grins that sunshine smile of his at him.
“Sure. Okay.” Jinki nods.
“Alright,” the doctor tries again, “What does this remind you of?”
“I’m not sure, sir.” Jinki purses his lips, tilts his head to the side as if he’s really thinking about what the ink blob is subliminally showing him. The doctor watches him expectantly and there is a slight trace of wonder in his eyes when Jinki gasps and smiles.
“What is it?”
“It looks exactly like a waste of time.” Jinki chirps, fighting to keep himself from grinning too wide and bursting out in laughter.
The doctor doesn’t share his bright expression, though. He gives Jinki a pointed look and returns the card to the stack. His bones crack as he pushes himself out of his chair and Jinki blinks up at him, the dictionary definition of innocent.
“It seems we need to take a little break. Hopefully, when we resume you’ll be a little more cooperative.” He says and walks out the open door without looking back at Jinki.
Jinki grins to himself. He feels accomplished. He waits another minute or so before he himself rises out of his chair and exits the room. There are nurses rushing around and he briefly wonders what is wrong but then he comes to the conclusion that trying to understand their franticness would only make his head hurt. Deciding to pay them no attention, Jinki shrugs and heads to the stairs. A few days ago he learned the patients couldn’t use the elevator. Something about the movement of the elevator would possibly cause some kind of offset reaction in some of the patients. Jinki’s also learned that most of what comes out of the staffs’ mouth is completely made-up. He decides not to question that either.
Back on the second floor and walking to his room, Jinki bumps into the one person he hasn’t seen in a while. It is also the one person he hasn’t missed in the last few days.
Taemin.
The taller but lankier boy is trapped in his own thoughts it seems, though. Mumbling words to himself he barely acknowledges the small brush of their shoulders as they walk past each other. Jinki is confused but he doesn’t dare question it. The day he outwardly questions Taemin’s actions when he isn’t doing anything wrong will be the day he dies. And Jinki has no intention of dying today.
But despite Jinki’s appropriate fear of Taemin, he can’t help but wonder if something is wrong with the boy. He pauses in his step just to watch as the shaggy haired male turns and opens the door to his room, just the epitome of calm.
Jinki fears the sky will start falling soon.
-
It is a couple of days later, on a Saturday morning when Jinki is woken up to eyes looking directly into his. He immediately starts to scream but a hand is placed over his mouth. He thrashes against the weight of the person above him, not hearing the other person trying to calm him down, too busy fearing for his life at the current course of events. Jinki is on the verge of sinking his teeth into the hand of whoever has him captive when he finally registers the voice calling out to him and suddenly he stops. He looks into wide and round panicked eyes partially hidden by a sweep of glossy brown hair as he tries to calm his frantically beating heart.
Reaching up, Jinki removes the hand from his mouth. “Jonghyun, what do you think you’re doing?!”
Jonghyun gapes and chokes on his words, a little shaken up at what just happened. “I’m sorry! I was trying to wake you up but then you flipped out.”
“Why did you cover my mouth then?!”
“You were screaming!” Jonghyun looks totally exhausted to Jinki who himself hasn’t recovered his breath. His eyes are beginning to look less frantic but Jinki still sees a bit of worry in the brown color. “What else was I supposed to do?! People would think I was some psycho trying to slaughter you or something!”
Jinki closes his eyes and focuses on his breathing, counts to ten, and reopens his eyes. Jonghyun blinks, still worried. The two stare at each other for a second before Jinki bursts out into laughter.
“Hey! Why are you laughing?” Jonghyun questions but Jinki doesn’t hear him, his laughter drowning out the sound of the other’s voice.
The entire situation is ridiculous and is definitely not as humorous as Jinki’s laughter would suggest but he just can’t help but laugh. Jonghyun whines but he otherwise doesn’t say anything, just waits for Jinki to come down from his laughing high and by the time he does the corners of Jonghyun’s lips are curling up as well.
They spend a bit of time smiling at each other before Jinki suddenly asks, “so why did you want to wake me up?”
Jonghyun stares at him before he reaches down off the side of the bed with a hardly audible oh, right, that. “I brought breakfast!” He grins wide and pulls up a plastic bag. Sitting it in his lap, he pulls out a plastic container of assorted fruit and bottles of regular, banana, and coffee milk. Jinki looks at the arrangement appreciatively.
“You shouldn’t have.”
“Well, originally, this wasn’t for you.” Jonghyun says and Jinki’s smile drops. The former doesn’t notice the latter’s change in mood as he opens the container of fruit. “I promised Sulli I’d have breakfast with her and Amber one day. But as it turns out, Sulli and Amber have group therapy this morning and I didn’t feel like waiting until they were finished.”
Jinki picks out a strawberry and bites into it. It’s sweet and tart and perfect and it has been years since Jinki has had fruit that is so fresh. He forgives Jonghyun on the spot for coming to Jinki as a second choice and for scaring the crap out of him earlier. “So, you don’t like me enough to just offer me fruit and milk randomly is what you’re saying.” Jinki asks just to mock the other boy.
Jonghyun nods but then shakes his head. “Wait, no, that’s not what I meant at all. I mean, of course I like you enough. I could have went back home but instead I came here even if I wasn’t really thinking of having breakfast of you this morning.” Jonghyun pauses in his speech and Jinki raises an eyebrow at him. “Does that sound wrong? It’s like I like you but I don’t know you so why would I waltz in with this? You could be allergic to strawberries for all I know.”
Jinki finishes chewing the berry in his mouth before he smiles at Jonghyun. “Calm down.” He chuckles and plucks a grape from its stem. Reaching over, he presses it to Jonghyun’s lips and slowly pushes it inside his mouth. “I didn’t need you to explain yourself. I was just messing around.” He pokes Jonghyun’s forehead and sticks out his tongue before picking up the banana milk.
“Well your messing around was the worse guilt inducing situation I’ve ever been in.” Jonghyun frowns and opens the coffee milk.
Jinki notices this and grimaces. “Please don’t tell me you’re a coffee fanatic.” He says, reaching for another strawberry.
Looking down at the coffee milk, Jonghyun twists his face in contemplation. “Not necessarily. But it’s early in the morning and I need a bit of caffeine to wake me up, you know. You’re obviously a morning person.”
“It’s pretty hard not to be this alert after you’ve been assaulted.” Jinki shrugs.
“Hey, I apologized, didn’t I?” Pouting, Jonghyun tosses a grape at Jinki who catches it in his mouth.
Jinki grins at his success only to be hit in the eye with the next grape thrown at him.
“You’re a cheeky little thing, aren’t you?” Jonghyun asks, tossing another grape at Jinki who sticks out his tongue and throws it back, making a game out of their childishness.
“You’re the one who decided to befriend me.”
Jonghyun catches the grape when Jinki throws it back in his direction and plops it into his mouth with a shrug. “My parents used to tell me I had bad decision-making skills.”
--
“I don’t understand how you can do this. Sitting here, day after day, wasting your life away.” Kibum gasps and puts his hand to his chest, looks down at Jinki who is lying beside him. “I’m quite the poet, aren’t I?” He asks and Jinki rolls his eyes.
“Yes. Quite.” Jinki rolls over on to his back and immediately regrets it, turning over once more and burying his face in his sheets. “It would be so great if you could close your legs.”
Kibum blinks and raises his left eyebrow with a slightly confused “what?” He glances down at his lap and then he remembers he’s wearing a skirt today. Oh, he laughs and pats Jinki on the back.
“Hey, I’m pretty sure mine looks exactly like yours.”
“Please don’t give me the images, Kibum. I can live without them.” Jinki groans and covers his head with his hands. He sits up abruptly with a gasp more dramatic than Kibum’s and covers his eyes. “Oh God, I’m imagining it. Ew. Ew.”
With a snort, Kibum hits Jinki on the back. The latter yelps and flails as he falls off the bed. Not worried at all, Kibum crawls to the edge and peers over at Jinki who is trying to reach and soothe the part of his back Kibum attacked. He rolls his eyes at the sight of his friend rolling around pitifully, moaning and groaning like he’s lost a limb.
“Grow a pair, would you?” Kibum props his elbow up on the bed and places his chin in his palm. “I didn’t hit you that hard.”
“At what point in time did you forget that you have, oh I don’t know, super human strength?” Jinki groans as he pulls himself back up onto his bed, pushing Kibum over and out of his way.
Kibum snorts and just rolls onto his back, folding his arms beneath his head. “I always manage my strength when I’m around others.” He says uncaringly but checking Jinki out from the corner of his eye. He looks fine. And that’s all Kibum needs to assure him that he really didn’t slip up and hurt Jinki.
Still in the middle of his overdramatic fit, Jinki continues to groan and whine and make all kinds of unnecessary noise. Kibum almost reaches over and really hits him but before his mind can even connect to his arm, he’s distracted by the sound of his phone ringing.
This time it’s his turn to groan as he picks his phone out of his pocket. Not bothering to look at the caller ID, he answers the phone with a lazy ‘Hello?’
Jinki, silent to be respectful to his friend, watches the other, catching on to how Kibum’s eyes glitter as he converses with whoever’s on the other half of the line. He raises a brow when Kibum hangs up with a slight giggle and a sweet sounding goodbye.
Kibum smiles at his phone for a little while longer before he turns to face Jinki. “I’m sorry but I have to go. You don’t mind do you?” He gives a small pout to seem even more innocent.
Shrugging, Jinki shakes his head. “No, not at all-
And before he can even finish his sentence, Kibum vanishes.
“He must think he’s too good to use a proper door ever since he revealed his secret to me.” Jinki sighs and looks at the clock. He should probably head down to the cafeteria to hunt for food.
The hallway is empty when Jinki waltzes out of his room that night. It’s peculiar, like the calm before a storm, if he wants to give it such a cliché description. The place is always showing some sign of life whether it’s Sulli skipping around, Taemin flipping tables, or a nurse trying to get Joon to stop eating the macaroni shells in the recreation room.
He slows his pace and adjusts his breathing accordingly. He’s probably overreacting - maybe there was something in the aspirin his doctor allowed him to have that has some kind of overdramatizing side effect - but he can’t help but feel that something is off. His stomach is fluttering with frenzied monarchs and while it could just be that Jinki is hungry and delusional, he’s pretty sure frenzied monarchs are not a good sign.
Shaking his head and the butterflies from his precious and empty stomach, Jinki continues on in his walk, trailing his fingers along the wall as he goes. When he approaches the stairwell, he picks up the familiar voice of Sulli and a smile instantly crosses his face.
Throwing open the heavy door leading to the stairs, Jinki is greeted with the sight of Sulli pacing around on the bottom step, speaking so rapidly Jinki doesn’t bother with trying to understand her.
“Sulli!” He grins and the girl gasps and almost slips off the step but she catches herself.
“Jinki! You just about killed me.” She frowns and crosses her arms over her chest. She’s too adorable to look menacing and upset, though, so Jinki smiles wider when he apologizes.
“Sorry sorry. What are you doing?”
Sulli blinks.
After seconds of no response, Jinki tries to repeat the question when she snaps out of whatever temporary world she was caught in.
“Oh, me? Jonghyun left his iPod in my room some days ago and he hasn’t seen me to come get it back. I was singing. That was … some song that was on it.”
Jinki purses his lips and nods his head, impressed. “It sounded like you were rapping or something. I have no idea what you said, though.”
“Good.” She mumbles.
“Excuse me?” He raises a brow and tilts his head to the side.
“Huh, what? I said I wish you would … have. Understood. So you could give me feedback. Yeah.” She chuckles and Jinki doesn’t catch the uncertainty in her voice or notice the nervousness in her eyes.
“Oh, well, maybe another time, hm? I was going to go scavenge for food.”
“Yeah, yeah. Another time.” Sulli agrees and Jinki makes a noise of confirmation with a small smile.
The two stand in silence until Sulli clears her throat and turns to the door leading out of the stairwell. She steps toward it and cracks open the door, peeking outside before turning back to Jinki. “I’ll see you later, then. I have more practicing to do I guess.”
He smiles and gives her a thumbs-up, watching her walk away.
I am hopeless. Fic will probably still be ongoing even after I die.
Supernatural AU // PG-13
No one knew where it came from. The powers. Some thought there was something in the water, others thought those with them were like freakish mutants or aliens come to rid of them. Needless to say, the normal people aren’t too excited and the need to get rid of the freaks is strong. Rewind time a few years. Those with the powers have to stop the impeding fighting from happening and who better to lead them than Jinki, a telekinetic orphan abandoned at a mental hospital.
00 | 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | 07 | 08 | CHAPTER NINE
Taemin slouches when he walks and he stuffs his hands into his pockets. He turns to Sulli and sighs through his nose, rolling his eyes. She peeks at him through her bangs none too discreetly and it only bothers him because he wishes she would at least try to be a bit stealthier. It isn’t that hard, really. He’d be happier if she just stared at him with no remorse, to be honest. And the way she averts her gaze when she realizes he’s looking at her only makes him angrier.
Grabbing at her forearm, Taemin stops them both. He faces her completely and he suppresses the rising need to laugh because he can see her heart stopping and her breath catching and it’s so cute how afraid of him she is. The amusement is lost just as quickly as Sulli tries to calm herself and Taemin scowls.
“I will gouge your eyes out if you keep looking at me like that. Don’t ever believe for a second that I won’t.” And with a pretty little smile he releases her and continues on, walking faster than before. He doesn’t wait to see if she’s following.
He stops again in the middle of the hallway and he feels Sulli bump into his back. She squeaks in surprise and backs away but Taemin ignores her anyway, pressing the button to the elevator.
Nothing is said as they wait for the elevator to come up from the first floor. Taemin taps his foot in his impatience but it starts to fall into a familiar rhythm and he immediately stops. He almost sighs in relief when the elevator pings and the doors open to the small empty space. He walks in and Sulli trails along behind. He presses the button for the third floor of the institution. As soon as the doors close and the elevator starts to move, he presses the emergency button. The elevator jolts to a stop.
“W-What are you doing?” Sulli asks from behind him.
Taemin sighs and turns around, sliding down the wall of the elevator and bringing his knees to his chest. He buries his face into his knees. “Drop the act. There are no cameras in this elevator.” He mumbles into his legs but Sulli still hears him because she huffs and takes a seat on the floor of the elevator as well.
“Okay, what are we doing here? We’re not going to have much time to talk before they get the elevator working again.”
Tossing his head back, Taemin closes his eyes. “I know.” He taps his fingers idly on the flooring in the rhythm he started outside the elevator. This time, though, he allows himself to play out the song to the end. When he’s finished he reaches behind him and pulls out the pocket knife, throwing it effortlessly at Sulli. He still doesn’t open he eyes but he knows he’s nicked her when she hisses.
“You idiot. If your aim was off that would have gone through my arm.” Sulli curses and Taemin almost opens his eyes to check to see if she’s alright. Almost.
“A knife through your arm is a lot better than the both of us being found out. And that’ll happen if you keep singing that damned song.” Taemin opens his eyes to glare at her before he closes them again. “There are too many variables lurking around here lately. Last thing I need is for you to do something that will cost us our lives, Jinri.”
The girl scoffs. “They’ll find something suspicious in your acting before they question mine. ‘Eat strawberry ice cream with me or I’ll rip off your face, rawr’.” She mocks with a sarcastic laugh. “Someone has obviously done their research on how to be an unrealistic psychopath.”
Taemin takes a deep breath, goes through another round of tapping out their song on the floor.
“I’m starting to think you want us to be found out. I mean, how can you be so bad at this? Seriously?”
“Jinri, you are seriously grating on my patience.”
“Oh, really? And what are you going to do? Throw another pocket knife at me? Oh I’m so scared.” Sulli taunts, sing-song.
Taemin growls, opening his eyes. Something swirls in the space between them.
“Okay, okay, I’ll stop.” Sulli stands abruptly and turns with fearful eyes toward Taemin. “Just calm down.”
All of a sudden the elevator starts up again and finishes its ascent to the third floor. Taemin stands and Sulli falls back onto the floor before he even has a chance to get the feeling back into his legs.
She curls into herself in the corner just as the doors open.
“Taemin! What are you doing in there? You know patients are not allowed to ride the elevator.” A nurse and one of the cleaning staff are standing outside the elevator doors.
Taemin shuffles to Sulli’s side of the elevator to pick up his knife and he pockets it, hoping neither of the two outside saw it. He looks at the girl on the floor meaningfully before turning around to leave, pushing past two outside without as much as a glance.
--
“What does this remind you of?”
Jinki looks at the card in his doctor’s hand and scoffs. He leans back in his chair and doesn’t even let the sharp edges of the wood digging into his skin wipe the smug expression off his face.
“An ink blob.” He says and it’s the cockiest he’s ever been in his life. He thinks he deserves a medal for this feat.
The old man sighs, exasperated and rubs a hand over his face tiredly.
“Cooperate with me Jinki. Please.” He pleads and Jinki grins that sunshine smile of his at him.
“Sure. Okay.” Jinki nods.
“Alright,” the doctor tries again, “What does this remind you of?”
“I’m not sure, sir.” Jinki purses his lips, tilts his head to the side as if he’s really thinking about what the ink blob is subliminally showing him. The doctor watches him expectantly and there is a slight trace of wonder in his eyes when Jinki gasps and smiles.
“What is it?”
“It looks exactly like a waste of time.” Jinki chirps, fighting to keep himself from grinning too wide and bursting out in laughter.
The doctor doesn’t share his bright expression, though. He gives Jinki a pointed look and returns the card to the stack. His bones crack as he pushes himself out of his chair and Jinki blinks up at him, the dictionary definition of innocent.
“It seems we need to take a little break. Hopefully, when we resume you’ll be a little more cooperative.” He says and walks out the open door without looking back at Jinki.
Jinki grins to himself. He feels accomplished. He waits another minute or so before he himself rises out of his chair and exits the room. There are nurses rushing around and he briefly wonders what is wrong but then he comes to the conclusion that trying to understand their franticness would only make his head hurt. Deciding to pay them no attention, Jinki shrugs and heads to the stairs. A few days ago he learned the patients couldn’t use the elevator. Something about the movement of the elevator would possibly cause some kind of offset reaction in some of the patients. Jinki’s also learned that most of what comes out of the staffs’ mouth is completely made-up. He decides not to question that either.
Back on the second floor and walking to his room, Jinki bumps into the one person he hasn’t seen in a while. It is also the one person he hasn’t missed in the last few days.
Taemin.
The taller but lankier boy is trapped in his own thoughts it seems, though. Mumbling words to himself he barely acknowledges the small brush of their shoulders as they walk past each other. Jinki is confused but he doesn’t dare question it. The day he outwardly questions Taemin’s actions when he isn’t doing anything wrong will be the day he dies. And Jinki has no intention of dying today.
But despite Jinki’s appropriate fear of Taemin, he can’t help but wonder if something is wrong with the boy. He pauses in his step just to watch as the shaggy haired male turns and opens the door to his room, just the epitome of calm.
Jinki fears the sky will start falling soon.
-
It is a couple of days later, on a Saturday morning when Jinki is woken up to eyes looking directly into his. He immediately starts to scream but a hand is placed over his mouth. He thrashes against the weight of the person above him, not hearing the other person trying to calm him down, too busy fearing for his life at the current course of events. Jinki is on the verge of sinking his teeth into the hand of whoever has him captive when he finally registers the voice calling out to him and suddenly he stops. He looks into wide and round panicked eyes partially hidden by a sweep of glossy brown hair as he tries to calm his frantically beating heart.
Reaching up, Jinki removes the hand from his mouth. “Jonghyun, what do you think you’re doing?!”
Jonghyun gapes and chokes on his words, a little shaken up at what just happened. “I’m sorry! I was trying to wake you up but then you flipped out.”
“Why did you cover my mouth then?!”
“You were screaming!” Jonghyun looks totally exhausted to Jinki who himself hasn’t recovered his breath. His eyes are beginning to look less frantic but Jinki still sees a bit of worry in the brown color. “What else was I supposed to do?! People would think I was some psycho trying to slaughter you or something!”
Jinki closes his eyes and focuses on his breathing, counts to ten, and reopens his eyes. Jonghyun blinks, still worried. The two stare at each other for a second before Jinki bursts out into laughter.
“Hey! Why are you laughing?” Jonghyun questions but Jinki doesn’t hear him, his laughter drowning out the sound of the other’s voice.
The entire situation is ridiculous and is definitely not as humorous as Jinki’s laughter would suggest but he just can’t help but laugh. Jonghyun whines but he otherwise doesn’t say anything, just waits for Jinki to come down from his laughing high and by the time he does the corners of Jonghyun’s lips are curling up as well.
They spend a bit of time smiling at each other before Jinki suddenly asks, “so why did you want to wake me up?”
Jonghyun stares at him before he reaches down off the side of the bed with a hardly audible oh, right, that. “I brought breakfast!” He grins wide and pulls up a plastic bag. Sitting it in his lap, he pulls out a plastic container of assorted fruit and bottles of regular, banana, and coffee milk. Jinki looks at the arrangement appreciatively.
“You shouldn’t have.”
“Well, originally, this wasn’t for you.” Jonghyun says and Jinki’s smile drops. The former doesn’t notice the latter’s change in mood as he opens the container of fruit. “I promised Sulli I’d have breakfast with her and Amber one day. But as it turns out, Sulli and Amber have group therapy this morning and I didn’t feel like waiting until they were finished.”
Jinki picks out a strawberry and bites into it. It’s sweet and tart and perfect and it has been years since Jinki has had fruit that is so fresh. He forgives Jonghyun on the spot for coming to Jinki as a second choice and for scaring the crap out of him earlier. “So, you don’t like me enough to just offer me fruit and milk randomly is what you’re saying.” Jinki asks just to mock the other boy.
Jonghyun nods but then shakes his head. “Wait, no, that’s not what I meant at all. I mean, of course I like you enough. I could have went back home but instead I came here even if I wasn’t really thinking of having breakfast of you this morning.” Jonghyun pauses in his speech and Jinki raises an eyebrow at him. “Does that sound wrong? It’s like I like you but I don’t know you so why would I waltz in with this? You could be allergic to strawberries for all I know.”
Jinki finishes chewing the berry in his mouth before he smiles at Jonghyun. “Calm down.” He chuckles and plucks a grape from its stem. Reaching over, he presses it to Jonghyun’s lips and slowly pushes it inside his mouth. “I didn’t need you to explain yourself. I was just messing around.” He pokes Jonghyun’s forehead and sticks out his tongue before picking up the banana milk.
“Well your messing around was the worse guilt inducing situation I’ve ever been in.” Jonghyun frowns and opens the coffee milk.
Jinki notices this and grimaces. “Please don’t tell me you’re a coffee fanatic.” He says, reaching for another strawberry.
Looking down at the coffee milk, Jonghyun twists his face in contemplation. “Not necessarily. But it’s early in the morning and I need a bit of caffeine to wake me up, you know. You’re obviously a morning person.”
“It’s pretty hard not to be this alert after you’ve been assaulted.” Jinki shrugs.
“Hey, I apologized, didn’t I?” Pouting, Jonghyun tosses a grape at Jinki who catches it in his mouth.
Jinki grins at his success only to be hit in the eye with the next grape thrown at him.
“You’re a cheeky little thing, aren’t you?” Jonghyun asks, tossing another grape at Jinki who sticks out his tongue and throws it back, making a game out of their childishness.
“You’re the one who decided to befriend me.”
Jonghyun catches the grape when Jinki throws it back in his direction and plops it into his mouth with a shrug. “My parents used to tell me I had bad decision-making skills.”
--
“I don’t understand how you can do this. Sitting here, day after day, wasting your life away.” Kibum gasps and puts his hand to his chest, looks down at Jinki who is lying beside him. “I’m quite the poet, aren’t I?” He asks and Jinki rolls his eyes.
“Yes. Quite.” Jinki rolls over on to his back and immediately regrets it, turning over once more and burying his face in his sheets. “It would be so great if you could close your legs.”
Kibum blinks and raises his left eyebrow with a slightly confused “what?” He glances down at his lap and then he remembers he’s wearing a skirt today. Oh, he laughs and pats Jinki on the back.
“Hey, I’m pretty sure mine looks exactly like yours.”
“Please don’t give me the images, Kibum. I can live without them.” Jinki groans and covers his head with his hands. He sits up abruptly with a gasp more dramatic than Kibum’s and covers his eyes. “Oh God, I’m imagining it. Ew. Ew.”
With a snort, Kibum hits Jinki on the back. The latter yelps and flails as he falls off the bed. Not worried at all, Kibum crawls to the edge and peers over at Jinki who is trying to reach and soothe the part of his back Kibum attacked. He rolls his eyes at the sight of his friend rolling around pitifully, moaning and groaning like he’s lost a limb.
“Grow a pair, would you?” Kibum props his elbow up on the bed and places his chin in his palm. “I didn’t hit you that hard.”
“At what point in time did you forget that you have, oh I don’t know, super human strength?” Jinki groans as he pulls himself back up onto his bed, pushing Kibum over and out of his way.
Kibum snorts and just rolls onto his back, folding his arms beneath his head. “I always manage my strength when I’m around others.” He says uncaringly but checking Jinki out from the corner of his eye. He looks fine. And that’s all Kibum needs to assure him that he really didn’t slip up and hurt Jinki.
Still in the middle of his overdramatic fit, Jinki continues to groan and whine and make all kinds of unnecessary noise. Kibum almost reaches over and really hits him but before his mind can even connect to his arm, he’s distracted by the sound of his phone ringing.
This time it’s his turn to groan as he picks his phone out of his pocket. Not bothering to look at the caller ID, he answers the phone with a lazy ‘Hello?’
Jinki, silent to be respectful to his friend, watches the other, catching on to how Kibum’s eyes glitter as he converses with whoever’s on the other half of the line. He raises a brow when Kibum hangs up with a slight giggle and a sweet sounding goodbye.
Kibum smiles at his phone for a little while longer before he turns to face Jinki. “I’m sorry but I have to go. You don’t mind do you?” He gives a small pout to seem even more innocent.
Shrugging, Jinki shakes his head. “No, not at all-
And before he can even finish his sentence, Kibum vanishes.
“He must think he’s too good to use a proper door ever since he revealed his secret to me.” Jinki sighs and looks at the clock. He should probably head down to the cafeteria to hunt for food.
The hallway is empty when Jinki waltzes out of his room that night. It’s peculiar, like the calm before a storm, if he wants to give it such a cliché description. The place is always showing some sign of life whether it’s Sulli skipping around, Taemin flipping tables, or a nurse trying to get Joon to stop eating the macaroni shells in the recreation room.
He slows his pace and adjusts his breathing accordingly. He’s probably overreacting - maybe there was something in the aspirin his doctor allowed him to have that has some kind of overdramatizing side effect - but he can’t help but feel that something is off. His stomach is fluttering with frenzied monarchs and while it could just be that Jinki is hungry and delusional, he’s pretty sure frenzied monarchs are not a good sign.
Shaking his head and the butterflies from his precious and empty stomach, Jinki continues on in his walk, trailing his fingers along the wall as he goes. When he approaches the stairwell, he picks up the familiar voice of Sulli and a smile instantly crosses his face.
Throwing open the heavy door leading to the stairs, Jinki is greeted with the sight of Sulli pacing around on the bottom step, speaking so rapidly Jinki doesn’t bother with trying to understand her.
“Sulli!” He grins and the girl gasps and almost slips off the step but she catches herself.
“Jinki! You just about killed me.” She frowns and crosses her arms over her chest. She’s too adorable to look menacing and upset, though, so Jinki smiles wider when he apologizes.
“Sorry sorry. What are you doing?”
Sulli blinks.
After seconds of no response, Jinki tries to repeat the question when she snaps out of whatever temporary world she was caught in.
“Oh, me? Jonghyun left his iPod in my room some days ago and he hasn’t seen me to come get it back. I was singing. That was … some song that was on it.”
Jinki purses his lips and nods his head, impressed. “It sounded like you were rapping or something. I have no idea what you said, though.”
“Good.” She mumbles.
“Excuse me?” He raises a brow and tilts his head to the side.
“Huh, what? I said I wish you would … have. Understood. So you could give me feedback. Yeah.” She chuckles and Jinki doesn’t catch the uncertainty in her voice or notice the nervousness in her eyes.
“Oh, well, maybe another time, hm? I was going to go scavenge for food.”
“Yeah, yeah. Another time.” Sulli agrees and Jinki makes a noise of confirmation with a small smile.
The two stand in silence until Sulli clears her throat and turns to the door leading out of the stairwell. She steps toward it and cracks open the door, peeking outside before turning back to Jinki. “I’ll see you later, then. I have more practicing to do I guess.”
He smiles and gives her a thumbs-up, watching her walk away.
I am hopeless. Fic will probably still be ongoing even after I die.