Somebody Else (DooSeob AU oneshot - Sequel to I Remember)
Title: Somebody Else (I Knew It AU)
Author: himawarixxsandz
Rating: PG-13
Pairing(s): DooSeob, DooSeung, mentions of JoonHo
Summary: He's used to Doojoon loving someone else.
A/N: Seriously. This drama lately has even got me writing not as fast as I usually do with new AUs T^T Just, please, pray for our seven boys, okay? But. Yeah. So. This is about...three months-ish? After the events in Go. And by now we all know what happens after a considerable amount of time. Seung gets bored. In this case, Seung not only gets bored, but he notices something about Doo too.
It’s something he just does whenever he sees you-annoying at first, endearing later on, and now you don’t even spare a thought over it because it’s like breathing-to you and probably to him too. He does it automatically and instinctively as you climb into the passenger seat of his car-his hand instantly reaches out and tousles the back of your hair, fingertips gently holding the nape of your neck.
“You’re out early,” he says, turning down the radio and revving up the engine.
You throw your bag and jacket into the backseats of the car, grinning up at him and pulling on your seatbelt. “I got someone else to close up,” you say as the car starts moving.
Doojoon rolls his eyes. “Stop using your face to manipulate poor bastards, Yang Yoseob,” he says, pinching your cheek and withdrawing his hand before you have the chance to punch his arm.
“Poor bastard,” you say sympathetically, reaching up and pinching his cheek right back.
The car leaves the parking lot as Doojoon slaps your shoulder. “Fuck right I am,” he says. “Look at me-picking you up from your fucking late shift on a Friday night just to make sure you don’t get attacked on the subway.”
You laugh. “Boyfriend pissed that you aren’t laying it on him right now?” you ask teasingly.
Doojoon shrugs, smiling. “Nah-I think he has a late shift of his own-fucking workaholic.”
You lean against the window, head against the cool glass.
I can’t bear to hug you when you’re in front of me
You think that maybe it’d be easier if he was always happy.
It would still hurt-by no means would it make it hurt any less, but at the very least, if all Doojoon ever had to say to you were reports, stories, on perfect dates with Hyunseung, perfect sex with Hyunseung, perfect conversations with Hyunseung-on how perfect Hyunseung is in general-even though it might even hurt more, at the very least, you wouldn’t have those ugly thoughts swimming around in your head.
You wouldn’t have thoughts that you know definitely make you a terrible person-worse than being in love with someone who’s in a relationship-worse than wishing unhappiness on your best friend just so you can have him.
You wouldn’t have thoughts of how you could do so much better than Jang Hyunseung in making Doojoon happy.
I can’t say a single word
You’re so pathetic that you count.
You keep count of the times Doojoon comes to you grinning and bright because things have been going well with Hyunseung, because they saw a movie the other day, because they went to an amazing new restaurant that opened last week, because things are going great at work with the new project he’s working on with Hyunseung. You keep count of the good times and you keep count of the bad times-of the times when Doojoon comes to you angry and sad and sometimes even bitter-because there was another fight, because Hyunseung is being suspicious again, because Doojoon knows that Hyunseung is still bent up over his ex, because Hyunseung is just being Hyunseung and Doojoon is confused and hurt.
You keep track of the good times and the bad times and it doesn’t escape you for a moment how there’s over triple the number of bad times than there are good times. You hate the part of you that’s happy over something like this-you hate that terribly insistent voice in your head that never stops, that never shuts up, that continues insisting on how you could do so much better than Hyunseung if you were only given the chance.
But the fact is that you’re not.
You haven’t been given the chance and you’re pretty sure you never will be because it only takes one glance to look over the people Doojoon have been with and the person Doojoon is with now to see that Yoon Doojoon would never go for someone like Yang Yoseob.
You’re just a friend, after all.
And that’s all you’ll ever be.
So every day I am looking only at you
It’s so easy on nights like tonight.
Nights where he’s over at your apartment, head in your lap, alcohol on the table (he brought it over because he says he needs to forget, to loosen up for tonight), television on some sports channel-droning on in the background about the score. It’s so easy to forget about everything else, about the situation, the circumstances, on nights where it’s just you and him and he’s looking up at you with that smile (the smile that always kills you).
(The smile where the corners of his eyes crinkle and all of his teeth show and he’s laughing at something you said and trying to snatch the bottle of beer out of your hand)
“Get your fucking own, lazy ass,” you laugh and dodge out of his reach (slip away from beneath him and his head lands with a thunk on the floor).
He gets up, propping himself up on his arm and crawling after you, catching you around the waist and throwing you onto the sofa. “Yah,” he says, grinning, fingers digging into your sides and you just laugh harder because it tickles. “I’m the one who fucking brought it, Yang Yoseob-I paid for it, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” you say, rolling your eyes playfully as you lie on your back on the sofa and try not to spill the contents of the bottle. You offer it to him, holding the rim to his lips. He takes it out of your hand and sets it back on the table. “Yah,” you frown, “if you’re not going to drink it-”
“That was for me to drown my shit in,” Doojoon says with a small smile. “Not you, okay? Stop drinking so fucking much.”
You want to tell him that you have just as much shit to drown as he does, but then he’d ask what kind of shit and answering that isn’t really an option for you unless you want to be without a best friend. “What’s wrong this time?” you ask instead, sitting up on the sofa, socked feet on the floor.
He slides closer, crawling around the carpet and resting his arms and head in your lap again as he kneels at the foot of the couch. “He’s pissed at me,” he says, “like always.”
You frown. “For what?”
Right now, in your two eyes
Sometimes, when you hear the reasons-the causes-for the fights they have, when you hear the reasons and causes for why Hyunseung feels the need to make Doojoon feel like complete shit-sometimes you wonder if Hyunseung even actually loves him.
(And that horrible part of you will pipe up and insist that no matter how much Hyunseung loves Doojoon it’ll never be as much as you do)
A different person other than me
Jang Hyunseung is everything you expected him to be before the first time you get to meet him. He’s everything Doojoon always dates (sexy and flirtatious and charming like Changsun, beautiful and slender and smiling like Gina, dry and quirky like Gayoon-because Doojoon has always dated beautiful and perfect people, with beautiful and perfect bodies, beautiful and perfect personalities) and you were just preparing yourself for another few months watching Doojoon indescribably happy until they part ways because either they or Doojoon feel like things just aren’t working out.
But they always stay friends because it’s Yoon Doojoon and Gina and Changsun and Gayoon were every bit as perfect as Doojoon so naturally two perfect, beautiful people always remain friends after their beautiful, perfect, mutual break-up.
So you were just a little surprised the first time Doojoon came knocking on your door, alcohol in hand, rings under his eyes, and telling you that he’s going to spend the night here because Hyunseung refuses to speak to him until tomorrow morning.
Is standing before you, smiling at you
Doojoon smiles oddly-a strangled, choked sort of smile. “I kind of suggested to him that maybe he’s still hung up on his ex,” he says, resting his chin on his arms and tilting his face up to look at you. “He kind of blew up on me-and at me.” He laughs a bit under his breath. “I had to dodge a lamp.”
You squint. “He threw a lamp at you?”
“I dodged,” he shrugs. You stare. He laughs again, putting his arms around your waist, cheek against your thigh. “Relax,” he says. “It’ll blow over. He gets pissed fast, but he stops being pissed fast too.”
You’re quiet. “Why did you say that, though?” you ask in a small voice.
Doojoon’s eyes don’t meet yours, smile fading slightly. His hands go limp on your hips and he draws away, coming to sit beside you on the sofa. You watch his silhouette as he stares straight ahead, eyebrows furrowing.
I can look at you
(You want to hold his hand-you want to thread your fingers through his and tell him that, even though you’re not perfect or beautiful, you want to be given a chance. You want to tell him that even though you’re not as sexy and flirtatious and charming as Changsun, as beautiful as Gina, as witty and dry as Gayoon-you want to tell him that you’ll still try, you’ll give everything you can to make him happy, to be the one that lasts the longest)
But I can’t approach you
You meet Doojoon when you first started bartending-when you were new and sent to an office to tend the bar at a Christmas dinner party for the company. It’s before you started working at the club, and before Doojoon’s position was as high up as it is now. You meet him because he’s new at his workplace and you’re new at yours and his sunbaes keep sending him back and forth for drinks and your sunbaes keep yelling at you for making the drinks wrong.
You meet him because he takes a seat, exhausted from constantly running back and forth, constantly bowing, constantly being introduced and introducing-you’re exhausted from being yelled at, from making drinks in bulk, from running back and forth from the kitchens to keep the bottles filled.
He grins at you.
You blink. “Please don’t hit on me,” you say, because you’re really just tired and wish businessmen didn’t drink such complicated drinks (what’s wrong with fucking soju-or something else that all you’d have to do is pour-what’s wrong with milk and water).
He laughs. “You’re cute,” he says.
“Thanks,” you say. “I like your tie.”
He holds out his hand. “Yoon Doojoon.”
You slide a drink to him-iced and sweet, since his hair is sort of stuck to his face with perspiration and he’s kind of panting. “Yang Yoseob,” you smile a little, and shake his hand.
I have no courage
Doojoon brings his eyes to meet yours slowly, and with every passing second that your gazes are locked, you feel the crack in your heart getting deeper and deeper because it’s so obvious-so fucking, terribly obvious-how Doojoon actually loves Hyunseung. Because Doojoon would never be upset over something like this, would never bother unless he really loves the person (and Doojoon always takes care of the people he loves).
“I don’t know,” Doojoon says quietly. “Maybe-I mean-I never really believed when he’d tell me how his ex was all abusive and shit. Like-I wouldn’t talk crap about his ex, but I don’t know-after I met him-and-like-I’d try saying something but Hyunseungie would just tell me to shut up because he doesn’t want to talk about it or because he keeps getting angry at me for saying shit about his ex when I just wanted to-I don’t know,” Doojoon runs a hand over his face.
You bite your lip. “Maybe he doesn’t want to talk about it because they’re really bad memories.”
A tiny, humorless smile curves Doojoon’s mouth as he looks at you. “I don’t think so,” he says softly. “His ex gave him this signed poster of some dance crew, and he keeps holding it and staring at it when he thinks I can’t see because I’m not in the room.”
You don’t know what to say to that.
Because I’m afraid we might grow apart
Or maybe you do.
Maybe you know exactly what to say to that.
Maybe you know that you should tell Doojoon that, for once in the years you’ve known him, it’s his turn to break-up with someone instead of always being broken-up with. You want to tell Doojoon that he always loves too hard, too wholeheartedly, too selflessly, and all he’s ever gotten from Changsun and Gina and Gayoon were break-ups and heartaches. It doesn’t matter how much he loves them, they all left him with apologies of how they just want to be friends and Doojoon doesn’t even spare three seconds to be upset with them.
You want to say that maybe Doojoon should stop looking for people to love, people who he won’t know will leave him or won’t leave him-that maybe Doojoon should look at a place that he’s been staring at all along-that maybe, despite you not being even close to as beautiful and perfect and engaging as anyone Doojoon usually dates, you’ll stay with him. You’ll love him back exactly as much as he loves you if he would only give you a chance and love you.
Maybe you know exactly what to say.
You’ve just always been too terrified to say it.
You’re still too terrified to say it.
So I’m waiting and I’m waiting
And you know that.
You know that you have no right in hurting over Doojoon always being with somebody else because you’ve never had the balls to say anything about it during the times when Doojoon is single.
Maybe because you’re just that afraid he’ll turn you down-terrified of rejection.
(Because it’s so much easier to just fantasize than to face the reality of how Doojoon only dates people who’re perfect and beautiful)
Though I don’t know where the end is
When he leaves, as always, there are a lot more words on your tongue than just goodbye and good night.
“See you tomorrow, Yoseob-ah,” he tousles your hair again, the way he always does, gently squeezing the back of your neck and smiling at you a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes at all (weary and sad).
Don’t go back to him
Stay with me
Don’t leave just because he called you
Only leave when you want to and not when he wants you to
Don’t go back to him if you’ll just come back to me when he hurts you
I love you
“Okay,” you say. “Feel better.”
Everyone tells me that I’m such a fool
Sometimes you wonder if Jang Hyunseung’s purpose in life is to make you feel like a terrible human being. You hate how judgmental and short-sighted and close-minded it makes you seem whenever you want to tell Doojoon that it doesn’t matter how terrible Hyunseung’s ex was, Hyunseung still cheated on him and you think that that says something about a person-regardless of circumstance. But it’s not like you really know Hyunseung, he’s not a close friend of yours, you’ve only met him a few times in person, so you can’t say anything.
You won’t say anything.
Because for all you know, maybe Hyunseung is worth all the hurt that Doojoon goes through every single time they fight. You shouldn’t say anything just because you’re jealous and horrible and the worst kind of friend and someone who doesn’t even deserve to be friends with Doojoon at this point. Using the fact that you’re in love with Doojoon is just cowardly and unnecessary. That’s just you being selfish.
You need to be a good friend-you need to be as best of a friend as you can be because Doojoon is the best man you’ve ever met and you don’t want to lose him.
But no one knows my heart
He calls you in the morning, like he always does before you head out for the day (he always calls you right after he has breakfast around seven and right after you usually start for a coffee shop at eight), and tells you-the way he always does-that everything is fine now between him and Hyunseung and Hyunseung says it was just because he was tired and that of course he didn’t mean to upset Doojoon like that as long as Doojoon remembers next time not to mention Hyunseung’s ex again otherwise Hyunseung will be upset and Doojoon isn’t going to want that.
Words quoted directly from Hyunseung, apparently.
You hate how Doojoon falls for Hyunseung’s threats.
(Because there’s no other word-Hyunseung threatens Doojoon and Doojoon never does anything otherwise)
The call ends with Doojoon thanking you for listening to his drunk, miserable ass last night and how you’re an amazing friend and how he’ll pick you up from wherever you are tonight (since you don’t have a shift at the club today) and that he’s sorry he can’t be with you tonight after dropping you off at your apartment because Hyunseung wants to go out with Doojoon tonight and he thanks you again and-
You wonder if you’ll ever get a chance.
(To prove that you can make him so much happier if he’ll only let you)
(But that’s selfish)
My heart that only beats towards you
When you get to the studio, you’re captured around the waist with a face buried into your stomach and Seungho laughing at you from across the hall. You try to push Changsun away but he just hugs at you harder and you can feel his nose indenting itself into your ribs. “No, seriously,” you say, “I’m going to hit you, hyung.”
“Busy with the boyfriend?” Seungho asks, patting Changsun’s ass and yanking him back by the collar away from you.
“He’s not my boyfriend,” you say quietly because even though they tease you about it all the time (while listening to you complain and mope), you really just don’t want to talk about this right now (or ever). You look up just enough to meet his eyes and he offers a tiny smile (and you know he understands with the way he’s smiling).
“C’mon,” Seungho says while Changsun reattaches himself to you, “I have some new songs waiting for you.”
Can’t be stopped
“I think they hate me these days,” Doojoon says as he slows to a stop at a red light.
You think you probably should’ve tried harder to keep Seungho and Changsun from coming down with you when Doojoon came to pick you up from the studio. You think you probably should’ve tried harder to have them not blatantly glaring identical glares that only Seungho and Changsun can do (couple glares, you once called them), highly disapproving beams aimed in Doojoon’s general direction.
“Nah,” you say. “They probably just thought you got ugly. Changsunnie-hyung is allergic to ugly, remember? And Seungho-hyung doesn’t want him to break out into rashes. It ruins the sex, I hear.”
Doojoon stares at you (you feel like he should maybe be looking at the road instead). “You are so fucking mean to me, y’know,” he says and you laugh.
“No, I’m not,” you say, mockingly indifferent and patting his face until he swats away your hand.
He rolls his eyes, grinning. “You fucking are,” he says, reaching out and tousling your hair. “But it’s only ‘cause you love me, right?”
You look straight ahead as the cars start to move. “You’d better hurry,” you say lightly. “Or else you’ll be late for your date.”
With the pointless hope that you might look back
Doojoon smiles suddenly, looking straight ahead just like you are as he moves the car forward when the light turns green.
“What date?” he says and your head whips around to face him. His voice is tight, his expression is tight, his smile is pointless and humorless and dark and terrible, and you watch as his knuckles turn white over the steering wheel.
I am always waiting for you
He doesn’t have any alcohol this time as he walks with you into your apartment. He says that he would’ve had some if not for the fact that he wasn’t expecting Hyunseung to cancel the date on account of being upset with Doojoon for a reason that even left Doojoon speechless. He refused to tell you what the reason was throughout the entire ride home-saying that if he even tried to tell you, he’s terrified that he’ll crash into someone.
Doojoon lies down on the carpet of your living room, right beside the table where you two would usually put the alcohol on during nights like these (it’s weird to have two nights like these in a row because usually once there’s a fight, the next few days are filled with good moments and he doesn’t have to come lean on your shoulder right away again).
You sit beside him and he touches your hair, running his fingers down through your bangs and smoothing them over your eyes. “He’s fucking lost it,” Doojoon says quietly. “I think he’s fucking lost his mind.”
“What was the reason?” you ask, frowning.
Doojoon turns his eyes to the ceiling.
“He thinks I’m cheating on him with you.”
Will you just let me stay by your side?
You’ve always wondered about what would hurt more-if it would hurt more to go on dealing with all of this the way you are, or to just tell Doojoon, to get it over with, and take a chance to end the pain one way or the other. You’ve always wondered about what would hurt more and what would hurt less because sometimes it feels like you’re at a standstill. It feels like you’re not moving and even though you used to tune out all of what Changsun says to you about forgetting Doojoon, now you’re starting to wonder if that’s what you should do.
At the very least, take time off being Doojoon’s unpaid relationship counselor in order to counsel yourself on how not to be self-destructive by loving someone who will clearly never love you back (because he’s too busy loving beautiful and perfect cheaters). After all, Changsun was with Doojoon beforehand. Changsun knows how Doojoon works and from all he’s told you about how Doojoon works in a relationship, it’s nothing that you haven’t figured out already.
Doojoon is someone who’ll love and love and love the person he’s with-he’ll love them right, he’ll love them for as long as possible, and he’ll love them the way they need and want to be loved. He’ll love them perfectly.
But he has to love them first.
And you know that he doesn’t love you.
I’m happy with the way things are right now
Doojoon doesn’t have any alcohol, right? He didn’t have time to bring any.
He’s supposed to be sober-he’s been at work so he can’t have drunk anything, at least not a lot of anything.
Doojoon is supposed to be sober, but he’s acting anything but. He sits up and looks at you with eyes that are focused and unfocused all that once, narrowing as if he can’t really see your face-as if he’s trying to but there’s something in the way. You want to say something-anything-but nothing comes out of your mouth because what the fuck are you even supposed to say to something like that?
“Don’t you think it’d be so much fucking easier?” Doojoon says in a voice barely above a whisper. His hand comes up again, only this time, not to your hair.
He touches your face.
(Holds your face, thumb against your cheekbone)
Behind you, for you
He kisses you.
I will wait until that day
You’re so stupid. You’re fucking stupid.
You lean into it-you kiss him back-you don’t know how long you stay like that, letting him kiss you and kissing him back when all you want to do is punch his face until he’s black and blue and bleeding because right in that moment, as his lips are gentle and warm against yours, you hate him. You hate Doojoon for never giving you a chance, and as you’re hating him, during every second of this kiss, you hate yourself more.
Because you’re the one that’s the coward.
You’re the one who’s always been too afraid to ask him for a chance-to tell him that you want one.
You’re the one who’s simply stood by his side like a fucking dumbass, constantly watching him with somebody else when, during all this time, that somebody else could’ve been you. Maybe. Perhaps. Who knows.
But you never will because you’ve never even tried.
Though I am standing here
When he draws back, you don’t look at his face.
“Get out,” you whisper, and stare at the fibers of your carpet.
You don’t look up until you hear the front door slam shut.
If I can’t have you
You don’t hear from him for an entire week.
If everything is a dream
No phone calls, no texts, Changsun doesn’t hear from him either.
Doojoon is wiped off the face of the earth for an entire week until Saturday night, until right now, until here in the club that you work at (where thankfully Dongwoon and the others aren’t here to see any of what might or might not happen between you two-possibly lots of shouting in which you beg Doojoon to take you back as a friend despite all this shit).
“What the fuck are you doing here?” is the first thing, embarrassingly, that comes out of your mouth. Your hands stop shaking and you put the nearly-finished-drink down (ignoring the glares from the couple waiting for their cocktails).
He takes a seat, right in front of where you’re standing behind the bar, and folds his hands in front of himself neatly, an odd expression on his face (not quite a smile but not quite a blank expression either). “I just thought you might like to know,” he says, “that Hyunseung and I broke up.”
You’re almost afraid to breathe.
“Why?” you ask (you hate how small your voice sounds all of a sudden).
Then I want to dance with your memories
“Oddly enough,” Doojoon says, turning his eyes to the shelves upon shelves of alcohol behind you (his expression is light-thoughtful), “it’s not because of his ex.” He leans forward slightly and meets your eyes this time, that odd smile a little clearer on his lips. “Oddly enough-it’s about me not being able to take a hint and him telling me that I must be the fucking biggest dumbass in the world.”
Your eyebrows furrow. “He broke up with you because he still thinks you’re cheating on-”
“He broke up with me because he knows that I love you,” Doojoon says simply, looking straight into your eyes. “Apparently,” his smile is a little dry, “he knew before I even did and that’s why I’m the fucking biggest dumbass in the world-to him, anyway.”
You wonder if maybe the new shipment of brandy that your manager gave to you earlier this evening for the special birthday party going on tonight had toxic fumes or something wafting out of the bottles-if maybe you breathed those fumes in for a little too long and a little too deeply and this is the result.
“So,” you say quietly, biting your lip, and still knitting your eyebrows together, “what’s-like-what’re you trying to get at?”
He stands up.
Palms down on the bar, leans across-forward-over-
And kisses you.
You love somebody else
“Just,” he says, after he pulls back (and all of the clubbers at the bar are officially ogling at you), “please tell me you’re-like-not in love or about to go out with someone else.” He offers an uncertain smile. “It kind of took me this entire week to get the balls to do this.”
Really.
You don’t have much to say at this point.
(So you don’t-you just vault over the bar, careful not to spill any drinks, and throw yourself into his arms)
Author: himawarixxsandz
Rating: PG-13
Pairing(s): DooSeob, DooSeung, mentions of JoonHo
Summary: He's used to Doojoon loving someone else.
A/N: Seriously. This drama lately has even got me writing not as fast as I usually do with new AUs T^T Just, please, pray for our seven boys, okay? But. Yeah. So. This is about...three months-ish? After the events in Go. And by now we all know what happens after a considerable amount of time. Seung gets bored. In this case, Seung not only gets bored, but he notices something about Doo too.
It’s something he just does whenever he sees you-annoying at first, endearing later on, and now you don’t even spare a thought over it because it’s like breathing-to you and probably to him too. He does it automatically and instinctively as you climb into the passenger seat of his car-his hand instantly reaches out and tousles the back of your hair, fingertips gently holding the nape of your neck.
“You’re out early,” he says, turning down the radio and revving up the engine.
You throw your bag and jacket into the backseats of the car, grinning up at him and pulling on your seatbelt. “I got someone else to close up,” you say as the car starts moving.
Doojoon rolls his eyes. “Stop using your face to manipulate poor bastards, Yang Yoseob,” he says, pinching your cheek and withdrawing his hand before you have the chance to punch his arm.
“Poor bastard,” you say sympathetically, reaching up and pinching his cheek right back.
The car leaves the parking lot as Doojoon slaps your shoulder. “Fuck right I am,” he says. “Look at me-picking you up from your fucking late shift on a Friday night just to make sure you don’t get attacked on the subway.”
You laugh. “Boyfriend pissed that you aren’t laying it on him right now?” you ask teasingly.
Doojoon shrugs, smiling. “Nah-I think he has a late shift of his own-fucking workaholic.”
You lean against the window, head against the cool glass.
I can’t bear to hug you when you’re in front of me
You think that maybe it’d be easier if he was always happy.
It would still hurt-by no means would it make it hurt any less, but at the very least, if all Doojoon ever had to say to you were reports, stories, on perfect dates with Hyunseung, perfect sex with Hyunseung, perfect conversations with Hyunseung-on how perfect Hyunseung is in general-even though it might even hurt more, at the very least, you wouldn’t have those ugly thoughts swimming around in your head.
You wouldn’t have thoughts that you know definitely make you a terrible person-worse than being in love with someone who’s in a relationship-worse than wishing unhappiness on your best friend just so you can have him.
You wouldn’t have thoughts of how you could do so much better than Jang Hyunseung in making Doojoon happy.
I can’t say a single word
You’re so pathetic that you count.
You keep count of the times Doojoon comes to you grinning and bright because things have been going well with Hyunseung, because they saw a movie the other day, because they went to an amazing new restaurant that opened last week, because things are going great at work with the new project he’s working on with Hyunseung. You keep count of the good times and you keep count of the bad times-of the times when Doojoon comes to you angry and sad and sometimes even bitter-because there was another fight, because Hyunseung is being suspicious again, because Doojoon knows that Hyunseung is still bent up over his ex, because Hyunseung is just being Hyunseung and Doojoon is confused and hurt.
You keep track of the good times and the bad times and it doesn’t escape you for a moment how there’s over triple the number of bad times than there are good times. You hate the part of you that’s happy over something like this-you hate that terribly insistent voice in your head that never stops, that never shuts up, that continues insisting on how you could do so much better than Hyunseung if you were only given the chance.
But the fact is that you’re not.
You haven’t been given the chance and you’re pretty sure you never will be because it only takes one glance to look over the people Doojoon have been with and the person Doojoon is with now to see that Yoon Doojoon would never go for someone like Yang Yoseob.
You’re just a friend, after all.
And that’s all you’ll ever be.
So every day I am looking only at you
It’s so easy on nights like tonight.
Nights where he’s over at your apartment, head in your lap, alcohol on the table (he brought it over because he says he needs to forget, to loosen up for tonight), television on some sports channel-droning on in the background about the score. It’s so easy to forget about everything else, about the situation, the circumstances, on nights where it’s just you and him and he’s looking up at you with that smile (the smile that always kills you).
(The smile where the corners of his eyes crinkle and all of his teeth show and he’s laughing at something you said and trying to snatch the bottle of beer out of your hand)
“Get your fucking own, lazy ass,” you laugh and dodge out of his reach (slip away from beneath him and his head lands with a thunk on the floor).
He gets up, propping himself up on his arm and crawling after you, catching you around the waist and throwing you onto the sofa. “Yah,” he says, grinning, fingers digging into your sides and you just laugh harder because it tickles. “I’m the one who fucking brought it, Yang Yoseob-I paid for it, okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” you say, rolling your eyes playfully as you lie on your back on the sofa and try not to spill the contents of the bottle. You offer it to him, holding the rim to his lips. He takes it out of your hand and sets it back on the table. “Yah,” you frown, “if you’re not going to drink it-”
“That was for me to drown my shit in,” Doojoon says with a small smile. “Not you, okay? Stop drinking so fucking much.”
You want to tell him that you have just as much shit to drown as he does, but then he’d ask what kind of shit and answering that isn’t really an option for you unless you want to be without a best friend. “What’s wrong this time?” you ask instead, sitting up on the sofa, socked feet on the floor.
He slides closer, crawling around the carpet and resting his arms and head in your lap again as he kneels at the foot of the couch. “He’s pissed at me,” he says, “like always.”
You frown. “For what?”
Right now, in your two eyes
Sometimes, when you hear the reasons-the causes-for the fights they have, when you hear the reasons and causes for why Hyunseung feels the need to make Doojoon feel like complete shit-sometimes you wonder if Hyunseung even actually loves him.
(And that horrible part of you will pipe up and insist that no matter how much Hyunseung loves Doojoon it’ll never be as much as you do)
A different person other than me
Jang Hyunseung is everything you expected him to be before the first time you get to meet him. He’s everything Doojoon always dates (sexy and flirtatious and charming like Changsun, beautiful and slender and smiling like Gina, dry and quirky like Gayoon-because Doojoon has always dated beautiful and perfect people, with beautiful and perfect bodies, beautiful and perfect personalities) and you were just preparing yourself for another few months watching Doojoon indescribably happy until they part ways because either they or Doojoon feel like things just aren’t working out.
But they always stay friends because it’s Yoon Doojoon and Gina and Changsun and Gayoon were every bit as perfect as Doojoon so naturally two perfect, beautiful people always remain friends after their beautiful, perfect, mutual break-up.
So you were just a little surprised the first time Doojoon came knocking on your door, alcohol in hand, rings under his eyes, and telling you that he’s going to spend the night here because Hyunseung refuses to speak to him until tomorrow morning.
Is standing before you, smiling at you
Doojoon smiles oddly-a strangled, choked sort of smile. “I kind of suggested to him that maybe he’s still hung up on his ex,” he says, resting his chin on his arms and tilting his face up to look at you. “He kind of blew up on me-and at me.” He laughs a bit under his breath. “I had to dodge a lamp.”
You squint. “He threw a lamp at you?”
“I dodged,” he shrugs. You stare. He laughs again, putting his arms around your waist, cheek against your thigh. “Relax,” he says. “It’ll blow over. He gets pissed fast, but he stops being pissed fast too.”
You’re quiet. “Why did you say that, though?” you ask in a small voice.
Doojoon’s eyes don’t meet yours, smile fading slightly. His hands go limp on your hips and he draws away, coming to sit beside you on the sofa. You watch his silhouette as he stares straight ahead, eyebrows furrowing.
I can look at you
(You want to hold his hand-you want to thread your fingers through his and tell him that, even though you’re not perfect or beautiful, you want to be given a chance. You want to tell him that even though you’re not as sexy and flirtatious and charming as Changsun, as beautiful as Gina, as witty and dry as Gayoon-you want to tell him that you’ll still try, you’ll give everything you can to make him happy, to be the one that lasts the longest)
But I can’t approach you
You meet Doojoon when you first started bartending-when you were new and sent to an office to tend the bar at a Christmas dinner party for the company. It’s before you started working at the club, and before Doojoon’s position was as high up as it is now. You meet him because he’s new at his workplace and you’re new at yours and his sunbaes keep sending him back and forth for drinks and your sunbaes keep yelling at you for making the drinks wrong.
You meet him because he takes a seat, exhausted from constantly running back and forth, constantly bowing, constantly being introduced and introducing-you’re exhausted from being yelled at, from making drinks in bulk, from running back and forth from the kitchens to keep the bottles filled.
He grins at you.
You blink. “Please don’t hit on me,” you say, because you’re really just tired and wish businessmen didn’t drink such complicated drinks (what’s wrong with fucking soju-or something else that all you’d have to do is pour-what’s wrong with milk and water).
He laughs. “You’re cute,” he says.
“Thanks,” you say. “I like your tie.”
He holds out his hand. “Yoon Doojoon.”
You slide a drink to him-iced and sweet, since his hair is sort of stuck to his face with perspiration and he’s kind of panting. “Yang Yoseob,” you smile a little, and shake his hand.
I have no courage
Doojoon brings his eyes to meet yours slowly, and with every passing second that your gazes are locked, you feel the crack in your heart getting deeper and deeper because it’s so obvious-so fucking, terribly obvious-how Doojoon actually loves Hyunseung. Because Doojoon would never be upset over something like this, would never bother unless he really loves the person (and Doojoon always takes care of the people he loves).
“I don’t know,” Doojoon says quietly. “Maybe-I mean-I never really believed when he’d tell me how his ex was all abusive and shit. Like-I wouldn’t talk crap about his ex, but I don’t know-after I met him-and-like-I’d try saying something but Hyunseungie would just tell me to shut up because he doesn’t want to talk about it or because he keeps getting angry at me for saying shit about his ex when I just wanted to-I don’t know,” Doojoon runs a hand over his face.
You bite your lip. “Maybe he doesn’t want to talk about it because they’re really bad memories.”
A tiny, humorless smile curves Doojoon’s mouth as he looks at you. “I don’t think so,” he says softly. “His ex gave him this signed poster of some dance crew, and he keeps holding it and staring at it when he thinks I can’t see because I’m not in the room.”
You don’t know what to say to that.
Because I’m afraid we might grow apart
Or maybe you do.
Maybe you know exactly what to say to that.
Maybe you know that you should tell Doojoon that, for once in the years you’ve known him, it’s his turn to break-up with someone instead of always being broken-up with. You want to tell Doojoon that he always loves too hard, too wholeheartedly, too selflessly, and all he’s ever gotten from Changsun and Gina and Gayoon were break-ups and heartaches. It doesn’t matter how much he loves them, they all left him with apologies of how they just want to be friends and Doojoon doesn’t even spare three seconds to be upset with them.
You want to say that maybe Doojoon should stop looking for people to love, people who he won’t know will leave him or won’t leave him-that maybe Doojoon should look at a place that he’s been staring at all along-that maybe, despite you not being even close to as beautiful and perfect and engaging as anyone Doojoon usually dates, you’ll stay with him. You’ll love him back exactly as much as he loves you if he would only give you a chance and love you.
Maybe you know exactly what to say.
You’ve just always been too terrified to say it.
You’re still too terrified to say it.
So I’m waiting and I’m waiting
And you know that.
You know that you have no right in hurting over Doojoon always being with somebody else because you’ve never had the balls to say anything about it during the times when Doojoon is single.
Maybe because you’re just that afraid he’ll turn you down-terrified of rejection.
(Because it’s so much easier to just fantasize than to face the reality of how Doojoon only dates people who’re perfect and beautiful)
Though I don’t know where the end is
When he leaves, as always, there are a lot more words on your tongue than just goodbye and good night.
“See you tomorrow, Yoseob-ah,” he tousles your hair again, the way he always does, gently squeezing the back of your neck and smiling at you a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes at all (weary and sad).
Don’t go back to him
Stay with me
Don’t leave just because he called you
Only leave when you want to and not when he wants you to
Don’t go back to him if you’ll just come back to me when he hurts you
I love you
“Okay,” you say. “Feel better.”
Everyone tells me that I’m such a fool
Sometimes you wonder if Jang Hyunseung’s purpose in life is to make you feel like a terrible human being. You hate how judgmental and short-sighted and close-minded it makes you seem whenever you want to tell Doojoon that it doesn’t matter how terrible Hyunseung’s ex was, Hyunseung still cheated on him and you think that that says something about a person-regardless of circumstance. But it’s not like you really know Hyunseung, he’s not a close friend of yours, you’ve only met him a few times in person, so you can’t say anything.
You won’t say anything.
Because for all you know, maybe Hyunseung is worth all the hurt that Doojoon goes through every single time they fight. You shouldn’t say anything just because you’re jealous and horrible and the worst kind of friend and someone who doesn’t even deserve to be friends with Doojoon at this point. Using the fact that you’re in love with Doojoon is just cowardly and unnecessary. That’s just you being selfish.
You need to be a good friend-you need to be as best of a friend as you can be because Doojoon is the best man you’ve ever met and you don’t want to lose him.
But no one knows my heart
He calls you in the morning, like he always does before you head out for the day (he always calls you right after he has breakfast around seven and right after you usually start for a coffee shop at eight), and tells you-the way he always does-that everything is fine now between him and Hyunseung and Hyunseung says it was just because he was tired and that of course he didn’t mean to upset Doojoon like that as long as Doojoon remembers next time not to mention Hyunseung’s ex again otherwise Hyunseung will be upset and Doojoon isn’t going to want that.
Words quoted directly from Hyunseung, apparently.
You hate how Doojoon falls for Hyunseung’s threats.
(Because there’s no other word-Hyunseung threatens Doojoon and Doojoon never does anything otherwise)
The call ends with Doojoon thanking you for listening to his drunk, miserable ass last night and how you’re an amazing friend and how he’ll pick you up from wherever you are tonight (since you don’t have a shift at the club today) and that he’s sorry he can’t be with you tonight after dropping you off at your apartment because Hyunseung wants to go out with Doojoon tonight and he thanks you again and-
You wonder if you’ll ever get a chance.
(To prove that you can make him so much happier if he’ll only let you)
(But that’s selfish)
My heart that only beats towards you
When you get to the studio, you’re captured around the waist with a face buried into your stomach and Seungho laughing at you from across the hall. You try to push Changsun away but he just hugs at you harder and you can feel his nose indenting itself into your ribs. “No, seriously,” you say, “I’m going to hit you, hyung.”
“Busy with the boyfriend?” Seungho asks, patting Changsun’s ass and yanking him back by the collar away from you.
“He’s not my boyfriend,” you say quietly because even though they tease you about it all the time (while listening to you complain and mope), you really just don’t want to talk about this right now (or ever). You look up just enough to meet his eyes and he offers a tiny smile (and you know he understands with the way he’s smiling).
“C’mon,” Seungho says while Changsun reattaches himself to you, “I have some new songs waiting for you.”
Can’t be stopped
“I think they hate me these days,” Doojoon says as he slows to a stop at a red light.
You think you probably should’ve tried harder to keep Seungho and Changsun from coming down with you when Doojoon came to pick you up from the studio. You think you probably should’ve tried harder to have them not blatantly glaring identical glares that only Seungho and Changsun can do (couple glares, you once called them), highly disapproving beams aimed in Doojoon’s general direction.
“Nah,” you say. “They probably just thought you got ugly. Changsunnie-hyung is allergic to ugly, remember? And Seungho-hyung doesn’t want him to break out into rashes. It ruins the sex, I hear.”
Doojoon stares at you (you feel like he should maybe be looking at the road instead). “You are so fucking mean to me, y’know,” he says and you laugh.
“No, I’m not,” you say, mockingly indifferent and patting his face until he swats away your hand.
He rolls his eyes, grinning. “You fucking are,” he says, reaching out and tousling your hair. “But it’s only ‘cause you love me, right?”
You look straight ahead as the cars start to move. “You’d better hurry,” you say lightly. “Or else you’ll be late for your date.”
With the pointless hope that you might look back
Doojoon smiles suddenly, looking straight ahead just like you are as he moves the car forward when the light turns green.
“What date?” he says and your head whips around to face him. His voice is tight, his expression is tight, his smile is pointless and humorless and dark and terrible, and you watch as his knuckles turn white over the steering wheel.
I am always waiting for you
He doesn’t have any alcohol this time as he walks with you into your apartment. He says that he would’ve had some if not for the fact that he wasn’t expecting Hyunseung to cancel the date on account of being upset with Doojoon for a reason that even left Doojoon speechless. He refused to tell you what the reason was throughout the entire ride home-saying that if he even tried to tell you, he’s terrified that he’ll crash into someone.
Doojoon lies down on the carpet of your living room, right beside the table where you two would usually put the alcohol on during nights like these (it’s weird to have two nights like these in a row because usually once there’s a fight, the next few days are filled with good moments and he doesn’t have to come lean on your shoulder right away again).
You sit beside him and he touches your hair, running his fingers down through your bangs and smoothing them over your eyes. “He’s fucking lost it,” Doojoon says quietly. “I think he’s fucking lost his mind.”
“What was the reason?” you ask, frowning.
Doojoon turns his eyes to the ceiling.
“He thinks I’m cheating on him with you.”
Will you just let me stay by your side?
You’ve always wondered about what would hurt more-if it would hurt more to go on dealing with all of this the way you are, or to just tell Doojoon, to get it over with, and take a chance to end the pain one way or the other. You’ve always wondered about what would hurt more and what would hurt less because sometimes it feels like you’re at a standstill. It feels like you’re not moving and even though you used to tune out all of what Changsun says to you about forgetting Doojoon, now you’re starting to wonder if that’s what you should do.
At the very least, take time off being Doojoon’s unpaid relationship counselor in order to counsel yourself on how not to be self-destructive by loving someone who will clearly never love you back (because he’s too busy loving beautiful and perfect cheaters). After all, Changsun was with Doojoon beforehand. Changsun knows how Doojoon works and from all he’s told you about how Doojoon works in a relationship, it’s nothing that you haven’t figured out already.
Doojoon is someone who’ll love and love and love the person he’s with-he’ll love them right, he’ll love them for as long as possible, and he’ll love them the way they need and want to be loved. He’ll love them perfectly.
But he has to love them first.
And you know that he doesn’t love you.
I’m happy with the way things are right now
Doojoon doesn’t have any alcohol, right? He didn’t have time to bring any.
He’s supposed to be sober-he’s been at work so he can’t have drunk anything, at least not a lot of anything.
Doojoon is supposed to be sober, but he’s acting anything but. He sits up and looks at you with eyes that are focused and unfocused all that once, narrowing as if he can’t really see your face-as if he’s trying to but there’s something in the way. You want to say something-anything-but nothing comes out of your mouth because what the fuck are you even supposed to say to something like that?
“Don’t you think it’d be so much fucking easier?” Doojoon says in a voice barely above a whisper. His hand comes up again, only this time, not to your hair.
He touches your face.
(Holds your face, thumb against your cheekbone)
Behind you, for you
He kisses you.
I will wait until that day
You’re so stupid. You’re fucking stupid.
You lean into it-you kiss him back-you don’t know how long you stay like that, letting him kiss you and kissing him back when all you want to do is punch his face until he’s black and blue and bleeding because right in that moment, as his lips are gentle and warm against yours, you hate him. You hate Doojoon for never giving you a chance, and as you’re hating him, during every second of this kiss, you hate yourself more.
Because you’re the one that’s the coward.
You’re the one who’s always been too afraid to ask him for a chance-to tell him that you want one.
You’re the one who’s simply stood by his side like a fucking dumbass, constantly watching him with somebody else when, during all this time, that somebody else could’ve been you. Maybe. Perhaps. Who knows.
But you never will because you’ve never even tried.
Though I am standing here
When he draws back, you don’t look at his face.
“Get out,” you whisper, and stare at the fibers of your carpet.
You don’t look up until you hear the front door slam shut.
If I can’t have you
You don’t hear from him for an entire week.
If everything is a dream
No phone calls, no texts, Changsun doesn’t hear from him either.
Doojoon is wiped off the face of the earth for an entire week until Saturday night, until right now, until here in the club that you work at (where thankfully Dongwoon and the others aren’t here to see any of what might or might not happen between you two-possibly lots of shouting in which you beg Doojoon to take you back as a friend despite all this shit).
“What the fuck are you doing here?” is the first thing, embarrassingly, that comes out of your mouth. Your hands stop shaking and you put the nearly-finished-drink down (ignoring the glares from the couple waiting for their cocktails).
He takes a seat, right in front of where you’re standing behind the bar, and folds his hands in front of himself neatly, an odd expression on his face (not quite a smile but not quite a blank expression either). “I just thought you might like to know,” he says, “that Hyunseung and I broke up.”
You’re almost afraid to breathe.
“Why?” you ask (you hate how small your voice sounds all of a sudden).
Then I want to dance with your memories
“Oddly enough,” Doojoon says, turning his eyes to the shelves upon shelves of alcohol behind you (his expression is light-thoughtful), “it’s not because of his ex.” He leans forward slightly and meets your eyes this time, that odd smile a little clearer on his lips. “Oddly enough-it’s about me not being able to take a hint and him telling me that I must be the fucking biggest dumbass in the world.”
Your eyebrows furrow. “He broke up with you because he still thinks you’re cheating on-”
“He broke up with me because he knows that I love you,” Doojoon says simply, looking straight into your eyes. “Apparently,” his smile is a little dry, “he knew before I even did and that’s why I’m the fucking biggest dumbass in the world-to him, anyway.”
You wonder if maybe the new shipment of brandy that your manager gave to you earlier this evening for the special birthday party going on tonight had toxic fumes or something wafting out of the bottles-if maybe you breathed those fumes in for a little too long and a little too deeply and this is the result.
“So,” you say quietly, biting your lip, and still knitting your eyebrows together, “what’s-like-what’re you trying to get at?”
He stands up.
Palms down on the bar, leans across-forward-over-
And kisses you.
You love somebody else
“Just,” he says, after he pulls back (and all of the clubbers at the bar are officially ogling at you), “please tell me you’re-like-not in love or about to go out with someone else.” He offers an uncertain smile. “It kind of took me this entire week to get the balls to do this.”
Really.
You don’t have much to say at this point.
(So you don’t-you just vault over the bar, careful not to spill any drinks, and throw yourself into his arms)