SHINee {Minho/Onew ; There's Something About Jinki (2/3)}
Title: There's Something About Jinki (2/3)
Fandom: SHINee
Pairing: Minho/Onew, Jonghyun/Key
Word count: 5,619
Rating: PG
Summary: Onew really doesn't understand what Choi Minho, football captain, loved by the student body as a whole, is doing talking to him, but he'd quite like him to stop. Being the butt of someone's joke was never the point of Onew's high school career.
A/N: so how this usually happens is that we write sections and then civilized_era edits it and finds music and pictures to go with it, and basically I do nothing of interest :|
There's Something About Jinki (2/3)
BLUSH by Plumb
No, no no no, this wasn't supposed to happen; the library was Onew's Safe Zone, complete with yellow caution tape and flashing lights to divert traffic. Or it might as well be: the librarian and he were on pretty good terms -- occasionally she'd ask him to test-read new books for the school censor board, which, come to think of it, seemed like questionable intent -- and the study room nearest to the world history section practically had his name on the door. She knew he wasn't exactly popular -- okay, furthest from -- and thus wouldn't have sent the most popular kid in the entire school his way unless...what was this with the questionable intentions again?
And then all of a sudden Onew is mad, mad because what in the hell, what gave Minho the right to be nice like this all of a sudden, to act as though it was perfectly fine to be seen talking to him like it wasn't disrupting any social structure that had been set in place since the invention of high school, where geeky losers like him never came within one hundred feet of popular jocks him like Minho, ever. It wasn't okay. And it definitely wasn't okay how the sudden rush of anger and confusion is making his head spin.
"Look," he snaps, and stands up abruptly, shrugging off Minho's hand from his shoulder. "What exactly do you want from me, Choi? Are you doing this as a favor for someone? Is this a long-term joke to you and your friends or something? If it is, just tell me what to do for the punchline and I'll fucking do it, just as long as you promise to leave me alone--"
"Jinki," Minho says in that slow, calm way of his, but somehow it just manages to irritate Onew even more, "this isn't a joke--"
"Then what? I don't have the time for tutoring, I'm not good at any sports, not least of which football with your stupid confusing jersey numbering system or whatever, I'm sorry for the stupid card and wanting to say thank you and just, I don't want anything else, okay?" Onew is practically begging. "You don't have to seek me out and try to be my, my--"
"Friend?" Minho interrupts, and the way he says it is almost cold, enough so that something twists low in Onew's stomach, fearful of a huge misunderstanding. "That's good, I don't want to be your friend either."
"Oh," Onew says, and tries to ignore the shock of the words, like being shot in the chest. "Well, then I--"
"Not your friend," Minho says again, totally unnecessarily, except he's acting kind of suspicious, a discreet glance over his shoulder to see if there's anyone else nearby. There isn't. "Not your friend, but--"
"What?"
Minho looks back at him and smiles all of a sudden, this strange, sincere, wobbly sort of smile, as if he's nervous about something. "Maybe something else," he murmurs, eyes bright, and Onew is able to take one more startled breath before Minho is kissing him.
Well, his brain says after a few seconds, he never saw that coming. And then it goes into this repetitive, frantic flurry of how this isn't serious, no way could this be serious, no way that this could be possible. How could the most popular guy in school possibly be standing the library, kissing him, and actually mean it? Somehow, Minho knows, and Onew has been set up, with a hidden camera or hidden friends, and -- damn that card, it's all because of that card, isn't it? Minho thinks it's all some big joke, a prank to play on the nerd. His anger rising again, he puts his hands against Minho's shoulders and pushes him away, hard enough for Minho to stumble backwards into the table. Onew looks down at his hands; he wasn't aware that he had that kind of strength. Minho, for his part, looks extremely shocked, the kind of shocked like when you get hit by something on the head and you're not quite aware what it is yet. No doubt that's because he's never been rejected during a kiss before. But there's a first time for everything.
"Leave me alone," he says, and he's out of the library before Minho can even think about reacting.
The look that Key gives him is nothing short of terrifying, and if Onew keeps shrinking in his seat like this, he's going to do permanent damage to his back. "You did what?"
"I--"
"You pushed him away? Why would you do that, why? He was kissing you!"
"Because he was kissing me!" Onew nearly knocks over his glass from his attempt to emphasize his point by gesturing. "What was I supposed to do, I didn't want to -- you know -- I couldn't act like I enjoyed it, then I'd be incriminated!"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"It was just some sort of a joke to him! Embarrass the nerd. Make the nerd like you and then profit."
"Profit. You thought it was a joke." Key's voice is very low. Extremely low. It makes Onew shift uncomfortably, like a child getting scolded. Key turns to Jonghyun. "Hold me back, or I will punch him in the throat." Jonghyun rests a calming hand on his lower arm and Onew clutches at his throat; the last time Key followed up on that threat had been after Jonghyun had kissed him. Jonghyun couldn't talk for a week. But that reminded Onew of something.
"You thought Jonghyun was joking! When he kissed you!"
"Well, that was different," says Key. "Jonghyun is always joking. Jonghyun is like, the joker. Not like your Minho."
"But I'm better looking, aren't I?" Jonghyun asks.
"Don't call him my Minho," Onew says.
"No," Key says, and neither of them ever find out who he's talking to. All Key does is repeat that Onew is an idiot every time Onew says anything, like "but I'm not," and "I'll have a refill, please," and "how much is my section of the bill?" Key even telephones him just before he goes to sleep to tell him that he's an idiot, and Onew knows this. He knows that he's an idiot, not for the same reasons Key thinks, but because he pushed the most popular guy in school.
He's so going to get beaten up tomorrow.
He gets through half the day without anything happening, but after lunch, Onew dares to hope that maybe he's safe after all. This weekend was the football game, and after that, no one will care about anything that the class geek did, even if he did physically assault the captain of the football team. Once everyone else forgets, maybe Minho will also forget about him: forget his name, forget about the stupid card, and Onew can go back to not living his life in complete and utter terror of meeting Minho by chance at school.
Kind of like right now. Minho is walking down the hallway, seemingly towards him, long strides over tiles. Onew reacts without thinking, darting into the nearest empty classroom and sinking against the closed door behind him, heaving out a large sigh of relief. He hopes really, really hard, that Minho will forget; this can't be good for his heart.
Saturday morning is a welcome respite from the stomach-twisting ordeal that has become school. Onew wakes up and doesn't feel any paranoia or dread, just a blissful kind of drowsy, sunlight streaming through the blinds, wind rustling the branches and leaves, the birds chirping outside. Onew sighs, rolling on his stomach, tucks his head in a darkened corner of blanket, all prepared to drop off to sleep again--
Only then his phone starts ringing. A few seconds later Onew groans, struggling to prop himself up on his elbows, staring blearily across the room. All the way over on his desk too. He rolls out of bed, staggers upright, somehow manages to make his way over without tripping, answers while stifling a yawn, "Hello?"
It's the editor for the school paper. "Jinki, I need you to cover the game today." There's no question which game it could possibly be, but this -- this wasn't his job, dammit.
"Why can't Wooyoung do it?" he asks, shoving his bangs out of his eyes. "He's the sports editor, after all."
"Wooyoung is sick," his editor says, "and everyone else is busy."
"What!" he protests, "I'm busy too, I've got plans--"
"What plans?"
"Um..."
"Exactly. Game starts at five, try to get there a little early so you can interview some of the alumni, a few of them are coming. Lee Donghae, Kim Youngwoon, you know."
"But--"
Click.
Shit. But there's no way he's going to that game. While camping out in the empty classroom the other day, he had come up with a foolproof plan: avoid any kind of contact with Minho by all means possible for the next three months. After that, he would graduate, move on to university, and never have to hear or see him ever again. It was a good plan; going to the game, however, would directly interfere with it. The thought of Minho catching sight of him in the stands makes his gut twist painfully, and in fit of desperation, he dials Key.
"We'll go with you!" Key chirps after he tells him the news.
"No! No, you're not supposed to go with me! You're supposed to keep me from going, what kind of friends are you?"
Jonghyun snorts. Key must have put it on speaker. "How are we supposed to keep you from going? Kidnap you?"
"Yes!"
"Onew, it's not a kidnapping if the victim is willing," the other boy reminds him.
"Besides," Key puts in, "I want to take a look at this Minho guy. See if he's as scary as you make him out to be."
"I never said he was scary," Onew says, annoyed. "I just--"
"You just let him kiss you and then -- wait, he kissed you. That settles it, there's gotta be something wrong with him."
"I hate you both."
"Come on," Jonghyun wheedles. "We'll stay long enough for you to get your quotes or whatever and for Key to get his fill of eyecandy, then we'll go to noraebang. Sound good?"
Onew doesn't know what's the point of having friends if they refuse to help you out and only know how to bait you into doing something you don't want to do. Reluctantly he agrees. He loves noraebang.
"You look ridiculous," Key hisses at him six hours later. "It's not even light out anymore." He snatches Onew's sunglasses from his face. "You don't need this either," he says, snagging his baseball cap.
"Give it back!" Onew makes a grab for it, but Key hands it to Jonghyun, who stuffs it in his back pocket. "Key, that was my disguise."
"Why do you need a disguise?" Key looks around. The stands are packed, parents, students, the jazz band on the left belting out raucous melodies. Everyone in good spirits, clutching water bottles and bags of candy, painted faces, a sea of green and white, the school colors. On the opposite side of the field, a mirror image, except everything was black and gold. It was a famous rivalry between the two districts. "There's no way he can spot you in this crowd."
"Which one is he, anyway?" Jonghyun asks.
"Number ten," Onew answers distractedly, catching sight of Lee Donghae, class of 2005, and presumably a few of his friends, slowly make their way past the seats in front. "Sorry, I have to go -- shit, where's my pen again--" He bends down to search for it, just as a certain midfielder on the field turns his head in their direction.
Warming up on the sidelines. Taejo says his leg is better from the sprain, but Minho's not too sure. Still, can pull him out after the first quarter if his condition worsens. They've brought it to this game, Minho can feel it. Drill after drill after drill, conditioning and weight training, hours of time together. They know each other better than their own families. One mind with a common goal: to win. And they are going to win.
Just before he enters full game mode, Minho carefully scans the stands one last time. Probably useless, he knows. Onew doesn't even know about Pele or Ronaldinho, so why would he be here? Onew, who's smile makes his chest ache, his dogged optimism even when things are at their worst. Onew, who's clumsy with his feet and even clumsier with his feelings. The thought of Onew at the game makes Minho's lips twitch. Yeah, most likely not. But just in case...
As he glances over to the right side, someone gives a big wave. Minho squints, hand above his eyes to shield from the glare of the stadium lights. It's Taemin, and right next to him, Lee Donghae and a few other famous alum. A grin breaks out over his face; he waves back. Even if Onew wasn't there, at least they were.
Onew only knows the alumni through pictures in the entrance hallway of the school, but he thinks that he can put names to faces. Lee Donghae was the last captain of the soccer team to lead their school to victory, Kim Youngwoon, Lee Hyukjae, and Choi Siwon all part of that team. Next to Youngwoon is Park Jungsu, student council president the year Onew came to the school. The person on Siwon's right, Onew takes a while to place, but eventually he realises it's Hankyung, the first Chinese transfer the school had taken: Onew has trouble recognizing him since, the last he's heard, Hankyung had gone back to China. But apparently not. Hankyung's presence possibly explains why Kim Heechul is here: Heechul never attended sports games when he was part of the school, never mind afterwards. He's talking loudly as Onew nears, so Onew avoids him. Siwon and Jungsu are reportedly nicer. There's also a kid with them, stick thin, limbs too big for his body, huge brown eyes, but he's leaning over the railings and waving at the team.
None of them are going to know who he is. He's a nobody in the school at the present, so he's even less of a nobody to these people, whose names grace the walls and awards on display throughout the school. They are the alpha and the omega, they are sporting heroes, the leading roles in school performances, the whispers and sudden hushes in the hallway as they walk past. It's pathetic how scared he is of them.
But they don't notice him until he clears his throat, and even then a few of them still ignore him. Youngwoon has his eyes fixed on the team warming up on the field, and Hankyung is saying something in a patient tone that leaves Heechul looking remarkably unimpressed. "Can I help you?" Jungsu finally asks, but he sounds kind enough.
"I'm from the paper," Onew says, and waves his notepad in the air, then immediately feels foolish. Great start. "I was wondering if I could have some quotes?"
Heechul makes a clicking noise with his tongue, clearly derisive. "Sports editor," he says with a roll of his eyes. Heechul used to be on the school paper, but he used to cover the arts section, which is how he first met Hankyung, a member of the dance club. Heechul had been in a famous rivalry with the sports editor at the time, a boy called Park Jangra, who somehow ended up at the bottom of three flights of stairs the day after a particularly vocal row with Heechul. Onew shies away, clutching his book to him like a shield, but feels the need to defend his honour.
"Actually, I'm the science editor, but I was asked to come along today." A pause. "The sports editor is sick, you see."
"What would you like?" He was right: coming to Jungsu was the correct thing to do. There's something about his smile that makes Onew feel completely at ease. He smiles back, and Jungsu stares at him. "Sorry, did you tell me your name?"
"No, no." Onew laughs nervously. "It's Jinki. Lee Jinki."
Almost simultaneously, everyone other than Youngwoon suddenly stares at him, then back at the pitch where the two teams are still warming up. Heechul, by now practically on top of Hankyung, says scornfully, "You're Lee Jinki? Is Minho blind?"
"Oh, quiet, Heechul," says Jungsu. "Leave the poor boy alone." His smile is now much more than polite and welcoming; now he's looking at Onew like they're old friends who've not only known each other for forever, but perhaps even survived a near-fatal accident together to boot. It's weird. All those people who once waxed poetry over Jungsu clearly missed that he was a little mad. Then Heechul's question filters through.
"Wait, Min--?"
"What do you want to know?" interrupts Jungsu.
"Just...some quotes about the team."
"Well, they haven't even started yet," says Heechul scornfully.
"They're going to win," says Youngwoon, leaning back in his chair, suddenly relaxed.
"Right?" Donghae agrees.
"How do you know?" Onew is beginning to think the whole lot of them are mad. He squints down at the pitch, but all he can make out is a few lines of boys in striped shirts running up and down the field.
"They're a team," says Donghae. "They've trained so much that they're practically one. They're going to win."
"Really?" Onew has no idea, but he notes it down anyway, then tentatively asks, "And what do you think of the captain?"
"Minho is a nice boy," replies Jungsu, which strikes Onew as odd, since that wasn't exactly what he had asked. Youngwoon gives Jungsu a withering look, even as his arm slips around his waist.
"He's a great captain," he says. "We've sat in on a few training sessions, he really knows what he's doing."
"Oh, okay," says Onew.
"You don't know a thing about football, do you?" Heechul asks, an amused smirk on his face.
"Not really, no," admits Onew, and then blinks at his hand. There was a pen there, a couple of seconds ago. "Where's my--"
"It fell under there," says Hyukjae helpfully, pointing at a couple of benches in front of him. Onew goes scrambling for it, just as the kid starts screaming Minho's name; clearly, he's a fan.
Onew makes his way back over to Jonghyun and Key, wondering whether the headline "Ex-Captain is a Psychic" would run through if their team does actually win; but if they lose, any quotes he uses are going to make their alum seem like presumptous idiots. He sits down heavily on the bleacher next to them and sighs. "Well, that was pointless."
"So we've decided," says Key, who clearly doesn't give a damn about Onew's encounter with loony sunbaes. "Your Minho must be totally touched in the head."
"He's not my Minho," Onew says wearily; he was getting tired of repeating himself. "And how do you figure that out?"
"We've been watching," Jonghyun says, casually putting his arm across Key's shoulders. He looks like a guy trying to get fresh with his girlfriend at the cinema, and judging by the way Key rolls his eyes, he knows it. "Every girl here appears to be completely in love with this Minho. He could have anyone he wanted, and probably more than one at the same time if he so wanted. And yet, he's going after you."
"Hence, touched in the head," agrees Key.
"He's not 'going after me'," says Onew. "It's a prank or something, he's not serious. And what's wrong with me?"
Two very pointed looks. He winces. Good point, well made.
"I'm nice," he protests. "I'm -- I'm -- I have nice hair."
"I'm surprised you haven't been snapped up already," says Key dryly.
Before Onew can say anything else, there's a whistle from the pitch: the game has begun. Onew knows nothing about football, Jonghyun a little more, Key, more than the both of them put together. At half time, he sits back, arms folded, impressed. "They're good," he says. Jonghyun smothers a yawn against his shoulder.
Onew hadn't really been paying attention either. He's ashamed to admit, even if it was just to himself, that he's been watching Minho non-stop since the game began. Off the field, Minho cuts an impressive figure: the legs of a giraffe and a face graced by God will do that to you. On the pitch, however, Minho looks like a caged animal. He prowls and stalks and Onew can't stop staring. Quickly, he enters into a conversation with Key so that no one can notice his mouth hanging wide open, yet at the same time, he's also glad that too Key is engrossed in the match to pay attention to him in the second half, because Onew might just be...falling a little bit in love. And that's not right, at all. It's not fair that he should get such a crush on someone who is treating the whole thing like a joke.
He's horrified to find that when the match ends and their team is declared the winner, he's silently agreeing with the shouts of the girls near them for Minho to take his shirt off. He blushes madly, which, of course, attracts Key's attention, and he opens his mouth to say something that Onew really doesn't want to hear when suddenly a figure runs onto the pitch. It's the kid who had been sitting with the previous captains. He's shouting something, waving his arms wildly, and Minho's face almost cracks in two, he's grinning so hard. He opens his arms wide and the kid throws himself into them, hugging him tightly and jumping up and down. Minho is laughing. Onew realises that he's never seen Minho laugh before. He's caused Minho to smile, but never laugh.
"I want to leave," he says softly, closing his writing pad and slipping his pen between the metal hoops at the top. He quickly stands and starts pushing his way out of the stadium. Luckily, everyone else is still celebrating their victory -- semi-finals? Quarter-finals? He can't even remember where they're up to -- and so it's easy for him to get out. Good, because he feels too close to tears for comfort. Key jumps up with a curse and follows after him. Key's known Onew long enough to realise what must now be going through his mind.
Jonghyun is still staring at the pitch. "Wait a minute," he says to no one in particular. "I know that kid."
CRACKS OF MY BROKEN HEART sung by Lee Jinki
"Come on," Key nudges him half an hour later at the karaoke bar. "You're bringing down the mood."
"Yeah, big time," Jonghyun adds, then bellows out another note of Insomnia. "And I thought you said he wasn't yours anyway."
Onew doesn't appreciate Jonghyun's flair for perfect apathy. "I never said I minded--"
"So you're saying you don't mind," Key gives him a critical look.
"Yes! No! I-I don't know--" Onew moans, holding his head and slumping down on the couch. "It's just...Sixteen Candles doesn't happen in real life, Key," he says morosely. "The jock doesn't go for the loser, ever. There's a complicated set of rules and this whole thing, it breaks all of them." Key just raises an eyebrow at him.
"Yeah," he says finally, "you're absolutely right. Those formulaic teen movies don't happen in real life. So the chances of him meaning it might be higher than you think."
Onew hadn't thought about it like that. "Oh," he says at last, feeling kind of lame.
Key shakes his head. "Whatever, now you're seriously getting me all depressed! Sing for us, Onew," he grins widely. "Since it's your equivalent of taking a happy pill anyway."
He reluctantly reaches out for the mic. "What should I sing?"
Jonghyun keys in a song on the video display. "How about this one."
Eric Benet. Like he could resist. Onew sighs, then takes a deep breath.
"I can't believe you dragged me here," Minho says mildly to the younger boy hanging onto his arm.
"Not my fault," Taemin shrugging, "but his." He points to his older brother similarly attached to the Chinese collegiate walking in front of them. "Heechul always gets his way."
"Just like you?"
"Yeah, better watch out when we both want the same thing," Taemin smiles winningly, and Minho blushes. "But I want to hear you sing, hyung." Minho can feel the imprints of his fingers into his arm, pressing enthusiastically. "I hear you sound, well..." the younger boy trails off suggestively.
Minho opens his mouth to tell him that he's more like his brother than he thinks, when he stops suddenly, feet frozen in place.
"Minho?"
"Do you--" he breaks off, cocking his head to the left side of the hallway. "Do you hear that?"
"I--" Taemin's brow furrows. "No?"
"It's beautiful," Minho breathes, and goes up to the wall, pressing his ear right against it. "Whoever it is that's singing, and in English--" his eyes wide in awe. Taemin laughs at him, then jerks his chin at a spot a little ahead of them.
"You know, that's the door to the room right there. Why don't you knock, see who it is?"
Minho straightens, looks skeptically at the other boy. "And that's not a completely insane thing to do?"
"Like they'd have any protests once they saw you."
True enough. And they had just won the semi-finals, he was entitled to something crazy. Minho takes a deep breath, moves a few steps forward and knocks on the door.
The singing stops. There's a short pause, then the sound of the lock fumbling open, grinding metal against wood, a catcall in the background. The boy who opens the door has his head turned in rebuttal, so Minho catches sight of two other boys in the room, their expressions suspiciously lacking in surprise, before the boy turns around, and Minho gets that strange, fluttering feeling in his stomach again, like he's just been dropped from forty-thousand feet in the air without a parachute.
"Jinki," he manages.
"M-Minho," Onew stammers. They stare at each other in silence.
It's Taemin who thankfully disrupts the awkward moment, peering over Minho's shoulder to see what's going on. "Hyung!" he cries happily.
"Taemin!" and then Key's practically forcing Minho into the doorframe as he scrambles past to take Taemin in his arms, immediately cooing over him -- he actually pats him on the top of his head. Minho and Onew exchange confused glances, and then the moment is ruined by Onew blushing bright red and looking to Jonghyun for an explanation.
Jonghyun just shrugs. "I told you I knew the kid."
"Taemin?" Minho focuses on his companion. "Do you -- know this person?"
"Key's my sunbae," says Taemin happily. "He buys me lunch every day."
Key pats him on the head again. "He doesn't eat enough."
Suddenly, there's a shout from down the corridor; it's Heechul. "Hey Minho, what the hell are you doing to my brother that's making you so late?"
As Taemin struggles out of Key's arms to shout something back, Onew tries to work through all this information that's suddenly clouding his head: Minho is dating Kim Heechul's little brother, who goes to the same school as Key and Jonghyun, and apparently is a favourite of Key's. All this time, there's been a link between the two of them, this kid who can't be more than fifteen.
He wonders if Taemin knows that his boyfriend kissed Onew as a prank. Probably not, but Onew doesn't have the guts to say something about it. Instead, he fixes Minho with a very angry glare. Minho frowns back at him. Only he looks very handsome in a confused sort of a way as he does so, so Onew is forced to announce that he's going to get some drinks, just to get away from it.
Jonghyun recognises the look that appears on Key's face as soon as Onew leaves the room. He chuckles and says, "Hey, Taemin, want to come sing with me?" Taemin jumps at the chance; he's always trying to get Jonghyun to sing for him anyway, so singing with him is an honour.
"So you're Minho," Key begins. Minho nods seriously. "Onew went on about you enough, you'd think you were some sort of superhero."
"Onew -- you mean Jinki-hyung?" Minho smiles, and the normally serious facade melts away to reveal just a regular, sixteen year old boy. It's charming. "Does he talk about me a lot?"
Which just reveals how smitten he is. Very smitten.
"Now and then," says Key absently. He's already got all the information he needs just by watching Minho's face. Although he doesn't give much away, it's obvious that Onew has it wrong -- that's usual, then -- and Minho isn't just having him on. "Why don't you go help him with the drinks?"
Onew's sitting with his head on the edge of the bar when someone places a hand on his shoulder. "Hyung," he hears, and he freezes up, because he knows that voice and either Minho is just a stalker, or Key's been a bad friend and sent him here. "Hyung, are you okay?"
Onew forces a laugh, then sits up with a bright grin. Whatever else happens, he can't let Minho know that he's not okay. He couldn't find out that just when Onew was kind of letting himself believe that maybe Minho wasn't just stringing him along, a boy named Taemin appears and ruins everything. "I'm fine, Minho-ah," he says. "Just waiting for drinks, you know." He practically radiates complete all-rightness. "Why are you here?"
Minho doesn't look overly convinced, but lets it go. "Your friend asked me to come help you with the drinks."
That's it, he decides; he's going to kill Key. He's in the Chemistry club, he can create a poison, and he'll put it in Key's double cream mocha with chocolate sprinkles. For now, however, Onew picks up the three glasses that he bought and says, a little stubbornly, "It's okay, I can manage three drinks myself."
He says that, then turns around and trips over the errant leg of a bar stool, falling flat on his face. Two of the drinks spill away from him, and the other one covers him in sticky diet cola. All three glasses, however, had fallen from his hands as he had pitched forward and smashed on the floor in front of him, and when he throws out his hands to break his fall, they land on broken glass.
He can't help the scream of pain, though he does wish it wasn't quite so girly. Minho, with his lightning reflexes, reaches down and yanks him up and away from the glass, and when Onew stumbles again, tears in his eyes and blood on his hands and balance still not quite there, Minho holds him upright and helps him to a nearby armchair. The only waitress in the room is staring in horror at them: Onew's hands look like they've been lifted straight from a horror film.
Minho turns to the girl. "Do you have a first aid kit?" he asks, and at her terrified nod, asks her to get it. She runs off, looking glad to be away. Onew is sobbing now, he can't help himself, there's glass in his hands, and amidst his sobs, he's disgusted at himself for crying in front of the great Choi Minho, who is probably writing him off as a crybaby, along with a geek. Minho kneels in front of him, folding down his neverending legs, and inspects his hands.
"Maybe we should go to the hospital," he murmurs thoughtfully.
"No," Onew gasps, trying to pull his hands away, but Minho holds tight. "Not the hospital. I'm okay." In reality, he doesn't want Minho -- or anyone, really, except Key and Jonghyun already do -- to know just how many times he's been to the hospital. The receptionists in the ER know him on a first name basis. Minho frowns, but the waitress appears with a first aid kit and ushers them into the staff room, where there's a table and chairs and a sink that Minho uses to wash the blood from Onew's hands. It makes him feel a little faint.
The waitress leaves after Minho reassures her that they're fine, and that they'll clean up after they're done. Onew really wishes she'd come back, because he isn't sure how he's going to be able to deal with Minho right now, not while his eyes are all swollen and his face is still a little wet and he's probably all blotchy. Minho silently takes his hands, and wielding a pair of tweezers, sets about pulling the pieces of glass out.
There aren't actually that many, and Minho pulls them out before they can dig in too deep. It hurts though, so much so that Onew is practically in tears again by the time Minho lays the last piece of bloody glass on the tissue paper and picks up the sterilizing fluid. The sting of it against the cuts makes Onew gasp, and a few tears roll down his cheeks as Minho bends over his hands and wraps them up. "School will be fun on Monday," Minho says, straightening up. He pauses at the sight of Onew's face. Onew tries to wipe away the tell-tale tear tracks, but the bandages get in the way. Minho reaches out, cups his jaw, wipes away the tears with his thumb, and then leans in.
Before Onew can move, Minho is kissing him again.
Fandom: SHINee
Pairing: Minho/Onew, Jonghyun/Key
Word count: 5,619
Rating: PG
Summary: Onew really doesn't understand what Choi Minho, football captain, loved by the student body as a whole, is doing talking to him, but he'd quite like him to stop. Being the butt of someone's joke was never the point of Onew's high school career.
A/N: so how this usually happens is that we write sections and then civilized_era edits it and finds music and pictures to go with it, and basically I do nothing of interest :|
There's Something About Jinki (2/3)
BLUSH by Plumb
No, no no no, this wasn't supposed to happen; the library was Onew's Safe Zone, complete with yellow caution tape and flashing lights to divert traffic. Or it might as well be: the librarian and he were on pretty good terms -- occasionally she'd ask him to test-read new books for the school censor board, which, come to think of it, seemed like questionable intent -- and the study room nearest to the world history section practically had his name on the door. She knew he wasn't exactly popular -- okay, furthest from -- and thus wouldn't have sent the most popular kid in the entire school his way unless...what was this with the questionable intentions again?
And then all of a sudden Onew is mad, mad because what in the hell, what gave Minho the right to be nice like this all of a sudden, to act as though it was perfectly fine to be seen talking to him like it wasn't disrupting any social structure that had been set in place since the invention of high school, where geeky losers like him never came within one hundred feet of popular jocks him like Minho, ever. It wasn't okay. And it definitely wasn't okay how the sudden rush of anger and confusion is making his head spin.
"Look," he snaps, and stands up abruptly, shrugging off Minho's hand from his shoulder. "What exactly do you want from me, Choi? Are you doing this as a favor for someone? Is this a long-term joke to you and your friends or something? If it is, just tell me what to do for the punchline and I'll fucking do it, just as long as you promise to leave me alone--"
"Jinki," Minho says in that slow, calm way of his, but somehow it just manages to irritate Onew even more, "this isn't a joke--"
"Then what? I don't have the time for tutoring, I'm not good at any sports, not least of which football with your stupid confusing jersey numbering system or whatever, I'm sorry for the stupid card and wanting to say thank you and just, I don't want anything else, okay?" Onew is practically begging. "You don't have to seek me out and try to be my, my--"
"Friend?" Minho interrupts, and the way he says it is almost cold, enough so that something twists low in Onew's stomach, fearful of a huge misunderstanding. "That's good, I don't want to be your friend either."
"Oh," Onew says, and tries to ignore the shock of the words, like being shot in the chest. "Well, then I--"
"Not your friend," Minho says again, totally unnecessarily, except he's acting kind of suspicious, a discreet glance over his shoulder to see if there's anyone else nearby. There isn't. "Not your friend, but--"
"What?"
Minho looks back at him and smiles all of a sudden, this strange, sincere, wobbly sort of smile, as if he's nervous about something. "Maybe something else," he murmurs, eyes bright, and Onew is able to take one more startled breath before Minho is kissing him.
Well, his brain says after a few seconds, he never saw that coming. And then it goes into this repetitive, frantic flurry of how this isn't serious, no way could this be serious, no way that this could be possible. How could the most popular guy in school possibly be standing the library, kissing him, and actually mean it? Somehow, Minho knows, and Onew has been set up, with a hidden camera or hidden friends, and -- damn that card, it's all because of that card, isn't it? Minho thinks it's all some big joke, a prank to play on the nerd. His anger rising again, he puts his hands against Minho's shoulders and pushes him away, hard enough for Minho to stumble backwards into the table. Onew looks down at his hands; he wasn't aware that he had that kind of strength. Minho, for his part, looks extremely shocked, the kind of shocked like when you get hit by something on the head and you're not quite aware what it is yet. No doubt that's because he's never been rejected during a kiss before. But there's a first time for everything.
"Leave me alone," he says, and he's out of the library before Minho can even think about reacting.
The look that Key gives him is nothing short of terrifying, and if Onew keeps shrinking in his seat like this, he's going to do permanent damage to his back. "You did what?"
"I--"
"You pushed him away? Why would you do that, why? He was kissing you!"
"Because he was kissing me!" Onew nearly knocks over his glass from his attempt to emphasize his point by gesturing. "What was I supposed to do, I didn't want to -- you know -- I couldn't act like I enjoyed it, then I'd be incriminated!"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"It was just some sort of a joke to him! Embarrass the nerd. Make the nerd like you and then profit."
"Profit. You thought it was a joke." Key's voice is very low. Extremely low. It makes Onew shift uncomfortably, like a child getting scolded. Key turns to Jonghyun. "Hold me back, or I will punch him in the throat." Jonghyun rests a calming hand on his lower arm and Onew clutches at his throat; the last time Key followed up on that threat had been after Jonghyun had kissed him. Jonghyun couldn't talk for a week. But that reminded Onew of something.
"You thought Jonghyun was joking! When he kissed you!"
"Well, that was different," says Key. "Jonghyun is always joking. Jonghyun is like, the joker. Not like your Minho."
"But I'm better looking, aren't I?" Jonghyun asks.
"Don't call him my Minho," Onew says.
"No," Key says, and neither of them ever find out who he's talking to. All Key does is repeat that Onew is an idiot every time Onew says anything, like "but I'm not," and "I'll have a refill, please," and "how much is my section of the bill?" Key even telephones him just before he goes to sleep to tell him that he's an idiot, and Onew knows this. He knows that he's an idiot, not for the same reasons Key thinks, but because he pushed the most popular guy in school.
He's so going to get beaten up tomorrow.
He gets through half the day without anything happening, but after lunch, Onew dares to hope that maybe he's safe after all. This weekend was the football game, and after that, no one will care about anything that the class geek did, even if he did physically assault the captain of the football team. Once everyone else forgets, maybe Minho will also forget about him: forget his name, forget about the stupid card, and Onew can go back to not living his life in complete and utter terror of meeting Minho by chance at school.
Kind of like right now. Minho is walking down the hallway, seemingly towards him, long strides over tiles. Onew reacts without thinking, darting into the nearest empty classroom and sinking against the closed door behind him, heaving out a large sigh of relief. He hopes really, really hard, that Minho will forget; this can't be good for his heart.
Saturday morning is a welcome respite from the stomach-twisting ordeal that has become school. Onew wakes up and doesn't feel any paranoia or dread, just a blissful kind of drowsy, sunlight streaming through the blinds, wind rustling the branches and leaves, the birds chirping outside. Onew sighs, rolling on his stomach, tucks his head in a darkened corner of blanket, all prepared to drop off to sleep again--
Only then his phone starts ringing. A few seconds later Onew groans, struggling to prop himself up on his elbows, staring blearily across the room. All the way over on his desk too. He rolls out of bed, staggers upright, somehow manages to make his way over without tripping, answers while stifling a yawn, "Hello?"
It's the editor for the school paper. "Jinki, I need you to cover the game today." There's no question which game it could possibly be, but this -- this wasn't his job, dammit.
"Why can't Wooyoung do it?" he asks, shoving his bangs out of his eyes. "He's the sports editor, after all."
"Wooyoung is sick," his editor says, "and everyone else is busy."
"What!" he protests, "I'm busy too, I've got plans--"
"What plans?"
"Um..."
"Exactly. Game starts at five, try to get there a little early so you can interview some of the alumni, a few of them are coming. Lee Donghae, Kim Youngwoon, you know."
"But--"
Click.
Shit. But there's no way he's going to that game. While camping out in the empty classroom the other day, he had come up with a foolproof plan: avoid any kind of contact with Minho by all means possible for the next three months. After that, he would graduate, move on to university, and never have to hear or see him ever again. It was a good plan; going to the game, however, would directly interfere with it. The thought of Minho catching sight of him in the stands makes his gut twist painfully, and in fit of desperation, he dials Key.
"We'll go with you!" Key chirps after he tells him the news.
"No! No, you're not supposed to go with me! You're supposed to keep me from going, what kind of friends are you?"
Jonghyun snorts. Key must have put it on speaker. "How are we supposed to keep you from going? Kidnap you?"
"Yes!"
"Onew, it's not a kidnapping if the victim is willing," the other boy reminds him.
"Besides," Key puts in, "I want to take a look at this Minho guy. See if he's as scary as you make him out to be."
"I never said he was scary," Onew says, annoyed. "I just--"
"You just let him kiss you and then -- wait, he kissed you. That settles it, there's gotta be something wrong with him."
"I hate you both."
"Come on," Jonghyun wheedles. "We'll stay long enough for you to get your quotes or whatever and for Key to get his fill of eyecandy, then we'll go to noraebang. Sound good?"
Onew doesn't know what's the point of having friends if they refuse to help you out and only know how to bait you into doing something you don't want to do. Reluctantly he agrees. He loves noraebang.
"You look ridiculous," Key hisses at him six hours later. "It's not even light out anymore." He snatches Onew's sunglasses from his face. "You don't need this either," he says, snagging his baseball cap.
"Give it back!" Onew makes a grab for it, but Key hands it to Jonghyun, who stuffs it in his back pocket. "Key, that was my disguise."
"Why do you need a disguise?" Key looks around. The stands are packed, parents, students, the jazz band on the left belting out raucous melodies. Everyone in good spirits, clutching water bottles and bags of candy, painted faces, a sea of green and white, the school colors. On the opposite side of the field, a mirror image, except everything was black and gold. It was a famous rivalry between the two districts. "There's no way he can spot you in this crowd."
"Which one is he, anyway?" Jonghyun asks.
"Number ten," Onew answers distractedly, catching sight of Lee Donghae, class of 2005, and presumably a few of his friends, slowly make their way past the seats in front. "Sorry, I have to go -- shit, where's my pen again--" He bends down to search for it, just as a certain midfielder on the field turns his head in their direction.
Warming up on the sidelines. Taejo says his leg is better from the sprain, but Minho's not too sure. Still, can pull him out after the first quarter if his condition worsens. They've brought it to this game, Minho can feel it. Drill after drill after drill, conditioning and weight training, hours of time together. They know each other better than their own families. One mind with a common goal: to win. And they are going to win.
Just before he enters full game mode, Minho carefully scans the stands one last time. Probably useless, he knows. Onew doesn't even know about Pele or Ronaldinho, so why would he be here? Onew, who's smile makes his chest ache, his dogged optimism even when things are at their worst. Onew, who's clumsy with his feet and even clumsier with his feelings. The thought of Onew at the game makes Minho's lips twitch. Yeah, most likely not. But just in case...
As he glances over to the right side, someone gives a big wave. Minho squints, hand above his eyes to shield from the glare of the stadium lights. It's Taemin, and right next to him, Lee Donghae and a few other famous alum. A grin breaks out over his face; he waves back. Even if Onew wasn't there, at least they were.
Onew only knows the alumni through pictures in the entrance hallway of the school, but he thinks that he can put names to faces. Lee Donghae was the last captain of the soccer team to lead their school to victory, Kim Youngwoon, Lee Hyukjae, and Choi Siwon all part of that team. Next to Youngwoon is Park Jungsu, student council president the year Onew came to the school. The person on Siwon's right, Onew takes a while to place, but eventually he realises it's Hankyung, the first Chinese transfer the school had taken: Onew has trouble recognizing him since, the last he's heard, Hankyung had gone back to China. But apparently not. Hankyung's presence possibly explains why Kim Heechul is here: Heechul never attended sports games when he was part of the school, never mind afterwards. He's talking loudly as Onew nears, so Onew avoids him. Siwon and Jungsu are reportedly nicer. There's also a kid with them, stick thin, limbs too big for his body, huge brown eyes, but he's leaning over the railings and waving at the team.
None of them are going to know who he is. He's a nobody in the school at the present, so he's even less of a nobody to these people, whose names grace the walls and awards on display throughout the school. They are the alpha and the omega, they are sporting heroes, the leading roles in school performances, the whispers and sudden hushes in the hallway as they walk past. It's pathetic how scared he is of them.
But they don't notice him until he clears his throat, and even then a few of them still ignore him. Youngwoon has his eyes fixed on the team warming up on the field, and Hankyung is saying something in a patient tone that leaves Heechul looking remarkably unimpressed. "Can I help you?" Jungsu finally asks, but he sounds kind enough.
"I'm from the paper," Onew says, and waves his notepad in the air, then immediately feels foolish. Great start. "I was wondering if I could have some quotes?"
Heechul makes a clicking noise with his tongue, clearly derisive. "Sports editor," he says with a roll of his eyes. Heechul used to be on the school paper, but he used to cover the arts section, which is how he first met Hankyung, a member of the dance club. Heechul had been in a famous rivalry with the sports editor at the time, a boy called Park Jangra, who somehow ended up at the bottom of three flights of stairs the day after a particularly vocal row with Heechul. Onew shies away, clutching his book to him like a shield, but feels the need to defend his honour.
"Actually, I'm the science editor, but I was asked to come along today." A pause. "The sports editor is sick, you see."
"What would you like?" He was right: coming to Jungsu was the correct thing to do. There's something about his smile that makes Onew feel completely at ease. He smiles back, and Jungsu stares at him. "Sorry, did you tell me your name?"
"No, no." Onew laughs nervously. "It's Jinki. Lee Jinki."
Almost simultaneously, everyone other than Youngwoon suddenly stares at him, then back at the pitch where the two teams are still warming up. Heechul, by now practically on top of Hankyung, says scornfully, "You're Lee Jinki? Is Minho blind?"
"Oh, quiet, Heechul," says Jungsu. "Leave the poor boy alone." His smile is now much more than polite and welcoming; now he's looking at Onew like they're old friends who've not only known each other for forever, but perhaps even survived a near-fatal accident together to boot. It's weird. All those people who once waxed poetry over Jungsu clearly missed that he was a little mad. Then Heechul's question filters through.
"Wait, Min--?"
"What do you want to know?" interrupts Jungsu.
"Just...some quotes about the team."
"Well, they haven't even started yet," says Heechul scornfully.
"They're going to win," says Youngwoon, leaning back in his chair, suddenly relaxed.
"Right?" Donghae agrees.
"How do you know?" Onew is beginning to think the whole lot of them are mad. He squints down at the pitch, but all he can make out is a few lines of boys in striped shirts running up and down the field.
"They're a team," says Donghae. "They've trained so much that they're practically one. They're going to win."
"Really?" Onew has no idea, but he notes it down anyway, then tentatively asks, "And what do you think of the captain?"
"Minho is a nice boy," replies Jungsu, which strikes Onew as odd, since that wasn't exactly what he had asked. Youngwoon gives Jungsu a withering look, even as his arm slips around his waist.
"He's a great captain," he says. "We've sat in on a few training sessions, he really knows what he's doing."
"Oh, okay," says Onew.
"You don't know a thing about football, do you?" Heechul asks, an amused smirk on his face.
"Not really, no," admits Onew, and then blinks at his hand. There was a pen there, a couple of seconds ago. "Where's my--"
"It fell under there," says Hyukjae helpfully, pointing at a couple of benches in front of him. Onew goes scrambling for it, just as the kid starts screaming Minho's name; clearly, he's a fan.
Onew makes his way back over to Jonghyun and Key, wondering whether the headline "Ex-Captain is a Psychic" would run through if their team does actually win; but if they lose, any quotes he uses are going to make their alum seem like presumptous idiots. He sits down heavily on the bleacher next to them and sighs. "Well, that was pointless."
"So we've decided," says Key, who clearly doesn't give a damn about Onew's encounter with loony sunbaes. "Your Minho must be totally touched in the head."
"He's not my Minho," Onew says wearily; he was getting tired of repeating himself. "And how do you figure that out?"
"We've been watching," Jonghyun says, casually putting his arm across Key's shoulders. He looks like a guy trying to get fresh with his girlfriend at the cinema, and judging by the way Key rolls his eyes, he knows it. "Every girl here appears to be completely in love with this Minho. He could have anyone he wanted, and probably more than one at the same time if he so wanted. And yet, he's going after you."
"Hence, touched in the head," agrees Key.
"He's not 'going after me'," says Onew. "It's a prank or something, he's not serious. And what's wrong with me?"
Two very pointed looks. He winces. Good point, well made.
"I'm nice," he protests. "I'm -- I'm -- I have nice hair."
"I'm surprised you haven't been snapped up already," says Key dryly.
Before Onew can say anything else, there's a whistle from the pitch: the game has begun. Onew knows nothing about football, Jonghyun a little more, Key, more than the both of them put together. At half time, he sits back, arms folded, impressed. "They're good," he says. Jonghyun smothers a yawn against his shoulder.
Onew hadn't really been paying attention either. He's ashamed to admit, even if it was just to himself, that he's been watching Minho non-stop since the game began. Off the field, Minho cuts an impressive figure: the legs of a giraffe and a face graced by God will do that to you. On the pitch, however, Minho looks like a caged animal. He prowls and stalks and Onew can't stop staring. Quickly, he enters into a conversation with Key so that no one can notice his mouth hanging wide open, yet at the same time, he's also glad that too Key is engrossed in the match to pay attention to him in the second half, because Onew might just be...falling a little bit in love. And that's not right, at all. It's not fair that he should get such a crush on someone who is treating the whole thing like a joke.
He's horrified to find that when the match ends and their team is declared the winner, he's silently agreeing with the shouts of the girls near them for Minho to take his shirt off. He blushes madly, which, of course, attracts Key's attention, and he opens his mouth to say something that Onew really doesn't want to hear when suddenly a figure runs onto the pitch. It's the kid who had been sitting with the previous captains. He's shouting something, waving his arms wildly, and Minho's face almost cracks in two, he's grinning so hard. He opens his arms wide and the kid throws himself into them, hugging him tightly and jumping up and down. Minho is laughing. Onew realises that he's never seen Minho laugh before. He's caused Minho to smile, but never laugh.
"I want to leave," he says softly, closing his writing pad and slipping his pen between the metal hoops at the top. He quickly stands and starts pushing his way out of the stadium. Luckily, everyone else is still celebrating their victory -- semi-finals? Quarter-finals? He can't even remember where they're up to -- and so it's easy for him to get out. Good, because he feels too close to tears for comfort. Key jumps up with a curse and follows after him. Key's known Onew long enough to realise what must now be going through his mind.
Jonghyun is still staring at the pitch. "Wait a minute," he says to no one in particular. "I know that kid."
CRACKS OF MY BROKEN HEART sung by Lee Jinki
"Come on," Key nudges him half an hour later at the karaoke bar. "You're bringing down the mood."
"Yeah, big time," Jonghyun adds, then bellows out another note of Insomnia. "And I thought you said he wasn't yours anyway."
Onew doesn't appreciate Jonghyun's flair for perfect apathy. "I never said I minded--"
"So you're saying you don't mind," Key gives him a critical look.
"Yes! No! I-I don't know--" Onew moans, holding his head and slumping down on the couch. "It's just...Sixteen Candles doesn't happen in real life, Key," he says morosely. "The jock doesn't go for the loser, ever. There's a complicated set of rules and this whole thing, it breaks all of them." Key just raises an eyebrow at him.
"Yeah," he says finally, "you're absolutely right. Those formulaic teen movies don't happen in real life. So the chances of him meaning it might be higher than you think."
Onew hadn't thought about it like that. "Oh," he says at last, feeling kind of lame.
Key shakes his head. "Whatever, now you're seriously getting me all depressed! Sing for us, Onew," he grins widely. "Since it's your equivalent of taking a happy pill anyway."
He reluctantly reaches out for the mic. "What should I sing?"
Jonghyun keys in a song on the video display. "How about this one."
Eric Benet. Like he could resist. Onew sighs, then takes a deep breath.
"I can't believe you dragged me here," Minho says mildly to the younger boy hanging onto his arm.
"Not my fault," Taemin shrugging, "but his." He points to his older brother similarly attached to the Chinese collegiate walking in front of them. "Heechul always gets his way."
"Just like you?"
"Yeah, better watch out when we both want the same thing," Taemin smiles winningly, and Minho blushes. "But I want to hear you sing, hyung." Minho can feel the imprints of his fingers into his arm, pressing enthusiastically. "I hear you sound, well..." the younger boy trails off suggestively.
Minho opens his mouth to tell him that he's more like his brother than he thinks, when he stops suddenly, feet frozen in place.
"Minho?"
"Do you--" he breaks off, cocking his head to the left side of the hallway. "Do you hear that?"
"I--" Taemin's brow furrows. "No?"
"It's beautiful," Minho breathes, and goes up to the wall, pressing his ear right against it. "Whoever it is that's singing, and in English--" his eyes wide in awe. Taemin laughs at him, then jerks his chin at a spot a little ahead of them.
"You know, that's the door to the room right there. Why don't you knock, see who it is?"
Minho straightens, looks skeptically at the other boy. "And that's not a completely insane thing to do?"
"Like they'd have any protests once they saw you."
True enough. And they had just won the semi-finals, he was entitled to something crazy. Minho takes a deep breath, moves a few steps forward and knocks on the door.
The singing stops. There's a short pause, then the sound of the lock fumbling open, grinding metal against wood, a catcall in the background. The boy who opens the door has his head turned in rebuttal, so Minho catches sight of two other boys in the room, their expressions suspiciously lacking in surprise, before the boy turns around, and Minho gets that strange, fluttering feeling in his stomach again, like he's just been dropped from forty-thousand feet in the air without a parachute.
"Jinki," he manages.
"M-Minho," Onew stammers. They stare at each other in silence.
It's Taemin who thankfully disrupts the awkward moment, peering over Minho's shoulder to see what's going on. "Hyung!" he cries happily.
"Taemin!" and then Key's practically forcing Minho into the doorframe as he scrambles past to take Taemin in his arms, immediately cooing over him -- he actually pats him on the top of his head. Minho and Onew exchange confused glances, and then the moment is ruined by Onew blushing bright red and looking to Jonghyun for an explanation.
Jonghyun just shrugs. "I told you I knew the kid."
"Taemin?" Minho focuses on his companion. "Do you -- know this person?"
"Key's my sunbae," says Taemin happily. "He buys me lunch every day."
Key pats him on the head again. "He doesn't eat enough."
Suddenly, there's a shout from down the corridor; it's Heechul. "Hey Minho, what the hell are you doing to my brother that's making you so late?"
As Taemin struggles out of Key's arms to shout something back, Onew tries to work through all this information that's suddenly clouding his head: Minho is dating Kim Heechul's little brother, who goes to the same school as Key and Jonghyun, and apparently is a favourite of Key's. All this time, there's been a link between the two of them, this kid who can't be more than fifteen.
He wonders if Taemin knows that his boyfriend kissed Onew as a prank. Probably not, but Onew doesn't have the guts to say something about it. Instead, he fixes Minho with a very angry glare. Minho frowns back at him. Only he looks very handsome in a confused sort of a way as he does so, so Onew is forced to announce that he's going to get some drinks, just to get away from it.
Jonghyun recognises the look that appears on Key's face as soon as Onew leaves the room. He chuckles and says, "Hey, Taemin, want to come sing with me?" Taemin jumps at the chance; he's always trying to get Jonghyun to sing for him anyway, so singing with him is an honour.
"So you're Minho," Key begins. Minho nods seriously. "Onew went on about you enough, you'd think you were some sort of superhero."
"Onew -- you mean Jinki-hyung?" Minho smiles, and the normally serious facade melts away to reveal just a regular, sixteen year old boy. It's charming. "Does he talk about me a lot?"
Which just reveals how smitten he is. Very smitten.
"Now and then," says Key absently. He's already got all the information he needs just by watching Minho's face. Although he doesn't give much away, it's obvious that Onew has it wrong -- that's usual, then -- and Minho isn't just having him on. "Why don't you go help him with the drinks?"
Onew's sitting with his head on the edge of the bar when someone places a hand on his shoulder. "Hyung," he hears, and he freezes up, because he knows that voice and either Minho is just a stalker, or Key's been a bad friend and sent him here. "Hyung, are you okay?"
Onew forces a laugh, then sits up with a bright grin. Whatever else happens, he can't let Minho know that he's not okay. He couldn't find out that just when Onew was kind of letting himself believe that maybe Minho wasn't just stringing him along, a boy named Taemin appears and ruins everything. "I'm fine, Minho-ah," he says. "Just waiting for drinks, you know." He practically radiates complete all-rightness. "Why are you here?"
Minho doesn't look overly convinced, but lets it go. "Your friend asked me to come help you with the drinks."
That's it, he decides; he's going to kill Key. He's in the Chemistry club, he can create a poison, and he'll put it in Key's double cream mocha with chocolate sprinkles. For now, however, Onew picks up the three glasses that he bought and says, a little stubbornly, "It's okay, I can manage three drinks myself."
He says that, then turns around and trips over the errant leg of a bar stool, falling flat on his face. Two of the drinks spill away from him, and the other one covers him in sticky diet cola. All three glasses, however, had fallen from his hands as he had pitched forward and smashed on the floor in front of him, and when he throws out his hands to break his fall, they land on broken glass.
He can't help the scream of pain, though he does wish it wasn't quite so girly. Minho, with his lightning reflexes, reaches down and yanks him up and away from the glass, and when Onew stumbles again, tears in his eyes and blood on his hands and balance still not quite there, Minho holds him upright and helps him to a nearby armchair. The only waitress in the room is staring in horror at them: Onew's hands look like they've been lifted straight from a horror film.
Minho turns to the girl. "Do you have a first aid kit?" he asks, and at her terrified nod, asks her to get it. She runs off, looking glad to be away. Onew is sobbing now, he can't help himself, there's glass in his hands, and amidst his sobs, he's disgusted at himself for crying in front of the great Choi Minho, who is probably writing him off as a crybaby, along with a geek. Minho kneels in front of him, folding down his neverending legs, and inspects his hands.
"Maybe we should go to the hospital," he murmurs thoughtfully.
"No," Onew gasps, trying to pull his hands away, but Minho holds tight. "Not the hospital. I'm okay." In reality, he doesn't want Minho -- or anyone, really, except Key and Jonghyun already do -- to know just how many times he's been to the hospital. The receptionists in the ER know him on a first name basis. Minho frowns, but the waitress appears with a first aid kit and ushers them into the staff room, where there's a table and chairs and a sink that Minho uses to wash the blood from Onew's hands. It makes him feel a little faint.
The waitress leaves after Minho reassures her that they're fine, and that they'll clean up after they're done. Onew really wishes she'd come back, because he isn't sure how he's going to be able to deal with Minho right now, not while his eyes are all swollen and his face is still a little wet and he's probably all blotchy. Minho silently takes his hands, and wielding a pair of tweezers, sets about pulling the pieces of glass out.
There aren't actually that many, and Minho pulls them out before they can dig in too deep. It hurts though, so much so that Onew is practically in tears again by the time Minho lays the last piece of bloody glass on the tissue paper and picks up the sterilizing fluid. The sting of it against the cuts makes Onew gasp, and a few tears roll down his cheeks as Minho bends over his hands and wraps them up. "School will be fun on Monday," Minho says, straightening up. He pauses at the sight of Onew's face. Onew tries to wipe away the tell-tale tear tracks, but the bandages get in the way. Minho reaches out, cups his jaw, wipes away the tears with his thumb, and then leans in.
Before Onew can move, Minho is kissing him again.