Happy Holidays bexy31! Exchange fic: "Fire Starter"
Title: Fire Starter
Rating: R
Genre: AU, Romance, Humor, Drama, Crime
Warnings: sexual situations (nothing explicit), language, mature themes
Summary: Jaejoong has been a volunteer firefighter for 3 years in his small hometown when, no longer wanting to withstand prejudice from people in the small community, he leaves it behind and transfers to a station in Seoul. There he finds the new start he wanted, but with a bigger city comes bigger problems. Soon he finds himself with one of his own in the form of a strange and not-so-secret admirer named Yunho who seems to always appear in front of him; but that is the least of his worries as a string of arsons begin to appear throughout the city.
6459 wc
For bexy31, who wanted non-girly Jaejoong. Happy Holidays! ♥
Standing there in nought but his sleeveless cotton t-shirt, boots, insulated pants and suspenders, Jaejoong was startled, mid-task of putting away the rest of his gear into the truck by a whistle.
“Nice arms,” smiled the tall, tanned guy standing to his left, causing him to flinch in response.
“What?”
“Your arms, they're really great; you must work out a lot to keep them like that. And the shirt really suits you. Shame you have to wear sleeves to cover them up when you’re working. But the nice sheen of sweat afterwards is really appealing,” he grinned widely, all white teeth and smiling eyes.
“Ugh,” Jaejoong grunted, immediately thinking he needed a shower now more than ever after feeling dirtied by the man's words and stare. “Look, I'm not interested.” If he was some weird fireman fanboy Jae wanted no part in his obsession, even if he was slightly - moderately - handsome. He was just weird.
Not seeming to take his words to heart, the other man just laughed lightly, “My name's Yunho, I'll see you around~” and he winked before jogging off down the street, duffle bag slung and bouncing on his back.
“What the...” Jaejoong sighed to himself, turning again as his closest junior, Kim Junsu approached him.
“Who was that?” Junsu asked, tossing his helmet to Jae to put away.
Shrugging, he continued to focus on his task, thankful that the call today hadn't been a rescue, just a minor case of what appeared to be arson to a currently unused warehouse. The damage was extensive and these things were still problems, but ones that could be handled without hitch or risk of human life. Any time it was a relatively uneventful day meant that civilians and his fellow crew were safe from danger, so he counted that type of day a good day. It was the task of the police force to carry on an investigation after they'd finished securing the building; their job was relatively minimal.
A weird guy hitting on him - if that's what the guy had been doing? - wasn't going to ruin the good day for Jaejoong, so he smacked Junsu on the back amicably and suggested with a smile that they head back to eat lunch.
---
Fate decided not to be kind to Jaejoong.
“Yu...You,” Jae's initial surprise ebbed away into narrowed eyes.
“Hey gorgeous, bet you didn't expect me here.”
Jaejoong grimaced, “What are you doing here anyway? Look, am I going to have to place a restraining order against you?”
The other man seemed to think that was hilarious as he sputtered into full-out laughter, only serving to annoy Jaejoong further.
Junsu chose that moment to happen to come over and fill in the blanks, “Ah, you must be the new guy?” he hitched his thumb towards the notice board. If Jaejoong had happened to read it earlier, he would’ve indeed seen that name, Jung Yunho listed on the weekly news bulletin and been able to maybe save himself the awkward moment.
Just great. The weirdo wasn’t just some random fanboy who happened to be stalking him. He was a new volunteer member of their station crew who was also a weirdo apparently.
Jae escaped any impending conversation and headed to his usual corner of the break room, deciding that not talking to the weirdo was the way to go. Junsu was chatty enough for the two of them - though a few moments he suspected they were talking about him and his 'cold shoulder' towards new people, (something the younger man picked on him about - not so long ago he was the “new person”) because they'd look over at him and smile between themselves.
Over the next few weeks Yunho seemed to fit in well enough at the station - he gave off that “man's man” aura - something that didn't come quite as naturally to Jaejoong, he'd have to reluctantly admit.
He often had to make the effort for people to see him that way - if he ever went back to the way he'd been in college, that pitiful, thin, waif-like creature whose androgyny had males and females alike confused at his gender - well, he would never go back to those days. He aimed to distance himself from most of his past, especially the recent year before he moved into the city where he felt like the outsider who couldn't fit in or be accepted even by those he thought he’d proven himself to.
Jae himself felt 100% male, masculine, strong. But he had to exercise twice a day to make everyone else look at him with even a modicum of acknowledgement for those aspects. Added to that was the imposed need to appear manly to his peers in spite that he was homosexual, which was something that the general society, not to mention the field he was in, just could not abide. A bitter truth he knew all too well. It was less a means of compensation (as he had never equated being gay as emasculating), but more a shield of armor (to protect from those that no doubt did). Naturally, he wasn’t out in the Volunteer Firefighting Corps or at his part-time job at the nearby fitness center, though he was to a select few trusted friends and family. Jaejoong wanted to keep it that way, tired of the discrimination he’d faced during his entire adolescence and at his last station.
So, it frankly ticked him off. Yunho - this outsider by definition - was born with all the oozing natural machismo and God-given handsome features, and yet he seemed the most dandy in moments when he'd stand with a hand (a pretty, long-elegant-fingered hand) on his hip, or in the playful - sometimes sickeningly aegyo way he'd joke around during training drills or tease him, presumably trying to provoke a response he just wasn't giving. Jaejoong remained stone-faced while internally smashing the idiot's head against the wall.
Why did he have to fight for people to take him seriously as a man and this idiot was so easily accepted by everyone around him? Something wasn't right in the cosmos.
---
Late one night over soju, light-weight Junsu gushed, “It's because he likes you, y'know~” to which Jae, having drank twice as much without much of a buzz, upended an entire bottle as his reply to the notion. After a day of working a morning shift at the gym and responding to one non-serious call in the afternoon, he was in a pretty good mood and didn’t want the direction of the conversation to ruin it for him. Apparently the universe wanted to do that for him again anyway.
“Speak of the devil!” Su whisper-yelled, in a tone that clearly indicated he seemed to think he was being subtle and enigmatic, but was unable to gauge his volume.
“Hey guys,” with a nauseating grin Yunho sat himself down next to Jaejoong on the bench, much to Jaejoong’s (thinly-veiled) distaste, with his stein of beer (how manly of him, Jae mused to himself with a sardonic curl of his lip) along with two of his friends across from him. He introduced them as Park Yoochun and Shim Changmin, his ‘American’ and ‘Lawyer’ friends whom he knew from his ‘International Studies’ and his ‘Father’s Law Firm’ respectively (how ‘manly & American & Lawyer...y’ of him).
“Aren't you cool,” Jaejoong muttered under his breath. ‘Mr. Popular-I-Have-Foreign-and-Smart-Friends-Jung. Mr. my-family-has-money-and-success-and-I’m-still-a-good-guy-who-volunteers-my-time-and-risks-my-life-for-the-protection-of-our-great-society-Jung. Mr. I-don't-have-to-lift-weights-my-body-is-just-naturally-bulky-and-fit-Jung. Mr. Bastard.’
Four sets of eyes suddenly seemed upon him and he cursed that last bottle of soju making his tongue loose and his inside-words outside-words. This was a syndrome he decided to deem was contagious and blame on Junsu. With this syndrome combined with pure frustration exacerbated, he'd put himself to this humiliation. Dammit.
“Haha...someone needs to get laid,” the American introduced as Park Yoochun drawled in perfectly good Korean - no trace of American accent - and the other, Lawyer Shim Changmin, went all wonky-eyed and chuckled at his expense before just helping himself to the anju on the table.
Just great. ‘The annoying idiot's friends’ were idiots out to annoy him too. And well, 'the annoying idiot himself', he just seemed to be looking at him with something akin to concern and bemusement - which was strange, for him.
At that moment, Jaejoong felt too warm and light-headed. Standing, and subsequently knocking several empty to partially empty soju bottles over with a clatter, he grumped an “I'm leaving,” and smacked several thousand won onto the sticky table before stuffing his hands into his pockets and quickly walking away in what he hoped was a dignified yet aggressive way. He didn't trip over his unbuckled boots, so he figured that was something.
Behind him he vaguely registered Junsu attempting to get up after him before toppling half-onto Yoochun, but he continued onward, with what remained of his pride and the burn of soju at the back of his throat.
How he actually managed to start walking in the right direction to his home seemed miraculous, considering his recently proven supreme lack of awareness to his surroundings in his given state, but all he could think of was that he was ready to lay a thrashing on Junsu for inviting him out under the guise of blowing off some steam - and probably inviting the weird idiot and company to have fun at his expense unbeknownst to him.
So with that thought, he refused to slow his pace or turn to meet the little traitor as footsteps hurried nearer to him from behind. It was only when they were a considerable proximity to him that in his alcohol-addled mind he realized that Junsu was a clumsy drunk (several times clumsier than Jae himself sober - and he could admit he wasn't always super-coordinated) and at that moment his pulse quickened in anxiety.
‘Oh shit. I'm going to have to kick a mugger's ass.’ He paused in his footfalls, readying himself for arm-breaking when-
“Jaejoong-ah!” that familiar semi-nasally, sexy-sweet voice that he so hated clued him in to the identity of the 'mugger'. ‘Weird idiot mugger.’
He stopped completely, but refused to turn around, afraid he might actually rethink the arm-breaking instinct if he had to see that stupid handsome weirdo face with a teasing expression, and flinched as Yunho touched his elbow in what had to be an attempt to keep him from storming off again. “Are you okay?”
“I'm fine. I need to go home and sleep.” He left out the ‘Because I can't sleep in tomorrow, some people aren’t rich and loved by all and actually have important tasks to do instead of just being annoying creeps.’
Yunho’s mouth twitched a bit at the corner but Jaejoong didn’t know if it was because he’d thought aloud again or it was coincidental, “I’ll walk you, it’s dark in these back alleys,” he offered in what Jae would assume to be a chivalrous manner - if he were a woman, that is, and not a man that could bench press more than his own body weight. But because he was in fact a man, it just seemed condescending.
“I’m fine,” he repeated, tone edging from annoyed towards actually pissed, and he turned to face Yunho with a cold glare just to get the point across, “Worry about yourself.”
“I am, actually,” Yunho chuckled, still holding onto the sleeve of Jaejoong’s jacket, “Worried. You look like you might kill me with those eyes of yours…” belaying his words, Yunho’s eyes seemed to shift down his face to his lips, which he himself was aware, were quite alluring even when he had his bitchface on.
‘Don’t even think about it buddy…’ He gripped back at the other’s arm, still considering the breaking option if he tried anything funny. For a moment they seemed to be stuck in that pose, both faintly illuminated by the nearby streetlight, before Jaejoong cleared his throat and looked away, shrugging Yunho’s arm off. “Walk with me, but don’t touch me.”
“Alright, I can do that,” Yunho grinned handsomely in a way that said he was thinking ‘for now…’ and Jae had to blink a couple times to shake off the notion and keep from voicing his annoyance.
He was actually mildly surprised that he kept his hands to himself, and didn’t even make any weird comments the entire time they walked. Shuffling his feet and knocking his boot into a raised part of the sidewalk (the same part he always seemed to hit), he nearly tripped and did a face-plant but Yunho steadied him with that dandy hand of his. “Th…thanks…” he said begrudgingly and Yunho automatically retracted his hand.
Maybe he’d underestimated the effects of all that soju on him, because the sensation of smashing his toe seemed numb-er than usual, and his skin warmer. He realized after a few seconds that they’d stopped (another sign of perhaps too much soju) and that Yunho had bent down in front of him to fasten his boots to keep from tripping over them. It was kind of nice of him, Jae thought, but kind of annoying. For some reason, he just couldn’t bring himself to kick the guy over.
---
Bright morning light filtered in through the blinds he obviously had neglected to close the previous night and Jaejoong peeked one eye open, confused at the solid and warm mass that seemed to be under his cheek in lieu of his pillow. He blinked. And blinked again.
“What the hell?!” ‘What is this?’ Jae panicked, shoving the offending bare chest so hard that the man it belonged to toppled sideways, off the bed and onto the hard floor rather unceremoniously.
“Ooof,” there was a groan before he stood back up, naked and fully on display, making Jaejoong bark his shock once more and attempt to kick the nude guy further from the bed whilst still within the tangled sheet around his body.
“Why the hell are you here?!”
“I take it you don't remember last night?” Yunho asked, an uneasy but albeit there smirk tugging at the corner of his lips.
“Of course not you idiot! I must've been drunk out of my mind to even have you in my bedroom right now!” he struggled to free himself from and simultaneously cover himself with the sheet folded over and under himself, “And can you put on some clothes and cover that damn thing?!” he pointed accusingly at Yunho's (he'd admit, somewhat intimidating) nether regions.
Shrugging, Yunho put a dandy hand on his hip and chuckled at the man in the bed who had the sheet pulled up to his own chin, “You're pretty loud for someone who must have a huge headache right now...”
“I don't GET hangovers, now find your clothes-” he punctuated the demand by toeing what was evidently Yunho's boxer-briefs at the end of the bed, “-and walk your ass right out of my bedroom.” Jae shook his head abruptly to rid it of further Yunho’s-ass related thoughts.
To his surprise, Yunho actually did as told, collecting his garments and pulling them on with a sheepish grin, so unlike the annoying one Jaejoong was used to seeing. With a sigh as the other man left the room, Jae disentangled himself from the sheet cocoon and surveyed the damage from the night before. His room was littered with the remains of his clothing and what appeared to be a few condom packages (well, at least someone was in their right mind) which confirmed without further inspection that he was definitely never drinking so much again. “Definitely never.”
Slipping from the bed, he kicked some of the chaos into a pile and headed for his closet to get something to wear - and according to the full-length mirror within - to cover up the numerous marks on his otherwise pale neck and chest. “What the HELL…” he muttered to himself before tugging on some sweatpants and a thick hoodie.
He was past the point of annoyance now - he just couldn’t be annoyed. The facts were what was done was done. This situation had never actually happened before, since Jaejoong had such a strong tolerance for alcohol and a low tolerance for douchebags who may try to hook up with him whilst under the effects of said alcohol.
But, here he was, apparently having slept with the object of his annoyance and he just couldn’t bring himself to be upset like he thought he should be. Maybe it was the thought that now that Yunho had gotten what he wanted he might leave him alone, he wasn’t sure what the sense he had was. But he was somehow not really that upset.
Just hungry.
It just so happened that he seemed to smell some kind of food and made his way out to his kitchen where Yunho apparently had found his apron and was making something in a pan that didn’t seem terrible. “What. The. Hell.”
Using a spatula, the man plated his creation and set it onto the island countertop before Jaejoong, “I made French toast. It’s the only breakfast I know how to make since it’s easy,” he smiled and his eyes crinkled charmingly and because of the particular way the morning sunlight hit his face Jaejoong noticed the silvery scar intersecting the crinkles on one side and he had to wonder the story behind that.
Realising that he was starring, he redirected his attention to the plate in front of him. He knew he should probably knock some sense into Yunho and send him on his way, but for some reason he couldn’t bring himself to do so like that in his current mood, so he picked up the fork and took a bite.
Yunho watched him expectantly, “Not bad,” he put the fork down, “Next time I’ll cook though.”
“What...you’ll?” the taller man blinked in a clueless and almost cute way.
“Well I’m not saying you’re moving in, but I’d at least expect we’re seeing each other now,” Jaejoong said on his way to the fridge, as though he was commenting on the day’s weather forecast.
He tossed Yunho a bottle of water, and the dazed man somehow caught it, “We are…?” he numbly worked his long fingers to uncap the bottle.
Jaejoong caught himself staring again and looked down to resume eating, not bothering with answering.
His attention was drawn again when he heard long gulping from Yunho, who seemed to be as thirsty as he’d been hungry. Jae couldn’t help but laugh, so he did, loudly, covering his mouth with his hand. This situation, it was just so absurd.
Yunho stopped drinking, set the bottle down and looked at him with a solemn expression, “Ah. You’re making fun of me. I almost believed you were serious when you said we should see each other, aish…” his handsome features turned into a scowl.
Well, Jaejoong pondered, he hadn’t said it to make fun of him, but rather to scare him off. No one likes a clingy one-night stand, right? He leaned across the counter, “Listen…”
“No, that’s okay, I get it,” Yunho pulled the apron off, “I do, I’m not actually an idiot. Well, I might be…” he shook his head and walked out of the room, leaving only the sound of the door clicking shut behind him moments later to signify he’d left.
“Hm...” That was the desired result, wasn’t it? Jaejoong wondered why he didn’t feel so great about it.
---
“Ah, the classic tale of boy meets boy, boy hits on boy, boy is rejected by boy, repeatedly. Of course ending in boy has drunken night of wild abandon with boy and happy ever afters. You know the one.”
“I don’t think that’s quite the story here Yoochun.”
“C’mon hyung, I believe in you guys, you’ll get the happy ending,” the storyteller patted Yunho on the back consolingly.
“God you’re so sappy…” Changmin rolled his eyes and continued to eat.
“I agree with Chun-ah~ You’ve got an inside man here, Jaejoong-hyung has been through a lot and he needs some good in his life. I’ll help get you two together.” Junsu nodded enthusiastically, sending conspiratory looks to Yoochun. They must’ve already been plotting together.
“Am I the only one here who thinks you’re going about this the wrong way…?” the youngest of the group asked, but was ignored, so he sighed and focused on his food once more.
Yunho stood up, “I have to go, thanks for the talk guys,” he put on his best smile and left without much fuss, Yoochun and Junsu were now deep in conversation about his love life slash lack thereof and Changmin was busy eating everyone else’s share of lunch.
---
That afternoon Jaejoong wasn’t able to dwell on his unknown feelings because he got a call from dispatch and had to rush to the station, meeting Junsu just outside with several other crewmen.
“Someone called in the source being an office, but it’s already spread through the building…” he was informed as they hurried to don their uniforms and were already on the truck when Junsu added, hesitantly, “Yunho was a first responder, he happened to be nearby, apparently he is being taken to the hospital after rescuing someone, but we don’t know all the details yet…”
“He…” Jae breathed slowly, taking in his words as the noise of the siren and horn around him started to tune out like he had cotton in his ears. Grasping his helmet with white-knuckles, he focused on not thinking about anything other than his job for now.
---
They had determined that it was another arson, the starting point quite clearly showing trace of accelerants. Luckily, it was over lunch break and the staff had been out, all but one woman, whom reportedly Yunho himself had assisted out and they had both suffered from mild smoke inhalation. The damage to other areas of the building was relatively minimal, but insurance was surely going to have their work cut out for them considering the security system had been badly damaged in the blaze.
Jaejoong stood outside the hospital room. He’d insisted Junsu let him wait alone. Perhaps it was part of his conscience needling him, that he felt bad for the way they’d left off that morning, that Yunho just had to go hurt himself to make him feel worse. The idiot.
When the nurse emerged, Jae straightened up to greet her, “How is he?”
“He is just fine,” she smiled warmly at him, “Go on in,” she bowed, hanging the clipboard up outside the room and excused herself.
Entering the room with his heart in his throat, Jaejoong was surprised to see Yunho already dressed in his civvies and getting ready to leave.
“Yah.” He made sure his tone indicated just how annoyed he was, “You’re okay.”
“I’m…sorry…?” Yunho raised an eyebrow, “Next time you expect to find me on my deathbed I hope to not disappoint,” he teased.
Jaejoong didn’t find that amusing in the least, and he felt his eyes burning, as though some of the smoke that caused him to be here still lingered, “You ass,” he blinked hard, trying to will the sensation away but he knew his eyes must be red.
“Are you okay?” Yunho asked, stepping near him, but being mindful to keep some distance.
Jaejoong snorted at the irony of it, “No, I’m not okay. Idiot.” He grasped at Yunho’s jacket, “You’re in the hospital. Don’t do that again,” he reprimanded, shaking him a bit for emphasis.
“Okay.” Yunho smiled gently, putting his hands on Jaejoong’s slightly trembling shoulders, “I won’t.”
Biting his lip, he nodded and shrugged Yunho’s hands off, “Let’s go.”
---
After heading back to Jaejoong’s place, they had an interesting conversation.
“Wait…”
“Yeah…?” Yunho looked up over his coffee mug.
“You mean…we didn’t?” Jae blinked, as flashes of the night in question happened to come back to him.
“Well, not exactly…”
Jaejoong stripped himself, rather unceremoniously as though he was about to hop in the shower (oh, sexy) before proceeding to practically tear Yunho’s clothes off him with the grace of a mountain lion (also sexy) and a few inarticulate comments (ah, so sexy.)
He had the decency to feel mortified at the recollection, covering his face with his hands.
“You seemed…really eager, but drunk, and you ripped two condom packages in half along with the condoms themselves before you just threw them aside and well…” Yunho trailed off sheepishly.
“Well…?” Jae peeked out from between his fingers, eyes wide, “Well what?”
“Well you gave up and then basically tackled me with a crushing bear-hug and then there was some, well I guess you can call it kissing,” Yunho scratched the back of his head, “Then you fell asleep on top of me,” he chuckled, “I was afraid to wake you. You’re heavy, by the way.”
“Wait, then how did I get all these damn hickies?” he rubbed at his neck, the marks there would take a while to fade.
“Well, that was when we were still dressed and before I realized just how drunk you were…” Yunho chuckled, “You didn’t manhandle me until a while after that.”
“You ass!” Jaejoong socked him plainly in the arm, causing him to recoil.
“What?”
“You let me believe that we…” Jae tugged at his hair in frustration, “Ugh…I can’t believe I was going to sleep with you again to see what I had missed.”
“Wait, what.”
“Never mind, fleeting lapse in judgement.”
“Uh…” Yunho rubbed at his abused arm, clearly still slightly fazed.
“Just so you know, I would’ve topped.”
---
He came to the sensation of lips and warm breath on the nape of his neck, fingers gripping his hips.
Later, wrapped up together, those lips still grazing lightly against his skin moved ever so, “I believe you said something about topping?”
“Shut up, you’re ruining the moment.” Jaejoong grunted half-heartedly, swatting at him.
The low rumble of Yunho’s chuckles would’ve normally irritated him, but right now he was in a state where not much could bother him.
“You also said something about you cooking breakfast next time…” he felt Yunho’s smile.
“That, I wasn’t bluffing about,” Jaejoong laughed, “Your skills are lacking.”
“You weren’t saying that a while ago.”
“You know, you’re much better when you’re not talking.”
“Sorry, fleeting lapse of judgement.”
Jaejoong, in lieu of an elbow to the ribs, turned and squeezed him hard into a crushing bear-hug and Yunho wheezed, having an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. Happily, this time he knew they’d both remember what happened in the morning.
---
Unfortunately, breakfast was not on the morning agenda as another call came sometime around 4am. Yunho woke him. This time it was a nearby residential area.
“Sounds serious,” Yunho muttered as the team geared up and loaded into the pumper. It was rhetorical of him to say actually. These types of situations were always serious. They waited for the dispatcher to give the size-up. “Four-story brick villa, reports of heavy smoke from the rear third-floor windows, three trapped.”
Arriving at the scene, the smoke was visible from some distance away and it was nothing but chaos as people were out on the narrow street, as well as several police vehicles. In the distance an ambulance could be heard.
“Alright, search and rescue, two-in two-out,” Choi, their leading officer, instructed. They all immediately dispersed to their duties, knowing that time was of the essence.
---
Miraculously, no one had died. One of the three trapped men had sustained moderate though not life-threatening injuries, while the other two were treated for only minor ones. None of their team had been injured, and they’d managed to contain and extinguish the fire before it could spread to another floor.
They were lucky, again. Jaejoong couldn’t escape the feeling that their luck would run out eventually, it wouldn’t always be a happy ending. It was the very nature of their jobs. But he kept on, for the happy endings. They all had to.
Later when the police reported it had been determined an arson, and said they had connected it to a rash of arsons throughout Seoul, nearing close to a dozen at this point in the investigation, Jaejoong had been surprised. He had been more surprised when they cited that they suspected the perpetrator an above-average to extensive knowledge of fire-setting techniques, and was even possibly an active or retired firefighter.
“That’s just crazy…” Junsu scoffed, “How could anyone…” he couldn’t even finish his sentences, he was so flabbergasted.
“I don’t know…” Jaejoong said softly, running over scenarios in his mind and still not being able to guess what would even possess someone to think…
The warehouse. “My name's Yunho, I'll see you around~” and he winked before jogging off down the street, duffle bag slung and bouncing on his back.
The office building. “Yunho was a first responder, he happened to be nearby,”
The villa. Yunho woke him. This time it was a nearby residential area.
Jaejoong was never one to believe in coincidence, but he did believe in his gut feelings. Okay, so he had the means…but did he have the intent? Also, the list of other arsons they said were related were spread across the city, and seemingly unrelated in Jae’s eyes. But just how much did he know about Yunho? Perhaps not as much as the police…he shuddered.
Even thinking, contemplating this as a possibility was sickening to him.
“No. It couldn’t be…” he stated to himself resolutely.
Yunho was weird, idiotic, and even reckless at times. But he was also kind, considerate, and brave. He was a member of an affluent family; he had many things going for him. An arsonist? That just didn’t match.
Junsu watched the expressions change on Jaejoong’s face silently.
Yunho returned from the restroom and sat next to Jaejoong, “What’s wrong?” his hand instinctively went to squeeze his thigh reassuringly.
Turning the television off, Jaejoong shook his head, “Nothing, I just zoned out for a minute there. Tired. Long day.”
“I’ll let you guys be then, goodnight,” Junsu excused himself with a knowing look, and a saccharine smile.
Jaejoong turned to look at Yunho, who in turn brushed some hair from his eyes, “Are you sure you’re okay…?” he rubbed a thumb over Jae’s cheek.
“I am. Are you?” Jae asked with pointed meaning.
Uncertain, Yunho frowned, “What do you mean?”
His distress unveiled, Jaejoong pried, “There’s nothing- Nothing wrong? At all? With you?”
“Well at the moment you’re really freaking me out, but other than that I couldn’t be better,” he said with sincerity, “What is it you’re trying to say exactly?”
“No…nothing,” he sighed, eyes heavy lidded, “I guess it’s just the stress getting to me. Come to bed with me,” Jaejoong got up, expecting him to follow.
“If that’s what you wanted you didn’t have to be so dramatic about it,” Yunho joked, letting him lead the way.
---
Jaejoong stirred in the middle of the night, feeling tormented by whatever dream he awoke from, so much so that he was thankful he couldn’t remember the details.
Yunho lay at his side, for some reason he had been expecting otherwise. Eyes tracing over the handsome man’s features in the dark room, he fought to regulate his racing heart. “You’re okay. He’s okay. Everyone’s okay…”
Well no, that wasn’t right. Some demented person was out there maliciously setting places afire, and it seemed far too close for comfort.
Turning over with a sigh, he noted the time on the clock - still early morning - and closed his eyes again to begin trying to settle his overactive mind.
“Jaejoong-ah?” he heard Yunho’s voice thick with sleep and felt his hand on his waist, too strong and reliable to not be true. “What’s wrong?”
Remaining silent, Jae turned over again and wrapped his arms tightly around Yunho’s torso. The man stiffened a bit, unsure, before he relaxed and loosely slung his arms over him. “Sleep,” Jaejoong murmured, and Yunho left it at that.
That is, of course, until his and Jaejoong’s phones buzzed to life in unison in a way that had become all too familiar.
---
This time, it was a high-rise hotel in the heart of Myeongdong district. The blaze required several companies from the nearby stations to deal with, and rescue of over two-dozen clientele and staff. Once more, and amazingly, there were no casualties. The newscasts and media would applaud the valiant efforts of the men involved, but overlook what the police and more interestingly, those at the scene as well as several eye-witnesses knew.
Not only was the fire purposely started, it was done so by one of those rescued. The police had ordered a hush over this information as they were investigating if this was their serial arsonist or rather a copycat. The techniques were very similar, including use of accelerant and multiple origins of ignition however the young man barely in his early 20’s did not fit the profile of who they’d been looking for, a pathological fire setter with sophisticated methods, and, they speculated, perhaps a point to make. The man they had in custody seemed opportunistic, and excitement-seeking, and most notably, without the knowhow to not get trapped in destruction of his own making. The time between the two most recent incidents, or lack thereof, also did not comply with the established pattern of several days to weeks between each, presumably for the clever level of planning involved. The person they were looking for had not been caught up to this point, whether on camera or otherwise, so it seemed very unlikely they would be so careless.
Jaejoong didn’t feel great about this. He’d hoped they would have absolved his unspoken fears before they had to make their way out of him.
As it was, he couldn’t sleep and by the second day after he had to talk to someone. Junsu seemed the only reasonable person to confide in.
“What…?” Junsu’s face wore the same disturbed veil that had been wrapped suffocatingly around Jae’s heart. He started to laugh, a sick, hollow sound, as sadistic as the very notion he had spoken of. “You’re thinking someone you know…?”
“I know, it sounds crazy…I just…all the signs…I have this uncanny feeling I’m right…” He hadn’t been specific with the who - some part of him was protecting Yunho, likely the part of him that was already deathly loyal and adamantly denying that the man he’d come to care about could be guilty. In case he was wrong, in hopes that he was wrong, he felt he just had to be discreet.
“How so?” Junsu’s brow was furrowed, his expression dark as he hunkered down with his forearms on the table between them and his shoulders hunched. Now that Jae had said something to him, he had to hear all the details.
He began reciting the reasons and occurrences that led him to believe he possibly knew the criminal responsible in the most compelling ways he could, while remaining vague enough so as to not be evident or incriminating (ironically). He really just wanted to hear another perspective on this. Maybe it was just his over-analytical brain, finding things where they weren’t. Never wanting to feel secure in being happy, always trying to find a way to prove he couldn’t be. (His eldest sister always berated him on that subject.)
Junsu grew quiet, and Jaejoong suspected that maybe he hadn’t been subtle enough and it was far too clear who he’d been talking about. When he finally spoke, it was so hushed and low that Jaejoong didn’t even recognize his normally chipper friend’s voice, “Are you going to turn him in?”
“I…I don’t know…” Jaejoong swallowed thickly, balling his fists up so hard his nails dug crescents into his palms. ‘So much for him reproaching me, telling me to come to my senses…’ “Should I?” he didn’t want to even meet Junsu’s eyes, to see just how downcast they were, a direct reflection of his insides at that moment.
Before their conversation could continue, Jaejoong’s phone chimed to life beside him. Yunho. They both gazed at the caller id, and Jaejoong hesitantly reached for it, afraid either the coincidence or his hesitance or his constant overthinking (once more) would give things away.
He didn’t remember picking up, there was only darkness.
---
Jaejoong opened his eyes slightly, the distinct feeling of warmth around him. He didn’t recognize the room he was in. How did he get here?
“You know hyung, I always thought we were alike, you and I,” Junsu spoke from somewhere to his right, he could see his shadow flickering on the wall. “We have so many things in common. An understanding…” he chuckled, that same sick kind that Jaejoong could never get used to.
“Why’re you-” Jae winced as he felt a numbing, warm wetness seeping through his hair, noticing around him the distinct odor of gasoline.
“It’s disappointing, really,” the sound of Junsu’s voice moved around him slowly, the noises he made muffled slightly by the ringing in his ears. “This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.”
“Junsu-ah…what’s…what are you talking about?” Jae was finding it hard to hold his head up, but he tried to crane his neck to see him through the hair that had fallen into his eyes.
“Shh…you’ll see.”
This time the darkness was preceded by far too much light.
---
As if to continue the sequence, he emerged from the dark into blinding white light. It would’ve been classically reminiscent of near-death experience if it weren’t for the harshly real clinic lighting and the steady beeping of a heart monitor.
Jaejoong found he couldn’t move, but all at once it didn’t matter as his parents as well as several of his sisters appeared in his vision. It seemed surreal, like a dream, he hadn’t seen them all in quite some time. He tried to talk, but he had on an oxygen mask and they hushed him, calmly explaining the situation and that he was alright. He’d be alright. There were so many things he wanted to ask, people he wanted to ask about, but he felt exhausted and soon slipped back into a deep slumber.
The next time he felt that he could move a bit, his toes, his fingers, before he opened his eyes. There, next to him, was Yunho, holding his hand and looking startled by the movement.
“Jae…” he smiled, stroking his hand, “I’m sorry…”
Now without the mask hindering him, Jaejoong could find his voice, uttering a soft, “…why?”
“I said I wouldn’t be in the hospital again,” Yunho quipped, and if he had the strength he’d have punched him.
Instead he just smiled. “Idiot.”
Rating: R
Genre: AU, Romance, Humor, Drama, Crime
Warnings: sexual situations (nothing explicit), language, mature themes
Summary: Jaejoong has been a volunteer firefighter for 3 years in his small hometown when, no longer wanting to withstand prejudice from people in the small community, he leaves it behind and transfers to a station in Seoul. There he finds the new start he wanted, but with a bigger city comes bigger problems. Soon he finds himself with one of his own in the form of a strange and not-so-secret admirer named Yunho who seems to always appear in front of him; but that is the least of his worries as a string of arsons begin to appear throughout the city.
6459 wc
For bexy31, who wanted non-girly Jaejoong. Happy Holidays! ♥
Standing there in nought but his sleeveless cotton t-shirt, boots, insulated pants and suspenders, Jaejoong was startled, mid-task of putting away the rest of his gear into the truck by a whistle.
“Nice arms,” smiled the tall, tanned guy standing to his left, causing him to flinch in response.
“What?”
“Your arms, they're really great; you must work out a lot to keep them like that. And the shirt really suits you. Shame you have to wear sleeves to cover them up when you’re working. But the nice sheen of sweat afterwards is really appealing,” he grinned widely, all white teeth and smiling eyes.
“Ugh,” Jaejoong grunted, immediately thinking he needed a shower now more than ever after feeling dirtied by the man's words and stare. “Look, I'm not interested.” If he was some weird fireman fanboy Jae wanted no part in his obsession, even if he was slightly - moderately - handsome. He was just weird.
Not seeming to take his words to heart, the other man just laughed lightly, “My name's Yunho, I'll see you around~” and he winked before jogging off down the street, duffle bag slung and bouncing on his back.
“What the...” Jaejoong sighed to himself, turning again as his closest junior, Kim Junsu approached him.
“Who was that?” Junsu asked, tossing his helmet to Jae to put away.
Shrugging, he continued to focus on his task, thankful that the call today hadn't been a rescue, just a minor case of what appeared to be arson to a currently unused warehouse. The damage was extensive and these things were still problems, but ones that could be handled without hitch or risk of human life. Any time it was a relatively uneventful day meant that civilians and his fellow crew were safe from danger, so he counted that type of day a good day. It was the task of the police force to carry on an investigation after they'd finished securing the building; their job was relatively minimal.
A weird guy hitting on him - if that's what the guy had been doing? - wasn't going to ruin the good day for Jaejoong, so he smacked Junsu on the back amicably and suggested with a smile that they head back to eat lunch.
---
Fate decided not to be kind to Jaejoong.
“Yu...You,” Jae's initial surprise ebbed away into narrowed eyes.
“Hey gorgeous, bet you didn't expect me here.”
Jaejoong grimaced, “What are you doing here anyway? Look, am I going to have to place a restraining order against you?”
The other man seemed to think that was hilarious as he sputtered into full-out laughter, only serving to annoy Jaejoong further.
Junsu chose that moment to happen to come over and fill in the blanks, “Ah, you must be the new guy?” he hitched his thumb towards the notice board. If Jaejoong had happened to read it earlier, he would’ve indeed seen that name, Jung Yunho listed on the weekly news bulletin and been able to maybe save himself the awkward moment.
Just great. The weirdo wasn’t just some random fanboy who happened to be stalking him. He was a new volunteer member of their station crew who was also a weirdo apparently.
Jae escaped any impending conversation and headed to his usual corner of the break room, deciding that not talking to the weirdo was the way to go. Junsu was chatty enough for the two of them - though a few moments he suspected they were talking about him and his 'cold shoulder' towards new people, (something the younger man picked on him about - not so long ago he was the “new person”) because they'd look over at him and smile between themselves.
Over the next few weeks Yunho seemed to fit in well enough at the station - he gave off that “man's man” aura - something that didn't come quite as naturally to Jaejoong, he'd have to reluctantly admit.
He often had to make the effort for people to see him that way - if he ever went back to the way he'd been in college, that pitiful, thin, waif-like creature whose androgyny had males and females alike confused at his gender - well, he would never go back to those days. He aimed to distance himself from most of his past, especially the recent year before he moved into the city where he felt like the outsider who couldn't fit in or be accepted even by those he thought he’d proven himself to.
Jae himself felt 100% male, masculine, strong. But he had to exercise twice a day to make everyone else look at him with even a modicum of acknowledgement for those aspects. Added to that was the imposed need to appear manly to his peers in spite that he was homosexual, which was something that the general society, not to mention the field he was in, just could not abide. A bitter truth he knew all too well. It was less a means of compensation (as he had never equated being gay as emasculating), but more a shield of armor (to protect from those that no doubt did). Naturally, he wasn’t out in the Volunteer Firefighting Corps or at his part-time job at the nearby fitness center, though he was to a select few trusted friends and family. Jaejoong wanted to keep it that way, tired of the discrimination he’d faced during his entire adolescence and at his last station.
So, it frankly ticked him off. Yunho - this outsider by definition - was born with all the oozing natural machismo and God-given handsome features, and yet he seemed the most dandy in moments when he'd stand with a hand (a pretty, long-elegant-fingered hand) on his hip, or in the playful - sometimes sickeningly aegyo way he'd joke around during training drills or tease him, presumably trying to provoke a response he just wasn't giving. Jaejoong remained stone-faced while internally smashing the idiot's head against the wall.
Why did he have to fight for people to take him seriously as a man and this idiot was so easily accepted by everyone around him? Something wasn't right in the cosmos.
---
Late one night over soju, light-weight Junsu gushed, “It's because he likes you, y'know~” to which Jae, having drank twice as much without much of a buzz, upended an entire bottle as his reply to the notion. After a day of working a morning shift at the gym and responding to one non-serious call in the afternoon, he was in a pretty good mood and didn’t want the direction of the conversation to ruin it for him. Apparently the universe wanted to do that for him again anyway.
“Speak of the devil!” Su whisper-yelled, in a tone that clearly indicated he seemed to think he was being subtle and enigmatic, but was unable to gauge his volume.
“Hey guys,” with a nauseating grin Yunho sat himself down next to Jaejoong on the bench, much to Jaejoong’s (thinly-veiled) distaste, with his stein of beer (how manly of him, Jae mused to himself with a sardonic curl of his lip) along with two of his friends across from him. He introduced them as Park Yoochun and Shim Changmin, his ‘American’ and ‘Lawyer’ friends whom he knew from his ‘International Studies’ and his ‘Father’s Law Firm’ respectively (how ‘manly & American & Lawyer...y’ of him).
“Aren't you cool,” Jaejoong muttered under his breath. ‘Mr. Popular-I-Have-Foreign-and-Smart-Friends-Jung. Mr. my-family-has-money-and-success-and-I’m-still-a-good-guy-who-volunteers-my-time-and-risks-my-life-for-the-protection-of-our-great-society-Jung. Mr. I-don't-have-to-lift-weights-my-body-is-just-naturally-bulky-and-fit-Jung. Mr. Bastard.’
Four sets of eyes suddenly seemed upon him and he cursed that last bottle of soju making his tongue loose and his inside-words outside-words. This was a syndrome he decided to deem was contagious and blame on Junsu. With this syndrome combined with pure frustration exacerbated, he'd put himself to this humiliation. Dammit.
“Haha...someone needs to get laid,” the American introduced as Park Yoochun drawled in perfectly good Korean - no trace of American accent - and the other, Lawyer Shim Changmin, went all wonky-eyed and chuckled at his expense before just helping himself to the anju on the table.
Just great. ‘The annoying idiot's friends’ were idiots out to annoy him too. And well, 'the annoying idiot himself', he just seemed to be looking at him with something akin to concern and bemusement - which was strange, for him.
At that moment, Jaejoong felt too warm and light-headed. Standing, and subsequently knocking several empty to partially empty soju bottles over with a clatter, he grumped an “I'm leaving,” and smacked several thousand won onto the sticky table before stuffing his hands into his pockets and quickly walking away in what he hoped was a dignified yet aggressive way. He didn't trip over his unbuckled boots, so he figured that was something.
Behind him he vaguely registered Junsu attempting to get up after him before toppling half-onto Yoochun, but he continued onward, with what remained of his pride and the burn of soju at the back of his throat.
How he actually managed to start walking in the right direction to his home seemed miraculous, considering his recently proven supreme lack of awareness to his surroundings in his given state, but all he could think of was that he was ready to lay a thrashing on Junsu for inviting him out under the guise of blowing off some steam - and probably inviting the weird idiot and company to have fun at his expense unbeknownst to him.
So with that thought, he refused to slow his pace or turn to meet the little traitor as footsteps hurried nearer to him from behind. It was only when they were a considerable proximity to him that in his alcohol-addled mind he realized that Junsu was a clumsy drunk (several times clumsier than Jae himself sober - and he could admit he wasn't always super-coordinated) and at that moment his pulse quickened in anxiety.
‘Oh shit. I'm going to have to kick a mugger's ass.’ He paused in his footfalls, readying himself for arm-breaking when-
“Jaejoong-ah!” that familiar semi-nasally, sexy-sweet voice that he so hated clued him in to the identity of the 'mugger'. ‘Weird idiot mugger.’
He stopped completely, but refused to turn around, afraid he might actually rethink the arm-breaking instinct if he had to see that stupid handsome weirdo face with a teasing expression, and flinched as Yunho touched his elbow in what had to be an attempt to keep him from storming off again. “Are you okay?”
“I'm fine. I need to go home and sleep.” He left out the ‘Because I can't sleep in tomorrow, some people aren’t rich and loved by all and actually have important tasks to do instead of just being annoying creeps.’
Yunho’s mouth twitched a bit at the corner but Jaejoong didn’t know if it was because he’d thought aloud again or it was coincidental, “I’ll walk you, it’s dark in these back alleys,” he offered in what Jae would assume to be a chivalrous manner - if he were a woman, that is, and not a man that could bench press more than his own body weight. But because he was in fact a man, it just seemed condescending.
“I’m fine,” he repeated, tone edging from annoyed towards actually pissed, and he turned to face Yunho with a cold glare just to get the point across, “Worry about yourself.”
“I am, actually,” Yunho chuckled, still holding onto the sleeve of Jaejoong’s jacket, “Worried. You look like you might kill me with those eyes of yours…” belaying his words, Yunho’s eyes seemed to shift down his face to his lips, which he himself was aware, were quite alluring even when he had his bitchface on.
‘Don’t even think about it buddy…’ He gripped back at the other’s arm, still considering the breaking option if he tried anything funny. For a moment they seemed to be stuck in that pose, both faintly illuminated by the nearby streetlight, before Jaejoong cleared his throat and looked away, shrugging Yunho’s arm off. “Walk with me, but don’t touch me.”
“Alright, I can do that,” Yunho grinned handsomely in a way that said he was thinking ‘for now…’ and Jae had to blink a couple times to shake off the notion and keep from voicing his annoyance.
He was actually mildly surprised that he kept his hands to himself, and didn’t even make any weird comments the entire time they walked. Shuffling his feet and knocking his boot into a raised part of the sidewalk (the same part he always seemed to hit), he nearly tripped and did a face-plant but Yunho steadied him with that dandy hand of his. “Th…thanks…” he said begrudgingly and Yunho automatically retracted his hand.
Maybe he’d underestimated the effects of all that soju on him, because the sensation of smashing his toe seemed numb-er than usual, and his skin warmer. He realized after a few seconds that they’d stopped (another sign of perhaps too much soju) and that Yunho had bent down in front of him to fasten his boots to keep from tripping over them. It was kind of nice of him, Jae thought, but kind of annoying. For some reason, he just couldn’t bring himself to kick the guy over.
---
Bright morning light filtered in through the blinds he obviously had neglected to close the previous night and Jaejoong peeked one eye open, confused at the solid and warm mass that seemed to be under his cheek in lieu of his pillow. He blinked. And blinked again.
“What the hell?!” ‘What is this?’ Jae panicked, shoving the offending bare chest so hard that the man it belonged to toppled sideways, off the bed and onto the hard floor rather unceremoniously.
“Ooof,” there was a groan before he stood back up, naked and fully on display, making Jaejoong bark his shock once more and attempt to kick the nude guy further from the bed whilst still within the tangled sheet around his body.
“Why the hell are you here?!”
“I take it you don't remember last night?” Yunho asked, an uneasy but albeit there smirk tugging at the corner of his lips.
“Of course not you idiot! I must've been drunk out of my mind to even have you in my bedroom right now!” he struggled to free himself from and simultaneously cover himself with the sheet folded over and under himself, “And can you put on some clothes and cover that damn thing?!” he pointed accusingly at Yunho's (he'd admit, somewhat intimidating) nether regions.
Shrugging, Yunho put a dandy hand on his hip and chuckled at the man in the bed who had the sheet pulled up to his own chin, “You're pretty loud for someone who must have a huge headache right now...”
“I don't GET hangovers, now find your clothes-” he punctuated the demand by toeing what was evidently Yunho's boxer-briefs at the end of the bed, “-and walk your ass right out of my bedroom.” Jae shook his head abruptly to rid it of further Yunho’s-ass related thoughts.
To his surprise, Yunho actually did as told, collecting his garments and pulling them on with a sheepish grin, so unlike the annoying one Jaejoong was used to seeing. With a sigh as the other man left the room, Jae disentangled himself from the sheet cocoon and surveyed the damage from the night before. His room was littered with the remains of his clothing and what appeared to be a few condom packages (well, at least someone was in their right mind) which confirmed without further inspection that he was definitely never drinking so much again. “Definitely never.”
Slipping from the bed, he kicked some of the chaos into a pile and headed for his closet to get something to wear - and according to the full-length mirror within - to cover up the numerous marks on his otherwise pale neck and chest. “What the HELL…” he muttered to himself before tugging on some sweatpants and a thick hoodie.
He was past the point of annoyance now - he just couldn’t be annoyed. The facts were what was done was done. This situation had never actually happened before, since Jaejoong had such a strong tolerance for alcohol and a low tolerance for douchebags who may try to hook up with him whilst under the effects of said alcohol.
But, here he was, apparently having slept with the object of his annoyance and he just couldn’t bring himself to be upset like he thought he should be. Maybe it was the thought that now that Yunho had gotten what he wanted he might leave him alone, he wasn’t sure what the sense he had was. But he was somehow not really that upset.
Just hungry.
It just so happened that he seemed to smell some kind of food and made his way out to his kitchen where Yunho apparently had found his apron and was making something in a pan that didn’t seem terrible. “What. The. Hell.”
Using a spatula, the man plated his creation and set it onto the island countertop before Jaejoong, “I made French toast. It’s the only breakfast I know how to make since it’s easy,” he smiled and his eyes crinkled charmingly and because of the particular way the morning sunlight hit his face Jaejoong noticed the silvery scar intersecting the crinkles on one side and he had to wonder the story behind that.
Realising that he was starring, he redirected his attention to the plate in front of him. He knew he should probably knock some sense into Yunho and send him on his way, but for some reason he couldn’t bring himself to do so like that in his current mood, so he picked up the fork and took a bite.
Yunho watched him expectantly, “Not bad,” he put the fork down, “Next time I’ll cook though.”
“What...you’ll?” the taller man blinked in a clueless and almost cute way.
“Well I’m not saying you’re moving in, but I’d at least expect we’re seeing each other now,” Jaejoong said on his way to the fridge, as though he was commenting on the day’s weather forecast.
He tossed Yunho a bottle of water, and the dazed man somehow caught it, “We are…?” he numbly worked his long fingers to uncap the bottle.
Jaejoong caught himself staring again and looked down to resume eating, not bothering with answering.
His attention was drawn again when he heard long gulping from Yunho, who seemed to be as thirsty as he’d been hungry. Jae couldn’t help but laugh, so he did, loudly, covering his mouth with his hand. This situation, it was just so absurd.
Yunho stopped drinking, set the bottle down and looked at him with a solemn expression, “Ah. You’re making fun of me. I almost believed you were serious when you said we should see each other, aish…” his handsome features turned into a scowl.
Well, Jaejoong pondered, he hadn’t said it to make fun of him, but rather to scare him off. No one likes a clingy one-night stand, right? He leaned across the counter, “Listen…”
“No, that’s okay, I get it,” Yunho pulled the apron off, “I do, I’m not actually an idiot. Well, I might be…” he shook his head and walked out of the room, leaving only the sound of the door clicking shut behind him moments later to signify he’d left.
“Hm...” That was the desired result, wasn’t it? Jaejoong wondered why he didn’t feel so great about it.
---
“Ah, the classic tale of boy meets boy, boy hits on boy, boy is rejected by boy, repeatedly. Of course ending in boy has drunken night of wild abandon with boy and happy ever afters. You know the one.”
“I don’t think that’s quite the story here Yoochun.”
“C’mon hyung, I believe in you guys, you’ll get the happy ending,” the storyteller patted Yunho on the back consolingly.
“God you’re so sappy…” Changmin rolled his eyes and continued to eat.
“I agree with Chun-ah~ You’ve got an inside man here, Jaejoong-hyung has been through a lot and he needs some good in his life. I’ll help get you two together.” Junsu nodded enthusiastically, sending conspiratory looks to Yoochun. They must’ve already been plotting together.
“Am I the only one here who thinks you’re going about this the wrong way…?” the youngest of the group asked, but was ignored, so he sighed and focused on his food once more.
Yunho stood up, “I have to go, thanks for the talk guys,” he put on his best smile and left without much fuss, Yoochun and Junsu were now deep in conversation about his love life slash lack thereof and Changmin was busy eating everyone else’s share of lunch.
---
That afternoon Jaejoong wasn’t able to dwell on his unknown feelings because he got a call from dispatch and had to rush to the station, meeting Junsu just outside with several other crewmen.
“Someone called in the source being an office, but it’s already spread through the building…” he was informed as they hurried to don their uniforms and were already on the truck when Junsu added, hesitantly, “Yunho was a first responder, he happened to be nearby, apparently he is being taken to the hospital after rescuing someone, but we don’t know all the details yet…”
“He…” Jae breathed slowly, taking in his words as the noise of the siren and horn around him started to tune out like he had cotton in his ears. Grasping his helmet with white-knuckles, he focused on not thinking about anything other than his job for now.
---
They had determined that it was another arson, the starting point quite clearly showing trace of accelerants. Luckily, it was over lunch break and the staff had been out, all but one woman, whom reportedly Yunho himself had assisted out and they had both suffered from mild smoke inhalation. The damage to other areas of the building was relatively minimal, but insurance was surely going to have their work cut out for them considering the security system had been badly damaged in the blaze.
Jaejoong stood outside the hospital room. He’d insisted Junsu let him wait alone. Perhaps it was part of his conscience needling him, that he felt bad for the way they’d left off that morning, that Yunho just had to go hurt himself to make him feel worse. The idiot.
When the nurse emerged, Jae straightened up to greet her, “How is he?”
“He is just fine,” she smiled warmly at him, “Go on in,” she bowed, hanging the clipboard up outside the room and excused herself.
Entering the room with his heart in his throat, Jaejoong was surprised to see Yunho already dressed in his civvies and getting ready to leave.
“Yah.” He made sure his tone indicated just how annoyed he was, “You’re okay.”
“I’m…sorry…?” Yunho raised an eyebrow, “Next time you expect to find me on my deathbed I hope to not disappoint,” he teased.
Jaejoong didn’t find that amusing in the least, and he felt his eyes burning, as though some of the smoke that caused him to be here still lingered, “You ass,” he blinked hard, trying to will the sensation away but he knew his eyes must be red.
“Are you okay?” Yunho asked, stepping near him, but being mindful to keep some distance.
Jaejoong snorted at the irony of it, “No, I’m not okay. Idiot.” He grasped at Yunho’s jacket, “You’re in the hospital. Don’t do that again,” he reprimanded, shaking him a bit for emphasis.
“Okay.” Yunho smiled gently, putting his hands on Jaejoong’s slightly trembling shoulders, “I won’t.”
Biting his lip, he nodded and shrugged Yunho’s hands off, “Let’s go.”
---
After heading back to Jaejoong’s place, they had an interesting conversation.
“Wait…”
“Yeah…?” Yunho looked up over his coffee mug.
“You mean…we didn’t?” Jae blinked, as flashes of the night in question happened to come back to him.
“Well, not exactly…”
Jaejoong stripped himself, rather unceremoniously as though he was about to hop in the shower (oh, sexy) before proceeding to practically tear Yunho’s clothes off him with the grace of a mountain lion (also sexy) and a few inarticulate comments (ah, so sexy.)
He had the decency to feel mortified at the recollection, covering his face with his hands.
“You seemed…really eager, but drunk, and you ripped two condom packages in half along with the condoms themselves before you just threw them aside and well…” Yunho trailed off sheepishly.
“Well…?” Jae peeked out from between his fingers, eyes wide, “Well what?”
“Well you gave up and then basically tackled me with a crushing bear-hug and then there was some, well I guess you can call it kissing,” Yunho scratched the back of his head, “Then you fell asleep on top of me,” he chuckled, “I was afraid to wake you. You’re heavy, by the way.”
“Wait, then how did I get all these damn hickies?” he rubbed at his neck, the marks there would take a while to fade.
“Well, that was when we were still dressed and before I realized just how drunk you were…” Yunho chuckled, “You didn’t manhandle me until a while after that.”
“You ass!” Jaejoong socked him plainly in the arm, causing him to recoil.
“What?”
“You let me believe that we…” Jae tugged at his hair in frustration, “Ugh…I can’t believe I was going to sleep with you again to see what I had missed.”
“Wait, what.”
“Never mind, fleeting lapse in judgement.”
“Uh…” Yunho rubbed at his abused arm, clearly still slightly fazed.
“Just so you know, I would’ve topped.”
---
He came to the sensation of lips and warm breath on the nape of his neck, fingers gripping his hips.
Later, wrapped up together, those lips still grazing lightly against his skin moved ever so, “I believe you said something about topping?”
“Shut up, you’re ruining the moment.” Jaejoong grunted half-heartedly, swatting at him.
The low rumble of Yunho’s chuckles would’ve normally irritated him, but right now he was in a state where not much could bother him.
“You also said something about you cooking breakfast next time…” he felt Yunho’s smile.
“That, I wasn’t bluffing about,” Jaejoong laughed, “Your skills are lacking.”
“You weren’t saying that a while ago.”
“You know, you’re much better when you’re not talking.”
“Sorry, fleeting lapse of judgement.”
Jaejoong, in lieu of an elbow to the ribs, turned and squeezed him hard into a crushing bear-hug and Yunho wheezed, having an overwhelming sense of déjà vu. Happily, this time he knew they’d both remember what happened in the morning.
---
Unfortunately, breakfast was not on the morning agenda as another call came sometime around 4am. Yunho woke him. This time it was a nearby residential area.
“Sounds serious,” Yunho muttered as the team geared up and loaded into the pumper. It was rhetorical of him to say actually. These types of situations were always serious. They waited for the dispatcher to give the size-up. “Four-story brick villa, reports of heavy smoke from the rear third-floor windows, three trapped.”
Arriving at the scene, the smoke was visible from some distance away and it was nothing but chaos as people were out on the narrow street, as well as several police vehicles. In the distance an ambulance could be heard.
“Alright, search and rescue, two-in two-out,” Choi, their leading officer, instructed. They all immediately dispersed to their duties, knowing that time was of the essence.
---
Miraculously, no one had died. One of the three trapped men had sustained moderate though not life-threatening injuries, while the other two were treated for only minor ones. None of their team had been injured, and they’d managed to contain and extinguish the fire before it could spread to another floor.
They were lucky, again. Jaejoong couldn’t escape the feeling that their luck would run out eventually, it wouldn’t always be a happy ending. It was the very nature of their jobs. But he kept on, for the happy endings. They all had to.
Later when the police reported it had been determined an arson, and said they had connected it to a rash of arsons throughout Seoul, nearing close to a dozen at this point in the investigation, Jaejoong had been surprised. He had been more surprised when they cited that they suspected the perpetrator an above-average to extensive knowledge of fire-setting techniques, and was even possibly an active or retired firefighter.
“That’s just crazy…” Junsu scoffed, “How could anyone…” he couldn’t even finish his sentences, he was so flabbergasted.
“I don’t know…” Jaejoong said softly, running over scenarios in his mind and still not being able to guess what would even possess someone to think…
The warehouse. “My name's Yunho, I'll see you around~” and he winked before jogging off down the street, duffle bag slung and bouncing on his back.
The office building. “Yunho was a first responder, he happened to be nearby,”
The villa. Yunho woke him. This time it was a nearby residential area.
Jaejoong was never one to believe in coincidence, but he did believe in his gut feelings. Okay, so he had the means…but did he have the intent? Also, the list of other arsons they said were related were spread across the city, and seemingly unrelated in Jae’s eyes. But just how much did he know about Yunho? Perhaps not as much as the police…he shuddered.
Even thinking, contemplating this as a possibility was sickening to him.
“No. It couldn’t be…” he stated to himself resolutely.
Yunho was weird, idiotic, and even reckless at times. But he was also kind, considerate, and brave. He was a member of an affluent family; he had many things going for him. An arsonist? That just didn’t match.
Junsu watched the expressions change on Jaejoong’s face silently.
Yunho returned from the restroom and sat next to Jaejoong, “What’s wrong?” his hand instinctively went to squeeze his thigh reassuringly.
Turning the television off, Jaejoong shook his head, “Nothing, I just zoned out for a minute there. Tired. Long day.”
“I’ll let you guys be then, goodnight,” Junsu excused himself with a knowing look, and a saccharine smile.
Jaejoong turned to look at Yunho, who in turn brushed some hair from his eyes, “Are you sure you’re okay…?” he rubbed a thumb over Jae’s cheek.
“I am. Are you?” Jae asked with pointed meaning.
Uncertain, Yunho frowned, “What do you mean?”
His distress unveiled, Jaejoong pried, “There’s nothing- Nothing wrong? At all? With you?”
“Well at the moment you’re really freaking me out, but other than that I couldn’t be better,” he said with sincerity, “What is it you’re trying to say exactly?”
“No…nothing,” he sighed, eyes heavy lidded, “I guess it’s just the stress getting to me. Come to bed with me,” Jaejoong got up, expecting him to follow.
“If that’s what you wanted you didn’t have to be so dramatic about it,” Yunho joked, letting him lead the way.
---
Jaejoong stirred in the middle of the night, feeling tormented by whatever dream he awoke from, so much so that he was thankful he couldn’t remember the details.
Yunho lay at his side, for some reason he had been expecting otherwise. Eyes tracing over the handsome man’s features in the dark room, he fought to regulate his racing heart. “You’re okay. He’s okay. Everyone’s okay…”
Well no, that wasn’t right. Some demented person was out there maliciously setting places afire, and it seemed far too close for comfort.
Turning over with a sigh, he noted the time on the clock - still early morning - and closed his eyes again to begin trying to settle his overactive mind.
“Jaejoong-ah?” he heard Yunho’s voice thick with sleep and felt his hand on his waist, too strong and reliable to not be true. “What’s wrong?”
Remaining silent, Jae turned over again and wrapped his arms tightly around Yunho’s torso. The man stiffened a bit, unsure, before he relaxed and loosely slung his arms over him. “Sleep,” Jaejoong murmured, and Yunho left it at that.
That is, of course, until his and Jaejoong’s phones buzzed to life in unison in a way that had become all too familiar.
---
This time, it was a high-rise hotel in the heart of Myeongdong district. The blaze required several companies from the nearby stations to deal with, and rescue of over two-dozen clientele and staff. Once more, and amazingly, there were no casualties. The newscasts and media would applaud the valiant efforts of the men involved, but overlook what the police and more interestingly, those at the scene as well as several eye-witnesses knew.
Not only was the fire purposely started, it was done so by one of those rescued. The police had ordered a hush over this information as they were investigating if this was their serial arsonist or rather a copycat. The techniques were very similar, including use of accelerant and multiple origins of ignition however the young man barely in his early 20’s did not fit the profile of who they’d been looking for, a pathological fire setter with sophisticated methods, and, they speculated, perhaps a point to make. The man they had in custody seemed opportunistic, and excitement-seeking, and most notably, without the knowhow to not get trapped in destruction of his own making. The time between the two most recent incidents, or lack thereof, also did not comply with the established pattern of several days to weeks between each, presumably for the clever level of planning involved. The person they were looking for had not been caught up to this point, whether on camera or otherwise, so it seemed very unlikely they would be so careless.
Jaejoong didn’t feel great about this. He’d hoped they would have absolved his unspoken fears before they had to make their way out of him.
As it was, he couldn’t sleep and by the second day after he had to talk to someone. Junsu seemed the only reasonable person to confide in.
“What…?” Junsu’s face wore the same disturbed veil that had been wrapped suffocatingly around Jae’s heart. He started to laugh, a sick, hollow sound, as sadistic as the very notion he had spoken of. “You’re thinking someone you know…?”
“I know, it sounds crazy…I just…all the signs…I have this uncanny feeling I’m right…” He hadn’t been specific with the who - some part of him was protecting Yunho, likely the part of him that was already deathly loyal and adamantly denying that the man he’d come to care about could be guilty. In case he was wrong, in hopes that he was wrong, he felt he just had to be discreet.
“How so?” Junsu’s brow was furrowed, his expression dark as he hunkered down with his forearms on the table between them and his shoulders hunched. Now that Jae had said something to him, he had to hear all the details.
He began reciting the reasons and occurrences that led him to believe he possibly knew the criminal responsible in the most compelling ways he could, while remaining vague enough so as to not be evident or incriminating (ironically). He really just wanted to hear another perspective on this. Maybe it was just his over-analytical brain, finding things where they weren’t. Never wanting to feel secure in being happy, always trying to find a way to prove he couldn’t be. (His eldest sister always berated him on that subject.)
Junsu grew quiet, and Jaejoong suspected that maybe he hadn’t been subtle enough and it was far too clear who he’d been talking about. When he finally spoke, it was so hushed and low that Jaejoong didn’t even recognize his normally chipper friend’s voice, “Are you going to turn him in?”
“I…I don’t know…” Jaejoong swallowed thickly, balling his fists up so hard his nails dug crescents into his palms. ‘So much for him reproaching me, telling me to come to my senses…’ “Should I?” he didn’t want to even meet Junsu’s eyes, to see just how downcast they were, a direct reflection of his insides at that moment.
Before their conversation could continue, Jaejoong’s phone chimed to life beside him. Yunho. They both gazed at the caller id, and Jaejoong hesitantly reached for it, afraid either the coincidence or his hesitance or his constant overthinking (once more) would give things away.
He didn’t remember picking up, there was only darkness.
---
Jaejoong opened his eyes slightly, the distinct feeling of warmth around him. He didn’t recognize the room he was in. How did he get here?
“You know hyung, I always thought we were alike, you and I,” Junsu spoke from somewhere to his right, he could see his shadow flickering on the wall. “We have so many things in common. An understanding…” he chuckled, that same sick kind that Jaejoong could never get used to.
“Why’re you-” Jae winced as he felt a numbing, warm wetness seeping through his hair, noticing around him the distinct odor of gasoline.
“It’s disappointing, really,” the sound of Junsu’s voice moved around him slowly, the noises he made muffled slightly by the ringing in his ears. “This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.”
“Junsu-ah…what’s…what are you talking about?” Jae was finding it hard to hold his head up, but he tried to crane his neck to see him through the hair that had fallen into his eyes.
“Shh…you’ll see.”
This time the darkness was preceded by far too much light.
---
As if to continue the sequence, he emerged from the dark into blinding white light. It would’ve been classically reminiscent of near-death experience if it weren’t for the harshly real clinic lighting and the steady beeping of a heart monitor.
Jaejoong found he couldn’t move, but all at once it didn’t matter as his parents as well as several of his sisters appeared in his vision. It seemed surreal, like a dream, he hadn’t seen them all in quite some time. He tried to talk, but he had on an oxygen mask and they hushed him, calmly explaining the situation and that he was alright. He’d be alright. There were so many things he wanted to ask, people he wanted to ask about, but he felt exhausted and soon slipped back into a deep slumber.
The next time he felt that he could move a bit, his toes, his fingers, before he opened his eyes. There, next to him, was Yunho, holding his hand and looking startled by the movement.
“Jae…” he smiled, stroking his hand, “I’m sorry…”
Now without the mask hindering him, Jaejoong could find his voice, uttering a soft, “…why?”
“I said I wouldn’t be in the hospital again,” Yunho quipped, and if he had the strength he’d have punched him.
Instead he just smiled. “Idiot.”