May Old Acquaintance be Forgot
Title: May Old Acquaintance be Forgot
Pairing: JaeSu (friendship), hints of JaeChun
Rating: Pg-13
Length:Oneshot
Genre: Humor, Angst, Fluff
Summary: Jaejoong doesn't want to be forgotten and Junsu doesn't see how he can be. But he still promises to keep that damn tree up until Jaejoong comes back.
A/N: A fic written on a request from Nicky to write a JaeSu based off this comment on a post she made. This was my first time attempting JaeSu, even as a bromance, and as always--my mind took it to crazy places. And somehow JaeChun still snuck its way into this becase that seems to be my brain's default and I am not a strong enough person to deny JaeChun when it appears XD But hopefully the JaeSu love still shines through!
Junsu was 3 minutes from falling asleep when he heard noises from outside of his room. He was 2 minutes from falling asleep when he realized that he was the only one in his house so there probably shouldn't be noises coming from outside his room.
He was 1 minute from falling asleep when he heard a muffled voice which definitely shouldn't have been there.
The haze of sleep quickly left Junsu's brain as he went into alert mode. Okay. He had trained for this. Well, he hadn't trained for this, but he did love action movies so he sort of had a vague idea of what to do in situations like this.
Making sure he at least had pants on, in case the noise was from some trigger happy sasaeng, Junsu blindly groped around the dark bedroom until his hands collided with slim, cold metal. Perfect. He knew letting Junho keep his old baseball bat here would come in handy one day.
Junsu creeped towards the door, bat clutched firmly in his hands. He exhaled, said a quick prayer, counted to three and then threw the door open with admittedly shaky bravado.
He didn't really know what to expect outside of the room: visions of masked robbers, murderers with axes, and foreign spies had all danced across his mind. But instead what he got was just a stream of middle aged dudes carrying what looked like all the fir in Korea and wearing red shirts that had “LEE'S BOTANICAL NURSERY” stitched on the front.
"What...."
The men didn't even look up at him. All of them seemed to be concentrating on bringing in pile after pile of green branches. Junsu wondered for a second if he had slipped into some other dimension, one where his apartment had been condemned by the government so that they could turn it into an evergreen forest for the sake of preserving Korea's natural resources...
"Junsu-yah!"
A bright voice cut through Junsu's thoughts and his eyes went to the doorway of the living room, where a familiar blonde head was poking out.
"Hyung?"
"What are you doing up so late? I thought you had rehearsals tomorrow" Jaejoong asked, stepping out so that he could see the second floor balcony clearly. "And why do you have a bat? Are you going to play baseball? This late?"
"Hyung....I think I'm getting robbed. Or...what's the opposite of being robbed? Like when people bring junk to your house and leave it there" Junsu asked, still so confused.
"Anti-robbed?" Jaejoong said, helpfully.
"Yeah. Well i think I'm being anti-robbed"
"By who?"
Junsu waved his bat around wildly. "Do you not see all these men in red shirts everywhere?" Jaejoong turned and looked at the men with a smile.
"Oh, these guys? They aren't anti-robbing you, Su-yah. They're your birthday present"
"You got me a bunch of ahjussis for my birthday?" Junsu asked, slumping against the balcony railng. Well, it wasn't the worst birthday present he had ever gotten. And he could use the help taking care of his cats...
"Of course not, you big idiot. The tree, remember? The 4 meter tall Christmas tree that I promised I would get you"
Junsu's eyes grew wide. "You were serious about that?"
"When have I ever lied to you about anything?"
"You did tell me you were going to come to my concert..."
"And you told me you were going to come to my drama set to see everyone" Jaejoong countered back easily.
"I sent Yoochun instead"
"Chunnie would have come anyways" Jaejoong said, rolling his eyes, "now come down here and tell these poor guys where you want your tree to be set up"
2 hours later, all the red shirted men had left and there was just Junsu and Jaejoong sitting under a massive Christmas tree, all lit up and shining in the early morning light.
"This...is surprisingly pretty" Junsu said after a few seconds.
"It's a Christmas tree, of course it's pretty" Jaejoong said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small box. "And here is the second part of your present"
Junsu opened the box and saw a small tree ornament in the shape of what seemed to be a very weird looking patchwork coat.
"I had it custom made" Jaejoong said smugly.
Junsu looked up, eyebrows knitted together. "Why?"
"Oh, you'll see once you meet with Chunnie tomorrow"
Three days later, Junsu slipped on the gift that Yoochun had given him. A long, odd coat that perfectly matched the ornament. He sighed and turned off the lights on his tree as he went outside. He couldn't wait for those two to go to the army already.
~~~***~~~
The night before Jaejoong's enlistment was a sensory overload: there were too many noises and people and crying and enough alochol in such pretty colors that even Junsu was tempted to take some. Or to dye his hair in one of the bright shades.
He was staring deeply at a cup of dark blue vodka when Jaejoong slid next to him as easily as he always did.
"You should dye your hair that color"
"I was thinking about it"
Jaejoong sighed and ran a hand through his own messy brown locks. "I'm going to miss you"
"I'll miss you too, hyung"
"I was talking to my hair"
Junsu snorted. "Well I'm sure your hair is going to be happy to take a vacation from your dumb head"
"Such harsh words" Jaejoong said in mock hurt. "And on my last night too!"
"Don't be so dramatic. You're acting like you're going to die"
Jaejoong grinned and reached over to the backpack he had brought along with him. He took out a box and gave it to Junsu. "Something for you, so that you'll remember me"
"You really sound like you're planning on dying or something" Junsu said with narrowed eyes.
"Hey, I'm Kim Jaejoong. They won't let me die. Not even the military would be able to handle the force of my fans if they did" Jaejoong boasted.
"I'll kill all of them myself if they let you die" Junsu said as he opened the box. Inside was another christmas ornament, this one made out of metal and in the shape of a military beret.
"I know you won't keep that tree up for three years, but at least you'll think of me every Christmas, right?"
Three years. Junsu's throat suddenly felt dry. He couldn't even clearly remember his life before Jaejoong had been in it. Ever since he was a teenager, there hadn't been a time where the older boy had been away with him for more than a couple of weeks, let alone three years. Of everything that had changed and twisted and became distorted, Jaejoong and Yoochun had been his only constants. Not even Junho had been through what the three of them had gone through together, and Junsu wondered what his life was going to be like without one of the most important parts there.
"I'm not going to take the tree down until you come back" Junsu said, tucking the box away in his pocket.
Jaejoong looked over with a grin. "Really?"
"When have I ever lied to you about anything?"
Jaejoong reached out and pulled Junsu into a tight hug, fingers digging into the younger's shoulders with bruising force. And Junsu wondered how Jaejoong ever even thought that he would need something to remember this.
That night, Junsu hung the little ornament on his tree next to the one of the ugly coat and smiled. Three years wouldn't be so bad.
~~~***~~~
Jaejoong being gone wasn't even a big deal at first.
Life often times had gotten in the way over the past 6 years, and there were times that Junsu didn't even see Yoochun and Jaejoong for weeks. So it wasn't a big deal.
Of course, Junsu missed the daily kakaotalk messages, the emoticon filled ~good lucks~ and ~thinking of you~ and ~LOL look at this cat video I found~ that he was used to filling his inbox.
Without his phone buzzing in his pocket steadily throughout the day, Junsu just felt a little...empty.
So he texted Yoochun and some of the musical staff and Junho and even his mom. He sent someone from B2ST a picture of a kitten in a sweater that he knew would have made Jaejoong laugh until he was rolling on the ground.
In return, he got some very formal messages from the musical people, all who seemed unsure of what to do with Xia Junsu texting them. There weren't any emoticons anywhere and it just felt wrong.
He got a “LOL” from Yoochun. Which was normal for Yoochun. But it wasn't a paragraph length comment about how much he missed Junsu and loved Junsu and...it just felt wrong.
He got a “What's going on with you? You never text. Call me” from Junho and a “Are you eating? Umma is going to bring you some dishes” from his mom and there wasn't any of the sunniness and rainbow colored texts and exploding hearts and...
It all just felt too wrong.
So instead, Junsu tossed his cellphone on his couch and decided to go on a walk. Which probably wasn't the smartest idea, seeing as how crazy fans were always close by. But it didn't stop him from putting a hat over his bright blue hair and putting on a pair of Junho's old basketball shorts and going outside.
He passed by a small shop that, for some reason, was having a sale on Christmas ornaments. In May. He stared at them for a moment before going inside.
Half an hour later, he was back home, hanging up a cat-shaped ornament on the giant Christmas tree that he still hadn't taken down. The crystal figure twinkled in the light, almost looking as though it was winking at him.
For the first time all day, Junsu smiled.
~~~***~~~
Him and Yoochun met for the opening of something. Some ambassadorship that Baek had casually emailed to let them know about. It usually went like that for them. They'd wake up in the morning with an email saying 'Oh, by the way, you're now the official Korean nuclear waste spokesmen!' and then they'd be shuttled to places where they were stuffed into bright clothes and told to put on bright smiles and look as though they cared about nuclear waste, or computer security, or whatever else Baek felt they needed to care about.
“Are we cherry blossom ambassadors?” Junsu asked, looking down at the overly pink sweater that they had put him in.
“Roses, maybe?” Yoochun answered-a crown made out of leaves resting on his messy hair.
They both lapsed into silence, staring at their reflections in the mirror. Junsu wondered why they hadn't given him the crown. Yoochun fidgeted in his seat, a ball of nervous energy that really really wasn't characteristic of him. His phone lay, unused, on the makeup counter in front of them.
“Your manager told me that you started composing again” Junsu said after a few awkward seconds. “When you have breaks from filming”
Yoochun's fingers twitched at this side. “They're nothing”
“Do you want me to look at them?”
“Not yet....they don't have any lyrics” Yoochun said, eyes dashing to his phone every few seconds before looking away, dissapointed.
Junsu felt a burning feeling in his stomach as he thought back to all those times he had walked through their dorm at midnight to get a glass of water only to find Jaejoong and Yoochun sitting, drunk and giggling, surrounded by sheets of music that they would take turns writing lyrics on.
“How...”
“Three minutes” Yoochun interrupted, looking at his hands. “Hyung called me yesterday and he could only stay on the phone for three minutes. I haven't talked to him in a month and all I got was three minutes”
And Junsu wanted to say that Jaejoong's next vacation was coming up soon, or that they could both go and visit him together before that, or that there was always letters....
But he couldn't. Because there was an empty chair between him and Yoochun, and an empty silence that would usually be filled with airy chuckles. And Yoochun was looking exhausted, shaky and nervous and just not right and Junsu didn't know how to fix it. Because he couldn't even fix the shaky feeling inside of himself.
But Yoochun needed to be calmed right now, and the person who always calmed him was 45 minutes away in Yongin, what felt like forever away in reality.
“Let's go visit him next week” Junsu said with an overly bright smile.
They knew they couldn't, neither of their schedules had any space, but Yoochun smiled back at him and cracked a weak joke about the people at the base would take one look at Junsu's hair and think he was in some gang.
And Junsu felt okay.
That night, he put on some old records Yoochun had loaned him and hung a Micky Mouse ornament on the tree.
~~~***~~~
Musical practice was crazy. It was the first musical that CjeS was putting on, and they expected nothing but perfection from all of the cast, Junsu in particular.
So Junsu sang. He let them dye his hair black and he let them put him in costumes and he let them shove cameras in his face as he sang and sang until he felt like his throat was going to bleed. He loved being on stage, but it always got to the point in every musical where it felt as though all the sets blended into one and spun around him, so fast that he couldn't keep up with anything.
“You want me to come over tonight?” Junho asked over the phone. “We can play video games and eat pizza and you can watch me get shitfaced”
Junsu wanted to cry because that was really the last thing he needed right now. What he needed was a good 20 hours of sleep and gallons of samgyetang and for the ground to open up and swallow him whole and...
His phone beeped, informing him that he had another call.
“Someone else is trying to call me, hyung. I'll get back to you later” Junsu coughed out before switching over to the other caller.
“Yes?”
“Junsu-yah-someone on base found a cat and I convinced him to name it Xiah! I'll send you a picture with my next letter!”
And just like that, Junsu felt a strange calmness sweep over his body.
“Hyung”
“How are you, Su-yah?”
Junsu clutched onto his phone and he felt like he wanted to cry, which was embarrassing. Because he was a grown man just talking to another man and that definitely should not be enough to make him tear up like this.
“My noona told me that you're practicing for your musical right now. You're overworking yourself again, aren't you?”
“Shouldn't I be the one worrying about you overworking, hyung?”
Jaejoong laughed from the other side. He sounded just the same as always, bright and happy. “When have you ever had to worry about me before?”
Junsu scoffed. “When have I not?”
“I asked my noona to come over and bring you a couple of things. Don't let yourself work too hard, okay, Junsu-yah? Hyung isn't there to tell you to give yourself a break”
However when Suyoung showed up an hour later with a container full of samgyetang and a little box that had an apple shaped ornament with the words 'Junsu Fighting!' engraved on it, Junsu thought that maybe Jaejoong was still there.
~~~***~~~
“You don't look any different at all with a shaved head”
Junsu stared at Yoochun with a frown on his face. “Really, you don't look different at all. How are you and hyung able to look the exact same with a military cut?”
Yoochun shrugged, running a hand over his newly bald head. “You'll probably look the same too”
“I definitely won't”
“Keep dying your hair a different color every week and you'll find out soon enough”
“Hey now, save all this aggression for the army”
Yoochun sniggered and leaned back on his sofa. Unlike Jaejoong, who had thrown 3 parties of various degrees of of intimacy, Yoochun had decided to spend his last night as a free man just chilling at home with his family and Junsu. And unlike Jaejoong, who had been a nervous and teary ball of energy, Yoochun looked almost relaxed. As though he had been looking forward to going into the army for months.
“Sorry that I'm going to miss your musical” Yoochun said after a few seconds.
Junsu snorted. “Like you would have gone to see it anyways”
“I'm sure I would have.....at least made an effort...”
Junsu laughed shakily. What was he going to do without this for another three years?
“Hey, I almost forgot! Jae's noona gave me something that hyung wanted me to give you” Yoochun said, reaching behind him and taking out a small box. “Why is hyung buying you gifts now?”
“Because he loves me more” Junsu said, taking the box from Yoochun. He opened it and felt his eyes get teary at what was inside.
That night, he hung the second metal army beret on the tree and sat in front of it, knees pulled up to his chest, chin resting on them. It was June but 'All I want for Christmas' was playing in the background and for the first time in his life, Junsu felt all alone.
~~~***~~~
Soldiers in the ROK army technically weren't allowed to decorate anything, but all the commanding officers turned a blind eye when the privates put up pictures in their lockers. So on the first day in their permanent unit, the boys of the 5th Infantry division spent the first few hour decorating their lockers like middle school girls.
Most of the soldiers had pictures of family and girl group idols they had cut out from magazines that they hung up with tape or cute magnets their parents or girlfriends had sent them.
Junsu looked at the rest of the kids in his unit and shook his head. He was only 29, but being surrounded by a bunch of kids in their early twenties made him feel like some sort of old grandpa. He overheard two soldiers arguing if Hani or Suzy was prettier, and which one they should hang up in their lockers.
"Hyung, who's picture did you put up?" one of the soldiers asked Junsu, looking over at his locker. "Wait...why did you hang up a picture of that?"
Junsu looked at the only picture that he had taped in his locker. A single shot of his Christmas tree, all lit up, with every ornament clearly displayed.
"I made a promise to someone special to me that I'd keep the tree up" Junsu said easily. He didn't really need, or want, to explain anything further. He smiled at the picture and then closed the locker door.
Only two more years, hyung
Pairing: JaeSu (friendship), hints of JaeChun
Rating: Pg-13
Length:Oneshot
Genre: Humor, Angst, Fluff
Summary: Jaejoong doesn't want to be forgotten and Junsu doesn't see how he can be. But he still promises to keep that damn tree up until Jaejoong comes back.
A/N: A fic written on a request from Nicky to write a JaeSu based off this comment on a post she made. This was my first time attempting JaeSu, even as a bromance, and as always--my mind took it to crazy places. And somehow JaeChun still snuck its way into this becase that seems to be my brain's default and I am not a strong enough person to deny JaeChun when it appears XD But hopefully the JaeSu love still shines through!
Junsu was 3 minutes from falling asleep when he heard noises from outside of his room. He was 2 minutes from falling asleep when he realized that he was the only one in his house so there probably shouldn't be noises coming from outside his room.
He was 1 minute from falling asleep when he heard a muffled voice which definitely shouldn't have been there.
The haze of sleep quickly left Junsu's brain as he went into alert mode. Okay. He had trained for this. Well, he hadn't trained for this, but he did love action movies so he sort of had a vague idea of what to do in situations like this.
Making sure he at least had pants on, in case the noise was from some trigger happy sasaeng, Junsu blindly groped around the dark bedroom until his hands collided with slim, cold metal. Perfect. He knew letting Junho keep his old baseball bat here would come in handy one day.
Junsu creeped towards the door, bat clutched firmly in his hands. He exhaled, said a quick prayer, counted to three and then threw the door open with admittedly shaky bravado.
He didn't really know what to expect outside of the room: visions of masked robbers, murderers with axes, and foreign spies had all danced across his mind. But instead what he got was just a stream of middle aged dudes carrying what looked like all the fir in Korea and wearing red shirts that had “LEE'S BOTANICAL NURSERY” stitched on the front.
"What...."
The men didn't even look up at him. All of them seemed to be concentrating on bringing in pile after pile of green branches. Junsu wondered for a second if he had slipped into some other dimension, one where his apartment had been condemned by the government so that they could turn it into an evergreen forest for the sake of preserving Korea's natural resources...
"Junsu-yah!"
A bright voice cut through Junsu's thoughts and his eyes went to the doorway of the living room, where a familiar blonde head was poking out.
"Hyung?"
"What are you doing up so late? I thought you had rehearsals tomorrow" Jaejoong asked, stepping out so that he could see the second floor balcony clearly. "And why do you have a bat? Are you going to play baseball? This late?"
"Hyung....I think I'm getting robbed. Or...what's the opposite of being robbed? Like when people bring junk to your house and leave it there" Junsu asked, still so confused.
"Anti-robbed?" Jaejoong said, helpfully.
"Yeah. Well i think I'm being anti-robbed"
"By who?"
Junsu waved his bat around wildly. "Do you not see all these men in red shirts everywhere?" Jaejoong turned and looked at the men with a smile.
"Oh, these guys? They aren't anti-robbing you, Su-yah. They're your birthday present"
"You got me a bunch of ahjussis for my birthday?" Junsu asked, slumping against the balcony railng. Well, it wasn't the worst birthday present he had ever gotten. And he could use the help taking care of his cats...
"Of course not, you big idiot. The tree, remember? The 4 meter tall Christmas tree that I promised I would get you"
Junsu's eyes grew wide. "You were serious about that?"
"When have I ever lied to you about anything?"
"You did tell me you were going to come to my concert..."
"And you told me you were going to come to my drama set to see everyone" Jaejoong countered back easily.
"I sent Yoochun instead"
"Chunnie would have come anyways" Jaejoong said, rolling his eyes, "now come down here and tell these poor guys where you want your tree to be set up"
2 hours later, all the red shirted men had left and there was just Junsu and Jaejoong sitting under a massive Christmas tree, all lit up and shining in the early morning light.
"This...is surprisingly pretty" Junsu said after a few seconds.
"It's a Christmas tree, of course it's pretty" Jaejoong said. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small box. "And here is the second part of your present"
Junsu opened the box and saw a small tree ornament in the shape of what seemed to be a very weird looking patchwork coat.
"I had it custom made" Jaejoong said smugly.
Junsu looked up, eyebrows knitted together. "Why?"
"Oh, you'll see once you meet with Chunnie tomorrow"
Three days later, Junsu slipped on the gift that Yoochun had given him. A long, odd coat that perfectly matched the ornament. He sighed and turned off the lights on his tree as he went outside. He couldn't wait for those two to go to the army already.
~~~***~~~
The night before Jaejoong's enlistment was a sensory overload: there were too many noises and people and crying and enough alochol in such pretty colors that even Junsu was tempted to take some. Or to dye his hair in one of the bright shades.
He was staring deeply at a cup of dark blue vodka when Jaejoong slid next to him as easily as he always did.
"You should dye your hair that color"
"I was thinking about it"
Jaejoong sighed and ran a hand through his own messy brown locks. "I'm going to miss you"
"I'll miss you too, hyung"
"I was talking to my hair"
Junsu snorted. "Well I'm sure your hair is going to be happy to take a vacation from your dumb head"
"Such harsh words" Jaejoong said in mock hurt. "And on my last night too!"
"Don't be so dramatic. You're acting like you're going to die"
Jaejoong grinned and reached over to the backpack he had brought along with him. He took out a box and gave it to Junsu. "Something for you, so that you'll remember me"
"You really sound like you're planning on dying or something" Junsu said with narrowed eyes.
"Hey, I'm Kim Jaejoong. They won't let me die. Not even the military would be able to handle the force of my fans if they did" Jaejoong boasted.
"I'll kill all of them myself if they let you die" Junsu said as he opened the box. Inside was another christmas ornament, this one made out of metal and in the shape of a military beret.
"I know you won't keep that tree up for three years, but at least you'll think of me every Christmas, right?"
Three years. Junsu's throat suddenly felt dry. He couldn't even clearly remember his life before Jaejoong had been in it. Ever since he was a teenager, there hadn't been a time where the older boy had been away with him for more than a couple of weeks, let alone three years. Of everything that had changed and twisted and became distorted, Jaejoong and Yoochun had been his only constants. Not even Junho had been through what the three of them had gone through together, and Junsu wondered what his life was going to be like without one of the most important parts there.
"I'm not going to take the tree down until you come back" Junsu said, tucking the box away in his pocket.
Jaejoong looked over with a grin. "Really?"
"When have I ever lied to you about anything?"
Jaejoong reached out and pulled Junsu into a tight hug, fingers digging into the younger's shoulders with bruising force. And Junsu wondered how Jaejoong ever even thought that he would need something to remember this.
That night, Junsu hung the little ornament on his tree next to the one of the ugly coat and smiled. Three years wouldn't be so bad.
~~~***~~~
Jaejoong being gone wasn't even a big deal at first.
Life often times had gotten in the way over the past 6 years, and there were times that Junsu didn't even see Yoochun and Jaejoong for weeks. So it wasn't a big deal.
Of course, Junsu missed the daily kakaotalk messages, the emoticon filled ~good lucks~ and ~thinking of you~ and ~LOL look at this cat video I found~ that he was used to filling his inbox.
Without his phone buzzing in his pocket steadily throughout the day, Junsu just felt a little...empty.
So he texted Yoochun and some of the musical staff and Junho and even his mom. He sent someone from B2ST a picture of a kitten in a sweater that he knew would have made Jaejoong laugh until he was rolling on the ground.
In return, he got some very formal messages from the musical people, all who seemed unsure of what to do with Xia Junsu texting them. There weren't any emoticons anywhere and it just felt wrong.
He got a “LOL” from Yoochun. Which was normal for Yoochun. But it wasn't a paragraph length comment about how much he missed Junsu and loved Junsu and...it just felt wrong.
He got a “What's going on with you? You never text. Call me” from Junho and a “Are you eating? Umma is going to bring you some dishes” from his mom and there wasn't any of the sunniness and rainbow colored texts and exploding hearts and...
It all just felt too wrong.
So instead, Junsu tossed his cellphone on his couch and decided to go on a walk. Which probably wasn't the smartest idea, seeing as how crazy fans were always close by. But it didn't stop him from putting a hat over his bright blue hair and putting on a pair of Junho's old basketball shorts and going outside.
He passed by a small shop that, for some reason, was having a sale on Christmas ornaments. In May. He stared at them for a moment before going inside.
Half an hour later, he was back home, hanging up a cat-shaped ornament on the giant Christmas tree that he still hadn't taken down. The crystal figure twinkled in the light, almost looking as though it was winking at him.
For the first time all day, Junsu smiled.
~~~***~~~
Him and Yoochun met for the opening of something. Some ambassadorship that Baek had casually emailed to let them know about. It usually went like that for them. They'd wake up in the morning with an email saying 'Oh, by the way, you're now the official Korean nuclear waste spokesmen!' and then they'd be shuttled to places where they were stuffed into bright clothes and told to put on bright smiles and look as though they cared about nuclear waste, or computer security, or whatever else Baek felt they needed to care about.
“Are we cherry blossom ambassadors?” Junsu asked, looking down at the overly pink sweater that they had put him in.
“Roses, maybe?” Yoochun answered-a crown made out of leaves resting on his messy hair.
They both lapsed into silence, staring at their reflections in the mirror. Junsu wondered why they hadn't given him the crown. Yoochun fidgeted in his seat, a ball of nervous energy that really really wasn't characteristic of him. His phone lay, unused, on the makeup counter in front of them.
“Your manager told me that you started composing again” Junsu said after a few awkward seconds. “When you have breaks from filming”
Yoochun's fingers twitched at this side. “They're nothing”
“Do you want me to look at them?”
“Not yet....they don't have any lyrics” Yoochun said, eyes dashing to his phone every few seconds before looking away, dissapointed.
Junsu felt a burning feeling in his stomach as he thought back to all those times he had walked through their dorm at midnight to get a glass of water only to find Jaejoong and Yoochun sitting, drunk and giggling, surrounded by sheets of music that they would take turns writing lyrics on.
“How...”
“Three minutes” Yoochun interrupted, looking at his hands. “Hyung called me yesterday and he could only stay on the phone for three minutes. I haven't talked to him in a month and all I got was three minutes”
And Junsu wanted to say that Jaejoong's next vacation was coming up soon, or that they could both go and visit him together before that, or that there was always letters....
But he couldn't. Because there was an empty chair between him and Yoochun, and an empty silence that would usually be filled with airy chuckles. And Yoochun was looking exhausted, shaky and nervous and just not right and Junsu didn't know how to fix it. Because he couldn't even fix the shaky feeling inside of himself.
But Yoochun needed to be calmed right now, and the person who always calmed him was 45 minutes away in Yongin, what felt like forever away in reality.
“Let's go visit him next week” Junsu said with an overly bright smile.
They knew they couldn't, neither of their schedules had any space, but Yoochun smiled back at him and cracked a weak joke about the people at the base would take one look at Junsu's hair and think he was in some gang.
And Junsu felt okay.
That night, he put on some old records Yoochun had loaned him and hung a Micky Mouse ornament on the tree.
~~~***~~~
Musical practice was crazy. It was the first musical that CjeS was putting on, and they expected nothing but perfection from all of the cast, Junsu in particular.
So Junsu sang. He let them dye his hair black and he let them put him in costumes and he let them shove cameras in his face as he sang and sang until he felt like his throat was going to bleed. He loved being on stage, but it always got to the point in every musical where it felt as though all the sets blended into one and spun around him, so fast that he couldn't keep up with anything.
“You want me to come over tonight?” Junho asked over the phone. “We can play video games and eat pizza and you can watch me get shitfaced”
Junsu wanted to cry because that was really the last thing he needed right now. What he needed was a good 20 hours of sleep and gallons of samgyetang and for the ground to open up and swallow him whole and...
His phone beeped, informing him that he had another call.
“Someone else is trying to call me, hyung. I'll get back to you later” Junsu coughed out before switching over to the other caller.
“Yes?”
“Junsu-yah-someone on base found a cat and I convinced him to name it Xiah! I'll send you a picture with my next letter!”
And just like that, Junsu felt a strange calmness sweep over his body.
“Hyung”
“How are you, Su-yah?”
Junsu clutched onto his phone and he felt like he wanted to cry, which was embarrassing. Because he was a grown man just talking to another man and that definitely should not be enough to make him tear up like this.
“My noona told me that you're practicing for your musical right now. You're overworking yourself again, aren't you?”
“Shouldn't I be the one worrying about you overworking, hyung?”
Jaejoong laughed from the other side. He sounded just the same as always, bright and happy. “When have you ever had to worry about me before?”
Junsu scoffed. “When have I not?”
“I asked my noona to come over and bring you a couple of things. Don't let yourself work too hard, okay, Junsu-yah? Hyung isn't there to tell you to give yourself a break”
However when Suyoung showed up an hour later with a container full of samgyetang and a little box that had an apple shaped ornament with the words 'Junsu Fighting!' engraved on it, Junsu thought that maybe Jaejoong was still there.
~~~***~~~
“You don't look any different at all with a shaved head”
Junsu stared at Yoochun with a frown on his face. “Really, you don't look different at all. How are you and hyung able to look the exact same with a military cut?”
Yoochun shrugged, running a hand over his newly bald head. “You'll probably look the same too”
“I definitely won't”
“Keep dying your hair a different color every week and you'll find out soon enough”
“Hey now, save all this aggression for the army”
Yoochun sniggered and leaned back on his sofa. Unlike Jaejoong, who had thrown 3 parties of various degrees of of intimacy, Yoochun had decided to spend his last night as a free man just chilling at home with his family and Junsu. And unlike Jaejoong, who had been a nervous and teary ball of energy, Yoochun looked almost relaxed. As though he had been looking forward to going into the army for months.
“Sorry that I'm going to miss your musical” Yoochun said after a few seconds.
Junsu snorted. “Like you would have gone to see it anyways”
“I'm sure I would have.....at least made an effort...”
Junsu laughed shakily. What was he going to do without this for another three years?
“Hey, I almost forgot! Jae's noona gave me something that hyung wanted me to give you” Yoochun said, reaching behind him and taking out a small box. “Why is hyung buying you gifts now?”
“Because he loves me more” Junsu said, taking the box from Yoochun. He opened it and felt his eyes get teary at what was inside.
That night, he hung the second metal army beret on the tree and sat in front of it, knees pulled up to his chest, chin resting on them. It was June but 'All I want for Christmas' was playing in the background and for the first time in his life, Junsu felt all alone.
~~~***~~~
Soldiers in the ROK army technically weren't allowed to decorate anything, but all the commanding officers turned a blind eye when the privates put up pictures in their lockers. So on the first day in their permanent unit, the boys of the 5th Infantry division spent the first few hour decorating their lockers like middle school girls.
Most of the soldiers had pictures of family and girl group idols they had cut out from magazines that they hung up with tape or cute magnets their parents or girlfriends had sent them.
Junsu looked at the rest of the kids in his unit and shook his head. He was only 29, but being surrounded by a bunch of kids in their early twenties made him feel like some sort of old grandpa. He overheard two soldiers arguing if Hani or Suzy was prettier, and which one they should hang up in their lockers.
"Hyung, who's picture did you put up?" one of the soldiers asked Junsu, looking over at his locker. "Wait...why did you hang up a picture of that?"
Junsu looked at the only picture that he had taped in his locker. A single shot of his Christmas tree, all lit up, with every ornament clearly displayed.
"I made a promise to someone special to me that I'd keep the tree up" Junsu said easily. He didn't really need, or want, to explain anything further. He smiled at the picture and then closed the locker door.
Only two more years, hyung