[D53] SUMMER SNAPDRAGONS (3/3)
Prompt Code: D53
Title: Summer Snapdragons
Silence inundates the apartment. Jongin strains his ears to detect some sound - running water, shuffling feet, Kyungsoo’s murmuring, anything - but he comes up empty. He can’t even hear his own breathing, or the pounding of his heart against his chest, and he knows that the feeling thrumming in his veins is nervousness. It’s a sensation he has felt every year of his life, one he has become so closely acquainted with but had never experienced quite so intensely until the beginning of the summer.
He remembers wide eyes and flushed cheeks, ivory skin shining in the afternoon sun and ebony hair tousled from the breeze. Kyungsoo had been late to his interview, apologising profusely even though there was nothing he could have done about the late bus, and one strap of his backpack was askew on his shoulder, inches away from slipping off. Jongin remembers waving a hand and telling Kyungsoo not to worry, and he remembers the smile that had soon after taken over the younger male’s face. Lips pink as azaleas had stretched wide, forming the peculiar shape of a heart and revealing just a glimpse of gums. He remembers how the corners of Kyungsoo’s eyes had pushed up and up, how one eye closed just a little more than the other, and he recalls the subtle dip of full brows, how it only made Kyungsoo look years younger.
And Jongin had decided that he would always want to see that smile.
When Kyungsoo officially started working at Hwayoil, Jongin tried plenty of things to bring back that smile. Occasionally, he would step in for Baekhyun during one of their ongoing lessons about coffee brewing, giving him tips on how to multitask behind the counter while still ensuring a properly prepared drink. He would also ask Kyungsoo to help him bring in new furniture and decorations for the café, but the younger male had always been so quiet. In addition, he didn’t seem to share in Jongin’s joy for each new addition to the coffee shop’s décor, no matter how fantastic many of the items had been.
It had gotten to the point where Jongin would resort to tactics he’d seen on television re-runs, such as straightening Kyungsoo’s name tag and reaching for a mug on the top shelf from behind when Kyungsoo had trouble reaching it, but these gestures only seemed to make the new barista skittish. Even after Jongin had read through plenty of books on how to appear more friendly, over and over and over again, Kyungsoo would barely look him in the eye, let alone send him a smile.
None of it seemed to work.
Ironically enough, Jongin hadn’t actually planned to offer Kyungsoo a ride home tonight. Worried that the younger man would rather dig a hole to escape the café than sit in a car with Jongin, he reminded himself to wake Kyungsoo before completely locking up but had stupidly forgotten to do so between wiping down the kitchen counters and conducting inventory on the coffee beans. But despite whether or not the opportunity to hold some meaningful conversation with Kyungsoo was coincidence, Jongin wasn’t about to let it slip between his fingers.
So here he is now, carefully flipping through a sketchbook chock full with images of himself and doing his best not to ruin any of Kyungsoo’s hard work in the process. Occasionally, between sections of pencil and charcoal, he happens upon a handful of paintings done in what appears to be water colour. However, upon closer inspection, Jongin is surprised to discover that it’s actually coffee. Several pages later, he finds a portrait of himself from the shoulders up completed with, after moving closer to catch a whiff of the imprinted scent, what must have been raspberry sauce from one of the cheesecakes served at Hwayoil.
By the time Jongin finishes browsing through every page of the sketchbook, Kyungsoo still hasn’t come out of the bathroom.
With a glance to the watch on his wrist, Jongin finds the hour hand crawling closer and closer to one. Considering Kyungsoo has class in the morning, he should probably be sleeping by now. But instead he’s holed himself up in the bathroom, probably beating himself up for this whole situation.
And it worries Jongin.
- ☕ -
Kyungsoo should have been happy.
Ankle-deep in the lake, he should have been more than grateful to be allowed this close to Jongin, to see this side of the man whom he had admired upon first walking into the coffee shop. But curiosity reeled him in, persuaded his feet to continue forward with inviting arms and saccharine smiles until he found himself wading in the water, violet reaching all the way to raised elbows. Entranced by the whispers laced in the travelling breeze, Kyungsoo fell victim to their spells and wandered one step too far into the water.
The floor of the lake abruptly cut off, swallowing him whole and dragging his body down into a seemingly endless trench, down where the sunlight could no longer find him, down, down, down. His sight was the first to go, blinded by a darkness so profound that he could no longer tell whether his eyes were open or shut. Then went his hearing, obscured by the panicked flailing of his limbs beneath insurmountable pressure, until finally the sound of his own voice crying out for help had faded into silence. By the time he’d run out of oxygen, Kyungsoo knew he was done for. As his lungs began to swell with water, drowning in the very colour he had adored and longed to hold, his body grew still, yielding every fibre of muscle and strand of tissue to the numbness stinging his nerves.
It feels like years before he finally gathers the courage to open the bathroom door, after he’s scrubbed his face at least three times to remove the stubborn charcoal. But no matter how firmly he believed in himself, it would never have been enough to prepare him for the next handful of seconds.
Immediately after swinging the door open, with perhaps a bit too much force in his efforts to appear slightly less shaken, Kyungsoo hears the concerning whack of a collision, followed closely by a clear yelp of pain. When he rushes out of the bathroom, nearly slipping on the wooden floor, he finds Jongin crouching down with his hands on his face, cradling his nose.
If Kyungsoo had felt like dying before, then now he’s just been sent to the void of the afterlife.
With cautious hands, he guides Jongin into the bathroom while shooting out a million apologies a second and running a wash cloth under cool water. Even as he rummages through the medicine cabinet for a first aid kit, Kyungsoo never stops spouting a string of sorry, sorry, sorry, his panic far too loud for him to hear when Jongin speaks up.
“Kyungsoo, I’m fine, I swear!” Jongin exclaims, keeping the makeshift cold press over his nose, and he repeats this just short of a hundred times before realising that Kyungsoo won’t hear him like this. With a sharp exhale, he drops the wash cloth into the sink and takes hold of the younger male’s wrists, carefully but firmly turning him around until they face each other properly. “Kyungsoo, look at me.”
In the brief second that they make eye contact, Jongin notices the faint glistening in the other man’s eyes, the rising of colour in his cheeks, and the slight wrinkle between his brows as Kyungsoo looks away. He’s never seen Kyungsoo like this, looking three times as small in the cramped space of a bathroom and almost trembling with every breath. Despite the gentle grip he has on Kyungsoo’s wrists, Jongin can feel the pulsing of his heart, how it beats in sync with his quick, shallow breathing, and after several seconds of silence, Jongin loosens his hold until their skin just barely touches, hardly more than mere contact. Then slowly, so as not to startle Kyungsoo, he lifts a hand to brush the pad of his thumb across the highest point of the younger man’s cheek, clearing away the last bit of charcoal from otherwise flawless skin.
“I’m all right, Kyungsoo,” Jongin begins quietly, keeping his voice steady. “It doesn’t even hurt anymore, I promise.”
Kyungsoo still can’t look up at the other man. His heart is beating a storm within his ribs, stirring up electricity in his nerves and thunder in his joints, and he’s beginning to worry that Jongin will be able to hear it as well. With his face turned down, Kyungsoo’s gaze fails to focus on any single object for more than a second, jumping from where their hands still touch to the stitching at the hem of Jongin’s cardigan, from the off-white bathroom tiles to the half-empty bottle of shampoo on the shelf above the toilet. Powerless to ease his own anxiety, he begins to feel light-headed from the constant movement and the booming silence, noting with some distress that if he were to lean forward just a handful of inches, he could rest his head on Jongin’s chest. If Kyungsoo wanted, he could wind his arms around Jongin’s waist and prop his temple against his shoulder, but he can’t find the strength to lift even a finger.
“About the pictures,” Jongin starts, and Kyungsoo braces himself for the worst. “I don’t mind them. They’re great. Awesome, actually. That doesn’t really begin to describe what I think, and I’m having trouble finding the right words to explain it, but I don’t think it’s something you should be worried about, because I’d really, really like to see more, if you’d be okay with that.”
Silence creeps in through the cracks, but Jongin is determined to keep it from taking over again. With his head angled slightly downward, he tries his best to look into Kyungsoo’s eyes, choosing his words with care and always speaking softly.
“Kyungsoo - “ A brief pause to steady his own breathing. “ - I like you.”
Silence again. Roaring, piercing silence, and Jongin wants so desperately to defeat it.
“I don’t mean it as in just a friendly way. I really like you, Kyungsoo. And I’m not saying this to make you feel better - or, well, I do want to make you feel better, but not just because of what happened earlier. Whether or not I’d seen the sketchbook, I still like you now, Kyungsoo. I have for a while, but I was never sure if you even thought of me as a friend.”
Jongin pauses to catch his breath, confidence wavering ever so slightly when he finds that Kyungsoo still hasn’t looked up at him. But he continues to try.
“I’m not an artist like you, Kyungsoo. I don’t know much about things like chiaroscuro or the difference between acrylics and tempera, but I know that I like listening to you talk about it. I like hearing about your projects and the papers you’re working on, the weird professors and the things you see on the bus ride to the university. I know you don’t speak much, but when you talk about the things you like, your face lights up. You know how to put words together, Kyungsoo, and you know how to describe things in ways I’d never have even thought of. So I may not sound the most eloquent, or the most imaginative, but what I feel when I’m with you can’t really be explained in words. I’m just certain that it’s one of the best feelings I’ve known.”
It could be the exhaustion buried deep in his bones. Or perhaps it’s the fact that Jongin does know all the right words to say, how to arrange them, how to voice them. Even when Kyungsoo can now feel the older man’s rapid pulse from where their fingers touch, he can’t help but find it just a little unfair that Jongin can speak so well - especially when Kyungsoo is still struggling to lift his gaze.
Whatever the reason may be, when silence starts to peer over their shoulders with a brazen grin, Kyungsoo fights it off by pouring as much strength as he can into his muscles. He seizes back the faith that had been stolen from him and wills his body to move, taking the pressure head on. Striving up and up and up, he seeks out the sound of Jongin’s voice and the light that had kissed his cheeks above the clouds. His lungs are heavy with water and they burn from exertion, but Kyungsoo battles upward. He swims past the shadows, then higher still, never stopping until he finally breaks through the surface of the water, gasping for breath and soaking in the golden light above.
When Kyungsoo opens his eyes, he finds himself surrounded in a warm embrace, with his head tucked beneath Jongin’s chin and body almost weightless with relief. Deep in his chest beats his steady heart, stained a vibrant shade violet and warped into the shape of serenity. And finally, Kyungsoo has the strength to speak up.
“I like you, too.”
He isn’t entirely sure how long they stay like this, reveling in the feeling of simply holding one another and the spark of electricity in their veins. They could stand in this bathroom barely capable of fitting the two of them for hours, but neither of them would complain. Where silence has left them for good, the rhythmic beating of their hearts takes over in a melody of comfort.
For however long they had remained in each other’s arms, it feels infinitely too short by the time good night comes around. Far sooner than either of them would like, they find themselves standing in the doorway, fingers idly lacing together in the space between them. Jongin is clumsy when he asks Kyungsoo for an official date to a local gallery on the weekend, stumbling over the simplest of words, but the younger of the two is no less unrefined when he accepts. Their cheeks are dusted with pink, all too apparent under the fluorescent lights, but neither of them makes an effort to hide it.
Jongin wishes a good night.
Kyungsoo tells him to drive safely.
But neither of them is sure who leans forward first, who closes the distance between their lips and pulls their bodies close.
By the time the door swings shut and the lights flip off, it doesn’t matter which one of them moved first.
Shoes are kicked off, landing on the ground with a clatter. Hands begin to roam about with barely restrained curiosity, gliding over the breadth of shoulders and the subtle curve of a waist. It isn’t long before fingers dip beneath shirt hems and card through thick locks of hair, and their feet are just as restless to move, tripping over one another in the short distance across the flat. Far too eager to take in their surroundings, Jongin leads them through the dark and right into the knee-high table, sending a few pens cascading to the floor, but Kyungsoo only laughs against his lips and takes hold of Jongin’s cardigan to guide him around the mess.
They land on the bed in a tangle of limbs and mingling exhales, teeth accidentally clicking in their refusal to be even an inch away from one another. It only earns another brief bout of laughter from the two before the sound of rustling fabric and airy sighs takes over again. Like clockwork, Kyungsoo hikes a leg over Jongin’s hip just as the older of the two slips an arm around Kyungsoo’s waist and carries their bodies further up the bed. Their lips never part, not even for oxygen, as Jongin shrugs off his cardigan and tosses it to the ground, settling comfortably in between Kyungsoo’s legs and helping him with the buttons of his shirt.
When Kyungsoo tugs Jongin’s shirt from where it’s tucked into his trousers, he instantly forgets to unfasten the last few buttons and diverts all attention to running splayed hands over the expanse of Jongin’s back, fingertips tracing the curves of tensed muscles and the jut of a shoulder blade. Jongin just barely manages to undo the rest of his shirt buttons in his own impatience, and he discards of it in the same fashion as with the cardigan. He’s more than relieved to have his hands free again, to slip them under Kyungsoo’s shirt and run them along his sides, following the sinuous curve of his ribcage and experimentally sweeping a thumb over a nipple. It pulls out a soft noise from Kyungsoo, and Jongin repeats the gesture to hear that sound again, smiling into the kiss and parting his lips to invite a shy tongue.
Kyungsoo has had a handful of kisses before, some better than others, but this moment surpasses all the rest. When Jongin whispers his name, Kyungsoo finds himself surrounded in the pool of violet again, struggling to stay afloat, but then Jongin is there with him, to hold his hand and reassure him that everything will be fine. And Kyungsoo trusts him.
When Jongin begins to trail open-mouthed kisses along the younger male’s jaw, Kyungsoo takes the opportunity to catch his breath but never stops his hands from travelling. With one hand at the back of Jongin’s neck, Kyungsoo runs his fingers along the curve of a collarbone, all the way to the point of the older man’s shoulder and down the length of his arm, outlining where his muscles tense and committing every contour to memory.
There is a split second when distance comes between them, when Jongin helps Kyungsoo out of his tee and flings it off to the side, but the two close the gap as quickly as it had formed. They sigh heavily in unison as Jongin settles his weight against Kyungsoo and presses their bare chests together, pausing briefly to catch their breath before the heady feeling of having such contact knocks them out. With his own chest rising and falling noticeably, Kyungsoo takes to kissing down the column of Jongin’s neck and pays particular attention to the quickening pulse he can feel against his lips. Feeling just how fast Jongin’s heart beats, as frantically as his own, has him smiling against bronze skin and gently squeezing the other male’s bicep.
Not a moment later, he feels the light pressure of teeth tugging at the spot just below his ear, where his jaw meets his neck, and when Jongin begins to lightly suck on the skin there, Kyungsoo slaps a hand over his mouth to stifle the moan that escapes him. Immediately, the flush staining his cheeks spreads to his neck and the tips of his ears, and as Jongin bites down harder, apparently intent on leaving a mark, Kyungsoo can’t help but squirm beneath him, pushing up off the mattress and all but slamming their hips together.
He can’t even begin to describe the jolt of heat that shoots up his spine when their lower halves meet, how the arousal confined in his jeans twitches hard. With a fleeting squeeze to Jongin’s arm, Kyungsoo gives in to the adrenaline thrumming in his veins and undoes the fastenings of the older man’s trousers with miraculous preciseness, wasting no time whatsoever in shoving his hand down Jongin’s boxers. Wrapping his fingers around the base of the other male’s cock, Kyungsoo gives an experimental tug, just enough to fully expose the length through the fly of Jongin’s trousers. Much to the younger man’s excitement, Jongin drops his head to Kyungsoo’s shoulder and groans loudly enough for the noise to escape the still-open window and surely beyond the thin walls of the flat.
Before Kyungsoo can comment on how sensitive the other man is, Jongin bucks up into his curled fist and bites down his shoulder. He’s rewarded quickly with yet another noise of surprise from the man beneath him, and after laving his tongue crudely over the mark blossoming on pale skin, Jongin trails a line of almost inappropriately affectionate kisses down the center of Kyungsoo’s torso, his hands bracketing the younger male’s waist all the way down.
Upset with the space developing between their bodies and the consequent loss of warmth, Kyungsoo busies himself with tangling his fingers in the auburn locks of Jongin’s hair and watches with ragged breaths as the older of the two moves to unfasten Kyungsoo’s jeans. He works excruciatingly slow, pecking feather-light kisses to the space below Kyungsoo’s navel and occasionally squeezing his hip. The short, restless tugs to his hair fail to convince Jongin to move any faster, and he finds a selfish sort of delight in the way Kyungsoo begins to whine and squirm, his heels digging into the mattress before he rocks his hips in small, upward circles out of nothing but the need to be touched.
“Jongin,” breathes the younger male, almost exasperated and flushed all the way to his chest. “Please.”
And Jongin, unable to refuse parted lips swollen from kisses and the imploring of half-lidded eyes, doesn’t dare waste another second teasing. Pressing a last, lingering kiss to Kyungsoo’s abdomen, Jongin helps the other man out of his jeans and shucks off his own trousers, along with any clothing left still on either of their bodies, all of which he shoves to the floor. As soon as every piece of fabric separating their bodies is done away with, Kyungsoo pushes himself to sit up and crashes his lips into those of the older male, their mouths working and fitting together at every angle as he climbs into Jongin’s lap. The moment their fully hard cocks brush against one another, a low noise escapes them both, followed soon by heavy exhales and the subtle creaking of the bed frame when Kyungsoo ruts his hips back and forth.
Before they can fall apart in the next instant, Jongin guides the younger man’s arms to wrap around his shoulders before he snakes one of his own arms around Kyungsoo’s waist, delicately lowering their bodies back onto the mattress. Their lips never part for the entire manouevre, nor when Jongin hitches one of Kyungsoo’s legs around his waist and fondly squeezes his thigh before giving a testing roll of his hips, only to pick up a slow, deliberate rhythm when Kyungsoo practically mewls his name aloud.
Soon after, Jongin slips a hand between their bodies, catching both of their cocks in a firm grip, and it’s just as he sweeps his thumb over Kyungsoo’s slightly leaking tip that he breaks the liplock to meet the other male’s gaze, eyes dark with the arousal flooding his body. He has to clear his throat to speak, voice coming out lower than usual when he’s pressed for breath, and his stare remains intense as he asks,
“Do you have class in the morning?”
Kyungsoo very nearly bursts into laughter.
“Are you really asking if I have class, when we’re right about to fuck?”
Jongin’s cheeks flush another shade deeper when the last word leaves Kyungsoo’s mouth, and that uncharacteristically sheepish expression appears on his face again as he holds the younger man’s gaze and defends, “Well, yeah - I mean, I really want to. Like, really want to, but if you have to be up early…”
“My first lecture isn’t until noon,” Kyungsoo assures, a soft smile playing at his lips.
“Oh.”
“Yeah, so…”
“So it’s all right if we..?”
“Jongin.” Lifting both hands to cup either side of the older male’s jaw, Kyungsoo leans forward ever so slightly, just enough so that their lips barely make contact, and stares into Jongin’s eyes when he whispers, “I want you inside me, now.”
And Jongin nearly comes right then and there.
The next handful of moments are just as clumsy as their first kiss had been, with Kyungsoo fumbling about to find the lube hidden under his mattress and Jongin marveling - out loud - over the fact that the younger man even has something like this in his possession. Kyungsoo shuts him up by vaguely mentioning a handful of “other things” hidden around the flat. With an affectionate smile taking over his expression, one that has Jongin’s chest swelling with warmth, Kyungsoo presses a kiss to the older male’s cheek and pushes the little bottle into Jongin’s hand.
As it turns out, Jongin is far better at this than he has any right to be. He slips the first finger, slick with lube, into Kyungsoo with all the ease in the world, planting kisses across the expanse of ivory skin before him and paying special care to the tiny freckles scattered about. It isn’t even until Jongin begins applying pressure against Kyungsoo’s upper wall does the younger of the two realise a second finger has slipped past his rim as well, curling upward and pressing almost rhythmically. With how well Jongin works with his fingers, it hardly takes any time for him to find the firm patch against Kyungsoo’s walls that makes him yelp in surprise. Easing in a third finger is just as effortless, a measure that Kyungsoo doesn’t quite need but one Jongin takes for his own enjoyment. He smiles into the kisses he leaves along a neck blooming with pretty marks when the younger man begins to whine and plead, tugging at Jongin’s hair in between murmurs to hurry up already.
After one more kiss to the dip of Kyungsoo’s collarbone (and a cheeky crook of his fingers that has the man beneath him squirming again), Jongin gently removes his fingers and fusses with the condom Kyungsoo had procured from under his bed as well. Even while struggling to breathe, Kyungsoo is kind enough to help roll the thing over Jongin’s cock, all while nipping lightly at the older male’s jaw for having taken so long.
Using the remaining lube on his fingers, Jongin slicks himself up with a few self-serving pumps, then steadies his weight with one hand by Kyungsoo’s head as the other grips the base of his cock, leading the tip past the pinkened entrance. Even after plenty of nights alone, hiding his face against a pillow to muffle his whimpers, Kyungsoo is still taken by surprise as Jongin eases into him, moving slowly and letting him feel every last inch that he has to offer.
They both freeze when Jongin is fully sheathed, chests rising and falling in tandem as they both work to relax. At some point, one of Kyungsoo’s hands abandons the soft strands of Jongin’s hair to fall on his shoulder instead, where blunt fingernails press into skin, and he almost feels like he’s sinking back down into that endless abyss, where nothing but silence and numbing cold awaits him - but he hasn’t drowned just yet. Grasping his hand, leading him back to the surface, is Jongin. Kyungsoo clings to his shoulders and presses their chests together, and Jongin smiles fondly as he supports their weight, keeping them afloat.
Jongin feels more than hears when Kyungsoo assures him that he can move, but simply rolling his hips back even an inch has his body running cold for but a moment before a fire sparks in every nerve, ten times hotter than the second before. With Kyungsoo’s walls so tight around his cock, their bodies finally locked together in only the most intimate of ways, breathing becomes near impossible when Jongin attempts to move again. But Kyungsoo is here, eyes still open and trained on Jongin’s, with one hand now tangled in the older man’s hair and the other at the nape of his neck, whispering his name over and over and over again until Jongin’s thoughts consist of nothing more than making sure Kyungsoo feel so good that words lose all purpose.
He starts slow, always attentive for any sign of discomfort in Kyungsoo, and as they both grow accustomed to the novel sensation of being so close to one another, Jongin gradually picks up speed. When the bed beneath their bodies begins to creak and groan again, shifting with the rocking of their weight and occasionally knocking into the shared wall between flats, there’s enough noise already filling the room for them to just say fuck it and abandon any semblance of restraint they may still have.
In seemingly no time at all, the quiet whimpers and murmurs escalate into shameless moans and cries for each other, rhythmically punctuated by the none too subtle slap of skin whenever Jongin’s hips meet the back of Kyungsoo’s thighs and the plush of his ass. Even as the obscene, wet noises of Jongin’s cock sliding in and out of Kyungsoo joins the mess of overflowing emotions and ragged breaths, they never pause to keep their voices in check, entirely lost to the feeling of drowning in one another and inhaling each other’s exhales.
With far too much finesse than he should honestly be able to work with, Jongin pries one of Kyungsoo’s thighs from around his waist and hikes it up over his shoulder. It keeps his body open as Jongin begins to move faster still, one hand planted on the mattress to support his weight. The other takes to following the subtle curve of Kyungsoo’s waist one more time before gripping it so tightly that Jongin’s knuckles whiten, and it only takes a handful of moments of their bodies moving with fiery friction for Kyungsoo to cry out Jongin’s name, his voice louder than the older of the two has ever heard it before. And Jongin loves how the syllables ring in his ears, muting every other sound that isn’t Kyungsoo’s voice.
The muscles in Kyungsoo’s abdomen tense just as the heat that had been coiling low in his gut finally snaps, leaving his body numb for but a half-second before all feeling returns tenfold and overwhelms every last nerve in his body. Caught between their bodies, his cock gives a particularly hard twitch before Kyungsoo comes untouched and makes a mess of both himself and Jongin, who leans in for a slow, almost methodical kiss. Oxygen is hard to come by, especially when the older of the two refuses to pull away for even a hiccup of a gasp, but he would rather suffer hours of vertigo than halt his appreciation for the person beneath him. His lips are fickle in their travels, jumping from the tip of Kyungsoo’s nose to the space between his knitted brows, then from the apple of a flushed cheek to the dip of his Cupid’s bow. There isn’t a part of Kyungsoo’s body that Jongin wouldn’t love to spend hours showering in kisses and murmurs of admiration, now bare before him and his to explore.
When the younger male begins to whimper, his smaller hands grasping at strong shoulders, Jongin cards his fingers through Kyungsoo’s hair to push back his fringe. He presses one last kiss to the center of his forehead and finally pieces their lips together again, breathing in and swallowing every last incoherent whisper Kyungsoo has to offer. He accepts it all like overdue rain in the apex of summer, frantic to collect every last drop but resolute in fully appreciating each one. Growing tired of Kyungsoo could never be possible.
In the next moment, Jongin’s own body tightens up, freezing completely after he slams back into Kyungsoo one last time. Buried deep inside the younger of the two, where Kyungsoo’s walls cling so closely to his cock that it’s almost painful, Jongin feels that very same heat seizing his every muscle. It almost feels as if his lungs are about to explode from just how hard he’s breathing, fringe sticking to his forehead from the sweat gathered there, but nothing feels more comforting than the release of tension when his arms finally give out beneath him, leaving him to practically collapse onto Kyungsoo. A soft murmur of an apology escapes his lips, but it’s the last sound he makes before resting his head on Kyungsoo’s shoulder.
Thankfully, the younger male doesn’t seem to mind it in the least, breathing out a soft noise only when Jongin guides his leg down from his shoulder and back around his waist, where Kyungsoo’s ankles lock together almost instinctively. As their bodies recover from their respective highs, the two remain still for a generous length of time, catching their breath and allowing fingertips to wander absentmindedly, purely out of the persistent desire to memorise the curves of each other’s forms.
Kyungsoo’s fingers once again find Jongin’s hair, pushing back his fringe and watching as it falls back into place seconds later, a process which he repeats several times. With only the light from the moon and a lone streetlamp streaming in through the open window, Kyungsoo scans his gaze over the older male’s face and uses his free hand to trace every feature, astonished that he can finally, truly experience this reality. He outlines the faint wrinkles at the corners of Jongin’s eyes and the thin scar on his chin, hoping with every fibre of his being that Jongin will still be here after each blink he has to take.
(Jongin never leaves.)
Eventually, Jongin has to move. He tries to make it short, easing his hips backwards with only some difficulty. After securing the end of the condom after removing it, he tosses the thing into a mercifully nearby rubbish bin by Kyungsoo’s desk. In an open closet just inches away from the foot of the bed, Jongin finds a towel and uses it to clean Kyungsoo and himself, but he misses when he tries to toss it into the laundry basket across the room. Despite how quickly he had worked, though, the moments in between had still been far too long for either of them to take, legs instantly tangling together and arms wrapping around one another at the first opportunity to do so.
“I’ll pick it up in the morning, I promise.” Jongin’s voice is rough when he speaks, but his hands are gentle as he turns their bodies onto their sides and holds Kyungsoo close, gently massaging the lingering tension in his back.
“All right,” whispers the younger of the two, his own voice in similar condition. He shifts around slightly to pull the blanket over themselves, then smiles contentedly after tucking his head beneath Jongin’s chin, taking immense joy in the way their bodies fit together like a two-piece puzzle. “As long as you stay for breakfast.”
“I will,” Jongin promises with a tender kiss to the crown of Kyungsoo’s head. The smile that curves across his lips matches the one on the other man’s face, and it remains there as he adds, “I’ll even give you a ride to class.”
Kyungsoo laughs quietly and mumbles an “I’d like that very much” before allowing his eyes to fall shut. Exhaustion digs deep into his bones and refuses to leave after such a busy day, stubborn in its quest to finally drag Kyungsoo into deep, deep sleep.
“Hey, Kyungsoo?”
But exhaustion can wait a few seconds longer.
“Yes?” he whispers in return, fingertips idly circling the faint jut of a vertebra.
“We’re still going on that date Saturday, right?”
Another spell of laughter hits Kyungsoo, causing his shoulders to tremble slightly, and when he gathers his senses once more, he leans forward to land a kiss on Jongin’s chest, just above his steadily beating heart. “Yes,” he answers. “We’re still going on that date.”
“Oh, good,” Jongin sighs out, smile clear in his voice and even more so in the way his arms tighten around the younger man. “Because I still really like you, Kyungsoo.”
His ears still ring faintly with the howling of the storm, and his cheeks remember the chill of icy rain as it descended upon his fallen figure. For a brief moment, Kyungsoo feels his chest tightening, and he begins to panic. He stumbles in the water, and the lake swallows him whole, reaching for his body with outstretched fingers. But a hand grasps his own and hauls his body back to shore, where marigold kisses his skin and violet embraces his heart. Fields of cobalt blue and magenta continue to swirl and meld, and the shimmering lake continues to grow at the banks, water still once more as Kyungsoo looks up to find the man who simultaneously steals and grants his breath.
“I really like you, too, Jongin.”