stratospheric
jongyu, g, 4296 w
unbeta'd
Jonghyun propped himself up on his elbows, facing the window. The sky was a bleary gray.
“Wake me up if you're awake at four,” Jonghyun had whispered to Taemin.
“Okay.”
Taemin wasn't awake at four, but Jonghyun had miraculously managed to wake himself up at half past three.
Clouds scudded across like soapy bubbles sliding over water, and the breeze that fluttered the white curtains was chilling. A cold, quiet calm whispered over the city in the leaves of the trees, set along in straight, organized lines along the boulevards. His skin felt damp and soft against the comforter, watching Taemin's shoulders rise and fall as he slept on his side.
It was comfortable and lazy, lying there, stretched out. A little nauseating, maybe, but he was always that way after he woke up. A snore fluttered through from the other side of the room, and Jonghyun lifted his lips in a sleepy smile at the familiar sound, as his eyelids dragged down. He leaned on his left hand, drowsing off for a couple of seconds before jerking awake again with a snort. Taemin shifted in his bed against the opposite wall, mumbling.
Jonghyun sighed, breathed in the air from the window, and it trickled down his nose to the back of his throat, stinging it slightly, like the aftertaste of cherry soda he drank because Kibum wanted them to drink it together in their midnight 'sleepover' sessions.
He heard a sound from the kitchen - some pots clanking as quietly as they could possible clank.
First he thought it was probably Minho, trying to make midnight ramen (as usual), before he smelt coffee. No, it was Jinki. Coffee meant either Kibum or Jinki, but past seven in the evening coffee could only be Jinki.
He patted his bed down for something, eyes shut, not bothering to sit up and actively search for it. He finally found a wrinkled ball and pulled the T-shirt over his head. It smelt two days old and had probably been lying around for some time now, but he didn't bother. Jinki wasn't one to care about that kind of stuff.
Quietly, he let himself off the bed, bent over slightly with the effort of tip-toeing so as not to wake Taemin up, and opened turned the handle. It gave a sigh as it gave, and he slipped out of the room, closing the door behind him.
The smell of coffee came stronger now, and he padded nonchalantly to the kitchen, hands shoved into his pockets. He blinked in surprise as he saw the drawing room - neat and tidy, everything swept away and the curtains pulled back. The windows were closed, and pink glowed in the room, color stealing up behind the stars.
“Jonghyun,” Jinki called softly from the kitchen, and Jonghyun turned around, waving his hand towards the tidied sofas. “Hey, wow, man! You do this?”
“Couldn't sleep,” Jinki shrugged, stirring the mixture in the pot, idly.
Jonghyun rose an eyebrow. “We have a coffeemaker.”
“Couldn't sleep,” Jinki repeated, as if that was a reason.
“So...?”
“It's late at night, I forgot if the coffeemaker would make noise or not. Plus it's fun, you know. Old fashioned.”
“Okay,” Jonghyun sat in a chair, elbows on the table, chin on laced fingers. “Is it... the problem, again?” he questioned, carefully, but Jinki smiled, shook his head.
“No, I've been sleeping properly for a couple of weeks, now. I just couldn't sleep tonight, I felt a little excited.” He took up a mitt and poured some into a cup.
“What about me? I want something to drink too!”
“Oh, I'm warming water for you.”
“Water,” Jonghyun both eyebrows, feeling acutely insulted.
“Ever heard of mint tea?” Jinki grinned, and turned to the fridge, taking out a packet of dry leaves.
“Yeah... I guess,” Jonghyun yawned and leaned back, stretching his arms as he kicked his legs against the floor. Then he pulled his knees up against the table and hugged them. “What're you excited for?”
Jinki looked over his shoulder at Jonghyun. He was pouring honey into Jonghyun's cup, and chewed his lower lip, thoughtfully. Then he lifted the honey bottle and closed the cap, stirred the stuff with a spoon, and handed it over on the table.
“I just,” the elder stared into his mug, steam rising and warming his nose to a flushed pink. “I just want... adventure, I guess.” He took a sip, closed his eyes, and Jonghyun followed suit. The tea burned his throat slightly, refreshed him as the icy mint mixed with the warmly sweet, reassuring base of honey. “Ahan? Good tea,” Jonghyun commented.
“Mmm, thanks,” Jinki looked up and stared over his head. “A backpack, and stuff, you know? Fresh grass and dewy flowers, morning mist and purple clouds. Like in the books - you just run away. And you can come back, and you will come back, but you need space for a while, a little thinking cave in the mountains or something - you think Daejon would be a good place? Caves, I mean - and then you can just look at things passing by. Little things, like ants and birds and cats, I suppose. And then big things, like aeroplanes and maybe cars somewhere, and they're all alive, or full of people that are breathing and...” Jinki took a sip, and sat on the counter, swinging orange-socked feet.
“And that kind of makes you realize you're alive. Fully alive, a full realization - like when you're lying in bed and you think absolutely nothing for a whole hour but you keep shaking your leg and then you think, 'Wow, I'm breathing'. But that kind of alive makes you want to go out and do something. I just had that right now, and now I need to go somewhere so I can get back. It's kind of like a... a...” Jinki frowned and stared at his feet, searching for a word.
“Balance,” Jonghyun put in, looking at him comically from just over the rim of his cup. Jinki saw him and laughed. “Yeah! Yeah, a balance... or a circle, of some sort.”
“That's cool.” Jonghyun cupped his chin and stared at Jinki. Good old Jinki, drinking coffee made in a pot from a bright pink mug that was probably Kibum's. He cracked a smile at the thought.
“Hey, hyung, I have an idea.”
Jinki placed the mug at his side, and looked at him interestedly. Jonghyun felt a rush of warm gratefulness for the fact that the only person who didn't seem to think that all of Jonghyun's ideas usually lead to disaster, was the one he looked up to, was nice about silly things and understood them, was clumsy and hilarious and kind - was Jinki.
“C'mere,” Jonghyun held out his hand, and Jinki pouted in curiousity, held it.
Five minutes later, clad in proper shirts (Jonghyun snuck a hat on, Jinki grabbed a backpack and stuffed it with apples), they stomped out the building, giggling over their escapade. “You know,” Jinki cleared his throat as they walked quickly over to God-knew-where, “We're going to get in trouble.”
“We're going to have an adventure.”
“Jonghyun.”
“Hyung.”
Jinki receded, but Jonghyun could feel him grinning as he leaned into his shoulder and he clung to his arm, the two making their way through the cold. Sharp cracks of gold glimmered through the candy pink sky, clouds darkening to gray and floating apart.
“Here we are,” Jonghyun waved his arm, and Jinki looked at the shack with apprehensive excitement. It was a little way off an alley nearby, with rotting blocks of cement doing a poor job as steps leading up to its rusted door. “What's this?”
“I keep this thing rented, okay? We have to be careful.”
“This thing? Like, this whole room thing?”
“No, no, the thing inside this room. Here, carefully, the steps are a bit weird.”
Jinki stumbled and shoved himself face first into the door anyway. “I'll say,” he mumbled, rubbing his forehead. Jonghyun went in after him, clicked something and flooded them with light. “This thing has electri - ? Oh.” Jinki realized the light came from a torch. “How much power does that thing have?” Jinki asked, pointing at it, but Jonghyun was tugging at something with one arm. Jinki hurried to help. It had skinny handles, and that was all he registered, or cared to register.
When they managed to get it out on the alley, they both looked at it admiringly. “That's a bike, Jonghyun.”
“I know, right?” Jonghyun basked for a while in the amazement that Jinki showered his possession with, walking round it in circles and ooh'ing and aah'ing at the make. Apparently Jinki was into bikes and knew more about this model than Jonghyun did himself (which was not surprising, since he'd rented it in a hurry anyway, but still).
A car honked in the middle of Jinki's awed commentary as it whizzed by, making them both start. “Okay, let's get this ba - this, um, on the road. Or something,” Jonghyun trailed off, a bit unsure. Bikes weren't really the type of transport that got called 'baby', were they? But Jinki was already eagerly pulling it away, and Jonghyun rushed to catch up. “Here, here,” he said, quickly, “I want to.” So Jinki respectfully stepped away at once, talking about adventures and Pinocchio and the stars, loping easily as Jonghyun nodded and dragged the bike along.
At length, Jinki stopped. “Can we ride now?” They were in front of a line of small shops, street poles in front of them, dimming quickly, wreathed in purple lights.
“Sure,” Jonghyun already mid-nod, nodded again, almost nodding his hat off. He swung up in front, Jinki climbing behind him and hugging him around the waist. Jonghyun smiled at the front wheel and felt at home, as he turned his route to the highway and pedaled as hard as he could. The air was still chill, blowing in gusts at their ears and hands, making them shiver, but it was a nice kind of blowing and a nice kind of shivering, and they stuck closer to each other as minutes sighed on.
__
They reached a hill at half past six in the morning, three hours since Jonghyun had been up, running on two hours of sleep, a cup of mint and Jinki's flow of thoughts - half riddled with sleepy ridiculousness, half baked with nights of tossing and turning - spoken in a clear, low voice that was able to make everything sound sensible; Jinki, on zero sleep and a mug of coffee, fueled only by excitement.
“Jonghyun!” he called out, the concepts of image and media evaporated and long forgotten, now that the people who'd drilled the concepts in him were miles behind.
Jonghyun looked up drowsily from Jinki's shoulder, almost regretting that he'd let Jinki take the pedaling when they nearly lurched into a nearby ditch. “Hmm?”
“There's a hill!”
“Great,” Jonghyun smiled at Jinki's enthusiasm and broke into a thunderous yawn, feeling disgusting as strands of saliva clung to his tongue.
“I'll cycle us up, okay?”
“No.”
Jinki stuck his legs out and braked, shocked. “Really?”
“Yes.”
“Yes, we can?”
“No, we can't.”
“Okay.”
“What do you mean, okay?” Jonghyun sat up and poked his shoulder, making Jinki turn around.
“I mean, okay, we're not going to cycle up.”
The sky had turned an azure blue, pale rays of yellow touching them both in warmth, their shadows long and tilted across the worn, asphalt road. Jonghyun put his legs down, too, arms akimbo and looking generally ridiculous.
“You're sleepy,” Jinki said, shortly. “I shouldn't have given you tea or dragged you around like this. Besides, it's okay now.”
Jonghyun knit his brows. “We can cycle onwards, just not up the hill.”
But Jinki lifted a slim index finger and pushed Jonghyun's forehead back behind his neck. “I said, it's okay now. That thing, you know, I talked about? About feeling the thing that makes you want to go back?”
“Don't tell me,” Jonghyun sighed, although he wasn't stopping the other from turning the cycle 'round. “You felt it because I said we couldn't cycle up.”
“Nah,” Jinki shook his head, hair getting in Jonghyun's eyes. “I'll tell you later. You sleep.”
Jonghyun really hadn't wanted to, and he didn't imagine how he could, with the air smelling like fresh pinecones and damp grass, Jinki's hair still reminiscent of apricots from his shower around eight hours ago, and the warmth and steady thudding of their pulses against each other as he slowly closed his eyes and rested his head against Jinki's back. He made a mental note that he'd jerk himself up in three seconds, but he didn't.
Sleepy mumblings flitted into Jinki's ears as he cycled quietly, quickly as possible, back to the city.
__
When Jonghyun woke up later, it was in his own bed, tucked securely - with a stuffed dolphin he didn't recognize, nuzzling his cheek. He frowned and turned over, then unconsciously bolted up straight. The curtains were drawn, Taemin's bed was rumpled and empty, a pillow drooping sadly over the edge and the blanket tossed on the floor; voices echoed happily from the living room. He trudged out, holding the dolphin in his hand. Three pairs of eyes looked up and crinkled. “Yah, Jonghyun!” Minho called. “Why'd you sleep in so late?”
Jonghyun opened his mouth, about to tell them, and then stopped. It was a private sort of occurrence, and he doubted they'd understand. It was not that he didn't trust them, but they were usually sensible, despite their craziness and sense of humor. He and Jinki tended to be a bit more... impulsive, bordering on insane. It was their thing, kind of - and although everyone laughed, they didn't always get the point. So Jonghyun gave a carefree shake of his head, shrugged as if it was nothing. The others made faces as a means of replying, and turned back to the TV.
Jonghyun sat on the kitchen table once more, noting that the stuff Jinki had used last night was already whisked away, back into the cabinets and out of sight. Perhaps it had been a terribly long dream? Still, he had a stuffed dolphin out of nowhere, and Jonghyun was past believing in fairies dropping him gifts while he slept.
“Did Tokki help you sleep?” Jinki grinned toothily, trotting into the kitchen, very obviously just out of bed himself.
“Tokki? Oh! Um, dolphin guy. I guess?”
Reaching for a glass to fill with water, Jinki hesitated. “What's wrong?”
Jonghyun asked himself the same question. The answer he came up with made him want to ask himself again because honestly, what was wrong with him? Jinki was Jinki, though, there wasn't any harm in telling him. “You just, I dunno, turned around. You shouldn't have done that, you know. I was just being grumpy.”
Jinki sighed, set the glass down, and Jonghyun winced. Did he have to sigh, as if he was dealing with a little child?
“Look - ”
“Don't bother explaining.” Jonghyun rolled his eyes inwardly. He'd meant to listen and understand Jinki's explanation, and then he suddenly went turned on himself. Why couldn't Jinki see through him, get when he was serious and when he wasn't?
Jinki shuffled closer and bumped their shoulders. “Okay.”
Jonghyun's mouth pulled up on one side in a little smile.
__
The next week, Jonghyun woke up at three in the morning because he rolled out of it in his sleep. There was a commotion, some flailing, Taemin cursing randomly in confusion (still asleep), and then a resigned sigh as Jonghyun lay on his stomach, spread-eagle. He was tired from this sudden crisis, as well as from a slight hangover, courtesy Kibum's insistence on 'treating' him.
When he looked up towards the door, it was because there was silence in the kitchen, but someone bustling quickly through the corridor. He scrambled up to his feet, almost tripping and falling flat on his face on an open drawer in his hurry.
“Do not leave drawers open at night,” Jonghyun hissed to his sleeping roommate, who came up with a slurred, incoherent reply.
“Do the seeming as.”
Jonghyun's eyebrows jerked up. “What?”
“Seeming as the do, dogs jumped over rainbow lark poop.”
“Wow, Taemin, I'm happy for you,” was all Jonghyun could say.
A lock clicked, and Jonghyun groaned. “Idiot! I don't know what's happening!”
“Nobody asked you to,” Taemin woke up suddenly, and frowned at him with distaste, eyes puffy and brow creased. “It's thirteen in the morning or something, doofus, go back to dreaming about Vanessa Hudgens or that Olivia Hussey grandma.”
They always called her a grandma! Couldn't they understand that he liked her in that movie? That he was not attracted to her in real life, at present? But Taemin's snores wrenched his indignation to shreds and reminded him that someone had just left the dormitory - and judging from recent events, it was probably their leader.
With a sigh, he pulled on Taemin's jacket that hung carelessly from the bedpost (two sizes too small and a bad choice, but he was a bit out of choices right then), and ran out the room. He was in luck: as he reached outside and looked around, the elevator blinked 6 once and stopped. Resounding down the stairwell from the floors above were the sounds of someone huffing as they dragged their feet up. There were six floors, which the elevator (on good days) provided access to, and then the roof, which one could only reach by going up the stairs.
Why Jinki would go on the roof was beyond Jonghyun. Then again, why Jinki would bleed his heart out as he wore it, tattered, on his sleeve as part of a daily basis, running away from innocent urges and hurting his own mind, was also beyond him.
Jinki, Jonghyun mulled as he rode up the elevator, hands tapping the mirrored wall beside him, was very much an ethereal person, stratospheric, a breath of air that came into being as a butterfly flapped, and dissipated, disappeared. Jinki was the achingly sweet perfume people smell in dreams sometimes: the kind that brings back nonexistent memories of lightning crackling through clouds at noon, a world of eerie, unembodied souls, with a sky of rippling silver.
The elevator chimed, and Jonghyun stepped out, pleased with the elegant wording of his thoughts, considering he still had some alcohol in his system, tucked away somewhere, more than able to addle him into idiocy he'd become notorious for, among his four friends. He went to the right, walked contentedly and purposefully for a while until his face smashed into a wall. Just then, there was panting up ahead, followed by a grunt and a wooden squeak. He turned around, and stubbed his toe into the stairs when he reached them. Nothing seemed to be able to get rid of his sudden good mood, though, and he went up, skipping stairs two at a time.
The door to the roof was a sorry excuse, hanging on by one hinge and silently resisting his efforts. No wonder Jinki'd grunted. He was growling himself, right now. The door gave way a second time, and fell completely off with a terrifying oomf, seemingly ten echoes reverberated off the walls and steps through the building at once.
The familiar, jacketed figure leaning on the railings didn't turn around as Jonghyun ambled forward. “What's up?” he said, in affected English, and they both laughed.
“Suh-ky,” Jinki replied, also in English, pointing up. Jonghyun looked at him, as if to say, Really? Jinki colored. “I'm watching it,” he explained, going back to Hangul, and Jonghyun nodded, understanding at once.
__
They made a habit of it, then; every once in a while, sliding out quietly and talking about cherries and why the sky was blue and sneakers, Jonghyun explaining to Jinki how he didn't really need to go to the gym since he was fine already, Jinki countering that Jonghyun shouldn't go to the gym, concocting ridiculous plans to rule the world and discussing the feelings of being in a balloon (apparently they'd both had dreams of the experience when they were younger). They talked about airy things and earthy things, of notes and pitch and words and resonance, about why Jinki named his stuffed dolphin Tokki, because hello, Tokki was rabbit, plain as day ( - “I felt like it,” Jinki shrugged, and Jonghyun felt inexplicably fuzzy at that). They talked about red, pink, orange, black, what wig Taemin might wear next at their concert, if Kibum might end up singing Dance Again, about computers and the Stone Age and cellphones and girls, but Jonghyun was sure they both liked it most when they took up the old bedsheets Minho and Jinki kept from debut days, drew them out on the roof, and lay on their backs.
“So this...” Jonghyun spoke up, once, waving his hand around meaningfully. “Looking at stars?”
“Skywatching,” Jinki replied immediately, eyes sparkling. “I know it's not a real word, I made it up.”
“Why?”
“'Cause I'm not looking at the stars, I'm looking at the sky. I'm looking at all of it. The stars, and the moon, and the clouds. The black gaps between the stars, the little rips where there's darker black on night blue, random stuff like that.”
“You don't focus, basically,” Jonghyun looked up, up, up and thought he could see silhouettes of angels watching them from above. “You take in.”
“Yeah.”
They lay almost shoulder to shoulder, close but in their own worlds, together and not apart, always cosily aware that the other was there.
“You know,” Jinki started, a couple of nights later.
“Nope.”
“No, really,” Jinki protested, and Jonghyun complied, turning on his side to look at him properly.
“Yes?”
“The reason I... just turned back, then, was because I'd realized you'd fallen asleep.”
Jonghyun nodded, not understanding where this was going. He always slept, there was nothing special about that. He was capable of sleeping on stage, and nobody had been surprised when that had happened.
Jinki sensed this, and attempted again. “Like, you'd fallen asleep. On my shoulder. You were breathing on me and I don't mean it creepily, okay? You just were, and that was that, and it was making the hair on the back of my neck rise, because it was really warm and the wind was really cold that day, remember? And that just jerked me, you know. It was like your breath was telling me I was alive. It just brought the whole situation into my actual realization, and I realized that I was cycling out of Seoul, basically, with you asleep on my shoulder, and that made me feel really... good? Good and responsible, and then I realized I didn't just feel responsible, I was responsible - for you, and the kids back at the dorm - and I just had to go back.”
Jonghyun, surprised, tried to process all this quickly. Jinki wasn't one for speeches, he almost always kept it short. Sometimes he'd even hand the mike over to Jonghyun.
“Oh,” he said, after a while.
“It felt good,” Jinki said, again, smiling up goofily at the moon.
Jonghyun brushed their fingers together, Jinki held his hand.
__
Jinki was staring up at the ceiling, for a change, so Jonghyun sat on the bed and looked up, too. The other wiggled a bit to the right to make room for him, and Jonghyun lay down fully next to him. There were stars on the ceiling, and planets and moons and suns; the stars had five sides, shining a slight orange, vying for attention with the several moons present, spread generously across the expanse of concrete. Little Saturns and Jupiters were scattered here and there, glowing green and pink and orange.
“Lots of stars,” Jonghyun commented. Jinki nodded, the motion creasing the pillow they shared deeper, sinking Jonghyun's head in it slightly.
“Interesting, aren't they? They're terribly childish, but somehow I don't mind this version, either.” Jinki sounded excited and fascinated, raising his arm to trace shapes that were more made by the corrugated bumps (that people thought were fashionable to have on house surfaces these days) on the ceiling than the 'stars' themselves.
Jonghyun watched him, gold-tipped fingers of light from the lamp outlining the side of his face - the forehead, the brows, the strong nose and thick lips, the soft but determined chin. Unconsciously, his own fingers reached out to trace the other's features, and Jinki stayed absolutely still, warm puffs of his breath stuttering slightly as he dropped his arm and let Jonghyun do what he would.
“You're nice,” Jonghyun murmured, fingers eventually buried in the other's hair. Jinki didn't say anything, just looked at him, eyes wide.
“I like nice,” he explained, taking a deep breath of the apricot scent, and Jinki swallowed, almost inaudible.
“D'you like... me?”
“Hmm,” Jonghyun turned to face him fully, pretending to think. “Very much.” He dropped little, chaste kisses between Jinki's eyebrows, down his nose, on the side of his mouth. Then he drew himself up and looked down, smiling.
“I like you too,” Jinki rose himself up on his elbows and kissed Jonghyun's chin, sucking it, slightly. “Very much,” he added, as he rested his head on the other's lap.
The room was quiet, not even the wind whispering at seventeen minutes past midnight. Just the hushed rushing of faraway rivers in his ears and Jinki, breathing loudly into his giraffe-printed pajamas. Everything felt decidedly nice, he thought, humming softly. And yeah, he liked nice. Very much.
a/n: about time i wrote this, tbh - i was inspired by this, all the way back in february.
unbeta'd
Jonghyun propped himself up on his elbows, facing the window. The sky was a bleary gray.
“Wake me up if you're awake at four,” Jonghyun had whispered to Taemin.
“Okay.”
Taemin wasn't awake at four, but Jonghyun had miraculously managed to wake himself up at half past three.
Clouds scudded across like soapy bubbles sliding over water, and the breeze that fluttered the white curtains was chilling. A cold, quiet calm whispered over the city in the leaves of the trees, set along in straight, organized lines along the boulevards. His skin felt damp and soft against the comforter, watching Taemin's shoulders rise and fall as he slept on his side.
It was comfortable and lazy, lying there, stretched out. A little nauseating, maybe, but he was always that way after he woke up. A snore fluttered through from the other side of the room, and Jonghyun lifted his lips in a sleepy smile at the familiar sound, as his eyelids dragged down. He leaned on his left hand, drowsing off for a couple of seconds before jerking awake again with a snort. Taemin shifted in his bed against the opposite wall, mumbling.
Jonghyun sighed, breathed in the air from the window, and it trickled down his nose to the back of his throat, stinging it slightly, like the aftertaste of cherry soda he drank because Kibum wanted them to drink it together in their midnight 'sleepover' sessions.
He heard a sound from the kitchen - some pots clanking as quietly as they could possible clank.
First he thought it was probably Minho, trying to make midnight ramen (as usual), before he smelt coffee. No, it was Jinki. Coffee meant either Kibum or Jinki, but past seven in the evening coffee could only be Jinki.
He patted his bed down for something, eyes shut, not bothering to sit up and actively search for it. He finally found a wrinkled ball and pulled the T-shirt over his head. It smelt two days old and had probably been lying around for some time now, but he didn't bother. Jinki wasn't one to care about that kind of stuff.
Quietly, he let himself off the bed, bent over slightly with the effort of tip-toeing so as not to wake Taemin up, and opened turned the handle. It gave a sigh as it gave, and he slipped out of the room, closing the door behind him.
The smell of coffee came stronger now, and he padded nonchalantly to the kitchen, hands shoved into his pockets. He blinked in surprise as he saw the drawing room - neat and tidy, everything swept away and the curtains pulled back. The windows were closed, and pink glowed in the room, color stealing up behind the stars.
“Jonghyun,” Jinki called softly from the kitchen, and Jonghyun turned around, waving his hand towards the tidied sofas. “Hey, wow, man! You do this?”
“Couldn't sleep,” Jinki shrugged, stirring the mixture in the pot, idly.
Jonghyun rose an eyebrow. “We have a coffeemaker.”
“Couldn't sleep,” Jinki repeated, as if that was a reason.
“So...?”
“It's late at night, I forgot if the coffeemaker would make noise or not. Plus it's fun, you know. Old fashioned.”
“Okay,” Jonghyun sat in a chair, elbows on the table, chin on laced fingers. “Is it... the problem, again?” he questioned, carefully, but Jinki smiled, shook his head.
“No, I've been sleeping properly for a couple of weeks, now. I just couldn't sleep tonight, I felt a little excited.” He took up a mitt and poured some into a cup.
“What about me? I want something to drink too!”
“Oh, I'm warming water for you.”
“Water,” Jonghyun both eyebrows, feeling acutely insulted.
“Ever heard of mint tea?” Jinki grinned, and turned to the fridge, taking out a packet of dry leaves.
“Yeah... I guess,” Jonghyun yawned and leaned back, stretching his arms as he kicked his legs against the floor. Then he pulled his knees up against the table and hugged them. “What're you excited for?”
Jinki looked over his shoulder at Jonghyun. He was pouring honey into Jonghyun's cup, and chewed his lower lip, thoughtfully. Then he lifted the honey bottle and closed the cap, stirred the stuff with a spoon, and handed it over on the table.
“I just,” the elder stared into his mug, steam rising and warming his nose to a flushed pink. “I just want... adventure, I guess.” He took a sip, closed his eyes, and Jonghyun followed suit. The tea burned his throat slightly, refreshed him as the icy mint mixed with the warmly sweet, reassuring base of honey. “Ahan? Good tea,” Jonghyun commented.
“Mmm, thanks,” Jinki looked up and stared over his head. “A backpack, and stuff, you know? Fresh grass and dewy flowers, morning mist and purple clouds. Like in the books - you just run away. And you can come back, and you will come back, but you need space for a while, a little thinking cave in the mountains or something - you think Daejon would be a good place? Caves, I mean - and then you can just look at things passing by. Little things, like ants and birds and cats, I suppose. And then big things, like aeroplanes and maybe cars somewhere, and they're all alive, or full of people that are breathing and...” Jinki took a sip, and sat on the counter, swinging orange-socked feet.
“And that kind of makes you realize you're alive. Fully alive, a full realization - like when you're lying in bed and you think absolutely nothing for a whole hour but you keep shaking your leg and then you think, 'Wow, I'm breathing'. But that kind of alive makes you want to go out and do something. I just had that right now, and now I need to go somewhere so I can get back. It's kind of like a... a...” Jinki frowned and stared at his feet, searching for a word.
“Balance,” Jonghyun put in, looking at him comically from just over the rim of his cup. Jinki saw him and laughed. “Yeah! Yeah, a balance... or a circle, of some sort.”
“That's cool.” Jonghyun cupped his chin and stared at Jinki. Good old Jinki, drinking coffee made in a pot from a bright pink mug that was probably Kibum's. He cracked a smile at the thought.
“Hey, hyung, I have an idea.”
Jinki placed the mug at his side, and looked at him interestedly. Jonghyun felt a rush of warm gratefulness for the fact that the only person who didn't seem to think that all of Jonghyun's ideas usually lead to disaster, was the one he looked up to, was nice about silly things and understood them, was clumsy and hilarious and kind - was Jinki.
“C'mere,” Jonghyun held out his hand, and Jinki pouted in curiousity, held it.
Five minutes later, clad in proper shirts (Jonghyun snuck a hat on, Jinki grabbed a backpack and stuffed it with apples), they stomped out the building, giggling over their escapade. “You know,” Jinki cleared his throat as they walked quickly over to God-knew-where, “We're going to get in trouble.”
“We're going to have an adventure.”
“Jonghyun.”
“Hyung.”
Jinki receded, but Jonghyun could feel him grinning as he leaned into his shoulder and he clung to his arm, the two making their way through the cold. Sharp cracks of gold glimmered through the candy pink sky, clouds darkening to gray and floating apart.
“Here we are,” Jonghyun waved his arm, and Jinki looked at the shack with apprehensive excitement. It was a little way off an alley nearby, with rotting blocks of cement doing a poor job as steps leading up to its rusted door. “What's this?”
“I keep this thing rented, okay? We have to be careful.”
“This thing? Like, this whole room thing?”
“No, no, the thing inside this room. Here, carefully, the steps are a bit weird.”
Jinki stumbled and shoved himself face first into the door anyway. “I'll say,” he mumbled, rubbing his forehead. Jonghyun went in after him, clicked something and flooded them with light. “This thing has electri - ? Oh.” Jinki realized the light came from a torch. “How much power does that thing have?” Jinki asked, pointing at it, but Jonghyun was tugging at something with one arm. Jinki hurried to help. It had skinny handles, and that was all he registered, or cared to register.
When they managed to get it out on the alley, they both looked at it admiringly. “That's a bike, Jonghyun.”
“I know, right?” Jonghyun basked for a while in the amazement that Jinki showered his possession with, walking round it in circles and ooh'ing and aah'ing at the make. Apparently Jinki was into bikes and knew more about this model than Jonghyun did himself (which was not surprising, since he'd rented it in a hurry anyway, but still).
A car honked in the middle of Jinki's awed commentary as it whizzed by, making them both start. “Okay, let's get this ba - this, um, on the road. Or something,” Jonghyun trailed off, a bit unsure. Bikes weren't really the type of transport that got called 'baby', were they? But Jinki was already eagerly pulling it away, and Jonghyun rushed to catch up. “Here, here,” he said, quickly, “I want to.” So Jinki respectfully stepped away at once, talking about adventures and Pinocchio and the stars, loping easily as Jonghyun nodded and dragged the bike along.
At length, Jinki stopped. “Can we ride now?” They were in front of a line of small shops, street poles in front of them, dimming quickly, wreathed in purple lights.
“Sure,” Jonghyun already mid-nod, nodded again, almost nodding his hat off. He swung up in front, Jinki climbing behind him and hugging him around the waist. Jonghyun smiled at the front wheel and felt at home, as he turned his route to the highway and pedaled as hard as he could. The air was still chill, blowing in gusts at their ears and hands, making them shiver, but it was a nice kind of blowing and a nice kind of shivering, and they stuck closer to each other as minutes sighed on.
__
They reached a hill at half past six in the morning, three hours since Jonghyun had been up, running on two hours of sleep, a cup of mint and Jinki's flow of thoughts - half riddled with sleepy ridiculousness, half baked with nights of tossing and turning - spoken in a clear, low voice that was able to make everything sound sensible; Jinki, on zero sleep and a mug of coffee, fueled only by excitement.
“Jonghyun!” he called out, the concepts of image and media evaporated and long forgotten, now that the people who'd drilled the concepts in him were miles behind.
Jonghyun looked up drowsily from Jinki's shoulder, almost regretting that he'd let Jinki take the pedaling when they nearly lurched into a nearby ditch. “Hmm?”
“There's a hill!”
“Great,” Jonghyun smiled at Jinki's enthusiasm and broke into a thunderous yawn, feeling disgusting as strands of saliva clung to his tongue.
“I'll cycle us up, okay?”
“No.”
Jinki stuck his legs out and braked, shocked. “Really?”
“Yes.”
“Yes, we can?”
“No, we can't.”
“Okay.”
“What do you mean, okay?” Jonghyun sat up and poked his shoulder, making Jinki turn around.
“I mean, okay, we're not going to cycle up.”
The sky had turned an azure blue, pale rays of yellow touching them both in warmth, their shadows long and tilted across the worn, asphalt road. Jonghyun put his legs down, too, arms akimbo and looking generally ridiculous.
“You're sleepy,” Jinki said, shortly. “I shouldn't have given you tea or dragged you around like this. Besides, it's okay now.”
Jonghyun knit his brows. “We can cycle onwards, just not up the hill.”
But Jinki lifted a slim index finger and pushed Jonghyun's forehead back behind his neck. “I said, it's okay now. That thing, you know, I talked about? About feeling the thing that makes you want to go back?”
“Don't tell me,” Jonghyun sighed, although he wasn't stopping the other from turning the cycle 'round. “You felt it because I said we couldn't cycle up.”
“Nah,” Jinki shook his head, hair getting in Jonghyun's eyes. “I'll tell you later. You sleep.”
Jonghyun really hadn't wanted to, and he didn't imagine how he could, with the air smelling like fresh pinecones and damp grass, Jinki's hair still reminiscent of apricots from his shower around eight hours ago, and the warmth and steady thudding of their pulses against each other as he slowly closed his eyes and rested his head against Jinki's back. He made a mental note that he'd jerk himself up in three seconds, but he didn't.
Sleepy mumblings flitted into Jinki's ears as he cycled quietly, quickly as possible, back to the city.
__
When Jonghyun woke up later, it was in his own bed, tucked securely - with a stuffed dolphin he didn't recognize, nuzzling his cheek. He frowned and turned over, then unconsciously bolted up straight. The curtains were drawn, Taemin's bed was rumpled and empty, a pillow drooping sadly over the edge and the blanket tossed on the floor; voices echoed happily from the living room. He trudged out, holding the dolphin in his hand. Three pairs of eyes looked up and crinkled. “Yah, Jonghyun!” Minho called. “Why'd you sleep in so late?”
Jonghyun opened his mouth, about to tell them, and then stopped. It was a private sort of occurrence, and he doubted they'd understand. It was not that he didn't trust them, but they were usually sensible, despite their craziness and sense of humor. He and Jinki tended to be a bit more... impulsive, bordering on insane. It was their thing, kind of - and although everyone laughed, they didn't always get the point. So Jonghyun gave a carefree shake of his head, shrugged as if it was nothing. The others made faces as a means of replying, and turned back to the TV.
Jonghyun sat on the kitchen table once more, noting that the stuff Jinki had used last night was already whisked away, back into the cabinets and out of sight. Perhaps it had been a terribly long dream? Still, he had a stuffed dolphin out of nowhere, and Jonghyun was past believing in fairies dropping him gifts while he slept.
“Did Tokki help you sleep?” Jinki grinned toothily, trotting into the kitchen, very obviously just out of bed himself.
“Tokki? Oh! Um, dolphin guy. I guess?”
Reaching for a glass to fill with water, Jinki hesitated. “What's wrong?”
Jonghyun asked himself the same question. The answer he came up with made him want to ask himself again because honestly, what was wrong with him? Jinki was Jinki, though, there wasn't any harm in telling him. “You just, I dunno, turned around. You shouldn't have done that, you know. I was just being grumpy.”
Jinki sighed, set the glass down, and Jonghyun winced. Did he have to sigh, as if he was dealing with a little child?
“Look - ”
“Don't bother explaining.” Jonghyun rolled his eyes inwardly. He'd meant to listen and understand Jinki's explanation, and then he suddenly went turned on himself. Why couldn't Jinki see through him, get when he was serious and when he wasn't?
Jinki shuffled closer and bumped their shoulders. “Okay.”
Jonghyun's mouth pulled up on one side in a little smile.
__
The next week, Jonghyun woke up at three in the morning because he rolled out of it in his sleep. There was a commotion, some flailing, Taemin cursing randomly in confusion (still asleep), and then a resigned sigh as Jonghyun lay on his stomach, spread-eagle. He was tired from this sudden crisis, as well as from a slight hangover, courtesy Kibum's insistence on 'treating' him.
When he looked up towards the door, it was because there was silence in the kitchen, but someone bustling quickly through the corridor. He scrambled up to his feet, almost tripping and falling flat on his face on an open drawer in his hurry.
“Do not leave drawers open at night,” Jonghyun hissed to his sleeping roommate, who came up with a slurred, incoherent reply.
“Do the seeming as.”
Jonghyun's eyebrows jerked up. “What?”
“Seeming as the do, dogs jumped over rainbow lark poop.”
“Wow, Taemin, I'm happy for you,” was all Jonghyun could say.
A lock clicked, and Jonghyun groaned. “Idiot! I don't know what's happening!”
“Nobody asked you to,” Taemin woke up suddenly, and frowned at him with distaste, eyes puffy and brow creased. “It's thirteen in the morning or something, doofus, go back to dreaming about Vanessa Hudgens or that Olivia Hussey grandma.”
They always called her a grandma! Couldn't they understand that he liked her in that movie? That he was not attracted to her in real life, at present? But Taemin's snores wrenched his indignation to shreds and reminded him that someone had just left the dormitory - and judging from recent events, it was probably their leader.
With a sigh, he pulled on Taemin's jacket that hung carelessly from the bedpost (two sizes too small and a bad choice, but he was a bit out of choices right then), and ran out the room. He was in luck: as he reached outside and looked around, the elevator blinked 6 once and stopped. Resounding down the stairwell from the floors above were the sounds of someone huffing as they dragged their feet up. There were six floors, which the elevator (on good days) provided access to, and then the roof, which one could only reach by going up the stairs.
Why Jinki would go on the roof was beyond Jonghyun. Then again, why Jinki would bleed his heart out as he wore it, tattered, on his sleeve as part of a daily basis, running away from innocent urges and hurting his own mind, was also beyond him.
Jinki, Jonghyun mulled as he rode up the elevator, hands tapping the mirrored wall beside him, was very much an ethereal person, stratospheric, a breath of air that came into being as a butterfly flapped, and dissipated, disappeared. Jinki was the achingly sweet perfume people smell in dreams sometimes: the kind that brings back nonexistent memories of lightning crackling through clouds at noon, a world of eerie, unembodied souls, with a sky of rippling silver.
The elevator chimed, and Jonghyun stepped out, pleased with the elegant wording of his thoughts, considering he still had some alcohol in his system, tucked away somewhere, more than able to addle him into idiocy he'd become notorious for, among his four friends. He went to the right, walked contentedly and purposefully for a while until his face smashed into a wall. Just then, there was panting up ahead, followed by a grunt and a wooden squeak. He turned around, and stubbed his toe into the stairs when he reached them. Nothing seemed to be able to get rid of his sudden good mood, though, and he went up, skipping stairs two at a time.
The door to the roof was a sorry excuse, hanging on by one hinge and silently resisting his efforts. No wonder Jinki'd grunted. He was growling himself, right now. The door gave way a second time, and fell completely off with a terrifying oomf, seemingly ten echoes reverberated off the walls and steps through the building at once.
The familiar, jacketed figure leaning on the railings didn't turn around as Jonghyun ambled forward. “What's up?” he said, in affected English, and they both laughed.
“Suh-ky,” Jinki replied, also in English, pointing up. Jonghyun looked at him, as if to say, Really? Jinki colored. “I'm watching it,” he explained, going back to Hangul, and Jonghyun nodded, understanding at once.
__
They made a habit of it, then; every once in a while, sliding out quietly and talking about cherries and why the sky was blue and sneakers, Jonghyun explaining to Jinki how he didn't really need to go to the gym since he was fine already, Jinki countering that Jonghyun shouldn't go to the gym, concocting ridiculous plans to rule the world and discussing the feelings of being in a balloon (apparently they'd both had dreams of the experience when they were younger). They talked about airy things and earthy things, of notes and pitch and words and resonance, about why Jinki named his stuffed dolphin Tokki, because hello, Tokki was rabbit, plain as day ( - “I felt like it,” Jinki shrugged, and Jonghyun felt inexplicably fuzzy at that). They talked about red, pink, orange, black, what wig Taemin might wear next at their concert, if Kibum might end up singing Dance Again, about computers and the Stone Age and cellphones and girls, but Jonghyun was sure they both liked it most when they took up the old bedsheets Minho and Jinki kept from debut days, drew them out on the roof, and lay on their backs.
“So this...” Jonghyun spoke up, once, waving his hand around meaningfully. “Looking at stars?”
“Skywatching,” Jinki replied immediately, eyes sparkling. “I know it's not a real word, I made it up.”
“Why?”
“'Cause I'm not looking at the stars, I'm looking at the sky. I'm looking at all of it. The stars, and the moon, and the clouds. The black gaps between the stars, the little rips where there's darker black on night blue, random stuff like that.”
“You don't focus, basically,” Jonghyun looked up, up, up and thought he could see silhouettes of angels watching them from above. “You take in.”
“Yeah.”
They lay almost shoulder to shoulder, close but in their own worlds, together and not apart, always cosily aware that the other was there.
“You know,” Jinki started, a couple of nights later.
“Nope.”
“No, really,” Jinki protested, and Jonghyun complied, turning on his side to look at him properly.
“Yes?”
“The reason I... just turned back, then, was because I'd realized you'd fallen asleep.”
Jonghyun nodded, not understanding where this was going. He always slept, there was nothing special about that. He was capable of sleeping on stage, and nobody had been surprised when that had happened.
Jinki sensed this, and attempted again. “Like, you'd fallen asleep. On my shoulder. You were breathing on me and I don't mean it creepily, okay? You just were, and that was that, and it was making the hair on the back of my neck rise, because it was really warm and the wind was really cold that day, remember? And that just jerked me, you know. It was like your breath was telling me I was alive. It just brought the whole situation into my actual realization, and I realized that I was cycling out of Seoul, basically, with you asleep on my shoulder, and that made me feel really... good? Good and responsible, and then I realized I didn't just feel responsible, I was responsible - for you, and the kids back at the dorm - and I just had to go back.”
Jonghyun, surprised, tried to process all this quickly. Jinki wasn't one for speeches, he almost always kept it short. Sometimes he'd even hand the mike over to Jonghyun.
“Oh,” he said, after a while.
“It felt good,” Jinki said, again, smiling up goofily at the moon.
Jonghyun brushed their fingers together, Jinki held his hand.
__
Jinki was staring up at the ceiling, for a change, so Jonghyun sat on the bed and looked up, too. The other wiggled a bit to the right to make room for him, and Jonghyun lay down fully next to him. There were stars on the ceiling, and planets and moons and suns; the stars had five sides, shining a slight orange, vying for attention with the several moons present, spread generously across the expanse of concrete. Little Saturns and Jupiters were scattered here and there, glowing green and pink and orange.
“Lots of stars,” Jonghyun commented. Jinki nodded, the motion creasing the pillow they shared deeper, sinking Jonghyun's head in it slightly.
“Interesting, aren't they? They're terribly childish, but somehow I don't mind this version, either.” Jinki sounded excited and fascinated, raising his arm to trace shapes that were more made by the corrugated bumps (that people thought were fashionable to have on house surfaces these days) on the ceiling than the 'stars' themselves.
Jonghyun watched him, gold-tipped fingers of light from the lamp outlining the side of his face - the forehead, the brows, the strong nose and thick lips, the soft but determined chin. Unconsciously, his own fingers reached out to trace the other's features, and Jinki stayed absolutely still, warm puffs of his breath stuttering slightly as he dropped his arm and let Jonghyun do what he would.
“You're nice,” Jonghyun murmured, fingers eventually buried in the other's hair. Jinki didn't say anything, just looked at him, eyes wide.
“I like nice,” he explained, taking a deep breath of the apricot scent, and Jinki swallowed, almost inaudible.
“D'you like... me?”
“Hmm,” Jonghyun turned to face him fully, pretending to think. “Very much.” He dropped little, chaste kisses between Jinki's eyebrows, down his nose, on the side of his mouth. Then he drew himself up and looked down, smiling.
“I like you too,” Jinki rose himself up on his elbows and kissed Jonghyun's chin, sucking it, slightly. “Very much,” he added, as he rested his head on the other's lap.
The room was quiet, not even the wind whispering at seventeen minutes past midnight. Just the hushed rushing of faraway rivers in his ears and Jinki, breathing loudly into his giraffe-printed pajamas. Everything felt decidedly nice, he thought, humming softly. And yeah, he liked nice. Very much.
a/n: about time i wrote this, tbh - i was inspired by this, all the way back in february.
