When I Did Not Know You So Well
Title: When I Did Not Know You So Well
Pairing: Jongkey
Rating: R
Genre: romance, sort of angst
Summary: "I could tell you exactly when I fell, it was back when I did not know you so well"
Kibum can’t remember exactly when it started. There was a shift, in the geologic time of constant contact, when suddenly it wasn’t just he’s always there and I’m sick of him it was when I need him, he’s there. He started to notice the way Jonghyun looked at him, started to look back, and when their eyes met it was all clichés, the way the rest of the world disappeared, and sometimes when Jonghyun would casually rest his hand on the small of Kibum’s back, when he would absently ghost his finger along Kibum’s forearm, when no one was looking, Kibum didn’t know if he wanted to laugh or to cry.
* * *
“Hey, Jonghyun…”
They are a tangle of legs and blankets, arms and pillows, carelessly taking up the whole couch as the tv plays through the same thirty seconds of menu animations. Jonghyun doesn’t respond, the light from the screen flickering across his face, his head half pillowed on Kibum’s leg.
“You can’t really be…you’re asleep. Idiot.” Kibum shifts slightly, tucking the blankets more securely against the chill of the dark apartment, before resting his fingers lightly on Jonghyun’s head, habitually rearranging loose strands of hair.
“M’not idiot.” His words are slurred, muffled slightly by a pillow, and Kibum knows better than to think he’s awake.
“If you’re not an idiot, tell me how the movie ended.”
Jonghyun rolls over until his face is entirely hidden in the blanket on top of Kibum’s leg, and he grumbles into the softness, something about a girl in the sewer and a monster that trails off into silence. It’s comfortable, and Kibum lets himself have the moment, muting the television and listening to the rain on the window, the rustle of Jonghyun’s leg as it slowly slips further off the couch, his own slow breathing. It could last forever, he thinks, but no. Jonghyun’s leg slips the rest of the way, his foot hitting the floor with a thud.
“Jonghyun.” He pulls his feet up underneath him, taking the chance as Jonghyun contorts himself back into a sitting position. “What did you think of me? When we first met?”
“Don’t remember.” Kibum shoves him with his foot. “Okay, okay…you were annoying.” Another shove. “Are annoying. Wait, no, okay, I’ll be serious.” Jonghyun stares at the flickering tv out of habit, expression going soft as he remembers. “I was sorta intimidated. It was like you were good at everything. Didn’t think we’d get along.”
“I am good at everything.”
“Good thing we get along then.”
Jonghyun’s smile disappears in the dark of the living room, but Kibum knows it’s there, hears it in the tone of his voice, and wonders when that happened, when he started to understand the smallest things. Wonders if there was ever a stop when he could have gotten off. Wonders if he slept through the stations on purpose.
“What about me? I assume you were overwhelmed by my handsomeness.” Jonghyun leans closer to Kibum, and the pretense of it being cold isn’t necessary anymore.
“Annoying.” And when Jonghyun doesn’t react, Kibum realizes that maybe he can still be surprised, and when Jonghyun traces the curve of his ear with one finger, he decides that he’s okay with that.
“Just annoying?” His breath is like summer, impossibly close to the side of Kibum’s face.
“And short.” He doesn’t mean to react when Jonghyun slides his hand up into his hair, when lips and teeth graze against the side of his neck. His hands tighten on the blankets, and he knows that Jonghyun notices.
“And you started-“ Jonghyun’s grip tightening on his hair, almost enough to hurt, and teeth on his collarbone, never enough to make a mark. “You started giving me these weird looks.” Kibum bites his lip, closes his eyes, and misses the way Jonghyun looks up at him, but he knows, Jonghyun’s been giving him those weird looks for longer than he cares to remember.
As Jonghyun pushes him back toward the edge of the couch, as Kibum sees that something in Jonghyun’s eyes, he silences Jonghyun with his lips before he has a chance to say words he can’t take back, because maybe Kibum doesn’t believe in love, and until he finds the words for what he does believe in, this will have to be enough.
* * *
Jonghyun knows that they can’t show it, not really. He knows how fast it would blow up in their faces, knows how important all of this is to Key. So when Key pulls away from his touch, he doesn’t mind, because sometimes love is about not taking it personally. Sometimes he dreams about running away, running far enough to escape Almighty Key and Bling Bling Jonghyun, somewhere he could rest his hand on Kibum’s lower back without first looking for cameras. But he knows that if he ran Kibum wouldn’t follow.
* * *
Watching Kibum with Yoogeun is a constant reminder of what they will never have. As they climb into the van after another day of filming, Jonghyun leans his head against the foggy window and doesn’t see the city passing by.
“You’re not an entirely hopeless father. I’m surprised.” Kibum rests his hand on Jonghyun’s leg, pulling him out of his thoughts.
“Shut up, I’m great with kids.” When Kibum rolls his eyes, Jonghyun loses himself in their camaraderie, in now instead of what if.
“Yeah, you can really get down onto their level.” The jibe isn’t hidden at all, and they devolve into childish insults until Minho breaks them up with if you don’t stop fighting I’ll separate you and they both spend the rest of the ride laughing about how fatherly Minho already is, calling him an old man.
Later that evening, as Kibum is washing dishes and Jonghyun is pretending to help, the subject comes up again.
“You’ll make a really good parent someday, Kibum-ah.” Jonghyun leans against the windowsill as he speaks, breath fogging up the glass.
Kibum laughs, placing another clean, dry dish onto the rack. “I told you. I’m good at everything. Here, help me dry these.”
Jonghyun walks over, feels the way their fingers brush as Kibum hands him a bowl, the way they stand just slightly too close, and pretends he doesn’t see where everything is going.
* * *
There is no time, or next to no time, because they have to be on stage and performing so soon, but Key is wearing those silver pants, and his makeup is perfect, and they are in Los Angeles, and everything is strange except for the feeling of Kibum’s lips against his.
“Jjong…not here…it’s…” But all too soon he forgets his protests in favor of sliding his hands up under Jonghyun’s blazer and his hips move against Jonghyun’s in a way that probably should be illegal.
“Ki-fuck…” He gasps against Kibum’s lips, pulling at his hair until his head falls back, and it takes all of his willpower to not send Kibum onstage with the most obvious of hickeys.
“Not now.” Kibum bites at his lip, smirking against Jonghyun’s skin before pulling away just as a stagehand rounds the corner, informing them that they need to be in the wings five minutes ago and Kibum fixes the clasp of Jonghyun’s necklace as an excuse to run his fingers through his hair before they make their way to the stage.
By some miracle they escape early from the after party, pleading jet lag, exhaustion, but it’s anything but that pulls them together the moment they’re in the elevator leading to their nearby hotel room, Kibum smothering his moans into the side of Jonghyun’s neck.
The space between the elevator and the room is measured in restraint, as Jonghyun manages not to touch Kibum until he can push him up against the door, lock moving easily under his fingers, relative safety until morning.
“Jjong-“ Kibum gasps, hooking his fingers into the rips in Jonghyun’s pants, pulling him unbearably close.
“Such a tease.” He exhales slowly against Kibum’s ear, these words are only for him. “I love it when you wear these pants.”
Kibum doesn’t respond with words, just pushes at Jonghyun’s jacket until it’s on the floor, and by the time they’ve stumbled to the bed Jonghyun decides that he likes these pants even more when they’re on the floor.
Jonghyun wants to lose himself in this, in Kibum, in the impossible feeling of skin against skin. Kibum gasps against Jonghyun’s lips as he moves perfectly, because they know each other too well, and Jonghyun knows exactly what makes him fall apart. Kibum rakes his nails down Jonghyun’s back because no one will see the scratches the next day under his shirt, and Kibum adds the way Jonghyun’s back arches to his list of things that shouldn’t be possible, right next to love and the ease with which Jonghyun pushes him down against the mattress.
“Jjong-“ His wrists feel sharp against each other under Jonghyun’s hand, and he struggles because he can’t escape, because he doesn’t want to, because of the way his grip tightens every time Kibum moves. “You’re the tease.”
Jonghyun just laughs softly, breath against Kibum’s collarbone, lips on skin and Kibum is wound tight, a hot coil and if Jonghyun would just touch him-
“You like it.”
Kibum wants to lie and say he doesn’t, wants to draw this out but they both know that the others could be back to their next door rooms sooner than they want, and they’ve both forgotten how to be quiet, and when Jonghyun presses slicked fingers into him, Kibum bites his lip hard enough to draw blood because it’s either that or let the whole hotel know how they spend their nights.
It’s later, when the sheets are sideways and their legs are tumbled together like a puzzle, that reality starts seeping back in.
“We’ve got to stop leaving early from these things.” Kibum traces his name onto Jonghyun’s skin with his finger, watching him shiver. “People might talk.”
“’People might talk’. What are you, an old lady?” He shakes with laughter, forcing Kibum’s handwriting into an illegible scrawl.
“At least I care about my career.” He pulls away, wrapping most of the blankets around himself against the air conditioned chill of the room. Hopes that a shower will get rid of the creeping chill in the pit of his stomach.
“Kibum...wait.” Pulls on his pants from where he left them earlier that day, left carelessly on a chair before changing into stage clothes.
“I don’t want to talk about this.”
Jonghyun doesn’t let him escape to the bathroom, holds him back by the wrist.
“I care.”
Kibum feels something break inside of him, pulls Jonghyun around to face him, sees it in his eyes. “I know.”
Hot water in hotels never runs out, and Kibum kisses Jonghyun until his back is against the wall, and doesn’t realize that his mouth tastes like goodbye, knees slick against the shower tiles, Jonghyun’s fingers tight in his wet hair.
* * *
A month later, Jonghyun goes on his first date with Shin Sekyung.
There's nothing you can't save me from,
but I can't save myself
A/N Major inspiration for this came from a couple Pony Up! songs, "Best Offence" and "Marlon Brando's Laundromat", as well as this performance of RDD. Because. Those pants. Yes. Also I wanted to explore the idea of Jonghyun going off and dating Sekyung as a way to protect Key, since obviously any relationship between the two would be dangerous for both their careers, and Jonghyun is so caring I could see him thinking that would be the right thing to do, even if it's painful. Anyways, thanks for reading~!