[ontae] and we could be too | part ii
[ part i]
It's hard, too hard, to give up what he's wanted for so long and has only gotten to have for much too brief a time, but Jinki knows what he has to do. Nothing has to change, he tells himself, from the life he's been living for the past few years, the life he was living before Taemin forced his way back in. It'll just be as if Taemin had never come back from Thailand, or Europe, or wherever he was before he appeared in Jinki's apartment that night.
The card Taemin's father left is still on the kitchen counter, right where Taemin had left it. Jinki picks it up, fingers it for a moment before steeling his resolve. He dials the number printed and embossed in black, then folds the card into his pocket. The phone rings only once before a cool female voice speaks.
“Hello, please state your name and purpose,” it says.
“I-Lee Jinki, I'm calling for-for Mr. Lee,” says Jinki, slightly thrown. Stupid, he thinks at himself; it's not as if someone of that level is going to answer his own calls.
“If you leave a message,” says the woman on the other end, “I can pass it on to him.”
Jinki pauses for a moment, then says, “Tell him I'll do it. Tell him Taemin should be coming by today, and I'll take care of it then.”
Right on cue, the door to his apartment clicks as its lock is picked, and then swings open. Jinki turns, and Taemin is toeing off his shoes in the entryway.
“I will tell him,” says the voice. “Is there anything else?”
“No,” says Jinki, eyes not leaving Taemin's. “No, that's it; thank you.” He hangs up the phone as Taemin comes through the open doorway into the kitchen.
“Who were you talking to?” Taemin asks.
Jinki ignores his question. “Taemin,” he says. “I need to talk to you.” Taemin eyes him warily, folds his arms over his chest. Jinki swallows. “I need-” his voice breaks, and he clears his throat and tries again, but his voice doesn't seem to want to cooperate. He stands there and looks at the floor, focuses just on breathing in and then out.
“I can't,” he blurts. “Everything-your family, what you do, all the violence, who you are-I thought I could deal with it, but I can't.” He takes a deep, shuddering breath. “I want you to go away,” he says. “I want you out of my life again.”
Taemin is dead silent. Jinki scuffs his feet against the worn linoleum. The compressor on the refrigerator whirs on; a motorcycle roars by outside. Then Taemin crumples in on himself suddenly, slouching against the doorframe. Jinki wants to squeeze his eyes shut, so he doesn't have to see; he wants to go to Taemin in two brisk strides, pull him close and apologize for lying. Instead, he digs his thumbnail into the bone of his other wrist and counts to ten in his mind as he waits for Taemin to say something.
Taemin straightens up. “I see what this is about,” he says, and his voice is unexpectedly clear. He takes a step forward, uncrosses his arms and hooks his thumbs into his belt loops. He's almost smiling-but the upwards tilt of his mouth is unpleasantly lopsided. “This is about my family, isn't it?” he says. “This is about the offer my dad made you.”
Jinki's eyes widen. For a moment he doesn't even know if he's still breathing.
“Fine,” Taemin says. The corners of his mouth twist downward in a sneer. “If that's the way you want it, then fine.”
“Taemin?” says Jinki, uncertainly.
“The way I see it,” Taemin continues, “you're either a coward or a whore.” Jinki starts at that, blinks twice in confusion. Taemin meets his eyes squarely as he says, “Either you're scared of my father and are bowing to his will, or you purposely lured me into bed so you could dump me afterwards and collect the money. Either way,” he concludes, “I don't want anything to do with you.”
And with that, he turns tail and pushes his way back out of Jinki's apartment and out of Jinki's life.
Jinki's an idiot. He realizes this slowly over the next twelve days. It's a short time-less than two weeks even, a short time to be without Taemin considering Jinki's spent the last three years not knowing where Taemin was. And yet, it feels unbearably long. Jinki misses Taemin, and he knew he would, he'd expected to, but he hadn't expected to wake up in the mornings barely registering the light, only knowing that something must have clawed out his heart during the night, because what else could this empty place in him be?
It's not just Taemin's absence. It's not just Taemin leaving. It's that Jinki was the one who'd pushed him away. All this time, he'd wanted Taemin more than anything in the world, and just when he finally had him, he'd ruined everything, and it wasn't anyone's fault but his own.
Why had he been so afraid? Jinki forgets more of the reasons why every day after Taemin left. He'd wanted to make things easier for the both of them, wanted Taemin's family to treat him better, and wanted to avoid getting himself killed. But Taemin had been so furious when he'd figured out what Jinki was doing, and as for the other thing-now that Taemin is gone, Jinki realizes it doesn't matter what Taemin's family does to him, as long as it means he can have one day, one hour, one second more with Taemin.
But Taemin's gone, and it's too late now for those kinds of thoughts.
It's not too late.
That's what Jinki thinks when he sees Taemin buying food from a street-side vendor in the early evening.
“Taemin,” he says before he can fully think it through. Taemin turns at the sound of his name. His eyes narrow when he sees Jinki, face completely closing itself off. He takes his food in its little plastic baggy and slides a crumpled bill across the counter, then turns and leaves without saying anything, without even sparing Jinki a second look.
Jinki follows him. Taemin walks briskly, taking twists and turns through the streets. Jinki jogs to catch up, and Taemin quickens his pace even more, walks down smaller and smaller alleys, taking Jinki through secret corners of the city he's never even known existed.
“Taemin,” Jinki says as he closes the distance between them, and grabs at Taemin's arm. Taemin's face twists nastily; then he steels his expression, smoothing away the creases in his brow by force. He doesn't say anything, just pulls his arm away from Jinki, puts his hands in his pockets, and strolls away again.
Jinki follows him. “Taemin,” he says again. “I was wrong,” he says. “I just thought we'd be better off-that things would be easier for you if I broke things off with you.” Taemin continues to ignore him, except for a slight quickening of his pace. Jinki broadens his strides as well to keep up. “It wasn't about the money,” he says. “It was never about the money; I don't care about that.” Taemin doesn't even look at him, so Jinki reaches out for him again.
“Taemin-”
Taemin turns then, turns around, shakes Jinki's hand from his shoulder, and punches Jinki in the face, all in one smooth, fluid motion. Jinki swears and stumbles, reaches to clutch at his nose, feel if it's broken, but Taemin doesn't let him, grabs Jinki's shirt collar and pushes him up against the alley wall before Jinki can even bring his hand up. It's not that skinny, lithe Taemin is stronger than Jinki, but he's stronger than he looks, and with the added element of surprise, that's enough to overpower Jinki.
He kisses Jinki. Jinki's head slams back into brick from the force of it; the noise of pain he makes is lost into Taemin's mouth.
“Taemin, what,” says Jinki, and then doesn't know the words for the question he means to ask.
“Don't you know?” asks Taemin. There's a pleading note to his voice, Jinki thinks, something he's never heard from Taemin, cheerily teasing Taemin, sarcastically sinister Taemin. But Jinki's not sure what it is Taemin wants so badly for him to know, so he doesn't say anything. “Never mind,” says Taemin, ending on a sigh. He steps away; Jinki thinks for a moment he's going to turn and leave, but instead he hooks a finger through Jinki's belt loop, pulls him along.
“Let's go,” he says, and Jinki thinks he should ask where, but the truth is he'd follow Taemin anywhere, always.
“I love you,” Jinki says, later.
“Yes,” replies Taemin, and arches up, and digs blunt nails into Jinki's arms.
He wakes up and doesn't know why. It's dark but for the faintly illuminated digits on his alarm clock: 3:44AM, they read. Taemin is asleep beside him, face smoothed out into a peaceful expression he rarely carries while awake. Jinki watches him for a few moments; fondness twists at his heart, and he rests a hand on Taemin's shoulder. It rises and falls with Taemin's slow, deep breaths.
Then, abruptly, Jinki becomes aware of the reason for his sudden awakening: there's someone in the apartment. He hears, just barely, low murmurs in living room, the soft rustling sounds of feet brushing along carpet. He sits up, shakes Taemin awake-but before he can rouse Taemin, the door to the bedroom is flung open, and in the same instant, the hall light flickers on. Jinki blinks against the brightness, shields his eyes, but can only make out the backlit silhouettes of three figures.
Taemin stirs, blinks blearily and mumbles something unintelligible against Jinki's side. The sound seems to trigger the men in the doorway: they move forward in broad strides-one hits Jinki in the head, hard, and then again. Jinki barely registers the shadowy figure of another man grabbing for a Taemin who is suddenly alert as well before he's gone, mind swirling into dark oblivion.
He wakes up with his hands tied behind his back; the coarse texture of the rope against the tender skin of his wrists is the first thing he registers. He twists and turns them, uselessly, and then blinks and coughs and clears his dry throat.
“Welcome to our humble abode,” comes a voice. Jinki lifts his head and when his vision focuses, Lee Taesun is sitting in front of him. He stands as Jinki looks around, takes in his surroundings. “Well,” Taesun amends his earlier statement, “our humble headquarters, anyway.”
“Why,” starts Jinki, then thinks of a more pressing question. “Where's Taemin?”
Taesun ignores him. “You took our money and then went back on your word,” he says. “That constitutes stealing, you know.”
“The money's still there,” says Jinki. “You can have it back; I haven't touched it.”
Taesun opens his mouth to laugh, only it's not Taesun's laugh that Jinki hears. The voice he hears is deeper, gruffer, and Jinki turns to see Taemin's father coming into the room. Taesun immediately stands up straighter, face going professional in an instant.
“Smart boy like you should know better than that,” says Taemin's father. “You should know that's not how it works.”
And he does know, Jinki supposes, although he'd tried hard to pretend he didn't. Still, he shows no expression on his face, no sign of giving in, of weakness. He stands his ground, or as well as he can when he's tied to a rickety wooden chair.
“I ought to kill you for your little antics.” Jinki gulps, but doesn't respond. His eyes track the movements of the two men standing around him as the older gestures to his son, who then moves forward, closer to Jinki.
“Or perhaps I'll have Taesun knock some sense into you first,” Taemin's father says. Jinki feels his breath come faster, feels himself start to panic as Taesun moves closer still. Jinki catches the glint of Taesun's blade in his belt; the memory of the cold steel biting into the flesh of his throat bursts fresh in his mind, and he presses himself back into the chair.
Taesun doesn't go for the knife, though-not yet. He cracks his knuckles against the palm of his left hand, then pulls his fist back to strike. Jinki squeezes his eyes shut, head instinctively turning away from the impending blow-but it never comes. Instead, Taemin's father laughs again, and Jinki opens his eyes to see him holding up a hand, stopping Taesun.
“But that would be too easy now, wouldn't it?” he says, false amusement cold in his eyes. He smirks, the expression odd on his stodgy, square face. “No,” he's saying now, “I know what gets to people like you.”
There's a commotion then, coming from behind Jinki, as the door is wrenched open and someone is dragged in by a pair of heavy-set men, protests muffled behind one gargantuan hand.
“Taemin,” Jinki breathes. Taemin looks at him, eyes wild, but not in that familiar savage way-he looks terrified, and Jinki feels something in his chest clench. He wants to go to Taemin, but Taesun holds him back as soon as he twitches forward, places a hand on Jinki's chest and presses him bodily back against the blade of his trusty knife, warning. Jinki stills, helpless.
Taemin's father nods at the two men holding Taemin by the arms. The one with a hand over his mouth lets go; Taemin tries to say something, Jinki thinks, but he barely has time to breathe in before it forms a fist and drives into his stomach, hard, and any words that might have formed disappear in a whoosh of exhaled breath. Jinki sucks in a breath. The other man, who's wearing his long hair back in a ponytail, aims a kick at the back of Taemin's knees, and Taemin bends his legs reflexively, crumpling to the floor. The long-haired man continues kicking him, in the ribs now, over and over, and Jinki cries out, his voice mixing with Taemin's yelps of pain.
“Tell them to stop,” Jinki pleads, turning his head to look at Taemin's father. The man stares back, almost but not quite expressionless; Jinki thinks he sees, horrifyingly, a hint of satisfaction on written over his features. “How can you do this?” asks Jinki. “He's your son!”
“All the more reason he must be taught to obey,” says Taemin's father.
Jinki stares for a moment, disbelieving, and then jerks forward again. “Hey,” Taesun barks, and then Jinki has to sit back again, because there's the familiar feel of Taesun's sharp-edged knife pressing into the skin of his throat.
Taemin's cries have died down to whimpers by now. Jinki blinks away the tears in his eyes to see that Taemin's white shirt has been stained bloody, and realizes that they must have broken ribs, that the bone must have pierced skin. “Taemin,” he says again, a low moan.
“Do you get it now?” Taemin's father says, and Jinki turns his eyes back to him. “There is a price to pay for disrespect,” the man continues. “No one crosses us. Do you get that now?”
“I won't do it again,” Jinki swears. “I'll go away, I'll leave Taemin alone-just call them off-just tell them to stop.”
Taemin's father looks pleased, but he doesn't do anything, doesn't say a word or lift a finger to stop the thugs beating his son to a pulp. Jinki curses and turns back to Taemin, who is now curling in on himself, a sobbing wreck on the floor. One of the men nudges him in the side with his foot, rolls him over onto his back. One of Taemin's arms flops bonelessly to the floor, fingers a loose curl at his side. The man raises one heavily booted foot; Jinki realizes what he is about to do a split second before he does it.
The sickening crunch is almost drowned out by Taemin's scream. Jinki shouts, then falls to his knees, sobbing, dissolving into incoherent begging. The foot presses down ruthlessly, twisting, grinding the already broken bones of Taemin's hand into the ground. Taemin screams again, muffled; he's biting his lip against the pain, Jinki realizes, and pleads harder. “Stop it, please, let him go, he's your son,” he says in one long babble, but it's not until the the man has lifted his foot and stomped down once more on Taemin's twisted fingers that Taemin's father clears his throat and holds up a hand.
“All right, that's enough,” he says. It's matter-of-fact and unfeeling-no sign of displeasure at how far his henchmen have gone, nor any hint of remorse for his son. He gestures at his underlings when they look over at him, flicks his fingers in the universal sign of dismissal, and they exit the room without a word.
Taemin's father gestures again, this time at his elder son. “Get him out of my sight,” he says, nodding at Jinki. “And the worthless brat, as well. I trust they've learned their lesson this time.”
Taesun cuts the ropes binding Jinki's hands with one swift swing of his knife and hauls Jinki up by the back of his collar. Jinki is too stunned to fight it, too stunned even to stay steady on his feet, and Taesun half drags him out of the and down the hall. Jinki has almost no recollection of making it back up the basement stairs and to the door, but suddenly he finds himself being thrown out into the fading sunlight, surrounded by the oblivious chirping of crickets, the warm and humid air doing nothing to dry his tear-streaked cheeks.
“Better keep your word,” says Taesun. His voice is stern, but when Jinki turns to look back at him, a soft and dangerous smile is playing about his lips. “Who knows what'll happen next time you decide you can't stay away.” He cocks an eyebrow meaningfully, then steps forward, knife pressing once again against Jinki's back, and ushers Jinki into the waiting car. He shuts the door, then leans down to peer at Jinki through the open window as he says, “Bye now.” He waves. “Have a safe trip!”
The window rolls up then, dark tint gradually obscuring Taesun's face from view, and the car pulls away.
He goes back to his apartment. He goes to class. He finishes school, gets his degree. He serves his mandatory time in the military. He moves back in with his parents while he finds a job. Then, when he finds one, he moves into an apartment a couple of blocks from the company building, a nice one, nicer than the worn-down place he had been living in before.
He would like to be able to say that he forgets Taemin, but he could never forget Taemin.
It's almost doable during the day; Jinki works and types things up on the computer and attends meetings and maybe even sucks up to his boss, turning on charm that he thought he had lost long ago, and some days, the thought of Taemin doesn't even cross his mind. Then he goes home, maybe picks up something to eat on the way, and then-and then.
It's not even the same apartment as before, but Jinki sits down to eat, takes out the paper cartons of food and sinks his chopsticks in, and he sits at the table and looks at the kitchen counter and remembers Taemin, leaning jauntily against the counter and looking up playfully through his bangs, beckoning with only his eyes. Jinki throws away the empty cartons and disposable chopsticks when he's done eating, and watches TV and thinks of Taemin, leaning against him on a different couch, years ago. He showers and remembers Taemin, hair dripping wet, sleek against the curve of his neck. Gets in bed and turns off the lights, and can almost feel the ghost of a memory, a warm weight sharing the blankets, fingers threaded through his own.
Almost. But that's it. Only ever the ghost of fingers against his palm. The Taemin in his memory is only ever a ghost.
He actually does see Taemin-just once.
He hears Taemin's voice first, and thinks he's going crazy, thinks, It's finally happening; I'm finally losing it. He blinks and clears his throat and pulls out a chair at the conference table, takes a seat between two well-groomed men in gray tweed suits.
Then there's a clatter, loud and startling against the soft chatter of businessmen conversing amongst themselves before the start of the meeting. Everyone turns their heads toward the noise, and Jinki looks too.
And he blinks and shakes his head, looks away and then back again; but he still sees the same thing.
Taemin's standing in the hallway just outside the open door of the meeting room. His hair is cut shorter than Jinki remembers, hands clasped loosely around the edge of the binder he'd just dropped and then scrambled to pick up. Taemin's there, staring at Jinki as if seeing a ghost.
Jinki half-stands. Taemin, he thinks, and wants to cross the room in four brisk, easy strides, wants to grab Taemin's arm or cup his face in his hands, because after so long he's not sure that Taemin was even ever really real.
And then he sees the way Taemin's knuckles bell awkwardly in the fingers of his right hand, how he grips his binder with his left hand instead, leaving the right pressed gently flat against the cover instead of holding, how the fingers dangle crookedly, bent at angles that can't be quite natural, and Jinki sits down again. He swallows. The front-desk secretary, guiding Taemin through the corridor, murmurs something to Taemin, a softly lilting question, and touches his elbow. Taemin shakes himself slightly, then smiles at her, seamless and perfect. Jinki finds that his breath stutters a little when he inhales and turns back to face forward in his seat. He smoothes down the edges of his papers and doesn't listen to any of the thousand thoughts hurtling through his head.
Taemin is gone by the time Jinki looks up again. Later, Jinki wanders down the halls, telling himself he's just walking, not looking for Taemin, even though he knows it's a lie. It doesn't matter anyway; Taemin must have left already; he's nowhere to be found.
On his thirtieth birthday, Jinki's expecting to spend a quiet night at home alone. His parents had already visited and celebrated with him the weekend prior, and these days, he has few friends left, and even fewer who would take him out for his birthday, who even remember what day he was born on.
Instead, as he's settling down with a bottle of beer after dinner, the doorbell rings, and he opens the door to someone he hasn't seen in years.
Jinki stares at the smirking figure on his doorstep. Then: “I haven't done anything,” he blurts. “I haven't contacted him, I haven't heard from him, I haven't spoken to him-so please don't-” please don't hurt him, he means to say, but rough laughter cuts him off.
“I know all that already,” says Lee Taesun. He gestures for Jinki to let him in, and Jinki steps back, somewhat dumbfounded.
Taesun looks around, peers into the kitchen, then down the hall, and finally stops in the living room, leaning, all casual nonchalance, against the back of the couch. “Nice place,” he says. “Better than the last, for sure.”
Jinki follows nervously, stands a couple of yards away, arms stiff at his sides. “What,” he says, and then has to swallow past his suddenly dry throat. “What do you want?”
Taesun puts his hands in his pockets, then looks up at Jinki, expression becoming serious. “My father had a stroke,” he says.
“Oh,” says Jinki, after a beat. He wonders if he should offer condolences, but can't quite bring himself to say the words when he thinks of the gruff, stout man who threatened him in his apartment and ordered his underlings to beat his own son to within an inch of his life. He keeps quiet instead.
“He's stable for now,” Taesun continues, “but we all know it's only a matter of time before the old man is out of the game for good.” Taesun stands then, takes his hands out of his pockets, looks Jinki straight in the eye.
“Here's the thing,” he says. “All that shit that went down-that was because Dad wanted Taemin to stop playing around and get serious about the family business. And it worked. Too well, actually. Turns out the little shit is actually really good at the business side of things when he puts his mind to it. Whereas Dad still sees me as just a grunt, someone who can take care of the dirty work for him.” Taesun shifts his weight from one leg to the other. “Dad's choosing an heir soon. Someone to be the head after he retires. I want it to be me. But right now it's looking like it's going to be Taem.”
Jinki's heart is pounding. He hasn't seen Taemin's father for years, but suddenly his mind is filled with images of Taemin becoming as cruel and imposing as that man. He shakes his head a little to clear it.
Taemin's brother continues. “Taemin doesn't even want this life-whether he knows that or not. And you don't want this life for him, do you?”
Jinki swallows hard. “What are you saying,” he says.
Taesun shrugs one shoulder, up, then down. “Our father's too weak now to be able to do anything to either of you,” he says. “The only thing he'd be able to do is disown Taemin, give someone else the position he's about to get. The position I want.” Jinki stares. “I'm saying,” Taesun says, “that if you still want Taemin, now's the time.”
Jinki wants to react, but he's frozen in place, and anyway he doesn't know what to think, what to feel. He stands there, and Taesun pulls a slip of paper from his pocket, sets it on the coffee table before showing himself out of the apartment, giving Jinki a little nod farewell over his shoulder before the door shuts.
Jinki sits heavily on the couch. He reaches out, hand trembling, for the paper Taesun had left; on it is a phone number and an address, and scrawled below, the words Lee Taemin.
Maybe it's a trap. Maybe they weren't satisfied with how they left things five years ago, so they want to lure Jinki in again, test him, and when he shows up to find Taemin, torture them both and kill him.
But Jinki can't shake the niggling thought that maybe, maybe it's real. Maybe Taesun's telling the truth, maybe their father really is indisposed and powerless to hurt them, and maybe Taemin-
Maybe Taemin will still want him too.
So he goes to the address on the paper. It takes him a few days to pluck up the nerve, but then he's going, rides the train three stops, then walks three blocks east and one north, matching the door numbers with the one he's memorized by now, until he gets to the right house.
Jinki rings the doorbell and waits. It's weird, he thinks; he'd always thought that Taemin would live in a huge mansion, or perhaps some dark hideout. He'd never thought of Taemin as living in a perfectly normal townhouse on a perfectly normal street in a perfectly normal part of town.
Jinki hears footsteps approaching from behind the door, and then there's a pause, and a muffled sound that sounds a lot like someone saying, “Fuck.” Another moment passes before the door is pulled open.
Taemin's standing there, looking grim, or anyway annoyed. He crosses his arms across his chest. “What are you doing here,” he says, flatly.
“I-” says Jinki, and then gets distracted by the way Taemin's hair-black now-is falling into his eyes, and by the dark smudges of color and exhaustion and the five years that have passed since he was last this close to Taemin beneath them.
Taemin huffs impatiently. “Never mind,” he says, harsher than Jinki remembers. “Come in before someone sees you.” He pushes the door open wider, just a bit, just enough for Jinki to slip past. Jinki's breath catches in his throat, just the tiniest hitch, as he's pushed up against Taemin for a moment; and then he's through, he's into the open space of Taemin's home, and Taemin's behind him, shutting and locking and latching the door. Jinki watches Taemin to see if he had any hint of the same reaction at being pressed up against Jinki-but Taemin's impassive, face betraying nothing.
Taemin leans against the wall and crosses his arms over his chest. The black of the silk button-up he's wearing is starkly dark before the white paint. The blinds of the living room window are closed, and the room is dim but for the streaks of light that enter through the vertical gaps at the edges, golden light that falls over Taemin's face. Jinki stares at his cheekbones, stares at the hollows that have grown under them in the five years they've been apart.
“Well?” says Taemin.
“Oh,” says Jinki. “I. I. How have you been?”
Taemin sighs. It's an irritated sound, and Jinki winces at himself. “You shouldn't be here,” Taemin tells him.
“I heard about your father,” Jinki blurts. Taemin starts back a little, but then composes himself, raises a cool eyebrow. “And I just thought,” Jinki continues, “that it's okay now, that it'd be safe for me to come find you, and see...” He trails off. Taemin just keeps staring at him, expressionless. Jinki fidgets for a moment, but Taemin doesn't say anything.
“I'm sorry,” says Jinki, and turns to go. “I shouldn't have come here-I shouldn't have expected-I'll go.”
Taemin's fingers suddenly pressing into his wrist stop him. Jinki looks at him in surprise. Taemin's features are contorting; he opens and then closes his mouth as if not trusting himself enough to speak. “Don't,” he says, finally. “You don't have to leave. I don't want you to.”
Jinki takes a step towards Taemin, and then another step closer, experimentally. Taemin's grip on his wrist loosens somewhat; Jinki pulls his hand free, just enough to slip his fingers down and hold Taemin's hand in his own. It's the one that was broken, stomped on; the bones healed knobby and crooked, long digits made inelegant by the injury. “Taemin,” he says.
Taemin avoids his eyes, lashes fluttering down as he looks away. “I never told you,” he says, “not really. I mean, I tried, once, but.” He breaks off, face wrinkling uncomfortably again.
“Do you remember,” he says after a moment, “that time you caught me washing blood off myself in your kitchen? Do you remember what I said to you then?”
Jinki remembers. I don't love you; I've never cared about you; not those words exactly, but that was the gist of it. He nods.
Taemin takes a deep breath. “I lied,” he says.
Jinki is confused for a moment, and then the implication dawns on him, his eyes widening with the realization.
“Not just to you,” Taemin continues. “To myself too. I didn't want those feelings, so I told myself they weren't there, they weren't real. But it never really worked, not really, and I stopped lying to myself when you left, when they broke my hand.” He pauses, swallows. Jinki watches the bobbing of his throat.
“The truth is,” Taemin says, “I-”
Jinki kisses him.
Later, Jinki doesn't know why, doesn't know what made him stop Taemin in his rare moment of honesty. Maybe it's that he'd been scared of what Taemin had been about to say, but he doesn't really think so. Maybe it's that he doesn't need to hear Taemin say the words to know what he means. Or maybe it's that he loves Taemin whether Taemin is honest with him or not.
Or maybe.
Maybe Jinki just wanted to kiss Taemin.
So he does.
tried to break my ontae curse with this fic. not sure if successful.
uhhh, so basically I was reading back over they might be monsters, which is my very first fic ever, and I still quite liked it, so I thought that since that one was kind of jongkey-ish, I should write an ontae sequel. and...this is what came out of it, I guess.
will try to write more fic soon, but I am a slow writer, so don't expect too much from me, hah.
It's hard, too hard, to give up what he's wanted for so long and has only gotten to have for much too brief a time, but Jinki knows what he has to do. Nothing has to change, he tells himself, from the life he's been living for the past few years, the life he was living before Taemin forced his way back in. It'll just be as if Taemin had never come back from Thailand, or Europe, or wherever he was before he appeared in Jinki's apartment that night.
The card Taemin's father left is still on the kitchen counter, right where Taemin had left it. Jinki picks it up, fingers it for a moment before steeling his resolve. He dials the number printed and embossed in black, then folds the card into his pocket. The phone rings only once before a cool female voice speaks.
“Hello, please state your name and purpose,” it says.
“I-Lee Jinki, I'm calling for-for Mr. Lee,” says Jinki, slightly thrown. Stupid, he thinks at himself; it's not as if someone of that level is going to answer his own calls.
“If you leave a message,” says the woman on the other end, “I can pass it on to him.”
Jinki pauses for a moment, then says, “Tell him I'll do it. Tell him Taemin should be coming by today, and I'll take care of it then.”
Right on cue, the door to his apartment clicks as its lock is picked, and then swings open. Jinki turns, and Taemin is toeing off his shoes in the entryway.
“I will tell him,” says the voice. “Is there anything else?”
“No,” says Jinki, eyes not leaving Taemin's. “No, that's it; thank you.” He hangs up the phone as Taemin comes through the open doorway into the kitchen.
“Who were you talking to?” Taemin asks.
Jinki ignores his question. “Taemin,” he says. “I need to talk to you.” Taemin eyes him warily, folds his arms over his chest. Jinki swallows. “I need-” his voice breaks, and he clears his throat and tries again, but his voice doesn't seem to want to cooperate. He stands there and looks at the floor, focuses just on breathing in and then out.
“I can't,” he blurts. “Everything-your family, what you do, all the violence, who you are-I thought I could deal with it, but I can't.” He takes a deep, shuddering breath. “I want you to go away,” he says. “I want you out of my life again.”
Taemin is dead silent. Jinki scuffs his feet against the worn linoleum. The compressor on the refrigerator whirs on; a motorcycle roars by outside. Then Taemin crumples in on himself suddenly, slouching against the doorframe. Jinki wants to squeeze his eyes shut, so he doesn't have to see; he wants to go to Taemin in two brisk strides, pull him close and apologize for lying. Instead, he digs his thumbnail into the bone of his other wrist and counts to ten in his mind as he waits for Taemin to say something.
Taemin straightens up. “I see what this is about,” he says, and his voice is unexpectedly clear. He takes a step forward, uncrosses his arms and hooks his thumbs into his belt loops. He's almost smiling-but the upwards tilt of his mouth is unpleasantly lopsided. “This is about my family, isn't it?” he says. “This is about the offer my dad made you.”
Jinki's eyes widen. For a moment he doesn't even know if he's still breathing.
“Fine,” Taemin says. The corners of his mouth twist downward in a sneer. “If that's the way you want it, then fine.”
“Taemin?” says Jinki, uncertainly.
“The way I see it,” Taemin continues, “you're either a coward or a whore.” Jinki starts at that, blinks twice in confusion. Taemin meets his eyes squarely as he says, “Either you're scared of my father and are bowing to his will, or you purposely lured me into bed so you could dump me afterwards and collect the money. Either way,” he concludes, “I don't want anything to do with you.”
And with that, he turns tail and pushes his way back out of Jinki's apartment and out of Jinki's life.
Jinki's an idiot. He realizes this slowly over the next twelve days. It's a short time-less than two weeks even, a short time to be without Taemin considering Jinki's spent the last three years not knowing where Taemin was. And yet, it feels unbearably long. Jinki misses Taemin, and he knew he would, he'd expected to, but he hadn't expected to wake up in the mornings barely registering the light, only knowing that something must have clawed out his heart during the night, because what else could this empty place in him be?
It's not just Taemin's absence. It's not just Taemin leaving. It's that Jinki was the one who'd pushed him away. All this time, he'd wanted Taemin more than anything in the world, and just when he finally had him, he'd ruined everything, and it wasn't anyone's fault but his own.
Why had he been so afraid? Jinki forgets more of the reasons why every day after Taemin left. He'd wanted to make things easier for the both of them, wanted Taemin's family to treat him better, and wanted to avoid getting himself killed. But Taemin had been so furious when he'd figured out what Jinki was doing, and as for the other thing-now that Taemin is gone, Jinki realizes it doesn't matter what Taemin's family does to him, as long as it means he can have one day, one hour, one second more with Taemin.
But Taemin's gone, and it's too late now for those kinds of thoughts.
It's not too late.
That's what Jinki thinks when he sees Taemin buying food from a street-side vendor in the early evening.
“Taemin,” he says before he can fully think it through. Taemin turns at the sound of his name. His eyes narrow when he sees Jinki, face completely closing itself off. He takes his food in its little plastic baggy and slides a crumpled bill across the counter, then turns and leaves without saying anything, without even sparing Jinki a second look.
Jinki follows him. Taemin walks briskly, taking twists and turns through the streets. Jinki jogs to catch up, and Taemin quickens his pace even more, walks down smaller and smaller alleys, taking Jinki through secret corners of the city he's never even known existed.
“Taemin,” Jinki says as he closes the distance between them, and grabs at Taemin's arm. Taemin's face twists nastily; then he steels his expression, smoothing away the creases in his brow by force. He doesn't say anything, just pulls his arm away from Jinki, puts his hands in his pockets, and strolls away again.
Jinki follows him. “Taemin,” he says again. “I was wrong,” he says. “I just thought we'd be better off-that things would be easier for you if I broke things off with you.” Taemin continues to ignore him, except for a slight quickening of his pace. Jinki broadens his strides as well to keep up. “It wasn't about the money,” he says. “It was never about the money; I don't care about that.” Taemin doesn't even look at him, so Jinki reaches out for him again.
“Taemin-”
Taemin turns then, turns around, shakes Jinki's hand from his shoulder, and punches Jinki in the face, all in one smooth, fluid motion. Jinki swears and stumbles, reaches to clutch at his nose, feel if it's broken, but Taemin doesn't let him, grabs Jinki's shirt collar and pushes him up against the alley wall before Jinki can even bring his hand up. It's not that skinny, lithe Taemin is stronger than Jinki, but he's stronger than he looks, and with the added element of surprise, that's enough to overpower Jinki.
He kisses Jinki. Jinki's head slams back into brick from the force of it; the noise of pain he makes is lost into Taemin's mouth.
“Taemin, what,” says Jinki, and then doesn't know the words for the question he means to ask.
“Don't you know?” asks Taemin. There's a pleading note to his voice, Jinki thinks, something he's never heard from Taemin, cheerily teasing Taemin, sarcastically sinister Taemin. But Jinki's not sure what it is Taemin wants so badly for him to know, so he doesn't say anything. “Never mind,” says Taemin, ending on a sigh. He steps away; Jinki thinks for a moment he's going to turn and leave, but instead he hooks a finger through Jinki's belt loop, pulls him along.
“Let's go,” he says, and Jinki thinks he should ask where, but the truth is he'd follow Taemin anywhere, always.
“I love you,” Jinki says, later.
“Yes,” replies Taemin, and arches up, and digs blunt nails into Jinki's arms.
He wakes up and doesn't know why. It's dark but for the faintly illuminated digits on his alarm clock: 3:44AM, they read. Taemin is asleep beside him, face smoothed out into a peaceful expression he rarely carries while awake. Jinki watches him for a few moments; fondness twists at his heart, and he rests a hand on Taemin's shoulder. It rises and falls with Taemin's slow, deep breaths.
Then, abruptly, Jinki becomes aware of the reason for his sudden awakening: there's someone in the apartment. He hears, just barely, low murmurs in living room, the soft rustling sounds of feet brushing along carpet. He sits up, shakes Taemin awake-but before he can rouse Taemin, the door to the bedroom is flung open, and in the same instant, the hall light flickers on. Jinki blinks against the brightness, shields his eyes, but can only make out the backlit silhouettes of three figures.
Taemin stirs, blinks blearily and mumbles something unintelligible against Jinki's side. The sound seems to trigger the men in the doorway: they move forward in broad strides-one hits Jinki in the head, hard, and then again. Jinki barely registers the shadowy figure of another man grabbing for a Taemin who is suddenly alert as well before he's gone, mind swirling into dark oblivion.
He wakes up with his hands tied behind his back; the coarse texture of the rope against the tender skin of his wrists is the first thing he registers. He twists and turns them, uselessly, and then blinks and coughs and clears his dry throat.
“Welcome to our humble abode,” comes a voice. Jinki lifts his head and when his vision focuses, Lee Taesun is sitting in front of him. He stands as Jinki looks around, takes in his surroundings. “Well,” Taesun amends his earlier statement, “our humble headquarters, anyway.”
“Why,” starts Jinki, then thinks of a more pressing question. “Where's Taemin?”
Taesun ignores him. “You took our money and then went back on your word,” he says. “That constitutes stealing, you know.”
“The money's still there,” says Jinki. “You can have it back; I haven't touched it.”
Taesun opens his mouth to laugh, only it's not Taesun's laugh that Jinki hears. The voice he hears is deeper, gruffer, and Jinki turns to see Taemin's father coming into the room. Taesun immediately stands up straighter, face going professional in an instant.
“Smart boy like you should know better than that,” says Taemin's father. “You should know that's not how it works.”
And he does know, Jinki supposes, although he'd tried hard to pretend he didn't. Still, he shows no expression on his face, no sign of giving in, of weakness. He stands his ground, or as well as he can when he's tied to a rickety wooden chair.
“I ought to kill you for your little antics.” Jinki gulps, but doesn't respond. His eyes track the movements of the two men standing around him as the older gestures to his son, who then moves forward, closer to Jinki.
“Or perhaps I'll have Taesun knock some sense into you first,” Taemin's father says. Jinki feels his breath come faster, feels himself start to panic as Taesun moves closer still. Jinki catches the glint of Taesun's blade in his belt; the memory of the cold steel biting into the flesh of his throat bursts fresh in his mind, and he presses himself back into the chair.
Taesun doesn't go for the knife, though-not yet. He cracks his knuckles against the palm of his left hand, then pulls his fist back to strike. Jinki squeezes his eyes shut, head instinctively turning away from the impending blow-but it never comes. Instead, Taemin's father laughs again, and Jinki opens his eyes to see him holding up a hand, stopping Taesun.
“But that would be too easy now, wouldn't it?” he says, false amusement cold in his eyes. He smirks, the expression odd on his stodgy, square face. “No,” he's saying now, “I know what gets to people like you.”
There's a commotion then, coming from behind Jinki, as the door is wrenched open and someone is dragged in by a pair of heavy-set men, protests muffled behind one gargantuan hand.
“Taemin,” Jinki breathes. Taemin looks at him, eyes wild, but not in that familiar savage way-he looks terrified, and Jinki feels something in his chest clench. He wants to go to Taemin, but Taesun holds him back as soon as he twitches forward, places a hand on Jinki's chest and presses him bodily back against the blade of his trusty knife, warning. Jinki stills, helpless.
Taemin's father nods at the two men holding Taemin by the arms. The one with a hand over his mouth lets go; Taemin tries to say something, Jinki thinks, but he barely has time to breathe in before it forms a fist and drives into his stomach, hard, and any words that might have formed disappear in a whoosh of exhaled breath. Jinki sucks in a breath. The other man, who's wearing his long hair back in a ponytail, aims a kick at the back of Taemin's knees, and Taemin bends his legs reflexively, crumpling to the floor. The long-haired man continues kicking him, in the ribs now, over and over, and Jinki cries out, his voice mixing with Taemin's yelps of pain.
“Tell them to stop,” Jinki pleads, turning his head to look at Taemin's father. The man stares back, almost but not quite expressionless; Jinki thinks he sees, horrifyingly, a hint of satisfaction on written over his features. “How can you do this?” asks Jinki. “He's your son!”
“All the more reason he must be taught to obey,” says Taemin's father.
Jinki stares for a moment, disbelieving, and then jerks forward again. “Hey,” Taesun barks, and then Jinki has to sit back again, because there's the familiar feel of Taesun's sharp-edged knife pressing into the skin of his throat.
Taemin's cries have died down to whimpers by now. Jinki blinks away the tears in his eyes to see that Taemin's white shirt has been stained bloody, and realizes that they must have broken ribs, that the bone must have pierced skin. “Taemin,” he says again, a low moan.
“Do you get it now?” Taemin's father says, and Jinki turns his eyes back to him. “There is a price to pay for disrespect,” the man continues. “No one crosses us. Do you get that now?”
“I won't do it again,” Jinki swears. “I'll go away, I'll leave Taemin alone-just call them off-just tell them to stop.”
Taemin's father looks pleased, but he doesn't do anything, doesn't say a word or lift a finger to stop the thugs beating his son to a pulp. Jinki curses and turns back to Taemin, who is now curling in on himself, a sobbing wreck on the floor. One of the men nudges him in the side with his foot, rolls him over onto his back. One of Taemin's arms flops bonelessly to the floor, fingers a loose curl at his side. The man raises one heavily booted foot; Jinki realizes what he is about to do a split second before he does it.
The sickening crunch is almost drowned out by Taemin's scream. Jinki shouts, then falls to his knees, sobbing, dissolving into incoherent begging. The foot presses down ruthlessly, twisting, grinding the already broken bones of Taemin's hand into the ground. Taemin screams again, muffled; he's biting his lip against the pain, Jinki realizes, and pleads harder. “Stop it, please, let him go, he's your son,” he says in one long babble, but it's not until the the man has lifted his foot and stomped down once more on Taemin's twisted fingers that Taemin's father clears his throat and holds up a hand.
“All right, that's enough,” he says. It's matter-of-fact and unfeeling-no sign of displeasure at how far his henchmen have gone, nor any hint of remorse for his son. He gestures at his underlings when they look over at him, flicks his fingers in the universal sign of dismissal, and they exit the room without a word.
Taemin's father gestures again, this time at his elder son. “Get him out of my sight,” he says, nodding at Jinki. “And the worthless brat, as well. I trust they've learned their lesson this time.”
Taesun cuts the ropes binding Jinki's hands with one swift swing of his knife and hauls Jinki up by the back of his collar. Jinki is too stunned to fight it, too stunned even to stay steady on his feet, and Taesun half drags him out of the and down the hall. Jinki has almost no recollection of making it back up the basement stairs and to the door, but suddenly he finds himself being thrown out into the fading sunlight, surrounded by the oblivious chirping of crickets, the warm and humid air doing nothing to dry his tear-streaked cheeks.
“Better keep your word,” says Taesun. His voice is stern, but when Jinki turns to look back at him, a soft and dangerous smile is playing about his lips. “Who knows what'll happen next time you decide you can't stay away.” He cocks an eyebrow meaningfully, then steps forward, knife pressing once again against Jinki's back, and ushers Jinki into the waiting car. He shuts the door, then leans down to peer at Jinki through the open window as he says, “Bye now.” He waves. “Have a safe trip!”
The window rolls up then, dark tint gradually obscuring Taesun's face from view, and the car pulls away.
He goes back to his apartment. He goes to class. He finishes school, gets his degree. He serves his mandatory time in the military. He moves back in with his parents while he finds a job. Then, when he finds one, he moves into an apartment a couple of blocks from the company building, a nice one, nicer than the worn-down place he had been living in before.
He would like to be able to say that he forgets Taemin, but he could never forget Taemin.
It's almost doable during the day; Jinki works and types things up on the computer and attends meetings and maybe even sucks up to his boss, turning on charm that he thought he had lost long ago, and some days, the thought of Taemin doesn't even cross his mind. Then he goes home, maybe picks up something to eat on the way, and then-and then.
It's not even the same apartment as before, but Jinki sits down to eat, takes out the paper cartons of food and sinks his chopsticks in, and he sits at the table and looks at the kitchen counter and remembers Taemin, leaning jauntily against the counter and looking up playfully through his bangs, beckoning with only his eyes. Jinki throws away the empty cartons and disposable chopsticks when he's done eating, and watches TV and thinks of Taemin, leaning against him on a different couch, years ago. He showers and remembers Taemin, hair dripping wet, sleek against the curve of his neck. Gets in bed and turns off the lights, and can almost feel the ghost of a memory, a warm weight sharing the blankets, fingers threaded through his own.
Almost. But that's it. Only ever the ghost of fingers against his palm. The Taemin in his memory is only ever a ghost.
He actually does see Taemin-just once.
He hears Taemin's voice first, and thinks he's going crazy, thinks, It's finally happening; I'm finally losing it. He blinks and clears his throat and pulls out a chair at the conference table, takes a seat between two well-groomed men in gray tweed suits.
Then there's a clatter, loud and startling against the soft chatter of businessmen conversing amongst themselves before the start of the meeting. Everyone turns their heads toward the noise, and Jinki looks too.
And he blinks and shakes his head, looks away and then back again; but he still sees the same thing.
Taemin's standing in the hallway just outside the open door of the meeting room. His hair is cut shorter than Jinki remembers, hands clasped loosely around the edge of the binder he'd just dropped and then scrambled to pick up. Taemin's there, staring at Jinki as if seeing a ghost.
Jinki half-stands. Taemin, he thinks, and wants to cross the room in four brisk, easy strides, wants to grab Taemin's arm or cup his face in his hands, because after so long he's not sure that Taemin was even ever really real.
And then he sees the way Taemin's knuckles bell awkwardly in the fingers of his right hand, how he grips his binder with his left hand instead, leaving the right pressed gently flat against the cover instead of holding, how the fingers dangle crookedly, bent at angles that can't be quite natural, and Jinki sits down again. He swallows. The front-desk secretary, guiding Taemin through the corridor, murmurs something to Taemin, a softly lilting question, and touches his elbow. Taemin shakes himself slightly, then smiles at her, seamless and perfect. Jinki finds that his breath stutters a little when he inhales and turns back to face forward in his seat. He smoothes down the edges of his papers and doesn't listen to any of the thousand thoughts hurtling through his head.
Taemin is gone by the time Jinki looks up again. Later, Jinki wanders down the halls, telling himself he's just walking, not looking for Taemin, even though he knows it's a lie. It doesn't matter anyway; Taemin must have left already; he's nowhere to be found.
On his thirtieth birthday, Jinki's expecting to spend a quiet night at home alone. His parents had already visited and celebrated with him the weekend prior, and these days, he has few friends left, and even fewer who would take him out for his birthday, who even remember what day he was born on.
Instead, as he's settling down with a bottle of beer after dinner, the doorbell rings, and he opens the door to someone he hasn't seen in years.
Jinki stares at the smirking figure on his doorstep. Then: “I haven't done anything,” he blurts. “I haven't contacted him, I haven't heard from him, I haven't spoken to him-so please don't-” please don't hurt him, he means to say, but rough laughter cuts him off.
“I know all that already,” says Lee Taesun. He gestures for Jinki to let him in, and Jinki steps back, somewhat dumbfounded.
Taesun looks around, peers into the kitchen, then down the hall, and finally stops in the living room, leaning, all casual nonchalance, against the back of the couch. “Nice place,” he says. “Better than the last, for sure.”
Jinki follows nervously, stands a couple of yards away, arms stiff at his sides. “What,” he says, and then has to swallow past his suddenly dry throat. “What do you want?”
Taesun puts his hands in his pockets, then looks up at Jinki, expression becoming serious. “My father had a stroke,” he says.
“Oh,” says Jinki, after a beat. He wonders if he should offer condolences, but can't quite bring himself to say the words when he thinks of the gruff, stout man who threatened him in his apartment and ordered his underlings to beat his own son to within an inch of his life. He keeps quiet instead.
“He's stable for now,” Taesun continues, “but we all know it's only a matter of time before the old man is out of the game for good.” Taesun stands then, takes his hands out of his pockets, looks Jinki straight in the eye.
“Here's the thing,” he says. “All that shit that went down-that was because Dad wanted Taemin to stop playing around and get serious about the family business. And it worked. Too well, actually. Turns out the little shit is actually really good at the business side of things when he puts his mind to it. Whereas Dad still sees me as just a grunt, someone who can take care of the dirty work for him.” Taesun shifts his weight from one leg to the other. “Dad's choosing an heir soon. Someone to be the head after he retires. I want it to be me. But right now it's looking like it's going to be Taem.”
Jinki's heart is pounding. He hasn't seen Taemin's father for years, but suddenly his mind is filled with images of Taemin becoming as cruel and imposing as that man. He shakes his head a little to clear it.
Taemin's brother continues. “Taemin doesn't even want this life-whether he knows that or not. And you don't want this life for him, do you?”
Jinki swallows hard. “What are you saying,” he says.
Taesun shrugs one shoulder, up, then down. “Our father's too weak now to be able to do anything to either of you,” he says. “The only thing he'd be able to do is disown Taemin, give someone else the position he's about to get. The position I want.” Jinki stares. “I'm saying,” Taesun says, “that if you still want Taemin, now's the time.”
Jinki wants to react, but he's frozen in place, and anyway he doesn't know what to think, what to feel. He stands there, and Taesun pulls a slip of paper from his pocket, sets it on the coffee table before showing himself out of the apartment, giving Jinki a little nod farewell over his shoulder before the door shuts.
Jinki sits heavily on the couch. He reaches out, hand trembling, for the paper Taesun had left; on it is a phone number and an address, and scrawled below, the words Lee Taemin.
Maybe it's a trap. Maybe they weren't satisfied with how they left things five years ago, so they want to lure Jinki in again, test him, and when he shows up to find Taemin, torture them both and kill him.
But Jinki can't shake the niggling thought that maybe, maybe it's real. Maybe Taesun's telling the truth, maybe their father really is indisposed and powerless to hurt them, and maybe Taemin-
Maybe Taemin will still want him too.
So he goes to the address on the paper. It takes him a few days to pluck up the nerve, but then he's going, rides the train three stops, then walks three blocks east and one north, matching the door numbers with the one he's memorized by now, until he gets to the right house.
Jinki rings the doorbell and waits. It's weird, he thinks; he'd always thought that Taemin would live in a huge mansion, or perhaps some dark hideout. He'd never thought of Taemin as living in a perfectly normal townhouse on a perfectly normal street in a perfectly normal part of town.
Jinki hears footsteps approaching from behind the door, and then there's a pause, and a muffled sound that sounds a lot like someone saying, “Fuck.” Another moment passes before the door is pulled open.
Taemin's standing there, looking grim, or anyway annoyed. He crosses his arms across his chest. “What are you doing here,” he says, flatly.
“I-” says Jinki, and then gets distracted by the way Taemin's hair-black now-is falling into his eyes, and by the dark smudges of color and exhaustion and the five years that have passed since he was last this close to Taemin beneath them.
Taemin huffs impatiently. “Never mind,” he says, harsher than Jinki remembers. “Come in before someone sees you.” He pushes the door open wider, just a bit, just enough for Jinki to slip past. Jinki's breath catches in his throat, just the tiniest hitch, as he's pushed up against Taemin for a moment; and then he's through, he's into the open space of Taemin's home, and Taemin's behind him, shutting and locking and latching the door. Jinki watches Taemin to see if he had any hint of the same reaction at being pressed up against Jinki-but Taemin's impassive, face betraying nothing.
Taemin leans against the wall and crosses his arms over his chest. The black of the silk button-up he's wearing is starkly dark before the white paint. The blinds of the living room window are closed, and the room is dim but for the streaks of light that enter through the vertical gaps at the edges, golden light that falls over Taemin's face. Jinki stares at his cheekbones, stares at the hollows that have grown under them in the five years they've been apart.
“Well?” says Taemin.
“Oh,” says Jinki. “I. I. How have you been?”
Taemin sighs. It's an irritated sound, and Jinki winces at himself. “You shouldn't be here,” Taemin tells him.
“I heard about your father,” Jinki blurts. Taemin starts back a little, but then composes himself, raises a cool eyebrow. “And I just thought,” Jinki continues, “that it's okay now, that it'd be safe for me to come find you, and see...” He trails off. Taemin just keeps staring at him, expressionless. Jinki fidgets for a moment, but Taemin doesn't say anything.
“I'm sorry,” says Jinki, and turns to go. “I shouldn't have come here-I shouldn't have expected-I'll go.”
Taemin's fingers suddenly pressing into his wrist stop him. Jinki looks at him in surprise. Taemin's features are contorting; he opens and then closes his mouth as if not trusting himself enough to speak. “Don't,” he says, finally. “You don't have to leave. I don't want you to.”
Jinki takes a step towards Taemin, and then another step closer, experimentally. Taemin's grip on his wrist loosens somewhat; Jinki pulls his hand free, just enough to slip his fingers down and hold Taemin's hand in his own. It's the one that was broken, stomped on; the bones healed knobby and crooked, long digits made inelegant by the injury. “Taemin,” he says.
Taemin avoids his eyes, lashes fluttering down as he looks away. “I never told you,” he says, “not really. I mean, I tried, once, but.” He breaks off, face wrinkling uncomfortably again.
“Do you remember,” he says after a moment, “that time you caught me washing blood off myself in your kitchen? Do you remember what I said to you then?”
Jinki remembers. I don't love you; I've never cared about you; not those words exactly, but that was the gist of it. He nods.
Taemin takes a deep breath. “I lied,” he says.
Jinki is confused for a moment, and then the implication dawns on him, his eyes widening with the realization.
“Not just to you,” Taemin continues. “To myself too. I didn't want those feelings, so I told myself they weren't there, they weren't real. But it never really worked, not really, and I stopped lying to myself when you left, when they broke my hand.” He pauses, swallows. Jinki watches the bobbing of his throat.
“The truth is,” Taemin says, “I-”
Jinki kisses him.
Later, Jinki doesn't know why, doesn't know what made him stop Taemin in his rare moment of honesty. Maybe it's that he'd been scared of what Taemin had been about to say, but he doesn't really think so. Maybe it's that he doesn't need to hear Taemin say the words to know what he means. Or maybe it's that he loves Taemin whether Taemin is honest with him or not.
Or maybe.
Maybe Jinki just wanted to kiss Taemin.
So he does.
tried to break my ontae curse with this fic. not sure if successful.
uhhh, so basically I was reading back over they might be monsters, which is my very first fic ever, and I still quite liked it, so I thought that since that one was kind of jongkey-ish, I should write an ontae sequel. and...this is what came out of it, I guess.
will try to write more fic soon, but I am a slow writer, so don't expect too much from me, hah.