Crush'd
Title: Crush’d (Part 1/4)
Pairing: Onew/Taemin
Rating: R
Warnings: Violence/ Assault/ non-con/ domestic violence/abuse
Final Word Count: 28136
Jinki recalled the day he first saw Lee Taemin very clearly. They had never met, and even though they attended the same university, Jinki was positive that he had never even seen the boy before. After all, he was almost positive that he would have remembered someone like Taemin. At the time, Taemin had been standing across the courtyard, smile positively greasy as he leaned against the girl he had an arm slung around, thumb tucked loosely into his belt. Anyone looking at him would have been able to tell that Lee Taemin was not exactly a fairytale prince, but Jinki thought differently.
Looking at Taemin gave Jinki tunnel vision, everything but his striking profile blurring into white noise. To Jinki, Taemin’s hair practically glittered, shining blonde in a way that Jinki had only seen in cheesy romance comics. Watching him stand there all pretty in the sunlight, Jinki felt like he had had the air knocked out of him, choking on the spit that he hadn’t realized had collected under his tongue. Conveniently enough, though, everything began to move in slow motion while he took a moment to collect himself, adjusting the collar of his shirt that hadn’t been choking him until that moment.
After a beat or two of pointlessly fumbling around with his hair and trying to calm the rapid pounding of his heart in his chest, he became aware that things had not, in fact, been moving in slow motion at all. Even Kibum had stopped whatever it was he was saying to try and snap Jinki out of his daze.
“-inki. Jinki. Old man. Old. Man. Really?” Kibum’s voice was growing more and more exasperated and eventually, he resorted to physical violence, as he often did, shaking Jinki’s shoulders roughly.
Jinki blinked out of his haze and smiled widely. “What’s up?”
“What do you mean ‘What’s up’?” Kibum asked rhetorically “You’ve been ignoring me for the past ten minutes. Rude.”
Jinki’s face went blank for a moment, brain still scrambling to focus on something that wasn’t the blonde boy across the courtyard, before he rearranged his expression into something as unthreatening as possible, smile just a bit too wide. “Sorry! I just got lost in my thoughts!”
Kibum rolled his eyes in that way of his that said enough about what he thought of Jinki’s intelligence for Jinki to wince slightly. “Whatever. Anyways I--”
Jinki tuned him out again and swung his gaze across the courtyard, trying to locate the boy with the sparkly fairy hair. It didn’t take long spotting the spec of blonde in a sea of black and brown. The sun seemed to be drawn to him with the way that it appeared to shine a spotlight on that little spot of grass on which he stood. Jinki allowed his face soften into something gentle, absorbing the warmth that the boy let off like a flower in bloom, and he felt his eyes crinkle happily when the boy tilted his head back and laughed without restraint, lifting a small hand up to his mouth as if to hold in the sound. Zeroing in on the boy’s short fingernails, Jinki wondered if he was in the habit of biting them.
Jinki felt his body moving and noticed that the boy was getting further away. He snapped his attention to the hand that was around his wrist dragging him back inside for his next class. Jinki made himself tune back into Kibum’s rambling in case he missed anything that he would be questioned on later. Thankfully, Kibum was too absorbed in what he was talking about to pay attention to the fact that Jinki hadn’t been listening to him, at all. Not that Kibum cared much now that the initial scolding was out of the way. Kibum didn’t want someone to actually listen to him and comment on what he was saying. Sometimes, Jinki thought that Kibum just liked to listen to the sound of his own voice. Which was fine for Jinki, who was often quiet and a bit reserved.
Once they were inside and the air conditioner had slammed into them like a bucket of ice water, Jinki gained some control of his movements and turned off his auto pilot, preparing himself for his Medieval History lecture. Kibum, however, seemed to shut down as soon as the professor walked in. Unlike Jinki, who actually enjoyed history, Kibum was just taking the class to fulfill a general education requirement. Jinki could almost taste how bored Kibum was from the way he was slumped against the table and twirling his wooden pencil around his fingers with an expertise that only a student who had made not paying attention a profession could. Jinki was pretty sure that his pencil wasn’t even sharpened.
Jinki, however, was fully prepared for class, as always. His one-subject spiral notebook was laid out neatly in front of him, a pencil and a ballpoint pen lying in two exact parallel lines. He liked for things to be in order like that. The lecture proceeded as it always did, but somehow, Jinki found himself thinking about other things. Things like blonde hair and pitch black roots. Eyes that glisten with mirth. Lips that tease at a smile.
Angels standing in the sun.
~~~
The next day, Jinki made sure to place himself in the courtyard at the exact same time that he had stood there the previous day. Without Kibum there to distract from the fact that he was flat out staring at someone, he occupied himself with his history textbook, flipping through pages distractedly as his eyes scanned the courtyard with more focus than a security camera.
Again, it didn’t take long to find him, striking as he was. Today, Jinki was enamored with the roundness of the boy’s cheeks, only really noticing them when the blonde’s hand had reached up distractedly to scratch at one. Jinki liked the way his cheeks puffed out when he was wearing irritation on his face, swelling around his eyes and forcing them into crescents. Jinki enjoyed the static that filled his brain and the thump-thumping of his heart at the sight and with a gentle sigh, he allowed his mind to drift far away. He was so caught up in the way the blonde’s lips curved slightly into a little smile when he talked that he didn’t pay any attention to the fact that the boy had turned his eyes in Jinki’s direction. He did, however, notice the slight downturning of the boy’s lips and that urged Jinki to drag his eyes up his face to meet his gaze. Jinki was immediately aware of the confusion in them and the furrow of his brow. Jinki thought he looked cute like that. Confused.
Jinki managed to shake himself out of his thoughts long enough to shift his expression into something disarming. He hadn’t meant to scare the boy, he just couldn’t quite reign in his admiration and wasn’t sure how to approach him. Jinki had never been good at that kind of thing. That’s why he was such good friends with Kibum who seemed to talk enough for the both of them.
The boy’s mouth hesitantly drizzled into a shy smile, eyes calm and slightly mischievous. Jinki was relieved. He didn’t want to imagine that he had ruined his chances before he had even really had a grasp of them. He noticed that the boy began to move towards him, but unfortunately, Jinki had to go to his history lecture. He cursed his luck.
He bowed slightly in apology and rushed off to class, banishing his disappointment to a deep part of his mind to turn over later.
~~~
After the incident in which he was almost discovered, Jinki decided to lay low for a while, forbidding himself from standing in the courtyard for too long until he was sure that the coast was clear. Two days later, Jinki was swept away by the way his nose curved gently at the tip, hooked in a way that Jinki found endearing. He liked the way that it crinkled with his eyes when he smiled, which he seemed to do a lot of. It was a nice nose, not pointed and tiny like some of the ones that he had seen on other students after a nose job. Jinki could tell that he had had some work done in the past with the way that it seemed to want to turn forward when he laughed too hard and the occupation that his hands seemed to have with it, pushing at it in a way that was almost like he was making sure it was still in place. Jinki wondered if it made him feel self conscious.
His phone buzzed in his pocket, shaking him from his thoughts so suddenly that it left him a little breathless. He lifted his phone out of his pocket, rubbing a thumb on the cracked surface before flipping it open.
“H-Hello..?” He managed to get out, grasping at his shirt in an attempt to slow his heart beat.
“Where are you?” He heard Kibum snap on the other line. “You’re late for your advisor meeting. You’re lucky I’m such a good friend.”
Jinki burst into a sprint, instantly forgetting the boy that he had been watching. “Oh my gosh! Thank you, Kibum!”
Kibum huffed happily and hung up on him.
This pattern of Jinki admiring the boy from a far and Kibum yelling at him for not paying attention continued for quite some time until a few weeks later, Kibum’s growing frustration drove him to corner his friend.
“What’s gotten into you lately?” Jinki heard Kibum say, mind waking slowly from the deep sleep that the gentle curl of Taemin’s eyelashes had put his consciousness in.
Jinki smiled in a way that he hoped was reassuring.
“What do you mean by that?”
Kibum huffed and Jinki could tell that that meant he was getting irritated. “You’ve been dodging me all week and your head has been in the clouds way more than usual.”
Jinki’s eyes unintentionally drifted over to the boy, once more, observing the way that his lips thinned and pouted as he talked. He was careful when he enunciated.
Kibum must have followed his line of sight because after a half second of peering across the courtyard and piercing his lips, he was patting Jinki’s shoulder and shaking his head. “You poor sap.”
Jinki was instantly confused. “What do you mean by that?”
“You’ve caught the Lee Taemin Bug.” The matter-of-fact way that Kibum spoke informed Jinki that this was something of an epidemic that only he was unaware of. Typical.
“The what?”
“That’s Lee Taemin. Campus cutie.” Kibum crossed his arms over his chest and continued to shake his head disappointedly. “Why couldn’t you like someone nice like Minho?”
“I don’t like him…” Jinki mumbled, cheeks warming in embarrassment.
“You totally do.” Kibum asserted. “You’ve been giving him goo-goo eyes for weeks now!”
Jinki gasped. “I-I have not! I do not...do...that…” His sentence lost some of its force as his voice was swallowed up by his embarrassment.
He attempted to digest some of what Kibum had been saying. Jinki was disappointed that the boy whom he had been so obsessed with wasn’t the angelic figure that Jinki had painted in his mind. However, when Jinki looked in his direction again, he couldn’t see anything but a cheerful, nice person standing there. There was just no way that someone who looked gentle and kind could be as terrible as Kibum was making him out to be. At the very least, Kibum had provided him with a name.
Lee Taemin. Jinki rolled the syllables around in his brain and let his mouth wrap soundlessly around it. It was at once beautiful to him, melodic in a way. Jinki loved it. He felt his lips curling up at the thought of the closeness that knowing the boys name had given him to the object of his affections. He smiled too wide in the way that he usually did.
Kibum roughly shook his shoulders. “Earth to Jinki! Come back to me, Jinki!”
“Sorry about that.” Jinki apologized weakly, rubbing the back of his head in a way that he knew looked sheepish.
“Anyways, are we still on for tonight?” Kibum was already barely paying him any mind, fixing his hair in the reflection of the window they were standing by.
Jinki’s brows furrowed. “What’s going on tonight?”
“You know. Jonghyun’s house warming party. I told you about this a week ago.”
Jinki didn’t remember, but he knew better than to say so. “Oh yeah. Sure!”
Kibum was suspicious but obviously didn’t care too much by the way that he went back to fixing his hair. “Come by my dorm at nine, we’ll go together.”
Jinki grinned widely again and agreed. He hoped that maybe the party would take his mind off of the way the light reflected in Taemin’s eyes. Besides, he really enjoyed Jonghyun’s company and hoped the get together would give him some time to catch up with some of the people he had been progressively ignoring as the semester drew closer to finals.
With his head still drifting in the clouds, he made his way to lecture.
~~~~~~
Jonghyun’s party was not, in fact, a small get together. Rather, it was a bustling house party that had obviously started to overwhelm the host. By the time Kibum and Jinki had waded through the masses of people crowded around the entrance to the kitchen, the crease between Jonghyun’s brows was deeper than the Grand Canyon.
Kibum was about to reach out to him when he was suddenly being pulled away by someone he knew. Instead, he sunk his nails into Jinki’s shoulder and yelled over the loud music that Jinki should offer to help him. With that said, Kibum was lost to the crowd with the flick of a wrist and a loud cackle.
So much for going together.
Jinki was all too familiar with this aspect of Kibum, though. Kibum knew everyone and expecting him to go to a party without running into someone he knew was impossible. Jinki, on the other hand, was socially awkward and shy. Any attempt that he made to befriend someone without Kibum there to fix the situation and to explain Jinki’s weird jokes was usually met with a cold shoulder.
He began to make his way towards Jonghyun, once more, growing increasingly worried about the panic gathering in his eyes.
“Hey, Jonghyun! Nice party!” Jinki patted Jonghyun’s shoulder reassuringly.
That seemed to be a cue for Jonghyun to latch onto Jinki’s arms, eyes begging the taller man to help him.
“Oh Jinki! I don’t know where all these people came from!” The frustration in his voice was audible. “I only meant for, like, ten people to show up. My house is going to get trashed!” Jonghyun tore himself away from Jinki and rubbed at his eyes furiously before beginning to pace back and forth.
A sickening crash from the living room only made it worse.
“Jinki, you’ve got to help me. I don’t know what to do!” Jonghyun’s face was worryingly tense and Jinki felt his hyung instincts start to kick in.
Jinki arranged his mouth in a reassuring smile. He went in to pat Jonghyun on the head but tactfully avoided that, knowing that it would only make him more frustrated. He hated being reminded of the height difference. Instead, Jinki carefully laid his hand on Jonghyun’s shoulder.
“Everything will be fine. I’ll find Kibum, he’ll know how to get people to start heading home.” Jinki’s trailing gaze found the few bottles of alcohol sitting on the kitchen table. It wasn’t enough for the amount of people present, but it was enough to be encouraging. “In the meantime, why don’t you put the booze away? I’m sure once people can’t drink anymore, they’ll start filing out.”
Jonghyun’s expression was dripping in gratitude and left over frustration. “Yes. Yes that’ll work. I don’t know what I would do without you, hyung.”
The use of honorifics surprised Jinki slightly. Usually, their friend group didn’t bother with formalities. Jinki was suddenly filled with warmth and felt even more motivated to help Jonghyun.
He began to move towards the living room where most of the party goers seemed to be concentrated, hoping that he would be able to find Kibum there. It wasn’t hard spotting him with his bright pink hair and the way that he seemed to draw people towards him like moths to a flame. He relaxed once he had successfully located him and was about to begin heading in his direction when something else, something much brighter, captured Jinki’s attention.
There, in the center of the room, in front of the enormous speakers that Jonghyun liked to use when he was performing, was Lee Taemin. His body was thrusting and turning to the beat, blonde hair sticking to his face and teeth pressing into his fat lower lip. His legs were hugged by black skinny jeans that were ripped beyond what would be considered decent and his torso twisted inside a black top that swung about him. Jinki’s heart immediately started hammering in his chest, the sound seeming to blend in with the pumping bass in his ears. He licked his suddenly dry lips and fiddled with the hem of his button down shirt nervously. He had to look strange, standing by himself like that, but he didn’t care.
Suddenly, without warning, Taemin’s eyes flickered up from the boy that Jinki just noticed he was dancing with, and met Jinki’s across the room. His dark eyes were swimming with some emotion that Jinki couldn’t identify, lips pursed out into a pout that had to be intentional before his teeth sunk into that lower lip once more and he winked invitingly. The whole act was blatantly sexual. It left Jinki breathless. He felt his feet carrying him towards Taemin, body on autopilot and mind slave to the siren’s song that Taemin’s eyes were singing.
Jonghyun had a very uneven, hardwood floor. He had tried to cover up the old planks with a large rug with a loud pattern. It would need replacing soon. Jinki learned all of this on his way down after catching his feet on the edge of one of said planks that was raised slightly above the others. His body slammed into the floor with a slap that was loud enough to be heard by the few people standing around him, but thankfully, not over the loud music that was still soaking the room. Jinki wasn’t embarrassed. Anyone who knew Jinki at all knew that he wasn’t exactly the most graceful person to ever traverse the planet. It only stung a little that Taemin had been watching him when it happened. He felt people begin to move around him, already going back to what they were doing as though it had never happened.
When he had managed to get to his feet again, he noticed that Taemin had gone back to dancing, his body grooving to the beat in a way that looked more natural to him than breathing. Jinki felt that he had missed his opportunity and sighed deeply, shoulders weighed heavily by the regret that threatened to crush him.
~~~~~~
By the time that everyone had vacated Jonghyun’s house, tempted to leave by the lack of booze and Kibum’s loud voice insisting that the club downtown had more space and booze than Jonghyun’s poor one bedroom home, Jinki was utterly exhausted. He collapsed on the secondhand couch in the living room and welcomed the backrub that he seemed to instantly receive from Jonghyun. He could tell that the silver haired man was thankful.
“Thanks again, hyung. I don’t know what I would do without you and Key.”
Jinki turned his head to the side enough to be able to answer him without his voice being muffled. “It’s no big deal. Do you need help cleaning up?” Even though it had to be well into the early morning hours, Jinki felt obligated to offer assistance. Thankfully, it was Saturday and he didn’t have class. Kibum had wandered off with the group heading to the club some hours ago and Jinki didn’t expect to hear from him until much later on in the day if at all.
Jonghyun’s eyes turned downwards into that classic puppy-dog look that told Jinki that he was relieved. “Would you mind? If we work together we can get it done quickly. I would really appreciate it…” He trailed off, looking around the living room and eyeing the broken glass and trash that seemed to cover the place, as well as the spots of mysterious liquid scattered here and there.
Jinki managed to drag himself into a sitting position, back cracking audibly. After a few moments of allowing his joints to settle, he was finally on two legs, swinging his arms from side to side to stretch. In the mean time, Jonghyun had ventured into the kitchen to retrieve some trash bags after uploading a picture of the chaos onto his snapchat story. The two set off to work, bagging things here and there and making little conversation. After some time, Jonghyun put some soothing music on his ipod and connected it to the speakers. Jonghyun had always been good at that kind of thing.
Thankfully, with some music playing, the time seemed to go by and before Jinki really knew it, they had finished putting everything in order and had cleaned Jonghyun’s semi-new carpet up as best as they could. For the most part, the damage seemed to be mostly broken beer bottles and spilled drinks that were easily remedied. Looking through the cheap curtains that hung over the nearby window, Jinki saw that they sun had risen some time ago.
Suddenly, Jinki’s phone started vibrating in his pocket. He put down his broom and answered it after seeing that it was Kibum calling.
“Hey, what’s up?”
Kibum’s voice was groggy and gritty, like he had sandpaper in his throat. “Good. You’re up. We should go to Cafe E. I need coffee and I’m already out. Take Jamong with you.”
Jinki looked up and saw that Jonghyun was just returning from hefting the large trash bags to the bin outside. “Jonghyun, Kibum wants to meet us at Cafe E for breakfast.”
Jonghyun’s eyes lit up and he scurried off to grab his wallet and keys. “Sweet! I’ll drive.”
It didn’t take long to get there from Jonghyun’s house. Cafe E was a local diner near the university that was so frequently inhabited by students that it almost seemed to be owned by the university. Upon walking through the large glass doors, Jinki spotted Kibum at once, adorned in last night’s clothes and nursing a large cup of coffee with his most-likely-designer sunglasses perched on his upturned nose. He lifted a single hand in the air to make sure that they could see him and then went back to mourning whatever set of decisions he had made the previous night that had led him to where he was now.
Jonghyun rushed over to him and plopped down in a chair across from him, waving Jinki over who followed behind at a calmer pace.
“Yo, Key!” Jonghyun chirped, “What happened to you last night, man?” Jonghyun reached across the table and tore some of Kibum’s muffin off and threw it into his mouth between words. Kibum obviously didn’t care from the way he groaned and cradled his head which must have been aching.
“We don’t talk about last night. Fireball is a nasty poison, gentlemen. I got so drunk that I don’t even remember what happened.” He downed the rest of his coffee and poured himself another cup from the pot that was waiting on standby.
“I used to know a joke about amnesia, but I forgot how it goes.” Jinki smiled, eyebrows raised and eyes looking between Jonghyun and Kibum, waiting for what he just said to sink in.
Jonghyun let his head hit the table with a loud thump. “Oh come on, really Jinki?”
Kibum lowered his sunglasses slowly from his nose to glare at Jinki over the rim. “Listen, old man, I am not the one today.”
Jinki pouted and shrugged. While Kibum and Jonghyun exchanged drunken war stories, he occupied himself with stacking the coffee creamer packets that were tossed haphazardly in a wire basket at the end of the table. It wasn’t his fault that his friends didn’t appreciate his comedic genius.
“Hey, Jamong,” Kibum said suddenly in an offhand manner “Did you know that Jinki has a crush on Lee Taemin.”
Jinki’s coffee creamer tower fell to the table in a rush and Jinki lifted his eyes from the chaos in order to glare at Kibum. “Oh come on, Kibum. What the Hell.”
Jonghyun, on the other hand, was suddenly very interested. He even closed his Twitter app and set his phone down. “Oh really, now? This is the first time I’m hearing about it. I didn’t think Jinki would ever like anyone…” Jonghyun’s sentence trailed off, eyes scanning Jinki’s polka dot button down shirt and khaki pants. “But wait, you said Lee Taemin?”
Kibum nodded. “Yup. Lee. Taemin.”
Jonghyun groaned and cradled his head in his hands. “Really, Jinki? Couldn’t you like someone nice like Minho?”
“That’s what I said!” Kibum announced, high fiving Jonghyun from across the table.
Jinki sighed and the mourned the loss of his coffee creamer tower. “Why does everyone keep saying that? He can’t be that bad.”
Kibum snorted. “Well he’s pretty, I’ll give him that, but he’s got a terrible personality. He’s a flirt, doesn’t take anything seriously, and I’m pretty sure that he does drugs. You’d be better off if you forgot about him before you get in too deep.” Kibum reached over to pat his shoulder.
For a moment, Jinki drowned in sadness, kicking his feet at the ground beneath them and hanging his head slightly, mouth dropping into a frown. In what must have been only seconds, though, his lips thinned and the corner of his mouth grew tense. There was no way someone who seemed so gentle and nice could be as bad as Kibum and Jonghyun were making him out to be.
“You guys don’t even know him, what gives you the right?”
Kibum snorted and rolled his eyes. “Oh, and you do? Tell him, Jonghyun.”
Jonghyun smiled sadly and patted Jinki’s shoulder. “Sorry, man, but Lee Taemin is bad news. We just don’t want to see you hurt. If you want, I can set you up with someone…?”
Jinki smiled gratefully. “I appreciate your concern. Really. I think I need some time to think…” With that said, he stood from the table and excused himself, leaving Kibum and Jonghyun to catch up. He maintained his cheerful demeanor until he left the building, after which, he allowed his shoulders to slump under the weight of his sadness and his feet to shuffle along the sidewalk.
Jinki was so intent on counting the cracks in the pavement and allowing his thoughts to fuzz around in his mind until he reached the school again, that he didn’t even notice that someone was walking in front of him until he bumped into their back, tripping over his own feet and crashing into the ground. He hissed as his elbow bore the brunt of his weight and closed his eyes against the pain.
A gentle hand rested on his shoulder, radiating warmth through the thin material of Jinki’s shirt, and a voice suddenly spoke, singing the stranger’s concern so softly that Jinki vaguely worried that his voice would be carried away by the wind. “Oh my gosh! Are you alright?”
Jinki cracked his eyes open slightly and through the blur of his vision, he could make out full lips downturned in concern and wide nostrils flared. His heart stopped beating. His brain stopped functioning. The only thing he could think of to say was; “Did you hear about the guy who was cut in half? He’s all right now.”
Jinki winced at how lame that was.
Taemin’s eyes widened in surprise before he suddenly barked out a laugh, lifting a hand to cover his mouth which Jinki thought was a shame since he had such a pretty smile. “That’s hilarious!” The eyes that Jinki could see peeking over the top of his hand were shaped like crescent moons and shined with amusement.
Jinki was instantly relieved and rushed to his feet, brushing off any dirt off of his clothes. “Sorry about that. I know that was lame. I’m fine, thank you.”
Taemin stood to his feet, as well, lifting his bag back over his shoulder. “Oh that’s fine, I needed a laugh, anyways. Well, see you around!” He waved a hand over his shoulder and began walking away, leaving Jinki rooted to the ground behind him.
Jinki couldn’t remember anyone ever laughing at one of his jokes and the thought that he had managed to make Taemin laugh the first time he met him made his face flush happily.
Watching Taemin’s silhouette get smaller and smaller, Jinki felt that that had been the start of something great.
~~~
Jinki was focused on Taemin, again, watching him openly from across the courtyard in what had become a routine. He knew that his face had slipped into a solid blankness that would easily confuse anyone who chose to look his way, but he was so consumed by the curve of Taemin’s left nostril that he couldn’t make himself devote attention to anything else.
It wasn’t until Taemin’s left nostril, which had been turned to the side just moments before, was facing Jinki head on that he could even force his attention upwards to drink in the confusion swimming in Taemin’s gaze. Jinki didn’t react immediately, which was risky if he didn’t want to get caught staring. Instead, he took advantage of that moment of unabashed eye contact, soaking in the way the light reflected in Taemin’s eyes making them glitter in a way that Jinki thought was magical. He wondered how a real life person could look so much like an anime character.
When Jinki realized that Taemin’s eyes were getting decidedly closer to him, he came to the conclusion that Taemin was attempting to approach him. His eyes twitched for a moment and his heart abused his chest cavity, air escaping his lungs in short staccatos. He decided in that brief moment of panic that it would be best if he and Taemin didn’t come into contact. By the look that Taemin was giving him, Taemin wanted to know why Jinki had been staring at him. It must have seemed strange to catch him in the act twice and Jinki didn’t want to risk scaring Taemin off. Besides, Jinki wasn’t a stalker.
Mind made up, he quickly twisted his mouth up into a smile, muscles quivering under the weight of his lips as they dragged them upward. He lifted a single hand into the air in greeting and then ducked down into a shallow bow, excusing himself from Taemin’s presence and escaping into a nearby building. He decided that he needed to stop watching Taemin in the courtyard.
~~~
Jinki hated the suffocating stillness of the library. He didn’t typically choose to study there, more than happy to share a study space with his roommate, but he was doing some research on the Spanish Inquisition and he needed to make some copies of reference books. His feet carried him to the reference section on auto pilot. As a history major, he was more than familiar with the layout of the library and knew intimately where the religious section was and assumed that the material he needed would be located there.
He thumbed through the different books on the shelves, pushing them here and there while he looked for anything that could be useful in writing his paper. His fingers found purchase on an encyclopedia of religious terminology and after yanking it from the shelf and flipping through the pages absentmindedly, he sighed with disappointment. He needed to look harder. He wished that his professor would have allotted them more internet sources, but as it was, they were only permitted two.
He lifted the heavy book and prepared to place it back on the shelf when suddenly, he noticed that the absence of the thick tome had left a gap large enough to see through the shelf to the other side.
There, lit by the setting sun that shone through the large floor-to-ceiling windows, sat Lee Taemin, nose buried in a bible and furiously scribbling notes on a piece of notebook paper that he had apparently ripped out of a notebook judging from the rough edges. His tongue was poking out, resting against his lower lip in concentration and occasionally, he would run a hand through his golden hair, brushing a few stubborn hairs from his eyes. It was breathtaking. He felt like he had to do something to capture the vision that Taemin made.
Jinki’s hand twitched towards his pocket and in slow motion, he withdrew his phone from his pocket. He wanted to see if photographing the sight would make it seem any more real. He felt sweat rolling down his neck and he lowered his baseball cap over his forehead even though it was apparent that he and Taemin were the only ones in the reference section of the library at that hour. He thumbed at the surface of his phone, flipping it open quickly and pulling up the camera function before he lost his nerve. He snapped a photo.
He had forgotten to turn the sound off on his phone.
Taemin’s head shot up at the sound of a camera shutter whirling. Jinki cursed his luck and ducked down, allowing only his eyes to peek out of the gap in the shelf, holding his breath and hoping desperately that Taemin couldn’t hear his heart beating from where he sat.
Taemin’s voice rang with confusion as he called out, beckoning to whoever was there. “Hello..? Is there anyone there?”
The library was dead silent. A moment of dense quiet passed. Then another.
Taemin reluctantly returned to his work, shoulders noticeably tense and Jinki rejoiced.
That night, he jerked off four times to the tip of Taemin’s tongue pushed up against his lower lip.
It was a good night.
~~~~
A few days later, he found himself at Jonghyun’s house, observing a riveting game of monopoly between Jonghyun and Kibum. He had decided to sit out, knowing better than to involve himself in their inevitable fighting.
“Where’d you get all the pink fifties, Key?!” Jonghyun practically snarled, lurching over the table to gesture wildly towards Kibum’s stack of fake money.
Kibum cackled, fanning himself with the money that he had obviously stolen. “That’s not for you to be concerned about, Jongie!”
Jinki smiled at the two of them, enjoying the entertainment even though Jonghyun looked frustrated enough to strangle the pink haired boy. Before long, they decided to call it a tie, putting an end to a game that would have otherwise lasted hours.
“Geez, Key, I don’t understand why you take that game so seriously.” Jonghyun whined, rubbing at his stiff neck.
“I take everything seriously.” Kibum deadpanned. “Which reminds me, Jinki, have you made any progress with Taemin? Not that I approve of you dating him, of course.”
“I actually ran into him the other day. Literally.” Jinki chuckled, thinking back fondly.
“You what?!” Kibum shouted, leaning over the table to peer into Jinki’s eyes in order to determine if he was making it up.
Jinki nodded seriously. “Yeah, you could say that we really hit it off.” His face split into a wide grin, fighting back a stray chuckle at his joke.
Kibum looked mildly disgusted for a moment before he sighed. “You can’t really think that he’s going to be interested after you mowed him down with your big, meaty feet, do you?”
Jinki was offended. His feet were average in size. “He laughed at my jokes. I think I have a chance.”
Jonghyun slapped the surface of the table and pointed haphazardly in Jinki’s direction as his laughter echoed throughout the room. “Please. Please tell me that you didn’t dish out one of those! You’re dead, man. You have no chance. K.O.” Jonghyun continued laughing as he packed up the board game.
Kibum sighed. “Listen, Jinki. You’re in college, now. If you want to stand a chance with him at all, you’re going to have to talk to him. And I mean really talk to him.” He pulled a pack of sticky notes from his bag and and purple gel pen. He started scribbling out something that Jinki couldn’t quite make out. “Here. This is Taemin’s dorm building and room number. Be a big boy and go introduce yourself properly.” He wasn’t surprised that Kibum knew where Taemin lived. Kibum knew everyone on campus and getting that information wouldn’t have been difficult.
Jinki grappled for the piece of paper like a dying man, tucking it into a pocket right near his heart.
~~~~
Once Jinki knew where Taemin’s dorm was, he couldn’t stop himself from occasionally finding an excuse to pass by the giant brick building, eyes scanning the rows of windows in order to find the one that belonged to Taemin. Taemin’s dorm was right in front of the mailroom so it wasn’t difficult for Jinki to convince himself that he suddenly needed to check his mailbox or to buy a stamp for his collection.
When Jinki did, however, eventually determine which window was Taemin’s it was completely on accident. He was taking a shortcut to the library which happened to cut through a tunnel connecting the side of Taemin’s dorm to another dorm building. He had taken the shortcut numerous times but had never really paid attention to the buildings that were connected by it. This time however, as Taemin’s building loomed closer, Jinki’s eyes widened as he realized how close he had been to his crush all this time without noticing.
He chanced a side glance at the building as he made his way to the tunnel and was stopped in his tracks when he saw, on the first floor just near the tree that occupied most of the space in front of the tunnel, was Taemin’s room. Jinki could tell because through the open window, the blonde could be seen hopping around the room with a video game controller in his hand, frantically slapping at the buttons. Jinki could hear Michael Jackson’s Beat It blasting from the room. He willed his feet to move now that he had the knowledge that he had so desperately desired and to just continue on his way to the library, but he was rooted to the ground, craving more of Taemin.
Taemin shouted in victory and threw his controller on his desk, dancing a victory jig before suddenly leaning out the window. Jinki lept behind the tree, carefully placing himself out of sight, waiting to see what Taemin was going to do next. He reasoned that he couldn’t possibly leave without being discovered, so he was just going to have to wait it out.
Taemin was chuckling and talking to someone in the room, his roommate Jinki assumed. “You can suck all of my ass, Kai. You’re never beating me at Fifa.” With that said, Taemin slipped a crumpled pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket and slipped one between his lips. “Yo, Kai, you got a light, man?” He called back, reaching a hand out expectantly and after catching the lighter mid air, he lit his cigarette and that was that.
It was risky for Taemin to be smoking inside, even though he was leaning out the window. The smoke detectors in the older dorms were sensitive. The fact that Taemin obviously did this quite often led Jinki to believe that he and his roommate had deactivated the smoke detectors so that they wouldn’t be caught.
Taemin suddenly started chuckling and turned back into the room, cigarette still in hand. “Hey did you want to go to the hookah bar tonight? Krystal wanted to try that new flavor that they mixed last time...What was it called? Adam’s Dick? Eve’s Tit?”
His roommate answered immediately. “Serpent’s Nipple. And yes, I’m so down.” Jinki could hear the slapping of skin and assumed that they had high fived. “Taemin you’re the worst religious studies major ever.”
Taemin returned to leaning out the window. “Yeah, I know.” With that said, Taemin took one final drag of his cigarette, pulling long and hard on it, before expelling all of the smoke all at once, blowing it right towards the tree that Jinki was hiding behind. After he was done, he put the cigarette out in a clay flower pot that must have doubled as a secret ashtray and went inside once more, shutting the window behind him.
Jinki couldn’t stop himself from breathing in the secondhand smoke, choking on the stench of cheap cigarettes. Still, somehow, Jinki marveled at how beautiful Taemin had looked with his lips wrapped around something so ugly. The way the wind had danced with his hair. Jinki thought that Taemin had looked angelic like that, huffing out great clouds of smoke and spitting profanities in a relaxed way that looked easier than breathing.
Jinki was sure that he was in love.
He smiled secretly to himself, tucking the memory away, and made his way to the library even though he was sure that he wouldn’t be able to get work done, anymore.
~~~
Pairing: Onew/Taemin
Rating: R
Warnings: Violence/ Assault/ non-con/ domestic violence/abuse
Final Word Count: 28136
Jinki recalled the day he first saw Lee Taemin very clearly. They had never met, and even though they attended the same university, Jinki was positive that he had never even seen the boy before. After all, he was almost positive that he would have remembered someone like Taemin. At the time, Taemin had been standing across the courtyard, smile positively greasy as he leaned against the girl he had an arm slung around, thumb tucked loosely into his belt. Anyone looking at him would have been able to tell that Lee Taemin was not exactly a fairytale prince, but Jinki thought differently.
Looking at Taemin gave Jinki tunnel vision, everything but his striking profile blurring into white noise. To Jinki, Taemin’s hair practically glittered, shining blonde in a way that Jinki had only seen in cheesy romance comics. Watching him stand there all pretty in the sunlight, Jinki felt like he had had the air knocked out of him, choking on the spit that he hadn’t realized had collected under his tongue. Conveniently enough, though, everything began to move in slow motion while he took a moment to collect himself, adjusting the collar of his shirt that hadn’t been choking him until that moment.
After a beat or two of pointlessly fumbling around with his hair and trying to calm the rapid pounding of his heart in his chest, he became aware that things had not, in fact, been moving in slow motion at all. Even Kibum had stopped whatever it was he was saying to try and snap Jinki out of his daze.
“-inki. Jinki. Old man. Old. Man. Really?” Kibum’s voice was growing more and more exasperated and eventually, he resorted to physical violence, as he often did, shaking Jinki’s shoulders roughly.
Jinki blinked out of his haze and smiled widely. “What’s up?”
“What do you mean ‘What’s up’?” Kibum asked rhetorically “You’ve been ignoring me for the past ten minutes. Rude.”
Jinki’s face went blank for a moment, brain still scrambling to focus on something that wasn’t the blonde boy across the courtyard, before he rearranged his expression into something as unthreatening as possible, smile just a bit too wide. “Sorry! I just got lost in my thoughts!”
Kibum rolled his eyes in that way of his that said enough about what he thought of Jinki’s intelligence for Jinki to wince slightly. “Whatever. Anyways I--”
Jinki tuned him out again and swung his gaze across the courtyard, trying to locate the boy with the sparkly fairy hair. It didn’t take long spotting the spec of blonde in a sea of black and brown. The sun seemed to be drawn to him with the way that it appeared to shine a spotlight on that little spot of grass on which he stood. Jinki allowed his face soften into something gentle, absorbing the warmth that the boy let off like a flower in bloom, and he felt his eyes crinkle happily when the boy tilted his head back and laughed without restraint, lifting a small hand up to his mouth as if to hold in the sound. Zeroing in on the boy’s short fingernails, Jinki wondered if he was in the habit of biting them.
Jinki felt his body moving and noticed that the boy was getting further away. He snapped his attention to the hand that was around his wrist dragging him back inside for his next class. Jinki made himself tune back into Kibum’s rambling in case he missed anything that he would be questioned on later. Thankfully, Kibum was too absorbed in what he was talking about to pay attention to the fact that Jinki hadn’t been listening to him, at all. Not that Kibum cared much now that the initial scolding was out of the way. Kibum didn’t want someone to actually listen to him and comment on what he was saying. Sometimes, Jinki thought that Kibum just liked to listen to the sound of his own voice. Which was fine for Jinki, who was often quiet and a bit reserved.
Once they were inside and the air conditioner had slammed into them like a bucket of ice water, Jinki gained some control of his movements and turned off his auto pilot, preparing himself for his Medieval History lecture. Kibum, however, seemed to shut down as soon as the professor walked in. Unlike Jinki, who actually enjoyed history, Kibum was just taking the class to fulfill a general education requirement. Jinki could almost taste how bored Kibum was from the way he was slumped against the table and twirling his wooden pencil around his fingers with an expertise that only a student who had made not paying attention a profession could. Jinki was pretty sure that his pencil wasn’t even sharpened.
Jinki, however, was fully prepared for class, as always. His one-subject spiral notebook was laid out neatly in front of him, a pencil and a ballpoint pen lying in two exact parallel lines. He liked for things to be in order like that. The lecture proceeded as it always did, but somehow, Jinki found himself thinking about other things. Things like blonde hair and pitch black roots. Eyes that glisten with mirth. Lips that tease at a smile.
Angels standing in the sun.
~~~
The next day, Jinki made sure to place himself in the courtyard at the exact same time that he had stood there the previous day. Without Kibum there to distract from the fact that he was flat out staring at someone, he occupied himself with his history textbook, flipping through pages distractedly as his eyes scanned the courtyard with more focus than a security camera.
Again, it didn’t take long to find him, striking as he was. Today, Jinki was enamored with the roundness of the boy’s cheeks, only really noticing them when the blonde’s hand had reached up distractedly to scratch at one. Jinki liked the way his cheeks puffed out when he was wearing irritation on his face, swelling around his eyes and forcing them into crescents. Jinki enjoyed the static that filled his brain and the thump-thumping of his heart at the sight and with a gentle sigh, he allowed his mind to drift far away. He was so caught up in the way the blonde’s lips curved slightly into a little smile when he talked that he didn’t pay any attention to the fact that the boy had turned his eyes in Jinki’s direction. He did, however, notice the slight downturning of the boy’s lips and that urged Jinki to drag his eyes up his face to meet his gaze. Jinki was immediately aware of the confusion in them and the furrow of his brow. Jinki thought he looked cute like that. Confused.
Jinki managed to shake himself out of his thoughts long enough to shift his expression into something disarming. He hadn’t meant to scare the boy, he just couldn’t quite reign in his admiration and wasn’t sure how to approach him. Jinki had never been good at that kind of thing. That’s why he was such good friends with Kibum who seemed to talk enough for the both of them.
The boy’s mouth hesitantly drizzled into a shy smile, eyes calm and slightly mischievous. Jinki was relieved. He didn’t want to imagine that he had ruined his chances before he had even really had a grasp of them. He noticed that the boy began to move towards him, but unfortunately, Jinki had to go to his history lecture. He cursed his luck.
He bowed slightly in apology and rushed off to class, banishing his disappointment to a deep part of his mind to turn over later.
~~~
After the incident in which he was almost discovered, Jinki decided to lay low for a while, forbidding himself from standing in the courtyard for too long until he was sure that the coast was clear. Two days later, Jinki was swept away by the way his nose curved gently at the tip, hooked in a way that Jinki found endearing. He liked the way that it crinkled with his eyes when he smiled, which he seemed to do a lot of. It was a nice nose, not pointed and tiny like some of the ones that he had seen on other students after a nose job. Jinki could tell that he had had some work done in the past with the way that it seemed to want to turn forward when he laughed too hard and the occupation that his hands seemed to have with it, pushing at it in a way that was almost like he was making sure it was still in place. Jinki wondered if it made him feel self conscious.
His phone buzzed in his pocket, shaking him from his thoughts so suddenly that it left him a little breathless. He lifted his phone out of his pocket, rubbing a thumb on the cracked surface before flipping it open.
“H-Hello..?” He managed to get out, grasping at his shirt in an attempt to slow his heart beat.
“Where are you?” He heard Kibum snap on the other line. “You’re late for your advisor meeting. You’re lucky I’m such a good friend.”
Jinki burst into a sprint, instantly forgetting the boy that he had been watching. “Oh my gosh! Thank you, Kibum!”
Kibum huffed happily and hung up on him.
This pattern of Jinki admiring the boy from a far and Kibum yelling at him for not paying attention continued for quite some time until a few weeks later, Kibum’s growing frustration drove him to corner his friend.
“What’s gotten into you lately?” Jinki heard Kibum say, mind waking slowly from the deep sleep that the gentle curl of Taemin’s eyelashes had put his consciousness in.
Jinki smiled in a way that he hoped was reassuring.
“What do you mean by that?”
Kibum huffed and Jinki could tell that that meant he was getting irritated. “You’ve been dodging me all week and your head has been in the clouds way more than usual.”
Jinki’s eyes unintentionally drifted over to the boy, once more, observing the way that his lips thinned and pouted as he talked. He was careful when he enunciated.
Kibum must have followed his line of sight because after a half second of peering across the courtyard and piercing his lips, he was patting Jinki’s shoulder and shaking his head. “You poor sap.”
Jinki was instantly confused. “What do you mean by that?”
“You’ve caught the Lee Taemin Bug.” The matter-of-fact way that Kibum spoke informed Jinki that this was something of an epidemic that only he was unaware of. Typical.
“The what?”
“That’s Lee Taemin. Campus cutie.” Kibum crossed his arms over his chest and continued to shake his head disappointedly. “Why couldn’t you like someone nice like Minho?”
“I don’t like him…” Jinki mumbled, cheeks warming in embarrassment.
“You totally do.” Kibum asserted. “You’ve been giving him goo-goo eyes for weeks now!”
Jinki gasped. “I-I have not! I do not...do...that…” His sentence lost some of its force as his voice was swallowed up by his embarrassment.
He attempted to digest some of what Kibum had been saying. Jinki was disappointed that the boy whom he had been so obsessed with wasn’t the angelic figure that Jinki had painted in his mind. However, when Jinki looked in his direction again, he couldn’t see anything but a cheerful, nice person standing there. There was just no way that someone who looked gentle and kind could be as terrible as Kibum was making him out to be. At the very least, Kibum had provided him with a name.
Lee Taemin. Jinki rolled the syllables around in his brain and let his mouth wrap soundlessly around it. It was at once beautiful to him, melodic in a way. Jinki loved it. He felt his lips curling up at the thought of the closeness that knowing the boys name had given him to the object of his affections. He smiled too wide in the way that he usually did.
Kibum roughly shook his shoulders. “Earth to Jinki! Come back to me, Jinki!”
“Sorry about that.” Jinki apologized weakly, rubbing the back of his head in a way that he knew looked sheepish.
“Anyways, are we still on for tonight?” Kibum was already barely paying him any mind, fixing his hair in the reflection of the window they were standing by.
Jinki’s brows furrowed. “What’s going on tonight?”
“You know. Jonghyun’s house warming party. I told you about this a week ago.”
Jinki didn’t remember, but he knew better than to say so. “Oh yeah. Sure!”
Kibum was suspicious but obviously didn’t care too much by the way that he went back to fixing his hair. “Come by my dorm at nine, we’ll go together.”
Jinki grinned widely again and agreed. He hoped that maybe the party would take his mind off of the way the light reflected in Taemin’s eyes. Besides, he really enjoyed Jonghyun’s company and hoped the get together would give him some time to catch up with some of the people he had been progressively ignoring as the semester drew closer to finals.
With his head still drifting in the clouds, he made his way to lecture.
~~~~~~
Jonghyun’s party was not, in fact, a small get together. Rather, it was a bustling house party that had obviously started to overwhelm the host. By the time Kibum and Jinki had waded through the masses of people crowded around the entrance to the kitchen, the crease between Jonghyun’s brows was deeper than the Grand Canyon.
Kibum was about to reach out to him when he was suddenly being pulled away by someone he knew. Instead, he sunk his nails into Jinki’s shoulder and yelled over the loud music that Jinki should offer to help him. With that said, Kibum was lost to the crowd with the flick of a wrist and a loud cackle.
So much for going together.
Jinki was all too familiar with this aspect of Kibum, though. Kibum knew everyone and expecting him to go to a party without running into someone he knew was impossible. Jinki, on the other hand, was socially awkward and shy. Any attempt that he made to befriend someone without Kibum there to fix the situation and to explain Jinki’s weird jokes was usually met with a cold shoulder.
He began to make his way towards Jonghyun, once more, growing increasingly worried about the panic gathering in his eyes.
“Hey, Jonghyun! Nice party!” Jinki patted Jonghyun’s shoulder reassuringly.
That seemed to be a cue for Jonghyun to latch onto Jinki’s arms, eyes begging the taller man to help him.
“Oh Jinki! I don’t know where all these people came from!” The frustration in his voice was audible. “I only meant for, like, ten people to show up. My house is going to get trashed!” Jonghyun tore himself away from Jinki and rubbed at his eyes furiously before beginning to pace back and forth.
A sickening crash from the living room only made it worse.
“Jinki, you’ve got to help me. I don’t know what to do!” Jonghyun’s face was worryingly tense and Jinki felt his hyung instincts start to kick in.
Jinki arranged his mouth in a reassuring smile. He went in to pat Jonghyun on the head but tactfully avoided that, knowing that it would only make him more frustrated. He hated being reminded of the height difference. Instead, Jinki carefully laid his hand on Jonghyun’s shoulder.
“Everything will be fine. I’ll find Kibum, he’ll know how to get people to start heading home.” Jinki’s trailing gaze found the few bottles of alcohol sitting on the kitchen table. It wasn’t enough for the amount of people present, but it was enough to be encouraging. “In the meantime, why don’t you put the booze away? I’m sure once people can’t drink anymore, they’ll start filing out.”
Jonghyun’s expression was dripping in gratitude and left over frustration. “Yes. Yes that’ll work. I don’t know what I would do without you, hyung.”
The use of honorifics surprised Jinki slightly. Usually, their friend group didn’t bother with formalities. Jinki was suddenly filled with warmth and felt even more motivated to help Jonghyun.
He began to move towards the living room where most of the party goers seemed to be concentrated, hoping that he would be able to find Kibum there. It wasn’t hard spotting him with his bright pink hair and the way that he seemed to draw people towards him like moths to a flame. He relaxed once he had successfully located him and was about to begin heading in his direction when something else, something much brighter, captured Jinki’s attention.
There, in the center of the room, in front of the enormous speakers that Jonghyun liked to use when he was performing, was Lee Taemin. His body was thrusting and turning to the beat, blonde hair sticking to his face and teeth pressing into his fat lower lip. His legs were hugged by black skinny jeans that were ripped beyond what would be considered decent and his torso twisted inside a black top that swung about him. Jinki’s heart immediately started hammering in his chest, the sound seeming to blend in with the pumping bass in his ears. He licked his suddenly dry lips and fiddled with the hem of his button down shirt nervously. He had to look strange, standing by himself like that, but he didn’t care.
Suddenly, without warning, Taemin’s eyes flickered up from the boy that Jinki just noticed he was dancing with, and met Jinki’s across the room. His dark eyes were swimming with some emotion that Jinki couldn’t identify, lips pursed out into a pout that had to be intentional before his teeth sunk into that lower lip once more and he winked invitingly. The whole act was blatantly sexual. It left Jinki breathless. He felt his feet carrying him towards Taemin, body on autopilot and mind slave to the siren’s song that Taemin’s eyes were singing.
Jonghyun had a very uneven, hardwood floor. He had tried to cover up the old planks with a large rug with a loud pattern. It would need replacing soon. Jinki learned all of this on his way down after catching his feet on the edge of one of said planks that was raised slightly above the others. His body slammed into the floor with a slap that was loud enough to be heard by the few people standing around him, but thankfully, not over the loud music that was still soaking the room. Jinki wasn’t embarrassed. Anyone who knew Jinki at all knew that he wasn’t exactly the most graceful person to ever traverse the planet. It only stung a little that Taemin had been watching him when it happened. He felt people begin to move around him, already going back to what they were doing as though it had never happened.
When he had managed to get to his feet again, he noticed that Taemin had gone back to dancing, his body grooving to the beat in a way that looked more natural to him than breathing. Jinki felt that he had missed his opportunity and sighed deeply, shoulders weighed heavily by the regret that threatened to crush him.
~~~~~~
By the time that everyone had vacated Jonghyun’s house, tempted to leave by the lack of booze and Kibum’s loud voice insisting that the club downtown had more space and booze than Jonghyun’s poor one bedroom home, Jinki was utterly exhausted. He collapsed on the secondhand couch in the living room and welcomed the backrub that he seemed to instantly receive from Jonghyun. He could tell that the silver haired man was thankful.
“Thanks again, hyung. I don’t know what I would do without you and Key.”
Jinki turned his head to the side enough to be able to answer him without his voice being muffled. “It’s no big deal. Do you need help cleaning up?” Even though it had to be well into the early morning hours, Jinki felt obligated to offer assistance. Thankfully, it was Saturday and he didn’t have class. Kibum had wandered off with the group heading to the club some hours ago and Jinki didn’t expect to hear from him until much later on in the day if at all.
Jonghyun’s eyes turned downwards into that classic puppy-dog look that told Jinki that he was relieved. “Would you mind? If we work together we can get it done quickly. I would really appreciate it…” He trailed off, looking around the living room and eyeing the broken glass and trash that seemed to cover the place, as well as the spots of mysterious liquid scattered here and there.
Jinki managed to drag himself into a sitting position, back cracking audibly. After a few moments of allowing his joints to settle, he was finally on two legs, swinging his arms from side to side to stretch. In the mean time, Jonghyun had ventured into the kitchen to retrieve some trash bags after uploading a picture of the chaos onto his snapchat story. The two set off to work, bagging things here and there and making little conversation. After some time, Jonghyun put some soothing music on his ipod and connected it to the speakers. Jonghyun had always been good at that kind of thing.
Thankfully, with some music playing, the time seemed to go by and before Jinki really knew it, they had finished putting everything in order and had cleaned Jonghyun’s semi-new carpet up as best as they could. For the most part, the damage seemed to be mostly broken beer bottles and spilled drinks that were easily remedied. Looking through the cheap curtains that hung over the nearby window, Jinki saw that they sun had risen some time ago.
Suddenly, Jinki’s phone started vibrating in his pocket. He put down his broom and answered it after seeing that it was Kibum calling.
“Hey, what’s up?”
Kibum’s voice was groggy and gritty, like he had sandpaper in his throat. “Good. You’re up. We should go to Cafe E. I need coffee and I’m already out. Take Jamong with you.”
Jinki looked up and saw that Jonghyun was just returning from hefting the large trash bags to the bin outside. “Jonghyun, Kibum wants to meet us at Cafe E for breakfast.”
Jonghyun’s eyes lit up and he scurried off to grab his wallet and keys. “Sweet! I’ll drive.”
It didn’t take long to get there from Jonghyun’s house. Cafe E was a local diner near the university that was so frequently inhabited by students that it almost seemed to be owned by the university. Upon walking through the large glass doors, Jinki spotted Kibum at once, adorned in last night’s clothes and nursing a large cup of coffee with his most-likely-designer sunglasses perched on his upturned nose. He lifted a single hand in the air to make sure that they could see him and then went back to mourning whatever set of decisions he had made the previous night that had led him to where he was now.
Jonghyun rushed over to him and plopped down in a chair across from him, waving Jinki over who followed behind at a calmer pace.
“Yo, Key!” Jonghyun chirped, “What happened to you last night, man?” Jonghyun reached across the table and tore some of Kibum’s muffin off and threw it into his mouth between words. Kibum obviously didn’t care from the way he groaned and cradled his head which must have been aching.
“We don’t talk about last night. Fireball is a nasty poison, gentlemen. I got so drunk that I don’t even remember what happened.” He downed the rest of his coffee and poured himself another cup from the pot that was waiting on standby.
“I used to know a joke about amnesia, but I forgot how it goes.” Jinki smiled, eyebrows raised and eyes looking between Jonghyun and Kibum, waiting for what he just said to sink in.
Jonghyun let his head hit the table with a loud thump. “Oh come on, really Jinki?”
Kibum lowered his sunglasses slowly from his nose to glare at Jinki over the rim. “Listen, old man, I am not the one today.”
Jinki pouted and shrugged. While Kibum and Jonghyun exchanged drunken war stories, he occupied himself with stacking the coffee creamer packets that were tossed haphazardly in a wire basket at the end of the table. It wasn’t his fault that his friends didn’t appreciate his comedic genius.
“Hey, Jamong,” Kibum said suddenly in an offhand manner “Did you know that Jinki has a crush on Lee Taemin.”
Jinki’s coffee creamer tower fell to the table in a rush and Jinki lifted his eyes from the chaos in order to glare at Kibum. “Oh come on, Kibum. What the Hell.”
Jonghyun, on the other hand, was suddenly very interested. He even closed his Twitter app and set his phone down. “Oh really, now? This is the first time I’m hearing about it. I didn’t think Jinki would ever like anyone…” Jonghyun’s sentence trailed off, eyes scanning Jinki’s polka dot button down shirt and khaki pants. “But wait, you said Lee Taemin?”
Kibum nodded. “Yup. Lee. Taemin.”
Jonghyun groaned and cradled his head in his hands. “Really, Jinki? Couldn’t you like someone nice like Minho?”
“That’s what I said!” Kibum announced, high fiving Jonghyun from across the table.
Jinki sighed and the mourned the loss of his coffee creamer tower. “Why does everyone keep saying that? He can’t be that bad.”
Kibum snorted. “Well he’s pretty, I’ll give him that, but he’s got a terrible personality. He’s a flirt, doesn’t take anything seriously, and I’m pretty sure that he does drugs. You’d be better off if you forgot about him before you get in too deep.” Kibum reached over to pat his shoulder.
For a moment, Jinki drowned in sadness, kicking his feet at the ground beneath them and hanging his head slightly, mouth dropping into a frown. In what must have been only seconds, though, his lips thinned and the corner of his mouth grew tense. There was no way someone who seemed so gentle and nice could be as bad as Kibum and Jonghyun were making him out to be.
“You guys don’t even know him, what gives you the right?”
Kibum snorted and rolled his eyes. “Oh, and you do? Tell him, Jonghyun.”
Jonghyun smiled sadly and patted Jinki’s shoulder. “Sorry, man, but Lee Taemin is bad news. We just don’t want to see you hurt. If you want, I can set you up with someone…?”
Jinki smiled gratefully. “I appreciate your concern. Really. I think I need some time to think…” With that said, he stood from the table and excused himself, leaving Kibum and Jonghyun to catch up. He maintained his cheerful demeanor until he left the building, after which, he allowed his shoulders to slump under the weight of his sadness and his feet to shuffle along the sidewalk.
Jinki was so intent on counting the cracks in the pavement and allowing his thoughts to fuzz around in his mind until he reached the school again, that he didn’t even notice that someone was walking in front of him until he bumped into their back, tripping over his own feet and crashing into the ground. He hissed as his elbow bore the brunt of his weight and closed his eyes against the pain.
A gentle hand rested on his shoulder, radiating warmth through the thin material of Jinki’s shirt, and a voice suddenly spoke, singing the stranger’s concern so softly that Jinki vaguely worried that his voice would be carried away by the wind. “Oh my gosh! Are you alright?”
Jinki cracked his eyes open slightly and through the blur of his vision, he could make out full lips downturned in concern and wide nostrils flared. His heart stopped beating. His brain stopped functioning. The only thing he could think of to say was; “Did you hear about the guy who was cut in half? He’s all right now.”
Jinki winced at how lame that was.
Taemin’s eyes widened in surprise before he suddenly barked out a laugh, lifting a hand to cover his mouth which Jinki thought was a shame since he had such a pretty smile. “That’s hilarious!” The eyes that Jinki could see peeking over the top of his hand were shaped like crescent moons and shined with amusement.
Jinki was instantly relieved and rushed to his feet, brushing off any dirt off of his clothes. “Sorry about that. I know that was lame. I’m fine, thank you.”
Taemin stood to his feet, as well, lifting his bag back over his shoulder. “Oh that’s fine, I needed a laugh, anyways. Well, see you around!” He waved a hand over his shoulder and began walking away, leaving Jinki rooted to the ground behind him.
Jinki couldn’t remember anyone ever laughing at one of his jokes and the thought that he had managed to make Taemin laugh the first time he met him made his face flush happily.
Watching Taemin’s silhouette get smaller and smaller, Jinki felt that that had been the start of something great.
~~~
Jinki was focused on Taemin, again, watching him openly from across the courtyard in what had become a routine. He knew that his face had slipped into a solid blankness that would easily confuse anyone who chose to look his way, but he was so consumed by the curve of Taemin’s left nostril that he couldn’t make himself devote attention to anything else.
It wasn’t until Taemin’s left nostril, which had been turned to the side just moments before, was facing Jinki head on that he could even force his attention upwards to drink in the confusion swimming in Taemin’s gaze. Jinki didn’t react immediately, which was risky if he didn’t want to get caught staring. Instead, he took advantage of that moment of unabashed eye contact, soaking in the way the light reflected in Taemin’s eyes making them glitter in a way that Jinki thought was magical. He wondered how a real life person could look so much like an anime character.
When Jinki realized that Taemin’s eyes were getting decidedly closer to him, he came to the conclusion that Taemin was attempting to approach him. His eyes twitched for a moment and his heart abused his chest cavity, air escaping his lungs in short staccatos. He decided in that brief moment of panic that it would be best if he and Taemin didn’t come into contact. By the look that Taemin was giving him, Taemin wanted to know why Jinki had been staring at him. It must have seemed strange to catch him in the act twice and Jinki didn’t want to risk scaring Taemin off. Besides, Jinki wasn’t a stalker.
Mind made up, he quickly twisted his mouth up into a smile, muscles quivering under the weight of his lips as they dragged them upward. He lifted a single hand into the air in greeting and then ducked down into a shallow bow, excusing himself from Taemin’s presence and escaping into a nearby building. He decided that he needed to stop watching Taemin in the courtyard.
~~~
Jinki hated the suffocating stillness of the library. He didn’t typically choose to study there, more than happy to share a study space with his roommate, but he was doing some research on the Spanish Inquisition and he needed to make some copies of reference books. His feet carried him to the reference section on auto pilot. As a history major, he was more than familiar with the layout of the library and knew intimately where the religious section was and assumed that the material he needed would be located there.
He thumbed through the different books on the shelves, pushing them here and there while he looked for anything that could be useful in writing his paper. His fingers found purchase on an encyclopedia of religious terminology and after yanking it from the shelf and flipping through the pages absentmindedly, he sighed with disappointment. He needed to look harder. He wished that his professor would have allotted them more internet sources, but as it was, they were only permitted two.
He lifted the heavy book and prepared to place it back on the shelf when suddenly, he noticed that the absence of the thick tome had left a gap large enough to see through the shelf to the other side.
There, lit by the setting sun that shone through the large floor-to-ceiling windows, sat Lee Taemin, nose buried in a bible and furiously scribbling notes on a piece of notebook paper that he had apparently ripped out of a notebook judging from the rough edges. His tongue was poking out, resting against his lower lip in concentration and occasionally, he would run a hand through his golden hair, brushing a few stubborn hairs from his eyes. It was breathtaking. He felt like he had to do something to capture the vision that Taemin made.
Jinki’s hand twitched towards his pocket and in slow motion, he withdrew his phone from his pocket. He wanted to see if photographing the sight would make it seem any more real. He felt sweat rolling down his neck and he lowered his baseball cap over his forehead even though it was apparent that he and Taemin were the only ones in the reference section of the library at that hour. He thumbed at the surface of his phone, flipping it open quickly and pulling up the camera function before he lost his nerve. He snapped a photo.
He had forgotten to turn the sound off on his phone.
Taemin’s head shot up at the sound of a camera shutter whirling. Jinki cursed his luck and ducked down, allowing only his eyes to peek out of the gap in the shelf, holding his breath and hoping desperately that Taemin couldn’t hear his heart beating from where he sat.
Taemin’s voice rang with confusion as he called out, beckoning to whoever was there. “Hello..? Is there anyone there?”
The library was dead silent. A moment of dense quiet passed. Then another.
Taemin reluctantly returned to his work, shoulders noticeably tense and Jinki rejoiced.
That night, he jerked off four times to the tip of Taemin’s tongue pushed up against his lower lip.
It was a good night.
~~~~
A few days later, he found himself at Jonghyun’s house, observing a riveting game of monopoly between Jonghyun and Kibum. He had decided to sit out, knowing better than to involve himself in their inevitable fighting.
“Where’d you get all the pink fifties, Key?!” Jonghyun practically snarled, lurching over the table to gesture wildly towards Kibum’s stack of fake money.
Kibum cackled, fanning himself with the money that he had obviously stolen. “That’s not for you to be concerned about, Jongie!”
Jinki smiled at the two of them, enjoying the entertainment even though Jonghyun looked frustrated enough to strangle the pink haired boy. Before long, they decided to call it a tie, putting an end to a game that would have otherwise lasted hours.
“Geez, Key, I don’t understand why you take that game so seriously.” Jonghyun whined, rubbing at his stiff neck.
“I take everything seriously.” Kibum deadpanned. “Which reminds me, Jinki, have you made any progress with Taemin? Not that I approve of you dating him, of course.”
“I actually ran into him the other day. Literally.” Jinki chuckled, thinking back fondly.
“You what?!” Kibum shouted, leaning over the table to peer into Jinki’s eyes in order to determine if he was making it up.
Jinki nodded seriously. “Yeah, you could say that we really hit it off.” His face split into a wide grin, fighting back a stray chuckle at his joke.
Kibum looked mildly disgusted for a moment before he sighed. “You can’t really think that he’s going to be interested after you mowed him down with your big, meaty feet, do you?”
Jinki was offended. His feet were average in size. “He laughed at my jokes. I think I have a chance.”
Jonghyun slapped the surface of the table and pointed haphazardly in Jinki’s direction as his laughter echoed throughout the room. “Please. Please tell me that you didn’t dish out one of those! You’re dead, man. You have no chance. K.O.” Jonghyun continued laughing as he packed up the board game.
Kibum sighed. “Listen, Jinki. You’re in college, now. If you want to stand a chance with him at all, you’re going to have to talk to him. And I mean really talk to him.” He pulled a pack of sticky notes from his bag and and purple gel pen. He started scribbling out something that Jinki couldn’t quite make out. “Here. This is Taemin’s dorm building and room number. Be a big boy and go introduce yourself properly.” He wasn’t surprised that Kibum knew where Taemin lived. Kibum knew everyone on campus and getting that information wouldn’t have been difficult.
Jinki grappled for the piece of paper like a dying man, tucking it into a pocket right near his heart.
~~~~
Once Jinki knew where Taemin’s dorm was, he couldn’t stop himself from occasionally finding an excuse to pass by the giant brick building, eyes scanning the rows of windows in order to find the one that belonged to Taemin. Taemin’s dorm was right in front of the mailroom so it wasn’t difficult for Jinki to convince himself that he suddenly needed to check his mailbox or to buy a stamp for his collection.
When Jinki did, however, eventually determine which window was Taemin’s it was completely on accident. He was taking a shortcut to the library which happened to cut through a tunnel connecting the side of Taemin’s dorm to another dorm building. He had taken the shortcut numerous times but had never really paid attention to the buildings that were connected by it. This time however, as Taemin’s building loomed closer, Jinki’s eyes widened as he realized how close he had been to his crush all this time without noticing.
He chanced a side glance at the building as he made his way to the tunnel and was stopped in his tracks when he saw, on the first floor just near the tree that occupied most of the space in front of the tunnel, was Taemin’s room. Jinki could tell because through the open window, the blonde could be seen hopping around the room with a video game controller in his hand, frantically slapping at the buttons. Jinki could hear Michael Jackson’s Beat It blasting from the room. He willed his feet to move now that he had the knowledge that he had so desperately desired and to just continue on his way to the library, but he was rooted to the ground, craving more of Taemin.
Taemin shouted in victory and threw his controller on his desk, dancing a victory jig before suddenly leaning out the window. Jinki lept behind the tree, carefully placing himself out of sight, waiting to see what Taemin was going to do next. He reasoned that he couldn’t possibly leave without being discovered, so he was just going to have to wait it out.
Taemin was chuckling and talking to someone in the room, his roommate Jinki assumed. “You can suck all of my ass, Kai. You’re never beating me at Fifa.” With that said, Taemin slipped a crumpled pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket and slipped one between his lips. “Yo, Kai, you got a light, man?” He called back, reaching a hand out expectantly and after catching the lighter mid air, he lit his cigarette and that was that.
It was risky for Taemin to be smoking inside, even though he was leaning out the window. The smoke detectors in the older dorms were sensitive. The fact that Taemin obviously did this quite often led Jinki to believe that he and his roommate had deactivated the smoke detectors so that they wouldn’t be caught.
Taemin suddenly started chuckling and turned back into the room, cigarette still in hand. “Hey did you want to go to the hookah bar tonight? Krystal wanted to try that new flavor that they mixed last time...What was it called? Adam’s Dick? Eve’s Tit?”
His roommate answered immediately. “Serpent’s Nipple. And yes, I’m so down.” Jinki could hear the slapping of skin and assumed that they had high fived. “Taemin you’re the worst religious studies major ever.”
Taemin returned to leaning out the window. “Yeah, I know.” With that said, Taemin took one final drag of his cigarette, pulling long and hard on it, before expelling all of the smoke all at once, blowing it right towards the tree that Jinki was hiding behind. After he was done, he put the cigarette out in a clay flower pot that must have doubled as a secret ashtray and went inside once more, shutting the window behind him.
Jinki couldn’t stop himself from breathing in the secondhand smoke, choking on the stench of cheap cigarettes. Still, somehow, Jinki marveled at how beautiful Taemin had looked with his lips wrapped around something so ugly. The way the wind had danced with his hair. Jinki thought that Taemin had looked angelic like that, huffing out great clouds of smoke and spitting profanities in a relaxed way that looked easier than breathing.
Jinki was sure that he was in love.
He smiled secretly to himself, tucking the memory away, and made his way to the library even though he was sure that he wouldn’t be able to get work done, anymore.
~~~