Shine - ZhouWook
Title Shine
Pairing Zhou Mi/Ryeowook
Genre AU, fluff, mild romance
Rating: G
Warnings: Anxiety triggers
Summary: There is a melody of hope, sung by a voice of loneliness. There is a beauty that is hidden behind self-imposed walls. There is one who is left behind. Unheard.
Song is "Seventeen Ain't So Sweet" by the Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.
Don't worry, you'll show them.
There's a fire in your eyes and I hope you let it burn
There's a scream in your voice and I hope you will be heard
There's a fire in your eyes and I hope you let it burn until you're heard.
It was at the back of the library, where the librarians didn't really pay attention - where they couldn't hear what was going on. Zhou Mi was getting a headache deciphering the mathematical terms in his Korean textbook, scrawling the translations on the book in pencil so that he could remember them later.
The back of the library was the noisiest place.
"Sungmin, we're heading off to karaoke. Come with us!"
"Ah, okay. Wait. Are you going too, Heechul-hyung?"
"Of course I'm going."
Sungmin groaned. "Ugh, hyung, you can't even sing normally, and you'll be drunk."
He received a slap to the back of his head for his comment and Heechul scowled. "Watch it, Sungmin."
Sungmin just smiled sweetly. "Of course I'll come. Who else is going?"
"Us, Geng, Donghae, Yunho, Taeyeon, Siwon, Changmin and his dorky friend, Kyuhyun. Come on."
"Coming."
The noise slowly faded as they left the library, but there wasn't silence. A boy with wire-rimmed glasses and a sharp jaw stood up, tie flopping down as he bent over and carefully fitted his books into his bag.
Zhou Mi watched him as he straightened his blazer and walked out with his head down.
He was a foreign student at a new school.
He noticed the ones who were left behind.
~
Zhou Mi didn't speak to that boy for over half a year. After the initial bullying, he was picked up by some friends - students who, since he became associated with them, caused the bullying to stop instantly.
He had accompanied them to one of their karaoke meetings several times, and really hit it off with that Kyuhyun guy. Kyuhyun was smart and snarky, often dragged along by Sungmin. Zhou Mi, while he himself would do anything to avoid study, admired Kyuhyun a lot for the fact that he would rather be working. They sang together, and when they were going back, when the desperation for attention and microphone-hogging had left them all, the others would admit easily that the two of them were the best singers. Kyuhyun would flush and push his glasses up his nose, muttering something indiscernible, and Zhou Mi would beam, unable to hide his appreciation of the compliment while he denied it like he was
supposed to. Jessica would clap her hands and laugh. Sungmin would pinch his cheeks. Routine. What Friends Do.
"Who is that?" he would ask in the corridor, as the sharp-jawed boy passed by beneath their eye-line. Head bowed. Books clasped to his chest. Bag hanging limp and empty on his shoulders.
"Who is who?" Heechul would ask.
The boy with the wire-rimmed glasses would speed up and keep walking without looking back.
~
Zhou Mi liked attention and couldn't pretend otherwise. He liked to perform, he liked people to listen to him, he liked looking good, he liked walking around with the others that the students looked up to. He wouldn't trade their friendship for anything, no matter how often they were called shallow, vain attention whores.
But he was still a foreign student in a new school. And he still noticed the ones who hid behind their own faces.
"Kui Xian, who is that?"
"Nobody," Kyuhyun replied with an edge of bitterness that Zhou Mi didn't fully understand, adjusting his glasses. "He's nobody, right?"
~
He was everywhere. Walking the corridors. Studying in the library. Watching the music students practice. Doing his homework in the bleachers as the soccer players trained on the oval. Quiet.
His silence was loud to Zhou Mi.
He was invisible to everyone else.
~
"Watch it," Heechul frowned as he marched heedlessly into him.
"Sorry." A low bow. A high, respectful voice. Submissive avoidance of eye contact.
Zhou Mi was intrigued.
"That. Who was that?"
"Him? I don't know his name," Sungmin answered. "Why?"
~
Kyuhyun left their duet practice early that Wednesday. His sister needed him for something. Or something. Zhou Mi smiled as he waved goodbye and hummed quietly to himself until he noticed the lack of otherwise-silence.
Chords that sang of untouched beauty. High melodies that sang of spring skies. A sweet, high, unimposing voice
bearing lyrics that spoke of optimism, love and joy, toned with such loneliness that Zhou Mi quietly slipped out of his practice room and peered through the little window into the next one.
He watched as the boy played, his sharp jaw bobbing with each note, small lips working their way around the words, until he began to pack up and Zhou Mi fled silently.
~
"Ryeowook," he said, the first and only to answer Zhou Mi's question, backing away even as he did. "I'm Ryeowook."
~
Ryeowook.
The boy who existed, but not really.
The quiet one with the wire-rimmed glasses, sharp jaw, small lips, unimposing figure.
The voice of unattainable beauty.
They had a name.
Ryeowook.
Zhou Mi couldn't even pronounce it.
~
It wasn't until the next year that Zhou Mi realized Ryeowook had friends. Donghae hugged him in the corridors. Kibum was quiet with him in the library. He squished Henry's cheeks, smiled at him. Sooyoung begged and pleaded and aegyo-ed until he bought her food with a gentle laugh. Kyuhyun wrapped an arm around his shoulders with a jealous, protective bitterness that Zhou Mi still didn't understand. Siwon took him to church on Sunday mornings and the two of them sent him texts while he was trying to enjoy his sleep.
He spoke.
His participation was like a crescendo; he came closed; slowly opened up. He laughed. Spoke. Took part in skinship. Sang.
"Shut up, Wookie!"
The others laughed. Spoke. Moved on.
Ryeowook closed up again.
~
Zhou Mi cornered him against the wall and wrapped his lanky body around his frame.
"What's up, Mimi?"
"Nothing." A whisper.
Zhou Mi could feel the warm spots of Ryeowook's hands on his back, the steady breathing on his neck. The shuffle of Ryeowook's foot as he shifted his balance. The crashing of his rapid heartbeat through their ribs.
He pulled away and walked off without a word.
~
Ryeowook only sang alone. Zhou Mi sought it like creeper vines crawl for light. He sat outside the school practice rooms. Followed when Ryeowook went to sit at the edge of the (seemingly) deserted oval.
Caught.
Ryeowook looked up through the window in the practice room door.
Zhou Mi tried to run, but Ryeowook - short, petite, strong Ryeowook - hauled him back inside.
"I'm sorry."
"Why are you listening to me?"
Silence.
"Because I want to."
Again.
"Because it's nice."
A lowered head, a soft confession.
"Because it's beautiful."
An eternity of white noise.
Ryeowook drew in a breath and transformed it into a note.
Zhou Mi closed his eyes and sank to the floor. The voice haunted his waking dreams.
~
"What are you on about now?"
"Sungmin doesn't have the guts to ask Sunny out." Hyukjae put on a mocking warble. "She's in my mind all the time, Hyuk! I can't stop thinking about her-"
"I do not say that!"
"'Cause I can't stop thinkin' 'bout you g-!"
"Shut up, Ryeowook!"
Hiding behind his own face.
~
"Don't you like karaoke, Ryeowook?"
"Huh?"
Zhou Mi understood that Ryeowook had heard the question. "You never come with us."
Pretty mid-register chords. Lonely, sweet, high melodies. They filled the eternity of would-be white noise.
"No-one asks."
~
The music trailed off into nothing.
"Why'd you stop?"
A silent shrug.
Zhou Mi slid onto the stool beside The Boy With The Bowed Head.
"Wookie-ah."
"Wookie-ah."
"Yes, Mimi."
"You know I'm always listening, right?"
There was a small hand as guidance for a tentative meeting of lips. A first encounter. A brush in the dark.
"I know."
Zhou Mi could feel the warmth seeping through the contact between their bodies.
Thank you.