Rainy Days and Mondays
Rainy Days And Mondays (Always Get Me Down)
by withcoffee
PG; HyukMin, ShinMin; 1715 words
I wanted to try something different: a (very slightly) different style and a story where Sungmin doesn't equal a cute pink bunny. I'm not sure how I like the result, so concrit is welcome and in fact requested! Some reading between the lines necessary. Title from the Carpenter's song "Rainy Days And Mondays" (listen to it).
When Sungmin thinks of Hyukjae, for the most part, he thinks of the strange synthetic heat that comes from the stage lights and the way they strike Hyukjae’s back.
He tells this to Donghee once, the words softened on his tongue by alcohol and slipping past his lips with ease. And then, once those words were through, it was like a dam bursting - the rest of the words came tumbling out as well.
When he wakes up the next day, Sungmin has the vague impression that maybe there’s something he should be regretting - something he shouldn’t have said - but he can’t remember. Rolling over, he sees the glass of water and aspirin left for him on his nightstand. 'Ah,' he thinks, 'Donghee. Alright, then.' He sits up, swipes a hand blearily across his face, and swallows the aspirin with the finality of putting a period at the end of a sentence.
Sungmin hides his feelings well. Despite appearances, his band members are actually very perceptive. This is extremely unfair, he thinks, because somebody as brash and ostensibly obnoxious as Youngwoon, and somebody as catty as Heechul, should not be perceptive to other people’s feelings as well. "Unfair advantage," he mouths at his reflection in the mirror.
Then his eyes are drawn to the little white flecks of toothpaste crusted onto the surface of the mirror. He wets a handful of paper towels and methodically begins to wipe them clean, starting from the top left corner and working his way across and down. He’s really just wasting time, he knows - putting off the inevitable. He’s picked a good task for that, though, because after the toothpaste flecks are gone, there are the infinitely more annoying semi-opaque water stains to deal with as well. Finally, finally, when he’s satisfied that his bathroom mirror is one hundred percent speck-free, and when he’s sure he’s already half an hour late to rehearsal, Sungmin shoves a handful of fabric that he grabs out of his closet without looking into his duffel bag and heads out the door.
His apartment is only a couple blocks away from the company building (the only reason he’s paying the exorbitant rent on this dump is so he can walk to work instead of dealing with traffic in the mornings) but he grabs a taxi anyway. The taxi driver looks at him out of the corner of his eye but doesn’t say anything; but the look grates against Sungmin’s nerves the wrong way anyway, and he snaps “I know it’s just down the street, just do your job.” After the words leave his mouth, he feels a little bad, but not enough to apologize.
They get there in about the same time it would have taken Sungmin to just walk (six minutes), thanks to a street full of black sedans containing businessmen, but that’s not the point. Sungmin drops a couple bills on the seat behind him as he gets out; it’s this act, this giving away of currency, that he’s after. It’s an unnecessary expense, a luxury, and on a day like today (Monday, on top of hangover and rehearsal with eleven idiots and him) he thinks he deserves to give himself little treats to make the day a little more bearable.
Over half the group is just lounging around when Sungmin pushes open the door to their dance studio. Hyukjae, Donghae, Hankyung, Donghee are the only ones on their feet and moving. And even within this group, it’s really just Hyukjae and Donghae who are properly focused on the routine. Hankyung’s eyes meet Heechul’s through the mirror and they are both laughing at some private joke, lips curling up with a genuine, wholesome good humor that would make Sungmin feel even more sour and sullen if their happiness weren’t so, well, genuine and wholesome. His gaze shifts and now he’s looking at Donghee through the mirror. Only the concern and thinly veiled something - knowledge, perhaps - in Donghee’s eyes unsettles him so his gazes shifts again and lands on Hyukjae.
Hyukjae and Donghae don’t need the mirror to look at each other. They very openly have their eyes set on each other as the dance routine brings them closer and closer to each other. It all reeks of one big, fat cliché. The same genuine, wholesome happiness is palpable in the air between these two as well, only this time it makes Sungmin puke.
He makes it to the bathroom in time to hang his head over the sink before his entire fucking stomach surges up through his throat. A familiar hand holds his bangs back and a familiar voice murmurs “you should have stopped drinking when I told you to” without a single hint of reproach.
Jungsu tries to force him to go back home for the day, but Sungmin resists and the managers say that if it’s a hangover, then it’s his own fault, so Sungmin stays. He forces his body to move as vigorously as the rest, forces some spicy ramyun down during lunch, and then feels much better in the afternoon for having sweated and eaten and swilled down the fifty billion gallons of water Jungsu forces on him.
Of course it’s raining when they finally finish rehearsing. Sungmin stands under the overhang at the front of the building, frowning at the grayness of the raindrops. He glances at the time on his cell phone again (one minute’s passed since the last time he looked) and wonders, idly, why raindrops aren’t blue or yellow or pink or something else more cheerful. Another taxi rolls through the growing puddles, people dry and snug inside.
Suddenly, the door bursts open, practically knocking Sungmin aside, and Hyukjae comes barreling out while struggling to open an umbrella. “Oh good, you haven’t left,” he says breathlessly, “come on, I’ll drop you off at your apartment.” (Sungmin makes a small noise of surprise that Hyukjae’s not leaving with Donghae, and finds out that apparently, SJ-M is starting to record their second album that day.)
They huddle as close together as they can; the umbrella Hyukjae’s holding is small, definitely not big enough to shield two grown men, no matter how slender they both are. Under the blue cloth of Hyukjae’s umbrella Sungmin grins at Hyukjae, who smiles back baldly. Sungmin’s happy to let one of his shoulders get soaked in the downpour. He knows it’s futile, knows he’ll only ever be second best, but he’s also resigned to his fate and easily satisfied, and can be contented with this small, shared moment.
It’s easy to talk with Hyukjae, years and years spent together singing and dancing, and conversation comes effortlessly. They talk of mutual friends and the album comeback and SJ-M’s pending departure again and then Hyukjae’s cell phone rings and then - “Junsu! What’s up?! Hey, I’m with Sungmin right now - Min, Junsu says hi - yeah, yeah, cool, that’s great! How’s everyone else? Oh yeah? Guess what happened the other day. And that’s not all - oh look, we’re here, see you tomorrow Min - Changmin said WHAT?! Well, that’s just crazy... uh huh, uh huh...”
Sungmin watches, through the glass pane of the apartment building’s main door, as Hyukjae moves down the street, phone still glued to his ear. There’s a long, thin strip of wetness on the back of his shirt, where the umbrella he’s not paying attention to drips rainwater on him, that clings to his sharp shoulder blade.
Sungmin reflects that he’s always looking at Hyukjae’s back. The thought wears him out.
He spends the rest of the evening sitting on the couch staring into space. He pulls the covers from his bed and makes a nest out of them on the couch, and brews himself a cup of persimmon tea. The sound of rain hitting his window panes chills him, but rain is something he loves to hate so he’s content to mope the night away. He watches the hour hand on the clock chase the minute hand around, and the minute hand chase the second hand, round and round and round until two, three, four hours pass. He tells himself he’s not thinking of Hyukjae, not thinking of Hyukjae, not thinking of Hyukjae...
The doorbell rings when it’s near to midnight and startles Sungmin out of his clockwatching. Since it’s not yet midnight, he doesn’t get up to answer, wanting to milk as much brooding as he can out of this day, before he’ll return to his usual sunny self. But the person isn’t letting up, the G# note of the doorbell crashing wave after wave into his consciousness until he thinks he’ll get tinnitus.
Just when he’s about to give in and answer the door, the knob turns, tentatively (it’s just barely in his line of sight from where he’s buried on the couch) and then there’s Donghee, dripping rainwater into his anteroom. A lecture about locking his door naturally follows as Donghee takes off his wet outer garments, overriding Sungmin’s half-hearted protests that he swears he thought he’d locked it.
Donghee goes into the kitchen to make himself a cup of hot chocolate, familiar enough in Sungmin’s apartment that he can rummage around in the cupboards without having to ask for permission. The homely sounds of dishes rattling around makes Sungmin feel grudgingly better. And when Donghee comes to sit down on the couch, Sungmin leans over and rests his head on the other’s shoulder. Donghee puts his arm around Sungmin and, like that, Sungmin falls asleep a few minutes before the clock strikes midnight.
When Sungmin wakes up the next morning, he’s ridiculously comfortable in his makeshift nest on the couch, and the sun is shining joyfully in his face. Donghee is gone; in his place is a pillow and a post-it with a smiley face and a cute, plump little heart drawn on.
He has time to make himself a proper breakfast, so he fries a cheerful, yellow egg (sunny side up, because he likes the way the words sound) and draws a smiley face with syrup on his pancake.
He’s third to arrive at practice, after Donghae and Jongwoon, and they sit around and sing funny improv songs about the other members until everyone else gets there.
by withcoffee
PG; HyukMin, ShinMin; 1715 words
I wanted to try something different: a (very slightly) different style and a story where Sungmin doesn't equal a cute pink bunny. I'm not sure how I like the result, so concrit is welcome and in fact requested! Some reading between the lines necessary. Title from the Carpenter's song "Rainy Days And Mondays" (listen to it).
When Sungmin thinks of Hyukjae, for the most part, he thinks of the strange synthetic heat that comes from the stage lights and the way they strike Hyukjae’s back.
He tells this to Donghee once, the words softened on his tongue by alcohol and slipping past his lips with ease. And then, once those words were through, it was like a dam bursting - the rest of the words came tumbling out as well.
When he wakes up the next day, Sungmin has the vague impression that maybe there’s something he should be regretting - something he shouldn’t have said - but he can’t remember. Rolling over, he sees the glass of water and aspirin left for him on his nightstand. 'Ah,' he thinks, 'Donghee. Alright, then.' He sits up, swipes a hand blearily across his face, and swallows the aspirin with the finality of putting a period at the end of a sentence.
Sungmin hides his feelings well. Despite appearances, his band members are actually very perceptive. This is extremely unfair, he thinks, because somebody as brash and ostensibly obnoxious as Youngwoon, and somebody as catty as Heechul, should not be perceptive to other people’s feelings as well. "Unfair advantage," he mouths at his reflection in the mirror.
Then his eyes are drawn to the little white flecks of toothpaste crusted onto the surface of the mirror. He wets a handful of paper towels and methodically begins to wipe them clean, starting from the top left corner and working his way across and down. He’s really just wasting time, he knows - putting off the inevitable. He’s picked a good task for that, though, because after the toothpaste flecks are gone, there are the infinitely more annoying semi-opaque water stains to deal with as well. Finally, finally, when he’s satisfied that his bathroom mirror is one hundred percent speck-free, and when he’s sure he’s already half an hour late to rehearsal, Sungmin shoves a handful of fabric that he grabs out of his closet without looking into his duffel bag and heads out the door.
His apartment is only a couple blocks away from the company building (the only reason he’s paying the exorbitant rent on this dump is so he can walk to work instead of dealing with traffic in the mornings) but he grabs a taxi anyway. The taxi driver looks at him out of the corner of his eye but doesn’t say anything; but the look grates against Sungmin’s nerves the wrong way anyway, and he snaps “I know it’s just down the street, just do your job.” After the words leave his mouth, he feels a little bad, but not enough to apologize.
They get there in about the same time it would have taken Sungmin to just walk (six minutes), thanks to a street full of black sedans containing businessmen, but that’s not the point. Sungmin drops a couple bills on the seat behind him as he gets out; it’s this act, this giving away of currency, that he’s after. It’s an unnecessary expense, a luxury, and on a day like today (Monday, on top of hangover and rehearsal with eleven idiots and him) he thinks he deserves to give himself little treats to make the day a little more bearable.
Over half the group is just lounging around when Sungmin pushes open the door to their dance studio. Hyukjae, Donghae, Hankyung, Donghee are the only ones on their feet and moving. And even within this group, it’s really just Hyukjae and Donghae who are properly focused on the routine. Hankyung’s eyes meet Heechul’s through the mirror and they are both laughing at some private joke, lips curling up with a genuine, wholesome good humor that would make Sungmin feel even more sour and sullen if their happiness weren’t so, well, genuine and wholesome. His gaze shifts and now he’s looking at Donghee through the mirror. Only the concern and thinly veiled something - knowledge, perhaps - in Donghee’s eyes unsettles him so his gazes shifts again and lands on Hyukjae.
Hyukjae and Donghae don’t need the mirror to look at each other. They very openly have their eyes set on each other as the dance routine brings them closer and closer to each other. It all reeks of one big, fat cliché. The same genuine, wholesome happiness is palpable in the air between these two as well, only this time it makes Sungmin puke.
He makes it to the bathroom in time to hang his head over the sink before his entire fucking stomach surges up through his throat. A familiar hand holds his bangs back and a familiar voice murmurs “you should have stopped drinking when I told you to” without a single hint of reproach.
Jungsu tries to force him to go back home for the day, but Sungmin resists and the managers say that if it’s a hangover, then it’s his own fault, so Sungmin stays. He forces his body to move as vigorously as the rest, forces some spicy ramyun down during lunch, and then feels much better in the afternoon for having sweated and eaten and swilled down the fifty billion gallons of water Jungsu forces on him.
Of course it’s raining when they finally finish rehearsing. Sungmin stands under the overhang at the front of the building, frowning at the grayness of the raindrops. He glances at the time on his cell phone again (one minute’s passed since the last time he looked) and wonders, idly, why raindrops aren’t blue or yellow or pink or something else more cheerful. Another taxi rolls through the growing puddles, people dry and snug inside.
Suddenly, the door bursts open, practically knocking Sungmin aside, and Hyukjae comes barreling out while struggling to open an umbrella. “Oh good, you haven’t left,” he says breathlessly, “come on, I’ll drop you off at your apartment.” (Sungmin makes a small noise of surprise that Hyukjae’s not leaving with Donghae, and finds out that apparently, SJ-M is starting to record their second album that day.)
They huddle as close together as they can; the umbrella Hyukjae’s holding is small, definitely not big enough to shield two grown men, no matter how slender they both are. Under the blue cloth of Hyukjae’s umbrella Sungmin grins at Hyukjae, who smiles back baldly. Sungmin’s happy to let one of his shoulders get soaked in the downpour. He knows it’s futile, knows he’ll only ever be second best, but he’s also resigned to his fate and easily satisfied, and can be contented with this small, shared moment.
It’s easy to talk with Hyukjae, years and years spent together singing and dancing, and conversation comes effortlessly. They talk of mutual friends and the album comeback and SJ-M’s pending departure again and then Hyukjae’s cell phone rings and then - “Junsu! What’s up?! Hey, I’m with Sungmin right now - Min, Junsu says hi - yeah, yeah, cool, that’s great! How’s everyone else? Oh yeah? Guess what happened the other day. And that’s not all - oh look, we’re here, see you tomorrow Min - Changmin said WHAT?! Well, that’s just crazy... uh huh, uh huh...”
Sungmin watches, through the glass pane of the apartment building’s main door, as Hyukjae moves down the street, phone still glued to his ear. There’s a long, thin strip of wetness on the back of his shirt, where the umbrella he’s not paying attention to drips rainwater on him, that clings to his sharp shoulder blade.
Sungmin reflects that he’s always looking at Hyukjae’s back. The thought wears him out.
He spends the rest of the evening sitting on the couch staring into space. He pulls the covers from his bed and makes a nest out of them on the couch, and brews himself a cup of persimmon tea. The sound of rain hitting his window panes chills him, but rain is something he loves to hate so he’s content to mope the night away. He watches the hour hand on the clock chase the minute hand around, and the minute hand chase the second hand, round and round and round until two, three, four hours pass. He tells himself he’s not thinking of Hyukjae, not thinking of Hyukjae, not thinking of Hyukjae...
The doorbell rings when it’s near to midnight and startles Sungmin out of his clockwatching. Since it’s not yet midnight, he doesn’t get up to answer, wanting to milk as much brooding as he can out of this day, before he’ll return to his usual sunny self. But the person isn’t letting up, the G# note of the doorbell crashing wave after wave into his consciousness until he thinks he’ll get tinnitus.
Just when he’s about to give in and answer the door, the knob turns, tentatively (it’s just barely in his line of sight from where he’s buried on the couch) and then there’s Donghee, dripping rainwater into his anteroom. A lecture about locking his door naturally follows as Donghee takes off his wet outer garments, overriding Sungmin’s half-hearted protests that he swears he thought he’d locked it.
Donghee goes into the kitchen to make himself a cup of hot chocolate, familiar enough in Sungmin’s apartment that he can rummage around in the cupboards without having to ask for permission. The homely sounds of dishes rattling around makes Sungmin feel grudgingly better. And when Donghee comes to sit down on the couch, Sungmin leans over and rests his head on the other’s shoulder. Donghee puts his arm around Sungmin and, like that, Sungmin falls asleep a few minutes before the clock strikes midnight.
When Sungmin wakes up the next morning, he’s ridiculously comfortable in his makeshift nest on the couch, and the sun is shining joyfully in his face. Donghee is gone; in his place is a pillow and a post-it with a smiley face and a cute, plump little heart drawn on.
He has time to make himself a proper breakfast, so he fries a cheerful, yellow egg (sunny side up, because he likes the way the words sound) and draws a smiley face with syrup on his pancake.
He’s third to arrive at practice, after Donghae and Jongwoon, and they sit around and sing funny improv songs about the other members until everyone else gets there.