heaven.
this is my the fic that i wrote for dbsk_bigbang . i'm posting it here in this journal just because i feel it was a huge accomplishment, and i'd like to give it a spot in this journal. idk, it's weird, but oh well. (:
Title: Heaven
Author: xiahki
Pairing: Yoochun/Junsu
Rating: Heavy R
Summary: All Junsu ever wanted was to be a singer, but whenever he finds his way to Seoul, he gets swept up into a different sort of career. When sex, drugs and lies take over, he meets a struggling artist named Yoochun. Will they get out together, or will Junsu pull Yoochun down with him?
Warnings: drug abuse, language, sex, prostitution, violence
Word count: 10,085
Disclaimer: DBSK are their own people under the management of SM Entertainment. The portrayals here are fictional and no money is being made.
Author's Note: This fic took me months of endless typing and researching, but I'm very, very proud of the way that it turned out and I hope you guys will like it too. Huge, special thanks to Sazz (applesu ) who beta-ed this fic for me. She's wonderful and encouraged me all the way. <3
The first time that Junsu met Yoochun, it was a steamy haze of drugs, rock music and too much time to waste. The one person bathroom in the back room of the run down bar became their sanctuary. Completely closed off from the rest of the world, they stayed there until they couldn’t anymore, and Yoochun had Junsu in every way that his body could’ve desired.
Afterwards, he smoked a cigarette and Junsu smiled at him and left with a handful of cash to claim his prize. His eyes were dark and empty, and it should have ended there.
It should have ended before it ever began.
--
Junsu couldn’t remember exactly when he had started living his life this way. He knew that it all started to blend together, seasons blurring around the edges and events colliding and whirling and mixing so that it was nearly impossible to figure out what had happened last month and what had happened yesterday morning.
Small things stood out in his mind.
He remembered the day that he told his parents he wanted to move to Seoul to try and get into the music industry. Your voice is sent from heaven, his mother had said. You’ll make it and here’s some money to get you started and don’t forget to call.
She had sent him on a bus the next morning and from there it had only been a matter of time, a slow countdown to his downfall.
The bars on the main streets of Seoul wouldn’t let him sing. They laughed at him because he was young and had no money, and they told him that if he wanted to make it in this world it was going to cost him.
The first night he cried alone in his hotel room, and wondered if he should move back home and forget about everything.
He remembered the first time he had heard the word underground. He was standing in line at a café and trying to decide what kind of drink he wanted to order when he heard the two girls in front of him talking about it.
It was through those two girls that, unknowingly, he collected the information that would lead to his demise.
He found his way to the streets on the outskirts of the city, the bars that smelled like smoke and sex and too many other things for him to place. He stumbled inside and found a man with a guitar who wanted to make music. From the hours of ten until two in the morning he sang songs about loving and leaving and hurting and laughing and by the end of the night his throat was on fire.
Somebody bought him a drink, and a man in the back with a nice smile and a cold stare wanted to know if he wanted to live a good life and make money as well as music.
Junsu said yes, the man smiled, and that was the last he could recall of his innocence.
--
The first man who had fucked him hadn’t done it slowly or gently. He hadn’t taken his time, and Junsu still remembered the smell of his aftershave and the way that his grunts sounded in his ear, rhythmic and breathless.
It had felt like he was on fire from the inside out. He was being ripped apart at the seams, and the one thing that symbolized his purity and all of the truth he had grown up with and believed in from his soul to his smile were being stripped away, leaving him naked and shaking without anything to hold onto.
He had surrendered without a fight, eyes blank and staring at the ceiling, seeing nothing. He waited for the man to finish, and when he did, he zipped up his pants and lit a cigarette, tossed some cash on the bed before slipping out the door, going back to his perfect life and nobody would ever know what had just happened.
When Junsu tried to stand up he cried out, and there was blood on the bed sheets.
He had been raped of everything he had ever known, but there was a pile of remuneration and he held it in his hands, stared at it for a long time. It was his for the taking, and despite the loss of everything, he smiled.
But it wasn’t as simple as that. He went out and went shopping the next day, bought himself a striped sweater and a bottle of water. The man from the club came looking for him. Follow me, he said, and Junsu didn’t have a choice in the matter.
The man took him back to a house that seemed a little too old and run down, but it was empty when they went inside. It smelled like the bar from before, only there was a greater stench of sex in the air and it almost made Junsu gag.
What do you think you’re doing?, the man said. What do you mean? Junsu asked, and he took a step back because he seemed angry.
You earn your money and you bring it to me, you got that? Why? I give my body to them. I’m the one who was bleeding all over the bed. I’m the one who got raped. Why isn’t the money mine?
His punishment came in the form of a blow to his cheek. Another to the back of the head. The man struck him over and over again until he couldn’t get up and when he coughed it felt like his ribs were breaking.
You bring it to me, the man said again, and he left the room without saying anything else.
When he came back, he was holding something that Junsu had never seen before. A small packet of white powder, and that night Junsu found out everything there was to know about Heroin.
He learned how to chase the dragon and how to shoot it up, and once he was light headed and completely blank, the man held him close and rocked him back and forth.
In his state of disorientation, he learned that this man’s name was Yunho. He held him too gently and whispered words that only half made sense.
I’m sorry for hurting you, he said, but I had to do it. We’ll get along if you do what you’re supposed to do.
--
Heroin was a tricky substance. It was the kind of drug was glamorous and untouchable, and the power to hold it in the palm of your hand and know that it would take everything away was almost overwhelming, definitely intoxicating.
It was heaven in the form of small, fragile crystals, and he took every packet of it gladly and over time it grew to be worth so much more than the money could ever amount to.
Soon enough, he was working for the Heroin, nothing else. And he wasn’t the only one.
One of the girls who worked the lobby of the hotel started coming up to listen to music and chase the dragon with him. Her name was Ladybug, and she had dark red hair that fell to her waist and always seemed to be perfectly straight and smooth. Not one strand was ever out of place, and sometimes he wanted to touch it.
They would lay together on his rickety hotel mattress, watching colors and tasting the music and talking every now and again about life and the men that they had sex with. Ladybug would always talk about how much she hated men, all of them, and it made Junsu smile.
Once, she asked him if he ever wondered what a woman’s body felt like. He told her he didn’t know, and stared without shame as she stripped her clothing and laid his hands against her.
He didn’t feel anything, and they never spoke about it again.
--
Ladybug was the closest thing to a friend that Junsu had. She would come and go as she pleased, but there was always something to do, always smack to be inhaled and music to listen to, always conversations to be had.
She told him all about how she used to live in the big city, she used to have a job and an apartment and a cat and everything was happy. But then her relationship with her boyfriend had taken a wrong turn somewhere. He had shown her Heroin and he had beaten her and reduced her to a shell of her old self. She left him, and she liked to say that God led her to this hotel and showed her an easy way to make money.
She was older than Junsu, and her skin was like porcelain that hadn’t been treated as well as it should have. Her teeth were stained so she rarely smiled, and she started coming to his room more and more. Her hands were always shaking slightly.
What if we ran away from here? he asked her once. What if we left this city and started a better life, what if we decided to stop selling sex and start doing something better?
Ladybug said nothing. She laughed and then put out her cigarette on the wall behind his bed.
After that day, he never saw her again.
--
Junsu heard from some of the other girls in and around the hotel that Ladybug had been caught by the police.
They liked to patrol the streets at night, and they weren’t forgiving. It was against the law to do practically everything that their lives consisted of, and eventually it became second nature to scatter and cover yourself whenever those red and blue lights ricocheted off the shadows.
Usually if they caught one of the streetwalkers they would spend the night in a cell, huddled in the corner and just waiting until their boss would come and turn over enough money to bail them out. Possession was more serious, and there was a heavy fine or a jail sentence. It all boiled down to what kind of boss you had and how much business you could manage in a short amount of time.
Word on the street was that Ladybug had been on her way down to one of the bars whenever she was stopped by a man on the street. They got to talking and he was going to buy her a drink, but then the police came. They couldn’t run fast enough, and both of them ended up in jail.
Someone came to bail out the man, but even though Ladybug called up her boss, he never came for her. Eventually she gave up, and the prison guards found her cold on the ground with the small knife she used for cutting her drugs beside her.
The night after Junsu found out about Ladybug, he went back to his room and shot up a little more than he was supposed to. The illusions were ten times better and he felt like he was floating on the edge of the world, and Ladybug was sitting next to him and whispering in his ear, men are nothing but pigs, each and every one of them. I hate them. I hate them so much I could die.
--
Heroin was the kind of thing that could take your entire life and throw it away into nothing. It could shake you and break you over and over again but you would never see it, because the whole time it felt like the best thing you could ever have.
Gradually, the doses increased. It took more and more to get him off, to get him to the place where he needed to be to stop the shaking, but Junsu never once thought about quitting. Not anymore. Not without Ladybug. It wasn’t a choice, anyway. Heroin wasn’t just a habit, and it wasn’t just an addiction. Heroin was life, and the more he used, the more men he had sex with and the more bruises that appeared on his arms, he became convinced that there was nothing else out there for him.
Drug busts were common on these streets, and he had been relocated a few times. Yunho was always getting nervous, always trying to stay out it as much as possible, trying not to get involved. He just wanted to make money. Just wanted to make a living, and that was how Junsu found himself sharing a room with Changmin.
Changmin was younger than Junsu, but he was just as talented. He had large, wide eyes and nice skin and long legs, and he brought in customer after customer. He shot up more frequently in larger amounts than Junsu did, and he spent his free time sleeping. But still, he wasn’t a bad kid.
Sometimes, when Changmin had just finished shooting up and they were getting ready for bed, they would talk. They never talked about anything too serious, mostly just pointless chatter about men they slept with and drugs they had tried and what they thought about Yunho. Still though, it was nice to have someone who understood enough to have this sort of conversation.
Are you ever afraid? Junsu asked him. Are you ever afraid of getting thrown in jail or getting killed or something?
Changmin said, the only thing I’m afraid of is not having enough smack. Now shut up and go to sleep.
--
As much as Junsu didn’t want to believe it, he supposed that it was only a matter of time before everything spiraled out of control. He could only live in this world for so long, and it was a twisted turn of fate that brought him to this position, being in a cold cell all by himself, feeling the blood wet on his clothes.
It all happened too fast for him to really remember it. All he remembered was spending a few hours in the bar, chatting with some potential customers and drinking whatever they bought for him, a smile on his face and the assurance that he would get his business for the day without trying too hard.
There was no warning before the gunshots, and those lights appeared almost instantaneously. He didn’t think. He didn’t have time for thinking. Instead he just ran, followed the swell, the crowd of junkies and drinkers and musicians and businessmen and he just so happened to trip and roll on the pavement.
He scrambled to his feet and started running. He remembered having no idea where he was going, and taking temporary shelter in an alleyway. He was terrified. His face was wet with tears and his lungs were burning and his heart was pounding so hard that it felt like it would stop at any given moment.
He remembered the panic, the terror, the blur of lights and sounds and screams and still the gunshots. He remembered pulling the last of his stash out of his pocket, remembered the way his hands were shaking as he quickly threw it onto his tongue and down his throat, desperation overriding the fear and he couldn’t be found with it on him. But he couldn’t waste it. It was too good for that.
He remembered the click and the sting of metal against his skin and the you have the right to remain silent pressed somewhere against his ear. He remembered the car ride and resting his forehead against cold glass and watching rain drops fall down the window and thinking that this must be what it feels like, to hit rock bottom.
He didn’t know then that he was only halfway there, and prison was fucking nothing at all compared to living hell.
--
It took almost a week before someone finally came for him, and by that time he had already stopped believing in everything.
Without Heroin, there was nothing to believe in. Without Heroin all he could do was sit, sit on the floor with his legs drawn up to his chest, rocking back and forth and back and forth and trying to stop the shaking. Always trying to stop the shaking, and when they opened his cell he was singing to himself in a voice that was once beautiful, but was starting to fall off key.
Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high. There’s a land that I heard of once in a lullaby…
--
When Yunho came to get Junsu out of his cell, he didn’t have good news. Your mom came looking for you, he said. How did she find me? I don’t know, but when she met me she cried and she said she would stay until you came to see her.
It didn’t take long, because she had been waiting at the hotel, staying there for hours every day and hoping to see a glimpse of him. When she saw him she hugged him and cried and cried and apologized because he was too skinny. He was too skinny and there were circles under his eyes and nothing inside. He was empty, so empty and the Junsu she remembered had been full of life and smiles.
It’s okay, she said, as she cried and cried. It’s okay. Mommy’s here, and I’m going to take you somewhere safe. I’m going to take you somewhere to fix this.
Junsu went upstairs and found all of his things, packed them all up into a suitcase and it didn’t even fill it halfway, but he didn’t mind. He left the shoebox with his needle and his stash and the little knife he used for cutting and splitting because he didn’t want his mom to find it.
He slipped a packet of heaven into the waistband of his boxers and cleared his throat. I’m leaving, he said, and Changmin didn’t open his eyes.
The door closed with a click, and that was supposed to be the end of everything that had spiraled out of control.
--
The rehab clinic was nice and white and smelled like rubbing alchohol no matter what Junsu did. The people there weren’t so bad, not really anyway, and life was nothing more than a schedule and weekly visiting hours.
Mostly, all Junsu wanted to do was sleep. He wasn’t worried about eating or getting exercise or participating in therapy sessions, whether they be single or group. He spent the next few months staring at the ceiling or watching the IV drip into his arm, imagining that the clear liquid was crystals instead, crystals of heaven that would take him away from this place.
Nothing was there anymore. There was nothing to do, nothing to think about, nothing to live for and he lost track of time, lost track of life itself. Nineteen. He was nineteen years old and his body was dead, his will to live following close behind, and the time passed slowly and quickly and the routine was nothing to be proud of but also nothing to hate.
Time passed, just like it always does, and time fooled them into believing that he was cured. He had become such an expert at lies and deceit by that time that telling his mother anything he could think of just to get him back to Seoul wasn’t a problem. I’m better now, I promise, he said. He even worked up some tears, and she couldn’t see past them to the emptiness inside.
His mother had always had a soft spot for him. Unfortunately it wasn’t that soft, but he still found a way out.
That night they stayed in a hotel, and he laid awake while she cried herself to sleep, waiting until the tears reduced themselves to sniffs every now and then and whispered prayers faded into silence. He crept to the side of her face and stared with wide eyes at her sleeping form, watched the way that the moonlight glistened off of her hair and realized that he felt nothing.
There is no God, he whispered, and leaned to brush a kiss across her salt stained skin.
And then he left, once again in pursuit of his heaven.
--
Back in Seoul, Yunho didn’t hide how surprised he was whenever Junsu knocked on the door of the house he had been living in. He opened the door to find wide eyes staring at him, a face that looked even smaller and more sunken then when he had left him months ago.
I came back, Junsu said. I came back and I’m going to work some more.
Yunho’s heartstrings tugged for the boy, but he knew what it was like. He knew what it was like when the addiction overpowered everything, and once you had a taste of heaven, you couldn’t go back. So he stepped aside and let Junsu slip past him, easy, certain motions that took him down the hallway until he found the room he was sure that Changmin usually occupied, and he knew that this was home again.
--
The first couple of weeks passed by without ceremony, Junsu being fucked by strangers at least once a day, sometimes more, taking the money back to Yunho and then getting his fix. It wasn’t a complicated system. It didn’t have to be complicated, but things were about to change.
It all started the moment that a stranger walked through the door of the bar that Junsu now frequented, hair messed up and cheeks slightly flushed from the weather, and from that moment he had captured Junsu’s interest. Strangers didn’t appear often. After two weeks, most of the men around this place had already had him multiple times. He knew their faces, memorized habits that went with appearances and just how much money he was able to squeeze out of them.
Strangers didn’t come often, and Junsu found himself thinking that he wanted to know this stranger’s name.
Observation was the first step, and Junsu was skilled enough to do it without attracting attention. He watched, stealing glances and lingering when he was sure he wouldn’t be spotted, averting his gaze carefully if the stranger happened to look up. He took a drink of his beer, and Junsu thought that he was beautiful.
His skin was flawless, smooth, with high cheekbones and a nose gently sloped at the perfect angle, soft, full lips and before Junsu knew what he was doing he was on his feet and that face was getting closer.
It was easy to slip into the chair across from him, lean forward across the table just so, curl his fingers slightly and the movements came easily with practice and repetition.
Then the stranger looked at him, and the second those deep, thoughtful eyes locked onto his own, he forgot everything that he was going to say. There was a pause and something hung in the air between them, just for a split second, open and suspended and it was a little funny how, even after so much time and practice, the small talk could die in his throat like this.
Have a drink with me, the stranger said, and his voice was low and smooth like silk. Okay, Junsu said, a little breathless, and he liked the way that the stranger’s eyes crinkled at the edges when he smiled.
--
Sex had never been anything special for someone like Junsu. Sex was work, sex was business, and he was never looking for pleasure in his actions. He used to, used to search in his client’s touch for even a hint of what he used to see in childhood fantasies, but now he realized that it was nothing but that. A fantasy. The reality of sex was that it was nothing, just something to leave you feeling empty and dirty inside and crisp bills in your hand.
The stranger’s touch was different. Even though they were both a little drunk and it took longer than it should have to stumble down the hallway, back into the bathroom and to twist the lock behind them, the stranger’s touch held something that Junsu wasn’t used to.
His fingers were warm, nearly scorching, and gentle along his skin. Junsu panted harshly against him and moaned when his body told him to, smiling when the other rocked against him like waves and mimicked the sounds, low in his throat.
What’s your name? Junsu asked, low and husky with fingers tangled in soft silk, mouthing over the stranger’s throat. Yoochun, he slurred, and Junsu thought it was beautiful. The syllables rolled off his tongue just right, so he said it over and over again. Yoochun. Yoochun. Yoochun. It didn’t stop until Yoochun came inside of him and then it was over, and Junsu watched as he refastened his pants, smoothed the wrinkles out of his shirt and pulled a cigarette out of his pocket.
He could still feel the name whispering along his skin, and when Yoochun’s eyes met his, he smiled. The press of paper in his hand was familiar, and he gave a small nod, letting his fingers linger a little longer than usual.
Then he left, and he was sure that he wouldn’t see that perfection ever again. He got his drugs and went back to his room to share a little bit of Heaven with Changmin, and after he had fallen asleep Junsu laid awake in his bed, whispering the word to himself over and over again. Yoochun. Yoochun. Yoochun.
And he imagined that he could feel those fingers on his skin.
--
After that, he didn’t see Yoochun for a while. He didn’t know why or where he went, but his days were usually filled with building anxiety and usually ended with nothing but the sharp sting of disappointment.
He tried to tell himself that it was stupid, tried to tell himself that all he was doing was making things worse for himself but he couldn’t forget that touch. He couldn’t forget those eyes, and something about it made him want more. He wanted to feel those fingers again, and the only way he could do it was through Heaven.
--
Junsu didn’t go out into the city very often. There wasn’t anything for him there, not unless he was sent there to buy something or on some other order of business.
Today he was chosen to deliver a message to a dealer who had managed to keep himself undercover right in the heart of Seoul, and he clutched the address in his palm and imagined that everyone was staring at him as he walked by.
He caught a glimpse of himself in one of the store windows, barely there but still enough to be real. He saw the circles under his eyes for just a moment, the way that his clothes were a little too big and he didn’t want to look at it anymore.
He looked through it, and saw something that took his breath away.
It was a simple painting, really. A nighttime landscape filled with strokes and sweeps of purples and blues, colors blending together to create what he was sure was a masterpiece. But it wasn’t the colors or the shapes or the sounds that spoke to him. It was the artist's name, scrawled in the bottom right hand corner, words barely legible but they made his heart jump into his throat.
Park Yoochun. Yoochun. And the whole way back home he kept saying it to himself, imagining the strokes of the pen against the canvas and the way that the pen must have felt, being held by those fingers.
--
You’re a painter, he said, the first words that left his lips the next time he saw him sitting in the bar, and he watched the way that Yoochun’s eyes crinkled at the edges just like he remembered.
How did you figure that one out? He asked, and his eyes were bright and laughing as he set down the glass. Junsu was itching to touch him, itching to feel that scorching heat again but all he could do was slide into the empty seat across from Yoochun and try to remember how to breathe.
I saw your picture. It was a simple sentence, but even Junsu wasn’t too far gone to notice the light in Yoochun’s eyes when he said that. It was a light of surprise, disbelief, almost of happiness. And he smiled like always and bought Junsu something to drink and the rest of the night passed by in a blur of laughter and conversation and a constant buzz in the back of his mind.
It wasn’t until the early hours of the morning that Yoochun pushed himself to his feet, swaying just slightly, still smiling that smile and pulling some bills out of his pocket, setting them on the table. I have to go, he said, and Junsu shook his head. Don’t leave yet, he begged, and Yoochun didn’t push him away when those fingers curled around his arm. He didn’t object to the lingering whisper against his skin, and it only took one more sentence to pull him in.
Come home with me. Yoochun couldn’t refuse. Not with the way those eyes were looking at him, and the walk back to the run down shack that Junsu called home was filled with nothing beyond chatter about painting and bars and how cold the weather was, Yoochun laughing slightly when Junsu stumbled and a cloud of mist came with the surprised breath.
Inside the house, the laughter quieted. Faded into a dull, stale silence, and Junsu took Yoochun’s hand, carefully leading him down the hallway and into the third room on the right side. Changmin was already asleep, a barely there bulge in the mattress on the far side of the room, but Yoochun didn’t seem to notice. He was too busy staring at the peeling wallpaper and few pieces of clothing scattered across the space, Junsu pulling him down onto the other bed.
You live here? Yoochun asked, and Junsu nodded, pressing a finger to his lips. I share this room with Changmin, he whispered, but don’t worry, he’s already asleep.
Yoochun’s head turned just slightly as he caught sight of something, a syringe sitting on the bedside table, but gentle fingers brought his gaze back, pulled him down and under with a skilled kiss.
The sex was different than before, slower and smoother and not filled with so much desperation. Junsu sighed quietly against Yoochun’s neck and Yoochun trailed fingers over every inch of him, skilled and wanting all at the same time. It was over before he was ready for it to end, and it was the first night that Junsu could remember falling asleep with someone beside him.
--
Time was perfect, just enough to show Yoochun exactly what he had managed to throw himself into. Time led to more sex with Junsu, more money spent to have time holding him, and more nights told that he was with someone else sir, you’ll have to wait for your turn.
Time was enough to give Yoochun more nights in that grimy hotel room, wrapped up close with Junsu and more glimpses of that syringe, more glimpses of Changmin and his dark, empty eyes.
Time brought changes, subtle and sweet. Time brought new clothes and more smiles on the good days and when Junsu wasn’t working window shopping was his favorite thing to do. Time brought new paintings full of blacks and blues, things he couldn’t explain or understand and everything was starting to blur together.
Months passed, and he watched the circles under Junsu’s eyes grow, watched the life slipping out of his body slowly and watched himself from afar as he slowly fell in love and tried to explain it to his friends, his family. It was impossible, and yet time never stopped.
Junsuyah, he whispered, voice low and smooth one night when they were lying awake and he could tell sleep hadn’t come yet. Don’t do this anymore. His voice was strained and he knew that Junsu was in Heaven because he had seen it, had seen the needle and the liquid and the empty gaze but it was still worth it to try.
Don’t sell yourself like this anymore, you don’t need to. I can’t stand the thought of you with anyone else.
The truth burned his throat and Junsu heard it he knew but he was sure he would forget in the morning. Still, fingers danced along his jaw and eyes stared and lips formed a broken whisper that he held onto only because he wanted to believe.
I won’t, Yoochunah. I won’t. I promise.
--
Promises were made to be broken, and this one didn’t last long. No more than a couple of days, and Yoochun knew that he was stupid, knew that he never should’ve believed something like that could last. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise, but it still hurt, stung deep inside whenever he found the third room on the left side nearly empty, Changmin’s steady, knowing gaze all that he needed.
Leaving didn’t seem possible, and even though he knew that waiting around was dangerous, it was the only thing he could come up with. He said nothing as the time passed, people constantly in and out, Changmin getting up and taking his leave after an hour had passed. All he could do was wait, and it didn’t take long for Junsu to reappear, slipping into the room with a click as the door closed and fresh bills in his hand.
It took too long for him to notice Yoochun’s presence, and that was a sort of tiredness that only came with one thing. Before he could stop himself the anger had spiked along with the hurt, and the look of shock in Junsu’s eyes was nothing compared to the twist in his stomach.
Yoochunah, I-I don’t want to hear it. B-but, I-You what, Junsu? You what? I know damn well what you did.
Junsu closed his mouth and his eyes, turned his head away in shame that Yoochun couldn’t see, and fingers gripped his wrist, trying to force it away from his eyes. Trying to make him look up, and Yoochun couldn’t stop the anger, only growing.
Look at me, Junsu. Damnit, look at me! Is this what you are? Are you a slut, Junsu? Are you nothing but a fucking slut?
His voice was growing in volume, nearly screaming and yet Junsu said nothing. He kept his eyes firmly shut and didn’t react when Yoochun pulled him back, when he fell onto the bed and Yoochun was on top of him, fingers rough and cold and nothing like what he was used to as they forced Junsu’s clothes off.
Is this what you like, Junsu? Do you like it when strangers fuck you like this? When they take you and leave you just so you can go and get fucked up again?
Yoochun’s hands were shaking and his voice was on the verge of shattering, fragile, and Junsu swallowed hard. Stop, he whispered. Please, Yoochunah. Please stop.
It hurt him, and Junsu knew that. He could feel it in the roughness of Yoochun’s touch, the way his fingers still trembled and the way that he gasped for breath and when Junsu finally looked up, finally brought his gaze to Yoochun’s his eyes widened and the warmth rushed back into his touch.
I’m sorry, he whispered, fingers wrapping around Junsu’s back, cradling his head and rocking him back and forth, back and forth. Junsu felt wetness near his shoulder but he didn’t say a word, fingers clutching onto Yoochun’s shirt and not letting go, face pressed close into his chest. Those words were all he could remember hearing, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, over and over until everything faded into black and Yoochun felt himself falling apart.
It couldn’t be like this, couldn’t stay like this. They had to get help, had to get the hell out of this place.
He had to make Junsu whole again. But first, he had to pick up the pieces.
--
Life carried on just the way it had always been, and Junsu didn’t notice any difference in the way that Yoochun acted. It was the same as always, meetings in the bar on the other side of town that led to nights of tangled limbs and gasped words, fading into whispers and soft touches in a hotel room or a house with too much sin and not enough electricity.
Junsu never forgot about the night that Yoochun got angry with him, but they never talked about it after that. Neither of them brought it up in conversation but sometimes when they had sex Yoochun would take caution to be extra gentle and Junsu could tell that he was sorry.
Sorry wasn’t enough to erase the words, and the words weren’t enough to erase the habit. Yoochun stopped trying to fight it, and instead he started trying to find a way out. He sold all of the paintings that he had kept, arranged meeting after meeting with buyers and sellers alike and it looked like he might be finding a way out of this.
Nighttime was the time that Junsu always spent in Yoochun’s arms, and it was the only time when he really felt safe. Sometimes Yoochun said he couldn’t stay, he had to leave and there was a meeting early in the morning and I promise I’ll be back tomorrow. Junsu always begged, always pleaded with desperate eyes and fingers tight around any part of Yoochun he could reach, but it didn’t always work. Sometimes Yoochun had to leave anyway, walking out of the room with a kiss and another promise to come back tomorrow.
That was when Junsu had to start looking for his Heaven instead.
That was his only other form of security, the only other thing he had that he could think of to fall back on and the small syringe held much, much more meaning for him than it ever had the right to. He never did it in front of Yoochun. He knew how much it upset him, but that didn’t mean that he had gotten rid of the cravings.
Every time was the same, and now was no different. He had begged and begged and Yoochun had insisted. I have a meeting in the morning, Junsu, I can’t. I have to go back. I’ll be back tomorrow. I promise I’ll be back tomorrow. Fingers tightly curled around the front of Yoochun’s shirt relaxed, and with a kiss and another whisper he was out the door.
Junsu fought with himself, just like always. You shouldn’t. I shouldn’t. It’s bad, and you know Yoochun wouldn’t like it. I know, but he doesn’t have to see. It’s still bad. But I need it. You don’t understand. You don’t know what it’s like, just don’t tell him. And he closed his eyes as he secured the elastic band with his teeth, trying his best to force back the emotions threatening to boil over. His heart was starting to beat faster, a dangerous combination of anticipation and underlying guilt.
The guilt never won, and he tapped at his arm impatiently, waiting for a vein to rise and he hadn’t noticed the sound of footsteps in the hallway, or if he had, he had chosen to ignore it. There was no way that he could know. No reason to think that Yoochun would have turned around, that he would come back because everyday was the same and that wasn’t a part of the routine.
Yoochun didn’t know either. He didn’t know why he had come back or why he had decided that staying the night wouldn’t be so impossible after all. Maybe it was something in Junsu’s eyes, something about his voice or the way that he had looked and Yoochun couldn’t get it out of his mind. Either way, he was already back, soft footsteps in the hallway and he paused in the doorframe because he hadn’t expected to see something like this.
Junsu was sitting cross legged on his bed, sleeves pushed up with an elastic band around the top of one arm and his fist clenched, pulling out the back end of a syringe with his teeth. Yoochun watched in horror, completely unable to look away as Junsu eased the needle down, pushing past the skin and his thumb slowly pressed Heaven into his bloodstream. For a moment everything was tense, a wince taking over his expression, and then it smoothed over. He withdrew the needle and set it down on the bedside table, taking a deep, only slightly shaky breath.
When he happened to look up, the doorway was empty. Yoochun had slipped back after the needle had come back out, slumped against the wall and running fingers through his hair, fighting every impulse in his body because they were all telling him to go in there and take the damn thing, to break it in half and scream and cry and shake Junsu until he realized what he was doing to himself.
It was useless. It was useless and stupid and he was out of time and he knew it. They couldn’t stay here, and Junsu had just proven to him that nothing was getting better and he was only falling deeper into everything that Yoochun wanted them to get away from.
--
It was a matter of weeks, phone calls, auctions and meetings that seemed like they would never end before Yoochun finally held the bills in his hand. He had the money, every last piece of it, and all that was left to do was to show Junsu and hope that he would be as excited as Yoochun was.
The walk to the run down house that Junsu still lived in seemed so much longer than it had before, Yoochun’s head spinning and swimming with so many thoughts that it was starting to make him dizzy. Excitement turned to anxiety. Anxiety turned to doubt, cold and unforgiving, winding tighter and tighter in his stomach until he found himself unconsciously walking faster.
Junsu wasn’t in his room. He wasn’t in the bathroom and he wasn’t in the hallway and Yoochun felt himself nearly having an asthma attack before he felt fingers on his shoulder and turned, face to face with someone he remembered and felt like he should know.
He’s not here, the man said with a smile that was much too forced. But please, come with me.
Yoochun had never been down any of the other halls, had never been in any rooms besides the one that Junsu shared with Changmin with the stained carpet and the peeling wallpaper, but the others weren’t much better. He got glimpses as he passed, flashes of men and women alike, all of them with the same sunken, dead gaze. He saw Junsu in all of them, and it made him shiver.
Sit down, please. The voice startled him, and he blinked before following the suggestion, seating himself on a somewhat moldy couch in the corner of a room at the end of one of the halls and to the left. The man closed the door and made his way closer, eyes turning darker. So, he started, and Yoochun’s leg was shaking just slightly. It seems you’ve taken a liking to Junsu.
I love him, Yoochun said evenly, and the man’s eyes grew even darker.
The next few hours passed by in a blur, memories that were half there and hazy and that Yoochun would really rather forget. He remembered the feeling of Yunho’s fist against his cheek, the cracking sound of his own body hitting the ground. He remembered the taste of blood and the way that Yunho grunted with the effort of hitting him again and again, over and over until he was coughing and choking, desperate for air.
He remembered the smirk on Yunho’s face, remembered the panic and the worry in Junsu’s voice once he came back, remembered fragile arms around him and apologies that sounded so much more distant than they should have.
He remembered the way that Junsu was shaking, fingers trembling so badly that he could barely hold onto anything, and Yoochun didn’t know if it was from need for his fix or something else. It was impossible to tell, and the thought made him sick.
I’m sorry, Junsu said, nearly choking on the words. I’m sorry. We’re leaving, and Yoochun’s voice was calm and steady despite everything raging inside of him. We’re leaving, and Junsu didn’t argue.
Yoochun watched him pack up the few things he had, helped him make sure everything was in order and tried his best to ignore Changmin’s empty stare from the other side of the room. Junsu said nothing, and neither of them spoke of the shoebox hidden away underneath the bed.
--
Tokyo was everything that Yoochun could’ve dreamed of, and his doubts flew away the second he set foot in the condo he had set up for them. It had cost him stress, phone calls, selling his home in Korea and most of his artwork, but with Junsu by his side he was sure it would be worth it.
They didn’t have many boxes or furniture, and their bed was a mattress placed perfectly in the center of their wide bedroom. Junsu wandered away while Yoochun went through the boxes sitting in the middle of their empty living room, padding with quiet feet down the hall. Everything was quiet and the hardwood floors were slick.
He nudged the first door to the left open, greeted with a large room with white walls and a large window, sunlight streaming inside and filling every corner. He didn’t know why, but something about this room was entrancing and he left the door open just barely, shuffled to the center and gently lowered himself onto the ground, stared outside at buildings and cars, completely unfamiliar.
Junsu didn’t know how long he stayed in that room, but the sunlight gradually faded into an orange glow, soft against his skin and he was mesmerized by the sweeping strokes of blues and purples somewhere overhead.
Yoochun’s footsteps were a little heavier, soft clunks against the wooden floors and he peeked into the room just barely. When he came closer he could see the way that Junsu’s body was shaking, and he wrapped a blanket around his shoulders and held him close.
It’s okay, Junsuyah. It’s okay. And they stayed there until the warmth faded to black.
--
The warmth didn’t come back. After that night, it took weeks for them to finally see it again, and even though the sun peeked in and reached every corner of the room, it was a miracle if Yoochun could actually convince Junsu to get out of the bed in the morning.
He knew that it wasn’t going to be easy. He had never expected easy, but he also hadn’t been prepared for what was happening. He hadn’t been prepared for the shaking, the cold sweats and the way that Junsu would wake up in the middle of the night screaming or crying for no reason at all. The hallucinations scared him more than they scared Junsu sometimes, especially when Junsu screamed even louder when he tried to touch him, tried to help him make it go away.
It’s okay, Junsuyah. Three words he would always repeat, even when it got bad enough that Junsu didn’t want to be touched, curling up by himself under a blanket and Yoochun couldn’t do anything but watch and try not to let Junsu hear the tears in his voice.
It was going to get better. It had to get better.
--
It didn’t get better. It wasn’t changing, and Yoochun started to wonder if he had been stupid, if it had been foolish to think that moving away would make everything better.
Junsu was changing. The sweetness from before, the lingering touches and deep gazes were gone. Most of the time, he was sleeping. If he wasn’t sleeping, he was screaming, and the screams were almost always aimed towards Yoochun. It had only been three days, but Yoochun had hoped to see some improvement by now.
Yoochun always painted in the early hours of the morning. He usually started around four or five, climbing out of their makeshift bed carefully so as not to wake Junsu. Painting was hard these days. In fact, it was nearly impossible, and his mind and his heart were both so heavy, so positively weighed down that his paintings were never anything more than strokes and blotches of dark colors swirled together.
He had just finished a large square of dark blue when he heard a crashing sound from somewhere near the bedroom, and he nearly overturned his easel in his hurry to get out of his chair and down the hallway.
Junsuyah, he called, but there wasn’t an answer. The bedroom was empty, but the door to the room with the picture window was barely open and it wasn’t hard to figure out that that was where Junsu was.
When Yoochun opened the door, he was sitting in the center of the room with the phone that Yoochun had brought from his old apartment in front of him, handset to his ear and fingers shaking, frantically pushing at the buttons.
Junsuyah? He asked, but Junsu didn’t hear him. Yunho, he was saying, rocking back and forth and still pressing the buttons. Yunho. Yunho. You have to pick up. Yunho, answer the phone. Yunho, I can’t do this. I need it, please.
Junsu. Yoochun’s voice was firmer this time, but still Junsu kept pressing the buttons, over and over again, his voice growing more and more desperate. Yoochun couldn’t stand it. He couldn’t stand seeing him like this, watching him like this, and he reached out and grabbed the phone, regretting it the second Junsu reacted.
He was used to being screamed at now, used to hearing Junsu lose it and go off at the household appliances, used to the sounds of him screaming over and over again in the shower, but it was starting to wear him down.
Now Junsu was screaming, unintelligible sounds as he grasped for the phone, nails clinging and scratching at Yoochun’s skin, kicking and hitting and Yoochun refused to let go. Give me the phone, Junsu was screaming, and Yoochun refused. Give me the phone. I need it. Give me the fucking phone. Over and over again, and Yoochun could hear him choking on the rage in his own voice, could feel him shaking even as they fell to the ground and Junsu continued trying to get the phone from him.
No, Yoochun said, and he hated raising his voice but it was the only way to even hope that Junsu would hear him now. No, Junsu, you can’t have it. You don’t need it. You can do this, please, just stop.
He wasn’t sure how long they spent fighting over the damned thing, how long Junsu screamed and cried and cursed and still he was scratching hitting, anything he could think of. Finally he got it, but once the phone slipped from Yoochun’s grasp, it hit the wall with a loud crash and then Junsu was on the ground again, curling into himself and shaking uncontrollably all over again.
He pushed Yoochun away when he attempted to comfort him, and it had only been three days. Yoochun was starting to wonder if he could handle this.
--
By the end of the first week, Yoochun was sure or at least hoping to God that the symptoms had reached their peak. Junsu wasn’t sleeping at all, at least not during the night, instead spending his time shaking and curled in on himself, clutching his stomach.
There were minor improvements. He wasn’t always so irritable, so angry, and on most nights he let Yoochun hold him, let Yoochun run fingers through his hair and gently rock him back and forth against the chills, let him whisper words that had been dying to roll off his tongue and when it got really bad, that was usually when Junsu started apologizing. I’m sorry, he would say. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, over and over again until the nausea overwhelmed him and he had to stumble to the bathroom, grasping onto the wall for support to keep himself from hitting the ground.
Daytime was worse. Yoochun spent his time making phone calls, trying to figure out ways to keep bringing in money and trying to explain to the outside world that he couldn’t do this. He couldn’t paint like this, couldn’t find the inspiration while he was watching Junsu live his life this way.
Junsu refused to eat, instead spent his time on the mattress in their bedroom, sweating profusely and unable to get comfortable, usually kicking his feet restlessly and struggling to lie in one position for more than a few minutes. Yoochun did whatever he could to help, holding Junsu whenever he needed him to and leaving whenever he didn’t, never wanting to upset him more than what was absolutely necessary.
He sold a few more paintings that he had brought to Tokyo with him. He managed to sell a few of the ones he had been working on here, though not for much, and sold the one tv that he had brought along. He knew that the money would only last them a month or so, and he prayed that that would be long enough to get Junsu out of this state, long enough to get him at least a little bit closer to a normal life.
--
The second week passed in much the same fashion. Full of sleepless nights and restless days, Yoochun helping Junsu sit upright against the bathroom wall when the nausea got too bad for him to leave the bathroom.
Halfway through he found Junsu in the kitchen, trying to make a piece of toast and yelling at the toaster for not working, even though it wasn’t plugged in. But still, he was trying. Somehow, somewhere deep inside of himself, Junsu was trying. And by the time the third week started, it seemed like maybe he really was going to be able to get better.
Slowly, very slowly, his appetite returned. A piece of toast a day turned into two, gradually he added more things like a bowl of cereal or some crackers or even a sandwich if he was feeling up to it. The nausea started to dissipate until he could go for three or four days at a time without getting sick, and he started falling asleep and staying asleep during the night.
The irritability was practically nonexistent. He had stopped yelling at the household appliances, and, more importantly, had stopped having outbursts at Yoochun. He didn’t tremble when Yoochun held him anymore, didn’t shake and sweat uncontrollably and he didn’t spend all of his time in bed, either. Yoochun couldn’t explain it, but it was like he was coming back to life again. He was getting better.
--
By the start of the fourth week, Junsu was talking more. He was telling Yoochun things like what he wanted to eat, whether or not he felt like doing anything, how he felt and when he took showers he wasn’t screaming anymore.
It reminded Yoochun of what they used to do, how they used to be on the good days when Junsu hadn’t been using too much and they would spend their time tangled up together on Junsu’s bed, talking about dreams and life and painting and colors and anything else that Yoochun threw out into the open.
Their mattress didn’t seem so foreboding anymore, and Yoochun didn’t so much mind spending time wrapped up in this Junsu that didn’t seem so distant anymore. This Junsu with a spark barely lighting in his eyes, with a touch that didn’t shake so much, that seemed more sure than he could ever remember.
Yoochunah. His voice was gentle, almost a shock after lying together in silence for what felt like hours and Yoochun started slightly before looking down to see what Junsu wanted. Light fingers were running over his hands, smoothing over light scars that would heal within another week or so. Where did these come from? Junsu’s voice was light and curious, but his tone told Yoochun that he already knew the answer.
You were mad, he answered gently, squeezing Junsu’s fingers lightly in his own. I wouldn’t let you have the phone even though it was disconnected. You wouldn’t stop screaming and kicking me. There was silence for a few beats, an almost heavy silence as Junsu took in the words, trying to remember. Everything was spotty now. Things that had happened a week ago were difficult to recall. Finally, he settled on those same two words from before.
I’m sorry, he whispered, and Yoochun shook his head, held Junsu closer. Don’t be sorry. You’re getting better. You had to. Don’t be sorry for that.
Another beat of silence, and now it was Yoochun’s turn to tremble, just slightly. Nervous. He didn’t know what to expect, but business was slow and his muse knew what it wanted to do. Junsuyah, he started, and when Junsu looked up at him his breath caught in his throat.
I want to paint you. And Junsu didn’t say no.
--
Junsu’s body was the perfect canvas. He was beautiful in every way Yoochun could have ever imagined, tanned skin stretched over muscles, ribs that weren’t quite as defined as before, but were still visible. The sweep of his neck was gorgeous, the curve of his back a work of art that Yoochun had never been able to understand.
Using only one color seemed like a sin, and he decided that he needed the entire rainbow to complete something like this, to capture exactly the kind of person that Junsu was and could be.
The brush moved over his body in long, slow strokes, and the cool, wet paint sent shivers through Junsu’s body. Yoochun started with his neck, sweeping down in shades of blue and purple, mixing and swirling together in shapes, designs that wouldn’t have looked so perfect on any piece of paper.
Junsu sighed and murmured gentle sounds, both under the gentle massage of the brush and the sunlight streaming in from the picture window, stretched out comfortably on the starch white sheet that Yoochun had laid down in the hardwood floor.
The silence in the room wasn’t heavy or uncomfortable, and it stretched on with Yoochun’s concentration, stretched on as the rainbow grew with shades of green, red, and orange, sweeping strokes and swirling colors along Junsu’s torso. The brush dipped lower still, strokes still soft and careful as it slipped into shades of yellow, light patterns of pink and white over the stretch of his legs, finally slipping back into the same dark blues and purples that had started the palette.
The strokes of the brush slowed, stilled and then pulled away and Yoochun couldn’t breathe whenever he looked down at him, down at the Junsu that he had loved for so long, loved throughout every shade that he had been through. The dark blues, the purples, the reds, and Junsu opened his eyes slowly and looked up at him.
You’re beautiful, Yoochun whispered, and Junsu didn’t say anything, simply watched as he picked up the paints, the small cup of water he had been working with and set them on the windowsill.
He watched as Yoochun shrugged out of his own clothes, settling himself down against the white sheets as well, moving closer to Junsu until they were practically touching. He felt Junsu’s fingers nudging against his own, wrapping around and tightening and pulling him that much closer until the colors mixed, spread between them and he wasn’t sure where he ended and Junsu began.
He felt lips against his own, warm and full of so many things, so many bright colors that he hadn’t felt before and it was everything he could’ve wanted. It made it all worth it. The pain, the struggling, the withdrawal and the scars were all worth it.
Junsu pulled back slightly, just barely, and through the smudges of a rainbow against his skin, he smiled, and Yoochun saw life in his eyes.
It was heaven.
Art Post by copulatedlove
Title: Heaven
Author: xiahki
Pairing: Yoochun/Junsu
Rating: Heavy R
Summary: All Junsu ever wanted was to be a singer, but whenever he finds his way to Seoul, he gets swept up into a different sort of career. When sex, drugs and lies take over, he meets a struggling artist named Yoochun. Will they get out together, or will Junsu pull Yoochun down with him?
Warnings: drug abuse, language, sex, prostitution, violence
Word count: 10,085
Disclaimer: DBSK are their own people under the management of SM Entertainment. The portrayals here are fictional and no money is being made.
Author's Note: This fic took me months of endless typing and researching, but I'm very, very proud of the way that it turned out and I hope you guys will like it too. Huge, special thanks to Sazz (applesu ) who beta-ed this fic for me. She's wonderful and encouraged me all the way. <3
The first time that Junsu met Yoochun, it was a steamy haze of drugs, rock music and too much time to waste. The one person bathroom in the back room of the run down bar became their sanctuary. Completely closed off from the rest of the world, they stayed there until they couldn’t anymore, and Yoochun had Junsu in every way that his body could’ve desired.
Afterwards, he smoked a cigarette and Junsu smiled at him and left with a handful of cash to claim his prize. His eyes were dark and empty, and it should have ended there.
It should have ended before it ever began.
--
Junsu couldn’t remember exactly when he had started living his life this way. He knew that it all started to blend together, seasons blurring around the edges and events colliding and whirling and mixing so that it was nearly impossible to figure out what had happened last month and what had happened yesterday morning.
Small things stood out in his mind.
He remembered the day that he told his parents he wanted to move to Seoul to try and get into the music industry. Your voice is sent from heaven, his mother had said. You’ll make it and here’s some money to get you started and don’t forget to call.
She had sent him on a bus the next morning and from there it had only been a matter of time, a slow countdown to his downfall.
The bars on the main streets of Seoul wouldn’t let him sing. They laughed at him because he was young and had no money, and they told him that if he wanted to make it in this world it was going to cost him.
The first night he cried alone in his hotel room, and wondered if he should move back home and forget about everything.
He remembered the first time he had heard the word underground. He was standing in line at a café and trying to decide what kind of drink he wanted to order when he heard the two girls in front of him talking about it.
It was through those two girls that, unknowingly, he collected the information that would lead to his demise.
He found his way to the streets on the outskirts of the city, the bars that smelled like smoke and sex and too many other things for him to place. He stumbled inside and found a man with a guitar who wanted to make music. From the hours of ten until two in the morning he sang songs about loving and leaving and hurting and laughing and by the end of the night his throat was on fire.
Somebody bought him a drink, and a man in the back with a nice smile and a cold stare wanted to know if he wanted to live a good life and make money as well as music.
Junsu said yes, the man smiled, and that was the last he could recall of his innocence.
--
The first man who had fucked him hadn’t done it slowly or gently. He hadn’t taken his time, and Junsu still remembered the smell of his aftershave and the way that his grunts sounded in his ear, rhythmic and breathless.
It had felt like he was on fire from the inside out. He was being ripped apart at the seams, and the one thing that symbolized his purity and all of the truth he had grown up with and believed in from his soul to his smile were being stripped away, leaving him naked and shaking without anything to hold onto.
He had surrendered without a fight, eyes blank and staring at the ceiling, seeing nothing. He waited for the man to finish, and when he did, he zipped up his pants and lit a cigarette, tossed some cash on the bed before slipping out the door, going back to his perfect life and nobody would ever know what had just happened.
When Junsu tried to stand up he cried out, and there was blood on the bed sheets.
He had been raped of everything he had ever known, but there was a pile of remuneration and he held it in his hands, stared at it for a long time. It was his for the taking, and despite the loss of everything, he smiled.
But it wasn’t as simple as that. He went out and went shopping the next day, bought himself a striped sweater and a bottle of water. The man from the club came looking for him. Follow me, he said, and Junsu didn’t have a choice in the matter.
The man took him back to a house that seemed a little too old and run down, but it was empty when they went inside. It smelled like the bar from before, only there was a greater stench of sex in the air and it almost made Junsu gag.
What do you think you’re doing?, the man said. What do you mean? Junsu asked, and he took a step back because he seemed angry.
You earn your money and you bring it to me, you got that? Why? I give my body to them. I’m the one who was bleeding all over the bed. I’m the one who got raped. Why isn’t the money mine?
His punishment came in the form of a blow to his cheek. Another to the back of the head. The man struck him over and over again until he couldn’t get up and when he coughed it felt like his ribs were breaking.
You bring it to me, the man said again, and he left the room without saying anything else.
When he came back, he was holding something that Junsu had never seen before. A small packet of white powder, and that night Junsu found out everything there was to know about Heroin.
He learned how to chase the dragon and how to shoot it up, and once he was light headed and completely blank, the man held him close and rocked him back and forth.
In his state of disorientation, he learned that this man’s name was Yunho. He held him too gently and whispered words that only half made sense.
I’m sorry for hurting you, he said, but I had to do it. We’ll get along if you do what you’re supposed to do.
--
Heroin was a tricky substance. It was the kind of drug was glamorous and untouchable, and the power to hold it in the palm of your hand and know that it would take everything away was almost overwhelming, definitely intoxicating.
It was heaven in the form of small, fragile crystals, and he took every packet of it gladly and over time it grew to be worth so much more than the money could ever amount to.
Soon enough, he was working for the Heroin, nothing else. And he wasn’t the only one.
One of the girls who worked the lobby of the hotel started coming up to listen to music and chase the dragon with him. Her name was Ladybug, and she had dark red hair that fell to her waist and always seemed to be perfectly straight and smooth. Not one strand was ever out of place, and sometimes he wanted to touch it.
They would lay together on his rickety hotel mattress, watching colors and tasting the music and talking every now and again about life and the men that they had sex with. Ladybug would always talk about how much she hated men, all of them, and it made Junsu smile.
Once, she asked him if he ever wondered what a woman’s body felt like. He told her he didn’t know, and stared without shame as she stripped her clothing and laid his hands against her.
He didn’t feel anything, and they never spoke about it again.
--
Ladybug was the closest thing to a friend that Junsu had. She would come and go as she pleased, but there was always something to do, always smack to be inhaled and music to listen to, always conversations to be had.
She told him all about how she used to live in the big city, she used to have a job and an apartment and a cat and everything was happy. But then her relationship with her boyfriend had taken a wrong turn somewhere. He had shown her Heroin and he had beaten her and reduced her to a shell of her old self. She left him, and she liked to say that God led her to this hotel and showed her an easy way to make money.
She was older than Junsu, and her skin was like porcelain that hadn’t been treated as well as it should have. Her teeth were stained so she rarely smiled, and she started coming to his room more and more. Her hands were always shaking slightly.
What if we ran away from here? he asked her once. What if we left this city and started a better life, what if we decided to stop selling sex and start doing something better?
Ladybug said nothing. She laughed and then put out her cigarette on the wall behind his bed.
After that day, he never saw her again.
--
Junsu heard from some of the other girls in and around the hotel that Ladybug had been caught by the police.
They liked to patrol the streets at night, and they weren’t forgiving. It was against the law to do practically everything that their lives consisted of, and eventually it became second nature to scatter and cover yourself whenever those red and blue lights ricocheted off the shadows.
Usually if they caught one of the streetwalkers they would spend the night in a cell, huddled in the corner and just waiting until their boss would come and turn over enough money to bail them out. Possession was more serious, and there was a heavy fine or a jail sentence. It all boiled down to what kind of boss you had and how much business you could manage in a short amount of time.
Word on the street was that Ladybug had been on her way down to one of the bars whenever she was stopped by a man on the street. They got to talking and he was going to buy her a drink, but then the police came. They couldn’t run fast enough, and both of them ended up in jail.
Someone came to bail out the man, but even though Ladybug called up her boss, he never came for her. Eventually she gave up, and the prison guards found her cold on the ground with the small knife she used for cutting her drugs beside her.
The night after Junsu found out about Ladybug, he went back to his room and shot up a little more than he was supposed to. The illusions were ten times better and he felt like he was floating on the edge of the world, and Ladybug was sitting next to him and whispering in his ear, men are nothing but pigs, each and every one of them. I hate them. I hate them so much I could die.
--
Heroin was the kind of thing that could take your entire life and throw it away into nothing. It could shake you and break you over and over again but you would never see it, because the whole time it felt like the best thing you could ever have.
Gradually, the doses increased. It took more and more to get him off, to get him to the place where he needed to be to stop the shaking, but Junsu never once thought about quitting. Not anymore. Not without Ladybug. It wasn’t a choice, anyway. Heroin wasn’t just a habit, and it wasn’t just an addiction. Heroin was life, and the more he used, the more men he had sex with and the more bruises that appeared on his arms, he became convinced that there was nothing else out there for him.
Drug busts were common on these streets, and he had been relocated a few times. Yunho was always getting nervous, always trying to stay out it as much as possible, trying not to get involved. He just wanted to make money. Just wanted to make a living, and that was how Junsu found himself sharing a room with Changmin.
Changmin was younger than Junsu, but he was just as talented. He had large, wide eyes and nice skin and long legs, and he brought in customer after customer. He shot up more frequently in larger amounts than Junsu did, and he spent his free time sleeping. But still, he wasn’t a bad kid.
Sometimes, when Changmin had just finished shooting up and they were getting ready for bed, they would talk. They never talked about anything too serious, mostly just pointless chatter about men they slept with and drugs they had tried and what they thought about Yunho. Still though, it was nice to have someone who understood enough to have this sort of conversation.
Are you ever afraid? Junsu asked him. Are you ever afraid of getting thrown in jail or getting killed or something?
Changmin said, the only thing I’m afraid of is not having enough smack. Now shut up and go to sleep.
--
As much as Junsu didn’t want to believe it, he supposed that it was only a matter of time before everything spiraled out of control. He could only live in this world for so long, and it was a twisted turn of fate that brought him to this position, being in a cold cell all by himself, feeling the blood wet on his clothes.
It all happened too fast for him to really remember it. All he remembered was spending a few hours in the bar, chatting with some potential customers and drinking whatever they bought for him, a smile on his face and the assurance that he would get his business for the day without trying too hard.
There was no warning before the gunshots, and those lights appeared almost instantaneously. He didn’t think. He didn’t have time for thinking. Instead he just ran, followed the swell, the crowd of junkies and drinkers and musicians and businessmen and he just so happened to trip and roll on the pavement.
He scrambled to his feet and started running. He remembered having no idea where he was going, and taking temporary shelter in an alleyway. He was terrified. His face was wet with tears and his lungs were burning and his heart was pounding so hard that it felt like it would stop at any given moment.
He remembered the panic, the terror, the blur of lights and sounds and screams and still the gunshots. He remembered pulling the last of his stash out of his pocket, remembered the way his hands were shaking as he quickly threw it onto his tongue and down his throat, desperation overriding the fear and he couldn’t be found with it on him. But he couldn’t waste it. It was too good for that.
He remembered the click and the sting of metal against his skin and the you have the right to remain silent pressed somewhere against his ear. He remembered the car ride and resting his forehead against cold glass and watching rain drops fall down the window and thinking that this must be what it feels like, to hit rock bottom.
He didn’t know then that he was only halfway there, and prison was fucking nothing at all compared to living hell.
--
It took almost a week before someone finally came for him, and by that time he had already stopped believing in everything.
Without Heroin, there was nothing to believe in. Without Heroin all he could do was sit, sit on the floor with his legs drawn up to his chest, rocking back and forth and back and forth and trying to stop the shaking. Always trying to stop the shaking, and when they opened his cell he was singing to himself in a voice that was once beautiful, but was starting to fall off key.
Somewhere over the rainbow, way up high. There’s a land that I heard of once in a lullaby…
--
When Yunho came to get Junsu out of his cell, he didn’t have good news. Your mom came looking for you, he said. How did she find me? I don’t know, but when she met me she cried and she said she would stay until you came to see her.
It didn’t take long, because she had been waiting at the hotel, staying there for hours every day and hoping to see a glimpse of him. When she saw him she hugged him and cried and cried and apologized because he was too skinny. He was too skinny and there were circles under his eyes and nothing inside. He was empty, so empty and the Junsu she remembered had been full of life and smiles.
It’s okay, she said, as she cried and cried. It’s okay. Mommy’s here, and I’m going to take you somewhere safe. I’m going to take you somewhere to fix this.
Junsu went upstairs and found all of his things, packed them all up into a suitcase and it didn’t even fill it halfway, but he didn’t mind. He left the shoebox with his needle and his stash and the little knife he used for cutting and splitting because he didn’t want his mom to find it.
He slipped a packet of heaven into the waistband of his boxers and cleared his throat. I’m leaving, he said, and Changmin didn’t open his eyes.
The door closed with a click, and that was supposed to be the end of everything that had spiraled out of control.
--
The rehab clinic was nice and white and smelled like rubbing alchohol no matter what Junsu did. The people there weren’t so bad, not really anyway, and life was nothing more than a schedule and weekly visiting hours.
Mostly, all Junsu wanted to do was sleep. He wasn’t worried about eating or getting exercise or participating in therapy sessions, whether they be single or group. He spent the next few months staring at the ceiling or watching the IV drip into his arm, imagining that the clear liquid was crystals instead, crystals of heaven that would take him away from this place.
Nothing was there anymore. There was nothing to do, nothing to think about, nothing to live for and he lost track of time, lost track of life itself. Nineteen. He was nineteen years old and his body was dead, his will to live following close behind, and the time passed slowly and quickly and the routine was nothing to be proud of but also nothing to hate.
Time passed, just like it always does, and time fooled them into believing that he was cured. He had become such an expert at lies and deceit by that time that telling his mother anything he could think of just to get him back to Seoul wasn’t a problem. I’m better now, I promise, he said. He even worked up some tears, and she couldn’t see past them to the emptiness inside.
His mother had always had a soft spot for him. Unfortunately it wasn’t that soft, but he still found a way out.
That night they stayed in a hotel, and he laid awake while she cried herself to sleep, waiting until the tears reduced themselves to sniffs every now and then and whispered prayers faded into silence. He crept to the side of her face and stared with wide eyes at her sleeping form, watched the way that the moonlight glistened off of her hair and realized that he felt nothing.
There is no God, he whispered, and leaned to brush a kiss across her salt stained skin.
And then he left, once again in pursuit of his heaven.
--
Back in Seoul, Yunho didn’t hide how surprised he was whenever Junsu knocked on the door of the house he had been living in. He opened the door to find wide eyes staring at him, a face that looked even smaller and more sunken then when he had left him months ago.
I came back, Junsu said. I came back and I’m going to work some more.
Yunho’s heartstrings tugged for the boy, but he knew what it was like. He knew what it was like when the addiction overpowered everything, and once you had a taste of heaven, you couldn’t go back. So he stepped aside and let Junsu slip past him, easy, certain motions that took him down the hallway until he found the room he was sure that Changmin usually occupied, and he knew that this was home again.
--
The first couple of weeks passed by without ceremony, Junsu being fucked by strangers at least once a day, sometimes more, taking the money back to Yunho and then getting his fix. It wasn’t a complicated system. It didn’t have to be complicated, but things were about to change.
It all started the moment that a stranger walked through the door of the bar that Junsu now frequented, hair messed up and cheeks slightly flushed from the weather, and from that moment he had captured Junsu’s interest. Strangers didn’t appear often. After two weeks, most of the men around this place had already had him multiple times. He knew their faces, memorized habits that went with appearances and just how much money he was able to squeeze out of them.
Strangers didn’t come often, and Junsu found himself thinking that he wanted to know this stranger’s name.
Observation was the first step, and Junsu was skilled enough to do it without attracting attention. He watched, stealing glances and lingering when he was sure he wouldn’t be spotted, averting his gaze carefully if the stranger happened to look up. He took a drink of his beer, and Junsu thought that he was beautiful.
His skin was flawless, smooth, with high cheekbones and a nose gently sloped at the perfect angle, soft, full lips and before Junsu knew what he was doing he was on his feet and that face was getting closer.
It was easy to slip into the chair across from him, lean forward across the table just so, curl his fingers slightly and the movements came easily with practice and repetition.
Then the stranger looked at him, and the second those deep, thoughtful eyes locked onto his own, he forgot everything that he was going to say. There was a pause and something hung in the air between them, just for a split second, open and suspended and it was a little funny how, even after so much time and practice, the small talk could die in his throat like this.
Have a drink with me, the stranger said, and his voice was low and smooth like silk. Okay, Junsu said, a little breathless, and he liked the way that the stranger’s eyes crinkled at the edges when he smiled.
--
Sex had never been anything special for someone like Junsu. Sex was work, sex was business, and he was never looking for pleasure in his actions. He used to, used to search in his client’s touch for even a hint of what he used to see in childhood fantasies, but now he realized that it was nothing but that. A fantasy. The reality of sex was that it was nothing, just something to leave you feeling empty and dirty inside and crisp bills in your hand.
The stranger’s touch was different. Even though they were both a little drunk and it took longer than it should have to stumble down the hallway, back into the bathroom and to twist the lock behind them, the stranger’s touch held something that Junsu wasn’t used to.
His fingers were warm, nearly scorching, and gentle along his skin. Junsu panted harshly against him and moaned when his body told him to, smiling when the other rocked against him like waves and mimicked the sounds, low in his throat.
What’s your name? Junsu asked, low and husky with fingers tangled in soft silk, mouthing over the stranger’s throat. Yoochun, he slurred, and Junsu thought it was beautiful. The syllables rolled off his tongue just right, so he said it over and over again. Yoochun. Yoochun. Yoochun. It didn’t stop until Yoochun came inside of him and then it was over, and Junsu watched as he refastened his pants, smoothed the wrinkles out of his shirt and pulled a cigarette out of his pocket.
He could still feel the name whispering along his skin, and when Yoochun’s eyes met his, he smiled. The press of paper in his hand was familiar, and he gave a small nod, letting his fingers linger a little longer than usual.
Then he left, and he was sure that he wouldn’t see that perfection ever again. He got his drugs and went back to his room to share a little bit of Heaven with Changmin, and after he had fallen asleep Junsu laid awake in his bed, whispering the word to himself over and over again. Yoochun. Yoochun. Yoochun.
And he imagined that he could feel those fingers on his skin.
--
After that, he didn’t see Yoochun for a while. He didn’t know why or where he went, but his days were usually filled with building anxiety and usually ended with nothing but the sharp sting of disappointment.
He tried to tell himself that it was stupid, tried to tell himself that all he was doing was making things worse for himself but he couldn’t forget that touch. He couldn’t forget those eyes, and something about it made him want more. He wanted to feel those fingers again, and the only way he could do it was through Heaven.
--
Junsu didn’t go out into the city very often. There wasn’t anything for him there, not unless he was sent there to buy something or on some other order of business.
Today he was chosen to deliver a message to a dealer who had managed to keep himself undercover right in the heart of Seoul, and he clutched the address in his palm and imagined that everyone was staring at him as he walked by.
He caught a glimpse of himself in one of the store windows, barely there but still enough to be real. He saw the circles under his eyes for just a moment, the way that his clothes were a little too big and he didn’t want to look at it anymore.
He looked through it, and saw something that took his breath away.
It was a simple painting, really. A nighttime landscape filled with strokes and sweeps of purples and blues, colors blending together to create what he was sure was a masterpiece. But it wasn’t the colors or the shapes or the sounds that spoke to him. It was the artist's name, scrawled in the bottom right hand corner, words barely legible but they made his heart jump into his throat.
Park Yoochun. Yoochun. And the whole way back home he kept saying it to himself, imagining the strokes of the pen against the canvas and the way that the pen must have felt, being held by those fingers.
--
You’re a painter, he said, the first words that left his lips the next time he saw him sitting in the bar, and he watched the way that Yoochun’s eyes crinkled at the edges just like he remembered.
How did you figure that one out? He asked, and his eyes were bright and laughing as he set down the glass. Junsu was itching to touch him, itching to feel that scorching heat again but all he could do was slide into the empty seat across from Yoochun and try to remember how to breathe.
I saw your picture. It was a simple sentence, but even Junsu wasn’t too far gone to notice the light in Yoochun’s eyes when he said that. It was a light of surprise, disbelief, almost of happiness. And he smiled like always and bought Junsu something to drink and the rest of the night passed by in a blur of laughter and conversation and a constant buzz in the back of his mind.
It wasn’t until the early hours of the morning that Yoochun pushed himself to his feet, swaying just slightly, still smiling that smile and pulling some bills out of his pocket, setting them on the table. I have to go, he said, and Junsu shook his head. Don’t leave yet, he begged, and Yoochun didn’t push him away when those fingers curled around his arm. He didn’t object to the lingering whisper against his skin, and it only took one more sentence to pull him in.
Come home with me. Yoochun couldn’t refuse. Not with the way those eyes were looking at him, and the walk back to the run down shack that Junsu called home was filled with nothing beyond chatter about painting and bars and how cold the weather was, Yoochun laughing slightly when Junsu stumbled and a cloud of mist came with the surprised breath.
Inside the house, the laughter quieted. Faded into a dull, stale silence, and Junsu took Yoochun’s hand, carefully leading him down the hallway and into the third room on the right side. Changmin was already asleep, a barely there bulge in the mattress on the far side of the room, but Yoochun didn’t seem to notice. He was too busy staring at the peeling wallpaper and few pieces of clothing scattered across the space, Junsu pulling him down onto the other bed.
You live here? Yoochun asked, and Junsu nodded, pressing a finger to his lips. I share this room with Changmin, he whispered, but don’t worry, he’s already asleep.
Yoochun’s head turned just slightly as he caught sight of something, a syringe sitting on the bedside table, but gentle fingers brought his gaze back, pulled him down and under with a skilled kiss.
The sex was different than before, slower and smoother and not filled with so much desperation. Junsu sighed quietly against Yoochun’s neck and Yoochun trailed fingers over every inch of him, skilled and wanting all at the same time. It was over before he was ready for it to end, and it was the first night that Junsu could remember falling asleep with someone beside him.
--
Time was perfect, just enough to show Yoochun exactly what he had managed to throw himself into. Time led to more sex with Junsu, more money spent to have time holding him, and more nights told that he was with someone else sir, you’ll have to wait for your turn.
Time was enough to give Yoochun more nights in that grimy hotel room, wrapped up close with Junsu and more glimpses of that syringe, more glimpses of Changmin and his dark, empty eyes.
Time brought changes, subtle and sweet. Time brought new clothes and more smiles on the good days and when Junsu wasn’t working window shopping was his favorite thing to do. Time brought new paintings full of blacks and blues, things he couldn’t explain or understand and everything was starting to blur together.
Months passed, and he watched the circles under Junsu’s eyes grow, watched the life slipping out of his body slowly and watched himself from afar as he slowly fell in love and tried to explain it to his friends, his family. It was impossible, and yet time never stopped.
Junsuyah, he whispered, voice low and smooth one night when they were lying awake and he could tell sleep hadn’t come yet. Don’t do this anymore. His voice was strained and he knew that Junsu was in Heaven because he had seen it, had seen the needle and the liquid and the empty gaze but it was still worth it to try.
Don’t sell yourself like this anymore, you don’t need to. I can’t stand the thought of you with anyone else.
The truth burned his throat and Junsu heard it he knew but he was sure he would forget in the morning. Still, fingers danced along his jaw and eyes stared and lips formed a broken whisper that he held onto only because he wanted to believe.
I won’t, Yoochunah. I won’t. I promise.
--
Promises were made to be broken, and this one didn’t last long. No more than a couple of days, and Yoochun knew that he was stupid, knew that he never should’ve believed something like that could last. It shouldn’t have come as a surprise, but it still hurt, stung deep inside whenever he found the third room on the left side nearly empty, Changmin’s steady, knowing gaze all that he needed.
Leaving didn’t seem possible, and even though he knew that waiting around was dangerous, it was the only thing he could come up with. He said nothing as the time passed, people constantly in and out, Changmin getting up and taking his leave after an hour had passed. All he could do was wait, and it didn’t take long for Junsu to reappear, slipping into the room with a click as the door closed and fresh bills in his hand.
It took too long for him to notice Yoochun’s presence, and that was a sort of tiredness that only came with one thing. Before he could stop himself the anger had spiked along with the hurt, and the look of shock in Junsu’s eyes was nothing compared to the twist in his stomach.
Yoochunah, I-I don’t want to hear it. B-but, I-You what, Junsu? You what? I know damn well what you did.
Junsu closed his mouth and his eyes, turned his head away in shame that Yoochun couldn’t see, and fingers gripped his wrist, trying to force it away from his eyes. Trying to make him look up, and Yoochun couldn’t stop the anger, only growing.
Look at me, Junsu. Damnit, look at me! Is this what you are? Are you a slut, Junsu? Are you nothing but a fucking slut?
His voice was growing in volume, nearly screaming and yet Junsu said nothing. He kept his eyes firmly shut and didn’t react when Yoochun pulled him back, when he fell onto the bed and Yoochun was on top of him, fingers rough and cold and nothing like what he was used to as they forced Junsu’s clothes off.
Is this what you like, Junsu? Do you like it when strangers fuck you like this? When they take you and leave you just so you can go and get fucked up again?
Yoochun’s hands were shaking and his voice was on the verge of shattering, fragile, and Junsu swallowed hard. Stop, he whispered. Please, Yoochunah. Please stop.
It hurt him, and Junsu knew that. He could feel it in the roughness of Yoochun’s touch, the way his fingers still trembled and the way that he gasped for breath and when Junsu finally looked up, finally brought his gaze to Yoochun’s his eyes widened and the warmth rushed back into his touch.
I’m sorry, he whispered, fingers wrapping around Junsu’s back, cradling his head and rocking him back and forth, back and forth. Junsu felt wetness near his shoulder but he didn’t say a word, fingers clutching onto Yoochun’s shirt and not letting go, face pressed close into his chest. Those words were all he could remember hearing, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, over and over until everything faded into black and Yoochun felt himself falling apart.
It couldn’t be like this, couldn’t stay like this. They had to get help, had to get the hell out of this place.
He had to make Junsu whole again. But first, he had to pick up the pieces.
--
Life carried on just the way it had always been, and Junsu didn’t notice any difference in the way that Yoochun acted. It was the same as always, meetings in the bar on the other side of town that led to nights of tangled limbs and gasped words, fading into whispers and soft touches in a hotel room or a house with too much sin and not enough electricity.
Junsu never forgot about the night that Yoochun got angry with him, but they never talked about it after that. Neither of them brought it up in conversation but sometimes when they had sex Yoochun would take caution to be extra gentle and Junsu could tell that he was sorry.
Sorry wasn’t enough to erase the words, and the words weren’t enough to erase the habit. Yoochun stopped trying to fight it, and instead he started trying to find a way out. He sold all of the paintings that he had kept, arranged meeting after meeting with buyers and sellers alike and it looked like he might be finding a way out of this.
Nighttime was the time that Junsu always spent in Yoochun’s arms, and it was the only time when he really felt safe. Sometimes Yoochun said he couldn’t stay, he had to leave and there was a meeting early in the morning and I promise I’ll be back tomorrow. Junsu always begged, always pleaded with desperate eyes and fingers tight around any part of Yoochun he could reach, but it didn’t always work. Sometimes Yoochun had to leave anyway, walking out of the room with a kiss and another promise to come back tomorrow.
That was when Junsu had to start looking for his Heaven instead.
That was his only other form of security, the only other thing he had that he could think of to fall back on and the small syringe held much, much more meaning for him than it ever had the right to. He never did it in front of Yoochun. He knew how much it upset him, but that didn’t mean that he had gotten rid of the cravings.
Every time was the same, and now was no different. He had begged and begged and Yoochun had insisted. I have a meeting in the morning, Junsu, I can’t. I have to go back. I’ll be back tomorrow. I promise I’ll be back tomorrow. Fingers tightly curled around the front of Yoochun’s shirt relaxed, and with a kiss and another whisper he was out the door.
Junsu fought with himself, just like always. You shouldn’t. I shouldn’t. It’s bad, and you know Yoochun wouldn’t like it. I know, but he doesn’t have to see. It’s still bad. But I need it. You don’t understand. You don’t know what it’s like, just don’t tell him. And he closed his eyes as he secured the elastic band with his teeth, trying his best to force back the emotions threatening to boil over. His heart was starting to beat faster, a dangerous combination of anticipation and underlying guilt.
The guilt never won, and he tapped at his arm impatiently, waiting for a vein to rise and he hadn’t noticed the sound of footsteps in the hallway, or if he had, he had chosen to ignore it. There was no way that he could know. No reason to think that Yoochun would have turned around, that he would come back because everyday was the same and that wasn’t a part of the routine.
Yoochun didn’t know either. He didn’t know why he had come back or why he had decided that staying the night wouldn’t be so impossible after all. Maybe it was something in Junsu’s eyes, something about his voice or the way that he had looked and Yoochun couldn’t get it out of his mind. Either way, he was already back, soft footsteps in the hallway and he paused in the doorframe because he hadn’t expected to see something like this.
Junsu was sitting cross legged on his bed, sleeves pushed up with an elastic band around the top of one arm and his fist clenched, pulling out the back end of a syringe with his teeth. Yoochun watched in horror, completely unable to look away as Junsu eased the needle down, pushing past the skin and his thumb slowly pressed Heaven into his bloodstream. For a moment everything was tense, a wince taking over his expression, and then it smoothed over. He withdrew the needle and set it down on the bedside table, taking a deep, only slightly shaky breath.
When he happened to look up, the doorway was empty. Yoochun had slipped back after the needle had come back out, slumped against the wall and running fingers through his hair, fighting every impulse in his body because they were all telling him to go in there and take the damn thing, to break it in half and scream and cry and shake Junsu until he realized what he was doing to himself.
It was useless. It was useless and stupid and he was out of time and he knew it. They couldn’t stay here, and Junsu had just proven to him that nothing was getting better and he was only falling deeper into everything that Yoochun wanted them to get away from.
--
It was a matter of weeks, phone calls, auctions and meetings that seemed like they would never end before Yoochun finally held the bills in his hand. He had the money, every last piece of it, and all that was left to do was to show Junsu and hope that he would be as excited as Yoochun was.
The walk to the run down house that Junsu still lived in seemed so much longer than it had before, Yoochun’s head spinning and swimming with so many thoughts that it was starting to make him dizzy. Excitement turned to anxiety. Anxiety turned to doubt, cold and unforgiving, winding tighter and tighter in his stomach until he found himself unconsciously walking faster.
Junsu wasn’t in his room. He wasn’t in the bathroom and he wasn’t in the hallway and Yoochun felt himself nearly having an asthma attack before he felt fingers on his shoulder and turned, face to face with someone he remembered and felt like he should know.
He’s not here, the man said with a smile that was much too forced. But please, come with me.
Yoochun had never been down any of the other halls, had never been in any rooms besides the one that Junsu shared with Changmin with the stained carpet and the peeling wallpaper, but the others weren’t much better. He got glimpses as he passed, flashes of men and women alike, all of them with the same sunken, dead gaze. He saw Junsu in all of them, and it made him shiver.
Sit down, please. The voice startled him, and he blinked before following the suggestion, seating himself on a somewhat moldy couch in the corner of a room at the end of one of the halls and to the left. The man closed the door and made his way closer, eyes turning darker. So, he started, and Yoochun’s leg was shaking just slightly. It seems you’ve taken a liking to Junsu.
I love him, Yoochun said evenly, and the man’s eyes grew even darker.
The next few hours passed by in a blur, memories that were half there and hazy and that Yoochun would really rather forget. He remembered the feeling of Yunho’s fist against his cheek, the cracking sound of his own body hitting the ground. He remembered the taste of blood and the way that Yunho grunted with the effort of hitting him again and again, over and over until he was coughing and choking, desperate for air.
He remembered the smirk on Yunho’s face, remembered the panic and the worry in Junsu’s voice once he came back, remembered fragile arms around him and apologies that sounded so much more distant than they should have.
He remembered the way that Junsu was shaking, fingers trembling so badly that he could barely hold onto anything, and Yoochun didn’t know if it was from need for his fix or something else. It was impossible to tell, and the thought made him sick.
I’m sorry, Junsu said, nearly choking on the words. I’m sorry. We’re leaving, and Yoochun’s voice was calm and steady despite everything raging inside of him. We’re leaving, and Junsu didn’t argue.
Yoochun watched him pack up the few things he had, helped him make sure everything was in order and tried his best to ignore Changmin’s empty stare from the other side of the room. Junsu said nothing, and neither of them spoke of the shoebox hidden away underneath the bed.
--
Tokyo was everything that Yoochun could’ve dreamed of, and his doubts flew away the second he set foot in the condo he had set up for them. It had cost him stress, phone calls, selling his home in Korea and most of his artwork, but with Junsu by his side he was sure it would be worth it.
They didn’t have many boxes or furniture, and their bed was a mattress placed perfectly in the center of their wide bedroom. Junsu wandered away while Yoochun went through the boxes sitting in the middle of their empty living room, padding with quiet feet down the hall. Everything was quiet and the hardwood floors were slick.
He nudged the first door to the left open, greeted with a large room with white walls and a large window, sunlight streaming inside and filling every corner. He didn’t know why, but something about this room was entrancing and he left the door open just barely, shuffled to the center and gently lowered himself onto the ground, stared outside at buildings and cars, completely unfamiliar.
Junsu didn’t know how long he stayed in that room, but the sunlight gradually faded into an orange glow, soft against his skin and he was mesmerized by the sweeping strokes of blues and purples somewhere overhead.
Yoochun’s footsteps were a little heavier, soft clunks against the wooden floors and he peeked into the room just barely. When he came closer he could see the way that Junsu’s body was shaking, and he wrapped a blanket around his shoulders and held him close.
It’s okay, Junsuyah. It’s okay. And they stayed there until the warmth faded to black.
--
The warmth didn’t come back. After that night, it took weeks for them to finally see it again, and even though the sun peeked in and reached every corner of the room, it was a miracle if Yoochun could actually convince Junsu to get out of the bed in the morning.
He knew that it wasn’t going to be easy. He had never expected easy, but he also hadn’t been prepared for what was happening. He hadn’t been prepared for the shaking, the cold sweats and the way that Junsu would wake up in the middle of the night screaming or crying for no reason at all. The hallucinations scared him more than they scared Junsu sometimes, especially when Junsu screamed even louder when he tried to touch him, tried to help him make it go away.
It’s okay, Junsuyah. Three words he would always repeat, even when it got bad enough that Junsu didn’t want to be touched, curling up by himself under a blanket and Yoochun couldn’t do anything but watch and try not to let Junsu hear the tears in his voice.
It was going to get better. It had to get better.
--
It didn’t get better. It wasn’t changing, and Yoochun started to wonder if he had been stupid, if it had been foolish to think that moving away would make everything better.
Junsu was changing. The sweetness from before, the lingering touches and deep gazes were gone. Most of the time, he was sleeping. If he wasn’t sleeping, he was screaming, and the screams were almost always aimed towards Yoochun. It had only been three days, but Yoochun had hoped to see some improvement by now.
Yoochun always painted in the early hours of the morning. He usually started around four or five, climbing out of their makeshift bed carefully so as not to wake Junsu. Painting was hard these days. In fact, it was nearly impossible, and his mind and his heart were both so heavy, so positively weighed down that his paintings were never anything more than strokes and blotches of dark colors swirled together.
He had just finished a large square of dark blue when he heard a crashing sound from somewhere near the bedroom, and he nearly overturned his easel in his hurry to get out of his chair and down the hallway.
Junsuyah, he called, but there wasn’t an answer. The bedroom was empty, but the door to the room with the picture window was barely open and it wasn’t hard to figure out that that was where Junsu was.
When Yoochun opened the door, he was sitting in the center of the room with the phone that Yoochun had brought from his old apartment in front of him, handset to his ear and fingers shaking, frantically pushing at the buttons.
Junsuyah? He asked, but Junsu didn’t hear him. Yunho, he was saying, rocking back and forth and still pressing the buttons. Yunho. Yunho. You have to pick up. Yunho, answer the phone. Yunho, I can’t do this. I need it, please.
Junsu. Yoochun’s voice was firmer this time, but still Junsu kept pressing the buttons, over and over again, his voice growing more and more desperate. Yoochun couldn’t stand it. He couldn’t stand seeing him like this, watching him like this, and he reached out and grabbed the phone, regretting it the second Junsu reacted.
He was used to being screamed at now, used to hearing Junsu lose it and go off at the household appliances, used to the sounds of him screaming over and over again in the shower, but it was starting to wear him down.
Now Junsu was screaming, unintelligible sounds as he grasped for the phone, nails clinging and scratching at Yoochun’s skin, kicking and hitting and Yoochun refused to let go. Give me the phone, Junsu was screaming, and Yoochun refused. Give me the phone. I need it. Give me the fucking phone. Over and over again, and Yoochun could hear him choking on the rage in his own voice, could feel him shaking even as they fell to the ground and Junsu continued trying to get the phone from him.
No, Yoochun said, and he hated raising his voice but it was the only way to even hope that Junsu would hear him now. No, Junsu, you can’t have it. You don’t need it. You can do this, please, just stop.
He wasn’t sure how long they spent fighting over the damned thing, how long Junsu screamed and cried and cursed and still he was scratching hitting, anything he could think of. Finally he got it, but once the phone slipped from Yoochun’s grasp, it hit the wall with a loud crash and then Junsu was on the ground again, curling into himself and shaking uncontrollably all over again.
He pushed Yoochun away when he attempted to comfort him, and it had only been three days. Yoochun was starting to wonder if he could handle this.
--
By the end of the first week, Yoochun was sure or at least hoping to God that the symptoms had reached their peak. Junsu wasn’t sleeping at all, at least not during the night, instead spending his time shaking and curled in on himself, clutching his stomach.
There were minor improvements. He wasn’t always so irritable, so angry, and on most nights he let Yoochun hold him, let Yoochun run fingers through his hair and gently rock him back and forth against the chills, let him whisper words that had been dying to roll off his tongue and when it got really bad, that was usually when Junsu started apologizing. I’m sorry, he would say. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, over and over again until the nausea overwhelmed him and he had to stumble to the bathroom, grasping onto the wall for support to keep himself from hitting the ground.
Daytime was worse. Yoochun spent his time making phone calls, trying to figure out ways to keep bringing in money and trying to explain to the outside world that he couldn’t do this. He couldn’t paint like this, couldn’t find the inspiration while he was watching Junsu live his life this way.
Junsu refused to eat, instead spent his time on the mattress in their bedroom, sweating profusely and unable to get comfortable, usually kicking his feet restlessly and struggling to lie in one position for more than a few minutes. Yoochun did whatever he could to help, holding Junsu whenever he needed him to and leaving whenever he didn’t, never wanting to upset him more than what was absolutely necessary.
He sold a few more paintings that he had brought to Tokyo with him. He managed to sell a few of the ones he had been working on here, though not for much, and sold the one tv that he had brought along. He knew that the money would only last them a month or so, and he prayed that that would be long enough to get Junsu out of this state, long enough to get him at least a little bit closer to a normal life.
--
The second week passed in much the same fashion. Full of sleepless nights and restless days, Yoochun helping Junsu sit upright against the bathroom wall when the nausea got too bad for him to leave the bathroom.
Halfway through he found Junsu in the kitchen, trying to make a piece of toast and yelling at the toaster for not working, even though it wasn’t plugged in. But still, he was trying. Somehow, somewhere deep inside of himself, Junsu was trying. And by the time the third week started, it seemed like maybe he really was going to be able to get better.
Slowly, very slowly, his appetite returned. A piece of toast a day turned into two, gradually he added more things like a bowl of cereal or some crackers or even a sandwich if he was feeling up to it. The nausea started to dissipate until he could go for three or four days at a time without getting sick, and he started falling asleep and staying asleep during the night.
The irritability was practically nonexistent. He had stopped yelling at the household appliances, and, more importantly, had stopped having outbursts at Yoochun. He didn’t tremble when Yoochun held him anymore, didn’t shake and sweat uncontrollably and he didn’t spend all of his time in bed, either. Yoochun couldn’t explain it, but it was like he was coming back to life again. He was getting better.
--
By the start of the fourth week, Junsu was talking more. He was telling Yoochun things like what he wanted to eat, whether or not he felt like doing anything, how he felt and when he took showers he wasn’t screaming anymore.
It reminded Yoochun of what they used to do, how they used to be on the good days when Junsu hadn’t been using too much and they would spend their time tangled up together on Junsu’s bed, talking about dreams and life and painting and colors and anything else that Yoochun threw out into the open.
Their mattress didn’t seem so foreboding anymore, and Yoochun didn’t so much mind spending time wrapped up in this Junsu that didn’t seem so distant anymore. This Junsu with a spark barely lighting in his eyes, with a touch that didn’t shake so much, that seemed more sure than he could ever remember.
Yoochunah. His voice was gentle, almost a shock after lying together in silence for what felt like hours and Yoochun started slightly before looking down to see what Junsu wanted. Light fingers were running over his hands, smoothing over light scars that would heal within another week or so. Where did these come from? Junsu’s voice was light and curious, but his tone told Yoochun that he already knew the answer.
You were mad, he answered gently, squeezing Junsu’s fingers lightly in his own. I wouldn’t let you have the phone even though it was disconnected. You wouldn’t stop screaming and kicking me. There was silence for a few beats, an almost heavy silence as Junsu took in the words, trying to remember. Everything was spotty now. Things that had happened a week ago were difficult to recall. Finally, he settled on those same two words from before.
I’m sorry, he whispered, and Yoochun shook his head, held Junsu closer. Don’t be sorry. You’re getting better. You had to. Don’t be sorry for that.
Another beat of silence, and now it was Yoochun’s turn to tremble, just slightly. Nervous. He didn’t know what to expect, but business was slow and his muse knew what it wanted to do. Junsuyah, he started, and when Junsu looked up at him his breath caught in his throat.
I want to paint you. And Junsu didn’t say no.
--
Junsu’s body was the perfect canvas. He was beautiful in every way Yoochun could have ever imagined, tanned skin stretched over muscles, ribs that weren’t quite as defined as before, but were still visible. The sweep of his neck was gorgeous, the curve of his back a work of art that Yoochun had never been able to understand.
Using only one color seemed like a sin, and he decided that he needed the entire rainbow to complete something like this, to capture exactly the kind of person that Junsu was and could be.
The brush moved over his body in long, slow strokes, and the cool, wet paint sent shivers through Junsu’s body. Yoochun started with his neck, sweeping down in shades of blue and purple, mixing and swirling together in shapes, designs that wouldn’t have looked so perfect on any piece of paper.
Junsu sighed and murmured gentle sounds, both under the gentle massage of the brush and the sunlight streaming in from the picture window, stretched out comfortably on the starch white sheet that Yoochun had laid down in the hardwood floor.
The silence in the room wasn’t heavy or uncomfortable, and it stretched on with Yoochun’s concentration, stretched on as the rainbow grew with shades of green, red, and orange, sweeping strokes and swirling colors along Junsu’s torso. The brush dipped lower still, strokes still soft and careful as it slipped into shades of yellow, light patterns of pink and white over the stretch of his legs, finally slipping back into the same dark blues and purples that had started the palette.
The strokes of the brush slowed, stilled and then pulled away and Yoochun couldn’t breathe whenever he looked down at him, down at the Junsu that he had loved for so long, loved throughout every shade that he had been through. The dark blues, the purples, the reds, and Junsu opened his eyes slowly and looked up at him.
You’re beautiful, Yoochun whispered, and Junsu didn’t say anything, simply watched as he picked up the paints, the small cup of water he had been working with and set them on the windowsill.
He watched as Yoochun shrugged out of his own clothes, settling himself down against the white sheets as well, moving closer to Junsu until they were practically touching. He felt Junsu’s fingers nudging against his own, wrapping around and tightening and pulling him that much closer until the colors mixed, spread between them and he wasn’t sure where he ended and Junsu began.
He felt lips against his own, warm and full of so many things, so many bright colors that he hadn’t felt before and it was everything he could’ve wanted. It made it all worth it. The pain, the struggling, the withdrawal and the scars were all worth it.
Junsu pulled back slightly, just barely, and through the smudges of a rainbow against his skin, he smiled, and Yoochun saw life in his eyes.
It was heaven.
Art Post by copulatedlove