(for mialynn8) For a Rainy Day
For: mialynn8
Title: For a Rainy Day
Genre: Fluff, fluff, fluff
Rating: PG (brief language)
Length: 4,000 words
Summary: It's a terrible smile, one that should rightfully be outlawed in every part of the world, because it makes red-haired, narrow-shouldered roommates uncomfortable and dizzy.
Notes: guuuuh-- I really enjoyed writing this, and I hope you like it! Happy Kaisoo Day(s)~ \o/
"You know what they call a.. a Quarter Pounder with cheese, uh.. in Paris?"
"They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with cheese?"
"No, man, they got the metric system. They wouldn't know what the fuck a Quarter Pounder is."
Kyungsoo wakes up to a conversation he's heard at least seventy times. It's always the same two guys in the neighbouring room, discussing cultural differences and exchanging the same trivia every single time. If Kyungsoo didn't know any better, he'd bet that every letter, space, and period had been branded into his skull after just how many times those exact words have interrupted his daily naps. Maybe there would even be a picture or two in case he couldn't remember for the life of him what the hell a Quarter Pounder with cheese was.
"Then what do they call it?" the second person asks. Kyungsoo sighs.
"They call it a Royale with cheese," the boy mumbles under his breath, perfectly in sync with the first person in the other room. His eyebrows pinch together when the words almost involuntarily leave his lips, and as he tries to stretch his arms overhead, his elbows hit the ceiling with little grace. This happens every time, but he can never really commit the factoid to memory. He’s just glad that his head isn’t what hits the ceiling, because while that really just means he’s short, it at least guarantees that he gets the top bunk.
The second person in the other room chuckles and asks what a Big Mac is called in Paris, and Kyungsoo swings his stiff legs over the edge of his bed, chorusing with the first person, "Big Mac's a Big Mac, but they call it Le Big Mac."
The friend of the first male repeats the name with an exaggerated accent, and the two of them laugh together. When the second man asks what a Whopper is called, the first says he doesn't know. Apparently he didn't go to Burger King while in Paris.
By the time Kyungsoo successfully untangles himself from his duvet and climbs down the steel ladder at the edge of his bed, the two men outside are talking about how people in Holland put mayonnaise on their french fries instead of ketchup. Kyungsoo prefers mustard.
"I seen 'em do it, man," the first guy says with a short laugh, and the second one scrunches up his nose in distaste. "They fuckin' drown 'em in that shit."
Lifting both arms over his head now, Kyungsoo stretches his limbs properly and tilts his head to the side, working out the little kinks in his shoulders. As soon as he steps out of the room, the boy leans against the sturdy frame and runs a hand through his unruly hair, slim fingers carding through ruby-coloured locks while full lips purse ever so slightly.
There's only one person lounging on the sofa in the living area when he makes it there.
"Jongin," he starts quietly, eyes still too tired to open all the way. He waits a second or two for the only other living being in the room to respond, but said male remains silent. With his glazed-over eyes glued to the sleek device in front of his face, the other boy seems to be in a trance, completely mesmerised by the scene he has to have witnessed at least a million times before. Laying on the sofa that’s too short for him, he’s in the same position Kyungsoo usually finds him in, with his unfairly long legs sprawled before him and his knees hooked over the armrest, feet dangling freely. One hand is tucked under his head of messy blond hair, and the other holds the tablet playing the movie just inches from his face. In an attempt to gain the other male's attention, Kyungsoo clears his throat and proceeds, "You've seen that movie twenty times just this week."
"We should have shotguns for this kind of deal," murmurs one of the men on the screen.
Jongin doesn't respond; the movie goes on. Kyungsoo loses another bit of his sanity when the other man in the movie asks,
"How many're up there?"
"Three or four."
"That's countin' our guy?"
The first man glances at his partner, then turns to a pistol he's procured from the trunk of their car. A quiet click pierces the air as the second man loads a pistol of his own, a model identical to that of his accomplice.
“Not yours.”
At some point, after the two men in the movie enter an apartment building but before their conversation about whether eating someone’s wife out is as bad as massaging her feet, Kyungsoo takes the tablet away from Jongin, much to the other boy’s discontent.
“Hey!” the blond starts, lips curving into a pout that makes him look twelve instead of twenty-one. “I was watching that.”
“You’ve seen it a billion times,” Kyungsoo retorts quickly and pauses the movie. He has half a mind to stop it altogether, but he knows better than to do that, because Jongin would just snatch the device back and start the movie from the very beginning. He likes this movie too much.
“Well, yeah,” the younger of the two-by a whopping two days-agrees weakly, but then continues, “But why does that mean I can’t watch it one more time? There’s stuff in that movie that you don’t notice the first thousand times you watch it.”
The red-haired boy snorts softly and hands the tablet back to his roommate, gesturing for him to make room on the sofa. Despite everything he’d done earlier, Kyungsoo ends up finishing the movie with his friend, knees tucked close to his chest as Jongin holds the tablet up for both of them to watch. He’s been doing this for over ten years now. Two more hours won’t kill him.
It’s right as Samuel L Jackson starts reciting a verse from the book of Ezekiel when Jongin turns away from the screen to regard his narrow-framed roommate for several beats of silence. Kyungsoo, having not been all that entranced by the movie in the first place, notices this but keeps his gaze on the tablet as gunshots are fired in the movie and a man in a denim button-down named Brad wails before dying.
Occasionally, Jongin does this-just stares at him, like he isn’t sure whether he’d meant to ask something or if he’d forgotten to reply to something Kyungsoo had said. He doesn’t mind, of course, but sometimes the older boy wishes he knew what was going on in his friend’s head. One second, the guy would be busy trying to finish an essay due that afternoon, hunched over his laptop as his fingers tap away madly on the keyboard, and in the next he’d ask Kyungsoo to help dye his hair in the bathroom, having already bought all the necessary supplies.
Even after ten years, Kyungsoo still has trouble keeping up with the other boy.
Today, however, is the day Jongin decides to surprise him the most.
“Hyung,” he finally says, earning a soft hum from his roommate. “Let’s go to France.”
This time, the blond receives a rather unattractive choking noise from his friend, who then takes to staring at Jongin with those endearing, owlish eyes that the neighbourhood kids had teased him about when he first moved into the house on the corner of the street. Silence, save for the low hum of a car engine and casually conversing men in the movie, inundates the room, and Jongin begins to shift nervously, having never fared well in the absence of noise.
“Why?” is the only thing Kyungsoo manages to choke out after several seconds of imitating a dying fish.
“They were talking about Paris in the movie,” the younger male responds simply. “Wouldn’t it be cool?”
The smile that appears on Jongin’s face, Kyungsoo decides, should be outlawed in every square inch of the earth, regardless of whether or not humans are physically capable of traveling to certain areas. Like the bottom of the ocean. Or the earth’s core. His smile should be illegal everywhere.
“Jongin,” the red-haired boy tries to reason, even going so far as to pause the movie and turn towards the other boy, and he speaks slowly, enunciating every word carefully so as not to be mistaken. “We can’t just pack our underwear and fly to another country halfway across the world. It’s expensive, and neither of us know any French besides bonjour, oui, and baguette.”
“But-”
“No, Jongin. I’m sorry, but we can’t.”
If the younger boy’s smile should be banned on all points of Earth, then the disheartened expression that befalls his face now should certainly be banned in every point of the universe, because Kyungsoo can’t think of a worse sight than a heartbroken best friend who’s just been told that he can’t go to Paris on a whim. Kyungsoo may as well go outside and kick a whole box of orphan puppies into a sewage drain, which would no doubt upset Jongin even more, given just how much he likes dogs.
Of course, despite Jongin’s obvious disappointment, Kyungsoo knows he’s right. They probably can’t even gather enough money together to pay for a single one-way plane ticket to France, let alone two tickets, accommodations, food, and anything else they may (and will) want to spend money on. It just isn’t possible, no matter how much the older boy wishes everything could be arranged as easily as tossing some clothes into a suitcase and booking a flight. To make matters more difficult, classes are still going on, and summer break is nearly a whole month away. They both have several projects to finish and various tests to study for, and then there’s the matter of attending to clubs and making sure their other friends don’t set the campus on fire, all of whom happen to be just as spontaneous as Jongin. Traveling to France is out of the question.
But that pout…
//
Nearly four hours later, the pair hops off a train and immediately find themselves suffocating on the very air around them. With summer just beginning to creep over the mountains, the humidity in the region is higher than anything they’ve experienced before in the city, and it will continue to climb as the season carries on. The clouds are thick and grey in the sky, blocking out almost all the light that the sun has to offer, and while neither of them have taken any meteorology classes, it doesn’t take a genius to see that it will undoubtedly rain within the next ten minutes.
Kyungsoo is already sick of the countryside, but Jongin celebrates the change, whooping and hollering and jumping around like a mad man. A group of elderly women sitting on a single bench regards the blond boy with strange looks and hushed whispers, apparently having never seen a city boy so desperate for travel that he’d settle for taking a train to a moderately-sized port city just over three hundred kilometres away.
Perhaps it was that dreadful pout, or maybe it was the way Jongin only answered his questions with single syllables and trudged around the dorm all morning, but the younger of the two had somehow convinced Kyungsoo to toss some clothes into a backpack and shove on his shoes at the front door, mumbling something about how they were only going out of town for one night. And one night they would stay in this little town, because even with each of their rainy day funds combined, they only have enough for round-trip train tickets to the very last stop on the Honam line, a bus ride into the city, a single meal for the both of them, and one cheap-very cheap-hotel room.
//
It takes nearly half an hour to get far enough into the city for Jongin to feel like there will be some sense of adventure, and while they’ve spent most of the afternoon with their rear ends stuck on lightly cushioned seats, Kyungsoo is just glad they have enough money to pay the bus fare. (The grin on Jongin’s face might just be worth all the hassle, but the older of the two is still lamenting over the dramatic diet his wallet is going on.) As soon as they hop off the bus, Kyungsoo retrieves an umbrella from his backpack and promptly opens it, just in time to avoid a barrage of water from the sky. Jongin, however, is more than pleased with the erratic weather, grinning like a toddler and holding his arms out as his clothes become progressively wetter in the rain. With bright red cheeks, the shorter male grabs his friend’s now damp shirt and pulls until they’re both standing under the umbrella, though Jongin has to duck just a handful of inches.
“If you get sick on this trip, I’m not going to pay for you to see the doctor.”
Jongin just smiles and huddles closer to his roommate, gently prying the handle of the umbrella from the other boy’s hand so he can hold it up for them instead.
“It’s okay, Hyung,” he muses with that same, bright expression glowing on his face, and Kyungsoo. “I won’t get sick.”
They spend a couple of hours just walking from one street to another, deep enough in the city to never run out of road, and occasionally stop to browse through a few stores, though they remind each other (Kyungsoo really does most of the reminding) that they can’t buy anything if they don’t want dinner tonight. Thankfully, they each have their own cell phones, which allows them to capture only the silliest of memories, from Jongin posing next to a tarp display of live squids to Kyungsoo right in the middle of a sneeze, because he’s allergic to most flowers and the younger of the two decided that it would be a good idea to have him pose next to an entire wall of them.
Mokpo, they discover, isn’t all that different from Seoul, as far as buildings and streets are concerned, lines and lines of uniform, concrete buildings and grid-like roads connected with interlacing alleys. The greatest contrast lies in the air they breathe now, heavy wafts salt and plant life colliding with the aroma of smoke and exhaust that they had become so used to inhaling in the capital. With the ocean so close and an impressive range of mountains even closer, there’s no wonder as to why the weather is like this, constantly jumping from rain to no rain to full-on typhoon. During the heavier storms, the pair takes shelter in the nearest store, laughing at each other because they only have one change of clothes for the entire trip.
Another trait of Mokpo that makes it so different from Seoul is the people. It’s in the way they cross the street and in the thick accent that weighs heavily on their tongues when they ask the pair if they’re idols on vacation, just from the bright, impossible-to-miss heads of ruby and something close to silver. Their lips hug the o’s a little tighter but give their ah’s all the freedom in the world, creating a sort of sing-song drawl that confuses the hell out of Kyungsoo but makes Jongin laugh with excitement. (That last part may have more to do with how often the residents here swear, even if affectionately.) The Seoulites shake their heads politely and proceed down the street, taking whatever turn is most convenient when they feel like it, and Kyungsoo has to wonder why they’ve never done this sort of thing back at home.
Sure, they’ve turned plenty of street corners and eaten cups of microwave ramen in more than anyone’s fair share of convenience stores, but not like this. Here in Mokpo, they don’t have to worry about research deadlines and overnight shifts just to pay for a textbook. Noisy neighbours and noisier dogs are of little concern, along with the constant drone of rubber on pavement that drives everyone insane, let alone the interjections of tire screeches and shrieking car horns to add to the cacophony. All that matters here is whether or not their umbrella will hold out under all this rain. (And it definitely will, because Kyungsoo picked it out himself.)
After more than ten years, it’s really only when they’ve settled at a table in a modest soup restaurant that Kyungsoo starts seeing Jongin in a different light-and it isn’t because the one above their table won’t stop flickering. The bright-haired boy practically feeds him everything, going so far as to even inspect every piece of meat to make sure they’re cooked properly. Of course, it doesn’t bother Kyungsoo, because Jongin does this all the time at home, but what does bother him is the little murmurs and half-second glances from the other customers. But even then, as he reaches across the table to wipe away a piece of rice stuck to Jongin’s chin, that isn’t really what gets on his nerves, because what starts to pick at his head more than anything is the urge to protect his friend from those whispers, from those curious looks and the soft mumbles that, honestly, probably aren’t even about the boy sitting across from him.
The same feeling hits him when they’re walking on the streets after eating much, much more than their stomachs should be able to contain, wandering the city yet again until they tire themselves out and decide to take the four-hour train ride back to Seoul. Jongin is holding the umbrella over both their heads again, and four girls still in their school uniforms glance in their direction for two full seconds, all hiding their mouths behind their cell phones and the abundance of charms dangling from the cases. There must be something in the salt-laden oxygen of the coast, because in the next moment Kyungsoo finds himself pursing his lips in response to the barely stifled giggles. He presses even closer to his roommate’s side, until only a loose thread in the sleeve of Jongin’s t-shirt separates them, and the taller male sends him a smile that causes just one of his cheeks to dimple while corners of both eyes crinkle just slightly. The expression makes the older boy’s stomach churn with one too many potatoes and rice cakes, which in turn has his cheeks colouring faintly as he wonders if Jongin had heard his restless stomach.
It’s a terrible smile, one that should rightfully be outlawed in every part of the world, because it makes red-haired, narrow-shouldered roommates uncomfortable and dizzy.
But here.. Here in Mokpo, Kyungsoo deems it legal.
//
A few minutes before midnight, the two college students decide to give their aching feet a break, not at all used to walking around this much. They manage to find an unoccupied bench at the edge of the sidewalk, with a breath-taking view of a grey building with a candy shop on the first storey and a dentist’s office on the second. To the right, a seafood restaurant that closed around ten can be found, with the distinct stench of freshly-caught squid and shrimp still emanating from the locked doors, and to the left stands an office supplies shop, filled to the brim with overly cute stationery with the faces of Big Bang and Girl’s Generation plastered on just about anything that can be stamped.
Thankfully, it stopped raining an hour ago, leaving the bench water-free, but even if the bench had still been wet from all the storms today, neither of them would have minded, so long as they could take a moment to let their legs relax. Still full from the soup they’d scarfed down several hours ago, Kyungsoo whines softly and leans back against the bench, eyes falling shut as he tries to recall any hotels they had passed today that looked to be in their budget. Beside him, Jongin does the same but thinks of what else they could do in the eerily quiet city instead of where they should stay the night; he also wonders if Kyungsoo would agree to buying some candy from that store across the street. If they just had a little more money, Jongin thinks, he would have pouted a tad more and begged for one more day in the port city. The older male probably would have caved.
However much time passes, neither of them are entirely sure, only certain that the moon looks about two hundred times brighter in this coastal city than it does back at home, where smoke and general pollution dominate the skies. What’s even more miraculous is how they can actually see the stars.
At some point, Kyungsoo’s temple finds the point of Jongin’s shoulder, but before he can sit up straight and clear his throat, the younger of the two settles an arm over the other boy’s shoulders and fidgets with the sleeve of his shirt. In line with all the strange lurching of his stomach and tingling in his fingertips, Kyungsoo feels his cheeks warming up to dizzying temperatures in just seconds, which Jongin will no doubt be able to feel, but he remains where he is, oddly content.
Several minutes later, Jongin is the first to break the silence.
“I had fun today, Hyung.”
Kyungsoo hums, eyes still closed.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” the older boy mumbles in reply, hoping the conversation will offer a distraction from how hot his face feels. It doesn’t work, mostly because Jongin doesn’t say anything else, leaving Kyungsoo to his own worries about whether or not he still smells like sweat and yellow radishes and if Jongin finds that gross. (He probably does.) Earlier that evening, Kyungsoo had accidentally stepped into a puddle of murky water, resulting in a less than pleasant stain on his shoe and the end of his jeans, and now he’s starting to wonder if Jongin hates that, too.
“Hyung.”
There was also that time he held a crab with his bare hands just so Jongin could take a picture, and now his hands probably reek of crustaceans. Maybe even his feet, too, because one of the crabs had somehow gotten a claw stuck on his shoelace.
“Hyung.”
As if that weren’t enough, it’s been raining all day, and the humidity levels have been well over eighty-percent the entire time they’ve been here. Kyungsoo has never been the athletic type, which explains why he prefers taking the bus everywhere back in Seoul, but they don’t exactly have the budget for bus rides on this trip-and that means they’ve been walking around all day. Naturally, it’s made the red-haired male short of breath and overly aware of his lack of physical fitness, something that Jongin no doubt finds doubly unattractive.
“...Hyung.”
But what does it matter if Jongin hated any of that? They’ve seen each other at their worst, sniveling in each other’s arms because they just can’t finish that paper on time or because moving back into the dorm means Jongin has to leave his three dogs back at the house even though he really, really doesn’t want to. Jongin had even seen him dressed in a rather unflattering pumpkin costume in the eighth grade for the school festival, when their class had been in charge of the haunted house and Kyungsoo swore giant, grinning pumpkins were nightmare fuel. So why would Jongin care if his roommate smelled like slimy sea creatures and rain? Is he being too defensive? Is he over-reacting?
Before the elder of the two can start worrying over his own worries, the soft press of lips to his cheek hauls him out of those thoughts, prompting his eyes to fly open as his cheeks adopt a bright shade of red. Right in front of him is a smiling Jongin, eyes crinkled at the corners and the apples of his cheeks pushed up at just the right angles. Kyungsoo can only manage to utter an unattractive gurgling noise that sounds a little closer to ‘what?’ in his own head.
“Thank you for going on this trip with me, Hyung,” Jongin says, his voice ringing like dulcet piano keys in the other boy’s ears, a sweet serenade that will surely last for centuries.
Kyungsoo tries to answer with another ‘you’re welcome,’ and when he only succeeds in babbling more nonsense, the blond laughs softly and presses another kiss to his cheek. As expected, the gesture earns another quiet squeak, and Kyungsoo’s face turns at least one more shade of red.
Still smiling, Jongin lifts a hand to gently urge the other male to rest against his shoulder again, quite liking the warmth it offers. Without protest, Kyungsoo obliges, cheeks nearly matching his hair in colour, but the tension has fallen from his shoulders, like drops of rain from the windshield of a car parked nearby. Jongin stays still, occasionally brushing the back of his index finger against Kyungsoo’s arm, and it’s in this silence when the older boy decides that this trip was more than worth the money they spent, even though they still have to find a hotel to stay in for the rest of the night. And in the morning, they’ll have to dig out more cash to take the bus back to the train station so they can finally go home. It’s money they probably could have spent on three hundred boxes of ramen instead of a train ride to Mokpo, but Kyungsoo is glad they’ve spent it this way. This is comfortable.
“Can we go to Paris now?”
“No!”
_______
A/N: the movie from the beginning is Pulp Fiction \o/ oh and they totally go to paris in the summer LOL
Title: For a Rainy Day
Genre: Fluff, fluff, fluff
Rating: PG (brief language)
Length: 4,000 words
Summary: It's a terrible smile, one that should rightfully be outlawed in every part of the world, because it makes red-haired, narrow-shouldered roommates uncomfortable and dizzy.
Notes: guuuuh-- I really enjoyed writing this, and I hope you like it! Happy Kaisoo Day(s)~ \o/
"You know what they call a.. a Quarter Pounder with cheese, uh.. in Paris?"
"They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with cheese?"
"No, man, they got the metric system. They wouldn't know what the fuck a Quarter Pounder is."
Kyungsoo wakes up to a conversation he's heard at least seventy times. It's always the same two guys in the neighbouring room, discussing cultural differences and exchanging the same trivia every single time. If Kyungsoo didn't know any better, he'd bet that every letter, space, and period had been branded into his skull after just how many times those exact words have interrupted his daily naps. Maybe there would even be a picture or two in case he couldn't remember for the life of him what the hell a Quarter Pounder with cheese was.
"Then what do they call it?" the second person asks. Kyungsoo sighs.
"They call it a Royale with cheese," the boy mumbles under his breath, perfectly in sync with the first person in the other room. His eyebrows pinch together when the words almost involuntarily leave his lips, and as he tries to stretch his arms overhead, his elbows hit the ceiling with little grace. This happens every time, but he can never really commit the factoid to memory. He’s just glad that his head isn’t what hits the ceiling, because while that really just means he’s short, it at least guarantees that he gets the top bunk.
The second person in the other room chuckles and asks what a Big Mac is called in Paris, and Kyungsoo swings his stiff legs over the edge of his bed, chorusing with the first person, "Big Mac's a Big Mac, but they call it Le Big Mac."
The friend of the first male repeats the name with an exaggerated accent, and the two of them laugh together. When the second man asks what a Whopper is called, the first says he doesn't know. Apparently he didn't go to Burger King while in Paris.
By the time Kyungsoo successfully untangles himself from his duvet and climbs down the steel ladder at the edge of his bed, the two men outside are talking about how people in Holland put mayonnaise on their french fries instead of ketchup. Kyungsoo prefers mustard.
"I seen 'em do it, man," the first guy says with a short laugh, and the second one scrunches up his nose in distaste. "They fuckin' drown 'em in that shit."
Lifting both arms over his head now, Kyungsoo stretches his limbs properly and tilts his head to the side, working out the little kinks in his shoulders. As soon as he steps out of the room, the boy leans against the sturdy frame and runs a hand through his unruly hair, slim fingers carding through ruby-coloured locks while full lips purse ever so slightly.
There's only one person lounging on the sofa in the living area when he makes it there.
"Jongin," he starts quietly, eyes still too tired to open all the way. He waits a second or two for the only other living being in the room to respond, but said male remains silent. With his glazed-over eyes glued to the sleek device in front of his face, the other boy seems to be in a trance, completely mesmerised by the scene he has to have witnessed at least a million times before. Laying on the sofa that’s too short for him, he’s in the same position Kyungsoo usually finds him in, with his unfairly long legs sprawled before him and his knees hooked over the armrest, feet dangling freely. One hand is tucked under his head of messy blond hair, and the other holds the tablet playing the movie just inches from his face. In an attempt to gain the other male's attention, Kyungsoo clears his throat and proceeds, "You've seen that movie twenty times just this week."
"We should have shotguns for this kind of deal," murmurs one of the men on the screen.
Jongin doesn't respond; the movie goes on. Kyungsoo loses another bit of his sanity when the other man in the movie asks,
"How many're up there?"
"Three or four."
"That's countin' our guy?"
The first man glances at his partner, then turns to a pistol he's procured from the trunk of their car. A quiet click pierces the air as the second man loads a pistol of his own, a model identical to that of his accomplice.
“Not yours.”
At some point, after the two men in the movie enter an apartment building but before their conversation about whether eating someone’s wife out is as bad as massaging her feet, Kyungsoo takes the tablet away from Jongin, much to the other boy’s discontent.
“Hey!” the blond starts, lips curving into a pout that makes him look twelve instead of twenty-one. “I was watching that.”
“You’ve seen it a billion times,” Kyungsoo retorts quickly and pauses the movie. He has half a mind to stop it altogether, but he knows better than to do that, because Jongin would just snatch the device back and start the movie from the very beginning. He likes this movie too much.
“Well, yeah,” the younger of the two-by a whopping two days-agrees weakly, but then continues, “But why does that mean I can’t watch it one more time? There’s stuff in that movie that you don’t notice the first thousand times you watch it.”
The red-haired boy snorts softly and hands the tablet back to his roommate, gesturing for him to make room on the sofa. Despite everything he’d done earlier, Kyungsoo ends up finishing the movie with his friend, knees tucked close to his chest as Jongin holds the tablet up for both of them to watch. He’s been doing this for over ten years now. Two more hours won’t kill him.
It’s right as Samuel L Jackson starts reciting a verse from the book of Ezekiel when Jongin turns away from the screen to regard his narrow-framed roommate for several beats of silence. Kyungsoo, having not been all that entranced by the movie in the first place, notices this but keeps his gaze on the tablet as gunshots are fired in the movie and a man in a denim button-down named Brad wails before dying.
Occasionally, Jongin does this-just stares at him, like he isn’t sure whether he’d meant to ask something or if he’d forgotten to reply to something Kyungsoo had said. He doesn’t mind, of course, but sometimes the older boy wishes he knew what was going on in his friend’s head. One second, the guy would be busy trying to finish an essay due that afternoon, hunched over his laptop as his fingers tap away madly on the keyboard, and in the next he’d ask Kyungsoo to help dye his hair in the bathroom, having already bought all the necessary supplies.
Even after ten years, Kyungsoo still has trouble keeping up with the other boy.
Today, however, is the day Jongin decides to surprise him the most.
“Hyung,” he finally says, earning a soft hum from his roommate. “Let’s go to France.”
This time, the blond receives a rather unattractive choking noise from his friend, who then takes to staring at Jongin with those endearing, owlish eyes that the neighbourhood kids had teased him about when he first moved into the house on the corner of the street. Silence, save for the low hum of a car engine and casually conversing men in the movie, inundates the room, and Jongin begins to shift nervously, having never fared well in the absence of noise.
“Why?” is the only thing Kyungsoo manages to choke out after several seconds of imitating a dying fish.
“They were talking about Paris in the movie,” the younger male responds simply. “Wouldn’t it be cool?”
The smile that appears on Jongin’s face, Kyungsoo decides, should be outlawed in every square inch of the earth, regardless of whether or not humans are physically capable of traveling to certain areas. Like the bottom of the ocean. Or the earth’s core. His smile should be illegal everywhere.
“Jongin,” the red-haired boy tries to reason, even going so far as to pause the movie and turn towards the other boy, and he speaks slowly, enunciating every word carefully so as not to be mistaken. “We can’t just pack our underwear and fly to another country halfway across the world. It’s expensive, and neither of us know any French besides bonjour, oui, and baguette.”
“But-”
“No, Jongin. I’m sorry, but we can’t.”
If the younger boy’s smile should be banned on all points of Earth, then the disheartened expression that befalls his face now should certainly be banned in every point of the universe, because Kyungsoo can’t think of a worse sight than a heartbroken best friend who’s just been told that he can’t go to Paris on a whim. Kyungsoo may as well go outside and kick a whole box of orphan puppies into a sewage drain, which would no doubt upset Jongin even more, given just how much he likes dogs.
Of course, despite Jongin’s obvious disappointment, Kyungsoo knows he’s right. They probably can’t even gather enough money together to pay for a single one-way plane ticket to France, let alone two tickets, accommodations, food, and anything else they may (and will) want to spend money on. It just isn’t possible, no matter how much the older boy wishes everything could be arranged as easily as tossing some clothes into a suitcase and booking a flight. To make matters more difficult, classes are still going on, and summer break is nearly a whole month away. They both have several projects to finish and various tests to study for, and then there’s the matter of attending to clubs and making sure their other friends don’t set the campus on fire, all of whom happen to be just as spontaneous as Jongin. Traveling to France is out of the question.
But that pout…
//
Nearly four hours later, the pair hops off a train and immediately find themselves suffocating on the very air around them. With summer just beginning to creep over the mountains, the humidity in the region is higher than anything they’ve experienced before in the city, and it will continue to climb as the season carries on. The clouds are thick and grey in the sky, blocking out almost all the light that the sun has to offer, and while neither of them have taken any meteorology classes, it doesn’t take a genius to see that it will undoubtedly rain within the next ten minutes.
Kyungsoo is already sick of the countryside, but Jongin celebrates the change, whooping and hollering and jumping around like a mad man. A group of elderly women sitting on a single bench regards the blond boy with strange looks and hushed whispers, apparently having never seen a city boy so desperate for travel that he’d settle for taking a train to a moderately-sized port city just over three hundred kilometres away.
Perhaps it was that dreadful pout, or maybe it was the way Jongin only answered his questions with single syllables and trudged around the dorm all morning, but the younger of the two had somehow convinced Kyungsoo to toss some clothes into a backpack and shove on his shoes at the front door, mumbling something about how they were only going out of town for one night. And one night they would stay in this little town, because even with each of their rainy day funds combined, they only have enough for round-trip train tickets to the very last stop on the Honam line, a bus ride into the city, a single meal for the both of them, and one cheap-very cheap-hotel room.
//
It takes nearly half an hour to get far enough into the city for Jongin to feel like there will be some sense of adventure, and while they’ve spent most of the afternoon with their rear ends stuck on lightly cushioned seats, Kyungsoo is just glad they have enough money to pay the bus fare. (The grin on Jongin’s face might just be worth all the hassle, but the older of the two is still lamenting over the dramatic diet his wallet is going on.) As soon as they hop off the bus, Kyungsoo retrieves an umbrella from his backpack and promptly opens it, just in time to avoid a barrage of water from the sky. Jongin, however, is more than pleased with the erratic weather, grinning like a toddler and holding his arms out as his clothes become progressively wetter in the rain. With bright red cheeks, the shorter male grabs his friend’s now damp shirt and pulls until they’re both standing under the umbrella, though Jongin has to duck just a handful of inches.
“If you get sick on this trip, I’m not going to pay for you to see the doctor.”
Jongin just smiles and huddles closer to his roommate, gently prying the handle of the umbrella from the other boy’s hand so he can hold it up for them instead.
“It’s okay, Hyung,” he muses with that same, bright expression glowing on his face, and Kyungsoo. “I won’t get sick.”
They spend a couple of hours just walking from one street to another, deep enough in the city to never run out of road, and occasionally stop to browse through a few stores, though they remind each other (Kyungsoo really does most of the reminding) that they can’t buy anything if they don’t want dinner tonight. Thankfully, they each have their own cell phones, which allows them to capture only the silliest of memories, from Jongin posing next to a tarp display of live squids to Kyungsoo right in the middle of a sneeze, because he’s allergic to most flowers and the younger of the two decided that it would be a good idea to have him pose next to an entire wall of them.
Mokpo, they discover, isn’t all that different from Seoul, as far as buildings and streets are concerned, lines and lines of uniform, concrete buildings and grid-like roads connected with interlacing alleys. The greatest contrast lies in the air they breathe now, heavy wafts salt and plant life colliding with the aroma of smoke and exhaust that they had become so used to inhaling in the capital. With the ocean so close and an impressive range of mountains even closer, there’s no wonder as to why the weather is like this, constantly jumping from rain to no rain to full-on typhoon. During the heavier storms, the pair takes shelter in the nearest store, laughing at each other because they only have one change of clothes for the entire trip.
Another trait of Mokpo that makes it so different from Seoul is the people. It’s in the way they cross the street and in the thick accent that weighs heavily on their tongues when they ask the pair if they’re idols on vacation, just from the bright, impossible-to-miss heads of ruby and something close to silver. Their lips hug the o’s a little tighter but give their ah’s all the freedom in the world, creating a sort of sing-song drawl that confuses the hell out of Kyungsoo but makes Jongin laugh with excitement. (That last part may have more to do with how often the residents here swear, even if affectionately.) The Seoulites shake their heads politely and proceed down the street, taking whatever turn is most convenient when they feel like it, and Kyungsoo has to wonder why they’ve never done this sort of thing back at home.
Sure, they’ve turned plenty of street corners and eaten cups of microwave ramen in more than anyone’s fair share of convenience stores, but not like this. Here in Mokpo, they don’t have to worry about research deadlines and overnight shifts just to pay for a textbook. Noisy neighbours and noisier dogs are of little concern, along with the constant drone of rubber on pavement that drives everyone insane, let alone the interjections of tire screeches and shrieking car horns to add to the cacophony. All that matters here is whether or not their umbrella will hold out under all this rain. (And it definitely will, because Kyungsoo picked it out himself.)
After more than ten years, it’s really only when they’ve settled at a table in a modest soup restaurant that Kyungsoo starts seeing Jongin in a different light-and it isn’t because the one above their table won’t stop flickering. The bright-haired boy practically feeds him everything, going so far as to even inspect every piece of meat to make sure they’re cooked properly. Of course, it doesn’t bother Kyungsoo, because Jongin does this all the time at home, but what does bother him is the little murmurs and half-second glances from the other customers. But even then, as he reaches across the table to wipe away a piece of rice stuck to Jongin’s chin, that isn’t really what gets on his nerves, because what starts to pick at his head more than anything is the urge to protect his friend from those whispers, from those curious looks and the soft mumbles that, honestly, probably aren’t even about the boy sitting across from him.
The same feeling hits him when they’re walking on the streets after eating much, much more than their stomachs should be able to contain, wandering the city yet again until they tire themselves out and decide to take the four-hour train ride back to Seoul. Jongin is holding the umbrella over both their heads again, and four girls still in their school uniforms glance in their direction for two full seconds, all hiding their mouths behind their cell phones and the abundance of charms dangling from the cases. There must be something in the salt-laden oxygen of the coast, because in the next moment Kyungsoo finds himself pursing his lips in response to the barely stifled giggles. He presses even closer to his roommate’s side, until only a loose thread in the sleeve of Jongin’s t-shirt separates them, and the taller male sends him a smile that causes just one of his cheeks to dimple while corners of both eyes crinkle just slightly. The expression makes the older boy’s stomach churn with one too many potatoes and rice cakes, which in turn has his cheeks colouring faintly as he wonders if Jongin had heard his restless stomach.
It’s a terrible smile, one that should rightfully be outlawed in every part of the world, because it makes red-haired, narrow-shouldered roommates uncomfortable and dizzy.
But here.. Here in Mokpo, Kyungsoo deems it legal.
//
A few minutes before midnight, the two college students decide to give their aching feet a break, not at all used to walking around this much. They manage to find an unoccupied bench at the edge of the sidewalk, with a breath-taking view of a grey building with a candy shop on the first storey and a dentist’s office on the second. To the right, a seafood restaurant that closed around ten can be found, with the distinct stench of freshly-caught squid and shrimp still emanating from the locked doors, and to the left stands an office supplies shop, filled to the brim with overly cute stationery with the faces of Big Bang and Girl’s Generation plastered on just about anything that can be stamped.
Thankfully, it stopped raining an hour ago, leaving the bench water-free, but even if the bench had still been wet from all the storms today, neither of them would have minded, so long as they could take a moment to let their legs relax. Still full from the soup they’d scarfed down several hours ago, Kyungsoo whines softly and leans back against the bench, eyes falling shut as he tries to recall any hotels they had passed today that looked to be in their budget. Beside him, Jongin does the same but thinks of what else they could do in the eerily quiet city instead of where they should stay the night; he also wonders if Kyungsoo would agree to buying some candy from that store across the street. If they just had a little more money, Jongin thinks, he would have pouted a tad more and begged for one more day in the port city. The older male probably would have caved.
However much time passes, neither of them are entirely sure, only certain that the moon looks about two hundred times brighter in this coastal city than it does back at home, where smoke and general pollution dominate the skies. What’s even more miraculous is how they can actually see the stars.
At some point, Kyungsoo’s temple finds the point of Jongin’s shoulder, but before he can sit up straight and clear his throat, the younger of the two settles an arm over the other boy’s shoulders and fidgets with the sleeve of his shirt. In line with all the strange lurching of his stomach and tingling in his fingertips, Kyungsoo feels his cheeks warming up to dizzying temperatures in just seconds, which Jongin will no doubt be able to feel, but he remains where he is, oddly content.
Several minutes later, Jongin is the first to break the silence.
“I had fun today, Hyung.”
Kyungsoo hums, eyes still closed.
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” the older boy mumbles in reply, hoping the conversation will offer a distraction from how hot his face feels. It doesn’t work, mostly because Jongin doesn’t say anything else, leaving Kyungsoo to his own worries about whether or not he still smells like sweat and yellow radishes and if Jongin finds that gross. (He probably does.) Earlier that evening, Kyungsoo had accidentally stepped into a puddle of murky water, resulting in a less than pleasant stain on his shoe and the end of his jeans, and now he’s starting to wonder if Jongin hates that, too.
“Hyung.”
There was also that time he held a crab with his bare hands just so Jongin could take a picture, and now his hands probably reek of crustaceans. Maybe even his feet, too, because one of the crabs had somehow gotten a claw stuck on his shoelace.
“Hyung.”
As if that weren’t enough, it’s been raining all day, and the humidity levels have been well over eighty-percent the entire time they’ve been here. Kyungsoo has never been the athletic type, which explains why he prefers taking the bus everywhere back in Seoul, but they don’t exactly have the budget for bus rides on this trip-and that means they’ve been walking around all day. Naturally, it’s made the red-haired male short of breath and overly aware of his lack of physical fitness, something that Jongin no doubt finds doubly unattractive.
“...Hyung.”
But what does it matter if Jongin hated any of that? They’ve seen each other at their worst, sniveling in each other’s arms because they just can’t finish that paper on time or because moving back into the dorm means Jongin has to leave his three dogs back at the house even though he really, really doesn’t want to. Jongin had even seen him dressed in a rather unflattering pumpkin costume in the eighth grade for the school festival, when their class had been in charge of the haunted house and Kyungsoo swore giant, grinning pumpkins were nightmare fuel. So why would Jongin care if his roommate smelled like slimy sea creatures and rain? Is he being too defensive? Is he over-reacting?
Before the elder of the two can start worrying over his own worries, the soft press of lips to his cheek hauls him out of those thoughts, prompting his eyes to fly open as his cheeks adopt a bright shade of red. Right in front of him is a smiling Jongin, eyes crinkled at the corners and the apples of his cheeks pushed up at just the right angles. Kyungsoo can only manage to utter an unattractive gurgling noise that sounds a little closer to ‘what?’ in his own head.
“Thank you for going on this trip with me, Hyung,” Jongin says, his voice ringing like dulcet piano keys in the other boy’s ears, a sweet serenade that will surely last for centuries.
Kyungsoo tries to answer with another ‘you’re welcome,’ and when he only succeeds in babbling more nonsense, the blond laughs softly and presses another kiss to his cheek. As expected, the gesture earns another quiet squeak, and Kyungsoo’s face turns at least one more shade of red.
Still smiling, Jongin lifts a hand to gently urge the other male to rest against his shoulder again, quite liking the warmth it offers. Without protest, Kyungsoo obliges, cheeks nearly matching his hair in colour, but the tension has fallen from his shoulders, like drops of rain from the windshield of a car parked nearby. Jongin stays still, occasionally brushing the back of his index finger against Kyungsoo’s arm, and it’s in this silence when the older boy decides that this trip was more than worth the money they spent, even though they still have to find a hotel to stay in for the rest of the night. And in the morning, they’ll have to dig out more cash to take the bus back to the train station so they can finally go home. It’s money they probably could have spent on three hundred boxes of ramen instead of a train ride to Mokpo, but Kyungsoo is glad they’ve spent it this way. This is comfortable.
“Can we go to Paris now?”
“No!”
_______
A/N: the movie from the beginning is Pulp Fiction \o/ oh and they totally go to paris in the summer LOL