[gen-dbsk] the subway gang
title : the subway gang
pairing : gen - dbsk, changmin/yunho
rating : r
words : 6889
summary : a subway ride and five friendships
a/n : i haven't written in a long, long time. i suppose this is my grind it out writer's block fic. mostly gen-dbsk with changmin/yunho weaved in because what can i do? they're my favorite ♥
They're known as the subway gang.
Or at least that's what Junsu's mom refers to them as. It all started when her son came home one day from summer school with a blond friend in tow, their hands laced and swinging as they walked in the front door, matching cheshire grins on their faces. He tells her that they'd met on the ride to school and that they'd shared a triple fudge brownie and a carton of milk together, sipping out of the same straw and everything. If that's not a mark of friendship, Junsu says, then he doesn't know what is.
His name is Kim Jaejoong and even at the age of eleven, he's awkward. Jaejoong's strikingly beautiful considering he's just a child but he's blessed with such dainty and pretty features that many often mistaken him for a girl. Ever since his brief obession at the age of six with ronald mcdonald, Jaejoong's been a self-proclaimed schinzophrenic about his hair, sometimes going from bright red to dull brown to light purple. He's currently sporting a yellow so pale that it makes him look exactly like something out of a fantasy novel and Junsu's mom finds it all too easy to imagine the fragile looking child battling dragons in a full knight of Arthur's roundtable getup.
Junsu brings home another boy a few weeks later, a Shim Changmin that at first glance seems to be the nerdy bookworm type. He's a full year younger than Junsu but he seems to be lightyears ahead of the others in terms of his maturity and mannerisms. When she offers the trio cookies and milk, Changmin asks her politely if the cookies were made from whole-wheat flour and whether or not the milk was properly enzymed. Jaejoong knocks Changmin's head into the plate and tells her with such a shy smile that Changmin's actually twenty-one and not ten that even she has to laugh. Because it's not like she really knows how to answer the question, she hadn't even known milk needed to be enzymed. They leave a few hours later, running out the door to play ball in the park and as she's cleaning up after them she finds that Changmin hadn't eaten his cookie and learns years later that he's actually allegic to flour.
Another month later, the trio return home from a day at the museum with another two kids trailing behind them and while Junsu's mom is more than supportive of her son making friends, she's starting to worry. New York City subways aren't exactly where she wants her son to socialize. But after they're introduced, she realizes she can't exactly say no to Yoochun's charming smile or refuse Yunho's adorable accent and polite tones. He actually reminds her so much of Changmin that she wonders briefly if they're related.
Yoochun is the same age as her son and he's as much a crybaby as Junsu's female cousin. He gets along particularly well with Jaejoong and more than not, the two of them are found together in some corner of the house. Every night at seven, she makes her way up to Junsu's room to collect her son and then goes into the basement to get Jaejoong and Yoochun before she gathers the other two kids in the living, usually asleep on the couch atop one another, Yunho almost always cradling Changmin to his body. Naturally as the hyung, even though he's technically younger than Jaejoong, Yunho turns out to be the most responsible and protective of all the boys.
The five come home one day with ripped clothes and cuts on their faces but only Yunho's bleeding from the nose, knuckles bruised and a dark purple spot across his ribs that he received from a kick to the chest he'd taken for Jaejoong. Seems like they ran into a couple of bullies on the way home and while the others had taken the bullying for as long as they could, in the end punches were thrown and Yunho was the first to hit back.
Mrs. Kim always wondered if the boys lost or won that fight but no one had been willing to tell and it's not as if a parent could ask such a question straight out. A few years later she remembers and asks Junho if he knows and her other son tells her between bites of toast that after Yunho had gone home, the four had gone back to the park armed with enough water balloons and a taser from Jaejoong's mom. It was Changmin's meticulous planning in telling his sisters to call the police exactly twenty minutes after they'd left his house that got the other boys in the end.
The police arrived not too long after the balloons were thrown and another fight was started. In fact, they'd gotten there just in time to watch Changmin's glasses being stepped on by one of the older teens and arrested the other group on the spot. Changmin had bet on the fact that the cops would believe a bunch of wild mannered kids over the obviously more delinquent teens and he'd bet right. Of course when Yunho had heard of that, he'd taken Changmin aside and given him a talking to about doing such dangerous things without telling him ahead of time.
The two had argued about it for a while and it ended with Changmin taking a seat all the way at the other end of the couch during movie night and with Yunho scowling through dinner for the night. Needless to say, they fought a silent war for about three days before Yunho gave in and offered Changmin a scone he's bought especially for the younger boy. And even though Changmin's got an allergy, he ate it anyway, running upstairs to take a Benadryl for the imminent allergy reaction.
Yunho had been thirteen and Changmin just ten.
By the time high school comes around, the five started to systematically stay over at each other's house every weekend. The plan was thought up by Changmin over lunch one day and carried out by all of them the following Friday night. After a while they had realize what a bother it is to stay at Junsu's all the time because then his mom has to feed all five of them and while they've been over his house so much that even Yoochun refers to her as Mommy and not Aunty, it's still a bother.
For the first week, they relocate to Jaejoong's and even though he has seven older sisters chittering and chattering about, it's more than fine. Yoochun and Junsu are found in one of the rooms playing tea party with the two youngest sisters and Changmin's in the study with a book in his face and his feet in Yunho's lap. This period of time in also when they all discover that Kim Jaejoong is actually a really good cook. He surprises them one afternoon with a huge pot of kimchi jjigae that no one but Changmin tries and following suit with that Yunho takes a bite and Yoochun's forced to as well before Junsu finally inches forward with his spoon to try it. And soon enough Jaejoong becomes the resident cook, doing the bidding of not only his sisters but Changmin and Yoochun. They're the only two who regularly ask for and eat his food.
He finds that Changmin with his iron stomach will try pretty much any type of food as long as it smells good and looks edible. Yoochun, if approached at the right moment will snap the food up with a muffled thanks as he devours it. Yunho and Junsu on the other hands are the picky eaters but it's not too long before Jaejoong figures out their weakness : chicken. After he figures that out, it's easy sailing. Jaejoong makes fried chicken and grilled chicken, chicken cutlet over rice and diced chicken with peppers. Ambitiously, he even tries to make a chicken flavored ice cream that wisely, no one touches.
They follow the schedule accordingly and the next week is Yoochun's where they discover that sleeping on the cold floor, even with a sleeping bag, might not be too comfortable. First off, there's only two sleeping bags and so they're forced to share. Jaejoong gets his own mainly before he makes such awful faces in his sleep that no one wants to bother with trying to sleep with him. Junsu forces his way onto Yoochun's bed, his rather plentiful behind serving as the do not cross line between the two of them on the bed. Yunho gallantly tries to offer the remaining sleeping bag to Changmin who merely rolls his eyes before tugging his older hyung in with him, curling right against the older man because Yunho's so warm and it's comfortable this way.
Mrs Park checks in on them that night to find the boys are curled into one another save Jaejoong who somehow got his hands on a stuffed pig. Yoochun's got an arm slung around Junsu's waist and despite being the tallest one out of them all, Changmin's curled into a ball and tucked into Yunho's arm like he belongs. It's because of that that when they stay over again a few months later, she's not at all surprised to find Yunho and Changmin with their hands laced as they're eating dinner side by side.
None of the boys were surprised either. Yunho's always shown a larger amount of affection for the youngest out of them all, doting on him when he had been a child, offering up his tater tots because Changmin liked them more than the roast beef served during lunch. And for his part, Changmin had always relied on his Yunho-hyung more than he had on any of them and he'd always gone to Yunho for his bumps and scratches. Soon it became customary for Yunho's mom to call Changmin's house in search of her son and vice versa. They'd always been closer than the others growing up, napping together in the same space on the couch and eating each other's food.
And even in High School when they had to split up for after school activities, Changmin would be watching from the sidelines as Yunho danced and Yunho would be there at the library when Changmin re-filed the books. They were always by each other's side and so it was only natural that they would progress from being good friends in their childhood to even closer friends in their teens to lovers by the time they were juniors. There was a saying in their High School, "Where Changmin was you would find Yunho and where Yunho was, you'd bet there would be Changmin."
The one weekend they stay over at the Jung house, Yoochun finds Homin, or what the other three have no dubbed the Changmin/Yunho couple, with their lips glued together in bed. He stares for so long that Junsu actually finds him just leaning against the door and pulls him away to find Jaejoong who is in the kitchen mixing some kind of homemade concoction of yogurt and cucumber that their oldest hyung swears will smooth over all wrinkles and laugh lines. Of course in reply this this, Junsu can only reply that they're fifteen and don't have wrinkles. Jaejoong however thinks it's never too early to fight old age and applies the mixture to his face and even body sometimes.
At Changmin's the boys separate to do other things as well. Junsu grabs the Nintendo 64 and calls immediately for the good controller while Changmin just grabs the other good one from his bedroom and Jaejoong ignores them to head up to the other room where Changmin's sisters will be playing Barbie. It's inevitable and they two girls will come down crying at least once during their sleepover about how Jaejoong's cut off almost all the hair of one of their dolls and colored it pink with a marker. Yoochun grabs the third controller and after a littler persuasion, Yunho will sit behind Changmin with the last controller, barely paying attention to the screen because he's always more interested in Changmin's long fingers.
---
There's a period in each of the boys' lives which can only be described as a trying period or a time in which each one of them experience certain personal ordeals. They labeled these their growing pains.
Yoochun's the first. Over the course of one summer, he decides that he wants to suddenly become everyone's best friend. Even though all five of them are close, it's inevitable that one of them is closer to another one of them, much like Changmin is close enough to Yunho to allow the older man to touch certain parts that if Jaejoong or Junsu were to even look at, they'd get their asses kicked. Yoochun, however, decides that he wants to be everyone's best friend.
He tries with Yunho first. Yoochun starts to follow him to the weekly Tae Kwon Do practices where Yunho's training to be a black belt. All goes well for a while and Yoochun actually learns a thing or two about defending himself and he's even praised for his punches and stances. But when he falls mid-air during a roundhouse kick, breaking two bones in his left leg and another one in his right, he decides maybe that he'll leave the job of Yunho's best friend to Changmin.
Next target on the Park list of BFFery is Jaejoong. Now he's always been quite close to his oldest hyung so he figures that everything would work out well. But of course that would be too good to be true and so it doesn't work out. Yoochun takes to cooking with Jaejoong in the kitchen but he burns things, pots and pans, eggs and pancakes. The last straw is when Yoochun falls asleep while waiting for the water for their jjigae to boil and ends up nearly killing them all with the still on gas leaking through the house. Needless to say, Jaejoong politely tells him to get out.
Changmin tries to ward off any attempts but Yoochun is nothing but stubborn and somewhat sneaky. He applies to work at the same bookstore that Changmin works at and a week into the job, the youngest of the five is already at his wits end. Yoochun gives discounts to the pretty girls, overcharges their boyfriends and nearly gives away the books to the ahjummas when they chat him up. Yunho's the one that approaches Yoochun first, telling him in soft tones that if he doesn't quit by next Monday, Changmin'll hand the resignation letter in for him.
Junsu's the last of them all because Yoochun figures he'd becomes best friends with Junsu in no time. And for once, he's right. All it takes is a little less sleep and lot of soccer enthusiasm. Yoochun starts napping in the afternoons so he can wake up at two am to watch the European matches with Junsu. Naturally he's got no idea who is who but he always cheers for the one wearing number 10 and while sometimes he supports the wrong team, Yoochun learns soon enough that Junsu will forgive him because Junsu's not paying attention to him.
Two months after he first starts mission find a best friend, Yoochun gives up. He thinks it's for the better this way and to reward his decision, Jaejoong buys him a beer and Changmin gives him a five dollar bill so he can buy some pretzels to go along with that beer.
Changmin's ordeal isn't an ordeal per se and it's not really a learning experience either. It's puberty.
A few months after he and Yunho start to date, Changmin begins to wake regularly with a racing heart and a hard erection. The two don't really go in hand but once he considers how he dreams of Yunho in his dance outside of sweats and a black tank top nearly every night, it starts to make more and more sense. He's sixteen and Yunho's eighteen and while the older man's very insistent on telling him that it's illegal for the two of them to do anything at all since he's a minor, he feels a kiss or two wouldn't be asking for much.
Yunho, being his wise and more mature hyung, tells him that's not the case and so while they hold hands and sleep together in bed nearly every night, Changmin doesn't get any. And it drives both him and the other three crazy. They start to plot against Yunho and the older man finds himself in certain situations that he really doesn't want to be in. Say for example, being locked into a closet with a dark-eyed and fresh out of the shower Changmin. Or when he wakes up with his feet and arms bound to the bed, the three take turns begging him to just fuck Changmin and get it over with because the younger man is getting moody and starting to snap at even his morning wood.
He takes all these into consideration and when he finally makes the decision to go for it, Changmin's suddenly just not interested. He ignores Yunho for days on end and by the time Yunho grovels his way back into Changmin's good graces, the younger man is merely interested in watching movies on the couch or playing Mario Brothers Party on the Wii. A week later and Yunho cracks, so incredibly horny when tempted and teased by Changmin's pale thighs and hourglass figure that he locks them both in his room, stuttering and mumbling before being dragged into bed by Changmin.
"Hyung," Changmin says quietly, "now you know exactly how blue my balls were."
There's much relief had that night and more then enough screaming and moaning on Changmin's part. Cries from it hurts, it hurts, fuck, Yunho! IT HURTS!< to oh, oh yeah, r- right there, Y- Yunho!; finally ending with I- I'm c- co- coming! Yunho, I'm coming!!
The next morning there's teasing and limping but there's also a lot of loving.
Junsu's claims he's never had a thing but the others tell him that that's not true. But then again, they suppose they can't exactly label when Junsu had become obsessed with spending time with Junho a thing because he doesn't actually get over it.
Jaejoong's thing isn't really so much as thing but another eccentric point about an already eccentric boy. When he's seventeen, Jaejoong declares his undying love for all his friends and goes around kissing them all.
Yunho gets the first smooch and it's halfway through dinner when it happens. Jaejoong just leans over while he's handing Changmin a new bowl of rice and turns so he can kiss Yunho right on the lips. There's indignant screaming and protesting coupled with a few well aimed kicks in the shin and hard punches to the shoulder from Changmin but it's dismissed because all Jaejoong does is tell Yunho he loves him and smiles.
He approaches Junsu after that, cornering him when the younger boy is in the bathroom just about to shower. Junsu remembers hugging a towel to his naked body and Jaejoong remembers tugging it away to kiss Junsu's arm. "I like that you have such pale arms" is what Jaejoong tells Junsu and he leaves right after he's done, shouting an "I love you" before he closes the door to let Junsu take his shower.
Changmin gets the kiss while he's lying on the couch and reading a book for class. Jaejoong walks by and leans over the side of the couch, grinning widely as he gets all into Changmin's face. "What do you want?" is Changmin's exasperated question and Jaejoong answers with kiss to Changmin's heart, telling the younger boy that "I think you have a big heart, stop trying to hide it." Changmin remembers falling off the couch after that and being rescued by a laughing Yunho.
Yoochun never really gets his kiss. He waits for it and Jaejoong shrugs when confronted about it. "I love you but I don't know if I want to kiss you." Yoochun never makes much sense of that answer and he forgets about it after a few months pass. Years after that when they're eating pasta in Olive Gardens, Jaejoong leans over mid-slurp of the pasta and kisses Yoochun's fingers, "I like your fingers. They're so pretty." Yoochun doesn't think much about it at all but when he gets home and receives a pretty, emoticon filled text message from Jaejoong that states Love you too, Chun. he suddenly remembers and laughs about it.
Yunho's thing is even less of a thing than Jaejoong's. It's more of a tragedy.
The first person to realize that something's wrong is naturally Changmin. There's one day that Yunho's kisses grow more hurried and his touches become desperate. The normally gentle hands are rough in a way that Yunho never is and the tender sex they have for that night is more passionate and harder than Changmin's ever been taken before by Yunho. There's also a look in Yunho's eyes when he comes, a little darker than normal and when Changmin kisses him afterwards as they're curled together, Yunho cries into his neck and Changmin holds him that much tighter. He doesn't ask in words but in his kisses and Yunho just kisses harder, wordlessly refusing to answer.
Jaejoong can tell because he's Jaejoong and he's always been institutive about these things. He finds Yunho eating a bucket of fried chicken in the kitchen with a large mashed potato on the side and sits next to him, leaning against his side to provide some kind of strength. Yunho doesn't tell him and so Jaejoong doesn't ask, feeding Yunho before driving him to Changmin's later that night when the younger man is off from work.
Junsu doesn't realize it really but he gets the hunch that something is wrong when he shows up for dance team practice one night to find Yunho already in the practice room, tank top and shorts soaked in sweat. Changmin's sitting by the side with his eyes trained on Yunho's constantly moving body and Junsu takes a seat next to him, nudging and not getting an answer because Changmin doesn't know either.
The one who really figures it out is Yoochun. And it's not that hard either but none of them realize how they missed it the first place. All five are staying over at Junsu's for the Saturday because it's the Fall and probably the the last time they can really camp outside in Junsu's backyard. Yoochun's given the tedious and so important job of ripping of newspapers for the campfire when he comes across the Obituaries for last week. Now it's not like Yoochun's always dreamed of being an Obit writer but lately he's developed an interest in reading Obit columns and there's a rather large picture he comes across, a familiar face and an even more familiar name.
He walks back outside to find the other four roasting marshmallows and sits cross-legged, holding out the entire stack of papers and dropping it all gently into the flames with Yunho's grandfather's picture on the top. There's nothing that any of the boys say, every one of them knowing just how important the older man had been to Yunho. His grandfather had been his mentor, his best friend and from time to time, Yunho would tell them stories about how he'd gone fishing as a child with his Grandfather or how he'd follow him to the law office and sit there as he worked so his Grandfather wouldn't have to work alone.
Yunho is the first to break the silence and he reaches into his bag to pull out four black envelopes, handing each of them one. "Mom says that you should all come to the wake if you can. Figured it'd be cheaper if I just gave it to you guys instead of mailing." Changmin doesn't say anything about the stamp already posted on the side nor does he say anything about the sticky note that Yunho crumbles, to be mailed 14th October, three days earlier.
The night before the wake, Yunho leaves the house hours before the service, a metrocard and nothing else in hand. He gets on the 4 train first, taking it all the way to Brooklyn and then back to Times Square where Changmin finds him in the corner of the R train. He takes the empty seat next to him and hands him the stuffed deer that Yunho had kept at Changmin's place, lacing his hand with Yunho's and sitting with the older man as they leave Manhattan for Queens. Jaejoong joins them in Bronx on the 6 train, running and getting his sneaker into the closing doors just before the train leaves without him. A sleepy Yoochun's dragged in by an equally sleepy Junsu who manages to catch up to them back in Manhattan when they're waiting to get on the N train.
It's the same route they'd all met on and an hour after they've all gathered once more, Jaejoong is the one who starts it off with the short anecdote about how Yunho's Grandfather had been the one who helped him dye his hair from pepper grey back to chestnut brown. No one laughs and no one cries but they do drink a can of beer each to the man who introduced them each to the bitter liquid and when they file off the train to the wake, it's Changmin's warmth that Yunho curls into, Jaejoong's hand that he's holding and Yoochun's hoodie he's wearing and Junsu's baseball cap he's got on.
---
Not too long after that, they begin the application process for College. Changmin's two years behind and both Yoochun and Junsu are another year behind but with careful planning and many accelerated courses, all five graduate High School in the summer of 2009. All five also get accepted into completely different schools.
Yoochun decides to wait for his brother Ricky to graduate so the two of them can enroll together. Jaejoong's accepted into the very prestigious Le Cordon Bleu Institute of Culinary Arts located in Dallas, Texas. Junsu finally summons up enough courage to audition for one of the most well known Korean entertainment companies and to no one's surprise except Junsu's, he's accepted and set to train. Changmin gets into his dream school Standford University in Palo Alto, California. And Yunho, determined to become a lawyer like the rest of his family, enrolls into the freshmen class at Columbia University located in New York City.
That summer is their last together and while all five no longer do everything together, they try. The entire three months are spent by each other's side but what must end does. Changmin is the first to leave for orientation and Yunho's the one who waves goodbye for the longest at the airport and cries the most. The two were given an entire weekend to spend together free of any interruptions and predictably enough, neither step foot out of Yunho's bedroom. There's much sex had and while Changmin can barely remember how many times he'd come that night, he remembers clearly the soft words whispered into his ears about their futures together. Yunho's never promised him anything short of forever and Changmin's never given Yunho anything less than everything.
The two don't promise to always call one another and Yunho doesn't make Changmin promise to visit every Winter, Spring and Summer break nor does Changmin ask Yunho not to date anyone else. It's because those are already givens, promises made before even asked. What Yunho does do is drop down on one knee with a ring in his hand that's less like an engagement or wedding band and more like a promise ring. And what Changmin does say is yes.
Jaejoong leaves with Junsu, the two of them taking the same flight back to Korea so Junsu can start his training while Jaejoong visits his birth mother in Seoul. Yoochun and Yunho end up in Junsu's bedroom long after the three have gone and despite the fact that there's only the two of them left, there's still five cans of beer on the floor and two cigarettes waiting to be lit.
---
Yunho's first day at Columbia is uneventful. First off he's late for lecture and ends up with the seat all the way in the first row and dead center where the Professor stares at him to answer every question he's asked. He also trips over the single step down and ends up face first in the lap of a girl wearing a miniskirt and with no tights or leggings on. There's apologies made and some flirting unreciprocated before he's on his way to lunch, face redder than a tomato.
He's got a lame garden salad in hand and his cell in the other, trying to multitask between eating and calling Changmin. Predictably as if he were in a Korean drama, the call goes through and there's an all too familiar ringtone heard from behind him. He turns and finds Changmin with a bag across his shoulder and an amused smile. Yunho's still too busy with his tongue down Changmin's throat to notice Junsu stumbling into a seat, grumbling the entire while about how they'd chosen such a hard table to spot. Jaejoong strolls by arm in arm with Yoochun, the two of them falling into the remaining empty chairs.
Yunho stares wide-eyed with his fork half in the lettuce before it's taken away from and substituted with a container of hot, white rice that Junsu hands over. Yoochun takes out the gigantic thermos of soup while Jaejoong systematically sets the tiny containers of banchan out before them. Changmin hands out the Coke cans, a straw for each of the four cans with him and Yunho sharing one. He sneaks out a bottle of Qoo for Yunho, grinning when the older man immediately reaches for it. The food is half gone by the time Jaejoong asks who had the Bulgogi and Changmin startles, taking out the still warm container out of his bag.
And that, they all agree, must be the first time Changmin has food in his bag that he forgets to eat.
pairing : gen - dbsk, changmin/yunho
rating : r
words : 6889
summary : a subway ride and five friendships
a/n : i haven't written in a long, long time. i suppose this is my grind it out writer's block fic. mostly gen-dbsk with changmin/yunho weaved in because what can i do? they're my favorite ♥
They're known as the subway gang.
Or at least that's what Junsu's mom refers to them as. It all started when her son came home one day from summer school with a blond friend in tow, their hands laced and swinging as they walked in the front door, matching cheshire grins on their faces. He tells her that they'd met on the ride to school and that they'd shared a triple fudge brownie and a carton of milk together, sipping out of the same straw and everything. If that's not a mark of friendship, Junsu says, then he doesn't know what is.
His name is Kim Jaejoong and even at the age of eleven, he's awkward. Jaejoong's strikingly beautiful considering he's just a child but he's blessed with such dainty and pretty features that many often mistaken him for a girl. Ever since his brief obession at the age of six with ronald mcdonald, Jaejoong's been a self-proclaimed schinzophrenic about his hair, sometimes going from bright red to dull brown to light purple. He's currently sporting a yellow so pale that it makes him look exactly like something out of a fantasy novel and Junsu's mom finds it all too easy to imagine the fragile looking child battling dragons in a full knight of Arthur's roundtable getup.
Junsu brings home another boy a few weeks later, a Shim Changmin that at first glance seems to be the nerdy bookworm type. He's a full year younger than Junsu but he seems to be lightyears ahead of the others in terms of his maturity and mannerisms. When she offers the trio cookies and milk, Changmin asks her politely if the cookies were made from whole-wheat flour and whether or not the milk was properly enzymed. Jaejoong knocks Changmin's head into the plate and tells her with such a shy smile that Changmin's actually twenty-one and not ten that even she has to laugh. Because it's not like she really knows how to answer the question, she hadn't even known milk needed to be enzymed. They leave a few hours later, running out the door to play ball in the park and as she's cleaning up after them she finds that Changmin hadn't eaten his cookie and learns years later that he's actually allegic to flour.
Another month later, the trio return home from a day at the museum with another two kids trailing behind them and while Junsu's mom is more than supportive of her son making friends, she's starting to worry. New York City subways aren't exactly where she wants her son to socialize. But after they're introduced, she realizes she can't exactly say no to Yoochun's charming smile or refuse Yunho's adorable accent and polite tones. He actually reminds her so much of Changmin that she wonders briefly if they're related.
Yoochun is the same age as her son and he's as much a crybaby as Junsu's female cousin. He gets along particularly well with Jaejoong and more than not, the two of them are found together in some corner of the house. Every night at seven, she makes her way up to Junsu's room to collect her son and then goes into the basement to get Jaejoong and Yoochun before she gathers the other two kids in the living, usually asleep on the couch atop one another, Yunho almost always cradling Changmin to his body. Naturally as the hyung, even though he's technically younger than Jaejoong, Yunho turns out to be the most responsible and protective of all the boys.
The five come home one day with ripped clothes and cuts on their faces but only Yunho's bleeding from the nose, knuckles bruised and a dark purple spot across his ribs that he received from a kick to the chest he'd taken for Jaejoong. Seems like they ran into a couple of bullies on the way home and while the others had taken the bullying for as long as they could, in the end punches were thrown and Yunho was the first to hit back.
Mrs. Kim always wondered if the boys lost or won that fight but no one had been willing to tell and it's not as if a parent could ask such a question straight out. A few years later she remembers and asks Junho if he knows and her other son tells her between bites of toast that after Yunho had gone home, the four had gone back to the park armed with enough water balloons and a taser from Jaejoong's mom. It was Changmin's meticulous planning in telling his sisters to call the police exactly twenty minutes after they'd left his house that got the other boys in the end.
The police arrived not too long after the balloons were thrown and another fight was started. In fact, they'd gotten there just in time to watch Changmin's glasses being stepped on by one of the older teens and arrested the other group on the spot. Changmin had bet on the fact that the cops would believe a bunch of wild mannered kids over the obviously more delinquent teens and he'd bet right. Of course when Yunho had heard of that, he'd taken Changmin aside and given him a talking to about doing such dangerous things without telling him ahead of time.
The two had argued about it for a while and it ended with Changmin taking a seat all the way at the other end of the couch during movie night and with Yunho scowling through dinner for the night. Needless to say, they fought a silent war for about three days before Yunho gave in and offered Changmin a scone he's bought especially for the younger boy. And even though Changmin's got an allergy, he ate it anyway, running upstairs to take a Benadryl for the imminent allergy reaction.
Yunho had been thirteen and Changmin just ten.
By the time high school comes around, the five started to systematically stay over at each other's house every weekend. The plan was thought up by Changmin over lunch one day and carried out by all of them the following Friday night. After a while they had realize what a bother it is to stay at Junsu's all the time because then his mom has to feed all five of them and while they've been over his house so much that even Yoochun refers to her as Mommy and not Aunty, it's still a bother.
For the first week, they relocate to Jaejoong's and even though he has seven older sisters chittering and chattering about, it's more than fine. Yoochun and Junsu are found in one of the rooms playing tea party with the two youngest sisters and Changmin's in the study with a book in his face and his feet in Yunho's lap. This period of time in also when they all discover that Kim Jaejoong is actually a really good cook. He surprises them one afternoon with a huge pot of kimchi jjigae that no one but Changmin tries and following suit with that Yunho takes a bite and Yoochun's forced to as well before Junsu finally inches forward with his spoon to try it. And soon enough Jaejoong becomes the resident cook, doing the bidding of not only his sisters but Changmin and Yoochun. They're the only two who regularly ask for and eat his food.
He finds that Changmin with his iron stomach will try pretty much any type of food as long as it smells good and looks edible. Yoochun, if approached at the right moment will snap the food up with a muffled thanks as he devours it. Yunho and Junsu on the other hands are the picky eaters but it's not too long before Jaejoong figures out their weakness : chicken. After he figures that out, it's easy sailing. Jaejoong makes fried chicken and grilled chicken, chicken cutlet over rice and diced chicken with peppers. Ambitiously, he even tries to make a chicken flavored ice cream that wisely, no one touches.
They follow the schedule accordingly and the next week is Yoochun's where they discover that sleeping on the cold floor, even with a sleeping bag, might not be too comfortable. First off, there's only two sleeping bags and so they're forced to share. Jaejoong gets his own mainly before he makes such awful faces in his sleep that no one wants to bother with trying to sleep with him. Junsu forces his way onto Yoochun's bed, his rather plentiful behind serving as the do not cross line between the two of them on the bed. Yunho gallantly tries to offer the remaining sleeping bag to Changmin who merely rolls his eyes before tugging his older hyung in with him, curling right against the older man because Yunho's so warm and it's comfortable this way.
Mrs Park checks in on them that night to find the boys are curled into one another save Jaejoong who somehow got his hands on a stuffed pig. Yoochun's got an arm slung around Junsu's waist and despite being the tallest one out of them all, Changmin's curled into a ball and tucked into Yunho's arm like he belongs. It's because of that that when they stay over again a few months later, she's not at all surprised to find Yunho and Changmin with their hands laced as they're eating dinner side by side.
None of the boys were surprised either. Yunho's always shown a larger amount of affection for the youngest out of them all, doting on him when he had been a child, offering up his tater tots because Changmin liked them more than the roast beef served during lunch. And for his part, Changmin had always relied on his Yunho-hyung more than he had on any of them and he'd always gone to Yunho for his bumps and scratches. Soon it became customary for Yunho's mom to call Changmin's house in search of her son and vice versa. They'd always been closer than the others growing up, napping together in the same space on the couch and eating each other's food.
And even in High School when they had to split up for after school activities, Changmin would be watching from the sidelines as Yunho danced and Yunho would be there at the library when Changmin re-filed the books. They were always by each other's side and so it was only natural that they would progress from being good friends in their childhood to even closer friends in their teens to lovers by the time they were juniors. There was a saying in their High School, "Where Changmin was you would find Yunho and where Yunho was, you'd bet there would be Changmin."
The one weekend they stay over at the Jung house, Yoochun finds Homin, or what the other three have no dubbed the Changmin/Yunho couple, with their lips glued together in bed. He stares for so long that Junsu actually finds him just leaning against the door and pulls him away to find Jaejoong who is in the kitchen mixing some kind of homemade concoction of yogurt and cucumber that their oldest hyung swears will smooth over all wrinkles and laugh lines. Of course in reply this this, Junsu can only reply that they're fifteen and don't have wrinkles. Jaejoong however thinks it's never too early to fight old age and applies the mixture to his face and even body sometimes.
At Changmin's the boys separate to do other things as well. Junsu grabs the Nintendo 64 and calls immediately for the good controller while Changmin just grabs the other good one from his bedroom and Jaejoong ignores them to head up to the other room where Changmin's sisters will be playing Barbie. It's inevitable and they two girls will come down crying at least once during their sleepover about how Jaejoong's cut off almost all the hair of one of their dolls and colored it pink with a marker. Yoochun grabs the third controller and after a littler persuasion, Yunho will sit behind Changmin with the last controller, barely paying attention to the screen because he's always more interested in Changmin's long fingers.
---
There's a period in each of the boys' lives which can only be described as a trying period or a time in which each one of them experience certain personal ordeals. They labeled these their growing pains.
Yoochun's the first. Over the course of one summer, he decides that he wants to suddenly become everyone's best friend. Even though all five of them are close, it's inevitable that one of them is closer to another one of them, much like Changmin is close enough to Yunho to allow the older man to touch certain parts that if Jaejoong or Junsu were to even look at, they'd get their asses kicked. Yoochun, however, decides that he wants to be everyone's best friend.
He tries with Yunho first. Yoochun starts to follow him to the weekly Tae Kwon Do practices where Yunho's training to be a black belt. All goes well for a while and Yoochun actually learns a thing or two about defending himself and he's even praised for his punches and stances. But when he falls mid-air during a roundhouse kick, breaking two bones in his left leg and another one in his right, he decides maybe that he'll leave the job of Yunho's best friend to Changmin.
Next target on the Park list of BFFery is Jaejoong. Now he's always been quite close to his oldest hyung so he figures that everything would work out well. But of course that would be too good to be true and so it doesn't work out. Yoochun takes to cooking with Jaejoong in the kitchen but he burns things, pots and pans, eggs and pancakes. The last straw is when Yoochun falls asleep while waiting for the water for their jjigae to boil and ends up nearly killing them all with the still on gas leaking through the house. Needless to say, Jaejoong politely tells him to get out.
Changmin tries to ward off any attempts but Yoochun is nothing but stubborn and somewhat sneaky. He applies to work at the same bookstore that Changmin works at and a week into the job, the youngest of the five is already at his wits end. Yoochun gives discounts to the pretty girls, overcharges their boyfriends and nearly gives away the books to the ahjummas when they chat him up. Yunho's the one that approaches Yoochun first, telling him in soft tones that if he doesn't quit by next Monday, Changmin'll hand the resignation letter in for him.
Junsu's the last of them all because Yoochun figures he'd becomes best friends with Junsu in no time. And for once, he's right. All it takes is a little less sleep and lot of soccer enthusiasm. Yoochun starts napping in the afternoons so he can wake up at two am to watch the European matches with Junsu. Naturally he's got no idea who is who but he always cheers for the one wearing number 10 and while sometimes he supports the wrong team, Yoochun learns soon enough that Junsu will forgive him because Junsu's not paying attention to him.
Two months after he first starts mission find a best friend, Yoochun gives up. He thinks it's for the better this way and to reward his decision, Jaejoong buys him a beer and Changmin gives him a five dollar bill so he can buy some pretzels to go along with that beer.
Changmin's ordeal isn't an ordeal per se and it's not really a learning experience either. It's puberty.
A few months after he and Yunho start to date, Changmin begins to wake regularly with a racing heart and a hard erection. The two don't really go in hand but once he considers how he dreams of Yunho in his dance outside of sweats and a black tank top nearly every night, it starts to make more and more sense. He's sixteen and Yunho's eighteen and while the older man's very insistent on telling him that it's illegal for the two of them to do anything at all since he's a minor, he feels a kiss or two wouldn't be asking for much.
Yunho, being his wise and more mature hyung, tells him that's not the case and so while they hold hands and sleep together in bed nearly every night, Changmin doesn't get any. And it drives both him and the other three crazy. They start to plot against Yunho and the older man finds himself in certain situations that he really doesn't want to be in. Say for example, being locked into a closet with a dark-eyed and fresh out of the shower Changmin. Or when he wakes up with his feet and arms bound to the bed, the three take turns begging him to just fuck Changmin and get it over with because the younger man is getting moody and starting to snap at even his morning wood.
He takes all these into consideration and when he finally makes the decision to go for it, Changmin's suddenly just not interested. He ignores Yunho for days on end and by the time Yunho grovels his way back into Changmin's good graces, the younger man is merely interested in watching movies on the couch or playing Mario Brothers Party on the Wii. A week later and Yunho cracks, so incredibly horny when tempted and teased by Changmin's pale thighs and hourglass figure that he locks them both in his room, stuttering and mumbling before being dragged into bed by Changmin.
"Hyung," Changmin says quietly, "now you know exactly how blue my balls were."
There's much relief had that night and more then enough screaming and moaning on Changmin's part. Cries from it hurts, it hurts, fuck, Yunho! IT HURTS!< to oh, oh yeah, r- right there, Y- Yunho!; finally ending with I- I'm c- co- coming! Yunho, I'm coming!!
The next morning there's teasing and limping but there's also a lot of loving.
Junsu's claims he's never had a thing but the others tell him that that's not true. But then again, they suppose they can't exactly label when Junsu had become obsessed with spending time with Junho a thing because he doesn't actually get over it.
Jaejoong's thing isn't really so much as thing but another eccentric point about an already eccentric boy. When he's seventeen, Jaejoong declares his undying love for all his friends and goes around kissing them all.
Yunho gets the first smooch and it's halfway through dinner when it happens. Jaejoong just leans over while he's handing Changmin a new bowl of rice and turns so he can kiss Yunho right on the lips. There's indignant screaming and protesting coupled with a few well aimed kicks in the shin and hard punches to the shoulder from Changmin but it's dismissed because all Jaejoong does is tell Yunho he loves him and smiles.
He approaches Junsu after that, cornering him when the younger boy is in the bathroom just about to shower. Junsu remembers hugging a towel to his naked body and Jaejoong remembers tugging it away to kiss Junsu's arm. "I like that you have such pale arms" is what Jaejoong tells Junsu and he leaves right after he's done, shouting an "I love you" before he closes the door to let Junsu take his shower.
Changmin gets the kiss while he's lying on the couch and reading a book for class. Jaejoong walks by and leans over the side of the couch, grinning widely as he gets all into Changmin's face. "What do you want?" is Changmin's exasperated question and Jaejoong answers with kiss to Changmin's heart, telling the younger boy that "I think you have a big heart, stop trying to hide it." Changmin remembers falling off the couch after that and being rescued by a laughing Yunho.
Yoochun never really gets his kiss. He waits for it and Jaejoong shrugs when confronted about it. "I love you but I don't know if I want to kiss you." Yoochun never makes much sense of that answer and he forgets about it after a few months pass. Years after that when they're eating pasta in Olive Gardens, Jaejoong leans over mid-slurp of the pasta and kisses Yoochun's fingers, "I like your fingers. They're so pretty." Yoochun doesn't think much about it at all but when he gets home and receives a pretty, emoticon filled text message from Jaejoong that states Love you too, Chun. he suddenly remembers and laughs about it.
Yunho's thing is even less of a thing than Jaejoong's. It's more of a tragedy.
The first person to realize that something's wrong is naturally Changmin. There's one day that Yunho's kisses grow more hurried and his touches become desperate. The normally gentle hands are rough in a way that Yunho never is and the tender sex they have for that night is more passionate and harder than Changmin's ever been taken before by Yunho. There's also a look in Yunho's eyes when he comes, a little darker than normal and when Changmin kisses him afterwards as they're curled together, Yunho cries into his neck and Changmin holds him that much tighter. He doesn't ask in words but in his kisses and Yunho just kisses harder, wordlessly refusing to answer.
Jaejoong can tell because he's Jaejoong and he's always been institutive about these things. He finds Yunho eating a bucket of fried chicken in the kitchen with a large mashed potato on the side and sits next to him, leaning against his side to provide some kind of strength. Yunho doesn't tell him and so Jaejoong doesn't ask, feeding Yunho before driving him to Changmin's later that night when the younger man is off from work.
Junsu doesn't realize it really but he gets the hunch that something is wrong when he shows up for dance team practice one night to find Yunho already in the practice room, tank top and shorts soaked in sweat. Changmin's sitting by the side with his eyes trained on Yunho's constantly moving body and Junsu takes a seat next to him, nudging and not getting an answer because Changmin doesn't know either.
The one who really figures it out is Yoochun. And it's not that hard either but none of them realize how they missed it the first place. All five are staying over at Junsu's for the Saturday because it's the Fall and probably the the last time they can really camp outside in Junsu's backyard. Yoochun's given the tedious and so important job of ripping of newspapers for the campfire when he comes across the Obituaries for last week. Now it's not like Yoochun's always dreamed of being an Obit writer but lately he's developed an interest in reading Obit columns and there's a rather large picture he comes across, a familiar face and an even more familiar name.
He walks back outside to find the other four roasting marshmallows and sits cross-legged, holding out the entire stack of papers and dropping it all gently into the flames with Yunho's grandfather's picture on the top. There's nothing that any of the boys say, every one of them knowing just how important the older man had been to Yunho. His grandfather had been his mentor, his best friend and from time to time, Yunho would tell them stories about how he'd gone fishing as a child with his Grandfather or how he'd follow him to the law office and sit there as he worked so his Grandfather wouldn't have to work alone.
Yunho is the first to break the silence and he reaches into his bag to pull out four black envelopes, handing each of them one. "Mom says that you should all come to the wake if you can. Figured it'd be cheaper if I just gave it to you guys instead of mailing." Changmin doesn't say anything about the stamp already posted on the side nor does he say anything about the sticky note that Yunho crumbles, to be mailed 14th October, three days earlier.
The night before the wake, Yunho leaves the house hours before the service, a metrocard and nothing else in hand. He gets on the 4 train first, taking it all the way to Brooklyn and then back to Times Square where Changmin finds him in the corner of the R train. He takes the empty seat next to him and hands him the stuffed deer that Yunho had kept at Changmin's place, lacing his hand with Yunho's and sitting with the older man as they leave Manhattan for Queens. Jaejoong joins them in Bronx on the 6 train, running and getting his sneaker into the closing doors just before the train leaves without him. A sleepy Yoochun's dragged in by an equally sleepy Junsu who manages to catch up to them back in Manhattan when they're waiting to get on the N train.
It's the same route they'd all met on and an hour after they've all gathered once more, Jaejoong is the one who starts it off with the short anecdote about how Yunho's Grandfather had been the one who helped him dye his hair from pepper grey back to chestnut brown. No one laughs and no one cries but they do drink a can of beer each to the man who introduced them each to the bitter liquid and when they file off the train to the wake, it's Changmin's warmth that Yunho curls into, Jaejoong's hand that he's holding and Yoochun's hoodie he's wearing and Junsu's baseball cap he's got on.
---
Not too long after that, they begin the application process for College. Changmin's two years behind and both Yoochun and Junsu are another year behind but with careful planning and many accelerated courses, all five graduate High School in the summer of 2009. All five also get accepted into completely different schools.
Yoochun decides to wait for his brother Ricky to graduate so the two of them can enroll together. Jaejoong's accepted into the very prestigious Le Cordon Bleu Institute of Culinary Arts located in Dallas, Texas. Junsu finally summons up enough courage to audition for one of the most well known Korean entertainment companies and to no one's surprise except Junsu's, he's accepted and set to train. Changmin gets into his dream school Standford University in Palo Alto, California. And Yunho, determined to become a lawyer like the rest of his family, enrolls into the freshmen class at Columbia University located in New York City.
That summer is their last together and while all five no longer do everything together, they try. The entire three months are spent by each other's side but what must end does. Changmin is the first to leave for orientation and Yunho's the one who waves goodbye for the longest at the airport and cries the most. The two were given an entire weekend to spend together free of any interruptions and predictably enough, neither step foot out of Yunho's bedroom. There's much sex had and while Changmin can barely remember how many times he'd come that night, he remembers clearly the soft words whispered into his ears about their futures together. Yunho's never promised him anything short of forever and Changmin's never given Yunho anything less than everything.
The two don't promise to always call one another and Yunho doesn't make Changmin promise to visit every Winter, Spring and Summer break nor does Changmin ask Yunho not to date anyone else. It's because those are already givens, promises made before even asked. What Yunho does do is drop down on one knee with a ring in his hand that's less like an engagement or wedding band and more like a promise ring. And what Changmin does say is yes.
Jaejoong leaves with Junsu, the two of them taking the same flight back to Korea so Junsu can start his training while Jaejoong visits his birth mother in Seoul. Yoochun and Yunho end up in Junsu's bedroom long after the three have gone and despite the fact that there's only the two of them left, there's still five cans of beer on the floor and two cigarettes waiting to be lit.
---
Yunho's first day at Columbia is uneventful. First off he's late for lecture and ends up with the seat all the way in the first row and dead center where the Professor stares at him to answer every question he's asked. He also trips over the single step down and ends up face first in the lap of a girl wearing a miniskirt and with no tights or leggings on. There's apologies made and some flirting unreciprocated before he's on his way to lunch, face redder than a tomato.
He's got a lame garden salad in hand and his cell in the other, trying to multitask between eating and calling Changmin. Predictably as if he were in a Korean drama, the call goes through and there's an all too familiar ringtone heard from behind him. He turns and finds Changmin with a bag across his shoulder and an amused smile. Yunho's still too busy with his tongue down Changmin's throat to notice Junsu stumbling into a seat, grumbling the entire while about how they'd chosen such a hard table to spot. Jaejoong strolls by arm in arm with Yoochun, the two of them falling into the remaining empty chairs.
Yunho stares wide-eyed with his fork half in the lettuce before it's taken away from and substituted with a container of hot, white rice that Junsu hands over. Yoochun takes out the gigantic thermos of soup while Jaejoong systematically sets the tiny containers of banchan out before them. Changmin hands out the Coke cans, a straw for each of the four cans with him and Yunho sharing one. He sneaks out a bottle of Qoo for Yunho, grinning when the older man immediately reaches for it. The food is half gone by the time Jaejoong asks who had the Bulgogi and Changmin startles, taking out the still warm container out of his bag.
And that, they all agree, must be the first time Changmin has food in his bag that he forgets to eat.