Strength
Title: Strength
Pairing: YunJae
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the words!! :D
Word count: 3720
Summary: They loved each other so, so much, but they were doing it all wrong. It hurt but they couldn’t let go.
♥♥♥
As the three of them moved into yet another dormitory, Jaejoong could see - not just because he was behind the other two while they struggled with the personal things they had preferred to move on their own than deal with engaging movers, but because he knew them so well - just how battered and bruised each of them was.
He could feel the bone-deep tiredness in himself that was probably showing on his face, etched in his own features, after setting up a lawsuit just to walk into another, trusting the wrong people, and watching helplessly as their fans went into a virtual war and running into walls everywhere when it came to performances. They had expected it, but it was a different matter entirely to be going through it - to be taken and churned into stories by the media, for everyone to see and dissect and spit on, all the while hurting - it was unbearably painful, and he wondered if they’d ever make it through intact, and still able to stand on a stage. But most times, he tried not to think at all, because it helped with the ache in his heart and helped him keep things together - and he needed to do it now, more than ever.
Jaejoong tried not to think of past times, of better times when there were more people in the group, when moving to a new dorm had involved running and shoving and fighting tooth and nail (during some of the more hilarious times) for first dibs on the best bedroom, as he set his own boxes of belongings down in the contrasting silence they were working in.
There was a couch and he sunk into it, thanking the powers-that-be for fluffiness and down feathers and whatever else made the softness beneath him so comfortable, before spreading his arms in an invitation to the other two. “Come on; those can wait. We’ll rest for a bit, okay?”
Junsu looked slightly surprised with the rare allowance Jaejoong was making and Jaejoong could almost see the question popping forth (Seriously, hyung, rest before cleaning?), so he smiled a little, wiggling his fingers in response. It wasn’t long before he found himself with two armfuls of warmth, respectively named Junsu and Yoochun. And so they sat for a long time - Jaejoong carding his hand through Yoochun’s hair and rubbing Junsu’s back soothingly, humming a calming tune he knew from somewhere and pretending not to notice when his sleeves turned a little damp.
But Jaejoong alone knew that each tear shed - from the days before all the way till now and even into the future that they couldn’t see into - made his heart a little stronger, gave him a little more strength.
He was their hyung, and he would be strong enough for them both.
---
“Hey, boo.”
“Hey.”
“How are you?”
“I’m okay, Chun and Junsu are coping. I’ll make sure they’re okay. Min?”
“He’s alright…I miss you, Jae.”
“So do I. So, so much.”
---
He worked a little harder, smiled a little wider each time they came to a dead end. If they were banned from performing in Korea, they turned to Japan, then to the rest of Asia. If that wasn’t enough, he worked so that they could go beyond Asia - to America and to Europe. The management said they could take care of it, but Jaejoong wanted to look at all the details, smooth out all the glitches. Because things should be nothing less than perfect for his groupmates; they deserved nothing less.
---
“It’s okay, I ate earlier.” The eldest of the three absentmindedly refused the offer before returning to talk about the details and plans that had been set out for the months ahead. Too caught up in explaining technicalities, he didn’t notice the lapse of silence that had momentarily fallen over and the worried glance that passed between the other two.
---
“Hey.”
“Hey, Yun. How’s…” He trailed off, unable to think of a word to fill in the blank for a moment, “…everything?”
“It’s all alright, we…” Then a sigh. The voice returned, but sounded decades older, “We’re cutting an album soon, as TVXQ. And-”
“I know… I know.”
---
His throat was burning. The night was breezeless, the bed, a little warm, and he kicked the blankets away from his body. He swallowed and squeezed his eyes shut in a fruitless attempt to go back to sleep. (He knew it wouldn’t have worked but there was no harm trying, right?) With a little moan, he rolled off the bed in a motion that could never be described as graceful and went in search of a glass of water.
He stumbled a little in the dark and because he wasn’t too awake yet, but managed to get to the kitchen without making too much noise, navigating more on memory than on sight. When he was finally holding the glass of clear liquid in his hand, he drank gratefully and felt the pain in his throat abate as the cool fluid soothed it. Leaving the empty glass in the sink for tomorrow, he moved to make his way back to his room.
Then he walked past Jaejoong’s room and the faint light from the iPod had given the latter away. Junsu supposed if Jaejoong hadn’t chosen that moment to probe the device, he probably wouldn’t have seen him. But he did, and so Junsu stopped at the door, about to call out until something struck him: the whole posture of his hyung was decidedly wrong. The body on the bed, curled in on himself, and though Jaejoong had his back to the door, and Junsu couldn’t make out his face, the slight illumination that outlined his figure also revealed his shivering shoulders. No, not just his shoulders - his trembling form.
He was crying, Junsu realized belatedly, his mouth caught, pre-call.
He realized he didn’t know what to do, because he hadn’t seen Jaejoong like that since they moved into the new dorm and he strongly suspected that Jaejoong hadn’t let Chun either. And also, the fact this happened so late into the night was also a dead giveaway.
He didn’t know if this was a one-off thing, if it was better to let him have time alone - because despite the fact both Chun and he were beyond close to Jaejoong, they weren’t Yunho, and Yunho was the one who could coax Jaejoong out of tears and out of hiding, and out of everything, in fact.
He thought perhaps he should wait, and see how things are before telling Chun, so he stepped away quietly from his place at the doorframe and back to his own room.
He didn’t think he could get any sleep that night, and he was right.
---
It became obvious that it wasn’t a one-off thing. Junsu made a point to wake up in the middle of the nights to secretly check on Jaejoong occasionally and caught him a few more times, but ended not saying anything to anyone, cataloguing the heartbreaking moments for himself, though he was entirely unsure what to do with this piece of information. But Yoochun noticed, even before Junsu got to tell him anything.
It was blaringly obvious that Jaejoong wasn’t eating.
Not entirely starving himself, but he would refuse any food, telling them he had already ate, but all they’ve seen him eat around them would be sugar. Sweets and confectionary. And if the loss of appetite had been just a little noteworthy before, it was now downright worrying. The thought that their hyung was living off the short bursts of energy those small sweet things were supplying him made them both wonder, when he would inevitably collapse.
And they had tried, so hard, to coddle and coax some substantial food down their hyung’s throat. Even threatened. But each time he would take a few bites and push it away. And then they wouldn’t be able to do much else except look at each other helplessly, both wanting to cry, but unable to in front of him.
---
Jaejoong knew they were worried. He knew every single time he was unable to swallow what they offered, they were devastated. He knew their hearts broke whenever he took care of them, cooked their food and chased them off to bed, because they were well aware that he wasn’t doing the same. He knew, but he couldn’t.
He wanted to be healthy and normal for them. Just as much as they wished it. As much as he tried to deny it in the beginning, he couldn’t do that anymore, as his jeans started falling off his hips and he could no longer conceal how much thinner he had become or how much more tired he was all the time - he wasn’t in control anymore and it was so, so hard to regain it.
It had started when he started losing his appetite to the ache in his heart. It had filled him to the brim, the ache that had come about when Yunho and he had started to lose the trust between each other. Their phone conversations were shorter and shorter, and the content was more and more brief. And it pained the both of them, but they couldn’t talk about it, and he didn’t know how to fix it. How could it be that they were so in love, still so in love with each other, and still be drifting apart in the worst possible way and not know why? They were both trying so hard to bridge the gap, and yet it was useless. He had agonized over the issue, his heart twisting in his chest and his breath stolen so many times because of the pain, his meals had been skipped because he had no hunger for them.
Then gradually it had become a routine, meals became something unnecessary, and the lies had come about because the worried looks on his dongsaengs’ faces were guilt-inducing for him. And now-
Now it scared him because he couldn’t hold on to his food.
Even if he did ingest a good amount to be considered a meal (which was rare), the nausea would have him rushing to the toilet, and retching most of his stomach’s contents out. It always left his throat raw, his stomach hurting and his body exhausted from the spasms, so he didn’t want to try anymore. Yoochun and Junsu resorted to buying him more confectionary because Jaejoong insisted he was fine and insisted on keeping everything running smoothly when they had tried to wrestle some of his workload over and nothing worked.
---
“Hey, Jae.”
“Hello.” He bit his lip, unsure of what to say.
“Yoochun called me again, and told me.” Yunho’s voice sounded tight with worry, even over the phone, and Jaejoong had no answer for Yunho, just like he didn’t for everyone else - because I can’t sounded more like an excuse than the truth, and he couldn’t make anyone understand without explaining everything from the start, but how could he explain it to Yunho of all people, when it involved Yunho?
“Jae, this can’t go on, you know that, right?” Yunho pressed, persistent.
“…I know.” Jaejoong answered hesitantly, knowing where the conversation was going, because they’ve been through this so many times, and sometimes he wondered if Yunho was just a teeny bit relieved that they now had something to talk about despite it being a problem, because he had to admit he was - just a little. He knew it wasn’t a real solution - it was too one-sided to be - but he was content to listen to Yunho’s voice, however guilty he felt, in their now-slightly-elongated conversations, until he managed to figure out how to fix this… whatever it was that was happening to the two of them.
---
Changmin had been furious when he called Yoochun, all swearing and cursing and damn you hyung, how DARE you leave me in the dark? The worst thing was that Yunho hadn’t volunteered the information either - Changmin had seen a recent interview of the JYJ trio and it had been so blatant something was wrong with Jaejoong that he had confronted Yunho for answers - so Yoochun could only imagine how much worse Yunho had gotten it from the maknae, considering the fact that he was physically within reach.
Junsu had sported an amused smile on his face when Yoochun had picked up the phone, put it to his ear and winced - and said smile very soon disappeared as soon as Yoochun hastily passed the phone over to Junsu, though Yoochun was too chastised to gloat.
“I’ve the most idiotic hyungs on earth,” Changmin declared, after his rage had somewhat dissipated. “I’m sending the other one over.”
The line was cut before Yoochun could ask any more and then the doorbell had rung, as if on cue.
---
“Hi.”
Yunho greeted when Yoochun opened the door, somehow managing a small smile. He wanted to tell them he was happy to see them but all he had at the forefront of his mind was Jaejoong. And knowing they’d forgive him made it easier for him to sidestep Yoochun and slip across the threshold to be met with Junsu.
The expression on Junsu’s face would have been hilarious, if not for the hammering of his heart. Because despite knowing what he had to do now, he had been wrong and Jae was the one suffering - and that knowledge made it hard, and made him nervous. Yoochun knew who he was here for, as he always did, and tilted his head in the direction of a closed door, mouthing good luck before reaching out for Junsu and leaving out the door.
Yunho was a little more nervous as his fingers closed around the cool door handle - it’s now or never flitting across his mind - and turned it quietly, letting himself into the room.
---
Jaejoong was sleeping, and he looked so tired with the dark rings around his eyes that Yunho didn’t have the heart to wake him. He slipped in on top of the covers then, careful not to rouse Jaejoong, and rested his weight on his elbow, bending over the tranquil face almost possessively, his fingers gently threading through the strands of Jaejoong’s hair, his other arm coming to rest on the latter’s waist.
But he was apparently not as careful as he initially thought he was - that, or Jaejoong was more of a light sleeper than the last time they had met, but Yunho tried not to think about that because it would break his heart if Jae had been not eating and not sleeping much - because Jaejoong stirred, and opened his eyes groggily. Yunho almost berated himself when his breath caught and his heart squeezed a little at the sight, and then remembered that it was a reaction he had never gotten rid of and probably never be able to, just not with the circumstances and was adequately placated just as Jaejoong’s brain started to kick in.
“I. You. Why are you here?” Jaejoong looked almost panicked and Yunho knew he had imagined so many scenarios on his way over but this was definitely not the expression he hoped Jaejoong would be sporting, nor the question. His face must have fallen, because Jaejoong sat up a little too fast, and grabbed his arm to keep it around his waist even though Yunho hadn’t had the slightest intention to pull it away. “I-No, sorry, it sounded nicer in my head. I-Are you okay?” Jaejoong had his hand grasping the side of Yunho’s face, his thumb running across a bruise on the cheekbone, once Yunho had followed suit so that they were sitting cross-legged on the bed, facing each other.
“Changmin punched me, then kicked me out because I’m ‘the most idiotic person alive and can’t come back till Jaejoong is well.’” Yunho chuckled a little at that, “but I’m only here because of you. What makes him think I’d want to go back when you’re well?” He dipped forward to nuzzle Jaejoong’s neck. Jaejoong stiffened a little, and he pulled back, frowning unsurely.
Jaejoong sighed. “I’m sorry, I just-I didn’t want you to see me like this.” Yunho blinked at him, “Like what? You’re still beautiful, I love you, and I still will if you came out of the swamp smelling like a rhinoceros.”
Jaejoong returned the comment with a slap to his arm, and then turned serious, looking up at Yunho. “No, I just-I didn’t want to worry you. You obviously had so much to deal with, and I just didn’t think I should burden you with anything else at all. But it became too much for me because we weren’t talking properly at all and I fell apart and you didn’t and I just-I wanted to match up, I wanted to be strong for Yoochun and Junsu and Changmin and you…” The rest of the words tapered off into nothing as tears escaped his eyes and Yunho wiped them before hugging Jaejoong to him in an almost awkward position, whispering comforting words near his ear, while his brain whirred almost in disbelief.
When Jaejoong had stopped trembling with tears, he held Jaejoong slightly away with hands on both his shoulders to look him in the eyes, “We’re both such idiots.” Jaejoong settled back to sit down, and Yunho’s hands sought his, keeping them in a loose grip and running comforting circles over the back of them with his thumbs. “I was thinking the same thing,” he admitted quietly, his gaze fixed on their linked hands between the two of them. “I thought that perhaps it was better to keep some of the problems to myself because the three of you had a hell lot more to deal with than the two of us did.”
There was a slight lull as they both processed the information, then Yunho removed his hands in favour of cupping Jaejoong’s cheeks and held Jaejoong’s gaze. “But for the record, you’re already perfect for me. We more than match up to each other and there’s no other way I’d like us to be. And I didn’t not fall apart, so we’re even. I’m sorry I took so long to get here though - I’m an idiot, but I’m glad you love me.”
The little speech done, he pressed his lips to Jaejoong’s and felt like his life was all back in order, even though Jae felt smaller and a lot more frail in his arms, there was time and this time they’d do it right.
Then Jae murmured against his lips, “You didn’t not fall apart?”
Yunho’s lips quirked and he knew Jaejoong could feel it, but the moment was still perfect and honestly Yunho didn’t care about much else.
“Ask Changmin.”
---
“Nobody listens to me, why does nobody listen to me? If they all listened to me, there’d be world peace and love and no Junsu.”
“Yah! I’ve had enou-“
Changmin shot Junsu a glare, and continued, “And since we’ve established that I’m the smartest here and am always right, hyung, cook something! I’m hungry.”
Jaejoong moved to comply but when Yunho’s limbs around him didn’t budge, he made a small noise and looked up at his captor questioningly. Yunho simply looked down and smiled, “I’m hungry too, what about you?”
All of them held their breaths unconsciously as they waited for Jaejoong’s answer. And Jaejoong chewed his lip as he thought back on the past month, the many times Yunho and Changmin had made it back just to hold him and care for him and make sure he ate, even if a little. Sure, the maknae had mostly cajoled him into cooking and ate up what he couldn’t finish (don’t waste it, hyung!), but he noted the relief that was on the maknae’s face as the leftover food had decreased in proportion very slowly, but steadily. He and Junsu and Yoochun had hugged and cried and cried for what seemed like hours (and maybe it had been, he wasn’t sure) and they had wrenched much of the things he was overseeing out of his hands and promised him that it would be all perfect for him, because they wanted for him what he had wanted for them. And the resulting warmth in his chest, radiating and humming, made him want to try and try and try again.
“Yeah, a little.”
The resulting smiles on all five faces were all that he needed to know that he did the right thing. Yoochun cried a little, and Junsu comforted him, and Jaejoong wasn’t sure if the latter had ended up crying with him. But Jaejoong pretended that he didn’t see Changmin’s eyes tearing up before the maknae had turned over on the couch so that his back was facing them, but he took this memory and kept it close to his heart, added it to the warmth that was centered in his chest.
The arms around him tightened and he could feel the kisses littered on the crown of his head, feel the love and gratefulness singe through his scalp as Yunho whispered “Okay, okay” into his hair before pulling the both of them up and moving them to the kitchen, arms still around Jaejoong.
They both loved each other so, so much that they did it the wrong way - but only out of love. But Jaejoong knew, as he turned in Yunho’s arms and pulled the latter down for a kiss, that they had both learned. Distance hadn’t made them love less, but more - and even though they had once thought strength was within each of them, love had taught them otherwise - that strength was in each other, in completion and complementation of each other. And as their lips melded perfectly against each other, and their bodies fitted flawlessly, Jaejoong knew that he’d never forget again that he wasn’t alone, that he had Yunho-
“YAH! Yunho-hyung! Let Jaejoong-hyung cook! I know you’re making out in there!” Changmin shouted from the couch, followed by YooSu’s boisterous laughter.
-and also the three dongsaengs in the living room, he thought, unable to bite back his smile amidst the happiest sounds he’d ever heard in his life.
♥♥♥
A/N: Something short I wrote yesterday to get rid of my writer’s block! I’ve been hitting walls recently and I thought to write something familiar and I hope it’s good \O/ I have a sequel/interlude somewhere but it’s still jumbled and so it might or might not appear here =) Happy V Day! ♥