Best Friends (One-shot)
Title: Best Friends
Pairing: Donghae/Hyukjae
Genre: Romance, Slice-of-life
Rating: PG-15
Summary: They had always been best friends and always will be.
[A/N: My most romantic idea of a relationship is when two best friends fall in love. Honestly don’t get the ‘friend-zone’ thing, especially with a best friend that has always been there for you. So this is probably my thoughts on the issue liquefied into prose.]
To them it had always seemed inevitable. Even though they had all those things they thought stood between them - the doubts, the tip-toeing, the societal factors, the snide-glances… all the insecurities that all seemed trivial and products of immaturity now. But as they’d finally pushed hard enough and broke past the barriers, lips meeting in a fission of emotion, it was as if the universe had relaxed, leaning back on its leather backed chair and heaved a weary sigh of ‘finally’.
They’d grown up together. It was the story of the usual meeting at the playground - that easy childish mentality that anyone who could run up at plastic contraption and slide down again a billion times and enjoyed it was a friend. Maybe it wasn’t anything special at first, but their mothers had cooed over how adorable their little boys were with their heads bent over the sand… thing (it was possibly a castle, but it could also have been a mound) they were building looked and then had promptly discovered that they had more things in common other than just having little boys. It progressed from playground meetings to birthday parties to weekly visits to each other homes, the mothers chatting tea and homemade snacks while they shooed off and encouraged the boys to play with each other even more than they already were.
Of course it helped that the boys didn’t loath each other at first sight. As a matter of fact, Hyukjae had found Donghae’s boundless energy, easy smile and unerring fascination for aliens fascinating; while Donghae had taken one look at the scrawny boy with the crinkle in his eyes and the gummy smile and took his place as sworn protector of Lee Hyukjae from that day forth. The weekly visits turned into daily ones on their own accord, and continued, even long after the mothers stopped having authority to force them to play together.
They also kept together through the years, not drifting apart with slowly differing interests as childhood friends tend to do. It wasn’t as if they were clones of each other though. Hyukjae’s love was dancing, and though Donghae had a soft spot for that, he preferred open air fields and the adrenaline of running in competition. And it wasn’t they didn’t have other friends other. Hyukjae was one half part of the Junsu-Hyukjae clown duo - notorious in their year, and even in the school. Donghae was good friends with his track-and-field captain, Siwon, and the two of them together had sent many girls in the school swooning. Donghae found out quickly that fangirls, with their imaginations piqued, could come up with quite… creative… ideas when it came to the imaginary situation of them coupling together.
If they’d known that the closeness that Hyukjae and Donghae shared with their school friends was nothing compared with the one the two of them had… If they’d known about the late nights, the bouts of insanity, the sleepovers… If they’d known about the comfortable way Donghae’s head would drop onto Hyukjae’s lap after just 5 minutes of homework and the wry smile Hyukjae would give in return, running his fingers through his best friend’s hair… If they’d known…
But they didn’t, and maybe it was part of the reason why Hyukjae and Donghae took so long to realize. There had been no one there to spark of the wonderings of ‘maybe…?’.
And it wasn’t as if there hadn’t been other people. Hyukjae had a few flings here and there, so did Donghae - although Donghae’s attempts tended to be more serious. There was even a girl that Donghae thought had been the one - she was smart, pretty, witty and best of all, she got along not only with Donghae but also with Hyukjae. The day that Hyukjae received a call from a dazed sounding Donghae that they’d broken it off, Hyukjae had rushed to Donghae’s home with words of comfort on his lips and arms open wide only to have Donghae take one look at him and burst into laughter.
Hyukjae had looked scandalized, even after Donghae had wrapped apologetic arms around the other’s waist, through the sincerity of the action might have been compromised by the slight tremors still coursing through Donghae’s body. But when he finally calmed down enough to answer Hyukjae’s question of ‘why’, he said that it was because Hyukjae had looked so worried when there had been nothing to worry about. Donghae hadn’t felt a single thing when he broke up with Sooyoung. No hurt, no pain, no tears of unending sadness - no nothing. And not in emptiness sort of nothing - it was just that he wasn’t at all hung up about the break up was all.
It’s only a few years later that Donghae finally answers Hyukjae’s other question. “It finally made sense, you know. Why I didn’t feel a thing even after I broke up with what must have been the woman of my dreams. The same with when I was dating all those other people - I felt there was something missing.”
“Missing?” Hyukjae asks, although he really needn’t. He knows where it’s headed, and he wonders a little if he’s ready to hear it out loud.
“Yes… It was always something. They were too skinny, or too tall, or too short. Their eyebrows were too angled or too bushy, their faces too round, not angled enough. When they laugh, it’s too cultured or soft, not unrestrained and adorable, and the action is not accompanied by a careful hand that I want to swipe away so that I can see that bright gummy smile that always makes my day-”
“Hae…”
“-And they didn’t hold my hand on the first day of pre-school, reassuring me that everything was going to be alright even though the person himself was terrified to death himself. Nor did they get into every imaginable scrap with me by going along with my admittedly ridiculous ideas and staying by me even if it got him punished. And they certainly weren’t the ones who accidentally stumbled on a porn website and nearly blinded ourselves when we got a bit too curious for our own good one day…”
Hyukjae’s cheeks are red, and he swallows, wanting to interrupt again, but misses his chance as Donghae finishes.
“And they weren’t the ones who stayed by me… when… when my dad died. When I fell so hard into grief that I sought to drive everyone away and he was the only one who dared to stay. The only one who didn’t give up when I threw tantrums like a child, when I stubbornly refused to eat, when I wouldn’t get out of bed, too jaded with the world to dare to face it. They weren’t the ones who finally coaxed me out, who took my hand and squeezed it when the first thing I did after stepping out of the house for months was complain that it was far too bright… the one who gave me a reason to smile and to live again…”
The look on Donghae’s face almost breaks Hyukjae’s heart. It’s so tender, and so soft… and Hyukjae can’t help but think that he doesn’t deserve such a look - that it can’t be for him. “You… they weren’t you, Hyukjae.”
He loathes to say the next words. He wants to fall into delusion, and to just smile and let the non-existent ‘happily-ever-after’ take over. But the relationship he has with Donghae is too important to be frivolous with, and so he has to remind them both. “But Hae… you’re my best friend.”
And Donghae smiles that smile of his. The one that makes Hyukjae simultaneously want to kiss him… and punch him in the face. “I know. All the better, isn’t it?”
Hyukjae realizes later, what Donghae means, after the rough kisses and frantic grindings that turned into soulful explorations and soft brushes of bitten pink skin. Donghae can be a childish prat at times. He tended not to everything people said, preferring to charge ahead with his own vague impressions. He was inherently lazy, tended to forget to switch of the lights, and was more than a bit of a slob. He drooled a little in his sleep, snored whenever the temperature reached below 24 degrees, and had a peculiar habit of cutting his toenails before bed.
It’s not like Hyukjae himself is perfect. He will admit to being a little OCD, and Donghae has complained time and time again about his cold jokes, his lack of self esteem and the smell of his feet, which stink of fermented beans even though it has lessened over the years through constant care.
And yet, strangely, none of Donghae’s flaws bother Hyukjae. Or at least, they don’t after the bouts of irritation Hyukjae has that makes him want to throttle Donghae. It’s like what they said - that if you could stay with a friend 24/7 for a few days straight and still be friends after, then that friend was worth keeping - what more a lover. And from the way Donghae kisses him good morning in spite of the morning breath, seems to indicate that his sentiments are the same.
They’ll always be best friends. The fingers that are splayed across hips, mapping the acres of skin, are just a new exploration of something that they always had.
Pairing: Donghae/Hyukjae
Genre: Romance, Slice-of-life
Rating: PG-15
Summary: They had always been best friends and always will be.
[A/N: My most romantic idea of a relationship is when two best friends fall in love. Honestly don’t get the ‘friend-zone’ thing, especially with a best friend that has always been there for you. So this is probably my thoughts on the issue liquefied into prose.]
To them it had always seemed inevitable. Even though they had all those things they thought stood between them - the doubts, the tip-toeing, the societal factors, the snide-glances… all the insecurities that all seemed trivial and products of immaturity now. But as they’d finally pushed hard enough and broke past the barriers, lips meeting in a fission of emotion, it was as if the universe had relaxed, leaning back on its leather backed chair and heaved a weary sigh of ‘finally’.
They’d grown up together. It was the story of the usual meeting at the playground - that easy childish mentality that anyone who could run up at plastic contraption and slide down again a billion times and enjoyed it was a friend. Maybe it wasn’t anything special at first, but their mothers had cooed over how adorable their little boys were with their heads bent over the sand… thing (it was possibly a castle, but it could also have been a mound) they were building looked and then had promptly discovered that they had more things in common other than just having little boys. It progressed from playground meetings to birthday parties to weekly visits to each other homes, the mothers chatting tea and homemade snacks while they shooed off and encouraged the boys to play with each other even more than they already were.
Of course it helped that the boys didn’t loath each other at first sight. As a matter of fact, Hyukjae had found Donghae’s boundless energy, easy smile and unerring fascination for aliens fascinating; while Donghae had taken one look at the scrawny boy with the crinkle in his eyes and the gummy smile and took his place as sworn protector of Lee Hyukjae from that day forth. The weekly visits turned into daily ones on their own accord, and continued, even long after the mothers stopped having authority to force them to play together.
They also kept together through the years, not drifting apart with slowly differing interests as childhood friends tend to do. It wasn’t as if they were clones of each other though. Hyukjae’s love was dancing, and though Donghae had a soft spot for that, he preferred open air fields and the adrenaline of running in competition. And it wasn’t they didn’t have other friends other. Hyukjae was one half part of the Junsu-Hyukjae clown duo - notorious in their year, and even in the school. Donghae was good friends with his track-and-field captain, Siwon, and the two of them together had sent many girls in the school swooning. Donghae found out quickly that fangirls, with their imaginations piqued, could come up with quite… creative… ideas when it came to the imaginary situation of them coupling together.
If they’d known that the closeness that Hyukjae and Donghae shared with their school friends was nothing compared with the one the two of them had… If they’d known about the late nights, the bouts of insanity, the sleepovers… If they’d known about the comfortable way Donghae’s head would drop onto Hyukjae’s lap after just 5 minutes of homework and the wry smile Hyukjae would give in return, running his fingers through his best friend’s hair… If they’d known…
But they didn’t, and maybe it was part of the reason why Hyukjae and Donghae took so long to realize. There had been no one there to spark of the wonderings of ‘maybe…?’.
And it wasn’t as if there hadn’t been other people. Hyukjae had a few flings here and there, so did Donghae - although Donghae’s attempts tended to be more serious. There was even a girl that Donghae thought had been the one - she was smart, pretty, witty and best of all, she got along not only with Donghae but also with Hyukjae. The day that Hyukjae received a call from a dazed sounding Donghae that they’d broken it off, Hyukjae had rushed to Donghae’s home with words of comfort on his lips and arms open wide only to have Donghae take one look at him and burst into laughter.
Hyukjae had looked scandalized, even after Donghae had wrapped apologetic arms around the other’s waist, through the sincerity of the action might have been compromised by the slight tremors still coursing through Donghae’s body. But when he finally calmed down enough to answer Hyukjae’s question of ‘why’, he said that it was because Hyukjae had looked so worried when there had been nothing to worry about. Donghae hadn’t felt a single thing when he broke up with Sooyoung. No hurt, no pain, no tears of unending sadness - no nothing. And not in emptiness sort of nothing - it was just that he wasn’t at all hung up about the break up was all.
It’s only a few years later that Donghae finally answers Hyukjae’s other question. “It finally made sense, you know. Why I didn’t feel a thing even after I broke up with what must have been the woman of my dreams. The same with when I was dating all those other people - I felt there was something missing.”
“Missing?” Hyukjae asks, although he really needn’t. He knows where it’s headed, and he wonders a little if he’s ready to hear it out loud.
“Yes… It was always something. They were too skinny, or too tall, or too short. Their eyebrows were too angled or too bushy, their faces too round, not angled enough. When they laugh, it’s too cultured or soft, not unrestrained and adorable, and the action is not accompanied by a careful hand that I want to swipe away so that I can see that bright gummy smile that always makes my day-”
“Hae…”
“-And they didn’t hold my hand on the first day of pre-school, reassuring me that everything was going to be alright even though the person himself was terrified to death himself. Nor did they get into every imaginable scrap with me by going along with my admittedly ridiculous ideas and staying by me even if it got him punished. And they certainly weren’t the ones who accidentally stumbled on a porn website and nearly blinded ourselves when we got a bit too curious for our own good one day…”
Hyukjae’s cheeks are red, and he swallows, wanting to interrupt again, but misses his chance as Donghae finishes.
“And they weren’t the ones who stayed by me… when… when my dad died. When I fell so hard into grief that I sought to drive everyone away and he was the only one who dared to stay. The only one who didn’t give up when I threw tantrums like a child, when I stubbornly refused to eat, when I wouldn’t get out of bed, too jaded with the world to dare to face it. They weren’t the ones who finally coaxed me out, who took my hand and squeezed it when the first thing I did after stepping out of the house for months was complain that it was far too bright… the one who gave me a reason to smile and to live again…”
The look on Donghae’s face almost breaks Hyukjae’s heart. It’s so tender, and so soft… and Hyukjae can’t help but think that he doesn’t deserve such a look - that it can’t be for him. “You… they weren’t you, Hyukjae.”
He loathes to say the next words. He wants to fall into delusion, and to just smile and let the non-existent ‘happily-ever-after’ take over. But the relationship he has with Donghae is too important to be frivolous with, and so he has to remind them both. “But Hae… you’re my best friend.”
And Donghae smiles that smile of his. The one that makes Hyukjae simultaneously want to kiss him… and punch him in the face. “I know. All the better, isn’t it?”
Hyukjae realizes later, what Donghae means, after the rough kisses and frantic grindings that turned into soulful explorations and soft brushes of bitten pink skin. Donghae can be a childish prat at times. He tended not to everything people said, preferring to charge ahead with his own vague impressions. He was inherently lazy, tended to forget to switch of the lights, and was more than a bit of a slob. He drooled a little in his sleep, snored whenever the temperature reached below 24 degrees, and had a peculiar habit of cutting his toenails before bed.
It’s not like Hyukjae himself is perfect. He will admit to being a little OCD, and Donghae has complained time and time again about his cold jokes, his lack of self esteem and the smell of his feet, which stink of fermented beans even though it has lessened over the years through constant care.
And yet, strangely, none of Donghae’s flaws bother Hyukjae. Or at least, they don’t after the bouts of irritation Hyukjae has that makes him want to throttle Donghae. It’s like what they said - that if you could stay with a friend 24/7 for a few days straight and still be friends after, then that friend was worth keeping - what more a lover. And from the way Donghae kisses him good morning in spite of the morning breath, seems to indicate that his sentiments are the same.
They’ll always be best friends. The fingers that are splayed across hips, mapping the acres of skin, are just a new exploration of something that they always had.