le collectionneur ; kaisoo
Title: Le collectionneur
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jongin/Kyungsoo [jongin!centric]
Wordcount: 11,600
Warning: Mentions of depression, anxiety attacks.
Disclaimer: EXO belongs to themselves and SME
Notes: Le collectionneur is French for the collector.
Summary: Jongin collects pieces of Kyungsoo, but fails to notice how he hands Kyungsoo pieces of himself in exchange.
It all started when Jongin was small, so small that his mother's waist felt like a roof above his head when he got scared, and his feet didn't reach the end of his bed. There were few things tiny Jongin could say he understood perfectly well, and even like that, he wasn't always sure what it really meant. He knew, though, that some things were more precious than others, and that not everyone would agree. He liked stumbling on those things, like having his mom handing him a few chocolates, realizing he knew the routine before everyone else in his dance class, or even having a terrible nightmare and waking up to a quiet house and his teddy bear's comforting smell. But no matter how much Jongin loved those things, he never realized he could keep them, at least not until he met Joohyun.
She was just as small as he was, and she had the prettiest hair, but she was just a kid in his class, doomed to be erased from Jongin's memory quicker than his last nightmare, instead living in Seulgi's -her best friend. But Joohyun liked daisies, and it changed everything.
Jongin still remembers walking up to her, he remembers her tiny hand wrapped around the daisies' stems she was picking up in the schoolyard, the petals pressed against her top as she eyed the other flowers at her feet, and the glares she was throwing at everyone who was walking too close to her. Tiny Jongin found it quite interesting, and he watched her with scrutinising eyes as she carefully picked another flower.
“You already have like ten of them,” he then asked, startling Joohyun. “Why do you want more?”
Joohyun glanced at him with disdain, a look that tiny Jongin had already seen a couple of times in other girls' eyes. To be quite honest, girls kind of scared him back then. They seemed so powerful, like they knew things boys didn't, and they had a way to whisper into their friends' ears that made him think of his parents. Not to mention that a lot of them were taller than them.
“Because,” Joohyun said. “I like daisies.”
Jongin kept silent, and Joohyun sighed as if he was missing the point. She held her bouquet out for him to see.
“They're all different. See? And because I love daisies so much, I want them all.”
Jongin didn't pay attention to Joohyun's patronizing voice, because it suddenly made so much sense. He stared at her with wide eyes that made her worry he might be sick, and she took him by the hand. She dragged him across the schoolyard, towards their schoolteacher, her fingers still wrapped around her precious bouquet, but they didn't reach the teacher. Jongin stopped and laughed, because it actually made so much sense he couldn't understand how he didn't think about it before, and Joohyun watched him with surprise before laughing too.
Joohyun was a nobody and Jongin was small, so small that his mother's waist felt like a roof above his head when he was scared, but if he had had the words back then, he would have said that it had felt like being born again. Joohyun would have laughed harder, maybe even shaken her head, this way waking up the delicate flower smell of her hair, and it would have been the very first thing Jongin would have collected.
(But he didn't have the words, and neither did Joohyun because she was small, and her feet didn't reach the end of her bed, so Jongin went home, and what started his collection turned out to be his father's figure deformed by his suitcases walking away.)
The lights are flickering above his head, and Jongin pictures red, green, blue and orange painting his skin. There are explosions of gold sparkling in the edge of his vision, and the smell of the Christmas tree is filling his nose and liquefying on the tip of his tongue. He imagines happy families dancing a strange ballet all around the Christmas tree, hanging decorations and laughing, poor couples cuddling in front of their fake Christmas trees, excited children playing with the decorations, and the rush of feelings is so violent Jongin has to close his eyes. He takes his time to swallow it down, tastes the little imperfections on their edges and feeds on the details, like kisses or soft and tender smiles, and for a second, it feels like it's his own heart that is now swelling with love. Jongin doesn't reach to grab it though, and just like that, he falls back into reality, crashes against the cold floor of his apartment, and is suddenly caught with the feeling that his Christmas tree is trying to steal all the oxygen from him.
Jongin straightens, presses his knees against his chest and wraps his arms around them. He buries his face in the darkness and plays the only game he knows how to play, the game in which he pretends his body is a fortress, a shelter that keeps the anxiety at bay. Weirdly enough, he thinks about Joohyun, even though it's been years since the last time he saw her, but he finds solace in the memories of her pretty skin, as white as the daisies' petals. The thought's comforting, but probably not as it would be if Jongin didn't have any thoughts at all, so he tries to shut them all down.
Just when he's about to give in, to let his body crumble under the pression of the siege he's enduring, Jongin hears a boy humming. It's low and distant, but the walls are thin, so Jongin even hears the short intakes of breath between the notes. The boy is crooning low RnB melodies, and soon enough, ad libs are raining on Jongin. The voice is thick, deep and smooth, and even though Jongin has heard it a dozen of times already, he finds himself spellbound by the strong accuracy of every note. His body slowly turns into the biggest theater, and Jongin's the audience. He listens quietly, and all thoughts of fortress leave his mind, hand to hand with Joohyun.
The first time Jongin meets Do Kyungsoo, he's coming back home from work. There's a pleading “Wait, please! Wait!” that rings through the hallway, and that has Jongin stoping the elevator's doors before they close. He watches as a smaller boy rushes between them, dragging an even smaller Christmas tree behind him, and forgets to look away when incredibly wide eyes look up at him with embarrassment.
“I'm sorry,” the man apologizes. “I'm having a really shitty day and I didn't want to wait.”
The boy's voice isn't as deep when he only talks, but Jongin still recognizes it at the very first syllable leaving his mouth. He watches him clutching his Christmas tree as discreetly as he can, and slowly takes in pale skin, chapped lips and long eyelashes. If Jongin had given a thought or two about the man who's been singing to him through his anxiety attacks for the past couple of weeks, he wouldn't have come with a figure that seems so fragile, nor would he have pictured fingers that look barely past puberty. There's innocence and softness radiating from the boy's round cheeks and wide eyes, but Jongin knows better than that. There are stones in the boy's voice that build walls and castles, and Jongin perceives strength running in the pale blue veins drawing intricate lines on the boy's hands.
The boy glances at him, and contrary to what his apparence might suggest, he doesn't blush when he notices Jongin's eyes glued to him. Instead, the boy's brows slip from under dark bangs and weigh on his eyes, thick and questionning.
“Don't worry about it,” Jongin quickly answers. He holds out his hand. “I'm Kim Jongin.”
The boy takes his hand. “Do Kyungsoo. I moved into the building a couple of weeks ago.”
Jongin nods, because he knows. He remembers the movers' coming and going, and the hustle and bustle. That night was the first time he heard Do Kyungsoo sing, melodies strong between carboard boxes' sliding across the floor. Jongin also remembers dreaming of the excitation of a new life and promising days blooming on the tip of the tongue when he went to bed.
The elevator suddenly comes to a stop, and Jongin has barely enough time to look at the red numbers right above the doors to know it's not supposed to before the lights come out.
“You have to be kidding me,” Do Kyungsoo deadpans.
The emergency lights come on, sickly orange raining on them and waking up new tormented shadows on their faces. Kyungsoo glances at the ceiling, darkness emphasizing the black of his eyes.
“Christmas is gonna be fucking delirious this year, I can feel it.”
Jongin tastes irony on his tongue, but doesn't fail to notice Kyungsoo's hands still tightly wrapped around the Christmas tree.
“It happens quite a lot,” he explains, reaching out to press the emergency button. “They'll probably be here in about a hour.” Kyunsoo's brows furrow. “I'm sorry,” Jongin adds. “The building's old.”
Kyungsoo watches him quietly then lets his eyes wander around the elevator, probably looking for a solution that doesn't exist before he finally sighs.
“Okay,” he says. “Okay.” His eyes meet Jongin's, and he flashes him a faint smile. “Then I guess all we can do is wait.”
Jongin breaks the silence out of curiosity -he usually basks in it- because being stuck with the boy with the velvet voice changes everything. He sees a flock of raw emotions flicker in the dark mazes of his neighbor's eyes as they wait cross-legged on the elevator's floor, but he can't quite grasp them, and it bothers him to no end. So when Kyungsoo adjusts his Christmas tree against the wall for the fourth time before glaring at it, Jongin leaves his mutism behind.
“Don't you like Christmas?” he asks.
Kyungsoo looks at him with surprise, his hand still midway to the Christmas tree and when he realizes it, he lets it fall on his knee. Jongin reads bitterness when Kyungsoo's thick eyebrows furrow, and he picks it up, burns its imprint in his mind, and adds it to the long list of things he could be feeling, but that he finds more enjoyable as private movies that play in his thoughts.
“I do,” Kyungsoo answers. “But this will be my first Christmas away from my family and friends so I'm not really looking forward to it.”
Jongin doesn't ask him why he bought the tree if he's not going to celebrate Christmas, because after years of watching people care, he's learned that symbolism has a biggest part in their hearts than materialism, and he's no one to judge. He associates the curve of Kyungsoo's eyebrows to a cold feeling of loneliness drenched in the harsh knowledge that it's inevitable, and his imagination flies off the handle. He's trying to picture himself leaving family and friends behind -even if that requires painting faces on memories he's only pretending to have- when Kyungsoo speaks again.
“What about you? Do you like Christmas?”
Jongin shrugs. “I usually spend it alone.”
Kyungsoo watches him intently for a while, round orbs searching Jongin's eyes to the extent that Jongin feels a hint of unease warming his cheeks. It's so different from his usual dullness, and it catches him off guard, but he's quick to fall back into shades of grey as he swallows down the words that rushed into his mouth. Words that would say a little bit too much about how he still bought a Christmas tree because he's learned that symbolism was important, and he kind of wants to feel it too even though, after years spent picking up people's emotions to use them as his way-out, he forgot how to feel for himself. Kyungsoo's voice is made of stones, and sure, stones can build fortresses and bridges, but in the depths of Kyungsoo's eyes, Jongin is remembered that stones can also rain on you in a deadly avalanche. He runs away from it, but still watches it cover everything, leaving nothing in its trail.
“So, uhm... Where is your family?”
Kyungsoo glances at him with a little smile, and instead of the surprise Jongin was expecting at his burst of curiosity, there's only a slight shrug.
“In Busan. I moved into Seoul only a couple of weeks ago, for work.”
Jongin nods. “I see.”
He's not much of a talker, and more than ever, he realizes how precarious he is when it comes to words and small talks, but oddly enough, silence doesn't feel right this time. Kyungsoo's eyebrows move when he talks, he plays with his fingers a lot, and his round eyes actually go from oval to almond-shapped every two seconds, and Jongin finds out he wants more.
“Are you a singer?” he enquires, and Kyungsoo's eyebrows shoot up with surprise. “I hear you sing sometimes,” Jongin quickly explains. “The walls are thin. The building's-”
“Old,” Kyungsoo interrupts him with a smile. “Yeah, I heard so.”
Kyungsoo's smile looks like an invitation, but Jongin's too busy dissecting every frame of it to realize it. Kyungsoo doesn't seem to let himself get discouraged though, as he shakes his head, the corners of his lips turning upwards. Jongin could swear he saw them falling, but he blinked and when he opened his eyes again, there was a smile, white teeth, and no frown.
“I'm not.” Kyungsoo makes a vague gesture with his hand. “A singer, I mean. I like singing, is all. I'm sorry if I bothered you though. You should have said something.”
“No, no, don't worry. I like your voice.”
Kyungsoo smiles again, and just like that, they both fall into short questions and even shorter answers. The talk's mundane, but full of details, and Jongin feeds on every single one of them. Kyungsoo doesn't check his watch a single time, and he lets the tree slides against the wall and falls in the corner without sparing it a glance. He looks more comfortable with his legs spread on the floor than sitting cross-legged, so Jongin makes sure to leave him enough space. He learns that Kyungsoo is a lawyer, that he watches a lot of anime, and that he likes to cook even though he doesn't know a lot of recipes. Kyungsoo learns that Jongin finds it easier to talk to him when he doesn't really look him in the eyes, that he works in a theater, but hidden from view since he mostly takes care of sets and scenery, and that he loves reading. Soon enough, small talks cease to be about their favorite colors or what they would be doing if they weren't stuck in the elevator to Jongin, but about funny thoughts blooming on Kyungsoo's face with wrinkles and sparkles, Kyungsoo chewing his lower lip when he thinks, and small chuckles that never really leave his mouth.
They both start when the elevator moves again, and the repairman's face when they reach the first floor falls on Jongin like a large block of ice. Before he can do anything, Kyungsoo is back at clutching his Christmas tree closer, and there's a hint of embarrassment nesting in his eyes as he profusely thanks the repairman. The ride in the elevator after is silent, and Jongin doesn't break it because he knows that the doors will open this time. He feels like trying to grasp more of Kyungsoo would be an insult to him, because despite his fragile figure, Kyungsoo is made of stones and walls, and Jongin can't pretend to have him figured out after only a few random words thrown at him.
“Well... I guess this is it.” Kyungsoo finally says when they reach Jongin's door. Kyungsoo's eyes travel to his own door, only a couple of steps away, before they come back to meet Jongin's again. He flashes him a faint smile, a tiny piece of what they shared in the elevator and Jongin gladly takes it. “Thank you for, you know... not freaking out in the elevator, because I'm pretty sure I would have too.”
Jongin shrugs, and gestures his head toward the Christmas tree. “Have fun decorating it,” he says.
Kyungsoo watches him with a mix of surprise and amusement in his eyes, and before Jongin can add anything, or even try to remember to grab his keys, Kyungsoo nods, embarrassment gone from his eyes.
“I will,” he smiles--actually almost chuckles. “I will.”
When Jongin goes to bed later, his body crashes against cold sheets, and he realizes that there's no anxiety attack warming up his bed for him. There's a faint smell of peacefullness coming from the wall on his left, that wall that separates his world from Kyungsoo's, but he's too used to living in other people's colors to get saddened by the fact that he's not nesting in his own easiness. His last thought is about Joohyun and the kiss she gave him on the cheek a couple of months after the daisy incident, but he's soon too gone to realize that he might have found himself the most beautiful daisy for his collection.
Jongin meets Kyungsoo for the second time on a rainy day. He is drenched by the humidity he can feel lurking from behind the windows, and his extremities are so cold that it almost hurts to grab the doorknob. As soon as he opens the door, Jongin meets dark orbs and pale skin, and his body crashes against Kyungsoo's presence as if Kyungsoo was a cliff, and Jongin nothing more than a draft. Kyungsoo smells of sugar and chocolate, and the cake he's holding smells a little like him.
“This is for you,” Kyungsoo says as a hello as he holds out the cake. It's covered with whipped cream and white chocolate curls, but Jongin pays more attention to the dark chocolate ornaments contrasting sharply with all that white. “For, you know, celebrating the fact that we didn't die in an elevator.”
“Nobody ever died in it.” Jongin remarks.
Kyungsoo's lips twitch with amusement. “You can't be sure. That building's really old, after all.”
Jongin smiles and steps aside, gesturing Kyungsoo to come in, and it feels so natural that he doesn't even think about the weeks, months, years even, separating him from the last time he let someone in. Kyungsoo puts the cake on the table, dispeling every trace of void and numbness Jongin's been wandering in with his every motion. Warmth comes with the smell of chocolate, and the humidity has no other choice than to look away and find itself another prey. Jongin runs away from the burst of feelings and emotions, but not fast enough for he still catches a glimpse of need and want to never let this go. Even like that, it's easy to pretend he's just doing what he does best, sucking the life out of others and using what he grasped as movies for when the night's too dark and the day's too lonely, and despite Kyungsoo's strong presence crushing him so violently he loses pieces of himself with every second passing by, Jongin wordlessly places two dessert plates on the table.
They eat two pieces in silence, and up to this point, Jongin still understands everything, he is still in control, but then he blinks maybe too many times, and he finds himself four hours later standing on his balcony, the warmth of a meal Kyungsoo cooked in his stomach fighting the cold of Seoul's winter night. There is alcohol running in his veins, just enough for him to know he can stare at Kyungsoo for a lengthy amount of time, because the same fire is burning in Kyungsoo's veins, and Jongin will go unnoticed.
He listens to the low voice more than he pays attention to the words it draws in the night. Kyungsoo's voice is made of thick melted chocolate with a drop of cream right where there should be sharp intonations, and the alcohol inside of Jongin makes him wonder what it would taste like on his own tongue. There are blank spaces between some of Kyungsoo's sentences, but they fill Jongin's mind more easily, like the short silence after they found out Kyungsoo was actually one year older than him, and that should have been replaced by mentions of respect and Kyungsoo asking Jongin to call him hyung. A few minutes later, Kyungsoo calls him Jongin before telling him about his best friend back in Busan, and Jongin answers him with a discreet 'Kyungsoo' as he mentions Sehun and Tao, his own -and only- friends. The back of his mind is hit with memories of couples living as outlaws when it comes to respect and rules, and he hears himself saying Kyungsoo's name more often after that.
There's alcohol in the beer bottle he's holding, alcohol running in his veins and alcohol burning Kyungsoo's tongue, but Jongin feels like breathing for the first time in ages.
“You don't talk much, do you?” Kyungsoo asks, a sparkle of amusement lightening up his eyes. Jongin simply shakes his head. “It's okay,” Kyungsoo adds before looking back at the city before them. “I'm usually not much of a talker too.”
Once again, silence holds more meaning. Jongin watches Kyungsoo's breath condensing when it hits cold air as the few seconds of silence whisper directly in his ear that what's happening right now is as special for Kyungsoo as it is for him.
“Must not be easy to make friends, though,” Kyungsoo says. He glances back at Jongin, alcohol heavy in his eyes, and Jongin suddenly craves liquor-filled chocolates.
“I have two friends,” he explains, or maybe defends himself, like he usually does. “But they're both in China. They work in a dance company. They're really good.”
Kyungsoo hums in agreement, but it's not enough.
“There was this girl when I was younger,” Jongin quickly adds. “We were really close even though it took me a long time to befriend her. I used to tell her everything.”
Once again, Kyungsoo remains quiet, but his silence still says more than words, and Jongin feels it slipping through the cracks of his skin to finally unite with the fire in his veins, and before he can protest or take control over his own actions, there are words popping out of his mouth. All he can do is brace himself for the rush of memories.
"She was kind of scary because she was an expert at biting sacarsm, but then again I guess I was intimated by most girls back then. You know what it's like."
"Not really," Kyungsoo says. "I wasn't afraid of any girl."
Jongin stares for a while, and maybe it's the fact that he's talking about Joohyun, or maybe it's the look of sincere surprise on Kyungsoo's face, but alcohol turns into bubbles in his stomach, and he lets out a chuckle.
"I should have known," he smiles.
Kyungsoo throws him a questioning look but he doesn't push it further. Jongin is quick to fall back into thoughts of Joohyun.
"She was so fierce and so strong, she made the best friend a kid like me could have hoped for. She gave me my first kiss when I was nine because she claimed she wanted the best for me, but I was her first too."
Or maybe was it Seulgi? Jongin can't remember, but he's not surprised. He was the best when it came to reducing Joohyun to what only revolved around him when she was in fact so much more than that, and it's probably why she finally chose to turn his back on him. Kyungsoo's eyes still shine like the space between the stars, still glued to him, but Jongin finds no solace in them this time, and alcohol is suddenly not enough to warm him up anymore. He straightens and rests his elbows on the railing.
"She had this thing with collections. She used to collect everything, like books, buttons and even restaurants' menus, but daisies were her favorite things. She was the one who made me realise that we could make the things we like last, and what I liked the most were my mother's smiles, or hearing people laugh on the streets. So I began to observe more, and at night I replayed feelings I watched during the day. I guess I found it easier than to live them myself, because there was also a lot of pain."
Jongin doesn't mention his mother's tears, nor does he talk about what cracked then broke in his chest when he tried to call his father and had only sharp ring tones answering to him. It is easier when you're not involved, but with the way Kyungsoo is looking at him, with his eyebrows weighing on his eyes, Jongin is not sure what to expect. There's control in every second of his life, but Kyungsoo comes with the unexpected, with laughters that are actually more like smiles, silences that are louder than words and zero childhood memory of fearing girls.
“I've always thought that collecting was like fossilizing. There's no beauty left in things when you turn them into stones.”
Jongin's eyebrows furrow, but he finds himself tongue-tied under Kyungsoo's stare. He usually has tons of arguments that he mostly uses against Zitao and Sehun's invading bursts of worry, but he knows they'll be ineffective with Kyungsoo. Alcohol is now turning into ice in his veins as it's being stomped on by panic, and there's a voice screaming crystal clear in his mind that it was all a bad idea. Kyungsoo isn't a fortress, he's a prison with walls so thick Jongin will never see daylight again. Kyungsoo is dangerous, like his mother's questions when he calls her, and Jongin should run and forget everything about deep voices and dark and shiny hair.
Kyungsoo blinks and looks away, his motion's slow and fast at the same time. Jongin is freezing, but Kyungsoo doesn't even shiver, and Jongin realizes that it's not Kyungsoo's breath that is condensing when it hits cold air, but the opposite. Cold air is condensing when it crashes against Kyungsoo's breath, and maybe, maybe, Kyungsoo is both the fortress and the dragon.
“So what happened to her?” Kyungsoo finally asks. “Are you guys still in touch?”
Jongin shakes his head. It takes him a few seconds to forget the feeling that the ground under his feet is crumbling under Kyungsoo's presence, and only then does the alcohol bring back burning memories of Joohyun.
“She got sick when we were thirteen, and I...” Jongin swallows and glances at Kyungsoo. “I wasn't there for her, so I guess it was only fair she stopped being there for me too.”
He remembers Joohyun's pretty hair falling on her face and her eyes glued to the ground as she walked through the school's hallways. Maybe she had been running away from something with all those collections, but whatever it was, it had finally caught her. Jongin watched her loosing herself in dark clouds and thunderstorms, and he did what he did best. He picked up her eyebags, the greyish tone of her skin and the weight she had lost, and he put it all in a drawer he then labeled depression. Seulgi's furious eyes on him and the twitch of her lips every time their paths crossed were anger so strong it makes your fists itch with the need to hit. Joohyun had been his everything for seven years, and the day she stopped coming to school, he made her into a memory. Nothing more, nothing less.
Kyungsoo keeps quiet for the longest time, and Jongin can only imagine the thoughts wandering behind his eyes. Kyungsoo's silence is heavy, but Jongin doesn't understand it this time, and after ten minutes of shivering in the cold of the night, he realises Kyungsoo won't put it into words. It takes his neighbor another ten minutes to finally move again, and Jongin watches him go inside his apartment, frozen on his spot. The rush of panic makes him dizzy, but Kyungsoo is quick to come back with another two beers in his hand, and Jongin is even quicker to open his.
Alcohol burns his tongue, it burns his veins and fights off the cold of Seoul's winter, but Kyungsoo's presence remains strong and crushing.
Both the fortress and the dragon, indeed.
Jongin's daily routine is finally shattered once and for all when he meets Kyungsoo for the third and fourth time on the following day. Third time happens in the morning when Jongin wakes up on his couch, and finds Kyungsoo rolled into a ball in his old armchair. He feels like forever happens two or three times as he tries to process what he's seeing, but before he can even think about trying to remember how Kyungsoo ended up sleeping in his apartment, the latter stirs in his sleep. He opens one eye, then the other, and he finally straightens with a slowness Jongin's heart obviously doesn't share. Jongin watches Kyungsoo rub his eyes before he takes a look around and processes where he's spent the night, and once again, Kyungsoo blows up into unexpected reactions, splashing colors on Jongin's white walls as he chuckles.
“I think we drank too many beers,” he says when his eyes finally meet Jongin's.
“Looks like we did,” Jongin mutters.
Kyungsoo stretches out, colors still vivid on his face even though it's still swollen from sleep, and Jongin has flashbacks of fantasy books and dangerous dragons. He has trouble remembering why he pictured a heart of fire inside of Kyungsoo's chest when Kyungsoo looks so delicate and fragile. He watches him smooth out the wrinkles on his long-sleeved shirt with the palm of his hand, his disheveled hair flashing more of his forehead than Jongin has ever seen, and Jongin reads only softness on his cheeks, warmth on his pink lips and innocence on his button nose. Kyungsoo stands up and walks to the kitchen, cuts one more piece of his cake and puts it on a plate. It's only then, when Kyungsoo hands out the plate to Jongin with a little smile that Jongin remembers how he told everything about Joohyun even though Kyungsoo never said a word.
"Eat," Kyungsoo commands him. "I have to get ready for work. Thank you for yesterday Jongin, I had fun."
Kyungsoo gives him another smile before he finally goes, slowly closing the door behind him and leaving Jongin to thoughts he knows he's not ready to face. He remains seated on the couch with the plate in his hand, still trying to register what happened, and finds himself stuck most of the day in the question mark that inevitably hits him when he wonders whether or not it's a good thing it did happen.
Fourth time happens only a couple of hours later. Jongin is reading a book, tasting words and letting them fill him, when someone knocks. Tao and Sehun are the only ones who sometimes visit him, but with both of them dancing their way to glorious days in China, it's not hard to guess who's on the other side. Even like that, Jongin finds himself breathless when Kyungsoo looks up, eyes already digging up holes in Jongin's face. He has his hair up and a dark blue tie is tied around his neck, but Jongin mostly notices white teeth chewing on thick lips and round orbs standing out against pale skin. He should be used to it by now, but it takes him a while to remember that Kyungsoo is the boy with the velvet voice, the boy whose melodies rains on him on too dry days, and who builds unbreakable walls around the ruins of Jongin's body.
“I left in a hurry this morning,” Kyungsoo starts. “But I wanted to give you my phone number.”
He holds out a paper with tiny numbers scribbled on it, the sleeve of his jacket going up on his arm and flashing a strip of pale skin. Jongin doesn't look up as he hesitates, and silence falls on them, but he sees Kyungsoo's veins stand out even more on his fingers and hand as he tightens his hold on the paper. He wonders what kind of conclusions Kyungsoo feared in those few seconds of silence, and writes lack of confidence with hundred of question marks in his head. He's not sure what makes him grab the paper, if it's the want to find an answer to those questions or simply the ink spread so nicely on the paper, but he still does it even though he knows that some things come with consequences, and that this is one of them. Kyungsoo looks up, and Jongin gives in.
“I'll text you mine right away,” he says.
Kyungsoo smiles. Jongin reads relief, glee, he reads heart drawn on lips and fortresses not minding the wind's heavy blows. He feels his time and space breaking and cracking, and he realises how insignificant the distance between his eyes and Kyungsoo's is. It would be dull, and unoriginal, just neighbors befriending over doormats for others, but Jongin feels the ground shake under his feet, he feels his shadow spinning out of control, and avalanches of stones burrying his determination to keep Kyungsoo as a drawer in his mind, a drawer he could have placed next to Joohyun's. It's still today and not even tomorrow yet, but Jongin knows for sure that today will become a yesterday and never turn into a today again, for Kyungsoo has definitely turned his world upside down and doomed all of his tomorrows to be made of unknown and unexpected. The idea of doing something not already written down in his daily planner, be it the one in his mind or the one on his desk, is too much for Jongin, but his eyes remain glued to Kyungsoo's, and the fortress opens up and swallows him whole. Fortress, prison, or even dragon, Jongin still has no answer.
part ii >>
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Jongin/Kyungsoo [jongin!centric]
Wordcount: 11,600
Warning: Mentions of depression, anxiety attacks.
Disclaimer: EXO belongs to themselves and SME
Notes: Le collectionneur is French for the collector.
Summary: Jongin collects pieces of Kyungsoo, but fails to notice how he hands Kyungsoo pieces of himself in exchange.
It all started when Jongin was small, so small that his mother's waist felt like a roof above his head when he got scared, and his feet didn't reach the end of his bed. There were few things tiny Jongin could say he understood perfectly well, and even like that, he wasn't always sure what it really meant. He knew, though, that some things were more precious than others, and that not everyone would agree. He liked stumbling on those things, like having his mom handing him a few chocolates, realizing he knew the routine before everyone else in his dance class, or even having a terrible nightmare and waking up to a quiet house and his teddy bear's comforting smell. But no matter how much Jongin loved those things, he never realized he could keep them, at least not until he met Joohyun.
She was just as small as he was, and she had the prettiest hair, but she was just a kid in his class, doomed to be erased from Jongin's memory quicker than his last nightmare, instead living in Seulgi's -her best friend. But Joohyun liked daisies, and it changed everything.
Jongin still remembers walking up to her, he remembers her tiny hand wrapped around the daisies' stems she was picking up in the schoolyard, the petals pressed against her top as she eyed the other flowers at her feet, and the glares she was throwing at everyone who was walking too close to her. Tiny Jongin found it quite interesting, and he watched her with scrutinising eyes as she carefully picked another flower.
“You already have like ten of them,” he then asked, startling Joohyun. “Why do you want more?”
Joohyun glanced at him with disdain, a look that tiny Jongin had already seen a couple of times in other girls' eyes. To be quite honest, girls kind of scared him back then. They seemed so powerful, like they knew things boys didn't, and they had a way to whisper into their friends' ears that made him think of his parents. Not to mention that a lot of them were taller than them.
“Because,” Joohyun said. “I like daisies.”
Jongin kept silent, and Joohyun sighed as if he was missing the point. She held her bouquet out for him to see.
“They're all different. See? And because I love daisies so much, I want them all.”
Jongin didn't pay attention to Joohyun's patronizing voice, because it suddenly made so much sense. He stared at her with wide eyes that made her worry he might be sick, and she took him by the hand. She dragged him across the schoolyard, towards their schoolteacher, her fingers still wrapped around her precious bouquet, but they didn't reach the teacher. Jongin stopped and laughed, because it actually made so much sense he couldn't understand how he didn't think about it before, and Joohyun watched him with surprise before laughing too.
Joohyun was a nobody and Jongin was small, so small that his mother's waist felt like a roof above his head when he was scared, but if he had had the words back then, he would have said that it had felt like being born again. Joohyun would have laughed harder, maybe even shaken her head, this way waking up the delicate flower smell of her hair, and it would have been the very first thing Jongin would have collected.
(But he didn't have the words, and neither did Joohyun because she was small, and her feet didn't reach the end of her bed, so Jongin went home, and what started his collection turned out to be his father's figure deformed by his suitcases walking away.)
The lights are flickering above his head, and Jongin pictures red, green, blue and orange painting his skin. There are explosions of gold sparkling in the edge of his vision, and the smell of the Christmas tree is filling his nose and liquefying on the tip of his tongue. He imagines happy families dancing a strange ballet all around the Christmas tree, hanging decorations and laughing, poor couples cuddling in front of their fake Christmas trees, excited children playing with the decorations, and the rush of feelings is so violent Jongin has to close his eyes. He takes his time to swallow it down, tastes the little imperfections on their edges and feeds on the details, like kisses or soft and tender smiles, and for a second, it feels like it's his own heart that is now swelling with love. Jongin doesn't reach to grab it though, and just like that, he falls back into reality, crashes against the cold floor of his apartment, and is suddenly caught with the feeling that his Christmas tree is trying to steal all the oxygen from him.
Jongin straightens, presses his knees against his chest and wraps his arms around them. He buries his face in the darkness and plays the only game he knows how to play, the game in which he pretends his body is a fortress, a shelter that keeps the anxiety at bay. Weirdly enough, he thinks about Joohyun, even though it's been years since the last time he saw her, but he finds solace in the memories of her pretty skin, as white as the daisies' petals. The thought's comforting, but probably not as it would be if Jongin didn't have any thoughts at all, so he tries to shut them all down.
Just when he's about to give in, to let his body crumble under the pression of the siege he's enduring, Jongin hears a boy humming. It's low and distant, but the walls are thin, so Jongin even hears the short intakes of breath between the notes. The boy is crooning low RnB melodies, and soon enough, ad libs are raining on Jongin. The voice is thick, deep and smooth, and even though Jongin has heard it a dozen of times already, he finds himself spellbound by the strong accuracy of every note. His body slowly turns into the biggest theater, and Jongin's the audience. He listens quietly, and all thoughts of fortress leave his mind, hand to hand with Joohyun.
The first time Jongin meets Do Kyungsoo, he's coming back home from work. There's a pleading “Wait, please! Wait!” that rings through the hallway, and that has Jongin stoping the elevator's doors before they close. He watches as a smaller boy rushes between them, dragging an even smaller Christmas tree behind him, and forgets to look away when incredibly wide eyes look up at him with embarrassment.
“I'm sorry,” the man apologizes. “I'm having a really shitty day and I didn't want to wait.”
The boy's voice isn't as deep when he only talks, but Jongin still recognizes it at the very first syllable leaving his mouth. He watches him clutching his Christmas tree as discreetly as he can, and slowly takes in pale skin, chapped lips and long eyelashes. If Jongin had given a thought or two about the man who's been singing to him through his anxiety attacks for the past couple of weeks, he wouldn't have come with a figure that seems so fragile, nor would he have pictured fingers that look barely past puberty. There's innocence and softness radiating from the boy's round cheeks and wide eyes, but Jongin knows better than that. There are stones in the boy's voice that build walls and castles, and Jongin perceives strength running in the pale blue veins drawing intricate lines on the boy's hands.
The boy glances at him, and contrary to what his apparence might suggest, he doesn't blush when he notices Jongin's eyes glued to him. Instead, the boy's brows slip from under dark bangs and weigh on his eyes, thick and questionning.
“Don't worry about it,” Jongin quickly answers. He holds out his hand. “I'm Kim Jongin.”
The boy takes his hand. “Do Kyungsoo. I moved into the building a couple of weeks ago.”
Jongin nods, because he knows. He remembers the movers' coming and going, and the hustle and bustle. That night was the first time he heard Do Kyungsoo sing, melodies strong between carboard boxes' sliding across the floor. Jongin also remembers dreaming of the excitation of a new life and promising days blooming on the tip of the tongue when he went to bed.
The elevator suddenly comes to a stop, and Jongin has barely enough time to look at the red numbers right above the doors to know it's not supposed to before the lights come out.
“You have to be kidding me,” Do Kyungsoo deadpans.
The emergency lights come on, sickly orange raining on them and waking up new tormented shadows on their faces. Kyungsoo glances at the ceiling, darkness emphasizing the black of his eyes.
“Christmas is gonna be fucking delirious this year, I can feel it.”
Jongin tastes irony on his tongue, but doesn't fail to notice Kyungsoo's hands still tightly wrapped around the Christmas tree.
“It happens quite a lot,” he explains, reaching out to press the emergency button. “They'll probably be here in about a hour.” Kyunsoo's brows furrow. “I'm sorry,” Jongin adds. “The building's old.”
Kyungsoo watches him quietly then lets his eyes wander around the elevator, probably looking for a solution that doesn't exist before he finally sighs.
“Okay,” he says. “Okay.” His eyes meet Jongin's, and he flashes him a faint smile. “Then I guess all we can do is wait.”
Jongin breaks the silence out of curiosity -he usually basks in it- because being stuck with the boy with the velvet voice changes everything. He sees a flock of raw emotions flicker in the dark mazes of his neighbor's eyes as they wait cross-legged on the elevator's floor, but he can't quite grasp them, and it bothers him to no end. So when Kyungsoo adjusts his Christmas tree against the wall for the fourth time before glaring at it, Jongin leaves his mutism behind.
“Don't you like Christmas?” he asks.
Kyungsoo looks at him with surprise, his hand still midway to the Christmas tree and when he realizes it, he lets it fall on his knee. Jongin reads bitterness when Kyungsoo's thick eyebrows furrow, and he picks it up, burns its imprint in his mind, and adds it to the long list of things he could be feeling, but that he finds more enjoyable as private movies that play in his thoughts.
“I do,” Kyungsoo answers. “But this will be my first Christmas away from my family and friends so I'm not really looking forward to it.”
Jongin doesn't ask him why he bought the tree if he's not going to celebrate Christmas, because after years of watching people care, he's learned that symbolism has a biggest part in their hearts than materialism, and he's no one to judge. He associates the curve of Kyungsoo's eyebrows to a cold feeling of loneliness drenched in the harsh knowledge that it's inevitable, and his imagination flies off the handle. He's trying to picture himself leaving family and friends behind -even if that requires painting faces on memories he's only pretending to have- when Kyungsoo speaks again.
“What about you? Do you like Christmas?”
Jongin shrugs. “I usually spend it alone.”
Kyungsoo watches him intently for a while, round orbs searching Jongin's eyes to the extent that Jongin feels a hint of unease warming his cheeks. It's so different from his usual dullness, and it catches him off guard, but he's quick to fall back into shades of grey as he swallows down the words that rushed into his mouth. Words that would say a little bit too much about how he still bought a Christmas tree because he's learned that symbolism was important, and he kind of wants to feel it too even though, after years spent picking up people's emotions to use them as his way-out, he forgot how to feel for himself. Kyungsoo's voice is made of stones, and sure, stones can build fortresses and bridges, but in the depths of Kyungsoo's eyes, Jongin is remembered that stones can also rain on you in a deadly avalanche. He runs away from it, but still watches it cover everything, leaving nothing in its trail.
“So, uhm... Where is your family?”
Kyungsoo glances at him with a little smile, and instead of the surprise Jongin was expecting at his burst of curiosity, there's only a slight shrug.
“In Busan. I moved into Seoul only a couple of weeks ago, for work.”
Jongin nods. “I see.”
He's not much of a talker, and more than ever, he realizes how precarious he is when it comes to words and small talks, but oddly enough, silence doesn't feel right this time. Kyungsoo's eyebrows move when he talks, he plays with his fingers a lot, and his round eyes actually go from oval to almond-shapped every two seconds, and Jongin finds out he wants more.
“Are you a singer?” he enquires, and Kyungsoo's eyebrows shoot up with surprise. “I hear you sing sometimes,” Jongin quickly explains. “The walls are thin. The building's-”
“Old,” Kyungsoo interrupts him with a smile. “Yeah, I heard so.”
Kyungsoo's smile looks like an invitation, but Jongin's too busy dissecting every frame of it to realize it. Kyungsoo doesn't seem to let himself get discouraged though, as he shakes his head, the corners of his lips turning upwards. Jongin could swear he saw them falling, but he blinked and when he opened his eyes again, there was a smile, white teeth, and no frown.
“I'm not.” Kyungsoo makes a vague gesture with his hand. “A singer, I mean. I like singing, is all. I'm sorry if I bothered you though. You should have said something.”
“No, no, don't worry. I like your voice.”
Kyungsoo smiles again, and just like that, they both fall into short questions and even shorter answers. The talk's mundane, but full of details, and Jongin feeds on every single one of them. Kyungsoo doesn't check his watch a single time, and he lets the tree slides against the wall and falls in the corner without sparing it a glance. He looks more comfortable with his legs spread on the floor than sitting cross-legged, so Jongin makes sure to leave him enough space. He learns that Kyungsoo is a lawyer, that he watches a lot of anime, and that he likes to cook even though he doesn't know a lot of recipes. Kyungsoo learns that Jongin finds it easier to talk to him when he doesn't really look him in the eyes, that he works in a theater, but hidden from view since he mostly takes care of sets and scenery, and that he loves reading. Soon enough, small talks cease to be about their favorite colors or what they would be doing if they weren't stuck in the elevator to Jongin, but about funny thoughts blooming on Kyungsoo's face with wrinkles and sparkles, Kyungsoo chewing his lower lip when he thinks, and small chuckles that never really leave his mouth.
They both start when the elevator moves again, and the repairman's face when they reach the first floor falls on Jongin like a large block of ice. Before he can do anything, Kyungsoo is back at clutching his Christmas tree closer, and there's a hint of embarrassment nesting in his eyes as he profusely thanks the repairman. The ride in the elevator after is silent, and Jongin doesn't break it because he knows that the doors will open this time. He feels like trying to grasp more of Kyungsoo would be an insult to him, because despite his fragile figure, Kyungsoo is made of stones and walls, and Jongin can't pretend to have him figured out after only a few random words thrown at him.
“Well... I guess this is it.” Kyungsoo finally says when they reach Jongin's door. Kyungsoo's eyes travel to his own door, only a couple of steps away, before they come back to meet Jongin's again. He flashes him a faint smile, a tiny piece of what they shared in the elevator and Jongin gladly takes it. “Thank you for, you know... not freaking out in the elevator, because I'm pretty sure I would have too.”
Jongin shrugs, and gestures his head toward the Christmas tree. “Have fun decorating it,” he says.
Kyungsoo watches him with a mix of surprise and amusement in his eyes, and before Jongin can add anything, or even try to remember to grab his keys, Kyungsoo nods, embarrassment gone from his eyes.
“I will,” he smiles--actually almost chuckles. “I will.”
When Jongin goes to bed later, his body crashes against cold sheets, and he realizes that there's no anxiety attack warming up his bed for him. There's a faint smell of peacefullness coming from the wall on his left, that wall that separates his world from Kyungsoo's, but he's too used to living in other people's colors to get saddened by the fact that he's not nesting in his own easiness. His last thought is about Joohyun and the kiss she gave him on the cheek a couple of months after the daisy incident, but he's soon too gone to realize that he might have found himself the most beautiful daisy for his collection.
Jongin meets Kyungsoo for the second time on a rainy day. He is drenched by the humidity he can feel lurking from behind the windows, and his extremities are so cold that it almost hurts to grab the doorknob. As soon as he opens the door, Jongin meets dark orbs and pale skin, and his body crashes against Kyungsoo's presence as if Kyungsoo was a cliff, and Jongin nothing more than a draft. Kyungsoo smells of sugar and chocolate, and the cake he's holding smells a little like him.
“This is for you,” Kyungsoo says as a hello as he holds out the cake. It's covered with whipped cream and white chocolate curls, but Jongin pays more attention to the dark chocolate ornaments contrasting sharply with all that white. “For, you know, celebrating the fact that we didn't die in an elevator.”
“Nobody ever died in it.” Jongin remarks.
Kyungsoo's lips twitch with amusement. “You can't be sure. That building's really old, after all.”
Jongin smiles and steps aside, gesturing Kyungsoo to come in, and it feels so natural that he doesn't even think about the weeks, months, years even, separating him from the last time he let someone in. Kyungsoo puts the cake on the table, dispeling every trace of void and numbness Jongin's been wandering in with his every motion. Warmth comes with the smell of chocolate, and the humidity has no other choice than to look away and find itself another prey. Jongin runs away from the burst of feelings and emotions, but not fast enough for he still catches a glimpse of need and want to never let this go. Even like that, it's easy to pretend he's just doing what he does best, sucking the life out of others and using what he grasped as movies for when the night's too dark and the day's too lonely, and despite Kyungsoo's strong presence crushing him so violently he loses pieces of himself with every second passing by, Jongin wordlessly places two dessert plates on the table.
They eat two pieces in silence, and up to this point, Jongin still understands everything, he is still in control, but then he blinks maybe too many times, and he finds himself four hours later standing on his balcony, the warmth of a meal Kyungsoo cooked in his stomach fighting the cold of Seoul's winter night. There is alcohol running in his veins, just enough for him to know he can stare at Kyungsoo for a lengthy amount of time, because the same fire is burning in Kyungsoo's veins, and Jongin will go unnoticed.
He listens to the low voice more than he pays attention to the words it draws in the night. Kyungsoo's voice is made of thick melted chocolate with a drop of cream right where there should be sharp intonations, and the alcohol inside of Jongin makes him wonder what it would taste like on his own tongue. There are blank spaces between some of Kyungsoo's sentences, but they fill Jongin's mind more easily, like the short silence after they found out Kyungsoo was actually one year older than him, and that should have been replaced by mentions of respect and Kyungsoo asking Jongin to call him hyung. A few minutes later, Kyungsoo calls him Jongin before telling him about his best friend back in Busan, and Jongin answers him with a discreet 'Kyungsoo' as he mentions Sehun and Tao, his own -and only- friends. The back of his mind is hit with memories of couples living as outlaws when it comes to respect and rules, and he hears himself saying Kyungsoo's name more often after that.
There's alcohol in the beer bottle he's holding, alcohol running in his veins and alcohol burning Kyungsoo's tongue, but Jongin feels like breathing for the first time in ages.
“You don't talk much, do you?” Kyungsoo asks, a sparkle of amusement lightening up his eyes. Jongin simply shakes his head. “It's okay,” Kyungsoo adds before looking back at the city before them. “I'm usually not much of a talker too.”
Once again, silence holds more meaning. Jongin watches Kyungsoo's breath condensing when it hits cold air as the few seconds of silence whisper directly in his ear that what's happening right now is as special for Kyungsoo as it is for him.
“Must not be easy to make friends, though,” Kyungsoo says. He glances back at Jongin, alcohol heavy in his eyes, and Jongin suddenly craves liquor-filled chocolates.
“I have two friends,” he explains, or maybe defends himself, like he usually does. “But they're both in China. They work in a dance company. They're really good.”
Kyungsoo hums in agreement, but it's not enough.
“There was this girl when I was younger,” Jongin quickly adds. “We were really close even though it took me a long time to befriend her. I used to tell her everything.”
Once again, Kyungsoo remains quiet, but his silence still says more than words, and Jongin feels it slipping through the cracks of his skin to finally unite with the fire in his veins, and before he can protest or take control over his own actions, there are words popping out of his mouth. All he can do is brace himself for the rush of memories.
"She was kind of scary because she was an expert at biting sacarsm, but then again I guess I was intimated by most girls back then. You know what it's like."
"Not really," Kyungsoo says. "I wasn't afraid of any girl."
Jongin stares for a while, and maybe it's the fact that he's talking about Joohyun, or maybe it's the look of sincere surprise on Kyungsoo's face, but alcohol turns into bubbles in his stomach, and he lets out a chuckle.
"I should have known," he smiles.
Kyungsoo throws him a questioning look but he doesn't push it further. Jongin is quick to fall back into thoughts of Joohyun.
"She was so fierce and so strong, she made the best friend a kid like me could have hoped for. She gave me my first kiss when I was nine because she claimed she wanted the best for me, but I was her first too."
Or maybe was it Seulgi? Jongin can't remember, but he's not surprised. He was the best when it came to reducing Joohyun to what only revolved around him when she was in fact so much more than that, and it's probably why she finally chose to turn his back on him. Kyungsoo's eyes still shine like the space between the stars, still glued to him, but Jongin finds no solace in them this time, and alcohol is suddenly not enough to warm him up anymore. He straightens and rests his elbows on the railing.
"She had this thing with collections. She used to collect everything, like books, buttons and even restaurants' menus, but daisies were her favorite things. She was the one who made me realise that we could make the things we like last, and what I liked the most were my mother's smiles, or hearing people laugh on the streets. So I began to observe more, and at night I replayed feelings I watched during the day. I guess I found it easier than to live them myself, because there was also a lot of pain."
Jongin doesn't mention his mother's tears, nor does he talk about what cracked then broke in his chest when he tried to call his father and had only sharp ring tones answering to him. It is easier when you're not involved, but with the way Kyungsoo is looking at him, with his eyebrows weighing on his eyes, Jongin is not sure what to expect. There's control in every second of his life, but Kyungsoo comes with the unexpected, with laughters that are actually more like smiles, silences that are louder than words and zero childhood memory of fearing girls.
“I've always thought that collecting was like fossilizing. There's no beauty left in things when you turn them into stones.”
Jongin's eyebrows furrow, but he finds himself tongue-tied under Kyungsoo's stare. He usually has tons of arguments that he mostly uses against Zitao and Sehun's invading bursts of worry, but he knows they'll be ineffective with Kyungsoo. Alcohol is now turning into ice in his veins as it's being stomped on by panic, and there's a voice screaming crystal clear in his mind that it was all a bad idea. Kyungsoo isn't a fortress, he's a prison with walls so thick Jongin will never see daylight again. Kyungsoo is dangerous, like his mother's questions when he calls her, and Jongin should run and forget everything about deep voices and dark and shiny hair.
Kyungsoo blinks and looks away, his motion's slow and fast at the same time. Jongin is freezing, but Kyungsoo doesn't even shiver, and Jongin realizes that it's not Kyungsoo's breath that is condensing when it hits cold air, but the opposite. Cold air is condensing when it crashes against Kyungsoo's breath, and maybe, maybe, Kyungsoo is both the fortress and the dragon.
“So what happened to her?” Kyungsoo finally asks. “Are you guys still in touch?”
Jongin shakes his head. It takes him a few seconds to forget the feeling that the ground under his feet is crumbling under Kyungsoo's presence, and only then does the alcohol bring back burning memories of Joohyun.
“She got sick when we were thirteen, and I...” Jongin swallows and glances at Kyungsoo. “I wasn't there for her, so I guess it was only fair she stopped being there for me too.”
He remembers Joohyun's pretty hair falling on her face and her eyes glued to the ground as she walked through the school's hallways. Maybe she had been running away from something with all those collections, but whatever it was, it had finally caught her. Jongin watched her loosing herself in dark clouds and thunderstorms, and he did what he did best. He picked up her eyebags, the greyish tone of her skin and the weight she had lost, and he put it all in a drawer he then labeled depression. Seulgi's furious eyes on him and the twitch of her lips every time their paths crossed were anger so strong it makes your fists itch with the need to hit. Joohyun had been his everything for seven years, and the day she stopped coming to school, he made her into a memory. Nothing more, nothing less.
Kyungsoo keeps quiet for the longest time, and Jongin can only imagine the thoughts wandering behind his eyes. Kyungsoo's silence is heavy, but Jongin doesn't understand it this time, and after ten minutes of shivering in the cold of the night, he realises Kyungsoo won't put it into words. It takes his neighbor another ten minutes to finally move again, and Jongin watches him go inside his apartment, frozen on his spot. The rush of panic makes him dizzy, but Kyungsoo is quick to come back with another two beers in his hand, and Jongin is even quicker to open his.
Alcohol burns his tongue, it burns his veins and fights off the cold of Seoul's winter, but Kyungsoo's presence remains strong and crushing.
Both the fortress and the dragon, indeed.
Jongin's daily routine is finally shattered once and for all when he meets Kyungsoo for the third and fourth time on the following day. Third time happens in the morning when Jongin wakes up on his couch, and finds Kyungsoo rolled into a ball in his old armchair. He feels like forever happens two or three times as he tries to process what he's seeing, but before he can even think about trying to remember how Kyungsoo ended up sleeping in his apartment, the latter stirs in his sleep. He opens one eye, then the other, and he finally straightens with a slowness Jongin's heart obviously doesn't share. Jongin watches Kyungsoo rub his eyes before he takes a look around and processes where he's spent the night, and once again, Kyungsoo blows up into unexpected reactions, splashing colors on Jongin's white walls as he chuckles.
“I think we drank too many beers,” he says when his eyes finally meet Jongin's.
“Looks like we did,” Jongin mutters.
Kyungsoo stretches out, colors still vivid on his face even though it's still swollen from sleep, and Jongin has flashbacks of fantasy books and dangerous dragons. He has trouble remembering why he pictured a heart of fire inside of Kyungsoo's chest when Kyungsoo looks so delicate and fragile. He watches him smooth out the wrinkles on his long-sleeved shirt with the palm of his hand, his disheveled hair flashing more of his forehead than Jongin has ever seen, and Jongin reads only softness on his cheeks, warmth on his pink lips and innocence on his button nose. Kyungsoo stands up and walks to the kitchen, cuts one more piece of his cake and puts it on a plate. It's only then, when Kyungsoo hands out the plate to Jongin with a little smile that Jongin remembers how he told everything about Joohyun even though Kyungsoo never said a word.
"Eat," Kyungsoo commands him. "I have to get ready for work. Thank you for yesterday Jongin, I had fun."
Kyungsoo gives him another smile before he finally goes, slowly closing the door behind him and leaving Jongin to thoughts he knows he's not ready to face. He remains seated on the couch with the plate in his hand, still trying to register what happened, and finds himself stuck most of the day in the question mark that inevitably hits him when he wonders whether or not it's a good thing it did happen.
Fourth time happens only a couple of hours later. Jongin is reading a book, tasting words and letting them fill him, when someone knocks. Tao and Sehun are the only ones who sometimes visit him, but with both of them dancing their way to glorious days in China, it's not hard to guess who's on the other side. Even like that, Jongin finds himself breathless when Kyungsoo looks up, eyes already digging up holes in Jongin's face. He has his hair up and a dark blue tie is tied around his neck, but Jongin mostly notices white teeth chewing on thick lips and round orbs standing out against pale skin. He should be used to it by now, but it takes him a while to remember that Kyungsoo is the boy with the velvet voice, the boy whose melodies rains on him on too dry days, and who builds unbreakable walls around the ruins of Jongin's body.
“I left in a hurry this morning,” Kyungsoo starts. “But I wanted to give you my phone number.”
He holds out a paper with tiny numbers scribbled on it, the sleeve of his jacket going up on his arm and flashing a strip of pale skin. Jongin doesn't look up as he hesitates, and silence falls on them, but he sees Kyungsoo's veins stand out even more on his fingers and hand as he tightens his hold on the paper. He wonders what kind of conclusions Kyungsoo feared in those few seconds of silence, and writes lack of confidence with hundred of question marks in his head. He's not sure what makes him grab the paper, if it's the want to find an answer to those questions or simply the ink spread so nicely on the paper, but he still does it even though he knows that some things come with consequences, and that this is one of them. Kyungsoo looks up, and Jongin gives in.
“I'll text you mine right away,” he says.
Kyungsoo smiles. Jongin reads relief, glee, he reads heart drawn on lips and fortresses not minding the wind's heavy blows. He feels his time and space breaking and cracking, and he realises how insignificant the distance between his eyes and Kyungsoo's is. It would be dull, and unoriginal, just neighbors befriending over doormats for others, but Jongin feels the ground shake under his feet, he feels his shadow spinning out of control, and avalanches of stones burrying his determination to keep Kyungsoo as a drawer in his mind, a drawer he could have placed next to Joohyun's. It's still today and not even tomorrow yet, but Jongin knows for sure that today will become a yesterday and never turn into a today again, for Kyungsoo has definitely turned his world upside down and doomed all of his tomorrows to be made of unknown and unexpected. The idea of doing something not already written down in his daily planner, be it the one in his mind or the one on his desk, is too much for Jongin, but his eyes remain glued to Kyungsoo's, and the fortress opens up and swallows him whole. Fortress, prison, or even dragon, Jongin still has no answer.
part ii >>