Five Steps to Nowhere (oneshot)
Title: Five Steps to Nowhere
Rating: PG
Form: Oneshot
Words: 2 054
Pairings: Jaeho...
Genre: drama, fluff
Summary: You want to step out, touch the sky and live your dreams. And you want him right there beside you when you do it.
AN: Not as good as the Yunho one, but I find Jae hard to channel. ^^;
Five Steps to Nowhere
The first step is to the left, out of his way on the fourth floor, outside the studios you’d just been shown. He’s followed by a bunch of other boys, boisterous and loud, and you blink in wonder as they pass.
“That’s Yunho.” Your guide says, and you mouth the name, rolling it over your tongue. Yunho, you think. And you do know.
The studios are big and the building is full of people and everything is exciting enough to set your heart thundering. This is what you’ve wanted, back from when you’d woken up every morning with music on your mind, and knowing that you would be a singer. The fact that you could not sing hadn’t fazed you. Your mother had called you a dreamer, but it hadn’t been like your dream to be an astronaut, because you had known that was a dream and this was not, and that’s also why you’re not sure that dreamer was the word for you. Because look at you now. You’re halfway to the stars already.
Class starts the very next day and it’s terrifying. There are so many, and you know there’s only room for a few. Despite your practice, your hours and hours spent singing anything and everything while your fingers had frozen in the winter and you’d starved in the summer… despite everything - you’re not what you should be. The instructor is hard and no-nonsense, and you feel your throat go dry and raw as he pushes and pushes.
A five minute break and you’re outside, head throbbing and chest aching with disappointment at your failure, when he’s suddenly just there.
“He’s a bastard. Your voice is good. Really good.” Are the words you hear, and you look up to see him standing there, can of tea in hand and a smile of crooked teeth on his face. You laugh, bitterly, and he blinks.
“Not good enough.” Is all you can think of to reply with.
“You will be,” His tone is confident and you wonder why he’s talking to you. “I can tell.”
Somehow, it makes you feel better, and as your voice protests climbing the scales half an hour later, you push on, watching his spiked up, funny hair from the corner of your eye. Leaving the room, he grins at you in passing.
“Yunho.” He says, and you grasp his outstretched hand. It’s warm and dry and you think, I wish my fingers were that long, that sure. It’s a nice hand, and its touch stays in your memory.
“Jaejoong.” You tell him in return, and he nods, changing the clasp of your hands so that it’s the first part of some secret handshake you’ve yet to discover.
“Welcome to the madhouse, Jaejoong.” Is his welcome into this giddy world of possibilities, and you return his smile, even as he turns away, swallowed back into his group of friends.
People, you gather, think you’re weird. You get some funny looks as you walk around, and not many people talk to you. It hurts, cutting fine, paper thin slices from your heart, but you can survive without them. There are some that do deign to talk to you, and they’re enough. There’s a boy with a pretty voice from your second level singing class, who smiled at you one day and had lunch with you the next. His name is Yesung and you think you might be friends.
The second step is more of a stumble, as you, in your clumsiness, trip over your own feet and nearly knock him into one of the mirrored walls.
“Whoa!” He says, grabbing at your arm to keep you from falling.
“Shit, sorry.” You mutter, trying to find your feet and frowning at yourself. He brushes off your apology with a laugh, patting you on the back. You don’t even know why he’s in the class, thinking he should be in some advanced dance group - he makes this routine look like a snap and you feel like an idiot fumbling around next to him.
You can feel his eyes on you as the group starts from the top again, and you nearly fall over again when you hear his low whisper to tuck your arms in closer and to wait half a beat on the turn.
After class, you’re quietly dying in a corner, legs aching and head spinning as you keep panting for air, when a pair of sneakers enter your vision.
“You’re not so good with dancing, are you?” Yunho’s voice is vaguely amused and you wonder if ignoring him would make him go away. He doesn’t go away though, and after a while you roll your eyes up to look at his towering form.
“You noticed.” You say dryly, and he grins.
“Bit hard not to.” He hunkers down before you, fingertips brushing over the tops of his shoes. “How about we help each other out?” He suggests. You eye him warily, not really understanding what he’s talking about.
“What?” You prompt, when he doesn’t seem to be expanding.
“You’re a much better singer then I am. I’m a much better dancer then you are. I think we can help each other.” He says. You wonder, again, why he’s talking to you. He’s got friends everywhere… surely one of them can sing? You find out later that most of his friends are dancers too. Except Junsu, who can do both (you want to hate him, you really do, but he’s such a sweet kid and he calls you ‘Joongie’ and you get on famously) and Heechul who doesn’t seem to do much of anything except primp and bitch.
You agree though, because he’s Yunho, and it seems to work out for the both of you. You’re hard on him, exacting and unforgiving as you try to help him find his voice. He’s just as hard on you, determined to untangle your two left feet. You both spend long hours in the trainee rooms, practicing after classes. It’s not exactly friendship, but you know his voice, and sometimes you feel like you can hear his soul.
The third step is a drunken stumble coming out of a club. His arm is around your shoulder and you’re both keeping each other upright. Smoke clings to your clothes and hair, and as he stumbles to a wall, throwing up in an undignified manner, you pet his hair and rub his back, your own legs wobbly under you. Your stomach is made of stronger stuff though and you refrain from joining him in emptying your stomach. You can hear Donghae retching as well, and feel muzzily proud of yourself for being able to hold your liquor. You don’t feel so proud the next morning when the whole world is entirely too noisy, too bright and too awake.
He had dithered purposefully at the front doors of the building after your dance session together, looking like he wanted to say something. You raised an eyebrow at him in question, and he suggested you come with him and his friends to a club down town. You couldn’t find a reason to say no, so you said yes.
Lying there, eyes slitted to filter out the offensive sun as everything span around in a not-so-pleasant manner, you can sort of see Yunho’s slack face not far away and realise you must have found somewhere to sleep. You think that patting his back as he threw up constitutes a shift in relationship, and you smile at the ceiling, even as you fall back into oblivion. It’s nice, you think, to have friends.
You’re ‘Yunho’s friend’ for a long while when you hang out with him, as everyone sizes you up and figures out what you’re doing there. Yunho’s popular, part of the ‘in crowd’ of the trainees with experience and seniority. His friends are all handsome and cool, and you like them. Not as much as you like Yunho though.
Yunho’s gregarious and fun and just as determined to make it as you are. He’s grounded and focused and he calls you a dreamer like your mother did. Does. But he likes your dreams, or so he says the time you stay up all night sitting on the curb and just talking. He says he likes a lot of things about you, like your voice and your eyes. And you feel good about it because you like a lot of things about him too. He’s different from anyone else you’ve ever known
The fourth step is a small movement backwards. You’re just in the hallway outside the studio, reading over your weekly set of vocal pieces for class when he comes up behind you, bumping your shoulder in greeting. You throw him a distracted smile, staring at the notes before you and tapping your foot to the imagined melody.
A delivery man comes through the hall with a huge box and you move backwards slightly to let him pass, the warmth of Yunho’s body pressing against you. When the delivery man is gone, you don’t move away again, and neither does Yunho. Instead, the next thing you know, his arms are around your waist and his chin is on your shoulder, while he reads along with you.
“Yunho?” You ask, and he hums in reply. “What are you doing?”
“Hugging you.” Is his simple reply. And it appears to be just that simple. You just leave it be and go back to the music, his solid warmth at your back.
The next time it happens, you don’t question it.
The fifth step is a mutual step forward. You’re Dong Bang Shin Ki, you’ve been told, your unnamed concept group slowly gaining definition and substance. There’s Junsu, who you’ve been friends with almost as long as Yunho, though somehow not in quite the same way. There’s Changmin, the respectful boy full of shy smiles and insightful comments. There’s Yoochun, the lonely American with whom you feel an instant connection. And then there’s Yunho. Yunho and you.
It’s the second week of your intensive training for your debut, and all of you are ready to drop. The frenetic energy of your excitement keeps you all going though, and the thought that you’re actually going to debut, debut debut… Your dream isn’t so far away now, and you can practically touch the stars.
It’s late. Or early, you can’t tell. The rooms are all dark, and the others are asleep - something any sane person should be doing considering you need to be up at 6:30 to get to a costume fitting and then there’ll be yet another round with the ruthless choreographer. Your left feet still trip you up sometimes, despite all of Yunho’s coaching, and being half asleep won’t help you. But you’d been talking. You do that a lot with him, and time slips away unnoticed when it happens, until you suddenly find you’re both sitting in the dark hours later, yawning. No matter how tired you are though, you wouldn’t trade these moments for anything. You feel less stressed, less exhausted, for having them.
“Jaejoongie.” He says, quiet. The pair of you are dithering in the hallway, somehow reluctant to enter the bedroom and fall into well-deserved slumber. His expression is open and smooth even in the shadowy light, so unlike the serious face of leadership he’d undertaken recently. You’re glad he can feel that free with you. You want to be able to be there for him always, no matter what, to listen to whatever he may have to say, as well as all the things he can’t say.
“Yes?” You ask, turning your face until your eyes meet.
“Jaejoongie…” He says again, and you hear something in it, something that feels like all those hugs you’ve shared. Your hand finds his in the dark, and your fingers entangle. It only takes half a step. Half a step forward and you’re breathing each other. You close your eyes, lean in. He tastes like stardust and dreams.
The road before you is long, and there will be many steps taken. Some will be hard. That’s okay though, because you know now that every step will be carrying you forward, and wherever you may walk, Yunho will be walking right there beside you.
Rating: PG
Form: Oneshot
Words: 2 054
Pairings: Jaeho...
Genre: drama, fluff
Summary: You want to step out, touch the sky and live your dreams. And you want him right there beside you when you do it.
AN: Not as good as the Yunho one, but I find Jae hard to channel. ^^;
Five Steps to Nowhere
The first step is to the left, out of his way on the fourth floor, outside the studios you’d just been shown. He’s followed by a bunch of other boys, boisterous and loud, and you blink in wonder as they pass.
“That’s Yunho.” Your guide says, and you mouth the name, rolling it over your tongue. Yunho, you think. And you do know.
The studios are big and the building is full of people and everything is exciting enough to set your heart thundering. This is what you’ve wanted, back from when you’d woken up every morning with music on your mind, and knowing that you would be a singer. The fact that you could not sing hadn’t fazed you. Your mother had called you a dreamer, but it hadn’t been like your dream to be an astronaut, because you had known that was a dream and this was not, and that’s also why you’re not sure that dreamer was the word for you. Because look at you now. You’re halfway to the stars already.
Class starts the very next day and it’s terrifying. There are so many, and you know there’s only room for a few. Despite your practice, your hours and hours spent singing anything and everything while your fingers had frozen in the winter and you’d starved in the summer… despite everything - you’re not what you should be. The instructor is hard and no-nonsense, and you feel your throat go dry and raw as he pushes and pushes.
A five minute break and you’re outside, head throbbing and chest aching with disappointment at your failure, when he’s suddenly just there.
“He’s a bastard. Your voice is good. Really good.” Are the words you hear, and you look up to see him standing there, can of tea in hand and a smile of crooked teeth on his face. You laugh, bitterly, and he blinks.
“Not good enough.” Is all you can think of to reply with.
“You will be,” His tone is confident and you wonder why he’s talking to you. “I can tell.”
Somehow, it makes you feel better, and as your voice protests climbing the scales half an hour later, you push on, watching his spiked up, funny hair from the corner of your eye. Leaving the room, he grins at you in passing.
“Yunho.” He says, and you grasp his outstretched hand. It’s warm and dry and you think, I wish my fingers were that long, that sure. It’s a nice hand, and its touch stays in your memory.
“Jaejoong.” You tell him in return, and he nods, changing the clasp of your hands so that it’s the first part of some secret handshake you’ve yet to discover.
“Welcome to the madhouse, Jaejoong.” Is his welcome into this giddy world of possibilities, and you return his smile, even as he turns away, swallowed back into his group of friends.
People, you gather, think you’re weird. You get some funny looks as you walk around, and not many people talk to you. It hurts, cutting fine, paper thin slices from your heart, but you can survive without them. There are some that do deign to talk to you, and they’re enough. There’s a boy with a pretty voice from your second level singing class, who smiled at you one day and had lunch with you the next. His name is Yesung and you think you might be friends.
The second step is more of a stumble, as you, in your clumsiness, trip over your own feet and nearly knock him into one of the mirrored walls.
“Whoa!” He says, grabbing at your arm to keep you from falling.
“Shit, sorry.” You mutter, trying to find your feet and frowning at yourself. He brushes off your apology with a laugh, patting you on the back. You don’t even know why he’s in the class, thinking he should be in some advanced dance group - he makes this routine look like a snap and you feel like an idiot fumbling around next to him.
You can feel his eyes on you as the group starts from the top again, and you nearly fall over again when you hear his low whisper to tuck your arms in closer and to wait half a beat on the turn.
After class, you’re quietly dying in a corner, legs aching and head spinning as you keep panting for air, when a pair of sneakers enter your vision.
“You’re not so good with dancing, are you?” Yunho’s voice is vaguely amused and you wonder if ignoring him would make him go away. He doesn’t go away though, and after a while you roll your eyes up to look at his towering form.
“You noticed.” You say dryly, and he grins.
“Bit hard not to.” He hunkers down before you, fingertips brushing over the tops of his shoes. “How about we help each other out?” He suggests. You eye him warily, not really understanding what he’s talking about.
“What?” You prompt, when he doesn’t seem to be expanding.
“You’re a much better singer then I am. I’m a much better dancer then you are. I think we can help each other.” He says. You wonder, again, why he’s talking to you. He’s got friends everywhere… surely one of them can sing? You find out later that most of his friends are dancers too. Except Junsu, who can do both (you want to hate him, you really do, but he’s such a sweet kid and he calls you ‘Joongie’ and you get on famously) and Heechul who doesn’t seem to do much of anything except primp and bitch.
You agree though, because he’s Yunho, and it seems to work out for the both of you. You’re hard on him, exacting and unforgiving as you try to help him find his voice. He’s just as hard on you, determined to untangle your two left feet. You both spend long hours in the trainee rooms, practicing after classes. It’s not exactly friendship, but you know his voice, and sometimes you feel like you can hear his soul.
The third step is a drunken stumble coming out of a club. His arm is around your shoulder and you’re both keeping each other upright. Smoke clings to your clothes and hair, and as he stumbles to a wall, throwing up in an undignified manner, you pet his hair and rub his back, your own legs wobbly under you. Your stomach is made of stronger stuff though and you refrain from joining him in emptying your stomach. You can hear Donghae retching as well, and feel muzzily proud of yourself for being able to hold your liquor. You don’t feel so proud the next morning when the whole world is entirely too noisy, too bright and too awake.
He had dithered purposefully at the front doors of the building after your dance session together, looking like he wanted to say something. You raised an eyebrow at him in question, and he suggested you come with him and his friends to a club down town. You couldn’t find a reason to say no, so you said yes.
Lying there, eyes slitted to filter out the offensive sun as everything span around in a not-so-pleasant manner, you can sort of see Yunho’s slack face not far away and realise you must have found somewhere to sleep. You think that patting his back as he threw up constitutes a shift in relationship, and you smile at the ceiling, even as you fall back into oblivion. It’s nice, you think, to have friends.
You’re ‘Yunho’s friend’ for a long while when you hang out with him, as everyone sizes you up and figures out what you’re doing there. Yunho’s popular, part of the ‘in crowd’ of the trainees with experience and seniority. His friends are all handsome and cool, and you like them. Not as much as you like Yunho though.
Yunho’s gregarious and fun and just as determined to make it as you are. He’s grounded and focused and he calls you a dreamer like your mother did. Does. But he likes your dreams, or so he says the time you stay up all night sitting on the curb and just talking. He says he likes a lot of things about you, like your voice and your eyes. And you feel good about it because you like a lot of things about him too. He’s different from anyone else you’ve ever known
The fourth step is a small movement backwards. You’re just in the hallway outside the studio, reading over your weekly set of vocal pieces for class when he comes up behind you, bumping your shoulder in greeting. You throw him a distracted smile, staring at the notes before you and tapping your foot to the imagined melody.
A delivery man comes through the hall with a huge box and you move backwards slightly to let him pass, the warmth of Yunho’s body pressing against you. When the delivery man is gone, you don’t move away again, and neither does Yunho. Instead, the next thing you know, his arms are around your waist and his chin is on your shoulder, while he reads along with you.
“Yunho?” You ask, and he hums in reply. “What are you doing?”
“Hugging you.” Is his simple reply. And it appears to be just that simple. You just leave it be and go back to the music, his solid warmth at your back.
The next time it happens, you don’t question it.
The fifth step is a mutual step forward. You’re Dong Bang Shin Ki, you’ve been told, your unnamed concept group slowly gaining definition and substance. There’s Junsu, who you’ve been friends with almost as long as Yunho, though somehow not in quite the same way. There’s Changmin, the respectful boy full of shy smiles and insightful comments. There’s Yoochun, the lonely American with whom you feel an instant connection. And then there’s Yunho. Yunho and you.
It’s the second week of your intensive training for your debut, and all of you are ready to drop. The frenetic energy of your excitement keeps you all going though, and the thought that you’re actually going to debut, debut debut… Your dream isn’t so far away now, and you can practically touch the stars.
It’s late. Or early, you can’t tell. The rooms are all dark, and the others are asleep - something any sane person should be doing considering you need to be up at 6:30 to get to a costume fitting and then there’ll be yet another round with the ruthless choreographer. Your left feet still trip you up sometimes, despite all of Yunho’s coaching, and being half asleep won’t help you. But you’d been talking. You do that a lot with him, and time slips away unnoticed when it happens, until you suddenly find you’re both sitting in the dark hours later, yawning. No matter how tired you are though, you wouldn’t trade these moments for anything. You feel less stressed, less exhausted, for having them.
“Jaejoongie.” He says, quiet. The pair of you are dithering in the hallway, somehow reluctant to enter the bedroom and fall into well-deserved slumber. His expression is open and smooth even in the shadowy light, so unlike the serious face of leadership he’d undertaken recently. You’re glad he can feel that free with you. You want to be able to be there for him always, no matter what, to listen to whatever he may have to say, as well as all the things he can’t say.
“Yes?” You ask, turning your face until your eyes meet.
“Jaejoongie…” He says again, and you hear something in it, something that feels like all those hugs you’ve shared. Your hand finds his in the dark, and your fingers entangle. It only takes half a step. Half a step forward and you’re breathing each other. You close your eyes, lean in. He tastes like stardust and dreams.
The road before you is long, and there will be many steps taken. Some will be hard. That’s okay though, because you know now that every step will be carrying you forward, and wherever you may walk, Yunho will be walking right there beside you.