i only had faith in forever.
Title: I only had faith in forever.
Pairing: OT5 (Jaemin)
Rating: PG
Summary: Seven years later, and everything's changing.
Notes: This was posted a year ago, but I was never quite satisfied. After heavy revision, I'm still not really, but. Please note, this fic contains heavy implications of eating disorders and suicidal thoughts.
Exhibit 1.
After many years out of the spotlight, Korean pop group JYJ has released their second Japanese album, "Reason”. Despite the group's seasoned fanbase, the album has been met with lukewarm success. Their previous album (''In Heaven", 2011) dominated the international charts; its successor, however, has largely failed to find success in both digital downloads and physical purchases.
Fans (perhaps hyperbolically) have accused JYJ’s previous management agency of putting pressure on Japanese distributors to blacklist the group. The company has not responded to these allegations.
Exhibit 2.
Name: Jung, Yunho
Age: 25
Date of enlistment: January 1, 2012
Exhibit 3.
From: parky6586@live.com
To: bchangu@cjes.co.kr
hyung, i don't understand? i thought you said we shouldn't take any meetings. can someone please tell me what's going on??
Message delivery failed.
Exhibit 4.
Two voicemails left on Kim Jaejoong’s cell-phone.
“Hyung, I think you should say yes.''
“I'm calling on behalf of Kim Youngmin. We would like to formally extend an invitation to you, Park Yoochun, and Kim Junsu, to attend a meeting next month discussing the terms of your contract, as per your request.”
Exhibit 5.
A small announcement on the news page, underneath the link to a new f(x) CF: We would like to welcome Xiah Junsu, Micky Yoochun, and Youngwoong Jaejoong back to TVXQ! and the SM Entertainment family. Please continue to support them.
Jaejoong justifies it in the following ways.
Junsu’s newest album is blacklisted before it comes out. His radio bookings are cancelled; his television spots are pulled. One by one, the sponsors drop out. The stadium is half-empty, and the bills aren't payed. On the plane ride back, when he thinks Jaejoong is asleep, he starts to shake.
Yoochun’s eyes are as bloodshot and dry as Tokyo, 2006. He's chain-smoking as though he wants lung cancer; when he calls Jaejoong, he's like a man begging for the noose. When Jaejoong tries to talk about a new album, he hangs up.
Jaejoong can't write.
In the car, Junsu stares out the window. He's wearing sunglasses but Jaejoong knows his eyes are red. Yoochun is still in his fatigues - Jaejoong tries to tease him and Yoochun tries to laugh, and Jaejoong feels like a champion.
Yoochun said yes after a month. Junsu has been saying yes since 2010. Jaejoong still hasn't agreed.
Yunho pretends to smile at them across the table. Changmin doesn't even look up.
Junsu signs his name quickly, as though if he looked down any longer the words might burn. Yoochun lingers over his signature before handing the pen to Jaejoong. He looks straight ahead, and then at the desk, and then at his lap, and then he shuts his eyes.
The pen weighs heavy in Jaejoong's hand. He looks up. Yunho is staring at out the window. Changmin is staring at the desk. He does not recognize either of them. He looks down.
The first time Junsu suggested it, Jaejoong didn't talk to him for three days. The second time Junsu suggested it, Yoochun had been in the army for two days, and their Japanese agency announced they would "not seek to extend their contract with JYJ".
Jaejoong hadn't eaten in three days and Junsu started crying.
Kim Jaejoong, he prints, carefully and on the dotted line.
Changmin stands up and leaves.
Yoochun still has three months of service. SM thought it would be bad for publicity if they pulled him out early, but at least they got him switched from active to public service. The limo (because they have limos, now) shuttles him away before Jaejoong's pen has left paper.
It is Yunho and Junsu and Jaejoong and six lawyers at the reunion of the century.
Junsu asks, very quietly, if he can see Hyukjae.
Yunho's lips tighten, and a lawyer asks for their cellphones.
There's an impasse.
Management has decided to wait on the reveal until Yoochun comes back and they have the complete set. They fill their time with photo shoots and hair cuts and album preparation. It's familiar and so fucking safe. In his spare time, Jaejoong hates himself.
There are provisions in their contracts now. Things that will hurt them if they sue; things that will hurt their families if they sue. Nondisclosure agreements. Apologies that will be made. Songs that will be taken. In return, SME will pay their debts, and they will sing.
Changmin doesn't talk to them. He will look at them, and he will nod in their direction, but in the last month he hasn't addressed either of them beyond ''hello''. It's not so much hate as apathy, and Jaejoong really doesn't want that. In this black-tar kind of way, he wants Changmin to punch him in the face, because that would require him to look at Jaejoong.
Yunho doesn't know what to do, and maybe that's worse. Sometimes he smiles at Junsu, which makes Junsu happy, but he doesn't do it that often, which makes Junsu sad. He never smiles at Jaejoong, which makes Jaejoong go home and stare at his ribs in the mirror for two hours. He looks at Jaejoong a lot, and sometimes he tells Jaejoong when he's got a hair out of place, but mostly he just laughs with the coordi-noonas and looks like he wishes he wasn't there. He and Changmin talk in corners a lot.
Junsu smiles, though. Jaejoong eats, sometimes.
Jaejoong starts smoking again. CJES is bought out, but very quietly.
Jaejoong calls Yoochun at when he is finally released from a meeting about his comeback hair color. It is three in the morning.
“I want to go back into the army,” he says, in lieu of a hello. “At least I'll get sleep there.''
Yoochun responds with the time, and a fuck you, and a ''This is what you signed up for.'' His voice is muffled and cottony.
“Exhaustion?”
“Being a star.”
Jaejoong snorts. “It’s about singing - it's about you and Junsu,” he says, “it’s not about a fucking spotlight. They should know that.” He says it with a viscous bite he only ever gets with the help of a late-night buzz.
“Jae,” Yoochun says, ''I have to get up in twenty minutes, so if you actually start to use us as excuses I'm going to hang up. Yeah, we might be part of it, but if you tell me that's the whole thing I'm going to hang up. I mean, Jesus. It's been five years. What were you expecting?”
Jaejoong was expecting a week of awkward conversation, of Yunho flinching away when Junsu tried to touch him and Changmin going tight-lipped and dark-eyed when Jaejoong unthinkingly brought up their lost years - only for the four of them to be drawn back together by some shared memory that reminded them that whatever they had lost wasn’t as important as what they had had, and could have now. And then it would be all better. And then it could be okay.
Jaejoong got a week of awkward conversation and avoided glances, Yunho flinching away when Junsu tried to touch him and Changmin going tight-lipped and dark-eyed when Jaejoong unthinkingly brought up their lost years. And then another week. And another.
‘this can’t last forever,’ Junsu tweeted, ‘and this won’t last forever. one day. one day.’ The fans assumed he was talking about Tigger, who was staying with Junho.
min: You took my brush when you left, can you give it back tomorrow?
Kim Jaejoong (work): aish, sorry, i was sleepwalking, ill get it back to you asap
min: Thanks.
Jaejoong-hyung: how does changmin hav e my number
su: It's four am
su: Why do you have his
Jaejoong starts drinking alone, in that Jaejoong drinks alone and Junsu and Hyukjae play fighting games on his Wii-U. Jaejoong likes it when Junsu is happy, and sometimes Hyunjoong comes over and they talk about despair until Hyukjae and Junsu start laughing and knock over the empty beer bottles.
Junsu twitpics it and the coordi-noonas post the picture on his dressing-room mirror. He catches Yunho examining it when he thinks Jaejoong isn't looking.
They have two lead singles, a slow-burning ballad and a hyper-intense dance routine. Jaejoong asked if he could write the ballad and was politely denied - they gave him two songs on the album, though, and he takes that victory. The song they end up going with is tragic and saccharine. It will be a chart topper.
Yoochun is out in two weeks. They're trying to get the album as finished as it can be with only four voices. Tonight they're working on the dance track's solos. It's ideal because it means they don't have to pretend at harmony, but it sucks, because they have to sit in a room together.
Changmin, at least, got out of it two hours ago; he claimed a late-night photoshoot as he was saying goodbye to Yunho. It's three in the morning and they've been here for five hours. The sound people are fussing in the booth, so the talent has been left to its own devices.
For Junsu that means going over exactly what is wrong with Jaejoong's dance solo beat by beat for the last twenty minutes straight. For Jaejoong that means watching him with a half-glazed, half-infuriated expression. For Yunho that means watching them without a word.
“Hyung,” Junsu sighs, snapping his fingers in front of Jaejoong's face, “are you even listening to me? I'm not doing this to torture you, I'm doing this because I want you to be the best.”
“After you, of course,” Jaejoong says. He pulls his phone out, almost by instinct.
“Always,” Junsu replies, grabbing Jaejoong's phone and putting in his own pocket. “No, hyung,” he reprimands, “no Twitter! I told you, you have to get this right before practice tomorrow.”
“It's fine,” Jaejoong sighs, letting his neck flop forward and wincing at the ache.
“No, it isn't!” Junsu crosses his arms. “You are actually the worst and you are ruining things.”
“He's right, Jaejoong,'' Yunho says, “Lee-seonsaengnim is gonna break something - you - if you mess up again.''
It's only a beat of silence before Junsu is agreeing wholeheartedly, tilting his body to include Yunho in his coalition of the disappointed. Jaejoong has to muster up the strength to raise his head - he's so tired - but it's worth it to see Yunho smiling softly as Junsu rallies against laziness and Jaejoong, nodding in agreement every time he's called on for support.
It's not the most Yunho has talked to them in the last month but it's the sincerest he's sounded, and Jaejoong isn't sure what to make of it; of his words, of the way he looks at Junsu, of the way he looks at Jaejoong when he notices him watching three minutes later. When the sound guys call Junsu in for another take Yunho wishes him good luck.
They don't talk again that night, but the next day he wishes Jaejoong good morning, and asks Junsu about FC Men, and when Jaejoong stumbles during dance practice he laughs with Junsu and helps the eldest get back up. He kind of flinches when Jaejoong grabs his arms, but at least he doesn't pull away.
Changmin watches them in the mirrors, and when he notices Jaejoong looking turns his back.
When JYJ was formed, Jaejoong started this habit of taking really long cigarette breaks (mostly to get away from Junsu when he was getting over-emotional about Jaejoong's rapidly shrinking stomach). The habit hasn't died with DBSK's rebirth - before, when he knew how upset it would make Yunho, he refrained from smoking during work, but five years have quickly taught him how easy it is not to care.
When his cigarettes disappear out of his bag one day, he assumes that one of the coordi-noonas or a PD snagged them. He asks around until Yunho tells him, with a slight uncertain smile, it had been Changmin. He gestures to the magnae, who glares back at them all tight-lips and bullish challenge. Changmin retorts that just because he's decided he'll die in five years doesn't mean the rest of them have to help him. He says it all while dancing, so it's strange, but it's the most Changmin has talked to him in a month and he's too out of breath to yell. Jaejoong grins at him in the mirror, and Changmin glares. His neck is flushed red.
It's weird, the week before Yoochun comes up. Junsu is super excited but is trying not to show it. He and Changmin are sort of talking to each other again; the dancers have Madden set up in a changing room, and they're working out their friendship through societally endorsed homoeroticism. Jaejoong is jealous in an obvious way, but Changmin still won't talk to him and doesn't seem to care. Yunho is understanding, but not sympathetic.
''You want him to forgive you immediately,'' he tells Jaejoong one night after dance practice, ''I mean, Jae, I love you, that's never changed, but I haven't forgiven you. None of you, not completely.''
''No,” Jaejoong shakes his head, ''I just want him to consider forgiving me. You know him better than us, Yunho, you know that when he gets a grudge he will hold it closer than his mother. He gave Junsu a chance, he's gonna give Yoochun a chance, I know it, and I've been trying and trying but he won't even fucking look at me except to yell at me. I mean, it's not. Fair?”
Yunho looks at him with pity. ''Jaejoong, you're my best friend and I don't idolize you the way Changmin did. You didn't see him in 2009. The way our Changmin was that year, do you honestly think he'll be back to normal in three months?” He shakes his head. ''I love you, but you were a jackass to him. If I were him I wouldn't fucking forgive you that fast. I'm sorry for swearing.''
Jaejoong starts writing these really dumb love songs, the kind Yunho likes to listen to when he works out. He doesn't show them to Junsu, because Junsu would get what they mean and smile at him in a horrible way. He throws them away before he can even consider showing them to Yoochun.
Jaejoong hides during lunch and leaves during dinner. He thinks he's stealthy enough to get away with it, but he forgets that he's not the only one paying attention.
Changmin corners him after a meeting about the album art, too late at night for Jaejoong to fight back. "Are you eating?" Changmin asks, his eyes narrowed. His shoulders are hunched and his mouth is sort of twisted into a grotesque caricature of anger. Jaejoong might have read pity there if Shim Changmin could ever lower himself to pity anyone.
"Ye-" Jaejoong begins to lie, but Changmin's expression kills the lie before it even has a chance to breathe. "Sort of," he responds instead, "I'm trying." It comes out like a protest.
"This isn't just about you, hyung," Changmin says. He sounds disappointed, which is how he always sounds around Jaejoong now. "Don't be so fucking arrogant."
Jaejoong eats the next day, just a little bit, but enough for Changmin to see. The magnae isn't paying attention.
They all go together, the day Yoochun gets out. Their PR thinks this is the ideal reveal - the poignancy, the screaming fans, the a backdrop of patriotism: it really couldn't be better.
The car ride is awkward. They can't agree on music, and Junsu is so jittery he keeps smacking Changmin's knee with his hand, and Yunho's gone all disapproving father on them, and Jaejoong just really wants a cigarette and Yoochun and for Changmin to look at him.
Yunho tries to coach them all as they approach the recruitment center: there will be crowds, there will be cameras, stick together, try not to die. Jaejoong is tired and cranky and scared and at one point he snaps, “Yunho, we've been idols for ten and a half years, I'm pretty sure we know what to do with a cameraman.'' Yunho looks put-out, but Jaejoong catches a barely-there smirk before Changmin hides it away.
Yoochun is standing at the center of a sea of camouflage. Fangirls scream from all sides, waving signs and pen-lights and hands; camera flashes blind them and the soldiers. The soldiers standing behind Yoochun look embarrassed and awed. Yoochun just looks embarrassed.
They park a few minutes away. Jaejoong's hands and legs and shoulders tremble the whole walk - he wants to vomit, but there's nothing in his stomach. Yunho places his hands on his shoulders and tells him to breathe. Jaejoong doesn't remember how.
They are chanting, Dong bang shin gi. It falls in rhythm with his heartbeat.
They're met at the compound and ushered behind the crowds into the building. They're kept behind a door as as a uniformed man commends the discharged soldiers. They can't pick out Yoochun in a sea of shaved heads. Jaejoong wants to run. Jaejoong wants to kill himself. Jaejoong wants to to go back in time and kill himself.
The man turns back, to smile at the soldiers, and asks the crowd if he can take a moment to personally thank one soldier - the crowd screams in agreement - could Private Park please step forward. Electricity and dread coalesces inside Jaejoong's stomach.
There are some special guests here to see Private Park today. Could they come forward. Jaejoong can't. There is warmth; a hand squeezes around his palm, and whispers, come on. It's Changmin.
He tugs Jaejoong forward, out of the building, into the sunlight. The world bottoms out. Yoochun looks at them, his eyes wide.
There is a moment of silence. And then.
And then.
The screams could deafen.
Yoochun’s smile could blind.
TVXQ reunited at last? EXCLUSIVE PICTURES
(Comments: 2461)
>>OPPA-DEUL U LOOK SO BEAUTIFUL UR FACES
>>can’t...breathe.......so handsome........
>>fucking traitors, crawling back when your wallets run out
>>junsu oppa >_____< i’ve waited for you >______< for so long >______<
>>THE RISING GODS OF THE EAST, WEST, NORTH, AND SOUTH!!!!!!!!
>>who????
(143 new comments, click to expand)
min: Remember to breathe.
Yoochun sleeps at Jaejoong's apartment, and when Jaejoong wakes up at three in the morning to feed Jiji the light is still on in the spare bedroom. He hears music, and crying, and Yoochun softly talking to someone he calls ''dongsaeng''.
It's familiar now. They can't go outside on their own anymore. They have to change phones again. The reaction has been predictable - some people refuse to acknowledge the reunion, and some people say they're traitors to both music and humanity. For the most part, though, SM is good at PR, and Cassiopeia is good at optimism. Their album isn't going to be released for two weeks and it's already broken six records.
welcome back, dickface, Boa texts him. welcome back, dickbreath, Jessica texts him.
They go on Strong Heart, and the same people who refused to acknowledge them at awards shows fall over themselves to pay lip service. The questions are about Jaejoong's cats and Yoochun's hilarious Barcelona trip. No one mentions JYJ. No one mentions 2009.
Jaejoong does a trot version of Keep Your Head Down which makes Changmin laugh, though.
Changmin talks to Yunho, and Junsu, and Yoochun, now. His face is never as open with the two of them as it is with Yunho, but at least he smiles when Yoochun talks to him. Jaejoong burns with jealousy, and Yoochun tells him to stop being dumb.
“Why is it so easy for you?” he asks Yoochun one night, exasperated, sad. “Why does he forgive you two so easily?”
“Because I’m not you.” Yoochun is infuriatingly cryptic.
Jaejoong tells Yoochun he has no idea what he's talking about, and Yoochun tells Jaejoong his face is stupid. They let the matter drop.
All his tweets have to go through a PR team, but he still manages to slip in one of Yoochun, Yunho, and Changmin carefully drawing on an unconscious Junsu. Junsu retaliates by pouting.
The album hits number one, because it has to. Critics called it predictable, “but coming from a five membered-TVXQ I think predictable is what fans want”. Fans call it perfect, stunning, Dong Bang Shin Gi, Dong Bang Shin Gi, over and over and over again. Jaejoong didn’t know what to call it. They cut out his two tracks.
“Are we selling out?” he asks Junsu as his hair is poked and prodded by stylists. It's three hours to their comeback stage but they have been here for five, because perfection takes work.
Junsu looks at him in the mirror. His expression is serious, and doesn't suit him. “Where we started, do you think we ever had the chance to sell out?”
Jaejoong shrugs. Junsu eyes him for a moment longer before sighing. “Hyung. Were you happy?”
“Yes.” Junsu looks pained but continues.
“Are you happier now?”
Jaejoong pauses. “No.”
“Do you think you might be happier, later?”
Jaejoong looks in the mirror, and sees Yunho and Yoochun, bent over Yoochun’s iPad as he explains the concept of a ‘Twitpic’ to their leader. He sees Changmin on the couch, pretending to watch SPICA's stage but really eyeing the two members with an amused smirk. He sees Junsu, watching him watch them with an expression so hopeful, so ready for rejection, it could break his heart. He sees himself. His cheekbones are gaunt. There are lines in his forehead he hasn't seen in years. He is so tired.
He nods.
Changmin watches him in the mirror.
“Coming up in just a few minutes, for the first time in almost six years, Dong Bang Shin Gi!”
Jaejoong sits next to him on the couch. Changmin's watching the monitor with blank eyes, and doesn't say anything, just scoots over to make room. Jaejoong leans his head against his shoulder, and the youngest stiffens. It takes him longer than it should to relax, but Jaejoong doesn't mind. It was like that last beginning.
''How do you think we'll do?” he mumbles, his eyes half-closed. He sees SPICA bowing; he sees Changmin's jawline, strong. “Do you think they'll like us?”
Changmin flicks Jaejoong's ear, hard and familiar. “How could they not?” He says it so arrogantly, Jaejoong's proud, fierce magnae. “We're TVXQ.'' He looks down at Jaejoong, finally, and smiles. Jaejoong's breath catches, like it does every single time. “They’d be stupid not to.”
There's an apology crystallizing in his throat, along with a million other things. Some of them are big and some of them are small and some of them are secret, and only a few are regretful. Instead he says, ''I'm glad I came back.''
Changmin doesn't say anything, but he doesn't stop smiling, and for now, that's enough.
They clasp hands, like they're supposed.
Jaejoong looks to his left. He looks to his right. He breathes.
The curtain goes up.
“One, two, three - hello, we’re Dong Bang Shin Gi!”
Pairing: OT5 (Jaemin)
Rating: PG
Summary: Seven years later, and everything's changing.
Notes: This was posted a year ago, but I was never quite satisfied. After heavy revision, I'm still not really, but. Please note, this fic contains heavy implications of eating disorders and suicidal thoughts.
Exhibit 1.
After many years out of the spotlight, Korean pop group JYJ has released their second Japanese album, "Reason”. Despite the group's seasoned fanbase, the album has been met with lukewarm success. Their previous album (''In Heaven", 2011) dominated the international charts; its successor, however, has largely failed to find success in both digital downloads and physical purchases.
Fans (perhaps hyperbolically) have accused JYJ’s previous management agency of putting pressure on Japanese distributors to blacklist the group. The company has not responded to these allegations.
Exhibit 2.
Name: Jung, Yunho
Age: 25
Date of enlistment: January 1, 2012
Exhibit 3.
From: parky6586@live.com
To: bchangu@cjes.co.kr
hyung, i don't understand? i thought you said we shouldn't take any meetings. can someone please tell me what's going on??
Message delivery failed.
Exhibit 4.
Two voicemails left on Kim Jaejoong’s cell-phone.
“Hyung, I think you should say yes.''
“I'm calling on behalf of Kim Youngmin. We would like to formally extend an invitation to you, Park Yoochun, and Kim Junsu, to attend a meeting next month discussing the terms of your contract, as per your request.”
Exhibit 5.
A small announcement on the news page, underneath the link to a new f(x) CF: We would like to welcome Xiah Junsu, Micky Yoochun, and Youngwoong Jaejoong back to TVXQ! and the SM Entertainment family. Please continue to support them.
Jaejoong justifies it in the following ways.
Junsu’s newest album is blacklisted before it comes out. His radio bookings are cancelled; his television spots are pulled. One by one, the sponsors drop out. The stadium is half-empty, and the bills aren't payed. On the plane ride back, when he thinks Jaejoong is asleep, he starts to shake.
Yoochun’s eyes are as bloodshot and dry as Tokyo, 2006. He's chain-smoking as though he wants lung cancer; when he calls Jaejoong, he's like a man begging for the noose. When Jaejoong tries to talk about a new album, he hangs up.
Jaejoong can't write.
In the car, Junsu stares out the window. He's wearing sunglasses but Jaejoong knows his eyes are red. Yoochun is still in his fatigues - Jaejoong tries to tease him and Yoochun tries to laugh, and Jaejoong feels like a champion.
Yoochun said yes after a month. Junsu has been saying yes since 2010. Jaejoong still hasn't agreed.
Yunho pretends to smile at them across the table. Changmin doesn't even look up.
Junsu signs his name quickly, as though if he looked down any longer the words might burn. Yoochun lingers over his signature before handing the pen to Jaejoong. He looks straight ahead, and then at the desk, and then at his lap, and then he shuts his eyes.
The pen weighs heavy in Jaejoong's hand. He looks up. Yunho is staring at out the window. Changmin is staring at the desk. He does not recognize either of them. He looks down.
The first time Junsu suggested it, Jaejoong didn't talk to him for three days. The second time Junsu suggested it, Yoochun had been in the army for two days, and their Japanese agency announced they would "not seek to extend their contract with JYJ".
Jaejoong hadn't eaten in three days and Junsu started crying.
Kim Jaejoong, he prints, carefully and on the dotted line.
Changmin stands up and leaves.
Yoochun still has three months of service. SM thought it would be bad for publicity if they pulled him out early, but at least they got him switched from active to public service. The limo (because they have limos, now) shuttles him away before Jaejoong's pen has left paper.
It is Yunho and Junsu and Jaejoong and six lawyers at the reunion of the century.
Junsu asks, very quietly, if he can see Hyukjae.
Yunho's lips tighten, and a lawyer asks for their cellphones.
There's an impasse.
Management has decided to wait on the reveal until Yoochun comes back and they have the complete set. They fill their time with photo shoots and hair cuts and album preparation. It's familiar and so fucking safe. In his spare time, Jaejoong hates himself.
There are provisions in their contracts now. Things that will hurt them if they sue; things that will hurt their families if they sue. Nondisclosure agreements. Apologies that will be made. Songs that will be taken. In return, SME will pay their debts, and they will sing.
Changmin doesn't talk to them. He will look at them, and he will nod in their direction, but in the last month he hasn't addressed either of them beyond ''hello''. It's not so much hate as apathy, and Jaejoong really doesn't want that. In this black-tar kind of way, he wants Changmin to punch him in the face, because that would require him to look at Jaejoong.
Yunho doesn't know what to do, and maybe that's worse. Sometimes he smiles at Junsu, which makes Junsu happy, but he doesn't do it that often, which makes Junsu sad. He never smiles at Jaejoong, which makes Jaejoong go home and stare at his ribs in the mirror for two hours. He looks at Jaejoong a lot, and sometimes he tells Jaejoong when he's got a hair out of place, but mostly he just laughs with the coordi-noonas and looks like he wishes he wasn't there. He and Changmin talk in corners a lot.
Junsu smiles, though. Jaejoong eats, sometimes.
Jaejoong starts smoking again. CJES is bought out, but very quietly.
Jaejoong calls Yoochun at when he is finally released from a meeting about his comeback hair color. It is three in the morning.
“I want to go back into the army,” he says, in lieu of a hello. “At least I'll get sleep there.''
Yoochun responds with the time, and a fuck you, and a ''This is what you signed up for.'' His voice is muffled and cottony.
“Exhaustion?”
“Being a star.”
Jaejoong snorts. “It’s about singing - it's about you and Junsu,” he says, “it’s not about a fucking spotlight. They should know that.” He says it with a viscous bite he only ever gets with the help of a late-night buzz.
“Jae,” Yoochun says, ''I have to get up in twenty minutes, so if you actually start to use us as excuses I'm going to hang up. Yeah, we might be part of it, but if you tell me that's the whole thing I'm going to hang up. I mean, Jesus. It's been five years. What were you expecting?”
Jaejoong was expecting a week of awkward conversation, of Yunho flinching away when Junsu tried to touch him and Changmin going tight-lipped and dark-eyed when Jaejoong unthinkingly brought up their lost years - only for the four of them to be drawn back together by some shared memory that reminded them that whatever they had lost wasn’t as important as what they had had, and could have now. And then it would be all better. And then it could be okay.
Jaejoong got a week of awkward conversation and avoided glances, Yunho flinching away when Junsu tried to touch him and Changmin going tight-lipped and dark-eyed when Jaejoong unthinkingly brought up their lost years. And then another week. And another.
‘this can’t last forever,’ Junsu tweeted, ‘and this won’t last forever. one day. one day.’ The fans assumed he was talking about Tigger, who was staying with Junho.
min: You took my brush when you left, can you give it back tomorrow?
Kim Jaejoong (work): aish, sorry, i was sleepwalking, ill get it back to you asap
min: Thanks.
Jaejoong-hyung: how does changmin hav e my number
su: It's four am
su: Why do you have his
Jaejoong starts drinking alone, in that Jaejoong drinks alone and Junsu and Hyukjae play fighting games on his Wii-U. Jaejoong likes it when Junsu is happy, and sometimes Hyunjoong comes over and they talk about despair until Hyukjae and Junsu start laughing and knock over the empty beer bottles.
Junsu twitpics it and the coordi-noonas post the picture on his dressing-room mirror. He catches Yunho examining it when he thinks Jaejoong isn't looking.
They have two lead singles, a slow-burning ballad and a hyper-intense dance routine. Jaejoong asked if he could write the ballad and was politely denied - they gave him two songs on the album, though, and he takes that victory. The song they end up going with is tragic and saccharine. It will be a chart topper.
Yoochun is out in two weeks. They're trying to get the album as finished as it can be with only four voices. Tonight they're working on the dance track's solos. It's ideal because it means they don't have to pretend at harmony, but it sucks, because they have to sit in a room together.
Changmin, at least, got out of it two hours ago; he claimed a late-night photoshoot as he was saying goodbye to Yunho. It's three in the morning and they've been here for five hours. The sound people are fussing in the booth, so the talent has been left to its own devices.
For Junsu that means going over exactly what is wrong with Jaejoong's dance solo beat by beat for the last twenty minutes straight. For Jaejoong that means watching him with a half-glazed, half-infuriated expression. For Yunho that means watching them without a word.
“Hyung,” Junsu sighs, snapping his fingers in front of Jaejoong's face, “are you even listening to me? I'm not doing this to torture you, I'm doing this because I want you to be the best.”
“After you, of course,” Jaejoong says. He pulls his phone out, almost by instinct.
“Always,” Junsu replies, grabbing Jaejoong's phone and putting in his own pocket. “No, hyung,” he reprimands, “no Twitter! I told you, you have to get this right before practice tomorrow.”
“It's fine,” Jaejoong sighs, letting his neck flop forward and wincing at the ache.
“No, it isn't!” Junsu crosses his arms. “You are actually the worst and you are ruining things.”
“He's right, Jaejoong,'' Yunho says, “Lee-seonsaengnim is gonna break something - you - if you mess up again.''
It's only a beat of silence before Junsu is agreeing wholeheartedly, tilting his body to include Yunho in his coalition of the disappointed. Jaejoong has to muster up the strength to raise his head - he's so tired - but it's worth it to see Yunho smiling softly as Junsu rallies against laziness and Jaejoong, nodding in agreement every time he's called on for support.
It's not the most Yunho has talked to them in the last month but it's the sincerest he's sounded, and Jaejoong isn't sure what to make of it; of his words, of the way he looks at Junsu, of the way he looks at Jaejoong when he notices him watching three minutes later. When the sound guys call Junsu in for another take Yunho wishes him good luck.
They don't talk again that night, but the next day he wishes Jaejoong good morning, and asks Junsu about FC Men, and when Jaejoong stumbles during dance practice he laughs with Junsu and helps the eldest get back up. He kind of flinches when Jaejoong grabs his arms, but at least he doesn't pull away.
Changmin watches them in the mirrors, and when he notices Jaejoong looking turns his back.
When JYJ was formed, Jaejoong started this habit of taking really long cigarette breaks (mostly to get away from Junsu when he was getting over-emotional about Jaejoong's rapidly shrinking stomach). The habit hasn't died with DBSK's rebirth - before, when he knew how upset it would make Yunho, he refrained from smoking during work, but five years have quickly taught him how easy it is not to care.
When his cigarettes disappear out of his bag one day, he assumes that one of the coordi-noonas or a PD snagged them. He asks around until Yunho tells him, with a slight uncertain smile, it had been Changmin. He gestures to the magnae, who glares back at them all tight-lips and bullish challenge. Changmin retorts that just because he's decided he'll die in five years doesn't mean the rest of them have to help him. He says it all while dancing, so it's strange, but it's the most Changmin has talked to him in a month and he's too out of breath to yell. Jaejoong grins at him in the mirror, and Changmin glares. His neck is flushed red.
It's weird, the week before Yoochun comes up. Junsu is super excited but is trying not to show it. He and Changmin are sort of talking to each other again; the dancers have Madden set up in a changing room, and they're working out their friendship through societally endorsed homoeroticism. Jaejoong is jealous in an obvious way, but Changmin still won't talk to him and doesn't seem to care. Yunho is understanding, but not sympathetic.
''You want him to forgive you immediately,'' he tells Jaejoong one night after dance practice, ''I mean, Jae, I love you, that's never changed, but I haven't forgiven you. None of you, not completely.''
''No,” Jaejoong shakes his head, ''I just want him to consider forgiving me. You know him better than us, Yunho, you know that when he gets a grudge he will hold it closer than his mother. He gave Junsu a chance, he's gonna give Yoochun a chance, I know it, and I've been trying and trying but he won't even fucking look at me except to yell at me. I mean, it's not. Fair?”
Yunho looks at him with pity. ''Jaejoong, you're my best friend and I don't idolize you the way Changmin did. You didn't see him in 2009. The way our Changmin was that year, do you honestly think he'll be back to normal in three months?” He shakes his head. ''I love you, but you were a jackass to him. If I were him I wouldn't fucking forgive you that fast. I'm sorry for swearing.''
Jaejoong starts writing these really dumb love songs, the kind Yunho likes to listen to when he works out. He doesn't show them to Junsu, because Junsu would get what they mean and smile at him in a horrible way. He throws them away before he can even consider showing them to Yoochun.
Jaejoong hides during lunch and leaves during dinner. He thinks he's stealthy enough to get away with it, but he forgets that he's not the only one paying attention.
Changmin corners him after a meeting about the album art, too late at night for Jaejoong to fight back. "Are you eating?" Changmin asks, his eyes narrowed. His shoulders are hunched and his mouth is sort of twisted into a grotesque caricature of anger. Jaejoong might have read pity there if Shim Changmin could ever lower himself to pity anyone.
"Ye-" Jaejoong begins to lie, but Changmin's expression kills the lie before it even has a chance to breathe. "Sort of," he responds instead, "I'm trying." It comes out like a protest.
"This isn't just about you, hyung," Changmin says. He sounds disappointed, which is how he always sounds around Jaejoong now. "Don't be so fucking arrogant."
Jaejoong eats the next day, just a little bit, but enough for Changmin to see. The magnae isn't paying attention.
They all go together, the day Yoochun gets out. Their PR thinks this is the ideal reveal - the poignancy, the screaming fans, the a backdrop of patriotism: it really couldn't be better.
The car ride is awkward. They can't agree on music, and Junsu is so jittery he keeps smacking Changmin's knee with his hand, and Yunho's gone all disapproving father on them, and Jaejoong just really wants a cigarette and Yoochun and for Changmin to look at him.
Yunho tries to coach them all as they approach the recruitment center: there will be crowds, there will be cameras, stick together, try not to die. Jaejoong is tired and cranky and scared and at one point he snaps, “Yunho, we've been idols for ten and a half years, I'm pretty sure we know what to do with a cameraman.'' Yunho looks put-out, but Jaejoong catches a barely-there smirk before Changmin hides it away.
Yoochun is standing at the center of a sea of camouflage. Fangirls scream from all sides, waving signs and pen-lights and hands; camera flashes blind them and the soldiers. The soldiers standing behind Yoochun look embarrassed and awed. Yoochun just looks embarrassed.
They park a few minutes away. Jaejoong's hands and legs and shoulders tremble the whole walk - he wants to vomit, but there's nothing in his stomach. Yunho places his hands on his shoulders and tells him to breathe. Jaejoong doesn't remember how.
They are chanting, Dong bang shin gi. It falls in rhythm with his heartbeat.
They're met at the compound and ushered behind the crowds into the building. They're kept behind a door as as a uniformed man commends the discharged soldiers. They can't pick out Yoochun in a sea of shaved heads. Jaejoong wants to run. Jaejoong wants to kill himself. Jaejoong wants to to go back in time and kill himself.
The man turns back, to smile at the soldiers, and asks the crowd if he can take a moment to personally thank one soldier - the crowd screams in agreement - could Private Park please step forward. Electricity and dread coalesces inside Jaejoong's stomach.
There are some special guests here to see Private Park today. Could they come forward. Jaejoong can't. There is warmth; a hand squeezes around his palm, and whispers, come on. It's Changmin.
He tugs Jaejoong forward, out of the building, into the sunlight. The world bottoms out. Yoochun looks at them, his eyes wide.
There is a moment of silence. And then.
And then.
The screams could deafen.
Yoochun’s smile could blind.
TVXQ reunited at last? EXCLUSIVE PICTURES
(Comments: 2461)
>>OPPA-DEUL U LOOK SO BEAUTIFUL UR FACES
>>can’t...breathe.......so handsome........
>>fucking traitors, crawling back when your wallets run out
>>junsu oppa >_____< i’ve waited for you >______< for so long >______<
>>THE RISING GODS OF THE EAST, WEST, NORTH, AND SOUTH!!!!!!!!
>>who????
(143 new comments, click to expand)
min: Remember to breathe.
Yoochun sleeps at Jaejoong's apartment, and when Jaejoong wakes up at three in the morning to feed Jiji the light is still on in the spare bedroom. He hears music, and crying, and Yoochun softly talking to someone he calls ''dongsaeng''.
It's familiar now. They can't go outside on their own anymore. They have to change phones again. The reaction has been predictable - some people refuse to acknowledge the reunion, and some people say they're traitors to both music and humanity. For the most part, though, SM is good at PR, and Cassiopeia is good at optimism. Their album isn't going to be released for two weeks and it's already broken six records.
welcome back, dickface, Boa texts him. welcome back, dickbreath, Jessica texts him.
They go on Strong Heart, and the same people who refused to acknowledge them at awards shows fall over themselves to pay lip service. The questions are about Jaejoong's cats and Yoochun's hilarious Barcelona trip. No one mentions JYJ. No one mentions 2009.
Jaejoong does a trot version of Keep Your Head Down which makes Changmin laugh, though.
Changmin talks to Yunho, and Junsu, and Yoochun, now. His face is never as open with the two of them as it is with Yunho, but at least he smiles when Yoochun talks to him. Jaejoong burns with jealousy, and Yoochun tells him to stop being dumb.
“Why is it so easy for you?” he asks Yoochun one night, exasperated, sad. “Why does he forgive you two so easily?”
“Because I’m not you.” Yoochun is infuriatingly cryptic.
Jaejoong tells Yoochun he has no idea what he's talking about, and Yoochun tells Jaejoong his face is stupid. They let the matter drop.
All his tweets have to go through a PR team, but he still manages to slip in one of Yoochun, Yunho, and Changmin carefully drawing on an unconscious Junsu. Junsu retaliates by pouting.
The album hits number one, because it has to. Critics called it predictable, “but coming from a five membered-TVXQ I think predictable is what fans want”. Fans call it perfect, stunning, Dong Bang Shin Gi, Dong Bang Shin Gi, over and over and over again. Jaejoong didn’t know what to call it. They cut out his two tracks.
“Are we selling out?” he asks Junsu as his hair is poked and prodded by stylists. It's three hours to their comeback stage but they have been here for five, because perfection takes work.
Junsu looks at him in the mirror. His expression is serious, and doesn't suit him. “Where we started, do you think we ever had the chance to sell out?”
Jaejoong shrugs. Junsu eyes him for a moment longer before sighing. “Hyung. Were you happy?”
“Yes.” Junsu looks pained but continues.
“Are you happier now?”
Jaejoong pauses. “No.”
“Do you think you might be happier, later?”
Jaejoong looks in the mirror, and sees Yunho and Yoochun, bent over Yoochun’s iPad as he explains the concept of a ‘Twitpic’ to their leader. He sees Changmin on the couch, pretending to watch SPICA's stage but really eyeing the two members with an amused smirk. He sees Junsu, watching him watch them with an expression so hopeful, so ready for rejection, it could break his heart. He sees himself. His cheekbones are gaunt. There are lines in his forehead he hasn't seen in years. He is so tired.
He nods.
Changmin watches him in the mirror.
“Coming up in just a few minutes, for the first time in almost six years, Dong Bang Shin Gi!”
Jaejoong sits next to him on the couch. Changmin's watching the monitor with blank eyes, and doesn't say anything, just scoots over to make room. Jaejoong leans his head against his shoulder, and the youngest stiffens. It takes him longer than it should to relax, but Jaejoong doesn't mind. It was like that last beginning.
''How do you think we'll do?” he mumbles, his eyes half-closed. He sees SPICA bowing; he sees Changmin's jawline, strong. “Do you think they'll like us?”
Changmin flicks Jaejoong's ear, hard and familiar. “How could they not?” He says it so arrogantly, Jaejoong's proud, fierce magnae. “We're TVXQ.'' He looks down at Jaejoong, finally, and smiles. Jaejoong's breath catches, like it does every single time. “They’d be stupid not to.”
There's an apology crystallizing in his throat, along with a million other things. Some of them are big and some of them are small and some of them are secret, and only a few are regretful. Instead he says, ''I'm glad I came back.''
Changmin doesn't say anything, but he doesn't stop smiling, and for now, that's enough.
They clasp hands, like they're supposed.
Jaejoong looks to his left. He looks to his right. He breathes.
The curtain goes up.
“One, two, three - hello, we’re Dong Bang Shin Gi!”