Alone, I had Only to Wish for lunathunderhead 1/3

[feixing]

Title: Alone, I had Only to Wish
For: lunathunderhead
Pairing: Sehun/Kai
Rating: NC-17
Length: 31,100
Warnings: alternate reality, angst, (((car accident)))
Summary: “I felt that I had been happy and that I was happy again. For everything to be consummated, for me to feel less alone, I had only to wish that there be a large crowd of spectators the day of my execution and that they greet me with cries of hate.” - Albert Camus, The Stranger
A/N - Dear lunathunderhead, I hope I can tell you another story, once this one is over. With sincere thanks to Miaou, for everything.



Jongin is seven when he first joins a ballet school. His mother holds his hand as they enter the studio where the auditions are held and he has no expectations. When the adjudicators announce the names and numbers of those accepted into the Primary Boys I class, Jongin’s name is not called out. He is not altogether surprised, even if he is disappointed.

“Park Jaehyun, number twenty-seven, and Kim Jongin, number forty-one, please come with me.”

Jongin lifts his head sharply and wonders what’s going on. A stern faced woman leads him into a smaller empty studio.

“We would like to offer you two positions in our Primary Boys II class. It seems that both of you would be excellent additions.”

Jongin is speechless.

“Why don’t we ask your parents what they think?”

At age seven, he is one of only two newcomers to the Primary Boys II class. A class where the established hierarchy does not want to be shifted. At that age, Jongin already understands that the perceived value of a dancer is articulated through the curve of their elbows, the bend of their fingers, and the tapering off of sharp, delicate lines. And having the best lines was the only thing that really mattered to him, to the other students, to their teacher, and to the world.

The thirteen pairs of eyes that examine him when he enters the studio don’t affect him at all. They analyze him without subtlety, looking him up and down, wondering if he’ll be any good, wondering if they would be able to best him if it came down to a competition. He can almost see the thoughts running through their minds like the lines of a book, open and easy to read.

Within moments of their first warm-up exercise, a simple circle sequence done to an upbeat mazurka, it becomes apparent to his peers that Jongin possesses a certain gift. He has an inherent talent for dance, and even if he is just a young boy, too small and bony without the muscle structure of a man, there is a certain fluidity in his actions, movement without jarring or jerkiness. The air with which he carries himself is not typical for a seven year old; everyone’s eyes are immediately drawn to him.

While his teacher leads them through pliés and tendus at the barre, Jongin pays attention only to his body. He takes care to suck in his stomach, until he remembers to point his toes and in doing so forgets about his tummy. As focused on posture as he is, he does not notice the other boys around him who are quietly jostling for closest position to him, trying to catch his eye and whisper, “partner?” to secure a place beside him. What they really want is to be a part of the pair that impresses the woman at the front of the room, the woman with a solemn look on her face, gray hair pulled back into a tight bun, the same woman who had auditioned Jongin and noticed something special.

She lets them battle for positions as her “favourites”. It remains her only source of unique entertainment in this setting, like a civilized bullring where boys throw each other under the bus in hopes of receiving one or two words of acknowledgement. She holds onto praise tightly, pressing her lips together firmly as she watches, knows that any compliments will be rarer than ever with this new boy in the studio.

The studio cannot contain Jongin as he gallops across the room with the boy who won the power struggle to be his partner. The teacher smiles at them without saying a word, and proceeds to outline every mistake that the other pairs make with an exasperated sort of tone. The boy with Jongin thanks him, to Jongin’s confusion. He’s small and broad-shouldered, but powerful and smooth in his dancing. Later, as soon as they finish their reverence, he will introduce himself, and Jongin will nod coolly without processing the name, leaving the change rooms before the others have gotten their shirts on.

Jongin won’t remember any of their names, doesn’t remember becoming friends with any of them. Not for lack of others trying, but because he doesn’t see a point when they don’t really want to be friends with him, just friends with what he might eventually come. He resents that a little, resents that he’s only worth the reputation that precedes him, and that if he failed to meet their expectations for him, he’d be worth nothing to them.

None of them will remember the other boy who joined the class, the one who came in the same year as Jongin. The small boy with spectacles and poor turn out, but with just as much heart and soul as the others, the boy who ends up totally ignored. Though he doubles his efforts to keep up with some of the more advanced students, he will be forgotten and neglected and no one will ask about him when he drops out halfway through their fourth year. Jongin won’t say anything, but he will remember.

He remembers when he’s auditioning for the School of Performing Arts, he remembers when he’s auditioning for SM, when he auditions over and over. He remembers that there were two boys, one who excelled, and another who didn’t, and he knows which one he has to be at all cost. He knows which one he has to be when they interview him, when they ask him “do you want to dance?” and Jongin tells them no, tells them that he needs to dance. The interviewer smiles at him, and he thanks George Balanchine.

Jongin is sixteen when he makes Sehun come for the first time. Or maybe fifteen, he can’t be sure.

Jongin isn’t the greatest at making friends. People only gravitate towards him when he’s dancing, but take away the barre and dance floor, he is aloof and alone. The lack of friends is a mixture between others being too scared to approach him and him being too scared to approach others.

He’s not like Sehun, who seems to naturally attract everyone around him.

Sehun doesn’t try to make him laugh; he tells awful jokes that Jongin laughs at anyway, by virtue of how ridiculous they are and the faces Sehun makes when he tells them. Jongin laughs easily and earnestly at stupid things, and Sehun readily obliges him without thinking. Instead of asking Jongin about Jongin, Sehun tells Jongin about Sehun, recounts trivial facts about his family, about his life before this school, and even things that happened just yesterday, like burning his tongue on the ramyun and being grateful he can’t taste how crappy the cafeteria food is today. They tease each other when they get too gangly to know what to do with their limbs, and give each other advice when choreography isn’t coming smoothly. Jongin isn’t usually serious even if he acts like he always is, and Sehun brings out the kid in him.

Jongin appreciates Sehun’s playfulness. It reminds him that just because someone isn’t being serious doesn’t mean that their heart’s not into it. Sehun makes dancing fun, manages to help Jongin channel the onstage personality into the offstage one, and he feels like a normal boy his age again. He doesn’t notice that they’ve become inseparable until one day someone introduces them as “Jongin, the best dancer in the school,” and “Sehun, his best friend,” and Jongin doesn’t know which statement makes him laugh harder.

It happens when they’re showering after dance practice. They’re the only ones left because they stay rehearsing longest, and being naked beside each other is nothing new, but then Sehun gives a little moan and Jongin turns to look at him. Sehun’s head is tilted back, steam rolling off his skin, he’s half hard and looking every bit a naked teenage boy.

Jongin touches him instinctively; hand already on Sehun’s cock before he knows what he’s doing. He never really figures out what he’s doing, fingers wrapped around Sehun and stroking relentlessly. It’s awkward. It’s awkward because Sehun’s his best friend, and he’s jacking Sehun off in the showers. It’s awkward because he’s kind of at a loss for what to do but Sehun thinks he has everything in control. All Jongin knows is what makes himself feel good, and little tips that Taemin hyung has taught him in order to be discrete in the dorms, but all that is useless now. There’s no one but them in the showers, and the angle is completely wrong compared to how Jongin usually holds his arm, the movement giving him a cramp in his wrist, and he has no idea how close Sehun is because he’s not Sehun.

But Sehun keeps making these little noises, hums of appreciation, gasps, and groans and he looks like his legs are going to give out at any moment, and suddenly one of Sehun’s hands is gripping Jongin’s shoulder tightly, and he backs them up against the wall so that he can lean against it and not have to hold himself upright. Jongin thinks that with the state Sehun’s in, he must be doing something right. So he keeps going, snaps his wrist jerkily, running the ring he’s formed around Sehun’s cock up and down, everything feeling slick from the shower and Sehun’s moaning grows louder. Jongin’s sure by now, sure that there’s a sensation building in Sehun, sure that he feels damn good with Jongin’s palm providing all the heat and friction Sehun could want.

He squeezes his fingers gently and pauses. Sehun whimpers loudly and obscenely and Jongin relishes how much control he has, how he can make Sehun feel good but also feel needy at the same time. He redoubles his efforts, ignoring the soreness in his hand and pumping Sehun, pumping and pumping. Sehun arches forward into him, so desperate and so close, and Jongin runs his thumb across Sehun’s slit. Sehun thrusts twice into Jongin’s hand before coming; he loses all the energy in his body, doubling over against Jongin for support.

Afterwards, they don’t talk about what happened. Jongin wonders what Sehun would have done if Jongin hadn’t reached out, he wonders if Sehun would have jacked off in front of him, he asks himself if he would have watched, if he would have gotten hard too, and joined him, two teenage boys in the showers getting off in the middle of the night. There’s a thought in the back of his mind that he doesn’t want to think about - that he thoroughly enjoyed feeling the weight of Sehun’s cock in his hand, that he didn’t mind jerking him off at all. He doesn’t exactly wonder if this is what it’s like to be in a relationship, but they go from best friends to best friends who get each other off pretty damn quick.

Jongin is eighteen when the first EXO teaser finally rolls out. They say EXO, but it’s only Kai, a car, and a pocket watch. They gather together behind a laptop screen, tiny in comparison to the number of them, twelve grown men squeezed too close together and craning their necks to see not much more than a few twirls and overuse of flash camera techniques and water effects. Jongin gets to sit on the only actual chair because he’s the only one in the teaser, but part of him would rather not watch at all. Lu Han hyung somehow manages to push his way to sit beside him, and Jongin is mostly relieved to have someone else’s thigh pressing against his. It grounds him, a little, in this moment where his dreams of becoming a star are finally being realized. He has to hold his breath the entire way through. Lu Han notices and squeezes his knee.

When the video ends, he can see Lu Han’s eyes crinkle and his lips form a smile out of his peripheral vision. Chanyeol makes some kind of ugly laughing noise and starts to clap. Jongin’s not sure if he’s being made fun of until everyone else starts cheering for him too, and he thinks he understands, he thinks that they’re all allowing themselves a moment of elation, finally realizing that this is real, that they’re an actual band, and they’re going to debut. They pat him on the back, ruffle his hair, whoop with joy, and he lets himself laugh with them, feeling truly happy for the first time in a long while.

Someone puts their arm around Jongin’s shoulder and whispers congratulations into his ear. He doesn’t realize that it’s Lu Han hyung until after almost everyone else has dispersed. Chanyeol pulls Jongin onto the couch for a few celebratory rounds of Halo, and Jongin allows himself to be louder than usual whenever he gets a kill. He thinks he probably deserves it. Chanyeol shrieks every time he gets killed, and Jongin laughs at him every time, takes no mercy as Chanyeol swears at him relentlessly and loudly. After each game, Chanyeol pulls him into a headlock and Kyungsoo looks at them both with so much displeasure that they end up helping him set the plates and food on the table for dinner. Chanyeol drags him around the dorms to round up the others so that they can eat together. He’s incredibly obnoxious about the whole process, but Jongin laughs instead of telling him to shut up.

After most of them are finished eating, Joonmyeon goes through a quick briefing to give them a rundown on the next day’s plans. He’s probably saying something relevant and useful when Jongin pulls out his phone to text Lu Han, wondering where he is.

Lu Han texts back ‘with a friend’ and an excess of squiggles that makes Jongin wonder if Lu Han is actually twelve years old.

He jokingly asks, ‘are you seeing someone, hyung?!’ and smirks a little bit in at how witty he is.

He’s pretty sure that he’s got Lu Han in a corner until his phone vibrates again and reads Lu Han’s, ‘nope but are you seeing sehun-ah?!?!?!’ Jongin’s smirk turns into a frown. Joonmyeon looks over, a little puzzled at what he’s said to make Jongin unhappy.

Jongin doesn’t look at Joonmyeon. He looks at Sehun, who’s staring blankly at Joonmyeon-hyung and quite obviously not paying attention. Jongin doesn’t know if the arrangement they currently have can be called a relationship. Is that what they call it when you grind against someone under the sheets late at night when you think that everyone else in the dorms must be asleep? He doesn’t think that really qualifies as “seeing someone.” He decides on texting Lu Han ‘wouldn’t you like to know?’ and turns his phone off, thinking that was that.

Later, moments after Joonmyeon’s done talking and moments before Lu Han returns to the dorms just in time for dessert, Jongin turns his phone on and checks his texts again. There are two messages.

He opens Lu Han’s message to find nothing but a winking face and Jongin thinks that it’s unbelievable a person like this could be older than him.

The other is from Sehun, and reads ‘fuck, i’m horny, will joonmyeon hyung ever shut up’ and Jongin has no idea what to think.

At that moment, he doesn’t have to think, because Sehun does the thinking for him, as well as the jerking off. After, Sehun sits cocooned in Jongin’s blankets and leans against Jongin’s shoulder, playing Mario Kart on his 3DS even though his breathing still hasn’t evened out and they accidently got semen on the sheets and someone’s going to have to clean it up later. It’ll probably be Jongin. Sehun yells at his character easily, acting as if the fingers he’s using to press ‘a’ and ‘b’ weren’t just wrapped around both their cocks, as if orgasms don’t matter. Jongin supposes they don’t.

“Lu Han hyung said he would treat for a midnight snack later, do you want to come?” Sehun asks after his Yoshi comes in first place again.

“Bubble tea again?”

Sehun doesn’t look up from the screen as he starts another round. “Yeah, probably.”

Sehun leaves it up to Jongin to clean up the mess. Jongin doesn’t mind, but he’s tired, and his nerves are frayed, he doesn’t know what Lu Han hyung is saying to him, but he knows he wants to keep fucking Sehun even if it’s a secret, and bandmates aren’t supposed to fuck bandmates. He doesn’t think about that. Instead, he drags Chanyeol and Baekhyun with him into their living room to gather around the space heater and makes Chanyeol play all the new R&B songs that he thinks Jongin might like. Jongin hates all of them and likes all of them at the same time. They remind him that he’s in a boy band with eleven other guys and he’s sucking one of their dicks.

Eventually, Baekhyun makes his excuses to shower and sleep and looks pointedly at Chanyeol as a reminder that he needs to sleep too.

“Yeah, I know, I’ll go to bed soon,” Chanyeol confirms, without actually moving. He doesn’t move for a long time, staying with Jongin to sing along to weird English music from America that Jongin doesn’t really quite understand the lyrics to.

“I can’t decide if it’s easier to pick up rap lyrics in English or learning them in Mandarin,” Jongin says.

Chanyeol laughs at him, laughs at the idea that memorizing sounds and tones for rapping could be difficult. Chanyeol is the only real rapper in the entire company; Jongin thinks of course he would find it easy. When Chanyeol caves to fatigue as well, he apologizes to Jongin with his eyes already half closed. He’ll probably forget to brush his teeth and he’ll end up drooling on his pillow and in the morning Baekhyun will be the one who sorts out the crimp in Chanyeol’s neck.

Jongin watches Chanyeol walk away and thinks that Chanyeol is a great friend to him, almost as good as Baekhyun is to Chanyeol. He lays his head down on the sofa, and accidentally falls asleep to the hum of the space heater.

In his dreams, he’s in a darkened room and Sehun is walking towards him slowly and deliberately. When he gets close enough to touch, Jongin reaches his hands out, wanting simply to feel and know that Sehun’s existence is real. As soon as his fingertips brush against Sehun’s collarbone, Sehun dissolves into a hundred tiny pale butterflies and he’s left grabbing at nothing but air. The butterflies fly upwards, away from Jongin’s life in a kaleidoscope, and disappear.

When he wakes up, someone’s trying to open the door. He hears Lu Han’s soft voice whispering a goodbye and Sehun appears out of the doorway, padding into the living room.

“I didn’t mean to fall asleep,” Jongin says, lifting his head barely off the cushions. It comes off as a justification, but he doesn’t know why he needs to justify himself and he doesn’t know what he’s justifying.

“The light was still on,” Sehun comments. “Were you waiting up for me?”

“No,” Jongin says truthfully, “or at least, I don’t think so.”

Sehun stares at him with his brows furrowed. Jongin’s learned the hard way that even though he’s the one fucking Sehun, going on one of Lu Han and Sehun’s bubble tea dates always leaves the other party feeling like a third wheel. It feels like that even if all the rest of EXO are there. For some reason, it’s become their thing, and they bond over it in a way that Jongin will never understand. Jongin and Sehun are best friends. Lu Han and Sehun are more like brothers, and in thirty years, Lu Han will still coo at Sehun being an absolute brat and Sehun will still look up to Lu Han in a way no one else comprehends. The closest comparison Jongin can make is Lu Han and Jongin’s friendship, so inexplicably codependent that Jongin has difficulty knowing how to get through days without Lu Han’s stupid emoticons.

“Get some sleep.”

He can’t really explain it, but he suddenly understands why Baekhyun never mothers other people, but still ends up bossing Chanyeol around anyway. Sehun, predictably, rolls his eyes and walks toward the bathroom, shifting his weight from hip to hip for each step, walking with the same deliberation as the Sehun in Jongin’s dreams, walking with purpose, as if he were a model on a runway. Jongin closes his eyes.

At their first water break during practice the next day, Jongin rushes to find himself an empty practice studio. He doesn’t bother to shut the door closed behind him and collapses onto the floor, cheek pressed against the cold wood, and muscles releasing just a little bit. He stays there, entire body feeling boneless, and wills himself not to fall asleep.

Without warning, a heavy weight presses down on his back and the entire lower half of his body spasms a little. Jongin’s head shoots up to look in the mirror and sees Lu Han, hands digging into Jongin’s muscles. Jongin throbs with pain and tension. His entire body seems to vibrate with need, with some kind of desire for human touch, Sehun’s touch-.

“Wow, I can’t believe how stiff you are,” Lu Han says while rubbing firm circles against Jongin’s waist. “How are you still moving when all of your muscles are like this?”

Jongin grunts a little, but doesn’t bring himself to comment. The feeling of fingers pressing against all the knots in his back and gently teasing them apart make his legs feel weak. They’re not Sehun’s fingers. He knows that it’s Lu Han hyung giving him a massage but he still moans a little. Lu Han chuckles at him and presses into him harder. Jongin winces, and can’t tell if he’s hurting more or less.

He doesn’t remember how it all built up, but the tension had just gotten worse with each practice and after all the recording sessions that were too many hours long what he really needs right now is for Sehun to comfort him so he can finally relax his shoulders.

“Jongin, lower your shoulders,” their choreographer had nagged throughout the entire practice. He thinks he probably can, now.

And after a while, he imagines that it’s Sehun, long, thin fingers kneading his back, squeezing the muscles and touching him all over. He thinks about a hundred little butterflies all resting on specific points along his back, pinning him down with enough pressure to relieve all the tight soreness in his muscles. Like little acupuncture needles, draining him of any hurt, miraculously making him feel better, making everything okay. He doesn’t imagine that the butterflies are Sehun, doesn’t imagine, doesn’t, doesn’t, and fortunately, Lu Han’s voice interrupts his thoughts.

“I just wrapped Yixing up in bandages, so I’m going to give you a compress too. I feel like the company should be doing this, but they probably don’t give a crap unless you collapse on stage or something.”

Jongin nods his agreement, or tries to, but his cheek is still pressed against the ground and he’s not planning on getting up anytime soon. Or at least, not until Lu Han slips an arm under his shoulders and lifts Jongin up off the ground so that Jongin can stand with some assistance. Jongin limps slowly to the door, and bumps into Yixing, who’s coming out of the studio across the hallway. He looks to be in just as much pain and the two of them share a wry smile.

Lu Han helps both of them back to where the larger group overall is working on choreography. They have a few moments to spare so Lu Han goes to grab them water bottles. Sehun is in a corner with Zitao, discussing baseball cap designs off a website they’re looking at from Zitao’s phone. Jongin watches the two of them, lost in their animated discussion, watches while chugging water and wiping off sweat, slowly forgetting that they’re in a dance studio at all. They could be just friends, maybe in a cafe somewhere, or even outside a university, they could be normal. The only care in the world that they have is whether that leopard print will go with anything else, not whether or not they can get through rehearsal unscathed, whether or not someone will fuck up during their next performance, whether they’ll get scolded again. Jongin remembers, then, that it doesn’t matter about the leopard print, because if the company asks you to do something, to wear something, to say something, to think something, you just do it, no questions asked.

Luckily, he doesn’t have an invested interest in clothing. Jongin doesn’t have an invested interest in anything except dancing really, doesn’t know what’s going on in the fashion world, or in any part of the world, not even the current affairs in his own country. All he understands is dance, and he knows that isn’t normal. He thinks he should at least care more about popular music and actually appreciate what Chanyeol shares with him instead of being so neutral about it all. Really, he just wants to be normal, not imagining Sehun’s hands on him all the time, not thinking about Sehun as some kind of butterfly prince, not being jealous that Sehun has close friends that aren’t Jongin, not having a world that is slowly starting to spin tighter and tighter circles, until it’s revolving around Oh Sehun.

He doesn’t know how he’s gotten here, nor how he’s let it go this far, but now he doesn’t think he can find a way out either. Sehun catches his eye right before they’re about to begin again and smiles the smile with his eyes that takes up his entire face and starts to show him joking childish dance moves. Jongin knows that he should be mimicking those moves but it takes him a while and by the time he’s figured out what he’s supposed to be doing, they’re being called back to attention.

That afternoon, Jongin dances with ferocity and doesn’t notice anyone else in the studio. He doesn’t see them, or hear them. He knows they’re there, peripherally, but there’s something he needs to get out of his system, something that can only be danced out, and he loses himself in the music, gives every single position and movement his maximum effort, throws himself into it.

By the end, of course, he’s completely burnt out.

Jongin tries to catch his breath. He stands up only to bed over again and touch his toes. He stretches his entire body, glutes, calves, hamstrings, back, arms, and waist. When he’s done he reaches up towards the sky and smiles a little. He thinks he feels better.

The choreographer shakes their head and claps Jongin on the shoulder.

“If you try to dance away all of your problems kid, you’ll soon find that dance is your problem.”

“I’m pretty sure it already is,” Jongin replies, grinning.

When they get back to the dorms later, Lu Han inspects Jongin’s lower back and waist again.

“It’s not that you’re uninjured,” Lu Han begins slowly, “but it seems that my massages work?”

Jongin smiles at him. “I feel so much better. You just keep on believing that you’re the solution to all my problems, hyung. Just keep thinking that. It’ll be easier for you, right?”

Yixing hasn’t shown any signs of improvement.

“What the fuck, Jongin, are you normal?” Lu Han wonders with his hands on his hips.

Jongin shakes his head, laughing.

“I don’t know how you got better so quickly, but I still think you should take it easy for a little while, alright? Don’t want you getting any stress fractures or sprains right now, right before we debut. If you dance any more, I think you’ll be aggravating the issue. It’s not like being an idol doesn’t already take a physical toll-.”

“No,” Jongin interrupts Lu Han and clarifies for the second time that day. “Whenever there’s something wrong with me, I just need to dance more. And then I’ll be okay.”

Jongin doesn’t look at Sehun, and he doesn’t think about the butterflies. At least physical ailments have tangible fixes.

Jongin is nineteen. One day, Jongin wakes up and sees Sehun curled up into a ball beside him. The sun has not yet risen. It’s four in the morning when Kim Jongin closes his eyes and sleepily thinks, fuck, I’m in love with my best friend.

Jongin takes a deep breath. He had always thought that the world would sit at a standstill when he fell in love. He thought everything around him would halt. It didn’t. Nothing changes. The world goes on. Kyungsoo gets up and asks him why he is sitting at the dining table and not eating. Jongin eats. Sehun goes on. Sehun wakes up second last and drinks milk while Jongin cleans up his own dishes. And Jongin goes on too. He looks at Sehun and thinks that Sehun is not in love, Sehun is in like with having Jongin’s dick buried in him. He promises himself that he won’t share this bit of information with anyone, not even Lu Han hyung.

A light flashes in his face. Jongin blinks and Lu Han smiles at him, camera in hand.

“Good morning, Jongin,” his voice is cheery.

Jongin mumbles, “Good morning,” and doesn’t let a note of his recent revelation slip through. He thinks.

He stares at the photo developing in Lu Han’s hands, drying to reveal Jongin’s rather sleepy face in a lazy sort of smile. Lu Han pulls a marker out of nowhere and writes the date on the bottom, as well as Jongin’s name in neat Hangul.

“Are you going to be forgetting my face sometime soon?” He jokes.

“I just don’t want to ever forget this moment!” Lu Han is entirely too cheery this morning for his own good.

Jongin freezes up a little, and tries to reassure himself that Lu Han can’t read minds, that Sehun’s not going to look at him tomorrow and tell him that he’s not interested in commitment or fucking a bandmate forever. He takes a deep breath and doesn’t look at the picture of himself. Doesn’t look at Sehun. He looks Lu Han in the eye and rolls his eyes exaggeratedly.

“I can see it now hyung, when you’re old and reminiscing about this fifty years from now, you’ll pull that picture out and remark on that young man with the handsome face.”

“In your dreams. You’ll be wishing that you had taken more pictures to remember my beauty instead.”

“Both of you are wrong,” Sehun says, slinging an arm around each of their necks, “It’ll be my cute and adorable face that you’ll both be missing.” He sticks out his tongue.

Jongin laughs. Not at Sehun’s audacity, but at the three of them, standing there with dark and heavy eye bags, each of them looking like absolute shit from exhaustion, and finding it in them to joke about their beauty. Jongin’s looked in a mirror recently, he knows that his cheeks are sunken and his skin is breaking out and he looks like death warmed over. He knows that Sehun probably looks the same, worn out and chronically fatigued, but he also knows that he finds Sehun incredibly endearing.

He buries his face in Sehun’s shoulder and groans. Lu Han pats him on the back.

“It’s okay that you find our terrible humour funny. It makes sense because none of your jokes are funny anyway.”

Jongin swats at Lu Han half-heartedly, and thinks that this whole knowing that he’s in love thing is going to be a lot harder than he thought.

Jongin hates car rides. He spends the entire time with his thigh pressing against Sehun’s. Sehun is looking straight ahead with his eyelids heavy, trying not to fall asleep. Jongin is steadfastly looking anywhere but at Sehun, thinking about anything except the warmth of where their bodies are touching. He suddenly feels claustrophobic, and it’s like he can’t breathe.

He doesn’t think it should be like this, can’t imagine that he would be sitting in a car, staring out at a window, so terrifyingly conscious of Sehun in the space beside him. This isn’t what love was supposed to be like. He tries not to react when Sehun’s head hits his shoulder, acts completely normal as his best friend naps on him. This is normal, this is how they act all the time, touching and being in each other’s spaces. This isn’t normal.

Baekhyun and Chanyeol are in front of them, having what appears to be a competition to determine which of them sounds more like that strange bird creature in the movie Up. Jongin thinks Chanyeol is winning until Baekhyun lets out a cawing noise that shouldn’t be humanly possible. Chanyeol can’t stop shrieking with laughter, and won’t stop clapping his hands.

“I win right?” Baekhyun asks, doing a little celebratory dance in his seat.

“Only if being able to sound like Kevin can really be considered winning.”

So that’s what the bird’s name was.

“Face it, Park Chanyeol, you’ll never beat me at imitating strange things.”

“Whatever, you’re never going to be able to rap like I can.”

“Are we really going to do this, because I can think of a hundred songs you could never sing-”

“Please don’t do this,” Jongin begs, turning to Kyungsoo and Joonmyeon for support. Kyungsoo is dozing against the window, mouth slightly open and cheek squished against the glass. His ears are sticking out again. Joonmyeon is listening to something through his earphones and doesn’t look up from whatever he’s reading. There’s no one to save him now.

“Chanyeol’s not going to do anything because he knows he’s going to lose, no matter what,” Baekhyun taunts.

Chanyeol, in a perfect imitation of a three year old, flicks Baekhyun in the head and sticks his tongue out at him. He starts to sing “Hero, hero, hero, hero, hero, hero, hero, I’m a hero,” loudly in a low voice and Baekhyun thankfully rushes to put a hand over his mouth.

“No, stop it, every time we do this you’re always pretending to be Simon D and that’s so boring.”

Jongin internally gloats because Chanyeol’s voice is muffled, but nothing actually stops Chanyeol from trying to make himself heard. He croons and hums despite Baekhyun’s attempts to silence him and Jongin only stops himself from strangling Chanyeol because he doesn’t want to wake Sehun.

“Can you stop?” Baekhyun says, a little out of breath, “It’s like six in the morning, I’m not awake enough for this!”

Chanyeol momentarily pauses.

“Wait, ew, what the fuck, did you just lick me?” Baekhyun removes his hand from Chanyeol’s face as quickly as possible and wipes saliva on Chanyeol’s jeans.

Jongin gives both of them a look of disgust. Baekhyun is now reenacting a scene from The Simpsons and Chanyeol is interjecting his best Bart voice at appropriate intervals. He turns away from them and stares at Sehun’s reflection in the window. Jongin hates car rides.

When they finally arrive at the airport, Jongin is already exhausted from having to listen to bickering the entire car ride there. Fans shrieking into his ears are the last things he wants to deal with. He spots them even before they’ve driven up to the drop-off area, the gaggle of them, anxiously peering at them, on the lookout. He tries to steel himself as they approach. He thought Chanyeol was being loud, but he knows that one person singing is nothing compared to what he’s about to hear when he steps out of the car.

Jongin nudges Sehun awake as gently as he can. Sehun comes to slowly, and makes an irritated face.

“You move a lot when you’re sitting in a car, you know?” Sehun complains.

“Next time, you don’t have to lean against me,” Jongin retorts.

By the time Sehun’s realized where they are, Joonmyeon is already stepping outside, and Sehun groans into Jongin, who unbuckles their seatbelts and grabs their bags quickly. He hands Sehun’s to him without a word and grimaces as he’s greeted by loud screaming when gets off the car. He doesn’t look at any of the girls standing there, only looks up behind him to make sure that Sehun is following. The entire walk to the check-in terminal, he keeps his head down and carefully avoids bumping into anyone. They shove things at him, posters, gifts, and pictures they want him to see. He’s a little overwhelmed by cameras flashing from every angle, and wonders how they can be so energetic this early in the morning.

Even as EXO and their staff are lining up, he hears occasional bursts of shouting. It’s really too early for this. He’s barely awake, and is only standing at all because of an extra cup of coffee. Shoulders hunched, he knows that he’s radiating grumpiness and wonders why that in itself doesn’t deter the insistent cheering and constant attempts by the fans to get a raise out of him by yelling his name as loudly as they can.

“You’ve got my attention, why can’t you just keep quiet?” He mumbles through gritted teeth.

Joonmyeon whacks him in the back of his head and chastises him. “Be nice. Smile at them or something. Fanservice, remember?”

Sehun snickers at him before going off to find Zitao so he can point out one of the funnier signs even though Zitao probably won’t understand what it means.

Jongin sighs. He’s sleepy, and he’s annoyed, and he doesn't want to give fanservice. It’s easier just to lean against Lu Han and close his eyes for a bit. Lu Han doesn’t flinch, just accepts Jongin into his space and continues talking to Minseok.

“They’re such a good team,” Lu Han complains, “But they just can’t finish strong in games. I can’t tell you how frustrating their complacency issues are to me, much less how much it must suck for them.”

“Half of them are on Bayern, and Bayern doesn’t have nearly the same difficulty with holding on,” Minseok is insisting, “They just don’t practice enough together.”

“So help me god if one more person tells me that their greatest weakness is their defense, I will eat that someone’s face.”

Minseok nods in agreement before saying, “Hey, wait, not mine right?”

Lu Han ignores this comment. “If one more person hounds Lahm or Mertesacker…” He looks murderous, and it’s probably not a look the fans should see.

“And England? Portugal? Their chances?” Minseok tries weakly, in a hurried attempt to steer the topic away from a more dangerously disposed Lu Han.

“Don’t talk to me about either of them. Just don’t. I don’t want to think about it.”

“Spain,” Jongin whispers into Lu Han’s ear, to some fan’s delight.

Lu Han shifts away from Jongin and frowns. “Brazil’s probably going to win the cup, or something,” he says loudly, “Even though I don’t like it. If it’s a European team, it will definitely be Germany.”

Jongin laughs. He thinks about Ramos, Xavi, Villa, Casillas, Iniesta, and Torres, and knows that the Spanish team is the favourite to win the 2014 World Cup, even if only South American teams have so far ever won the cup in South America.

This is easy, this leaning against others and just talking to them kind of fanservice. It keeps Jongin’s mind away from the fans and the camaraderie is comforting. He watches as Zitao and Sehun tease each other, poking and prodding and laughing. The kinds of friendships they’ve built with each other have become a form of fanservice too.

After getting through security and arriving at the gates, Jongin finally gets the chance to sit down and slump in his seat. It’s only been a couple hours since he woke up in the morning, but he feels like an entire day has already passed. He settles his backpack beside his feet and fishes out an iPod from within. He’s plugging in the earphones when Sehun settles down beside him. Jongin slides an earbud in place and offers the other one to Sehun, who takes it without looking.

They sit, side-by-side, silent until their flight is called. Sehun makes him laugh at all the right times, and they swap saliva almost as frequently as they swap silly stories with each other. In the end it’s in moments like this one, when they aren’t even looking at each other but simply enjoying each other’s presence, that Jongin feels most at ease. It reminds him that it doesn’t matter what language they speak, that they don’t need hand gestures or even physical touch to know how the other is feeling.

“Let’s go,” Sehun says, and drags Jongin up out of his seat like Jongin had dragged Sehun off the car earlier that day.

“Better take one last deep breath before we’re in the hazy air of Beijing again.”

“I like Beijing.”

“Whatever.”

They walk in step with each other to the queue, passports and boarding passes in hand. The music that they’re sharing pulses between them and for the first time since they first began travelling out of Korea for performances, Jongin doesn’t feel like he’s flying away from home.

The first thing Jongin does when they arrive at the hotel is to find a space where he can practice. He hates leaving Korea because he doesn’t have a rehearsal studio. He hates flights even more than he hates sitting in a car because the time spent in a cramped space is even longer and he can never feel his legs when he gets up. It's a very painful kind of numbness, and in order to stretch out all his limbs, he always ends up on the roof or some equally bizarre place just so he can get blood flowing in his veins again. He knows that at least twelve fans had followed them into the building, and probably three have the guts to take the elevator up with them. Someone's going to end up blogging about how disrespectful it is, and someone else will have to post a warm note about how much everyone in EXO loves their fans. It's almost become routine, and Jongin needs to get away from it.

As soon as the elevator announces their arrival in recreation floor, Jongin finds himself amongst a whole lot of unused gym equipment and a whole lack of people. He turns up the volume on his iPod, shoves it into the pocket of his hoodie, and lets himself go. He's stiff and sore and cold, and his neck is still in pain from when he fell asleep awkwardly pressed against the window, but it feels good just to not be sitting still. The others are probably napping, unpacking, or doing some kind of relaxing activity like normal individuals. They have a schedule in the afternoon, and everyone's still tired from the plane ride. In a sense, it's better that Jongin's up here dancing, so that he doesn't end up falling asleep again and finding it impossible to wake up.

There's a lot of choreography in Jongin's body. Preprogrammed to each song that he's learned, things that he's picked up from Taemin, or pieces of choreography that he's had to memorize for the dozen EXO teasers that he danced for. It's all in there, along with anything that dance teachers and professional instructors had shown him over the years. And he pulls out whatever he can think of now, to music that he wishes he could dance to regularly, pushing himself to sweat and feel alive. He doesn't stop until a stunned couple comes across him midway through twisting his torso. He hurriedly stops and bows to them, rushing off so that they can sit and enjoy the pool. They probably think he's crazy, or something, and definitely don't recognize him as a Korean pop idol.

He takes the stairs back down, since his body is still charged with adrenaline and he feels like he could move perpetually. Back in his hotel room, Sehun is watching weird cartoon shows playing in Chinese that he definitely doesn't understand and Zitao is eating ice cream while telling Sehun a story. Sehun probably doesn't understand what Zitao's saying to him either. If there’s anyone who’s been lazier about keeping up with their Mandarin homework than Jongin, it’s Sehun.

Jongin slips into the shower and washes the sweat off his skin. This is perhaps the most enjoyable and least enjoyable part about being in China. He always feels slightly sticky, like there’s a layer of something covering him that he can’t wash off. No matter how hard he scrubs, it stays there. But whenever he’s in the bathroom, all the freebies that come with the hotel room are a blessing. The warm water rolls off his back and the scent of the shampoo and conditioner is nicer than the ones he uses at home, even if they're probably of poorer quality. When he turns off the water, the TV is still playing and he can hear Sehun giggling. Jongin dries himself quickly and wraps a fluffy hotel bathrobe around himself before joining the other two in front of the television.

Closer to the time that they have to leave, Zitao slips out to go back to his own room, and Jongin thinks he should probably put on some actual clothes, reluctant as he is to change out of the comfortable robe. Sehun doesn't take his eyes off of what he's watching, immersed in identifying the one or two words in Mandarin that he actually knows and laughing at the misery of the main character. Jongin doesn't even bother pretending he can follow what's going on, even though the plot doesn't seem to be all that intensive. China makes him feel all out of sorts, because everything that seems like it could be familiar isn't quite.

Even talking to the other members is a little strange. Lu Han slips into Mandarin quickly, just because he sees all the signs are in Chinese, and even though he only speaks in Korean to Jongin, it seems weird hearing Lu Han's native tongue at any other point in time. It makes him just confused enough that he doesn't feel comfortable in his own skin, but it's not strange enough that he can numb himself against it. It's probably a sign that he should be paying more attention in their Mandarin tutoring classes, and stop playing video games when he should be revising for pronunciation and vocabulary, but he knows that the Korean members in Super Junior-M all got by with only a few phrases. Besides, dancing's supposed to be a universal language that transcends whatever dialect it is that their fans are speaking, or whatever.

For the entire time that they're at the photo shoot, there are two sets of orders that are called out. The actual photographer keeps yelling things in simple Mandarin, and it's clear that only two or three of the Korean members understand what he's saying. The second set of instructions is coming from a translator, and Jongin wonders if they've ever tried yelling something wrong or the opposite of what was wanted just to see the chaos that would erupt. He would have a lot of fun playing around like that, but it would probably get someone fired.

In the interview that follows, only Wu Fan, Lu Han, Yixing, Zitao, Joonmyeon, Jongdae, and Minseok actually answer questions. The other five of them sit around, nodding at appropriate intervals, and trying not to look like they have no idea what's going on. Jongin has not a single clue what they're saying, or what they're being asked. Even with the translator, there's too much that he doesn't understand for him to keep trying to pay attention. He's not as diligent as Joonmyeon when it comes to being involved in the conversation, and he knows that even Chanyeol and Baekhyun, who usually both have a lot to say, have lost the trail of the discussion a long time ago.

When someone announces that they’re finished, Jongin feels relieved. They bow to all the staff working there, and smile whenever someone smiles at them. He'll probably be scolded later, for not even trying to say something simple, even though Lu Han had been training him to say cheesy things like “I love my fans” and “You are so beautiful” for days in advance. He’s too tired to care, much too interested in getting back to their hotel to finally go to sleep.

As usual, there are screaming fans in the lobby of the hotel when they arrive. He doesn't know how they keep doing it, finding them wherever they go, and then sharing their information with all their friends. They might as well be screaming their location out to the entire world. Jongin almost wonders why EXO even bothers trying to avoid them anymore; it seems like an impossible task. No matter where they go, day or night, someone will inevitably spot them and in the ensuing chaos, an EXO member will always either get hurt or really pissed off. It's a miracle that he can walk through the crowd of them at all, and an even bigger miracle that he doesn't get stuck on the elevator with any of them on the way up. He imagines that's probably the most awkward situation that any idol can be put in, and thinks that it's strange the fans don't find it awkward too.

Sehun takes another twenty minutes to get up to their shared room.

“I’m alive,” he announces dramatically after opening the door.

“Did you get caught by one of them or something?”

“They just refuse to get out of your hair,” Sehun says, fluffing his own hair.

“What happened?”

“Had to take a back entrance. There was no way anyone in our van was going to get through the crowd. I have no idea how the lot of you got up here unscathed,” Sehun complains. He sighs exaggeratedly.

Jongin snorts a little. Unscathed today, but there's no telling what would happen tomorrow. There's anxiety in him whenever they have to go out in public these days, and he should be used to it by now, but he's not.

Sehun lets Jongin use the bathroom first. Jongin brushes his teeth and washes all of the make up off his face as quickly as he can so Sehun can get to shower. He collapses onto his bed gracelessly and removes all of his clothes except for his boxers before slipping under the covers. With the bed lamp still on, he ends up reading a volume of manhwa as Sehun goes through his own bedtime routine. When Sehun gets out of the shower, he doesn't even pretend to go on his bed. He dries off his hair and throws his towel into a hamper before diving in beside Jongin.

“Read to me.”

“It's a comic, Sehun, it’s not exactly like a bedtime story that you can read to small children. Half of what's going on is explained in pictures.”

Sehun laughs. “Alright, let me read too.”

Jongin can never refuse Sehun whenever he asks for something.

When they're finished the book, it's a little past midnight and Jongin wants nothing more than to sleep. He's about to turn off the light when Sehun whispers into his ear, “Jonginnie.”

Jongin shivers. He's tired but -.

Sehun is insistent. Neither of them is wearing very much anyway, and he doesn't resist when Sehun kisses him.

“Fuck,” Jongin whispers.

“Fuck,” Sehun agrees, “I've wanted your dick in my mouth since you put that suit on.”

Jongin can't breathe. He takes a moment to slide his tongue along Sehun's bottom lip and ends up getting pushed down into the mattress as Sehun rolls over on top of him. He's tired, but it's been a while since he's had any release. He's tired, but Sehun is sucking on his tongue. He's tired, but he wants this, badly. He's tired, but he remembers that earlier today he realized he was in love with his best friend and he hopes that Sehun doesn't realize anything's changed when he presses his tongue against the roof of Sehun’s mouth, exploring everywhere, and claiming Sehun’s tongue for his own.

Sehun's fingers slide down his chest and Jongin moans.

“Shh, we don't want Lu Han hyung hearing and then making fun of us in the morning, do we?”

Sehun pinches one of Jongin's nipples with his thumb and index finger and gently sucks on the other. Jongin slips a hand in between Sehun's legs, cups his balls and squeezes at his cock. He releases his hands in order to position Sehun's hips just so, aligning the two of them so that their dicks slide against each other, forcing Sehun to stop what he’s doing and catch his breath. Jongin trails open mouthed kisses along Sehun’s jaw and doesn't stop rubbing against him, cocks brushing against each other through the fabric of their boxers.

“Stop, fuck, if you keep doing this, I'm going to come,” Sehun says, all the while humping Jongin rather willingly.

“Isn't that the point?” Jongin asks, increasing the friction between them and wrapping a leg around Sehun’s waist.

Sehun responds by shifting his body weight back on his knees and gripping the waistband of Jongin's boxers to remove them. He takes off his own and slides further down the bed so that he can position his head at Jongin's pelvis. He runs a hand along the length of Jongin's cock and Jongin strains against his fingers, hips arching upward and head leaning back into the pillow. He growls.

“Awake now? You've been sleepy all day.”

Jongin can't respond any more than by gasping out Sehun's name. Sehun darts his tongue out to wet his lips, and touches the tip of Jongin's cock with his mouth. Jongin's breathing is heavy as Sehun licks and sucks slowly and deliberately. It's enough that Jongin desperately wants release, but not enough that Jongin can actually find it. Sehun takes Jongin’s entire dick into his mouth and hums. Jongin closes his eyes and summons all of his self-control to prevent himself from screaming. With one hand he threads fingers in Sehun's hair, with the other, he runs fingers along Sehun’s cock. Sehun's mouth is hot and wet and feels incredible against his skin. Sehun licks a stripe from the base of Jongin's cock to the tip and Jongin has to pull away.

“Here,” Jongin manages breathily, “Come and turn your body over here.”

Sehun obliges, lies so that Jongin has access to his cock without taking his mouth off of Jongin’s. Jongin takes Sehun in his hand, strokes slowly and then takes him in his mouth. Sehun makes a spluttering sound around Jongin's dick. Jongin keeps his lips around him, lets Sehun thrust into his mouth over and over, all while still sucking Jongin’s dick. Jongin repays the service, flattens his tongue and licks. He fists Sehun with his hand and circles the tip of Sehun’s cock with his tongue, rubs his lips against it and kisses his way down to Sehun’s balls. He takes all of Sehun’s dick into his mouth again, and tries not to gag when he feels Sehun in the back of his throat. It isn’t textbook, but it’s instinctive and it’s the only thing Jongin knows. The pooling sensation in the pit of his stomach builds; he’s almost there and then Sehun’s coming into his mouth. Sehun throws his head back and gasps when he comes, and Jongin is coming too, all over Sehun’s face.

“You fucker,” Sehun complains as he tries to clean himself up with tissues.

“Not my fault. Could’ve been coming down your throat but you had all of the poor sense to stop sucking before I was done,” Jongin sniffs.

“Still a fucker.”

“Here,” Jongin offers, and ends up washing Sehun’s face for him.

They sleep in the same bed, Sehun curled into Jongin. Jongin’s smiling as he closes his eyes, and just before he falls asleep, he thinks I love you. He sleeps soundly that night, and forgets the fact that he’s in an unfamiliar country and in an unfamiliar bed. The body that’s warm and beside him is as familiar as it gets.

Jongin sleeps so well that he almost misses his alarm. Rather than waking up before everyone else, by the time Jongin opens his eyes, Sehun is already dressed and heading downstairs. Jongin doesn’t get to the breakfast lounge until almost everyone else is gathered in small groups around tables. There’s an entire breakfast buffet laid out with a variety of cuisines but Jongin has little appetite. He waits in line to pick up a mug of coffee and holds it gingerly as he walks over to a table and tries not to spill any of it. He sits down beside Sehun just in time to hear Lu Han saying something.

“Sehun-ah, were you sleepwalking last night? Did you walk into a closet or something, is there a reason why there’s bruising down your jaw-”

Lu Han pauses for a moment and peers closely at Jongin’s face, eyes lidded and mostly asleep.

“Oh. I see.”

Jongin yawns and doesn’t process what’s going on. He takes a sip of his drink and sets it down before trying to rub the sleepiness out of his eyes. He feels more well rested in comparison to usual, but that really means nothing in the grand scheme of things, considering that his average hours of sleep a night hovers around three. He downs the coffee even though it’s scalding and doesn’t feel awake until he’s drunk the last drop.

When he opens his eyes clearly, Lu Han is glancing back and forth between Jongin and Sehun with a smirk plastered across his face.

“You know the make up staff are going to be teasing you about hickeys for weeks right?”

Jongin blinks a few times before feeling himself blush.

“Aw, look Jonginnie’s turning red. It’s okay Jongin-ah, I would know. Hyung knows that in the prime of your youth, one tends to have these manly urges, and Sehun-ah’s so adorable it must be hard to resist.”

“Shut. Up,” Jongin glares at Lu Han with as much anger as he can muster, which isn’t very much at all because he feels relaxed. He frowns at himself and tries to glare again. “Fuck your manliness and manly urges.”

Lu Han just smiles at him some more. The more Lu Han smiles at him, and the wider Lu Han’s smile becomes, the more embarrassed Jongin feels.

“Jongin-ah, don’t worry, even though you just look like an adorable puppy right now, you’re definitely manly in my books.”

Jongin tries for another glare, but jumps in his seat when Zitao sets his breakfast down at their table too, a plate of grapefruit pieces and a huge glass of water. His luck’s always been shitty.

“Why are we affirming Jongin’s masculinity?” Zitao asks, before placing a piece of fruit into his mouth. He looks at Jongin with judging eyes, as if determining if he’s wearing something wrong. Jongin slides further down into his seat and tries not to be offended.

“Jongin’s just embarrassed,” Lu Han exclaims, “It’s nothing to be worried about!”

“What is he so embarrassed about this time? Did another fan catch him making cute faces at himself in the mirror or something?”

Lu Han tilts his head in Sehun’s direction just as Sehun sleepily asks, “What do you mean another fan caught him making faces? He’s done that more than once?”

Zitao ignores Sehun’s comment and laughs. “Our babies are growing up so fast. Don’t forget to use protection now.”

“Oh my god,” Jongin says, covering his face with his hand. Lu Han coos at him.

Sehun snorts. “Hyung, it’s not like you haven’t known that we’ve been fucking for months now.”

“Yeah, but usually you’re not so obvious. Also, usually we don’t have breakfast together like this where I get to make you feel awkward.” Zitao is absolutely gleeful as he eats. The smirk doesn’t leave his face even as he chews.

Lu Han pipes in with, “I’m getting old, Sehun-ah, let the hyungs have their fun, alright? You two are so cute!” He pulls out his Instax Mini.

Sehun rolls his eyes and seems completely undisturbed as he continues eating his piece of French toast. “Bbuing bbuing,” he says without opening his eyelids fully.

Jongin bangs his head into the table and refuses to look up. “This is the worst. This is the absolute worst. And to think we even tried to keep it down. I mean. Shit.”

“Oh, so that’s what the moaning sounds coming from your room were!”

“Huang Zitao, I’m going to punch you in the face.”

Just as Jongin lifts his head to glare threateningly in Zitao’s direction, Lu Han hits the shutter button and snaps a shot. He pulls out the film the camera spits out and leaves it in his lap to dry. When the image clears, he holds it just out of Jongin’s reach to show them the rather unattractive photo of Jongin glaring and Sehun looking at his breakfast with absolutely no interest. Jongin pouts, and when Lu Han doesn’t hand the picture over, he glares at everyone at the table.

After breakfast, they’re supposed to head to the performance venue. Their managers make them rush in an attempt to get them out of the building before even more fans arrive and get in the way of the exit. Jongin already notices some taxis idling around, and the horde of fans never seems to disappear, even if the people in the group change. Already, the hotel staff members are sick of their constant presence and have yelled at them more than once for blocking up the entrance. Jongin feels sorry for them, but not as sorry as he feels for EXO themselves, who have to get through the group just to get out of the building.

One of their managers approaches them and carefully whispers, “We’ll probably have to take the back entrance. You’ll try to get out there in groups of twos or threes so that they don’t take notice. Even still, there might be fans back there already, so be careful.”

Jongin rolls his eyes and tries to keep up behind Lu Han as closely as possible when they get up. Sehun seems to be falling asleep again, and leans on Lu Han’s shoulder the entire time that they’re walking. Jongin tries to keep his head down and hides behind Zitao. As they’re waiting for the vans to pull up in the back, a swallowtail lands on Sehun’s shoulder. Jongin blinks at it while Zitao coos and hurries to take a picture with his phone.

“What are you two doing?” Lu Han asks.

“Oh my god, just look at it, it’s a butterfly!”

Lu Han joins Zitao in the cooing and Jongin laughs.

“What the fuck guys, you’re three fully grown adults star struck by an over-glorified caterpillar,” Sehun complains, but he remains still so that it doesn’t move away.

Zitao is about to defend the butterfly when a group of fans spot them and shriek. It flies away while they dash towards them and Jongin becomes incredibly put out, both by the presence of fans, as well as the fact that the butterfly was scared away. He jumps behind Lu Han so that they can’t see him, and can’t be grateful enough when the van pulls up.

Lu Han gets on first, and Jongin is about to step on when he turns to look at Sehun, who looks like he can barely stand up from being so tired.

He thinks back to the ride to the airport and asks, “Did you want to sit next to Lu Han hyung? So you can sleep, since I move around too much and all?”

Sehun shakes his head and stifles a yawn. “It’s alright, I’ll just lean against the window.”

Jongin shrugs and sits down beside Lu Han. As Sehun buckles himself in, he tries to stifle another yawn.

“You know you didn’t actually move around a lot right? I don’t really mind, anyway,” He says, before closing his eyes and putting his head on Jongin’s shoulder again.

Jongin leans his head back against Sehun’s and smiles.

Zitao pokes Jongin in the head from behind them and makes hearts with his hands when Jongin finally bothers to turn around and glare at him. Zitao giggles and feigns innocence, but does it again as soon as Jongin turns his head back. He ignores him this time, and turns to elbow Lu Han.

“Share your music.”

Lu Han takes out an earbud and holds it out to Jongin, scrolling for a song that they both know. Jongin’s about to put the earbud in his ear when he hears the sudden skidding of brakes. The earbud falls out of his hand when their car swerves sharply to the right. Someone screams and then another car is slamming into their van right where-.

He hears it after it happens, a crunch of metal, shattering glass, bones breaking. He doesn’t feel anything until after he hears it, and pain shoots up his entire right arm where he’s instinctively reached out to wrap it around Sehun. He can feel Lu Han touching him, trying to figure out if he’s okay and then he blacks out.

The sounds of sirens wake him up and his first thought is fuck, I hate car rides. His second is fuck,

“Sehun-ah? Where’s Sehun?”

He tries to get up but he can’t, he feels like his world is spinning, his eyes are closing, where the fuck is Sehun, and he feels someone’s hand squeezing his, is it Sehun’s it better fucking be Sehun’s and he loses consciousness again.

part two