Work Text:
It’s a Wednesday night, and Jaebeom is fucking stuck.
His song is a whole mess, and the more he tries to untangle it, the messier it gets. He left the studio a while ago, after falling asleep at his desk, this morning, probably, or sometime during daylight. It was definitely bright outside, and now it’s dark again, but God knows that could’ve been yesterday for all he cares. This song was supposed to be his best one yet, the next big thing, his entire heart and soul - and instead it’s a nightmare, it just won’t work, it just sits there on his computer and laughs him in the face and Jaebeom honestly considers just quitting music altogether and moving to the countryside to raise a farm of cats in peace.
Instead, he slams the laptop shut, digs his phone out from underneath the heaps of notes he’s written and scrapped, and, ignoring all other missed correspondence, texts Jackson.
‘Come over?’ he sends, because it’s really only him that can help when he's like this. Jinyoung would try his best, no doubt, but a careful selection of words has never pulled Jaebeom out of a slump, and Mark would listen, always thoughtful and attentive, but Jaebeom has been listening to his own thoughts for days on end and that's exactly what’s gotten him stuck in the first place. Also he hasn’t seen Jackson since he got back from that Hongkong music festival thing a few days ago.
‘Is this a work-call or a booty call?’ Jackson texts back, almost immediately, and Jaebeom smirks, despite himself.
‘Yes’ is all he types, after a few minutes of consideration. One doesn’t necessarily exclude the other, when it comes to Jackson.
‘Be there in an hour’ Jackson writes, accompanied with a sequence of mildly disturbing emojis in true Jackson fashion. Still, Jaebeom’s heart skips a beat. Jackson is coming over. He’s missed him, missed his warmth and his laugh and the grounding feeling of his touch, too.
With that train of thought, Jaebeom realizes he should probably take a shower or something, because it’s been long and he probably smells, and Jackson is used to Jaebeom’s artistic process and all the quirks it entails, but there’s only so much body odor that he can force himself to put up with.
Inside the shower, he sets the water to boiling hot and lets his eyes fall shut and his mind wander under the blanket of steam.
There were a couple of texts from Jinyoung that he should probably reply to, before Jinyoung starts to worry, he thinks distantly, and then his thoughts are already with Jinyoung, falling back onto him by default.
It seems like Jinyoung’s always been the default for Jaebeom. He tries, and fails, to remember a time without him, even though he knows that they’ve only met as teenagers - Jaebeom has lived more than ten years before Jinyoung came into his life and turned it upside down with a well-aimed grin and a gentle hand and a tongue like a weapon.
Jinyoung is his beginning and his end, and now, almost twenty years later, Jaebeom has not only come to accept this, but relishes it. But it wasn’t always that easy, was it.
It was dark and painful and so, so fucked up for many, many years. Dark when they’d just started to grow from children to young adults, painful when their grounding, lingering touches suddenly disappeared; when they grew scared and angry at each other, at themselves, for feeling in ways they weren’t supposed to feel, for wanting things they weren’t supposed to want.
Jaebeom had been an angry teenager and an even angrier young adult. At first he was angry at himself, because clearly there was something wrong with him and he was risking his best friend for it. Then he was angry at Jinyoung for being a liar and a coward and not feeling the same - then for feeling the same, too. And once that was over, once Jinyoung’s had enough of Jaebeom’s antics - it had always been Jinyoung that drew the lines for Jaebeom’s madness, always Jinyoung that steered him in the right direction, Jinyoung that would think instead of flying in blind, Jinyoung that was the brave one, between the two of them - once Jinyoung’s patience ran out, he made Jaebeom sit down and talk about it.
Jaebeom still remembers his face, soft around the edges with the last memories of his teenage years, but eyes already burning dark and ruthless with honesty. Remembers every single spot on his skin that’s since been treated flawless, remembers his hair sticking up every which way, remembers the slight tremble in his lips as he sighed and took Jaebeom’s hand. They hadn’t allowed themselves to touch for weeks by then.
‘Why are we doing this to ourselves, hyung?’ he’d asked, quietly, and Jaebeom felt his heart plummet into the ground.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about’ Jaebeom said, because he was a coward.
‘Can you not lie to my fucking face for a change?’ Jinyoung snorted, but he didn’t pull his hand away.
‘I don’t think I know how, Jinyoung-ah.’
‘What are you afraid of?’ Jinyoung asked, and Jaebeom wanted to laugh, because he’d been afraid of literally everything, up to that point, but under Jinyoung’s gaze, everything was burning away until nothing remained but their linked hands, and really, what was left to be afraid of, when Jinyoung was the entire world?
‘How would we even… what if people find out?’
‘Didn’t we say we won’t be idols? Who’s there to find out, then? Hyung, I’m not saying let’s get married in City Hall… I’m saying let’s stop torturing ourselves, because I don’t know about you, but I’m really tired of pretending not to want you.’
And there it was, a confession, thrown so carelessly into Jaebeom’s lap, like Jinyoung still trusted him, like he wasn’t building a career day by painstaking day, like he didn’t have to go for days on one meal to maintain some sort of impossible figure, like he didn’t wear himself paper thin, going from audition to audition to debut as an actor and finally realize his dreams. Like one misstep, one wrong word from Jaebeom couldn’t bring it all crashing down.
‘Then don’t’ Jaebeom finally said, because what else could he do? Certainly not say no - there wasn’t a single thing in the universe that he was capable of denying Jinyoung, at that point, especially when all Jinyoung seemed to be asking of him was Jaebeom himself, and he’d already had him, whether he knew it or not.
‘You’re gonna kiss me now’ Jinyoung answered, and if his voice was trembling and his hands clammy, Jaebeom didn’t notice.
‘Why?’
‘Because if I kiss you, then I know you’ll kiss back, but that’s different, that’s still my choice, and I need to be sure. I need you to be sure, hyung’ Jinyoung whispered, and his face got closer, somehow, closer but still not close enough, and suddenly he wasn’t even looking Jaebeom in the eyes anymore, and that wasn’t something he thought he could stand for another second.
So Jaebeom leaned in to press his lips against Jinyoung’s, and it was hesitant, and clumsy, and messy, and the single most perfect moment of his life.
Their first kiss didn’t even last that long, and most of it was breathlessly laughing into each other’s mouths, but it was just enough to dissipate all the bitterness and anger that’s made its home inside Jaebeom’s chest for a while. He was still angry, more at the world than anything now, angry for having to hide, angry for all the years he was forced to feel wrong about the rightest, brightest thing in his life, but Jinyoung was there to soothe him, and his music was there to shout it from the rooftops instead of him, and with Jinyoung, Jaebeom’s life was more or less on the right track.
Jaebeom stands underneath the shower until it starts to run cold, but the stream of memories don’t seem to end, even after he steps out and dries himself off. There’s just so much, so many months and years of Jinyoung and Jackson and Mark, and he supposes it’s only natural for everything to come back all at once, what with the past few days he’s had and this song poking around in the back of his mind.
It’s not like they aren’t always just on the edges of his every waking thought on most days, anyways.
He gets dressed - puts on clean clothes and tells himself it’s not for Jackson - and then grabs his phone again, checking his messages and the time. He texts Jinyoung back, just a sign of life, but he ends it with a few hearts, because he feels super shitty for pretty much ignoring him, all of them really, for the past days. It’s not like they don’t understand his artistic recluses, or Jackson’s destructive bouts of self-doubt, or Jinyoung’s crazy work hours, or Mark’s moments when the world gets too overwhelming and he needs to take a few steps back and hide in the security of his own mind. They’d spent enough time learning themselves and each other, figuring out all the ways they each fit until their lives became a single picture of perfectly cut puzzle pieces, and along the way, they’d survived much, much worse and came out on top together.
Jaebeom likes to think it’s a testament to something big and fateful, that they always win in the end. It has to be.
He doesn’t think he will ever be able to forget the day the photos came out, and that was probably the scariest day of his life - of all their lives.
He’d been at his studio, working, and by some divine luck, hit a little slump and picked up his phone just a few minutes after Jinyoung’s first missed call. There was one from Jackson, too, and then a link from him in their own chat room without any explanation, and Jaebeom had the foresight to open that first.
There was an article, too, but his eyes immediately snapped to the pictures once he realized what they were - blurry and unfocused, but definitely candid shots of Jinyoung and Mark, leaning into each other in what they thought was the privacy of an opened car door in an almost empty parking lot.
Jaebeom recognized their outfits, too, because they’d sent selfies to the group chat - it must have been on their date a few nights ago.
Jackson was at a company dinner of some sort, and Jaebeom went to visit his family, so it ended up being just the two of them, Mark and Jinyoung, out on a casual dinner date to make use of a rare free evening. And they hadn’t seen each other for a while, because apparently they couldn’t quite keep their hands off each other, and someone now had the pictures to prove it.
The whole internet had the pictures to prove it.
Jaebeom’s mind was running a mile a minute, thinking up possible explanations and discarding them right after - they could say that the photos were fake, but that would just open the doors to more speculation, because what reason would anyone have to fabricate a dating scandal between a seemingly random actor and model?
They could say the pictures weren’t what they seemed - it wasn’t like Mark and Jinyoung were kissing in them or anything. Jaebeom, of course, could see, clear as daylight, how in love they were, but that was because he’d seen their faces up close when they looked like that, all soft eyes and gentle smiles and open adoration. Still, that didn’t have to be damning evidence…
He was already out the door by the time Jinyoung picked up, and from his voice, Jaebeom could immediately tell that things were indeed as grim as they seemed to be.
‘Is he with you?’ Jaebeom asked, his heart throbbing in his throat as he ran down to the garage.
‘No, I’m at the agency. I have to go to a meeting, but can you go over to his place? Jackson’s gonna take another few hours, and I don’t know when I’ll be out. I’ll go over as soon as I can’ Jinyoung answered. He was trying his best to stay calm and collected, which Jaebeom was infinitely proud of him for, but this definitely wasn’t a time for calm.
‘Are you sure you’re okay to go there?’ Jaebeom asked, trying to be as careful as he could.
‘I know what I’m doing, hyung. Just make sure to be with him’ Jinyoung huffed, before shouting something to someone on the other end of the line. ‘Listen, I have to go, but - ‘
‘Jinyoungie’ Jaebeom cut in, dropping his head back against the headrest in the driver’s seat. ‘Are you okay?’
‘I will be, hyung’ Jinyoung answered, not sounding the smallest bit okay at all.
‘I love you’ Jaebeom said, in a hurry, but only the steady beep of the line cut answered him this time.
The drive to Mark’s apartment complex felt to stretch on for hours, every red light taking a lifetime - Jaebeom was sure he’d ran a few, but that was the least of his worries now.
Once he arrived, he thought he saw a few suspicious people with cameras lingering by the gates, but he just drove straight by, resisting the urge to get out and break their noses, which was definitely something few-years-ago-Jaebeom could not have boasted. Getting to Mark was all that mattered now.
The gatekeeper had Jaebeom’s plate number, and all that remained was a quick elevator ride from the garage, before Jaebeom was finally standing in front of Mark’s door, his palm glued to the bell.
Mark answered the door in his pajamas. He looked tired and broken and so, so painfully beautiful Jaebeom’s heart throbbed with it.
‘You could’ve just let yourself in’ he greeted Jaebeom, turning on his heels and walking back to plop himself down on his sofa, where he’d clearly spent the last few hours, judging by the empty snack wrappers and the game paused on his TV screen.
In Mark’s line of work, he hardly ever allowed himself this kind of snacking, especially in the evening. Jaebeom stood by the door, wanting nothing more than to wrap his arms around him, to pull him into his chest and whisper sweet assurements into his hair until the emptiness was gone from his eyes, but he found himself frozen on the spot.
He wished Jackson was here. Jackson knew how to console someone, knew how to soothe Mark when he was in one of his moods, just knew how to be around people even when things got messy.
Jaebeom, on the other hand, was terrible with people and with feelings and, he was starting to think, this whole relationship-thing in general. What good was he, if he couldn’t protect the people he loved from getting hurt?
Mark picked up his spare controller and waved it in Jaebeom’s general direction, which brought him out of his stupor enough that he could walk over and sit down by him, suddenly wary of touching, unsure of how to act. They were into their second round of mindless car-racing, when he felt Mark slowly leaning into his side, and when he looked down, his eyes were rimmed red. Jaebeom dropped his controller, letting his car crash on the screen, and turned to pull Mark into a hug, arms tight around his thin frame and face pressed into the top of his head.
They stayed like that for a long time - Jaebeom thought Mark had cried a little, at one point, but he never lifted his face from Jaebeom’s sweater, and eventually, his breathing slowed down again. Jaebeom refused to let go of him once they finally pulled back, and Mark laughed at his disapproving pout. It was a weak laugh, but his teeth showed and his eyes sparkled, and Jaebeom was hit by his feelings for him like by a train.
‘Blanket burrito?’ Mark asked, and he was already getting up to bring his giant fluffy blankets from the bedroom, leaving Jaebeom feeling cold and unsettled on the sofa.
They burrowed themselves under a heap of blankets, Mark tucked safely into Jaebeom’s lap, his head on his shoulder and his hands splayed against his back. Jaebeom wanted to say so many things - wanted to tell him that everything would be alright, wanted to promise that they’d get through this, together, but he didn’t want to make promises he couldn’t keep, and he thought Mark was more grateful for his honest silence than his hopeful but empty lies.
‘I’m here for you’ he thought at him, instead, and kissed the top of his messy, red hair. ‘I’ll always be here for you’ he sighed, and cradled the back of Mark’s neck. ‘I won’t ever let you go’ he promised himself, inside his heart, and pressed his forehead against Mark’s, as if he could somehow transmit his thoughts instead.
‘I love you’ he said, because that much he’d learnt to say, albeit hesitantly, by now, and kissed him, slow and gentle and careful.
Mark melted against him, hours of tension seeping out through every point of contact that their bodies made, and he opened his mouth against Jaebeom’s, tracing his tongue along his teeth.
‘Are you trying to distract my thoughts?’ he asked, once their kisses picked up pace and Jaebeom’s hands grew restless along his spine.
‘Do you want me to?’ Jaebeom asked back, drunk on the taste Mark left on his tongue and just about ready to jump out the window if Mark so wished.
‘Maybe…’ Mark sounded thoughtful and unsure, but the way his fingers were digging into the small of Jaebeom’s back was anything but.
They kept making out on the couch, hiding under the blankets as Jaebeom tugged Mark’s hoodie away to spread reverent kisses all across his neck and chest and stomach, slow and hazy and dream-like. Eventually they must have fallen asleep, because they both startled at the sound of Jaebeom’s phone ringing.
‘I’m here, Jinyoung-ah’ Jaebeom greeted, as soon as he picked up, and he felt Mark tense next to him.
‘And Jackson?’ Jinyoung sounded dead tired, and judging by the background noise, still hadn’t left work.
‘Was he supposed to?’
‘He should be there by now… he called from the car. Can you just… They don’t want to let me go, but I’ve said all I wanted to, so I’m coming over soon, too. Probably have to sneak out at night, but... Can you guys wait for me? We need to -’
‘Please don’t say ‘we need to talk’ Mark cut in, suddenly, and Jaebeom heard Jinyoung’s breath hitch.
‘But we do, hyung’ he answered, and Jaebeom knew he didn’t mean it like that, but he couldn’t help the rock that manifested in the pit of his stomach. ‘We do, but it’s okay, I promise, I’ll take care of it, okay? Just wait up for me?’
Mark went very still, once the call ended, but Jaebeom finally felt brave enough to reach out and hold his hand, waiting for him to speak.
'If he breaks up with me… No, let me finish, because I don't know if I'll be brave enough to ask once they're all here! If he breaks up with me, and he's gonna have to, doesn't he, what happens to the rest of us? Is he leaving us all? Are you all leaving me? I mean, he can’t leave you, you two are cemented, but -’
‘Hyung don’t’ Jaebeom blurted out, heart racing like it wanted to break out of his chest. This was the real question, wasn’t it? This was the nagging voice in the back of his own head, since he first saw those pictures, this was the true nightmare, the threat of losing Jinyoung, of him cutting his losses and leaving the three of them behind - but just as soon as Mark had said it, Jaebeom knew it couldn’t be true. There was nothing in this world that would separate him and Jinyoung, they promised there wouldn’t be - and they’d made that same promise to Jackson and to Mark. Not if they didn’t want it, not if they could help it, not if it was the four of them against the world.
‘Nobody is leaving anyone’ Jaebeom said, and then repeated it with more and more conviction, pulling Mark into another hug. ‘We’ll figure it out. We’ll be alright.’
And saying it now, it didn’t taste like a lie at all.
Jackson found them like that, all curled up and asleep on the sofa, and wasted no time in kicking off his shoes and climbing in with them. He was warm and solid and safe on Mark’s other side, and while Jaebeom could tell that he was upset, he didn’t say a word of it, just held them close, his breath a soothing rhythm in the frightening silence.
‘I think we should go public’ Jinyoung announced, just as soon as the door closed behind him. There were enormous dark circles under his eyes and his hair was unstyled and he hadn’t shaved, but Jaebeom’s half-asleep heart went crazy at the sight of him, finally, finally close enough to touch. He was so caught up in the joy of seeing him that his words didn’t even register, not until he heard Mark’s flat, disbelieving ‘What?’
‘I think’ Jinyoung repeated, taking a seat on the coffee table and facing them, eyes lighting up with a mad sort of excitement ‘that we should go public.’
‘What, all of us?’ Jackson asked, confused, letting go of Mark to sit up properly and rubbing at his eyes. Jaebeom himself felt sleep leave his body for possibly forever, too.
‘Well, no. That’s probably… that could be too much, all at once. But me and Mark, at least. I mean, the cat’s out of the bag, right? I talked to my management, and they weren’t too happy, but we think we can turn this around… If we want to, they said. If I’m sure it’s… permanent. Like, can you believe that? The audacity… Permanent. Of course it’s fucking permanent, my agent knows it, she’s known about us forever!’
Jinyoung was rambling now, standing and pacing up and down as he talked, but the excited smile never left his face, and Jaebeom simply did not have the heart to break his mood. He knew that he should have - all the while Jinyoung talked, big red sirens kept going off his head about all the ways this could possibly end bad, about all the bad press and the opportunities Jinyoung could lose, about all the traps of a public relationship, even a heterosexual one…
But this was, ultimately, Jinyoung’s choice, and Mark’s, and Jaebeom had recently grown into the healthy habit of not giving two shits of what the world thought of him, so he really didn’t feel like he had a say in this.
And yet, Jinyoung stopped and stared at them, expectant, like he did, in fact, want them to pitch in, like he didn’t always just go through with any idea he set his mind on, however crazy. Like Jaebeom could ever stop him from being amazing and brave and brilliant and beautifully mad.
‘I mean’ Mark finally spoke, his knees pulled up against his chest as he looked for his words carefully ‘it's hardly my career we have to worry about here. No one's really straight in fashion, it’s not like anyone expects me to be. Plus, if we do - if we go public, clearly I’m gonna be the one that got lucky with you, so it might even give me a boost, I don’t know. Not that you should care about that, Jinyoung-ah. Please don't think about my career in this.’
‘Don’t fucking say that’ Jinyoung shot back, and Jaebeom sort of echoed the sentiment. He, too, hated it when Mark was downplaying his own worth. ‘My career isn’t more important than yours -’
‘Maybe, but it’s still more fragile!’ Mark snapped, standing up and grabbing Jinyoung’s arm. ‘You’re a young actor, for fuck’s sake, this could ruin you… I won’t be responsible for ruining you, Jinyoung. I can’t’
‘But you wouldn’t’ Jinyoung said, gently prying Mark’s hand off his arm and kissing the back of his fingers, before he let it drop. ‘Just like I won't stand in front of a whole bunch of people and lie and pretend to be someone I’m not.’
‘You're an actor, Jinyoung, that's literally your fucking job.’ Jackson cut in, voice quiet and distant. Jaebeom turned to look at him - his face was pale and his eyes far away, and he was clutching a pillow to his chest pitifully. Jaebeom reached out to lay a soothing hand on his neck, but Jackson shrugged it off.
‘I won't' Jinyoung emphasised again, voice stern and determined, which always meant that the argument was over. You couldn't argue with Jinyoung if he didn't want to. 'If they outright ask, and they are asking now, I won't deny Mark in front of the world. I'm not ashamed of loving him.'
'You're such an asshole' Mark muttered, rolling his eyes, which was Mark speech for ‘I'm deeply moved and I love you too’ . ‘I don’t know, Jinyoung, I… I think we should think about it a little more, before doing anything crazy…’
‘Yeah, that’s a good idea. And maybe think about what the rest of us will be doing, if you two decide to play house in front of the whole world…’Jackson muttered, half to himself, and Jaebeom knew, realistically, that he had every right to be upset, but he also felt his blood pressure rise, just like Mark, who’d turned away from Jinyoung to glare at Jackson.
‘Can you not make something about yourself for once?’ he huffed, eyebrows drawn so tight Jaebeom could physically feel the temperature drop.
‘Oh, I’m sorry for wanting to be included in my own relationship!’ Jackson snapped back at him, and Jaebeom took a deep breath to calm himself. They all promised not to get involved in each other’s fights, even if Jaebeom started to feel more and more like he understood where Jackson was coming from.
‘Well, and I’m sorry for worrying about important things like Jinyoung’s career more than your fragile ego!’ Mark threw his hands in the air, kicking a fallen pillow aside as he stormed into his bedroom.
‘Jackson, what the fuck?’ Jinyoung asked, voice like ice.
‘I know your career is more important than my ego’ Jackson answered, which was not an actual answer at all, but Jinyoung didn’t seem like he wanted to continue the argument, because he just sighed and shook his head in defeat.
‘I’m gonna go after him’ he said, and if he heard Jackson’s murmured ‘of course you are’, then he chose to ignore it. Even on his best days Jinyoung liked to stay atop his moral high horse.
‘Wanna grab a smoke?’ Jaebeom asked, once the door closed behind Jinyoung. Jackson merely grunted, but he still stood up and followed him out onto Mark’s little balcony.
Jaebeom didn’t often smoke, and Jackson never did, but over time, it’s become somewhat of a little ritual for the two of them, when things got too heated - when Jaebeom needed take a breath instead of blowing up, when Jackson let his emotions get the better of him and had to take a step back to assess a situation. This moment now felt like a little bit of both.
‘I’m such a fucking idiot, Jaebeomie’ Jackson finally said, after staring at the smoke of Jaebeom’s cigarette for a few silent minutes. ‘I did make it about myself, didn’t I?’
‘It’s about you, too. It’s affecting all of us either way.’
‘I guess’ Jackson relented, leaning back on his elbows against the handrail.
Behind his back, the mellow, washed-out neons of the city lights painted makeshift rainbows against the backdrop of the inky night sky, bathing the edges of Jackson’s figure in yellows and pinks and reds and blues. He looked stunning, thoughtful and gentle and a little bit sad, his picture-perfect dreamboy, and Jaebeom let his eyes linger as he exhaled, his mind fuzzy with tiredness and the rollercoaster of emotions of the past hours - all of which were quieting down to the low buzz of Seoul by night, bleeding into the single thrum of his heart slowly pumping blood into his veins.
His pulse was singing, quiet and tentative, but there was a song in the beat, and it was a song for the shadows of Jackson’s lashes against his cheeks, for the sharpness of Mark’s teeth, for the curve of Jinyoung’s mouth when he said Jaebeom’s name.
‘Why are you looking at me like that?’ Jackson suddenly asked, jolting Jaebeom from his reverie. He shook his head and turned away to put his cigarette out, but when he looked back, Jackson was still watching.
‘Like what?’ he asked, as if he didn’t know.
‘You know’ Jackson huffed, his huge, round eyes smiling even as his ears started to burn.
‘Like you’re my everything?’ Jaebeom thought to himself, but he didn’t need to say it for Jackson to know. ‘You look like you’re posing in a magazine like that.’
‘Aww, hyung, you’re hot too’ Jackson smiled, and leaned into Jaebeom’s side when he came to lean on the rail next to him. They watched the night view in quiet for a while, Jackson lost in his thoughts and Jaebeom content to just enjoy his rare, silent company.
‘I get it tho, you know’ he told Jackson, and that was just about everything he was prepared to say on the matter, because somewhere deep in his gut, he really did, and that understanding stirred up all sorts of ugliness inside him.
Jackson was jealous of all the things Jinyoung and Mark would have, would be allowed to have, if they chose to go public - the hand-holding on the streets and the casual dates and the showing up to each other’s events without all sorts of excuses on the ready, the natural acknowledgement of their relationship - things that Jaebeom kept telling himself didn’t matter, but filled his heart with longing, still. Things that maybe he too wanted to share with them, with at least one of them if he couldn’t with all three, even though choosing one felt somehow even worse than hiding all three. Weren’t they all equals in this? Wasn’t that what they promised, when it all started, and when they found Jackson, and then once again, when they finally had Mark, too?
‘But hey, I can be your public boyfriend, if you wanted me to?’
‘Honestly?’ Jackson asked, grin matching Jaebeom’s, and there was the innocent, almost child-like spark in his eyes that Jaebeom fell in love with every single day. ‘You know what, we'd look so hot together… But I know. I know I can’t. I’m not even supposed to date girls, hyung. I don’t even know what I’d do if it was me and one of you. Don’t think I’d have the balls to… to come out like that. And it kills me, you know? Every time I have to bullshit about not seeing anyone, it fucking kills something in me. Jinyoung’s right. I hate being ashamed of loving you.’
'Then don't be.' Jaebeom said, pushing his shoulder into Jackson's playfully to ease the tension. Jackson's arm found its way around Jaebeom's waist.
'Keeping it quiet and being ashamed isn't the same, Jackson. I don't go around announcing anything, either, but it's enough that I know… That you know.'
'Know what, hyung?' Jackson asked. His voice was too quiet - his everything was. Jackson wasn't meant to be quiet or subdued, Jackson was a supernova meant to burn the sky. And yet, Jaebeom still found it so hard, sometimes, to fuel him, put on the spot like that. Didn't he just tell Mark he loved him, a few hours ago? Didn't he tell Jinyoung, earlier on the phone?
'That you're my heart' Jaebeom sighed, eventually, feeling somehow like the ground was pulled out underneath his feet.
'I do know, you know' Jackson turned to embrace Jaebeom properly. 'But thank you for saying it. I know it gets hard for you, sometimes.'
'Gets hard for all of us, I guess.'
'Sure hope it does' Jackson chuckled, pulling his head back to wink at Jaebeom, who groaned in defeat.
'Oh my god shut up!'
'Yeah yeah, shutting up!' Jacksom laughed, wiggling his brows, and Jaebeom laughed with him. It was near impossible not to. 'I've ran my mouth enough for tonight, haven't I? Gonna just go in and apologize… pray Mark doesn't strangle me?'
'Then get going' Jaebeom pushed him, then pulled him back to kiss him, just for good measure, then pushed him again, all the way into the apartment.
Jinyoung left the bedroom when Jackson entered, and Jaebeom could hear the warm timbre of their voices as they started to talk in rapid English-Chinese.
He could've probably understood some of it, if he paid enough attention, but he tried to make it a point not to. It was their thing, this secret language, just like talking with their eyes was his and Jinyoung's.
Jinyoung walked past him to go out to the balcony, and Jaebeom followed after him, stopping in the door to admire Jinyoung looking up at the night sky with his head thrown back. Jaebeom made a square with his fingers, pretending to take a picture, like old-old times, and when Jinyoung noticed this, he laughed. His eyes disappeared, they always did when he laughed, but when he looked at Jaebeom again, every single star shone reflected in them.
'Do you think I'm crazy?' Jinyoung finally asked, turning back to look out at the city.
'You've always been a little crazy, Young. But… if this is what you want, what you both want, then I guess we'll make it work.'
'You guessing is not enough' Jinyoung shook his head. Then, he sighed and reached his hand out to pull Jaebeom next to him. They leaned on the rail on an elbow each, their heads tilted to the side, their gazes connected, their postures mirrored, twin towers watching over a world unaware.
Then, Jinyoung plucked Jaebeom's cigarettes from his pocket, pulled one out and pressed it between Jaebeom's obedient lips.
He was nervous - he was tired and tense and afraid and so, so, so diligently fighting not to show it.
'This is… huge' he finally said, voice wavering even as his eyes didn't. 'I know it is. Again, I need you to be sure too, hyung.'
Jaebeom's heart had been full of love for years now, and he'd been pushing more and more hope in there somewhere, too. But as he looked at Jinyoung, staring at him with his fears bared but his resolve shining through them, Jaebeom finally found the conviction inside himself as well.
'I am sure, Jinyoungie. We'll make it work. We always do' he nodded, and Jinyoung stepped into his arms, his breath shaking against Jaebeom's neck like a bird whose cage had been left open.
They stood there like that for a while, recharging in their embrace, Jinyoung's heart finally calming and Jaebeom's tiredness slowly catching up on him as the adrenaline wore off, until…
'Are they… having sex in there?' Jaebeom suddenly asked, pulling back with an incredulous cock of his brow.
'Well it's Jackson and Mark in a bedroom, what did you expect?'
'Oh, I don't know, maybe that they'd be too tired for make-up sex at 4 fucking AM…' Jaebeom rolled his eyes, but he couldn't fight the grin that was starting to take over his face.
'Not everyone is as old as weary as you are, hyung' Jinyoung teased. His eyes spelled danger and the lines of his mouth a challenge, and Jaebeom shivered despite the balmy dawn breeze.
'Go fuck yourself, Park Jinyoung' he snorted, even as he tightened his arms around Jinyoung's waist.
'Fuck me yourself, you coward' Jinyoung laughed, slipping out underneath Jaebeom's arm and into the apartment. He started towards the bedroom, not stopping to see if Jaebeom was behind him, and at this point Jaebeom couldn't even feel bad for the almost Pavlovian reflex with which he followed.
'You know what, I think I will.'
-*-
Jaebeom is startled out of his walk down memory lane by the ringing of his phone - it's Mark's ringtone, which can only mean one thing, so he dives to answer it, his heart picking up speed as relief and joy floods his veins.
'You're back?' he greets, straining to keep his voice level - it's not like Mark doesn't know how Jaebeom likes to have all his ducks in a row and all his boyfriends in at least the same country. It's not like he doesn't tease the living daylight out of him for it. Serves him right for dating at least two international celebrities, he guesses.
'Yeah, just landed. Gonna head home and sleep like the dead, probably, but… you said to let you know, so… Yeah.' There is a short, rustling silence at the end of the line, before Mark speaks again. 'I'm home, Jaebeom-ah.'
They talk a little about how the flight was, how fashion week went, how Jaebeom's work is going, mainly just to keep listening to each other without having to ask for it, and then they hang up before Mark gets into a taxi, but Jaebeom feels somehow revived - like a few minutes of Mark's voice filled his head with hours of music again.
Countless musicians in Korea could thank the melody of Mark's laugh - the lines of his throat and the patterns of his palm and the warmth of his bones and the magic of his fingertips - for their greatest hits, if only they knew.
But Jaebeom knows, and Jinyoung and Jackson know, and Mark hopefully knows too, and that’s more than enough. For now.
Thinking back, Jaebeom probably knew from the very first moment he saw Mark, even if he didn't realize it right away.
For a while, it had only been Jaebeom and Jinyoung, and between the two of them, the world felt small and insignificant and entirely conquerable. But then Jinyoung met Jackson, and with a careless smile and a well-aimed wink, he turned everything upside down.
They'd met shooting some variety show that Jaebeom proudly admits to never having watched properly. With Jackson, a rising popstar, and Jinyoung, a rising actor, the producers hoped to have some fun rivalry between the two of them - instead they ended up with an unholy amount of chemistry that blew up the internet for days after each episode aired.
Jaebeom did watch the cuts, but he didn't need them to see what was going on, because the first time Jackson's song came up on TV in the background as they were cooking dinner, Jinyoung turned the stove down, pulled Jaebeom to the sofa and took his hands in a very serious manner that did not fit the general mood of wine-and-dine night at all.
'He's a nightmare. He's loud and acts way too familiar. He gets on my nerves all the fucking time' Jinyoung had said, looking at the screen fondly. 'He's such a fucking flirt. His eyes are the warmest shade of brown I've ever seen. His laugh overshadows the sun. I keep wanting to kiss him, hyung. I keep wanting to see you kiss him. Can we deal with this somehow, please?'
Jinyoung had said that he knew they needed Jackson from the start, which everyone knew to be an exaggeration, but months later, they all laughed about it, Jackson lounging with his head in Jaebeom's lap and his feet propped up in Jinyoung's.
Then, almost a year later, Jaebeom saw Mark for the first time, and he felt the world come to a screeching halt the minute their eyes met.
He'd been attending a fashion show, the designer a friend of a friend whose name was stirring up more and more recognition. Fashion was a hobby of sorts for Jaebeom, even if he himself didn’t always take part in it - but there was something profanely poetic about fashion shows, a beauty to the artificial perfection, a grand big lie crafted of so much pain and blood and tears.
Inhumanely beautiful people walked the catwalk, the thin, hard lines of their bodies pulled impossibly taut and their make-up blurring lines of age and gender and reality, and Jaebeom sat back, mind a pleasant buzz in the darkness as his senses tuned in to them, his breath catching in his throat with every flourishing turn, every dramatic flip of fabric.
It had been up there, on that catwalk, that Jaebeom saw Mark for the first time. He stalked out, a riot of dark silk flowing around him as he walked, his skin so pale it was almost white as it stretched in contrast, naked and open all the way from his jutting hip bones, up his chest and his expressionless face.
It was the most exquisite face Jaebeom had ever seen, too.
His hair was black and his eyes were black and his lips were painted black, and Jaebeom was enthralled, mesmerized, hypnotised.
He started the afterparty with a half-assed introduction to Yugyeom’s friend, the designer, while subtly scanning the crowd for one boy, and one boy only, and ended it with Mark’s number on his phone, but when later asked, he could barely remember even the theme of the collection - something with crowns and royalty and a whole lot of gold.
Mark seemed thoughtful and quiet at first, but going out with him had been a rollercoaster that constantly caught Jaebeom off-guard, to Jinyoung’s utmost delight.
‘Can I take you out to dinner?’ Jaebeom would text, and Mark would take half an hour, before texting ‘I don’t know, can you?’ back.
‘Wanna go skate?’ Jaebeom would ask, and Mark would stare at him, contemplating, before grabbing Jaebeom’s hand. ‘Take me to the amusement park instead.’
‘Let’s just go clubbing, music boy’ he said once, meeting Jaebeom in front of the restaurant they were supposed to have dinner at. And Jaebeom had been hungry - he’d been jittery, too, restless with confusion, with wanting to see Mark more and more, and dreading him at the same time, his quiet snarkiness, his piercing eyes, the velvet of his voice and the magnetic force of his thin fingers across dinner tables. But he just shrugged and went. He would’ve gone all the way to Hell, probably, because nothing mattered as much as wanting to impress Mark, who turned out to be extremely fun in the most spontaneous ways, his quiet confidence and straightforwardness overshadowing the constant voices of doubt and worry in Jaebeom’s head.
Jaebeom liked clubs, because they had no windows and the lights were unnatural and the music formed a physical entity inside, touching you and embracing you and gently molding your body into real shapes for unreal rhythms. But clubbing with Mark, dancing with Mark was a frightening affair - it was music twisting, undulating like a living beast and staring right into Jaebeom’s soul through Mark’s burning eyes.
It was Jaebeom's hands clammy and his breath beer-bitter and his lips dry and Mark's impossible mouth too close to his ears, a constant reminder of all the things he’d been wanting but wasn't brave enough to ask for.
Logically, he knew that Mark was waiting for him to make a move. Logically, he also knew he was a good dancer - he was an amazing dancer because he breathed music like people breathed air, because the beat spoke to him and in his heart the low hum of the bass always echoed. But in front of Mark and the soft, languid way his hips moved, Jaebeom felt clumsy and off-beat and suddenly didn't have control over his feet anymore.
'Have you put a spell on me?' he asked, not bothering to raise his voice over the volume of the music.
'What?' Mark shouted, leaning closer, and Jaebeom just shook his head and grabbed him, his heart in his throat. He wasn’t drunk, and he certainly wasn’t brave enough yet, but if he was one thing, it was this - unable to take another second of the unspoken tension and the unsaid words, the challenge in Mark’s eyes as he watched his every move waiting, but never stepping first.
He kissed Mark in a panic - he kissed him like he just didn’t know any better. Like Mark was the moon and he the tide, like this kiss was the inevitable crash you hear after you’ve watched as the dropped glass falls to the ground in imagined slow-motion. Like there was nothing in the world that could have prevented it.
Their teeth knocked but their lips went auto-pilot - Mark’s lips were as soft as they seemed, Jaebeom’s mind registered, as plump and sweet as he dreamed and then some. They did not stop kissing as Mark moved into Jaebeom, winding his arms around his neck and swaying to the rhythm, kept dancing as Jaebeom’s hands explored Mark’s thin waist and strong back and the bristle hairs on his neck.
They were both grinning by the time they broke apart, breathless and giddy and still dancing, always dancing, and stayed on the dancefloor long after, bodies flush together and mouths finding each other time and time again. Jaebeom’s feet never touched the ground.
He pulled his phone out when Mark went to the bathroom, checking the notifications in the groupchat with Jinyoung and Jackson. There was a string of messages from Jackson, asking how the date went, and then a short, brisky text from Jinyoung, urging Jaebeom to focus on the date and ignore Jackson, and threatening Jackson to stop interrupting. And then, at the end, there was a selfie, with the two of them curled up cozy on Jinyoung’s sofa in front of the TV with a bowl of snacks, with the caption ‘hoping you’re having fun but still missing you’. In it, Jackson was grinning like a preschooler, nestled in Jinyoung’s lap, and Jinyoung was scrunching his nose in disapproval, but Jaebeom could still see the way his chest was puffed and his head turned to show his most optimal side-profile. Affection flooded his veins, mixing with the alcohol already cruising there, creating the possibly most dangerous cocktail ever known to man, and Jaebeom couldn’t hold back an endeared laugh - just the moment Mark returned to the bar.
‘What’s got you smiling like that?’ he asked, and Jaebeom’s fingers froze mid-sending-hearts, when the situation he was in caught up with him.
It wasn’t like he didn’t tell Mark - he made it a point to tell him about them, as early as possible, but then he also made it a point to never mention them again, in fear of scaring Mark off.
But well, it was not like he was going to lie about it.
‘Just… my boyfriends’ he shrugged, trying to downplay the flurry of emotions as his brain readily supplied all sorts of possible connections between Mark and “boyfriends”.
‘They give you a curfew?’ Mark joked, and Jaebeom rolled his eyes, laying his phone down the bar.
‘Just asking about… the date. Sending me selfies to distract me.’
‘Can I see?’ Mark asked, showing interest the first time since Jaebeom ever told him about his relationship, so of course Jaebeom showed him the picture.
‘Cute’ he remarked, staring at the screen just a second too long, before giving the phone back. Jaebeom was quickly realizing that this was his chance, his first real opening, to test some waters and maybe set in motion something he’d been dreaming about so secretly he hadn’t even told Jinyoung about it.
‘They said they wanted to meet you, you know.’
‘Are you sure they didn’t mean it in a ‘wanting to meet in a dark alleyway with no eyewitnesses’ kind of way?’
‘What, no. No, they’re not like that’ Jaebeom shook his head, smartly omitting the fact that he was the most prone to jealousy out of the three of them. ‘Plus Jackson said you’re the hottest model he’s seen, and he hangs out with hundreds of them.’
Mark just stared at him, eyes squinted curiously as he bit his lips in contemplation, and Jaebeom had to physically restrain himself not to lunge forward and kiss him again. His own lips still felt raw and tingly and his fingertips numb with adrenaline, and it was entirely possible he’d never calm enough to fall asleep again.
‘Okay, then, let’s go’ Mark finally said, downing the rest of his beer with a big gulp and a frown.
‘What, right now?’ Jaebeom blinked, scrambling to get off the high barstool.
Mark laughed, endeared and quiet - his sounds were always quiet in a way that his presence never managed. His presence was towering and tall and overwhelming, an entire enchanted universe folded into his lithe, ethereal body but pulsing through cracks, glimpses of a giant, scorching sun, loud without making a sound. It was impossible to be around Mark, and not be looking at him - and it was doubly so when he moved right into Jaebeom’s personal space, smelling clean despite the sweat clinging onto his skin, and put a hand on Jaebeom’s hip.
‘Did you not want to take me home tonight?’
Jaebeom nodded, because he didn’t really trust himself to speak without losing the last semblances of his cool, but he knew that Mark knew he was literally shaking with excitement from the way he gently squeezed Jaebeom’s fingers when he took Mark’s hand to lead him out of the club.
Truth was, he did - not particularly that night, but any night Mark would let him, and this had been a known fact for some time now, a fact that may or may not have come up during sex with Jinyoung and Jackson, whispered casual-filthy into Jaebeom’s ear, triggering reactions that Jaebeom was entirely unprepared to address for another millennia or two.
He did think about it a lot, but he never quite believed it would actually happen, not with all four of them, but the way Mark was clinging to his back as they navigated through crowds, the way he hid his hands in Jaebeom’s back pockets to ward off the cold as they waited for a taxi, didn’t really leave much to his imagination.
He hadn’t really been drunk, and what alcohol he had quickly evaporated once they were back at Jinyoung’s, once Jackson made Mark laugh for the first time, once Jinyoung slid his arms around Jaebeom’s neck theatrically and told Mark to “join in whenever” before kissing Jaebeom in the hungriest, showiest way possible. Having all three of them close - his boyfriends that he still couldn’t quite believe he had the luck to have, and this third wonderful, enchanting boy that kissed him like he wanted to devour him, touched Jackson like he’d known his body forever and fell into Jinyoung’s rhythm like they shared the same pulse - it was dreams come true that he hadn’t been aware he even had.
Of course it was bound to turn into a nightmare.
He really didn’t mean to eavesdrop when he woke up, thirsty, in the middle of the night. He didn’t even notice that they were gone from the bed as he fumbled out in the darkness, heading for the kitchen, noticing the light in the hallway just a second before he stepped out. And he was going to, he really was, but then he recognized Jackson’s raspy sleep-voice, and something prompted him to stay and listen.
‘Are you sneaking out on us?’ he heard Jackson say, and he chanced a glance out of the dark to the lit-up entrance, where Jackson was leaning into the wall, a glass of water in hand as he watched Mark put his shoes on.
‘I'm just being a polite hookup’ Mark answered, flashing a placating smile that seemed to bounce right off Jackson. For all his warm-hearted, open affection, Jackson really knew how to pull his walls up when he wanted to.
‘Huh’ he hummed, sloshing his water around for a silent moment, before stepping abruptly forward. ‘He really likes you, though, you know that, right?’
‘Does he now?’ Mark asked, teasing, but whatever he saw on Jackson’s face dimmed his smirk immediately.
‘Obviously. He's being very… Careless about it, too.’
‘How about you?’ Mark asked, still smiling, still playful, but more cautious now. If Jaebeom had known him back then as much as he knew him now, he would’ve realized that this was the first breaking point for Mark - the first time that they failed him. ‘Do you like me too?’
‘Jinyoung likes you enough. Likes how Jaebeom gets when he’s around you.’ Jackson shrugged, honest to a fault, giving away Jinyoung’s secrets like candy at a playground. ‘Me… Jury's still out.’
Remembering the way Jackson was practically begging Mark's name all night last night, Jaebeom was taken aback by the chill in his tone now. He was feeling increasingly wrong and like he shouldn’t be standing there, shouldn’t be listening to this conversation, but his heart was picking up its irregular beat, the longer he watched Mark preparing to leave, the longer he watched Jackson standing cautious guard by their door. Like watching the so often mentioned car crash, his insides were starting to scream but he was unable to look away now.
‘What's your tipping point?’ Mark asked, throwing his jacket over his shoulder, his head cocked aside and his hand in his pocket, the perfect statue of indifference - but his eyes were shining something strange, and Jaebeom almost burst out to yell at Jackson to answer right.
‘You're not gonna hurt him, right?’ Jackson asked back, instead, and Jaebeom saw Mark’s shoulders fall, just a minuscule movement - that one invisible, tiny snowflake that brings about the avalanche.
‘I don't plan on anyone getting hurt, Jackson’ Mark finally answered, reaching for the doorknob, before he thought better of it, and stepped right back into Jackson’s personal space. ‘Give this to him for me, yeah?’
And then he grabbed Jackson’s jaw and kissed him, fast and deep and desperate, throwing his whole body into it for a second, and retreated just as quickly, slipping away while Jackson stared ahead, touching his lips in disbelief. Jaebeom turned and tiptoed back into the bed, pretending to be asleep once Jackson returned to press a warm and apologetic and gentle kiss against his chapped lips.
‘This one’s from Mark. He was very sorry but he had to leave’ Jackson whispered, pressing another kiss into Jaebeom’s hair, before climbing into bed behind him and pulling him onto his chest.
Jaebeom did not fall back asleep that night.
Sleeping with Mark was easy - dating Mark seemed impossible.
After that night, he practically ghosted Jaebeom, and he tried to be rational about it, tried to explain to his aching heart that he wasn’t allowed to be ungrateful, having all he already had. That it wasn’t him that drove Mark away, and even if it was, that was his loss and not Jaebeom’s. That as long as he had Jinyoung and Jackson, he’d be alright.
Neither of them brought it up, but he knew that Jackson had been talking to Mark, and somehow, secretly, that hurt a little, too. Not that Jackson would be the one Mark wanted, instead of him - everyone in their right mind would choose Jackson, sweet and beautiful and kind and selfless Jackson, over Jaebeom.
Then, one day, Jinyoung asked for Mark’s number, and two days later, while he had both Jinyoung and Jackson over, Mark appeared on Jaebeom’s doorstep, eyes cast down and fingers fiddling with sweater paws, and told them that maybe he wasn’t as averse to trying out a foursome in a relationship kind of way as he originally thought he was.
-*-
Jaebeom picks up the phone again - opens call history, and closes it, opens it again, hovers over Mark’s contact, closes it again, opts for a text instead.
‘We still on for Friday, yeah?’ he asks, because he has to, because he’s too tired and the memories are too strong, and their grip around his heart is mean and taunting.
‘Sure’ Mark texts back, almost immediately, and Jaebeom releases a sigh.
Then there’s a link - a performance of Jackson’s new song. ‘Have you watched it?’ Mark asks, and Jaebeom rolls his eyes. Of course he has. He listens to this one song maybe too much - it reminds him of Mark, of the beginnings, the confusion and the hurt and the way Jackson used to cling to them, staring at nothing with empty eyes, which was a hundred times worse than if he’d cried.
They don’t talk about that either, but they know it’s Jackson’s way to heal his very last scars about Mark. And even if it wasn’t - even if it wasn’t full of hidden lines and maybe-admissions, Jackson had wanted to film the music video with him, which was admission enough.
They actually talked about it, had drawn up a whole list of pros and cons, even pitched it to some of his production team members - but they scrapped it in the end and just went with an actress, instead.
'It's not that I don't want to, Jacks' Mark had said, voice soft and eyes apologetic, and even through Jackson's excessive pouting and huffing, Jaebeom could tell that he - reluctantly - understood.
'It's just that it's too risky… for you, most of all' Jinyoung added, and Jackson sighed.
'Or is it just that you don't want to share your public boyfriend with anyone?' Jackson shot back, just to sting, because he got petulant and unreasonable when he was upset.
Him and Jinyoung had a huge fight that evening, but they came around by next morning.
They filmed their own version later, spilling drinks and fake tears, with Jackson singing into an empty soju bottle while Jinyoung draped himself all over him dramatically, clad in nothing but an anime print bedsheet, and Mark pressed Jaebeom against the wall and sucked harsh red spots all over his chest.
Jaebeom himself writes songs about them enough - they’re all he writes about, if he’s not commissioned specifically. The good and the bad, laughter and tears, finding Heaven and leaving Hell, the magic of fingertips and secret words whispered under crumpled bed sheets. But he keeps most of it to himself - they’re his inspiration, not his topics, usually.
It’s been a bit different, since Jinyoung and Mark came out, but they’ve always spoken hidden confessions of each other, have always supported each other and all the work they did, wherever they could.
Jaebeom particularly remembers Jinyoung’s first big premier, and how they all went, even if they couldn’t all go on the same terms - even if Jaebeom had to pull in a few industry favors for an invite, even if Jackson had to fight his manager about conflicting schedules. But it was Jinyoung’s big night, and so they all showed up.
Jaebeom got to the venue first, parked his car, and gave himself a quick once-over in the tinted windows before walking up to the wide steps covered in red carpet in front of the theatre. He had his invitation tucked inside his breast pocket, but no-one even asked for it, which was both slightly flattering and curious. People usually knew his work, not his face.
Still he stopped on top of the stairs and stood still, kind of smiled for a few photographs that he was sure won’t ever leave anyone’s camera roll, and dutifully walked up to a reporter he actually sort of remembered talking to once before.
‘What brings you here today, Defsoul?’ the reporter asked, sounding genuinely curious.
‘I promised my boyfriends, didn’t I’ he thought to himself, but managed a small smile with almost concealed boredom.
‘I like movies’ he’d said, and then walked away with a wave to some of Jackson’s fans that he recognized, smirking to himself how they didn’t yet know what Jaebeom did, that Jackson would be arriving soon, too.
He’d texted from the car a little while ago, so Jaebeom decided to wait just inside the doors, where he could still see, because he was a masochist like that, and also because he loved watching Jackson in his element, basking in adoration and celebration.
An older director that Jaebeom only knew by face, and a couple of girl group members later, Jackson’s sleek, black company car pulled up to the curb, and he stepped out onto the red carpet, all wide smiles and carefully styled hair and enthusiastic waves. He was wearing some sort of eccentric, wine-colored suit embroidered with black patterns that hugged his frame just the right side of tight, and suddenly Jaebeom felt grossly underdressed in his designer leather jacket. But more than that, he just felt awe-struck, watching Jackson effortlessly stride up the stairs and pose for all the cameras that were pointed at him. Everywhere he went, he commandeered attention with an ease Jaebeom almost felt jealous for - but then again, Jackson was born for this. Born for love and fame, born for the spotlight, the flashes and the screams.
He walked inside and past Jaebeom, who’d been half-hiding in the shadow of a giant plant and peeking outside like a common creep, but before he could turn to follow him, the crowd started to buzz outside. They were here.
They arrived in three cars - Jinyoung’s on-screen nemesis and the movie director in the first one, their wives on their arms, all dolled up and pleasant and decorative like bouquets of flowers. Then the second car rolled closer, and Jaebeom’s breath stuck in his throat yet again.
Jinyoung was breathtakingly handsome - he always was, wasn’t he, with his silky black hair and silky black tux and black coffee eyes, his pink lips and smooth skin and charming smile, eyes shining humble but proud. It was his big night, after all.
‘Isn’t he just prince charming’ a voice rumbled beside Jaebeom’s ear, and he startled, just barely, his instincts automatically leaning him into Jackson’s side as his subconscious recognized his scent and the pattern of his breathing, which was probably something Jaebeom should be revisiting once he got a moment to think.
‘Yeah’ he agreed, instead, because Jackson didn’t take well to being ignored and also because he was completely right and Jinyoung looked like the charmingest prince Jaebeom had ever seen.
He straightened his jacket and then held the door open to the actress that Jaebeom thought was playing his mom in the movie, maybe, and then - and then Mark followed her, pulling himself out of the car by Jinyoung’s outstretched hand.
If Jinyoung was a prince, Mark was an outright dream.
He’d just recently dyed his hair blonde, and for the premier, he dressed to match it in pristine whites and quiet creams and gentle sparks. His glittering turtleneck was the same tone as his pale skin, as if his chest itself was covered in diamonds, and his white jacket accented his shoulders but made the rest of his edges all flowy and fuzzy, like you couldn’t be sure your eyes weren’t deceiving you. He looked like a mirage, like a million dollars, like he stepped straight off the catwalk, like he existed on a plane entirely different from the rest of humanity - and then he straightened up beside Jinyoung and took his elbow and they clicked right into place, a perfect wet dream in black and white.
Jackson was cursing under his breath, and Jaebeom had to fight himself not to reach out and take his hand.
They walked up to the stairs arm-in-arm, Jinyoung waving and bowing politely and Mark gently smiling one of his paid smiles, but when they eventually separated, and Mark left with the rest of the plus ones to head into the building and let the actors and actresses have their spotlight, Jaebeom saw their eyes meet, saw Jinyoung mouth something to Mark and Mark drop his eyes shyly and grin, and that moment, that grin, that spark in Jinyoung’s eyes, that was the realest, rawest thing Jaebeom had seen all evening.
That, and the way Jackson stroked his neck before gripping his shoulder, just the safe side of appropriate, and whispered, voice raspy and breath like flames licking the shell of Jaebeom’s ear.
‘All of you are staying over at mine tonight.’
Before Jaebeom could agree, Mark walked right past them, giving them a cheeky grin and a little wave, and Jackson's grip turned iron on Jaebeom's shoulder.
'Actually, fuck that, you think we could find a nice bathroom somewhere and-'
'Nope' Jaebeom snorted, popping his 'p' with far more disapproval than he actually felt. 'We're not gonna have semi-public bathroom sex at Jinyoung's premier.'
'Why are you such a spoilsport' Jackson pouted, and Jaebeom rolled his eyes, endeared.
‘Because we are proper grown-ups capable of self-restraint and keeping it in our pants. And also because Jinyoung would skin us alive.’
‘I hate it when you’re all adult and responsible.’
‘No you don’t. You think it’s hot’ Jaebeom shot back, and Jackson was smiling now, bright and conspiratory and making Jaebeom’s heart do all sorts of un-adultlike flips inside his chest.
‘I think it’s soooo hot’ Jackson admitted, turning to leave, but he stopped mid-step to leer at Jaebeom. ‘Hey, but you didn’t say that you didn’t want to!’
‘Are you kidding? I’d fuck them right on top of those steps, if I could’ Jaebeom smirked, and Jackson laughed at him again, and then they left to merge back into the crowd slowly starting to file into the theatre for the actual movie, which Jaebeom would definitely have to re-watch again, because he couldn’t pay much attention after the bug that Jackson put in his ear.
-*-
Jackson finds Jaebeom back at his computer when he arrives, hugging him from behind and pressing his face into his still wet hair with a loud inhale.
‘Aww, babe, you showered just for me?’ he asks, grinning, and Jaebeom shoves him playfully instead of admitting that he kind of did.
‘What’s this, then?’ Jackson leans closer, once he’s pulled up a chair to sit next to Jaebeom, an arm thrown around his shoulder to keep him close. Jaebeom sighs and presses play, fighting the urge to hide his face in his hands.
The vocal guide is still very unpolished, and there are multiple parts where he just gave up on editing altogether, but it’s a work in progress and Jackson knows that - it’s not what Jaebeom is embarrassed about.
It’s the lyrics, words upon carefully thought-out words that keep losing their meaning each time Jaebeom revisits them, beautiful words and sweet words and deep words that still fail to convey exactly what Jaebeom is trying to say.
Maybe for Jackson, he won’t need them.
Jackson, whose eyes are closed and whose forehead is wrinkling in that cute way they all openly adore, as he listens to Jaebeom sing.
He sings of budding flowers and the scent of new beginnings, of birds and fresh grass and rainbows after sudden April showers; he sings about Jinyoung who’s playful and vivid and kisses like Spring bringing in new life.
He sings of purple sunsets on the glistening sea, the careless freedom of daylight that never quite ends, of warmth around bonfires and lazy stargazing; he sings about Jackson who’s intense and magnificent and makes love like the Summer heat.
He sings of the world coated in every shade of gold, of turquoise mountain streams and air so crisp and fresh you can taste it, of long, sweet expanses of skin soaking up the last rays of the Sun, hands held for hours and apple juice drank from another’s lips; he sings about Mark, who’s gentle and beautiful and embraces like the serene quiet of Autumn.
He doesn’t sing of his love for them, but he sings of his life, and all the ways that they make it, save it, transform it into an endless cycle of wonder. He doesn’t sing of his love for them, but he sings of his life with them, and the two are somehow one and the same.
Jackson is quiet for a long while once the song’s over, and Jaebeom is reluctant to ask why.
He can see it in the way his lips are pressed tight and his chest slightly trembles on every inhale, the way his hands grip the arms of the spare chair - he’s overwhelmed, he’s processing, he’s thinking.
Then, suddenly, he’s not thinking anymore, because he’s up and in Jaebeom’s lap, pressing their mouths together so harsh their teeth knock and Jaebeom thinks he can taste blood, which really is irrelevant, because Jackson is kissing him, he’s holding onto his shoulders and kissing him and devouring him whole, his kisses so hurried and his fingers so tight Jaebeom’s head is spinning with it.
His weight on top Jaebeom’s thighs is grounding and hot, and his tongue licks into his mouth relentlessly, no teasing, no hesitation, just open mouthed hunger and demand. Somebody groans - Jaebeom thinks it’s probably him, what with the way Jackson is holding onto his hair and rocking his body closer.
‘What’s this…?’ Jaebeom asks, gasps, in between kisses, when Jackson’s mouth travels from his lips to the sensitive skin behind his ear, down his neck, licking and biting and sucking.
Jackson doesn’t answer, just hums into Jaebeom’s slick skin, his hands sliding under his shirt to caress and scratch, leaving goosebumps all over his chest. A nail is caught on a nipple and Jaebeom groans again, throwing his head back to let go, to let Jackson have his way.
He doesn’t often get like this, doesn’t often throw himself into it with such abandon - Jackson’s a tease, he pushes buttons and pulls on strings, dances away at the last second, drives Jaebeom insane with the quirk of his lips and the glint in his eyes and the way he lets his shirts slide up his hips just so, right until the moment Jaebeom loses his cool (he always does, he’s never cool, not with them), right until he grabs him and pushes him against the first hard surface and eats him right up, Jackson laughing all the way because that’s exactly what he wanted.
But now, now he’s dragging, tearing Jaebeom’s shirt over his head, touches and paws at him all over and rocks in his lap, swirling his hips rhythmically and Jaebeom’s nerves are on fire. His blood boils with need and his breaths are irregular gasps of Jackson’s name - and they kiss and keep kissing, they kiss while Jackson grabs Jaebeom’s hands and pulls them onto his ass, kiss open-mouthed and filthy and loud, their lips red and shiny, the air between them practically shimmering with lust.
‘That’s it, baby’ Jackson chokes when Jaebeom squeezes his ass helplessly, and resumes biting a big, red bruise right under Jaebeom’s collarbone. He presses his thumb into it, and Jaebeom moans with the sharp spike of pain that shoots straight to his head - straight down to his groin.
He twitches in his pants, and Jackson must feel it, because he leans back and grins - wide and unabashed and beautiful, so beautiful -
‘Fuck you’re gorgeous’ Jaebeom groans, unable to help himself, and Jackson just chuckles, cradles Jaebeom’s face in both hands, caresses his cheekbones with his thumbs.
‘I love you so fucking much it’s practically a joke’ he answers, kissing the slope of Jaebeom’s nose gently, before sliding off and between Jaebeom’s thighs onto the floor.
‘What… are you doing?’ Jaebeom asks, and Jackson just rolls his eyes, reaching up to run his hands down Jaebeom’s naked chest with reverence.
‘De-stressing blowjob? Honestly I was totally gonna eat you out for hours but we’re both too tired for that now’ he shrugs, like it’s the most natural thing to say, like Jaebeom’s insides aren’t quivering with arousal and his underwear isn't getting painfully tight. He reaches the drawstring of Jaebeom’s sweatpants and tugs on them, playful and teasing, and Jaebeom swears through gritted teeth, his mind helpfully supplying memories of all kinds with Jackson on his knees, eyes sparking and watery, mouth slick and red and stuffed full…
‘Yeah, yeah okay’ Jaebeom blabbers, and Jackson laughs even as he pulls the embarrassingly tenting pants and underwear down.
‘Glad we’re all on board’ he winks, because he’s a little shit, but there’s nothing teasing or playful in the way he looks at Jaebeom and licks his lips.
Sometimes, he makes a show out of it. Both he and Mark are amazing at giving head and they know it, but Jackson enjoys the performance part of it more than the actual act - the praise, the eyes on him, the incoherent filth they whisper as they rock their hips forward, holding him by his hair and telling him how good he looks, how wet and tight his throat feels, how he was made for this, for them.
This time, however, he doesn’t wait for Jaebeom to start speaking or pleading or demanding - Jaebeom isn’t sure he could say a coherent word, not with the way Jackson almost immediately dives in and sucks him all the way down, no teasing, no playful licks, no fooling around.
He hollows his cheeks and sucks, and Jaebeom sobs with the overwhelming sensation of it - of being the single focus of Jackson’s undivided attention, his mouth hot and tight, so tight, so wet, all around Jaebeom, saliva dripping down his chin and onto his fist that keeps the base of Jaebeom’s cock in place. He’s loud, too, satisfied hums and lewd slurping making every hair on Jaebeom’s body stand up, making him wish the record button was close enough to press, making him want to keep these sounds to himself for eternity -
And above that is his own whimpering, his own, broken moans of ‘Jackson, Jackson, baby, please, please’, like there was anything else he could be asking for, like Jackson wasn’t already giving him everything and more.
Pleasure is quickly flooding the pit of his stomach, not building up like it normally would, but exploding, rushing through his every vein until his whole body is buzzing with it.
He comes like that, fast and sudden like a freight train, the syllables of Jackson’s name tangling on his tongue into unintelligible moans and cries, his body going taut before he all but collapses into himself, twitching through the aftershocks while Jackson carefully licks up the mess he made and tucks him back into his pants.
Jaebeom pulls him up then, needy and impatient, kissing him until he’s satisfied he kissed all of his own taste away.
‘Isn’t that all better’ Jackson coos against Jaebeom’s panting lips, against the corner of his mouth, the tip of his nose, his closed eyelids. Jaebeom gathers himself enough to scramble for Jackson’s belt, but he chuckles and grabs his hand, standing up and pulling him to Jaebeom’s couch.
‘Nap now, sloppy handjob later. You look like you haven’t slept in days.’
‘I must have’ Jaebeom replies, which was obviously the bad thing to say, because Jackson frowns, pushing him into the pillows and curling up in front of him, fitting his broad back snug against Jaebeom’s chest.
Jaebeom is the first to wake sometime later, slowly coming to with the prickly sensation of his arm having fallen asleep, his nose filled with Jackson’s scent and his mouth with Jackson’s sweatshirt. He grins at the slobbery stain before pushing it out of the way to press a trail of butterfly-kisses to the back Jackson’s neck. He tastes soft and cozy like sleep, and Jaebeom gets bolder and bolder until he feels him stir in his arms.
‘I could get used to waking up to this’ Jackson murmurs, turning onto his back so that he can look up at Jaebeom. His eyes are puffy with sleep and his hair is sticking up every which way, and Jaebeom feels so fond it’s threatening to break through his ribs and spill right onto his couch.
‘Forever at your service’ he grins, nuzzling against Jackson’s temple, before rearranging his arms to continue lazily caressing up and down his warm, relaxed body.
Jackson gets his promised handjob, squirming and gasping quietly against Jaebeom as he whispers revering praise against his quickening pulse, free hand roaming mindlessly across all he can reach. It is sloppy, but there’s nothing hurried about it - Jaebeom takes his sweet time, keeping them in that fuzzy state between asleep and awake for as long as he possibly can, and they dissolve in a fit of breathless giggles once Jackson’s came, cuddling close.
‘You know what’s missing from your song, right?’ Jackson says, once they’ve calmed and he’s on his back again, staring up at Jaebeom with his dazzling, dazzling eyes.
‘What?’ Jaebeom asks, taken aback, his forehead furrowed in confusion. For a while there, he’s forgotten about the past few days of stress and frustration, which, admittedly, was half the point of inviting Jackson over, but right in this warm, lovely moment, he isn’t very keen on revisiting the other half just yet.
Jackson sighs and sits up, swiping some used tissues to the floor with a disgusted wrinkle of his nose that makes Jaebeom chuckle despite himself.
‘Oh, baby’ Jackson shakes his head, taking Jaebeom’s hands in his to kiss the top of his knuckles. His breath is still ghosting over them, but he’s looking at Jaebeom, and his eyes are open with emotions in a way that Jaebeom himself has never quite managed. ‘It’s you. We’re not what we are, without you.’
Air rushes out of Jaebeom’s mouth without a sound. He wants to answer, but doesn’t really know how to, doesn’t really have the words to-
‘And now you’re overthinking again’ Jackson laughs, reaching out to tuck a stray strand of hair behind Jaebeom’s ear. ‘Listen, love, everything you’ve written, I… there’s a reason you’re in producing and I’m in performing. There is a reason you’re the artist out of all of us. You seem to forget that you have a way with words and music like nobody quite does. Jinyoungie, he’s… I’m not gonna say I know what he exactly is to you, because humanity’s been trying to solve that riddle since the beginning of times, but I do feel it too, you know, how he’s magic. And Mark, well, you know me and Mark have our rough patches, but it’s still true, what you said, that he’s always the last quieting thought before I fall asleep.’
‘But you, hyung, you’re… you’re the safety of sleep, you know? You hold us up and pull us back together when we start to float and… Winter isn’t bad just because it’s cold, is it? It’s cold so that the world can take a breath. It’s cold so that we can appreciate warmth. It’s cold but it’s clean and it’s simple and it’s beautiful. There is no cycle without winter, Jaebeomie. There is no us without you.’
Jackson falls silent, eyes going comically round as if he’s surprised at himself for the rush of words - but Jaebeom isn’t.
Jaebeom is overwhelmed and still sleep-deprived and has been on the wrong side of emotional for the past few days, but he’s not surprised at Jackson for throwing something so raw and touching out there as simply as if he was discussing dinner options. It’s one of the things he loves about him, he guesses, this unashamed and open affection, this never-ending love that he has for the whole world. Sometimes, Jaebeom still wonders how he got so lucky to end up receiving so much of it.
‘Thank you’ he finally says, throat clogged and voice rough, because what else could he possibly say to all of that? How could he suddenly find the expressions he’s been looking for for days now, frozen to the spot in Jackson’s arms, under his heavy gaze?
‘That’s why you keep me around’ Jackson jokes, clearing his throat subtly, and squeezes Jaebeom’s hands again, before hauling himself up from the sofa with an overplayed groan, effectively easing the too-emotional tension. He gently pulls Jaebeom up as well, guides him back to his chair and sits him back down, ruffling his hair playfully.
‘Khm. Okay, so anyway, that’s all I have on that, and well, I dunno, maybe try to play with the key of the second verse a bit, I guess?’ he continues, absent-mindedly twisting and twirling the unkempt locks of Jaebeom’s hair, which he really shouldn’t be doing, if he’s not planning on seeing that through the end. He seems to realize this when Jaebeom’s eyes fall shut involuntarily, and he giggles, leaning down to press one last kiss to his forehead.
When he leaves, he leaves his giddiness and warmth behind, and it continues to embrace Jaebeom like a cocoon of all things sweet and innocent and entirely too sappy for anything but girl group songs. Still, Jaebeom feels more rested and driven than he’s felt in ages, and this feeling, too, he tucks away into the special drawer he keeps in his mind for boyfriend-related discoveries to revisit in his darkest, coldest hours.
-*-
Friday creeps up on Jaebeom like a stalking tiger, but the song is ready. Almost ready. As ready as it will get, with only him to sing it, but it’s not like he can ever give this one away. Maybe he won’t even upload it onto Soundcloud. Maybe he’s still not ready to share something like this with the whole faceless, nameless world.
It’s his turn to host dinner night, which realization sends him into somewhat of a cleaning frenzy, his cats staring at the long unused vacuum cleaner in murderous contempt from atop their crawling posts, but cleaning takes his mind off things enough that he forgets to fret about the song, forgets to feel all jittery and worried like a high schooler planning his confession to his first crush.
He’d been dating these men for up to multiple years now, he really shouldn’t be feeling so nervous about this. It’s not like he’s embarrassed to bare the deepest nooks and crannies of his soul to them, to lay his heart open, to confess, so to say....
‘It’s not like I’m embarrassed to, like, confess, or anything…’ he tells Jackson over the phone as he’s carefully piling Chinese takeout into the fancy porcelain dish set he got from Mark’s mom for his last birthday.
‘Are we sure about that?’ Jackson wonders, on the other end of the line, and Jaebeom can hear him grin, because he really gets zero respect in this relationship.
‘Oh shut up, maybe a little, but you’re the one that’s gonna cry when you hear it anyways.’
‘Me, maybe, Mark-hyung, definitely’ Jackson agrees, still audibly smiling, and Jaebeom rolls his eyes, before -
‘Okay, Sseun, get back to my lines now’ he hears Jinyoung in the background, and he freezes, fried rice slipping off his spoon frozen mid-air.
‘...Jackson, did you put me on speaker?’ he asks, even though he already knows the answer.
‘No, no he hasn’t. And now he needs to help me practice while I drive so see you soon, hyung!’ Jinyoung answers, speaking over Jackson’s delighted giggles, and hangs up.
Jaebeom briefly considers widowing himself before he even gets to get married. But isn’t the point of having three boyfriends that you’ve still got one left if you murder two?
‘I’m divorcing Jinson’ he texts Mark, just to clarify where they stand, and gets back to preparing dinner.
‘More for me then’ Mark replies, quizzical, but Jaebeom doesn’t deign that with a reply.
Mark gets to his place a little while later, anyways, grumbling about Jaebeom ignoring him even as he hugs his waist from behind and presses his face into the crook of his neck.
They stand like that for a while, Jaebeom with his eyes closed and Mark with his face hidden into Jaebeom and drinking in his scent, content to just sway softly.
'Hello, beautiful’ Jaebeom winks when he finally turns to face him.
'Fuck off' Mark shrugs, but he smiles. ‘That was such a Jackson thing to say.’
They don’t say they missed each other - it’s a fact and neither of them are big believers in stating the obvious, but Jaebeom feels it in the way Mark is so reluctant to let go, lingering around him as he puts the finishing touches on dinner.
‘You wanna help set the table?’ Jaebeom asks, and Mark frowns, getting out of his way to flop down onto his couch, reaching down to pull up a wandering cat into his lap.
‘No, not really’ he grins, to which Jaebeom rolls his eyes.
‘Put on some music then, at least’ he sighs, bringing out the plates, and Mark hums in agreement, fumbling with his phone even as he continues petting the cat.
Jinyoung finds Jaebeom still in the kitchen when he arrives with Jackson, waiting patiently for him to set aside the dish he was holding, before he grips his neck and turns him towards himself for a kiss.
‘Hi, hyung’ Jinyoung whispers, smiling. His thumb is rubbing tiny, absent-minded circles into the back of Jaebeom’s neck, and the scent of his aftershave is making Jaebeom’s head cloudy. Or maybe it’s the glint in his eyes, maybe the way the weight of his hand feels like home on Jaebeom’s nape. Maybe the way that he says ‘hyung’ like it’s a time-loop - such a small word, such enormous power, throwing Jaebeom years back to the first time they met, small children with big dreams; and years ahead to both of them old and wrinkly, the whiskers around Jinyoung’s eyes permanent and his lush hair silver, the soft skin of his hands thin and spotted as he holds Jaebeom’s neck and says ‘hi, hyung, I’m here, hyung, I missed you, hyung, hold me, hyung, I’ve got you, hyung’ ... His Jinyoung of days gone, of days lived, of days to come, all coalescing in this one single touch, this one single word.
‘Hi’ Jaebeom breathes, suddenly overwhelmed, and smiles into Jinyoung’s mouth. ‘How are you?’
‘Perfect, now’ Jinyoung answers, glancing towards the sofa where Jackson and Mark are curled up loosely against each other and in the process of annoying the hell out of Jaebeom’s cat, laughing as they make her chase Jinyoung’s scarf. Jinyoung breaks away with a last, fleeting kiss to greet Mark and Jaebeom gets back to pour some drinks. Jackson joins him soon after, and they fall into an easy conversation about a movie they’ve been meaning to see, hands and minds in perfect sync around each other.
By the time Jackson and Jaebeom are finished, Jinyoung is back to practicing his new script with Mark in the living room - he’s leaning against the side of an armchair, looking down at Mark kneeling on the rug, brows drawn in concentration and badly concealed mirth as he reads his next lines.
‘But I know you, Kang Minwoo’ Mark says, trying in vain to school his features into a solemn expression as he grossly over-gesticulates, clutching at his heart dramatically. ‘You’re many things, but you’re not a killer.’
‘We’ll see about that’ Jinyoung answers, except it’s not exactly Jinyoung - it’s someone with Jinyoung’s voice and Jinyoung’s face but without any of Jinyoung’s sweetness and warmth in his eyes. He makes a twirling motion with his fingers, and there’s nothing there, but Jaebeom can almost picture a knife -
‘Okay, that’s quite enough of that’ Jackson shudders, glaring at both of them. ‘You’re this close to freaking me out.’
‘Fuck, that’s so hot’ Mark bursts out, his eyes glued to Jinyoung’s cold and almost emotionless face, and Jaebeom is inclined to agree with both of them. He’s about to say something, except Mark is up and at Jinyoung in the blink of an eye, grabbing his collar and pressing his body against him. ‘I’d let you step on my throat any day, holy shit.’
‘You’re one sick motherfucker’ Jackson groans, and Jinyoung keeps up his black, deadly stare for one second longer, before they all dissolve in a fit of giggles, Mark attacking his mouth even as they laugh.
They get tangled in each other after that, something Jaebeom has experienced so many times and yet it still never fails to enchant him - the way they pull each other in like gravity, the way their hands always find just the place to hold onto, the way the four of them can embrace and dance and laugh and kiss in the middle of Jaebeom’s crowded living room and belong there more naturally than Jaebeom by himself ever would.
Jackson is the first to pull away, once things start to get a little heated, once Mark has started to push Jaebeom towards the couch with Jinyoung’s hands underneath his hoodie - he stands up and clears his throat and shoots a disapproving glare at Mark, who’s trying to coax him back by attaching himself to his neck.
‘There will be no sex before dinner on this date, you hear me?’ he huffs, shooting a not-at-all subtle, meaningful glance towards Jaebeom, and Jaebeom startles as he remembers. Right. The song. He was gonna show that to them tonight.
They eat expensively served and garnished cheap take-out, while Mark tells them about a new diet his agency is trying to push onto him that he’s absolutely cheating his way out of that Jinyoung has quite a few choice words about, and Jackson shares the latest entertainment gossip, talking loud and animated and absolutely adorable. Then, as they always do, they move to the living room with wine glasses in hand - wine is for date-nights and special occasions, and Jaebeom feels a little bit like this is both. Jinyoung pulls Jackson into his lap, and Mark lays his head across Jaebeom’s thighs, the three of them deep in conversation about some sports thing that Jaebeom would probably be at least some level of interested in, if he wasn’t getting itchy and restless with trying to figure out how to bring the song up.
‘Everything okay?’ Mark asks, turning his face up to him quietly while Jinyoung and Jackson aren’t paying attention, and Jaebeom’s frozen half-smile thaws. Of course Mark would notice - they all would, eventually, but no one is quite as attentive as Mark, when it comes to things someone is trying to keep hidden.
‘Yeah, just…. Give me a sec’ Jaebeom nods, running a hand through Mark’s inky-black bangs, before he gets up to find his phone.
They’re all looking at him expectantly when he returns, but Jaebeom isn’t feeling on edge anymore.
Maybe it’s the warmth of the food, or the gentle buzz of the wine. Or maybe it’s the way they look at him, limbs casually intertwined on his couch, in his house, in his heart, fitting together so naturally and easily Jaebeom almost laughs with the realization that everything he’s been trying to figure out, trying to give shape to, put into words, solve and dissect is the most natural, simplest law of nature - that Mark and Jinyoung and Jackson and Jaebeom are one.
He plays the song for them, forgets himself a little and ends up humming it, heart open and eyes closed. When he looks up, Jackson is smiling so wide it surely must hurt, and Mark is staring stubbornly at the rug under his feet even as he quietly hiccups, and Jinyoung is looking back - Jinyoung is always looking back, and Jaebeom’s legs always move on their own to him - gravity, gravity, gravity.
They fall into each other wordlessly, but there are a thousand words in that sort of quiet, too, a thousand adoring, choked-up confessions in the way Jaebeom kisses the specks of glitter remaining from Mark’s morning shoot make-up, in the way Mark holds Jinyoung’s hands to his lips, in the way Jinyoung keeps running his nails through the peach fuzz on Jackson’s neck, in the way Jackson draws shuddering breaths against the hollow of Jaebeom’s throat.
Nobody really remembers when and how they get to the bedroom - there was a throwaway comment from someone about the cats watching, but Jaebeom isn’t sure if that was a joke or not - but soon enough, they find themselves sprawled across Jaebeom’s bed, all care for the outside world abandoned, along with most of their clothes.
Jackson is always the first to fall apart when they’re together, eyes glazing over just as soon as somebody starts touching him, starts whispering praises into his ears. Mark and Jinyoung take longer, are equally tough to shake, and Jaebeom thinks Mark would have a fair chance of holding out, if only Jinyoung didn’t play so dirty, which he always does.
Jackson likes being praised, and Jinyoung’s voice is dripping honey across his skin as he calls him perfect, calls him sweetheart, baby, angel, beautiful, the sweetest thing in the whole damn world. Mark likes feeling wanted, and Jinyoung’s hands are hot iron as they grope at him, his teeth unrelenting as he bites and sucks and claims, leaving angry pink bruises and goosebumps in his wake. Jinyoung himself likes to stay focused, feel in charge, likes to make them work for it - and Jaebeom, Jaebeom fucking loves working for it.
Standing by the bedside, Jinyoung has him on his hands and knees now, running his fingers through his hair, pulling his head away whenever Jaebeom starts to lean in, to reach for him. He laughs, mean and playful and amused, but Jaebeom is anything but. He wants Jinyoung and he wants him now, wants his taste, wants his hands, his strong, lithe fingers pushing him down instead of away.
Mark beats him to it, though - he sweeps in, kisses Jaebeom almost apologetically and then dives right in, taking Jinyoung in his hands and his mouth, and he looks so incredible, unbelievable like that that Jaebeom forgets to complain.
In a way, they each have something of a speciality, something they enjoy the most, something with just that little extra to drive the others up the wall.
For Mark, it's definitely giving head. It’s not just that he looks mind-blowing when he’s doing it, the long, long line of his neck stretched taut and his long, long lashes fluttering against his porcelain-pink skin - it’s the way he loves it, gets lost in the sensation of it, of having his mouth full of someone, or more than someone; of the way he’s taken over but still maintains control, of driving them crazy with just the O of his plush, red lips, of keeping their taste on his tongue for days.
So Jaebeom forgets himself in watching him, tracing the shape of Jinyoung through his cheek, and Jackson stumbles over too, pulling Jinyoung into a hasty, open-mouthed, hungry kiss, moaning when Mark urges him off the bed to take him into his mouth at the same time. It’s not the first time, nor the second, that he’s done this, but Jaebeom’s mind still short-circuits at the sight, at their closed eyes and taut stomachs and blissed faces, at the filthy, content little hums Mark makes as he holds onto their hips and pulls them closer, closer, closer.
It’s Jinyoung who breaks the spell, always level-headed Jinyoung - Jaebeom has plans to make him lose it, but he knows he’s gonna have to work very hard for it. Jinyoung’s pupils are blown wide, eyes darker than black, but unlike earlier when he was practicing, they’re full of heat, twin specks of molten coal. He pulls Mark up for a kiss, grunting when he tastes both himself and Jackson, and pushes him back against the crumpled sheets to crawl over him. Jaebeom leans back too, beckons Jackson over, straddles him once he’s back on the bed, attacking the expanse of his warm, exquisite chest with kisses and teeth even as he grinds against him, the fog of lust too thick on his brain to really do anything less instinctual.
They’d probably both come just like that, writhing against each other’s sweaty, wanton bodies, need too great to do anything more about it, if Mark wasn’t suddenly there behind Jaebeom, teeth pressing into his shoulder and fingers running up and down and up and down his back, teasing everywhere but where Jaebeom suddenly very much wants them.
‘I’m really not in the mood’ Jaebeom warns, tearing himself off Jackson’s whining mouth with great effort, but Mark just laughs, angelic and sweet and not teasing at all, despite his playful fingers.
‘Huge fucking lie’ he retorts, but he counters it with a kiss, fleeting and careful, to Jaebeom’s mouth first, and then to Jackson’s, cursing when Jackson whines in need.
‘What am I even gonna do with you’ he hisses, his hands in a frenzy to touch them both at the same time, while Jinyoung suspiciously stays away. He’s lying just out of reach, Jaebeom notices when he looks up, close enough to see but not close enough to kiss, touching himself lazily as he watches them with hunger - but also adoration, so much love and adoration Jaebeom gets goosebumps all over.
He knows he’s probably quite a mess with his hair all sweaty and his skin bitten red all over, but still he makes grabby hands at him and Jinyoung huffs, smiling, as he crawls closer to them.
‘C’mere’ he beckons Jaebeom, and he goes, of course he goes, almost tripping over himself in his haste to touch him, to whisper all the overwhelming love and need and ecstasy that he feels right into his ears.
Somehow, they still end up with Jackson in Jinyoung’s lap, face blissed out and mouth open to a constant litany of pleasure as he rides him, slow and torturous and deep, exactly the way they both like it. He’s always a sight like that, a fucking renaissance painting with his quivering thighs and wide eyes and skin like silk, and Jaebeom is watching him in awe with Mark right behind him, inside him, more slow rocking than actual moving least they miss the show.
‘They’re so fucking gorgeous’ Jaebeom breathes, clenching up when Mark suddenly moves, and Mark chuckles but it dies in a moan.
‘So are you two’ Jinyoung chokes out, hands gripping Jackson’s hips so tightly his knuckles are turning white, and Jaebeom falls forward to kiss him.
They keep kissing, keep exchanging mindless pleas and praise until nobody knows who’s even talking and to whom, but that’s the point they’ve all been looking for, the point where they cease to be four and melt into one single mess of trembling limbs and hungry bodies and an erratic heart bursting with love.
Jaebeom zones out a bit afterwards, and only gets all of his senses back in order when he feels Jackson return to the bed to cuddle up against him, and then Jinyoung and Mark are there, too, with water and extra blankets to exchange the old, completely ruined one.
Jinyoung’s mouth smells like toothpaste when he leans over Jaebeom to kiss Jackson and Mark, and he tastes like it, too, when he kisses Jaebeom on his way back. They all curl up, still somewhat breathless and content in the post-coital bliss, and nobody really seems to want to break it, until Mark - Mark of all people, Mark who’s always the first to fall asleep, speaks.
‘Sorry I didn’t say anything about the song, Jaebeom-ah. I’m gonna find the right words soon, I promise. But, like… thank you, until then, okay? It was really beautiful.’
‘Oh Mark’ Jackson sighs, voice getting kind of wobbly again, and throws all limbs over him to pull him into a bone-crushing hug.
‘I think that’s the point, hyung’ Jinyoung answers, and Jaebeom sighs, relieved that he doesn’t have to. ‘If there were right words, Jaebeom-hyung has found them. But we’re… We don’t need them, to know. Not that we shouldn’t… talk about it’ he continues, before anyone could think to bring up him being the biggest advocate of Always Talking Things Out. ‘But even if we wrote a new song about us every day… this, us right here like this, it would still say more.’ He ends his speech with an embarrassed laugh and hides his face in Jaebeom’s chest, and they all laugh with him, but as Jaebeom stares at the dark ceiling with his lovers in his arms, he thinks that maybe, just to be safe, he will still try to write a new song for them every day, for the rest of his life.