Chapter Text
Jeongin and Seungmin are engaged.
Hyunjin gets the call while he’s in Paris. It’s fashion week. Felix is there too. They’re sitting on a balcony in their fancy hotel drinking champagne they were gifted, because that’s something they do now? Somehow. They used to drink the cheapest liquor they could find straight from the bottle but now they sip out of delicate glasses and stare at the Paris cityscape. The streets glow beneath them, the lights twinkle through the ornate wrought iron.
Hyunjin feels like a small child showing up to an office with an extra-large blazer and a briefcase so heavy it drags on the ground.
They had plans to go out. They both had their last show that afternoon and they got invited to more things than Hyunjin could even really wrap his head around — then Seungmin called.
Jeongin proposed. It was unexpected.
Hyunjin would’ve put his money on Minho and Jisung getting engaged first. They just bought the cutest house together. Hyunjin got a tour on FaceTime. He heard the birds chirping, saw the California sun streaming through the windows of Minho’s kitchen and the breeze blowing through the foliage in their little yard all from the comfort of his shitty studio apartment. He can afford better; he chooses to keep it.
At that point, he hadn’t seen the sun in three days. The biggest shock from growing up in LA to living in New York was the weather — Hyunjin was reminded of this as he glanced between his window and his phone. Smog and gloom versus light and breezy.
If Minho and Jisung weren’t the first couple to be engaged, Hyunjin would’ve guessed Chris and Felix. Sure, they’re physically separated more than they’re together, but Felix flies into LA every chance he can get and Chris visits them in New York constantly. He would’ve bet on a long-distance engagement before he bet on Jeongin and Seungmin.
Hyunjin sometimes questions if they’re actually even in a relationship. They make so many jokes about hating each other, they were never even really dating, they’re breaking up, they’re on a break, they’re using each other for their bodies, it’s a (multi-year, year round) summer fling, they’re sleeping with other people, they’re each others’ placeholder until they find a nice Korean girl to settle down with, they’re roommates who fuck, they’re roommates who find each other repulsive, they’re just friends. Hyunjin doesn’t even know if he’s heard either of them refer to the other as a boyfriend . Now they’re engaged?
They were the last couple that Hyunjin expected to get this call from. Everyone in their college friend group coupled off, but—
Well. Hyunjin hasn’t spoken a word to Changbin in over a year. So. Not everyone.
Anyway. He and Felix were going to go out, but when Hyunjin’s tears of joy for his friends morphed into uncontrolled sobs of self pity he retreated to his own hotel room with promises of I’m fine, I’m so tired, I need some rest. Which was almost all the way true. It sat close to the truth. In the general vicinity of the truth, definitely.
That is good enough for Hyunjin’s conscience, most of the time. This is something he’ll admit to himself but no one else, something he’ll acknowledge but won’t fix.
Hyunjin always flies back into JFK. He lives in New York, technically, but he doesn’t spend a lot of time there. Always flies back into JFK feels more fitting than lives in New York. He tries to keep himself booked and busy. It’s been going well. He’s found success.
Kind of.
That all depends on how one would define success, really, because if the definition of success is being booked then Hyunjin has it. He half believed he was never going to make any real money out of modeling, but his last hotel stay would’ve been four months rent four years ago and he didn’t even have to pay for it himself. So if success is having discretionary income then Hyunjin has that too.
If success is having meaningful relationships and lifelong friends, Hyunjin has that. His friends are his world, he loves them so much it sometimes feels like his heart is going to crack open under the pressure of it all. It aches that six out of seven of them permanently reside on the opposite coast and Hyunjin can’t quite bring himself to step foot back in LA, but they visit and they call and they text. Hyunjin’s heart still bursts for them, even across the distance.
If the definition of success is having a fulfilling career, Hyunjin kind of has that. International runway model sounds a lot more glamorous than it is, but Hyunjin enjoys it and it’s one of his art forms and he can be fulfilled with it, probably. Maybe. One day. He thinks.
He’s an artist through and through: he paints and he writes and he dances but those don’t compare to his physical beauty and his ability to channel it, apparently, so modeling is the thing he makes his living off of.
Hyunjin doesn’t feel successful.
Hyunjin feels half caught in the past all the time. He longs for what once was, he thinks he wants it back but can’t quite make up his mind about it. He becomes paralyzed by decision. He runs away from the things that scare him. He thinks one thing and he says another. He craves love and seeks it desperately even though he’s fairly sure he’s already surrounded by it.
He spends most of his time in his own head, all he thinks about is Hyunjin, and he still can’t figure himself out.
He finds people like himself insufferable. He puts up with himself anyway. Out of love, or whatever. He’s trying to get better. He tells himself this. He repeats it in his head. He’s trying to get better.
He’s not entirely sure what better looks like yet, but he’s working on figuring it out. Kind of. He mostly just thinks about how he wants to be better and not how he’s going to make that happen.
He hypothesizes better looks something like this:
He’s famous. Famous enough that people will give a shit about his paintings and poems and he only poses in front of a camera or parades himself down a runway when it meets his artistic vision. He finally gathers up the courage to live in a nicer apartment. He manages to convince Jeongin and Seungmin and Minho and Jisung to move to New York and Chris moves in with Felix. Changbin comes too, and that’s okay because Hyunjin is no longer soul crushingly in love with him. He’s gotten over it, they can just be best friends like they used to.
(They were never just best friends. At least, not from Hyunjin’s perspective. But he’s working on it. He’s trying to get better.)
Hyunjin didn’t always want to be famous, necessarily. He just wants to be beloved. Fame seems like the best way to get the devotion he longs for when he is no longer seeking it out from Changbin, so fame is what he now seeks. Much better to to be adored but not known, have a little devotion from thousands as opposed to monumental devotion from one.
Changbin was devoted to him. He was. Not in all the ways Hyunjin wished and hoped for, but in the spirit of humor and friendship . No matter the motivation, monumental devotion from one only leads to monumental dependence on one. It’s an addiction Hyunjin strives everyday to overcome.
He thinks maybe fame will curb the craving. He thinks maybe distance will curb the craving. He thinks maybe time will curb the craving.
Still, he longs for Changbin like he breathes, even with the distance and even with the time. He’s hoping that maybe he just hasn’t given himself enough distance or enough time, and the more faraway countries he travels to and the more texts he leaves unanswered, the more his longing will weather away.
It hasn’t worked yet. Not even a little. But he’s trying to get better, see?
Except, that’s only in the general vicinity of the truth, if he’s being really generous with himself.
His longing is a red hot coal, he nurses it in his palm. He keeps it clutched tight in his fist and lets it burn, burn, burn. He doesn’t know how to drop it. It’s searing a hole in his hand. It’s embedded itself in his flesh, persistent and progressively painful but he keeps his fist closed anyway.
Sometimes he feels the urge to throw it, chuck it at Changbin’s unblemished skin and burn him as bad as Hyunjin burns, make him scarred and blistered too. He wants to scream look, look how much I hurt, look how much I ache for you, look what you’ve done to me.
But he doesn’t. He keeps it all to himself, hoarding it like gold although it’s the opposite. He wonders if something about him is intrinsically broken, like maybe some wires got crossed in his making and he can’t differentiate gold from coals or love from longing.
Changbin doesn’t deserve to be burned. He doesn’t, and if Hyunjin really thinks about it — sits down and turns off the music and locks his cell phone and closes his door and thinks about it — it’s not Changbin’s fault. His favorite joke throughout their entire college career might have been how desperately he longed for Hyunjin, and the psychological damage of having his reality broadcasted as a bit for his friends may have been severe and irreversible, but that wasn’t Changbin’s fault.
It’s Hyunjin’s fault that he can’t take a joke. It’s probably Hyunjin’s fault that he is a joke, though he can’t figure out quite what he did to plant himself in that position. And maybe Hyunjin will never see himself as anything but a joke, because the one person he longs for used longing for him as a punchline.
But that’s not Changbin’s fault either. It’s not.
So Hyunjin will hold his coal in his palm, he’ll keep it close where it can always burn. He’ll squeeze it and let it blister and scar, over and over, he’ll feel it flare up every time he sees Changbin in his friends’ Instagram posts and every time they say his name. He’ll curl up in bed and he’ll ignite the burning by playing the playlists Changbin made for him in college and running through every joke Changbin ever made, every time Changbin asked him on a date but not for real and every time Changbin said he loved him. He thinks of every instance where he imagined what it would be like if Changbin just leaned in and kissed him and all the places they used to go, together, the two of them, him and Changbin, all the routines they used to have.
Sometimes he’ll try to soothe the injury by inviting someone else in his bed. They’ll be short and muscled, soft belly and thick arms. His new friends always say he has a type.
It’s Changbin, Changbin, Changbin, Changbin, Changbin.
Hyunjin hasn’t been back to LA since he graduated. He always says that he didn't leave California for twenty two years, so now he won’t go back for twenty two years. His friends respond with that makes no sense (Seungmin) or but we miss you (Jisung) or a sympathetic Hyunjin (Chris). He sticks to it.
He doesn’t dislike New York. New York is nice. He likes that he can walk everywhere and the subway is better than the metro. It feels like a known fact that New York is better than LA and Hyunjin is inclined to agree but no matter how much he avoids it, LA is home. That’s not to say that he likes it, but it is home. He feels rather indifferent towards New York. It isn’t home but he doesn’t want to go home so he floats around, travels to as many places as he can get to, books as many jobs as he can physically work and he yearns.
It’s pathetic, really. How much yearning he does and for how long he’s been doing it. Sometimes he thinks it's just become a part of him now — he’s grown to accept it. He breathes and he works and he yearns. There’s nothing else to do. Changbin is on the other side of the country and Hyunjin has closed that door firmly shut. His back is pressed up against it and his heels are digging into the floor.
Felix is already in California to visit Chris, so Hyunjin flies into LAX alone for the engagement party. It’s the worst airport he’s ever been to, and he’s been to a lot of them now. He hates it. He’s fairly sure it has been under construction since he was an infant and flew in from Korea. Always something to work on; always something to be improved; never, ever finished. He hates it. He hates it.
He glances out the little window. The sun’s setting. There’s pink in the sky. He’s looking down at the clouds. He tries to stare. It really is pretty, the billowing clouds and the cotton candy colors and swirling light.
He can’t get rid of the discomfort in his stomach.
Being above the clouds is a sight that Hyunjin has never gotten used to, despite being here so frequently. It feels wrong — like he’s not supposed to be here, like he’s breaking the order somehow. Why should Hyunjin’s human body, all his flesh and blood and organs, be above the clouds? That can’t be right.
It adds to the feeling of dread that sits heavy in his abdomen, it trickles out into his limbs and then to his fingertips. It’s been manifesting for weeks, ever since they got the phone call in Paris.
Hyunjin hates the city of Los Angeles. This festers as they hurdle towards it at 500 miles per hour. He hates the traffic, he hates the weather, he hates seeing the street corners where he and Changbin used to drunkenly lean on each other, waiting for the crosswalk to turn green even though it was the middle of the night and there were no cars on the road. Just so they could spend a little more time together. He wonders if Changbin realizes this was what Hyunjin was doing, or if he thinks Hyunjin is really serious about traffic law. The thought is laughable.
He does this a lot: wonders if Changbin knows the things he never shared, the things he purposely tried to keep hidden.
He tricks himself into it sometimes. He tells himself that Changbin knows everything. Changbin knows that Hyunjin jaywalks every day of his life. Changbin knows that Hyunjin actually hates horror movies and only watched them because he wanted to watch the things Changbin liked. Changbin knows that every time he called him beautiful, Hyunjin laughed and rolled his eyes because if he didn’t he would cry. Changbin knows that all of those paintings and poems and songs were about him. Changbin knows how Hyunjin yearns for him.
That must be the joke, right? That’s why it’s funny, doesn’t he see? Hyunjin will suffer in silence, let it simmer and seethe. Changbin will loudly stoke the embers, add fuel to the fire and laugh when it burns. Right? That’s why it’s funny?
But no, it’s not Changbin’s fault. He doesn’t know what Hyunjin doesn’t tell him and it’s not his fault. As much as Hyunjin tries to trick himself into shifting the blame, he knows he is the only one who deserves it. He knows that he has a voice, even if he struggles to use it, and he could say something if he wanted to. He could say hey, I know you always joke about taking me on a date, but what if you did for real? And what if we kissed and made love and then what if you got on one knee and we grew old together?
But the thought makes him sick: coughing his heart up into his mouth, spitting it out in his hands and passing it over. He’s sure it’d stop beating. He’s sure Changbin would take one look at it and laugh, say something teasing and playful and Hyunjin would be down an organ for nothing in return but a couple giggles and a dumb pick up line.
So instead he took a scalpel and scraped off chunks of his still beating heart. He presented the bloody evidence in a beautiful package wrapped up in ribbons, in the form of a painting or a poem or changing Changbin’s lock screen to a photo of himself. He made it pretty. He wishes Changbin would’ve seen how grotesque it truly was.
It’s too late now, either way. That’s not Changbin’s fault either. Hyunjin sometimes wishes he would’ve said something three years ago, back when they saw each other everyday, when they still fell asleep talking to each other, but the thought makes him sick even retroactively.
At least he likes landing in Los Angeles at night. The lights twinkle. It’s pretty from a distance. Hyunjin can relate.
He gets an Uber straight to Jeongin and Seungmin’s apartment. His friends love him enough to pick him up from LAX but he loves his friends too much to ask them to pick him up from LAX, especially given that he has Uber money now.
His headphones die five minutes into the ride. His phone is at thirteen percent. He should’ve charged it on the plane and didn’t. He's obviously not going to ask the driver if he can plug it in. He’s left to stare out the window and think.
Jeongin. And Seungmin. Engaged. To be married. To each other.
He wants his friends to be happy, of course, of course he wants his friends to be happy. He loves his friends and he wants his friends to be happy. Of course.
(He’s so fucking jealous of his friends that it aches in his bones; he wishes for things he’ll never say.)
Minho and Jisung are a done deal. Minho was an international student who had every intention of returning to Korea post-grad and ended up staying for Jisung, who bounced around a million different IB schools but always knew he wanted to end up in LA for his music. They built a life together in California, complete with careers and cats and the cutest little cottage style house and all. They’re settled. They’re it for each other.
Chris and Felix are a done deal. They only get to see each other twice a month and it requires a five hour flight in between but they’re so devoted to one another that they make it work. The distance is temporary, until Felix further establishes his career with this agency and has the freedom to move back to LA to be with Chan. They’re as close as they can get to settled in a long distance relationship. They’re it for each other.
Seungmin and Jeongin… They were always kind of up in the air. Or it seemed that way, at least. They never could admit what they really were to each other. They were roommates for a couple years, though no one ever really believed that and Hyunjin suspected they just thought it was funny to maintain. Jeongin always said he was going back to the Bay; Seungmin always said he was sick of LA and was going to flee the US to live in one of the many empty pieces of real estate his parents own in Korea.
Apparently not. Apparently, they were staying in LA too. Together. As a married couple.
And Hyunjin is so, so, so happy for them. He’s so happy for them. He wants his friends to be happy. He loves them. What kind of friend would he be if his longing rotted him from the inside out, decayed at all the love in him until only envy remained? No, he’s trying to get better.
But, that did leave Hyunjin and Changbin. Hyunjin and Changbin, who were attached at the hip for nearly four years and haven’t spoken in nearly two. The fourth pair of their little group, no longer a pair. The only incomplete piece of the puzzle, the odd ones out.
Really, Hyunjin is the only one who hates LA. Hates his home. He’s never moving back. Everyone else is happy here, so he’s the odd one out. Just him.
He wonders if Changbin ever thinks about this, how everyone in their friend group coupled off and built lives together. He wonders how Changbin reacted to the engagement news.
They probably told him in person. He probably burst into a grin and bolted to squeeze Jeongin and Seungmin, always so openly affectionate it was baffling. He probably had happiness and excitement radiating out of him, with a slew of high-pitched noises and pinchy fingers on cheeks.
He definitely didn’t burst into tears and retreat to a dark hotel room.
Sometimes, Hyunjin pretends that he and Changbin weren’t just best friends. Like, officially. He pretends that they too were once in love. They kissed and cuddled and when Changbin introduced Hyunjin to people he said this is my boyfriend with his wide lopsided smile and they didn’t love each other — they were in love, for real, not as a joke. That delusion makes the burning in his palm feel a bit more justified. Not better, but more justified.
He’s dangerously adroit at toggling in and out of reality. He builds fantasies to make himself feel better and to make himself feel worse, to help solve his problems and to create more.
He acknowledges that. He won’t fix it.
“Congratulations!” Hyunjin squeals, darting into Jeongin and wrapping his arms around his shoulders the minute he answers the door. He swings him back and forth and ruffles his hair. Seungmin is hovering nearby; Hyunjin reaches out and crushes him into the hug too.
“For what?” Jeongin asks casually. He’s reciprocating the hug more than he used to when they were younger. He used to leave his arms limp at his side while Hyunjin squeezed and shook him. Hyunjin has the passing thought that maybe this change is less about age and more about the fact that Jeongin may miss him and his stomach starts hurting more than it already did. He shoves that thought away.
Hyunjin pulls back, keeping his arms looped around them. “For your… Engagement?”
“Oh, yeah, I don’t know.” Jeongin looks over at Seungmin. There is suddenly fondness seeping out of his pores. “We might call the wedding off.”
Seungmin giggles. Hyunjin steps back, confused.
“I don’t even know if I like him that much.” Jeongin adds with a shrug. “Do you even like me that much, Minnie?”
Seungmin collects himself. “Definitely not. I just wanted an excuse to get Hyunjin back in town.”
“Right,” Jeongin agrees. “Who knows if the wedding will even happen.”
Seungmin hums. “Jeongin’s kinda annoying. I just wanted to see you, Hyunjinnie.”
“Mmhm.” Jeongin points at him in agreement.
Hyunjin looks at one, and then the other. Their faces are completely straight, serious to a tee.
“You got engaged to get me back in town,” Hyunjin deadpans.
“Yeah,” Seungmin and Jeongin both answer at the same time.
“Cool.” Hyunjin nods. “I’m here. So, no engagement party?”
“No, the engagement party is still on,” Seungmin corrects. “We booked a really cool restaurant, that’s definitely still happening.”
“Yeah, the wedding is up in the air,” Jeongin further clarifies.
“We might just break up,” Seungmin says. It’s meant for Hyunjin, but he’s staring at Jeongin and the serious mask is slipping. His eyes are big, full of so much love that it’s palpable.
“I’ve never loved you,” Jeongin responds, staring back at him like he’s god’s greatest gift.
“Me either,” Seungmin shakes his head, affectionate smile blooming across his features. “And I find you unbearable.”
“You’re the most irritating person I’ve ever met.”
“Likewise.”
They stare at each other, smiling.
Hyunjin is friends with freaks because he’s a freak too. He wouldn’t change it. But if Changbin offered him a ring and then uttered the words I’ve never loved you, everyone within a ten mile radius would witness a psychiatric emergency.
Not that Changbin would ever propose to him, he reminds himself. Not in all seriousness, at least.
“Um…” Hyunjin looks between them. “Okay?”
Seungmin looks away from Jeongin, and suddenly his face is back to neutral. “Felix is on his way, Chris has an early meeting so he’s going to bed, Minho and Jisung said you landed too late for them to be leaving the house, and Changbin—”
Hyunjin flinches. He knew it was coming and he thought he could keep it together but his body reacted before his mind. Seungmin notices. He doesn’t say anything.
“Is really busy with work this week, so you’ll just see him at the party,” he finishes.
Hyunjin lets the information go in one ear and out the other. He can’t think about it.
Hyunjin is having trouble sleeping.
He booked a hotel room, because obviously he’s not staying with his parents and he had no desire to stay with a newly engaged couple, or a freshly reunited long distance couple, or a couple that has settled so far into domestic life that they can’t leave the house past nine pm.
So instead he sits in a hotel room alone in his hometown. He showers and does his skincare and gets in bed. He closes his eyes for thirty seconds. He scrolls on his phone. He gets out his sketchbook. The walls start closing in, the yellow lighting makes his vision go fuzzy and distorted. The AC is making his throat dry, he can’t breathe.
He puts on a hoodie to go for a walk.
He quickly remembers another reason why he hates Los Angeles: without a car, he’s trapped. The feeling immediately starts gnawing at his patience, growing so intolerable that he gets a Lyft to a twenty four hour car rental place.
He gets in his rental and drives down the freeway for longer than he should. He passes the exit that leads to the hotel and merges to go north. If he drives for long enough he’ll be in Ventura County and maybe he’ll magically feel better.
It can be kind of peaceful late at night, with fewer cars on the road. He drives in silence because he doesn’t know what to listen to.
Changbin used to curate all of Hyunjin’s music — Hyunjin just couldn’t find what he liked the way Changbin could. He would try, but every time Changbin said I found a song, you’re gonna love it Hyunjin was blown away. It didn’t compare to anything on his shitty playlists with ten songs that he was never really in the mood to listen to anyway.
One time in college, Changbin went to a show with Jisung and Chris and then showed up to Hyunjin’s apartment instead of going home. He was so sure Hyunjin would love the band and he needed Hyunjin to hear their stuff right then immediately, and he always had to watch Hyunjin listen to a song for the first time. He told Hyunjin he loved his expressions all the time.
Changbin was a little drunk and all hopped up on live music endorphins. He jumped on Hyunjin’s bed with such enthusiasm that he knocked Hyunjin right off, and then fussed over him profusely. All my Hyunjin! and is your pretty face okay? and cute noises as he inspected Hyunjin for damage.
Hyunjin loved being fussed over by Changbin, it was really one of his favorite things, but he loved it so much it burned. He batted his hands away.
Changbin connected his phone to the speaker in Hyunjin’s room, the speaker he bought for Hyunjin. He used the excuse it’s basically for me, I’m here all the time and your speaker sounds like shit as well as how are you supposed to enjoy my music for you with this crunchy fucking sound. Hyunjin narrowly accepted it, mostly on account of the fact that he’d seen pictures of Changbin’s parents’ house in the hills and their beach house in Montecito and also their penthouse in Seoul.
(Hyunjin has always been a jealous person, even before the longing rotted him to this degree. He feels guilty for his greed, because his parents gave him everything and worked hard for it too. He always, always itches for more. They’re right when they call him ungrateful. Acknowledged; unfixed.)
Changbin promised he’d take him to Korea one day, to their place in Seoul, when Hyunjin told him he’d never really been there. He was born there, but he has no memories whatsoever, so he’d never really been there. He still doesn’t know why he feels strange when he says that so he chooses not to think about it all that much.
Hyunjin brushed off the promise, in large part because his parents would be horrified by the mere suggestion of him accepting handouts from the rich kid he befriended in college. By extension, the thought made his own skin crawl.
He thinks a lot, to this day, about how his mom would love Changbin. He’s so polite and his Korean is perfect, much better than Hyunjin’s. Worlds better than Hyunjin’s. Changbin learned Korean from the tutors his dad hired and not from desperately trying to connect with his parents in a way that they never really desired to connect with him.
Changbin is really close with his own mom. Hyunjin’s always been jealous of that, too. They exchanged I love you s every time they hung up the phone and when Changbin got his first C in a class she said you tried your best, baby! His dad was pissed, yeah, but as he was yelling at him on FaceTime his mom was making faces and rolling her eyes in the background. His dad stormed off and she took the phone back and said Cs get degrees! and then they both laughed and she said I’m proud of you, Binnie-baby! Changbin said he loved her and she said it back and they hung up.
Then he turned back to Hyunjin, unfazed, ready to continue the movie they were watching. Hyunjin felt like he was going to cry on Changbin’s behalf. Changbin apologized for the interruption with a little laugh and pressed play.
If Hyunjin uttered the phrase Cs get degrees in his mother’s presence she would smack him, ask if he was stupid, then smack him again. If Hyunjin asked his mom if she was proud of him she’d say for what? If he said I love you she’d think she misheard him and ignore it.
He loves his parents and his parents love him, he knows that. Their love isn’t worse, just different. But sometimes he wonders if some of the reluctance to ever express any of his feelings — especially his most gut wrenching ones, especially the ones he feels for Changbin — comes from the fact that he never really learned how.
And there he goes, blaming everyone else. It’s no one’s fault but his own and he knows it. He starts making his way back to the hotel. He never made it to Ventura County.
Minho and Jisung invite Hyunjin over for lunch. He’s the only one who has yet to see their house in person and they have a new cat. Hyunjin has always been more of a dog person, but Minho and Jisung’s cats are their babies so they hold a special place in his heart nevertheless.
He rolls out of bed twenty minutes before he has to leave because he was up all night, plugs the address into his map and drives his rental car there. He’s never been great with directions, he needs them to get around the city even though he lived there for twenty two years.
Changbin was always really bad at directions too. They were both LA natives and they got lost constantly.
(Sometimes Hyunjin would fuck up the navigation on purpose.)
He arrives at Minho and Jisung’s house. It’s adorable. The roof is gabled and there’s an arch over the entryway, they have a lawn and flowerbeds, it’s in a nice, quiet neighborhood. It definitely cost millions of dollars.
Jisung’s career was going extraordinarily well — as was Chris and Changbin’s by extension, they always stuck together. Minho’s career was going extraordinarily well too, but not in the buy a multi-million dollar home in your mid-twenties way. Minho’s career was fulfilling in a sense that Hyunjin couldn’t quite grasp: he was fostering an adoration of dance in people of all ages, helping them develop a passion or hone in their craft, teaching his skills and sharing his love.
Hyunjin sometimes wonders if he’ll ever find a career like that, but he’s a bad teacher. He’s way too focused on himself.
Acknowledged, unfixed.
He gives himself a couple seconds to stare at the facade and suppress every feeling that is bubbling up in his gut. He loves his friends. He’s so happy for his friends. He loves his friends. He’s so happy for his friends. He loops it a couple more times.
He texts the group chat with just the three of them before he gets out of the car and Jisung swings the door open immediately, massive smile on his face. His hair is longer, curling at his neck. He has some stubble on his face. It’s a sight Hyunjin has never gotten used to; he was baby faced and smooth throughout their college years and they don’t see each other enough now for it to be normal.
Minho is standing behind him. There’s a cat on his shoulder. Hyunjin doesn’t recognize it so it must be the new one.
“Hyunjinnie!” Jisung sings as Hyunjin slams his car door shut. He holds his arms out and Hyunjin runs to slip into them, squeezing him so hard that he wheezes a little.
“I’m so happy to see you guys,” Hyunjin says into Jisung’s hair. It comes out smaller than he’d like. His voice always gets kind of weird when he’s honest, when the truth feels too close to his core. He misses his friends.
Hyunjin pulls out of the hug before he can think about it too much.
“This is Dori.” Minho says, instead of a hello, scooping the cat down from his shoulder and holding it in his arms like an actual baby. He presents him to Hyunjin with all the pride of a new father.
Hyunjin reaches out and pats its head. “Hi Dori!” He coos.
Minho, entirely straight faced, lifts up the cat’s paw and makes it wave at Hyunjin. Jisung starts giggling.
“He’s acclimated really well.” Jisung also reaches to give Dori some scratches. It’s much more comfortable than Hyunjin’s, less tentative, and Dori nuzzles into his hand.
There is delight coming off of Jisung in waves, tangibly proud. Hyunjin is so happy for his friends.
(His stomach twists and curls, bile creeps up in his throat and he has to swallow it down.)
They give Hyunjin a quick tour of the house. It’s distinctly Minho and Jisung, not just one of them but the two of them together, as a pair, in this space that they’ve curated together. It’s lived in but tidy, minimal but colorful. Hyunjin is so, so happy for his friends.
(He needs to lock himself in the bathroom for a second. He takes a deep breath and splashes some water on his face.)
Minho leads Hyunjin and Jisung out to their backyard to eat the lunch he prepared, because it’s a nice day. (It’s always a nice day in LA, it’s repetitive and grating.) He made jjajangmyeon because he knows its Hyunjin’s favorite, though he doesn’t say as much. He made all the banchan himself, some with vegetables from his own garden. He tells Hyunjin that he works part time now, mostly spends his days gardening and cooking and lounging in the sun with their cats.
“He’s my housewife,” Jisung says. His cocky grin is splitting his face in half. “Right, sweetheart?”
Minho flips him off and Jisung explodes into giggles. Hyunjin’s stomach churns; his palm burns.
Minho and Jisung mostly speak Korean with each other. Sometimes they start talking and switch languages, get on a tangent together, and Hyunjin loses track of what they’re saying. It’s a feeling he hasn’t experienced in a while, and he’s surprised with how quickly it comes back and how instantly he feels like a desperate child trying to keep up, grasping at every piece of language and context to gather some minute understanding. By the time he does, there’s already something new to understand. He can never catch up.
He feels like he’s purposefully being left out. He reminds himself that not everything is about him. It’s always brief — they always turn back to him and slip back into English or at least Konglish that he can comprehend. They’re not even thinking about it; it’s not a big deal.
Hyunjin used to practice his Korean with Minho when they were in college. It somehow felt less embarrassing with him, because Minho is Korean. Of course his Korean is good, he wasn’t better than Hyunjin for speaking Korean. He literally grew up in Korea. And Minho’s English was pretty basic their freshman year, which made the playing field feel more even. Hyunjin’s English was good, his Korean was bad. Minho’s Korean was good, his English was bad. They met in the middle. It made Hyunjin feel better.
Now it feels worse. Minho’s English is perfectly fluent, because he worked hard and practiced. Jisung mentions that they’re learning Japanese together now; it feels worse again. Hyunjin still can’t even speak his first language.
It’s his own fault. He knows it’s his own fault. He knows if he stopped being so afraid of the things that make him uncomfortable, if he let go of the burning shame, if he wasn’t so scared of misunderstanding and being misunderstood and he just practiced — he could improve his language skills like anyone else.
He acknowledges it. He leaves it unfixed.
Hyunjin spends all day into the evening at Minho and Jisung’s house. It’s really nice to catch up with them and gets progressively less painful the longer he stays. He loves his friends.
Minho’s parents are coming to visit for the first time, and he is obviously very excited. He’s really close with them — he calls them twice a week at least, every week since he was eighteen years old. He goes back to Korea as much as he can but they’ve never come here, and they’ve never met Jisung.
Minho gets a little fidgety and nervous when that comes up. It’s nerve wracking, even though the overall situation is good, better than Minho ever anticipated. His parents accept that their son is never getting married and they are very supportive of his best friend and roommate whom he purchased a home with.
They all know what’s happening. Nobody ever puts words to it. They’re still so close.
(Hyunjin is consumed by jealousy. He’s sure if they tested his blood it would show.)
Jisung tells him about his music and about the album he’s producing for an artist he really likes. He cackles his way through a story about catching Chris looking at a picture of Felix’s ass during a meeting. He says he just sent it! I didn’t know what it was gonna be! in the worst Australian accent ever and Minho starts cackling too.
Hyunjin pretends not to notice that he’s beating around mentioning Changbin. Hyunjin knows he was there, they always stick together, but somehow he never comes up.
They ask about Hyunjin’s travels. Hyunjin shows them pictures and tells them stories and they giggle together. He loves his friends. He misses his friends. He really is happy for his friends, really . He settles into the feeling more.
Then Jisung starts yawning behind his hand. When Minho rubs his lower back, Hyunjin can see the I know you’re sleepy, baby in his eyes and he feels worse than he has all day. He needs to be gone immediately.
So he starts driving back to his hotel. His mind is fuzzy and exhausted; he misses his exit. He keeps driving down the freeway in silence. He merges onto a different freeway. Loops back around. He takes a random exit and he drives around there. He half focuses on the road, half admires the houses.
Hyunjin doesn’t like driving. Changbin drove him everywhere when they were in college. Hyunjin would curl up in the passenger seat or put his feet on the dash and stare at him. Changbin would reprimand him for not sitting properly and Hyunjin would call him homophobic. Changbin would yell how is that homophobic?! and Hyunjin would shush him.
Changbin would shush. Hyunjin would keep his feet on the dash. He always let Hyunjin do whatever he wanted anyway.
Sometimes Changbin would text him wanna go for a drive? and Hyunjin would always say yes. Hyunjin said yes to most of the things Changbin wanted to do — sometimes he would complain a little but he always agreed. Especially because Changbin would take him home as soon as he said he wanted to go, even if they stayed for thirty seconds.
Changbin was always on AUX. He would sit in the driver's seat for ten minutes before they went anywhere, staring at his phone and picking songs. Hyunjin would whine about him taking so long and Changbin would say I’m curating a queue for my Hyunjin!
(Hyunjin mostly whined because he knew he would get to hear Changbin call him his. He could take all the time he wanted. If Changbin was staring at his phone, Hyunjin could stare at him.)
One time he asked why Changbin couldn’t curate his queue before he picked Hyunjin up. Changbin said I have to see what you’re feeling and Hyunjin pointed out that he never asked what he was feeling.
Changbin looked at him with his big, lopsided grin and said I don’t have to.
It landed somewhere weird in Hyunjin’s rib cage, almost at his heart but a couple inches towards his stomach; pleasant but so pleasant that it verged on uncomfortable, got too heavy, drooped into his abdomen and made him feel sick.
And you wouldn’t tell me anyway, Changbin added. He went back to his phone. Hyunjin didn’t know what to say so he didn’t say anything.
Changbin’s curated queue hit the mark every time.
He knew all Hyunjin’s favorite parts of his favorite songs and would turn up the volume when they came on. Sometimes he knew when Hyunjin would really like a bridge or a pre-chorus or a certain chord progression or a specific riff and he would interrupt the conversation, say wait, listen to this with his hand on the dial to blast it.
Hyunjin would close his eyes and listen in the way that Changbin taught him, listen to all the layers and try to feel it in your body and make it an experience. He thought it sounded dumb and pretentious but, as with most things, Changbin was right. It made it better.
So Changbin would curate a queue with songs that would zap up Hyunjin’s spine and tingle down his fingers. He would try to peel apart the layers and hear all the harmonies then put them back together again to experience the music. Changbin curated the queue just for him, after all, the least he could do was appreciate it.
There was a whole variety of music that Changbin picked for him, different genres and languages and eras. Sometimes Hyunjin could tell why Changbin chose something; most of the time he couldn’t. All the same, he enjoyed it.
Changbin knew Hyunjin well. Changbin knew Hyunjin better than Hyunjin knows himself.
Hyunjin needs to stop driving and pull over on the side of the road so he can put directions in his phone to take him back to the hotel. He sees that Felix texted him saying that Chris is Very Upset — with a bunch of angry face emojis — that he hasn’t gotten to see Hyunjin yet. He asks if Hyunjin can get breakfast in the morning because Chris has a meeting in the afternoon.
Hyunjin agrees. His phone starts directing him back to the hotel.
Hyunjin tries not to feel like the odd one out, even though he quite literally is.
Seungmin and Jeongin decided to join them for breakfast. They’re sitting together across from Hyunjin and Felix. Chris is sitting at the head of the table, probably in some attempt to make Hyunjin feel more included.
Which he does. He does feel included. Chris scooped him up in a big hug when he saw him, even though he’d seen him a few weeks earlier when he was in New York. Something about meeting in LA makes it feel like more of a reunion.
Jeongin immediately started telling Hyunjin about this vintage store he found and making plans to go before he left town. Seungmin asked if he finished the drama they were texting about, and if he also thought the ending was awful.
These are his friends. He does feel included.
But Jeongin keeps picking up Seungmin’s left hand to examine it. Hyunjin can tell he does it when he thinks no one is looking — he’ll thumb the ring or twist it around, staring with smiling eyes. Seungmin will spare him a fond glance and otherwise ignore him, like this is routine now.
When Felix laughs at something Chris says he leans towards him. Chris leans in too. Sometimes they get so close that their noses almost touch, giggles pouring into the limited space between them. Felix will bat Chris’ arm then squeeze his bicep and Chris will blush and Felix will giggle some more.
All his friends are so in love. All his friends are so in love with each other.
He guesses Changbin’s the only odd one out, on that account.
Hyunjin does his best to spend his time with his friends without bitterness seeping into his bloodstream, and for the most part he succeeds. His friends know him well: they know how to make him laugh and they know what to ask to get him talking and they know he’ll love to hear the gossip about their lives and their coworkers and people they went to college with.
When they separate, Felix says I love you, Hyunie! and Hyunjin says you too!
(When his friends casually say I love you he always says you too. He does love them, obviously, but bringing himself to say it feels foreign and charged. If the situation really calls for it he’ll muster it up, but it still feels a little like scooping out a chunk of his flesh and feeding it to the other person. It’s gory and intimate and deeply strange.)
Hyunjin drives back to his hotel. He debates telling his parents that he’s in town.
He doesn’t call them very often. When he does, he tries to stick to the same script, because if it veers off he stops understanding. It goes:
“Yes?” Like Hyunjin is a telemarketer and they don’t know why he’s calling.
“Hi, how are you?”
“Good, how are you?”
“Good, I’m going to—” Insert country. “For my job.”
“Wow,” said with a tinge of reluctance, as they are whenever Hyunjin calls modeling a job.
His Korean is always stilted and unnatural, even when they stick to the script. It gets worse when he’s uncomfortable. “Yes. It will be fun.”
“It will be fun,” said with passive aggression. Hyunjin isn't really working, is he? He’s just having fun?
“Yes.” Awkward silence. “What are you doing?”
“Working,” said definitively. They are working. Hyunjin is fucking around and ignoring all the opportunities they brought him here to have.
“Yeah.” More awkward silence. “Well I’ll talk to you later.”
“Okay bye.”
Hyunjin wishes he had more to share and just doesn’t have the language to do it, but that’s not true. He doesn’t know what he’d tell them, even if he actually spoke Korean. What does he have to share with his parents about the life he leads? I party a lot and I make art about being gay in love with my best friend from college and I’m kind of a miserable person.
The scope of his parents’ disappointment in him runs wide enough already, anything he has to share will just increase the breadth.
He doesn’t tell them he’s in town.
Hyunjin stays in his hotel room for the rest of the day. There’s something deeply depressing about lounging in a hotel room in his hometown midday, but he doesn’t feel like doing anything else.
It kind of reminds him of when he was a child on summer vacation, laying around his house and watching TV while the sunshine streamed through his windows. He didn’t have very many friends growing up, he mostly kept to himself, and his parents were always at work. He spent a lot of time alone. That’s why he started doing art in the first place — he had a lot of time to kill.
Hyunjin liked the days where it got gloomy. Those were few and far between. There was a lot of sunshine to waste in California, but Hyunjin felt guilty for doing it anyway. The gloom made him feel better about staying inside to paint. His mom bought him watercolors and watercolor paper one summer when she saw how much he’d been drawing.
(He remembers that when he reminds himself that his parents do love him.)
Hyunjin never had many fond memories of summer vacation, until he met Changbin.
Hyunjin’s first summer with Changbin, the summer after their freshman year, was Hyunjin’s first good summer. Minho went back to Gimpo, Felix and Chris went back to Sydney, Jeongin went back up north, Jisung went to stay with his parents in London, Seungmin spent the summer in Seoul like he had since he was a kid.
Hyunjin remembers when he went to Changbin’s house for the first time. It was only a couple days into break and extraordinarily hot outside. Hyunjin was texting Changbin, whining about how hot it was and yearning for AC. Changbin responded what the fuck? there are houses here with no ac? which would’ve pissed Hyunjin off if anyone else said it but Changbin said it so he was endeared.
Changbin came and picked him up.
It took kinda a long time to get from Hyunjin’s house to Changbin’s, especially with traffic, but it took a long time to get everywhere here and they drove around for fun anyway. Changbin never minded. Hyunjin thanked him profusely and he said that’s why I’m here with a massive grin on his face.
Hyunjin didn’t know what he meant and didn’t know what to say so he didn’t say anything. It’s a lifelong habit he can’t break.
Changbin’s driveway went on for a million years. His house was set back up in the hills, so it had a really pretty view. The actual home was, like, architectural magazine level sumptuous. It was massive and there were whole walls of glass.
When he first walked in, Hyunjin kind of felt like he was in a fishbowl. He wondered if Changbin ever felt like he was being watched, or if the distance from everything else and the familiarity of it soothed the overwhelming exposure. Hyunjin could never get used to it.
They spent the whole day together. Changbin had a pool so they swam. They ate takeout outside at one of the tables in his massive backyard, no sunshine gone to waste. When it got dark they watched movies on Changbin’s couch.
Eventually Hyunjin started yawning and rubbing at his eyes. Changbin stared at him for a little before asking if Hyunjin wanted him to be taken home.
The answer was no but Hyunjin nodded anyway. He couldn’t admit that he wanted to stay. It felt vulnerable and rude, he was always afraid of asking for too much.
(He was more afraid of asking, and not receiving.)
Changbin came and got Hyunjin the next morning, and the next day after that. Then the next day, and the next day, and the next day…
They developed a routine. Changbin would pick Hyunjin up in the morning, or whenever Hyunjin woke up. He curated his queue and he would say the first couple are background tracks and they would talk. Or sometimes he would take one look at Hyunjin and turn the music up so they could drive wordlessly.
One day, Hyunjin was struggling to keep his eyes open. He slept awfully. His head kept lolling to the side as he fell asleep a little bit and woke himself back up again.
You can nap, baby, Changbin softly said.
Suddenly Hyunjin was wide awake.
Changbin called Jeongin baby all the time, sometimes Felix and Jisung too. Hyunjin thought he was jealous of them but now it had happened to him too and it actually made his stomach lurch so violently he felt like he was going to throw up.
Hyunjin replied with I’m okay immediately. Changbin hummed and turned the music up.
One day Changbin picked him up and said he didn’t feel like going back home. Instead, they went to the dollar store and bought plastic water guns shaped like dinosaurs. Changbin forgot his wallet, so Hyunjin paid the $2.15 while Changbin hugged his back and thanked him for providing for them. Hyunjin’s hands shook as he put his wallet away.
Once they obtained the water guns they drove down the PCH. Changbin said he was curating the best queue of all time tailored specifically to the beautiful Hyunjin Hwang for this beautiful day. Hyunjin tried to just roll his eyes but he also ended up blushing and giggling too.
They got to the beach, filled the dinosaurs with ocean water, and went at each other. Hyunjin shot Changbin right in the face even though that was clearly against their outlined rules and Changbin tackled him, threw him over his shoulder and threatened to drop him in the ocean in retaliation. He brought him right up to the surf and swung him around while Hyunjin screamed and laughed and begged for mercy.
Changbin tossed Hyunjin into a bridal carry. He looked at him with his pretty eyes, the kindest eyes Hyunjin had ever seen, and said I’d never put you in danger, Hyunie.
Hyunjin’s throat closed. He didn’t know what to say so he didn’t say anything.
Eventually he would just sleep in Changbin’s bed. It was big enough for the both of them and there was no need for Changbin to make the drive if Hyunjin was just going to be back at his house in the morning anyway.
Sometimes Hyunjin would curl into Changbin’s chest in the night, his body reaching out for him. He’d be so embarrassed when he woke up and because his embarrassment always seemed to please Changbin, he’d be in a really good mood.
They would mostly watch movies and eat takeout and listen to music and swim in Changbin’s pool. Changbin always did this thing in the pool where he would pick Hyunjin up and throw him around. Hyunjin would screech and giggle and put up the worst fight of all time. One time, when Changbin was trying to toss him across the water, Hyunjin tried to fight it by wrapping his legs around his waist and tugging him in and then their noses were touching.
They were so close that Hyunjin’s eyes crossed to look at him. Hyunjin would sometimes come to the earth shattering realization of how handsome Changbin was; he’d try to forget or ignore it, but so close up it was hard not to confront. He was so handsome.
You’re really beautiful, Hyunjin, Changbin breathed.
Hyunjin unwrapped his legs and dunked himself underwater.
Changbin’s parents were literally never home — like, Hyunjin never saw them once.
Hyunjin knew that Changbin’s dad was an expat with a gazillion dollars. Him and Changbin had a fine relationship. That was one of the few things Hyunjin and Changbin could relate on: they were both the American sons of Korean fathers who kind of gave a shit about them but not really.
Changbin always gushed about his mom. Their friends made fun of him for being a momma’s boy, but Hyunjin never did. Even though they were close in a way that Hyunjin never really got.
(She’s also very beautiful. Hyunjin has this twisted thing in his mind where he thinks that maybe because Changbin’s dad married someone exceptionally beautiful, Changbin will want to marry someone exceptionally beautiful too and that someone will be Hyunjin.)
Because his parents were never home, they did whatever they wanted. It wasn’t like they were doing anything particularly scandalous, but they played loud music and Changbin was always yelling. They took up a lot of space because there was a lot of space to take up and they left the house kind of messy.
Birds would fly into the big windows. Changbin always jumped when it happened, even though it happened all the time. He never failed to go outside and check on them. Sometimes they were shocked, sometimes they were dead. It was extremely out of character, he’s scared of everything and Hyunjin always wondered if he did it just for show, but Changbin would pick them up in towels. He would put them somewhere safe where they could fly away eventually or bury them in the backyard.
(Hyunjin felt like that sometimes: pathetic and small and needing to be taken care of after flying face first into an obstacle he did not foresee. What he wants — he reminds himself desperately that he doesn’t actually need it — is to be scooped up in Changbin’s hands, coddled and cooed over, put somewhere safe to recover or buried altogether.)
As it always seems to go, he didn’t expect to fall for Changbin like he did. Changbin was loud and boisterous and so comfortable with feelings that he could talk about having feelings as a joke. He was nothing like the boys Hyunjin had yearned for in high school, nothing like the quiet mystery and shitty indie music and amateurish poetry and commitment issues and tendencies to do a little experimenting on a boy as pretty as Hyunjin only to show up with a girlfriend a week later.
At first he thought that Changbin’s jokes about Hyunjin being so beautiful were a ploy to get in his pants. He thought that Changbin was a straight guy trying to be casual about the fact that he wanted to fuck and using dumb, exaggerated flirting to maybe make that happen. Very just kidding… unless? with a touch of trying to embarrass Hyunjin in the process. It pissed Hyunjin off and left a bad taste in his mouth but all their friends were friends; Changbin was an unavoidable presence in his life.
(He’s always been drawn to Changbin. There was not a single moment where he wasn’t drawn to Changbin. He thought Changbin was cool and outgoing, Changbin knew who he was and what he wanted for himself to a degree Hyunjin had never witnessed before. Hyunjin resented that he had become the target of these jokes while simultaneously lapping up the attention, clinging to it desperately, no matter how unserious it was in reality. It’s pathetic how deeply content and validated he felt with some throwaway compliments and played-up flirting.)
Eventually he realized that Changbin just thought himself very funny, which was fair because everyone always laughed.
It bothered Hyunjin. But then Changbin always had a song he thought Hyunjin would like and Hyunjin always actually liked them. He would bring Hyunjin chicken tenders from the dining hall when he was really focused on an assignment and gave Hyunjin his leftovers when he went to some fancy, expensive dinner with his parents. Hyunjin once made an offhand comment that he wanted jjajangmyeon and Changbin showed up at his dorm room with takeout that night. He would leave an event with Hyunjin the second he said he was tired to walk him home and if Hyunjin didn’t feel like going out he never did either.
Hyunjin would sometimes almost think he actually liked him — like, liked him, liked him, in the way that Hyunjin wanted — if it weren’t for all the ridiculous jokes.
The song recommendations always came with this song is so pretty, just like you! The chicken tenders came with can’t let the most beautiful person on the planet starve! The leftovers came with what’s mine is yours, gorgeous and the takeout came with this is kind of like a date, haha. The walks home would be filled with over the top flirting, ingenuine admissions of love and devotion that Hyunjin wished Changbin would just leave at the party, where his friends were there to point and laugh.
Having their friends there made it easier to hide the fact that Hyunjin mostly felt like he was going to have an emotional and psychological meltdown. Having a larger audience relieved some of the pressure to shove him and roll his eyes and pretend like there wasn’t a coal in his hand, steadily increasing in temperature, not unbearable yet but there and felt, threatening to worsen by the minute.
People loved Changbin. People love Changbin. He’s a fantastic friend. To everyone, not just Hyunjin. He’s funny and he’s kind and he’s radiant. Changbin didn’t seek attention; he got it. People love to be around Changbin.
And for some reason, Changbin liked to be around Hyunjin.
Hyunjin found out that Changbin spent his summers in Seoul too. He had every single year of his life, up until then. His house was always so empty because his parents and his sister were in Korea. Hyunjin asked him why he didn’t go.
I’ve gone to Korea every summer, Changbin answered. It’s my first summer with you.
Which translated to I missed an opportunity for international travel and to see my family because I didn’t want to leave your pathetic ass alone in LA for the whole summer and I know you don’t have any other friends, and Hyunjin felt sick under it. There he was, being coddled and cooed over, and he fucking hated it. He hated it. It made his skin crawl and his throat close. He tried to move on as quickly as possible.
But later, as he laid in bed — his own bed, not Changbin’s — he looped it. First summer, it was their first summer together, implying that there would be more. There would be a second and a third and a fourth; they would spend their summers together. They would listen to music and they would talk and they would drive down the coast and they would watch movies, not just this summer, but in summers to come as well. This was their first summer.
The thought made Hyunjin half giddy and half ill.
They had a hotpot place. It didn’t have a name, just a glowing sign that said HOT POT. It was always empty. The way to the bathroom was through the kitchen and they could never find it on Google.
Most of their other friends blatantly refused to go because Felix swore he saw a mouse the one time he joined them — Changbin and Hyunjin could not confirm nor deny that allegation with confidence. Seungmin took one look at it and said no, then took them to a ramen place they had to wait in line for. One time Jeongin came and he said this isn’t even that good, which deeply offended Changbin and Hyunjin on principle.
It was always open criminally late, even though there was never anyone there. Hyunjin speculated it might have been a drug front, to which Changbin very seriously responded buy ket, hotpot. It made Hyunjin laugh so hard he cried, even though it didn’t make sense and it wasn’t funny.
Every time they went thereafter they made jokes about doing ket at hot pot. Changbin once said I’m gonna put ket in the hotpot and Hyunjin responded I’m pretty sure that’s not how ketamine works? and Changbin scoffed okay, Mr. Ketamine.
Hyunjin laughed so hard he cried again. It wasn’t even funny.
He did that a lot with Changbin; he always had tears rolling down his face and aching abs and no breath in his lungs. Changbin was (is) the funniest person on Earth and Hyunjin was (is) desperately in love. He thinks those two things are probably interconnected.
Truthfully, Hyunjin was always kind of happy that no one else liked HOT POT.
One day, Changbin excitedly relayed to Hyunjin that Chris had agreed to join them. Hyunjin pretended like he had a change of plans and they actually couldn’t go. Chris found a way to enjoy everything — what if he liked it too and then it became a Changbin and Hyunjin and Chris thing, instead of just a Changbin and Hyunjin thing? Hyunjin couldn’t have that, as much as he loved Chris. He wouldn’t even think the ketamine jokes were funny.
So it was a Hyunjin and Changbin thing, for just the two of them, their little HOT POT in the strip mall next to NAILS and iPHONE REPAIR and LIQUOR. They went all the time, to the point where they were recognized. Hyunjin once got into an argument with a new waitress (definitely the owner’s teenage daughter) because she overcharged them — by, like, two dollars, but it was the principle. They were there all the time, Hyunjin knew what that receipt was supposed to look like. Changbin sat there with his stupid, handsome grin and said Hyunie, I don’t think it matters that much.
Hyunjin would not let it go. The owner came out and defended Hyunjin — by name, because they were single-handedly keeping this restaurant afloat — and reprimanded her. Hyunjin was very smug. Changbin left a massive tip for the trouble.
Sometimes they would go to the liquor store before and Changbin would use his fake to buy beer which they then transferred to water bottles, because under no circumstances could HOT POT acquire a liquor license. The people working there definitely always knew what they were doing. They giggled and sipped out of metal water bottles, conspicuous and shifty-eyed the first few times and shameless every time after that. Hyunjin was always flushed red head to toe and he always blamed the alcohol, not the fact that Changbin likes to play especially flirty when he’s drunk.
It was always worse when they were together just the two of them than it was with their friends. When Changbin didn’t have much of an audience he was quieter, more subtle. He didn’t commit quite as passionately. Instead, he kicked Hyunjin’s feet with his own and when Hyunjin said stop that he said stop what? with a snide little grin. He hummed at Hyunjin’s startled reaction when he accidentally dropped a piece of meat into the pot and the broth splashed up at him. He said how can you be so cute, Hyunjin-ah? under his breath in Korean.
(Sometimes they spoke Konglish. Most of the time they didn’t. It makes Hyunjin feel strange and uneasy and inadequate that he’s the one who needs the language to properly communicate with his parents, but Changbin is more skilled.)
Afterwards, Hyunjin would complain about being bloated and Changbin would pull up his shirt and dramatically rub the swell of his belly. Hyunjin would scoff and roll his eyes and wonder what would happen if he reached out to touch, what would happen if he squeezed his tummy in between his fingers and planted kisses on his skin.
He never found out.
When it gets dark, Hyunjin decides he needs to get out of this hotel room or he’ll lose his mind. He gets in the car and starts driving. He hates driving, he hates LA, but he keeps getting in the car to drive around LA.
He doesn’t need directions to get to HOT POT, somehow.
He hits a pothole as he pulls into the parking lot. He pulls up right in front of HOT POT — the sign is still there but there are chains on the doors. He gets out of the car to inspect further. It’s dark inside and much of the furniture is missing.
He has no thoughts about that at all. It doesn’t feel fitting at all.
He floats into the liquor store. He walks through the aisles, and he pathetically pretends that Changbin is in the aisle over. He pretends Changbin’s gonna peek his head around and say pregame? and hold up a package of gummies. Hyunjin will roll his eyes and say no sweets before dinner but then they’ll share them anyway. Changbin will say these are ket gummies and then Hyunjin will google if ketamine comes in gummy form. They’ll giggle like they’re the funniest people in the world because they are to each other.
Instead, in reality, he grabs a tall can of beer and walks to the register alone. The man sitting there is talking on the phone in a language Hyunjin doesn’t understand as he rings him up.
“When did the hotpot place close?” Hyunjin asks. He’s interrupting but he asks anyway.
The guy shrugs. “Year ago, maybe.”
Hyunjin hums. He inserts his card and he puts it back in his wallet and he leaves.
He sits on the curb in front of NAILS, drinking the beer and staring into their restaurant. He wonders what his friends in New York would say about him sitting on a curb in a strip mall at midnight with an open container and dead eyes. He wonders how he looks — if a photo of this would maybe look kinda cool and grungy on his Instagram grid instead of earth shatteringly depressing. He wonders if maybe this is rock bottom for him. He wonders what Changbin would think.
Hyunjin wishes the end of their friendship was more climactic than it actually was. It feels painful that something so important to Hyunjin slipped away so easily.
(Hyunjin watched their friendship die slowly and painfully; it’s a houseplant he put in a dark cabinet and never watered.)
He moved to New York and Changbin cried when he dropped him off at the airport. He paid for parking so he could walk Hyunjin in and help him get his luggage checked.
Changbin made no less than five jokes about coming with him on the walk from the car, no less than ten on the drive there. Hyunjin laughed and rolled his eyes when he wanted to say please come with me, please please please come with me, I’m so scared and you’re the only person who makes me feel safe and I love you so much, I’m so in love with you, please come with me.
But he didn’t. It was far too risky, put way too much on the line, and Changbin’s life is in Los Angeles. His career was already picking up, his momentum was only growing. He’s so close with his family and Hyunjin was the only one moving, all his friends were here. It would be silly to ask him to come. Not everything is about Hyunjin.
“You won’t forget about me when you’re a world famous supermodel,” Changbin stated more than he asked, his grin still so bright even though his eyes were watery. “Right, Hyunie?”
He wouldn’t. He hasn’t. He’s tried.
Hyunjin shook his head. He clung to Changbin for much longer than he’d usually allow himself and let a couple tears fall down his face. He wiped them away before he pulled back.
They texted a lot at first. Hyunjin texted Changbin with every single inconvenience he had. Changbin texted Hyunjin that he missed him most days. Hyunjin always said me too.
Hyunjin remembers one night that he called Changbin. He can’t even remember what happened but something happened, and he called Changbin crying. It was late; he woke Changbin up. Changbin lied and said he didn’t. He let Hyunjin cry on the phone for over an hour.
“I wish you were here,” Hyunjin sobbed. “I miss you so much, Binnie . I wish you were here.”
Changbin stayed silent for a couple moments.
“That’s the first time you’ve said that,” he finally said.
Hyunjin started crying harder. Changbin knew that Hyunjin missed him, he had to, Hyunjin missed Changbin so bad that it ached. He never felt homesick, not once, he just missed Changbin. Changbin knew that, it was obvious, Hyunjin didn’t have to say it.
“I wish I was there too.” Changbin exhaled a heavy breath. “I miss you so much, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart nestled in Hyunjin’s ribs: shattered glass inserted into flesh, sharp with ragged edges, embedded so deep that it rests between his bones to this day. If he stays still enough, it doesn’t hurt. If he closes his eyes, controls his breath and pretends a little, he can trick himself.
Hyunjin was torn in half. So comfortable, so in love; mortified by what he could lose, terrified of what could happen next.
“You should come here,” Hyunjin mumbled. He let himself lean into the former. He’s so in love. He's only comfortable with Changbin. He’d never had to miss anyone like this before.
“I would,” Changbin answered without hesitation. “You know I would. I will. Do you want me to?”
Hyunjin sighed. He brought himself back down to Earth. He sniffed and wiped some of the snot off of his face. “No, I can do it.” He didn’t need Changbin to drop everything because he was crying. He just moved to a new city, of course there was going to be some adjustment. “I’m gonna be okay.”
Changbin didn’t respond. Hyunjin tried to catch his breath. He stayed quiet for what felt like multiple minutes.
“...Binnie?”
“Of course you’re gonna be okay,” Changbin said, like they hadn’t paused it all. It was so genuine, so full of truth, so Changbin; Hyunjin believed it too.
Hyunjin hummed. They sat together in the quiet. Hyunjin counted Changbin’s breaths. He missed falling asleep next to him, like they did in the summer.
“I love you, Hyunjin.” Changbin broke the silence, speaking in the exact same way as before. Genuine. True. It sent a shock up Hyunjin’s spine, dispersed in sweet little tingles throughout his limbs. Changbin loved Hyunjin, through and through. Hyunjin knows that. In the same way Hyunjin loves him? That, Hyunjin didn’t know. He doesn’t know. He’s too scared to find out.
His heart crept up into his throat, threatening to spill out of his mouth. He swallowed it down.
“You too,” Hyunjin replied.
“I—” Changbin exhaled heavily. “I really miss you.” His voice was tight around the edges. Hyunjin wondered if he sounded the same.
“Me too.”
“I love you,” Changbin repeated. “I really— I’m—” He exhaled again. He took a second. “I’m missing you a lot.”
Hyunjin thought of Changbin every single day, multiple times a day. His body ached for him so painfully it was nauseating. He hadn’t listened to music in weeks.
“Me too,” Hyunjin whispered.
A little time. A little distance. That would fix everything. A few unanswered phone calls. Texts left on delivered for a couple days. He would reach out when he felt better; that would fix things.
Hyunjin didn’t need Changbin, that was unfair to Changbin and Hyunjin didn’t need anyone.
Days turned into weeks. The phone calls stopped coming. Hyunjin just needed a little time, that would fix everything.
Hyunjin shouldn’t need Changbin. Hyunjin’s an addict. He’d reach out again when he found a new drug of choice. When he found something that sent the same buzz up his spine and settled through his system in the same way, something that made him laugh and simultaneously sated him in the same way, that understood him and took care of him and loved him in the same way — then he’d reach out again.
Weeks turned into months. He would reach out eventually, he would, he just had a flight to catch and a job to do and he needed a little distance. That would fix things.
Hyunjin was working on not needing Changbin.
In order to do this, he ignored his texts completely and booked more jobs. He traveled more and went out more and drank more and dabbled in party drugs. He tried to make more friends in the city and he slept with more guys that looked like Changbin.
None of it worked. Mostly because his longing was a red hot coal in his fist, closed so tight for so long that the joints in his fingers had fused together.
It’s all his fault, see?
He wished for a lot of things. Mostly, he wished Changbin would beg for him, fight for him. He fantasized that Changbin would show up on his doorstep without Hyunjin having to ask. He would be there to figure out why Hyunjin hadn’t been answering his messages, so desperate to talk to his best friend that he made the trip across the country and knocked on his door.
In Hyunjin’s delusions, sometimes Changbin would be worried. He would be so concerned for Hyunjin and so relieved to see him, he’d coo and coddle. Sometimes he would be mad. He would be so pissed that he’d start yelling at him as soon as he opened the door. Sometimes he would just be so happy to see Hyunjin that he swept him off his feet and spun him around.
In every variation, they kiss at the end.
The last time they texted, there had been a couple months of radio silence on both ends. Previous to that, Changbin had messaged multiple times over the course of many months, obviously, and Hyunjin had left them all unanswered. He’d look at them: his chest would ache and his palm would burn. He’d say he’d get back to him when he felt better and he never felt better so he never got back to him.
Eventually, Hyunjin reached out. Not because he felt better, but because he couldn’t help himself. He’s an addict.
Changbin answered in less than a minute. They planned a time to talk a couple days later; they both had extremely busy schedules now, individual lives to lead.
Hyunjin canceled an hour before.
Just a little more time. Just a little more distance.
Hyunjin went to Seoul for the first time, without Changbin, for a job. He realized his Korean was worse than he thought, which is really saying something, and even further understood what his parents meant when they said he was so American.
He met some idol he’d never heard of at a club in Itaewon and took him back to his hotel room. He was a bad kisser and clearly had no idea what he was doing but Hyunjin liked the whimsy of it. He did it for the story. And Hyunjin didn’t lose his virginity until he was twenty three, he could be sympathetic.
It was in no way whimsical. Hyunjin did not understand any of the things that were drunkenly being said to him, but the language barrier was familiar and comfortable in a way that Hyunjin chose not to think too deeply about. He just kept kissing him instead of responding even though this guy was a terrible kisser. The sex was bad. Hyunjin had to put in all the work and he didn’t look anything like Changbin, he didn’t have any soft muscles to grab onto or the cute pouty lips so Hyunjin couldn’t even really get into it.
Then he went home and kept fucking guys who looked like Changbin.
One time (a few times) Hyunjin said Changbin’s name while fucking some guy that looked like him, which most of his hookups did. All of his hookups. As respectfully as possible, the random 5’5 buff Asian guys with tummies were usually pretty excited about being pursued by Hyunjin and most of the time they didn’t care if he called them by the right name or hardly ever looked at their faces.
Hyunjin is a bad person. Acknowledged, unfixed.
After he lost his virginity to some guy he met in a bar, he realized the only people he was actually attracted to were… Well, Changbin. This guy was tall and skinny and artsy, the kind of guy Hyunjin would have yearned for in high school. It was fine. But as it was happening, Hyunjin kept wishing he was Changbin.
He had no desire to have sex with anybody else in college. It wasn’t like he was saving himself for Changbin. No, that would be ridiculous. That wasn’t what was happening.
But he did kind of want it to be special, and no one is more special than Changbin.
It didn’t end up being special. Obviously. But he wasn’t answering Changbin’s texts and he was trying everything he could to get him out of his mind so he went for it. He regretted it. But the door had been opened so he kept trying.
No one made him feel like Changbin did. Even though it was always a joke, no one made him feel like Changbin did.
So he did the next best thing: found guys who looked like him and pretended.
Felix hosted a minor intervention once. He said that this was probably unhealthy and maybe he should branch out or maybe — this part was said so tentatively, like if Felix made one wrong move Hyunjin would shatter — he should reach out to Changbin.
Hyunjin insisted he was fine.
One time, and this actually only happened one time, he said I love you. He had been sleeping with this guy for a while and he really looked like Changbin, he had wavy hair and his lips were a perfect little circle. Hyunjin had already called him Changbin a couple times and he didn’t seem all that surprised when the I love you came out, they both knew what was happening between them. They never talked about it, obviously, but they both knew.
Hyunjin knows in the back of his mind that Felix was right. He knows it’s an extremely unfair and disrespectful and dehumanizing thing to do to the people he’s having sex with. He knows that he’s not even trying to move on and he knows he’s making himself miserable.
Acknowledged, unfixed.
It’s been nearly two years since the last time Changbin and Hyunjin saw each other in person.
Changbin came to New York to visit. Hyunjin was so excited about it that he felt sick for weeks. He stood outside his building bouncing on the heels of his feet, waiting for Changbin’s Uber to pull up even though his location said he wouldn’t be there for thirty minutes. The fall air was crisp and Hyunjin forgot to bring a jacket down but he couldn’t go back upstairs. What if Changbin miraculously made it here early and Hyunjin wasn’t there to greet him? No, he couldn’t have that, so he stood with his arms wrapped around his torso and his mind wrapped around Changbin — Changbin’s face, his smile, his body, the sound of his voice.
Hyunjin stalked his location until he saw that Changbin was on his block. His heart was beating up into his throat, and when the Uber pulled up in front of his building Changbin was opening the door before the car had even fully stopped. He threw a rushed thank you! at the driver, leapt out of the car, and tossed his bag on the sidewalk and grabbed Hyunjin to lift him off the ground.
Hyunjin clung to him, holding his shoulders and wrapping his legs around his waist, gripping him as tight as he could.
They didn’t say anything for a while. They stood on the street in the dark, holding each other.
Hyunjin eventually, reluctantly, loosened his legs. Changbin set him back on the ground and instead moved to hold his face in both hands.
Changbin was grinning, his cheeks were flushed bright red. Hyunjin’s face was hurting from the force of his smile and he kind of felt like he might cry under the emotion of it all.
“Binnie,” Hyunjin laughed.
“I’m so happy to see you,” Changbin breathlessly responded, taking in Hyunjin’s face like he had to make sure he was real.
Hyunjin nodded. He looped his arms around Changbin’s waist. “Me too.”
Their faces were so close. Changbin’s hands were warm on Hyunjin’s cold cheeks and… It would be easy. To just lean forward, press their lips together. What if? What would happen?
Changbin’s eyes fell to his lips, and for a moment it all seemed very obvious.
“I missed you so much.” Changbin spoke softly, never looking away from Hyunjin’s mouth.
It was all very obvious.
This happened sometimes. It still happens. A moment of clarity will hit and Hyunjin will realize that this is actually very silly, that he’s agonizing over something that is exceedingly clear, the only problem here is his own mind.
But then Hyunjin was in New York trying to build a new life for himself and Changbin’s career was growing exponentially. What would they even do? Would Hyunjin move back to LA? He didn’t want to move back to LA, he didn’t think he even could. But Changbin couldn’t move to New York, his friends and his family and his career lived in LA. So what would they do? Long distance? Could they even do that? Chris and Felix made it work.
He stared at Changbin’s lips. They were dry from the airplane, cracked and pale. Hyunjin had never wanted to kiss anyone more.
“I did too,” Hyunjin whispered.
Changbin wrapped his arms around Hyunjin’s shoulders, tugging him in again. Hyunjin buried his face in his hair and smelled his shampoo, he’d been using the same one since college. His mom bought it for him. Hyunjin wondered if his mom still bought his shampoo, or if he had learned to do some things for himself since they graduated.
These are the details Hyunjin missed being so far away. He used to know every little piece of Changbin. He knew his class schedule and his gym routines and the food he liked to eat on a weekly basis. He knew that his mom would come over with stuff for him regularly and he would say you don’t have to! but he loved being taken care of. Hyunjin knew that Changbin would always pick up the phone if his mom was calling, no matter what, and vice versa. Hyunjin would watch him giggle on the phone with her, he always knew what was going on in Changbin’s mom’s life because he was always listening to their conversations.
At that moment, he had no idea what was going on in her life. He didn’t know if she was still trying gardening or if they ever got around to remodeling the back patio. He didn’t know if she still brought her son’s shampoo or if they still sometimes went grocery shopping together. Everyone made fun of Changbin, he was a momma’s boy and he was coddled. Hyunjin never found it off-putting, just endearing. Hyunjin would do the same thing if his mom wanted to.
Hyunjin hated that he didn’t know those things. He hated that there was so much distance between them and he hated that they had so much catching up to do. And then the thought creeped up against his will, the one he vehemently avoided at all costs.
What would it have been like if Hyunjin told him two years ago?
What if, on one of those nights when they were lying in Hyunjin’s bed and listening to music and laughing over nothing, he leaned in and kissed him? Changbin would’ve kissed him back. Hyunjin was sure of it now. He wasn’t sure at the time, there was too much uncertainty to act, but now he was sure. And he wished he would’ve done it.
Maybe then they would’ve planned their lives around each other. Maybe LA wouldn’t seem quite as miserable, maybe Hyunjin wouldn’t have felt the desperate need to escape. Maybe they would’ve moved in together. Maybe they would still get to see each other every day, not once a week on a screen. This was the first time he’d seen Changbin in person in months and he wished he would’ve just kissed him when he still could.
Now everything was too messy.
Plus, what would’ve happened if they had kissed back then, and it didn’t work out? He wouldn’t be wrapped up in Changbin’s arms right now. This was much better than nothing, right? He couldn’t risk having nothing. The risk, no matter how minuscule, wasn’t worth it. He couldn’t put their friendship on the line at all, not even a little bit, if there was any risk it wasn’t worth it.
Hyunjin walked into Changbin’s life, sat on the floor, crossed his legs and folded his hands in his lap. He’ll stay there at Changbin’s feet until the day they die. He’ll be an immovable object, he’ll sit so still that his flesh binds to the floor. He won’t move a muscle. He won’t make a sound.
The risk wasn’t worth it. He’d rather have this than nothing.
Hyunjin didn’t think it was possible to fall more in love with Changbin than he already was. During Changbin’s time in New York, he realized he was wrong.
That week with Changbin kind of reminded Hyunjin of their first summer together. They got to fuck around, no responsibilities, hanging out with each other and laughing. There was a lot to talk about, lots of catching up to do, stories about their friends in LA and stories about Hyunjin’s new life in New York. All the little things that they used to discuss daily but hadn’t been able to.
Changbin had a massive playlist of songs to show Hyunjin. He liked to see his reactions, so he was hoarding them. At the end of their days they would come back to Hyunjin’s apartment and lay on his bed and work their way through the playlist. It all felt very reminiscent — sometimes their feet would be touching, the music would be playing, Hyunjin would close his eyes and forget they weren’t back in his shitty apartment in Westwood. It’d catch him off guard when he opened them again.
On Changbin’s last night there, they went to some fancy dinner as a send off. They were tipsy and made each other laugh so much and so loudly that Hyunjin was kind of surprised they weren’t asked to leave.
When they got home, they laid down on Hyunjin’s bed. They had already listened to the whole playlist so they were looping through it again, talking and laughing over it. Hyunjin didn’t know how it happened, he never really did, but they ended up on their sides, facing each other, so close that Hyunjin could feel breath on his face. Staring at each other.
“I miss you,” Changbin whispered.
Hyunjin exhaled a long sigh out of his nose. It had been such an incredible week, he wasn’t ready to go back to missing Changbin. “I miss you too.”
Changbin stared at him for a moment. “You never say it,” he murmured. It wasn’t an accusation, just a neutral observation. Hyunjin didn’t know which was more painful.
“But I do,” Hyunjin answered. “Miss you.”
Changbin smiled. He put a hand on Hyunjin’s cheek; Hyunjin’s skin erupted into little tingles. “I don’t get to see your pretty face anymore, Hyunie.” He laughed a little. “You have to tell me how you feel.”
“I miss you,” Hyunjin repeated. “All the time.”
“Okay.” Changbin nodded. His smile was soft, loving — it was all so obvious. He brought his hand up to Hyunjin’s hard and started combing through it. “I just wanted to hear it.”
“You know I miss you,” Hyunjin said. He had to know, even if Hyunjin didn’t say it, he had to know. “Right?”
Changbin nods. “I —” He paused. He thought about it for a moment. “Kind of,” he decided. “Like, logically.”
“Logically?”
“You’re my best friend.” Changbin shrugged. “It makes sense that you’d miss me.” He examined Hyunjin’s face for a moment. “But I don’t know for sure unless you tell me.”
Hyunjin hummed. He knew that. Kind of.
Changbin smiled like he was about to tell a joke, and then said:
“I think I might miss you more.”
Hyunjin’s eyebrows furrowed together, his lips pressed into a pout. He shook his head. “That’s not true.”
Changbin laughed, breathy and soft. “You have no idea how much I miss you, baby.”
Hyunjin shivered. A pleasant zing ran up his spine, his eyes fluttered shut. He scooted closer to Changbin, so their bodies were almost touching, and put his face into his chest.
“I wish you could just stay,” he replied into his shirt.
“Would you want me to?”
“You can’t."
“I can. And I would."
Hyunjin looked up at him. He loved seeing him this close, the thought of only seeing him on a screen for the next six months made him really consider it. “You would?”
“I will,” Changbin asserted. “I’m serious.”
He wanted Changbin to stay. He did. But a move that big — what if things went wrong? It would be even worse than before. Changbin would resent Hyunjin for tearing him away from his life for nothing.
“No.” Hyunjin shook his head. “You’re not gonna move across the country from your mom and all of your friends.”
“Felix is here.”
“What about your career?”
“I can— I’ll just pick things back up here, I know some people.”
“Without Chris and Jisung?”
“We’ll make it work,” Changbin insisted. “I’ll make it work.”
Hyunjin stared at him, thinking about it. He felt insane for even thinking about it.
Changbin knocked their foreheads together, Hyunjin didn’t even flinch. He could smell the alcohol on his breath when he whispered, “I just wanna be with you.”
“Are you sure?” Hyunjin whispered back. This was insane, so insane.
“I’m so sure.”
“Changbin,” Hyunjin sighed helplessly. He wanted it, he wanted it so badly it ached, it just wasn’t realistic. It wasn’t something that could work, and even if there was a chance the risk was far too high. “No.”
Changbin closed his eyes.
“Okay.” He nodded his head; it jostled Hyunjin’s. “That’s fine.”
“You can’t—” Hyunjin made a small, pained sound in the back of his throat. “You can’t just drop everything for me.”
“I could.”
“But you shouldn’t.”
Changbin sighed this time, long and exhausted. “Okay.”
“You would hate me for it,” Hyunjin added. Changbin would hate him for it. He’d move away from everything he knew to a city he never wanted to live in just to be with Hyunjin, who was clearly a disaster of a person that never knew what was going on or how he felt about it, constantly lived halfway out of reality to serve his own narrative and had dragged out this nightmare of a situation for so many years that it had become mind-numbingly convoluted. What were they even doing? What was this? They weren’t best friends, right? Had they ever been?
Changbin lifted his head to look more directly into Hyunjin’s eyes, so serious Hyunjin felt the need to look away. He didn’t.
“I could never hate you,” Changbin said. It sounded like a promise; Hyunjin took it like a promise. Changbin put his hand back on his face, he moved his thumb to swipe across his skin. “I love you so much, Hyunjin.”
It was obvious.
But Hyunjin had sat so still for so long that his joints had fused, his muscles had atrophied and he was frozen. Maybe it would’ve worked before, when they were in college, but their lives had changed so much. They lived across the country from one another and they were doing different things. From all that he’d heard from Changbin over the course of that week, he was really happy. He loved his life in Los Angeles. The only problem was that he missed Hyunjin. What was he going to do? Move away from everything he loved just to solve one problem?
Hyunjin loved Changbin too much to let him do that.
Hyunjin nodded. He loves Changbin too, Changbin knew that. He could see it on his face. He already felt like he was being stripped down to his bone, he didn’t have any flesh to give, the words wouldn’t leave his mouth.
“You’ve never said it back,” Changbin said, like he knew what Hyunjin was thinking. Changbin did that a lot. But he had never brought this up, not in five years of friendship.
“…Do you want me to?”
“No.” Changbin shook his head. “No, you—” He paused for a moment. He took a deep breath. “No. That’s not what I meant.”
“I do,” Hyunjin whispered.
“Yeah, I— I know.” Changbin’s eyes slipped shut as he nodded. “I just wish…” He trailed off.
Hyunjin’s eyebrows furrowed. “What?”
“That we could be together,” Changbin softly finished.
Hyunjin wished that too, more than anything. Almost. The only thing he wanted more was for Changbin to be happy. And he couldn’t picture Changbin being happy here, with him.
“You can’t move across the country for me, Changbin,” is what he said out loud.
“That’s not what I—” Changbin cut himself off. He sighed. “No, you’re right.”
Hyunjin buried his face into Changbin’s chest again. He wrapped around him, pulling in so their bodies were pressed together. He squeezed him, trying to get as close as he could. Changbin squeezed him back. They couldn’t be together, not right now, but in that exact moment they could hold each other as close as they could. They could feel each others’ warmth and listen to their breathing and feel their hearts beat together, for now.
“Will we ever be together again, though?” Changbin asked into Hyunjin’s hair.
Truthfully, Hyunjin didn’t know. He couldn’t think about it. He knew they couldn’t be together now. But if not now, when? Hyunjin never wanted to move back to LA. Maybe Changbin would actually come to New York? In a couple years? Not now, they couldn’t now, but maybe sometime in the future. When things were a little less messy, when their lives had settled in. Maybe it would become less convoluted.
“We will,” Hyunjin answered, even though he didn’t know that for sure.
Changbin moved his hand up to Hyunjin’s hair. He held Hyunjin against his chest. “We have to,” he said. “Right?”
Hyunjin knew himself. He knew that as soon as Changbin left he’d convince himself that this had always been a joke, that this love was unrequited, fated to be tragic, and even if there was a possibility that Changbin could feel the same way, he didn’t know for sure. It's a cruel habit he can't seem to break.
But for now, at this moment, it was obvious.
“We will, Binnie,” Hyunjin promised. “We will.”
Changbin left the next morning. That was the last time they saw each other.
“So…” Felix says. Hyunjin’s stomach starts hurting immediately, he knows what’s coming. “Party’s tomorrow.”
“Mmhm.” Hyunjin flicks on his blinker and leans to check the road. They’re going to Minho’s for dinner, Jisung and Chris have some work thing so Hyunjin needed to pick Felix up.
“Changbin’s gonna be there,” Felix continues. Even though he knows this information, even though he was anticipating Felix bringing it up, it hits him right in the soft part of his side.
“Mmhm.”
“Are you…” Felix trails off. He doesn’t finish, so Hyunjin doesn’t answer. He makes his left turn.
“I know you…” Felix sighs. “I know you don’t like when I push it, Hyunie, but—”
“Then don’t push it.”
Felix sighs again, deeper this time. “Are you going to talk to him?”
“Of course.” What was Hyunjin going to do, ignore him all night? No, he’d be polite.
“Are you actually going to talk to him?”
“Yes.”
“Like, about…?”
“About what?”
“Hyunjin,” Felix sounds exasperated, like he usually does when this comes up. It doesn’t come up very often anymore.
Hyunjin shakes his head. “We’re not going to figure out six years of shit at our friends’ engagement party, Felix.”
“But—”
“No but,” Hyunjin interrupts. “It’s Jeongin and Seungmin’s night. I’m not gonna bring my…” Hyunjin wildly gestures at his own head. “Drama into it.”
“It’s not really drama, Hyunjin,” Felix responds. “And we all want you to make up,” he adds, quieter.
“We’re not fighting."
“Well, no, but—” Felix exhales briefly out of his nose. “We want you guys to talk again.”
Hyunjin doesn’t respond.
“He really wants you to talk to him again,” Felix adds. Hyunjin turns the music up.
Hyunjin, Felix, Jeongin and Seungmin all gather round Minho’s dinner table and feast on his food like animals. Hyunjin doesn’t know what Jeongin and Seungmin’s excuse is, apparently they have dinner at his house nearly every Saturday. But Hyunjin and Felix don’t get Minho’s cooking very much anymore and they are ravenous.
Hyunjin doesn’t miss his mother’s cooking, his mother barely had time to cook. He misses Minho’s cooking. Minho used to make dinner for them in college, when he wasn’t drowning in assignments. He so graciously cooked for all eight of them, accommodating their massive appetites it was really closer to food for twenty. Those are some of Hyunjin’s favorite memories: drinking and eating in Minho’s apartment, drunkenly laying in his living room and reminiscing on how good dinner was, yapping and making each other laugh.
They do the same thing tonight. They eat and drink and then they collapse on the couch or floor, giggling and speaking too loudly. Hyunjin kind of feels like they’re back in Minho’s apartment and for a moment he lets himself pretend.
“Wait, do you guys have engagement photos?” Felix asks Seungmin and Jeongin. Hyunjin is back in reality.
Jeongin made a face. “Ew, no.”
Felix bursts into giggles. “No proposal pictures?”
“Who would take the pictures?” Seungmin asks. He turns to Jeongin. “Imagine someone saw that? That would be so embarrassing for you.”
Hyunjin tilts his head. “But you said yes…?”
“Fuck, you’re right.” Seungmin puffs out a breath between his lips, shaking his head. “It’s embarrassing for me too.” He nods towards Jeongin. “More embarrassing for him, though.” He turns towards Jeongin completely, his lip curled in judgment. “Photographed on your knees? For a man?”
Hyunjin throws his hands up. “What is this bit?”
“It’s gotten worse since the engagement,” Minho says. “They are deeply in love, this is how they show it.”
Jeongin gags. He also slips his hand underneath Seungmin’s shirt, wrapping his arm around him and pulling him into his side.
Seungmin rests his head on his shoulder and grabs the hand that’s not under his shirt. They’re drunk; the two of them are never this touchy otherwise. “I’ve never loved him.”
Jeongin nods in agreement. “I’m marrying him ‘cause his parents are rich.”
“I’m marrying him ‘cause he’s hot."
Jeongin cranes his neck to look at him, smiling. “Ew, you think I’m hot?”
“Not your face, only your body,” Seungmin immediately responds. “I hate your ugly face.”
“Eh...” Jeongin tilts his head side to side as he turns that over in his mind. “That’s fine, then.”
“This is so weird,” Hyunjin observes. “If my fiancé said that to me I’d kill myself,” slips out of his mouth. It’s not something he’d usually say, he likes to stay away from the mere idea of him being in a relationship.
Minho and Felix suddenly exchange a look. Hyunjin doesn’t know what it is, but it’s a distinct look, and he immediately gets a bad feeling about it. Felix shakes his head. Minho looks at Seungmin. Seungmin nods and looks at Jeongin. Jeongin shrugs.
Minho turns to Hyunjin. “We have something to tell you.”
“Um.” Hyunjin’s heart rate picks up, his mouth starts watering a little bit, he’s so viscerally nervous so quickly. “Okay?”
Felix sighs. Minho looks at him and says, “It’s better if he knows going in.”
Felix shrugs, staring into his lap. “I guess.”
Minho turns to Hyunjin.
“Changbin has a girlfriend,” he states, like he’s ripping the bandaid off. “She’ll be there tomorrow.”
Hyunjin’s ears start ringing.
“They’ve been together for a while,” Minho continues. “We really like her.”
Is that supposed to make him feel better?
Hyunjin turns towards Felix. “You knew?”
Felix nods.
“For how long?” Hyunjin asks.
Felix looks guiltier than Hyunjin’s ever seen him. “A couple months.”
Hyunjin closes his eyes. He can’t catch his breath. The ringing has gone more distant, he hears it in the background of the whooshing in his ears.
Jeongin cuts through the sticky silence. “We really want you to come still.”
“Of course I’m coming,” Hyunjin snaps. He doesn’t mean to be so aggressive but it’s what comes out. He opens his eyes to look at Felix. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
Felix is obviously struggling to maintain eye contact. “I didn’t think you’d wanna know.”
That’s true.
Hyunjin neutralizes his face. He’s not sure what it looked like before but he makes sure it says nothing now. “Okay.”
“...Okay?” Felix tentatively repeats.
“Yeah, that’s fine.” Hyunjin shrugs. “We’re not even really friends anymore.”
Hyunjin might throw up.
“Hyunjin,” Seungmin sighs. He’s looking at him with pity; Hyunjin bristles.
“It’s fine,” Hyunjin insists. “I’m glad you guys like her.” It comes out more sardonic than he intended.
“She’s really nice,” Felix meekly says.
"You’ve met her?”
Felix nods once. “A couple times.”
“Cool,” Hyunjin deadpans. “Can’t wait to meet her.”
Hyunjin remembers the first time Changbin hooked up with someone, some random girl at a party. He found out about it because Minho high-fived him the next morning at breakfast and made a borderline disgusting comment. Jisung shook his head and said something in Korean that Hyunjin didn’t understand but he’s fairly sure he wouldn’t have heard him either way. It felt like cotton had been stuffed in his ears. He thinks his eye twitched.
Hyunjin didn’t say a fucking word for the entire duration of the meal. Changbin kept sending him strange looks. Hyunjin ignored them.
Later, when they were doing homework together in the coffee shop on the corner of Changbin’s block, Changbin looked up from his laptop and asked:
“Are you mad at me?”
“No,” Hyunjin answered without looking up from his screen. Looking back at it, he was too defensive to be normal. At the time, Hyunjin thought he was impenetrable. “Why would I be mad at you?”
“You’ve been weird all day,” Changbin explained. “Since this morning. You’re ignoring me.”
Hyunjin gestured vaguely around the coffee shop. “I’m literally here with you right now.”
“But you’re not talking to me,” Changbin countered. “And you’re being weird.”
Hyunjin looked up into Changbin’s eyes so he would think he was being sincere. “I’m fine.”
“Are you…” Changbin squirmed in his seat, he looked extremely pleased for thinking Hyunjin was mad at him. There was a little smile on his face, his ears were turning red. “Are you mad that I slept with her?”
Hyunjin shrugged. He looked back down at his laptop. He started scrolling, making a show out of appearing busy. “No.”
Admitting that was out of the question, the implications there were far too revealing. Hyunjin wasn’t about to shatter this friendship in a coffee shop on a random afternoon just because Changbin lost his virginity.
“Oh.” Changbin said. “Okay.”
Hyunjin kept his eyes firmly locked on his screen. He didn’t really want to know the answer, but his curiosity got the best of him. “Was it good?”
“Not really,” Changbin answered without hesitation. “No.”
Hyunjin hummed. “That sucks.” He doesn’t want details, not at all, the thought of hearing details made him want to vomit. But he can’t help but ask, “Why?”
“To be honest…” Changbin laughed, small and sheepish. “I just kept thinking about you.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t have left me all alone at that stupid fucking party."
Hyunjin wasn’t alone, he was with all of their friends, but Changbin always stuck by his side at those things. He was happy that Changbin felt a little guilty, he left without telling Hyunjin where he was going and he was deeply contented at the fact that this weighed on Changbin’s conscious while he was fucking some random girl.
“No, not—” Changbin paused. He sighed. “I shouldn’t have.”
And it never happened again.
There was a time during their second year, where late night had long past turned to early morning and the conversation had settled into comfortable silence as they laid on Hyunjin’s bed. Hyunjin was staring at the ceiling, thinking.
He turned to his side to face Changbin. Changbin was already facing him, staring at him. Hyunjin stared back for a moment, admiring his handsome face. The middle of the night in Hyunjin’s bedroom was the only time and space where he really allowed his gaze to linger. He was too tired to stop himself and together they formed a little cocoon, nothing outside of this room existed and Hyunjin didn’t have to think about reality. He didn’t have to think about what reality would look like, how it would change, should Changbin find out.
All he could think about was how warm he was. How comfortable he felt in the silence. How much he wanted to stay in their cocoon, listening to music in his bedroom and talking forever. Fear gnawed at him constantly but it was overshadowed by the aching in his core from laughing so much all night. He didn’t have the capacity to think about what if s or the fact that they weren’t going to stay in Hyunjin’s bedroom forever. He could only look at Changbin’s pretty face, feel the buzzing remnants of laughter in his system and simmer in the all-consuming comfort.
“I think you’re my best friend,” Hyunjin whispered.
Changbin broke into a grin. “You think?”
Hyunjin smiled too. “You are.”
Changbin’s grin went softer. He reached out and pressed his thumb to Hyunjin’s bottom lip — he did that sometimes. Hyunjin always wondered how he could so casually touch like that. He supposed that was what was possible when there weren’t any other feelings attached, when a simple touch between best friends was that and that only, no other swirling emotions clogging his throat and twisting his vocal cords.
“You’re my best friend, Hyunjin.” Changbin was suddenly serious. “Definitely.”
Hyunjin tried not to smile, he worried that if he moved his lips at all Changbin would move his hand away and he wanted to feel his touch for as long as possible.
“You’re the best friend I’ve ever had,” Changbin added.
Hyunjin nodded and whispered, “Me too.”
There was another time shortly thereafter, where they were tipsy at HOT POT on a Thursday night instead of going out with their friends.
“What’s your favorite thing about me?” Hyunjin asked. Sometimes he asked things like this, when there was alcohol in his blood. He would rattle off hypotheticals to test Changbin’s loyalty or prompt him to give a detailed, step-by-step introspection on the first time he saw Hyunjin. He always answered with something over the top and dramatic, grinning and giggling, stuff like I’ll always choose you, Hyunjinnie, no matter what! and I thought you were the most gorgeous person I had and ever would see.
“Your face,” Changbin answers with no thought whatsoever as he shovels meat into his mouth.
Hyunjin scoffed and rolled his eyes on the outside. On the inside, his heart broke into a couple thousand pieces.
“You can’t think of one nice thing to say to me other than that I have a pretty face?”
“Well.” Changbin finished chewing and swallowing his meat as he considered it. “I guess it’s not really your face. It’s, like, your expressions.”
“My expressions?”
“It’s not about the way your face looks, it’s about what your face tells me about you,” Changbin explained. He broke into a greasy grin. “It helps that you’re gorgeous, too.”
Hyunjin kicked his shin underneath the table. “What does that even mean?”
“It means you’re gorgeous.”
“You know what I meant!” Hyunjin whined.
Changbin burst into giggles for a moment. He countered Hyunjin’s kick in the shin by intertwining their ankles, overlapping so they were touching. Hyunjin’s breath caught a little. He stayed very still, so Changbin wouldn’t move away.
Changbin hummed. “It means a lot, I guess.” He thought about it. “I like the way you react to things. You’re really expressive.”
Hyunjin tilted his head. “Like what?”
“Like…” Changbin tilted his head and stared at the ceiling for a moment. He suddenly lit up and turned his attention back to Hyunjin. “When you’re really feeling a certain part of a song. And your chin kind of tilts up, and you have this little smile.” He paused. “It’s not really a smile, I guess, but it’s like—” Changbin tilted his chin up and closed his eyes, his face almost neutral with his lips quirked up at the corners, subtly pleased. “Like that.”
Hyunjin didn’t even know he did that. “Oh.”
“Or when I tease you, and you go.” Changbin imitated his pinched eyebrows and judgmental side-eye. “Or when I bring you coffee, or a treat. And you get so excited. You’re just…” Changbin pursed his lips and pondered it for a moment. “You’re radiant.”
Hyunjin exhaled briefly out of his nose, smiling with closed lips. “Radiant?”
“Yeah.” Changbin nodded. “Nothing else makes me feel like that. Like, when you look at me like that. I don’t…” He shrugged. “I’ve just never felt that.”
Hyunjin didn’t know what that meant and he didn’t know what to say. He didn’t say anything at all.
“And you don’t say what you mean all the time,” Changbin added. “I like that I can see what you mean.”
“You don’t either,” Hyunjin mumbled as he swirled his piece of meat around in the broth.
“What?” Changbin puffed out an disbelieving laugh. “I do. All the time.”
“But—” Hyunjin cut himself off. He didn’t want to get into it. He couldn’t get into it. Mostly because he didn’t want it to stop.
“But?”
“You think you’re so funny,” is what Hyunjin ended up saying. It was meant to be casual but it came out kind of bitter.
“You don’t think I’m funny, Hyunie?” Changbin cooed.
“No,” Hyunjin deadpanned.
“No?” Changbin grinned. “Not even when I put ket in the hotpot?”
Giggles burst out through Hyunjin’s lips. It wasn’t even funny , Hyunjin didn’t know why he was laughing, but he always was. Nonstop, all the time, if he was with Changbin then he was laughing.
Changbin stared at him for a moment. “And you’re my best friend,” he said. “That’s my other favorite thing about you.”
“What about Chris and Jisung?” Hyunjin asked, because he felt like being difficult and that comment made so much emotion swell up in him he had to deflect.
“They’re like…” Changbin thought about it. “My coworkers.”
“They are not your coworkers,” Hyunjin scoffed. “You’re such an idiot.”
“But how else can I say it, Hyunie?” Changbin smiled. “Everyone is nothing compared to you.”
Hyunjin rolled his eyes. His heart was creeping out of his throat, pushing its way up and blocking his airways. He knew Changbin wasn’t being serious, he loved his friends so fiercely it was a part of him, but he was feeling giggly and light at the declaration and he couldn’t swallow his heart back down.
“You’re everything to me, too.”
“I know that.” Changbin smiled. “I can see it on your face.”
Changbin always said he wasn’t good at taking care of people. Which was silly, because Hyunjin had never felt taken care of before he met Changbin. It created a weird rift in Hyunjin’s reality, where he wasn’t quite sure if he was supposed to feel taken care of, or that was just his heart’s desperation for Changbin showing and being intermittently, barely satisfied.
But he watched Changbin take care of their other friends, too. Changbin would watch out for their health and always be there to listen if they needed to talk and try to instigate apologies when they had arguments.
He was so loud with Hyunjin; he loved everyone else a lot quieter. He was a lot more gentle about it with the others. He would do the same things without all the flirty comments and booming declarations.
Hyunjin wonders what it was about him that gave off the impression that he didn’t need to be treated gently.
Now he can’t stop wondering if Changbin treats his new girlfriend gently. He’s dreading seeing how they’ll interact but he also has a morbid curiosity to satisfy. Does he call her beautiful every chance he gets? Does he declare his love constantly? Does he flirt with her mercilessly? Or is he more quiet about it, like he was with their friends? Is his affection more intimate? Does it seem more real?
He isn’t sure which scenario would upset him more.
Once more, it all seems so obvious. Like maybe there was no what if and the only thing that stopped them from being together was Hyunjin’s debilitating fear.
It’s easier to think otherwise. It’s easier to believe that there was completely founded doubt, that Hyunjin was being reasonably cautious in an effort to maintain their friendship.
Well, their friendship is gone. So. Was that really it?
He believed he was doing the right thing in college. He thought he was being selfless. Changbin clearly wasn’t serious and Hyunjin would be stupid if he misunderstood. It would be bad for their friendship, things would get awkward and stilted.
And the attention would stop.
He didn’t want to risk all of Changbin’s adoration crumbling into dust and blowing away because of a misunderstanding. If he knew Hyunjin was in love with him it’d just be cruel to continue the joke; Changbin isn’t a cruel man. And of course it was a joke, of course Changbin didn’t want him like that, of course it would be embarrassing if Hyunjin expressed that he maybe thought otherwise by confessing his own feelings. He didn’t want to risk the humiliation of misunderstanding.
He wanted to keep Changbin close so desperately. He made no moves, kept so still, so as to not jostle Changbin into pulling away.
Plus, what would he even say? I’m in love with you? He’s not sure he could get those words to come out of his mouth. That’s digging nails into his flesh, piercing the skin and tearing out a bloody, oozing chunk.
He didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything at all.
Although sometimes Hyunjin thinks about how much he trusted Changbin, and how often Changbin said he was serious, he wasn’t joking, he always means what he says, he’s not flirting, he’s literally being serious.
Hyunjin had no reason not to believe him. Sometimes he wonders why he didn’t believe him.
Depending on when you ask him, he still isn’t sure. But in some moments, it couldn’t be more obvious. Hyunjin had no reason not to believe him. Why didn’t he just believe him?
He chooses not to think about it very often. He chooses to believe he was justified in not saying anything, because then that means it’s not all his fault.
He knows it’s his fault, in the back of his mind. That’s just much harder to sit with. It’s much easier to toggle out of reality, convince himself that this situation is tragic and out of his control, and do nothing but make himself miserable out of fear of being miserable and humiliated.
Now it’s too late.
So it is out of his control, really. For real this time. Even if he did want to say something now he couldn’t, so the blame isn’t on him anymore. There’s nothing he can do. They’re going to talk for the first time in a year, see each other in person for the first time in nearly two and Hyunjin couldn’t say anything even if he wanted to. Changbin is in a relationship. It’s not Hyunjin’s fault.
Hyunjin isn’t quite sure what’s wrong with himself, but he knows something is.
He knows he’s a bad person. He knows he’s closed off to the point that it hurts the people around him and he knows his life is controlled by fear, he makes decisions to the detriment of others because he’s scared and he ignores all the things that make him uncomfortable. He’s so paralyzed by the panic of potentially being misunderstood that he doesn’t give anyone a chance to understand him at all. Even worse, he doesn’t want anyone to know how much he doesn’t understand. He feels like he doesn’t understand anything and even if he thinks he might, he’s too petrified by the possibility of being wrong.
So maybe there isn’t one thing in particular that’s wrong with him, but a bunch of little things that culminate in one miserable, unloveable disaster of a person. And maybe it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. Maybe the problem isn’t so much that he’s unloveable. Maybe the problem is that he finds himself unloveable.
Because he’s pretty sure Changbin loved him.