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Rain pounds against the windshield in steady sheets as the wipers swish rhythmically to combat it. The radio plays softly, tuned to the same station it’s been on since he got in the car. His eyes are heavy, fingers aching, neck disgusting, and there’s a cramp in his hip, but Jun’s foot doesn’t cease pressing down on the accelerator. He’s got to go. He’s got to go. He’s got to.
Seven hours and counting.
The clock reads 3:41, and the highway is dark and empty. Jun supposes that, were it not raining, he’d be able to see the stars. The desert is the perfect place to view them, after all, all open space and dry air and high altitude. Not tonight, though. It’s monsoon season, and Jun’s caught in the dead center of a storm.
How appropriate, he deems.
He fights sleep, blinking against the fatigue threatening to set in. Empty paper coffee cups roll around at his feet, reflecting his efforts. He’s got to stay awake. Got to keep his eyes open. Got to.
His body is drowsy, but his mind hasn’t been more awake in years.
Three years. Three years is a long time to go without seeing someone you love, although Jun supposes it’s not so bad when you thought the person was dead.
Three years ago, they’d been everything.
Three years ago, Jun had lost everything.
Soft piano pours from the radio. The headlights reflect off of the sign as he passes it. His fingers tighten around the wheel.
Highway 535, exit one mile.
Soon.
Jun pulls off the highway and whips quickly onto the side road, tires spinning mud. The motel sign beckons him through the rain. He follows.
To the end of the world, he follows.
Tires squeal as he pulls into the mostly empty lot and parks the piece of shit car in the farthest spot, under the small overhang. The rain hasn’t lightened, but he makes it under the roof before he gets too damp. He pulls the cap further down over his eyes, pops his collar harder, and hunches past the grubby man who stands outside room 103 smoking a cigarette. The man eyes him uneasily as he passes, but Jun doesn’t acknowledge him. Can’t. Can’t think of anything except got to get upstairs, got to see him, got to know, got to, got to.
He ascends the stairs in five steps and takes quick strides to the room. Their room. It hasn’t changed, the chip in the doorframe from the time Jun fell into it, the ever-rusty numbers. 226.
He swore he would never come back here. And here he is, three damn years later, still breaking promises.
Jun knocks twice. Holds his breath. Counts to four, and knocks once more.
He hears footsteps, and the lock turns.
Jun opens the door. And there.
There he is.
His hair’s longer, and he’s taller, but it’s him. It’s him. And he’s so beautiful Jun forgets how to breathe.
Minghao stares at him, eyes wide and knuckles white as he aims the glock. Jun takes a step forward, shuts the door, and the gun drops.
They stare.
Minghao breaks first. “You were faster than I thought you would be,” he says, and God, his voice is a breath of the freshest air. A glass of the coolest water. “Too fast. I thought you were one of them.”
Of all the things he could say, of all the thirty thousand thoughts battling it out in his head, Jun’s brain decides on, “You’re supposed to be dead.”
Minghao laughs, though it’s more of a sigh. “I know. I can explain.”
“No,” Jun says, voice raising, and Minghao freezes. “I saw you—I saw. I watched you—I watched him shoot you. But—you’re not. You’re here. How—how is that?”
Minghao sizes him up, and Jun gets the uncanny feeling of being analyzed. “Why don’t you sit down.”
It’s not a question. Jun sits at the edge of the bed.
Minghao slides the gun into the waistband of his jeans and sits, too.
“I had to get out,” he says. Jun stares at him, waiting for more. Waiting for an explanation. Waiting for an excuse.
Got to know. Got to.
“I had to get out. You knew what was happening. You knew what shit I was in. Everyone knew. I could never pay back that much fucking money, and everybody knew it. You saw how Jeonghan was looking at me. My days were numbered. I wasn’t gonna stick around and wait for them to get me in my sleep, so. I got out.”
“How,” Jun says through unmoving lips.
“Vernon. And Chan. How else? When Vernon got the orders, he came straight to me. We planned it out. When he pulled the trigger, he aimed too high.” Minghao pulls the collar of his shirt away, revealing smooth collarbones, but more importantly, a large, white, circular scar an inch above his heart. “Seungcheol never noticed. They smuggled me out, brought me to Seungkwan. Patched me up and got me a car, and I was gone. He was always loyal, in the end. Always,” Minghao bites his lip, thinking. “How is he these days? Chan too.”
“Vernon? He’s dead.” Minghao blinks. “Chan killed him.”
Minghao gapes at him. “No. No way. No fucking way. He can’t have—“
“He did. I saw. Shot him through the fucking head. I carried—I hauled the body. Burned him in a field. I had to,” Jun says.
“But—why?”
Jun laughs humorlessly. “Why else? Seungcheol’s orders. Hierarchy. And he suspected, I think.”
“What about Chan? What’s—how’s he—I mean, what’s he up to these days?”
“Well, shit, what do you think? He’s Seungcheol’s right hand man now, isn’t he? Second to Jeonghan,” Jun says. “And he fucking loves it.”
Minghao closes his mouth and shakes his head. “No. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t do that shit. Not of his own accord.”
“Wouldn’t he, though? Wouldn’t he? He was seventeen when you knew him, Hao. He’s changed.”
Minghao opens his mouth like he wants to say something, but closes it, hesitating. Instead, Jun continues. “So. Three years.”
“Yes.”
“Where the fuck have you been?”
It’s the most harmless question Jun can ask, and the least confrontational; what he really wants to say is why, why did you leave without me, why didn’t you just tell me, did I really mean that little to you that you would just abandon me in that shithole without so much as a heads up or even a goodbye.
But he can’t ask those questions, no. Because it’s been three years, and Minghao’s taller and shaggier and older, and things have changed.
Jun certainly has changed. And he knows Minghao has too.
“Here and there.” It’s not an answer and Minghao knows that. “Got out of the country for a bit. Went down to Mexico, lived in a shack there for about a year. Managed to scrape by selling fruit on the side of the highway with this old Venezuelan lady. Then she died, and I figured it was safe enough for me to come back to the states.”
“And then?” Jun almost doesn’t want to know.
“Moved east. Bought a cabin in the mountains, settled there for a few months until the money got low. Tried to get in contact with Vernon, but. He never answered. I guess I know why now.” Minghao clears his throat. “Anyway, after that, I headed back west. Started to get back into things, I guess. I’ve been going by a different name, though, and I talked to a guy who knew a guy through Seungkwan, and he got me all new papers. I’m Park Seungmin now. I’ve been moving around a lot, too. Don’t think I’ve stayed in the same town for more than a couple nights. I’ve been rotating through LA, San Diego, San Jose, ‘Frisco, Vegas, y’know. The big ones. Where I’d be harder to pin down.”
“And then.” But Jun doesn’t need to continue. They both know what happens next.
Jun, Jisoo, and Soonyoung had been meeting some associates in a hotel room in San Jose to discuss business. They’d been interrupted, rather rudely as Soonyoung had pointed out, by a sniper stationed in the next building over, who had attempted to help speed negotiations along a bit. The other three men had quickly been shot dead, and Soonyoung had cursed and spat and stomped their noses in and clutched the bullet wound in his shoulder.
“Fucking east side cunts,” he seethed as Jun and Jisoo covered him and crowded into the elevator. “Never trusted ‘em. Not for a fucking second.”
Jun and Jisoo knew better than to comment. They kept their guns aimed at the door, anticipating the worst when they hit the ground floor. And the worst it was.
A bloodbath. Getting out of the hotel was a fucking bloodbath. Receptionists screamed and ducked behind desks, and bellhops dived out of the way as Jun and Jisoo mowed down men in suits before they could get them first. Kill or be killed. You look after your own, and other lives are inconsequential.
Jun doesn’t really care about anyone else’s lives these days. Jisoo does, though, and Jun watched his lips move silently, too fast for him to follow. He didn’t need ears to know that Jisoo was praying.
Miraculously, they made it out of the hotel. Jun and Jisoo had dropped their guns and pulled on caps, and the three ran down the street, Jisoo waving his arm to hail a cab before anyone else spotted them.
And there.
There he was. Looking as beautiful as the day Jun met him, there he was. Alive. Alive and living and breathing and standing right across the street.
Soonyoung had noticed him too. “No fucking way. That’s—“
He hadn’t had a chance to finish. Jun had whipped his arm around and shot him through the head before the sentence was out of his mouth.
Jisoo stared at Jun in shock, struggling to put two and two together until he finally did. His eyes darted across the street where Minghao was standing, a rifle slung over his shoulder, having obviously just run out of the building across the street.
Jisoo’s mouth fell open, and he turned back to Jun, only to find himself staring down the barrel of a gun.
“You keep your fucking mouth shut,” Jun had told him as he sprinted for the nearest car. It happened to be occupied, but not for long. The young, screaming woman had fallen onto the street as jun yanked her from the driver’s seat by her hair, but not before putting a couple bullets in the license plates. He pointed the gun at Jisoo, who had not moved, one last time and shouted, “If you tell him, I’ll fucking kill you, you hear? I’ll fucking kill you!”
Right. Like his threats would hold up when he was a state over and outnumbered. It had worked for the time being, though, and that was all that mattered.
One stop to exchange license plates and grab a change of clothes, one stop to get gas, one stop to pull into an alley and avoid cops, and he was out of the city and flying along the highway. The blood had dried on his neck, but he could feel it, crusty and warm and flaking off onto his shirt in small flecks. He hadn’t seen any flashing lights in his rearview mirror, nor any familiar black sedans, but he’d put the pedal to the metal once the sun had gone down and hadn’t taken his foot off the accelerator since.
And now, here he is. Their hotel, smack in The Middle Of Nowhere, Nevada. They’d come here together an uncountable number of times in a lifetime before, so why would this time be any different?
Even after three years, Jun knows him too well.
“So. Who knows?” Minghao asks.
“Soonyoung, but he’s dead. And Jisoo, so by extension, Jeonghan, and by that extension, Seungcheol. So, I’d say we’ve got a pretty decent manhunt after us right now,” Jun tells him. Minghao pales a shade but swallows, accepting.
“I figured as much. I’m glad you got here first, though. Kinda takes some of the pressure off me, huh?” He jokes, but neither of them laugh. They both know the weight of Jun’s words, though they’d like to pretend otherwise.
If they don’t get out of here soon, they’ll be dead before dawn.
But fuck it. Jun’s driven eight hours to find the man he loves alive, and he’ll be damned if he’s not going to forget the rest of the world for a little while.
“Do you mind if I shower before we make our grand escape?” Jun asks, and jostles the bag in his hand. Minghao’s eyes fly to it like he hasn’t noticed it until now, and he gulps, so subtly Jun almost misses it.
Almost.
Well. It’s good to know that that aspect of their relationship hasn’t changed, at least. Good to know Minghao’s dying to get his hands on him as much as Jun is.
“No. I mean, no, I don’t mind. Go for it. There, over, it’s over there,” Minghao says, gesturing vaguely to the door on the other side of the room. Jun nods his thanks and shuffles past him, relishing the way Minghao’s muscles tense when Jun’s hand brushes his thigh as he passes.
He shuts the door behind him, but doesn’t lock it, and he knows that Minghao is listening intently for the click of the lock that will never come.
An invitation.
Jun’s never been good at resisting temptations, especially when it comes to Xu Minghao. Especially then.
He strips off his jacket and shirt, frowning at the red stain splattered across the left shoulder. He really should have been more careful with that one. Oh, well. Soonyoung’s six feet under now, and there’s nothing he can do about it. He drops the clothes to the floor and turns on the water before unbuckling his belt and slipping out of his pants.
He stares at himself in the mirror as he waits for the water to heat up. His hair is falling out of its sleek bun, so carefully constructed earlier in the day, so he tugs the hair tie free and allows the curls to drape over his shoulders. It hardens his features somehow, casting sharp shadows over his eyes, carving out his cheeks, sharpening his jaw. He looks older, grayer, but maybe it’s just this lighting. Motel bathroom lighting has never done wonders for anyone.
He’s been under the spray for exactly eighty-three seconds—he’s counting—when the door creaks open. He’s holding his breath, and he knows Minghao is too, because the only sound is the drizzle of the water onto the shower floor. And then there’s a sharp inhale, and the curtain is pushed aside, and he’s there.
He’s taller, but still shorter than Jun, a fact that he takes advantage of as he presses Minghao against the tiles and shoves his tongue into his mouth.
“Junhui,” Minghao says breathily when they come up for air, and then, “Junnie.”
Jun groans as Minghao’s fingers card through his hair, brushing it back from his forehead. “Hair’s so long,” Minghao breathes, and Jun can’t exactly argue. He just digs his fingertips into Minghao’s neck and kisses him harder.
Minghao’s breathing erratically, and when Jun works a thigh between his legs, he groans and shudders, melting against him. Jun’s fingers trace him, his shoulders, his collarbone, his chest. Re-memorizing what was once known, but has since been forgotten. Minghao doesn’t protest, just pets Jun’s hair and stares at him with that adoring look that Jun would never forget, after three years or three hundred.
God, it’s been too long. And to think Jun was finally beginning to accept that he’d never get to have this again, tan skin and flushed cheeks and adoring eyes. To think that he was forgetting how it feels to have Minghao panting beneath him as he sucks bruises onto his neck, traces a nipple with his tongue, moves further south and revels in the way Minghao yanks on his hair.
“Missed you,” Minghao gasps as Jun’s tongue dips into his bellybutton. “God, missed you so fucking much, couldn’t stop thinking about you, felt so fucking guilty for leaving you behind, God—“
“Yeah?” Jun asks, because he needs to know. Needs Minghao to tell him that he’s still wanted here, that he didn’t spend three years being empty for nothing. That he’s willing to fill him up again.
“Fuck, yeah,” Minghao hisses, both an answer to Jun’s question and an exclamation as Jun slides his tongue over the head of his cock.
“Missed you, too,” Jun tells him, voice muffled as he presses kisses to Minghao’s hips, his pubic bone, the shaft of his dick. “Thought you were fucking dead, Hao, thought I would never—that we’d never—“
“I know,” Minghao breathes, almost whimpers, as Jun takes the head of his cock into his mouth. “Fuck, shit, Junnie, I’m so sorry, fuck, I—“
“Don’t,” Jun says, pulling back so he can talk. Minghao takes one look at his swollen lips and really does whimper, like the sight is too much for him to bear. “Don’t talk about it now. Just—let me. Let me do this.”
Minghao hesitates, one hand in Jun’s hair, one hand in his own, and nods. “Okay. Shit, okay.”
Jun smiles at him gratefully and sucks his cock back into his mouth like it’s all he’s ever wanted to do.
He thrives on Minghao’s little gasps and moans, and when he reaches a hand down to touch himself as he sucks Minghao off, Minghao’s hips jerk forward, like he can’t help himself. “Oh, fuck, Jun,” he hisses, and Jun hums, tongue lapping around the head of Minghao’s cock. “Fuck, baby, so fucking gorgeous, missed you so fucking much, fuck,” Minghao says, and yeah, even three years ago, he’d been a talkative little shit, too. Good to know that’s hasn’t changed either.
When Minghao’s hips jerk forward again, Jun’s ready for it, and he relaxes his jaw and lets Minghao slide his dick to the back of his throat. Minghao groans, full and deep, and holds Jun’s head in place as he lightly fucks his mouth. Jun moans and takes it, fisting his own cock quickly, chasing release.
“Fuck, Junnie, gonna—gonna come, shit, don’t wanna come yet, fuck, stop,” Mingaho sighs, releasing Jun’s hair. Jun pulls back, gasping, and lets go of his own cock as he catches his breath.
The spray of the shower has gone lukewarm, and they both seem to notice at the same time, because Jun climbs to his feet and reaches for the towel at the same time that Minghao shuts off the water. They dry off quickly, sharing the towel, before Jun wraps long fingers around Minghao’s wrist and gently leads him back to the bedroom.
They don’t speak as Minghao lies down on the bed, and Jun climbs on top of him, bracketing his hips. His hair drips onto Minghao’s chest as he presses damp kisses into his neck, breathing him in, and Minghao lightly drags his fingertips down Jun’s sides, just to watch him squirm.
“Still ticklish?” Minghao asks teasingly, and Jun smiles into his neck before reaching a hand between them and traces the skin just above Minghao’s cock. Minghao sucks in a breath, and Jun chuckles.
“Seems like you are, too,” he notes, before abandoning Minghao on the bed to ruffle through his bag. Mingaho props himself up on his elbows and watches, openly ogling Jun’s pale, round ass when he bends over. Jun smiles when he catches him staring, and holds up what he was looking for: a small bottle of lube. Minghao returns the smile easily, and Jun quickly rejoins him on the bed, every second spent not touching Minghao a second wasted.
Minghao tenses when Jun slips a slick finger between his cheeks and presses it against his hole, but with a few kisses and hushed encouragements, he relaxes, and Jun slides the tip of his index finger into Minghao. Minghao screws his eyes up, adjusting the intrusion, and Jun lets him take his time, waiting patiently and whispering nothings against his neck. When Minghao finally gives the okay, Jun doesn’t hesitate, quickly adding a second finger and crooking them. Minghao squirms and cries out, and Jun watches him with dark eyes, simply watches him move, because he’s the most damn beautiful thing Jun’s ever seen.
Eventually, Jun adds a third finger, and then Minghao’s really sweating, telling him that it’s too much. His cock is leaking, dripping a steady pool onto his stomach, and Jun can’t help but think that it’s like no one’s fucked him since. Like everything Jun does is the first he’s had since the last time they fucked, made love to each other, in this very same room, and Minghao had cried, and Jun hadn’t realized that he’d been crying until later, when he was standing over a fresh grave, wondering if Minghao had known somehow. If he’d predicted his own fate and had known that it would be the last time. If that was why he had cried.
But no, now was not the time to think about those things. He’s alive. He’s alive and living and breathing and wiggling beneath Jun right this very second, begging him to just get on with it already, God, don’t be a jerk, just give me your fucking cock, Jesus, Junnie, need you, please—
Oh. Well, Jun’s never been one to resist such an eloquent request, especially from Xu Minghao.
Especially from him.
He clumsily slicks himself up and lines his cock up to Minghao’s hole, and Minghao stills, legs falling open as wide as they can as Jun grips his shoulder and pushes the head into his slick, stretched hole.
They both stop. Catch their breath. Look at each other, really look, and come to terms with all the things they’ve missed out on in the past three years.
Accept them.
Forgive.
Minghao wraps his legs around Jun’s waist, signaling him to go deeper, and Jun does. He buries himself to the hilt, his cock engulfed in Minghao’s tight heat, muscles quivering. They pant against each other’s mouths as Jun pulls back and snaps his hips, fucking into Minghao hard.
“Missed you,” Minghao groans, bucking his hips up to meet Jun’s thrusts. Jun whines and fucks him harder, adjusting the angle, and Minghao yelps. Jun’s free hand snakes between them to grip Minghao’s cock, stroking him in time to their thrusts.
“Missed you, too,” Jun sighs, and Minghao bites his lip in acknowledgement, too preoccupied to speak.
It doesn’t take long for either of them to come. Minghao finishes first, spilling over Jun’s knuckles with a groaned, “Aw, fuck,” and Jun follows moments later, burying himself deep in Minghao’s ass, letting him feel every inch. They lay there for a moment, covered in come, Jun’s softening cock still buried in Minghao’s ass, before he pulls out with a sigh and goes to find a washcloth.
When he comes back forty-six seconds later—he’s counting—Minghao hasn’t moved, and Jun is surprised. He half expected him to be gone again.
But no. Minghao smiles sleepily at him, beckoning him with a finger, and Jun happily follows.
To the ends of the earth, the end of time itself, he follows.
“How long do we have?” Minghao asks him as Jun sweeps the wet cloth across his stomach, over his cock, between his legs. Jun shrugs.
“Not long. An hour, maybe two.”
“Shame. And here I was hoping we’d get to have a nice nap, talk about our feelings and shit.”
Jun smiles. “Well, maybe next time.”
They dress quickly. Minghao retrieves his pants and gun from outside the bathroom door and slips them both on as Jun pulls a new, clean shirt over his head. He tosses Minghao a pack of cigarettes, scavenged from a jacket pocket somewhere, and Minghao smiles in thanks as he takes one out and grabs his lighter from the nightstand.
“Ready?” Minghao asks him the second he’s packed. They’ve mostly shaken it off, but Minghao’s still got a glow about him, the way he always did back in the day after they fucked. Jun revels in it. Revels in the way that some things never change.
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” he replies, and pulls his hair into a messy bun before slapping on a cap and following Minghao out the door and into the start of a new forever.