Archive of Our Own

I.

Show-business, Donghyuck comes to realise, is just one long trail of names he will never bother to remember and faces that get replaced every time they get tired and worn out. Nobody sticks around too long in these circles, it’s just a matter of how long you can keep up in the race before you slip up, fall behind, drop right out - off of the face of the earth.

“I feel like I’ve seen you before - on TV or something. Say, you haven’t been in any commercials?” The guy babbles on, one of those voices that draws out his vowels and pitches at the end of each sentence. He fumbles with the curled up corners of his script, leg jiggling hard enough that Donghyuck can practically feel the vibrations from the chair next to him; first audition jitters.

“Maybe I just have one of those faces.” Donghyuck leans forward in his seat - his anxiety seems to take a very different form to the guy beside him, a dark pit in his stomach rather than butterflies in his chest.

“No, I’m sure I really do know you,” He presses on, a few beats of concentrated silence before he jerks upright, “You were in that play, a couple weeks ago, at The Peacock! You were the brother-in-law, had that whole speech at the end and everything! God, you were good.”

Donghyuck turns slowly, genuine confusion setting in. The answer that seems to have satisfied the other guy only cracks open a thousand questions for him, “That wasn’t me. You’ve got the wrong person, really.”

His face furrows at the response, eyebrows knitting together and lips pursed at his misguided confidence. Before he can speak, a casting director appears from behind a door to beckon Donghyuck in, and he gladly leaves the man behind in his dust. Perhaps these actor guys really do all look the same, beautiful in a generic sort of way. He supposes he must be too.

On his way out, he brushes shoulders with him again, called in right after - he must be a Lee, also.

“The actor I had you confused with - the one from The Peacock - his name was Jaehyun Jung, something like that. I really did think you were him.” The guy says, voice giddy with anticipation. He stands in the doorway, expectant.

Donghyuck snorts, “‘S that a compliment?”

The other Lee smiles, one of those painfully earnest ones without a hint of mocking, the kind that can’t be taught, only born with, “Lets just say I wouldn’t mind getting mixed up with someone like him.”

And then he disappears behind the door and Donghyuck is left in the waiting room once more, script hanging limply in his hands. He hopes the other guy gets the part, he realises, on his way out. The casting director wouldn’t go for him, he could tell by the way she’d thanked him afterwards. The name Jaehyun Jung falls right out of his head, slips from his ear onto the sidewalk before he’s even reached the subway - he figures it will dissolve just as quickly as every other he’s heard since he moved to Los Angeles.

He doesn’t hear it again for another five months.

II.

Johnny is Donghyuck’s first proper actor friend.

They hadn’t started out as friends, but rather, as Donghyuck found so many relationships did in this city, with hands brushing up against one another in a bar, to fumbling for light switches, to wet mouths on hot skin.

“You’ve done this before, right?” Johnny had asked, trailing kisses down Donghyuck’s abdomen.

“‘Course I have.” Donghyuck gritted out, arching against Johnny’s mouth, searching for more contact.

Johnny had paused, looked up at him. “I mean, with a man.” His voice was hushed, as though the confession could hurt them here, in Johnny’s darkened apartment.

Johnny was paranoid like that - it was one of the reasons that had been their first and only fuck. Donghyuck had never worried much about keeping what, and who, he did between the sheets to himself. Perhaps it was naivety, he realised, upon watching how quickly Johnny had dressed after, the way he glanced between the gaps in the curtains, skittish like a frightened animal. Donghyuck tried not to think about it too much, didn’t give the shame enough time to start festering inside him.

It’s late spring, the sort of weather that can convince them to spend whole afternoons drinking coffee al fresco, only ordering more when the waitress comes to bug them about the cheque. Johnny is sitting across from him, speaking through a haze of smoke, gesticulating with his hands as he explains how this guy he knows from acting class was gonna be in some indie flick - the closest thing to a big break anybody they know has had so far.

“It’s this married woman who has an affair with one of her ex-students - she was a teacher before she had a husband - and it turns into this whole melodramatic love triangle. Taeyong thinks it’s horribly pretentious, but the director swears it’s gonna get him a trophy.”

“Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he?” Donghyuck shrugs before ashing his own cigarette, “Taeyong, is he playing the student then?”

Johnny goes in for another drag of his own, “Not even close, he’s a hotel bellhop, but he still gets the credit for his resume, and it’s cash, y’know? Nah, the student is supposed to be this other guy, Jaehyun Jung.”

Donghyuck blinks at him. “That sounds familiar.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. Apparently he’s gonna be a real big deal soon, name’s been floating around a lot.” Johnny goes on, talking with the usual ease and confidence that draws people in, convinces you he’s speaking gospel with every word.

But Donghyuck is long gone - he’s sorting through memories, conversations after plays, the ends of parties, trying to figure out why the name echoes round his head the way it does - and then he lands on it. He remembers the whole scene, clear as day, the guy with the overexcited eyes and jittering legs. Wouldn’t mind getting mixed up with someone like him.

The waitress is eyeing them again, both cups dangerously close to empty, and she’s clearly losing her patience.

“Say,” Donghyuck presses his cigarette into the base of the ashtray. It hisses with finality. “What was that movie called?”

III.

These theatres are always deserted in the middle of the day, nothing but schoolgirls cutting class and housewives trying to fill the hours. And Donghyuck, of course.

The movie, as it turns out, is exactly as Donghyuck expected it to be - long, pretentious, lots of slow shots of characters walking. The woman stays with her husband, in the end. She falls to her knees and begs him for forgiveness, and a teenage girl a few rows down from Donghyuck in the half-empty theatre hiccups a sob. He wishes he’d bought popcorn, if only to throw it at the screen in protest of its predictability.

But that isn't why Donghyuck came. The real reason is up there on the big screen, staring right back at him, eyes red, hair dishevelled, accepting defeat. There’s something in his gaze, like he’s looking straight past the camera, down into the audience, close enough that Donghyuck can feel the cool breath against his cheek, when he whispers, voice tinny and compressed, “I suppose this is the last I’ll see of you then.”

And all Donghyuck can think is, Jesus fucking Christ, because this guy is it. He’s the end of the line, he’s whatever next big thing rumours have been thrown around - he has lived his entire life in black and white, made to be looked at from below in a darkened theatre. And all of a sudden Donghyuck feels so small, out of place, like he’s been struggling to get by in the fast lane and this guy has just flown straight past in a puff of smoke.

“I’m afraid that’s true.” The woman on screen says, but her voice is composed, artfully constructed, and Donghyuck doesn’t believe her for a second. Not like he believes Jaehyun Jung when he cracks a hopeless smile, eyes glassy with tears, and tells her, “Maybe it’s for the best, quitting whilst we’re ahead. Before we have a chance to hate one another.”

There’s a lump in his throat, watching it from the old velvet chairs, and Donghyuck realises, defeated, that he couldn’t make anybody feel this way, not like this guy can. Not in a million years. Not if he died trying.

When the credits finally roll, and Donghyuck filters out of the movie theatre amongst a dozen other patrons, the mid-afternoon sunlight is still burning high. The heavy feeling has refused to leave his chest, like he’s swallowed a ball of lead, and in spite of his efforts, a stray tear creeps out and down his cheek. He assures himself it’s the sudden shift in light, squeezes his eyes shut for good measure.

There’s a poster outside, the three main actors' faces drawn up in shades of blue, like they’re all bathed in moonlight, and he is on the left, lips slightly parted, eyes wide. He really is beautiful, Donghyuck thinks bitterly.

“What did you think?”

Donghyuck’s head snaps back to confront the voice, and before he can even make eye contact, he’s thinking, oh. Oh no, because it’s familiar, it’s so goddamn familiar.

Jaehyun Jung looks different in person - mostly because Donghyuck had failed to consider that he could even exist outside the movie. He looks less angular, all the sharp lines in grayscale become blurry, softer somehow, in the orange sunlight. For a second Donghyuck convinces himself it must be a mirage, maybe a dream, He’s still in the theatre, dozed off in his seat.

But he’s not, and the guy is right there, barely a few feet away, watching him expectantly.

“Romantic tragedies have never really been my thing.” Donghyuck shoves a hand into the pocket of his jeans, trying to look unfazed. He hopes that Jaehyun isn’t close enough to spot the damp shine on his cheek.

He laughs, and that’s different in real life too, ringing out rather than the fuzzy notes that had come from the theatre’s speakers, “Why’d you show up then?”

“Somebody thought that I was you.” Or that you were me. Same difference.

Jaehyun is fishing a pack of cigarettes out of a pocket, he doesn’t seem the least bit surprised by the comment, “And you wanted to check it out for yourself?”

And all of a sudden, Donghyuck wishes he had never even turned up. It’s embarrassing, to stand here and tell this guy that he’d come looking for him, he’d seen a little bit of himself in how Jaehyun spoke, how he’d smiled and kissed, how he’d forced the audience to hold their breaths. Or at least, Donghyuck had hoped to find it. Now it all feels like wishful thinking.

He just shrugs, “I don’t see it.”

Jaehyun places a cigarette between his teeth before offering one to Donghyuck. He shakes his head, he doesn’t know why. The entire time he’s lighting up, Jaehyun watches Donghyuck, and it’s like being back in the movie, eyes that pry into him, right down to his soul, only a million times worse, and then Jaehyun inhales and says, “I might be able to.”

Donghyuck watches the glowing tip, mostly to avoid eye contact. It makes him feel naked. He forces out a mean laugh, “You pay to watch your own movies?”

Jaehyun just keeps smoking, looking completely unbothered, he won’t bite. Donghyuck wants to see him flinch, the slightest hint of irritability, to drop his composure for a split second, but instead he cracks another smile, “Someone oughta.”

“Assholes watch their own movies.” He feels like a child trying to bait an animal, goading him on like this.

Jaehyun leans forward, and his voice drops a little, quiet but steady as ever, “I’ll tell you all about it when you’re in one.”

Donghyuck hates him. He wants to kick and scream, he wants to spit in his face and tell the bastard that one movie doesn’t make him a big deal. In a haze of anger, he briefly considers punching him square in the jaw, if only to see his knuckles glow red, Jaehyun’s skin turning bruised and blotchy - but instead, he just grinds his teeth.

“I’m not an actor.” He grits out, unsure as to why he’s even lying.

Jaehyun rolls his eyes, but the smugness doesn’t leave his face for a moment. He sounds so sure of himself, “Yes, you are.”

“I liked you better when you couldn’t talk back.” Donghyuck says, and then his heart drops. He’s got it all wrong, he realises. He’s the one who’s been baited on, he’s the one throwing out insults like they’re his last defenses, he’s the one who got cornered.

Jaehyun exhales, a stream of smoke blowing directly into Donghyuck’s face, and it’s a victory lap, nothing more, “I liked you better when you were crying.”

Then he’s walking away, and Donghyuck is trying and failing to think of a clever comeback, standing alone on the dusty sidewalk with the sun beating down on him. It’s over.

I hate you I hate you I hate you, he thinks, I hate that you make me hate myself.

IV.

One of the feelings Donghyuck comes to know most quickly during his first year in LA is, unsurprisingly, hunger. He knows it intimately, like a lover, and spends countless nights alone with it in bed, listening to the pained sounds of his own stomach.

And he tries, he really does, waiting tables and washing cars and bagging groceries, but everybody else in this city is hungry too, and somehow it’s never enough.

That’s all he’s thinking about, really, when it happens. The jar full of rescued spare change that doesn’t feel very spare, the two lonely tins at the back of his pantry, the auditions that go nowhere.

In some ways, it’s not all that different from those first formative experiences as a teenager. Off a sideroad with no streetlights, in the backseat of somebody else’s Station Wagon, awkward, quiet. The man is older than him by a long shot, hair tinged with gray and crow’s feet around the eyes. He reminds Donghyuck vaguely of a math teacher he once had.

He doesn’t talk much, just silently maneuvers Donghyuck with large, fumbling hands, and then it’s happening, and the man is trying to be gentle, he can tell, but the slide is dry and painful nonetheless.

I am not here, he thinks, as the cracked faux-leather of the seats digs into his cheek, This is happening to somebody else. Behind him, there is a grunt of effort, somehow both painfully close and a hundred miles away. Anybody else.

The guy doesn’t last long before grinding to a halt, fingers digging into Donghyuck’s hips, stickiness dripping down the backs of his thighs. He winces as the man pulls out, the sharp sound of a zipper being tugged up in the night stillness.

If anything, the aftermath is more humiliating than the deed itself, trying to turn back around and pull his jeans back over his ass in the tiny space, and the man’s eyes stay on him the entire time.

“You’re pretty, y’know,” He says, palm reaching out gingerly to cup the side of his face. Donghyuck tries not to flinch, keeps his breath steady, “Probably get that all the time.”

He wants to go home. He wants to be far, far away from here as quickly as humanly possible. The man doesn't look so kind anymore, no, now his gaze is condescending, some pitiful reminder of what he did to Donghyuck, what Donghyuck let him do to him.

The bills are crumpled, covered in lint, the edges flutter in the breeze when he clambers back out onto the street. It’s a warm night, they always are, this time of year. The Station Wagon disappears from his periphery as quickly as it came, sliding back onto the main road, and soon the murmur of the engine is gone too. Maybe he can hear the faint hum of cicadas in the distance, maybe his brain is trying to fill the silence.

There are no stars out tonight, only a thick blanket of clouds hovering over the city, threatening to collapse into summer storms at any minute. He hopes it does. He hopes that when he wakes up tomorrow morning, it will be to the sound of rain, washing everything and everyone clean.

Donghyuck doesn’t feel pretty.

V.

If there’s one person the universe seems hellbent on Donghyuck meeting, that person is Mark Lee. It's the auditions, just as it had been that first time, and they always end up going for the same roles, another bitter little reminder that there are hoards of desperate guys just like him waiting to step into Donghyuck's place when he gives up on Los Angeles.

They actually end up getting along rather well - Mark is gullible, easy to talk circles around, and they end up gravitating towards each other in these cramped waiting rooms for two-line parts in B movies.

"Met that actor you got me mixed up with," Donghyuck, chances, making small talk one morning.

"Yeah?" Mark says, seemingly recalling the situation all at once - it clearly hasn't been weighing on his mind as much as it has Donghyuck.

Donghyuck snorts, "He was a real asshole."

Mark laughs at that, throwing his head in earnest amusement, "That's how you know he's gonna be famous."

And maybe that's true; if ego is any kind of requirement for success, Jaehyun and his half-smiles, when Donghyuck couldn't be sure if he was being laughed with or at, are a shoe in.

"Still don't know how you got us confused, we don't even look alike." Donghyuck shrugs, and at the back of his mind, he sees Jaehyun's face, all even lines, frustratingly handsome.

"You don't exactly look alike," Mark clarifies, sitting up straighter in his seat, starting to gesture with his hands, "You seem alike. I can't really explain it, must be the mannerisms or something."

Donghyuck doesn't know what to do with that - he hates the tiny part of himself that swells with pride at the idea that he'd remind somebody of an actor like that. But why Jaehyun?

Anyone but Jaehyun, he wants to say, as the assistant casting director ushers him into the audition room, for the third time in a week, I'll be anyone you want, but not him.

VI.

“Mother, I didn’t mean to…” Donghyuck’s voice cracks as he chokes back a whimper. His vision blurs a little, eyes stinging. This is it - the final moment, to release everything he’s built up inside for the past two months, and the tears fall slowly, one by one, beads of salt rolling into the corner of his mouth.

She holds him close, shushing gently although her own face is cramping with emotion, and the embrace is safe, tight. He stumbles a little as she guides him away, up the steps - and that’s when he breaks, the second his foot hits the wood. His sobs echo back to him in the silence; raw, animalistic sounds.

And then, behind him, the gentle creak of the stage curtain pulling shut.

There’s a final beat of quiet before the audience erupts into applause. They feel so far away, sealed behind the curtain, but his heart still races, giddy with excitement. She pulls away from him now, smiling, wiping the remaining tears off both their faces with her sleeve.

The other actors are coming back onstage, and once more the curtain is pulled back, so they line up to bow. The lights are hot and blinding, it’s impossible to make out any faces in the dark mass of an audience, but he lets out a small laugh of disbelief - because they came and they watched him and they liked him.

He must look a mess by now, sweaty and caked in old makeup, eyes red, but he doesn’t care because this is it. This is worth the scrounging and scrimping, this is worth long nights and breaking things in frustration and crying in the shower. This is what it is to be alive. He lets out a shaky breath.

The afterparty is - well, it’s a bottle of champagne and two dozen friends of friends crowding onto the stage. Johnny practically tackles him with a bear hug, speaking at a mile a minute about how well Donghyuck did, how proud of him he is, how much of a big fucking deal he’s going to be.

And it’s nice. When people tap him on the shoulder from behind to congratulate him, he just thinks to himself, I deserve this. Maybe in the cold light of tomorrow morning, when he’s all out of opening night excitement, he’ll sit back and tear himself to pieces over every line, but for now, it doesn’t hurt too bad to enjoy it.

That’s when he spots him. It’s been months since their one and only meeting, but he’s unmistakeable - across the set of the Keller backyard, leaning against a fake poplar tree, talking to one of the actresses. He’s clearly noticed Donghyuck too, eyes flickering over every couple of seconds before going back to the girl. He’s smiling, but Donghyuck can’t figure out who it’s at.

Jaehyun reminds him of some kind of predator, the way he approaches him, slinking across the stage in the lowlight, and asks “Remember me?”

It’s calculated, deliberate, just like his very presence. Why is he even here? At the show, at the afterparty, in Donghyuck’s line of sight - somewhere at the back of his mind, Donghyuck wonders if he came to see him.

He chooses not to dignify the question with a response, he’s learnt his lesson from last time. Instead he just rolls his eyes, makes to turn away, but then Jaehyun speaks again -

“You weren’t half bad, y’know.”

That’s what gives him pause. Maybe it’s that air of smugness that seems to waft off of Jaehyun at all times, maybe just his own jealousy rearing its ugly head, but for some reason the comment makes him angry. It tastes like pity.

“You don’t have some place better to be?” He gestures around the small set - wooden deck chairs and a painted up sky in the background.

This time it’s Jaehyun’s turn to roll his eyes, “I’m being serious, you make a good Chris.” Jaehyun nods vaguely at Donghyuck’s checked shirt and suspenders, “Can’t you just take the goddamn compliment?”

“You’re an actor,” Donghyuck snorts, “I’ll just assume everything that comes out of your mouth is a lie.”

That’s the thing. Jaehyun is an actor - a really fucking good one - and Donghyuck hates the part of himself that believes the compliment, believes in Jaehyun’s sincerity.

“I could say the same for you.” Jaehyun says quietly, and well, Donghyuck doesn’t know how to respond to that. There’s a moment, strangely intimate, where neither speaks, Jaehyun just watches him shift from one foot to the other, that same gaze. Like being pinned to a glass slide beneath a microscope, like being dissected right here on the porch steps of the Keller family home. Jaehyun clears his throat, “Somebody come to watch you?”

“Johnny.” Donghyuck shrugs. He could count all the people he actually likes in LA on one hand, and still have enough fingers left to flip Jaehyun off.

“I meant, a girl or something.” Jaehyun laughs.

Donghyuck’s heart jumps a little, and suddenly it’s like being back at Johnny’s apartment that night they first met, like waiting for something to go wrong.

“I’m not like that.” He says carefully.

He waits for something, a flicker of shock in Jaehyun’s eyes, maybe some other emotion - anger? He has no idea. Instead, Jaehyun just gives a small nod of acknowledgement, still not breaking eye contact.

“I see.” He says, biting his lip, and it could mean anything, really. He’s impossible to read, at least from where Donghyuck is standing.

Donghyuck coughs. “I’m gonna go get some fresh air.”

Jaehyun nods again, polite, and Donghyuck doesn’t wait for a response before turning on his heel and making a beeline for the backstage exit. He doesn’t know what he’s expecting to happen, for Jaehyun to follow him, maybe just to escape the situation.

The air may be warm outside, but he still shivers when it hits him, such a shift from the claustrophobic heat of the theatre. It’s opened out into an alleyway between buildings, hidden away from the rest of the world. Donghyuck leans back against the gritty wall, closes his eyes. A few minutes pass, nothing but him and the faint sound of traffic in the distance.

And then, noise - chatter spilling out as the door swings open again, and Jaehyun is standing in the glowy light, barely a silhouette. It slams shut behind him, and all of a sudden it’s darker than before, quieter. Jaehyun swallows visibly.

“I didn’t think you were coming.” Donghyuck says, hands deep in his pockets.

“Neither did I.” Jaehyun slowly tugs out a packet of cigarettes and Donghyuck takes one wordlessly. Jaehyun lights his own first, and then Donghyuck expects him to hand over the lighter. Instead, Jaehyun flicks it open, arm extending ever so slightly towards Donghyuck. He leans forward, towards the little orange flame, so bright when everything else is navy in the moonlight. When he pulls away, and the lighter snaps shut again, he realises just how close they are to one another, barely a foot between them. The alleyway is so small, the city is so big - they disappear right into it.

“What if somebody comes out?” Jaehyun asks. His voice is hushed, even though nobody can hear them from inside anyway. The instinctual feeling of secrecy remains.

“Nobody will.” Donghyuck says in a breath of smoke, and for some reason, he believes himself. It’s the darkness, some kind of promise that they could do anything and no one would ever know. Right now he could kiss Jaehyun, he could kill him, and it would stay safe and locked away. At that moment, it feels no more dangerous than the thoughts in Donghyuck’s head, intangible to anyone but him.

Jaehyun tastes like champagne and Lucky Strikes - so does Donghyuck, probably. He has to tilt his head back a little, Jaehyun is ever so slightly taller, and when his tongue presses forward, Jaehyun lets out a small gasp - Donghyuck wants to laugh, it’s almost girlish. Jaehyun’s hand presses into his shoulder, thumb rubbing half-moons into his collarbone, his touch like a tiny shock wave.

Donghyuck is the first to pull away, and Jaehyun’s eyes flutter back open a few seconds later. His features are soft, pretty, nothing like whoever Donghyuck first met outside the movie theatre that day. He steps back and takes a shaky drag from his cigarette, the tip sparking red again.

“You’re good, really,” Jaehyun says, and Donghyuck has no idea if he’s referring to the performance or the kiss, “You just gotta work on your self-preservation instincts.”

Donghyuck kicks at the dusty ground absentmindedly, because this is turning out exactly like Johnny had. He’d said something similar one night, after one too many drinks, leaning across the bar to Donghyuck, cheeks flushed and eyes teary; “People like us, we got to keep it real - hic - quiet. Or else they’re gonna eat us alive, you understand me?”

Donghyuck knows - one wrong move, one misread situation, and it’s all gone, everything he’s worked for. Or worse. And yet he never stops.

“And yours are so much better?” He raises an eyebrow.

Jaehyun laughs at that, and like everything else, it’s a little controlled, a little held back, “We’re the same, I’m just smart enough to keep it to myself.”

The same. He thinks back to what Mark Lee told him when they’d first met, and the time after that, and watches Jaehyun tap ash off the end of the cigarette. The same.

Maybe that’s why he hates him, or at least, has decided to - he hates the parts they share between the two of them, the things they have in common. Not mirror images, not quite.

They’re two different actors, playing the same person, on two different nights.

VII.

Donghyuck's big break comes in the form of a spy thriller with a budget that makes him dizzy - he thinks he's imagining it when he gets the call, still half-asleep at seven in the morning, and everything starts changing for him.

He gets an agent, for one thing, who promises him things with stars in his eyes, and Donghyuck doesn't even think twice before signing the contract. It makes him feel important, when secretaries offer him coffee and security waves him into the studio with barely a cursory glance at his ID. And he likes being big, no matter how shallow it seems - he has been so small for so long.

The very first thing he buys when that paycheck tumbles out of his mailbox is also shallow, it's a motorbike.

"You don't even know how to ride it," Johnny protests, when Donghyuck drags him to the dealership to pick it up.

"I can learn," Donghyuck replies, "Besides, I've always wanted one."

The bike is all shiny chrome and clean lines and dust and smoke in the air when it roars beneath him, and he knows it's obnoxious but he doesn't care. It suits him. It suits Haechan.

That happens too. The name is brainstormed by a group of higher-ups in his agent's office whilst Donghyuck sits on a velvet armchair and plays with the buttons on his jacket, barely paying attention. It doesn't matter much, he tells himself; he's never been all that attached to his name, and if dropping it is what it takes, he'll do it in a heartbeat.

To celebrate the whole ordeal - to celebrate him - he gets taken out to dinner one night by that same group of higher-ups, at some French restaurant that he can't pronounce the name of. It's surreal, the way the bottles of wine pile up, when they get sick of one dish and just order another, the waiters that seem to appear as if from nowhere whenever Donghyuck's drink runs dry.

One of them is telling a story, gesturing aggressively with his hands, nearly knocking over a tall candle several times, and Donghyuck is only half paying attention. What makes him focus is when seemingly all at once, they each turn to look at him, and his brain scrambles to figure out what he's done wrong. That's when he notices the vague presence of something hovering over him, like a shadow cast.

He turns and cranes his head up to look, that's when his heart stutters - it's somehow both a complete shock and the least surprising thing ever.

"Jaehyun," He chokes out, barely managing to mask the disbelief in his voice.

Jaehyun is standing with one hand on the back of Donghyuck's chair, the other tucked into his trouser pocket, a relaxed smile on his face. He's not even really looking at Donghyuck, eyes instead darting between everybody else at the table, who all seem just on the brink of recognising him.

"This is a strange coincidence." He says, although he doesn't sound all that surprised - that same ironclad control over his expressions, like he's always two steps ahead of everybody else.

Donghyuck suddenly remembers where he is, turning back to the rest of the table, "Do you mind if I -" He points vaguely backwards with his thumb, trying to indicate stepping away for a second, and they all nod, only half-invested in the situation, already returning to the previous conversation. By the time he's taken his napkin off his lap and slid out from his chair, he's obviously been entirely forgotten, clearly not that integral to the discussion in the first place.

Jaehyun leads him away from the table, passing through the crowded restaurant without even glancing back to look at Donghyuck, to a staff door in the back, and as they step out into the night air, it all feels incredibly familiar. They haven't seen each other since then, the opening night of All My Sons, now months past.

"You didn't introduce me to your friends," Jaehyun laughs, the word friends tinged with an air of mocking. Donghyuck wants to kick himself for the mistake, as soon as he realises it, still not used to the etiquette these circles demand. Or maybe Jaehyun's sudden presence had just made him forget all basic manners, he can't say for sure.

"They're from the studio." He corrects - the men are not his friends, not by a long shot. The dinner had been more about them than it had anything to do with him, really.

"I heard," Jaehyun says, "About the movie studio, I mean."

News spreads quickly, and now Donghyuck is news, after all.

He swallows, "Yeah, I heard about you too."

Whilst Donghyuck had been making it big, Jaehyun had apparently been doing the same. He'd found out, from a friend of a friend, about Jaehyun signing a contract just like his, only three months earlier. Maybe it wasn't a surprise, that Jaehyun was always just a couple rungs higher than him, but every achievement seemed to be dulled by that fact - Jaehyun always got there first. His first play, his first movie, signing with a studio, he inevitably found himself watching Jaehyun from behind.

Jaehyun rubs the back of his neck, like he's unsure of what to do with his hands. Eventually, he shoots Donghyuck a half smile, "So, Haechan?"

Donghyuck laughs, "Yeah." It honestly still feels strange to hear it aloud.

"But that's not your name." Jaehyun cocks his head to one side, raising an eyebrow.

"Haechan suits me better." He shrugs.

Jaehyun doesn't seem satisfied with the answer, his expression almost a challenge, "You really think that?"

He's so frustrating. Donghyuck doesn't have anything to prove to him, and yet he always finds himself baited on, like Jaehyun is constantly searching for holes to prod at, little things to pick on him for, "What does it even matter to you?" He snaps.

Jaehyun looks him up and down, "Listen, can I just give you some advice, as a friend?"

Donghyuck doesn't miss a beat before responding, "You're not my friend. I'd have to like you for us to be friends."

"God, can you just be a little less difficult?" Jaehyun says, like he's speaking to a petulant child.

Donghyuck blinks at him. If he's difficult, Jaehyun is impossible. For one thing, he hasn't even acknowledged what happened behind the theatre that night, just dragged Donghyuck out here to criticise him - what's Donghyuck supposed to think of it? "Shouldn't we talk about the last time we met?" He blurts out.

At that, Jaehyun tenses up immediately; his shoulders go stiff and his expression freezes. He looks at the ground, "Donghyuck, that can't happen again."

This time, it's his turn to freeze, "Why not?"

Jaehyun is still refusing to meet his gaze, "I've got a contract now - I just signed with Paramount," His hands shove deeper into his pockets, "Do you know how quickly this would kill all that?"

Maybe he's trying to let him down easy, but the words still burn like hell coming out of his mouth.

"Nobody's gotta know." Donghyuck says, and the words come out weaker than he intended, audibly disappointed. He hates himself for being so transparent.

"It could get out." Jaehyun shrugs, and he's right, deep down Donghyuck knows how right he is; that if anybody at his table caught a whiff of something between the two of them, the studio would drop him like a ton of bricks - a reminder of his expendability, as if Donghyuck's entire life hasn't been just that.

"You're so fucking confusing," He huffs, "First, you want me, then you're freaking out about your career or whatever." And it might be irrational, but Donghyuck is angry - at Jaehyun, at the studio, he doesn't even know.

Jaehyun rolls his eyes, "Yeah, I'm confusing."

Donghyuck just glares at him, at a loss for how to respond.

“You should get back to your friends then.” Jaehyun says, taking a step back, away from Donghyuck, towards the door. The word stings even harder now.

And it’s strange, because as much as Donghyuck wants Jaehyun out of his sight before he can succumb to the temptation to hit him, some weak, hidden part of his soul wants to ask him to stay. To preserve this briefest moment of honesty, before Donghyuck has to go back to being some higher up’s bitch.

But his tongue won’t move fast enough to say all that, and before he knows it, Jaehyun disappears, threading between tables, and he’s left to take his seat again, apologising profusely to the rest of his table. They seem even less bothered by his return than they did his leaving.

Hatred is a bizarrely intimate emotion, Donghyuck learns that night - or maybe Jaehyun teaches him.

VIII.

When Donghyuck spills his guts to Jaehyun for the first time, it's a complete accident.

He's draped over his sofa, toying with the telephone cord, talking about something, about nothing. They've been at it for hours, back and forth with little insults and jibes, a situation they seem to find themselves in more often than he'd like to admit. It's comfortable, talking to Jaehyun like this - the only person he doesn't find himself trying to impress. He doesn't care what Jaehyun thinks of him, after all, and it ends up making for a surprisingly honest relationship.

So one afternoon, it happens. Jaehyun is talking about some new neighbor of his, buying up these gaudy lawn ornaments, the sort of flashy extravagance everybody goes through when they first get rich; Donghyuck still has the bike to prove it.

"And I get it," Jaehyun's laugh sounds down the line, "That it's fun having money for the first time, but it's seriously the ugliest thing I've ever seen in my entire life."

"Money can't buy taste, just look at you." Donghyuck shrugs.

Jaehyun chuckles, "God, I remember being like that though. And back before then, I was so desperate for cash I'd do just about anything."

Donghyuck doesn't know what spurs him on, because it's not something he's ever told to anyone before, not even Johnny. He'd kept it locked away in some part of his brain he could only get to on those dark days, when he was alone with his thoughts for too long. But Jaehyun's voice is so familiar, so strangely comforting, as though even if Donghyuck doesn't like him, he wants to trust him.

"One time I was so desperate I let someone fuck me." He says, and the words are so much bigger out loud, so much harder to ignore. He regrets it immediately - imagines Jaehyun on the other end of the line, disgusted. He almost panics and hangs up, not wanting to sit through the judgement, until -

"I'm sorry." Jaehyun's voice comes out fuzzily. And really, he has nothing to be sorry for, but it's so genuinely sympathetic, like they're talking about the loss of a loved one. Not the faintest whiff of judgement. All of a sudden, Donghyuck feels like he could cry.

It's like confessing, like church when he was a little kid, only this time he actually feels lighter for it. Jaehyun doesn't bring it up again, but the knowledge sits between them, a small token of faith.

Maybe we're not friends, Donghyuck thinks, finally hanging up, just as the sun is going down, But we know each other.

IX.

For somebody he doesn’t like all that much, Donghyuck spends an awful lot of time with Jaehyun.

It’s that they’re in the same circles, he tells himself, that they float around in each other’s periphery, and couldn't get away from one another if they tried. Maybe he likes having Jaehyun around because he’s one of the few people who remembers him from before, when he was somebody else. Jaehyun calls him Donghyuck, for one thing. Even Johnny had defaulted to Haechan after a couple of months.

Jaehyun picks him up in a brand new red Chevy Bel Air - it’s so stupidly flashy and big that Donghyuck can’t resist the urge, lets out a low whistle as Jaehyun rolls up outside his gates.

“You like it?” The window winds down slowly, revealing Jaehyun in a white shirt, the first few buttons open, dark sunglasses low on the bridge of his nose. Everything about him is ridiculously Hollywood; if he wasn’t in movies, he wouldn’t exist, probably. Jaehyun lives his life like there’s always a director just outside the frame, somebody watching his every move.

“I mean, it makes sense, yeah.” Donghyuck slides into the passenger seat, pulls his own sunglasses down over his eyes. The radio is playing on low, some blues hit he vaguely recognises. Wind flutters in through the open windows as they cross over hills, past gated communities and sprawling white houses, the road lined with leafy trees on either side, fluorescent blue pools glittering in the distance.

“Well I wasn’t going to take the Haechan Lee for a drive in just any old car,” Jaehyun smirks, “I’m your biggest fan, you know.”

Donghyuck snorts back a laugh, “No you’re not. My biggest fan lives in Kentucky. Maybe Maine. The address is different on every letter.”

“They sure do love you, huh?” Jaehyun sighs and rolls his eyes, “I can’t go anywhere in this goddamn city without hearing your name.”

Donghyuck bites his lip. They do love him, they tell him all the time. It never gets any less surreal, strangers knowing who he is, being so visible to the world. Twenty two years and nobody looked at him twice, all reversed in less than three.

“I saw that new flick of yours.” He changes the subject - he can never think about that for too long.

“Thoughts?” Jaehyun’s latest movie is another big melodramatic romance, he’s very good at those. Maybe it’s just him, the way he looks at people, like he’s always a breath away from falling in love.

“You’re lucky you’re pretty.” Donghyuck teases, mostly because it’s a slippery slope to tell Jaehyun how he really feels when he watches those movies, silly as they are. How his chest tightens up, how sometimes he has to look away for a moment, because he’s worried about what will happen if he sinks too deeply into those images, projected above him in grayscale.

“Well, I gotta be pretty,” Jaehyun runs a hand through his hair, “Need to make the camera love you, see.”

And Donghyuck does see. He sees it clear as day, how the movies love Jaehyun, how he loves them right back.

“You look better kissing girls. Suits you.” He doesn’t know why he says it. If it’s supposed to be a joke, if he’s dead serious, Donghyuck has no idea what eggs him on, only that it’ll make Jaehyun mad. The reason for why he wants that eludes him just as much as everything else.

Jaehyun’s grip tightens ever so slightly on the wheel, and he keeps his eyes firmly fixed on the road in front. When he speaks, his voice is more sad than anything else, and a dark pit of shame pools in Donghyuck’s stomach. “Don’t be like that.”

Donghyuck looks out his own window, the sea shimmering in the distance, edged in by tight lines of white sand on one side, the horizon on the other, “I’m always like this.” He deadpans.

They round another corner, and the radio suddenly seems far too quiet, trapping them in the car with nothing but each other and the space between them. It’s hard not to feel guilty when beside him, Jaehyun exhales, audibly frustrated.

“No,” He says, like he knows anything about anything, about Donghyuck, “You’re not.”

X.

Renjun is everything that Jaehyun isn’t - maybe that’s why Donghyuck likes him so much.

That night, years ago, before things were the way they are now, when Donghyuck had kissed him in blue darkness behind a theatre that’s since shut down, the alleyway demolished and gone forever, everything about Jaehyun had been so soft. His features, his voice, his hand on Donghyuck’s shoulder, his lips - it was all gentle and hazy like something out of a dream.

Renjun is not like that. He is sharp edges and bright eyes that cut right through Donghyuck’s defenses, and when he kisses, it’s fast and hungry. It’s like dunking his head in the freezing January ocean, coming out gasping for air, and going right back down every time, just to feel the shock of the cold.

It’s what I need, is what he thinks when he presses into him, Renjun’s high moans ripping through the entire house, somebody who will touch me.

They’re friends. Friends who sleep together, occasionally, and that’s all. There’s no ambiguity about it, nothing between the lines, and Donghyuck likes the simplicity of the whole arrangement. They don’t kiss unless they’re about to fuck, and nobody pretends otherwise.

Renjun tells him just why he finds it so easy - to separate the two - one morning, as he watches Donghyuck pull a shirt on. “I like nice things,” He says vaguely, “And people like buying me nice things.”

It makes sense; Donghyuck has seen Renjun in action, hanging off guys’ arms, whispering things in their ears and watching their eyes go wide. The bits of jewellery, the silk shirts, the pile of perfume-sweet letters on his bedside table. Renjun’s paying them all back, of course, in his own way.

That’s why Donghyuck agrees to take him to Johnny’s new house-warming party, more or less, because it will inevitably be filled with men with too much money looking for pretty things to spend it on. “I can be a pretty thing.” Renjun pleads, from the other side of the bed, when Donghyuck first tells him about it.

As it turns out, his assessment is entirely correct, when they step into the entrance hallway, and he recognises every face almost immediately. Some he’s met before, some only on big screens, all eyeing him up like they’re waiting for the right moment to rip him to pieces.

Renjun taps on his shoulder and shoots a smile before disappearing into swathes of people, and then Donghyuck is alone, suddenly so small in the expanse of Johnny's new house, all high ceilings and bannisters and filled with people he knows only in the most abstract sense. In that way, he's almost glad when he spots Jaehyun immediately, zeroes in on him. He's got a glass of wine in one hand, gesturing with it as he speaks to some actress Donghyuck vaguely recognises but never bothered to learn the name of. Jaehyun isn’t looking at him though, no, his eyes are trained on Renjun, watching him ‘accidentally’ bump into an older man and begin apologising profusely.

He’s about to make a beeline for Jaehyun, for some reason the most comforting face in the crowd, when a hand from behind grasps onto his shoulder and pulls him into a back hug.

“It’s nice, right?” Johnny’s voice booms from behind, clearly already a few drinks in. Donghyuck squirms to get out of his grasp before straightening out his suit.

“I’ll say.” He lets out a low whistle, still slightly in awe of the expanse of the place.

“Better be worth it,” Johnny laughs, face flushed, no doubt from the alcohol, “I dunno if I could afford to move again.”

Which isn’t a surprise, with the houses way out here in the Hills; Donghyuck’s own mortgage makes him feel a little dizzy.

The hours fly by - mostly by clinging to Johnny’s side and catching occasional glimpses of Renjun. Donghyuck likes people, he really does, just not these people, like sharks waiting to take a chunk out of him. It’s something he’s noticed in Los Angeles, the more people who know him, the fewer he actually wants to know.

Eventually, he spots Jaehyun again, almost having forgotten he was even there, but he recognises his silhouette immediately, through the sliding glass door leading out to the back patio. When he steps out, Jaehyun is alone, cradling a drink in one hand, looking out at the landscape. Houses spread out like a map from above, and beyond that, the lights of the city.

Jaehyun glances at him, but doesn’t smile, barely even acknowledges Donghyuck’s presence beyond looking him up and down. The air feels thick, maybe it’s the haze of alcohol, but Jaehyun seems on edge, completely still. Donghyuck’s brain scrambles to recall if he’s done something wrong, a way to explain the hostility.

"Spoke to that guy you brought," Jaehyun says, and there's almost a bite to his voice, like he's mad at something, apparently Donghyuck, except he has no idea why. "He seemed very interested in getting to know me."

Donghyuck doesn't dignify it with a response - it's none of his business if Renjun wants to shake Jaehyun down the way he does all those other lonely men.

Jaehyun takes a sip from his drink, and there's a shout somewhere in the distance, in one of the backyards that seem to stretch out forever, over hills and back into the city. Why is it always like this? Jaehyun and Donghyuck together in some hidden place away from everybody else, the night sky blanketing over them.

"Is he an actor or a whore then?" Jaehyun asks, and even though the words aren't directed at him, they still sting.

Donghyuck turns to him, "He's a friend of mine."

"So, a whore." And they've always been like this, but something is different tonight. Jaehyun is usually controlled in the way he speaks, careful to teeter just on that line between teasing and insults. It’s where they’ve always been, really, a balancing act between the two. But tonight is different - Jaehyun’s words are a little too sharp, come out a little too fast. He's clearly wound up, tight, the air brittle with tension.

"Why the concern?" Donghyuck snaps, because if Jaehyun wants to be spiteful, he can be spiteful too, "Don't tell me you think you're too good for that all of a sudden."

Jaehyun doesn't say anything to that. They just lean back against the wall, watching the city from a distance, tiny lights in an expanse of blackness.

"Are you fucking him?" It's so curt, so harsh, so not Jaehyun. The words fall with a thump in the silent yard.

Donghyuck snorts, "Does it matter?"

He doesn't know why he's so reluctant to admit the obvious, though. So what if him and Renjun are fucking - why should Jaehyun even care? Maybe you don’t want me, he thinks, but is it so hard to believe that somebody else does?

"Depends on the answer." Jaehyun shrugs, and it's not fair. Donghyuck sat low in those crushed velvet seats, watched Jaehyun sweep all those girls into kisses, swallowed his feelings and dealt with it because that was how it was supposed to be. There wasn't going to be something between them; not now, not ever - so Jaehyun doesn’t get a fucking say in how Donghyuck lives his life. He wants to have his cake and eat it too, and somehow Donghyuck is the one being punished.

But he doesn't dare say any of that, because it's an unwritten rule between the two of them - to pretend there was never anything there at all. Instead, he just rolls his eyes, "What, got your eye on him? I wouldn't bother, he's too expensive for you anyway."

Something flashes in Jaehyun's eyes, something Donghyuck has never seen before, he looks like a different person. Maybe it’s pain, anger - it’s so unfamiliar, he doesn’t have a point of reference. Jaehyun takes a deep breath and leans in close, looking down through dark lashes - and for a second Donghyuck thinks he's about to kiss him. Jaehyun's face is barely a few inches from his own, lips parted slightly, and then he whispers, voice as soft as a lover: "Does he cost more than you did?"

Donghyuck thinks he's going to be sick.

He can feel his eyes start to sting with tears - pure humiliation - and all of a sudden he hates Jaehyun more than he's hated anybody else in his entire life. More than the man in the back of the Station Wagon that night, calloused fingers on his hips, labored breathing, telling him how pretty he was. He hates Jaehyun for reminding him of what Donghyuck did, back when he was a different person, when he didn’t matter and when nothing anyone did to him mattered. Mostly, he hates himself for being deluded enough to tell Jaehyun the whole sordid story in the first place. Jaehyun is a fantastic actor, after all, and Donghyuck got lured in, thought he could bare that part of his soul to him. He feels stupid.

He looks up at Jaehyun, burning with rage, and spits directly into his face. It lands squarely on his cheek, wet and disgusting. Jaehyun deserves it. "Fuck you." He hisses.

And that's it - he doesn't bother waiting for a reaction, just turns on his heel and yanks the patio door open, back into the expanse of the party, suddenly so suffocating, bursting with people. He doesn't look for faces, doesn't want to recognise anybody, just keeps his eyes fixed on the ground and tries to remember the direction towards the front door. He brushes past people, someone curses at him when he knocks into their drink, spilling red wine onto Johnny's new kitchen tiles, but he still doesn't look up. He doesn’t bother saying goodbye to anybody - his friends are all probably settled into couches somewhere, hands stuffed into someone else’s slacks, and they wouldn’t want him anyway.

The journey home is long and arduous - his vision is fuzzy from tears and a couple of times he has to swerve at the last second to avoid flying right into a battered old Ford. By the time he reaches his front door, kicking past a pile of mail and slamming it shut behind him, the emotion has simmered into a bitter kind of hatred, tears of anger and shame. Now it's like poison at the back of his throat, urging him on.

He catches a glimpse of himself in a full-length mirror propped up in the living room - some ridiculously expensive vintage thing Johnny had convinced him to buy - and he looks nothing like the Haechan in the movies, the person he promised to himself. His eyes are red and puffy, cheeks flushed from blood vessels, snot on his cupid’s bow. Pretty, he thinks bitterly.

Donghyuck yanks off his tie, balled up and flung across the room. He curls up on an armchair, knees to his chest like a kid, and tries to stop the blood pounding through his ears. Maybe Renjun is looking for him in guest bedrooms, maybe Johnny is asking if anybody’s seen Haechan Lee around.

The telephone rings, once, twice - Donghyuck yanks it off the hook and holds it against his ear. On the other end of the line, somebody is breathing deeply, "What do you want?" He spits out.

"I need to speak to you." And Donghyuck almost laughs - because Jaehyun has balls, he'll give him that. It’s quiet, no noise in the background, so Jaehyun must have ditched the party early too.

"That's too bad, I don't like hearing your voice in my house." He hopes he never hears it again, actually. He should slam the phone down right now. He tries to make himself, to force his hand to pull the receiver away, but it won’t budge.

"I wanted to apologise." Jaehyun's voice is back to its usual candor, controlled, purposeful, and for some reason it only makes Donghyuck angrier - Jaehyun pretending to be reasonable.

"Then talk."

He hears Jaehyun exhale shakily, "I shouldn't have said that, any of it, about Renjun -" He pauses, breath hitching a little, "And about you. I'm sorry."

This time, Donghyuck actually does laugh. If Jaehyun were here in the room with him right now, he would knock each and every one of his perfect teeth out, "You're a wonderful actor, if I close my eyes I can almost pretend you're being genuine. You have a gift, really."

"I'm being serious, you jackass," Jaehyun snaps, "Why don't you believe me?"

Donghyuck speaks slowly, like Jaehyun is dumb, "Because you decided to grovel down the telephone instead of saying sorry to my fucking face."

And it's true, this Jaehyun is weak, pathetic. He hides away and makes amends on the other end of the line, where he doesn’t have to meet Donghyuck’s eyes.

"Listen, do you want my apology or not?" His voice is growing stern, and it’s ridiculous - like he's entitled to be angry, as if this isn't his fault in the first place.

"No! Not at all!” Donghyuck yells at the top of his voice, and he hopes that Jaehyun flinches away from the telephone when he does, “What I want is to go to sleep and try to forget that somebody had the gall to say that to me. What you want is, what?” He snorts, “Absolution?”

Jaehyun isn’t getting any, that’s for sure. He wants the guilt to eat him from the inside out, to rot away forever, until there’s nothing left of him but bones, and that’s when Donghyuck will start thinking about forgiveness.

“God, I don’t know why I even try with you,” Jaehyun says, exasperated. His voice is low, bitter, “You need to make yourself the victim so bad, it’s embarrassing. It’s like you’re desperate to create reasons to hate me.”

“I don’t have to hate you, Jaehyun, you do that to yourself already.” Donghyuck scoffs, and it becomes very apparent, very quickly, that they’re not just talking about what Jaehyun said before. No, this goes back long before that, right back to his first glimpse of that hidden part of Jaehyun, what he’d seen that night at the theatre. Fear - of what people think of him, of Donghyuck; fear of himself. Jaehyun fucking reeks of it.

Jaehyun sneers down the phone, “You’re a child.”

And that’s fine, he can call Donghyuck immature all he wants, if it makes him feel better.

“You’re a pussy.” He spits right back, without missing a beat.

There’s a moment of quiet, just the two of them breathing heavily, worked up beyond belief, Donghyuck hasn’t let himself be angry like this in years. He swallows before speaking again, softening his voice the way Jaehyun had before, “You want to know the truth, since you were so curious in the first place?” It’s sickeningly gentle, every word dripping with sugary venom, “I’d have fucked you for free, if only you weren’t such a coward.”

And then, with finality, he slams the phone back down into the receiver.

He catches his reflection once more, chest heaving up and down, face screwed up with emotion. It’s still so foreign, it must belong to somebody else.

He briefly considers unplugging the telephone, but knows that Jaehyun won’t call again tonight. They’ve humiliated themselves and each other enough for now.

Maybe tomorrow morning, he wonders, when things will go back to the way they were, more or less. A few days, max, before Jaehyun rolls back into his driveway and they both pretend Donghyuck hadn’t finally vocalised what they had sworn to bury.

In the end, they don’t talk for the better part of a year.

XI.

In some ways, the months he spends away from Jaehyun are painfully easy - there are no more conversations to decode, interactions to lie in bed, wondering about, none of the confusion that follows wherever Jaehyun goes. He shoots another movie - a big deal, his agent assures him, this is the one people will remember when they hear his name - and when it comes out, he lines up his awards in neat little rows behind a glass screen. And it's success. It's money and prestige and telling the entire world that he is somebody to be respected.

You've made it, he tells himself in the bathroom mirror one evening, you fucking did it and nobody can ever take that away from you.

And yet, he doesn't feel any better for it.

Sometimes he'll zone out, when he's smoking or watching television or reading, and find himself staring absentmindedly at the telephone for minutes at a time, and he knows what he's waiting for, but it never comes. The times it does ring, he darts across the room at record speed, and he can hear the desperation in his own voice when he answers, and it's never what he hopes it would be. He comes to resent it a little, and all the people who call him on it, even though they've done nothing wrong. It's stupid. It's so, so stupid, because Mark will call him from New York, where he's doing some new play on Broadway, and Donghyuck wants to throw the telephone across the room, hates Mark for being himself, for not being somebody else.

"I don't get you," Renjun says one night, propped up on one elbow, tracing a finger down Donghyuck's chest, "You bitch about the guy nonstop and when you actually manage to get him out of your life, you start moping around like a kicked puppy."

Donghyuck sighs, runs his hands over his face, "I don't get it either."

"Isn't it a good thing, though? Everybody knows you two can't stand each other."

And Donghyuck doesn't know how to reply to that, because it's true. Word travelled fast, reporters even faster, and it was no secret that for some reason, unbeknownst to the public, Jaehyun Jung and Haechan Lee were like big cats marking their territory. This was just the next logical step, to disappear from each other's lives completely.

He never actually tells anybody the reason they stopped talking, not for a while at least, because just the thought of it makes his cheeks burn with shame. One journalist practically camps out outside his gates until he almost puts the guy in a chokehold through the bars, and Johnny has to pull him off. Even then, it doesn't stop Donghyuck from promising, through tears, in a voice that he's never heard from himself before, that if he doesn't get off his property, Donghyuck will kill him right there.

So nobody asks after that.

In fact, he doesn't think those words will ever see the light of day, and in a way they don't. He whispers them to Johnny in pitch black darkness one night, in Johnny's bedroom, from the other end of the king sized bed. It all tumbles out, more than he ever planned - the entire evening and everything he and Jaehyun said to one another, and that word, the one he'd kept hidden in the darkest recesses of his mind for so long, the one Jaehyun dragged out from his thoughts and threw in his face.

It's only a word, after all, and Donghyuck has been called far worse, Jaehyun didn't even say it about him. Still, the shame wells up inside and refuses to go away.

The next morning, over mugs of black coffee, Johnny looks at him from across the kitchen table and says, very quietly, "Y'know, all actors were whores at one point or another."

“I guess some still are.” Donghyuck replies, staring down into the dark void in his mug. They don't speak about it again, just eat breakfast in close, comforting silence, and that's enough for Donghyuck.

The strangest part about Jaehyun disappearing from his life is the fact that he doesn't - he is impossible to avoid, actually. His face is on posters outside every movie theatre, his voice on the radio, and Donghyuck isn't even listening to what he's saying, just the way he laughs with the host, the pauses to think. Sometimes it works to fill that lonely place inside of him, sometimes it just makes the emptiness grow even bigger.

He thinks he sees him once, when he's stopped at a red light at an intersection. His bike hums with effort beneath him, one foot on the black tarmac as cars pass like a school of fish, exhaust fumes clouding over. And then, a red Chevy Bel Air, gliding straight past, and the light bouncing off the paint job almost blinds him. He's about to turn right into the lane, speed up to it, before he gets a hold of himself - it's probably not even his car.

There are so many people in Los Angeles, crowds to disappear into and bridges to burn without a second thought. There are two million people in this city, faces he might see once and then never again - two million strangers, really. He just never thought Jaehyun would end up as one of them.

XII.

Donghyuck has only ever been in the hospital twice in his entire life.

The first came when he was twelve years old - appendicitis, a nasty thing - he remembers pretty nurses sneaking him toffee at meal times and endless rounds of gin rummy. In the months after, he’d come up with at least half a dozen stories for how he got the scar, each more impressive than the last, and made a habit of showing it off in locker rooms and public pools.

The second time round, Donghyuck doesn’t think he’s going to make it to the hospital, no, he envisions himself pale and stiff, sprawled on the gray tarmac, the air filled with red dust.

It happens the way he’d always imagined it would; fast, loud, bloody. The car’s windshield shatters like rain, a million tiny shards showering over him, and an ugly dent on the hood he absentmindedly notes is the same shape as his torso. He ends up on the side of the road, pinned down by his bike, and with every breath he feels dirt and soot and his own blood entering his lungs. A woman is screaming, a wretched, animal sound, and the purr of the engine drones on in the background. He presses a hand to his abdomen, it feels tight and heavy, and when he pulls it back, holds it in front of his face, his blood is so dark he thinks it must be oil. I’m going to die, he thinks, staring up at the sun, mind going fuzzy around the edges, I’m going to die right here and nobody is going to tell my friends.

That's the last thing he sees before he loses consciousness. Images hovering in the air in front of him, Johnny and Mark and Renjun in front of newsstands, on their doorsteps, at kitchen tables, reading tomorrow morning’s paper, and the front page is all him, wearing a halo of shattered glass, skin almost luminescent in the dark pool of blood. And then he sees Jaehyun, turning on the television as he lights the first smoke of the day. He wonders if Jaehyun will pick up the phone and call him, just to be sure. For some reason, it makes him sadder than the thought of dying.

Well, in the end he doesn’t die. Instead he is torn from the ground, limp like a puppet with its strings cut, and somehow they manage to breathe life back into him.

“You’re lucky,” A doctor tells him, the first words he hears when he opens his eyes, “You should be dead.”

Every muscle from his jaw down to his stomach aches when he speaks, but he still does, “I should be dead.” He echoes back to himself.

Johnny is the first person to visit him, only a couple hours after he’s woken up, and he looks like hell. His hair is greasy, eyes red and puffy, clothes crumpled like he’s been wearing them for two days straight - Donghyuck learns later on that this assessment is correct. He doesn’t say anything at first, just sits down in the chair next to the bed and puts his face in his hands. Donghyuck suddenly feels incredibly guilty, but he’s not quite sure why.

And then, a voice, quiet and hoarse, “I can’t believe you’re alive. Motherfucker.”

Donghyuck laughs, and the pain in his chest flares up again. Johnny looks up at him, face all tenderness, eyes still glassy with tears, a tiny smile cracking one corner of his mouth.

“Your bedside manner leaves something to be desired.” Donghyuck croaks out. It’s the most he’s said since he first came to.

“Jesus Christ, you have no idea how pissed I was at you for dying. It was the fucking worst, you made me cry in public.” Johnny runs a hand through his hair, leans back in his seat.

Donghyuck pouts in response, “You have to be nice to me now that I’m ugly.”

It’s a half truth - in all honesty, Donghyuck has no idea what his face is like. When he looks down at the body beneath him, it’s a mess, thick bandages cocooning his abdomen, both legs suspended in casts. He can barely make out a square inch of skin not wrapped up in white. He imagines his features horribly disfigured, unrecognisable, and wonders vaguely if he still has a career. It’s a funny thing, to fall asleep on the side of the road and wake up as a nobody.

“I hate being the one to tell you that you’re still insufferably pretty, Haechan.” Johnny says, and he feels a pang of sadness. It’s times like these, when Johnny’s voice goes all soft and gentle, a tiny part of him wonders about if things had been different between the two of them. He doesn’t really know what to do with that.

“You wanna know the worst part of this?” Johnny asks, his usual drawl returning, the moment passed.

“Tell me.”

“The car you wrecked. A Ford Thunderbird, almost brand new.”

Donghyuck sees it again in the back of his mind, shiny and crisp white. For some reason, the thought of it being torn to scraps in a junkyard somewhere makes him sad too. Something beautiful like that, ripped up and forgotten forever.

Johnny stays for a while longer, and they shoot the shit like they always do, like Donghyuck’s body isn’t mangled beneath him, like he isn’t the biggest piece of news in the world at that moment. Johnny tells him about how Mark is probably on a plane back from New York as they speak, and how the hospital had to kick out a dozen reporters who had swarmed in the waiting room, and how there’s not a radio station in LA - on earth - that isn’t reciting the same damn story.

Eventually, Johnny leaves, promising to be back that afternoon after he’s showered and consumed something other than coffee. Donghyuck rolls his eyes, telling him that he's got attachment issues, separation anxiety at its finest, but there’s affection in his tone. He’s grateful for the comforting familiarity that Johnny brings, when everything else around him is cold, sterile.

Donghyuck gets another visitor that day, and really, he should have known. Who else would come to him on his supposed deathbed?

Jaehyun is standing in the doorway, hands deep in his pockets, suit freshly pressed, so good-looking it almost makes him angry. He always has a way of showing up when Donghyuck is at his lowest, and he supposes it doesn’t get much lower than this, looking down at his own body, bruised purple and green.

Jaehyun coughs, comes in slowly, like he’s unsure if he’s allowed to. “Press are camped out in the parking lot, I could barely find a spot.” He says, and it’s strange, Donghyuck hasn’t heard his voice outside a television screen in so long, “About a hundred reporters asked for a statement on my way in.”

Donghyuck has half a mind to kick him out, throw it back in his face, tell him that no amount of shattered bones could coax him into speaking to him ever again, but instead he just smiles, “Tell them that I’m dead.”

“You look it.” Jaehyun sits down where Johnny had been, crosses one leg over the other. And it’s cruel, but Donghyuck is also cruel - they are cruel with each other. It’s the way it’s always been; Jaehyun sitting there, straight out of a magazine, frustratingly perfect, telling him things that nobody else does.

Donghyuck looks him up and down, “Nice suit. It’s new?”

“I thought I had a funeral to go to.” Jaehyun shrugs, adjusting his tie. Really, Donghyuck has no idea if the suit is new, he hasn’t seen Jaehyun in the flesh for nearly a year. Somehow that feels like both too long and not long enough. He’s lost weight, cheekbones more prominent than before, and his hair is also longer. Now it curls around his ears like dark little hyacinth petals.

“Sorry to disappoint.” He snorts.

A few beats of silence pass; it’s strangely intimate. He wonders how Jaehyun’s life has diverged in the past eleven months, if he still holds the same position in it. The role he’s always had, really.

Eventually, Jaehyun swallows and asks, “How do you feel?”

“Okay. I mean, my legs don’t work, but other than that I’m alright.” Donghyuck can’t resist saying. He knows Jaehyun is asking out of courtesy, anyway; any asshole with two working eyes could parse out that Donghyuck is being held together by scotch tape and spite.

“A nurse told me they all thought you were a goner when they first brought you in.” Jaehyun fidgets, crosses his legs round the other way before giving in and just standing up, walking over to face the window, “Said she’d never seen somebody lose that much blood and wake up again. It’s like winning the lottery.”

Donghyuck watches him toy with the blinds, tap on the side of a vase of roses somebody must have left for him. He’s never seen Jaehyun so jittery, uncertain. “Yeah well, it certainly feels that way.” He replies, deadpan.

Jaehyun digs around his breast pocket and emerges with a pack of cigarettes - at least the neverending smoking is still a constant. He has to try a couple times to get one lit properly, muttering curses with each failed attempt, and even from across the room Donghyuck can see the shake in his movements. Smoke drifts idly across the room, but he still doesn’t turn to face Donghyuck when he says, controlled and withdrawn, “It’s a good thing you’re not dead.”

Donghyuck tugs at a strand of hair; it’s greasy and unwashed, “I didn’t have much of a say in the matter, if I’m being honest.”

“You know what I’m trying to say, jackass.” Jaehyun says, and it should be lighthearted, but his voice betrays him, quivers a little. And then, he does what Donghyuck never expected him to do, he turns around and asks, “Do you remember the last time that we spoke?”

It’s a loaded question, the air thickens the moment it’s out of his mouth. Because Donghyuck does remember. Of course he remembers. How many hours has he spent, in the time since that conversation, replaying it in his head, milling over every syllable, driving himself insane sorting through what he regrets and what he stands by. It proves to be an unsolvable puzzle.

All he can manage to say, through a forced laugh, is - “Vividly.”

Jaehyun leans against the window, not quite looking him in the eye, “I couldn’t stop thinking about it, after Johnny called and told me what happened. I thought those would be the last words we ever said to each other. I'd never felt so guilty before in my entire life.”

“Well, I’m still here, so your conscience can be cleared.” Donghyuck replies, shifting a little. He doesn’t know what to do with his arms. If he’s being honest, he had thought the same thing, believed that conversation would be the one to finally cut the invisible string that kept them in each other’s orbits. Drifted off into space, forever.

Jaehyun bites his lip, nods. “Well, I suppose you should get some rest.”

And some small voice inside of Donghyuck wants to tell him to sit back down, stay here with him and his body, all torn up, miraculously still here and not six feet deep, below a cypress tree. Keep me company in hell, please. You’re the only one who will.

Just as Jaehyun is reaching the door, Donghyuck says, voice thick, “So much for no self-preservation instinct, huh?”

Jaehyun doesn’t turn to look at him, but his shoulders jerk a little with - laughter? Something. His voice is low, like there’s something trapped in his chest, weighing him down.

“I guess you got a way of sticking around like that.”

XIII.

"Fucking Christ," Jaemin groans, like the words are being forced out of him, as Donghyuck pushes through those last few thrusts, "Haechan."

His movements are hard and stuttered as he rides out the orgasm, almost seeing stars before his arms give in, and he collapses onto Jaemin with a grunt. Beneath him, he's still moaning into Donghyuck's pillows, practically incoherent.

Donghyuck's face is pressed into his back, salty sweat against his lips, feeling how Jaemin pants, body shifting with every exhale. He pulls out, come dripping out of Jaemin's hole and onto his fingertips, before rolling off of him.

He'd picked Jaemin up outside a restaurant downtown the previous night - although honestly, it felt a little like Jaemin had been the one picking him up. He'd been incessant, full of stories about how Donghyuck was his hero, how he'd seen each and every single one of his movies, even the early ones. It was probably bullshit, for the most part, but Donghyuck couldn't bring himself to care; Jaemin was pretty when he begged, even prettier on all fours.

He lights a cigarette, leaving the pack in the space between them for whenever Jaemin feels like digging his face out of Donghyuck's sheets, and glances at his watch - nearly ten. When he turns back, Jaemin is smiling at him, eyes half lidded.

"Can I ask you something?" He says, pulling the comforter over his crotch, chest still shining in the sunlight that's managed to filter through the curtains.

Donghyuck nods, and Jaemin continues, "You know Jaehyun Jung, right?"

That's what makes him freeze up. It's a stupid question, really, the answer is such common knowledge - that Haechan Lee and Jaehyun Jung used to know one another. Not so much anymore.

"Everybody knows everybody here." He answers vaguely.

Jaemin's voice drops a little quieter, but his smile turns to a grin, like he's in on some wonderful secret, "I mean, in the biblical sense.”

"What are you getting at?" Donghyuck asks slowly. It's like a slap in the face, nobody has ever asked him outright like that. Even the mention of Jaehyun feels foreign, albeit not in the way it used to, before his accident. Nearly six months have passed since then, when he clung to the last breaths of life and somehow made it back whole. They haven't spoken, not really at least, beyond awkward run-ins at events and minute long phone calls to ask how Donghyuck's legs are doing. And somehow, it's different. Not avoiding one another deliberately, to make a point, but simply because Donghyuck has no idea what he would say to him.

Jaemin bites his lip, but the smile doesn't fade, "Is he like us?"

"You're asking me if Jaehyun Jung is a queer."

Jaemin chuckles, finally flicks open the lighter and holds it to a cigarette, the other end between his lips, "I suppose I am, yeah."

"Well, he's not." Donghyuck replies bluntly. He exhales to watch a puff of smoke disappear into the air.

Jaemin frowns in confusion, eyebrows knitted together, "Someone told me that he was."

And it hurts, he's not entirely sure why, but some little part of Donghyuck aches when he replies, "Someone must have lied to you then."

A bird chirps somewhere outside, and Jaemin nods solemnly, seemingly not entirely satisfied with the answer, but given up on pushing for it. He turns away from Donghyuck when he takes another drag, facing the window instead. The sun has a warm, orange glow to it, marking out boxes of light on their bodies, "You two must really hate each other, huh?”

Donghyuck opens his mouth to say something, once, twice, but the words just don't come. Eventually, he lets out a heavy sigh, "I guess so."

Jaemin glances back at him, the grin now a little dulled. If Donghyuck didn't know any better, he'd call it pity. "But you know him pretty well."

And there's the catch - the one that's always there with Jaehyun. There are so many things he hates about him, so many reasons he should see the radio silence between the two of them as a blessing - and yet, there's nobody in the world he knows better. Nobody who knows him better. That has to count for something, doesn't it?

"It's like that, sometimes." He says. He doesn't know what else he can say.

It sticks in his brain like a parasite for the rest of the day, even when Jaemin is long gone with no trace left but Donghyuck’s sheets, still mussed. He wonders if somebody else is crawling out of Jaehyun’s bed too, asking about him, and how would Jaehyun respond to that? Would he tell it in all its gory details, or would he brush it off, say that they just grew apart? What does Jaehyun think about him? Does he think about him at all? The questions are like sharks circling in his head, making no progress, endlessly repeating.

That night, Donghyuck does the only thing he knows how to. It's what he's always turned to, whenever he doesn't know how else to cope.

He picks up the telephone.

There is a ringing on the other end of the line, and it carries on for so long he's half-convinced nobody is going to pick up, and then a click, and a voice, raspy from sleep.

"Hello?" Jaehyun clears his throat, but the croak doesn't quite disappear.

"It's me." Donghyuck's heart is thumping, the sort of panic he hasn't felt since he was a teenager, scared and uncertain of the whole world.

Jaehyun exhales, almost a laugh, "I knew it would be."

Donghyuck squints, "You're lying."

The sound of shifting on the other end, furniture creaking, like Jaehyun is pulling up a chair, "Everybody else respects me too much to call at two in the morning. Of course it's you."

Donghyuck bites back a smile at the thought. Would Jaehyun have picked up anyway? Or was it because he knew? He swallows, "Somebody asked about you today."

"Yeah?"

He tugs at the skin around his nails with his teeth, and his fingertips smell of smoke. He doesn't even know why he called - the interaction had been fleeting and unimportant. People talk about Jaehyun all the time, he's one of the biggest names in Hollywood, it's never a surprise that his name would come up. And yet, Donghyuck felt like he had to tell him, as proof somehow. I thought about you today. I said your name today. I thought you should know.

"Asked if we hated each other." He says.

Jaehyun is quiet for a moment, and Donghyuck wonders what his face looks like right now, what it would be like if they were in the same room together. Eventually, Jaehyun asks, voice tentative, "What did you tell them?"

"I said yeah. That we did." And maybe they do - technically. For as long as they've known one another, that's always been the answer that's made the most sense.

"'S that the truth?" Jaehyun has never sounded so hesitant before, "On your part, at least?"

There's the kicker. Donghyuck sighs, "Maybe - sometimes. I can never really make up my mind about it, to be perfectly honest."

Jaehyun doesn't reply. Donghyuck doesn't know what he's expecting; for Jaehyun to hang up, to argue with him? There's nothing but silence on the other end of the line, impossible to gauge.

"You should come over." He blurts out, mouth moving faster than his brain.

Jaehyun's voice is almost pained, "You know I can't do that."

It's like reliving every other rejection at once - every time Jaehyun has been so close to his grasp before inevitably darting away, back to that hidden place Donghyuck can't reach. It's as constant as the packs of Lucky Strikes and the knowing laughter and the mocking in a voice so sweet it doesn't even hurt; the running away.

"The thing is," Donghyuck huffs, "You can."

"I'm being serious, Donghyuck -"

Donghyuck snorts, tone sarcastic, "Oh, you're being serious now? That changes everything."

Jaehyun coughs, but when he speaks again, his voice is still thick with emotion, "I'm not trying to make you mad, you know," He pauses, "I never am."

Then, with a definitive click, he hangs up, and Donghyuck is alone, more alone than he's ever been before. He can feel it inside of him, the guilt that bubbles up and spews out with every passing second. Why can he never just shut up? Why does he always have to make it so difficult? His heart sinks with the realisation that for every step Jaehyun takes to run away, Donghyuck is chasing him off just as quickly.

He puts the receiver down, suddenly deflated.

Donghyuck feels like a ghost walking around his house - the weight of the silence is almost too much to bear. He could call somebody else, any one of his friends would be over in a heartbeat, but he can’t bring himself to pick the phone up again, dial a number other than the one he’s used to. The rooms feel bigger in the darkness, cold and empty, like there’s a black hole sitting in the middle of his living room, sucking all the life out of it.

Regret slams into him at full force - every bit that he’s shoved far enough down he thought he could forget about it completely, all at once. It’s like being eaten alive, from the inside out, he could cry from the ache.

A car passes outside his window, the rumble of the engine low, the harshness of the headlights penetrating right through the curtains, blinding. Donghyuck ducks past them to catch a glimpse, not all that many people are usually driving around this neighborhood at close to three in the morning - and when he does, his breath stutters in his windpipe.

A bright red Chevy Bel Air, just outside his front gate. And it honks.

He’s almost ashamed of how quickly he’s out the front door, probably in record time, hands shaking as he frantically presses the buzzer more times than necessary. The bars groan as they heave open, and he takes a few staggered steps backwards, feet crunching on gravel.

The car rolls in slowly, Donghyuck can almost feel the hesitancy, although it’s too dark to even properly see Jaehyun. The door swings open. He swallows, hard. He has to make his mouth move.

"You said that you weren't coming." Donghyuck wraps his arms around himself, the night air sending a chill through him - or maybe it's anxiety, he can't tell.

Jaehyun clambers out, and suddenly he's standing in Donghyuck's driveway in a navy blue pyjama set, the tassel of his dressing gown trailing behind him, brown loafers not even on properly, "I've said a lot of things to you." He shifts awkwardly from one foot to the other.

Donghyuck blinks at him. Jaehyun looks like a mess, hair sticking up in every direction, face flushed red.

"You don't know if you hate me, okay -" Jaehyun continues, starting to pace back and forth, "But I know exactly how I feel about you."

He looks almost angry, Donghyuck half expects him to start yelling, so he speaks slow, controlled, "Jaehyun, if you're here to chew me out for something -"

Jaehyun spins around to face him again, stopping dead in his tracks, “Christ, would you listen to what I’m trying to tell you for once, instead of hearing whatever awful thing you think I’m saying?”

Somewhere inside of him, Donghyuck's heart stutters, "What are you saying then?"

"I'm saying," The fire inside Jaehyun seems to disappear at once, deflated, but his expression is still raw with emotion. He looks at Donghyuck helplessly, "Every time the telephone rings, I hope it’s you and I’m angry when it’s not.”

And Donghyuck wants to laugh - because they really are the same.

For once in his life, Donghyuck isn’t thinking; for the two seconds it takes to get to Jaehyun, and then for the one to wrap a hand around the back of his neck and kiss him. Jaehyun’s breathing is ragged, adrenaline fuelled and he matches him hungrily, clinging to the back of Donghyuck’s shirt like it’s keeping him afloat. He doesn’t kiss him like a movie star, no - it is feverish and messy, it is every part of Jaehyun he has tried so desperately to cover up, laid bare for Donghyuck to see.

The entire time they're stumbling backwards into the house, grasping at clothes, their own panting echoing back to them, Donghyuck thinks, This is a dream. I'm on the side of the road, bleeding out.

But Jaehyun's mouth on his doesn't feel like a dream - it is real and hot and wet, and smiles every time Donghyuck's breath hitches, pushes back against him.

Jaehyun's hands tug at his shirt, ghosting over his abdomen, and the slightest hint of contact is enough to make Donghyuck's pulse jump,

"I want you to fuck me." Jaehyun whispers as the tips of their noses brush against each other. His eyes are open, he's looking straight at Donghyuck, almost pleading.

"Get in line." Donghyuck breathes out, but shoulders open the bedroom door nonetheless. Once they're in, he doesn't waste any time before spinning Jaehyun around and walking him backwards, until the backs of Jaehyun's knees hit the edge of the bed. He collapses onto it, shuffling to prop himself up on his elbows and the sight alone is so, so much. His dressing gown must have been lost somewhere along the way, the top few buttons of his shirt undone, hiked up on his waist to reveal a strip of tan skin. His eyes are blown, mouth red and shiny with spit. He looks desperate, in a way Donghyuck never imagined Jaehyun could be, completely unravelled.

"I always knew I would see you begging me for it one day." Donghyuck groans, cock stirring within the confines of his pants.

Jaehyun rolls his eyes good naturedly, "Yeah? Then hurry up before I remember my dignity."

And Donghyuck isn't going to argue with that.

Fucking Jaehyun somehow feels both completely unfamiliar, and like the most natural thing on earth. It's strange, the world has seen so much of Jaehyun, they have seen him cry and yell and fall in and out of love - but only Donghyuck gets to see him like this. His eyes flutter shut when Donghyuck eventually pushes past his rim, head lolling back to reveal the expanse of his neck. His hips roll forward, he lets out gentle gasps whenever Donghyuck hits that spot deep inside of him.

Donghyuck can feel nails digging craters into his back as Jaehyun pulls them closer together - and it stings, but it's a good hurt. Just like Jaehyun.

Jaehyun comes first, with a stuttered moan that burrows so deep into Donghyuck's mind he's sure he could never forget it, even if he tried. He spurts onto his own stomach, shiny and translucent, and when his mouth falls open, Donghyuck leans forward to meet it in a kiss. The visual is too much for him to handle, he comes too then, barely seconds later, and it happens all at once. No build up, except for the entirety of the past five years.

He pulls out slowly, but doesn't get off of Jaehyun, instead just lies with one cheek against his chest, feeling it heave with effort beneath him. If he holds still for long enough, he can almost hear his heartbeat, starting to slow back to normal.

"You okay?" He mumbles.

Above him, there's a contented sigh, it blows lightly against the ends of his hair, "Yeah, I am."

Donghyuck shifts to move forward slightly, face now nuzzled into the crook of Jaehyun's neck, "You really mean what you said before?" he asks tentatively.

Jaehyun lets out a low laugh, Donghyuck can feel the vibrations of it in his throat, "You know what I was trying to say, right?"

And Donghyuck does know - Jaehyun's told him a couple times, just not the exact words. Donghyuck doesn't need to hear them anyway, Jaehyun has said them to so many women on so many screens - this is theirs. Nobody else deserves to know what Jaehyun sounds like when he's confessing for real.

"Yeah," Donghyuck says, "Me too."

That's how they fall asleep, first Jaehyun, and eventually, just as the birds are starting to wake up, Donghyuck. He has laid next to so many men in his life, he stopped keeping track of numbers, let alone names, long ago. This is the first time, he realises hazily, as his eyes drift closed, that he's stayed up to listen to the sound of their breathing.

XIV.

When the morning light begins to filter through his curtains, Donghyuck is thankful for Jaehyun's body, warm and still beneath him - it's the only thing he has to prove that last night wasn't a vision of some kind, a hallucination of a world where he and Jaehyun could get on.

How will he measure time now, he wonders, when he's so used to bookmarking his life with their disagreements?

He tries to be slow when he rolls over, cringing when the bed frame creaks loudly and Jaehyun's eyes flicker open at the sudden noise.

"Sorry," Donghyuck winces, and his voice comes out hoarse.

Jaehyun smiles and exhales faintly from his nose, the hint of a laugh. He looks pretty in the early morning light too, Donghyuck finds out, maybe he just suits these liminal times and places.

"Smoke?" Jaehyun asks, and his voice cracks, equally groggy from sleep.

Donghyuck nods, and watches as Jaehyun's body twists to reach the bedside table, Donghyuck vaguely remembers leaving a pack there a couple days ago. When Jaehyun moves back into place, balancing a glass ashtray in the space between them, his free arm snakes around Donghyuck's shoulders.

"It's gonna be real hot this summer," Donghyuck says just as Jaehyun is pulling out two cigarettes. He kicks the sheets off his legs, already starting to sweat. Without the curtains, it'd probably be like a greenhouse in here, even so early in the morning. For some reason, he's not all that bothered by it - the heat doesn't feel nearly as claustrophobic as it did before.

"You think?" Jaehyun hums, lighting his own with a puff before holding the little flame out to Donghyuck.

"I know." Donghyuck's head juts forward just a little, to let the end hover over the lighter, until it glows red.

I suppose we’re the same person after all, he thinks, eyes scanning over Jaehyun's face. It's just like it was the first time he ever lit a cigarette for Donghyuck - albeit a little wearier, more experienced. It looks good on him. Or maybe we're just playing the same person.