Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Throughout his life, Doyoung has always considered that above all, his true talents probably lie in two things: lying to himself, and withholding the truth from everyone else.

It’s funny, how easy it is to stack one after another on top of each other. Navigating it isn’t so hard, after a while. Like with anything else, it becomes second nature after practice. Once you learn how to curate your mannerisms, speech, and inner monologues to reflect a certain reality, it’s no longer necessary to look over your shoulder, paranoid, to see if anyone has noticed. No one pays that much attention. In your own head, it’s easy to deny unwelcome truths.

Doyoung had learned this all by the time he was about seventeen, when he sold his friends, his teachers, the school social worker, and most importantly himself on the notion that he was only living with his nineteen year old brother because it was more convenient for his parents.

That convenience had absolutely nothing to do with the fact he was sleeping with a kid at his brother’s art school and Doyoung was absolutely, mind-numbingly horrified of what they’d do if they found out that no, he wasn’t planning on going out with that beautiful girl from church his Mom adored. He wasn’t planning on going out with any girls at all. His only romantic plans involved getting high and making out to German arthaus films with the very male, very beautiful Zhang Yixing, whose prestigious dance awards could almost assuredly never overshadow his gender. Doyoung had no intentions of proving himself correct.

But it wasn’t about that at all. He just wanted to get out of their hair, that’s all. Make their lives a bit easier. He’d be on his own soon, anyway.

Doyoung had mastered it by the time he was twenty, when he spent weeks practicing, recording, and editing audition tapes for half the music colleges in Seoul only to delete them all from his hard drive the day Gongmyung accepted his first film role. His brother had made something of himself, after all. Now the spotlight was his. He was already denying them all so much. An uncertain career change would only make matters worse. It was only his duty.

It wasn’t because he was afraid. Not in the slightest.

This talent is what makes him so good at his job. It’s what makes him so good at life, he’s often certain of that. It’s never been hard. He’s never had to work at it. It all just melts off his back, effortless and light. He’s never been prone to weigh himself down with all the things he can’t handle, all the complete truths he’s safer to deny. It’s just who he is.

Not even Jaehyun makes it hard. It’d take a lot more than a beautiful kid with guitar-calloused fingers and a sharp tongue to undo years and years of practice, of perfection. They come out like clockwork. They come out before Doyoung can even think to stop them. It’s how it always is.

“We shouldn’t talk long.”

Jaehyun blinks at him, innocent. “Do you have to be somewhere?”

Yes. God, yes. I have a very busy night of wallowing in my own self-pity and unresolved emotions over you and they require my full and undivided attention and must be completed entirely alone so if you will excuse me, I’ll be on my way.

“I came here with Taeyong,” Doyoung explains, rubbing at the back of his neck. It’s absolutely freezing out, and the longer he stands, the harsher it cuts through his clothing and down to his skin. “I don’t want to keep him waiting. You know how he is.”

“I do,” Jaehyun hums, drawing his arms to his chest for a moment before letting them drop, averting his eyes. “I just ran into him on my way out, actually. He said you were looking for a drink.”

“And I don’t want to keep him waiting.”

“Then I’ll go with you,” Jaehyun says, gentle, but firm. Doyoung doesn’t miss the point, shrinking back a step and brushing against the streetlamp. “I’ve waited three months, so he can wait a few more minutes.”

Doyoung feels each bone in his body shift as he sighs. Every muscle in his body aches and he doesn’t even know why. He doesn’t want to know why. “If I told you that you couldn’t, would you listen?”

Jaehyun considers this by taking a step closer, and Doyoung can see his breath in the air, wishes he could feel it’s warmth. Sometimes, he can’t help but kind of hate himself. “If you really meant it, of course I would. I’d never violate that.”

There’s something almost funny about the absurdity of this all, but Doyoung doesn’t dare laugh. “I mean it, Jaehyun.”

He puts so much conviction, so much seriousness in his voice that he’s all but sure it’ll take. Doyoung looks him dead in the eyes and everything. For over three decades, Doyoung has watched that tone of voice drive away almost everyone that pry themselves in too close to his heart, anyone that touches something too similar to honesty. Doyoung makes it easy for people to accept him at face value. That’s the point.

“You don’t, though.”

In retrospect, he should have known Jaehyun was smarter than that.

The worst part is, it isn’t even an accusation. Jaehyun’s brows are knitted together, like he’s studying him, really trying to decide whether or not Doyoung’s safe to believe. There’s nothing smug about it, even though it’s absolutely the answer he knows Jaehyun wants to arrive at. It’s an honest, scientific conclusion.

It cuts deeper than the cold by far. Jaehyun continues before he can respond. “I don’t understand a lot of things about you, that’s fine. I don’t need to. But I know enough to tell if I’m being shut out or not.”

Doyoung rakes a hand back through his hair, hard, digging into the strands. It could use a cut, and it’s only then he notices Jaehyun’s taken a few inches off his in the time since they’d last met. “You have to know what this looks like, from my perspective. You have to know why I’m not comfortable with this.”

Jaehyun takes another step forward, and this time, Doyoung doesn’t move, just rolls his shoulders forward and pulls his coat around him tighter. Sometimes, and only when he’s around Jaehyun, he feels so much younger than in reality. Or maybe it’s just that Jaehyun feels older, no matter how dangerous that line of thinking is. He doesn’t know which implication is worse. “Of course I do. But what are the odds of it meaning anything to anyone tonight?”

His first instinct is to fire back, relative to the odds of me running into you again that first day we met, statistically speaking. For better or worse, he has just enough of a filter left to keep it down, hoping instead a similar idea is conveyed in the way he tilts his head, incredulous. “It’s always a safer bet when it’s not your reputation.”

“It’s freezing, Dr. Kim.” All Doyoung can do is stare at him, jaw tight, because of course he knows Jaehyun has it in him to twist the knife in just the right way. He’s been on the receiving end of it before, but after all this time, it still hits harder than the last. Dr. Kim, his ass. “I’m going to keep arguing with you either way, can we at least do it inside?”

Doyoung’s relationship to suffering feels more like an old friend he just can’t seem to shake, now a days.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Doyoung prepared for the possibility that Jaehyun would seek him out, even if he took care to never let that on. If nothing else, he has a firm commitment to setting realistic expectations, and this was something he would have been a fool to be caught off guard by. That he’d dig his heels in was the part that didn’t feel realistic enough to entertain, which is his fault. It should have been obvious he isn’t the type to let things go quickly, if literally nothing else. But somehow, that isn’t the worst part of this.

The part he feels really, truly unprepared for is the three feet of space they’re putting between them in every direction. Reaching out, even if just to brush something off his shoulder or rest a hand on his… he never realized just how intrinsic touching him it had become until now, where crossing this unspoken No Man’s Land would destroy whatever fragile equilibrium exists. If it exists at all.

The occasional reversal of their roles feels final, somehow. Doyoung searches for something in Jaehyun’s face that shows it’s just as hard for him only to find nothing even close to comfort. Jaehyun just stands there, unflinching, and all Doyoung can do is cave, again. And again.

“I didn’t realize you…” Doyoung tapers off, trying and failing to fill in the rest with anything that won’t incriminate either of them, justified or not. He gestures between them vaguely, the lack of professionalism far from lost on him.

Jaehyun smiles, all teeth, eyes soft. Whether it’s the mix of guilt, exhaustion and pure, selfish desire to sneak whatever ill-gotten minutes he can pry out of him—or just the way that look always makes him melt—Doyoung hates how ready he is to follow him.

He should fight him on it. He wants to fight him on it, to tell him all the reasons why whatever closure he’s searching for has already happened. Underline in bold that anything more than a quick chat by a stoplight is already too much. Whatever Jaehyun’s still feeling, he has to do it on his own. Just like Doyoung is. Just like Doyoung feels like he’ll be doing for quite a while.

But Jaehyun smiles, and it’s over. It’s easy enough to pretend like he doesn’t want him when Doyoung’s home alone and trying to convince himself he’s doing just fine in life. With Jaehyun standing so close, Doyoung feels like he’s one wrong move away from breaking down in the worst way. If something has to give to stop the lump in his throat from turning into something worse than a simple concession, there aren’t a lot of options left on the table. It is freezing, after all.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let this go against you,” Jaehyun says, barely above a whisper. It’s meant to be comforting, Doyoung can tell by the way he draws in and loses just a little of his edge, but the effect’s lost on him. “I’ll be careful. I promise. Don’t treat me like I don’t understand you.”

“I’m not comfortable with this,” Doyoung replies, because he’s always had a penchant for stating the obvious. “I know you know better.”

The, that’s why I’m entertaining it, goes unspoken for both their sakes.

“I just want to talk to you,” Jaehyun continues, shaking his head. He’s biting his lip again, and Doyoung aches at a cellular level. He doesn’t even have the words to reciprocate it, and he grits his teeth against the realization it’s probably the only comfort he has. It’s dangerously easy to use Jaehyun’s exceptional status as an excuse when he keeps getting smacked straight in the face with reminders of it.

He realizes a little too late that’s probably what he’s been doing all along.

“Just once,” Jaehyun says, after a pause. Doyoung’s aware it was supposed to be his to fill, but he doesn’t trust himself that much. Jaehyun doesn’t seem to mind. “Then I’ll leave you alone, I promise. Otherwise, I can’t guarantee I won’t try again.”

Doyoung is Dr. Frankenstein, and Jaehyun is his metaphorical monster. Or something. He’s losing feeling in his toes, the thin boots he’s wearing faltering under the pressure of the wind. He takes a deep breath in, counts to three, and exhales.

“You’ve come a long way, Jaehyun.” Doyoung’s ears buzz with traffic and people, drowning out his own voice enough to let the words out. “You might not get what you’re looking for out of this. Whatever that is.”

“I know,” Jaehyun shoves his hands into his pockets, shrugging. Doyoung wonders if anyone could look as effortless in acting like his entire face isn’t tinged pink with more than the cold. “Thank you for trying anyway.”

In the quiet, Doyoung wonders whether or not he’d regret walking away more than he’d regret living with himself after crossing this boundary in a way that can’t be reversed. Up until now, there was nothing to hang himself on. Not that could be traced. Not that could be proven.

As a former patient, and one removed by time, there’s nothing in what Jaehyun’s proposing that would absolutely, without question result in termination. As far as the letter of the code is concerned, anyway. Interpretation is more individualized, and even if every doctor doesn’t necessarily believe relations with former patients are on the same level as violating the boundaries of current ones, no one would bat an eye if it ended a career, either. Even just meeting in public toes things too close for comfort.

If he crosses this line, the implications of his choice are clear. He respects the sanctity of his position less than he cares about Jaehyun. It doesn’t matter if he’ll get away with it, just like it doesn’t matter if he’s technically allowed. If the moral principle is thrown aside, he’s already lost.

The worst part is, he knew the answer before he even asked the question.

Yuta keeps a quote on top of the desk in his flat in Japanese. When Doyoung asked about the translation, he picked up a piece of paper, and wrote it out in Korean. From there, Doyoung put that on his own work desk, and promptly forgot about it entirely until Doyoung takes the first step in Jaehyun’s direction and watches his face light up.

We are all going to die. I intend to deserve it.

He makes a mental note to ask Yuta to write it out for him again, and laminate it this time.

Doyoung looks at anything but Jaehyun, and hangs his head.

He never did learn how to refuse him.

“Is this the best thing I can do for you, Jaehyun?” Doyoung asks, though it sounds too much like a plea in his own ears for comfort. “Be honest. Say you’ve thought this through.”

“It’s the only thing,” Jaehyun replies, snapping his jaw shut. “If you want to help at all.”

“Okay,” Doyoung nods, until he believes it. “That’s okay.”

He barely remembers to text Taeyong not to wait up.

It’s not until a few minutes later, and several blocks down to the tiny late-night cafe he lets Jaehyun lead him in, that Jaehyun circles back to the part he never responded to. Even off the main streets, with quiet clients and minimal windows for which to stare into, Doyoung’s skin is crawling the moment they step inside, a distinct feeling of claustrophobia creeping up his neck.

It’s a small shop, too small, with no alcohol in sight. Though for better or worse it’s shaping up to be the wiser choice to avoid it. The handful of tables it boasts lay occupied, leaving open only armchairs and couches scattered around the perimeter. Doyoung had no idea this place even existed, though it’s a tall order when he can’t even pronounce whatever French is in its name, and it’s probably an advantage of Jaehyun’s youth that he knows the city a little more intimately.

It’s like insult to injury that it makes Doyoung remember he really, really doesn’t get out much.

He’s getting coffee with an ex-patient he might be in love with.

Nothing feels real anymore.

“I don’t know why I need this so much,” Jaehyun admits, right after rattling off Doyoung’s coffee order on his behalf like he does it in his sleep. “I don’t… really know what’s happening right now. I just wanted to ask how you’d been. But then I saw you, and it wasn’t enough. I didn’t plan this part out. I’m not thinking straight.”

Doyoung quirks an eyebrow. “You could be dissociating.”

What Doyoung means to say is that he’s dissociating.

The strangest thing about going insane is how calm and unremarkable it all feels. He’s mindful like he’s never able to be with all the workshops and in-home mediation in the world. The only thing he registers is the color of the walls, the heat radiating from the mug in his hands, and the way Jaehyun’s sweater is a little wrinkled in some places, but it makes it look even better on him. Details like that.

“Good news, you’re not my therapist.” Jaehyun, on the other hand, is very much present. “Don’t know if you knew that or not.”

It’d probably be really thrilling to hear Jaehyun talk back like that if he wasn’t on the receiving end of it. They settle down in a set of two armchairs, the farthest away from the window and tucked into a cozy corner just close enough to the fireplace on the far wall. Doyoung watches five minutes click away on his wristwatch before either of them speak.

“You were going to tell me what you thought,” Jaehyun finally mutters, running his fingernail along the rim of the mug. He ordered something sugary and chocolate-filled, a deviation from the plainer options Doyoung’s seen him go for in the past.

Doyoung just blinks at him, clearing something that caught in his throat. “Is that really what you did this for?”

“No, I’m just holding you to your word. If that’s all I wanted, I would have let you go.”

“I thought you’d have figured it out by now.” Doyoung stares at his hands, dry and red and too long for the rest of him, and talks to them instead of the boy across from him. “I told Kyungsoo to listen to you because I couldn’t say to your face I thought you were incredible.”

Getting something like that off his chest doesn’t feel nearly as freeing as he’d hoped. He still feels just as small. Jaehyun exhales, brushing a strand of hair out of his eyes. “I wanted to hear you say it.”

“You have so much potential,” Doyoung insists. “In so many ways. I know I told you last time, but it’s true.”

“How are you doing, Doyoung? Like, how are you really doing?” Jaehyun can’t be talking at more than a normal indoor volume, but it’s loud enough compared to his last few sentences to take Doyoung off-guard.

The way Jaehyun can flip back and forth between fight or flight is one of the hardest things for Doyoung to wrap his brain around. Doyoung’s work has made so many people predictable to him, but never Jaehyun. Maybe that’s why he likes him so much more than almost anyone else. “What do you mean, how am I really doing?”

Jaehyun sighs, resting his chin in the palm of his hand. “I want you to talk to me like I’m a person. Not a…”

Jaehyun can’t bring himself to say the word, but Doyoung doesn’t need him to. He gets what he means. “You’ve said that more than once.”

“Well, I mean it.” Jaehyun cocks his head to the side, and looks him in the eye for just a brief second before he turns his head back towards the fireplace again. “I don’t want you to give whatever answer will change the subject quicker. I want to know how you’re doing because I care how you’re doing.”

There’s an honest answer he could give. There’s another answer that borders on inappropriate levels of honesty, and yet another that’s easy and requires nothing more than a tight-lipped smile and something in between the truth and a lie. In the end, he chooses none of them. “I’m doing about the same as I always was when you saw me.”

Jaehyun curls up his nose, and in a moment of weakness, Doyoung thinks it’s one of the most adorable things he’s ever seen. “Do you practice non-answers on everyone, or just with me?”

Doyoung smiles and is surprised to feel it’s genuine. “I do this to everyone.”

There’s a small part of him that wants to bite back something harsh, about how this is who he really is. If Jaehyun wants him to talk to him like he’s anyone else he knows, he’s really just signing himself up for the parade of emotional repression, smartass remarks, and unapproachability he rewards those closest to him with. Maybe it’d even be fun, in the horrible way getting to remind someone whom they’re dealing with tends to be.

It’s been like this his whole life. Someone likes him too much, and his first impulse is to remind them why they should really reconsider. Doyoung is confident in a lot of things about himself, his intelligence, his career talents, his sense of humor even if no one else seems to agree… But the details of his personality are deterrents to intimacy, not selling points. He’s just doing others a favor when he argues against himself, or at least that’s what he spent a lot of his youth believing.

WIth Jaehyun, though… At the last moment, he decides to give the boy some credit.

All things considered, Jaehyun already knows.

“I can’t wrap my head around you,” Jaehyun shakes his head, licking a tiny dollop of whipped cream off his lip, and Doyoung loves him. He has to. It’d be scarier to feel this much and have it be anything else. “Every time I think about you too long, I end up believing ten different things that each make less sense than the last. Two hours later, I doubt it all again.”

Doyoung wants to reach his hand across the table and grip Jaehyun’s fingers in his, but he keeps them firm around his mug. “Do you think about me that much?”

“All the time.” Jaehyun looks at him he can’t believe Doyoung has a goddamn Ph.D. and still has the gall to ask something so ridiculous. “Sorry if that’s not what you want to hear.”

There’s nothing he can say that wouldn’t incriminate him one way or the other, and he’s not sure he could stand by either as the truth. “Jaehyun, you’re beautiful. You’re talented, you’re young.”

Jaehyun’s eyes widen, that deer-in-the-headlights sort of panic that turns his knuckles white against his coffee. “Stop. I know where you’re going with this, and stop.”

If he were a better person, maybe he’d listen. But Doyoung’s a man possessed. “You can do better than—”

“Better than you?” Jaehyun interrupts, voice taut and fingers clenching tighter on the handle. “I take it back, I can tell you’re not in therapist mode now. If you were you’d know that won’t work on me.”

Doyoung pinches the bridge of his nose, counting to three as he inhales. “Jaehyun…”

He doesn’t dare look up, but he can feel Jaehyun’s eyes on him, narrowed, tired. “I don’t want anyone else. That’s my fucking problem. I still haven’t found anyone that comes close. I see more in you than I know you see in yourself, and I can’t even show you why. Do you know what that feels like?”

“More than you know,” Doyoung snaps back, before he has the time to filter it out. Jaehyun shrinks back into his seat, but his spine stays rod-straight, and even as Doyoung slumps back down into his own chair, Jaehyun doesn’t relax for a second. He just watches him, barely-restrained tension lacing his every move. “I was going to say better than this, for the record.”

Jaehyun’s a little quieter, but no less precise. “I don’t see the difference.”

Doyoung is of the opinion that one should always break their own heart first. It’s only polite, but more than that, it lessens the damage when the expectations are set low. “You can do better than staying hung up on someone who can never give you what you need.”

It works, this time. Jaehyun exhales, sharp, and recoils back down until he can’t look at Doyoung straight anymore, pulling his drink to his lips and crossing his legs, quiet.

If anything, it hurts more than the alternative. Doyoung still has all his old tricks, but they don’t work the way they used to. Not with Jaehyun.

Knowing he can’t stop himself from getting hurt isn’t even the most terrifying thing. It’s knowing that Jaehyun’s hurt is the cause. Seconds pass in tens before Jaehyun speaks again. “Then help me get over it.”

Doyoung curls his lips upwards, but there’s no humor there. “You made sure that wasn’t my job anymore.”

He can see the exact moment something lights up in Jaehyun’s eyes, not exactly inspiration, but something more like determination. It’s not as much spontaneous as it is strategic, like he’s had a goal in mind this entire time but only just now found the perfect way to implement it. Like he’s gotten the pieces to finally fit. It happens so quickly that Doyoung barely has time to brace himself before Jaehyun’s words are left hanging in the air. “Look me in the eyes and tell me you never felt anything. Tell me it’s just all in my head.”

Getting sucker punched straight in the gut would be preferable to whatever feeling Doyoung’s left with in the wake of that statement. The nausea hits hard and fast, and it’s unforgiving, Doyoung having to steady himself with his hands on the table between them just so he can keep himself from betraying the dizziness in his head, guilt pooling inside his stomach. “Don’t put me in this position. I won’t let you.”

“I know it’s stupid.” It’s the closest thing to begging he’s heard in Jaehyun’s voice all night, maybe ever. “I know it’s ridiculous, trust me, Doyoung. I already know you don’t. I just need to hear it, so I can’t try to convince myself otherwise. Please.”

In a way, it’s the next best thing to an out Jaehyun’s ever given him. It’d be all too easy to just end it right here, right now. All he has to do is lie straight through his teeth, take a deep breath, and give him what he wants. Doyoung never felt a thing. It’s a simple, three step process, and it’s not hard to play back in his head and imagine those words just coming out, simple and clean. It’s just you, Jaehyun.

The second he turns his head up, just a little, and gets a peek at Jaehyun’s thin arms, his sharp collarbones and tight jaw, all his corners and intricacies… His mind goes blank. Every single moment in his entire life that’s prepared him for this means nothing. The sentence he’d just replayed in his head a second before no longer exists, replaced with alarm bells and a fresh wave of nausea, drowning out all rationality.

This is supposed to be effortless. This is supposed to be his one guarantee. He has to let those words slip, even if they destroy him. Even if he regrets it for the rest of his life. He has to get them both out of this. It’s all on his shoulders. He has to let it end.

Doyoung meets Jaehyun’s eyes, and in the split second where he parts his lips, his heart catches in his throat and he can’t. He can’t. It’s the only truth he knows. No matter how strongly he believed differently, he can’t deny it. There’s nothing left to say. There’s nothing he can command his body to do other than just sit there, silent, resigned.

Jaehyun goes through more emotions in the five seconds it takes him to register the reality of the situation than Doyoung knows how to even identify. He doesn’t want to try. When he reaches equilibrium, his mouth falls open, and only one expression, dread, remains. “Doyoung. Holy shit. You… no, no.”

Doyoung slides his focus back towards his hands, but doesn’t dare say a word.

By the time either of them moves again, Doyoung’s half hoping Jaehyun will just walk out. Dealing with that anger would be better than dealing with the silence. Anything would be better than the silence, at this point.

“How long?” Jaehyun asks through his teeth, like it’s physically painful.

“I knew in December,” Doyoung replies, as quiet as he can get away with being. “Subconsciously? Longer than that. I wasn’t trying to push the blame on myself, back then. I was just being honest. Whatever you felt, I egged it on. It’s not self-deprecation, Jaehyun, so don’t start.”

Jaehyun sinks down into his seat, and out of the corner of Doyoung’s eyes, he sees him rub circles into his temple, squeezing his own shut with a sigh. “Jesus Christ,” he mutters once, then again, the second backed by short, humorless laughter. “I swear, you… I should have known.”

Doyoung feels small enough to sneak through the cracks of the hardwood floor and disappear forever, but it’s only a pipe dream, however appealing it seems. “I’m so sorry, Jaehyun.”

“I had an answer for everything,” Jaehyun presses, like Doyoung hasn’t said anything at all. He can feel Jaehyun’s gaze on him again, and slowly, if only for the sake of professionalism, Doyoung lifts his head enough to look in his vague direction. “Every time I started to think we had something, I’d talk myself out of it. Even when I told you how I felt, I had an answer for why you looked like you’d seen a ghost. But all this time, I should have just let myself believe it. That’s insane. You’re insane.”

It’s not Doyoung’s place to complain about salt in the wound, so he doesn’t even consider it. “It should have never been on you to end it.”

“Shut up.” Jaehyun presses the heel of his hand to the bridge of his nose. “Stop saying that.”

“No, this was my job,” Doyoung insists, louder, something dangerously close to anger sparking inside him. “The one basic guarantee I should have been able to make was to draw that boundary, and I fucked it up. You deserved better from this.”

Doyoung needs Jaehyun to hate him. It’s the only way he’ll forgive himself. If Jaehyun can hate him, it’ll at least mean he didn’t do enough damage to make him somehow think any of this is okay. If Jaehyun storms off now, hell, he might even be able to look himself in the mirror by summer. If not…

Jaehyun brings his hand down on the table, hard and fast. “Will you seriously just shut up for two goddamn seconds?”

It’s loud enough that the patrons around them go quiet, and Doyoung feels dizzy with deja vu. And a whole other host of other emotions, if he’s being honest.

Jaehyun pulls back, his fingers shaking, and for the first time Doyoung notices how flushed he looks still, cheeks pink and eyes wide, like that outburst had been bottled up for way longer than he’d given Jaehyun credit for. Doyoung steadies his breath and obliges, nodding his head and snapping his jaw shut.

“Sorry. I’m sorry,” Jaehyun says, all but tripping over the words in haste. Doyoung counts three breaths, just the way he taught him, before Jaehyun continues. “But if you really think I’m the type of person to base my feelings on whether or not they’re returned, you don’t know me at all.”

“I don’t think that,” Doyoung replies, the air deflating from his lungs. He knows it’s pointless, but he has to say something. Nothing would be so much worse. Jaehyun leans in, and Doyoung keeps himself frozen, hanging on to every word.

“You don’t understand,” Jaehyun shakes his head, and Doyoung doesn’t have anything to argue against that with. Jaehyun leaves a pause, like he’s expecting him to, and it stings. “I’ve been fantasizing about you since the day I first left your office. I wanted you so badly I could barely keep my shit together around you. You’re what got me out of bed on every low day, just to go out and meet person after person I could have had something with if I wasn’t so hung up about wishing it were you in their place. I had every opportunity I’d ever dreamed of a year ago, and all I could do was sit around and think about the one person I couldn’t have. Again, Doyoung, do you even know what that’s like?”

“Yeah, I think I do.” Doyoung enunciates every single word with as much clarity and precision as he’s capable of with how badly his legs are shaking. “I think I know exactly what that’s like.”

“Then you know,” Jaehyun licks his lips, breathless. When did he get this close? “Then you know I wouldn’t have just given it up. You could have held me five feet away from you at all times with surgical gloves and I still would have gotten off to screwing you in my shower every morning. Fuck, I don’t know. Just get off your self-righteous high-horse and listen to me, please.”

“You can’t know,” Doyoung protests, but from the look in his eye he knows Jaehyun can tell how weak it sounds. “You can’t know how you would have felt if I hadn’t reciprocated.”

He expects Jaehyun to lash out again, but instead, he just squares his shoulders, tightens his jaw, and nods once. “You’re right. I can’t. But it’s all hypothetical at this point, because this is how it went down, and this is what I’m dealing with.”

For some reason, the truth of it only hits Doyoung right as he says it. “Neither of us moved on.”

Jaehyun hums, his eyes closed again. “I guess not.”

Doyoung doesn’t know what to say to that anymore. The one thing he’s trusted all his life are his words, and now that they’re failing him, he doesn’t have any defenses left. Just his luck. All of it’s just his luck.

It doesn’t feel like clarity at all. Not a single part of him feels relief. Instead, it’s just numb. Maybe he’s known all of it deep down for so long he doesn’t have it in him to react to it anymore, and that’s the worst twist of all.

From the way Jaehyun’s looking at anything but him, his lips pressed in a tight line, Doyoung would wager a guess he’s not alone in that feeling.

It’s Jaehyun that breaks the silence, turning his phone face-up on the table and checking the time with a frown. “It’s almost ten. They’ll be closing soon.”

He says it casually, like it doesn’t affect them in the least. Doyoung envies how good he is at that. “Oh. Well, then.”

“We can talk on the way,” Jaehyun offers, digging at a spec of dirt under his nail. Doyoung doesn’t have the heart to ask where that way is, so instead he just nods and swallows his pride yet again as he lets Jaehyun take the lead.

Doyoung finishes off the rest of his drink, though it’s lukewarm by this point, and waits as Jaehyun does the same. There’s barely any left in his. He expects this quiet to be awkward, or at least tense with the weight of it all just like moments before, but it’s not. It just feels like two men finishing up their coffee excursion, and the normalcy frightens him. After all they’ve said, Jaehyun still feels so natural at his side, more than anyone in his position should be allowed to. When he thinks about it, that’s been the problem all along. Jaehyun feels right, but Doyoung knows better.

He’s so tired of this.

Out in the cold of the night again, Jaehyun sticks his hands in his pockets, rocks back and forth on his heels, and faces Doyoung with his bottom lip between his teeth, back pressed up against the side alley that makes up a non-windowed wall of the shop. Doyoung just stays on the sidewalk, watching him out of the corner of his eye with caution, but doesn’t attempt to walk past him.

“I’m not an idiot,” Jaehyun says, almost defensively. Doyoung shakes his head before he can start.

“I know you’re not.” Doyoung’s still shivering, but it’s not as cold as the forecast said it would be by this time, from what he can tell. There’s one bright spot, at least. He always has considered himself an optimist.

“I get it. I’m putting you in a way worse situation than I’m putting myself in,” Jaehyun shrugs, staring up at one of the marquees that line down the rest of the street. “It doesn’t make it better, I know that. But I read the laws and everything. I did my research.”

Jaehyun shrinks back, like he’s convinced admitting that makes him look more like a child than ever. As far as Doyoung’s concerned, it’s not childish as much as it is just sort of human. His chest clenches from fondness before contorting into good, old-fashioned anxiety. “The laws are just what’s written down. Almost everything is up to discretion in reality. Some would consider meeting you just to talk about the weather indefensible.”

“For others, though, it’s all pretty case by case, isn’t it?” Jaehyun’s eyes are wide, and he’s looking at him now, unflinching and square in the face. Doyoung almost feels like he’ll disappear completely if he dares to look away. This time, the innocent, quiet way he talks does make him feel his age. “I’d say everything I just said to you in front of anyone. You never once tried to push me towards this. Someone else in your place could have had a predatory angle, sure, but I would have seen through it in a heartbeat. I can take care of myself, and more importantly, Doyoung, you did everything you could. You would have done anything to avoid this.”

He’s seeing stars behind his eyes every time he closes them, and it’s hard to hold his balance up against nothing. But he doesn’t move. “I’d lose everything.”

“You might,” Jaehyun admits, pure and simple. “You know that better than me, I can’t promise you anything. If you want, I can just call Johnny whenever. We both have the truth out there now, so if that’s enough for you, then it’s enough for me. I’m not going to beg you to do something that could destroy you, I’m not a monster.”

Doyoung rests his head on the corner of the wall; separating him and Jaehyun by several feet across yet not far enough that he can’t feel the warmth of his breath, close but never too close. It’s just so he can see straight again, that’s all. Jaehyun stares at him, brows furrowed as he hangs to every word with his full attention. “Then what are you trying to say to me?”

He realizes just a second too late it might just be intentional on Jaehyun’s part that he brings himself down to a whisper, knowing it will force Doyoung to lean in out of reflex. But in the moment, it feels genuine, like Jaehyun really can’t say it any louder than he’s already struggling to. “I would do everything I could. I’d take on whatever responsibility I need to, I have nothing to lose by arguing a case. We tried to make it work, hyung.”

Doyoung searches his face for something that would show any signs of uncertainty, but all he finds is the same resolve that’s been on Jaehyun’s face all night, all the months of research and thinking and deciding etched into a hard line across his eyes. Doyoung feels like he’s aged twenty years in an hour, easy. “That’s dangerously naive, Jaehyun.”

“I just want you to know how serious I’m willing to take this. Meet me wherever you can.”

Doyoung forces the words between tiny gaps in his teeth, keeping his jaw clenched around it. “I think you should go.”

“You don’t want me too.” Jaehyun sees straight through him, but Doyoung’s starting to suspect part of him, at least deep down, has all along. “And know I’m only asking this because I care, but hyung, what are you going to do about that?”

“I’ll figure it out.” His face is really, really close. It’d feel awkward if he backed up, but he knows even in the moment that it’s all in his head. “I was doing that before, plan on continuing that after. Don’t worry about me.”

“Trust me, I wish.” Jaehyun rakes a hand back through his hair, shakes his head, and shrugs. “I don’t know you half as well as you know me, I get that. I don’t know what’s good for you. But I’d rather not stand here all night waiting on the answer. Not sure I have the stamina.”

Doyoung purses his lips, and says nothing. It takes Jaehyun a while, but he stutters into another sentence, thrown off by the quiet. “I think you deserve to be happy, whatever that is. If keeping me around in this kind of situation won’t make that happen, then I’ll go. I get it.”

If he were in therapist mode, finding an answer to that would be easy. He’d just mutter something about catch-22s and oversimplified false equivalences, or maybe about how it’s unfair to try and play someone’s emotions that way and that he should stray away from it in the future, thanks. Even just a few weeks ago, it’d be so easy to bite out something sarcastic and pretend like it doesn’t affect him at all, like, Self-destruction always makes me happy, Jaehyun, or some other sly way to say that sometimes he’s afraid nothing really makes him happy without unethically switching their roles.

It’s a moot point, though. Even when nothing else does, Jaehyun’s made him happy, time and time again. If he was going to wax philosophic to himself about ethics, that train’s long gone. Besides, he doesn’t have the luxury of using his position as a shield anymore. He’s just a man stuck between a rock and a hard place with way too much knowledge of human psychology and the worst timing on God’s green earth.

If Jaehyun walks away, he keeps his career without the paranoia, and will just continue to cling to the hope that even at his age, someone else will come along. Someone without rough hands and a sharp tongue and deadly vocal chords to match, someone with the good sense to not do this to him. Maybe he won’t need anyone after a while. Considering his current stance on wanting anyone else besides Jaehyun, the latter seems more likely. That’d be nice.

If he doesn’t, well, there’s only two real ways this could realistically play out. In the version Doyoung has to be prepared for, the rest of his office flips shit and he loses his job, if not his license in the statistically significant worst-case scenario. At best, the rest of his office thinks he’s absolutely insane, and look at him in a different light until enough time passes that they start to accept he’s still the same person, still the same doctor, underneath all of his half-baked excuses. Timeframe indefinite.

He’s thought about it a lot. More than he ever would want to admit to anyone. After hours and hours weighing the two scenarios, he’s still not sure which is worse.

Realistically, Doyoung knows himself. No matter who comes and goes, maybe he’ll never be able to shake the idea that if he walks away, he’ll never know what would have happened if he’d stayed. It’s easy to imagine, and it hits too close for comfort how real the image is—him, laying on his bed, wondering what his life would look like if he’d said yes, how he’d feel if one day someone else ended up in Doyoung’s position and no one blinked an eye, knowing they could have gotten away with it. How his memory would splice Jaehyun into the smile of every man who caught Doyoung’s eye at the bar.

Jaehyun would remain in his orbit, but nothing more than a stranger, averting his eyes, talking to Taeyong like he’s a complete ghost at his side. He’d move on faster than Doyoung, taking some other boy to his shows after shaking him off like a bad cold. The curiosity over whether or not any of that would even be true would have to go unanswered in silence. All the while, every migraine would be punctuated with the droning chorus of what if, what if, what if against his skull. Timeframe indefinite.

He’s been repeatedly, inexcusably shitty at letting things go.

Doyoung parts his lips, but something in his expression sours Jaehyun’s own, and he just shakes his head. “Goodnight, Doyoung.”

His eyebrows are etched together, pained and steeled, and the idea of that being the last emotion Doyoung sees reflected back on him is too much for him to let slide. His body moves without him, and just as Jaehyun spins around on his heel, Doyoung reaches out to dig his fingers into his shoulder. It’s meant to be light, just enough to get his attention, but it sends Jaehyun staggering back into the wall. Doyoung forgets to let go in time not to follow, catching himself with one hand next to Jaehyun’s head on the brick and the other still on his arm, matching him up toe to toe.

“Shit, sorry,” Doyoung hisses, ignoring the cold air through his fingers the second he pulls them off Jaehyun, letting his arm fall to his side. He’s less successful at ignoring the way Jaehyun’s looking at him, eyes wide but not out of surprise, more like he’s trying to memorize what he’s seeing. Against his best judgment, Doyoung lets him, inhaling steady through his nose. He doesn’t know what to say, so he just repeats himself, muttering to no one in particular. “I’m sorry.”

Doyoung counts three more exhales before Jaehyun blinks. It’s so graceful and measured Doyoung barely even notices he’s moving beyond that at all, only registering his arm is no longer glued to the wall when Jaehyun’s hand falls on Doyoung’s face, cold enough to make him flinch. Jaehyun doesn’t seem deterred, though, and Doyoung doesn’t think he could move if he tried, frozen in place as Jaehyun’s fingers trace his jawline, his cheekbones, ghosting over his eyelids when he blinks, up to his forehead where he brushes a strand of hair back behind his ear. His thoughts are just white noise, out the window the second he felt skin to skin, completely monopolized by the task of registering his own senses.

Jaehyun meets his eyes, but the question he’s sending him doesn’t register. But he knows that look, and knows he’s supposed to understand it. So he just nods, once, just subtle enough to be noticed from the inches away Jaehyun’s standing. Satisfied, Jaehyun lets his eyes flutter closed, traces his thumb over the curve of Doyoung’s lips, stopping only when his own take its place.

Jaehyun makes no move to open his mouth, so neither does Doyoung, but despite their position, there’s nothing chaste about his intentions. He hesitates just long enough for him to realize Doyoung isn’t going to push him away, because God, he doesn’t know how, before he moves his hand to the back of Doyoung’s neck and pulls him in, pressing in and clinging like he can’t get deep in enough, needy and just a little desperate. But Doyoung’s attempts to deepen the kiss itself are met with resistance, Jaehyun shifting to catch Doyoung’s lower lip between his every time they move against each other and nothing more. The mix of calculation and passion forces him into a rhythm he doesn’t know how to match, so he just follows, only moving when Jaehyun moves, only kissing when Jaehyun kisses.

If Jaehyun’s trying to make everything a hundred times worse, it’s working. Every part of him aches, even as he finds a hand moving to his hip, another to the side of Jaehyun’s own face. The worst part, though, is that Doyoung knows he’s not. The fact that it hurts this much is his own problem. He knows Jaehyun well enough to know what he’s doing. He’s trying to commit this to memory—it’s not out of desire, it’s an analysis, his attempt to map how he feels pressed against him, the contours of his body up against his.

Doyoung’s not nearly as good at it, not nearly as thorough, but he takes advantage of the time to at least try and do the same, even if his focus shatters every time he can feel Jaehyun’s chest rise and fall. He’s not one to catalogue, anyway. All he needs is the memory of it. The specifics have always been secondary. But he knows for Jaehyun, it matters. So he lets him do what he needs, for however long he needs it.

It buys him time, either way.

It lasts too long not to hurt when it’s over, and even when Jaehyun pulls back, it’s only far enough to talk, one arm still looped around his neck, cheeks flushed, lips red, and eyes fixed on nothing but him, unflinching. Doyoung’s not nearly prepared for the ice in his voice. “Thanks for indulging me.”

“Wait.” Keeping with the spirit of the extended out of body experience known as his life, his brain doesn’t have a chance in hell to beat the aching desperation in his chest in the race to just say something, anything the second he starts to pull away. “Don’t leave, not yet.”

Jaehyun looks at him, and where Doyoung expects relief, there’s just caution. A little bit of hope, of course, but it’s still guarded. It’s fine. It’s better that way, even. He holds his breath when Jaehyun talks. “Alright. I won’t.”

Does it ever get kind of lonely?

Gongmyung is the master of statements that say one thing and mean about five more. It’s because he’s an actor, he says. Or something. He’d brought it up the first time Doyoung showed him around his current flat about a year and a half ago, before any pleasantries about the décor or location, naturally. Doyoung knows better than to take anything he says at face value. It’s a statement on the whole living alone thing, sure. But it’s more than that.

It was about pushing himself through semester upon semester of course overload fueled only by spite. It was about pushing away anyone who cared about him just so he wouldn’t have to take time out of his day to decline social invitations that would inevitably conflict with an internship, or a lab-write up, or his pre-scheduled stress crying. It was about not even being able to relate to his ambition-fueled peers, because it wasn’t ever about being the best, it was about keeping himself busy to the point he couldn’t even question whether or not he was personally miserable. Even the only real adult relationship he held onto for any extended period of time was borne out of academic misery. Of course it gets fucking lonely.

It’s all things he’s heard before from Gongmyung, but through the years, he got tired of saying it, and Doyoung got tired of hearing it. So it gets condescend into passive aggression, to which Doyoung just kind of shrugged, threw his brother’s suitcase in the corner, and muttered for him to shove it up his ass.

He expects Jaehyun to maybe say something similar, for no real logical reason other than it’d feel fitting. Or maybe that’s just what Doyoung wants him to say, because when Jaehyun just mumbles that it’s nice under his breath, Doyoung doesn’t do him the courtesy of pretending he didn’t hear it.

“I sacrificed a lot to get one with a balcony,” Doyoung quips, dry and flat. It’s not clear whether or not Jaehyun gets the point, he’s busy scanning the entryway in barely-concealed approval either way.

Jaehyun hums, watching Doyoung unlace his boots and prop them up by the door before following suit with his own, staring at his feet as he talks. “How long have you lived here?”

He’s half in his mind not to answer it, because it seems absurd to have nothing more than idle chatter. It’d make Jaehyun feel too much like anyone else if he lets them give into that awkward, but necessary banter to fill the silence when bringing someone over for the first time. Doyoung assumes, anyway. It’s been a while.

But everything in the past few minutes has felt too normal, ever since the tension in the alleyway broke and he found himself shivering again. Jaehyun asked where they wanted to go, and Doyoung’s exhaustion and impulsivity broke down the last of his will to ashes. It felt so clear. Impulsivity really does feel so nice, when you let it.

In truth, it wasn’t his first choice to bring him here. It just sort of happened. One foot in front of the other for ten minutes and they were on the corner of his apartment block when Jaehyun pulled his sweater down and muttered they’d been out in the cold too long. And, well, the solution to the problem was right there.

It wasn’t like it was planned, anyway. Doyoung was halfway through the third street block when he finally gathered up the nerve to ask where they were going.

Jaehyun just hummed, and while staring at his feet offered, Not home.

Well, Doyoung figured he might as well follow directions. It was too late for anything relevant to them to be open now, and considering the last thing Doyoung needed was a bar at this point, Doyoung’s body just took them to the one place he really knew where to go. He didn’t even realize where he was going until it was too late, and if Jaehyun noticed which way they were going or what the nervous hole Doyoung was chewing in his cheek meant, he didn’t say a word. Not one. Not even as Doyoung waved his key in front of the automatic lock to his apartment building or in the elevator up to his floor. They were silent, the elephant in the room sucking most of the air out of their space. But now, he’s commenting on his house.

In the end, Doyoung gives him an answer. Giving in is all too easy after the first time. “Since just after Taeyong and I broke up, so a little over a year.”

Jaehyun looks at him out of the corner of his eye, nodding and burying whatever emotion peaks beneath his mask faster than Doyoung can read it. “So you were with him.”

Doyoung grimaces, peeling off his jacket, draping it over one of hooks and stifling a sigh. Jaehyun just hovers in the entryway, eyes following Doyoung’s every step. “Is it that obvious?”

“I wouldn’t say obvious,” he shrugs, crossing his ankles. “But knowing both of you, it wasn’t that hard of a guess.”

“It’s a little too big for me,” Doyoung decides it’s better to just ignore that statement. “The place we lived together was about half this size. I think I went a little too far trying to compensate.”

It isn’t all that big, really. The entryway splits off left into a living area and the right into a well-condensed kitchen and dining area, straight ahead nothing more than a bedroom, a small bathroom, and a walk-in closet. It’s fitting of his budget, if on the more modest end, but Doyoung doesn’t need to be as good at he is at this to know Jaehyun’s only ever dreamed of living somewhere like this. It’s not in his best interest to be modest, and either way, it’s not a lie.

He and Taeyong made do with 450 square feet for years because any space to keep their hands off each other was an inconvenience. Now, Doyoung shares over a thousand with nothing but his cat Oscar, and even he’s been commandeered for the weekend by Taeyong to keep him company while Yuta’s out of town. Jaehyun’s presence somehow makes it feel comfortable, like he’s not being suffocated.

That doesn’t keep him from feeling like a stranger to his own home, though, crossing aimlessly into the center of the living area like his feet have forgotten the layout. Jaehyun takes a step inside, stops, and Doyoung sees the gears spinning until Jaehyun sighs and makes his way over to Doyoung’s side. “It’s nice, though. I like it.”

I like you, is what Doyoung wants to say, but he bites it back. “Thank you.”

A few seconds tick by before Doyoung notices Jaehyun’s too busy staring out the full-panel glass door to register he’s said anything in reply at all, and Doyoung smiles to himself as he moves over to pull back the curtains, opening up the view of the balcony and the streets below. In the quiet, Jaehyun just looks, unassuming and soft, the streetlights reflecting back into his face. Doyoung hopes he doesn’t notice the shake in his legs.

The time passes into minutes like that. At first, it’s nice. Before long, it starts to itch.

Jaehyun’s digging at the dirt under his fingernails, and Doyoung starts to panic, the realization that neither of them know how to proceed hitting him with all the force and subtlety of a brick. “You can call Johnny whenever you want, by the way. I just thought it would be nicer to wait somewhere warm. Help yourself out to whatever you want in the meantime.”

If Jaehyun doesn’t want to be here, then all the caution he has or hasn’t exercised up to this point is completely out the window. At first, it’s just a precaution, a safeguard in case Jaehyun’s looking for an out and doesn’t know how to say it, but by the end of the sentence it’s beginning to crush him. Jaehyun was never informed, never consented. This line was crossed with nothing backing him up, not even an assumption that it would be okay. If Jaehyun feels uncomfortable, he’s ruined it. All of it. He should never have done this, what the fuck is he thinking? What was he thinking this entire night? He should kick him out now, kick all of this to the curb, spare the both of them, scrap the entire situation—

“Are you saying you want me to leave?” Jaehyun raises his eyebrows, and Doyoung hates how natural he’s starting to look in his house, the lost vibe he was carrying earlier no longer clinging to him as he leans on the wall between the entryway and the bedroom like he’s been here a million times. His heart catches in his throat.

“I just don’t want you to think that I want something from you, or that I have any specific intentions.” Doyoung can hear his voice hitch on every other word, and it’s enough that he knows Jaehyun can pick up on it. The anxiety is pushing up against his ribcage, his hand on the wall barely keeping his vision from spinning. “I don’t even know what I mean by you being here, other than…”

He drifts off, and he can feel Jaehyun’s stare boring into his skull even as Doyoung focuses on a light out the window. It burns, but he’s determined to wait him out, the vague sense of accomplishment hollow even as Jaehyun clears his throat. “Other than…?”

“That I don’t want you out of my life,” Doyoung rushes through every word without a space, quiet enough he’s shocked that Jaehyun nods like he heard it. “I don’t have anything to say between the lines. Trust me.”

“You can’t want something from me that I wouldn’t just to give you, though.” Jaehyun shakes his head, and Doyoung’s relieved to see him smile, even if he doesn’t understand it. “I know you can’t just not freak out, I get it. But how many times do I need to say I want this from you?”

This was a terrible idea.

The proximity is already too much—maybe it was the open air or the tension of the moment, but now that both are gone, he’s hyperaware of every inch of space Jaehyun’s body takes up in his house, and even more of the space between them. Doyoung’s always been able to have control over what he wants, or at the very least shove it down hard enough to ignore—which amounts to more or less the same thing as far as he’s concerned—but with Jaehyun, it’s hard enough to just keep his thoughts together. Even then, every coherent idea is interrupted with fantasies he’s been trying to suppress for months—Jaehyun’s hand up his shirt, Jaehyun’s back against his mattress, Jaehyun’s clothes spread out on his floor…

The idea that he could feel even half as strong is still insane.

“I don’t know if it’ll ever be enough.” Doyoung blinks and Jaehyun’s sitting on the piano bench just a few paces from him, elbows folded over his knees and back up against the key cover. It hurts knowing it’s still too early to reach out for him. “I have to know what you want and don’t want in words. I need to make sure that’s always what I’m doing. I can’t just run off of that assumption and stay sane at the same time.”

“I want to stay,” Jaehyun says, short and matter-of-fact.

“Okay,” Doyoung swallows, closing and opening his eyes slow. “Okay.”

Jaehyun’s unflinching, and Doyoung feels weaker by the second, an overwhelming fondness digging a hole in his chest. “If you’d rather I go, that’s fine. That’s your right. But don’t do it just because you feel guilty, or whatever else is going on in your head. If it’s up to me, let me be here with you, please.”

Doyoung’s smart enough to know it’s really not the time, but he still has to say it while it’s genuine, while it’s in the moment. “You’ve really changed a lot since we’ve met, you know.”

“You still change the subject too much.” Jaehyun thinks he’s funnier than anyone but Doyoung finds him, probably.

“I just know saying something like that would have been all but impossible at first,” Doyoung shrugs, and Jaehyun’s face softens a little in the dark. “I don’t know how it reflects on me that I’m the one on the receiving end of what I taught you.”

Jaehyun turns his head to the side and whispers, “Do you ever stop talking?”

Doyoung lowers his eyes, sheepish, and Jaehyun just holds out a hand. “Come here.”

In the back of his mind, Doyoung realizes he should think this over, weigh his options. But he lets his own slide into Jaehyun’s without a second thought, and before he can entertain it at all Jaehyun’s folding their hands together, on his feet again with their chests almost touching. Jaehyun wraps his fingers around Doyoung’s. “I missed you.”

That’s all it takes.

Doyoung doesn’t know who leans in first, but all that matters is he’s kissing Jaehyun, hard, his hand on the back of Doyoung’s neck and the other digging into the fabric of his shirt, frantic and just a little messy. He lets himself get pushed back into the wall when Jaehyun catches his balance forward, parting his lips and breathing him in, the sides of Jaehyun’s face in his palms, and he missed him so fucking much.

He wants to say it back, he needs Jaehyun to know how he thought about him every single day, but he’s got his lips between Jaehyun’s teeth and it’s a worse thought to pull back. So he just hopes that the desperation he’s putting into every touch sends a clear enough message. He didn’t even realize what the itching feeling of uncertainty clouding him since they’d left was, but now he’s allowed, it seems so obvious. His entire relationship with Jaehyun was built on touch, on tactile recognition and physical intricacy—all the talking in the world can’t feel as natural as this, Jaehyun moving against him, his tongue on the back of his teeth, chest to chest.

Before Jaehyun, kissing was just a stepping stone professionally, and a prelude personally. Maybe it used to be something he cared about more, but he can’t remember, especially not when it feels like something he’s never even done before when it’s with Jaehyun. He’s never had someone who appreciates it so much, who clings to this stage like it’s the most important part of intimacy. At first, Doyoung figured it might just be because Jaehyun finds it safe, but now, outside of that context, Doyoung’s convinced it’s really just because he likes it. That, and there’s history—they’ve done it more together than anything, and even if Jaehyun doesn’t care, it hangs heavy in Doyoung’s chest. He loves that Jaehyun loves it. He loves that he wants to do it with him.

It’s scary how much it feels like a missing piece sliding back into the picture. He doesn’t know what to do about it except for cling harder and draw him in closer, even though there’s no space between them left to erase. Jaehyun sighs into his mouth as he traces a hand to the small of his back. It lasts long enough for Doyoung to forget how it even began, or at least have nothing more than a hazy side thought, and by the time Jaehyun finally pulls away, he has to blink in the surroundings again, like he’s just walked in the door.

Jaehyun has his head cocked a little to the side, studying him like he’s weighing his options. “You aren’t… You can do this without treating me like your case, right?”

Doyoung stifles a sigh, letting Jaehyun’s arm drape against his shoulder. “I haven’t been for a while. What’s required of me is probably too similar to how I always am.”

Jaehyun nods once, short and fast. “Alright. That’s what I thought.” His eyes soften, but there’s not an ounce of vulnerability there. “I guess I still don’t realize just how out of line you actually were. But I’m starting to get it.”

“I still have time to decide I’m not okay with this,” Doyoung means it to be serious, but no matter how firm he tries to make himself sound, it still ends up feeling half-hearted. Heat rises in his face, and he lowers his voice out of instinct. “I just always thought you deserve to feel comfortable, like what you want is was valid. I should have seen this coming when I realized I wanted to be the one to do that.”

He’d normally never admit it. As soon as it’s gone, he has no idea why in the Hell he would until he looks at the quiet sort of appraisal in Jaehyun’s eyes and, oh, yeah, that’s why. He’d laugh at himself if it wouldn’t ruin all sorts of moments, so he just shrugs. Jaehyun matches that emotion, whatever it is, sighing, “Yeah, well. I came back every week.”

“Look where it got you,” Doyoung leans into Jaehyun’s hand on the back of his neck, not used the idea that he doesn’t have to hide his reactions, measure out his feeling. He still does it out of instinct, not quite melting into the way his thumb is rubbing circles against the top of his spine despite the urge. Doyoung catches the clock at his bedside, gnawing at the inside of his cheek. “It’s later than I thought.”

Jaehyun ignores him completely, softening the tone of his voice. “What do you want, Doyoung?”

He has a snappy retort on the tip of his tongue, but the vulnerability of the situation strikes it down before he can put it into words. “That’s a broad question.”

Jaehyun smiles, just smug enough to bother him but not enough to make him actually care. “Not so fun being on the other side of that, is it?”

He could debate whether or not he’ll let it happen, but it’d only be for show. If he had any intentions of doing that once the decision was placed in his hands, Jaehyun wouldn’t even be here. Hell, they probably wouldn’t have met tonight at all. Maybe there’d be an argument to make about how showing hesitation would heighten the need for intentional consent on Jaehyun’s part, but in Doyoung’s unprofessional opinion, that’s stupid.

Jaehyun’s here, with no intention of running, knee in between Doyoung’s thighs and nothing but expectation on his face. Whatever bullshit pros-and-cons chart he’d draw up would be for his own sake, and despite the danger of how badly he wants this, he doesn’t need it. He’s done his time. It’s late, he’s tired, and he’s done everything he could.

He’s done everything, and he’s out of excuses.

In place of anything he could say, Doyoung just leans over and kisses him again, feeling Jaehyun smile against his lips before giving in. He’ll let Jaehyun feel like it’s a victory. He probably owes him that much.

Jaehyun doesn’t let it last too long, though, indulging him only for a second before he pulls back, something more serious in his expression than before. “I’m serious, Doyoung. I need to know. I trust you, but I have to hear it.”

More than anything before, this feels like an admission of defeat—the truth he’s been holding in, even after all the others. It’s not as hard to say as he thought it would be, staring at the ceiling weeks ago indulging impossible daydreams or on the walk here. But he can still barely hear it in his own ears. “You, Jaehyun. That’s all.”

Doyoung lets himself meet Jaehyun’s eyes and he sees where this is going. He knows.

He’ll let it happen.

*