Work Text:
Kun was a physical person. That much was obvious to everyone who knew him. It didn’t matter how close you were to him, whether you were close friend or someone he’d only met once before — sometimes even if you were an ex-boyfriend — you’d still get an arm on your shoulder, a gentle grip on your arm, a light pat on your thigh. Maybe a flick of the nose.
It was going to be the death of Johnny.
Johnny was physical too, so it wasn’t like contact was something he wasn’t used to. He wasn’t as comfortable with strangers as Kun, but he could get very touchy with his peers. Mostly in the form of hugs and pulled cheeks and sometimes the occasional peck on the crown of the head.
All of those touches were nothing more than acts of friendship, and that was why Kun was slowly leading Johnny towards an early grave.
“Hey,” Kun asked Johnny as he peered at him from behind Johnny’s chair, hands gripping his shoulders and gently squeezing, “Don’t you think it’s time to turn in?”
Johnny chose not to focus on the sensation of Kun’s fingers on his clavicle, rubbing his eyes underneath his glasses. “I might need another half an hour or so.”
“Hm.” Johnny felt an index finger move light as a feather closer to his collar. “Every time you say that, you end up working for another hour instead.”
Johnny laughed. “That’s because every time I say that, some kid decides to do something stupid with their essay.”
“So you’re jinxing yourself.”
“Maybe.” Johnny tilted his head backwards to give Kun a tired smile, but found that Kun’s face was only inches away looking down at him, so he quickly reverted back to looking at his pile of papers.
His shoulders felt cold when Kun’s hands left them. “I’ve left some coffee in the jug. Want me to bring a mug over?”
“No, I’m good to get it myself. Thanks, Kun, you’re a godsend.”
Kun ruffled his hair, and Johnny imagined his smile as the younger headed back into his bedroom.
————————
If anyone knew what was happening between them, if anyone had asked, Johnny would say he wasn’t sure how it came about. He’d tell you he couldn’t say when or how or why, just that it didn’t really stop after that.
That wasn’t the truth. Johnny remembered it perfectly.
It was just over a year ago. They weren’t as close back than as they were now but they were definitely already friends. Kun had rejected a night out at the club for his birthday, so his friends came over and they all sat together and got soju drunk while watching nature documentaries. Ten — mutual friend who had set them up when they were both in need of a roommate — would down a whole bottle every time an animal died. Taeyong — animal lover — didn’t appreciate it.
When they’d all eventually left because Doyoung insisted they shouldn’t be hungover in Kun’s house, it was just just Johnny and Kun on their shared couch, one bottle of soju left between them. They took turns drinking straight from the bottle because they were both too lazy to find their shot glasses. Kun’s thigh rested well on top of Johnny’s with no intention of moving away.
“It’s not that I don’t care about sex,” Kun said. Johnny was aware of the younger’s eyes on him as he took a big gulp of soju. “I’m just not desperate enough to go seeking it out.”
“Amen to that,” Johnny nodded, passing him the bottle. Johnny eyed the spot where the rim met Kun’s lips, and then quickly looked away. “Meeting new people is exhausting.”
“That isn’t to say I wouldn’t mind getting down to business, though.”
Johnny snickered, earning a smack from the other. “Getting down to business.”
“Fine! Fucking somebody. You know what I mean.”
“Sure I do!”
“Fuck off.”
Johnny smiled sleepily. “Yeah, I know what you mean. Sometimes my hand just doesn’t cut it, I need another human being. It’s so hard to find one, though.”
“A human being?”
“Yeah.”
Kun nodded solemnly, passing the bottle over to let Johnny take a sip. “If I just had a designated person that I could call any time I was feeling it. No strings attached.”
Johnny tipped his head back and took a big gulp, letting the drink burn its way down his throat so that he wasn’t too late for his fantastic comeback. “I think that’s called a fuck buddy, Kun."
“Huh.” Kun frowned, and Johnny was upset that drunk Kun didn’t appreciate his sense of humour as much as sober Kun did. “You’re right.”
“You’d like a fuck buddy?”
“I think so. Just someone’s who’s nearby and on call.”
“That sounds like a good idea.” And then, because his brain wasn’t working properly, he decided to add, “I don’t mind.”
Kun narrowed his eyes and Johnny could see his eyes slowly focus in on his face. “What?”
“I don’t mind. Being your fuck buddy.”
Kun didn’t respond, so Johnny continued quickly while he still had the confidence, “Because honestly I’ve been thinking of getting one too, but I don’t really know anyone who’d be down for that kind of thing and-or who aren’t already in relationships I don’t want to get myself involved in—”
Johnny shut up when the soju was pulled from his grasp, Kun’s fingers brushing his along the way, the thigh that was previously on one of Johnny’s thighs now resting on two. He didn’t straddle Johnny completely until the bottle was safely on the coffee table and out of their way, but Johnny’s hands had already found their way to his hips. He’d been with enough people, done this enough times, to know it was okay to pull Kun in by the shirt and crane his neck forward just enough to catch Kun’s lips against his.
Thank goodness they were both notoriously good at using lip balm.
Johnny’s could only describe his memory of that night through sensations. He’d gotten used to the touches by that point in their friendship, even looked forward to them, but having so much of Kun against him was overwhelming, so much so that Johnny’s brain tuned them out in favour of the smaller things. Kun’s fringe brushing his neck. The leg he’d hooked around Johnny’s. The strong grip against the back of his thighs that ended up leaving a small bruise. Those were the points of contact he cherished the most.
Johnny remembered it perfectly, how it all started out. But he doesn’t remember how the hell it got to where it was now.
————————
Being manager and owner of his record store, Kun wasn’t obliged to do anything more than the usual nine to five, Monday to Friday, and so Johnny thought it was a testament to his character that Kun took on later hours on Friday and Saturday nights. He’d come home at ten o’clock, sometimes later, looking like he had a lot to say but wasn’t going to. Johnny waited for him on their usual hangout, the couch, where Kun would flop down and let his head rest like a dead weight against Johnny’s shoulder, or chest, or whatever he could get access to. In the summer, when Johnny’s shirts were thinner, he could feel Kun’s breath fanning out through the fabric and onto his skin.
However, it was mid-winter now, and the heater had been bust in their apartment all day. Johnny was cooped up in thermals and a cardigan and his thick down jacket from the minute he got home.
“I talked to the landlord,” he said, stylus tapping against his iPad as he made quick adjustments to his syllabus for Ancient World History for the class 10B. “He said he can only get someone in to fix it by tomorrow evening, and you know what that means."
“We’re not getting heating for two days, because the guy is always late.” Kun yawned. “We should invest in a portable heater.”
“We should. I was thinking of going to Kmart a bit later to pick one up.”
“If we go now then I can come with you and help you choose.”
There wasn’t really anything to choose when it came to a portable heater — it was only for emergencies like this, and they only needed the one since they slept in the same bed these days. But Johnny took the bait anyway. “Sure, we can go now.”
Kun had his hand on Johnny’s thigh the whole drive down. Every once in a while as they walked through the parking lot, Kun’s finger would brush Johnny’s gloved ones and he’d let it linger there for a few seconds. When Kun got distracted by a sandwich presser (“We don’t have one of those yet!”), Johnny let himself be pulled down through several aisles of the home appliances department, Kun’s arm hooked through his.
They bought both a sandwich maker and a small heater.
Johnny drove one-handed all the way home, his other hand resting lightly on the one Kun had on his thigh.
————————
Kun’s tongue was, as all tongues were, slimy. It doesn’t matter how much you love a person, that is the only way another person’s tongue in your mouth will ever feel.
Johnny was much more interested in other things anyway. The kind of heavy that Kun was after he had draped himself over Johnny’s back. The feeling of his scalp being tugged back by Kun’s grip on his hair. Kun’s finger tracing light circles into the skin just under his navel.
The idea that Kun remained gentle, even now.
“You with me?” Kun whispered against his lips, tongue withdrawn back into his own mouth. He must have noticed Johnny zoning out.
“Yeah.” Johnny’s neck had already turned around as far as it could go, so he bit at Kun’s lip instead. The hand tracing patterns into Johnny’s skin suddenly lay flat against his stomach, pressing into him as if for support. Kun’s other hand jerked Johnny’s head back further.
Johnny’s body would kill him the next day, but that was a problem for the Johnny of tomorrow.
————————
It was Ten’s birthday. Ten didn’t usually have the time to properly celebrate his birthday, considering he was always busy planning someone else’s wedding, so it was a miracle that this year he’d managed to call everyone over. Understandable, then, that Kun had latched himself onto the Thai man like a leech.
Okay. Maybe leech wasn’t the right descriptor for Kun. It was a little harsh. Johnny had nothing to be mad at him for, so he didn’t know why he was mad, per se.
“Kun’s practically claimed him,” Doyoung muttered. They had both set up at Ten’s kitchen counter to guard the alcohol from all five people in the house who posed an immediate threat to it. “He saw Ten and thought he was free real estate.”
“Hm.” Johnny wasn’t nearly drunk enough for this conversation.
“He’s such a hoarder. The rest of us missed him too.”
“Same.”
“You wanna jump on them and form a human pile?”
It was a great idea. All of them were just as entitled to Ten’s physical affection as Kun was. It’s not like the two had some special relationship that allowed Kun, exclusively, to put his head on Ten’s shoulder, to hook his arm around Ten’s elbow, to play with Ten’s newly dyed black hair.
Hopefully.
“Nah,” Johnny said instead, “I have to stop Yuta from getting to the jagermeister.”
Doyoung shrugged. “Your loss.”
Doyoung’s human pile idea didn’t work, because Taeyong was too busy playing on his 3DS in a corner and Yuta and Jaehyun were getting really into their arm-wrestling contest. Kun had stretched his arm to accomodate for Doyoung on Ten’s other side, Doyoung flinching away as Kun tickled the back of his neck. Ten whispered something in Kun’s ear that sent him into fits of laughter, and Kun unhooked his arm from Ten’s to place it lightly on his knee as he animatedly replied back.
Johnny knew for a fact that Kun, Ten and Doyoung were nothing more than friends. And that somehow made him feel worse.
————————
When Johnny came home to find Kun’s room door shut, he knew immediately that Kun was composing. Kun usually tried to contain that to the three nights a week he’d rent out a studio where he wouldn’t bother Johnny, but he couldn’t control when inspiration struck, so he locked himself in his room if he really couldn’t wait. Johnny usually moved as silently as possible about the house, listening for the very quiet notes of Kun’s electric keyboard, making a simple dinner or even just ordering in if he felt particularly lazy. He’d sit at the desk by the window of their living room, glasses on, and mark whatever assessments he had to until Kun finally made his way out. Johnny would stop what he was doing to heat Kun’s food up for him, despite Kun’s insistence he could do it himself, and Kun would squeeze Johnny’s arm in appreciation. After Kun ate, Johnny would head over to Kun’s room and listen to whatever it was Kun was working on, and then he wouldn’t leave Kun’s room from there.
Today, there were two distinct voices coming from behind Kun’s closed doors. Kun’s keyboard volume was turned all the way up, and Taeyong had turned his own voice even louder.
Johnny stuck to his usual habit. It was a Thursday evening and Johnny only had the freshman class to teach tomorrow, and he didn’t quite feel like pulling out 11A’s pop quizzes on the end of the Cold War, so he settled down on a kitchen stool with the book he’d started reading the previous week.
About a chapter on, Kun and Taeyong burst through the door.
“Not that I have a problem with you changing the time signature that much, but it’ll be tough making a verse to that,” Taeyong said.
Kun followed behind him and responded with several two-handed pats on the older’s shoulders as they walked out to the kitchen. “If anyone can do it, it’s you.”
“You always have to make me work hard, don’t you?”
“It just sounds more interesting that way. Sometimes you have to let the instrumental speak for itself.”
“Then why am I rapping over it? Oh, hi John.”
“Hi,” Johnny waved.
“Your Soundcloud has a lot more listeners than mine.” Kun only greeted Johnny with a nod, a smile, and a hand on the shoulder as he walked around where Johnny was sitting to pull out three mismatched mugs. “Herbal for you, right?”
“I brought my own tea.” This was common for Taeyong. The only house he didn’t bring his own tea to was Yuta’s, because Yuta apparently kept stock of every single tea in existence. “I just need hot water.”
Kun turned to turn the kettle on, which Johnny had already filled with water for him to turn into tea whenever Kun was done for the night. Johnny was a little put off that Kun was pampering them instead of Johnny pampering him, but Taeyong was here, so he put that aside.
“How was school?” Taeyong asked once the kettle started to sound and they were sure it was functioning.
Johnny shrugged. “I pulled a pop quiz on the kids on a topic I hadn’t taught them, and I’m not the cool history teacher anymore.”
“Why the hell did you do that?!”
“Quizzes are the best way to learn! I can’t tell you the number of things I remember just because I got it wrong on a quiz. And in my defence, I did ask them to read up on the topic in the last class.”
“Yeah, but how on earth are they supposed to know what to study for?”
“I only asked them basics! When did the Berlin Wall fall, what’s glasnost, who dissolved the Soviet Union. That kind of thing.”
“What the hell is a glasnost?”
“I kind of like the idea of learning from quizzes, actually,” Kun interrupted. “You learn best when you learn from mistakes.”
“And it’s not like it contributes to their final grades,” Johnny added. “It’s just a fun quiz.”
Taeyong shook his head. “It’s like you’ve never been a student before.”
Johnny shrugged, and Kun decided to sway the conversation back to the song they were working on. Johnny watched as both engaged each other with wide eyes and big hand gestures. Taeyong’s hands pointing upwards and downwards as he tried to work out whether the natural emphasis on certain words worked with the rhythm he needed to rap to. Kun grabbing Taeyong’s hand with both of his own when he came up with a fresh idea.
When the kettle was done and their tea bags had spent enough time seeping into the boiling water, Kun rose from his barstool. “Back to work?”
Taeyong nodded. “Mm. I just need to use the bathroom and I’ll be right with you.”
“Alright.”
Johnny wasn’t sure Kun’s knuckles had dragged against his back on purpose, but he missed the feeling of them when he’d headed back for his room.
Taeyong returned to pick up his mug of tea before retreating himself. “I’m going to rip my hair out if one of you doesn’t make a move,” he told Johnny quietly.
Johnny was only half paying attention to him. “What?”
“I said you should ask Kun out. ASAP.”
Johnny took a long sip of his tea before he found it within himself to answer his friends. “It isn’t like that.” Taeyong raised an eyebrow, and Johnny added, “Not on his end, anyway. I don’t want to say anything to him and risk ruining a friendship. What we have now is good.”
“Is it?”
Johnny took another sip. “It’s good enough.”
Taeyong sucked on his teeth. “Jungwoo’s been trying to find Kun a date for the past week.”
Johnny perked up. “He has?”
“I think he found a guy. Some Chinese guy who just moved here.”
“And Kun is going along with it?”
Taeyong shrugged. “He’s not very enthusiastic about it, but I think he wouldn’t mind meeting someone he could speak his native language to. Xiaojun can be kind of young, sometimes.”
He and Kun had never discussed seeing other people, but the agreement was implicit. They were roommates, good friends who could turn to each other to let out some sexual frustration, no strings attached. They weren’t in a relationship and they weren’t exclusive. If at any point one of them wanted to end their arrangement, there would be no hard feelings.
So Johnny owed it to Kun to not feel bad.
“Good for him, I guess.”
“Oh, you’re so frustrating!” Taeyong rolled his eyes, grabbing his mug and pulling away from the kitchen counter. “Really, I’m going to get stress diabetes or something because of the two of you. Don’t talk to me until you’ve asked him out.”
“Now that’s just—”
“I mean it!”
————————
Johnny felt a dip on the other side of the bed before Kun’s breath ghosted on his neck. “What are you reading?”
“‘Churchill’s Secret War’,” Johnny replied, not taking his eyes off the page. “It’s about a famine in Bengal during the second World War.”
“Sounds interesting.” Kun’s arm snaked around his middle and his lips pressed into that sweet spot Johnny had just under his ear. Johnny tilted his head away and looked down at his roommate from under his glasses.
“I’m not really in the mood today, Kun. Sorry.”
“Oh.” Kun withdrew immediately, Johnny almost wincing at the sudden loss of warmth. “That’s okay.”
“Maybe tomorrow?”
“Uh,” Kun looked distracted, tugging at the neck of his shirt, “I’m actually out tomorrow. I’m meeting a workmate of Jungwoo’s who’s just moved here from Wenzhou. Talk to him about culture shock and things.”
Culture shock. “Right. Sounds like that’ll be fun.”
“If he’s nice, sure.” Kun pursed his lips. “If he’s not an asshole, I was thinking I could call him and the kids over for some home-cooked Chinese food some day. I have no idea if he can cook, but I expect he’ll miss it anyway.”
“I’d be down for that.”
And Johnny didn’t have much else to say. Part of him felt guilty still about how Kun reacted to Johnny saying he wasn’t feeling up to being intimate with him, and wanted to take it back. But Johnny didn’t want to commit to something that wasn’t going to lead to where he wanted it to.
Funny how it had come to that. Johnny had been perfectly happy to push any budding feelings aside roughly a year and a half ago for his own indulgences. Then he got greedy, and soon he wouldn’t have anything.
“Well then,” Kun lifted himself off of Johnny’s bed, “I think I might turn in for the night. You look tired.”
“I’m really sorry again.” Johnny removed his glasses so Kun didn’t look blurry on the other side of the room. “I’ll make it up to you somehow.”
“Don’t worry about it. You were always allowed to say no.” Kun smiled tiredly. “Good night?”
“Night night,” Johnny whispered back. His smile dropped as soon as Kun was out of sight.
He promised himself he had done the right thing.
————————
Johnny and Kun’s shared apartment, normally quiet, now rang with the sound of several voices speaking rapid Mandarin to each other. The most Johnny knew was an introductory class he’d taken in his freshman year of college, so he couldn’t join in. Kun looked alive as he chattered amongst the kids — Johnny and Kun’s term for the group of misfit Chinese kids Kun had collected through the years — and Sicheng, the new guy, seemed to fit right in.
Yangyang said something that sounded particularly snarky, and Kun pushed himself away from Johnny’s chest, throwing his arms around the boy and tackling him to the ground. It was only until Yangyang seemed sufficiently punished that Kun had made his way back onto the couch and back into Johnny’s chest.
Yeah. Kun was being particularly clingy.
Every once in a while, Johnny would catch Sicheng eyeing them with a calculating look, like he was assessing them. It was then that Johnny would try to place some distance between them, not wanting to ruin Kun’s chances by giving Sicheng the wrong idea, but Kun wouldn’t budge. He kept moving back into Johnny’s personal space.
It wasn’t anywhere near the time of year for mooncakes, but Kun liked them and had managed to buy a box of them for everyone to share.
“Open wide,” Kun said, raising the mooncake to Johnny’s mouth. Johnny tried not to glance around the room self consciously before letting Kun feed him.
It wasn’t that Johnny hated public displays of affection. Quite the contrary; he thrived on them. Johnny wanted nothing more than for the whole world to know that he was in love, and who he was in love with, and just how much.
But things with Kun were complicated and temporary. Things with Kun had become difficult to navigate.
After Kun shut the door behind Sicheng, the last to leave, he leaned against a nearby wall and heaved the heaviest, loudest sigh Johnny had heard come from him for a while. “That’s over."
“Yep. Now we just have to clean up!” Johnny grinned, and then grinned even wider at the dirty look Kun threw him.
“I think I need a back massage. I’m all sore.”
Johnny was by Kun’s side and leading him over to their couch in an instant, because no matter how difficult things were between them right now, he wasn’t going to leave his friend with a sore back. “Where is it worst?”
“Lower back.” Kun felt behind him for Johnny’s hands and guided them to the area, pushing the back of his shirt up and out of the way. “Right there.”
Johnny pressed his thumbs into his skin, feeling the muscles and fat press under his fingers. They were both only slightly buzzed, one glass of wine between them, but Kun still felt hot to touch. Johnny gave some pretty good massages, but wasn’t sure what he was doing was working until Kun threw his head back and against Johnny’s neck.
“Move it up a little bit,” Kun mumbled, eyes closed. “Yeah. This is good.”
“It feels stiff.” Johnny leaned over Kun’s shoulder to look at his face. “Tough week at work?”
“I was working in the bar area quite a bit. I’m not used to it. Oh, yes, that’s good! I don’t think this is big enough to go to a physiotherapist.”
“You should get it checked if it gets worse. You don’t know what this could be a symptom of.”
“Only if it gets worse. Right now, I’m sure I’m fine.” Kun opened his eyes sightly and gave Johnny a lazy smile. “I’m being pampered by the best hands in the world.”
Johnny laughed. He wasn’t able to kiss Kun, so he buried his face into Kun’s shoulder instead. “Shut up.”
Johnny felt Kun’s body rumble with soft laughter under his head. He felt a pair of lips against his temple, not puckered, not kissing him, but very deliberately resting there.
Johnny’s ministrations slowed till they were basically useless over time. There wasn’t much he could do, anyway, with Kun leaning back all the way against his shoulder and staring up at him. “What?”
“Nothing. You look good from this angle. Your lips look better.”
Johnny’s grip tightened around Kun’s hips before he could stop himself. Kun’s hair tickled his ear as he turned his head to the side and without thinking, Johnny leaned in.
It had been two weeks since Kun had been on that date with Sicheng, and two weeks since Johnny had started avoiding Kun and sleeping in his own bed. Kun had never initiated anything between them, and Johnny took at as a sign that things had ended. He wasn’t sure if today’s display was to make Sicheng jealous, or if this was Kun venting his frustrations till he could get some with someone he was actually interested in.
Johnny shouldn’t have been going along with it. But he missed doing this with Kun, so here he was.
“We can do this some other time if you don’t want to,” Kun said softly, his breaths coming out a little too fast, his body stiff under Johnny’s hand.
Johnny put on his best reassuring smile. “I was thinking we could take this some place more comfortable.”
Kun’s eyes continued to sparkle when Johnny picked him up with both arms, one hand gripping the back of Johnny’s neck and the other clutching the fabric of Johnny’s shirt near his collarbone. He could feel Kun’s laugh against his jaw in between the small pecks Kun tried to leave on the side of his face.
He had plenty of time to regret later.
————————
Whenever Ten was having a rough day, Johnny let him wear his glasses because they were so big on Ten’s face, they made him laugh. It also served as a warning signal to their friend group that Ten was to be left alone, and any conversations were to continue on as if nothing was wrong.
Except for Kun. Johnny could never tell that worry wart what to do.
When Kun came home late that Friday night, he was at Ten’s side in an instant. Johnny had already captured the boy in an impenetrable bear hug, but Kun weaved his way in, somehow fitting himself into Johnny’s arms alongside Ten and clasping his arms around Ten’s stomach. “Wanna talk about it?”
“No.” Both Johnny and Kun waited in silence until Ten slumped in their arms. “Okay, yes. My ex just asked me to plan his wedding and I want to die.”
“Which e—” Johnny raised an eyebrow, warning Kun to stop. “Oh. Him.”
“I don’t even care about him getting married, but when will I get married? Not that I actually want to be in a commitment like that, but it would be nice to tell people I’m married!”
“Ten,” Kun said gently, “If you get married, then people are going to ask you when you’re going to have kids.”
Ten froze. He looked like he was about to cry, so Johnny quickly whipped out his phone. “Hey, I wonder what filters Snapchat is running at the moment.”
“You still use Snapchat?” Kun asked.
“For the filters.” Johnny gathered the two of them closer into his arm. “Look! The best dog one is back!”
“Do they have the one that makes your mouth big? That’s my favourite.”
“Oh, Ten, that’ll look hilarious with your glasses.”
Ten was holding back a smile, and Kun gave Johnny a fond look. They let Ten pry Johnny’s phone from his hand and swipe through the filters. Ten shook in silent laughter against Johnny’s side, and Kun tugged at Ten’s ear before letting his arm rest across Ten’s thighs to where Johnny’s free hand rested, the tip of his index finger a hair’s breadth away from Johnny’s. Every once in a while, Kun would let his fingers stretch and touch him properly.
Johnny finally caught Kun’s fingers between his own, and let them stay there.
————————
“How long have you and Kun be together?” Ten suddenly asked, halfway into Johnny driving him home.
Johnny momentarily lost the focus he had on the road. He wasn’t sure how long he’d clocked out; he counted his lucky stars nothing major happened. “Kun and I aren’t together.”
“You don’t have to lie, Johnny. Even if you’re both just testing the waters or whatever, you’ve been into each other for so long.”
“We’re not together,” Johnny repeated, teeth gritted this time. “Or even getting there.”
Ten took a minute to respond. “Well, you two have something going on.”
Johnny could deflect. He could lie and tell Ten he was imagining things, or he could change the subject and that would be the end of it. “Yeah, we do.”
“How’s that working out for you?”
Johnny gripped the steering wheel tighter. “It’s fine for now.”
“Is it exclusive?”
“No.”
“Johnny.”
“It’s okay, Ten. If that’s the most I can have with him, then I’ll have to be satisfied with that.”
“Johnny, I can handle a relationship like that, but you can’t — especially since you’ve had your eye on Kun before you were roommates!”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You literally told me you’d die for him when you two first met.”
“It was a passing comment.” It was still true, but it wouldn’t help Johnny’s case to verbalise that.
“What makes you think Kun won’t like you back, anyway?”
Johnny let his car come to a complete stop before a traffic light before he addressed Ten again. “Kun’s never expressed that kind of interest in me. He just wants someone to fuck into every once in a while, and I’m happy to be that for him. He wants nothing else other than that.”
“You’re blind,” Ten groaned. “Taeyong was right. We’re all going to get stress diabetes because of you two.”
Johnny raised an eyebrow. “You guys talk about us?”
“All the time. Why do you think Jungwoo got Kun to go out on a date with Sicheng? We wanted to push you to ask him out instead.”
Johnny pursed his lips. Kun couldn’t be into him, because if Kun really did like him that much, he would have showed as such. But outside of the sex, Kun treated Johnny exactly like he treated all of his other friends. It wasn’t like he was getting extra attention.
“Well, it’s not happening.”
“Huh.” Ten sighed, stretching his neck from side to side. “Taeyong’s never talking to you again.”
“Good for him.”
————————
The airport wasn’t too crowded considering it was 3am on a Wednesday morning, which is just how Johnny liked it. He could stand right at the front of arrivals, sipping his coffee with no fear of someone invading his personal space. Kun wouldn’t take forever to get through immigration. They wouldn’t have to weave through the crowd with his 22-kilogram luggage and dodge taxis to get to the car park.
Kun had been home to visit his family in Fujian for the first time in three years, so of course he’d been excited about it. Johnny remembered Kun resting against his arm and half of his chest as he searched up ticket prices, babbling about some restaurant his parents would always take him to in his hometown and this one illegal thing he and his dad did together to get Kun’s ambitious music video idea done. Johnny had heard about Kun’s family and hometown in bits and pieces before and had carefully stored that information away in his brain for safekeeping, but it was nice to have a much clearer picture of it now.
Kun had fucked him like he’d never done before a few hours before leaving for the airport. If Johnny wasn’t perfectly clear on what their relationship was, he would have called it making love. But he didn’t.
Kun’s flight was delayed by only 20 minutes, but that 20 minutes was excruciating. Johnny was almost tempted to get a second cup of coffee when he noticed people slowly trickle out through the gates — people in wheelchairs first, a couple of families with small children, business suits, the stream of people becoming fuller as time went on. Johnny almost wondered if Kun had got stuck with baggage issues, or — even though he knew it was ridiculous — couldn’t carry his suitcase for whatever reason and needed help. Or maybe he got stuck at customs and was being held by border security.
The anxieties washed away when Kun finally appeared, his suitcase wheeling behind him, eyes searching the corridor until they rested on Johnny’s. Johnny looked away before his heart could swell at the inevitable beautiful smile Kun would give him as he pace walked to the side without the railings to meet Kun there.
Kun practically threw himself into Johnny’s arms when he was close enough. “Hi.”
“Hey.” Johnny pressed his nose into his hair, drinking in the smell of airplane tea and minty chewing gum that was somehow very attractive to him at that moment. He relished in the way Kun’s hands clutched at his jacket. “How was your flight?”
“Eh,” Kun shrugged, “In-flight entertainment could’ve been better.”
“How old was the newest movie?”
“Only a few months old, but it had Vin Diesel in it.”
Johnny cringed. “Yuck.”
Kun chuckled and turned his head so his nose was tucked under Johnny’s ear, and Johnny’s lips were a hair’s breadth from his jawbone.
Excruciating.
“Come on,” Johnny said, pulling back and snatching the handle of Kun’s suitcase away from him before Kun could stop him. “Let’s get going. You look exhausted, you poor thing.”
“It’s only because I can’t sleep on planes.” Kun yawned, covering his mouth with one hand. “And none of the movies were award-winning-yet-mediocre enough to put me to sleep.”
Johnny snorted. “I’ll make sure to put on La La Land when we get home.”
“I’d love that.”
Kun slipped his hand into Johnny’s and locked their fingers together, gently rubbing the knuckle under Johnny’s index finger with his thumb, and Johnny wondered if there was an alternate universe where it could mean something other than platonic to them.
He wished the Johnny of that universe well.
————————
“The Johnny of yesteryear would stop the bullshit and go get his man,” Ten had told him once, in another bout of frustration over his and Kun’s relationship. Johnny didn’t understand the level of emotion, considering Ten himself didn’t have to suffer being in love with someone who would never love him back.
(Kun cared about him, Johnny knew that. He wasn’t delusional. He just knew Kun would never care about him in the way Johnny did about him.)
Kun was dangerous. He made Johnny want to write his will and get funeral insurance. It was push and pull these days — Johnny’s feelings were so strong that he was either high off or in excruciating pain because of Kun’s presence.
Kun would insist on hand-feeding Johnny when he was making something he’d never tried before. One time it was some kind of French soup, where Kun had lifted the spoon to Johnny’s lips and then wiping an escaped droplet away with his thumb. Kun had let the contact linger a second longer than was socially acceptable, but then quickly pulled away and shooed Johnny from the kitchen.
Kun stopped him every other day before Johnny headed off to work to pick on something about his appearance. Some days it was Johnny’s hair, other days his collar — it didn’t matter, as long as Kun would fix it himself.
Sometimes Johnny would come home exhausted after a day of dealing with class 9C (the worst class). Kun had a glass of homemade iced americano ready (made with instant coffee, of course, because Kun was an angel but not a miracle worker) and would coax whatever wild story Johnny had out of him. Then he’d press kisses to his temple, and this was the confusing part — because Kun was ready to kiss anybody, but since their agreement had started, Kun’s kisses with Johnny in particular usually meant he wanted it to lead to something more.
These meant nothing.
“Have you asked him out yet?” Taeyong asked on the phone as soon as Johnny picked up.
“No,” Johnny replied.
“Bye.”
The end call tone sounded and Johnny held his phone out to find it was back to its home screen.
Wouldn’t change his mind, though.
————————
After the sex was Johnny’s favourite part. Actually, all of it was his favourite part, but Johnny had a special place in his heart for the moments right after.
Kun trailed a hand on the marks across Johnny’s thigh, the movement slowing over the darkest ones. It was soothing, a momentary relief from the soreness that was already starting to seep in and take over from post-orgasm bliss. He didn’t say anything, just eyed Johnny’s body in a way that almost made Johnny shiver.
What did make Johnny shiver was the occasional moment where Kun would make eye contact with him, his eyes tired but teaming with something else Johnny couldn’t place, and squeezed the flesh wherever his hand rested. It was a quick squeeze every single time, almost nervous, like if he did it fast enough then maybe it never happened.
“You’re fantastic,” Kun murmured in a voice much thicker than his previous one night stands.
Johnny took a deep breath and blew it back out very, very slowly in an effort to calm his own nerves. “You’re so insistent on making every single person you know feel like they’re the most important person ever, huh?”
Kun paused. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Johnny put on his easiest grin, “If this is how you’re treating me as a friend, then I can’t imagine how lucky your future partner is going to be.”
For five whole seconds, Kun looked like a deer caught in headlights. It wasn’t often Johnny caught him off guard, or not to this extent, at least. Johnny treasured the image, even if he didn’t understand why it had come to be.
His face relaxed into one void of any kind of emotion. “Yeah. I guess you’re right.”
————————
That night was pivotal, Johnny realised over time, because things began to change from that point on.
Kun still notified him whenever he needed Johnny for the night, whether to cuddle or to fuck. It used to be every night where either one of them would want one of the two; now it was only once or twice a week.
The nights they did spend together became faster, rougher, more desperate. They had always been rough with each other, because that’s how Johnny liked it, but always with an added layer of tenderness because that’s how Kun liked it — that wasn’t as prominent anymore.
The way Kun touched him outside of their nights together became less frequent and more contrived. Where Kun’s touches had always tip-toed the line between friendly and romantic — the very line driving Johnny to insanity — they had now very clearly picked a field to make home. The platonic field.
To make things more confusing, there were other quirks that Johnny expected to die down but didn’t. Kun fussing over things like Johnny’s collar and hair was one. Kun having an iced americano ready was two. Kun nuzzling into Johnny’s neck at the end of a night working late was three.
One night, Johnny even found it hard to focus on correcting the last of a set of essays he had to return to his students the next morning, just because he suddenly thought that Kun might have demoted him to acquaintance. Johnny didn’t end up getting all the papers marked and had to apologise to his class the next day. His perfect record of returning grades on time ruined.
“What did you do to him?” Yuta asked him one day when they both had a moment to themselves.
“Why are you assuming I did something?”
“Because it has to be you.” Yuta glared sharply enough to make Johnny flinch. “You take up 70% of Kun’s motivation to do anything, so it has to be you.”
This one time, Johnny allowed himself to ponder if that was true.
————————
Johnny dropped by Kun’s record store one day on a whim. It was one of those evenings Kun was working late, so it was only a matter of driving by after he was done at school. Nothing special, nothing he hadn’t done before; Johnny had been a semi-frequent patron of Kun’s store in the past.
It was a quaint inner city suburb, and the store was on one of those roads that was vital to the early morning city-bound rush, but was somehow never upgraded to more than the two lanes. It was after 6:30pm when Johnny made it over, so he’d missed the majority of the evening rush. It still wasn’t easy to find a park, but at least he wasn’t stuck searching around for one in traffic.
Kun’s store was very small business. Johnny had gushed over it the first time he ever saw it — the plain chalkboard sign that just said “RECORDS”, the un-plastered brick wall interior, the 1930s gramophone that Kun had fought hard for on an eBay auction, that played whatever record Kun decided to feature for the day. Kun had complained the day Johnny first visited that he didn’t have enough space for live gigs. That was the first day Johnny was conscious of the fact that he was more than just mildly attracted to his new roommate.
Things were different now.
Kun was surprised to see him. Johnny couldn’t tell if it was a pleased surprised or a put off one. “Johnny? I didn’t know you’d be coming over.”
“I was craving good coffee,” Johnny smiled. He did his best to pretend Kun hadn’t been withdrawing lately. “Came to the only place I could trust.”
Kun raised an eyebrow. “You know the bar closes at six.”
“C’mon, I got here as fast as I could! You can’t make an exception?”
“I don’t know, can I? Jeno?”
Johnny hadn’t even noticed Jeno. His eyes drifted towards the bar to find the boy in front of a sink holding what looked like half the coffee machine. “I just finished cleaning the heads, but I can probably make—”
“Guess not,” Kun shrugged, not looking very sorry.
Johnny tried halfheartedly to look devastated. He didn’t really want any coffee. He just wanted to see Kun. “I don’t even mind if you just gave me some coffee beans, and then I can just place it under the LP on the gramophone—”
Kun’s eyes widened in horror. “No…”
“And then as the LP turns,” Johnny pressed his hands together, mimicking the LP and the turntable, and rotated the hand on top, “The coffee beans slowly get crushed underneath…”
“Johnny, that’s horrible!”
“And then you take the LP off and scrape the ground coffee onto it,” he mimed out, “And then pout boiling hot water onto the vinyl—”
“You could just crush the beans with my tamper,” Jeno interrupted, placing what looked like a doorknob on the counter. (Johnny lived and breathed coffee, but he knew nothing about making it.) He placed a plate next to the knob and dropped a handful of coffee beans on it. “Try it.”
“That doesn’t look safe.” Kun was over by the bar in less than a second, snatching the instruments away. “Johnny, my employee has to have this entire area sanitised and spotless before he clocks out in 15 minutes. Do you want to get him in trouble?”
“Okay, okay, I’m done.” Johnny leaned an elbow on the front desk while waiting for Kun to come back. “Sorry, Jeno.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Was there anything else you wanted?” Kun asked, “Or are you going to stay here and chase my customers away?”
“I had one more thing to ask.” Johnny was coming up with something on the spot now; he had nothing to ask, and the fact that he wasn’t able to touch Kun was killing him. “Do you want a ride after work?”
Kun blinked. “I have three hours left, Johnny.”
“So? I can bring you dinner and you can just eat in the backroom while I look after the store — for free — instead of you having to wait till 9:30. And,” Johnny let the hand that was hidden from Kun’s view clench into a fist, “We’re going for that movie later anyway, so I thought it’d be nice if we could just hang out beforehand.”
‘Going to a movie’ was their code for dick appointment.
Johnny hated that he couldn’t read Kun’s face. He knew he wouldn’t be able to decipher it even if he took 360 videos of the moment and poured over the footage for hours after, because Johnny had learnt over time that when Kun didn’t want his feelings known, he kept them under lock and key and threw them in an impenetrable safe.
“I’m fine. I don’t need help around the store today. It’s quiet.” The corner of Kun’s lips twisted upwards. “And I’m not hungry, so I’m okay getting dinner later.”
Johnny sucked on his teeth. “I’m still happy to hang around if you want a ride.”
“I still have the train, so no stress.” His mouth opened and closed again, and Johnny waited till they seemed to figure out what they wanted to say. “And about the movies…”
Here it was. The beginning of something Johnny had been hearing more and more often lately. Not every single time, but too often to be a coincidence.
“…Can we get a rain check? I’m pretty tired today.”
Johnny tried not to make it obvious that he was struggling to breath. “Yeah, of course.”
There was nothing else to do but turn around, walk out and head home. Kun had made that quite obvious. “I’ll catch you when you get home, then.”
“Yeah, catch you then.”
Johnny didn’t drive off immediately after getting into his car. He took the time to lean his head back into the leather headrest, close his eyes and will himself not to get worked up over something so minor. Remind himself that this was bound to happen some day.
When he opened his eyes, he saw a pick-up truck waiting several metres away, indicator on and ready to steal into Johnny’s park as soon as it was safe to do so. So Johnny put his car into drive and let thoughts of Kun drift to the back of his head for the time being.
He had the rest of the night to himself to mope anyway.
————————
It was quite the extreme reaction to a mere bouquet. Johnny hadn’t meant much by it — he’d seen the white lily and rose arrangement while walking past a florist’s near where he was taking a class on a field trip and slipped away during his lunch break to quickly arrange for the bouquet to arrive at their apartment later that evening. He had no idea what the flowers meant and neither would Kun; he just knew that Kun would think the white and green would look great on their dining table.
Besides, Kun’s favourite colour was red, and the only red bouquets available at this point in January were Valentine’s Day roses. Johnny wasn’t brave enough to buy those.
Nonetheless, even though Johnny had explained the delivery as casually as possible while he poured over the minutes from a teacher’s meeting he had missed, Kun had latched onto his back and planted quick kisses all over the left side of his face, which then turned into Kun sucking at his earlobe, which then turned into Kun biting and lapping his way down Johnny’s jugular.
Twenty minutes later, Kun had not relented trying to make sure as much of his body was in contact with Johnny’s somehow — their foreheads pressed together, Kun’s hands running up and down Johnny’s chest and stomach, the insistence that Johnny, back pressed against the bed, would keep his arms around Kun’s shoulders and down across his back despite Johnny gradually losing feeling in them. Kun was palming and grabbing like his life depended on it.
And for Johnny, it was a sensory overload.
There was too much to focus on all at once. One second he’d register the way Kun’s lips kept missing his and would hit the corner of his mouth instead; the next, it’d be Kun’s elbows hitting his calves; then, Kun’s thighs squeezing Johnny’s hips. It didn’t help when Kun’s hands eventually linked with Johnny’s own and dragged his arms up, pressing their forearms together above Johnny’s head.
It was too much. He was losing every last vestige of his self-control.
“I love you,” finally slipped out of Johnny’s mouth when Kun had the gall to look him in the eye. He watched as Kun’s eyes widened along with his, and everything slowed to a stop.
Johnny didn’t know what to do. His heart was beating so fast he thought it might take off out of his chest. He shouldn’t have said what he did, but it was out there now and he had the fallout to deal with. He had thought about something like this happening many times, but somehow all of those imaginary scenarios had flown straight out of his head.
He settled with, “I’m sorry.” He took a deep breath. “I know I shouldn’t have agreed to something like this knowing I was going to fall for you anyway, but I did, and it’s happened, and we can close this chapter if you wanted to. I’m happy to move out if this makes you uncomfortable. I’ll pay rent until you find a new roommate, of course —”
“You’re not messing with me, are you?” Kun asked, interrupting Johnny’s very thoughtful, very considerate spiel.
“Messing with you about what? Rent? Kun, I know what your wages are like, and I don’t want you draining your bank account on full rent because of me—”
“I’m talking about the bit where you love me.”
Johnny’s breath hitched in his throat. “Yeah, I— I might as well get it all out in the open now, right? I was into you before we started sleeping together and I probably would have fallen for you if we never had, but I guess this kind of accelerated it and— ow, Kun! That hurts!”
Kun had gripped his hand so hard that Johnny could feel the pain through the numbness that hadn’t entirely disappeared, that point where every sensation was heightened to unbearable amounts. Kun relaxed the grip immediately. “I love you too.”
Johnny had to consciously remind himself to breathe. “You do?”
“I do.”
Kun broke out into a smile Johnny would never forget before clutching Johnny’s face between his hands and leaning down to kiss him properly. Johnny felt his cheeks being pulled so close he could barely see, before closing his eyes and letting the feel of Kun’s soft lips pry his own apart, tongue coaxing Johnny’s out. When Kun let go of Johnny’s cheeks to side his arms under his neck, Johnny could finally feel Kun’s smile across his face.
Johnny let his legs wrap around Kun’s thighs for support and bucked his hips, causing Kun to pull away with a gasp. Kun looked even more offended when Johnny smirked up at him and jerked upwards again.
The upper hand was only momentary, as expected.
————————
Johnny loved that whenever Kun sat on his lap, he sprawled himself out to take up as much of Johnny’s space as possible. Johnny could be sitting anywhere and Kun would situate himself comfortably on his thighs, lean back against his chest, make sure all four of their limbs were aligned with each other. He didn’t care if his hair tickled Johnny’s nose. It was like Johnny was his throne.
This is what Johnny had missed out on for a year and a half.
Johnny was on Taeyong’s living room floor this time, sprawled out across his rug in front of a SNES that Taeyong had apparently bought the previous week from some garage sale. $30 sounded like a rip-off for cheap plastic, but it had provided Johnny hours of fun now so he couldn’t complain.
Kun would leave him a kiss every once in a while, sometimes on his face, sometimes on his neck, sometimes a peck, sometimes obscene. Sometimes he’d leave a kitten lick on one of the sweet spots under Johnny’s jaw, and Johnny would fall behind on Mario Kart.
Johnny still ended up winning somehow.
“Okay,” Taeil finally announced, throwing his controller to the side. Johnny barely spared Taeyong’s horrified cry any attention. “Johnny and Kun’s blatant displays of PDA are, as the kids say, cramping my style.”
“F,” both Jaeyun and Sicheng said at the same time. Johnny knew Taeil wouldn’t know what that meant either.
“Yeah, F them.” Johnny was right.
“You’re only bitter because you came last,” Kun told Taeil, and rightly so.
“I came last because I can see you trying to give Johnny a boner, Kun. Nobody wants to see his demon dick!”
“What do you know about my demon dick?” Johnny asked, wiggling an eyebrow. Taeil feigned throwing up, but Johnny was more interested in Kun tilting his head back to smile at him and squeezing a spot on his thigh dangerously close to his crotch.
“Okay,” Yuta announced, drawing both of their attention. He had his hands pressed together in front of his face. “We have all been waiting for this to happen forever. And we’ve turned a blind eye to your general grossness. But I genuinely do not want to see Johnny’s boner ever in my life.”
There’s a chorus of agreement from everyone in the room, and Johnny felt Kun’s hair tickle his ear as he took a deep breath and groaned it out. His hand hasn’t moved from Johnny’s thigh, but his legs are closing in as if ready to move.
Johnny put his SNES controller aside much more carefully than Taeil did and wrapped his arms around his boyfriend. “Let’s go home?”
Kun couldn’t make eye contact from the position they were in, so Johnny settled for Kun’s nose pressing into his cheek. “Let’s go home.”
————————