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i.
There’s nothing else to do.
Sungyeol reminds himself of that, taking a deep breath before he raps on the door and pushes it open once he gets the invitation to enter, hand shaking just a bit as he does. Sunggyu is laying on his bed—of course—his laptop open in front of him and the sound of a Nell song drifting out of the speakers; it’s surprisingly suited to Sungyeol’s mood, that music. Sunggyu’s eyes flicker up to take in Sungyeol standing in the door, but Sungyeol doesn’t notice: he’s too busy looking over at where Woohyun is hanging up clothes on the clothes stand.
Woohyun looks up at Sungyeol and smiles. “Hey,” he says casually, and somehow that just makes Sungyeol angry—or tired, maybe: he’s not so good at telling the difference anymore.
“So are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Sungyeol demands, crossing his arms, and maybe his voice shakes a bit, but maybe no one will notice.
Yeah, right.
Sunggyu rises, closing his laptop and tucking it under his arm, giving Sungyeol an unreadable look as he passes, pulling the door shut behind him. Sungyeol barely notices him go, his eyes trained on Woohyun. Just tell me what it is, you prick. Tell me what it is so we can fix it.
“What’s going on with what?” Woohyun asks lightly, putting the last jacket on a hanger, and now Sungyeol knows for sure he’s mad.
It only takes a few long strides for him to reach Woohyun and grab him by his bare shoulders—he’s already ready for bed, wearing a tank top, and Sungyeol tries not to get distracted by the feel of skin under his hands. It’s easy not to get distracted from his roiling emotions when Woohyun won’t meet his eyes—Sungyeol can’t remember the last time that happened, and seeing it now makes him feel like something ravenous is eating away at his insides. “Don’t give me that shit,” he snaps, and Woohyun’s gaze stutters to his face.
“Yeol—“
“Something’s s going on.” The anxiety that’s been building in his stomach over the past few days gushes up inside him, practically choking him. And maybe his eyes are burning too, but he ignores that. “You’ve been weird and you’ve been avoiding me and—“
“I haven’t been avoiding you!” Woohyun protests, and his voice sounds strained, like he’s trying to be light but failing. “We spent all afternoon together yesterday—“
“Yeah,” Sungyeol says, hands tightening on Woohyun’s shoulders, staring down at those dark eyes that keep skittering away from his. What did I do? Just tell me so I can make it right, Woohyun, please. “With Myungsoo. And the day before that you asked Sungjong to eat dinner with us. And this morning you got Dongwoo to go to the gym with us. You’ve been avoiding being alone with me.”
A bolt of guilt flashes across Woohyun’s face and the knots in Sungyeol’s gut tighten. No. Please don’t let it be that. Please.
“Sungyeol—“
“Are you tired of me?” The words shoot out without his permission, too raw and vulnerable, and he mentally curses himself, biting his lip so hard it hurts as he releases Woohyun abruptly and takes a half-step back. He looks away, but he can’t quite keep his gaze from Woohyun entirely—he never can; it’s like there are magnets in his eyes attracted to Woohyun so that he wants to be looking at him all the time—so when he glances at him, he sees Woohyun’s face soften. He thinks he also sees a glint of humor, too, and he flushes as he averts his eyes again. Why the fuck did you have to say that out loud, dumbass?
“Yeol.” Yeah, there’s humor in Woohyun’s voice, and Sungyeol knows it isn’t mockery, but his blush deepens as Woohyun’s arms snake around his waist. “I can safely say I could never, ever get tired of you.”
Tangled in jarring emotions, Sungyeol snorts, but Woohyun pulls him closer, firm and warm against him.
“You’re weird enough that I could spend the rest of my life trying to figure you out and never quite manage it, Lee Sungyeol.”
Sungyeol knows when Woohyun is teasing him, but he can’t help but get stuck on the ‘rest of my life’ part of the sentence. Why would you say something like that, you dick? He can’t bring himself to look at Woohyun’s face again.
Woohyun sighs, and Sungyeol feels it against his neck as Woohyun’s forehead thumps against his shoulder. “It’s not us,” Woohyun says. “It’s got nothing to do with us.”
The words are ones Sungyeol has been waiting days to hear, days of watching Woohyun be overly cheerful when he knows Sungyeol is looking at him and strangely brooding when he thinks no one’s paying attention; days of not spending even a few minutes alone together and feeling like Woohyun is so far away even when Sungyeol is touching him. Sungyeol relaxes just a little, lets himself take in the feel of Woohyun against him, the smell of him, as always both arousing and comforting in a way that only Woohyun could possibly ever be. Then stop scaring me to death, asshole.
“I’m sorry I’ve been a dick,” Woohyun says, hands fisting into the cotton of Sungyeol’s t-shirt at the small of his back.
“It’s not like you can help it,” Sungyeol says with a dry throat. “It’s just in your nature. Ow!” He jumps a bit and scowls down at Woohyun; he really doesn’t appreciate when Woohyun sticks his hand under his shirt and pinches the soft skin just above his hipbones. Which is probably why Woohyun does it.
“In yours, too,” Woohyun says, smirking up at him, and though he’s got that smug expression on his face, there’s still enough of something Sungyeol can’t understand in his eyes that Sungyeol knows he can’t let himself relax fully. “I guess it’s why we’re so good together. We can appreciate each others’ dickery. And each others’ dicks.”
Sungyeol rolls his eyes and is about to tell Woohyun just how much of a pervert he is, but then Woohyun’s hand is on the back of his neck tugging him down, and then there are Woohyun’s lips. Fuck, he’s got the most fucking dirty, amazing lips, and it’s been too long since Sungyeol got to really kiss them. They still try not to subject the other guys to their displays of affection, as Sungjong insists on calling them, but they try to steal a few minutes each day to at least make out for a bit (some days Sungyeol is pretty sure that the five minutes he spends pressed up against Woohyun are the only thing keeping him going). But over the last few days even that has been cut down to just a few swift kisses before Woohyun makes an excuse to slip away. That's exactly why Sungyeol has been so worried; even when they’re angry with each other, they still want to be touching as much as possible. If Woohyun has been cutting down on their physical contact, something must really be wrong, or at least that’s been Sungyeol’s line of thinking. He’d held back all the questions that are hounding him, hoping Woohyun would volunteer the truth in his own time, but it’s been days and Woohyun has been holding something back from him, and Sungyeol has been terrified, which just makes him angry, and now he needs an answer. Almost as much as he needed to feel Woohyun’s lips against his.
“I have to tell you something and I’ve been dreading it,” Woohyun pants against Sungyeol’s lips when they break apart. Every muscle in Sungyeol’s body tenses up, but Woohyun was obviously anticipating that, because he hurries to add, “Not like that, dumbass. I told you it wasn’t about us.”
“Well, then, why are you being all weird and fucking jumpy about telling me?” Sungyeol thinks he might sound a little whiny and desperate underneath his anger, but fuck it: he hates the thought of Woohyun not wanting to tell him something. There’s nothing he can’t tell me. Bastard. And he can’t imagine there being anything Woohyun wouldn’t want to tell him that doesn’t have to do with the two of them and their relationship. Everything else Woohyun confides in him, even if he does it with snark and banter when it’s too serious for him to feel comfortable just saying; but they always find a way to talk about whatever they’re thinking. They always do.
“Because I’m a fucking coward,” Woohyun says. “I didn’t want to see the look on your face when I told you.”
Sungyeol shoves him away. “What the fuck? You’re freaking me out! God, you’re enjoying watching me squirm, aren’t you, you bastard? You’ve had me jumpy and shit for days now and you’re dragging this out as long as you can and—“
“I got offered a drama role, okay?”
Oh.
Oh.
“Yeol.” Woohyun’s finger pokes into his shoulder, but Sungyeol barely feels it, barely hears his voice. “Yeol! What are you thinking? Talk to me! Now you’re freaking me out.”
Sungyeol surfaces from the hazy numbness that’s clouding around him, drifting back into the moment slowly, and as his eyes focus on Woohyun’s face he sees the worry thick in his eyes. He knows he needs to say something to reassure Woohyun, understands now why he’s been so weird the past few days. But somehow he can’t think of anything at all. “I don’t know,” he says finally though he doesn’t feel his mouth moving. What is there to say? “I—when?”
Woohyun’s face is tight, his eyes trained on Sungyeol’s face, and that kind of makes Sungyeol want to punch him, because the bastard has been avoiding his eyes for almost a week, and now he’s looking at Sungyeol like that? But the cotton swaddling Sungyeol’s mind absorbs most of the anger, turning it into more numbness.
“On Monday,” Woohyun says slowly.
“No,” Sungyeol says blankly. “I meant—“
“Filming starts next month,” Woohyun clarifies.
“Oh.” And then something new pops into his mind. “You didn’t try out or—“
“No! I would tell you before I did something like that!” Woohyun looks almost as upset at that idea as Sungyeol feels. “I wasn’t looking for this at all, Yeol, I swear, it hadn’t even occurred to me. But they called the company and said they wanted me and I—“ He shrugs helplessly, looking as distressed and tired as Sungyeol has seen him in forever. Normally that would have him tugging Woohyun over to the bed and wrapping himself around him in seconds—the fact that Sunggyu could return at any minute be damned—but right now he can’t move.
“And you said yes.” The way the words come out, even Sungyeol can’t tell whether they’re a question or not.
Woohyun grabs Sungyeol’s hands in his, looking up at him with pleading eyes. “It’s not like I could say no, Yeol. You can’t say no if they offer something like that, CEO-nim would never have let me refuse exposure as great as that when there wasn’t a good reason and—“ A thought dawn in his eyes, and he jerks back a bit, hands closing even tighter around Sungyeol’s limp ones. “Did you want me to say no?”
Sungyeol hasn’t even thought of that, but the question jolts him a bit out of his wooly blankness. “I—no. No, of course not.” Even I’m not that much of a prick. “I just—they just offered you the part?”
Woohyun looks dangerously close to tears now, and Sungyeol kind of hates himself for the fact that he can’t keep the pain off of his face, that he can’t shove his feelings aside and be happy for Woohyun the way he did when Myungsoo told him about Shut Up Flower Boy Band. Woohyun hadn’t told him this immediately because he was scared of Sungyeol acting just this way, and somehow Sungyeol can’t help but do it. Fuck. “They said I’m just the type they wanted, that the writer had me mind and—it’s not a big role, Yeol, I’m not a lead at all. And it didn’t sound like it would be particularly good and—“
Okay, Sungyeol can’t keep this up. If Woohyun is trying to play down the importance of it, he must be practically killing himself with worry over what Sungyeol is feeling, and Sungyeol can’t let him do that to himself, no matter how much this hurts. Sungyeol knows he’s selfish most of the time, that his default reaction is to think of himself first, but he can’t do that, not to Woohyun. Not when Woohyun is always so good to him, not when Woohyun has clearly only been thinking of Sungyeol since he heard this news. Not when Woohyun means everything to him.
“I’m happy for you,” he says, and it’s not quite a lie. He’s sure that somewhere in the murky depths of his feelings, there is genuine happiness for Woohyun—how can there not be when he wants Woohyun to have everything? So what if he can’t find it right now? It’s what Woohyun needs, and so he will find it. He has to.
Woohyun, though, looks like Sungyeol just hit him. “What?”
“This is great for you. The fact that they wanted you without even an audition—that means something, that you’re making an impression and stuff. That’s fucking awesome, Woohyun.” Saying the words is like a magic spell: even as they come out of his mouth he starts to mean them, if only a little bit. His pleasure at knowing that people appreciate Woohyun is veiled by other, more negative emotions, but it’s there all the same.
Woohyun still looks so upset. “Yeol, you don’t have to—“
“Yes, I do. I do because it’s true.” He feels life course back into his hands where they’ve been lying limp in Woohyun’s painfully tight grip, and he squeezes back. “This really is awesome for you. I wouldn’t want you to turn it down, not if it’s what you want.”
“But I don’t know if it is what I want!” Woohyun protests. “I don’t know. It isn’t something I’d ever thought about, not seriously and—“
“And you haven’t even had time to think about whether you want it because you’ve been so busy freaking out about how I’d react, right, dumbass?”
Just a bit of the tension in Woohyun’s face drains away—just a bit, but enough that Sungyeol can see it. “What can I say?” Woohyun says, voice a little shaky. “I can’t help it if you’ve got me whipped. I’m a healthy young guy who’s contractually not allowed to date and you let me fuck you—how could I help but worry that you’d cut me off?”
Woohyun’s voice is a little strained under the gilding of his forced lightness, but Sungyeol gets that, he knows what Woohyun is doing. “Damn straight. You better keep me happy if you expect to ever get any of this ass ever again.”
“Yeol—“ Suddenly Woohyun’s arms are around his neck and he’s kissing him desperately; Sungyeol kisses back just as furiously, wrapping his arms around Woohyun and pouring all the desperate emotions he’s feeling into the kiss. Woohyun half-moans, half-whimpers, pressing even closer to Sungyeol as though wanting to disappear inside him, and the tiny part of Sungyeol that isn’t totally focused on Woohyun’s lips can feel the way Woohyun’s fingers are shaking as they slide into his hair.
Sungyeol presses Woohyun up against the wall—not hard, just firmly, because he knows that sometimes Woohyun likes the security of being completely surrounded, of feeling like Sungyeol is hiding him—and Woohyun clings to him, devouring Sungyeol’s lips like they’re the only thing keeping him alive. It’s at times like this that Woohyun seems the smallest, the most defenseless, that Sungyeol catches a glimpse of all the vulnerabilities that Woohyun keeps hidden under a mask of bravado and grease and cheer. It always makes Sungyeol feel pathetically humble and grateful, that Woohyun lets him see him like this, that that he trusts him enough; Sungyeol isn’t sure he trusts himself with something as important as Woohyun, and the fact that Woohyun does….
He’s shuddering almost as much as Woohyun is by the time Woohyun finally releases his tender lips and pulls back. His mouth is swollen and his eyes are red, and his face contorts as he looks up at Sungyeol. “I fucking hate this, I hate that it’s like this—that it’s me and not—“
Woohyun stops abruptly, and this whole situation just makes Sungyeol so sick. Not at Woohyun—never at Woohyun, but at himself. At every single fucking casting director and PD who thought he wasn’t good enough. But mostly, mostly at himself for not being good enough. “You can say it,” Sungyeol says, voice twisting with bitterness. He’d been trying to keep tamping down on it so Woohyun wouldn’t feel bad, but fuck it—he’s weak, and everyone knows it. “You can say that they want you and they never want me.”
“Yeol—“
“It’s like I’m standing there begging and they don’t even see me and they find you and Myungsoo who don’t even care and ask you instead—and Hoya! He was so good, and that role, do you know what I would do for a role like that? I’d give up a year of my life, Woohyun, I swear I would and—“
Pain shoots up through him as his ass hits the ground; there isn’t much padding to soften the impact of his tailbone slamming into the floor. Sungyeol gapes at he stares up at Woohyun, not quite able to believe that his boyfriend just pushed him that hard— even if it wasn’t very hard at all.
Woohyun’s face is all twisted up so that Sungyeol almost doesn’t recognize him. “Don’t you dare fucking say that! You would not give up a year of your life for that—don’t say that!” he commands, voice snapping like a whip.
Sungyeol draws his knees up, buries his face in his hands, ignoring the fact that they’re trembling. “I’m sorry.” His voice is raspy and low, but it’s all he can manage. “I’m sorry, Woohyun. I just—I want to be supportive and all excited for you and shit because I am, but—but it just really hurts sometimes.”
There’s silence for a moment, and Sungyeol is beginning to regret saying that at all. You should just do what he always tells you to do and fake it until you feel it. That’s what you should have done. You’re feeling sorry for yourself again and you’re ruining this for him and—
But there are Woohyun’s hands, pulling him to his feet, and there are Woohyun’s eyes, looking so very tired as he leads Sungyeol towards the bed. “Be supportive and excited tomorrow,” he says, pushing Sungyeol’s rear—gently—to get him to climb up to the top bunk ahead of him. “Tonight you can just let it hurt.”
When Sunggyu comes in about fifteen minutes later, Sungyeol hears him pause in the doorway. Sungyeol just wriggles closer to Woohyun, burying his face in Woohyun’s neck and not turning to see the expression on Sunggyu’s face at the sight of Woohyun wrapped around Sungyeol in Woohyun’s bed. Sungyeol knows that Sunggyu pretends not to know about Woohyun occasionally sneaking into Sungyeol’s bed at night, but it’s easy to pretend when Woohyun is always back in his bed by the time the alarm goes off. This, though, is a little more blatant than either of them would had thought Sunggyu would stand, even if all they’re doing is cuddling, fully clothed, and Sungyeol won’t be surprised if Sunggyu kicks him out and gives them a lecture about being fair to their bandmates.
But instead the light switches off and then Sungyeol feels the bedstead shift as Sunggyu settles into the bunk below. Woohyun’s arms tighten around Sungyeol, warmer than the blankets around them, and Sungyeol presses a kiss to Woohyun’s neck. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs, low enough that Sunggyu can’t hear, and a moment later he feels Woohyun kissing the top of his head before he whispers, “I’m sorry, too.”
ii.
Everything’s always a little better in the morning, Dongwoo always says, and Sungyeol finds that it’s true. He wakes up to the sound of Sunggyu’s alarm, and when he rolls over in the tangle of sheets and Woohyun’s arms, Sunggyu has climbed out of bed and is looking up at him. “I’ll let you wake him up,” Sunggyu says, jerking his head toward Woohyun, who’s still asleep. “I’m getting the rest of the kids up.”
Sunggyu leaves the room and Sungyeol turns back to Woohyun. His hair is a mess and his mouth is slightly open and Sungyeol smiles as he shakes him. Sungyeol goes from asleep to fully awake pretty instantly, but it always takes Woohyun a few minutes, so his eyes are still bleary as he blinks up at Sungyeol.
“Hey,” he says after a minute, voice creaky with sleep.
“Hey,” Sungyeol answers. He wants to give Woohyun a kiss, but Woohyun always has really bad morning breath, so he just settles for looking at him.
“You feel better?” Woohyun asks, hope scattering the drowsiness in his eyes.
“Yeah.” Because he does. “Woohyun.”
“Yeah?”
“Woohyun—they want you. They asked for you. That’s really fucking amazing.” And it is; Sungyeol can see that now, can actually feel it, after a night next to Woohyun. It’s not that the bitterness and self-loathing are entirely gone; they really aren’t. But they’ve drifted to the edges, and mostly what he feels is pride that someone recognizes how amazing Woohyun is.
Woohyn’s eyes light up at Sungyeol’s words; clearly he can tell that Sungyeol really means them now. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” Sungyeol confirms. “That doesn’t happen very often—Hoya had to try out for Reply 1997 and even Myungsoo had to do a screentest before they signed him for his dramas. The fact that they know that they want you is really awesome.”
Happiness is making its way across Woohyun’s face, and Sungyeol can see that he’s beginning to get excited in a way he hadn’t allowed himself before. Guilt pings around in Sungyeol’s mind; Woohyun should have been able to get excited as soon as he heard the news, not worry about his boyfriend’s self-esteem. But Sungyeol is determined to make it up to him. “I’ll help you with your lines and stuff. It’ll be great.”
“Yeah,” Woohyun agrees, looking truly excited for the first time. But then that excitement dims a bit—“But what if I suck at it?”
Sungyeol has to laugh. “How could you suck? You act every day!”
Woohyun grabs a pillow and shoves it in Sungyeol’s face, and Sungyeol is still laughing when he pushes it away. “Even if you do suck, you still won’t be the worst idol who ever acted,” Sungyeol says. “They expect idols to be bad.”
“Oh, thank you, that’s just so encouraging. Remind me to nominate you for Boyfriend of the Year, okay?”
“You know what I mean, dumbass. I’m sure you’ll be fine. What’s it about?” He hadn’t even asked the night before, but he’s going to do better now.
“Something about a gumiho who has to have a thousand guys fall in love with her or something. I didn’t really pay much attention.”
Sungyeol rolls his eyes, falling back onto the pillow. “Haven’t gumihos been done to death? And how could anyone be as good as Shin Min Ah? I feel like they should have retired the concept after her.”
Woohyun shrugs, laying down on his back alongside him. “Don’t ask me why writers can’t ever come up with something creative.”
“Well, maybe it’ll surprise us.” Sungyeol tangles his fingers in Woohyun’s, pulling their hands up in the air and resting their elbows on the bed. “Hoya’s didn’t sound all that promising, but it’s amazing.”
Woohyun is staring at their intertwined hands in the air between them. “I wouldn’t hold my breath. It’s not like it’s a TvN show. But acting is acting, right?”
Sungyeol thinks of his one big role, in that silly little sitcom that everyone’s forgotten about already and feels a jab of pain at the thought of the quality of his bandmates’ projects. But he puts it to the side—last night was for hurting; today is for being supportive and excited. This is about Woohyun, not you. “Right.”
They’re silent for a moment, both of them watching their hands, Sungyeol’s long pale fingers twined through Woohyun’s darker broader ones, and listening to the sound of somebody starting breakfast out in the kitchen.
“I think I’m kind of excited,” Woohyun says suddenly. “I mean, even if it’s shitty, it’s a new thing, something I’ve never done before. I think I am excited.”
“Of course you are,” Sungyeol says. He turns his head against the pillow to see Woohyun’s face, and sure enough, his eyes are crinkling with excitement. Fuck morning breath; Sungyeol will deal with it. He pushes himself up onto his elbow and leans over to kiss Woohyun, and sure, the staleness is not that appetizing, but it’s worth it when Woohyun eye-smiles up at him, the rest of his face solemn. “Yeol. Thank you.”
There’s the guilt again, that Woohyun has to thank him for something he should have done in the first place. I’m a shitty boyfriend. But he vows to be a better one, even as he smiles smugly and says, “If you are sucky at it, I’m totally making fun of you.” Woohyun shouts and shoves the pillow in his face again and it’s all downhill from there.
When Sunggyu comes in to yell at them to stop feeling each other up—they protest that they’re wrestling, but it’s really just an excuse and all three of them know it—and get a move on, Sungyeol is feeling like he can handle this, like he can be a good boyfriend and not let his own issues ruin this for Woohyun.
Turns out it’s not as easy as he hoped, though.
iii.
Sungyeol tries to keep his face blank as he reads, reminding himself that it’s good practice, if nothing else. It’s pretty hard, though, and it gets tougher with each line. He can feel Woohyun’s eyes on his face, almost as tangibly as he feels the warmth of Woohyun’s body against his, and the knowledge that his opinion is this important to Woohyun is the incentive he needs to keep his face neutral, no matter how much of a challenge that is. He scans a few more lines, flips another couple of pages, and then says, very carefully, “I think your character’s charming.” Or at least it will be, because you’re playing him. So: not a lie.
In response, Woohyun rolls his eyes and lets out a frustrated noise, falling back onto the bed where they’re sitting. “It’s shit—you can say it’s shit. You don’t have to pretend for my sake,” he says, throwing his arm up across his eye.
Sungyeol relaxes a bit, leaning back against the pillows behind him and letting his smirk show. “It’s not that bad.”
Woohyun lifts his arm to give him a skeptical look.
“Okay, it’s not that great, but seriously, there’s a lot worse out there—a lot worse. I’ve tried out for way bigger shit-piles than this, really.”
Woohyun lets his arm drop back and moans. “It’s really bad. I’m going to have to be embarrassed.”
Sungyeol kicks him in the ribs. “No, you aren’t. It really isn’t that bad. I mean, it’s definitely not good, but it’s sort of…” He flips through a couple of pages, searching for a way to describe it. “…inoffensively cute,” he finally settles on. “You really don’t have to be humiliated.” Besides, if you have to be embarrassed of this, what does that say about my drama?
Woohyun doesn’t seem convinced. “And did you see my part? I just follow Hyomin-sunbae around looking all lovesick and saying greasy things.”
Sungyeol laughs. “Well, of course you do. You say they offered you the role without you even having to try out—what else did you expect? That’s the only thing they know you can do, besides sing.”
Without sitting up, Woohyun grabs a pillow and hurls it in Sungyeol’s face, and Sungyeol bats it away, laughing. He flops down on his stomach on the bed beside Woohyun, looking down into his face and sobering when he sees that Woohyun’s eyes are still narrowed. Apparently that’s not the right thing to tease about. Okay. Time to try something different. “They matched you with the role because of your stage personae. Just like they did with Myungsoo and the whole ‘ice prince’ thing in Flower Boy Band. That’s how these things work. Uhm Tae Woong plays badass guys haunted by their pasts, Yoon Eun Hye makes you fall for her by being all adorable and then rips your heart out when she cries, and now you play greaseballs who fall in love with older women. Typecasting is a thing because it works, Woo.”
“I know,” Woohyun mutters. The furrows in his face have eased, but there’s still something lurking in his eyes that bothers Sungyeol. “I don’t really mind that.”
“Then what are you being all moody for?” Sungyeol demands, poking a finger into Woohyun’s upper arm.
“I’m not being moody,” Woohyun answers, swatting Sungyeol’s hand away.
That isn’t even slightly convincing. And he’s trying to be an actor now. “Woohyun. Tell me what it is.”
Woohyun just looks up at him, eyes troubled, and then he sighs, drawing a hand over his face, relenting. “It’s just…they have me take off my shirt in my very first scene.”
Oh. Sungyeol gnaws on his lip in thought, leaning a little further over Woohyun. “You have a fucking great body,” he says after a moment. “And you work really hard on it. They thought you’d like to show it off and make the ladies happy.”
“I know,” Woohyun says again with a sigh. “I know they cast idols for their looks and their names, so I shouldn’t be surprised when they do it for me, but….” He trails off, reaching up and idly working his fingers into Sungyeol’s hair. Sungyeol just continues to study his face, seeing the tightness around his eyes that comes from too little sleep, the discouraged droop of his mouth, the little imperfections of his skin that are usually slathered over with bb cream. “I sometimes just wish that wasn’t all people see of me.”
Sungyeol actually takes his time to think of how to respond to that, because he can see that Woohyun hates feeling this way and the last thing Sungyeol wants is to make him regret voicing it in front of him. When he speaks, he isn’t sure that he has the words right, but he’s trying. “They’re strangers, Woohyun. They’re an audience. They like you because you entertain them, and you do a really good job of it. But they don’t really know you. You’re only showing just a small part of yourself to them, because you can’t give everything away or you won’t have anything left for yourself. It’s not you being fake. It’s you being…smart.”
Woohyun’s eyes are steady on Sungyeol’s face for a long moment, and then he tugs on Sungyeol’s hair. Sungyeol knows what he wants, bends his face down to kiss him. He feels Woohyun relax beneath him, and for the thousandth time he wonders at the way that Woohyun seems to be most relaxed—most himself—when Sungyeol is kissing him. Sungyeol knows how he feels: everything seems so much easier, so much less heavy, so much less important, when Woohyun is kissing him.
Woohyun’s eyes are a bit clearer when they pull back, but not enough to set Sungyeol at ease. “Nobody who knows you really thinks you’re just a greaseball with aegyo and abs,” he says. “The people who matter know you’re more than that. You just…can’t let anyone else matter.” Sungyeol knows it’s not that easy, not simple at all, especially not for Woohyun, who is so attuned to what other people want and who hungers to make them happy more than anyone Sungyeol has ever met. Woohyun can’t help caring what other people think any more than Sungyeol can help having no confidence about his singing abilities. But maybe if Sungyeol keeps saying it over, it’ll sink into Woohyun’s mind and start to make a difference. Maybe if he remembers that he always makes Sungyeol happy, it’ll be easier to deal with.
“Besides,” he says with a shrug. “No matter how many hearts you throw at fangirls, I still let you fuck me, so, honestly, there really isn’t anything you should be complaining about.”
Woohyun picks up the script and smacks Sungyeol in the head with it, and Sungyeol flops down beside him, laughing. “You over your moodiness now?”
Sungyeol knows the answer to that question, can see it in the tension still lurking at the corners of Woohyun’s eyes. But he does look like he’s feeling a little better, and when he answers, Sungyeol knows he’s ready to escape from this topic, from this set of worries. “Not really—now I have to figure out how I’m going to suck so hard at basketball like the script says,” Woohyun says with a dramatic shrug. Sungyeol rolls his eyes: his boyfriend is such a drama queen (he’ll never admit it’s one of the things he loves most about Woohyun). “How can I possibly hold back my athletic prowess? I’m going to make every basket even when I try not to,” he adds, adding a fake but profound sigh for punctuation.
So this is what they’re doing. Okay, Sungyeol can do this. He elbows Woohyun in the side. “Sure, because we all know you’re a basketball prodigy. Where did they get the nerve to ask you to miss?”
“This is going to be a big blow to my NBA career. I was going to go to America and everything! But they’ll never sign me once they see me make a fool of myself on TV. This drama will taint the name of Nam Woohyun forever.” He wipes a fake tear from his eye, pretending to sniffle.
Sungyeol snorts. “Speaking of which, I can’t believe they’re just using your name—is the writer so lame she can’t even invent one? It’s really not that hard; even the While You Were Sleeping writers managed it. Do they think this is a documentary or something?”
“No, if it were a documentary it would involve a lot more sweating in practice rooms at three in the morning and a lot fewer females,” Woohyun answers. “But at least I get the girl in the end, that’s something.”
“Oh, so it’s a girl you want, is it?”
Woohyun turns onto his side to face him, smirk in place. “Yeah, got any ideas where I can find one?”
Sungyeol pretends to think deeply about this. “I think I’ve heard of them before—smaller than us, no dick, tits? That sound right?”
“Yeah, I’ve even seen one once or twice. I hear they smell really good and they never have to use the bathroom.”
“Yeah, and they live on just a sip of water.”
Woohyun is laughing as he rolls them over, pinning Sungyeol down on the bed and kissing him deep. And even if Dongwoo comes in not five minutes later insisting that they come play some new video game with him—Dongwoo is really good at totally ignoring any and all public displays of affection, acting like nothing awkward is happening in front of him, probably because he couldn’t ever find any kind of touching awkward—so they never get past making out, Woohyun is a lot more cheerful now and Sungyeol thinks that maybe—maybe—he’s getting a hang of this ‘being a good boyfriend’ thing.
iv.
It’s fifteen minutes till broadcast, but it’s all the time they’re going to get today—schedules have been insane lately and if the look in Sunggyu’s eyes is any indication, they aren’t going to slow down any time soon—so as soon as the stylist noona is done with the finishing touches on his makeup, Sungyeol hops out of the chair and grabs Woohyun by the arm, pulling him out into the hallway and around a corner. Sunggyu gives them a warning glare as they slip out the door, and Sungyeol waves in acknowledgment. Woohyun had been texting furiously—probably to Key—and almost trips as Sungyeol pulls him along, but he doesn’t seem annoyed at all, righting himself and shoving his phone into his pocket.
“What’s up?” he asks, because it’s clear Sungyeol isn’t wanting to make out or something; they don’t risk that in public anymore, not ever (or at least almost never). Not only is there a chance of getting caught, there’s also a chance Sungjong or Key would find out, and that’s practically scarier.
“What did you need to tell me?” Sungyeol asks, and okay, they can’t kiss, and crowding in as close as he’d like to Woohyun’s body is probably a bad idea too—if someone sees them, they can’t write it off as fanservice if they’re alone in a back corridor—but he slips his finger into one of Woohyun’s belt loops because he needs to be touching him somehow.
“I never said I needed to—“
“You think I can’t tell, dumbass? You’ve been making ‘sneak away with me’ faces all morning and not the fun kind.”
Woohyun smirks a bit at that before sobering. “Yeah—I—it’s about the drama.”
“What about it?” It has to be something fairly serious if Woohyun wouldn’t talk about it in front of the other guys. Sungyeol isn’t all tensed up with anxiety as he was back when Woohyun was avoiding telling him about his casting—the looks Woohyun has been giving him aren’t nearly so worried this time—but there’s clearly something Woohyun isn’t thrilled about telling him. Fuck the world for doing this to them all the time. Why can’t it just leave them alone?
“They, uh, they want Sunggyu-hyung to do a cameo.”
Sungyeol blinks. “Okay…?”
“As my best friend, the one I go to for advice and stuff.”
Woohyun shifts his feet a little as Sungyeol just looks at him blankly. Why was this something they couldn’t talk about in front of the others? And why is Woohyun getting twitchy about it? And then— “Oh, come on, Woo, you didn’t really think I’d care about that did you?” He’d almost be annoyed or offended or something, but he’s truthful enough with himself to know that past experience has given Woohyun a right to be worried. But still: even he’s not that pathetic.
Woohyun relaxes visibly at Sungyeol’s dismissive words, a smile beginning to tug at the corners of his lips. “Well, I mean, it isn’t you and—“
“Fuck, Woohyun, I’m not going to be a baby about this. They asked because of the Woogyu thing—nobody knows about us—we don’t want anyone to know about us. Of course when they think of you they think of Sunggyu-hyung next. You’re one of the fanservice couples. It just makes sense.”
Woohyun’s grin shines with his relief, but there’s also a little bit of sheepishness in his eyes. “Yeah, I know you say that doesn’t bother you—“
Time to make at least this much clear. “I’m not just saying that, Woo. Don’t you think I’d let you know if it was bugging me?” Woohyun smirks and rolls his eyes, but Sungyeol can see the fondness in the gestures. “I really don’t care about fanservice. It’s not real, we both know that. It’s not like you care about Myungsoo hanging all over me or whatever.”
“Of course not! He’s your best friend!”
“Right, and I’m your boyfriend and I know I’m the one you want to be with when we’re alone, so I don’t care about you and Sunggyu-hyung making fangirls scream and I don’t even care about you and Dongwoo-hyung cuddling all over the place.” Sungyeol really wants to drop his head down and press his forehead against Woohyun’s; that’s what he’d do if they were alone. “I don’t even know if I’d want for us to let all the fans know, even if we could. It wouldn’t…it wouldn’t feel right.”
Woohyun does that thing with his eyebrows that’s so sexy it usually drives Sungyeol to shove him up against a wall. (Sungyeol never would have thought he could find anything about eyebrows sexy, but that was before Nam Woohyun.) Sungyeol’s finger tightens in Woohyun’s belt loop. “You’re saying you’re ashamed of me? Don’t want the world to know that you’d settle for someone like me?” Woohyun teases.
Sungyeol rolls his eyes. “Oh, yeah, that’s it. I couldn’t possibly want everyone to know that I’m dating a fucking hot fellow idol. What will people think of me?”
Woohyun’s grin widens at the compliment; Sungyeol’s still not so good at saying out loud how amazing he thinks Woohyun is, and Woohyun beams every time he does. It sometimes makes Sungyeol feel guilty that he doesn’t verbalize his feelings enough, but he knows Woohyun understands. That’s just not him and it never will be. “Honestly, I think I’m the one who should be worried about people’s reactions.”
Once, Sungyeol might have worried that Woohyun’s sharp tongue might tease a bit too much, might cross some line and actually hurt him. But those days are long gone, so he lets his thumb sneak up under the hem of Woohyun’s shirt and press against the skin over his hipbone as he asks, “Oh, yeah, why’s that?”
It might be Sungyeol’s imagination, but he’s pretty sure Woohyun’s eyes go dark at the small caress. “Can you imagine what they’d think of me? If they knew I settled for you? Surely I could do better than this hilarious, tall, gorgeous model of a guy, right?”
Again with the wanting to shove Woohyun up against the wall; Sugyeol’s fingers twitch against the fabric of Woohyun’s pants and his thumb makes little circles against Woohyun’s skin, making Woohyun’s lips part in a gasp. Good—time to throw him off a little. Sungyeol knows his ears are probably pink; no matter how many times Woohyun says things like that to him—tells him that he’s gorgeous or funny or smart or brilliant or whatever—Sungyeol still isn’t used to it. It makes his insides squirm, and most of the pushing-Woohyun-against-a-wall comes from wanting to shut up him up so Sungyeol won’t be so embarrassed—most of it. “Fuck, you’re so greasy.”
“Only for you, baby,” Woohyun smirks, and the joke is funny because of how untrue it is: even if he’s easier than Sungyeol will ever be with giving compliments, Woohyun saves most of his grease for the fans, and Sungyeol doesn’t expect that to change any time soon. Not that he’d want it to: his grease is just one of the many ways Woohyun throws himself into being the best idol he can be, and even though Sungyeol sometimes hates how he overworks himself, he can’t help but love him for it, too. No one wants people to be happy as much as Woohyun does, and that’s pretty fucking amazing.
Woohyun goes serious, though, shifting a little so his hip is that much closer to Sungyeol. “I know what you mean, though. Sometimes the fan stuff makes it weird with Gyu, and it’s like I have to think about what people will think every time I smile at him or touch him or say anything to him at all when we’re in public. I wouldn’t want us to be that way.”
Sungyeol is on the same page. Maybe if they were regular people, eventually he wouldn’t mind walking around holding Woohyun’s hand (at least in Hongdae or some other area where it’s slightly more socially acceptable) or telling everyone they knew that they were dating (and by ‘everyone’ he means ‘everyone who wouldn’t lose their shit about it’). But he doesn’t want the fans to ever know, all those strangers with their entitlement and their curiosity and their shipping; he’s grateful for the fans, thinks most of them are probably pretty great people (crazies aside), but even with the good ones, he doesn’t want them getting their grubby hands all over what he and Woohyun have. That many people knowing and speculating and prying for more information, it would change something about their relationship, make it less theirs. What he and Woohyun are to each other belongs to them and it isn’t anyone else’s business. The other members and a few other good friends know, but even they only get to see the surface of it, despite the fact that Sungyeol trusts them with his life. But no matter how much he loves and trusts them, he still doesn’t want them to know everything. He doesn’t want to share it with anyone. It’s theirs.
Let the fans think Woohyun and Sunggyu belong together. When they finally get to take off their idol masks, Sungyeol is the one Woohyun wants.
This would be the time to kiss Woohyun, to pull him as close as they can get and slide his tongue into Woohyun’s mouth, except that they’re in public and he can hear a stir behind him that says that they’re probably about to be called onto the stage.
He glances over his shoulder and Woohyun looks over, too, and without talking about it, Sungyeol releases Woohyun’s belt loop and they fall into step headed back down the hall. “I’m going to give Sunggyu-hyung a hard time about it, though,” Sungyeol announces, Woohyun’s fingers brushing against his and briefly twining together before they turn the corner and are back in the rush of things.
“So what else is new?” Woohyun says with a grin, putting his phone with his bag and waving to acknowledge Sunggyu pointing them towards the stage.
“He always said he had absolutely no interest in acting—‘I’m a singer, a musician, I’m not going to get distracted by things like that,’” Sungyeol mocks in a surprisingly good imitation of Sunggyu’s voice. Woohyun is laughing as they head out on stage, his fingers brushing against Sungyeol’s one more time before they have to be idols again.
v.
Sungyeol doesn’t say much after the episode is over. The others—the others who are home: Hoya, Sungjong, Dongwoo—are laughing and talking, already arguing about what who gets to watch what next, but Sungyeol rises immediately and starts heading towards his room.
“Hey!” Hoya shouts after him as he reaches the door. “Are you really going to let your man go on TV and show off his body like that for the whole world to see? I’d never let my man do that.”
Sungyeol knows he’s teasing; Hoya is anything but conservative about things like that. But he’s not in the mood to mess around. “Yeah, well, you don’t have a man and you’re not ever going to.”
“Yeah, because I’m going to have a lady instead,” Hoya retorts.
“Whatever, I’ve seen you checking out Sungjong while he changes.”
“Hyung!”
Sungyeol slips into his room and closes the door behind him before he can fall victim to Sungjong’s wrath. He flops down on Myungsoo’s bed, blowing his bangs out of his eyes with the force of his sigh, and digging in his pocket for his phone as it vibrates.
home soon. missed you, the text from Woohyun reads, reminding Sungyeol that he hasn’t seen Woohyun all day, and he groans and buries his face in the pillow. It’s not much—they have to be careful with what they send via text; it’s not unheard of for idols’ phones to get hacked and they can’t risk anything incriminating—but just those few words are enough to send a pulse of helpless love through Sungyeol. Fuck, he loves Woohyun so much. He’d been thinking of that as he watched Woohyun’s television debut earlier with the other guys, as he watched how Woohyun threw himself into the acting just like he does into everything else. He’d looked good—though, admittedly, Sungyeol thinks he always looks good—and he’d been shining with excitement in a way that made Sungyeol’s heart ache. But…
Sungyeol doesn’t want to think about the ‘but,’ so he just keeps his face in the pillow, cycling around and around in his head, trying to avoid the thing he doesn’t want to think about, but it doesn’t matter: he keeps carouseling back to it, until his overworked mind and his perpetually-sleep-deprived body say enough is enough.
A shake of his shoulder is what wakes him, and he must have been even more exhausted than he thought, because usually he’s jolted into wakefulness the moment someone opens the door. He mops a hand over his groggy face, flipping over onto his back to see Woohyun sitting on the edge of the bed and smiling down on him.
“Why did you decide to take a nap on your face on Myungsoo’s bed?”
“There wasn’t any deciding about it,” Sungyeol answers, voice husky.
“Oh, so you were just trying to suffocate yourself, then?”
Sungyeol tries to hide his wince. That hits a little too close to home. “Something like that.”
“Well, please don’t, because if I don’t have you around, I’m pretty sure I’ll die from sexual frustration, and then what will my fangirls do?”
“Find someone else with chocolate abs and too much grease to be obsessed with?”
“Dumbass,” Woohyun says, and Sungyeol doesn’t have a chance to shoot back an insult because Woohyun’s leaning down and kissing him, and, as always, it’s the best feeling in the world. Before Woohyun, Sungyeol had sometimes wondered how people stay together for decades, how they don’t grow tired of each other after a few years. Now he knows.
Still greeting Woohyun’s mouth with his own, Sungyeol slips his arms around Woohyun’s waist and gives him a good yank, and Woohyun tumbles half on top of him before extricating himself long enough to stretch out beside Sungyeol. Sungyeol pushes him onto his back, moving over him and capturing his lips again in a deep, long kiss. And then another. And another.
Finally Woohyun pulls back and tugs on Sungyeol’s hair with the fingers that are already tangled in it. “Missed me that much?”
Always. “Missed your mouth.”
“Sometimes I feel like I’m just a mouth and a dick and an asshole to you.”
“You’re definitely two of those things.”
It’s been a week or two since they’ve had the time to make out like this, deep and unhurried, taking the time to get to know each other again. The warmth of Woohyun, his smell, the taste of him—they turn Sungyeol on and allow him to relax at the same time, and he’ll never understand how Woohyun can give him both of those things at the same time, but he’s just so grateful that he does.
Eventually, Woohyun tries to draw back, but Sungyeol chases his mouth down, and does it again the next time Woohyun shows signs of stopping. Eventually Woohyun grabs Sungyeol by the shoulders and pulls him away.
“Are we going to make out all night?”
“Do you have any objections?”
“Not really, but I’d kind of like to find out what you thought of my drama first.”
Fuck. Sungyeol schools his face pretty quickly, but Woohyun is always so damn observant when it comes to him, and his eyes are already narrowing by the time Sungyeol manages to work up a smile.
“Oh. I see. You were hoping if you kept my mouth occupied long enough I wouldn’t ask.”
“Woohyun—“
“No, I get it. I guess that tells me what I need to know, right?” Woohyun’s mouth is turned up at the corners, but that’s not a smile, even if it’s trying to be, and Sungyeol’s heart is stuttering into a panicked rhythm.
“Woo, no, I didn’t—“
“It must have been pretty damn bad if you don’t want to talk about it. I guess that’s not much of a surprise; I didn’t think I was great or anything.” Woohyun’s voice is never so rough as when he’s trying to be light and not managing it at all, and the sound of it always makes Sungyeol’s stomach churn.
“Woo—“
“I just thought I’d give it a try—I guess even I can’t be good at everything—“
Fuck, now he’s joking and at his own expense, and Sungyeol hasn’t hated himself this much in a long while.
“Woo—“
“It’s a good thing it’s only a few episodes—can you imagine if it were one of those 50 episode-long sageuks? I don’t know how I’d look with the long hair—probably not as good as you but then you’re the actor so I guess it doesn’t matter—“
Sungyeol’s hand clamps down over Woohyun’s mouth and Woohyun blinks at him over the top of it. Sungyeol takes a ragged breath, trying to calm his sickeningly fast heartbeat and get hold of his cycloning thoughts long enough to think of something to say. “I’m going to talk now, okay?” he says finally. “That was a dick move, me trying to distract you like that, I’m sorry.”
He slowly lowers his hand, and Woohyun stays silent, just looking up at him with eyes that only show the slightest bit of hurt around the edges. Fuck, Sungyeol really is the worst at this.
This is one of those times when he wishes he could lie easily. He rarely wishes that; most of the time he prides himself on his honesty (‘lack of tact and respect,’ Sunggyu says, but Sungyeol knows otherwise). But there are times, with Woohyun, that Sungyeol can understand why people lie to each other to spare each others’ feelings. There’s nothing in the whole world worse than hurting Woohyun, nothing. And if he could lie to keep from doing that, well….
But he can’t. That’s not who he is, and it’s not who he’s ever going to be. He’s willing to change a lot of things about himself for Woohyun, but not that. Most of the time he comforts himself by reminding himself that Woohyun wouldn’t want him to change that, that Woohyun values his honesty as much as he himself does. But right now he thinks he might be about to hurt Woohyun enough that Woohyun might wish Sungyeol could lie, too.
He can’t lie. But there are different ways to tell the truth, he’s learning, and some of them are better than others.
“The drama isn’t awful,” he says first, because it’s true, and because he’s pretty sure Woohyun knows all this already. “It’s not good either, but it’s definitely not awful.”
“I know that,” Woohyun says, and there’s the slightest bit of petulance about the way he says it and fuck, sometimes he’s really adorable. Woohyun isn’t the petulant type, but on the rare occasions that he is…
“Right. And the dialogue is…pretty rough, and…you’re not a good enough actor to rise above it—but!” he continues, before the hurt can spread any further. “There are very few who would be—I’m certainly not! And even fewer young actors—maybe Myungsoo’s friend Sung Joon or something, but almost no one else could.”
Woohyun’s eyes calm as Sungyeol explains, and Sungyeol lets out an inward sigh of relief that Woohyun can be rational about this, that he wasn’t expecting to be lauded as the next big thing or something like that.
But what he’s going to say next, well, that’s different. He sighs and drops his forehead against Woohyun’s chest, breathing in the smell of him and rubbing his forehead against the soft cotton. “Do you really want to know what I think? Like—really?” he mumbles into Woohyun’s t-shirt. You could say no. We could just not talk about this. It might be better.
Woohyun is quiet for a minute, and then his fingers are there, running through Sungyeol’s hair again. “Your opinion is the only one I really care about.”
Once, Sungyeol might have laughed at that, thinking it was a pathetic lie or at least some kind of joke, since it’s clear to anyone that Woohyun cares about everyone’s opinion of him. But now he knows what Woohyun means by that: other opinions might matter, but Sungyeol’s trumps all of them. It makes his insides tremble, that knowledge; sometimes he thinks the weight of this—of Woohyun’s heart—is way too much for him to handle, that it’s too heavy and he’s too clumsy, that one day he’ll shatter it completely without half-meaning to and then he’ll have to hate himself for the rest of his life. Sometimes he wonders why Woohyun trusts him with it at all; he’s never done anything to make Woohyun think he’ll take care of it well. There are so many other people who would do a better job guarding it.
But he knows that Woohyun wants him, as crazy as that is, and he wants Woohyun so much that he feels like Woohyun’s name must be written in microscopic letters on every cell of his body. Woohyun chose him, and he chose Woohyun, and he’s got to at least try to be worthy of that.
He thinks it might be easier if he could say it like this, face buried in Woohyun’s chest, without Woohyun’s eyes looking at him at all. But that would be cowardly, and though Sungyeol knows that he’s sometimes the biggest coward in the world (especially compared to Woohyun’s full-hearted bravery), he can’t do that to Woohyun.
He raises his head reluctantly and meets Woohyun’s guarded eyes, and when he speaks, his voice cracks more than usual. “I don’t think acting is your gift.”
It’s the kindest way he could think to say it, but something still flickers in Woohyun’s eyes, and Sungyeol thinks he would throw himself on a sword or something dramatic like that if it meant he could keep those words from hurting Woohyun like that.
Woohyun clears his throat a couple of times, then nods jerkily. “Well, at least I’m good at singing.”
“You’re fucking amazing at singing,” Sungyeol is quick to reassure him, and that’s the absolute truth.
“Am I—am I worse than Myungsoo?” The words and the forced twist of his mouth make it sound like a joke, but Sungyeol can see his eyes, and he knows it isn’t.
“You’re definitely not worse than Jiu.” That, at least, is true.
Woohyun’s gaze jerks away from his for a second before returning. “Worse than Flower Boy Band?”
How the fuck is he supposed to say this? Quit asking, Woo, please. “There was a way, way, way better director and writer on Flower Boy Band. That makes a big difference, Woo.”
Woohyun nods again, and his eyes wander away from Sungyeol’s, and that’s when he realizes what else he can say. The truth doesn’t always have to be stark and blunt and on its own. You can wrap the harsh things up in other things that are also true and a lot more welcome, the softness of them swaddling the sharp edges of the painful things. Once, Sungyeol would have thought that that was dishonest, that it was just an excuse. But now he’s beginning to think that it’s just…wise.
“But none of that matters.”
Woohyun’s eyes jerk back to his. “What?”
“For one thing,” Sungyeol says, sitting up—the knowledge that he can make this better for Woohyun is pulsing through him, making it impossible for him to stay reclining, “nobody’s good when they start out. You can definitely get better, especially if you work with better directors next time.”
Woohyun gives him a look that borders on nasty. “Next time?”
Sungyeol doesn’t mind the look. “If you want to,” he says with a nod. There are so many really bad idol actors. Why shouldn’t Woohyun keep trying if he really wants to?
“Yeah, like I really want to after hearing from my boyfriend that I suck.”
“I didn’t say you suck! I wouldn’t say that!”
“No, but that’s what you meant.”
“No it’s—“ Off Woohyun’s look, he reroutes. “Okay, fine, it is! You sucked! But everyone sucks when they start out!” He smacks his hand down on the bed beside him. “Everyone does! You can keep trying, and you will get better, because I know you, and you work your ass off at everything and you keep going until you get good at it—remember when you couldn’t dance? And now you’re one of the best in the group. There’s no way you won’t end up the same way with acting if you try. I literally can’t think of anything else you’re bad at. And it’s okay to suck at things! I suck at singing, and I’m still in an idol group! And you’re good at, like, everything else! It wouldn’t be fair to the rest of the world if you were naturally good at this, too!”
“Sungyeol,” Woohyun sighs, and he sounds really tired. “I know. I know all that. I just…”
“What?” Sungyeol prompts, because he needs to know, needs to know what in particular is hurting Woohyun the most about this situation, so he can know what to say or do—or at least try to figure it out, even if he ends up blundering it as he usually does.
“I just…I went on television in front of millions of people and now you’re telling me I’m bad at it, and I can’t help but feel like I’ve made a big fool out of myself and that people—“ He stops abruptly and looks away, but Sungyeol doesn’t need for him to finish. Sungyeol knows what he’s thinking: and that people won’t like me anymore. Of course. This is Woohyun.
The old Sungyeol, the Sungyeol-before-Woohyun, might have said something flippant about how there probably weren’t anywhere close to millions watching that particular drama, but that isn’t who Sungyeol is anymore—that isn’t who he’s ever going to be again. He moves to stretch himself out over Woohyun again, needing to be close to him, needing Woohyun to feel him there. Woohyun still doesn’t look at him. “No,” Sungyeol says, and he sees Woohyun’s eyes dart around, even if they don’t come to focus on him. “You didn’t make a fool out of yourself. It wasn’t like that. Because that’s the other reason why it didn’t matter how good you were at acting.”
Woohyun finally looks up at him, skepticism bordering on exasperation on his face but something smaller and more fragile in his eyes. “What the hell are you talking about, Yeol?”
“You. You were there, and you were you. And it didn’t matter if your acting was amazing or terrible, because I’m telling you: all the girls who were watching were falling in love with you anyway. Because you may have been playing a flat, greasy character, but you were still showing through, Woohyun, I swear. And all of the women watching fell in love with the way you did, I’m telling you. I know it.”
Woohyun is very, very still for a moment, and in that moment Sungyeol has to hold his breath because he can’t read Woohyun’s eyes. You know I’d never lie to you, Woohyun. You know I mean this. You just have to let yourself believe it. The moment stretches and pulls and it feels like Sungyeol’s heart is doing the same.
And then: “Yeah?”
Woohyun’s voice is small and clearly aiming at casual, but Sungyeol can see the dawning hope in his eyes. “Yeah, Woohyun. Yeah. I promise. No one who watched that will think less of you. They’ll love the character because you’re playing it. I know it.” The words feel odd in his mouth, too sincere by far, but he says them without hesitation. This is Woohyun.
Woohyun is quiet again for a long moment, and then his hand steals up and splays across Sungyeol’s chest, the tips of his fingers brushing against Sungyeol’s collarbone. “That’s not what I wanted to hear.”
Sungyeol’s heart grinds to a halt, his stomach lurching. What? He’d thought—he’d thought he said the right thing (for once), he’d thought it was getting through to Woohyun and now—but, fuck, what will he say now, what can he say if that didn’t work, what’s he going to do—
Woohyun is talking, but the words barely connect with Sungyeol. “It’s nice to hear that the girls will fall in love with me,” he says. “But it’s not really girls I’m concerned about.”
And then a little bit of a smile tugs at the corner of Woohyun’s mouth and those little dimples underneath pop up and—
“Woohyun,” Sungyeol says warningly as things start to piece themselves together. “You better not—“
“I only care if this one guy I’m sort of into falls for me.”
“Woohyun, I told you—“
“I’ve had my eye on him for a while. He’s tall and ridiculously gorgeous and the wittiest person I know and—“
“Woohyun, don’t you start—“
“and I kind of think he likes me back, but I’m not quite sure and—“
“Nam Woohyun!” Sungyeol shouts, and Woohyun is laughing, and Sungyeol pounces and there’s a tussle and kisses and a few annoyed growls from Sungyeol and maybe some groping and more kisses and when they finally roll to a stop, Sungyeol on top again, they’re both panting from laughter and kisses.
Woohyun yanks at Sungyeol’s hair—a habit Sungyeol has gotten used to by now. “At least you didn’t tell me not to quit my day job,” Woohyun says with a grin.
“Well, I could—“
“Don’t even think about it.”
Woohyun looks up at him for a moment longer, eyes dark and grin dying away, and then he reaches up and pulls Sungyeol’s head down till their cheeks are pressed against each other, Woohyun’s smooth one against Sungyeol’s soft one, and Woohyun’s mouth is right against his ear, his lips moving against the earrings, and then he says, quiet but fierce, “You need to be told that, too.” Sungyeol jumps in surprise, not sure what’s going on here, but Woohyun’s arm slips around his waist and holds him down. “I know sometimes you wonder what you have to offer to Infinite.” Woohyun’s voice is always rougher than usual when he’s being sincere in a way he doesn’t feel entirely comfortable with, and the sound of it rasping against Sungyeol’s ear makes Sungyeol shiver. Fuck, Woohyun. “And singing might not be your gift. But you have no idea how many people fall in love with you every time you go out there and show yourself. And you’re always so honest and so they know it’s you and—and that’s what you give. You’re really fucking easy to fall in love with, Lee Sungyeol.”
Sungyeol feels like his chest is contracting; he can’t breathe. Woohyun….
“And I know how much it hurts you that you don’t get any roles.” Sungyeol can feel the husk of Woohyun’s voice in his fingers and toes. “And I can’t tell you why, because I know you deserve them, and I’d do anything to get them for you—“ Sungyeol tries to hitch away, but Woohyun’s arm tightens, holding him close, and Sungyeol is panting hard against Woohyun’s ear. “I can’t tell you why the world is so fucking unfair, and I won’t tell you that you’ll get everything you want because I don’t know that, no matter how much I want it for you. But it’s not because you aren’t good enough—it’s because the world isn’t fucking good enough for you, and don’t you dare tell me I’m greasy because it’s the truth, and anyone who can’t see how amazing you are is completely fucking blind.”
Sungyeol is caught somewhere between trembling and paralysis, between wanting to shove Woohyun away with a quip about how greasy he is and wanting to curl up against him, maybe even cry. As hard as it is for Sungyeol to say out loud the things Woohyun means to him, sometimes it’s even harder for him to hear Woohyun say these things to him—to hear them and to convince himself that Woohyun really means them. It makes him feel so raw, so hypersensitive that he almost can’t stand it, like he’s about to come out of his skin and blow apart and—
And now Woohyun is turning his head and their lips are meeting and the figuring out how to react doesn’t matter because this is the answer to everything, to every single problem in his life: him and Woohyun and together, as close as they can get, as close as they can get. Woohyun.
Sometimes, Sungyeol thinks hazily before his mind gets pulled completely into the tide of Woohyun, they both manage to figure out exactly what to say.