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“He likes you, you know.”
Yeongwoon stilled, his hand on the doorknob. Taegu had somehow heard about his stop at the hospital last week and came by with a bag of miscellaneous, over-the-counter medicine for him to keep on hand. The visit was unannounced, but considering that Seoin had still been asleep when Yeongwoon heard the first knock, he thought he had nothing to worry about in terms of another awkward confrontation. So much for that, then.
“What?” Yeongwoon blinked, furrowing his eyebrows. “No he doesn’t. Not like that, anyway.”
A condescending smile pulled at the corners of Seoin’s mouth before he released a puff of air through his nose and dropped his head. He reached up and rubbed his palm over his eyes, still leaning back against the kitchen island. His other hand was bracing the edge of it, tapping at it with his fingers. “Only you could possibly go this long without realizing it. Without seeing the way he looks at you.”
“You’re being ridiculous,” Yeongwoon said, finally stepping away from the door. He made his way over to Seoin and stood in front of him, trying to get a look at his expression. But his bangs were hanging too far over his eyes, obscuring his face. “Taegu hyung’s been there for me since I was a kid.”
A moment passed before Seoin eased his grip on the counter and lifted his head, meeting Yeongwoon’s gaze. He had the kind of look in his eyes that never failed to make Yeongwoon uneasy on his feet, feeling like he’d been caught doing something he shouldn’t have and was now boxed in, unable to run away. His tiny apartment was the wrong place to be having this conversation.
“Sure.” Seoin smiled again. “Except that gangsters don’t usually hang around sixteen year olds out of the kindness of their hearts, Yeongwoon. Why else do you think he does all this shit for you, paying for everything and coming over at a moment’s notice to—”
“You don’t know anything about him," Yeongwoon cut him off, starting to feel a little defensive on Taegu’s behalf. “But even if he were a bad person, what is it to you? I don’t work for him anymore, I work for you. There’s nothing for you to worry about.”
Seoin’s took a step away from the counter, drawing closer to Yeongwoon. “You know this isn’t about work. You’re not obligated to be around me like… like that.”
The tone of his voice conflicted with the way he was glaring at Yeongwoon, like the mere idea of this relationship—no, this whatever it was, being bound merely through business made him want to spit the words out as if they were poison. It made no sense. From the beginning, Seoin had always taken whatever he wanted without a second thought. He was the kind of person who made promises without meaning them and whispered sweet words against your skin just to hear the sound of his own voice.
Maybe not always. Not during that first year, when Yeongwoon wasn’t sure what he meant to Seoin but knew that he’d agree to whatever the boy wanted to label them as. But that was before the decade spent staring at billboards of his former best friend and wondering what led Seoin to decide on the bleach-blond hair that made him look so unlike himself. Before Yeongwoon realized his place in Seoin’s life had never been anything more than a waving hand, pulling him in and out whenever Seoin craved the convenience of it. And it was Yeongwoon’s own fault that he had let himself slip back into the comforting touch of that hand now.
“Aren’t I?” he asked, forcing himself not to look away from Seoin’s hardening gaze. “I’m your manager. It’s kind of my whole job.”
“Oh, yeah?” Seoin scoffed. He was close enough now that he was standing over Yeongwoon, less than a foot away. There was a difference of less than three inches of height between them, but whenever Seoin looked at Yeongwoon like this, it felt like much more. It made his stomach twist, made him want to turn on his heel and run away like he had done all those years before.
“So when you asked me to stop sleeping around and to use you instead, when you turned yourself over and let me fuck you into your own mattress, that was just you doing your job? Wow. I had no idea the responsibilities of a talent manager were so vulgar.”
“That’s not what I meant—”
Seoin turned away before Yeongwoon could finish, taking a step back and crossing his arms over his chest. It was only then that Yeongwoon noticed Seoin was wearing his old hoodie. It was a gray one from his judo days, back when he wore nearly everything oversized to cover up the bruises his dad left littered across his body after a bad competition. It was much tighter on Seoin’s body now, but not to the point that he looked entirely out of place in it. And the longer Yeongwoon looked, the clearer it became that he’d actually seen Seoin in it before. He’d worn it to school once after Yeongwoon accidentally left it over at his house, refusing to take it off until the very end of the day.
“You said you wanted to,” Seoin’s said, his shoulders tensing up. “When I asked you in the dressing room, you said you didn’t want me to hook up with other people. You told me that.” He snorted abruptly. “I guess it’s my own fault for falling for it again. Jaewon would be having a fucking field day.”
The mention of Seoin’s brother had Yeongwoon stiffening, but he tried to disguise his discomfort by shifting on his feet and curling his fingers into the ends of his sleeves. Choosing to ignore the mention of Jaewon altogether, he said, “Falling for what?”
“This thing you do.” Seoin gestured towards him as if that made it make sense. “Being so nice to everyone, making them feel—it’s like you don’t even realize you’re doing it. Ask Haeyool. He’s probably still convinced you’re in love with him, too.”
“Too?”
Seoin froze and, for a moment, looked like he might be sick. “What?”
It’d probably be better to leave it alone. To move on and keep doing this back and forth of pretending that that year back in school meant nothing to either of them. Like Yeongwoon didn’t find himself drifting off to sleep sometimes and hearing Seoin’s laughter echoing in his ears. The way they’d spent hours playing on the gaming console in Seoin’s room on ten minute intervals, or whenever one of them died in-game. The way Seoin used to hold Yeongwoon’s hands while they kissed. For a while, he couldn’t think about that at all without remembering the kiss he walked in on at the end of it all—the one that made him feel like everything he knew about his relationship with Seoin was a lie.
But when it came to this man, Yeongwoon could never think straight. “You said, ‘he’s probably still convinced you’re in love with him too.’”
Seoin dropped his hands by his sides before stuffing them inside the pockets of his sweatpants. “Yeah, well. What can I say? Haeyool’s not one to give up easily. You dodged a bullet by not indulging him.”
“You did that,” Yeongwoon pointed out. “You sent his sponsor over in my place and told me not to go.”
For a second, Seoin couldn’t seem to hide the surprise on his face. He looked Yeongwoon up and down as though studying him and said, “What would you have done, then? Fucked him like he so desperately wanted you to? How unfortunate that you didn’t get to follow through with that.”
“No, that’s not—” This was starting to get exhausting. Yeongwoon had his hands thrown up in irritation when he stopped and sighed, turning his attention back to Seoin’s tense form. “Why do you care either way? About him or Taegu hyung. None of it even affects you.”
He watched as Seoin absorbed the words, as they sunk into his skin and kickstarted whatever section of his brain was responsible for the dismissive attitude he always seemed to carry himself with nowadays. Seoin physically deflated, his gaze lowering so that he was staring at the floor beneath him. “You left,” was all he eventually said.
But Yeongwoon knew what he was referring to. It was the same thing Seoin had tried to bring up just a few days prior, fresh from a shower and lying comfortably on Yeongwoon’s bed. “I’ve been wondering… why you disappeared like that ten years ago, and what you’ve been up to since.” He’d said it slowly, almost like he was afraid the mere mention of it would send Yeongwoon off running like a spooked animal. And he wasn’t wrong, really. Yeongwoon didn’t want to talk about it. He didn’t want to verbalize the way it felt to see Seoin kissing Jaewon in that classroom, to realize in that moment that it really had all just been some strange sort of practice. A game. Yeongwoon wasn’t special, or needed, and he never had been.
What a humiliating thing to be asked to admit out loud. He couldn’t say that. “Yes, I did.”
Seoin flinched, and it was so abnormal to see from him that Yeongwoon automatically assumed he imagined it. “Why?”
“Because I…” He thought of the way Jaewon sneered while crouching above him on the pavement, one of his friends pressing Yeongwoon’s face harder against it. Of the way his ribs ached for the next couple of days every time he inhaled, and how much it hurt to flee the school hallway after seeing the two siblings like that. In the following weeks, he couldn’t tell if the pain in his chest was from his injuries or something deeper, more internal. But he knew now. “I had to get out of there.”
That, at least, wasn’t a total lie.
“I waited for you outside my house, the day of my flight,” Seoin said. He still wouldn’t look Yeongwoon in the eyes. “And the whole time I was gone, I kept waiting for you to text me or call me or just give me any sign that something hadn’t happened to you. I took my phone into a repair shop because I thought it must not have been working right, and that’s why I wasn’t getting any messages from you. But they told me it was fine.” He scoffed again. “And then I got home and I found your note. Thanking me for letting you use my Switch. Like I gave a shit about the—anyway. Yoontae told me you weren’t coming back.”
Having pulled his hands back out of his pockets by this point, Seoin started tapping his index finger against his pant leg. “You told Yoontae, and not me.”
“I knew he wouldn’t have anybody to look out for him anymore,” Yeongwoon offered. It was a weak excuse, and they both saw right through it.
“You didn’t think I deserved to know?”
Yeongwoon opened his mouth before closing it, unsure what to say. He just kept seeing that kiss in his head, and all the other memories that became distorted in the wake of it. How many of the hours and hours that he spent at Seoin’s side were meant solely for Jaewon’s benefit? How long did Seoin plan on stringing him along, smiling whenever they kissed and falling asleep with his head tucked against Yeongwoon’s chest? “I figured you wouldn’t really care.”
“You—” Seoin stopped, his eyes blown wide. “And what the hell made you think that?”
Yeongwoon didn’t say anything in response, leaving Seoin to grasp at any conclusion he could possibly think of. “Did I do something wrong?” he asked, his voice starting to waver. “Was it because of what happened up on the hill?”
The question made Yeongwoon pause, recalling the memory. About a week before Seoin’s flight, just before another snowstorm was set to roll in, they had met up on the hill that overlooked the neighborhood to talk in one of the few places they had all to themselves. Our spot, Seoin called it. That day, he’d unzipped the backpack he had slung over his shoulders and pulled out a small knife. After freaking out over the sight of it and the creepy way Seoin was gripping it in his hand, Yeongwoon watched in confusion as Seoin pointed the tip of it against the wooden bench they were sitting on and began to carve into it.
“What are you doing?” Yeongwoon hissed at him, attempting half heartedly to swat the knife away. “This is public property! Other people use this bench.” But Seoin just waved him off, his bottom lip pulled between his teeth while he continued to etch lines into the wood. At one point, he told Yeongwoon to close his eyes. “Like you had me do on my birthday. Come on, it’s not like I’m gonna stab you. If I wanted to, I would’ve done it already.”
Yeongwoon rolled his eyes before complying, and when he was given the okay to open them again, he looked down and saw the initials “BY + PS” engraved on the bench in jagged handwriting. He furrowed his eyebrows, saying, “PS? Why did you write that?”
Blushing, Seoin tucked the knife back into his bag and scratched at the back of his neck. “It was my old name before I got adopted, remember? Park Seoin. I figured… since you already saw everything…”
Yeongwoon pressed his hand to the bench and ran his fingers over the carving, a smile on his face. It made him so foolishly happy that he leaned in and kissed Seoin right there without it being under the guise of practice and without the usual privacy that they tried to afford themselves. But then they were interrupted by snickering, and Yeongwoon pulled back to see Jaewon standing a few feet behind them, leaning against the side of a street light.
It was the last time they’d seen or spoken to each other as teenagers. Yeongwoon meant to go say goodbye to Seoin the day of his flight, putting whatever feelings he had about the kiss Seoin shared with Jaewon temporarily behind him, but he never got there. Jaewon made sure of that.
“No," he answered honestly, shaking his head. “It wasn’t because of what happened on the hill.”
“So what, then?” Seoin’s head snapped up, and his expression looked almost pained. “There has to be something. We were fine, weren’t we? I know he was being really weird to you that day, but I took care of it. He wasn’t going to bother you, Yeongwoon. I made him swear it. You didn’t have to… to disappear.”
The fact that Yeongwoon didn’t immediately say anything in response only made Seoin angrier, and he took another few steps back until he went lax and dropped down onto the couch. He put his head in his hands, covering his face. “Why do you trust Haeyool, and Taegu, and apparently everyone else you’ve ever met in your life except for me?”
Nothing but silence and the slight sound of Yeongwoon’s footsteps followed his words. Yeongwoon drew closer until he was standing just in front of Seoin, staring at the top of his downturned head. Seoin continued.
“I was never dumb enough to really think you loved me. But I thought you—we were friends, at least. We were. That was the only thing that kept me from losing it whenever Jaewon said you’d leave if you ever really got to know me. I thought he was just being an asshole, trying to get in my head the way he always did. But then you did leave, and you didn’t even say goodbye.”
He dug his fingers into his hair, clutching at the strands without quite tugging yet. Yeongwoon instinctively reached out to grab his wrists, and Seoin’s hands fell away from his face. He looked up, asking, “Was I really so awful that you had to get away from me forever?”
Yeongwoon’s mind drifted back to the multiple times over the past few weeks that he’d opened the door to Seoin’s apartment only to find everyone in various states of undress on the other side, Seoin typically at the center of it with a dazed, faraway look in his eyes. The first time he’d seen it, it rattled something in Yeongwoon’s bones because of how different that look was from the way Seoin used to smile whenever he had his hands on him. It was almost unnerving, and he thought of it again when Seoin was kneeling between his legs on the floor of his own apartment, taking Yeongwoon into his mouth on the basis of completing a transaction that Yeongwoon never meant to initiate. He made it seem so clinical, this thing that used to make Yeongwoon’s heart stop whenever they did it as teenagers.
He thought of how easily Seoin had called himself a whore, and the way he sounded when he was hovering over Yeongwoon in bed, saying it wasn’t enough, that he needed more. Like Yeongwoon was sand and Seoin couldn’t stop the grains from slipping through his fingers. Like the reason he couldn’t keep a grasp on Yeongwoon came down to some defect in Seoin’s very being, and because he didn’t know what exactly it was, he gave up on everything that made himself who he was. After all, if it hadn’t been enough to make Yeongwoon stay, then why keep it?
It was hard to reconcile these two people Yeongwoon now knew as the same person. The Han Seoin of glossy magazine covers and the one who sat in front of him now, wearing his old clothes.
Before he realized he was doing it, Yeongwoon reached out and stretched his hand over Seoin’s head, threading his fingers into the other man’s hair. Sometimes, when they were younger, Yeongwoon used to do it to help Seoin fall asleep. They didn’t sleep in the same bed often, but Seoin claimed he slept better whenever he did.
It seemed to have a similar effect now, despite everything. Seoin’s eyelids fluttered before he forced them back open and looked up at Yeongwoon, something like nostalgia coloring his expression. Yeongwoon cleared his throat. If he didn’t explain himself now, then when was he ever going to?
“I wanted to go visit you one day after exams, but you weren’t home. Your mom said Jaewon told her to tell me that you were still at school, trying to get your desk cleaned out before winter break. So I went, and I saw you and Jaewon there.”
Seoin’s eyes widened like he already had an idea as to what Yeongwoon was about to say.
“You were kissing him. Neither of you saw me, so I just left. I was going to pretend I didn’t see anything—”
“He said it was his one condition,” Seoin blurted out. He reached out and grabbed Yeongwoon’s other hand, holding it with his own to anchor Yeongwoon to this very spot and ensure he couldn’t disappear on him again. “He said that if I did it, he wouldn’t tell anyone what he saw you and I doing. I don’t know why I believed him. I was just so worried that you’d get scared off if he dangled it over your head—I would’ve done anything.” He pulled Yeongwoon’s hand towards him so that the back of it was brushing against his mouth, muffling his next few words. “But he knew that, of course he did. It’s my fault. If I hadn’t realized how much I—”
He stopped for a moment, looking like he realized he was rattling on too long. Going in a direction he hadn’t quite meant to. He swallowed and asked, “Is that all that happened?”
The feeling of the ice-cold pavement digging into his cheek wormed its way back to the front of Yeongwoon’s mind and he shook his head. “No. I did go to see you the day of your flight. But Jaewon… stopped me, and told me to leave you alone.”
It was a majorly oversimplified version of the truth, and he was deliberately leaving out the part about Seoin’s mother refusing to give him a way to contact Seoin after his phone broke, but it was the truth nonetheless.
“...Did he hurt you?”
The sound of the words as they hesitantly left Seoin’s mouth made Yeongwoon feel uneasy. It was like Seoin was afraid of hearing an affirmative answer, but already sort of expected one.
Yeongwoon wasn’t sure what possessed him to nod. Jaewon was dead, and there was nothing either of them could do now to make up for the decade they spent torn between resenting each other and clinging onto the memory of a face they were sure they’d never see again. Well—in person at least. Yeongwoon could leave, but he couldn’t stop Seoin from burning the branding of his face into every retail shop window he passed on his way to work for the next ten years of his life.
Yeongwoon didn’t notice Seoin getting up from the couch until his arms were already winding around his body, pulling him into an embrace so tight that Yeongwoon could smell his own soap on Seoin’s skin. He stiffened, which only caused Seoin to strengthen his hold.
“Don’t go," he said. “Please. I know you’re not—I’m sorry. Just stay.”
It had been so long since he last heard Seoin speak in that hushed tone that Yeongwoon couldn’t help but listen. He eventually brought his own hands up, curling them into the fabric of his hoodie. He didn’t know what to do with himself when Seoin was being so open. Over the past few weeks, he’d gotten used to the smirks and the thinly-veiled insults. The way Seoin phrased things a specific way just to make Yeongwoon squirm. After all, if anybody knew him well enough to do it, it would be Seoin. Even after all this time.
There was something he still wanted to ask, though. Just to hear it for himself. Yeongwoon swallowed and gripped the sweatshirt just a bit tighter. “So when you used to say it was practice for the person you liked, were you—”
“It was you,” Seoin answered. He dropped his forehead against Yeongwoon’s shoulder the way that once felt so natural before adding, “It had always been you.”
The confirmation of it made Yeongwoon feel like his blood had turned molten in his veins. He pulled away from the hug and waited for Seoin to lift his head, trying to discern if Seoin was lying or not. But Seoin’s gaze was wholly unguarded when he looked up and met Yeongwoon’s eyes, either waiting for him to say something else or walk away again.
It made Yeongwoon’s head spin to see him like that. When they were teenagers, his friends used to tease him by saying that he was the only person Seoin ever bothered listening to. That he must’ve been either the world’s strictest student mentor ever, or was so passive with Seoin and his work that following Yeongwoon around like a puppy was the model’s unconventional form of gratitude.
“Yeongwoon,” Seoin said, breaking his train of thought. “Say something.”
But what was there to say? They had spent so long apart that the only physical pieces of themselves that they used to share with each other and still had now were their bodies. Gone was Seoin’s Switch, his childhood bedroom, the notebooks that they used to doodle in during class to talk to each other without raising their teacher’s suspicion. They just had the memories of those things, and most of them had been tainted by time and the mistaken belief that hundreds of miles away, the other person wasn’t thinking about them just as much.
Yeongwoon didn’t quite know how to put that into words without sounding foolish, so he didn’t bother saying anything at all. Instead, he angled his face forward and kissed Seoin, closing his eyes so he wouldn’t have to see the surprise he’d surely find there in his expression. Yeongwoon rarely ever initiated anything between the two of them as teenagers, and even less so now that they were adults.
Soon enough, he was met with a sound of shock from the back of Seoin’s throat before his hand came up and cupped the back of Yeongwoon’s head, his fingers tangling in the locks while his other hand went to Yeongwoon’s hip.
Seoin kissed him back fervently, his mouth already opening under Yeongwoon’s so he could use his tongue to coax his lips apart. Having become used to this long ago, Yeongwoon did as silently instructed and received a low groan against his mouth in response.
“Tell me to stop.” Seoin abruptly pulled back, breathless. He was looking between Yeongwoon’s eyes and lips, his gaze darting back and forth like he couldn’t pick just one to focus on. “Tell me before I won’t be able to. You weren’t feeling good the other day, and I don’t—”
Yeongwoon shook his head, wrapping his arms around Seoin’s neck so he could pull him back in and silence him. He didn’t want to talk again and risk ruining whatever this was, the way Seoin was looking at him like he would do whatever Yeongwoon wanted. It was a heady feeling, and one he imagined himself latching onto before it had the chance to evaporate into nothing.
“Touch me,” he murmured, letting his breath fan over Seoin’s lips. “Like before. Please.”
Whatever coil of self-control that Seoin might’ve had up until then snapped. He hooked his arms under Yeongwoon’s thighs and hoisted him up, his eyes half-lidded. Yeongwoon would’ve said something, would’ve asked Seoin why he was carrying him through his shoebox apartment when he had two perfectly good legs of his own, but he wasn’t granted the opportunity. Seoin was so preoccupied kissing him and holding Yeongwoon up that it was a wonder they didn’t knock into any walls or furniture on the way to Yeongwoon’s bedroom.
But once they arrived, Seoin set Yeongwoon down on the bed and immediately crawled over him, slotting his knee in between Yeongwoon’s thighs. He reached up and cupped Yeongwoon’s cheek, hardly thinking beyond his current, pressing need to get his hands on every inch of Yeongwoon that he could. To press the memory of his touch so deep into Yeongwoon’s skin that it would erase anybody who might’ve come before him, of whom there admittedly hadn’t been very many.
A girl who lived in his university dorm, a boy he shared one kiss with during their mandatory enlistment and then never spoke to again. A few more after, but none that ever took away the image of gray eyes and black hair that had seared itself into his brain so many years before.
He opened his eyes when he felt Seoin’s lips trailing down his throat and over his collarbone, his hands roaming underneath the hem of Yeongwoon’s shirt. Eventually, Seoin’s fingers settled on the waistband of his pants and he stopped, looking up at Yeongwoon. “Can I?” he asked.
Yeongwoon felt his cheeks flush a deep shade of pink. Seoin never asked for anything, he just took it. Especially when it came to something like this. Still, he nodded. “Yes.”
Tugging Yeongwoon’s pants and underwear down to his knees, Seoin wasted no time wrapping his hand around the soft length and lowering his head to take it between his lips. His blond hair hung low, making it difficult to see his face as he wound his tongue around the head of Yeongwoon’s cock and took it into his mouth. While he had been relatively quiet the first time he did this here, in Yeongwoon’s apartment, now he was anything but.
Seoin hummed at the heavy weight on his tongue, stretching his lips around it. Yeongwoon wasn’t entirely hard yet, but with sounds like that coming from the blond head bobbing between his legs, he imagined it wouldn’t take him very long to get there. He clenched his hand in the bedsheet, the noise apparently loud enough that it caught Seoin’s attention.
He momentarily pulled his mouth off of Yeongwoon, gazing up at him with unabashed want in his eyes. “No,” Seoin said, grabbing his hand and pulling it away from the sheet. He moved it so Yeongwoon’s fingers were splayed out over the top of his head. “Use me instead.”
Yeongwoon’s mouth felt so dry that it was hard for him to even swallow. He went to ask if that was really what Seoin wanted, but the other man wasn’t looking at him anymore. He had already lowered his head again and was sucking Yeongwoon back into his mouth, his tongue lying flat against the underside of his cock so he could take it deeper. Yeongwoon inhaled, curling his fingers into the hair on Seoin’s scalp more out of instinct than immediate desire. He didn’t know how much he was allowed to do before Seoin snapped out of whatever daze he was currently hypnotized by, so he held his grip rather loosely.
Apparently, Seoin wasn’t a big fan of that. He hollowed out his cheeks and took Yeongwoon’s length nearly to the base, feeling him at the back of his throat. His fingers were digging into the flesh on Yeongwoon’s thighs, keeping him from completely clamping his legs together and locking Seoin’s head in place. Yeongwoon jerked, the movement causing him to tighten his hold and tug harshly on the blond man’s hair. The ensuing whimper that he heard come from Seoin’s mouth was so slight in sound that he was almost positive he made it up.
Seoin didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed by it, though, if the continuous up and down motion of his head was any indication. Rather, he seemed invigorated by what Yeongwoon had done. So in a sort of experiment, Yeongwoon waited a few seconds before tugging on Seoin’s hair again, and he was met with a similar noise that vibrated around his cock.
Stammering on Seoin’s behalf, Yeongwoon started to find it harder and harder to focus. Sounds of pleasure began leaving his own mouth without much effort to stifle them, and he threw his head back with his hand planted firmly in Seoin’s hair. “So good," he said, hardly able to think. “Seoin, please.”
“Please what?” Seoin let Yeongwoon’s cock fall from his lips again, mouthing at the head. Wet with precome and Seoin’s saliva, Yeongwoon saw the mixture of substances smear Seoin’s lips before he went right back to his ministrations.
It was almost too much, seeing that. Hastily, Yeongwoon said, “You should stop. I’m close, I can’t…” hold on much longer, was what he wanted to say. But there was a part of him, secret as it was, that wanted to see what Seoin would do if he came in his mouth like this.
Seoin made a noise in his throat that sounded like No, or at least something close to it. He bobbed his head faster, inviting Yeongwoon to forget his reservations and just let go.
It didn’t take much, after that. Yeongwoon felt something like liquid pleasure travel down the length of his spine before he tensed up and came down Seoin’s throat. His cock pulsed and he involuntarily bucked his hips up into the warm embrace of Seoin’s mouth, his grip on present reality cracking before it eventually shattered. The only thing that brought him back down was hearing the audible noise of Seoin swallowing. Yeongwoon blinked down at him, spent and tingling all over.
“S—sorry," he mumbled, trying to remember what a person was even supposed to say after something like this. He had never been very good at it, and was in recent times often too distracted by the obscene words Seoin always insisted on whispering in his ear to even think of anything intelligent to say at all. “I didn’t mean to.”
Seoin merely grinned at him before he pushed himself up on his hands, hovering over Yeongwoon. “You should ‘not mean to’ more often, then.”
After getting the wherewithal to think in more than just short, fragmented pieces, Yeongwoon looked down at the bulge in Seoin’s sweatpants. He thought of what Seoin told him once before. “You said you get hard after sucking someone off. Do you want me to…?”
“No,” Seoin answered, shaking his head. It took Yeongwoon a moment to realize that he was holding a hand up to the side of Yeongwoon’s head, twirling a lock of hair in between his fingers almost unconsciously. Considering what he’d just been doing, the gentle touch and smile on his face were a little disorienting. “That’s alright. I was lying, anyway.” He looked Yeongwoon in the eyes. “It was only because it was you.”
Yeongwoon blushed and averted his gaze, looking off to the side. Seoin took it as an opportunity to bring his lips to the corner of Yeongwoon’s mouth and kiss him. Absent-mindedly, Yeongwoon was aware of the fact that Seoin tasted of his own release. But he didn’t really have it in him to care.
“It looks uncomfortable," he said, glancing at the erection straining against Seoin’s sweatpants.
“It is, a little bit.”
“So why did you say no?”
Seoin shrugged, his mouth still far more focused on kissing along the side of Yeongwoon’s jaw than engaging in conversation. “Because. I want to fuck you instead, but I’m waiting for you to let me.”
Yeongwoon stared at him, dumbfounded. Let him? “What are you talking about?”
Seoin finally pulled his head away and leaned over Yeongwoon, gazing at him. “You said you wanted it to be like before. So tell me what to do the way you used to. What you’d like.”
The words stirred something in Yeongwoon’s mind, a memory of crawling into Seoin’s lap and muttering hesitant words about how he wanted to be kissed. It was part of their supposed practice, figuring out what they enjoyed and didn’t really care for while fooling around. Again, Yeongwoon was surprised by how well Seoin seemed to remember it. But perhaps he shouldn’t have been. Seoin had already alluded to the fact that he just about lost his mind when Yeongwoon vanished all those years ago, and if he was anything like Yeongwoon, he would’ve spent so much time replaying those memories in his head whenever he spaced out that they eventually became a permanent stain on his mind. Impossible to be scrubbed out.
“I never told you what to do,” Yeongwoon said, finding that his voice had grown hoarse some point between now and the last time he had spoken. Funny, since he hadn’t been doing anything other than just lying there a bit uselessly. He waited for Seoin to laugh at him for it, but he didn’t. “It was always you who started everything.”
“Yes,” Seoin conceded. “At first. But you know what I mean.”
And he did. Of course he did. Yeongwoon could put up a front all he liked, telling Seoin that the time they spent together when they were younger meant nothing to him in the end, but it was a lie as flimsy as his resolve. He hated himself for it, sometimes. The way he would so easily bend to Seoin’s will when he so much as spared him something that resembled a smile. Even less than that, now. The mere idea of Seoin going back to those men who touched him through a drug-induced haze, spread open and waiting for him to do whatever he wanted to them, was enough to send Yeongwoon into an endless tailspin.
The irony of it wasn’t lost on him, either. He was Seoin’s manager now, not his friend. Yeongwoon had torn that title in half the moment he left town without a single word of explanation. It was the best way to do it, according to Taegu. If he didn’t leave any trace of himself behind, it would be significantly harder for his dad to find him and drag him back home. Harder for anyone to.
He’d never tell Seoin that, though. Not when he clearly despised Taegu so much already.
“Then…” Yeongwoon began, swallowing down the nerves that threatened to keep him from speaking. He reached out and grabbed Seoin’s hand, moving it between his legs. “I want to do it slowly this time.”
Seoin stared down at his hand like he couldn’t quite make sense of it being attached to his body at this particular moment. He stammered in an attempt to ask, “What?”
Yeongwoon silently prayed his cheeks weren’t flaming the way he imagined they were. “You usually go really fast, like you’re rushing or something. It hurts.”
“I’m sorry,” Seoin said. He blinked and tore his gaze away from his hand so that he was looking at Yeongwoon's face instead. “I’ll go slow. Do you have lube?”
Yeongwoon shook his head.
“Okay, that’s fine. I do.” Seoin began to maneuver himself off of Yeongwoon to get down from the bed. “Hold on, I’ll go get it.”
“Where on Earth are you keeping lube? You didn’t even bring a jacket.”
Seoin glanced between the still-open bedroom door and the half-naked man on the bed before answering, “My car.”
“Your car?”
“Yes, I know. I’m disgusting. It’ll only take a second, though. Or would you rather I use my tongue instea—”
“Just go get it,” Yeongwoon blanched, grabbing at one of the pillows behind his head to throw at Seoin. With a smile, Seoin ducked out of the way before disappearing through the door. And the very moment he was gone, Yeongwoon pulled his legs together and pressed his palms to his face, suppressing the urge to scream. The image of himself drawing Seoin’s fingers in while blushing like a naive virgin replayed over and over again in his mind. Of course they needed lube. What had he intended for Seoin to do without it?
“...What are you doing?”
Yeongwoon peeked through his fingers and saw Seoin standing in the doorway again, a plastic bottle gripped loosely in his hand like he wasn’t sure if he would even need it now.
“Waiting for you,” Yeongwoon answered.
“You look terrified.”
“I’m not.”
Seoin tipped his head, letting it thump against the doorframe. “You’re still not a very good liar.”
“I’m not lying. You’re just… I don’t know. Different. It’s hard to get used to.”
To Yeongwoon’s surprise, Seoin pushed himself off the doorframe and came forward to sit in front of him on the bed. He set the bottle of lube on the edge of the mattress, and Yeongwoon tried not to focus on the fact that he was half-naked, the bottle half-empty.
“What am I doing wrong?” Seoin asked after a second, his voice low.
“You’re not doing anything wrong,” Yeongwoon said, shaking his head. Because it wasn’t wrong, not on paper. But part of it felt like a trick or something that he would have to repay long after the haze of longing had passed and Seoin got whatever he wanted out of him. “I thought you hated me.”
And hate wasn’t really the right word for it, but when Seoin was holding him down on the couch with his hand behind his back just a few weeks ago, Yeongwoon could think of nothing else to call it.
Seoin leaned back, his eyes darting around somewhere below them. He was silent for so long that it seemed like he wasn’t going to answer. Then, “I wanted to.”
“Do you still?”
“Yes. Things would be a lot easier if I could.” He reached back and grabbed Yeongwoon’s clothes from where he’d tossed them to the side. “Here.”
Yeongwoon hesitated to take them. “I didn’t mean to ruin it.”
“…Ruin what?”
“This.” He swallowed, then finally took the fabric from Seoin’s hand. He slid off the bed and turned away, hoping Seoin hadn’t noticed the embarrassment written all over his face. But that seemed futile now with all the lights on and Seoin looking right at him like this. He harshly tugged on his underwear, pulling them back up to his hips when the bed creaked behind him and Seoin’s hand closed around one of his wrists.
“You’re talking about sex?” Seoin sounded disbelieving in his tone. At the following nod, something twisted in his expression and he tugged Yeongwoon back onto the bed.
“What are you doing—”
“Just lie down,” Seoin said, letting out a huff of air through his nose. “Stop thinking so much.”
Yeongwoon blinked, his vision obstructed by the sternum he’d just been pressed against. He leaned away and looked up at Seoin’s face. “Stop thinking? I’m just—this is what you want me for. That’s what you said.”
The hand on Yeongwoon’s wrist loosened and pulled away only to slide over his back instead, coming to rest just below his shoulder blades. Seoin’s eyes narrowed. “Well, I’m not saying it now, am I? So stop panicking. It’s not like you’ve never shared a bed with me before.”
“But you’re…” Yeongwoon trailed off, his gaze dropping to the space between Seoin’s legs.
“It’s fine.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeongwoon,” Seoin sighed. “You just said you thought I hated you. That doesn’t exactly put me in the mood to shove my dick in you right now.”
Yeongwoon scrunched up his nose in distaste and pressed his hands against Seoin’s chest to push himself back and sit up. Seoin’s fingers curled into the fabric on the back of his shirt. “Okay, you don’t have to say it like that.”
“Yeah, yeah.” Seoin tugged at his shirt and looked Yeongwoon in the eyes. He tilted his head. “Do you hate me?”
Unable to hide his surprise at the question, Yeongwoon’s mouth fell open. “What?”
Seoin just shrugged. “You asked me. It’s only fair that I get to ask you.”
“I—no," Yeongwoon answered honestly. He may have accepted this manager position under the impression that it would eventually resolve any lingering feelings he had for Seoin, but as the days went by and he kept bending over backwards for each and every one of Seoin’s whims, that started seeming more and more like nothing but an excuse. Just like when he used to tell himself that he was only helping Seoin practice for his amorphous crush, a person who had apparently been Yeongwoon all along. He was still struggling to fully wrap his head around that.
“I’m sorry that I didn’t go slow before. I should have.”
Swallowing, Yeongwoon murmured, “It’s fine.”
“Enough with that already,” Seoin said, tightening his arms around Yeongwoon for a second to try and snap him out of it. “Or I’m going to go eat all your food and steal your Ziploc money out of your sock drawer.”
“How did you know about that?” Yeongwoon shot up, his gaze instinctively going to his dresser before he heard a snort beside him and looked back at Seoin. Fighting the urge to smack him for laughing, Yeongwoon grumbled, “You don’t even need that money. It’s, like, a hundred and fifty thousand won.”
Seoin was still laughing when he said, “That’s where you hid it before. You showed me.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have if I’d known that you’d memorize it.”
“I mean, it’s not exactly an uncommon spot. You could’ve been hiding something worse there.” Seoin grinned, shrugging. “Like a—”
“Please shut up,” Yeongwoon interrupted him, reaching back to grab his pillow and press it over Seoin’s face. At least like this, Seoin couldn’t see his face turn red. “I really should hate you.”
Seoin struggled under the pillow for about three seconds before he lied pliant on the bed, his voice muffled. “But you don’t, right?”
“No.” Yeongwoon hated to keep admitting it, especially now. But he could hardly pretend he didn’t like this, being the sole focus of Seoin’s attention. Talking to him like it was easy, like no time had passed at all. He could figure out the rest later.
“I don’t.”