Chapter Text
Jisung was completely drained by the time he stumbled through the doors of the convenience store. The only thing on his mind was a hot bowl of ramyun and his usual seat in the corner by the window. His work day had been shit and he had another phone call with his older brother which was also shit, but not as bad as it could have been. His last meeting ran late and then he missed the bus he usually took so here he was, starving, pissed, and almost delirious.
“Yah, I almost left.”
Jisung waved away the words that were aimed at him from the back of the store. Food first, talk after. “I’m here, aren’t I?” He chose his go-to noodles—the one that never let him down because he was not in the headspace for adventures tonight—and made his way to the counter.
“And my food is cold,” Minho shouted back. “You already owe me from last time.”
“I’m not paying for your food, there’s a perfectly usable microwave,” Jisung said.
“It’ll be mushy!”
Jisung pushed the loose change over the counter to pay for his meal. “He only got here five minutes ago, he’s just being dramatic,” Jeongin, his favorite cashier, said as he rang Jisung up. “He was afraid that he’d be late.”
“Liar!” Minho shouted. “I’ve been waiting at least ten minutes.”
Jeongin sighed. “Sure,” he said. He handed Jisung back his ramyun which he took immediately to heat up.
“You two remember to clean up after yourselves,” Jeongin called after him.”This isn’t your—”
“Isn’t our living room, yeah, got it,” Jisung said. He shifted his weight from foot to foot as the numbers on the microwave counted down to the ding of completion.
Jisung nearly burned his fingers trying to grab the steaming hot noodles, carrying it the couple steps to the corner table. He sat down, hissing and licking stray broth from his fingers. Though when he went to finally grab his chopsticks and eat, he realized he had forgotten to pick a pair up at the counter.
“Shit, I—”
“Forgot this?” Minho said, holding up an unopened pair in front of him. He said it with a knowing smirk, something that looked so natural on his angular face but was undercut by the little spot of teriyaki sauce clinging to his bottom lip. Jisung huffed and snatched it from his hands. “No thank you hyung?”
“Shove it,” Jisung said as he went to finally shovel the hot noodles into his mouth.
Too much of Jisung’s life was busy and loud. Work demanded his attention from the moment he woke up, voices shouting into the phone or emails sucking the life out of him. It was all spreadsheets and repetitive meetings every day, but somehow, people still acted like it was the most important job in the world. Why aren’t you being more productive? You should show more care in your work. Fuck that, his job didn’t deserve half the attention he gave it, and Jisung only did what he needed to to get by.
His apartment required a different sort of attention—the desperate need to be productive in the limited amount of time he had on his own. He wanted to make music, so he stayed up long hours into the night, putting off sleep so he could keep hold of that creative time. He would drift off with lyrics strewn about him at 3 am just to be woken up again at 6:30 with a blaring alarm and that sinking feeling that he needed to drag himself back to the office. Rinse, repeat.
This store was something else, separate from all that. And now, Minho was something separate from that. They had this routine down for almost six months. Six months of late dinners filled with instant noodles and convenience store bento under the incessant fluorescent lights. The entirety of their friendship had taken place in the confines of those walls, sitting in metal chairs and leaning on the plastic table in the far corner of the store. Jisung had started going to this particular convenience store after he had moved to the neighborhood, though not because it was the closest to his apartment or on the way to the subway stop. It was because it was a little lonely, a little run-down. Jisung was looking for a place to be alone and anonymous to sit and watch the world go by.
Initially, Jisung had wanted to give himself a moment to himself to just not think. He didn’t want to worry about that argument at work or the last text his father sent him or the song that he just couldn’t get the top line to work. He wanted to stuff his face with the cheapest food he could get and watch strangers wait for a bus at the stop across the street. His mind could be quiet except for the hum of the refrigerators and the occasional beep of the register.
Until Minho came along.
“You’re in my seat,” was the first thing Minho said to Jisung. Jisung was already deep into a bowl of ramyun that was a little too spicy for his taste but delicious nonetheless. Jisung looked up at the man, a little haggard but likely similar in age to him, and then behind him to the two unoccupied tables beyond.
“Oh, is that what the sharpie on the back of the chair said,” Jisung said. “The handwriting was a little hard to read, thought it said something about big dicks.”
Minho smirked and Jisung could see that beyond the sharp stare and black hoodie was someone he wouldn’t mind getting to know. “Should’ve written it clearer for the folks who didn’t pass their reading comprehension tests,” he said. He sat down heavily, putting a box of kimbap out in front of him. “Minho.”
Jisung blinked, then realized that he had introduced himself. “Oh, uh, Jisung,” he said.
Minho and Jisung didn’t talk much during the first few weeks. Jisung saw him every three or four days, sometimes just a glimpse and a nod as he grabbed an iced tea and chicken breast before heading out, and sometimes they’d sit and look out the window while eating their dinners. Jisung learned a few things about Minho early on—he worked close by at a dance studio and came by for meals between late-night classes he taught, he lived with one roommate who is also his coworker, and he wanted to get a cat but his roommate was allergic. But that was basically it. Their conversations, purposeful or not, almost always steered clear of anything personal. He didn’t know the dance company’s name, or what style of dance Minho did. He didn’t know if he’d always taught or had performed at some point, too. He didn’t even know Minho’s roommate’s name because he only referred to him as the weasel, with varying degrees of affection.
In turn, Jisung gave little away about his own life. Jisung liked not needing to prove himself, because who was he trying to impress? A random guy who ate plastic-wrapped meals at the same time as him? He told Minho he had an office job of little importance but he actually just wanted to make music. It was too bad the music was also of little importance.
“Don’t say that,” Minho said, looking Jisung in the eye with that unwavering stare he’d come to expect.
“You haven’t heard my music,” Jisung said.
“You don’t need someone else telling you it's good,” Minho said. “But if you make it meaningless like that yourself, why even try? Just give up.”
Jisung stared into his noodles. “I’m not giving up.”
“Great,” Minho said. “So it’s important to you.”
“I guess that’s right,” Jisung said after he found he had no retort that wasn’t filled with lies.
There was something about the time of night, the feeling of the lonely street, and the routine of it all that made it hard for Jisung to lie to Minho. It was like all the pretense didn’t matter, or never mattered. Here they were, two souls crossing paths, seeing each other in the dark. Jisung never had to explain every reason he couldn’t leave his day job or why he was so scared about putting his music out into the world. Instead, he could talk about the movie he watched last weekend at the theater and how disappointed he’d been that he’d wasted the money on such a piece of trash. He could argue, then, about the merits of cinematography over plot until his food was long gone and his coffee lukewarm.
Minho was interested in his opinions and asked—no, demanded them. Even when they both got heated over the latest episode of a popular drama and Minho slammed his palms down on the teetering table, explaining to Jisung that he was an idiot for thinking that the main character’s boyfriend should be forgiven, Jisung found that he was enjoying himself. He had started to look forward to these meetings, even planned his evenings around them, until it was simply a part of his life. Jisung had come to this convenience store to be alone, but really, he’d stayed to remind himself that he wasn’t just how productive he could be. He could just… be.
“Okay, so you know that Takoyaki place just around the corner from the subway stop?” Minho was saying. Jisung was filled with noodles and finally relaxing into the familiar space, the stress of the day slowly melting away. “It smells so fucking good every time I walk past.”
“But the prices…” Jisung said.
“I know,” Minho said. “Every day I’m tempted. Every day, I remind myself how much money I actually have in my wallet. But do you know what my dumb ass tried to do the other day?”
“What?”
“Try to make it for myself—no, hear me out. I’m not a terrible cook.”
Jisung looked between Minho and the half-empty plastic bowl in front of him. “Sure.”
“I’m not,” Minho said. “I just don’t have the time to—whatever. So I’ve made some semblance of takoyaki in the past with someone who actually had the right equipment. You know, the pan with the little half-circles. I obviously wasn’t going to buy that, but I thought, maybe I can make one?”
“Make?” Jisung said. “With what? You have a welding kit stashed away at your place?”
“Tin foil,” Minho said.
“God.”
“Don’t laugh! I made a half-decent one until the batter caught on fire.”
“Well, I guess congratulations should be in order for not setting yourself on fire,” Jisung said. “Or your apartment, I hope.”
“No one was injured in the attempt,” Minho said.
Jisung laughed. “You could have just, like, borrowed your friend’s pan?”
Minho hesitated for just a moment, almost imperceptible except that by now, Jisung was starting to get used to Minho’s conversational tics. “Ah, no,” he said. “Not a friend.” He didn’t say more and Jisung didn’t push it. He didn’t need to know, not really.
The gaps in their knowledge of each other’s lives were purposeful and careful, now that they’ve become close in this way. They started out just as strangers, there was no need to know the details of each other’s lives, but now Jisung knew they couldn’t be called strangers anymore. This was just the way they worked.
“Well,” Jisung said instead, “I hope you learned a lesson.”
“Keep trying and eventually you’ll succeed?” Minho said.
“Idiots get burnt,” Jisung said and was rewarded with a little chuckle from Minho.
“Shit,” Minho said and started packing up his things. “I’m late for my next class. You can finish my rice.”
“So I can clean up after you?” Jisung said.
Minho raised a hand in goodbye, stepping out the door with his gym back over one shoulder. “See you next time.”
“Bastard!” Jisung called after him. Though he did finish Minho’s rice. And he did throw it all away.
Back at his apartment, Jisung threw his bag and jacket onto his bed and was contemplating just throwing himself onto it as well when he was startled by a voice at his bedroom door.
“Finally,” Changbin said. “Will you finally listen to this track?”
Jisung jumped and clutched his chest like some sort of poorly acted drama. “Knock first?”
“Right, of course. Knock, knock. Hi, Jisung, can you please answer your texts for once and stop ignoring me every time I ask you about this track I sent?” Changbin said. “I promised Chan I’d get him something by this weekend and this weekend is now tomorrow.”
Jisung knew he had been avoiding Changbin’s messages, but he wouldn’t say that outright. It was bad enough sneaking around the apartment when they were both home, flushing quietly because Changbin’s room was closest to the bathroom. Now, he also was leaving him on read at work because his tiny brain couldn’t handle more than one crisis at once. “I’ll listen, I’ll listen,” Jisung said.
“Now?” Changbin had his hands on his hips. Jisung hated it when he got like this.
“Fine,” Jisung said. “Fine, let me get my computer.”
Jisung had been friends with Changbin since high school. They graduated a couple of years apart, and after Changbin finished university and Jisung moved out to start working, they got an apartment together. They’ve been making music together since they were teens, but it didn’t get serious until Changbin met Chan at university. He was serious, passionate, and really the only reason Jisung had any goals at all in the industry. Chan had gone to school for production, had a vision. Changbin, too, was diligent and focused. Jisung often thought he was just along for the ride.
Jisung turned on his computer and pulled up the file Changbin had sent earlier in the week. “What’s the project for?” Jisung asked.
“Chan wants to submit a couple of things to one of the big entertainment companies. Sounds like they need b-sides for a girl group,” Changbin said. “Maybe low odds at this point, but Chan knows a guy—”
“—of course he does.”
Changbin hummed. “Right. Well, it’s a big deal, even if they reject the ideas. If they like him, it’ll mean more opportunities.”
“Why didn’t you say it was so important?” Jisung said, but as soon as he did, he realized that some of Changbin’s texts said exactly that. He’d ignored him and promptly did his best to forget to avoid the stress of putting it off in the moment. When Changbin gave him another hands-on-hips stare, Jisung turned away and put his headphones on.
It was good. It had a thrumming synth leading the melody through a rising chorus into a catchy hook. There weren’t lyrics yet, but Jisung could easily imagine this playing on TV. It was safe, but safe in the way Chan was probably intending. And then, it got to the bridge, and Jisung clicked back to listen again. And then again.
“The rhythm, right?” Changbin said. “When it—”
“Yeah,” Jisung said. “Wait, let me figure it out.”
This was what Chan was about. Pushing the comfort zone just enough that it was memorable but execs would still probably sign off on it.
“I want to hate it,” Jisung said. “But I can’t. Wow, it’s just so annoying. Can that be my feedback? Chan, why are you so annoying?”
Changbin laughed. “Annoying works.”
“It does,” Jisung said. He put his headphones down and stared at the screen. He thought about Chan, making this music and chasing a specific dream. Even Changbin, using his degree for a music-adjacent day job as he works through an album and plays shows on the weekends. Jisung feels like he’s just playing a game. He feels bad for duping Chan and Changbin into endulging his fantasy.
“So, I was focusing on the first chorus,” Changbin said. “And what do you think about…”
They worked well into the night, accumulating notes for Chan and playing around with their own ideas. Jisung had half a melody for something he’d been humming to himself and Changbin helped him flesh it out into a full verse. By the time Jisung fell asleep, the melody was fully stuck in his head, searching for lyrics.
There was a multitude of reasons Han Jisung hated his job. For one, he hated getting up in the morning. The blare of the alarm before dawn made him physically ill and he was pretty sure his walk to the subway when it was still dark out contributed to his clinical depression. He hated the corporate blandness of the office space itself. Every floor of the fourteen-floor highrise was exactly the same—cubicle after cubicle with people in business suits and gray walls with views of more bland buildings out the window. He hated the work itself because he was never the strongest with numbers, but somehow most of his job required comparing some big number with another big number and convincing others that the big numbers should get bigger. Which brought him to how he hated almost all of the people that he had to play nice with every day. It was banking, after all. What could he expect?
There was a single reason Han Jisung couldn’t leave the job. His father owned the bank.
Jisung was the second son, you’d think he’d be able to dodge the duty factor, but that was unheard of in his father’s household growing up. There was no discussion. His older brother would inherit the company and Jisung would be some sort of VP. A title that was probably made up and the job as spare. It was a family business and Jisung was fairly certain that he was conceived for this explicit purpose because there wasn’t any sort of affection between his parents that would hint otherwise.
Jisung didn’t have to go to university to get a coveted junior investor position, but at the same time, his father didn’t allow him to fall behind. He would work his way up the company the same as anyone else his age, he’d told him. Start at the bottom, earn your promotions, and understand every aspect of this company. He had to compete, of course, with peers who had master's degrees in finance or mathematics and, more to the point, cared. All only to add to his stress, of course, because his father wouldn’t have him embarrass him.
His coworkers mostly didn’t know who he was. His boss’ boss was aware and made sure he wasn’t fired or ridiculed too strongly, but in the day-to-day, he was another employee. Another fuck-up, according to Namil two cubicles down.
The “start from the bottom” scheme, however, was the only way Jisung had convinced his parents to let him move out on his own. If he was to be the same as everyone else, shouldn’t he also start without the financial advantages that were afforded to him from birth? He’d never had to worry that he wouldn’t have the money for a meal at the end of the day or calculate exactly how much each utility cost.
Jisung wanted the freedom but didn’t imagine when he suggested it that he’d end up under his sink on a Thursday night, trying to fix a leak using a wrench he’d borrowed and a youtube instructional video. Still, the ounce of freedom was worth this and more.
“You can always ask your dad for cash,” Changbin had said when Jisung came out of his struggle with the sink wet and frustrated.
“No,” Jisung said.
“But I think that you just made it worse,” Changbin said. Yes, the sink was leaking more than before. Yes, he also now had a long cut on his arm and was debating if it needed medical attention. But even suggesting that he couldn’t do this on his own to his father was the worst possibility.
Instead, Jisung spent the last of his money for the month for a plumber to come by and replace the piping. He survived that last week on the instant ramen from the back of the cabinet and free pastries he stole from work to bring home.
Jisung had tried to talk to his brother about the mutual burden they shared, but his brother never had the patience for it. “It’s a gift to be given a purpose in life,” he’d said. “Don’t squander it with your attitude.” Jisung didn’t try to reach out again after that.
That Tuesday had started out like any other. Loud alarm followed by the churn of Jisung’s stomach. He hadn’t felt well enough to eat anything for breakfast, but he threw a piece of bread into his bag after downing his coffee. He rushed onto the subway and made it into the conference room just before the manager of his team stepped in.
“Cutting it close?” Seungmin hissed as Jisung slid into his seat and took out his laptop.
Seungmin, the guiding light and only friend Jisung had on his team. The singular reason Jisung hadn’t climbed up to the fourteenth floor and jumped off yet.
Jisung kicked him under the table.
“Okay team, we have an important client meeting on Friday and we need the slide decks to be done by tomorrow so the higher-ups can clear them,” the team manager said. Jisung switched between taking notes and sending Seungmin running commentary on exactly what he thought about their boss’ new tie on their open chat. The only way Jisung knew Seungmin was reading them was when Jisung sent a particularly detailed description of how his wife tied him up with it at night, Seungmin choked on his water.
“Namil and Seungmin, double-check those numbers and make them look good by this afternoon. Jisung and Wonyong, familiarize yourself with the individuals who will be there. You’ll be presenting this time.”
“Yes, sir,” Jisung said, marking it in his calendar. Just then, another notification popped up on his screen.
Jitae-hyung: Dad wants to talk to us. Can you come for dinner on Saturday?
Jisung sighed and closed his laptop without answering.
Though it had been half a year since Jisung had first met Minho in that convenience store, it was more like three months of actually expecting to meet each other there. Again, like everything they did, it wasn’t explicit. It wasn’t planned. It was a quick, see you tomorrow, and a nod in affirmation or a casual comment that Jisung had a dinner he needed to attend or Minho had a private lesson to teach that would get in the way of their meal.
The friendship was unspoken, just as the details of their lives were, but there was something intimate in the anonymity that Jisung treasured. He found himself speaking more about pieces of his life he couldn’t bring up to Changbin or Seungmin for fear they would take it the wrong way. And Jisung could sense there was something in Minho, too, that desired this outlet of a third-party observer into his life.
“Do you ever feel like you’re just never going to be good enough?” Jisung said that night. The day had started with that meeting with their manager and spiraled into a disagreement with Namil and an all-out fight with Wonyong about the presentation. He’d gone to Seungmin for help, but he’d been so deep into data crunching that Jisung didn’t want to disturb him. His brother had texted him five times before he finally answered, saying yes, he’d be at home on Saturday. Jisung had spent the rest of the day imagining every way it would go wrong, especially if he fucked up the client meeting on Friday.
“Good enough in whose eyes?” Minho said. “Yours? Or the people around you?”
They’d finished their food at least 30 minutes before, but Minho didn’t have a class and Jisung knew Changbin was out at a gig, so no other obligations to spirit them away.
“Both,” Jisung said. “But specifically, I think mine? Well, the problem is I know enough to understand how I’m messing up, but I don’t know enough how to fix it.”
“Can you ask for help?” Minho asked.
“That’s more complicated than you’d think,” Jisung said, his father’s face flashing in his mind. “If I do, it’d be a failure in itself.”
“You don’t have to think like that.”
“That part is in other’s eyes, not mine,” Jisung clarified.
“So you specifically are frustrated with yourself because you’re not doing as well as you want to,” Minho said. “However, the people who are evaluating you would think that asking for help means that you are doing a poor job, therefore you are stuck between you thinking you’re not doing well enough versus them thinking you’re not doing well enough.”
“Exactly,” Jisung said. “And if it was something else, I think I’d just suck it up and make myself better but…”
“But?”
Minho looked at him with open cat-like eyes, so patient, listening intently. It broke his heart a little to see someone spend so much energy on him.
“But I don’t care. Not about work. It’s just something I have to do, and if getting by means the bare minimum, that’s fine,” Jisung said.
“Even if it means you beat yourself up about it every day?” Minho said.
“I’m not—”
“Jisung,” Minho said. “I see you do it. It isn’t healthy.”
“Okay mister I ate two pickles and a banana for dinner,” Jisung shot back.
“I told you, I don’t have an evening lesson today,” Minho said. He shrugged. “No jumping around, don’t need as many calories.”
“Yeah, okay,” Jisung said.
Minho blinked slowly. “I don’t know how long you can keep this up, realistically. You hate it. But you somehow think you deserve to be miserable, so you do nothing about it.”
“That’s a little harsh,” Jisung said.
Minho shrugged and looked out the window. The light hit the angles of his nose and cheeks just right to exaggerate the classically attractive features. Minho had bags under his eyes and a sweep of messy hair that was just shy of being able to be pulled back into a high bun.
Jisung had tried over the months to guess at things that Minho wouldn’t tell him with little clues that he left behind, like the stains around his middle and forefinger that looked like he smoked, though Jisung had never seen him buy cigarettes. Or, the small tattoo of a bouquet of flowers on the inside of his forearm that despite being in such a visible place, Jisung didn’t see for months because Minho hardly ever wore short sleeves.
There was once Jisung had asked if Minho was seeing someone. It was a passing thought, of course, Jisung found him extremely attractive but this was far enough into their meetups that it was clear Jisung wasn’t trying to hit on him. It was more curiosity, and maybe a little anxiety, about how often they would really be able to see each other. Jisung, of course, had no one to go back home to besides a well-meaning but pushy roommate. Minho though? Jisung would be surprised if he couldn’t find a date whenever he liked.
“I don’t date,” Minho had said with a striking sort of finality. “I—it’s not—” It looked as if he was trying to avoid saying exactly why but still wanting to give Jisung some explanation. Even as Jisung tried to wave the question away like it didn’t matter, Minho still wanted to say it. “I don’t think I’d be a good partner. I’m not available in ways I’d need to be and—well, I think it’s asking the universe a bit much, to give more more than I already have now. I’m lucky.”
“You think dating is asking for too much?” Jisung asked.
Minho tilted his head to the side, a halfway answer.
“Not even casually?” Jisung asked.
“Definitely not casually,” Minho said, pulling his sleeves over his hands like he did whenever he got uncomfortable. Jisung felt a moment of shame, thinking of the hookups he’d had in the past few years. All discrete, all one-night stands. He couldn’t have anyone from work finding out because talk would reach his father about who he was taking to bed. Minho’s reaction didn’t feel like judgment, though, at least not outward. It seemed more directed at himself. At some sort of memory.
Jisung hadn’t pushed it.
Today, Jisung stared at his profile and wondered how much of Minho he was missing and how much he was allowed to have access to. He was right, after all, that Jisung’s self-deprecating attitude wasn’t helping. But no matter what, Jisung still felt stuck.
“I’m afraid of what will happen if I ask for help,” Jisung said. “Because it might end up worse in the end.”
“But at least then you’re doing something,” Minho said. “And you will feel lighter.”
“Said from experience?” Jisung said. He meant it as a joke, trying to lighten the mood before they left for the night, but Minho didn’t take it as such.
“Yes,” he said. “Because it’s the only thing I can say for sure that I’ve done right in my life.”
On the day of Jisung’s dinner with his family, he ran his suit to the dry cleaner around the corner, got a haircut, and went over his work notes so he could be prepared for any questions his father would ask him. His client meeting went passably well, it seemed they were neither thrilled nor offended, so Jisung took that as a win. But then, of course, he spilled coffee on the pants of his only expensive suit and he needed it for dinner, so, here he was, running around so much that he needed to figure out when to sneak in a shower as well.
When he was finally clean, changed, and tidy, he ran out the door with a weak, “have fun,” by Changbin from the couch. Jisung then only contemplated jumping in front of the train briefly before settling in for the ride.
The part of the city Jisung grew up in was disgustingly affluent. There were sleek houses with named architects that the wives of the neighborhood would drop like the luxury brand names of their purses. There were German cars parked in driveways even though most of these families hired drivers and manicured lawns they hid behind walls. Jisung had hardly ever seen it from this angle—walking up the steep hill from the closest station—because they had never gone anywhere using public transportation. How beneath them. It was only now that he’d moved out that he approached like this, feeling like a stranger ringing the doorbell of his own home.
“There’s dirt on your pants,” was the first thing his father said to Jisung when he arrived. The housekeeper showed him into the living room where he and his brother were having a glass of wine while the private chef made them dinner.
Jisung looked down. There was a single small streak from where his shoe likely scraped against the bottom cuff of his right pant leg on the walk over. “Sorry,” Jisung said.
“Should have had it cleaned properly,” his father said.
“Sorry.”
His father looked up and frowned. “What are you just standing there for? Sit down.”
Jisung’s body moved to obey before he realized what he was doing. He sat on the couch on the other end to his brother, who was pouring him a glass. Jisung accepted, knowing it was the only thing that could hide the shake in his hands.
“Where’s mother?” Jisung asked, looking around as if he’d just missed her standing by the bar or perched on a chair in the corner. It could happen, if she was an expert if anything, it was knowing how to disappear.
“Upstairs,” Jitae said. “Getting ready. She’ll be down for dinner soon.”
“Right,” Jisung “She’s feeling okay?”
“Your mother is fine,” Jisung’s father said. “You should worry more about yourself.”
Jisung braced himself, fingers laced in his lap and picking at his nails.
“When Jitae was in your position only a few years ago, he was the undisputable top of his group,” his father said. “Unanimous praise from his seniors. His teammates went to him for advice.”
Jitae sat up straighter next to him. Though he was one to bask in any praise, especially when it was just the two of them and he could throw it back in Jisung’s face, in the company of his father he kept quiet.
“Now you?” his father continued. “Anything less than the best is an embarrassment, but you’re not even that. Some of your seniors didn’t know your name.”
Jisung looked at his hands. He wasn’t loud like Jitae. Wasn’t a people person and didn’t make his managers laugh. He didn’t have the skills like Seungmin to make up for that gap. He was useless.
“I helped secure the funds for—” Jisung started.
“Yes, I heard about that deal this week,” his father said. “So what? Small fish and it sounded like your teammate did most of the work anyway.”
“I’ve also—”
“Yes? Speak up Jisung you’re mumbling”
Jisung took a breath. “There was also the portfolio from—”
His father clicked his tongue. “Look up at me when you talk to me,” he said.
Jisung’s breath caught. His heart stuttered and his vision blurred.
“I said look at me!” his father hissed.
Jisung obeyed. It felt like he couldn’t get enough air. His eyes darted from his father’s narrowed eyes to his closed fist on the armchair. Jisung was watching. Waiting for what happened next.
There were footsteps down the stairs. His father’s fist relaxed when his mother turned the corner, dressed in a beautifully draped dress with perfect waves of hair to her shoulders. “Oh, honey,” she said to Jisung, “I didn’t realize you were already here.”
Jisung stood on shaking legs to greet her. “Hi, mom.”
“What I was going to say,” his father continued, “was that if your performance doesn’t improve, I will have to think about exactly what is holding you back.”
“The others have degrees,” Jisung offered. “If I went back to school—”
His father barked out a laugh. “You don’t need academics to tell you the theory behind something you can learn on the job. Your brother had no issue. So, as I see it, it can only possibly be a few things. One, you are being distracted by this silly idea of living out there with a roommate. Two, you aren’t trying hard enough. But that can’t possibly be it, not after our frequent conversations about the subject. Or, finally, you’re simply stupider than your brother.”
“Oh, honey,” his mother said.
“What? Are you, Jisung? Are you just stupid?”
Jisung wanted to say yes. He wanted to agree and move on and let it be. Because honestly? That was probably the correct answer. He was too stupid for the job and nothing he could do would make his brain any better at it and they’d all be torturing each other until something broke because he couldn’t possibly keep pretending and—
“Dinner’s ready,” the housekeeper called.
And they dropped it. Jisung was silent for the rest of the night.
“So much for asking for help,” Jisung said to Minho Monday night. “That blew up in my face before I could really do anything.”
“I didn’t specify who you should have asked for help from,” Minho said.
“I guess you’re right. I can try Seungmin maybe.”
“Seungmin?”
“Know-it-all at work. Likable know-it-all, though. He’d probably do it if I trade him some of my old baseball cards.”
Minho snickered. “Cute,” Minho said and Jisung relaxed.
“Why don’t you ever eat dinner with me anymore?” Changbin whined when Jisung got home.
“I’m sorry, did I miss something?” Jisung said. “When did eating dinner together become a thing you wanted to do?”
“Well, I don’t,” Changbin said. “But you’re just never here now. You are eating something, right?”
“I’m eating, don’t worry.”
“Is it just work that’s keeping you late? Bastards,” Changbin said. “Or, oh! Did you find a guy? Are you seeing someone and haven’t told me about it!”
“No, it’s not like that.”
Changbin shot up. “Not like—oh my god, you are meeting up with someone. Tell me, tell me!”
“He’s a friend, hyung. We sit, we eat, we chat. That’s it. I just like his company,” Jisung said, walking to his room. Changbin followed.
“And you don’t like mine?” Changbin said.
“Obviously I hate you and being around you,” Jisung deadpanned. “What do you think? We just get to talk about things that I usually don’t. I don’t know. Let me not think about it too deeply.”
“I bet you don’t ignore this guy—”
“Minho.”
“Minho’s texts,” Changbin said.
“Actually,” Jisung said. “I don’t even have his number.”
Changbin stared at him. “How long have you been meeting up?”
Jisung avoided his gaze, making himself busy with putting his bag away and organizing the clothes on his floor from the last time he did laundry. “Six months?”
“Wow,” Changbin said. “That’s…”
“The decision-making of an insane person with only three friends?” Jisung said. “Yeah, I know. It’s just not what we do… it would be weird.”
“And you’re okay with that?” Changbin said. “That you’re a friend of convenience? Not important enough to stay in touch with?”
“It’s not like that either,” Jisung said. “I can’t explain it, it’s almost nice? Being there or not being there, it’s binary. No expectations.”
“For him, too?”
“I think so,” Jisung said.
“Okay,” Changbin said but didn’t sound convinced.
In truth, Jisung had thought about it more than once. He’d wanted assurance that Minho would be there when he needed him and proof that what they had in their little bubble was something worth keeping, but something had always held him back. He was worried he’d fuck it up. Make a mistake and break whatever this tenuous connection was. Jisung was afraid that as soon as he spoke up, named it, it would disappear.
Maybe Minho thought the same, or maybe Minho didn’t care at all. Jisung had invaded his space after all, joined him on a dinner break from work and sat where he already got his food. Jisung hadn’t asked for his number, but as Changbin just reminded him, Minho hadn’t asked for his number either.
Jisung kept thinking about what Changbin said throughout the next day and into the night. He sat down next to Minho who had just warmed up his food, watched him blow on the noodles and close his eyes as he took the first bite. His cheeks were pink from the cold outside and maybe still from the exertion of dance practice. Jisung wondered if this was all just convenient, he was a throwaway person, and that’s why Minho didn’t tell him anything of substance. Why Jisung had to keep guessing. But something inside him knew—hoped? — that wasn’t all there was to it.
Jisung opened his mouth to speak, but Minho beat him to it.
“Do you ever miss the lit classes you took in high school?” Minho asked.
Jisung closed his mouth and thought. “I don’t miss getting graded.”
“Not the tests or the essays,” he said. “But the part where we discussed books. Like, now, I read these novels and think I know what they’re talking about, but I wish I could be in a setting like that again, you know? I want to know what the same book looks like if someone else reads it. I miss only seeing the same thing from others' points of view.”
“I can see that,” Jisung said. “Though my memories of high school literature classes were mostly boys who thought they were too cool making fun of anyone who tried to participate.”
“Yeah, maybe I’m just remembering it as more rigorous than it actually was at the time,” Minho said. “Still, there was this foreign works in translation class I’d signed up for that I was excited to take. You had to get certain grades to get in and people knew it was tough so only people who cared would have been there. I wish I could have gone.”
“Why didn’t you?” Jisung asked.
“Dropped out of school before my last year,” Minho said. “Good thing my job now doesn’t care about a high school degree.”
Jisung had half guessed at this fact, but it was the first time he’d heard it out loud, so blunt. “You seem smart enough to have taken the graduation test,” he said. “You could have just done that.”
Minho pulled at his sleeves. “I wasn’t in the headspace at that time,” he said. “And I couldn’t have paid the exam fees.”
“Now?”
“Now it doesn’t really matter,” Minho said. “I’m 25, I have a job I like. Feels like going backward.”
“If—” Jisung started, thinking about if this was too invasive a question. “If you could go back, do it again. Be, what, 16 or 17 and know what you know now. Would you do it?”
Minho poked at his noodles. “Time travel isn’t possible,” he said.
“Fine,” Jisung said. “But if. Was the struggle worth where you ended up?”
“It isn’t that,” Minho said. “The dropping out. It felt huge at the time, the biggest decision I’d ever made, but it feels so small now in comparison to what came after. Sure, I’d drop out again. I had my reasons. But what happened after?” Minho looked at Jisung and the tiredness in his eyes alone made him wish he’d never asked. “No, I don’t think so.”
“What—”
“Don’t,” Minho said. “Don’t ask what came next.”
Jisung’s voice went quiet. “Why?”
“Because I’m afraid I’d actually tell you.”
Jisung reached out his hand and touched the tip of Minho’s fingers. He held them there, connected, and Minho didn’t pull away. This was not the time to push for anything. Fuck Changbin. Jisung didn’t need a phone number, a text, or a photo to know what this was. That it was real.
So, that’s where they were. Life moved on. Winter melted into a mild spring and Jisung watched the rain splatter against the pavement in front of their convenience store with Minho at his side. He passed performance reviews with the help of Seungmin, but just barely, and he put his brother’s number on mute to avoid thinking about who he couldn’t be. Chan’s songs hadn’t been chosen by the company, but they did ask him to submit for a specific project, which he asked Jisung and Changbin to help him on. So, at least, that was something.
Sometime in late March, though, everything changed.
It was an unusually warm day, one of those spring nights that felt like the flowers would bloom overnight, and the smell of the rain was a little sweeter. Jisung had made it to their corner seat before Minho, scrolling his phone and chewing on his chicken breast before Minho showed up.
When he did, it was like a storm swept him in.
Minho stalked through the doors and didn’t wave to Jeongin like he usually did, or even grab food. He went straight for their corner, dropped his bag, and collapsed into the seat. Jisung was stunned. Minho was usually so calm, so steady. He had never seen him get anything more than annoyed, and even that it was partly for show. Yes, he’d been sad or quiet on many of their days here, but he was usually so good at keeping his feelings close. This was darker and heavier and all out in the open.
After a moment of just staring blankly at the table, he flexed his fingers and gripped the edge. There was something simmering, just under the surface. It was already lapping at the edges of Minho’s control.
Jisung could have let it be. He could have understood Minho’s reluctance to talk about anything real in his life. It could have been their relationship, but it also could have just been him. Jisung didn’t know. But this time, he could see how close to the surface the anger was, and he wanted to know what it looked like.
He thought, maybe, Minho needed to let it go for once.
“Minho?” Jisung said, cautiously. “Are you okay?”
“Fine,” Minho snapped.
Clearly, not fine.
“How can I help?” Jisung tried again.
“Ha,” Minho said. “I’d like to see you try.”
Jisung was quiet for a moment, taking in the way Minho’s fingers were turning white with the pressure he was putting on them and the way an angry blush crawled up his neck to his ears. Finally, Minho took a breath, relaxed his shoulders, and let go of the table.
Jisung pushed some of his food over to Minho, he wasn’t going to get up to buy something now and he’d be hungry, but he just shook his head.
“I don’t know what to do,” Minho said.
“Tell me what happened,” Jisung said. “The studio?”
“No,” Minho said.
“Home?” Jisung tried again. “Your roommate?”
“No, Hyunjin’s fine. Everything is fine,” Minho said. “It’s my own problems, thinking I could run away from them. It’s my fault, but I just thought—I had the delusion that it was behind me. I convinced myself it was over and this was my life and it was fine now, but I was wrong.”
Minho dug his fingers into his arm and looked away.
“I knew I didn’t deserve this,” Minho said, quietly.
Jisung reached out and tried to gently detangle Minho’s fingers from his sleeve and have him let go, but his grip was hard enough to bruise. “Deserve what?”
After a moment, Minho let Jisung take his hand. They found each other’s eyes and the moment hung in the air.
“Happiness,” Minho said.
And then, the moment was gone. Minho flinched and stole his hand back, backing away like he was burned.
“How can you say that?” Jisung said.
“I don’t know,” Minho said. “Same way you say it about yourself all the time. It gets tiring, you know, the self-deprecation.”
Jisung ignored the sting of hurt. “And you help me, hyung. Every time. This time, let me. I can—”
“Respectfully, you have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Because you don’t tell me anything,” Jisung countered. “Maybe if you would just say what you’re so afraid of, I could—”
“No,” Minho said, quick and sharp. “It’s not some stupid conflict with a boss or argument with a friend. It isn’t something you can talk your way out of.”
“That’s not fair—”
"That’s not fair, seriously, Jisung?” Minho said. “You’re such a child.”
“If I can’t help,” Jisung said, making sure his words were careful and precise. “And you’re not eating anything. Why are you here?”
In the next beat of silence, Minho’s face flickered from angry to pained to ashamed. Then, it became unreadable.
“I don’t know,” Minho said. He looked out the window. A truck drove by and an older couple were sitting at the bus stop, talking. “Fuck. I don’t know.”
The refrigerators buzzed and a young woman was being rung up at the cash register. Iced coffee and a bag of chips.
“I’m not a good person, Jisung,” Minho said. “You don’t know me. If you did—”
“I do know you,” Jisung tried.
“No,” Minho said. He stood, grabbing his bag. “No, you don’t.”
The thing Jisung regretted most about that day was that he didn’t say anything then. He didn’t try to convince Minho that he knew how kind he was by the patience with which he listened to Jisung’s anxieties. He knew that Minho loved his crew and took care of his students and brought cakes back to his roommate when he was feeling down. But Jisung didn’t say any of that. He watched Minho leave, thinking they would have time to work this out. That he’d see him soon and, maybe it would take a few days, but Minho would find himself again.
But Jisung said nothing, and Minho left, and he didn’t come back the next day. Or, the next. Or, the next.