Chapter Text
“If you’re still looking for someone to flirt with, I’m available.”
Jungsu pushes his tongue along the inside of his cheek, focus on the couple that had just subjected him to a, frankly disgusting, display of possessiveness instantly broken. His eyes snap back to the other side of the cash, landing on the next man in line.
He’s cute. More than, if Jungsu is being honest with himself, but the way he’s offering himself up on a platter is slightly off putting. Jungsu usually goes for subtlety. He’ll even dabble in danger, maybe a secret or two.
But, this guy is just his type.
A bit shorter than him, slight but muscular, ashy, dark-brown hair with a slight wave to it, just long enough to go against the norm. Expressive eyes, too. Jungsu loves men with interesting eyes.
Well. If he’s asking.
“Is that so?” Jungsu smirks, leaning over to press his hands flat on the countertop, angling his body in a way he knows makes his shirt gap around the neckline, a straight shot down his chest and stomach. He bites his lip, for extra effect, running his tongue over it first.
The guy looks thoroughly debauched and properly enticed, eyes having trouble deciding whether to focus on Jungsu’s mouth or chest, even flicking a few times to where his tattoos peek out of his right shirtsleeve. Cute.
“Uh, y-yeah?” he stutters, cheeks turning a precious pink. “But now that I asked I’m realizing how hot you are and I’m not sure if I’ll be able to adequately return any advances.” His big, expressive eyes pinch in the middle, right on the bridge of his nose.
Oh , Jungsu would love to get him in bed. So flustered and easily, vocally, bent to his will.
“Hmmm,” Jungsu hums through a sly smile. “So did you come here to order or just stare, pretty?”
The man springs into action, eyes dropping to the counter, hands shoving into the pockets of his jeans groping for money. “Large popcorn, please.”
Jungsu turns to Seungmin, his coworker already watching him with a disgusted look on his face. “Got it,” he grumbles, making gestures like he’s throwing up as soon as he’s out of sight from the customers.
Finally able to produce his payment, the guy slides his money across the counter.
“Oh, you didn’t have to go through the trouble, babe,” Jungsu smiles serenely. “It’s on the house.”
The guy gapes, mouth opening and closing a few times. “I can’t… let me pay you somehow,” he insists. What a gentleman.
Jungsu leans forward even further, just inches from the other’s face. He can see the man’s eyes flutter, the tiniest movement, watches a shiver run down his body. “How about a name?” he purrs, under his breath.
“Gunil,” the man says, throat bobbing, soft honey skin practically begging to be marked up. He rolled over and gave Jungsu what he wanted oh so easily . “What’s yours?”
“Here you go Gay su, I mean, Jungsu,” Seungmin cuts in, dropping the popcorn on the counter. “Oops! Sorry, Freudian slip.”
“Pretty name,” Gunil says, ignoring the intrusion, tongue visibly running over his teeth.
Jungsu wants to eat him whole.
“And here you were telling me you couldn’t give it to me properly,” Jungsu pouts, popping out his bottom lip.
A shuddery, breathy laugh escapes Gunil. “I said I didn’t know if it would be up to your standards.”
“Hm,” Jungsu curls a finger in one of the longer locks of hair at the nape of his neck. “I’m liking what I’ve seen so far. I’m willing to continue this little… experiment… in giving and receiving if you are...”
Massive, expressive eyes that turn dark at the insinuation. Jungsu is enthralled.
“Gunil!” a shrill voice calls. “What’s taking so long, lets go!”
Gunil’s mouth freezes where it’s halfway open, pupils shrink, the color on his cheeks travels up to the tips of his ears, three shades darker than before. He doesn’t say anything. Not a peep. He just grabs the popcorn with shaking hands and flees, not sparing Jungsu another glance.
Jungsu huffs, heady haze immediately retreating. The man even left his money on the counter. A twenty, way too much for his food. Jungsu pockets it.
Seungmin eyes him, one brow raised.
“It’s like a tip for inconveniencing me,” he explains, grabbing a handful of popcorn from the bucket Seungmin is carrying and tossing it into his mouth.
“Whatever,” his friend snorts. “That was truly painful, I hope you know. Not just for you, but for me .”
“What was painful?” Jooyeon butts in, cheery voice arriving before he does, loping onto the scene with his usual goofy ass grin.
Jungsu thought managers were supposed to be intimidating and scary before he worked here. But then again, he also thought they were supposed to be older than twenty, so, Jooyeon is already subverting his expectations.
Seungmin hops up onto the counter, nearly sitting on Jungsu’s hand. “He hit on one guy and nearly got his head bitten off by a crazy boyfriend, and then he hit on another guy that ran away from him as soon as things were getting good.”
Jungsu nods, frowning. Fair enough.
“Aw, baby Su, don’t get too down,” Jooyeon coos, coming over to pinch both of his cheeks.
Jungsu swats him away. “You have to stop calling me that, I’m two years older than you, Joo.”
Jooyeon ignores him. “I interviewed a guy today that’s, like, exactly your type!”
“Jesus fucking Christ, Jooyeon,” Seungmin moans. “You have to stop interviewing people without me!”
“Why?” Jooyeon scoffs, face twisting into displeasure, arms across his chest. “I’m the boss.”
Seungmin rubs at his temples. “Because last time you hired someone without me monitoring you brought on a literal criminal. He tried to kill Hyeongjun behind the dumpsters, Jooyeon!”
“That’s a little dramatic, Minnie,” Jooyeon argues, head lolling to one side. “He didn’t try anything, he just pulled a knife.”
“Same difference!” Seungmin yells, hands thrown into the air.
“My type?” Jungsu asks. The only thing he’s curious about in this exchange.
“Please at least tell me you didn’t ask what his favorite Pokemon is as a prerequisite to the interview,” Seungmin pleads.
“No, Seungmin, I didn’t,” Jooyeon says defensively.
“Well did you hire him?” Jungsu tries again, eager to stop being ignored.
Jooyeon only spares him the tiniest glance. “Yeah.” Now Jungsu is interested. “His favorite Pokemon is Lucario, how could I not?”
His shift drags after that, just like it does every day.
Jooyeon ‘working’, Seungmin trailing behind him picking up all his messes as he makes them, Hyeongjun pretending he’s not stealing glances at Seungmin from the window where he watches the movies, Jiseok doing whatever Jiseok does.
It doesn’t get interesting until intermission, the crowd rush bringing a stunning fox-eyed man to his register.
This guy is much more Jungsu’s speed, heavily shrouded innuendos, a caress of the hand when he gives Jungsu his money, a low, ‘any chance you get a break around here?’
He doesn’t get a break, but this guy doesn’t need to know that, not when his blush red lips are wrapping around the popsicle he just bought, and his eyes are on fire with lust.
“Meet me out back in ten? I think I left something in my car,” he responds.
So he tells Seungmin to cover for him and he slips out the back and lets the stranger fuck him in the back seat of his piece of shit station wagon, falling to pieces under his strong hands and around his pretty cock.
“Oh, fuck ,” Jungsu moans, chest heaving as he flops back on the seat, tugging his pants back up. “What was your name again?”
The man laughs, cracking a window to chuck out their soiled condom. “Don’t think I ever said,” he grins, eyes sparkling. “Jeongin.”
Jungsu laughs back, still out of breath. “Jungsu.” He pulls himself up, clicking open his center console and digging around. “Wanna smoke a joint?”
“Are you my fucking soulmate?” Jeongin groans, graciously accepting the roll into his mouth, clenching it in his teeth through his smile as Jungsu lights it.
They fall into silence, passing back and forth the joint, taking drags. Jungsu watches the colors of the movie flicker through the fogged up dash.
“You always take boys back to your car and let them fuck you?” Jeongin asks teasingly on his next pass.
Jungsu smirks. “Yeah. But I only share my weed with the really pretty ones.”
They part ten minutes later, Jeongin typing his number into Jungsu’s phone with a promise to call if he’s ever in the city. He won’t be, but it’s a nice thought.
“You’re so lucky Jooyeon chose tonight to have a Street Fighter competition with Jiseok,” Seungmin snorts when he bangs back into the concession. “You took longer than usual.”
Jungsu huffs, running his hands through his hair, attempting to straighten it out at least a little bit. Jooyeon screams from across the lobby, sure enough, still curved over the arcade game, Jiseok knocking shoulders with him. None of them have any idea why Jiseok is always loitering around. He doesn’t even work here.
“How’s your refractory period, Su?” Hyeongjun sidles up, flipping through the shift schedule clipboard. “Looks like loverboy starts tomorrow.”
Jungsu yanks the thing from his hands, eyes scanning over the sloppy scribble of Jooyeon’s handwriting.
“Goo comma G,” Seungmin says, chin hooking over his shoulder. “Sounds hot.”
“Do you not still have a boyfriend, Su?” Hyeongjun snaps the gum he’s chewing, breaking Jungsu’s focus on the name of his new plaything.
“What a rude question, Hyeongjunnie,” he sighs. “Yes.”
“Woo! Get fucked Jiseok!” Jooyeon howls.
He has to step over his own littered condom to get into his car at the end of the night.
—
If Jungsu had to pick a color to describe his life he’d pick gray.
A murky, edging on brown gray. The color of the lake water in the early morning sun, when there’s still fog rolling off the water.
He’s been in the same town his whole life. Grew up right on the edge of the woods in a small house with just enough room for him, his older sister, and his grandma. It was fine. Nothing special. They didn’t have much money, but no one around here does, save for those contained within a few specific neighborhoods.
He didn’t excel in school, and he didn’t have enough money or motivation to seek out college.
Before he started working at the drive-in he didn’t really have friends that understood him. He hung out with a few girls in high school, the pretty, popular types that liked having him around after they found out he was gay. Those friends live in the wealthy neighborhoods.
When his grandmother died, that was the first time he realized that maybe the gray he was seeing was more inevitable than situational. Because one month turned into two, and then two into three, and then he realized that the dark haze he’d been wading through his whole life wasn’t something everyone dealt with as a prerequisite to their days.
His sister came home then, after she had managed to escape, because she had to. He felt bad putting it on her, so he found ways to cope. Shut himself in the bathroom and etched his pain into his hip bones, the front of his thighs. He still doesn’t wear shorts. Still doesn’t let anyone fuck him from an angle that exposes his stomach.
He doesn’t like to think about that part of his life. Because he started working at the drive-in and he met Seungmin, and Seungmin convinced him to try medication. His sister escaped again, this time for good, and he found comfort in his murky, gray, monotonous life.
Some people aren’t destined for more than getting fucked in their car on work time, or being tied to a town that holds all their hurt, knot cinched too tight to pull apart.
Jungsu likes the color gray; it’s all he’s ever known.
—
He should know something is off when he shows up to work the next day and Seungmin is smiling devilishly at him.
Jungsu didn’t get pretty for the new boy, that would be ridiculous, no? He’s just wearing a tank that exposes his arms and gaps enough the sides to tease at hints of his flank. And maybe he threw the tiniest amount of sparkle on his eyelids, but that's neither here nor there.
“You’re about to lose your fucking mind,” Seungmin says giddily, laughter bubbling out.
His good mood puts Jungsu in an immediate fowl one, frown already pulling down his lips. “What are you talking about?”
“And, oh!” Jooyeon’s voice lifts from behind him. “Here’s the last person you have to meet. Perpetually late… I mean, Jungsu! Sorry, I always get those confused.”
Jungsu swings around, coming face to face with Jooyeon’s sweetest, most innocent grin and then, a second later, the blushed cheeks of the man that ran out on him last night.
“Su, this is Gunil,” Jooyeon chirps, sticking a finger straight through the gaping arm hole of his shirt to poke his bare skin. “The one I told you about.” Subtlety is not his forte.
Gunil shifts anxiously. Jungsu manages to swallow back his surprise, maintaining a cool face and narrowing his eyes. “Nice to meet you, man,” he says, playing up the heterosexuality factor.
“Yeah, uh…” Gunil’s cheeks burn brighter. “You too?” The man’s eyes creep down his arm, his half-sleeve on full display in the ratty shirt he’s wearing. Jungsu smirks.
Jooyeon beams. “I knew you two would get along! Now let’s go see the ticket booth.”
To his credit, Gunil recovers quickly, following Jooyeon outside, throwing an apologetic smile over his shoulder on his way out.
Seungmin laughs and laughs, and only stops when Hyeongjun tells him to shut up so he can focus on writing his latest Letterboxd review.
He and Gunil don’t run into each other for most of the man’s first shift, mostly due to the fact that Jooyeon is hanging off of him like he’s a lovestruck puppy, teaching him the ropes in between his swooning.
Jungsu doesn’t know what the deal is. It’s not like he has any reason to hate the guy, they talked for like five minutes tops. He’s just a petty bitch, and the way Gunil didn’t ask for his number after so heavily flirting irks him.
He’s hot! Men always ask for his number!
He’s smoking a joint by the dumpsters after taking the trash out when Gunil finally catches him alone.
“Hey,” he says, slinking up nervously, hands wrung. “Jungsu, right?”
“Good memory,” Jungsu snickers.
“Uh, look…” He creeps closer, nose wrinkling up when he gets close enough to smell the smoke leaking from Jungsu’s joint. “Are you doing drugs on work time?” he asks in what sounds like genuine amazement.
Jungsu laughs, coughing a bit, Gunil catching him at the tailend of an exhale. “Yes. Want a hit?” he asks, extending his arm.
Gunil looks unbelievably troubled. It’s disgustingly endearing.
“I shouldn’t…” he says, eyes not leaving Jungsu’s hand. “Right?”
“Are you really asking me that?”
“Fuck it,” Gunil decides, taking the thing and sucking in a long drag.
Heat curls in Jungsu’s gut at the picture. Gunil’s delicate lips wrapped around the place his were just moments ago, the intoxicating swell of smoke leaving his lungs. Shit.
“You keep surprising me,” he admits, taking back the joint and indulging in a greedy hit.
Gunil leans back against the dumpster, arms crossed, mouth tipping up the slightest bit. “Can we start over? Forget yesterday?”
Jungsu stares into the distance, ash getting concerningly close to his hand. “Only if you tell me why.”
“Could I get another hit?” Gunil asks, sounding smaller than before.
Jungsu hands it back, watching carefully. Gunil’s hands shake, the slightest tremor, probably unnoticeable to anyone who’s not looking for it.
“Finish it,” Jungsu says.
Gunil does, and then he tosses the butt on the ground, scuffing it out with the toe of his combat boot. “I had a lapse in judgment last night,” he intones.
“Ouch,” Jungsu blows his bangs out of his face, refocusing on the screen on the horizon. They’re playing some shitty western today, something Hyeongjun wanted to watch.
At least cowboys are kind of sexy.
“No, no,” Gunil rushes, eyes widening, hands waving in front of him. “Not like that, I mean, fuck, this is humiliating.”
Jungsu waits. He’s running thin on patience.
“I never do that, okay? I’ve never hit on someone like that. I got lost in the fucking moment, it almost got me in trouble, I just…” he bumbles through non-answers.
“What, you have a boyfriend?” Jungsu snorts.
“No,” Gunil sighs, gripping his fingers into his hair in a way Jungsu would really like to try himself. “I’m… I’m not out, okay?”
Even in the low light of the back of the lot, where there’s only the low hum of an overhead lamp and the colors bouncing off the movie screen, Jungsu can still see the pink gathering on Gunil’s cheeks.
“Jesus, dude. How old are you?”
Jungsu’s a bit taken aback, honestly. Most of the closeted guys he’s been with were older, usually pretending that he was a one off. They usually went quick and fast and didn’t spend time buttering him up, and they surely didn’t confidently, albeit a bit awkwardly, flirt with him at his place of business.
“Twenty four,” Gunil shrinks, wincing.
“Right…” Jungsu tries not to exude judgemental energy. The way Gunil is grimacing, though, it’s probably not working. “I’ve fucked around with closeted guys before, so. Don’t stop on my account.”
Gunil swallows, adam's apple bobbing. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea… for me…”
“Alright. Whatever, dude,” Jungsu scoffs, kicking off the dumpster. “Just let me know if you change your mind, kay? I just think you’d look so cute bending me over a counter, you know?” He doesn’t look back again, dirt puffing up around his feet in the gravel on his way back inside.
—
One thing about being gray is that it can feel lonely.
He’s known he’s into boys from the second he could know anything about any of that shit. His first crush was on a kid named Jongho who sat next to him in the third grade. He remembers going home and telling his grandma he wanted to marry him. She didn’t say much at all.
He got his first tattoo when he was fifteen, using a fake ID he’d procured from one of the rich kids. It’s a strelitzia in plain black ink, wrapping up the back of his shoulder. He went alone. He wished he had someone to hold his hand through it.
His grandma died, and he never wanted to feel so lonely again, so he thought maybe it would be easier if he didn’t let himself feel lonely. It’s hard to lose something you were never holding onto in the first place, after all. Close enough to satiate his human urges, but always far enough from the line to preserve his sanity.
The first boyfriend he had was right before he turned seventeen, the last semester of junior year of high school. Yunho was sweet on him, one year his senior. He taught him a lot and Jungsu felt giddy and smiley in his presence. But some people are destined for better things, even if he isn’t, and Yunho went away for college and never came back.
The second boyfriend he had was much too old, and that’s when things really got fucked up for his loneliness, if he traces it back. Something about going into adulthood after being treated the way he shouldn’t seems to have really screwed with the wiring in his brain. Imagine that.
Seungmin was the first person that stepped over his line. Forcefully. Without asking. He just pushed and pushed until Jungsu let him in because he didn’t have the fight to keep him out anymore. His friend is annoying like that.
Sometimes if he spends too much time with his friends, if they push too much, try to get in, he feels like he can’t breathe. He feels like he’s trapped in one of those rooms from a horror movie where the walls are slowly closing in.
Lonely, lonely, lonely. Gray, gray, gray.
It’s comforting to know he’ll be alone.
He’s scared of a day where he wakes and anticipates being anything other than by himself.
Terrified.
But scared feels blood red, and he much prefers the color gray.
—
For someone so insistent that they should forget that one time they were engaging in verbal foreplay, Gunil sure does stare at him a lot.
He can feel it prickling on the back of his neck every night.
The back of his neck and down his arms, legs, back… fucking everywhere .
Sometimes he’ll catch it, too. Turn around when he feels the weight of expressive eyes on his arm, the one that’s painted with traditional art. He’ll snap his gaze back, lock onto Gunil, the hazy, dark sheen over his face intoxicating.
When that happens, Jungsu likes to tease. Run his tongue over his lower lip, get it completely slick with spit, cock his head the tiniest fraction and sink his teeth in. He revels in the way Gunil shivers, the way a shadow falls across his features.
Jungsu likes to play with his food before he eats it, and he will be tasting Gunil sooner or later.
It’s been one month of gradually amped up staring and teasing and gentle hands on lower backs when they pass one another, and then it’s time for the ceremony.
Jooyeon named it that, not him, to be clear.
A tradition, more than anything else, after a new employee survives a full month at the theater they all gather in front of the screen after the last car pulls out of the lot. Jiseok supplies the beer, because what else does he have to do all day, literally nobody knows, and they click the necks of their bottles and chug.
As soon as each of them finish, they chuck their bottle as hard as they can at the brick wall lining the bottom of the screen. Slowest drinker or last one to break their bottle becomes the designated driver for the night while they all get fucked up and watch a movie until the sun comes up.
They haven’t done this in a long fucking time. The last guy that almost reached a month of employment tried to stab Hyeongjun before he could even get to his ceremony.
Jungsu can’t deny that he loves the tradition. It's his favorite part of the job and it’s not even really part of the job.
“That’s it!” Jooyeon yells, hands cupped over his mouth from across the lot. “Last car just rolled out, let's get it!”
Jiseok starts chanting, or maybe he’s barking, hands on Gunil’s back as he leads him towards the screen. Jooyeon is trotting across the way, Hyeongjun making his way after locking up the other gate.
Jungsu takes a deep breath, taking it all in for a few seconds before he starts meandering forward.
He’d lost track of Seungmin until the man hooks an arm around his neck from the side, pulling him in until their foreheads bump at the temples while they walk. “I’ll stay sober with you if you want, Su,” he says quietly. “You probably shouldn’t be drinking much this close to the season change.”
“Ugh, get off me,” he snips, shoving the man away. “I can do what I want.”
“Okay, bitch, be like that,” Seungmin waves a hand, no bite to his tone. “But if you lose on purpose I’ll stay sober with you. Just so you know.”
“Whatever,” Jungsu grumbles.
But then the bottlenecks clink, and they all throw their heads back, and Jungsu keeps his tongue pressed close to the opening so that the flow is tampered.
And Seungmin breaks his bottle first, and then Jiseok, and Gunil, and Hyeongjun, and finally, Jooyeon, his eyes wide in fear of being last again .
But Jungsu waits… waits until Jooyeon shatters his bottle against the brick before he lowers his head.
“Whoops,” he shrugs.
When his bottle hits the wall it explodes with half the beer inside it still, spraying all over Jiseok.
Seungmin cracks into a wide grin, intercepting to start feeding the man shots before he gets angry about his soiled clothes.
Jungsu walks back towards the booth to load up the movie. Pulp Fiction, Gunil’s choice.
“I won’t lie, this is a major red flag, Gunil,” Hyeongjun says casually as the opening scene rolls. Seungmin and Jungsu pulled the old couches out of the breakroom, dropping them in the middle of the lot, and Jiseok pulled his car around and popped the trunk to reveal his stash of liquor.
Somehow Jungsu ends up next to Gunil, something he can’t tell if he instigated, or Gunil instigated, or is just by happenstance.
“What are you talking about?!” Gunil whines, a tone Jungsu hasn’t heard him use until this moment. “I thought everyone loved this movie?”
“Don’t get me wrong,” Hyeongjun swings his legs over Seungmin’s lap, making a cute blush bloom on the older’s cheeks. “It’s a fantastic movie, but if a man picks it as his first choice… sheesh.” Hyeongjun is such a cute drunk, his soft demeanor peeled back to reveal a chatty, more bubbly version of his usual subdued self.
“Well I wanted you guys to think I was cool!” Gunil says, slumping down in his seat. The move makes his legs widen a bit, denim clad thigh pressing into Jungsu’s.
Jungsu can’t convince himself it’s accidental.
“What’s your actual favorite, then?” someone asks. It doesn’t matter who, not when Gunil’s floppy drunk hand has fallen to his thigh.
“It’s embarrassing,” Gunil insists, still not even looking over as his fingers inch down the inside of Jungsu’s leg.
“Just tell us, babe,” Jungsu says, low. He can hear Gunil’s breath hitch when he turns around to look him in the eyes.
“Brokeback Mountain,” he says, voice creaky but loud enough to carry.
“That is embarrassing,” Jooyeon agrees, nodding his head sagely.
Hyeongjun hums, squinting his eyes like he does when he’s deep in thought, “I guess this is better. Or else Su would be crying so hard he wouldn’t be able to drive any of us home later.”
“Hey!” Jungsu protests.
“Oh, that’s so true!” Jiseok enthuses. “Last time we watched it he literally threw up he cried so hard!” His friends fall apart with laughter, Jooyeon smacking his hand on the armrest of the couch so hard that Jungsu is slightly afraid it will break.
“Damn,” Gunil chuckles. “Threw up, huh?” He blinks up at Jungsu with stars in his eyes.
“Queer longing, huh?” he retorts, leaning back and focusing on the screen.
That shuts Gunil up.
Goo Gunil is a touchy drunk, Jungsu finds out that night.
Throughout the runtime of the movie he’s had to remove the man’s wandering hand from creeping dangerously up his inner thigh at least ten times. It’s like Gunil doesn’t even realize he’s doing it, either, completely enraptured by the screen.
Jungsu is going to go crazy. He’s so horny it’s absurd.
It’s not only the hands, but the slow relaxation into the couch, further from Jooyeon and closer to Jungsu as time ticks on. By the end they’re pressed together in a neat line down each of their sides, warm all the way up.
Jooyeon and Jiseok are good at convincing people to do things, all it takes is one look from their twin puppy-dog stares and Gunil is drinking one more shot, one more beer. He’s absolutely wasted by the time the sun rises blue and gold behind them.
And then, because he’s a good friend, and not because he’s embarrassingly intrigued by his mysterious coworker, he ends up in his car alone with Gunil.
Of course he would suggest Seungmin drive Hyeongjun home, they’ve been painfully pining over each other for ages, he’s just playing wingman. Jooyeon and Jiseok have fallen asleep inside of Jiseok’s car before the movie is even over, so the others just toss the keys in with them and lock them in.
Gunil is horribly shitty at giving directions, seemingly more focused on staring straight at Jungsu’s face instead of the road.
“Can you focus, please, Gunil, I have no idea where you live.”
The older man led him to his neighborhood, at the very least, a process that took much longer than it should have. He lives in one of the rich ones, which, Jungsu wasn’t either expecting or not expecting, but he feels more on edge driving through the well-manicured streets.
“I am focused,” he says, deadly serious. Jungsu peeks over to find the man narrowing his eyes like he’s reading something blurry.
“On the road , jackass, Jesus Christ,” Jungsu reaches out to push his chin forward. “Do you know your street name?”
“Mmmmm,” Gunil sighs. Jungsu is one second from giving up and taking him back to the theater when Gunil perks up, throwing a wild finger at the window. “That one!” he yells.
They’re already creeping past the house he’s pointed to, so Jungsu has to slam on the breaks, backing the car up lest he forget which house is his again.
When he shifts the car into park Gunil doesn’t move to get out, he just keeps staring at Jungsu, raking his eyes across every inch of his face painstakingly slowly.
“Like what you see, babe?” Jungsu says, only half teasing.
Gunil pokes out his tongue and licks over his lips.
Shit. Jungsu would take him right here if he wasn’t so fucking drunk. But if he wasn’t so fucking drunk he wouldn’t be acting like this.
“I think I want you,” Gunil breathes, pupils dilating when his eyes finally land on Jungsu’s mouth.
“You think?” Jungsu clenches his jaw.
Gunil’s head bobs up and down slowly.
“Kay, well, that’s nice, but you’re drunk and you need to get out of my car.”
“Do you want me, Su?” It’s the first time he’s said the nickname. Jungsu’s stomach turns.
“It doesn’t matter what I want, Gunil.” He throws the car in reverse to punctuate his point. “See you at work tomorrow.”
Gunil’s clumsy fingers struggle to open the door, so Jungsu has to lean across the console and open it for him. He ignores the feeling of Gunil’s shaky breath on his neck and the way their fingers brush hot on the handle.
Despite his urge to flee the scene, Jungsu waits for Gunil to stumble through the door before he peels away.
He turns the radio off on the way home, content to listen to the beat of his heart thundering in his skull.
Jongmyung is on his porch when he arrives, smoking a cigarette, lips already twisted into a punishing scowl.
“Where the fuck were you?” he growls, hands finding Jungsu’s hips as soon as he steps within reach.
He tries and fails to wiggle out of his boyfriend’s tight grasp. “Out with a new coworker,” he says casually.
“Since when do you have a new coworker?” He smells like cigarette smoke, teeth grazing Jungsu’s ear.
Jungsu shrugs, finally able to open the door. “Been like a month.” He peers over his shoulder as he walks into his house. “Jooyeon says he’s just my type.”
Jongmyung always fucks him harder when he’s jealous.
—
Maybe he should have been expecting this, Jungsu thinks, as he’s dragged out of the concession by a painfully strong hand at his wrist.
After all, he had been blatantly ignoring Jongmyung for three weeks before his lovely partner showed up at his house last night.
“Let me go, asshole,” he seethes, gritting his teeth, helpless against his boyfriend’s strength.
“Asshole, really Jungsu?” Jongmyung laughs unkindly, but finally shirks his grasp on Jungsu.
They’re behind the building now.
Jungsu isn’t worried about it. He knows Seungmin is listening through the door, finger on the button to call the cops if he has to.
“I’m the asshole when you’ve been flouncing around here like a little slut , giving it up for anyone who asks?” Jongmyung is ugly when he yells, the veins in his forehead bulge and his eyes go bloodshot.
Jungsu sighs, leaning back against the brick of the building behind him. He’s already tired of it. “Isn’t that why you like me at all, Jongie?”
Jongmyung’s fist clenches around nothing. Jungsu eyes it, raising a brow as if to challenge him. He knows he won’t do it. He never does. It’s the only hard line his cruelty ademately stays behind. Words are okay, but hands aren’t.
“Quit,” the man spits, blood hot in his face. If Jungsu were to reach out, he’d probably find him hot to the touch.
A choked laugh worms it’s way up Jungsu’s throat. “Sorry, what?”
“Quit,” Jongmyung repeats, gesturing to the building behind him. “Quit your job or we’re over.”
“Wow, what a toughie,” Jungsu says sarcastically, kicking off the wall and stalking back towards the door. “You have ten minutes to leave before Seungmin calls the cops.”
“You’re fucking nobody without me, Jungsu!” Jongmyung screams after him, the end of his sentence muffled by the concession door, closing with a satisfying click.
Two sets of eyes blink owlishly at him, Jooyeon and Gunil standing around the door when he comes in. Seungmin has one hand on Gunil’s chest and one on his phone, clicking the call screen off when they hear Jongmyung’s pickup roar to life and screech out of the vicinity.
Seungmin rolls his eyes. “See, I told you it’s fine. Look, he’s in one piece,” he says to the guys, hand falling off Gunil’s chest.
No matter how many times Jooyeon sees it, he still always reacts the same way to a fight between Jungsu and Jongmyung: with teary eyes and blubbering. “A-are y-y-you oka-y?” he asks, collapsing into Jungsu’s arms when he offers the younger a hug.
“Yes, Joo, just like always,” he sounds annoyed but he pets Jooyeon's long hair anyway, soothing him.
“Like always?” Jungsu almost doesn’t recognize Gunil’s voice, tainted with such disdain that it comes off a bit frightening. Or… maybe that’s arousal.
“Don’t worry, prince charming, I just ended it,” Jungsu says. He skims over Seungmin’s questioning look, turning to him when he adds, “For good this time.”
Seungmin snorts. “Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve heard that one, Su.” And then he’s walking off with his pissy little attitude.
“Dramatic,” Jungsu mutters.
Jooyeon clings to him the rest of the night, never more than two feet away, always watching with his big round eyes. Jungsu can’t even complain that much when the boy is so goddamn cute. What he can do is ignore the worried looks Gunil sends him all night. He doesn’t want any fucking pity.
He thinks he’s outrun his demons until Gunil corners him at the dumpsters at the end of the night, a detour on the way to his car.
“We have to stop meeting like this, Gunil,” he drawls, tossing the trash bags he’s carrying over the edge of the bin.
“Are you okay?” Gunil asks, still sounding shaken up.
Jungsu sighs, rubs his palm against his forehead. “Wanna smoke?” he says in lieu of a proper answer.
He doesn’t give Gunil time to respond, instead starting for the front of the lot. To his credit, Gunil doesn’t question it until they’re halfway to the screen.
“Where the fuck are we going?” he calls from somewhere behind.
Another ignorable question, as far Jungsu is concerned. “Are you afraid of heights?”
“No?”
“Sick.”
Jungsu ducks through the service panel around the side of the screen, holding it open for Gunil to follow. He has to turn on his phone flashlight while they’re inside the structure in order for them to see well enough to climb the annoyingly steep stairs.
Right at the top of the screen there’s a wooden platform. It spans across the entire length of the thing, meant for maintenance, obviously, but Jungsu likes to sit right in the middle, legs dangling over the edge that overlooks the side opposite the lot.
He drops to sitting, taking a joint out of his pocket and lighting it with practiced hands.
From here the moonlight shines down and he can see over the expanse of forested farm fields that surround the theater. It’s quiet, and calm, and in the middle of the night it makes him feel big instead of small.
Gunil seems nervous when he sits down next to him, scooting close to the edge carefully instead of throwing his legs over like Jungsu had. Jungsu offers him the joint. He accepts.
“Isn’t this dangerous?” he asks, smoke held in his lungs.
Jungsu shrugs. “Probably.”
They’re silent for a minute, just looking out over the land laid out ahead of them. Jungsu squints. Zeroes in on the pavement below.
“I almost jumped off here once,” he says casually, matter of fact. He’s found that’s the easiest way to get the message across when telling people why you’re so fucked up.
Gunil doesn’t flinch. “Why didn’t you?” he asks, calm.
Jungsu points down at the ground, the lit joint hanging at the end of his fingers, ash flickering softly. “Jiseok stood right there, told me that I probably wouldn’t even do any damage. That I’d just break my legs and humiliate all of us.” He laughs lightly at the memory. A shock of panic runs through him for a split second, his brain unsure why he so easily is letting Gunil toe his line. The weed dulls it.
“And that worked?” Gunil asks.
When Jungsu looks up he’s met with genuine eyes, reflecting off the moon.
Ah , that’s why. It’s because of the way his body gives in when Gunil looks at him.
Jungsu purses his lips. “Long enough for Seungmin to come tackle me, sure.”
“Huh,” Gunil sounds.
Huh is right.
Now it’s Jungsu’s turn to pry.
“Why are you here, Gunil?” he asks, letting the last of the joint fall off his fingertips and sail to the ground below. It’s not lost on him that the only portion of the thing that’s left when they finish is the part that’s felt the press of both of their lips.
“I dropped out of school,” he says simply. “My parents moved, so I came with.”
“Boring,” Jungsu frowns. “I was hoping you escaped a sex cult.”
Gunil laughs through his nose, a short huff. Lets the joke simmer a bit. “So are you?”
“Am I what?”
“Okay?” he finishes.
Is he? Is he okay?
“I think now… if I were to stand up here, ready to jump…” Jungsu closes his eyes, pictures it in his head. The way the wind blew through his hair that day. “I’d give Seungmin’s sorry ass enough time to catch me.”
“Wouldn’t it be easier if you didn’t jump in the first place?”
They’re speaking in layers, with hidden meanings and webs that make his brain cry out. “It always is, isn’t it?”
“Suppose so.”
The conversation lapses again, Jungsu counting up and down from ten, pressing each of his fingers into the wooden planks beneath them.
“You can see Venus tonight,” Gunil breaks the silence, tipping his chin to the sky. “The bright one, right there, two clicks from the moon.”
Jungsu focuses as hard as he can. He’s not sure he’s looking at the right dot, but he lets Gunil think he is.
“Pretty,” he murmurs, but by the end of the word he’s got his eyes resting on Gunil’s face again. On the soft curve of his cheeks, the light curl of his eyelashes.
“I think I need to get going,” the older mumbles, face turned towards Jungsu so that they’re just inches apart. He’s horrible at hiding the way his eyes drop to Jungsu’s lips.
“If I asked you for a kiss would you give me one?” Jungsu asks, breath short.
“I think you know that I would, Su.”
But he doesn’t ask.
Maybe he’s a coward.
He doesn’t ask, and he lets Gunil get up, and say a quiet, “Goodnight, Jungsu.”
And he says, “Drive safe.”
And Gunil’s eyes bunch up, and he still doesn’t ask, because Gunil steals the last word:
“Don’t jump when I’m not here to catch you, alright?”
Jungsu doesn’t realize until he sees Gunil’s taillights fade into the distance, car creeping down the road and away from him.
He wishes he kissed him goodbye.
He’s never wanted to kiss anyone so badly in his entire life.
If only he asked.
Deep, dark, blood red, edging up through the gray.