Chapter Text
“I made a mistake last night,” Minho said. He sat by the window in his apartment. The sun was setting, bathing the city of Seoul in pink and orange. The view only made Minho feel worse.
“What kind of mistake?” Jonghyun asked. He was on the last leg of a world tour, currently in Osaka, and they’d kept in touch well.
“The kind of mistake that can’t be undone.”
“Hmm, well, if you tell me what it is, maybe I can help. Most things aren’t as bad when you say them out loud. It’s your head that makes them larger than life.”
Minho toyed with the remote control near his thigh, turning it over and over as he ran through his thoughts. There had to be a way he could say what happened without divulging the actual details. The thing was—it was those details that would outline the tentacles of this particular problem.
“I slept with someone.”
“I’ve never considered getting laid a crime, assuming you didn’t pay for it,” Jonghyun chirped.
“No, I slept with someone I shouldn’t have.”
“We’ve all been there. What’s the worst that could happen, in all honesty? Think about it. Some awkward interactions? Some hurt feelings? These things happen.”
Jonghyun was not exactly inexperienced in such indelicacies. He was a senior who, when Minho was still doing homework at night, would be averaging two dates a night. Minho had looked up to him for his experience and trusted his opinions.
“Yeah, all those things are going to happen.”
“So, live with it. Just don’t be mean or cruel to her. You gotta be kind, at least, because it might not feel like a mistake to her.”
Minho’s stomach cramped.
“Don’t be an asshole. You got that?”
Jonghyun was using his big brother voice. Apparently, it still needed to come out even as they approached their thirties.
“That’s the last thing I would do. I would never hurt this person.” Minho’s voice had softened.
“You care about her.”
Silence.
“Listen, I have to head out for rehearsal. Just, be nice to yourself and her. So, you got carried away. You both did. It won’t cause any disaster. We’re not kids anymore. It’s not like you'll get in trouble or lose your job or something. Hang in there.”
Minho said his goodbyes and ended the call. Looking out over the fiery sunset, Jonghyun’s words were of no comfort. He could lose his job in quite a few spectacular ways over this. His mind had already run a few creative exercises, and they’d all ended in humiliation and hurt.
Nothing could make him regret it, though. Not even a life relegated to shitty bit parts in low-budget projects or even back-office work where he’d never be seen in the glitz again. He’d still do it all over, every single moment.
Two days ago
Key was pouring Dom Perignon like it were the price of Coke. It was a housewarming, and a big one—the kind that required attendance, even if only for a few hours. Minho arrived on time with gifts in hand—several Le Creuset pots in boxes that he easily hauled onto Key’s dining table. An hour later, he watched Taemin arrive looking awkward and distracted, insisting that his gift for Key would arrive sometime that week. Minho knew there was a higher chance that Taemin had not ordered it yet. And not because he was uncaring; he just wasn’t organized.
As Key fluttered around his myriad of guests, Minho spotted Onew chatting away to a few of the managers they’d worked with for years. He listened to their banter, something about ordering food at 3 am, and soon Minho’s eyes drifted to Taemin. He was perched awkwardly on the edge of a large sectional sofa, champagne in hand, with a fake smile plastered on, as he nodded here and there like he was listening to various conversations but contributing nothing.
He wasn’t a social butterfly; Minho knew that. He had never been, but Taemin had grace and manners and in settings like this, he was a well-behaved wallflower, no matter how many drinks he’d have. On more than a few occasions, Taemin had been the one to stay and clean up when the host himself had long passed out.
Their eyes caught, and Taemin gave him an innocent and plaintive look. Minho just smirked, returning to his conversation. An hour passed and two more bottles were popped. Minho had made his rounds to nearly everyone at the party. It was almost like a mission to him. He hated to leave even a single person out.
“Hey, can you go save the baby on the couch, please? He'll turn into stone if he sits there any longer.”
While Minho had made his rounds to nearly everyone, he’d purposely left Taemin out. It’s not that he was reluctant, it’s just that it was Taemin. A different world would engulf him as soon as they spoke in a setting like this.
Minho did as told, bringing two shots of soju for him and the baby. He sat beside him and then handed the shot over.
“Here.”
“I’m half drunk.”
“So am I.”
“I’m gonna leave soon.”
“Why?”
Taemin just stared, like Minho should find this obvious.
“I’ve been here for two hours.”
“Stay, come on. You’ve got these rare days off. Just have a little ordinary fun.”
“This is not ordinary. Half the people in this room are celebrities.”
“And you’re not?”
“You know what I mean. Doesn’t he deliver the news on MBC?”
Taemin was subtly pointing at a smartly dressed young man with a young woman on his arm. Key laughed with the two as he offered them hors d’oeuvres.
“I dunno. I don’t watch the news, Taem.”
Taemin stood. “I’m going to go find my coat.”
“Wait, come on.”
The real fun would start soon, once it was only Key’s closest friends left. It was so rare that they got to spend this kind of time together now that everyone had hugely successful dual careers. Even one day off a month was a rarity, so Minho couldn’t let this opportunity dissolve. He followed Taemin, grabbing a bottle of soju as he did.
They ended up in a back bedroom with a pile of coats on the bed.
“Why is every party like this? Coats on beds.”
Minho watched as Taemin tried and failed to find his own.
“Why are you in a rush to leave?” Minho asked.
“I’m not, I’m just…”
Taemin stopped fussing with the coats. This wasn’t the Taemin Minho expected to see tonight.
“You know everyone in there, more or less. It’s no big deal,” Minho offered.
“What do you want me to say? That it’s overwhelming? That I feel like jumping out of my skin, and I can barely string a sentence together?”
This Taemin shouldn’t have been drinking. And Minho took a swig of soju to soothe his guilt at following him.
“I didn’t realize it was still that bad.”
“Well, it is. This kind of thing doesn’t go away.”
They’d had this conversation before when Minho had done virtually the same thing—insensitively pushed back at Taemin’s impulses to flee a social situation. Minho didn’t want to be that guy again.
“You could go home or we could sit in here and have a few drinks, talk.”
“You wanna talk?”
The surprise on Taemin’s face made Minho a bit flushed.
“We text all the time but it’s not the same, is it?” Taemin continued.
“Come on, let’s sit down.”
They sat on the floor, cross-legged, passing the soju bottle back and forth. They caught up on the details of all the stories they’d alluded to in their texts to one another. All the little details, the funny things people said or did, and the things only they would care to talk about.
“You have to wait until the next hole clears before you can tee off,” Minho was saying.
“So, what, you were standing around?”
“Yeah, you have to stand around, out of the way, while the party ahead of you finishes. It would be a huge faux pas to tee off when they’re not done.”
“Doesn’t it get boring? All the waiting?”
“Nah, it doesn’t. I keep saying this, but you’d like golf. It’s quiet, for the most part.”
“Imagining you being quiet during a sport is kind of hard.”
Minho pouted, knowing Taemin wasn’t wrong. “I’ve only been told off a couple of times.”
Taemin laughed, squeezing Minho’s thigh as he did. The warmth of his touch radiated, and Minho couldn’t help but enjoy it. He put his hand on top of Taemin’s, squeezing it. Whenever they were together, he was reminded of how he missed Taemin’s touch. When he’d finished his enlistment, Minho had basked in cuddling Taemin as soon as they’d met up. And he knew it was a bit over the top, but it felt right. Minho found it easier to follow his body’s instincts than to question it all in his head.
With the liquor long gone, Minho knew he was drunk. And he knew Taemin was drunk because he was cuddling on him in return. That was something nigh on impossible for sober Taemin.
“Home time is now,” Minho managed to say, rather stupidly.
“Now… home?” Taemin pouted. He broke away from Minho, crawling a bit before he started pulling a coat down from the heap on the bed.
“No, no, no you’ll spill them.”
“They’re not liquid.”
Minho grabbed Taemin’s waist to stop him, pulling him backward. Drunk Taemin was now a little bundle in his lap. And they were close, a little too close. Taemin looked into his eyes with an unfocused gaze as Minho tried and failed to keep his own. Suddenly, Taemin cupped his jaw sloppily.
“I just need my coat. To exit this soiree,” he said.
“Don’t exit.”
“There’s no exit.”
“What?” Minho asked. It was that point of drunk where everything and nothing made sense at once.
“Siri, car. C-A-R. Car.”
Minho watched like he was witnessing an alien.
“Come with me, the car’s coming,” Taemin announced. He sprang from Minho’s lap onto the bed, where he crawled around until he found their coats.
“Let’s go,” he said.
And Minho just followed. He was certain he had drunk most of that soju, so somehow, he was even with Taemin’s level of drunk, meaning there were no questions now. He was happy to play follow the leader.
When they said their goodbyes to Key, Taemin draped himself over him and hugged him a little too tight. Minho pried him off, only to do the same.
“Oh, you two are fucked up. Where are you going?”
Taemin just shoved his phone out for Key to read.
“Okay, company car. Go ahead. Don’t cause trouble on your way out.”
The two sat quietly in a comfy van as it drove into the night. Minho hadn’t caught where they were going, but he’d smirked as Taemin seemed to give directions through the passenger window before they entered the vehicle. Every few minutes, they’d catch each other’s eyes and giggle, until Taemin reached out and pushed Minho’s face, making him turn his head away.
“Watch the scenery.”
“It’s too dark,” Minho complained.
“Then watch the other scenery.”
Minho looked at the eyes staring back at him with a glimmer. It was dark in the van, too, but he could see the puppy-love-drunk face of Taemin quite well. He loved Taemin like this—it was like when they were kids. The times when they could play around in their spare time, stay up a bit too late, get told off, and even sneak into the same bed to tell secrets while everyone else slept. The time before anyone looked at them funny for being so close.
When the van came to a stop, Taemin confidently announced they’d arrived and led the way through a parking garage to an elevator. It was Minho’s apartment.
“You’re home,” Taemin grinned.
“I’m home.”
“Home,” Taemin echoed.
The puppy-love-drunk look had changed. The person in the elevator with Minho was a new Taemin, one that had echoes of Taemin’s on-stage persona. Instinct took over, and Minho let his persona erupt.
“If I’m home, where are you?”
“I might be home, too.”
Taemin had leaned against the wall of the elevator, bringing a finger to his mouth like he was about to suck on it. Minho batted it away and grabbed his hand. Once on his floor, he marched them into his apartment, flipping on only one dim light. He grabbed the collars of Taemin’s coat and started slinking it off him. They both let it drop to the floor.
“Does this look like your home?”
Without hesitation, Taemin assured him it was.
“Here, let me take your coat.”
Taemin unbuttoned Minho’s coat button by button until he was on his knees trying to undo the last one. He felt his way up Minho’s sides before gripping each side of the coat to push it off messily. It was only half off before Taemin sat back on the marble tile of the Minho’s foyer.
“What are you doing?” Minho asked, roughly running his hand through Taemin’s hair.
“I don’t know.”
It was an honest answer. Minho had no idea what he was doing either. He liked playing with Taemin, even at this age. He liked goofing off and messing around and feeling young again. But this wasn’t what was happening. Minho could feel his body wanting things he wasn’t allowed to want from a man, from his junior, from someone he cared for and cherished for so long.
Taemin wasn’t standing up. Instead, he pushed his back against the closets that lined Minho’s foyer. And Minho stood over him, peering down at a face he knew like his own palm, but what he saw now he thought wasn’t possible. It was full of the magic Taemin used when dancing—enchanting, alluring, and beckoning.
Minho’s thoughts were twisted. He knew what he wanted to do but he was trying to fight it with the tiniest vestiges of sobriety he could muster. It didn’t work, and when Taemin’s hands reached up to pull him down to his level, Minho gave in.
He sat opposite Taemin and wedged his hands between Taemin’s thighs. He would kiss him—but only if he was sure what he saw was real, that he wasn’t hallucinating some taboo fantasy. As he spread his legs apart, he watched as Taemin’s eyes fluttered, and a moan escaped.
“Jesus Christ,” Minho muttered.
“You shouldn’t take the lord’s name in vain.”
Minho moved closer as Taemin thumbed at his lips.
“How will you repent?”
“I-I don’t know…”
“Devotion. Show me devotion.”
Minho grabbed his face and kissed him, kissed him hard and wet, their tongues meeting immediately and starting their dance. It was a few minutes before they broke apart, and when they did, Taemin moaned a demand.
“Fuck me here, on the floor. Hold me down and do it.”
The surprise had Minho speechless, but his body talked for him. And Taemin noticed.
“Are you desperate for me?”
Minho still couldn’t speak.
“Prove it. Don’t even take my clothes off. Do it now. Fuck me.”