His bones are empty, save for the cold itch of desolation, marrow of desperation. He can’t scratch it, no matter how many miles he runs, nor how many times he tries to burn it out. His bones remain knit only by a shaking, feeble hope. And there is a black hole in his stomach, which threatens to his cells dry of it.

Shaking arms around his torso, keeping it from falling apart and stopping his insides from drifting away at a soft word; until he can’t hold on anymore and a deep weariness drains his veins. Loose limbed on the floor, restlessness overcome by a fatigue that eats into his flesh and buries itself where he can’t dig it out; not that he cares to, dares to, anyway. As his hope flees, and tiredness besieges his body, his head is free to break how it wants…

His mind’s primary desire is to curl up and stop, just stop, quickly, not this endless torment of dysphoria, death as slow yet inevitable as a desert of black sand with the sun cold and beating down unrelentingly, water invisible, or maybe never existing in the first place.

Thoughts are blades that cut without contact, slice though his brain with a disconcerting preciseness that sends shivers down his spine. They strike like lightening at noon on a pretty day: the entropy of civilisation, with his repulsion at the world around him plummeting to the depths of those empty bones. Disillusionment had occurred so quickly that he can still pretend, sometimes, that it hadn’t happened; but when the sky is dragged through ink into black-velveteen, star-speckled darkness, he knows the truth,

And he lies there, wallowing in the pits of despair, needing nothing more than to escape the terrible world around him, listening to the sound of falling tears and chinking coins and mocking laughter and jeering cat-calls, a cacophony which echoes through bones as empty as the brain of a politician, but with a little more conscience.

Sometime later, he falls asleep.

---------------------------------------

“Jonghyun, wake up!” Key shouts, before startling back when Jonghyun sits straight upright. Then Jonghyun moans and brings his hands up to rub his forehead. “Are you alright?” he asks in a softer voice, leaning against the bed as he Jonghyun’s bleached blonde hair with one hand and places the palm of his other on Jonghyun’s forehead. “You don’t have a temperature,” he murmurs, almost to himself, eyes narrowing in worry when Jonghyun doesn’t respond besides a gurgling groan.

“Come on,” Key says, trying to lift Jonghyun out of bed. He used to be able to carry the smaller man, but Jonghyun’s developed muscle recently and he’s a lot heavier, so Key just resorts to draping Jonghyun’s arm around his shoulders and half-dragging him. “Let’s get some food in you. Give you some energy and you can’t have pills on an empty stomach, my grandma always said.”

Taemin points at Jonghyun with his chopsticks when they enter the kitchen. “He alright?”

“Don’t talk with your mouth full,” Key replies, sighing as he deposits Jonghyun on a chair and busies himself getting his hyung some food.

“No, seriously, what’s wrong? He looks ghastly.” Taemin moves around the table to sit next to Jonghyun, who drops his head onto his arms, mumbling something about just getting to sleep and “now I’ve got the worst headache”. Taemin rubs his back and shoots Key a worried glance. “Hyung, you went to bed earliest out of all of us.”

“Yeah, but I couldn’t sleep,” Jonghyun whines into the wooden tabletop.

“You spent the whole of yesterday afternoon complaining about how you were about to fall asleep right then and there!”

Jonghyun looks up sharply, glaring, “Yes, but I couldn’t sleep.”

“Did you really try to?” Key asks as he puts the plate down in front of Jonghyun, fingers brushing Jonghyun’s arm.

“What the hell does that mean? Of course I tried to! As Taemin so kindly reminded us, I was about to drop dead on my feet all yesterday, but for some ing reason, the second I actually had the chance to, I just couldn’t.” Key flinches and turns away to hide his hurt expression from the elder.

Even being exhausted isn’t an excuse to snap at one another - most of the time, they’re all just as shattered as each other - and the way Key’s lips are scrunched up doesn’t escape Taemin’s notice. So he spares no mercy when he elbows Jonghyun and gives him a disapproving look, jerking his thumb at Key’s back when Jonghyun raises an eyebrow in angry questioning.

Jonghyun sighs and wearily stands, stumbling a little as he walks to Key and wraps his arms around the thinner man’s waist. “Sorry Bummie,” he murmurs, kissing the nape of Key’s neck, “I didn’t mean to yell at you.”

“Your food will be getting cold,” is all Key says, but his blunt words are softened slightly by the way he twists in Jonghyun’s arms to awkwardly kiss his nose before pushing him gently back towards the table. “I’ll get you those headache pills.”

Jonghyun takes them and as the pain fades so does his irrational anger. He apologises again to Taemin and Key, who both wave his apology away. Taemin forgives and forgets easily and Key says, “I was just worried, that’s all”. He feels fine for the rest of the day and when he gets into bed, he readily falls asleep.

Jinki is terribly tense when he pulls Jonghyun into an empty dressing room backstage.

“Jinki, we’ve been dating for quite a while now, you don’t need to be this embarrassed pulling me aside for a quick snog.” As expected, Jinki flushes bright red.

The leader composes himself and Jonghyun lets him, watching with a fond smile. “It’s not that.”

“Oh?” Jonghyun starts wondering, at Jinki’s serious expression, if maybe there’s actually something going on here he doesn’t know about.

“Jonghyun,” Jinki makes a pained expression that Jonghyun has to struggle not to about, “Are you drinking before interviews?”

Of all the questions to ask, Jonghyun had not been expecting that. His jaw drops, quite literally speechless, the carpet pulled out from beneath him. Jinki just raises his eyebrows and gives him a sort of despairing look of encouragement. Jonghyun splutters, “Wh-what? No! What gave you that idea?”

The elder rubs the back of his neck ruefully, “It wasn’t me who was wondering. Our manager asked me to ask you about it. He said you just seem really…not there. During interviews and stuff. I wanted to see for myself, after he’d made me aware of it, and asked for some time to look for myself. And the interview we just did? Your involvement was erratic at best. For most of it, you just stared at the back of Taemin’s head, unless something the staff distracted you. I’ve never known you to have so little focus or concentration.”

“Do I smell like alcohol?” Jonghyun demands.

Jinki sighs in exasperation, a hint of misery seeping into his tone. He hates that he has to do this. “Jonghyun, did you, or did you not have alcohol earlier today?” Jonghyun can feel the beads of sweat forming on his skin even as the bright lights of the dressing room start blurring into colossal stars, too close.

“Alright, alright-“ he starts, waving his arms to mollify the elder and dispel the black dots appearing on the edges of his vision.

“Five minutes ‘til SHINee are needed upstairs,” somebody calls out in the corridor. He can hear people moving, the click of heels through the floor and his skull, the loud hisses of synthetic fabrics passing over one another, jostling one another, swishing echoes around his brain.

“Wait, does that mean you did? Jonghyun I never thought-!” Jinki breaks off and lurches forward to catch Jonghyun, as the shorter man’s entire body suddenly goes limp and his eyes roll back. “Jjong? Oh God.” He lays Jonghyun on the floor and props his legs over a chair to get the blood running to his head, then sticks his head out of the door. “Taemin!” he gasps in relief, “Stay with hyung for a second, I’ll run and get the manager.”

“What’s happened? Jjong!”

“Taemin why are you yelling? Jinki don’t run so fast, you’re going to trip. I don’t want you falling agai-“ Key’s voice drops pitch abruptly, slowing in deliberation as Key tries not to panic, “Taemin, what happened to Jjong?”

Before Taemin can stammer his own confusion, Jonghyun groans and starts to stir. They both give each other looks of relief mixed with worry and kneel on either side of Jonghyun, somewhat at a loss for what to do.

“I’ve fainted before,” says Key, and Taemin really doesn’t think right now is the best time for anecdotes. “I did a bit of research to try and stop it from happening again. He probably overheated,” as he speaks, Key reaches for an MCs discarded script and uses it to fan Jonghyun, “Or maybe his blood sugar levels dropped too rapidly. Why don’t you go and get him something sugary?” Relieved to be given something useful to do, Taemin speeds away, almost crashing into Minho, not pausing to explain.

Minho would pass it off as Taemin forgetting or losing something last minute - as he has a custom to - but there’s a hint of something in Taemin’s eyes as he bumbles an apology and continues running that makes Minho enter the room he saw Taemin leave, feeling more than a little intrepid.

“Is he dead?” Minho asks. Key slaps his shin and can’t help but laugh at the overdramatic whine Minho lets out in response.

“You’re useless. And no, I think he just fainted. Jinki was interrogating him about why he’s been so off recently.” The door opens halfway through the sentence.

“I was not interrogating him,” Jinki looks affronted by the accusation and Key immediately feels bad, but he’s bad at apologising so he just gives Jinki a remorseful smile. “I was just asking him if he had a drink before the interviews or something!”

“What the , Onew?”

“Yeah Onew, what the ?” comes a weak echo. Key looks down at Jonghyun, who is grinning up at them despite looking slightly worse for wear.  Taemin returns and ignores their eyes on him, completely focused on his task, kneeling next to Jonghyun and offering the cup of orange juice with a smile on his face.

Jonghyun takes one look at the drink and gags. “Yeah no, I think if I drank that I’d be sick.”

Taemin pouts, “But Key said it would be good for your sugar blood levels.” Nobody bothers correcting his mistake. Jonghyun just waves him away with his eyes closed and nearly takes out Taemin’s eye with his pinkie. The maknae retreats to the corner of the room to sulk and pouts even more when nobody comes over to comfort him.

“Darling, how are you feeling?” Key asks, crouching down besides Jonghyun and helping him actually sit on the chair. Their manager tenses at the endearment but the door is closed and he’s already made the executive decision. Jinki had met with him in private to explain the situation. He had promised they’d not sign again if their relationship was threatened. So their manager had decided that as long as they keep it on the down low, with him doing everything in his power to make sure the whole thing never gets out, he’d stay out of it. He doesn’t meet Minho’s slightly challenging glare.

“Jjong, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to-“ Jinki starts, eyes and mouth tight with guilt, but Jonghyun interrupts.

“It wasn’t you, Jinki, I’m just really,” he took a deep breath, and sighed out the last word on the exhale, “tired.” They all look at him uncertainly. “Really tired.”

“How much did you sleep last night?” their manager speaks up for the first time since entering the room.

“I didn’t,” states Jonghyun simply. He meets each of their gazes in turn. Key wonders how he didn’t notice the dark bruises under Jonghyun’s eyes. Taemin stops sulking when the dressing room lights twist the exhaustion in his hyung’s stare into something slightly hysterical. Jinki feels shame twist a knife in his stomach at his ignorance to the tired slant of Jonghyun’s shoulders whilst Minho notes how pale he is.

They get on with filming, because they have to. Luckily it’s only an interview and now they’re aware and prepared for it, the others easily cover up the gaps in conversation Jonghyun leaves. It seems like they needn’t have worried so much though, because halfway through, Jonghyun wakes up a little and soon they’re working like the well-oiled, well-cared-for machine they are.

At some point, they’re asked what scents they wear. They don’t let Taemin answer, all shooting him a warning glance, and smiling indulgently as Key waxes lyrical about vanilla and lavender, about sugar and spice and all things nice.

“I still can’t believe Jonghyun uses Lynx,” Key divulges, disgust colouring his tone.

“Hey! I only spray it like this.” Four pairs of eyes watch with disappointment as he gestures.

“Jonghyun, any Lynx is too much Lynx.” Taemin states. Before Jonghyun can attack him for just parroting Key, Jinki somewhat clumsily changes the topic. Despite his awkwardness, he is nevertheless effective in managing to save Taemin from Jonghyun’s wrath and in sparing the world from the extent of Jonghyun’s love for that infamous stench of masquerade machismo. 

Jonghyun mock-glares at Jinki’s head and when Jinki turns to meet his gaze, the elder smiles to see Jonghyun acting normally. He lets his hand fall so the back rests lightly and subtly against Jonghyun’s thigh and he settles into his seat more comfortably. The shorter man can practically feel his leader’s relief, diffusing through the small area of contact and to be absorbed into his bloodstream. It helps warm his insides and Jonghyun feels like his next smile, at one of Jinki’s god-awful puns, is the first real one in a long time.

Piling into the car is the usual mess of limbs and elbows in stomachs and loud exclamations and, really, you would’ve thought they’d be better at this by now. Over Key’s nagging to put their seatbelts on, Taemin is ranting about food, all types of food, Minho throwing his thoughts on the delicious subject matter out there too. They dissolve into chortles after Minho tirades about ramen noodles until he literally has no breath left. Key reaches around from the front seat and hits Taemin around the head but ends up being dragged into the conversation.

Jonghyun can’t resist humming the toast song, gradually louder and louder until he and Jinki burst out singing it simultaneously, grinning at each other as Key wails in embarrassment. Taemin and Minho wave their arms back and forth, hitting the car roof every swoop, attempting to harmonise and ending up with a horrible noise that hurts their driver’s eardrums, though not as much as the cacophony of laughter which follows.

“We don’t have another schedule until Monday. Right?” Jinki aims the last bit at their driver, who nods, and Taemin and Minho whoop loudly, flailing their arms around even more.

“I can’t believe I sometimes forget you’re a maknae,” Key goads Minho, but the younger man just sticks his tongue out as if to confirm his youth.

“Lunch!” Taemin sings suddenly. And very loudly. Jonghyun reaches over Jinki’s lap to slap the maknae’s knee. Taemin yelps and Key cackles.

As Taemin launches into a description of his would-be Last Supper, changing his mind on the courses halfway through every sentence, with Minho and Key’s input hardly helping, Jinki smiles down at Jonghyun, still lying on his lap. There’s a hint of guilt still lurking in the corners of his mouth, so Jonghyun wriggles around until he’s facing upwards then makes kissy lips. Hesitantly, Jinki obliges, bending over to place his full lips on Jonghyun’s narrow ones. Jonghyun hopes the elder can feel that he doesn’t blame him, in their kiss.

When Jinki pulls away, saliva making his lips rosy and so scrumptious Jonghyun wants to crane his neck and kiss him again and again until he can’t breath, the helpless self-blame has faded. Jonghyun smiles and his eyes scrunch up as he does so and suddenly he can’t seem to open them again.

“Are you going to sit up any time soon?” Jinki teases quietly, under the hubbub of noise from the other three members. Jonghyun mumbles something that might be “yes” but could quite as easily be taken for “no” and Jinki frowns. “Jjong?”

It’s just that this wave of exhaustion has swept through him and he suddenly feels like Jinki’s thighs are the best pillow - to be honest, Jinki’s thighs are the best pillow all the time - and that to move would expel an amount of energy equal to that needed to move Mount Everest.

“Jonghyun, can you hear me?” Jinki’s voice is rising and Jonghyun can hear how the other three gradually quieten.

He can feel worried glances bouncing off his skin and Jinki’s increasing panic and can imagine Minho wrapping an arm around Taemin as the younger boy watches in confusion and wonders if anyone else can sense Key’s rapidly escalating anxiety levels. In an attempt to placate them he manages to stumble through the words “just tired”, before completely succumbing to the tsunami of sleep that crashes over him.

In the white horses that follow, Jonghyun is very vaguely aware of the car pulling up outside their building because he knows the shape of the driveway. He knows the strength of Jinki’s arms when the leader hands him out of the car into Minho’s warmth and then the two carry Jonghyun between them.

Whoever opens the door does so with a shaking hand, if the scrape of the key on the lock is any hint, and then Jonghyun can smell the lunch they were all looking forward so much to. He doesn’t really want to eat anything now, but hopes, with strange detachment, that the others won’t worry about him and will enjoy the meal with as much enthusiasm as they had been displaying in the car. Jinki’s chest rumbles as he speaks and Jonghyun trembles with it, but he can’t make out the words. Next thing he knows, it’s the sheets of his bed.

They reek of tossing and turning and never being comfortable. His duvet rustles like cars racing down midnight streets, the growls of their engines keeping him awake. The springs of his mattress tick like the clock under dawn-brightening skies. Jonghyun scrambles for sleep as it threatens to disappear. He moves sub-consciously to weakly grab Minho’s arm as he pulls away.

“Not here,” Jonghyun pleas. He’s eternally grateful at Minho for obliging immediately and carrying him to another bed.

Jonghyun presses his face into the pillow and it smells like mint and lemon and lavender. Key. When Minho tucks the duvet over him, he’s engulfed in the fragrance of clean linen, which reminds him of Jinki. Minho kisses his forehead gingerly and he feels like Jinki’s hugging him and his brain is soothed by Key’s scent; he misses Taemin momentarily. Then, Jonghyun sinks back into slumber.

Key has this terrible habit, of waking up in the middle of the night and stealing into the kitchen to eat whatever crap he can find in the fridge and sobbing as he stuffs himself. Admittedly it’s not so much a habit as something he does whenever the stress piles up and his shoulders can’t bear the weight any longer. Or he misses home. Which he doesn’t very much, and they’re good at sharing the stress between the five of them, so it’s actually a pretty rare occurrence. Still, all the members know about it.

They respect that he likes being left alone to his thoughts in the quietness of 1am and have assured him that if he needs them they won’t mind being woken up, and they let him be. Nobody comments when his eyes are red and puffy the next day and the fridge is practically empty, but Jinki might shoot him a few more loving looks than usual, Minho might a little less, Jonghyun might hug him a bit tighter and Taemin might pepper little wet kisses all over Key’s face.

What the members don’t know about, though, is how when Key can’t eat another bite, the reflection of himself in the mirror seems to engorge even as he watches, horrified. The tear stained cheeks bulge, his arms droop with fat hanging from them, his thighs feel heavy and his ankles swollen.

With a thick finger he pokes his disgustingly large stomach and then the bile is rising in his throat and he rushes silently to the bathroom and retches everything back up. He hacks until he dry heaves and then he flushes the toilet three times and sprays the bathroom spray everywhere and cleans his teeth meticulously and scrubs the lingering smell of leftovers and vomit off his hands.

None of members know, that is, until Jonghyun finds himself awake and glaring with foggy eyes at the blinking 12:30 on the clock when somebody runs down the corridor outside the room towards the bathroom, leaving the echoes of sobs in their wake. Frowning, he gets out of bed, wincing when his joints crack. He hopes it’s nothing serious, because that time Minho got diarrhoea was awful. The door isn’t locked and he pushes it open.

He freezes, words dying on his lips. Key doesn’t seem to notice his presence, too busy shoving fingers down his throat to get the last of his binging session to leave his stomach. Jonghyun’s brain sort of shuts down, and he just watches from the doorway as Key stands shakily and flushes the toilet three times. He sprays the bathroom spray everywhere, and in doing so turns around.

At the sight of Jonghyun, the bottle slips from Key’s fingers, luckily landing on somebody’s discarded towel. Key looks like he’s about to be sick again, before he in a deep breath and pointedly ignores Jonghyun. He goes to the sink and cleans his teeth meticulously and scrubs the lingering smell of leftovers and vomit off his hands. Then he walks up to Jonghyun, takes the shorter man’s hand, and pulls him back to the living room. The lights of Seoul twinkle outside the window and the whole flat is silent.

Then Key says, “It only happens every now and then. You know how rarely.” His pleading eyes reflect the lights and they’re still puffy from his crying earlier. “I know it looks bad; sometimes I even worry myself. But I swear it’s not a problem. I just eat too much too quickly, at a weird time. Could you stop staring at me like that?” Somewhere during Key’s little speech Jonghyun had regained the ability to breath and think and generally act like a person instead of a robot.

“Of course, sorry,” he manages, and the softness of his apology makes Key melt a bit, “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

“I’m not uncomfortable,” says Key, but it’s a reflex reaction. Jonghyun’s eyes look like he’s stolen all the light out of the city, gleaming warm and comforting.

“Come ‘ere.” Jonghyun opens his arms and Key doesn’t even try to resist, just nuzzles his head under Jonghyun’s chin and into Jonghyun’s firm chest, lets Jonghyun’s strong arms hold him carefully, as if he were made of china.

“Don’t tell Jinki?” Key whispers.

“You know I can’t promise that.” Jonghyun laughs softly and Key chuckles in a way that sounds like surrender. Jonghyun helps him tidy away the empty Tupperware and put the dishes in the dishwasher then tucks him into bed. He kisses Key’s lips with a hint of desperation to ensure Key knows how much he loves him. Key returns it in kind, tongue hesitantly at the seam of Jonghyun’s lips, hands burying themselves in blonde hair as the kiss deepens. When Key is kissing like he usually does, kinda filthy, with more challenge than submission, Jonghyun draws away and pats Key’s cheek.

“Goodnight. Love you.”

“Love you too, Jjong.”