Written for chillaxdiva, you know why.  

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They’re in the middle of promotions for “If You Do” when Jaebum gets injured during the filming of Running Man.  

Always wanting to put the group’s best interest first and to show a cool image, the last thing he wants is to find himself wearing a cast, using crutches, and sitting in a chair off to the side of the stage while everyone else performs.  But that’s exactly what happens.  It’s in the same breath that he curses his injury and the timing of it that he prays for a quick recovery.  

He hates feeling like he’s disappointing the fans.  That he’s adding extra work and pressure to the members, since the expectation to put on a perfect performance is higher in order to make up for his lack of presence in the choreography.  

He hates sitting in that chair, on the sidelines, like he’s an unwanted guest.  It’s embarrassing and lonely and it, in one word, .  His leg hurts too, but he tries to make due with over-the-counter pain reliever versus the strong pain medicine he’d been prescribed because while it works well, it makes him sleepy and less focused, two things he cannot afford to be during their hectic never-ending schedules.  

He does his best to keep a smile on his face, always in full leader-mode even when injured and in pain.  He doesn’t want to worry fans.  He doesn’t want to worry the other members, he does not want to worry Youngjae.  He’s supposed to be the one they depend on, rely on, but that’s not possible if he lets them see him in moments of weakness and struggling.  Maybe it’s pride, maybe it’s a mixture of stubbornness and stupidity, but it’s how he feels.  

Youngjae isn’t fooled by Jaebum’s smile or forced cheer, because it’s at night that Jaebum lets his guard slip a little.  The stronger dose of pain medicine that Youngjae cajoles him into taking leading him to admit his worries and his frustration out loud.  He mumbles countless apologies for making it harder on Youngjae and everyone before finally falling asleep.

It’s difficult seeing his boyfriend injured, but knowing that he’s beating himself up over the injury, for something he couldn’t have prevented, only makes Youngjae feel worse.  The next morning, with a plan in mind (Operation Sunshine, he calls it), he finds their manager and begs for a bit of free time between schedules.

Before leaving, he makes sure to ask Jinyoung and Jackson to look after Jaebum while he’s out and make sure that he doesn’t overexert himself.  They look mildly offended before replying of course, like the answer’s a given.  And it is (he apologizes to them), it’s just with Jaebum injured, he can’t fully shut off the ‘excessive worry’ part of his brain.

Jaebum is the one who has always looked after and taken care of him the most, and to be honest, he loves and appreciates every single moment.  He feels special and loved.  But now it’s his turn to be the caretaker in the relationship.  It’s a fine line though, because he knows Jaebum doesn’t want to be coddled or treated like he’s incapable of doing things by himself.  So he tries his best to stand close, but not too close; to offer help, but not make a big deal of it; to suggest he rest or sit, but not too often (he recruits the other members to help him with this one— ‘ganging up’ on the leader for a good cause).

—

It’s later, after everyone’s showered and changed into comfier bedtime clothes, back in their rooms to wind down for the night.  

Youngjae sits alone, as he waits for Jaebum to finish talking with their manager.  Several minutes pass and then there’s Jaebum, using one of his crutches to push the cracked door open further so he can enter and then shutting it behind him before he makes his way over to their bed.

Taking the crutches from Jaebum he sets them to the side so he can help Jaebum maneuver into a sitting position on the bed, his back resting against the wall, a pillow in between for comfort and cushioning, and his legs stretched out in front of him.  It’s while Jaebum has his eyes closed (Youngjae knows it tires him to move around by crutches) that he heads to the corner of the room where earlier he hidden the surprise underneath a sweatshirt of his.

“What’s that?” Jaebum asks, opening his eyes again at the sound of movement and sees Youngjae standing in front of him holding a yellow box.

“It’s for you.”  He hands Jaebum the box first, then sits down next to him, being careful not to jostle the bed.  “It’s been a tough week with you getting injured, the cast and crutches, you hurting but not being able to rest because we’re busy promoting… I know you hate sitting out and not being able to perform with us.  I just wanted to do a little something to cheer you.”

“You didn’t have to,” Jaebum says.  A smile blossoms slowly and beautifully on his face, because he thinks it’s so very Youngjae-like to do something exactly like this.

“I know, I didn’t have to.  I wanted to.”  Since Jaebum seems more than happy to just stare at him, making no move to open his present, Youngjae prompts, “Open it!  Please.”

“All right,” he says, laughing at his boyfriend’s slight impatience.  He takes the lid off the box, not sure what to expect, and finds an assortment of the most random things in various shades of yellow.  

“Yellow things only because yellow is the color of sunshine, and sunshine brightens your day.  So it’s a box of sunshine,” Youngjae explains the meaning of the gift.

The first thing he pulls out is a yellow smiley face stress ball.  He squeezes it a few times before placing it on the bed.  “That will be useful,” he murmurs softly.

There’s a package of ramyun and various yellow-colored candy.

“Whenever you’re hungry, I’ll make you ramyun.  Remember Jinyoung hyung and I came in second place during our ramyun cooking contest.”

“Please don’t bring that up.”  He frowns at the memory and makes Youngjae laugh.  “Yugyeom and I only had bean paste… of course it was going to be salty…”

“Sorry, hyung.  It totally wasn’t a fair competition, I agree,” he comforts his pouting boyfriend.

Next, a pikachu cell phone charm. 

“Because I pikachu,” he says, trying to make it sound like I pick you.

“Funny.”  Jaebum’s smiling as he places the charm on his phone.  

“What can I say?  I try.”

A box of band-aids, depicting the ever-popular Minions.   

“Stop Stop It,” they say at the same time, remembering the countless comments they received about their music video outfits reminding fans of Minions in the Despicable Me movie. 

Lip balm, honey flavored.

“Are you trying to tell me something about my lips?” Jaebum jokes, pretending to be insulted. 

“No, never.  I’d kiss you even if your lips were chapped.  It’s almost wintertime and your lips are precious and it’s important to keep them moist and you know extra kissable, so—”

Jaebum kisses Youngjae mid-sentence.  “I promise to use it well.”

The next item he pulls from the box is a bumblebee headband, and he gives Youngjae a look, like really now babe?

“What hyung?  I think you’ll look really cute wearing them!”  To prove his point, he puts it on Jaebum’s head and immediately grins at the sight.  “I was right.”  He grabs his phone off the nightstand and turns it to camera mode so Jaebum can use it as a substitute for a mirror.  “My boyfriend is the cutest,” he proudly declares.

Jaebum makes a face, shaking his head.  He disagrees, because to him Youngjae holds that title.  

“Come on, let’s take a picture,” Youngjae requests, not able to hide his grin of excitement.

Jaebum sighs and nods, albeit a little reluctantly.  He really doesn’t mind though, not when he knows it’ll make Youngjae happy.

Youngjae takes a few candid shots.  Two with Jaebum wearing the bumblebee ears — one where Jaebum smiles, the other Jaebum pretends to be mad.  One with Jaebum putting the headband on him and he makes bunny ears behind Jaebum’s head with his free hand. 

His favorite picture that he takes is the one where Jaebum kisses him just as he snaps the photo.

The last few things in the box are: sheet masks (lemon, honey, Korean ginseng, bee venom, and Jeju tangerine all in shades of yellow packaging), an action figure of Son Goku in Super Saiyan mode, and a rubber ducky wearing glasses and a tie (bought for the sake of being random).

They spend a few minutes play fighting, Jaebum’s Son Goku character versus Youngjae’s rubber ducky.  Duckie, as Youngjae names him mid-battle, fights valiantly but is no match against Super Goku.  

“You win, you win,” Youngjae says finally, laughing as he surrenders.  

While Youngjae helps him place everything back into the box for the time being (it’s getting late), he’s silent as he thinks thank you seems hardly worthy or sufficient enough.  Maybe it’s just a box of random little things, but all those little things add up into one giant way of Youngjae showing him how much he cares about him.  He wonders if Youngjae realizes how much he loves him?  Is it even possible, because how can he put into words what his heart feels every time he looks at Youngjae or Youngjae kisses him?

“You forgot one thing.”  Youngjae’s voice interrupts, breaking into his thoughts.  

“Really?  I took everything out though.”  He opens the box, looking at everything inside, and closes it again confused.  Then he looks over at Youngjae and sees that he has a yellow post-it note stuck to the front of his shirt.  An arrow drawn and pointed toward his face with one word written in capital letters and in English.

ME.

“I can’t really fit into a box or anything,” he makes a joke, stating the obvious, then smiles brightly.  “But I promise to always be your sunshine.”

Never has he been more certain than in this moment that if you looked in the dictionary under the words sunshine and fluff there would be a picture of a smiling Choi Youngjae. 

“You’re really kind of cheesy,” he says, but he adores it and Youngjae.  “You know that, right?”  Youngjae nods, blushing slightly, and Jaebum leans forward to capture Youngjae’s lips in a sweet kiss.  “I love you, my sunshine.”

“Love you too, hyung,” he murmurs and kisses him back again and again.

It’s with reluctance that Jaebum breaks their kiss before getting too carried away.  They have another long day ahead of them tomorrow, and his leg is hurting him more than he’s willing to admit.

Youngjae figures it out though and immediately gets up to bring him a glass of water and medicine to take.  He doesn’t argue this time and takes the pills willingly in one quick swallow.  “Thank you.”

Not wanting to worry Youngjae further and because he’s beginning to realize that it’s nice to have someone care about him so much and that maybe it isn’t such a bad thing to need and accept help, he lets Youngjae help him to lie down, even asking his boyfriend to place a flattened pillow under his left leg to elevate it slightly.

“Maybe I should sleep on the floor so that I don’t bother you?”

“No,” he immediately shuts the idea down.  “I sleep better with you beside me.”  He pats the space next to him and then adds, “Please?”

“Fine, fine…”  He smiles, because he sleeps better next to Jaebum too.  He turns the overhead light and bedside lamp off, before carefully crawling into bed.  At Jaebum’s request, he moves closer until Jaebum’s arm is around him and he has his head lying on Jaebum’s chest, listening to the steady beat of his lover’s heart.

“Get some sleep,” Jaebum murmurs quietly in the darkness as he traces incomprehensible patterns up and down Youngjae’s back, helping to soothe the younger man to sleep.

“Night hyung, wake me if you need anything,” Youngjae tells him, voice already becoming drowsy, as the long day catches up to him finally.

Soon Jaebum hears the soft sound of even breathing, indicating Youngjae’s fallen asleep.  While he’s tired too, the medicine hasn’t fully kicked in, so he keeps his mind distracted from the pain by thinking about the man he holds in his arms.  

His boyfriend is the epitome of sunshine and fluff, never failing to brighten his every moment just by being Youngjae.

But the dictionary definitions do not capture the moments…

The way Youngjae pleads, “Five more minutes hyung,” in the early morning hours when he goes to wake him up for another day of endless schedules.  The way Youngjae snuggles closer and presses lazy, languid kisses to whatever skin his lips come into contact with, trying to entice him into staying in bed with him longer and shutting out the world for a while.  The temptation to do exactly that is strong; he wants to forget his responsibilities and leadership duties and just bask in the sunshine and warmth that Youngjae offers.

The way Youngjae’s eyes flutter close when he kisses him, and how his lips feel and move against his own.  The taste of Youngjae’s kisses, sweet and addicting.  The way Youngjae’s arms come around his neck or around his waist to pull him closer and closer until there is no beginning or end between the two of them.  The way Youngjae touches him, still a mix of pure innocence and eagerness that is nothing short of intoxicating and leaves him wanting more, always.

The way when everyone’s in the living room piled together and absorbed in the action on the TV and he joins them later that Youngjae’s head turns, searching for him, before he even comes into view, like his body senses him drawing nearer and how Youngjae smiles and holds out his hand to beckon him closer.  “Hyung.”  The way he makes room for him, always making room for him no matter what or when or where.  The way he laces their fingers together and leans against him. The way he wraps an arm around his waist, sweetly, possessively, and whispers in his ears only loud enough for him to hear the words.  “I love you,” he tells him before turning his attention to the screen again. 

In so many ways and moments, small and large and in-between, Youngjae is the very definition of fluff and sunshine and everything that is right and perfect and holy in this world; in his world. 

It’s as his eyes begin to drift close that he thinks he needs to add one more entry to the dictionary.

Choi Youngjae: owner and keeper of Im Jaebum’s heart.

FIN

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*special shoutout of thanks to 2tinytriangles who suggested Son Goku on Super Saiyan mode and reminded me about Minions

Comments, constructive criticism, 2jae fangirling: all welcomed and appreciated.  Thank you!