pt. 4
3:37am(Kyungil POV)
...
He's made you record the same verse for the past hour, over and over again, never satisfied and you know he can be a perfectionist, but you're pretty sure he's doing this to punish you. "Again," he says into the microphone, interrupting your verse for at least the fiftieth time. You start again, only make it five words in before he stops you. You're getting angry and your throat is starting to hurt and you know he'll keep making you re-record all night if you don't stop him, so you clear your throat and say, "Okay, time for a break."
He doesn't want to, but he nods after a moment. "Ten minutes," he grants. You take off your headphones, open the door, sit down next to him as he futzes with the controls on the soundboard. "You want to talk about it?" you ask. "I'm fine, it's just not... coming together like it is in my head. I'll figure it out." You nod, picking up your phone and scrolling through your notifications, realizing that you've been here for an hour already and you haven't made any progress. (On multiple fronts.)
On the surface, your European tour went well, but things have suc.ked for both of you ever since and it doesn't seem to be getting any better. You miss him and it's pretty obvious that he misses you too and even your bandmates have told you to hurry up and figure your s.hit out so everything can go back to the way it was. That's the problem, isn't it? You don't want to go back, you want to go forward, you want this to go somewhere, you want to solve it, there has to be a solution and you're determined to find it. You thought you had found it, but obviously not.
You don't even know what you want half the time, what's the best case scenario, but right now he's focusing on mixing the recordings he's been gathering for days and his eyes are focused and his brow is furrowed and you're starting to realize how lucky you are that he's into you, that you got to be with him even for a little while, that he's worth all of this. (Why do you keep insisting on screwing it up?)
"Let's take an actual break," you suggest. "Not yet," he responds quickly, still focusing on making the perfect title track. "Oh, I'm sorry, I thought I was the leader or something," you say, half teasing, half serious. He sighs, standing up from his chair. "What kind of break?" he asks, and you can think of lots of suggestions, but you try to pick the least risky one. "Dinner. It's past 9 and you haven't eaten since lunch." Since you brought him lunch and practically forced him to eat it.
He grabs a jacket because it's chilly out and you both walk to his favorite chicken restaurant. You sit down and order too much food and two beers, which you know you'll end up drinking because he'll want to go right back to work as soon as you leave the restaurant. He's not looking up from his phone and you know he's still working, so you pry it from his hands and set it next to you. "I'll give it back once you eat everything on your plate," you tell him, and you didn't use to hate treating him like a child but now it feels weird. He starts to eat, focusing on his plate instead of you, and you can't believe you thought things were improving between you.
"You'll get it," you say, hoping he'll look up at you. (He doesn't.) "I know," he tells you. "I'm sorry my voice isn't up to your standards today." He chuckles. "Your voice isn't the problem, it's the verse. Something's missing, I just have to find it." You start to open the second beer, but he grabs it from you. "Mine," he chirps, putting the bottle to his lips. He raises an eyebrow at your expression. "What? It might not help me find it, but it can't hurt."
It's too hot and you slide your hoodie off your arms, order another beer, realize how slowly you've been eating. He smiles, you roll your eyes. "I know what you're thinking, but it's like an oven in here." He looks down at the leather jacket he's still wearing comfortably, then back up at you. "Come on, you know I'm always hotter than you." He laughs and you realize how your words could be misunderstood so you add, "I mean, like, temperature not looks, 'cause you're totally hot." He chokes, putting his hand to his mouth, beer dribbling out down his chin and onto the table. He cleans himself up quickly and he's still coughing and you wish you could use alcohol as an excuse for what you said, but you haven't had nearly enough for that. His eyes are watering from coughing so much, but he's smiling and shaking his head. "I needed a laugh, so thanks."
"It wasn't a joke," you whine, because apparently you're not done digging this hole yet. "Yeah right," he says, piling soggy napkins onto his empty plate. "Didn't I... I never told you that, did I? When we were... before?" He shakes his head. "Not in so many words." Add that to your never-ending list of regrets, keeping those kind of thoughts to yourself for months. "It's too late to say it now, right?"
"I wouldn't have believed you anyway," he laughs before excusing himself to wash his sticky hands in the bathroom. You try to finish eating but this is not going the way you thought and you're gonna end up having to push him away all over again. He returns a minute later and you stand up, pay the bill, leave the restaurant, walk back home.
It's dark inside and you turn on the lights. "Isn't anyone here?" you ask. "Nah, they said they were tired of recording and dealing with me so they all went out drinking. They might never come back at this rate." He pauses. "You're probably tired of me too, you should go have fun." If only, you think, if only I could get tired of you. "I'm not. You're not as bad as you think." He laughs. "Yeah, I'm hot right?" He's followed you back into his studio and he closes the door behind you. You turn around. "Yeah," you breathe and your head is buzzing but not because of the one and a half beers you had earlier, it's because of him, because he's only a foot away from you, you could cross the distance in under a second and just... you shake your head, trying to think rationally.
"So, you know the booth is soundproof, right?" he reminds you, looking you in the eye, not blinking, and your choices seem to be either go into the booth yourself to record or pull him in with you. (Is it even a choice?) You haven't kissed him in 18 days, you think that's 18 days too long, you think the fact that you were still counting should have been a clue, you decide to do something about it right now. He's pressed between you and the door and you forgot how good he is at this, at knowing exactly what you like, what you need, because while you were busy answering your questions about him and obsessing over how this didn't mean anything, how it couldn't, he was figuring out precisely what to do to make this worth it for you, how to make you want him more, applying his perfectionist ways to you. (He doesn't know that he didn't have to try nearly that hard.)
You stumble into the recording booth, wondering if the cleaners will wonder how the glass got all smudged up, but you can't think about it for long because it's been 18 days and he's real and he's clearly forgiven you even if you don't deserve it and you know the rest of your band will stumble home with your manager at some point so you have to make the most of this. (It's the only logical choice, isn't it?) You know this doesn't necessarily solve anything, but it's at least some kind of progress and you don't want to rush him into defining this or say something stupid because he shouldn't have forgiven you in the first place.
You're sitting on the floor and he's sitting next to you, holding your hand and resting his head on the wall and you notice that you apparently ripped his shirt at some point during the last half hour, and you're actually smiling for the first time since London. "Don't you hate it when people make a mess of your space?" you say, surveying the wreck you've made of the recording booth. "People, not you," he answers, rolling his head over to rest on your shoulder. "I've kind of made a mess of your life too, though." He shrugs. "Haven't I messed up yours?"
"Nothing I can't handle," you respond, your hand on his thigh. "I don't want to ruin the moment but... does this change anything?" Does it count for anything? Yes. Does it change anything? You're not so sure. He always looks to you for the answers, for what you want, for what you're ready for, but you think he's earned a chance to decide for himself. "If you want, if you're prepared for this to fall apart again," you tell him. If you're okay with the fact that I'll break your heart again someday, you think, but you keep it to yourself. He lifts his head from your shoulder, slides closer to you, kisses you slowly, purposefully, and you wonder why he needs words at all because this is so much better than talking.
You look at the clock and realize that you might not be alone much longer, so you pull him to his feet, kiss him, start to tidy the booth, kiss him, finish tidying up, kiss him, relocate to the couch in his studio, kiss him. "Are you sure this can't work here?" he asks, his voice unsteady. "I'm not really asking," he adds, "I just don't want to wait." He kisses you quickly, as if telling you not to reply, but you want to. "It'll be worth it, I... I promise." A promise you'll do everything you can to keep. "You're gonna think it's stupid, but I think I figured out what's wrong with the song."
"You were thinking about that the whole time?" If that's what he can do when his focus is split, then it's a good thing he's distracted most of the time, you decide. He snickers. "Not the whole time, just... part of it. The verse isn't right for you, I'll assign it to somebody else and give you the pre-chorus." He seems so much better than he did a few hours ago, happier and freer and back to normal. "See? Never underestimate the power of a break."
"Never underestimate the power of us," he retorts, sounding a little embarrassed as he stands from the couch. "You want to try recording it now?" he proposes and you agree. It only takes three tries before he's satisfied with your lines, and he couldn't look any more pleased, you're sure of it. You sit down next to him while he finishes saving all of the changes and making notes of how to finish it up before he glances at the clock. "Done before midnight? That never happens."
"The power of us?" you suggest. "Too bad we can't make this work here, we'd top the charts," and he's joking, but it still makes you feel guilty. You change the subject, because you don't know what you'll say if you don't. "Well, it's much too early to go to sleep. Want to watch a movie?" He hums, deciding, and it's making you nervous. "Is there going to be popcorn involved?" You nod, relieved. "Then count me in."
Twenty minutes later, you're lounging on your bed picking a movie and arguing about which genre to choose and spilling popcorn as you fight over the remote and you can't even bring yourself to demand the movie you want, can't pull the age card or the leader card or the it's-my-room-so-my-rules card because it finally feels normal again and it seems so unbelievably simple right now. The sooner you decide on a movie, the sooner he'll fall asleep in your arms, so you let him pick for once, not without complaining about his terrible taste in entertainment of course.
Sure enough, he nods off halfway through, and you're not sure if he's really slept since Europe, you know you haven't, so you don't wake him up, pull a blanket around him and turn off the tv, kiss his face no less than three times until you finally allow yourself to drift off.
When you wake up the next morning, he's kissing you and the dorm is quiet and the sun is shining and it feels like a dream, a prophecy if you're lucky, because you could definitely get used to this. "We should stop," you mumble as he reaches for your waistband, curse the fact that your room isn't even close to soundproof, wish you were leaving the country tomorrow, not in a couple weeks. He smiles and you ruffle his floppy hair and you smile back.
"We should make some breakfast," he says, "the others will need to eat whenever they get up." You nod, considering his suggestion. "Or," you add, "we could stay here and let them fend for themselves." You try to kiss him, but he pulls away laughing. "Come on, I'm starving and we probably owe them for putting up with us the past few weeks."
You sigh dramatically, shockingly okay with the idea of cooking breakfast and sitting down at the table with him and being normal, as normal as it gets for the two of you, so you roll yourself out of bed and into a pair of jeans. He's just wearing boxers and the shirt you tore last night and you realize that he hasn't even tried to wear your clothes since you started doing whatever this is (clothes are less than necessary when you're together lately) and it's all you can think about so you toss him a pair of sweats and a t-shirt. To say your clothes swim on him would be an understatement and he looks so cute you can hardly stand it, frowning at the expression on your face, rolling up the cuffs of your sweats.
He puts his arms around your waist while you're cooking, kisses your shoulder quickly, too aware of the fact that you could get walked in on. You sit down across from him and he starts shoveling food into his mouth gleefully. "Slow down, you'll make yourself sick," you nag him. "Sorry, I haven't been this hungry since... forever..." he trails off, continuing to eat, and you feel guilty again. You thought he was skinnier lately because he'd been working so hard, and he has been, but it's your fault, just like everything else he's had to go through lately. "Eat as much as you want, I'll make more if we need it."
There's that look again, the dangerous one you won't name, but you return it anyway, quickly but sincerely. It's not going to be easy to keep your hands off him until you go back on tour, but you're willing to wait a lot longer than that if it means he's ready to accept that this is all you can give him right now, that it won't be long before you say something hurtful again as a reflex, that you can't label this or explain it or make it predictable.
He goes back to his studio after breakfast to work on new tracks for the next album while you tend to your hungover roommates. When you go to check on him, he's changed his clothes but he's still wearing your shirt and you think he's really forgiven you even though you've done nothing to deserve it, you haven't even really apologized. If the two of you were in an actual relationship, you would have opted for the big romantic gesture, taken him to some secluded spot in the woods, bought the most expensive picnic lunch in the history of mankind, got down on your knees and... begged for his forgiveness. You're not in a relationship, though, and getting back together wasn't supposed to be your goal, and yet somehow here you are.
You can't decide if you should leave him to work by himself, but he sees you in the doorway and his eyes light up and he drags you over to sit next to him and listen to what he's been working on. Even when you think he might be ready to be alone, he grabs your hand and puts it down on his thigh so you know he doesn't want you to go yet. Instead, you stare at him while he works and plays you samples of songs and looks for the approval that you haven't quite been able to give him for weeks.
"It sounds great, really," you say. "It's still our voices but they sound... different, fuller." You should seriously, seriously think of something more intelligent to say, but he beams at you anyway and says, "You really think so?" You nod your answer, beaming right back at him. "I guess I've just listened to it too much, it started to sound predictable. You probably have other things to do, but... thanks. I needed... another opinion."
He doesn't realize that there's nothing you'd rather do than spend time with him, even if you do have other things scheduled, that you're always gonna be there when he needs you, whether he likes it or not, that the only reason you avoid him sometimes is because you don't want to make it harder on him and because knowing you're the reason why he looks so sad, why he doesn't leave the dorm, why he isn't even hungry is too much for you to take. It makes you want to take it back, every stupid thing you've ever said, plan some crazy romantic apology even though it would end in disaster and it probably wouldn't be what he wanted anyway, so you cope by making sure you don't have to occupy the same space unless absolutely necessary.
You forgot how nice it is to be in the same space, but it didn't take long to remember because you've been sitting next to him for four hours and it feels like four minutes and it's so easy, it doesn't feel complicated and he keeps looking over at you and smiling, asking you to okay all the little changes he's making to songs, and this is how it could have been the whole time if you'd just stop screwing it up.
Eventually, you have to stop ignoring your responsibilities to sit next to him and watch him work, but it's okay because he glances at the door before he kisses you and you pull his chair closer. "Not even two weeks," he says, "we leave in less than two weeks." You smile, kiss him again, tell him two weeks is nothing, leave reluctantly to catch up on everything you've been ignoring.
When you get home, he's still working, to no surprise, so you barge into his studio and glare at him. He looks up at you and laughs nervously. "I just need another half hour. Thirty minutes and I'll quit, I promise." You shake your head, walk closer to him, put your hands on the back of his chair. "Save and quit or I'll do it for you." He presses the save button, knowing that you'll make good on your threat. "I just have to..." You spin his chair around. "Nope, I'm cutting you off," you tell him, hoisting him over your shoulder and carrying him out of the studio and into his room. "Hey!" he protests, kicking his legs pathetically as you use your foot to close the door. "You should have listened to me the first time," you tease, setting him down on his bed. "Ugh, dizzy," he whines. "Poor baby."
"I would have done it, you didn't have to carry me." You squat down in front of him, resting on your knees, run your hand through his hair, kiss his forehead. "Better?" He nods. "How did your day go?"
"Nothing to report, just a lot of driving around. What about you? Finish another hit song?" He puts his arms around your shoulders. "Mostly I just missed you," he admits quietly. "Me too," you whisper. "This is gonna work this time, right?" he asks after a moment. "I'll do my best."
"Are you sure this is worth it?" he whispers but he means, am I worth the trouble? You nod. "Yes, I'm sure." He might not believe you, but you lean in to kiss him anyway, as if that could convince him.
(His fists tighten around the fabric of your t-shirt and you're certain this is going to be the longest two weeks of your life.)
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