2011

Much to his chagrin, Henry has somehow gotten cuter having grown into his confidence. No, that’s not quite the right word. Okay, fine, more attractive. He quietly huffs with frustration at his own thoughts and pushes his bangs out of his eyes.

These interviews are so boring. Just say the same thing six or ten times to different hosts. He’s already planning trips out and studying, to try and learn some different things to say, and maybe understand better, too.

And that’s how he ends up with Henry throwing himself down on the couch next to him, jostling the notebook he has in hand. The last letter he wrote now has a sharp ramp upward and to the right. He scratches out the tail and looks back up to the TV.

“What’re you doing?” Henry says, bumping their shoulders together.

“Studying,” Ryeowook answers as neutrally as he can. “I don’t want to be boring on that radio show. After this,” he gestures to the screen using his chin, “I’m going to work on my diary.”

Beside him, Henry lets out a long breath. “I should study too... Mama said so, remember?” He says with a laugh, jumping to his feet. “I’ll go grab my notebook.”

The gentle jab goes unnoticed until he’s left the room. Despite concentrating that hard, Ryeowook only gets one more phrase written down, frowning down at the page because he’s not sure he caught the last syllable right. He squints at the TV. Not sure why; it’s not as if it’ll help him hear better.

Henry comes back just then, setting down two bottles of green tea before rattling the couch just as hard as the first time he sat down. He gets a light kick for that, at which he only grins, before Ryeowook tugs on his sleeve.

“Did I hear this right?” He asked, pointing at the phrase and then grabbing the bottle closest to him.

“It’s a little different. The last part…”

*

Ryeowook had been back for maybe ten minutes, a slice of banana in his mouth, when he heard the door open and close, immediately followed by Henry asking in a pained voice where the bandages are, a loud clatter, and the sound of plastic wheels rolling aimlessly.

He puts down his workbook and turns around. In order, he sees Henry’s wincing face, the patch of dirt on his forearm, a thin trickle of blood sliding out past the leg of his shorts, and a red patch on the fabric itself. He’ll admit it: he freaks out a bit.

“Take off your shorts” is what comes out of his mouth, said in no uncertain terms. Henry’s eyes widen. Realizing how that must’ve sounded, Ryeowook feels his face heat up, but still manages to explain in a steady voice, “They have blood on them. I need to wash them before it stains permanently. I’ll get you bandages too.”

Though the other man still looks weirded out, he dutifully takes off his shorts and sits down on the closest chair.

“No, come on,” Ryeowook says, and leads him by his arm towards the restroom, grabbing the shorts along the way. He turns them inside out and runs them under cold water for a bit, then leaves it running to get as much as possible out before he needs to soap it. After that, he takes out the rubbing alcohol, ointment, and gauze, silently thanking whoever restocked all this.

Henry hops up onto the counter of his own volition. A couple of bottles fall over.

Uncaring of that or anything else, Ryeowook delicately cleans the scrape with water and a bit of soap, making sure there’s no dirt or rocks left in it after he wipes it off with a wet towel, then does the same for the cut. It's long, but shallow; it looked worse at first glance. Because of the blood. Right, not freaking out about that.

Henry winces, but says, “It’s okay, it’s just, um,” and then something that’s probably English that sounds sort of like ‘radish’, maybe. Ryeowook ignores that, warns him with a frown that this'll hurt, then wipes the scrape with alcohol without waiting for a reply.

He glances up. It’s hard to look at Henry wincing through it, even though he’s not making any pained noises, so he stops.

After that’s done, he puts a fresh dab of alcohol on the paper he’s using. The cut is bleeding again, so he wipes that off as well. He puts the ointment on both next, then wraps only the scrape in gauze and ties it. it’s not the nicest-looking knot, but it should hold.

Then one thread of his iron control snaps. He places a kiss on Henry's knee, a bit below the scrape.

Henry looked perplexed.

“Bwahahahaha!” It's so glaringly not what he wanted to do that Ryeowook bursts into disbelieving laughter at himself.

Henry frowns at him with what might be disapproval, looking a touch red. “Hyung…”

The disbelief wasn’t fake, and what Ryeowook says to try to cover for himself is at least something in the same city as the truth. "What was that?! It’s like you’re actually my kid!" Standing up straight, he ruffles Henry's hair, refusing to meet his eyes a second time.

Instead, he starts rubbing soap on the stain, furiously scrubbing it in hopes of calming down. "I know! Let's go get ice cream!" He says with forced cheer, refusing to acknowledge any of this. “Actually, Zhou Mi brought up the idea earlier. And- I mean- I can pick up- some things to make dinner on the way back, and that one cake I saw at the market, the little pretty one I’ve been wanting to try making.” He’s babbling, trying desperately to mentally wipe away his misstep. The stain appears to have come out. Good, it was still fresh, he thinks a little hysterically.

After hastily drying his hands, he goes right to Zhou Mi's room. He knocks twice, then opens the door without waiting for answer. “You said we should go for ice cream, so let’s go!”

Zhou Mi slowly sits up on his bed. He tugs out his remaining earbud, looking wary through his smile, but not quite at him. Ryeowook turns around to see that Henry has a different pair of shorts on and is still looking kind of red in the face, as well as evasive, shifting around, rocking on his heels. He turns back to Zhou Mi, shakes his head, and motions towards the front door. He’ll deal with the older man’s answering we’ll talk later look, well, later.

Luckily, Henry seems just as determined to put aside the awkwardness of the earlier moment. Though he does give Ryeowook the occasional inscrutable look, he quickly hides it when caught. Other than that oddity, the chatter flows easily between the three of them, granting them all a welcome reprieve from the often-grueling pace they’ve been made to keep while they’re here.

Still. Ryeowook’s not looking forward to fessing up to this one later. In all honesty, he doesn’t want to offer up any more ammunition to the argument that what he’s doing is bad for him, clinging to something that isn’t going to happen; he already knows all too well.

*

What he's feeling is no ordinary worry. Oh no, this was icicles down your spine, wear a hole in the floor, can't close your eyes worry. This was out of control, out of your mind worry. And it didn't bode well for him.

If someone could read his mind - thank god that couldn't happen - they might say that he has a habit of worrying about Henry. And they might be right.

Forcing himself to sit down again, he went over everything one more time, not that it had helped the first however many times. Henry had left hurriedly earlier in the evening, sullen and looking downtrodden, rebuffing all offers of company. He’d been out the door before Ryeowook could get hardly more than a glimpse of his face and the set of his shoulders, having picked up on his voice in the chaotic tangle of conversations but not what he said.

There’d been no time to dwell on it then with Sungmin’s arm over his shoulders jostling him the slightest bit, gently cajoling him to go out for dinner and drinks with everyone else. While there were certainly things Sungmin could tempt him into, his growing sense of unease meant this wasn’t one of them; he’d begged off going, saying he needed rest and some extra study time.

By the time his answer had been accepted with a final squeeze and wishes to rest well, Henry had been gone for a while. Thus, Ryeowook had ignored the fear already settling into the pit of his stomach.

The man was capable of handling himself here, of course - far more than Ryeowook, to be sure. If only that stopped him from worrying. He’s sure Henry should’ve been back two hours ago at this point, whatever the younger man was doing; he’s not answering his phone or replying to his messages, hell, not even looking at them. The rest of the group and staff will probably be back within the hour. If Henry hasn’t returned by then… It wouldn’t look good.

It’s not looking good now.

Where is he?! They have filming tomorrow, they’re not supposed be out by themselves past a certain hour, and Ryeowook has no clue where he is. Is he okay? What if he got hurt?! Or lost, or something worse- No, he can’t let himself think about any of that, he digs his nails into his arm to ward off the thoughts.

One unsatisfying nap was all he’d managed. He can’t focus on his studies at all. It was a good excuse to stay in, having the side benefit of being true, but he’s read the same sentence at least five times now and can’t remember a word of it. He keeps looking between the clock on the wall, the one on the microwave, his phone, and only occasionally at the workbook laid flat on the table. Which he hasn’t filled in more than two lines in because he’s frantic with dread in a way he’s not sure he’s ever been.

He spends so long staring at the door that it startles him when it opens.

Relief is what he feels first, a palpable thing that has him slumping over like he was being held up by wires that’ve been cut. The rest takes a little while to filter in.

Henry’s flushed red. That was the first thing that stood out. He’s also rubbing his own arm with the opposite hand, hunching in on himself like he’s cold, and there’s a bottle hanging loosely at the end of said arm. He’s glassy-eyed and visibly unsteady on his feet.

Ryeowook’s brain seamlessly switches modes at the first lurch to one side. He takes the bottle, not without encountering some mumbly grumble-whining, and sets it down on the kitchen counter. Since Henry doesn’t look like he’s going to stay upright much longer, he leads the younger man to the couch.

He’s more right than he realized. He somehow ends up with Henry’s head in his lap, though how the other man got there from sitting upright is a mystery. Pressing the back of his hand to Henry’s cheek and forehead, he can feel heat radiating off of him and frowns. The flush spreads at least as far down as his chest, visible through the collar of his t-shirt. And if the bottle hadn’t given him away, the smell sure would have.

Henry’s eyes open and focus on him. “Hi,” he says with a goofy smile.

“You’re hot,” Ryeowook says, his mouth pursed with concern. How much did he drink? He thinks but doesn’t ask. Henry giggles.

“Thanks, I like you too.”

“No, I mean you have a fever.” He can already tell this is going to try his patience.

“Mmno. Nooooo. Alcohol.” Henry’s head lolls from side to side. “It’s fine. S’fine. Alcohol. N- no- not sick. Comfy here.” He scratches his thigh, then his chest; he doesn’t seem aware of much of anything.

“You were gone for a while,” Ryeowook tries again, not that he’s at all sure he’ll get anywhere. On balance, he’s still far more worried than annoyed; this isn’t typical for Henry at all. Not the moodiness, or not answering his phone, or especially not getting plastered like this.

“Awww, you care ‘bout me. You, you take such goo- care of me. It’s so nice. You’re so niiiice.” His smile is sloppy, he mixes formality levels the longer he talks, and then his face is somehow pressing into Ryeowook’s midriff.

in an involuntary breath, Ryeowook stiffens. That’s… not a thing he can handle.

Luckily, Henry rolls away, but then he’s looking up at Ryeowook with the saddest eyes. “Wha’sit? I do something wrong?” The man genuinely looks like he’s about to cry, so Ryeowook hurries to reassure him.

“Nono! No, it’s fine, that just tickles, so don’t do that.”

“Mrms’rry. You smell good though.”

Now Ryeowook’s even more flustered and isn’t sure what to do. Henry answers that for him by actually trying to tickle him. He’s uncoordinated, though, so it doesn’t take much effort to get a hold of his hands and wrangle him away. “Hey, stop that, would you?” Henry makes an odd-looking open-mouthed smirk and laughs and tries one more time. “Don’t make me sit on you!”

“Heeey, come on, why do you hate me?” Maybe his drunken state has rendered him unable to discern their usual kind of joking, because he doesn’t sound like he’s entirely joking. And then he doesn’t sound like he’s joking at all. “Why does everyone hate me?”

“Come on, that’s not true,” Ryeowook says, Henry’s hair in hopes of both calming and distracting him. It works for a bit; Henry weakly pushes his head into the touch and seems placated. He mumbles something - unclear what language it was in, and he doesn’t seem bothered that he doesn’t get any response. But soon, his expression falls.

Then he starts crying.

A second ago, things seemed under control. Now, all of a sudden, there’re tears falling out of the corners of his eyes, his red face is contorted in sorrow, and he’s got a death grip on the bottom of Ryeowook’s shirt.

"Hyuuuuung am I clingy? I'm not clingy, right?” Henry bites the corner of his lip as he talks. It was… far too enticing of a sight given the situation. “I’m trying so hard not to be clingy be-because being clingy is annoying and I don't, I don’t wanna be annoying!” He then mumbles something else while Ryeowook’s still processing the unexpected turn this conversation has taken.

"Wait, what? What?! No!” Henry’s hair again gets him a shaky sniffle and a shakier exhale, but at least the man looks like he’s mentally here. “Who told you that??" Ryeowook says, equal parts indignant and bewildered.

Looking firmly in the other direction, Henry mumbles yet again. Ryeowook tries not to sigh.

“Speak up, you’re mumbling.”

"I said, my ex-“ The rest is unintelligible. His stomach sinking, Ryeowook gets the picture nonetheless. And then he’s furious.

“How dare she! You know what, I bet she was just projecting her own fear of being clingy on to you so she could displace the blame!" He huffs. What a ty thing to do!

"Hyung-"

"You have nothing to worry about, Henry. You're not clingy. That girl was wrong to say that kind of thing to you. So wrong!" This is exactly the kind of bull that gets his blood boiling, making someone feel like crap for no good reason. As if breakups aren’t hard enough!

"Hyung-"

"She doesn't know what she's missing out on-"

"HYUNGI'MGAY!"

Mid-rant, Ryeowook’s hand pauses on the top of Henry’s head. He looks down to see the other man with his eyes squeezed shut. His head falls sharply to the side as though heavy with the gravity of what he’s revealed. Ryeowook can starkly feel its weight on his lower thigh. “…What?”

His heart hammered in his chest, but he willed it away. The stretched-out moment that felt like forever was only a second or two that his hand stuttered before returning to smoothing back Henry’s bangs. He kept an even rhythm that didn’t falter again.

“…My ex was a boy.” Henry never looked so small as he did right now. “I mean, um, they all were, after... yeah. Y'know. But, yeah. It, uh, it was a guy who called me clingy. When he- When he broke up with me.” The poor thing is lapsing into English here and there, he’s so nervous.

Ryeowook’s heart aches for him.

So he’d heard right. The picture becomes clearer in his mind as he speaks, fueling his protective rage. What kind of bastard could say such a terrible thing to his sweet Henry? "Well then, he doesn't know what he's missing out on- and-“ His left hand clenches into a fist. No, he knows exactly the type. “Ooh, this is even better, if I ever meet him, I don't have to feel bad about decking him for hurting you!"

Henry bursts into laughter - loud, unfettered, wet-sounding laughter that edges towards a sob a couple of times without quite getting there. Ryeowook's still mad at the who brought this on, but when Henry's laughter peters out with a big sniff, he looks unsure and touched and worried, which instantly takes up all his focus.

Painfully wide-eyed and radiating insecurity, Henry at last opens his eyes to look up at him when he asks, “This isn’t a joke, right? You really don’t hate me?”

Not realizing that he’d stopped, Ryeowook goes back to his hair and says, "Of course I don't hate you, Henry. I could never hate you, especially not for something as silly as who you love." He has a strong urge to kiss Henry’s forehead. That would not come off right, he's sure of that, so he refrains extra hard.

All of a sudden, Henry’s face is pressed into his middle again, but this time, it’s because the younger man is sobbing, wailing what sounds like thank you, over and over again. Ryeowook just keeps his hair until he calms down. That he’s so drunk that he’s lost all ability to bottle up anything speaks to how much those hurtful words affected him.

How long had he been suffering, keeping that inside?

At length, Henry pulls back, his face damp, the whole of him looking profoundly tired. "Hyung. Hyung, it's really difficult."

“I understand.” That’s all he says; it’ll have to do. There’ll be a better time to explain just how much he understands. This isn’t about me right now. It’s about him. He needs me to listen, not make things more complicated.

But Henry doesn’t say anything more. He stays on his side, his head pillowed by the middle of Ryeowook’s thigh, resting in intimate silence. His arm shaking, he grasps Ryeowook’s hand, steadying the longer they remained clasped together.

As much as he'd like to stay here, just like this, Ryeowook looks at the clock and immediately becomes alarmed at the prospect of anyone else seeing Henry in this state.

Getting the other man to stand up is the most difficult part; getting him to place his arm over Ryeowook's shoulders to lean on to steady himself is a breeze by comparison. But once he’s down, on his bed, he’s down for the count.

“You should really change out of your clothes before you fall asleep.”

“In just a minute,” Henry mutters, making no move to avoid falling asleep. Ryeowook sighs and shakes his head. He picks a soft shirt that he’s seen Henry wear at night out of the dresser drawer and puts it under his pillow.

“It’s behind your pillow if you change your mind.”

“Mm. Thanks for not leaving,” Henry says before yawning.

The words squeeze Ryeowook’s heart like a vise. Tears well up at the corners of his eyes; how much pain must Henry have gone through to say such a thing? Words escape him, so he smoothes down Henry’s hair one last time. “Good night.”

Henry murmurs something indistinct that sounds affectionate and then promptly falls asleep.

Overtaken by that nameless force once more, Ryeowook looks on for a minute, relieved to see the man at peace. It’s not until he’s torn himself away and is setting a bottle of water down next to Henry’s bed that the enormity of the tectonic shift hits him. He proceeds to promptly freak out, though he’s not so out of control that he forgets to very slowly close the door behind him as he heads back into the kitchen.

Now that Henry’s taken care of, Ryeowook can lose his mind to his heart’s content.

He made himself a cup of tea. That’s the logical conclusion, though as far as his memory’s concerned, it materialized all by itself. He doesn’t drink it, because that would make sense, and require him to have any brain cells left to devote to anything other than the million thoughts that the last couple of hours have spawned racing through his mind.

The most obnoxious among them yelling, I might have a chance! A real chance! I can’t believe this!

A small part of him still wishes he didn’t care about that. Or want it. But he can’t get it out of his head. Out of the blue, he’s been left reeling.

With all this new information at hand, he could no longer hide from the knowledge that the very thing that scared him the most was what was missing from his brief relationships with the quite nice and, yes, admittedly cute handful of men he’d tried to date.

He hadn’t wanted to hurt any of them. But this was worse than not going away.

He looks towards the sole closed door, sorrow and longing washing over him. I wanna take care of you. I wanna protect you. No one else makes me want these things so badly.

Curling his hands around his barely-warm mug brings him no solace; that was a hard thing even to think in the privacy of his mind.

The worst part is that it’s true.

He hears the others returning, a mass of words and shouts and laughter, and bolts to his room in a panic. He locks his door, not wanting them to see him like this, or ask anything about his evening. Especially not about Henry. Not his whereabouts or activities or when he returned. Can’t upset anyone with answers they think he’s too asleep to give.

The sound outside soon dispersed, calming his fear. He lies safe in his temporary room, behind a locked door, under a blanket and a sheet, covered in a shield of darkness, no one intruding on him. His insides unclenching, he finally feels free to take a full, long breath. He can think again.

He takes stock of himself. Of his worry, blown far out of proportion. Of his elation at the thought that his feelings might not be hopeless. And of the fact that it'd been years now, and said feelings only seemed to grow stronger no matter his efforts to get rid of them.

It’s clear now that none of the things he’s been telling himself have amounted to anything in his heart when it’s beating wildly in his chest, fear replaced with reckless hope etched into its surface. Not the perils of rejection, nor the pitfalls should it end, not even the difficulties of discretion - none of it was enough to deter him any longer.

He presses his palms over his eyes. Some part of him he didn’t know he possessed keeps urging him on to courage, to take the chance that’s in sight, however slim it may be. He thinks instead of all he can gain, all he can do, and the enormity of all he can give if given the chance makes him want so badly that he’s beside himself with yearning for that vision of the future.

One by one, the pillars of denial fall away, forcing him to see clearly. He at last admits to himself the conclusion he’s been avoiding.

This isn’t a crush. I think I’m in love with him.