Part 2

The best part of any competition, in Taemin’s opinion, was the few seconds between the jump off the block and the first . In a real competition, he would stand on the starting block and the announcer would call for silence. Then there would be the signal for the swimmers to take their mark. This was when Taemin’s heart would stop and his muscles would tense under his skin; a spring ready to unfurl. The starting gun would sound and he’d dive gracefully into the water, where he would be wrapped in a few split seconds of absolute silence. The momentum from the dive usually took him a few good meters down the length of the pool, and the second his head would break the surface for his first he would be bombarded with the sounds of the crowd. But those few seconds of utter silence were always his favorite part of a race. It was like being transported to another world, where the only thing that existed was him and his heartbeat pounding in his ears.

That feeling came second only to Heechul’s smile when he saw Taemin’s times.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Okay,” Heechul said when Taemin put the water bottle down. “It’s about time for them to get here, so let’s see what your 200 meter front crawl time looks like.”

Taemin nodded and stood up from the bench he’d been relaxing on for the last 10 minutes. The pool they were at right now had been reserved for Kibum to hold a final training session for the interns, but he and Heechul had taken full advantage of the empty pool for a spontaneous training session. It wasn’t an Olympic pool, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.

Taemin made his way over to the starting block, shaking out his arms and legs a bit and making sure his goggles were suctioned tightly to his face.

“Okay, okay, Princess,” Heechul said jokingly. “Get up on that block, you look fabulous.”

Taemin rolled his eyes but did as he was told. Heechul set his stopwatch.

“Take your mark.”

Taemin crouched, his fingers just touching the plastic of the block.

“Go!”

There it was, the leap and those first seconds right after the impact- even in a deserted and quiet pool it was magical. And right after that Taemin started to focus on his actual . 200 meters in this pool was 8 laps- and he had to focus on each one of them because he hated this event with a passion.

By the 5^th lap he knew he was losing steam, but he pushed himself forward, keeping up a steady stream of pep-talk in his head, well, pep-screaming really. On his last lap he surged forward, swimming so hard he all but stopped breathing and merely went through the motions of turning his head. Finally he reached the end of the pool and slammed his palm down on the wall, race over.

He was panting hard when he looked up at Heechul.

“Well?” he demanded.

Heechul held his hand out for a high five. “1:46.87,” he said proudly.

Taemin grinned and clapped his hand weakly against his coach’s. That was almost a whole second under the qualifying time, and it wasn’t even his best event. He pulled off his cap and goggles and ducked under the water, letting it cool off his face and neck.

“Go cool down,” Heechul ordered when he resurfaced. “Two laps.”

Taemin kicked off of the wall and started one lap of easy backstroke. His new time was good, but already he was thinking about a new training regimen that could shave another half second or so off of it. More drills during practice, more time with the kickboard, a few more pushups during his warm up… he’d have to run it by Heechul of course, but he couldn’t see where there would be any problems. Front crawl may have been his least favorite but that didn’t mean he got a free pass on the , if he wanted to make in to the Olympics he needed to show everyone that he was no slacker.

The flags crossed his vision and he flipped onto his stomach just in time to turn and start butterfly back to the other end of the pool. Fueled by his determination and excitement he unknowingly began to swim faster- not nearly as fast as he could have but a bit much for a cool down. Heechul clucked his tongue at him when he got back to the diving block.

“Where’s the fire, kiddo?” He asked.

Taemin grinned sheepishly. “Sorry, I got lost in thought,” he said, bracing his palms on the groove in the side of the pool. He then vaulted his body up and grabbed the starting block, hoisting his body up until his feet found the groove in the pool’s side and he could step out.

“I wish you would just use the ladder,” Heechul sighed, handing Taemin his towel. “Well, let’s clear out for them.”

“Who?” Taemin asked, already turning to the bleachers. He froze, towel still halfway to his head.

“Who are they?” He breathed, already knowing the answer.

“Those are the interns,” Heechul said, preoccupied with gathering the both of their belongings and missing the look of awe on Taemin’s face.

In the past 3 years that Taemin had been tagging along on these trips he’d come to expect something of the interns. They were either the type of people who spouted off phrases like “carbon dating,” “holism” and “biomass” like movie titles, who would wax for hours about Ernst Heinrich Philipp August Haeckel like he was a God. Usually these interns wouldn’t know Abercrombie and Fitch from a hole in the wall, and they had messy hair and threw on the first thing they touch when they get up in the morning. They were the kind of people who got so engrossed in what they did that they forgot to eat, and Taemin felt like he fit right in. Admittedly they were crazy about different things, but they were driven by the same frenzied desire to be better, to know more, to come out on top.

The four boys sitting in the bleachers looked like they not only shopped religiously and Abercrombie, but like they could also be models for the brand. They were impeccably put together, not a hair out of place, and even from 50 feet away Taemin could tell that they might as well exhale charm and appeal.

“Dear God,” Taemin whispered, acutely aware of his towel-hair and scrawny limbs. Suddenly he wanted nothing more than to go home and curl up under his blankets for a few weeks. He turned his back to them and dashed as fast as he could to the locker room, hoping to God that they had no idea that he was tagging along on their trip.

On the way back to the hotel Taemin turned to Heechul and, only half-jokingly, asked if it was too late for him to go back to Seoul. He thought Heechul would laugh it off, but instead Taemin found himself on the receiving end of a curious look and a battery of questions.

“You’ve always looked forward to these trips,” Heechul said. “What happened? Did you hurt yourself during practice? Are you feeling alright?” Heechul took one hand off the steering wheel of their rental car and Taemin gasped.

“Both hands on the wheel! Are you trying to kill us?!” He yelped even as Heechul felt his forehead for a fever. Taemin pushed him away. “I’m fine- I swear, it was a joke! Now please focus on the road!”

Heechul put his hands back on the steering wheel but shot another curious glance at Taemin. “If you’re fine then why do you want to go home?”

Taemin slumped down in the passenger seat, glaring out the window. “Forget it,” he muttered. Miraculously Heechul shrugged and remained quiet for the remainder of the drive, and Taemin figured he’d just let it drop. Once they were back at the hotel and Heechul had parked the car in the garage, Taemin was prepared to let the matter go entirely- of course he’d overestimated Heechul’s ability to let things be.

Taemin opened his door and shrieked a bit when he found Heechul waiting on the other side.

“How did you get over here so fast?” He cried, looking over his shoulder like he expected Heechul’s clone to be in the driver’s seat still. He jerked his head back around when he felt Heechul’s hands on his knees and then regretted it, because he was literally nose to nose with the man who could spot a lie better than any adult Taemin knew.

“The truth, Lee Taemin,” Heechul demanded. “What’s gotten into you?”

Taemin looked at his lap and swallowed nervously. “It’s really stupid,” he muttered.

Heechul snorted. “If you thought it was stupid, you wouldn’t have brought it up. You never say anything for the hell of it.”

Taemin winced and decided to accept defeat; Heechul would never let this go. He took a deep breath. “It’s the other interns,” he confessed. “I wasn’t expecting them to be so...” he trailed off, unable to find the right words.

“So...?” Heechul prompted.

Taemin felt himself growing frustrated. “Well I mean you saw them!” He said. “Look at them and then look at me—we’re total opposites! They could be Abercrombie models and I look like a twelve year old girl. And don’t you dare think that this is just me being shallow and insecure about my looks,” Taemin said sharply, aware that he’d just sounded incredibly whiny, but Heechul didn’t even look judgmental.

“Oh, Taemin,” He sighed, smiling a bit sadly. “I know that’s not it—I remember what you told me about middle school.”

If there was one thing Taemin was sure he would never have outside of a pool, it was confidence in himself. Throw him in a pool and he could be the freaking King, but take him out and it he felt like a poser. Be it because of his limp or because he was painfully shy, he never felt like he could match up to the people around him.

Before and after his diagnosis of cerebral palsy, Taemin had been the subject of many taunts from his peers. He was too pretty, to skinny, too damn cute. When was he going to stop being such a freaking baby and the like. Maybe some people- like Heechul- would have grown a shell and learned to let those comments roll off of them, but instead Taemin had done the opposite. He absorbed those comments and let them define him, he walked with his head down and his mouth shut, preferring to be invisible.

Taemin looked away, hating himself for feeling so insecure. “But I don’t even understand it myself,” he admitted. “I’ve never been this self-conscious when it came to the other interns- I mean yes, maybe a little nervous but never this bad!”

Heechul backed away and let Taemin get out of the car before pulling him into a careful hug. “Well I'll admit, this is the first time the interns have been so close to your age- both because you’ve gotten older and Kangin seems to have made a conscious effort to involve the younger generation in ocean conservation. To be fair, you haven’t had much interaction with boys your own age in a while, and that’s mostly my fault.”

Taemin flicked Heechul’s arm without pulling out of the hug. “I’m the one who said I didn’t want to  go to school,” he muttered, refusing to let Heechul blame himself for his issues.

Heechul sighed and stepped back but kept one arm around Taemin’s shoulder as he led them towards the garage elevator. “Well if it’s any consolation, I know Ryeowook interviewed them all personally and you know what a good judge of character he is. I doubt those boys would be anything but nice to you.”

Taemin nodded, mumbling that Heechul was probably right. Still, that didn’t erase all the doubts that he had- years of taunts were still engraved in his brain, it would take a while to get rid of them. Seemingly sensing his discomfort, Heechul offered a compromise.

“Just give them a chance, but if it’s really unbearable then I’ll arrange it so we practice when they’re not preoccupied with diving so you can avoid contact.”

Taemin considered the offer for a moment. “How long is this chance lasting?” He finally asked as they got off the elevator.

Heechul shrugged. “I’d say if after 4 days you still feel uncomfortable then we can commence operation Keep Away From the Interns. KAFI for short.”

“Coffee? No thanks, not right now,” Taemin teased.

“YAH! You brat!” Heechul yelped, cuffing Taemin lightly on the back of his head just as he opened the door to their suite. Siwon groaned from the couch.

“If you two are going to start bickering already I’m going home,” he warned.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The internship officially kicked off the following morning when the interns would go out for their first dive in the ocean. Taemin typically went along for this trip, and knowing how uneasy he was Heechul had said that they could sit this one out. In the end though, Taemin said he was fine with going out, since he knew that Heechul really wanted to see his cousins (even if he insisted that he really didn’t need to and he’d see enough of their faces later). The only condition he had was that they make sure they were the first ones on that boat, that way he could get on and hopefully sit down somewhere without having to show off his mobility issue just yet. Even if Taemin stood to bow to them, he wouldn’t have to move his feet at all, and he planned to keep this charade up for as long as he could.

Taemin wasn’t embarrassed or shy about his mobility issue (he now refused to call it a disability- that had also been Heechul’s doing), it was just that when people knew they tended to pity him, or look at him as somehow being less; again, not ‘less’ in a disrespectful or belittling manner. Several times people who wouldn’t have looked twice at him before suddenly wanted to be his best friend when they saw him walk with his limp. As if a slight stumble turned him into a helpless little thing that needed to be protected and coddled.

No thank you.

And if he was going to be friends with these interns he wanted to establish that relationship before they saw his limp, just to be on the safe side. Plus getting there early meant Kangin could hopefully finish his fussing before anyone showed up to witness it.

Heechul and Taemin arrived at the boat an hour before the launch (Siwon was coming over later) and were greeted by Heechul’s overly enthusiastic cousin.

“Taemin-ah!!”

‘It begins.’

Taemin’s “Uncle” swept him into a hug that lifted him off of the ground.

“Aiya, did you get taller?!” He gasped once Taemin’s feet were back on the deck. “Stop growing, boy! You’ll be taller than me one of these days! And why are you so thin? Heechul!” Kangin turned to his cousin, still keeping Taemin locked in the hug. “Are you feeding this kid? He’s all skin and bones!”

Heechul scoffed. “Are you kidding? Taemin’s eating everything in sight, I go shopping every other day now!”

Taemin tugged on Kangin’s sleeve and pouted at him. “I’d worry less about what I’m eating and more about my mental health,” he said, pointing at Heechul. “With him prancing around in his Lady Gaga outfits all the time.”

Kangin’s eyebrows shot up. “Really, Heechul? Are you trying to scar the kid for life?”

Taemin used the ensuing squabble to make a break for the lower level of the boat, where he found Kibum and Ryeowook on their final check of the oxygen tanks. After the usual round of a thousand hugs (Ryeowook) and questions about how he managed to survive life with Heechul (Kibum), they too found themselves on the subject of how much taller Taemin had gotten.

 “I think he’s taller than you, Wookie,” Kibum remarked, eyeing the pair of them. Of course Ryeowook couldn’t let that stand, and after going back to back they found that not to be true, although Taemin certainly was catching up.

“If you get taller than me,” Ryeowook growled, looking as menacing as a baby rabbit, “I’ll cut your legs off at the knees.”

Taemin smiled and reached up to pat his hyung’s head. “I’m sure you will,” he calmly. Kibum held Ryeowook back while Taemin dashed back up to the deck, where Kangin and Heechul were still wrapped up in their own little world.

“At least I don’t leave other people’s belongings out in the rain where they can rust!” Heechul was screaming.

“Will you give that a rest already, it was fifteen years ago. And for the record I dried it off before it could rust.”

“The wheels squeaked after that!”

Taemin chose that moment to interrupt, throwing his hands over their mouths. “Do you know how many times I’ve heard this argument before?” He whined. “Can we talk about something new? Like my times from yesterday?”

“Yes,” Kibum put in, coming up from the stairs with Ryeowook close behind him. “Let’s talk about that.”

Every time they got together Taemin found it harder to believe that these four men could be related. He always thought that he would not find a bigger group of misfits anywhere in the world. Taemin knew from experience that Heechul was brash and fresh, and he’d mouth off at anyone who caught him at a bad time, but it was really only because he wasn’t very good at expressing any kind of emotion that would make him vulnerable. Kangin, for all that he looked like a body guard, was in fact a gigantic teddy bear with a loud laugh and a soft spot for kids. He wore his heart on his sleeve and he rarely had a moment where he felt down about anything. Ryeowook was one of the gentlest people Taemin knew, and people seemed to gravitate towards him. Kibum was undoubtedly the quiet one out of the four, but that didn’t mean he had nothing to say; he just didn’t need many words to say it. A lot of times people mistook Kibum for being shy, but Taemin knew that wasn’t true either.

The only times Taemin saw the family resemblance was when the four of them got riled up. They had the exact same temper, it was just harder to set some of them off. Heechul lost it regularly, Kangin frequently but not as much, Kibum rarely and, actually Taemin had only seen Ryeowook really pissed off once in his life, and it was when he pulled a fishing net with a dead sea turtle in it out of the water.

Heechul may not have been the professional environmentalist, but all four of them were passionate about sea life, and every now and then they’d get into heated discussions about how lax the laws protecting the ocean really were. When that happened the four of them all got the same fierce look in his eye, and whenever Taemin was lucky enough to catch it he was always blown away by how alike they looked in that moment.

The other time he saw the resemblance was when the four men were fussing over him. Somehow it seemed like Taemin had become the unofficial baby brother of the group (despite Kangin’s insistences to be called Uncle; that man just really wanted a nephew) and they had taken it upon themselves to be the glue that held Taemin together. So far they were doing a fantastic job of it, and Taemin was sure that he couldn’t have found a better second family even if he searched for a hundred years.

All too soon Kangin looked towards the end of the dock and stood up, waving his hands over his head to get attention.

“Over here, guys!” He yelled, jumping up and down.

Heechul grabbed Kangin’s arm and yanked. “Yah,” he said when Kangin had been thrown off balance, “Stop shouting—let the boys figure it out themselves.”

“Siwon is with them you know,” Ryeowook pointed out as he too stood up and waved the boys down the dock. “Well, okay in front of them.”

“That goes double for him,” Heechul sniffed. “In fact, if Siwon can’t find this boat on his own then he doesn’t deserve to be on it.”

 “That’s not very nice, hyung,” Siwon said as he climbed onboard, having overheard that last part- Taemin jumped, he hadn’t realized Siwon was that close.

Heechul waved his hand. “You don’t love me because I’m nice, you love me because I’m the most interesting person you know.”

“I wasn’t going to say interesting,” Siwon stated, but he was cut off by Kangin shouting a welcome to his four charges for the summer. Taemin nervously wiped his sweaty palms on his shorts and tried to look like he wasn’t half ready to jump overboard. It took a few minutes for Kangin to get through everyone on the boat before he finally directed everyone’s attention in Taemin’s direction.

“And this is Heechul’s student, Lee Taemin!”

Taemin smiled and stood up. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you,” he said with a bow.

“Oh my god!” One boy cried. “You are the cutest thing I have ever seen!”

Taemin felt his smile freeze on his face. What the heck…?

The boy rushed over and put his hands on Taemin’s shoulders. “Wow, you really are adorable! How old are you?”

“Um…seventeen,” Taemin stuttered nervously.

The boy gaped at him. “WHAT?!” He shrieked. “You can’t be! That’s totally not fair!”

Another boy—this one taller than anyone else in the group—came up from behind a clapped his hand over the shrieking one’s mouth. “Please ignore Jinki, he’s a bit paranoid about his own delicate age and—”

“Taemin,” Kibum interrupted, shoving his way between the two boys, “Meet Jinki and Minho.”

Taemin nodded and Kibum pointed to the other two. “And they are Jonghyun and Kibum.”

“Please call me Key,” Kibum- er, Key said empathetically, “The last thing we need is people getting confused as to which Kibum is being addressed.”

Taemin tried not to smile too widely, because once again it seemed he’d been foolishly worried about nothing. These guys were totally cool!

Happy Independence Day to my fellow American citizens! And happy Wednesday the 4th to uh...everyone else ^^ Next part will be posted on Friday!