Sometimes talking is exhausting. You have to mind your choice of words, your tone. The pace needs to be appropriate and understandable but can be adjusted depending on context and situation. The phrasing is important as it colors the other person's impression of you. A well thought-out, grammatically and linguistically correct sentence will work wonders while stuttering, mumbling, half-assed and incomprehensible associations might ruin your image. But the opposite is also true; a lover will get tired of perfection and formality and a stoic friend will appreciate flailing about and hurried exclamations of joy once in a while. Until you put yourself in that situation, bare your neck to the beast, will you not know how to talk. Your own voice will appear with time, but the voice you use with other people will be different.

Seunghyun is aware of his wide spectrum of voices. There's the voice he uses with the YG President, humble and collected, and the one he uses with friends, up-beat and mischievous. There's the award show voice, the dating voice, the dongsaeng voice, the pre-debut voice, the T.O.P voice and the concert voice. There are many, many more voices of different sizes and importance that Seunghyun knows he has used or am using. But in a world of artists and musicians, someone or some situation making him chose his words and constructing a voice, that is not something out of the ordinary. As for the people who bless Seunghyun with comfortable silence without the need of exhausting etiquette, those are actual living miracles.

He hadn't expected Seven-hyung to be one of them. Always smiling, always there to support, console, aid or tease. When Seunghyun had been a rookie he had found the more experienced artist to be intimidating. A person with a smile that big must have an awfully large lie to hide, he had thought. It wasn't later when they grew closer and got to first name basis that Seunghyun regretted his previous assumptions. Dongwook had proven to be just as stunning as his smile, as genuine as his laughter and as confident as his strut. Seunghyun looked up to the man, literally and otherwise, and used to think he had to keep the conversation going whenever they met in fear that his hyung would find him boring otherwise.

But he had been wrong.

They were both currently sitting in a white sofa in Dongwook's apartment. How they ended up there, Seunghyun could only vaguely remember. Sometimes it was after rehearsals, sometimes he spent the night after drinking together, sometimes it simply was. Like today. It didn't matter why they ended up together or the circumstances, instead Seunghyun was simply happy for being by his hyung's side.

The sofa was large and comfortable. Seunghyun sat in one of the corners, reading a book with his left hand while the other hand rested on the back of the sofa. Dongwook was lying down with his head in the younger man's lap, reading too of course. The concept of time and the passing of minutes were lost between them. All that was heard was the sound of each others deep, relaxed breathing and the occasional flipping of pages. Seunghyun's mind was elsewhere, in the land of the heroine Jung See Ah and her fatal attraction to the gang leader Shin Il Jae (a book a fan had sent him a while back), but he was still aware of Dongwook's every move.

He wouldn't call it observing, but whenever Dongwook did something Seunghyun noticed. The way Dongwook's eyes squinted when he was intrigued or the subtle way he rose his eyebrows when he was surprised. The warmth of his head against Seunghyun's lap was soothing and although his mind was more than willing to wander off into more frisky waters he surprised himself by not feeling the need to. Yes, he was a man and by definition people expected his mind to be pre-occupied with and a slave to frivolous urges. Which was a big stack of horse . Men are not beasts, unable to control the 'animalistic instincts' associated with and whose mouths water by the sight of exposed flesh like rabid carnivores. Men are people, human and not nearly as flawed as some paint them out to be. Sure, Seunghyun himself knows he is easily aroused but that doesn't give him a free ticket to ravage the closest person and he knows it. And seeing as that person has been Dongwook-hyung the last couple of times, Seunghyun could just imagine the scandal that would unfold if anyone knew.

But he was getting further from the subject. While blinking he realized he had flipped the page without reading, and when he realized what subject he had just spent the time contemplating he felt his cheeks turn red.

"Reading something explicit?" Dongwook's voice startled him and Seunghyun looked down to see his hyung smile knowingly back at him.

"Wha- what? Why?"

"No reason." A low chuckle escaped the older man's lips. "Just wondering if I ought to reconsider the position of my head." Seunghyun's whole face lit up like a stop sign and he almost choked on his own spit, something the older man found amusing as his chuckle turned into a full-blown laughter.

Silence enveloped the two once again, much to Seunghyun's relief. Their small talk must have made Dongwook restless though as he not long after flipping a page started to drum his fingers against his chest. He squirmed a bit in Seunghyun's lap and after finishing another chapter Seunghyun looked down to see that his friend was still on the same page, still tapping his fingers almost anxiously against his chest. The noise wasn't unpleasant but unnecessary and uncharacteristic and was making Seunghyun uneasy. When Donwook's restless fingers attacked a defenseless thread sticking out from the sofa Seunghyun had enough.

Removing his right hand from leaning against the back of the sofa he used it to grab a hold of the older man's hand and intertwined their fingers, ultimately resting them on Dongwook's chest. He seemed to get the message and visibly relaxed. Soft fingers, warm skin, duly noted. Seunghyun now felt safe returning to See Ah's world and love conflict. The sweet but rebellious heroine had suffered for her affection to Il Jae and tried her best to stay clear from the careless criminal, trying to save both of theirs reputations. But Il Jae would have none of it and every man close to See Ah would be fought off by either threats, blackmail or violence. Moving didn't help and one night when See Ah returned home she-

Dongwook's thumb was tracing patterns on Seunghyn's hand. Soft skin barely teasing his own but an act so sweet it made his mouth go dry. He could feel it again, the unavoidable warmth that spread it's wings inside of him, rooted deep in his stomach, whenever Dongwook would do something affectionate towards him, unfolded itself as on cue. The pattern wasn't consistent, instead fluid yet meticulous. Seunghyun noted that Dongwook had placed his book on the coffee table and used his free hand to pry Seunghyun's fingers open.

He tried to read, he really did, but the way Dongwook tenderly held Seunghyun's hand, occasionally twisting it and mapping every inch of it by a gentle press of his fingertips, was making it hard to focus. The pressure was light as a feather, the act innocent if but slightly odd. Seunghyun didn't feel like telling the other man to stop, just because his own breath was irregular and his heartbeat louder than usual didn't mean anything. Dongwook probably doesn't feel a thing, a skeptic voice inside of him said, he has probably done this before to many others - you're not special.

"Have you finished reading?" Once again, Dongwook's voice caught him by surprise. Deep, dark eyes searched his own and Seunghyun had to swallow a few times to be able to give a collected answer.

"What do you mean?" Really smooth there Bingu.

"Well, you haven't flipped page in a while so I figured you were done. Am I right?"

"Right..." Dongwook moved to sit up and Seunghyun leaned forward to place his book beside the other on the table. When he leaned back again he felt Dongwook stare at him. The gaze was firm and searching, just like a few seconds ago. Unsure of what his companion was looking for Seunghyun started to feel self conscious. "What? Do I have something on my face?"

Dongwook raised his hand and let his fingers graze the side of Seunghyun's cheek, sliding down his high cheekbones to his jaw and then gently gripping his chin. Seunghyun felt a thumb press at his lower lip, but quickly the touch was gone and Dongwook was patting his thigh, making the younger man question his own sanity. Did I just imagined all that or-

"Nope. Just your face." Dongwook said smiling as broadly as the first time they met before rising up from the sofa and making his way to the kitchen, shouting that he was making coffee. Seunghyun released a breath that he didn't know he was holding and sunk deeper into the sofa. His hands gripped his hair in frustration. The invisible patterns drawn on his hand felt like they were burning and so did his cheeks. His tongue darted out to wet his dry lips, unconsciously rubbing against the part where Dongwook's thumb had previously been twice. He could hear Dongwook call from the kitchen, asking if Seunghyun wanted him to do something for him.

Well, considering my current state I'd say I want you to do me.