Taemin groaned within the bed sheets and stretched out his tense back muscles. He kept his eyes closed and strained his hearing for the sounds of morning song birds in the courtyard. When he was more than half awake, he cracked opened an eye and peered about the dark room; the heavy curtains hid away all evidence of the sun outside. He did not care about what the time was at present; his thoughts wandered to his last memories. An indulgent smile pulled at his lips and he felt the fatigue of last night’s ... exercises.

Taemin let out a chuckle and rolled to the other edge of the bed. He frowned when he almost fell off its side. He rolled back the other way and this time fell off and onto the floor, dragging the sheets with him.

“,” Taemin cursed and bit his lip to stop him from sobbing. It was a dream – god knows he had enough of them mixed in with those rare, real, moments. “.”

He pulled the sheets about himself and formed a human cacoon. He tried to find comfort in the return to complete darkness. He figured that he did not need to go to work for a while so he allowed himself to wallow in some self-pity for a little longer. Soon enough, he felt his cheeks flush with an intense self-directed anger. It was the same dream, again.

“You are a ing idiot,” he scolded himself.

“No you’re not;” came a soft whisper next to his cheek on the other side of the bed sheets.

Taemin froze; his heart raced; he dared not hope to believe in the ghosted words.

“Why are you on the floor?” the whisper continued.

Taemin felt the sheets move down from his head. In an irrational panic, Taemin scrambled to keep them up and over his face.

“What are you doing?” the whisper chuckled and tried to break through his cacoon.

Taemin felt the other’s shrug when he stubbornly persisted in keeping himself in the dark. He felt the sudden weight on top of him as the other cuddled up next to him. They stayed in those positions for a minute as Taemin’s heart returned to a rational rhythm and his brain argued that he would not have been able to hallucinate the warmth he felt irradiate from the other side of the sheets.

And he would not mistake that perfect fit the other had with him.

Cautiously, Taemin pulled down the bed sheets he had covered his face with. His eyes immediately fixed on the short brown hair that tickled at Taemin’s nose. He tilted his head forward a bit and followed the other’s profile, from the wide forehead to the chubby nose and thick lips. Taemin’s eyes travelled to the other’s chest and he blushed to find it . His gaze continued its journey to the top of the other’s pants and Taemin his lips.

Oh yeah, this was definitely real.

Taemin felt soft fingers brush across his cheek and his eyes snapped back up to the other’s face. Gentle brown eyes frowned up at him.

“You’re crying,” he whispered to Taemin and wiped his other cheek.

Taemin shook his head – that was not the important thing at the moment. “You’re here,” he whispered back and took the hand that rested on his cheek. “Jinki ...” Taemin breathed out.

Jinki solemnly watched Taemin kiss the inside of his wrist before he pulled him closer. “I am not going to leave you, Taemin.”

Taemin gave a hollow chuckle. “You said that before.”

“No,” Jinki sternly insisted, “I mean it. I am going to remember.”

Taemin continued to laugh, causing Jinki to scowl. The older man sat up from the floor to get a better look at Taemin. “Why are you laughing?” he demanded.

Taemin choked off his laughter and gave his lover a small sad smile. “Baby, you said that before too.”

Jinki frowned and pulled Taemin up from the floor. He cupped the younger man’s face with his hands and stared intensely into his eyes. The gesture was so ridiculous; Taemin erupted in another fit of giggles.

“Promise to meet me at Kibum’s place later tonight,” Jinki told him, his eyes wide and pleading. Taemin nodded and Jinki’s face relaxed into a wide grin. He leant forward and kissed Taemin his happiness.

--//--

“What does he have planned?”

“Shut up,” Kibum snarled at him through clenched teeth. Taemin had asked that question for the hundredth time since he had started work.

Taemin shifted to a new angle and pressed the button a few times. “Seriously,” he said absently, off with the fairies as he thought about his date with Jinki at his old best friend’s place.

“Seriously,” Kibum hissed back; “shut up and do your job properly.”

“All I am doing is taking photos of you,” Taemin flatly responded and flicked out a hand to a nearby assistant to fix Kibum’s clothes. The young intern rushed forward and carefully rearranged the delicate fabric around the model’s shoulders. Kibum scowled at Taemin over her head and told him that was precisely why he had to focus! Taemin merely shrugged and scrunched his nose at him.

“Fine,” Kibum huffed when the intern ran off the set and he looked off to the distance. Taemin’s camera shutter chattered as a few other photos were snapped. “I won’t tell you what Jinki has planned for you then.”

Taemin almost dropped the camera and swore when he inspected the last photo. It was blurry. Kibum smirked with a little triumph of his revenge. But it him an hour later when Taemin was so distracted that he knew what Jinki was up to that nothing was going right for Kibum. It took longer to get the desired shots and a few times the lighting or angles were disastrous. Kibum threw in the towel when one came off centred and half of his head chopped out of the photo.

“Let’s end this here!” Kibum grabbed Taemin’s arm and pulled him out of the studio. He pushed the boy out onto the street and ordered him to go to his place and end his misery, already!

Taemin scrambled away before Kibum had finished yelling out his sentence.

--//--

Taemin lifted up a hand to knock on the door of Kibum’s apartment but stopped before his knuckles struck its polished surface. His mind had involuntarily flashed the memory of curious brown eyes crinkled up into crescents ... and the frown between the scrunched up eyebrows. His breath stopped at the empty stares.

Taemin let his hand fall back to his side. He remembered the echo of the vacant rooms with cold snow globes on the mantle piece and forgotten shirts left behind in dusty corners. He heard again the broken promises recorded in countless voice messages. He felt again the emptiness next to him on the piano bench.

His mind flickered to the vows he had written for another person.

Taemin took a step backwards. He suddenly felt suffocated with the crush of his remembrances. This was not real; it was going to happen all over again.

He spun on the balls of his feet and made to go back down the hallway when Kibum’s apartment door opened...

“Taemin...?”

2LSON - No Way (Feat. Zion)

The chapters are not in chronological order (unless they share the same title).