This is crazy.

It is not a new word to him. Junjin knows crazy all too well. Half of his life has been spent in Shinhwa and God knows that with Shinhwa, anything and everything is a derivative of crazy. Crazy members, crazy schedules, crazy ideas, crazy behaviour that somehow has never faded with time...

The life of a celebrity is all sorts of crazy but, with Shinhwa, it is a good kind of crazy. The kind of crazy that makes you question your life choices only to realise, again and again, that even if given a complete do-over, you would have still chosen the same path no matter what.

But this – what he is thinking – feeling – right now is not that kind of good crazy. This thing right now is absurd, ridiculous ... sick ... wrong.

He should not be feeling this way.

He should not be feeling like his heart is about to break through his ribs, his knees going weak, and his insides tying themselves into multiple knots while his mouth feels like it has shrivelled up, so dry has it become...

He should not be feeling any of this when his eyes meet the piercing gaze of the man in front of him.

But then the man in front of him smiles, all warm and sincere, and the knots in his guts transform into a million frantic butterflies and Junjin gives up on his sanity and accepts the fact that he must have lost his mind.

Because he must be out of his mind to have fallen for , his friend, his brother.

Fallen for Lee Sunho.

For Andy.

~***~

If one were to ask Junjin exactly when he had lost his mind, he would not be able to answer. He himself has yet to figure that out.

Giving up on that, Junjin then begins to wonder about the how and why. How can such a thing have happened? Why after all this time, all these years of knowing each other...? He tries to remember the first time they met, back when he had still been lanky pretty boy Choongjae and Andy had been shy and cute Sunho. He tries to recall if these strange feelings had been there then too, but no...

No, he repeats to himself. His heart had not run a marathon to another universe – like it does now – the first time he saw Andy, nor for the next few years of knowing him. He has never considered such a thing, never thought of any of the members that way...

Who or what is to blame for what has changed in him? The copious amount of skinship, possibly? It makes him uncomfortable to contemplate it. He has never minded being physically affectionate with the members. It has never been something forced or fake, but genuine shows of affection between them. Of course fans like to think more of it, he knows; the fans are who first introduced the idea of him being romantically linked to another man, after all. The thought had been strange at first, especially when the whole Eric and Hyesung water-and-oil couple thing had hit the roof. But since then, Junjin had accepted the concept. Fans enjoy service and so he had come to enjoy providing it.

At one point, he had even stopped thinking of it as fanservice. It was and still is not much different to how they usually interact even while away from the public eye. And Junjin is someone who interacts with everyone. Doing skinship with Andy is no more different than doing skinship with any of the other members.

...right?

(But doing skinship with other members does not exactly send his heart rate skyrocketing. There is obviously something very wrong here.)

And that is how Junjin ends up spending his nights awake in bed, with his mind full of these questions he cannot find answers to, and Andy. Always Andy.

He wonders when it all began, when all the little affectionate touches they share started to mean something different to him. When every smile, hug and random kiss they shared began plucking a different tune from his heartstrings; one he is not quite ready for.

He wonders when the line between what is forbidden and what is not became so blurred that he can no longer tell the difference. The difference between loving this man in front of him as his brother ... or something much much more.

~***~

He starts experimenting.

Over a period of several weeks, Junjin has managed to convince himself that he may be just overreacting because he is ... confused. After all, he has never been involved with a man before. Maybe all the strange feelings he has started to get around Andy are just normal consequences of doing weird things, like unhealthily excessive amounts of skinship with other men.

(In a corner of his mind, Junjin knows this is pretty darn contradictive to, well, everything. After all, it has already been established that doing skinship with other members actually doesn’t affect him the same way Andy does. But Junjin is scared and desperate, and when those two mix together, it’s pretty amazing the things you can delude yourself into believing.)

And so, one fine morning when he arrives at Shinhwa’s dance practice room for a rehearsal to find that only Hyesung had arrived so far, he marches right up behind the singer, belts out a sing-song greeting and wraps his arms around him. Before the older man can react, Junjin reaches around, pretending to plant a kiss on his cheek but deliberately moving his head so that his lips end up on Hyesung’s neck instead.

At once Hyesung’s palm come whipping up to playfully bop him atop the head, pushing him away. ‘Aish, this kid! It’s too early for these games.’

‘Such a spoilsport, as always, hyung,’ Junjin mock-complains, but his mind is focussed not on Hyesung’s look of exasperation, but his own self.

Hmm, funny... his heart is beating pretty normally, it seems. And his stomach does not feel like a butterfly haven either. But kissing another man’s neck ... surely that should have given him more of a reaction? What he has just done is not exactly a normal level of skinship, even for Shinhwa.

He experiments again when the next member arrives. Dongwan has barely managed to put down his bag when he finds himself with an armful of Park Choongjae who enthusiastically kisses him on both cheeks. Dongwan leans back a little with a ‘Whoa!’ and looks up at his dongsaeng with a mixture of surprise and amusement.

‘Good morning to you, too, Choongjae. Your affection is overwhelming, today,’ he remarks with a grin.

Junjin shrugs cutely while Hyesung scoffs from the other side of the room. ‘He was like that with me, too.’

‘Was there something in the soju you drank last night?’ Dongwan teases.

‘What’s this? Everyone gets kisses and not me?’ The amused mock-whiny voice announces Minwoo’s arrival, along with the rest of their dance team, and Junjin goes over willingly. Minwoo bursts out laughing when Junjin nuzzles his ear with his lips and their dance team glance amusedly at the funny scene before continuing on, already used to Shinhwa’s public displays of affection.

‘You’re right, someone definitely spiked his soju last night,’ Minwoo says laughingly as he rubs his ear, pushing Junjin away with one hand.

Dongwan and Hyesung say something in reply, but Junjin is no longer listening. He frowns to himself, unsatisfied with how normal he is still feeling despite already having molested three of his hyungs. Where is the pounding heart, the knots in his gut, anything to suggest that it is normal to feel weird after doing skinship with men?

But then he hears footsteps behind him and a familiar voice greets the room at large and Junjin finds himself freezing to the spot, unable to move. It is downright ridiculous, he tells himself, but that does not stop his mouth from going dry or his heart from doing a somersault.

You’ve got to be kidding me.

‘What’s going on?’ He hears Andy’s voice behind him and then suddenly, the man is right beside him, looking from Junjin to Minwoo and back again. Junjin glances at him and thinks that it is so unfair how someone can look so good first thing in the morning, especially when all he has on are baggy sportswear and messy bed hair.

So unfair.

He is shaken from his thoughts by Dongwan, who cackles from the other side of the room, ‘Junjin’s turned serial kisser on all of us this morning. You’re next, Andy.’

Andy crocks an eyebrow at Junjin. ‘Really?’ He waits a few seconds and when Junjin remains frozen, asks, ‘What, I don’t get a kiss then?’ His eyes sparkle in amusement and he begins to turn away. ‘Not that I mind if I’m not on your list, though. A day without anyone molesting me is a heavenly day, as far as I’m concerned.’

This is invitation enough for Minwoo, standing close by, to make a beeline straight for Andy, the mischievous fire in his eyes positively screaming his intentions. The sight snaps something inside Junjin.

Next thing he knows, he is turning, lunging to grab Andy by the arm before Minwoo can get to him. He does not know what possesses him to do what he does next, but it is too late.

‘Hold up there, Lee Sunho, you didn’t think I’d let you off so easy, did you,’ he hears himself say. And then he is pulling Andy around and towards him, tilting his head to kiss his cheek.

What he does not expect is for Andy’s momentum to spin his body further, so that when his lips finally find their target, it is not Andy’s cheek he is kissing.

Time stops and Junjin stares, wide eyed at Andy’s own open eyes, which are blurred from the sheer proximity as the two of them remain frozen, Junjin’s fingers still gripping the other’s arm as he just stands there, kissing Andy’s parted lips.

The next thing he registers is the shock of electricity that starts from his lips and sizzles through his entire body, setting his heard pounding.

....