Middle of November, 2012

            Key sat in the corner of the dance room, smiling into his cell phone. He probably looked unusual to the other members. Normally he was the one staying focused during rehearsal while the other boys goofed off. Key’s mind always revolved around perfecting the routine as soon as possible, but lately his mind had been elsewhere.

            It had been almost two weeks since his date to the park with Hyeongseop. Could you even consider it a date? he asked himself. They had only snuck away from the SHINee dorm and gone for a walk, which hardly counted as a date, but it certainly seemed to end like one.

            The only time Key and Hyeongseop had spent not messaging each other were the hours they were asleep each night. When they were awake, they were constantly texting or messaging on Kakaotalk. It wasn’t uncharacteristic of Key to often be distracted by his phone, but nowadays he never set it down. Key hoped maybe his fellow members hadn’t noticed, but at least one had.

            “What are you smiling at?” Jonghyun’s voice startled Key. He was standing over Key, looking down at him. Key chuckled inwardly at the idea of looking up at Jonghyun, but quickly slid his phone into his pocket.

            “Nothing,” he said, still seated on the hardwood floor.

            “Lately, you’ve been smiling the biggest I’ve seen you smile in a long time,” Jonghyun said, and he sat down next to him. He was holding two water bottles, one obviously for Key. “I brought you this,” he held out the bottle.

            Key looked at the water bottle and realized that he had been so distracted that he had forgotten to grab one during their break. He smiled, half in gratitude and half embarrassed of himself for forgetting basic necessities because of Hyeongseop. He knew Hyeongseop would feel bad if he knew he had been distracting Key this much. But Seop makes me forget everything else, Key thought. He’s as important to me as water.

            Key took the bottle and cracked it open. “Thank you,” he said to Jonghyun, who smiled in return.

            “And now that I have you cornered,” Jonghyun said, chuckling at his own joke. “Tell me what’s been going on.”

            Key tried his best to seem confused. “What do you mean?” he asked, his voice shaking slightly.

            “Oh, come on, Kibum,” Jonghyun shoved Key softly. “I’ve known you way too long to not notice when something affects you this much. You’ve been so different these past few days.” He paused, biting his lip slightly. “It’s Hyeongseop, isn’t it?” he whispered.

            Key felt his ears immediately turn red, and his face warmed as his cheeks blushed. He turned away immediately to try and hide his reflexive reaction from Jonghyun. “I – I don’t know what you mean,” he stuttered. He immediately hated himself for wearing his feelings so blatantly on his sleeve.

            Jonghyun merely looked him. “Okay, Kibum,” he said, raising his hands in defeat. He stood up. “When you’re ready to talk though… I’m here.” He turned and walked to the front of the room where the choreographer was calling them back together.

            Key watched Jonghyun walk away and felt his face begin to cool down. He had no idea how Jonghyun knew. Was he being that obvious? Had he left his phone lying around by accident? He knew he would have to be more secretive. But was there really anything to be secretive about, especially to his fellow members?

            Key’s mind raced with conflicting thoughts as he stood and joined the other boys who were standing around their instructor.  He tried to push the thoughts away in order to focus on the choreography, but not even performing could seem to take his mind off Hyeongseop.

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            Key shook his still-damp hair as he entered his room. He had taken a long shower to relax after rehearsal, while the other boys had run to the kitchen for lunch. It had been a very long morning of rigorous instruction, but at least they had the basis of the choreography down, so it could only get better from that day on. Soon enough the group would be entirely prepared for their comeback, and the work would finally pay off.

            He had done his best to avoid messaging Hyeongseop for the rest of rehearsal and the ride home, but with everyone else gone, Key flopped heavily onto his bed and dug his phone from his pocket in the solitude of his room. He had two unread messages from Hyeongseop.

            The first message was received over an hour before. It said Ahh, that’s good. I know how much you love performing, in response to Key telling Hyeongseop how rehearsal was going. But the second one was more recent, from only fifteen minutes ago.

            What else are you doing today?

            Key thought for a moment. As far as he knew, there wasn’t anything else planned for the evening.

            Nothing tonight, Key wrote back. Did you have something in mind? He sent the message.

            A few minutes of anticipation later, Key’s phone chimed.

            Let’s go shopping :) the message from Hyeongseop read.

            Key immediately jumped up from his bed, no longer tired from rehearsal. His eagerness to see Hyeongseop flowed through him as he ran to pick an outfit from his closet.

            “Where are you going, all excited?” This was the second time today that Jonghyun’s voice had startled Key out of his thoughts about Hyeongseop. He turned to see Jonghyun standing in the doorway.

            Key hesitated. “I decided to go shopping to relax after this morning,” he said.

            “Are you even going to eat lunch?” Jonghyun asked, walking past him and sitting down on the bed.

            “I’ll get something while I’m out,” Key turned back to his clothes and sorted through the seemingly endless amount of clothes. No matter how much he tried to focus, he couldn’t seem to find anything that he liked.

            The room was silent for a while, only the scrape of hangers along the metal closet rack filled the room as Key became increasingly tired of searching for clothes. Jonghyun played with the sheets of Key’s bed impatiently before finally speaking up.

            “You’re going out with Hyeongseop, aren’t you,” he said. The inflection of his voice gave away that it wasn’t a question, and more of a statement, a matter-of-fact sentence. Jonghyun didn’t make it a question because he knew the answer already.

            Key’s hands dropped from the hangers of clothes and fell to his sides. “We aren’t going out,” Key said. He found himself unable to look Jonghyun in the eye as he said this, but he was not quite sure why.

            “But you two are serious, right?” Jonghyun pressed on. He stood up from the bed and walked toward the closet where Key stood. “Ever since that night we went to the fashion show, you’ve been different. Uncharacteristically, almost.”

            “What do you mean, ‘uncharacteristically’?” Key turned indignantly toward Jonghyun.

            “I just mean that you normally aren’t this expressive,” Jonghyun said quickly. “You usually contain your emotions, but lately everyone around can tell that you’re acting differently. Even the other members…” Jonghyun trailed off.

            Key walked quickly past Jonghyun and crouched to open a drawer on his dresser. He pulled out a sweater and held it up in front of himself. “Of course they noticed,” he grumbled. “God forbid Kibum is happy for once.” He tossed the sweater onto his bed and opened another draw in search of a pair of pants.

            “Stop being so defensive!” Jonghyun walked to the dresser and knelt beside him. “We just want to know what’s going on. You won’t tell anyone. We’re all your friends and you shouldn’t seem ashamed to tell us.”

            “I’m not ashamed to tell them,” Key said, blindly grabbing a pair of black jeans and shoving the rest back into the draw hastily. “I just don’t want to.”

            He stood and crossed to the bed. He had shocked himself with his answer. Was he ashamed to tell people? Or did he really just want to keep this secret. He knew, of course, that he and Hyeongseop could never be public as anything more than friends, and they weren’t even officially dating yet. He thought maybe he could just have one thing to himself for once, instead of having everyone else know about it as well.

            “We just want you to be happy,” Jonghyun said. His voice seemed genuine, but Key couldn’t believe it.

            “I am happy,” Key said, his voice rising involuntarily. “I’m always a happy person, I don’t understand what you mean.”

            Jonghyun stepped back. “I mean happy with someone,” he said softly.

            “Oh that’s rich coming from you,” Key scoffed.

            “Kibum, despite everything that has happened between us,” Jonghyun said, managing to keep his voice down in comparison to Key’s. “I actually do care about you, regardless of what you may think. Just because my feelings for you aren’t the same way yours are –”

            “Were,” Key interjected. “My feelings for you were. Past tense.”

            “Right,” Jonghyun nodded. “That still doesn’t mean I don’t want you to be happy. I want more than anything for you to be happy.”

            Key bit his tongue, holding back his words as best he could to give himself time to think. Jonghyun’s words did seem sincere, and Key realized it had been far too long to continue to bear any ill will toward him for feelings he could not control.

            “Thank you,” he said simply. He had no idea what else to say. “I’m sorry that I don’t feel comfortable enough to open up to you about this right now. But I can promise you I will in the future.”

            Jonghyun nodded and smiled. “That’s all I wanted to hear. We care about you, and we’ll be ready to listen when you’re finally ready to tell us. I’ll let you get ready now.” He smiled again as he walked past Key and out of the room.

            Key sighed and sat down on his bed before checking his phone. He immediately jumped up again when he saw the time. He ran to change his clothes as fast as possible in order to meet Hyeongseop in time, not even giving himself time to dwell on what had just happened.

---

            Key looked across the shop and saw Hyeongseop browsing the clothes hung on the walls. The two had finished lunch and begun shopping by the time it was late afternoon. Hyeongseop looked so well put together, as if he had planned for today in advance. Key wondered whether he had planned today, and had been waiting for Key to be free to ask him to go out. He was smiling to himself at the thought of Hyeongseop thinking of ways they could spend time together, when Hyeongseop turned and locked eyes with Key from across the store. Key’s face flushed and he smiled wider.

            Hyeongseop crossed the store quickly, his long legs carrying him so smoothly he didn’t seem to move from the waist up. No matter where he goes, he always carries himself like a model, Key thought.

            “Did you find anything, Kibum?” Hyeongseop asked.

            “Oh I’ve found plenty,” Key chuckled. “But nothing I particularly need.”

            “If not, then let’s get out of here,” Hyeongseop said. “We can go for a walk, or find somewhere else to shop if you want.”

            “A walk sounds nice,” Key smiled. He followed Hyeongseop out of the store and into the street.

            The pair walked together for a while, chatting about Key’s rehearsals and Hyeongseop’s recent photoshoots. There wasn’t much about either of them that the other didn’t know already, as they had been constantly messaging, but they somehow never ran out of the topics to talk about. They could jump from personal matters to international news to childhood memories of Daegu within minutes, and the conversations never slowed or got awkward. Key felt incredibly comfortable with Hyeongseop, a way he felt for the first time with anyone.

            Soon the pair had walked out of the shopping district and nearly into the residential areas. The trees that lined either side of the street were almost completely bare of leaves, as winter was finally beginning to set in. Key pulled his sweater tighter around him as they walked side by side. Children in thick winter coats were running around in their yards as their parents kept a close eye on them and Key smiled at their squeals of delight.

            “Kibum, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about something,” Hyeongseop said to him.

            The sudden change of subject caught Key off guard. His heart fell into his stomach as he wondered what Hyeongseop wanted to talk about.

            “We’ve been talking constantly over the past few weeks,” Hyeongseop said, his eyes scanning the scenery. Key could tell he was thinking of how to carefully choose his words. “But there’s been something I’ve wanted to say, but I couldn’t bring myself to say it in a message. It’s too important.”

            Key stopped walking and placed his hand on Hyeongseop’s arm to stop him as well. “What is it?” he asked intently.  The sounds of life around him seemed to die away as he could focus on Hyeongseop and nothing else.

            Hyeongseop turned and looked into Key’s eyes. The height difference between the two was not very large, but it was large enough that Key had to tilt his head back slightly to meet Hyeongseop’s gaze. Hyeongseop’s eyes drew Key in, and he immediately felt safe, as if nothing else would matter if he could only just look into Hyeongseop’s eyes forever.

            “Will you be my boyfriend, Kibum?” Hyeongseop asked him softly.

            Key blinked, unsure if Hyeongseop had actually asked him that or if he had only heard what he wanted to hear. His mouth dropped slightly as he tried to speak, but he couldn’t find the words with which to respond that were worthy of that question.

            “I know it’s soon in our relationship,” Hyeongseop continued, noticing Key’s hesitance. “And it would be risky in terms of your status as an idol. But I want to be with you, Kibum, and I’ll do anything to make it work.”

            Key was still trying to search for words in response but his actions suddenly overtook his thoughts. He rose up on his toes and quickly pressed his lips against Hyeongseop’s mouth. The kiss was short, as Key’s thoughts came back to him in the middle of it and he realized the pair was standing in public.

            “Absolutely,” he said, smiling up at Hyeongseop. His voice shook slightly and he inhaled deeply to try and catch his breath.

            Hyeongseop grinned broadly and he sighed in relief. “I wasn’t sure how you’d feel about it. I know it will be hard for us, with our busy schedules and trying to maintain a low profile.”

            “Let’s not worry about that just now,” Key said. “It will be difficult, I’m sure, but we’ll have each other, and we’ll do whatever we need to do. But for now, we can be happy.”

           The pair continued to walk along the street, walking closer than they ever had before. Key was incredibly happy at how easily he fell into the idea of being Hyeongseop’s boyfriend. Nothing had changed except the title of their relationship, but he felt entirely different. There was a sense of security with the word “boyfriend.” And with that word, Key felt like he had finally found someone that fit into his life, like the final piece needed to complete a puzzle.

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AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sorry for such a long time between updates! I hope this was worth the wait ;_; College has started and I was really busy for two weeks but I finally got some time off and I felt inspired and ready to write again. The good news is I already have an idea for the next chapter so it shouldn't be quite as long of a wait until the next update. I hope I can get it to you guys as soon as possible, and thank you so much for bearing with me and my long lengths of time between updates ^^