11. Titanium – David Guetta

Jongin loves that feeling of flying that comes with dance. Being suspended in the air, in the middle of a jump. The world spinning around you as you turn. The steady thrumming in your ears that is either the music or the pumping of your blood, which one, you can never quite tell.

There's a certain power that comes with being on stage. A feeling that only performing can give. It makes you high, hyper-aware, and your body burns with a heat that’s not from stage lights or even from pushing your body to its absolute limits. It's just this buzz you get that comes from being able to do something you love, in front of an audience that is solely focused on you.

When Kyungsoo comes to watch though, everything is different.

Jongin stops dancing for the thrill of it when he knows Kyungsoo is there. When Kyungsoo is there, he dances for him.

Everyone else in the room fades to nothingness. A dark blur of unrecognisable faces. There is only Kyungsoo.  And Jongin relishes in the feeling of it.

*

*

12. Bad – U2

Kyungsoo has found he can always rely on Jongin. Whether it's some little thing like asking how his day has been exactly when he needs it, like sending him a smile across the room when they aren’t close enough for words; or something bigger, like Jongin always understanding. Always knowing exactly how he feels before he’s even said anything. When he needs space, and when he wants the warmth of another person next to him.

He can rely on Jongin not to tell the others things he doesn’t want them to know, like how he’d tripped stupidly during practice today and really, really hurt his ankle, but still found a way to excuse himself and Kyungsoo so they could go and get some ice for it and take a look without embarrassing him.

(‘Joonmyun hyung, my back is hurting again. Can I go get some ice for it please? It’ll only take a second, I promise.’ ‘Alright Jongin.’ ‘Can I take Kyungsoo hyung too?’ ‘Yes Jongin, if you think you need him.’)

(He ignores the waggling eyebrows he gets from several of the others.)

He knows that Jongin can read him like an open book, but trusts him never to exploit it.

He knows that Jongin has no problems sneaking into his bed at two in the morning because he’s lonely and he wants someone to cry on.

Somehow, as they’ve trained together and lived together and seen each other at their best and worst, they have become each other’s anchor. And despite his misgivings at the start, now, Kyungsoo wouldn’t change it for the world.

*

*

13. Last Farewell – BIGBANG

The club lights blind him almost as soon as he steps in, heavy bass and electronic sound effects assaulting his ears and shaking the floor. One quick glance at the dance floor reveals a swarming, writhing mass of sweaty bodies, arms up and jumping as one to the beat of the song blaring out of the speakers.

As a consequence of this, he heads straight to the bar.

He orders himself a beer and wonders forlornly how people can possibly enjoy being packed so close together like they are on the dance floor, and observes them swaying and bouncing as the music does.

Why is he here again?

Then there is a hand in front of his face.

“Dance?” The stranger says.

No. Says Kyungsoo's brain.

“Sure.” Says his mouth.

*

*

14. The River – Missy Higgins

Kyungsoo doesn’t know about Jongin, but his legs ache by the time they reach the bridge. They're both breathing hard. Jongin has a funny look on his face that Kyungsoo can’t place. It's somewhere between ‘this is so exciting’ and ‘I ate too much’. Kyungsoo knows the latter an unlikely expression to appear on his friends face – he doesn’t think he's ever actually seen anything close to that on Jongin’s face – but he's seen it on TV; people looking like they're going to explode from food.

Now that he takes the time to look, he notices the new pattern of bruising just beginning to bloom around Jongin’s left eye. Oh. That explains the expression.

Kyungsoo can feel his own injuries starting to smart underneath his clothes. His shoulder especially. Jongin looks over his shoulder at him, a small smile hanging on his lips. A little too sharp to be natural and not entirely innocent. The moonlight falls over his face unevenly, washing out half of his features in pale, watery light, and leaving the other half almost black with shadow. He tugs Kyungsoo’s hand in his own.

“C’mon,” he says. Voice flat. Kyungsoo remembers that, a very long time ago, neither of them sounded like that.

They climb over the railing together.

Their hands never separate.

*

*

15. Kooks – David Bowie

Jongin and Kyungsoo have always been just that.

Jongin and Kyungsoo.

The best of friends.

They do everything together. Always have. When Jongin stayed in afterschool care because his dad couldn’t pick him up on time, Kyungsoo did too. Even if it meant he didn’t get to go home on time. When Kyungsoo skinned his knee on the basketball court during lunch, he had to go to the infirmary. Not five minutes into his stay there, as the nurse cleaned his wound, Jongin came hobbling in, smiling through the pain and the tears on his cheeks and proudly showing the nurse his own matching injury. When Jongin got sick and had to stay at home in his bed, Kyungsoo skipped school and spent the day curled up under the covers next to Jongin, watching old movies and drinking hot chocolate. When Kyungsoo auditioned for the talent contest at school, and made it to the semi-finals, Jongin came to every performance. Likewise, Kyungsoo has attended every concert Jongin’s dance school has ever had ever.

They’re practically joined at the hip. Cop a bit of for it, too, but really, they’re just friends. Jongin is the best friend that Kyungsoo has ever had. Will ever have.

Which is why it kind of surprises him when Jongin kisses him and says, “Can this just be a thing already?”

*

*

16. Don’t Panic – Coldplay

Kyungsoo’s skin is the softest thing Jongin has ever felt. It is silk beneath his fingertips and it glides against his own in the most beautiful of ways.

He loves the way his cheeks flush in the cold, and the way his tongue darts out to wet his plush lips in nervousness.

Kyungsoo’s skin is supple under his palms and all flowing lines and smooth porcelain. Slick and slippery around him, hot and wet and creamy.

Kyungsoo's skin is something out of this world for Jongin. It's something he fixates on and worships and still doesn’t quite do justice. Nothing can compare to the flat expanse of Kyungsoo’s stomach, skin stretched taught over his ribs, chest expanding with deep, shuddering breaths.

*

*

17. 21 Guns [Cast Version] – Green Day & Cast of American Idiot

Despite the screaming and the smashing of plates and fists hitting walls and the shattering of bloodied knuckles and the tears and the ragged breaths… Kyungsoo lives for this.

There is so much emotion in everything about them. Their relationship – whatever it's called – is a furious clashing of personalities that shouldn’t ever work. Everything is fast and hard and passion and hatred. Their love is violent.

Jongin has never injured Kyungsoo though. No, it's not that kind of violence. Emotional violence maybe? Is that a thing?

They don’t actually argue much. Mostly they’re actually so in tune with each other it's scary. The way Kyungsoo likes to think of it is, they love so hard and so fast that they lose their footing sometimes. They tumble over one another, struggling, battling tooth and nail until they realise that – it's so much easier to free fall.

And then they're headlong back into it.

So yeah, sometimes Jongin punches a wall. Bleeds and aches.

And sometimes Kyungsoo wants to cry. Wants to pull his hair out and give in. Feels like it's not worth it.

But he doesn’t. Neither of them do.

They never will.

*

*

18.  City of Blinding Lights – U2

It sounds kind of funny, but some of the most special moments they’ve had together have been on stage.

It is a bit weird, he supposes, to have something so intimate displayed on a stage with ten other guys, in front of thousands, literally thousands, of screaming girls. But oh well. That doesn’t change the fact that it's true.

When the lights go on and they can hear the fans calling their names – the stage calling their names, they just have this connection. It's like the whole world lights up. Sparks in their bellies and fire in their eyes and every glance, every momentary locking of eyes is filled with love. So much love.

There are photos sometimes – moments caught on camera that make their managers nervous. They get told ‘lay off a bit guys’ and ‘people are going to think’ but they don’t care.

On stage they are beautiful. They are together. They're in love, and they don’t give a who sees.

*

*

19. Electrical Storm – U2

They meet for the first time on some obscure beach, before the sun is even up.

They’re tangled in sheets before they even know each other’s last names.  

Hey’s had been exchanged. After that a long period of silence. They’d stared at where the water met the sky, streaked with pinks and oranges of the rising sun.

It had been hot.

The kind of hot that sits on you for days before it pours with rain. It clings. It's muggy. Sticky. No matter how many cold showers you have, it refuses to be shaken.

Jongin had been back the next morning. So had Kyungsoo. This time no words were spoken. Neither remembers the short walk to Jongin's hotel room.

They both remember exactly what happened there.

They stay there all day.

When they're lying together in the evening, linen strewn all over the floor, it begins to rain.

Kyungsoo sits up. The window is open. Water is splattering the floor.

Jongin.

Kyungsoo can see the ocean from the window. It roils.

Jongin come here.

Flashes of light and cracks of thunder split the sky. Jongin approaches the window. Kyungsoo’s face is lit up momentarily. They stand and look out at the sea.

*

*

20. I Got a Boy – SNSD

‘Did you hear?’

Kyungsoo grins into his locker as they pass by, stage whispers floating around him.

‘Have you seen him?’ ‘Have you seen them together?’

He straightens his face as best he can and collects his books.

The stares follow him through the hallways all day.

When class finishes for the day, Kyungsoo finds himself back at his locker. He’s tugging his bag free when his phone starts buzzing in his back pocket. He bites his lip to contain his smile.

“Hey Jongin.”

‘Oh my god!’ ‘Did he just call him?’ ‘Is that him?’

Kyungsoo balances his phone between his shoulder and his cheek, and continues his battle to extract his backpack from the confines of his tiny locker.

“No. Yes. Mmm. Yeah, nah it's been good. Great even.”

There are girls actually stopped behind him to listen now.

“Really? Awesome,” a pause. “Yeah, yeah that’s awesome. Thanks. Love you too. See you in a second.”

He slams his locker door shut and swings his bag onto his shoulders.

He makes his way to the street in front of the school, and yeah, maybe there's a bounce to his step and smug smile on his face. No one calls him out on it, because didn’t you hear? Kim Jongin is waiting for him.

*

*

So, I finally got motivated to write another chapter of this. Thoughts?