Jaebum doesn’t really think much of it when he walks into the dorm to find BamBam and Yugyeom in an intense battle with foam swords. He isn’t surprised to see Youngjae reading a comic book while glancing up at the duel in front of him with slight interest. He isn’t bothered by Mark and Jackson yelling for the two duellers to get out of the way so that they can play their video game. Comeback is soon, yes, but after all the hard work that went into preparing for this, Jaebum supposes that everyone needs some time of relaxation before the strict schedules inevitably appear.

After Jaebum sits down on the ottoman in front of Youngjae’s chair, he watches the two youngest members and offers strategic advice to Yugyeom (which causes BamBam to accuse him of favoritism right before Yugyeom manages to “slice” BamBam’s arm off). Because of the yelling from Mark and Jackson, the cries of agony from BamBam, and the hysterical laughter from Jaebum, Jinyoung steps into the living area from the kitchen with one eyebrow raised and a blank expression on his face. He carefully avoids the fighting taking place in the middle of the room and stands in front of Jaebum with his arms crossed. “What exactly are they doing?”

It takes Jaebum a few seconds to respond because of his laughter, but he replies with a smile. “They’re having an intense duel. I don’t know what for though.”

Normally Jinyoung would go along with these type of things, unless it was disturbing someone’s sleep or it was damaging the dorm, so Jaebum is confused when Jinyoung’s blank expression transforms into a look of disdain and he tersely asks, “And what about Mark and Jackson?”

Jaebum, not understanding Jinyoung’s sudden attitude, replies cautiously, “They’re playing a video game.”

“Why aren’t they more focused? Comeback isn’t far away at all,” Jinyoung retorts without losing eye contact with Jaebum. At the tone of Jinyoung’s words, Jaebum flinches and looks away.

“I know that, but everyone needs to relax a bit, you know? No need to be more stressed than necessary. It wouldn’t hurt you to relax-”

Jaebum stops speaking when he sees Jinyoung rolling his eyes and walking away, but before he could chase after him to find out what exactly is his problem, Yugyeom calls his name in need of assistance, and Jaebum returns to his previous position as Yugyeom’s advisor, all the while pushing Jinyoung to the back of his mind.

-

At 12:15 AM, perhaps Jaebum should be worried that BamBam and Jackson still aren’t back at the dorm. After all, they are all required to be through the door by 11:30 PM every night; that is a very strict rule. But, Jaebum reasons, everything else in their lives has been strict for the past who knows how long, and being forty five minutes late isn’t that severe of an issue in his opinion.

Jackson walks through the door at 12:27 AM with an arm around BamBam’s neck and a goofy, lopsided grin on his face. Seeing his fellow members smiling makes Jaebum smile as well, and since Jaebum feels happy and giddy, he jokes, “Guys, we’ve been waiting for our night rituals for so long! Where have you been?”

The pair plops down side by side on the floor, and BamBam yawns and says, “Out.”

Jaebum chuckles lightly and plans to tell everyone their wake-up time for the morning when Jinyoung bluntly says, “You should take a violation of curfew more seriously.”

All noise - the little bit of chatter from Yugyeom and Youngjae, the crinkling of a plastic bag that Jackson bought, the TV station they were absently watching - ends immediately after Jinyoung finished his statement. Jaebum feels his elated mood slowly turn darker and perturbed. “Jinyoung, it was just one night-”

“Jaebum,” Jinyoung interrupts, and there he goes again, rolling his eyes. “Remember what happened two years ago when two people didn’t follow curfew?”

All the heads in the room turn to face Jaebum, and with the meaning of Jinyoung’s words and the new attention from the others, he suddenly feels anxious and uncomfortable. Leave it to Jinyoung to say something in front of everyone and leave it intentionally ambiguous, so that only he and Jinyoung know the extent of what he’s saying. But naturally, Jinyoung realizes that the others get that he’s hinting at something from their past, and that very fact unnerves Jaebum.

It unnerves Jaebum because he knows that Jinyoung is doing this on purpose. Because if there’s only one thing Jaebum doesn’t like, it is feeling embarrassed and out of place in front of the other members. Jinyoung knows that; Jinyoung knows so much about him, so he has to know that. Why would he do this then?

Jinyoung sighs exasperatedly and says, “I’m going to bed. Please tell us the schedule.”

Jaebum, slightly dumbfounded, recites verbatim the schedule sent to him via text. As soon as Jinyoung leaves for his bedroom, the remaining five members begin to jokingly ask where BamBam and Jackson were for so long, but no one gets a different response from BamBam’s original, “Out.” Jaebum rubs his eyes and waves goodnight to the others; he considers knocking on Jinyoung’s door so that they can talk about what just happened, but Jaebum knows that Jinyoung needs time to cool down if he really wants to have an actual conversation, not a screaming match. Resigned, Jaebum walks into his room and falls into a restless sleep.

-

Just when Jaebum thinks that the drama with Jinyoung is over, he is mistaken. It is in fact not over; it only manages to get worse.

The group knows that he and Youngjae tend to wake up late sometimes, so when Jaebum wakes up fifteen minutes before they’re supposed to leave, he assumes that no one will think much of it. After all, this is not the most unusual occurrence in their dorm.

Jaebum nearly pushes Youngjae off of his bed in an effort to wake him up. Once he succeeds at that, he stumbles out of their bedroom with one shoe on and his jeans ped, only to see that the only people awake and ready are Mark and Jinyoung. Great.

Jaebum stiffens noticeably when Jinyoung sends daggers at him, and deciding that it is far too early to deal with whatever has been bothering Jinyoung, Jaebum mumbles in Mark’s direction, “Can you go make sure Jackson is up and ready to leave in ten minutes? I’ll get Yugyeom and BamBam.”

Mark simply nods and does as he’s told. Jaebum, with one shoe still untied, rushes to the the other two’s door and bangs on it until he hears BamBam yell, “We’ll be ready in like five minutes!”

Satisfied, Jaebum walks into the kitchen and grabs an apple. Just as he takes his first bite, Jinyoung walks over, stares at him, and walks past him to the refrigerator without a word. Jaebum, trying to be civil, murmurs, “Hey Jinyoung.”

Jinyoung, without taking his eyes away from the contents of the fridge, hesitantly replies, “Hello.”

At that moment, Jackson comes out of his room singing the Ariana Grande song he has been singing for the last two months. Jaebum walks out of the kitchen and jokingly adds harmonies to Jackson’s melody, while ignoring the piercing stare he feels Jinyoung giving him.

-

Although they barely manage to make it on time for their dance rehearsal, after continual daily practices, they could probably dance this routine with their eyes closed. By this point, they no longer need a choreographer to teach them the dance, or a supervisor to make sure they practice it. So, as leader of the group, Jaebum decides that they will focus on their practice for at least some of the time to make sure there are no mistakes.

After repeating the same dance sequence three times, Jaebum puts on random dance tracks and allows the dancers to freestyle for a bit. Even that lax instruction evolves into something even more slack; fifteen minutes later, all of them end up in a circle playing 007 bang.

Jaebum doesn’t notice that Jinyoung isn’t participating until he sees movement out of the corner of his eye, and he hears a door slam soon after that. Since he is distracted, he messes up in the game, causing the other members to rejoice in the opportunity to punish their leader through Indian bap.

As soon as the slapping ends, Jaebum quickly stands up and excuses himself from the practice room. He walks out and tries to find where Jinyoung went, and he finally succeeds after nearly five minutes of searching. Jaebum enters another practice room a few hallways away and sees Jinyoung practicing the very dance they practiced a little while ago.

“You know that you already dance perfectly, right?” Jaebum lightheartedly says when he shuts the door.

Jinyoung turns off the music and looks at him expressionlessly, but Jaebum see a smidge of emotion in his eyes that says he’s annoyed. “What are you doing here?” Jinyoung huffs.

“I came looking for you,” Jaebum says as he walks closer to Jinyoung, only for the latter to take a step back.

“I don’t see why.”

After multiple days of Jinyoung’s short, clipped answers and his annoyed attitude, Jaebum finds that he has very little patience left, meaning he has less ability to hold back his anger. Jaebum breathes and tries to hide his exasperation. “Because you just stormed out of the practice and I wanted to know why.”

“Why? Why did I leave?” Jinyoung sardonically chuckles, and Jaebum cowers slightly when he hears Jinyoung’s dialect coming out. He loses control of his accent only when he’s angry; why is he so angry?

“I left because I didn’t see any reason in wasting my precious time playing a stupid game.” Jinyoung moves to turn on the music again, but Jaebum grabs his shoulder to stop him. However, he quickly lets go when he sees the look Jinyoung gives him.

“We’ve practiced it to the point that it’s almost ridiculous to practice it for another two hours. The guys need a break.” Jaebum tries to reason, so he uses his pleading eyes that he knows will sway Jinyoung - they do every time.

Jinyoung sighs and visibly releases some of his tension, which Jaebum takes as a good sign. Jinyoung runs his fingers through his hair, and he mutters, “Fine. I understand. I want to practice though. Go check up on the kids to make sure they’re not killing each other for someone supposedly ‘cheating.’” Jinyoung makes air quotes and snorts, causing Jaebum laugh.

“Okay. Are you sure you don’t want to come play?” Jaebum can tell that Jinyoung wants to end this conversation now, so he leaves Are you sure you’re alright? unsaid.

“Positive.” Jinyoung flashes a halfway smile before turning on the music again.

Jaebum waves and walks out of the practice room, smiling brightly about his and Jinyoung’s understanding. As he approaches the dance room with the other five members in it, he hears yelling from outside the door, so he shakes his head and laughs before walking in.

-

With it being their first day in a while where they don’t have an early schedule, Jaebum takes the opportunity to sleep in. When he wakes up feeling relaxed, he walks into the kitchen and grabs a snack before sitting down on the couch beside Youngjae, who surprisingly is awake before he is.

Yugyeom, though technically awake, lays his head on Mark’s shoulder, and his eyes start to droop. Jackson and BamBam are watching some video on BamBam’s phone that causes Jackson to break out in uncontrollable laughter. Just when Jaebum begins to wonder where Jinyoung is, he steps out of his bedroom with the same expressionless face he has had for the past few days. He walks into the middle of the room and says, “Guys I need to address something.”

Jackson and BamBam continue watching their video until Jinyoung narrows his eyes and tilts his head at both of them and Jaebum. Though the pair is not swayed by Jinyoung’s apparent anger, Jaebum is, so he quietly tells them to pay attention and to respect Jinyoung.

Once he has everyone’s attention, Jinyoung stares at the piece of paper in his hands. His hands shake when he says, “I have a petition to change the leader of the group.”

Yugyeom jolts into alertness; Mark’s eyes bulge with shock; BamBam and Jackson are finally quiet; Youngjae looks incredibly confused. Not that Jaebum can notice much about the others right now; after Jinyoung’s announcement, Jaebum tenses and fixes his stare and all of his attention on Jinyoung.

“I suppose you all want to know why,” Jinyoung bites his lip and continues without removing his eyes from the piece of paper. “Luckily, I have made a list of reasons.”

“Reason number 1: When we’re so close to comeback, he allows idiotic things to happen. Like being out after curfew.” Jinyoung looks around the room at the other members, particularly at Jackson and BamBam, with his blank expression before looking back at the sheet.

Everyone in the room is either staring at Jaebum or at Jinyoung, and the sudden surge of attention on him makes Jaebum feel uneasy. He nervously plays with a loose thread of his t-shirt in an attempt to calm down his rising anxiety.

“Reason number 2: He is incapable of waking up in time to make sure s are awake as well. We barely made it to our practice in time. What happens if we don’t make it to our press conferences on time?”

Jackson has no amount of joking in his voice when he snaps, “But we weren’t late. And nothing bad would happen by us coming in late to dance practice, except for your pissy attitude.”

Jinyoung turns his attention to Jackson long enough for him to seethe, “Just because it didn’t happen then doesn’t mean it won’t happen in the future. It’s naive,” he nearly spits, “to think otherwise.” Yugyeom covers his ears with his hands so that he cannot hear their argument, and Mark wraps an arm around the younger boy in an attempt to console him.

Jinyoung’s eyes focus on his list again, and he reads, “Reason number 3: He’s too laid back. It’s like he’s our friend, not our leader. We need someone who will actually confront us.”

Jaebum lays his head in his hands because it feels dizzy and heavy with all the thoughts racing through it. Almost a year ago, he was considered too confrontational, too standoffish; Jinyoung, among a few others, told him that. So, why has he suddenly changed his mind?

BamBam cackles, which draws the attention of everyone in the room. When he notices this, he says with a hint of laughter, “Jinyoung, you’re like that one religious guy who posted that list of things wrong with the Church. How many more reasons do you actually have?”

BamBam’s comment makes everyone but Jinyoung and Jaebum snort, and through the space between his fingers, Jaebum can tell Jinyoung is starting to blush. From embarrassment or anger, he doesn’t know.

Youngjae looks at Jaebum and thinks he is hiding his face in his hands, so he offers a comforting grip of the shoulder. Jaebum breathes deeply and removes his hands from his face to offer Youngjae a faked smile. He is confident that almost anyone could tell it’s feigned.

“I have a few more, I assure you,” Jinyoung retorts with his customary eye rolling. “But, for now, listen to my proposal. Think of it like T-ara’s leader system. One person does it for a while, someone else does it, someone else does it. You know, until it circles around, and then we could determine our new leader.” Jinyoung pauses and kneads his bottom lip with his teeth, “Or we could just vote on a new one.”

No one responds to his plan, which makes Jinyoung purse his lips and sigh before leaving the dorm. Jaebum just sits there silently, unmoving. He doesn’t respond to Yugyeom’s hug of comfort until he shrugs it off and murmurs, “I’m tired.” He knows the others know it’s an obvious lie seeing as he just woke up less than an hour ago, and he’d never admit something as trivial as, “being tired” in front of the others. Jaebum, while ignoring the concerned gazes from the remaining five in the room, stumbles to his bedroom and gently closes the door so that he doesn’t attract any further attention.

-

In hindsight, Jaebum supposes he should have noticed all the signs that led up to this point. He should have realized what Jinyoung was hinting at every time he stormed off, or every time he had an attitude. He should have known what Jinyoung meant by all this.

Jaebum knows in the back of his mind that Jinyoung is right, and that he’s only doing this because he cares about the group. One day someone could stay out past curfew, and it could cause horrible rumors if the press finds out. What if they were to oversleep for an important event and a disgruntled manager would have to come wake them up? What if his present lack of confrontation has caused the members to be slack in their responsibilities? Jinyoung is right; he’s completely right. They can’t afford for anything like that to happen. It seems like everyone is always comparing them to other rookie groups who debuted around their time, so there is no room for error - especially from the leader. That doesn’t stop the traces of betrayal he’s starting to feel, despite the fact that he doesn’t want to feel this way. He doesn’t want to be angry at Jinyoung; he doesn’t want to be upset at all. And yet, it still hurts that someone who has been by his side the longest is the first person to think he is unworthy of his position.

Jaebum sighs, walks out of his bedroom, and leaves the dorm without responding to the calls of the others. He needs a walk alone to clear his thoughts and to organize his future plans for leadership of the group.

-

The next morning, Jaebum wakes up after his second, back-up alarm rings, and he not-so-gently wakes Youngjae up. When he finally wakes up, he groans at the fact that Jaebum woke them up, “too early” - meaning they are awake an hour and a half before they need to leave. Jaebum walks into the living area to find no one waiting for him, so he sits on the couch by himself and looks over the instructions he received last night. When no one steps out of their rooms in the next five minutes, Jaebum stands up and pounds on the others’ doors until he hears grumbles of, “We’re awake! Please stop!”

As soon as everyone is in the living room with twenty five minutes to spare, Jaebum delivers the orders he received from their manager in a monotonous tone, which causes Jackson to try to joke with him by asking if Jaebum traded places with that teacher in Ferris Bueller's Day Off, because he has never heard him so boring. Jaebum starts to chuckle at Jackson’s attempt of a joke, but then he remembers that Jinyoung would probably think his lack of seriousness is a vice. That little, anxious, insecure center in his brain shuts down his slight laughter and tells the guys to get focused and to stop joking around. Ignoring their appalled faces, Jaebum walks towards the door and tells everyone to follow after him before they’re late.

Jaebum hears loud footsteps approaching him, so he turns around to see Youngjae racing after him. Once they are in proximity, Youngjae looks behind him to see how close the others are before whispering, “You know Jinyoung was staring at you the entire time.”

Jaebum continues to walk forward and doesn’t spare him a second glance when he says, “Worry about important things.” Youngjae mutters a quick, “Sorry,” before falling back with the rest of the crowd. Jaebum nods to himself and feels accomplished that he has successfully completed the first step of his improvement as a leader, even though he’s secretly reeling inside at the mere thought of Jinyoung watching him.

-

This time when Jaebum leads the dance practice, he not only makes them truly practice for the entire two hours, but he also doesn’t give any breaks. They have had enough breaks with all the slack I have given in the past, Jaebum reasons to himself when he sees Youngjae heaving over a trash can and Yugyeom coughing in an attempt to regain his breath.

From that practice all the way to the filming of their music video, to various press meetings, and to their first comeback stage, Jaebum is incredibly serious. He doesn’t accept excuses for being late to practice; he doesn’t tolerate playing around on set when they should be focused; he doesn’t allow the members to talk nonsense during interviews.

When they are backstage after one of their performances, Jaebum anxiously rocks back and forth. Yugyeom approaches him with a wide grin, and apparently Jaebum has a very apparent frown because Yugyeom jovially says, “Cheer up! Smile! We’ve got this.”

Jaebum simply nods in a way that he hopes will make Yugyeom get the message to leave him alone, but their maknae doesn’t seem to get it when he attempts aegyo and says, “Please give me a piggyback ride. It will make you and me both happier!”

Jaebum looks over at the younger with what he thinks is obvious disinterest, and he says, “We don’t have time for things like that.” Yugyeom looks at him, stunned, and walks off without another word.

Now that Jaebum is alone just like he wanted to be forty-five seconds ago, he starts to wonder if he’s doing this right, if he’s being the right kind of leader. Being a leader shouldn’t mean he has to feel so awful when he talks to his fellow members. So, once again, maybe Jinyoung was right. Perhaps they need a new leader who can handle this amount of stress and responsibility. He was right before when he called out Jaebum for all of his mistakes as a leader, so it doesn’t shock Jaebum that he is right again. It shocks Jaebum that it took him so long to realize that he really isn’t cut out for this.

-

Within minutes of them arriving at the dorm, Jackson and Mark each grab one of Jaebum’s arms and lead him into their room. After carefully navigating him through the mess of shoes and t-shirts that cover the floor, they sit him down on Mark’s bed. Jackson and Mark sit on the former’s bed, and Jackson is the first to say anything when he sighs, “Jaebum, what’s happened to you? I’ve never seen you so uptight.”

Mark doesn’t add anything, but he does nod his head in agreement. Jaebum really isn’t up for this type of conversation when he could be agreeing to Jinyoung petition from all that time ago, so he expressionlessly says, “It’s nothing really.”

“It’s obvious something,” Jackson retorts with his eyes piercing Jaebum’s. Jaebum looks away.

“No, I’m fine.”

“I don’t think you are.” Jackson increases the volume of his voice.

“Jackson, I’m telling you-”

“You haven’t been fine since Jinyoung came up with that petition a few weeks ago,” Mark interrupts quietly. Jaebum mentally sighs because regardless of the situation, whenever Mark finally decides to speak up, he’s generally right about whatever he said. Jackson knows this, so naturally he’s not going to give up like Jaebum was hoping he would.

“Man, what Jinyoung said. How would we have gotten anywhere without your leadership? We were doing just fine before you went all serious and boring.”

Jaebum doesn’t look convinced, so Mark mumbles with his eyes downcast, “You know you almost made Yugyeom cry earlier? He just wanted to make you happy. He hates seeing you so unhappy. We all do.” Mark waits for Jackson’s nod of agreement before he continues. “You were happy before, so why would you let Jinyoung change that?”

Jaebum still doesn’t respond, so Mark and Jackson tell him to think about what they said, and they promise that they will continue this talk the next day. Jaebum walks out of their room and enters his without saying a word to the members watching TV in the living area. He sits down at his desk and considers their words. Why did he change so easily when he sacrificed his happiness for this change? After what feels like more than an hour of soul searching, Jaebum realized why he did it: he didn’t want to disappoint Jinyoung ever again, because he feels like he’s done it so many times, not only recently, but also even before their debut as JJ Project. He ignores the slight tingle in his mind that it could be something else.

-

With Youngjae asleep in the bed beside him, Jaebum turns off his lamp and prepares to fall asleep until he hears someone knocking, and suddenly light from the TV floods the room when someone walks in. Jaebum doesn’t feel the need to look up to see who it is; however, he is completely surprised when he hears Jinyoung’s voice whispering, “Jaebum. Are you asleep?”

“No,” Jaebum curtly replies and adjusts his pillow.

“Well, can you come to my room to talk?” Jinyoung whispers even quieter than before; Jaebum has to strain just to hear what he said.

Jaebum doesn’t verbally reply; he slides out of his blankets and walks over to Jinyoung, who gives him a small smile and leads him into his bedroom.

Jaebum stands in the middle of the floor and feels out of place in Jinyoung’s bedroom, even though he was always in here talking with him less than two months ago. When Jinyoung tells him to take a seat on his bed, Jaebum tensely sits down on the bed and waits for Jinyoung to begin speaking. Jinyoung seems to be looking for the right words to say, and when he finds them, he stutters, “I-I’m sorry.”

Jaebum raises an eyebrow and looks at Jinyoung as the latter sits down beside him. “What for?”

“For everything.”

“That’s really vague.”

“I’m always vague. Don’t you know?”

Jaebum can’t prevent the snicker from leaving his mouth, but Jinyoung doesn’t seem to be bothered. Actually, he gives Jaebum a larger smile than before.

“Really, I am sorry. I’m sorry for criticizing you. I’m sorry for potentially ruining your self-esteem. I’m sorry.” Jinyoung finishes with a whisper.

Jaebum simply nods in response, and when he sees Jinyoung staring at him expectantly, he mumbles, “Thank you.”

“I think my words came out too harshly,” Jinyoung murmurs. “What I should have said was maybe you should try to include the serious aspects of Jaebum with the laid-back, carefree Jaebum we all know. That would be more ideal for the group, more balanced.”

Seeing that Jaebum is still unresponsive, Jinyoung whispers again, “I’ve missed the Jaebum who would give Yugyeom anything he wanted the second he asked for it.”

Jaebum looks up with wide eyes from where he was staring at his hands and asks, “You saw that?”

Jinyoung sheepishly nods his head, “I’ve seen a lot of things like that.” Jinyoung pauses and adds, “I’m sorry,” as an afterthought.

A relatively comfortable silence occurs between them until Jaebum looks directly at Jinyoung and asks, “Why did you start pointing out my leadership flaws in the first place? It just came out of the middle of nowhere. I was so confused.”

“About that,” Jinyoung begins and stops to gather his thoughts. “I was leaving vocal practice nearly two months ago when I heard a rumor that people were talking about how you didn’t take your job as leader seriously enough. And well, I guess I tried to scare you into taking it more seriously by threatening you with the petition.”

Jaebum remains silent for a few seconds before he mumbles, “You cared enough about me that you tried to protect me?”

“Idiot,” Jinyoung huffs, but the corners of his lips are turned up into a smile that Jaebum recognizes as the playful, silly grin Jaebum has always loved, “I’ve always cared for you.”

“What does that mean?” Jaebum questions without removing his eyes from Jinyoung’s smile.

“Whatever you want that to mean.” Jinyoung looks directly at Jaebum, and when Jaebum’s eyes meet Jinyoung’s, he sees every emotion in his eyes that Jinyoung has ever hid behind his blank stares. He sees remorse, guilt, happiness, and, is that hope?

Jaebum feels a sense of the carefree, ambitious, impulsive Jaebum again when he decides to lean forward and press a quick kiss against Jinyoung lips. Jaebum can’t prevent his grin from appearing when he feels Jinyoung’s smile against his lips. Jaebum pulls away shortly after their lips brush, and he evaluates Jinyoung’s present beam as a positive sign.

“Why don’t you just tell me exactly what you feel instead of being vague?” Jaebum asks with his hand grabbing for Jinyoung’s hand.

Jinyoung rolls his eyes (typical Jinyoung, Jaebum thinks); however, the smirk Jinyoung has on his lips disappears when he surges forward and mutters, “Okay,” against Jaebum’s lips before closing the distance once more.