Are you having a hard time?

At both the highest and lowest of times, Jaebum wonders what would’ve happened if he’d changed his mind.

The scenarios play themselves out differently every time he tries. Sometimes he sees failure and anger slashed into the fabric of his future, sometimes it works out to become something else entirely, something glittering and worthwhile and regretful in every way possible.

He can’t count the number of times he’s packed his bags and unpacked them, how many doors he’s slammed and expletives he’s shouted across tiny rooms in this glorified prison. It’s like every second he spends here makes him more miserable and more convinced to stay.

So it’s no surprise somewhere in the middle of 4-hour sleep cycles and 6-hour practice bouts and two missed meals a day, getting lost is simple.

Sometimes he gets so lost he forgets to find the rest when they get lost too.

*

Jaebum makes sure he leaves the practice studio last.

It’s not a big thing, really, it’d become an accidental habit after Youngjae tried staying back on his own to cram in extra practice and ended up missing more meals than what would be considered just relatively unhealthy- long story short, Jaebum doesn’t feel at ease until he does a round of the practice studios every night to make sure he’s the last one here, no matter how tired he feels.

It’s almost eleven by the time he’s wrapped up an impromptu meeting with their managers about the coming week’s schedule, and Jaebum winces at the thought of having to get up early tomorrow. It’s a busy morning stuck in between some of the rare holidays they get in between promotions- just after the Christmas rush and before the next comeback JYP tries to cram in, but everyone’s probably back at the dorms, playing video games or eating or basically enjoying this tiny window of freedom while they still can.

So it surprises him when he passes a window of light in one of the doors lining the corridor that heads down to the elevators.

It's the studio Mark and Jackson use to practice their tricks when they're learning new ones or familiarising themselves with ones they haven't done in a while, because it's decked out with a giant (and now rather old) springy blue mat in the centre of the room to stabilise shaky landings, and springboards and adjustable mats around for help if needed. It’s probably one of them (probably Jackson) practicing alone, because Jaebum had seen their trainers leave the complex earlier that evening, so it’s not like they’ll be around to help.

Jaebum's frowning when he opens the door, about to start lecturing Jackson for trying to squeeze in extra practice on top of all his other commitments and taking the risk of tricking alone, when he hears a low, angry mutter resonate through the purposefully high-ceilinged room, and sees the back of someone significantly taller than Jackson come into view, pacing the room in exhaustion.

He watches, slightly confused, slightly awkward, as Yugyeom stands perfectly still at the edge of the mat for a while, before taking to it at a run, and he recognises the drill immediately. It’s a low-level stunt, the ones they’d encouraged Jinyoung and Youngjae to practice in their free time, just something to acclimatise the newer ones to the whole deal of tricking.

And he watches Yugyeom hit the mat at the right pace, body twisting effortlessly, arms swinging to build the momentum to lift off the ground-…

Then pivoting on his takeoff foot, stumbling to regain balance on the mat, before letting out a frustrated sigh, shoulders slumping in defeat.

He turns here, about to go to the start of the mat to try again, and that’s when their eyes lock, and Yugyeom stops dead where he’s standing, shock written all over his face.

Jaebum remembers himself, then, and takes a step inside, clearing his throat. “You’re not supposed to be in here alone, you know that, right?”

“I was just…” Yugyeom gestures lamely, though his posture’s still tense. “Practicing.”

He’s frustrated, Jaebum can tell- the kind of frustration that would send Jackson into shouting sprees that can last for hours, that can throw Jinyoung into a day of moody silence or keep Youngjae up two nights in a row with depression, except their maknae clamps it down, keeps the boiling anger under tight wraps so the only thing anyone sees is passive indifference.

“What if you’d gotten hurt?” Jaebum slides his bag down on the ground, still frowning, regardless- thoughts of one of them fracturing or twisting something, even during this break period, are enough to wire him with anxiety. “Even Jackson and Mark need each other to be around before practicing. That’s a rule- these stunts are dangerous, remember?”

It sinks in only after a second, what he’s said- of course Yugyeom would remember. In fact, their maknae would be in the best position to remember how dangerous these stunts are.

Yugyeom’s head is bowed but his jaw is set, some act of suppressed, silent rebellion that Jaebum’s all too used to seeing, and he feels the odd urge to just call the whole thing off, remind Yugyeom to come home soon and leave the studio. This is something the younger boy needs to settle on his own, unfinished business he needs to resolve himself. And Jaebum can, unfortunately, relate all too well to that sensation.

But then the big bright LEADER banner rears its ugly head in Jaebum’s head, and he swallows the innate urge to just walk away by taking a step towards Yugyeom. “Did the trainers say you could resume practice?”

“It’s been three years, hyung,” Yugyeom barely mumbles, eyes darting from the floor to meet Jaebum’s for only seconds. Then, “I’m sick of not being able to do what you guys do.”

Oh.

They stand in a tight silence for moments more, before Jaebum comes to a decision relatively quick, sighing internally.

“Well it’s still not right for you to do it on your own,” he mutters, turning around to tug his pullover off over his head and dump it on his bag, so he’s in a plain black tee, just like Yugyeom is now. “Come on.”

“What? No, it’s okay, hyung, I’ll just go back-…”

“No, let’s settle this now,” Jaebum toes off his shoes before stepping onto the mat, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet, regaining the feel of it. It’s been a while since he’d stepped on this mat. “You were doing the 540 kick, right? You got the footing right, you just need to work on your takeoff.”

Yugyeom looks reluctant, now, as if regretting that he’d come here at all, and Jaebum wonders if he’s doing the right thing. But it’s too late for second thoughts now.

“Show me your landing footing,” he presses on, resting his hands on his knees. “You’re right, it’s been three years, and we did promise the fans you’d show them your tricking one day too, so come on. You’ve got this.”

Jaebum watches carefully as Yugyeom steps gloomily up, doing a half-hearted, faux jump and landing perfectly on his right foot, turning to regain his balance, technique perfect from years forgotten of practice.

“You’ve got the footing,” Jaebum continues, taking a step back, watching Yugyeom carefully. “Why don’t you try the jump now? The takeoff?”

“I can’t,” Yugyeom mutters, bare feet scuffing the mat irritably, and Jaebum presses his lips together.

“Just try, and I’ll tell you what you need to work on,” he walks behind Yugyeom. “Come on, I’ll spot you.”

There’s a dubious quality to the way Yugyeom nods assent, but Jaebum decides it’ll have to do for now. The scenario seems to repeat itself, then- the younger boy standing at the edge of the mat, fixing the centre with a certain determination in his eyes, before running, arms swinging back, about to lift-…

Then he stops again, just shy of performing the jump, except he stumbles harder this time, almost falling before he regains balance on his own.

“I can’t,” Yugyeom repeats, with a level of frustration breaking through the passive front he puts on all the time, and Jaebum feels a twinge of sympathy and a little guilt.

It wasn’t Yugyeom’s fault he’d broken his ankle all those years ago, but it’d felt that way all the same- uncertainty about their future, their comeback, their reputation as a group famed for martial arts tricking (before Hyunwoo had left and Youngjae had joined), all at stake, and for a moment there in all that tension and fear he supposed Yugyeom must’ve taken the brunt of it.

But the Jaebum back then and the Jaebum of now are vastly different people. The Jaebum of now etches the six of their hearts like tattoos into his mind, forces himself to freeze-frame tiny quirks and actions from the others that would otherwise be dismissed as nothing, and mind map these into a web of coherence in his head.

He’s done this particularly well for Jinyoung- it’d be a shame if all those years of knowing each other came to nothing, and it’s easy for people like Youngjae, people like Jackson, people who catalogue their emotions on their faces, whose fears and delights pour off in waves from their skin that Jaebum can recognise and link instantly.

But then there are people like Mark, people like Yugyeom, who carve out labyrinths in their mind designed to trap people like Jaebum, leave him lost and wandering until the time comes when he loses them entirely. Except Mark is older, closer, and Jaebum’s mapped out his way deeper into the other man’s mind than most would give him credit for.

Yugyeom, on the other hand, leaves a deliberate lack of anything to be desired. He smiles at all the right times, talks when he’s supposed to, practices like the good dongsaeng he’s been drilled to become, everything everyone needs to feel perfectly fine about leaving him alone.

But Jaebum knows that isn’t the case. So he tries harder.

“You can,” Jaebum urges, gesturing towards himself. “I’m right here, come on.”

“I feel better already,” Yugyeom laughs, though his voice sounds like it’s strung tight, this close to snapping, and the leader wonders if he should adopt another strategy.

For a moment he wishes Jinyoung were here- the other man would be able to understand Yugyeom straight away, whisk him to another room and talk gentle sense into him without a problem, but now it’s Jaebum who’s here, Jaebum who’s supposed to advocate hard work and discipline as the only way through this alive.

“You don’t think I’ll catch you?” Jaebum raises a brow, lips tilting into a smile, relieved when he sees Yugyeom relax a little at that.

“I’m too heavy,” the younger man shrugs. “Bambam always says no one will be able to catch me.”

“Please,” Jaebum scoffs. “If Mark can spot Jackson, I can spot you, no problem. Trust me, come on.”

But nothing seems to change, because Yugyeom tries again and the exact same thing happens- he approaches, tries to take off, and fails, unbalancing away from Jaebum onto the mat this time.

“You still don’t trust me,” Jaebum frowns when he offers his hand and Yugyeom seemingly doesn’t see it or just doesn’t want to take it. “Why not?”

“I trust you,” Yugyeom replies, but it’s the standard maknae-to-leader response, like someone had recorded a soundbyte and installed it into his throat. It’s the response that’d been programmed into him, when what he really feels about any of them remains a mystery.  

“Really-…you know what? Come over here,” Jaebum steps off the mat, gesturing for Yugyeom to follow, and though he’s the picture of cool control, his stomach’s twisting a little in apprehension. He’s only ever done this a few times before, but it’d helped him out a lot when he’d first started bboying stunts, regardless of how weird it sounds in retrospect.

Yugyeom follows grudgingly, mouth set as if expecting a scolding or a punishment- and taking Jaebum into perspective, it shouldn’t be all that surprising, to be honest. But that isn’t what he has in mind tonight, not now.

Jaebum takes a deep breath, hoping he doesn’t sound too stupid for about what he’s going to suggest.

“Let’s do a trust fall.”

Yugyeom’s blinking, lips quirking as if to start laughing anytime now, tone unmistakeably derogatory when he clarifies.

“What?”

“Trust fall,” Jaebum shrugs, like there’s nothing to it. “I did it with Mark when I first started training with him when he came over to JYP. You turn your back to me, and fall, and I catch you. Simple. If you can’t trust me with this, then you can’t trust me to catch you when you’re tricking. So let’s start small.”

“Hyung, I already said,” Yugyeom’s tone is bitterly condescending, something that grates on Jaebum because of how much he can’t understand it- when he’s angry, he usually just blows, lets the steam off in little explosions. Passive-aggressiveness is more of Jinyoung’s thing, if he’s to be honest. “You can’t catch me. I’m too heavy.”

“And I already said,” Jaebum mimics. “I can.”

Yugyeom holds his tongue- five years as the maknae of such a big group has trained him well, but he turns back to the mat reluctantly anyway. “Why can’t we do it on the mat?”

“I’m asking you to trust me, not the mat,” Jaebum shakes his wrists a little, loosening his joints. “Come on, it’ll be over in a minute. Turn around, count to three, then fall. And I’ll catch you.”

Yugyeom obeys, as usual, but after he counts, his knees buckle before he even leans back, feet already shifting to steady himself, gaze lowered and hands folded when he turns to look at Jaebum.

“Don’t move your feet,” the leader scolds, turning Yugyeom back. “Let’s try again. Count to three, you fall, and I’ll catch you.”

It’s better this time, at least the younger boy almost falls, but again he’s stumbling, unable to properly unbalance.

“Come on,” Jaebum urges, pulling Yugyeom upright again. “You know I’m not going to let you fall.”

And there it is, barely audible, the hissed mutter of yeah, right and Jaebum tenses, trying to process the meaning behind those words.

“What was that?” he asks, wincing when his voice comes out more authoritarian that he’d meant for it to. It’d hard, talking sympathetically to someone taller than you, even if they are four years younger than you.

“Nothing,” Yugyeom’s voice is coolly bitter, and Jaebum walks around him to look him directly in the eye.

“What’d you say?” Jaebum’s voice is deliberately gentler now, but perhaps by so much that maybe Yugyeom can hear the artifice in it.

“Nothing, hyung,” it’s the stress on the syllables that takes Jaebum by surprise, not the scorn hidden neatly behind each word, nor the emotion that slips through, by accident or on purpose, Jaebum has no idea.

“What did I do?” Jaebum asks, frowning slightly, and for a moment there he wonders what’d prompted him to say something like that. There’d been nothing accusatory in Yugyeom’s tone, nothing that pushed the blame on anyone, for that matter, but at the same time he feels nothing but imposed guilt.

Perhaps it’s a sign, then because knows he’s hit a button when Yugyeom laughs, a short, breathy sound that vanishes as suddenly as it’d come, before taking a deep breath and looking Jaebum straight in the eye, something dark and acidic simmering behind his eyes.

“Nothing,” he enunciates, perfectly clear and perfectly listless, then, like he’d etched out every letter of that word in his head and cleanly cut all emotion from it before permitting it to leave his lips. “Nothing, hyung. You did nothing.”

If it’d been anyone else, even without the undeniable hostility lining Yugyeom’s words, they would’ve left the situation as it was, satisfied with the insistence, several times, that they’d done nothing wrong, and it wasn’t their fault, because that’s inevitably all they’re concerned about. But Jaebum’s long learned that he has to listen to the words each of them blank out in every sentence, scratch off the tape they use to cover up what they really mean, and hear what Yugyeom means, not what he says.

So he takes a step back. Up to this point the leadership that’d been forcefully upon him has been nothing but a series of manuals and sunbaes’ long-suffering advice, printed like instruction sheets on Jaebum’s mind till they’d been sure he’d never think of anything else, but now he fumbles for it, mind scrambling for directions and hitting dead ends every time he tries.

Nothing’s ever been said about what to do in a situation like this. No one’s ever told Jaebum what to do in the case that a team member lets slip a wound he’s been nursing since predebut, never taught him how to stop the blood and stitch the cut to make sure it never opens again. He’s teetering at the edge of a cliff, cornered, his only choices left to back down or take a step off the beaten path into the unknown.

Jaebum bites his lip. Maybe it’s good, then, for once, that he never backs down.

“Yugyeom,” he starts, and he can literally see the lights in Yugyeom’s eyes defuse, this terrible mixture of disappointment and fear and another sign he’s going to disappear again, further into that maze of his mind, lock himself in deeper down this time. So Jaebum reaches out, secures as firm a hold as he can manage before he lets that happen. “I have no idea what it is we’ve done that’s gotten you like this, but listen-…all I can say is I’m sorry, okay?”

Yugyeom looks ashamed, annoyed, and though Jaebum can feel the repulsion he knows that can only mean he’s getting closer.

“We were all idiots back then- we’re kids, just like you, and no matter how grown up any of us try to act we’re all still stupid and scared and people do really, really ty things when they’re both of those combined,” Jaebum tries to phrase it properly- these are things he’s thought of but never said, not like Jinyoung, who can expound on the simplest idea in the most intricate ways. These are fears and regrets he’s kept at the back of his mind since the beginning of time because that’s what he does, that’s the only thing he knows how to do at times like these. “Look, whatever we’ve done- we’re not fit to be called your hyungs, we never deserved this title and we probably won’t for a long time. But we need you here with us. We’re not-…we’re not strong enough, not together and not alone, to face something like this, okay?”

“Then there’s nothing wrong, hyung,” Yugyeom says, voice level, calm, like it’s the solution to everything, because it has been for the past four years, for him, and for the rest of them. Pretend everything’s fine, pretend they don’t see the broken glass sticking out of skin or the twisted, broken bones so everything goes as smoothly as they need to pretend it to be.

Jaebum remembers, now, cornering Yugyeom half a year back, on a rare occasion like this, almost, about to demand an explanation for the blandness and lack of spirit Jaebum’d begun to feel spilling through his actions, and Jackson interrupting, halfway, troubled and tired and anxious.

“Just let him go,” Jackson had been muttering, eyes wide, like he was the one being scolded. “It’s such a small thing, he’s fine, why are you getting so hung up on this?”

But that was exactly what Yugyeom had wanted them to think, Jaebum realises. That he was nothing but a small thing, that he didn’t warrant any of their attention, good or bad, and the further they left him alone, the further he drifted into the periphery of their hearts and minds, rotting, comfortable and isolated.

So Jaebum doesn’t let him go this time.

“No, you can’t think that way, are you listening?” Jaebum keeps his voice down, channels the urge in his voice to concern rather than anger. “Things people leave unfixed for years and just let sit there, we can’t, you might think it’s fine and as long as you keep it to yourself it’ll be fine and it won’t affect anyone else but it will, get it? Because these things are going to just keep growing and one day they’re going to break us because we’re not strong enough to handle something like this okay?”

“This isn’t about any of you,” Yugyeom bites out sorely, because that’d been the driving point of his entire act, to make sure, all these years, that none of them ever had anything to do with him.

“No, it isn’t,” Jaebum says firmly. “It’s about us, Yugyeom. All of us. Predebut was different-…we’re here now. Things are different.”

“Okay,” Yugyeom deadpans. “That’s fair.”

“Fair?” Jaebum frowns. “Look, we promised each other, Yugyeom, we need all of us to pull through this together, remember? As long as someone’s not with us, we’re nothing, understand?”

“Could’ve thought of that four years ago,” Yugyeom almost spits it out, and though half of Jaebum’s anxious, tempted to rear up and bite back with his own arguments, the other half that’s concerned is relieved to finally get a reaction out of the maknae.

“Four years ago?” Jaebum presses on, unshaking. “What is this about?”

Yugyeom scoffs, a short, choking sound of disbelief, and it’s only because Jaebum’s watching carefully that he sees the way the younger boy’s gaze spins across the room, as if to say what do you think? why the hell do you think I’m here?

And in one sickening, trainwreck moment, Jaebum thinks he finally understands.

You did nothing.

Of course.

Of course, they did nothing. They hadn’t done anything after Yugyeom fell all those years ago, hadn’t done anything while their management shot frustrated, despairing looks in the maknae’s direction after the accident, barely bothering to hide annoyed sighs at the stress of reconfiguration and possibility of a delayed debut, hadn’t done anything about the bags that appeared under Yugyeom’s eyes after countless sleepless nights spent worrying about their future and how it was his fault, his fault everything was going wrong because he’d fallen and none of them had been around to pick him up.

It’s in this moment Jaebum realises Yugyeom hadn’t just fallen the night he broke his ankle- he’d fallen every day, every second after that night, hitting rock bottom and shattering every time someone else managed to convince him it was his fault for endangering the group, and the rest of them had done nothing about it.

(Maybe because they’d believed it was his fault too.)

It’d been easy to think that way, easy to stack one fear on top of another until it towered, then push it on the nearest excuse that came along so it crushed them, so with every bone broken in their body it felt like redemption.

And maybe it’d been the worst with Jaebum- the Jaebum of the past, whose temper flared painfully easily, who let nothing stand in the way of his pride and his dreams, who’d seen what would possibly be his second and last chance for fame snap as tangibly as the bone in Yugyeom’s leg had.

It’s such a crazy thought it winds Jaebum, leaves him reeling at the magnitude of it, and he wonders for a moment how that must’ve felt, must’ve tasted, recycled anger and confusion and hatred simmering silently for years at the back of your throat. In that moment he doesn’t have an idea what to say to something like that, because there’s no explanation to neatly tie up as frayed a knot as this, nothing to cauterise a wound that’s been torn open so wide.

“Is that what this is about?” he asks quietly, and Yugyeom flinches so visibly Jaebum feels the fear roll off his skin in waves.

Yugyeom isn’t afraid of isolation, Jaebum had realised long ago. He gets too much of that on a daily basis to still fear it with the same tenacity he’d had predebut- it must feel like a whip on old scars, by now. Instead, he’s afraid of intimacy, terrified of the idea someone might ever be able to understand his heart and mind with even half the clarity he does. People like Youngjae, Jackson, pour their souls out through their words and expressions, doors to their hearts wide open for anyone who might pass and be entranced enough to try and enter, but people like Yugyeom handle the interest of people in them like a flame in both hands, desperate to be rid of it and feeling dully bereft of its warmth when it’s gone.

Jaebum needs time to think, structure his thoughts, because one wrong word could send those doors, now forced open by a tiny crack, slamming back shut, locks tightening further than they’d been before.

So he gestures, the sign barely there, as he sits cross-legged on the mat, for the maknae to follow suit, and Yugyeom predictably obeys. He waits until they’re both comfortably seated before talking again, pulling thoughts one by one from the web in his head, trying to fuse them into a coherent idea.

“Hey,” he says it only after a while, dragging the pads of his finger along the rough surface of the mat, unsure if what he’s about to say next is right, or even acceptable. “You know what I felt about Youngjae, back when he first came in?”

Yugyeom shrugs, averting his eyes.

“I was pissed as hell he existed,” Jaebum lets out a rough laugh, lowering his head sheepishly. “I thought we were good as we were, you know? Heck, I thought I was good with Jinyoung. The idea someone else was going to come in, someone who hadn’t put in half the effort I did and was going to debut on the same platform, just pissed me off, you know?”

Yugyeom doesn’t move- this isn’t something he’s been programmed to respond to. But that just spurs Jaebum on all the more to keep talking.

“The thing is,” Jaebum leans back, letting his arms support him on the mat, as if talking about the weather or the food they’d had today. “I didn’t just hate him. I hated Mark when he got to act in Dream High 2 with us even though he didn’t have to go through the whole process of the Open Audition. I hated Jackson for getting along so well with the staff and the rest of you guys even though he couldn’t speak a drop of Korean and just got here from Hong Kong, and the fact he won an Olympic medal just made things ten times worse, you know? Hell, I hated Bambam for getting attention from all the staff wherever he went for his dancing and how cute he was. I was jealous of a kid, Yugyeom, that’s how far gone I was,” he rolls his eyes, glancing over to see Yugyeom eyeing him warily, wound further with every word, as if waiting for the catch. When he speaks next, his words come out slower on their own, softer, as if reminiscing a good memory. “And of course there was you, this crazy talented freestyle specialist with an underground crew behind you and a dance competition title at the age of fourteen and I hated that the most, because I felt like I was supposed to be the only one like that, you know?”

“I’m nothing compared to you,” Yugyeom says dutifully, but Jaebum sees him accepting the praise with a sliver of embarrassed happiness- dancing’s the only thing he can truly claim to be proud of.

“Please, you were a threat,” Jaebum scoffs. “The only threat. The stuff we do now is commercial garbage compared to what both of us did back then, and at the time we started training together I felt like-…like you were the only other one who actually got the whole art of it, of dancing, you know?” this is something he’d never imagined himself saying, something he’s never discussed good and proper with the other artists in the company, other than Junho and a couple of their choreographers. Jaebum sighs, picking a bit of lint off the mat. “All that time I spent pissed and sulking and hating everyone I was introduced to, especially you guys- I was an .”

For a moment it’s like Jaebum can’t even hear Yugyeom breathe- forced into this terrible suspense for the conclusion that the older boy’s driving at with all these sudden confessions of hatred.

So sudden, in fact, that Jaebum’s still familiarising himself with the taste of this new idea when he speaks next.

“And now I’d give up my life for every single one of you,” the thought sounds funny in words, when it’s been nothing but a hum of a promise and a feeling at the back of his mind, the foundation upon which he operates on a daily basis to keep them all together, keep them pulling forward. Keep him reaching out to those who rush ahead too fast, burning themselves out, and to those who get left behind and don’t dare to say a word, not for fear that the rest won’t wait, but for fear that they will.

Yugyeom doesn’t speak, but Jaebum can feel his eyes on the side of his face, watching him cautiously, studying him for any signs of a lie. But for some strange reason Jaebum feels completely relaxed, and he wonders, for a brief moment, when he’d come to terms with that truth himself too, to be able to confess it so readily.

“What I’m saying,” he pulls together the threads of conversation they’ve been having, trying to wrap it all together with the coherency and thoughtfulness that takes grown adults years of struggling to hone. “People can change if you let them, you know? Things can change. For the better. I’m not asking you to suddenly find it within you to forgive us but at least-…” Jaebum winces, trying not to push too hard. “You could try to give us a chance?”

Yugyeom looks cornered, for a moment, and that’s the last thing Jaebum wants so he backpedals, takes the heat off him immediately.

“You don’t have to make any decisions now,” he says quickly. “Just, you know, give it some thought, okay?”

“No, I-…” Yugyeom says, looking surprised himself at how he’d refuted that statement, before he lowers his head in shame. “Thank you hyung.”

Jaebum looks over, surprised, feeling the hints of a relieved smile tug at the edges of his mouth.

“Thank you,” he says, after a minute or so, and Yugyeom barely looks up, peeking through the fading indigo strands of hair, damaged and dry from constant treatment. “For trying.”

*

It’s 2am when the two of them stumble in, shivering from the post-winter chill and sticky with drying perspiration and panting from the impromptu race up the stairs Jaebum had initiated. Jinyoung is concerned for about 0.2 seconds in which he hauls them bodily towards him to check if anyone’s sick or injured or not very sane, after which he hits them both hard enough to bruise on the shoulder.

“Where-were-you,” Jinyoung hisses, while both (notably more physically equipped to inflict pain) boys hang their heads in uncomfortable shame. “Im Jaebum, do you have any idea what time it is and what time we have to get up tomorrow-…”

“It was my fault,” Yugyeom says quickly, quailing slightly when Jinyoung turns the entirety of his furious gaze upon him.

“And you, don’t think that just because you’re turning eighteen, you get the right to go wherever you like whenever you like,” Jinyoung says in a harsh, low tone, before turning back to Jaebum. “Explain yourself.”

The two of them stand in awkward, shifty-eyed silence for about a minute more, before Jaebum (reaches up and) wraps an arm around Yugyeom’s shoulder, chuckling nervously.

“We were just,” he gestures vaguely, and Yugyeom winces, before looking aside to roll his eyes slightly. “Talking. About things.”

“You smell like gym mats,” Jinyoung squints, before the look in his eyes softens. “Oh.”

“That’s your cue,” Jaebum shoves Yugyeom towards the bathroom. “Don’t use up all the hot water, kid.”

“’M not a kid,” Yugyeom mumbles, turning for a moment to stick out his tongue in their direction, and Jaebum lets out a relieved, breathy laugh.

He’s glad Jinyoung waits till Yugyeom’s disappeared into the washroom and the sound of the shower’s started before turning to him, eyes wide with concern.

“Well, how’d it go?”

So much for keeping it a secret, Jaebum thinks, but Jinyoung has the right to at least know, if he’s picked up on what’d happened already.

“I think,” Jaebum tugs down his sleeves unconcernedly, before lifting the overshirt off his head and turning to face Jinyoung with a slight smile. “It turned out the best way we could’ve hoped for, I guess.”

“How did you do it?” Jinyoung folds his arms across his chest, lower lip jutting out in a pout. “I’ve been trying to get him to open up about that for the past year, he hasn’t said a word.”

“Maybe it’s just me,” Jaebum says, with a perfectly straight face, and Jinyoung slaps him hard, on the other shoulder this time. “Ow, what was that for-…”

“Pity, at this rate you won’t be able to wear all those sleeveless denim vests for that photoshoot we have to wake up early for tomorrow,” Jinyoung shoots back, before the shower shuts off, and he turns his attention back to the bathroom, voice considerably softer when he speaks next. “I’m glad he’s okay.”

“Glad to know I hold a special place in your heart as well,” Jaebum mutters, nursing his arm, and Jinyoung scoffs.

“Congratulations, hyung,” Jinyoung rolls his eyes, eyeing Jaebum’s expectant gaze with some level of derision. “And fine, thank you,” he glances over at the bathroom again, sighing. “I was really starting to get worried.”

“The kid’s tougher than he looks,” Jaebum lets out a soft laugh. “He’s going to be fine.”

There’s an etch in Jinyoung’s brow that doesn’t let up over the next few minutes, so Jaebum rests a hand on his shoulder, fingers rubbing soothing patterns into his back, smiling at the semi-annoyed, semi-pleased look on the other boy’s face, before speaking again.

“We’re all going to be fine,” he says absently, lifting his hand as the bathroom door opens and Yugyeom wanders out, rubbing a towel into his hair and blinking sleepily, mouth already opening in a yawn. “If I were you, I wouldn’t worry about a thing.”