CHAPTER THREE
Sunlight streamed through the curtains and Jiyong woke with a start. He was disoriented and it took him a moment to realise that he was in his own bed at his apartment. The blessed early morning silence should have been his first clue. It was something he had forgotten existed living in the dorms with four other guys. One of those four was destined to annihilate the last remaining threads of his sanity.
At least, that’s what his subconscious mind decided to remind him of all night long. His dreamscape was plagued by a mixture of memories and self indulgent fantasies of the delicate crush of Seunghyun’s petal-soft lips against his, the silken feel of his skin, his eyes fixing Jiyong with a look that made his insides feel like jelly, the one that told Jiyong in no uncertain terms that he wanted him and only him.
Goddammit, Seunghyun.
He rolled over and pressed his face into his pillow to stifle the remaining wisps of the dreamlike miasma clouding his mind before making the incredibly difficult decision to lug his sorry carcass out of the warmth of his beloved bed. He could very easily lay here all day replaying the night’s torturous dreams and wallowing in self-pity. As inviting as that sounded, he needed to get moving and get on with things.
Jiyong released a long drawn out sigh at his incessant need to think about Seunghyun as he stumbled into the shower, the one in which he’d lain so despairing and desolate only months before, his tears falling for what felt like endless hours until the water ran cold and his body racked with uncontrollable tremors as his boundless heartache poured out of him.
Thoughts of Seunghyun continued to swirl around him, the smoky tendrils of his dreams lingered as he stepped under the hot spray. Jiyong did his best to shake off the thoughts but his body had other ideas. The agonising dreams – about kissing Seunghyun senseless, the bittersweet memory of his taste lingered on his tongue, the tantalising glide of long slender fingers across his skin, lips and teeth leaving their mark along the inside his thighs – had his cock bristling for attention.
Jiyong slid his hand down his stomach and slowly ran his fingers up along the underside of his cock then down again, his small whimpers ricocheting inside the cubicle making them seem much louder in the small space. Jiyong’s breathing came in short, ragged gasps as he took his hardness in hand, his hips rocking forward as his hand glided along his length in long slow strokes.
His mind wandered and he imagined Seunghyun was with him, wet skin and deliciously toned musculature flush against his back, his tongue laving a trail along the soft flesh of Jiyong’s throat, his fingers trailing heat as they slowly tracked down his stomach and into the dark thatch of pubic hair at the base of his cock.
Thoughts of Seunghyun were setting his skin alight and the speed of his strokes increased creating the friction he desperately needed. He closed his eyes, head snapping back as he visualised Seunghyun taking him in hand. The tantalising thought of Seunghyun’s deliciously long fingers wrapped around his cock had his hips jerking forward as he came hard against the tiles, blinding heat flooding his senses.
Jiyong stood for a long while letting the water wash over him, the post orgasmic haze fading as his breathing and heart rate normalised. Facing the man he loved everyday, particularly one he had to face after he got himself off fantasising about him, was becoming increasingly difficult. He had to get his game face on yet again. Once more into the fray, he thought as he prepared himself to go back to the dorms.
He made himself a large mug of coffee and sat by the window to idly watch the rest of the world wake up as the sun blazed a gentle trail across the morning sky. He let his mind wander as he sipped his coffee, taking his time. He thought about work and what the next few months entailed. After he down the last of his coffee, he grabbed his phone from the kitchen bench and quickly typed out a message to Youngbae to let him know he’d be there within the hour.
As Jiyong’s taxi pulled up to the dorms, Youngbae met him at the door. He pulled Jiyong into a tight hug and asked how he was feeling. Ji smiled at him at promised that he felt better. Jiyong pushed the thought away and smiled at Youngbae. He was going to be just fine.
Fucking liar.
*
Preparation had commenced for the next round of shows. The endless days and nights in the studio had paid off and they had to turn their minds to taking the show on the road. Days turned into weeks in a flurry of activity: organising and reorganising set lists, planning out choreography, auditioning musicians, dancers, stage hands, electricians; creating lighting rigs, stage dressing, and the endless costume changes that began to resemble what their lives would consist of over the next few months.
It had gotten to the point where Jiyong absolutely hated being in such close proximity to Seunghyun after each practice. The way he looked dripping sweat as he gradually divested himself of the cloying layers, the stupid pranks he pulled on his dongsaengs, the way he could go from being a five-year-old boy to a ludicrously handsome man in the blink of an eye. All of it became increasingly unbearable for Jiyong and the nature of what he was feeling towards Seunghyun was still too raw to handle.
Jiyong could put a brave face on it in the public eye – that was easy. But when they were backstage in the dressing rooms and guards were down, it was too easy for his mask to slip. So he made his excuses for not hanging out with the boys and the crew afterwards. He hated lying to them but the truth was far more painful.
Considering how things were left – unacknowledged and agonisingly unresolved – Jiyong flat out refused to be out with the man wherever alcohol or drugs were involved, given where it would usually lead (all six times, according to his mental count).
Jiyong was committed to treating him like a colleague if that’s how it was going to be, it was the only way he knew how to cope. Act like nothing’s wrong? Sure. He was the all-suffering, non-billowy haute couture coat-wearing king of bullshitting his way through things. Fake it until you make it. Sure, Jiyong had this locked down.
*
Another exhausting day was spent practicing their routines in the studio for the string of shows they were about to kick off. Jiyong was able to keep his focus on the work, though some days it was harder than others. He had been able to maintain an air of indifference and nonchalance around his band mates and particularly Seunghyun – even though every infinitesimal fibre of his being yearned to reach out and touch him, pull him close, feel his bare skin against his, the sweet crush of his lips against his own just one more time.
He was quite impressed with his performances, his own acting putting Seunghyun’s to shame. He chuckled to himself as he pushed through the studio doors and out into the drizzly street.
It had been raining hard for most of the day, the city streets shining wet in the half-light of the late afternoon. Seungri, Youngbae, Seunghyun and Daesung followed suit and climbed into the van behind Jiyong. Jiyong slid into the back seat and slumped against the window, beanie pulled low over his forehead, sunglasses planted firmly on his face – even though it was raining.
He feigned a headache (yet again) so the others would let him be for the trip. A song seemed to suddenly blare from the radio and threatened to obliterate Jiyong’s well-rehearsed façade entirely:
“Guess it was not meant to be,
But it’s not as bad as it seems,
It only burns when I breathe…yeah,
You saw the way that I fell,
But I’m better off by myself,
That’s the tale I like to tell, yeah”
A poisoned switchblade was ever so gracefully being forced right through the centre of his beleaguered heart and Kwon Jiyong was slowly bleeding out while the world watched on in cold indifference.
He wanted nothing more than to let the floodgates open letting everything spill out of him. Allow his quiet, destructive yearning to be released into the world for all to see. Everyone in the van would be forced to bare witness as he bled his undisclosed desires out, his heart a quivering mass of pulsating viscera, raw and vulnerable. Let Seunghyun see the effect he had on him, see what he’d started and then walked away from.
No. The pragmatic G-Dragon would never let that happen – let them see his weakness. That wouldn’t be the clever or gracious thing to do. Instead, he kept his eyes focussed on the rain-slicked streets around them while his inner turmoil consumed him and he blinked back the hot sting of tears that threatened to slip through.
Seunghyun seemed to be completely oblivious as to how much Jiyong was being corroded from the inside out and he would let it remain that way for as long as he needed to. Jiyong could never tell him. He couldn’t stomach facing up to his rejection in the cold light of day, once was more than enough.
Silently, he thanked the fashion gods for oversized sunglasses.
*
Once all the shows were finished, the tour concluded and the group were on short hiatus each going their separate ways for a few months of much needed downtime. Jiyong threw himself into his work in the vain attempts at voiding his head of everything Seunghyun. He was booked for various shoots and promotions and he was thankful for the amount of work on his plate away from the others, away from Choi Seunghyun.
In a cruel twist of the switchblade in his heart, Seunghyun started showing up at photo shoots “for support”. Even though Jiyong appreciated it, in all honesty it would be so much easier if he just didn’t. Jiyong maintained his smokescreen and acted like Seunghyun wasn’t there. If he wasn’t in his eye line he could at least pretend that it was true.
After weeks of catching glimpses of Seunghyun watching him (when he thought he was being incredibly stealthy) and then immediately glancing away the second Jiyong caught his eye, was driving him insane. Too many photo shoots and interviews had gone down this way with Seunghyun’s beautiful dark eyes burning into him, watching him like a hawk, tongue ghosting across his bottom lip, quiet sighs he believes no-one hears; only to pass it off like it was all in Jiyong’s imagination whenever the subject came up.
Jiyong found Seunghyun’s clandestine attentions nothing short of incredibly fucking distracting. To the casual observer, it may have seemed innocent but Jiyong knew a damn sight better than that.
And Jiyong was beyond done with it.
He had almost come to terms with the fact that they wouldn’t be together and then Seunghyun starts showing up and paying very close attention to every little thing. It didn’t make sense and Jiyong was going to set it straight, whether Seunghyun liked it or not.
He quickly scrawled a note in his dressing room when the shoot finished and purposefully strode towards his intended target. Seunghyun was doing his utmost to melt into the wall behind him, all the while refusing to make eye contact with Jiyong as he closed the remaining distance between them.
Jiyong reached him quickly barely leaving centimetres between their bodies as he forcefully shoved his missive down into Seunghyun’s hip pocket with such force that Seunghyun was sure every part of him shoved against the wall was going to bruise. Jiyong glared at him fixedly as he stuffed the note into his pocket with two fingers, knuckles grazing Seunghyun’s hipbone as he forced it down.
Jiyong delivered his message in silence, his eyes intently focussed on Seunghyun’s all the while, top lip curled up in a small snarl, bottom lip caught behind his teeth. It was a look he had perfected through thousands of photo shoots, music videos and promotions and he knew it was one that Seunghyun had favoured, tracing his tongue along his bottom lip when he thought no one else could see him.
Jiyong retracted his hand quickly, making Seunghyun flinch and stormed out of the building without so much as a backward glance. Seunghyun stared after him in stunned silence; his mouth working to form words, syllables, anything but they failed to materialise as his world shifted and tilted on its axis.
He remained in place for a few moments, feeling a small bruise forming on the back of his skull. Once he’d regained some composure, he dug the note out of his pocket and read the forcefully delivered message:
S,
Meet me at my apartment, 6.30pm sharp. We need to talk. Don’t be fucking late.
J.
The four little words “we need to talk” made the blood fizz in his veins. He’d been far too obvious and this could only mean one thing.
Jiyong knew.
RantyPants! 