to make sense out of sleepless tumbling nights

[drawingintheair]

title: to make sense out of sleepless tumbling nights
pairing: Eunhyuk/Donghae
rating: pg-13
word count: 8090

‘Someday,’ linking their fingers together, Donghae drags their hands over Hyukjae’s chest, travels once around his collarbones, and settles them over his heartbeat, the yellow trapped between their palms and unable to slip through their fingers. ‘We’ll go back someday.’



to make sense out of sleepless tumbling nights

Smoke fills the air, ringlets of grey and ash swirling like cynical smiles. The lighting is dim, unable to clearly make out the faces and shadows around the bar.

It is a ritual for Hyukjae.

Finish work at exactly seven. Walk three blocks in worn out leather shoes. Become engulfed in smoke, lights, and most nights, alcohol.

An unwinding process. He loosens the tie around his neck to indulge in the burning sensation in his throat when he swallows his first sip. It travels all the way to the pit of his stomach, the flames scorching in a deliciously comforting way, quenching that ache he feels.

Staying for as long as it takes to down a few drinks and call a cab, nothing else holds any interest to Hyukjae.

Until he walks in.

The bar is empty except a few regulars, Hyukjae among them as much as it pains him to admit it. Rain pours outside; the pitter patter on the windows is a constant beat that Hyukjae follows with his foot against the bar stool. The door is pushed open and with the gush of wind and rain comes the faint smell of something oddly sweet in this place that tastes of acid, bitterness and burnt wood.

The newcomer approaches the counter and standing a few feet from Hyukjae, asks the bartender, ‘Can I use your phone?’

His voice is deep, Hyukjae catches a heavy accent laced with an old folk story melody and chewed over words. He looks through the corner of his eye in time to see a smile when the bartender hands him the phone. It’s all teeth and sunshine, and something that can only be described as magical, the way his face lights up in the almost nonexistent lighting.

Swirling his drink in his glass, Hyukjae is distractedly aware of when he sits, two stools from Hyukjae’s. He orders a drink, something warm and spicy, sips it at a sort of paused calmness and Hyukjae fidgets, an odd tension bubbling inside him.

Water drops bounce off Hyukjae and for the first time Hyukjae turns to look at the stranger directly, eyebrows raised.

Surprised, the man stops shaking his head, realizing he’s gotten Hyukjae wet.

‘Sorry. It’s a downpour out there,’ he apologizes weaving a hand through his damp hair. It’s longer then what most men wear it, but it suits him, Hyukjae decides.

‘No worries,’ Hyukjae waves it off and it earns him a smile, bigger than the first one and Hyukjae, in a possibly clichéd manner, is enchanted.

‘I’m Donghae,’ he says turning his torso in Hyukjae’s direction slightly. ‘Come here often?’

Hyukjae recognizes it. The interest flashing in those eyes, darkly bright and misleadingly innocent. Hyukjae rests his elbows on the bar and swivels his stool just enough. ‘I’m Hyukjae and sadly, yes, I do.’

Donghae laughs, rich and deep in his throat making the tension in Hyukjae’s insides migrate to his muscles.

‘This is the time I usually go home,’ Hyukjae admits, eyeing the old wooden clock over the bar.

Eyes flicker across the clock before roaming Hyukjae’s face. ‘How ‘bout I buy you another round? Make the extra time worth your while.’

Hyukjae doesn’t go home with strangers. Never flirts randomly at bars or night clubs. He has a routine and sticks to it. Never once breaks his rules. But there’s something in the way Donghae’s neck arches when he laughs and the way his hair falls wet and curls on his forehead. Maybe something about his eyes or his smile. Or maybe it’s nothing at all. But it makes Hyukjae want to break every one.

And he does.

It doesn’t take a drink more or a drink less before it’s slick mouths sliding across wet lips. Pushing tongues and gasping breaths. Wandering and grasping fingers on heated skin. Getting lost in the unknown and finding release in the unconsciousness of trembling limbs and racing hearts.

---

Hyukjae’s eyes blink open to a pounding head and yellow walls shining obnoxiously in his face. Sheets rest low on his hips; he feels his body numb against cotton and body heat.

At his side, Donghae’s still asleep, face peaceful and relaxed, steady breath ghosts Hyukjae’s shoulder.

He can’t stay, he didn’t even plan on falling asleep, but the temptation to sleep in warm skin instead of cold sheets had been too much, too inviting, pulling him in until Hyukjae let himself fall.

Hyukjae memorizes the curve of a shoulder, soft hair fanning over a cheek and parted lips before untangling himself from soft yellow sheets and getting out of the bed.

He finds half his clothes scattered across the bedroom floor, the other trailing the hallway. Picking out his, Hyukjae gets dressed hopping on one leg to get his pants on, stumbling over his own feet putting on his shoes.

Making his way into the living room, Hyukjae takes in the area, small but feeling like an actual home. Not sterile and almost robotic like Hyukjae’s apartment, modern and cold furnishings where Donghae has bright colors in the form of quilts and picturesque paintings on the walls.

A low rumble takes his gaze towards the window, and all he sees is mile after mile of grey. It’s raining, a heavy grey blanket covers the city blocking out all the light. Hyukjae looks at the clouds through yellow lace curtains, wondering at the chances of catching a taxi this early, as he walks out.

Hyukjae’s finger calls the elevator, stabbing the illuminated button with more force than necessary. He struggles to keep himself anchored, fighting the increasing urge to turn and walk back into Donghae’s apartment. Scribble his phone number on a napkin and then …

His train of thought is broken when the apartment door opens. Hyukjae looks and finds Donghae leaning against his doorway, hair tussled and a pair of boxers hanging low on his hips.

Lazily, Donghae smiles, says something Hyukjae doesn’t hear and stuffs something in his arms. A raincoat. Yellow and shiny and plastic.

‘It looks like it might rain,’ Donghae says, even though it’s already raining quite clearly through the window a few feet away.

Before Hyukjae can ask or even blink, the door to Donghae’s apartment is clicking closed and the elevator dings.

The minute Hyukjae steps outside of the building into the early city morning, he’s met with what resembles a waterfall crashing over the city, continuous drops panging against the hard pavement.

A bright yellow raincoat making its way down the street must have been quite the sight in the gloomy atmosphere.

---

Yellow, or any bright shade, looks out of place among his coats, but Hyukjae hangs it up on his coat rack anyways.

---

He goes through one of his busiest weeks and one of the season’s sunniest.

On Sunday he notices the imprint of a puddle on the wooden floor beneath the raincoat, realizing he hasn’t had time to stop by the bar or think about the person who supplied him with said raincoat.

Hyukjae doesn’t stop thinking about either after that.

---

It’s a Friday night. People look for places to forget, someone to make them forget. At least for a little while.

Hyukjae pushes through the throng of skin, bursts of laughter, alcohol and smoke. He’s tired yet full of adrenaline. An expectation of sorts, his body waiting for something to happen.

It vibrates through him when he sees a familiar figure at the bar.

Mouth stretched in a smile, he tilts his head back when he laughs at something someone says to him. Spotting Hyukjae, Donghae’s smile freezes. His eyes flicker and his smile changes, it sparks an electric pull in Hyukjae’s body and Hyukjae follows the invisible line connected to Donghae’s mouth across the sticky bar floor.

---

Sleep eludes him this time. Hyukjae’s body is so sated it hums in satisfaction he can barely feel his limbs. The sheets are so soft, absorbing the sweat off his body, a yellow field Hyukjae wants to lay himself in and get tangled in the stocks and hide from the sun.

He can’t stay. He’s not supposed to. This isn’t his bed and the line of Donghae’s back is a bright neon sign unlit and warring off unwanted visitors after hours.

The bed shifts as Hyukjae sits up trying to remember where his underwear is. He has the memory of Donghae flinging it, somewhere, but Hyukjae hadn’t really paid attention where it landed.

When he spots them, dangling off the corner of a picture frame, Hyukjae hears a moan along with the bed sheets rustling. He looks back and finds Donghae facing him now, face pulled into an annoyed expression as he throws a leg across Hyukjae’s lap, his knee pressing his torso.

Hyukjae could just push him off. Donghae’s asleep he wouldn’t even notice.

Instead, Hyukjae lies back, lets the field of yellow swallow him whole. Donghae’s face relaxes, just a fraction, his knee hooking around Hyukjae’s hip, toes prickling the hairs on Hyukjae’s thighs.

Hyukjae lets the sun blind him and falls asleep.

---

Hyukjae forms a new routine.

Prior to arriving to the bar, it’s exactly the same. As soon as smoke fills his air waves, things seem to shift, turn, and slide into focus.

It’s a guessing game wondering when Donghae will be there. Hyukjae starts thinking he has a hat he pulls days of the week out of to decide when he’ll show up.

Drinks aren’t the main agenda anymore. Reading signs and body language. The difference between smiles.

Sometimes, Donghae does nothing more than slip onto the stool next to Hyukjae’s, press his knee to Hyukjae’s thigh and soon they’re in the back of a cab. Donghae mouths the base of Hyukjae’s jaw, hands skirting hot trails through cotton, slipping through to find hotter skin, while Hyukjae bites his lip to keep quiet and Donghae just smirks.

Other nights, Donghae swigs the liquid in his glass, his hand smacking against the countertop in rhythm to the song playing on the bar’s crappy sound system. He sings sometimes, in tune or off key depending on his mood. Swinging to the music, hips swaying to a sensual beat only he can hear, Donghae enthralls not just Hyukjae under dim lights.

He never asks Hyukjae to go home with him on those nights. Leaves Hyukjae with a smile and feeling more worked up than when he arrived.

---

When Donghae says ‘The last exhibition went well’ or ‘My sink broke again; help me kick my landlord’s ass to get it fixed?’ Hyukjae knows it’s the practical side of him talking. That side of people dealing with the normal things, everyday aspects of life. Work. Friends. Latest movie or concert seen. Malfunctioning kitchen appliances.

But then there’s the part of Donghae “normal” people don’t have. Or at least, don’t show unless it’s to rows and rows of beer bottles on the wall or lying on leather couches while a pair of spectacles pry into your mind asking the likes of ‘And how do you feel about that?’

Donghae talks about the moon falling from the sky and a world in which everything is yellow and gets tarnished in black ashes. There’s a glint in his eyes when he smiles, like he’s hiding a secret Hyukjae finds himself begging to know. Words fall from his lips like a spell, wrapping Hyukjae in until he can’t hear how twisted those words might sound to someone else.

‘She’s lonely.’ Donghae chugs the rest of his drink in one swift motion, the tension in his throat muscles visible under tight skin.

‘Who?’ Hyukjae asks, watching him through curious eyes.

‘The moon,’ Donghae says, eyes glued to the window next to the endless line of wine glasses and the beer tap.

Following his gaze, Hyukjae looks as well. Bright and large in the impossibly dark night sky, she shines in all her glory. Not a star in sight to take her stage.

‘She’s lonely.’ Donghae repeats. Through hazed ears, Hyukjae doesn’t hear an ‘s’ in Donghae’s ‘she’.

---

They’re sitting side by side, elbows knocking elbows, knees brushing knees.

‘I think we were fated to meet.’ Donghae sings close to Hyukjae’s ear. His breath smells faintly of alcohol overlapping that sweetness Hyukjae has tasted on his tongue.

‘How’s that?’ Hyukjae asks, eyebrow quirked at people believing in fate at this day in age.

Donghae smiles at him and it’s all sorts of breathtaking and smolderingly beautiful. Hyukjae feels his heart thumping in his chest, blood rush loudly in his ears.

‘The night we met, I could have walked into any place to ask for a phone. Could’ve found a payphone,’ Donghae points out, smile growing. ‘But I walked in here. Into you,’ he adds as an afterthought and smiles at it.

‘Fate, huh?’ Hyukjae smiles into his bottle, calling it coincidence, luck, but deciding fate sounds nicer.

---

The air is quiet but the constant tossing and turning of the blankets wrestles Hyukjae out of his sleep.

‘Can’t sleep?’ he asks Donghae, pillow folded in a strange way and hands fisted with the sheets.

He sighs and shakes his head. He rolls on his side, feet brushing Hyukjae’s calves. Donghae looks over at the fish shaped clock, bright yellow in the otherwise dark room.

‘It’s three,’ he props himself up, palm covering half his face and Hyukjae watches the shadows dance across the other half. ‘I always feel lonely at three. Never lets me sleep.’

Hyukjae doesn’t know how someone can dictate loneliness by a specific hour or how he hasn’t noticed, but he doesn’t ask for an explanation. He’s realized Donghae has some things no one, not even Donghae himself probably, understands.

But Hyukjae does understand loneliness and the best way to cure it if only for a while.

For an undefined period of time during the earliest hours of the morning, they forget anything that doesn’t narrow down to them exists, fooling themselves in the process that loneliness is just a myth as well.

---

‘Stay.’

It’s said quietly. Not exactly a plea, not really doubtful. Just, quiet.

Hyukjae looks back at Donghae, feels his palm against his lower back and his smile on his skin.

‘It’s the weekend,’ Donghae reasons, his fingers moving, sending shudders through Hyukjae’s spine. ‘Sleep and we’ll go out for coffee later.’

He’s never asked him to stay. Never asked him to leave either, but Donghae seems to be asking more than for Hyukjae to stay in bed a little longer. Donghae’s hand moves to Hyukjae’s hip, grasping it in his hand and inching him closer.

Hyukjae smiles and gives in because, really, it’s not like he wants to leave.

His head hits the pillow and Donghae throws his yellow comforter over their heads and they hide themselves in warm arms and warm fabric to keep the rain falling outside, out.

---

‘What if we just meet here?’

Donghae looks up from his paper cup, and blinks at Hyukjae. Venturing in making coffee himself for the first time had been a disaster. The coffee was burnt, watery and extremely sweet. Hyukjae had to keep himself from spiting it back in the cup Donghae had just handed him with a bright smile.

Disgruntled by Hyukjae’s face, Donghae had taken a sip from his cup and actually did spit it back. ‘I usually stick to tea,’ he’d explained with a shrug and pout which Hyukjae had kissed away against the counter, the coffee pot digging into Donghae’s back. After, Hyukjae had gone to the coffee shop around the corner.

‘Instead of the bar,’ Hyukjae explains not meeting Donghae’s eyes, but looking at the spot on the wall over his shoulder. ‘I could just come here. O-or we could meet somewhere else,’ he adds, hating the stutter in his voice.

His only answer is Donghae leaning over the table, the newspaper and their disposable cups, and the way his mouth meshes with his.

---

Everything in Donghae’s apartment is yellow. Flowers, candle sticks on the mantle piece, the comforter on his bed. Endless pots of yellow paint, as opposed to the two or three of every other color of the rainbow he uses to create fabricated images of fast spinning life.

His hair is streaked of the color. Hyukjae finds smudges of it on Donghae’s skin when his lips are pressed to the inside of Donghae’s thighs or sliding along the nape of his neck, pigment sticking to his tongue he brushes away in the morning.

Donghae’s smiles are bright like carnival lights and electric sparks, but Hyukjae has come to realize his eyes are like lightless flames. Burning intense, but cold to the touch. It’s a sad kind of cold and the saddest thing about is, Donghae doesn’t seem to realize it.

---

Water drops drip down Donghae’s bare shoulders when he opens the door to Hyukjae. The tight jeans sitting low on his hips hang by a thread Hyukjae already wants to snap with his teeth, tug fabric away and press his mouth to the skin stretched over Donghae’s hipbone.

“Sorry about the mess,” Donghae says, rubbing his head with a towel and padding into the kitchen. His apartment is always a mess, splattered canvas cloths thrown on the book shelf, stacks of books cluttering his shoe rack by the door. It’s an organized mess in a way, Donghae always seems to know where everything is, never missteps and grabs the toothpaste from the cheese drawer in the fridge, paint brushes lined up neatly in his underwear drawer.

Hyukjae is still not used to this. Being here without a pretense, without a prelude mumbled over fuzzy hazes and smoke. He’ll still end up in twisted sheets and hot skin, Hyukjae’s not that obtuse, but it’s an evening shine that shadows the walls and not hard wood but soft cushions he sits on.

Donghae reappears, white t-shirt sticking to his torso, in mid sentence and this is when Hyukjae realizes he’d been speaking.

“so I don’t bother with it. Awful, isn’t it? Anyways, you’re the first person I cook for in, well. I can’t even remember really. That’s how long it’s been.” He starts pouring tea with orange dusted hands and smirks at Hyukjae when he says, “You should feel honored. Though I won’t say no to a foot rub or blow job, all forms of gratitude are accepted.”

“Oh,” Hyukjae’s tongue seems stuck to the roof of his mouth, the tea Donghae hands him only helps a bit.

Donghae smiles, sitting next to Hyukjae and gathering his legs in his arms. His feet peek out from the cuffs of his jeans smooth and kind of pretty yet masculine, veins strung out against lightly tanned skin. He teasingly pokes Hyukjae’s side with one foot, rips a strangled squeak from Hyukjae’s mouth. “I’m just teasing you, Hyukjae,” he laughs but, really, Hyukjae doesn’t mind putting his hands or mouth on Donghae. On any part of
him.

The couch digs into his back as they eat, small, simple dishes served in too large bowls. There is an odd mixture of soju and a weird smelling fruity wine mixed in a large pitcher Donghae empties out quicker than it takes Hyukjae to finish one glass.

Donghae laughs around bites and he takes from Hyukjae’s plate, but Hyukjae can’t find it in himself to be put off or infuriated even. Watching Donghae is kind of like watching a painting. Some people don’t get it. Some hate it. Some, however, find it fascinating.

“It’s all crap really,” Donghae says, having crawled around the coffee table to sit next to Hyukjae again, feet resting against Hyukjae’s shin. “You meet these people thinking they’re different. Deep with insight. Turns out, artists are pretentious fuckers just as bad as the corporate dick heads they hate so much.”

Here, Hyukjae laughs. Hyukjae the corporate dick head and Donghae the pretentious fucker. What an ironic pair they make.

“Society says you and I should hate each other.” Donghae shrugs and scoots closer, setting his wine glass down. “Hate is a useless emotion. Depressing. It’s ugly, gives you nothing but emptiness and you end up hating yourself more than anything in the end.” The smile he gives Hyukjae is equal parts fake and real. “Isn’t it funny? It’s the darker emotions that make some of the best art but half the time, we’re struggling to feel anything at all.”

What emotion do I inspire, What emotions do you feel, Hyukjae wants but doesn’t ask.

He slips his hand in Donghae’s hair when Donghae leans forward and kisses him, tasting of spicy curry and disgustingly sweet wine and bitter raw emotion he’ll never say but later spill in paint on canvas.

I love love, Donghae’s lips outline over his, sweet and gentle like he wants to kiss, to be kissed, and hold on to Hyukjae’s mouth for seconds and years and lifetimes.

I lust lust, says the push of his tongue, the stroke of his hands beneath Hyukjae’s shirt.

I fear fear, being feared, fearing myself, Donghae hides from Hyukjae when he shuts his eyes as Hyukjae tries looking in, tries to see beyond pupils and irises and glimpse beyond.

I hate hate as much as I wished it hated me, tell the fists Donghae makes in Hyukjae’s hair, gentle yet painfully strong.

I want to want, to be wanted, Donghae’s hips say, luring Hyukjae’s to move as erratically, as desperate as his.

To create out of nothing. To destroy and tear down everything, the world, and piece it back together however I want it.

Or maybe he says nothing. Maybe Hyukjae merely imagines it all, mistakes empty blind needy lust for more as he’s pushed down in yellow fields and Donghae blocks out the sun.

---

‘Are you happy, Hyukjae?’ Donghae asks one day.

At first, Hyukjae thinks he means them, unsure of what them is exactly. But Donghae is quick to clarify. ‘No. You, just you. Are you happy?’ Hyukjae can’t give him an answer.

Donghae tilts his head and frowns, turning back to the sink to scrape paint from underneath his fingernails, running water filling the long silence his brush strokes have left behind.

---

‘You know, I was around fifteen when I left home,’ Donghae tells to the curve of Hyukjae’s neck. They’re a tangle of limbs and hands on skin sprawled on Donghae’s bed. It’s raining softly, Donghae’s voice is sleepy.

They’ve always used mouths in their relationship. What used to be muttered incoherencies and breathy moans turned to rarely told stories and trivialities of a week and back. Hyukjae wonders how seriously he should take these changes. It’s odd and without substance for an actual relationship. When Hyukjae started thinking of this as one, he isn’t sure. Since the beginning probably as stupid he knows that sounds.

But Donghae isn’t exactly normal so maybe odd is a good thing.

Hyukjae hums in wonder, his hands running waves through Donghae’s hair.

Nodding, Donghae continues about how he wanted to become a painter and his parents had disagreed. How he’d left home with what little savings he had and hitched rides all the way to the city. Hyukjae listens with a sense of fascination and wonder at how Donghae isn’t just different from most people, he and Donghae are also quite different.

‘I had to leave early. The sun hadn’t even risen.’ Again that quietness accompanied by the softness of Donghae’s lips against Hyukjae’s neck. ‘I might’ve changed my mind and I don’t think I would have forgiven myself if I had.’

‘Do you remember what time it was?’ Hyukjae asks, feeling he already has the answer.

‘I think it was around three.’

Hyukjae goes to say something, but Donghae’s gently brushing has turned to nipping and his hands are fervently sliding down Hyukjae’s chest lower and lower and Hyukjae’s words get lost to Donghae’s name.

---

‘Come on,’ Donghae says, as soon as he sees him, grabbing his hand and leading Hyukjae down the streets.

‘But your apartment is that way.’ Hyukjae looks over his shoulder to make sure and there he sees the small building in a sea of giant skyscrapers. His head whips around when he stumbles because Donghae has stopped moving and let his hand go.

Donghae’s face is serious, etched in street lights and he asks the one thing Hyukjae has been wondering. ‘Is that all this is to you?’

Hyukjae breathes in city night, cold air on his tongue and oil paints and spice and sugary bitterness and sunflowers and something distinctively of the sea, seafoam maybe. Donghae. He breathes in Donghae, every inch of him he’s shown Hyukjae and even the parts he hasn’t.

Hyukjae breathes out and shakes his head, knowing this, whatever it is, is more than that. Whether they intended to or not, it is.

Donghae smiles and takes his hand in his once again. He tugs him along through the crowds and unknowingly, pulling and twisting the beat in Hyukjae’s chest.

---

‘You sure this is okay?’ Hyukjae asks, hovering behind Donghae to shield his body from prying eyes that might see the lock pick in his hands. Completely in awe of how he was convinced of this, Hyukjae feels his dinner churn in his stomach.

‘Yes. This place was abandoned years ago.’ Donghae says, tongue pocking out in concentration. ‘Besides, the worst that can happen is getting thrown in jail for trespassing.’

Hyukjae yelps, starting to walk away in exasperation. Donghae laughs and coaxes Hyukjae up the stairs, who grumbles all the way up there but can’t help the spring of excitement in his step.

The scent of flowers greets them. A whirlwind of colors and stars light the way.

‘This was the first place I discovered when I got to the city,’ Donghae says, walking through the garden. ‘It was open for public back then but I like sneaking up here sometimes.’

Hyukjae watches Donghae, half his face in star light, half shadowed in leaves and flower petals. He imagines a young country boy coming here for the first time as his first stop in the city. A wonderland of beauty and nature at its simplest. Hyukjae would have decided to stay as well.

Letting himself be pushed against a tree trunk, Hyukjae lets Donghae taste his mouth. Lets him kiss him as quietly as he wants and steal away as much breath from Hyukjae’s lungs as he needs and give him as much back.

Under the world of an abandoned wildly grown oak tree, they lose themselves to their own abandon, hearts speeding up slow and steady to a beat they both hear.

---

During work, Hyukjae stares out the window and changes the sun into the moon. Sunflower colored dresses and golden ties distract him from his computer screen painted with numbers and file codes.

He sleeps in his apartment and his bed is like a snow bank he lies naked in. In his sleep, he reaches over for skin only to be met with fabric he clutches with too much force.

With an odd sort of surprise, Hyukjae senses he looks forward more to the after. He likes Donghae’s face soft and relaxed on the pillow smiling, than twisted in pleasure completely tensed. Donghae’s hands running through Hyukjae’s sweaty hair gently, as opposed to yanking it closer or farther to his skin. Pressing gentle kisses on cheeks and lips than leaving bright marks on patches of skin no one else sees.

It’s not until Hyukjae is in the break room drinking coffee, black with two sugars exactly like he likes it. Halfway through the cup, he thinks that he prefers the burnt overly sweet cups Donghae leaves for him on the night stand with a mischievous smirk.

Hyukjae catches up with his thoughts and lets himself admit it silently in the confines of his brain and that nagging place somewhere in his chest.

He sets the cup down and goes back to his desk staring at the computer screen unblinking until the clock strikes seven.

---

Nose buried in sunflowers, Donghae smiles. He arranges them, hands ruffling the petals in different directions. Satisfied, he sets them on the coffee table and falls back onto the couch next to Hyukjae.

‘Thank you,’ he tells Hyukjae, smoothing his hand over the front of Hyukjae’s shirt.

‘You’re welcome. I saw them and thought of you.’ Hyukjae lets Donghae press into his body, legs tangled on the edge of the coffee table.

‘You think about me?’ Donghae asks, smirk evident in his voice and how his lips are pressed against Hyukjae’s shoulder.

‘Only when I’m bored,’ Hyukjae says lamely.

‘I’m sorry you get bored so often.’ Donghae laughs, fingers twisting in the fabric of Hyukjae’s clothes. Hyukjae jabs him in the side harshly causing Donghae to laugh harder.

Silence stretches for a moment before Donghae pulls away a bit to see Hyukjae’s face.

He grabs Hyukjae’s hand, fingers grazing his palm, later settling in the spaces between. ‘I get bored a lot too,’ he admits.

‘Yeah?’

‘Yeah.’ Donghae’s smile presses against Hyukjae’s palm before latching onto Hyukjae’s almost invisible grin. ‘All the time.’

---

There are times Hyukjae thinks himself the luckiest person on earth. The happiest. Nothing can compare to what he’s found.

Donghae is as beautiful as the paintings he makes, both on the surface and in his depths. Everything is new with him. Less mundane. Something spiritual, almost. Life itself. Food. Dancing at a bar. Seeing a film. Sex. Doing absolutely nothing. Donghae takes it and makes it as mind-blowing as the first time he did it. There’s nothing better than the feeling of Donghae’s hand in his and his smile against Hyukjae’s.

There are times when Hyukjae wants to slap himself, yank out all his hair and wish Donghae had never walked into that bar on some rainy night.

Hyukjae says the wrong thing, Donghae ignores him for days. Asks the wrong thing and he gets told to mind his business. Does the wrong thing and is shown, in Donghae’s mind, how he’s supposed to do it. He finds his work suits splattered in paint, yellow almost always.

But good comes with bad. Difficult with easy. Hyukjae is not perfect either, far from it. So Hyukjae takes it in stride. Apologizes when he sees it fit. Brings yellow sunflowers every so often. Shuts Donghae’s mouth with his own and a shove against the nearest wall or plain surface when nothing else seems to work.

---

Hyukjae can’t breathe. He’s sweating and his lungs burn. He’s about to die he moans, but he’ll be revived by Monday.

There’s a buzzing, loud and insistent so he buries himself beneath the covers, smashing the pillow to his ears. The buzzing stops eventually and he lulls off to sleep only to be awakened by the slam of a door and footsteps.

The covers are yanked off his head and Hyukjae is met with a soft smile and concerned eyes.

‘Donghae? What?’ Hyukjae is cut off by hands cupping his face and inspecting him. Dressed in a yellow shirt, Donghae brightens the room and it hurts Hyukjae’s eyes.

‘You sounded pretty bad over the phone and I was guessing you weren’t taking anything so I brought some medicine and soup,’ he strokes Hyukjae’s hair off his forehead, brows knotted in concern.

‘Why are you here?’ Hyukjae is surprised. No one he’s ever been with has wanted to take care of him. Just a ‘hope you get better’ over the phone and he knows Donghae is busy with his next exhibition.

Donghae tilts his head, smiling confused. ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ he says reminding Hyukjae, Donghae isn’t like anyone he’s ever been with, and probably unlike the ones he hasn’t.

He swallows Donghae’s home remedy and the soup from the Vietnamese restaurant, and only half protests when Donghae lies next to him and wraps Hyukjae up in his arms until Hyukjae falls in a dreamless sleep.

By Sunday, Hyukjae is recovered and picks up the phone when Donghae calls at three am because he can’t sleep. Hyukjae sings until he hears faint snoring around four and falls asleep to Donghae’s breathing.

---

Red dot. Blue dot. Green dot. Blue dot. Purple- no, Red dot. ‘They call this art?’ He moves in different angles, but no, they’re still dots. They’re supposed to mean something, but Hyukjae doesn’t get it.

‘This isn’t yours,’ Hyukjae points out to Donghae standing next to him who rolls his eyes.

‘It’s a young artists’ expo. I told you we’d see things that weren’t mine.’

Hyukjae nods, because he had been listening but only caught half of what Donghae had said in the noisy subway on the way to the art gallery.

After meeting people Donghae introduced him to, sipping a glass or two of some champagne, finally Donghae shows him his collection.

A set of five paintings. Yellow is all Hyukjae sees at first. In a variety of shades, from lightest to darkest.

Lines take form, blurs clear out and Hyukjae sees.

A little boy, Hyukjae can tell from the posture, the size, the dark golden mop of hair on his head, something familiar about him. He’s somewhere on a beach, sand all around him, shovels and buckets. He holds a pail in one hand and his overalls are only fastened on one side. Hands deep in the sand, he’s building a sand castle. The other three frames are exactly the same, the progression of the sandcastle as he builds it.

In the last frame, a wave wipes out the sand castle, destroying it completely.

Hyukjae tears his gaze from the paintings and looks at Donghae who’s looking back at him and Hyukjae’s chest constricts painfully.

He sees the same desperation he feels reflected in Donghae’s eyes.

It’s the only painting he understands in the entire exhibit.

---

‘When was the last time you saw your parents?’ Hyukjae knows this is one of those questions he’s not supposed to ask, but he doesn’t care.

Donghae runs a hand across his cheek, staining it red and blue making purple. He shrugs, wrapping another canvas in sheets. ‘When I left home. Haven’t seen them since.’

‘Phone calls? Letters? Nothing? They’re your parents,’ Hyukjae exclaims, baffled.

Again, Donghae shrugs and says nothing which upsets Hyukjae. How Donghae will talk to him about anything, things that don’t exist even, but not this.

‘Why?’

Donghae stops his work, setting his wrapped painting against the wall. He goes over to the coffee table and starts clearing off the plastic containers from their dinner. ‘Because, I just haven’t. What’s the big deal?’

‘Because you’re obviously pretty screwed up over it,’ Hyukjae spits it out, regretting it the second after he says it.

Dropping a container, Donghae’s eyes narrow at him, on him, closing in and burning Hyukjae in his seat. ‘What? You have no idea what you’re talking about. You get along with your parents, right?’

Hyukjae nods, stunned into silence at the hurt look on Donghae’s face.

‘Then you can’t understand, so shut up,’ Donghae gives him a last look, then goes over to the sink and dumps the containers in it. He rests against the sink, his back a slumped line Hyukjae wants to put his hands on. ‘I have work to finish so either go to bed or go back to your place, but get out of here ‘cause I don’t want to look at you right now.’

Hyukjae gets off the couch, wanting to fight but knowing now’s not the right time.

Donghae hears a door open then close, breathing a sigh of relief at which one it is.

---

His hand meets fabric when he reaches over to the other side of the bed and he opens his eyes, blinking slowly in the darkness. Taking a look at the clock, it’s a quarter past three.

Pushing the covers out of the way, he gets out of bed and goes to the living room, moving around slowly in the darkness.

He finds him sitting crossed legged on the carpeted floor, hair pulled into a small ponytail, wearing paint splattered washed out jeans and a t-shirt, that Hyukjae would have realized is his had it not been for the hour.

He watches him silently for a few minutes as Donghae passes the brush over the canvas, some sort of form coming to life by the consistent strokes of color on the page. Watches him push his bangs behind his ear, getting the locks painted with bright yellow paint.

At one point, his body tenses, like he can sense his presence and Donghae turns around, pulling his headphones from his ears and pausing his cd player. Donghae doesn’t have an iPod like a normal person does. He still listens to cd’s and had been appalled when Hyukjae had tried to introduce him to the era of digital music and bootleg mp3’s.

They stare at each other, the tension palpable between them. But Donghae doesn’t look angry and Hyukjae doesn’t want to fight.

‘It’s kind of late to be making an ode to Van Gogh,’ Hyukjae says in hopes of making Donghae laugh.

Donghae just stares at him, brush paused and leaking paint on the floor.

Hyukjae doesn’t care what’s right or what’s wrong, he just wants to not have to feel that cold sensation in his hands when he was searching for Donghae and came up with air.

So he takes the step.

Across the living room until he’s kneeling on the floor in front of him. Donghae watches him with widened eyes as Hyukjae places his hand on the nape of his neck and kisses him, soft and sweet.

‘Come to bed,’ Hyukjae mumbles against his lips, fingers in Donghae’s hair, messing his already messy ponytail. ‘It’s three and I’m lonely.’

Donghae’s fingers dig into the muscles of Hyukjae’s arms and he goes to speak but Hyukjae shakes his head and presses his mouth against Donghae’s, swallows his words and the gratitude and unnamed emotion flashing in Donghae’s eyes.

---

‘It’s what some people do sometimes,’ Donghae says as they lay tangled in each other’s arms.

‘Hmmm?’ Hyukjae asks, rubbing his nose gently against the heated skin of Donghae’s neck.

‘People in love. They fight sometimes.’

Hyukjae freezes, nose plastered against Donghae. He swallows air, and breathes a few times before trying, carefully, to speak. ‘Love?’

Donghae smiles, hands running through Hyukjae’s hair tilting his head back so he looms over him. ‘Maybe. Someday,’ he amends, and his smile holds a secret he’s not letting Hyukjae in on.

‘Someday?’ Hyukjae asks, his voice faint and weak to his ears.

Nodding, Donghae pushes Hyukjae back until his head hits the pillow behind them. ‘You know the thing about someday, though?’ he lays himself over Hyukjae’s body, lips speaking over his. ‘Sometimes, someday has already passed and we just don’t know it.’

Donghae kisses him until it becomes all Hyukjae needs. Just Donghae’s mouth on his for days and months and years making him forget what anything that isn’t Donghae tastes like and what someday even means.

---

Hyukjae doesn’t know what to do when he arrives home to find Donghae sitting in front of his door, a suitcase next to him.

‘I’m going to see my parents,’ Donghae says, still from the floor. ‘You want to come with me?’

Hyukjae stares at him disbelieved for a moment. He pulls Donghae up, holding him by his upper arms. ‘Are you sure? I don’t want you to go because you feel forced.’

‘It’s time,’ Donghae says decidedly and Hyukjae knows he means it; Donghae doesn’t let himself be pushed into anything. He tiptoes on thin wires and unstable ground until, finally, he let’s go and wants to fall, craves for it, and lands on two feet or all fours.

They board the train without much thought; they’ll be back before the weekend is over.

Donghae is quiet. This time the quiet doesn’t bother Hyukjae, he silently listens to it.

---

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

Hyukjae feels cold. It has nothing to do with the whipping wind or the breeze of the sea and everything to do with where they are and the sad look in Donghae’s eyes.

‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know how. I never talk about it and I just. I didn’t but I wish I had.’

Hyukjae clears his throat and swallows the lump lodged in it. ‘If I would have known, I wouldn’t have said what I said. I-.’

Donghae stops him by taking his shaking hands. Hyukjae wants to pull away, but instead laces their fingers together.

‘I’ve been alone for so long, I guess.’ Donghae sighs a shaky breath, tightening his hold on Hyukjae’s hands. ‘I guess I’m just not used to having someone.’

‘I wish you would have told me,’ Hyukjae repeats, feeling like a small child who didn’t know he was doing something wrong until he’s proven otherwise.

‘I’m sorry.’ Raising one of his hands, Donghae caresses Hyukjae’s face and breathes against his mouth, his eyes searching Hyukjae’s.

Hyukjae closes the distance between them, giving Donghae the forgiveness he seems to desperately need, the one Hyukjae wants to give him anyways.

---

Donghae talks to his parents for the first time since he was fifteen. He kneels on the rocky ground, hands on either side of him supporting his weight.

His words are met with hollow breeze and sea salt, the faint call of a few seagulls.

He leaves with Hyukjae’s hand in his and it is Hyukjae who gives a final look back at the tombstones, the beach as their back drop.

---

‘By the time I got here, they were gone,’ Donghae says sitting on the front steps of his childhood home. ‘The epidemic had spread and in a town like this there aren’t enough doctors to go around.’

Hyukjae sits next to him and listens, hands deep in his pockets. The breeze around them is soft, taking Donghae’s words with it but not the impression they leave on Hyukjae.

Suddenly, Donghae laughs, chuckles that get trapped in his throat. ‘I’m a walking cliché. Typical artist with a typical tortured past,’ he says and Hyukjae would laugh if Donghae weren’t so completely the opposite of typical.

‘I’m sorry.’

‘Stop saying you’re sorry,’ Hyukjae says sternly.

He knows Donghae. He does, he realizes. Donghae can speak without a care in the world, say things no matter how ridiculous or stupid or silly or insane they sound. How true or made up they are, he thinks it, and out he says it.

Other things, Donghae won’t even tell himself.

Sighing, Hyukjae wraps an arm around a shivering Donghae, trying to smile at him when Donghae’s damp eyes lean against his shoulder.

The sun falls into the ocean that night and the stars turn into streetlights keeping them warm on the front porch that holds them like a rust wooden bed.

The moon is unseen and every single one of the streetlights is a blazing yellow.

---

Hyukjae can see him up ahead, the wind running through his hair, it runs runs and runs, leaving shoe marks and trails behind for Hyukjae to follow.

His watch tells him it’s nine. The sun high up in the sky says it’s a few minutes from noon.

Hyukjae wonders if this is what being with Donghae will always feel like. Time shifted, slowed down, impossibly sped up, frozen. If someday will always feel like today, tomorrow, forever.

Donghae turns and smiles at Hyukjae, extends his arm in Hyukjae’s direction, palm upward.

Getting up from the porch, Hyukjae walks towards him, slips his hand into Donghae’s and relishes in the way their fingers slip and almost fit together. How it seems like they’re starting to belong with palms pressed together and fingertips on each other’s knuckles.

Standing with him, Hyukjae notices Donghae’s hair is wet. There is water pooling at his feet. His palm is cold and slippery in Hyukjae’s.

‘The water wasn’t so bad,’ Donghae says but he leans into Hyukjae, steals from his warmth but gives none back.

They leave the beach, leave behind a home and three lives that’ll find a way to mend someday. Maybe they already have.

---

“Let’s go back to your place,” Donghae says once their off the platform and on the street.

Hyukjae stops, surprised when he probably shouldn’t be.

It takes a fifteen minute walk in which they don’t speak except when Hyukjae points out a direction, says when they are closer or nearer.

When Donghae sees the raincoat, still hanging on Hyukjae’s coat rack, he fingers the plastic and the smile he gives Hyukjae takes him back to a dull, grey morning.

Hyukjae feels unsettled, his nerves jitter and dance inside him as he hears the water rush in the bathroom. He imagines Donghae under the shower head, his hair black and water running down his face, his hands following the rivers flowing down his skin.

Resting against the kitchen counter, for the first time, Hyukjae realizes most of his house is white. The furniture, the walls. A dash of black, and tan, a little blue, but other than that, colorless. He stares at his counter top, at the ceramic burners of the stove and paints them yellow.

The water increases pressure, then, stops.

Hyukjae follows the sound of footsteps, of a closing then opening door and arrives at his bedroom.

He finds Donghae, on the bed, beneath the sheets. He’s tracing the creases of white, finger lazily drawing circles and zigzags.

At first, it’s as if Donghae doesn’t notice that Hyukjae has joined him in bed, that he’s as naked as he is, wanting as he is. But then, he’s tracing a particularly long crease until Hyukjae’s body cuts it short, Donghae’s finger bumping against his arm. He looks up, eyes probing and searching into Hyukjae’s and Hyukjae finds that, he can search and probe and find right back.

The drawing continues, this time on Hyukjae’s arms and torso, dipping into his ribs and tracing the curve of his hips.

Donghae reaches down, all the way down to Hyukjae’s toes and back, and lies on his back, his eyes asking Hyukjae to follow. Follow the lines and slopes of his body, to paint Donghae’s skin and draw on his bones.

And Hyukjae does. His tongue is his paintbrush, the breath he breathes on Donghae’s skin is the paint, his fingers smudging and correcting his mistakes. He strokes from his neck to his chest, takes his time with Donghae’s stomach and hips, with his thighs and his knees, quick, timid, brushstrokes on his feet. Flips Donghae around and draws on his back, the curve of Donghae’s spine arching beneath Hyukjae’s mouth, limbs trembling as Hyukjae traces the curving slope of his backside and dips into the planes where it ends in the back of his legs.

Hyukjae reaches the end of Donghae, the soles of his feet with toes digging into the mattress and strained in an arc, and realizes it.

Not a trace of yellow. Not a speck on the side of his torso, or a drop of it on the inside of his knee. He goes over again, to make sure, but Donghae stops him not even halfway, shoving Hyukjae back and crawling inside Hyukjae’s skin.

There’s no field of yellow to fall into. It’s more like a sea of white, crashing and colliding and wrapping them together before getting lost in waves only to be dragged and thrown back on shore.

The sea foam clings to Donghae’s skin, Hyukjae smells it as he stares at the ceiling trying to catch his breath, salt on his tongue from drinking too much water.

Hyukjae looks at him when Donghae places his chin on his shoulder, finger already back to drawing, yellow leaking from Donghae’s fingertips and seeping into Hyukjae’s skin.

‘Let’s go back.’

Donghae smiles up at him, the carnival lights lighting up his face. ‘To my hometown?’

Hyukjae nods and his finger joins Donghae’s on his chest, smudging yellow against white, their fingers brushing and holding.

‘Someday,’ linking their fingers together, Donghae drags their hands over Hyukjae’s chest, travels once around his collarbones, and settles them over his heartbeat, the yellow trapped between their palms and unable to slip through their fingers. ‘We’ll go back someday.’

I swam across
I jumped across for you
Oh all the things you do
Cause you were all yellow

I drew a line
I drew a line for you
Oh what a thing to do
And it was all yellow

-Yellow, Coldplay

a/n: Surprisingly enough, this fic was not influenced by Coldplay’s song but as I was giving this fic a final once over, I was listening to that song and it just seemed to fit. The first time I wrote this plot was almost a year ago and this version looks absolutely nothing like that thanks to daisychains555 who is always awesome and honest enough to tell when my writing it complete crap. It took me forever and a day to come up with the title which I owe in part from Imogen Heap’s gorgeous lyrics from this beautiful song.