(2pm) untitled.
hey, junho.
he's calling you again.
hey, do you ever think about him?
you roll onto your back, ribs hurting and neck throbbing and hands shaking.
no. no, i don't.
there's a pause and you breathe so deeply that when you let go, you almost miss his response.
yeah, me neither.
everyone is practicing for the fifth night in a row. the concert has to be perfect, the dance has to be perfect, they have to be perfect, absolutely perfect.
but they haven't been for a while now.
chansung is looking like he lost his soul again, eyes blank as they stare at taecyeon and junsu in the floor to ceiling mirrors. you come up behind him and wrap your arms lightly around his waist.
there are no managers around yelling, telling, to get back to practice. no leader around yelling, start from the top!, and chansung's breathing is slow beneath your hands.
in the van on the ride home, nichkhun sits next to you with an arm over your shoulders and fingers tangled in your hair.
he tugs at the strands, random and strangely comforting. it helps relieve stress, nichkhun tells you and you're tired and drained. he hums the chorus of only you into your ear and it's so close to perfect that you let your eyes fall shut.
when you open them again, taecyeon is hovering above you and everyone else is already probably in the dorm.
hyung, you should carry me, you say to him, sickenly sweet and ridiculous.
if jaebeom were there, he would tell you to stop being such a baby.
but jaebeom isn't and taecyeon is.
taecyeon is laughing as he turns around and lets you sling your arms over his shoulders, around his neck. taecyeon is complaining about your weight but is sprinting the distance from the car to the dorm's doors because it's raining. taecyeon is warm and solid and he colors red when you kiss him on the cheek in thanks.
taecyeon is so very, very, close to perfect that you almost wish he was.
almost, because then taecyeon is throwing the door open and catching everybody's eyes as they freeze in surprise, grinning, but you can see how he quickly searches the room a second time with a glance, and you know that you aren't the kind of perfect he's looking for.
a couple times a month, junsu comes into your room and lays down in the empty bed next to yours, silent and tense.
he buries himself in the now plain white covers and pushes his face into the pillow and struggles. junsu, he presses his fingers, hands, against the wall, stains his palms with tiny rock patterns, in hopes that something will crumble and open and give him what he's been aching for all this while until he's the one that's crumbling.
you stay still and watch junsu's spent and shaking form in the dark.
you want to tell him to stop, stop, because the bed doesn't smell like jaebeom anymore, doesn't feel like jaebeom anymore, doesn't hold jaebeom anymore. that it hasn't for a long time.
but all you do is watch, and wait.
you wait for your eyes to blur the image of junsu in that usually empty bed and when you fall asleep to the never real image of park jaebeom's rising and falling chest, you dream of perfection.
and just like a dream, every morning on those couple days of the month, the bed is impeccably made, junsu is the first one in the kitchen, and you wake up to the sight of a bed that looks like it hasn't been slept in since days, weeks, months, too long, ago.
hey, junho.
he's calling you again. he's calling your name again.
you lied to me.
you listen to his approaching footsteps, feeling so hollowed out and empty and exposed.
yeah, but so did you.
he is not smiling and he doesn't touch you, hasn't for days, and you ache.
i'm not perfect, junho.
there's a pause before he's kissing you and it's awkward before he kisses you again and his t-shirt material is soft and crumpled in your hands.
wooyoung isn't perfect. he grinds his teeth in his sleep and has pajamas that could belong to an eight year old. when he takes pictures, something or someone is always cut off, but he makes you laugh in that stupid, silly, way of his.
but there are moments, when wooyoung is dancing, is singing, is smiling; is so heartbreakingly perfect that it makes your breath choke and chest sting.
somehow, it's moments like those when your perfection seems farthest.