a year in the life: rain man
yunho/jaejoong
slice of life, romance / pg13 / oneshot
Catch a glimpse of Jaejoong's university and love life.
hi. it’s been too long. i have not posted (cos i’ve been writing, or at least trying to, really) in about a year, so i thought i should practice writing through this. i hope you enjoy this new verse!
note: all the drabbles are set in one universe, and will be in jaejoong’s pov. i know some of you hate first person pov fics, but it’ll be easier that way. enjoy!
a year in the life
i. 雨男 (rain man)
It started with a tap, then another, and another one until it turned into a pitter-patter. Droplets of water continuously hit the window as if wanting to catch my attention, and it did. It successfully snatched me from my essay that was due in two days. That was okay, it was starting to make my brain all fuzzy anyway. I absolutely love Philosophy, but right now my heart is leaning towards basking in the sound of the rain. It is therapeutic. Now I just need my boyfriend to wrap his arms around me while I run away from responsibilities for a little while.
I found love not in a hopeless place, but right here in the confines of my own dorm room. Yunho was my roommate before he became my boyfriend. Well, he still is my roommate, but now his role in my life has become more significant. I’d rather not get all mushy and talk about the beginnings of our love life and everything in between.
“Have you been talking to yourself again?”
The familiar voice brings a smile to my face. “Mentally.” I didn’t hear him come in. Maybe I was too lost in my thoughts.
“As expected.”
I watch him fondly as he sets all his things on his desk and changes into a more comfortable set of clothes. He gets under covers and snuggles with me right after. The way he was holding me gives me a hint that today is just not his day.
“Things didn’t go well?”
His nod serves as a confirmation. I wait for him to speak. Yunho’s not one to say his feelings out loud. But he’s working on it. There’s silence for around five minutes before Yunho responds.
“Professor threw my *plate on the floor.”
“Did he say why?”
“He didn’t have to. We passed it late.”
“But you’re not late. You’re never late.” I argue. I know what I’m saying. I could attest to that. He is very passionate with his studies. He works his ass off every single day, pulls all nighters if he has to, and never misses a due date.
He sighs. “This time I was. I wouldn’t be this upset if I brought that upon myself. But a classmate held me back. She asked me to pass her work along with mine, and so I did. Stupid me had to check the back of her canvas. She didn’t have her name on it so I had to give it back to her. Out of courtesy, I waited until she finished but I suppose our professor had no more time to spare for us. Once I handed him our canvases, he looked right in my eyes and threw it on the floor.” His grip on my waist tightens. “Well there goes my hardwork. I had to pull two all nighters for that one.”
I could understand his frustration to an extent. He’s dealing with it gracefully, I must say. If it were to happen to me, I wouldn’t know how many buckets I would need for my tears.
He falls asleep still upset and still holding me. I wiggle out of his embrace to work on my essay and let him have his much deserved sleep. I feel so bad for him but there is nothing else for me to do than to take care of him and make sure he does not go too hard on himself.
It’s still raining by the time I finish my essay. The sun has set and Yunho’s still passed out on our beds (that we have pushed together). My stomach growls from hunger. I bet Yunho would be starving when he wakes up. So now I have two choices: one is to change into decent clothes and go out to buy dinner or two, get fast food delivered.
I opt for the second one, not having the heart to leave my boyfriend alone, starving, and unhappy.
Yunho wakes up at eight in the evening- an hour since our food arrived. I greet him with a kiss on the lips and a hug. He says he’s feeling much better although I could still see sadness in his eyes.
“Am I overreacting?” he asks, sipping on his soda. Definitely not, I tell him. “I just had high expectations for that one. Portraiture is my strength. I was hoping to have the chance of getting my work displayed at the students’ gallery.”
I carefully run my fingers along his tangled locks. “Maybe you have to talk to your professor about it? I’m sure he knows your study ethics. Somehow, at least.”
“You think he’d listen to me?”
“Well,” I chuckle. “I listened to your drunken ass when you declared your love for me.”
“Hey!” For the first time since he came home, he genuinely laughs. “That’s different. I won’t be declaring my love for my professor this time.”
“I really hope not.”
“Stop teasing. Hmm, I guess I could give it a try?”
“Yes, please do.” He grabs me by the waist and then pulls me to sit on his lap which causes me to squeak in surprise. “You didn’t deserve to get dragged by that irresponsible lady. Like seriously, who forgets to write their name on their school work? How stupid do you have to be to do that?”
Yunho pokes me on the side. “That’s mean.”
I agree.
On Saturdays, we go on dates. That, of course, is when we’re not buried in a pile of school works. It doesn’t happen very often which is good. Being grumpy while on a date is undoubtedly unpleasant.
Yunho decided to stop mulling over it and gave his professor a visit. All went well. As we both expected, he still wasn’t allowed to pass his plate, but he was given something to work on for extra credits. Better than nothing, no?
“Darling, what do you want for lunch?” he asks me. We are walking our way out of our dorm side-by-side, still mindful of intolerant people.
“I want to hold your hand more than anything.”
His lips curl into a smile, and then he silently grabs my hand. My lips mirrors his as I glance at our intertwined fingers. We used to be a lot more carefree. We would hold hands, give each other kisses on the cheeks, sometimes on the lips, and everything else that couples normally do. But that changed when we encountered people who weren’t accepting of people like us. From then on, we have agreed to tone it down a little. Just a little bit. Kisses could still be given, shared, and stolen, and fingers could still be intertwined every once in a while. It was not that much of a big deal anyway because aside from uni duties, we spend the majority of our time together in our dorm room.
Just as we step inside our favourite restaurant, it starts drizzling.
“Almost a year of being together and it still amazes me how you seem to be capable of making it rain.”
I scoff as I scan the place for an occupied table. It’s particularly busy today, it seems. “I’m not capable. It’s just coincidence.”
“Well Jaejoong, darling, it happens way too often for it to be called a coincidence.”
“Your brain is just going haywire because you can potentially get extra credits for your late plate.”
We settle down in a secluded area of the restaurant. Yunho sits across me, wiggling a finger at my face as he does so. “Not potentially. I’m going to get those extra credits even if they’re just ten percent of the actual plate I fucked up.”
“Confident.” I reply with a smile. “I like that.”
“Oh hey, Yoochun and the other two are asking if we can hang out tomorrow at his house.”
“And you tell me this just now?”
“He gave me a ring while you were taking a bath.”
I shrugged. “Fair enough. I’d love to, but I have a revision to work on. Please send them my apologies.”
Yunho reaches out to hold my hand, brushing the pad of his thumb along the back of my hand. “You work too hard. Saw your calendar. It’s not due until Tuesday. I’m sure you can spare one day for our dear friends. It’s been a while since we hung out and Changmin won’t have a free time until next month. Junsu has a recital to practice for. Yoochun’s almost always free, but still. Come on, love, hm?”
I hum, trying to weigh the pros and cons which I probably shouldn’t do because they’re my friends, not topics I should be analysing. “I guess I can make time for them.”
“Great. So what do you say about making our friends happy by gracing them with your presence?”
“I say let’s get the red carpet ready.”
We both chuckle.
I can’t wait to meet my friends.
/
* i tried googling for a more formal definition but found nothing. now i’m not sure if it means the same thing for everyone who’s in art school. basically, for us, plates are our artworks, our assignments, etc. if we were asked to draw or paint or conceptualise something, that is a plate lol i’m explaining unnecessarily. but i'm sure you get the point
this was just a brief introduction to jaejoong, yunho, and how their relationship works. apologies if it’s quite a messy read. i’m getting really rusty at this ;;
you might be tired of the hundreds - an exaggeration - of verses i have, but hey making your own universe where characters act a certain way you want them to and be something completely out of their actual character is fun
anyway, thank you so much for reading! i'll be sure to post the next one as soon as i could :)