Starburst - Part 2/3
Title: Starburst
Pairing: Junjin/Andy, JinDy
Genre: Romance, Angst, Friendship, Fluff
Warnings: Some coarse language, sensuality
Rating: PG-13
Summary: It is the single most mystifying and terrifying moment of his life - and that is how he will always remember the first time he met his soulmate in this world.
Previous: Part One
STARBURST - PART TWO
Sunho cannot have Choongjae - not in the natural course of things.
That reality check slaps Sunho in the face some nine years after their debut and four girlfriends later. Choongjae’s girlfriends.
Choongjae is not the type to talk about his personal problems much, but after his last breakup, he speaks about it once on a drunken night with Shinhwa in Minwoo’s apartment.
He is the sort to take relationships very seriously. Sunho has always known this, known from the moment Choongjae took his first girlfriend - his first love - and given her his everything while Sunho fell apart inside. All of his following relationships over the years had followed the same pattern, the same seriousness, though they did not work out.
He laments about it that night, drunk and on the verge of tears.
‘Why does it never work out? What am I doing wrong?’
‘I feel ya, man,’ says Minwoo, also tipsy. He slaps Choongjae on the shoulder in brotherly encouragement. ‘But you’ll meet the one for you someday. You’ll see. Have faith, brother!’ And he throws his arms around Choongjae, who is slumped over the dining table with the rest of the other drunk members.
Sunho sits in a sort of frozen stupor on Minwoo’s sofa, far enough to escape having to offer his own comfort to Choongjae, but close enough to hear every word.
It is then that he realises what he has been blind to from the moment Choongjae began his first relationship all those years ago - Choongjae has only ever dated women.
The crippling pain of seeing Choongjae with someone else has always been the main focus for Sunho every time he was in a relationship. Sunho has never paid attention to the other factor, but it is glaring him in the face right now. Always has been.
Choongjae likes women.
And it dawns on Sunho that he has never, not once, witnessed Choongjae being interested in a man before. It has always been women for him.
Leaning back against the sofa, Sunho closes his eyes wearily.
He has harboured the idea - more than once - of trying to win Choongjae’s heart and woo him into falling in love with Sunho, regardless of their soulmate bond, so that they can finally be together. He had not known how to go about it before, having comfortably settled into the role of being Choongjae’s awkward-not-so-awkward-maybe friend for so many years, but now he can see that it was a hopeless idea to begin with.
Choongjae will not fall for Sunho. Not like this.
That train of thought leads to another unexpected insight that night - Sunho does not know his own sexuality.
Swallowing, he tries to remember the years before he met Choongjae, but it is all a blur. His preteens and earliest teens had been energetic days, when Sunho was more concerned with getting started on fulfilling his dreams than pursuing love. There had not been crushes - and then Choongjae had just waltzed into his life and turned everything upside down.
From the moment his soulmate bond had awakened inside him, no other man or woman have crossed his thoughts since. His heart, mind and soul have revolved solely around Choongjae from the beginning.
With a groan, Sunho gets up and prepares to leave, feeling suffocated.
To his surprise, Choongjae notices the movement through his state of inebriation.
‘You’re leaving?’ he slurs at him, raising his head from the dining table.
Sunho pauses and looks back at him. Minwoo is snoring on Choongjae’s shoulder, Pilkyo and Eric are sitting opposite him at the table, almost knocked out themselves, and Dongwan is nowhere to be seen. Quite possibly he had fallen off his chair beyond Sunho’s line of vision.
‘Don’t go,’ says Choongjae, blinking miserably at him.
‘I’ve always been here,’ returns Sunho quietly. ‘I always will be.’ He turns to leave, but stops again. ‘Minwoo hyung is right, you know.’
Choongjae blinks at him and Sunho is pretty sure he will not remember any of this come morning.
‘You have someone waiting for you. And that person will always wait for you, until the day you realise. But they can’t make you recognise them.’
‘Sunho-yah…’ It has been a long time since Choongjae had called him by his given name.
‘You have someone who loves you and wants you so much it hurts … you only need to say the word.’ Biting down on his lip, Sunho leaves the apartment.
The next time they meet for a show recording, Choongjae makes no indication of having any memory of that night. Sunho is not surprised, but it does not lessen any his urge to punch something.
~***~
Shinhwa has one last farewell after their tenth anniversary concert; a small intimate gathering just between the six of them, haphazardly thrown together at Eric’s place with hastily bought beers, fried chicken and heaps of junk food.
They do not waste their breath on obvious things like ‘This is not the end’ or ‘We’ll come back, we promised’ or even ‘We’ll stay in touch’. Those are actualities taken as read and they spend the night the way they always do, with video games, random dance-offs, drinking competitions and taking a bunch of pictures they will regret once sobriety returns.
Despite the laughter and the madness, Sunho knows they are all at the same crossroad he is: caught between joy and melancholy, looking towards a necessary but uncertain future where they do not know when they will actually come back together again. They will, without a doubt; but how far down the road that moment is, none of them knows.
Somewhere in the deep hours of the morning, Dongwan slurs from where he is sprawled half on Eric and half on the floor, ‘Get your shit together, all of you.’
‘The hell you talkin’ about, man?’ groans Minwoo from the other side of the room, where he is on the sofa, using Sunho as a footrest.
‘This hiatus,’ says Dongwan loudly, waving a limp arm in the air. ‘Use this chance to get your shit together. Your lives and your problems and your shit and -’
The rest of his words are drowned in the laughter that erupts from all of them.
‘Yah,’ says Eric, poking Dongwan’s head nestled on his stomach. ‘Forget about us. You just focus on not getting thumped when you enter the military.’
‘That goes for all of us,’ grunts Dongwan back, digging the back of his head deeper into Eric’s abs in revenge. ‘And you’re the weakest of us all, Mun Junghyuk. Sure you can make it out of the army alive?’
‘You wanna die before you’re enlisted even?’
Sunho laughs with the rest of them. His head is fuzzy from the alcohol, but he is still sober in comparison to his hyungs.
As if having read his thoughts, Choongjae suddenly pipes up from where he is curled up on an armchair, ‘Forget military service, you hyungs will be lucky if you don’t die from hangovers first thing tomorrow morning.’
Sunho laughs harder at that, even more when the older members immediately begin to grumble.
‘Hey, I’m just saying,’ says Choongjae obnoxiously when Pilkyo rouses himself from his stupor long enough to throw a poorly aimed cushion at his face. ‘It’s not my fault you guys can’t hold your liquor. Well, not me and Andy’s fault,’ he amends with a quick grin at their youngest member.
Sunho grins back amiably and mimics exchanging high fives with Choongjae across the room amidst the loud complaints from the other members. With a grunt, Pilkyo turns over on the floor and goes back to sleep.
‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ whines Minwoo, kicking lightly at Sunho’s thigh, ‘the both of you have amazing alcohol tolerance. We’ve heard it all before. Go give yourselves a cookie, why don’t you.’
‘You know what, I’mma do just that,’ replies Choongjae brightly and leaps up from his armchair. ‘I know exactly where Eric hyung hides his stash. Want some cookies, Andy?’
‘Yah, don’t you dare,’ yells Eric from the floor as Choongjae makes a dash for his kitchen, but the combined weight of Dongwan and intoxication are too heavy for him to fight off and he remains where he is.
He continues to grumble in a low slur when Choongjae returns, holding up a large packet in victory.
‘Wow, chocolate chip cookies, Eric hyung?’ he drawls as he flops down on the floor by Sunho’s feet. ‘Can you get any more American?’
With a snort, Sunho pushes Minwoo’s feet off his lap and slides off the sofa to sit beside Choongjae, eagerly reaching for the snacks.
Eric grouses something that translates into defeat and soon falls silent, probably dozing off at last. Minwoo begins to snore softly and tranquillity fills the air as Sunho and Choongjae dig into the cookies in silence, needing no more words.
They finish off the whole packet in record time and Choongjae chuckles. ‘I should’ve brought out Eric hyung’s second hidden packet, but I was being generous.’
Sunho shrugs with a small smile. ‘Eh, it’s enough. Anymore and my teeth will rot.’
Choongjae hums and they fall back into peaceful silence for a while. Sunho basks in the placidness of that moment, keeping his mind blank and not thinking about their future or the perpetual ache inside him at Choongjae’s close presence. For now, he is simply happy to be there, beside the man who is his everything and surrounded by the men who have been part of his family for more than a decade.
The peace is broken by Choongjae, who suddenly says in barely more than a whisper, ‘I’m scared…’
Sunho looks around, taken aback.
With a low chuckle, Choongjae hangs his head. ‘I’m scared about the future. This -’ he indicates Shinhwa with a wave of his arm ‘- has been my life for so long, I don’t know how I can even begin to be alone…’
Sunho bites his lip, understanding his fear all too well. ‘It’s not forever,’ he says quietly.
‘I know,’ murmurs Choongjae. ‘I know we’ll make it. I know we’ll stand on stage together again. But not knowing when or how long it will be, or what I’ll be doing in that time … it scares me.’
Sunho is quiet for a long time, just watching Choongjae, wishing he can take him in his arms and chase all his fears away.
‘Me, too,’ he finally whispers. ‘All of us.’ And he downs a half-empty bottle of soju standing on the coffee table to quell the sudden emotions that rise like tidal waves in his heart.
As he lowers the empty bottle from his lips, Choongjae returns to the kitchen, muttering something about getting water. Sunho looks after him, his fingers clenched around the neck of the bottle. Choongjae’s revelation had just driven it home that for the next - three years? four? five? - they will not be Shinhwa. Not exactly.
They will handle some solo activities probably, but above all, they will enter military service one by one. All of them will fend for themselves until they have dealt with everything that needs to be sorted out, before they can return as Shinhwa again.
They will, of course, keep in some form of contact with each other, but Sunho knows it is only wishful thinking to hope that they will meet often. They would be lucky if all six of them could gather at one place even once a year after tonight.
The next few years of his life without Shinhwa … without Eric, Minwoo, Dongwan and Pilkyo, and all their shenanigans together…
Without Choongjae.
The soju bottle slips from his fingers to clunk dully on the carpeted floor and Sunho’s limbs move almost of their own accord; next thing he knows, he is standing on the threshold of the kitchen, staring feverishly at Choongjae.
Choongjae meets Sunho’s intense gaze and furrows his brows in concern. Lowering his glass of water to the sink, he begins to walk over, a question half-formed on his lips,
‘Hey, you feeling alrig -?’
The rest of his words are lost in Sunho’s mouth.
Choongjae makes a noise that might have been of surprise - might have been a protest - but it is all lost as Sunho slides one hand around his neck, burying his fingers in thick unruly hair and holding Choongjae’s head down as Sunho kisses him with everything he has. His other arm winds tight around Choongjae’s waist, pulling him flush against Sunho’s body with not a hair’s breadth between them and, in that moment, Sunho’s entire world rights itself.
Choongjae tastes like beer and chocolate. He tastes like golden drops of sunlight on the first morning of spring and like the scorch of lightning in the heart of a storm. He tastes like salvation in its purest form and like every dark thought Sunho has ever had.
He tastes like fate.
‘A-Andy,’ he gasps against Sunho’s lips, tilting his head back to speak. ‘Y-you - are you drunk -?’
Is he? Maybe he is. He is not thinking straight. It does not matter right now. With a soft grunt of discontent, Sunho pulls Choongjae back to him. He kisses his parted lips with wild abandon, notes the way Choongjae catches his breath when he bites down on his lower lip and sucks it into his mouth, commits Choongjae’s muffled whimper to memory as he slides his tongue into his warm mouth, teasing and curious and demanding all at once.
Sunho can feel it now, how their soulmate bond sings and resonates between them. He feels the universe wrap them in that celestial embrace he had first felt the day they had met, sees starbursts and lights play out behind his eyelids, and feels the gaping void in his soul filling and reaching completion.
How do you not feel this? He wonders as he caresses Choongjae’s back, vaguely aware that the other man is resting his hands limply on Sunho’s shoulders, not pushing him away.
How can you not recognise me? Recognise this?
He does not want it to stop. He wants to stay like this forever, to kiss Choongjae, to breathe him in and make love to him. To complete him, them, for what they are to each other.
How can you still not know?
With one last lingering kiss, chaste and tender this time, to lips soft and pliant under his, Sunho slowly draws away.
Choongjae’s eyes are a dark vortex of unfathomable emotions. Lips parted, hands still suspended where they had been resting on Sunho’s shoulders, he stares at the younger man in frozen shock … and something else.
Sunho searches his eyes, wondering with dwindling hope if things had finally fallen into place. The frozen look in Choongjae’s eyes does not change, but it is not the recognition of a soulmate. Sunho will know that look anywhere - has seen it countless times in the visions that haunt him - but this is not it.
Choongjae, whatever is going on inside his head right now, still does not know.
His heart sinks, heavy with shattered hopes and despair. He feels like he should not be surprised, but the devastation is crushing.
It takes a moment to pull himself together, to take a deep breath and crack a dopey smile at Choongjae. ‘I’ll miss ya for the next few years,’ he says, deliberately slurring his words a little. If it will make things easier for Choongjae to believe that Sunho had been drunk, he is willing to do it.
With a vague wave, he mutters, ‘G’night, Jin-ah …’ and ambles out of the kitchen.
Sunho curls up on the floor next to Pilkyo under a blanket and squeezes his eyes shut, listening to the heavy thumps of his heart. Eventually, he hears Choongjae come back and the dip of the armchair when he sits down, but Sunho does not open his eyes.
He waits a long time for sleep to come and, until he finally dozes off, he does not hear Choongjae move again.
~***~
The next day when the members finally stir awake around noon, Sunho goes full steam ahead with his façade of having been drunk the night before.
He wakes up with a “hangover”, accentuated with a few well-timed groans of pain as he massages his temples; and the first thing he mumbles, keeping his voice thick and sluggish, while squinting around is,
‘The hell happened last night? I dreamed I was kissing a troll.’
Laughter greets his words, followed immediately by hushed groans of pain as the rest of the members regret the amount of alcohol they had chugged the previous night.
All except for Choongjae, who Sunho abruptly notices is still in his armchair, with lips drawn in a thin line and swollen eyes bespeaking a sleepless night. He gazes back wordlessly at Sunho, expression impossible to read.
Sunho pauses, thinking back to that moment when he had kissed Choongjae for the very first time, after years and years of dreaming about it.
It is the strangest feeling in the world to simultaneously regret something so wholly and not regret it at all.
But he does not drop his hangover act. It is better this way, he tells himself. Better for Choongjae to believe his actions last night had stemmed from the influence of alcohol, because as long as Choongjae does not feel their soulmate bond, there is no other explanation he can give.
Not without messing up their relationship anyway.
Sunho would rather have Choongjae like this, as a mere colleague and friend, than not have him at all.
When the members finally gather outside Eric’s apartment to bid their final farewell before officially commencing their hiatus, Pilkyo finally says aloud what none of them had voiced before:
‘This - this is not the end for us.’
For a moment, they take in the words sombrely, allowing their true feelings free reign. Then they wave away his words with laughter and playful banter.
‘Yah! We all know that, idiot.’
‘Thanks a lot, sir captain of the Obvious ship.’
‘Speak for yourself, I ain’t ever coming back to you again, Jung Pilkyo.’
‘Then I call dibs on him!’
‘Ugh, get away from me, I don’t want any of you!’
‘Hyesung hyung, are those tears in your eyes? Are you crying?’
‘You wanna die?!’
‘Aww, group hug, anyone?’
‘Eric has a death wish - Ow! Don’t hit me!’
‘Keep in touch, you punks.’
That is how they part ways. With jovial smiles, playful shoves, a few choice swear words and a hidden tear or two, they walk away to enter the long interlude of their lives.
On the way, Sunho says one last farewell to the person he will miss most, above anyone else.
‘See you around … Choongjae-yah.’
It is the first time that he has ever, in complete sobriety, addressed Choongjae by his given name.
Choongjae stops in his tracks and looks over his shoulder. Sunho waits, wearing an easy smile that hides the wrenching feeling in his gut and how his heart is already missing his soulmate so much that it is a tangible ache.
Five seconds pass. The look in Choongjae’s eyes is unlike any Sunho has seen before.
‘See you,’ he says at last, without offering a smile.
Sunho’s heart sinks. With a short nod, he turns and walks away, numb and hollow.
‘See you around … Sunho …’
The sound of his name - how long has it been? - brings back a faint smile to his lips. Then Choongjae is turning away and Sunho keeps walking towards his uncertain future.
~***~
For four years, Sunho carries the weight of Shinhwa’s memory on his shoulders.
They are not yet over, but they are not together and the decade that they have spent as one - even longer, counting their training - already feels like a past life that clings to his ankles as he tries to go about his life.
They call each other now and then, and those who manage to scavenge some free time meet up sporadically for drinks, but most of the time, their communication is limited to Kakao and group chats. Never has Sunho been so thankful for technologically as he scrolls through their messages and laughs quietly to himself on lonely nights.
The four years become a long blur of solo activities, management and training of his own groups, and inevitably, military life. He challenges all of it head on, immersing himself in the new pace of his life so that it leaves no room for other thoughts.
He succeeds at it, most of the time.
But it never really goes away, the loneliness. He has lived too long as one sixth of an entity, as part of something that works in perfect tandem only when it is operated by six souls, and now he cannot get used to working alone. The longest he had been separated from them before had been a year - a dark era of his past in which his thoughts had been solely focussed on his mother - and not even that had entirely prepared him for this.
Simmering beneath it all is the other loneliness; the one that leaves his entire soul numb and in anguish at the same time. Sunho had gotten used to it while they were together, but now with this clear cut separation, the complete lack of his soulmate’s presence assaults him anew.
How has he lived with this for all these years? Sunho wonders sometimes as he lies awake at night, his body drained but mind buzzing.
How does anyone?
For Sunho is quite certain there must be other soulmate couples out there, some who have succeeded and some who are stuck like him. But like how he cannot ever talk about it - for what proof does he have to show for this awareness? - no one else seems to talk about it, either. It is something cosmic and beyond understanding that is simply accepted, and perhaps only soulmates who have recognised their counterparts ever acknowledge it out loud, to each other.
The only solace for Sunho is the one filtered through his visions, these glimpses into his other lives that have never ceased over the years.
The visions show him that somewhere out there, beyond reach and reason, he has a life - several lives - where fate is kind and he is with his soulmate as they were always meant to be.
They show him that somewhere out there, he is living lives reversed where it his soulmate who is suffering in silence, waiting with aching heart and soul for him to recognise their bond, but he remains oblivious.
And they show him that crueller fates are at work out there, where there are lives in which he has never met his soulmate. Some lives where his soulmate bond has awakened but he has never met him, or some lives where it remains dormant and he carries on with life, never knowing why there is a part of himself deep within that feels empty and hollow.
Out there are lives where his infinite selves - and Choongjae’s infinite selves - are suffering worse than what he is going through here, in this life. At least here, he knows his soulmate, has met him, has been close with him for so long…
Sunho tries to take comfort in that.
But then he wonders if it would have been less painful if his bond had never awakened at all.
And so Sunho continues to trudge forward, carrying the weight of Shinhwa’s memory on shoulders he refuses to hunch, and his unrequited devotion to Park Choongjae in a heart that refuses to harden.
~***~
It is like they had never parted.
The first time all six of them gather after their hiatus for the final preparations of their long-awaited comeback, their first greeting is comprised of uncertain grins bordering on shyness.
The awkward moment lasts some four seconds. Then,
‘So … you punks got all your shit together or did you just self-destruct in the past few years?’ Dongwan asks loudly with a shit-eating grin.
It is just the right spark to ignite their laughter, and then they are walking forward to greet each other properly, all loud voices and butt slaps and just chaos.
‘I’ve never been happier to see your face. Man, you look as ugly as ever.’
‘Not one of you assholes wrote to me in the army!’
‘You think you were the only one in the army?!’
‘We spoke on Kakao all the time.’
‘Dude, your new haircut is having adverse effects on my guts, I feel pukey.’
‘Your face is making me pukey.’
‘Chatting on Kakao is not the same as sending letters!’
‘Get your girlfriend to send you handwritten letters with little hearts on th - oh wait, I forgot, you’ve never had one.’
‘Yah, stop choking him! You can kill him after we’ve had our comeback.’
Surrounded by his five hyungs - a little older and a little wiser (maybe) than before, but just as loud and rambunctious - Sunho has never felt more at home. He feels the heavy weight slip off his shoulders, washed away by their words and their laughter; their love and their presence.
This is what he has endured four long years for.
He greets them all one by one, hugging all the eldest members first, because he will always need a moment to prepare his resolve for Choongjae. But when the moment arrives, Sunho does not hesitate; he strides over to the tall man currently in Minwoo’s embrace, urged on by his conscious desires as much as his soulmate bond, and disregarding Choongjae’s look of surprise at his approach, wraps his arms firmly around him.
‘Hey,’ he says simply, tilting his head slightly to breathe in Choongjae’s scent. Fighting the urge to bury his face in his neck, Sunho tightens his arms around him instead, revelling in the joy of being able to actually feel him again.
Choongjae’s response comes a few beats too late. ‘Hey…’ It takes a couple more seconds before he returns the hug, looping his arms around Sunho more loosely than he used to.
Sunho notices the change, minute though it is, but remains where he is. ‘I’ve missed you.’
Again, that slight pause. ‘Yeah … me, too.’
Pangs of uncertainty trickle into his elation and Sunho finally pulls back, carefully looking up at Choongjae. The man is wearing a small smile, but there is something fixed about it. His eyes are warm like before, but there is something else there, too - something guarded and intense in the way he is staring at Sunho right now.
Breath hitching a little, Sunho wonders for a moment if Choongjae recognises their soulmate bond, but then pushes the thought away. Choongjae is not looking at him in that light - he would know in a heartbeat if it was - but Sunho cannot for the life of him put his finger on what has changed.
A sudden thought occurs to him and Sunho freezes, locked in that staring contest with Choongjae. It cannot be…
It has been four years already. And he had pretended to be drunk that night after … after what had happened. Surely, Choongjae is still not thinking of that, is he?
And if he is … what does that mean?
The moment is broken by Minwoo calling all of them to gather around to finally discuss work, and Sunho and Choongjae move towards the rest, not saying anything else.
Sunho is at a loss. There is something suddenly different with Choongjae and he has no idea what. Except that it is to do with him. Choongjae is not acting strange with anyone else.
Has he really ruined the stability of their friendship - hard fought and hard won - with the whimsical mistake of a single night?
A single kiss?
Yet, he still cannot bring himself to regret it. If time were to rewind four years back into the past, Sunho knows he would still kiss Choongjae again that night.
Swallowing, he pushes the matter to the back of his mind. In time, he will figure out the problem and win back that familiarity with Choongjae again.
It had taken him close to ten years since their first meeting to reach that point with Choongjae and he will not stand to lose it.
~***~
Choongjae’s behaviour is puzzling.
The next time they meet face to face for their Shinhwa activities, he gets that odd look in his eyes again - so blatantly obvious - and he falters for a moment before he returns Sunho’s greeting.
He acts completely normal after that.
There is no hesitation behind his smiles, his jokes or his touches around Sunho after all the members have gathered. It is like his strange behaviour from earlier had never happened.
Sunho does not know what to make of it, but he welcomes that familiar closeness with Choongjae again. Though perfectly aware that something is clearly amiss, he is certainly not one to complain about the chances for intimacy with his soulmate. Exchanging banters with Choongjae has never felt so good before, and Sunho is pleased - and more than a little relieved - when Choongjae suggests they rehearse their lines for Venus together, like how they used to before.
Within a few days, Choongjae begins to initiate more skinship with Sunho as well. Brief touches on the shoulder transcend to hugs again. Eventually, a surprise kiss or two to the cheek follow too, though Sunho expertly laughs them off as normal displays of affection on camera. He is gratified to know that no matter what has changed between them, it has not driven a wedge between them ... that Choongjae is still making the effort to maintain their closeness.
But he looks differently at Sunho now.
Sunho just cannot put his finger on what it is.
~***~
If there is one thing Sunho and Choongjae have in common, it is that neither of them likes to burden other people with the problems that occur in their personal lives.
Sunho has been aware of it for nearly fifteen years now, but it has never struck him as deeply as it does the day Shinhwa finally spill their darkest individual pasts on national television.
It is an arduous task, revisiting the tormenting pain of pasts left half-buried in the sands of time, and yet, it is also one of the most liberating. There is a strange sense of freedom in finally revealing the truth - sans the most private details - of their harshest, dreariest, worst situations to the public, despite the long years that have already passed since then.
It is during the show that Sunho appreciates fully just how much he and Choongjae hold out on sharing their burdens with others. He listens numbly as Choongjae narrates, with an attempt at his usual laidback attitude, the period of his paranoia and depression. Choongjae does not visit the causes behind that particular period, but Sunho - like the public - has heard of the scandals, wrongful accusations, that Choongjae had gone through.
His heart grows heavier as he listens to Choongjae's sombre tale of how he had lived and handled those months, drowning and trying to claw his way out of a ditch he had not deserved. Despite being aware of the scandals, this is Sunho's first time hearing about the emotional trauma that had ensured.
Till that moment, Sunho has never more deeply regretted not having been able to be there for Choongjae.
But he had had his own problems then.
As if on cue, one of the show hosts directs the topic to Sunho, bringing up the rumor of his alleged "suicidal period". Sunho grits his teeth, hardens his resolve, and begins to recount the truth behind his one-year hiatus from Shinhwa for the very first time.
Choongjae is not the only one who keeps his burdens as painful secrets.
Sunho sees the reactions of the members in his peripheral vision as he speaks of tending to his ailing mother, of struggling with mounting hospital bills, and of suffering through insomnia with increasing medication that had born the rumours of his suicidal thoughts. His hyungs’ eyes are downcast and Dongwan silently intertwines their fingers together as Sunho recalls the tears and helplessness of a past he has kept hidden for over ten years.
It has been so long since then, but the pain is still as fresh as the tears in his eyes as he admits, in not as many words, how much he had missed being Shinhwa’s Andy even for that one year.
'This might be the members' first time hearing about this,' he confesses and is met with solemn murmurs of confirmation from his hyungs.
He swallows and leans back after he is done. There is a lump in his throat and his eyes are still prickling, but he feels lighter inside; as if finally laying his pains bare before his brothers has somehow cleansed him of the burden.
The talk goes on and he listens in silence to the hardships of other members. Some tales he already knows and some he hears for the first time, but ultimately, he is glad to learn that all of them had not been left alone like he had been, that they had had other members to lean on and cheer them up during their struggles.
What takes him by surprise is right before the show's end when the hosts ask them to express who they're most grateful for, and Choongjae speaks up, his voice choked,
'I feel sorry towards Andy.'
Sunho looks round at him and is met briefly with dark eyes filled with tears.
'He suffered so much during that time, yet I couldn't help him because of my own problems,' Choongjae continues quietly, his voice breaking a little. 'I really regret it. I feel really apologetic towards him.'
So do I, Sunho thinks to himself, swallowing. He had not been able to be there for Choongjae as well.
'I'm recently trying to take better care of him,' Choongjae adds, barely able to meet Sunho's gaze the few times he glances in his direction. 'Because I really regret it. Listening to him just now and knowing about it all so late...'
Sunho is feeling slightly choked himself, deeply touched by his soulmate's feelings. He wants to reassure Choongjae, but he cannot speak and is soon beaten to it by the hosts and other members who comfort Choongjae.
When it is his turn, he answers simply and truthfully that he is grateful to all of them. His brothers who had overcome their ugliest selves and harshest struggles, the brothers who had welcomed him back with open arms and no questions asked, the brothers who make him feel better about himself everyday - he is thankful to them all.
NEXT: Part Three
Pairing: Junjin/Andy, JinDy
Genre: Romance, Angst, Friendship, Fluff
Warnings: Some coarse language, sensuality
Rating: PG-13
Summary: It is the single most mystifying and terrifying moment of his life - and that is how he will always remember the first time he met his soulmate in this world.
Previous: Part One
STARBURST - PART TWO
Sunho cannot have Choongjae - not in the natural course of things.
That reality check slaps Sunho in the face some nine years after their debut and four girlfriends later. Choongjae’s girlfriends.
Choongjae is not the type to talk about his personal problems much, but after his last breakup, he speaks about it once on a drunken night with Shinhwa in Minwoo’s apartment.
He is the sort to take relationships very seriously. Sunho has always known this, known from the moment Choongjae took his first girlfriend - his first love - and given her his everything while Sunho fell apart inside. All of his following relationships over the years had followed the same pattern, the same seriousness, though they did not work out.
He laments about it that night, drunk and on the verge of tears.
‘Why does it never work out? What am I doing wrong?’
‘I feel ya, man,’ says Minwoo, also tipsy. He slaps Choongjae on the shoulder in brotherly encouragement. ‘But you’ll meet the one for you someday. You’ll see. Have faith, brother!’ And he throws his arms around Choongjae, who is slumped over the dining table with the rest of the other drunk members.
Sunho sits in a sort of frozen stupor on Minwoo’s sofa, far enough to escape having to offer his own comfort to Choongjae, but close enough to hear every word.
It is then that he realises what he has been blind to from the moment Choongjae began his first relationship all those years ago - Choongjae has only ever dated women.
The crippling pain of seeing Choongjae with someone else has always been the main focus for Sunho every time he was in a relationship. Sunho has never paid attention to the other factor, but it is glaring him in the face right now. Always has been.
Choongjae likes women.
And it dawns on Sunho that he has never, not once, witnessed Choongjae being interested in a man before. It has always been women for him.
Leaning back against the sofa, Sunho closes his eyes wearily.
He has harboured the idea - more than once - of trying to win Choongjae’s heart and woo him into falling in love with Sunho, regardless of their soulmate bond, so that they can finally be together. He had not known how to go about it before, having comfortably settled into the role of being Choongjae’s awkward-not-so-awkward-maybe friend for so many years, but now he can see that it was a hopeless idea to begin with.
Choongjae will not fall for Sunho. Not like this.
That train of thought leads to another unexpected insight that night - Sunho does not know his own sexuality.
Swallowing, he tries to remember the years before he met Choongjae, but it is all a blur. His preteens and earliest teens had been energetic days, when Sunho was more concerned with getting started on fulfilling his dreams than pursuing love. There had not been crushes - and then Choongjae had just waltzed into his life and turned everything upside down.
From the moment his soulmate bond had awakened inside him, no other man or woman have crossed his thoughts since. His heart, mind and soul have revolved solely around Choongjae from the beginning.
With a groan, Sunho gets up and prepares to leave, feeling suffocated.
To his surprise, Choongjae notices the movement through his state of inebriation.
‘You’re leaving?’ he slurs at him, raising his head from the dining table.
Sunho pauses and looks back at him. Minwoo is snoring on Choongjae’s shoulder, Pilkyo and Eric are sitting opposite him at the table, almost knocked out themselves, and Dongwan is nowhere to be seen. Quite possibly he had fallen off his chair beyond Sunho’s line of vision.
‘Don’t go,’ says Choongjae, blinking miserably at him.
‘I’ve always been here,’ returns Sunho quietly. ‘I always will be.’ He turns to leave, but stops again. ‘Minwoo hyung is right, you know.’
Choongjae blinks at him and Sunho is pretty sure he will not remember any of this come morning.
‘You have someone waiting for you. And that person will always wait for you, until the day you realise. But they can’t make you recognise them.’
‘Sunho-yah…’ It has been a long time since Choongjae had called him by his given name.
‘You have someone who loves you and wants you so much it hurts … you only need to say the word.’ Biting down on his lip, Sunho leaves the apartment.
The next time they meet for a show recording, Choongjae makes no indication of having any memory of that night. Sunho is not surprised, but it does not lessen any his urge to punch something.
~***~
Shinhwa has one last farewell after their tenth anniversary concert; a small intimate gathering just between the six of them, haphazardly thrown together at Eric’s place with hastily bought beers, fried chicken and heaps of junk food.
They do not waste their breath on obvious things like ‘This is not the end’ or ‘We’ll come back, we promised’ or even ‘We’ll stay in touch’. Those are actualities taken as read and they spend the night the way they always do, with video games, random dance-offs, drinking competitions and taking a bunch of pictures they will regret once sobriety returns.
Despite the laughter and the madness, Sunho knows they are all at the same crossroad he is: caught between joy and melancholy, looking towards a necessary but uncertain future where they do not know when they will actually come back together again. They will, without a doubt; but how far down the road that moment is, none of them knows.
Somewhere in the deep hours of the morning, Dongwan slurs from where he is sprawled half on Eric and half on the floor, ‘Get your shit together, all of you.’
‘The hell you talkin’ about, man?’ groans Minwoo from the other side of the room, where he is on the sofa, using Sunho as a footrest.
‘This hiatus,’ says Dongwan loudly, waving a limp arm in the air. ‘Use this chance to get your shit together. Your lives and your problems and your shit and -’
The rest of his words are drowned in the laughter that erupts from all of them.
‘Yah,’ says Eric, poking Dongwan’s head nestled on his stomach. ‘Forget about us. You just focus on not getting thumped when you enter the military.’
‘That goes for all of us,’ grunts Dongwan back, digging the back of his head deeper into Eric’s abs in revenge. ‘And you’re the weakest of us all, Mun Junghyuk. Sure you can make it out of the army alive?’
‘You wanna die before you’re enlisted even?’
Sunho laughs with the rest of them. His head is fuzzy from the alcohol, but he is still sober in comparison to his hyungs.
As if having read his thoughts, Choongjae suddenly pipes up from where he is curled up on an armchair, ‘Forget military service, you hyungs will be lucky if you don’t die from hangovers first thing tomorrow morning.’
Sunho laughs harder at that, even more when the older members immediately begin to grumble.
‘Hey, I’m just saying,’ says Choongjae obnoxiously when Pilkyo rouses himself from his stupor long enough to throw a poorly aimed cushion at his face. ‘It’s not my fault you guys can’t hold your liquor. Well, not me and Andy’s fault,’ he amends with a quick grin at their youngest member.
Sunho grins back amiably and mimics exchanging high fives with Choongjae across the room amidst the loud complaints from the other members. With a grunt, Pilkyo turns over on the floor and goes back to sleep.
‘Yeah, yeah, yeah,’ whines Minwoo, kicking lightly at Sunho’s thigh, ‘the both of you have amazing alcohol tolerance. We’ve heard it all before. Go give yourselves a cookie, why don’t you.’
‘You know what, I’mma do just that,’ replies Choongjae brightly and leaps up from his armchair. ‘I know exactly where Eric hyung hides his stash. Want some cookies, Andy?’
‘Yah, don’t you dare,’ yells Eric from the floor as Choongjae makes a dash for his kitchen, but the combined weight of Dongwan and intoxication are too heavy for him to fight off and he remains where he is.
He continues to grumble in a low slur when Choongjae returns, holding up a large packet in victory.
‘Wow, chocolate chip cookies, Eric hyung?’ he drawls as he flops down on the floor by Sunho’s feet. ‘Can you get any more American?’
With a snort, Sunho pushes Minwoo’s feet off his lap and slides off the sofa to sit beside Choongjae, eagerly reaching for the snacks.
Eric grouses something that translates into defeat and soon falls silent, probably dozing off at last. Minwoo begins to snore softly and tranquillity fills the air as Sunho and Choongjae dig into the cookies in silence, needing no more words.
They finish off the whole packet in record time and Choongjae chuckles. ‘I should’ve brought out Eric hyung’s second hidden packet, but I was being generous.’
Sunho shrugs with a small smile. ‘Eh, it’s enough. Anymore and my teeth will rot.’
Choongjae hums and they fall back into peaceful silence for a while. Sunho basks in the placidness of that moment, keeping his mind blank and not thinking about their future or the perpetual ache inside him at Choongjae’s close presence. For now, he is simply happy to be there, beside the man who is his everything and surrounded by the men who have been part of his family for more than a decade.
The peace is broken by Choongjae, who suddenly says in barely more than a whisper, ‘I’m scared…’
Sunho looks around, taken aback.
With a low chuckle, Choongjae hangs his head. ‘I’m scared about the future. This -’ he indicates Shinhwa with a wave of his arm ‘- has been my life for so long, I don’t know how I can even begin to be alone…’
Sunho bites his lip, understanding his fear all too well. ‘It’s not forever,’ he says quietly.
‘I know,’ murmurs Choongjae. ‘I know we’ll make it. I know we’ll stand on stage together again. But not knowing when or how long it will be, or what I’ll be doing in that time … it scares me.’
Sunho is quiet for a long time, just watching Choongjae, wishing he can take him in his arms and chase all his fears away.
‘Me, too,’ he finally whispers. ‘All of us.’ And he downs a half-empty bottle of soju standing on the coffee table to quell the sudden emotions that rise like tidal waves in his heart.
As he lowers the empty bottle from his lips, Choongjae returns to the kitchen, muttering something about getting water. Sunho looks after him, his fingers clenched around the neck of the bottle. Choongjae’s revelation had just driven it home that for the next - three years? four? five? - they will not be Shinhwa. Not exactly.
They will handle some solo activities probably, but above all, they will enter military service one by one. All of them will fend for themselves until they have dealt with everything that needs to be sorted out, before they can return as Shinhwa again.
They will, of course, keep in some form of contact with each other, but Sunho knows it is only wishful thinking to hope that they will meet often. They would be lucky if all six of them could gather at one place even once a year after tonight.
The next few years of his life without Shinhwa … without Eric, Minwoo, Dongwan and Pilkyo, and all their shenanigans together…
Without Choongjae.
The soju bottle slips from his fingers to clunk dully on the carpeted floor and Sunho’s limbs move almost of their own accord; next thing he knows, he is standing on the threshold of the kitchen, staring feverishly at Choongjae.
Choongjae meets Sunho’s intense gaze and furrows his brows in concern. Lowering his glass of water to the sink, he begins to walk over, a question half-formed on his lips,
‘Hey, you feeling alrig -?’
The rest of his words are lost in Sunho’s mouth.
Choongjae makes a noise that might have been of surprise - might have been a protest - but it is all lost as Sunho slides one hand around his neck, burying his fingers in thick unruly hair and holding Choongjae’s head down as Sunho kisses him with everything he has. His other arm winds tight around Choongjae’s waist, pulling him flush against Sunho’s body with not a hair’s breadth between them and, in that moment, Sunho’s entire world rights itself.
Choongjae tastes like beer and chocolate. He tastes like golden drops of sunlight on the first morning of spring and like the scorch of lightning in the heart of a storm. He tastes like salvation in its purest form and like every dark thought Sunho has ever had.
He tastes like fate.
‘A-Andy,’ he gasps against Sunho’s lips, tilting his head back to speak. ‘Y-you - are you drunk -?’
Is he? Maybe he is. He is not thinking straight. It does not matter right now. With a soft grunt of discontent, Sunho pulls Choongjae back to him. He kisses his parted lips with wild abandon, notes the way Choongjae catches his breath when he bites down on his lower lip and sucks it into his mouth, commits Choongjae’s muffled whimper to memory as he slides his tongue into his warm mouth, teasing and curious and demanding all at once.
Sunho can feel it now, how their soulmate bond sings and resonates between them. He feels the universe wrap them in that celestial embrace he had first felt the day they had met, sees starbursts and lights play out behind his eyelids, and feels the gaping void in his soul filling and reaching completion.
How do you not feel this? He wonders as he caresses Choongjae’s back, vaguely aware that the other man is resting his hands limply on Sunho’s shoulders, not pushing him away.
How can you not recognise me? Recognise this?
He does not want it to stop. He wants to stay like this forever, to kiss Choongjae, to breathe him in and make love to him. To complete him, them, for what they are to each other.
How can you still not know?
With one last lingering kiss, chaste and tender this time, to lips soft and pliant under his, Sunho slowly draws away.
Choongjae’s eyes are a dark vortex of unfathomable emotions. Lips parted, hands still suspended where they had been resting on Sunho’s shoulders, he stares at the younger man in frozen shock … and something else.
Sunho searches his eyes, wondering with dwindling hope if things had finally fallen into place. The frozen look in Choongjae’s eyes does not change, but it is not the recognition of a soulmate. Sunho will know that look anywhere - has seen it countless times in the visions that haunt him - but this is not it.
Choongjae, whatever is going on inside his head right now, still does not know.
His heart sinks, heavy with shattered hopes and despair. He feels like he should not be surprised, but the devastation is crushing.
It takes a moment to pull himself together, to take a deep breath and crack a dopey smile at Choongjae. ‘I’ll miss ya for the next few years,’ he says, deliberately slurring his words a little. If it will make things easier for Choongjae to believe that Sunho had been drunk, he is willing to do it.
With a vague wave, he mutters, ‘G’night, Jin-ah …’ and ambles out of the kitchen.
Sunho curls up on the floor next to Pilkyo under a blanket and squeezes his eyes shut, listening to the heavy thumps of his heart. Eventually, he hears Choongjae come back and the dip of the armchair when he sits down, but Sunho does not open his eyes.
He waits a long time for sleep to come and, until he finally dozes off, he does not hear Choongjae move again.
~***~
The next day when the members finally stir awake around noon, Sunho goes full steam ahead with his façade of having been drunk the night before.
He wakes up with a “hangover”, accentuated with a few well-timed groans of pain as he massages his temples; and the first thing he mumbles, keeping his voice thick and sluggish, while squinting around is,
‘The hell happened last night? I dreamed I was kissing a troll.’
Laughter greets his words, followed immediately by hushed groans of pain as the rest of the members regret the amount of alcohol they had chugged the previous night.
All except for Choongjae, who Sunho abruptly notices is still in his armchair, with lips drawn in a thin line and swollen eyes bespeaking a sleepless night. He gazes back wordlessly at Sunho, expression impossible to read.
Sunho pauses, thinking back to that moment when he had kissed Choongjae for the very first time, after years and years of dreaming about it.
It is the strangest feeling in the world to simultaneously regret something so wholly and not regret it at all.
But he does not drop his hangover act. It is better this way, he tells himself. Better for Choongjae to believe his actions last night had stemmed from the influence of alcohol, because as long as Choongjae does not feel their soulmate bond, there is no other explanation he can give.
Not without messing up their relationship anyway.
Sunho would rather have Choongjae like this, as a mere colleague and friend, than not have him at all.
When the members finally gather outside Eric’s apartment to bid their final farewell before officially commencing their hiatus, Pilkyo finally says aloud what none of them had voiced before:
‘This - this is not the end for us.’
For a moment, they take in the words sombrely, allowing their true feelings free reign. Then they wave away his words with laughter and playful banter.
‘Yah! We all know that, idiot.’
‘Thanks a lot, sir captain of the Obvious ship.’
‘Speak for yourself, I ain’t ever coming back to you again, Jung Pilkyo.’
‘Then I call dibs on him!’
‘Ugh, get away from me, I don’t want any of you!’
‘Hyesung hyung, are those tears in your eyes? Are you crying?’
‘You wanna die?!’
‘Aww, group hug, anyone?’
‘Eric has a death wish - Ow! Don’t hit me!’
‘Keep in touch, you punks.’
That is how they part ways. With jovial smiles, playful shoves, a few choice swear words and a hidden tear or two, they walk away to enter the long interlude of their lives.
On the way, Sunho says one last farewell to the person he will miss most, above anyone else.
‘See you around … Choongjae-yah.’
It is the first time that he has ever, in complete sobriety, addressed Choongjae by his given name.
Choongjae stops in his tracks and looks over his shoulder. Sunho waits, wearing an easy smile that hides the wrenching feeling in his gut and how his heart is already missing his soulmate so much that it is a tangible ache.
Five seconds pass. The look in Choongjae’s eyes is unlike any Sunho has seen before.
‘See you,’ he says at last, without offering a smile.
Sunho’s heart sinks. With a short nod, he turns and walks away, numb and hollow.
‘See you around … Sunho …’
The sound of his name - how long has it been? - brings back a faint smile to his lips. Then Choongjae is turning away and Sunho keeps walking towards his uncertain future.
~***~
For four years, Sunho carries the weight of Shinhwa’s memory on his shoulders.
They are not yet over, but they are not together and the decade that they have spent as one - even longer, counting their training - already feels like a past life that clings to his ankles as he tries to go about his life.
They call each other now and then, and those who manage to scavenge some free time meet up sporadically for drinks, but most of the time, their communication is limited to Kakao and group chats. Never has Sunho been so thankful for technologically as he scrolls through their messages and laughs quietly to himself on lonely nights.
The four years become a long blur of solo activities, management and training of his own groups, and inevitably, military life. He challenges all of it head on, immersing himself in the new pace of his life so that it leaves no room for other thoughts.
He succeeds at it, most of the time.
But it never really goes away, the loneliness. He has lived too long as one sixth of an entity, as part of something that works in perfect tandem only when it is operated by six souls, and now he cannot get used to working alone. The longest he had been separated from them before had been a year - a dark era of his past in which his thoughts had been solely focussed on his mother - and not even that had entirely prepared him for this.
Simmering beneath it all is the other loneliness; the one that leaves his entire soul numb and in anguish at the same time. Sunho had gotten used to it while they were together, but now with this clear cut separation, the complete lack of his soulmate’s presence assaults him anew.
How has he lived with this for all these years? Sunho wonders sometimes as he lies awake at night, his body drained but mind buzzing.
How does anyone?
For Sunho is quite certain there must be other soulmate couples out there, some who have succeeded and some who are stuck like him. But like how he cannot ever talk about it - for what proof does he have to show for this awareness? - no one else seems to talk about it, either. It is something cosmic and beyond understanding that is simply accepted, and perhaps only soulmates who have recognised their counterparts ever acknowledge it out loud, to each other.
The only solace for Sunho is the one filtered through his visions, these glimpses into his other lives that have never ceased over the years.
The visions show him that somewhere out there, beyond reach and reason, he has a life - several lives - where fate is kind and he is with his soulmate as they were always meant to be.
They show him that somewhere out there, he is living lives reversed where it his soulmate who is suffering in silence, waiting with aching heart and soul for him to recognise their bond, but he remains oblivious.
And they show him that crueller fates are at work out there, where there are lives in which he has never met his soulmate. Some lives where his soulmate bond has awakened but he has never met him, or some lives where it remains dormant and he carries on with life, never knowing why there is a part of himself deep within that feels empty and hollow.
Out there are lives where his infinite selves - and Choongjae’s infinite selves - are suffering worse than what he is going through here, in this life. At least here, he knows his soulmate, has met him, has been close with him for so long…
Sunho tries to take comfort in that.
But then he wonders if it would have been less painful if his bond had never awakened at all.
And so Sunho continues to trudge forward, carrying the weight of Shinhwa’s memory on shoulders he refuses to hunch, and his unrequited devotion to Park Choongjae in a heart that refuses to harden.
~***~
It is like they had never parted.
The first time all six of them gather after their hiatus for the final preparations of their long-awaited comeback, their first greeting is comprised of uncertain grins bordering on shyness.
The awkward moment lasts some four seconds. Then,
‘So … you punks got all your shit together or did you just self-destruct in the past few years?’ Dongwan asks loudly with a shit-eating grin.
It is just the right spark to ignite their laughter, and then they are walking forward to greet each other properly, all loud voices and butt slaps and just chaos.
‘I’ve never been happier to see your face. Man, you look as ugly as ever.’
‘Not one of you assholes wrote to me in the army!’
‘You think you were the only one in the army?!’
‘We spoke on Kakao all the time.’
‘Dude, your new haircut is having adverse effects on my guts, I feel pukey.’
‘Your face is making me pukey.’
‘Chatting on Kakao is not the same as sending letters!’
‘Get your girlfriend to send you handwritten letters with little hearts on th - oh wait, I forgot, you’ve never had one.’
‘Yah, stop choking him! You can kill him after we’ve had our comeback.’
Surrounded by his five hyungs - a little older and a little wiser (maybe) than before, but just as loud and rambunctious - Sunho has never felt more at home. He feels the heavy weight slip off his shoulders, washed away by their words and their laughter; their love and their presence.
This is what he has endured four long years for.
He greets them all one by one, hugging all the eldest members first, because he will always need a moment to prepare his resolve for Choongjae. But when the moment arrives, Sunho does not hesitate; he strides over to the tall man currently in Minwoo’s embrace, urged on by his conscious desires as much as his soulmate bond, and disregarding Choongjae’s look of surprise at his approach, wraps his arms firmly around him.
‘Hey,’ he says simply, tilting his head slightly to breathe in Choongjae’s scent. Fighting the urge to bury his face in his neck, Sunho tightens his arms around him instead, revelling in the joy of being able to actually feel him again.
Choongjae’s response comes a few beats too late. ‘Hey…’ It takes a couple more seconds before he returns the hug, looping his arms around Sunho more loosely than he used to.
Sunho notices the change, minute though it is, but remains where he is. ‘I’ve missed you.’
Again, that slight pause. ‘Yeah … me, too.’
Pangs of uncertainty trickle into his elation and Sunho finally pulls back, carefully looking up at Choongjae. The man is wearing a small smile, but there is something fixed about it. His eyes are warm like before, but there is something else there, too - something guarded and intense in the way he is staring at Sunho right now.
Breath hitching a little, Sunho wonders for a moment if Choongjae recognises their soulmate bond, but then pushes the thought away. Choongjae is not looking at him in that light - he would know in a heartbeat if it was - but Sunho cannot for the life of him put his finger on what has changed.
A sudden thought occurs to him and Sunho freezes, locked in that staring contest with Choongjae. It cannot be…
It has been four years already. And he had pretended to be drunk that night after … after what had happened. Surely, Choongjae is still not thinking of that, is he?
And if he is … what does that mean?
The moment is broken by Minwoo calling all of them to gather around to finally discuss work, and Sunho and Choongjae move towards the rest, not saying anything else.
Sunho is at a loss. There is something suddenly different with Choongjae and he has no idea what. Except that it is to do with him. Choongjae is not acting strange with anyone else.
Has he really ruined the stability of their friendship - hard fought and hard won - with the whimsical mistake of a single night?
A single kiss?
Yet, he still cannot bring himself to regret it. If time were to rewind four years back into the past, Sunho knows he would still kiss Choongjae again that night.
Swallowing, he pushes the matter to the back of his mind. In time, he will figure out the problem and win back that familiarity with Choongjae again.
It had taken him close to ten years since their first meeting to reach that point with Choongjae and he will not stand to lose it.
~***~
Choongjae’s behaviour is puzzling.
The next time they meet face to face for their Shinhwa activities, he gets that odd look in his eyes again - so blatantly obvious - and he falters for a moment before he returns Sunho’s greeting.
He acts completely normal after that.
There is no hesitation behind his smiles, his jokes or his touches around Sunho after all the members have gathered. It is like his strange behaviour from earlier had never happened.
Sunho does not know what to make of it, but he welcomes that familiar closeness with Choongjae again. Though perfectly aware that something is clearly amiss, he is certainly not one to complain about the chances for intimacy with his soulmate. Exchanging banters with Choongjae has never felt so good before, and Sunho is pleased - and more than a little relieved - when Choongjae suggests they rehearse their lines for Venus together, like how they used to before.
Within a few days, Choongjae begins to initiate more skinship with Sunho as well. Brief touches on the shoulder transcend to hugs again. Eventually, a surprise kiss or two to the cheek follow too, though Sunho expertly laughs them off as normal displays of affection on camera. He is gratified to know that no matter what has changed between them, it has not driven a wedge between them ... that Choongjae is still making the effort to maintain their closeness.
But he looks differently at Sunho now.
Sunho just cannot put his finger on what it is.
~***~
If there is one thing Sunho and Choongjae have in common, it is that neither of them likes to burden other people with the problems that occur in their personal lives.
Sunho has been aware of it for nearly fifteen years now, but it has never struck him as deeply as it does the day Shinhwa finally spill their darkest individual pasts on national television.
It is an arduous task, revisiting the tormenting pain of pasts left half-buried in the sands of time, and yet, it is also one of the most liberating. There is a strange sense of freedom in finally revealing the truth - sans the most private details - of their harshest, dreariest, worst situations to the public, despite the long years that have already passed since then.
It is during the show that Sunho appreciates fully just how much he and Choongjae hold out on sharing their burdens with others. He listens numbly as Choongjae narrates, with an attempt at his usual laidback attitude, the period of his paranoia and depression. Choongjae does not visit the causes behind that particular period, but Sunho - like the public - has heard of the scandals, wrongful accusations, that Choongjae had gone through.
His heart grows heavier as he listens to Choongjae's sombre tale of how he had lived and handled those months, drowning and trying to claw his way out of a ditch he had not deserved. Despite being aware of the scandals, this is Sunho's first time hearing about the emotional trauma that had ensured.
Till that moment, Sunho has never more deeply regretted not having been able to be there for Choongjae.
But he had had his own problems then.
As if on cue, one of the show hosts directs the topic to Sunho, bringing up the rumor of his alleged "suicidal period". Sunho grits his teeth, hardens his resolve, and begins to recount the truth behind his one-year hiatus from Shinhwa for the very first time.
Choongjae is not the only one who keeps his burdens as painful secrets.
Sunho sees the reactions of the members in his peripheral vision as he speaks of tending to his ailing mother, of struggling with mounting hospital bills, and of suffering through insomnia with increasing medication that had born the rumours of his suicidal thoughts. His hyungs’ eyes are downcast and Dongwan silently intertwines their fingers together as Sunho recalls the tears and helplessness of a past he has kept hidden for over ten years.
It has been so long since then, but the pain is still as fresh as the tears in his eyes as he admits, in not as many words, how much he had missed being Shinhwa’s Andy even for that one year.
'This might be the members' first time hearing about this,' he confesses and is met with solemn murmurs of confirmation from his hyungs.
He swallows and leans back after he is done. There is a lump in his throat and his eyes are still prickling, but he feels lighter inside; as if finally laying his pains bare before his brothers has somehow cleansed him of the burden.
The talk goes on and he listens in silence to the hardships of other members. Some tales he already knows and some he hears for the first time, but ultimately, he is glad to learn that all of them had not been left alone like he had been, that they had had other members to lean on and cheer them up during their struggles.
What takes him by surprise is right before the show's end when the hosts ask them to express who they're most grateful for, and Choongjae speaks up, his voice choked,
'I feel sorry towards Andy.'
Sunho looks round at him and is met briefly with dark eyes filled with tears.
'He suffered so much during that time, yet I couldn't help him because of my own problems,' Choongjae continues quietly, his voice breaking a little. 'I really regret it. I feel really apologetic towards him.'
So do I, Sunho thinks to himself, swallowing. He had not been able to be there for Choongjae as well.
'I'm recently trying to take better care of him,' Choongjae adds, barely able to meet Sunho's gaze the few times he glances in his direction. 'Because I really regret it. Listening to him just now and knowing about it all so late...'
Sunho is feeling slightly choked himself, deeply touched by his soulmate's feelings. He wants to reassure Choongjae, but he cannot speak and is soon beaten to it by the hosts and other members who comfort Choongjae.
When it is his turn, he answers simply and truthfully that he is grateful to all of them. His brothers who had overcome their ugliest selves and harshest struggles, the brothers who had welcomed him back with open arms and no questions asked, the brothers who make him feel better about himself everyday - he is thankful to them all.
NEXT: Part Three