(no subject)
Title: I first, for you, I fell (ddanddan ddanddada dda ddarappappara)
Pairing: Blohyuk
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Not mine, don't sue
A/N: This directly follows wobaozhewo's Punky Punky Party. You can find the rest of the College AU verse over at her journal. :Db
A flashing smile. “Let’s go backstage!”
“W-What?” He blinks quickly in sucession as the spell that had him so enraptured snaps apart. He casts a bewildered look around him as reality returns to him in bits and pieces and he remembers that this was where he inhabited, not the world they had described where pen and paper were infinite sounds echoed by the sounds of a pencil sharpener turning round and round.
“Backstage! Let’s go!” A hand, warm and sure, grabs his and bulldozes them through the crowd.
“W-Wait Donghae! But - ”
A laugh and words are cheerfully thrown over Donghae’s shoulder as he calls back, “No! I didn’t make it to class that day, but lend me your notes later!”
“But we’re not and I’m not in your -” he says, pitching his voice to be heard over the dull roar of the place, but his sentence suddenly collapses upon itself as he sees Donghae rapidly conversing with someone else, the words “alright, but those notes don’t come for cheap you know,” following back to him.
They bypass a heavy curtain and reach a non-descriptive door left slightly ajar. He attempts to peek slyly through Donghae’s shoulders as Donghae steps first into the room, preferring to stay on the outside of things, but a quick jerk from Donghae’s hand abruptly brings him barreling in instead.
“This is Mithra Jin,” Donghae says, dropping the grip on his hand in order to gesture to the man in front of him.
“Yo.”
“And Tukutz,” a close mouth smile accompanied by a “hello,” answers his lowered head bob greeting.
“And this,” a pause and a smile that’s just a touch too wide earns Donghae an elbow to the stomach, “This, is Tablo.”
“Hey.”
“Everyone, this is Hyukjae.”
“I’m Hyukjae.”
“I heard,” Tablo replies a half smile appearing on the mostly serious planes of his face.
“Let’s drink.”
Donghae cheers and begins to lead the way out of the room, Tukutz’s sunglasses somehow finding a way to his face.
The bar is long and already filled with people lined up against it, but Donghae has somehow managed to have drinks spread out on the sticky surface just for them. He had been the last one in the group to follow Donghae’s bobbling head, and is subsequently the last one who reaches the bar. He balks at the sheer amount of alcohol displayed; both encased in glass bottles with drops of condensation sliding down their edges, to ones taking up space in small stout cups, all of them colorless under the flashing lights of the room.
“Donghae, Donghae,” he says, urgently pushing his way towards him. “I-I don’t have enough mo…”
“Relax,” Donghae is quick to answer. “Everything is free. Everything,” he winks as another bright smile slides into place.
He feels something cold passed against the back of his hand.
“A beer,” Tablo says, nodding at him as he tilts his own bottle back.
“Shots for everyone!” Donghae crows and like a military assembly line, they all line up against the space at the bar Donghae has cleared for them. There is nothing he can do but try to not trip on his own toes on as he gets shuffled into the mix.
“To a good performance,” Mithra bellows, lifting up his shot glass. “And for fans,” Tablo is quick to add before everyone tilts their heads back and gulps down the colorless liquid swirling in the innocuous stout cups.
He coughs violently, the liquid like a target locked missile, trying to settle inside his stomach, but burning everything in its pathway to get there. Tukutz is thumping his back as he asks if he’s okay and he nods, wiping out the rest of his grimace into his shirt sleeve.
“First time?” Tukutz asks.
He wants to shake his head no, but he has never been a good liar, and so just nods instead. Like slowly unfurling tendrils of fire, he starts to feel the furnace like heat the alcohol is emitting as it settles like a warm brick in his stomach.
Tukutz nods and presses a cold beer that he had left on the bar into his hands.
At his silent inquiry, Tukutz provides an explanatory, “chaser.”
“Beer before liquor and you’ll get even sicker, but liquor before beer and you’re in the clear!” Donghae chirps brightly, the liquid inside his own half empty bottle of beer sloshing as he swirls the bottle around.
He brings the chilled bottle that Tukutz had handed to him up to his own lips, and takes a sip, then two, before setting it back down again.
“Are you okay?” Someone else asks.
“Fine, fine,” he says, his body starting to sway due to the sudden tilted axis of the room.
Donghae swings by and presses another cup of clear liquid into his hands.
“He’s fine, he’s fine! He’s just a light weight!” Donghae happily shouts, raising his voice to be heard over the music that had started up when the group performance had ended.
“What’s this?” he asks the words drifting and popping out of his mouth like soap bubbles as he swirls the new liquid around in his cup.
“Water,” Donghae tells him leaning in close. “Drink it after every second drink or you’ll be really sorry tomorrow morning.
“But-But I’m not drunk.” he says leaning his head against Donghae’s steady shoulders that had drifted into his sight. “Anyway, how can I drink this normally when the room is spinning like this?”
Donghae foists him onto another set of shoulders more in line with his own height and closes his hands around the drink in his hands. “Think of this as engine fuel!” he says clinking their glasses together before taking another long deep swallow from his beer.
Like a mirror’s reflection, he repeats the move, the water splashing down the hot contours of his throat.
“Are you drunk?” a voice, incredibly close to him asks.
“Of course not! I’m fine, I’m fine,” he answers, swaying a little on his feet.
The voice hums and after a few minutes of forced concentration and immense focus, the room eventually rights itself and stops whirling like a spinning top.
It was then he noticed whose shoulder he had been using for support.
“Ah, Tab-Tablo!” he stutters, swallowing thickly before attempting to start again. “I didn’t, I mean I -” he says, coloring as he feels the situation get more awkward under his fingertips as he tries to stumble out an apology.
But Tablo just shrugs like its no big deal, the same half smile remaking its appearance as he continues drinking.
He immediately tumbles off Tablo’s shoulders and hastily takes a long drought from the beer he had set aside when Donghae pushed the cup filled with water into his hands.
He felt weird, awkward and strange. Hell, he was weird, awkward and strange, you’d think he’d get used to it by now.
He wasn’t drunk. He wasn’t. He could recite his name, his major and his age all correctly and coherently in his head, but the liquid in his ear was still churning and that’s why he couldn’t speak correctly. That’s all there was to it.
To make matters worse, he really had no idea what to say in situations where he was not drunk. Not that he was drunk now or anything, he was just a little (maybe not so much as little, but a lot) tipsy, but certainly not drunk, what was he suppose to say now?
He settles on fiddling with the clasps of his watch as he takes in the scene before him.
Tablo was drinking placidly at his left, but all around them, he notices people standing idly by, some bobbing their heads in beat to the music and some shuffling their feet to it, but nobody was dancing. Not outwardly at any rate. They certainly weren’t sweaty, the type of sweat you work up when you dance like the beat is running through your veins and bodies are pressed up close to you because it’s crowded and they want an excuse to get close to you.
Not that he ever danced like that in public of course, but that’s how they dance in music videos and on TV shows late at night.
In situations like those, people always danced like they couldn’t stop thinking about you, though it was never really clarified him to who those people were. Maybe it’s a girl, since it’s always about a girl, right? So in his head where this entire conversation is taking place, all the “you”s translate into “I”s and it’s because - or rather ‘cause, because he always pretty casual when talking to himself - so it’s ‘cause I can’t stop thinking about you, girl…
Before his train of thought can take on any more passengers, he takes another deep swallow of his drink and feels it get surprisingly lighter in his hands.
It feels empty and as he peers down its depths, he realizes it is empty. He doesn’t want onto hold empty bottles, so he sets it down, feeling vaguely accomplished as he hears it clink against the surface of the bar.
Donghae spins by in all bright colors and laughter and yells out, “Let’s dance!”
He turns to Tablo and hesitantly asks him, “Do you…want to dance?”
Tablo shakes his head in a negative as he says, “Not right now,” but slants his beer bottle towards the dance floor, telling the other man to go ahead without him.
He looks like he wants to stay, to maybe try his hand at convincing Tablo otherwise, but he glances anxiously at Donghae’s quickly disappearing figure. “I’ll be right back,” he says, quickly darting after Donghae before he got engulfed by the crowd.
***
“That one, huh,” Mithra states as he settles besides Tablo, both of their backs turned against the bar as they face the dance floor.
Tablo makes a noise of agreement and Tukutz leans over Mithra to laugh at him. “Must be hard trying to look this cool in front of him, huh? Especially when you were really sweating it out on stage just now.”
“I was not sweating it out. I was cool. Like a slice of freshly peeled cucumber,” Tablo says, distracted as he tries to follow the sight of Hyukjae as he disappeared and reappears in the crowd.
“What kind of cucumber forgets the lyrics to a song that he wrote?”
“I! Did not forget the lyrics.”
“So what were those minutes of dead air we had after Tukutz spun?”
“That was a microphone malfunction.”
“How come I heard you -”
“‘Ey, why don’t you have a dose of SHUT THE HELL UP?” Tablo testily shot back as he lost sight of him in the crowd.
“Don’t get your frilly lace panties in a twist, you woman, he’s right over there,” Mithra points out.
Tablo follows the direction that Mithra’s meaty finger points to, and spots him and Donghae out on the dance floor.
Tablo had seen a plethora of dancers in his days - good dancers, bad dancers, dancers to whom dancing was just an simple extension of their bodies that was just as natural and effortless as breathing. Tablo had also seen dancers who lacked natural talent and had clawed their way to the top through heavy and rigorous training.
Tablo knows good dancers when he sees them, and he knows without a breath of doubt that Hyukjae is a good dancer.
He dances like the rhythm bleeds into his veins and his body pulses along with it. Like raw diamonds that have their own shine and allure but really become undeniably beautiful when they are refined, Tablo has a feeling that if any of his raw talent were to be harnessed and trained, he’d shine like a jewel on stage.
Tablo also knows he is good not just by the way he moved, but by the way the girls around him act.
He is good, but not so good that he looks boastful and standoffish in their presence. He is however, deemed excellent enough that the girls form a ring around him (much like how the girls are doing with Donghae in another group), surrounding him and allowing each girl to have him to herself for a few minutes.
He takes no notice of the maneuvering around him, taking the girls as they come, and letting them go when leave, and when he eventually returns to the bar, he is considerably more sweaty then when he had left. He is so parched that he doesn’t question the alcohol laced drink pushed into his hands and, instead, lifts it up to his lips, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down as it follows the contraction his throat muscles make as he gulps down the drink in two long swallows.
“Maybe you shouldn’t - ” Tablo begins to say, only to be cut off by Heechul who swaggers into place.
“Relax, he’ll be fine. He’ll just sweat it off anyway. Won’t you?” Heechul asks, his tone syrupy sweet, smiling at Tablo as if daring him to say he didn’t want him just a little intoxicated.
He nods, displaying a smile that is more gums than teeth, and makes quick work of the drink Heechul hands off to him.
He makes a face like it might have scorched going down, but gives a lopsided grin before diving back into the pulsating crowd and the girls that await his return with ill disguised looks of impatience.
Over the next couple of hours, Tablo watches him resurface from the dance floor for a gasp of air and to slam down another drink.
Dimly, in the back of Tablo’s mind (the part that isn’t slightly buzzed at the moment), he idly wonders if he should stop him. In the end, he decides not to, as Hyukjae is an adult after all. He is more than capable of making his own decisions, and the last thing he needs is Tablo to peck after him like a mother hen. But Tablo is more than a little bit more buzzed than he gives himself credit for, so that thought bubble doesn’t go too far before it floats out of his head and bursts with a slight ‘pop’.
Sometime after that, Mithra returns to Tablo’s side again, for Hyukjae-watching was only a sport that Tablo engaged in, and said, “Hey. We’re about to leave, you want to get yours and we’ll find Donghae and Heechul?”
Tablo grunts his acquiescence and pushes himself off the bar, heading straight into the throng of gyrating bodies that fill the dance floor.
It’s not that he doesn’t appreciate the female form (because hello, boobs? Always an instant win), but he honestly doesn’t need it nor does he appreciate it when girls stick their asses in his face while the line, “This night, I’ll do everything for you, so let me love you” blasts overhead. It’s especially frustrating when they jiggled like they need quarters to keep moving when all he wants to do is simply pass through on route to find someone.
He finds him exactly where he thinks he would, in the middle of the dance floor with enough girls to form his own harem. And he, acting like the mighty sultan that keeps them all within his palace as he rules over them.
Okay, that might be a bit of an exaggeration. Maybe he isn’t so much a sultan but a pretty little servant boy that the concubines all fawn and coo over, giggling as they put flowers in his hair. Except most boys found in palaces were eunuchs and Tablo doesn’t like to think of him in that way. Though Tablo can’t quite remember where he read about concubines dancing with pretty little servant boys like they were trying to propagate, judging from the distance that clearly doesn’t exist between the girl’s crotch and his dic -and this is where Tablo cuts in.
The girls whine and complain, the pitch of their protest audible even through the heavy bass beat emitting from the turntables. Tablo is firm however, a force to be reckoned with and probably less drunk than they are, so he gets his way and pulls a decidedly less than sober man behind him and off the dance floor.
When he gets to the bar, he finds Tukutz and Mithra already there, each supporting a decidedly less than coherent Donghae and Heechul.
“We’re going to take these two home first and probably end up crashing there. I have too much alcohol in me to be on the road and doing things that I might end up regretting,” Mithra says, leveling a look at Tablo as he steadies Heechul with one hand.
Tablo nods absently as he juggles Hyukjae, shifting him from one shoulder to the next.
“Do either of you know where he lives? I’m pretty sure he’s residing on campus…”
Mithra grunts as he shifts himself out from Heechul’s out flung arm. “We” he starts off, gesturing to himself and Tukutz, “are going to stay over at Heechul’s place. We won’t be home. Meaning, our apartment is going to be empty because you don’t know where he,” Mithra says, jabbing his thumb in Hyukjae’s direction, “lives. And even if you do, we distinctly heard you say you were going to take him back to our place first because you don’t know where he lives. Understand?”
Tablo nods.
“Now, don’t do anything you’ll regret, or end up writing a thousand love songs about it, got it?” He ambles his way back to Tukutz and reaches over to take Heechul. “I swear this guy is just fucking content to stalk him. Forget about getting laid,” he mutters under his breath. Tukutz solemnly nods his agreement.
He knows exactly what Mithra is warning him about. As the cab starts to pull out, the driver cursing as he narrowly avoids hitting the clusters of people that come spilling out from the party - unsteady on their feet but confident in their drunken immortality - Tablo can’t help but let his gaze linger on Hyukjae. In the muted darkness of the backseat, Tablo lets out a shaky exhale, his façade of unflappable nonchalance leaving him as easily as his escaped breath. He rests his arms across his knees and wonders if this is the right thing to do. Yes, he does want Hyukjae, beyond logic, beyond any sort of reason that he could put into words, but is it right for him to take advantage of the situation like this?
When the cab finally manages to pull away from the curb, tiny globes of street lights splash across Tablo’s set face as he makes his decision. No, he decides. It isn’t worth it, not like this. He is just going to take him home and let him sleep it off.
Tablo’s eyes rest on him. In the semi darkness of it all, he looks so thin and fragile, so very unlike the sweaty, powerful dancer that had enthralled everyone who caught sight of him. Tablo snorts as the description “elfin” passes through his mind, and full out laughs when the picture of a small anchovy fish with Hyukjae’s earnest expression swims past him in his head. Gently, Tablo peels him from the vinyl covered backseats and laughs at the small puddle of drool that’s left behind on the seat. Even this sight is oddly endearing to Tablo and he chuckles to himself as he lifts up the end of his shirt to wipe off the excess drool from his mouth as he transfers him to rest on the solidity of his shoulders. This was the most that he was going to allow the stupid pitter pattering of his heart to indulge in.
It’s kind of romantic, except when Tablo leans forward to pay the driver, Hyukjae pitches forward, slamming into the front seat when Tablo doesn’t catch him in time.
Well. So much for wondering if he should wake him up or not.
After a short elevator trip and several fumbling attempts to insert the right key in the lock, Hyukjae is still rubbing his forehead as they stumble into the apartment. Tablo is inclined to believe however, that he’s not any more conscious now as he was then, judging from his bleary-eyed expression.
Tablo toes his shoes off and bends down to help Hyukjae to do the same, and shuffles him into the kitchen where he deposits him gently into a chair. He is showing considerably more care to him than he’s ever shown to Tukutz, whom he usually flings onto the couch before passing out in his own bed, waking up the next day with yesterday’s clothes still crusted on.
When he turns around, Hyukjae is resting his elbows on the counter, eyes half open and head resting in his hands.
“Here, drink it. It’s water.” Tablo says, handing him a cup filled to the brim.
“Whuuu?”
“Water,” Tablo repeats, his touch lingering for a beat longer than necessary as he presses the ceramic cup into his hands. “You’re going to have a raging hangover tomorrow, judging from all those drinks you slammed down, but this should lessen it a fraction of a bit.”
Hyukjae accepts the cup, grinning lazily before lifting it up to his lips and upending it all over his shirt.
“Sorry, M’sorry” he mumbles in apology though Tablo can’t quite tell if the flush is from drunkenness or embarrassment.
“It’s okay,” Tablo reassures him with an easy roll of his shoulders, though he is sure to keep the laughter to himself. “I’ve done a lot worse when I was drunk.”
“I’m not drunk,” his voice calls plaintively out as Tablo goes to find a towel and another shirt for him. Tablo grins goofily as he rests his head against the fluffy folds of the towel, as he attempts to slow the erratic beating of his heart before heading out into the kitchen again.
Hyukjae repeats the line when he strips off his shirt and accepts the towel from Tablo.
“You can take my bed and I’ll take the cou…” Tablo starts to say, his words gradually trickling to a stop as he catches sight of him stripping.
Hyukjae stills as he notices Tablo’s lingering gaze on him. He follows Tablo’s eyes as they track the towel’s broad swipe across his chest, Tablo’s stare still lingering there when he lets the cloth fall from his grip.
“Tablo.” The voice that calls out his name is so different from the one belonging to the boy who had confused pill bugs for his lunch. With the alcohol that was still burning its after effects through his blood, Hyukjae approaches the other man, legs only shaking a little bit as he breeches Tablo’s personal space.
“You’re drunk,” Tablo tells him, his mind whirling into overdrive when Hyukjae’s lips are mere centimeters away from the other.
“I’m not drunk,” he says, his eyes suddenly clear and bright.
What the hell, Tablo thinks, all thoughts of good intentions flinging themselves out the window as he stares at his own image, reflected back at him in Hyukjae’s coherent gaze. He takes the first step and suddenly surges, bridging the minuscule distance between the two of them.
The wet sounds of kissing cuts through the previous silence of the room permutated by small moans that are quickly swallowed.
It is followed by the scraping sounds of teeth nipping at someone’s neck, soon after chased by the soft sensation of cool air being blown against the marked skin.
The kisses continue down the dip of exquisite collarbones, each lingering touch a fervent prayer of worship on the body so easily bared before him.
A dexterous tongue, well versed in the tripping symphonies of rhyme schemes follow next, mapping out this body, this temple, and blacking its walls with lyrical kamasutra.
With all the blood rushing to his head, Tablo is vaguely surprised there’s still enough of it to head down south. Still, he attempts to vainly swim towards the surface of coherency and the shore of doing the right thing. When Hyukjae starts moaning however, Tablo abandons all hope and instead plunges headlong into the pleasure filled haze both his body and heart are craving.
Hyukjae’s breathy pants are the soundtrack of this act, and his body arches in a powerful protest as Tablo’s lips leave him. They only settle when Tablo’s hands, warm from where they had been tracing invisible patterns on his skin, rise to envelop his own, tugging him urgently towards the bedroom.
His back meets no resistance as it falls against the soft billowy covers of the bed and Tablo hovers above him, his eyes, still a touch unsure, ask him if this was okay. His hands however, have never stopped from moving, feathery like the touch of a million paintbrushes across the canvas of his skin.
He rises on his elbows, fueled by want and desire and his lips reach for Tablo’s own, tracing the warm concave of Tablo’s mouth as his hands pull impatiently at his shirt. He gives a grunt, half in frustration and half in embarrassment as the shirt refuses to loosen itself and gets stuck instead.
He covers his face with his hands, and Tablo’s laugh comes out a little bit shaky as he leans in to kiss him.
When he peeks out, Tablo is sitting back on his haunches and is pulling his own shirt off instead, but in his excitement, gets his own head stuck in the shirt’s opening. He struggles with the shirt, a string of curses leaking out of his mouth.
He reappears, now shirtless and his hair all askew in funny angles and Hyukjae hides a snigger before his greedy hands reach out to plunge across the surface of Tablo’s now fully exposed upper body, giving a hum of appreciation when his fingers find a spot that makes Tablo force out a groan from deep in the back of his throat.
Tablo has had enough teasing, and with a small grunt of impatience, pushes him back down again. His mouth works against Hyukjae’s as one hand raises to fist in his hair while the other reaches down to undo his pants, fondling the member there that eagerly awaits his touch.
He wrestles with the material for a while before he gives a small cry of success, Hyukjae obligingly lifting up his hips for Tablo to slide the rest of his pants down.
When Tablo’s hands wrap around his cock, he swells, his moan of pleasure swallowed under the pressure of Tablo’s mouth.
“I-I…” he pants, head thrown back as his fingers clench around Tablo’s arms.
Tablo continues to stroke him, his hands gliding up and down his cock while his mouth eagerly consumes all the sounds of pleasure Hyukjae makes.
He pants, his body rising and falling to the rhythm of Tablo’s strokes and the lightening bolts of pleasure are rapidly building in his body, like the steaming vats of lava building in a volcano before it explodes. He can’t hold himself back any longer and grips Tablo’s shoulders, shouting as he comes. He spurts all over Tablo’s hand, and the bedroom is filled with nothing but the sounds of his gasps as he comes off his orgasm.
Dimly, he comes to the awareness of Tablo besides him, his denim clad erection pressing directly into his hips.
“Wait - you - I - still - why didn’t you,” he says, words tumbling over themselves as he shifts on his side to face Tablo.
“It’s okay,” Tablo says, holding up a hand, burying his face into the pillow besides Hyukjae as he slowly dies of embarrassment.
“No, no, let me,” he says, his cheeks still flushed from his own orgasm as he reaches for the top button on Tablo’s pants.
“No! I mean, no, it’s fine - Oh god yes - I’m fine - YES - it’s okay I’m okay - Oh god - it’s okay,” Tablo babbles, each word punctuated with a throated moan as Hyukjae tugs impatiently at his pants.
“Why,” Hyukjae grunting in effort, “are your pants so hard to take off?”
“Because,” Tablo lolls out, his head tilted back and his eyes rolling into the back of his head from the friction, “my dick is engorged, and you’re trying to zip down button fly jeans.”
“Oh,” Hyukjae says, trying to feel a little more humiliated, except the feeling of being incredibly turned on again seems to dominate what’s left of his brain.
The member that springs up to greet him is larger than his own, and his hands shake a little, as he places them on it. He reaches one hand out to touch Tablo, while his other hand reaches down to stroke himself. Both hands map out the same rhythm, a mix of long sweeping motions and short bursts of friction. The veins in Tablo’s cock throb under Hyukjae’s finger and as he slides his hand over the head of it, his hand wet with the evidence of Tablo’s pleasure. He moans as he rubs himself, his thumb stroking against the slick head of his penis as he does the same to Tablo. For Tablo, this sight is too much for him, and he bursts, coming all over Hyukjae’s hand. Not soon after, Hyukjae does the same, his body momentarily lifting off the bed as he hits his second orgasm. He falls back down again and besides him, Tablo is busy, fumbling around looking for something to clean them both off with.
His fingers brush against a shirt, and hoping that it’s his, he uses it to wipe them both down before tossing it aside. He feels sated and comfortable, waves of sleepiness crashing down upon him as he pulls the covers over the both of them. He noses into Hyukjae’s hair and murmurs, “sleep”, smiling as he feels Hyukjae burrowing his head into his shoulder. With one arm wrapped around Hyukjae, he feels strangely indulgent and complete as he lets himself drift off to sleep.
Pairing: Blohyuk
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Not mine, don't sue
A/N: This directly follows wobaozhewo's Punky Punky Party. You can find the rest of the College AU verse over at her journal. :Db
A flashing smile. “Let’s go backstage!”
“W-What?” He blinks quickly in sucession as the spell that had him so enraptured snaps apart. He casts a bewildered look around him as reality returns to him in bits and pieces and he remembers that this was where he inhabited, not the world they had described where pen and paper were infinite sounds echoed by the sounds of a pencil sharpener turning round and round.
“Backstage! Let’s go!” A hand, warm and sure, grabs his and bulldozes them through the crowd.
“W-Wait Donghae! But - ”
A laugh and words are cheerfully thrown over Donghae’s shoulder as he calls back, “No! I didn’t make it to class that day, but lend me your notes later!”
“But we’re not and I’m not in your -” he says, pitching his voice to be heard over the dull roar of the place, but his sentence suddenly collapses upon itself as he sees Donghae rapidly conversing with someone else, the words “alright, but those notes don’t come for cheap you know,” following back to him.
They bypass a heavy curtain and reach a non-descriptive door left slightly ajar. He attempts to peek slyly through Donghae’s shoulders as Donghae steps first into the room, preferring to stay on the outside of things, but a quick jerk from Donghae’s hand abruptly brings him barreling in instead.
“This is Mithra Jin,” Donghae says, dropping the grip on his hand in order to gesture to the man in front of him.
“Yo.”
“And Tukutz,” a close mouth smile accompanied by a “hello,” answers his lowered head bob greeting.
“And this,” a pause and a smile that’s just a touch too wide earns Donghae an elbow to the stomach, “This, is Tablo.”
“Hey.”
“Everyone, this is Hyukjae.”
“I’m Hyukjae.”
“I heard,” Tablo replies a half smile appearing on the mostly serious planes of his face.
“Let’s drink.”
Donghae cheers and begins to lead the way out of the room, Tukutz’s sunglasses somehow finding a way to his face.
The bar is long and already filled with people lined up against it, but Donghae has somehow managed to have drinks spread out on the sticky surface just for them. He had been the last one in the group to follow Donghae’s bobbling head, and is subsequently the last one who reaches the bar. He balks at the sheer amount of alcohol displayed; both encased in glass bottles with drops of condensation sliding down their edges, to ones taking up space in small stout cups, all of them colorless under the flashing lights of the room.
“Donghae, Donghae,” he says, urgently pushing his way towards him. “I-I don’t have enough mo…”
“Relax,” Donghae is quick to answer. “Everything is free. Everything,” he winks as another bright smile slides into place.
He feels something cold passed against the back of his hand.
“A beer,” Tablo says, nodding at him as he tilts his own bottle back.
“Shots for everyone!” Donghae crows and like a military assembly line, they all line up against the space at the bar Donghae has cleared for them. There is nothing he can do but try to not trip on his own toes on as he gets shuffled into the mix.
“To a good performance,” Mithra bellows, lifting up his shot glass. “And for fans,” Tablo is quick to add before everyone tilts their heads back and gulps down the colorless liquid swirling in the innocuous stout cups.
He coughs violently, the liquid like a target locked missile, trying to settle inside his stomach, but burning everything in its pathway to get there. Tukutz is thumping his back as he asks if he’s okay and he nods, wiping out the rest of his grimace into his shirt sleeve.
“First time?” Tukutz asks.
He wants to shake his head no, but he has never been a good liar, and so just nods instead. Like slowly unfurling tendrils of fire, he starts to feel the furnace like heat the alcohol is emitting as it settles like a warm brick in his stomach.
Tukutz nods and presses a cold beer that he had left on the bar into his hands.
At his silent inquiry, Tukutz provides an explanatory, “chaser.”
“Beer before liquor and you’ll get even sicker, but liquor before beer and you’re in the clear!” Donghae chirps brightly, the liquid inside his own half empty bottle of beer sloshing as he swirls the bottle around.
He brings the chilled bottle that Tukutz had handed to him up to his own lips, and takes a sip, then two, before setting it back down again.
“Are you okay?” Someone else asks.
“Fine, fine,” he says, his body starting to sway due to the sudden tilted axis of the room.
Donghae swings by and presses another cup of clear liquid into his hands.
“He’s fine, he’s fine! He’s just a light weight!” Donghae happily shouts, raising his voice to be heard over the music that had started up when the group performance had ended.
“What’s this?” he asks the words drifting and popping out of his mouth like soap bubbles as he swirls the new liquid around in his cup.
“Water,” Donghae tells him leaning in close. “Drink it after every second drink or you’ll be really sorry tomorrow morning.
“But-But I’m not drunk.” he says leaning his head against Donghae’s steady shoulders that had drifted into his sight. “Anyway, how can I drink this normally when the room is spinning like this?”
Donghae foists him onto another set of shoulders more in line with his own height and closes his hands around the drink in his hands. “Think of this as engine fuel!” he says clinking their glasses together before taking another long deep swallow from his beer.
Like a mirror’s reflection, he repeats the move, the water splashing down the hot contours of his throat.
“Are you drunk?” a voice, incredibly close to him asks.
“Of course not! I’m fine, I’m fine,” he answers, swaying a little on his feet.
The voice hums and after a few minutes of forced concentration and immense focus, the room eventually rights itself and stops whirling like a spinning top.
It was then he noticed whose shoulder he had been using for support.
“Ah, Tab-Tablo!” he stutters, swallowing thickly before attempting to start again. “I didn’t, I mean I -” he says, coloring as he feels the situation get more awkward under his fingertips as he tries to stumble out an apology.
But Tablo just shrugs like its no big deal, the same half smile remaking its appearance as he continues drinking.
He immediately tumbles off Tablo’s shoulders and hastily takes a long drought from the beer he had set aside when Donghae pushed the cup filled with water into his hands.
He felt weird, awkward and strange. Hell, he was weird, awkward and strange, you’d think he’d get used to it by now.
He wasn’t drunk. He wasn’t. He could recite his name, his major and his age all correctly and coherently in his head, but the liquid in his ear was still churning and that’s why he couldn’t speak correctly. That’s all there was to it.
To make matters worse, he really had no idea what to say in situations where he was not drunk. Not that he was drunk now or anything, he was just a little (maybe not so much as little, but a lot) tipsy, but certainly not drunk, what was he suppose to say now?
He settles on fiddling with the clasps of his watch as he takes in the scene before him.
Tablo was drinking placidly at his left, but all around them, he notices people standing idly by, some bobbing their heads in beat to the music and some shuffling their feet to it, but nobody was dancing. Not outwardly at any rate. They certainly weren’t sweaty, the type of sweat you work up when you dance like the beat is running through your veins and bodies are pressed up close to you because it’s crowded and they want an excuse to get close to you.
Not that he ever danced like that in public of course, but that’s how they dance in music videos and on TV shows late at night.
In situations like those, people always danced like they couldn’t stop thinking about you, though it was never really clarified him to who those people were. Maybe it’s a girl, since it’s always about a girl, right? So in his head where this entire conversation is taking place, all the “you”s translate into “I”s and it’s because - or rather ‘cause, because he always pretty casual when talking to himself - so it’s ‘cause I can’t stop thinking about you, girl…
Before his train of thought can take on any more passengers, he takes another deep swallow of his drink and feels it get surprisingly lighter in his hands.
It feels empty and as he peers down its depths, he realizes it is empty. He doesn’t want onto hold empty bottles, so he sets it down, feeling vaguely accomplished as he hears it clink against the surface of the bar.
Donghae spins by in all bright colors and laughter and yells out, “Let’s dance!”
He turns to Tablo and hesitantly asks him, “Do you…want to dance?”
Tablo shakes his head in a negative as he says, “Not right now,” but slants his beer bottle towards the dance floor, telling the other man to go ahead without him.
He looks like he wants to stay, to maybe try his hand at convincing Tablo otherwise, but he glances anxiously at Donghae’s quickly disappearing figure. “I’ll be right back,” he says, quickly darting after Donghae before he got engulfed by the crowd.
***
“That one, huh,” Mithra states as he settles besides Tablo, both of their backs turned against the bar as they face the dance floor.
Tablo makes a noise of agreement and Tukutz leans over Mithra to laugh at him. “Must be hard trying to look this cool in front of him, huh? Especially when you were really sweating it out on stage just now.”
“I was not sweating it out. I was cool. Like a slice of freshly peeled cucumber,” Tablo says, distracted as he tries to follow the sight of Hyukjae as he disappeared and reappears in the crowd.
“What kind of cucumber forgets the lyrics to a song that he wrote?”
“I! Did not forget the lyrics.”
“So what were those minutes of dead air we had after Tukutz spun?”
“That was a microphone malfunction.”
“How come I heard you -”
“‘Ey, why don’t you have a dose of SHUT THE HELL UP?” Tablo testily shot back as he lost sight of him in the crowd.
“Don’t get your frilly lace panties in a twist, you woman, he’s right over there,” Mithra points out.
Tablo follows the direction that Mithra’s meaty finger points to, and spots him and Donghae out on the dance floor.
Tablo had seen a plethora of dancers in his days - good dancers, bad dancers, dancers to whom dancing was just an simple extension of their bodies that was just as natural and effortless as breathing. Tablo had also seen dancers who lacked natural talent and had clawed their way to the top through heavy and rigorous training.
Tablo knows good dancers when he sees them, and he knows without a breath of doubt that Hyukjae is a good dancer.
He dances like the rhythm bleeds into his veins and his body pulses along with it. Like raw diamonds that have their own shine and allure but really become undeniably beautiful when they are refined, Tablo has a feeling that if any of his raw talent were to be harnessed and trained, he’d shine like a jewel on stage.
Tablo also knows he is good not just by the way he moved, but by the way the girls around him act.
He is good, but not so good that he looks boastful and standoffish in their presence. He is however, deemed excellent enough that the girls form a ring around him (much like how the girls are doing with Donghae in another group), surrounding him and allowing each girl to have him to herself for a few minutes.
He takes no notice of the maneuvering around him, taking the girls as they come, and letting them go when leave, and when he eventually returns to the bar, he is considerably more sweaty then when he had left. He is so parched that he doesn’t question the alcohol laced drink pushed into his hands and, instead, lifts it up to his lips, his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down as it follows the contraction his throat muscles make as he gulps down the drink in two long swallows.
“Maybe you shouldn’t - ” Tablo begins to say, only to be cut off by Heechul who swaggers into place.
“Relax, he’ll be fine. He’ll just sweat it off anyway. Won’t you?” Heechul asks, his tone syrupy sweet, smiling at Tablo as if daring him to say he didn’t want him just a little intoxicated.
He nods, displaying a smile that is more gums than teeth, and makes quick work of the drink Heechul hands off to him.
He makes a face like it might have scorched going down, but gives a lopsided grin before diving back into the pulsating crowd and the girls that await his return with ill disguised looks of impatience.
Over the next couple of hours, Tablo watches him resurface from the dance floor for a gasp of air and to slam down another drink.
Dimly, in the back of Tablo’s mind (the part that isn’t slightly buzzed at the moment), he idly wonders if he should stop him. In the end, he decides not to, as Hyukjae is an adult after all. He is more than capable of making his own decisions, and the last thing he needs is Tablo to peck after him like a mother hen. But Tablo is more than a little bit more buzzed than he gives himself credit for, so that thought bubble doesn’t go too far before it floats out of his head and bursts with a slight ‘pop’.
Sometime after that, Mithra returns to Tablo’s side again, for Hyukjae-watching was only a sport that Tablo engaged in, and said, “Hey. We’re about to leave, you want to get yours and we’ll find Donghae and Heechul?”
Tablo grunts his acquiescence and pushes himself off the bar, heading straight into the throng of gyrating bodies that fill the dance floor.
It’s not that he doesn’t appreciate the female form (because hello, boobs? Always an instant win), but he honestly doesn’t need it nor does he appreciate it when girls stick their asses in his face while the line, “This night, I’ll do everything for you, so let me love you” blasts overhead. It’s especially frustrating when they jiggled like they need quarters to keep moving when all he wants to do is simply pass through on route to find someone.
He finds him exactly where he thinks he would, in the middle of the dance floor with enough girls to form his own harem. And he, acting like the mighty sultan that keeps them all within his palace as he rules over them.
Okay, that might be a bit of an exaggeration. Maybe he isn’t so much a sultan but a pretty little servant boy that the concubines all fawn and coo over, giggling as they put flowers in his hair. Except most boys found in palaces were eunuchs and Tablo doesn’t like to think of him in that way. Though Tablo can’t quite remember where he read about concubines dancing with pretty little servant boys like they were trying to propagate, judging from the distance that clearly doesn’t exist between the girl’s crotch and his dic -and this is where Tablo cuts in.
The girls whine and complain, the pitch of their protest audible even through the heavy bass beat emitting from the turntables. Tablo is firm however, a force to be reckoned with and probably less drunk than they are, so he gets his way and pulls a decidedly less than sober man behind him and off the dance floor.
When he gets to the bar, he finds Tukutz and Mithra already there, each supporting a decidedly less than coherent Donghae and Heechul.
“We’re going to take these two home first and probably end up crashing there. I have too much alcohol in me to be on the road and doing things that I might end up regretting,” Mithra says, leveling a look at Tablo as he steadies Heechul with one hand.
Tablo nods absently as he juggles Hyukjae, shifting him from one shoulder to the next.
“Do either of you know where he lives? I’m pretty sure he’s residing on campus…”
Mithra grunts as he shifts himself out from Heechul’s out flung arm. “We” he starts off, gesturing to himself and Tukutz, “are going to stay over at Heechul’s place. We won’t be home. Meaning, our apartment is going to be empty because you don’t know where he,” Mithra says, jabbing his thumb in Hyukjae’s direction, “lives. And even if you do, we distinctly heard you say you were going to take him back to our place first because you don’t know where he lives. Understand?”
Tablo nods.
“Now, don’t do anything you’ll regret, or end up writing a thousand love songs about it, got it?” He ambles his way back to Tukutz and reaches over to take Heechul. “I swear this guy is just fucking content to stalk him. Forget about getting laid,” he mutters under his breath. Tukutz solemnly nods his agreement.
He knows exactly what Mithra is warning him about. As the cab starts to pull out, the driver cursing as he narrowly avoids hitting the clusters of people that come spilling out from the party - unsteady on their feet but confident in their drunken immortality - Tablo can’t help but let his gaze linger on Hyukjae. In the muted darkness of the backseat, Tablo lets out a shaky exhale, his façade of unflappable nonchalance leaving him as easily as his escaped breath. He rests his arms across his knees and wonders if this is the right thing to do. Yes, he does want Hyukjae, beyond logic, beyond any sort of reason that he could put into words, but is it right for him to take advantage of the situation like this?
When the cab finally manages to pull away from the curb, tiny globes of street lights splash across Tablo’s set face as he makes his decision. No, he decides. It isn’t worth it, not like this. He is just going to take him home and let him sleep it off.
Tablo’s eyes rest on him. In the semi darkness of it all, he looks so thin and fragile, so very unlike the sweaty, powerful dancer that had enthralled everyone who caught sight of him. Tablo snorts as the description “elfin” passes through his mind, and full out laughs when the picture of a small anchovy fish with Hyukjae’s earnest expression swims past him in his head. Gently, Tablo peels him from the vinyl covered backseats and laughs at the small puddle of drool that’s left behind on the seat. Even this sight is oddly endearing to Tablo and he chuckles to himself as he lifts up the end of his shirt to wipe off the excess drool from his mouth as he transfers him to rest on the solidity of his shoulders. This was the most that he was going to allow the stupid pitter pattering of his heart to indulge in.
It’s kind of romantic, except when Tablo leans forward to pay the driver, Hyukjae pitches forward, slamming into the front seat when Tablo doesn’t catch him in time.
Well. So much for wondering if he should wake him up or not.
After a short elevator trip and several fumbling attempts to insert the right key in the lock, Hyukjae is still rubbing his forehead as they stumble into the apartment. Tablo is inclined to believe however, that he’s not any more conscious now as he was then, judging from his bleary-eyed expression.
Tablo toes his shoes off and bends down to help Hyukjae to do the same, and shuffles him into the kitchen where he deposits him gently into a chair. He is showing considerably more care to him than he’s ever shown to Tukutz, whom he usually flings onto the couch before passing out in his own bed, waking up the next day with yesterday’s clothes still crusted on.
When he turns around, Hyukjae is resting his elbows on the counter, eyes half open and head resting in his hands.
“Here, drink it. It’s water.” Tablo says, handing him a cup filled to the brim.
“Whuuu?”
“Water,” Tablo repeats, his touch lingering for a beat longer than necessary as he presses the ceramic cup into his hands. “You’re going to have a raging hangover tomorrow, judging from all those drinks you slammed down, but this should lessen it a fraction of a bit.”
Hyukjae accepts the cup, grinning lazily before lifting it up to his lips and upending it all over his shirt.
“Sorry, M’sorry” he mumbles in apology though Tablo can’t quite tell if the flush is from drunkenness or embarrassment.
“It’s okay,” Tablo reassures him with an easy roll of his shoulders, though he is sure to keep the laughter to himself. “I’ve done a lot worse when I was drunk.”
“I’m not drunk,” his voice calls plaintively out as Tablo goes to find a towel and another shirt for him. Tablo grins goofily as he rests his head against the fluffy folds of the towel, as he attempts to slow the erratic beating of his heart before heading out into the kitchen again.
Hyukjae repeats the line when he strips off his shirt and accepts the towel from Tablo.
“You can take my bed and I’ll take the cou…” Tablo starts to say, his words gradually trickling to a stop as he catches sight of him stripping.
Hyukjae stills as he notices Tablo’s lingering gaze on him. He follows Tablo’s eyes as they track the towel’s broad swipe across his chest, Tablo’s stare still lingering there when he lets the cloth fall from his grip.
“Tablo.” The voice that calls out his name is so different from the one belonging to the boy who had confused pill bugs for his lunch. With the alcohol that was still burning its after effects through his blood, Hyukjae approaches the other man, legs only shaking a little bit as he breeches Tablo’s personal space.
“You’re drunk,” Tablo tells him, his mind whirling into overdrive when Hyukjae’s lips are mere centimeters away from the other.
“I’m not drunk,” he says, his eyes suddenly clear and bright.
What the hell, Tablo thinks, all thoughts of good intentions flinging themselves out the window as he stares at his own image, reflected back at him in Hyukjae’s coherent gaze. He takes the first step and suddenly surges, bridging the minuscule distance between the two of them.
The wet sounds of kissing cuts through the previous silence of the room permutated by small moans that are quickly swallowed.
It is followed by the scraping sounds of teeth nipping at someone’s neck, soon after chased by the soft sensation of cool air being blown against the marked skin.
The kisses continue down the dip of exquisite collarbones, each lingering touch a fervent prayer of worship on the body so easily bared before him.
A dexterous tongue, well versed in the tripping symphonies of rhyme schemes follow next, mapping out this body, this temple, and blacking its walls with lyrical kamasutra.
With all the blood rushing to his head, Tablo is vaguely surprised there’s still enough of it to head down south. Still, he attempts to vainly swim towards the surface of coherency and the shore of doing the right thing. When Hyukjae starts moaning however, Tablo abandons all hope and instead plunges headlong into the pleasure filled haze both his body and heart are craving.
Hyukjae’s breathy pants are the soundtrack of this act, and his body arches in a powerful protest as Tablo’s lips leave him. They only settle when Tablo’s hands, warm from where they had been tracing invisible patterns on his skin, rise to envelop his own, tugging him urgently towards the bedroom.
His back meets no resistance as it falls against the soft billowy covers of the bed and Tablo hovers above him, his eyes, still a touch unsure, ask him if this was okay. His hands however, have never stopped from moving, feathery like the touch of a million paintbrushes across the canvas of his skin.
He rises on his elbows, fueled by want and desire and his lips reach for Tablo’s own, tracing the warm concave of Tablo’s mouth as his hands pull impatiently at his shirt. He gives a grunt, half in frustration and half in embarrassment as the shirt refuses to loosen itself and gets stuck instead.
He covers his face with his hands, and Tablo’s laugh comes out a little bit shaky as he leans in to kiss him.
When he peeks out, Tablo is sitting back on his haunches and is pulling his own shirt off instead, but in his excitement, gets his own head stuck in the shirt’s opening. He struggles with the shirt, a string of curses leaking out of his mouth.
He reappears, now shirtless and his hair all askew in funny angles and Hyukjae hides a snigger before his greedy hands reach out to plunge across the surface of Tablo’s now fully exposed upper body, giving a hum of appreciation when his fingers find a spot that makes Tablo force out a groan from deep in the back of his throat.
Tablo has had enough teasing, and with a small grunt of impatience, pushes him back down again. His mouth works against Hyukjae’s as one hand raises to fist in his hair while the other reaches down to undo his pants, fondling the member there that eagerly awaits his touch.
He wrestles with the material for a while before he gives a small cry of success, Hyukjae obligingly lifting up his hips for Tablo to slide the rest of his pants down.
When Tablo’s hands wrap around his cock, he swells, his moan of pleasure swallowed under the pressure of Tablo’s mouth.
“I-I…” he pants, head thrown back as his fingers clench around Tablo’s arms.
Tablo continues to stroke him, his hands gliding up and down his cock while his mouth eagerly consumes all the sounds of pleasure Hyukjae makes.
He pants, his body rising and falling to the rhythm of Tablo’s strokes and the lightening bolts of pleasure are rapidly building in his body, like the steaming vats of lava building in a volcano before it explodes. He can’t hold himself back any longer and grips Tablo’s shoulders, shouting as he comes. He spurts all over Tablo’s hand, and the bedroom is filled with nothing but the sounds of his gasps as he comes off his orgasm.
Dimly, he comes to the awareness of Tablo besides him, his denim clad erection pressing directly into his hips.
“Wait - you - I - still - why didn’t you,” he says, words tumbling over themselves as he shifts on his side to face Tablo.
“It’s okay,” Tablo says, holding up a hand, burying his face into the pillow besides Hyukjae as he slowly dies of embarrassment.
“No, no, let me,” he says, his cheeks still flushed from his own orgasm as he reaches for the top button on Tablo’s pants.
“No! I mean, no, it’s fine - Oh god yes - I’m fine - YES - it’s okay I’m okay - Oh god - it’s okay,” Tablo babbles, each word punctuated with a throated moan as Hyukjae tugs impatiently at his pants.
“Why,” Hyukjae grunting in effort, “are your pants so hard to take off?”
“Because,” Tablo lolls out, his head tilted back and his eyes rolling into the back of his head from the friction, “my dick is engorged, and you’re trying to zip down button fly jeans.”
“Oh,” Hyukjae says, trying to feel a little more humiliated, except the feeling of being incredibly turned on again seems to dominate what’s left of his brain.
The member that springs up to greet him is larger than his own, and his hands shake a little, as he places them on it. He reaches one hand out to touch Tablo, while his other hand reaches down to stroke himself. Both hands map out the same rhythm, a mix of long sweeping motions and short bursts of friction. The veins in Tablo’s cock throb under Hyukjae’s finger and as he slides his hand over the head of it, his hand wet with the evidence of Tablo’s pleasure. He moans as he rubs himself, his thumb stroking against the slick head of his penis as he does the same to Tablo. For Tablo, this sight is too much for him, and he bursts, coming all over Hyukjae’s hand. Not soon after, Hyukjae does the same, his body momentarily lifting off the bed as he hits his second orgasm. He falls back down again and besides him, Tablo is busy, fumbling around looking for something to clean them both off with.
His fingers brush against a shirt, and hoping that it’s his, he uses it to wipe them both down before tossing it aside. He feels sated and comfortable, waves of sleepiness crashing down upon him as he pulls the covers over the both of them. He noses into Hyukjae’s hair and murmurs, “sleep”, smiling as he feels Hyukjae burrowing his head into his shoulder. With one arm wrapped around Hyukjae, he feels strangely indulgent and complete as he lets himself drift off to sleep.