deeper conversation: chapter 4
deeper conversation: chapter 4
yunho ♥ jaejoong | yoochun ♥ junsu
chaptered | AU | nc-17
a/n: a bit of angst in this chapter. *_*
--
All the hot and steamy dreams I had every night since I met The Gorgeous One had proven to be dreams and nothing more; because reality was something else altogether. What happened proved to be much, much better than the messy dreams I had of Jaejoong, hell even the awesome sex I had with my last partner (the one where we fucked on my study table and nearly rammed straight through the wall with the momentum we had going on. What? One is allowed to exaggerate when it comes to one’s favorite sexual memory, okay?) If I could scream my heart out right now I would, but Min would probably kill me because he’s just generally in a sour mood since my hour-long lecture yesterday, his body probably still not agreeing to the aftereffect of drugs pumped out of his system. He had been giving me the deadly glare since I switched the lights on when came home at 3 a.m., smelling of strawberry shower gel and wearing someone else’s clothes. Jaejoong’s clothes to be exact. We can all squeal now. Jung Yunho had scored 1 for the home team!
Here’s what happened after we left his office yesterday evening. Jaejoong (yes, I can safely call him that now, it still made me blush but now that something was definitely going on between us, it’s all good. Can you feel me grinning? I can, and my cheeks ached) drove us to his favorite dining place, Misarang Imshil Pizza in his slick and chic BMW (the silver baby was so cool I nearly drool all over the dashboard). The owner was so friendly towards us, hugging both of us just as we stepped inside the family restaurant. I learned later that the place belonged to Jaejoong’s friend’s father, the uncle who hugged us and gave us cheese sticks and a jug of Coke for free (I love you already, ajusshi, and you don’t even have to be gay to make me do that) and that he often brings his son to this place. Imagine my shock when Jaejoong said he has a son - I was still trying to accept that this very cute guy in front of me was well over thirty - that I started to choke and managed to disgustingly spewed half-chewed meatball pizza all over my side of the table.
Jaejoong had laughed, before handing me a glass of clear water and sweetly wiping the tears that came out from my eyes. He said that he didn’t expect that kind of reaction - hell, I didn’t expect that kind of news coming, excuse me - and he was clearly amused that I had reacted like that. I was embarrassed beyond words; I couldn’t even look at him in the eye because I could feel him smirking while looking at me. He had probably thought that I was a loser, which gave me a sinking feeling, similar to that of Titanic sinking to the bottom of icy-cold Pacific Ocean from an iceberg called Jaejoong’s son.
It’s not like I hate the fact of Jaejoong having a son, to be honest the thought of him with a kid kind of gives this very cute mental image that is just spazzable material, but I’ve had older lovers before, but none who were married and had a child. Even I knew that one little fact could be an inconvenience, if we ever make it to the next stage, if there’s a scant chance that we do. A married man, especially one with a son, is definitely off-limit. He’s probably straight too, with a pretty wife that caters to him night and day. Cries oh cries.
My mood soured for a while after what Jaejoong had said, and he’d possibly noticed this too because we ate in uncomfortable silence after I got my mess cleared up and began eating like a civilized person again. I wanted to ask him about his family, about his wife and son, just to make sure that there’s no hope I should cling on to but I was just a chicken in all actuality when it comes to my crushes. I kept reminding myself to just give it up - there’s no way Kim Jaejoong would consider me if he’s a straight, married father with a son. You just don’t go snatch someone else’s sheep, Mr Farmer, no matter how greener your grass is compared to the owner’s or that you vow to devote your whole life’s effort on rearing that sheep with tender loving care if it ever chooses to be in your side of the land. It just isn’t done, and while Kim Jaejoong might be the most beautiful guy I have ever met in my life, he’s someone else’s, and Jung Yunho has to learn how to step back and treat his wound by himself.
But one word changed everything, from the bleak future I had seen coming head-on and relentlessly cruel to days full of rainbows and heart-shaped cotton candies.
“I miss my son. He’s staying with my ex-husband during the weekdays, and I could only see him tomorrow. I can’t wait, five days seem like forever.”, Jaejoong had gushed, cheeks blushing and smile so heartwarmingly charming that I just had to smile back. ‘Ex-husband’ - that means he’s divorced, and gay to boot. And probably wasn’t seeing anybody too, because if he was, he wouldn’t say that he’s lonely, would he? My heart was summersaulting and dancing to the music of my happiness when I realized that mere fact - and the sunken ship came back to life with the help of a word. I never knew that ‘ex-husband’ can be such a joy-inducing word.
After that, my mood improved considerably, and we started talking about his son. I was so excited I nearly peed in my pants, and thank God my manners didn’t leave me completely because I had almost asked him about that ex-husband of his, something that you just don’t go asking your divorced, gay supervisor about.
Can you tell that I was just happy?
I couldn’t help but felt touched by the love Jaejoong has for the boy. I learnt that the boy’s name is Park-Kim Jinjoo, two surnames because of the obvious reason. He’s ten, at the age between being adorable cute and just plain annoying. Jaejoong told me that Jinjoo loves the pizzas here, and the owner ajusshi was Jinjoo’s grandfather because Jaejoong’s ex married the owner’s son. Ah, that explained why the owner was so nice and friendly towards us, he knew Jaejoong personally. I guessed from the look of things, Jaejoong still befriended his ex-husband and somehow, it just doesn’t sit well in my stomach.
Jaejoong paid for our dinner despite me arguing that I was the one who had asked him out - he intelligently countered that I had asked him out for ‘a drink’, and that dinner was on him because he called it first. What did I expect from a verbal-battle with an experienced language teacher? I lost even before the battle begins.
We went to a bar afterwards, because the good mood just flowed and it seemed right for us to finish the night off with a few good drinks. This time, I quickly told the bartender to put the charges on my tab and not to let Jaejoong pays. A man has got to keep his pride in check, y’all, despite the obvious dent this little outing will put on my budget this month.
We drank few glasses of lemon soju, just enough to lose the tightness in our limbs and started talking freely but not enough to get us both drunk. Jaejoong held his drinks well, and by the third glass, I was already feeling a hot burn coiling from the pit of my stomach, a good indication that I would probably be shit-drunk if I drank one more glass of that really nice lemon soju, while he was steadily drowning his fourth or fifth glass. When I asked him if it’s okay to be drinking like that, he simply laughed and told me he never get drunk on soju, he needs whiskey or Bourbon for that. Impressive man is impressive - even his level of soberness is different from us mere normal men.
Maybe it was the soju talking or my brain just got liquidated from the heat in my body and from the strobe lights above our heads, but before I knew it, I was dragging Jaejoong from our stools at the bar to the middle of the dance floor, dancing suggestively in front of him and near him. He just laughed and laughed, a rich creamy sound that sounded melodious in my ears, ringing loudly and joyously that I won’t mind if he goes on laughing forever like that. He ducked his head shyly when I grinded against his nice back, and I was having the time of my life to notice that I was flirting openly with this gorgeous man. Jaejoong might not be the best dancer out there but he definitely can sway and dance a little, and when his hips brushed daringly against my front as he bit his lips and looked at me from under hooded eyes, I swear my eyes rolled all the way around and I saw fireworks went off between us, blinding me with its intensity and amazing colors.
Truth was, a line of lightbulbs exploded (thus the fireworks I had seen) above us, and we were the only two not aware of it happening until someone from the crowd pulled us off from the dance floor to a safe spot. We were laughing like two crazy fools when we realized what had happened, so I paid the tab as quickly as I can and ran outside with Jaejoong into a cold night, both still crowing loudly. When we finally caught our breaths, I realized that Jaejoong was shivering considerably, teeth chattering between his sweet smiling lips.
It just seemed like the right time to do so, so I just did. I pulled him close to me and kissed his full smiling mouth, tasting the lemon soju and something sweet, something just Jaejoong. He sighed against my lips, and when I deepened our kiss he didn’t pull back, but kept pressing on until our tongues tangled in the most delirious way possible. Little did we realized then that we were in the middle of the street, kissing like there’s no tomorrow.
A taste of Jaejoong and I knew I couldn’t get enough of his sweetness. There’s a musky manliness in the way he swiped his tongue against the back of my teeth and the roof of my mouth, but there’s softness too, in the way his fingers curled on the lapels of my jacket, burrowing closer and deeper into my embrace, and to the way he shyly tugged on my lower lips when I wanted to pull away for a breath. When we finally parted, Jaejoong smiled a sexy half-lidded smile, looking up at me coyly and giggling like he wasn’t 33 at all. A naughty innocence shone bright and young from his eyes, and I fell deeply in love with him right at that very moment.
*
I didn’t get a wink of sleep since I came back home early this morning - so I just lazed around on the couch reading some Oscar Wilde and waited for the usual time I wake up and started preparing for school. I showered and put my best shirt on, laid an extra blanket on Changmin and filled a bottle of water and left it at the table beside the bed. I put a full pack of custard buns beside the bottle and the meds, wrote a quick reminder on a Post-it for Min before I jogged out of my apartment to the nearest bus stop.
I was grinning to myself when I remembered the kiss Jaejoong and I shared outside the bar, and inside of Jaejoong’s car, before I blanched when I recalled that I threw up all over his shirt and mine just as we were about to make out. I wanted to kill myself from the humiliation as he drove us back to his place so we could clean up, his very nice car stinking with lemon soju plus pizza vomit. An embarrassing thing indeed to be happening to me, but it had been good because once we were at his place, out of our vomit-reeking shirts and had gurgled our mouths off the stinks, Jaejoong had kissed me again, pushing me against the sink in his bathroom and kissing me breathless for good long minutes. We groped each other’s bodies for a bit, giggling like teenagers as we kissed against the bathroom wall. We stumbled out of the bathroom and unto his bed, but we didn’t do anything else afterwards, just cuddled together on his large, wide bed that smelled of sweet vanilla musk. He dozed off in my arms before I fell asleep myself, both shirtless and dizzy from our kisses.
It had been a really good night indeed, something I had never imagined to happen so soon between us. Maybe Jaejoong had been drunk when he brought me home and kissed me, but it was the nearest thing to affection I had felt from another human being aside from Changmin for a long, long time. And this felt better than any sexual intercourse I’ve had - it felt like my first love.
We woke up in the middle of the night, agreed that he should send me back to my place because there’s still school tomorrow, and it wouldn’t be a good thing if we were to come to school together in his car. When we arrived in front of my apartment building last night, we didn’t kiss goodbye, but Jaejoong had given me his mobile number and had said softly, eyes warm and hopeful,
“Call me later tonight okay? I’ll wait for you.”
Tonight. And for the rest of the day I’d have to put my best actor mask on and pretended that nothing happened between us. This was good enough for me.
*
When I got home that evening, Changmin was not getting better, tossing and turning in the bed. He growled something inaudible at me, a blanket covering his body up to his nose. When I looked closely I realized that he was shivering, and worry for my brother kicked thoughts of Jaejoong off my mind for a good while.
“Min, are you okay?”
He mumbled something I couldn’t tell, and when I put a hand on his forehead I realized he was burning hot. He had a fever, a symptom that followed his recovery from drug overused. I put another blanket on him, the last one we had, and hugged him closed for a while, letting him steal some of my body heat.
“Hang in there okay? It’ll get better soon, I promise.”, I half-cooed, rubbing soothing circles on his back. He made kittenish sounds, shrugging deeper in my arms and falling asleep on my chest soon after.
What happened to Changmin still was a shock to my system, the fact that I nearly lost my brother to drugs was a reminder of our childhood - a life void of joy and happiness. My father was a drug addict, and because of his addiction, he often pestered my mother for money and sometimes went as far as beating my mother black and blue when she couldn’t give him what he wanted. I remembered cowering away in our room and cupping my hands over Min’s ears to shield him from all the noise of the fights we had going on between our parents, but I guessed Min managed to listen to this even when I tried to shelter him from the ugliness of the situation. My mother didn’t make it easier for us, and when our father was away, she’d beat us with the broom or the mop, just because we reminded her of the bastard she had as a husband. It pained me still when I couldn’t think of my parents in a favorable way, there’s nothing that I could remember them by without having a nauseating feeling creeping up into my throat and making me want to throw up.
I wondered if I ever loved my parents at all, as far as I had remember I had fend for myself and Min my whole life. We ran away from home when Min turned 13, with only backpacks full of books and the clothes on our backs, finding shelters under the bridge until I found a job at a paint shop and in a few short months, managed to rent a low-cost room for the two of us and sent Changmin to school again. I studied on my own at the local library and saved up money enough for the high school certificate exam, no ambition on my mind except to ensure that Min finished his schooling and get into college. At least one of us deserves a chance at a better life, and I was surprised when a golden opportunity sprung up on me in the form of students’ loans from the same library I had studied in before, although the course was limited to the School of Education. I didn’t mind of course, beggars can’t be choosers. So here I was, after nearly 4 years went by. My students’ loan let me live comfortably, saved that I had worked my asses off during the first two years and in the summer breaks, and Changmin had managed to lighten up my burden by getting a special scholarship into the best law school in Seoul. I was so proud of my brother, I never doubt that he could succeed in his life. Changmin had always been a bright boy, the smartest one in his class since standard 1, but I never thought drugs would get to him and affected him this way. I didn’t even envision this coming at all.
I cried finally, the dire seriousness of the situation was something I rarely want to give a thought but now that the history and bitter memories were out in the open, I couldn’t help but analyze where I had went wrong. Min told me yesterday that he didn’t meant to take drugs at all, he swore it was his first time, but something happened that put stupid ideas into his head. I wanted to ask him about Inshil, his girlfriend of three months’, but when I mentioned her name, his face had turned pale and his eyes began to water and I knew instantly that the girl had been the cause of Min’s situation. Given some time, he’d probably tell it all to me when he was ready to open up his wound and share his pain with me.
It seemed like I have an ocean of tears in me because I couldn’t stop crying while I think of Changmin and our life. It just seemed all messed up, and just as my life was about to get interesting too, what with the recent positive development I had in my relationship with Jaejoong - if it could be called that at all.
I cried myself to sleep that night, forgetting all about a phone call I should be making to a certain special someone.
--[TBC]
yunho ♥ jaejoong | yoochun ♥ junsu
chaptered | AU | nc-17
a/n: a bit of angst in this chapter. *_*
--
All the hot and steamy dreams I had every night since I met The Gorgeous One had proven to be dreams and nothing more; because reality was something else altogether. What happened proved to be much, much better than the messy dreams I had of Jaejoong, hell even the awesome sex I had with my last partner (the one where we fucked on my study table and nearly rammed straight through the wall with the momentum we had going on. What? One is allowed to exaggerate when it comes to one’s favorite sexual memory, okay?) If I could scream my heart out right now I would, but Min would probably kill me because he’s just generally in a sour mood since my hour-long lecture yesterday, his body probably still not agreeing to the aftereffect of drugs pumped out of his system. He had been giving me the deadly glare since I switched the lights on when came home at 3 a.m., smelling of strawberry shower gel and wearing someone else’s clothes. Jaejoong’s clothes to be exact. We can all squeal now. Jung Yunho had scored 1 for the home team!
Here’s what happened after we left his office yesterday evening. Jaejoong (yes, I can safely call him that now, it still made me blush but now that something was definitely going on between us, it’s all good. Can you feel me grinning? I can, and my cheeks ached) drove us to his favorite dining place, Misarang Imshil Pizza in his slick and chic BMW (the silver baby was so cool I nearly drool all over the dashboard). The owner was so friendly towards us, hugging both of us just as we stepped inside the family restaurant. I learned later that the place belonged to Jaejoong’s friend’s father, the uncle who hugged us and gave us cheese sticks and a jug of Coke for free (I love you already, ajusshi, and you don’t even have to be gay to make me do that) and that he often brings his son to this place. Imagine my shock when Jaejoong said he has a son - I was still trying to accept that this very cute guy in front of me was well over thirty - that I started to choke and managed to disgustingly spewed half-chewed meatball pizza all over my side of the table.
Jaejoong had laughed, before handing me a glass of clear water and sweetly wiping the tears that came out from my eyes. He said that he didn’t expect that kind of reaction - hell, I didn’t expect that kind of news coming, excuse me - and he was clearly amused that I had reacted like that. I was embarrassed beyond words; I couldn’t even look at him in the eye because I could feel him smirking while looking at me. He had probably thought that I was a loser, which gave me a sinking feeling, similar to that of Titanic sinking to the bottom of icy-cold Pacific Ocean from an iceberg called Jaejoong’s son.
It’s not like I hate the fact of Jaejoong having a son, to be honest the thought of him with a kid kind of gives this very cute mental image that is just spazzable material, but I’ve had older lovers before, but none who were married and had a child. Even I knew that one little fact could be an inconvenience, if we ever make it to the next stage, if there’s a scant chance that we do. A married man, especially one with a son, is definitely off-limit. He’s probably straight too, with a pretty wife that caters to him night and day. Cries oh cries.
My mood soured for a while after what Jaejoong had said, and he’d possibly noticed this too because we ate in uncomfortable silence after I got my mess cleared up and began eating like a civilized person again. I wanted to ask him about his family, about his wife and son, just to make sure that there’s no hope I should cling on to but I was just a chicken in all actuality when it comes to my crushes. I kept reminding myself to just give it up - there’s no way Kim Jaejoong would consider me if he’s a straight, married father with a son. You just don’t go snatch someone else’s sheep, Mr Farmer, no matter how greener your grass is compared to the owner’s or that you vow to devote your whole life’s effort on rearing that sheep with tender loving care if it ever chooses to be in your side of the land. It just isn’t done, and while Kim Jaejoong might be the most beautiful guy I have ever met in my life, he’s someone else’s, and Jung Yunho has to learn how to step back and treat his wound by himself.
But one word changed everything, from the bleak future I had seen coming head-on and relentlessly cruel to days full of rainbows and heart-shaped cotton candies.
“I miss my son. He’s staying with my ex-husband during the weekdays, and I could only see him tomorrow. I can’t wait, five days seem like forever.”, Jaejoong had gushed, cheeks blushing and smile so heartwarmingly charming that I just had to smile back. ‘Ex-husband’ - that means he’s divorced, and gay to boot. And probably wasn’t seeing anybody too, because if he was, he wouldn’t say that he’s lonely, would he? My heart was summersaulting and dancing to the music of my happiness when I realized that mere fact - and the sunken ship came back to life with the help of a word. I never knew that ‘ex-husband’ can be such a joy-inducing word.
After that, my mood improved considerably, and we started talking about his son. I was so excited I nearly peed in my pants, and thank God my manners didn’t leave me completely because I had almost asked him about that ex-husband of his, something that you just don’t go asking your divorced, gay supervisor about.
Can you tell that I was just happy?
I couldn’t help but felt touched by the love Jaejoong has for the boy. I learnt that the boy’s name is Park-Kim Jinjoo, two surnames because of the obvious reason. He’s ten, at the age between being adorable cute and just plain annoying. Jaejoong told me that Jinjoo loves the pizzas here, and the owner ajusshi was Jinjoo’s grandfather because Jaejoong’s ex married the owner’s son. Ah, that explained why the owner was so nice and friendly towards us, he knew Jaejoong personally. I guessed from the look of things, Jaejoong still befriended his ex-husband and somehow, it just doesn’t sit well in my stomach.
Jaejoong paid for our dinner despite me arguing that I was the one who had asked him out - he intelligently countered that I had asked him out for ‘a drink’, and that dinner was on him because he called it first. What did I expect from a verbal-battle with an experienced language teacher? I lost even before the battle begins.
We went to a bar afterwards, because the good mood just flowed and it seemed right for us to finish the night off with a few good drinks. This time, I quickly told the bartender to put the charges on my tab and not to let Jaejoong pays. A man has got to keep his pride in check, y’all, despite the obvious dent this little outing will put on my budget this month.
We drank few glasses of lemon soju, just enough to lose the tightness in our limbs and started talking freely but not enough to get us both drunk. Jaejoong held his drinks well, and by the third glass, I was already feeling a hot burn coiling from the pit of my stomach, a good indication that I would probably be shit-drunk if I drank one more glass of that really nice lemon soju, while he was steadily drowning his fourth or fifth glass. When I asked him if it’s okay to be drinking like that, he simply laughed and told me he never get drunk on soju, he needs whiskey or Bourbon for that. Impressive man is impressive - even his level of soberness is different from us mere normal men.
Maybe it was the soju talking or my brain just got liquidated from the heat in my body and from the strobe lights above our heads, but before I knew it, I was dragging Jaejoong from our stools at the bar to the middle of the dance floor, dancing suggestively in front of him and near him. He just laughed and laughed, a rich creamy sound that sounded melodious in my ears, ringing loudly and joyously that I won’t mind if he goes on laughing forever like that. He ducked his head shyly when I grinded against his nice back, and I was having the time of my life to notice that I was flirting openly with this gorgeous man. Jaejoong might not be the best dancer out there but he definitely can sway and dance a little, and when his hips brushed daringly against my front as he bit his lips and looked at me from under hooded eyes, I swear my eyes rolled all the way around and I saw fireworks went off between us, blinding me with its intensity and amazing colors.
Truth was, a line of lightbulbs exploded (thus the fireworks I had seen) above us, and we were the only two not aware of it happening until someone from the crowd pulled us off from the dance floor to a safe spot. We were laughing like two crazy fools when we realized what had happened, so I paid the tab as quickly as I can and ran outside with Jaejoong into a cold night, both still crowing loudly. When we finally caught our breaths, I realized that Jaejoong was shivering considerably, teeth chattering between his sweet smiling lips.
It just seemed like the right time to do so, so I just did. I pulled him close to me and kissed his full smiling mouth, tasting the lemon soju and something sweet, something just Jaejoong. He sighed against my lips, and when I deepened our kiss he didn’t pull back, but kept pressing on until our tongues tangled in the most delirious way possible. Little did we realized then that we were in the middle of the street, kissing like there’s no tomorrow.
A taste of Jaejoong and I knew I couldn’t get enough of his sweetness. There’s a musky manliness in the way he swiped his tongue against the back of my teeth and the roof of my mouth, but there’s softness too, in the way his fingers curled on the lapels of my jacket, burrowing closer and deeper into my embrace, and to the way he shyly tugged on my lower lips when I wanted to pull away for a breath. When we finally parted, Jaejoong smiled a sexy half-lidded smile, looking up at me coyly and giggling like he wasn’t 33 at all. A naughty innocence shone bright and young from his eyes, and I fell deeply in love with him right at that very moment.
*
I didn’t get a wink of sleep since I came back home early this morning - so I just lazed around on the couch reading some Oscar Wilde and waited for the usual time I wake up and started preparing for school. I showered and put my best shirt on, laid an extra blanket on Changmin and filled a bottle of water and left it at the table beside the bed. I put a full pack of custard buns beside the bottle and the meds, wrote a quick reminder on a Post-it for Min before I jogged out of my apartment to the nearest bus stop.
I was grinning to myself when I remembered the kiss Jaejoong and I shared outside the bar, and inside of Jaejoong’s car, before I blanched when I recalled that I threw up all over his shirt and mine just as we were about to make out. I wanted to kill myself from the humiliation as he drove us back to his place so we could clean up, his very nice car stinking with lemon soju plus pizza vomit. An embarrassing thing indeed to be happening to me, but it had been good because once we were at his place, out of our vomit-reeking shirts and had gurgled our mouths off the stinks, Jaejoong had kissed me again, pushing me against the sink in his bathroom and kissing me breathless for good long minutes. We groped each other’s bodies for a bit, giggling like teenagers as we kissed against the bathroom wall. We stumbled out of the bathroom and unto his bed, but we didn’t do anything else afterwards, just cuddled together on his large, wide bed that smelled of sweet vanilla musk. He dozed off in my arms before I fell asleep myself, both shirtless and dizzy from our kisses.
It had been a really good night indeed, something I had never imagined to happen so soon between us. Maybe Jaejoong had been drunk when he brought me home and kissed me, but it was the nearest thing to affection I had felt from another human being aside from Changmin for a long, long time. And this felt better than any sexual intercourse I’ve had - it felt like my first love.
We woke up in the middle of the night, agreed that he should send me back to my place because there’s still school tomorrow, and it wouldn’t be a good thing if we were to come to school together in his car. When we arrived in front of my apartment building last night, we didn’t kiss goodbye, but Jaejoong had given me his mobile number and had said softly, eyes warm and hopeful,
“Call me later tonight okay? I’ll wait for you.”
Tonight. And for the rest of the day I’d have to put my best actor mask on and pretended that nothing happened between us. This was good enough for me.
*
When I got home that evening, Changmin was not getting better, tossing and turning in the bed. He growled something inaudible at me, a blanket covering his body up to his nose. When I looked closely I realized that he was shivering, and worry for my brother kicked thoughts of Jaejoong off my mind for a good while.
“Min, are you okay?”
He mumbled something I couldn’t tell, and when I put a hand on his forehead I realized he was burning hot. He had a fever, a symptom that followed his recovery from drug overused. I put another blanket on him, the last one we had, and hugged him closed for a while, letting him steal some of my body heat.
“Hang in there okay? It’ll get better soon, I promise.”, I half-cooed, rubbing soothing circles on his back. He made kittenish sounds, shrugging deeper in my arms and falling asleep on my chest soon after.
What happened to Changmin still was a shock to my system, the fact that I nearly lost my brother to drugs was a reminder of our childhood - a life void of joy and happiness. My father was a drug addict, and because of his addiction, he often pestered my mother for money and sometimes went as far as beating my mother black and blue when she couldn’t give him what he wanted. I remembered cowering away in our room and cupping my hands over Min’s ears to shield him from all the noise of the fights we had going on between our parents, but I guessed Min managed to listen to this even when I tried to shelter him from the ugliness of the situation. My mother didn’t make it easier for us, and when our father was away, she’d beat us with the broom or the mop, just because we reminded her of the bastard she had as a husband. It pained me still when I couldn’t think of my parents in a favorable way, there’s nothing that I could remember them by without having a nauseating feeling creeping up into my throat and making me want to throw up.
I wondered if I ever loved my parents at all, as far as I had remember I had fend for myself and Min my whole life. We ran away from home when Min turned 13, with only backpacks full of books and the clothes on our backs, finding shelters under the bridge until I found a job at a paint shop and in a few short months, managed to rent a low-cost room for the two of us and sent Changmin to school again. I studied on my own at the local library and saved up money enough for the high school certificate exam, no ambition on my mind except to ensure that Min finished his schooling and get into college. At least one of us deserves a chance at a better life, and I was surprised when a golden opportunity sprung up on me in the form of students’ loans from the same library I had studied in before, although the course was limited to the School of Education. I didn’t mind of course, beggars can’t be choosers. So here I was, after nearly 4 years went by. My students’ loan let me live comfortably, saved that I had worked my asses off during the first two years and in the summer breaks, and Changmin had managed to lighten up my burden by getting a special scholarship into the best law school in Seoul. I was so proud of my brother, I never doubt that he could succeed in his life. Changmin had always been a bright boy, the smartest one in his class since standard 1, but I never thought drugs would get to him and affected him this way. I didn’t even envision this coming at all.
I cried finally, the dire seriousness of the situation was something I rarely want to give a thought but now that the history and bitter memories were out in the open, I couldn’t help but analyze where I had went wrong. Min told me yesterday that he didn’t meant to take drugs at all, he swore it was his first time, but something happened that put stupid ideas into his head. I wanted to ask him about Inshil, his girlfriend of three months’, but when I mentioned her name, his face had turned pale and his eyes began to water and I knew instantly that the girl had been the cause of Min’s situation. Given some time, he’d probably tell it all to me when he was ready to open up his wound and share his pain with me.
It seemed like I have an ocean of tears in me because I couldn’t stop crying while I think of Changmin and our life. It just seemed all messed up, and just as my life was about to get interesting too, what with the recent positive development I had in my relationship with Jaejoong - if it could be called that at all.
I cried myself to sleep that night, forgetting all about a phone call I should be making to a certain special someone.
--[TBC]