round 01, challenge four: entry #1
Title: The Pact
Fandom and Pairing: DBSK, gen with hints of HoMin and Hosu
Rating:pg
Word Count: 2,064
Summary: “A pact,” You started as the others stared at your hand. “To never come here by yourself or with another member unless it’s all five of us.”
Warnings: angst, non-au, faulty timeline
Prompt #: 1
It was your favorite restaurant to go to. You all had found it one night after a full day (and night) of shooting for some new variety show. Everyone had been too hungry to fall asleep, so you all decided to walk around until there was something that satisfied everyone’s cravings. Of course, none of the usual restaurants that gave you a back room or a table hidden in a corner were open, which left the only option of finding a new, safe restaurant for you and your band members to eat in.
Junsu had been the one who found the restaurant, your future safe haven in Korea when the stress got a little much or when your stomach growled a little too loudly from the liquid diet you found yourself on more often than not. The old woman who ran the restaurant never gave any of you problems and normally gave all of you double portions for half the price of a normal portion when you would tread in after a particularly hard practice and looked a bit like death. The restaurant was something that was special to all five of you, a place that felt, and tasted, a bit like home. It was always the first place you went to for food after a long time in Japan and whenever none of you could decide where to eat, that was the place you always ended up at. There were warm, happy memories inside its small walls that now became shadows of what had been; reminders of what had gone wrong.
-----
A few days after the last Mirotic concert you would do, after all the tears and promises screamed out to the fans, you found yourself back at the restaurant: You and Changmin on one side, Jaejoong, Yoochun, and Junsu on the other. It was just something natural, where everyone sat, but with the way the lights were directed away from your table and the shadows cast over the three across from you, you couldn’t help but laugh and wonder if this was meant to be. The other four looked at you strangely, but you shook your head and placed your hand in the center of the small booth you usually squished in.
“A pact,” You started as the others stared at your hand. “To never come here by yourself or with another member unless it’s all five of us.” You stared each one of them in their eyes, saw the hint of sadness behind them and beginnings of loneliness(SM had informed you that this was your last night together, as Jaejoong and Junsu were being forced out), but still a spark of hope that would keep this pact alive. Your hand started to twitch as it was the only one on the table, but then Jaejoong nodded and covered your hand with his.
“Yeah. I’d...like that.” Jaejoong’s voice wasn’t the strong, confident one you were used to, and you felt your heart break a little more when the other three nodded and whispered out agreements as they placed their own hands on top. You placed your other hand on top of everyone’s and squeezed.
If you hadn’t glanced down, you wouldn’t have noticed how easily all of your hands tangled together, or how perfect it was.
-----
The first few months that followed were your hardest. From the flop that was your drama to the other three at the MAMA’s to the extremely awkward performances in Japan at the end of the year. It wasn’t that you had meant to be awkward and closed off, but after so many rumors and facts and statements, you couldn’t tell what was real and true and what was false anymore. You found yourself slipped into a mask similar to the one Changmin wore ever since that last night at the restaurant. Numbers were changed and changed again, emails and letters were monitored and sneaking out was no longer an option. And while you wanted to worry about the other three, your youngest member gave you enough to be worried about. You watched slowly as Changmin started to drop weight and become obsessed with the gym.
“It’s for my drama, hyung,” he had told you one night as he grabbed his bag and water bottle. “You understand, right? You had to do the same thing, so...So just let me be, okay? I’ll be fine.”
You hadn’t had the heart to tell him there (or in the following months when you weren’t always there with him, not keeping a close enough eye) that your drama had been about a sport and his wasn’t. Or that he already looked fantastic in a suit and ten times better than the other four with the twenty or so pounds he used to have.
When you came back from Japan after doing the shoots for the “Best Selection” album, you even tried to bribe Changmin with a trip to the restaurant when he tried to be to bed without eating a single thing all day. The mention of the restaurant made him scoff.
“What about our pact? Huh, Yunho? What about that? Should we go and break the only remaining thing that connects us? Because really, that’s the only thing the five of us have in common anymore.” And with that, he walked down the hall and slammed his door shut.
You just sat down on the couch, your own stomach growling, and melted into the darkness of the apartment, the silence, and the loneliness (despite the other person in the room down the hall) that had crept around you for the past few months. Your thoughts wander around past memories and you’re surprised when you start laughing, something dark and that kind of sounded like a sob when you realize that you can’t figure out why it was easier to take care of four people instead of just one.
You realize that you actually are sobbing when your body is surrounded by warmth and fingers brush away tears. A hand rubbed up and down your back as you cried into Changmin’s sharp shoulder, pent-up frustrations finally released. After a while you calmed down and tried to push away from the younger, but he just held you tighter. You relaxed in his arms and laid your head on his shoulder. In the corner of your eye, you caught your reflection in one of the windows across the room, the barely there moonlight reflecting a partial image of yourself, alone, with no part of Changmin. But you knew by the arms wrapped around you and the hand that grasped yours tightly, that you weren’t alone. That you never were.
You never mentioned the restaurant again.
-----
A couple months passed by and you and Changmin find yourselves settled into the roles set out for you. Magazine shoot here, appearance there. Always solo, never together with Changmin, let alone anyone else. You hear things about the lawsuit, but they all sound the same, like nothing has moved forward and it only seems to be going backward. The news of the other three’s unit is a shock, but really, you thought after you read the article Changmin gave you, it’s what you all loved to do. Singing, music, was your lives and your lives were nothing without it.
You were jealous, sure, because they were actually able to do things they wanted to do, while you and Changmin sat around and waited for commands on what to do. Then, for a while, you and Changmin followed their activities closer than before (Junsu’s solo single, Jaejoong’s drama, and Yoochun’s dramas) and both of you found yourselves more proud of them than ever.
-----
Another couple months flew by and you found yourself already in the month of June, sprawled out on your bed, headphones in and one song on repeat. The heartbreak is easily picked out in the song and the pure, raw emotion has moved you to tears more than once. One headphone is pulled out of your ear as Changmin lay down next to you, the bag by the door and the smell of sweat confirming that he had just got back from the gym. Both of you lay there for a while, the song repeated countless times, until a sniffle broke the silence. You reached your hand over until you grasped one of the hands that covered Changmin’s face and held it tightly to your chest.
“It’s okay. They’ll be okay. We’ll be okay. It’ll all be okay.” You whispered, but the sniffles increased and you grabbed and held Changmin as close as you could, your own words echoing in your head.
As you held Changmin even tighter, as he held you those few months ago, you prayed that your words would come true.
-----
Things changed, people changed, you adapted. You hung out with Changmin and your friends more often and found that it’s not hard to smile anymore. The magazine articles with their titles ‘ON HIS OWN’ don’t sting as bad and you were, are, okay with this limbo you’ve found. You were not, are not, happy, but you are no longer sad, just…okay. You developed a habit of taking walks late at night; they help to clear your mind each night and allow you to relax. Things were good. And then, that was more than enough.
-----
It’s now late June and you can’t help but marvel at the fact it’s practically been a year since this whole fiasco began. That night, just as you finish getting ready to leave for a walk, Changmin and Minho ask (scream) for you to bring food back home with you as they watch movies together. You yell back an “Okay!” before you push in your headphones and start your nightly ritual.
For the first time in almost a year, your feet lead you through a path that you haven’t gone in almost a year. The restaurant is closed, not a single light on and all the signs taken down. But there’s a man tracing the ‘For Sale’ sign on the window, the moonlight illuminating his arm as he moves it up, right, down, left, and starts over. A sigh escapes the man as he takes a step back from the window and turns round and sees you.
You can’t even remember the last time you’ve seen Junsu. He’s standing in the shadows, so you have to take a few steps closer to see him. A little skinner and much more tired and sad than you remember him to be. You stare at each other, not saying a word, but your expressions alone say everything.
I miss you.
I’m sorry.
I’ll be okay.
We’ll be okay, one day.
I love you.
You close your eyes and take a deep breath. “Heard about the album, it’s…a great opportunity”
“Thanks. Um, heard from Jaejoong about your musical a-and SMTOWN. Word hard for u-…for you and Min.” You open your eyes at the mention of your musical and see that Junsu is looking everywhere but your direction. You nod absentmindedly and stare at the closed down restaurant.
“It closed down a week ago,” Junsu states and you can see him fidgeting with his hoodie out of the corner of your eye. “We…um, have been keeping an eye on the place, one of us checking it every now and then, to see that it’s still here…but when we came back from Japan after our tour…” He fades out and you look over to see him staring at you, a grimace on his face. You nod again and a silence falls between you.
“Well,” Junsu says, “I have to go, I shouldn’t be here anyways. This was supposed to be Jaejoong’s night but he’s packing for America. So-” Junsu hesitates and rushes in for a tight hug. “We miss you, more than you could imagine.” He whispers into your shoulder. ““Please take care of yourself and Changmin. And good luck with…with everything, Yunho. I-We believe in you. Both of you.”
You watch as he steps back and walks away, disappearing fully into the night. You look at the restaurant one more time and pull out your phone to take down the number on the ‘For Sale’ sign. When you close your phone, there’s a smile on your face. Time to go buy food for Changmin and Minho.
Fandom and Pairing: DBSK, gen with hints of HoMin and Hosu
Rating:pg
Word Count: 2,064
Summary: “A pact,” You started as the others stared at your hand. “To never come here by yourself or with another member unless it’s all five of us.”
Warnings: angst, non-au, faulty timeline
Prompt #: 1
It was your favorite restaurant to go to. You all had found it one night after a full day (and night) of shooting for some new variety show. Everyone had been too hungry to fall asleep, so you all decided to walk around until there was something that satisfied everyone’s cravings. Of course, none of the usual restaurants that gave you a back room or a table hidden in a corner were open, which left the only option of finding a new, safe restaurant for you and your band members to eat in.
Junsu had been the one who found the restaurant, your future safe haven in Korea when the stress got a little much or when your stomach growled a little too loudly from the liquid diet you found yourself on more often than not. The old woman who ran the restaurant never gave any of you problems and normally gave all of you double portions for half the price of a normal portion when you would tread in after a particularly hard practice and looked a bit like death. The restaurant was something that was special to all five of you, a place that felt, and tasted, a bit like home. It was always the first place you went to for food after a long time in Japan and whenever none of you could decide where to eat, that was the place you always ended up at. There were warm, happy memories inside its small walls that now became shadows of what had been; reminders of what had gone wrong.
-----
A few days after the last Mirotic concert you would do, after all the tears and promises screamed out to the fans, you found yourself back at the restaurant: You and Changmin on one side, Jaejoong, Yoochun, and Junsu on the other. It was just something natural, where everyone sat, but with the way the lights were directed away from your table and the shadows cast over the three across from you, you couldn’t help but laugh and wonder if this was meant to be. The other four looked at you strangely, but you shook your head and placed your hand in the center of the small booth you usually squished in.
“A pact,” You started as the others stared at your hand. “To never come here by yourself or with another member unless it’s all five of us.” You stared each one of them in their eyes, saw the hint of sadness behind them and beginnings of loneliness(SM had informed you that this was your last night together, as Jaejoong and Junsu were being forced out), but still a spark of hope that would keep this pact alive. Your hand started to twitch as it was the only one on the table, but then Jaejoong nodded and covered your hand with his.
“Yeah. I’d...like that.” Jaejoong’s voice wasn’t the strong, confident one you were used to, and you felt your heart break a little more when the other three nodded and whispered out agreements as they placed their own hands on top. You placed your other hand on top of everyone’s and squeezed.
If you hadn’t glanced down, you wouldn’t have noticed how easily all of your hands tangled together, or how perfect it was.
-----
The first few months that followed were your hardest. From the flop that was your drama to the other three at the MAMA’s to the extremely awkward performances in Japan at the end of the year. It wasn’t that you had meant to be awkward and closed off, but after so many rumors and facts and statements, you couldn’t tell what was real and true and what was false anymore. You found yourself slipped into a mask similar to the one Changmin wore ever since that last night at the restaurant. Numbers were changed and changed again, emails and letters were monitored and sneaking out was no longer an option. And while you wanted to worry about the other three, your youngest member gave you enough to be worried about. You watched slowly as Changmin started to drop weight and become obsessed with the gym.
“It’s for my drama, hyung,” he had told you one night as he grabbed his bag and water bottle. “You understand, right? You had to do the same thing, so...So just let me be, okay? I’ll be fine.”
You hadn’t had the heart to tell him there (or in the following months when you weren’t always there with him, not keeping a close enough eye) that your drama had been about a sport and his wasn’t. Or that he already looked fantastic in a suit and ten times better than the other four with the twenty or so pounds he used to have.
When you came back from Japan after doing the shoots for the “Best Selection” album, you even tried to bribe Changmin with a trip to the restaurant when he tried to be to bed without eating a single thing all day. The mention of the restaurant made him scoff.
“What about our pact? Huh, Yunho? What about that? Should we go and break the only remaining thing that connects us? Because really, that’s the only thing the five of us have in common anymore.” And with that, he walked down the hall and slammed his door shut.
You just sat down on the couch, your own stomach growling, and melted into the darkness of the apartment, the silence, and the loneliness (despite the other person in the room down the hall) that had crept around you for the past few months. Your thoughts wander around past memories and you’re surprised when you start laughing, something dark and that kind of sounded like a sob when you realize that you can’t figure out why it was easier to take care of four people instead of just one.
You realize that you actually are sobbing when your body is surrounded by warmth and fingers brush away tears. A hand rubbed up and down your back as you cried into Changmin’s sharp shoulder, pent-up frustrations finally released. After a while you calmed down and tried to push away from the younger, but he just held you tighter. You relaxed in his arms and laid your head on his shoulder. In the corner of your eye, you caught your reflection in one of the windows across the room, the barely there moonlight reflecting a partial image of yourself, alone, with no part of Changmin. But you knew by the arms wrapped around you and the hand that grasped yours tightly, that you weren’t alone. That you never were.
You never mentioned the restaurant again.
-----
A couple months passed by and you and Changmin find yourselves settled into the roles set out for you. Magazine shoot here, appearance there. Always solo, never together with Changmin, let alone anyone else. You hear things about the lawsuit, but they all sound the same, like nothing has moved forward and it only seems to be going backward. The news of the other three’s unit is a shock, but really, you thought after you read the article Changmin gave you, it’s what you all loved to do. Singing, music, was your lives and your lives were nothing without it.
You were jealous, sure, because they were actually able to do things they wanted to do, while you and Changmin sat around and waited for commands on what to do. Then, for a while, you and Changmin followed their activities closer than before (Junsu’s solo single, Jaejoong’s drama, and Yoochun’s dramas) and both of you found yourselves more proud of them than ever.
-----
Another couple months flew by and you found yourself already in the month of June, sprawled out on your bed, headphones in and one song on repeat. The heartbreak is easily picked out in the song and the pure, raw emotion has moved you to tears more than once. One headphone is pulled out of your ear as Changmin lay down next to you, the bag by the door and the smell of sweat confirming that he had just got back from the gym. Both of you lay there for a while, the song repeated countless times, until a sniffle broke the silence. You reached your hand over until you grasped one of the hands that covered Changmin’s face and held it tightly to your chest.
“It’s okay. They’ll be okay. We’ll be okay. It’ll all be okay.” You whispered, but the sniffles increased and you grabbed and held Changmin as close as you could, your own words echoing in your head.
As you held Changmin even tighter, as he held you those few months ago, you prayed that your words would come true.
-----
Things changed, people changed, you adapted. You hung out with Changmin and your friends more often and found that it’s not hard to smile anymore. The magazine articles with their titles ‘ON HIS OWN’ don’t sting as bad and you were, are, okay with this limbo you’ve found. You were not, are not, happy, but you are no longer sad, just…okay. You developed a habit of taking walks late at night; they help to clear your mind each night and allow you to relax. Things were good. And then, that was more than enough.
-----
It’s now late June and you can’t help but marvel at the fact it’s practically been a year since this whole fiasco began. That night, just as you finish getting ready to leave for a walk, Changmin and Minho ask (scream) for you to bring food back home with you as they watch movies together. You yell back an “Okay!” before you push in your headphones and start your nightly ritual.
For the first time in almost a year, your feet lead you through a path that you haven’t gone in almost a year. The restaurant is closed, not a single light on and all the signs taken down. But there’s a man tracing the ‘For Sale’ sign on the window, the moonlight illuminating his arm as he moves it up, right, down, left, and starts over. A sigh escapes the man as he takes a step back from the window and turns round and sees you.
You can’t even remember the last time you’ve seen Junsu. He’s standing in the shadows, so you have to take a few steps closer to see him. A little skinner and much more tired and sad than you remember him to be. You stare at each other, not saying a word, but your expressions alone say everything.
I miss you.
I’m sorry.
I’ll be okay.
We’ll be okay, one day.
I love you.
You close your eyes and take a deep breath. “Heard about the album, it’s…a great opportunity”
“Thanks. Um, heard from Jaejoong about your musical a-and SMTOWN. Word hard for u-…for you and Min.” You open your eyes at the mention of your musical and see that Junsu is looking everywhere but your direction. You nod absentmindedly and stare at the closed down restaurant.
“It closed down a week ago,” Junsu states and you can see him fidgeting with his hoodie out of the corner of your eye. “We…um, have been keeping an eye on the place, one of us checking it every now and then, to see that it’s still here…but when we came back from Japan after our tour…” He fades out and you look over to see him staring at you, a grimace on his face. You nod again and a silence falls between you.
“Well,” Junsu says, “I have to go, I shouldn’t be here anyways. This was supposed to be Jaejoong’s night but he’s packing for America. So-” Junsu hesitates and rushes in for a tight hug. “We miss you, more than you could imagine.” He whispers into your shoulder. ““Please take care of yourself and Changmin. And good luck with…with everything, Yunho. I-We believe in you. Both of you.”
You watch as he steps back and walks away, disappearing fully into the night. You look at the restaurant one more time and pull out your phone to take down the number on the ‘For Sale’ sign. When you close your phone, there’s a smile on your face. Time to go buy food for Changmin and Minho.