SHINee Duets 2012: saanrio & kat_elric
Title: Memories Written in Falling Snow
Authors: saanrio & Kat_elric
Pairing: Onew/OC, Onew/MinHo
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: sexual content (beginning)
Authors’ Notes: This is the first part in what we realized had grown into a massive story when we weren’t looking. Instead of rushing to finish it all and chancing it being less than satisfactory, we decided to write the first part and continue to work on the rest of the parts to follow.
“Onew, yes, please, I’m almost... there.”
He looked down at the smooth back of the girl beneath him, his hands gripping her hips firmly as he thrust into her, their breaths an uneven rhythm compared to the slapping of skin on skin. He shifted a little, winding his hand around her hip to slip his finger between the folds of her sex, finding and rubbing gently at the hard nub he found there. He was rewarded by her breath coming in little hitches and her inner muscles gripping him as she moaned and reached her orgasm, not complaining at all as he let himself go and thrust quickly into her a few times before he came as well.
He waited a moment, then pulled himself out of her and forced himself to his feet, padding to the bathroom to remove the condom and dispose of it in the trash. When he returned to the room, she was lying on her side on the bed, her hair pushed haphazardly to one side, exposing the creamy skin on her neck as she watched him with dark eyes. He pulled on a pair of boxers and sat down on the bed, his back leaning against the headboard as she looked up at him and smiled slowly.
He wasn’t surprised when she moved up to lay beside him, her head landing on his chest just below his shoulder as her hand trailed lightly along his skin. When she didn’t say anything he was relieved. In spite of her clingy attitude, she hadn’t said anything to hint that she was thinking of this relationship as anything more than he did: a bit of stress relief and someone to make him feel not so alone for just a short time. He closed his eyes, his hands lying limp at his sides on the bed, making no effort to touch her as she lay against him, silently hoping she would decide to leave on her own before he had to ask her to leave. He had a class to attend, a test he needed to study for, and it was supposed to snow, later.
He opened his eyes when she got up a moment later and moved toward where her clothes had wound up on the floor near the door. They hadn’t wasted much time once they got inside, he remembered, glancing at the clock before he rose and reached for a pair of jeans on the floor. He had a class in thirty minutes, and he would need ten minutes to walk from his dorm to the building the class was in, five if he ran. He had finished buttoning his pants and was looking around for his shirt when a small box was thrust into his field of vision. It was wrapped in silver paper with a red ribbon and looked suspiciously like a birthday present.
He looked up at the girl and frowned a little. She had pulled on her clothes quickly and stood, dressed, while he held his shirt in his hands and was getting more uncomfortable as the seconds ticked by.
“It’s for you,” she said finally, smiling brightly. “Happy birthday!”
“My birthday was last month,” he said, shaking his head, the lie coming easily to his lips. He had never liked celebrating his birthday. As a child, he had cried and locked himself in his bedroom until his mother had spanked him and grounded him for a week, but he had still refused to come out. He had started lying about his birthday, telling friends he didn’t want a party, and basically making it difficult for anyone who was so inclined to celebrate it with him, so most people had finally stopped trying.
“You can’t lie to me, Oppa,” she giggled, shaking her head at him. “A friend of a friend works in the administration office, and she took a peek at your file when you wouldn’t tell me. So, I got you a gift.”
“You shouldn’t have,” he said, his voice flat as he turned away and pulled his shirt on, walking to the dresser and taking out clean socks before sitting on the edge of his bed to pull them on.
“Oppa,” she said as she sat next to him. “What’s wrong? Don’t you celebrate your birthday?”
“No,” he said firmly. “I don’t. It doesn’t mean anything other than another year gone by, what’s the point of celebrating it?”
“Because it is the day that the man I lo--” She paused for a moment, and he glanced up and saw the look of near panic on her face. “Like. The day the man I like was born.”
Onew sighed and rubbed at his forehead where a small headache was starting. He hated this part, and it never seemed to go any better. He stood and took her elbow, leading her toward the door where he let go and began putting on his coat and scarf, taking out his gloves and tugging them on before picking up his bag and slinging it over his shoulder.
“We need to leave, now. I’m going to be late for class.”
She nodded, and put down the present on his desk, then reached for her coat, her face tense and worried.
“You’re not mad at me, are you, Onew-oppa?”
“Mad?” He shook his head, but didn’t look at her. “No, I’m not mad.” He waited until she was dressed and ready to go, then opened the door and let her out first, picking up the present from his desk and handed it back to her before following her out.
They walked down the stairs to the first floor, and then stopped in front of the reception desk for the building, the security guard stationed there winced, knowing what was coming. Onew turned to her and sighed gently before he started speaking.
“GaEul, I have enjoyed our time together, but I don’t return your feelings, and I think it would be best to end things now.”
She opened and closed her mouth for a moment, looking like a fish before tears gathered and she shook her head.
“You’re dumping me? Why? Just because you don’t feel the way I do right now, that doesn’t mean you won’t later. Oppa, please.”
He sighed again, shaking his head and glancing toward the security guard behind the desk. The man rose and walked out, coming to stand near the girl and getting her attention, calmly asking her to please leave quietly. Onew watched as her eyes grew round and wide, as she realized he was really breaking up with her and she had no chance of making him change his mind. He watched as she frowned, then threw the wrapped box to the ground and he heard something inside it break as she walked out the door with her head held high.
He knelt down and picked up the box carefully, hearing the bright sounds of broken glass rolling around inside before he dropped it into the waste basket. He nodded to the guard as he left the building. The poor man was used to Onew’s breakups by now, having been subject to at least two every year. Onew shivered a little as he left the building and headed to class. Perhaps it was time he just gave up the pretense of dating at all.
“For you!” he exclaimed holding out the box that was much too large to be cradled in his tiny hands, to the small boy in front of him.
“For me?” the little boy asked looking at the box with wide eyes.
He nodded, smiling with happiness at the older boy. “Mommy told me I could give it to you tonight. I picked it.”
The older boy beamed at him and accepted the gift in arms that didn’t quite yet fit his body. He settled with it on the floor, likely the safest bet due to his sporadic bouts of clumsiness. The older boy, his dark hair curling at the tips against his neck, squinted at the print on the wrapped package. He had insisted on writing it himself, the characters that were supposed to be the older boy’s name.
“I can read it,” the older boy told him smiling at him in a way that made him feel all fuzzy and warm in the center of his chest. “It’s my name.”
“Uh huh,” he nodded proud of his accomplishment. “Open it!”
“Hold on,” the older boy smiled and scrambled to his feet, nearly tripping on the way and sending himself right back to the floor. He recovered with a small unconscious hop, something he was so used to doing, and scuttled across the room to his bed. From beneath it he removed a box clearly hand wrapped by a young child in bright paper. He carried it across the room, cradling it protectively in his arms until he reached the younger boy.
“This is for you,” he said, holding out the box.
“For me?” the younger boy asked puzzled.
“Yep,” the older reassured him with a nod. “Mom said I could give you one early too! Let’s open them together!”
“Okay!” the younger agreed accepting the package, then he remembered the manners he had been taught “Thank you for the gift.”
“You’re welcome,” the old boy told him as he dropped back down beside his own gift. “On the count of three. One. Two. Three!”
And the sound of paper tearing was replaced by the shrill screeching to his right pulling his mind from the place it had been. A hand reached out to slap at the offending piece of electronic equipment, silencing it rather forcefully. His eyes were hesitant to open as his mind felt to hold onto the images it had held. He wanted to sink right back into them and he likely would have if his phone hadn't chimed in from across the room.
“Minho, wake up! Minho, wake up!” came the annoying voice of one of his good friends on the soccer team, a tone recorded to drive him out of bed in situations just like this.
With a sigh he opened his eyes and turned his head to the side, focusing on the picture that sat beside his bed. In it was the image of himself as a small boy and beside him, with hair curling at the back of his neck and an arm around his shoulders, was the boy from his dreams. He paused for a moment, staring at the photo and absently rubbing at his chest with one of his hands.
Then the cry of “Minho, wake up! Minho, wake up!” began again. With a groan he rolled from his bed and found his feet, the picture forgotten behind him as he readied himself to face the day.
Onew knocked on the door to Professor Kim’s office and waited a moment for the older man to call for him to enter. He had gotten the short text when his last class of the day was ending and had come straight over, not wanting to delay if there was a problem with his thesis for his research paper. He heard the invitation to enter and walked inside, sliding his bag off his shoulder as he took the seat indicated in front of the slightly cluttered desk.
“Professor Kim,” he began, “I got your text. Is there a problem with my thesis?”
“Oh, no, no, your thesis is excellent. I’m rather intrigued to see what you will do with it,” the Professor said excitedly, smiling brightly. “No, I called you here to discuss a different matter. I have a student with a lot of potential, but whose extracurricular activities I fear may be getting in the way of this class.”
Onew frowned a bit. “So, why not simply suggest that he curb his extracurricular activities if they are adversely affecting his grade?”
“I considered that, actually. Unfortunately, the problem with that is that then he would no longer be my student. You see, he is here on a combination scholarship. If he quits the football team, or if his average slips too far in his courses, he could lose the scholarship. Which leaves me in the position that the best I can do for him is to arrange a tutor, and of course I thought of you straight away. What better tutor could the boy have than my most brilliant student in a decade?”
“Professor, I’m flattered, but I’m not sure that this is really a good time for me to be taking a student to tutor.” Onew frowned a little, his eyes darting to the window, where a light dusting of snow sat on the ledge from the night before.
“SeonDong,” the professor began, and Onew winced a little at being called by his given name. “I know that you have a light schedule this term, because you took heavier loads the last two years. You are a very good student and a hard worker and I normally would simply send the boy to the student center for tutoring there, you know this.”
Onew nodded, waiting for the professor to continue.
“The fact of the matter is that, just as I have developed a certain fondness for you in the time you have been my student, so I am similarly fond of this boy. I want to see him do more than just get a high grade in my class. I want to see him blossom and grow and find something in life that he will love to do.”
A knock sounded on the door followed by a muffled inquiry of, “Professor?”
Onew looked to the door and then watched as Professor Kim called out a cheery greeting of “Yes, yes, come in!” He watched as the door opened and the other student walked in. He didn’t follow football, and he wasn’t normally the type to search out the lower years, but for some reason, this young man seemed oddly familiar to him in some way. He blinked slowly, pushing the feeling away, certain they had never moved in the same circles or attended the same schools before if he were a scholarship student.
“You needed me for something?” the young man asked, shifting the weight of his bag more evenly on his shoulders.
“Yes, sit, please,” the professor said, waiting a moment while the boy complied before he continued. “As you know, your last test was not as high as it should be, and your last few quizzes have shown a rather dramatic downturn in your scores. I’d like to suggest a tutor to help you bring your grade up.”
There was a moment’s pause as the young man seemed to mull it over and then frowned. “While I think that might be helpful Professor,” he said finally. “My schedule doesn’t really have any extra time for something like tutoring.”
“I understand your dilemma, however, I think that it would be in your best interests to make time. And since I have already taken the initiative in asking the best student I have had in a decade to be your tutor, I think everything is basically settled.”
The clock on the wall chimed and the professor looked up, then hastily grabbed for a stack of papers on his desk. “I’ll just leave you two to discuss the details. SeunDong, do make sure you lock up on the way out, please?”
Onew watched in a sort of amused resignation as the professor hurried out the door, dropping one of his papers and scooping it back up off the floor before giving them a decidedly mischievous smile as he closed the door behind himself. He turned back to looking at the younger man beside him and gave a small internal sigh.
“You’ll have to forgive the professor, he does have a habit of deciding things and making sure you can’t really say no.” Onew shook his head and forced himself not to look at the window. He knew it was supposed to snow more today, and he didn’t need the distraction right now.
“I see that,” the young man replied, his features twisted into an frown. “I guess I don’t have much of a say in this.”
“You aren’t the only one. I need him to write a recommendation for my entrance application to graduate studies, I can’t afford to disappoint him right now.” Onew frowned a little, himself. Whether he wanted to do this or not, having a student who was reluctant or flat-out rebellious about it was not going to make his job easier. “Look, we may not like this but it seems like we are both rather stuck with it, so we might as well make the best of it. We can schedule things at times that you have free when you would likely be studying, anyway, and make it work that way.”
Onew reached for a scrap of blank paper on the professor’s desk and wrote out his mobile number along with his preferred name, since he hated to be called by his given name, and then held it out to the other boy. “Here, that’s my number, just text me or call me with when you have free and we’ll make something work. My classes this term are a little flexible, so I’ll be able to work something out, I’m sure.”
Nodding, the young man accepted the paper from his hands. “I suppose I should thank you,” he relented. “You are taking time out of your schedule to help me.” An expression of guilt flashed across his face. “Forgive me, I usually have better manners than this. My name is Minho. I will look over my schedule when I go back to my dorm and let you know when I am free. Thank you for agreeing to help me.” With those words Minho bowed formally to the other man.
Onew shrugged and went to stand. His foot landed on a sliding pile of papers and books under the professor’s desk and he wound up sitting down again rather abruptly before making it to his feet finally. “I understand, trust me. I didn’t arrange my classes with the thought of tutoring anyone, but, well, yeah.” He bowed a little, careful of the hazards in the professor’s office. “I’m Onew, like it says on the paper. Just, let me know, and we’ll figure something out, but right now, I have somewhere to be.” He gestured toward the door, waiting for the taller boy, MinHo, he reminded himself, to proceed him so he could lock up the professor’s office.
The young man straightened and nodded. “I will do that.” Taking Onew’s indication to leave, Minho turned and lead the way from the building with an air of purpose about him.
Onew watched the younger boy go, taking in the way he seemed to have places to go and people to see. It was an appearance he had tried very hard to cultivate in his own life and knew he wasn’t always successful with. He frowned a little before he turned back and flipped the light switch on the wall near the door inside the office and then made sure the door was locked before he pulled it closed. He turned and went the opposite direction down the hallway, not because he needed to go that way, but because he had caught a glimpse of what might have been a snowflake through the window and wanted to wait as long as he could to get to the main door of the building, and thus give the other plenty of time to be gone before Onew got there.
He finally stepped out the main door and was greeted with the sight of small specks of frozen white drifting down through the nearly still air. He paused, his throat working as his mind began to drift away. Snow always had the same effect on him, ever since he could remember, which wasn’t as far back as he honestly thought it probably should be. He stood and watched the small flakes fall, oblivious to them gathering and melting in his hair as he stood, until enough of them had melted to cause a drop of very cold water to drip onto his forehead.
He brushed a hand back through his hair, grateful that it wasn’t very wet, after all. Likely, he thought, his hair had just been warmer from being inside. He dropped his head and watched his feet as he walked, since it helped to keep him focused enough to make it home. Once there, he could afford to sit near the window and let himself get caught up in memories and half-forgotten dreams.