Tart
TART; PG
Siwon goes missing in the summer before their seventh anniversary. The investigators think he was kidnapped. The media spins some fabulous tale about him falling in love with a foreign celebrity and being exonerated to an island. His family seems to think he’s collapsed under the pressure and taken his life. The rest of the boys have no idea what to think.
They look for him, diligently for two weeks, let the police handle it for the next month, and then give up completely after three.
Kyuhyun handles it better than he thinks he would. He thinks he’s going to turn into one of those insufferable nutcases, the kind that can’t fathom the idea of sleeping anymore, the type of person that’s always hugging themselves with inconsolable shaking and night terrors of what a great person Siwon was. But he doesn’t.
His hand won’t stop itching though. He tries to dismiss it.
He eats a lot and his face gets incredibly puffy and swollen from all the late night ramen but he doesn’t care. It’s the lack of schedules, it must be what keeps him so surprisingly unwound and apathetic. The company puts Super Junior on a temporary halt of all activities until they figure out what Siwon’s AWOL means for the group, and the plethora of free time kind of distracts Kyuhyun from ever accepting that Siwon is gone.
The lack of disruptions from game time helps immensely to heal. (re:heartbreak)
Not that Kyuhyun was ever in love with Siwon, of course, he just had an amicable admiration for his bandmate, his friend, his hyung. Donghae is the one who asks him one day, in between courses of Starcraft and helping of top-notch ramen (Ryeowook’s batch) if he misses Siwon at all, if he ever thinks about him.
“I have dreams about him. Dreams where he hugs me, and makes fun of my height. Do you?”
“Not really,” Kyuhyun says, pupils still dilated from overuse of game time. He shrugs when Donghae frowns, twisting his chopsticks in his bowl wrongly.
“It’s a different feeling than when Kibum left or Hangeng hyung. It feels like a part of my side is missing, like half of my lung or something. It’s strange.”
“Maybe you haven’t been going to the gym enough, your body isn’t used to the change.”
“Maybe.” Donghae just frowns again, twisting his noodles up in the air. “Is it weird that I miss his dimples?”
“Yeah,” Kyuhyun focuses back on the game, but his stomach does an unsettling flip-flop and for whatever reason he doesn’t stop thinking about those pesky little dimples when he tries to go to sleep that night.
It’s five months later and Yesung’s about to go to the army when the dorm turns into another melancholic festival. They go to sleep earlier now, there’s less people around and less things to chat about or make fun of, but Yesung insists they have an early celebratory dinner for his turtle’s birthday before he has to leave.
Donghae bakes an excellent cake and Ryeowook makes the western style crab legs, and Sungmin and Shindong continually laugh at Eunhyuk’s never ending display of tears. Eunhyuk drinks all the time now, and it’s become a bit of a show how terribly emotional he gets whenever there is a bottle of soju in his hands, mostly encouraged by Kangin. Kyuhyun laughs at it all from the background, mostly staying silent because he’s forgotten how to be annoyingly garrulous from the lack of attention from the older hyungs. He’s content this way, except his hand keeps itching, right below the pinky, telling him he’s forgetting something to do or someone, he can’t remember what.
And he keeps itching that part of his palm with the nail of his thumb until his mood turns sour because it doesn’t go away, when the front door opens and Eunhyuk is screaming; utterly piercing at the top of his lungs with a shriek until Sungmin clasps a hand to his mouth, but Eunhyuk’s eyes are still wide and clownlike.
Kyuhyun’s hand stops itching and there’s Siwon, right in front of him like an illusion, a supernatural form - a ghost. He’s hollowed out, the lack of muscles visibly apparent and his hair is almost gone - short in a buzz cut but he’s still all smiles, dimples exuding; the same demeanor of the Choi Siwon they used to know.
“Call the police, we’ve got to report this!”
“No, call the ghostbusters!”
“What the fuck happened Siwon?”
“What the fuck is happening?”
“Is someone going to call the company or?”
“Is that really you, Siwon?” Ryeowook’s the one who approaches the ghost first, he’d always been an unexpected brave soul and he reaches up to touch Siwon’s concave chin, delicately fingering the fine lines of his jaw and Siwon’s still smiling.
He’s not a ghost.
Hugs. Tons of them, one on one hugs, some even not with Siwon, but most of them are, group hugs, inappropriate kissing, appropriate kissing, the bellowing tears of an overwhelmed Eunhyuk, the loud chanting and roaring of lifting Siwon up into the air and then failing, all take over the dorm living quarters and then some. Kyuhyun partakes, although quietly but enjoys it nonetheless and he feels a tinge of embarrassment creep up his cheeks when Siwon gives his stomach a side squeeze in between the frenzy of group limbs and those familiar dimples are omnipresent in his view.
“Where’d you go hyung?” Ryeowook asks after all the uproar dies down and they decide not to call anyone else for the moment and just let this be their sacred time, just for now.
“Yeah, where did you go?” Yesung mimics, and soon they all share the sentiments.
Siwon unlocks his arms from the shoulders of Kangin and just sighs nicely, “I went on a missionary trip to Africa. The church wanted me to keep it under wraps so I didn’t tell anyone.”
“Ooh,” they all nod and and beam in proud unison but Kyuhyun doesn’t buy it, he knows when Siwon’s lying because those devious dimples of his disappear from plain sight.
There’s arms around him, two firm ones and although they feel lighter and less bulky, they still feel the same; strong. He acts nonchalant about it, ignores the faint smell of fresh shampoo and slightly wet hair from a shower tickling the back of his neck. Siwon lets a legs scrape against the back of Kyuhyun’s and Kyuhyun can feel the leg hairs itching his own, and he’s suddenly reminded of that feeling of his hand constantly itching.
“So where did you go, hyung?” Kyuhyun calmly says from underneath his covers when he can’t pretend he’s sleeping anymore and Siwon’s hold of him gets a bit stronger, constricting his breathing. Kyuhyun holds his breath, waiting for his answer.
“Truthfully? I needed some time alone.”
“That’s selfish.”
“I guess.”
He can feel Siwon’s nose on his neck now, so close he can feel Siwon’s eyelids fluttering shut just underneath the nape of his hair.
“So what did you think? Of being alone. Or whatever.”
“I did a lot of reflection, Kyuhyun-ah.” Something inside Kyuhyun tingles at the way Siwon says his name and affects the way his toes feel: numb. “I thought a lot about how I’ve sinned.”
“Like you’ve ever sinned, Siwon-hyung,” Kyuhyun says and then regrets when Siwon squeezes him even tighter.
“Isn’t this kind of sinning?” Kyuhyun doesn’t answer because suddenly his brain regresses and he doesn’t know the answer to anything not even his own name when Siwon whispers into his ear ‘I’ve missed this’ and the smell of fresh shampoo becomes closer in proximity.
“Did you miss me?” Siwon once asks him a couple of weeks later when the madness of his return and Yesung’s send off and their company’s flurried decision for a spontaneous comeback settles down. They sit in the living room, babysitting Yesung’s turtle, playing videogames at Kyuhyun’s more or less demand. Kyuhyun’s eyes find Siwon from his peripheral vision, not really wanting to take his eyes off the screen but feeling inclined to do so after a while as Siwon patiently waits for an answer.
He’s gained a bit of weight now, from Ryeowook’s insistence at making healthy chicken breasts and homemade barley soup for Siwon five meals a day and Siwon doesn’t refuse, even hitting the gym with Donghae several times a week. It’s like things have returned to normal and Kyuhyun isn’t sure what to think of it.
“I won the game,” Siwon says taking Kyuhyun out of his reverie and he stares at the screen in a delayed response, because he’s never lost at this one before. It’s not supposed to happen.
“Unfair,” he mutters and Siwon smiles at his side with those pesky dimples again.
“You didn’t answer my question, so also unfair.”
The turtle watches when Kyuhyun leans over and gives Siwon a simple kiss, certainly something that shouldn’t be called sinning but feels like it anyway. They both smile when it breaks and Kyuhyun punches Siwon weakly in the arm before he grabs his game controller again.
“No, I didn’t miss you.”
Kyuhyun overanalyzes everything for the next couple of months but it doesn’t matter much. Sometime in the course of comeback stages and rediscovered stolen kisses, the part of his hand below his pinky learns how to stop itching.
It has to be the dimples.
Siwon goes missing in the summer before their seventh anniversary. The investigators think he was kidnapped. The media spins some fabulous tale about him falling in love with a foreign celebrity and being exonerated to an island. His family seems to think he’s collapsed under the pressure and taken his life. The rest of the boys have no idea what to think.
They look for him, diligently for two weeks, let the police handle it for the next month, and then give up completely after three.
Kyuhyun handles it better than he thinks he would. He thinks he’s going to turn into one of those insufferable nutcases, the kind that can’t fathom the idea of sleeping anymore, the type of person that’s always hugging themselves with inconsolable shaking and night terrors of what a great person Siwon was. But he doesn’t.
His hand won’t stop itching though. He tries to dismiss it.
He eats a lot and his face gets incredibly puffy and swollen from all the late night ramen but he doesn’t care. It’s the lack of schedules, it must be what keeps him so surprisingly unwound and apathetic. The company puts Super Junior on a temporary halt of all activities until they figure out what Siwon’s AWOL means for the group, and the plethora of free time kind of distracts Kyuhyun from ever accepting that Siwon is gone.
The lack of disruptions from game time helps immensely to heal. (re:heartbreak)
Not that Kyuhyun was ever in love with Siwon, of course, he just had an amicable admiration for his bandmate, his friend, his hyung. Donghae is the one who asks him one day, in between courses of Starcraft and helping of top-notch ramen (Ryeowook’s batch) if he misses Siwon at all, if he ever thinks about him.
“I have dreams about him. Dreams where he hugs me, and makes fun of my height. Do you?”
“Not really,” Kyuhyun says, pupils still dilated from overuse of game time. He shrugs when Donghae frowns, twisting his chopsticks in his bowl wrongly.
“It’s a different feeling than when Kibum left or Hangeng hyung. It feels like a part of my side is missing, like half of my lung or something. It’s strange.”
“Maybe you haven’t been going to the gym enough, your body isn’t used to the change.”
“Maybe.” Donghae just frowns again, twisting his noodles up in the air. “Is it weird that I miss his dimples?”
“Yeah,” Kyuhyun focuses back on the game, but his stomach does an unsettling flip-flop and for whatever reason he doesn’t stop thinking about those pesky little dimples when he tries to go to sleep that night.
It’s five months later and Yesung’s about to go to the army when the dorm turns into another melancholic festival. They go to sleep earlier now, there’s less people around and less things to chat about or make fun of, but Yesung insists they have an early celebratory dinner for his turtle’s birthday before he has to leave.
Donghae bakes an excellent cake and Ryeowook makes the western style crab legs, and Sungmin and Shindong continually laugh at Eunhyuk’s never ending display of tears. Eunhyuk drinks all the time now, and it’s become a bit of a show how terribly emotional he gets whenever there is a bottle of soju in his hands, mostly encouraged by Kangin. Kyuhyun laughs at it all from the background, mostly staying silent because he’s forgotten how to be annoyingly garrulous from the lack of attention from the older hyungs. He’s content this way, except his hand keeps itching, right below the pinky, telling him he’s forgetting something to do or someone, he can’t remember what.
And he keeps itching that part of his palm with the nail of his thumb until his mood turns sour because it doesn’t go away, when the front door opens and Eunhyuk is screaming; utterly piercing at the top of his lungs with a shriek until Sungmin clasps a hand to his mouth, but Eunhyuk’s eyes are still wide and clownlike.
Kyuhyun’s hand stops itching and there’s Siwon, right in front of him like an illusion, a supernatural form - a ghost. He’s hollowed out, the lack of muscles visibly apparent and his hair is almost gone - short in a buzz cut but he’s still all smiles, dimples exuding; the same demeanor of the Choi Siwon they used to know.
“Call the police, we’ve got to report this!”
“No, call the ghostbusters!”
“What the fuck happened Siwon?”
“What the fuck is happening?”
“Is someone going to call the company or?”
“Is that really you, Siwon?” Ryeowook’s the one who approaches the ghost first, he’d always been an unexpected brave soul and he reaches up to touch Siwon’s concave chin, delicately fingering the fine lines of his jaw and Siwon’s still smiling.
He’s not a ghost.
Hugs. Tons of them, one on one hugs, some even not with Siwon, but most of them are, group hugs, inappropriate kissing, appropriate kissing, the bellowing tears of an overwhelmed Eunhyuk, the loud chanting and roaring of lifting Siwon up into the air and then failing, all take over the dorm living quarters and then some. Kyuhyun partakes, although quietly but enjoys it nonetheless and he feels a tinge of embarrassment creep up his cheeks when Siwon gives his stomach a side squeeze in between the frenzy of group limbs and those familiar dimples are omnipresent in his view.
“Where’d you go hyung?” Ryeowook asks after all the uproar dies down and they decide not to call anyone else for the moment and just let this be their sacred time, just for now.
“Yeah, where did you go?” Yesung mimics, and soon they all share the sentiments.
Siwon unlocks his arms from the shoulders of Kangin and just sighs nicely, “I went on a missionary trip to Africa. The church wanted me to keep it under wraps so I didn’t tell anyone.”
“Ooh,” they all nod and and beam in proud unison but Kyuhyun doesn’t buy it, he knows when Siwon’s lying because those devious dimples of his disappear from plain sight.
There’s arms around him, two firm ones and although they feel lighter and less bulky, they still feel the same; strong. He acts nonchalant about it, ignores the faint smell of fresh shampoo and slightly wet hair from a shower tickling the back of his neck. Siwon lets a legs scrape against the back of Kyuhyun’s and Kyuhyun can feel the leg hairs itching his own, and he’s suddenly reminded of that feeling of his hand constantly itching.
“So where did you go, hyung?” Kyuhyun calmly says from underneath his covers when he can’t pretend he’s sleeping anymore and Siwon’s hold of him gets a bit stronger, constricting his breathing. Kyuhyun holds his breath, waiting for his answer.
“Truthfully? I needed some time alone.”
“That’s selfish.”
“I guess.”
He can feel Siwon’s nose on his neck now, so close he can feel Siwon’s eyelids fluttering shut just underneath the nape of his hair.
“So what did you think? Of being alone. Or whatever.”
“I did a lot of reflection, Kyuhyun-ah.” Something inside Kyuhyun tingles at the way Siwon says his name and affects the way his toes feel: numb. “I thought a lot about how I’ve sinned.”
“Like you’ve ever sinned, Siwon-hyung,” Kyuhyun says and then regrets when Siwon squeezes him even tighter.
“Isn’t this kind of sinning?” Kyuhyun doesn’t answer because suddenly his brain regresses and he doesn’t know the answer to anything not even his own name when Siwon whispers into his ear ‘I’ve missed this’ and the smell of fresh shampoo becomes closer in proximity.
“Did you miss me?” Siwon once asks him a couple of weeks later when the madness of his return and Yesung’s send off and their company’s flurried decision for a spontaneous comeback settles down. They sit in the living room, babysitting Yesung’s turtle, playing videogames at Kyuhyun’s more or less demand. Kyuhyun’s eyes find Siwon from his peripheral vision, not really wanting to take his eyes off the screen but feeling inclined to do so after a while as Siwon patiently waits for an answer.
He’s gained a bit of weight now, from Ryeowook’s insistence at making healthy chicken breasts and homemade barley soup for Siwon five meals a day and Siwon doesn’t refuse, even hitting the gym with Donghae several times a week. It’s like things have returned to normal and Kyuhyun isn’t sure what to think of it.
“I won the game,” Siwon says taking Kyuhyun out of his reverie and he stares at the screen in a delayed response, because he’s never lost at this one before. It’s not supposed to happen.
“Unfair,” he mutters and Siwon smiles at his side with those pesky dimples again.
“You didn’t answer my question, so also unfair.”
The turtle watches when Kyuhyun leans over and gives Siwon a simple kiss, certainly something that shouldn’t be called sinning but feels like it anyway. They both smile when it breaks and Kyuhyun punches Siwon weakly in the arm before he grabs his game controller again.
“No, I didn’t miss you.”
Kyuhyun overanalyzes everything for the next couple of months but it doesn’t matter much. Sometime in the course of comeback stages and rediscovered stolen kisses, the part of his hand below his pinky learns how to stop itching.
It has to be the dimples.