Title: Blindsided
Pairings: MinHo
Rating: PG
Warnings: Some angst, a bit of blood.
Genre: Romance, Angst
Disclaimer: Plot and story belongs to http://community.livejournal.com/minho_yongwonhi/275385.html#cutid1
People learn to breathe because they have to. They're born, forced into the cold clarity of the world, where, mouth open, the body follows the instincts of its first ancestors, sucks in the thing it most needs to stay alive. To stay alive. Changmin knows that right now, at this very moment, his blood is rushing through him, carry oxygen to be exchanged in the alveoli. He feels his chest rise and contract, knows that nothing is wrong with him, physically. But he can't breathe, can't get air in fast enough to support the bullet-rapid breaths he takes. Consciousness pulls in, chases away the medication-induced sleep he'd been trapped in.
The nightmares are nothing new. They come more often than not, invisible entities that wrap long-fingered hands around his throat. He massages the sweat-damp skin, pushes away sheets that stick, feel like a coffin around him. It's inky dark, the dead of night that contains neither the residual light of day nor the break of morning's first color. He gets out of bed, walks on stiff legs to the glass door that leads out to his balcony, presses his forehead against the smooth surface before sliding it open, stepping out to let the wind smooth its hands over his burning skin. He rests on his forearms, staring out at the lights of Seoul. It's peaceful, the hours of limo between one day and the next.
He hasn't spoken to anyone in days. He left Yunho in Japan, where his leader (god, he can't help that his mouth pulls into a sneer when the image of Yunho flickers translucent in his mind) had held his tongue when the news broke. His hyung had done what was necessary. Like a good wind-up doll, he'd asked the fans to wait, promised they would do what they could to return. Promised that this hiatus was temporary. That they would always be DBSK.
“Yeah,” Changmin snarls to no one, pressing his lips together until they disappear, a line sewn like stitches across his face. He scrubs a hand through his hair, pressing his nails down a bit too hard, enjoying the quick flares of pain that skitter down his back. Who was leader-sshi kidding? They were falling apart, bit by bit. Changmin knows Yunho's in pain, knows this thing, this lawsuit is clawing at the insides of the older man, but he gets nothing. He is not Yunho's confidant. Hyung's got to protect his dongsaeng. His thoughts are barbed, carry the inflection of a sneering lip. He looks down at his hands, large, sturdy appendages. They are a man's, not that of a little boy. And yet, when the cameras stopped flashing, when everyone left and all that was left was them, a fragment of a whole, Yunho had kept his facade, the stiff upper lip that placed a thick wall between them, coworkers. Not friends.
Leaving was easy enough. Yunho didn't wake the morning he'd slipped out. He'd stayed dead to the world and all its trouble, head resting on bent arms. Changmin hadn't looked back, took a taxi to the airport and bought a ticket, speaking coldly behind a disguise of sunglasses and a loose hat, wishing he had someone else's face for a day. And here he is, anonymous in Seoul, in an apartment of a friend away on holiday, phone turned off. Unreachable. Changmin doesn't need Yunho, doesn't need anyone (them) It's easy to be alone, to pretend his other hyungs, the three men he trusts and loves most in the world are just out somewhere, going to get groceries or run errands. That any moment, they could come through the door, offering food, challenging him at video games, lecturing him for leaving his stuff everywhere.
He can deal with the silence, with the delusion that it's temporary, that things will go back to how they were. He goes back inside, leaves the door open. The bathroom light flickers when he hits the switch, paints him with a sickly yellow glow that only emphasizes the dark circles under his eyes, the wan stretch of his skin. He's forgetting to eat, lately, cues lost by hunger that doesn't come. He turns the tap on, lifts warm water to his face and raises his head to the ceiling, soaking in the warmth that dribbled down his neck to the naked skin of his chest until it's caught by the waistband of his boxers. The water cools on his skin as he walks back to the bedroom, sparks that feel like the fingertips of a lover as they caress. Lover? The flowery language is a mockery of the sex he's had. Women with bird-hollow bones, light underneath him, panting his name as he tries white their faces out with moments of bliss hollowed by their cheapness. And then he walked away, countless times, their names light on his lips, forgotten with the changing wind. No. No lovers.
A knock at the door spurs him into movement from the place he'd stopped between the bed and bathroom, staring blankly into space. No. How could he find me here? Because there's no question of who's on the other side of the three or so inches of wood between them. His hand is on the doorknob but he doesn't know what to do because the silence makes him ache, makes his breath catch again, draws attention to the in out in out—it's so loud, how could the other man not hear Changmin, shake his head at the younger man's pathetic emotions? So he makes the decision, or it makes him, and then the door's open and he sees Yunho, the real Yunho. The groomed, porcelain veneer-revealing leader has vacated, left someone tired in his place, someone who looks dead on their converse-clad feet, slouching in jeans and a hoodie.
“Yunho,” he whispers, but nothing else gets out because the man whose name spirits past his lips rears back before surging forward, connecting his fist with Changmin's jaw. He tastes blood where his teeth press into his lips and cheek, and spots roam over his vision as Yunho's fingers catch his nose. He swallows a few times, the tang of life in his mouth not entirely unpleasant.
“Don't you ever fucking disappear again,” Yunho says, stepping into the apartment. Without a word or glance between them he wraps himself around Changmin, lets the younger man burrow into his neck. There's shaking but Changmin isn't sure where it's coming from. His throat constricts, eyes, burn and he can feel warmth dribbling from his nose. He's pushed away, watches as Yunho sets off toward the bathroom, as if the apartment is his and he knows everything in it, mumbling about tissues. Changmin sits on the bed, waits for him to come back. Yunho kneels in front of him, traces fingers along his jaw and murmurs an apology that Changmin shakes away, guilty. He deserves more, if anything.
“Why?” Yunho asks, avoiding his eyes as he brings a wet tissue to Changmin's bloodied lips and nose.
“I don't feel like I'm a person to you,” he answers, eyes closed. “Like, you shut me out to protect me, but that just makes it worse.” He sucks air between tight teeth when the tissue makes contact with his nose and scrubs gently.
“Sorry,” Yunho says, distracted. “Then don't act like a child, Changmin.” He opens his eyes, stares at his hyung, anger building, but Yunho just holds his hands up. It's then Changmin sees the streaks of red on his neck, traces of himself on the older man, drying into his skin.
“You ran away. You ran away because I didn't want to fall apart. I can't fall apart, Changmin. Because if I do, if I grieve for what's happening, then it's real.” If Yunho's eyes are shiny, Changmin doesn't call attention to it. He pulls the older man up so he stops at eye-level and they hold there for a moment, locked together as time forgets itself. The spell is broken when Yunho's lips come down on Changmin's, snowflake light with heat that shocks the nerves of his lips. The sudden need of his body pushes to the surface, forces his consciousness down and he pulls Yunho back so they can entwine on the bed, hands on each other, anchors that hold together. Changmin fights, not for dominance, but to show the older man that he's there, will never leave again and that he's sorry, so sorry for having made such a big mistake. Yunho kisses hard, fingers digging into Changmin's arm but it's alright because it's real, and it's life and life is painful but in moments like this, it just proves how beautiful it is, too.
When they're breathless and have lips like sandpaper, Changmin strips Yunho and they curl around one another, content just to sleep. For now. Yunho whispers that it's alright, everything's ok and soon this will all be the past, forgotten like a footprint on a beach. Even if it's not the truth, Changmin smiles, presses closer. As he drifts away, letting fatigue take over, he's comforted by Yunho's steady breaths and thinks, just maybe, he can hear the echo of the others' as well.
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