Archive of Our Own

Donghyuck gets married just as March fades into April. 

'Bridging the three generation rivalry: a Lee-Lee wedding' is the one article they get in The Korea Herald. They're important enough just to cause a little bit of a stir, important enough for the talk to swell and then die out slowly. It's accompanied by an exclusive photoshoot, the one Donghyuck barely remembers a thing from, the one where they're wearing their matching Cartier LOVE bracelets in, almost taking all the focus off their inconspicuous matching rings. Almost, but not entirely. 

Dispatch had a field day when Donghyuck went to pick them out. 

“Aw, officially shackled down. Congrats. Couldn't be me, though,” Renjun giggles into the phone just seconds after the article lands in Donghyuck's messages. 

Donghyuck presses his head against the glass. His breath condenses in a circle. It's damp and cold, just like the entirety of March has been. 

“Just you wait, Injunnie. One day you're gonna blink and there will be a twenty million won bracelet hanging from your arm that you can't even take off without unscrewing either it or your hand off your wrist.”

“Sounds painful. Your husband hasn't tried to somehow magic it off yet? You know, just like he—”

“My husband,” Dongyuck says, spits out really, the word absorbing all the feelings distending his chest, “you could stick my husband into the mud and he'd fall limply off to the side within seconds.”

“Really? The Mark Lee? Wait 'til the press hears about that one.”

Downstairs, all his suitcases and boxes are waiting in a line to be shipped off to Mark Lee's house. Donghyuck is also waiting to be shipped off to Mark Lee's house. 

The press will be hearing about how capable and hardworking he is. The perfect husband. What a fucking joke. 

“Renjun-ah,” Donghyuck sighs, “are you gonna come visit?” What Donghyuck doesn't say is: are you gonna come guns blazing to get me out of there if I call? 

“Am I invited? What would Mark think about that?”

“I'm sure he'd be a splendid host.” What Donghyuck doesn't say is: that's what I'd like to know, too. 

°°°

Donghyuck last saw Mark at their wedding, which was like four days ago. Under the pretence of a wedding night, they were whisked off to the presidential suite, where Donghyuck barely blinked an eyelid closed, lying stiff on the huge bed while Mark's snores trickled softly from the sofa. 

Mark is— Mark. That's the entire problem. He's perfectly polite, impeccable manners, the result of their similar upbringing, almost solemn in its bourgeois. The difference is that it never seems to have stuck with Donghyuck and it showed— in the way his mother had to keep reminding him to straighten this or that every time he made the mistake of looking at her during the ceremony and the following reception. His shoulders, his smile. The silvery knot at the base of his neck, his matching cufflinks. 

And Donghyuck kept wondering if someone seeing the wedding would question whether the two young people getting married were in love. Whether the stars made it just so and what compelled them to choose the date of their marriage; if someone would think they kept dreaming about the moment their hands touched while exchanging the rings, whether anyone would doubt the whole thing after seeing Mark leave a barely-there kiss right in the centre of Donghyuck's lips. 

It didn't even ache. 

And when Donghyuck walks into the house with finality, all the boxes and suitcases full of clothes and skincare having found their rightful place without him barely having to lift a finger, there are artisanal candles strewn in every corner of the living room. Mood lamps and lighting washed warm, giving the whole space a cosy vibe in the dusk of the day. The sun still sets too early. 

It's clear it wasn't Mark who lit the candles, because he makes quick work of blowing them out as he walks Donghyuck across the place, pointing at each room with the air of an airport employee giving out directions, quick and detached. As if Donghyuck hasn't been walking the space for hours. 

As if this whole thing wasn't just for show, anyway. The house is big and airy, a perfect amalgamation of Pinterest’s luxury dream house boards, but it's too clean and impersonal and Donghyuck knows Mark splits his time between staying here and in his Gangnam penthouse. Maybe that's what feels mocking— here, isn't this what you asked for? 

“Here's the dining table— I don't really eat there. Oh, and the TV— uh, cable, Netflix, Amazon Prime, feel free to just…tell me if you'd need to add anything, like HBO, I don't really—”

“It's okay, Mark-ssi,” Donghyuck says, “seems to me like you don't really do a lot of things. It's fine, I don't really watch TV either.” He doesn't mean for the words to come out as derisive, but they still do.

“Okay,” Mark says, face shuttered into the polite mask that seems to never crack. 

“But I think I'd…” Donghyuck stretches the words out as he runs a hand across the massive dining table wood. Mark is behind the kitchen island that holds two high chairs, a marble coated barrier separating the two of them. Donghyuck can't imagine them sitting there side by side, sharing breakfast. “I'd like to eat here.”

“You can do whatever you wish for. Wanna continue the tour?” 

“Sure,” Donghyuck says, but his attention is on the huge windows and the last light of the day that's trickling in. Even as they drove up the hill, the whole area was encased in a misty kind of vibe, and fog is settling along the flawlessly green lawn, now stretching out as far as Donghyuck can see but it's so, so empty. 

“You garden?” he asks, despite knowing the answer as he follows Mark down the windows to the hallway, expecting to be shown the small gym next to the bathroom and his bedroom that he's already found on his own. Mark's back is to him, and Donghyuck can see the wings of his shoulder blades, how they cut solid through his— and, god. Enough. 

“Do I… do I look like I garden? I'm more of a spectator, honestly,” Mark says and pauses at the end of the hallway. In profile, his nose slopes straight down, almost unnoticeable, and the pout of his lips makes Donghyuck wish he never looked. His throat is an endless expanse of skin right down to his clavicles dipping out from the neckline of his pristine white shirt. 

“Thank you for the tour,” Donghyuck says, half-honest, hand already stretched towards the doorknob of his room. He wonders whether Mark sleeps with the blinds open. Does he like to keep the room warm? Cooler? Does any of it matter? “Would you mind if I take it away from here?” 

And Mark, adeptly polite Mark, bows his head ever so slightly and leaves Donghyuck to learn the layout of his room all on his own. 

°°°

Donghyuck would like to not wake up to rain, just for fucking once.

He’d like to take his coffee out to a sun drenched terrace and stare at the empty garden where he’d go for a walk right after. 

But like every day, there’s a minute after he wakes up, bewildered to find himself in bed that isn’t his own, grabs his phone from the unfamiliar nightstand, and is just as bemused by the ring and bracelet combo catching light on his arm. Annoyed, he stares through the gaps between his fingers, unfocusing enough to see the day washed grey and the part of the window that's not covered by the huge automatic shutters being splattered with raindrops, and wishes for sunlight.

Mark is the kind of person who’s meticulous with his— basically everything. His routine, mostly. 

Donghyuck tries his best to match it, but he’s so inherently wired to reject anything resembling a routine he ends up being terrible at following pace. Mark has given Donghyuck practically every window to stay out of his way and yet they always seem to run into each other. 

The conversation is usually short and stilted, a sorry, excuse me when they need to pass each other in a doorway or in the kitchen, a how are you, you need anything at the most. What is there to talk about when their lives barely intercept?

And it’s just that. Mark would give him everything, as he's probably been instructed to, as he's probably been inculcated since childhood. Donghyuck tries not to run off wild with this information— which is not that hard since Mark being a wet noodle about everything takes all the fun from it. 

Perfect smiles, perfect emptiness. Perfect strangers, learning how to move around each other.

To his credit, Mark has given him enough of a chance for these encounters not to happen, with his unchanging habits of waking at a certain time and coming back home when it's too late for Donghyuck to be venturing outside of his room. But Donghyuck also got time off work. Mark didn't. There are more pressing matters he needs to attend to, like the case he's representing Donghyuck's family firm on.

And it's not like Donghyuck's been explicitly forbidden from going out. It's just been gently suggested that it’d be a better idea for him to keep quiet until the hype around them both dies down.

He thinks about the messages piling up on his phone that he’s been steadfastly ignoring, mostly from Renjun and Jisung, or the two missed calls from his mother.

The last time he’d talked to her, she was holding both his cheeks in her hands. Families like ours… Eomma didn’t marry for love either, she said. Make it work, for us all.

Donghyuck wants to be backpacking through Cambodia. Donghyuck wants to be sunbathing on a yacht in the middle of the Indian Ocean. The last thing he wants to be doing is play house with someone whose vocabulary seems to be unnervingly lacking even despite the fact that he’s an attorney.

Instead, he rolls out a dusty yoga mat from the garage in front of the huge windows and watches the rain rivet down. Instead, he stares at the faultlessly empty garden and bored with the stillness, has the most insane thoughts of planting rows upon rows of flowers or vegetable patches. Sunflowers. Peas. He could do peas. If this goes on for long enough, he's going to be drawing Punnett squares and returning to high school Mendelian genetics. Biology's always been a favourite. 

He wants to bury his fingers in the soil still-wet from the neverending downpour and watch something wild and unruly grow. Get absolved by the late sun and stop feeling like he's seconds away from melting out of his own skin just like when you salt a cucumber. 

They get their groceries delivered. A cook is supposed to come in later in the week, that is— to give them privacy for the time being. What are they gonna do, fuck on the kitchen counters? All this privacy and Donghyuck's husband barely makes eye contact with him.

And so Donghyuck cooks, for himself and then some. He bakes cinnamon rolls just for the hell of it, and considers leaving Mark a note that says Eat well, yeobo!. It's crumpled and basketball-dunked in the bin before Donghyuck writes the first syllable of that last word.

Still, he always finds the dishes Mark must've used in the dishwasher as he turns it on in the morning. 

°°°

The best day is when he discovers the wine cellar. 

°°°

Donghyuck first saw Mark on the cover of Forbes his mother had laid out on the coffee table in her office for almost four months. Sure, Donghyuck knew about him before, but he was more of an awkward oily-skinned teen in Donghyuck’s imagination, rather than the man staring him down from the front page.

That's why when Donghyuck uncovers a little bit of the facade, he's a bit delighted and a lot more of something he refuses to admit. On one of the repetitious mornings, he witnesses how Mark Lee operates to become, well— Mark Lee, superstar attorney whose latest case has everyone on their toes. 

Even though the house is huge, it seems like his own room is the one that came with an en-suite while Mark uses the one in the hallway, the one Donghyuck has to walk by when he wants to get back into his room. 

The one he pops into to wash his hands really quickly and finds Mark there, already. Donghyuck is convinced that there isn't anything more vulnerable than a person in the bathroom right after waking up. 

And Mark’s got a toothbrush in his mouth and a mess of hair on the top of his head, curling towards the nape of his neck. Donghyuck watches him wet the tips of his fingers first and dampen it, then comb it back with an inconspicuous nameless but surely expensive pomade. 

Mark is also shirtless. 

He’s lean and wiry, broad shoulders tapering into a small waist and an outward curving ass that looks almost illegal in the dress pants he’s wearing. Donghyuck should most definitely stop staring. He should—

Mark’s sleepy eyes meet his in the mirror, for a moment. 

“You needed something?” he asks. Donghyuck, only because he can’t tear his gaze away as the whole thing seems to have successfully anaesthetised his brain into inactivity, stares longer at Mark pouting out his lips to apply a thin sheen of lip oil over them. It’s tinted.

“No,” Donghyuck says and turns abruptly. Sorry is on the tip of his tongue.

°°°

Donghyuck's back usually bothers him in the evenings. Sometimes, he wakes up like that, too, but it's rare and mostly like this: after he's already settled in for bed, showered and pyjama clad when the neurons light up, an ache Donghyuck is familiar with.

The yoga mat is in the garage, that's where Donghyuck returns it after every use, the garage so full of randomly spaced things and cabinets that he’s never even noticed the work table in one of the corners is actually in use until he walks in and finds Mark sitting there. 

At the sound of the door opening, Mark startles bad, tipping halfway from the creaky computer chair he's occupying. 

“Hi?” Donghyuck says, “sorry. Didn't know you were working here.” 

Mark looks seconds away from protectively covering the spreadsheets on the wall in front of him with his entire body. He has his laptop open, a stack of books next to it, and what looks like attempts at stick figures and chaotic arrows on grey-lined paper. 

“No, you're good. I, um— yeah. I work here.”

There is a teacup and a half-eaten brownie Donghyuck baked that afternoon alongside the mess on the table, too. 

Donghyuck is in his silk shorts and an oversized tee almost covering them halfway. Inside the dimly lit room, it's hard to make out but— that's Mark's eyes lingering on the space where fabric meets thigh, flitting up and down. Interesting.

In any other universe, Donghyuck would stretch a leg forward. Pull the fabric of the shorts higher, maybe even scratch at the skin of his torso and let his shirt get dragged up by his wrist, allow a glimpse of his lower belly. 

In any other universe, Donghyuck would get a chance to seduce his husband before marriage.

The thoughts make him snort softly.

“Something funny?” Mark asks. 

Mark is also wearing lounge clothes. Sweatpants and a dark green hoodie, the drawstrings tied in a small bow at the base of his throat. It’s almost jarring to see him without his suits, it makes him look younger and boyish, and so do the black-framed glasses that catch light when Mark turns to fully face him. 

“No, it just… made me think. We’ve barely been acting like roommates. I don’t know a thing about you, and yet we’re supposed to be—”

“Married?” Mark supplies.

“Married. Husbands. Doing stuff that people do when they’re devoted to each other for eternity or whatever. It’s kinda hilarious.”

“What stuff?”

“You want me to describe it to you in great detail?” Donghyuck leers at him.

“Donghyuck-ssi, I don’t—”

“That is to say— I'd rather call off this whole scam than have to spend the rest of my life with someone who runs the other way if I so much as breathe one room over as if I had a— what's a really contagious disease?”

“Measles?”

“That. So you get me.”

“No, I— sorry, it's just… full disclosure: I have no idea what I’m doing. I’m so out of my element here it almost makes my skin break out.”

And, oh. Was Mark Lee’s perfect facade just him being shy? Tentative?

“Ah, just like me with the measles. Look at us, a match made in heaven.”

Mark presses his lips together.

“Mm, sorry. Was that you opening up to me?”

Mark unfolds himself up on the chair so that he simultaneously looks bigger and smaller. The fingers of his left hand reach out and almost as if it's an unconscious gesture, start twirling the band around his ring finger. 

“See, this is exactly what… Donghyuck-ssi I'm not good at the whole…” Mark waves his hands around.

Donghyuck takes a breath and then tries not to let the exhale gather up rage like it would've about two weeks ago before he'd resigned himself to all this. Which was also before his therapist appointment. 

“What? The what? The games we've had to play only because fate made it just so we were born and it came with a certain status? Full disclosure: I didn’t get a welcome brochure either.”

“I'm not good at those.”

“Well, you better fucking learn how to play, Mark Lee. I'm not lugging your weight around for the rest of— however long this is gonna take.”

“Right,” Mark has closed off again but there's something lighting up the corners of his eyes as he says: “You know a good teacher around here?”

Donghyuck inhales again and is finally able to get his legs moving enough just to grab the mat he came here for in the first place. He hums thoughtfully as he turns back to Mark. 

“Only one whose condition is not to talk formally with his students.”

“I can agree to those terms. Donghyuck-ah.” 

It doesn’t feel monumental.

Something in Donghyuck still settles. 

°°°

The days blur like a water spill over an ink pen. 

Mark goes to work.

Donghyuck sits in his actual office, the one that’s clearly not in use, and plans out three different campaigns for the new perfume line he wants to push through. Considers calling his mother and begging her to let him go back to work. 

Logically, he knows that it’s not forever. He's just a little vexed that Mark gets to go away for hours on end and Donghyuck has to keep up the settling into his new life façade. Guess the golden boy gets a pass. Donghyuck bets he's been settled into married life as soon as he learned how to walk. Which was also most likely unnaturally early. 

The computer setup in his own room is nice, for a few days. For a few hours every day, even. But Donghyuck’s back starts acting up if he sits for too long and he has to take breaks and then he— gets bored. 

He's one more unhinged thought and an impulsive shopping spree away from taking up woodworking or craft candle making. Lino cutting, terrarium making, pottery. He already did jewellery once. 

Donghyuck's Tesla is in the actual garage that's not a storage slash Mark's glorified working space and he drives down to a grocery store in full disguise— an inconspicuous snapback covering the upper half and a mask on the lower half of his face. It's not like he cares, he just doesn't particularly wish for a lecture in safety on the off chance he gets recognised, especially this soon after the whole thing went down. 

Trunk-full of produce and an Iced Americano in the cupholder, the garden centre is just the logical conclusion of his outing. There's a How To Repot a Plant: With Pictures pulled up on his phone and an unidentified houseplant waiting for him on the coffee table.

Donghyuck buys gloves, too, but ends up doing the whole process bare-handed, soil spilling across the tiles in the living room. It smells like the garden centre contained within a bag and it yields underneath Donghyuck's hands as he presses it around the plant inside of its new pot. 

This one is raised off the floor with three rounded wooden legs and is, frankly, adorable.

Donghyuck wonders whether Mark would notice the change. 

°°°

He catches him rummaging through the kitchen a few days after their talk in the garage.

Mark's holding a whole bouquet in one hand, lifting it high up in the air as if to cause minimal damage while his body is almost halfway inside one of the cabinets. 

“Do you know where— do we have any vases?” 

“It's your house, Mark. Hyung,” Donghyuck adds as an afterthought.

“Our.” Mark's face depicts a person who regrets a word after their leaky brain-to-mouth filter already let it out. Still, Donghyuck admires him for barreling on. “Our house. Do we?”

“I don't know. What d’you need it for?” 

Mark huffs. 

Something shifted in Donghyuck after that night. A part of him, the exact part he was almost subconsciously holding in a death grip, the part that sets off a tingly string of emotion starting at the base of his spine when he sees Mark’s slight eye roll at his words. It makes him almost impatient to push for more. 

“Here.” He hands the bouquet to Donghyuck. It's made up almost exclusively out of sunflowers, vividly yellow, standing out against the greens and the beige toned wrapping paper. “But if you'd rather let the poor flowers dehydrate and shrivel up and die, well…”

“Hmm, oh, how surprisingly thoughtful. Your Eomonim put you up to this?”

“No. I, um—”

While Mark is finding his words, Donghyuck brings the sunflowers up to cover the lower half of his face, and also any unwanted mouth movements that might be making an appearance. He definitely must've asked Donghyuck's mother, and Donghyuck can only guess what she's gonna make out of that. The only other option is Renjun and that thought is honestly terrifying. 

“Tomorrow. The charity event on behalf of my parents is pretty much non-negotiable, they want us to make an appearance. I think a suit will be ready for you in the morning.” 

“I knew that. You don’t need to bribe me, I’d have to be there anyway.” 

“I know that,” Mark says and doesn’t offer anything else.

Donghyuck, unbreaking the eye contact he's got him locked inside of, reaches into the cabinet further along the wall leading into the hallway and pulls out a big, clear vase, simple in its shape, relying on the beauty of whatever's being put into it. Purposed only to make it stand out.

“Well then. We'll do our worst, Mark Lee.”

°°°

Wearing an immaculate Tom Ford, Mark looks like Donghyuck's husband, which he is. Clean-cut, stoic, made Forbes 30 under 30 number one spot two years in a row. 

Donghyuck entertains the one insane thought about getting his hands on the buttons of Mark's shirt and undoing them but just for a minute, for a few unhinged seconds before Mark notices him standing in the foyer. 

It's their first public appearance together after the wedding. Donghyuck spent the whole afternoon getting ready because that's just what he does. What he was made for. What he's expected to be doing, and that’s why he's gonna be damn good at it. 

“No flowers tonight?”

Mark's eyes are lingering somewhere in the vicinity of Donghyuck's neck. He knows the simple diamond drop sitting in his jugular is just enough to highlight the space where his clavicles meet— his shirt is collarless and ivory silk, paired with a Prada suit. He's wearing eyeshadow in the shade Sultry Rosé. He knows he looks good. 

“No flowers,” Mark confirms, hands him a flat rectangular box, “but I was kinda hoping you'd wear this.” 

“What's with the presents, Mark Lee? You better be careful or else one day I might end up getting the wrong idea.” 

It's worth seeing the way Mark's eyebrows shoot up in surprise, but witnessing the way his neck flushes up this close is even better. “My assistant picked it out, she, um— said something about white gold and your skin tone, I wasn't really listening, and anyway, you don't care…” 

“I care,” Donghyuck says and extracts the box from Mark's grip. The necklace is simple, a thin double chain tangled in a pattern, but it's glimmering in the overhead lights, and Donghyuck realises there are small stones intersecting the coiled chains. He hands it back to Mark to unfasten the necklace he's wearing and drops it onto the dresser before he grabs the new one, quicksilver-slippery between his fingers.

It sits in the space between his shirt flaps even more perfectly. Donghyuck looks at Mark looking at him through the mirror, face unreadable but eyes half-lidded, and for a moment he can pretend that it was his young, smooth hands brushing the nape of Donghyuck's neck as he put the necklace on. 

°°°

They leave the house as two strangers and enter the fundraiser as— 

Two strangers who have barely learned how to move around each other having to move together as one. As if Mark's shape has already been dented into Donghyuck's body. As if Donghyuck's body has already learned how to curve itself under the hesitant touch of Mark's handsome hands. 

“Talk to me,” Mark leans in close to murmur, and his breath hits the side of Donghyuck's jaw. If he were to turn his head, their noses would brush. 

“About what?” 

“I don’t know. Whatever, just… pretend you’re enjoying it. Laugh like—”

“Like you’re funny?”

Mark snorts and Donghyuck allows him to catch the little smug tilt of his own lips. Then, the game is on. 

The event is as stuffy as Donghyuck expected, business cards gilded with gold and stuffy people giving them glances before pretending they never even cared. Mark glides him through the space, carrying himself tall— as if he didn't need the attention of the room on him, but still knew he was gonna get it. 

They've both got glasses in their hands but where Mark's hold is lax, Donghyuck's is feral. He suffers through the Lee-ssi, can we get a picture right when they enter, and then rounds of mind-numbing pleasantries, again and again. Mark lied, he's good at this, is apparently good at any conversation not involving direct eye contact with Donghyuck, is charming enough that Donghyuck only has to speak when addressed, and he's content with that. 

Donghyuck only wanders away far enough to snatch one of the less plastic-looking canapes and comes back to catch the entrance of a new person in Mark's corner not-really-hide-out but more of like a take-a-breather position. 

“Mark-ssi. Congratulations on the new sugar baby.”

Mark chokes. 

“The what?”

Donghyuck schools his face into neutrality and goes to take his place back at Mark's side but this time he doesn't get a hand around his waist.

“He’s very cute.”

“I don’t— what?”

“Aw, yeobo, you don’t think I’m cute.”

Mark goes bug eyed at Donghyuck's voice, glancing at Donghyuck's pout before looking around as if there’s a hidden camera filming the whole encounter, lips parted in surprise. Donghyuck finally lets out the short laugh that's been building up in his chest. 

“Ah, Jungwoo hyung, you got it all wrong, it’s actually the other way around,” Donghyuck says and lets Jungwoo tug him away from Mark and into a hug that Donghyuck soaks up with every atom of his body. “Now apologise to Mark, you've scandalised him.”

“I’m sorry for scandalising you, Mark-ssi,” he says over Donghyuck’s shoulder. His chin digs in for a moment, stiletto-pointy, and Donghyuck pushes him away. 

“You're terrible.”

“No, you are a terrible child. At least reply to my Instagram DMs. And stop by the shop sometime, too. Jaehyun’s been asking about you.”

“I will, please say hi to hyung. And—”

“Yeah?” 

“Nothing. I'll text,” Donghyuck lets a smile take over, one that starts in his eyes. He feels Mark's hand settle around his waist, waiting. Donghyuck inclines his head towards Mark's shoulder. Next a tug, possessing. 

“Enjoy your night, hyung, I think we have a,” Donghyuck waves his hand around, “places to mingle. People to be.” 

Donghyuck thinks Jungwoo's going to say more. There's something about the way he looks at the lines separating, or more like adjoining Donghyuck and Mark where they press against one another. But he just salutes and Donghyuck watches him walk away, his silk shirt rippling with every step, all blacks and silvers, shoulders thrown back.

“Jungwoo's a model, actually,” Donghyuck turns to Mark. They're the same height, like this. With Donghyuck making himself smaller against him. As if it's visceral. “He and his partner own a boutique in Cheongdam-dong. I’ll take you sometime.”

“If you wanna,” Donghyuck adds. He doesn't know why he just said that. 

“Sure,” Mark says as he leads them towards the dance floor, “but first… if you'll let me have this one?”

°°°

There is a protocol to waltz, one Donghyuck's familiar with. He follows the steps instinctively, lets himself be led— Mark pulls him closer and it doesn't make him falter, if anything Donghyuck rises up to the challenge. They weave through the dancefloor, just two bodies getting lost in the crowd and yet it always feels as if there are eyes on them. Looking for a weakness, where to dig, where to put their mouths to prove this or that. Their families will always be a topic of interest. 

“You call this dancing?” Donghyuck says, leans his face closer to the side of Mark's cheek. He has no idea what cologne Mark's wearing but it smells nice, not too heavy, tickles woodsy and fresh in Donghyuck's nose. 

“Shh, I'm counting.”

“What the hell are you counting? Your steps?”

“Time 'til the song is over.”

“First, you invited me to dance and now you're being rude. Just you wait until I bruise every single one of your toes on my way out. Hope they fall off in your sleep.”

“Go on.” Mark raises an infuriating eyebrow “My parents are watching.”

Donghyuck sighs. “Well then, how long has it been.”

“This song is ten minutes long.”

Donghyuck rolls his eyes. 

They execute a perfectly convincing dip, Mark's palm warm through the back of Donghyuck's suit jacket, and Donghyuck letting his eyes slip closed. As if to say: see, this, my trust isn't about to collapse in on itself for your viewing pleasure.

“What do you call dancing, then?” Mark's breath hits Donghyuck's ear, and the grind of Donghyuck's teeth together isn't enough to catch the rattle that starts somewhere inside and translates into his skin shaking whole. 

“Maybe I'll show you one day. Maybe I should start making a list. Better buy me a planner, Mark Lee.”

One side of Mark’s mouth curls up, almost imperceptible.

“Now.”

The song ends. 

°°°

Donghyuck builds these rituals by himself:

He takes his time getting ready to go out. Wears his Celine shirts and Tom Ford jeans, accessorizes minimally. He’s got the ring and a bracelet, after all, and a pair of thin necklaces in addition. It's enough.

He takes his time getting undressed. In the evenings, he gets the bath running— perfumed oil bathbombs and candles on the counters, wine glasses and playlists of his most sensual songs. 

He takes his time moisturising his legs— his lotion is Blackberry&Bay, same as the day cologne he uses, loves when he’s clean shaven and velvety all over. Walks naked to and from the bathroom. A slow seduction of the carpet, the Egyptian cotton bedsheets, the entire fucking furniture inside of Donghyuck's room.

He does this all, then sits on the huge bed, all by himself.

Goes to sleep all by himself. 

°°°

“Where are you off to?”

Donghyuck's got half a foot inside one Chelsea boot when the voice startles him into doing a full-body slam backwards into the entry hall closet with a yelp. 

“Jesus, I almost died.” Donghyuck clutches at his chest. “You almost died. This heel was seconds away from impaling your skull, Mark hyung, what the hell.”

“Imagine the headlines.”

“They'd say I killed you for your money.”

“Eh, I've had worse. So…” Mark crosses his arms, “where are you going?”

“Out…side? Didn't know I needed to report to you.”

“You don't, just— I know I said I've had worse, but like, being out without your husband this soon? Very real possibility of front paging. I don't wanna be fielding calls all week.”

Donghyuck thinks on it. Then he thinks some more. There's a text from Renjun and an itch underneath his skin like— he actually needs to get out of here before he combusts. And he's already done his makeup. He didn't even think he'd have to regress back to his teen habits of sneaking out of a house. It's mildly irritating.

“Then come with. Or— I am going, whether you join me or not.” 

“Give me ten? Where are we going?”

“If you're gonna wear a suit, these sweatpants are the better option.”

Mark pushes off the doorframe. 

“I'm not gonna wear a suit.”

°°°

Mark does not wear a suit. 

Donghyuck spends the entirety of the what-the-fuck-am-I-doing drive trying to look down at his phone and not at what Mark is actually wearing. 

Mark does not look like Donghyuck's husband. His jeans are oversized and his T-shirt is oversized, too, the print on it half-covered by a trendy black jacket. He has a chain around his neck and a snapback on backwards and Donghyuck is not losing it. He is not. 

He steals a glance at Mark's smooth knuckles and the veins on the back of his hands and then goes back to his phone, opening and closing his conversation with Renjun. Help? My husband is somehow here. And his forehead is out?!?! Do we stage a burst appendix? 

Renjun just sent back a string of kkks.

Donghyuck also failed to account for the fact that this means the inevitable. The Renjun meeting Mark, Mark meeting Renjun, planets coming off alignment, or just Donghyuck tipped off his own axis. He's gonna deal with that later. 

They don't find him at first but Donghyuck sees Johnny, a bright mosaic of light cutting across his figure. The place is as full as Donghyuck expected from a Friday night, music just loud enough, louder on the dance floor, the vibes just classy enough so that no one would bat an eye if they were recognised here. 

Johnny spots them when they get closer and heads over to meet them, broad smiles and waves, and Donghyuck automatically grins back, ready to run up into his arms when Johnny is close enough. And then— 

“Mark! Dude, it’s been a while,” Johnny says.

“What,” Donghyuck says.

Taeyong is just behind Johnny, turning his huge eyes at him, and going for the hug Donghyuck was expecting just moments before.

“What,” he says again, tries to convey all his confusion and dumbfoundment within the word against Taeyong's shoulder that smells like laundry detergent and lemongrass.

“They met in the States. Mark was his underclassman.” Taeyong grabs him by his upper arm and gives him a fond once over. “You look good, Hyuck. Your hair’s gotten longer.”

“Huh. Huuuuuh,” Donghyuck draws out. Goes serious. Focused. “Hyung, tell me that's vodka soda and not San Pellegrino.”

Taeyong offers him his glass. “I’ll do you one better. It's tequila.”

“Perfect,” Donghyuck says and tips it back. 

°°°

Donghyuck feels out of it after that, on an elemental plane. The night passes in snapshots, unsettled feelings buzzing just underneath his skin. 

Next, the bar. 

The fondness about seeing Renjun lasted approximately until he, graceful and serene, said to Mark: “No need to be formal, please. I’ve put up with your husband for long enough to feel a sense of comradeship with you.”

If Mark was surprised, he didn’t let it show. He took to it swiftly, unable to resist the Renjun charm— they’re bent over Renjun’s phone and Mark is smiling at whatever monstrosities from their uni days Renjun’s camera roll surely unearthed. Donghyuck is gonna interfere. In a minute. 

“You know, I’d always thought you and Mark would get along. Almost introduced you but there was never the right time— and you beat me to it. How's domestic life treating you?” 

Johnny has to know, or at least suspect. Nothing is ever this easy, this fast— the kind of love that turns into marriage. Or maybe it is, maybe Donghyuck can pretend he and Mark were the exception. He doesn’t think Johnny would be fooled.

Next, the form of tequila ingested turns to shots. 

“Oh, terrible, hyung,” Donghyuck fake swoons into Johnny's arms and he catches him with a smile, “we fight over the dishes every day. And whose turn it is to walk the dog.”

“Markie doesn’t really get mad. You're sus,” Johnny says, “what breed is your dog?”

Donghyuck slams back another shot. “Just a little… guy. Super cute.”

Johnny's laugh rings through him. 

“I'm gonna dance, hyung. You wanna dance?” 

°°°

Next, the floor.

The room shifts into a song louder and heavier, and Donghyuck heads to the thickness of it, feels it vibrate in his chest, beating there along with his too-quick heart. 

Donghyuck avoids the loudness of his thoughts by closing his eyes and moving, following a different kind of protocol. An unwritten one. One that simply calls for a pair of hands to grab at his waist and get close, one that's frankly inevitable when you're already kind of red in the face, just on the verge of sloppy. 

He spins around and spins again into the next pair of arms, and these ones are a bit more unrelenting. Somewhere deep within Donghyuck, it rings that he should care more but how can he, when he's feeling this good— 

He loses the warmth. 

“Back off, man.”

Next, the feeling that rushes across Donghyuck's body at Mark's voice. 

Donghyuck gets a new kind of warmth, this one not as sweaty and smelling incredibly nice when he pulls Donghyuck closer. Mark grabs Donghyuck’s right hand with his own right hand, brings it up to the light. Pointed. Possessing. 

“Jeez. No need to be pissy, bro, I can take a hint.” Now that Donghyuck’s looking at him, the guy is kind of ugly.

Mark snorts. “One hell of a hint.” He kisses the knuckle above the ring on Donghyuck's hand. Donghyuck breathes out, then doesn't take another breath until he's almost desperate for it. 

He turns his eyes at Mark. Really racks it up, knows they're just the right amount of glossy, his lips just the right amount of pout. And Mark's face is a hard mask, there's a startling furrow between his eyebrows, mouth downturned. Mark is either fake mad or real mad. Doesn’t matter. 

Like this, Donghyuck can even pretend they had just met tonight. That Mark saw him through the crowd, that they made focal points of each other, until the guy came to dance with Donghyuck, and that it was the impulse setting it off, perfect Mark in the perfect distress scenario.

“Would you look at that. Mark Lee and something something multitudes, huh?”

“Contain multiple,” Mark jazz hands and then turns to walk away. Donghyuck follows him as if Mark’s holding a thread tied to Donghyuck inside a tight fist. In the space connecting the entrance and the bar, where the light just barely hits but where they can hear each other better, Mark turns to him. Thumbs at Donghyuck's pulse. 

“You gonna kiss me as well? To really get the message across,” Donghyuck says, on the verge of breathlessness, heart going light with it. He pats Mark’s chest. It’s a really nice chest. 

Mark reels back as if he’s been burned. “No, I— no?”

“Is that a question? C’mon. You’re allowed. I’m yours, after all.”

Donghyuck thinks: I am prepared to be devastated by you. 

“Fuck, Donghyuck, you… you’re drunk.” 

“So you do curse,” Donghyuck says, delighted. “Say fuck again.”

“Oh, Christ.”

Donghyuck throws his arms around Mark's neck and tries to get his lips on the bare skin of his throat. It’s a crime that all of it is still left unkissed. Mark tilts his whole head away. The hands pushing at Donhyung's hips are strong. 

“If I say fuck again, will you let me take you home?”

“Mark-sssiiiii,” Donghyuck draws the word out, lets himself be guided backward, still holding onto Mark's neck, “how scandalous. What would your husband think?”

He's sure Mark wouldn't let him fall, even if he stumbles repeatedly as they make their way outside. He’s never been more sure of anything. 

“I don't know. He never tells me.”

“I want kimchi jiggae.”

“Mhm.”

Mark doesn’t look like he’s listening, but he makes no effort to shake Donghyuck off, just grabs him around the waist and tugs him over to their car. 

“Pork dumplings? Mmm, no, McDonald's milkshake.” Mark makes sure to put a hand over the top of the car roof as he helps Donghyuck get in. If Donghyuck were a bit more sober, it’d make him pause. “Strawberry. How's that for a thought?”

“You know, I was never allowed to have McDonald’s growing up,” Mark says from next to him, just like a by the way. 

“Are you for real? Driver-ssi, turn it around. We're going to McDonald's.”

“No, don't—” 

Mark bodily tugs him back into his seat and Donghyuck lands next to him, close. Too close. Donghyuck’s head is the bottom of the ocean floor getting swirled around by the currents. 

“Please. Please I’ll never ask for anything else, hyung. Hyung.” Donghyuck has him by the elbow and Mark’s face is too close as well but it’s no longer a hard mask, one side of his mouth pulled up in a smile. It’s nice to look at, even though Donghyuck’s vision is kinda blurry.

“We'll get it next time. Promise.”

He’ll just close his eyes for a bit. Just for a minute. “Really?”

“Sure, Donghyuck-ah.”

Donghyuck only vaguely knows how he gets to bed. Everything is dark, nearly soundless. He's shaken awake and definitely not princess-carried, but Mark holds him by the waist and helps him to his room. Donghyuck is too tired to feel embarrassed about his unmade bed and the clothes strewn around.

“Mm, makeup. Gotta take it— off.” He tries to get up but the mattress is quicksand. Mark’s must’ve taken off his shoes and jacket— Donghyuck clumsily tries unbuttoning his silk shirt but gives up halfway. He’s barely alert to take note of the water bottle being set on his nightstand.

“Mark. Take off my makeup.”

“Idiot, idiot husband.” Donghyuck thinks Mark murmurs as a damp washcloth soothes down his face. The aircon is running. Donghyuck's lower back sinks deeper into the mattress, body making a mould out of itself. 

And the kiss on his forehead is so imperceptible he might as well have dreamed it up. 

°°°

There are swallows building a nest under the awning of the gazebo. They flit over Donghyuck, carrying straw and grass and twigs, and at one point he feels something feather light land on the back of his neck. He kneels in the grass and does his own work while they do theirs— a quiet kind of companionship. 

The sun finally caught the warm edge of almost-summer and it bleeds through the cotton of Donghyuck's shirt, even though the air still bites. Dampness soaks his knees and the dirt he's digging into with the small plastic hand shovel is still kind of wet, easier to work with, sure, but also messier. 

He hears the footsteps down the cobblestones first, his name second. 

“Donghyuck.” It's the first time Mark says it like that and it makes Donghyuck wonder. About the intricacies of his voice, the way syllables make their way past his throat depending on the situation. On the word. On the person he's addressing. 

Mark has never been allowed McDonald's growing up. Mark has a mole on his left wrist. Mark is an attorney. Donghyuck doesn't know him nearly enough. 

He tries to shake the desperation threatening to cave his lungs in with how much he wants to ask. How awfully greedy he is. 

“What are you doing?” Mark continues. 

What's your favourite colour?

“Hyung. I know you wear glasses but this one should be obvious even without them.”

Do you prefer aisle or window?

“Cute,” Mark says, a bit quiet like he didn't even mean to out loud and Donghyuck tilts his head up to look at him, eyebrow raised, “the flowers. This is cute,” he continues, undeterred, only a silhouette cut against the glare of the late spring sun.

“Is it? I've found like three worms in here already.”

Was your childhood as lonely as mine?

“You do know we have a gardener. Probably. Where’d you learn all this?”

“This little magic thing called the internet. Don't— what are you doing, you're gonna ruin your pants.” Donghyuck panics in it, a bit. What if all that desperation is visible, what if it's gonna burst out of him at the most inopportune moment. 

Why can't I stop needing you to see me? 

Mark kneels next to him anyway. 

His hand reaches out first, solitary, and Donghyuck never really got it, the way a whole world stopping is always portrayed when a touch between two people toeing the line of something none of them is quite ready to address happens. It doesn't, not really, it just kind of blurs over as Mark brushes dirt off Donghyuck's cheek. Maybe that's why it seems like it gets put on hold. Because at that moment, you aren't aware of the swallow dropping a leaf down the back of your shirt, or the way your knees are actually kinda fucking cold. 

It's just hand, meet cheek. Heart, meet skip. 

“Why are you out here, Donghyuck-ah?”

It's unfair that it's only Mark who gets to ask questions. 

“If I wanna see this bloom by the summer, I gotta plant now. You reap what you sow, or however that one goes. Why, wanna help? Isn't it a bit too early for you to be home?”

“I should go change,” Mark says, but makes no move to stand up. His big eyes are on Donghyuck and it rattles him into action— he grabs the hand shovel again and pretends to finish weeding out the next patch of soil he's gonna be planting the butterscotch coloured daylilies in. He's got sunflower seeds and tulips ready to go, too, and a lavender hedge planned for around the gazebo. Mark doesn't offer any further commentary on Donghyuck's gardening project. 

“Seonsaengnim.” And oh, that's Mark's voice inside Donghyuck's ear. “Show me?”

He pokes his fingers into the vulnerable space between Donghyuck's ribs and it makes him yelp and curl into himself protectively. 

“You’re so not winning student of the month.”

“You gotta actually teach for me to be a student.”

“Fine, take the daylily from that pot,” Donghyuck huffs, “Yeah, careful. Now put it right here and fill in the soil around it.”

Mark performs meticulously under instruction. Donghyuck watches him, hands outstretched, but he doesn't actually need help until the flower is in its place, ready for the dirt to be packed around it. 

“No, you gotta— harder.”

Donghyuck’s ring is on his nightstand but Mark is still wearing his. Donghyuck can feel it against his skin when he presses his own hands into the back of Mark’s to pack down the soil. The daylily stands small and proud, ready to be watered, ready for the full sun it needs. 

By the end his nailbeds are caked with dirt. So are Mark's. 

°°°

The worst part of it all is how Donghyuck is a physical person. He even took one of those quizzes when they were floating around, the viral love language stuff, only to confirm what he already knew.

There’s a need to be touched, the fulfilment of his pyramid of physiological needs— a pulsing palm to his back. A hand in his hair, perhaps.

It’s what makes the casual touches Mark gives him even worse. They mostly happen when he has to, when they’re being looked at, when they’re pretending to have a marriage out of love so that no one suspects a thing. Donghyuck almost wants to call the thing like it is, to let everyone know— it’s arranged, it’s always arranged. The entirety of his life is. 

But Mark also touches him inside the house, too. A hand on Donghyuck’s hip as he passes him in the kitchen, a finger to his wrist to get his attention. It’s devastating.

Not the touch in itself but because Donghyuck, at his core, is also always going to be starving for more.

°°°

Somewhere alongside the sweaty afternoons in the garden and sharing a dinner table with Mark, summer slips in. 

Soon, they start leaving the door to the terrace open only when the sun starts to set. The mid evening breeze floats in, like tepid water. Mosquitoes and moths at the screen door. Him and Mark sitting across from each other, clinking of dishes and a vinyl Mark pulled out from the worn stacks of records he keeps in his living room. 

Donghyuck works, gardens, and cooks on occasion. He goes out to meet up with Renjun and Jisung and a host of other people he and Mark need to see to fill up their socialising quota. 

Somehow, Donghyuck feels at home yet still unsettled. 

This wicked strangeness might be Mark himself— familiar and a stranger to him still at the same time. Mark works, too, seems to get even busier than before but he goes out of his way now to make room for Donghyuck despite the fact. He always makes sure to ask about his day, a beacon of stability Donghyuck gets used to every night. 

And it's painless then, admitting it. He thinks about Mark more than he should. Even though there's no one to tell him what's a normal amount of thinking about someone you're apparently doing all the steps out of order with. Donghyuck wants to lay concrete over the careful stack of cards they're building up. He doesn't want to keep worrying that it's gonna blow over if he so much as breathes wrong.

Mark makes it easy. 

Donghyuck is sitting at the outdoor patio table, legs folded underneath him, staring out into the warmly-lit garden when Mark finds him. 

“What are you sitting around in the dark for? Come inside already. It's not warm enough for this yet,” he says. But he has a blanket in his arms that he presses into Donghyuck's chest. He's still wearing his suit, the buttons are open down to his chest though, and he's missing a tie. His hair looks as if he's been running his hands through it the whole day. 

Donghyuck lolls his head back against the wood of the chair. “Kind of like it when you nag me, yeobo .”

“I care.”

“Mhm,” Donghyuck says and hides his smile into the blanket as he pulls it up around his shoulders. The summer has not peaked into its full warmness yet, Mark is right. There is no sound but the cicadas, their nighttime song. Wind skimming the patio. 

“Is that so hard to believe?”

“You care about me?” Donghyuck turns his mouth into a pout-speak. Pitches his tone up higher, amps it up, and watches Mark's face for reaction. “Really? Really truly?”

“Less and less as the minutes go by. I take it back,” he says and turns to walk back inside. Donghyuck catches his smile, though. It spreads warm somewhere from deep within Donghyuck's chest cavity. 

“Too bad, you can’t. I’ll just care about you more to make up for it.”

Donghyuck goes to follow him inside, but just as he's kicking his shoes off, Mark slides the door shut and turns the handle to lock it. Makes a face Donghyuck’s never seen on him. Like a schoolboy would do to a crush to get their attention. 

A surprised giggle fizzes out of Donghyuck. Everything inside of him moves, rearranges, finds a new place. Not necessarily the right one, but not wrong either. Oh, hell. 

He suddenly feels too young, childlike on the patio of his house, illuminated by the living room mood lamps only. It's too quiet. Only the cicadas, and Donghyuck's quick heart, beating its wings like a bird afraid. Mark on the other side of the door. 

Donghyuck takes a breath. Then he throws himself against the pristine clear glass and fake sobs into the quiet. Their laughs meet in the middle.

Mark, orderly and meticulous Mark, is good at doing things out of order, too. Of course he is. 

°°°

New muscle memory forms.

Donghyuck reaches out. Mark lets him.

°°°

Donghyuck can't sleep. 

He leans back against the wood of the headboard, sheets soft on his skin. The only source of light in the room is the moon, ashen and hazy. 

He'd gone out for hot pot with Renjun and Jisung earlier, and they both thought there was something off with him. There's been something off with Donghyuck ever since Mark Lee looked at him with his big, dumb eyes for the first time. 

“Sounds like you're enjoying yourself,” Renjun commented, mouth full. 

“It's not like that, I… all of this is backwards. Stop— how can you eat at times like these, I'm losing my mind over here, hello?”

“You invited us to dinner.” 

“I am uninviting you.” Donghyuck put his head on the table. “Renjun-ah, this is bad. This is real bad.”

“What is? Your avoidance issues? Or having a thing for your husband? Sorry, gay police is next door, you can file your report there.”

Donghyuck groaned. 

Jisung, who'd been quietly processing all that time, petted over Donghyuck's hair. “What's the problem, then? You can just ask.”

That is the problem. His admittances ricochet around his head, preventing him from sleeping. Donghyuck cannot just ask his husband to touch him. At all times. To slam him against the huge living room windows and leave blurry prints of their bodies on them. 

What he can do, apparently, is think about it very intensely. 

He already thinks about Mark more than necessary, what's one more thought spared for the way he'd looked that one time in the bathroom, shirtless, getting ready for work. It's all just veiled lines and soft silhouettes in Donhgyuck's mind by now, but it's enough. 

He thinks about Mark sitting at the table, dishevelled from the day, when the shadow of a stubble growing in is visible. When he grins, boyish. He thinks about his voice when taking a work call, serious and focused, sometimes cold the way Donghyuck thought he'd sound all the time. What's one more thought? One more touch. 

Drifting his hands in slow circles from his jaw, Donghyuck imagines it's Mark's hands that draw gentle paths down his chest. Mark's mouth that follows, Mark's stubble that scratches down his lower belly. Mark's hot breath on the sensitive triangle of skin just shy of the iliac crest, that's where Donghyuck's fingers rub and pretend. 

When he slips his hand beneath the waistband of his shorts, eyes shuttering closed, it's easy enough to feel him there. He wonders whether Mark would twist his wrist, whether he'd rub tight circles into the head of Donghyuck's cock just as he likes. Whether if, for some reason, Mark were to open the door to Donghyuck's room right now, would he slip into the bed behind him? Would he stand in the doorway and watch? Would he listen from the other side of the wall?

Donghyuck breathes heavily, focuses on painting the picture in his mind. Hands, mouths, cocks. Sweaty bodies pulled together, Mark's eyes on him in the dark, breath on his hips, looking up while his hand moves, quickening, right there, there— 

The cloying, gut-reaction shame of wanting is the catalyst. 

Donghyuck pants into his pillow, finally blissed out enough for the thoughts to stop flowing. Just for a bit. 

°°°

They have dinner arranged at Mark's parents' house. Donghyuck doesn't know how intense the pretence-keeping should be but he gets ready. And Mark is there. Always holding this or that, Donghyuck's waist, his hand under the dinner table. It's weirdly comforting but also as if they're doing something they shouldn't. 

Mark's parents are the exact same as Donghyuck's in front of guests, which is to say— overly polite and kinda impersonal. Donghyuck feels weirdly at home underneath the huge dining room chandelier. And his favourite is definitely Mark's grandmother. She’s the most down to earth out of them all, even though she seemed intimidating at first, with her steel blue hair and tailored trouser suits. 

She calls Mark Minhyung and makes fun of the way he eats his pickled radish wraps— unwrapped. Winks conspiratorially at Donghyuck when Mark calls him cute in the middle of a sentence and Donghyuck is left speechless while Mark continues as if nothing happened. 

He can't wait to get his ass handed to him when they play Go with her in the family room after dessert. But first, Mark takes him upstairs to wait. 

Inside his childhood bedroom, Mark looks the same but different. He takes off his suit jacket and hangs it on the back of a high-backed computer chair. 

A momentum in disguise— the longing that starts at the base of Donghyuck's rib cage. 

He distracts himself by looking at the spread of photos Mark has on one of the shelves. There's a small Mark and a teen Mark, wearing glasses in a photo with his classmates, still in uniform. 

“You look like a dweeb,” Donghyuck teases. 

“As if you had any better pictures.”

“Sure did. You look like a spinning the top champion. Bet you watched every Top Blade episode.” 

“Alright, that's enough,” Mark says and wrestles Donghyuck back by wrapping his arms around his ribs, and then he kind of just. Doesn't let go. 

They stand there like that, in the middle of Mark's childhood bedroom, Donghyuck's whole body involuntarily going lax in Mark's hold. He inhales, shaky and distorted. He bets Mark’s perfume is going to be lingering on his clothes hours later. It's the kind of thing that would make Donghyuck swoon if Donghyuck were a boy who swoons. Which he isn't. 

But Mark's body is warm and big and, oh, that's his breath on Donghyuck's cheek. Donghyuck tries to imagine feeling the rhythm of Mark's heart through his back, whether it'd be the same kind of rabbit-mad pulsing his own is doing. He gets a hand around the side of Mark's throat to check, brushing the tips of his fingers against the soft hair at the nape of his neck. 

And Mark skims his nose up to Donghyuck's temple and then back. Donghyuck tries to breathe quietly, but he can't be sure whether he's successful because his ears are ringing. Every inch of his body aching with it. Kiss me there, he thinks, kiss me, kiss me, kissme.

“Donghyuck,” Mark says.

Wanting him is almost close to a prayer.

He's holding Donghyuck impossibly close and his shoulders are impossibly broad and so when he asks: “Okay?” and his lips land just shy of the side of Donghyuck's mouth, Donghyuck can't do anything more but gasp, a soft, breathy sound.

Donghyuck turns around in Mark’s arms and lets himself be kissed by his husband. 

He presses into Mark’s lips, urgent and reckless. 

Mark presses back. His tongue flicks out. He licks his way into Donghyuck's mouth, tilting his head and kissing him over and over again, a continuation and a prelude to something at the same time. Donghyuck's stomach explodes into a fine mesh calligraphy of everything hot and needy. He tries his best to keep up, but it's as if Mark is not letting him have this one just yet. It's as if he can't get enough of him, even though it should be the other way around. 

“Jesus,” Mark says when he drags his mouth away and Donghyuck just pants there for a bit, breathless, gripping the sides of Mark's waist.

He smacks his lips together, tilts his chin up, eyes still closed. 

“Again. Hyung, ag—” 

This time, Mark brings one hand to the back of Donghyuck’s head and moves at an angle, so that when their tongues meet, they can slip into each other's mouths easily. Mark dips in and out, their lips dragging against each other, slowing down with each kiss as if they had all the time in the world. 

Donghyuck has always loved the act of kissing itself, but this, him, he doesn't think anything could replace it. This, Mark, somehow knowing exactly where to touch and how to hold. 

“Stop me now, Hyuck,” Mark says as he pulls back to tilt Donghyuck's head back and puts his mouth on his neck. 

“Don't wanna.” 

He inhales and Mark is biting the side of his throat, he exhales and Mark is nosing at his collarbone, tugging at the neck of his shirt with insistent fingers until the first button pops open. The thread might even snap from out of the buttonholes. Donghyuck's entire shirt could rip open and he wouldn't even notice. Wouldn't even care. 

Donghyuck pushes backwards and Mark goes, sits down on the bed, tugging Donghyuck in between his legs. He stubbornly remains standing, catching Mark's cheeks within his palms and fish-pouting his lips like that. Donghyuck looks at him and Mark stares back, burning handprints on Donghyuck’s hips.

Mark looks like Donghyuck's husband, which he is. Malleable and placid, heart-attack face, handsome even while Donghyuck is trying to make him look silly. 

Donghyuck's, for a moment.

He pulls back and tries to bite over Donghyuck’s wrist. Donghyuck twists his hair in a fist, stilling him, and leans down to kiss him again. He sucks on Mark’s lower lip so harshly it draws a breathy moan from him, one that Donghyuck catches with his mouth. 

There’s something sweet but hungry happening.

Donghyuck wonders whether Mark can feel it. That Donghyuck is like this: always on edge, too loud or too silent, too much and simultaneously not enough. Holding everything in his hand or nothing at all. That he kisses like that, too. 

Mark drags himself away. He faceplants right into Donghyuck’s stomach and makes a pained noise against the fabric of Donghyuck's shirt. 

“What?” Donghyuck asks, quiet. His fingers catch around the gel hardened strands of Mark’s dark hair. 

“Can't believe it's this easy. Touching you.”

“Yeah?” Donghyuck gets into his lap. “You wanna touch me so bad.”

“Wanna do anything you let me.”

Donghyuck brings Mark's hands to his ass in lieu of an answer.

Mark gets mean about it. His kisses, the way he tilts Donghyuck's head back, grazes his teeth and hands over chest, his ribcage, licking with a ferocity that Donghyuck wants to bottle. Wants to keep as a reminder.

“Not here, though,” Mark says and presses one last kiss to Donghyuck’s mouth. 

He lingers for a long while, so long Donghyuck thinks it’s never gonna end. But it does and Mark forces him to stand, to go back downstairs and pretend that they haven't just spent the last however long that was making out like teenagers in Mark's bedroom. Donghyuck is still all red-hot as Mark fixes his shirt back up. He smiles, secret and just for him. 

Where then? Donghyuck wants to ask. He doesn’t get the chance.

°°°

Mark gets conveniently busy at work.

Donghyuck gets regularly busy at work and regularly bored at home. A new set of thoughts arises. Kiss me again? Kiss me again but better. More. All the time. Bend me over the fancy marble kitchen countertop? Take me. Take me. 

They don’t really talk about it. Small talk, yes. Brief kitchen encounters, have you eaten yet? Once, Mark slides a hand down his back as they pass each other in the hallway, feather-light, and Donghyuck keeps thinking about it hours later.

He worries about how obvious he’s being. Because he wants Mark so bad it shapes the way he speaks to him. The way he walks. Everything. He's trying very hard not to spiral himself into a what-does-it-mean territory but he feels he's at least entitled to know whether the way his husband kissed him had any real thought behind it. Mark doesn't seem to wanna elaborate. 

He's still sweaty when he comes from the outside. The yoga mat is damp and drying out on the terrace, that's where he's spent the last half an hour holding a plank amongst the other ridiculous core exercises just so his stupid back wouldn't seize up on him. 

The water spills down the side of his mouth as he almost inhales a cup whole. It mixes with the sweat on his neck and he's still deciding between a shower and a coffee when Mark walks in. It's two p.m. on a Saturday and Mark's got his shirtsleeves rolled up. Socks off. 

“Hey,” he says.

“Um. Hey. It's early?” It comes out like a question. He feels Mark move up to him and when he glances to the side, he's leaning against the kitchen counter. His mouth is pulled into a half-smile.

“So. I wasn’t avoiding you but I am done with everything now. I really had many commitments booked for this week. I’m sorry, Hyuck.”

Guess Mark wants to talk, after all. Everything rolls back to him, a slow spinning movie reel. Now that he knows how Mark kisses, the coffee maker is suddenly the most interesting thing in the world. And it's like he physically can't stop himself from asking now that he knows he probably can.

“So,” Donghyuck holds up the portafilter up to the bean grinder. Asks into the noise. “You— did you know? Or did you just take a chance that night?”

Mark doesn't hesitate, doesn't seem to be confused as to what Donghyuck wants from him. “I think I knew. At least I wanted to convince myself of this.”

“What?” Donghyuck puts the filter down. Coffee spills dark across the off-white counter. 

Mark grabs Donghyuck’s wrist. Thumbs at his pulse, right underneath the bracelet. These days, Donghyuck seems to forget he’s even wearing it. It’s become a part of him. 

“That the way you keep looking… as if you wanted me to bend you over the kitchen counter. That it really was what you wanted.”

Donghyuck takes a yielding breath. “That’s mean, hyung.”

“Like you wanted, right?” Mark is suddenly behind him, presses him into the counter. Hip bones against marble, mean. “Right, Donghyuck-ah?”

“I'm. I'm gross,” he protests through the heartbeat roaring in his ear canals. 

“Don't care.”

Heat is unspooling like silk somewhere beneath his sternum. Donghyuck tries turning around but Mark doesn’t let up. He settles for turning his head to the side, just to see Mark’s face. But Mark puts his lips on Donghyuck’s skin and he forgets the intention, eyelids slipping shut almost unwittingly. 

Mark drags his mouth across Donghyuck’s cheek, over and over again until Donghyuck notices a pattern.

“What are you doing?” he laughs.

“I’ve finally connected the dots.” Kiss, kiss, kiss. Mark’s mouth making a game out of the moles. 

“That’s ridiculous,” Donghyuck says, “God. You never do anything I expect you to.”

“Isn’t that a good thing?”

Donghyuck holds his breath. Mark's hands are underneath his shirt. Touching damp skin.

“Now.”

“Now what?”

“I'm gonna take a shower. And you either wait for me in my bed.” Donghyuck slips out of Mark’s arms and starts walking backwards out of the kitchen. “Or you don't. Surprise me.”

°°°

Donghyuck goes through the motions. Middle finger, water, middle finger lube. Shower gel, but skips the lotion because he's probably about to get all sweaty anyway. Opening his bedroom door, the nervous energy that buzzed through him is completely warranted, he thinks. 

But Mark is in his bed. Shirtless, patient, terrible for Donghyuck's health. Donghyuck drops his towel in the doorway. 

Mark’s eyes widen as Donghyuck walks closer. He sits up. “Well, were you expecting this?”

“Mm no. Thought you’d slap a bow on your forehead, too, or something.”

Mark’s face scrunches with his laugh. He pulls Donghyuck between his legs, a deja-vu of last week.

“These are driving me insane.” He slides his hands up Donghyuck’s thighs. “Been driving me insane for weeks.”

“Really? I didn’t notice.”

“Mm, I’m very discreet.”

His fingers drag with intent, to clutch at the yielding skin right where ass meets thigh, to slip up and almost tease at Donghyuck's hole. He clings to Mark's warm shoulders as his open mouth waters.

“I don't have to be discreet now?”

“No,” Donghyuck gets out. 

No, he doesn't have to. And Donghyuck doesn't have to be discreet either, about the way he  wants him, about the way Mark's hands on his body get him riled, about how Mark wanting him feels. He's swallowed all the air in the room and could float away with it, that's how light he is. 

“Come lie down.”

At Mark’s coaxing, his insistent hands get Donghyuck on his back, one leg bent and spread out to the side as Mark settles next to him, lets him lay his thigh across his own.

He feels Mark nose at his cheekbone again, open lips dragging across his skin, and it is probably supposed to be soft, but it only makes Donghyuck shake in his arms, needy. He tilts his head for a kiss, eyes still closed and Mark dips down, puts his open mouth on Donghyuck’s, light and quiet.

“Hyung,” Donghyuck says, finally ready to admit it to Mark after endlessly sloshing the thought around in his head.

“Yes.”

“Want you to fuck me.”

He feels the catch in Mark’s breath. “Yeah. Yes.”

Donghyuck reaches a hand to touch Mark through his boxers, his cock hot and heavy and big, and Mark answers by sliding his fingers down, down across Donghyuck’s balls, where he squeezes gently and finally touches his hole. 

“You fingered yourself?”

“A little, yeah,” Donghyuck breathes. His heart feels unsteady. 

“What did you think about?” Mark says, dips a finger inside. It makes Donghyuck reflexively squeeze before he relaxes, opening up under the careful administration of Mark's hand. He is a shuddery mess in his arms. 

“What do you think?”

“Mm, my cock? Me spreading your lovely legs open and getting between them?”

Mark's hand disappears, then comes back wetter, and Donghyuck hikes his leg up higher on Mark's thigh so he can easily reach and just—

Spread the lube all over, dip one finger inside of him again, Mark's eyes still dark and careful on him. Donghyuck's face scrunches despite himself when Mark puts another finger against his rim. He takes a deep breath and Mark steals it with his mouth and presses two fingers inside of him. He occupies his mouth so that Donghyuck has barely enough attention left to spend on the way he's being stretched out. 

He kisses him all messy, the way good kisses go, the way he makes Donghyuck never want to pull away from him ever again. The way they fit together. His desperate gasps against Mark's gentle shushing. Because that's what it feels like. As if Mark is shushing him with his mouth, with his fingers, with his other hand so gentle on Donghyuck's cheek. Saying, it's okay, I got you , even without words.

And then three is— not unbearable, but definitely more, just. More. Every inch of Donghyuck's body lighting up with it, mouth watering, saliva in a pool at the bottom of his mouth and Mark's lips on his ear. 

“It’s okay,” he says and Donghyuck thinks he moans in response. He wants it, wants this so bad he's shaking with it, wants the shape of Mark's cock that he can feel underneath his thigh to go inside of him already. His whole body is on fire. 

And this part he'll remember for sure. 

“You think you can take it?” Mark asks. 

“Yeah. Yeah, I can, just—” 

He pulls his body from underneath Donghyuck's, and Donghyuck grips the pillow on both sides of his head, stares at the ceiling, head buzzing. Whole body flushed all over. Mark is back moments later, very naked and very hard, putting a condom on with one hand, coating it with lube, and Donghyuck almost doesn't get through that one. Mark shuffles closer on his knees and Donghyuck is a whole live wire, wiggling his ass and trying to lift his hips. 

“Like this?” Mark says.

“Like this. Like anything. Anywhere. Hyung, I'm—” Donghyuck tries, tongue getting tangled with it. 

And Mark just laughs a little and pulls Donghyuck down towards himself by the thighs. Settles there like he belongs. Donghyuck's legs open, accepting. He leans down and puts his mouth on Donghyuck's, warm and silken, fucks his tongue in without mercy, kissing him into the mattress. And his hips—

Their cocks brushing between their bodies for one delicious moment before Mark is grabbing his own, grabbing Donghyuck's thigh with the other, still bent over him like a taut bow. And then he presses the tip of his cock to Donghyuck's hole and Donghyuck is making too much noise and then none at all, air punched out of him, cock red and too hot. He grabs a fistful of Mark's hair, pulls hard enough to make him groan between them. 

“Mark-hyung,” Donghyuck says when Mark sinks inside. It's slow, testing the give of Donghyuck's body and not at all like the way he was saying before, to fuck him. This is fucking, except it's too gentle still, like Mark is holding himself back, and Donghyuck's heart is almost ready to crack with it, that's how much he isn't sure if he can bear it. 

“Good?” Mark asks, he even dares to ask and Donghyuck is almost mad, almost snaps at him before Mark buries his thick cock inside of him fully. 

“Yes, good. Fuck me,” he breathes, yanks at Mark's hair again. “Wanna feel you for days.”

And, oops. Too honest, maybe, but it makes Mark raise an eyebrow and then straighten his spine, brace his knees on the bed better so that he can grab Donghyuck's thighs and fuck into him properly, finally. 

He drives his hips in with a force, short and shallow at first, then long strokes that would make the whole bed rock, the whole cliche of headboard against a wall if the bed wasn’t massive wood screwed into the wall. And Donghyuck lets his mind go empty with it, tilts his pelvis up until Mark is brushing inside of him just right, makes him breathe out a desperate string of yesyesyes. 

He fucks him like that, one of Donghyuck's legs ending up over Mark's broad shoulder, skin crackling underneath his touches. Sweat on temples and sliding down a neck, slicking every contact between their bodies until it's almost unbearable. Donghyuck's hole around Mark's cock like a pulse. 

And of course Mark fucks like this. Like he does everything. Takes quickly to the way Donghyuck responds to him. 

He knows how to work his body, it's his hips moving endlessly, his stamina blowing Donghyuck's through the roof, body curving so his knees are pressed to Donghyuck's ass. His strong hands everywhere Donghyuck lets him, and there isn't a place he doesn't. Way past the point of turning him on, it's out of body almost. 

Donghyuck has Mark's name in his mouth, wears it out. 

He waits to put a hand on his own cock until Mark is close, until he can see it in the way he grits his teeth and the stroke of his hips lengthens. Almost punishingly quick, the force returns and Donghyuck lets his moans go long with it, too, following the rhythm of Mark punching the breath out from his lungs. 

“Please, Mark,” he finds himself gasping.

“Please what?” 

“I wanna come.” His pulse is pounding at every soft place in his body, behind his eyes and his eardrums and his elbows, in his gut beneath the ache of his cock. “Please. Please.”

Mark stops moving inside of him fully, just stays pressed in one spot before he starts rocking back and forth, these tiny movements that put absolutely insane pressure right at his prostate. He covers Donghyuck's hand on his cock. 

“So come.”

When Donghyuck thinks about it later, arranges the details in order, he won't know what's the thing that truly does it. Whether it's Mark's voice or the something behind his voice. The meaning of the words or just the tiny stroke of Mark's thumb across the head of Donghyuck's cock. 

He comes— in a wave of sensitivity and pleasure so powerful his vision goes white behind his eyes, throat closing and toes curling. And he just keeps coming. The lightheadedness feels incredibly good and soothing. 

“There we go,” Mark is saying softly, letting him ride it out through the rocking of his hips. 

“Mm, you…” 

“Yes. So good.” 

Mark's hips are twitching. Through his blurry eyes, Donghyuck can see him gritting his jaw and he knows Mark must be aching to come as Donghyuck did and so he brings him in close.

“Inside. You can… hyung, you can do it inside.”

“Oh, fuck,” Mark groans.

He encourages Mark to work himself until he comes, too, trapping him with his thigh and arms around his neck, even though all he wants is to fall limp against him. If Mark goes on he thinks he’d eventually be able to come again, maybe, he doesn’t know, but his whole body is alive with it. With the way he notices Mark’s breathing getting quicker and each moan elongated, forced deeper from his chest. 

It feels like Mark is trying to get all of himself inside of Donghyuck. He bites down onto his shoulder with a grunt, breathy and low as his hips stutter through an orgasm. 

“Christ,” Mark mumbles into his neck, “fuck.”

Melting and palpitating under him, Donghyuck sighs. “Pretty unexpected again, Mark Lee.”

The sound of Mark’s laugh keeps him out of it hours later. 

°°°

The rain comes unannounced.

Mark has taken his work to the patio. Donghyuck’s last seen him nose deep in an enormous book, glasses and a white T-shirt with the neckline stretched so wide Donghyuck got a peep down his whole chest. 

He’s got his own book, twice as small as Mark’s fancy whatever that is. Late afternoon sun pulling at his skin. Barely-there breeze lulling him to sleep. 

First, the clouds start intermittently covering the sun and then Mark’s shadow covers Donghyuck from where he’s lying on the grass. 

“Want a strawberry?”

Donghyuck opens his mouth. “Aah.”

When Mark kneels next to him, he puts the whole bowl on Donghyuck's stomach and brings a strawberry to Donghyuck's open mouth. It's saccharine and still kinda wet from being washed. Mark has red across the bridge of his nose and the tops of his cheeks— he took a swim in the direct sun earlier. Donghyuck's own skin is tinged brown. 

The day feels endlessly long. 

It’s the summer romance of Donghyuck’s dreams, except this one is the lasting kind or whatever. At least he hopes. 

He lets Donghyuck take a bite and finishes the strawberry, lips pouting prettily around the wide part of it. God, he really is unfairly heartbreaking. 

“Hey,” Donghyuck protests. The first droplet lands on the side of his cheek. 

Mark doesn't seem to notice, he lets himself get pulled down by Donghyuck's fist in his shirt, still laughing as Donghyuck tries to kiss the strawberry out of his mouth. It's sweet. 

“Compliments to the chef,” Donghyuck says and another drop lands on his forehead, followed by three consecutive ones on his arm. “It's starting to rain.”

Donghyuck tries standing up but this time it's Mark who doesn't let up and brings his wicked mouth to Donghyuck's while his hands hold him steady by the jaw. The most vivid thing Donghyuck has ever felt— Mark's tongue dipping in and the rain in a sudden, ceaseless wave all over them.

“The perks of cooking at home. You get to kiss the cook,” Mark says and tips his head up to the sky. “You could say starting.”

Donghyuck tries juggling the strawberries and protecting his book at the same time while Mark doesn't make any effort to help as Donghyuck tugs him to his feet. 

“Now we’re calling just about anything ‘cooking’?”

“Mhm. Will you let me be sous-chef, finally?” 

Mark gets him by the waist. The rain isn't really cold, it feels actually kinda refreshing after the sun and the humidity of the day. Still, Donghyuck's never been a fan. His clothes are plastered to him and heavy. His book ruined.

“I will if you let me go the fuck inside.” 

Mark laughs. 

“Mark,” Donghyuck tries. The arms locking him in an embrace are strong. “Hyung.”

He has water in his mouth. Giving in, he turns around and tries a pout. Mark's eyebrows do a complicated thing on his forehead before he's bumping it affectionately against Donghyuck's.

“You’re beautiful,” he says, confident and sure. 

Funny. Exactly what Donghyuck was thinking. He hits him on the chest with the ruined book. “Psh, Mark Lee. What do you know.”

“I know. I dialled up god and he told me. When you’re standing around in the kitchen trying to decide where to put the washed colander. Cute. You with your silly gardening thing. The way you walk. Everything you do is giving you away. What else is there?”

Stupid perfect husband and his words. Now that Mark seems to have found them, it’s like he’s just saying things. It almost makes Donghyuck laugh, because he knows nobody possesses that ease, to see Mark like this. 

“We really should go inside,” he says instead of: everything is there, with you. 

“We shouldn’t. In fact, I think we should stay out here,” Mark gathers him impossibly close, “just… like this.”

Mark's hair is plastered against his forehead, water streams colliding and joining on their way down his face and he smiles against it, looks alive with it. The way that makes Donghyuck always want to be around him, close to him. 

He’s so silly. Donghyuck wants him forever.

Mark kisses him in the middle of summer rain, dislodging every part of him that held a protest before. There's no spring, no summer, no rain. Only a mouth and the strange, brilliant fervour that fills Donghyuck's chest. 

°°°

The year is a circle. 

The sunflowers bloom early September, and Donghyuck draws out extensive plans with the garden company. If he wants to see it bloom by spring, he needs to start early. 

Autumn is interminable and the cold catches Donghyuck unprepared— he thought he'd have more time. It doesn't matter. The days roll into a pleasure-filled blur. Donghyuck dates his husband. 

Mark is a constant, unchanging. His hands are always warm and always on Donghyuck. He lets Donghyuck shiver into him, all throughout the winter. 

°°°

It's the other way around, too. Donghyuck loves Mark like this. In the darkness of the room, head resting on Donghyuck's belly, folded within the warmth of Donghyuck's arms. 

“You know, we've never really honeymooned. I miss the sun.”

“Where would you wanna go then? Okinawa? Yachting through the waters of the Indian Ocean?”

Something squeezes at Donghyuck's throat. He smothers Mark deeper into his stomach, wraps his hands around him tighter. 

“I love you, Mark Lee.”

“All that at the promise of my private jet?” Mark muffles a laugh into Donghyuck's hoodie but then pulls back to look at him, eyes serious. “I know. I’ve known for a while. Do you have a why?” 

Donghyuck takes a breath. “It’s a responsibility, I guess. It’s the only one to take, there isn’t any other. Something I chose myself. Just like when I saw that empty garden and thought: oh, I wanna see something grow. And then along the way love happened, and I took to it, somehow. Hoped that I wasn’t the only one.”

“You weren’t. Aren’t.”

Mark looks like Donghyuck's husband, which he is. Handsome, even through the hollowness underneath his eyes, a bit silly, the way Donghyuck now knows he can get. Smooth-shaven and alert.

“Tell me you love me, Mark.”

And, what else is there?