sweet life

“You-“ he exhales, “You’re like- ha-“ a laugh spills right out of him. Gyuvin’s lost full control of his face. The Drake from Ricky’s speaker sounds even better than it did a minute ago. “You're like my rich baby daddy.”
Realization dawns on Ricky. “Ah. It’s hit.”
(Gyuvin is moving to Korea to become a trainee, has a quarter life crisis, and takes an edible with Ricky.)

Notes:

playlist here ricky played bryson tiller on live once (twice!) and this just… came out of me 😭😭
warnings! there is a short scene describing panic attacks, vomiting and derealization, there’ll be a ꕥ before it starts and when it ends so you can skip it if you need to. also note the dubious consent because of the nature of substance use. please use wisely. be safe and well, enjoy!

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

He got the email in AP Chemistry, of all places.

Every detail was a vivid memory in his brain. March sun had left the almost empty classroom a diffused golden. Gyuvin had kicked up his Adidas slides on Ricky’s desk (much to his distaste), and next to his feet were Ricky and Gunwook huddled around their phones in shared disinterest.

Stephen and Lia were pretending not to flirt. Everyone else was pretending not to notice. In the name of senioritis, a third of the class were either playing hooky or slept in. Ms. Vo, the sub, had resigned quietly to her laptop, probably knee deep into a monster of an Amazon order.

Gyuvin had considered work briefly, he really did, before giving in and pulling out his phone. For the last week and a half, every time he’s unlocked his phone he’s gone straight to gmail.

It’s compulsory at this point. A nasty habit that only grows the more he feeds it. Tens of tabs were littered with google searches of ‘are the BigHit 2024 global auditions out’ ‘does HYBE send rejection letters,’ ‘kpop auditions for boys 2004,’ ‘UC irvine results day’ and not uncharacteristically, an Indeed tab with the search ‘server jobs near me.’ If it doesn’t end up working out, the minimum wage he makes at Chick Fil A just won't cut it

His eyes filtered through the usual junk. DoorDash, Canvas, Chase- and there it was: an email from Hybe Labels, dripped in gold.

Every sound faded into something far away and muffled. At once, he was underwater. Sinking and weightless all at once, his heart was struggling to stay in his chest.

And fuck the school wifi, it was loading so slow.

This was a bad omen. Surely- he’s braced himself for rejection.

It’s okay. There’s always next time. Maybe FAFSA will pull through.

“Ricky. Gunwook. Oh my fucking god.” Their heads had snapped. He got in. He got in. Holy shit.

They waste no time invading his space, jumping, hugging, patting his back, scruffing his hair.

His ribs squeeze with the weight of them. Everything was so surreal. Gunwook takes his phone to read it aloud. First in Korean, then English for good measure.

“To inform you, Kim Gyuvin- That’s you- that you’ve passed the 3rd round of auditions. And we need you in skinny jeans right away-“ Gyuvin knows he can barely make a dent in him, but he socks his arm all the same.

He can already hear it now, Gunwook embarrassing him to everyone they know. “take a good look at him before he becomes famous.” As goofy as it is, he can’t help but preen, a heady rush coloring his cheeks pink.

It felt like fireworks, like relief. Like the thing that had wound him so tightly had snapped and he was free to breathe.

It felt so good, so why? It hit him then, a belated and devastating pit in his stomach.

Ricky hadn’t checked his email yet. He celebrated too early. He’s the worst best friend on planet earth. Maybe he already has checked— and—

“We’re getting celebratory Chipotle,” Gunwook decides.

“You mean with my car?” Ricky asks.

He answers with nothing but a toothy, stupid, oblivious grin. Gyuvin gets aux. They’re playing New Jeans. One more hug for the road.

He doesn’t miss how Ricky holds on a little tighter.

Tab #430 on Gyuvins iPhone.

Quora
“I got into a really good college but my best friend didn’t and it’s awkward now. What should I do?”

Kalyani Asker
4y
Go to your university. You can still stay close, but the bottom line is this is your opportunity. It makes no sense to let someone else get in the way of your dream. If they are a good friend they’d understand that …Continue Reading

Rebecca Hanes
Owner of Perro Nuevo (2016– present)
Something you learn as you get older is that what matters isn't where you went to college or what outfit you wore. It’s who you are. What I’ve come to learn is that friendship is more important than… Continue Reading

Lilliana Rivera-Patton
4y
Hey, I think we’re in similar situations. This actually happened to me last year. For a number of reasons other than the fact I got into Dartmouth and she didn’t, we haven’t been on speaking terms since. Honestly… Continue Reading

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College is a scam, your friend just got a blessing in disguise. If you have half the brain whatever cushy college you got into thinks you have, then you’d both realize that and start working. The problem with this generation is… Continue Reading

Thuy-vy Nguyen
4y
You guys will get over it. Trust. Just hug it out.

Ricky Kim

[attached image]
;p

OH MY GOD
OMFGGGG
YOU GOT IN TOO I FKING KNEW IT

Outgoing Call to Ricky Kim
58:00 mins

dude I'm sorry if I sounded pushy at the end. I support whatever you want to do 100% YK that
I j wanted this for both of us and it feels so crazy
I don’t want to go without u😕

read 12:00 AM

ik ik. it's all good
i'm really happy for u. ur gonna go far

Thanks bro
Sleep tight kim ricky
Hearted by Ricky Kim

Stop being fake -__-

sweet dreams jungkook 😍
Thumbed down by Me

now GTS
hahahaha gts bts

K

Incoming Call from Ricky Kim
7:05:00 Hrs

3 weeks later, Gyuvin and his parents decide. They’re visiting a week after graduation. He’s moving at the end of the summer. He quits his job at Chick Fil A. It’s all too fast and all too much.

Ricky still picks Gyuvin up every morning before school. They still throw each other sheepish glances in choir every time their voices crack because their shitty teacher insists they’re both tenors and dog each other afterwards.

They still fight every day about where to go for lunch. They still play Overwatch or Valorant until 1 am on school nights, and blame each other for their loss streak, and fall asleep on FaceTime, and share hoodies and nothing has changed.

But it has. Admittance was solemn and quiet, like if it’s acknowledged it, it became true. Idol talk was always coated in a thick layer of ice and eggshells he lacks the tact to walk around.

Gyuvins going to the one place Ricky can’t follow, and for once in his life they won’t be Ricky and Gyuvin.

Horrible plans to dorm together and get drunk at a frat party and finally get his license fade at the edges.

Even if he knows he doesn’t even have half the money to go to university wherever Ricky gets accepted. Not too long ago they were crossing their fingers, binging SHINee stages on Gyuvin’s home computer, holding on to a childhood dream of getting into a big 3 company.

A new and uncertain future is unfurling slowly. Ricky’s made himself to be the realist, and that leaves Gyuvin naive and dreaming. Something impossible claws in his chest, intangible and wanting. They’re already so close, but not enough. They're running out of time.

It’s this fleeting grasp for youth that pushes Gyuvin to do what he does next. Kind of like a quarter life crisis.

Matthew texts him for math answers, in typical Matthew fashion, and to both of their surprise, slides him on offer.

He just baked a shit load of edibles apparently, with ‘homemade cannabutter’ whatever that is- and he’s selling it for cheap. Not that Gyuvin would know the usual going rate, but he doesn’t doubt him.

우현 형

Ofc it’s cheap for my favorite 동생‼️

Do I eat the whole thing?

Oh god no don’t do that
I take like half.
U should take less than that. Wait 2 hours before taking any more.

ok 형
I’ll be responsible

Ofc U will
Friday good?

Hearted by Me

Ricky says to take it with him so he can watch u look dumb

😐😐😐

🤣🤣🤣
Thumbed down by Me

Ricky Kim

R u free Friday? Could u dye my hair🌚

read 6:00 pm

Ricky wasn’t happy when he told him.

Gyuvin had tucked the ziplock safely away in his backpack, like a fragile weight in his pocket. It looked- well, like a regular brownie. Only thicker, stodgier, and of course smellier. Matthew had taken the crumpled ten dollar bill gleefully and patted him on the back. Don’t have too much fun! He said. Apparently, that’s exactly what he did.

“Did he only give you half?” Ricky asks, inspecting the bag closely, as if he can sense bullshit with his eyes alone.

“No?” Gyuvin plugs his phone into the aux cord. He doesn’t play any music yet.

Ricky makes a face. “So where’s the other half?”

“I ate it?” It was an unremarkable thing actually. Right after Matthew gave it to him after lunch, he took a tentative bite. It went down easily. It tasted like... brownie. He waited 2 hours just like he told him to, and didn’t feel a single thing. It’s then he decided to eat the rest of the half before the bell rang. He felt fine.

Ricky looks at him like he just said he was dying. “Are you serious?”

A nervous laugh escapes Gyuvin’s lips. He knows what Ricky sounds like when he’s joking. It doesn’t sound like he’s joking.

“Did he tell you to take half?” Ricky’s facing him now. In the passenger's seat he felt small and scorned. A scolded kid. Gyuvin shakes his head.

“Well Matthew takes half,” he says childishly.

“Of course he takes half, he’s been smoking since he was 12. His tolerance is higher than mine!” His perfect brows crease in the center.

“Dude what’s wrong? Is it that bad?” Ricky takes a deep breath, in and out. Stay here, Ricky tells him.

He steps out of the car and dials Matthews' number. Grown out roots and a tiny ponytail, held together by a single rubber band, ready to snap.

His voice was muffled by his tinted windows and the buzz of every student in the parking lot, but he heard every word. He asked how many milligrams are in one square. Oh. Like give me an estimate. 100? Deadass? Why didn’t you tell him? You know how his parents are. I’m not his… This isn’t funny. Are you high? I’ll talk to you later. Yeah. Bye.

Ricky closes the car door with a thud. He braces his hands on the steering wheel.

“You got the bubble dye?” Gyuvin nods.

“Are you hungry?” He nods again, not exactly but, food never hurts.

Fuck it. He’s not going to do this sober.

“Pass me the other half,” he says.

He bites off a little more than a fourth. A crooked smile spreads across Gyuvin’s face, and like that, the mood has changed.

Gyuvin tracks down their playlist and screws around on shuffle. “Let’s go!”

They’re en route to this really good Mexican spot, according to him.

Gyuvin, it’s better than sex, he says.

“Like you’d know,” Gyuvin snarls.

“Like you’d know,” Ricky throws back. He’s just going to have to believe him.

An hour and a bowl of Asada fries later, he still doesn’t feel it. You’re not supposed to, Ricky explains, it’s like digesting food. You wouldn’t shit 20 minutes after eating. It has to absorb and metabolize

Bubble brand dye is really easy to apply. He could’ve done it himself, if he wanted. That’s actually the point of it anyway. But Gyuvin is lazy. And Ricky’s always been fastidious with matters of appearance, if his rows of hair, skin, and makeup products neatly organized across the top of his bathroom counter are anything to go by.

If there’s anyone he trusts to not ruin his hair, it’s him. Ricky is the type of person to never be caught looking unkempt. Even Target doesn’t get to witness him not looking runway-ready. His dark circles are always concealed neatly, eyes winged out expertly.

Once, Gyuvin had gotten curious. After he stays the night, they end up rising at different hours, content to go through their motions at separate times and meet somehow to eat before noon. But that day, they’d woken up together. After Gyuvin brushed his teeth, he simply watched. To his surprise Ricky let him. It was as easy as breathing for him.

All sorts of creams and liquids he couldn’t possibly know the use for, applied in the right order to the right corner of his face, or building up the thin layers of eyeshadow that are only visible up close.

Now he caught so many details he would’ve never noticed. How he de-puffs his face after waking up, how his contacts are a shade of hazel that only fit him. How he actually does have eyebags, he’s just stupidly good at hiding them.

All things to catalog, tucked away in his ever growing Ricky file. That particular night, he had fallen asleep without taking off his face. He started the morning by soaking cotton rounds in micellar water and letting it sit on his eyes, a weak color wiping away on the other side. Then he does it all over again. Stripping it away just to do it over again. It was fascinating.

At 11 am in the downstairs kitchen, no noise but the crunch of cereal and the clipped songs off TikTok, Gyuvin sends Ricky a video. A girl doing a boy's makeup, titled “I turn my boyfriend into a k-pop idol.” A one word text accompanying it, ‘us?’

“Qubing, you want me to do your makeup?” Ricky asked aloud, breaking the sacred morning bubble, a self important stupidly-smug smile already forming.

Realistically, Ricky doesn’t do makeup on others. He learned how to do makeup in the comfort of his moms bathroom, carried by the thrill of fishing through her drawers and rushing to scrub it off before she came home. Plus, his TikTok is full of scarcely lit thirst traps and ignored comments from girls.

What’s the worst that could happen?

Incredulously, he shrugged. “If you think you’re going to fuck it up just say that.” Game on. An hour later Ricky had perched himself atop a spinny-chair, maneuvering around a propped camera. Their effortless banter made for good content. The next morning, he woke up to a million notifications. Neurotically, hopelessly, he read every single comment.

imi🎀
@SMTOWN i think we found the next nct member ♡ 14.1k

Saaaaaaab
why does he acc look like an idol ♡ 9k

madi.question.mark
he was feeling himself once the eyebrows came on ♡ 533

🧸 jane
can u pls do an aegyosal tutorial 🥹🥹 ♡ 1264

泉锐.
it's in my pinned :)

R A Y N E
the closet is made of glass ♡ 533

gojostoes
no literally. like why r u on his lap?🤨 ♡ 127

It’s privated now. Per Gyuvin’s request.

There’s a downloaded copy, tucked away safely in his camera roll. 100, no 1,000 of the views must’ve been his own. If anyone from the company saw— maybe they’d see— it’d be obvious. The caption was titled satirically: “turning my boyfriend into a k-pop idol 😍😍” The words made his stomach curl.

Gyuvin has been to his house too many times to count, and the overwhelming feeling is always still I am so poor and I never want to leave. His bedroom has a bathroom. His mirror has ring lights. His toilet has a bidet. He wouldn’t be surprised if there was an ass heater he’s hiding somewhere in there too. If his shits were diamond encrusted.

Despite the sheer lack of necessity, Ricky takes extra precaution anyway. He sections Gyuvins too-long hair, two pigtails in the front, one ponytail in the back.

“Kim Ricky, do I look cute?” He peers up at him from the stool through his lashes. Doe eyes, his secret weapon. Ricky shoots him a sour look.

“You look like Eumppappa.” Gyuvin didn’t like that answer. He just got compared to a dog. Ricky snickers and snaps a photo, squishing his cheeks together, skin hot against his fingers. “You’re going on Instagram.”

“Don’t-“ he starts, “Put it on public. I know.” Ricky takes the words out of his mouth. Gyuvins totally wiped his Instagram clean, in preparation.

Nothing but a blank profile picture and minimalist bio is left. ‘IHS ‘24 @irvine_asb” Eumppappa had his own highlight, so did Ricky and Gunwook. Not anymore, though. Obviously.

“Maybe I’ll keep it to myself. Blackmail.” He mutters, swiping Vaseline across his hairline. It felt slimy and cool.

All his muscles relax. Slow and methodical, Ricky massages the sudsy mixture into his hair. Nails graze against his scalp just barely. His eyes fall closed. Softly, if he pays attention, he can hear him hum along to the music playing from his speaker.

He has a clear view of his neck, of his tattoo, of the fading bruise under it. From who— that’s not his business.

But It’s Matthew, most likely. He says hi by grabbing him by the waist. Who does that if not the guy you’re fucking? Belatedly, Gyuvin wonders what his mom would think, if she knew. Is she gonna notice? When is it going to hit him? Could he act normal when he comes home? Is he normal right now?

“Okay,” Ricky inspects his work in the mirror.

His head looks like an ice cream cone. “Siri, set a timer for 20 minutes.”

Initially, it shocked Ricky. Straight laced Gyuvin, “my-mom-would-never-let-me-get-my-ears pierced” Gyuvin, who passes vocal judgment everytime Ricky mentions a hookup, winces at every offer to smoke (padded with a ‘like no pressure tho’), and bites back a lecture should he show up to school with sunglasses and a headache.

Matthew’s grand theory? He’s trying to impress him. Which is utterly ridiculous. It seems more like a midlife- post highschool, pre entrance into the Orwellian nightmare that being a trainee is- crisis. When Ricky asked why the sudden change he laughed him off. Because I want to. Why, do you not approve?

A pout forms on Ricky’s lips. He looks longingly at the discarded cup on the counter. “My horchata is all watery.” Because you waited so long, forehead, he thinks. That’s not what he says, though.

Gyuvin rolls the foreign syllables around in his mouth. Hor-cha-ta. “What’s that?”

“It’s kind of like sweet rice milk. Try it.” Ricky slips off the dirty gloves, lifting a straw to his lips. The cold hits his teeth and makes him shudder. A line of spit connects his lips as he pulls away.

“You-“ he exhales, “You’re like- ha-“ a laugh spills out of him. “You’re hair is- it looks like sweet-“ Gyuvin’s lost full control of his face. His tongue is nothing but a heavy weight in his mouth. Every exhale turns into a laugh. The Drake from Ricky’s speaker sounds even better than it did a minute ago.

Realization dawns on Ricky.“Ah. It’s hit.”

“Ricky, the songs about you,” He can’t possibly guess where he’s going with this. Sexxy Red just said “Let that coochie breath.” He smiles like he’s just playing with his jaw muscles, figuring out how wide he can grin and how long he can hold it. “You’re my rich baby daddy.”

This is fun. If you told Ricky a year ago he’d be able to witness the Gyuvin Kim high as a kite, he’d call you sorely mistaken.

“Am I?” He laughs. They needed to wash this shit out like 3 minutes ago. For lack of a better term, he bends him over the tub. Neck straining over cool, white material. A ring of wet forms on the collar of his T-shirt.

“Yeah- haha,” Gyuvins chipper ass voice reverbs against the tile.“Ricky, my- my clench muscles-“ another sentence intercepted by a fit of giggles, “My-ha- my clench muscles are-“

“Gyuvin please shut the fuck up.” That much doesn’t stop him, he still cackles like a Hyena.

He quickly lathers his expensive shampoo and conditioner, brashly covering his strands in it before rinsing it off. Warm water against his hair makes him sigh with relief, melting into the shower rug underneath him. A towel flops over his head. Under it lay a freshly colored deep sienna, only a slight lift from his original color. Not bad, he thinks.

“I look so cool. Thank you Ricky,” He leaves a little trail of water drops all the way to Ricky’s bed. He shakes like a hosed down dog. Cute, he thinks.

A yawn so loud he shakes a little leaves Ricky. It’s going to hit him soon, too.

“Alright, how do you feel Gyuvin?” Glassy eyes and a stupid smile stare back at him. “I was saying before I feel fine but the clench- like I release slower,” Ricky has to fight to not roll his eyes at the word choice, “everything’s in double time. I see things as I- I like, see things as I do them.”

Ricky nods, he remembers trying to explain his highs too. He still does, every now and then. No words will properly describe the languid and warm feeling that looks in his muscles, the ease of lungs, the closing of eyes.

“But my throat’s really dry,” Gyuvin lays down the towel against Ricky’s satin pillowcase and props his damp head of hair against it. Ricky hands him the drink from before, thankful it’s mostly water by now. A quiet sort of calm washes over him. He tugs at the corner of a blanket and slips inside. The dim ambient lights of Ricky’s clean room glow a little brighter, he thinks. This drink tastes a little better. This bed, softer.

“Qubing, what do you wanna watch?”

“You,” he sings, a lilt to his voice. Ricky kicks him under the sheet for that.

He scrolls aimlessly through Hulu. “Everything Everywhere All At Once?” Gyuvin shakes his head. “You’ll cry again.” More hyena laughs fall out of him.

“You cried too,” Ricky kept scrolling. He ignores that blatant lie. In the theater, Gunwooks eyes watered a little, maybe, from not blinking for that long, while Ricky and Gyuvin were sobbing for the last 10 minutes. It’s always been like that.

“Ooh, Magic Mike,” that earns him a bemused look.

“You want to see a movie about white male strippers?” A mountain of plushies at the foot of his bed stare back at him. He can’t subject Rilakkuma to this debauchery.

Gyuvin scoots closer, “it’ll be funny.” Ricky shrugs and presses play. The Lego set Gyuvin got him sits half opened and spilled between them. They better get started.

More lego pieces end up thrown at each other in fits of laughter and frustration than assembled together. They give up completely. Ricky retrieves snacks from downstairs.

At this point all the lights are off but the TV screen. They snap a photo of themselves with flash and send it to Gunwook. They invited him, but he strongly passed. He quote, ‘didn’t want to be in the middle of that.’ And maybe he was right to think so. Ricky was half on top of him, cat eyes now half lidded, matching Gyuvins. They looked properly gone. More than he feels.

“Rickyy,” Gyuvin drawled, “this movie sucks.”

“You picked it” Ricky stretches a little.

He’s not paying attention to the plot half as much as Gyuvin is, because he has no idea why there are bare balls in his face. Boobs too, probably, at some point, he can’t remember. But he’s intently picking it apart, a less than rave review coming to life on his tongue.

“These movies they’re always so… unrealistic.” That makes him laugh.

A beat passes, he waits for elaboration that doesn’t come. “Well, yeah.”

“No like…” he realizes this is how they usually speak. Just a lot slower.

“The… you know.” He gestures to the screen.

Channing Tatum is fully getting his dick sucked. This would be more awkward under different pretenses, but here, it’s just amusing.

“What about it?” Ricky probes.

He looks at him in disbelief, like it should be obvious.

“It…” he whispers his next words, “Ricky. In real life it hurts.”

Now he’s properly laughing, a whole body shake, air squeezing out of his chest and ribs. Gyuvin looks horrified, but he’s laughing too.

“Do— For— for her?”

It raises so many more questions than it answers. What girl confided in him? About the real cost of head. Shedding truth on the situation. Bursting the bubble that years of porn have blown out of proportion.

“It’s, really, it doesn’t always hurt. If— if he’s not a dick.”

Another question raised and fallen. He’s not sure who’s talking from what perspective. Gyuvin hasn’t— has he?

“Well,” Gyuvin chews on it thoughtfully. Under the faint glow, he thinks he can see a blush forming.

“I mean… I’m sure for her too but…”

His foot is hooked over Ricky’s under the blanket, weighing him to the bed. It clicks at once. Ricky turns to face him, and gets really serious.

“Gyuvin,” he pronounces perfectly, low voice dipping lower for emphasis, “did someone— ha— don’t laugh— did someone suck your dick off?”

That breaks them wholly. Fits of laughter erupt between them. Gyuvin groans and hides his face behind a pillow, before smacking Ricky silly with it. His abs twitch and his side hurts from doubling over. It’s a good kind of hurt.

A few seconds pass, and he thinks that’s enough of the dick conversation. Channing Tatum is no longer getting freaked. They’re outside now, somewhere in Florida or wherever this is set. But Gyuvin gathers strength again, and starts to speak. All of his attention is on him.

“Once, in freshman year,” Ricky listens intently, “I was at some party the upperclassmen from basketball dragged me to.”

Gyuvin at a party sounds as surreal as him laying on his bed, feeling halfway to mars, but both are true. In freshman year, they weren’t as close as they were now. They’ve been friends since elementary school, but by then they found different crowds. He’s glad they’re here now, now that it matters. It makes sense that he didn’t know. Still, it tugs at him, all the things he can’t possibly know about Gyuvin.

“They were all drinking. I didn’t, well, I wanted to, but I didn’t. I didn’t know anyone there. Just some guys on the team.”

The house was unfamiliar, his designated driver long lost to the crowd and too loud music.

All he remembers was it was so hot. He fucked off to a dark room upstairs, hoping he could wait it out. He didn’t know that’s where people usually are— well— he wasn’t looking for that kind of company, but it wasn’t unwelcome. He was just 15.

“This junior I had a crazy crush on was already there, sitting on the bed. Hannah Liu.” The name doesn’t ring a bell for Ricky, but an image forms in his head. Long silky hair, maybe a highlight or two, grown out to her shoulders. Smart and thin, Gyuvin’s type. The truth was Gyuvin could count how many words they exchanged on one hand.

“At the time I thought— well I was so!” His hands gesture at nothing. He has no idea what he means by that.

“But she just asked me, like, straight up. It was crazy. Who just… goes up to someone they don’t know and… anyway. I just nodded. I thought if I opened my mouth I would’ve said something stupid.”

The vision comes to him easily, a young and eager Gyuvin, shocked into silence. He wonders what she said. If it was shameless, if it made him squirm. If he was so scandalized he can’t repeat it, if the Gyuvin laying next to him right now would squirm the same.

“She,” Gyuvin blinks at nothing, staring straight

up at the ceiling, eyebrows furrowing a little recalling the finer details.

Ricky’s facing him. His eyes rove over his troubled expression, trying to look for something. “She tied her hair up and dropped to her knees.” He inhales sharply.

“And I wanted to look away but it was like roadkill. You can’t look away.” Ricky doesn’t want to imagine it anymore. He wishes this story was over now.

Gyuvin shakes his head a little. “I felt, I felt her teeth. It hurt.”

Ricky winces at that. “Ouch,” he supplies uselessly.

The towel had fallen on the floor by now, his brown locks fanning across blue sheets. “I couldn’t— I pulled her off. I zipped my jeans up and left. I feel bad. It was so embarrassing. She probably felt like shit.”

Words are getting harder and harder to form now, his tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth every time he closes it, but he keeps speaking anyway. He wants to tell Ricky.

Usually, this would be his opening. Where they’d start bickering and the heavy air would lift, But not now. The words come out a little too honest.

“Don’t feel bad. Everyone’s first times are awkward. That was probably her first time too.” Gyuvin’s face would’ve been crumpled by now, if the edible hadn’t made his jaw weigh 300 pounds.

“But, agh,” he grovels, squeaks, more like.

“Ricky, I wasn’t even— I wasn’t even hard.”

In unison, they swallow. Hard. Up close, he can hear him stop breathing. He can see his Adam's apple bob up, and down. The words lay heavy in the air. Sticky. Syrupy.

“It’s not, they’re not all like that, it was your first” words slowly trickle out of Ricky, no direction in sight. Waves ripple at their points of contact.

“She didn’t even work you up. Girls don’t know…” he trails off, content to let his body go slack. Gyuvin finishes the sentence mentally.

Now he’s thinking, if it were Ricky on his knees instead. What he’d do differently. If he’d make him hard the way she couldn’t.

Every sense is heightened. His head is all fuzzy and just curling his toes feels nice. The scent of Ricky’s shampoo, the taste of spit in his mouth. It’s all good. A quiet static fizzles across skin and it’s all so good.

It wouldn’t be hard to show him. He would palm him, nice and slow, let friction key him up until beads form at the tip.

Bite his lip, make him sing against his mouth. His hands would touch where they’ve always been dying to, his chest, his throat, his jaw. They’d kiss and kiss and pull. Then slide down on the bed, tucked between his legs, litter kisses all over his thighs. Spread the wet from his head all the way down his length. Pump him, once, twice, rub his tongue against the tip. Hold him down to see how he writhes.

Let his hands grab at his strands, burning his scalp and throat until his taste turns salty and bitter. Show him how good teeth can feel when it’s his.

He’ll beg and beg and all he’ll be able to do is groan around his cock. His canines would drag against his veins, pushing his hips higher off the bed, into his mouth.

The cum would gather in his mouth and drip off his tongue, back onto his dick, and he’d stroke him again. Again, and again and again. It’s a sequence he’s replayed too many times to count. It’s a little different each time. Usually it’s Ricky’s playlist on the TV. Sometimes their hands are interlaced, or they’re in Gyuvin’s room, not his. Sometimes they’re high out of their minds.

He would. He wants to. He really fucking wants to, but he’s so gone and Ricky’s not far from it. He really hopes he can’t tell he’s hard. The thought of a pliable Gyuvin under him makes him shudder and shocks him with shame.

He’s going to shove his cheek into the pillow and be okay with being hard. He’ll slip into the bathroom, when he’s sure he’s asleep, and flush the guilt away, along with the rest of the ogre that comes up when he thinks about Gyuvin Kim.

Gyuvin would never, not in the right mind, not with a boy, not with him, or at the very least, not now. Everything he’s ever wanted is just a few feet away. It’s so close, so who would he be, to take that away? Not with half his best friend here, while the other half is chasing something else.

Ricky knew who he was from a very young age.

He stared at his Taemin poster a little too long, this indescribable squeeze at his chest, wanting him indiscernible from wanting to be him. He feels that way when he looks at Gyuvin. Puppy eyes and innocence. The kind of aegyo-sal makeup can’t replicate. Broad like a man and pretty like a girl. That’s all he’s ever wanted to be.

After lockdown in middle school they grew apart. How could they not? Ricky was busy playing with eyeliner while Gyuvin was watching some Twitch streamer. They used to play idols during recess, but it’s nothing like that anymore. Their daily texts turned far and few between.

Lockdown lifted. Ricky went blonde. Gyuvin made Junior Varsity. His different set of pronouns on Instagram were erased, in fear of facing people in public and letting awkward air linger after correcting them one too many times.

His sister and online friends got it right, for the short time he let himself care, that’s what mattered.

Through no fault of his own, resentment built high in him. Gyuvin’s never looked up ‘boys kissing’ on the home computer, has he? He’s never felt the pit in his stomach at the barbers, begging his mom to let him keep it long. He didn’t have to learn to cut his own hair or crop his own shirts. He didn’t have to gain validation on his knees in the back of strangers' cars or stare longingly at proud people with more confidence than him.

By sophomore year he had a girlfriend and a Varsity letter. He had the sweet life. But it was childish, and acrid, and it all went away when they became friends again last year. The residual turned into something much uglier, fantasies and want and reckless behavior. Like no time has passed, even when it has.

Gyuvin feels like 10 weighted blankets are piled high on him. Crushed, in the best way. Ricky’s side is pressing him down, making him feel weightless and free.

He has the horrible urge to press into him right back, sink his whole narrow body into the bed. Bask in the sensation of skin on skin. To be his best, regardless if he knows how. Eclipse that stupid hickey with a bigger, better mark. This desire is crawling to the surface, no longer drowning in the recesses of his mind. It’s at the tip of his fingers. It’s next to him, breathing slower. It's slipping away and will stay here in Irvine when he’s long gone.

It’s been simmering in the heat of his gut as long as Ricky’s been blonde and now it’s reaching a fever pitch.

He finally turns to face him. His eyes are just barely open, flannel falling off his shoulder, exposing pale and unmarked skin.

Does he notice? Is he obvious?

“Qubing,” he says, drowsily on his side, both hands tucked under his face, “What are you looking at?”

His eyes go in and out of focus. He can’t make eye contact, because once he locks in to that half lidded stare he’s not confident he could look away. A perk of being high? He doesn’t care. He just gets lost. Black irises take him in, boundless, and pin him down. He’s so happy. So lucky.

It’s hard, but he opens his mouth to speak again. “Your tattoo.” The high is pulling candor from his lips.

Ricky yawns again and blinks all slow, like a cat. A flash of teeth, a twitch of his nose. “I want another,” he mutters, “where should I get it?”

He reaches over, listless, not much distance to cross anyway. He drags the pad of his finger across his brow bone. The sharp hint of his nail makes him shudder.

“Here. Face tat.” Ricky exhales a laugh, through his nose.

Everything is so soft. Enamored by the sensation, he moves back in again. Swipes a thumb across the words, Role Model, and conveniently, over the purple splotch above it. It wasn’t him who put that there, but who’s in his bed now? Ricky gasps, sensitive. He’s looking intently now, searching. Ricky's gaze is tracing the tongue darting across his lips.

“Where else?” He whispers. Is this permission? Can he really?—

Ricky’s eyes flutter closed. It’s all up to him. Gyuvin’s lips are so feather light, he can’t tell he’s being touched at all. It’s like breathing. Fireworks on his flesh, their chapped lips just meet.

Gyuvin feels that delicious weight on his chest again, it’s Ricky’s body on his, and he feels lightheaded. Their chests rise and fall, syncopated, as Ricky moves against him. Cradling his jaw. They’re so close, but not close enough. Every part of them should touch. He’s melting, and Ricky’s laughing against his lips and he’s so weak.

He’s all over me. He’s so warm, so soft.

He almost forgets to move, every limb taking immeasurable force, gravity taking him hostage. He’s content to float. Formless. Happy to let Ricky mold his body.

Gyuvin thumbs the indent of his hips, mapping the shape of the bone with his fingers, committing it to memory. It’s too easy. Like skating across silk, soft and effortless. Ricky pulls back, eyelids impossibly sunken lower, all pink cheeks and wide smiles. Gyuvin thinks he might’ve frowned, missing the warmth on him already. It doesn’t last long, because he realizes he can just look.

His wife beater has been rucked up from readjusting so much, stomach and thin hair and the Calvin Klein logo peeking out from under his sweats.

It makes his already dry mouth even dryer. He’s never been allowed this. Now that he is, he never wants to stop. How can he?

Ricky leans in and he’s swimming in ecstasy again. His nails are scratching his scalp and pulling him closer.

He noses his neck and pokes his tongue out. Not even trying to make a mark, just content to taste. Like salt and skin. Like Gyuvin. The wet spot makes his heart soar. He’s on cloud 9. Gyuvin sighs into his hairline.

Pants hanging low on his hips, he sees something peek out from under his waistband. Without thinking, he hooks his thumb under it all, under his boxers, pulling just enough to see.

Ricky feels air hit his skin and he’s frozen. He pulls back and peers up wearily through his lashes. He’s shivering, now. What is he asking for? Does he want this? He can’t possibly. His hands pause there, like a question. He realizes then what he’s trying to say. It washes over him like water. Cooling his cheeks, but drowning his lungs. Both relieving and damning.

Ricky’s hands knock into his, tugging the rest down over his ass. There it was, in a thin winding fine line, a daffodil. His birth flower. His first tattoo. Behind it, the swell of his cheek, curved and uncovered. Gyuvin’s hand still burns over his waist.

They’ve seen so much of each other, but they haven’t seen this. Faint stretch marks etched like lightning bolts in his side, hidden under clothes. Something he got while he wasn’t looking. Gyuvin traces that, too, and Ricky thinks he’s going to implode.

How Ricky drinks from him, parched. Or how Gyuvin chases his lips single minded, insistent, like he does everything else he wants. Digs his nose in the sheets, mouth against satin. Never getting enough of his scent.

He doesn’t know how much time has passed but it must’ve been long enough for yet another sex scene to begin. Moans ring from the screen, volume edging on too high, too obscene, but he’s not looking. It’s pitch black outside and bleach blonde in his eyeline.

Lean muscle twists under his arm, he’s showing him. Ricky splays a hand against his abdomen, soft and solid at the same time. Hikes his leg up, arching out, nudging their faces oh so close.

Kneeing his half hard dick through thin basketball shorts. Ricky stiffens.

Alarm bells sound off in Ricky’s brain, toomuch toofar toomuch.

His heart is beating in his ears, breath careful and labored. Dirty pants pitch higher from the screen, masking his own. Gyuvin’s hand is still on his side. With dim eyes, he licks his spit slick lips and leans forward again. Weak and exposed, he lets him tongue into the ridges of his mouth. This kiss is so different. Before, they were breathing. Sipping air. Now he’s knocking the wind out of him. Groping his ass. Making him groan into his mouth.

Aligning them, rubbing clumsily next to each other through fabric. Pulling out meek ‘ah-hh ah’s against jaw until he fills out. Gyuvin doesn’t know when he started to grind, against the mattress, against Ricky, but he feels his dick straining his pants, and he’s chasing. Not friction, but buttery smooth slides, the kind against satin sheets, against his— against—

He holds Ricky’s face in his hands, mouth open, eyes screwed shut. If he doesn’t see it, it’s not real.

Gyuvin says something that throws Ricky so off-kilter, his eyes fly open. They’re wide and glassy. Beautiful and delicate. He tells him as much. He’s never seen anyone prettier. You’re so beautiful. He’s winded. There’s no way he knows what he’s saying, Ricky‘s sure.

Ricky looks broken. The splayed hand against Gyuvin’s abdomen flinches, caught between pulling back and pushing forward. His tank top skews in the wrong ways, catching on a flash of a hard pink nipple. So rubbed and raw. This is all he can do for him. Sit still and look pretty. It’s nothing like he imagined. It’s so much better. It’s so much worse.

The outline twitches against his hip. Face flushing with heat. He’s petting his flank now, urging his thigh closer and closer between his legs, so he tumbles on top of him. Their lips detach with an oof, only to kiss the air out of him again.

He slides his hand under his tank top, pushing it up, up, up, bracketing both hand’s around his tensing waist.

Ricky gasps for air, looking desperately for somewhere to brace against. Strong arms tangle at his back. He’s so out of his depth.

Gyuvin’s hair is fanned across the navy pillowcase, lips bitten and red and hanging open, eyes drooping and glossed. He looks so fucked. So perfect. But this shouldn’t be happening when he’s this gone and Ricky can’t even hold himself up. Half of his ass is still out. Goosebumps remind him so. Ricky pulls his pants up with the little decency he has left and scoots back, Gyuvin does the same. Gyuvin lazily and obviously looks down at his dick, because of course he’s wearing gray sweats, and Ricky slaps at one of his pecs. They laugh until their lungs run out of air, as if they weren’t both painfully hard and eating each other a minute ago.

Ricky shifts around on his lap and Gyuvin flat out moans. His voice cuts through the thick air, replaying over and over in Ricky’s ears, making his hackles raise.

Ricky just looks at him in disbelief, disregarding the arousal lighting up his skin. Gyuvin’s not sober enough to have shame, he simply cants his hips slightly up, mouth hanging open like this is all he can do.

White hot pleasure tingles up his spine and he forgets why they shouldn’t do this. Sweaty, red, and half asleep, he really does look gone. A line of drool stains his cheek. All he can think about is how stupidly perfect he looks, even now, like this.

It makes him angry when he thinks about it, what those greedy bastards might do when they get his hands on him.

Would they tear down his perfect nose? Sand down his two cute front teeth, in favor of something ceramic? Cut a new eyelid where there shouldn’t be? For what?

“So far,” Gyuvin rasps. Ricky thinks he’s going to pass out.

Their teeth clash, and he misses his mouth by a centimeter, but he’s squeezing his waist so tight, and Ricky’s hugging his neck even tighter, butterflies escape from his ribs.

Gyuvin’s movements jostle Ricky’s body, lithe and spineless above him. They’re grinding for real, until they’re rutting. All noise from TV is completely reduced to murmurs, utterly drowned out.

The only things audible are soft exhales and mouths against skin. Just two bodies, trapped in this world of theirs.

Gyuvin pulls away to look at him, then pecks his lips all slow, and pecks and pecks until the butterflies return and his knees get so weak.

Nuzzling his cheek just because he likes how it feels. Ricky likes it too, so he doesn’t know why suddenly he feels like he should cry. It’s intimate. It’s so careful. He doesn’t think Gyuvin knows any other way to love. He’s so glad he doesn’t. He kisses his nose, his cheek, his ear. Dives back into him, aiming lower, into the meat of flesh under his bruise, hot and open mouthed, biting his hickey.

The sting bunches his shoulders together as he sucks hard, hands roving over his nipple. He cups his flat chest like there's something to grab and that makes his spine curl.

Ricky lets a punched out ‘ha— hha’ spill out of him. He’s lifting up, off of the bed, into his space, pulling him down. Gyuvin’s muttering something, can I? Can I— and Ricky doesn’t care what it is, he nods

Gyuvin throws all caution to the wind, shoving a dry hand in his pants and spreading his precome down his length.

Ricky’s mouth hangs open. Not even the worst parts of his mind could have envisioned this.

The outline of everything emerges from his shorts. Knuckles, fingers, balls, tip. It’s so much dirtier than seeing it straight up.

Gyuvin groans and strokes himself at a rapid pace, burning his cheeks hot and making his heavy wrist ache. Ricky can’t look away. All he can do is stare like a pervert. Ignore his own dick, heavy and hard between his legs.

He breathes ragged into his hand, covering his own mouth, letting the sight burn into his memory. A high Gyuvin, propped against his headboard, gaze fixed on him, shirt pulled up, hand cupping his ass, fucking his fist like he needs to cum now.

Everything in him aches. All he can do is chase and chase. Every point of contact sends shockwaves down his back. Legs straddling his hips. A hand pushing up his T-shirt. More. He needs— he needs—

Under his other hand, he starts to touch himself too. Hiding a pretty pink head pulled free, poking out from his waistband.

Smearing, pulsing, against his palm. He slumps forward, head against his shoulder, breathing hard and nearing his orgasm.

Gyuvin stares down in awe. Their cocks are nearly touching. Gyuvin imagines cumming on him, all over his pretty eyelashes, his fancy sheets other boys have been in, on pretty lips, swallowing him whole and taking him to the hilt. On the flower imprinted onto his ass cheek.

That’s— that’s where he’d do it. In between. Pushing in. Trembling under him.

In his peripheral is Ricky on top of him, slack jawed and hands between his thighs. Just the thought takes him over the edge.

Wordlessly, Gyuvin’s mouth drops open. He can’t even hear himself climax. Just feels the pleasure course through him, warmth crashing into him. Cum soaking his pants in a way he doesn’t care for, that Ricky clearly does, ogling with sex dumb desire. He’s exhaling hard, holding himself back, hiding himself from him. Slow and dazed, Gyuvin reaches for him. His touch is overwhelming. Intoxicating. He digs a thumb into his slit, tip tacky and wet, and tugs without any real finesse. His hand is so big and heavy. The pressure from his waistband and the tight circle made by his— Gyuvin’s fingers— makes his mind go numb.

Ricky bucks forward, completely curling in. His knuckles feel everything pull together.

It’s so good, and it’s ha ha hhh, and it’s pulsing, spreading all over his fingers.

Gyuvin’s never felt full this way. He can’t stop rolling him around his fingers. Tearing noises right out of him, cock hot and spurting in his hand. It’s addicting, the way he responds to it all.

Ricky just twitches above him, lashes clumping together in over stimulation.

He doesn’t care. It’s too good. He’s so good to him.

In his pants it’s gooey, and warm, and probably disgusting but he can’t bring himself to care. The world is still sideways, and he’s pressed up against the boy he likes, and he doesn’t care. If he could lucid dream, he’d dream about doing this everyday. Every part of them that can touch, is touching. They’ve never been this close before, but he still wants to be closer. He lets it wash away. He’s okay with this. It’s enough for him. They fall asleep like that, like two puzzle pieces forced together, almost aligning in the ways that matter, if you ignore all the parts that don’t.

ꕥ

Gyuvin wakes up and feels 10 things at once. Pools of sweat under him. Spit burning in his throat. A migraine shifting behind his eyelids, traveling to his temples and seizing his cranium. The movie ended ages ago. A Samsung logo bounces around the screen in slow motion, missing the corners and burning his retinas.

First, he’s face down and he can’t breathe. He just had a dream so long it felt like months had passed. If it weren’t for the dried cum sticking to his underwear he’d be sure he dreamt that, too.

It was so vivid and mundane but it doesn’t matter because he can’t breathe and he thinks he’s going to die. At least it’s here. At least.

When he finally jolts upright, hands bracing against the sheets, he can see himself in third person. Someone’s watching him and they saw everything and they caught him. He’s sorry. He’s so sorry.

He rises from the sheets, like his frame rate has dropped to 3 and things are happening after he does them. The room is swaying. He feels sharp pain prick at his feet, a stray Lego piece, he registers this what must be 5 seconds or 5 minutes after it happens.

A silent scream gurgles in his throat. He can’t. If he makes noise they’ll hear him and hurt him. He’ll wake Ricky up and— something’s lodged deep in his chest.

It’s coming up. It’s nauseating.

In a spark of clarity, Gyuvin beelines for the bathroom, staggering through his own fatigue and lack of spatial awareness. He must knock something down because he hears thuds and he can’t tell if it’s the sound of him clambering to the floor or Ricky’s belongings, thrashed and discarded. He can see himself trip at halftime, doubling over and gripping the bowl and it’s frightening to his core.

If Gyuvin could think about anything but the bile rising in his throat he’d say his goodbyes. He hacks and coughs and knows he’s being punished. The worst part is never throwing up, it’s everything before it.

That’s what Ricky wakes up to, a sliver of light from the bathroom and the sound of dry heaving. Fuck. Everything’s on the floor and he doesn’t care. His feet have never moved faster.

In a tiny ball in the corner, there he was. Curled against the tile. Shivering and hiccuping.

He sees himself at 15, alone in the boys stall, greening out during 4th period. He knows how much it hurts.

“Gyuvin? Aw Gyuvin,” he croaks.

Standing in the doorway, a halo of light around his wayward hair. Tears are hot and streaky against his cheeks. He looks at him wide and hopeless, but it all comes up so quickly. Anxiety thrums through him. He turns to the bowl and lets it out.

Ricky’s stomach isn’t weak. It can’t be, not after babysitting his nephews and growing up with unrestricted internet access and holding back his friends' hair as they regret a night with too many shots into a strangers sink. But now, it’s impossible to look. Gyuvin isn’t a drunk girl at a party, or a devil faced baby.He doesn’t belong on his knees in a bathroom regretting everything. It’s guilt, what he’s feeling, and he doesn’t have time to feel it for a second longer.

Ricky pushes past the noises bouncing around the room and tucks into his side.

He whispers to him like a chant. “It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re okay,” and rubs circles into his back.

Let’s him shake and shudder.

Gyuvin has no sensation to ground him other than Ricky’s cold fingers on his neck, knees at his hip, voice in his ears, and musk in his nose.

Blood isn’t circulating to his feet, folded and aching under him. He’s scared. To open his eyes and see what came out of him, stand and feel the floor shift under his feet again, turn and feel pitied under Ricky’s gaze. If he moves he’ll feel his pants stick and unstick to him. It’s as if his whole body has been rung out to dry.

It’s been a couple of minutes since he’s thrown up. He thinks it’s over but he can’t be sure. All he can do is lean onto the warm body next to him, keep his neck craning and stiff, even when his muscles have all gone limp. He wipes his mouth with toilet paper and flushes.

Ricky’s voice, while soft in reality, sounds like a booming omniscient being in his ears. “I’m going to get you water, okay?”

Gyuvin looks up at him like a kicked puppy. The words ‘don’t go’ die on his lips. He just leans back against the wall next to him and hugs his knees to his chest.

He just wants it to be over.

ꕥ

Gyuvin couldn’t guess how long he was gone even if his life depended on it. Seconds and hours all blur together in his mind, time slipping like sand between his fingers. Ricky comes back with a litany of things in his arms. It seems like he took half the pantry with him. Bottled water, Gatorade, apple sauce, sliced bread, paper towels, a change of clothes, and a partridge in a pear tree. Thin frames perch atop his nose. He doesn’t remember him taking out his contacts.

Weak and exhausted, Gyuvin takes whatever he hands to him. This reminds him of his mother. Wobbling at her door at 4 am with unsightly news. Somewhere, Freud is laughing in his grave. Hahaha. Not funny.

He swishes and spits the water 10 more times than he has to, aftertaste sharp in his mouth. The Gatorade helps. Despite his fears he eats. Even if chewing this stoned feels like an Olympic sport. It'd be the worst event ever. Mens free-smoke. In last place, Kim Gyuvin!

Ricky leaves him again, and he thinks he wants him to shower because his shirt is sticking to him and has sick on it and he leaves him with a fresh set of clothes from Ricky’s closet, but he doesn’t know how to tell him if he gets in hot enough water he might just pass out.

In this strange headspace, he finds the fortitude to rinse off and slip into his friend's clothing. He even gave him underwear.

Gyuvin has a special toothbrush from many sleepovers ago. Peppermint body wash fills everything and he feels half melted by the end of it.

The lamp is flicked on. Ricky’s sitting upright on the bed, scrolling through the phone. The floor is a little cleaner than it was however long ago. There’s a dent in one of his manga. He feels guilty. He checks the time on the bedside clock, 3:21 am.

Gyuvin comes out in Ricky’s boxers and plaid pajama pants, hair wet and torso bare, white towel around his shoulders. Ricky’s eyes flit away, as if spurned. A part of him shrivels up and dies.

He throws his balled up nasty laundry in the bin by his closet. With perfect accuracy of course. It’s not as satisfying as it usually is. This mood seriously sucks. All of his joints are jelly. Fuzz hasn’t completely left the corners of his brain but he feels subdued. Sated. Like drinking warm milk or warming up a cold bed.

“All yours,” Gyuvin says, plopping on the bed. It’s not lost on him the lack of need to invite someone into their own bathroom, but he feels like he should say something. Ricky’s mouth is pulled into such a tight line it looks like it might snap.

“Thanks,” Ricky replies emptily. It’s Gyuvin’s turn to doom scroll while he waits.

He checks his texts first, whizzing past the tens of notifications to check his chat with Gunwook. They sent a lot more photos than he remembers. Point fives, Matthew McConaughey in a thong, their feet all entangled, a faceless photo, the back of Ricky’s head walking into Taco Rosa.

At some point he’d tried to explain why SpongeBob was in his mouth and he didn’t even bother to open his messages out of pity.

Ricky comes back with his hair down, in a matching satin top and bottom, because of course he does. He walks to the dirty laundry hamper and drops it in like a normal person.

The silence seems a lot more comforting to Gyuvin’s than it looks to Ricky, smoldering like a wet cat.

“Are you hungry?” Ricky asks.

The truth is his stomach is painfully empty and he could clear five grocery stores right now. But he knows an olive branch when he sees one, and that tells him Ricky’s avoiding A Talk, and that most definitely means they need one.

“Thank you, but I don’t think I’d keep it down.”

He grimaces, “right, sorry.”

“It’s okay. You should eat though.” Ricky shakes his head softly.

Gyuvin slips under the covers, still on his phone, waiting for him to say something. Ricky’s stewing in something, still cross crossed on top of his sheets.

“What?” Gyuvin eyes him down. He stares back. Skittish. Grim.

“What,” Ricky says back.

“You’re thinking.”

“I’m always thinking. Do you not think?”

“Stop—“ Gyuvin closes his dry eyes, “I’m too tired to argue. We can talk or we can go to sleep but I don’t want it to be weird. Just talk to me.”

Ricky’s eyes fall to a nondescript wrinkle on the sheets. “I don’t think we should.”

Gyuvin’s eyebrows thread together, “why?”

He says it simply, like it’s obvious,“You’re high.”

“I’m coming down. I’m fine. Really.”

“You just greened out.” I recall, he wants to say. All over your $900,000 market value 3 story home. It’s mortifying. If he thinks about it any longer, he might die of embarrassment. But he pushes on, single minded.

“And you helped me. It’s all out.” That’s not how marijuana works, logically. It’ll stay in his system for a long while, considering how much he took and the nature of the drug, but mentally speaking, Gyuvin isn’t lying. He’s all here. Tired, out of his mind, still too honest, but here.

Ricky’s doing inverse trig in his head right now, he can tell.

Whatever weed is left in him is doing a great job of relaxing him, because otherwise he’d be in a ball right now. He knows it could only be about one thing, that his suspicions were right, and it’s squeezing his heart so tight. These feelings he’s never verbalized feel too tall for his body. He feels like a kid again. Briefly, nausea too, building back up again.

He finds the courage. “If this is about him, then I’m sorry.”

To Gyuvin, Ricky’s love life has always been this thing shrouded in mystery, and it’s not an accident. Unintentionally, Gyuvin got awkward everytime Ricky would mention somebody. Gunwook says it’s a childhood friend thing. Ricky thinks it’s a straight guy thing, even if he swears he’s just deep in the closet. Gyuvin knows it’s a Ricky thing. It makes sense he wouldn’t be the first to know. Labels and hand holding and matching couples costumes never seemed his style, so he’d have no other way of knowing. It’s obvious though, that they’re a thing. Ricky always sends him snaps of them together at odd hours. They’re in each other’s space the way friends aren’t.

Ricky’s features go taught, “Who? Who are you saying sorry to?”

“To you— but Matthew too, I crossed a line—“ Ricky intercepts his word vomit with his hands swiping the air.

“Pause, Matthew?”

Gyuvin motions to his neck, “No? But… aren’t you guys together?...”

“Oh my god. Oh my god." Ricky hides his head in his hands, ears already a striking color-me-pink.

“We are not dating. Why does everyone think that? He’s just my plug, I swear. This is so fucking embarrassing,” he mutters into his palms, “My slutty life is catching up to me.”

Gyuvin just laughs, not because he agrees but because he was kind of scared and the nerves are running rampant through him and it’s never not funny seeing perfect Ricky so distraught. If he laughs too long he thinks he might cry. The last of his high keeps his heart rate down. The ugly part in him is elated to hear this news. First, he’s relieved, then he’s terrified. If not that, then… he must regret it already.

“Okay, no.” Ricky huffs with conviction and disbelief, ice thawing out from before. “No more assumptions. We’re going to ask each other anything because, because,”

Nowadays Gyuvin’s used to finishing his sentences. Like prediction text, he always thinks he knows what he’ll say next. But before he knew how to do that, he learned to be patient. Ricky used to rifle through all the few words he knew in English just to talk to him, to be his friend. His pause means he cares enough to find them for you. It’s valuable.

“Because we trust each other.” Ricky says.

“Right.”

“Right,” he affirms.

They agree on that, but he can’t help but think they’re on two totally different planets. He joins him under the covers, squirming his feet like he always does. Before he slides in, his shirt rides up and he can see, his fingers left a red mark on his hip. It’s going to bruise. Talking was a bad idea. He wants to go to sleep in blissful ignorance. Is it too late?

Gyuvin lets his eyes unfocus on the wall as warmth reenters him. It’s easier this way. He turns on his back. Ricky does too.

“How much of last night do you remember?” So it is about that. He’s not sure where this is going,

Too much. Not enough. “All of it,” Gyuvin says, with entirely too much confidence, because he backtracks immediately. “Most of it.” Ricky’s face starts to fall. “I kind of passed out and spun out at the end. My dream was really trippy and, I don’t know if any of it was real, before I yakked— sorry about that, again.”

Ricky blinks, one or two times.

It’s times like these he wished he still had that all seeing power, to peer inside Ricky Shen and know what he’s thinking. He doesn’t have that here. It’s never been like this. He’s waiting for him to say something, and he doesn’t.

“Is that not…” He can hear Gyuvin’s frown, even if he can’t see it. “Is there more? Did I do something you’re not telling me?” Does he know? Did he say something?

“You just— I don’t know. You talked a lot.”

Gyuvin almost finds the humor to laugh. Halfway between an aborted chuckle and a shaky exhale.

“I mean you always do. But I don’t know, you sounded delirious,” in a sense, he was, but he couldn’t help it. “It just kind of clicked now.”

“I’m sorry. For all of it. I guess I lost my filter,” his fingers pick at each other under the covers. He thinks his eyes are watery, but he doesn’t care enough to notice. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.” The silence that came after stretched countries, continents long.

“How come you keep saying sorry to me?” The words come out small. His heart is outside of himself.

Ricky doesn’t let him catch up, he finds strength again, quiet and still. “I should be saying that. You were so out of it. Saying all types of crazy things. And I should’ve known then and looked after you. But I let everything get out of hand and I felt like, like I took advantage of you.” His voice cracks at the end. Something in Gyuvin fully breaks, he doesn’t understand. Is saying he likes him so crazy?

“Is that what you think happened?”

He can’t look up at the ceiling anymore. He has to look at him and know he means it. He sees the weight of the world atop Ricky's shoulders, ready to snap him in half. It’s not even funny how wrong he has it. Ricky turns to him, eyes wide and red.

“Ricky, I don’t feel like that at all,” his throat feels dry, “I wanted this.”

That does little to console him. Ricky’s still as pale as a ghost. At least now he knows his memory doesn’t betray him and he didn’t do anything insane. Except for call his best friend the prettiest person he’s ever met. And then jerk off in his bed. Which, now looking back on it, is pretty up there. A quiet war ensues in his eyes and he just shakes his head. He looks up and breathes in through his nose and keeps shaking his head no. It feels like he can’t do anything right. He doesn’t want to make it worse.

“This is so fucked. I can’t do this,” Ricky whispers.

The meaning gets lost on him, the shape of his lips and depth of his words all mixing up and scrambling into one big devastating pile of Ricky too complicated for him to understand, too scared for him to know.

Whatever this is, he doesn’t want it. He doesn’t want it to be weird or for it to go back to the way it was. He doesn’t want to think he’s in love with the first guy he hooks up with. He doesn’t want to taste his last drop of freedom before it’s stripped away from him and he doesn’t want to unlock a part of him he’ll have to lock right back up as soon as he touches Korean soil. He doesn’t want to dorm with him at UCI and discard his dreams. He doesn’t want to call Ricky his something while Ricky figures out a better name. He may think he does, but he doesn’t.

You didn’t do anything, he wants to say. I’m just me and that’s the problem

Gyuvin’s always been bad at reading in between the lines, so he takes his chance anyway.

“Can I ask you something, too?” Okay, Ricky says.

“Are you mad at me for going?” He asks, artless and small.

“Of course not,” he laughs, bewildered. The sudden change in temperature throws him for a loop and stuns him out of stewing. Gyuvin looks so serious. “I just get pissy cause I don’t want my best friend to live so far away.”

“Then why don’t you come with me?” He holds his gaze, steadfast and unwavering. He says it like it’s simple. Something he’s always thought, but was always too scared to ask. To hurt him, as if he hasn’t already,

Ricky’s still smiling, somehow. “You know why.”

“Why?” He tests.

“I can't be an idol. I have tattoos,” he says obviously.

Gyuvin lours, “so does Hyolyn. They’ll just cover it up.”

“And I’m Chinese.”

“So? There are tons of Chinese idols.” He’s right about that. Even if they’re not treated the best.

“And…I’d have to hide who I am,” he says. It comes out a little too real.

Gyuvin pushes on, determined, desperate. “So would I.” He lets the implications speak for itself. Something he’s never told anyone.

“But you wouldn’t have to, not with me. We’d have each other. And the world is changing now. They’re not from very big companies, but there are trans idols. Like Harisu, and Hanbit, and that all non-binary group that debuted last year.”

Ricky’s smile is all but faded now. “Why do you know that?” He asks feebly.

“I looked it up. When we got in.”

Ricky’s overflowing. His heart is going weak and he’s fighting the overwhelming urge to smother him and scream. Now he’s crying and he can’t stop. Gyuvin looks utterly mortified, like he’s messed it up for good.

“Shit— don’t cry, did I say something wrong? I’m sorry.”

“Do you know what you sound like?” He asks shakily, voice garbled and raw, wiping at his face while he swallows whatever’s caught in the back of his throat, “When you say stuff like that, and make me think you want me too. How am I supposed to take it?”

The words hit him like a truck. Devastates and lights him up all the same. It’s not long until Gyuvin’s grinning like a madman, heart in a million pieces. He’s shining now. Giddy like a kid.

“What’s funny?” Ricky says without any real bite, palms pushed against his eyelids, shielding his face.

He pulls him in as tight as he can. In his arms he’s trembling. If Gyuvin looks him in the eyes, he’s sure he’ll just cry, and then it’ll all be about him again, so he looks down at him and takes a deep breath. He’s been selfish enough. He has to say this before it’s too late.

He holds him a little closer, until his hands peel from his face and wrap around his shoulders. Words just fall out of him. Quiet and world shattering.

“I think I’ve had a crush on you since middle school. I like you so much. I don’t know what to do,” he blurts. It’s honest and tactless, just like the Gyuvin he fell in love with.

Back then, everyone was sure Ricky lived easily. He thought so too. Girls lined up to watch him play basketball at recess, even though he wasn’t any good. His closet was half Stussy at age 12. Gyuvin couldn’t even afford braces. But he saw past that. A boy like him, carrying a burden twice his size. Dreaming of someplace better. He was no different than those schoolyard girls, thinking even the way he drinks water is handsome. It clung hard to his ribs, made him breathless and confused. Gyuvin didn’t know what to do with any of it. Every girlfriend had a little trace of Ricky. Strong eyebrows, fuller lips, or siren eyes. When they met again, he could tell so much had changed. Ricky had become braver, and hotter, by some evil grace of god, while Gyuvin had just barely grown into himself, cowardly and tall. It was hard to imagine how they’d fit now. He still dreamt of escaping, the same as he used to.

Ricky laughs wetly, “Why’d you wait so long?” he whispers into his chest.

This wasn’t what he envisioned. He planned to tell him after graduation, free to flee overseas when he gets rejected. In his mind, him leaving would make it easier. He feels stupid for thinking that now. For waiting so long. “I wasn’t gonna tell you until June of senior year. Then I was gonna transfer schools,” he admits.

There’s a wet spot where Ricky’s face is smushed against him. He looks up, glossy, lips wobbling in betrayal. Before tucking back in, hiding in his chest. “Idiot.” The words vibrate on his sternum, muffled by his band tee. Ricky’s band tee, on Gyuvins body. Gyuvin, in Ricky’s bed. Where one starts and the other begins is irrelevant now. Two kids, hugging like they’re afraid of what would happen if they let go.

But they’ve realized this all too late and he’s moving. A whole new life appears in front of him, reimagined in Ricky’s shape. I’ll stay, he thinks deliriously, they’ll save up for a studio and ditch the dorms, they’ll get Eumppappa a brother, he’ll hard launch Gyuvin and he’ll hard launch them back. Or— or Ricky comes with him. They train for 2 years and debut in a mega successful group. All their dreams come true.

5 years after their prime, when everyone’s serving in the army, they retire back to America and get married. Live a private life. It could all be so easy.

Somewhere along the way, Gyuvin couldn’t help but cry too. For the second time that night, tears stain his cheeks, but this time he’s thankful it’s next to him.

A dam breaks loose in him, barely holding together for years. It feels so good and hurts so bad.

He can’t ask him to leave everything behind. How could he?

Gyuvin kisses the black hair peeking out from his crown.

Breathing and quaking, gathered in his arms and small in his clutch. Everything that mattered before feels insignificant now. The whole world is in him. Every instance. What if he takes it back? If he wakes up, and everything’s different?

Gyuvin hooks his chin over his head and tries to push past every feeling in his throat

“I’m scared,” he breathes, raw and pathetic.

“I know,” Ricky says, “Me too. It’s okay. It’s okay.”

He hopes his thoughts are loud enough for him to hear. That he’ll say the things he’s too scared to. I love you lingers on his lips and makes his veins melt.

Gyuvin tips up and they kiss sober.

They wake up like that, entangled in each other and crusties in their tear ducts. Sun burns their eyes. Paints them in pretty hues. Their morning, or afternoon, more like, is sacred and quiet. His parents left for work hours ago. His sister has her swim team on Saturday mornings. It’s quiet, just the two of them. Their shoulders brush together in the bathroom. He gets to just watch him in the mirror while he rinses his face.

“What are you looking at?” He asks, water dripping everywhere.

Gyuvin flashes his puppy eyes, an evil crooked smile. Guileless and sly.

“You.” He supplies back, not half as charming as he’d hope it’d be.

His arm gets pushed out of the way. Ricky hides in a microfiber towel. He can tell his ears are blushing, though. He gets to say things like that, now, and mean it. It’s scary how drunk he’s getting off this power.

They plan for breakfast at IKEA, because Gyuvin was craving it and Ricky didn’t feel like saying no.

He raids Ricky’s closet again, trying to find something not tight. The Uniqlo tee is just a little short around his waist, his own zip up hiding how it clings to his torso. Under all his whining, he likes how it fits. Ricky’s drowning in a brown Nike hoodie Gyuvin swears was his at one point. But it’s cuter on Ricky. That, he can’t contest. He might just take it back, just to make him mad (and not because it’ll smell like him.)

As he swipes a sunscreen stick across the smooth plane of his cheeks, his silver earrings dangle on his ear lobe.

Just underneath, a trail of hickeys, all the way to his Adam's apple. Damning and dark. Purple and pink. He can’t stop looking. It's like a reminder he wasn’t dreaming. That his lips were on Ricky’s skin and Ricky’s was on his, too.

He hasn’t even looked at his own neck yet. He wonders how long the mark will last. Hopefully, it’s somewhere between a week and forever.

In the car, Gyuvin ques their joint aux playlist. He presses skip a hundred times, like he always does. Gyuvin settles, finally. A song he doesn’t quite recognize. The band, wave to earth, vaguely registers in his mind as the dreamy chords fill the car. It’s the one you liked, Gyuvin says. Gunwook and Gyuvin dragged him to the concert in August, when all he knew was seasons. Ricky doesn’t have the heart to tell him he can’t really tell their songs apart. Surf, the title reads on the screen. He tucks it away for later.

Gyuvin’s notifications look barren, thanks to DND since last night. He doesn’t bother to turn it off. His Lock Screen changes, a photo of the three of them from prom. It wasn’t that long ago, but he already feels sad. Nostalgic for memories he’s just made. For people right in front of him.

Today, the earth is tripping him out. There’s no traffic on the roads. Colors in the sky are looking a little warmer. A bird just kissed a worm. Maybe he’s still high. Or going a little crazy.

They woke up too late to catch breakfast. Neither of them minded, though. It seems like everyone’s come in pairs, matching puffers and kids circling them in line.

Couples span miles in front of them. On the sidewalk, the escalator, in the lamp aisle next to the food court. Their hands keep knocking together from how close they’re walking and it makes him hold his breath. He’s been reduced to a puddle of nerves. He fumbles with his Apple Pay at checkout. Ricky gets a notification behind him.

His lips make an O shape.“BeReal?” He asks. Gyuvin starts to pose and throws up a V, mirroring Ricky. He turns his phone to check the photo.

He inspects it thoroughly. “Why isn’t my face in it?”

It only shows him from the neck down, capturing more of his tray than it does him. Ricky’s mouth quirks at that. He’s always sure to cover his face in photos now. This time isn’t any different.

“Why would it?”

Gyuvin frowns like a kid, “are you calling me ugly?”

Ricky rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I am. Take your own.”

They talk about nothing over meatballs for 20 minutes, compare the bounciness of the show beds, judge the “gamer setups” on display and get distracted by the ice cream downstairs. On every floor, their fingers can’t stop running into each other. Electricity passes between them. The kind that makes his hair stand up. On the way out he decides to take his BeReal late.

Another clumsy invasion of each other’s space, he thinks it can’t be an accident. Gyuvin takes out his phone before they step out of the parking lot. Brave and shy, all at the same time. He stretches out his hand to him, palm flat and broad, facing the sky. Asking a question he can only hope he’ll answer.

Flushed and narrow, his fingers fit between his. The first photo is of the IKEA sign, on top of the building. The second, the phone pointed down at both of them, a little blurry from the motion. Hands interlaced and jeans and shoes in view. He shows Ricky, proud.

“See? That’s how you do no-face aesthetic.” He doesn’t accept defeat, just scowls in his direction.

“Send me that,” he says.

When he acts stupid, Ricky really wants to kiss him. It’s not a new feeling but it makes him all gooey. They could’ve been holding hands hours ago. Now that they are, they can’t stop. All the way to his car. In front of the driver door.

Before they let go, he asks, “Can I kiss you?” Cross eyed and light headed, he just nods.

Gyuvin’s pecks him on the cheek. All the blood rushes straight to his face. A hot and immediate feeling. Blood and sugar, all turned to molasses in his body.

They don’t get the luxury of waiting. Of letting love in slowly. They’re on borrowed time. He’s been waiting since 7th grade, to kiss him like this and be okay. To love them loudly and unabashedly. Gyuvin traps him between the window, and steals another long one on the corner of his mouth, making him squirm and push him off, embarrassed. Like a pressure cooker, his brain is boiling down to stew in his skull. He wouldn’t be surprised if it started leaking out of his ears. Ricky kisses him again, for the road. Because he likes how it feels.

Across the console, they hold hands in the car, too. Gyuvin finally checks his notifications. Lots of surprised faces in his BeReal comments.

3 texts from his family group chat, his dad asking him when he’s coming home, his mom reminding them they have church in the morning, and that he should invite Ricky in for dinner. He reads that text aloud. They both laugh at that. Ricky’s sure Gyuvin’s mom would pass out at the sight of him now, tatted and bleached, pierced and rangy. A far cry from the cute little boy he had over years ago.

How he’d explain the matching massacres on their necks, now that’s something he doesn’t want to stick around long enough to find out. (Monday will be horrible, won’t it? It’s actually not even that noticeable. Maybe. He’ll have to borrow some concealer.)

He kept his backpack in the trunk so there’s no need to go back to Ricky’s before going to Gyuvin’s. Part of him wishes there was. Ricky asks if he wants to drive around a little, but they’re both exhausted. Rings cling to their under eyes. Dark and puffy. He knows he just wants to make it last a little longer. They have the whole summer, he reminds himself. I think my mom might kill me, other than the hair, he says. They almost forgot how they got into this mess in the first place.

At a red light, Ricky turns to him. “Your hair looks really good, I wonder who did it.” Gyuvin pinches his thigh, where his hand was resting. He swats it off, making him cackle, only to guide it back where it was before. Holding his. He waves them back and forth a little, tapping on the steering wheel with his free hand, restless. Gyuvin’s house is only four minutes away. The light turns green,

Somewhere between the residential roads and the glaring sun, his mind starts to drift. Physically, he could drive to his house with his eyes closed, but mentally, he’s somewhere else. After graduation, helping him pack. At the airport, hugging him goodbye and crying on his coat. With Gunwook, on the silent ride home. Calling him at an ungodly hour on Kakao or WeChat or whatever he’ll be using by then. In 3 years, when they don’t make it past 1 and he’ll have to block his debut group on every social media platform just to stay sane. Losing him looks so simple. He hates it. How doomed it all is. How he’s already thinking about the end, before it’s really started. Gyuvin must sense it, because he hasn’t said anything in a while and he squeezes his hand when they park. At his trunk, he pauses.

“Ricky, um, if you want,” he starts.

“Yeah?” He perks up.

He looks sheepishly to the side. “I don’t know if your parents are cool with it,” whatever it is, chances are they don’t care. And if they did, Ricky wouldn’t care anyway. “But my mom said you could sleep over. She’d just probably drag you to church with us. I know you're Buddhist, so maybe you could leave early or something, if you don’t want to go, but it’s up to you… yeah.”

Ricky smiles really fucking big. It’s funny seeing him look embarrassed, as if he hasn’t known his family for years. Like there’s a chance he’d say no. “Yeah. I'd love to. I didn’t bring anything, though.”

Gyuvin slings his backpack over his shoulder, trying to hide that he’s overjoyed. “You just want to steal more of my hoodies, don’t you.”

“Oh no,” he feigns, trunk shutting with a thunk. He leads the way with a little skip in his step. “You caught me.”

“Wait,” Gyuvin says. Ricky turns around, assuming he forgot something.

Gyuvin catches up to him, grabbing his hand, even if he’ll only get to hold on for the 10 seconds it takes to walk up his driveway. Ricky stops walking. Looks in his eyes, starry and huge. All his. He leans in, centimeters from his face, letting Gyuvin close his eyes. Breathing his air. Anticipating the weight of his lips, the race of his heartbeat. A second passes and his lips are bare. He opens his eyes to an evil Ricky, staring back at him, biting back a laugh.

“Hey.” Gyuvin frowns for real. Everything about him is so cute. “Why won’t you kiss me?” The words are so innocent, so Gyuvin. His 6 foot baby.

“You haven’t earned lip privileges,” Ricky proclaims, knowing it's utter bullshit.

Gyuvin, like the idiot he is, takes it at face value. Eager for anything, really, as long as it’s with Ricky. That’s okay. He can live with that. “Really?” He asks, properly distraught.

Ricky nods, smitten. He’ll never stop being fun to tease. Gyuvin turns to face him again.

And then he’s being kissed.

Still. Gentle. His hand cups his face, tender and devastating. Coaxing small sighs out of him. His fingers twitch where they’re interlaced. Knocks the air out of his lungs. The ground sways under him. A feeling he can’t fight. Not anymore. He wouldn’t dream of it.

Lips and teeth scream through the cracks in the pavement. I love you, I love you, I love you.

Ricky bites his lip, just because.

“Ricky!” Gyuvin yelps, all pink and bothered. His fingers come up to his lips, personally victimized. He doesn’t know what he signed up for. When Ricky loves someone, all he wants to do is annoy them. He’d let Ricky annoy him forever. But he can’t let him know that. Ricky lifts their hands to kiss his knuckles, a meek apology for all the teasing.

Their hands fall out when Gyuvin has to pat around for his keys at the door. They pull their hoodies up as high as they can go, hoping they cover enough. Gyuvin’s mother, short and stout, with a smile like his, hugs him in the doorway. He didn’t even take his shoes off yet. He’s lost weight, she says. You’re so handsome. How’s your mom?

At dinner, Ricky lets the buzz of a full house fill him from top to bottom. Under the table, their feet are hooked together.

Notes:

thank you for supporting my writing debut (hahaha) but seriously! couldn’t have finished my first fic without lai, my eternal math partner, who hyped me up when i was at 7k a month ago (little did we know…) like how do y’all pump these out all the time?
i apologize to any magic mike fans, i also don’t know what’s going on because i, too, was high while watching it (it looked mid, really.) and fyi the making of this PREDATES long hair ricky so i take total credit by law of manifestation. i don’t make the rules! lmk how we felt <3
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