Chapter Text
CHAPTER 1
Yeonjun has it down to a science, knock on the door first, and when that doesn’t work, shake the poor boy to death, and when THAT doesn’t work… well that’s why there is always a pitcher of water by the bed. Soobin has always been hard to wake up, it takes desperate measures to get the kid out of bed. Yeonjun feels a pang of guilt whenever he sees Soobins bed ridden face. He knows that he has a lot on his plate, and that sleep is far and few between. Especially since he’s just had a comeback. Soobin has worked his whole life to become the famous idol that he is, ever since they were kids that’s all he would talk about. Yeonjun is glad that his hard work has paid off and that he’s finally getting the recognition he deserves. Yeonjun was there through it all, every step of the way. Yeah it was hard sometimes, it was difficult to be around the same person you have loved for 20 years every day. It was hard to look at soobin when he was going through a hard time with all the pressure of media and fans. It was hard to accept the fact that no matter how much he loved soobin, that love would never be reciprocated. But Yeonjun has come to accept it, hes happy with just being friends, because when all else is going wrong the one right thing is Soobin. He’s always been there to make Yeonjun happy, to make him better. He couldn’t imagine doing anything else than what he is right now. Being a bodyguard is hard work, but its moments like this that make it worth it.
“Ahhhgggg! Whats happening? Whats going on?” Soobin has the same adorable look of confusion every time the water inevitably gets dumped on him. He looks around to see a sight he beholds every morning, and that’s Yeonjuns sly smile
“Its me bud, its always me, why are you still confused every morning?” Yeonjun throws Soobin the towel he has on hand every morning. Soobin goes to wipe the cold water off his face and looks at the time
“Oh shit, I have that interview today… what was it for again?”
“Bunny I’m your bodyguard not your personal assistant, when are you going to give in and finally hire one, you are so bad at keeping up with your schedules and its only getting worse”
“You know why I don’t want to do that yeonjun” Soobin says as he positions himself into a sitting position on his bed, he gives Yeonjun one of his warning looks indicating that he doesn’t want to bring up the topic.
“Yeah, I know, I know…” Yeonjun decides to drop the subject as it’s a sensitive one for the boy, he gets up to get breakfast ready but turns to look back at Soobin before he leaves the room
“The interview is for kmagazine by that way, hurry up we have to leave in an hour”
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After much hustling a bustling the pair ended up making it to the interview on time. With Yeonjun practically dragging a half asleep Soobin along the whole time. Now Soobin is situated under bright stage lights being interrogated by the interviewer. Yeonjun hates this, he hates that he has to watch Soobin sit there, obviously uncomfortable with the question, and he can’t do anything about it. Being a bodyguard is only helpful in keeping him away from crazed fans and large crowds, when it comes to interview questions Yeonjun is utterly helpless.
“So soobin we heard that you grew up in quite the tough home, could you tell us how growing up in that situation has helped you become the role model you are now?”
“Yeah um… I think everyone has struggles in their lives, and we all have to overcome them. Struggles are what make us human, we have to learn to work through them and better ourselves because of them.” Soobin has had lot’s of practice in avoiding these tough questions. He never understood why people feel so entitled to his personal life. Surely they would know that questions like these make him uncomfortable? But he guesses that’s the problem with the industry he’s in… no one cares. At the end of the day, they don’t mind making you uncomfortable as long as they can get a good headline out of it.
“I’ve heard little rumors of a girlfriend, are you currently in any relationships? I’m sure your fans are dying to know”
“Ahaha no, I’m to busy to even daydream about dating let alone actually do it” Soobin shifts uncomfortably in his seat, again with the personal questions. He wishes it would just stop, he wants to leave but he knows he can’t… not right now. Right now he has to sit here and suffer through this, that way his fans will be happy with him.
In a perfect world he would love to be asked about his songs, not about his family or personal life. Hes never been good at opening up, so it’s especially hard when random strangers expect you to.
Soobin casts a quick uneasy glance to Yeonjun. Yeonjun can tell he’s nervous and just wants to go over there and hug him and tell him it will be alright. But he can’t. Not until they are out of the public eye at least.
“You’ve recently been in a plagiarism scandal with GQ Entertainment. They have accused you of stealing the melody from one of their artists songs, do you have anything to say about that?”
“It’s really sad that my work has been questioned in this way, and I want to assure my fans that I have never and will never plagiarize any persons art.”
“Very well Soobin, I hope that this all works out in the end” The interviewer looks bored with his answer, it was clear she was just looking to get a rise out of him. It worked but Soobin had trained himself to hide his emotions well, he’d never let them know that topics such as these deeply affect him.
“Thanks so much for joining us today Soobin, do you have anything to say to your fans who are watching live before we say goodbye?” Soobin turns his head towards the camera and his face lights up, his fans are worth all the uncomfortable interviews in the world, they are what got him here and that’s a debt he thinks he’ll never be able to repay in full.
“Moas! I love you guys, thank you so much for supporting my new album and I hope we can meet each other soon!” Soobin shows a finger heart to the camera and for the first time during the whole interviews shows a real genuine smile.
“Alright thank you so much again for being here, and thanks to our viewers for joining in!” The interview wraps up and the cameras shut off, soobin hurries off the set, desperately finding the one person that can ease his nerves. He soon finds Yeonjun situated just behind the camera that was recording the interview.
“Hyung” Soobin calls out to him to get his attention, but it wasn’t necessary, for Yeonjun has had his eyes on him the whole time.
“You did good today bunny” Yeonjun says in a hushed tone, they are still in public and must uphold a professional tone.
“We have to leave soon, you have a photoshoot at 5, and then you’re off the rest of the day”
“I think I need to go somewhere quiet first hyung, I need to clear my head” Soobin looks at him with pleading eyes, Soobin knows that its hard to find a quiet place in all the bustle around them, but yeonjun gives him a nod and a quick “follow me” and they are off down a hallway.
Yeonjun finds a staff member and asks them if there is a waiting room they could use really quick. She looks at the two awestruck, and silently nods her head and points them in the direction of a room. Before they could leave, she calls out “Wait!”
Soobin turns around with a questioning looks, and the girl puts her head down shyly “I was wondering if I could perhaps get an autograph? I’m a really big fan of yours, I really want to be in your line of work someday” Soobin gives her a smile “Sure! I’d love to!”
The girls looks up confused, “Oh…. I’m sorry, I was actually talking to Yeonjun-ssi”
Yeonjun snaps his head towards her, did he hear that right? This has never happened before, why would a girl be a fan of him?
“I’m sorry did you say me? You’re a fan of me?” Soobin is standing in the middle of the two in absolute awe, this is definitely a situation that has never happened. Most of the time he gets stopped everywhere he goes, he has learned to get used to it and giving autographs to random people has become no big deal to him. But for this to happen to Yeonjun is definitely new. He’s happy someone is appreciating Yeonjun however, Soobin knows he doesn’t get enough of it.
“Of course I’m a fan! You’re pretty famous yourself you know, everyone wants to meet Soobin-ssi’s cute bodyguard, did you really not know?”
“Ah no I guess I didn’t, you said you wanted to be a bodyguard someday?”
“Yeah its always been a dream of mine, you’re my biggest role model.” Soobin is still very much confused but he finally takes a step back and lets the two get closer. The girl takes the opportunity and stands right in front of Yeonjun. Yeonjun looks a little uneasy, this is something completely new to him, but hes glad he could have a positive impact on somebody.
“Well, it’s nice to meet ya, could I ask your name?”
“oh, sorry I completely forgot to tell you! My name is Cha Min Young” She reaches out her hand for a handshake and Yeonjun accepts it, giving her hand a firm shake. Soobin was beginning to feel a little restless, his nerves were still shot, and he wasn’t expecting this interaction to happen. All of a sudden, he just wanted to get out of there, he wanted yeonjun to stop talking to her and he wanted to go into the quiet room.
“Nice to meet you Min Young-ssi, what do you want me to sign”
Min Young hands Yeonjun her phone and asks him to sign the case, after he does so she gives him a quick good bye and heads down the hall.
“Well, that was something” Yeonjun chuckled as he turns to Soobin to see the other looking at the floor
“Hey, are you alright?” Yeonjun takes a step closer and puts his hand on Soobins shoulder, bending down to look at his eyes.
“Yeah, yeah I’m fine. I guess I’m just shocked haha, who knew Yeonjunie hyung actually had fans” Soobin was trying to make light of the situation, he was feeling things he didn’t understand. He felt uneasy and caught off guard. He never liked it when things didn’t go according to plan, and when all he needed was Yeonjun and a quiet room to himself, that got interrupted. Soobin knew it wasn’t a big deal and he was truly happy for Yeonjun for meeting a fan, but for some reason he couldn’t shake this feeling of...
“Aw is little soobinie jealous?” Yeonjun joked. A look crossed Soobins face that Yeonjun didn’t recognize, was it possible Soobin was actually jealous? Hes not really the type, but Yeonjun didn’t want to push it and decided to change the topic.
“She said the room was over here right? Lets go, we still have a bit of time” Yeonjun started walking to the door but he looked back when he realized Soobin wasn’t following.
“Come on Soobin, you wanted to go somewhere quiet right?” Soobin snapped his head up and quickly walked over.
“Sorry hyung I guess I was just lost in thought”
They made it to the room, and it was fairly nice, it just had two vanities and a sofa, Yeonjun plopped himself down on the couch and patted the place next to him, Soobin caught the hint and quickly sat himself down.
“Are you alright? That interview was pretty intense” Yeonjun moved himself so that he was facing Soobin
“I don’t know to be honest, you’d think I’d be used to it by now, but I really wasn’t expecting them to bring up my family or…..the scandal” Soobin looks down at his hands, he hates that he lets things like this bother him, hes wrote songs about his rough past which makes it understandable that they would ask about his family, but what he really didn’t understand was why they’d bring up plagiarism, especially since the whole thing was fake anyways. It was just the company trying to slander his name, its nothing new, hes had problems with that place for a long time now. He feels his eyes start to swell with water, he doesn’t want to cry, but he can’t help it, hes always been too emotional.
“Aw bunny please don’t cry” Yeonjun feels his heart break, hes seen Soobin cry too many times, he wants to change that, but he doesn’t know how. He just wants to shelter Soobin from the world, and protect him from every harmful thing that crosses paths with him, but he cant, and that’s what hurts the most.
“I just…. I feel like I let my fans down, even though I didn’t do anything wrong, I know that, but I can’t help but feel like I hurt them.”
“Don’t say that Soobin, you are the light in your fans life, they look up to you and they trust you, they know you’d never plagiarize anyone, they know how pure your heart is” At this point Soobin has tears running down his face, he just can’t help it. It’s been a long day and all of his feelings have just caught up with him, Soobin knows what he wants, but suddenly hes to scared to ask for it. Yeonjun has always been his comfort and whenever he’d cry he’d always ask yeonjun for a hug, it was just natural at this point. But for some reason he can’t find it in him to ask him for a hug right now. He feels like he can’t, for some reason something is holding him back from asking.
“Soobin is there something else bothering you? You know you can tell me anything right? I’ll always be here for you” Yeonjun takes soobins hand into is own and gives it a light squeeze. Soobins eyes follows Yeonjuns hands to his own. Why was something that’s supposed to be comforting making him so nervous?
Why did yeonjuns touch have such an effect on him all of a sudden? Soobin swallows thickly and looks up to see yeonjun looking at him with sad eyes.
“h-hyung I don’t know what’s wrong with me right now, I feel… different and I’m not sure why” Soobin can’t look Yeonjun in the eyes anymore so he looks around the room to find something else to stare at.
“Soobin…” Yeonjun can see that he’s uncomfortable and he can’t figure out why, Soobin never acted like that around Yeonjun, and he was beginning to worry that he did something wrong. “Soobin look at me please” Soobin turned his head towards Yeonjun but couldn’t bring himself to look into his eyes
“Did I do something wrong? Please tell me so I can fix whatever I did, you know I’d never mean to hurt you right?” Yeonjun really can’t take this anymore, Soobin looks so sad and confused.
Tears are starting to roll faster down Soobin’s face and Yeonjun instinctively wipes them off, his hand gently brushing his cheeks. But suddenly Soobin flinched away from his touch like he’d been burned.
“Please don’t” he whispered
“Don’t what, Soobin?” if Yeonjun wasn’t confused before he definitely was now. Soobin never had a problem with physical touch, in fact he quite enjoyed snuggling with yeonjun, they’d often watch movies at night and just hold each other after particularly long days. Soobin stood up abruptly, wiping away the remaining tears
“Ah I’m sorry hyung I don’t know what came over me, I think I’m just stressed because of the comeback, ignore what I said, I’m not making any sense right now” He lets out a dry laugh and turns around to give Yeonjun a smile. Yeonjun could tell Soobin was lying, but like always he decides to drop the topic. That’s something Yeonjun could major in, dropping topics. He doesn’t want to push Soobin away, so the only option is for Yeonjun to never push conversations that he can tell Soobin doesn’t want to have, even if that means it hurts Yeonjun deep down.
“ok soobin we don’t have to talk about it, but please if I ever do something to hurt you, could you tell me? Could you do that for me Soobinie?” He looks at Soobin desperately, he needs to hear his answer
“Yes hyung, but you really didn’t do anything wrong, its just me who messed up, just me ok?” Soobin looks down sad. He’s mad with himself because Yeonjun is blaming himself for Soobins sadness. He thinks its something he did to make Soobin feel this way, but in reality it’s his own fault for not being able to control his emotions.
“Ok bud, why don’t we head out of here? We still have to go to that photoshoot remember?”
The two head out the door and begin walking to the car when a familiar face shows up.
“Oh hey Min young-ssi” Yeonjun calls out to the girl that was walking towards them, she has a little white slip of paper in her hands, she slows down as she approached the boys
“Hi yeonjun-ssi, umm I-I wanted to give you this, you don’t have to do anything with it, but I think I’d be mad at myself if I didn’t give it to you, please don’t unfold it until I leave” She hands yeonjun the little folded sheet of paper she was holding, and then she turns to leave, but waves goodbye before running away. Yeonjun unfolds the paper and there written on it is her number and a note that reads “Here’s my number, call me cuz I’d love to go out sometime... P.S your, like, really cute.” Yeonjun chuckles after reading it.
“That girl has got guts ill give her that.” Curious, Soobin reads what the girl had written on the paper, and he feels that unfamiliar feeling again. Is it jealousy? Sure not, why would he be jealous? Maybe his best friend could finally get some.
Laughing he turns to Yeonjun and says “You should totally call her! Its been so long since you’ve been on a proper date, and you’re beginning to depress me with all of your single-ness”
“wait a minute? MY SINGLENESS? Bitch you haven’t dated anyone in a whiiiiiile, who are you to talk?” Yeonjun laughs incredulously “and anyways I don’t even know her, what if shes one of youre more um… crazier fans, and is just using me to get to you?”
“I seriously doubt that hyung, she didn’t even look at me before, she was too caught up in youre so called ‘cuteness’”
“oh really? Does bunny think I’m cute?” Soobin could feel his face grow hot.
“Uh no? Clearly you’re the ugliest man I’ve ever met. I was just referencing what Min Young-ssi wrote in her love letter to you.” Soobin pushes past Yeonjun to go out the swinging doors of the building. There’s a short flight of stairs and a large black SUV parked at the base of them.
“Awww come on Soobin you know you don’t mean that!” Yeonjun runs to catch up to the idol and playfully punches his shoulder.
“Ouch! The hell was that for Hyung??!” Soobin grabs his shoulder and feigns a serious injury. Yeonjun laughs and is glad Soobin seems to be somewhat back to normal. It was nice to see him smiling and joking around at least.
“THAT WAS FOR CALLING ME UGLY YOU BITCH!” Yeonjun jumps into the SUV and slams the door in Soobins face. A couple seconds pass and he hears a soft knock on the window. He rolls it down a notch to see Soobin’s sad eyes peering into the car.
“Ok Hyung, I was wrong, you are the most handsome, amazing, cute, stunning, brilliant man I’ve ever met. Now can you please let me in the car?” Soobin holds his hands up in a prayer gesture and shakes them in front of Yeonjun, he sees the latter crack a smile.
“Oh Soobinie you know I can never say no to you.” Yeonjun chuckles and unlocks the door, allowing soobin to enter. Soobin slides into the back seat and situates himself at Yeonjuns side. They begin their car ride to the photoshoot in silence. It's a nice silence, however. A comforting one. Soon Soobin nods off as his head hits his window gently. Yeonjun looks over at the look the content look on his face. It's nice to see Soobin this way, without stress. He knows it won't last, and that as soon as he wakes up for the photoshoot the serene look will be gone. But for now, Yeonjun just enjoys looking at his bestfriend. He hopes this is a sight he can see for a long time