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Jungah finds Kyungsoo’s side of the bed empty, and her sleep lifts immediately. It’s difficult to stay asleep when the warmth she reached out for is missing. And - she turns around, squinting at the neon red clock she bought - at 2AM, her boyfriend missing from the bed is suspicious.
“Soo?” She croaks, pleased at the lower register of her voice. She grins as she pulls away from the comfort of her bed, placing her feet on the soft rug and rubbing them against it to wake up better.
“Kyungsoo-yah, where are you?” She calls, louder than she’d like. But his absence is concerning in ways she doesn’t like feeling. She looks around the room, then notices the light seeping through the door left open. Okay, he’s probably outside then. In the bathroom?
When she stands up, the room gets a little darker, and Jungah sighs in relief. “Soo,” she says, whining. “Where did you go?”
“I’m not feeling great,” Kyungsoo says, walking into the room. He comes closer to her, his posture worse than usual. He sounds completely awake too, like he hasn’t slept at all. “It’s just dysphoria, I think.”
“What’s wrong?” She plops back to the bed, and holds out her hand. In the faint light of the room, Kyungsoo’s hand finds hers; he sits down too, and leans his head against Jungah’s shoulder.
“I hate the facial hair,” Kyungsoo grumbles. “Aren’t I supposed to like it? Isn’t it masculine?”
Jungah thankfully remembers talking about this when he wasn’t feeling shitty. It was a pretty good discussion on gender and politics of expression; it brought up so much of her own feminity and what she thinks of it. She pats his cheek, her stomach warms up when Kyungsoo’s arms wrap around her waist. In the loose t-shirt and shorts she’s wearing, her body leeches onto the heat of his skin.
“Half of the South Korean population doesn’t have beard, baby.” She turns a little and pulls at his t-shirt, more content when he presses up against her completely. “You already have an angular face. You have a great body that you enjoy taking care of.”
“I don’t like it,” Kyungsoo says, petulant. Jungah laughs at that. Of course he doesn’t, he’s not liked it exactly like she hasn’t. Her face is rounder, more feminine that Kyungsoo’s ever been, and she too has bouts of disliking everything about herself. Sometimes, she wishes she never grew out of her tomboy phase.
“I can shave it for you, if that’s the problem right now.”
“Noona,” Kyungsoo looks up, a cute little pout on his lips, and his eyes fucking twinkle. Jungah presses a hand against his flat chest. “It’s too late to be shaving.”
“I can,” she insists. “If you’re okay with it. I’m not sleepy anymore.”
“Sorry.”
“Not your fault.” She finally pushes him away, and gets up once again. “What do you say?”
With her friends, Jungah is insufferable. She teases them, she’s far more rigid, she’s less giving. She hates being anywhere near motherly, and unfortunately for her, her love language is acts of service, so everything she does is patched up to her being a ‘mama bear’ and she fucking hates it. She never offers any help to any of her friends, unless they are super-duper close and her best friend.
It’s different with Kyungsoo, though. It took quite a bit of examining her own thoughts and feelings, but it’s stopped feeling horrible when she does things for him. It feels romantic now, like in La La Land.
The bathroom light, when she switches it on, is harsh. Both of them wince in response, and move around for a bit with their eyes screwed shut. Jungah somehow finds the cabinet with Kyungsoo’s shaving kit, and as she blinks her eyes open, she takes out the shaving cream and the straight razor.
“Have you ever used it?” Kyungsoo is comfortable on the edge of the bathtub. He places his hands on Jungah’s hips automatically when she stands between his knees. “Please don’t cut me.”
“Guess you’ll find out soon,” Jungah teases, laughing at her boyfriend’s cute grimace. She drops a kiss on his forehead, and goes back to the kit. She inserts the single-use blade, sprays shaving foam on her hand. Wouldn’t the floor be more comfortable? She thinks. She places all the materials they will need on the floor, passing a jug to Kyungsoo to fill. “Let’s sit on the floor,” she says when Kyungsoo turns to her. “That’ll be more stable, I think.”
They get comfortable on the cold tiles, all of the equipment within her reach. She carefully spreads the shaving foam on his chin first, then to his neck, then to his jaw, closer to his ears.
“My upper lip too,” Kyungsoo says. Jungah nods and spreads some there too.
“Don’t move a lot, okay?” Jungah places her palm on his forehead and pushes it back. She starts at his neck, gently stroking the blade downwards in small strokes, like she remembers several articles and videos had told her. She’s shaved her own legs with a razor like this, before switching to hot wax.
Jungah, when she was obsessed with her labels, thought ‘lesbian’ fit her perfectly. Even now, when she thinks the space is accepting but not very knowledgeable, she says ‘bisexual’ instead of ‘queer’ - the former fits her perfectly. She thought she was a lesbian. Kyungsoo thought she was a woman. Both of them were wrong. But both of them are here, happy, together, and having a great time in this relationship.
To clean the razor, she dips it in the water. The foam disappears in it, leaving some hair floating around.
Precision is important while using a straight razor, and at almost two-thirty in the morning; being focused is making her sleepy. She somehow gets through her boyfriend’s neck, and cleans the razor in water before she places a hand on Kyungsoo’s forehead, giggling, a little delirious, and tilts his head back.
“Doing your chin,” she whispers. In the silence of the bathroom, her words sound louder than usual. She moves closer, placing her knees on top of Kyungsoo’s and starts at his chin where the hair is the thickest.
She glances down at her knees, at the mass of her thighs that’s spilling out from her bones. It’s hard to like her body, like Kyungsoo has a hard time liking his, despite being post-top surgery and pre-bottom. He says he probably should start liking himself a bit more, body or not. And Jungah agrees, she finds everything about him good looking and attractive, and recently she’s started to be more neutral than before.
It’s nice to be able to talk to Kyungsoo about their bodies in a more neutral manner; not as a object of desire but a thing to live with. Like a pet, but it’s a gremlin instead of a lovely puppy. Kyungsoo never says ‘you’re sexy’ in response to her hating her stomach, like her previous partners did; And Jungah will always hug him (or hold his hand) when he’s spiralling out of contorl.
“My dad shaved every day,” she says. “So I’ve never liked beard on men.”
Saying that out loud feels weird, but it’s kind of true. She initially thought she didn’t like bearded men, then she realised she doesn’t like men at all; now she likes all women and the one Kyungsoo, her lovely, lovely Kyungsoo. He gulps a little and Jungah somehow, despite her increasing sleepiness, figures he wants to talk too. She pauses.
“I know,” Kyungsoo whispers. “You always make a face when any of your favourite celebrities grow a beard for their roles. It’s cute.”
“Mister Do, I have a blade at your throat,” Jungah giggles. “It’s cute right now. But I doubt that’s your real opinion.”
“It’s my honest opinion, Miss Jungah.” Kyungsoo smiles, a sleepy, cute, honest smile that leaves Jungah’s heart fluttering. “Anyone who tells you otherwise is simply slandering me.”
Giggling more, Jungah continues shaving her boyfriend’s chin. She moves the razor in the smallest possible movements at the curve of his jaw. She cups some water in one hand and paws off the remaining shaving foam from his skin, feeling the area for any spots she’s missed.
“Freshly shaved skin feels like heaven,” she says. “And look, I haven’t cut you at all.”
“Thanks,” Kyungsoo says. He places a hand on her knee, and Jungah opens her crossed legs, places her ankles near Kyungsoo’s waist and pulls him closer by her legs. She could slide too, but most of her skin is on the tile, it’ll burn her. He can do it, though, since he’s wearing shorts that come up to his knees.
He grins as he slides closer, amused at her antics, and places a foam-covered kiss on her cheek.
“Ew, foam.”
“Sorry.”
Jungah wipes the foam away and dips her hand into the jug of water. “That’s okay. I like you more. Enough to tolerate that.”
“Let’s go to bed now? I’ll put on the after-shave and be with you.”
“I’ll wait for you to finish.”
“Okay.”
Jungah helps put some of the shaving kit away. She observes Kyungsoo wash his face and wipe with a light blue towel. He looks handsome after a shave, especially so when it’s two-fifty in the morning. For a moment, the running commentary in Jungah’s head stops and she’s consumed by an urge to capture this moment: Kyungsoo staring at himself in the mirror, wiping his face with his towel; Then, next sketch is of Kyungsoo pouring some after-shave on his fingers, and gently wiping his chin and neck with it.
He hisses at his lower neck, breaking her trance. She takes a step towards him but he shakes his head.
“Not a cut, it’s just a pimple that I popped this evening.”
“It’s too late to lecture you,” Jungah huffs. “And also because I popped one myself, a day ago.”
“Let’s sleep,” Kyungsoo says, chuckling. She turns around when he does, and Kyungsoo pushes Jungah with his hands on her shoulders, making it easier for her to walk.
They slide under the blankets together, and Jungah wraps her arm around Kyungsoo’s waist. She isn’t a cuddler in her sleep, but she likes holding him close like this until she is ready to completely fall asleep.