beautiful stranger

n0stradamus:

(picture credit)

When Lee Jinki falls in love, he does it on the rooftop of a prestigious Korean entertainment enterprise’s building, practicing the dance routine his clumsy feet can’t seem to grow accustomed to, the promise of a leader’s position so terrifyingly real to him, that he dances until his body feels heavy, the allure of a clean bed, a shower, too much of a fantasy to be tangible. When Lee Jinki falls in love, he does it through dance moves, bright smiles like gumdrops, foolish but deliberate brushes of the hands, of the lips.

The boy with the bowl haircut had apologized profusely, blushing in a cute, nervous way that had caused Jinki’s heart to flutter, and the elder smiled kindly, took his hand, and by moonlight, they went over the routine.

His name, he’d said: Lee Taemin.

Jinki fell in love under the imaginary stars of Seoul, and with fumbling words and tongues and lips, he’d given his own name in return. Taemin had smiled, wide, teeth and half-moons and an innocence that spoke worlds and worlds of purity that the society they lived in lacked.

When Lee Jinki falls in love, he falls in love with Lee Taemin.

It begins, he recalls, with a kiss on the cheek, a whisper in his ear, a grin in his direction, and the fluttering that had never left grows worse. He beams like a firefly, follows the youngest up to the roof of the group’s dormitory, hand folded in the skeletal, too-warm, too-perfect, ever-shining other’s, and Jinki blushes profusely – a child, a schoolboy, blushing bride-child-man-thing.

When Lee Jinki falls in love, he becomes a blustering idiot.

So when Taemin turns to look up at him, smiles wide, hair long and tied in the back, having grown into a man and making everyone so, so proud and so, so happy, Jinki realizes how lucky, how fortunate he is. He splutters something unimportant, tripping over his words much like he trips over his feet, only silenced by full lips on his.

Taemin kisses him with a sweetness, a hesitation that feels strange to the older, and when he wraps strong arms around a tiny waist, the youngest relaxes against him, sighs against his mouth.

When Lee Jinki falls in love, he falls in love under the moon on a rooftop with the whole city around them, lights and cars and noise their audience, whilst Taemin only presses closer, smiling, happy, bright.