#ruwon.

@ruwonid​ apartment, late night.

to [ ☠️] (sent at 2:46 am) buzz me up motherfucker

it takes her a long time to be able to type it out without typos, her face screwed up into a visage of desperate concentration, vision blurring as she attempts the task. her thumbs are clumsy and her legs are jello beneath her. she’s far too drunk to be at his apartment. she’s far too drunk to be sitting here in this empty, cold lobby. she’s got a hat pulled down over her face and a mask slung over her face, the hood pulled up over her ears, hair long and dark falling over her shoulders. she’s a study in black on black on black, from the tips of her toes and all the way up. as if that makes her incognito. maybe it does, with all of the reality of jowi hidden behind layers and layers of fabric, her good sense buried deep under vodka and tequila. 

when he does buzz her into the building she moves quickly. heads for the elevator and up, her footsteps tapping against the marble floors, one arm wrapped around her waist. she makes her way down the winding hall to his apartment and punches in the code, slips inside to toe off her shoes. “you’re up late,” she tells him, as if it isn’t obvious already, as if regularized sleeping hours mean anything in this industry, to either one of them. 

it’s a familiar scene. 

tousled hair and low slung sweatpants speak to the fact that he hadn’t been expecting company. he looks good like this, collarbones stark beneath the line of the thin white shirt, wire rimmed glasses balanced on the tip of his nose, the soft brown of his hair lending a warm quality to the boy in the dim, blue light. like the world around him is washed in something cold and he stands alone as this beacon of something warm and inviting. 

she’s giving him the upperhand. 

maybe he’s always had it, in a sense. in his lazy smirks and boxy grins, in the effortless way they burrow into the marrow of her. he’s so warm it feels like burning and she throws herself into that fire over and over again. trembles, frigid, in his absence. 

@ruwonid at a fancy noraebang.

ruwon understands it. ruwon understands him, maybe. kiwon is not what people expect him to be. despite his stature, despite his build, despite candy floss hair and an endless smile, despite a propensity to giggle and grin, despite a soaring falsetto, he is not under any circumstances half the flighty creature he seems to be. it is easy to write him off as someone frivolous or vapid, to label him a whore or an attention seeking child, to deem him immature or ignorant.

but he isn’t.

kiwon wants to be loved. kiwon wants to be adored. kiwon wants to be touched and cherished and more than anything else he wants to be necessary. in many ways he attempts to do this by crafting himself into the perfect chameleon. if they want wanton and pliable, he’s happy to deliver. if they desire a cheeky drinking companion, he’s there. if they want an endlessly listening ear, that’s fine too.

he’s not sure what ruwon wants, but he knows what he needs.

he knows this summarily,  because it’s exactly the same thing that kiwon needs. he’d known this the moment he watched him, at a party, the first time he’d seen him interacting in a more personal sphere, one that didn’t require the masks of idol life. what he saw was a boy still fully masked, grandstanding and showboating, putting on a performance for the amusement of others. the act was so incredible, so effortless, so well practiced, in fact, that someone who wasn’t kiwon would never have been able to guess it was at play. to the outside observer ruwon seemed genuinely happy go lucky, a surface level treat, a display in the comedic relief all friendships need.