Work Text:
It’s too loud—
his heart, slamming against his ribs like it’s trying to break out.
Too cold—
even though sweat has soaked through his clothes hours ago, clinging to his skin like proof he’s still moving, still alive.
Everything is too much because everything is gone.
Park Han runs.
The city is cruel in its silence and indifference with the way it goes on sleepless at three in the morning. The city hums on, while something precious slips away from his fingertips.
Seventeen hours.
Seventeen hours since he last saw him. Seventeen hours since he last heard him say his name and bid good bye. Seventeen hours since he last saw him smile, that soft devastating smile. Seventeen hours since he last heard his voice, his warmth, memorized the weight of his touch without knowing it would become absence.
It’s been 17 hours since Han realized that he’s slipping away and he just watched it happen.
The fear doesn’t crash into him all at once. It creeps. Crawls. Settles under his skin like something alive, whispering you missed it, you missed him, you lost your chance with every step he takes.
His lungs burn. His hands shake. Every passing face feels wrong.
“JL…”
The name breaks in his throat.
“Please,” he whispers, barely louder than the night air. “Where are you?”
── .✦
It started with smiles that didn’t quite reach his eyes.
Han should have known by then—God, he should’ve known. But he told himself JL was just tired, just under the weather that day, and so he let it go. He always did. Still, he noticed it: the way JL’s smiles lacked their usual shine, how they lingered a fraction of a second too long before fading. Han caught himself watching for them anyway, like muscle memory.
But JL learned how to disappear without leaving.
JL felt it too. He watched himself from somewhere behind his eyes.
Smile.
Laugh.
Be okay.
Everyone loved him best like this.
Smiling had become second nature, muscle memory. If he smiled wide enough, laughed loud enough, no one would look too closely. If he played the part well, maybe the cracks wouldn’t show. Maybe Han wouldn’t see the fear curling in his chest every time happiness felt too warm, too steady.
Then came the laughter—too loud, too sharp. Laughs that echoed through the dorm whenever someone cracked a joke that wasn’t even funny. JL would throw his head back, the sound ringing out, rehearsed and bright.
Han used to think it was just JL being JL.
He didn’t know that the laughter wasn’t meant for Jeongwoo’s awful dad joke—it was meant to drown out the whispers in JL’s head. The ones that told him this was temporary. That love like this didn’t last. That one morning he’d wake up and Han would be gone, the warmth gone with him, like it had never existed at all.
The changes lived in JL’s quiet, too.
It was one of those exhausting nights when they were sprawled around the table, half-asleep, arguing about dinner. Han was halfway through listing options when he realized JL hadn’t said a word. He was just—there. Elbow on the table, chin in his palm, eyes unfocused. When Juwon bumped his shoulder to get his attention, JL startled, then smiled automatically.
“I—uhh, umm, I’ll get the same thing Juwon gets.”
The words came out smooth, practiced. Like a line he’d memorized for moments like this. Han’s chest tightened. It had been like this for half a month now, and he should have known by then.
“You sure, hyung?” Juwon asked. “It’s just plain jajangmyeon.”
“Y—yeah. It’s okay.”
Han reached for him without thinking, their hands meeting under the table. He squeezed once—not enough for anyone else to notice, just enough for JL to feel it. JL’s fingers curled back around his, brief but deliberate, before letting go.
Because JL felt it, felt the warmth, and his fingers curled back instinctively. For a second, he let himself believe. For a second, he thought, Maybe this is real. Maybe he really loves me.
Then fear rushed in, cruel and familiar.
If you believe this, it whispered, it’ll hurt more when it’s gone.
He let go first.
Then comes the numbness.
JL had always been dramatic, everyone knew that. A scraped knee was a tragedy, a paper cut a reason to whine for hours. But lately, nothing seemed to touch him. Pain barely registered. He felt hollow, like sensations reached him only after a delay, muted and distant.
One night, long past when they should’ve been asleep, Han walked into the kitchen and found JL by the sink. The kettle was still steaming. Water had spilled over the rim of his cup, sloshing onto his hand.
“You burned yourself,” Han said, already moving toward him.
JL blinked down at his skin, red and angry. It took a moment to feel anything at all.
“Oh… right.”
Han guided his wrist under cold water, careful, gentle. JL didn’t pull away. He was too tired to pretend this time.
“Are you okay?” Han asked softly.
“Yes, Hani-hyung,” JL replied after a pause. “Just… tired. That’s all.”
It wasn’t a lie. Just not the whole truth.
Han didn’t let go right away. He lingered a second longer than necessary, his thumb brushing lightly over JL’s wrist, as if memorizing the warmth there—anchoring JL, or maybe himself.
“What are you doing?” JL asked softly, confusion threaded with something gentler.
“I’m kissing the pain away,” Han murmured.
The kisses were light reverent even. JL felt each one like a question he didn’t know how to answer. Han pulled him closer, arms around his waist, fitting them together like they were meant to be that way.
JL melted into him.
And that terrified him.
Because this felt too good. Because safety felt borrowed. Because if Han ever saw the parts of him that were insecure, needy, desperate to be loved in ways that felt too much would he still stay?
JL melted into it. And that was all it took.
“I love you…” Han breathed, the words slipping out before fear could stop them.
JL’s heart clenched.
“I know…” JL whispered, voice muffled against the curve of Han’s shoulder so Han wouldn’t see the panic in his eyes.
Han stilled. “Know what?”
“That you love me.”
There was no surprise in JL’s tone. Only certainty. And that terrified Han more than anything.
“Then… say it back?” Han asked, almost pleading. He tilted JL’s face up and pressed a gentle kiss to his forehead, as if bracing himself for loss.
JL smiled then—small, soft, devastating. The kind of smile that made Han forget how to breathe, just for a moment.
“I love you, hyung,” JL said quietly. “So damn much.”
Their lips met, and Han drowned. Because this—this warmth, this gravity pulling him in—was home. In JL’s orbit is his home and nowhere else.
And JL?
He kissed him like this was the last time. He is memorizing this version of Han: the warmth, the way his hands held him, the way love felt when it hadn’t left yet.
What Han didn’t taste was the salt of JL’s fear. The belief, carved deep into him, that he was unlovable unless he gave everything. That love had to be extreme, consuming, painful because otherwise it wasn’t real.
But Han should’ve known. He did know, somewhere deep down. He’d been watching JL from the very beginning, watching the way he second-guessed himself, the way fear crept in whenever happiness felt too close, too fragile to trust. JL loved him with everything he had… and that was exactly what terrified him.
The fear of losing Han had clouded JL’s mind until leaving felt safer than staying.
And now Han was alone.
The streets of Seoul stretched endlessly beneath the city lights, cold and unforgiving as he searched eyes scanning faces, hands shoved into his pockets, heart lodged painfully in his throat. Every passing stranger felt like a mistake he couldn’t undo.
He should’ve held on tighter. He should’ve said more. He should’ve known that JL didn’t run because he loved Han less—
He ran because he loved him too much.
── .✦
The city blurred past Han as he walked, streetlights smearing into gold and white. Somewhere between panic and hope, a memory surfaced—soft, uninvited, persistent.
Hani-hyung, do you know that nighttime is the best time to be honest with yourself?
JL’s voice came back to him with aching clarity.
They had been sitting side by side by the Han River then, legs dangling over the edge, the city humming quietly behind them. JL hadn’t been looking at him when he spoke. His gaze was fixed on the water, on the reflection of the moon trembling with every ripple.
“Oh really?” Han had asked, tilting his head up toward the sky, the moon bright and watchful above them.
“Because the moon listens,” JL had said. “It listens and keeps your secrets safe. It’s alone up there, so there’s no one for it to tell.”
Han smiled, nudging him lightly. “Isn’t that like … lonely?”
JL had shrugged, a small, almost sad curve to his lips. “Maybe. But that’s why you can be honest with it. When you’re alone, you don’t have to pretend you’re someone else, you can remove the mask and strop the facade.”
The memory tightened around Han’s chest.
The moon listens.
He stopped walking.
His head snapped up, eyes scanning the skyline, then instinct carried him forward—feet moving before doubt could catch up. The river. The quiet. The place where JL always went when his thoughts grew too heavy to hold.
Han was breathless by the time he reached it.
The river lay quiet under the moonlight, dark and listening, just like JL had said. And there—near the railing, shoulders hunched, hands tucked into his sleeves as if trying to make himself smaller—was JL.
For a moment, Han could only stare. Afraid that if he blinked, JL would vanish again.
Then JL turned.
Their eyes met.
“Found you,” Han said, the words breaking out of him like a vow he’d been holding too long.
JL froze.
For a heartbeat, his face went completely blank—as if his mind had slipped somewhere else before catching up. Then his breath hitched, and a laugh escaped him, soft and unsteady, almost disbelieving.
“…You weren’t supposed to,” JL said quietly.
But his eyes were shining. Too bright. Too full.
Han took a step closer.
JL swallowed. “I mean—” he let out another shaky breath, something between a laugh and a sigh. “I kind of knew you would.”
There it was. The truth slipped through the crack.
He smiled, and it was the same smile as before fragile, hopeful, and afraid. “I just didn’t think you actually… would.”
Han didn’t answer with words. He closed the distance and pulled JL into his arms, holding him like he was something precious he’d almost lost.
JL clutched at Han’s jacket, fingers trembling.
“You found me - why?”
“Becasue - I can’t have you slipping away from me.” He brought a hand up to JL’s back drawing small circles to soothe the younger like he was making sure he was really there.
They stayed like that for a moment. Breathing. Grounding.
“I hate you.” JL whispered weakly against his chest.
“Hmmm-”
“I hate that you actually go out of your way to come and find me.” His voice rose, frustrated, trembling. “Do you have any idea how stupid it feels to think I’m safe with you? How… how much I want to believe it, and yet…”
Yet JL is scared because he has learned the hard way that he needs to be - perfect and light, not heavy or everyone else would leave.
Not because it came naturally - but because it worked.
Be the kid who fills the room, who makes adults say what a good boy, who makes people linger a second longer before leaving. He learned which parts of himself earned praise and which parts made the air go strange and thin. He learned to swallow fear before it reached his mouth, to tuck sadness behind jokes, to sand himself down until there was nothing sharp enough to cut anyone.
Because the first time he’d shared too much—
the first time he’d admitted he was scared, or lonely, or angry, or needy —
people had looked at him differently.
Not cruelly. Worse.
Overwhelmed. Tired. Like they’d just realized he was heavier than they’d signed up to carry.
And then they left.
So JL learned the rule:
Be good, and people stay.
Be real, and people go.
It carved itself into him so deeply that even now, standing in front of Han, loved and held and wanted, his body remembered the old pattern before his heart could catch up.
That was why Han’s certainty scared him.
And now he cut himself off, taking a ragged breath. His grip on Han’s back tightened. Then, almost violently, he let the words tumble out.
“I have this gnawing fear that one day I’ll wake up and you’ll be gone. That you’ll see… all the parts of me I hate. All the needy, messy, broken parts and then you’ll leave, like anyone else would! That’s why I ran! Because I love you too much to trust that it’ll last!”
“I’ll love you anyway” Han stated it like a fact. Like it’s something set in stone and nothing could change it and that's what makes the ache in JL’s chest hurt more because he sounds so sure.
“How can you be so sure hyung? How can you be so sure that you would love me either way? That you would love me despite this - “
Because either way meant all of it.
The ugly thoughts. The need. The way love, for him, never came gentle—it came feral, clinging, desperate to be proven real.
“That you’d love me despite this—”
He stepped back then, creating space like it was instinct. Like flight. He didn’t miss how Han’s hand reached for him automatically, fingers grasping at air before stopping, hovering—wanting to pull him back.
“You don’t know it, hyung,” JL said, voice cracking. “You don’t understand.”
Because how could Han understand what it was like to grow up believing that being loved was conditional?
Because JL had found refuge in delusions instead. In fiction where love was loud and ugly and consuming—where people crossed oceans, burned the world down, ruined themselves just to keep someone by their side. Love that didn’t flinch at flaws but dug into them, claimed them, said this too is mine.
That kind of love had rewired him.
It taught him that devotion meant extremity.
That being wanted meant being impossible to leave.
And now? Now Han was offering him something soft. Steady. Certain.
And JL was terrified it wouldn’t be enough.
Terrified that one day he’d wake up wanting more. Wanting proof. Wanting obsession. Wanting to be loved in ways that would scare Han away.
Terrified that he would ask for too much and lose everything.
“Then make me Jaeyel-ie,” Han begged. “Make me understand you because I want to.” Hands searching for JL’s warmth. Crossing the distance he put between them because Han wants nothing but to erase it all - the doubts, insecurities, and JL’s inner demons so that his love can love him freely.
“Would you? Would you understand if I want you to love me so much that you’re scared of me leaving? I want you to want me… to need me so badly that it physically hurts - that it borders on-” He stopped, hands trembling, voice fierce and fragile. “…on obsession?”
── .✦
JL’s words don’t land gently.
They split something open.
Because before this—before the river, before the quiet confession, Han had already lost all control he had on himself.
He remembers it in flashes.
His hands shaking as he redialed a number that wouldn’t answer.
His voice breaking when he left voicemails he never meant JL to hear.
Please. Just text me. I’ll come wherever you are. I won’t ask why. I won’t be angry. I just—please.
He remembers bargaining with the dark like it could hear him.
I’ll be softer.
I’ll give him space.
I’ll be better. I’ll be quieter. I’ll be whatever he needs…
Because Han hadn’t decided to be soft by accident.
Soft was survival.
Soft was the version of Park Han the cameras loved. It lies with the gentle laugh, the patient nods, the careful words in interviews. Soft was what kept scandals away, what made fans say he’s safe, what let managers trust him to hold the group together.
Soft was what made people stay.
And somewhere along the way, Han learned that softness could also be a disguise.
Because the truth was before JL, Han had always felt things too sharply. Want curled deep in his chest and stayed there. When he loves, it wasn’t spacious or forgiving. It narrowed his world down until everything else blurred at the edges.
So he taught himself restraint.
Hands loose instead of tight.
Smiles instead of claims.
Concern instead of ownership.
When JL entered his life, Han decided almost immediately that this was someone he couldn’t afford to frighten.
JL was light on the surface. Laughter easy. Affection given freely, carelessly. The kind of person people gravitated toward without effort. And Han saw it how easily others slipped into JL’s orbit, how naturally he belonged everywhere.
Han told himself he was being rational.
That was why he stood a half-step closer than necessary during schedules. Why he learned JL’s cafe order before anyone else.Why he always offered his jacket first before anyone else could.
Little things. Invisible things. Things that looked like care.
He never corrected fans when they paired JL with someone else, but he always made sure to be there. Just off-camera. Just close enough that JL’s eyes flicked to him instinctively. Like a compass needle finding north.
During fan signs, Han watched JL more than the fans. Watched how long hands lingered. Watch which smiles came too easily. He’d lean over casually afterward, murmuring reminders—You’re tired. Drink water.
He’s not jealous. He was never jealous. Just… attentive.
When stylists dressed JL in something that drew too much attention, Han didn’t argue. He only suggested alternatives. Softer colors. Covered lines. A hand resting briefly at JL’s lower back as if guiding him elsewhere.
Always gentle. Always reasonable. Always effective. He told himself it was protection.
But there were nights, you know the quiet ones when Han caught himself imagining impossible things. JL laughing on top of him as he lightly punches Han’s chest for saying something stupid. JL woke up beside him with a smile so bright, he could die. JL held him tightly, saying his name like a prayer in a breathless voice - .
JL with him - just him.
And the thought that followed, uninvited and honest:
I want him.
That was the thought Han buried deepest.
Because idols weren’t allowed to want like that.
Because love like that was dangerous.
Because JL is bright, fragile, already afraid of being too much would never survive being the center of something so consuming.
So Han became softer.
He swallowed the possessiveness. Redirected it into reliability. Into being the one JL leaned on without realizing why it was always him.
Then the coldness of the Seoul’s street at four in the morning stripped him of his mask:
That the softness wasn’t who he was—it was what he chose so JL wouldn’t leave.
But JL left him.
And who was Han before JL? Who is he after JL? Without JL? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t want to know ever - that’s why he needs him back. He needs his love back.
Running until his lungs burned is something Han would never do but perhaps this is what love does to people. It makes them do unexpected things because they are desperate and Han - oh Han is as desperate as the word means in every sense. Because the thought of losing JL of him leaving Standing still until panic swallowed him whole. The sick, crawling thought that JL could choose not to come back—and that Han would survive it only in the sense that people survive amputations.
He had begged.
Not once. Not twice. Over and over, stripped down to want and fear and nothing else.
And threaded through that desperation—ugly and undeniable—was another truth he refused to look at too closely:
Because the idea of JL walking away from him and never coming back made something dark coil in his chest. That the thought of JL slipping beyond his reach didn’t just scare him—it enraged him.
That love, for Han, had never been gentle too. It had always been hungry.
He’d hidden that part well.
Until now.
“…on obsession?”
JL’s voice trembles when he says it. Like he expects Han to recoil. Like he’s offering himself up to be judged and discarded.
Instead—
Han goes still.
The begging drains out of him all at once, leaving behind something frighteningly clear.
Because JL isn’t asking for reassurance.
He’s asking to be owned.
And Han knows that he would be anything JL wants —
Right now JL wants Han to keep him forever and he would oh he would until JL tells him otherwise.
The moon listens. Night is for honesty.
He steps closer, slow, deliberate, reclaiming the space JL created. His hands come up—not desperate now, but certain—settling at JL’s waist like they’ve always belonged there.
JL inhales sharply.
Han’s voice, when it comes, is quiet. Almost reverent.
“…I love you, do you know that? Oh - I love you so damn much I thought the right way to love you is to love you softly so I did ” Han laughs. “ But my Jaeyel-ie - who would’ve thought that you would want it more if I just loved you the way I wanted to-”
Han hides himself in JL’s neck inhaling deeply allowing his breath to ghost over the skin marvelling on how goosebumps stand on their wake because of him, then he said in whisper because in reality he is scared too - to open up, to be honest, to be vulnerable, “Cause I’m afraid that if you saw how badly I wanted you, you’d run faster.”
A beat.
“But you already did.”
JL’s eyes widened.
“And I begged,” Han continues, unashamed. “I broke myself open in the streets for you. I would’ve done anything to bring you back.” His forehead dips until it rests against JL’s. “That part of me isn’t gone.”
He exhales—slow, steady.
“But neither is this.”
His grip firms just enough to be felt.
“You wanting to be needed like that?” Han murmurs on JL’s skin. “To be the thing someone can’t let go of?” A quiet, almost breathless sound escapes him. “You didn’t scare me, Jaeyel-ie.”
He tilts his head, brushing their noses together—not a kiss yet. A warning.
“You made me stop lying.”
JL’s heart is racing now—relief and fear tangling until he can’t tell which is louder.
“You think you’re the only one who’s afraid of being left,” Han says softly. “So do I; Because I don’t love halfway. I never have.”
He doesn’t say mine.
He doesn’t have to.
Because JL feels it—in the way Han stands too close, in the way his hands don’t let go but instead grip his waist tighter, almost bruising but still gentle in its own way, and is the certainty beneath every action.
And somewhere between the comfort and the danger, JL realizes:
Han didn’t chase him just to keep him safe.
He chased him because losing JL was unthinkable.
And keeping him?
That’s the plan all along.
── .✦
The city doesn’t rush them.
The river keeps moving the way it always has – dark, steady, listening.
For a long moment after Han’s words, neither of them speaks. JL’s hands are still fisted in Han’s shirt like he’s afraid letting go would send him drifting again. Han doesn’t pry them loose. He lets himself be held.
“I thought,” JL says finally, voice hoarse, “that if I wanted too much… you’d disappear.”
Han’s answer is immediate, not defensive, not rushed.
“I thought if I showed too much,” he murmurs, “you’d run.” Then a slow laugh of disbelief bubbles from Han’s throat.
Their foreheads rest together, breath mingling. The fear between them doesn’t vanish, it settles. Becomes something they can see instead of something that chases them.
“So we were both lying,” JL whispers.
Han huffs a quiet laugh. “Badly.”
JL’s shoulders loosen a fraction. Not relief—recognition.
“I don’t want to be perfect anymore,” JL admits. “I’m tired of being good so people won’t leave.”
Han’s hands slide up—slow, careful—to cradle JL’s face, thumbs brushing under his eyes like he’s grounding him in something real.
“Then don’t be,” Han says. “Stay.”
It’s not a command. It’s a plea. It’s a prayer backed by desperation and need.
JL exhales, something breaking open in his chest. He leans in first hesitant, almost asking but Han meets him halfway.
The kiss isn’t rushed.
It’s deep without being forceful, consuming without being sharp. Han kisses him like he’s been waiting like this is something he’s allowed to take now. JL melts into it, breath stuttering, fingers tightening not in fear but in choice.
Han’s hand slips to the back of JL’s neck, anchoring. JL presses closer, chasing warmth, grounding himself in the familiar steadiness of Han’s body.
When they part, they stay close enough that their noses brush.
JL laughs softly, breathless. “You’re dangerous.”
Han smiles—not wide, not smug. Honest.
“So are you.”
Another kiss—slower this time. Softer. One that lingers like a promise they don’t need to name.
The moon watches.
The river listens.
And for the first time, neither of them is afraid of what they hear reflected back.
They’re on the same page.
Still in love.
Still choosing each other.
Still dangerous—but together.
And this time, neither of them ran, because…somewhere between Han’s warm lips and JL’s cold hands, staying stops feeling dangerous and starts feeling real.