feel me | yeonbin

020

Present day

The media, Yeonjun thinks, could be likened to a swarm of piranhas bitten by zombies. Zombie piranhas. Are those even a thing? It probably doesn't matter either way. It's just a fun distraction for his brain at this point.

There's no more press circuit for Cheap Kills. In fact, the premiere date is just floating around in outer space now without gravity to give it a landing, and Yeonjun is pretty sure he's floating somewhere alongside it. Postponed. Postponed. Postponed. He hates that word now.

"Is there, uh... anything else I can do for you right now?"

"You could leave." Yeonjun's voice is dull as he continues to scroll listlessly through the Netflix options. "I appreciate a babysitter as much as the next grown-ass man, but I'm not moving from this couch." Yeonjun cranes his neck to glance over at Jaejoong, who is sitting awkwardly on the adjacent couch and has been for the last hour. It's not even ten in the morning yet, but Daeul is at work doing chaebol things and fending off the media who are in a frenzy, and he'll be home by lunchtime.

"I was advised to stay here so that you aren't alone," Jaejoong says with caution, and Yeonjun stops his incessant scrolling, shifting beneath the blankets.

"If I wanted to jump out the window and end it all, Jaejoong-ssi, I'd do it," he says with no pretense. "Not even your babysitting could stop me. I'm stubborn and persistent. Character flaws that you probably haven't seen much of yet because I'm KHK's little prince."

"Yeonjun, me being here is simply just to keep you company," Jaejoong replies like he's being helpful. "I've been with you for over a year now. This is just about making sure that you're emotionally cared for and that-"

"Since when does anyone care about my emotional well-being?" Yeonjun asks with a weak chuckle, picking up the remote again. "It's about damage control and maintaining my image, isn't it? That's what we're doing, here. That's the goal. Find the motherfucker who leaked my sex tape, keep Choi Yeonjun in the dark completely and treat him like a ten-year-old child, and then there will be a nice rainbow in the sky when it's all over."

"Yeonjun..."

"Sorry, am I not being peppy enough for you?" Yeonjun selects, of all things, a nice rom-com to distract him for the afternoon. "My naked body and my moans are all over the Internet, and so far, I've heard nothing. Radio silence. It's been ten days since the leak, Jaejoong-ssi."

"I recognize that."

"Ten days, and I missed a friend's wedding because I was too busy crying my fucking eyes out." Yeonjun knows he has a bite in his tone. He doesn't care. "I had to see my ex again after two years because the whole Internet got to watch us fuck. My entire public image is now just me having drunken sex with my ex- boyfriend. All of my press events are canceled. The show I worked my ass off for is postponed indefinitely."

"I'm sure that they'll find a new-"

"Ten days, and I've heard fuck- all about my own victimhood in a sex crime. What kind of progress has been made, if any? You're not going to tell me, are you? No. You're not. But you sure as hell watched my entire sex tape, didn't you?"

"Yeonjun, this isn't-"

"Get out of my house," Yeonjun snaps, gesturing to the door as he stares at the TV screen. "I want you gone. I'm ordering, not requesting. You can get me in trouble for it later. Leave."

"Yeonjun-"

"GET OUT," Yeonjun shouts, and then he throws the remote at Jaejoong and hits him square in the chest. This is a kind of out-of-control that he hasn't felt in years. It's the same burning in his lungs and gasping breathlessness that he felt while packing up his belongings and leaving the apartment he shared with Soobin after their break-up.