The Name Chapter: Yours | YEONBIN

[13]

There's white noise in Soobin's ears, a roaring like the ocean.

"It's fine," Yeonjun is saying as he loops the fabric back around his wrist, fingers trembling, "Don't freak out." He's hurrying but his hands are shaking and he doesn't get it in the right knot. The edge of Choi is still visible and Soobin's heart is hammering in his chest.

Soobin's hand reaches out of its own accord to grab hold of the fabric, halting him.

Yeonjun looks down at his hand and then up at him. Eyes wide. Terrified.

"How long?" Soobin hears himself ask, as if from a distance.

"Fuck, Soobin," Yeonjun says. He closes his eyes. "Does it matter?"

"Of course it matters." All this time. All this time. He's been hiding his feelings and fighting off how he feels and all this time Yeonjun's had his name on his wrist. "How long?" He figures it must be a recent development, there's no way Yeonjun could have kept this to himself, not unless — unless he never wanted Soobin to know, unless he didn't want him to be his soulmate.

"A while."

"What does that even mean?"

"A while, alright?" Yeonjun demands, eyes snapping open again with a flash of anger. "Long enough."

Soobin lets go of the fabric and reaches out for his wrist. Yeonjun flinches back away from him, angry and afraid in equal measures and Soobin wants — he wants so much he doesn't even know what it is anymore that he wants.

His fingers skim the air above the name on Yeonjun's wrist. His name.

Soobin repeats, "How long?"

"Since the day we met!" Yeonjun practically yells at him, the words bursting out. "You looked me in the eye and introduced yourself and before you'd even finished saying Choi it was there, on my wrist, like my body knew you were the one before you'd even spoken."

Soobin can't believe—he can't believe—

Yeonjun presses his hands over his eyes, unwilling to look at him — or possibly not wanting Soobin to see his expression. His shoulders are slumped, his head hanging down. The gauzy fabric drifts onto the floor, no point to using it now when the secret is out.

Soobin stares. And stares and stares and stares.

Yeonjun's breath hitches. He's trying not to cry.

Soobin takes a breath.

Carefully, he reaches out, curling his fingers around Yeonjun's wrists, thumbs brushing over the tremor in his pulse, and pulls Yeonjun's hands away from his eyes. Yeonjun lets out a shaky breath. Soobin waits until Yeonjun's eyes are fully open before he lets go of his wrists and then reaches for the clasp on the soulband on his own arm.

Soobin opens the clasp. The metal soulband falls to the floor.

His wrist is free, bare.

Yeonjun's name across his skin, unmistakable.

"What the fuck?"

Soobin's played this out so many times in his mind, has had both dreams and nightmares about this scenario and how it will play out.

In not a single one did Yeonjun have Soobin's name on his wrist too.

His hand wavers in the air where he holds it out, wrist up, so Yeonjun can see it.

Yeonjun reaches out tentatively, fingertips skirting across Soobin's palm then up, up, up, over the thin skin of his inner wrist. His thumb traces his name on Soobin's wrist and something electric shoots through Soobin's veins.