Running to You | Park Han + JL + Steven | Haneulz + Stejay AU

Chapter 65: If You've Seen It

I'm sorry I didn't protect you.

Instead, he'd offered sharpness.

Tough love.

Love without the softness.

Thwack.

The sting was worse this time. His knuckles ached.

He didn't stop.

Because at least here, in the cage, he could keep swinging. Could pretend that effort still counted for something -- even if he wasn't the one JL turned to.

Not anymore.

And maybe not ever again.

"Are you done being emo?"

Han followed the wry voice and his eyes landed on Jeongwoo, who was leaning casually against a vending machine with his arms crossed. Jeongwoo's hair was tousled, and Han knew he had come from extra hurdle practice. 

"What do you want, Jeongwoo?" Han picked up his bat again, prepared to smash another ball. He didn't resent Steven, but for some reason imagining Steven's face superimposed on each ball made them easier to hit. 

Jeongwoo grinned. "Come on, we're going to Golden Mic. Skip the brooding anti-hero monologue for a day." 

Han straightened up. "Fine. But you're buying all my drinks."

* * * 

Golden Mic turned out to be a private karaoke room, which was another way of saying it was a chaos-colored box with soda-sticky floors, seizure-flashing neon lights, and a TV blasting lyrics no one could read over the sound of off-key screaming and tambourine crashes. It smelled like sour apple soju, cheap cologne, and the kind of thrill that comes from watching national athletes dissolve into human disasters.

Shuaibo had been singing for fifteen straight minutes -- not a song, just his own remixed version of "Love Scenario" by iKON that featured two key changes and a dramatic fall to the knees during the bridge. Woongki had joined in, wielding a tambourine like it was a holy relic. Steven was trying to keep score, for reasons no one understood, and JL was in the corner nursing his third can of peach-flavored highball, because if there was ever a night for feelings, apparently this was it.

Han, meanwhile, had gone quiet. He hadn't touched the mic. Just leaned back against the padded wall with his drink in hand, like a king surveying the court. But even JL could tell something was off -- looser posture, eyes glassier than usual, a little too soft around the edges.

"Is he drinking?" JL asked, low.

"Han?" Juwon said, sliding next to him with a half-full bottle. "Oh, he's drinking."

"I thought he didn't -- "

"He usually doesn't," Jeongwoo said from behind them. "Because when he gets drunk..."

JL raised an eyebrow. "What happens?"

"He gets weirdly affectionate," Juwon said. "Like clingy, sweet, 'I've always loved you, bro' affectionate."

"He once cried into my shoulder because I bought him hotteok," added Kyungho. "In March."

"That was cold hotteok, too," Woongki noted.

"Drunk Han has no shame," Shuaibo chimed in. "Last time, he climbed onto the dorm balcony and yelled, 'I'm emotionally constipated!' Like a war cry."

"I've seen him write a three-stanza haiku on someone's forearm in sharpie," Jeongwoo added. "It was actually decent. The last line made me cry a little."