Jongin followed Jongdae and Sehun back to EXO's dressing room, trying to swallow back all his feelings - trying to swallow back the bile he could almost feel sneaking up his throat.
Jongin had been struggling since Taemin dumped him, struggling more than he wanted to admit to even himself. But he hadn't really thought about the idea of Taemin struggling as well. He knew Taemin missed Jonghyun, he knew that - everyone knew that.
But he didn't really realize how much Taemin could have been missing Jonghyun.
All Jongin's bandmates had always made comments about how Taemin practically ran to Japan after Jjong's death. All the Japanese concerts, the Japanese CD he was working on. All Taemin's attention and efforts had been focused on Japan.
It seemed like he was barely ever in Korea anymore.
Jongin hadn't really viewed it as Taemin running away from Korea, but he knew it was because Taemin didn't want to deal with the feelings of losing Jonghyun - if he wasn't in the country, he could pretend that Jjong was still back here - alive.
But he hadn't realized exactly how true he might have been about that until now. Taem had struggled so much with Jonghyun's death, locking himself away in Shinee's dorm after the funeral - barely talking to Jongin when Jongin was sitting right there.
Telling Key that Jongin had always reminded him of Jonghyun.
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"What was that out there?" Sehun asked as soon as they were within the confines of their dressing room.
Jongin shrugged, "I just went up to talk to him and things got out of hand."
"Well I don't like how he was talking to you. Like he was the only one that had lost something - like you had no right to judge him."
"Let it go, Sehun."
"No, Jongin. I'm not letting it go cause you're practically my brother and I don't wanna see anyone talking to you like that. Especially not Taemin after all he did."
"Sehun - let it go. It's okay really. Taemin's just - he's going through a lot."
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Jongin spent a lot of time with Jung Ah and Sehun after that. As much shit as he gave Sehun over dating his sister, Jongin had to admit Sehun wasn't that bad of a guy and he always had Jongin's back. Sehun took up for Jongin whenever he needed him to - and even sometimes when Jongin didn't need him to.
So Jongin found himself being more and more supportive and approving of the relationship as time went on. At the end of the day Sehun was a good guy and Jongin was glad Jung Ah had so far picked a decent guy to be dating.
Jongin had to admit that Sehun had his approval when it came to dating his sister. At the very least most days Sehun provided Jongin with some company when they were both at the dorm, cause Sehun seemed to have made it his personal mission to not let Jongin mope around on his own.
But none of Sehun's insistence on getting him out of the dorm helped him miss Taemin less, just like dating Jennie hadn't worked and neither had hooking up with anyone he could.
Worst part was Jongin knew that there wasn't much he could do to change how the situation was currently. Jongin and Taemin's discussion the last time they had came face to face had settled that in his mind.
It had settled a lot in Jongin's mind. Taemin was still hurt over Jonghyun - angry over it. Jongin had just been a casualty of that anger and Jongin realized that there wasn't much he could have done differently that would have caused a different outcome to the situation. Taemin would have always broken up with him no matter what he did.
Jongin had always wanted to assume that he could have done something different, that there was something that he had done to cause the breakup. But now he didn't think it was. Now he thought that no matter what he had done, Taemin would have left him.
The other part of Jongin thought that they were both broken. They had officially broken themselves and each other with their relationship and break up.
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"Come on Nini!" Sehun hollered from outside Jongin's bedroom door, knocking loudly on the door.
Jongin slowly got up and walked over to the door, opening it. "Can I help you?"
"You can get out of your room and stop moping around for starters. But for right now you can come out to the living room and socialize at the very least." Sehun said, shrugging as he looked at Jongin.
"Or I could go back to napping and enjoying my down time?" Jongin said even though he knew that was not how things were going to end up. He knew Sehun wasn't going to just let him go back to laying alone in his room right now.
Sehun didn't say anything, just looked at Jongin for a second before Jongin sighed. "Fine, move."
Sehun stepped backwards, a small smile sliding onto his face while Jongin walked out of his bedroom and into the living room.
"Hey! Look who's rejoined the world of the living." Baekhyun said, grinning over at Jongin.
"Shut up, Baek." He said, sitting down on the couch.
"It's just good to see you actually out of your room for more than just whenever you're leaving the dorm, Nini." Baekhyun said, shrugging.
Jongin rolled his eyes while Sehun dropped down onto the couch beside him. "Ignore Baekhyun Hyung." Sehun said, laughing.
"That's impossible, Sehun - you know this."
"I'm completely insulted, Jongin." Baekhyun said, looking over at Jongin and Sehun. "All I was saying is that it's good to see you out here and not hiding away in your room. I've kind of gotten use to only seeing you whenever we're working or if I come into your room."
"Yeah I'll start making an effort to change that, Baek."
Sehun scoffed slightly, "Believe it when I see it."
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And Jongin really did start putting in more of an effort when it came to leaving his room more often and trying to actually communicate with his bandmates more than just when necessary.
Although Taemin was still on Jongin's mind most of the time, he didn't know whether he was just getting better at ignoring the older man or if.... if he was actually starting to get over Taemin.
Jongin didn't know which he would rather have happen. If he would rather be getting over him or just getting good at ignoring the constant presence of Taemin in his mind. He didn't really think that he was actually getting over Taemin, cause Jongin thought that if he had been getting over Taemin that the older man wouldn't constantly be on his mind.
So he had settled it. He was just getting better at ignoring the constant thought of Taemin. He could go on ignoring the mess that Taemin had made of Jongin's life. He could... he could forget. Eventually. At some point.
He could fake being happy. He could fake not being broken. He could fake acting like Taemin wasn't constantly at the corner of his consciousness - waiting for him to acknowledge the presence that he had left in Jongin's life. The tornado influence he had been in the course of how Jongin's life should have gone.
Would have gone if it hadn't been for him.
Jongin had never planned on falling in love with a guy. Jongin didn't know if he was ever going to fall in love with anyone and then when it finally happened, it was with Taemin. He didn't even know when it happened.
It wasn't necessarily at the beginning of their relationship - not at the very beginning at least. He was attracted to Taemin at that point but not in love with him.
But at some point he had fallen in love for the first time in his life and it had been with Taemin, the one person that he knew wouldn't let him fall alone.
At one point Jongin thought that Taemin was the best person he could have fallen for, then he got his heart broken by the same guy he fell for. It was almost ironic. The first person Jongin truly let in was also the first person to break him this much.