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Meet Me At Our Spot

Summary:

Taeyong just wants to feel ok. Ten wants the same thing.

~~~
Alternatively: High schoolers taeten find hope in each other

Notes:

A small thing with no real point. Enjoy the feels with me

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

Taeyong sits quietly at the dinner table, the remnants of his dinner staring up at him tauntingly. Grains of rice and tempura veggies that are beginning to make him nauseous.

“Taeyongie, what’s wrong?”

He pushes the food together to the center of the plate instead of answering and jumps when something hits the table, rattling all the plates and cups. He glances up to meet his father’s glaring eyes, his fist on the table.

“Your mother is talking to you, Taeyong. Answer when you’re spoken to. You’re not going to disrespect us in our house.”

His mother smiles a little, teasing twinkle in her eyes, “What’s wrong, baby?” The knots in his stomach constrict painfully and the acid burns stronger. His skin feels gross. “Eat your dinner and please get your elbow off the table.”

He reluctantly removes his arm off the table but stays hunched over, face obscured from them. He’s really not hungry. He really wants to lock himself up in his room. 

“Taeyong.” His father raises his voice, calling his name in warning.

Fear creeps into his core, he feels how fast his heart starts to beat, feels the cold sweat that builds quickly all over his body, his fingers tremble. He hates how much control his parents have over him. He bites down on his cheeks to keep from crying cause if he cries now, he’s gonna be interrogated and yelled at. 

He stuffs the remnants in his mouth and forces it all down with coke. “And sit up! You’re a man.” He only flinches a little and manages to sit up, pressing his shoulders to the back of his seat. His stomach hurts with nerves. 

His mother stands, picking up plates and taking them over to the sink. His father watches him for a moment before standing, drawing a toothpick out of his shirt pocket and sticking it in his mouth. “And I don’t want to see you walking around like that anymore, like Tinker Bell. Walk like Captain America. You’re a man, not a girl,” he mumbles around it and disappears off to the living room. 

It’s the final nail in the coffin and Taeyong quietly slides out of his seat and goes to his room. His parents aren’t drunkards or drug addicts, no, they’re worse. They’re religious. Devout Christians. They’re full of hatred and judgement, everything their god is simultaneously for and against.

He closes the door and crawls into bed, burrowing under his layers of blankets and then he remembers as the tears sneak out over his cheeks. He reaches under the bed, grabs his cat plushie he keeps hidden within the mess, and brings it to his chest, curling into it as he cries himself to sleep.

Tonight he dreams of stars burning as they fall from the sky, brightening the night before they crash on Earth, flooding everything. It makes sense that he’s on a port, on the small boat that he calls his home, when he sees the giant wave in the distance, coming straight at him. It makes sense even though he’s never lived near the sea or ports or even stood on a boat.

He wakes up to his father yelling and banging on his door. The knob turns as he’s pulled from his dream and the ceiling light blinds him. “Get up! You have 15 minutes to get ready. If you’re not ready by then, I’m leaving and you’re going to have to walk.”

He slowly sits up just so his father will go away. He waits for his heavy footfalls to disappear to the other side of the house and hides his cat plushie under his bed again. It doesn’t really take him long to get ready. Finding his homework in his mess of books does though. Luckily, he manages to step out of the house at the same time his father does, out into the early morning chill to head to school.

His father insists on praying on the way to the school and tells him he loves him when he drops him off and it makes Taeyong feel worse, anxiety mixing with the anger and betrayal that ruminates in every nook and cranny in his brain. He’s in his last year of school so he’ll only have to endure his parents for a few more months, he’s had enough.

Until then, he keeps quiet, does his schoolwork, tries to stay out of trouble, he stays miserable… right up until he meets him.

Being miserable doesn’t keep a person from developing crushes on others. So when his eyes land on Ten, as he’s known, he’s pretty much head over sneakers. Suddenly, his daydreams of running away include a 5’6” husband with the brightest smile, mischievous brown eyes, and adorably infectious giggles. Suddenly he wants nothing more than to hold Ten in his arms and be the object of his affections. He wants Ten’s love, wants to be Ten’s love. And maybe he gossips with his classmate, Yuta, just to know more about the boy.

“Forget about it,” Yuta had sighed when he wrung out every detail about Ten from him. “He’s a grade younger than us, you pervert.”

It tampers his daydreams, enough to be aware of his surroundings again. He accidentally breaks a plate while washing dishes and cuts his hand. His mother is initially annoyed, but she pulls him away from the broken bowl and pretends to care, making sure he has no glass in his cuts before covering them with bandaids. 

He wonders if she realizes it’s much too late for this affection. He should’ve gotten this type of care when he was smaller, when she finally got off her drug addiction, when she would take out her anger on him, throwing plates, cans, whatever she had in her hand at him when his 12-year-old self didn’t do a chore correctly. Does she even remember?

He stubbornly finishes washing the dishes when she’s done. He ruminates over everything else she’s put him through. The months she’d be gone when he was 8… 9… 10… 11, somehow it feels like she was never really there for him throughout his childhood. Months that felt like forever with only his workaholic father to care for him. The time she cut his hair when he was 16 cause she found his diary, evidence of his homosexuality. The time she only stood by and watched as his father attempted to beat the gay out of him, slapping him multiple times across the face with all his strength. 

He cries himself to sleep again.

He tries to forget the new addition to his daydreams. He tries to tell himself he’s better off alone. Because he’s not only inherited his parents’ genes but their abusive habits too. He gets irrationally angry just like them, he gets the urge to throw things and yell just like them, he’s mean and can make someone feel small and worthless with only his words just like them. 

He’s better off alone, he tells himself, but he forgets to remember when Ten approaches him one day out of the blue.

“Can I sit here?” A sweet, high voice asks and it takes Taeyong a moment to realize the question is directed at him. Ten stands nearby, holding onto his backpack straps with a small smile.

“Y-Yeah,” he squeaks and feels his face burn up as he moves his backpack from the only other seat next to him.

Ten smiles brightly and sits, “Thanks.”

The spot in the school is on the third floor where all the big windows overlooking the city are. This particular spot offers a view of the river and the field separating the school from the city in the distance. Clouds move along lazily across the sky and the trees lining the river sway just a bit. It’s a therapeutic sight.

Or it would be if he weren’t currently sitting with the boy he’s been crushing on ever since he heard and saw him. Ten sits with him in silence for a few minutes. Taeyong wonders if he’s also skipping lunch to sit up here, not that they’ll get in trouble, but there’s always the possibility.

And then he notices Ten straight-up staring at him and turns to look at him with—he’s going for inquisitiveness but he’s sure he just looks like a deer in headlights.

Ten smiles, huffs in amusement, “I heard you’ve been asking about me.”

Oh shit.

“I— Uh—”

“Do you have a pen?”

He stutters for a good 15 seconds, patting himself down with trembling hands until he’s found the pen he keeps in his pocket. He holds it out—going for charming bravado but he really just looks like a scared child.

Ten takes the pen and his wrist, pulling his arm closer to him as he uncaps it and scribbles on his wrist. The ink feels cool on his skin, but Ten’s touch electrifies him. He could swear his hair is standing on end.

He caps the pen and gives it back to him with a smirk, “There.”

Taeyong looks down at the numbers on his skin and he knows what it is. He knows exactly what those numbers are, but he still asks, “What’s this?”

“My number.”

“For what?”

“So we can get to know each other.”

He tucks the pen away, meets Ten’s eyes, and is surprised to see a glint of amusement, but there’s also something else that he recognizes and it’s giving him way too much hope. The question spills from his lips before he can stop himself.

“Are you taken?”

That thing he saw in Ten’s eyes only brightens, shines closer to the forefront as a smile stretches his beautiful pink lips. “I am not—” he lowers his voice to a murmur and leans closer—“Maybe you could change that.”

For once, Taeyong goes to sleep and he doesn’t dream of death.

~~~

For once, he doesn’t feel alone. He thinks— He knows he’s being selfish. He thinks he’s a lot like a sailor with no rafts or boats in sight, clinging to the first thing that will keep him afloat. Should he just let himself drown?

“You ok?” Ten whispers hoarsely, strands of his dark hair in his eyes and sticking to his skin, forehead shiny with sweat. His boyfriend of three months is currently nestled on his lap, hands clasped tight over his nape, balancing precariously with his legs over his shoulders. Taeyong’s holding him by his lower back, keeping him from falling.

The stall they’re in is dark and at the end of the expansive school restroom. It should be disgusting and sad, but it’s the only place they can be openly affectionate with each other (and it’s arguably the cleanest one, no stink to ruin moods.) It’s become a sort of haven (even though they’ve nearly been caught a couple of times by security guards.) They’re lucky not many people frequent this restroom after school, too busy trying to get home or to clubs.

“Yongie?”

He belatedly realizes he’s gone soft. “Sorry,” he manages, trying and failing to pull his head out of his thoughts and into the present. 

Ten’s brow furrows with concern. He slowly lowers one leg at a time and stands to fix his jeans back on. Taeyong quietly does the same.

When they’re done, Ten climbs back onto his lap, wiping his forehead with his short sleeve. The toilet creaks under their weight, making them both crack a small embarrassed smile. Taeyong wraps his arms around his boyfriend’s waist and Ten lets him bury his face in his chest, hugging him close.

“What’s wrong, baby?”

He’s always had trouble voicing his thoughts out, but he lets go so easily with Ten. He often wonders why. “I… Sometimes… I feel like I’m… using you…”

The fingers massaging the back of his head still. His heart also comes to a standstill and his boyfriend murmurs, “Are you?”

“No… I don’t know… You’re the only thing that makes me happy.”

“That’s not true. Music makes you happy and those crack videos you watch on Youtube make you happy too,” Ten keeps massaging the back of his head and Taeyong hugs his waist tighter cause he doesn’t think he deserves someone so bright and warm, but he still wants him… He wants him so bad.

He wants so bad to be needed and wanted by Ten. He knows they both haven’t exactly had it easy… which just makes their whole relationship mean so much more to him than any previous ones.

“Those are different. They make me happy only for a little while. That kind of happiness disappears. But with you, I feel happy all the time. I feel like I could be happy for a long time with you.”

Ten chuckles softly, moves his hands down from his hair to cup his cheeks and direct his gaze up, “Yongie, I think you’re confusing happiness for hope. You’re describing hope.”

He gulps. Ten’s eyes hold so much… fondness. It’s all for him? A small part of him wants to believe it is… but a bigger part doubts. That small part has a loud voice though because he’s lost in Ten’s eyes again and all he can see is a future with him. He wonders if Ten can see it too.

They’re both from broken homes after all.

“You give me hope… and it’s not right for me to be completely dependent on you like that… is it?”

“Hm—” Ten frowns and glances up pensively—“Probably not, but I guess I’m sort of dependent on you like that too… You make me really happy.”

Taeyong feels his cheeks flush pink and then his boyfriend meets his eyes again, thumbs sweeping over his cheekbones. “So?” He squeaks, voice cracking so the question comes out almost embarrassingly loud in the restroom.

“I don’t think it’s wrong if we both feel the same way… Maybe we can help each other become independent.”

“And then…?”

“And then we could be independent together,” Ten smiles and kisses him quickly, sliding off his lap right after.

Taeyong follows him. They quietly wait and listen to make sure no one else is in the restroom before stepping out of the stall. They wash their hands, dry them off, and step out of the restroom into the long, quiet halls. They walk side by side to their lockers to get their backpacks and then go to their spot on the third floor, where they first met.

They press their chairs together and Ten pulls a notebook out of his backpack. “Let’s keep planning.”

“Ok.” Taeyong smiles, watching as his boyfriend opens up the notebook to a seemingly random page in the back, holding a few dates and addresses and numbers. A folded-up paper falls out and he catches it before it gets too far.

The folded paper is a map with a path drawn across state lines in bright yellow highlighter. Ten draws out a pen from his backpack, uncaps it with his mouth, and leans close to him as they hold the notebook and map on their laps.

“Ok, so, once we graduate, we’ll be done fixing that old truck,” he points to a polaroid taped to the page, one of them posing on top of an old rusty red truck.

“Mhm.”

“We’ll head east first—”

“Explore everything we can.” Taeyong smiles, glancing over their shoulders to make sure no one’s there before wrapping a tentative arm around his boyfriend’s waist.

Ten smiles, cheeks flushing a deep pink, leaning closer into him, “Mhm! And then we’ll go west.”

“We can live beside the ocean,” Taeyong murmurs.

“Where no one can hurt us… We’ll leave the world behind. It’ll just be you and me,” Ten trails off, turns to look at him with a soft smile. Maybe he has something on his face.

“What?”

“I think we’ll make it ok,” Ten says, resting a gentle hand against his chest, over his heart, which has begun to quicken its pace under his boyfriend’s gaze. 

And instead of saying something equally romantic and promising, his brain panics, once again caught up in visions of walking along distant beaches with Ten, sun warming their skin, openly holding hands and exchanging kisses, he spills, “I want kids.”

Ten is caught off guard, eyes going wide before they crinkle with amusement, “How many?”

“T-Two. They can be cats. W-We don’t have to get any actual human babies.”

His boyfriend smirks, glances down at their notebook, and hums, “I think we can work that into our plans… Yeah, that will work.”

Taeyong smiles, presses a quick kiss to his Tenie’s temple, and returns his attention to the notebook.

He used to dream of his future, one where he stayed broken and bitter, one where he would undoubtedly become his parents. Now he dreams of a future where he overcomes them and everything they passed down to him… and it’s all because of Ten. He wants to heal for Ten. He wants to heal for himself because he loves Ten. He really can’t help it.

For once, he has hope. For once, he feels ok about the future.

For once, they don’t worry about the unsafe world around them. All that matters to them is each other and the future they’ll make and share together.



Notes:

Ok, author lied. This has two points.
1) I've been working through a lot of stuff lately and things I keep saying I'm over and done with keep bothering me. I like to think I'm a changed person, that I've healed from a lot of stuff, but healing is a process and sometimes it takes a while. I wrote this out to let go of stuff I was hung up on.
2) Sometimes people don't really need a solid reason to be together. Sometimes you just get a feeling, call it intuition, and you have to run with it... This is a story based on experience. That being said, realistically, Ten and Taeyong are not completely honest with each other and never go through with their plan. Realistically. But this story is not reality, it's my wish and hope, so they definitely make it to that far away beach, they make it together, healing side-by-side, piece-by-piece

Title taken from Willow and Tyler Cole's song of the same name. If you've made it this far, thank you <3
I hope you're all doing well and staying safe out there. Sometimes hope, no matter how small, is enough. Love y'all!