Page 79 of Hamartia
There’s no response right away. Then I see the dots flickering. Disappearing. Flickering again. My heart is beating so loud and quick in my chest I can feel it rocking my whole body. Fuck. Fuck why did I tell him that? It’s too much. I try to imagine a girl saying that to me after a few nights together and then I’mcertainI’m going to throw up. I might know what it is but I still don’t know what I’m fucking doing here. I’m thinking of a way to walk it back a little, make it seem more casual than it is, but then the dots are back and I’m holding my breath.
JH: Okay?
I’m not entirely sure how to take it. The word or the addition of the smiling face. But it’s his thing, he uses this particular emoji a lot. So I decide not to take anything from it. He texts back a moment later.
JH: Do you want to talk?
With a smile, I hit on the little call icon next to his name and wait for it to ring through.
LA is the coldest I can remember it ever being. Not as cold as Colorado, or Seoul (Jaehyun had sent me a pic that morning of the snowfall from his window) but it’s not t-shirt weather either. Global warming is fucking real.
I wait until I’m in the cab from the airport before I text mom to tell her I landed safely. I’ve got messages from Cleo and Zeke which I tap out responses to. Nothing from Mase since our talk in New York meaning Monday should be fun. Our first day in the studio after a break is always like that, like the first day back at school after summer. Friendships redefined, grudges either amplified or forgotten.
There’s been nothing from Camille either, which should make me feel something more than relief, but it doesn’t.
The cab driver recognizes me and talks to me about music for the entire journey from LAX to Sunset. Then he mentions my dad and I give him my standard response.Never knew him so I know less than you, man.His taste had been good and I’d planned to tip him a hundred, but I cut it in half for that. He seems grateful all the same when he drops me at the bottom of the drive and speeds off with Faith No More pouring out of the open window.
I take a long hot shower, change into a pair of sweats and nothing else, before doing a twenty minute run on the treadmill. After, I grab a bottle of water and collapse on the sofa to check his social media. I still look at it several times a day—out of habit more than anything else now. I’ve decided that I like looking at his pictures and videos more now I have this new insight. His captions, I hear in his voice. His pictures, I can see as moving images in my head. He’s the same person, but now I know the Jae behind the phone camera. I’ve tasted him and felt him come under my fingers and around my cock. It’s all more vivid and intense.
It’s just after 1 a.m. there but I know he’s a night person so he will still be awake. He told me he only sleeps normally when he’s on tour, otherwise he can be awake to see the sun come up before sleeping the day away. I hate that he doesn’t seem to sleep well, but it will certainly help this long distance thing.
Me: I’m back home in LA. Are you awake? Free? I miss you.
There’s no response straight away so I lose myself through his Instagram again. Though I know his grid off by heart at this point. He’s not a prolific poster of pictures to his grid but he does use his stories—once every other day or so. His last story was a video of a TV show he was watching. Looked to be some kind of talent show. He was congratulating the finalists, according to the translation.
I stop on the picture of his from a magazine photoshoot from a year or so ago, like I always do. Zooming in on it, back out. He’s wearing a tartan skirt with white thigh highs underneath, the lace band of them around his thigh just visible beneath the hem of the tartan. A white t-shirt with the Chanel logo, a thick silver necklace that looks like a collar, and a pair of black biker boots. His hair is silver and his lips look cherry red.
My dick is hard in a matter of moments. I’m not sure when or why I started imagining him wearing white lace panties under that skirt—but it happened and it’s impossible not to think of now whenever I look at it. Which used to be almost daily. Less now definitely. But now I know how his pretty pink cock would look through the material as it hardens and how his perfect firm ass would look spilling out of the back of them, it’s almost worse.
I’m about ready to slide my hand into my sweats and jerk myself off when my phone rings with a video call, Jaehyun’s name emblazoned on the screen. My heart leaps in my chest as I settle back on the sofa and lift the phone up. Then he’s there. Smiling wide on the screen, hair wet and…fucking hell he’s topless. The sight of his tiny pink nipples makes my dickwant.
“Hey,” I say first, reaching down to squeeze the head of my dick to calm it down. “You’re wet.”
He grins. “I have just had a shower. I was in the dance studio.”
“At 1 a.m.?”
He shrugs. “I had so much energy today so I worked late. Practicing.”
“You don’t need to practice.”
I can see his blush from here.
“We all need to practice. What about you? What are you doing?”
“Ah, nothing much. I got home about an hour ago. Took a shower, did a run. Looked at some pictures of you.”
“Pictures of me?” He lets out a full-bodied laugh. “Why?”
“Because I missed you. And I was…” I close my eyes and groan. “You know.” I hope the look I give him says what I haven’t.
“I don’t know.” A mischievous smile tugs at the side of his mouth. “Tell me.”
Tell him. Tell him that if he hadn’t called I was gonna jack off to a picture of him in stockings and the mental image of him wearing lingerie. I try to decide how best to say that. How would he take it? Would it be an insult? If I said it to a girl, it would be sleazy as fuck, so surely it’s the same here? But he’s not a fucking girl. He’s a guy. It’s completely different. Fuck, I really have no idea what I’m doing.
I cannot teach you everything, Raphael.
Fuck it.