Landing is even worse than flying, as it turns out. Kyungsoo’s feet are swollen, he’s groggy from dozing on and off during the flight, and he feels like utter shit even before the plane starts to descend. Jongin, despite all of his initial worries at takeoff, handles it like a pro, but now it’s Kyungsoo suffering from hot flashes, sweating as his stomach turns over and threatens to revolt. He groans softly, fanning himself as the plane touches down and starts taxiing. Jongin shoots him concerned glances, but only asks once if he’s okay. Kyungsoo isn’t sure.
Thankfully, the nausea passes soon after they get off the plane and go to claim their luggage. The Beijing airport is bizarrely quiet and orderly, and both Jongin and Kyungsoo look around in confusion as they breeze through customs. Kyungsoo, who knows about six words in Mandarin and can’t read any, has the feeling they might be doing something wrong, accidentally beating the system somehow, but it remains a mystery.
Jongin does a little filming as they find the airport subway station and buy their tickets for the station nearest their hostel. Kyungsoo currently couldn’t care less about photography or the blog. He wants to go to bed.
By the time they reach their hostel, after getting slightly lost and dragging their damned luggage all over the city, it’s nearing 11:00pm Beijing time, which means it’s 8am PST and Kyungsoo barely slept all night, and now it’s night for a second time. Their internal clocks are confused, their bodies are exhausted, and the lady at the counter has a warm smile and heavily accented English. Everything has a fuzzy, dream-like quality to Kyungsoo, who still isn’t 100% sure he won’t puke his guts out.
“This room...you booked...is it okay?” the counter lady asks, showing Kyungsoo a paper with chicken-scratch handwriting on it.
He glances over it quickly, registering approximately nothing. “For two people?” he asks.
“Yes,” the woman says, looking like she does and doesn’t want to go on at the same time.
“Then it’s fine,” Kyungsoo says, waving his hand.
The woman nods, giving him a key, and points them to their room.
The hostel is small, a little dingy, and homey. They’ll be there for four nights, and Kyungsoo is eager to settle down and spread out, even for a short time.
Or at least, he’s eager until he turns on the room’s light and he sees one bed against the wall, and that’s it. Granted, it’s a double bed, but now Kyungsoo understands why the desk lady seemed so uncertain. He goes hot with embarrassment. “Um. The English on the website was pretty...basic.”
Jongin peers in and laughs softly. He lifts his camera, as if to document Kyungsoo’s humiliation. “Looks like we’re really getting to know each other tonight,” he says teasingly.
“I can take the floor,” Kyungsoo says immediately, flushing.
“What, you don’t like me? Ouch.” Jongin grins, swinging the camera around their little room as he drops his bags on the floor. “You’re small, we can fit.”
Kyungsoo wants to protest, but he feels like doing so would be even more obvious than shutting up about it. He clenches his jaw and shrugs.
“Simple room,” Jongin says to the camera as he walks around with it. “Bed, blanket, pillows, nightstand, tiny bathroom. Oh look, they provided us with shampoo and soap! And...that’s the end of our tour. Bedtime!” He returns from the bathroom and flops onto the bed while Kyungsoo stiffly puts down his luggage. “Oh. Okay. That was harder than expected.”
“That’s common in Asia,” Kyungsoo says, avoiding looking at Jongin all sprawled across the bed, like he’s waiting for him.
“I know,” Jongin says. “I’m Korean.”
Now Kyungsoo does blink up at him. “So am I,” he says. “But not every American-born Korean knows that much about...real Asians.”
Jongin laughs, rolling onto his stomach. “My parents are pretty Korean.”
“Yeah?” Kyungsoo says, eyebrows lifting.
“Mmm.” Jongin stretches. “Anyway, bedtime for real. I’m dead on my feet.” He gets up and immediately starts pulling off his clothes.
Kyungsoo balks, taken by surprise. “What are you doing?” he blurts.
Jongin freezes, his shirt stuck around his neck. “Changing…?”
There’s a tense moment of silence, and then Kyungsoo swallows thickly and says, “Oh, right. Sorry, I just...I’m super tired.”
Jongin chuckles a little, then finishes taking off his shirt and pulls on another from his backpack, an XL thing with Tony the Tiger on the front. “I got it from a cereal box,” he tells Kyungsoo, ducking his head bashfully.
Kyungsoo nods and looks away as Jongin strips out of his jogging pants. Sleep would be a very good idea. Except that they’re sharing a bed.
He manages to change into his pajama shirt without embarrassing himself further, although he keeps his sweats on, even though it’s pretty warm in their room. He waits for Jongin to use the bathroom, then takes his own turn, brushing his teeth and splashing cold water on his face to brace himself.
When he returns to their room, Jongin is already in bed, on the side away from the wall. He smiles up at Kyungsoo sheepishly. “I don’t like being trapped in that spot…” he says.
Kyungsoo thinks about having to climb over Jongin’s body every night and says, “I really can sleep on the floor.”
“Shh, no more complaints! Come to bed.” Jongin beckons him with the corner of their blanket.
Climbing over him is just as awkward as expected, and Kyungsoo is flushed and red by the time he gets to his spot, pressed against the wall. If Jongin notices Kyungsoo’s putting as much room between them as possible, he doesn’t mention it.
He thinks he won’t be able to sleep at all, in the same bed with Jongin, but as it turns out, exhaustion trumps all. He’s out in a minute flat.
He’s wide awake again at 4am, pale light streaming in through their window, jetlag making itself well-known. He groans and rubs his eyes, turning to look at Jongin.
Who is already awake, lying on his side and staring at him, smiling slightly. Kyungsoo startles.
“Good morning,” says Jongin. “I’ve been up for half an hour.”
“...Oh,” Kyungsoo says, while his inner, socially capable, flirty self (whom Kyungsoo calls KyungSmooth and who is promptly silenced) says, Enjoying the view?
“Wanna do more filming?” Jongin asks, and his face is really uncomfortably close. Kyungsoo feels himself heating up.
“Film what?” he manages to ask.
Jongin immediately turns to reach over the side of the bed, lifting his camcorder from the floor. “Don’t worry, just follow my lead.”
It’s balls o’clock, they’re in bed together, and Kyungsoo feels Jongin’s foot brush against his own under the covers. Jongin grins at him in the low light, his bedhair wild, and Kyungsoo is not thinking entirely pure thoughts about what they could be filming.
They sit up against the headboard, groggy and headachey (in Kyungsoo’s case), and Jongin turns on the camera and points it at them. “Day 1,” he says with a sleepy smile. “We’re up at 4:09am. Our Great Wall tour leaves at, what, 9:00? So we decided the best idea would be to conduct some interviews.”
“We did?” Kyungsoo says.
“I did,” Jongin clarifies. “Have you ever been to Asia before, Mr. Do?”
Kyungsoo stifles a yawn, acutely aware of where Jongin’s arm is pressed against his own, his skin warm and smooth. “No,” he says, clearing his throat. “I’ve travelled to 23 states, Mexico, Canada, England, Italy, and Chile.”
“Oh, that’s impressive,” Jongin says, eyes wide.
“It comes with the job,” Kyungsoo mumbles with a shrug. “Baekhyun’s been to way more.” Then he remembers to ask, “Have you been to Asia?” He tries to edge away from Jongin, his inner paranoid shoulder-devil (the mirror to KyungSmooth, who is terrified of romance and never wants Kyungsoo to get laid, whom he calls The Asshole) whispering that he’s showing too much interest again.
Jongin doesn't seem to notice, and smiles as he says, “Yeah! I mentioned it yesterday, but my family is pretty Korean. My parents only immigrated here, with my dad’s parents, when they were already married. I was born in the States six years later. Their English is good, but we use a lot of Korean at home, and my grandparents know very little English. Anyway, we went to Korea when I was 13 for a summer to visit my mom’s parents.”
“Oh,” Kyungsoo says. “I barely speak any Korean.”
“Really?” Jongin turns away from the camera to look at him. “Were your parents born in America?”
Kyungsoo nods. “Mom was, Dad immigrated when he was very young. My dad is bilingual, but my mom speaks little. I only know the very basics. My pronunciation is awful.”
“Sehun is fluent, though,” Jongin says.
Kyungsoo nods. “My dad and his dad were friends after his parents immigrated in their teens. Sehun is bilingual.”
“What about Baekhyun?”
“Conversationally fluent. He made an effort to learn it from his parents, although they mostly speak English. Language freak. His husband’s the same.”
Jongin grins. “Language transmission is such a cool thing. If you don’t learn it as a kid, it’s gone in one generation.”
Kyungsoo nods, and The Asshole demands he remain silent, deciding he’s said enough already.
Jongin isn’t done, though. “Can you speak any other languages? You travel enough to warrant it.”
“Baekhyun’s the linguaphile. And you can get by with just English and a few choice words and phrases in the native language in most countries,” Kyungsoo says with a shrug. “I speak English and some Spanish.”
“Cool,” Jongin sighs, sounding jealous despite the fact that Kyungsoo knows he knows two languages fluently, and a third well enough that he felt confident enough to go to China. The younger man slides down a little in his spot, wiggling back against his pillow and adjusting the screen of the camcorder, and suddenly The Asshole thinks they look way too cozy there in the LCD screen. Kyungsoo feels himself close off, turn away, stiffen noticeably. Jongin glances at him in mild concern.
“I’m gonna go shower,” Kyungsoo says, hating himself for it. “Can you get out?”
“Oh, sure,” Jongin says, scrambling out of bed to make room. His huge shirt hangs almost to the hem of his boxers, and Kyungsoo has to look away.
“You should try to get some more sleep, we have a busy day,” Kyungsoo says, sliding out after him and opening his backpack to get out clean clothes.
“Right. Okay. Have a nice...shower,” Jongin says awkwardly.
God, it’s college all over again. Jongin is sweet and expresses interest in him—even if it’s just friendly, polite interest—and Kyungsoo completely shuts him down for no reason other than that the prospect of Jongin knowing about his crush horrifies Kyungsoo beyond any sort of rationality.
If you’re nice to him, maybe he’ll like you, and if he likes you, maybe he’ll date you, says KyungSmooth, the voice of reason, who would actually like a significant other someday.
Unlikely. And there’s so much potential for awkwardness and embarrassment between here and there, The Asshole argues as Kyungsoo gets ready to shower. Too much.
But he might like you. He’s really nice.
Not worth it.
As always, Kyungsoo listens better to fear than optimism. He takes his shower and fantasizes about how much better that exchange could have gone, sighing.
Kyungsoo’s fantasies don’t even include sex anymore. They just depict normal human social ability. What a dream.
Things are a little stilted when Kyungsoo returns from his shower (which was alternatingly ice cold and hellfire hot, with almost no in between), but Kyungsoo lies in bed with his laptop and gets their VPN working so he can use websites blocked by the Great Firewall of China, and Jongin dozes on his side of the mattress and sometimes fiddles with his phone or his cameras after he takes his own shower. He doesn’t try to make anymore conversation, which is a blessing, even though the silence is kind of oppressive between them.
Eventually, after Kyungsoo messages Baekhyun and his parents to let them know they made it safely and spends some time jotting down details of their trip thus far for future blog posts, breakfast time rolls around, and the two of them trudge out of their room for a complimentary meal that makes Kyungsoo’s queasy stomach roll. He forces the food down nonetheless, knowing they have a long, exhausting day ahead of them.
Which, now that Kyungsoo thinks about it, vaguely horrifies him. Why the hell did he plan their Great Wall tour for their first day? Why, when Kyungsoo knows that Jongin is an athletic person, and Kyungsoo hasn’t done any walking farther than the convenience store down the street in months? He’s going to make a total fool of himself. It’s going to be mortifying. As if he doesn’t have a bad enough first impression of Kyungsoo already.
At 9:00, the bus picks them up to take them to the Wall, three hours away. Their guide is a cheerful, leopard-print-pants-wearing counterpart to how generally bleh Kyungsoo feels, and Kyungsoo starts to feel more nervous when they’re informed they’ll only have three hours to cover the 6-kilometer section of the Wall to the spot where they’ll be picked up. He’s not about to suggest to Jongin that they take the easy way out and walk back to the starting point after the first hour, but he also doesn’t know if it’s worth being that slow-ass dude in the back looking like a loser.
They nap or listen to music or, in Kyungsoo’s case, worry for the length of the drive, and then they eat small, packed lunches, and prepare for their hike. The mountains had been gorgeous through the bus windows, but when they get off at their stop they can actually see the Wall, and it’s awe-inspiring. Kyungsoo thinks maybe he’s a little bit excited after all.
“I’ve always wanted to see the Great Wall of China,” Jongin breathes, standing next to Kyungsoo in his shorts and his tight, sleeveless shirt, looking like the kind of person who belongs on a hipster travel blog. Not like Kyungsoo, who very stupidly decided to wear a black t-shirt today.
Jongin looks picturesque, honestly, standing there with the sun shining down on his hair and the mountains behind him, and if nothing else, it reminds Kyungsoo of his job. He fumbles to get his camera out of his bag and lifts it to snap some shots of the bus, the mountains, the Wall in the distance. He doesn’t take any pictures of Jongin, but it’s not for lack of wanting to.
Blessedly, he’s distracted from his embarrassing contemplations of Jongin’s striking side profile by their guide telling them to line up for a group photo—there’s some twenty other people on their tour with them—and then sending them on their way. Guide apparently just means person who will take you to the Great Wall, because he’s not coming with them. Which is good, maybe. The guy looked like he would have left them all in the dust.
They head for the gates after a brief pee break, and then they start climbing. And climbing. It’s all stairs for the first stretch, and Kyungsoo grits his teeth as his thighs begin to burn immediately. Oh, hell. Oh no. He’s going to be the first person to drop out of this hike.
But then Jongin whines, “How do my feet hurt already? This isn’t fair, we have another 2 hours and 55 minutes to go,” and a rush of relief flows through Kyungsoo. It actually makes him dizzy with its intensity. He’s not the only one.
In fact, the entire entourage is winded and groaning by the time they make it to the first little resting spot, and Kyungsoo has to grin. There are a few retired Americans, a group of students from an international school, some Australian tourists, a couple of English teachers, and all of them are panting and sweating in the hot May sun. Kyungsoo couldn’t be happier.
“Kyungsoo is laughing at other people’s pain, I think,” Jongin says out of nowhere, and Kyungsoo whips around to see Jongin’s camcorder pointing at him. The lens swings around quickly. “Uh, I didn’t say anything.”
"Why are you filming me?" Kyungsoo asks, fidgeting as his smile slides of his face.
"I'm not filming you," Jongin says, pretending to point his camera at other things. "I'm filming the Great Wall of China, May 2016, Jongin's Great Wall Adventure."
"Okay," Kyungsoo says dumbly, blinking at him. Jongin turns to shoot him a smile.
"Hello!" says a middle-aged Chinese woman, sidling up beside them with a backpack stuffed full of goods. "Hello!"
"Um," Jongin says. "Hello."
"Jongin, don't talk to them," Kyungsoo says quickly, taking a step closer. "They're just going to try to sell you crap."
"Oh," Jongin says. "No thanks."
"Cold water?" the lady says, gesturing to her back. "Hat? T-shirt?"
"No thanks," Jongin says again, looking very nervous. "Maybe later."
"Later?" the woman says, following Jongin as he takes an uncertain step away. "T-shirt?"
"Uhhh. Bu yao. Wo bu yao." Jongin takes another step away, and is followed another step.
"Don't tell them later, they'll just keep following you," Kyungsoo says, rolling his eyes.
"I'm not saying later!" Jongin protests as the woman tries to take off her backpack to show him her wares.
"But you did, and now she's got it in her head that you will at some point want something," Kyungsoo says.
"Dui bu qi," Jongin says, visibly sweating (but maybe that's from the sun beating down on them). "Bu yao."
Kyungsoo is torn between laughing and crying. Jongin looks at him desperately. "Let's just go," he says, gesturing towards the path.
"But I didn't get to rest," Jongin says with a childish pout, still waving his hands at the persistent saleswoman.
Kyungsoo steps in between Jongin and the woman, shakes his head, doesn't make eye contact, and physically drags Jongin away before he ends up buying everything this lady pushes on him. He walks them to a spot of shade under a tree and quickly lets go of Jongin's arm. "Sit."
Jongin sits right on the ground, sighing in relief. "She was scary."
"She wasn't scary; she just wanted to sell shit."
"I panicked and forgot how to say no," Jongin says, tilting his head up to shoot him a sheepish smile.
The corners of Kyungsoo's mouth twitch up, and he bites his tongue to stop himself. "You're like a baby."
"Hey, I told you that from the start. Be forceful with me. Full permission to get handsy."
Kyungsoo coughs and flushes, squatting to relieve the burning in his calves. "Sure. Okay."
"Put a leash on me, I'm serious," Jongin laughs.
Kinky, says KyungSmooth. "Yeah," is what comes out, flat and boring.
They get up a minute later to keep climbing, and Jongin seems lively and energetic after their short break. He puts away his camera and gets out his first water bottle instead, passing it to Kyungsoo as he chatters about a hiking trip he went on with his family one time, and how sore he was the following day.
"But aren't you, like," Kyungsoo starts, and then swallows because it might be weird to know this about Jongin, he shouldn't be showing this much interest, he should keep his mouth shut, but it's too late. "A fitness kind of person?" he finishes lamely.
Jongin laughs, bright and open. "I am," he says, sounding surprised and pleased that Kyungsoo knew. Kyungsoo flushes with embarrassment. "But that's more like health and muscle tone, you know? And dance. Very different muscles for climbing stuff. My apartment’s on the second floor of my building, I don’t usually have to climb that many stairs. And my stamina could use some work."
"Oh," Kyungsoo says stupidly. There's probably an invitation for a sex joke in there, but Kyungsoo's not going to make it.
"So I'm guessing you're not, like, a fitness kind of person?" Jongin says, tone teasing.
Kyungsoo's face goes hot, and he rummages in his small backpack for his hat to shield his probably-pink cheeks. "No. Not really."
"I'd try to convert you, but I have the feeling I won't be sticking to any kind of regimen on this trip," Jongin says, and laughs. "You can watch my videos though." He wiggles his eyebrows.
Kyungsoo looks away, over the edge of the walls on either side of them, and shrugs noncommittally. "Maybe."
It's a disappointing answer, a boring answer, and he knows it. When he looks back at Jongin in the following silence, the younger man is chewing on his lip and looking around with slightly furrowed eyebrows, like he thinks maybe he said something wrong. Kyungsoo feels like an idiot. He should say something. He should make a joke, or a comment, or something.
He stays silent.
Three hours is a long time to be walking, especially when Kyungsoo feels like dying after the first half hour. There are a lot of stairs—like, a lot of stairs—and that includes ups and downs. There are steep, stair-less inclines, too, which are possibly even worse, and Kyungsoo periodically has to pause during these stretches of the Wall to rest and catch his breath. Sometimes, he feels a little bit like puking. His skin is sticky and too warm under his t-shirt. Sweat drips down his temples and soaks the lip of his hat. His legs and feet and lower back ache and burn and throb. His fingers feel swollen from hanging at his sides.
But the Wall is amazing. He'd picked this section for a reason—it's only partially reconstructed, it's a fairly easy hike, but it's less accessible to the general public and thus much less crowded than the more popular Badaling or Mutianyu. The towers are gorgeous, the scenery is magical, and Kyungsoo can't stop taking photos. Jongin gets out his camcorder frequently to update it on how they're doing as the three hours crawl by, and sometimes he films Kyungsoo, too, telling the camera that Kyungsoo has stopped him from being bullied into buying so-and-so many tourist t-shirts, and that Kyungsoo hasn't uttered a word of complaint even though Jongin has been whining non-stop, and look at Kyungsoo's thighs, no wonder he's killing this hike (Kyungsoo blushes for a long time after that comment). He seems to think Kyungsoo is much more impressive than he is, and Kyungsoo doesn't have the heart to tell him that he's actually, secretly, practically dead on his feet.
The first section of the Wall is all easy walking, up and down stairs and along long stretches of sloped pathways, gazing out at amazing vistas. The sun is hot, but there's a nice breeze, and the view of the green, tree-covered mountains, with the Wall snaking its way through them, is incredible. But the latter section of their trek is considerably more perilous, less restored and with more crumbling stairways and a couple absurdly steep inclines that they have to practically drag themselves up, panting and groaning.
"This would be a lot easier without cameras in our hands," Jongin huffs, pulling himself up a few broken steps carefully with one hand as he clutches his camcorder in the other.
"You could let it hang around your neck," Kyungsoo says, waiting behind him on the narrow staircase.
"But this is the most interesting part to film," Jongin argues. He scrambles up a few more steps, then feels around carefully with his feet.
"You're going to fall," Kyungsoo warns him. "Use both hands."
"I'm not going to fall. I have excellent balance." Honestly, it looks like he does, and he dances up the rest of the staircase.
Kyungsoo keeps his mouth shut and lets his camera dangle on its strap as he starts climbing up behind him, using both hands to guide and pull himself, palms raw as they rub over rough stone.
"Careful, some of the rocks there are loose," Jongin calls down to him, standing at the top. "Here." He holds out a hand.
It's not the first time Jongin's offered him help like this, and Kyungsoo swallows his pride and reaches up, snagging his wrist. The younger man's biceps strain as he pulls gently, and Kyungsoo looks away.
And then his toe slips on a narrow, worn step and he falls, swearing loudly as his knee scrapes painfully against the stone. Jongin yelps and braces himself, thankfully quickly enough that they don't both tumble back down the stairs, and Kyungsoo manages to get his feet under him fairly quickly and pull himself out of the stairway.
“Fuck,” Kyungsoo hisses, stumbling farther onto the path and looking down at his knee, which is already beginning to ooze tiny beads of blood.
"Are you okay?" Jongin asks, sounding shaken. Kyungsoo looks up at him, and realizes he's still clutching Jongin's hand. He drops it quickly.
"I'm fine. It's just a scrape. I didn't roll my ankle or anything." He sits down heavily against the closest wall and looks at his wound, carefully brushing away tiny bits of rock and dirt. The skin is red and torn, and a thin trickle of blood runs down his shin. "Fucking fuck."
"Here, you can rinse it with this," Jongin says, pushing a bottle of water into his hands. It's his last one, and Kyungsoo knows it.
"I'm fine," Kyungsoo insists. "We're almost to the end. I have bandaids back at the hostel." Which he won't be able to get his hands on for another three-plus hours, but that's a small detail.
"Are you sure? You should at least rinse the dirt off. Does it hurt?"
"Of course it hurts, it's bleeding," Kyungsoo mutters, using the hem of his shirt to dab at the blood. He's suddenly not regretting wearing black so much. "Come on, let's go. I'm okay."
He can't even get up before Jongin's twisting the cap off his bottle and pouring a thin stream of water over the wound, washing away some of the grit and blood. A warm palm wipes over the unbroken skin underneath the scrape, and then Jongin finally stands. "Do you need to lean on me?"
"No, I'm okay," Kyungsoo says thickly, scrambling upright. His scrape burns as the movement pulls at the skin, but it's really not that serious. "Come on."
"Can I film this?" Jongin asks tentatively. "I mean, you don't have to, but—"
Kyungsoo just shrugs. "Whatever." He bends his leg a couple times, testing it out. More blood wells up.
"I'll be really fast," Jongin says, whipping up his camcorder. "Kyungsoo, Badass Extraordinaire, shows no fear in the face of a grievous injury."
"It's a scrape," Kyungsoo insists, rolling his eyes.
"In the middle of the wilderness, with only half an hour to get back to base camp 2, there's no time to get medical attention," Jongin continues to narrate, his voice urgent and dangerous. It pulls a smile out of Kyungsoo despite the pain in his knee. "Will we make it? Stay tuned to find out."
"Oh my god," Kyungsoo says, snorting.
"Come on, we really do have to go. I think we're getting close." Jongin flashes him a smile, surveys the injury one more time, and then starts walking. "Let me know if you need any help!"
With a soft sigh and another muttered curse, Kyungsoo follows behind him, letting the post-accident embarrassment wash over him. Smooth, Soo.
Twenty-five minutes of downward climbing and a sudden barrage of Mulan references from Jongin later, they make it to the resting area where the bus is waiting to pick them up, and Jongin is near tears with relief. Kyungsoo is too, of course, but he's not so dramatic about it. They use the bathroom, rinse off Kyungsoo's scabbing wound more thoroughly, and count the number of people from their tour who have already arrived, pleased to note that, in Jongin's words, "Had this been a race, we wouldn't have lost that badly." Then they just sit and wait for the others to arrive in silence, taking off their shoes and rubbing their feet or flicking through their photos. Jongin sings the We Did It song from Dora under his breath, and Kyungsoo bites his lips to hold back a grin.
"That wasn't so bad, right?" Jongin says a moment later as they climb onto the bus, sighing in relief at the air conditioning. His camcorder is up again, recording their victory.
"You told me four separate times that you literally would rather be dead," Kyungsoo points out, getting comfortable in his seat and trying not to get blood on anything.
Jongin grins at him. "You have no proof of that."
"How do you know I didn't record it on my camera?" Kyungsoo's own words shock him. Is he…teasing? Is he making jokes with Jongin? This is an incredibly momentous occasion for him. He's making real progress. He'll even have video evidence.
Jongin laughs delightedly, like he's proud of Kyungsoo, too. "You were a real champ, though. Are you even sore?"
"I'm legitimately contemplating amputation right now," Kyungsoo says, almost giddy with how easily the words slide off his tongue. This is all he needed. Profound exhaustion and a death wish. And the excuse of a camera pointing at his face, encouraging him to be ridiculous. That helps. "I honestly think it might be less excruciating than how I feel right now."
Jongin beams. "There you have it, folks. He does feel pain."
"I'm going to pass out now," Kyungsoo tells him, and he means it. "Wake me up when we get to our hostel."
He falls asleep before they even pull out of the parking lot.
He’ll be mortified about his words later, when he wakes up.
Conquering China (Without Sacrificing the Bank) - Beijing, Days 1 & 2
Written by Kyungsoo
[Note from Baekhyun, The Talkative One: my poor friend Kyungsoo, while exemplary in grammar, is sub-par when it comes to narrative. His photos, however, are beautiful. Please focus on the photos.]
As regular readers will know, a few months ago Baekhyun won a pair of tickets to China in a photography contest (check out his winning submission here). Since he couldn’t go, I veritably lept at the chance to be basically as far away from that annoying bastard as possible. And since we had two tickets, I invited health/fitness/dance YouTuber Jongin (CallMeKimKai) to come along with me to offer his half-decent Mandarin skills and to do some filming. He’ll also be updating his Instagram throughout our trip, so keep an eye on that.
[Image]
Here’s a sloppy selfie Jongin conned me into taking. That’s me on the left, and Jongin on the right, being way less obnoxious than Baekhyun.
We landed in Beijing and are staying at a hostel here. Note that little ‘s’ that makes it different from a hotel. That ‘s’ stands for savings. (Not really.) I’ll talk about ways to save money out here in future posts but for now, let me just say this: hostels are great, they’re cheap, they’re convenient, but you get what you pay for.
[Image]
As you can see, we only have one bed, and that’s about it. And it’s not a particularly comfy bed.
On Day 1, we went to the Great Wall, a quintessential Chinese experience, but probably a bad idea if you just got off a 13-hour flight and subsequently woke up at 4am. Regardless, we sucked it up, we only shed a few tears, and we saw the Great Wall of China.
[Image]
Gorgeous, people. I usually have my doubts about how hyped up big tourist attractions are, but this one was worth it. It was hot and sunny, we felt like dying after the first flight of stairs, Jongin got harassed by persistent Chinese peddlers, but damn. That is one big wall. (And a lot of stairs.)
[Image]
Jongin taking a break before tackling this particularly intimidating flight of stairs. Possibly praying.
[Image]
This section of the wall was really empty, especially at this time of year, before the tourist rush. Made for incredible photos, and also stress-free.
[Image]
One of the towers along the wall, this one unrestored and crumbling. We passed through over a dozen of these towers, but each one was gorgeous, and each one provided some much-needed shade. And usually another person trying to sell stuff.
I honestly don’t know what else to say about the Great Wall, apart from that it was insanely taxing, and insanely gorgeous. I could write emotive poetry on both topics, but it’s Baekhyun’s job to be flowery and embarrassing, so I’ll show him the pictures and let him do the rest.
We got home around 6pm, completely dead on our feet. Both of us slept on the trip back, so we weren’t too tired, but we were really sore and physically exhausted. But also starving, so we found a little restaurant down the street from our hostel and clumsily ordered something that Jongin assured me was beef and noodles and soup. Whatever it was, it was delicious, and also only 15¥ (~$2.25).
[Image]
Jongin only knows a few of the Chinese characters for foodstuffs, and I know zero, so ordering was a struggle, but the food is all cheap and delicious anyway.
We ate, we walked around a tiny bit, and then we went back to our hostel and showered and went to bed, because we could barely keep our eyes open anymore. Day 1: Conquered!
On Day 2, after another early wake-up, I made various other bad choices; namely, scheduling two days that included climbing in a row. To be quite honest, just walking up and down stairs to get to the subway made us tear up a little. But we made it to Tiananmen Square, where we looked at famous stuff, and then we looked at General Mao’s Mausoleum (but didn’t go in because that shit is creepy and also costs money), and then we went searching for the Forbidden City.
[Image]
Tiananmen Square was packed with tourists, but at least it provided opportunities for people-watching.
[Image]
China loves General Mao’s face.
Here’s a little tip about travelling in general: no one tells you how lost you’re going to get, and how frequently it’s going to happen. We got lost the second we stepped out of the subway car. What exit do we take? Which way do we turn? How do we cross the street? Where does this line go? I’m going in this line. I’m just going to follow these people. Where are we now? Where’s a map? Do you understand this map? Jongin? Jongin, where did you go? Oh, you’re looking at that map. Do you understand that map? Etc. etc. etc. And for a huge, sprawling attraction, the Forbidden City was bizarrely hard to find if you didn’t want to go into it. Which we didn’t, because that costs money.
So genius Kyungsoo had this great idea to go to the park at the back of the place and climb the hill there to look into the Forbidden City, for very few kuai (the much more pronounceable alternative to yuan). Brilliant, yes? No. Legs say no. But we did it anyways, once we found it, and there was much wailing and gnashing of teeth, but at least we were rewarded with this beautiful, only-slightly-smoggy view.
[Image]
The park and hill were really pretty, at least.
[Image]
Worth it, though? Ask me when I get home.
From there, we took a long journey to find a Peking duck restaurant that wouldn’t cost us an arm and a leg, which included a 20-minute waiting time (but they provided snacks!). It was, in all honesty, as good as they all said it would be. (But we only got a half portion because we’re cheap-ass motherf***ers.) (Baekhyun told me to tone down the swearing.) Then we picked up a bunch of street food, which I don’t know the name of but was super delicious and dirt cheap and potentially unhygienic. And we wandered around looking at street stalls and soaking in how incredibly Chinese everything was. And we wept about how incredibly sore we were. And then we went back to the hostel, and picked up dinner and some kind of mango drink nearby because there are mango drinks everywhere. Mangoes for days.
[Image]
Little restaurant, delicious food. The fancy presentation lasted about 0.5 seconds.
[Image]
Busy Beijing streets, with a million types of souvenirs and foods.
Day 2: Kind of conquered!
Anyway, I’ll write separate posts for saving money in Beijing, but here are a few quick tips that I’ve picked up so far:
wash your clothes in the sink if they try to make you pay for laundry service. Let them dry overnight. F*** the system.
if you didn’t pack a towel, or yours smells weird, use that spare bedsheet they gave you. Hashtag winning.
if they offer you free shampoo, use it. Also fill up your little travel-sized bottle. Steal shamelessly. (But not if it’s illegal.)
It’s 9:00pm out here in Beijing, which means bedtime for us before we keel over. More updates to come! And feel free to comment below if you have any specific questions, tips, explanations, or anything of the sort. See you around~
“You’re much more expressive in your blog posts.”
Kyungsoo looks up at Jongin, who’s tapping away on his laptop at 6:30 in the morning on day three of their trip (progress!). He flushes. “Oh, you, uh, read that?”
Jongin shoots him a little grin over his screen. “Of course I did. I had to see if you were slandering my name.”
“And was I?” Kyungsoo asks, feeling hot with embarrassment. He hadn’t thought of Jongin seeing his posts. While Baekhyun’s were usually try-hard artsy and over-the-top descriptive, Kyungsoo’s tended to be sarcastic and to the point, entertaining only in their dry humour and nice pictures. That side of him usually only came out in real life around his closest friends and family; Jongin was never supposed to see it.
“Nah, you mostly just called me less annoying than Baekhyun. I’ll take it.” The younger man laughs. “It was a funny post. I liked it.”
“Baekhyun always threatens to fire me if my posts are too boring,” Kyungsoo grumbles.
“Hah. I should get someone to police my internet content and threaten me if they get boring. All my sisters do is gush, and Sehun tells me it all sucks.”
Kyungsoo snorts slightly. “I’m sure no one finds it boring,” he says, coming off as way too blasé and carefully shutting up before he accidentally says because you’re really good-looking I mean who would get bored of watching that.
"That really was a crap selfie, though," Jongin says with a chuckle, scrolling back up on his laptop. "Your face is all in shadow."
"I don't have much experience taking them," Kyungsoo says, wrinkling his nose and looking away. "Baek always does it. And my camera doesn't have a front-facing screen."
"I'm an excellent selfie-taker," Jongin says, sticking his tongue out just a little between his teeth as he smiles. It's dangerous. "I used to be reeeeeally bad, so Sehun gave me a crash course, so that I wouldn't ruin my Instagram." He makes little quotes around the words with his fingers.
Kyungsoo chews on his lip and nods, and keeps it to himself that he knows Jongin takes nice selfies, he is in fact very aware, because he glanced through said Instagram when he asked Jongin for the link for the post, and he saw many very attractive pictures of him, and it was very bad. He shouldn't have asked, because now he knows, and now he may not be able to stop himself from looking at it.
They've now spent three days total together, plane ride included, and Kyungsoo is making very little progress. He does okay, sometimes, when the camera is out and he has an excuse to say things that are something other than uninterested and bored, but most of the time The Asshole cannot be controlled, and Jongin has retreated with his metaphorical tail between his legs when Kyungsoo inevitably shuts him down more than once. Amazingly, Jongin hasn't given up or snapped at him yet for being a dick, but that may just be because they have over two and a half weeks left together and can't really afford that kind of tension. Or maybe it's because Jongin is an angel. Both equally possible.
"So what's on the itinerary today?" Jongin asks brightly. He's sitting on the floor, against the wall, because it's the most accessible way to use his laptop while it's charging, and he looks adorable in his sweats and Tony the Tiger t-shirt.
"Uhh," Kyungsoo says, fumbling to grab his hard copy from the bedside table. "It's, um. We're exploring the hutong, and checking out some temples, and going to a market, if we're not too exhausted."
"Oh, we will be," Jongin laughs, tapping away on his keyboard. "When are we not too exhausted?"
"No kidding," Kyungsoo mutters. Their jetlag is slowly wearing off, but they keep waking up way too early, and then doing way too much walking and climbing, and generally start feeling like they're about to pass out around 3pm. Kyungsoo wakes up sore. "Is it bad to already want to take a day off?"
Jongin laughs again, and for a moment Kyungsoo is embarrassed, but then Jongin says, "God, I know right? I was all yeah woo let's do stuff every day but now I'm more like...bring on the weird cafés and trips to the park to nap on the benches."
Kyungsoo eyes him carefully over the top of his papers. "Do you...want to do that? Today? We don't have to stick to the itinerary."
"Really?" Jongin blinks up at him. "I don't want to mess up your schedule or whatever. Or stop you from seeing things you wanted to see."
"No, I mean. We have two days left in Beijing, and for tomorrow I only have a few maybes, nothing set in stone. Se we could move today's stuff to tomorrow, and then...today...just relax?"
"Yeah?" Jongin's eyes light up. "I wouldn't mind doing that."
"Okay," Kyungsoo says, fidgeting under his gaze, a mixture of embarrassed and pleased and horrified at himself for trying so hard to cater to Jongin's needs—ignoring the fact that Kyungsoo would die for a day of relaxing. "We can, uh, we can look up some stuff, and find a nice park and some cafés or whatever, and then we can go?"
"Sure," Jongin says, beaming. His fingers start to fly across his keyboard.
They spend the next half hour in silence, only speaking up when one of them finds something worth sharing—"Do you want to go to a cat café?" "This park has a lake, apparently." "This place looks cheap. I love cheap."
They head out another half hour later, maps and directions in hand, dressed in their most comfortable clothes. It's a cloudy day, at last, and the breeze blowing through Beijing is cool enough that Kyungsoo shivers in his loose t-shirt, looking up at the clouds warily.
"Do you think it'll rain?" Jongin asks as they make their way toward their subway station. "I didn't bring an umbrella."
"The forecast said possible afternoon showers," he admits. "So maybe we should go to the park first?"
"Good idea. But breakfast first." And Jongin veers off course for the jianbing stall near their hostel to order two of the egg crepes in broken Mandarin. The ayi at the stall coos at him, and Jongin beams and orders some tea eggs as well.
They eat their breakfast at a rickety little table, then get on the subway and head for the park Kyungsoo had found. It's a weekday, and it's early, so the park is relatively empty of the usual city crowd, and it's nice. The wind picks up over the water, so Kyungsoo pulls on his sweater, grateful he'd thought to bring it along, and beside him, Jongin does the same. That puts them in matching outfits again, but Kyungsoo doesn't mention it, hoping Jongin won't notice.
The park is lovely, all well-manicured gardens and huge weeping willows dipping their leaves into the water, and Jongin buys them overpriced ice creams from a little stall so they can sit by the lake and eat them there. They don't talk, but for once, it's not an uncomfortable silence. Jongin gets out his e-reader from his backpack, and Kyungsoo snaps some pictures of the park and the lake and tries to decide if there's any way he could ask Jongin if he could take a picture of him, looking soft and sweet and happy there with his toes dipping in the water, without wanting to die of mortification. He never asks.
They sit there for half an hour and Kyungsoo finishes his ice cream and takes three dozen photos before he realizes he didn't bring anything else to do. He flicks aimlessly through his phone apps—no games, because he's an idiot—for a few minutes until Jongin says, "You can borrow mine, if you want."
"What?" Kyungsoo turns to look at him, shocked to see him holding out his e-reader. "Oh, no, that's yours. I won't make you give it up." He thinks he stumbles over a few of the words, flustered by the generous offer, but Jongin just smiles.
"I brought my Gameboy. Don't worry about it." He offers the little tablet again. "I'm sure there's something on here you could stomach, I have like a zillion books downloaded."
"Okay," Kyungsoo says, taking it hesitantly. "Thank you."
"No problem." Jongin beams, then takes out his Gameboy Color and his iPod. "Do you want to share my music?"
"Oh, n-no, that's okay. I can't listen and read at the same time." God, why does he sound like a middle schooler with a crush all of a sudden? This is possibly even worse than The Asshole, who seems to have taken a vacation to let Schoolgirl Soo take a turn. God.
Locking his jaw before he can let anything else embarrassing slip out, Kyungsoo browses through Jongin’s e-reader, finding books of every genre downloaded onto it—fantasy, sci-fi, YA fiction, mystery, romance. He picks some kind of spy novel at random and starts to read, only glancing over at Jongin occasionally, watching furtively as he chooses a song on his iPod and turns on his Gameboy.
And then they lapse into silence again, reading or playing, with the only sounds being Jongin's muttered comments about his game and the lapping of the water against the shore and Chinese chatter around them. It's quiet and peaceful and lovely, and Kyungsoo genuinely enjoys it.
For the briefest of moments (really, he only allows it for a second), Kyungsoo imagines that this is what it would be like to date Jongin. And then he very quickly shuts that thought down, because it's absurd and no one wants to date Kyungsoo, especially not bright, bubbly, friendly, very attractive young men like Jongin.
But sitting here at the park with him like this is enough, anyway. Anything more would be...too much. Kyungsoo wouldn't handle it well. It would be one embarrassment after another, probably. He wouldn't even like it, it would never work out.
He keeps telling himself that, even as Jongin holds his phone out and angles it to take a picture of the two of them, teasing Kyungsoo lightheartedly about not smiling big enough for the selfie, and then making a high-pitched sound when Kyungsoo does smile wider, telling him it looks cute. Kyungsoo feels almost sick with embarrassment after—that Jongin had to tell him to smile more, that Jongin noticed how childish his real smile looks—but at the same time, Jongin is so sweet, and so genuine, and Kyungsoo isn't so sure he'd hate dating him.
As if that's even feasible.
|
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kaisooficrec
