Chapter Text
Johnny stops the car at a stop sign at the intersection of Random Street #1 and Random Street #2 in Nowhere Town of Where The Fuck Are We State and Dongyoung stares blankly out the front window as he sucks on a ring pop he found in a convenience store close to campus back when they were still amongst human civilization. Mark is laid out across the backseat, drooling all over his arm, but he's just as useful like that as he'd be if he was actually awake.
The clock on the dashboard reads 10:37 AM - just too early for Dongyoung to want to strangle someone and yet Johnny's fake grin in his peripherals is taking him there.
Sucking in a breath through his nose, Dongyoung slowly pulls the candy out of his mouth with a deliberate wet smack.
"John."
"We're not lost."
Dongyoung turns to glance at the boy in the driver's seat with a raised eyebrow. He waves at the scenery around them, ring pop glistening where it's hooked around his index finger. "We're going to Toronto but it looks like we're in the middle of Ghost Town, Kentucky."
Johnny grins. "To be fair, outside of cities, most of the States looks like this."
Dongyoung runs his tongue over his lips. He didn't waste away his childhood at hagwons studying English so he could enter an American university so he talk shit to his friends back home just to die in some dusty, backroads town.
He slips the ring pop in and out of his mouth and reaches for his pocket with his other hand. "I don't even know why you got off the highway. I'm opening Google Maps."
"No!" Johnny reaches over the center console and snatches the phone out of Dongyoung's hand. "We're not lost, Doyoung, really," he says, but there's just enough uncertainty in his eyes that he can't be trusted. "I'm taking the scenic route."
Dongyoung looks at his captive phone and then up and Johnny's big, round, believe-me eyes. Slipping the ring pop into his mouth, he flips the lock on Johnny's Mazda and pushes open the door to the car, mumbling around the candy as he slides out. "Goodbye, John. I'll have better luck hitchhiking to Canada."
There are a number of things that led to this exact moment of Dongyoung furiously shaking an unconscious Mark Lee while Johnny tries to placate him - Dongyoung joining the Korean American Student Alliance in his freshman year, Dongyoung applying to the University of Illinois at Chicago instead of staying in Korea, Dongyoung studying English instead of Chinese, Dongyoung being born an asshole with a superiority complex who would then decide to do all of the former things listed - but the most pivotal moment happened two months ago.
The Dongyoung of two months ago made his first mistake when he didn't lock the door to the bathroom before getting in the shower one Saturday morning in January.
He turned off the water once he was finished and pulled back the shower curtain to see Mark sitting on the edge of the sink. Gasping, Dongyoung tried to take a step back reflexively and his shoulder knocked into the wall behind him.
"Ow, fuck." He reached back to rub at his sore bone and narrowed his eyes at the boy sitting on the edge of his sink and staring back like a cockroach that just had a light shined on it. "Mark, why are you in here?"
When he entered the shower, Mark was definitely not in the apartment, let alone in the bathroom with him.
"I...um, I wanted to ask you something." Ears redder than a boiled lobster, Mark scratched the back of his neck.
"And it couldn't have waited until I was out of the shower?"
Mark chuckled awkwardly. "Well, you know what they say about the element of surprise."
Dongyoung's towel was on the rack just outside the shower and he finally reached out for it. "Sorry, no, I don't speak English," he said in Korean as he dried himself off.
"Hyung."
Ignoring him, Dongyoung wrapped the towel around his neck and stepped out of the shower. He took to getting dressed in the bathroom, just because it's usually too cold to walk back to his bedroom with damp skin. Taking his lounge pants, he slipped his legs into them and pulled them up over his ass.
Mark kicked his feet against the cabinet under the sink. "Okay, maybe I wanted to see you naked."
Glancing at the other boy out of the corner of his eye, Dongyoung snorted. "I believed you more when you said you needed to ask me something." Mark huffed and the older of the two laughed. "I'm also going to pretend like I don't know Johnny made you come in here and ask what you want."
The accusation made the red in Mark's ears flood into his cheeks. "That's not..." He shook his head. "Whatever. Do you want to go somewhere with me for spring break?"
"With you?" Dongyoung repeated, reaching for his thin, long sleeved shirt to pull over his head. "As in, just the two of us?"
Mark gave a boxy, non-smile. "The two of us plus Johnny?"
"Pass."
"Hyung, please," whined Mark. "We're going to take a road trip."
Sucking in a long breath, Dongyoung held it for suspense before exhaling out, "Double pass." He grabbed his lotion out of the cabinet above the toilet.
"Hyung."
Squeezing past Mark, Dongyoung pushed open the door to the bathroom, stepped out into the hallway, and then closed the boy inside again.
The door quickly opened again and soon a hand closed around Dongyoung wrist.
With a light tug, Mark turned him around. "Doyoung, just... I'd like it to just be the two of us, but then we'd have to just stay here considering neither of us can drive and the highway bus is trash. So, I asked Johnny if he'd come." He pressed the pad of his thumb against the inside of Dongyoung's wrist and rubbed small circles in his skin. "It's only a couple hours in the car together and then we can ditch him."
It sounded like an excuse Johnny would draft for Mark to say, but Mark also looked so genuinely hopeful with his still red cheeks and soft pout, that Dongyoung couldn't help but sigh.
He had always been weak against cute boys and it would be his demise.
"...Okay."
A wide grin broke out on Mark's face. "Okay?"
Dongyoung nodded, at the time choosing to believe he wasn't making a huge mistake. "Yes, I'll go."
At the very least, in the moment, the bear hug Mark gave him was a nice consolation that everything would be okay.
The Dongyoung of two months ago made his second mistake when he watched Johnny highlight lines on a paper map in their living room and didn't immediately change his mind about the trip.
"What are you doing?" he asked from the doorway to the kitchen, opened family size bag of sour cream and onion Lay's chips tucked against his chest with one arm.
Johnny hummed. "Nothing."
Dongyoung pinched two chips out of the bag and shoved them into his mouth. "Doesn't look like nothing," he said around a full mouth. Looked a lot like bullshit, if he was to be completely honest.
Johnny glanced up shortly. "Can I have some?"
"No."
Sucking his teeth, Johnny went back to studying the map. "I think it'll take us eight or so hours to get to Toronto."
Yeah, that was what their old friend Google said when Dongyoung looked it up. He didn't know what the point of the map on the floor was, though.
Or rather, he knew Johnny was going to do some dumb shit like lead them from a book of maps, but he tried to tell himself that maybe Johnny just wanted to paste it on the wall or something, like a momento - that there was no way Johnny could be so idiotic to attempt an early 2000s, cheesy montage filled teen movie cross country road trip like that.
(Maybe Dongyoung's problem is that he never gives their stupidity any validity until it's too late.)
"Mark, wake up. We're hitchhiking."
"Doyoung, get back in the car. People are going to look."
Dongyoung narrowly misses bumping his head on the roof of the car as he stands up. Johnny has exited the car too, ready to chase him down, and Dongyoung glares at him over the top of the car. "What people, John?" He turns around. There's farms lining the road on either side of them, their fields still bare in the early spring cold.
He ducks down into the car again. "Mark." He shakes the boy furiously with the hand not wearing his ring pop.
Groaning as he joins the living again, Mark slaps a hand over his face. "What's going on?"
"Johnny's big head got us lost."
Johnny pokes his head into the car. "I'm just trying to find gas."
"So we're lost and running out of gas, got it." Mark rubs his eyes with the heel of his palm. Worming his body around until he's sitting up, he pats around his waist with his eyes still squeezed shut. "Let's just look up a gas station." He pulls out his cell phone to Johnny's dismay. "We're still in the States, right?"
Dongyoung snorts. "Who knows."
Mark finally opens his eyes at that and squints through tired, contact-less eyes out the rear window. "Oh, so we're lost lost."
"The point of this trip is to make it without technology, guys." Johnny sighs, flopping into the driver's seat.
"You." Dongyoung jabs a finger in Johnny's direction. "Shut up. Lying about looking for gas as if we didn't pass a gas station when you first got off the highway."
"Maybe we didn't need gas then."
"Yeah, and we need it now because we're lost." Dongyoung rolls his eyes. "I know basic math, Johnny. I can put two and two together."
Mark looks up from his phone in surprise. "You know that idiom?"
"I had a dictionary back home," Dongyoung explains offhandly.
Humming a noise of no meaning, Mark looks at his phone again as he swipes his thumb around the screen. "So, I just typed in our hotel cause I don't know what else to do, and it says the highway is, like, forty minutes away."
Frowning, Dongyoung glances at Johnny who frowns back.
"Scenic route?" Johnny says as if that means anything when he's been driving aimlessly for almost an hour.
"And there's a McDonald's."
Dongyoung slips his ring pop in his mouth and claps his hands. "Great. Let's go. Mark, get in the front since you have the directions."
"Yessir."
He moves out of the way enough for Mark to slide out of the car once the boy finds his glasses on the floor, holding himself against the open door. Mark bumps into him anyway, but instead of apologizing, he hooks a finger in the ring of Dongyoung's diamond ring shaped lollipop, pulls it out of the older boy's mouth, and slips it into his own with a summery giggle.
Fucking cute boys and their games.
Mouth left gaping fish open, Dongyoung stares at the boy as he swivels around to get to the passenger side door. Popping it open, Mark takes the candy out of his mouth to grin wide.
"Thanks."
"You're not welcome?"
Once they're both seated and buckled in, Johnny tosses Dongyoung's phone into the backseat. "Can you two not be gross?"
Dongyoung picks up his phone and slumps into the seat as he loads up Twitter. "Shut up and drive."
Apparently the ice cream machines at McDonald's still don't work even in the middle of nowhere - granted, there's no point in fixing something that's hardly being used - but it's fine because it's not like Dongyoung actually wants ice cream when it's four degrees Celsius outside. It's just interesting how certain things around the States are constants: like the uneven bob the mother of four boys in the booth across the fast food place has; or how outside the city, every car has an ugly, fading bumper sticker for their owner's conservative views.
The older woman behind the counter slides across the extra cups of honey mustard Dongyoung asked for and he scoops them up in his hand with a mumbled thanks. Instead of returning to the table, he stops by the service table in the opposite direction and knocks his hip into Mark's.
The younger boy glances at him over the top of his glasses, chuckling. "Hi."
"When we get back on the road, we should both sit in the back and cuddle and make Johnny uncomfortable," Dongyoung says as he digs out a handful of napkins to steal and keep in his bag for emergencies.
Mark laughs harder, replacing the cap to his coffee after adding some cream. "How long are you going to be mad he got us lost?"
"Until either of us die, probably."
Dongyoung's been known to hold a grudge over the smallest of things. He still hasn't forgiven Moon Taeil from first grade for taking the lead role of Prince Charming in their meaningless play and could probably pick him out from a lineup today, thirteen years later, even though Moon Taeil most likely has no recollection of ever knowing him.
Mark squeezes the back of Dongyoung's neck. He trails a hand down his spine and leaves it a light ghost on the small of Dongyoung's waist. "I think maybe you're just looking for an excuse to cuddle."
Dongyoung sniffs and brushes the hand off his back. He might not mind the touch, but he's not trying to be a victim of unsolicited white Christian morals in a McDonald's in the middle of America's country asshole. "Maybe if you were Jaehyun, I'd be looking for an excuse to cuddle," he says, slipping away from Mark and turning back toward the table.
Following like the sweetest puppy dog, Mark slings an arm around his shoulder. It's a little uncomfortable for them both, but Mark isnt going to retreat and Dongyoung isn't going to make him.
"Don't lie, hyung. Jaehyun is stiff."
Dongyoung pets Mark's hand that's lying against his collarbone. "Those are called muscles, sweetheart."
"You guys are so slow," comments Johnny when they reach their booth table in the corner. He drags a limp fry through the ketchup squeezed in a glob on his open big mac wrapper, other hand propped up on its elbow and cushioning his chin.
Sliding onto the seat across from him, Dongyoung kicks at his leg under the table. "Don't talk to me about being slow. We could have been at the border by now if it wasn't for you."
Mark takes the spot beside Johnny, sliding his coffee onto the table. He steals a fry from the eldest boy as he laughs. "Guys, can we not fight at the lunch table? This is a place of peace."
Dongyoung looks over at Johnny who returns the stare while sticking out his tongue. Mumbling in Korean about having to spend his vacation with a biggest fails compilation video come to life, Dongyoung opens his box of fifteen nuggets.
"I can understand you." Johnny picks up another fry.
"That's why I said it."
"Does anyone want my pickles?"
Dongyoung points a finger at Johnny just as Johnny slides over his wrapper to Mark who slaps the warm pickles next to his burger.
"You know, if you don't eat your vegetables, you won't grow any taller." Johnny slides his burger back in front of him and reaches for his large cola.
Dunking a nugget in honey mustard, Dongyoung snorts.
Mark takes a bite out of his chicken filet sandwich. Over a full mouth, he says: "Thanks for the advice, dad."
"You're welcome."
A bit of honey mustard gets on Dongyoung's finger and he leaves his half-bitten nugget in the sauce as he brings his finger to his mouth to suck it off. "This isn't going to work out if you refer to each other as dad and son."
"I've heard people find it hot," Mark says, as if he really knows anything about that.
"Taeyong isn't a person; he's a waste of oxygen filling a human shell."
"I'll tell him you said that," Johnny says.
It's sounds like it's supposed to be a threat, but that just turns it into a joke. A single tear beads at the corner of Dongyoung's right eye and he flicks a finger at it with a breathless laugh and a shake of his head.
Mark chuckles too, just because he's always been a little amused by Dongyoung and Taeyong's thinly veiled dislike for each other. He thinks it's a 'not recognizing this guy is more similar to you than you think and there's a lot of potential for him to become your best friend' sort of thing.
It's not.
"I could tell him myself if you really want me-- excuse you?"
Dongyoung stares at Mark who returns the look with that stupid, sweet grin of his as he pops one of Dongyoung's nuggets into his mouth.
Mark covers his chewing mouth with a hand as he giggles. "Sorry, thought you were more distracted than that." He sinks down in the faded seat and then a moment later Dongyoung feels legs hook and tangle with his.
"You're literally eating a chicken sandwich."
"It's not the same as a good nuggie though."
It's stupid, really, how much Dongyoung wants to kiss this loser.
"You look like you don't know if you want to break his glasses or make out." Johnny snorts, lips wrapped around the straw of his soda.
"It's kind of like one of those optical illusions where both options are correct depending on which way you're looking." Dongyoung resolves to lightly shove his heel into one of Mark's calves.
Mark mumbles out a soft 'ow' but he's still wearing that grin.
"And I'm back to third wheeling." Johnny sighs and takes a long, dramatic sip of his cola before sliding the cup back onto the table with a dull clap.
"The only wheeling you're good at since you can't drive."
Johnny gives Dongyoung a look. A second later his gaze shifts to something between Dongyoung and his eyes widen.
Brows furrowing, Dongyoung turns around to see what he's looking at.
There's the sound of something moving on the table and then Mark choking out 'dude, oh my--' around a wheeze.
Dongyoung turns around to Mark slapping Johnny, whose cheeks are oddly full, in the arm. He glances down at the white, paper box in front of him to see it askew and missing a few more nuggets.
He looks back up with a glare. "Really?"
Cheeks puffed up like a blowfish, Johnny tries to pucker his lips at Dongyoung. They're grease-slicked and there's a bit of nugget at the corner of his mouth.
"You're disgusting."
Johnny shrugs and powers through chewing the mass in his mouth.
Dongyoung looks at Mark as he drags the box with his remaining nuggets toward himself and out of reach. "I thought I liked you enough to spend time with him," he throws his head at Johnny, "but I was wrong. We should have taken the Greyhound."
All Mark does is laugh.
"As if your ass was gonna sit on a twelve hour bus ride." Johnny scoffs.
"Pretty sure I'd actually make it to Canada and in less time than we will now."
"If you want to make that bet, I can take you back to Chicago."
Dongyoung rolls his eyes. "Cute threat. Might have meant something if you actually knew where the fuck we are right now, but you don't."
"Then walk!"
"I was going to!"
Mark finally reaches for his coffee and lifts it up to his face, his glasses fogging from the heat.
By the time they're back on the road, with a full gas tank and Johnny's phone in Google Maps navigation mode, it's already close to noon. Mark doesn't sit in the back with Dongyoung, choosing to sit shotgun and take control of the aux cord. Dongyoung slouches in his seat, presses his cheek against the seat belt strap, and listens to the organized chaos of alternative R&B playing through the speakers.
He pulls his phone out of his pocket to check his social media accounts that he's already checked a million times. Yoonoh has added a short video of him doing absolutely nothing but looking beautiful to his Instagram story and Dongyoung has half a mind of call him out for using the app for its genuine thirst-trapping purpose — Dongyoung's own Instagram feed is full of aesthetic shots and more selfies of Johnny that the other boy took and uploaded behind Dongyoung's back than of Dongyoung himself — but he lets Yoonoh live his best life in peace.
There isn't much else that's changed since the last time he checked the app fifteen minutes before and it's the same for Twitter, so he drops the phone between his legs and glances out of the window as Mark begins to sing along to Tinashe.
"Doe? ...Hey, Doe?"
Dongyoung blinks his eyes open at a touch to his thigh, unsure of when he closed them and drifted off. Johnny is looking back over the seat at him, a small smile playing at his lips.
Dongyoung frowns and glances up at the rear view mirror and sees Mark staring straight ahead. "I thought Mark couldn't drive," he says.
A part of him is wondering if he should sound the alarm bells that they're going to crash, but Frank Ocean is serenading through the speakers and he can only lift a hand to rub at his eyes.
Mark glances at him through the mirror. "I know how to drive, I just don't have a license," he says. "But these are open roads, so it's not like anyone's around."
That sounds like an excuse someone who doesn't actually know how to drive gives before they sverve off the road or get pulled over by some cop hiding behind a conveniently large bush, but Dongyoung lets it go.
What's he going to do? Demand Mark pull over?
"We hit a rest stop like an hour ago and we got you something to eat, if you're hungry," says Johnny.
"You didn't wake me up?" Dongyoung finds his phone and lights up the screen to check the time. His eyes widen when he sees he's been asleep for almost two hours.
"Didn't want to hear your voice." Johnny grins and tosses a plastic bag between the seats.
Dongyoung scowls as he picks up the bag that fell into his lap and peeks inside it. There's a sandwich, a can of Arizona half and half, and a bag of peanut M&Ms. "Fuck you," he says, hardly sparing a glance up as he takes out the chocolate candy.
"Fuck you," Johnny hisses back. "You've been bothering me all day."
Mark laughs. "Don't make me pull this car over, boys."
It's common knowledge that Dongyoung can argue about the simplest of non-issues forever, but he settles down - not because Mark wants him to, but because he doesn't want to give Johnny any more of his energy. Tearing open the M&Ms, Dongyoung shakes a few out into his palm and pops them into his mouth.
"Thank you, Doe."
When Dongyoung glances up at the rear view mirror, Mark is giving him that sweet, boy next door smile.
"Whipped," Johnny mocks, hiding it poorly behind a fake cough.
Dongyoung pops another M&M into his mouth and takes out his phone. ‘i will beat your ass’, he sends to the older man in a text.
Johnny snorts. ‘wow im so scared. how will i defend myself against dongyoung kim and the leftover mcd's french fries he calls arms 😪😴’, he replies.
Dongyoung throws an M&M at Johnny's head. It hits him perfectly in the back of his ear and Johnny lifts a hand to touch the spot as he turns around to look at Dongyoung with narrowed eyes.
"Bite me," Dongyoung mouths wordlessly.
The car suddenly rolls to a stop on the side of the road. Both Dongyoung and Johnny turn their attention to Mark.
"We weren't doing anything," says Johnny.
Mark rolls his eyes. "I have peripheral vision, I could see you making faces at him," he says. "But that's not why I stopped. We're getting on the highway that'll take us straight to the border so we need to switch."
"Oh, right."
Getting past the border isn't so bad. They ask the usual questions - how long will they be in Canada, where they're going to stay, what they're going to do, how they know each other - and glance over their passports before letting them go. Then, it's just the same dragging ride but on Canadian land.
"Aw, man, I wish we could go to Niagara," Mark says suddenly.
Dongyoung sips at his half and half, tapping his fingers on the side of the can in time with the discordant melody of an FKA Twigs' song. "What's stopping us?"
Mark looks back between the seats and reaches out a hand, wiggling his fingers. "It's on the other side of Ontario. We'd have to drive past Toronto," he says. "Can I have a drink?"
Pretending to be annoyed, Dongyoung sighs and passes over the can. He unashamedly stares at the way Mark's adam's apple bobs as he swallows.
"We can always drive out there another day," comments Johnny. "Not like we have anything specific planned."
"That's true." Mark hands Dongyoung the can again with a smile and a tiny air kiss that makes Dongyoung's heart clench. He turns back around and starts fiddling with his phone, searching for a different song to play. "And I think it'd be best if we rest a little bit. We can just explore the area around our hotel later on today."
"I'm always down to rest." Dongyoung says.
Johnny snorts and even though he doesn't exactly know what he means by that, Dongyoung still reaches over the seat to pull his hair.
The man behind the wheel swats at Dongyoung's hand like it's a mosquito. "How many rooms did we book again?"
"One." Dongyoung gets a hit to the top of Johnny's head in before he unbuckles his seat belt and slides across to be behind Mark.
"Jesus." Johnny sighs.
Mark, true to form, laughs. "If anyone should be sighing right now, it's me. I can only imagine what tonight is going to be like with the two of you."
"A great time," replies Johnny, all the sarcasm he can muster in his voice.
Dongyoung gives a small hum. "Oh, absolutely fantastic."