The Trouble

by Daria Defore

  "Fuck," Danny moaned, threading his fingers through Jiyoon's hair and trying to figure out why this straight-faced asshole turned him on more than anything. Jiyoon seemed relieved to finally have a face-full of cock, and he'd gone kind of dreamy-eyed as he ran his hands up and down Danny's thighs. He hooked a finger in the waistband of Danny's underwear and dragged them down, capturing the head of his cock with his lips once it was free. He gave Danny a look that said pretty clearly, "start talking," so Danny caught himself against the wall and tried to gather his thoughts.

  "So I noticed you a while ago, right. And I thought, shit." The exclamation also applied to the slow slide of Jiyoon's lips down his cock. "You were always at the bar… so I had a really good view of you. Every weekend. I sang to you, but I don't think you noticed—" At that, Jiyoon made a noise of surprise and looked up at him, which drew a gasping laugh out of Danny. "Uh, chill out, it's fine." He patted him on the head, and Jiyoon rolled his eyes. It was a night of firsts for Danny, who had never seen someone manage to look so annoyed while deep-throating. He tried to catch his breath. "Wow. Okay, so you're really—really fucking cute, like, I'm gonna need help coming up with a better description. Don't make that noise at me. And talking to you was great. It's obvious you're smart and you don't take shit. Not even from super-hot guys like me."

  Jiyoon pinched the back of his thigh, and Danny failed to hold back a whimper. He moved his hands from Jiyoon's head to his shoulders, squeezing them. "You put me in my place. And I guess I kinda dug that. Also, I'm gonna come."

  Sliding his thumb up the underside of his cock, Jiyoon gave him an affirmative moan that rocketed straight up Danny's spine. "Oh, you want me to come in your mouth—cool, okay, that's—" And it didn't take much more than that and he was coming, eyes sliding shut as pleasure and relief washed through him. Jiyoon swallowed and let Danny's cock slide from between his lips. His hands traced up and down the backs of Danny's thighs, while Danny waited for his legs to steady.

  "That was kind of awesome." Danny's voice creaked.

  "Thank you." Jiyoon stood up and nuzzled into the crook of Danny's neck, and Danny made a vow to make him come so hard they would be best friends. He worked his hands under Jiyoon's shirt and stripped it over his head, then maneuvered him back toward the bed. Jiyoon dragged Danny down on top of him, laughing as he watched Danny try to kick his pants off his ankles. "You missed your socks."

  "I'm getting there."

  "No, leave them on." Jiyoon bit his bottom lip. "That's a great look."

  Danny yanked his sock off and threw it in Jiyoon's face, then dodged when it came flying back his way. "Hey."

  "What?" Jiyoon settled back on the bed, and Danny leaned over him, bracing his arms on either side of Jiyoon's head.

  "I think you've got jizz on your cheek."

  "Mortifying," Jiyoon replied in a monotone. His eyebrows raised a fraction of an inch. "Why don't you take care of it?" Danny started reaching for his other sock, and Jiyoon squirmed and hit his arm. "Don't you dare—"

  Danny went for it at the same time Jiyoon shouldered him off-balance, and they wrestled until Jiyoon was breathless and laughing against Danny's lips, with Danny's hands pinned firmly between them. The kiss was sloppy, and Danny broke it to lick the come off his cheek, to the tune of Jiyoon whispering, "Gross," in his ear. He left another kiss on Jiyoon's cheek for good measure and leaned back to grin at him.

  "So what can I do for you?" Danny asked.

  "Mmm… what have you been thinking about?"

  Danny tugged his wrists out of Jiyoon's grip and cupped his face in his hands, thumb gliding over the wet spot on his cheek. "Why don't I blow you, and you can tell me what you're into while I'm down there?"

  "What if I don't want to talk to you?"

  "That wouldn't make you a very communicative partner." Danny made a face at him, then hustled down the bed so he could get Jiyoon's pants off. Jiyoon made an undignified noise.

  "Are you supposed to be my therapist?" Jiyoon asked.

  "No, but I took a human sexuality class once."

  "Fantastic, one class and you're an expert—" Jiyoon's derisive tone went breathy as Danny took his cock in mouth, cheeks hollowing as he happily sucked his way down to nuzzle Jiyoon's stomach with his nose. Jiyoon let out a soft string of profanities. For all his talk, Danny reflected, he was as easy as any guy who liked getting his dick sucked. "You're good," Jiyoon finally managed. One of his hands came to rest on top of Danny's head, soft and warm.

  "Hmm?"

  "Trying to be communicative." Jiyoon let his eyes fall closed and leaned into the pillow. The way his chest rose and fell with each breath, it looked like he was trying to hold his shit together. Danny decided to step it up a notch. He ran his palms up Jiyoon's bare thighs, feeling Jiyoon tense and wriggle against him. Every move drove his cock deeper into Danny's mouth, which was fortunately part of the plan. He got two handfuls of Jiyoon's ass and squeezed, then released, smoothing his palms over his backside.

  "Okay, so here's what I think." He ignored the despairing noise Jiyoon made when he stopped sucking him off. "You deserve some something nice—"

  "And yet you're down there talking."

  "—so why don't I eat you out?"

  Jiyoon's full cheeks had gone very red. "You're not serious."

  Danny was already pulling his hair back into a ponytail. "If that's not your thing, I won't. We could—"

  "No, you wouldn't just offer to—to do something like that. Not without me—"

  "Begging?" Danny finished for him, and enjoyed the embarrassment on Jiyoon's face. "I don't mind. Seriously," he added when Jiyoon scoffed.

  "You're not going to give me a rimjob. You barely know me." Jiyoon said it with disbelief. To Danny, it sounded less like "keep your filthy mouth away from my ass" and more like "I dare you to eat my ass, poser."

  "If you want me to eat you out, turn over. If not, I'll find something else to do," said Danny, who, a minute later, was tongue-deep in Jiyoon's ass.

  "Oh my God," Jiyoon was saying. "Oh my God, oh my God—" It was muffled because he was pressing his face into the pillow and occasionally letting out these full-throated moans that Danny really wanted to hear at top volume. But this was apparently Jiyoon's comfort zone, so Danny didn't mind, and when Jiyoon was clawing the sheets and rocking his hips back onto Danny's face, Danny nuzzled in deeper and rode it out.

  Jiyoon fell apart when he came, flattening onto the bed and breathing hard like he had just been the one taking a nosedive into someone's asshole. He seemed a bit overwhelmed, so Danny ran a hand up and down his back until he came back to earth and finally cracked his eyes open to look at Danny.

  "Oh my God."

  "Do you have mouthwash?"

  "Bathroom." Jiyoon sighed and shut his eyes. When Danny came out of the bathroom with a washed face and clean mouth, Jiyoon was still lying face-down on the bed, legs spread, completely naked, and completely asleep.

  "Ah."

  Danny waffled for a moment. The clock on the nightstand blinked one a.m., and if they weren't going to fuck, he really wanted to sleep. On the other hand, the bed was kind of small, and Danny couldn't imagine Jiyoon being glad to see him in the morning. It didn't seem like that kind of a one-night stand.

  He turned Jiyoon on his side and tucked him in with a sheet, then let himself out.

  Chapter Six

  Danny wasn't exactly dreading going back to school on Monday, but he certainly wasn't anticipating good things. Lei had spent the weekend making wisecracks about Danny acing accounting, while Danny looked at his homework in incomprehensible despair.

  "If this thing with Doubletime works out, d'you think my parents will forgive me if I drop out?"

  "We're seniors," Sam replied. She was tapping numbers into her calculator and deleting them over and over again. "You can make it to the end of the year."

  Danny didn't really even make it to the end of Sunday, because he kept finding himself jotting down song lyrics instead o
f formulas. They were meeting with Erika again to sign the promotional contract that week, and there were a couple open-mic nights coming up that he and Sam were doing solo. It didn't seem like the time to slack off. At least, not musically.

  There was radio silence from Jiyoon all weekend, which wasn't odd per se because the guy had called him annoying right before they went home together, but it didn't make Danny feel any more confident that he had done the right thing by walking out. He had found a notebook and scrawled "You fell asleep! See you in class," on the back of the cover before he left. In retrospect, he wasn't sure Jiyoon would appreciate the gesture.

  "It's not weird that I didn't email to say thanks, right?" he asked Sam as they walked the few blocks to campus.

  "No, it's not weird that you didn't email your TA to thank him for sex." Sam had perfected the art of deadpan, especially when it came to Danny's stupid questions. She had been hearing them long enough, after all. "In fact, it's probably best that you didn't."

  "I don't know, I'm kind of gunning for 'not a jerk', and I feel like I might've fucked that up—"

  "You did, long ago. But you're overthinking this. If anything, he spent the weekend thinking about his breakup. Not you."

  "Oh. Yeah."

  Sam really had a point. It wasn't about Danny at all; it was still about Devin. Even if things hadn't been that great in Jiyoon-and-Devin-Land, the break-up must've sucked. Jiyoon had been desperate enough to come to Danny.

  They parted ways on campus. Danny had an hour or so to kill before European Literature. He waved goodbye to Sam and went to the closest coffee shop, where he was assaulted by the clatter of glassware, dozens of voices, and Jiyoon Lee staring back at him in either shock or horror. Danny stopped short and then the door closed on his back, pushing him into the cafe with a stumble. Jiyoon wasn't looking at him anymore; he was standing with a knot of friends, so Danny just smiled and made the executive decision to Play It Cool and get in line.

  In his efforts not to look, he didn't notice Jiyoon at his elbow until he cleared his throat. Danny nearly flinched out of his skin.

  "Jesus—!"

  "Hello." Jiyoon looked perturbed, but certainly none the worse for wear after that weekend. "Your timing is convenient. What are you drinking?" Jiyoon scanned the length of the line as he spoke. "I think I owe you a coffee."

  "You do?"

  "What do you like?"

  "Vanilla latte with whipped cream." Danny blanked and rattled off Sam's usual without thinking. Jiyoon's straight face was suddenly in danger of slipping.

  "Really?"

  "Apparently, yeah." Suddenly, all Danny could imagine was Devin scoffing as he drank an organic fair trade Ugandan dark roast. "It's actually not bad."

  "Another surprise." Jiyoon sighed. "Sit down. I'll find you."

  It probably wasn't a threat. Danny set up shop at a table by the window, where he could get distracted by the students passing by and call it research. He had still-unfinished homework in his bag, but he chose to pull out his songwriting notes instead.

  Danny had spread his papers all over the table and was drawing a guitar on fire in lieu of writing lyrics when Jiyoon set a cup of coffee down in front of him firmly.

  "There."

  "Thanks." Danny picked up the cup and took a sip. "So you didn't poison this, right? I'm not gonna drop dead any second?"

  Jiyoon checked his watch and raised his eyebrows at Danny. Then a tentative smile came to his face. "No… just a regular apology coffee."

  A perfect vanilla latte, and not a trace of arsenic. Danny took a bigger sip and licked some off his bottom lip. "It's cool, but I don't really get why you're apologizing."

  "I'm mortified," Jiyoon told him, with the tonality of someone explaining that humans breathe oxygen. He took a seat across the table. "I have had ample opportunity to think about this weekend, and I am ashamed. Coffee is the least I could do."

  "Seriously? I mean, I'll take it, but I enjoyed, uh, everything else—"

  "Thank you, but I'd rather not…"

  In the bright light of day, staring across the table at his prim and sweater-vested TA, it finally sank in for Danny how truly awkward this was.

  "This is kinda fucked up, isn't it?"

  "Kind of? Oh, yes. And very… very morally suspect." Jiyoon scrubbed his face with his hands and then ran them through his short black hair, messing it up. "Were you paying attention when Professor Weaver went over the Code of Conduct?"

  "Uh, definitely no." It sounded vaguely like something Weaver had covered while Danny was cowering under his desk. Jiyoon sighed.

  "All right, so, the way I treated you, have been treating you, most certainly goes against every rule about interactions between TAs and students. And I would understand if you felt that I had failed you as a TA and wanted to report me."

  Danny was reeling. "Wait, are you telling me I could get you fired?"

  "Yes. They prefer it when TAs don't solicit students for sex." Jiyoon was outright grimacing now. "Like I said. I feel very responsible."

  "Damn." Danny tried to wrap his head around all this. Suddenly, he was holding all the cards, but it didn't feel right. This whole time, he had assumed he was just a thorn—albeit a super-hot one—in Jiyoon's side. It hadn't even occurred to him that Jiyoon had a responsibility to him, and might feel guilty about it. He dragged a hand through his hair, pulling out the tie that held it back and letting it fall around his face, then shook his head. "I mean, thanks for telling me, but I'm not gonna turn you in. You're actually a good teacher. I listen to the shit you tell everyone else, and you make more sense than Weaver does."

  "You listen to me?"

  "Yeah. I take pretty good notes, too. You know, since you don't really call on me or anything."

  "Right." Jiyoon was cringing. "That was immature of me. And hypocritical. I’m sorry about that. And I'm also…" He flushed and his voice dropped to a low murmur. "I’m sorry I fell asleep and left you to your own devices."

  Danny had the decency to try to cover up his laugh. "I found the door all right. Sorry about the note, by the way. I figured you didn't need me invading your space anymore."

  "That's… very considerate." Jiyoon spoke like he couldn't believe he was applying those words to Danny. "In fact, you were very considerate to me all night, and I have to thank you for that as well. I don't know why I expected anything different."

  "Did you uh, want something different?"

  "No, no, it was—I think it was better this way." Jiyoon took a cleansing breath. "You were probably also expecting something else—"

  He stopped abruptly as a rabbity young woman drew up next to the table, with an equally timid man lurking a couple feet behind her. Jiyoon drew up straight and adopted a blank expression, like he had just been caught red-handed in the cookie jar.

  "Sorry, sorry to bother you—" The woman took a deep breath, and looked right at Danny. "You're Danny Kim, right? From The Trouble?"

  "Uh… yeah. Yeah, that's me." Danny's surprise was turning into pleasant, head-inflating satisfaction. "What's up?"

  "We just, uh—" She reached back and grabbed the man's hand, pulling him up next to her. "Sorry, I just wanted to say hi. We saw you guys play for the first time this weekend, and it was cool…" She gritted her teeth a bit, like this wasn't coming out quite as smooth as she had hoped.

  Danny could relate. He smiled, trying to put her at ease. "Hey, you gotta come to another show, all right? That definitely wasn't our best."

  "Oh, no, it was great—wasn't it great?" She twisted around to look at her friend, who nodded mutely.

  "I really appreciate it, guys. Thanks for the support. Did you want me to sign a notebook or something?"

  There was a lot of fumbling as both of them rifled through their backpacks, and Danny ended up signing a notebook and a Jamba Juice punch card with a ballpoint pen. After profuse thanks on both sides, and reassurances from Danny that they weren't annoying, the fans rushed away and out the cafe door.

&nb
sp; Danny looked back to Jiyoon, who had been completely silent throughout the encounter, minus lending the fans his pen.

  "So, I did not pay them to do that just to impress you." Danny said.

  One of Jiyoon's eyebrows quirked, and so did the side of his mouth. "Lucky you."

  "You're saying it didn't work?"

  Jiyoon's full smile finally came out. "That was… a lot to take in."

  "Dude, I know. I'm sorry. That's not a totally normal thing."

  "But you want it to be."

  "Well, sure." Danny shrugged. "When you put it all out there, it's nice to have someone notice it." From the little frown on Jiyoon's face, it seemed like this conversation was way outside his realm of understanding. Danny decided to bring it back. "Hey, listen. Can we just start over?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "With… you know, everything. I'll try to be less of a dick and maybe… you can stop giving me so much shit in group?"

  Jiyoon winced. "Of course. And I won't—I won't be seeking you out for sex anymore. It was inappropriate, especially given our academic relationship."

  "Yeah, I kinda figured. It's okay." Danny held out his hands. "I get that there's a lot of rules and responsibilities that you gotta follow, but I really hope we can try to be friends. There's not a rule against that, right?"

  "I mean…" Jiyoon was staring somewhere over his shoulder and nibbling at this lower lip. His next words came torturously slow. "I suppose we could try?"

  "Okay. Deal. I'll be your best student, and your, uh, kinda shitty friend."

  "My best student isn't doing his homework right now, is he?" Jiyoon gave a hesitant smile and tapped his finger on the table, where Danny's papers were piled.

  "Okay, for a TA, you sure sound a lot like my dad."

  Jiyoon's face contorted, and then he let out a surprisingly loud, easy laugh. "Sorry. It's a habit."