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“Are you sure you don’t need help?”
Ryan abruptly drops the split log into the campfire, and the flame roars up with a burst of sparks. The rush of heat is even sharper in the chill of the early spring evening. He jumps back, but quickly recovers as he turns back to Min-Gi with a smile. “Nah, it’s fine!”
The night sky hangs clear and blue over the roadside campground where they’ve settled for tonight. Ryan’s got the portable grill fired up. He’s prepared a packet of pork belly, fresh cut and rubbed over in seasoning—a bit beyond their usual budget for groceries, but they’ve had a steady flow of work these past few weeks. With his bare hands, Ryan reaches into the fire pit to move the logs around (a habit which used to make Min screech) so he can balance a closed cast-iron pot (full of rice, waiting to boil) over the heart of the flames.
This will be fine! This will be good.
Min deserves something nice, anyway. Especially right now.
“I will never get used to seeing you stick your hands into an open bonfire,” Min says from the back of the van, mini-synth in his lap. He sits with his legs dangling off the edge of the trunk, one foot in a sneaker and the other wrapped in a makeshift brace. It’s been over a week now since Min fell, and he’s been taking it well. Suspiciously well.
( When they left the clinic, Min leaning on a crutch, Ryan had tried to do what seemed like the sensible thing and said, “Hey, if you need to rest... maybe we should cancel this week’s shows.”
Min had stared at him like he was the crazy one. “What? Dude, it’s a sprained ankle, not a broken arm. As long as I’ve got a chair, I’ll be fine.”
“Are you sure?” An uneasy feeling pulled at Ryan’s stomach. “Wait, you’re not pushing yourself because of me, are you? Min, I promise, I’m not gonna hold it against you if—”
“Ryan.” Min shook his head, then smiled. “I know you wouldn’t. That’s why I know I’ll be fine.”
“That doesn’t even make sense,” Ryan grumbled, “but sure, I’ll trust your judgment.” )
Min-Gi’s been handling himself like a pro. He was right—the injury didn’t affect his ability on the synthesizer, so they’re still playing gigs like normal. He has to lay down in the back when they’re riding in the van, and sometimes he bites back a hiss when he gets up too fast or fumbles his crutch (and putting too much weight suddenly onto the injured foot) but otherwise, he never complains. Well, except for when he’s accusing Ryan of fretting over him.
“I just don’t get how you can do that ,” Min says with a gesture towards the fire, “but you freaked out when I tried to hand you the grill lighter.”
“First of all, you’ve seen me do this dozens of times! Like when we used to camp out in my backyard. Second ,” Ryan says, whirling around, eyes narrowed, “you were trying to get up!”
“I was barely leaning forward—”
“I told you that you don’t have to do anything,” Ryan says, breezing across Min’s protests. “I’ll make dinner and you can rest up to recover from playing a week’s worth of shows with a sprained ankle.”
“I keep telling you, it wasn’t that big of a deal,” Min-Gi grumbles. But it is! Ryan wants to argue. It’s been eight months on the road together, but this is the first time either of them has really gotten hurt. If it was Ryan who’d fallen, then that would be okay. But Min… this kind of thing shouldn’t happen to him. Min’s new to this. Min had to get past so much fear and anxiety and near-death experiences just to even make it to this point: bickering with Ryan over dinner, which they’ll eat in a van that permanently smells like musty carpet and ineffectual air fresheners. So now, Min deserves to enjoy himself. It's important for Ryan to ensure that being here is fun and relaxing and, and, and worthwhile for Min-Gi.
Putting the smile back on, Ryan says, “This isn’t a big deal either, Min. Just relax. I’ve got this covered.”
---
After the rice pot boils over and the grill leaks ominously dark puffs of smoke, Ryan suspects that perhaps he doesn’t have this covered. But it’s too late to back down now. They’re in the middle of nowhere and they can’t let food go to waste without at least trying to eat it. With mismatched oven mitts and a battleworn spatula, he scrapes what he can salvage onto a pair of paper plates.
Hm. Hm. One side of the pork slabs looks… not too far from freshly laid asphalt. And the rice might be melting together in a wet paste. He pokes it around with the spatula, trying to arrange it into something that looks intentional. Maybe it won’t be so bad if he ups the presentation…? (Nope, still looks bad!)
Antsy, Ryan glances back at Min. He’s muttering under his breath, a new tune forming on his stylophone, totally lost in his own world and showing no signs he’s witnessed Ryan’s terrible food crimes. In the past half hour, he’s surrounded himself in a mess of papers and notepads; Min likes to look over their previous notes as he works on new music, making sure their setlist doesn't come off as repetitive. It’s a concern Ryan never really dwelled on alone. With Min, it’s different. Lyrics come clearer, melodies flow smoother, and their respective voices fill each other’s gaps to make something more… just, more.
He almost doesn’t want to interrupt Min now, especially not for… what he’s about to inflict upon him… but Min-Gi looks up, expression half-lingering in concentration, tongue sticking out of his mouth. “Oh, hey. Dinner’s ready?”
“...Yep!” Ryan says, forcing a cringe into a smile. Maybe this won’t be so bad. Maybe they can laugh about it later. With a sword dangling over his head, he carries their meal to Min.
They sit side by side at the edge of the van’s open trunk, plates of food smoking dubiously.
He takes a bite and—
Ah. Hm.
The rice is mushy, like porridge, yet… crunchy. But at least the pork came out fine! Once you gnaw through the hardened burnt-black exterior...
Ryan grimaces, lets the food sit on his tongue long enough to actually taste it. The flavor isn't bad. It’s solidly okay! But the texture , Jesus Christ.
Eyes watering, it’s easier for Ryan to swallow his pride before his own cooking. “Okay, I fucked up,” he says, setting his own plate aside before turning to Min. “You don’t have to—”
Min swipes a hand over his mouth, setting down his plate. His plate, which is empty. “I don’t have to what?”
Ryan stares at him. “Dude.”
“ What? ”
“Tell me you didn’t eat all of that. I’m gonna have to call poison control.” Ryan jabs a warning finger towards him. “Do not tell me you actually enjoyed the meal, man, I just ate the same thing and I’ll know you’re lying.”
Min rolls his eyes. “I enjoyed the meal, Ryan.”
“Liar! Deceiver!”
“The rice should’ve been cooked with less water, and probably stirred around once or twice—”
“There we go, there’s the honesty, thank you.”
“—and the seasoning is practically nonexistent, so I’m guessing it was burned right off—”
“Okay, okay—”
“—and the meat’s pretty dry, but hey, I’ve known Dumpty’s regulars who’d probably love that—”
Oh, that cuts deep. It’d cut deeper if not for the mischievous glee that lights up Min’s face like almost nothing else.
“ Alright ,” Ryan groans, holding back a smile. “Looks like you haven’t totally lost your mind. Glad to hear it. I thought we were roasting the pork tonight, not the Ryan.”
“Anyway, as I was saying,” Min continues, crumpling up the empty paper plate, “I enjoyed the meal.”
Is this pity? This feels like pity. But fine, Ryan can suffer through Min’s pity since, again, this was Ryan’s fuckup, on top of all the other fuckups Ryan’s made recently. Like when he didn’t realize Min was carrying too much luggage down a really narrow, rickety staircase at that shitty motel, and didn’t move fast enough to catch him when he fell, and couldn’t figure out what to do with himself until Min, the big idiot, tried to stand up on his own.
( And he’d gasped , just a small, rushed inhale, but from the clench of his jaw, it was so, so obvious he was trying not to show how much it hurt. But it did. It hurt for them both.
As Ryan helped him up, Min had made some wisecrack that neither of them could remember now. Something about pride not being the only thing that comes before a fall?
Then, he’d cocked an eyebrow and a shaky grin at Ryan. (In better conditions, it’d have been more effective. Min could be charming—he was already so stupidly handsome—but he always played it off like a joke, like he seriously didn’t comprehend the effect he had on… on anyone with functional eyes.) Right then, Ryan fucking knew Min was more worried about trying to calm him down in that moment, even though he’d just sprained his own ankle.
And when he realized that… he hated himself so fiercely and loved Min so much and couldn’t understand why, why, why Min thought he had to reassure Ryan or pretend to keep it together when Ryan was the one who practically begged him to join him on the road, the one who brought them to that seedy below-safety-code motel, the one who needed to prove he was capable of thinking about someone other than himself— )
Min regards Ryan patiently. He’s picked up Ryan’s half-eaten plate and a knife and diced the pork up into tiny pieces. “Easier to get past the burnt bits this way,” he says, as he hands the plate back to Ryan. “Really, it’s not bad.”
Under the attention of those quiet, dark eyes, something loosens from under Ryan’s tongue.
“I should be able to do more for you,” he mutters. “You’ve been great. Everything’s better now that you’re here. You take care of—um, of all kinds of things, and you just make it… easier.”
Min’s the one who found the portable grill at a thrift store, and the cast iron skillets at a garage sale. Min’s the reason they land so many shows: he hunkers down for research in every new city, finds out who’s who and what venues they’ll have the most luck getting worthwhile gigs from. When Ryan sleep-crashes in the back of the van or on a motel bed, Min shoves pillows under his head so he won’t get a crick in his neck. (Ryan doesn’t think Min knows that Ryan knows he does this, and he won’t call Min out as long as he doesn’t stop.) Min drives at the crack of dawn as Ryan’s waking up, and he drives after dark when Ryan’s burning out. Every day and every night, Min’s there.
How did Ryan ever think he could make it without him?
“I mean, wasn’t that what I was supposed to learn on the train? That I need to look out for you?”
“Yes,” Min says. “And so do I. We look out for each other. If you’re worried about which of us is doing the better job, well…” Min shrugs, turning his gaze to the campfire. “We have the rest of our lives to balance it out, don’t we?”
Ryan opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He opts to shove in the burnt pork instead. (Min’s right; it really isn’t so bad.) They watch the sparks rising from the flames disappear into the pitch-black night, like stars winking out. Once Ryan’s cleared his plate, Min shakes out the quilt and drapes it over their shoulders.
They know the depth of their promises to each other. It hasn’t been necessary to spell out the specifics; they both know what you’re stuck with me means.
But…
There’s a piece of Ryan that’s never left the gas station parking lot where he stood nearly a year ago, glaring down at a payphone and wanting something so bad he couldn’t see any point going on without it. He hadn’t realized it was still lingering there until Min’s words put it to rest, bringing it back to him whole.
“We do,” he agrees, and lets Min tuck the quilt around them tighter, a cocoon against the cold.