"What are you staring at?" Yushan spoke, finding Jun off guard. Jun knew he was staring, but he had forgotten he was staring.
He blinked quickly, feeling the weight of Yushan's voice pull him back into the moment. The air between them tightened; Yushan didn't even look up right away, his eyes still half-focused on whatever he was doing. Jun felt his heart stutter once before his mouth moved on its own.
"Not really you," the words left his mouth before he could think through them. "It happens, people tend to think I'm staring at them when in real sense my eyes are passed them." He didn't look away or shift, just let his eyes drift slightly past Yushan, pretending that his focus was somewhere behind him, anywhere else.
Yushan finally looked up, "I didn't say you're staring at me," he said, voice unreadable. "I asked what you are staring at, and you made it clear yourself that you were staring at me. I mean, don't you have anything better to do?"
The tone wasn't loud or cold, just steady and flat, but it hit Jun harder than he expected. There was something in the way Yushan said it, not rude, but detached, the kind of tone that told him he wasn't worth being bothered by.
"Actually," Jun said, his voice slipping out before hesitation could stop it, "I was staring. But when I stare, it's not because I'm enjoying the view. I'm irritably waiting for you to finish whatever you're so engaged in, so maybe we can talk like grown-ups."
The words came out sharp, tighter than he intended. He knew right away he had crossed a line, no junior actor in their right mind would dare talk like that to Yushan.
Even those who had been in the company for years, older or more established than him, still spoke to Yushan with visible restraint.
But Jun told himself that since Yushan had been acting so distant, so stubbornly unreadable, he might as well test the waters. He wanted to know just how far Yushan's boundaries went, and what would happen if he pushed just enough.
The silence that followed stretched too long. Yushan's brows knitted, a faint crease forming between them.
The look on his face wasn't anger, it was something closer to disbelief, almost a stunned reaction.
He turned fully to face Jun, his body shifting in a slow motion that made the air around them feel even heavier.
"What do you want to talk about?"
The question should've been neutral, but it carried something else, a quiet edge that made Jun's throat feel dry.
"The reason we're stuck in this room together," Jun said, "is because of developing chemistry. But we barely talk to each other, so we can as well ask them to release us from this endless suffocation." He said it too quickly, almost spitting the words out before he could think them through.
Yushan's expression didn't shift much. His face stayed calm, but the look in his eyes made Jun's stomach twist.
"Don't we already have the chemistry they needed?" Yushan asked, his voice still perfectly flat.
The words landed like a small, quiet blow. Jun blinked once, trying to process them. The chemistry they wanted? The way Yushan phrased it, clinical, made it clear he wasn't talking about their chemistry, not something real or mutual. It was just something expected by the directors, an obligation to fulfill.
"I realize that we don't even need to talk all the time or do other stuff to develop one," Yushan continued, his tone calm as ever. "I mean… the scene we did today, it was kind of top notch, the chemistry came out naturally. Isn't that the kind of chemistry everyone is talking about?"
The mention of the scene they did earlier made Jun's face burn instantly. It wasn't that he had forgotten it, if anything, it had stayed in his mind all day, vivid and stubborn. He had just been forcing himself not to think about it. Trying to treat it like what it was supposed to be.. an act. A script to follow, a job to do.
Jun could still feel it, the warmth of the kiss, the electric pull beneath his skin, the way every nerve in his body had come alive like it was the first time he'd ever felt anything real.
His heartbeat had raced, his breath caught somewhere between shock and want, and even now the memory clung to him like static.
He tried to tell himself it was just the scene, just what acting demanded of him. Maybe this was how a kiss was supposed to feel, and he only thought it meant more because he'd never kissed anyone before.
But the thought unsettled him. The fact that he had nothing real to compare it to... no line separating performance from truth, made him uneasy.
A small, restless part of him ached to feel it again, to know if it would still be the same off camera. And that craving alone scared him enough to force the boundary back into place. Acting was acting. Feelings were feelings. He couldn't afford to let the two blur, no matter how vividly his body remembered.
"But if you feel like there's still a gap in our chemistry," Yushan said suddenly, breaking the silence, "we can deepen it with something personal, like actually knowing each other. So tell me… Xiao Jun."
The way he said his name carried a strange formality, almost like he was reading it off a list.
"How did you get a job here? Did you go to college for acting or it's just a talent? Why did you decide that you want to be a BL actor and not the other… straight actor? How does your family take it? Are they okay and supporting you doing this, or did you decide to follow a dream without caring about other people's opinions? Are you actually gay or straight? How many siblings do you have? Are you the last born, first, or middle? Mmh… what else?"
He spoke quickly, almost rhythmically, like the questions weren't meant to be answered but thrown out to see which one would make Jun flinch.
And Jun did. His face stayed composed, but the edge in his eyes hardened. He didn't miss how easily Yushan had mixed those questions... professional, personal, and intrusive, as if there was no difference between them.
"I don't really think those questions are valid," Jun said, his voice tightening. Even the way he spoke betrayed that something among Yushan's questions had hit too close. "We can focus on ones that concern us with our stay in this company and the project we have."
His tone wasn't defensive, but it wasn't steady either. There was a flicker in it, a strain that told Yushan exactly what he wanted to know, that one of those questions had landed somewhere Jun didn't want anyone to touch.
Yushan tilted his head slightly. "What do you mean? Go on then, and ask the kind of questions that you think are valid."
Jun hesitated for a second. His heartbeat was loud in his ears, the kind of sound that made it impossible to think clearly.
He wanted to pull back, to choose something harmless. But the thought that had been sitting at the edge of his mind since they met finally broke through.
"Like…" His throat went dry before he could finish. "…what really happened with you and Xin."
The words left his mouth before he could stop them. And as soon as they did, he knew he had gone too far.
He didn't look up, unable to bring himself to see Yushan's reaction.