Chapter Text
No one had told him that life was going to be like this. Life didn’t come with explanations, generally, there weren’t usually directions or warning labels. Still, Porchay took it pretty personally that no one had ever come up to him and been like ‘Hey, kid, if you don’t stop your brother he’s going to become a mob wife and you’re going to spend the rest of your life worried about being kidnapped’. Maybe Yok could have done that for him if only she hadn’t been supportive of Porsche’s new mob wife lifestyle. So instead of living a boring, average life, striving to become a musician so he could play the live music at the bar on the beach his brother always dreamed of (or more likely, playing at bars around Bangkok for scraps) Porchay was now living a life where he had to worry about getting kidnapped by strangers in karaoke bars.
Someone was singing an off-key rendition of some song in English in the booth next door. Porchay rested his head against the wall and thought idly about whether or not they were thin enough that he’d be able to do something like break them.
“ I said get off me !” An annoyingly familiar voice dragged Chay’s attention away from the question of whether or not he could escape through some form of industrial damage. When he looked to the door he saw Macau shoved through it, his eyes blazing and his arms pulled behind him. When Macau spun around to kick wildly at the men who had shoved him into the room Porchay got a glimpse of gleaming silver locked around Macau’s wrists.
Ah, cuffs.
Chay scratched at the plastic table in front of him. It was covered in similar light scratches and faded damage from copious drinks placed on it without a coaster. He waited out Macau’s attempted kick fight and also the long string of swear words Macau shouted at the shut, and locked, door of the karaoke booth. He waited until Macau calmed down enough to realize that he wasn’t alone and his ‘cousin’ turned to give Porchay a withering glance.
“Are you just going to sit and wait to be rescued?” Macau snapped, “You’ve been stuck in here for what, fifteen minutes? Your hands aren’t even tied up!”
“Oh, yeah, I should try and escape.” Chay stood up and tried to step forward, the cuff on his leg clanging against the long bolt that held the table attached to the floor.
“…” Macau looked at his cuffed ankle, “well fuck, sorry, I guess.”
Did he find it more annoying that Macau had apologized or that Macau had thought he’d just be sitting there, waiting to be rescued?
“What do you mean 15 minutes?” Porchay questioned, coming back around to what Macau had said. He glanced down at his wrist only to scowl when he remembered that his watch had been taken. They probably wouldn’t have taken it if Porchay had been wearing his old, cheap wristwatch. Unfortunately one of the only gifts that Kinn and Porsche had dropped on his doorstep (or on his bed) that Porchay appreciated had been a smartwatch. He liked the functions, the way it meant he didn’t have to pull his phone out to check the time, or the weather, and it also meant that the texts his hia sometimes rapid-fire sent him could be read quickly and just as quickly ignored. Pulling out a phone so that he could be sure Porsche wasn’t texting ‘gunfight breaking out, might die, love you’ could get exhausting.
The smartwatch had been slipped from his wrist at the same time some guy had snapped the cuff around his ankle. It had happened at gunpoint, Porchay’s hands held away from his body as he was patted down for his phone and any weapons.
He hadn’t had any weapons on him, he never did, they’d be more of a danger for him than anyone else. It wasn’t like he had grown up learning how to stab or shoot someone. The worst he could do was a choke-hold, the best he could do was a knockout.
“Oh,” Macau glanced around the room and then moved to lean against the wall a few steps away from Porchay, “I saw them bring you up. What were you thinking, following Mĕe?”
‘That P’Mĕe had a crush on me and I was going to get laid,’ sounded bad, even in Porchay’s head. He gritted his teeth and did not snap at the other boy. Normal people were allowed to follow upperclassmen into darkened rooms to get kissed, they didn’t have to question whether the reason a guy had been watching you closely was because they wanted to kidnap you rather than kiss you. Bodyguards weren’t something Chay should have to worry about, he was still getting used to being followed around when he went out, still getting used to having a driver and having to clear when and where he went with his brother. It was a fight every day to keep the bodyguards at a distance, to keep them in the car instead of in the classroom. Chay had thought that he and Macau could have bonded over it. Macau griped as much about the bodyguards as Porchay did but Macau had been raised in the kind of environment where everything was a danger.
While Porchay might have had to worry about debt collectors and someone getting it into their head that Uncle Thee wasn’t a good guardian, he hadn’t had to worry about getting kidnapped or stabbed.
“Whatever,” Macau shrugged and then jerked his arms, suddenly he was rubbing his freed wrists as the handcuffs clattered to the floor behind him. “I called backup.”
Flopping back down onto the seat of the booth Chay groaned, “My brother’s never letting me have fun again .”
After that thing with the minor family attempting to over through the main one (something Porchay did not completely understand and no one had bothered properly explaining to him) Porsche had gotten so overprotective that Chay had been climbing the walls of the Theerapanyakul building. While he hadn’t been allowed to leave it Porsche had been going in and out day by day, establishing himself as some kind of mob boss. Helping his little brother process the trauma of their mother’s resurrection, the death of their old lives, or Porchay’s terrible dating choices had been nowhere on Porsche’s radar. It had taken months for Porsche to even realize that the reason Chay hadn’t had any issues at school for not going to classes was because Chay hadn’t signed up for university. One shouting match later and Chay hadn’t even had a choice not to go. It had meant he could finally leave the damn compound before he became Tankhun.
Macau snorted, “Don’t worry, I didn’t call Porsche.”
Who the hell else could Macau have called? The mysterious ‘Vegas’ who Porchay only ever heard through closed doors before Porsche would spot him and hurriedly hang up?
“Isn’t your brother-” locked up, out of town, or healing? Chay would have asked but Macau cut him off with another snort, this one louder and followed by a quick snicker.
“ Oh boy , wow, no, my brother would like absolutely love to meet you but I’m not going to let that happen,” Macau’s smile was a little manic and his eyes were wide as he pulled a small black sleeve out of the waistband of his pants. A moment later a tool that Chay assumed was a lock pick was held between his fingers. “With my luck, he’d probably want to fuck you too, which, wow , like I don’t think I could handle that.”
‘Fuck me too?’ Chay stiffened as Macau fiddled around by his bare ankle, the back of his neck bare and strangely vulnerable. While Macau’s clever fingers and the sharp line of his lock-pick worked at the cuff around Chay’s ankle, Porchay’s mind raced. Did Macau want to sleep with him? Or maybe it meant something else. Had Vegas fucked Macau’s friends before? Were he and Macau friends? And wait, Vegas had a boyfriend now, Pete. Was Vegas cheating on Pete?
Annoyed, Porchay ran a hand through his hand and let out a groan, “Well who did you call?”
The lock of the cuff clicked open in time with an alarm ringing deep in the club. Porchay startled, bumping back against the wall as he stared at the closed door.
“Not your brother,” Macau steadied Porchay with a hand on his hip and grinned up at him, “or mine. Someone way cooler.”
Way cooler.
“There’s a fire,” Porchay didn’t want to think about that, to follow the line of ‘way cooler’ and the way Macau grinned up at him from his knees, “We should-”
The hand at his waist tightened and Macau stood up while shaking his head, he was so close Chay could feel the wind created by the movement. He could smell the soft scent of Macau’s soap and shampoo, a familiar scent. The fact Kim and Macau smelled the same made Porchay feel insane. At first, he’d put it down to the idea that all high-end personal care smelled the same. The fact that Kinn and Tankhun smelled different wasn’t something he put much thought into. Once he found out that Macau would spend time with Kim, not just time but spend nights with Kim, he had been assailed with the thought that Macau didn’t just use the same products as Kim but also might have used Kim’s products.
There had been a total of three times that Kim had let Chay inside his apartment, all but one of those times had only been a stop-over for Kim to change his jacket or drop off his guitar. The third time had been because of a torrential downpour and the time spent in the apartment had given Porchay ample time to steal one unopened bar of soap and a travel shampoo bottle. There had also been time to slip one of the printed selfies he had taken into Kim’s guitar (and under Kim’s pillow, tucked under a pile of takeout chopsticks, and inside a book of English poetry). That had been the last time that Chay had been over at Kim’s apartment. The two of them had both gotten busy with schoolwork and when Kim wasn’t at school he’d been in the studio, their weekend hang-outs (that Kim had never called dates) fell to the wayside and Kim had often left Chay on read.
In hindsight, it was clear that Kim had been trying to distance himself. While he had not outright ghosted Porchay he’d come close enough that if Porchay had been anyone but a love-struck teenager he’d have seen it. Porchay had been a love-struck dumb teenager though, so he’d tracked down Kim’s friend Mic and coaxed them into revealing Kim’s schedule. Not that much coaxing had been needed. Porchay had dragged the toe of his shoe along the ground and claimed that Kim was supposed to meet him for tutoring but it looked like he had forgotten could P’Mic tell him where Kim had gone?
It had worked the first time too, Chay showing up and looking sad and asking if Mic had Kim’s address because Chay hadn’t lost it.
A thump startled Porchay and he bumped against the wall behind him, slipping and falling back into the booth. His elbow banged on the table and a moment later Macau fell on top of him. Tangled up, Chay wheezed as his head fell against the booth’s cushion and he stared up past the fluff of Macau’s hair at the karaoke bar’s ceiling.
After the first nerve-shattering thump others followed, the sound of bodies hitting the floor or being thrown against the wall. Porchay couldn’t possibly discern exactly what was going on outside but his imagination ran away from him with scenes from an action movie occurring one after one until the thumps stopped and Chay’s heart raced to the time of the fire alarm instead.
“Do you think-” Porchay shoved at Macau’s shoulders, “you could get off?”
The lock on the door broke as it was kicked inward, followed by Kim Theerapanyakul wreathed in a cloud of menace. Though perhaps that was just the hint of smoke and blood that followed him in.
“The two of you shouldn’t be here,” Kim said, voice flat. He made his way across the room with a speed that spoke of danger and a smoothness that dripped malice, “It’s not safe.”
The vibes were bad and Porchay was pissed off. It was supposed to be a fun night out with friends, it was supposed to be a chance to get laid, or at least to relax. Maybe it was just because Kim always seemed to piss Chay off when he showed up.
To piss Chay off and make him cry.
“Why isn’t it?” He threw out, angrily, and shoved himself out of the booth too fast and too hard. The steps he took to make up for the momentum propelled him right into Kim’s space, right into Kim’s face. “It’s within the radius of the minor family’s territory! The bodyguards-”
A finger was pushed into Chay’s face, pushing him back, and Kim slipped right past Porchay’s guard on his way to Macau.