Chapter Text
Shortly after their debut, Minho takes Seungyoon out to more formally meet Jiho for an introduction that isn’t quickly done in front of cameras for a humorous behind-the-scenes cut. Jiho is the one travelling the farther distance to a restaurant close to Minho and Seungyoon’s dorm, since the former is the one with more years under his belt, and far more freedom what with how he lives on his own now. Jiho arrives after they do, of course, cap pulled low over his eyes, but a smile evident immediately the moment he reaches their table, grasping Seungyoon’s hand and squeezing Minho’s shoulder.
They drink and eat and talk nearly the entire night - Seungyoon and Minho don’t have curfew in the strictest sense, but rather as long as they are within the neighborhood of the apartment complex their dorm is in, they can be up and out as long as they want. Minho knows Jiwon and Jiho are on friendly terms, having found each other without Minho connecting them, but somehow this feels different.
Even though Jiho had messaged Minho himself the way he had with Jiwon, asking about him, about what kind of friendship Minho had with him just simply in the way that anyone would when they’re interested in connecting with a friend’s friend, this - tonight with Seungyoon - feels different. Seeing the one of his best friends of so many years - someone he originally began his dreams with, someone who he had thought he would fulfill his dreams alongside - smiling and laughing with and approving of a friend that he will be fulfilling his dreams with leaves a surreal sort of emotion that Minho can’t decipher or name for himself.
He pretends to look hurt, playfully irritated, when Jiho jokingly starts on how he’ll message Seungyoon for tripe and drinks in a few weeks and Minho isn’t invited. Seungyoon laughs, playing along on how he won’t tell Minho when Jiho texts him from now on anymore.
Jiho leaves first - while he doesn’t have a curfew, he still has schedules in the morning. He says the entire meal is on him even though Seungyoon tries to insist otherwise, but Minho just waves Seungyoon down because Jiho is even more stubborn than the two of them put together. They stay back a bit after Jiho pays and climbs into a cab, finishing the alcohol that’s still on the table and the meat that’s still on the grill.
Once all the food and drinks are finished, and they’re standing up to pull their coats on and pick up their phones, Seungyoon says lightly, “I like him. He’s cool.”
“Yeah?” Minho watches his teammate’s expression.
Seungyoon’s smile is warm and amused when he meets Minho’s gaze. “Yeah.”
During their first Japanese tour, it strikes Minho how little he knows about Seungyoon.
Being with and near Seungyoon, working with him, spending time with him, talking with him, comes so naturally and easily that he doesn’t quite realize how recently he has met Seungyoon compared to other friends he would consider close. The same goes for all of his members, and Minho is comfortable with all of them, but for some reason, the realization is more striking with Seungyoon.
The thought comes to him late, late at night - far past when he and Seungyoon should be asleep what with rehearsal starting tomorrow early in the morning - and they are together, alone, in the lobby of the hotel. They’ve exhausted talking about the actual concert tomorrow as well as the plethora of songs they have partially started but not even close to finishing on their laptops, and somehow, both of them are looking through old school photos.
Most of it is trying to keep to a reasonable volume for two in the morning their incredulous laughter at each other’s varying levels of haircuts they’d rather erase from their, and everyone else’s, memories. Another part of it ends up being Seungyoon narrating, almost detachedly, in a low voice the details that weren’t included when he revealed his past on national television years ago.
He doesn’t say anything Minho doesn’t already know - that anyone doesn’t already know when it was broadcasted out to the entire country - but, here, just the two of them, in the emptiness and silence of the vast lobby, shoulders and legs touching as they sit close on a two-seater, the version of the story Seungyoon offers has all of the regrets, all of the aspirations borne out of them, all of the determination and resolve.
Minho expected it would, naturally, since it isn’t an edited snippet injected for views and sympathy entertainment in the middle of dozens and dozens of other montages for hundreds of other contestants. He doesn’t quite expect for the way it makes him feel, hearing it, and looking into Seungyoon’s eyes afterwards.
He thinks, then, it would only be fair if he return the favor - that Seungyoon also should know all of the fears and anger, regrets and resolutions, hopes and goals, that brought Minho to this point. He knows Seungyoon has heard the abbreviated version before, but he thinks Seungyoon deserves to know everything else.
“I want to do what Jiwon and Hanbin did,” Minho says at the end, glancing for Seungyoon’s expression - for his reaction.
“You want to go through another debut survival?” Seungyoon teases, and Minho rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling. “You’re going to ask to join that show,” he says, a statement rather than a question, once the playful tone of his voice is gone.
“I think it’d be good,” Minho says. “I think it’d be good timing, too.”
Their eyes connect in silence, and Seungyoon holds Minho’s gaze for a long time. “I think so, too,” Seungyoon finally says. “You’re good, after all.”
Minho grins. “I know.”
The next day, they go to the beach with a couple of cameramen.
It’s bright and early in the morning before rehearsals begin, and it was Seungyoon’s idea - bolstered by the encouragement of one of the directors for the tour DVD for extra footage. They fool around accordingly for the cameras, making embarrassing puns and jokes in their rudimentary Japanese - Seungyoon’s far more fluent than Minho’s - and they walk along the shore with the cameras following in their wake.
The staff begin head back to the hotel first, and Minho’s head turns, watching them walk away for a moment and wondering if he could stay out here for longer when he notices that Seungyoon hasn’t even glanced away from the ocean. Minho wonders if it makes him think of home - his home, not just their dorm back in Seoul. Seungyoon’s eyes are covered by sunglasses, and Minho wishes they weren’t, suddenly - wishes he could better see his teammate’s expression right now.
Seungyoon’s bangs are dark and choppy and too long, brushing near the top of his sunglasses when his hair is undone the way it is now. His cheeks are pale and soft in the sunlight and when the seaside breeze blows a little too hard, his full lips purse together as he ducks his head slightly so the wind will blow against the back of his head rather than into his face. The border of large rocks that they are sitting on is expansive but they sit close together, arms and legs touching, and Minho is glad that he too is wearing sunglasses.
It wouldn’t do if Seungyoon could so easily see how Minho is watching Seungyoon through the corner of his gaze.
To say the least, it’s hell.
He acknowledges the mistake he has made, and he has apologized, but the criticisms continue turning into condemnations regardless of what he does. He thinks he’s dreamed about the day that he’s put into the spotlight - he himself as a name and an image - but he had never dreamed that it would be like this. He had expected hatred to an extent, he had expected and prepared himself for the worst sort of vitriol, and what he is receiving is no worse than what he’d told himself could happen.
He hadn’t expected exactly the way it made him feel.
If they are treating him like this when his performance every round had been nothing short of flawless, he doesn’t want to imagine what would happen if he slipped up for even a moment - even a second, one word missed, one line confused, one vague show of uncertainty or doubt or fear - he doesn’t want to know what they would do to him then. He doesn’t want to think about what they would say, and he’d never known until now how much exactly words alone from faceless names could hurt.
He had always thought that when the time came, he could take it - drank in all the advice from Jiho and Jihoon about what it will feel like when the time inevitably arrived that they too would swarm and attack him for his character, personality, past, family, friends. He figures now it was one of those feelings that couldn’t be described - that would always seem manageable when someone else was telling you how it felt, but when you felt it yourself, it was entirely far more terrible.
The night after the filming of the battle round, he asks the manager to drop him off at the agency rather than the dorm. Minho gets a look of intense concern through the rearview mirror, and he avoids his manager’s gaze, looking down into his phone and pretending as best he can that he’s fine, and he just wants to get a head start on the next round even though that’s naturally impossible as the team producers haven’t even chosen yet who remains for the following round.
But it’s the best and only excuse he has, and their manager seems to know that Minho needs this right now. Minho only has his wallet and phone with him, leaving his bag in the van after he hops out of it and heads on through the doors of the company entrance. He knows that if he rummages around somewhere in his studio, he’ll find enough alcohol to get him a little past tipsy at the very least, which is all he needs and probably all he can handle right now.
If he gets too drunk, he knows he’ll end up in a worse place than he already is in - a place he doesn’t want to return to, and swore that he never would.
By the time the studio door opens and Seungyoon steps in, expression clearly taking in the lack of lighting and the stench of alcohol, Minho has gotten himself to the precise stage of inebriated that he had been aiming for. He doesn’t look up as Seungyoon takes a seat across from where Minho is on the couch. “Did Seho-hyung text you?” he asks, as the vocalist settles into the office chair at the studio table.
“No,” Seungyoon says, simply, taking the paper cup out of Minho’s hand and peering into it before draining the rest of its contents. Minho raises his eyebrows mildly at that. Seungyoon doesn’t usually drink so easily. “I heard you come in down the hall.”
“You knew it was me?”
“I guessed,” Seungyoon grins slightly, putting the cup down. He eyes the empty bottles.
“Filming was rough,” Minho says, even though he doesn’t owe anyone any explanations - least of all Seungyoon. He’s never been that kind of leader and he never will be - it’s why he makes a good one, in Minho’s opinion.
“I guessed that, too,” Seungyoon’s voice is light.
Minho moves his eyes away from Seungyoon’s hands, glancing at his teammate’s expression. Seungyoon’s gaze is as light and unassuming as his tone. From the loose shirt, jeans, and frames, Seungyoon has most likely been working since this morning. Minho remembers him already being gone when Minho came out of his own room to get into the van for filming. There’s hair falling along the top ridge of Seungyoon’s frames, and Minho knows it’s the stress and weariness and alcohol playing on him, but his fingers twitch slightly against the cotton of his sweatpants. He inanely imagines what it’d feel like - what it would be like - to reach up and brush Seungyoon’s hair back away from his glasses.
It isn’t a normal thought to have about your teammate - Minho knows that.
Seungyoon doesn’t ask Minho if he wants to talk about it and Minho is thankful. Minho knows that Seungyoon knows Minho doesn’t need advice or comfort. Seungyoon knows Minho knows in his mind everything that he needs to - his heart just can’t help feeling what it does when the hatred and judgment ceaselessly pour in day after day.
They sit there in silence for a while. Minho isn’t sure how long exactly, but enough time passes that Minho finishes the bottle he had opened when Seungyoon came in and two more following that. Minho is glad Seungyoon doesn’t take the lack of conversation as a cue to leave, and he’s also glad that Seungyoon doesn’t attempt to make conversation.
He’s grateful - so, so grateful - for the company and the quiet.
He’s grateful for Seungyoon.
Minho’s phone tells him that he’ll get barely four hours of sleep tonight by the time they reach their dorm, but he insists to Seungyoon that they walk back anyway rather than take a cab. The summer air is muggy and sweltering, but Minho doesn’t care - he’s too drunk to do so, and he doesn’t want to be in a car right now.
Any other time, Minho knows Seungyoon would have complained and convinced Minho with ease to take a taxi instead. Tonight, Seungyoon goes along with Minho’s request without even an expression of reluctance or protest, and Minho wishes he didn’t understand the way his heart stutters in his chest as he watches Seungyoon wordlessly pack up his bag to leave his own studio.
He wishes he didn’t understand why he feels stone cold sober when Seungyoon smiles at him on the way to the door, slinging the strap of his bag over his shoulder.
The walk back is filled with muted conversation that is mostly Seungyoon talking about the pieces he worked on today - the new pieces he began and the ones he has begun to wrap up. Minho’s drunken haze relaxes him enough to be able to walk and listen to Seungyoon’s voice without focusing on how much he likes hearing it wash around him and calm the frayed edges of his mind from today.
When they’ve reached the apartment building, as they stand in the elevator, waiting to arrive on their floor, Minho feels Seungyoon’s eyes on him suddenly. Minho has seen this gaze before but he hasn’t seen it in a few years - hasn’t felt it on him since they were fighting for their future and Minho made a mistake that, at the time, seemed so painfully monumental and crushing.
It’s okay , Seungyoon had said and he hadn’t been Minho’s leader yet. Minho had still been the leader, but even if to Minho’s mind, those were the words and tone that only a leader should have, Seungyoon hadn’t been saying it as one and he never did - never does. There is never and has never been anything patronizing or pitying in Seungyoon’s voice, and even though he’s the leader now, he doesn’t say it as one.
He just says it as Seungyoon, and even if he suddenly weren’t the leader anymore, nothing would change.
That same expression is in his eyes as he says, in that same tone, warm and sincere and simple, “You’re doing it right, if you’re scared - I think.”
From the walk through the midsummer’s night humidity, the edges of Seungyoon’s hair that have gotten a bit too long curl almost damply from the thin sheen of sweat at the sides of his face. They stick slightly to the top curves of his ears and his frames have slid down his nose so that his eyes look over them rather than through them. Minho doesn’t have a response to Seungyoon’s words, and he doesn’t trust himself to speak when his heart seems to want to crawl its way up his throat.
The elevator arrives in time for the silence between them to remain comfortable even if Seungyoon had been expecting a reply. Knowing him, however, Minho doubts he was. A glance over to meet Seungyoon’s eyes confirms that as he aims a small smile at Minho while they step out together, walking down the hall towards their dorm.
“Thanks,” Minho says as Seungyoon unlocks the door.
“Should’ve known you forgot your key again,” Seungyoon continues to smile, even though his eyes make it loud and clear he knows what Minho means - he always does.
When the filming wraps up, it’s late enough at night that it could be considered morning in barely an hour or two, and Minho is solidly buzzed. They filmed the scenes with Alexa first before it became too late, and then finished up with the takes of him drinking inside before packing up for the night. He had been drinking casually throughout the filming but it became more than one bottle, maybe two, maybe three and it was the good stuff - on the stronger side - and Minho was glad for it.
Seungyoon had insisted on watching it all, mostly the first portion of filming and then he was pretty much stuck at the site after the others had been shuttled back, so he had ended up sticking around waiting for Minho to finish entirely before they could both head back to the hotel. This means that, now, Minho is in a dark car, his head leaning against the cool glass of the window, face tipped to the side just enough that he can make out Seungyoon’s eyes glinting from the lights of the passing buildings.
“She said you’re a good kisser,” Seungyoon’s grin is visible even in the blackness surrounding them. “A great kisser,” he adds, teasingly, and Minho can’t do this right now - he can’t - not at this time of night, not when the fact that they’re so far from home tempts him with how dissociated an encounter here could be, not when he’s on the right side of tipsy, not when this has been all he could think about for past weeks - he just can’t do this now.
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” slips past Minho’s lips before he can stop himself.
Seungyoon laughs.
That’s right, after all, this is how their relationship has always been. Their banter has always skirted suggestive, they’ve always been on the edge of flirting on or off cameras - in front of fans or when there was no one else but each other. This is how it has always been between them since Minho arrived at the company, since they’ve become comfortable around each other, but somewhere amidst greeting the early mornings after sleepless nights, somehow through the afternoons spent together in vans looking through the music on each other’s phones, at some point - for Minho - friendship became a concept that blurred itself into something else entirely.
Minho waits for Seungyoon to follow-up the laughter that rang musical, and melodious, in the quiet of the car.
I’ll pass.
No thanks.
Either of those, any of those, anything along those lines - Minho waits for the strange tightness in his chest to be alleviated by the peace of indirect rejection, but nothing comes. Seungyoon’s laughter simply settles into an easy, small smile, eyes turning to look out through his own window. Minho stares across the space between them. Seungyoon had taken his jacket off as soon as they’d climbed into the car, tossing it onto the empty seat that separates them. The leopard-print shirt that was part of the costume beneath the leather jacket is still on him, sleeves rolled up now however to his elbows, but the buttons are still left open below his collarbone, and it’s still haphazardly tucked into his dark pants.
His hair has gotten long again - as long as it’d been when they’d first met, and it was back to the same color, too. Minho thinks maybe it’s even longer than before because he doesn’t remember it curling at the ends like this the first time he’d seen it down to the vocalist’s eyes.
The rest of the ride goes by in silence, and Seungyoon falls asleep halfway back to the hotel. Minho looks away.
At the same time that they tell him about the nomination, they also let him know that he’ll be performing that night and that Seungyoon will be sharing the stage with him. The performance is going to be minimal and simple, quite literally just him and Seungyoon going around on the stage set as they please, and since they’ve got group schedules crowded in these days finally, they don’t bother rehearsing together until a few nights beforehand.
They decide to leave the key as it is since Seungyoon has no problem with it, and from there, they look at the stage blueprints sent to them by the director and organizers. There’ll be plenty of time to figure it out more during the dress rehearsal tomorrow, but both of them like to go over a rough idea of what’ll happen before they try it out at the actual venue.
Going over the song itself takes all of twenty minutes, and then, technically, they’re free to go - free to call the manager to drive them back to the dorm. Minho takes a seat on one of the benches near the sound system, flipping his mic around in his hand once he’s turned it off and staring at the screen of his phone in his other. The time reads half past midnight, and they really should be heading back.
Seungyoon sits down beside Minho. “You’ve texted Seho-hyung already?”
“No.” Minho pockets his phone and glances at the other man. “Let’s eat here.”
He earns a look that is equal parts unimpressed and highly amused. “I’m not eating chicken again,” Seungyoon says, and Minho will never understand how he manages to have a wide, easy grin on his face while still sounding utterly and fatally final about whatever he is stating.
Minho wraps both hands around Seungyoon’s wrists and tugs them back and forth, shaking the vocalist imploringly. “What do you mean again - we haven’t chicken in like a week - c’mon.”
“We had it like three times last week because of you,” Seungyoon yanks himself out of Minho’s grasp even though he smiles. “Either we get sushi or I’m leaving.”
“You get sushi,” Minho says, “I’m getting chicken.”
Seungyoon’s smile broadens. “Either you get sushi too or I’m leaving.”
Minho blinks. “What the fuck?” the words come out laced around an incredulous laugh.
“I’m doing this for your arteries, you can thank me later,” Seungyoon says, making a show of pulling out his phone and dialing the Japanese restaurant they always order from whose number Seungyoon - naturally - already has stored. “So - what do you want?”
“I’ll leave, then,” Minho stands up, jokingly, and when he looks back down at Seungyoon, he’s met with dancing eyes and full lips pursed with bit back humor.
“Be my guest,” Seungyoon salutes Minho, even as the rapper simply sits back down and elbows Seungyoon in the side. Seungyoon’s small laugh is smug as he hands his phone over so Minho, who hasn’t memorized the entire menu of this place, can decide what he wants to eat.
The entire day was an emotional rollercoaster from start to finish, and it definitely ends up being the latest they’ve ever finished filming for the show. They don’t get back to the dorm until near midnight, which, before they’d begun a show with young children whose body clocks were nearly the opposite of theirs as young adults in the industry, would’ve been considered absurdly early. Now, however, their bodies are already ready to fall asleep as they cross over the threshold of their apartment, and there is also the addition of their early wake up times now - they have to be up in less than seven hours.
Minho does a short stream with Jinwoo and Seunghoon to greet the fans as it is his birthday, and even though he can’t give away the details of the filming, he wants to at least show his face and converse with them even if for just ten minutes. His birthday is more or less over by the time the stream finishes up, and Seunghoon and Jinwoo go to wash up, but Minho stays on the sofa. Both bathrooms will be occupied right now anyway, and he ends up reaching over to where he’d placed the kids’ letters near the lamp on the table next to the couch.
He’s still looking over them again - slower now that he has the time to do so, and without the obstruction of hot tears trying to be held in - when Seungyoon walks into the living room, in pajama pants and nothing else as he often does, dark hair damp against his flushed face, Bei cradled in his arms. The cat jumps smoothly down to the floor off of Seungyoon’s lap seconds after he takes a seat on Minho’s free side, as the rapper is sitting right up against the arm of the long sofa.
Being around Seungyoon after he’s taken a shower is always the worst - his skin is sensitive to temperature, and just warm water coupled with the steam generated by it is enough to turn him pink at the hands and cheeks. Because Seungyoon has been using the same shampoo since Minho has ever begun living with him, the scent of that exact shampoo, mixed with the clean smell anyone has after taking a hot shower, never fails to make Minho’s throat dry.
After Bei had taken his leave, Minho sees that Seungyoon had actually come out here with more than just a cat in his arms. “What’s that?” Minho asks, jerking his head down at the small, wrapped lump in Seungyoon’s lap. He already has a feeling what it might be, however, the ends of his mouth curling upward before Seungyoon even hands it over.
“Don’t cry on me, okay? I just showered.” Seungyoon snorts at the size of Minho’s grin at this point and the expectation that the rapper knows he can’t keep off his face anymore.
“Can I open it in front of you or should I open it later in case I don’t like it?” Minho says, already tearing through the paper.
“Have I ever given you anything you didn’t like?” Seungyoon snorts again, as Minho finishes unwrapping the gift.
Minho crumples the wrapping paper up and places it in the pocket of his sweatshirt so none of their pets end up eating it, and shakes the shirt that was within it out. The fit is loose, the sleeves are long, and there’s an extremely realistic and perfectly imperfect spray paint job done all over it. The entire affair is exactly his style - as everything Seungyoon gives him always is - and beneath how happy he is about the gift, how he already is thinking about when he can first wear it and what he’ll wear it with - beneath all of that, his throat goes from dry to tight at the thought of how well Seungyoon knows him.
“I like it,” Minho says, when he realizes that the silence is anticipatory and Seungyoon has been waiting for a response. “It’s fucking my style.”
“Of course,” and, there, again, there’s smugness laced through his voice that only makes Minho want to close the distance between their mouths with a hand against the back of Seungyoon’s neck. Seungyoon leans back into the cushions, tapping his palm against his thigh hard enough to make a sound and then Rei is appearing from around the corner, running towards them and then hopping gracefully into Seungyoon’s lap.
Minho folds up the shirt, taking the letters from the kids off the table again and consolidating it all together in a neat pile in his arms. He doesn’t hear the water anymore from either bathroom, meaning Jinwoo and Seunghoon must be finished showering - and yet, Minho can’t bring himself to stand yet. Seungyoon’s bare shoulder and arm are pressed up against Minho’s with Rei lying nearly on his back in Seungyoon’s lap, balanced half in the crook of the vocalist’s elbow, ears poking into Minho’s own arm.
“I can’t believe you actually really thought we’d forget your birthday,” Seungyoon snickers - the way his eyes smile softly at Minho however is at odds with his tone and expression. “I can’t believe you thought I’d forget.”
Stop.
Don’t say that.
“You forget to feed Jhonny all the time, though,” Minho counters casually, even as his chest aches and caves.
“She’s your cat,” Seungyoon’s voice rises at the end with equal parts amusement and indignation.
Minho shakes his head. “Heartless,” he says, putting the cards into his sweatshirt pocket and slinging the shirt over one shoulder. He stands up and takes Rei out of Seungyoon’s arms. “Well, this isn’t your cat either.”
As soon as Minho makes an attempt to let Rei curl against him, however, the cat suddenly squirms and jumps back for Seungyoon, landing beside him on the sofa and giving Minho a flat look - though most all of Rei’s expressions are flat. Minho glares back - just a bit - he knows Rei’s favorite is Seungyoon but Minho had been the one to clean up Rei’s mess at least twice yesterday night.
“He isn’t yours either clearly,” Seungyoon laughs, mouth open wide and head bowed forward slightly. His laughter rings through the late night silence of the apartment, fading into a pleased expression as he runs his fingers around the backs of Rei’s ears.
“I’ll give you two some privacy, then,” Minho pretends to sniff, turning to head in for a shower finally.
He’s just about to round the corner for his room to drop off what’s in his arms when he hears, “Minho.”
Seungyoon is fully turned back to face the rapper on the sofa, arms resting on the back ledge. The smile on his face knocks the breath out of Minho’s lungs, makes that ache in his chest intensify to the point where Minho is actually rather impressed at how he manages to still remain upright. “Happy birthday.”