Chapter Text
Dowoon is only half-awake when their manager asks the question, so really, it isn’t entirely his fault. It’s one of those Friday nights where they’d practiced until late and had the next day off which meant only one thing for Dowoon: he would most definitely be sleeping on the couch. Thing is, the whole Jae-and-Brian-are-a-thing thing wasn’t really a huge spectacle or surprise for any of them--they’d figured it out a couple of months before debuting, when the yelling from Jae and Brian’s room had turned into, well, a whole other kind of ruckus.
The kind that made you want to stuff plugs into your ears--or if you were Dowoon and had the unfortunate circumstance of being assigned the same room as them, get the fuck out of there.
Now, their manager has been through a lot with the boys. There was the whole he-who-must-not-be-named leaving thing, the whole trying to pry Jae’s Twitter account out of his hands after he’d threatened to tweet #managerhyungdoesntwashthedishesyoudidnthearitfromme (something he only understands after Brian makes the mistake of reading it out in Korean), the whole Brian and Jae throwing things at each other and yelling until four in the morning, the whole Wonpil refusing to let everyone else use his XBox quarrel, the whole Sungjin insisting that they all eat dimsum for dinner for a month thing. When it happens, he’s exhausted but more relaxed than he’s been in a while: finally, things are kind of stable. Finally, plans to have the band soar up and onto the charts are in place: the new single (one that had made him cry) comes out next week, the boys are booked for music shows, everything is alright for once.
Quiet, even.
Manager-hyung wasn’t taught the expression about not speaking too soon.
He’s in a good mood when he walks into the dorm after a night out with the other managers and admin staff. They’d had a hearty meal--tender samgyeupsal with just-cold-enough naengmyeon, free-flowing drinks--and had capped the night off with a good few hours at the noraebang. Of course, he’d sung Congratulations. Of course, he’d rapped that bridge with conviction. Those were his kids up there. He’d drunk-cried from pride until someone put Bon Jovi on and the mood had turned jovial again. He walks into the small apartment still humming It’s My Life, all of it blurring into mylifeisfrankiediditmyway. When he turns on the lights, he almost jumps out of his skin to find Dowoon’s sleeping figure splayed out on the sofa, limbs draped over the edge of the futon, one leg up on the back rest, the kid completely knocked out and snoring in his deep, baritone voice.
He frowns. It isn’t the first time that he’s seen the kid sleeping here. He glances up at the room Dowoon shares with Jae and Brian. Thoughts start to form in his mind, concern welling up in his heart. Is Jae having nightmares again? Have they been fighting? Is Dowoon undergoing a form of depression or alienation? Are people being left out?
No rest for the wicked. It’s the manager’s job to know their kids are alright.
Their manager sighs, making up his mind to be proactive this time, to make sure to protect the kids right this time. He takes his chances and nudges Dowoon gently.
“Dowoon.”
Dowoon’s eyes flutter open for a moment. He grumbles something vague.
“Dowoonie,” their manager says, a little louder this time. “Why are you sleeping out here?”
This time, Dowoon’s eyes open for a little bit longer, registering their manager’s face, the question, the need to answer--and not much else.
“The hyungs are busy.”
The manager’s eyes grow wide in shock. “Busy? Ahhhh but that room should be shared! Did they kick you out? Are you being bullied?”
Dowoon snickers in his state of half-waking. “No. They’re just in love, it’s okay. Couch is comfy. S’okay.”
“In love? They’re dating someone? Why doesn’t anyone ever pay attention to the contract? The dating ban is only two and a half years anyway! If someone can’t wait two years for you, then they don’t love you! We’re trying to build your careers here! Which one is it? Jae? That little brat, I swear. Where did he even meet anyone? Is it Jimin? Or someone else from KPop Star? Is it someone from Twice? Where did they even get the time to talk?”
“Not Jimin,” Dowoon says, frowning. “Brian.”
“BRIAN IS THE ONE DATING? Well, I wouldn’t have expected that. But then again, there was that thing that happened to him in highschool. But he already has his courses to worry about! Plus those bass lessons he requested--don’t think I didn’t hear about him falling asleep while playing the bass last week! He has to take care of his mental health and his physical well-being. Now he’s going to get into a relationship where--wait a minute,” their manager pauses, frowning. “What does that have to do with you sleeping out here?”
Dowoon clicks his tongue in annoyance, pulling one of the throw pillows over his face. “I told you. They want to be alone.”
Just then, the muffled sound of laughter erupts from Jae and Brian’s room. They’re in love. There is the rustle of sheets. An idea starts to tug at the manager’s mind. But they hated each other. Slowly, he walks away from Dowoon, who is finally sleeping in peace, curling himself around a throw pillow. He walks slowly toward the door, holding his breath, mentally preparing himself for whatever he might see. He turns the knob carefully, opens the door a crack, and peers in.
Brian is in Jae’s bed, both of them covered by the duvet. Only the reading lamp on Brian’s study table is turned on, but it’s enough light to see by. Brian lying on top of Jae, wearing Jae’s pink and blue sweater. They’re laughing. Brian is so glad that they’ve finally got some time to themselves. The mini-album is done, they’re going to go and see the proof copies next week. Everything is set, ready to go, and here he is, lying in the arms of his mortal-enemy-turned-bestfriend, his sorta-happy-crush-turned-boyfriend-he-is-crazy-fucking-in-love-with. Brian thinks Jae looks beautiful all the time but most especially at home, with the lights low, make up off, his longish blonde hair falling at just the right angle into his face.
“Ugh, that hair is so sexy on you,” Brian says.
Jae laughs. “Look who’s talking, Mr. Steal-Your-Fans.”
“What?"
“It’s all over Twitter. Everyone’s like yeah Jae was my bias but have you seen Brian’s Instagram?”
Brian wiggles his feet in protest. “Why does everyone call me Brian?? My handle has YoungK in it.”
“You just look like a Brian. It’s a vibe.”
“I should’ve picked YoungK as my English name. Then everyone would just call me YoungK.”
“You would’ve been bullied.” Jae snorts. “Can you just imagine attendance? Kang, YoungK? I mean come on.”
“You crazy? I was popular in highschool. Mathlete, band kid, YouTuber--”
Jae flicks Brian’s nose. “--also, I can’t imagine myself going oh yeah, YoungK, that feels so fucking good, so--”
Brian pins Jae down, keeping Jae’s leg between his thighs before tickling him. “--that’s what you think.”
Jae thrashes around the bed, laughing. “Stop! Bri--”
“--what did you say!?!?!”
“YOUNG K!”
“Okay, now that was weird.” Brian relents, laughing. “Fine. You can call me Brian.”
Jae adjusts himself so that he has an arm around Brian’s waist, slipping a hand under Brian’s sweater to play with the soft skin of his back. With his free hand, Jae brushes Brian’s hair back, his fingers lingering at the shell of Brian’s ears. “You should show your forehead off more often. You look so damn hot like that.”
Brian grins, eskimos his nose against Jae’s. “Yeah but you always get so much more riled up when I hide it away for a while.”
Jae flicks Brian’s forehead. “Do not.”
“Do too.” Brian leans down, pinning Jae to the bed and kissing him softly on the lips. “You practically jumped my bones the second Dowoonie left the room.”
“Did not!”
“You totally did! I was reading and then suddenly I was being tackled!”
Jae giggles. “Fine. But come on, can you blame me? I mean you look like a fucking silvery blue black haired Jesus I don’t even know what that color is god--”
“--emphasis on the god?” Brian jokes, grinning.
“Emphasis on the fucking--”
“--okay, that’s enough, you two!” Their manager bursts into their room, turning the lights on.
Jae screams. Brian and Jae jolt out of bed. Jae scrambles to put pants on, accidentally puts on Brian’s tribal-print granny pajamas which stop awkwardly above his ankles.
“IT’S NOT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE!” Brian yells, hands up.
“WE WERE JUST REENACTING A DRAMA IN CASE ONE OF US DEBUTS AS AN ACTOR!” Jae yells, realizing how stupid it sounds right as it comes spilling out of his mouth.
Their manager sighs as he glances down at the floor and picks up a discarded condom wrapper. “Okay, well, first of all: none of you are going to be debuting in a porno so that excuse is useless. Second, if anyone in this band is going to debut in a drama, it’s going to be Sungjin. And third, I wasn’t born yesterday! Now this is what’s going to happen: you two are going to explain to me how this started, and then you’re going to apologize to Dowoonie for kicking him out. Come on, you two. We just got out of the woods! We almost didn’t even get a second chance! And now, this!”
“We’re not stupid,” Brian says. “I mean, we’re not going to get caught kissing in public or anything.”
“Yeah,” Jae says, shifting nervously from foot to foot, their numerous mushy posts on Instagram coming to mind--the couple OOTDs, the fuego comments on each others’ selfies, him trending the #jaehyungparkian on Twitter before they took it away. “I mean. I never post about Brian anyway.”
“Oh no,” their manager says, sighing. His eyebrows furrow together with worry. He knows that face. It’s the Jae-is-lying-through-his-teeth face. “BRIAN!”
Brian startles. “Yes, hyung?”
“YOU’RE GOING TO TRANSLATE ALL OF JAE’S TWEETS TO ME.”
“REALLY, JAE? JAEHYUNGPARKIAN?” Their manager’s voice booms loud and clear across the living room the next morning. “I swear, I’m going to be bald from stress by next year at this rate--”
“--hyung, your head is shaved,” Wonpil offers. “So no one would notice anyway.”
“That isn’t the point!”
They’re all sitting in the living room, their manager having called a breakfast meeting. Where the breakfast was, exactly nobody knew. They sit around the coffee table, their manager surprised (and terrified) to find out that not only had Jae and Brian told everyone in the band, they also pretty much told all of their friends too--Jimin, Mark, Jackson, Jinyoung, Bernard, BamBam, Bang Chan. Everyone.
“Well, see, hyung, it isn’t really a big deal,” Sungjin says carefully. “I mean, there are lots of people secretly dating--”
“--that isn’t helping, Sungjin.”
“Ah.”
“But I don’t mind sleeping on the couch, hyung,” Dowoon says for the nth time that morning, trying to avoid Jae and Brian’s glares. “I mean, really. I just--”
“--okay, Dowoon, we’re way beyond that. We’re now at the part where we’re trying to figure out how many people Jae told about him and Brian being together so we can protect them from haters and keep their contracts in tact.”
“Yes, hyung.”
“Okay, now Jae. Tell me about jaehyungparkian.”
Jae grins feebly. “I mean. It was cuuuuute. And do you know that MARKSON IS A HUGE SHIP? From time immemorial, the popularity and longevity of fandoms has depended largely on fanfiction--”
“--exactly,” their manager says, turning on his heel. “Fiction, Jaehyung. FICTION. But when you out yourself and your boyfriend who is also a part of the band--”
“--I don’t see what the big deal is, hyung,” Sungjin pipes up, shrugging.
“Thank you, Sungjin.” Jae smiles smugly, leaning against Brian.
“I mean, everyone already knows anyway because these two suck a keeping secrets. Between the guy who sleep talks and the guy who tells the extensive story of the first night that they kissed to anyone who’ll listen--”
“--it was a romantic story!” Brian interrupts. “I mean, it was right out of 10 Things I Hate About You! He said that he hated the way I was gorgeous and looked at him like he was the only person in the whole wide--”
Jae’s face is beet-red. “--but it’s true, your eyes are so--”
“--okay, see the relationship itself isn’t the point,” their manager says quietly. “I want you two to know that I am always going to be supportive of love and that I’m glad you two found each other. Frankly, it’s been a whole lot quieter for everyone--”
“--speak for yourself,” Dowoon says from where he’s lying on the couch.
“Sorry, Dowoonie.” Jae says.
“Don’t apologize to the tattletale,” Brian retorts.
“I WAS ASLEEP!”
“--as I was saying, it’s been more peaceful anyway. And there isn’t anything wrong with you two dating but it does violate your contracts which is why I don’t want anyone finding out about it at least until next year. Plus, everything is nice and cheery and cute now because the fandom is still nice and cozy. But no one gains more fans without also gaining more haters. And as we get more successful, those haters are going to dig and dig and dig and they’re eventually going to find something if there’s something to find. It’s too early for something like this to happen and I just want to keep you guys safe. You all worked hard, we all worked hard. We need a plan.”
Brian shrugs. “I could just deny it and say it’s fake.”
Their manager sighs. “Any other ideas?”
The room is silent.
“Fine, then. We’ll try Brian’s plan first.”
It doesn’t work.
And that isn’t really Jae’s fault--well, not really. Or Brian’s fault. Well. Kinda.
It isn’t Jae’s fault that he lost the radio challenge. It isn’t his fault that Brian had to bring up the love-hate thing or that they’d made smiley, googly eyes at each other the entire time or that Jae had been unable to resist the urge of jumping onto Brian’s back or that Brian had caught him and let impulse take over, saying I love you too--or so Jae’s excuses go at the debriefing after their radio interview.
Wonpil and Dowoon are doubled-over in laughter. Sungjin’s shoulders are shaking from the attempt to hold his giggling in.
Their manager stands beside them, perplexed. “Good news is the song is doing pretty well. We’re going to have to find better ways of promoting, though. The music shows are good but they’re really meant for MR-heavy stuff. We need to showcase your live sound. Maybe more radio guesting, more broadcasts--”
“--oh! OH! ASC! I want to be on ASC!” Jae says, suddenly remembering him and Jimin talking about how much fun that’d be.
Their manager glares at him. “You think you’re soooo clever. But actually. Good idea. Let’s list that down.”
“What’s the bad news?” Dowoon asks.
Their manager jerks his thumb at Jae and Brian. “Bad news is at this rate all of them will know you two are dating by September. Brian--”
“--YoungK--”
“--Kang Younghyun. Why didn’t you tell me that your Instagram was full of pictures of Jae sleeping?”
“We’re roommates!”
“And the couple outfits?”
“Well, its deactivated so what’s the harm--”
“--do you know what a screenshot is?”
“Yes.” Brian looks at his feet.
“Do the math, mathlete. Now, we need some kind of plan. Some kind of. Something.”
Jae sighs, knowing full well that once he speaks, he’ll be giving up his ace. “Do you know what ao3 is?”
Their manager furrows his eyebrows. “I’m almost scared to find out.”
“It’s a fanfiction website,” Brian says.
Jae’s eyebrows disappear into his hairline. “Look at you, BriBri--you been reading stuff on there or--”
“--you forgot to clear your browser history.”
“Fuuuuuuck.” Jae’s face is red.
Wonpil bursts out laughing. “That’s why I don’t let you borrow my computer.”
“Shut up, Wonpil,” Jae says, half-fond, full-mortified. “Well anyway. It’s a fanfiction website and I’ll be glad to tell you that we all have official tags on there now. Anyway, so. Currently, BriBri and I are the number one most popular pairing on there for our fandom. Maybe we could use it to cover that up?
“Ah, yes. Sue them!” Their manager says, clapping his hands together loudly.
“No, no, no!” Jae says hurriedly. “That’d just make it worse. Because they would wonder why we were suing. But maybe we can write fics of other pairings and just you know. Sink an old ship by sailing a new one.”
“Huh.” Their manager turns to all of them. “Okay. Who else is dating? Sungjin? Are you in love with Wonpil? Dowoon? Harboring any secret feelings toward the hyungs?”
Sungjin bursts out laughing, clutching his stomach as he braces himself against the table. “Please hyung--stop--stop it--”
Wonpil lets out a small, soft laugh, doesn’t meet Dowoon’s eye. “I don’t think that’s what Jae meant.”
Dowoon coughs, nervous, knows that Wonpil is probably looking at him--or trying not to look at him. “I think what he means is make a new pairing to distract from this one. A diversion. A smokescreen.”
Jae nods. “Right.”
“And how are we going to make that happen? We don’t have the budget to hire writers for this kind of thing. And newsflash: if this gets out to higher management, you two are going to be in the hottest water you have ever been in. Forget suspension, that’s contract reevaluation and I’ll fight a bulldog on the tongue of a dragon before I let that happen.”
Brian smiles, in awe of their manager, his dedication. “I’ll do it. I’ll write the fan fiction. What…do I write though? Like if not me and Jae, then who?”
“Something not likely but which we can milk for all its worth on broadcasts and things,” Sungjin says, his leader duties kicking in. “Dowoon and Wonpil?”
“HAH,” Jae says, grinning. “No one would buy that. They’re more like grandpas who go to the Saturday market together.”
Dowoon and Wonpil exchange a look that Jae misses but Brian catches. A flush moves over Dowoon’s cheeks. Wonpil tosses a rolled up tissue at him.
“That could work,” Wonpil says, trying not to smile as he picks at the hem of his sweater.
“No, I’ve got it!” Jae says, leaping out of his seat. “Wonpil. And me.”
Their manager nearly snorts his coffee through his nose. He bursts out laughing, catching them all off guard, the entirety of his body bellowing with the sound. “Oh my god. Okay. That’ll work. If for nothing else, it’ll make me laugh.”
“You mock me now,” Jae says. “But I’m going to make the world believe I’m in love with Wonpil that soon that tag is going to be overpopulado with stuff about us. I’m going to answer Wonpil to every damn thing that anyone asks me from now until Sunday until people go ‘Jaehyungparkian is dead’ whenever they think about it.”
“Heyyyy,” Brian pouts.
“Well, just online, baby,” Jae says, rubbing Brian’s back.
“Jesus, you two,” Sungjin says. “Get a room.”
“They already did,” Dowoon pipes up. “That’s how this all started.”
“I’m going to call it JaePil.”
“Oh,” Brian says, raising an eyebrow. “Not Jaehyungparkil?”
Jae grins. “No, baby. ‘Cause only you get to have all of me.”
“Fuck, that’s smooth,” Brian says, squeezing Jae’s hand under the table.
Wonpil pretends to vomit into the nearby trashcan. Dowoon pretends to be Marie Antoinette on a guillotine.
Sungjin scratches his head. He turns to Brian. “Why? That is the only question. WHY?! When I signed up for this team, I didn’t know I was heading into the zoo.”
“Okay,” their manager says. “So. JaePil in full blast. Brian will write a fanfic. Jaehyung, you need to make a new Twitter account. A secret one to spy on the perception of the fic. That’s it for now. You guys rest up. We’ve got a whole bunch of other things to do this month.”
The fic is cute and well-written because well, Brian wrote it. It’s heartwarming--in the fic, Jae secretly has a crush on Wonpil, secretly likes how he looks in the pink sweater, secretly loves his voice, thinks he’s hella sexy. It’s set at a highschool where they’re in band together and Wonpil thinks Jae hates him, absolutely abhors him. When prom rolls around, Jae finally gets the courage to ask him out and Wonpil thinks he’s joking so he slaps him. The rest of the fic builds to a scene with One Big Gesture which is during the school band’s year-end rehearsal where Jae has the band perform a sappy song about being sorry while he runs down the field with a bouquet of flowers for Wonpil. It ends with them at prom, dancing slow to Madonna’s Crazy For You.
“Okay,” Jae says, reporting on the first few statistics of the fic. “This is a three-chaptered fic and so far, 400 people have viewed it in the two days it’s been up. Since our fanbase is relatively small and this is a relatively new pairing, that isn’t bad at all. For Kudos, since my love BriBri wrote it, we’ve got a good 45 kudos. That’s more than 10 percent and I’ve been looking at the fics written about me and BriBri and those have on average 10 to 12 percent kudos from the views.”
“Do you think it might be better if you put it up chapter-per-chapter next time?” Sungjin asks. “You know that’s how they made novels and comics work. They serialized it because it built suspense, hype.”
“Huh,” Jae says, nodding. “Yeah that might work. Plus ao3 archives based on what’s most recently updated. So that’ll keep us on top for longer.”
“Any feedback on Twitter?” Their manager asks. “People tweeting about it?”
“Welll,” Jae says, thoughtfully. “I tweeted about it. Not as me, of course. As jaeisthehottestever but yeah. It got some RTs, some people said it was cute and that they found Wonpil very attractive in it. Of course, they swooned over me arranging the band performance. Anyway. I’ll try and get more follow-for-follows and join some Group Chats.”
“Okay. Now. Let’s move onto schedules for the month. We’ve got Kiss The Radio next week--”
“--right,” Brian says. He and Jae exchange a nervous look. “Hyung please let us do the Put Your Records On cover. Please. Pleasepleaseplease. I know it’s a bad time but we rehearsed and we love that song and at the very least it’ll get us fans. I promise we won’t do anything flirty. Cross my heart, hope to not eat anything for two hours tops.”
Their manager sighs. “Fine.”
The problem is that the cover goes viral. The problem is that all throughout prep, fan sites take pictures of Jae and Brian laughing together, Jae and Brian fighting over the small mint candies, sharing the same water bottle, laughing fondly. The problem is that the song is very catchy and the harmonies are incredible and everyone starts everyone keeps tweeting gifs of 00:31 seconds in when Jae smiles at Brian in what people are calling that Jaehyungparkian way. The problem is that when Jae logs into his ao3 account that night, there are a billion new fics that pop up in the Jaehyungparkian tag: ones mostly about them as college kids who fall in love after a drunken mishap, some that are about them falling in love as roommates, others about them singing that song on their wedding day. The problem is that there’s also an influx of new fans. More of the old screenshots resurface.
On one level, Brian and Jae are pleased with themselves. On the other hand, they know that they’re going to have to think something up--quick.
The week passes in a flurry of performances, broadcasts (some where yes, Brian says to no avail, that Jaehyungparkian is, in fact, not a thing). By the time it’s done, their manager is high-strung and irritable, anxious and stressed out. Jae and Brian decide to help him out, take the matter into their own hands.
By the time they get to their next meeting, Brian’s written five new fics, pending approval, and Jae has come up with new assignments, new ways to make JaePil’s sails flutter in the metaphorical breeze.
“We’re going to have to be more aggressive,” Jae says. “So. Okay. Dowoonie, you’re going to be in charge of an account I’ve commandeered called JaePil doing things. You’re going to post exclusively gifs of me and Wonpil. Wonpil, I need you to extricate yourself from treating Dowoon like a baby for a few seconds every broadcast to come and hang out with me and let me make googly eyes at you. And Sungjin, I need you to be our ghost commenter.”
“What?” Sungjin’s eyebrows furrow. “What’s a ghost commenter?”
“Studies show that response begets response. If people see someone’s already liked or commented or re-blogged, they’re going to be more likely to do the same. So I need you to get the ball rolling. Ao3 has a comment-as-guest feature where you can comment without an account. So I need you to go and be the first three comments. Doesn’t have to be anything crazy--it just has to get the ball rolling.”
Their manager smiles at them. “Thank you two for being so pro-active about this. I really appreciate it--I’ve just been so stressed out--”
“--it’s okay, hyung,” Jae says. “You got us. We gotchu too.”
Just like Jae’s theorem on response, secrets also beget secrets. And the thing that no one had brought up--because no one knew about it, really, aside from the two people involved--is exactly what happened as a result of Jae and Brian kicking Dowoon out of their room so often over the past year or so. It hadn’t happened often, just a couple of times, innocently enough, but even the those involved hadn’t really talked about it much.
That is, until tonight.
Tonight, Dowoon goes out for a run even if he’s cutting it close to curfew. He needs to clear his head before the busy week ahead of them. It’s weird, feeling like this--it isn’t like he thought the incident would change things between them, but maybe he’d thought or hoped that something would happen. But whatever those hopes were are dashed now, now that this whole plan is in effect.
It bothers him, the whole JaePil thing. After dinner, he and Jae’d picked out footage they could use to turn into gifs and he’d felt it in his heart: jealousy, a whole thing ramming at him from the inside as they picked out little clips of Jae poking Wonpil’s cheek, of Wonpil hanging off of Jae, an arm around his waist as they talked into the camera, of Jae talking about how he thinks Wonpil is handsome, of Wonpil smiling at Jae. He does it all out of love for everyone, and also because it’s partly his fault, but it hangs over him like his own personal rain cloud.
Because when the kiss happened, it was the first time that Dowoon ever felt that way about anyone. He holds the memory close to his heart like someone trying to light a flame on a windy night, like if he lets it get too far, it’ll flicker out.
It happened in early February. It was simple enough: Jae and Brian had approached him with that look and he’d taken his pillows out into the living room. The lights were out, moonlight spilling in from the kitchen window. He’d been lying on the couch, playing a game on his phone when Wonpil had walked out to the kitchen to get a glass of water. He’d finished it, standing at the kitchen counter, leaving it in the sink.
“You’re not going to wash that?”
Wonpil let out a laugh as he jumped, startled. He relaxed once he saw it was Dowoon, walking over to scoot close in that way of his that Dowoon’s always found comforting. “They kick you out again?”
Dowoon shrugged. “It’s fine. They’re young and in love and we make enough sacrifices as is. I mean it must get lonely.”
Wonpil smiled at him, tilting his head in curiosity. “Why are you talking about it like you aren’t in the same situation? It does get lonely. That’s a fact.”
Dowoon furrowed his eyebrows, watched Wonpil’s expression. “Are you lonely?”
Wonpil rolled his eyes, reaching over to swat at his shoulder. “Ah, come on. Let’s not talk about that stuff or we’ll end up crying.”
“Well, if you’re lonely you can tell me. Back in college, my friends used to come to me for advice because I’m very frank but also listen pretty well.”
“Did you date a lot of people in college, Dowoonie?”
Dowoon laughed. “Well, not a lot. But my fair share. Why do you ask?”
“I just never dated anyone before. I’ve never even kissed anyone. I’ve been training since I was in high school. So yeah. How does that feel? I’m not so much lonely as I am curious.”
Dowoon made the mistake of glancing down at Wonpil’s lips, still slick with the water he’d just drunk. “Oh. Well. I mean--”
"--Hmmm?"
It happened before either of them knew what was happening. Dowoon’s hand moving to cup Wonpil’s cheek, Wonpil inching closer, eyes fluttering shut at Dowoon’s touch before their lips met soft, sweet.
And then the moment was over. The next day, things had gone back to normal.
Dowoon thinks of all this as he runs around the dorm, faster, faster--until he barrels into someone standing outside the main building.
“Dowoonie,” Wonpil says, grinning at him as he steadies himself, holding onto Dowoon’s shoulders for balance. “Why are you running at eleven in the evening?”
“I just needed air,” Dowoon says, breathless. “You?”
Wonpil shrugs, smiling at him. He tucks his hands into his jacket pockets and falls into step with Dowoon.
“Same, I guess.”