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Their house is a mess, but that's okay. If it were Minhyun and Seonho coming over, the former being overprotective (and neat) as all hell and the latter being a klutz even by five-year-old standards, maybe Dongho would have done some cleaning up, or at least regretted not doing it. But since it's Taemin, Dongho decides it's alright to leave things messy. It's not like Taemin cleans his own house whenever Dongho and Samuel are over.
Samuel is bouncing off the walls. Samuel is always bouncing off the walls. Dongho huffs a laugh and leans over to ruffle his son's long hair. It really is getting long, he thinks. They'll have to go for a haircut. Anyway, Samuel is bouncing off the walls and Dongho laughs at him because he's cute, and then the doorbell rings and Samuel is off like a shot, screaming, "Jisung, Jisung!"
Dongho shakes his head sort of ruefully but not really and follows at a more indoors-acceptable speed. He opens the door - the handle tends to stick and there's a trick to opening it, a trick that Samuel hasn't quite mastered yet - and gives Taemin a resigned smile that the older returns as their sons rush each other and then scurry off to the living room.
"Hey," says Taemin.
"Hey," says Dongho.
They belatedly realized that Jisung has not yet taken off his coat.
"Ya, come here, you," calls Taemin, grinning, and startling Dongho as he barges into the house and grabs Jisung under the arms. "It's been snowing outside, you don't want to get snow all over Dongho's nice carpet, do you?" Dongho holds back a laugh, because the aforementioned 'nice carpet' had been bought on clearance at IKEA. It's not like he would care even if it were an actual nice carpet.
"But I'm cold," Jisung whines.
"You're always cold," Taemin ribs him. "You'll warm up."
"You look like a marshmallow in that coat," Samuel giggles, and this is what finally prompts Jisung to start tugging at the zipper to his olive green winter jacket. Peer pressure can do a lot of great things when it's used for good.
"Marshmallows aren't green," Jisung protests, while taking off his coat anyway.
"Maybe you're a Halloween marshmallow," suggests Samuel. "Or a zombie one."
"Ew!" Jisung's face crinkles until his features are all squished in towards the center. This prompts further teasing from Samuel. It's lighthearted, though, and they're both laughing.
Taemin regards Dongho for a moment. "Do you have tea? I want tea."
"What you want is to get drunk," Dongho responds as he walks into the kitchen, neatly dodging the island, "but don't we all?"
"Do you have tea." Taemin is nonplussed.
"Do you want peppermint or green?"
They drink their tea easily, leaned over the counter of the island, eyes darting between the boys and each other. Samuel and Jisung have taken out the many, many Tupperwares-full of Lego toys and are deeply, intensely occupied. Dongho enjoys his coffee. Taemin enjoys his tea.
"How's, uh." Dongho blinks, looking down into his mug and then up at Taemin again. "How's dance?" Of the four people in this house, Dongho is the only one who doesn't dance - his body is built for gym sessions, not practice rooms, and he's embraced that.
"Going fine," Taemin answers, flicking his index finger against the side of his own cup absentmindedly. "How's Bumju?"
"He's fine." Bumju, well... he's busy. He and Dongho both are. They have a lot of deadlines - he's sure Taemin, working as a teacher for teenagers who has to choreograph all his routines, is under the same stress.
They meet each other's eyes over their cups and laugh, drawing the attention of the boys. They're really not usually so awkward. Dongho waves Samuel's attention away and Taemin calms and gives Jisung a serene smile.
"But really," Dongho continues once they're both recovered from both the uncharacteristic awkwardness and their giggle spell, "things are alright?"
Taemin eyes Jisung and sighs. "They're better. They had him switch classes so he's not with the dickhats anymore."
Dongho has to stifle a laugh (again) at Taemin's choice of insult. "What the hell is a dickhat?"
"It's a hat for your dick, what else?"
Dongho rolls his eyes. "That's good, then," he soldiers on, choosing to ignore Taemin's... Taemin-ness for the time being. He watches Samuel and Jisung stacking Legos in an oddly specific color pattern and doesn't press back his smile. The road's been long for both their kids. But they have each other, and the other kids from their single-parents-groupchat friend group, and also Yeojin, whose mother got herself a girlfriend and was subsequently kicked out of the one group chat because she was no longer single. "That they're dealing with it. No one here does."
"Sam's been having issues?" Taemin blinks and leans further over the faux-marble.
"No, no, no," Dongho is quick to clarify. "It's just that... I feel like if he did..."
"Admin sucks," proclaims Taemin.
"Admin sucks," agrees Dongho. "Sucks ass."
"Ass!" shouts one of the kids, Dongho is too flustered to tell which one, either because Dongho was too loud (likely) or because they have markedly good ears (also likely). Taemin brings his tea mug up to hide his face and chuckles while Dongho turns a bit red and not-yells in the general direction of the living room that they didn't hear that, otherwise there would be no ice cream later. The boys perk up at the prospect of ice cream and Taemin does too - well, who wouldn't?
Dongho unwraps Samuel's ice cream for him and winds the plastic around the end of the stick to serve as a kind-of-napkin. Taemin throws Jisung's and his own plastic away. Dongho lets his ice cream melt into his coffee, because no matter what Hayoung says it's good that way.
"I don't know how you're already so messy," Taemin mutters, not really to anyone because Taemin is on the other side of the room from Jisung, stocking up on napkins from the napkin dispenser Minki had stolen from their college cafeteria. "You've barely started."
Jisung just continues making a mess of his face. The boys are both quick eaters and finish their ice cream in record time, leaving Taemin groaning because he still has half his left. "You know, if you put it in a cup, Taemin, this wouldn't happen..."
Taemin subtly flips him off. Dongho snorts. He just lets Taemin enjoy his ice cream (and sulk), at least until it sounds like something is going to get knocked off the table.
"We're fencing, dad!" Samuel grins up at him, bright-eyed, and Dongho has to stomp down the instinct to vocalize how adorable he is.
"With your popsicle sticks? Oh no." Dongho plucks Samuel's out of his hand. "Sungie, give yours here, I'll toss it for you."