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The dorm is surprisingly silent as Dongmin opens the door, halfway expecting Sanha and Rocky noisily playing video games, even at 1am.
It seems tonight is not one of those nights.
In the living room, a lonely figure is sitting on the sofa in the dark. For a split of a second Dongmin’s heart gives a pleasant lurch, thinking it’s Bin, but then he recognises Rocky. He tries not to show his disappointment.
‘Hey,’ he nods while taking his shoes off, his moves relaxed now that he is finally home.
‘Hey. How did the filming go?’ Rocky looks up from his phone, his face illuminated by the screen.
‘It was alright,’ Dongmin smiles. His friend’s continuous fascination with anything concerning his drama is rather endearing. By now, everyone’s curiosity faded a little, apart from Bin’s – who barely counts, as his boyfriend – and Rocky’s. Frankly, Dongmin cannot see what is so interesting about it all but he quite enjoys Rocky’s endless questions.
He opens the door to his room and walks in quietly, trying to make as little noise as possible.
‘Have you shot the kiss yet?’ Rocky follows him into his room, excitement making him speak louder than intended.
‘Be quiet and shut the door behind you if you want to talk. You’ll wake everyone,’ he chuckles and enjoys Rocky’s impatient expression.
‘So - have you or not?’ The door closes with a soft thud as Rocky makes sure to shut it as quietly as possible.
‘No, that’s not due for a couple of weeks yet.’
He is not sure whether he is pleased about the delay or not. He has never kissed a girl before.
So far, he has only kissed a boy.
Rocky settles on his bed, leaning against the wall and hugging his knees, watching him shuffling about, getting ready for bed. They chat about their day, an easy ping-pong of words, not minding the occasional silence when Dongmin is too tired to talk.
‘Do you want me to get you a face mask?’ Rocky asks all of a sudden.
‘Oh,’ Dongmin hesitates. ‘I don’t know. I'm really knackered.’
‘Bullshit.’ Rocky jumps up with so much energy as if it wasn’t 1am but three o’clock in the afternoon. 'Go get ready and I’ll find you one of my best ones. Your skin has been looking awful lately.’
Dongmin knows his friend is right. The endless schedules, lack of sleep and the junk food he’s been eating while on set have caused his skin to look pitiful; he can barely look at himself in the mirror in the morning these days. Eyeing Rocky’s flawless cheeks, he relents.
‘Ok, fine, get it then.’
Ten minutes later, teeth brushed and face scrubbed clean of make-up, he lies on his bed and Rocky is applying one of his wonders. The slimy feeling on his face is not one he particularly likes but one has to sacrifice things for beauty.
‘Don’t fall asleep, we’ll need to take it off soon,’ Rocky admonishes him when he sees Dongmin’s eyes falling shut. It’s hard to stay awake though; the tiredness is washing over him like a tide, the dim light of the night lamp doing nothing to keep him awake.
‘Hm.’ The reality is becoming blurry, Rocky’s voice becoming distant; he couldn’t car less whether he sleeps with the mask on till morning or whether Rocky will take it off for him; he is so tired nothing matters anymore.
On the brink of consciousness, he is registering Rocky peeling off the mask, touches of warm, wet flannel on his face, then the room gets quiet and dark. He can feel Rocky lying next to him and wonders vaguely why he didn’t go back to his room but his mind is floating, weightless and fuzzy, and then he remembers nothing.
…………….
Some time later, a touch of warm lips on his cheek wakes him up. The room is shrouded in absolute darkness but he feels a shot of pleasure as he turns his head to meet Bin’s lips.
Bin doesn’t always wait up for him to come back but he often creeps into his room in the night so they can spend a little time together. He once confessed to Dongmin that he would sometimes set his alarm for 3am to wake up and go over to his room. It made Dongmin cry.
They have very little time for each other right now; with Dongmin filming the drama almost every day, they hardly see each other at all.
Dongmin misses Bin, he misses his best friend, boyfriend, his better half – there are million names for the one and only person in his life that matters the most to him.
They are both counting the days till the shooting is finished. Not that Dongmin is not enjoying himself; he is grateful for his first break-through, the crew is fun to work with, he met new people and gained a few good friends.
But the day after the filming is wrapped up for good, Dongmin has a half a day off. No schedule in the morning means sleeping in. A morning off also means a lie-in with Bin. For once, Dongmin is deeply grateful for a room of his own. It does get lonely sometimes but there are advantages to it too.
The thought of Bin in his bed for the whole morning make his body tense and he turns to him, searching blindly for his lips in the darkness.
But in the very moment he hungrily meets Bin’s mouth, he realises with horror that the body pressing into his own is not that of his boyfriend. As he shoves the intruder away, he suddenly remembers who fell asleep in his bed tonight and why.
‘Rocky!’ he hisses, the shock making his voice tremble, ‘what the fuck you think you’re doing?’
The silence is deafening. Dongmin is shaking; his mind is reeling but can't find anything to hold onto. He is too stunned to think.
The room is filled with Rocky’s panicky breath. ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.’
He realises the boy is scared that the incident will unleash the famous Lee Dongmin temper but in a flash it hits him that to do that wouldn’t be wise; even pissed off he can see this is a delicate matter.
‘It’s ok, Hyukkie, I’m sorry I got mad. It’s just… What was that about?’
In the silence, Rocky only sighs heavily and doesn’t answer. The seconds are stretching like eternity.
Then suddenly Dongmin understands.
Of course.
Rocky’s shy smiles thrown in Dongmin’s direction, him hanging around all the time when they were together with Bin, THAT question from a long time ago – can I be your roommate?
The kiss.
The hunger, the desire with which Rocky’s lips found his.
Rocky is pressing his back against the wall, trying to take up as little space as possible, trying not to touch him and Dongmin is overcome with pity. He wraps his arm around the younger boy’s shoulders and squeezes him gently.
He can't stay mad at him, the anger that has flared up briefly is now gone. He feels for the boy whom he, Dongmin, robbed of his best friend after joining the agency and whom Bin robbed of any chance Rocky ever had with his crush.
We took everything from you, your best friend, even the love you could have had.
Or could you?
Dongmin doesn’t know if he would ever have fallen in love with Rocky, had Bin not been there.
No point playing the ‘what if’ game, it’s too late now.
He rubs Rocky’s back slowly and gets on with what needs to be said. ‘I like you Hyuk, you’re my friend. You know that, right? I just don’t like you… that way.’ Subconsciously he reverts to Rocky’s real name, as if the gravity of the matter required it.
He can feel Rocky’s body slumping, sagging heavy with unhappiness.
‘Yeah, I know. Sorry that I… that was stupid of me. You really like him, huh?’
There is no need to mention Bin’s name; they both know.
‘I love him, Hyukkie. More than anything. More than myself.’
‘Do you want me to go?’ The quiet resignation in Rocky’s voice makes his chest tighten.
‘Stay here tonight if you want to. It’s ok.’
Rocky curls into his side, a smile that Dongmin cannot see warming his voice, ‘Thanks, Min.’
Dongmin closes his eyes and tries to calm the whirring thoughts in his head. The confession - although unspoken, but a confession nevertheless - found him totally unprepared. With hindsight, he could have guessed but his love radar was never particularly great, so it’s hardly surprising.
He exhales slowly and concentrates on his breathing. To have a different body next to him, someone who is not Bin, is weird. Rocky feels very unlike his boyfriend, his small, wiry, angular form in sharp contrast to Bin’s pleasing bulk and baby-smooth skin.
Rocky’s breathing slows down after a while, deepens, and Dongmin himself is starting to freefall into deep sleep when quiet sobs start gently shaking the side of his body. He tenses a tiny bit but tries not to move, breathing in and out in regular intervals.
His heart goes out for his friend but there is nothing he can do, no way to help him with his heartbreak, so he keeps quiet until Rocky’s sobs die down and his body goes limp with sleep.
……………
‘Jeez!’ Bin’s shocked whisper jolts him awake in the darkness. ‘What on Earth is Hyuk doing here?’
Dongmin blinks. He can feel Bin kneeling by his head, his arm around him. His boyfriend seems rather surprised at having found his spot in Dongmin’s bed already taken.
‘Uh, he was up when I came. We got talking, he fell asleep here.’
He is too tired to elaborate; also he is not sure whether he wants to. Everything that happened feels too private; even to be shared with his boyfriend.
‘You should have sent him back to his room, Min. Don’t fuck with his head.’
‘What?’ If he wasn’t awake by this point, he is very much awake now. ‘What was that supposed to mean?’
Bin squirms a little uncomfortably; Dongmin hears it in his voice. ‘It’s not really any of my business but I think he has a crush on you.’
‘Oh,’ the awareness of the fact that Bin knows about Rocky makes his cheeks heat up but it doesn’t really surprise him. Bin reads people much easier than him, almost as if he could smell their emotions as well, not just their scent.
‘I know,’ he admits, albeit reluctantly, and it hurts him a little when Bin starts giggling quietly, as if in disbelief.
‘You knew, Min – you knew?’
Dongmin huffs, offended. ’What are you laughing at?’
‘Nothing,’ Bin buries his face in the crook of his neck and starts pressing kisses along his collarbone. ‘I'm just surprised, that’s all. You never notice things like that, never see people who gape at you and want to devour you with their eyes; you’re so pure and unaware. How did you know?’
‘Well,’ Dongmin’s cheeks are on fire by now, ‘he sort of confessed tonight.’
The atmosphere in the room changes. Bin looks up, all sobered up suddenly, ‘Oh crap. Poor Rocky.’
‘I know. I feel like shit.’
‘Don’t, Min. It’s not your fault,’ Bin pushes strands of hair off his forehead, fingers lingering on his temples, stroking his skin. ‘You can't be responsible for other people’s feelings,’ his voice is gentle, soft.
‘Easy for you to say,’ Dongmin turns his head a little, to kiss Bin’s fingertips. The heavy, unhappy feeling caused by Rocky’s confession is hitting him full force again.
‘Stop it,’ Dongmin’s emotions seem to be an open book to Bin, ‘stop beating yourself up.’
‘I don’t know how,’ with his free hand, the one that is not hugging Rocky, he pulls Bin’s head closer, searching for his lips.
‘Let me help you forget,’ Bin giggles into his mouth, deepening the kiss.
When he thinks he can’t breath anymore, Dongmin pulls away. His head clears for a moment, ‘Bin, we can't do this, he’ll wake up. It’s like a creepy threesome, it’s too weird.’
Bin lets out a quiet, breathy laugh, ’You think someone ever wrote a fan fiction with us as a threesome?’
‘Good grief, Bin, you are such a weirdo.’
‘Not much weirder than you, who read one aloud for me.’
The memory makes Dongmin squirm with embarrassment. His one and only delve into the world of Astro fan fiction. Bin made him to choose one about the two of them, and a smutty one at that. He felt grateful he picked an English one, the foreign language made it somehow easier to bear. Translating for Bin was pure torture though; hilarious and completely mortifying at the same time. They never did it again; Dongmin point blank refused.
Bin got turned on by it all though, so there’s a silver lining.
The memory of the night after makes him smile.
Right now, however, there are more pressing matters at hand.
He eyes Rocky, curled up and pressed against him, his head resting on Dongmin’s shoulder, ‘What are we going to do? I don’t want to wake him up; he cried himself to sleep.’
‘What did you say to him, Min?’ Bin voice is cracking all of a sudden, full of worry for their friend, not a trace of the easiness from barely a minute ago.
‘I didn’t say anything mean, Binnie. I simply told him that he was my friend and I liked him, just not that way. And I told him that I loved you. After that, when he thought I was asleep, he started crying.’
The silence that follows takes forever. Dongmin almost thinks Bin has started dozing off when his boyfriend’s voice, small and hesitating, interrupts the stillness of the room.
‘You said you loved me?’
Bin sounds awestruck and it hits Dongmin in that precise moment that he never said it before. Never told Bin he loved him.
I never said it. He might not even know I love him.
The thought terrifies him because his love for Bin has been an integral part of his life for so long that he can’t picture his existence without it anymore; it has been woven into the fabric of his being, it is him.
It’s hard to pinpoint when Bin morphed from being his best friend into something more, there are no milestones to mark it. The first kiss is no help; he knew by then he had been in love for ages, he just didn’t have the courage to do anything about it for a long time.
They started sleeping together during their US tour seven months ago; it felt natural, it was the next step in their relationship, there was no hesitation, angst, it simply happened one night.
So where is the point where love starts?
Dongmin is not sure but he can't remember the days when he felt nothing for Bin yet.
Their love didn’t happen like a bolt of lightning; it grew slowly amongst tired muscles and sore backs, between sweaty training clothes on the floor and endless schedules pinned to the wall of their living room; fed on every smile flashed across the stage and secret brushes of their fingers in the gym; every embrace, the hurried ones in the kitchen while brewing coffee in the morning, or the deep ones in Dongmin’s narrow bed, their bodies melting together.
He never felt the need to declare his love but the awe in Bin’s voice tells him now that this is an important moment; maybe words matter much more than he thought and suddenly the fear is gone and he feels the deep thrill of what is to come.
‘I love you.’ Once the words are out, he feels thousand pounds lighter, almost floaty.
‘Say it again,’ Bin’s face is buried in his hair, his voice muffled.
‘I love you,’ he laughs a little; it feels a bit embarrassing, cheesy, but suddenly Bin is kissing him so hard Dongmin can barely breathe.
‘Binnie, wait,’ he pushes him off, just about, mind hazy, not sure whether from tiredness or desire. ‘We need to get out of here before we wake up Rocky. Help me.’
‘Oh, right,’ Bin looks a little unfocused himself but shakes his head like a puppy and seems ready for action.
They try their best, Bin tenderly lifting Rocky’s head and shoulders, while Dongmin slides away from his curled body, moving slowly as not to wake him, and tries to shake his left arm where he feels pins and needles. They cover Rocky with a blanket and tiptoe out of the room.
……………
Curled up on the sofa in the living room, a warm blanket around them, Bin buries his face in Dongmin’s chest, ‘Why have you never told me you loved me before?’
‘What?’
The question surprises Dongmin. ‘I don’t know,’ he admits, ‘I suppose I loved you for so long that I never thought about it. I don’t really remember not loving you.’
He can't help but tease Bin a little, ‘You never told me you loved me either.’
Instead of the sweet giggle he expects to hear, Bin exhales shakily, ‘But you are, you know, you. You are so beautiful; you could have anybody you want. I always thought that one day you might find someone else and then you would come, all happy and shining, and announce that you have fallen in love with so and so. Because, you now, we are together but we never said anything to each other. And now the drama – you always look so in love with Soo Hyang.’
‘It’s called acting, Binnie,’ he can't help but rolling his eyes a little.
‘I know that,’ Bin hits his chest with his fists, ‘I’m not an idiot! I mean the behind-the-scenes videos though. You always laugh together and you both look so cute and the way you smile at her...’
Blinking furiously, Bin tries to fight the tears that are coming; Dongmin can see it and feels a heavy weight on his chest.
He wraps his arms around his boyfriend, the same way Bin used to do many times before, when Dongmin was too exhausted to cope, in the evenings when the only way to survive was to cry from sheer exhaustion against Bin’s chest.
He kisses the top of his head, the way Bin has done thousand times before, with Dongmin sitting on the floor of their dance studio, slumped and unhappy, despairing, and the only way forward was to feel Bin’s lips in his hair and to hear the silent ‘you can do it, Minnie’ in his ear.
‘Binnie,’ he whispers softly, ‘you idiot. I love you. Only you. Never loved anybody else in my life.’
He pauses for a moment, “Sorry I didn’t tell you that a long time ago though; I really should’ve done that. But I'm telling you now – I love you. I love you, I love you I love you I love you I love you…’
‘I love you too,’ Bin blurts out suddenly. He wipes his eyes and laughs through his tears. ‘Sorry I am blubbering; I know you love me, it’s just… it’s nice to hear it out loud.’
‘And I will be telling you that every day from now on. Aloud. For everyone to hear. I love Moon Bin!’ Dongmin laughs; he feels as light as a feather.
He suddenly stops, ‘Is it ok if we do that? To be more… I don’t know, visible? Will you mind if the others know, Binnie? I know Rocky knows but what about the others?’
To his surprise, Bin snorts with laughter, ‘Min, I think they know exactly what’s going on. They never said anything because we never said anything but believe me, they know.’
‘You think so?’
‘I know it.’
Dongmin smiles a little cheekily, ‘It will not matter then if we sleep here tonight, right? Together, without you having to sneak back to your room?’
Bin giggles against his neck, ‘Let’s do it. I am tired of playing musical beds almost every night. I'm staying here. Let’s give Sanha and MJ something to squeal about first thing in the morning.’
‘Why only MJ and Sanha? What about Jinjin?’
‘Jinjin is too cool to squeal.’
‘Hm, true.’
They laugh quietly and curl underneath the blanket, limbs intertwined, listening to each other’s breathing, eyes growing heavy.
‘Do you want to know something?’ Bin whispers in his ear, breaking the comfortable silence.
‘Jeez, Binnie, what do you want? What gossip can you possibly find so important that it can't wait until tomorrow?’ Dongmin grumbles; he was half-asleep already when Bin, inexplicably, decided to share something.
‘It’s about Rocky. I think he won’t stay miserable and heartbroken for too long.’ Dongmin can hear a smirk in Bin’s voice.
‘How? What do you know?’ Suddenly he wants to know; the grumpiness is gone, as if magicked away.
‘Sanha.’
‘What? How?’ Dongmin is confused. As always, Bin can see something he himself cannot see at all yet.
Yet. If Bin can see it, it is most likely true.
‘How?’ Bin shrugs his shoulders, “I don’t know. I can smell it.’
‘Silly,’ Dongmin pokes him gently in the cheek.
‘Just wait and see,’ Bin wriggles under the blanket and pulls him closer. “ I thought it might make you feel better about Rocky.’
‘If it’s true,’ Dongmin frowns a little. Some of Bin’s theories are hard to believe but it is almost scary how more often than not they turn out to be true.
‘Just watch Sanha for the next couple of weeks. The way he looks at Rocky. I give them till the end of the year.’
‘It’s beginning of September; that’s not long.’ Dongmin still thinks it’s all wishful thinking but he badly wants it to be true to feel less rotten about Rocky’s heartbreak.
‘Believe me, it will happen,’ Bin’s chuckle warms Dongmin’s heart, ‘and then you will feel a bit better about what happened tonight.’
‘That would be nice,’ Dongmin yawns, snuggles against Bin and lets his body relax.
‘It will happen, you’ll see. Everything will be fine,’ Bin’s arms are around him, they mark the boundaries of his little world tonight, of his safe place; the big world beyond them ceases to exist. He suddenly feels an overwhelming sense of gratitude towards this man who loves him unconditionally, who has loved him for so long without being certain whether he was being loved in return.
It’s time to give back.
‘I love you, Binnie. I love you so much.’
‘Love you too, Min.’