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bin thinks that minhyuk is a really good dancer.
the two of them have been on the same dance crew for over three years now, and though it used to surprise bin how talented the younger boy was, it doesn’t shock him when minhyuk is able to master or even come up with even the most complicated of sequences.
his turns are downright graceful and his timing is perfect and his execution could probably score an eleven out of ten if he went on dancing with the stars.
when it comes to beer pong, though, minhyuk fails miserably .
they’re at some frat party jinwoo had heard about earlier in the week. had come into dance practice just on time and a little out of breath because he’d gotten caught up talking with this boyfriend, mj.
apparently, this was some kind of party to kick off both the dance crew’s and the swim team’s competition season; because mj was on the swim team and convinced his captain’s frat to include the dance crew in the party they were throwing.
so sejin, the swim team captain, who bin vaguely knew from one of his classes, had told younghoon to invite them. and then younghoon had told mj to invite jinwoo and the rest of the crew.
it was a dumb roundabout invitation for what could’ve just been a text from sejin to jinwoo considering the two were lab partners for biology, but bin didn’t comment on it and instead just showed up where and when he was told.
(because to be honest, it didn’t really matter whose party it was, bin would have shown up anyways.)
bin was excited , because this was a chance to hangout with his friends and chill before competition season and midterms started in a few weeks. it was a night of no-stress before they were all overloaded with stress, jinwoo’s words, not his.
him and seungkwan had shown up a little late. they’d gotten distracted playing mario kart in their apartment after they’d gotten ready, which had started out as a way to kill time, but the two of them were way too competitive with one another and they had gotten a bit carried away.
when they’d arrived, jinwoo had already been way past sober, patting each of them on the shoulder and thanking them for being such great members with tears in his eyes.
mj had run up and steered jinwoo away quickly, mumbling under his breath about jinwoo being the sappiest drunk ever as jinwoo started telling him how much he loved him. the two of them had broken into fits of laughter, making their way to the kitchen where seungkwan ditched him for some guy from his music production class he was (hopelessly) pining after.
bin had joined in a conversation soonyoung, their crew’s co-captain, was having with dongmin, a member of the swim team, though after a while he’d lost track of what exactly they were talking about and ended up heading towards the dance floor.
there he had run into yoojung, another member of their dance crew, who had been willing to put up with him messing around and teasing her for a little while before she’d shooed him away and joined the rest of the girls on their crew instead.
somehow between then and now, bin had ended up talking with chanwoo and a few of the other guys on the dance crew for a bit, had a few too many drinks, gotten a water bottle to recover from that mistake, and was now lining up to play a round of beer pong against sejin and dongmin.
there was only one problem: bin needed a partner.
unfortunately, anyone close enough that he knew was either busy, like seungkwan flirting with the guy from his class, too drunk to play, like jinwoo crying about how much he loves mj in the corner, or unwilling to be his partner, like yoojung, who had gotten sick of his short jokes earlier in the night even though bin meant every single one of them lovingly.
(which bin was sure she knew, she was just messing with him because they had this weird back and forth going on where one of them would ignore the other because of whatever prank they’d mostly recently pulled.
like last week, when yoojung had convinced seungkwan to take bin’s clothes from his locker while he was in the shower; forcing him to come out of the changeroom in a towel with the entire dance team waiting for him to come to their team dinner.
which wouldn’t have been bad, because they’ve seen him shirtless before; except that they’d had some freshmen come check out the crew before joining that day, and the number of strangers staring at him while bin had been out there with his shirt off had been awkward .)
as he’s about to let two of the other guys from the swim team take his place, minhyuk appears out of nowhere , smiling widely at bin and slinging an arm around his body and telling him he’ll be his partner.
bin flushes down to his toes at minhyuk’s arm around him, because minhyuk is talented and he’s really handsome and bin has maybe had been harbouring a tiny crush on him since he’d walked into tryouts three years ago as a freshman and blown everyone away.
it wasn’t that he and minhyuk didn’t normally see one another, because they were friends , it was a bit impossible not to be. the problem was that he and minhyuk never really did things without the rest of the crew around, and they definitely didn’t wrap their arms around each other’s waists.
dongmin and sejin go first, sejin sinking his first shot and missing the second. bin downs the cup, offering the ping pong balls to minhyuk who shakes his head and lets bin go first.
bin sinks both, shockingly, turning to minhyuk who high fives him as the two of them cheer.
they’ve gathered a bit of a crowd as dongmin misses both his shots, passing the balls on to minhyuk who stands on the edge of the table.
he does this adorable spin dance before throwing, telling bin to blow on the ping pong ball in his hand for good luck with a wink. when he throws, it misses by a longshot , sailing over all of the cups and landing in sejin’s hand.
“air ball!”
and just like that minhyuk has lost the other ball, and dongmin and sejin get to choose a cup to take away.
sejin takes his second turn, missing one shot and sinking the other, leaving minhyuk to down whatever’s in the cup before bin picks up the balls, sinking both yet again and causing the people around to cheer for him.
minhyuk smiles widely at him again, and bin’s heart skips a beat (or three).
the game continues on for a while like this until each of them has one cup left to eliminate. somehow, dongmin manages to sink the shot, leaving minhyuk to attempt the redemption shot.
to bin’s utter despair, minhyuk misses, and sejin and dongmin win the game, high-fiving and shooing minhyuk and bin so another pair can take their place.
“sorry bin,” minhyuk’s cheeks are flushed red and he awkwardly puts a hand on the back of his neck, rubbing at the skin there.
bin shrugs his shoulders, “it’s no big.”
minhyuk flashes him a smile that has bin’s heart racing in his chest, “i’ll make it up to you,” he checks his watch, “do you wanna get out of here and go grab something to eat? my treat.”
“you don’t have to do that,” bin says, checks the time on his phone and is pretty surprised to see it’s nearing 1:00 already.
“i want to. c’mon, let’s go, i know a place.”
bin agrees easily at his insistence, sending seungkwan a text that he’s headed out and to text if he needs anything. seungkwan replies something about vernon being cute and being pretty sure he’s in love, but he’s drunk so it’s all pretty much a mess.
minhyuk ends up taking them to a 24-hour diner right at the edge of campus that bin’s never actually been to before. the only people there other than them are a waitress who looks like she’s ready to fall asleep on the spot and a middle-aged man drinking coffee and reading the newspaper, as if it’s a totally normal time to be doing so.
“their pancakes are amazing ,” minhyuk says quietly as they sit down, not even bothering to open his menu.
bin nods his head in acknowledgement, deciding to take his word for it and just get the same.
he’s not disappointed, the pancakes actually are amazing, and bin knows he’s definitely going to be coming back with seungkwan at some point just to have them again.
“these are so good. how did you find this place?”
minhyuk shrugs, smiling once more, “a guy i know from back in jinju showed me when i first moved here. i’ve been coming for years.”
“i can’t believe you’ve been keeping this place a secret from the team, jinwoo is going to kill you, he’s always going on about finding good places to eat.”
minhyuk laughs, and he looks so handsome doing it that bin actually has to fake cough to avoid saying something he’ll regret.
they end up talking long after they’ve finished their pancakes, sharing stories about their siblings and childhood and reminiscing on funny moments since they’ve been on the dance team together.
it’s nice and bin can’t help but think about how it feels like a date , and how he wishes it were a date, because sure, minhyuk is talented and he’s handsome, but he’s also one of the sweetest people bin has ever met, and he’s funny and considerate and open and honest; and bin thinks that maybe this is the biggest mistake he’s ever made in his life.
“it’s nice to hangout with you without the rest of the team around,” minhyuk says quietly, “we never really get to talk like this.”
bin nods in agreement, “it is nice. to be honest, i’ve always been a little intimidated by you; you’re like, crazy talented, and i’m just sorta here.” he laughs, hopes it’ll somehow make the confession less awkward than it seems.
“i’m intimidating?” minhyuk cracks up at that, giggling into his fist, and it’s cute and bin nearly dies.
“i think you have us mixed up, moon bin,” minhyuk comments after he’s finished laughing, “you’re definitely more intimidating than me.”
bin furrows his eyebrows, “how?”
minhyuk snorts at the question, says, “you’re like, this super handsome, cool dude who’s smart and funny and really good at dance and you’re friends with pretty much everyone.”
or at least minhyuk claims that’s what he said later. bin loses track of the comment after minhyuk calls him handsome because park minhyuk is calling him handsome and that has to be some kind of dream. bin must have drank much more than he thought.
“did you just call me handsome? have you looked in a mirror, minhyuk? i nearly die every time you even just breathe and you think i’m handsome and intimidating? that’s not even fair.”
minhyuk’s eyes are wide, “did you just say you die when i breathe ? did you talk to jinwoo and this is some kind of prank? because if it is that’s really mean, i’m really sorry if he told you i’ve had crush on you since forever, i never should ha-”
“shut up.”
minhyuk stops, staring at him.
“you’re so dumb ,” bin shakes his head, smiling fondly, “you’ve been crushing on me since forever and you didn’t say anything?”
“umm, well i ju-”
“be quiet,” bin says again, “you big dork i’ve had the biggest crush on you since we met. you did a three turn spin at your dance auditions and i thought you were the best person to ever walk this earth.”
“hey wait a second, why didn’t you say anything?”
“i don’t know, i was embarrassed. jinwoo is always teasing me about it, i thought you knew and just didn’t feel the same way so you weren’t saying anything.”
“i thought he was teasing me and you were doing that.”
“we’re both dumb,” bin says, but minhyuk has grabbed his hand across the table and that’s definitely anything but dumb.
minhyuk has this really adorable smile on his face and bin can’t stop smiling and it’s all a bit of a mess, to be honest. but it’s also kinda cute and minhyuk is cute and bin is really really happy.
the moment is interrupted by bin’s phone ringing, seungkwan’s contact coming up and causing him to sigh because of course his best friend would ruin this.
minhyuk just laughs, telling him to answer because he understanding and getting up to pay the bill.
seungkwan is going on about something to do with vernon and kissing and how he’s so in love and bin thinks it’s a lot overdramatic and tells seungkwan he’ll meet him at home.
and then minhyuk holds his hand as he walks him back to his apartment and bin takes back everything he said about seungkwan because he kinda thinks he gets it.
minhyuk kisses him on the cheek before he leaves and tells bin to have a good night, promising to text him when he gets back to his apartment safely.
“that was disgustingly soft,” seungkwan mentions as soon as bin opens the door, nearly hitting his roommate who was apparently standing behind the door watching them like a creep.
“you’re disgusting.”
bin shuts the door, and falls asleep only after minhyuk assures him he’s home okay. they have a lot to talk about still, but just knowing that minhyuk feels the same way about him makes all the unsureness okay. he’s sure they’ll work it out.
after all, minhyuk can work out any dance sequence in existence, there’s no way he won’t be able to handle this.