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There are three things Mingi knows for sure.
1) befriending Wooyoung when he was seven years old was not one of his best decisions and 2) helping Wooyoung to date San in their first year of high school wasn't much better which lead to 3) both of them being the reason he is having the worst migraines at only nineteen years old.
He can add a fourth one and it's that Wooyoung's screams are ear hurting but San's makes him to want to jump off a cliff. Which also leads him to stand in front of the nurse's office door. Again.
It's the sixth time he is here in only two weeks.
"Again here, Song Mingi?" The nurse doesn't even turn around, knowing that the only person that could enter without knocking would be him. Not that they’re friends, but kinda. Mingi told her how he missed his mom and she pat his head. It was nice.
"My head is killing me," he mumbles, feet slowly moving to the bed, where he lets his body fall. "I'm going to sleep for a while."
The nurse hums and someone closes the door, but Mingi is already heading to the dream land. He does know a fifth thing, and that's that the infirmary’s bed is comfy enough to kick his migraines away.
And, also, smells like vanilla.
🌌
Maybe, and just maybe, Mingi knows a lot of things but he just decides to go ignoring 99% of them. Like how Yeosang looks at Seonghwa and how Seonghwa always pretends he doesn't like his cheesy puns.
Or how Wooyoung kisses San every time he thinks he is not looking - but he is, he is always looking.
Or how there's always this one boy he doesn't know organizing the nurse's tongue depressors while singing a children's song. He is there every single time Mingi comes to take a nap, and he always shoots him a smile. But never really talks.
What Mingi doesn't know is why he decides to organize tongue depressors out of all things and why does it take him so much damn time.
It's 4 PM and Mingi is skipping a class because of Wooyoung and San's anniversary. He thought six years of screaming was bad but celebrating those six years was totally wrong.
He wants to sleep but there's a lot of noise. A lot.
"Excuse me," Mingi murmurs sleepily, rubbing his eyes.
It's kinda like a dream. The way he rests the weight of his body on his elbow and squints in the boy's direction. He doesn’t know hi name yet, even after all that time.
The window is open, white curtains waving, sunlight illuminating the back of his neck. He has black hair and soft skin. He also wears a white medical gown, but he looks too young to be a doctor. Maybe he is a med student, Mingi doesn’t really know (and it’s kinda eating him alive).
Mingi clears his throat, trying to catch his attention. "Excuse me? The tall doctor? Hello?"
Moving around, the boy keeps on humming to the song, until their eyes meet. His face lights up, taking off his earphones.
"Oh, hi," he is all smiles, fingers playing with one of the tongue depressors. Like always. "Did you sleep well?"
Mingi looks back, pain kicking it again. He puts a hand on his forehead, pressing a finger as if it would help him get rid of his migraines - even knowing the fastest way to do that would be deleting Wooyoung's number from his phone.
"Hey, are you okay?" The boy - young doctor, maybe? - moves closer, one hand on Mingi's head. "Are you having migraines again?"
Mingi presses his lips together, moving away from his touch. "Yeah," he says, "and I don't want to sound rude, but your singing isn't helping."
"Oh," at first, the boy looks hurt, but it only lasts a second. He puts on a soft smile and intertwines his fingers. Mingi can't help but notice he has chubby cheeks and puppy eyes. "I'm sorry. I'm just finishing things here, I have a class at five. Then I'll let you sleep, I promise," he winks at him and Mingi’s heart skips a beat.
The boy smiles and puts on his earphones again. As if nothing happens, he starts dancing softly, but he doesn't sing. Mingi lays back again, closing his eyes.
He can hear birds chirping and nothing more.
🌌
"Do you know the boy that works on the infirmary?" Mingi asks on Monday when he sits down on their usual table.
Jongho is talking about some party they need - like, real need - to go on Sunday, but Mingi couldn't care less. He wrinkles his nose, clearing his throat.
"So, the guy from the infirmary?" He insists.
"Huh? There's an infirmary here?" San raises a brow, munching on his food. "First notice I have."
"Are you for real? Where do you think I go when I'm not with you guys?"
San stops for a second, thinking. "Skipping classes?"
"But do you know why?"
"You don't believe in public education?" San guesses, stealing Wooyoung's dessert. The boy lets him. Whipped.
Mingi sighs loudly, pinching the bridge of his nose. He really is sure about these boys being the cause of his migraines (he should go see a doctor, actually).
"Anyway," he shakes his head, staring at the only one that could help him, "Seonghwa? Do you know about him?"
"Who?"
There's no use in being friends with this people.
"The boy of the infirmary," he says again, starting to lose all his initial interest. "A tall dude with chubby cheeks and big eyes. He works there, I think."
Seonghwa stops for a second, thinking about it. And Mingi is aware of the lovingly gaze Yeosang is throwing at him across the table. Cute, he thinks, but kinda annoying. Not Yeosang, but love.
Or whatever all his friends are infected with but refuses to take him. Yeosang suffers from the freshly and burning desire of a new love. Wooyoung suffers from the deep affection of a relationship of years that makes him smile every single time he locks eyes with San from across the campus.
The only thing Mingi is suffering from is a headache.
"I have no idea," Seonghwa says after a couple minutes and Mingi wants to stand up and leave.
"Oh, I see how helpful you are," he mutters under his breath, playing with his food.
"Wait, are you looking for Yunho?" Jongho stops talking about the party to point at him with his fork.
That catches Mingi's attention. Yunho huh?
"That's him?"
"I have a friend from one of my classes that is always walking around with a tall guy, one with chubby cheeks. Maybe it's him, but I don't know because I only know his name, but I can ask for his number if you want."
"Mingi do you have a crush?" Wooyoung shouts right in his ear, proceeding to laugh - right in his ear too.
"I don't, idiot. He keeps on singing every time I go to sleep at the nurse’s office, it's annoying."
He just wants to know who he is, pure curiosity. His mother always tells him he will get into problems one day because of that, but will that stop him? Not soon. He’s been going to the infirmary for months and that boy only decided to appear a month ago. Without saying a thing, greeting Mingi as if they were really good friends, and singing. He just wants to know who is he.
Yunho is a cute name that suits his cheeks.
"So, about the party. We really need to go," Jongho starts again, and next thing he knows, Wooyoung and San are screaming their answers.
Is a yes.
🌌
He has to admit the touch is soft and Mingi isn't really used to that. Someone taking care of him with such softness, fingers caressing the skin of his neck.
"Does it hurt?"
The voice is ever softer, almost velvety, even though he's not sure if that's the right word to describe a voice. He knows a lot of things but nothing about voices.
Yunho's voice is soft but bright. A mix between a spring breeze and the summer sunlight dancing in his skin. He doesn't know how to describe it. One of the days he went there to sleep because he was having insomnia, he described it as a soft remedy. A melody sweet enough to take him to the dream land. Honey coated voice, he called it.
One other day, when he just wanted to run away from Wooyoung and San and Yunho talked about the wedding of his cousin, he described it like the kiss of summer. Bubbly, warm, a little like a healing.
It only made Mingi get more curious about him.
"No," Mingi says, and it's obvious is a lie as his whole body shrinks, jaws tightening. "Maybe yes."
Yunho chuckles, one hand on his forehead.
"I really don't know what to do," he smiles, "I'm not even a nurse."
Mingi can't help but frown, rolling his eyes. He watches as he moves back from the bed, going back to what he was doing: organizing the tongue depressors. Just why, Mingi asks, why that. It's university, do they still use that?
"May I ask why you are here then?"
Yunho's whole being is soft. It's the fourth time that week they talk in a row, Mingi's headaches getting worse as finals get closer (and, also, the party gets closer and Jongho gets excited, making Wooyoung and San even more excited), yet Mingi only knows what Yunho shows, that is a little.
Like-- he's soft. He naturally moves with softness, every move as if he was walking in a flower field, trying not to break a single petal. And he laughs as if he holds music within him.
And smiles with his own light.
But nothing more.
What he does? Organizing tongue depressors. What kind of music he listens to? Children's songs. What does he like? Dancing in silence, as if no one was looking.
"Helping my mom," he says, pointing at him with the stick. "Do you want me to check your throat?"
Mingi stands up and walks next to him. They're the same height and Mingi kinda likes it, the way he doesn't have to lower down his eyes to talk with him as he does with Wooyoung. He can just look at him in the eye.
And he does.
He surely does look at him for a brief second, without saying a word. He stares at him and his long eyelashes, or how his cheeks slightly move as he starts smiling.
Yunho giggles.
"What?"
"Nothing," he quickly recovers, reaching his hand to the medicine cabinet. "Don't touch me with that, I'm not seven years anymore. Your mom has some medicine here, for my headache."
He tries to search for it, but he never payed attention to what he was taking. A very wrong decision. "But I don't know what type," he sighs.
Yunho's fingers wrap around Mingi's wrist. "Does it taste like orange?"
Mingi blinks. "Yeah."
"My mom is so predictable," the boy moves Mingi so he can take a little white box, from where he also takes a pill with a dinosaur form.
Mingi looks at him, confused.
"Children's medicine?"
"My mom used to give me these when I was little, guess she keeps on using it. Do you want some?" Yunho gives him the pill, a smile already blossoming in his lips.
Did he stop smiling, actually? Mingi wonders as he takes the pill and walks to the bed again. It tastes like orange, yeah.
He lets the coziness of the mattress engulf him, stars exploding at the back of his eyelids. Everything goes silent for a few minutes, Mingi already feeling sleepy, head burning.
Then, he hears it.
Again, it's soft. Like the breeze of a spring day kissing his face after a hot summer day. It crawls over his body and makes a home in his chest, where it kisses his skin and flowers bloom.
Yunho starts singing.
It's a children's song again, and it's the silliest thing Mingi ever heard. Dumbest than the song Wooyoung used to confess to San. He mocked him for a week, but right now, he opens an eye and stares at Yunho: sitting in the chair, doing nothing but sing.
His headache slowly fades.
🌌
Mingi fails his first exam on Friday. As he stares at his phone and his bad mark trying to figure the error, he reaches the conclusion that he needs to stop coming to the infirmary.
He does that while sitting on the office's bed, cross-legged and wearing Yunho's gown. He doesn't know why, but he likes the vanilla scent that engulfs him.
"Here, have some chocolate," Yunho offers, sitting next to him.
Mingi wrinkles his nose.
"It's almost summer," he says. "I don't want chocolate."
"But you need to drink hot chocolate when you're sad," Yunho retorts.
"I'm not sad."
"You always came half dead complaining about your friends, but today you just came with a sad face. I don't even believe your head is hurting today."
It's true, Mingi hates him for knowing him that bad, but also allows himself to feel good. He sighs, shouting down his phone and lying down.
Yunho looks at him with that gaze, as if he doesn't have secrets and has a lot at the same time.
Mingi stares back.
"What do you do for a living?"
Yunho raises a brow, laughing after that. He then lays next to him, hands on his chest and shoulder bumping with Mingi's. He locks their legs, playing with his feet.
"I'm studying, Mingi. What I am doing is making me lose years of life, actually."
"That's… Very right. But what do you study?"
He waits. But doesn't know what he's expecting, he doesn't know Yunho that much. He's only the kid that sings in the infirmary.
"Does it really matter?"
Mingi sighs loudly. "Why do you have so many secrets?"
"I don’t have secrets, I just don't it's important. Are you drinking the chocolate?"
Curiosity is killing him. He wants to know about Yunho, he never wanted to get to know someone that bad. He asked Jongho but the only thing he got from him was that he likes to pet stray dogs.
Cute.
But he wants more.
Yet he respects him and doesn't say a thing. He gives Yunho the chocolate and snuggle in the bed. He kinda feels down, maybe that's why he came to that place in the first place, even when he is, as Yunho said, just sad.. He is relieved Yunho's mom isn't there, and that Yunho is sharing the bed with him.
"Can you sing?" He mumbles after a couple minutes.
He is relieved Yunho doesn't find him weird and starts humming. Mingi moves so he is closer, legs tangled and hands on his hair. He can feel Yunho's fingers caressing him, softly.
He's singing that children's song again.
Mingi doesn't feel so bad about his mark anymore.
🌌
"Let me do your eye makeup," Wooyoung says, lips pursed in displeasure as Mingi refuses to get any closer to his dressing table - Why does Wooyoung have one of those though?
His friend clicks his tongue, waving a hand at San, who is too busy trying to decide between two identical white shirts to notice, what ends up in Wooyoung frowning. Mingi doesn't know what he's doing there either. "C'mon Mingi, don't make me go after you."
Mingi chuckles. "I'll end you using only a finger, Woo."
"I have San," the boy says, but doesn't seem so sure about that as San storms outside the room screaming for Seonghwa's help. Again, Mingi doesn't know what he’s doing, and he also has a headache. "Okay, maybe I don't have San."
That time, Mingi rolls his eyes and sits on Wooyoung's bed, the farthest from all that makeup piled up in the dressing table. Wooyoung is already dressed and showing a perfect makeup, which makes everything harder because his gaze got really intense.
He raises a brow at Wooyoung.
"What?"
"You have pretty eyes, Mingi," he says and Mingi wants to punch him.
"Are you flirting with me?"
"You wish! I'm just admiring your natural beauty."
"Dude, San will get mad at you, and maybe me, so just stop."
"San thinks the same."
"Oh my, you're creeping me out."
Wooyoung clicks his tongue again, moving fast so he can kick him. "You're an idiot. You're handsome, Mingi, but you always look like you're constipated or something."
He wants to die, punch Wooyoung in the face and die. But he retains himself, hands already on his head, softly pressing his temple.
"And whose fault it is?"
"Yeosang, maybe?" There's no use. "Anyway, let me do your makeup so you can kill anyone with a gaze."
"I'm killing you."
"That's a yes?"
Mingi doesn't answer, San storming back with the phone still in his hand. He is shirtless and annoyed. "Seonghwa says I can't wear white because he's already wearing white and doesn't want to change. What do I do now?" He lays his eyes on both of them, sitting in the bed, Wooyoung's hands on Mingi's shoulders. "What are you guys doing?"
"Nothing."
"What color do you think it'll suit Mingi's eyes the best?"
There's a brief minute of silence in where no one talks, San still frowning. Mingi knows San since they were twelve, he knows he's as irritating as Wooyoung and that he owns two types of voice so he can give him different headaches in the same day. But he also knows he's different from Wooyoung, and he has hope in that small part of his brain that actually respects Mingi.
"Purple," he says, smiling at Wooyoung.
Mingi decides he shouldn't have hope in those two anymore.
🌌
San decides to wear a green shirt and Wooyoung ends up doing Mingi's eye makeup. And Mingi, without a doubt, wants to die.
Because it's Sunday night and he hasn't been in the infirmary for two days. Because it's Sunday night and he's in that one party be refused to go. Because he kinda misses Yunho and because he has makeup on and a red eye because he moved when he shouldn't have.
The music it's too loud and there's a lot of bodies moving in the small living room. Next to him, Seonghwa is holding Yeosang's hand as if no one noticed - but Mingi did - and Jongho is greeting the owner of the house.
Mingi wants to go home.
And not only because of the music and the drunk boys grinding on him or the girl that poured her drink on his shoes or how his eyes hurt or how suddenly he's alone in that ocean of drunk people. No. He really hates his friends for that, but the reason he wants to sprint to his house is because Yunho is doing something other than organizing tongue depressors for the first time. And he's serving some punch.
He's not running though, feet glued to the floor - doesn't have to do a thing with all the alcohol the people are pouring, but at how Yunho styled his hair up.
"Mingi?"
Well, yes, maybe he tries to run away when Yunho sees him in the middle of the room. But he doesn't do it, he lets Yunho approach him with a big smile.
"What are you doing here? It's weird seeing you out of the infirmary’s bed.”
"The same could I say about you," he mumbles, looking at Yunho. He's not wearing white but black. Mingi likes black. Yunho looks at him with his big eyes, as if he's waiting for an answer. The music is too loud. "What are you doing here?"
Yunho smiles.
"Dancing! Do you want to dance with me?" He reaches out a hand, keeping secrets again.
Mingi hates that. He hates the way he never answers at his questions, the way he manages to avoid everything Mingi asks.
"Huh… I don't know how."
"You don't need to know, just feel it," Mingi loves the way Yunho's fingers wrap around his wrist, pulling him away from the epicenter of the party. Soon he's able to feel the hot summer breeze kissing his skin, moonlight illuminating their eyes.
"Put a hand here," Yunho leads his hand to his waist, pressing firmly as he puts his own around Mingi's neck, pulling their bodies together. "It's been a while since I've danced with someone who's my height."
Yunho's eyes light up at that, as he smiles and moves from side to side. He smiles like he's having so much fun, there, outside the party, dancing without music and with a boy he doesn't really know a thing about.
It's weird.
Mingi doesn't know how to feel about that, or how to react. He can feel Yunho's hands playing with his hair, softly, and his humming slowly leaving his lips. It's the first time Mingi dances with someone, or dances in general. And Yunho smells like vanilla. He kinda feels like he’s flying.
Yunho is a total stranger, a big kid who likes to dance to children songs. Yunho doesn't like to talk about his life. Yunho is as beautiful as a shooting star, and as fleeting as well.
Who is Yunho?
Mingi looks into his eyes and swears he's able to see galaxies.
"You like me?" He asks, in a whisper. Suddenly. If they weren't alone, only them and the moon, Yunho wouldn't have heard him.
But he does, he smiles and gets closer.
There's something about Yunho that always makes Mingi's mind go blank. His eyes, big and expressive, or the way his teeth pop out of his lips every time he feels happy, or how he is summer in human form. Maybe is the way he walks and dances, body and soul together, maybe is the happiness he oozes or how he never looked at Mingi like a stranger.
He opened his arms to him since the first moment, and that's why Mingi is mesmerized. By everything he does, everything he says.
Who's Yunho?
"I love working in the infirmary," Yunho says, resting his head on Mingi's shoulder.
And again, he doesn't tell him. He's unclear. Mingi likes that.
🌌
There are 101 things Mingi know for sure.
Thing 87 is that he has a crush on Yunho, but thing 88 is that Yunho's mysterious personality drives him crazy, and thing 101 is that he keeps on getting headaches because of Wooyoung and San but he started liking it along the way.
Because he gets to see Yunho on the infirmary, organizing his tongue depressors.
"Song Mingi," the nurse smiles at him as he enters without knocking. It's been five days since the party, and he has been avoiding Yunho. And thinking, mostly thinking.
He sure thought a lot during those days, it even gave him a headache.
"I'm starting to think you need to see a doctor. Does it hurt that bad?"
No, it doesn't.
The smell of that place always takes him back to his home, his small room and the kisses his mom gave him before sleep. That small office is like his personal heaven, the place he can come to relax.
"It's okay. I just need to rest for a while," he mumbles, eyes searching for Yunho. He's not there.
"Is that so?" The nurse chuckles, walking to him, a little box on her hands. "Were you expecting to see my son?"
The blush gets all over Mingi's face, words not leaving his throat. That's true.
"I'm going to take that as a yes," she smiles, pinching one of his cheeks. "I can't believe you. Both of you. Here, I'm going for a coffee. Rest a little," she hands him the box before leaving the room.
He's alone and confused, fingers drumming on the box. Is small, made of wood and with a little sun drawn in one corner. Mingi stands there for a minute, just to sit down on the bed then, cross-legged.
Inside the box, there's only a lot of tongue depressors.
He wants to laugh.
"What an idiot," he says, smile already dancing on his lips. He picks one of them, wanting to see why Yunho likes them so much, when something catches his attention. There's something written there. "What is this?"
"Who are you?" He reads, frowning. And he doesn't fully understand until he turns the stick, answer written at the back. "Jeong Yunho, the nurse's son."
Mingi's smile widens.
He picks another one, reading again.
"What do you do for a living?" A chuckle. "I'm studying architecture."
Another one.
"Why are you always listening to children songs?" He remembers asking that the third time they met and Yunho only smiled at him. "I love Baby Shark."
Another one.
"What are you doing here?" Mingi doesn't understands. "My friend told me about this party your friends were going, I was hoping you were there."
He quickly reaches for the other one.
"Do you like me?"
"Yes."
There's still a lot of sticks in the box but Mingi stops thinking. He holds the stick and looks at that single word, smiles and feels bubbly inside. He doesn't know what to do, so he just lays down on bed.
Smiling.
"You need to read them all."
The voice surprises him, sounding too close. He gets up to find Yunho on the door, staring at him.
"Read them all," he insists.
He's wearing normal clothes and no gown; his hair is messy and his cheeks bright pink. The weather is hot, Mingi can feel it. His eyes move from Yunho's face to the box.
Yunho's handwriting is really beautiful.
"Song Mingi," he can't help but feel like an idiot in love, feeling everything he wanted to feel. That weird thing that got Yeosang sighing about how beautiful Seonghwa was, that thing that made Wooyoung scream he wants to marry San from the top of his lungs. And he doesn’t know Yunho, and it’s been only a few days, but he feels it. He likes Yunho. He wants to get to know him. "I'd love to tell you everything about me, if you accept to go for a chocolate with me."
Mingi can't help but giggle, hand covering his lips.
"Are you really asking me on a date like this?"
Yunho's smile appears again on his face, and it's almost like the start of a cheesy play. The veil lifts and Yunho's the only one standing in the middle of the stage, looking mesmerizing.
And Mingi is the only one sitting in the theatre seats. He thinks he looks beautiful, dreamy like, like an illusion.
He doesn't know about Yunho, but he does know those three things.
1) befriended Wooyoung at seven years old was not one of his best decisions, but he is grateful that he did it, 2) helping Wooyoung to date San in their first year of high school wasn’t better but, again, he is grateful he did it and 3) both of them were the reason he is suffering from migraines at 19 years old, but he is grateful.
Because he got to meet Yunho.
"Isn't it cute?" Yunho sits in front of him, playing with one of the sticks. "Actually, it was because of you. Always asking me things. Hope I answered to everything."
Mingi chuckles.
"You did."
"Here," Yunho hands him the stick he has been playing with, "I also have a question for you."
Their fingers touch when Mingi reaches for the tongue depressor, electricity biting his skin. What he reads in the wood makes his heart stop for a second.
Yunho raises an eyebrow at him, hands already playing with Mingi's hair way before he even answers.
He doesn't need to answer though, hands caressing Yunho's cheeks as he leans in and kisses him. Softly, just like Yunho, and giggling, just like he dreamt of.
That small infirmary became his home, and the tall kid that liked to play with the tongue depressors no one used, his remedy.