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Chan is tired when he drags himself in through the door. He’s worked behind schedule, and even though the studio has air con, the summer heat had crept in from somewhere and he’d felt like he was drenched in sweat after a few hours. Either way, the trek from the studio to their dorms have left him drenched in sweat, regardless of the fact he's only wearing a sleeveless shirt and a pair of shorts.
He leans against the front door to take off his shoes. Now that he’s finally home he can feel heaviness in his eyelids, barely able to keep them open.
As he shuffles further into the dorm, his shin hits something, making him stumble. In the low lighting he can barely make out a cardboard box, silently cursing the kids for leaving it laying right in the way.
There’s a sharp sting of pain for a moment, but he doesn’t think much of it, too preoccupied with getting to his bed before he falls asleep standing.
—————
When he wakes up the next morning there’s a slight throbbing in his leg, but it’s quickly forgotten when Changbin starts shaking him awake.
“Hyung, get up. Get up. Hyung.”
Chan groans at the repeated words, but it’s one of the only strategies that actually makes him get up. He sits up and blinks blearily at Changbin.
“When did you even get back, hyung?”
Chan shrugs. “Dunno. It was dark. And hot outside.”
“Hyung, it’s hot all the time,” Changbin sighs. “You got back in the middle of the night again, didn’t you?”
“Maybe, I’m not sure. Probably?”
“God, what will we do with you, hyung? C’mon, get up now, breakfast is almost done.”
“Yeah yeah, I’m coming,” Chan mutters and falls back against his pillow. He allows himself a few seconds more of his eyes closed, willing the exhaustion to go away.
He’s never been particularly good at getting up in the mornings, and the few hours he’s gotten lately doesn’t help.
A door opens somewhere, and Changbin says, “C’mon hyung, you need to get up.”
“I am,” Chan mumbles, still laying down. He’s tired — he just needs one more minute before he can get up.
Apparently though, Changbin does not agree with that. He takes hold of both of Chan’s hands and pulls him upright. It’s a bit of a struggle, but Changbin is nothing if not stubborn. And Chan knows he needs to properly wake up. If he doesn’t, there’s the threat of either of the kids that have woken up to come in and loudly bullying him into the kitchen. It has happened before, and Chan is certain it will happen again, but he’d rather avoid it for today. He can feel a headache building behind his eyes, and he doesn't want to trigger it before he’s had breakfast.
Changbin keeps his grip on Chan's hands when he asks, "If I let go will you go back to sleep then?"
"Yeah," Chan answers, an automated reply to the question he was expecting, not the one he actually got.
Changbin raises an eyebrow at him.
"I mean, no," Chan corrects himself. "I thought you'd ask if I would get up."
"So I can go back outside and I won't have to come back to wake you up again?"
Chan shakes his head briefly, but stops when it makes his head spin. Great. He doesn't mention it to Changbin, though, knows he would just unnecessarily worry.
Changbin gives him a wary look but heads out the door, leaving it slightly ajar rather than closing it fully. Chan guesses it’s to make sure he won’t go back to sleep.
He’s dragged himself out of bed and is rummaging around for a clean pair of shorts when Seungmin sticks his head in and says, “Changbin-hyung told me to tell you that you don’t have time to shower, just get down to eat breakfast.”
Chan nods as answer and Seungmin leaves. Giving up on shorts, Chan sighs and picks out a pair of sweatpants, getting dressed in them and a t-shirt. He’ll just have to get through the day and remember to do laundry later.
Everyone is already up and awake when he gets down to the kitchen, Minho silently handing him a cup of coffee.
“We need to hurry up, manager-hyung is here soon,” Hyunjin says, coming up next to him with a plate of food.
Chan nods groggily, still feeling sleep clinging to him in heavy tendrils. He takes a seat in the chair Jeongin pulls out for him, thanking the boy with a nod.
“Are you okay, hyung?”
“Yeah, just tired,” Chan assures him and digs into the food. He eats slowly, wary of the way his stomach turns, and is not even halfway done with the plate when manager-hyung arrives.
From the corner of his eye Chan can see Minho watching him with narrowed eyes as he puts the plate into the fridge, leaving the half-eaten food for later. He raises an eyebrow at Minho when he turns around, but the other just shakes his head before going to the front door. Great, so now he has Minho worried.
Only Minho is still inside the dorms when Chan arrives at the hall to put on his shoes. “The others headed down to the car,” he says and holds his hand out for Chan to take. “I told them we’d catch up with them down there.”
—————
Chan finds himself sweaty earlier than usual during dance practice, his shirt soaked through before Minho seems to have even broken a sweat. No one but Minho seems to notice, and he throws Chan a Look. One of those he reserves for worrying, that Chan has received more and more recently. Chan waves him off, hoping that he won’t start actually worry. If he doesn't think too deeply about his observations then Chan is fine, but he knows that the second he starts actually thinking about it he’s fucked.
There’s too much going on right now (there always is, a part of Chan tries to tell himself) and he doesn’t have time to rest. (Another part of him thinks that if it was any of the other members he would fight tooth and nail to get them time to rest, no matter how busy their schedule is.)
After dance practice they have lunch and then head off to their individual schedules. Chan heads to his studio, always songs to work on. It’s something that mainly only he does, he tells himself, and that’s why it’s okay for the others to rest but he doesn’t have time to not work.
Minho comes and gets him later, when they have another dance practice.
“How are you feeling, hyung?” he asks, and Chan can feel the suspicion radiating off of him.
“I’m completely fine, Minho,” Chan assures him with a smile. “I’m just a little tired like usual, nothing you need to worry about.”
“You need to sleep better at night,” Minho frowns, “and for longer. You know, you need to get at least eight hours every night. You’re not getting that right now.”
Chan shakes his head at his concern. “It’s just because it’s too hot to sleep, it’ll get better when the weather becomes colder.”
They reach the practice room before Minho can protest, to Chan’s relief.
—————
Chan finds himself back in his studio after Minho ended dance practice early, stating that they seemed to be coming along well and deserved a bit of a break. He’d looked after Chan when he told them he would head back to the studio before going home, but didn’t say anything. Chan had seen Felix throw Minho a questioning look that he’d thrown off with a shake of his head before he’d rounded the corner.
That had been several hours ago, and it is currently nearing 2am. The fan is whirring away on the desk on the highest setting, but it’s doing nothing to cool him down. He’s downed at least two bottles of water, knowing that in this heat he would risk dehydration otherwise. It’s the only thing Jisung use to say he does for his health. (Secretly, at those times, Chan thinks that he loves eating too, but never mentions it directly to Jisung. Food is always a sensitive topic in the idol business, and Chan doesn’t want to give Jisung any weird ideas.)
It’s still hot and he can feel new and old sweat on his skin when he finally gets home. He’s too tired for a shower though, just shucks off his clothes before collapsing into bed. He’ll take a shower tomorrow morning, it’s fine.
—————
He feels worse the next morning, waking up even before Changbin shakes him awake. He lays still, not opening his eyes. He doesn’t want to face the world just yet, would rather crawl down into a pile of snow to sooth the fire burning on his skin, maybe a nice, big glass of cold water to soothe the headache that has already started pounding in his head.
He opens his eyes right away when Changbin starts shaking him, his stomach turning from the movements. “I’m awake,” he croaks, his voice sounding terrible even to his own ears.
Changbin blinks at him in surprise, clearly not having expected that. “We already finished making breakfast, wanted to let you sleep some more. Minho-hyung said you haven’t been sleeping well.”
“Thanks,” Chan mutters and sits up, ignoring the hint of concern in Changbin’s voice. “Do I have time for a shower?”
Changbin shakes his head and looks apologetic. “I’m afraid there’s something wrong with the water in the bathroom. Hyunjin has already talked to manager-hyung and he promised that they’d make sure someone looks at it during the day.”
Chan sighs. Not much to do about it then. “It’s fine. I’ll come down in a minute, you can go ahead.”
He drags himself up out of the bed when Changbin has left, and brings a set of clothes to the bathroom. Maybe they still have some wet wipes he can use. To his disappointment the box is almost empty, just two wipes that he uses under his armpits and along his back. Hopefully the water will be fixed by the evening and he can finally shower then.
Minho wrinkles his nose when Chan comes down to the kitchen and says, “Hyung, you stink.”
“Didn’t have time to shower yesterday,” he explains and takes the plate Felix offers with a smile. The sight of food makes his stomach churn, but he forces himself to eat some to not make the others worry about him. He’ll need the energy for practice, too.
During the car ride over to the company he leans his forehead against the window, sighing quietly at how wonderful the slightly cool surface feels against his hot skin. Maybe, if he doesn’t feel better, he’ll need to tell someone about this? It’s the last thing he wants to do, but he does know that he can’t let himself exercise if he really is starting to get sick.
—————
Chan can see the moment Minho notices what Chan is just starting to feel. Minho interrupts his movement mid-dance and stalks over to Chan, reaching him before most of the rest has even noticed what Minho is doing.
“Sit down, now,” he demands and takes a hold of Chan biceps.
Chan stumbles forward from the sudden interruption, and almost falls over. Minho manages to stop him from falling completely, but forces him down until he’s sitting on his butt, a hand on his neck guiding his head down and forward between his legs.
“Take slow breaths,” Minho instructs, before turning to where the rest of the boys have stopped dancing and are looking at the two of them. “Someone get me two water bottles, and someone go get manager-hyung.”
No one protests his instructions, and Hyunjin and Felix hurries out of the room. Jisung grabs two bottles and jogs over to them, handing both over the Minho. Minho gives one of them to Chan, saying, “Drink this,” and presses the other one against his forehead.
It’s first when he tries to unscrew the cap on the bottle that Chan notices how much his hands are shaking. Jisung does too, and takes the bottle from him to unscrew the cap before giving it back. Chan manages to drink most of the water from the bottle, but the shaking of his hands makes some of the water run down his chin to wet his shirt. It isn’t really noticeable, though, considering how soaked through his shirt is from his sweat.
“What the hell were you thinking, dancing with a fever,” Minho mutters, only half under his breath.
“I don’t think I’m sick,” Chan protest when he’s finished the bottle.
“Clearly doesn’t matter what you think, you have a fever.” Minho sighs and continues in a gentler voice, “Hyung, you’re burning up.”
Chan doesn't say anything, doesn't know what to say.
"Why are you wearing these sweatpants?" Minho asks, plucking at the pant leg closest to him.
"All my shorts are dirty."
Minho tsks at him, shaking his head slightly. "You should have told me, I would have lent you some."
"Sorry," Chan mumbles, slumping slightly against Minho.
"Don't worry about it now," Minho says, his tone almost scolding. "We should roll the pant legs up though, it might help."
Chan nods, but doesn't make a move to do it. He can see Minho and Jisung share a look before they reach out for one leg each. Minho has got the leg rolled halfway towards Chan's knee when he gasps and his hands fall to the floor.
"Chan, what happened?" he sounds almost horrified, but Chan can't for the life of him figure out why.
"What do you mean?"
Jisung sneaks a glance around Chan's legs to catch a glance at what Minho found, and falls back with a gasp only a few seconds later. He gulps and says, "That doesn't look good."
"What doesn't?" a new voice asks, and when Chan looks up Hyunjin and Felix has come back with manager-hyung.
"He has a wound," Minho says, his voice frail and shaking, "I think it's infected."
—————
They decide to take him to the company doctor. Felix had mentioned the hospital, but manager-hyung thought that was too drastic. Chan can still remember the looks on his members face when he'd said that, but he can also see why. Manager-hyung is a good guy, and he knows more of these things than they do. So if he says the company doctor is enough, then Chan is going to trust him that it is.
Both Jisung and Minho had insisted on coming with (though really, everyone had) but manager-hyung had protested that they didn't need to come. Eventually, Chan had asked Minho to come along, and he's glad for that now, squeezing his hand tight.
He shouldn't have let the wound get this far. He knew about it, knew he had probably gotten it. He had felt the pain from it, and yet he hadn't properly checked.
"I'm stupid," he mumbles to himself.
"No you're not," Minho says by his side quietly, squeezing his hand. "You're not."
"This could affect our schedules. I knew I wasn't feeling top, but I ignored it thinking it would go away because I didn't want to affect our schedules."
"I won't lie," Minho says. "Yes, it is possible that it will affect our schedules, but that doesn't make you stupid. It-"
"It does," Chan interrupts him. "When I came home the day before yesterday I bumped into one of the boxes in the hallway. I felt it hurt, but I was tired so I ignored it, didn't think more about it. I felt it hurt the next day, but I ignored it again. I didn't even shower, either of those times." Chan has to stop and close his eyes, silently berating himself for his sheer stupidity. "I didn't shower yesterday night either, because I was too tired. I was fucking covered in sweat but I didn't shower. Minho, that is disgusting."
"It's not," Minho protests instantly. "You were tired. You wanted to sleep."
"Still." Chan can't help but to laugh, a short and dry sound. "And then this morning there wasn't any water in the bathroom. This infection is because I'm stupid and covered in three days worth of sweat."
Minho doesn't say anything at first. When he does, he finally doesn't protests Chan's words. "It will be alright. I know it will."
—————
The doctor cleans out the wound and gives him strict instructions on how to take care of it. She prescribes him antibiotics, and tells him that as long as he takes them all, makes sure the wound is clean and rests for a few days, it will be fine.
Chan is glad Minho is there to hear everything as well, even if manager-hyung is also informed. Manager-hyung decides that he shouldn't participate in dance practice for a few days, and Chan wants to protest, but a single look from Minho shuts him up.
Maybe he deserves it. It has been a stressful time, and he could do with some rest. At the same time he knows that he will not be able to relax knowing how much needs to be done. It feels like a punishment for his carelessness, but he doesn't tell Minho that, knows that he would protest instantly.
When they're done they head back to the practise room, everyone is happy to see that Chan seems to be feeling better.
Minho makes sure he sits down and just watch them practice, even tells the rest of them about the new orders.
Minho throws him a look when he sinks down against the mirrors, making sure that Chan knows that there won't be any dancing for him until his few days are up. Chan can just sign in defeat — he knows which battles to pick.