Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Hyung, isn’t that your boyfriend over there?”

Seokjin whips around to where Jeongguk is pointing, and his eyes nearly pop out of his head. Halfway across the hall, walking with a carton of milk in his hand and a bag full of bread in the other is the guy that Seokjin claimed was his boyfriend.

“Oh, shit.”

Okay, so you might be wondering: how did Seokjin get into this mess? Why is he going around claiming random men are his boyfriend? Is he incapable of getting a man through ethical means?

To that, Seokjin says: fuck you.

It’s kind of complicated, you see. It hasn’t been long since Seokjin made the enlightening discovery that hey, the reason why he kind of was never really interested in dating girls was because he wanted to date boys instead. Well, if by wanting to date you mean fantasizing about it but being too chicken shit to actually go out and date a boy. Seokjin’s a little bit terrified of that part. Sure, he’s twenty and in university and he’s dated girls before and never felt nervous about them, but this was different. This was a whole new ballpark and Seokjin’s a little bit terrified of the balls.

That came out wrong.

Let’s start over.

Seokjin’s twenty years old. Came out to his friends last year. Has never dated a boy before. Too chicken shit to date one. Oh, wait, he said that part already, didn’t he? Sorry, you’ll have to be patient with Seokjin, he’s still a baby gay. Very nervous about gay stuff. Is doing his best.

His friends know this and love him regardless. There’s Park Jimin who knew he was gay from the moment he learned that you should never wear socks with flip flops, Kim Taehyung who came out as pansexual at sixteen and wears socks with flip flops just to piss Jimin off, and Jeon Jeongguk who watches anime. No one knows what his sexual orientation is, but he has a body pillow of Hatsune Miku that he left back home and a shirtless Son Goku as his phone’s background.

Seokjin loves them dearly. Would never tell them that, but whatever. They’re the reason that Seokjin’s in this mess to begin with. Ever since he came out to them they’ve been nothing but supportive and loving and they were all there for him whenever he felt confused and depressed. They also want Seokjin to have someone in his life, and perhaps they’re just a little bit overzealous with that endeavour of theirs.

He didn’t really know how he felt about it – nervous, maybe… discomfort, even. All he knows is that after being signed up on both Tinder and Grindr and shown just about a million pictures of guys that Seokjin could be set up with, he’d had enough, and one day showed them a picture of a dude he found by chance on Twitter and claimed that they were dating.

For a while, things were okay. They asked about Seokjin’s alleged boyfriend that Seokjin didn’t have any selfies with, and Seokjin was quick to make up excuses. Made up a lot of them. Luckily, they didn’t question him too far – because it’s only been a year since Seokjin came out and they knew how nervous he was about dating boys.

Seokjin, Jeongguk, Jimin and Taehyung – the four nations lived together in harmony like that, but everything changed when Namjoon appeared halfway across the hall, walking with a carton of milk in one hand and a bag of bread in the other.

“Hey, hyung, isn’t that your boyfriend over there?” Jeongguk asks, pointing halfway across the hall to the dude that looks exactly like the guy in the pictures Seokjin showed them.

“Oh, shit,” Seokjin mutters under his breath as he freezes.

“It is him!” Jimin jumps up in excitement. “I thought you said he doesn’t go to this university?”

“No, I said he’s not a part of our department,” Seokjin lies through his teeth.

“Oh, okay,” Jimin replies. “Well, let’s go, then! I’ve been dying to meet him!”

Seokjin almost trips over his own foot as he jumps up to stop Jimin. “N-no! Don’t!”

“Why not?” Taehyung asks. “We’re not going to embarrass you.”

“You’re wearing crocs,” Jeongguk rebuffs, but he stands up all the same. Taehyung flips him the bird.

They start weaving through the cafeteria, following after the guy that Seokjin pretended was his boyfriend, and for a moment Seokjin’s stuck in his spot, frozen in shock because he didn’t think he would ever cross paths with the guy, let alone be in the same university! And now his friends are going to find out, and they’ll know that Seokjin lied to them!

He quickly kicks himself into gear. Hoists his bag up onto his shoulder and runs after them, desperate to intercept them. He doesn’t have a lie prepared; his mind is a mess and his main priority is to stop them from reaching that guy. He’ll think of an excuse later.

But they reach him. Jimin’s opening his mouth, and the guy is turning to face them. Looks a little bit confused, but that’s nothing compared to his expression when Seokjin crashes into him.

Seokjin wraps his arm around the guy’s arm. “Darling! You should’ve told me you were here!” Seokjin laughs out, his voice loud and shrill and he’s never heard it sound like this. The guy looks at him, his eyes wide with confusion and a little bit of fear. “I haven’t seen you in so long!” Seokjin continues to shriek. “Look, these are my friends, Jeongguk, Taehyung and Jimin,” he points to each of them quickly. “Guys, I’ll just steal my darling for a moment, I’ll be right back!” he promises.

And he drags the guy away from his friends, who are stunned into silence. Seokjin doesn’t blame them. He doesn’t know why his voice has become so high-pitched. He’s never heard it sound like this before. His heart is thumping away in his chest as he drags the unassuming guy through the hallways and outside of the building before they stop and Seokjin lets go of him and he catches his breath with his hand pressed to his chest.

Neither of them speak for a moment. Seokjin, because he’s dying of embarrassment and shame and lack of breath. The guy because he had just been assaulted and kidnapped all in the space of a minute. But he recovers faster than Seokjin does. “Darling?” he asks incredulously, breathlessly.

Seokjin looks up at him. “Sorry, I didn’t know your name,” he says, and then he really looks at him.

Oh. Seokjin swallows hard. He’s so much cuter in person. “That’s… not what I meant,” the cute guy says.

“Oh,” Seokjin blinks a few times. “Oh, right,” he clears his throat. And then feels it starting to close up. “Haha. Funny story.”

Cute Guy cocks a brow. “I’m listening.”

Seokjin laughs again, nervously. He scratches the back of his head, and realises that he doesn’t know how to start explaining this without sounding like a total nutjob. Then, he realises that he is a nutjob. “Do you want to, uh, sit?”

“Is it going to take a while?”

“Yes. I mean, no.”

“Alright.”

Neither of them budge. Seokjin feels awkward as hell. “Okay, so. So. I came out last year, you see, as gay and-”

“Oh, congrats-”

“Yeah, thanks, anyway – I came out and my friends kept trying to set me up with guys and the only way I could get them to stop was to tell them that-”

“-you and I were dating?”

Seokjin smiles a little bit. “Hey, look at us, completing each other’s sentences! Couple goals.”

Cute Guy furrows his brows. “We’re not a couple.”

Seokjin frowns. “My friends think otherwise.”

“Yeah? And whose fault is that?”

Seokjin presses his lips together sheepishly.

“Anyway,” Cute Guy sighs, “thanks for explaining. Not that I can wrap my head around what just happened any time soon, but… whatever. Good luck explaining it to your friends.”

He turns around to leave. Seokjin’s hands dart out to stop him. “No, wait!” he calls out, and Cute Guy turns back around to stare at him. “Please. I don’t want to admit I lied to them,” Seokjin tells him desperately, his hand clutching the stranger’s arm.

“Do you… want me to tell them you lied?” Cute Guy suggests honestly with raised brows.

Seokjin shakes his head.

“Then…?”

“How about we don’t tell them?” Seokjin suggests, and Cute Guy gawks at him. Seokjin quickly raises his hands to appease him. “Just for a little while. And then we can break up. This way, my friends will stop trying to set me up with random people and they’ll leave me alone after we break up, too. What do you think?”

“I think you’re a little bit insane,” Cute Guy says, and leans forward, tapping the top of Seokjin’s head with his index finger. “Is everything okay in there?”

Seokjin brushes his hand away. “Oh, come on,” he huffs. “Help me out!”

Cute Guy stares at him for a moment, and just before Seokjin starts to feel awkward, he looks down and dismantles the straw from his carton of milk, pierces it, and takes a long sip of milk. “You don’t even know my name. But you found my picture somehow and told your friends that you’re dating me,” he narrows his eyes at Seokjin, “why should I help you?”

“I-I know your name,” Seokjin lies.

“Yeah? What is it?”

Seokjin licks his lips. Pauses. Licks his lips again. “Darling,” he answers.

Cute Guy laughs out loud, and Seokjin sulks until he’s done. Then, he holds his hands out in between them, and Seokjin, a little bit dumbfounded, slowly reaches out and shakes his hand. “My name’s Kim Namjoon.”

“Kim Seokjin,” Seokjin answers slowly as he shakes Namjoon’s hand. “Hey, we have the same last name! Doesn’t that sell the fantasy even better?”

Namjoon stops shaking Seokjin’s hand. “You don’t give up, do you?” he asks as he lets go of Seokjin’s hand.

“Nope. Neither do my friends when it comes to trying to set me up, so please, just pretend to be my boyfriend for a little while. Please? Please?” he pouts. “It’ll just be for a little while, and then we can have an amicable break up, like Reese Witherspoon and that Billy Bob dude.”

“Who?”

“Never mind. All I’m saying is that it won’t be as bad as you’re imagining. I promise. And then we can go straight back to being friends.”

Namjoon looks at him weirdly. “Go back to being friends? I didn’t even know your name until a minute ago.”

“Irrelevant.”

“I-”

Namjoon pauses and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Alright, let’s say I agree to this,” he begins, and Seokjin’s eyes light up in excitement. Namjoon notices and his eyes light up, too, in fear. “Hypothetically,” he quickly reiterates, “what do I get in return?”

“The pleasure of getting to say you’re Kim Seokjin’s boyfriend?”

Namjoon raises a brow.

“Uh… I’ll let you touch my butt?”

Namjoon’s eyes flicker down to Seokjin’s ass for a fraction of a second before he returns his gaze to Seokjin and crosses his arms over his chest. “Your skills in persuasion are unmatched,” he deadpans.

Seokjin sighs in exasperation and gives up. “Why don’t you just tell me what you want in return?”

Namjoon doesn’t say anything for a moment. His chin juts out just a little as he mulls over Seokjin’s proposition. Seokjin waits with bated breath, hands clasped together in prayer, until Namjoon finally looks at him. “I’ll think about it,” he says, and turns around to get away from Seokjin. But Seokjin knows what’s up; he knows that Namjoon’s just saying that to shut him up for now – so he reaches out and grabs Namjoon’s arm.

“Okay, how about you start pretending now, and think about it in the meantime?”

Namjoon looks like he still isn’t convinced, not in the slightest, and if Seokjin would take just a moment to sit down and think about how ridiculous his request is – and of a total stranger, no less – he might just sympathise with Namjoon on this, but Seokjin doesn’t have a moment to do any of that. All he has is his stubbornness.

He returns to the table where his friends are sitting in the cafeteria, and sits down. They all look at him with brows raised in anticipation. Then, he clears his throat. “Everyone, this is Namjoon, my boyfriend. Namjoon, this is Jimin, Taehyung and Jeongguk.”

“You already introduced us,” Jimin says, leaning forward, resting his chin in his palm. “Why’d you two run off so quickly earlier?”

Seokjin rubs the back of his neck. “Uh,” he begins slowly, and feels all of his bullshitting power slip away from him. He licks his lips and looks over at Namjoon, sitting calmly by his side like he wasn’t just dragged here against his will a moment ago.

“I haven’t seen him in a little while,” Namjoon answers when Seokjin fails to find the words. “So I stole him for a quick smooch. Sorry.”

Someone coughs. Seokjin realises it’s himself. Taehyung waves his hand and laughs. “Oh, don’t apologise! We’re just happy Seokjin can be with you out in the open. Up until now he’s never wanted to introduce you to us.”

“Hmm, I wonder why,” Namjoon drawls flatly, glancing over at Seokjin.

Seokjin knocks his knee against Namjoon’s. “Haha,” he laughs rigidly. His face feels frozen, and he’s not even sure if he’s smiling right now. He reaches down and grabs Namjoon’s hand, interlacing their fingers together, and brings their hands up and onto the table. “I was just afraid that, uh, someone would try to steal you away from me.”

“There’s no need to be afraid,” Namjoon replies, and from the corner of his eyes he watches as Jimin coos at them with hearts in his eyes. “It’s not like anyone could ever take anything from you, you’d probably hunt them down and take it back.”

“Yeah, that’s Seokjin-hyung,” Jeongguk agrees.

“You guys know each other so well already,” Jimin pouts. “That’s so cute.”

“Yep, that’s us,” Namjoon says. “Cutest couple in this entire university.”

He says it like it’s torture, but luckily it seems like only Seokjin’s picked up on it.

“Anyway,” Namjoon huffs out, pushing himself out of his seat, “I gotta get going. It was nice meeting you guys,” he waves to Seokjin’s friends. “Bye.”

And then, he’s gone.

“He’s not very talkative, is he?” Taehyung turns to Seokjin to ask.

“Uh,” Seokjin begins dumbly, because how is he supposed to know? He doesn’t know Namjoon any more than Taehyung does. “He just takes time to warm up to people,” he bullshits because there’s nothing else he can do at this point. He hopes he’s right, though, because if his friends catch on that they’re only pretending to be dating then Seokjin will be right back to square one with all the matchups that made him nervous as hell about dating guys.

“Well, anyway,” Jeongguk waves his hand, “at least he’s nice.”

“And good-looking,” Jimin adds. “And tall.”

“He’s, like, pretty much the same height as me,” Seokjin says, furrowing his brow.

Jimin pretends he didn’t hear Seokjin. “It’s so hard finding a man taller than you,” he laments.

“Can’t be that hard,” Jeongguk mutters. “Not for you, anyway. What are you, five foot seven?”

“Eight and a half!” Jimin hisses at Jeongguk.

“Like that makes any difference at all,” Jeongguk shrugs.

Jimin parts his lips to rebuff that, but Taehyung holds his hand out in between them. “Agree to disagree? Otherwise we’ll be here forever.”

“How did we even start talking about Jimin’s height, anyway?” Seokjin wonders.

“Jimin brought it up himself,” Jeongguk answers.

“Ah, I see,” Seokjin accepts with a nod.

Jeongguk nods, too, and sits back as Jimin continues to talk about his height.

Seokjin doesn’t talk to Namjoon again until later on that afternoon, while he’s in a lecture that he should probably be paying attention to. He hides his phone under the desk as he texts.

Namjoon responds almost instantly.

Seokjin pauses for a moment.

Namjoon doesn’t reply for a while. Seokjin decides to pocket his phone and pay attention to his lecture, and it isn’t until the lecture ends that he feels his phone buzz.

He pockets his phone again with a smile on his face. Seokjin might not have had any luck in the (real) boyfriend department, but he sure knows how to get his way with anything else.

And who knows, maybe the fake dating would boost his confidence and make him feel more prepared for when the real deal comes along?

Namjoon looks less than pleased to see Seokjin again for the second time that day. His lips are pursed like he’s pouting, and his arms are folded across his chest as he waits for Seokjin by the steps. “Gee, is the idea of a date with me that repulsive?” Seokjin sulks a little as he reaches Namjoon’s side. “Are you worried that people you know will see us?”

“It’s not that –”

“–because you could just tell them that we’re friends. So long as your circle and my circle stay as two independent circles.”

“Why do I always feel like I’m being coerced into things when I talk to you?”

“I wouldn’t say you were coerced,” Seokjin muses, tapping his chin as they start to walk together. “It’s more like… gentle persuasion. I just happen to be a very persuasive person.”

“Right…” Namjoon drawls, narrowing his eyes at Seokjin. “What did you say you’d let me do? Touch your butt? Very persuasive of you.”

Seokjin picks up on the sarcasm but he pretends it doesn’t exist. Much like his dignity ever since he’d coerced a random stranger into pretending to date him. “Well? Did that persuade you?”

He watches as Namjoon’s eyes flicker down to his ass for a fraction of a second. He looks back up and meets Seokjin’s eyes like he isn’t ashamed of himself at all. “Depends,” he says vaguely, and picks up the pace as they draw closer to the nearest café.

“On what?” Seokjin asks as he jogs a little to catch up to Namjoon just as they reach the café. Namjoon opens the door.

“On whether you meant it or not,” he answers, and then heads inside. He locates a small table for himself and Seokjin, sits down and begins to unpack his laptop and a textbook from his bag. He’s already typing in his password by the time Seokjin reaches him and sits down opposite. He starts to take out his own laptop, slowly, because he doesn’t really want to sit still and study with someone he barely knows when he could be playing games with his friends, and because that someone he barely knows just said something that Seokjin didn’t really understand and he’s waiting for an explanation – is he expecting to touch Seokjin’s butt or not – though he doesn’t seem to get what he wants, this time around.

He doesn’t really want to know, he realises. He’s never had his butt touched by a guy before, and he thinks that maybe he should take this slowly.

“What do you want to eat?” Seokjin asks Namjoon before he buries himself in his assignments. Namjoon looks up like he’d forgotten Seokjin was there.

“Oh,” he says. He did forget. “Hmm… how about an americano and a slice of cake? This place does really nice red velvet.”

Seokjin furrows his brows. “I would never have taken you for a red velvet kind of guy.”

“Hm?” Namjoon looks up to meet Seokjin’s eyes when Seokjin stands up with his wallet in his hand. “What kind of guy would you have taken me for?”

“I dunno,” Seokjin shrugs casually. “Granola bars and lattes, that kind of stuff.”

“Huh,” Namjoon straightens up slightly, “one of my friends said the same thing, once, about granola bars. I wonder why…”

“Namjoon,” Seokjin says, grabbing his attention just before he drifts off into his wonderment with his finger stroking his chin. Namjoon snaps his head up to look at Seokjin. “You’re wearing overalls. You don’t have to wonder that hard.”

He leaves Namjoon with that nugget of information and heads up to the front where he places their orders.

When he returns with their coffees and desserts he has to remind Namjoon not to dig into their cakes because selcas come first. He takes a few of their desserts before he twists in his seat to take some selcas with Namjoon. Then, he takes some of the café, because it’s cute.

Namjoon studies in between taking sips of his coffee and bites out of his cake in silence, just like Seokjin had said they would. Which is weird, because whenever he’d promise to study in silence with his friends they almost never stay quiet, not for any kind of extended period of time. It’s a little weird, and only for a moment does Seokjin remember that he’d only just met Namjoon that day, had forced him to go along with this insane plan of his, and has now dragged him out to this café, but soon enough he pushes that thought out of his mind. “So, Namjoon,” he says just loud enough that Namjoon looks up from his textbook. “What do you study?”

“You don’t know what I study?”

“No,” Seokjin replies, pursing his lips. “How would I know?”

“You found my picture online and pretended you were dating me. I thought you’d know everything about me.”

“I’m not a stalker,” Seokjin pouts. “Wait – if you thought that, why weren’t you creeped out?”

Namjoon shrugs. “More pressing matters at hand. Specifically, you begging me to pretend to date you.”

“And I succeeded in my endeavours. You agreed to it.”

“Name one time that I agreed to anything you’ve asked me to do.”

“Today,” Seokjin counts off on one finger, “I asked you to pretend to be my boyfriend. You agreed. Today, again, I asked you to go on a date with me. You agreed.”

Namjoon shuts his mouth and presses his lips together. “I –” he begins, and then quietens down again. “Fine, I’ll let you have that one. And FYI – I only agreed to this date because you said you would pay.”

“Cheap ass.”

“Whatever. At least my dignity’s still intact.”

“Are you saying mine’s not?”

“No offense, but you begged a total stranger to pretend to date you.”

“Yeah, and you agreed for the price of red velvet cake and an americano.”

Namjoon licks his lips and pauses as he sizes Seokjin up while simultaneously looking like his feelings just got hurt. “You said we would study in silence,” he sulks.

“You didn’t even tell me what you’re studying,” Seokjin ignores him.

“Art history. Can we–”

“Oh, cool. I’m doing psychology.”

“Didn’t ask. I’m putting my headphones in, now.”

“Ooh, who’s your favourite BT–”

“Shut up, please, I’m begging you.”

Namjoon taps Seokjin on the arm, knocking him back into reality. The sun is starting to set outside the café and Namjoon’s belongings are half-packed back into his backpack. “Let’s go,” he tells Seokjin. “Unless you wanna stay a little longer? You look so focused.”

Seokjin’s eyes flicker back and forth between Namjoon sitting opposite him, and his laptop screen that Namjoon can’t see where he’d been reading Kimetsu no Yaiba for the past few hours. “No, uh, I’m okay. Let’s go.”

He shuts his laptop and packs it into his bag, and they head out of the café together. Seokjin stretches his arms and legs out, and then they start to walk together. “So, did your friends like the photos that we took?” Namjoon asks casually.

Seokjin pulls his phone out of his pocket and checks. “Yep,” he says as he taps around on the screen. “Jimin said we look really good together, and Taehyung said he likes your outfit.”

“Oh, tell him I said thanks.”

“Who, Jimin or Taehyung?”

“Taehyung,” Namjoon clarifies. “We’re not a real couple, so looking good with you means nothing to me.”

Seokjin gives him the side eye. “Yes, yes, I get it, you’ve been forced against your will to pretend to date a guy you don’t know, aren’t you tired of complaining already? You got free cake and a coffee.”

“Ah, yes, because I can totally be bought with free cake and a coffee.”

“Hey, you’re the one who allowed yourself to be sold for cake and a coffee.”

Namjoon looks over at him and purses his lips. “You’re kind of annoying.”

“Thanks, I try. Hey, do you wanna meet up for lunch tomorrow with my friends? You can bring your friends, too.”

“And involve more people into this? I thought we were only gonna pretend for a short while before breaking it off amicably?”

“We have to be believable,” Seokjin tries to reason. “And that means meeting each other’s friends. Otherwise the breakup won’t mean anything and my friends are going to jump back on all the matchmaking.”

“And that’s such a bad thing, because…?”

“Dating boys is scary.”

“But pretending to date a stranger isn’t?”

“Nope.”

“…you know, I really question how your mind works.”

“Don’t psychoanalyse me.”

Namjoon huffs. “Fine, we can have lunch together. Meet me in the cafeteria at one,” he finally gives in, and Seokjin smiles widely at him. “Don’t look at me like that, I’m not happy about this.”

“Yeah, sure you aren’t,” Seokjin snorts, “you’ve literally jumped at every opportunity to spend time with me. I don’t even have to try anymore.”

“You’re so annoying.”

“I don’t hear you denying my claims.”

They reach their dorms before Seokjin even realises it, and he only stops walking because Namjoon does, first. “That’s because you’d find some way to invalidate me if I did.”

“It’s called having a conversation, Namjoon. People do that. I say something, then you say something, and then I tell you that you’re wrong and that it’s my way or no way.”

Namjoon raises his brows and puts one hand on his hip. “Oh, is no way an option? I didn’t know that. Please, let me invoke the no way clause.”

Seokjin slaps his stomach. “No backsies,” he threatens Namjoon with another smack. “Anyway. See you tomorrow!” he smiles sweetly and waves before he splits ways with Namjoon.

And true to his word, Namjoon’s waiting for him in the cafeteria the next day at one with his friends. They’ve claimed a whole table for the three of them, and when they spot Seokjin and his friends they shuffle around so that Seokjin can sit next to Namjoon.

He sits down with his food, and introduces his friends to Namjoon’s friends, and vice versa. Seokjin doesn’t know if Namjoon’s friends know that they’re only pretending to date, they haven’t discussed that – or discussed the meeting at all beyond the time and place – so Seokjin plays it safely and keeps his guard up.

Yoongi and Hoseok, Namjoon’s friends, take a liking to Seokjin almost immediately (unsurprisingly – is there ever a human being that doesn’t fall in love with Seokjin whether romantically or platonically?) and they hit it off so much that Jimin opens up his mouth and asks, “is it just me or are the two of you kind of awkward with each other?” to Seokjin and Namjoon (surprisingly – because apparently Namjoon is the only human being that didn’t fall in love with Seokjin either romantically or platonically almost immediately), and Seokjin freezes up a little.

He quickly grabs Namjoon’s hand in an attempt to show his friends how un-awkward they are. “What are you talking about?” he laughs nervously. “We’re not awkward.”

Namjoon shifts his hand in Seokjin’s and intertwines their fingers together. His hand feels hot. “It’s because he’s still new to this,” he says softly, and then turns to face Seokjin. “Aren’t you?” he smiles. He’s got dimples.

Seokjin’s face grows warm.

“Your ears are going red,” Namjoon laughs, and uses his other hand to touch Seokjin’s ear. “Cute.”

His face bursts into flames when Namjoon starts to lean in for what seems like a kiss and Seokjin freezes, because oh boy, is Seokjin gay. Seokjin’s very gay. Seokjin can’t believe he’d spent nineteen years thinking he was straight and that there was nothing strange about his lack of enthusiasm about girls when all it took to evoke such a visceral, ear-reddening response out of him was for one good-looking boy to tell him that he’s cute and to smile at him with a pair of dimples and then come at him, lips first. What the fuck. Seokjin gay.

He stands up quickly to avoid the kiss, and with his fingers still intertwined with Namjoon’s he pulls Namjoon up to his feet, too. “Come with me for a sec,” Seokjin tells Namjoon, and he quickly excuses himself to their friends before he drags Namjoon away.

Namjoon doesn’t say a word, not while he’s being led by the hand to somewhere he doesn’t know by a guy he doesn’t know for a reason Seokjin hopes he knows – because explaining himself right now seems like the worst possible thing in the world. But it needs to be said, and Seokjin doesn’t stop until they reach one of the restrooms, and only once they’re inside does Seokjin let go of Namjoon’s hand and check all the stalls.

“What the hell was that about?” Seokjin hisses at Namjoon once he’s sure they’re alone.

“What was what about?” Namjoon asks, leaning against the sink, folding his arms over his chest.

“The – the… you know,” Seokjin stammers, and reaches up to cover his ears. “Calling me cute,” he whispers. “And… and whatever the fuck you were about to do after that.”

“Kiss your cheek?”

Seokjin doesn’t say a word.

Namjoon frowns. “Just yesterday you were telling me we need to be realistic in order to be believable,” he says, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “But now you… what, changed your mind?”

“N-no, it’s not that…” Seokjin mumbles. “We, uh, should absolutely try to be believable…”

“Then?”

“I just… it’s just that…” Seokjin trails off, and then huffs. “Look, I’ve never been in a relationship with a guy before, and you caught me off-guard just now. That’s all.”

He swallows and stares at the edge of one of the sinks and waits as Namjoon apparently needs a moment to process what Seokjin has told him, and when he does, it seems, he starts laughing. Seokjin snaps his head up and finds Namjoon having the time of his life laughing at Seokjin’s misfortune. He bares his teeth.

“How could you laugh at me?!” he yells at Namjoon. “This isn’t funny!”

“It’s really funny,” Namjoon maintains as he calms down. “You’re the one who so confidently asked me to be your pretend boyfriend.”

“Yeah, well… I didn’t know you were gonna suddenly lean in. A little heads-up would’ve been nice.”

“Fine, fine,” Namjoon gives in, lifting his hands up in concession. “Next time I obey your commands I will warn you in advance.”

“Don’t be smart with me,” Seokjin sulks. “Now, let’s head back before they start suspecting something’s up.”

Namjoon just pushes himself off the sink and follows Seokjin out of the restrooms. “If your friends trust you when you say you’re dating me then the only thing they’d be suspecting is that we snuck off to make out or something.”

Seokjin’s face grows warm again and he picks up the pace so that Namjoon drags behind him a little. “Please stop talking about that,” he tells Namjoon. “It’s stressing me out.”

He hears Namjoon laugh again, but this time he doesn’t tell him to shut up like he wants to. Instead, he just picks up the pace to get back to his friends, his safety, sooner.

And when they do, Jeongguk asks them if they had fun making out, and Namjoon just laughs because apparently, he’d predicted it from the very beginning, and he makes absolutely no moves to correct Jeongguk. Seokjin punches his arm because he’s not happy about this even though he knows that the best option for him right now is to play along with this. When they sit down again, Seokjin leans in towards Namjoon to whisper to him. “You’re having way too much fun with this,” he sulks at Namjoon.

Namjoon leans in, too. “I think I deserve it, no? I still haven’t been rewarded for all my troubles.”

Seokjin grits his teeth. “Haven’t you thought about what you want in return?” he whispers again. “I’m getting kind of anxious thinking about what you’ll ask from me.”

“I haven’t decided yet,” Namjoon admits. “I’m still considering my options.”

“Alright, well… just keep in mind that I’m broke.”

Namjoon looks at him in disdain. “You should’ve said that at the beginning. Now I gotta say goodbye to most of my ideas.”

“Cheap ass,” Seokjin scoffs.

“Whatever,” Namjoon shrugs. “You’re in no position to shame me, you literally begged me –”

“God, are you ever gonna let that go?”

“I’ll let it go when I stop pretending to be your boyfriend.”

Seokjin sighs deeply. “Why’d I have to pick you, of all people…?” he laments quietly.

“Because I’m good-looking and taller than you?”

“We’re practically the same height.”

“Yeah, okay,” Namjoon scoffs incredulously. “Keep telling yourself that.”

“Alright, stand up,” Seokjin orders, and he steps out of his seat. The rest of the table looks at him as he grabs Namjoon’s arm and pulls him up. Then, he looks over at the others. “Guys, who thinks Namjoon is considerably taller than me?”

Namjoon’s the first to raise his hand. Seokjin quickly slaps it down.

As it turns out, Seokjin finds that he’s kind of outnumbered. Jimin had been carrying a torch for their height difference from the moment he’d seen Namjoon and continues to maintain that belief. Taehyung agrees too, but only because he’s thinks he’s the same height as Seokjin and thinks that Namjoon is taller than both of them. Jeongguk agrees, too, because he’s bitter that there’s yet another person he needs to beat in height in his ten-step plan of becoming the tallest in his group of friends. Seokjin didn’t even know they’d become a group of friends. Hoseok doesn’t need to say he agrees because he just says that they look cute together.

The only person who’s on Seokjin’s side is Yoongi – though he disagrees because from his short point of view everyone looks taller than him and he can’t really tell if there’s a difference between Namjoon and Seokjin. Seokjin holds onto that like it’s a lifeline.

They sit back down together, Namjoon now with his chest puffed out in pride of the two centimetres, max, that he has over Seokjin, and Seokjin with his feelings hurt. “Just be happy,” Jimin tells Seokjin. “It’s so hard finding a guy taller than you.”

“Again,” Jeongguk turns to face Jimin a little. “Not that hard. Not for you, anyway.”

“Hey, Jeon Jeongguk. I will fight you.”

Seokjin leans forward and rests his chin in his hand. “Why don’t you two just date each other?” he suggests, and watches as Jimin's face turns into a bright shade of red, and for a moment Seokjin feels like he can breathe now that he isn’t in the spotlight anymore, and he stops feeling so conscious of Namjoon sitting next to him.

And when their next classes begin and they have to get up and split ways, Namjoon stops Seokjin with hands to his arms, and he whispers, “I’m going to hug you, now,” before he leans forward and wraps his arms around Seokjin, and squeezes him for a second while Seokjin stands completely stock-still in shock. Then, he lets go. “Alright, I’ll talk to you later, Seokjin,” Namjoon says as he lets go, and waves goodbye to Seokjin’s friends before they leave. Seokjin doesn’t move a muscle – doesn’t even snap back into reality until Taehyung pats his shoulder.

“I know you miss your boyfriend already,” he says with an understanding nod of his head, “but if we don’t get going we’ll be late to our lecture.”

Seokjin almost jumps. “Haha. Yeah. Of course.”

He kicks himself into gear and follows his friends off to their next class.

Somehow, Seokjin’s plan of Not Making This A Big Deal starts its slow descent into backfiring when Jimin suggests that they all go out together, because, as he puts it, they should all get to know each other properly if they’re going to wholeheartedly support namjin.

(“What the fuck is a namjin?” Seokjin had asked.

“Yours and Namjoon’s couple name,” Jimin answered simply.

“What?”

“The nam comes from Namjoon and the jin comes from Seokjin,” Jeongguk explained, nodding his head in support of Jimin’s creativity.

“No, I got that,” Seokjin quickly dismissed, “I just don’t understand why my name isn’t first.”

“It’s because you’re shorter than him,” Jimin replied.

Seokjin groaned. “Why are you so obsessed with height?”

“It’s because he doesn’t have any,” Jeongguk answered.

And got a smack to the back of his head by Jimin.)

He decides to text Namjoon about the plan.

Seokjin stares at the screen of his phone for a moment as he processes the messages.

Seokjin sulks at his phone.

Seokjin ignores that.

Seokjin smiles widely at his screen, and for a moment he wants to brag about the power he now has over Namjoon, at how easy it’s become to convince Namjoon to go ahead with any and all of his plans, but he holds himself back from sounding too eager lest it scares Namjoon off. So he clears his throat and holds it back, for now, at least.

“Didn’t I tell you to match outfits with me?”

Namjoon looks down at himself, looks back up, and gives Seokjin an empty smile. “You did.”

“And you agreed. You even asked me to send you a picture of my outfit so you could match!”

“I did that so I knew what to avoid.”

Seokjin frowns at him. “Asshole. We have time. Go back and change,” he says, grabbing Namjoon by the shoulders and turning him around. He’d told Namjoon to meet up with him earlier than what the rest of the group had decided on because he knew he’d have to talk to Namjoon about something or another – and he was right, he knew Namjoon would need a talking to, and as it turns out, he was rebelling against Seokjin for no good reason at all.

He only manages to push Namjoon about three steps forward when Hoseok turns up at their meeting spot. “Oh, I thought I’d be the first one here,” he laughs as he joins them. Seokjin quickly lets go of Namjoon’s shoulders, and Namjoon turns around to stand besides him.

“Nope,” Seokjin replies brightly like he wasn’t holding himself back from beating Namjoon’s ass just a moment ago. “We decided to meet up earlier to talk a little before you guys got here.”

Namjoon looks over at him. Seokjin telepathically tells him to keep his mouth shut.

“Ooh, sorry if I was interrupting anything, then!” Hoseok slaps his hands together in apology.

Namjoon waves his hand. “Don’t worry about it. We weren’t talking about anything important. Seokjin was just telling me about how hot he thinks I am, that’s all.”

Seokjin snaps his head over to look at Namjoon, and he parts his lips to retaliate, but he quickly snaps his mouth shut when he realises that he absolutely cannot do that. He presses his lips together. Takes a breath. “I mean, can you blame me? Look at him,” Seokjin adds on, forcing himself to sound chipper. “I really got lucky with Namjoon.”

He looks over at Namjoon gingerly, who’s grinning like a fool, and he immediately feels the violent urge to smack the grin off his face but almost immediately after that he realises that ultimately, this is all his fault and that he can’t be mad at Namjoon for literally anything, since Seokjin asked for it. He’s reasonable enough to know this. And to bite his tongue. For now, anyway.

The rest of their two groups show up soon after, and together they head to the bowling alley that Jeongguk had suggested.

“You know what I just realised?” Taehyung says as they lace up their bowling shoes, pointing to Seokjin and Namjoon. “You two are matching.”

Seokjin furrows his brows, and looks down at his cute pink hoodie, and then over at Namjoon who had showed up in an offensive shade of blue under another goddamn pair of overalls, and his first thought is about how they couldn’t be further from matching with each other before he looks back at Taehyung, his second thought being about what could possibly be wrong with his eyes that would make him think they’re matching.

“Your watches.”

He looks back down at himself, at his hands while he’s lacing up his shoes, and at his wrist where his watch is – his rose-gold Rolex that he got from his parents as a gift for getting into university. Then, he looks at Namjoon besides him, and at the identical watch on his wrist, too, in silver.

He looks up at Namjoon, and Namjoon looks just as confused as he is.

“Damn,” Jimin sighs deeply, his shoulders sagging as he goes. “Tall, hot and rich. Seokjin, you really lucked out with this one. Bought a Rolex just to match with you.”

“Haha,” Namjoon laughs, and Seokjin wonders if he’s the only one who can tell how fake the laugh sounds. “That’s me. People would do anything to be able to say I’m their boyfriend.”

It’s a direct jab to Seokjin, he knows it. He’s still not over Seokjin begging him to pretend to be his boyfriend, and he’s going to complain about it as much as he humanly can, and in any way he could possibly express it – whether it’s explicitly when it’s just the two of them, or whether it’s mixed into snide, subtle remarks like this. He elbows Namjoon, but doesn’t deal much damage at all, and Namjoon just laughs. They stand up and move to their bowling alley.

Thankfully, the rest of the group move on from focusing their attentions on Seokjin and Namjoon. Jeongguk, as it turns out, only suggested bowling because he’s good at it. They split the group into two; Seokjin, Namjoon, Hoseok and Yoongi in one team, and Jeongguk, Taehyung and Jimin in the other. A strategic move, Seokjin realises, because neither Taehyung nor Jimin know how to throw the ball in a straight line and Jeongguk’s talent makes up for it, and both Seokjin and Yoongi play by making their legs as wide as the lane, and chucking the ball with both hands. Only Namjoon and Hoseok play the way it should be played.

“You look so stupid,” Namjoon laughs when Seokjin waddles up to the lane, carrying the ball in his hands.

“If this is what I gotta do to get a strike, then so be it!” Seokjin shouts back.

“Your technique isn’t even that helpful.”

“Hey, don’t question the technique,” Yoongi smacks him. “It works.”

“For you, maybe,” Namjoon replies. “For Seokjin? He just looks like an idiot.”

“Is that any way to talk about your boyfriend?” Hoseok scolds him with a laugh.

Seokjin swings his arms back to throw the ball.

“It’s okay, he’s my idiot.”

He throws the ball wrong, and it hits the gutter almost immediately after it lands, and Seokjin watches as it pathetically rolls away from him, and as Namjoon starts cackling behind him. He turns around and grumbles as he watches Namjoon crack up. He walks back in shame, sits down next to Namjoon, and punches his arm. “Hey. Stop laughing at me.”

“But it was so funny,” he sits upright and casually puts an arm around Seokjin. “I’ll show you how to throw it right when it’s your turn, next.”

“No thanks, I don’t want your help,” Seokjin sulks and shrugs Namjoon’s arm off him.

Namjoon’s arm slips down from Seokjin’s shoulders, but he keeps his hand on the small of Seokjin’s back. “Don’t you want a good score, at least once? Your friends over there are destroying us. Well, Jeongguk is.”

“Hm,” Seokjin purses his lips and looks away from Namjoon, and over to where Jimin is up and throwing his ball while Jeongguk stands behind him, his hands on Jimin’s arms, helping him. It feels like cheating, and Seokjin would normally absolutely be against cheating unless he’s the one cheating, but right now it feels like it doesn’t really matter. He looks back at Namjoon who’s sitting next to him, a hand on his back, leaning in towards him like Seokjin’s the most important person in the room. “Fine. You can help me. But only because I want to win.”

Namjoon smiles at him. His face is close – really close, so much so that his eyes flicker between Namjoon’s eyes before he looks away.

He swallows, hard. And waits patiently for his turn to go up.

Because when he does go up, Namjoon comes along with him. He stands behind Seokjin and circles his arms around him, clasping Seokjin’s wrists. He’s saying some stuff, Seokjin’s isn’t really sure what – though he suspects it’s about the ball and about bowling and about the pins lined up ahead. Then, he’s angling Seokjin’s body just a little bit with his chest pressed to Seokjin’s back, and just like that, the ball is rolling down the lane. It knocks over eight pins. Namjoon lets go of Seokjin to high-five him.

“Now, if we keep this up, we’ll beat them. I know it.”

“R-right.”

They go to sit down. Namjoon plops down on the seat close to Seokjin and doesn’t seem to notice the way their thighs are pressing together, like Seokjin does, or the way he leans in towards Seokjin like he’s drawn to him. Seokjin wishes that he didn’t notice it, either.

And for the rest of the game, Namjoon goes up with Seokjin to help him, and each time Seokjin scores well even if he isn’t paying attention to the game at all.

In the end, they don’t win. Jeongguk’s talent and assistance to Jimin and Taehyung pulls them through, and they decide that as a punishment they’ll pay for everything when they go out to eat. Yoongi finds a small restaurant, and they spend the rest of the night eating grilled meat, drinking beer and talking about anything that comes to mind.

It feels almost natural. Like they’d all been friends for a long time, like the way Namjoon sits just a little closer to him wasn’t born out of his consciousness that the two of them are only pretending to be together. It almost feels natural, and Seokjin has to remind himself that none of it is real whenever Namjoon looks over at him and smiles widely, just so that he doesn’t get carried away. He tries his best, he really does. But when it’s time to leave and the group splits ways, Namjoon sticks by Seokjin’s side.

“What are you doing?” he asks lightly.

“What does it look like? I’m walking you home,” Namjoon replies casually as they walk together on the sidewalk under the yellow streetlamps.

“You don’t have to,” Seokjin says quietly. “Our friends aren’t around to watch.”

Namjoon looks at him and doesn’t say anything for a brief moment. “I don’t mind. We’re already halfway back to your flat.”

Seokjin doesn’t say anything else to that. They walk together, silently, until they reach Seokjin’s front door, and Namjoon pushes his hands into his pockets. “Thanks,” Seokjin tells him as he takes his keys out of his pocket.

“Yeah,” Namjoon replies nonchalantly. “Surprisingly, I had fun tonight.”

“What’s so surprising about that?”

“I mean, I’ve literally never before in my life been forced into a friendship before. Or a relationship. Whatever. I didn’t expect it would be fun at any point.”

“I’m a very fun person. You’re welcome.”

Namjoon snorts. “As if you’re doing me a favour.”

“Well, you know me. Always trying to help. I love putting out good energy into the world, you know? And if that means letting you see what it’s like to date me, then so be it.”

There’s a funny look on Namjoon’s face that Seokjin’s too tired and a little bit too tipsy to read. “Don’t get it twisted, you’re the one having The Kim Namjoon Boyfriend Experience. Not that I willingly gave it to you. You kind of stole it.”

Seokjin sighs. “Will you ever stop complaining about that?”

“Nope.”

“I bought you food. Twice.”

“I can’t be bought with food, my dear boyfriend.”

“Then tell me what you want in return.”

“I’m still thinking about it. I gotta make sure it’s something good.”

“Don’t go overboard. I’m not rich, remember?”

Namjoon leans forward and taps the face of Seokjin’s watch. “Then where did this Rolex come from?”

Seokjin covers his watch with his hand and holds it near his chest. “My parents. It was a gift for getting into uni. Where did yours come from?”

“Birthday present.”

It’s a couple’s watch, Seokjin knows that – and up until now that meant nothing to him, because he was single and his watch came from his parents, so it meant nothing to him up until now – but Namjoon’s watch was a birthday present and Seokjin doesn’t know who from.

Which means that Seokjin had not thought about the possibility that Namjoon wasn’t single, up until now. He could’ve had a boyfriend or a girlfriend already – someone who was okay with him pretending to date Seokjin in front of his friends, or someone who didn’t even go to this university and would never find out – and Seokjin would’ve never known if he didn’t connect the dots by himself.

He looks back at Namjoon. He doesn’t say anything because he doesn’t have the right to. They’re not dating for real, after all, and Namjoon isn’t his.

“I’ll get going, then,” Namjoon says after a moment. “I’ll see you around.”

And just like that, he’s gone. They go back to being nothing once again.

On Monday morning, halfway into Seokjin’s first lecture of the day, his phone buzzes. He stealthily pulls it out of his pocket. It seems as though a group chat has been created for the amalgamation of Seokjin’s group of friends and Namjoon’s group of friends.

It’s too early for this. Seokjin locks his phone and stares at Jeongguk’s screen from where he sits two rows ahead. He doesn’t look at his phone again, not until it reaches lunch time and he joins back up with his friends and they head to the cafeteria, and Seokjin supposes that he doesn’t need to see the messages that had come through on his phone because it all makes sense when his friends lead him to a table with Namjoon and his friends.

Namjoon pats the seat next to him, and Seokjin takes it. It’s all so casual. So nonchalant. Doesn’t mean anything at all. Namjoon’s only doing what Seokjin asked him to do, and so far he’s doing it really well. Seokjin can’t complain.

But that’s just it – isn’t it? Seokjin can’t complain. He doesn’t have anything to complain about. He asked for it, demanded it, even, and Namjoon’s doing exactly what Seokjin asked him to do. Everyone’s talking and laughing and being friends with each other in a way that Seokjin never anticipated, and all he can do is sit and think about how there’s nothing to complain about, and even if there was, he wouldn’t be allowed to complain, because he’s the one who asked for it.

Namjoon leans in towards him. “You’ve been kind of quiet,” he whispers. “What’s wrong?”

“What! Nothing.”

Namjoon furrows his brows. “Your voice went all squeaky there.”

“It did not.”

“Totally did,” Namjoon laughs.

“Stop teasing me.”

“But it’s so much fun!”

Seokjin pouts. “The Kim Namjoon Boyfriend Experience sucks.”

“Oh, now I know you don’t mean that,” Namjoon coos as he pokes Seokjin’s cheek. Seokjin brushes Namjoon’s hand away, but Namjoon isn’t deterred at all. He pokes Seokjin’s cheek again. “You’re so cute.”

“You two are so disgusting,” Yoongi says in the background, and Seokjin’s only mildly aware that he’s talking about them. He doesn’t respond or react, because he’s too focused on getting Namjoon to let go of him. “Get a room.”

Namjoon just laughs. “Oh, we will, later.”

He winks at Seokjin.

And Seokjin can’t complain. He really can’t.

But oh, boy, does he want to.

The getting of a room later, as declared so brazenly by Namjoon, entails a conversation through text messages initiated by Seokjin when he realises that he can’t seem to focus on the anime he’d been watching. At first he’d wondered if he was just watching a boring anime – but that’s quickly shot out of the sky when he realises it’s Haikyuu and he’s halfway through the episode without any recollection of what he’d just watched, and then he’d wondered if he was just in the mood to talk to his friends, but after sending a couple of memes to the OG namjinists group chat he realised that that wasn’t the case, either. So he texts Namjoon directly.

He heads over to his wardrobe where he plucks out the first shirt he sees – a pretty, black sheer one that he hasn’t worn in a while, and didn’t think he’d be wearing any time soon. He slips it on, though, because he had no clue what to talk to Namjoon about even though he wanted to talk to Namjoon about something, and shirts at dates orchestrated to fool his friends seemed like the best and most viable excuse, and so Seokjin rolls with it. He takes a picture of himself in the bathroom mirror and sends it to Namjoon.

Seokjin stares at his screen.

And stares.

And stares.

And then Namjoon texts once again, the little pop-up message startling Seokjin into dropping his phone.

He doesn’t speak to Namjoon again for a week. Namjoon doesn’t text him again, and the group chat is just filled with pictures their friends had taken of them while they weren’t looking, and Seokjin doesn’t really talk on it at all. He just looks at the pictures, and wonders why the fuck he’s always sitting next so close to Namjoon, as if there’s no more available space and they have no other choice than to squish up next to each other.

Namjoon doesn’t text him again, and there’s a brief moment, some time during the week, when Seokjin has the urge to message him with some other stupid topic of conversation he’d pulled out of his ass, but he holds himself back. He doesn’t quite know why. All he knows is that he’s the one who asked for this, and he can’t complain.

He really can’t complain. It was his stupid idea in the first place, it was his own fault that his friends were so invested in finding a guy for Seokjin because he was too pathetic to find one for himself, it was his own doing that he’d lied to them and said he was dating Namjoon, and his own two hands that stopped Namjoon from rejecting Seokjin’s plan when he should’ve run for the hills. And now he can’t complain about Namjoon doing exactly what Seokjin wanted him to do – to act like a boyfriend, to look believable – and he can’t complain about the fact that Namjoon probably already has someone in his life. That someone out there has a matching watch with him, and that Namjoon likes this person. For real.

He can’t complain. It’s his fault – he’s the one who orchestrated it, and he’s the one losing out. So when they finally see each other again at the end of the week because Jimin was adamant that they were all best friends, now, and needed to meet again, it’s a little awkward even if Seokjin tries his best to pretend it’s not. As he’s come to realise, he’s not that good at pretending.

But he does it anyway.

“Hey, is everything okay?” Namjoon takes him by the arm, ushering him though the living room. They’d decided to meet up in his flat he shares with Hoseok and Yoongi to drink beer, eat snacks and play card games. The rest of the group are still pouring chips into bowls, so Namjoon takes the opportunity to take Seokjin to his room, and he closes the door.

“Yeah, everything’s fine. Why wouldn’t it be?” Seokjin breathes out before he gives Namjoon a winning smile. Or at least, he thinks he does. He’s not quite sure. He’s in Namjoon’s room, and the door is closed, and everyone on the other side is convinced that the two of them are in love with each other. They’re not, and it’s all Seokjin’s fault.

“Well, you didn’t reply to my text. And that was, like, a week ago.”

“Ah. Sorry. I uh… was busy.”

Namjoon looks at him like he doesn’t believe him. “So it has nothing to do with… our conversation before you suddenly became busy?”

“No.”

“Okay. Well. I’m sorry, anyway. I didn’t mean to take it that far. I don’t know if you saw my apology.”

“I saw it.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah.”

Namjoon opens the door, and he lets Seokjin out before following after. The rest of the group are sat in a circle on the floor, with only enough space available for the two of them to sit besides each other, again. And again, they ignore how much space they really have and crowd together as if some higher force was pushing them towards each other. Seokjin doesn’t know how it happens. He knows most of all of this is his fault, but he doesn’t know how his knee ends up on top of Namjoon’s knee. Or how Namjoon’s got his arm draped over Seokjin’s lap. He has no idea. This wasn’t his doing.

Neither was their friends becoming so close with each other – he couldn’t have anticipated this, didn’t think that they’d become close like this, thought that they’d meet once just so that it was believable, and then never interact with each other again, but they’d already created a group chat that hasn’t died off yet, and are already planning meet ups in the future. He wasn’t the one who pushed it to ever go that far.

He looks at Namjoon, who’s sitting close to him and laughing at something that Seokjin wasn’t paying attention to. There’s a weird feeling in his chest that he can’t quite name. He feels warm – though unsure whether it’s because of his closeness to Namjoon that feels both completely natural and completely absurd or if it’s because of the alcohol. He’s not drunk, he doesn’t think so, anyway. Namjoon looks at him, and the laughter is still wide on his lips. The laughter fades, but the smile stays. And grows closer. As if they weren’t so close already.

Seokjin feels Namjoon’s hand on the back of his head, cradling it like it’s delicate, and Namjoon’s nothing if not gentle and careful. He leans forward, closer still, and Seokjin’s wits come back to him just in time that he turns his head away and Namjoon, who's trajectory would've landed him on Seokjin's lips, finds himself kissing Seokjin's cheek instead.

The weird feeling grows bigger and bigger. He raises his hand and presses his palm to Namjoon’s chest, and he tries to push but there’s absolutely no strength to him whatsoever. Namjoon leans back just a little, anyway, and Seokjin faces him once again. Stares at his eyes because that’s all he can see.

“Sorry,” Namjoon whispers. “I promised I would warn you.”

“N-no, it’s okay,” Seokjin whispers back. His hand on Namjoon’s chest curls into a fist. “It’s my fault.”

Namjoon narrows his eyes. “What do you mean?”

“I’m the one who –”

He hiccups when the hand on the back of his head slides forward and settles on his jaw. “Seriously, you guys,” Yoongi complains, throwing his cards face down onto the floor. “Can you two focus on the game? Namjoon, it’s your turn.”

Namjoon leans back quickly, blinking a few times. “Right. Yeah. My turn. Okay. Cool.”

He picks up his deck and selects some cards to play. Then, it’s Seokjin’s turn. He plays a card. It’s okay. It’s cool. It’s completely fine. He holds his deck in both hands. And lifts it up to hide his face. And from the corner of his eyes, he glances over at Namjoon sitting besides him.

And finds that Namjoon is looking at him, too, from the corner of his eyes.

The weird feeling in his chest grows bigger and bigger. And suddenly, he feels breathless – but he doesn’t take his eyes off Namjoon.

Namjoon doesn’t look away, either.

He doesn’t know who wins the game, but then again, it doesn’t really matter.

At the end of the night Namjoon puts his shoes on along with Seokjin and his friends, and while no one else finds it strange, Seokjin gawks at him. “Where are you going?” he asks as he watches Namjoon lacing up his sneakers.

“What do you mean? I’m walking you home,” he says, like it’s obvious.

“You don’t have to – I’m going in the same direction as these guys.”

Taehyung nudges his arm. “Don’t question him, he’s clearly head over heels in love with you.”

Seokjin’s eyes widen a little, but he’s still the only one who finds it strange, and still, he’s the only one reacting. Namjoon doesn’t say another word, and neither do any of their friends. They leave Namjoon’s flat together at the same time, but Namjoon holds Seokjin back for just long enough that his friends are walking ahead of them and out of earshot. The weird feeling in Seokjin’s chest is back, and he has no idea what it is or why it’s back, but he braces himself anyway for what’s about to come. “What were you going to say, earlier? What’s your fault?”

“I see you haven’t forgotten about that. Haha.”

“Nope.”

“I just meant –” he pauses to gesture vaguely in front of him with his arms, “you know. All of this. It’s all my fault. I’m the one who came up with this plan and forced you to go along with it. So it’s not your fault. It’s mine. You don’t have to apologise to me.”

Namjoon takes a breath and faces the road ahead. “Still. I should still warn you when I’m about to do something we didn’t agree on.”

“Yeah, well, how realistic is that? If you tell me everything you’re going to do so I can prepare myself beforehand? Like, I’m going to hug you now or I’m going to kiss you now. Who does that?”

Namjoon laughs. “Well, at least you’re aware.”

Seokjin lightly punches his arm. “I guess I just…”

They walk on in silence for a while. “Just what?” Namjoon asks after a moment.

“I don’t know.”

They walk on in silence again, until Seokjin’s friends ahead of them say their goodbyes before they split ways. Seokjin and Namjoon continue to walk, slower now, now that they’re alone.

“You can go back,” Seokjin says quietly. “My friends are gone.”

“I came this far already, I might as well take you to your door.”

Seokjin doesn’t reply to that. He doesn’t say another word, not until he reaches his flat and they stop walking and Namjoon turns to face Seokjin and Seokjin feels that weird feeling in his chest once again. He doesn’t dare to look at Namjoon’s face, he doesn’t think he can bear it right now. “I’m going to hug you, now,” Namjoon says, and Seokjin looks up at him just in time to bury his face into Namjoon’s neck when Namjoon wraps his arms around him.

“You don’t have to do this,” Seokjin finds himself whispering as he reaches up and holds onto Namjoon.

“I know,” he hears Namjoon whispering back.

His hands curl into fists from where he feels like he’s trying to hold onto Namjoon, and it’s all his fault that the feeling in chest makes him want to hold onto Namjoon even tighter. It’s stupid. It’s so stupid. “You really don’t need to do this,” Seokjin whispers, and he can’t think of anything worse in the world than to let go.

Namjoon laughs quietly, the sound tickling Seokjin’s ear. “I know, but I gotta give you the full Kim Namjoon Boyfriend Experience, don’t I?”

“What the hell,” Seokjin scoffs, and realises now that it’s time to let go. So he slowly peels himself away from Namjoon, and finds it difficult to meet his eyes. “Goodnight.”

“Yeah,” Namjoon says mildly as he pushes his hands into his pockets. “Goodnight.”

Seokjin heads back into his flat. Enters his room. Closes the door, and presses his hand to his chest. And finally, he realises just how much trouble he’s in.

He tries to keep his distance from Namjoon, he really does, but it’s hard when the situation has gotten out of hand and has morphed into something Seokjin had never anticipated. Namjoon’s friends are now his friends. His friends are now Namjoon’s friends. And they all fell hook, line and sinker for Seokjin’s plan. There’s not an ounce of doubt in anyone’s mind that Seokjin is dating Namjoon. It worked almost too well, and now it’s agonising Seokjin, because he’d told himself he would keep his distance from Namjoon, but distance means nothing when they’ve amalgamated together as deeply as they did.

Seokjin exits out of the chat and mutes it and is just about to put his phone down when he sees a text from Namjoon.

The feeling in his chest from that night he hugged Namjoon comes crashing back as he holds his phone in his hand and contemplates ignoring the text. He mulls over it for a moment but decides in the end that he can’t bring himself to ignore Namjoon.

The feeling in his chest starts to feel bitter.

The message is read immediately, but Namjoon doesn’t answer for a few minutes.

The bitter feeling doesn’t go away, even if Seokjin tries his absolute hardest to suppress it.

Seokjin’s mouth goes dry.

At six, he makes his way over to the main entrance of the university after he’d left his friends. Fixes the buttons on his shirt before he gets there and finds Namjoon already waiting for him. When Namjoon spots him, he smiles widely and pushes off the railing he’d been leaning on. Seokjin walks over to him. “You look good,” he says when they reach each other.

“I always look good,” Seokjin replies. Namjoon just laughs as they start to walk together.

“Yes, you’re right about that.”

Namjoon talks to him about his day as they go, tells him about something that happened in one of his lectures, gives him an update about the recent development in taegi (Taehyung and Yoongi) that Seokjin didn’t really see coming, but has grown fond of regardless. It almost feels natural. It almost feels like there’s nothing wrong.

They reach the café Namjoon was talking about – this tiny, quaint little café on the third floor of a commercial building, with a small balcony area. Namjoon steals a spot for them out on the balcony. “This place suits your vibe.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know. Granola bars. Lattes. What would you like to eat, this time? Another sickly-sweet cake?”

“Sit down,” Namjoon tells Seokjin when Seokjin tries to stand with his wallet in his hand. “This one’s on me.”

Seokjin blinks a few times as he tries to process what Namjoon has just said. He can’t. “Huh?”

“I said, it’s on me.”

Seokjin still cannot compute what’s going on, so he sinks back into his seat to try and figure it out, step by step, as Namjoon leaves behind his coat and bag and takes his wallet back inside the café. He comes back a few minutes later. “Why are you paying?” Seokjin asks as soon as he sits down. “I’m the one who forced you to–”

“And I’m the one who asked you out this time,” Namjoon interrupts him. “So I should pay, right?”

Seokjin presses his lips together. “Why?” he asks quietly.

“Well, I’m not going to make you pay for me if you didn’t want to take me out, so it’s only fair that I p–”

“No. I mean–” Seokjin pauses. “I mean, why did you ask me out? Why are we here?”

Namjoon exhales lightly. “I told you. I found this café and wanted to bring you here.”

“But why me? We’re not dating. Not for real, anyway. You don’t even like me. You think I’m annoying.”

Seokjin watches as Namjoon’s expression turns dark. He inhales through his lips and gets ready to speak when one of the waiters comes over with their order, and he uses that breath instead to thank the waiter. Seokjin does the same. He waits for the waiter to be out of earshot before he starts to speak again. “Why would I voluntarily spend so much time with you if I didn’t like you?”

“I don’t know,” Seokjin blinks a few times and looks down at his coffee and his slice of cake that Namjoon remembered he liked from their first date. “Maybe you felt like you had no other choice. Because I bullied you into it.”

“You were very persuasive, I’ll admit,” Namjoon begins, nodding lightly, “but not once was I bullied into doing anything I didn’t want to. I’m a grown man, and I can make decisions for myself.”

Seokjin looks up and meets Namjoon’s eyes from across the table. “You said you weren’t going to stop complaining about it until it ended.”

“I don’t understand why you’re upset,” Namjoon says as he furrows his brows. “I like spending time with you. You said it yourself, that I jumped at any opportunity to be with you. It’s true. I really do like you. You’re fun to be around. You’re a little bit annoying, but I don’t mind being annoyed if it’s you.”

The ugly, bitter feeling in his chest grows and grows and it becomes hard to listen to Namjoon’s words amongst the noise that’s now in his head. “But the dating… the dating was fake.”

Namjoon doesn’t say anything to that.

Seokjin takes a sip of his coffee to calm himself down. “I think… I think maybe it’s time that we ended this.”

“Huh?”

“I took it way too far. Got our friends involved and everything,” he says as he stares at his cup of coffee, and then starts on his slice of cake that Namjoon had bought for him. He finishes it off in three bites. “I didn’t mean for it to get to this. I’m sorry.”

“What are you talking about, Seokjin?”

“We should break up, Namjoon. You know, just like we were always going to.”

He finishes off the rest of his coffee as Namjoon stares at him, wide-eyed and stunned in disbelief.

“Thank you for everything. I’ll rate The Kim Namjoon Boyfriend Experience with five stars, even if it was just a demo version.”

Seokjin turns up to his first lecture on Monday morning feeling like absolute shit. He’d spent the entire weekend feeling caught between two extremes – of feeling like this was inevitable, that this was bound to happen, was always going to happen, and that Seokjin was the one who’d orchestrated it all and that he can’t complain about the way it all ended, and of feeling sorry for himself that after all his scheming and dragging innocent bystanders into his bullshit, he’d realised that he actually, really, and absolutely liked Namjoon. This wasn’t how Seokjin envisioned it would go when he first came up with the plan, he didn’t think that, after fooling his friends into thinking they were dating, that Seokjin would be the one who’d be made a fool out of. He didn’t think that, after splitting amicably like Reese Witherspoon and that Billy Bob dude, that he’d feel so horrible about it afterwards.

He shouldn’t be feeling this way. It wasn’t a real relationship. Namjoon didn’t like him the way Seokjin came to like Namjoon. Namjoon was never flustered whenever they put on a show because he didn’t have any real feelings for Seokjin. Namjoon might’ve enjoyed their friendship – whatever that was – and the friendships he’d made with Seokjin’s friends, but that was it.

And maybe one day, Seokjin might feel comfortable enough to be just friends with Namjoon. Who knows. Maybe one day, his friends will set him up with someone that Seokjin will like. Maybe he’ll be able to forget this all happened. Maybe.

Jimin crashes into him as soon as Seokjin walks through the door. “Seokjin!” he cries as he hugs Seokjin. “Where were you?!”

“In my flat?” Seokjin replies.

“Why were you silent? Why’d you leave the group chat? We thought something happened to you!”

“Yeah,” Taehyung purses his lips. “Even Namjoon was MIA, until he texted Yoongi and said he’d gone to spend the weekend with his parents. He left the group chat, too.”

Seokjin’s lips part to say something, but he has no idea what to say or how to say it, even though this part of the plan was something he’d fleshed out in great detail. He had a whole speech planned out in his head – he was going to tell them that he and Namjoon were always going to be friends, that he and Namjoon just had different goals in life and that the timing was wrong or whatever other bullshit he’d stolen from movies and books, but none of that feels right. He doesn’t say any of that – and all of his plans, like they had been from the beginning, fall apart. “We broke up,” he answers quietly. Then, he looks down and he presses his lips together. Squeezes his hands into fists by his side. Wills himself not to cry.

“Oh,” Jimin whispers, and slowly he reaches up to take Seokjin’s shoulders.

He doesn’t cry, not then and there, in any case. But when he goes back to his flat that night, it finally hits him and he cries himself to sleep.

Several days later, while Seokjin is studying in his own bedroom in his flat while his roommates are out, he get a knock to his door that he doesn’t expect. He pushes his glasses up on his nose, pushes his feet into his slippers, and heads over to his front door.

Namjoon’s standing on the other side, breathing through parted lips and a heaving chest like he’d been running. Seokjin stunned to the spot, his eyes widening as the feeling comes back to his chest that he doesn’t have the strength to push down. “Seokjin,” he breathes out.

“What are you doing here?”

Namjoon runs a hand through his hair. “I was just… at this café, studying, and I couldn’t stop thinking about you.”

Seokjin’s hand on the door tightens. He licks his lips. “That’s nice.”

“You still owe me for everything I did, and I never decided on what I wanted from you in return for pretending to be your boyfriend. Until now.”

It feels like the air is knocked out of Seokjin’s lungs. He exhales deeply. “Namjoon, you could’ve texted that to me. I’m not… I’m not really in the mood for this right n–”

“No,” Namjoon cuts him off. “I had to ask you in person. I have to do this in person.”

Seokjin slowly lets go of the doorframe and pushes his glasses up on his nose again. He crosses his arms over his chest. “I’m not rich, so don’t ask me for anything ridiculous,” he looks away. “I told you that from the beginning.”

“Yeah, I know you did.”

A pause. “What is it, then? What do you want?”

“A date.”

Seokjin stares at him.

And stares at him.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“A date,” Namjoon repeats, and steps in closer. “A real one. I’ve been… kind of in love with you for a while now.”

Seokjin coughs. “I- I don’t understand,” he stammers, and reaches up to rub the back of his neck. “You never even spoke to me unless it was in front of our friends.”

“Yeah, well, I didn’t want to fall harder for you thinking you didn’t see me in that way.”

“I thought you didn’t like me.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I was just trying to protect myself.”

Seokjin shakes his head. “No, no, I’m the one who’s sorry. I’m the one who started this whole thing and this stupid plan and dragged you into it even though you didn’t want to and – wait. Did you say you’re in love with me?”

“Yes.”

“What the hell.”

“What do you mean, what the hell?! Seokjin, I’m trying to sincerely ask you out here!”

“What the hell, Namjoon!” Seokjin thumps his hand against Namjoon’s chest. “You can’t just… you can’t just waltz in here and overlook the shitty plan that I came up and dragged you into and –”

“My god, are you ever gonna let that go?” Namjoon sighs in exasperation, and the tiny hint of a smile on his lips at the end of his imitation of Seokjin annoys him, and he thumps his fist against Namjoon’s chest again. Namjoon laughs a little as he rubs the spot on his chest where he was hit.

“You’re so annoying,” Seokjin pouts.

“Right back at you.”

“The Kim Namjoon Boyfriend Experience is actually really shitty. I would like to retract my previous five-star rating.”

“That’s fine,” Namjoon grins a little. “That was just the demo version, anyway. I am now requesting that you try the full, deluxe version.”

Seokjin’s face grows warm.

“That’s if you would just honour your end of the deal, and grant me just one date. Just one chance to make you love me, for real.”

“You’re an idiot,” Seokjin mutters, and steps in closer to Namjoon. He reaches up – he’s not wearing any shoes and Namjoon’s got trainers on so there’s a goddamn height difference – and he takes Namjoon’s face in his hands. “I was already in love with you.”

He kisses Namjoon. And Namjoon quickly wraps his arms around Seokjin’s waist, kissing him back as he forces Seokjin back inside the house. He kicks the door shut behind him.

“Wait,” Seokjin quickly leans back, hands on Namjoon’s arms. “Aren’t you already with someone?”

Confusion erupts all over Namjoon’s face like this was the single most ridiculous thing he’s ever heard Seokjin say. “No? What?”

“Your watch. You got it on your birthday. By… by a significant other, no?”

He laughs a little, and then a lot, and then he throws his head back and laughs out loud, shaking Seokjin in his arms. “Oh, man, no. It was a present from my parents. But I never really wore it because it was meant to be a couple’s watch. Until I met you and saw you wearing yours. I’ve been wearing mine ever since.”

He leans forward and pecks at Seokjin’s cheek. “Are you honestly this cheesy as a real boyfriend? I thought you were just an overenthusiastic actor.”

Namjoon grins, and tightens his hold on Seokjin. “Nope. I just really, really liked you. And finessed the situation.”

Seokjin tries to hold back a tiny giggle, but it leaves his lips unrestrained.

“Which reminds me. I still haven’t touched your butt. Half the reason why I said yes to you all that time ago.”

Seokjin’s face grows warm again. “I mean. I did promise that to you. And I guess having my butt touched by you comes as part of The Kim Namjoon Boyfriend Experience, super deluxe version.”

“You ain’t seen nothing, yet. I will boyfriend the hell out of you. Jikook and taegi won’t even come close. Namjin is superior.”

“What?”

“Nothing. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Chapter Text

Both Seokjin and Namjoon’s phones keep buzzing, and Seokjin might’ve thought he could ignore it – there was, after all, more important matters at hand, that Seokjin might’ve thought would silence out the noise of both their phones, but it soon becomes apparent that he can’t ignore it, after all. He stops kissing Namjoon and leans back on the sofa, putting some distance between himself and his boyfriend.

“Oh, it’s just the group chat,” Seokjin breathes out as he quickly skims through it. There’s Jeongguk and Taehyung talking about some anime, there’s Yoongi asking if anyone has any aspirin on them, there’s Jimin arguing with Jeongguk about something, there’s Jimin asking if anyone has pictures of Seokjin and Namjoon kissing, and then more of them talking about anime.

“I should’ve never allowed myself back onto it,” Namjoon huffs, and shuffles towards Seokjin again, leaning forward to kiss him again. “Can’t get no peace and quiet around here.”

“Wait,” Seokjin says, and shuffles away from Namjoon. “Jeongguk says the new BNHA movie is showing this weekend,” he tells Namjoon, and repositions his phone in between both hands. “I really wanna watch it,” he says as he starts to make plans with his friends.

“Why don’t you go with me? We could make a date out of it,” Namjoon suggests and shuffles towards Seokjin again. There’s no more space on the couch, now, and Seokjin’s squashed up against the side. Namjoon leans forward and kisses his cheek.

“You don’t even watch anime, why would I go with you?”

“Because you love me?” Namjoon says lazily, and kisses Seokjin’s jaw. It sends a shiver down the side of his body but he has to focus on organising a trip to the movies with three other guys which requires his utmost attention right now.

“I do love you, but I love All Might more.”

“Who?”

Seokjin taps the home button on his phone and shows Namjoon the picture of All Might he’d used as his wallpaper. “This beefcake.”

“Oh, boy,” Namjoon sighs. “I’m really about to become jealous of an anime character.”

“Don’t be silly. You get to kiss me and touch my butt occasionally. All Might doesn’t have that privilege.”

Namjoon raises his brows. “Can I touch your butt, now?”

Seokjin was the one who brought it up, but now he’s the one growing embarrassed. “Um. Uh…”

Namjoon laughs quietly. “You’re cute. Annoying, but cute. I can’t even be mad that you don’t want me going to watch that anime movie with you.”

“You’re free to join us,” Seokjin says mildly. “But you might not want to sit with us. We get pretty into it. Jeongguk and I, especially.”

“Oh, god, don’t tell me you two watch anime at the movies the same way you watch it at home?”

Seokjin just looks at Namjoon and smiles, and Namjoon lowers his head into his palm.

“Okay, gotcha. I understand. Yeah. Fuck that. Count me out.”

Seokjin smiles again. “Love you.”

“Love you too.”

“We should go to the next Hatsune Miku convention. There’s going to be one in December,” Jeongguk says as he sips absentmindedly on his slush with one hand and scrolls on his phone with the other. “I’ve already got my cosplay outfit sorted out. My wig should be arriving next week.”

“Really?” Seokjin asks as looks over at Jimin and raises his brows. “This is the dude you like?”

Jimin’s face goes red, and Jeongguk is so unaffected that it almost makes Seokjin feel bad. “I have never, ever said that I like Jeongguk,” he denies vehemently.

“Ouch,” Seokjin winces. “He’s not that revolting. Sure, he’s attracted to anime characters, but come on. He’s not that bad.”

“I’m right here,” Jeongguk says.

No one acknowledges him. “That’s not the point,” Jimin tells Seokjin with a pout.

“Then? Is it the body pillow? Because I can rip that to shreds if you want me to,” Seokjin offers, and then he thinks about it for a moment. “Actually, I’ve been wanting to destroy it for a while, now.”

“Don’t you dare touch my body pillow.”

“One time I jerked off to Itachi,” Taehyung pipes up noncommittally, and everyone looks over at him. He seems not to care as he slips his right foot out of his ugly sandal to itch the back of his left leg. “Might get me a body pillow, too.”

“What does Yoongi see in you?” Jimin wonders with a mild look of disgust on his face.

Taehyung shrugs. “No clue. Let’s go get boba.”

It takes approximately eight minutes for Namjoon to show up at Seokjin’s new flat that he shares with his friends that he’s still mildly bitter about – because it means now that when there’s a whole group outing, Namjoon doesn’t get a moment where he can have Seokjin all to himself. Seokjin goes home with his friends, and even if Namjoon insists on walking Seokjin up to his door, they’re still not alone – and he complains about it all the way up to removing his shoes and walking into the living room where Seokjin’s friends are still unpacking their order of chicken and beer.

“Why didn’t you tell me you were inviting your boyfriend?” Taehyung asks when he sees Namjoon. He fishes his phone out of his pocket. “Let me invite mine.”

“Great, invite more third wheelers,” Namjoon grumbles.

“Are you calling me a third wheeler in my own home?” Taehyung rebuts just before Yoongi picks up, and he turns away from the table to speak.

Jimin manages to sneak in a few pictures of Seokjin standing next to Namjoon before Seokjin plucks the phone out of his hands and slips it into Namjoon’s back pocket. “You’ll get it back when Namjoon leaves.”

“But…” Jimin trails off, making grabby hands after his phone that he’d just been robbed off. “My precious hourly namjin account…”

“Deactivate.”

And finally, in the comfort of their tiny living room at their tiny table eating chicken and beer without Jimin’s phone glinting in the corner, Seokjin leans against his boyfriend and lets him massage his shoulder with his free hand. “This is nice,” Namjoon tells him quietly after a sip of beer. “But it would be nicer if we had our own flat.”

“Would be difficult to find something we can afford,” Seokjin shifts a little in his seat.

“Or we could just shove all of our friends into one flat, and the two of us will take the other.”

“Do I look like I’m that inconsiderate?”

Namjoon looks at him. “You forced a total stranger to pretend to be your boyfriend.”

Hoseok straightens up and looks over at them. “What?”

“Nothing,” Seokjin quickly shoos him away, and when Hoseok refuses to forget about what he’d just heard, Seokjin throws an empty ketchup pot at him which misses him by about a mile.

“See?” Namjoon whispers, pulling Seokjin in closer to him. “If we had our own place we wouldn’t have to deal with these idiots.”

“We can still hear you,” Yoongi deadpans as he throws a chip into his mouth.

“Get out, then,” Namjoon sneers at him. “Nobody asked you to come.”

“I did,” Taehyung puts up his hand.

Namjoon sighs deeply and turns his head so that his lips brush against Seokjin’s ear. “I’m serious, you know. Let’s get a flat for just the two of us,” he whispers.

“Too expensive,” Seokjin complains as he pretends like he isn’t growing warm and hyperaware of Namjoon’s lips on his ear.

“It won’t be as expensive as the ones we have, now. One bedroom. Cheap as shit.”

“One bedroom…” Seokjin echoes nervously.

“Yeah,” Namjoon whispers and lifts his hand to gently turn Seokjin’s face towards him. “Is that okay?”

“Um…”

“This is bullshit!” Jimin shouts out loud, slamming his fist down on the table, making Seokjin jump. “Did you take my phone because you knew you were gonna be all lovey-dovey with each other like this?!”

“Yes,” Namjoon answers flatly.

“This is Jimin-phobic. I have an account to run, and a family to feed.”

Taehyung cocks his head to the side. “Why were you guys so hellbent on finding Seokjin a boyfriend when it should’ve been Jimin we focused on?”

Jimin: “Fuck you.”

“Probably because deep in our hearts we all know he’s in love with Jeongguk.”

Jeongguk, who had largely kept quiet all night as he focused on scarfing down as much chicken as he could, perks up at the sound of his name. “Who’s in love with me?”

“Jimin,” Seokjin answers as if Jimin isn’t in the background screaming and denying everything while nobody listens to him.

“Oh. Yeah.”

Yoongi gawks at him. “You know?!”

Jeongguk nods.

“Then why didn’t you ever say so?” Seokjin asks, leaning forward at the table and out of Namjoon’s arms.

“What’s there to say? I thought everyone knew.”

“I mean, I had a feeling,” Seokjin says vaguely. Jimin’s still screaming. “I was just teasing you guys, all this time.”

“But, like… didn’t you ever talk to Jimin about it?” Taehyung asks. “Do you like him, too?”

“Do you even like boys?” Hoseok asks, raising a brow. “I’m still certain that you’re straight.”

“Literally, fuck you,” Jeongguk throws back. “You’ve known me for a year, now.”

“And?” Hoseok fights back. “It’s not like you’ve ever spoken about boys before. Or girls, now that I think about it. Are you asexual?”

“No, I–”

“Demisexual?”

“No–”

“Quoisexual? Placiosexual? Lithosexual?”

“I’m, like, eighty-percent sure you made those up.”

“Just come out, already! None of us here are straight, you have nothing to be afraid of!”

Jeongguk sighs deeply. “Gender has never mattered to me, so I guess that makes me pansexual.”

Taehyung immediately stands up. “Nice!” he hollers, and high-fives Jeongguk. Yoongi starts to clap for him, and soon everyone is congratulating him. Jeongguk blushes a little.

“Who else thought he was gonna say he’s attracted to anime characters?” Seokjin asks once the cheering dies down.

Namjoon raises his hand. “I almost feel a little disillusioned.”

“Fuck you guys,” Jeongguk tells them casually.

“Why don’t we go around and claim our sexualities?” Hoseok suggests. “Since apparently we’ve known each other for a year and don’t even know what gets Jeongguk going. I’ll start. I’m bisexual.”

“Me too,” Yoongi says.

“Same here,” Namjoon adds on.

“Did you three meet at a bisexuals-only pride parade?” Taehyung asks.

“As cool as that sounds, no,” Namjoon answers. “We’re flatmates who just happened to all be bisexual. And became good friends with each other.”

“Sounds like fate,” Taehyung says. “I’m pansexual. Along with my boy, Jeongguk.”

“Gay,” Seokjin claims.

“I’m gay, too,” Jimin sniffs, and everyone looks over at him. He’s still sulking, and Seokjin suddenly realises he’d stopped screaming – though he’s not quite sure of when that happened.

“Can you just admit you like Jeongguk, already?” Seokjin sighs, levelling himself with Jimin as he takes a sip from his beer. “He’s attractive and he’s taller than you. Isn’t that what you always say you want in a guy?”

“I’m not that shallow,” he sulks.

“Then? What else are you looking for?”

“I want someone who actually likes me, back! Jeongguk doesn’t–”

“You’re the one who always denies having feelings for me even though it’s obvious,” Jeongguk cuts him off, his voice lowering and suddenly sounding serious. Seokjin’s eyes go a little wide. “That’s why I never said anything. It’s like you think dating me would be embarrassing.”

“I don’t think dating you is embarrassing,” Jimin replies, his voice growing smaller and smaller.

“Then why do you always deny it whenever Seokjin mentions it?”

“Because you don’t like me back,” Jimin says quietly, and if the room hadn’t suddenly become silent Seokjin might not have heard it at all. “I don’t want to be that loser who has a crush on someone that doesn’t see him that way.”

“Well, I do. Like you. You’re not a loser,” Jeongguk tells him, and smiles a little. “Besides, I literally have a Hatsune Miku body pillow, I’m the group’s loser and you can’t take that away from me.”

Seokjin leans in towards Jimin. “I’ll burn that body pillow,” he whispers. Then, he stands up. “Let’s give these two some privacy to talk.”

Yoongi follows Taehyung into his bedroom while Namjoon and Hoseok get ready to go back to their flat. Seokjin decides to walk Namjoon back.

He holds Namjoon’s hand as soon as they close the door behind them. “Sorry,” he says quietly as Hoseok walks ahead of them on the street. “That we rarely have any time to ourselves.”

Namjoon squeezes his hand. “You don’t have to apologise. You love your friends, I’m not going to rip you away from them,” he begins. “Well. It depends on my mood, I guess.”

Seokjin laughs a little. “I love you.”

“I love you, too. And really, I’m serious about wanting to share a flat with you. I’m going to start looking for one, you should too.”

Seokjin pulls in a deep breath and walks slower. Namjoon matches his pace immediately, and the distance between them and Hoseok grows larger. “Isn’t it… too soon?” he whispers. “Aren’t we… moving too quickly? I know we’ve been together for a year, but…”

For a moment, Namjoon doesn’t answer. It’s like he’s trying to come up with an answer that won’t make Seokjin feel like shit, and Seokjin appreciates the hell out of it. “You should’ve said so,” he says quietly when he’s decided on what to say. “I’m sorry for making you uncomfortable.”

“No, no, I’m not uncomfortable. I just… well, you know. It feels like a huge step. And it’s very expensive.”

Namjoon laughs. “You’re right. It will be expensive.”

They continue to walk on, silently, in a way that feels just a little unnatural to them because they’re hardly ever silent when they’re together. They’re always talking about something, arguing about something else, or they’re kissing. So Seokjin opens his mouth to fill the silence. “Why don’t you spend this spring break at my house? My parents are going to Jeju Island, so we’ll have the house to ourselves for a whole week.”

Namjoon’s eyebrows fly up as he turns to look at Seokjin as they walk. “Really? Are you being serious?”

Seokjin nods. “But, uh… I’ll sleep in my parent’s room and you’ll sleep in my room.”

He watches as Namjoon’s brows come back down. “Oh. Yeah, of course. Sure.”

They go back to that strange silence until they reach Namjoon’s flat and they kiss goodbye, and Seokjin walks back to his flat strangely wishing he didn’t have to kiss him goodbye at all.

By the end of the week Namjoon has gotten himself all packed up and excited to go. It seems as though his initial disappointment (which Seokjin may have imagined – he’s not sure, but whatever it was, it only lasted for about two minutes after Seokjin had told him they wouldn’t be sleeping in the same room) has disappeared. It’s not something he corrects, though, when their friends tease them about finally spending a night together. Seokjin doesn’t correct them, either. He’s not entirely sure, why.

They take a train to Gwacheon together and pass the time by playing games with the cards Seokjin had stolen from Yoongi.

For just a moment, Seokjin decided, he would sit in the kitchen of his empty house and tap his finger along the counter. Namjoon was upstairs, unpacking some of his stuff in Seokjin’s bedroom. He could be minding his own business, or he could be snooping around in search for something embarrassing that he didn’t take with him to Seoul. Seokjin doesn’t really care – at least, not right now in any case. Right now, Seokjin just wants to sit in the big open kitchen with the huge windows and the potted plants and the oven mitts slung over the back of one of the chairs, because Namjoon is upstairs in his bedroom, and Seokjin feels kind of weird about it.

It’s kind of complicated, you see. It’s only been two years since Seokjin had made the enlightening discovery that he’s gay, and only one year since he fooled all his friends into thinking he was in a relationship to get them off his back, using a picture of some dude he’d found on twitter. He wasn’t prepared to have a boyfriend back then, couldn’t imagine himself holding hands with, hugging, kissing another boy. Just thinking about it made him nervous as fuck, and he had thought that pretending to date some guy that didn’t know who he was would solve his problem. It didn’t. Because, as it turned out, he ended up dating that guy for real. He still doesn’t know how that happened. Or how that guy came to be in his bedroom, unpacking his belongings.

Now, most people would be thrilled. Seokjin knows that. There’s a hot person in his bedroom that Seokjin somehow tricked into being his boyfriend. That hot person loves him and respects him. And even though Seokjin still thinks it’s a whole new ballpark that he’s not used to, he realises that the ball’s in his court – always has been.

So why do the balls still make Seokjin feel nervous?

He finally walks back upstairs and leans against the doorframe to his room, watching as Namjoon diligently unpacks. He turns around when he hears Seokjin.

“Oh, hey, there you are,” he says, and drops the t-shirt he was folding. He stands up and walks over to Seokjin, putting his hands on Seokjin’s waist. “Why the hell does the room next to this one have so many Super Mario figurines?”

Seokjin rests his hands on Namjoon’s chest. “I like Mario.”

“Yeah, no, I realised,” Namjoon muses as he looks down the hallway. “It’s… uh… cute?”

“Thanks. There’s a Waluigi buried somewhere in the backyard because my brother thought it would be funny to hide him in my collection and I still haven’t forgiven him for it. Anyway, when he left home I decided to move all my merch into that room and turned it into a game room.”

“You have a brother?”

Seokjin nods. “He lives in Seongnam with his wife, who’s about five months pregnant. I’m gonna be an uncle soon.”

“I can’t imagine you as an uncle.”

“I’m good with kids, you know.”

“Yeah, right,” Namjoon scoffs. “Remember that time we went to the movies a few months back, and some kid spat on you?”

He looks away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Seokjin, you put him in the bin.”

“In my defence, I was wearing a very nice sweater and that kid was a little shit.”

“If I ever meet your brother, I’m going to warn them not to let you babysit their child.”

“Rude.”

Namjoon laughs a little and leans forward, pecking a quick kiss on Seokjin’s lips, before leaning back and smiling widely at him. “This is nice,” he muses before he wraps his arms around Seokjin’s waist and pulls him in, closer. “Just me and you, alone, in this big house. Kind of makes you think, huh?”

Seokjin’s hands move up until he’s circled his arms around Namjoon’s neck. “About what?”

“The future, maybe?” he says, and wiggles his eyebrows at Seokjin in a such a ridiculous way that Seokjin starts to laugh. “You know, like getting our own flat?”

“You really want that, don’t you?” Seokjin sighs.

Namjoon nods vehemently, and kisses Seokjin on the cheek. “I just want to be able to do this with you,” he says, and kisses Seokjin’s other cheek. “And more,” he kisses Seokjin’s jaw, “without worrying about other people,” he says, and kisses the tip of Seokjin’s nose. Seokjin’s laughing out loud, now, and he tries to take a step back but Namjoon tightens his hold around Seokjin’s middle. “Don’t you want that, too?” he asks as he litters kisses all over Seokjin’s face.

Seokjin doesn’t even get the chance to respond because Namjoon’s attacking him relentlessly with kisses, and when Seokjin finally breaks free from him he starts to run down the hallway, and Namjoon chases him. He’s laughing so hard that he bumps into the wall before he starts to run down the stairs. Namjoon barrels down after him.

He makes it to the front door, ripping it wide open just in time to find his parents at the doorstep, keys in hand, and he freezes. Namjoon comes to a screeching halt behind him.

“How’d you know we were here?” his mother laughs, pocketing her keys and taking Seokjin’s shoulders in her hands before hugging him. “Oh, my baby. You look like you’ve lost so much weight! It’s a good thing we came back!”

“Um,” Seokjin mumbles dumbly as she rubs his back. His father walks in, too, and drops their luggage inside before closing the door. “Why didn’t you, uh, go?”

“The weather in Jeju wasn’t looking good, so we turned the car around and came home,” his father answers. “We can always try again in a few days’ time.”

They walk into the house, and notice Namjoon standing awkwardly at the base of the stairs. Seokjin quickly stands by his side. “Mom, dad, this is Namjoon. My, uh, friend, from uni,” he introduces, and glances over at Namjoon who looks stunned into silence. “Is it okay if he stays with us…?”

“Of course!” Seokjin’s mother says, smiling as she walks over to Namjoon and pats his shoulder. “The more, the merrier!”

His father nods. “It gets lonely here, sometimes, ever since you and your brother both moved out.”

Namjoon throws himself forward in a ninety-degree bow. “Thank you for having me! My name is Kim Namjoon, twenty-one years old. Studying art history.”

Seokjin’s mother laughs. “If I had a daughter I imagine her boyfriend would greet me like this.”

And Seokjin looks over at Namjoon. Namjoon looks over at him.

Fuck, Seokjin thinks. Here we go again.

Seokjin shoves Namjoon into his bedroom, slamming the door shut behind him, and pressing his ear against it to make sure his parents weren’t coming close enough to listen. For a moment, he hears nothing but his own heart thumping away in his chest, but after a minute he decides enough is enough, and he turns around to face Namjoon, who looks just as confused as Seokjin feels. He leans his back against the door and presses his hand to his chest.

“Okay, so. So. My parents don’t know that I’m gay and I… I didn’t know they were coming back, I swear, and I – I’m so sorry, but I’m gonna have to ask you to pretend to be just my friend–”

“Okay.”

“– even though we’ve been through this before, you have to know that this time it’s different and I–”

Namjoon grabs Seokjin’s shoulders, stunning him into silence. “Seokjin! I said, okay. It’s okay. I know this is different. We can pretend to be friends. It’s okay.”

It takes a few moments for Seokjin’s heart return to a normal, human beating rate. “What?” he breathes out.

Namjoon laughs. “I said, it’s okay. I’m not going to force you to come clean to your parents about your sexuality just so that you can be open with me. I would never do that to you.”

Seokjin’s bottom lip starts to move without his consent. “What did I do to deserve you?”

“You’re pretty and occasionally you let me touch your butt?” Namjoon suggests, and despite himself, Seokjin laughs. Namjoon laughs, too, and his hands move from Seokjin’s shoulders to his neck, to cupping his face. “Besides. Doesn’t this mean we’ll have to share this room? Since your parents will be using their own room.”

“Y-yeah,” Seokjin replies quietly, and he feels his face grow warm at the thought of it.

Namjoon licks his lips. “I’ll sleep on the floor.”

“No,” Seokjin says, grabbing at the front of his jacket that he hadn’t yet taken off. “You won’t. My bed is big enough for both of us.”

“Are you sure?” Namjoon asks, raising his brows. “I don’t mind sleeping on the floor. I’m a heavy sleeper, anyway. Bed, no bed, I can sleep through it all.”

“You’re sharing the bed with me,” Seokjin repeats, sterner this time, pulling Namjoon closer to himself by his jacket. “Okay?”

Namjoon’s face changes from a look of concern to a look of excitement he’s trying to hold back mixed in with a tiny little sliver of fear. “Okay,” he says. “That was kind of hot. You should talk to me like that more often.”

“Shut up,” Seokjin laughs despite the way his face grows warmer and warmer. “Come here,” he says quietly, and pulls Namjoon again so that he could kiss him.

The door opens, and in record time the two of them are in opposite corners of the room. “You two must be tired from travelling,” Seokjin’s mother says as she pops her head into the room. “I brought you some fruit!”

She hands Seokjin a plate of cut up fruit and if she notices the way Seokjin’s face is bright red, she doesn’t say anything, and for that Seokjin is immensely grateful. When she leaves the room she doesn’t shut the door, and neither Seokjin nor Namjoon move to fix it. Instead, they just silently pluck up cubes of fruit to eat.

“I am so sorry,” Seokjin whispers to Namjoon.

“I told you, it’s okay,” Namjoon replies as he pops a piece of watermelon into his mouth. “It might be kinda hot. You know, sneaking around.”

He grins.

Seokjin reaches into his pocket to fish out his phone. “Is the group chat active again?” he wonders mildly as he starts to unlock his screen. “I wonder what they’re talking about, now.”

Namjoon quickly slaps Seokjin’s phone out of his hand. It clutters onto the floor, and they both just stare at it.

“I’m gonna assume you did that for my own good,” Seokjin says as he leaves his phone on the floor and looks back up at the screen where he goes back to selecting a character to play as. Namjoon does the same.

“You know,” Namjoon begins as they stare at the loading screen, “at least it’s your parents here and not our friends. I’m starting to understand why you had to resort to pretending you were dating someone to get them off your back.”

Seokjin looks over at him. “Now I’m mildly curious about what they were talking about.”

“Don’t be.”

The match starts. Namjoon isn’t even paying attention, and Seokjin’s hand-eye coordination is unmatched, so he blasts ahead to first place in Mario Kart. He’s cackling out loud, putting his whole body into controlling his kart, even though Namjoon’s rooted to his spot and comfortable coasting by at fifth place because he really couldn’t care less, and it shows. Seokjin looks over at him, briefly, and wonders why someone as boring as Namjoon makes him so happy.

Namjoon looks over at Seokjin, too. Smiles widely enough that his dimples show. And Seokjin, who’s never understood what it meant for a heart to skip a beat, thinks that he gets it now. That Namjoon makes him so happy, and he loves Namjoon.

He’d kept his eyes off the screen for just long enough that his kart gets hit by something, and he screams as he watches the other characters race past him and take his spot at the top. “Fuck! Fucking hell! What the fuck!” he screams out loud.

Namjoon, for the first time since they’d started playing, shows some emotion in the form of laughter at Seokjin’s expense.

“You dick! Stop laughing at me! I got hit by a flying blue shell! Who shot it at me?!”

“I did,” Namjoon grins, and continues to laugh, pausing momentarily to stick his tongue out at Seokjin. “This game ain’t so bad, actually.”

“Is it only fun because you got to blast me?”

Namjoon nods earnestly as he keeps his eyes on the screen. “Not how I imagined I’d be blasting you, but I’ll take it.”

Seokjin glances over at him, and he quickly looks back at the screen before Namjoon notices. He doesn’t say anything, he doesn’t know how or what to say. So he keeps his mouth shut. After all, it’s just a joke, right? Right? Seokjin’s not as clueless as he used to be, and he might’ve realised that maybe, what he wants and what Namjoon wants are lining up more and more, though he’s still not sure on how to say it. Whether he should say anything at all.

So for now, he doesn’t say anything. He just continues playing.

Later, just as they’re heading down to have dinner, he looks at the group chat and reads everything he’d missed so far. And he pockets his phone without a word, watching as Namjoon helps his parents set the table.

And while they’re eating, Namjoon’s hand finds his under the table. Seokjin’s heart jumps in his chest, at first, because they’re holding hands and his parents are right there, right there, and all it would take is for one spoon to be dropped and picked up for Seokjin to be found out and judged and maybe even kicked out of his house. But Namjoon seems to pick up on it all, and he squeezes Seokjin’s hand. “Don’t worry,” he whispers so quietly that Seokjin’s parents don’t hear. Then, he goes straight back to telling Seokjin’s dad about what he studies, and Seokjin’s almost surprised that his dad, a seasoned and stoic surgeon, is actually managing to hold a conversation with him.

And, Seokjin supposes, it is kind of hot – sneaking around that is – as Namjoon almost makes a game out of touching Seokjin while his parents aren’t looking, like holding his hand under the table, like pinching him lightly at his waist when they’ve got their backs turned, like grabbing him the moment they’re back in Seokjin’s bedroom and pushing him up against the door and kissing him like they’ve been kept apart for too long and they’re starved.

It almost feels completely natural climbing into Seokjin’s bed together. Namjoon, apparently, sleeps shirtless (though for Seokjin’s mentality he had pulled on a thin tank top) and in his boxers. Seokjin’s in his striped Kakao Friends Ryan edition pyjama set. He had felt just the slightest bit out of place, but Namjoon had called him cute and had climbed into his bed like it was completely natural. So Seokjin climbs in, too.

“I’ve always wanted to do this,” Namjoon mumbles as he wraps his arms around Seokjin, pressing his chest to Seokjin’s back. He cocoons Seokjin and buries his nose in Seokjin’s hair. “It’s nice.”

Seokjin wiggles a little. “Mm,” he sounds. “And you wanted to sleep on the floor.”

“I didn’t want to sleep on the floor,” Namjoon replies, nudging the back of Seokjin’s leg with his knee. “I offered because I didn’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

“You don’t have to be so nice all the time, you know,” Seokjin whispers. “You’re my boyfriend, you’re allowed to want things from me, too.”

“I don’t want it if you don’t want it,” Namjoon whispers back, and tightens his hold on Seokjin.

Seokjin grips onto Namjoon’s arms around his stomach. The lights are off and he can barely see anything, hear anything, except for Namjoon’s breathing and his heart beating against his back. “What if I told you to get out of this bed, right now?”

Namjoon unlatches one arm to point at the floor. “Then I would roll right off.”

“You’re an idiot,” Seokjin laughs, and Namjoon brings his arm back to hold him.

“I’m your idiot,” he says, and he cackles a little. Seokjin snickers, too, like an idiot. And they keep on laughing quietly at nothing until they fall asleep.

Their peace is short-lived – through no fault of Namjoon’s, as one might be inclined to believe – because in the morning while they’re eating a traditional breakfast that Seokjin’s mother had been excited to cook alongside her son while Namjoon and Seokjin’s father set the table, Seokjin had accidentally said something that would change the way his parents viewed him, forever.

“I can never cut tofu in straight lines like you can,” his mother jokes.

Seokjin laughs. “Yeah, it’s the only straight thing I can do.”

“What?”

And Seokjin immediately stops laughing. He whips around to face her. “What?”

His father straightens up. “What?”

Namjoon looks over at him, eyes wide. “What?” he whispers.

The whole table has gone silent, and the sudden crushing weight of his parents realising that he’s not straight comes crashing down on him like a thousand bricks, and his ribs feel like they’re going to suffocate his heart, so he does what he thinks will save him: he runs. He jumps out of his chair and he runs upstairs and into his room where he slams the door shut behind him. Then, he leans his back against the door and cradles his head in his hands.

“Holy shit,” he whispers to himself as he tries to regulate his heart rate and slow down his breathing. “Holy shit,” he whispers to himself as he tries to forget the looks on his parents faces, but his thoughts are racing through his mind, piling up on him and beating him down. He almost doesn’t even hear Namjoon on the other side of the door, asking to be let in. He almost doesn’t let him in, but after Namjoon begs him for a few minutes, Seokjin gives up and opens the door.

“I’m an idiot,” Seokjin says as soon as Namjoon closes the door behind him. “I’m so stupid. I… It just came out of me. I should’ve been more careful. I was too comfortable. I let my guard down. I’m –”

His rant is cut off by Namjoon wrapping his arms around him, burying Seokjin’s face in his shoulder. He rubs at Seokjin’s back, and Seokjin doesn’t know how long they stay like that, how long Namjoon cradles him, until his senses come back to him.

“My parents… they know,” Seokjin whispers.

“Yeah,” Namjoon confirms. “They know. But it’s okay, I promise,” he tells Seokjin and pulls back just enough to hold Seokjin’s face in his hands. “You should go down and talk to them. Do it properly.”

Just the thought of it makes Seokjin feel frigid. “I don’t want to,” he whispers. “I’m scared. What if they… what if they don’t love me?”

Namjoon doesn’t say anything. He just lets Seokjin hold onto him again, and he continues to rub his back.

They spend several hours in Seokjin’s room. They play videogames, they talk on the group chat, they do anything but talk about Seokjin’s coming out that he’s just stalling at this point. Seokjin knows it, that he’s just putting off something inevitable, and that he’s going to have to face his parents sooner or later, and it’s not going to be any easier if he waits. He knows it, but he can’t bring himself to take the first step. His legs won’t move. He’s so afraid that it immobilises him. It’s his parents, after all. They gave birth to him, raised him, they have expectations of him. And Seokjin’s just holding off on letting them down.

When the two of them can no longer hold off their hunger and they go downstairs to eat, his parents join them at the table. No one’s saying anything, and everyone’s completely silent, and Seokjin’s throat has almost completely closed up. He’s eating just for the sake of survival at this point, and he knows that he told Namjoon before they left his bedroom that he would speak to his parents properly, but now that the moment is here and his parents are right in front of him, all the courage – what little of it he’d mustered up – slips away from him. He’s ready to run, he stands up to excuse himself, and Namjoon looks like he’s just following Seokjin’s lead, until –

“Seokjin, sit down,” his dad says.

Seokjin swallows, hard, and he sits back down. His legs are shaking as he anticipates what’s about to come. Namjoon and Seokjin’s mother leave the kitchen, and he can barely hear their footsteps as they walk away over the sound of his paranoia ringing in his head like voices that won’t quieten down, screaming at him that his dad won’t accept him, that his dad would disown him, that his dad doesn’t love him anymore. His mouth goes completely dry.

“I wanted to talk to you about anal elasticity.”

Seokjin’s eyebrows fly up into his hairline just before he freezes and catapults his mind into another fucking dimension.

He zones back in approximately seven minutes later while his dad is still telling him about the importance of preparation before anal sex, and he really, really wishes he had passed out and hit his head because this is absolutely mortifying. “And that brings me to cleaning out–”

Seokjin’s face feels hot enough to fry an egg. “Okay, thanks dad,” he breathes out quickly, his voice high pitched and unnatural, desperate to get his dad to Stop Talking, effective immediately. “I’m, uh. Gonna go. Thanks for the talk. Gonna do my own, uh, research. I’m sure you have better things to do that tell me all of this.”

His dad smiles as if he didn’t just spend the last seven minutes telling Seokjin about ass. “I always have time for you–”

Seokjin hightails it out of there so fast he pulls a muscle in his calf when he reaches the top of the stairs and finds Namjoon waiting by the door of his bedroom, biting on his lip to stop himself from laughing at Seokjin’s undeniably red face. “How much of that did you hear?” Seokjin squeaks, pushing Namjoon into the room and swinging the door shut behind him.

“All of it.”

“And you didn’t think to come and save me? That was the single most embarrassing moment of my entire life!”

And finally, Namjoon fails to hold himself together and he starts barking out in laughter. “Sorry,” he breathes out when he calms down and wipes a tear from his eye, “it was just so funny at first. I was sitting at the top of the stairs trying not to die. But then it became very interesting and helpful, you know. I never knew the male g-spot was an actual thing that existed, or that I’d learn from my boyfriend’s dad where to find it in his son.”

Seokjin didn’t think his face could get any hotter, but it does. He spins on his heel, marches over to the window, rips it wide open and screams into the fucking void. And, when he’s done screaming, he composes himself with a resolute deep breath and turns around to face Namjoon once again. Tries not to react to the shit-eating grin on Namjoon’s face. “I hope you know I am never going to recover from this. I have been scarred for life.”

Namjoon walks over to Seokjin and gently places his hands on Seokjin’s waist. “Come on, don’t say that. In a way, it’s kind of sweet–”

“It’s humiliating!” Seokjin wails in embarrassment. “My own father! Telling me how to stretch my own asshole!”

Namjoon’s laughing so hard and so loud that he’s shaking and making Seokjin stumble on his feet. He holds onto Seokjin’s waist tighter to keep himself from doubling over. “Oh my god,” Namjoon gasps, “I love you so much.”

“Yeah, well, I hate you,” Seokjin sulks as he clutches onto Namjoon’s elbows and holds him upright as he continues to laugh despite Seokjin’s shame. “And I’m never having sex with you, ever.”

The mirth on Namjoon’s face disappears in record time. “It really isn’t that funny,” he says as if he hadn’t spent the last ten minutes cackling like a madman. “Your father just wants you to be safe. It’s his way of telling you that he loves you, no matter what, and he wants you to be happy.”

Seokjin raises a brow, unimpressed. “Oh, really?”

Namjoon nods solemnly. “He would want you to have safe sex. With me.”

“Please stop talking about my dad.”

Namjoon’s lips wobble. “It’s all I can think about,” he whispers quietly like it’s taking a great deal of restraint to hold himself back, and he’s only barely able to keep himself from falling apart all over again.

“Namjoon, please,” Seokjin wails again, and a tiny laugh escapes Namjoon’s lips before he manages to keep himself in check again. “Let me crawl into a hole and die.”

He tries to wriggle out of Namjoon’s arms, but Namjoon captures his arms and immobilises him. “Nope. You’re my beautiful, funny, awkward-as-fuck boyfriend and I will absolutely not let go of you.”

“What are you, a human boa constrictor?” Seokjin hisses as he wriggles harder.

“I’m re-enacting a scene from one of Jeongguk’s tentacle porn videos.”

“Namjoon!”

“Sorry. You’re right. Your dad didn’t talk about that.”

He starts laughing all over again, and Seokjin uses his momentary weakness to break free from Namjoon’s hold, and he pushes Namjoon onto the bed, forcing him onto his back. He comes down, too, and traps Namjoon under him with his hands flat on the bed on either side of Namjoon’s head. “I’m serious. Stop,” he orders.

And once again, the mirth on Namjoon’s face disappears. He doesn’t speak for a moment. “Yeah, sure,” he answers breathlessly, looking up at Seokjin. “What were we even talking about? I don’t even know. Doesn’t matter. Do that again.”

“Do what?” Seokjin replies quietly, looking down at Namjoon.

“Talk to me like that. Sit down on me again. I’m getting kind of excited.”

Seokjin’s face bursts into flames again, and he suddenly becomes aware of Namjoon’s lap under his ass. His mouth goes completely dry, and he quickly climbs off Namjoon’s lap. It takes Namjoon a few moments to gather himself and sit up.

“So,” Namjoon begins mildly. “You want to get ice cream?”

“Huh?” Seokjin whips his head over to face him.

“Or a cold drink. Something refreshing.”

“Y-yeah, sure,” Seokjin replies dumbly as he slowly sits up and goes over to his wardrobe to find a light jacket. He turns back around and finds Namjoon still sitting on the edge of the bed, with one of Seokjin’s pillows now on his lap.

“Go downstairs, I’ll join you in a little bit,” Namjoon tells him.

Seokjin licks his lips. Looks at his pillow. Looks at Namjoon. “Sure.”

And he surprises himself with how well his legs work in sync with each other when he makes it back downstairs. His parents are in the living room, now, and when they hear him waiting by the door, they come over to him. His mother hugs him, and his father pats him on the shoulder as if they didn’t just have the world’s worst sex talk ever known to mankind. “The weather in Jeju will be good for the rest of the week, so we’re going to head over there tomorrow morning,” his father tells him.

Seokjin nods absentmindedly.

“Remember everything that I taught you when you finally get some alone time with your boyfriend,” his dad says, and he smiles as if he’d just told Seokjin to pick up some bread from the grocery store.

And Namjoon takes that as the perfect time to come down. “We good to go?” he asks casually.

Seokjin nods as his parents see them off. He doesn’t know what to say, because he was the one who demanded that Namjoon stop thinking about it, and now he can’t get it out of his head.

“You okay?” Namjoon asks, leaning in towards Seokjin a little as they walk.

“Yeah, just fine,” Seokjin answers, and he takes Namjoon’s hand. “Just got some good news, actually.”

Namjoon’s face lights up. “Yeah? What’s that?”

“The, uh, present Hoseok packed into your bag… we’ll be able to use it,” Seokjin says, and he doesn’t give Namjoon any time to click his mind into gear. “Well, maybe not all of it. But at least we no longer have to fake being just friends.”

“Seokjin,” Namjoon says dumbly. “What the fuck. You can’t just say that and– and–”

“I can say whatever I want, I let you touch my butt. And more.” Seokjin stops in his tracks and lifts his arm and pretends he’s holding a ball. He hands it to Namjoon, and Namjoon, stupid and very much in love with Seokjin, takes it. “Ball’s in your court, now,” he says. “I’m not afraid, anymore.”

He continues walking, and it takes Namjoon a moment to kick back into gear and he jogs to catch up to Seokjin. “You were afraid of my balls?”

“That’s not what I– never mind. I love you.”

“I love you, too.”