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Seungmin isn’t necessarily averse to physical affection, but it’s never come easy to him. His parents weren’t the type to hug or kiss him for no reason, and his older sister is a girl so he understandably didn’t want to get her cooties anywhere near him when he was younger. So, it’s possible that a different upbringing would have made him more dependent upon touch, but he has never felt as if something was missing from his childhood. To this day, casually touching his friends beyond a high five on Mario Kart nights or brushing shoulders on a crowded couch simply does not happen.
Changbin is the exact opposite.
Most of the other members (save for Jeongin, depending on his mood) are handsy, moreso on camera, and sharing the bigger beds at night or cuddling during movies is commonplace around the dorm. Even so, Changbin takes being clingy to an entirely new level. It’s as if his body is wired so that he always has to glue himself to the nearest warm body or else he’ll implode, or something. It sounds ridiculous, but Seungmin is unable to come up with any other reasoning, so that’s the story he’s sticking to.
Changbin being overly affectionate isn’t really a problem. Or rather, it hasn’t been, up until recently.
Seungmin is used to Changbin clinging to him like anyone else. Changbin is always the one to initiate contact and that’s never seemed to be a problem for him. He knows when Seungmin is in the mood to put up with getting his cheeks pinched and when to give him his space. After so many years of being packed into tight spaces with other trainees and his members in cramped dorms, small touches to his waist or his shoulder in passing are now little more than physical white noise to Seungmin.
Needless to say, the swoop in his stomach and the heat that courses over his skin when Changbin hugs him from behind one morning catches Seungmin off-guard.
He knows Changbin has been trying to gain weight, knows he’s been spending extra hours at the gym on free days. Knowing and understanding are two different things. Seungmin realizes this when Changbin squeezes the arms looped around his waist and presses his face into the nape of Seungmin’s neck, exposed by his loose-hanging sleep shirt. The toothbrush in Seungmin’s mouth has stilled, and he glances up to see his own astonished face staring back at him in the mirror hanging above the sink. He also sees the blush-pink sleeves of Changbin’s oversized hoodie and the way Changbin’s fingers are linked together over the middle of his stomach. He sees Changbin’s unstyled hair and a sliver of his bare forehead peeking out above Seungmin’s shoulder. Toothpaste dribbles down his wrist the longer he stares.
Changbin breathes a low, gravelly, “G’ morning, Seungminnie,” before shuffling over to get the warm water running in the shower, and the moment shatters.
Initially, physical affection made Seungmin uncomfortable. His arms would prickle, his stomach would roll, and he would shrink away from the touch without fail. After a long enough time learning how to be social and accepting that many people cannot grasp the concept of personal space, he became immune to it. He’d let himself be used as a teddy bear for as long as needed, not leaning away from the contact but not leaning into it, either.
So, suffice it to say, Seungmin isn’t prepared to deal with the pure contentment welling up inside of him after Changbin’s hug.
Changbin has been working out, and there are parts of him that have become noticeably more defined, but all Seungmin could feel just then was how soft he is. He’s shorter than Seungmin by a fair amount but had still managed to make Seungmin feel tiny, encapsulated, and utterly, utterly safe.
He’s draped himself over Seungmin countless times, and yet, this is the first time Seungmin has reacted positively rather than indifferently. The first time he missed the warmth, craved it now that he knows what it feels like.
Seungmin rinses the toothpaste out of his mouth and hurries to vacate the bathroom by the time Changbin starts to tug the hoodie over his head.
The feeling reappears three days later after a lengthy but successful dance performance filming for a popular variety YouTube channel for idols to appear on. They’ve pulled up a movie on the living room television, a recent installment in a superhero series that Seungmin is somewhat invested in. Everyone is drained and many of them are bound to fall asleep within the first fifteen minutes, but fulfilling the tradition of watching movies in the same room together at least once a week is what counts.
Seungmin is quick to claim one of the comfiest armchairs in the room, much preferring that to squeezing onto the couch next to more people than the furniture creators must have intended. He grabs a personal size bag of chips and tucks his feet up onto the chair, fully prepared to spend the next two hours with as much breathing room as he wants, but of course Seungmin isn’t that lucky.
As the opening credits flash across the television screen, Seungmin is distracted by a looming figure in his peripheral. Changbin is hovering at the side of the chair, swamped by a blanket pulled over his head and clasped in a fist near his chin. It makes him look like a wizard on a very tight budget.
Seungmin doesn’t get a warning before Changbin is vaulting over the chair and onto his lap. Changbin adjusts his blanket to cover the both of them comfortably and steals a few of Seungmin’s chips before finally settling back into his chest.
He’s warm and not all that heavy, but he acts like a weighted blanket, pressing Seungmin into the cushions. Breath startles out of Seungmin’s throat, first when Changbin jumps on him and again when he nuzzles his cheek into the crook of Seungmin’s neck. Suddenly, whatever’s happening on the television goes out of focus.
There it is again. It’s the kind of warmth Seungmin chases when he’s been standing outside in the snow and the air is still but it seeps through his parka and all the way to the marrow of his bones. It’s the kind of warmth that sparks from the center of his being, like he swallowed embers from a fireplace, and spreads out through each of his limbs and tickles his cheeks. It’s infectious, fuzzy, and leaves his tongue resting thickly in his mouth. It isn’t something Seungmin thinks he’s ever felt before.
“The action’s barely even started yet,” Changbin hums into the pulse thudding in Seungmin’s neck. It’s said quietly, like this observation is something secretive to be shared just between them. “I can’t believe your heartbeat’s this fast already.”
Seungmin frowns and digs his fingertips into the open space between two of Changbin’s ribs, easily found but much less prominent than the last time Seungmin’s hands were here, whenever that was. It earns him a shriek watered down by a giggle, gruff and melodious, high-pitched and hushed all at once (Changbin has always been paradoxical like that). Changbin doesn’t counter, and Seungmin doesn’t move his hand from Changbin’s side. It’s more comfortable there than wedged somewhere in between their bodies, in any case.
Their attention stays on the movie for a while after that, drawn in by the increasingly precarious ways the protagonist hides his true identity from the people in his life. Seungmin reaches back into his bag of chips eventually and comes back with only grease and salt on his fingers. Changbin must’ve snuck more while Seungmin was distracted. He huffs at the inconvenience, but it doesn’t matter to him all that much; he can grab another bag whenever he decides to get up next. He wipes his dirty fingers on Changbin’s hoodie sleeve to show his disdain anyways. It’s practically a formality. Then, they’re back to thirty minutes ago, this time with Changbin jabbing at Seungmin’s stomach and receiving pinches to his waist in return.
“Pipe down over there, my god,” calls Minho from across the room, irritation at the commotion only furthered by his placement at the end of the couch, shoved into the armrest with Hyunjin’s bare feet in his face.
“Anything for you,” Changbin singsongs back. He and Seungmin do end up settling down, and Changbin slips into drowsiness before long. He shimmies around until he’s facing completely forward, his broad thighs eclipsing Seungmin’s own. Changbin stuffs his hands into the pouch of his hoodie and sags back against Seungmin comfortably.
It’s a natural response for Seungmin to hold onto Changbin once he starts slipping off Seungmin’s thighs. His arms cross over Changbin’s stomach, his palms rest flat, and he hoists Changbin higher up on his lap. So he doesn’t fall off, Seungmin assures himself. He’s keeping his hands there so it doesn’t happen again.
In reality, Seungmin is distracted from the movie once again. He can clearly feel it now beneath his hands, just how malleable Changbin has become. While his arms, calves, and back may be firm and defined, Changbin’s stomach has an amount of give to it that wasn’t there a few months earlier. Seungmin thinks idly that perhaps that’s the kind of thing Changbin wants to work on, that maybe he’s adding bulk there so his future abs will be more impressive. The calm before the storm.
Except Seungmin knows what abs feel like, has slapped Chan’s as a joke in passing back when he had them, and he doesn’t think a stomach with the consistency of a brick building is nearly as appealing as what Changbin has now. He gets the allure of it, sure. He can see how all that hard work with a visible payoff can be satisfying.
But this. This is enticing in a way Seungmin’s never experienced.
Seungmin’s hands end up wandering. The fabric of Changbin’s hoodie is thick and only gives off an impression of what’s underneath, so Seungmin soon tires of drawing feather-light patterns into layers of cotton and guides his hands to the hem.
In a moment of clarity, it occurs to Seungmin that this is uncharted territory. He doesn’t touch people unnecessarily. He has a goal in doing this, even if he doesn’t know what it is yet.
He toys with the hem in his hesitation, flipping it up and down to feel how it creases. His eyes bore into the screen in front of him but he doesn’t register anything past momentary glares of color in each frame. Changbin hasn’t stirred since Seungmin first put his hands on him, giving nothing more than an absentminded scrunch of his nose while Seungmin messes with the end of his hoodie. It wasn’t even a reaction, that’s just something he does when he’s spacing out. He’s probably so used to touches like this from the others that even if this is one of the only times Seungmin has initiated it himself, it doesn’t register as something earth-shattering. To Seungmin, it does.
Seungmin sucks in a breath, figuring that he’s already gone this far, and curls his fingers under the fabric.
This time, Changbin jolts a little. “Cold,” he whines under his breath when Seungmin’s fingers make contact with his skin, twisting his head to the side without taking his eyes off the movie so Seungmin can hear him.
Seungmin doesn’t respond, just presses his hands more firmly into the warmth Changbin’s skin provides. Changbin lets out another whine, wordless this time. He probably thinks Seungmin’s teasing him.
Still, Changbin hasn’t pushed him away. He hasn’t called him weird or pointed out how out-of-character this behavior is. Seungmin figures he can get away with chasing the budding inferno in his chest a little longer.
He sweeps his outstretched fingers over every inch of skin he can easily reach. He has no way to explain the feeling or why it’s there, but he’s absolutely giddy with it. He leans into Changbin, trailing his hands up further and further until the hem of the hoodie shifts upwards with him and shocks Seungmin back into himself. The thought of Seungmin exposing bits of Changbin’s skin, even if hidden under a blanket, feels like an escalation of steps in between that and wiping grease on Changbin’s sleeve that he wasn’t mentally present for.
Now aware of himself, Seungmin glances over to gauge Changbin’s reaction. He seems unchanged, eyes resolutely focused on the television screen, but his throat bobs once Seungmin turns his attention on him. Maybe that was coincidental, but Changbin nuzzling back against him and letting out a pleased hum seems to be a good enough indicator of how he’s feeling.
Seungmin tugs Changbin’s hoodie back down, still alarmed. He continues to rub gentle circles into his stomach for the rest of the movie but doesn’t venture any further than the hem.
He wonders if this means something. If it does, he isn’t quite sure he’ll know how to handle it.
Undeniably, their dynamic changes after that. Seungmin changes.
Now, it’s like he can’t keep his hands off of Changbin. The thought of this development--one that seemingly appeared out of nowhere--makes his head spin, but his hands pick up the pieces where his mind fails him. Now, he ruffles Changbin’s bedhead when he passes him in the bathroom each morning. His fingers rest on Changbin’s hip when Seungmin reaches up on his toes to retrieve a mug on the top shelf for him. He drags Changbin onto that same armchair every time the group winds up in the living room. He burrows into Changbin’s bed on afternoons without promotions or practice.
It’s instinctual, and when he stops to think about it, that’s the part that scares him the most.
Who is Changbin to come in and tear up everything Seungmin knows about himself? Who is Changbin to be so warm and willing and inviting?
The thing is, Changbin is exactly that kind of person.
Seungmin tries not to worry about what this means. Most of the time, he doesn’t have the time to. If he’s not practicing or performing or eating with the other members, he’s with Changbin. Changbin doesn’t let him stop and brood. He sweeps him up into fast-paced games and warm hugs and comfortable meals passed with a table in between them. He and Seungmin have been spending time together a lot .
Currently, Seungmin is tagging along while Changbin scours a nearby shopping center for a birthday present to give to his older sister. Changbin is sure to keep them connected everywhere they go, whether it’s dragging Seungmin by the sleeve or steering him into the next vibrantly-colored store.
“You can’t go wrong with a plushie, right?” Changbin asks Seungmin, but he doesn’t wait for a response before rambling on. “I mean, everyone likes cute things. Especially grown women. She doesn’t have a baby, so maybe I’ll get her something cute to fill the void. Assuming she wants children at all. She has a cat, so maybe she’s like Minho and just wants to be a cat lady her whole life. Oh! I could get a toy for her cat.”
Seungmin has no choice but to look on fondly as the whirlwind of Changbin sends them spiraling towards yet another store. This one is filled with pet supplies, and Seungmin struggles to keep Changbin’s focus on what he came here to buy as they browse the aisles (“Do you want these dog treats, Seungminnie?”). Eventually, after much bickering, Seungmin gets him to settle on a catnip pouch shaped into a little felted bird.
They stop at the food court for lunch after making the purchase, hungry and needing to rest after all the wandering around Changbin made them do. It’s not as tiring as pre-comeback dance practice, but it comes pretty close.
“Is there anything you need to buy while we’re here?” Changbin asks over the steam rising from his bowl of pho. His leg is bouncing steadily and it rattles the table every once in a while, but he doesn’t seem all that nervous. Thinking ahead of himself, maybe. Nothing worthy of an intervention.
Seungmin shakes his head. “Nah. We can leave once we finish eating.”
“Oh.” Changbin’s face falls a little, just enough to be noticed, like he tried to keep himself from reacting. Seungmin doesn’t know why. He doesn’t like it, though, so he’s quick to tack on a suggestion.
“I mean, I saw that they opened up a new arcade by the bookstore, so, uh, if you wanted to check it out we can?”
Changbin lights up and Seungmin sighs to himself. A pouting Changbin always gets what he wants. Really, no one man should have that much power.
“That sounds great.” Changbin grins, lips curling prettily at the corners. Seungmin’s coat suddenly feels too humid and constricting around his body. “If you’re not too tired, that is.”
“Not at all.”
They go to the arcade. They verse each other on car racing games and air hockey and team up for a hunting game. Most of the equipment is brand new and therefore not layered with years upon years of kid germs, so Seungmin feels comfortable in the dim lighting despite the warmth that clings to his skin from mild adrenaline and proximity to Changbin. It’s fun, different from playing games back at the dorm, and they stay out so late that they get a concerned phone call from one of the managers asking why the hell they aren’t at the subway station at the agreed time.
Their shoes slap against rain-slick pavement as they sprint to the station and they track water onto the floor of the train compartment when it arrives. The denim of Seungmin’s jacket is cold and stiff after it was held above their heads to protect them from rain on the way over, so he drapes it over his arm and is left in only a thin t-shirt. Water that had slipped past the jacket and soaked into his clothing raises goosebumps along his arms. Changbin shuffles closer and clings to the waterlogged front of Seungmin’s shirt when he sees him shiver. Seungmin grips the handle above their heads to keep them both steady as the compartment sways in movement. The contrast of Changbin’s body heat against the chills covering Seungmin’s skin reminds him of the fever he got last winter after an impromptu snowball fight held outside their dorm. He remembers the way Changbin stumbled around in a puffy jacket twice his size with flecks of snow dotting his hair. He remembers the flush high in Changbin’s cheeks when Seungmin tackled him into a snowbank. He thinks he sees something reminiscent of that in the color of Changbin’s face now.
“Do you think either of us will catch a cold?” Seungmin asks. Changbin tips his chin up to meet his eyes. Seungmin bets he could fit him in his coat pocket if he really tried, even if his shoulders are that broad.
“I hope not,” Changbin answers. “I don’t want to appear on that radio show next week sounding like there’s a frog in my throat. Or a pig, or something.”
He snorts for good measure. Seungmin hides his laugh in Changbin’s shoulder.
Seungmin wakes up the next morning with an alarming body temperature and spends the whole day cocooned in bed. The managers chew him out for carelessness, but he doesn’t regret any part of the outing. Changbin insists on staying with him, insists on it being his fault, even when Seungmin swats him away to try and keep him from getting sick as well.
When Changbin falls asleep with his cheek pillowed against Seungmin’s chest, Seungmin doesn’t think the sudden warmth that floods his limbs has anything to do with his sickness.
Seungmin is stretched out on Felix’s bed and his left foot is cold because he lost a sock somewhere earlier in the evening, but that’s the last thing on his mind. A drama plays out in front of them, one that Felix seems invested in, which makes sense seeing as he was the one to suggest watching it together. Seungmin doesn’t even remember the show’s title.
He’s thinking about Changbin. Again. He’s been doing that a lot lately.
Never in Seungmin’s short, miserable existence has he ever wanted to touch someone just for the sake of having his hands on them. It doesn’t make sense, because nothing about Changbin has even changed. Not really.
Still, it’s been a long time since he’s been the boy Seungmin knew as a trainee, clouded by a gritty aura that demanded attention and respect. He’s always been mature and dependable, but now it’s as if he’s finally grown into those traits after being thrown into them against his will for the sake of the team. He’s the same in a lot of ways, but the way their CEO breathes down his neck has changed, so Changbin’s outward disposition has, too.
And, well, that all seems to really manifest in Changbin’s hugs now that Seungmin’s paying attention. All he can focus on whenever Changbin clings to him--and he’s been doing that a lot lately--is how safe and small it makes him feel. Seungmin wouldn’t peg himself as the type to like feeling that way; he likes having control over any situation he’s in, or even just his bearings, at the very least. Despite that, Changbin rubbing his cheek into Seungmin’s shoulder while they’re stalled out in line for coffee now brings with it a feeling of security that has Seungmin content to give up the reins and worry about nothing other than ensuring that Changbin stays nearby him at all times.
After all of these revelations spanning across the last few weeks, Seungmin finds himself here, seated beside Felix in bed. Felix is arguably just as cuddly as Changbin, and it’s possible that’s something he picked up from Changbin himself when the group was young and he took Felix under his wing.
It gives Seungmin an idea.
Seungmin has so far only found himself seeking out Changbin, but maybe it’s just a fluke. Maybe some switch flipped inside Seungmin that had nothing to do with Changbin and he only thinks it does because he has yet to be physically affectionate towards the other members. It’s a sound hypothesis, he figures, and it’s worth a shot if it gets him to stop fixating on every little touch shared between him and Changbin.
It takes him another moment of boring holes into the wall behind the television, but Seungmin eventually psyches himself up enough to roll over onto his side and face Felix. Felix doesn’t react, still just as drawn to the show. Seungmin takes a deep breath and rolls the rest of the way, drops his hand on the other side of Felix’s waist, and holds his breath. Felix lets out a short, surprised hum and meets Seungmin halfway to wrap an arm around his shoulder for balance, but otherwise doesn’t react. This is natural for him, of course, and he probably doesn’t think anything of it even if he knows it’s out-of-character for Seungmin.
Seungmin lets himself lay there for longer than he ever would normally. He doesn’t feel anything. It’s not bad by any means, doesn’t make him want to jump out of his skin and hide in the bathroom for an hour like it used to, but it doesn’t feel anything like it does when he’s with Changbin. Deep down, perhaps he already knew this.
He rolls out of Felix’s hold and onto his back once more, crossing his arms and huffing quietly.
“You good?” Felix asks, glancing over.
“Yeah,” Seungmin replies, except he isn’t entirely sure that’s true. “I think the main character is kind of dumb.”
Felix huffs a laugh. “You’re right,” he says, and that’s that.
As of right now, he doesn’t know what the bigger implication of his discovery is. All he knows is that it means something.
That night is a long one. For all the thinking Seungmin does, he doesn’t come up with many answers.
His next big run-in with Changbin after that takes place in the kitchen at four in the morning, two hours before they need to start preparing for a full day of interviews and performances. The lights stay off out of courtesy, Seungmin’s bedhead obscures his vision, and he doesn’t bother to retie the string on the pajama pants that threaten to slip off his hips, so he stumbles his way through the dorm solely on muscle memory and the confidence that no one’s there to see him bumbling around. He trips over a plushie that might be Jisung’s and jams his toe into a table leg but otherwise survives the excursion.
Getting the water he came for is an entirely different feat. He knows for a fact that Jeongin ignored the dirty dishes stacked precariously in the microwave (put there so he can’t ignore them, in theory) when he went to bed last night, so Seungmin doubts that any clean cups are left in the cupboards. He rummages around and decides that he can get away with using a bowl instead. It’s four A.M., no one’s around; he can do what he wants.
“Are you drinking from a bowl?”
Or not.
Changbin’s voice is craggy from lack of use and Seungmin can see the way he squints against the light coming from the phone in his hand. It’s certainly not the most incriminating position Seungmin’s been found in at so-late-it’s-morning o’clock, but the sudden spotlight and curious eyes trained on him sends embarrassment racing up the nape of his neck.
“Jeonginnie didn’t wash the dishes,” Seungmin explains tersely, setting the bowl down and leaning back against the counter. Changbin shuffles across the room to crouch in front of his minifridge, and Seungmin recoils at the harsh white light suddenly flooding the room. Once his eyes adjust, he registers just how small Changbin looks sitting there on the floor of their kitchen. Exhaustion always subdues his usual peppiness and he tends to withdraw into himself in more ways than one. Whenever Seungmin finds him curled into a ball at his desk with a blanket pulled over his head as he works, he makes sure to leave Changbin alone until he’s managed a few hours of sleep. He sees pieces of that here in the slump of Changbin’s shoulders. Seungmin wonders how long he was up before this.
Changbin looks small in the way his hands rest on his bare knees and are obscured by the sleeves of the hoodie he wears, one that’s large enough to reach past the hems of his boxers, as he scours the shelves in front of him. He doesn’t look anything like the gym rat he can be in waking hours. Paradoxical, like everything else about him.
It’s spectacles like this that have Seungmin snickering behind a hand whenever he plays back a performance to watch Changbin contort his face into a snarl. Any and all of his attempts at looking fierce on stage are watered down by his natural clinginess and the moments when he’s no longer thinking about how others might perceive him. Not that he really cares usually, not in the way some of the other members do, but he still has an image to uphold.
Here, they’re just Seungmin and Changbin. In a kitchen, running on little to no sleep, coexisting. That’s all that’s expected of them right now.
Slightly, imperceptibly, their dynamic changes once more because of it.
Changbin brings out a takeout box of half-eaten cold soba after long deliberation and eats it at Seungmin’s side. Their shoulders brush whenever Seungmin lifts the bowl to his lips or Changbin hunches over a particularly large mouthful of noodles. Something hangs in the air above them. Seungmin is almost brave enough to try and identify it.
Changbin finishes his soba, and Seungmin stops drinking water once he realizes that dehydration is no longer the cause of the dryness in his throat. Neither of them make to leave, though. Seungmin doesn’t even know what keeps him rooted to the spot.
Changbin, probably antsy after so much silence, fills the air with babble about a prank he pulled on Minho the other day. His words are quick, hushed, and broken up by a scrunch of his nose or a tug of his earlobe. His arms sweep like he’s painting the scene, then hover as if they lost their place. They cross for a minute, uncross, and the cycle repeats. Seungmin doesn’t know why he seems so unsettled, unless he’s suffocated by the same condensation of forceful indifference that’s currently stuck in Seungmin’s lungs.
Without thinking--which is alarming in itself--Seungmin’s hand shoots out to grip Changbin’s wrist. Changbin shuts up so fast his teeth clack, and maybe that was Seungmin’s goal all along. Except, while Changbin’s desperate rambling did nothing to alleviate the pressure in the air, this is much, much worse. That should have been predictable. Seungmin’s good at prediction, but only when he thinks before he acts.
“What are you--” Changbin licks his lips. Clears his throat. Tries again. “What are you doing?”
Seungmin looks down at his hand as if it’ll start speaking and give him an answer. “Uh… well, you were… talking.”
“Oh.” Changbin’s eyes are so, so wide. Seungmin can’t think of a time he was this close to them. He’s close enough to count each individual eyelash, and distracted enough to actually do it.
“A lot.”
“I see.”
Seungmin’s eyes begin to drift farther downwards. He feels a phantom weight pressing in on him from all sides, nearly expects to see the elephant in the room perched on his shoulders if he decides to look up. He startles when he feels Changbin’s arm flex in his hold. He startles again when Changbin intertwines their fingers.
Huh.
He meets Changbin’s eyes and sees his own vulnerability and trepidation reflected in them. And Changbin, because he’s Changbin and Seungmin gives off body heat, naturally shifts a hair closer. So Seungmin, because Changbin is a galaxy far too dense for the molecule of space dust that Seungmin is to ignore, gravitates forwards, too. He cranes his neck down a fraction of a degree more, sways onto the balls of his feet, teeters on a precipice with a ravine stretching beneath him even though he can’t see the bottom. His eyes fall to Changbin’s lips of their own volition, as if that’s what all of this was building up to. They’re full, a little slick from the soba, and pulled into the pout that means Changbin’s thinking really hard about something.
Seungmin, for one, isn’t thinking. He’s learned recently that Changbin does that to him. He doesn’t have time to think when he’s busy chasing whatever warmth Changbin is willing to give. He’s zeroed in on Changbin’s mouth like he’s got something to prove. To Changbin? To himself? He isn’t sure. Seungmin wets his lips unconsciously.
“We have to get ready soon,” Changbin blurts suddenly. Seungmin steps back like he’s been burned.
Maybe that glance into forbidden territory was the kicker. Maybe Changbin found something in Seungmin’s gaze that he wasn’t ready to face. It might not even matter either way.
“Y-yeah, I guess--” Seungmin starts, foolishly, but Changbin is already gone. A door clicks down the hall, and Seungmin is left with confusion and fear and Changbin’s empty soba container.
Later, after Seungmin’s pressed his face into his pillow and wondered until the birds outside woke the rest of the members, Changbin will dodge him in the halls while getting ready and wait for him to choose a van before entering the other one. If Seungmin spends every free moment inside bathrooms and changing rooms for the rest of the day, well, he wouldn’t even have a name for the reason as to why.
“What’s up with Changbin hyung?” Jisung asks, sliding onto the waiting room couch beside Seungmin.
Seungmin scowls into his cup ramen. “Like I’d know.”
“Woah, sorry,” Jisung breathes, eyes comically wide as he puts his palms up in surrender. “Didn’t know you were in a mood. Did you two fight or something?”
Seungmin rolls his eyes. Jisung’s good at a lot of things, but he’s best at getting under Seungmin’s skin whenever he’s feeling foul.
“No, Jisung. We’re peachy.”
Jisung frowns like he isn’t convinced. Seungmin isn’t known for his acting, obviously, and he’s feeling too bitter to do anything about fixing that at the moment.
He’s had a few days to mull over the interaction while being avoided by Changbin like he single-handedly brought back the bubonic plague. He knows what happened. He knows that, if Changbin hadn’t run off, Seungmin would have kissed him. The implications of that terrify Seungmin when he’s been alone with his thoughts for too long, but that isn’t even the real issue. The issue is that, apart from his perpetual disappearing act, Changbin is acting like nothing happened. It’s life as usual for him, just without Seungmin in the picture. Seungmin just wants to talk about it, damn it, but Changbin manages to slip away every time he tries to get him alone. He knows what he saw in Changbin’s eyes, knows that Changbin was technically the one who leaned in first, except the longer he goes without addressing it, the more it starts to feel like a cruel fever dream.
Changbin’s right to be scared, if that’s what it is. Seungmin just hates that he’s leaving him to pick up the pieces on his own.
Jisung scrutinizes him openly, then cups two hands around his mouth and leans dramatically over the arm of the couch.
“Oh, Changbin!” Jisung trills.
“Jisung, don’t,” Seungmin seethes as quietly as he can, frantic. He makes an aborted attempt to wrench Jisung’s hands away from his face as if that could realistically keep him from making noise, but it’s too late.
“Seungminnie says you guys are fighting!” Jisung bemoans. He makes sure to use his most irritating and dramatic tone of voice. “That’s no good, Changbinnie! You’ll make Hannie sad if you don’t work things out!”
Changbin’s head whips up from his phone and just so happens to make direct eye contact with Seungmin, who’s poised to flee. Seungmin no longer wants to deal with it. He doesn’t want to look Changbin in the eye long enough to see what he’s harboring there. Now that he’s faced with the chance at closure he’s been waiting for, he realizes that he never stopped to consider if he could handle the outcome. Does he share Seungmin’s same fears, his same interest? Or, is he disgusted and in denial? Seungmin doesn’t think he would know how to deal with it either way.
He’s out the door and pacing down the hallway in an instant. He heads for the vending machines even though an unopened soda is sitting back in the waiting room with his name on it. He stares at all the brightly-lit bottles for a period of time that he fails to track (a couple minutes? An hour?) until a staff member brushes past him to order from another machine and Seungmin realizes how odd he must look spacing out here. He feeds money into the machine before he even decides on a drink to buy and not open.
He can’t help the thoughts, though. They’ve been assaulting him at every idle moment, and not even doing the whole dorm’s laundry and reorganizing his closet by color during downtime has been enough to ward them off.
After enough introspection, and because Seungmin is honest with himself before anyone else, he is able to admit that he has feelings for Changbin. As in, he’s thought about what would have happened if Changbin didn’t run off that morning. If Seungmin obeyed his instinct and Changbin let him. Thought about tasting cold soba and solace on his lips. Thought about doing it again, in other settings, regularly, without hesitating or overthinking. And when he thought about it, he felt the same feeling that rises in his chest whenever he slings an arm over Changbin’s torso when they’re watching funny videos in bed, the same feeling he’s grown familiar with and openly chases now. He felt it every time he thought about kissing Changbin.
Those are the feelings he has for Changbin. Whatever that means, whatever that entails, he’ll go along with it unquestioningly so long as he gets to keep feeling like that. Relaxed, elated, good. If Changbin is willing to give that to him in any capacity, Seungmin thinks he could never ask for anything more. That scares him, but the sudden absence of touch from Changbin this past week has left him reeling, even after he spent so much of his life not caring either way.
Suddenly, a hand reaches into his field of vision and jabs a button on the vending machine in front of him.
“I was actually--” Seungmin begins, but a can is being pressed into his hands before he can finish.
“It didn’t look like you were gonna decide on anything,” Changbin says, smile placating, if not a little nervous. “I hope you don’t mind.”
Seungmin stares dumbly at the drink in his hand. It’s an apple-flavored Milkis, which isn’t often his first pick, but he enjoys it okay. He pops the tab and takes a sip so he doesn’t feel so guilty about wasting a couple thousand won.
“We should probably talk,” Changbin continues after watching Seungmin sip his drink for a beat too long.
A lot of indignation and anger wells up in Seungmin just then, after over a week of radio silence and dismissed attempts at this exact conversation. But Seungmin is mature and wants to figure this out for both their sakes. He takes a deep breath through his nose and meets Changbin’s eyes with a defensive sort of stoicism.
“We should.”
Changbin blanches after a lengthy silence stretches between them and he realizes Seungmin won’t be the one leading the conversation, as he had tried to do so many times before. “Uh, maybe we should go somewhere else?”
Seungmin lets himself be led into one of the vacant dressing rooms currently reserved for their team. Changbin’s shoulders are squared the way they are whenever he’s preparing for a meeting with the CEO. Seungmin wonders if this is the kind of situation that requires that kind of resolve, and then wonders further if he’s going into this vastly underprepared despite his week-long rumination.
Changbin rounds on him once the door locks. “So.”
Seungmin’s eyebrows lift involuntarily. “So?” He was expecting a little more confrontation.
“We need to talk.”
“We are talking.”
“Seungmin.”
Seungmin crosses his arms and stares hard at Changbin, unimpressed. “You’re the one who dragged me in here after a week of avoiding this conversation. If you think we need to talk about something, I want to know what you think that really is.”
Changbin breaks eye contact then, jaw flexing visibly as he deliberates. After a moment, he continues, “About that night. Morning. Whatever.”
Seungmin waves him along impatiently. Changbin appears to try and suppress his eyeroll, at the very least.
“About me running off. I’m sorry.”
Frankly, that catches Seungmin off-guard. The way Changbin has been acting since it happened, Seungmin wouldn’t have expected that he cared about how Seungmin felt about the situation.
Maybe he should give him more credit. After all, to Seungmin, Changbin has always been the best listener in the group. Seungmin should know better than to consider him uncaring.
“I left you there,” Changbin continues, looking less defensive and more drained now. He lets his head thump against the door behind him while his eyes continue to trail around the room. It feels like a blow to the chest when they finally land on Seungmin, open and unguarded. “I didn’t explain myself, and then I avoided you. I know you’re mad at me, and I know I made things weird between us in the kitchen, but I’m not going to stop caring about you even if you hate me for the rest of our lives. So, here’s your chance to yell at me all you want. I just want things between us to go back to normal.”
“Wait, you think you made things weird? That’s why you ran away?”
Changbin’s eyebrows furrow. “Yeah? Look, I know you’re straight and it weirded you out. I shouldn’t have come onto you like that. It won’t happen again, so let me make it up to you, alright?”
“I’m not-- Changbin, what?”
Seungmin feels like he missed something big. Throughout all of that overthinking where he thought Changbin was unaffected by the whole event, he missed something. Now, he’s been blindsided.
“What?” Changbin asks, looking just as confused as Seungmin feels.
“Changbin,” Seungmin says slowly, as if coaxing a frightened animal, even if he feels like the one being backed into a corner right now. “I want you to explain exactly what you think happened in the kitchen.”
Changbin ears go red as he winces. He opens and closes his mouth a couple times, struggling for words. Eventually, he chokes out, “I tried to kiss you.”
“Changbin, I tried to kiss you.”
“But you’re--”
“I’m not straight.”
Changbin stares at him. Seungmin stares back.
“So you--”
“Yes.”
“Because you wanted to--”
“Yes.”
“Oh,” Changbin breathes. “I guess that makes things easier.”
Seungmin grimaces. “Does it?”
“Yeah.” Changbin looks noticeably relieved. “Now we know we both wanted to kiss each other. No one’s weirded out. We don’t have to worry about it.”
“I think there’s a lot we have to worry about.”
“Like what?”
Seungmin pauses. Thinks.
These unnamed feelings of his only cropped up recently. He still doesn’t know what brought them on, even if intuitively he suspects they were a long time coming. Changbin is different from all the other members. Seungmin likes him in a way that is different from the way he likes the other members. That all makes sense. Seungmin wants to kiss Changbin. Changbin wants to kiss him. That makes less sense.
Regardless, their contracts still forbid relationships, with an invisible addendum existing even on contracts yet to be written that forbids them from having a relationship with another man, ever. There’s the rest of their group to consider. Does Seungmin even want a relationship? Does Changbin? What if Changbin just wants to blow off steam, and Seungmin’s the only one attaching feelings to things?
“Seungmin.”
Changbin’s voice brings him back to awareness, but Changbin’s hand holding on to his own brings him back to Earth. He meets Changbin’s eyes, sees hope and fragility and understanding within them, and forgets about all the things he could worry about. Didn’t he just admit to himself earlier that he’d do anything to keep Changbin close to him?
Seungmin doesn’t rush into things. Then again, Seungmin didn’t think he’d ever crave touch the way he does with Changbin. Maybe Changbin is showing Seungmin how to be paradoxical, too. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.
“I like you,” Changbin says, the corners of his mouth lifting naturally. Ease washes over Seungmin at the sight. “But that doesn’t have to mean anything if you don’t want it to. If you do want it to, then we can figure things out from there. Together.”
Seungmin looks at the ethereal shine in Changbin’s eyes and the honesty in his smile and finds that making a decision isn’t difficult at all. If he can make Changbin look like this, and if Changbin can make him feel like this, he doesn’t need any more convincing.
He squeezes Changbin’s hand. He mirrors his smile. He says, “Okay. I want to figure things out with you.”
The kind of warmth that fills his lungs when he takes a deep breath before plunging into cool water. The kind of warmth that blankets him like the layer of sweat after a performance with no slip-ups and a deafening crowd. The kind of warmth that finds him like a care package from his family after months without seeing them.
The kind of warmth that feels like Changbin. The kind of warmth he can find only when he’s wrapped in his arms.
Seungmin knows already that there will be roadblocks along the way. Nothing between the two of them is clear yet, and perhaps that’s something he’ll worry about in an hour when everything sets in. Right now, he doesn’t worry. Right now, he’s warm, and that’s all that matters.
Seungmin isn’t necessarily averse to physical affection, but it’s never come easy to him. Changbin makes it easy.