Chapter Text
Whoever had decided that it was a good plan for Minho Park and Thomas Greene to dorm together was obviously on some quite strong pills.
That is to say, having the two of them in any shared space, without supervision, was a terrible idea.
Minho was a runner, and with his obsessive ability to never stop moving and his fixation on 80’s music he was quite literally the definition of ADHD. He would blare his music so loud that dorm 250 had received multiple noise complaints from other students, and he would hang upside down with his legs hooked over the bed and his phone in his hand, jiggling his feet and somehow drinking coffee even though he was the wrong way up.
Thomas was just a quite literal capsule of creative energy. On his side of the room (and a good portion of Minho’s) the ceiling and walls were plastered with little sticky notes and immaculate sketches of people in unnamable different media’s from charcoal to sharpie, even drawn onto the back of receipts. His desk was chaotic and overflowing with art supplies and other random stuff.
Neither boy had any room to keep their textbooks, Thomas for lack of space and Minho because he would lose them under a pile of clothes or coffee cups or other random papers. This had led to the third bed in the dorm becoming the only relatively tidy space where their textbooks and laptops were kept. The bed was a no-touch zone, so that they didn’t end up damaging the stuff they actually needed for college.
It was a Tuesday afternoon and Thomas was laid on the floor on his stomach wearing nothing but briefs and an unbuttoned black shirt. He claimed it helped him get in the mood for drawing. A playboy magazine lay open on the floor in front of him, and he was furiously scribbling a drawing of the scantily clad model onto a crumpled sheet of newspaper.
“YO WHAT’S UP BITCH?” Minho hollered, quite literally kicking the door open.
Thomas rolled onto his side “OY, slim it Min, you’re gonna break the door!” he laughed loudly.
Minho dumped something on the floor and Thomas heard the sound of the microwave turning on before Minho emerged around the doorway.
“What ya drawing?” he walked over to where Thomas was laying, crouching down to look over his shoulder. “Well damn Thomas, you’ve been raiding my porn stash?”
Thomas grinned, looking up at Minho “Keep it in your pants mate, I’m just drawing her in all her pretty little naked-”
“Alright!” Minho took a step back, laughing “anyway I’m off to have a shower, there’s chicken wings in the microwave ready in 5.”
Minho backed into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him.
“WIPE THE GLASS WHEN YOU'RE DONE WANKING!” Thomas cackled in the direction of the bathroom.
There was a thud and then Minho opened the door, poking his head round to look Thomas dead in the eyes.
“Nah Thomas, I think I’ll make you clean up my-”
Thomas put his hands over his ears and shut his eyes.
He finally removed his hands and heard the shower turn on and Minho make a big show of moaning explicitly, and he laughed and rolled over, a contented smile on his face. Minho was honestly the best dorm mate he could ask for.
After a moment he stood up, pinning his sketch onto the wall, tugging a pair of tracksuits on (the autumn air was chilly in the evenings) and making his way into the kitchenette. He kicked the door as he passed the bathroom.
“You can slim it now, I get it!”
In the kitchen, Minho’s running kit was dumped in a sports bag in the middle of the floor and the chicken wings were slowly rotating in the microwave. Thomas bent down and picked up the sports kit, tossing it into the washing machine and checking their room for laundry before turning it on.
He reached into the fridge and cracked open a can of Pepsi, and leaned against the counter.
Thomas and Minho had returned to college a week early after summer, neither of them having anything left to do at home and thought that they might as well spend the week together on campus. Tonight, the rest of the students were coming in, but Minho and Thomas knew that they didn’t have anyone else in their dorm, they hadn’t last year either. He was glad. Thomas didn’t know how another person would react being in the presence of his and Minho’s chaotic energy, and he wasn’t sure he wanted to find out. The two of them had a rather acquired taste in humour and in lifestyle, to put it lightly.
The microwave pinged, and Thomas pushed away from the counter, taking the plastic tray out of the machine and setting it on the side. He took a jar of Barbecue sauce out of the minifridge and squirted a generous amount onto the side of the tray.
He was just about to pick up a chicken drumstick when a knock sounded on the door.
He frowned, thinking, as he made his way over to open it. Who on earth would be knocking on their door. Teresa never knocked, and neither did anyone else for that matter. Thomas tugged open the door.
Outside, there was a boy. He looked slightly younger than Thomas, but the way he carried himself made him look like he was older mentally. His chocolate eyes flitted nervously from the hall floor to Thomas’s face to behind him in the flat. He had dirty blond hair that lay fluffy on top of his head and he had a faded navy blue sweater on, which his hands hid inside the sleeves of.
Thomas looked him up and down, trying to figure out if he knew him. He didn't.
“Can I help?” he asked cautiously.
“Um- I-” the boy licked his lips nervously “the man at the front desk said this is my dorm room…”
He was British!
“I didn't know we had a roommate,” Thomas racked his brains in between the poetry and random song lyrics for anyone having said he and Minho would be having a roomie this year.
“I can go back down and check if it was a different-”
“No, no come in.” Thomas shook his head, stepping back to allow the boy to walk inside “Ill check with Minho, it probably just slipped my mind. Excuse the mess,”
The boy clutched a bag in his hands, nothing but his fingertips visible from below his long sleeves.
“Here, let me,” Thomas offered to take the bag, putting it on one of the bar stools.
He fidgeted awkwardly for a moment, bouncing on the balls of his feet, before spinning round.
“Chicken wings?”
The boy shook his head, his blond curls falling over his eyes.
At this moment, Minho emerged from the bathroom, wearing nothing but underwear.
“Hey Thomas, I purposely didn’t clean- wait, who's this?”
“Uhhh…” Thomas realised with a jolt that he hadn't asked the boy’s name.
“Newt. My name’s Newt.”
Minho furrowed his eyebrows “Is that your real name?”
Newt shook his head, carefully keeping his eyes averted from Minho’s muscular chest and arms and fighting the blush that was creeping onto his cheeks.
Thomas seemed to notice, and threw a dish-cloth at him.
“Put some clothes on Min, you're traumatising Newt!”
Minho grinned and winked, disappearing into the bedroom. Thomas turned back to Newt.
“My name’s Th-”
“Thomas. I know,” and when Thomas looked confused “I heard him say it just now.” Newt nodded to the direction Minho had gone.
Thomas nodded and mouthed ‘oh’ picking up a chicken wing. As he chewed, an avalanche of thoughts danced the tango inside his head, and he reached over and flicked on the stereo, the familiar sound of David Bowie filling the kitchenette.
“You can sit down if you want,” Thomas gestured to the bar-stool.
In actual fact, for some strange reason, he didn't know how to act around this new figure. Something about Newt’s presence made him lose control of his already jumbled thoughts, like radio interference when the sound crackles and buzzes, and he didn't know what to say.
Newt appeared to be equally awkward as he sat himself on one of the stools.
When Minho came back in, he looked back and forward between the two. Thomas, who was eating a chicken wing and tapping his hand on his thigh to the beat of ‘Under Pressure’, and Newt who was perched lopsidedly on one of the stools.
He turned to Thomas.
“Wait so do we know this shank?”
Thomas shook his head and swallowed his mouthful before responding.
“No, he said the man in reception sent him here.”
Minho looked confused, so Thomas added “It appears we’ve got ourselves a roomie!”
Newt nodded and smiled slightly, wringing his hands.
“I assumed you'd been told I was coming, I can ask for a different room if you guys have a problem with that…”
Thomas and Minho communicated silently for about three seconds before nodding.
“No, you don't need to do that,” Minho said “In fact I think I did get told, but it just kinda slipped my mind. Thomas, give me a hand moving the stuff off the bed?”
The two boys disappeared into the bedroom and Newt followed slowly, hesitating by the door.
Once all of Thomas and Minho’s college work had been moved off the bed which would now be Newts, they waved him in.
“That 's my bed, and that's Minho’s in the corner. You've got a desk here but feel free to dump stuff wherever you need.” Thomas pointed “the bathroom’s just in that door, there's a wardrobe here… and sorry about the mess. We weren't expecting anyone,”
Newt nodded, and limped back into the kitchen to get his bag and bring it in the bedroom. He sat down heavily on the mattress as Minho and Thomas returned to the kitchen, to eat more chicken wings.
Thomas stared at the ceiling in the dark. It wasn’t even light yet, but his mind was buzzing. Something felt weird, but in a good way.
Maybe it was because there were two sets of breaths in the room instead of the usual one. Newt’s breathing was light and shallow unlike Minho’s deep heavy snores. It was almost not noticeable unless you were specifically listening for it.
There was something about him, Thomas felt drawn to him, that little ounce of curiosity about his very essence. Like that spark of inspiration you get when you have a new idea and you're not sure what it's going to develop into. Thomas sighed and rolled over, dozing off into an easy sleep.
In the morning when he and Minho woke up, Newt wasn't there. His bed was neatly made and his school books were gone.
Minho looked at Thomas and shrugged “don't ask me mate,”