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Mingi entered the room as quietly as he could, but soon gave up and flopped on the bed next to where Seonghwa was sitting, his Macbook open on his lap. Seonghwa didn't even flinch, already used to this very occurrence, but decided to indulge the other anyway.
“Hey baby, need anything?”
Mingi just shook his head, which Seonghwa didn’t see as much as he felt it against his thigh. He hummed as one of his hands automatically reached down to pet Mingi’s hair. A few moments passed in comfortable silence and he felt Mingi slowly melt against his side.
“Hyung?” There it was .
Seonghwa hummed again to let him know that he was listening.
“Do you think that Yunho’s tired of me?”
Mingi’s voice was slightly muffled so Seonghwa almost thought that he’d misheard him. “I don’t think so, love. He adores you. What makes you think otherwise?”
There was another moment of silence before Mingi finally lifted his head slightly to look at Seonghwa. Mingi caught his eye for a second before laying back down and burying his head further into the other’s thigh, shrugging lightly.
“I don’t know. Lately, it just feels like he doesn’t want to spend as much time with me? I know we’ve known each other for a long time and we’ve done almost everything together, but he’s never been like this before. I’m so confused, hyung. Maybe we’ve been together for so long that he’s finally bored of me.”
Seonghwa’s eyes softened as he looked down at the vulnerable boy and his hand found its way to Mingi's hair again.
“Mingi-yah, you know I’m always here to hear you out whenever you want to rant, but be honest with me for a minute. Do you really think that talking to me is going to help?”
He took the other’s silence as his answer. “Do you know what will help?”
Mingi whined against his leg. “But what if I’m overreacting, hyungie? I don’t want to upset him or make him mad over something so trivial. Actually, you know what? Now that I think about it, it isn’t really that bad. I’ll get over it.”
Seonghwa rolled his eyes at Mingi's awful attempt at dismissal and pulled on his hair lightly to get him to look up.
“What did we say about invalidating our own feelings?” Mingi tried to hide in his hyung’s lap again but Seonghwa gave his hair another light tug. “Mingi.”
The disgruntled boy sat up and brought his knees to his chest. “My feelings aren’t stupid no matter how much my brain tells me they are and I am allowed to feel upset.”
He’d repeated this sentence enough times that it came out monotonous, not much different from the text to speech feature on his phone.
Seonghwa finally put his laptop down and pulled Mingi into his chest. “Just talk to him, baby. It’s Yunho. You know he’ll understand.”
All he got in response was a low hum and arms pulling him further down so that Mingi could properly nap.
_______
All of them were lounging in the living room, nestled against each other in one way or the other. Mingi was sprawled across the couch, a very tired San laying on top of him. He was about to drift off when he felt lips against his forehead and a finger rhythmically tapping against his chin. He opened his eyes to look at the offender and almost melted into a puddle when he saw Yunho looking down at him fondly.
“Hey sweetheart, I was thinking of going down to the store to pick up some groceries. Want to accompany me?”
Mingi heard muffled laughter and thought he’d imagined it until he saw Seonghwa sitting on the armchair next to him, hiding his shit-eating grin in Yeosang’s shoulder. The boy on his lap stirred awake from the sound and Seonghwa immediately backtracked, rubbing his shoulders to lull him back into sleep.
Mingi shot him a glare and looked back at Yunho who was staring at him, head tilted slightly like a confused puppy. He resisted the urge to squish the other’s cheeks as he got up and beckoned Wooyoung over to take his place, trying his best not to wake San up.
Ten minutes later and the two boys were walking towards the store, hands intertwined and swaying between them. Mingi could feel Yunho turning to look at him every once in a while, and couldn’t stop his ears from turning a bright shade of red.
“Is there something on my face?”
Yunho snapped out of his daze and turned his eyes towards the ground. “No, it’s just that,” he squeezed the other’s hand lightly, “I missed you, you know?”
Mingi laughed but it came out more strained than he’d wanted. “I’m right here.”
The taller of the two grunted and shoved him softly. “Don’t act cute, you know what I mean. It feels like we haven’t hung out, just the two of us, for a hot minute now.”
Mingi avoided his eyes and mumbled under his breath. “I thought you didn’t want to.”
Yunho stopped walking and tugged at their still connected hands to get the other to stop as well. “What?”
Mingi shook his head and started walking again. “Nothing. Don’t worry about it.”
He let out a small yelp as Yunho pulled him towards an empty alley, shielding him from everyone’s eyes and caging him against the wall. “What do you mean you thought I didn’t want to?”
Mingi looked over his shoulder, wanting nothing more than to disappear but a voice inside his head that sounded uncannily like Seonghwa’s was telling him not to be a coward.
“You were hanging out with Wooyoung and Jongho a lot lately. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but you weren’t asking to spend any time with me and I just felt like…..,” He finally looked up at Yunho, “Felt like you were tired of me.”
“Baby.” Yunho chuckled and brought a hand up to cover his mouth.
Mingi narrowed his eyes and tried to pull his hand out of the other’s grasp. “I’m glad me being upset is so amusing to you.”
Yunho laughed a little louder and brought his arms down to Mingi’s waist to pin him against the wall. “Come on. Baby, baby, don’t be mad.”
He leaned in to place little kisses on Mingi's cheek as he turned his head away from Yunho. “I’m not laughing at you, I promise. You’re just so cute when you’re jealous.”
The annoyed boy resisted the urge to stomp his foot like a kid. “I’m not jealous!”
Yunho softened at this, full of fondness for the endearing boy in front of him. “Mingi-yah,” he started, seriousness slowly seeping into his voice, “you’re my rock. I love the rest of our boys, but you are the one person that I know is always in my corner and is looking out for me. Trust me when I say that I will never, ever get tired of you. You’re my everything, sweetheart. As if I could ever live without you.”
He met Mingi’s teary gaze and leaned in again to connect their foreheads. “I love you, yeah? Forever.”
Mingi let out a wet chuckle and nodded. “I love you too. Forever.”
The two walked back to their apartment, groceries long forgotten. And if he saw Seonghwa throwing him his signature ‘I told you so’ look as they stumbled in, practically connected from head to toe, Mingi was none the wiser.