Archive of Our Own

I: early night vibes

(

Minho was drunk enough that the raucous conversation unfolding next to him flowed like water over his back. He smiled when Seungmin shot him a look, and stuck his thumb up. He’s fine, really. Just too drunk to participate in conversation.

It was late at night – nearing one, Minho thought, and the apartment reeked of grease from the mounds of fast food they had ordered, and they had worked their way through all the booze. There was nothing left to do except unwind, so that was what Minho was doing. Unwinding. Undulating until he was draped over the armrest of the couch.

“I’m good, Seungminnie,” Jisung said beside him, and whoa, when did that happen? “I’m done.”

“That’s more for me then,” Seungmin replied, and sipped his beer.

Minho had – well he hadn’t forgotten that Jisung is here, but it was still a surprise to see him. He had lost track maybe, and his sudden reappearance made Minho’s stomach fuzz with delight. “What’re you doing?” he asked, his mouth working on its own as it did whenever Jisung was near.

Jisung turned to him, a glass of water raised halfway to his mouth. He angled his phone towards Minho, not that Minho could see anything. “I’m making a playlist.”

“Playlist,” Minho rubbed his chin, “you’re making a playlist now?”

“Yeah,” with a sheepish chuckle, Jisung looked at his phone, thumb scrolling through the screen. “I have a project deadline coming, so I'm making playlists for it,” he shrugged. “Hopefully it will help me get in the zone and – like help me have positive associations...um.”

The usual sharp cadence of Jisung’s voice was dulled by a slur, but his shoulders were tense. “Positive associations and?” Minho prompted, watching the line of Jisung’s nose. It was a very cute nose.

“Help me destress, I guess,” Jisung smiled, “it’s nothing really.”

It didn’t seem like the truth, but the thought was fleeting and trailed off into the murk of his drunkenness. He blinked at the ear pod that Jisung offered him. He picked it up gingerly with his thumb and index finger when Jisung shook his palm. “What’s this for?”

“Do you want to listen to my playlist?” Jisung asked, obviously expecting Minho to say yes. He had an eager glint to his eyes, and Minho swore that he saw his nose twitch. Heh.

“Okay,” Minho plugged the ear pod in his ear, and considered how if this had happened half a decade earlier, then Jisung would’ve handed him an earphone, and it would’ve been the perfect excuse to be greasy and sidle up to Jisung’s side. But, everyone had accepted the coldness of modernity, so he had no choice but to remain lying on his side as Jisung clicked play.

It was ambient music, the sort that Minho never listened to in the light of the day because it was too lukewarm for his taste. Now though, it curled around his ribs in a soft frisson of warmth, melting into his mind. He snuggled deeper into the armrest, his thoughts unfurling to nonsense.

“They’ve been together for three years now,” Jisung murmured, voice gone gravelly with its quietness. “It’s so strange – the way time just passes by.”

Minho tilted his head, caught sight of Changbin and Seungmin laughing together, the remnants of their anniversary cake smeared on Changbin’s face. The rest of the apartment was quiet and the lights were dimmed. The balloons stuck to the wall had started wilting, and some of the festoons were drooping. Minho nodded, his hair dragging against the fabric of the couch. “It just seems like yesterday when my housemate was all – uh – aflutter before his first date.”

“Now look at the both of them,” Jisung laughed, “sappy and disgusting.”

He should laugh, Minho knew, but the idea of three years having passed was turning loops in his head like a dropped coin. It jangled – three years, three years – before it came to an abrupt stop when Jisung tapped his ankle.

“Hyung?”

So much time has passed, he thought, bewildered, trying to stop himself from clawing for memories of the past three years. “Sorry – this is a good song,” his words were shaky, “I was um. I got lost.”

“Oh! It’s good, right? I like it too. I just found it.” Jisung was beaming now. "Do you like such playlists? The… vibey ones?"

Minho nodded, faraway from this couch, this conversation. "They're good,” he replied, only half noticing the song changing.

)

*

Jisung’s already sitting on the sofa that’s a part of their seating, his back facing the entryway. As Minho follows the waiter to the table, he can see Jisung puffing his cheeks out and the smile blooming on Minho’s face is immediate and foolish.

“Thank you,” he tells the waiter and slaps Jisung’s shoulder before rounding the edges of the sofa and sitting on the one opposite Jisung.

Jisung yelps and flails for a second before hissing and checking his jeans and shirt for any spills from the beer mug he’s holding. Minho laughs as he places his satchel next to him. “Very dignified.”

“You’re not supposed to hit a man on the back when he’s not looking!” Jisung complains, but his smile is wide, “it’s not gentlemanly.”

“Oh, sorry,” Minho says and then lunges towards him.

Jisung shrieks and falls back against his seat, raising one of his knees to protect him. “Look what you did!” he grumbles, shuffling forward and thrusting his hand towards Minho.

There’s beer speckling the back of his hand and Minho makes a show of rolling his eyes in disinterest just to make Jisung huff, and continue mock grumbling with indignation. He knows that he is grinning like a fool, but he can’t help it. It’s just – it is cute, okay. He is sensitive to cuteness even if he doesn’t admit it to anyone.

“I forgive you.” Jisung says as he places his glass back on the table. He picks up an onion ring and waves it at Minho. “Even though you’re behaving like a feral cat.”

Minho raises a brow, as he picks up the menu. “I don’t remember asking for forgiveness. I think I would remember such a gross lapse in judgement.”

“You’re such a dick! Anyway, I forgive you,” Jisung shoots him a quelling look and then takes a bite of his onion ring once satisfied that Minho won’t interrupt him. “And I’m guessing your reading went well since you’re in such high spirits.”

Minho decides to save the teasing for later, when it’s part of the mosaic of conversation and less likely to reveal anything. “It did,” he lies, fiddling with the dog ear on one of the pages of the menu, “I had fun.” It had been a lukewarm experience, like most of these things were these days. 

“I can always tell,” Jisung says sagely, rubbing his thumb and forefinger together and making a face, “ugh, so oily.” He picks up the tissue he’d used to wipe the beer off his hand, “you get all excited and energetic when the crowd eats up whatever you read.”

Snorting, Minho flicks through the menu, trying to hide the spark of fondness that wells in him. “What a brilliant deduction, Hannie,” he says instead, even though Jisung's deduction is as far away from the truth as possible. A waiter is hovering somewhere near their section, so Minho gestures at him. He orders and wrangles the warm flutter in his stomach into control during the brief exchange.

 "I mean, people didn't throw tomatoes at me, and didn't start booing. So I guess it went well.” He places the menu back and picks up an onion ring.

“Yeah right, people definitely walk around with spare tomatoes to throw at others." Josing rolls his eyes. "But you know I would’ve skipped this hangout if I had a public event just before,” Jisung shudders, “I love you all, but the effort is too much.”

Had Minho skipped this dinner then he would be at his cold flat with the horror series he’s watching as his only company. The shift would be too jarring. “I guess I love you all more since I’m willing to make the effort,” he teases and taps Jisung’s nose with an oily finger to make sure that he knows it’s a joke. The cross-eyed look and comical frown on Jisung’s face is just a bonus.

They bicker till the others arrive. He almost accuses Changbin of planning his late arrival, but he is so huffy about the traffic he had to navigate that Minho doesn’t mention it. A waiter makes a beeline to Changbin and Seungmin and they get sucked into a long, involved conversation with him. They come here so often and bring so many people with them that they have managed to befriend the staff.

“So, how was your week,” Seungmin asks, once they settle in for their meal, “don’t ask me about mine, I don’t want to think about work for the next forty-eight hours.”

“Same,” Jisung says, smile wry and lopsided, “I want to exist in a bubble where I’m not an employee at a company that has my life in shackles.” He says it like a joke, but –

“Have you started looking for a new job?” Changbin asks, reaching across the table to pat Jisung’s knee. “I can put in a reference…”

Jisung shakes his head, “no work talk till Monday, hyung. You know the rules.”

“I’m going to rent out a cottage and I’m going to work on the book there,” Minho interjects, taking a sip of his beer. He notices Jisung’s shoulders relax, just a little. “I actually went there and checked it out last week and it’s really cool. Very verdant and stuff.”

“Wait a minute,” Seungmin asks, raising a brow, “you drove all the way to that village just to check out a cottage?”

Minho shrugs, then drains the last of his beer. “Yeah, I mean, the pictures itself were so gorgeous that I had to see it. I was not disappointed…” he pauses, wondering how to paint a picture of the way the sun had looked, a far off shimmer in the horizon but the way its warmth had cascaded past his windshield and warmed his cheeks. Or the way the thin air had whipped his hair around and how pure and cold it tasted. “The town was very old. It felt like… time had stopped there.”

“That sounds so cool, hyung,” Jisung says, genuine awe curling around his words. The tips of Minho’s ears burn. “It was like a small adventure just for yourself.”

Changbin sighs, leaning back against his seat. “Jisung, you are just really easy to impress.” He nudges Minho with his shoulder, “Minho hyung isn’t as cool as you think.”

“Yeah, Jisung,” Seungmin adds with a teasing smile, “take it from the most uncool person here.”

It takes them all a moment to understand the sarcasm and then Jisung and Minho burst out laughing as Changbin whines and pouts. Seungmin chuckles and blows Changbin a kiss which instantly mollifies him.

*

Later, Jisung and Minho wait under the awning of the brewery for their respective cabs. There’s a nip to the air and Minho shoves his hands inside his pocket to keep them warm. Jisung leans against his side and there’s a soft smile playing at the corner of his lips.

“Why are you smiling?” Minho asks, eyeing the numbers of the cars that stop near the curb. The wall behind him hums with the beats of the music that is playing inside.

Jisung covers his mouth as he yawns and then rubs the corner of his eyes. “Nothing. This day ended better than I expected.” He drops his hand and plucks at a thread at the hem of his denim jacket, “I’m glad I came.”

“Weren’t you going to?” Minho squints at a car that seems promising, but it is one number off. Heh, interesting.

“No, I was, but I thought that I’d still feel shitty when it was time to go back home…” he shrugs, holding the thread up to his face and then dropping it, “I feel better.”

Minho tilts his head and considers Jisung. He looks content huddled against Minho’s side in his too big jacket. He hadn’t noticed that Jisung was feeling off at all and it startles him. “Tough da–”

“Things felt off today,” Jisung says at the same time. He grins, “yeah. It was kinda tough.”

“I didn’t mean to…” Minho mumbles, stomach clenching. He wishes words came to him easily, just like the way they spark beneath his fingertips when he’s writing. “I didn’t mean to annoy you so –”

Jisung perks up. “Oh! That’s my cab.” He turns to Minho and pulls him into a quick hug. “You didn’t annoy me, hyung. I had fun.” He glances at his phone and then back at Minho. “I’ll see you soon.”

“Bye,” says Minho, weakly and a bit petulant in a way he’ll never admit to himself had he not had two cocktails in the past half an hour. He wants to spend more time with Jisung. “Take care, Sungie. Text me when you reach home.”

“Will do.” Jisung jogs to his cab and waves at him as the car drives away from the brewery. Minho raises a hand in reply and then goes back to scanning the road.

*

Jisung: I have reached!!

Jisung: home.

Jisung: also, like you don’t have to listen to it or anything but I finished the playlist that I was making and I thought I’ll send it to you since you liked some of it

Jisung : here it is https://open.spotify.com/playlist/2PFOlYuSBMzvfbSpWyWHtP?si=rjswLrFNR1SRdaF5uu_HZg&utm_source=copy-link

Jisung: hope you reached home safe too

Jisung: g’night hyung

*

II: day after day

(

The apartment was dark as pitch until Minho flicked on the lights, and then the light stung his eyes as he bent to unlace his boots. His apartment was silence itself, echoing with the sound of his boots thumping to the floor and his socks whispering as he shucked them off.

His bare feet squeaked on the floor as he walked to the kitchen, and he deposited the leftover food that Changbin had given him on the counter top. He fetched a glass of water and leaned against the fridge to study his apartment. Six months and every corner wore his mark in some way: a mug of coffee that he had forgotten by the windowsill, the water stain on his sofa, his books on the worktop, the painting of clouds hanging on the door to his room.

It settled something in him with a weight for which he has no name.

Maybe, he thought, maybe it was the certainty of this place being his home. The transformation from the bare space to something that framed his new life, held it within itself.

A place for him, and him alone.

)

*

Even though the idea of staying in his nest of blankets and letting the day melt twines around him, Minho still gets up and brushes his teeth. He changes without looking at his bed and makes a beeline to the kitchen as he tightens the drawstrings of his sweatpants.

It is difficult to will his mind into following his body as he warms up. When he’d first started working out, it had been the other way round: his muscles screaming and refusing to complete a rep, or giving up halfway through a set. Now it is his mind that he has to discipline. It’s strange, how nothing ever remains the same.

Everything is in flux, always.

He perseveres through the half an hour or so that it takes for the endorphins to hit, and by then it’s easier to fall into the rhythm of the workout of the day. It probably also has something to do with the people who start streaming in and the deep-seeded instinct to perform, but that’s not important. He completes his workout, clocks his stats, showers and goes to buy groceries.

There’s a sharp breeze blowing, chilling his neck and stinging his nose. But his hands are warmed in his pockets by heat packs. It’s a delightful juxtaposition, one that he has designed himself.

The grocery store isn’t crowded since people tend to flock to them after brunch and it’s barely past eight o’clock now. Minho loves this part of his weekends - likes traversing the world when it is still coiled in sleep and lazy, when its beat is a measured tick and not a rousing drumbeat that barks orders. He winds past people clustered around a display of fermented drinks and quickly marches past the people lingering in the aisles to get to the vegetable section.

His mind wanders as he selects the produce, creeping over the walls of everyday worries. His best ideas always come to him when his thoughts branch out like capillaries and unfold on their own. But today they are diffuse...jagged. They skitter over the gray shells in his psyche labelled ‘do not touch’ and skitter away to another when he bats at them.

There’s a weight in his stomach and it unfolds as he checks off the items on his list. Carrots – I can’t write . Onions – It will be Monday soon . Sesame leaves – I’m getting older and have nothing to show for it.

It’s when he picks a squash that the weight bursts to a spiralling, fizzing dread. I’m not having a breakdown in the vegetable aisle , he tells himself, and then imagines a hammer swinging in the dark. It works and is also reinforced by the buzzing of his phone.

He fishes it out. Frowning at the caller ID, he answers with a, “why the fuck are you up so early?”

“I have a morning shoot,” Hyunjin whines in an instant, “can you believe how much some people love sunlight? Why can’t they love the world that much too, man? Can’t they see that it’s the sun that is killing us all.”

Minho chuckles before he can stop himself. “Didn’t you just take off to a beach recently to bask under the sun?”

“That was leisure, not work,” replies Hyunjin, huffing. “I’ve been up since four because they wanted photos of the sunrise – Silhouettes and stuff or something. And the sun didn’t rise till seven because it’s nearly fucking October and –” he lowers his voice, “the models are difficult to work with.”

“Damn, that sucks,” Minho says, placing the squash down with a suspicious look, and picking up a pack of green onions instead, “so you’re on break now?”

Hyunjin snorts. “Some break. It’s cold as fuck. Anyway, I wanted to ask you if you wanted to go out for dinner today? There’s this nice place my friend suggested and I want to check it out.”

Minho pushes the cart forward and takes a moment to think. “Do you want to have dinner at my place instead? I’ll cook – I haven’t cooked in too long.”

“That works,” there’s a burst of incomprehensible chatter from Hyunjin’s side and he says, “one minute!”

Minho goes to the meat and seafood section, phone cradled between his ear and shoulder. He has already decided what he is going to cook.

“I’m back, and oh! I asked Hannie if he wants to join us tonight for dinner, but since we’re coming over to your place, should I tell him to come too, or not?”

“No, it’s okay, ask him to come.” He flushes a little even though there’s nothing to, you know, fluster him. Not that he’s flustered. He clears his throat. “Anyway, I’m at the grocery store, so I need to go. Come over at around seven.”

Hyunjin's bark of laughter makes Minho clench his hands around the handle of the cart, a retort ready. But Hyunjin continues talking. “It’s not even eight, hyung and you’re already running around. Always so productive.”

“Shut up. You're the one who got up at four.”

“Yeah, but I had to do it for money and you’re doing it ‘cause you’re a millennial grandpa who is always hustling.”

Minho studies the cuts of meat that are on display. “Hyunjin, I have a nice, new butcher’s knife and I won’t hesitate to try it out on you.” The lady next to him steps away, and Minho sends her an apologetic smile. “Do you understand?”

“You’re always so violent. I’m cutting the call now because I’m disappointed in you, hyung.”

Minho cuts the call before Hyunjin can and receives reams of complaining texts over the next few minutes.

*

Jisung: do you want me to get anything for dinner?

Jisung: dessert?

Jisung: there’s this cute bakery near your place that I heard sells nice stuff. Like cat shaped scones 👀So I can get it.

Minho: not really, I have a lot of stuff for dessert. Thanks for the offer though Hannie

*

Minho spends the rest of his day doing laundry and then working on the character notes for his next novel. He has a good feeling about this novel – well, good feeling as in ‘absence of absolute dread’ and not ‘it’ll all go well’ types. If he finishes off all the grunt work beforehand then he can dive right into the story when he sets camp in that cottage.

Even now, he thinks, as he adjusts his seat, and enters the password to unlock his laptop, it all seems like a dream. A dream where Lee Minho, aspiring idol turned industry chow picks up the shattered pieces of his goals and uses it to forge a new path for himself as an author. Where he becomes popular enough to make some money and to have some recognition.

Sometimes, Minho forgets that this public version of him is derived from his private life, and that it is true. True enough that it prickles to be seen, but also a feel good story that has been crafted by his PR, who slaved over the perfect blend of tropes and facts. It’s difficult to swallow, to agree and say, yes, “that’s me!” because he is eclipsing and exposing himself at the same time.

Not that anyone would like the unvarnished truth, Minho thinks as he watches the blinking cursor. Who would want to know that Lee Minho wears a stained undershirt because he mixed dark clothes with whites once, and sometimes suspects that he is living in a simulation? What would people do with the information that Minho, who in spite of his cool, untouchable image, is still ruminating over having invited Jisung to dinner because of the… How can he put it across in a dignified way? The I kinda like him stuff.

No, your dating life might be interesting to them, what with the unnecessary tension and chance of unrequited feelings.

He does what any self-respecting person trying to avoid discomfort does. He logs into twitter and scrolls mindlessly until it is time for his break. It is not easy to map the character graph of a bunch of friends who get embroiled in a murder investigation when he’s in the middle of a weird day.

So he writes what he can and starts cooking around five o’clock. By the time Hyunjin arrives, freezing and reeking of exhaustion, he already has the side dishes prepared. Hyunjin looks like he is going to cry when he picks up one of the bowls and then gets to work with the chopsticks that Minho silently hands to him.

After five minutes of nonstop eating, Minho intervenes. “Remember to breathe, Hyunjin-ah.” He turns back to the stew, and idly stirs it. “Rough day.”

“Don’t ask,” Hyunjin says, placing the bowl down on the counter. “Why is it so difficult to make money?”

“You complain about this every week,” Minho points out. “And we have spoken about this a lot.”

“I know but work sucks every week,” Hyunjin exhales noisily. “Just –” he pauses, drumming his fingers on the counter. 

“What?” Minho asks, raising a brow. He turns off the stove, and wipes his hands on a towel. 

Hyunjin sighs again. “Do you ever feel passionate about your work? Like this excitement to work – or like, I don’t know, this pride? Energy? Whatever?”

Does Minho feel passionate about his work? Minho places the lid on the saucepan, and bats away an errant fly. He is drawing a blank. “I mean, I enjoy some bits of my work,” he says. He’s facing Hyunjin now, and Hyunjin leans forward, eyes intent. Minho feels the heat of a spotlight on his face, and his stomach inexplicably roils. “It sucks sometimes too, you know. That’s how work is.”

Another sigh, and Hyunjin tips his head back, rolls it around his neck. “Same. Then I met this weird dude who really had this… you know how they say some people have a fire in their eyes but it’s just like them squinting at floaters or something? This dude honestly had that passion.”

“Must be nice,” Minho says. “I don’t know – it seems like being passionate requires a lot of energy.” That and the fact that passion poisons you with hope. He swallows and moves to the fridge to get a couple of beers out. “Now, let’s get buzzed before Jisung comes here and finds two sad sacks.”

The three of them together are lightweights, so it doesn’t take much time for Minho to be leaning towards Jisung, hands clasped around his glass of beer. “ – so yeah, passion only uh…smothers energy and stuff.”

“Dude, don’t get me started on passion,” says Jisung, cheeks flushed and teetering on his seat like a lone napkin in the holder, “I just work till I get my salary, shop online to feel better, and then work again,” he laughs. “There’s only one credit to my account ever, the rest are only debits.”

“You’re both a bunch of sad sacks,” Hyunjin says. He doesn’t even bother quelling his laugh when Minho glowers at him. “This is like a sad boy convention.”

“You’re the one who started it,” Minho shoots back. 

“Yes, but I moved on like forty minutes ago.” Hyunjin leans forward, “so anyway, Jisung are you interested in anyone right now? I have a friend who – ow!“

Jisung swivels his head from Hyunjin to Minho, and squints in confusion. “What..?”

“We don’t make guests uncomfortable,” Minho mutters, suddenly unsure of how his limbs work. He tries to take a sauve and cool sip of his beer even though his ears burn with the strain of waiting for Jisung’s response. Yeah, that’s what it is and not a blush or anything soppy like that.

Jisung just laughs as if that’s the appropriate reply, and not, you know, declaring his cute but also sexy intentions towards Minho. The chance was right there! How does this man survive in the 21st century? “I know, I know. I guess if I start talking about work then I don’t stop…it’s a disease at this point.”

“Yes, it is. It’ll make it hard for you to hit it off with someone you like,” Hyunjin says because he is shameless, “unless of course they already know you and already like you.” 

Minho waits with bated breath which turns out to be a waste of an exhale because Jisung is oblivious.

“That’s why I’m trying to dabble in more hobbies,” Jisung nods, sagely. “I tried doing a bit of origami, and I also started making playlists to be more creative.” He shifts his gaze towards Minho. “Like that playlist I sent you? Did you get a chance to listen to it?”

“I did listen to it a little bit.” Minho clears his throat, “I still have to listen to the rest of it.”

“Oh, that’s okay,” Jisung says, "so yeah, that's what I do these days -- it's a nice way to find new music too."

Minho feels caught out, mood souring a little for no reason. "That's a nice hobby, though. Relaxing." His words have the staccato rhythm of a marionette. Maybe he shouldn't have spoken. 

"Make me a playlist to get me out of bed on Mondays," Hyunjin says, "I'll pay you with a pastry."

"Make it two pastries and you have a deal."

*

Later, Hyunjin takes his leave and Minho toddles through his night time routine in the cloudy haze of sobering up. 

It is a lonely affair, not that it ever was... wait, what's the antonym of lonely? Social? Popular? Whatever. It's something that's always lonely but there's something stark in the way that he can only hear the rustle of his clothes as he changes for the night.

Once under his sheets, and on his side, he stares towards the farthest end of the room. There's nothing there except for his laundry basket. It's empty today, and it seems lonely too.

Drink a little less before bedtime, he tells himself. 

Nothing is right even though everything is in place.

His breath shudders in his sternum. It's probably the alcohol that's making him so emotional. Or maybe it's just been a hectic week, with readings and a lot of work. Or maybe it's the feeling from when he was eighteen –

No, I need to sleep, Minho tells himself, and flicks off the night lamp. He closes his eyes before darkness descends and counts backwards until the numbers turn to static.

*

(

There had been a time when he would get up in the mornings, and go on long, long walks. Not for any reason other than to do something even though there wasn't anything to do.

Sometimes he would get calls from the places where he had applied. He would answer their screening questions sitting in the park, hand on a stray cat's forehead. 

He would come home and recite all the interviews that he had given to his parents, just to assuage their worry. He would eat and spend the night working on his online diploma.

It was a time that didn't seem like time. It was...he had never known how to explain it. It was all hope - yes hope. 

He had come to terms that he wouldn't cut it in the entertainment industry, but he also wasn't too worried about getting a job. 

There was time. There was so much time for change.

)

*

Jisung: i made a playlist for our passion-less days

Jisung: it’s not /that/ great but it’s something?

Jisung: i kinda like it

Jisung: inspired by our conversation today

Jisung: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4nUHiKLrndgS9DSI6GNU6L?si=fQLjSUzqSeGqtuc8vqu6cQ&utm_source=copy-link

*

Hyunjin: passionate dude is really something

Hyunjin: saw him going to the gym at 4 lol

Hyunjin:  gymbros defy bodily limitations I guess

Minho: Are you stalking him?

Minho: And why are you up at 4?

Hyunjin: excuse me!! I didn’t stalk him, he was at the shitty gym in my building 😤

Hyunjin: god i have to get to a shoot

*

Minho packs his bags and confirms the details of his stay with the owner of the cottage once again. He posts an update on twitter as requested by his agent to, you know, show off his productivity and contribution to the writing world. He prints out the images he is using for reference, and files them carefully before putting it in his laptop bag.

There are other errands to run. His mom is a proponent of preparing the house before going away on an extended trip so it is easy to slip into those familiar movements. He creates a reminder to have groceries delivered on the day he gets back, and then stocks up on non-perishables. He washes his clothes, sweeps and mops the floors and uses every pest control powder known to man to the nooks and crannies of his house. It’s nice to not think about anything but dust motes for a while.

He writes a little, just enough to have something to build upon tomorrow when he gets to the cottage. He likes days like these sometimes – when they unfold at their own pace without any rush. The afternoon hour meanders to evening and then to night-time to the clicking of the keyboard. 

He retires to bed and is scrolling through twitter before turning in for the night when his phone rings, erasing any trace of sleepiness. 

Jisung is calling him.

His eyebrows jump to his forehead and his heart drops. Jisung never calls unless there is no other way. Even then he usually texts first to see if he can get out of making a call.

“Hello, hyung. Sorry. I’m – this is late.” Jisung’s exhale is a rush of static across the line.

Minho can only hear sounds of traffic in the background and a soft crackling sound. No sounds of clubs or… well, imminent danger and Jisung sounds normal if a little drunk. Relief swarms him in a rush, but the worry refuses to leave him still. “Hey, Jisung-ah. Are you alright? Is something wrong?” he checks anyway because this is out of character.

There’s a moment of silence that makes Minho think that the call has dropped, but before he can voice it,  Jisung starts chattering. “Sorry, hyung. Actually – um… I’ll start at the beginning? So, I went out for drinks with my co-workers and then the bar was pretty close to the bakery I wanted to try. Remember? And they had a sale so I went and I didn’t read the terms because haha… I’m tipsy… so I have too much cake and… do you want to have it?”

Minho sits up and frowns into the darkness of his room. He reaches a hand out and flicks on the table lamp then fumbles for his glasses. “Where are you right now?”

“At the bakery,” Jisung says. Minho can almost see the vacuous look of inebriation in his eyes. “I’m at the bakery with… too much fucking cake.”

“Okay, I’m coming to get you,” Minho swings his legs out of his bed and puts his glasses on in such a hurry that he smudges the lens. “Will you be able to text me your location details?

Jisung sighs again and the ragged edge to it tugs at something protective. “Yeah, I’m sorry.”

Minho switches on the lights in his living room and walks to the coat rack as he says, “nah. There’s nothing to worry about.” He pulls off the puffy jacket from the hook and on second thought, takes another coat as well. “Can you text it to me while we’re still on call? Or you can just tell me the name,” he amends, “that’ll be easier.”

“No, I can send it to you,” Jisung mumbles, “I’m just tipsy and… dumb. I’m sending it to you now.”

Minho places his phone on the side table and zips up his jacket, and searches for the sandals that he uses for quick runs to the roadside tea and kimbap stall near his apartment complex. His phone vibrates and he collects it along with his keys.

“Do you want me to keep talking to you?” he asks as he presses the call button of the lift. The lift comes to life and wails at being asked to move.

“No. It’s okay,” Jisung says and his voice sounds a bit stronger. “I’m fine. It’s awkward juggling the boxes and my phone.” A pause. “Thank you, hyung.”

The lift arrives and the doors slide open. Minho places his foot on the threshold. “Hold tight. I’ll be there soon.” After Jisung’s affirmative reply, he enters the lift and presses the button that’ll take him to the car park. Jisung was right the other day, Minho notices when he checks the location on the map,  the bakery is quite near to Minho’s place, but he has no interest in trying to shepherd a drunk person back home on foot.

Jisung is standing outside the bakery, a forlorn, unmoving figure against the foot traffic of raucous groups stumbling to their next haunt. Minho honks once and Jisung spurs into motion and hurries to the car. Watching Jisung manoeuvre the boxes and himself is a bit awkward and Minho helps as much as he can, but the boxes still get squished and Jisung still makes a pained noise when his knee bumps against the glove-box hard.

Minho wonders what he’s going to do with so much cake, but doesn’t ask. Instead he says, “do you want me to drop you home or do you want to come stay over?”

“Stay over. I forgot my keys and my housemate has gone out today. He’ll kill me if I call him.”

“Alright, then.”

The ride back home is silent except for Jisung thanking him again, a couple of minutes into the drive. He clutches the cake boxes to his chest like a shield and his breath hiccups now and then. He’s crying, Minho realises, and his fists clench around the steering wheel. He doesn’t know what to do – he darts his eyes to check on Jisung once more – when Jisung is obviously in distress, but also shielding himself. Head turned away and shoulders nearly to his ears.

It seems like Jisung is staving off prying eyes. It’s not the kind of distress that needs comforting, but needs to be left alone. So Minho focuses on the road. 

When he parks, he taps Jisung’s shoulder gently. “We’re here.”

Jisung sniffles and clears his throat before he opens the door. He has a tottering gait and overbalances sometimes as Minho leads him to the lift with a hand on his elbow. He is so tired all of a sudden. It feels like he is walking through wet sand as he enters the lift. Jisung leans with his shoulder against one of the walls, blinking a lot and Minho pretends that he doesn’t hear his quiet hiccups and ragged breathing.

The walk to the end of the hallway is silent too. The click of the lock is as loud as a gunshot without the usual hustle and bustle of daily life. As Minho unzips his puffy coat, he realises that he has forgotten the second coat at the back of his car. Nevermind, he’ll just take it with him to the village.

“I’ll get you a glass of water,” he tells Jisung who is hunched over as he unties the laces of his boots. “And bedding. Did you eat?”

Jisung shakes his head. “No,” his voice wobbles, but only a little. He forces a boot past the heel and then the other. He is left in socks that have huge sunflowers embroidered on them. The cloth is so thin and worn that Minho can see the paleness of his toes through them. He hopes that his shoes kept the chill away.

“I have instant ramen,” Minho says. “Do you want that?”

With another shake of his head, Jisung stands up. He looks small as he sways in place under the dim entryway light with tired eyes and his fists clenching and unclenching by his sides. The sweater he is wearing is fuzzy and his hair has been blown into a mess by the wind.

Minho has to physically keep his feet rooted to the ground, and has to keep his hands plastered in his pockets. Has to focus on what Jisung is saying over the drumbeat thrum of his heart.

“I think I should start with the cake,” Jisung laughs and it’s rough, humourless. He gestures at the boxes on the padded seat next to the shoe rack. “That’s two small birthday cakes I have there.”

“I know you like me a lot, Sungie, but my birthday is still a while away.” Minho takes off his glasses because the smudge is annoying him now. He cleans the lens with the hem of his t-shirt. “And two cakes is overkill.”

“Yeah, right,” Jisung snorts. Minho hears him shuffle closer and when he puts his glasses back on, Jisung is close enough that he can see a smear of ink in the middle of his cheek. “You don’t have to do anything, hyung. I’ll eat and clean up by myself.”

Minho stares at him, nonplussed. “You’re still drunk. I’m not risking you breaking anything. Come on,” he grasps at the boxes and tugs, “I’ll cut the cake since you’re so insistent.”

Jisung sighs as he lets Minho take the boxes. “It’s not for you!”

It is surreal to cut a slice of cake at one A.M. with all the lights in his house switched off except for the one in the kitchen. “This feels like we’re in a pocket dimension of some sort,” he tells Jisung and he transfers the slice to a plate. He places the dinosaur fork he keeps for his second cousins on the plate and hands it over to Jisung.

Jisung’s smile is genuine for the first time tonight. “Ah! This is so cute! You’re the absolute best ~”

Minho’s ears burn immediately and he scoffs as he goes to the sink to wash the knife. “Your attempts to flatter me are not working.”

“It is! My attempts are impeccable,” Jisung protests.

Minho glances at him with amusement and flicks his wet hand at Jisung’s face. He laughs at Jisung’s chagrined expression. “Sobering up, haven’t you? The big words you’re using gave it away.” He turns off the tap and places the knife on the counter.

“I don’t know. I still don’t have a filter,” Jisung says as picks up his fork. He hasn’t bothered to wipe the water droplets from his face and some of them cling to his eyelashes, which are wetter than what a few drops of water would warrant. “You should go to sleep, hyung. You have a long drive tomorrow.”

Minho should, but he doesn’t want to. He can’t actually, not until he is sure that Jisung is fine. And it’s not because he has a crush. He would’ve done the same if Changbin had been so quiet or if Hyunjin huddled his shoulders like this, trying to make himself smaller. “You look like a kicked puppy.”

Jisung freezes mid chew and scowls at Minho. “I don’t!”

“Yes, you do,” Minho says, crossing his arms, “and don’t tell me that you weren’t crying a few minutes back. Your eyes are red, you know.”

“Why are you so –” Jisung waves his fork around. His cheeks are pink. “You are supposed to pretend that you didn’t notice,” he groans and drops his head.

Minho says without thinking, “but your eyes are too pretty...” and then stills as he realises that he is thoughtlessly flirting like an idiot when he’s supposed to be getting over his feelings. But, Jisung’s eyes are wide… and pretty, so he clears his throat and finishes the sentence, “to not notice.”

Jisung laughs it off as always. “Now who is flattering whom?” he grins, “and hyung, complimenting someone’s eyes is so cheesy. I’ve only seen it in romance novels.”

“You have no taste, Han Jisung,” he says even as frustration and relief war with each other. This is a familiar pattern: a slip or a moment of foolish bravery that is always followed by laughter. “But really, are you fine?”

Jisung’s smile turns dull. “We have appraisals every month and these form a huge chunk of our quarterly appraisals,” Jisung pauses and carefully shaves the creamy layer of his slice with the side of his fork. “I bombed it,” a shrug, but his mouth tightens, “and I had to go cheer my co-workers who did well.”

“Ah.”

“ – and I’ve been in a… slump? and it was all too much so I ended up drinking too much.” The cake lies scattered in little pieces on his plate.“But I feel better now, hyung,” Jisung raises his eyes. “In this pocket dimension.”

Minho doesn’t want to pry. It is obvious that Jisung is only willing to share so much. Sometimes, it is difficult to gather your thoughts and lay them bare for examination. It is too raw to be trifled with like that even if open air heals them quicker. So, he nods and accepts it. “Okay, but if you wake me up because you want to talk, then there will be hell to pay afterwards.”

Jisung pouts. “So cruel,” he says, then he grins again, wide and bright,“but I won’t, hyung, I feel much, much, better already.”

There’s a whisper of warmth in Minho’s stomach and it’s too early in the morning to contemplate it. But it softens him all the same. “I’m glad,” he moves forward and pets Jisung’s hair, “that you feel better.”

Jisung looks soft too and maybe it’s his exhaustion, the hollowness that comes after you sweep away remnants of a terrible day, but Minho thinks that it’s because of him. That it’s for him. Minho swallows and retracts his hand just as Jisung presses his head closer. 

He steps back. “Good night, sleep well.”

“Good night, hyung,” Jisung says easily, unaffected as always. ‘I’ll clean up. Don’t worry.”

When Minho exits the kitchen, it feels like he is leaving a dream.

*

Minho leaves at around six to avoid the office hour traffic. Jisung sees him off from his nest of blankets on the sofa, sleep mussed and half awake. Minho’s heart skips a beat, but in the light of dawn, it is easier to ignore.

He sits in his car and sends out a slew of texts to his parents, to Changbin, and a couple of his other friends. He takes a set of photos with terrible filters and shares them with Hyunjin all at once with the caption: if you die before I get back, I’ll make sure that you aren’t laid to rest. 

Then he clicks on Jisung’s name and stares at the last message in their text window which is the location of the bakery. Minho rubs his forehead as he thinks of what to text.

Every option he comes up with is awful.  Hope you feel better sounds too formal; Hope you have a better day today sounds like an order.  You can reach out to me anytime is just… no. Don’t forget your cake :p – seems like he is obsessed with the cake. Good morning  ☀️ – now he is texting like his dad. 

You wouldn’t have texted him if he hadn't turned up yesterday , his last sliver of dignity points out, so why are you wasting time on it now . And he has no answer for that, so, thoroughly chastised, he clicks his phone off and puts it in his pocket.

After a quick mental review of his luggage, toiletries and other odds and ends, Minho drives into the early morning smog and towards the murky horizon. 

Minho ruminates about his book as he drives. The cottage is in a rural-ish area, quite close to a mountain range. The cottage is the farthest one from the town that it belongs to, but nearest to a lake. It was somewhat similar to the location that he has in mind for his book – hmm maybe there can be a scene where the detective drives down while listening to a podcast about an unsolved – one of the characters who is the first victim could’ve given information  – first to be targeted or red herring - false information? No definitely the drive should be the scene where exposition happens…nothing much happening anyway…

Jisung looked so small yesterday while driving back home. Minho doesn’t think he has ever seen him cry before – it’s not that he thinks about Jisung crying or anything but it’s a little… shocking. Unusual. Saddening too. Minho understands how painful appraisals are, especially the ones that go bad. How crushing it can be even if it helps in the long run. 

When he had been younger, it had been difficult to accept criticism from his instructors. He had known even then about the inevitability of criticism. Still for a whole year it was a blow to his core – it was not his skills that were lacking, it seemed as if he himself was wrong in some fundamental way. He’d been seventeen then, so it was easy to spiral but sometimes a bad review still prickles. 

It’s instinct, perhaps. Or maybe it’s the way all those criticisms led nowhere. That he had taken the pain and the embarrassment and honed his craft as much as he could only to find himself at a dead end.

He blasts his horn more to clear his head than because he has a reason to;  the traffic is scarce enough to be considered non-existent by city standards. Still the broken off edges of his thoughts linger in that cruddish way that dirt at the bottom of a glass of water. 

Forty minutes later, while he’s idling at a red light, the owner of the cottage calls and Minho just knows in a flash of bone deep certainty that he’s not going to like this call.

*

Jisung is struggling to fold the blanket he’d used last night when Minho enters his house. The blanket is too big and Minho doesn’t use it until December, but he had pulled it out from the chest where he keeps his winter bedding because Jisung gets cold easily.

The blanket tangles around Jisung’s feet and he curses. Minho drops his luggage on the floor with a resounding thump and shuts the door. “Need help?” he asks as he unbuttons his jacket.

Jisung yelps and whirls around to face him, his eyes bugging out. “Hyung! Fuck! You scared me,” he says, clutching the blanket to his chest.

“Remind me to never ask you to house-sit,” Minho teases as he hangs his coat on the coat rack and slips his loafers off his feet. “If I do then it’ll be like an invitation for burglars.” 

Jisung taps the earpods that are hooked on his ears. “I was listening to music.” His eyes widen again, “wait. Why are you here?”

“It’s my house, you know,” Minho says as he walks over to Jisung and the uncooperative blanket. There’s still a twinge of disappointment and he doesn’t want to let it leak into his voice because it isn’t a big deal. He tugs at the blanket as Jisung drops the air pods on the sofa. “The owner had a family emergency and couldn’t vacate the cottage.”

“That sucks, hyung.” Jisung’s brows furrow in sympathy, “you were so excited to go.”

There’s a stab of unwarranted irritation at Jisung’s words though he doesn’t deserve it. But Minho feels exposed. It feels like he is twenty and facing the barely disguised sympathy of all the people as his dreams burst to smithereens around him. Foolish, belly up and bared. “I just wish she had told me a couple of days before so I wouldn’t have left,” he says as he walks backwards with the corner of the blanket until it straightens out. “But, I suppose she couldn’t help it.”

Jisung scrambles to hold on to the other end of the blanket. “Yes, but – ugh, I hate when plans get cancelled.”

Minho drags his half of the blanket to where Jisung is standing. Jisung is rumpled and his hair is a knotted mess. The ink on his cheek is faded, but still visible even though he had washed his face last night. “Things go wrong.” Minho waves the corner he is holding and Jisung catches up, takes it in his other hand and joins the two halves together. “This was out of my control.”

Jisung smells a bit stale and also like the fruity face wash he must’ve borrowed this morning. He’s too close, Minho realises and he moves away, bending his steps towards the kitchen. He sighs when he remembers the barren cabinets. “Fuck. I have to go grocery shopping.”

“Oh!” Jisung’s hand lands on his shoulder and he whirls around Minho around. “Hyung, let’s go out for breakfast. My treat,” his cheeks redden, “for… you know, yesterday and stuff.”

Minho smirks and the colour of Jisung’s cheeks deepen and spread further. God, why is he so cute? “You don’t have to.” Minho taps the underside of Jisung’s chin, “But you can wash the dishes, if you really want to repay me.”

“I already did,” Jisung replies, puffing his chest out, “and since you don’t have anything in the house except for cake, why don’t we get breakfast together and then you can go to the grocery store.”

It does make sense and it is a much more delightful option than getting groceries, coming back to an empty apartment and then cooking a meal for one. “Alright,” he agrees and Jisung drops his hand from Minho’s shoulder to pump his fist in triumph. “But please shower first, you stink.”

He laughs when Jisung immediately starts sniffing his arms. The dark cloud that is rumbling over his head parts, just a little

*

Jisung dresses in the clothes he wore last night and heatedly insists on washing stuff he’d borrowed from Minho. “Hyung, please,” he says, clutching the bundle of sweatpants and t-shirt to his chest, “I don’t want you to do extra work.”

“It’ll go into my hamper and then into the washing machine,” Minho argues back, bewildered but when Jisung tightens his hold around the bundle, he gives in. “Fine,” he sighs, “I want it ironed though.”

Jisung rolls his eyes. “Of course, you’re the sort who irons your home clothes,” and then dodges a smack to his shoulder.

The wind has picked up and the sky is grey and cloudy. People are rushing to their work and school buses nose their way around cars and vehicles with many exhausted huffs and honking. The chatter of the crowds bounces off the buildings and Minho can hear a few broken, drifting pieces of conversation.

“I miss this,” Jisung says, swinging the bag of clothes between them.

“You miss this cacophony?” Minho asks, amused. The undulation of the crowd makes his arm or shoulder or some part of his body brush against Jisung’s body and he is unduly aware of it each time. Embarrassing. “I always used to miss my bus and had to run to training.”

Jisung frowns and tilts his head at him as if Minho has said something that he can’t understand. “Training?” He presses closer to Minho to avoid two people who are carrying a huge wrapped parcel together.

“Yes,” Minho says though embarrassment prickles at him, “you know, uh – idol, music training and stuff.”

“Ah, of course.” Jisung is silent for a moment and Minho tries to recall the tone in which he had spoken. The echo of his voice has already slipped from his mind, and Minho is about to say something facile to break the creeping tension when Jisung says, “I wonder how you would’ve been as an idol?”

Minho laughs but it sounds hollow. The cafe is fast approaching and he can change the topic by saying something as simple as we’re here. But instead he finds himself telling Jisung, “I don’t know. I wonder too, sometimes but it didn’t work out so it seems pointless to think – but yeah I wonder…” Someone strike him and his dumb tongue dead. “And um...”

“I do that too,” Jisung says, “if something had happened or not happened, I wonder what I would be like in a different dimension. If I would be totally different because of that scenario or if I would be the same with just a different memory. Like psychologically – personality wise and stuff.”

Minho looks at Jisung, finds him pouting in that way he does when he is deep in thought. “What is that thing that you think about? You know, the thing that didn’t happen.”

“Like even right now, if I hadn’t been friends with Changbin hyung, I wouldn’t have met you. Can you imagine?” He blinks, darts a startled glance at Minho and then looks away. “And…if I would have abs if I stopped going to the bakery so much.”

There’s an…awkwardness in the way Jisung speaks that signals the end of the conversation. Minho is glad too. It’s not a conversation he wants to have but it is also poised right at the precipice of his tongue. The kind of thing that you blurt out when the timing seems right, and regret immediately. 

So he stays silent. They’re near the cafe anyway.

*

Breakfast passes in congenial conversation. Jisung tells him about the online course he wants to register for and a friend he’s made in the music production course he’s doing. He seems to have entirely forgotten last night and everything that they had spoken about while coming here. 

So, it’s fun and the reluctance to finish breakfast just yet is a ball and chain that keeps him hooked to the table, making him order another coffee. Eventually, Jisung wipes his mouth with a napkin and drains the last of his coffee. “I think I should leave hyung,” he says, “the earlier I log in, the earlier I’ll be able to log-off.”

“Yes, I’m done too.” There’s actually half a cup of coffee left, but he has been lingering over it for so long that it’s tepid. He takes out his wallet and blinks when Jisung plucks it from his hands. “Hey!”

Jisung waves the wallet at him. “I said I’ll pay,” he grumbles, “why are you still trying to pay?”

Minho jerks forward and snatches the wallet back before Jisung can react. “I had forgotten but because you’re such a brat, I’m going to pay.”

“You’re just a contrarian,” Jisung complains, crossing his arms, “I’ll pay now and you can pay next time.” His eyes soften and his tone turns wheedling, “please? I really want to show my appreciation.”

Minho refuses to acknowledge the light fluttering in his stomach, but it is difficult to ignore the way it lights something deep within him and makes him want to throw his arms over his eyes to block the light from spilling out. “Do whatever you want,” says Minho with as much dramatic flair he can muster, “but remember that you've wronged your hyung.”

Jisung squints at him. “I’m terrified,” he replies, deadpan and deliberately turns to catch a waiter’s attention.

Minho balls up a napkin and throws it at his face.

*

The rest of the week plods on, dragging Minho along by the scruff of his neck. He works, then cooks. He cleans and he sleeps. He goes to the gym, the supermarket, and to restaurants. He meets his friends, and then his agent. He distracts himself for hours on end, only for his thoughts to roar to life once he enters his flat. 

His flat is always quiet, and the echo of his footsteps is the only company that he has. He listens to Jisung’s playlist, but it sounds mournful and dirgelike. He tries listening to a new podcast, but isn’t able to focus. It’s easy to think in his flat for there’s no distraction here, you see. So, it’s very easy to overthink too.

“I don’t understand,” he sighs, picking at the squeezed-out lemon wedge that he has discarded on the table. “I feel like… pfft.”

“You feel like pfft?” Changbin raises his brow. He is slouching in his seat, and is listing towards the right, but his eyes are sharp. Ish. There’s a light in there still, in any case. Minho can’t say that for himself.  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means it sucks,” Minho mumbles, cheek resting on his hand that is propped on the table. “You know, it’s the not nice.”

“The not nice? Hyung, I don’t have the energy to like, decode that nonsense.”

Minho sighs and stares into the depths of his glass. It’s not very deep because it’s a shot glass. “It’s when everything is fine and you’re like pfft anyway, you know?”

“You say ‘you know’ a lot,” Changbin laughs, “and now I do too, sometimes.”

“I do not.”

“Yeah, you do, you know.”

Minho scowls. “Shut up. I’m having a crisis and you’re making fun of me.”

“The only thing that I know about your crisis is that it is pfft.” Changbin shrugs and crosses his arms. “I don’t know anything else. Wait, I’ll just go to the bathroom and come back. You explain it to me in detail then.”

Minho doesn’t know how to explain it because he doesn’t understand it either. It just brews in the back of his mind when he is working, and roils in his stomach when he doesn’t have work to distract him. It’s nothing specific or maybe it is so specific that Minho can’t trace the creeping lines, understand its shape. 

He feels like is doing something wrong, but he doesn’t know what it is. If he can figure it out, if he can understand it then he can fix it. He’s good at that. He’s good at fixing things. He’s fixed everything up before too. He bites his lip and drags his phone towards him. Unlocks it and pulls up his messaging app.

His fingers fly over the keyboard – he’s not that drunk. Yeah, he’s tipsy and sad but… he clicks on Jisung’s name. 

Minho: At one point I was tooo afraid to imagine my future

Minho: As a celeb

Minho: I mean when we were talking about if we ever imagine how life 

Minho: would’ve gone if things had been different

Minho: Maybe I should’ve known then that I couldn’t imagine it because i already knew that it wasn’t going to happen

He gazes at the slew of messages that he has sent. They are pitiable like this -- his… feelings? – when they’re nothing but a string of characters on a stark background. So far removed from the torrid churn in his belly. 

“Whom are you texting?” Changbin asks. He takes his seat, and leans forward, his arms resting on the table. 

“Just replying to a few people,” Minho replies, pushing his phone away. It chirps beneath his hand, but he ignores it. “And I think I’m just going through a slump, you –” he clears his throat when Changbin shoots him an amused glance. “It’s just a slump. Everything is just super bland.”

Changbin nods. “Oh, I know what you mean.”

“You’re going through it too?” Minho asks, surprised and embarrassed by the absolute glop that he had unleashed on him. He trains his eyes on the waiter placing their third round of drinks down. Shot glasses are everyone’s best friends.

“Yeah, things are getting kind of boring now,” Changbin says. “Not in a bad way - but like, in a…” he frowns, “‘we’re slowly getting stuck here’ kind of way.” He shrugs. 

“Yeah well.” Minho doesn’t know what to say. “I think that’s what happens when we start paying taxes,” he jokes, but it comes out flat and weak. Somehow, it is worse that Changbin is commiserating with him. 

Changbin chuckles, nonetheless. “Or maybe, we just start going through cycles of highs and lows, and plateaus as we grow older. Or become more aware of them. Anyway, I don’t think it’ll last long – things change everyday, and we do too. Like, something or the other will…propel us ahead, I guess.”

“How philosophical,” Minho mutters, and then downs a shot. It goes down hard, hurting his throat. “But yeah, this is probably just a phase – it’ll pass.” It doesn’t seem likely, but there’s a pleasant burn in his sternum now, and he can’t be bothered to find words to explain. 

How ironic. 

“But, if it doesn’t–” Chanbing’s expression morphs to earnesty and fondness. The kind that makes his eyes all soft. Minho wants to cry. Just a little. “You can always talk to me.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know I’ll never be rid of you,” Minho says because he doesn’t want to – can’t  - handle another emotion apart from ‘let’s have another shot bro!’ right now. Why did he even open his mouth? He hates these days – days when everything seems wrong, and it is embarrassing to explain to people that he's having a crisis. He doesn't even understand why he has crises.

Still he pats Chanbgin’s hand because even if he can’t say anything, at least he can show something. 

He takes a cab back home. He journeys in a removed, distant way. Feeling the wind blow on his face. Watching colours of the city flash past him. Such a far cry from the elation of a night of drinking a couple of years back.

 God, he truly is a sad sack, isn’t he?

His flat is silent and vague lights spill in from the window. He’d forgotten to draw the curtains.  He takes his shoes off and stumbles to the kitchen, not bothering to switch on any of the lights. 

Another dimension, he thinks, as he drinks water. Everything is so out of place, that just aimlessly drinking water in his dark kitchen is weird. Or maybe it wouldn’t be weird if you’d turned the lights on, a small, rational part of his mind tells him. Just go to sleep.

And so he does.

 *

His phone starts ringing next to his ear while he snoozes on his sofa. He startles awake, and scrambles to find it. Jisung’s name flashes on his screen, and it takes him a moment to understand that he needs to answer.

“Hi hyung~” Jisung says.

“Hello?”

“Listen, I’m coming over to the bakery – the one near your house, and I also have your clothes ready, so can I come over to your place to drop them off?”

Minho stays silent, waiting for his brain to make sense of Jisung’s high speed prattle. It clicks - but not before Jisung asks a concerned, “hello?”

“Yeah! Yeah - uh. You can. When will you be coming here?”

“In half an hour? If that’s okay.”

“Yes, yes,” Minho nods, and pain twinges behind his brows. “I’ll be making lunch now, so you can eat here.”

“Uh - yes! Cool! I’ll get the dessert.”

After hanging up, Minho scrubs his face with his hand. He had only planned to relax a little after a cup of coffee in the morning, but that idea obviously hadn’t worked. He checks the time on his phone. It’s a little after eleven. 

There are a barrage of notifications waiting for him. He checks them one at a time, skipping over Jisung’s. He doesn’t want to handle the emotional schlock that he had poured yesterday. But - no. He’s curious. Jisung has sent him a total of ten messages, which yeah. God, he’s not taking his phone with him when he’s out drinking again. 

The gist of Jisung’s messages is this – it sucks, it’s fucked up, but Minho had done the best he could but it must’ve hurt to have that hard work go down the drain. Jisung thinks that Minho is brilliant at whatever he does, but he still wants to smack the entertainment industry. It is punctuated with a lot of 🥺😤 and 💪. Then there’s a bunch of messages from this morning, asking if Jisung can come to his home to drop off his clothes.

Minho’s thumb hovers over one of the messages that he has sent – and I guess we’ll always kind of mourn for what we could’ve been 🥺

In the light of the morning, yesterday’s dejected, confused spiral is not better than lint stuck to his shirt. Easy to brush off. Insignificant. But Jisung's message ricochets  in some cavernous chamber in his heart. 

It’s strange – not in a bad way really – it’s more of a surprise, the way Jisung seems to understand him. Also, it’s a little bit flattering in an odd way, and very cute, not that it's important or anything. Just an observation. 

Minho takes his coffee mug to the kitchen and rinses them. He cleans the living room a little, and then showers. He’s just started chopping the vegetables for lunch when Jisung arrives, both hands weighed by bags. He places them on the side table and beams as he takes off his fluffy coat. “I got all the best stuff from the bakery. I think you’ll like them too.”

Minho takes his coat. It is very soft, but seems like an overkill for this weather. Jisung continues chattering as he takes off his shoes. “Usually I’m too lazy to go to bakeries in the morning, but they run out of the stuff I like by evening. So today I went early and grabbed them before they’re gone.” He’s wearing bright red, glittery socks. 

“What a noble goal,” Minho teases, picking up the bag from the bakery. “Where would we be without your heroic efforts.”

“It is!” Jisung says as he follows Minho to the kitchen, “yesterday, I really wanted something sweet after the day I had at work, and they only had pizza rolls and pineapple pastries,” he scoffs. “It just worsened my mood.”

“Oh? You had a bad day or something?” Minho takes out the packages from the bag. There are so many  pastries and sweet breads that Minho gets a toothache just by looking at them.

“My co-worker bailed yesterday – we uh, had a deadline and he just took a leave, so I had to wrap up his work and mine. My boss was also in a really bad mood." Jisung sighs, "it was hell."

“Will your coworker be missed if you offed him?” Minho smirks when he sees Jisung startle. “I can tell you how to dispose of bodies and no one will be suspicious if a mystery author looks up weird stuff.”

Jisung chuckles. “You’ve stared so long into the void that you’ve become one with it, hyung,” he says. “I don’t remember you being so violent before.”

“Maybe my failed plans and existential crisis are what made me snap,” Minho jokes as he opens the fridge and waves at his stock of beverages, “like imagine the headline ‘local author’s plans to hole up in a cottage fails, leads to an existential crisis, causes him to nudge mild-mannered friend to murder a week later.’”

“Who said I’m mild-mannered?” Jisung tries to raise a brow but he cannot control his brows individually, so both of them lift at the same time. He looks confused more than anything.

“Maybe it’s the way you kept apologising when you accidentally stomped a waiter’s foot. Remember? When we went –”

Jisung screeches and plucks a can of cold coffee from the fridge and retreats to the side of the kitchen. “Hyung, we agreed that we’ll never talk about it!”

“No, you demanded that we should never speak about it,” Minho says, words trembling with laughter, “but I never agreed.”

“I came here with cake and you're tormenting me by reminding me of my awful social failures,” Jisung groans, pulling the pop tab of the can. “You’re such a bad host, Minho hyung.”

Minho takes threatening steps towards him. “I'm also feeding you lunch, you ungrateful brat.”

Jisung smiles widely with both hands around his can and puts on such a simpering expression that Minho snorts. “Hyung! You’re the best! How could you ever think that I’m not in constant awe and brimming with respect for your perfect mortal form.”

“Weirdo,” Minho says, casting a despairing look at the ceiling. When he looks back, he can see the curve of Jisung’s self-satisfied smile behind the rim of his can. Minho clears his throat. “Go wash your hands and help with chopping the vegetables.”

“How was your day yesterday?” Jisung asks, a couple of minutes later as he peels a few cloves of garlic. "You seemed a bit –"

 “Ah, no. I was just a bit drunk.” He focuses on the meat that he is slicing, "it was just one of those weeks."

“So are you going to plan another trip?”

Minho doesn’t know. He wants to go, but the idea of having to plan another trip is just… no. It's just easier to rot at home. “Maybe, but not immediately,” he replies, shifting the pork from the chopping board to a dish. 

“Does that mean  you’ll be working from home?” Jisung asks. He's trying to sound casual but there's an odd waver in his voice. A nervousness that underscores his words.

Minho gives him a quizzical glance, unsure of where this is going. Jisung almost never asks so many questions about his schedule.  “Mostly? I go to cafes and stuff sometimes, but other than that I write at home. Why?”

Jisung doesn’t look at him. He holds up a clove of garlic and examines it. Minho watches his brows and mouth dance through ten different expressions as he debates with himself. Anticipation twines like creepers up Minho’s spine.

“I do too. Um – work from home that is…” Jisung places the garlic back on the plate, tugs at the collar of his plaid shirt. He doesn’t meet Minho’s eyes. “And… like – only if you’re okay with it! – we could maybe work together? I don’t know if you need complete silence or if you prefer working alone – but what if we worked together? Ha. I mean, it's kinda boring to work alone. ”

Whatever Minho had been expecting, it’s definitely not this. “Work together?” 

Jisung rubs the back of his neck. “Only if you’re okay with it.” He shrugs, and embarrassment is obvious on his face. “I just thought, um… that maybe we can work together sometimes. A couple of times a week.” He pauses then sighs, “I don’t know about writing, but my work kinda gets lonely and I have tried co-working spaces, but...”

Writing does get lonely, but that has always been the case. It’s the nature of the work, after all, and it’s not like he hasn’t thrived on it. Things are different now, though, or at least he is. Uncertain and labouring under a weight that has no name. So, he says, impulsively, “we can try that out. Let’s see how it goes.”

Jisung’s eyes are wide, as if he hasn’t been expecting it. The shock abates and he grins widely, his eyes scrunching up. “Thank you, hyung. I – it’ll be great!” 

What the hell am I doing , Minho thinks.

*

III: oh, to yearn and to bloom in the city

The weekend is oddly short. Minho gets lunch with a couple of his friends then writes. He is easily distracted though and nitpicky, rewriting entire sections just because he doesn’t vibe with it. He also talks to his parents and hashes out the details of their working together arrangement with Jisung.

Hyunjin finds it funny and laughs long and hard when Minho calls him to tell him. “He really did shoot his shot, didn’t he?”

Minho rolls his eyes. “Yeah, wanting to work with me because he was lonely is shooting his shot,” Minho sniffs. “How romantic.”

“Maybe it is his way of flirting.” Hyunjin is still giggling. “Maybe he thought you would find his work life sexy.”

“Hyunjin, the amount of nonsense you spew just shocks me.” Minho grumbles, unwilling to admit even to himself that the tips of his ears are warm. “If it doesn’t work out or if it gets weird, then I’ll just boot him out.”

“Your capacity for weirdness just increases every time Jisung is near,” Hyunjin drawls, “anyway, do you remember the passionate guy? The one who was working out at like, 4 in the morning?”

“What about him?”

“He’s very hot,” Hyunjin says, “blisteringly hot.”

Minho blinks, and then sighs. “Thanks for letting me know. I’m very disinterested, by the way. Just in case you wanted to know.”

“I didn’t. I’ll keep you updated!” Hyunjin says, laughing.

*

“This is perfect,” says Jisung, drumming his fingers on the dining table. “I don’t think I need anything else,” he adds, smiling up at Minho, hands gesturing at the workstation that has been set up for him: an office chair, an old laptop stand and a multi adapter. 

“If you need anything else, you can just ask me,” Minho says. He’s a little bothered by how well dressed Jisung is at nine in the morning. Not that Minho is sloppily dressed or anything – he’s dressed in respectable track pants and a t-shirt – but Jisung has got jeans on. “Do you have a meeting?”

“Oh no… I just dress up well before work.” Jisung waves his hand, “it helps me concentrate, I guess.”

It won’t help Minho concentrate, that’s for sure. “Makes sense. When do you usually have lunch? We can eat together, you know.”

“At around one.” Jisung’s face brightens further, and Minho wonders how lonely he had been holed up at his home. “Or whenever you eat.”

Minho nods, taking a step back. “Yeah. I’ll leave you to it then.”

Honestly, it’s a little odd. He always works alone, unless he’s in a workshop, or talking to his editor. He doesn’t quite know what to expect. So he sits behind his desk and turns on his laptop, pulls up the first draft which is an ugly mess at the moment, and likely to get uglier the more he writes. 

When he was younger and more prone to magical thinking, he used to go to sleep full of hope. He had been so sure that all the mistakes and failures of the days would get synthesised to experience! and skill! He would definitely do better tomorrow! Now, Minho knows that nothing changes over-night, and today’s mess will remain waiting for the next day too, and he would have to grit his teeth and go through it, no matter what. 

He realises that he has lost a good five minutes to his abrupt reverie, so he starts typing without really knowing what to type. Just something to get him started, you know?

He is halfway into writing the scene where the characters discover the scene of crime when he notices Jisung hovering on the threshold of his room. He startles a moment later, his brain realising that someone is hovering at the door. That makes Jisung startle, and back track.

“Sorry! I didn’t want to disturb you!” Jisung says, nervously rubbing the back of his neck. “I – ah… wanted to get some coffee,” he points his thumb towards the kitchen. “Can I – do you want some –”

“No, it’s okay, I’ll come with you,” Minho says, standing up and stretching his arms above his head. He can’t figure out any other phrase than ‘gasped in shock’ so a break would do him good. “What time is it?”

“Eleven thirty,” Jisung replies, fidgeting with his fingers. “The mid morning blues hit me so– I didn’t want to disturb you, but also not just walk into your kitchen…”

“It’s really fine,” Minho says. He doesn’t know why Jisung is so nervous now, and radiating awkwardness. “I need a coffee too.”

“I usually have a lot of coffee throughout the day,” Jisung says, “I’m trying to control it haha – that much caffeine is not good for my health…but yeah and um, I don’t know where I’m going.”

“Me neither,” Minho says, amused. “You can make coffee whenever you want though, you don’t have to ask me.”

Jisung deflates a little, smiling sheepishly. “I didn’t really think about our working styles? I just realised that I probably do a lot of things that would be annoying for a…coworker? Friend turned co-worker?”

If it isn’t so sad, then Minho might’ve been amused by the way Jisung just runs in circles around the forcefield of romantic intent that Minho probably radiates. The disinterest is staggering sometimes. “Tell me about all the things you do, and I’ll tell you if they’re annoying or not.” Minho laughs at Jisung’s affronted look.

“I don’t do much – oh yes, an iced latte will do, what? I always have iced drinks  even in winter – I think I just walk around a lot, and maybe sing a little while listening to music? Yeah, that’s about it, I guess.”

“Hmm, sounds like you’re downplaying it,” Minho says, squinting at Jisung with fake suspicion. Jisung immediately puts on an exaggerated expression of innocence. Minho wants to push him against the fridge and see that expression drop, and wants to – okay. He walks around Jisung to get ice from the fridge. 

“Maybe you’re the one who does weird things,” Jisung continues, “what if you act out murder scenes or whatever?” He gasps, “what if you write a character based on me?”

“Then that character will be the first one to be written off,” Minho knocks his shoulder against Jisung’s on his way back to where he has placed their glasses. “You honestly seem like the character who trips and falls into the villain’s clutches right in the first chapter.”

“Hey! I’m very wily!” Jisung protests, “I’m scrappy and devious. I’m totally that character that solves the case in the background.”

“If you say so,” laughs Minho, handing over the glass  iced latte to Jisung. “And I keep shifting from one place to another while writing, that’s about it.”

“Now that definitely sounds too good to be true,” Jisung says, smiling, “what are you hiding?”

Minho grins. “Wait and watch,” he says, as he exits the kitchen, snickering when he hears Jisung whine behind him.

The rest of the day passes in smatterings of conversations through the day. They debate whether ice goes first or if the drink has to be poured first. Jisung complains about his boss. Minho teases Jisung when he catches him wiggling in his chair to the music that he’s hearing. 

Something settles in Minho by the evening. He doesn’t remember worrying about anything specifically – but an unnamed piece slots into place, and warms him as he goes to the kitchen for a glass of water, and hears Jisung singing along to a song under his breath. 

He goes to Jisung’s place a day later, and spends the day barely repressing his amusement as Jisung flutters around him, trying his hardest to be a gracious host. Jisung doesn’t have much space in his apartment, and they both work on the second-hand, creaky work table, face to face. 

It’s a bit distracting, in the first few hours. Jisung is a flurry of constant movement contained in a swivel chair. He pouts or puffs out his cheeks as he thinks. He nods his head along to music; he mutters under his breath as he thinks. His head snaps up whenever he thinks of something to offer Minho: coffee, then snacks, a spare pair of earphones in case Minho wants to listen to music, and a small chalkboard if he wants to write down his ideas. 

It’s not the most productive morning that Minho has had, but it’s… different. A nice kind of different. 

Jisung gasps and takes his headphones off, wrings them between his fingers. "Wait! Is it rude that I've got my headphones on? Should we talk – I mean, are you fine with it?"

"It's okay," Minho says, "I don't mind. Anyway, if I had an issue then I would tell you."

Though Jisung nods, he still glances at his headphones and then at Minho, as if wondering if he should really go back to listening to music.

"Honestly, Jisung. Just relax," Minho says, offering a smile. "I'm completely fine here."

"Yeah – um of course." Jisung's eyes dart  to his screen and then back to Minho. "I'm just a little nervous, I guess."

"It's just me, and honestly, I'm a very low maintenance guest, you know. You don't have to bother with me."

Jisung's shoulders slump, and he sighs. "Yes, of course." He sighs again, "I'm sorry, I'm not used to this. Like, working with someone, and being a host."

“Have you been working at home all this time?” asks Minho. He leans back against his chair, trying to get comfortable. And also to have a better view of Jisung, but that’s neither here nor there. 

“Yeah – my company had a permanent work from home policy even before I joined. So, I basically work only from home, unless someone arranges, like a team meet-up or something and – I’m new right? And I’m like mould, I grow on people so I don’t really have a relationship relationship with anyone, so yeah.” He exhales, and smiles sheepishly. “I’m bad at hosting?”

“Did you just call yourself mould?”

“I am what I am,” says Jisung, mouth twitching at the corners. “I’m a real fungi,” he adds in English.

“Hmm,” it’s not funny – okay, maybe it is a little, mostly because of how proud Jisung looks – but Minho is not going to give in so easily. “Now, you’re a bad host for making me suffer through that.”

“Hey! It works on multiple levels… mould and fungi, and because I told you that I’m not a good host, so I’m not a fun guy...”

“You’re making it worse,” Minho laughs, and simple happiness rushes through his veins, and tingles at the back of his ears. “You can’t salvage this, you know.”

Jisung looks proud, chest puffed, and shoulders thrown back. Then he collapses into himself, giggling. Cute. “Okay, yeah. That was bad.”

It’s difficult to get back to work after that, to pick up the thread and continue writing while his mind scatters in every direction, running on quicksilver feet. Outside, the leaves are browning. Curling into themselves like a crooked finger and beckoning winter. The window rattles with every gust blown against it.

His birthday is fast approaching too, he realises, in that resigned way that has marked every birthday since he turned twenty-three. “Let’s get back to work,” he says aloud, and shakes his head when Jisung shoots a curious look. “Sorry, I was talking to myself,” he mumbles, turning his gaze back to his screen.

*

This…work thing is still odd, but it goes well. It is easy to work with Jisung. Boring too, but interesting. 

It’s boring sometimes because Jisung’s work demands deep dives of concentration and only allows him to resurface every other hour. This means Minho can’t just idly bother him when he’s stuck on something. So he is left with taking coffee and water breaks alone, and pottering around until inspiration strikes again. 

But it’s fun too. He learns some facets of Jisung’s life that he could’ve probably never known because these are the fine, inconsequential things bound to slip between the cracks of the day. Like his recent interest with ‘real creatures that could almost be cryptids’.

“That Chirodectes jellyfish thing has only been scientifically studied once,” Jisung says, as they wait for the microwave to heat the shrimp rolls, “imagine being perceived by human eyes only once in your lifetime. I’m so jealous.”

Or that he likes fashion enough to have a bunch of magazines at his house which he graciously offers to Minho to make moodboards – “if that’s like, a part of your process, I mean.”

And he is so ambivalent about his job that, “I feel like screaming. Nothing is good nor bad, and I’m just floating from one work day to another.”

He says this as they’re sitting at a ramshackle restaurant Jisung claims is his favourite. He is put-out today, brows furrowed and legs restless under the table. “I worked till one in the morning yesterday, and I thought that if I was a farmer then I wouldn’t have to do this bullshit.”

“My grandparents had a farm,” Minho says, playing with the dog-eared corner of the menu card. “It was really fun to go there. I liked picking strawberries.”

“I would like that too,” Jisung says, mouth turning down at the corners. “Another life, I guess.”

“Another life,” Minho echoes, and it takes a moment for him to realise what Jisung is referring to. Mortification prickles his ears again when he remembers the messages that he had sent Jisung a couple of weeks back. “What if you hated that too? Being a farmer?”

Jisung doesn’t say anything. He drums his fingers on the table, bottom lip caught under his teeth. “I don’t know. I guess, I would’ve wished I could be something else. That’s how it is, right? Grass is always greener on the other side.”

Minho nods. “Even when you’re on what was the greener side once.”

The waiter places their meal on the table. It’s the sort of place that serves a huge amount of food on dingy bowls and plates. Minho mixes his noodles together, eyes focused on Jisung. “There are a lot of things we can do,” he says, “and it’s not like you would be stuck at this job forever.”

“I know,” Jisung sighs, “I just wish I could be satisfied right now too.” He pokes at his food, “It’s hard to just keep believing that things would get better, and that I would be happier… or at least satisfied in the future.”

Minho’s heart seizes, aches at how familiar the sentiment feels. That’s the thing, Minho realises, and the clarity isn’t relieving nor comforting.  All in all there’s nothing wrong, except that everything is wrong. Everything is wrong because nothing is satisfying even though this is his comeback – his underdog overcoming the odds story. 

“Hyung?” Jisung asks, chopsticks lingering halfway to his mouth. “Ah shit, I’m being depressing, aren’t I?” 

“No,” Minho coughs, and looks back at Jisung. “I was just thinking.”

“Anyway, it’s not like I’m bound to anything,” Jisung continues, eyes still wide. “I can always leave…it’s not like I’ll always be stuck.”

“Yeah.” He corrals his mind, drags it back to the restaurant, to the clink of steel and the smell of food. “Nothing is really permanent, you know.”

“Sometimes that’s good, “ Jisung waves his hand, “that all this stressful stuff and heartaches are just ephemeral things.”

“And just a little bit depressing,” Minho smiles. His heart is still knotted, and his stomach is still churning. “You’re right though, all these things are ephemeral.” He hesitates, words trembling at the tip of his tongue, poised for a fall. But he swallows them back when Jisung raises his brows, urging to speak. “Is that why you make such sad sounding playlist?” he asks instead.

“Wha – hey! They aren’t sad!” Jisung frowns, tilting his head, “they really weren’t! Okay, maybe a little… didn’t you like them?” his face falls, and he shifts until he is leaning back.

“Hey, I didn’t say that,” Minho says, confused by the sudden change in demeanour, “just that they were on the sadder end of the spectrum.”

“Oh. I thought – well you liked the song I showed you that day,” Jisung seems, no he’s definitely pink now. “At Changbin and Seungmin’s party.”

“Yeah, it’s not the music! They’re all good songs; it’s just…” he pauses, “they were a tiny bit sad for how I was feeling at that time.”

“Most of the songs that you seem to like are poppy and chill,” Jisung says, “I don’t…” he shakes his head, “nevermind.”

“I don’t mind listening to your other playlists,” says Minho quickly. “And yeah, thank you for sending them to me in the first place, I didn’t mean to…” God, now his ears are burning, “I didn’t mean to insult them or anything. I was just making a dumb joke.”

“No, no, it’s not like you had to listen to it, but you did anyway! Also, not to change the topic but I think we should hurry because it’s already been an hour and I have a meeting at three.”

*

(

Minho’s mother had come down from his hometown to spend the weekend with him and Minho had been half elated, half annoyed. He knew that she was really checking up on him, making sure that he hadn’t become a husk of his former self or that he hadn't become a hermit. Or both. She had to battle a long journey and exhaustion to do this and Minho didn’t think it’s worth the bargain especially now that his parents had good WI-FI.

“So how are you doing?” she had asked, trying to control the worry in her tone. She had used the exact same tone when he had said that he was going to audition at an entertainment company.

Minho had not known how to tell her that everything still felt like a dream, poised at the edge of the table, waiting for an errant hand to knock it down. That he didn’t know what he was doing, just that he had done something and it had worked out. He had settled on, “Pretty well. It’s nice to know that people liked the book, and even better to know that I’m making money.”

She nodded in satisfaction. “It’s good that you found a job you like.” She paused, considering Minho with a soft, careful look which was worse than one of anger. “The past few years have been stressful.”

“Yeah well, it all worked out,” Minho said. “I don’t think I would’ve liked working in a corporation anyway.”

“What was that about a fox and sour grapes?” his mom teased, leaning forward and patting his hand that was resting on the table. There were tendrils of steam rising from the cups of tea on the table, curling softly before dissipating. “I’m really proud, you know. I keep telling everyone that my son is a famous author.”

“I’m barely a midlist author, you know,” Minho complained, though his cheeks were prickling with heat. “Don’t keep boasting about me! If they look me up, they’ll find nothing about me because I’m not that well-known, and they’ll ask you if I lead a double life or something.”

“Too late,” his mom laughed, “maybe I should tell them that they misunderstood me and that you’re actually a famous ghost-writer among the well-known authors.”

“You come to my house and you insult your only son,” Minho said, pouting when his mom continued laughing. “Mothers these days are very cruel to their sons.”

“Right, right, but I know that you’ll do great as a writer. You’ve always done well at everything… even if you feel like you haven’t.” His mom never referred to his days as a trainee head-on. It was always an oblique reference, as if it was a secret that was not to be mentioned outright. 

It wasn’t malicious – maybe she thought she was following his directive of never speaking about it. Maybe she thought she was doing him a favour by not mentioning how his life’s dream had folded in on itself with one quiet conversation in the kitchen of his parents’ home. 

“I think I need to start studying and look for a job.”

Minho looked around the kitchen. His mother picked up her fork and sliced her pastry, humming as she took a bite. “I’m doing well now,” he said, picking at the crack that was on the lip of his mug, “and it doesn’t matter what I did then. This is the present…and that’s what I should focus on. Whatever happened, it has happened. It’s gone now.”

“Yes, of course,” Mom said, “but that doesn’t mean that I can’t praise your past self. He deserves some recognition too, right?”

“You’re so greasy,” huffed Minho, though his heart twinged. Just a little. Enough to know that it had hit a spot. “You can say nice things about my present self too, you know.”

“I think your present self needs a shave,” Mom shot back, smiling when Minho groaned.

)

*

Jisung: class was fun but minjae sat next to me and bored me about his new classic workout routine 🙄

Jisung: how many ‘that’s nice’ would it take for him to get that i don’t care 😭

Jisung: so i got a hotbar to spite him and his clean diet

Minho: Next time tell minjae that your friend (me) will curse him and make a weight plate fall on his toes if he bothers you

Jisung: and how will you make a weight plate fall on his toes

Minho: Telekinesis

Jisung: you pulled your shoulder yesterday reaching for a pen and complained for 2 hours. Why didn’t you use telekinesis then?

Minho: because i was bitten by a spider just today

Jisung: … what

Jisung: are you…that’s /not/ what spiderman does!!!

*

Minho : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z72Sji4sykE

Minho: Deep sea cryptid?

Jisung: i’ve seen this!!! I wish i could live in an invisible submarine in the deep sea

*

Jisung: if you’re getting a coffee, can you please get a mug for me too 😭

Jisung: i think i’ll have to put on my video soon 😭

Minho: Get it after your meeting

Jisung: 😭😭😭

Minho: You are speaking yet right?

Minho: Can I come in?

Jisung: what’s up?

Minho: To give you your coffee

*

“I thought you make playlists all the time?” Minho asks, scrolling through Jisung's phone. “There are only a few here.”

“It takes time to make playlists,” Jisung whines, placing two beers on the coffee table. “It’s tough finding songs to fit the vibe of a playlist.”

“Is that so?” There are only four or so playlists here and two of them have a few songs between them. “ I have more playlists than you.”

“I bet you don’t have eight hundred liked songs, or 0.5 gb of mp3s from your childhood days,” Jisung huffs, sitting beside Minho. He’s close enough that their knees knock together, close enough to feel his warmth. 

Minho blinks at the distance between him and Jisung, and Jisung and the other arm of the couch. It is not equidistant. Not that he minds, or anything. It’s an observation, you know. “What do you mean 0.5 gb of mp3s? Are you sure they’re not malware,” he asks instead. 

“No! It’s all music that I downloaded off my cousins’ phones, and the internet. And like, do you know there are so many versions of songs that aren’t on streaming? This treasure trove took me years to build!”

Minho clicks on a playlist that’s titled ‘ oh, to yearn and to bloom in the city. ’ Adoration bubbles in the shape of laughter, quaking through his frame. “Why is this title so – why is it so you ?” 

“Hey!” Jisung groans, covering his face when Minho laughs harder, “it’s a pretty title!”

“Why is it so dramatic? Oh, to yearn and bloom in the city? What is this Victorian poet impersonation?” he giggles, shying away from Jisung’s feeble swats. 

Jisung whines, trying to grab his phone back. “I was in a mood, okay? Stop laughing, hyung!”

“Okay, okay.” Minho straightens up, clearing his throat. Jisung has shifted closer in the skirmish, and if Minho shifts a little bit closer then he’ll brush against Jisung’s frame. “It’s a nice name.”

“Maybe it’s a bit pretentious,” Jisung shuffles backwards, and Minho doesn’t know if he wants to pull him back by the scruff of his neck or… well, that’s the only thing he wants to do. He swallows, trying not to reach out.

“It’s cute, don’t worry.” Giving in, Minho reaches out and pats Jisung’s cheek. His hand doesn’t linger at all. Nor does he retract his hand like he is scalded when the touch lasts for a breath longer than usual. “And it’s your playlist, what does it matter what I think?” he says, tone more strident than intended.

Jisung purses his lips, and then exhales a quiet laugh. “Yeah. Anyway, I was going to send it to you,” he shrugs, “it has an… ambience?”

“And I can use it if it’s a part of my process, you guess,” Minho says, grinning when Jisung huffs. “I’ll listen to it well, Hannie. Thank you.”

Jisung’s eyes soften. “Of course, hyung. Now can you please play a song so that I can show off my new Bluetooth speakers?”

*

“You just spend a couple of days a week together and you’ve been gushing non-stop,” Hyunjin grumbles, stirring sugar into his coffee with more aggression than required, “I get it, you are horribly smitten and too scared to do anything. It’s been the same story for months now.”

Minho swats Hyunjin’s hand, scowling. “I’m not scared! I don’t see the point of… doing anything when Jisung hasn’t shown… much interest in me.”

“Do you expect to be worshipped or something? He likes you!” Hyunjin pauses, rubs his chin, “I’m 95% sure, but he’s an odd little man, and I’m saying this purely based on vibes, so please don’t kill me if I’m wrong.”

“Whatever you say based on ‘vibes’ is almost always wrong.” Minho rolls his eyes, “like when you said that pickles and ice-cream seem to vibe together.”

“If I was sure that I’m right all the time then I would call it a fact and not a vibe, hyung,” Hyunjin says, “please try to keep up.”

Minho kicks Hyunjin’s ankle. "I don't understand why I ever invited you to my house,” he says over the sound of Hyunjin’s exaggerated death rattles. “In fact, I don’t know why I’m friends with you.”

“It’s because I’m too charitable to leave you orphaned on the streets.” Hyunjin rears away when Minho starts rolling his sleeves back. “Anyway! I think he likes you and you should just go for it. What’s the worst that can happen?”

“Shame and horror on seven generations of my family.” Minho wraps his hands around the mug again and frowns at the skin that has formed on his coffee. “It’s just – I don’t know.”

Hyunjin is silent for a moment. It’s a grey and still day today, the kind of day that is best spent behind the walls of your home. The light outside the window is dark swill, and the lights inside his home are too harsh. Minho blows on his coffee, watches the skin splinter and drift to the edges of his cup.

“Okay, I don’t care about this Jisung thing that much,” Hyunjin says. “It’s entertaining and all, but well – it’s just…” Hyunjin twists his hair tie around his fingers till the elastic is so tight that his finger turns white. “You have just been – a bit pensive lately, I guess.” Hyunjin sighs and pouts when Minho plucks the hair tie from his fingers. “I want to know if that’s what is making you…so negative and shit.”

Once Hyunjin’s fingers are free from the hair tie, Minho finds no way to avoid the question. So he turns back to his mug. “It’s nothing. I’ve just been busy.”

“Yeah right, I know what you’re like when you’re busy and this isn’t it,” Hyunjin points out immediately and Minho wonders if Changbin had spoken to Hyunjin. It annoys and warms him at the same time. “Come on, just tell me if something’s bothering you, so that we can bash it to dust, and then go get barbecue.”

Minho rubs his forehead. “It’s dumb. I don’t know how to explain it.” He shakes his head, and exhales an explosive sigh, “I’ve just been thinking about…the idol thing. And my work.”

“The idol thing?” Hyunjin raises a brow. “What about it?”

“It was the only dream I had at one point.” Minho picks at his sleeve. His words are clumsy on his tongue, brittle and bearing an unwieldy weight. “I thought I would make it, but I didn’t.”

Hyunjin makes a sympathetic noise. Minho continues speaking, “and I guess I told myself that I had to discard that dream completely and reinvent myself. Become wholly new – get a job and shit to patch the space that my dream had left behind.” He sighs again, “and then I got this – then somehow I was a writer, and it’s… I don’t know, I thought I was a writer, but I feel like…” he looks at Hyunjin, “I’m just a dude who writes for a living, you know.”

“Is that a bad thing?” Hyunjin gestures at him, “I mean, I think you’re doing pretty well. You have money to spend and save –”

“No, it’s not that,” Minho says. There’s that ugly roiling in his stomach again. “I thought I would – that I would be doing all of that for life, something that I loved, and I poured three whole years of my life…my blood and passion and whatever only to end up like this. I feel like I’ll never love any work again, and nor would I have the passion that I had then.”

Hyunjin frowns at him and Minho looks away, embarrassed by the outburst. “I’m not going to tell you that you’ll find a passion or whatever,” says Hyunjin. He has tied up his hair, so Minho settles deeper into his chair. “Work is just…horrible most of the time.”

“Don’t we know it,” Minho says, “isn’t that one of the pillars of adulthood.”

“It is,” Hyunjin agrees, “and it is pretty normal to want work that fills you with passion and joy, but I don’t know – do you want to be passionate about your work, or are you grieving like, the years that you lost working towards something that didn’t work out?”

Minho considers it for a moment, tipping his head back. His ceiling is dusty. He’ll have to clean it sometime soon. “I think it’s a bit of both and maybe also the fact that I’m never going to get that time back. I basically feel old and sad.”

Hyunjin laughs. “When I was younger, I thought I had to take over the world by twenty-five, hyung,  but that’s just around the corner, and I have no time to take over anything.” He pokes his toe against Minho’s ankle. “It’s just the way it is, I think. I totally get how shitty that feeling is.”

“The dissatisfaction and the utter misery of knowing that you can’t do anything because you’ve signed contracts and there are bills to pay?” Minho picks up his mug and takes a sip of lukewarm coffee. “The sudden and inexplicable ennui?”

“Now you’re just being a sad sack,” Hyunjin says, “but hyung, like, it’s just like that sometimes, yeah? It’s okay to be sad at times –”

“And we all have plateaus and lows and highs.” Minho grins, “Changbin pulled the same line on me too.”

“He’s right though,” Hyunjin picks up his mug, and makes a face when he peers at it. “Okay, yeah, I’ll have to heat that up. What was I saying – oh yes. It will pass or you’ll figure something out, but till then… I don’t really know the perfect thing to say, but I’ll listen to you even if you’re boring most of the time. There are just some things that have no solution, I guess.”

Minho hopes that his absolute fondness for Hyunjin is not visible on his face because he would never let that go. “I just wish things were different, but they can’t be. I’ll just have to wait. Hannie said most of these things are ephemeral.”

“Oh god, you’ve brought up your Hannie again,” Hyunjin says with heavy sarcasm and yelps when Minho kicks his ankle again. “Hey! I was nice to you for so long, why are you being mean?”

“That’s my way of showing affection.” He laughs at the wounded look on Hyunjin’s face. “You know, it’s my way of saying thanks for checking up on me,” he adds, standing up and picking up both their mugs, “even if you’re a pest to have around.”

Hyunjin, who has known him the longest, sighs in understanding. “You’re welcome,” is all he says. 

*

Minho walks to the bakery, cool gusts of wind keeping him company. He has only, foolishly brought along his stylish coat, the kind that only billowed with a gorgeous silhouette but did nothing else. It doesn't matter, however, the trip to the bakery is short even on foot. 

Mid-morning stillness changes the shape and bearing of a city. The people who populate the streets are tucked away in their work, and the children who colour the wind with their laughter are at school. It’s quiet enough that he can hear the scratchy caw of crows that are seated on the tree.  

The bakery is empty save for a few people who are scattered across the seating area. He purchases a castella and a scone, and leaves the bakery, paper bag knocking against his thigh. 

Jisung gives him a wide, beaming smile as he takes the package. Minho hopes that the sudden warmth on his face is not obvious. It's just… he has a really nice smile.

"Thanks, hyung," he says, "I made coffee."

Jisung is standing in front of the window when Minho returns after washing his hands. He picks up his coffee from the kitchen, the warmth of it chasing away the lingering coldness of water, and leans against the section of the wall near the window. “You seem to have more free time today,” he says. 

“Yeah, my workload has reduced a little.” Jisung crosses his fingers, and holds them to his heart. “Touchwood. Please universe, be on my side and don’t jinx this for me.”

Minho laughs. “At least you have to breathe now.” He watches Jisung brush hair away from his face. He hasn't styled it today, and it sticks up as it pleases. Minho wants to mess it up further. For science.  "Do you feel better now?"

"I suppose." Jisung shuffles over to Minho. The weak, hazy light from the window forms a halo around him, and the play of shadows makes his features softer. But Minho still notices the embarrassed quirk of his lips. “Now I feel ashamed of the way I reacted. It seems disproportionate.”

“I think your feelings were perfectly proportionate to how you felt back then,” Minho says. He taps his index finger on the rim of his mug, nail catching on the chipped edge. “I’m glad that you can relax a little now.”

“Touchwood,” Jisung says. “But I think it helps to work with you. Like, you don’t let yourself get consumed by your work, and it reminds me that I shouldn’t either.”

Minho wonders what Jisung would’ve thought of him back in his trainee days, when his sole aim was to pass muster and succeed at any cost. But that’s another life. What does he know about it? “Good. You sit for hours on end, you know. That’s not good,” he says.

“Why did we invent sitting if it’s not good for us,” complains Jisung. “What a waste. Anyway, how’s the book coming along, hyung?”

“It’s chugging along,” Minho says, and then amends himself, “ I’m chugging along, and I think the book is progressing well too.”

“That’s great, hyung.” Jisung pauses, and then smiles. “It feels like a good day today.”

Minho can’t resist the fondness boiling in his chest any longer. He reaches forward and taps Jisung’s cheek with his finger. “Cute.” Though Jisung scoffs, Minho catches his pleased smile even as he averts his face. 

*

“I don’t think this is going to end anytime soon,” Jisung says, craning his neck and looking at the clock. “I think I should leave now, and finish up the rest at my place.”

Minho looks at him over the screen of his laptop, and checks the time on his screen. It’s seven in the evening. “Oh wow, I didn’t feel time passing,” he stretches his arms over his head, groaning, “how long will it take for you to complete your work?”

“Pretty late? Like 9:30 or so at least,” Jisung says, and he looks resigned. “There are a lot of changes I need to make. So I think that if I leave now then –”

“Or you can just stay over,” says Minho, closing the document he’s working on and then surveying the tiny edges of the hundreds of tabs that he has open. He doesn’t have the energy to deal with them now, so he shuts his laptop. “You’ll be able to work uninterrupted, and then just crash when you’re done.”

Jisung looks at him, relief melting some of the tenseness around his mouth and shoulders. “Really? I mean, I’d love – that’s a great idea. But are you sure I wouldn’t be interrupting your routine or something?”

“I wouldn’t have offered it if I didn’t want you here.” Minho pushes his chair back and stands up, “don’t worry about anything, Hannie. Just get this day done with.”

There’s a soft, unreadable look on Jisung’s face, and his eyes are bright as he peers up at Minho. A curious flutter in Minho’s stomach, so easy to quash till now,  turns to a roaring swoop when Jisung offers a smile, small and pretty. “Thanks, hyung. You’re always so sweet to me. Really… thank you.”

“Pfft, don’t think you wouldn’t be doing the dishes tonight,” Minho says, and the joke is more of a reflex than something he intends to say. What he intends to say – that’s a different story. “Anyone would’ve done it?”

“Maybe, but I still think it’s very sweet and kind of you,” Jisung insists, standing and walking till he’s at the head of the table. He puts his hand on top of the chair, fingers playing a staccato beat, “and – you’ve always been this way to me, hyung.”

Jisung’s hair has escaped whatever coiffure he had attempted this morning, and has fallen in every direction possible. He’s dressed in lounge clothes today, and has gotten a tiny splash of coffee on his t-shirt. Minho notices this because he isn’t looking Jisung in the eye, overwhelmed and unsure for a moment. 

“And I’ll definitely do the dishes,” Jisung nods, “that’s the least I can do even if it makes my soul shrivel. I can do laundry all day long but dishes just – pain. Just pain,” he says, dragging the last syllable out. 

I like you so much , Minho thinks, and his mind has scattered, dissolved to one singular thought. What if I just told him –  “unluckily for you, there are a lot of dishes today,” is what he says, and he would like the record to note that his mouth had run off without his input. “But uh – it’s… you don’t have to thank me or anything.”

“So, my attempts at flattery failed?” Jisung asks, then clamps his lips, suddenly seeming embarrassed. “I was just joking – um.  I really meant it,” he adds in a quieter voice.

God, both of us are lacking in the smooth segue department , Minho thinks, half dismayed, and half amused by the awkwardness that has settled over them. “I know,” and he adds, and shuffles forward until he's close, and squeezes Jisung's shoulder. "You're adorable," he adds, belatedly throwing a pebble in the dark after the time to shoot his shot has passed. 

Jisung grins in delight. "That I am," he puffs his chest out. "Good for you for finally acknowledging it, hyung."

"Brat," Minho grumbles, but it is a futile effort because he can feel the force of his smile. 

He showers and starts on dinner, mind buzzing and neck prickling as he chops the vegetables. If his gaze goes towards the living room one too many times than necessary, then chopping a particularly pungent onion helps because he isn't able to see beyond his tears.

But his sniffling brings Jisung to the kitchen, and he flutters around Minho, offering many, many consolatory touches. "Why are onions so tasty but so painful?" asks Jisung, hand over Minho's shoulder as he presses a damp cloth to Minho's eyes. 

"Hmm." Minho is hyper aware of Jisung's presence, and also blushing hard enough to feel the heat of it radiate. Usually, he sniffles a little, dabs his eyes and moves on, which is much better for his overall well-being than what Jisung is doing. "I think I'm fine now," he says, and stands still as Jisung steps away. 

Spots dance in front of his eyes when he opens them, and he sees Jisung still hovering near him. There's also a distinct mischievous look on his face, so Minho goes to the sink to wash his hands, and accidentally sprays Jisung with water. 

They eat dinner in silence, and it hums along with their breath. Minho is annealed by a pleasant, sleepy fog as he eats, the going-ons in the movie they’re watching registering only in blips, and disjointed dialogue. Jisung is sitting close, and he’s invested more in his food than the screen.

“What are you going to do for your birthday?” Jisung asks, picking up the remote, and lowering the volume by two notches. “In a couple of weeks, right?”

“I don’t have any plans as such,” Minho replies, tapping his chopsticks against the rim of his bowl, “just dinner and drinks with you guys, my other friends and maybe I’ll visit my parents.”

“But that’s what you did last year,” Jisung says, leaning forward to pick up his glass of water that’s on the coffee table. The movement highlights the curve of his cheeks, and Minho wants to touch. He looks away just before Jisung settles against the backrest. “You’re not trying anything new?”

“What’s there to be done? I’m just getting older, you know. I can’t run about like I used to before.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you run,” Jisung says, squinting, “have I? No, I don’t think so. Do you run?”

Minho snorts. “Not if I can help it. Power-walking is enough usually.”

“Same!” Jisung holds out his fist, and Minho knocks it with his own, trying not to smile like a fool. It’s just…embarrassingly easy to smile about the smallest things with Jisung. “Unless I’m chased by a bear, I don’t see the point of putting my lungs through that. But anyway, you should totally do something different this year.”

“Like what?” Minho picks the last few grains of rice from his bowl. Jisung doesn’t reply, and when Minho notices an odd, conflicted look on his face when he turns to look at him? “Hello? Are you there?” He pokes Jisung’s cheek with the other end of his chopsticks. 

Jisung rears back and laughs, rubbing his cheek. “I guess uh – I don’t know,” he rubs the back of his neck, “maybe take us – all of us to a fancy place for dinner.” He winces and there’s a shift in his bearing, a visible drooping. He isn’t looking at Minho anymore, eyes laser focused on the empty bowl he’s holding.

Minho frowns in confusion. His mind runs a reel of their conversation, trying to understand the epicentre of the sudden shift. Nothing really stands out, except for the pinkness creeping across Jisung's cheeks. 

"Bankrupting me would not be a good birthday present, Hannie," Minho says with a laugh. He places his bowl on the table and is about to stand up when Jisung tugs at his elbow.

"Wait, hyung," Jisung says when Minho gives him a quizzical glance. He places his bowl on the table, and turns to Minho. He's very pink now, and Minho's heart seizes with anticipation. "Okay, I was going to say that you should take me out. On a date," says Jisung. "But I didn't because well that's not a gift and it sounded self-centred but I think we should uh. Maybe go out."

The words dissolve and swirl away from his mind without sticking, but Minho knows that Jisung is asking him out. For a moment, Minho is untethered by the sheer unexpectedness of it. 

"I like you," Jisung says. His face has set into a determined, obstinate expression now. He shifts until he faces Minho wholly. "I mean – I have for a while, and like I was trying to woo you? With the playlists and flirting all but I guess it was too subtle and yes. I like you."

"You like me," Minho repeats, and his ears are burning hot. "Wait, those playlists were for me?"

Jisung groans, leaning away. "God. Yes. I made those playlists because I thought you might like them." He scrubs his face with his hand, "please, I usually just like a song and call it a day – it's not like, yes I was making playlists for myself but then you and your big shiny eyes were so interested that I made soppy ones for you!"

"Oh," says Minho, torn between smirking and smiling like a fool. His face is probably caught in a demented expression. "That's so cut–"

"And you didn't even like them! Plus you're so obtuse sometimes! Like, I was sending signals and okay, you don't have to react or anything. But I need to get it out!" Jisung is worked up now, eyes round and wide, shoulder set for a battle. 

"I did like them! I'm telling you, they're good…wait did you call me obtuse? I'm not obtuse!"

"You are, a little bit," Jisung says. His shoulders drop and he rubs the back of his neck. "But I should've just asked instead of just trying to woo you, I guess." 

"I–" Minho wants to defend himself, but he doesn't, not when Jisung is beginning to look embarrassed, and starting to shift away. "I would've said yes," Minho says, "and it's a yes now too."

Jisung softens, a soft smile unfurling on his face. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," Minho squeezes Jisung's knee, barely feeling the touch himself, what with the way everything is going haywire."And I thought you weren't really interested – no listen! You were really inscrutable to me, and I'm not generally this oblivious,."

"Maybe I was too smooth," says Jisung, pushing his hair back, "like, my moves are on another level and it just went over your head."

"You know that the simplest explanations are often the correct ones, right? That means you were probably too subtle."

"Or that you're as dense as a rock," Jisung shoots back.

Perhaps, it was both, Minho thinks. But he's distracted by the way Jisung is knotting his fingers together, and the way his mind is still roaring. He takes his hand that's on Jisung's knee and cups Jisung's jaw.

Jisung leans into the touch, eyes fluttering for a moment. "I was going to combust the day I asked if you wanted to work with me," Jisung says. His cheeks bunch up slightly where the side of Minho's palm touches his skin. "I mean, I was planning on asking you for a long time, it just made sense? But I thought you would've known."

It's not a strong memory now, and Minho doesn't remember much of the conversation except for his confusion. He tugs at Jisung's earlobe, "I'm glad you asked...in fact now I'm kind of glad that my stay was cancelled."

The smile that lights Jisung's face makes Minho's stomach flip. In another world, he would be in that cottage grinding away with no company except for the trees, and the silence. He drops his hand, bringing it towards himself as Jisung shifts until he's close. Close enough that Minho can feel his warmth.

"Hyung." Jisung's voice cracks. He clears his throat, "can I?"

Minho nods, finding purchase on Jisung's waist and yielding when Jisung cups his jaw now with a light touch and cold fingers. It's awkward. Jisung's knees are knocking against his own. The kiss lands to the side of his mouth. Minho also realises that they've just eaten.

But then Jisung kisses him again, and his soft, shuddering breath sends a frisson of want down Minho's spine. He tugs Jisung closer, causing him to topple forward, and crash into Minho with all the elegance of a falling brick.

Minho grunts, and yelps when Jisung's elbow digs into his side. "Careful!" He helps Jisung find his balance, letting go of his waist once he settles down.

"I'm very nervous," Jisung laughs, "and also exhausted," he says, cheeks flushed. His eyes are still wide. "And physics is obviously not on my side right now."

"Yeah," Minho says, eyes still fixed on Jisung. His bottom lip is plush and Minho wants to capture it between his teeth. He brushes the pad of his thumb against it. "And we have to save something for our date, right?"

Jisung nods, his eyes still fixed on Minho. "Of course."

"And we can play your yearning and blooming playlist," Minho says, "it deserves to be in the spotlight."

Scowling, Jisung swats Minho's hand. "No! This playlist saga is done! I don't want to look at another playlist in my life."

Minho smiles, and this one is wide enough that he can feel its pull on his cheeks. "We'll see."

*

Hyunjin: i wish passionate dude was as upfront as Hannie

Hyunjin: would make my life easier

Hyunjin: but no worries, I'll be the master of my own fate 🌚😎

Minho: God save that man

Minho: I wish I could warn him about you

Hyunjin: you're the worst. but it's fair i guess since I told Jisung everything about you

Minho: You're lying which is the only reason that the 27 bones in your hand are intact

Minho: Or I would've broken them all

Hyunjin: which is the site where you find all these childish threats? I don't think you come up with them yourself

Minho: Your days are marked

Hyunjin: for my first date 😎

Minho: I'm blocking you 

*

Later, Jisung stands beside him, drying the dishes that Minho hands to him after washing. Music fills the bubble of silence they find themselves in along with the squeak of Minho’s washing gloves, and the clink of utensils being put away. 

 “You know how you told me that a lot of things are ephemeral? That they just change?” Minho says, “Hyunjin and Changbin told me the same thing…that sometimes things are a bit blue for no reason, but then we change, or things change.”

“Oh, yeah. Changbin hyung told that to me too,” Jisung says. His eyes are heavy-lidded with sleep now, “I mean – not like that, but he just said that I’m not bound to my job, and that things would change if I left it. He just put things in perspective, I guess.”

“Did it help you?” Minho closes the tap, and picks up the greasiest, dirtiest saucepan in the lot. He wrinkles his nose at it.

Jisung makes a soft, amused sound. “It didn’t at first, but then – okay, I always wanted things to be different. But then it got tiring,” he says, turning and leaning against the counter. “It got tiring to always wish for things to be different. So, I guess I just decided to… do what I want, and hoped for the best. I think it worked.”

Minho thinks for a moment, gaze still fixed on the saucepan. “I spent all these weeks thinking of my younger self, and his dreams,” he says, and then turns to look at Jisung. “But I think…I don’t know. I’m just thinking that well – things are different, and maybe it isn’t the way I had once thought it to be. But it’s mine, you know.” He averts his eyes, flushing. “I’m exhausted too, I think.”

“Yeah, I’m gonna be honest, that was a lot of words, hyung,” Jisung says. He slides closer to Minho. “But, one thing is for sure though, younger you didn’t have a hot guy in his kitchen helping with the dish washing.” He grins widely, his eyes crinkling with delight. “And he sure as hell didn’t have a handsome man taking him out on a date tomorrow.”

He’s obviously expecting Minho to joke back. But Minho turns and drops a kiss on Jisung’s cheek. “That’s definitely true,” he says, and cackles when he sees Jisung’s shocked, flushed face. “Wow, I didn’t know that you were so smitten, Hannie~ How adorable!”

“You – you can’t just say that! That’s so greasy!” Jisung says with a groan. “I wasn’t expecting it …stop laughing! Hyung!” He turns the tap on, and cups his hand beneath the stream of water. “You are going to regret this.”

There’s a lot to be thought about plateaus, and forgotten, buried dreams, Minho thinks as Jisung chases him around the kitchen.  But not now. Not at this moment. 

There’s another time for that.

End.