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“Alright, alright. Take a deep breath. Where was the last time you had it?”
Minho glanced up from the book in his hands as Felix wandered into the living room and began to lift the couch cushions around him.
“No, no. I’m looking. I’m checking the couch now. Have you looked under your bed? That’s where your headphones ended up….”
Minho frowned, feeling very much put out when Felix began to shoo him up and off the couch so he could continue checking the cushions. Minho scowled as Felix ruined his perfectly comfortable reading spot. It had been a stressful week. He had been fumbling through trying to come up with the new choreo in time, and he’d fought with Hyunjin, which only made things feel even more stressful and off-kilter. When he’d finally had an evening off, he’d wanted nothing more to settle in with his new book and some peace and quiet. Who had he been fooling...
“I know, I know. It’s not here. I’ve looked under the cushions. Are you sure….okay, okay. I’m sorry. I’ll keep looking here, okay. Keep me posted if you find it. It couldn’t have just walked off. I’m sure one of us will find it.”
“Can I have my spot back?” Minho raised a brow once Felix had hung up the phone.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry, Hyung!”
“What was all that about anyway?” Minho settled back against his favorite cushion, flipping his book to the page he’d left off.
“Hyunjin lost his ring.”
Minho rolled his eyes. Of course Hyunjin lost his ring. When wasn’t Hyunjin losing something? Served him right anyway, for causing Minho such headaches these last few days with this stupid fight that apparently meant he wasn’t speaking to him. Minho hadn’t known Hyunjin could cause such headaches without even speaking, but alas.
It was going on three days now, and neither of them had spoken more words than they had to at practice or with the group. Minho had tried, he had. He’d gone off to try to make peace after the first day, only for Hyunjin to brush past him and walk right off with Felix. Minho had half a mind to run after him and smack him, but he knew that wouldn’t help anyone. So he’d let Hyunjin be a brat, holding his tongue.
A lost ring was karma. Hyunjin was always losing things and finding them a few days later anyway. The ring would magically show up under his bed, in the washer, behind the couch, in the freezer.
“His Gucci ring,” Felix pressed when Minho hadn’t said anything, choosing instead to give an annoyed eye roll and return to his book.
The Gucci ring? The Gucci ring that Hyunjin treasured almost as much as the cross necklace from his grandfather? The Gucci ring that his mother had given him? The Gucci ring that never left his finger, that he fondly fussed over and spun on his finger when he was feeling anxious. Minho dog-eared the page of his book again.
So much for this peaceful afternoon.
“Are you serious?”
Felix nodded, “He said he’s torn their dorm upside down searching for it. I’ve looked here too, but…I know it’ll show up sometime soon, but I also know it’s got to be eating him up inside.”
Minho tossed the book to the side, standing from the couch only to crouch down in front of it, shining the flashlight of his phone underneath.
“I keep telling him to take better care of his things. He’s always losing shit. Last week it was his damn air pods. The week before that, his phone charger. Ugh, it’s not under here. But tell I.N-ie he’s on vacuuming duty tomorrow,” Minho stood from the floor, dusting off the front of his sweater before heading to the front door.
“Where are you going, Hyung?”
Minho huffed, tugging on his coat, “To go find his damn ring.”
—
An hour of searching the office later, and Minho found Hyunjin’s ring under of one of the benches in the changing room, a flash of silver catching his sight. Rolling his eyes, Minho retrieved it from the floor, wiping it off on his sweater and carefully tucking it into his jacket pocket. He knew Hyunjin was probably beside himself with worry right now, and he needed to hurry and get this back to him before he turned even more into an anxious mess, this time without the thing that calmed him down most just there on his hand.
Minho took a cab to the other dorm, quickly hurrying up to give the ring to Hyunjin.
He found him standing in the middle of his room - pillows, blankets, and clothes thrown all over the middle of the room. He was tossing clothes like mad out from one of his drawers, and Minho’s heart ached for him in that moment. Hyunjin was always losing his things, but that didn’t mean he didn’t care for them. Every item was precious to him, but especially this ring.
“Ya, did a tornado sweep through here?” Minho kicked at a shirt by the door.
“What do you want?” Hyunjin grumbled, not even looking up from the dresser.
Minho blinked. “Ya, Hyunjin-ah. Do you want a beating or do you want your damn ring?”
Hyunjin’s head whipped around from the dresser, his eyes widening into saucers, “What are you talking about?”
“Your ring,” Minho retrieved it from his jacket pocket, “It was in the changing rooms.”
Hyunjin reached for the silver ring in Minho’s hand, eyes still wide, lips parted in a near perfect “O” as if he couldn’t believe that his ring was finally found.
“Dummy,” Minho continued, roughly grabbing Hyunjin’s wrist and sliding the ring gruffly back into its rightful spot, “How many times has Hyung told you to look after your things, idiot? You’d lose your damn head if it wasn’t attached to your stupid body!” Minho dropped Hyunjin’s wrist and rolled his eyes again, “And it’s no wonder! Look at this mess! Who can even find anything in this damn room anyway!”
“Hyung.”
“It looks like a pig-stye, Hyunjin-ah! An absolute mess!”
“Hyung.”
“What?” Minho snapped.
“D-did you go all the way to the offices to look for my ring?”
Minho scoffed, “No. Absolutely not. Why the hell would I do something like that? Especially for a brat who can’t even be bothered to say two words to his hyung these last few days. No. I was just there working late and happened to see it.”
Hyunjin was smiling now, looking like an absolute idiot and Minho had half a mind to smack him in the face with one of his many plushies.
“Uh-huh.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Whatever you say, Hyung.”
Minho rolled hie eyes, “Whatever. Should have just left the damn thing there.”
“But you didn’t.”
Minho brushed past Hyunjin, stepping over the mess on the floor before settling on top of Hyunjin’s bed, crossing his legs and raising a brow, “Why have you been an ass these last few days?”
Hyunjin trudged over to the bed, sitting across from Minho, mirroring him. “I don’t know, really. I guess it began at the start of the week. I just felt like I couldn’t get any of the steps right and something you said in practice just set me off.”
Oh.
Minho frowned, “When I asked you if you were an idiot or just born to piss me off?”
“Yeah…that.”
Minho cringed, thinking at those harsh words. Sometimes he could speak harshly and it could be laughed off, no one taking those words of his to heart. But other times, he needed to be a bit more aware of the impact of those words. Whereas one day it could be laughed off, another day they might be the complete wrong thing to say. He’d known it’d been the wrong thing to say the moment he’d seen Hyunjin’s face fall before setting into a scowl aimed directly at him for the rest of the day. Minho sighed.
“I shouldn’t have said that. You were stressed about the steps, and I wasn’t helping. Hyung is sorry for that. And for what I said, Hyunjinnie.”
Hyunjin nodded, reaching for one of his plushies to hug, “It just really got to me and just made me feel really small and also really pissed off at you all at the same time.”
“Well, I can tell you right now you’re not an idiot. Even if you lose everything you own, Hyung doesn’t think you’re an idiot.”
“And the other part?”
Minho couldn’t help but smirk when he said, “What? We both know you’re karma for something in my past life.”
Hyunjin smacked him the with the plushie, and Minho couldn’t help the way his smirk turned into a laugh. He’d missed this these last few days.
“You’ve been an ass these last few days too.”
Minho couldn’t even deny that. It was as if the more pissed off Hyunjin was at him, the more he’d wanted to piss him off.
“I know. I’m sorry, Hyunjinnie. No more silent treatments, okay?”
Hyunjin nodded, “Okay.”
“Never thought I’d actually say that,” Minho chuckled.
Hyunjin smacked him with the plushie again. Then, getting distracted by the ring back on his finger, he said, “You went looking for my ring and brought it to me. It’s your evening off and you went looking for my ring and brought it to me.”
Minho adverted his gaze, “Ya! Only because I knew you’d be a terror to deal with if you’d lost it for good. I mean, look at this room! Explain - how is dumping everything out of your dresser drawers helpful?”
It was Hyunjin’s turn to cringe, “I guess I did kind of panic, huh?”
Minho shrugged, “It’s special to you. Makes sense you’d panic, being without it.”
Minho could almost hear Han Jisung’s obnoxious voice telling him, “You’re not just talking about Hyunjinnie and his ring, Hyung!” Minho made a mental note to find Jisung and smack him later.
“Are you staying tonight?” Hyunjin asked, reaching out to play with a lose thread on the hem of Minho’s sweater.
It wasn’t unusual for them to say over with each other. Sleepovers happened more often than not, the rest of the members joking that it was as if since moving apart, they couldn’t stand to be apart.
“Hyunjin-ah, I plan to settle in right here and watch you pick up this entire mess.”
Hyunjin stuck his tongue out at him, “Or you could help me?”
“Or I could stuff you in the air fryer.”
“Or you could help me?”
“It’s been awhile since you’ve eaten tissues, hasn’t it?”
Hyunjin rolled his eyes, hoping off his bed to begin to pick up the mess on the floor.
Minho couldn’t help the fond smile off his face as he watched Hyunjin begin to carefully fold and put his things away. He knew he’d been a wreck without that ring. After a few minutes, Minho huffed, hoping off the bed and bending down to pick up a t-shirt to fold.
Hyunjin met his eye, opening his mouth to say something.
Minho smacked him with the shirt before he could.
An hour later, once everything was finally picked up and put away, Minho found himself laying in Hyunjin’s bed, wearing one of his old hoodies that Minho loved to steal every time he came over for sleepovers, Hyunjin pressed to his side as they watched Toy Story 4 on Hyunjn’s obnoxiously big TV.
Minho glanced down at the hand beside his, reaching over and holding it in his own, gently twisting the silver ring around on the finger.
“What are you smiling about?”
“Nothing,” Hyunjin smiled wider, “Thank you for finding my ring, Hyung.”
Tonight, Hyunjin would fall asleep with his ring on his finger and Minho in his bed, gently stroking his hair back from his temple and whispering softly to him.
But Minho could feel his cheeks warm under Hyunjin’s sudden soft words and shy eyes, so he did the one thing he could do — he grabbed Hyunjin around the middle, wrestling him down into the mattress, pinning him beneath him.
—
“He said he’d keep me posted if he found his ring but I haven’t heard and I’ve been tearing our dorm apart looking….”
“I’ll go check if he’s found it. Lino Hyung came by awhile ago….maybe they’re looking together.”
“Mm. That or they’ve killed each other.”
“After these last few days, I honestly wouldn’t put it past….oh I am NOT going in there!”
Through the phone, Felix could hear Hyunjin’s familiar shrieking.
“I take it they found the ring?”
“Y’know, here I was thinking we’d have a moment’s peace with them separated into our different dorms.”
Felix chuckled. “With those two? We have a bigger chance of Hyunjin never losing anything again than that ever happening.”