Archive of Our Own ^beta

It's common knowledge by now: when Mark says party, he never really means party, because even if he meant party in the first place, give him half a day and the task of inviting anybody beyond their friend group, and he'll psych himself out enough to invite no one at all. He's got the worst people skills. He's working on it. Chenle adores him to bits either way.

But Jaemin never learns. He always brings too many snacks with him on the way over, and too much alcohol—like an outlandishly large amount that seems like a whole workout to carry on his own even with his buff arms. It's only his dad's credit card that lets him do so. Still running on his parents' money is the one thing that hasn't changed about him since middle school—now nearly done with college, Chenle doesn't see that changing any time soon in the near future either. The medium, yes maybe. From allowance to official salary, but it's all the same when he's got a nice last name and guaranteed job offer waiting unwaveringly.

He uses it for this—to put all that good money to waste on unhealthy amounts of packed and processed food—simply because he can. Because he's never lived on working three jobs so he can't fathom what budgeting is like. Because he'll never know the kind of jealousy chenle feels when he just doesn't show up to class because he argued with his parents for not bending to his whims. Because he's got his head in the clouds and no reign on his impulse. Because he's been in love with Mark from the first day they met. And he confessed to him their first year of university at an arcade, which sent Mark into a meltdown and Jaemin into rejectionville, blow softened fractionally by Mark's soft explanation about not being ready for romance just yet. And Jaemin does this because he still loves him. And he'll never tell Mark again, too afraid the insistence will play with the delicate balance of their friendship again and cut him out of the picture for good. So he does shit like this from a place of blind hope, like incentives stacked over time will warrant reciprocation. And it pisses Chenle off. 

Jaemin is bad for Mark. Jaemin is bad for almost everybody on the planet. When Jaemin smiles he looks like he's about to eat you up whole; and when he's angry, he's two steps ahead of karma when it comes to getting back at people. Jaemin is terrible at taking hints, and literally shameless when it comes to expressing himself, which to Chenle (professional represser) is a mega no-no. Jaemin has surrounded himself with the sweetest friends who were Chenle's first—a feat surely obtained by means of manipulation and taking advantage of their obliviousness to who he really is—but the bastard named Donghyuck is still, to this date, the only one who can bring the real Jaemin out to play.  

Jaemin is the absolute scum of the earth personality wise. The gum at the bottom of your shoe, the crack on a pavement, the fragments of a broken mirror, not a black cat because they're angels and not omens of evil and even if they were witches in disguise Chenle thinks that would be fucking cool as fuck but anyways he digresses.

And Chenle still lets Jaemin fuck him on the regular, so he isn't quite sure what that says about his own character. 

At least that whole arrangement is a balm to their dynamics. It lets them hash things out in the privacy of their rooms with lust-addled minds instead of snapping at each other during good moments. It aids in extending Chenles tolerance towards Jaemin’s antics, and vice versa on the other end. 

It is a solution. And a good one at that. 

Chenle sinks his teeth into the plastic cup handed to him, soda long gone, empty cup bending at his mouth and striking his nose sharply, sending splatters of leftover sugar on his shirt. Renjun looks like he wants to childe him, but one look at Chenle's doe eyes and half smile, and the scold dissolves before it even takes shape. He reaches a hand out instead and strokes down Chenle's nape. 

Chenle would indulge in it if it weren't for the doorbell ringing. All six of them are here, which means the only person who could be on the other side is Na Jaemin and his irritating hoard of not-romantic-but-also-secretly-romantic offerings. He opts to remain silent, letting the plastic cup drop to his lap so he can pretend to study it. From the entryway he hears a distinct smack of Mark undoubtedly hitting Jaemin on the shoulder. Jaemin's voice drawling out explanations follows. 

They all but stumble into the living room, and Jaemin is quick to drop the bags of food to pounce on Jisung and hold him tight, praising him for following in his hyung's footsteps and dyeing his hair platinum. Jaemin's footsteps? Chenle wants to scoff. The only reason Jaemin ever dyed his perfect hair was to prove Chenle wrong and show him up. But Chenle doesn't voice this. Not yet anyways.

He'll tug Jaemin by the strands and show him whose idea it really was later; he'll dip into his mouth and draw the confession straight from his lips.

"You guys are doing well these days," Renjun says all of a sudden. "Finally grew a tolerance for Jaemin? You're only what…a decade late?" Renjun smiles. He's just the type of person to sneak in introspective remarks out of the blue. Most of the time Chenle thinks nothing of it, but this time around guilt feels sticky under his skin and he squirms. Jaemin and him owe it to nobody to discuss their sexual lives, but secrets don't sit well with Chenle. He's always been the kind to bombard group chats with updates of his day, and talk everybody's ears off about his feelings. Now he has to resort to sneaking around with the person he'd least like to spend time with. All for what? He doesn’t even know himself.

Chenle cringes internally, imagining all the disapproval to the fucked logic that has lead Jaemin and him to this predicament. 

"What do you mean?" His grip on the cup tightens.

Renjun shrugs, gestures towards him, "Look at you, sitting quietly like a nice guy. Normally, you'd be at his throat by now. Or making that face you always do." 

Chenle scrunches up his nose, throws his cup towards Renjun. It ends up rolling over his lap and rattling to a stop in front of the TV. The noise makes Jaemin's head turn to him, with a glare no doubt, but Chenle makes sure not to meet his eyes. He regards Renjun, "I don't make faces."

Renjun chuckles at that. His voice is gentle and soothing, and his eyes twinkle with mischief. "You so do. I don't make things up. You have a look for him, you twist your face all up like you've bitten into a lemon. It's super noticeable." 

"Well that happens when you hate a person." 

"Yeah, so it's good that you aren't making it anymore," Renjun switches languages so only Chenle can understand him now. His voice drops a little, tone taking on a tinge of seriousness, "Did you guys actually work your differences out?" 

Chenle bites down on his tongue. In a way they have. The means are definitely not the most conventional, but it is something. He just doesn't know how he'd go about explaining any of it to Renjun if he were to inquire about details though. 

"I don't know— no," Chenle pauses, "Probably not."

Whatever this is, it isn't going to last for good. Whatever this is, it's temporary. They're only habituating themselves to counter irritation with calmness until it becomes the first instinct. Until they’re tired of each other, and tired of the sex. And then it’s over.

"It doesn't matter though? If nothing's changed all this goddamn time, it won't ever. Have you considered that we may just be tired?" 

"But you've known him for so long. And you've stuck by him." 

Donghyuck comes over in all his loud and clingy glory, draping himself over renjun. His skin is bare and sun kissed, 3 moles on his cheek that Renjun turns to drop pecks on so now he's sun kissed and Renjun-kissed. Chenle turns and grabs both of Renjun's hands in his own before the pair get immersed in some random conversation. "What are you getting at?" 

Donghyuck's head perks up in confusion. He probably knows a few phrases here and there, so Chenle really hopes Renjun will be careful with the way he puts it. "You really don't get it? I’m just saying…you and him could really work out you know?" 

Chenle stiffens, hands retracting. "I don't get you."

"You," Renjun sighs, "You've never thought about dating him? You've known each other for like forever." 

Chenle shakes his head, "I can't believe you—," 

"He's a good guy! you've just never given him a chance, plus you've got this look for him you know?"

"Renjun." Chenle snaps. His anger zaps through all his neurons and overrides whatever brain to mouth bridge there is that wires his common sense to his words, "You're being delusional, and that shit doesn't just work for all of us." 

Renjun's face falls. He glances at Donghyuck and then flushes crimson, in anger and in embarrassment. It is no secret that the beginning of his and Donghyuck's relationship had the most tediously long drawn path, attraction painfully obvious. But Chenle is also privy to the fact that most of that was because of Renjun's natural reservations about relationships in general. It was difficult for him to open himself up to Donghyuck of all people like that. 

And Chenle really has no right to throw all that right back at his face. Remorse and regret twist like a knife in his gut, pain of the realization sharp enough to make his breath hitch. Sometimes, all he manages to do is hurt people around him.

"I’m sorry," He mumbles after a beat, reaches out towards Renjun again, "I'm sorry I shouldn't have—"

Renjun backs away like Chenle's burned him. "Don't bother." He gets up and marches over to the kitchen. Donghyuck spares Chenle a wary look before rushing behind Renjun. He keeps asking Renjun what happened, but Renjun ignores him to ask Mark if he can stay in his spare room. At an affirmative, he shuts himself in and doesn't show his face the whole night. Donghyuck doesn't come back either. 

Jeno stops by at some point, lips drawn up but no mirth to the expression. Like he's thinking. It’s half comforting and half silent disapproval. It doesn’t sit well with Chenle. "You know I like it a lot better when you're fighting Jaemin and not the rest of us." 

"At least he's used to it," He drops a little paper cup shot on the floor by Chenle's feet and nods at it before heading back to the kitchen. 

Jaemin, scum of the earth, bane of his existence, personification of everything bad, may after all not be the problem. It may just be Chenle. He downs the shot Jeno left him while contemplating how to feel about it all.

🦋

Chenle bids everybody adieu and leaves early. After souring everybody’s night, it was too awkward to still stick around. At least now, Renjun might actually feel comfortable enough to crawl out of Mark’s room and show his face to everybody else. 

He barely makes it down the block when Jaemin catches up to him, out of breath. Chenle registers him slowly falling into pace with him, but doesn’t spare Jaemin a glance. He doesn’t bother to change his pace to shake Jaemin off his path either. Sometimes the acknowledgement of being a pain in the ass just feeds the smug monster in Jaemin more than it offends him. It’s the idiosyncratic things like that that make Chenle hate him all the more. He’s got a competitive streak so imagine how tiring it gets to keep track of all of Jaemin’s oddities just to have the last say.

“Nice night?” 

Chenle stuffs his hands further into his coat pockets and blows out a breath that comes out in a small puff because of the weather. It does nothing to sway Jaemin, who takes the chance to sidle up to Chenle, shoulders brushing. The little scratch and rustle of their coats sliding against one another makes Chenle cringe as if he were hearing a fork scratch against a plate. Jaemin notices and rubs their shoulders even more aggressively, until Chenle takes matters into his own hands and shoves him away. “Fuck you.”

Jaemin stumbles back under the weight of Chenle’s hands and raises his eyebrows at him. He’s stopped right beside a tree, and for some reason Chenle halts in his tracks too. “Fuck me yourself, man.” It’s partly jest and mostly a proposition.

Chenle spares him a glance. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, frustration simmering right under his skin, just excess energy lying in wait to be worked out. And Jaemin, ever so irritating Jaemin, is undeniably tempting when he flashes Chenle those fuck-me eyes under the moonlight. “Fuck you. Your place.” Is all he finally replies before storming off, the way to Jaemin’s place seared into his memory. He’s gotten so familiar with it after stumbling and hobbling his way to the complex while absolutely plastered, that Chenle actually fears he could sleepwalk to this place if he’s ever insanely stressed out of his mind. But those fears are irrational, rooted in nothing solid…probably. 

“I hate you,” Is the first thing Chenle says when he steps into Jaemin’s foyer. Even from the back, he can spot the rise of Jaemin’s cheeks while he toes off his shoes. 

Chenle says this because stepping foot into this place reminds him of everything he hates about Jaemin—starting with this foyer. The what…trillion won vase(?) that’s beside the shoe rack, the paintings and posters highlighting social causes Jaemin doesn’t know jack shit about. All of Jaemin’s expensive sneakers just out in the open, few so scuffed it physically hurts Chenle to see them, and makes his fingers itch to stuff them in his bag and run off into the night with them to get them restored. I’ll save you babies someday, he thinks toeing off his own trainers. 

“I always have adored the way you have with your words,” Jaemin hollers from the kitchen. Chenle follows after him, internally listing at least 36 other things he hates Jaemin for. 

“Would it kill you to just say you hate me back?” Chenle hops onto one of the marble counters and makes sure to wiggle around and get comfortable. He runs his nails down the surface and hopes at least that’s enough to make Jaemin a little nervous about Chenle’s ability to ruin his property.

“Yes, because I’m smart and I know that’s what you want. I’d never give you stuff for free.” Jaemin peers into a cabinet and fishes out two tall glasses, filling them both up with ice cold water. He holds one to his own lips and sets the other down beside Chenle, “C’mon, hydrate. You should know you’re in for a long night.” 

Chenle finds himself obliging, fingers curling around the condensation that’s begun to form on the cold surface, “What if it’s my birthday?” 

Jaemin hums and his eyebrows knit together while he thinks. Does he have to lean against the counter and throw his ass out while he does it? Absolutely not. But hooking up with Jaemin just comes with extra dramatics like that, and Chenle isn’t exactly complaining at the sight that he can grace his eyes with. “I’ll get you a picture frame, or a plushie, or flowers. Some sentimental crap you’d hate and people would think I’m so sweet for.” Jaemin bites down on his bottom lip, absolutely delighted at the mental image he’s come up with. 

“Ew,” Chenle scrunches his nose up and sips the water. “I hate you. You’re evil.” 

He reaches for his phone and pulls up his text log with Renjun. Half an hour into drinking alone because the others were either too awkward to approach him and be scathed by any remnant anger or busy coaxing Renjun out, Chenle had decided to occupy himself by dropping Kun memes and Renjun apologies. Kun, who knows Chenle only ever wants to joke around with him when things are wrong, went therapist mode. And Renjun, who is understandably upset, still hasn’t seen any of his messages. Scrolling up their texts, Chenle spots their last conversation. Plans to watch a new movie and get hot pot and speak about Renjun’s terrible new boss. Chenle sighs. There go his weekend plans. He drops another apology and hopes that 7 are enough to salvage their friendship again.

“It’s called business baby,” Jaemin replies to him after finishing his glass of water and setting it down beside the sink. His eyes flicker to Chenle’s phone, then to Chenle, and Chenle only blinks at him passively.

“That reminds me. I value my time, so come on,” He opens his arms and gestures towards himself, “Pounce on me.” 

“Excuse me slut,” Chenle raises an eyebrow, reaches forward and tugs Jaemin by the collar, “I have a few bones to pick with you before that.” 

“Bones, you say?” Jaemin’s tongue flicks out to wet his bottom lip and Chenle pauses to watch the movement, entranced. 

“Bones,” Chenle confirms, deciding to humor him. “Who did Jisung dye his hair because of? You or me? Fucking wannabe trendsetter.” 

The anticipation in Jaemin’s expression dims. He sighs, “You’re terrible at setting the mood you know? All you do is hold onto little things like that and wait for me to praise you like that matters. What should I do? Call Jisung and tell him I lost a bet? Do you want me to tell him what we were doing too when you bet me? Fuck you–”

Chenle reaches behind and cards his fingers through Jaemin’s hair before fisting them and tugging sharply enough to make Jaemin halt mid-curse. “Okay ouch, love that. But like I was saying. Fuck you.” 

Jaemin’s just as competitive as he is, and Chenle knows that if he refuses to let up then all they’ll end up doing the whole night is quarrel over Jaemin and his stupid drop dead gorgeous platinum blonde hair. It’s like striking two birds with one stone for him too, because Chenle’s sure that Jaemin will manage to fish a few compliments, and bend Chenle’s words if he has to to feed his own ego. So he tugs slightly harder, tilting Jaemin’s head at an angle that gives him perfect access to slot their mouths together. 

Chenle’s hold on his hair grows softer and softer until all he’s doing is carding through the strands and running his hand up and down Jaemin’s nape. Jaemin groans into the kiss and moves to stand between Chenle’s legs, hands on his hips to keep Chenle from kissing too hard and toppling over Jaemin. He can get pretty carried away sometimes, and Jaemin’s lips just have that effect on everybody. “Fuck me yourself,” Chenle whispers, pulling away. And it’s nice to see the way Jaemin has to take a minute to compose himself and think real hard to churn out a coherent thought. 

“Be a good sport and,” Jaemin swallows, moves closer like he wants to kiss Chenle again and pulls himself away just in the nick of time. It’s nice that after they kiss, Chenle doesn’t say things that require critical thinking skills to respond. Thinking with his dick suffices, “Wait for me in the bedroom. Then I’ll fuck you myself.” 

Chenle doesn’t think scum of the Earth Jaemin is a man of his words, but he has learned that there are some promises Jaemin will always keep. He walks towards the bedroom, feeling Jaemin’s eyes on him the entire time and that’s enough to distract him from the fact that he left his phone lying on the kitchen counter. 

Jaemin plucks it from its place, turns it off, and places it face down beside the condiments before following Chenle. 

🦋

“I have a request.” 

Chenle twists around in bed, the sheets tangling around his waist. The clock on Jaemin’s bedside table tells him that it’s well past 3AM. Going home right now is futile when all Chenle will probably end up doing is overthinking himself in circles till sunrise, only to start a new day all on his own and sufficiently depressed. Sometimes bad company is better than his own company. Chenle wonders if he sits higher than Jaemin on his own dislike list. It’s stupid anyways, but Chenle takes his silly little mental lists very seriously. He slumps into the pillow tiredly, pulling the sheets up his chest and then all the way to his neck. A cold breeze blows in through the open window, along with the smell of nicotine that makes Chenle scrunch his nose up in distaste. 

Jaemin watches this, walks inside to tap his cigarette twice on the ashtray before returning to the windowsill and taking yet another long drag. 

Now this is an instance where Chenle sometimes wants to consider allowing Jaemin to win at their game of hatred—because Jaemin hates Chenle so much he’s actually subjecting him to second-hand smoking. Taking a couple years off his lifespan a little bit at a time, it’s genius. The closest Chenle can get is being annoying enough and hoping that he stresses Jaemin out enough to raise his blood pressure a little. 

Jaemin twists his body away from Chenle and looks out the window. Chenle’s glad that he’s gracious enough to do so, but he’s also impatient. “What?” He tiredly groans, rising in his spot. It’s too dark to make out Jaemin’s face. And Chenle detests conversing with people he can’t read. So he rolls over and feels around the bedside table, turning on the first switch he can paw at. Thankfully the bedside lamp is the one to turn on. 

Chenle scoots towards the edge of the bed, “Are you going to say something or is this some new…thing you’re doing to get on my nerves?”

Jaemin sighs. “Promise me you’ll try to listen?”

Chenle narrows his eyes, “I’m a better listener than you fuckass. All you do is talk people's ears off. This is so rich coming from you.”

“Sorry for righteously predicting that you’re going to freak out like you always do and assuming that you are the creature of habit that you actually are, Chenle,” Jaemin has the gall to roll his eyes at Chenle. He steps into the room properly and stubs his cigarette butt into the ashtray. He plucks it up and fans the remnant smoke away near the window to reduce the amount lingering in the room. 

“So I’m too sensitive,” Chenle crosses his hands over his chest. Maybe he should go home actually. He could pull an all nighter and smack a ton of makeup on his face to look all fresh, like a spring child with cherub cheeks. And he could stop by a bakery and smell flowers on his way to campus and try to not go too insane by the end of the day because of sleep deprivation. He doesn’t need to put up with Jaemin and his endless string of insults. 

“Can you please just shhh—,” Jaemin steps towards him and presses his finger against Chenle’s lips. Of course, Chenle’s first instinctual response is to try and bite his finger off. 

Unfortunately, Jaemin gets by with his entire finger intact. It’s a shame Chenle’s too tired. 

“Listen to me you idiot.” 

“I’ve been waiting for you to say something for the last ten minutes Jaemin, can you please,” Chenle rubs at his eyelids and sighs. Even the dim light of the room is managing to be too much for his dry eyes to handle. “Please just cut to the goddamn chase.” 

“Okay. Be my boyfriend.” 

Chenle stares at Jaemin matter-of-factly, “See now was that too difficult? Swear you make things so much harder, if you were only nicer I wouldn’t hate you as much. It’ll trouble me a lot but of course I’ll be your boy—wait.” The delayed realization makes him physically reel back. 

“What even. What sort of. What the—,” Chenle tries to find the words, he honestly, earnestly, does. But he comes up empty for a response because of the sheer ridiculity of it all. “Listen I don’t know what sort of stupid post nut reaction or whatever the fuck this is Jaemin, but no. You could be Romeo and Juliet level in love with me, it’d still be a no, please go choke on a peanut. Like. Now. Right now, go.”

Jaemin only stares at him, slightly amused. It’s like he knew he’d get something like this back. Chenle thinks he even sees him lowly mutter creature of habit, but he’s too disoriented to even care at this point. He should’ve gone home. Instead of lounging around in Jaemin’s made-in-heaven grade million thread count bedsheets, Chenle should’ve been dozing off on the subway. Jaemin gives him a little smile, shrugs, and turns away to fiddle with his record player. “Could’ve just said no, a no would be fine.” 

Chenle stares at his bare back and rolls his tongue in his cheek, thinking. He’s always been too curious to let a conversation of this degree just die on the spot like that. So he pulls on his boxers and walks over to Jaemin. Chenle grabs him by the shoulder and forces him to turn. Jaemin raises an eyebrow but obliges. Chenle crosses his arms across his chest and hopes the smugness he’s feeling isn’t showing too much. Wouldn’t want to trample over Jaemin’s precious pride that is akin to his lifeline now, Chenle’s not that cruel. 

“Do you like me, Jaemin?” 

Jaemin pauses, humoring Chenle for a bit. But the answer is easy.

“Pft, no. I didn’t want to date you for real, idiot.” Jaemin replies. Chenle blinks at him and tilts his head, forcing Jaemin to continue, “It’s not you. It’s Mark hyung. Little birdie Jeno told me they kissed…but Mark hyung refuses to date him because…you know how he is.”

Chenle stiffens. Yes of course he knows how Mark is. Too cautious, too careful, too attuned to everybody’s feelings. And it isn’t like Jaemin has exactly been too subtle either. They don’t talk about it, but the elephant in the room that is Jaemin’s feelings is always there. Jaemin getting rejected because the love of his life is attracted to his best friend is…it’s intense. Mark would never dare to hurt anybody like that, even if it means he has to clamp down on his own feelings. It’s a good thing Jeno said something, Chenle thinks. But, Jaemin. Here he is, bopping his head up and down to nothing and pretending to be a DJ while spinning his vinyl record and having this conversation with Chenle like it’s absolutely nothing at all. That can’t possibly be healthy, but hey, as long as it isn’t a meltdown in his proximity, Chenle’s happy. He couldn’t possibly be a good candidate to comfort a crying Jaemin. He can’t even imagine Jaemin crying actually. No, no, Na Jaemin does not cry. Before his brain breaks trying to pull together a mental image of him being a snotty mess, Chenle stops his train of thoughts right there.

“So you want to fake date me? Why?” Chenle places his hand on Jaemin’s, right between the ridges on his knuckle, on top of one of the veins he likes to trace. It’s to stop him from destroying his own collection of vinyls. God, he really has no respect for any of his possessions. Chenle eyes all the music on his shelf and makes a mental note of running off with them too. They’d fare so much better in his care.

“Convenience? Gets Mark hyung off my trail and guess what’s going to help you talk to Renjun again,” Jaemin points to himself, “And we already have sex, the energy’s there?”

Chenle narrows his eyes, “I can get in Renjun's good graces without deceiving him, thank you very much. He’s something I like to call a real friend. Ever heard of that?” 

“Okay. You already said no,” Jaemin shrugs, “Just had to tell you y’know. If I’m gonna find anyone else this is gonna have to end.” He points around the room, especially the clothes strewn around on the floor, and then between them.

Chenle swallows, “Okay. Good on you for letting me know.” 

Of course, he’s not actually going to pretend to date Jaemin just because the sex is good and things are just convenient with him? The strings between them are scarce, and they don’t really care for each other which is typically a good thing when you’re just hooking up. They had a decade to form a connection and nothing happened, it is —was—- completely foolproof. But there’s plenty more fish in the ocean for both of them. 

“You’re cool?” Jaemin inquires, lips twisting upwards. He moves around to go and sit on the bed, all spread out and holding himself up with both arms. 

“Yep. So cool.” Chenle replies easily. 

“Okay. Good,” Jaemin smiles properly, “Try not to miss me too much.” 

“That’s nowhere near a possibility in this realm of reality.”

“Oh but it is. It always is, baby,” Jaemin winks. And Chenle really seriously contemplates smothering him with one of his stupidly fluffy silk pillows. 

But he leaves without committing any crimes, all dressed in his own clothes and with more determination in the world to grab the largest coffee he can get his hands on. He gets his phone from the kitchen after Jaemin shows him to it, miraculously doesn’t steal any of Jaemin’s sneakers, and begins his walk at sunrise. 

Vaguely in the back of his mind, Jaemin Jeno and Mark’s situation begins to take real weight. How fucked, he thinks. It’s so stupidly convoluted. If they thought Donghyuck and Renjun’s romance was the most dramatic one in their friend group, they’re all about to be proven terribly wrong.

Chenle hopes nothing crashes and burns too badly. But it’s not like he can make any promises about Jaemin’s fuck-up-ability when it’s what he doubts the most. 

🦋

Renjun is a nice guy. Renjun is soft. Renjun holds no grudges. He’s always the first one to forgive Chenle who seems to fuck things up on the regular. And more importantly, he never frames Chenle’s mistakes as some incriminating personality trait soldered into every fiber of his being. Many would call it a flawed friendship; imbalanced and incompatible and wholly unfair for Renjun. Which is true. But it worked for them somehow, and it felt like it’d just keep functioning like that forever.

In hindsight Chenle should’ve seen a breaking point coming up sooner. Should’ve predicted it as soon as Donghyuck came into their lives, and Renjun’s eyes lit up in a way it never did before him.

Thing is, Renjun is soft hearted and easy to convince. A little bit of whining accompanied by sweet treats from a cafe and forgiveness would follow easily. But Donghyuck isn’t. 

Donghyuck holds grudges and remembers every single time he’s been wronged. He calls people out and wrings forth the apologies he deserves and more. Then he makes you put in the work to earn his forgiveness so you remember not to repeat the same mistake again. Chenle thinks that it’s a miracle he has any friends at all. But it’s also a miracle that Chenle has any friends at all (not that he’d admit this), so maybe that’s slightly rich coming from him.

Donghyuck is also the apple of Renjun’s eyes, and his personality traits have been bleeding into Renjun’s habits in a way that had been cute once, but is now just an inconvenience.

So it isn’t a surprise that Donghyuck, ultimately, is the reason why Renjun hasn’t forgiven Chenle well into the week. 

Chenle’s left him 5 apology messages each after breakfast, lunch and dinner for four days straight (yes he’s been keeping count). He’s gotten Renjun cookies and cakes after his classes only to watch him hand them over to other classmates and completely miss Chenle’s message. 

And right now, at his absolute wits end, Chenle follows Renjun around in the cafeteria to drop his pride and apologize face to face for once.

“Renjun, Renjun,” Chenle sidesteps a group of students who nearly spill their trays on his shirt, only to find Renjun power walking away to his heart’s content, “Renjun stop. C’mon listen to me.” To which Donghyuck, because of course Donghyuck’s there, turns to glare at Chenle in Renjun’s stead. He’s rising up Chenle’s dislike list at breakneck speed. At this rate he’ll dethrone Jaemin in no time. 

“Renjun, stop being immature like him and listen to me,” Chenle stops and stomps his foot on the ground, banana milk clutched in his hand subject to the effects of his rage. Somehow that makes Renjun stop. See? Chenle knew he’d come to his senses. He had to. Donghyuck’s stupid influence could only last so long. Renjun isn’t the type to lose himself in a relationship, he really isn’t. He wouldn’t abandon Chenle like that. 

Chenle watches him swivel around, expression placid and unreadable just like it always is. His shoulders slump in relief and he flashes Renjun a smile full of expectation.

“Listen to what, Chenle?” Renjun snaps instead of sympathizing with Chenle who is properly taken aback. “Listen to you apologize and then treat me the same?”

“I–,”

“No,” Renjun is as calm as can be, which makes this all the more difficult a pill to swallow for Chenle. This is no heat of the moment rejection; there’s no seething or screaming or yelling. Only a finality that makes Chenle’s knees tremble a little. “Don’t say that that’s just how you are, or that it’s always been like this or that I know you already. I don’t care how little relevance our fight has or how silly it is. You still snapped at me, you always do. Don’t give me excuses Chenle.” 

Okay, so maybe this isn’t all Donghyuck. This terrifyingly accurate analysis and the way the words are stolen straight from his mouth before he can utter a syllable is definitely the most Renjun-est thing on Earth. But Chenle never concedes. He finds himself taking a page straight out of Jaemin’s book before he can help it, “I wasn’t going to say anything like that.” 

Renjun raises an eyebrow, “So you found a new way to reiterate it. Good for you,” He turns around and starts walking again, shoulders rising and fingers tightening on his tray of food. Chenle sighs, pauses to shake the hair away from his eyes before trailing after, miraculously managing to slip in between Renjun and Donghyuck. “It’s nothing like that.”

“So you’re lying.” Renjun stops and slams his tray down onto one of the tables. He sits and Donghyuck scrambles forward to take the seat next to him, dutifully puncturing a straw into Renjun’s yogurt drink while Renjun fights his battles. Chenle wants what they have, but he also doesn’t because they’re disgustingly in love.”If you’re going to lie then just zip it.”

It prompts Chenle to pause and reconsider. It wouldn’t technically be an entire lie now would it? Fake dating is just like dating but with a curfew and a couple of extra boundaries. 

Chenle watches Renjun stuff a spoonful of rice into his mouth and then lets it rip, “I’m dating him —Jaemin. I’m dating. Jaemin. Me and Jaemin, dating.” 

Instantly, and quite predictably, Renjun chokes. Donghyuck manages not to, patting Renjun’s back and holding the yogurt drink to his mouth while Renjun takes little sips at the end of his coughing fit to soothe his scratchy throat. After recovering, he fumes quietly for a few seconds, plucking a veggie from his tray with a chopstick and chewing on it angrily before regarding Chenle again. “I can’t believe you’d try to pull this.” The denial is strong, but Renjun’s darting eyes tell Chenle that deflecting the claim is fighting a losing battle.

“I’m not pulling anything,” Chenle replies, feigning smugness and crossing his arms over his chest. He takes the seat across from Renjun, pushes his straw into his own drink and takes an easy sip before speaking again, “I’ve been to his place too. I saw the trillion won vase in his foyer, and his insanely damaged shoes and the record player that I’m pretty sure he’s trying to break.” 

Donghyuck echoes all of his words partly in disbelief. Renjun gapes at him and his eyes flicker between the two, as if Donghyuck’s stupid muttering is some sort of authentication of Chenle’s truthfulness. 

Finally, Donghyuck painfully presses a hand to his chest at the mention of the record player, choking out, “That was a birthday gift.” He lets his head hit the table, but Renjun’s hand slides in between to cushion the collision, “It was so expensive.” 

Renjun comfortingly rubs his back and turns to Chenle. He purses his lips, “Then why did you snap at me?” 

“To say that I’m dating Jaemin,” Chenle swallows, barely biting down on his disdain, “It’s not exactly the easiest thing to admit.” 

“But I’m happy for you.” Renjun’s eyes soften. He reaches out and gathers Chenle’s hands in his. “You can come to me with anything you know, Chenle. Especially something as big as this.”

Technically that is a lie. Renjun may be the closest thing to a best friend that Chenle will ever come to encounter in the entirety of his lifetime, but he has his own personal views and reservations that are far too stark to Chenle’s hyper laidback way of living. Renjun is a cautious person; Chenle doesn’t go with the flow, he heads with the turbulence instead. There’s some nuances to Chenle that Renjun could never begin to understand. 

“I know,” Chenle’s lips spread into a cheshire grin, “I was just shy.”  

He lies again with no qualms.

Jaemin is becoming a bad, bad, influence. But if his ways get people in Chenle’s life to not book it the second they see the bits of his ugliness seep through, then so be it. Chenle has to hand it to him; if Na Jaemin knows anything masterfully, then it’s the art of getting people to stay.

🦋

The hunt for Jaemin unfortunately takes Chenle to the great outdoors. A very perplexed Jisung leads him to the blind date he set up for Jaemin and one of his classmates. Does he question the urgency and Chenle’s abrupt request? Absolutely. But bribing Jisung with ice cream is an old trick in the book that’s always guaranteed to work. Chenle could wack a guy over his head and tell Jisung to haul the body over to a dumpster and Jisung would do it with no questions asked in exchange for a soft serve. 

“They’re there,” Jisung points with his popsicle. Underneath the Sun’s glare, a large droplet of orange melts and falls on Jisung’s white shoes. Jisung curses, stuffs the popsicle in his mouth and tries to pull a handkerchief out from his coat to no avail. 

Chenle half begrudgingly reaches in and fishes it out for him. Jisung tries to say thank you, but Chenle’s worried about it becoming a choking hazard so he nods furiously and leads Jisung to one of the benches.  

After he’s seated and safely fussing over his shoes, Chenle looks around until he spots Jaemin. Surely enough, he’s under the shade of a tree with snacks laid out in front of him. He’s all bent over another guy and they’re probably kissing. Jaemin works fast, but it’s nothing that comes as a surprise to Chenle. If he can be good to somebody he hates, he’s probably amazing with the ones that get in his good graces. But a deep analysis of Na Jaemin’s relationships is not a topic that Chenle wants to get into now or ever, so he dusts his hands on his pants and makes a beeline to get what he’s here for. 

“Hi guys!” Chenle hollers, and it effectively works to separate the two. The other guy jumps in his spot and Jaemin only gets that dumb post kiss dazed look Chenle’s now become familiar with. 

Chenle drops to his knees, plucks the nearest handkerchief he finds and wipes the other guy’s mouth for him. “Sorry buddy,” He says with as much pep as he can to the guy who’s staring at him like he grew three heads (rightfully so), “He’s not interested.” 

“But we— what?” 

Chenle helps him up and goes the extra mile to walk him a good distance before patting him on the back comfortingly, pointing him in Jisung’s direction, and letting him go. 

When he returns to the picnic and plops onto the blanket, Jaemin looks more amused than annoyed. Chenle says nothing at first, reaching into the closest chip back and stuffing his mouth, waiting for Jaemin so he can get a feeler for his emotions. Jaemin smiles. It’s not a nice smile, it’s his smug I-will-eat-you-up smile that irritates Chenle to no end. He says nothing either, just stabs a toothpick into a kiwi and bites into it while staring at Chenle, which makes him finally snap. “What?” 

“You crashed my date.” Jaemin says simply, curiously. 

“Yeah, to make it my date.” Chenle gestures around, “By the way this is nice but has anybody ever told you you’re super fucking boring?” 

“So I was right?”

“About what? Don’t get me wrong, I’m doing this so you won’t have to go through all that trouble. It’s stressing… Jisung. It’s stressing Jisung out, look at him poor guy,” Chenle points in his direction, and finds him with one shoe in his hand, sock clad foot on the bench, wiping at the ice cream stain aggressively.  

“So Renjun forgave you immediately with no extra help required,” Jaemin raises an eyebrow.

Chenle grits his teeth, “Yes.” 

“So you won’t mind if I text Donghyuck to confirm?” 

Jaemin pulls out his phone and unlocks it, only to have Chenle reach over him and snatch it up. He finds himself sprawled on top of Jaemin, so he just decides to get comfortable there. He holds Jaemin’s phone face down against his own chest and closes his eyes, “The weather is so nice.”

Radio silence from Jaemin. Chenle cracks an eyelid open to see an even wider smile on his face. He sighs.

“Fine, yes. I lied to Renjun. I told him we’re dating. You were right.” He shuts his eyes again. Ever since he snapped at Renjun that night, Chenle’s been finding himself pulling more and more ridiculously embarrassing stunts. Following him around to apologize indirectly, throwing a tantrum when he did get to apologize directly, lying in Renjun’s face and then crashing Jaemin’s date only to have him scream I told you so in Chenle’s face without even saying anything. It’s like the universe decided to put his pride through a hydraulic press.

“Okay.” Jaemin says, letting Chenle stay with his head on his lap. 

“You can say it,” Chenle wants to roll away and bury himself in the ground right beside this blanket. But he decides to stay put and hold his own. Jaemin doesn’t need to know how petty and embarrassed he feels right now. 

“Say what?” 

“You know what.” Chenle rolls over so he can support himself up on his elbow. He throws Jaemin a glare.

“I don’t know actually, how about you say it?” Jaemin crosses his hands over his chest and leans back.

“Jaemin.”

“C’mon, boyfriend, you know it. You say it,” Jaemin shrugs, “Tell me what you want me to say.” 

“Fine,” Chenle sighs and sits up, acting a little bit more like himself. “You can say I told you so.”  

“Look at me, Chenle,” Jaemin prompts. To which Chenle acquiesces hesitantly, face twisting in disdain. He balls his fists up and places them on their of his knees hoping it’ll ground him enough to not bite Jaemin’s head off. “I. Told. You. So. I told you so!” Jaemin practically sings it and Chenle wishes he could plug his ears. 

“It’s over. Whatever, this is the last time you’ll be right.” Chenle grunts and throws Jaemin’s phone back onto his lap. 

Jaemin grins and begins to occupy himself by replying to texts. His eyes flick to him momentarily, “Wanna bet on it so you can lose again?” 

Chenle actually thinks he should strangle Jaemin on the spot. All it would take to get away with it scotch free is an ice cream and Jisung could handle the rest for him. Two ice creams and Chenle would never have to worry in his life. 

Jaemin shoving his phone in Chenle’s face is what snaps him out of his violent fantasies. The light irritates his eyes and Chenle reels back. Great, now Jaemin is trying to blind him too. Jaemin’s chat head with Jeno is open in front of him. Chenle’s gaze immediately drifts to the stupid awkwardly angled selfie Jaemin sent Jeno before moving down to what Jaemin really means to show him. 

R u rlly with Chenle?

“Word spreads fast,” Jaemin smirks. 

“Would you expect anything else?” Chenle rolls his eyes. His gaze sweeps over Jaemin in…concern, he thinks? Maybe a sprinkle of pity too. They’ve never shied away from poking or prodding at one another’s achilles heels, and Chenle only has good intentions this time around, so he easily gathers the courage to ask, “So Mark hyung?” 

Jaemin purses his lips. He drops his phone onto his lap and musters a tight smile, “He knows. Of course he knows.”

“Good for you then.” Chenle studies him for a second before replying. Jaemin doesn’t say anything. He’s picked up his phone again and seems immersed in it, but the look in his eyes tells Chenle that he isn’t really focusing on the screen at all. 

Chenle grabs his cheeks. Jaemin is only slightly startled, and relaxes into the familiar touch in seconds. Chenle drops a short, sweet kiss straight on Jaemin’s lips. Jaemin’s hands find his waist and Chenle’s hand finds Jaemin’s nape; it’s like routine. Jaemin’s dumbstruck when Chenle pulls away. 

“Jisung’s watching. We’d better put on a show,” Chenle points vaguely in the direction of the bench to explain himself, and turns to see that Jisung is indeed gaping at them. Chenle’s willing to bet 5 ice creams that he’ll start furiously texting the others only to find that they know everything already.

“Right,” Jaemin licks his lips. He changes the topic quickly, “Good for both of us actually. All thanks to me.”

Chenle will let him have that victory too today.

🦋

Chenle has a penchant for being possessive of the intangible and an undying need to be the best at what he sets his mind to. That being said, Halloween has always been his. Being “with” Jaemin doesn’t mean that Halloween gets to be Jaemin’s thing too. So, a little good natured lying seemed like the best solution to the dilemma at hand. Surely Jaemin should understand. It makes no sense for him to be glaring at Chenle now at Mark’s doorstep with a raging party going on inside. Chenle ignores him and beams in pride. Jeno actually helped Mark invite everybody and organize it all, so Chenle even splurged a little and got snacks this time to celebrate the milestone. Of course that’s Jaemin’s thing, but he’s happy to share his things. 

“Are you thinking about all the ways I could be rotting in hell right now?” Chenle presses the doorbell and inquires. It’s nice making small talk sometimes, “On a skewer, in a toaster, in lava, like a little minecraft villager, the list goes on.” 

“You’re so sweet, but have you thought about what we’ll tell them all?” Jaemin mutters dryly. He heaves in a breath. Standing in a narrow hallway clad in a very tall and accurate tomato ketchup costume will do that to you. Chenle adjusts his fangs and then smiles.  

“Of courssse,” Chenle’s lisp slips out and he adjusts the fangs again. “I’m a vampire–the best one—and you’re red…so like. Blood in a fun ketchup tube. Classic but different.” There’s no official competition tonight. But unofficially, people are always scoping out each other’s outfits. Chenle craves that woah look at them response to him and Jaemin, so he was very serious in his task of dressing up as the best vampire in the history of all Halloweens to come. Jaemin is just…what you could call an attention grabber? Like Chenle’s own lit up arrow sign pointing towards him. It just works. 

“Not all vampires suck blood, some suck dick. Have you thought of that?” 

“They can be omni-vore..no omnisuckers too. Have you thought of that? Blood and dick.” 

Jaemin does not look impressed, “Such a revolutionary.” 

The door opens to Mark’s sweet face. He’s got whiskers drawn on and cat ear headphones instead of the usual headbands. Seems like he made do with what he already had at hand. The way it lights up is a fun touch too. 

“Hi guys!” Mark steps back and Jeno joins him too, wrapping an arm around his waist when the giddiness makes Mark tremble a little. He seems to have a few drinks in him too. “You are…,” They both scan Chenle and Jaemin’s costumes. Jaemin swallows his pride and looks straight ahead at the crowd. 

“Dude…that’s so funny,” Mark throws his head back, and it’s a little too hard so Jeno has to reach behind him and make sure he doesn’t fall. He’s dressed up a little more casually, in what seems to be a Hogwarts student costume with a simple sweater and a muffler slung around his neck. Chenle scoffs internally. Nobody takes costumes seriously anymore. 

“It’s sweet too though! It’s definitely suuper sweet, come in!” 

Being Jaemin’s plus one at a party isn’t really something to be overjoyed about. At least not for Chenle. He isn't a big fan of parties in general, so he sticks to the living room area and finds a place for himself on the couch that he’s probably not going to end up leaving the entire night. Jaemin clearly isn’t having the time of his life in the tomato costume either, so he sits by Chenle’s side too. Mingling and flirting around is off limits for the both of them tonight if they really want to sell that they’re together, so they’re in for a boring time. 

Five minutes into just sitting, Chenle sighs. Jaemin squirms. 

“We could’ve both been vampires,” Jaemin grumbles.

“That wouldn’t be a couples outfit. What are we trying to be, homoerotically sworn bros? No. But this,” Chenle points between them, “This is a relationship of need.”  

Jaemin sighs in response. Chenle drops Jisung a quick text to bring them drinks, after asking Jaemin what he’d like. And Jisung sends back an emoji that takes Chenle quite a while to decipher the meaning of. He comes around anyways, carefully holding their cups with Renjun and Donghyuck trailing behind him. The way they look at Jaemin and Chenle is a far cry from a discreet onceover. Donghyuck crouches a little to whisper into Renjun’s fake elf ear and Renjun tugs him down by the sheet he’s wearing (to resemble a ghost) to whisper even more furiously. Thankfully when they’re seated and all tangled up in one another, they just resort to plain staring. Jisung also blinks at them, lingering for a second too long when handing each of them their drinks. He goes as far as to say, “Fruity drinks for my fruity friends.” Pausing dramatically to gauge their reactions. Jaemin takes both with an easy smile. He drops a sloppy kiss onto Chenle’s cheek—which is going to ruin his makeup—-and then hands him his cup.

“Fruitiest in the room!” He turns to Renjun and Donghyuck, “No offense.”

Renjun shakes his head politely. His eyes stray to Chenle with a knowing and giddy glimmer in them, and Chenle manages to spare him a little smile before covering his mouth with his drink to hopefully hide his expression. 

Donghyuck, however, decides to be difficult and direct. “So you two… you’re dating?” The question is mostly directed towards Jaemin. 

Jaemin blinks cutely at him, “Yes of course.”

“You don’t look too chummy,” Donghyuck scrunches his nose.

“I hate PDA,” Chenle glares at him and then turns to Jaemin, “Don’t be chummy just because of him.”

Jaemin sips his drink and stares at Chenle with big sparkly innocent eyes. They’re so fucking sparkly actually it’s a little irritating. Chenle can feel his shoulders rising because of the annoyance. Is it even natural for a person’s eyes to sparkle that much in this dim lighting? Jaemin nods after setting his cup onto the table, “Your wish, my command,” He shifts closer as he says this, and Chenle allows him to do so.

Stuff like this is natural. Casual gravitation in one another’s proximity, and staying true to their personalities. It would be so obviously fake if Chenle just started furiously making out with Jaemin in front of their friends to prove a point. But this is nice. It’s lowkey and a low maintenance facade. Jaemin is just as smart as he is, so Chenle had no doubts it would turn out like this. 

“Why is he wearing that though?” Donghyuck points at Jaemin. 

Chenle rises from his spot and hunches over. This is his going-to-battle-arguing-with-Donghyuck posture. It means he’s about to trample all over whatever the guy’s about to spew, “We have a concept.” 

“Embarrassing your boyfriend concept?” Donghyuck raises an eyebrow, “If he even is that.”

“What about you two? You’re not even matching. Plus, I think Jaemin looks cute in this. He’s so huggable too. I’m going to make him wear this to bed on the regular now.” Chenle wraps his arms around Jaemin and rests his head on his chest. When he looks up, he catches Jaemin’s face all blanched in fear, practically screaming for Chenle to not go through with what he’s said. Chenle only winks in response. 

“You know who isn’t going to have a boyfriend?” Renjun intervenes thankfully. He jabs a finger into Donghyuck’s chest, “You if you don’t stop hassling them. Pay attention to me.”

That successfully gets Donghyuck all whining and distracted. 

A good portion of the night passes the group by without Chenle even realizing it. Jisung keeps bringing them drink after drink, lugging the cooler along with him once he’s tired of playing fetch for them. Chenle promises to pay him back duly and his eyes light up. The conversation keeps going, bouncing between casual topics. Chenle and Jaemin stay cuddled next to each other despite the place being so stuffy. 

It’s when the music gets significantly louder that the others excuse themselves to go mingle with classmates or stop by the restroom. Chenle disentangles himself from Jaemin’s arms immediately, and Jaemin relaxes. Jaemin starts making random noises like he always does, fucking strange little dude, and Chenle tries his best to tune it out. When Jaemin starts moving around to the beat of the music, Chenle reaches his limit and snaps. 

“Stop.” 

“Why?” Jaemin continues.

“Go work your energy out on the dancefloor,” Chenle shifts away and closes his eyes. He recounts all the tasks that he has to get done once this party’s over, and thinks about how time seems to be escaping him. This party has got to be the last distraction if he even hopes to catch up in the race. 

“Come with me!” Jaemin reaches out and tugs at him. Chenle doesn’t respond at first, and Jaemin can be annoyingly persistent when he wants to be. 

“I don’t want to. Can you take a hint and go? For fuck’s sake it’s already tiring acting all the time.” 

Jaemin withdraws. Chenle’s annoyance overrides any pang of remorse and he shifts away further. It’s silent for a few seconds, with Jaemin just staring at Chenle and Chenle doing everything he can to evade registering the fact that he may have seriously upset Jaemin. It’s nothing to him anyways. It’s never been any of his concern and now isn’t a time that he spontaneously intends to begin caring. 

“Okay,” Jaemin finally quips, pep in his voice as annoying as ever, “I’ll leave you to it then little killjoy.” Chenle opens one eye to glare and catches Jaemin’s grin before the crowd swallows him up.

Despite hating his own company, Chenle doesn’t mind being on his own too much. At least this way, he doesn’t have to keep up appearances, and his phone is good enough to keep him entertained through the rest of the night. He scrolls through instagram, and takes a few pictures of himself. 

He’s going through filters with the front camera trained embarrassingly close to his face when Jeno comes and plops down beside him, making Chenle jump a little and close his phone at a suspicious speed. He says nothing though, just offers Jeno an incredulous look to which Jeno smiles that disarmingly innocent smile of his. Chenle wordlessly shoves him on the shoulder. “Got you drink.” Jeno pushes a cup into Chenle’s grasp. It’s oddly reminiscent of the night that Chenle snapped at Renjun, and he vaguely understands that Jeno’s words did ring true. Everything’s fine now and the only person he’s snapped at has been Jaemin. 

Jaemin who didn’t make a fuss, or get upset, or even care about Chenle’s jagged edged words enough to say anything back.

“Thanks,” Chenle tilts the cup and clinks it against Jeno’s. Jeno mutters a small high pitched cheers that makes Chenle laugh.

“Be honest, Chenle,” Jeno begins out of nowhere, “Are you dating Jaemin? For real? Not for anything else. Not because…,” He stops, unsure of himself and the limits of Chenle’s awareness of the situation at hand. 

“Because you’re forced to, or because you’re being considerate or anything.” 

Chenle sits up. It’s difficult to lie to Jeno, because he picks up on the signs quickly enough. He knows how to word his questions right and he’s never afraid to ask what needs to be asked just for the sake of politeness. He decides to be honest. “Look, I won’t say that we’re crazy in love or anything. ‘Cause we’re not.” 

Jeno turns to look at him, a little concerned.

“But we’ve been…y'know… something for a while now. So we decided to go official with it and just see what happens. It’s casual but it’s also mutual so,” Chenle breathes, “Don’t worry. We know what we’re doing.” 

Jeno purses his lips, “Okay. Thank you…for being honest with me. I just—I don’t want him to–,”

“Be hurt? Don’t worry I’ll take good care of him,” Chenle smiles. 

“No,” Jeno shakes his head. He pauses and studies Chenle, “I don’t want him to hurt you.” 

And Chenle wants to scoff a little at that. Nobody, much less Jaemin who he keeps at a 100 feet distance from his heart, can hurt him. Chenle is not so soft. He doesn’t wear anything on his sleeve. “Like I said, don’t worry. Just curious, would you kick his ass any time I ask you to though?”

That gets Jeno to relax and laugh a little. “I’d need a valid reason, no exceptions. By the way, Jaemin’s inside getting out of his ketchup costume if you want to kick his ass though.” 

“He what? ” Chenle throws his hands up. Jaemin called him a killjoy, but look who’s ruining the night now. He abandons his drink and bids Jeno a hasty goodbye before heading towards the bedrooms with a solid purpose of giving Jaemin the best dressing down of his life (not literally, that’s for later). Chenle goes into the first bathroom he finds, checks himself out for a few minutes and fixes his hair before wobbling out. The guest room is empty and locked, which is a good decision on Mark’s part to not let any random people makeout or worse. So the bedroom becomes Chenle’s final destination. 

He spots the door swung wide open, marches towards it with fiery determination when he sees Jaemin sitting on the bed just clad in the black T-shirt he wore under the costume and shorts. But it all fizzles out when Chenle sees Mark in there too. 

For a moment he second guesses himself. Thinks that walking in wouldn’t be an intrusion. But he ends up going with his gut, and finds himself pressing into the corner of the hallway. 

“Are you really dating Chenle?” 

The question that’s been hurled at them like a broken record. Mark is hunched over his dresser, probably looking for something for Jaemin to wear, and Jaemin’s eyes don’t leave his form for even a second. Chenle doesn’t think he’s even blinking. He breathes in, “Yep. I am.”

Mark pauses, holding a hoodie. He pretends to dust it and clears his throat nervously, “Are you happy?” 

Jaemin nods and hums. He looks tired, and a little drunk and woozy. There’s a flush on his cheeks and he kicks the ketchup costume by his feet. Chenle takes personal offense to that.

“I hope you don’t do anything you don’t mean because you’re hurt, or because I—,” Mark rambles as he walks over to Jaemin. 

Jaemin takes the hoodie from him and tiredly pulls it over his head. Mark’s hands fall limp by his sides and he stands there all worried. Jaemin stares up at him, pats the space next to him. Mark respectfully crosses the ketchup costume—see? This is why Chenle loves him—and obliges. Jaemin hesitates for a second. A flash of fear running through his eyes. Then he gives in and wraps an arm around Mark’s shoulder. It’s casual but it’s also a reach. It isn’t a boundary crossed, but it’s pretty close to toeing the line. It’s Jaemin’s last opportunity to pretend. 

“Hyung,” He gives Mark a little shake, voice fond. “Don’t worry about me. I think we both deserve to be happy. And we can. We already are. Don’t overthink it.”

Mark giggles, drunk himself. He makes vague gestures with his hands and then drops them to his lap, “I do tend to overthink things a lot don’t I?” 

“You do. But, please don’t be sad.” 

It’s the most serious Chenle’s ever seen Jaemin. And it irks him a little. The pretending, the lingering around Mark, the telling him he’s alright. He could just say the truth and distance himself. Some heartaches are necessary, and a few accountabilities are just beyond your control. Nobody ever sees the big picture nowadays, Chenle muses in disappointment. It’s uncomfortable, watching the love flood Jaemin’s eyes and pour out, and Mark just sitting there being oblivious to it all. Oblivious to how the hand on Jaemin’s other side, out of view, clenches the bedsheets like it’s a lifeline. How one corner of his lips trembles and threatens to twist into a frown. How he remains such a solid comfort to Mark despite it all. It makes Chenle’s skin crawl with anger.

But, who is he to meddle? 

Chenle comes to his senses and steps away, leaving the pair to their own devices, just hoping that none of them notice him. He safely makes it back to the washroom he was in just minutes ago, not feeling like being around the living room anymore. Chenle takes off his fangs and the cape, rubs his tired eyes, and sits on the countertop. He pulls out his phone and counts the minutes till he thinks it would be appropriate to go out and excuse himself. 

Chenle’s guilt ridden and over the night; he just wants to go home.

🦋

where r u

bathroom

r u throwing up ? ew

no i’m waiting for u to show up

     wanna head back?  

wait. be right there.

Chenle unlocks the door, and Jaemin shows up with red rimmed eyes, reeking of cigarette smoke, and a dumb grin painted on his face. He points towards the general direction of the front door, and Chenle purses his lips before leading the way. They bid their friends adieu with sloppy hugs and hollered goodbyes echoing all the way down the bottom of the staircase. 

Jaemin’s place is closer to Mark’s apartment than Chenle’s place, so that’s where they end up. Jaemin’s bed is comfier than Chenle’s own, so he can’t say he minds it too much after having his social battery absolutely drained.

He finds himself seated on the same bed with Jaemin rifling through his closet, nearly drifting off multiple times. 

“Chenle.” Jaemin chides out every single time his eyes feel like they might glue shut.

“Up. up,” Chenle mumbles. What is the problem falling asleep in his own clothes anyways? It’s a nice shirt and a pair of pants, nothing like Jaemin’s ketchup costume that’d no doubt suffocate him in his sleep. Chenle doesn’t understand why Jaemin still insists he change into pajamas.

“Where’s the ketchup?” He finds himself asking, in an attempt to genuinely stay awake. Chenle can’t tell if he’s just naturally bad at keeping his curiosity at bay, or if the alcohol makes him more readable—actually maybe the alcohol makes Jaemin more attuned to his surroundings? Whatever it may be, it makes Jaemin peer his head out of the closet and stare at Chenle with a knowing look on his face. He walks over with a matching set of cat printed pajamas and places it on Chenle’s lap before sitting beside him. 

There’s no beating around the bush. Never is when it comes to them, “You were there.” Jaemin says with a certainty that feels criminal to deny.

“How’d you–,”

“You have a really funny looking shadow you know?” 

“I hate you,” Chenle glares. 

“I know,” Jaemin replies easily, “Do you feel bad for me?” 

Chenle doesn’t answer at first. They’ve never broached the subject directly, so it feels awkward. He blows out a breath through his mouth and allows his gaze to fall on anything but Jaemin. The evasion earns him a little shove on his shoulders, and it’s enough to make his defenses kick in and head snap towards Jaemin. “You’ve never held back, don’t start now.” He’s right.

“Did you cry?” Chenle tilts his head and stares at Jaemin expectantly. Jaemin’s the one who looks away this time. 

“It’s not the end of the world.” 

Jaemin tries to reason. And God, this conversation is giving Chenle a headache. Can they stop skirting around each other’s questions and communicate directly? For fuck’s sake. Chenle urges his annoyance to simmer down. 

“No it’s not,” He ends up agreeing. He thumbs the fabric of the pajamas Jaemin’s given him, and stares at Mark’s hoodie that Jaemin’s probably going to end up sleeping in. Jaemin’s eyes flick to his, the beginnings of a frown forming on his face. “But it is a pity.” 

They leave it at that. Chenle changes into the pajamas and throws his own clothes onto the desk chair in the room. Jaemin drags him into the bathroom again right after he's done.

“Wait a minute,” Jaemin makes him stand in front of the mirror before beginning his search for something in his cupboard. Chenle scans his own reflection—red skin and a bare face, tired eyes and lips set into a frown. He tries forcing a couple of pleasant smiles, but gives up with a sigh in the end. Jaemin emerges with an extra toothbrush and Chenle thanks him. 

Chenle rips open the package and Jaemin squeezes a neat line of toothpaste onto his brush before doing the same to his own. 

"What about you?" Jaemin speaks and Chenle immediately looks at him with his eyebrows knitted in disdain. Why does everyone around him have to be a goddamn choking hazard? 

"What about me?" Chenle repeats. 

Jaemin doesn't answer. He gargles and rinses his toothbrush, puts it back in its holder and wipes his mouth with a towel. Chenle just assumes he's trying to get on his nerves over nothing, like always. But then Jaemin reaches out and moves Chenle's bangs out of his eyes, touch tender and affectionate in a way it's never been. They've known each other for a decade and Jaemin's never looked at Chenle with this much interest. 

"You lie to almost everyone you're close to and on good terms with. I'm the one person you've been the most honest with and you fucking hate my guts," Chenle looks away from him but Jaemin keeps staring. His brushing gets aggressive till it hurts, and when he spits the toothpaste out there's blood in the sink and iron in his mouth. Jaemin's hand flutters over his waist, touch hesitant and slow to fall. He pulls him in and Chenle stiffens in his arms, "So yeah, what about you Chenle? What about you is a pity?"

Chenle scoffs and they stay like that. Jaemin's touch is firm and familiar, and Jaemin's words are made to cut. He's nice and then he's not. Chenle wants to kiss him silly and kick him where it hurts. 

"You're getting back at me," He sighs in acquiescence, "I won't meddle, I hear you. Just asking would have been enough."

Jaemin breathes out in what seems like relief and Chenle feels it on his cheek. It'll have to be a placeholder for thanks for now. 

"One last piece of advice though," Chenle twists in Jaemin's arms and loops his hands around his neck. Their chests press together, and Jaemin leans in for a kiss but Chenle doesn't kiss him. He knocks twice on Jaemin's chest, "Bury this stupid thing alive if you ever want to be happy and thank me later."

"Won't you help me?" Jaemin says without missing a beat, eyes half lidded and trained at Chenle's lips, actions cautious and thought through. No fluster and no shame. Chenle nods and Jaemin kisses him again and again, all the way over to his gazillion thread count bedsheets and under them and everywhere he can like he's been aching to be touched.

The answer is always so easy.

Of course he can help bury a heart. It's what Chenle does best.

🦋

Working is also what Chenle does best. He can't say he particularly enjoys it, he isn't a masochist, but it's definitely an acquired habit that feels almost comforting to retreat back to now and again. Base your worth in your work and you'll be exactly like him—neck deep in things to do, with every ounce of energy milked from the soul and not even a breath to spare, and still feeling like there’s more that could be done. More that should be done. Like a fogged and muddled mind and aching bones is no excuse to fall behind. 

I'm busy is the only thing people have been hearing from him. 

I'm busy to Jisung's coffee run. I'm busy to Renjun and Donghyuck's (mostly Renjun's) invitation to a homemade lunch and hotpot for dinner. I'm busy to Jeno asking to be tutored. I'm busy to Mark's invitation to go cafe hopping over the weekend. I'm busy to Jaemin's rare and quite lame How are you?  

It's been two weeks now. He's had his eyes peeled for an incoming intervention since the end of the first week. Chenle won't be deterred by anything. Or so he thought. 

“Honey,” The grating sound of Jaemin being cute finds him tucked in the corner of their campus library. Chenle quickly puts on his headphones and hopes that he keeps going so people have to drag him away and ban him from entering. A surefire way to peace.

But Donghyuck comes around and wraps a hand around Jaemin’s mouth, thoroughly disgusted by the interaction. Jaemin gives his palm a little lick and that makes them separate. Two chairs scrape against the floor and the pair plop down across Chenle. Donghyuck cuts to the chase, “This is an intervention.” 

Chenle looks up, pushes his glasses up his nose bridge and gestures, “Where’s Renjun? You’re useless.” 

“I can—,” Donghyuck begins loudly and then drops his voice to a whisper-yell that’s somehow still too loud to be appropriate, “I can pull off an intervention just fine on my own.” 

“No he’s right. I’ve got this you go,” Jaemin agrees. 

“But—,” 

“Tell Renjun we started making out.” 

“Gotcha.” Donghyuck gives Jaemin a thumbs up, grabs his backpack and books it towards the entrance. He looks glad to go, and Chenle’s glad to have gotten rid of that blabbermouth. But Chenle’s biggest problem still sits there, all well behaved, cheek in palm, staring at Chenle work in fascination. It makes Chenle bristle in annoyance, but like he said, he doesn’t have a lot of breaths to spare to even try to get rid of Jaemin. Here’s to hoping he’ll just get bored of looking at Chenle’s stony face and leave on his own accord, but that’s still asking for way too much. 

Jaemin smiles, “They were right when they said you have a problem.” 

“I have no problems.” Chenle snaps, typing away on his keyboard. He stops, scans the textbooks sprawled across the table and jots something down on his notebook before resuming the furious typing again. 

“How do you have that much stuff to do anyways?” Jaemin tries plucking one textbook up, face twisted in distaste like he’s allergic to it. Chenle slaps his hand away.

“Work. And studying.” 

“I get studying, but what kind of workplace has you doing so much? Shouldn’t they know they hired a student?” Jaemin asks curiously. He makes a little tsk noise and tilts his head, “They’re exploiting you, you should quit.” 

“Nobody hires what they can’t exploit nowadays, Jaemin. Get with the times.” Chenle sighs and closes the tab he was working on. He takes a moment, just one little tiny moment, to groan and stretch his limbs. It’s silent, and he’s not nearly curious enough to know what’s going on in Jaemin’s little head to even spare him a glance. Then Chenle opens up a new tab and gets started on yet another assignment. Before he can even begin, an email notification pops up and he gets straight to formulating a reply. It’s neverending.

“Hey,” Jaemin calls out. He knocks twice on Chenle’s laptop upon receiving no reply, “Hey look at me.” 

“What. What is it now?” Chenle sighs in exasperation and finally looks up. Jaemin looks serious enough. And just the knowledge that he isn’t fucking around with him makes Chenle relax. 

“Did you eat today? And did you drink enough water? I’m guessing you’ve been pulling all nighters but you could make the effort to squeeze in a couple of naps you know?” Jaemin nags and a wholly foreign feeling tries to fit into Chenle’s chest. It barges in and catches him off guard. As Jaemin goes on, Chenle can’t even keep up with the words he’s saying, just entranced by the pout on his face and the mild concern etched in his features. It’s too much. 

“Shut up,” Chenle scolds. “I did…or whatever. What’s it to you?” 

Jaemin raises an eyebrow and scans Chenle for a second. He takes his time, putting his words into something that Chenle’s stubborn ass will accept. “Because I want to exploit you. Come out with me.”

“You’re so funny,” Chenle mutters dryly. 

But before he can go back to ignoring him, Jaemin reaches out and grabs his hand. “I’ll pay you just come on. I’m bored and Jisung’s with his friends and I’ll have to play third wheel with anybody else.” 

Robbing Jaemin doesn’t sound like too bad of an idea. And time is money, of course. So Chenle crosses his arms, leaning in with interest. “How much.” 

“Whatever you want, just take it from me later.” 

Chenle finds himself conceding. He packs up his stuff, and Jaemin even offers to run off and return the books on the table back to their appropriate shelf. He comes back, circles his hand around Chenle’s wrist and drags him away. Jaemin doesn’t let go well after they’ve exited. And it’s strange spending time with Jaemin like this—without the intention of going back to his place later, without any of their friends between them forcing them to speak or interact. Just Jaemin being Jaemin and Chenle being Chenle. And it’s easy in a way Chenle never fathomed that it could be. They get dinner and drinks, and Jaemin tries stealing food off Chenle’s plate to no avail. They play rock paper scissors to decide who gets to choose dessert, and Chenle wins so he drags Jaemin to a bingsu place across the street. Because he always feels devious around Jaemin, he orders one with strawberries. And because Jaemin looks seriously upset, Chenle orders him a chocolate bingsu behind his back when he goes to use the restroom. 

They’re way too full, so Jaemin makes them walk around the city in the name of good digestion. Chenle finds himself going along despite the exhaustion. On a bench by the river, Jaemin leaves because he gets distracted by somebody selling a bubble blower. 

Chenle takes the moment to breathe. He pulls out his phone and instinctively presses on instagram. Mark and Jeno’s faces are the first thing to pop up, and it makes Chenle feel slightly queasy. He finds himself going through both their stories and finds a weird sadness settle into his heart.

He turns to stare at Jaemin in the distance. 

It’s instinct to try and fill the absence of a person with another one. Call it a defense, call it a coping mechanism, whatever it is it helps. Chenle knows that hollowness all too well. And he thinks about Jaemin who’s feeling the strongest effects right now. He thinks about how much he could be helping him. 

“Look at this,” Jaemin comes back, staring at his new possession in wonder, “I haven’t seen these things since elementary school.” 

He keeps babbling and Chenle feels worse and worse, until he finds himself diving towards Jaemin. Chenle wraps his arms around him and buries his face in Jaemin’s chest. Jaemin emits a tiny noise of surprise at the collision. “Woah, what’s with you?” 

Jaemin chuckles, trying to peel Chenle away who only holds on tighter. He presses a hand against Chenle’s forehead, “You’re not running warm. Are you going crazy? Is it the work?” Chenle shakes his head, face still smushed against Jaemin. Truth be told, the embrace is helping his own exhaustion too. It’s a win-win. 

“Just take a picture,” Chenle lifts his head up. He finds Jaemin staring down at him, can see every single one of his long lashes fluttering when he blinks. Chenle ignores the way his heart races in his chest.

Thing is, sex is always disconnect. 

Always about Chenle and his worries floating about. Always about the satisfaction of pushing them away when they try to bite, saying— No, not now. Now I have something better. Now I have a face pressed against my neck and a hand touching where it matters. Now I'm too busy losing myself to afford to actually lose myself in anything else.  

Sex to Chenle, is always more about Chenle than it is about Jaemin. Before he came along there were others, and after he’ll be gone there will be more. There’s no intent to hold on and Jaemin’s never been Chenle’s to lose. The sparse moments of interacting in between, what they like to call their decade long “friendship”, Chenle has refused to accept Jaemin as anything but an annoying fixture in his life that just won’t leave. It’s difficult getting along with a reminder of everything you’re not, and Chenle’s always been the kind to cradle his bitterness rather than letting go in the name of being a good samaritan. 

But right here, right now, Jaemin is more than just a means to an end for a wandering mind. Jaemin is a real boy, pressed against Chenle. Jaemin has a pulse, a heartbeat, a warmth to him. Jaemin smells comfortable, vaguely like fresh clothes from the dryer that Chenle sometimes wants to clutch onto on bad days. Jaemin sighs and Chenle feels the warm breath on the top of his head, the steady rise and fall of his firm chest. 

“Show me off, will you?” Chenle drawls with a rare whine. Jaemin actually laughs at him. “I know you want to.” 

Jaemin obliges. He pulls out his phone and opens his front camera, and the second he takes the first picture Chenle knows he’s made a mistake. It’s from the oddest angle ever, all chins and nostrils and Jaemin smiling like a goblin. The second picture is no different with Chenle’s face twisted in disdain and Jaemin making an over exaggerated silly face. The third picture comes out blurry, with Chenle mid snatching the phone away from Jaemin’s grasp. And the ones following it are picture perfect.

Jaemin takes a few with his honorary bubble blower, going a whole video rant about them with Chenle chiming in with criticism ever so often, still attached to his chest for reasons unknown to himself. 

He budges when they have to go home. And even then, it’s easy to act like that was only the natural progression of things. Like Chenle going from being at Jaemin’s throat to hugging him isn’t something so outlandish that Chenle may as well have been replaced with a clone. 

It’s odd. It’s nothing to acknowledge, and yet also the tilt of an axis towards something grander; something that’ll make or break them. 

Chenle returns home smiling. He lets Jaemin learn the way and shows him the nearest convenience stores. He bids Jaemin goodbye from his window and watches him hobble away and out of view. He opens instagram because it’s instinct for Chenle to see what others are doing and rot his mind with social media appearances to prevent the chance of a thought occuring, and he finds himself clicking on Jaemin’s profile. There’s one story (compared to Chenle’s 10 about the food and the dessert the weather and the goddamn fucking bubble blower). It’s a picture of Chenle squished against Jaemin’s chest and Jaemin beaming with his mouth open like he’s going to eat him. The text on the screen reads Me with my cute fuckass cat. And Chenle deems it appropriate. He opens Jaemin and his chat. Despite having just said goodbye to him, Chenle strikes up a conversation immediately.

good. now nobody’s going to think you got dumped

so generous of u

ur good at this whole being a pretend boyfriend thing.

That he is. 

🦋

Dilemma decides to strike on a sunny Sunday morning.

“Can we go camping?” Jeno sinks onto the cafe table, bottom lip jutted out, eyes all pitiful and adorable. Mark rubs his back comfortingly, and turns to stare at the rest of them to strengthen Jeno’s case. Like his twinkling doe eyes weren’t enough along with Jeno’s little pout, Mark also adds, “Please? He’s been buying camping gear all week.” 

Jeno shakes his head, pout deepening. The entire table breaks into groans, knowing that their fates are set. Chenle vaguely muses that they’re made for each other. Two masters of manipulation and weaponized cuteness. He wonders if one of them has ever just resorted to being cute to snake his way out of an argument. Jaemin comes to the table bearing all their drinks, and Chenle sighs. Couldn’t be them. He goes back to answering emails on his phone.

Jaemin cutely recites all their orders and gives each person their respective beverage. Chenle’s the last, and right after setting his warm latte onto the table Jaemin plops down onto his seat beside him with his own drink of choice which happens to be death compressed into a cute, tiny little disarming cup. Chenle sips, thank goodness he doesn’t scald his tongue, and wonders if Jaemin even sleeps at night. Does he even need to? Strange guy. What does he do with all that time then? 

“What were you guys talking about?” Jaemin chimes up. Donghyuck tries to dramatically let his head fall onto the table, Renjun is yet again faster in cushioning any collisions. Jeno and Mark…they turn to Jaemin like a pair of scheming meerkats. Chenle opts to stare at a wilting flower outside the window, a strange thrum inside his head making itself known. He was on the brink of pulling an all-nighter just a few hours ago, so it’s strange to be out and about like this when he feels like he’s had a taste of death (the other death, stress induced, not Jaemin’s coffee of course).

Jisung points at the devils, “We’re going camping. No you can’t say no, just look at them.” 

So Jaemin does. And he doesn’t seem too dissatisfied with what he sees. He claps his hands together and nods, “Niceee. The weather’s so good this time around too. Do you guys want a lodge? I’ll rent us a nice lodge.”

Jeno looks a little guilty at the mention of so much spending. He scratches the back of his neck sheepishly, “Won’t just a little camping van be enough? Or maybe two..?”

“Nonsense,” Jaemin says, smiling into his coffee. 

Chenle hunches onto his drink and emerges with a foam mustache. Jaemin bumps his shoulders with him, “It’s our first trip together too. I want it to be memorable.” 

“For the love of everything good and your own wellbeing, don’t you dare kiss me in front of these losers,” Chenle grumbles. Jaemin tries to mimic the disdain in his expression and it’s a fun little watered down version that doesn’t leave Chenle feeling too offended. He doesn’t kiss him, and the others don’t question the lack of PDA. It’s just Jaemin being Jaemin and Chenle being Chenle. And keeping up the facade is as easy as that.

But Jaemin does reach out and hold Chenle steady with a hand to his nape and he does swipe a thumb over Chenle’s lip to make him look less like a miserably soppy cat, when he could well just leave him be. And the aftereffects of his care and concern, be it pretend or real, does wake Chenle up more than the caffeine does. He finds himself sipping with a little more care to not be messy. Renjun throws him a look which Chenle skillfully evades.

Jaemin is competitive, Chenle reminds himself. He’s been pretending so well, Jaemin must’ve wanted to up his own game. Every actor has his own flair, and this is just Jaemin’s own garnish to their play. 

🦋

Camping does not end up being fun, and the weather does not end up being anything near ideal. In a way, Chenle feels like he called this internally. He just had this gut feeling…and this nose feeling…something in his sinuses spoke to him…okay he just caught a cold. 

Jaemin was the one to graciously pick him up from his home, that he definitely remembered the address to and did not get lost 50 times in one hour. It’s fine not everybody has perfect memory like Chenle, and Jaemin does have much too big a pride to be earnestly admitting that he was on the wrong route the entire way, it’s okay. Chenle understands. And honestly, he was a little too miserable to fight. 

Turns out the thrum in his head from the cafe was not just an omen of disaster, but also the sign of illness. So cue Chenle hobbling down the road and into Jaemin’s car dressed in an abnormal amount of layers, muffler wrapped around his neck, cheeks all red and a tissue pressed to his nose. He didn’t even manage to pack much, but he did grab a tissue box from his kitchen before he left that’s been coming in handy. Then cue torrential downpour, Jaemin getting them lost yet again to the lodge that he booked himself (which is the only redeeming task he did), a sweet nap with the pitter patter of raindrops to drown out the noise of Jaemin mumbling and spewing nonsense, and the rest of their friends waiting miserably for them indoors. 

They couldn’t get the campfire going even if they wanted to, and even doing so much as setting a foot outdoors was impossible without ending up a sopping muddy mess. Nobody packed rain boots or raincoats, and they only had 3 umbrellas for 7 people. Mark tried to gather them all to lift their spirits by making them horrible tasting little cups of hot cocoa, and Jeno made a sweet attempt to roast marshmallows together by the indoor fireplace which ended up being an almost fire hazard. But even just leaving things be wasn’t absolutely terrible. 

Renjun thankfully brought groceries with him, and Jisung brought board games and a tiny projector for them to watch movies together. Jaemin deemed that they could just treat it like a little staycation.

Mark’s hot cocoa left Chenle feeling a little queasy, so he ended up excusing himself early on. Since then, he’s just been lying around in his room of choice, with all the lights off and the tissue box from home his only companion. He didn’t even notice when the sun went down, so when Donghyuck beckons him to go down for dinner Chenle is pleasantly surprised. He says he’ll be down in a minute, but he doesn’t end up going. Bundled in his blanket, Chenle rolls around the bed miserably while staring at his phone. His limbs ache and his head feels close to exploding. Whoever’s praying for his downfall must be trying particularly hard today. 

Another half an hour passes. Distantly, he can hear the others having dinner—they’re too rowdy to miss. Another knock resounds on his door and Chenle only groans in response. “Go away.” 

The person on the other end does not listen. The door knob turns slowly and the door itself is opened cautiously. Jaemin peers in, looks around and has to let his eyes adjust to the darkness before he spots Chenle in bed, just being a sad little lump. Him coming in makes a stripe of light enter the room and Chenle has to squint to look at him properly. 

Jaemin smiles soft, “I don’t think I will. Got you dinner.” 

He turns on a lamp, that is thankfully dim enough to not hurt Chenle’s eyes, and sits on the edge of the bed. Chenle feels the mattress dip, and a tray is set down on his lap. He stares at the bowl of noodle soup, and his stomach growls. 

Jaemin points at it, “This was a team effort, can’t take all the credit for it,” Then he points at the medicine beside the bowl, “This is all me. You were so sniffly and quiet during the ride here.” 

Chenle shrugs and when he speaks his voice is all clogged and nasally, “My smart mouth is worthy of missing.”

The glass of water and medicine are placed on the bedside table. Chenle pulls the tray closer to him and grips the spoon to take his first sips. It isn’t scalding, probably because it’s been a while since dinner was served, but it’s still pleasantly warm enough to soothe his throat. Chenle never has been one to lose his appetite when sick, so he easily finishes the dinner without putting up much fuss. Jaemin sits and waits for him. When he’s done, Jaemin moves the tray away and presses a hand to Chenle’s forehead. He pulls away with a tsk, “Could iron my clothes with your head.” 

Chenle frowns, “I hate you.” 

Jaemin sighs and repeats for the hundredth time in his life, “I know.” He hands Chenle his medicine, which Chenle swallows with no complaints, and then leaves the room momentarily. Chenle takes the opportunity to grab his phone again and stare at his current dilemma. He pulls his bottom lip in with his teeth and gnaws till it feels like it may bleed. It’s misery on top of misery on top of misery for him today it seems. 

Jaemin comes in at the worst moment and decides to make his life even more difficult. He turns down the temperature of the air conditioning and brings a bowl of cold water with a towel submerged in it to sponge Chenle’s forehead and neck. Chenle squirms away from him when he tries, and Jaemin scoots closer to no avail. 

“Stop being difficult, come here,” He scolds. Chenle’s frown deepens and he shoos Jaemin, pulling his phone closer. 

“Why can’t you go away? I had medicine, I’ll live,” Chenle rolls his eyes and turns away.

Jaemin sighs, organizing the thermometer and medicine beside the bowl of water in order before dropping his hands onto his lap in defeat, “I’m taking care of you.” 

“You don’t have to.” 

“Everybody’s worried, so I do.”

“Just send someone else.” Chenle snaps at him. The others aren’t nearly as persistent as him, and it’s easy to send them off. Sometimes when Chenle is too annoyed and on the verge of saying things he doesn’t mean, the others are spooked enough to leave him be for the sake of avoiding arguments. Jaemin isn’t afraid of upsetting Chenle to death, so he’ll never leave till he gets what he wants. It’s a real pain in the ass. He’s like a living fever suppository.

“Donghyuck is hogging Renjun, do you really think anyone else could do this?” Jaemin raises his eyebrow and gestures towards the bowl and the medicine. Chenle turns to see them all neat. He actually takes a moment to seriously give Jaemin’s question a thought. Troubleshooting with him may just help to get him to leave.

“Jeno…,” Chenle begins and then stops short. He shakes his head, “Mark hyung?” 

Jaemin scoffs distantly. The suggestion seems to be the last straw so he quits humoring Chenle’s fuss. Jaemin reaches for the bowl and begins preparing to sponge Chenle again. Water splashes into the bowl as he wrings out the towel. “Him? Never. I had to help him like this the last time he had a fever. At least you’re not throwing up all the time too…but I still don’t know if your snapiness is a good tradeoff either… Chenle? Hello, are you even listening?”

Absolutely not. Chenle is completely sucked into his and Kun’s messages, and the both of them are typing so quickly that it may as well be a texting competition. 

Jaemin seems to have reached his limit. He purses his lips, rolls his sleeves up to his elbows, and snatches Chenle’s phone from him. 

“Asshole, give it back!” Chenle slumps over and wriggles his way to Jaemin. He gets pushed into lying down and a damp towel pressed to his forehead. Jaemin didn’t even bother folding it, so a portion of it hangs over Chenle’s eyes. Jaemin sets the phone away, well beyond Chenle’s reach, and holds him by the arms to keep him still. 

“You’re such a baby.” He muses out loud, in what seems to be disbelief. Chenle vaguely registers him wiping his own forehead with the back of his hand like all this really worked up a sweat. “You’re fucking addicted to your phone you know?” 

“I’m not,” Chenle whines, trying to defend himself. “I just have things going on. So give it back. Now.” 

“Not happening,” Jaemin mutters. He pulls away the towel, wets it and wrings it out again before pressing it onto Chenle’s neck. Chenle shivers underneath the coldness of it, and Jaemin runs a soothing hand down his arm. He leaves the towel once Chenle adjusts, and pulls away. “What is going on with you anyways that’s so important that you’re literally worrying yourself sick- er? ”

“Long story.” Chenle quips and then seals his mouth suspiciously.

Jaemin gives him a doubtful onceover. Then he shrugs, “I got time.” 

Chenle glares, but Jaemin’s looking at him with big, sparkly, annoyingly expectant eyes that he just can’t evade. Jaemin blinks twice placatingly, and that has Chenle sighing in defeat. He points at Jaemin with two fingers and gestures for him to look into his eyes, “You have to listen very attentively okay?” 

“Please,” Jaemin rolls his eyes and scoots further onto bed. “I never listen to gossip without being attentive. You’ve got me invested a hundred percent.” He promises. Chenle stares at him for a minute, and once he has whatever implicit green signal he was looking for, he nods. Clearing his throat, Chenle lies onto bed and stares at the ceiling. It’ll help him picture things better. Figuring this out is a lot like rocket science actually. To him, at least.

“So let’s say I know person A and person B. And it’s person A’s birthday…and I wished them happy birthday. But person A adores person B and person B is not too sentimental…a little forgetful…ironically a super type A person if you know what I mean. Fuck I hope this isn’t confusing. But anyways I reminded person B to wish person A, and they were like…I already did lol. I just feel like I assumed the worst of them and now they’ll know and be angry with me and person A is going to think I’m going around gathering wishes for them out of pity and that I really shouldn’t meddle and they’ll both hate me and bitch about me. I just wanted to be happy but I can’t help but feel like a bad person who secretly wants to drive a wedge between them. Yeah that’s it,” Chenle closes his eyes, and finally breathes again after all the rambling. 

Somewhere in the middle of it all, Jaemin took away the damp towel and Chenle scooted all the way over to the wall and Jaemin took the opportunity to lie down beside him and now, when he turns, Chenle finds himself face to face with Jaemin. They’re shoulder to shoulder at first, but Jaemin moves to support his head up and stare at Chenle face on. “Do you?” 

Chenle tries to adjust to the proximity, but he feels a little winded, “What?”

“Do you want to drive a wedge between them?”

“No!” Chenle reels as he says this. Then he gulps and returns, eyebrows still knitted and face all twisted like he’s bitten into a lemon, “Never.” 

Jaemin shrugs, “Then nothing’s wrong.” 

“But what if they think I want to.” Chenle speaks through a pout and his voice comes out uncharacteristically small. It would be a lie to say that it doesn’t embarrass him, but he also trusts Jaemin to not try and joke about it now.

Jaemin stops and stares. The room goes quiet and Chenle can hear him breathe. He can notice things with a little more clarity now that the fever is on its way to being subdued, and Jaemin’s presence is practically engulfing him. “Well. Why do their opinions get to be right? Why can’t it be what you think?” 

“Well,” Chenle looks away and begins to spew random things while trying to gather an excuse. He gestures wildly with his hands like that’ll help conjure more of his brain cells, “Why of course…Well obviously…I mean. You know? It’s just…It’s like that. It has to be like that.” 

An airy chuckle leaves Jaemin when he finds Chenle stumped. Now making fun of this…Chenle couldn’t stop Jaemin if he tried. He really brought this onto himself the second he opened his mouth. Of course his problems are outlandish, they always are. Chenle could overthink himself in circles for an entire lifetime. At least Kun’s reached a point with him where Chenle’s little meltdowns don’t come as a shock to him anymore. And he’s always more than happy to bestow some guidance and quote the latest book that’s on his self improvement to-read roster while he’s at it. Jaemin’s advice is less diving into the miseries of life together and more You Fool, This Is What I End You With.

Chenle’s expecting humiliation and mortification, wanting to bury his head into dirt and never emerge or have Earth swallow him up. He’s expecting the absolute grating noise of Jaemin bursting into cackles and his own pride to be stepped all over. 

Chenle’s expecting anything but Jaemin pulling him into his chest and aggressively ruffling his hair. Sure his shoulders shake with laughter but it’s not the kind that Chenle feels comfortable taking offense to. Today he smells like lavender, and he’s just as warm as the last time. Chenle doesn’t know why it takes him off guard…it’s not like Jaemin’s an undercover vampire or a baked good that’ll grow cold.  And Chenle wonders why thinking about Jaemin’s warmth all of a sudden trumps the fact that he can’t breathe, all congested and being in this death embrace. It’s the perfect way to take him out, goodness, Jaemin must loathe him.

Jaemin rests his head on top of Chenle’s and sighs in satisfaction. “You’re so cute and stupid today.” 

Chenle tries to turn and glare, but Jaemin’s touch is as firm as it is gentle, and it keeps him in place, pressed to Jaemin’s collarbone. Chenle gives in and buries a groan in the crook of his neck. Should he lick him? Maybe licking him could get him to let go. It sure works wonders when Jaemin finds himself in similarly trapped situations and he gives them a lick. But then again, Jaemin is Jaemin and he’s exactly the kind of person whose first instinct to free himself is to dart his tongue out and give a silly goofy little lick. That’s not Chenle. That’ll never be Chenle. 

Jaemin pats his back, “I don’t know why you’re so hell bent on not believing it but—you’re a good person too, you know.”

Jaemin is so fucking stupid and he licks people sometimes if he needs to for fuck’s sake, but Chenle buys into his confidence for once. It’s certainty he craves, and Jaemin never lies to him.

🦋

It isn’t often that Chenle fails at rudimentary tasks. But this morning he burned his toast and got soap in his eyes and found a hole in his sock and scalded his tongue at the expense of being late to class, so you can probably tell what sort of day he’s been having. A three hour lecture in the evening hardly sounds fair, but nothing ever is. The world is a shitshow somehow wobbling by, and Chenle is only one man currently dozing off in aforementioned three hour hell class. The professor doesn’t notice and the class content isn’t really useful at all when all Chenle’s going to end up doing is cram read the lecture slides before exams, so it’s not an issue. 

The only dilemma is Kun being the teacher’s assistant. 

When he gets jostled awake and a rolled up handout bonking the top of his head, Chenle thinks he really should’ve seen this coming and worn a helmet to class too. 

“Do you want to fail?” Kun looms over him, eyebrow raised and one hand on his hip. His lips are pulled into a straight line and his brows are knitted in disdain. Sure he looks half constipated but the expression also causes his cheek dimples to make an appearance. 

Chenle dramatically nurses the top of his head and groans, “Do you want me to? You just killed a couple of my brain cells.” 

“Good,” Kun says, and Chenle’s words earn him a few more bonks. Kun finally safely deposits the handout on top of the desk, and Chenle pulls it towards him to quickly scribble his name on top. Kun has to move around a little to excuse the people who need to pass by him. The class begins to clear out. “Dinner before or after?” 

Chenle makes a noise of frustration, haphazardly stuffing his belongings into his bag, “After. Always after and then dessert, you already know.” 

It’s become routine at this point—going to play basketball every last weekday night with Kun to work through the frustrations of the week. They have teams and everything. When the really legitimate college players make an appearance, sometimes they just sit on the sidelines. The others like watching the current game unfolding in front of their eyes, but Chenle enjoys watching Curry matches on his phone and swinging his legs and giggling and falling backwards and sideways until Kun forces him to sit straight. The fact that this class happens to be timed perfectly enough for Chenle and Kun to head there together is just a nice coincidence. Chenle admits that the universe has done him a few favors. 

They exit, backpacks slung over shoulders and poking and prodding at each other. Chenle is nothing if not the bane of Kun’s existence, and Kun is nothing if not the most impatient person on Earth around him. Chenle reveals a giant bottle of soda and guzzles nearly a quarter of it down and hiccups. Kun stares at him in distaste, all elegant academia in his delicate cardigan, the poster child enthusiast of little drinks. “You’re unbelievable. It’s unbelievable that you’re alive.” 

“The thought of murdering you with stress one day is what keeps me going to be honest,” Chenle bats his eyelashes up at him and rubs his face against Kun’s arm like a cat. 

They have company, but Chenle doesn’t even realize it till company clears his throat and pushes himself off a wall to walk over and finally approach them. Chenle is a little pleasantly surprised. Very rare for a booty call to come see you after class, chivalry may not be dead after all. 

“Jisung said I could catch you here,” Jaemin scratches the back of his neck awkwardly. 

Chenle blinks at him a couple of times, “Okay…and?” 

“Right. Do you want to grab a drink or…?” His eyes flick between Kun and Chenle. Jaemin knows Kun vaguely. He knows a bit of the basics from hearsay and Renjun, and he’s seen him around parties, but that’s it. They’ve never really had to interact before, and Chenle never did tell him how close they were—not that he even had to, really. It never came up, and that’s just how it is between them. 

Chenle’s sudden surge of after class hyperness (very likely caused by that soda) causes him to swing an arm around Jaemin’s neck and startle him. “Sorry baby boy, I’ve got plans.” 

Oh and Jaemin hates that. He hates it so much, Chenle call feel it emanating from him. It causes his lips to lift into a cheeky grin. “That’s Kun by the way. Kun ge, this is Jaemin.” 

Chenle pauses, touch on Jaemin stiffening fractionally. Second to Jaemin, Kun’s the one person he’s always been honest to. He hates to lie to him, and Kun’s kept too many of his secrets to be doubtful, but news of fake dating is just something that would make him run straight to Renjun in concern to stage an intervention. So Chenle wraps an arm around Jaemin’s waist a little more naturally, and Jaemin is quick to lean into him too. Two little pats on Jaemin’s chest and a beam sent in Kun’s direction, “My boyfriend.” 

Kun narrows his eyes and goes into defensive stance, arms crossed over his chest. “Boyfriend you say?” He stares Jaemin down and Jaemin shrinks a little under the intense gaze. He can be an insanely prideful person, sure, but Kun’s judging glare can be scary for even the most confident of people. Chenle’s positive if Kun asked him what 1+1 was and then glared at him like that, he’d answer two and then just die from the shame of being wrong. But Kun’s not in charge of quizzing him in math and he’s left his kindergarten introduction to math classes far enough in the past to fear nothing now. 

Kun turns to Chenle and smiles. Chenle smiles back, all whisker dimples on display and cheeks hurting. “He should come with us then.” 

“Okay!” Chenle chirps forcefully and turns to Jaemin, “Come with us!” 

“Uh sure…” Jaemin says and unsurely follows Chenle to wherever it is that the pair are dragging him to. They walk to the park and Jaemin is introduced to everybody else on their little unofficial team. They have to act all lovey dovey all squished together, and emulate the strongest honeymoon phase never breaking up going to buy a farm together energy they can muster. They do catch a break when waiting for a few more people to arrive, and Chenle drags Jaemin to sit down on one of the benches. 

The air is cold and Jaemin sniffles, stuffing his hands in his pocket and sitting down like an old man with bad knees. People can still see them, so they’re still holding hands. Maybe the cold is minutely unbearable, so Jaemin gives his palm a little squeeze. Reciprocation is polite, so Chenle squeezes back. Silent moral support to fight the cold conversation over, Chenle turns to him properly. “Sorry you got dragged there…sort of impromptu. But what did you want?”

“What.” Jaemin asks dumbly staring at Chenle. A breeze blows by and messes up his hair. A few strands stick up and it makes him look dumber. It’s fitting so Chenle lets him be. 

“Why did you stop by?” 

“Oh. Well,” Jaemin begins awkwardly, “This works out perfectly actually, like I think I came exactly for this you know it was fated…,” 

Chenle stares at him with a deadpan look that makes Jaemin’s rapid rambling slow to a halt. “Right…okay…getting serious. Well I just. You’ve been a boyfriend to me right…you went to a party with me and let me exploit your precious time. So I just wanted to be a better boyfriend to you too.” 

And it’s the oddest reason Chenle’s ever heard. Sure their relationship is essentially give and take. Sex for sex, dating for their own personal agendas, but Chenle never thought that any of them would ever feel the need to owe one another emotionally. It’s a warm thing. Like buying your friend a cookie because they paid for your coffee last week; paying for a loved ones train ticket only to be repaid with them getting you something you need. Chenle being a “good” boyfriend according to Jaemin’s standards, and Jaemin wanting to rise up to do the same. The shoe fits, but it’s not them. It’s not what they’re supposed to be. And yet, Chenle welcomes it anyway, because he doesn’t know what else to do with it. 

“Okay…I’m sorry if you get bored though. We can get drinks afterwards?” Jaemin nods and Chenle sighs in relief. 

He guides Jaemin over to the bleachers that everybody else watching the game will be sitting at, and Jaemin pulls him in to kiss his cheek for good luck once Kun comes around. Chenle leaves him and walks over to his teammates. He takes off his hoodie to reveal his jersey underneath, and begins to warm up, giddiness coursing through his veins. It begins with a few basic drills, practicing their passes and dribbling in figure eights around their legs. They do a couple of layups and casual shots, and Chenle loses himself in fucking around with the guys. He finds himself heaving and doubling over in laughter. 

Chenle makes sure to check on Jaemin every time he goes over to drink water, and finds him sitting there all pretty and attentive. Jaemin cheers the loudest and boos with the most solemnity Chenle’s ever seen. And he’s there, just swinging his legs and giggling and falling backwards and sideways with nobody to hold him straight. At one point Chenle thinks he sees Jaemin obediently holding onto one of his teammates’s girlfriend’s purse, but he’s ducking under a defender and chasing down a rebound before he can even begin to dwell on how funny it is. 

It’s all fine till it’s not. Everything is serene until Chenle ends up pulling a Chenle.

It begins simply enough to not warrant much caution. A motherfucker on the opposing team double dribbles, gets called out on it and has the gall to vehemently deny. Chenle’s temper rises to his scalp and beyond. It’s smirks and snarks, and Chenle doesn’t even realize it when the ball hits the ground a final time, and everybody falls dead silent in dread. One shove. Chenle isn’t the first one to make physical contact. But fuck him if he isn’t enough of a saint to trample on the impulse to shove back. A fist heads his way in no time and Chenle is ready to be pummeled into this very court. 

Thing about lessons is—it always hurts more when somebody else gets yours. 

The punch doesn’t land on Chenle’s cheek, but a body falls at his feet. A collision does occur but it’s not him. There’s no damage where there should be, but there is a collateral caught in the crossfire. 

Kun steps in and thankfully stops matters from escalating, but the deed is done. There’s blood by his feet already, staining the white borders red, many shades darker than the worn and weathered color of the court. “Are you stupid?” Chenle drops to his knees and pulls Jaemin into him. He cradles his jaw and tilts his head up to get a better look. Jaemin hisses. He’s got a busted lip that looks pretty bad, but no serious damage otherwise. 

Jaemin presses a hand to the wound and pulls away with a streak of blood on his skin. His eyes flick to Chenle, to his lips which should’ve been bleeding now instead of Jaemin. “Are you stupid?”

They never did learn to communicate efficiently during intense conflict. 

The walk to the nearest convenience store is silent. It’s surprisingly not the discomforting kind. Chenle is mostly zoning out. He feels a little displaced from reality. Things barely disrupt the natural flow of his life—which in this case would’ve been getting punched in the face for being an asshole and then feeling sorry for himself while marinating in the realizations that come with consequence. But Jaemin is the biggest disruption to date. He shakes the very foundations Chenle builds his own stability on and makes him question himself. Most of all, every sincere thing he does embarrasses Chenle. It paints his real feelings neon and makes it known and solid and there; makes it something more real than just things swimming around Chenle’s own head. 

They buy medicine and snacks, and Chenle pays (half sheepish and half passive aggressive) because that’s the least he could do. Jaemin presses a cool can of soda against his lips and blankly glares at the poor nervous cashier. Chenle has to usher him past the front doors and sit him down on the curb because there’s nowhere else to go in the vicinity and he thinks both of them are far too tired to look. The light from the store submerges them in a fluorescent glow, and Chenle sits silently beside Jaemin with a cotton bud and tube of ointment in each hand, holding them more like weapons and defenses than an ailment. 

Jaemin doesn’t look at him initially. And when he does, Chenle wishes that he never did. 

It’s obvious how he tries figuring Chenle out. How he’s mentally piecing together fragments of knowledge gathered from the time of being by Chenle’s side and really acknowledging him. Chenle is no stranger to this look. It’s happened at some point with every hookup he’s had. And he never imagined Jaemin getting so close, but here he is. Here they are. Jaemin sets the can of soda onto the asphalt and raises an eyebrow expectantly. 

Chenle puts ointment on the corner of Jaemin’s lips. He does this purely and only because there are no mirrors around, and Jaemin really seems like the type to eat the ointment accidentally instead. Chenle doesn’t want to look at him during it. Jaemin doesn’t want to look away. His gaze is so clearly incriminating this time that Chenle thinks he’s going to implode any minute now. Maybe Jaemin’s trying to do something via telekinesis. “You like that don’t you? You enjoy riling people up.”

Irritation barely masked, Chenle’s eyes flick to Jaemin’s in silent disapproval of his accusation. 

“Am I wrong?” Jaemin is speaking far too much and without caution. At this point he’s going to eat ointment under Chenle’s care. Chenle wonders whether or not he should actually squeeze the entire tube onto his tongue the next time he speaks.

Sometimes it feels like Jaemin can see through him. Feels like he’s the voice in Chenle’s head, or that he’s been secretly pressing up against his skull and listening to the thoughts right as they form. Jaemin’s like all his demons personified. And sometimes this—his disappointment expressed so blunt and unabashed—makes Chenle want to shrivel up and disappear.

“Does it matter?” Chenle manages to retort, “We’ve known each other for an entire decade and that wasn’t enough for us to be even vaguely interested in one another. Don’t start now.” 

Jaemin halts Chenle from fussing over the injury by holding his hand still and then pushing it down to his lap. Chenle lets them fall limp. He was caring for Jaemin out of guilt, but if he won’t have the nice treatment, then who is Chenle to push?  “You really don’t think that’s worth changing.” 

“You’re like Renjun,” Chenle rolls his eyes and that seems to give Jaemin all the more ammo to scrutinize him further. 

“Is he so wrong?” 

Chenle’s mind wanders to when Renjun sincerely suggested they date, and his eyes take in all of Jaemin, bruised and bloody and cranky. “When it comes to you? Always. It’s crazy, it’s like they don’t know you.”

“And you think they know you? You always lie.” Jaemin huffs. If he takes offense to Chenle’s words, then some other absurd emotion must overtake it because Jaemin actually musters a little smile. It’s not intentional, it feels like one of those grins you just can’t stop from splitting across your face. Not Jaemin’s usual eat-you-up kind, but something a bit more genuine, “Maybe they do know me Chenle. Maybe it’s you who doesn’t. You’re all up in your own head, deciding that what you think is universal. It’s not.” 

Chenle does take offense to that and it does show on his face. Jaemin must think it’s cute with the way he reaches out and ruffles his hair before carding through the strands on his nape. He sighs in what seems like defeat, “I don’t like you. I don’t like people like you who decide things for themselves and are so okay with their own company and their own opinions. It makes the world lonely. Your world is so lonely.” 

It should be patronizing. If this conversation took place even a month ago, Chenle would take it as such and hurl all sorts of curses at Jaemin. But just as Jaemin has come to learn his habits, Chenle’s picked up a few things about him too. If there’s one thing Jaemin can do in his sleep, it’s keeping a facade. This is not one of them. It’s Jaemin real and raw and blunt, striking Chenle in the ribs with his words only to extend an arm to help keep him from toppling over. And he reaches over secretly to untie whatever it is that’s got Chenle’s guard pulled so taut. 

The conversation seems casual enough to allow vulnerability, adrenaline from the fight something Chenle can delude himself into thinking is comparable to the tipsiness from a few drinks. The words bubble up on his tongue with ease. A truth, “There’s no space.” 

Jaemin looks perplexed and Chenle continues slowly because it’s difficult picking out the right words, “There’s too much of everything in the world. Too much happiness, too many things happening, too much pain. And there’s no space for me to put mine. Nobody’s going to listen because nobody is mine. What is the point in being real and putting my pride out, like a slab of meat in front of a lion, for the world to consume?”

Jaemin is silent for a long time. Then he says something that would’ve perhaps been better left unsaid, “I’d listen to you.”

Chenle really looks at him. This boy who sought him out just in the name of being a better pretend boyfriend. This boy who cheered for him, took a punch for him, tried piecing him together and peeling his layers, and managed to make a dent in his wall of defense. He’s sitting here and his shoulder presses against Chenle’s. To test the waters Chenle tries leaning against him and he’s there and solid, and he doesn’t let Chenle fall. Chenle doesn’t know squat about what he likes or hates, but finds himself wanting to crack Jaemin open and see what makes him. 

Maybe he’s right, and maybe Renjun’s right too. Chenle doesn’t know Jaemin, and that may just be worth changing. 

🦋

The next week, on campus, Chenle makes an attempt to extend an olive branch. He says yes to Renjun’s invitation to eat together in the cafeteria, something that he’d generally just reject in favor of convenience store food and catching up on notes. Chenle does go some days when he’s gone the entire morning with the bare minimum amount of human interaction and is in dire need of speaking to someone, and he generally tries to hangout like this whenever his schedule isn’t packed. 

It’s usually crowded and rowdy, and somehow their table always takes the crown for being the loudest of them all. The guys are all fiends when they’re hungry, stealing food off each others’ trays and trading dessert for extra portions of what they like. It’s an experience. And Chenle hardly thinks it’s wise to be wasting his minutes like this when he’s got a quiz the next day, but the thought of Jaemin has been bugging him so much that this is better than just letting them fester.

Jaemin is there on time. He’s always there on time—because Mark takes punctuality seriously and Mark’s always there on time too. Jaemin might be generally lazy, but when it matters he makes sure that every minute counts. And Mark matters to him far more than anything else. 

A eureka moment strikes Chenle just as he plucks a tray and stands in line, eyeing their table in the distance. 

Mark. Maybe he should begin knowing Jaemin by knowing Mark. Because ever so irritating Jaemin bends and breaks parts of his life to make them align for love. That’s one thing he likes—love. And one person he loves—Mark. Imaginary tallies run through Chenle’s mind and he assigns a role for himself in Jaemin’s life too—a welcome distraction. 

He makes it through the line, tray full of food and a second serving of pudding because he batted his pretty eyelashes up at the guy working there and used the cutest voice he could muster. Chenle’s got tricks to make aegyo a little more digestible, it’s a natural talent. Jisung spots him first, begins drumming his fingers on the table to everybody else’s confusion, “This afternoon’s guest of honor…Zhong…Chen….Le —ouch.”

Jaemin flicks Jisung’s forehead when he finds Chenle rolling his eyes into oblivion at the antics. Jaemin pouts, and Chenle notes that he resembles a duck when he nags. He puts it in the list of things to know about Jaemin—government assigned animal option one: duck.

“Don’t do that. Embarrassment isn’t good for the baby.”

“What baby?” Donghyuck chimes. Renjun and him put their things down and sigh at the long line they’ll have to stand behind to get their food. Renjun fishes inside his bag for his wallet and Donghyuck leans into the table with interest.

And at the same time, Jeno straightens up from where he was occupied with Mark and bends over the table to regard them with critique,“I don’t think it’s supposed to go like that…”

“I’m baby,” Chenle grumbles anyways, plopping down beside Jaemin when he beckons him over with open arms and the promise to be held like he’s actually been missed. They rehearsed this once, during the very beginnings of their little relationship scheme. Jeno’s face twists up and Mark glances at them with a grin, murmuring dude and then giggling at Chenle’s still soured face. Donghyuck groans and thankfully gets dragged away by Renjun before he can begin with his complaints. At least Chenle can take one bite without having to run his mouth in an argument already.

Jaemin and him bypass the awkwardness of whatever happened before the weekend like this, and Chenle couldn’t be happier that the icky emotional and vulnerable atmosphere is no longer lingering. He knows better, but for the sake of his own pride just chalks it up to Jaemin just forgetting it ever happened. 

Jaemin punctures a straw into Chenle’s drink for him, then does the same for Jisung and offers to reach all the way across the table and do it for Jeno too while his own drink sits unattended and waiting. Chenle reaches out and does it for him absentmindedly, gaze lingering on Jaemin’s profile. His love language…definitely acts of service. Taking care of him when he was sick…and Chenle thinks he vaguely remembers Jaemin mentioning he does the same thing to Mark. This one’s something that doesn’t take a genius to figure out. But he’ll need better information and he’s got a mission in mind. 

Chenle stares at Jaemin until Jaemin’s forced to look his way. He sends an awkward smile his way, couples it with a wave when the cogs in Chenle’s head take a tad too long to turn. 

“Do you like pudding?” Chenle offers up his extra cup politely, with a spoon and all neatly kept on the lid. 

“Ooh choco. Nice,” Jaemin grabs it immediately without a word of thanks. Chenle suppresses the urge to roll his eyes and discreetly balls his fist on his thigh. He adds a few more things on his mental list about Jaemin—likes anything remotely related to chocolate + clearly hasn’t learned the 2 magic words by heart. 

Chenle takes the liberty to grab some stuff off Jaemin’s tray. When Jaemin shoots him a flabbergasted look, Chenle blinks at the pudding tub with clear emphasis. He smiles sweetly, looks around the table and catches multiple eyes, making their friends’ gazes flicker to them in interest, “You don’t mind do you babe?” 

Jaemin inhales through his nose, stuffs a spoonful of rice before speaking with a smile, “Of course not,” He piles a little more onto Chenle’s tray, and even manages to feed him a bite. 

“Thank you,” Chenle chews diligently and takes a sip of his drink. He turns to Jaemin, angling his shoulder in to murmur lowly so no one else may be privy to the conversation. Jaemin rolls a tongue in his cheek casually, leaning in too, almost automatically when he feels Chenle shift. “What’s your blood type?” 

Jaemin freezes. He turns his head properly to Chenle and knits his eyebrows together, “Are you going to murder me?” 

“Okay fine, then what’s your MBTI?” 

“Like I’d sit through any of those silly tests. Not in this economy.” Jaemin shakes his head and crosses his arms over his chest. Chenle suppresses the urge to roll his eyes, it is quite literally so rich coming from him when he’s loaded. But then again, Chenle assumes ambition knows no end..

“What’s your favorite weather then? And flower? And fruit? And color—fuck can’t believe I forgot the classic—,”

“Woah woah woah,” Jaemin grabs him by his shoulders, “Did you get abducted by aliens last night, genuinely? What are you trying to do?” 

Chenle clasps his hands together and falls silent. Good question. Valid question. But the answer is slightly more convoluted than what Chenle would feel comfortable explaining. How does he tell Jaemin where his brain just fixates on random things like these? And what he said in their last conversation has led to a realization that’s stuck in his mind like Jaemin superglued it in there with his own hands. Chenle’s begun doubting his perception of people. Could it really be that he’s misunderstood Jaemin this whole time? He thinks about Renjun and Jeno’s words about the bad blood between them and it makes him a little queasy. What if he has just never made enough effort. What more relationships is he destroying? Chenle has to get to the bottom of this or his social life will be up in flames. Of course this is for himself…absolutely not for Jaemin. But he doesn’t know how to explain it without sounding crazy. 

Thankfully solutions to such dilemmas exist in Chenle’s 200 IQ mind. Not tasteful solutions, sure, but they do. 

“Trying to get into your pants.” 

Jaemin raises an eyebrow, “And when were you going to ask me that? After you put me in an early grave with the rest of your questions?” 

Jaemin’s doubt actually reminds Chenle of another dilemma he’s been having and he groans, bumping his head onto the table. His forehead hits with a loud smack and it doesn’t hurt but it does garner attention that he doesn’t appreciate. Jaemin runs a fake affectionate hand through his strands. Chenle notes that his reflexes are not as quick as Renjun’s. Is it really fair that Donghyuck gets to act out and have forehead protection insurance while Chenle doesn’t? The universe can be cruel like that. But he digresses. The problem at hand needs more attention.

“I don’t know how to ask now that we’re boyfriends,” Chenle admits when all eyes are off them, “It just used to happen before you know?” 

Jaemin snorts. “That’s because I used to put in an effort. You’ve just never had to. I happened to be there conveniently.” 

Chenle pauses. He blinks once. Twice. A third time while thinking about all the times he and Jaemin hooked up. Yeah he never explicitly sought Jaemin out. Never even thought about sleeping with him or needing to let off steam like that specifically with him until Jaemin showed up and annoyed him to death and just ended up being the easy option to take home.

“Why would you?” Chenle asks a question that he knows will be his end this time if gone unanswered. 

“You hate me, so the sex is good. You hate me, so there will never be strings attached,” Jaemin shrugs, “Plus. I think everybody knows at this point that I make mooneyes just at Mark. Being disgustingly in love is a bit of a guy repeller.” He scrunches his nose up. And Chenle wonders how he can speak about his heart this openly. How he can put heartbreak so casually. No tears, no choked up voice, nothing. It feels like the most natural thing on Earth. 

And Chenle thinks maybe it’s just him. Maybe he’s a part of the population that sees love as some kind of an end to all things good instead of viewing it as a natural progression of affection; something that’ll ebb and flow at its own accord, something that you’re at ease with having no control over.

“Why would you? Like right now. Why are you making an effort?” Jaemin passes the question back at him. And it’s a good thing that Chenle thinks quick. 

He shrugs, lie easily slipping through, “I hate you so the sex is good. Helps get the frustration out of my system.” 

That’s one question he actually doesn’t have an answer to himself. 

🦋

That very night sees them at Chenle’s place for once. It’s a dump, if Chenle’s being honest. He feels a little embarrassed inviting Jaemin over. But for once he doesn’t want to go to Jaemin’s place and hate himself. He wants to be where he hates himself the most. Strange, but it makes sense in his own head so that’s all that matters. Jaemin doesn’t question it. He’s always been too nosy for his own good, one thing Chenle’s always known, so he follows him right over. Once inside, Chenle parks him by the front door although he knows Jaemin probably won’t stay, and quickly makes a round through the house to pluck strewn around trash and laundry and the hoards of water bottles lying around. 

He finds Jaemin in the kitchen, opening and closing dusty cupboards and cabinets. When their eyes meet the disapproval is clear. He says what Kun always says, “How are you still alive?” 

Cooking is a virtue, but Chenle’s skills unfortunately do not extend beyond making the occasional late night ramen and the perfectly runny-yolked fried egg. He nods solemnly at Jaemin, “Miracles do exist,” He gestures at himself. “Sometimes they’re this sexy.” 

Chenle ushers Jaemin towards the living room and peers into his fridge to grab them a couple of drinks to get the night going. When they’re together, Jaemin sitting on the only couch Chenle’s got and Chenle on the floor with his legs criss crossed, arranging their shot glasses in order, Jaemin looks around, “It’s cozy…but please never become an interior designer.” 

Chenle rolls his eyes, but accepts the critique. His place is decorated a little strangely, mostly bare with the exception of a few sentimental knick knacks that do nothing to establish any cohesive themes. Even when clean, this place wouldn’t exactly look like paradise. He pours Jaemin a drink first, watches Jaemin begin rudely drinking without him, and downs his own shot after a cheeky grin from Jaemin. The drinks go down easy, and the air feels bubbly and warm. In no time they’re both tipsy and red-cheeked. Jaemin is unbearably cute like this. Chenle crawls lazily into the couch and doesn’t care that his limbs bend uncomfortably to fit in beside Jaemin. 

Jaemin smiles. It’s a sloppy kind of grin that takes over his entire face and makes Chenle want to eat him up. He allows his head to tip forward until their foreheads touch, cradles Chenle’s jaw with one hand and allows his thumb to brush against his lip. It’s quiet for a little bit. And it’s easy just being like this. They could do a lot of things, they could do nothing at all and just stay, they’d both be sated either ways. Jaemin blinks slow and then quite crudely proposes, “Wanna get in my pants?” 

“Fuck off,” Chenle murmurs, voice low and gravelly. He wets his bottom lip and shifts to get a better view of Jaemin’s face, “But yeah. Make it easy like you always do.” 

And Jaemin does. He pulls Chenle onto his lap and kisses him. And Chenle helps by taking off both their shirts and leading them into the bedroom. When Chenle lays down this time there’s surprisingly no disconnect. His mind is here. It’s on Jaemin, watching the way he moves with an unfettered gaze. He hangs onto every little sharp intake of breath, every cadence of pleasure. The way Jaemin’s muscles flex under the strain of his actions, his eyelashes against his flushed cheeks, hair on his forehead and the look in his eyes. Good god the look in his eyes. 

In this moment, he can be Chenle’s. He is Chenle’s. And Chenle makes sure he revels every second of the attention and gives just as much back, makes sure Jaemin’s all kissed and marked up in all the spots he likes, every place that garners a reaction and makes Jaemin look at Chenle like he’s hanging stars in the sky.

When they’re done, Chenle presses up against Jaemin’s arm and Jaemin lies flat on his back, chest heaving. Chenle traces a finger up his jaw and Jaemin lets him. “Does doing this help?” The question comes to him out of the blue and escapes his lips before he knows it. 

Jaemin turns to him, “With what?” 

“With Mark,” Chenle stares up at him, trying to decipher what all the little shifts in Jaemin’s expression may mean. His eyes feel like bottomless labyrinths now. One that he’s not even allowed to enter, “You aren’t easy to read. Sometimes you’re just completely normal when you should be hurt and bitter, how do you not…I don’t know…get emotional.”

Jaemin purses his lips. And Chenle can visibly see him mulling over the task of taking the leap to open up, “I don’t know.” He looks away. Chenle would be happy with that and chide himself for being nosy, but Jaemin continues and Chenle finds himself moving closer. 

“Yeah it does affect me. Everything Mark does affects me. And some nights it feels like shit. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to cry every time I see him. I have bigger problems that take up my time, stuff Mark just wouldn’t understand. So if he’s happy like this, it works out for all of us as long as I’m not being immature. It’s better like this,” Jaemin turns to Chenle, tucking a hand under his cheek to stare comfortably, “But yeah you do help too. Sometimes it gets tough to bear the sight of them, but then you’ll just be there beside me acting like a goblin, and that’ll be enough to occupy my mind. I think I’d be a lot more miserable if I had to be alone.”

Why is Jaemin telling him all this? Sure they’re closer, and of course Chenle did obviously ask. But he really shouldn’t open up like this, because all it does is crack Chenle open with every word too. It’s an equivalent exchange, but a trade that none of them should’ve tried their hands at. 

“I get you. I don’t do that dating shit because I’ve got enough problems of my own,” Chenle sighs, “I’m broke and all my mom calls me for is to yell at me.”

“My dad communicates with me exclusively through emails…ghost written by his secretary,” Jaemin shrugs.

Chenle narrows his eyes. “Are you making this a competition?”

“No,” Jaemin shakes his head and it’s cute against the pillow, “Just comforting you. People can be so disorientingly normal sometimes. I don’t know…guess I just want to make it feel like we’re from the same world somehow. I feel like we are.” 

“Other people have their own stuff to be miserable about too, you know?” 

“I know. But they can pretend so well it makes me jealous. If everybody feels this jarring feeling everyday and manage to go on the way they do, and say the things they say, and laugh the way they laugh, then fuck me ‘cause I don’t think I’m a person. Or maybe I’m severely failing at being one.” 

Chenle feels the words hit too close to his own heart, so he sits up and hunches over his own knees. Sometimes he fails severely at being a person too. Jaemin shuffles around and Chenle doesn’t know what he’s doing until he’s bending over him and draping himself across Chenle’s back, leaning forward to nose the crook of his neck. There’s a cigarette between his teeth and Chenle holds back a groan. “Put that thing away.” 

“I’m not gonna light it indoors anyways, don’t nag.” 

And Chenle doesn’t. He just feels the weight of Jaemin’s solid chest against his back, trying to ignore the way his hair makes Chenle feel ticklish and how this is way more intimate than sex. “Do you think, if we tried to know each other a decade ago, all prejudices aside, we would’ve hit it off?” Would they have still been enemies? Or close friends? Or maybe more. Maybe in an alternate universe it’s Chenle that Jaemin fell for first, Mark a blip in the picture that appears much much later holding far less significance. 

“I can’t say. We were different people.” Jaemin murmurs into his skin, “We are different people. I won’t say we didn’t know what we were doing back then, but I guess this is just the natural progression of us.” 

Just them. Parallel lines for all their lives and closer now but still not quite meeting; constantly in orbit but no collision. 

Jaemin feels disgustingly real tonight. He clings onto Chenle a few seconds longer, unwilling to let go and then groans, “God give me courage to brave the cold and take this smoke break right now.” Before he’s shoving away the sheets.

It hits Chenle out of nowhere. When Jaemin scoots away and off the bed with an unwilling huff, Chenle feels himself grow too cold. A whine almost bubbles up his throat but he catches it prematurely. A plea for Jaemin to just stay. A minute longer, a second longer, humoring Chenle with sweet nothings the too-real-to-show-others introspective bits of him. He follows Jaemin with his eyes all the way till he’s out the bedroom door, feels a selfish swell in his pride when the hoodie Jaemin pulls over his sweatpants is Chenle’s, and holds his breath till the front door closes with a click. His heart does a flip and drops to his feet like a floundering fish out of water. And Chenle thinks of love.

Maybe all love is sometimes is a road not taken before. Maybe all love is is finding a monster inside yourself and then trying to forge the same monster in someone else just to make the walk a little less lonely. It's the unconventional way. But when affection goes unrequited, things just fester. 

Maybe all that’s comforting Jaemin is making a monster in Chenle. Maybe it was already there, slow to wake and quick to afflict. Maybe Chenle’s doomed by a beautiful boy who holds him and buries all his secrets in his kisses. Maybe Chenle knew all along and still let himself fall as some grand act of self sabotage.

Maybe Chenle’s just plain dumb. Dumb and in disgustingly in love for the first time in his life.

🦋

When love comes knocking on the door, and it is 100% guaranteed to be unrequited, similar to the stages of grief there is a certain order of reactions. At least this much is true when it comes to Chenle. The first phase is vehement denial. Chenle thinks back to all the times Jaemin annoyed him till he could feel his skin crawl from just being in close vicinity, only to find that now the rose colored lenses set into his eyes have colored those memories warm too. 

Next, he tries to convince himself it’s only infatuation. Close proximity and a stable pretend relationship will do that to you, he presumes, so he tries putting distance between them and avoiding Jaemin only to end up thinking about him even more. Missing him is a ruinous thing, it paints all of Chenle’s days blue and fogs over his priorities. Clearly, this doesn’t end up being a long term solution either. 

And the frustration of it makes anger follow next. He snaps at people, invokes hell on Earth wherever he goes and nearly gets into another tussle when playing basketball with Kun with no Jaemin to save him and Kun banning him from joining till he gets his head set straight again. But even then, nothing matters but the memory of Jaemin. The safety he’s instilled in Chenle. 

Chenle finds himself at his absolute wits end and just accepts it. He loves Jaemin. 

Chenle is in love with Jaemin—the disgusting, daydreaming about Jaemin, swinging his legs around and giggling at the thought of Jaemin, wanting to kiss Jaemin silly and shrink him and put him in a jacket pocket and zip him closed to gate keep him from the world, kind of love. But that doesn’t mean he has to do anything about it. 

He can just take a page from Jaemin’s books. He’ll just let it pass. Let it ebb and flow and roar and do whatever the fuck it has to in order to make it out of his system. Only he has to be a tad bit subtler than what Jaemin’s like with Mark. And he has to have a stronger reign on his emotions because of what Jaemin’s like with Mark. Chenle always has had a particularly strong jealousy streak.

Chenle has to do what he does best: suppress what he’s feeling. Should be easy enough.

Except the weekend finds him waiting for Jaemin in his apartment complex’s parking lot, and when Jaemin finally pulls into the property Chenle wants to melt into a puddle and just go down the nearest drain.

It’s almost time for midterms, and while smarter students would typically host parties after they’re done fighting for their lives to pass, their student body isn’t typically known for being the highest IQ cookies. So Chenle finds himself following his friends to a festival on campus. Is it smart? No. Is it fun? Yes. Would he have gone if he weren’t deeply in love with Jaemin? Absolutely not. But any excuse to see him is more than enough to have him running nowadays. Okay, Chenle thinks he may be going a little insane. But whatever, he'll worry about it back home. 

“Hey,” Jaemin rolls down the passenger side window. 

Chenle beams. But then he remembers. He rolls his eyes and clicks his tongue in feigned frustration, “Took you long enough.” 

Jaemin’s eyebrows knit together and goodness he’s just the cutest thing ever actually. Chenle is giggling manically in his head and spinning around and doing twirls and there’s rainbows and waterfalls and flowers up there. 

“I’m 10 minutes early though? Why were you out waiting in the cold?” 

Chenle purses his lips and says nothing. He gestures vaguely and Jaemin unlocks the car door, still waiting for an answer. Chenle settles in, pulls his tote bag into his lap and shrinks into himself. So yes he went all out at the mall earlier in the afternoon and got himself new clothes and a new cologne. And yes he put in a little more effort in his appearance, but not too much for it to be a transformation and hopefully, hope-fucking-fully, enough for Jaemin to notice. And yes it makes Chenle terribly antsy. Jaemin still stares and Chenle considers evading eye contact altogether, pretending like this Jaemin is the one from his imagination. But he caves in the end and spares the guy a glance. “What. I was just impatient, okay? That’s why I was waiting. Fuck off and drive now.” He grumbles as best as he can when he really just wants to coo and fall over into Jaemin’s lap. 

But alas, self control maketh man. 

Jaemin’s eyebrows knit together. He sighs, fiddles with the air conditioning and taps twice on the steering wheel whilst trying to find his words, “No, it’s not that. Did you… change? Your cologne?”

Chenle perks up in his place. He can’t stop the glimmer that makes itself known in his eyes and the smile that spreads across his face, “You can tell?” 

“I have a sharp nose. Always have. Fun story one time I smelled the iron burning at my parents’ house all the way from the bottom floor and saved the day. Somebody got fired that day though…so maybe the story isn’t exactly fun but—,” Jaemin speaks animatedly with hand gestures and appropriately timed pauses and a fun lilt in his tone, but none of it is what Chenle wants to hear no matter how endearing or how boastful of his olfactory prowess. 

“What about it?” Chenle tries to snap but annoyance that bleeds into his tone pales in comparison to how he was like with Jaemin in the past. Not that Jaemin really notices the pleasant change. 

“Oh…how do I say this?” Jaemin stops and squirms in his seat, pulls his bottom lip between his teeth. Chenle almost wants to scold him, seriously this time. But Jaemin releases his lip from the tortuous hold and speaks again, “It’s not you.” 

He frowns and Chenle frowns too. It isn’t often he splurges for himself or feels good about dressing up for anybody. He remembers that Jaemin and him aren’t actually dating, or flirting, or anything. They’re the most honest to each other because they’re supposed to already be on bad terms. There’s no room for consideration, no need for sugarcoating to get in his good graces. That’s just not what Chenle is to Jaemin. And the reality feels like a rope tied around his chest with a stone on the other end tugging him deeper and deeper into the icky and negative feelings that sometimes fester and haunt him on sleepless nights filled only with insecurity. 

Maybe Jaemin notices, maybe he doesn’t. Chenle doesn’t lift his head to look at him again when he keeps speaking. 

“This one’s so sweet, it makes me hungry. Seriously. I can’t be craving donuts in the evening. Who does that?” Jaemin speaks fast and peppy, “I like your scent better. The Chenle scent.” 

This time Chenle looks at him, trampling on every excess feeling so he can deal with them later, on the more appropriate sleepless nights scheduled for such thoughts instead of here with the love of his life. “You can’t even tell what I normally smell like?” 

“I can!” Jaemin complains, “It’s like…like baby powder and something else. I don’t know! Tough to describe but it’s just you. It's not like I go smelling you anyways either that's so weird but. You get me. ” 

A sudden boldness strikes him and Chenle finds himself leaning in to pinch Jaemin’s cheeks. He makes his voice all mock cutesy and takes the plunge, “So you like me?” 

Jaemin rolls his eyes, “Of course I like you.” He manages to take Chenle’s hands off him and turns to shift gears, beginning to pull out of the parking lot. Chenle allows his hands to fall limp in his lap, heart thud thud thud-ing so loud in his chest that it’s scary, and pulse thundering in his ears like a storm in full swing. Jaemin glances at him while driving, and their eyes meet momentarily in the rearview mirror before Chenle pulls out his phone and pretends to occupy himself. 

Out of nowhere Jaemin drops a hand to his knee. And it takes every fiber in Chenle’s being to not react in any way to raise suspicion. It hikes up a little, and Chenle has to remind himself this is natural. They fuck for fuck’s sake, he isn’t some Victorian man catching sight of ankles for the first time. Jaemin squeezes his thigh once. Who the fuck squeezes another man’s thigh for emotional support? 

“We don’t have to be enemies, you know. I like spending time with you.” 

But not being enemies doesn’t make Chenle what he wants to be either. Not being enemies makes Chenle normal in Jaemin’s eyes, making him like the rest of the crowd. Being enemies is what lets him see the sides that Jaemin would never dare to show anybody else. Every cute and unguarded smile, every cruel word, all bits of him, affliction and affection inclusive. 

So Chenle says, “I hate you.” 

And like a routine Jaemin replies, defeated grin on his face the best thing to have graced Chenle’s eyes in the entirety of the day, “I know.”

🦋

When it comes to directions, Jaemin is still a lost cause and just as stubborn to admit his misgivings. They bicker the entire way and it’s Chenle who eventually ends up leading them to the rest of their group by the ring tossing stall. 

Donghyuck, Jisung and Jeno are already deep in their ring tossing battle, competing intensely while Mark and Renjun shake their heads from a distance, presumably considering ceasing all association to the goofs. Jeno wins, gets on his knees and offers the prized plushie to Mark who flushes crimson at the dramatics before snatching the present up. Jaemin and Chenle walk up to them, stances and expressions identical, with hands stuffed into their pockets and resting bitch faces. Donghyuck catches sight of them first, stopping mid groan to wave them over. 

“You guys have no gauge of time do you?” He chides, biting down on his lip in irritation before tsk-ing. 

“Gee I wonder whose fault that is.” Chenle recites stoically. He stares at Jaemin, accusation clear as day on his face and Jaemin bristles at the attention. But Chenle really isn’t wrong, so there’s nothing to refute in his claim.

“Doesn’t matter, you’re here now at least.” Jisung pipes up. And before they know it, he’s ushering Jaemin and Chenle towards the ring toss game for them to play against each other like that makes any sense. He even pays for the two of them, stuffs the rings into each of their hands before falling back to the group.

Sure, Renjun smacks him across the head for pitting them against each other but Jisung shushes him and claims to know what he’s doing. 

Jaemin turns to him with the intent of catching Chenle’s attention, so Chenle tunes out from the others to focus on him. He beams and it makes Chenle feel weird and warm. The same eat-you-up grin that he used to hate with every fiber of his being makes his heart skip a beat. “If I win, you get the prize. And if you win, I get the prize. Okay?” 

It doesn’t make sense, and if there’s anything Chenle hates then it’s a win-win situation. What’s a competition if you don’t have the balls to factor in the possibility of loss? But he purses his lips and finds himself nodding along to what Jaemin says anyways. The person manning the stall explains the instructions to them with forced pep and blows a whistle to signal the start of a timer. Chenle gets a hoop onto the wooden pole on first attempt, and Jaemin misses thrice in a row. He bumps his shoulders into Chenle’s in a measly attempt to cheat, and Chenle giggles in giddiness before shoving Jaemin back so hard in excitement that he topples over to the side a little. Jaemin shakes his head in disapproval, “Competition makes you nasty.” And he doesn’t try too hard to win after that because of Chenle’s fiery determination.

Chenle’s performance is record breaking. He gets the largest prize there is and shoves it into Jaemin’s chest. He’s half smug, and half over the moon to win Jaemin something. 

“I let him win,” Jaemin announces to everyone else. “I wanted the prize.” 

Chenle rolls his eyes, “Sore loser.” 

And he’s fond of the way it and the rest of the guys’ teasing has Jaemin pouting and burying his face into the head of the giant teddy bear in his hands. Chenle reaches out and tucks it under his chin so the dustiness doesn’t irritate him. “Win me something then. We’ll be even.” Jaemin nods and reaches for Chenle's hand when everybody begins to walk ahead of them. It’s the feeling of being needed by Jaemin, in whatever small way, that makes warmth bloom in his chest. 

They tug each other along, dropping by random stalls to shop for things and participate in silly games to win more prizes. There’s a stall that’s selling animal ear headbands and Chenle and Jaemin both get matching cat ear ones. The visit to a cotton candy cart ends with them sharing one cone of blue, sugary fluff together. Chenle lets the sugar melt with the affectionate words on the tip of his tongue when he glances up and sees Jaemin looking around all happy. His eyes are glimmering and the expression on his face is so sweet Chenle has the strangest urge to bite his cheek. Don’t question it. They participate in couple games like popping balloons and cup shuffling that ends with their fortunes being told. The answer is recycled of course, and far from Jaemin and Chenle’s reality, but hearing that they’re a lovely couple with a prosperous future ahead of them still manages to make Chenle feel hopeful. Stopping by the strength testing machine has Chenle rendered impressed by Jaemin’s high score, and hanging off his arm with a little more fascination. 

They wander around a little more, consider getting on the ferris wheel before deciding that the deathly long line isn’t worth the to-die-for view. Their time could be spent having fun elsewhere. The smell of food takes them to a little circle with different eateries that the student council members have set up. Grumbling and mumbling about empty stomachs and aching feet, they all haul themselves along to find a table to sit at. 

Chenle’s gaze catches on a crepe stall and he excuses himself quickly to drop by. He orders whatever’s on the menu with the most chocolate in it and then glances back at Jaemin who’s stretching like a cat in his chair, wondering how his eyes will light up when he catches sight of Chenle’s order. Making Jaemin happy comes easy to Chenle nowadays. 

When he receives his tray of a terrifying amount of chocolate piled into weak little crepes, Chenle doesn’t head back to their table. Instead, he spots Jaemin at a dumpling stall and makes a beeline to him. Jaemin glances at him, pleasantly surprised at Chenle offering to keep him company as he waits, and then he looks at the tray in Chenle’s grasp and doubles over laughing. “Dessert for dinner?” 

“Shut up.” Chenle snaps weakly and tightens his grip. “What are you getting anyway?” 

“Oh this isn’t for me. Mark likes dumpling soup so I’m getting him dumpling soup because he refuses to not share with Jeno and Jeno wants spaghetti but Mark hates tomatoes and Jeno hates bechamel but Mark’s too sweet to say anything.” Jaemin huffs. 

“Why’d you get that?” Jaemin blinks at the crepes meant for him. He must be the densest person on Earth. It’s a good thing, Chenle thinks. Good because it saves him the embarrassment of his efforts being known.

“Shut up.” 

“What?” Perplexed, Jaemin inches forward only for Chenle to take meek steps back. 

“I said shut up. You’re so…annoying. I’m just going to go.” He turns on his feet before Jaemin can answer, and Jaemin must just shrug and turn away too. Making his way over to their table, Chenle ignores the questioning glances and the rest know not to ask anything when Chenle has anger written all across his face. Unlike other times, this instance is also coupled with watery eyes. He reaches over and steals some of Jisung’s spicy rice cakes before letting a few tears fall. Jisung stares at him weirdly, “I thought you had good spice tolerance?” 

Chenle glares, “Fuck off.” 

Jaemin drops to the seat beside him, and while Chenle looks at him he finds Jaemin exchanging a look with Mark. Mark glances down at the bowl of dumpling soup, then up at Jaemin, then down again, and he can hardly help the smile that overtakes his features. Chenle watches him mouth dude and watches Jaemin’s smug shrug while cutting through his crepes with a good for nothing plastic spork. Chenle digs in and swallows the torturously sweet bite. 

If Jaemin is home to him, then Mark is like home to Jaemin. The realization makes Chenle swallow his heart too. But he already knew what he was getting himself into. 

🦋

They do end up seeking out the ferris wheel again, and nobody can resist the view of a twinkling city at night so they decide to brave the long line and get on with it. Chenle’s too upset to subject himself to who knows how long of being stuck with Jaemin at the most romantic activity around here, so he opts to sit out. At least he can blame all that stupid chocolate for one thing. 

Renjun claims the height makes him queasy, so he says he’ll be with Chenle too. They grab a seat at the nearest bench and sigh in comfort when a breeze passes them by. Chenle has Jaemin’s gigantic stuffed toy in his grip, and he contemplates taking it home for himself since he’s the one who won it. 

The silence between them is heavy. And Renjun is nothing if not attentive to subtle shifts like the sad way Chenle twiddles his thumbs and stares at his feet. “Anything the matter?” 

Chenle sighs. He feels more upset at himself for being upset at Mark and Jaemin. “Am I a bad person, hyung?” 

Renjun blinks, a little shocked at how quick the confession comes. “No? Is this about Jaemin and…dinner?”

Chenle buries his face into the stuffed toy and groans, not caring about the dust. He hopes he sneezes himself into oblivion today. It’s embarrassing that Renjun noticed, and he’s pretty sure Jisung caught on too. It’s embarrassing to have his boyfriend pine after someone else while he goes above and beyond to make him happy. Renjun sighs and rubs Chenle’s back, but he seems unsure on how to tackle all of it too. 

“You know, when you said you’re dating Jaemin I was weary because of this,” He begins. And it really sounds more like an I told you so than comfort. God, Renjun sucks at this. “Mark and him may always be like this.” 

“And a decade of knowing Jaemin can’t help me now,” Chenle mopes miserably. 

“But,” Renjun begins and raises an eyebrow to show his disdain at being interrupted. Chenle makes a little lips zipped gesture before listening, “You never know. It takes time for things to change, and it takes patience. But the way Jaemin and you are with each other…I don’t know I definitely see a shift. A nice one. Like it’s love.” Renjun smiles and Chenle feels awful. It’s like fingers being pointed at him and putting his feelings underneath the spotlight. 

He shakes his head, “It’s not love.” It’ll never be love. The only thing Jaemin wants to do with him is like him like a normal person, not even as a crush.

“It could be. If it helps, you’re not alone. Jeno’s facing the same thing too. In fact he would probably be better at all this advice than me.” 

Chenle hadn’t even stopped to consider Jeno. How he’d become an inconsiderate boyfriend tonight just because of something Jaemin did. Because of how quick Mark was to acquiesce, and how he didn’t express his real wants with his actual boyfriend. It’s fucked. But Jeno didn’t cry, Jeno didn’t mope, Jeno didn’t snap. Jeno doesn’t look like he feels like he wants the ground to swallow him whole, and he’s not here being upset about it. Chenle could learn a thing or two, but the thought of having to put up with what Jeno is just angers him. 

Mark can be cruel, he realizes. And maybe all Jaemin does is see the good in people when he really shouldn’t.

🦋

After they make it out of the ferris wheel, Chenle is quick to rise to his feet and walk up to Jaemin. The strangest urge to cry again bubbles up in him but he swallows the ball of emotions lodged in his throat to wrap an arm around Jaemin’s waist and knock his forehead against Jaemin’s chest. 

Interrupted from the group conversation where everybody is rambling about being annoyed or gasping about the view, Jaemin stares down at him and chuckles. He makes a few random cooing noises, arms not wrapping around Chenle yet in hesitation because he can’t tell why Chenle’s doing this. That distance is always going to be between them. Chenle will never be able to divulge all of him to Jaemin. 

“Hey there,” Jaemin’s hand finally strokes down Chenle’s nape. He fixes a few strands of Chenle’s hair sticking up all haphazardly. The motion only halts when Chenle lifts his head to look Jaemin in the eyes. 

“Hi. Can you kiss me?” 

Jaemin laughs unsurely, taken aback. He looks around, like he’s trying to spot anybody they may need to put on an act for. Then he looks at Chenle like he’s trying to decrypt some hidden proposition to sleep together. It makes Chenle even more upset. 

“Just do it. And don’t ask why.” Because Chenle doesn’t even know why. He’s upset with Jaemin, he’s angry at Jaemin. He knows what he feels and yet allows himself to be submerged in delusions. He knows where the line between them is drawn, but tries to test it anyways, see if he can push it an inch or two or ten or infinity, till Jaemin loves him too with a certainty to be reckoned with. 

Jaemin detects his sadness, though not the cause, and he kisses Chenle. On the lips, on his eyelids, and a final one on his forehead. And then he looks at him in a way that feeds Chenle’s monster, makes the love grow. “All good now?” 

“Yeah, all good.” Chenle lies.

🦋

Chenle is embarrassed, and the only true ailment  he can find for that is evasion.

Ignoring Jaemin isn’t a problem. Well, at least physically it isn’t. Exams roll around soon enough and Chenle spends all his hours at the library when he isn’t working. He reads and crams all the information he can well into the night, busies himself with making notes and flashcards, and time escapes him too easily. During the exams themselves he finds himself occupied with trying to reign in his nervousness and keeping his breakfast down and catching up on all the sleep he’s lost so he doesn’t pass out in some random bush on campus. 

While he’s plenty diligent and hardworking, Chenle wasn’t made for academia. He wasn’t made for all the comparison and ranks and the perpetually dreadful fear of falling behind. So it quite clearly isn’t the best time for emotional distress to be piled on top of everything else either. 

Ignoring Jaemin physically is not a problem at all, because Jaemin doesn’t seek him out all too much either. But, ignoring the thoughts of Jaemin is a whole other story for Chenle.

Silly little things remind Chenle of him, and while he is fond, he’s also remarkably sad about it all. Jaemin who loves chocolate, Jaemin who hates reading. Jaemin whose love language is acts of service, Jaemin who is stubborn and Jaemin who struggles to tell his left from his right sometimes. Jaemin whose smile stretches long and wide and takes over his whole face, Jaemin whose eyes glitter too much. Jaemin whose loneliness parallels Chenle’s. Jaemin who would never lie to him, who has sides he doesn’t show to the world that feel like they’re all for Chenle’s taking. 

Jaemin who is in love with Mark. It always circles back to that.

No matter how many angles Chenle tries examining their situation from, to troubleshoot for ways to get a happy end, it only feels like he’s picking at bedrock with an axe made of paper. It feels like a truth set in stone, a fact as solid and unchangeable as the Sun rising from the East. Chenle doesn’t know if he’s ever known a Jaemin who wasn’t infatuated with the guy. And it makes him bristle because why him? All the ideas and opinions Chenle had about Mark shift around in his mind, and he doesn’t know if he can see him the same way again. 

What if all Mark’s doing is playing them? Jaemin and Jeno and Chenle now too. But it’s not like Chenle can prove this strange gut feeling of his either. Everybody would hate his guts. And fixing that is what all of this has been for, hasn’t it? To get back into Renjun and everyone else’s good graces. To put an end to being known as petty Chenle, always angry Chenle, snaps for no reason Chenle, going to end up all alone Chenle. He may just be delaying the inevitable, but god he’s going to fucking fight his own truth for as long as he can. 

And this is wherein another dilemma lies. The way this whole loving Jaemin incident has caused every single one of his bad thoughts to mesh together and run through Chenle’s mind like a never ending script he can find no rhyme or reason for. 

Before loving him, there was a tempo to the way Chenle dealt with his demons. The good days, the bad days. The hours of masking, the hours of facing himself. Now they’re all bleeding into each other; a completely synchronous symphony of misery. And the worst part is Chenle misses Jaemin through it all.

But still. Still, when all is said and done,  he isn’t the first one Chenle runs to as soon as exams are over. He finds himself making plans with someone a little more unlikely. 

It’s Jeno who gets any sign of life from Chenle after his exam-induced hiatus from socialization. 

And while it is a little inconceivable for the two of them to meet up, given that Chenle has friends he is closer to in their group and of course his so-called boyfriend, it shouldn’t be a surprise either. Sure Jeno is best friends with Jaemin and dating Mark, but Chenle and him also go way back. They used to spend a lot of time together because of all they have in common—habits and hobbies and the way they’re both homebodies. Maybe the heartbreak’s making Chenle all nostalgic, but he feels like rekindling all of that again.

The dog days spent playing video games, yelling into desk fans and sticking their heads in refrigerators. Splayed out under the sun on Jeno’s living room rug. Learning about his allergies and meeting Bongshik, Seol and Nal for the first time. It used to be nice before they grew a tad more distant. 

Chenle’s phone rings and he’s quick to pick it up, hiking his bag over his shoulder, “Hyung. Where are you?”

Jeno sounds like he just woke up, but he seems to lie and say that he’s on his way anyways. He must feel a little bad for leaving Chenle stranded for so long, so he says he’ll text Chenle an address and makes an excuse about the train running late. Chenle doesn’t call him out on it. He walks to the bus stand and instead heads to Jeno’s neighborhood. There’s a PC cafe there that Jeno now frequents, and it seems like that’s where they’ll be spending the rest of today. He waits at the bench in front of it, and once Jeno shows up they head in together. 

Jeno is dressed casually, wearing dark sweat pants and a flannel pulled over his equally dark shirt underneath. Chenle’s hunch ends up being confirmed when he blinks all groggy and pushes his lips out like a duck every now and again like he’s trying to really wake himself up. Chenle feels a little overdressed beside him, a nice sweater french tucked into his jeans. But it’s a PC cafe anyways, who even cares. 

“Were you at campus this morning? Oh—coffee for me please.” Jeno inquires once they’ve grabbed seats. He starts up league and Chenle begins to scan through the food menu. 

“Yeah, last exam today.” Chenle clicks on Jeno’s usual and orders himself a bowl of ramen and an iced tea.

“Mmm,” Jeno randomly clicks his mouse repeatedly while waiting for the game to load. He can’t really start until Chenle boots up his too, so they’ll just have to sit in silence for a bit. Conversation doesn’t come to them as easily as it used to. 

“Are you doing okay?” 

Chenle is slightly taken aback. For a moment he thinks over the way he’s been so upset the past few weeks, and the lie feels nearly painful when it leaves his mouth, “Yeah, of course.” 

Because all he wants to do is to express all of this to somebody. But there’s just too much to say for him to be comfortable with sharing. People don’t do well with information, he’s observed. You tell a person everything that’s hidden in your closet, and then what? What do they do with it? And what have you achieved by scraping out all of yourself, except calling upon an emptiness that leaves you ashamed? So Chenle doesn’t say anything. Keeps his mouth shut like he should, like everyone else does, and gets on with starting the game. 

“You uhh,” Jeno itches his chin, looking doubtful, “You should really stop doing that thing er—you know. Just pulling away from all of us when you’re stressed. Jaemin was concerned.”

Chenle doesn’t know if that’s a lie, because Jaemin hasn’t reached out to him at all. Maybe it was just a passing kind of concern. Like when the alley cat you see every night on your way home isn’t there all of a sudden and you briefly wonder where it’s gone. But an alley cat relative to Jaemin’s own life probably doesn’t mean all that much to make an effort to look. 

He gives Jeno an awkward, tight-lipped smile, “Yeah just a habit I have to shake off I guess.”

Aware of his own self-pitying too, Chenle wonders what he’s doing here. Wonders what he even meant to achieve by calling Jeno. What is he doing? Is this some strange act of pettiness? Like spending a good day out with Jeno would somehow by proxy break Jaemin and Mark the same way their thing has broken him? Like it would get them to listen the way he wants to without having to make the admittances that tax on his own pride. 

He had questions to ask Jeno too. How he copes with them. Jaemin loving Mark and the strange peekaboo reciprocation from Mark. But when he turns to Jeno with the question on his tongue, Jeno’s smiling down at his phone and his cheeks are crimson and the league game and coffee are long forgotten. He wouldn’t get it. 

“This isn’t working,” Chenle lies, pretending to fiddle around with the game for a while before giving up ultimately, “I’m spent from trying. I’ll just head home.” 

Jeno looks up in concern and like he doesn’t quite buy the excuse. But Chenle doesn’t stick around to convince him. 

Outside, the weather’s nice. The lights are pretty. There’s people on dates, and families having dinner together and friends laughing till they’re red-faced and out of breath. In the middle of it all, Chenle takes the bus home alone. 

🦋

Jaemin does end up reaching out, and Chenle does end up going all the way over to see him. Word must have reached him that Chenle saw Jeno, that Chenle seemed haggard and unhappy. But there were no questions asked, and Chenle is honestly glad. Jaemin just said come over and I’ll make you a homemade lunch, and Chenle said okay. It’s dramatic to hold out and stay petty with no reason he can actually verbalize into reality, and missing Jaemin makes it easier to acquiesce. After all, if Chenle wants this love to die out quietly, he’ll have to keep up appearances. 

So he heads there, the apartment he can get to even when sleepwalking. And Jaemin does cook him up a feast. Chenle makes sure to reach early and become a little sous chef. Jaemin doubts him but Chenle says he’s been learning stuff from Youtube, and flipping through cookbooks he finds at the library and websites promising quick meals after lengthy anecdotes. He peels and chops the veggies while Jaemin gets the stew broth going and meat marinated. Chenle takes the liberty to season the side dishes and they end up oversalted. When they sit to eat, Jaemin doesn’t just take a bite and say it’s tasty, he calls him out on his shit measure of saltiness. They bicker a little, Chenle spoons broth into his mouth too soon and scalds his tongue but still keeps powering on to argue. 

Afterwards, they find themselves in Jaemin’s room. The blind’s are pulled up and sunlight submerges the space. It’s delightfully warm, the toastiness making the winter seem a little less bleak. Chenle lies upside down on the bed, head where his feet should be. He can catch a better view of Jaemin this way. He realizes he’s never been here during the day. He isn’t here for sex for once. And Jaemin, for once in a blue moon, is working on an assignment on his laptop. He squints oddly sometimes. Chenle thinks he might need glasses. Chenle thinks it’ll make him look nice.

He wants this moment to stretch on forever. Bellies full, tastes sated, in each other’s company just silently. It’s a kind of dwindling peace that reminds him of the fleeting nature of relationships. Sure, it makes him want to cling to Jaemin for as long as he can and be with him every second of the day, but that isn’t something that would realistically serve Chenle either. All there is to people is an askew balance between loving them and missing them, more the latter than the former. It makes him sad, and Chenle starts dozing off with this palpable little grief mixing with his comfort. 

The typing stops, he vaguely registers. The bed dips as Jaemin shifts, Chenle can feel his breaths on his forehead when he nears. He moves the hair out of Chenle’s eyes and there’s a grin in his voice when he says, “I know you’re awake.” 

“Fuck off.” Chenle mumbles but there’s no real venom to it. 

Jaemin rolls over and nearly onto him. He rubs his face aggressively against Chenle’s abdomen while murmuring his name in many octaves like a silly incantation until Chenle wakes up completely. “Did I bore you so much?”

“Is having a calm afternoon such a bad thing?” Chenle replies groggily. 

Jaemin nods unabashed. He moves around the bed until they’re lying side by side again. Chenle wiggles his hand in front of Jaemin and he begins playing with his fingers. It’s like a little routine, gets rid of the aches and cricks in Chenle’s palm. Jaemin is massaging his knuckles when he speaks again. “Do you have any plans for winter break?” 

Chenle stops to think. He had wanted to visit home, but he would only be lugging disappointment with him on his trip. He thinks he’s had enough of painful and disappointing interactions with people. All he wants to do this break is wrap himself up in blankets like a cocoon and nap all day and night and indulge in the hobbies he used to like that he’s forgotten how to enjoy nowadays. A winter for him.

So he shakes his head, and watches Jaemin’s eyes light up.

“I was thinking, what if we all went on a trip?” Jaemin smiles, “Right after New Year’s Eve, let’s head out. We could go to the beach, off time makes it peaceful. We’ll take a train. And we’ll stay for as long as we can. And we’ll have barbecues and make up for the foiled camping trip tenfold. How does that sound?”

It isn’t ideal, sounds like his personal hell to be honest. But Jaemin looks fond of the idea, and Chenle can learn to like anything Jaemin does. Maybe a getaway could bring them closer, maybe it could mend things between all of them. The cracks are still invisible, and they have time to fix things before there’s any permanent damage. It sounds hopeful. It sounds warm. 

Chenle tangles their legs together and drops a kiss to Jaemin’s cheek just because. 

“It sounds amazing.” 

🦋

Christmas eve finds them at yet another party. Only this time, the occasion is fitting since they’re all on break and he doesn’t really know the host. The faces aren’t familiar but the place is pretty and the food is good and there’s more than enough drinks to go around for everybody. There’s a mistletoe stuck on the front door that Jaemin kisses him under, just a little peck. But there’s a strange gratification in knowing that he didn’t do it with ulterior motives, nobody around to pretend for, just a mistletoe and Chenle being the person Jaemin thinks of kissing first.

The night is off to a good start. They mingle around, not catching sight of any of their friends yet. Chenle starts speaking to a few people from his department, and Jaemin hangs around them with a hand steadied on his waist. When they’re distracted enough he leans down to whisper, “You’re so smart.” 

Chenle rolls his eyes, “Like that’s a surprise.” 

“Just take the compliment,” Jaemin insists with a little whine. He shakes his empty cup and nods towards the kitchen. Chenle lets himself be tugged along with him, craving for a drink too. Jaemin says he’ll mix something up for them, that they’re not having the hideous punch that has a dubious amount of alcohol in it. He rifles through the cupboards and the fridge and grabs random things like flavoring syrups and fruits for garnish. Chenle didn’t know he had a penchant for mixing drinks too. 

“Donghyuck taught me,” Jaemin offers up an explanation upon seeing Chenle’s dazed look of wonder. He’s got his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, and he licks his pinky after some kind of syrup gets on it.

Chenle looks away because the sight bothers him, “Of course he did.” 

Jaemin smiles before looking away. And the vaguest of memories hit Chenle, just what seems to be a distant impression of Jaemin from their high school days. Chenle remembers not liking him from the beginning. His confidence, the way he’d blink at others all alluring just to get his way. The way he was always up to no good, just scheming around with his friends. The way he didn’t really have to study. The way everybody loved him anyways. He remembers Jaemin sitting in front of him one year, using Chenle as a proxy to send his friend notes during class. They never really spoke, and Chenle never really cared to even look at him long enough before doing what he was asked to and returning his gaze to his books. He remembers in the hallways, their shoulders brushing past one another, Jaemin’s rain soaked hair, droplets rolling down his cheeks, mud stained shoes from playing soccer during recess despite being told not to. He remembers wondering how he wasn’t frozen to the bone. He remembers Jaemin’s smile, like sunlight peeking through the clouds, and an apology murmured quickly. Back then he didn’t care. Now he feels fond. 

“Hey,” Chenle calls for Jaemin’s attention. When he’s too immersed in his drink making, Chenle walks over to him and bumps their shoulders together. It ends up making whatever Jaemin was pouring spill over onto the counter. 

“Hey!” Jaemin complains, and then catches sight of Chenle’s deathly glare, “Oh…hey hehe…hey.”

“What was your first impression of me? Back in school.” 

“Middle school? When you couldn’t spell that word in our spelling bee and then ended up breaking the microphone, that was so funny.” Jaemin sighs and wipes fake tears from his eyes. 

“No,” It’s not the answer Chenle’s looking for at all. He groans in frustration and then holds out both his hands, “Okay pause. Let me put it differently. What did you see me as in high school?”

“Mmm,” Jaemin actually thinks about it. He sets aside all the cups and bottles, rolls his sleeves down and runs a hand through his hair. He rests an elbow against the counter top, and Chenle is quick to steer him away from the wet patch on the surface. 

“You were pretty quiet? It was cool but I didn’t like how intimidating you were. You know, like a house cat who refuses your love, except the house cat is now at school and you feel haunted. But I did admire your penmanship,” Jaemin shivers, which makes Chenle believe the house cat story may be from personal experience, and then he grins knowingly and Chenle knows exactly what he means by it. He’s talking about the time Chenle got fed up passing notes, so he just took Jaemin’s message, scribbled a flurry of swear words in it in front of him, and handed it back to him. 

Chenle doubles over laughing on the counter. This time it’s Jaemin who moves him away from the spill. He hands Chenle the finished drink and then grabs his own. Chenle takes a sip as they’re walking towards the living room, and it tastes so bad it makes him twist his face up in disdain. But when Jaemin looks up at him, eyes full of expectation, he says he loves it. Says he’s not sharing even if Jaemin’s one is bad—which, spoiler alert, ends up tasting equally shitty. But hey. At least now he thinks he’s made one nice drink. 

From the living room couch they have a view of the front door. They see all their friends pile in slowly through the night, one after another, and wave them over to sit. Jaemin hops between the kitchen and where they’re at by the couch, making drinks because suddenly now it’s become some kind of a party trick of his because of Chenle’s encouragement. The rest of the guys aren’t kind enough to hide their displeasure, and Chenle drinks all of the shitty beverages for them. Jaemin catches him finishing Renjun’s, sees the apologetic look in his eyes and immediately catches Chenle on his lie. He plops down beside him and slouches into the couch, “Why didn’t you tell me?” 

Chenle giggles, tipsy. He pats Jaemin twice on the chest, “I’m sorry, it was a little funny.” It wasn’t, really. But he can’t exactly say it’s because he cares for Jaemin enough to want to preserve the excited twinkle in his eye. Even alcohol won’t be able to fish a confession like that out of him. 

It will, however, aggravate his impulsiveness and draw far uglier things from the depths of Chenle’s mind. 

It’s Mark who arrives last. He says he’s late because of traffic, and also because of the little gift bag he holds in his grip. He hands each of them a wrapped box from it, and they open them up to see homemade cookies. They aren’t too good, the icing is messy and the shapes odd and inconsistent. Chenle tastes them and they’re dry and hardly savorable. But Jaemin stares at this little cookie box full of shitty cookies like it’s the only Christmas gift he’ll ever need. And he holds it to his chest like a treasure, scans every little detail of each cookie with fondness before biting in. He gives Mark a thumbs up. Says, “These are so good, I could kiss you.” Much to Jeno’s discomfort. 

Mark only smiles meekly, crimson dusting his cheeks. 

And, isn’t that incriminating proof enough that he knows what he’s doing? To Jaemin, to Jeno and Chenle now too. He’s babbling on about the process, where he got the recipe for and his silly little accidents. Chenle feels his anger multiply with every word out of his mouth, every giggle, every second that Jaemin stares at Mark like he hung the stars in the sky tonight just because he made some shitty fucking cookies. 

So sue Chenle if he can’t hold back any longer and just watch Mark being sweet while Jaemin loses himself in all his tricks.

“You’re speaking an awful lot tonight,” He begins. His tone is immediately hostile, a subtle kind of violence formed from inferiority clinging to each word. And it startles Mark into shutting up. Renjun immediately is the first one to sense where Chenle’s anger is coming from, and he knows he needs to put a lid on it before things end up snowballing. Jaemin’s staring at him too, trying to decipher Chenle. Nobody speaks though. 

“I–what?” 

“It’s funny because don’t you usually not speak at all? What is that? An act?” It’s an awful thing to do, calling somebody out on their biggest insecurity. Especially Mark. Sweet Mark, always attuned to his friends’ feelings Mark, sensitive Mark. He looks hurt, it’s clear in his expression, but he also looks confused. 

“Chenle,” He says placatingly, but his voice does nothing to soothe, “Where is this coming from?” 

“I know this is an act too,” Chenle points between Jeno and Mark, ignoring how Mark’s gentleness makes him want to throw up. “Is it fun? Stringing people along? You didn’t have enough drama in your life so now you decide to make your own, and you make other people miserable. Because that’s all you do Mark. You make people miserable.” 

 A hand reaches for his elbow. It’s Jaemin. He’s staring at Chenle like he’s a stranger, but he should be used to this. 

Mark shakes his head, tears filling his eyes. He’s sincere and that’s what makes Chenle’s gut twist all the more, “You know it’s not like that. I’m sorry Chenle but I promise it’s not like that. What can I do—What should I do?”

“You can fuck off.” 

And that has Jaemin properly gripping him by the arm and pulling Chenle enough, “Okay that’s enough. Let’s go cool off.” The last thing he sees is Mark sobbing into Jeno’s chest, the others running their hands over his back, and Renjun staring at Chenle in disappointment. Jaemin takes him to a vacant room. Makes Chenle sit on the bed with a care that feels patronizing. When he speaks, he’s eerily calm. 

“What was that?” 

His patience must be thinning. Chenle stares up, red-cheeked and having a hard time holding himself up, and replies with nonchalance, “What was what.”

“Why would you use that tone with Mark?” Jaemin paces, running a hand through his hair in frustration. What Chenle’s done has ruined their facade, completely taken them back to square one and beyond and poured all the effort down the drain. Chenle’s circling the drain himself too, Jaemin doesn’t realize. “Why would you say all that? Fuck.”

“I use that tone with you all the time. What’s wrong with him?” 

“I’m me Chenle. You know what we are.”

Chenle scoffs somehow. It feels like his chest is caving in, there isn’t enough room in the world to breathe because of how much space the pain takes up. “Of course I know what you are Jaemin. You’re like a loyal dog who only fucking sits by Mark’s feet waiting for something that’ll never come to you.” 

And Jaemin expects it. Because low blows are all that Chenle’s defense is made of, and being a shitty person comes to him like second nature. 

“What does that make Mark to me, in your head?” Jaemin nears and Chenle can’t bring himself to look at him. Because there’s judgment there, the same ammo he used swung back at him in subtler ways. Anger with reason. But Chenle’s anger, the one without reason, the one that makes no sense to anybody else in the world exists too. Where does that go? How does he change feeling like this? Thinking like this? Being a petty, horrible person. He can’t look at Jaemin because no degree of drunkenness will be able to shield him from the shame. 

“Answer me Chenle, what, is Mark like a cat? Are we like opposites who attract? Do you think we’ll go against all morals, everything we’ve talked through and solved, all the amends made, just for love? Not even his, but only mine?” Jaemin jabs a finger into his own chest, and it’s Chenle who hurts, “You’re punishing the person I love for my love. That fucking hurts. But I can’t see why. What, do you want to be him? What do you fucking want?”

Chenle’s chest heaves. And he’s clutching at the sheets until his knuckles go white now, trying in desperation to ground himself. Jaemin raising his voice hurts more than anything else. Jaemin pointing fingers at him, when he was the only one to see all of Chenle’s bitterness and call him a good person regardless. It’s changing, it's all changing. 

And it rips him apart because Jaemin's seen Chenle's wicked. Pried the cover to it open with his own hands and stared Chenle's wicked in the face. He's kissed Chenle's wicked. He's hugged Chenle's wicked. He's shown it the warmth of an embrace, and the safety in being known for once. He’s given it validation and a space to exist in as something normal and humane. He's held Chenle's wicked; cupped it's trembling and shivering form, like a little bird with broken wings, and clutched the stupid little thing to is chest. Jaemin's seen Chenle's most atrocious bits for fuck's sake, he's seen them through and through, and now he's abandoning it all. 

“I just–,” Chenle takes a deep breath, feeling tears welling up into his eyes pathetically. The last thing he should be doing after fucking things up is crying. He feels like shit, he feels like everything and everyone he’s never wanted to be. He shakes his head, “No. I want to know what I am to you, Jaemin.” Because Jaemin is as kind as a boyfriend should be, acts so caring it feels real sometimes, but it takes mere seconds for him to change. 

Chenle finally looks up. The sentence must disarm Jaemin, the emotion in Chenle’s eyes must throw him off guard. He was expecting a little more shittiness, a little more misplaced anger. But all that’s in front of him now is Chenle looking smaller than ever. He sighs, his own anger waning only to be replaced by dread. Chenle can see it all over him. He’s dreading what feelings Chenle may burden him with. 

“I need air,” Jaemin breathes, “I need air and you’re too drunk. Just stay here okay? Sober up and sit here. I’ll be back.”

And he leaves. And Chenle sits all obedient. And sobs wrack through him, an endless river of tears rolling down his cheeks. He wants them to stop, wipes his face with his sleeve as aggressively as possible to just get them to halt. He was never like this, Jaemin made him like this, Chenle let him. He doesn’t know, he doesn’t know. He fishes his phone out from his pocket, wondering who he could turn to when he’s burned so many bridges tonight. After the tenth weird reaction meme sent, Kun replies with : what’s wrong? 

Everything.

🦋

Kun doesn’t explicitly say come over, but Chenle assumes an offer to stay the night and get taken care of stands when he calls 10 times for Chenle to reject all of them. He makes a measly attempt to wipe his face down, and lifts himself up from the bed. Weaving through the crowd isn’t an easy task when it’s so stuffy and with the need to hurl only intensifying with time, but the masses of people just kind of push him along in the right direction, thankfully. Nobody familiar spots him.

Part of him wants them to. Part of him wants Jaemin to. Chenle wants Jaemin to part the crowd until his fingers are snaking across his arm, wants Jaemin to need him enough to reach out and get him to stay. 

But none of those things happen. He hobbles down the stairwell slumped against the walls in defeat, too tipsy to keep his balance without needing a crutch like that. It’s chilly outside, goosebumps on the exposed flesh of his arms reminds Chenle that he’s forgotten his coat indoors. The walk to Kun’s place is long, a little hazy in his memory. But crying keeps Chenle occupied enough, and he goes wherever his feet and instincts take him. To make matters worse, it starts snowing. Chenle hiccups and stares up after feeling dampness on the back of his neck, only to laugh ridiculously at the sky. He sticks a tongue out, swaying till he finds purchase on a lamp post. The light flickers. 

“Fuck you,” He slurs. And then with a little more energy, tries to bounce on his feet and give the sky the most enthusiastically hateful middle finger ever. His heel gets stuck in a hole in the concrete and his ankle twists oddly. The sharp pain makes Chenle hunch over and let out the loudest groan ever. This sort of behavior would embarrass even the drunkest version of him, it isn’t the alcohol that’s egging it on. It’s the shame of being known. It drenches him, soaks through inside out. And water only becomes as natural as air if you’ve been sunk deep and long enough. 

But Chenle limps to Kun’s place, a whole mess. And he stands there freezing and sopping wet on his doorstep, frantically knocking, not even out of breath after climbing the stairs with a bad foot. The door opens with a creak. It isn’t Kun on the other end. The guy tilts his head curiously, amber light from inside making his half obscured face glow. He’s got Kun’s clothes on, and Kun himself comes around before long to infiltrate the guy’s personal space, close enough for Chenle to catch on. His cheeks burn, a little more shame. 

“Hey.” Chenle croaks. 

Kun peers out, “Chenle?” He rubs his eyes sleepily, disappears back inside to turn on a few more lights before appearing again. The other guy remains stock still, confused. 

“Fuck, look at you. What happened?” Kun curses and goes into his home again before Chenle can even muster up some inappropriately humorous answer. When it’s just the two of them, it gets more awkward than confusing the second time. The silence becomes stuffy enough for it to be imperative to cut through it. He takes in the guy across from him, dark hair silky soft, purple splotch right under his jaw and a silver chain around his neck. His face is a little blurry though.

“You are very pretty,” Chenle blinks up, hopefully suggestively. But all he looks like is a kitten that tripped over and into its water bowl. “I’m Chenle.”  

“Ten. I get that a lot.” He grins smugly, holds the door open a little wider. His grin flattens into something a little more somber, “Are you alright Chenle?” 

“Of course not, good God,” Kun emerges again with a towel, spinning Chenle around to wrap him in it like a burrito before ushering him in, “You’re going to kill me one day you know? You’re seriously going to—hey watch it.” 

Chenle flops onto his couch with no care for the coffee table that he almost bumps into. Ten follows behind cautiously. Kun walks up to him and murmurs a few things into his ear with a sigh, they briefly disagree, and then Ten’s walking towards the bedroom. Chenle sees it all with his eyes squinted, which he closes quickly once Kun comes around and crouches in front of his face. 

“What happened?” He sighs gravely. 

“It’s a long story and I’m afraid you’re going to kill me when you hear.”

“We have time,” Kun rubs his hand on Chenle’s back, looking at him with a little more concern when he shivers. Ten puts a few things on the table and pushes a glass of water into Kun’s grip, “We have all the time in the world, and you’re right. But you need to tell me.” He prods gently, thumbs the tear streaks on Chenle’s cheeks and tsks when he begins to doze off because of the comforting motion.

He pushes the glass close to Chenle’s lips, tilts till he’s forced to swallow a gulp of the liquid. “Sober up first.” 

Sober up. It’s the same thing Jaemin said. He needs to sober up to stop asking stupid questions like what he means to people like Jaemin. Because only drunk people want answers that are glaringly obvious otherwise. 

What are they? Nothing. Nothing at all, really. 

🦋

Kun almost does end up killing Chenle in the end. Sure, he says it was an accident, but Chenle has his own suspicions. It happens after Chenle wakes up from his nap somewhere in the night. All of a sudden Kun is nocturnal, and Chenle finds him looming overhead while stirring aimlessly around the couch. He runs a tongue over his dry mouth, and Kun only silently heads to the kitchen, almost motherly premonitions telling him Chenle’s on the highway to dehydration, and grabs him yet another glass of water. Glass tipped to his mouth, Chenle decides to start talking. Ever the emotionally explosive being, Kun tilts it a little too much and suddenly Chenle is choking on good old plain H2O instead of his own salty tears. 

Okay, maybe his stupidity is partially to blame. But it’s a little impossible to believe that, for all the skills he possesses, this is when his dexterity ultimately decides to fail him. 

He is immediately at Chenle’s aid though, smacking him on the back through the coughing fit, and then pulling him close afterwards in a slow transition to rubbing soothingly. Chenle sinks into his arms and Kun’s rapid murmuring reaches him muffled, like there’s cotton plugged into his ears. Despite that, the tone and tenderness of it all somehow makes his emotions take a turn for the worse. Chenle cries again, till his chest literally aches. 

It’s an unusual sight, but being surprised by the display is all the more reason to believe that they should’ve seen this coming. Bottling things up never ends well, Chenle knows. It isn’t like he was turning a blind eye to the predicament. He was just too confident that this blubbering mess would never be him; shrunk onto someone else’s couch, desperate for warmth. It’s quite natural that even Kun, used to his antics and perhaps the only person most equipped to deal with Chenle’s meltdowns, pulls away in the end. He pauses and studies Chenle quietly. Under the scrutiny–despite it meaning well–Chenle shrinks.

“Hey,” Kun says, “I think you should go home.” 

The finality rattles him, but the swampy dread he used to feel at the prospect of returning home to face himself pales in comparison to the heartache. Familiarity trumps everything else, even his own ego. 

“I think so too.” 

And none of them mean his apartment. 

 🦋

Timing is a strange thing. The irony makes Chenle smile into his neck pillow. It fades in a second as he braces himself. 

It takes two rings for Jaemin to pick up. Chenle only stares at the seconds going by on the call timer and briefly regrets not stalling this for just a bit more. Jaemin says hello. It’s distant and static-ey, the effect only adds to the feeling of being in a completely new world. Chenle doesn’t take well to change. His heart leaps against his ribs, and he runs a hand down his sweater, bitten down nails snagging against the threads. He licks his bottom lip before finally pressing the cursed thing to his ear. 

“Hello?” Jaemin speaks again. Chenle has to inhale a shaky breath. 

“Hey,” His voice is strained from being unused. There’s an announcement in the background, calling a passenger to their boarding gate. Jaemin is quick to notice. 

“Are you here?” 

The hope in his voice makes Chenle incredibly sad. It’s like there’s a lonely stray in front of him, tail tucked between legs, whining. He doesn’t want to believe it. That Jaemin, despite everything, is still waiting. “No, I’m not. I’m going home, Jaemin. Are the others there?”

“No,” Jaemin chuckles a little, “Yeah, I don’t think they’re coming.” 

Then why are you there? Why be alone, just hoping for some last minute miracle that’ll fix things; make them whole again. Nothing between any of them is going to slot into place anymore like it used to before. It’s too late for that. 

“Oh.” 

“Have a safe flight,” Jaemin’s voice drops lower, a little more solemn. His face runs through Chenle’s mind; little pout, downturned eyes, the way he always gets when Mark runs to Jeno. He shakes his head. That’ll never be the look Jaemin saves for him. Stupid fucking looks. 

“I hate you.” 

Jaemin doesn’t say it back. 

 🦋