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In a world where soulmates exist, it is rare for a person to find them. The only way to identify their soulmate is by the song you hear, which is the song your soulmate currently has stuck in their head. The whole phenomenon begins when one turns 18, and continues on for the rest of their lives. Some people (Hyunjin) find the idea romantic, while others (Minho) think it’s anything but.
Minho doesn’t understand how the soulmate connection is supposed to help him actually find his soulmate. It’s not like the universe granted them the ability to read minds, so how is he supposed to know what song is stuck in another person’s mind? Why couldn’t the soulmate system in his world be something more normal, like marks or red threads or even drawing on skin or anything else really?
Since it’s so unlikely that one finds their soulmate, it’s normal for people to date around regardless of their soulbond. Only one in a million (Hyunjin) are naive enough to still believe they can meet their soulmate. As for Minho, soulmates are nothing but an inconvenience.
Yeah, he’s quirky like that.
Minho was unfortunate enough to start hearing songs in his head the very night he turned 18. He had stayed up until 1am (which is way past his usual bedtime) because his friends and boyfriend wanted to celebrate at midnight, just to wake back up at 3 in the morning to the haunting sound of minions singing about underwear.
He loves minions about as much as any other person does. Not when he needs to be up early and they’re the ones keeping him awake, though.
Fuck the minions.
And fuck his soulmate too. Who has minions stuck in their head at 3 in the fucking morning?
At the end of the day, though, neither minions nor soulmates matter to him, because he’s not going to date someone just because the universe bound them together. Choose your own destiny, and whatnot. Minho’s chosen destiny goes by the name of Bang Chan.
He’s been in a relationship with Chan since high school, having known him since they were children. They grew up as neighbours, and had been best friends their whole lives. Minho had never thought about Chan in a romantic sense until the boy came up to him all red in the face, asking him to go on a date.
Minho had to accept just to spare him the embarrassment.
(In reality Minho had a big, fat, ugly crush on Chan that he would rather not talk about out loud).
They both found out about their soulmates when they were already dating each other, but it had ultimately changed nothing about their relationship except the constant complaints Minho had about the complete stranger the universe had paired him with.
1
It was by pure coincidence that Minho decided to go to the same college as Chan. It had nothing to do with the fact that he wanted to spend more time with Chan, or his inability to handle being away from his boyfriend for too long. In fact, it had everything to do with the courses there, the business courses having a spectacular reputation. He planned to start his own business in the future, so he wanted to start learning everything from the very best as soon as possible.
By the time he reaches the end of the first semester, he can tell why the college is known for being one of the best. The professors are great, albeit a little strict, but it means that he ends up actually learning. That doesn’t mean he enjoys sitting exams at 8 in the morning though.
However, that is his current predicament. He’s focusing on a question which required the usage of theories of distribution to analyze a case of business when-
ring ding ding ding ding ding ring ding ding ding bem bem bem, land, labour or capit- wait what?
He freezes in horror, eyes widening as he realizes that it’s the song his soulmate has stuck in their head right now.
The fucking Crazy Frog song.
Oh fucking god. Why the fuck is this the first song they think of in the morning?
“15 minutes remaining.”
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck. He can’t afford to get distracted right now. He tries to go back to his exam and focus on the questions, trying and failing to ignore the song that’s looping in his head.
.
Minho storms out of the exam hall, shoving his stationary into his bag before pulling out his phone, dialing Chan’s number knowing he probably still hasn’t slept. As predicted, the call connects after only two rings.
“I hate them so much. You have no idea how much.”
“Hey, babe! Didn’t you just finish the exam? How was it? Did the professor do something?”
Minho’s weary sigh highly contrasts Chan’s cheery disposition. “No, he didn’t do anything. The exam would’ve been a million times better if my fucking soulmate wasn’t listening to crazy frog first thing in the morning though. I couldn’t concentrate because that was the only thing I kept hearing, and now I hate the crazy frog too. I will never, ever forgive them if I get a bad score on the exam, I swear.”
Chan just laughs in response.
“This is no laughing matter. I will make them pay for real,” Minho scoffs.
His soulmate didn’t have to pay for anything, however, as he passed the exam (like Chan had reassured him) with flying colours.
2
Minho and Chan have been in a relationship for almost 5 years now. Way before they started dating, Minho would say —in his mind— that Chan was his person. He was the one Minho was closest to, the one who he could rely on the most, the one who he never had any problem sharing his troubles with and the one he always wanted to see after a busy day. It was always relaxing when he saw Chan, and he could physically feel the tension leave his body.
So it’s understandable that after a long day of classes and running around with Hyunjin to make sure he doesn’t do stupid shit, all he wants to do is to see Chan. He arrives at his boyfriend’s apartment, not giving any warning before throwing himself into the other’s arms as soon as the doors open. Chan giggles, catching Minho with ease.
“Hey, my love. Long day?” Chan mumbles, running a hand through Minho’s hair.
Minho hums, closing his eyes to enjoy the warm embrace.
“Want to talk about it?”
“Later,” he mumbles.
Chan drags them both into his room, falling back on the bed with Minho on top of him. They adjust to a more comfortable position, Chan wrapping one arm around Minho’s shoulders to caress the hair at the nape of his neck, with the other on his back while Minho's head rests on Chan’s chest, listening to his heartbeat.
It’s the most relaxed Minho has felt the whole day.
Or it would have been, if not for the fucking song that’s stuck in his soulmate’s head. He has heard that song a few times on tiktok, and it went something like:
Four big guys and they grab on my thighs
Blow up my guts like the 4th of July
If they keep fuckin' my butt then I might just cry
Poop and semen sprayin' on my eyes
That's the only part his soulmate has stuck in his head too. He absolutely hates that song. Despises it.
“It's like they exist to annoy me,” Minho grumbles. His voice rouses Chan from his sleeping spell.
“Huh?”
“My soulmate. They have this song stuck in their head. Some four big guys.”
Chan bursts into a surprised laughter. “That’s actually so funny.”
“Right, so funny, ha ha," Minho deadpans, shooting his boyfriend a glare. “Be glad that your soulmate doesn’t listen to songs that annoys the fuck out fo you.”
“True. They had my favourite song stuck in their head just this morning,” Chan recalls, a stupid little smile growing on his face.
Minho groans and buries his face into Chan’s chest again. “Don’t rub it in my face.”
They sink into silence, both of them almost falling asleep before Minho’s soft voice floats into the room again.
“I wish you were my soulmate. If it were you, listening to these horrendous songs would be a thousand times better.”
Chan doesn’t say anything, just pulls Minho closer to his body and nuzzles his nose into his hair. He presses a kiss to Minho's head, muttering a quiet ‘love you’ before both of them eventually fall asleep.
3
Chan wasn’t the only friend Minho made in his neighbourhood as a kid. He had Hyunjin and Jisung, who were step-brothers that lived next door to Chan. At the mere age of 7, Minho practically adopted the brothers as his own children, swearing to protect and keep them happy unlike their neglectful parents. It’s safe to say that Minho has a strong protective instinct when it comes to them.
When Jisung told him that he was finally dating the love of his life, he knew nothing good would come out of it. Someone with the last name Kim is nothing but bad news. To no one’s surprise (except Jisung’s), Minho was more hostile towards this guy, Seungmin, than he was to the dumb bully who used to punch him in gym class ‘accidentally’ in high school.
He resists the urge to say ‘I told you so’ when he opens his apartment door to see a teary-eyed Jisung.
“Hyung,” he sniffles.
“Oh, baby,” Minho coos, pulling him inside and wrapping an arm around his shoulders. He leads them to the couch just as Jisung starts fully bawling, soaking through Minho’s shirt before they are even seated.
“Hyung, he broke up with me,” Jisung croaks out, words muffled into Minho’s shoulder. “He didn’t even say why, he just-just said that he doesn’t want to be with me anymore a-and he left.”
To be honest, Minho never actually considered the possibility of them breaking up. No matter how much he pretended to dislike the guy, he could tell that Seungmin really liked, or even loved Jisung. Being an asshole without a valid reason wasn’t something he expected from Seungmin.
Minho pats Jisung’s back, opening his mouth to comfort him.
The words that come out of his mouth aren’t exactly comforting, however.
“Damn, you’re a sexy bitch!”
They both freeze, Minho’s hands stilling on Jisung’s back and the cries stopping abruptly. Jisung bursts into laughter, leaning away from Minho.
“Damn, hyung, I know I’m sexy but don’t you have a boyfriend?” he chokes out, voice cracking through half-sobs and giggles.
“It’s not- it’s not me. I didn’t mean to say it,” Minho whines in frustration. “It’s my soulmate, who’s had this, this stupid song stuck in their head for hours . And the worst part is that it’s not just that song, it’s that remixed with fucking CBAT!”
At this point, Jisung is laughing so hard he’s holding onto the couch for dear life. Minho just watches, sick of his soulmate and highly amused friend.
Jisung crawls back up onto the couch, and pulls out his phone. “I need to text Chan hyung about this.”
Minho has half the mind to snatch it out of his hands. “Shut up.”
“I can’t imagine living like that. My soulmate almost never has songs stuck in their head,” Jisung muses, equal parts awed and relieved.
Minho sighs, the special one he’s been doing since 3am hit on his 18th birthday. “Damn, you’re one lucky bitch. My soulmate has something stuck in their head all the fucking time . Like, can I have some peace and quiet sometimes?”
+1
“Kim Seungmin,” Minho spits out. Sometimes he feels like he’s Draco Malfoy, in the presence of his long-standing and completely unjustified rival Harry Potter.
Eh. He always liked Malfoy better anyway.
“Minho hyung!” Seungmim greets back cheerfully.
The audacity of Kim Seungmin to call him hyung despite everything? And with cheer? The absolute gall? The balls on this motherfucker?
“Don’t you have some explaining to do?” Minho asks, raising an eyebrow.
Seungmin deflates like a balloon. He sighs, mumbling a soft ‘after class, I promise’ as he sits down to Minho’s left.
Minho and Seungmin share a class, because Seungmin is too smart to share classes with his own peers or whatever. They just weren’t aware of each other until Jisung introduced them. The day after they met, Seungmin beamed at Minho when they made eye contact and proceeded to sit in the empty seat next to him ever since, despite Minho's hostility.
(Minho would rather bathe in acid before he admits that it makes him feel warm inside every time it happens.)
They both walk out of the class together. Without missing a beat, Minho points the tip of the pen he was holding at the other. “Start speaking.”
“Woah, woah,” Seungmin says, raising both his hands in surrender. “Let’s just keep walking. I’ll explain along the way.”
They keep walking in silence for a while before Minho, fed up, raises his pen again.
“Okay, okay!” Seungmin says. “It’s just that…” he trails off, hands sinking into the pockets of his (Jisung’s, what the fuck) hoodie.
He pokes the pen into Seungmin’s bicep, gesturing for him to continue talking.
“I don’t deserve him,” Seungmin whispers.
“No shit,” Minho snorts.
“No, hyung, you don’t understand,” Seungmin blurts out, exasperation laced in his tone.
Minho crosses his arms over his chest. “That’s why we’re here. Explain. Elaborate. Whatever.”
Seungmin sighs, avoiding Minho’s eyes as he starts speaking. “He’s such a great person, hyung. He’s the closest thing to perfection I know. He is so unbearably kind, so funny, and so so talented. He’s just…so much. He deserves someone so much better than me, hyung. I can’t bear to bring him down any more.”
They walk in silence for a minute before Minho stops abruptly, waiting until Seungmin turns to face him.
“Isn’t that his choice to make? You can’t decide for him, that you’re what he deserves or what he doesn’t. He chose you, didn’t he?”
Minho watches as a myriad of expressions wash over Seungmin’s face, unable to settle on a singular feeling.
“Imagine how he feels not knowing why his boyfriend broke up with him out of nowhere,” Minho offers, knowingly adding more onto Seungmin’s mind. Asshole kind of deserves it anyway.
Seungmin crouches down, groaning into his hands. “I really fucked up, didn’t I?”
“Yeah.”
Minho doesn’t bother sugarcoating it, deciding that it would be best for Seungmin that way. He crouches down next to Seungmin, putting a hand on the latter’s shoulder. “You can still fix it, y’know.”
Seungmin looks up from his hands, staring at Minho, a bewildered grin on his face.
“I can’t believe you’re the one who’s knocking some sense into me. Thought you didn’t want me to be with Jisung,” he says with a laugh. Then, after a thoughtful pause, he continues. “Actually, I can believe it. You like me a lot more than you’d like to admit. My Minho hyung likes me so much.”
Minho stands up, walking away from Seungmin, mumbling a brisk “shut the fuck up” to hide how flustered that made him. Seungmin, for Minho’s sake, pretends like he doesn’t see how red his ears are.
“Hyung’s a little stupid,” Seungmin says as he falls back in step with Minho.
“I don’t want to hear that from someone who broke up with the love of their life because he’s too good for me,” Minho shoots back.
Seungmin smirks. “Yeah? Well, I don’t want to hear it from someone who hasn’t figured out that their boyfriend is also their soulmate.”
That has Minho freezing mid step. “What?”
Seungmin gives him a grave look. “You seriously didn’t know? Come on, hyung, you’re so much smarter than that.”
Minho is still reeling from the supposed revelation. “Wh-what do you mean?”
Seungmin blinks at him, face passive as if trying to control his expressions. “Say, hyung, what song do you currently have stuck in your head at the moment?”
“You Belong With Me. Why?” Minho answers immediately. It’s a good song. For once.
“You don’t find it weird that Chan hyung is going through a Taylor Swift phase and suddenly your soulmate has a Taylor Swift song stuck in their head?” Seungmin prods.
“That’s just-” Minho starts. There’s no way.
“What about that time you kept complaining about Dance Monkey stuck in your head all the time and it was the only song that hyung kept listening to the entire week?”
There was no fucking way. “Still-”
“Or what about the night you turned 18? Jisung told me that the first song you heard was some minion song. Wasn’t Chan Hyung having a Despicable Me marathon that night?”
Minho stands there in shock as he lets it all sink in. There’s no fucking way.
.
Minho stands in front of Chan’s apartment door, unsure of how he’s supposed to proceed with this situation. How is he supposed to tell Chan that the soulmate he’s always complained about, wished he never had, wished was Chan instead, was actually Chan? He debates ways he could break it to his boyfriend before deciding oh, fuck it, he will just go with the flow.
Minho opens the door, only to stand awkwardly after he shuts it behind him.
Chan comes out of the kitchen to greet him, probably at the sound of the door. “Hi babe! You okay?”
Minho laughs awkwardly. “Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”
Chan raises an eyebrow. “Come on in then? I’ve never had to invite you in before.”
Minho slowly removes his shoes, making his way to the couch. He clears his throat as Chan sits down next to him and scoots closer, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. “So, um…”
“Yes?” Chan encourages, his hand caressing Minho’s arm gently.
“What if I…” Minho begins, his nerves cutting him off.
Chan hums. “What if you…?”
“What if I told you that we are soulmates?” Minho finally says, his voice louder than expected. He has his eyes squeezed shut, but he can feel Chan’s hand come to a stop.
Chan pauses for a moment, looking off into a middle distance in deep thought. Then, miraculously, he chuckles as his hands come around tighter to wrap Minho in a hug.
“Aw, babe, are you thinking about that again? Of course we’re soulmates. We don’t need to be bound by the universe to know that,” Chan assures him, pulling him closer and turning Minho’s head so they’re facing each other.
Minho had expected that reaction. Of course Chan and his stupid optimistic personality would think he’s overthinking again. Stupid loving adoring boyfriend.
Minho opens his eyes, looking into Chan’s with as much seriousness as he can muster. “No, I don’t mean like that. I mean, what if I tell you that we are soulmates bound by the universe?”
Chan leans back at this, realizing that Minho is asking seriously. “That would be kind of amazing, actually.” Then he grins, his dimples making an appearance. “But it would also mean that you’ve been complaining about and hating me for years.”
“Because you have the worst songs stuck in your head at the worst times!” Minho defends himself, half yelling.
Chan laughs, holding Minho closer and trapping him in the embrace. “Hey, just because it’s a bad time for you doesn’t mean it’s a bad time for me!”
“Yeah? How is cuddling me a good time to have fucking Four Big Guys stuck in your head?”
“That’s-” Chan sputters. He pulls away, staring at Minho again. “Wait. Are you being completely serious right now?”
“Uh, yeah,” Minho looks away.
Chan looks almost too embarrassed to continue talking. “I always thought it was just a weird coincidence that the songs I listen to, your soulmate also listens to-”
Minho cuts him off, absolutely affronted. “So you had realized it!”
Chan balks, the redness in his cheeks increasing by the second. “I mean, maybe? Not really. How did you realize? And when?”
Minho keeps his mouth firmly shut, refusing to admit how. He couldn’t tell Chan he got one-upped by a freshman. He just couldn’t.
“Babe, come on,” He whines, “tell me!”
Minho groans, unsurprisingly ready to give in. “Today. Kim Seungmin told me.”
“Seungmin had to tell you?” Chan wheezes, falling back and slapping his knees in laughter like a little child.
“Shut up! It’s not like you realized on your own either, Mr. Oh I Thought It Was Coincidental.” Minho complains with a pout.
Chan sits up straight and wraps his arms around Minho again, pulling him into a hug.
“Hey, my soulmate,” he mumbles. It’s soft and so, so terribly fond.
Minho returns the hug, melting into his boyfriend’s arms. “As romantic as this is, Chan, having Smack That stuck in your head really isn’t helping your case.”
All his boyfriend does in response is laugh and pull him into a kiss.
Maybe having a soulmate isn’t so bad after all. Minho really is winning in life, having Chan as his person and his soulmate.
It still won’t stop him from complaining about the songs Chan listens to though.