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sometimes, people enter your life and you're not sure how they got there or why you let them stay. for wonwoo, jeonghan is one of those people.
how he got there, infuriating as it is, is at least easy to explain.
wonwoo showed up to his first university class five minutes early. the room was about half full. he got a seat — closer to the front so he could easily see, closer to an aisle but not on the aisle so it didn't seem like he wanted to escape — and pulled out his laptop and a small pad of paper and a pen, then rested his arms on it all and pulled up instagram on his phone.
people filtered in around him in the next few minutes, and he didn't pay much attention until he heard an obnoxious psst sound to his left. he ignored it the first time, he remembers, but by the third attempt he rolled his eyes and turned his head and hissed "what?" as the professor started writing on the board at the front of the room.
"do you have an extra pen?"
"are you serious? it's the first day," he'd said, because who doesn't have a writing utensil on the first day?
jeonghan had his stupid fingers spread against empty pages of his notebook, hair falling over his eyes, and wonwoo isn't sure why he caved but he did. of course he had a spare pen. more than one. he reached into his bag and heard the sigh of relief before he slapped it down on the notebook, a bit more forcefully than necessary. he tried to glare but all jeonghan did was smile a little and say thanks.
wonwoo remembers never getting his pen back and wanting to never see him again.
he did, of course — of course — in his next class, and remembers so clearly jeonghan dropping his bag nearly on wonwoo's foot as he slid into the chair next to him. he remembers bickering about why he was following him — jeonghan shrugging and saying, "no reason, saw you again and thought it would be funny" — and spending the whole class annoyed that he was there and hadn't given him his pen back and was chewing on the stupid thing more than using it.
wonwoo didn't spot him in the third class, the next day, too busy brushing off a girl that had turned around to try to make small talk, but someone took the seat next to him and he knew somehow. the smell of him was unmistakable only because it wasn't pungent body spray.
he glanced over and sure enough, jeonghan. he was adjusting his bag between his legs instead of nearly on wonwoo's toes and casually said, "you again?" while wonwoo gaped at him.
"there are so many open seats."
"yeah, but now i feel like i'm stuck in this bit where i see you again and sit next to you because it's funny and i don't know how to get out." he'd held his hand up, body awkwardly half turned, and said, "jeonghan."
"you could literally just sit anywhere else."
jeonghan leaned over, brazenly looked at his laptop screen before he could hide it and said, "think i'll stay here, wonwoo."
he'd almost snapped his own pen in half. it's a good thing it was their first class, relatively light on actual lecturing, because he's sure that his notes from it were abysmal.
jeonghan consistently found him in class for the first month, and wonwoo didn't bother trying to avoid it.
in week two, he rolled his eyes and accepted the little nudges, absentmindedly played along with very fake conversations whenever jeonghan wanted — usually when someone else was trying to catch his attention, which happened alarmingly often.
week three had jeonghan asking what he was studying and informing wonwoo he was going for a completely different major and agreeing that having so many boring, generic prerequisites for the courses that mattered was bullshit.
week four had jeonghan asking him if he had any friends as he was packing up after class. just like that — "do you have any friends?" — like they were in elementary school and wonwoo was the new kid on the playground. and wonwoo did, but he stumbled over his objection so hard that jeonghan definitely thought he was lying and invited him to a party and he couldn't turn it down without looking like a pathetic, helpless loner.
the rest of it really is just history. it's been years, and he remembers it all so clearly. he lost so many pens.
so yeah, sometimes, people enter your life and you're not sure how they got there or why you let them stay. for wonwoo, jeonghan is one of those people. and how he got there, infuriating as it is, is at least easy to explain. why wonwoo let him stay… well.
at first glance, they don't make a ton of sense on paper and never have. but jeonghan was that person he couldn't shake in a new place, a bastion of familiarity that he didn't know he needed until week six when jeonghan missed a class and he spent the whole thing anxiously tapping his pen against the side of his hand. another day of abysmal note taking.
they studied together because as obnoxious as jeonghan was, he was smart. at coffee shops, and eventually in dorm rooms. even when their paths diverged in their second year, they continued to meet up. wonwoo knows too much about biology for a business major.
their friend groups slowly melded the way they often do. almost everyone from both sides of the equation, upon meeting the other person, had been surprised that they're friends, and then not surprised at all. he remembers meeting seungcheol at a club on jeonghan's birthday that year — one he only agreed to go to so that he could keep an eye on him and make sure he got home safe even though jeonghan didn't ask him to — and seungcheol's eyes widening about two minutes into their conversation when he mentioned why he was there.
he takes any jokes or other shenanigans wonwoo throws at him and plays along or returns it, sometimes both. jeonghan gets him, has for a long time and without trying that hard.
there were dates, of course. jeonghan's myriad of partners and girlfriends of wonwoo's and the one boyfriend that resulted in a stilted, terrifying conversation in the middle of studying that went a lot like this:
"want to go see a movie tonight?"
"can't. i have plans."
"what's her name?"
"his. myungho."
"oh. okay. tomorrow?"
in retrospect, it was only after that relationship ended that wonwoo started to see everything wrong with everyone jeonghan brought around. was at christmas during their third year that wonwoo realized why and promptly shut that whole feeling away in a box and hid it in the darkest corner of his mind he could find.
which is all just a very roundabout way of explaining why what he's about to do is a terrible idea.
he raises his mostly empty cup in the air, and raises his voice. "i'll play."
⬅️
"mom, it's christmas. please no blind dates," wonwoo groans.
"she's a very nice girl…"
"say you have a girlfriend," seungkwan hisses in his ear.
wonwoo elbows him as his mother tells him how she knows this woman's parents. and she likely is a very nice girl, but his own parents have gotten so… helpful, since his younger brother got engaged.
"i'm seeing someone," he says quickly when he has a chance. knee-jerk reaction. seungkwan put the idea in his head and his mouth ran with it. it's very unlike him.
she's taken aback, stutters a little bit around the question of "who is— where did you meet them?" because his sexuality is a somewhat new topic, even though she was accepting. his father was outwardly fine with it, but he's outwardly fine with a lot of things. his true feelings are a question mark, and will probably stay that way.
"can i call you later? i'm out with some friends."
"of course."
"okay. i'll call in a couple of hours," he tells her. "i love you."
he hangs up and immediately turns on seungkwan. "why did you put that in my head? i'm not seeing someone."
"so what? plot of countless movies. find someone to pretend you're seeing. it's worked for me and eunbi. someone back me up here."
everyone at the table looks down at their food and wonwoo shifts, ready to slide out of the booth and leave so he can figure out how to explain he was lying when he calls his mother back, but he hears jeonghan's voice ask, "does she know you're not straight?"
"yeah. why?"
"i've always wanted to meet your family," he shrugs.
his body stops thinking about leaving, dumps all of its energy back into the cushion. it's jeonghan. he should've known better than to ask why.
"it's insane," seokmin offers helpfully. wonwoo could kiss him. would be a great option if he wasn't already seeing someone. "but it might work," he continues less helpfully, and all willingness to kiss him dies. "he's good with parents."
the truth is, they've bugged him about meeting jeonghan, too. but bringing him home? pretending they're dating? jeonghan is one of his best friends. it's nuts. he shouldn't even be entertaining it, and yet. he meets jeonghan's eyes, says, "talk later?" and gets a shallow nod in return.
"talk now," seokmin suggests obnoxiously.
"you guys have involved yourself in my life enough for one day," wonwoo says dryly.
there's silence for a second, but seungkwan happily drives the table into a conversation about his favorite volleyball team or something equally mundane that wonwoo barely listens to. thank god.
it ended up being a conversation on the floor of jeonghan's living room — his roommate out for the night — with beer that both of them desperately needed to get through it. because no matter how you slice it, deciding to pretend to date someone you aren't requires some ground rules, and deciding to pretend to date each other required a few more than usual. wonwoo imagines, at least. not that he's ever pretended to date someone before, but jeonghan is… jeonghan.
it was far more planning than he first considered it would be. he might've said no, if he had realized, but by the time he did, it was too late. hence the beer. because wonwoo is a romantic, but he's also very conservative about it. jeonghan is one, too, though he hides his behind an air of nonchalance. but perhaps more important is simply that he enjoys challenges, and convincing wonwoo's parents that they're together certainly qualifies. this manifested itself in pushing wonwoo to be a little more out there with their physical contact than he might normally be, even with someone he was dating.
"we've been friends for years, wonungie. they'll be suspicious if we aren't acting close," he had said, and wonwoo found it hard to believe his parents would think about it that hard, especially with their dubious acceptance of the idea of him seeing a man at all, but he also found himself shrugging along with whatever jeonghan suggested, up until the line he drew at kissing in any form. but that still leaves hand holding and other little touches. wonwoo has seen jeonghan with partners in the past. he can guess how it's going to go. maybe he's better off for it, in the long run. no surprises.
the petty argument about who was making the three-hour drive behind the wheel of wonwoo's car? perfect form, truly setting the mood of their upcoming overnight stay at his parents' house. he backed off eventually, let wonwoo win — or at least wonwoo thought. he got back from a bathroom trip at a rest stop and found jeonghan in the driver's seat.
they've pulled into his parents' driveway an hour later and he's still thinking about how stupid jeonghan is to have done it. wonwoo had to give him directions and it was a nightmare.
but jeonghan is practically bouncing. wonwoo can feel the energy radiating off of him. "you're way too excited to meet them."
"the people responsible for bringing you into the world at the same time as me? of course i am," jeonghan says breezily as he turns the car off. "you ready for this?"
wonwoo ignores the vague implication that they were fated to be friends. "i feel like i should be asking you that question."
jeonghan hums — not a response but not not a response — and gets out of the car, keys in hand.
wonwoo opens his door and hears jeonghan ask, "should we bring the bags in?" from somewhere near the back of the car.
he thinks for a second, decides to hell with it, might as well, and answers: "we can get them later, honey."
it's quiet for a beat too long, but jeonghan appears in wonwoo's line of sight and the tiny smirk gives him away, makes wonwoo smile, too. it's a moment that they needed, or at least wonwoo needed, to shake off some of the nerves. jeonghan reaches out for his hand, holding his own in the dead space between them until he takes it, and walks them up the pathway to the door.
his mother answers and is perfect — ushers them inside and gives wonwoo a tight hug. she visibly does a double take when she's introduced to jeonghan and clearly recognizes his name, but quickly recovers. his father is surprisingly warm. his brother and soon-to-be sister-in-law are unbothered.
and after they explain that their bags are in the car and demands are made for conversation, it becomes clear that jeonghan really is good with parents. he speaks sweetly, carries himself in a way wonwoo has never seen and talks about his internship with his leg touching wonwoo's and offers to help with lunch. it's hard to not laugh, because it's so unlike the guy he actually knows. he almost wonders if some of it is intentionally crafted to be exactly that. trolling by being cutesy. trying to make wonwoo die of secondhand embarrassment. wouldn't put it past him.
monopoly may have been a terrible idea.
jeonghan has gotten incredibly lucky. wonwoo is pretty sure he's cheating, though he's also not sure how someone cheats at monopoly. but he's managed to barter his way into the entire corner around free parking, and seemingly lucked his way into park place and boardwalk. he never runs out of money.
it's like he's stolen all of wonwoo's luck, because he's leveraged every asset he can when he lands on boardwalk and is forced to hand over his remaining cash and properties. his brother's fiancée makes a quip about someone sleeping on the couch and everyone laughs as wonwoo claims the bank.
he settles in and watches — jeonghan, mostly. it takes a few turns but he lands on chance and takes too long to read the card and it clicks. he's definitely cheating in at least one way. it's another set of rolls before he tries to unmortgage property collected from wonwoo and shamelessly hands him less money than necessary without even looking at him.
he should call it out, but the fact that he didn't catch it as it was happening is too embarrassing to bother, and it's impressive to watch. their own little secret. almost makes him forget their own big secret.
at least until the next time jeonghan has to pay the bank and looks right at him as he passes him a lower amount again. he runs his hands through his hair as he looks away, shrugs his top layer off his shoulders and complains it's warm. he puts his elbows back on the table, zeroing in on his next target like it's the most serious game of his life, and all wonwoo can think is "oh." followed immediately by "shit." because that's the guy he knows.
he rolls his eyes at himself, because christ. he's cheating. right in front of wonwoo's family, when he's supposed to be wonwoo's boyfriend. it's ridiculous. why is it attractive? why now? why not when he met jeonghan's last girlfriend and decided she was awful for him in seconds? why not the time before that when he accidentally met a guy leaving jeonghan's place and ran into him half naked in his kitchen and felt his stomach turn? jeonghan clearly nudges a die with the side of his hand and wonwoo considers swiping everything off the table and kissing him and pulling his own hair out.
he sets the tray of fake cash on the table, unfolds his legs as he clears his throat. "i'm getting some water."
➡️
seungcheol catches his elbow, says, "you're making a mistake," in a warning tone. one of the friends that hasn't taken sides by default, retreating back to their respective owners in the fallout in the last couple of months. all wonwoo processes is that jeonghan freezes momentarily, mid high fives and celebration on the other side of the room, and looks over at him like he doesn't know exactly whom the voice came from when he surely does. "he'll wipe the floor with you."
in retrospect, they should've discussed how they were meant to fake a break up. how it would go when they got home, after spending two days acting like the fact that they're relatively attached at the hip meant something. but they didn't. it's wonwoo's fault, probably. he let himself get swept away in the idea of being truly cared for, and that "by jeonghan" was a unique amendment to the feeling. his only defense for the first part is that he didn't really expect to. he has no defense for the second.
"maybe he will, maybe he won't."
seungcheol huffs a laugh — disbelief — and raises his arm. "there is no maybe, but if you insist on being an idiot then i'm at least giving you a fighting chance."
jeonghan waves them over and seungcheol grabs his arm to pull him through a line of spectators. seokmin and mingyu pour more shots, set them up on what will be wonwoo and seungcheol's side of the table.
how it actually went was that a week after they got home, wonwoo intended to tell him he thought he had feelings for him, but spotted him kissing someone he didn't know outside their regular coffee shop instead, and felt like he'd been punched in the gut. he turned around, went back home, and sent a text saying he didn't feel well, sorry, and played video games. shooting fake people made him feel minutely better, so there was that.
he was content with being miserable for about a day, but he couldn't pretend everything was fine. he ended up telling seungkwan. seungkwan convinced him to tell jeonghan anyway. it turned into a whole thing that it never should've turned into — for all of jeonghan's bravado he can be skittish about serious relationships and wonwoo isn't much better. it was a stalemate — jeonghan emphasizing that they're friends despite the fact that wonwoo could tell he was full of shit. it was in his eyes. and wonwoo got so upset at how stupid it all was that he just… gave up, because fighting to convince someone to give you a shot isn't how he wants to win an object of his affection.
he never said that they were mature about the whole thing.
jeonghan makes eye contact, questioning like he's giving wonwoo a chance to back out. he doesn't drink much. he's terrible at sports. jeonghan and mingyu do and aren't. there's a very solid chance that he will indeed wipe the floor with him. but they've already been drinking, and some stupid part of wonwoo thinks that maybe he can win. thinks maybe it would make him feel better, less betrayed. he stands at the edge of the table and waits.
jeonghan sinks the first throw, into the cup closest to him, and crosses his arms as wonwoo drinks.
wonwoo miraculously gets his first toss into a cup as well.
it's an even match thanks to seungcheol, until wonwoo's third toss goes off the side of the table. he's too warm, his arm doesn't want to work, he just wants to go to sleep. but he also wants jeonghan to lose at something, anything, the way wonwoo lost him.
jeonghan makes a few mistakes, seungcheol doesn't. eventually jeonghan drinks the last shot on his side.
the victory is hollow. he actually feels worse, seeing jeonghan, unsteady on his feet, wave his hand in mingyu's face and shake his head and say he's done. he's ninety percent sure he lost on purpose, and downs the rest of the shots in front of him like he's proving a point.
he remembers a couch, losing track of jeonghan in the group of people at the party and seungcheol saying he'd call a car and take him home. everything between then and now is hazy, including the way he ended up in bed, but he knows it's jeonghan that passed him water before letting him slide down to rest on his very wonderful pillow.
he knows it's jeonghan fiddling, constantly readjusting the blanket he fanned out on top of him the way his father used to when he was little, like he doesn't want to leave. "you're not seungcheol."
jeonghan is quiet for a beat before he says, "no. i offered to get you home and you said yes. you're an idiot for drinking that much."
wonwoo licks his lips. everything feels so dry. "you lost on purpose," he says.
"yeah, i did," jeonghan replies simply. his speech slips a little, gives away that he's drunk, too, as if his pink cheeks don't do enough of that. "you have some kind of vendetta and i don't want you to feel like shit tomorrow."
"why do you do that? you always think about me."
"always. because i love you," jeonghan says with a shrug. "sleep, wonungie."
he feels a palm on the side of his head, something against his forehead — takes a second to register that it's lips. he arches into it, spends a split second being embarrassed, but jeonghan's hand is cool against his face and his lips are warm and he silently pleads, because no matter how much he wants to be over it, he's not. jeonghan hears it maybe, or… it doesn't matter. he barely pulls away, slowly moves and wonwoo feels lips gently pressing against his cheek, his nose, and finally — his silent begging answered — his mouth.
wonwoo has enough of his wits about him to realize it's not a great idea. they're both trashed. maybe it would be okay without their history. but it feels so good that he tries to shut his brain off, tugs at jeonghan's shirt until he feels the covers move and the bed dip and feet tangling with his own, all against a soundtrack of shaky breaths and broken kisses.
drunk makeouts feel very high school, somehow, but he's not mad about it. he's not anything except warm and evidently head over fucking heels because kissing someone has never felt like whatever is happening, like part of him being filled that he didn't know was missing. he's acutely aware of every smoldering fraction of bare skin that's touching jeonghan's, hands under shirts and the fluttering in his stomach when jeonghan changes the angle the tiniest amount before kissing him again. almost like it's more than a night to regret in the morning, like it means something.
but everything about time is fake. drunk things. and as much as he tries to ignore it, one thought keeps coming back. he whispers, "hey, hang on," when he has a moment where his lips are his own.
jeonghan hums, barely moves away, just says, "you think way too much," and kisses him again.
wonwoo groans — lust or frustration, who knows — and lightly pinches his side. jeonghan makes a tiny yelp that's very cute, slips his hand out from under wonwoo's shirt and somehow punches his shoulder as he raises himself up on an elbow. the punch feels like nothing. a bug accidentally flying into him on a spring day. but his breathing is off, his lips are redder than usual, his cheeks pinker than they were before, and he stares, waiting — could bore a hole through wonwoo's eyes and into his damn soul if he let him. wonwoo splays his fingers against his side again, feels the heat there and jeonghan bites his lip, clearly struggling to keep a straight face. good. "you can't just say you love me."
"i really, really like you?" jeonghan deadpans.
"worse."
jeonghan fidgets with the edge of wonwoo's collar, is quiet as he runs a finger over the bone and says, "i miss you all the time. i made a mistake. i know you miss me too."
wonwoo closes his eyes and tries to memorize the feeling. like he could even dream to recreate it later. "you're drunk," he mumbles.
the hand moves to his face, fingers tracing up his neck and over his jawline and into his hair. "i mean it. i'll tell you the same thing tomorrow when we're sober." he pauses, like wonwoo is supposed to know what to say. he doesn't. there's a beautiful boy in his bed, his best friend, and words aren't enough for how much he's missed him, he realizes. it's almost too much, the adoration for the idiot that threatens to choke him. "you suck at beer pong, by the way," jeonghan adds with a smirk.
wonwoo huffs a laugh, gets a pleased giggle as he rolls onto his back and drags jeonghan with him. he cranes his neck, invites jeonghan back in and says, "you'd better."
he does.