Chapter Text
“You shouldn’t have come pick me up,” Sunghoon says, even as his lips quirk in a tired smile. Though the flight back home was less than two hours, he slept through all of it; even now, after getting off the plane and collecting his bag, he’s barely awake. The exhaustion of college baseball season combined with exams must’ve hit him harder than he initially thought. “I told you not to.”
“As if we’d ever listen to you,” Jungwon’s warm smile doesn’t falter at Sunghoon’s poor attempt to hide his enthusiasm. If anything, it widens, especially as he pulls Sunghoon into a hug. “We’re your friends, you know. We weren’t going to leave you stranded in an airport like Tom Hanks in that one movie. That’d be breaking bestie etiquette.”
“This is Midway,” Sunghoon mutters, wrapping his arms around Jungwon. “I literally live a half hour drive from here. I wouldn’t have been stranded.”
“It’s the thought that counts,” Heeseung says. He raises his eyebrows at Sunghoon after Jungwon lets him go, before his façade cracks and he pulls Sunghoon into an embrace, arms winding themselves tightly around him. “It’s nice to see you, asshole. Would it hurt you to at least act like you missed us too?”
Despite how much Sunghoon would really rather get home quickly than make a public scene, he lets himself relax into the hug. “You know I did,” he says, voice muffled slightly by Heeseung’s jacket. “Miss you, I mean. It’s really nice to see you.”
“See, was it so hard to start with that?”
It only takes a moment for Jungwon to join in on the hug, loudly exclaiming something about being excluded. Though they’re obstructing the way, Sunghoon doesn’t force them to break apart. The last time he’d seen the two of them had been during winter break and it’s not like he had much time to revel in their presence then, their universities’ vacation periods not aligning very well. He could’ve seen them again for spring break; both Jungwon and Heeseung went back home, but Sunghoon had been too eager to take advantage of the empty baseball diamond at Vanderbilt with a couple of his new teammates to do so.
In retrospect, he definitely should’ve flown back home for at least a week, but he’s here now, with nothing to do for the summer other than the occasional baseball practice and spending time with his friends.
“God, I can’t believe it’s been like, half a year since we saw each other,” Jungwon says as he and Heeseung reluctantly stumble back from Sunghoon after the fifth passerby bumps into them. He slips his arms from around Heeseung and Sunghoon’s shoulders to link their elbows together, ignoring their weak protests. “We gotta try and visit each other more next year.”
“Mhm,” Heeseung hums, swiping Sunghoon’s suitcase from under his hands as they start on their way to the exit. “We could just try and keep a bit more in touch, maybe. Schedule weekly Skype sessions or whatnot.”
“You want to schedule that shit?” Heeseung gives Jungwon a pointed look, but Jungwon doesn’t get the message in the slightest. “What for?”
“I think it’s pretty clear,” Sunghoon says. “You can just say it outright.”
“There’s nothing to say outright,” Heeseung replies. He uses his shoulder to open the doors and the hot summer air hits Sunghoon in the face as Jungwon drags him out of the airport. “Other than, you know. You could stay in contact more. Or something.”
“It was still better now than it had been at the beginning,” Jungwon pats the back of Sunghoon’s hand with his own, giving him a light smile, likely unaware of how patronizing he sounds. “You did go MIA for weeks at time, though. Had me wanting to try and bribe Sehun to drive me down to Tennessee to check on you all the damn time.”
“I was just busy,” Sunghoon says. It’s most of the truth, at least. “Uni work was a pain in the ass and baseball practice took up most of my evenings.” There was the whole… Jake situation, too, though Sunghoon figures it’s much too embarrassing to mention, even if Jungwon’s already more familiarized with it than he should be and Heeseung doesn’t even believe it happened. “All the free time I had was dedicated to either studying or napping.”
“I’m sure you could’ve had a bit more free time if you let up on baseball a bit,” Jungwon points out gently. “From what little you told us, it seemed like you were on the diamond twenty-four seven.”
“I wasn’t on it twenty-four seven,” Sunghoon argues, albeit weakly. He is maybe a tad bit obsessed with baseball, though he’d never admit it. “Even if, you haven’t seen the kind of equipment they have. It’s insane. It drives me a little crazy.”
“There is still such a thing as overworking yourself,” Heeseung cuts in, “and it’s not as if life starts and ends with baseball. Is that all you did for the past ten months?”
“I thought you came down here because you missed me, not because you wanted to stage some intervention.”
“We’re not staging an intervention,” Jungwon says, elbowing Heeseung when he tries to speak. “Well—maybe Heeseung is. I’m just curious as to what you’ve been up to, other than baseball.” He wiggles his eyebrows at Sunghoon and Sunghoon really should’ve put his foot down and not let them pick him up from Midway. “Any developments we should know about? Maybe we’ll finally soon be able to go on the triple date we’ve been dreaming of for months.”
“I think you’re the only one that’s been dreaming of it.”
“Uh,” Sunghoon feels his ears burning and reaches to shuffle his fingers through his hair, hoping it covers all redness. “As I told you, I haven’t really had the time for anything other than baseball and school.”
“No way,” Heeseung mock gasps, taking too much pleasure in how embarrassed Sunghoon is. “You’re actually crazy for baseball? I thought we were joking.”
“Okay, but like, seriously,” Jungwon says, “did you really not do anything besides that?”
“What was I supposed to do?” Sunghoon asks, “it’s not like I didn’t make friends or hang out with people. I just didn’t do anything, I don’t know, particularly interesting.”
“Did you hang out with anyone who wasn’t your teammate?”
“Yes,” Sunghoon says. Heeseung doesn’t let up his stare and he’s not going to believe Sunghoon until he meets his uni friends in person and is able to confirm that they are not, in fact, his teammates, so Sunghoon lets it go. “I just focused my time on doing what mattered. I’m not going to waste my time with underage drinking and—and other things, when I could be using it to better myself instead.”
“I don’t think it’d be such a bad thing to, uh… loosen up?” Jungwon tries gently. “You’re just going to let life pass you by if you keep up the whole baseball tunnel vision thing you have going on. Not that there’s anything wrong with being focused on baseball and ambitious and shit, but maybe it’d be better in moderation?”
“Yeah,” Heeseung agrees, snaking his arm out of Jungwon’s hold to take out his car keys and more successfully maneuver his way through the parking lot with Sunghoon’s suitcase. When Sunghoon tries to do the same, Jungwon links their elbows tighter, clearly adamant on maintaining physical contact. “You can’t just go through uni being such an incel virgin.”
“And nerd,” Jungwon adds.
“And nerd,” Heeseung echoes. “And I’m begging you to tell me that the underage drinking criticism is a joke. You’ve been Sehun’s friend for the past years. You can’t tell me you’re serious about that.”
“It was a joke,” Sunghoon lies, hoping his redness doesn’t give him away. He really shouldn’t be having such a physical response to this topic of conversation, considering that one, it’s not like he’s being embarrassing by doing his best to achieve his dream career, and two, he’s already talked about this more than once, with Sehun and more than half of his uni friends. “I really don’t see what the big deal is.”
“That’s part of the problem,” Heeseung tells him. “God, maybe this is on us. We should’ve done more before it got to this stage.”
Jungwon sighs, pressing a hand to his chest. “We really should’ve.” Sunghoon shoves him in retaliation, though that seems to do more harm than good: upon steadying himself on his feet, Jungwon grins, eyes wide. “Maybe we still can.”
“Of course we can,” Heeseung says, just barely listening. “We’ll force him to listen to one of those subliminal message videos that’ll make him the life of the party and shit. Maybe we can find one that eases up on the baseball shit but I think if anything we’d have to commission it and I just don’t know if I’m—”
“No, no,” Jungwon cuts him off, “I mean, it’s worth a try, I guess, but I’ve got a way better idea.”
“I’m not agreeing to whatever shit you want to put me through.”
“We’ve got the whole summer to help Sunghoon unlearn his incel virgin ways,” Jungwon says, ignoring Sunghoon completely. “Might as well take full advantage of that.”
“I’m not sure I’m following?”
“We’ll take him out somewhere next week,” Jungwon explains, not taking the hint when Sunghoon tugs on his arm in an attempt to get him to stop. “There’s plenty of cheap enough bars around the city that we could go to, for example. Plenty of parties that Sehun’s going to throw in the upcoming months—and anyone else, too. Shit like that.”
“I’m not doing that,” Sunghoon cuts in before Heeseung has the chance to voice his agreement—as he was going to, clearly, judging by the excitement written clearly over his features. “I’m not doing any of that shit. I’ve got much better things to do.”
“Don’t tell me all you wanted to do was watch baseball matches, play baseball, and get the occasional bubble tea,” Heeseung says.
“It wasn’t,” Sunghoon says. It was. “It’d still be better than doing all that, though. Promise me you’re not actually going to do that.”
“Well…”
“We’re not going to make you do anything you don’t want to,” Jungwon tells him, though he clearly deflates at the idea of his mastermind plan not being used, shoulders slumping. “It could be nice, though? Or it’s at least worth trying, isn’t it?”
“I already know that’s not my crowd,” Sunghoon says. “What’s the point of trying it out again?”
“Uh,” Jungwon stammers. “Heeseung?”
“Maybe it was the setting?” Heeseung suggests and Jungwon nods at Sunghoon before gesturing for him to continue. “Or, I don’t know, the people. The vibes? Either way, it was years ago and with that in mind, it’s probably worth trying out again?”
“Exactly,” Jungwon says, turning to beam at Sunghoon. “What he said.”
“I’m still not… I’d really rather do something I enjoy than force myself out of my comfort zone all summer long,” Sunghoon says, avoiding both Jungwon and Heeseung’s insistent stares. “It just—I mean, I doubt it’ll even give you the results you want and so it just kind of seems like unnecessary stress and shit.”
“We don’t have to go through with the whole thing,” Heeseung starts, stopping by an old Honda that Sunghoon recognizes to be his, and unlocking it with his car keys. Instead of getting in, though, he leans on Sunghoon’s suitcase, snapping his fingers, “we could just try it out once or twice? And if it’s, I don’t know, if it’s as bad as you think it’ll be, we can just scrap it completely.”
“Uh…”
“It’d be fun to try out something new,” Jungwon elbows Sunghoon lightly, “and it could help you out of your shell at least a bit?”
“Maybe you could meet someone,” Heeseung suggests.
“Or maybe you’d find it to be more fun than you remember?” Jungwon adds. He’s looking at Sunghoon with wide eyes and Heeseung’s not any better, trying to pull the same trick and failing miserably. “So? What do you say?”
Even before he speaks, Sunghoon knows he’s going to regret it.
“Fine,” he says, and Jungwon and Heeseung both erupt into unnecessary cheers. “Just once, though. And we leave as soon as I say.”
“We leave after a minimum of two hours,” Heeseung says.
“One hour,” Sunghoon insists.
“We can do one and a half,” Jungwon says, clapping his hands together as he finally lets go of Sunghoon, making his way to the passenger side of Heeseung’s Honda. “Not any less than that. God, this will be so exciting! Going to start tracking Instagrams of local bars to see if we can catch any cool events and shit.”
“Nothing that’s too much,” Sunghoon says in an attempt to reel him in just a little and prepare him for the upcoming disappointment. He trails behind him to get into the back of Heeseung’s car, too tired to argue for the passenger seat and figuring he can always lie down in the back and sleep some more. “Nothing too crazy. I have to agree to whatever shit you’ll be dragging me to.”
“Okay, but you can’t have veto power,” Heeseung straightens from where he was leaning on Sunghoon’s suitcase, wheeling it around to the back to try and struggle to get it into his trunk. Neither Sunghoon nor Jungwon make a move to go help him. “Otherwise you’d veto everything and we’d never get the chance to actually go out.”
That was Sunghoon’s plan. “I wouldn’t do that.”
“Nothing too crazy,” Jungwon nods, lifting his eyes to the sky in thought. “Nothing too crazy but nothing too tame, either, otherwise it’ll be boring… and we’re not telling you exactly what it is, I think. Keeping it a surprise will be a little fun.”
“I think you’re just doing that to be quirky,” Sunghoon tells him, just managing to dodge Jungwon’s kick. “You’re telling me what it’ll be, otherwise I’m not going.”
“We can tell you the general vibe,” Heeseung manages to say in between his grunts as he tries his hardest to lift Sunghoon’s suitcase. “Just not the specifics. That can be the surprise.”
Sunghoon exhales, trying to figure out his options. It’s not like he’s going to get out of this—not to mention it’d be humiliating to, after already agreeing. And it’s not like he’ll like whatever they take him to, anyway, so… “Fine,” he says. “Fine, you can do that. Just, I don’t know, give me some time to prepare for it or something.”
“Will do!” Jungwon grins, getting into the car. Sunghoon follows suit, wasting no time half-lying across the backseat, ignoring the obscenities that ring out of Heeseung’s mouth every so often as he wrestles the suitcase into the trunk.
He already knows the whole experience isn’t going to be enjoyable and that it’s going to be a waste of time (obviously), but at least he’ll be able to use this as a reason to drag his friends out to see and play more baseball matches than they’d agree to usually, so at least there’s that. And it’s not like it’s going to be the worst experience of his life, after all: it’s going to be nothing more than a simple bar trip. What’s the worst that can happen?