Archive of Our Own ^beta

As unlikely as it may seem, Sound does not start asking himself the important questions when he goes knocking on Win's door in a sudden, unexplained frenzy in the middle of the night with nothing on him but his heart on his sleeve. 

No, he starts way before that— when Win surprises everyone, including himself, by picking Sound up like he weighs nothing and bolting like his life depended on it. 

“What the hell?” The pegs of Sound’s electric guitar dig painfully into his hip. Win’s grip on him is strong and unfaltering, even as he struggles to break free. "Win, you psycho, put me down right now!" 

The call of Win's name seems to do the trick, because Win snaps out of whatever trance he was in, and he looks at Sound with a vaguely disbelieving and mostly shocked grimace painted all over his face. 

"Um," he says, and dumps Sound unceremoniously on the ground. 

Sound lands in a tangle of limbs, his guitar flipping over his head as he tumbles headfirst to the dirt. "Win, you bastard, this is Gucci!" 

"Hm," Win replies, still looking very lost, and he looks down at his empty hands. "Wait, where's my guitar?" 

"How should I know?" Sound yells, irate. He heaves himself to his feet, dusting himself off. His thigh twinges painfully. It's probably going to bruise. "You probably left it back there when you picked me up and ran away— which, by the way, what the fuck?" 

Seemingly incapable of coherent speech, Win doesn’t reply. He hems and haws for about a minute before he ambles off in the direction he came, completely ignoring Sound's question. 

Unable to do anything to stop him, Sound watches Win go in bewilderment.

Seriously, he thinks, what the hell is wrong with him?

The question resurfaces days later, when Sound is standing on Win's doorstep, banging on the door with all his might like it's offended him personally.

In a brief moment of clarity, he thinks to himself hysterically, It's three in the morning; seriously, what the hell is wrong with me? 

He doesn't get much time to ponder on his actions, because in a matter of seconds, Win is wrenching the door open and glaring at Sound furiously.

"Somebody better be dying," Win deadpans, a single eye cracked open.

Sound does not answer. 

He's too busy staring, mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water, taking in the sight of Win in his pajamas and sleep-ruffled in a way that the world does not typically have the privilege to see. It's bone-achingly familiar, and yet foreign all the same. Sound swallows. His throat feels parched. 

"Let me in." 

Win regards him suspiciously for a moment. 

Sound can't blame him, because if his ex-boyfriend (he's actually only ever dated one person) showed up on his doorstep at the asscrack of dawn, raining hellfire on his door like he's got a vendetta against it, he too would wonder if his ex-boyfriend (Win— he's the only one there's ever been) had somehow gone insane and decided to take them both out in a violent murder-suicide or something equally gory. He doesn't know. It could happen. Possibly. 

"The world ending out there or something?" Win sniffs, after a brief few seconds of hesitation. 

Sound shrugs.

"Might as well be," he says, voice oddly level for a man who just ran for 20 minutes to his ex-boyfriend's house with only one sock on in his long-time rival's too-big shoes with absolutely no explanation to back up his actions. It could be true; Sound isn't sure. It sure feels like it, though.

Win looks him up and down, assessing. Something must click in his brain, neural impulses transmitting, he reaches sudden enlightenment— either way, he pushes the door open further and steps aside to let Sound in.

"Suit yourself," he says in lieu of an explanation, "You know where everything is." 

The implication behind that statement, is, of course, that Sound knows where the spare key is, so he hadn't needed to bust down Win's door with his sudden intense need to be let in. The principle behind the matter, is, of course, that Sound does know how to let himself in with the spare key, but he needs Win to let him in. Needs to be willingly accepted back into Win's apartment, his life, to know if he had the slightest opportunity to regain the only good thing he'd had that he'd lost. 

Sound scrubs at his eyes with the heels of his hands as he stands in the middle of the living room to Win's apartment, feeling exhausted all of a sudden. 

Nothing has changed. 

Win's house is still clean. He still has flowers in the middle of the dining table because he thinks they add colour to the apartment. His fridge still has the magnets his parents get for him when they travel. The curtains are still that odd shade of light blue that looks grey in low-light. 

The coffee machine still has the cheery post-it Sound stuck on it the morning of the fight. The photos of him and Win still sit, neatly framed in front of the television, their twin smiles brighter than Sound has felt in the past few months. If Sound were to walk into the toilet, he knows he might see his toothbrush still sitting in its holder— slightly dusty, but still there.  

It's all a bit too much, all of a sudden. 

A hot mug of chamomile tea is pressed into his hands. It's banana-patterned, bright and cutesy and everything Sound is decidedly not feeling at the moment. 

Win tilts his head at it. "Drink." 

Sound drinks obediently. His mouth feels dry even after finishing the entire mug. "Do you have anything to eat?" 

"Do I...?" Win snorts. "Is your manager not going to try and kill you for eating this late at night?" 

"Fuck my manager," Sound says emphatically, and Win laughs. 

"I don't think you're awake enough for this," he says, shaking his head. "Are you drunk? You might be drunk." 

Sound scowls at Win. "What makes you think I'm drunk?" 

Win gestures to his entire body, and okay, Sound knows he's hardly put together right now, but this is Win, and he has seen him at his worst and then some, so this should hardly matter. 

"You're in my house," Win says simply, "You're sitting on my sofa and drinking my chamomile tea." 

"And?" Sound does not see his point. 

"And we broke up." Win levels him with a calm look. "You haven't done this since we called it quits. You don't do this. There's only one reason you would do this, and it's if you were drunk enough to forget that you don't love me anymore." 

"That's not true," Sound says, "I'm not drunk, just— really tired. I had nowhere else to go."

This is, somehow, the wrong thing to say; Win's open expression shutters, and he turns away from Sound wordlessly. Sound panics and catches his wrist in his hand before he can leave. 

"I only meant that there was nowhere else I'd rather be," his voice is quiet and only shakes a little on the exhale. "Look, I saw the video alright?" 

"The video?" 

"The one— the one at the park." Sound swallows. "What was that all about? Why did you pick me, and not your guitar, and run?" 

Win laughs. It's short and bitter, nothing like the laughs he used to pull from him. Sound hates it. "I'm not talking about this with you."

Sound isn't done. "Why did you let me in, Win? Why am I here?"

Incredulous, Win snatches his hand back and takes a minute step away from Sound. "Why—? You should be asking yourself that, Sound. Why are you here? Why did you choose to come here when you know we're over?"

Does he, though? 

Sound sighs. "I don't know." 

"That's what I thought." Win snorts derisively. "Look, you're in no state to be going anywhere right now; just stay here for the night. I'll get you a blanket." 

Sound doesn't know what else he can say. "Thanks." 

"Don't mention it."

Win disappears for a moment, then reappears with a blanket he must have purloined from some closet somewhere. Sound takes it, their fingers barely brushing in the exchange, and shuffles over to the couch numbly. As he lies down, dragging the blanket to his chin, his eyelids begin to get heavier, and he yawns despite himself. 

"I came over here to tell you something," He says numbly, "but I can't remember what." 

"Tell me in the morning," comes the reply. Sound turns his head to look; Win has gathered up his mug and has taken it to the sink to empty it of its contents. 

"Will you stay?" With me, here, Sound means to say. Will you sit with me until I fall asleep?

"This is my house," Win answers, but he crosses the room to sink into the sofa at Sound's feet. "Course I'll fuckin' be here." 

Sound falls asleep like that, his heart by his feet and his head on Win's sofa pillows. Win falls asleep there too, his arm resting across Sound's leg, a quiet reassurance and comforting weight. In the morning, when they wake, they are curled into each other, Win's hair tickling Sound's chin and Sound's arm gone numb under the weight of Win's head. 

They don't talk about it. 

Sound makes them both toast and eggs with bacon on the side for breakfast. Win pours the coffee into twin mugs, and adds sugar and a dash of milk to one of them, just the way Sound likes it. 

They don't talk about it. 

When Sound returns at the end of the day in a more presentable, put-together attire (two socks, a shirt and jeans that do not clash, his own beat-up sneakers), they brush their teeth side-by-side in Win's toilet and crawl into bed together, their hands intertwined the whole night. 

They still don't talk about it.

"I think you should talk about it." Pran says helpfully, when Sound finally finds the time to update him about everything that's going on in his life. "You can't keep this up; you know it's unhealthy for both of you." 

Pran, Sound's friend from his highschool band prior to transferring out to Niyomsil in the wake of Pran's abrupt departure from their old school, is someone Sound would consider a safe space.

He's technically an architect, but  he likes to expand into music composition in his free time under Sound's acting company— with all that common ground, it's no surprise that they've been fast friends since they reconnected over a shared love of music at their high school reunion a year back. 

It's nice to have someone to talk to who doesn't actually know Win personally. Sound feels like he can tell Pran everything about his feelings-not-feelings for Win and avoid being judged for them. 

"Is it really that unhealthy if I'm sleeping better than I have been for the past few months?" 

Pran gives him a withering look. "You know I don't mean it that way." 

Sound sighs. He's right, but he shouldn't say it. "I can't help that I'm codependent." 

Pran looks like he's a second away from strangling Sound, but reconsiders, evidently thinking of the compensation he'd have to pay for bruising one of the nation's fastest rising stars. "Codependency is for symbiotes. Not for ex-boyfriends who dump you over milk." 

"It was never really about the milk," Sound objects, "Besides, if it were really that bad, wouldn't he have kicked me out by now?" 

"Isn't this the same Win who you once had to take to the hospital because his niece stuck a lego up her nose so he did the same so she wouldn't be embarrassed when they went to the hospital?" Pran somehow manages to sound even more unimpressed than the first time Sound told him about this incident. "I don't think he has a good idea of what's good for him or not." He gives him a judgemental once-over. "And clearly, neither do you." 

"Fuck you," Sound says, without any real heat.

Pran pretends he doesn't hear him.

"You have to define what it is you are— and I know you're going to say something about how you're both people who hate talking about your deep vulnerable feelings because you're both egoistical bastards, blah blah blah— but you need to make it clear where you stand with him. Lest you end up on different pages; he thinks you're dating, you think you're casual buddies, then shit hits the fan sideways." 

Sound shudders. "Where the hell do I even start?" He complains, and thinks of being swept off his feet in the park and of chamomile tea in banana-patterned mugs, "This is all so confusing."

"You're just making it confusing," accuses Pran, "It's simple— do you still love him? Does he still love you?" 

Does Sound still love Win? 

The answer, without a doubt, as sure as the warmth spreading like molten gold through his veins at the thought of Win, is a resounding yes, a thousand times over, yes.

Sometimes, he wishes it were different, of course; maybe love would be less painful, less difficult, if he weren’t still in love with the first person who’d seen past the bluster of his persona and saw the true Sound Saran under all the layers of his prickly personality. 

But mostly, Sound knows that he wouldn’t have done things any differently, were he given the chance to do it all over again. He’d still choose to love Win, in every lifetime, in every universe; because painful as it may be, loving Win is beautiful, in its own little tragic way. 

So the answer is, irrevocably, yes. 

Sound still loves Win. 

But does Win still love Sound? 

Sound shudders. That's just going to have to remain one of the world's greatest mysteries. 

"P'Yak offered us a deal with his company?” Even rooms away, Win's voice carries through the walls, loud and indignant. “He has a company? Why didn't any of you tell me this? I'm part of Chinzhilla too!" 

"I thought Sound told you!" Gun cries. "We found out a month ago or something, and he took off running to your house at three in the morning; I assumed he just couldn't wait to tell you!" 

Sound winces. He remembers that day. They still haven't talked about it. 

They both look at Sound, sitting at Win's dining table, his laptop open to the script of his latest project. Win raises an eyebrow. 

Sound closes his laptop. "It just never came up," he mumbles, then somewhat nonsensically, makes jazz hands. "Uh, surprise?" 

Win rolls his eyes and stalks off.

"Fuckin' whatever," he grumbles, "It's a good thing so I'm not even going to bother getting mad about it." He goes to grab two apples from the fridge. Without looking, he lobs one in Sound's direction; Sound catches it deftly. They take a bite out of the apples at the same time. 

Gun looks from Win to Sound, from Sound to Win, then back to Win, before his gaze finally settles on Sound. He widens his eyes pointedly. 

Sound can feel the conversation coming up, and with it, a headache.

"Don't," he hisses, just barely audible so Win can't hear what Sound predicts will be an incredibly difficult conversation. 

He gets enough disapproving looks from Pran already, he doesn't need them from Gun too. 

"I haven't even said anything," Gun says, sidling up to him, "How do you know what I want to ask, unless you want me to ask?" 

"I just know," Sound retorts petulantly. He crosses his arms. "You're going to ask me what's going on with Win, aren't you?" 

"You said it, not me." Gun folds his hands under his chin and bats his eyelashes at Sound. "So, what's the story? You haven't been around my house in literal weeks, your eyebags aren't dusting the floor anymore, so I can only assume things have been looking up for you recently." 

"Quite the opposite," Sound says, "I'm super miserable." 

Gun squints at him.

Sound takes another bite of his apple, and explicitly ignores the way Gun's gaze tracks his movement then lingers knowingly on the apple.

"Okay," he says bemusedly, "I'll pretend I believe you." 

Sound can't even blame him for not believing him. 

Sound doesn't know when things began— that day in the park, or that early morning where he busted down Win's door— but even he's not stupid, and he can tell when Win's decided he's not someone he actively hates anymore. 

It's clear in the way Win doesn't actively shy away from him anymore; he will plop down next to him on the couch in the recording studio, pressed so closely to his side that he forgets where he ends and where Win begins, even if there's a valley of space between him and the other end of the couch. 

It’s clear in the way Win’s texts about his day pick up again after months of radio silence, first about Chinzhilla’s schedule and upcoming events, and then progressing to random updates about his day, like a funny tweet he’d seen or a cute cat he’d petted on the way to work. 

It’s clear in the way on the days Chinzhilla finishes up early and Sound has an event to get to, Win will wait for him for dinner no matter how late he ends up being, the house smelling deliciously of home-cooked food as Sound toes off his shoes by the door. The food is always warm, water always cold, and Win's eyes always warm when Sound tells him about his day. 

But what’s not clear is what they are to each other.

In the early mornings, before he has to get up, Sound likes to watch Win before he wakes up, before the weight of the world comes creeping back into their bedroom (and since when did Sound start thinking of Win's bedroom as theirs again?) and brings back the ever-present crease between Win's furrowed eyebrows. He looks peaceful like this, as young as his highschool self, when Sound first met him. 

Some mornings, Win wakes up and Sound cannot bring himself to look away from the languid way he stretches, shaking the sleep from his head as he blinks up with bleary eyes at Sound, recognition clear in their depths despite the early hour. Sometimes, Win looks back at Sound, and does not look away. He will sigh, a heavy, tenuous sound, and he will look at Sound like he has something to say to him.

But he never says a thing. 

Sound never asks, despite how badly he wishes he could grab Win by the shoulders and ask him: You don't hate me anymore, but does that mean you love me? Are you still in love with me?

So, maybe they're friends. 

Here, in the present, Win finishes preparing the food he's made to be brought into the company for today's lunch into two blocky, matching yellow and green lunchboxes. One for Sound, one for himself.

He shovels the still-hot leftovers into his mouth; they scorch his tongue, and he spends the next minute or so rapidly flapping his hands in the general direction of his face as if it's supposed to do anything to cool down the food in his mouth, which remains stubbornly sealed shut. 

Involuntarily, the corners of Sound’s mouth lifts in a fond smile; Gun must catch it, because he proceeds to nudge Sound’s foot under the table. 

“Don’t you dare tell anyone,” Sound threatens, and immediately feels stupid about it, because there really isn’t anything to tell, even though he really wishes there were. 

“Wasn’t going to,” Gun says, sounding distinctly amused, “It’s just bros being bros, isn’t it? Just friends being friends?” 

Fuck, okay. Sound can do 'friends'. 

Probably.

True to his word, Gun doesn’t breathe a word about their situation to anyone. Not even Tinn, which probably took a lot of effort on his part. 

Everyone seems to think that they’re still on bad terms, treating the situation between them with caution typically reserved for buried landmines. 

Frankly, this would be a stupid idea if their feud actually were true, since they’d already gone and joined a band together so it would’ve been kind of moot anyway, but he appreciates the sentiment.

And even though their poorly-concealed strategies aren’t exactly effective in preventing Sound and Win from fighting (because they’re not ), but they are incredibly annoying— Sound has to settle for barely seeing Win at all during the day even if they’re at the same event, separated by standing at opposite ends of a line, every other Chinzhilla member, plus their managers for good measure, putting distance in between them. 

It’s so stupid. 

They go to work together and they usually leave together, but they barely get to stand within a three-metre radius from each other before someone tries to separate them.

It’s gotten to the point where Sound considers talking to someone about it, just to get a semblance of understanding at the rationale of keeping them so distanced that multiple people have forgotten that they work together on multiple occasions occurring at multiple different times. 

It’s only a matter of time before he confronts someone about it, and Pran says to wait for the right time, but he isn’t exactly a patient person.

“Why don’t you ever schedule me and Sound for the same events?” 

Sound’s head snaps up. 

He’s in the company building, wrapping up his final acting project for the year as he makes preparations to enter the last year of his renegotiated acting contract, before he can join Chinzhilla as a more full-time member. 

Last he checked, he had been alone in the breakroom, nursing the giant bruises all over his body for having had to do his own stunt scenes, one of which on the agenda today had involved getting kicked in the chest and tumbling to the ground, knees braced for the fall. 

Chinzhilla’s actual manager (not Tinn), P’Fah, sits across from him, calmly assessing her Instagram feed. 

Win suddenly appears behind him, his hand pressing to the line of his shoulder naturally. Sound hopes the way he melts into his touch isn’t too obvious, but the silly little grin on Win’s face is enough to tell him that he shouldn’t be too optimistic. 

“What are you talking about, Win? You do go to events together.” 

“Alone,” he stresses, “Like how Yo and Pat are out today filming a vlog about replacing old instrument parts. Gun and Por have already done their idea of working retail at Auntie Gim’s milk bar for a day. Why don’t I get my own vlog with Sound?” 

P’Fah’s eyes dart from Win to Sound. Her tongue pokes out slightly to wet her lips, a nervous tic. She clears her throat. 

“Well, since Sound has his drama to attend to, I’m afraid he gets too busy sometimes for side projects like these—”

“—I don’t mind,” Sound interrupts, shooting a quick look at her, “Filming’s almost all wrapped up— I’ll free myself up for Win.” 

She pauses. 

“I’ve noticed it too, you know,” Sound says, rolling his eyes. “You really need to be more subtle if you’re trying to hide the fact that you’re trying your best to separate us.” 

“I personally do not care if you two have schedules together,” P’Fah is quick to correct, “The higher-ups were just worried that you hated each other, so they told us to keep you as far apart as possible. As long as you don’t manage to see each other, you won’t try to fight each other, and we won’t get banned from places and events in the future.” 

Sound buries his face in his hands.

At some point after The Breakup, before she had even met them, really, Sound and Win had found themselves in a bit of a… predicament, so to speak. 

They’d been out for dinner with Tiwson and Por, Por having insisted on meeting up with their friends regularly so as to not lose touch with his favourite people. Due to some scheduling error on Por’s part (really, is it his fault Tiwson is so distracting when he’s cleaning?), Sound had turned up to the restaurant to see Win sitting there and already eating. 

He’d tried to leave, obviously, but he’d tripped over a table and promptly ate shit on the floor, only to get up and find Win already staring at him with wide eyes. 

Face red-hot with embarrassment and yearning a quickly-tightening gyral in his chest, it was all too easy to turn to Win and just find something to start yelling about. 

Win, who could always be counted upon to give as good as he got, started yelling back—  under Tiwson and Por’s horrified gaze, they’d started arguing like their lives depended on it, making an even bigger scene than Sound’s initial fall. 

It was definitely about something stupid— it’s always about something stupid— but their argument had escalated to such lengths that it had ended with the four of them seated in a neat row outside of the restaurant with a very severe warning to please never return to the premises unless they were dying to get an indefinite stay behind bars at the local jail. 

Ultimately, it hadn’t been much of a deal— Win left first, Sound found a different place to eat at with Tiwson and Por, and all was good. 

They didn’t speak about it, never ended up speaking about it, and Sound was content to just pretend it never happened. 

P’Fah, apparently, is not; and if Sound weren’t so frantically trying to bury himself in the ground of embarrassment, he would wonder how she knows about the incident, but his dignity has just sunk to new asthenospheric-levels of low, so all he has on his mind is the overwhelming urge to flee. 

“We don’t fight anymore,” Win says casually, pressing down heavily on Sound’s shoulders with both hands, the warmth of his palms like searing brands on Sound’s deltoids. “We’re perfectly okay with each other, I promise.” 

“Yeah,” Sound says, and if voice comes out a little high and squeaky, that’s for him and him only to know. “What— what he said.” 

She regards them suspiciously, lips downturned. “You sure about that? I don’t want to have to deal with all those gossip rags just because you two couldn’t keep your hands off each other in public.” 

They all ignore the double entendre.

“We’re so okay with each other, we sleep together,” Sound blurts, and P’Fah stares. 

She points from Sound to Win, then back to Sound, then between them frantically as if she can draw a line connecting one to the other. “You two. You two are sleeping together.” She sighs, dragging a heavy hand down her face. “And why on earth did you think that was relevant for me to know? You want me to get you some forms from HR?” 

Sound stares. “There are forms just for living in the same house?” 

“No, but there are forms for sleeping with each other,” she says pointedly, looking at him like he’s the stupid one who doesn’t understand anything. 

“We just live in the same house,” Win cuts in, starting to sound vaguely annoyed. “Look, it doesn’t matter what Sound and I do— that’s honestly up to us— but we’re just saying that we’re on good terms now. You don’t have to separate us anymore. The fans are starting to ask questions,” Win raises his eyebrows, “And that can’t be a situation the company really wants, right?” 

P’Fah opens her mouth like she wants to say something, then seems to think better of it and closes her mouth again. What she settles on eventually is a curt, “Fine. I’ll talk to the higher-ups. See if we can schedule something for you two.” 

She goes back to her Instagram feed. Sound goes back to icing his injuries. 

Win takes a seat beside Sound. His movement jostles Sound’s aching ribs and a wounded sound escapes his lips involuntarily. Win’s hands are hovering over him instantly, a thousand apologies spilling from his lips. Sound shakes his head and goes back to icing his bruises. 

“Occupational hazard,” He attempts to joke, but it falls flat. 

Win glares at him. “Don’t they have actual stuntmen for this kind of shit? What are they going to do when you’re just a sack of bruises and too hurt to actually act?” 

Sound shrugs. It kind of hurts to move, when the bruises are this fresh, and Win must notice, because he takes the ice pack from Sound’s hand and helps him press it against the worst of the bruises on his knees. 

“It looks more real if I do it myself,” Sound mumbles stubbornly and lets the cold sweep across his knee with a numbing sort of comfort. 

“They should have at least taught you how to fall, then.” Win tsks disapprovingly. “Have you seen the size of this bruise?” 

Snorting derisively, Sound tries to flex his knee. “It’s quite literally on my leg, Win.” 

Win makes a sound of annoyance as he presses his hand into Sound’s thigh to keep his leg still. “Don’t fucking move, Sound, you’re going to aggravate your bruises more.” He pushes his finger into Sound’s forehead and doesn’t even let up when Sound shouts at him to stop. “I just don’t like seeing you get hurt. You should talk to the director or something, or I’ll do it for you.” 

Sound’s heart is a melted, gooey puddle in his chest. “Yeah?”

Win grins. “Yeah.” 

P’Fah doesn’t even bother to look up from her phone. “You sure you don’t need those forms?” 

“Who brought all this food in?” Por’s voice rises in a surprised shout from the meeting room. 

“Did someone say food?” Gun perks up, pushing past Sound to run towards the sound of Por’s voice. Pat and Yo follow suit, stumbling only a little in their haste to call dibs on the food before it can be snapped up by the rest of their band. 

The only person who lingers is Win, who saunters over casually to bump his shoulder into Sound’s.

“Not going to run for the food like the rest of them?” He asks, eyes flicking to where Gun has begun to rock back and forth on the balls of his feet at the sight of the dishes laid out neatly across their mahogany meeting table. 

Sound suppresses a laugh. “What would I do that for?” 

Win shrugs. “Curiosity, maybe?” 

Sound raises a single eyebrow, unimpressed. 

He knows who brought the food in, because he had been the one who’d had to help pack it into takeaway containers, and then carry it gingerly in the car as Win drove them both to the company building, after which he had foisted them onto Win and called it quits. 

Plus, he’d been the one to lug the heavy groceries used to make the food from the supermarket to his car, and then later from his car back to Win’s apartment. He’s quite literally been there every step of the way, from the conception to the metaphorical birth of the food; how on Earth does Win expect him to be curious about the food? 

“Curious my ass,” Sound scoffs, and stalks into the meeting room. 

Gun beckons him over excitedly. “Sound! Sound! Look at all this Tom Yum Goong— doesn’t it look so delicious?” He sighs, pressing his hands together. “Even my mother would be impressed, and she runs the best milk bar in town!” 

Win preens at the praise, however indirect, and Sound has to bite back his laughter. 

“Really? It doesn’t look that special to me,” he says, just to watch the way Win instantly gets offended, his hackles rising like an angry, puffed up cat. He glares at Sound, who merely glares back playfully. 

“Doesn’t look that special?” Por gasps, looking at Sound like he’s a crazed heretic. He gestures frantically at the giant pot of Tom Yum Goong sitting innocently on the table. “Have you seen the way it's plated? I couldn’t do it this well even if I tried.” 

“I’m looking at it,” Sound acknowledges, “But I still don’t see anything gasp-worthy about it.” 

“That’s because you’ve done too much staring at it already,” Win snaps. He shoves past Yo to throw the cupboard doors open to snag two bowls— under the stunned gazes of his friends, he roughly shovels food into both bowls, then thrusts one of them into Sound’s hands.

“There,” he declares, “Now eat before it gets cold.” 

Por falls to his knees. “You just ruined the plating!” 

“Food is meant to be eaten,” Win says flippantly. “Besides, I can always do it again next time, but Sound hasn’t eaten today because of his early morning photoshoot. He’s probably starving.” 

Sound barely reacts in time to tamp down on the shocked but pleased smile that threatens to make its presence known on his face. He hadn’t expected Win to remember that he’d had a photoshoot that morning, let alone the fact that he tried his best not to eat anything before a shoot, lest he have to run to the toilet or something halfway through. 

“I still think that’s unhealthy for you,” Win reminds, pressing a fork into Sound’s free hand, “So you better eat up right now.” 

“Wait, Win, you made all of this?” Pat looks back and forth between the food and Win like he’s in the midst of a quarter-life crisis. 

Nonchalant, Win shrugs. “Yeah,” he says, “I was actually just going to make something for Sound, but someone—” he pauses to glare pointedly at Sound, “ —bought too many ingredients, so these are technically leftovers.” 

“Oh?” Gun says in a tone Sound immediately decides he does not like, before he accosts Sound by roughly slinging an arm across his shoulder. “You two grocery shop together?” 

“That’s a waste of time,” Win tells him primly, “I just tell Sound to pick up the groceries before he gets home like last time.” 

“Home?” Gun sounds far too delighted for his own good. “Where’s home?” 

“None of your business,” Sound tells him instinctively, and shovels a spoonful of soup in his mouth before he can say anything potentially incriminating to reveal more about his current living situation than he is wont to admit. 

The flavours of the soup dance across his tongue, and for the second time today, Sound finds himself caught off guard.

Win’s cooking is good like it always is, but today’s dish just tastes different, hitting all of the right spots just the way Sound likes it. He pauses for a moment, lifts the bowl up to eye level and inspects it for a moment. Almost cautiously, he takes another mouthful. Somehow, it’s perfect. It tastes like comfort, like the Tom Yum Goong his mother would make when he got sick, like the feeling of belonging and warmth and love and everything in between. 

“What?” Win demands. “Is it bad?” 

Sound does not answer. He takes another bite. His eyes water. It’s just because the soup is spicy, he tells himself, nothing to do with anything like the fact that even Win’s fucking food has begun to taste like home to him. 

Win tries to snatch the bowl from his hands, but Sound holds on tightly. 

“If it’s that bad, you can just tell me, holy shit— you don’t have to cry about it!” Win growls, “I’m not fucking forcing you to eat it, what the hell?” 

“Shut up,” Sound chokes out, “Stop touching me and my soup, you bastard.” 

“What the fuck?” Win asks, utterly confused, “Do you like it or not?” 

“Do the fucking math,” Sound spits, “I love this shit, it’s the best thing I’ve ever eaten but also the worst thing that could ever happen to me, so leave me alone.” 

“Don’t call my cooking shit, asshole,” Win says on autopilot, then shakes his head in disbelief. “If I’d known you’d like it this much then I’d have cooked this for you earlier.” 

Seeing that Sound hasn’t been poisoned and hasn’t fallen over dead yet, Por deems it safe enough to slink over to the table to ladle some soup into bowls for the rest of them. He hands them out solemnly, and they all stand in a silent circle around the table, communicating their goodluck wishes with their eyes. 

Sound almost feels bad for them, because they’ve never tried Win’s cooking before, save for that one time in high school before Win had even learnt how to dice an onion properly. 

It’s safe to say that Sound can understand why they’re afraid. 

“Just eat it,” Win says bitingly, and then Por’s hurriedly putting a spoonful of soup in his mouth before he can be scolded any further.  

His eyes widen. He looks at Win with eyes as wide as twin moons. “Holy shit,” Por says, and gets back down on his knees. 

Yo spits out the Tom Yum Goong he had in his mouth all over Pat’s face. 

“Holy shit,” Por repeats emphatically, “This is the best Tom Yum Goong I’ve ever had, and I’ve tried Michelin-starred ones.” 

Yo starts to look like he regrets wasting the soup he spat on Pat. 

Win starts to look a little sheepish. He rubs the back of his neck with a hand, “I mean, it’s not that hard of a dish to make anyway, it barely took me an hour to make—” 

Por latches onto his pantleg. “Share your recipe with me,” he whispers reverently, “I am now your loyal disciple.” 

“Is it that good?” Win squints at Por. “You aren’t doing this just because you sat on my headphones and broke them last week?” 

“I’m not!” Por protests. “I don’t know how you suddenly gained the ability to cook, but this tastes like something from heaven— ask anyone else, they’ll tell you the same thing!” 

Gun is too busy going back for seconds to answer. He had already finished his entire bowl in the time it took for Por to overcome his fears and try the soup. Pat flashes them a thumbs up, then abandons his spoon in favour of drinking straight from the bowl. 

“Huh,” Win says, “Damn. Would never have guessed. I’ve been practicing with other dishes and everything, but Sound never says anything.” 

Sound slaps him on the shoulder. “What are you talking about, asshole, I finish my plate everytime you cook.” 

Yo pauses. He drops his spoon into his soup. “You cook for Sound?” He looks between them. “Regularly?” 

Pat smacks him on the back of his head so hard that his soup spills a little over the rim of his bowl and onto his shirt. “Of course he does,” Pat scolds, “Remember what P’Fah told us? C’mon Yo— what are you even asking?” 

This is a bit of a baffling reaction, but Win doesn’t seem to notice; instead, he looks incredibly pleased with himself, with the way Por and Gun are suddenly squabbling over the leftovers of his Tom Yum Goong, and Sound finds that he can’t really bring himself to care. 

Their vlog, as carefully negotiated with P’Fah and P’Yak, is filmed on a random Wednesday afternoon, in the sanctity of Win’s apartment. 

It hadn’t been either of their ideas, really— Sound wanted to do something awfully generic but entertaining, like go to the amusement park together and take the scariest, most death-defying rides they can find within the premises. Win, on the other hand, wanted to go to the aquarium and look at the fish, since he’d unwittingly been cheated out of a trip there in high school and never found the opportunity to make up for it. 

“Not the amusement park,” said P’Yak, when they told him, with a derisive shake of his head. “Too many opportunities for you to lose your voice screaming. Or your head, when the ride comes plummeting down like in those horror movies you see on the TV.” 

“Not the aquarium,” said P’Fah, when they told her, with the world’s most unimpressed expression marring her features, “Do you want to look like you’re on a date? Because that’s what people do when they’re on a date. Go to the aquarium and sneakily take pictures of each other and try to hold each other’s hands.” 

What they’d both suggested, in creepy unison, was to have a cooking episode, featuring Sound and Win. Just a vlog, P’Fah had explained, with Win teaching Sound to cook. 

Simple and easy. 

Except nothing about this is simple and easy, because Win is looping his arms around Sound’s waist to help him tie the strings of the apron which Sound can, quite frankly, reach on his own— which leaves Sound to furiously attempt to suppress the bright red flush spreading rapidly up his neck. 

With Win this up close, Sound can smell his shampoo— and it’s the same fucking shampoo he uses since they live in the same fucking house— but it’s different when it’s on Win, and it’s intoxicating to Sound in the worst ways possible. 

The most awful thing about the way Win pats him twice on the hip to signal that he’s done before slowly extricating himself from where he was pressed against Sound’s front for far too long, is that the cameras aren’t even rolling.

Which means that Win, for all intents and purposes, has to be doing this just because he feels like it. 

Sound is full of too many repressed emotions to even begin to process what the everloving fuck that’s supposed to mean, so he lets it be, and just mutters out a quick ‘thank you’ to Win before he busies himself with setting out the ingredients they need in an attempt to calm his racing nerves. 

It’s not like they haven’t cooked together before.

Their kitchen— or rather, Win’s kitchen— has borne witness to many of their cooking attempts, together or otherwise. 

At the beginning, Sound would return to Win’s apartment earlier, having a little bit of an odd schedule due to filming and photoshoots Win was otherwise uninvolved in, due to Sound’s solo career as an actor, and Win’s part-time internship as a sound engineer as he finished his university studies. 

He’d putter around the kitchen a bit and throw together the easiest thing he could think of— typically a bowl of ramen or something equally offensive in Win’s eyes, and call it a day. It was faster and less time-consuming than having to cook something proper, or to wait around for takeout, and though unhealthy, it kept him alive, so Sound didn’t really bother searching for an alternative.

Win had quickly caught on, after a few days of returning home to a suspiciously spotless kitchen, save for a single pair of chopsticks and a small pot sitting innocently on the drying rack, absolutely nothing of substance missing from his well-stocked fridge. 

Of course, as Win was wont to do, he’d scolded Sound the first few times; but when days turned into weeks turned into months, he’d given up, and picked up cooking. 

He’d been loathe to admit it at first, but he’d eventually been frustrated enough to admit that it had primarily been for Sound. The fact that he gets fed as well is just a happy bonus. 

Sound couldn’t even begin to discourage him, try as he might,  because any attempt on his part ended up with Win yelling at him with a saucy spatula pointed angrily in his direction as he was simultaneously lectured on the importance of healthy eating habits and the fact that Win has to eat too, asshole, get his fucking head out of his ass for once, does he not want Win to eat? Does he not care if he starves to death? Bitch.  

Now, Win comes home earlier than him most days, and he’ll pick up cooking without a word. By the time Sound gets home, Win will be seated at the dinner table, idly scrolling through his Instagram or messing around with his laptop, and he will perk up at the sound of the door closing. 

Sound will take his seat opposite Win at the dinner table, and they will eat in relative silence. Sound holds out his hand and Win passes the salt. Win holds out his plate and Sound will ladle the food he knows Win likes onto it. 

Sometimes, though, Win ends up coming home later— something to do with group projects or co-curricular activities— and Sound will pick up the mantle instead. 

Cooking for Win requires a much more concentrated effort on Sound’s part, because while he doesn’t care much about what he puts into his body, what goes into Win’s body is a different story entirely. 

He cooks as best as he can; and when Win gets home, Sound is there to serve him his dinner proudly, even if it is a little misshapen and oddly-flavoured compared to Win’s own creations. To his credit, Win has never complained (or rather he has, but Sound can tell he never means it, because he goes for seconds, and thirds, and sometimes he hogs the bowl so fervently that Sound has to get up and attempt to make more if he wishes to eat more than what he’s already taken for himself). 

So yeah, their kitchen can hardly be considered unfamiliar territory to either of them. 

But Sound can still feel the anxiety bubbling under his skin as he washes the rice in the sink under Win’s watchful eyes, and his hands no longer feel like his own. They shake a little, and Sound almost turns the tap off too late and drowns the poor rice grains in water. 

“We’re making stir-fried Thai Basil and Pork today,” Win announces to the camera, and turns it around to point it straight at the pot of rice Sound is attempting to salvage in the sink, “Sound is supposed to be helping me today, but I have no idea what he’s doing beyond waterboarding my rice.” 

Win adjusts his grip on the camera such that it frames Sound’s rapidly reddening face in the centre of the shot, with just enough space for his own to peek out at the corner so the fans can see just how appalled he is that Sound cannot cook rice. 

Sound knows how to cook rice. He’s cooked rice for Win many times without any problems. He’s just feeling … off today. 

It’s the cameras, he reasons, I’ve never cooked in front of an audience before.  

Win starts lecturing him theatrically on the merits of knowing how to wash his rice properly. Sound pretends to respond, nodding where he thinks appropriate, but the truth is that he has no idea what Win is saying at all, his voice becoming muted in the face of the roaring of his heartbeat in his ears. 

Deep down, Sound knows with alarming clarity that it’s not act of cooking or the rolling cameras that scare him— he is an actor, first and foremost, and has spent most of his life in the limelight under the watchful eyes of the cameras and a million staff members. 

No, it is the person he is cooking with that is causing this torrential undercurrent of fear. 

And the worst part is that Win isn’t even doing anything in particular, because maybe if he were, then Sound would have a good excuse to deliver a swift kick to the back of his knees such that he goes tumbling down to his stupid linoleum kitchen tiles together with that camera of his so that he can stop bothering Sound when he’s trying to plug the rice cooker in. 

Actually, no, Win bothering him is reason enough to do just that— Sound acts on his basest instincts and sticks a foot out to trip Win up. 

It works like a charm. Win goes down in a flurry of flailing limbs and curses Sound’s entire family tree dating back generations. 

He should be angry; Win’s default emotion is typically anger, no matter what he’s doing, but Win’s scolding Sound for playing around and desecrating the sanctity of their (and he refers to it as theirs, not his, and Sound is reeling) kitchen with a big smile on his face, and his expression is relaxed, open. 

Involuntarily, the corners of Sound’s mouth lifts as he delivers his own insults— the rice cooker is eventually abandoned for an impromptu rap battle in the kitchen. All the while, Win’s cheeks are stretched into a grin so wide his cheeks must hurt, and Sound’s heart sings along to the melody of his laughter. 

Smile frozen on his face, Sound knows exactly what is causing his heartbeat to stutter unnaturally in his veins— he’s afraid of cooking with Win in front of the fans, because he’s afraid of what they might see there. Do they see the love he holds for Win? Do they see the absence of its reciprocation from Win? 

Or maybe, do they see it growing between them, something small but ever-present, a remnant of a time lost and only recently regained? 

Sound’s afraid of the answer. 

His hesitation costs him; Win throws a handful of flour in his face, and his peals of laughter start up all over again at Sound’s wide-eyed look of shock, his nose and eyelashes coated in a thick layer of white. 

“There isn’t even flour in the recipe,” Sound tells the camera, lying forgotten on its side on the floor beside Win, his voice despondent as he sweeps a giant clump of flour from his face. “Are we even going to get anything done?” 

“You just can’t keep up with me,” Win says snidely, clapping his hands so a cloud of residual flour dusts off them in a giant plume, “Sounds like a skill issue to me.” 

Sound pauses. 

Behind the camera, P’Fah’s eyes are widening in alarm as she frantically shakes her head ‘no’, throwing up a giant ‘X’ sign with her hands with a sense of urgency that Sound personally does not share. P’Yak is practically on his knees, begging Sound not to give in. 

Sound looks back at Win, assessing. There’s a spark of challenge in the look he levels Sound with, a familiar smugness in the way he juts his chin out at him, like he’s daring Sound to rise to the bait. 

Between their managers and Win, Sound’s choice is clear. 

He shrugs apologetically at the cameras— his only warning to Win— before he lunges for the entire bag of flour, what for he isn’t sure, but probably something like upending all of its contents onto Win’s stupidly nice hairstyle. Win grapples with him for the bag, laughing raucously right into Sound’s ear. 

Sound can’t stop the smile that tugs on his lips. It’s the best sound he’s heard. 

They’re far too distracted by each other to get much done from that point onwards.

By the time filming wraps up, all they have is a poor approximation of stir-fried Thai Basil with Pork, and two somewhat sheepish, but mostly unapologetic Chinzhilla members trying to sweep flour from every nook and cranny of the kitchen they’ve unwittingly desecrated with their food fight prior. 

“I’m not even going to help,” P’Yak tells them once the cameras are off, “Your house, your mess, your clean-up.” 

Sound nudges Win and directs his attention towards P’Yak’s retreating back. “Should I get going too?” He teases. “Your house, your mess, your clean-up.” 

Win knees him in the gut. “It’s your house too, asshole.” He shoves a broom into Sound’s hands. Sound wonders if the way his hand lingers when their fingers touch as he takes the broom from him is merely a figment of his imagination. “Start cleaning, shithead.”

The thing is, Sound did catch that Freudian slip. 

He just pretended he didn’t, mostly because he isn’t sure if it really was a Freudian slip in the first place, or if Win just meant to refer to his apartment as home for them both, even though they’re broken up, maybe friends, and definitely not back together yet. 

Sound sometimes wonders if Win thinks he belongs there, like the post-ins multiplying on the coffee machine, their photos framed in front of the television, Sound’s toothbrush in Win’s toilet, no longer dusty, but lovingly tucked away in its rightful place for frequent use. Sound wonders if Win looks at him and files him away in the folder of his brain reserved for “things I love”, and “home”. 

The thing is, also, that Sound also thinks of Win’s apartment as home. 

He can’t pinpoint when it began for either of them, just distantly aware of some comments made in passing, a slip of the tongue changing “my home” into “our home”, or “Win’s apartment” into “our apartment”, or even “it’s your house too, asshole.” 

At some point of returning to the apartment in the evenings to discover Sound making himself at home in the same place on his couch between the armrest and the funny pillow he received from Pat as a gag-gift a few years back— very decidedly not at his own apartment or Tinn’s, where he tended to go to look for Gun— Win asked Sound, not unkindly, if he had a home. 

They had abandoned the dinner table that day in favour of the couch, eating dinner out of plates balanced precariously on their laps as they analysed an old American true crime series Win was partial to. Win had abruptly paused their show, looked up at him with clear eyes and the question on his lips; and Sound had hesitated. 

“I do,” Sound said slowly, afraid to disrupt the fine balance they’d achieved here, in the apartment.

Win blinked at him languidly. “Okay,” he replied calmly, “Why don’t you ever go home?”

Sound set his plate down on the coffee table, and in a rare display of vulnerability, drew his knees to his chest. “Do you want me to go home?”

“Yeah,” Win said nonchalantly, uncaring of the way Sound’s heart sank like a stone through the layers of Earth’s crust to bury itself in her molten magma core, “You stink up the toilet everytime you take a shit, even if you flush twice.” 

“I’ll go if you hate it that much.” He was proud of the way his voice trembled only slightly. “Get your head off my shoulder and I’ll go.” 

Win turned his head back to the television. He pulled up the remote and pressed play, digging his head further into the sharp point of Sound’s shoulder than humanly possible. “Nah,” he sighed, picking up his spoon, “I’m comfortable right here.” He smacked his lips together. “Looks like you’re staying one more night.”

Sound’s heart began its ascent back up through the lithosphere. “Yeah? Only tonight?” 

“Mhm,” Win nodded, as best as he could when the bulk of his skull remained supported by Sound’s shoulder, “You’re out first thing tomorrow morning.” There was light teasing in his tone and Sound found himself suddenly able to finally relax by a fraction, however minute. 

“Sure,” Sound replied, in the most casual tone he could muster, and tried valiantly to ignore the ball of confusion weighing heavy in his chest; when Win went to sleep that night, he lay awake for what felt like an eternity and then some, cradling Win in his arms like precious cargo, until his thoughts got too loud and he was forced to roll out of bed to put pen to paper before the floodgates burst open and he started spilling all his deepest, darkest secrets like an unstoppable flood. 

One night turns into another, and then another, and another, and then another; and Sound just stops going home entirely. 

Pran listens to the song Sound produced in a midnight panic-induced frenzy and taps his fingers on the coffee table to its rhythm, quietly assessing. 

It’s slightly different from his usual vibe, something a little more raw and confused than Sound likes to be in his music, but with all the elements of rock and electric guitar he typically brings to the table. Pat had been very agreeable when he’d asked him for the favour to play the drums for his backing track, but everything else Sound had covered. 

“I wanted to get your opinion on it before I showed it to Gun. Or like, management.” 

Pran hums. He quirks his lips in amusement as the song progresses. 

"Catchy beat," he says, and Sound starts to sweat. 

"I think I really like this harmony," he continues glibly, blissfully unaware of Sound's inner turmoil. 

"The electric guitar riff here is going to be so fun when you play it live," he notes, and there goes Sound's last straw. 

He slams his hands on the table. "Aren’t you going to ask about the lyrics?" Sound demands. 

Pran pulls out an Airpod and leans forward languidly, eyes sparking. "Do you want me to ask about the lyrics?" He asks coolly; this is precisely when Sound knows he's been played.

“No,” he says petulantly, and flops back against his chair. “Fuck.” 

“I think we should talk about the lyrics.” 

“I think we should not.” 

“It’s a good song,” Pran offers, and sips at his milk tea guilelessly. 

“Fuck you,” Sound retorts, just to be contrary. 

“You brought it up,” Pran says serenely. 

Sound scowls. “That was because I thought you were going to try and talk to me about it.” 

“I was,” Pran replies, shrugging nonchalantly, “But I wanted to let you start talking about it first. Freedom of speech and all that.” 

“That’s not how that works,” Sound retorts, but finds himself taking the next 40 minutes to try and explain the rigid dichotomy between whatever it is friends are supposed to be doing and whatever it is he and Win are doing anyway. 

“Fuck, it’s like— what even is friendship anymore? He makes my coffee before his in the morning, I towel his hair dry after he showers, he makes me dinner and we eat it together— it’s so fucking domestic,” Sound says miserably, “We even sleep together.” 

Pran chokes on his milk tea. 

Sound watches him cough, utterly unimpressed. He holds out a napkin, which Pran takes gratefully. 

When Pran’s soul has been successfully recollected, he looks at Sound awkwardly and goes: “So, uh, you two are uh—” He makes some vague, aborted motion with his hands. 

“Yes,” Sound says curtly. 

Pran’s eyes widen. “When I said maybe you could try being more than friends with him again, I didn’t mean friends with benefits.” 

It’s Sound’s turn to choke on his milk tea.

Pran, unfortunately seated directly across him, gets the worst of it. He takes it all in stride, and just grabs another tissue to wipe it off his face. 

“We— we’re not friends with— we haven’t gotten there yet—!” 

“You said you were sleeping together, what was I supposed to think?” Pran says hotly. “And then when I tried to confirm, you said yes! Literally two seconds ago!” 

“Why does everyone think that— I meant that we literally share a bed,” Sound shouts, voice sounding near-hysteric even to his own ears, “Holy shit, don’t scare me like that.” 

“Have you ever thought that it might be your phrasing?” Pran points out smartly, “What else can people think of when you say you’re sleeping together, knowing that you used to date?” 

And yeah, Sound sees where he’s coming from, but legally, he doesn’t have to admit to any of it, and that includes being wrong. 

“That doesn’t have to mean we’re friends with benefits!” 

“But would you want that?” Pran leans forward. “To be friends with benefits, maybe?” 

Sound purses his lips. He thinks about it— really, really thinks about it for a minute:

He thinks of what it would be like to fall into bed with Win and have to leave in the morning, and return only when and only when he’s called. 

His stomach roils uncomfortably. 

Yeah, Sound thinks, fuck that.  

He wants to wake up next to Win like he does now, slow and lazy, sharing warmth under the blankets with his hand tossed over Win’s stomach and Win’s legs tangled with his. He wants to share every moment, every breath with Win; Sound isn’t a small person but he wants to fold himself up and tuck himself into Win’s side and stay there forever, like some fucked up little parasitic symbiote, feeding off his warmth and love for the rest of his life. 

“Yeah, no, absolutely fucking not,” he settles for saying, instead of voicing his crazy delusions, “I can’t do that. I can’t settle for half; not when I want everything.” 

Pran regards him with a knowing look. He looks like he understands the feeling. “Everything?” 

“Everything,” Sound says pathetically, wringing his hands together, “A house with a white picket fence and two children and health insurance and maybe a cat or a dog or both and a joint bank account which we share and eating dinner across from each other every night for the rest of our lives— just— fucking everything.”

Leaning back in his seat, Pran twists his lips in a frown, and Sound suddenly feels about three sizes too small pinned under his calculative gaze. 

“Why don’t you ask him for everything?” Pran asks eventually. His tone is gentle, and when Sound looks at him, he knows he means well. He’s not saying this to hurt him, but it’s a genuine question of which Sound can hear the undertone— why doesn’t he ask Win for everything, when it seems like Win is already giving him everything? 

Sound does not bother to give himself time to think. He knows his answer, has spent one too many sleepless nights thinking about this exact issue to not have at least puzzled something out. 

“He doesn’t like me like that anymore,” is what he settles on eventually, swallowing around the thick lump of guilt in his throat. 

Pran looks incredibly dissatisfied with his answer. “You’ve got to be joking.”

Frowning, Sound folds his arms across his chest defensively. “No, I’m not. I’m dead serious.” 

Pran pinches the bridge of his nose and exhales noisily. “Sound,” he says, sounding very much like he’s speaking to a three-year-old rather than his very grown, very adult friend, “You can’t mean to tell me that with all the knowledge you’ve gathered through your twenty-two years of living on this Earth, that you’ve never gained enough sense to realise that with everything that man has done— is doing— for you, he is, in fact, obviously, undeniably, irrevocably head over heels for you?” He jabs his index finger in Sound’s vague direction to punctuate his point. “Why can’t you believe that he’s in love with you?” 

“Yes,” Sound repeats, “Because while he may have loved me before, he just isn’t in love with me anymore.” 

Pran looks lost for words. 

And Sound isn’t an insecure person— really, he’s not, he knows he’s a catch and then some— but there’s something about Win that makes him think twice.

He does not doubt that he is worthy of love at all, in fact, Sound knows he is loved; it is impossible for him to have gotten to where he is in life without having been shown love in a million different ways from the people around him, from his fans, his friends, his family, and himself. He knows he is loved, and he is grateful for that. 

Yet, where he is in life, love is conditional— it is a cold and hard fact drilled into him since the day he step foot into the industry. Tread carefully, because a single wrong step could send him tumbling into an abyss, and he loses everything he worked so hard to earn.

He has learned that in the wake of anger, love is lost; and in the wake of Win’s anger, there is no way he can recover the love there that once was. 

He’s not afraid that Win will find him impossible to love— he just doesn’t understand how he could . 

He says as such to Pran, hands shaking. 

“Love doesn't just cease to exist in the aftermath of anger, Sound.” Pran takes his hands in his, and gives him a small, sad smile. “Do you think I’ve never gotten angry at my boyfriend before? I've gotten angry at him so many times before— hell, I ran away on a bus to Chiang Mai without him because I was so angry and hurt by him that I just wanted some time and space for myself— but we’re still together, aren’t we?” 

“You don’t understand, Pran,” Sound pleads, “You don’t understand— he was so angry. How could he still love me after all that?” 

“Sound,” Pran says, “There is nothing you could have done to make him stop loving you underneath all that anger. Love is not conditional— you don’t lose it just because you did something wrong, and especially not over something as small as forgetting the milk.” 

Sound casts his gaze to his lap. “I— I don’t know. Wouldn’t Win have told me? If he still loved me?” 

“Have you?” Pran asks simply. “Have you told him you still love him?” 

Sound shakes his head mutely. “Why would I?” He says sullenly, “I’d only get rejected, and I’m not sure I can handle him leaving me again.” 

Pran blinks. “You’re one of the smartest people I know, you know that?” He says suddenly, looking to the ceiling. 

Sound follows his gaze upwards, frowning. There is nothing there but the whirring fan. He tears his gaze away from the rhythmic circles the fan blades trace in the air and looks back to Pran, who is staring at him with an unreadable expression now.

“But the moment Win comes into the picture?” Pran stabs his straw in his direction, “All those brains— gone. Never existed. You’re now the dumbest fucking person I know.” 

“Hey,” Sound bristles, his grief vanishing momentarily, “That feels uncalled for.” 

Pran shakes his head in disappointment. “You’ll figure it out eventually,” he sighs.

Sound does not figure it out. 

What he does figure out, which doesn’t seem to be what Pran hopes he figures out, is how to coexist with Win in a way that simultaneously feels like the kind of everything he wishes for, but is also the nothing he’s been stuck with since this whole confusing debacle began. 

They continue spending time with each other like they used to, long before the break-up. They come into work together, falling in step with each other when the morning begins, and bidding each other goodnight side-by-side as the night ends. They start practicing guitar together, and while Win is so much better at playing than he used to be in high school, the way he pouts and begs Sound for a break is so familiar it makes his heart ache. 

Sound starts to spend so much time with Win he starts to forget where he ends and where Win begins. It is just Sound and Win, and Win and Sound again, like it was always meant to be. 

The shift in their dynamic has affected more than just them, and Sound can tell— Yo no longer looks terrified when he’s walking with Win and happens to bump into Sound on their way to the toilet; Por stops trying to use himself as a human barricade between the two of them whenever they’re alone as a pair; Gun stops making weird faces at Sound when he sees him standing close to Win, opting instead to roll his eyes and look away in the other direction. 

Perhaps the most mind-boggling of all is how P’Fah eventually stops referring to them by their names, and just starts yelling SOUNDWIN! whenever she needs them. 

Sound finds this odd, because it is simultaneously both of their names, but also neither of their names. 

He’s actually tried to correct her a few times, Win in tow to prove a point, but all she does is look at them both before cutting him a bemused look and saying, “Well it did the trick, didn’t it?” Then, she ushers them off to whatever activity she has waiting, and Sound forgets all about it until she starts calling them ‘SoundWin’ again, and the cycle repeats itself. 

“Can you blame her?” Pat says, one day when he has the privilege of being around when Sound’s standing there and gaping at the empty space she used to stand in after she’s debriefed him and Win on their shared schedule for the week ahead. 

“Can I— what are you talking about,” Sound asks despairingly, “She refuses to explain why.” 

“It’s just more energetically efficient,” Pat tells him, like that’s supposed to make any sense to him, “Like— why bother with saying ‘Sound and Win’ when you can just say ‘SoundWin’ and get the same results?” 

“Because it’s neither of our names,” Sound says, and feels Win slip his hand into his own and squeeze. 

Pat’s gaze falls to their interlinked hands, and his face does a little spasm. It smooths out quickly enough that Sound almost wonders if he’d imagined it. 

“Okay,” Pat says, “But it is also both of your names.” 

Sound stares. He knows that. “I know that,” he tells Pat, his voice verging on annoyed, “So, why not just use both of our names separately?”

Pat stares back.  “I already told you— it’s just more energetically efficient.” 

P’Yak rounds the corner. He almost rams bodily into the two of them just standing there at a stalemate, glaring at each other, unwilling to back down. 

Win, who is leaning against the wall, one hand in Sound’s own and the other busy playing Candy Crush on his phone, is spared from the scolding P’Yak proceeds to deliver to both Sound and Pat about loitering with suspicious intent. 

“What are you two even doing standing around like a bunch of ghosts?” P’Yak scolds, hands placed on his hips. “Don’t you have anything better to do?” 

Pat sighs long-sufferingly. “I’m trying to explain to Sound why we call them ‘Soundwin’, and not just ‘Sound’ or ‘Win’ whenever we need them both.” 

P’Yak makes a noise of confusion, and Sound is just about to rejoice in the fact that someone else notices the sheer absurdity of the situation when he realises that P’Yak’s look of bafflement is not directed at Pat, but is directed at him instead. “Why the hell would we do that?” 

“Because those are our names!” Sound shouts. “My name is Sound, and his name is Win! We’re not ‘Soundwin’, we’re just Sound and Win!” 

P’Yak looks at him like he’s grown a second head. 

“Yeah, I know— but where there is Sound, there is always also Win— why bother calling for you both separately when I can just use an umbrella term and get you both?” He gestures rapidly between Sound and Win. “It’s like a buy-one-get-one free deal.” 

“That’s—” Sound looks at Win rapidly and then back to P’Yak. He drops Win’s hand. “—That’s not true! I do plenty of things without Win!” 

P’Yak and Pat both give him twin looks of exasperation. 

“Sure,” Pat drawls, “Name me one thing you did this past week without Win.” 

Sound opens his mouth to answer. 

“Not including going to the bathroom.” 

Sound closes his mouth. 

P’Yak folds his arms smugly. “Look, Sound, just accept it. You and Win both spend so much time together you’ve practically fused into a single human being.” 

“Like a human centipede,” Pat adds helpfully. 

Sound makes a face at the same time that P’Yak interjects with, “That’s super fucking gross, Pat.” 

P’Yak taps his chin thoughtfully twice, then snaps his fingers. “More like Tiwson and Por.” 

“How is that comparison any better than a human centipede?!” Pat cries.

Sound gags. 

While one might think that Tinn and Gun are the pinnacle of #relationshipgoals, the true masters of the art of relationships are none other than Tiwson and Por, who ever since they’d started dating openly, have been attached by the hip to each other. 

Unlike Tinn and Gun, both Tiwson and Por had been smart enough not to select university courses leading to careers in the healthcare sector after graduation, and thus never seemed to run out of human hours to spend with each other, even if they already spent every waking moment stuck like gum to each other’s sides. 

Sound is pretty sure that if not for the fact that they haven’t quite finished up their university education yet, Tiwson and Por would have long been married by now.

He turns to Win, mostly to gauge his reaction— only to find him already looking back at him, slightly amused smile sitting prettily on his features. 

“Does this not bother you at all?” Sound asks softly. 

Pat and P’Yak continue to bicker in the background, but the cacophony of their voices fails to reach Sound’s ears, and all he can hear is the deep baritone of Win’s light chuckle. 

“Why should it bother me?” He says with a nonchalant shrug, “I don’t care that much about it, since we’re a team, you and me.” 

“Oh, we are, aren’t we?” Sound snorts, shaking his head. 

“Of course,” Win replies easily. “It’s always only ever been you for me.” 

P’Fah’s voice floats down the hallway, shouting for SOUNDWIN!  

Win boosts himself off the wall and shoves his phone into his pocket. He straightens, and holds out a hand to Sound. “You coming?” 

Sound takes it. 

Eventually, though, just as Pran predicted, Sound does figure it out. 

The catalyst for his discovery is, unsurprisingly, P’Fah. 

She walks into the office one day, and when she discovers Sound and Win crammed together in a single office chair, sharing coffee and the little pastries from the bakery downstairs, she doesn’t sigh and leave like she usually does. 

Instead, she smirks at them like she knows something they don’t. 

“What?” Sound demands. “Do you have something you want to say to me?” 

P’Fah smiles, completely unbothered by the snippy tone Sound’s taken with her. “You can get those forms from me by the end of the day,” she says, inclining her head at the empty chairs surrounding Sound and Win, before she deserts them there, leaving Sound just about fifty shades more confused than he had been. 

“What on Earth is she talking about?” He says, puzzled. 

He’d been speaking to himself, of course, but Win shifts beside him to pull his phone from his pocket. “She’s talking about the forms HR has for in-the-workplace relationships.” He mentions offhandedly, snagging a little pastry from the plate in front of him.

Sound stares at him as he stuffs the entire thing into his mouth in one go. “Okay, but why is she getting them ready?” 

“Haven’t you heard?” Win grins wickedly around a mouthful of sugar-dusted passionfruit cruffin. “We’re the ‘most perfect couple of 2027’.” 

“The most— what?” Sound doesn’t think he’s ever been more confused in his entire life. 

Win dangles his phone in front of his face. “E-News just confirmed it,” He says, looking a little too much like the cat that got the cream, “Don’t we look like such a cute couple?” 

Right now, he has two working theories: the first is that the coffee he’s been drinking has actually been spiked with LSD or some similarly strong hallucinogen this entire time, and it is currently working overtime in his brain to produce a dream-like sequence of events so wacky that Sound doesn’t even think they could’ve been borne out of his wildest dreams. The second is that Win has been abducted by aliens replaced with a clone of himself, and clone!Win is currently doing his best to convince Sound that he is real in an elaborate 10-step plan, the first step being to convince Sound of his place in his life, except that the aliens have outdated information, and think he is still dating Win. 

The alternative, of course, is that this is real life. But it just seems too crazy to be true, so Sound sits and gapes and makes a sound that sounds remarkably like a dying fish. 

When he finally collects his soul back from wherever it had flown, Sound gathers all the strength he can muster and slaps himself across the face. 

“Fuck!” Win is on his feet in an instant, and Sound has mere seconds to mourn the loss of proximity before Win is taking his wrists in his hands and forcibly holding them away from his face. “Sound, what the fuck?”

“Sorry,” He replies, wincing, “It wasn’t supposed to hurt.” 

Win stares at him like he’s lost his mind— which, by the way, Sound can relate— and he drops Sound’s wrists. 

“What the hell, Sound, you just slapped yourself; of course it’s going to hurt.” Win sounds kind of annoyed, and he looks the part too, with how he’s currently glaring at Sound. “What were you thinking?” 

“I was thinking that this was a fever dream,” Sound says, rubbing his cheek with a grimace. Then— “Did they really call us the ‘most perfect couple of 2027’?” 

Win places his phone into Sound’s free hand. 

The E-News article is actually headlined 'Top 10 moments SoundWin proved they were the most perfect couple of 2027!'. The rest of the article proceeds in a somewhat cutesy fashion, where the author proceeds to gush about Sound and Win’s relationship since they met in 2022 to where they are today in 2027, except they’ve taken the creative liberty to embellish said relationship, namely bringing up its continued existence when Sound knows for a fact that they haven’t actually gotten back together. 

“What are your thoughts?” Sound asks, eyes fixed on Win’s phone screen. 

He’s reluctant to look up at Win, too afraid to see his reaction— but he’s forced to do so anyway when Win does not answer for much longer than he’s comfortable with. 

Win shrugs. “I don’t care,” he says, “It’s not like it isn’t true.” Then, he pauses, and fixes Sound with a wry smile. “Apart from the fact that we aren’t exactly a couple anymore.” 

And Sound had been thinking the exact same thing, but to hear Win confirm that they aren’t a couple anymore still causes his heart to ache something sinister, and he swallows thickly to push the rising hurt down as far as it will go. 

“Yeah,” he says, and tries not to sound so torn up about it. “That was weird of them.” 

Win shoots him a strange look that Sound can’t decipher. “Not that weird— we did use to date.” 

“That we did.” 

The thing is, it’s an easy conclusion to come to. 

Sound has been out of the closet for as long as he can remember. It’s not something he’s ever seen the need to keep hidden, once he’d realised and accepted it for himself, because it is simply a part of him; an undeniable fact. 

Sound was born in 2004. Sound is five foot eight. Sound is a musician in a band called Chinzhilla. Sound used to be an actor. Sound is gay, and he is in love with another man named Win. 

An undeniable fact. 

Besides, having had a vastly different beginning in the entertainment industry than Sound, Win very evidently lacks media training, and often ends up saying, or doing more than he means to. Which means the media has a field day after every interview they do together, where Sound ends up having to reel Win back in before he reveals some big secret of his because he hadn’t thought hard enough about what he was answering. 

There is one interview in particular that everyone, including P’Fah and P’Yak, had enjoyed immensely. Gun still teases Sound about it to this day.

It had been an interview to promote their band following the release of their first album, and Sound and Win had been called in to talk about the song they’d worked on together on the album, a track called ‘The Way I Loved You’ that Win had produced, with Sound providing the melody and the vocals. 

By then, Sound and Win had already grown close again, and following a resurfacing of the restaurant video on social media, they’d been forced to be open about the fact that they used to date in high school, but had broken up on bad terms. Now, they’re back together as friends, and closer than ever; what better than a fight that showed you the worst of someone to help you decide you actually like all of someone— their good and bad and everything in between? 

Win had explained to the interviewer that it had been these specific circumstances that had inspired him to write ‘The Way I Loved You’, which is why it had been paramount to him that Sound was his co-collaborator on the track. 

Sound remembers what happens next with crystal-clear clarity. 

The interviewer, seeing Win give Sound a sweet, fond smile that he tended to reserve for him and him alone, had asked innocently, “So, you’re meeting with good feelings again?”

Dazed by the open affection Win directed at him, Sound had been too late to stop Win from replying with an unsuspecting “Yeah, we don’t fight anymore.” 

To make matters worse, Win smiled winningly at the interviewer as he finished speaking, and took Sound’s hand in his to display their intertwined fingers to the camera. The cherry on top that really tied everything in a big "we're dating!" package was the sweet wink to the camera he delivered right after. 

The interview makes it to moment number five on the list of Top 10 moments SoundWin proved they were the most perfect couple of 2027! Sound's not actually thrilled that it's there at all. 

So yeah, it does seem like a natural conclusion to come to, that Sound and Win are in a loving, long-term relationship. 

Except, Sound thinks to himself hysterically, We aren’t. 

“I think I need to go,” he tells Win, and bolts out of the room without waiting for an answer. 

The first thing he does is get on the elevator. 

Chinzhilla is allocated a dance practice room on the fifth floor, and while they aren’t actually required to be in there very often (given that they are a band and not a T-pop boygroup and therefore aren’t required to know how to dance), Sound knows that there is bound to be one member of Chinzhilla in there at any given time. Two people, if the Chinzhilla member happens to be Por. 

Today’s Chinzhilla member screwing around in the dance practice room is Pat, who happens to be there the most. Out of all of them, he'd taken the most vested interest in dance, and ends up spending a good part of his day learning new choreographies to upload on the band account Tiktok account.

He isn’t filming anything today, just stretching on the floor to the beat of some English pop song Sound has heard on the radio recently. 

This works out very well for him. 

“Pat,” Sound says hurriedly as he rushes into the room, “Pat, I need your help.” 

Hearing the urgency in his tone, Pat springs to his feet. “Fuck, did Win knock over the mookata grill again?” 

This gives Sound pause. “What? No. Why would you assume it was Win?” 

“You’re always with him,” Pat says, “It’s a logical assumption. But if it wasn’t Win, was it Gun?” He frowns. “I thought he went on a date with Tinn today.” 

“He is on a date with Tinn today,” Sound says. “No one knocked over any mookata grills, okay— this isn’t high school.” 

“Huh,” Pat says slowly, folding his hands. “Okay, so if it wasn’t a mookata grill, then what do you need my help with?” 

Sound fumbles with his phone for a few seconds. He debates showing Pat the article, but eventually decides against it. No point putting ideas into his head— he needs an unbiased opinion, and the article is the exact opposite of unbiased. 

“Pat,” he asks, schooling his face into the most serious expression he can manage, “What are we?” 

Pat blinks, unsure if he’d heard him correctly. Then, his face promptly morphs into a vaguely disgusted expression, and he visibly takes a step back from Sound. 

“Gross,” Pat says,  “Why would you ask me that? You know you’re just a bandmate to me.” He shudders, as if finding the idea of dating Sound to be the most repulsive concept he’s ever considered. “Besides, you know I have a dinner date with Kajorn later.” 

It is now completely possible that Sound has entered an alternate universe. 

“You have a date with Kajorn? Like, student-council Kajorn?” 

Pat flushes a truly impressive shade of pink. “I— I mean—” 

“...Nevermind,” Sound tells him, holding up hand to stop him from explaining, “I don’t want to know. Nevermind.” He sighs. “I meant, what are Win and I?” 

It’s Pat’s turn to consider if he’s entered an alternate universe. “I’m going to ask you this again,” he says slowly, “Why are you asking me this?” 

“Why can’t I ask you this?” Sound frowns. 

“Shouldn’t you be asking— I don’t know— Win?” 

Sound chokes, shaking his head frantically. “I can’t ask him, what the fuck? Why would you ask me to ask him?” 

Pat frowns. “Sometimes I feel like we’re having completely different conversations,” he tells Sound, horribly confused, “What’s wrong with asking Win?”

“What’s wrong with asking Win is that he’s the root of the problem,” Sound hisses, “I can’t just go to him and ask him what we are.” 

“No— the part where Win is the issue, I figured that much—” Pat says, looking even more confused, “—but why can’t you ask your boyfriend what you are?” 

Sound stares. He’s definitely in an alternate universe now. “My boyfriend?” 

“Yeah?” Pat says casually, like he isn’t giving Sound a cerebral aneurysm with each word he continues to speak, “Isn’t Win your boyfriend?” 

“Isn’t Win my—” Sound splutters, unable to conjure up an answer; because isn’t that just the question he’s trying to ask himself? 

“It’s so weird to see you back here,” Gun comments, never one to pull his punches when it comes to Sound, “It’s been like, months.” 

Sound tries his best to glare at him from where he’s once again curled up on their couch, but he can’t be too mean to Gun, considering he’s intruding on his personal space and time with his boyfriend just because he’s trying to run away from his own problems. 

“Get off my back,” he grumps, because he can at least do this much, “Don’t you have a boyfriend to pester?” 

Gun sighs, loud and dramatic. “Tinn is on a volunteer trip in Laos,” he announces, then walks the few steps from the kitchen island to flop down on the sofa beside Sound, “So I’m lonely and we can be miserable here together.” 

“I’m not miserable,” Sound tries to say, but is immediately shut down by the unimpressed look Gun sends his way. “No, for real, I’m not.” 

“You’ve cleared everything there is to eat in my fridge already,” Gun deadpans, pointing to the pile of tupperware on the table, “Even the avocados. You haven’t done this since you broke up with Win, so I know it’s serious this time.” 

Sound gnaws on his bottom lip. “It’s just— I saw the E-News article, and I just— what am I and Win?” 

“What are you and Win?” Gun echoes, looking just as confused as Pat did. Sound hurries to explain. 

“It’s like— what are we to each other? Are we boyfriends? Friends? Exes?” He shakes his head. “I just can’t tell for sure what we are and it’s really confusing me.”

“That’s easy,” Gun says, “You’re Soundwin.” 

Sound’s head snaps up. Not this again. “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

Gun shifts till he’s sitting on his haunches, facing Sound fully. He brings the tips of his index fingers together and bumps them together before pulling them far apart, miming an explosion, sound effects included. “It is what it is,” he tells Sound cryptically. And even more mysterious still, he leans in and continues, “Think about it. Have either of you ever needed to define what you are to each other, or have you always just known?”

Later, when Sound thinks he's finally overstayed his welcome, he leaves, and he goes straight to the supermarket to buy the groceries because it's nearing the end of the week and they're bound to be running out of a few things at this point.

He likes to think that by now, they've achieved a sort of balance— an understanding—  where Sound's the one buying the groceries and Win's the one cooking, and after being bitched at a few times, Sound's also gotten good at guessing what needs to be restocked at the end of the week and what doesn't. 

It’s this understanding that has Sound moving on autopilot through the aisles at the nearby BigC supermarket, sweeping what he needs off the shelves and into the cart, as he mulls over Gun’s words from earlier in the day. 

Have they ever needed to define what they were to each other, or have they always known? 

Sound remembers liking Win in highschool, remembers liking how easy it was to like him. Win has always been loud and unrestrained, too carefree for the rules set in place around them; and for someone craving freedom so desperately like Sound, Win was the epitome of everything he wanted in life. So he’d liked, then loved, and loved fiercely.

He remembers pouring his heart out into a song and then confessing to Win on the beach before Hot Wave, remembers readying himself for a rejection that never came. And then Win had surprised him, and told him he was willing to try until his heart beat hummingbird-quick to the same rhythm as Sound’s. 

Even without speaking, then, they’d understood each other without words, operating on a frequency the rest of Chinzhilla found difficult to tune into, and Sound had always known what they were to each other even without having to put a name to it. 

Now, Win is different. 

He’s swapped out his haircut for something a little neater, a little easier to style in the morning before he heads to work. He’s no longer the skinny, pale kid Sound knew in highschool, having picked up a gym habit and a stubborn tan from the one holiday they took together before The Breakup to Boracay, where he’d forgotten his sunblock and promptly gotten a nasty burn, but also a pretty tan and some freckles to match. 

He’s also quieter, a little more mellow— he carries himself with a little more exhaustion these days, when life gets busy and difficult and he withdraws just a little bit into himself. 

They’ve weathered a lot together since getting together in highschool; graduation, the difficult first months of university where Win was suddenly absent and busy and meeting so many new people while Sound fought to advance in his career, and The Breakup. 

But even then, Sound still loves him. 

It’s different from the way he loved him in highschool, sure— times change, and inevitably, so does his love— but it never disappears, only evolves so he can love Win the way he deserves to be loved, for the sum total of all of his parts. 

That’s one thing that has never changed, even through the attrition of time; Sound is in love with Win. An undeniable fact. 

To say that they can put a name to what they are now is difficult, given the history between them— if Sound could do just that then he wouldn’t have been stuck in this awful predicament for months— but as Sound stops in the middle of the aisle in the cold-section of the BigC supermarket, his hand poised over a carton of milk in the specific brand that Win only drinks, and looks over the items in his shopping cart to realise that half of them are Win’s, he thinks that he may just very well know, deep in his heart, what they are and have become to each other. 

Win texts him then, a simple “come home quick im starving u fuckass i’ll kill u if the food gets cold before u get here”, and Sound realises that Win probably knows too. 

The epiphany washes over him like a rolling tide, gentle and all-encompassing, and in the wake of the sudden rush of giddy happiness bubbling up from within him, he grins in spite of himself, subconsciously crushing his phone so hard in his grip that he fumbles it and accidentally takes a screenshot. 

Immediately, he moves to delete it from his camera roll but ends up just standing there and smiling at it for so long that he finds he can’t bear to delete it at all. 

“Home,” Sound whispers to himself as he tucks his phone into his pocket and begins to move as fast as he can to the checkout aisle, “I’m going home.” 

Sound gets just about two days of self-assured euphoria to himself with finally knowing where he stands with Win before the man himself decides to have a go at his carefully constructed bubble of happiness with a wrecking ball. 

He’s getting dressed in the morning, just barely having been able to pull his boxers on, before Win barges into their room without a care for Sound’s partial nudity, and starts glowering at him with an intensity Sound hasn’t seen for a while but assuredly does not miss.

“Win,” he begins cautiously, “I do not have clothes on.” 

“I can see that.” Win snaps. He folds his arms but otherwise remains put. 

Sound tries again. “Okay, can you please get out so I can put my pants on? Or at the very least— turn around? Please?” 

Win snags the pair of cargo pants Sound had planned on wearing to the company that day and balls it up into a tight wad in his hands, and tosses it at Sound’s head. “You got a girlfriend or something?” 

Lost for words, Sound is so stunned all he can do is stand still as his pants hit him in the face. They fall to the floor with a thump, and Sound is left gaping at a very unhappy Win. 

“Win,” he says, with no small amount of confusion, “You of all people should know, very well I might add, that I am gay.” 

“That’s not what Twitter says,” Win says snidely, and thrusts his phone into Sound’s face. 

He goes cross-eyed with the effort to see what’s on the screen. The familiar blue bird logo eventually makes itself clear, and Sound soon finds himself staring at a shakily filmed video zooming in on his face as he smiles dopily at his phone in the middle of the BigC supermarket. He does look incredibly besotted in the video, his eyes softening at the corners as he presses his knuckles to his mouth in an effort to contain his smile. 

The tweet itself simply reads “SOUND SARAN HAS A GF OMG ITS ME GUYS ITS ME IM TELLING U ITS ME”

Sound looks up at Win and regards him with a critical look. “I can assure you that I am absolutely not dating Twitter user @chinzhi11as0und266.” 

“Who the hell are you talking to then, that makes you look so happy?” Win looks Sound up and down like he’s sizing him up for a fight. “You never told me you liked someone.” 

“Do I have to tell you if there’s someone I like?” Sound’s voice is incredulous as he responds. “Why would you care if there was someone I liked?” 

“We live in the same house, we share the same bed— you can’t be telling me that that wouldn’t be weird for you or the person you like?” Win scoffs. “Why don’t you just tell me who it is, and then we can move on from this?” 

Sound blinks at him. The way Win stands (his back against a wall and his chest puffed out and chin jutted out at Sound) and the way he speaks (like he’s spitting out venom with every word that spills from his lips) sounds … weirdly defensive. 

“Are you angry with me?” He asks instead of answering. 

Win looks a little dumbfounded, but he recovers quickly. “I’m not angry— why would I be angry? What makes you think I’m angry?”

“You just sound angry,” Sound replies, and suddenly, he feels tired. He could choose to escalate this conversation and argue with Win until they’ve both gotten the frustration out of their systems, but he’s tired of running circles around Win. He’s only just got him back in his life, just really realised and understood how much Win means to him and the place he wants Win to occupy in his life from now until forever, and he looks at Win and sees someone he loves so much that he knows he can’t survive losing him again.

He sighs. 

“Look,” he tells Win, “We need to talk about this.” 

“Of course we do,” Win retorts hotly, “Just tell me who you were fucking texting, man. Was it Pran?” 

“What does Pran have to do with anything? And you know he has a boyfriend!” 

“Then why won’t you tell me who you were texting? Why are you trying so hard to hide it?”

“It was you, dumbass,” Sound replies, exasperated. “And that’s not what I’m talking about.” 

Seemingly stunned by the sudden revelation that Sound’s open display of unfettered affection had been directed towards him all along, Win doesn’t speak, and just stares at Sound with wide eyes and an open expression. 

“We need to talk,” Sound continues, “Because we’ve been skirting over this— whatever this is between us— and I can’t do it. I just can’t do it.” 

“If you can’t handle being around me, you can just leave,” Win says, his anger simmering beneath the surface, mixed with something Sound can guess is hurt, “You don’t have to stay here with me, and have dinner with me, and share the bed with me—”

“And that’s just the thing—” Sound surges forward to catch Win’s hands in his own. “—Win. I love you. I love you so much that it hurts to breathe and my heart beats so fast around you I’m afraid I’ll develop and arrhythmia or something. I can’t just keep skirting over this weird thing between us because I love you , possibly more than I ever have, and I have realised that you have always been home to me.” 

“I need to know if you feel the same,” Sound searches Win’s expression, his voice coming out a little broken as he trips over his words, “I need to know if you feel the same as me. Because if you don’t, then I’ll have to leave. I don’t want to; but I cannot stay here with you and play house with you and pretend that we’re in a relationship we never left when that’s all I’ve ever wanted.” 

“I can’t do this by halves,” Sound whispers, the fight leaving his body in a single breath, until all that is left is his love and desperation, “I can’t do it because I want everything with you, you know? To want you so badly and to not be able to have you— it’s torture for me.” 

Win’s eyes rake over every square inch of Sound’s face, his chest heaving as he draws in a deep breath. His thumb comes up to swipe over Sound’s cheek— it comes away glistening; Sound didn’t even know he’d started to cry. 

“Sound,” Win says in a small voice, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know you felt that way.” Sound braces himself for the let-down. “Have you been thinking that I don’t love you back this entire time?” 

“You never said,” Sound mumbles. “You never gave me a reason to think you’d still love me after— after we broke-up.” 

Win exhales. His voice trembles as he speaks. “I didn’t think I could,” he admits slowly, “I was unreasonable, and I broke up with you; I didn’t know if I still had the right to ask for you back. But Sound, it’s always been you.” He smiles slowly. “I told you this before, didn’t I? It’s always only ever been you for me.” 

Involuntarily, Sound reaches out for Win; Win crosses the room and sinks into his embrace, hooking his chin over Sound’s shoulder. 

“I’m sorry,” Win says, “I’m so sorry about the milk. I was trying to make something for you, because I knew you were having a bad day, but all I did was add to it because I was so angry and so hurt that I thought you didn’t care enough about me and the effort I put in for you, and I never thought about how you might be feeling.” 

“I’m sorry too,” Sound whispers into Win’s hair, “I’m sorry about the milk, that I made you feel like I didn’t care, and that I didn’t come after you like I should have. I thought you needed space— but I think in doing that I just made the issue worse.”

Win laughs wetly. “Looks like we were both idiots. We could have been back together a lot faster if we’d just talked about it.” 

“Which part?” Sound jokes, and they both laugh. He tightens his hold on Win and feels him sag against him in relief. “In the spirit of communication, I have to ask— are we? Finally back together?” 

“Is that a challenge?” Win says, pushing Sound away till he’s at arm’s length to regard him playfully. “Do you think we can’t be back together?” 

Oh, how Sound has missed this push and pull. 

He leans forward as far as Win’s resistance against his shoulders will allow and smirks. “Do I think that? Maybe you’re just too scared that you’ll fall for me again.” 

“Who’s scared?” Win retorts. “Weren’t you just saying that you’re in love with me?” 

“Didn’t you admit it right back?” Sound teases, and Win glares. “Oooh, you wanna kiss me so bad.”

Win’s gaze drops to his lips. “Maybe I do,” he says, and promptly leans in to kiss Sound square on the lips. Sound welcomes him like a man starved; all thoughts of work forgotten, they fall into each other and tumble back into bed. 

He’s missed Win far too much to care about anything else, even the inevitable missed calls from P’Fah, P’Yak, and Gun that come to their phones later in the day. 

That night, Sound settles down beside Win in bed— which should be nothing unusual, considering that this has been routine for the past 6 months. But this time, Sound feels and believes like he belongs, and Win is welcoming him in with open arms and eyes that spark with mischief clearly visible even in the dark of their bedroom. 

Nothing has changed in the way Win tucks himself soundly against Sound’s side like a space has always been carved out there for him, but Sound’s heart is infinitely lighter, and his mind is finally quiet— he cannot help but feel like things have finally changed for the better. 

He presses a kiss to Win’s forehead and feels one dropped against his sternum in response— he smiles widely.

Yes, they definitely have.

In the wake of these new circumstances, Sound is aware that there are a few people he should probably update. Pran, for instance. Or maybe P'Fah and her forms for HR. 

He does none of that. He and Win tell no one; but the surprising thing is that no one notices. 

Sound figures it's probably because they don't act any different than they usually do. They've never been big on PDA, and if he wants to give Win's ass a little pat while they're at work, he only ever does so when no one else is around, so it's understandable if they don't notice anything amiss. 

Besides, is there really a point to telling everyone if they'd all already assumed they were dating in the first place? 

There is, actually, one person Sound tells.

Who it is surprises him too, because he never thought he'd be willingly surrendering information about his personal life to Tinn, of all people, but here he is, backstage before Chinzhilla's first official concert, with Win's hand in his own and Win's lipstick smeared on his lips, his hair distinctly ruffled from Win's hands running through it. 

Tinn, the ever-insufferable git, is unfortunately here because he's dating Gun, and Gun likes to have him around, especially before important Chinzhilla milestones like some sort of goodluck charm. Sound personally thinks he's more like a curse, or a jinx, but hey, to each their own, right? Sound's dating his ex again, he's not exactly someone to be speaking on another person's romantic choices.

Tinn raises an eyebrow at the broom closet Sound and Win have just stumbled out of, and looks at their interlinked hands. His eyebrow rises even further. 

Sound wants to smack it, preferably off his face. What does Gun even see in this guy?

He glares at him in a silent challenge, daring him to say something. Tinn fortunately takes the hint and raises his hands in surrender.

"You shut up," Sound tells him automatically. "You're full of shit." 

"I haven't even said anything!" Tinn protests immediately, and Win snorts. 

"He's gonna say it's annoying that you breathe too loud," Win says, and Sound immediately feels an insane sense of pride flow through him. Damn, his boyfriend knows him so well. He leans over and brushes a kiss to Win's cheek, which he accepts readily.

Tinn watches them with no small amount of amusement. "Just tell me one thing— have you guys actually been dating all this while, or is this a new thing?" 

Sound's just about to tell him to kindly fuck off, but Win's pressing closer to him, and the words die in his throat— he's suddenly feeling all giddy with happiness and love and every pleasant emotion he can name under the sun, but also vaguely like a rambunctious teenager sneaking off to make out in closets.

Win nudges him in the side; Sound gives Tinn the answer he was waiting for. 

"It's a new thing, if you can even call it that," He tells him grouchily. Then, his grin grows wickedly as he meets eyes with Win. “But is it really a new thing if we’ve already been together for three years?” 

To his credit, Tinn doesn't look phased. He shrugs mildly.

“Probably not. Now if you'll excuse me,” he says, turning to leave, “I have to go collect my winnings from Tiwson.” 

Sound and Win look at each other. He honestly has a good mind to chase after Tinn and beat him up (and maybe Tiwson, for good measure, but Sound fundamentally doesn't hate him as much) for betting on him, and then some; but Win is grinning softly and tugging Sound flush against him again.

"Hey you," he whispers, and Sound can't resist bringing a hand to the back of Win's head to pull him back into a kiss. Somehow, they tumble back into the closet, and whatever— the concert can wait. Tinn can go fuck himself.

Sound has a boyfriend to kiss.