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Alternate List, Day nine: Deep kissing
Seungmin stares at his reflection in the toothpaste splattered bathroom mirror. He never really studied himself before like he has in recent months, but now it’s an almost daily ritual.
To look at himself.
To pick himself apart piece by piece.
He can admit that his eyes are, as others have described, cute and dog-like; that his freshly dyed blonde bangs are flattering enough on his face; that his teeth are nice now that the braces have straightened them and spaced them out. That’s all he likes about what stares back at him, though. Seungmin can find far more flaws than he can strengths in his face. His nose is too big, his cheeks fluctuate between gaunt and chubby depending on what he does and what he eats, his chin is too square, his jawline isn’t defined enough for his taste, and his lips…Seungmin dislikes his lips most of all.
He brings a hand up and touches his mouth, squishes his lips together, pinches the bottom one between two fingers, pushes the top one up to touch his nose. His lips are too big, too pigmented, too wide, the borders are undefined, the corners don’t stretch up into an adorable, simpering smile like other people’s lips do, and when he rests his face they don’t convey an overall pleasant demeanor. All in all he’d say his lips are just not pretty or likable in any way. His entire face isn’t pretty or likable or particularly handsome in his opinion.
Seungmin drops his hand, stares at his face for a while longer, long enough for his brain to start convincing him everything looks weird. He peers into his own eyes for so long that even blinking seems weird.
Seungmin startles when he feels an arm wrap around his waist from behind, too in his head to have realized that Minho entered the bathroom too. He looks away from himself to his boyfriend through the mirror, whose chin is perched on Seungmin’s shoulder. Minho’s eyes are squinted at the harsh lighting, lips downturned and pouty from sleep, hair tangled and sticking up in ways that should be unattractive, but Seungmin likes Minho like this the most.
“What’re you doin’ up so early,” Minho slurs, voice scratchy and low. Seungmin grins at his sleepy boyfriend through the mirror.
“Had to pee,” Seungmin murmurs, not wanting to wake Minho up more than he already is by being loud.
“Been in here a long time just to pee,” Minho says, matching the quiet of the early morning as well. He hugs himself closer to Seungmin, draping his body over Seungmin’s back, soaking up his warmth in the cold room.
“Sorry, didn’t mean to wake you up.”
“S’okay.”
Seungmin looks at Minho’s reflection. His boyfriend is so pretty, even when he’s sleep-rumpled and puffy. He’s so pretty it makes Seungmin’s chest ache with fondness and admiration. He turns his eyes back to his own face and grimaces.
Minho finds Seungmin charming. Minho likes everything about Seungmin’s face and has told him as much many times over. He has kissed every inch of his face, reverently, lovingly, like there isn’t a single thing he can find to complain about. Minho always looks at Seungmin with sparkly eyes, looks at him like Seungmin is the prettiest, the best, the most perfect thing he’s ever beheld.
So Seungmin has made a habit of standing in the bathroom and staring at himself, trying to force himself to see what his boyfriend sees. He isn’t that shallow of a person to believe himself beautiful and desirable only when a cute boy tells him he his, but he can’t help but wonder what Minho finds so alluring, what makes him keep coming back, what makes him want to captivate all of Seungmin’s attention until he can’t think of anything or anybody else. Seungmin wants to see it too. He wants desperately to be able to look at himself and find someone worthy of such attention. He wants to look and not have to study and search, to not be so neurotic about something so insignificant in other peoples’ minds.
“I can hear your brain thinking too much,” Minho says. He’s looking through the mirror too now.
Seungmin turns around in the cage of Minho’s arms, if only to stop his downward spiral. Minho blinks up at him, already looking more awake and alert.
Seungmin thinks Minho is perfect. His eyes are round and bright, his nose fits his face, his slightly crooked teeth are endearing, and his lips…Seungmin loves his lips. They’re pretty and smooth. They make Minho look strong and untouchable when he’s not smiling, and when he does smile the corners curl up sweetly and flirtatiously. If he smiles big enough then sometimes his gums show, and sometimes one side of his bottom lip comes down a little further, showing his bottom teeth and making his smile uneven but all the more heart-wrenchingly perfect in Seungmin’s eyes.
He lifts his hand to Minho’s face, grazes over his smooth cheeks, presses his thumb into the gentle arch of his eyebrow. Seungmin traces over the bridge of Minho’s nose, cups his jaw tenderly and thumbs at the corner of his eye. Minho closes his eyes only long enough for Seungmin to pet over his eyelashes, gently, a butterfly on a flower. Seungmin drops his hand to Minho’s chin and pulls down enough for Minho’s lips to part. He can feel his boyfriend’s gaze through it all, begging to be returned, lighting Seungmin up from the inside until he’s burning, asking Seungmin to spark back, to light them both up like twin flames.
Minho’s eyes are glowing with that heat when Seungmin finally meets his gaze again. His eyes flick down to Seungmin’s lips, the lips Seungmin dislikes so much, the lips Minho can’t seem to get enough of.
Seungmin takes a breath in before Minho tilts his head up to kiss him.
He doesn’t mind his lips so much when they’re caught between his boyfriend’s. Minho slides their mouths together slowly, holds Seungmin’s waist tightly, cards his fingers through his hair gently like he knows Seungmin’s head is leading him into darkness and he wants to keep him in the light. Seungmin wants to stay there too, but it’s hard sometimes.
Minho breaks the kiss only to whisper, lips against lips, “Stop thinking so much.”
He reconnects their mouths, swiping his tongue along the seam of Seungmin’s lips until Seungmin drops his jaw, giving Minho full access, always. Minho could ask him to cut open his chest so he could crawl inside and Seungmin would do it. He knows he wants to do the same to Minho, to exist in every moment of his, to see through his eyes even if it’s just a glimpse.
Their tongues slide across one another, lick the backs of teeth and the roofs of mouths, flick teasingly. And it’s easy for Seungmin to stop thinking like this, when his head is getting fuzzy and hazy and all he can feel is Minho against him and inside him, filling him up to the brim and spilling over, drenching the world.
Minho pulls back with a final sweet, wet kiss and opens his eyes to look at Seungmin again. His eyes are hooded, liquid gold, cheeks flushed, lips swollen. He stares at him like Seungmin is where he wants to be forever and Seungmin knows the look is mirrored on his own face.
His head is quiet, for the moment.
“Better?” Minho asks, voice husky and deep. Seungmin shivers. He nods. The mirror is behind him. It’s in front of him.
“Better."