Work Text:
At the top of Seungkwan’s YouTube homepage was a tidy algorithmically-generated list of his interests, including but not limited to: professional volleyball, Pilates, nutrition, choreography. And, despite his best efforts: Kim Mingyu.
The “Not Interested” button was a lie, or a joke, because no matter how many times he selected “Do not recommend this channel to me,” the first thing on his homepage when Jeonghan pulled up YouTube on his laptop was Kim Mingyu’s strong, perfect jaw in the bright thumbnail of “Get ready with me! | morning routine + gym vlog.”
“I don’t know what your deal is,” said Jeonghan, scrolling through user min9yu_k’s channel. He paused the cursor over the preview for “ABS PROGRAM 1: Core Intensity Workout,” which showed a sweaty Kim Mingyu on an exercise mat rucking up his shirt to dry his forehead and bare the results of the titular intensity workout. “I think he’s very charming.”
Seungkwan looked over from across his bedroom to where Jeonghan and Chan were hunched over his laptop like two eight-year-olds on the family desktop in 2006. “Please don’t fuck up my recommendations more than they already are.”
Jeonghan stayed silent, so Seungkwan knew he had taken that as a challenge. He peaked at the screen in time to catch Jeonghan entering “kim mingyu sexy gym edit ten minutes” into the search bar and beaned the shirt he was folding at his head. Chan, perched to Jeonghan’s left, batted it away with a cackle while Jeonghan clicked through to the video.
“Doesn’t he live around here?” Jeonghan asked innocently, like all he was doing was looking up a mutual friend rather than intentionally terrorizing Seungkwan’s internet footprint.
“He lives in the neighborhood,” Seungkwan emphasized, scooping his shirt back up and folding it neatly into his dresser. “He blocks traffic when he films.” Once Seungkwan had come home to Kim Mingyu and his menagerie of beautiful men filming in a convertible in the middle of the street and had had to wait for them to move out of the way. “And he swims at my pool,” he added in a rushed mumble under his breath.
“Oh?” said Chan, obviously delighted. He twisted around to look at Seungkwan with bright eyes. “And you hate him? Does he run on the pool deck? Splash too much?”
Seungkwan placed the last of his laundry away and closed the drawer with a snap. “He disrupts my right to quiet enjoyment.”
“At work?”
Seungkwan pretended not to hear him. The real answer was that Kim Mingyu was genetically engineered to pick at every single one of Seungkwan’s ugly insecurities—tall, athletic, beautiful and successful in a way that made Seungkwan feel grossly bitter. Seeing him half-naked at the community pool three times a week hadn’t helped, even though Seungkwan was self-aware enough to know that any feelings of inadequacy were a him-problem, not a Mingyu-problem.
Fortunately, after half a summer of observing min9yu_k in person, Seungkwan knew that Kim Mingyu was also deeply, deeply annoying. Seungkwan—petty and imperfect bitch as he was—clung fiercely to this truth whenever his FYP filled up with charming Mingyu content. Good looks couldn’t fix an ugly personality.
“He has a make-up collab with Joshua Hong,” Jeonghan announced, gleefully clicking through to the video. Joshua Hong’s beautiful yet meticulously overwrought influencer brand was a special interest for Jeonghan, who had followed his career with the same fascination a young child might lend to a particularly cool rock.
Seungkwan mumbled something about meaning to block Joshua Hong but positioned himself to watch the video over his friends’ shoulders. On screen, Joshua Hong held a makeup brush up to the camera with two hands—one on the brush, and the other behind, to help the camera focus. He gave the camera a little too much eye-contact, then turned to Mingyu and smoothed the foundation across his cheek. Mingyu closed his eyes as he did, but couldn’t keep himself from smiling and quirking up his cheek like it tickled; Josh laughed and told him off.
“Mingyu is so cute,” said Chan. “You should ask him out so I can have a famous friend.”
“YouTube-famous,” Seungkwan corrected. “It’s not like he’s a real celebrity.”
“Fifteen million followers? That’s more than Emma Chamberlain, and she’s famous.”
“You can’t ask him out,” Jeonghan said, eyes glued to the screen. “I need to maintain an objective scientific distance from Josh, and if he came to your wedding we would almost certainly fall in love.”
Seungkwan snorted. “Then it’s a good thing I hate Mingyu’s fucking guts.”
His friends both scoffed like they didn’t believe him.
Jeonghan clicked out of the collab video and scrolled further down Mingyu’s channel to something ominously titled: “Weight Challenge: HOW MUCH I CAN LIFT??” He idled over the thumbnail, then asked, “Do you think he could bench press you?”
Seungkwan ignored him again. He’d already watched that video and knew the answer was yes.
//
“Hey guys,” Kim Mingyu lilted to his phone, angled high over his head to show off his jawline. A few yards away, Seungkwan rolled his eyes so hard he almost fell out of the lifeguard tower.
“I just wanted to jump on to say hey, and to let you guys know that I have a new video coming out this afternoon at 4pm KST.” He stretched languidly on the lounge chair, showing off his collarbones and upper bicep. “We’re kicking off week one of my summer program and I cannot wait to share it with you. See you soon!” He ended with a wink. His tinny recorded message echoed across the nearly empty pool deck as he played it back, once, twice, three times.
This fucking guy. Seungkwan rested his head on his hand and watched the woman in the second lane complete her laps.
“Hey everyone,” Kim Mingyu started again. “I just wanted to jump on and say hello, and to make sure you knew that my new summer at home workout program starts this week at 4pm KST. Looking forward to seeing you there!” He played it back and shook his head.
“Hi everyone,” he started one more time. “I’m just at the pool, and—"
“Just do it in a live or something,” interrupted Joshua Hong, influencer, from the neighboring lounger. “You’re killing the vibe.”
Kim Mingyu smiled—even from across the pool Seungkwan could tell it was a boyish, sheepish smile—and tossed his phone on his towel. “I’ll do my laps and try again.”
“It’ll be better for engagement if you’re wet,” Josh remarked mildly, without looking up from his phone.
Seungkwan snorted. Typical.
Kim Mingyu’s visits to the pool followed a predictable routine of weekday mornings and the rare afternoon. He never came on weekends, when the pool got crowded with kids and families cooling off from the late July heat. Seungkwan guessed that the content creator schedule made it easier to swim at low-traffic hours. Joshua Hong came with him on some days; on other days it would be different exceptionally well-muscled and good-looking young men, presumably with content careers of their own. (Seungkwan wouldn’t know. He had better things to do than research Mingyu’s friends.)
Mingyu filmed often: casual vlogs on the chaise, a stationary waterproof camera to capture his laps when he was alone, dive challenges and handstand challenges and whatever-else challenges when he brought his friends. It’s not not allowed—and Seungkwan knew that Mingyu had cleared it with management as long as other patrons weren’t in the shot and as long as there wasn’t a complaint. Seungkwan’s complaints, however founded, did not count.
Seungkwan preferred working in the mornings. He liked how cool and quiet it was before the full heat and activity hit at midday, and he liked how the water looked in the early hours, gently shifting in the easy sunlight. It was relaxed, and peaceful. Most of the patrons that came in at this hour were retired—he enjoyed talking to the older women in the morning water aerobics class, who loved to tease him and try to set him up with their grandchildren. The chaos that tended to follow Kim Mingyu was more often an annoyance than a welcome distraction.
But this morning, Kim Mingyu did his laps quietly. Seungkwan watched the pool come alive as Mingyu cut through the still water, sunlight refracting off of the shifting water into a million bright little lines. Mingyu was pleasant to watch swim—he was athletic, with good form in a smooth and confident freestyle. Seungkwan could appreciate it, purely from a sportsman’s perspective.
When he finished his laps, Mingyu pushed himself out of the pool near Seungkwan’s station, wet hair plastered to his skull and goggles on tight. For a moment he looked like a weird wet dog and Seungkwan privately delighted in it.
Seungkwan tweeted his whistle. “Hey.”
Mingyu looked up immediately. “Hey?” He pushed his goggles back and swept his wet hair out of his face in what was clearly supposed to be one cool sexy move.
Seungkwan pushed his sunglasses up and leaned toward him. Mingyu had red marks around his eyes where the goggles had bit into his skin, and Seungkwan hated that he found that charming. “Scuba classes are going to start every Tuesday next week at 8am. We won’t be open for lap swim for the first hour.” Mingyu stared at him blankly for a beat, which annoyed him. “You’re here early a lot,” Seungkwan clarified impatiently. “Just so you know.”
Mingyu smiled up at him. “They already told me at the front desk. But thank you.”
Seungkwan nodded and turned his attention to the pool, task complete. The 10:00 AM adult swimming class was beginning to arrive, and the first couple of students were getting into the water. “Okay, great.”
Mingyu stood by him for a bit, kicking at the surface of the water with one foot. “Is that when you work? Mornings?”
“Mornings Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday, afternoons Friday/Saturday,” he answered automatically. Across the pool, Seungkwan could see his coworker carrying far too many kickboards at once out for the program. He did this every time, no matter how often they told him not to.
He realized Mingyu had said something else to him. “Sorry, what?”
Mingyu waved him off. “No, I can see you’re busy. Listen, if you don’t work Sundays, I was wondering if you’d want to—"
A full-chested yodel interrupted him, and they both turned to look as dk_is_dokyeom (viral TikTok hit turned Broadway darling; five million followers; okay, maybe Seungkwan had looked up a couple members of Mingyu’s circle) crashed through the entrance. “KIM MINGYUUUU,” Seokmin belted in a long vibrato, lurching towards a giggling Mingyu in a dramatic shuffle that was half zombie-half-tragic-opera-heroine.
Mingyu’s giggles cut off abruptly when Seokmin got within four yards and his expression dropped into something sinister. “Hang on,” Mingyu protested, raising his hands defensively as Seokmin dropped into a run. “Wait. Don’t p—”
Seokmin tackled him into the water in a flying leap, and there ended Seungkwan’s quiet morning. When they surfaced, Seungkwan blew his whistle and chewed them out for running.
//
Mingyu continued to show up in the mornings despite the lanes being closed, choosing instead to wait patiently for the scuba class to finish while lounging in the sun, playing on his phone. If anything, Seungkwan started to see him more regularly—including a Saturday evening, which was weird, because the pool was much more crowded and much less conducive to filming. More than once Seungkwan had noticed Mingyu graciously taking a picture with some giggling teens.
Mingyu flagged him down on one of those busy afternoons.
“Check it out,” he said with a grin, unzipping his cooler and pressing a cold bottle into Seungkwan’s hand. “It’s my sport drink. It took months of prototypes, but this is the final recipe. It’s going into stores in a limited run this month.”
Seungkwan squinted at the bottle: blue and pink branding with a sun-lit watery-pattern over KIM MINGYU: WAVVE in big impact font. Mingyu himself was posed on the label, hair and skin wet like he had just climbed out of the water.
“I wanted to give—"
Seungkwan sighed. “You can’t have this here.”
Mingyu blinked. “Huh?”
“The glass. You can’t have glass here.” He gestured to the pool deck; the kids and bare feet and crush of summer fun.
“Oh,” Mingyu said, and he sounded so disappointed that Seungkwan almost felt bad.
“It’s a safety issue.” He tried to make it sound apologetic. “I need to ask you to take this out of the pool area or leave.”
He moved to hand the bottle back to Mingyu. Their hands touched, and Mingyu suddenly jerked his hand back like he’d been burned—sending the bottle crashing to the ground between them.
Seungkwan looked at the shattered glass on the ground.
He looked at Mingyu, who looked like he wanted to disappear.
“Okay.” Seungkwan said, tone short. “Are you alright? Did you get cut?”
Mingyu shook his head. “Fuck, I’m so sorry. I should have remembered about the glass—”
“Please stay there and don’t move.” Seungkwan said, cutting him off. “I’ll take care of it.”
“Who would ever put a fucking sport drink in a glass bottle,” he said to his coworker, loudly (too loudly) as he stomped over to the front office supply closet. Just a stupid D-list celebrity cash-grab with no thought or care about actual practicality or usability.
But what really got him was the whole “rules-don’t-apply-to-me” attitude. Kim Mingyu had clearly never had to get broken glass out of a swimming pool, or apply first aid on a crying kid who cut their foot because some asshole tried to sneak in their beer bottle.
“The final version won’t be glass,” Mingyu offered meekly when Seungkwan returned with the broom and shop vac. His face was beet red; Seungkwan ignored it.
“Great choice,” he answered shortly, and drowned the rest of the conversation behind the roar of the vacuum.
//
Seungkwan lost the battle against his curiosity and bought a pack of KIM MINGYU: WAVVE when he saw it in stores. It was overpriced and disgustingly sweet—but in plastic, so at least it was shatter-proof. He took the rest of the case into work so that his coworkers could finish it.
Seungkwan happened to be on the desk taking admission when Mingyu arrived and noticed the half-empty box in the front office. He broke into a wide grin. “Oh my god. You tried it?” he said, leaning over the desk excitedly. “What do you think?”
How to be diplomatic. “It’s not really my taste,” Seungkwan said hesitantly, leaning back a bit. Mingyu’s enthusiasm was pushing into his space like an overgrown puppy. “But our younger employees are enjoying it.”
Mingyu nodded earnestly. “Is it too sweet? My friends think it’s too sweet, but I don’t mind it too much. You should get the orange flavor next time. Actually,” he said, pulling out his phone and rapidly tapping at the screen, “I’ll send you some. How many people work here? I bet I can send a whole pallet.”
“A box is probably fine,” said Seungkwan, eyeing the growing line behind Mingyu.
Mingyu caught his look. “Oh, let me pay first.” He started pawing through his Hermès duffle bag--a tad ostentatious for an outdoor community pool, Seungkwan thought, but he wasn’t the one making god-knows what kind of money off of YouTube advertising.
Mingyu continued to dig through the bag. “Check this out,” he said. “I paid for a season membership and I just got my pool pass.” He looked up and winked at Seungkwan. “Now you’re stuck with me for the whole summer.”
Seungkwan did NOT react to his wink, and Mingyu ducked his head to focus more intensely on finding his wallet. He started pulling things out of his bag and stacking them on the desk as he kept pawing through his bag. Seungkwan could feel his irritation growing as the pile of discarded items did.
“Adult entry is five dollars, please,” Seungkwan said politely.
“Ah, okay.” Mingyu grimaced. “I think I forgot my wallet.”
Seungkwan shrugged in a whaddya-want-me-to-do-about-it-kinda way. “I can’t let you in without admission.”
“I’ll just…run home and grab it,” Mingyu said slowly, starting to repack his bag. “I’m so sorry.” His face was red. This dude blushed a lot.
“Mingyu?” said Seungkwan’s supervisor, coming out of the front office. “I thought I heard you out here.” She clapped Mingyu on the shoulder. “Just go ahead in. Don’t worry about it.”
His boss gave Seungkwan a look that said stop being a bitch. Seungkwan smiled sweetly back.
Mingyu thanked his boss profusely and said a bunch of words about how she really didn’t need to do that, he could pay, it’s really no trouble—while his supervisor absolutely refused to hear it.
“I promise I really do have a membership now,” Mingyu said to Seungkwan, after he relented and began heading into the changing room. He walked backwards and shot Seungkwan a big, movie star smile. “I wanted to impress you,” he called, and disappeared around the corner.
//
“A lot of people in the comments have been asking me to show my guitar,” Mingyu said, smiling into the camera in the opening frames of ‘I can play guitar?? REVEALING HIDDEN TALENT.’ “So, I figured in honor of 16 million subscribers I’d show you guys some stuff.” He paused and played a smooth riff, fingers long and confident against the strings. “This is a cover I’ve been working on for a while. I hope you like it!”
The moment he started to sing, Seungkwan snapped his laptop shut.
//
Seungkwan looks really good today, Mingyu thought. He craned his neck around as he made his way over to Josh’s lounger, watching Seungkwan climb up into the lifeguard tower. His five-inch inseam swim shorts showed off his legs in a way that made Mingyu want to stare. He changed his hair. It’s blond now. Did he shave the sides short too? Look at his arms on the ladder. He’s so tan, als—
Mingyu walked straight into a pole with a resounding KUTHUNK. His vision went black, he stumbled backwards into something else hard, slipped, and fell head first into the middle of the senior water aerobics class.
//
Mingyu didn’t come back to the pool for a while after that, of which initially Seungkwan thought good, he’s taking his concussion seriously, but by week three started to worry him. He’d been disoriented when Seungkwan pulled him out of the water on the immobilizer. The summer session was starting to wane, and Seungkwan kind of wanted to see how he was doing before September set in. min9yu_k’s account was posting, but it was clearly scheduled videos that had been filmed much earlier in the summer.
A YouTube push notification lit up Seungkwan’s phone on his desk: “You might be interested: New upload from joshu_acoustic: STORY TIME: HE ALMOST DIED? WITNESSING A NEAR-DEATH EXPERIENCE (REAL!!).”
He slid open the notification to mute recommended video notifications (again), but stopped when he caught the thumbnail—Joshua Hong and Kim Mingyu’s heads superimposed over a stock photo of a pool, with clip-art of a ghost and a life preserver.
He contemplated for a moment whether he needed to see Joshua Hong’s take on his work. Probably not, but he also was really curious about how Mingyu was doing—for all of his antagonism, Mingyu carried himself with a lot of confidence, and life. The idea of him laid up indoors, in the dark and miserable, just seemed wrong.
He missed seeing him around, maybe.
Seungkwan’s phone buzzed insistently. “Please be honest with me. You know you can be honest with me,” Jeonghan started when Seungkwan picked up his call. “Did you try to kill Kim Mingyu on purpose?”
Seungkwan put his phone on speaker and flopped back on his bed. “Did you watch Josh’s video?”
“Did you watch it?” he shot back, with long emphasis on the ‘you.’ “I don’t think you’d sound like this if you watched it.”
“You know how I feel about Josh’s content,” he said, mostly to piss Jeonghan off.
“I really need you to leave your prejudice against content creators at the door, please, or you’re going to ruin both of our lives,” Jeonghan replied. He started spamming the video link in their chat and Seungkwan laughed. “You’re like the Lizzie Bennet of lifeguarding. Drop your pride and hit play before I go insane.”
“Fine,” he said, opening the link after Jeonghan didn’t show signs of letting up. “I’m watching, quit it.”
Seungkwan scrubbed through the video—the first six minutes were a still shot of Joshua Hong talking to the camera in a home studio. Then, a clip of Mingyu’s body ping-ponging into the water and Seungkwan springing into action after him.
“I look so good in red,” he remarked absently.
“Yeah, yeah. Skip to 14:46.”
This video was fifteen minutes long? Seungkwan scrubbed forward to the timestamp: vertical iPhone footage of Josh and Mingyu leaving emergency care. Joshua’s delicate nasal voice spilled through the speaker:
“---poor buddy. You’re going to be okay.”
Josh flipped the camera so that it was on him and Mingyu making their way through a dark parking lot. Mingyu looked miserable, but smiled when Josh threw his arm around him and patted his back gently.
The camera shook when they separated and Josh fumbled to unlock the car with one hand, then a cut to Mingyu slumped in the dark passenger seat of Josh’s car, hands over his face.
“I think this is the most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to me,” he mumbled quietly.
“What was?” Josh’s voice came from behind the phone camera. “Eating it in front of the lifeguard you’ve been striking out with all summer? Getting so distracted by a hot boy you gave yourself a concussion?” He zoomed in on Mingyu as he spoke, who disappeared farther and farther into his hoodie with every word.
Josh turned the camera back to himself. “The most embarrassing thing that’s ever happened to you so far,” he emphasized. An indignant half-groan-half-laugh came from Mingyu in the background, and the recording ended.
//
Seungkwan rounded a corner on an exceptionally sweaty Tuesday in late August and nearly ran head-first into a patron going the other way. They both stumbled, and Seungkwan immediately reached out to steady them. “Careful, it’s slip—”
It’s Kim Mingyu. “Oh hey.” Seungkwan released his shoulder. “My fault. Sorry.”
“I’m sorry! My fault, probably. Not again. Ha ha.” Mingyu made a weird half-aborted movement like he meant to brush dirt off of Seungkwan’s shoulders, then caught himself and pushed his hands behind his back awkwardly. “So sorry. I can’t catch a break here.”
Seungkwan was so weirdly relieved to see Mingyu walking around that he broke into genuine laugh. “All good. How’s your head?”
“I’m alright,” Mingyu said, rubbing at the back of his head sheepishly. The movement made him seem even taller, and Seungkwan remembered in a rush how very, very good Mingyu looked. He dropped his arm, and Seungkwan noticed that he had a faint farmer’s tan cutting across his arm. That little mark nearly knocked him out.
“I hadn’t seen you around for a while, so I wondered how you were.” He accidentally said it directly to Mingyu’s bare bosom before he regained his professionalism.
“I had a minor concussion,” Mingyu said. “I took a lot of time off to make sure I recovered correctly. I actually do fitness and active stuff professionally? So I didn’t want to push it, and I actually do take safety really seriously, which is why I’m so sorry to have made you rescue me.”
He paused for a breath. “Thank you, by the way,” he said, looking Seungkwan in the eye for the first time since they bumped into each other. He was blushing again, a bright blotchy unattractive red that crept down onto his sternum. “Ha ha,” Mingyu added weakly, and it slowly dawned on Seungkwan that Mingyu was embarrassed.
Seungkwan felt something shift in his heart.
He smiled warmly. “All part of the job. I’m glad you’re okay.” He risked it and patted Mingyu’s bicep in mock comfort, right on the tan line. “Now you can get back to filming.”
Mingyu blushed harder. “You know about my videos?”
Seungkwan tried so very hard not to roll his eyes, but Mingyu must have caught his “are you kidding” expression anyway, because he quickly added, “Oh yeah, obviously, I guess I do film here a lot, so you would know.”
An awkward pause. Seungkwan threw him a bone. “I’ve seen a few of your videos. I like your acoustic covers.”
Mingyu’s eyes lit up. “Thank you! I’ve been really enjoying making those. I’m glad they’re doing well.”
Seungkwan decided to risk it again. “I saw Josh’s video about your concussion, too.”
A brief expression of panic flashed across Mingyu’s face before his features settled into what Seungkwan would describe as a mildly-crazed smile. “Oh? You have?” he said, voice three octaves higher than it normally was. “Ha ha. That’s great. You know. Like and subscribe.” He clicked his tongue and made double finger guns. “I think my friend is calling me okaybye.”
Seungkwan squinted after him as he fast-walked back to Joshua Hong. Mingyu threw his arms out parallel to his body as he moved, like some kind of overgrown Muppet.
Should he not have brought up the video? Their first conversation without Seungkwan wanting to throw him off of a cliff, and Mingyu had run out of it like Seungkwan had asked him to eat a worm. He was too confused to even be irritated by it.
Across the deck, Mingyu was furiously whispering something to Joshua Hong, who stared at him impassively until Mingyu dramatically threw himself down on his own lounger and covered his face in desperation. Seungkwan couldn’t be sure what he heard, making his way to his station at the other end of the pool, but he was almost certain he heard Josh tell Mingyu he was an idiot.
//
The next time he saw Mingyu wasn’t at the pool, or in a livestream (maybe Seungkwan tuned in every once in a while, whatever), but in the freezer aisle at the corner store on Seungkwan’s block, where they almost crashed into each other one more time.
“We have to stop meeting like this,” Seungkwan laughed, kneeling to help Mingyu pick up all of the groceries they dropped.
“I really can’t stop myself from embarrassing myself in front of you,” Mingyu said, separating out their items. “I promise I’m usually not like this.”
“We’re a dangerous combination,” Seungkwan agreed. They stood. God, Mingyu was tall. Seungkwan had to tilt his head back to look at him properly. It was weird to see him out of context, in loose-fit distressed jeans and a tank top instead of swimwear. He was a wall of well-muscled, tan summer boy.
A boy who was still holding half of Seungkwan’s groceries. He pulled his bottle of ice tea out of Mingyu’s arms and swapped it with Mingyu’s bottle of water.
“Sorry,” Mingyu said, shaking his head as if to clear it. He double checked the rest of his bundle and passed Seungkwan a second bottle of iced tea. “It’s funny. I’ve never seen you out of your guarding uniform.”
“Disappointed?” Seungkwan asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I do miss the lifeguard red,” said Mingyu, and Seungkwan laughed. “It’s good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you, too.” Mingyu, his mouth almost added, but Seungkwan stopped himself. Was that too familiar? Did Mingyu even know Seungkwan’s name? They had seen each other so many times, but it’s not like they had ever introduced themselves.
Seungkwan stood awkwardly in the realization that they were practically strangers. Currents of cold air from the freezer aisle prickled goosebumps up Seungkwan’s bare arm as he looked at Mingyu—famous and handsome and irritating and someone he barely knew at all.
“Listen,” Mingyu started, then stopped. “I’m sorry about the video.”
Seungkwan frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Josh’s. I was worried that it freaked you out to be in it. I was going to ask if you wanted us to take it down.” He shifted his weight nervously, cradling his groceries to his chest. “Josh likes to tease me, but it can get kind of hairy to joke about private people when you have a big audience. I can ask him to re-edit it to take you out, if you like.”
“Were you?” Seungkwan asked.
Mingyu looked up. “Was I what?”
“Joking.”
Mingyu was suddenly very very interested in the case of novelty ice creams. “About trying to hit on you all summer? I guess not.”
He barely knew Mingyu at all, but he had become someone Seungkwan was curious about.
Seungkwan tried to conceal his smile. “I wouldn’t mind it if you took me out.”
Mingyu nodded seriously, expression flat. He traced a pattern in the condensation on the freezer case. “Okay, no problem. We’ll re-edit. I’m sorry for all the trouble this summer.”
“Mingyu,” Seungkwan said. It was the first time he had said his name, and when Mingyu’s eyes zipped to his, Seungkwan felt that same shift in his chest. “You know, I don’t think we ever really introduced ourselves.”
He held out his hand to shake. “My name is Seungkwan.”
Mingyu took his hand. His grip was strong and firm. “Mingyu.”
Seungkwan didn’t let go. “Would you want to get dinner with me sometime?”
Mingyu grinned.
//
Two months later, after summer had well and truly passed into fall, min9yu_k posted a new video to their channel:
HE HATED ME BEFORE HE MET ME?? 😱😱 BOYFRIEND REVEAL + our first impressions