Chapter Text
Wonwoo and Mingyu moved together as soon as they hit their 18's. It was nothing deliberate at last moment, nor anything that caught anyone by surprise, that the two boys would still be nail and flesh when they were grown ups?
That was a sure thing.
As a matter of fact, Wonwoo didn't even consider the idea, not ever, that things could ever take a different course. The thing is, he did not have a memory where Mingyu did not appear, not since they started high school and had no choice but to sit together in the last free place because both of them had arrived late, unknowingly, taking the same bus.
Put into words it would seem like a friendship forged in the forced proximity of a small class with too many students and not too many desks.
The first thing Wonwoo noticed was that Mingyu talked too much. He was not bothered by how messy the table was, with his pencils scattered around, nor that he always took part of Wonwoo's space and unintentionally moved him while writing, not even the incessant movements of his leg that made both chairs tremble. It was okay, the world didnt end because of that, but for having to put up with his chatty classmate for almost five hours straight? Nothing could have mentally prepared him for that.
Especially, because Mingyu was someone who did not take a silence for answer, nor a monosyllable, the other guy didnt speak back and pretend he wasn't even there? Nothing happens, his mother had always told him that he should not judge books by their covers, he was surely shy and he didn't mind doing the talking for both of them. The first months of high school and psychological horror are still to this day synonyms for Wonwoo.
But in the usual silent way things happen, the invasion that Mingyu had meant in his day to day began to expand at lunchtime, followed to meetings to do homework, to supposedly "study" and simply end up in the nearest convenience store, years and years of sharing a desk, and yes, they even graduated with matching quotes.
Nail and flesh, i said it.
So it was natural to think that they would go to college together, their careers were similar so they would both coincide in some or other class and obviously it would be unimaginable to think that they would not share a room in the university residence. It was the natural rhythm of things. And Wonwoo was more than happy to plan the next decade of their lives for both of them if it was necessary.
Then the world went 180 degrees, full speed, because Kim Mingyu got a partner.
A boyfriend.
Hear me out, Wonwoo had nothing against homosexuality. Many of his acquaintances belonged to the LGBT community, he was well informed on the subject and was committed to defend it as many times as necessary.
Really. No problem.
Still Mingyu's relationship made him lose sleep at night.
"So how is it going?"
Wonwoo asked reluctantly, a few days after Mingyu updated him about his love status, since then he had only stepped on the shared room to sleep and shower, the rest of the time he had spent it with his boyfriend. God knows where. That week alone had been enough for Wonwoo to have the feeling of living alone, and it didn't leave him with a pleasant taste.
"It?" The younger boy was too busy fighting with his middle part, which rested on a crazy zigzag pattern just on top of his head. Messy morning hair, inconvenient for a date, right?
Wonwoo observed him in silence while sitting on the bed, casual, because it was not an uncomfortable situation, right? There was nothing wrong with asking his best friend about it, friends constantly talk about these things, they had enough confidence plus Mingyu had had partners before, just not...boys. He mentally scolded himself for how bitter the word sounded in his mind.
While he was having a crisis about whether he would be one of those big ass homophobes who claim not to be homophobic just because he has gay friends, Mingyu began his monologue as a background voice. "...I don't understand why it parts this way, maybe I should start sleeping with one of those silk pillows they talk about on Tik Tok- are you even listening to me?"
Not really. "Yeah, yeah, er, sure buy one."
"Everything good?" Mingyu laughed.
And he nodded.
There's nothing wrong with Jeon Wonwoo.
"I think theres something wrong with me."
He blurt out on a random friday night.
"Do you mean it because of the depressive tendencies, the crippling anxiety or..."
"Fuck off, Jeonghan, truly."
"I was just kidding," Jeonghan took a sip of his drink silently, "sort of."
Jeonghan and wonwoo were one of those cases of cousins who aren't really cousins but have lied about it so much that no one would believe otherwise, it all started when their mothers met in yoga class...long story short, Jeon Wonwoo was a magnet for forced friendships even before he was born.
A natural talent, surely.
"Just... I don't understand it, I just don't understand it."
"Which part?" Jeonghan was a good guy. Truly. Maybe sometimes his mocking, carefree attitude would put someone as squared as Wonwoo on the verge of a nervous breakdown but he always stopped when he had to, and he knew, deep down, that it was just his personal way of trying to calm things down.
"All of it, everything?, anything?, i dont know" Wonwoo replied eagerly chewing on his food, was he the only one in the world who could realize how strange the situation was?
It was at times like these that Wonwoo remembered that his most secret guilty fantasy, since his very early childhood, was to be able to have the ability that cartoon characters had to bang their heads and start seeing stars. He was sure that would be the only thing that could put his brain to rest for a few hours.
It was also the reason why he started going to therapy, children usually have a craving for playing and eating candy, not to be unconscious.
"If there were nothing wrong with it, we wouldn't be talking about it for the fifth time in a week. You always try to put me off when i tell you to hang out, and funnily enough you want to see me every day since Mingyu started with his boyfriend. It's not like i blame you, but definitely going out to dinner every day with you so you can think in circles about that guy and ignore me completly wasn't really at my 2024 bingo card." The eldest said casually, was Jeonghan that unsubtle with his patients as well?
"How did you even graduated?" Sigh the guy, taking out his glasses to clean them, as if that would also clear his state of mind.
"First of all, I'm a great psychologist, I just have friends who don't listen to me. Second of all, I'm telling you the same thing I told you last time-" Here it is again, Jeonghan and his pointing finger.
"Don't even get start-"
"You are being possesive about it." Wonwoo sighed exaggeratedly, deflating in his chair like a balloon after an acupuncture session, "Sigh all you want but you know its true."
"How in the earth does that make sense?"
Jeonghan shrugged, finishing eating the cream from his smoothie, "Why wouldn't it make sense?"
Wonwoo opened and closed his mouth again, like a fish out the water, his thoughts were a tangled knot " Because it doesn't, and for fucks sake, don't use the psychologist's voice with me."
"Im not, but you are still getting defensive." Said Jeonghan calmly.
Wonwoo let his forehead rest against the table, he didn't want to argue with him, mostly because he knew deep down that what he was saying was the truth, even if it was an ugly one and he didn't understand it at all.
"It's just the way human relationships work, Wonwoo. You spend a lot of time with someone, then the dynamic suddenly changes, and just like everyone else, it affects you. Mingyu was a projection of your space and time, and now it is shared with someone else, how many years have you two gone without being apart for more than a day? Maybe since 8th grade?"
Wonwoo felt the suddent urge to cry. He was not a crying in public person, not ever, if something happened to him at preschool he would wait until it was time to go home and cry all the way in the car. During his time in high school, like most teenagers, the bathroom was a recurrent safe place, he would lock the stall and stay there for hours. Now, he would prefear to curl up in a ball in his bed and just rot there till whatever was over.
Or Mingyu forced him to get out.
He wished from a very very deep corner of his mind that Jeonghan wasn't the way he was, without the sweet voice and patience, that he would not treat him that well, that he wasn't always so understanding. That way, Wonwoo would feel like he actually had a valid reason to want to cry right now.
He wouldn't feel so pathetic.
"Just because it feels like too much doesn't mean it's wrong to feel it."
But it didnt feel like that when you started dating Cheol, was what he wanted to say. But he didnt, because that would be cruel and he didint want Jeonghan to think that he wasnt any less important for him.
So as many other times, he decided to stay silent. Chewing on his burger like if he could swallow his sorrows the same way.
It felt heavy in his stomach.