Work Text:
Jiseok was spiraling. That being said he was only spiraling a little, and he was allowed a little spiraling as a treat. However, the spiraling was poorly timed. Typically Jiseok only allowed himself to spiral on Wednesdays (his day without any classes or work, reserved for sleeping and the occasional spiral) but he had been asked to cover someone’s shift at the cafe where he worked on Wednesday so his whole schedule was thrown off. He ended up sleeping when he was supposed to go to the library on Thursday and he hadn’t been able to catch up after that. Thus it was Monday night and he was supposed to be writing an essay due at noon Tuesday for a book he hadn’t finished for a class he didn’t want to be taking but needed for his stupid degree or else he wouldn’t be able to graduate. Cue the spiral.
Honestly, it was unfair. Jiseok was supposed to be sitting at a bar right off campus watching his hot boyfriend, Seungmin, and his hot coworkers bartend for irresponsible college kids who were out getting drunk on weeknights. Jiseok usually studied while he was there so it didn’t count as being irresponsible if he was drinking. That was just good time management. Instead he was sitting alone in his boyfriend’s bedroom (it was less depressing to work in his boyfriends bedroom than his own empty dorm room), opening his third redbull of the night, ignoring the barely touched plate of food supplied by Seungmin’s roommate Jungsu who’s love language was force feeding his friends, and staring at a mostly empty google docs file. All he had accomplished was his name and class number, mocking him in the corner.
'This is so stupid.' He thought to himself. He was going to join the science and tech fields, reading and analyzing Jane Austen novels wasn’t going to help him. He let out a frustrated groan. It was nearing midnight and he had nothing to show for it. So much for staying in and being responsible. It really shouldn’t even be that hard. How could molecular biology come to him like breathing but picking out feminist themes in one of the most famous examples of feminist literature was like pulling teeth? It wasn’t fair.
Jiseok downed half of his redbull in one go and reopened the Pride and Prejudice spark notes that he had already opened and closed like six times. All he had to do was force out the 3000 words he needed and accept that it was going to be a subpar essay no matter what. He had already done all the math, he only needed a C to be able to skate by and he could mourn his GPA later.
A few half assed paragraphs and the other half of his redbull later Jiseok could feel a headache approaching. Be it from lack of sleep, too much caffeine, or four straight hours of screen time or more likely a cocktail of it all, it was going to absolutely fuck the marginal focus he had managed to conjured up.
Jiseok shut his laptop with more force than necessary and shoved it away. It bumped into his plate of food, scattering crumbs across Seungmin’s desk because of course it did. Jiseok sighed. He laid his head down in the ‘overheating motor’ warm spot and closed his eyes. He would just rest for a few minutes and then he would bounce back better than ever and finish the dumb paper. He really only needed like five minutes.
The pressure of Jiseok’s headphones being leaving the sides of his head woke him up. He shot up straight, his head whipping around, searching for the headphone thief.
“Relax,” Seungmin pat down Jiseok’s hair where his headphones had messed it up, “It’s just me.” He soothed.
Jiseok twisted his body so he could look up at his boyfriend. He looked hot as ever. Seungmin always dressed up a bit for work since being pretty was always a plus for bartenders. The makeup he had done was smudged and he had taken off his jacket, leaving him in just a black tank top that showed off his toned arms. Jiseok felt a little feral for a moment. And then reality set in. If Seungmin was home from his closing shift at the bar that meant it was late. Which meant Jiseok had definitely gone past his allotted five minutes.
“What time is it?” Jiseok asked. His boyfriend was a nice distraction to wake up to but panic began to take over. He must have lost a lot of time sleeping.
“Almost three.” Seungmin answered, swiveling around the office chair so Jiseok was facing him. He knelt down and rested his arms on Jiseok’s knees. “How’s the paper coming?”
It was said with enough sympathy that Jiseok knew Seungmin already knew the answer. The real question was probably ‘why are you asleep at my desk when my bed is about four feet away, you freak,’ but Seungmin was too nice to ask that.
Jiseok took a deep breath. “Bad. I still need to finish it.” He explained, his voice drenched in despair. If he didn’t know better he would think he was close to tears.
Seungmin hummed. “You have until I get out of the shower.” He stated, patting Jiseok’s knee as he stood up. “And then we’re going to bed.”
Jiseok opened his mouth to argue that he couldn’t go to bed without finishing his paper but Seungmin was already out the door.
Empty threats were not Seungmin’s thing so Jiseok scrambled to throw his headphones back on and pull his laptop back toward himself. He had probably twenty minutes before Seungmin returned and he needed two thousand more words. Odds were against him. He felt a hot tear sliding down his cheek but he ignored it. He was not going to cry over a damn paper and even if he was he sure as hell wasn’t going to acknowledge it.
Jiseok accomplished another three paragraphs of nonsense before his chair was yanked backwards, effectively scaring the shit out of him. He ripped his headphones off and tilted his head back to glare at Seungmin.
Seungmin leaned over so his face was only a few inches away. Spiderman style. His hair was still damp and dripping onto Jiseok’s face. “Time for bed.” He stated, clearly unapologetic about almost giving Jiseok a heart attack.
It was difficult to be annoyed with Seungmin’s face so close to his own so he ducked his head and attempted to roll the chair back to the desk. Seungmin held it in place.
“C’mon, it’s too late for this, I wanna go to bed.”
Jiseok felt his lower lip trembling. “But I’m not done.” He wanted to feel irritated that Seungmin was interrupting but he just felt overwhelmed and sad. He didn’t even understand why he felt so upset about this assignment. He never had this much trouble finishing things.
“You’re burning yourself out, Jiseok.” It was like Seungmin could read his mind. He leaned over the back of the chair so he could put his arms around Jiseok. He rested his chin on the top of Jiseoks head. “You need to relax a little.”
“But it’s due tomorrow, I don’t have time to relax.” Jiseok choked back a sob.
Seungmin stood back up and nudged the chair back forward. “Save what you’ve done, and finish it tomorrow. Or email your professor and ask for an extension. But you’re not staying up anymore. You clearly need the sleep.” He reasoned. “Besides, you working would keep me up and I want to go to bed.” Guilt tripping was usually pretty effective against Jiseok.
“But-” Jiseok began again but was cut short when Seungmin heaved a sigh and spun the chair around. He scooped Jiseok out of it with an alarming ease. Jiseok briefly considered fighting it but he knew Seungmin was stronger than him and short of leaving his boyfriends house at three am he wasn’t going to get out of going to bed. And if he was being honest with himself he didn’t want to get out of it. Getting in bed with Seungmin was actually all he wanted to do. So he held still as he was carried the few feet across the room and was deposited in the middle of the bed.
Seungmin dropped down on the bed next to him and manhandled Jiseok into being the little spoon. Jiseok allowed it, letting the exhaustion take over and he melted back against Seungmin’s chest.Weirdly enough the two hour desk nap hadn’t made up for a week of being behind on sleep.
“You put too much pressure on yourself.” Seungmin said softly, bringing one hand up to brush over Jiseok’s damp cheekbone. “Obviously your classes are important but you’re more important.”
“But this should be easy.” Jiseok whispered. “I don’t know why I can’t do it. I didn’t even read the stupid book, I just can’t focus.” He was so embarrassed to be crying about this.
“Different things are easy for different people.” Seungmin pointed out. “I could never understand sciencey stuff like you do. Your brain is crazy, there's so much stuff in it. It’s pretty incredible.”
Jiseok hid his face in the blankets at the praise. He didn’t know how to handle compliments.
“Your brain is probably just, like, oversaturated. You gotta rest so you have some room to work with. Your paper is due at like twelve tomorrow, right?”
Jiseok nodded.
“Cool,” Seungmin cuddled a little further into the blankets and kissed the back of Jiseok’s
head. “Tomorrow you can ask for an extension, just say your cat died or something, and then we can watch the Pride and Prejudice movie and maybe that’ll help. Sounds okay?”
“Yeah,” Jiseok whispered. “Sounds good.”
“Perfect. Anyway you shoulda come tonight, Hyunjin spilled an entire shirley temple on some dude he was trying to flirt with. Dude was wearing a white shirt too. It was a mess.” He laughed.
Jiseok felt a little giggle escape, easing the tension that remained in his brain. Seungmin continued, quietly filling Jiseok in on any chaos he had missed from the evening. He could feel his eyes getting heavy.
Jiseok wiggled around so he was on his back and was able to see Seungmin’s face. The room was dimly lit from the screensaver on Jiseok’s still-open laptop and the small string of fairy lights hanging above the bed. It was enough to see that Seungmin was looking back at him with an expression so soft it made Jiseok choke up again.
“Thank you.” Jiseok murmured. “I think I’d probably fall apart without you.” It was the kind of emotionally vulnerable thing he could never say in the daylight, but four am was like another world.
Seungmin smiled. “Yeah, I know.” He leaned forward and pressed a chaste kiss to Jiseok’s lips. “Go to sleep, Jiseokie.”
And this time Jiseok obeyed without putting up a fight.