Work Text:
Seungmin liked routine.
He liked things to be a specific way, as much as it was possible, while working within an ever-changing industry. And he did what he could to maintain a schedule, to have little rituals for different parts of the day, to know that sleep would be preceded by him closing the journal, and the morning would start with a specific smell of coffee, brewed just right.
The others had been calling him out lately, for how he had been getting a little too distressed because of how he wanted things to be, and the adjustments he had to make, or rather, the grumbling that had recently been making an appearance more and more often. He knew he had to get it under control, because no one wanted things to get as bad as they had in the past again. After all, no ritual could have kept him from shattering his dream of professional basketball. No matter what his brain wanted to tell him.
But that wasn’t important at the moment.
What was important was that Hyunjin had dragged him over to a salon appointment –
And made him watch as the hair fell off, in long locks against the tiled floor, waiting to be mopped up soon.
He played it off by obtaining a kiwi in the time that Hyunjin’s hair got bleached, and laughed at the incredulous expression on the newly buzzed’s face. But he knew what was happening. What had happened. And the attempts that were being made.
Because of course, of course Hyunjin knew how his favourite person interacted with the world around him. How comfort and familiarity and reassurances were what held up the illusion of an unphased Seungmin. How sudden changes would have had him caught up in his thoughts about if he had missed any signs or if he could have preserved the past for longer.
And so Hyunjin had confided in him about his thoughts the first time they popped into his head, and then invited Seungmin along to watch the process and have the time to be able to accept what had happened and know that it was willingly done and not because of a piece of paper, or a voice distorted by network issues.
But what Hyunjin forgot, was that Seungmin knew him too. Knew that the fluidity couldn’t be contained. That familiarity made him antsy over time. That change was almost his assigned middle name. That for him to be Hyunjin, he would undergo reinvention and erasure and beginnings again. And Seungmin knew, that it was probably a way to remind himself that everything can go up in flames and at any time, and that Hyunjin was trying to maintain a sense of control by going off-route impulsively ever so often. But it didn’t mean that he didn’t love him still. That he didn’t appreciate the little steps taken to ensure his comfort with the major changes that Hyunjin made at a relatively startling frequency.
He saw the care, the consideration, the highlighted sticky note in Hyunjin’s mind to surprise the world but to have Seungmin be there alongside him. What more could love be?