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“So, you noticed it too?” Minho casually mentions in the car ride back home to Jisung.
“Notice what?” he responds, not looking up from his phone.
Minho thinks. “That Seungmin is mad at me for some reason.”
That piques Jisung’s attention. “What are you even talking about?” he puts his phone away now to look at Minho with a puzzled expression.
Minho rolls his eyes, because Jisung isn’t seeing the obvious. His suspicions had begun a few days ago when the group was practicing as usual. Rehearsals were one of those times of the day when Seungmin normally made it his mission to bother the other members as much as possible. It would never be anything serious, just poking fun at them and then playing the victim as a source of entertainment. His usual targets were Minho and Changbin — and while it was easier for him to get a reaction out of Changbin, Minho always felt like Seungmin had it out for him the most out of everyone.
All of a sudden, a few days ago Seungmin simply stopped.
It wasn’t as noticeable to the others, probably because he still was affectionately bothersome to Changbin. But Minho instinctively knew something was up, because despite how much he hated to admit it, he was somewhat sensitive to Seungmin’s mood swings.
This wasn’t even like he stopped casually interacting with Minho when necessary. But that’s where it ended. Seungmin would make the occasional eye contact and then go on pretending like nothing was happening with him. Earlier today, Minho had felt like Seungmin was boring his eyes into the back of his head, but as soon as he turned to look at him, Seungmin darted his sight away.
“Like,” Minho tries to simplify his thought process to not sound fucking crazy, “he hasn’t really been talking to me in a few days.”
“As opposed to you both being inseparable and always chatting with each other?” Jisung laughs it off sarcastically. “Please, I think you’re imagining it.”
Minho just sighs out loud and looks out the window. “You’re probably right.”
They don’t talk about it again that day.
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The nagging suspicion in the back of Minho’s mind receives some new development two days later, when he is walking back from the bathrooms to the dance practice room. He’s about to turn the last corner when he hears mumbled whispers from the other side.
“You know, you can’t go forever without asking him about it.” It’s the voice of the group’s youngest, Jeongin. “And you know better than me that its not right for me to just be a replacement like that,”
Minho hears the clang of a drink dropping down the vending machine in that hallway. And Seungmin’s response, “I’m not that delusional, Jeongin. If you don’t want to do it with me then just say so.”
“You know damn well this isn’t about me. You’re the one who brought up Minho-hyung first.”
So there was definitely something going on with Seungmin, and that something had to do with him. Minho was not crazy, for sure. He decides to pause to not alert the two of his presence.
“Again, it was just a passing thought!” Seungmin sounds uncharacteristically defensive.
“It didn’t sound like a passing thought to me, though. It sounds to me like you put a lot of thought into this and are chickening out at the last minute.” Minho hears Jeongin retaliate.
“That’s because he infuriates me!” Seungmin practically whines.
Minho tries his best to cycle his head through anything he could’ve done to piss Seungmin off that bad. Like maybe he got mad at Minho for not responding to his good night text two weeks ago. Or maybe it was because Minho didn’t hold his hand that one time three concerts ago. Or maybe because he hasn’t sent Seungmin a picture of his cats in a week. Maybe it's all of those things. Maybe it’s none of those things.
“Why do you look like you’ve seen a ghost?” Jisung appears in front of him just as he takes a deep breath, and Minho is just short of jumping several feet midair. He instinctively looks across the corner, but Seungmin and Jeongin have already gone indoors to the practice room.
He lets out a deep breath as Jisung looks at him with concern. “It’s nothing. Let’s go.”
┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈
After another day of impatience, Minho decides to get to the bottom of this whole thing. Unfortunately, he’s all too aware of Jeongin being difficult to pry any information out of, so he decides to go down the next best route.
That brings him to where he is now. Blocking Felix’s way in the company hallways and making an effort to prod into Kim Seungmin’s business.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about. Seungmin is fine, hyung.”
Thank goodness Felix sucks at keeping secrets.
“You and I both know that’s a lie, Yongbok-ah,” Minho puts on his gentle voice. Felix always falls for that one, he knows this from his years of living with him.
Felix takes a deep breath before finally meeting Minho’s eyes. He looks so tiny to Minho despite them being relatively the same height.
This time is somewhat different. Felix is stern as he says, “It’s none of my business, hyung. And it isn’t yours either. Not until Seungmin decides what he wants to do about it.”
Minho is baffled as Felix sidesteps him to walk away. And he takes the second to internalize what he said before catching up to Felix and deciding he needs to set the facts straight.
“That can’t be right. That’s not what I heard from Jeongin.” Minho pushes.
“Jeongin told you?” Now it’s Felix’s turn to look confused.
Minho scratches his head. “Well… not quite,” and he recounts what he overheard outside the vending machine that day. Felix just sighs, “If you were worried Seungmin hates you or something, he doesn’t.”
“He doesn’t?” Minho clears his throat. “I mean, I knew that. I don't care either way.”
He knows he’s not fooling the perceptive blonde. Minho hadn’t even mentioned the bit about his inner monologue, and somehow Felix knew. “Sure, hyung. Anyways, I’ve gotta go, yeah?”
Minho watches Felix walk away, leaving him to collect his thoughts.
┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈
He is in the recording studio with Chan on the same day when the topic is brought up again. “Did Seungmin ask you about that thing?” Chan casually mentions.
Minho is confused. “What thing?”
Realization that Minho and Seungmin haven’t communicated yet dawns visibly on Chan’s face. “Oh, he hasn’t yet. Don’t mind me, then.” He cheerfully throws the topic aside.
Minho takes off his headphones and gets out of the recording booth, because now he’s too nosy to act nonchalant about all this. “What is with everyone not telling me about what’s going on with Seungmin?”
“It’s nothing! Just something I heard in passing among the staff,” Chan isn’t even bothered, just continuing to pen some notes onto the lyric sheet. He turns up to look at Minho when he realizes the latter has left the booth. “We haven’t finished yet, Minho, you feeling okay?”
Minho considers the pros and cons of leaving the studio to go find Kim Seungmin this instant. He decides against it after a few seconds, but the curiosity is slowly getting the better of him.
At the end of the session about an hour later, he brings the topic up to Chan again. “What did the staff say about Seungmin?”
“Hmm?” Chan cranes his neck to try and recollect, “I think it was something about a song. Just ask him yourself if it’s bothering you that much,”
“It’s not bothering me,” Minho can feel Chan’s eyes rolling despite the older not even facing him, “I just wanted to know, okay?”
“Sure, sure. Good night, Minho-ya.”
“Night, hyung.” Minho grumbles back at him before heading out.
┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈
Minho manages to get Seungmin’s attention the next day, but it’s not in a way either of them prepared for.
About five minutes earlier, Minho spotted Seungmin walking in his direction in the hallway with his head down looking at his phone. He doesn’t notice Minho walking toward him and looks up just as they’re about arms’ length away. Seungmin pauses in front of Minho, and looks anywhere but right at him.
“Hey, Kim Seungmin,” Minho approaches him.
“Oh, hyung. Hi,” he waves awkwardly. Then, before Minho can even process it, he starts speed walking in the opposite direction to where he was going.
The audacity of this man.
Minho is left shell shocked for about one second. Then, he chases Seungmin, who is practically running at this point. Minho knows it’s Seungmin's loss once he starts running, because Minho is the more athletically inclined person here. Seungmin should also know this.
That doesn’t stop him from breaking out into a full sprint in the company hallways to the first available elevator. Minho chases after him while being absolutely flabbergasted as he watches Seungmin spam press what he can distantly make out to be the topmost button that leads to the rooftop of the JYP building.
Seungmin isn’t successful in his escapade as Minho manages to jam one arm in between the shutting elevator doors, forcing it open. Minho is faced by a panicked, sweaty and red Seungmin.
“Got you,” Minho pants as he leans onto the walls of walls of the now closed and moving elevator, “What the fuck is this about, man.”
Seungmin stares at him with wide eyes. Then, he bursts into giggles. “Hyung, I can explain!”
Minho glares at him, blood rushing to his face from what he presumes is the running, but could also well be from seeing Seungmin chuckle this way.
“Okay, but did you have to run for that?!”
Seungmin sticks his tongue out like a little kid. Minho can’t stand his ass. “I thought it would be funny, and it was worth it!”
“I’ll show you what was actually worth it!” Minho perks up ready to rumble when the elevator reaches the rooftop, and the doors open to the slowly setting sun in the sky. Both Minho and Seungmin walk out, and Minho notes that there’s nobody up there except the two of them.
“You owe me an explanation, Kim Seungmin.”
Seungmin awkwardly stares at his own feet for a few seconds. Then he pulls out his phone and wired earphones from his pocket, plugs it into the phone and puts one of the buds into Minho’s left ear. He puts the other one into his own ear and presses play on what Minho sees is an unlabeled track on his phone.
“Listen to this carefully, hyung.”
So Minho does. The audio is an instrumental track filled with grand melodies, drums and no vocals yet. It reminds Minho of a musical, his love for dancing and somehow tugs at his heartstrings all at once. And Minho sees Seungmin highlighted by the spotlight, singing into the mic like his life depended on it.
About three minutes elapse before Minho finally finds his breath.
“It’s… beautiful.”
Seungmin smiles tenderly. Minho is reminded of just how beautiful he can be as the glow of the sunset warms his big brown eyes.
“I received this track from a producer about a week ago,” he collects his headphones and twiddles it between his fingers while walking further ahead.
“It doesn’t have any lyrics yet. I was thinking about writing some.”
“You should,” Minho supplements. “I mean, if you want to. It’s a good song.”
He’s already plenty surprised by how nice he’s feeling towards Seungmin today. He decides to surprise himself again when he adds, “I can already imagine your voice in it, Seungmin.”
Seungmin looks at him with a question, “What did you think of when you listened to it, hyung?”
Minho thinks hard before he responds, “It made me think of the stage. Of my dreams as a dancer. Of my goals as a singer. I also thought about how you would look performing it in front of our fans.”
When Seungmin stays silent, Minho steps towards him shyly. “Sorry, was that too weird?”
“No, not at all. It’s kind of funny, actually.” Seungmin’s face is unreadable.
“What is?”
“When I first heard it, I too thought of the stage. I thought about singing– no, performing this in front of the largest audience ever. Like a show,”
Minho watches as Seungmin spreads out his arms wide. The sunset illuminated his hair and eyes, and he shone gold as the light breeze of the dusk gently swayed the wisps of his bangs across his face.
“You know what’s crazy, hyung? I closed my eyes when I listened to it. And when I did, I saw it.” Seungmin gently shuts his own eyes again, as if reminiscing a dream.
“I saw the giant stage, and the lights of our fans. And when I looked to my side, I saw you, hyung.”
Minho doesn’t know how to respond to that. He just stares at Seungmin.
“I thought,” Seungmin continues, “If there was anyone I pictured next to me in a stage that grand, it was instinctively going to be you.”
Seungmin looks at him bashfully, which was very much unlike his usual straightforward self.
“We’ve come so far, Seungmin. You know all you had to do was ask.” Minho reaches out and rubs his head. Despite everything, Seungmin was his baby underneath it all.
Seungmin giggles, his shoulders visibly relaxing. He swats Minho’s hand off his head. “Well, since I’ve spilled the beans, hyung,” he meets Minho’s eyes, “do you want to write this song with me?”
Minho also can’t suppress a grin. “This is what you ran away from me full speed for? I can’t stand you,” he playfully teases Seungmin. “At this rate, what are you going to do when it’s time to ask me to marry you?”
“Says the person who was losing his mind just because I didn’t bicker with him for a week,” Seungmin rolls his eyes at him, which earns him a gasp and smack on his shoulder from Minho. “Felix tells me everything, you know,”
God, it felt so good to be back to normal with Seungmin.
“Yeah, Seungmin. I want to write this song with you,”
“And for the record, I would rather die than ask you to marry me, of all things. You say such ridiculous things sometimes, hyung.”
There’s no bite in Seungmin’s tone, just a gentle warmth. Some things, Minho has learnt, are better left unspoken. Or communicated through their eyes, like he finds himself often doing with Seungmin in the past eight or so years of knowing each other.
So Minho drops the bickering for once, and decides to take in the moment, Seungmin and everything included.
┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈
“Lee Know, Seungmin, standby in 2 minutes!”
Minho adjusts his in-ear when he feels a nudge on his arm. He turns to see Seungmin handing out his microphone while holding his own in his other hand.
Minho grabs his mic. “Are you ready for this?” he shoots at him.
The past few months of songwriting, recording and rehearsals have been intense. Minho knows just how much both he and Seungmin have poured into this song, for the sake of their fans but also mostly for each other and themselves.
“Always have been,” Seungmin whispers back as he takes his position right across from Minho on the moving platform. In two minutes, they would ascend onto the stage they dreamed of by each other’s side.
‘Cinema’, the song’s title and theme, described the biography of two wandering musicians full of dreams that managed to find each other. Save each other, even.
That’s what Minho had been thinking when he wrote his part of the lyrics, and somehow he had no doubt Seungmin felt the same. Minho’s beliefs are reinforced when Seungmin reaches out and squeezes Minho’s free hand, just as someone yells out that there was one minute left till they had to go on stage.
“Seungmin…” Minho trails off as he meets Seungmin’s eyes. His eyes sparkled with the kind of excitement Minho had first seen on the day they debuted before their first ever show.
“I love you, hyung, I really do.”
“Yeah,” Minho manages to smile back, but he knows he can’t afford to choke up right before the performance. Minho hopes his eyes are communicating instead, like they always do with Seungmin.
When they ascend the stage, blinded by the lights from the audience that the two had shared a dream about, Minho knows deep in his heart that he wouldn’t be who he is today without Seungmin by his side.
Minho knows he loves Seungmin in more ways than those that make sense. He knows he discovered yet another one when he sees the lights of stardom shine upon Seungmin, bright enough for Minho to find himself in Seungmin’s eyes before they both begin singing.
┈┈・୨ ✦ ୧・┈┈