Chapter Text
“You know Fuma and Kei used to date,”
Nicholas’ comment is met with complete silence, prompting him to look up from his phone and stare back at his friends. “What?”
Maki breaks the silence with an exasperated expression, “and no one told us this because..?”
Nicho shrugged, returning his attention to his phone and relaxing back into his previous laid back position on the living room couch.
Yuma shakes his head, still confused, “but they’re so.. I don’t know! They’re polar opposites!”
“I guess so,” Nicho responds nonchalantly, not even bothering to look up, “but regardless, they were terribly in love with each other. I’ve never seen Fuma act so down-bad. Ever. And Kei was practically an aegyo machine whenever they were together it was disgusting."
The sound of the door opening catches the teamies’ attention and they turn to see Euijoo standing there, fresh out of the shower, still rubbing his hair with a towel. “Who’s disgusting?”
Nicho, suddenly un-hyptonized from his phone, looks up with a boxy smile and motions for Euijoo to sit down next to him on the couch. Euijoo compliantly does so, and Nicho takes the towel from his hands, beginning to dry Euijoo’s hair for him.
“Get this,” Taki starts, “Nicho just told us that-”
“Juju already knows,” Nicholas cuts Taki off, his attention still focused on Euijoo’s hair.
“What!” Yuma exclaims, feeling wronged. “How come Euijoo knew and we didn’t!”
Harua shakes his head, “Of course Nico told Euijoo about it,” earning a nod from Maki, who just so happens to be the president of the Nichojoo fan club. “Yeah, because we all know Nicho is crazy down bad for Eui-”
Nicholas swats Maki away with an annoyed expression, “shut up,” before returning to admiring the top of Euijoo’s head-- a task he takes very seriously.
“What do I already know?” Euijoo asks again, a little louder this time, but still just as confused.
Jo, who had been silent until now, finally speaks up, “If you think about it, I think it makes a lot of sense… For a while now, they’ve always well…sort of avoided each other."
Taki frowns, “when?”
Jo shrugs. “Just.. all the time.”
Euijoo raises his hand like the top student he is. “Wait, who is avoiding who?”
Once again, his quiet comment goes ignored, as Yuma turns to Nicho and questions loudly, “so why’d they break up?”
Euijoo lets out an exasperated sigh, “why’d who break up-” his voice is muffled by the towel, which hits his face as he turns his head in Nicho’s direction.
“I’m not sure actually.. I heard them arguing one night. It was right after Taki’s graduation.”
At the mention of his name, Taki looks up in horror. “Did it have something to do with me?”
Nicho shook his head, “something about how they don’t rely on each other enough… they shoulder blame and responsibilities on their own so that they don’t burden the other person.. And then it got really crazy. I’ve never heard them yell at each other like that.”
“Who was yelling at who?” Euijoo questioned once more.
Maki sighed, flopping onto the couch in defeat. “That’s so stupiddddd,” he whined, “you’re telling me they broke up because they care too much about each other?!”
“Who cares too much about who?”
Harua shrugged. “It seems oddly on point for the two of them though. They’re always caring for each other."
“Who’s caring for who?!”
“Wait!” Yuma called out excitedly, “I have an idea!”
“Oh no.”
“Have you guys ever seen the parent trap?”
Nicho claps excitedly, dropping the towel right onto Euijoo’s face, who lets out a muffled yelp in surprise. “Are you suggesting we try and get them back together?”
Yuma nods excitedly, and the rest of the members share a mischievous grin.
“Get who back together?” Euijoo questions from underneath the towel, not even bothering to remove it anymore.
At last, Nicholas notices him, and presses the towel further into Euijoo’s face. “Who do you think, silly.”
Euijoo fights back, pulling the towel off and with an innocent expression: “Fuma and Kei?”
Taki holds back a laugh. “Where have you been this whole time?”
Euijoo opens his mouth to retort with something along the lines of "I've been asking for the past ten minutes,” but Nicho shuts him up with a quick peck to the cheek. “You’re so cute when you’re confused.”
This earns a groan from the rest of the group minus Maki, who mutters something in English about how whipped Nicho is, which gets him a playful slap on the shoulder.
Quietly, Jo speaks up once again, “I don’t know guys.. Isn’t this kind of.. Pushy? Aren’t we being kind of nosy? It is their relationship after all…”
But his statement is ignored, as the rest of the boys huddle together and begin devising a plan in hushed whispers.
“We’ll need someone who can get close to them easily!”
“Someone that they wouldn’t question and trust fully.”
The entire group turns towards Jo.
Jo shakes his head quickly, “doesn’t it feel like an invasion of privacy?”
“Jojo~~” Maki calls out, with a familiarly mischievous tone.
Jo shakes his head firmly once more. “It just doesn’t feel right!”
“Aigoo~~ our little Jojo, our sweet baby Jojo,” Taki joins in.
Jo frowns, feeling more threatened than loved. “Absolutely not. I’m not going to betray Fuma and Kei’s trust like this!”
“Jo chan~~,” Yuma says, with a pleading tone.
Jo gulps, finally understanding just how horrifying peer pressure was. “No. and that’s my final answer! I’m putting my foot down.”
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“Remind me never to put my foot down again.”
Nicho laughs as he drags Jo down the hallway towards Kei’s apartment. “You’ll be fine! You’re their favorite anyway, so they won’t question you no matter how bad it gets. Probably.”
Without another word, Nicho disappears, leaving Jo alone in front of Kei’s door to face the horrors by himself.
Nervously, Jo knocks a quiet knock against the door, to which Kei opens immediately.
“Jo!” Kei greets warmly, just like Nicho predicted, “did you need something?”
If Jo’s face wasn’t enough to immediately give away his intentions, his voice definitely was. “Oh! Kei! Um.. actually I was.. No! We were um.. We wanted to uhh”
Kei stayed with the same warm expression on his face, unphased and patient with Jo’s nervous stuttering.
“Taki and I.. we’re thinking about going to get dinner! And we wanted to invite you! And.. probably no one else,” Jo’s voice trailed off quietly, hoping that Kei wouldn’t notice that he had almost revealed their plan to invite Fuma as well.
Kei grinned, unsuspectingly. “Of course! I’d love to! Just you, Taki, and I? Wouldn’t you like to invite Yuma? Actually, just us three is good too! You don’t have to worry about paying then! It can be my treat. After all, it’s just the three of us..”
Kei stopped mid-sentence and observed Jo with a questioning look. “Is something wrong Jojo?”
Jo immediately shook his head and tried to plaster a positive expression on his face, despite the dreadful feeling rising in his stomach. “No! No! Not at all! Yup! Just us three! Yup! Everything is fine! Why wouldn’t it be? Everything will be fine! It’s all good!”
Kei gave Jo a half concerned half confused glance, but laughed it off. “No need to be nervous around me Jojo. We’re all graduated now and I’m no longer your senior; you can be casual around me now.”
Jo just nodded, sealing his lips shut, out of fear that if he opened them, he might end up confessing the entire plan to Kei.
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At the same time that Jo was being a spluttering flustered mess in front of Kei’s door, Taki was inviting Fuma to a private dinner with just him and Jo present, to which Fuma happily agreed.
After a brief celebration that Jo had not blown the team’s cover like Taki kept saying he would, Jo and Taki departed for the restaurant with the rest of the members on speed dial.
They arrived 10 minutes before the time they had planned to meet up with Fuma and Kei. Before Jo could even step past the restaurant doors, Taki pulled him to the side.
“Okay Jo, remember the plan,” Jo nodded intently, and Taki pulled out a tube of whitening cream and a hot pack. Jo frowned. “Um.. what is this?”
Taki unscrewed the whitening cream and began squeezing it onto his hand. “How else do you think we’re gonna be able to convince Kei and Fuma that we had to leave urgently?” Taki began rubbing the cream against Jo’s face rushedly. “Hurry! Fuma always shows up early to dinners like this!”
Jo, who was still confused and extremely hesitant and unwilling, complied, and pressed the hot pack against his forehead while Taki continued to spread an excessive amount of whitening cream on his cheeks.
“All done,” Taki stepped back to inspect his cosmetic work, nodding in approval, “you look fantas-” Taki paused mid-sentence, his eyes bulging out of his head. Quickly, he snatched the heat pack and whitening cream from Jo and shoved both of the items into his coat pocket. “You look sick,” Taki shouted, much louder than before. “So extremely sick!”
Jo frowned, “Taki, what are you-”
“Who’s sick?”
Jo’s face immediately dropped and he felt his spirit evaporate from his body. Even without the whitening cream, he still would’ve looked pale as a ghost, as he turned around to meet Fuma’s gaze.
“Oh! Fuma! You’re here early!” Taki stuttered, quickly grabbing Jo and pulling him close.
Fuma nodded, a concerned look written across his features. “Jo.. are you alright? You don’t look too great.”
Taki shook his head with excessive exaggeration. “No! Jo has been feeling awful all day, and well.. He’s not holding up as well as we thought he would.”
Fuma frowned, pressing the back of his hand against Jo’s head, which only caused the crease in his brows to deepen. “You’re burning up Jo. You should head home. We can always come out to eat another day, once you’re feeling-”
“No!” Taki cried out, causing both Jo and Fuma to turn towards him in surprise. “Um.. so you see, we already reserved and prepaid everything… it was really really expensive! And it took us a long time to get this reservation! So we can’t reschedule!”
Fuma furrowed his brows, “this is our local curry place.. We used to come here every-”
“It’s gotten a lot more popular!” Taki cuts in, signaling with his eyes for Jo to help him convince Fuma.
Getting the signal, Jo nodded timidly. “It would be a waste.. We already paid.. So you should at least go in and get some food..” Taki nodded rapidly.
Sighing, Fuma gave in. “Alright. I’ll go in and get something and bring something back for everyone else. Taki, take Jo straight home and get him to bed immediately. And make sure to look after him; tell-”
Fuma stopped mid sentence, and the strict look that was written across his face just moments ago had faded into something sentimental. “Tell Euijoo. He’ll know what to do.”
Taki and Jo gave each other a knowing look. He was definitely going to say Kei.
Regardless, Taki nodded, and pulled Jo along with him, who faked a limp down the street. “Eat well!” Taki called as they hobbled away. “Good luck!”
As soon as they were out of Fuma’s line of sight, Taki pulled Jo into the nearest convenience store. “Good acting,” Taki said, as he peered out the window to make sure they weren’t spotted.
“Now,” Taki said excitedly, “To deal with Kei.”
Jo nodded, a quiet thank you, before taking out his phone to dial for Kei.
To no one’s surprise, Kei picked up after just one ring.
“Jo! I’m so sorry, I’m running late, don’t wait for me!”
Jo and Taki shared another knowing glance. Kei was always late; a fundamental part of their plan.
“Kei,” Taki responded, doing his best to hold back his laughter.
“Taki? Why are you on Jo’s phone? Is Jo there? Is something wrong?”
“Yeah,” Taki said, a fake misery in his voice, “Jo suddenly started burning up, and he’s not feeling too great.”
In the background, Jo let out a fake cough.
“We’re at a convenience store right now, picking up some cold medicine for him.”
Kei’s frown could be felt through the phone. “No! You two head home right now! I’ll pick up some medicine for you right now! In fact, I’m right next to a convenience store and-”
The store door buzzed, signifying a new customer, and Kei walked in with a distressed look.
“Kei!” Taki cried out, trying desperately to mask the panic in his voice whilst hanging up the phone.
Neither of them had expected Kei to show up right away.
Behind Taki, Jo snatched a box of pills off the shelf, pretending to inspect it.
“Jo!” Kei yelped, seeing the younger boy, “you are in no condition to be standing here! You should be in bed!” Kei pushed past Taki and pressed the back of his hand against Jo’s head, just like Fuma had done so earlier.
“You’re burning up like crazy!” Kei exclaimed, “and you look so pale! You need to go home immediately!”
Jo nodded weakly, which wasn’t even a complete lie. This whole facade had drained him of his energy to the point where he didn’t need to act. “Taki and I were just going to get some fever medicine…” Jo’s voice trailed off as he looked down at the box in his hands and noticed that what he was holding was definitely not fever medicine.
“Jojo, those are laxatives.”
Behind Kei's back, Taki to burst into silent laughter.
Frowning to hide his panic, Jo studied the box, racking his brain for an answer. “Well.. uh.. I don’t know.. I swear it said fever just moments ago..”
“He’s hallucinating!!” Taki jumped in quickly, causing Jo to let out a breath he didn’t even know he was holding. “The fever is starting to affect his vision! You were right Kei, we’ll head home immediately!”
Kei nodded, not phased at all by their terrible acting. “Alright, we can reschedule for another-”
“No!” Both Jo and Taki cried out in unison, causing Kei to flinch.
“Uhh what we mean is,” Taki explained quickly, “we prepaid everything! And the reservation took weeks! We can’t reschedule. It’ll be a waste of money! You should just go and get some food for our sake!”
Kei studied the two boys for a moment, before nodding. “Yeah, you’re right. I’ll bring back something for you guys, so take good care of him and-”
“I’ve already let Fuma know,” Taki finished, causing Jo to shoot him a worried glance that read, why would you bring up Fuma in front of Kei?!
Kei frowned for a split second, before immediately covering it with a forced smile. “Sounds good. Make sure to let Euijoo know as well.”
Taki and Jo both nodded with different levels of enthusiasm, surprised by the parallels and similarities in Fuma and Kei’s responses. Perhaps that was just the result of being so close to each other.
“Or, if Euijoo is busy, you can tell Nicho.. I’m pretty sure Fuma has a lot on his plate right now.”