Work Text:
Minho sighed as he looked at the small box resting on his counter with big, bold letters that read ‘congratulations!’
The story went like this: Minho was a fan of TV game shows. He loved watching people scramble to figure out the most basic, general culture questions, specially when he knew the response to majority of those questions.
It had been a very nice day, with Minho hanging out in his apartment with Chan and Felix, who were both eating his food and drinking as they watched one of Minho’s favorite game show.
“Now! For the question to our dear audience!” The host of the show said cheerfully, Felix sat next to Minho on the couch, shoving some chips into his mouth. “Who is, in the Roman mythology, the messenger of the gods? Call to the number in the screen and participate for a surprise prize!”
Minho scoffed. “Mercury, duh.” He said almost immediately, rolling his eyes as he took a sip from his beer.
And before he ever knew it, Felix was shoving his phone into his face. With a call on.
“Repeat it.” Felix whisper-yelled as the host spoke in his happy, cheerful voice.
“Hello! Who am I talking to?” The man asked. Minho shook his head as Chan snorted from the kitchen before Felix took matters into his own hands, putting the call on speaker and leaning in.
“Lee Minho.” Felix said, getting himself a glare.
“Well! Hello, Lee Minho! So, do you know the response?”
Felix looked at Minho, with his best puppy eyes screaming ‘repeat it for me?’, Minho rolled his eyes, repeating himself quietly.
“Mercury.” Felix repeated.
“That is…” The host said, making a whole suspense act that only annoyed Minho, who was sure he was right. “Correct!”
The people in the show cheered, clapping and all that, before the host talked again. “I’m sending you to the production so you can send us your address for your prize! Congratulations!”
And the idiot had given the address of Minho’s apartment, so now there he was, staring at a prize that was God-Knows-What.
He sighed, grabbing a small knife to tear open the tape that was holding the box closed and pulling whatever the hell was in there.
It was a plastic box with red lettering on top that read ‘put me in water and watch me grow!’
He tore the box open, holding what looked like a red guitar shaped sponge. He flipped the box, to convince himself he had read the back, not really caring too much, he knew the deal with these things, they just expand with water, nothing too impressive.
He walked through his kitchen, grabbing a big bowl and pouring water on it before he mindlessly threw the guitar in the water, leaving it on a high spot in his counter so his cats wouldn’t try to drink from it.
“Come on, you can play with the guitar tomorrow, let’s go to bed.” He said, scooping Dori up and going to his room to sleep peacefully.
So it was easy to imagine his surprise when he walked into his kitchen the next morning to find a boy around his age, perched on his countertop, with fluffy, slightly wavy messy hair, big round brown eyes that looked up at him almost innocently, squishy cheeks and oh, completely fucking naked.
“Who are you? How did you get in here? Put some clothes on! What the hell!” Minho barely snapped, shoving his cats into his room for safety as he walked towards the stranger who just tilted his head to the side.
“I’m Jisung. Han Jisung.”
“Okay, so? What are you doing inside my house? Like? And naked? What is wrong with you, dude?”
“I’m an expandable boyfriend! It says so on my box.” The guy (Jisung, apparently) explained with a soft voice.
“Expan— what?!” Minho said, frowning as he remembered the dumb guitar shaped sponge he had out on water, immediately walking further into the kitchen to find the bowl with nothing but water. “Where’s the guitar?”
“It melts! And I come from it.”
“From the guitar?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I… I’m not sure.” the guy mumbled, genuinely seeming confused.
Minho groaned, fishing the plastic box from the trash can and reading behind it.
‘The new and better expandable boyfriend has arrived! With these new version you can find five different models in both boyfriend and girlfriend, including non-binary models! Put the figure in water and watch it grow into the perfect partner!’
“This is so dystopic, what the hell.” He mumbled, throwing the box again and turning to look at the guy. “So you’re trained to be the perfect partner?”
The guy nodded, hair falling slightly over his eyes, Minho sighed. “Come on, I’ll give you some clothes.”
He helped the boy off the counter, guiding him to his room. “So, Han Jisung, right?”
“Yeah.”
“How old are you?”
“I’m 24, turn 25 September 14.”
“I’m 26, turn 27 in October.”
Jisung (?) hummed softly.
“So… what does this, ‘perfect partner’ thing mean?” Minho asked, pulling out some clothes and new underwear for the guy.
“I’m… cute? I… I don’t… know how to explain it i… as you can assume this is my first time.”
Minho sighed (his new favorite activity, apparently). “You have like… a back story?”
“I mean… I’m a person.”
“You come from a guitar shaped sponge.”
“That doesn’t make me any less of person.” Jisung frowned as he dressed.
“What do you like, then, person?”
“I like… music, i like singing and rapping… and I like… writing! And playing the guitar… and tattoos! But I don’t have any… i like… cheesecake… and…anime! And… uh… Dating reality shows! I like bug documentaries!”
“Bug… bug documentaries?”
“They’re interesting!”
“Fuck, how am I gonna explain this to my friends?” Minho groaned, looking at his cats.
“You can say I’m your roommate? Tho I’m… supposed to be your boyfriend!”
“I don’t even know you.”
“But… I’m like… good at this!”
“It’s your first time.”
“But I’m supposed to know how to… do it!”
Minho rubbed his face with his hands. “If someone asks you’re someone I’m seeing. Not dating. Nothing too serious. You don’t live here, just stay over sometimes. Understand?”
“Then where will I live?”
“Here.”
“But you said that i don’t live here.”
“If someone asks!” Minho said, exasperatedly.
“okay, okay, sorry.” Jisung mumbled, sitting on the edge of the bed and staring at his hands on his lap.
“I’m sorry, okay? It’s just… too much.” Minho said softly, looking at the guy. “You have a favorite meal?”
“I like ramen.”
“I can make some, you haven’t eaten, have you?”
Jisung shook his head and Minho sighed before he went towards the kitchen to start preparing some food for the both of them.
And it quickly became a routine as the weeks went by.
Minho would get up early in the morning for work, leaving breakfast ready for Jisung, who had gotten a job at a local cafeteria not too far away from the apartment, after Minho finished his appointments at the psychologist clinic he worked at, he would pick Jisung up and drive him to the apartment, where they would make dinner together and chat.
At the four month, Minho noticed Jisung eyeing a red guitar pretty similar to the one he had came from… it somehow had grown feet and ended up at their apartment for Christmas.
The sixth month, Minho’s friends were over at the apartment and finally met Jisung, who came up with the story that he had been living in Malaysia all these years and months, and that was why they had never seen him and why he moved in with Minho so quickly. Felix gave him a suspicious look, but didn’t comment on it.
By the seventh month, they were somehow sleeping together, cuddled up together, Jisung’s face buried into Minho’s neck, his arms wrapped tightly around his waist, gently drawing senseless lines on his lower back.
The ninth month? Jisung begged for a tattoo.
“You’re bad with pain, bug.” Minho explained for the billionth time.
“But I want one! On the chest!”
“Upper or lower?”
“Lower!”
“That’s four in the tattoo pain scale.”
“Upper!”
“That’s still a two on pain scale, Jisungie.”
“Please!” He whined, throwing himself on the floor and wrapping his arms and legs around Minho’s.
“You’re acting like a child!”
“I want a tattoo!”
“Get it then! You have money, duh!”
“But I want you to come with me! I don’t wanna go alone.”
“Jisung, I don’t like that place.”
“But you like me! Please!” He whined, looking up at Minho with those big, brown, innocent teary eyes, nearly in the verge of tears.
Minho sighed, caressing Jisung’s hair. “Fine, but I’ll only hold your hand, okay?”
And he did, he held Jisung’s hand tightly during the making of the tattoo, held him tight when he cried at night because it hurt, poked him in the stomach when he chose to get another one on his side, held him through it all over again.
A bit after the one year mark, Minho found himself at his apartment again, with his friends and boyfriend, watching some random game show on TV.
Felt almost like a deja vu the moment Felix sat down next to him with a smirk, already holding his phone up as the host prepared to ask the question for the audience.
“Today’s question is…” the host said, making a big dramatic pause.
“You’re not calling, Felix.”
“Why not?” He chuckled, leaning in to be almost way too close to Minho’s face. “Worried you’re gonna end up with another expandable boyfriend?” He whispered with a teasing voice.
“Wha-?!” Minho started, eyes widened and face pale in terror.
“What’s the only animal that doesn’t have a stomach? Call now and win an amazing prize!” The host said, interrupting Minho’s outburst.
Felix laughed mischievously, already dialing the number and holding it up to Minho on speaker, smirking wider as Jisung came and sat on his lap, looking at them curiously. “So?” He asked, still chuckling.
“Platypus.”
“Oh, I love you!” Felix giggled, getting off the couch and going to the kitchen to respond to the host.
“Whats he on about?” Jisung asked softly, looking between him and the screen.
“Felix wants a prize.”
“But you answered.”
“I already have my prize.”