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A dull buzz resounded in Jihoon’s head when he regained consciousness, the groggy feeling of sleep leaving him only to be replaced by an overwhelming feeling of nausea. His skull felt like it was being hacked in half and his mouth tasted like something Jeonghan had failed at cooking and left in the fridge for a year. With a groan he lurched forward, rolling off the bed and onto the floor to get to his bathroom. Once he had successfully maneuvered himself to the toilet he quickly lifted the lid and spilled the contents of his stomach into the porcelain bowl.
After a few minutes of nothing but painful dry heaving he flushed and set his head against the floor in an attempt to cool him down. He slowly dropped the rest of his body onto the ground and gripped his fingers into the plush blue rug, as if holding onto something would make his surroundings stop violently spinning.
He began to slow his breathing, counting to ten and then starting over, his inner metronome keeping a steady rhythm as he tried to regain his sense of balance. He cracked an eye open to peer at the blue rug again before closing them again.
In an instant his eyes shot open, realizing that he didn’t own a blue rug. The rug he stood on every morning to brush his teeth and pick at an occasional blackhead was brown, not blue. Moving only his eyes he gave the room a once-over. The small trash can in the wrong corner, the absurdly bright yellow bath towels stacked on a shelf above the toilet, the scribbled notes written on the mirror, none of what he was seeing belonged in his bathroom.
“What the f-” he began, jumping up only to have the fucked up reality that he was unbelievably hungover slap him in the face when his stomach backflipped and he ended up hunched over the toilet again. In between shallow breaths he tried to think back to the night before, trying to remember who was with at the very least.
He remembered being dragged to some house party with Hoshi and a few of the other guys, remembered getting a drink from the kitchen, and remembered watching Mingyu trying to get Wonwoo to dance with him. But what happened after that, and where did he end up? Did he leave with someone? That didn’t sound like something he would do, but judging by the pain in his head he had been drunk enough to do almost anything. He was 99.5% confident this has something to do with Hoshi and holy shit was he going to kick his ass when he saw him.
Trying not to lose his shit he shakily stood back up, flushing the toilet and going over to the sink to wash his face. After using his shirt to pat himself dry he looked in the mirror t-
Fucking hell, he wasn’t even wearing his own shirt. Staring back at him was an image of Krusty the clown flipping him off. Lovely.
He gripped the edge of the mirror and pulled it open to reveal a tube of toothpaste and a few toothbrushes still in boxes.
“Weird thing to have a collection of, but okay…” he mused, grabbing a pink one off the shelf and popping it open. He squirted the toothpaste onto his borrowed brush and began trying to get rid of the taste in his mouth. While he brushed he began drumming his fingers against the side of the sink, his head slightly bobbing to the beat of a song he had been working on in his music composition course.
Pausing, he leaned into the sink to spit, before looking up at the mirror to see two large eyes staring back at him.
“JEsus ChRIsT what the hell?!” he shouted, gripping the sink and spraying the excess toothpaste in his mouth at the stranger in front of him.
“Ahh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”
“Why didn’t you say anything when you came in?! What the shit?!” he grabbed at his head and faltered slightly, his hangover reminding him that it was very much present and wanted attention.
“Oh my god I’m sorry I just heard you moving around and was going to come check on you but then I heard you puking so I went to the store to grab you sprite and some advil and then heard the sink and wasn’t sure if you were going to the bathroom or maybe you were passed out on the floor I dunno I panicked so I came to see if you were okay and I was going to say something I swear but I wasn’t sure if you’d try to punch me again and-”
“Wait wait, stop. Too fast. Too much,” he groaned, closing his eyes in pain as he thought about what the stranger was telling him.
“Wait, did you say. . .you thought I was going to punch you? Again? he asked with an eyebrow arched. Sure he would rough up his friends when they got too out of hand, but the threats were mostly empty. Did he get drunk and attack this guy??
“Ah yeah, well last night I guess I got on your bad side pretty quickly and uh yeah you got a few good hits in before well, yeah.”
“That. . .what? Hang on, I need to sit down,” he mumbled, slowly opening his eyes to walk back to the bed he had been sleeping on earlier.
The stranger pulls up the desk chair and sits in it criss-cross, watching him intently. Now that he wasn’t standing directly behind him and staring into his eyes through the bathroom mirror Jihoon could get a good look at him.
He’s taller than him, that’s for sure. Even with his legs folded on the chair he was obviously close to six feet, give or take. He was peering at him with cautious eyes, combing his fingers through his hair in an attempt to manage his bedhead but it wasn’t doing anything. After giving up on fixing his appearance he hunched over his legs in the chair and stared.
“Wait,” Jihoon began, startling the guy in front of him, “What’s your name?”
“Ah! Seokmin,” the stranger piped up, sitting straight and extending a hand to him with a blinding smile. It was as if the sun had blasted its way through the curtains and straight into Jihoon’s already sensitive eyes, until Seokmin’s hand made contact with his across the gap between them. Unfamiliar and unhappy with sudden skinship, Jihoon shrank back, not expecting such an enthusiastic introduction.
“Oh, sorry! No touching, got it,” he said quickly, putting his hands up in front of him in what looked like an attempt to defend himself, “Uhm yeah, I’m Seokmin but you can call me DK!” he continued. “I like karaoke, bbq, and long walks to the fridge.”
Placing his hands in his lap he grinned again, “And you are?”
Gaining confidence that he wouldn’t be touched again, Jihoon sat up a bit more, placing his own hands into his lap. “Jihoon,” he began, “But you can call me Woozi.”
“Woozi? That’s a cute name! Ah wait, I meant to say it’s a cool name. A very manly name. Ah, I mean, I like it?” he finished lamely, scratching the back of his head as he focused intently on a section of the ceiling above him.
“Uh, thanks. Some of my friends and I gave each other nicknames in grade school and they just sort of. . .stuck.”
“Ahh, that’s cool. I know some people who stuck with their childhood nicknames. It’s good to embrace pieces of yourself and just let your freak flag fly, y’know?”
“Uh huh. . .so. . .what happ-”
“Oh last night? Oh man okay. So-. Actually, do you want anything to drink? This might take a while to explain.” He swung his legs off the chair and onto the floor as he stood up, motioning at the doorway to the kitchen as he waited for Woozi to reply.
“Uhm, okay,” he nodded, knowing full well he would need to chug at least two gallons of water before he would even begin to feel hydrated again.
DK went over by the door, extending an arm so Woozi could exit the room before him in an offhand romantic gesture. Had he not been so hungover he probably would have given him a weird look, but whatever.
“Water? Juice? Vodka?” DK offered, clasping his hands together in a waiter-esque fashion.
“Don’t talk about vodka right now are you joking? If I had the energy I would find a living descendant of the creator of vodka and punch them in their stupid face,” he grumbled, blatantly ignoring the way DK’s face scrunched up as he threw his head back to laugh.
“Alright, alright, Mr. Grumpy, here’s some sprite. There’s advil on the counter over there,” DK laughed, pointing to a space behind Woozi.
With a sigh he trudged over to the counter with a small white bottle surrounded by framed photographs. Almost all of them had DK in them, and the ones that didn’t looked like he had taken them, the way they were off center or blurry.
“Do you live here alone?” he asked. He didn’t know anyone on campus who had their own room, except maybe the one guy he had heard rumors about through Seungkwan a few months back. Apparently the kid had a habit of leaning over his roommates and drooling into their mouths and honestly, give the guy a padded cell because that’s fucking disgusting.
DK was busying himself at the stove, cracking an egg onto the pan in front of him, “Nah, but my roommate is overseas visiting his family. His sister just got married so he’s part of the wedding party,” he turned over his shoulder to face Woozi as he pulled an apron over his head and tied it behind his back, “How do you like your eggs?”
“What the actual fuck are you wearing?” Woozi asked, almost afraid of the answer he would receive. The apron was a neon orange with the words, “Believe It and You Shall Achieve It!” scrawled across it in a shade of blue that made it impossible to deny it was a Naruto reference. Woozi felt himself shudder as he imagined his elementary school self running with their arms dangling behind them, as he and his friends pretended to cast ‘jutsus’.
“Oh this little number?” DK was grinning so big his eyes were barely visible, “This was a gift to myself for finishing finals last term. I saw it in the window and just couldn’t pass it up.” He placed a finger on his chin as he looked up in thought, “I should have a headband lying around somewhere to complete the look-”
“Please don’t,” Woozi deadpanned, “Oh and over easy, but you don’t need to cook me breakfast. I crashed over here and I stole a toothbrush.”
Cackling DK turned back to the stove, “Over easy it is! And don’t worry about the toothbrush, I keep a bunch just in case any of my friends stay over to study.”
Woozi gave him a look and realized how domestic this scene was. He literally woke up in a stranger’s bed, threw up in his bathroom, and was now being cooked breakfast. Not to mention, if this wasn’t his shirt it had to be DK’s, and he wasn’t sure what that meant or how he felt about it. Either way, the last few minutes of pure golden hospitality and the lack of internal red flags meant he could at least trust him not to murder him when he wasn’t paying attention.
He turned back to the counter to pick up the bottle of pills but something about the pictures caught his eye and he stopped to look at them closer. The few that had DK in them featured other guys around their age, but only one had Woozi’s attention as he picked up the frame and glared at it.
“Hoshi. . .”
“Ahhh, yes, our dear Hoshi,” he began with a laugh, “He’s actually the reaso-”
“I FUCKING KNEW IT” he barked out, ignoring the thrum of pain that had just shot through his head at the sudden outburst.
DK looked taken aback as Woozi gripped the frame with both hands and shook it slightly.
“Ah, wait! Wait hear me out man, he helped you in a way-” He stopped talking immediately as Woozi set the picture back down and stalked over to the small table DK had in his kitchen. Not breaking eye contact he pulled out a chair and plopped himself onto it.
“I’m listening.”
With a nervous chuckle DK slid the sprite bottle across to Woozi, stopping and quickly removing his hand when it was within grabbing distance of the other boy.
“Okay, so here’s what happened last night. . .”
Fifteen Hours Earlier
“For the last time Soonyoung I’m not going to a stupid party with stupid loudmouth frat guys just so you can flaunt your stupid dance moves to look cool!”
A loud gasp was heard as Hoshi clutched his chest in shock, “Lee Jihoon you take that back! I am an excellent dancer and I already know I’m cool!”
“Then go by yourself! Aren’t you going with Jun and Wonwoo??”
“Well yeah but Wonwoo’s just gonna sit there and you know Jun’ll disappear in like five seconds flat. Just go with usssss, come onnnnnnn it’ll be funnnnnnnn!”
“It literally sounds so far from being fun you fuc-”
“LEE JIHOON, SWEAR JAR!” Jun exclaimed, walking through the door like he owned the place. A rumpled Wonwoo stood behind him, looking just as displeased as Woozi felt at the thought of going to a party with more than just their usual group of friends attending.
“I’m not going.”
“Oh come on,” Jun walked towards him with a small smile and bent down a bit to be eye level with him, “Even Wonwoo is going! And I heard that Vernon might go with Boo, so you’ll know people!”
“Get your stupid angular face away from me, Wen Junhui, before I smash it.”
“Look Jihoonie, just because you’re feeling like a party pooper doesn’t mean you have to bring everyone else down-”
“I don’t even want to go!”
“-it isn’t like we would invite you if we didn’t feel completely confident that you would have fun. Trust us!”
“The last person I would ever trust is you or Hoshi-”
“Mean, Jihoonie, mean!” Hoshi chirped, gripping his chest harder.
“-like I would rather be blindfolded and handcuffed to a chimpanzee- Ah, and! And I would give him my wallet and cellphone, before I would consider trusting one of you.”
“I. . .”
“Wow.”
“Damn son,” Wonwoo chimed in, “you guys got flippin’ burned.”
Hoshi let go of his chest to point a finger at Woozi, “I’ll record our history class for a whole month so you don’t have to go to lectures.”
Woozi raised an eyebrow at his roommate’s offer. There was no way he was serious.
“Not a single lecture. You can stay home and write lyrics and not deal with trying to stay awake in class. And you’ll be like ‘kyaaaaaa hoshi~ you're so great for doing this for me gosh golly why was I ever so mean to you when you’re such a saint’.”
“Good lord please stop, I’ll go.”
Hoshi cheered, Jun did a weird little celebration dance, and Wonwoo had walked into the kitchen to drink some juice.
“You don’t live here either you know. . .”
“Yeah, unfortunately for you.”
“Touche.”
An hour later Woozi found himself halfway across campus at a large frat house filled almost to the brim with drunk students. They hadn’t even gone inside yet and he already felt overwhelmed and sweaty.
“Alright," Jun grinned, "let’s do this shit. Everyone keeps their phones on them and wear protection if you catch a cutie.”
Hoshi hooted and shot off into the house, most likely to find the dance floor.
“Jun for the love of-” He didn’t even know why he bothered, Jun was already through the door and making his way to the kitchen to grab a drink. He gave a small sigh and followed him in. It wasn’t like Jun was a bad guy, but he tended to wander when it suited him and Woozi wouldn’t have minded if he hadn’t been bribed into coming to a place jam packed with people he didn’t know.
But he was in a place jam packed with people he didn’t know. And as much as a bunch of pains his friends could be he would much rather have at least one of them near him in situations like this.
Lost in his anxious thoughts he flinched when he felt a hand on his shoulder. Looking up he saw Wonwoo giving him a small smile. Oh right, he still had Wonwoo.
“Let’s grab some drinks and sit on those couches,” he suggested, pointing to a side of the room with less people.
“Yeah okay.” He reached over and grabbed the back of Wonwoo’s sweater to keep himself from getting sucked into the black hole of people around him.
Wonwoo nodded and started walking in the direction of the kitchen, trying to see if he recognized anyone around him. He saw Joshua across the room and gave him a small wave, which the older boy returned. He turned back to the kitchen but suddenly stopped when someone stepped in front of him, blocking him from entering. A second later he felt a small thump on his back when Woozi didn’t notice him stop and bumped into him.
“Wonwoo! I was wondering when you were gonna get here!”
Woozi rolled his eyes into Wonwoo’s back when he heard Mingyu’s voice cut through the music.
“Hey Gyu, who did you come with?”
“Ah, just Minghao, I think he’s with Jun somewhere over there” he pointed towards the huddle of bodies near the middle of the room, “did you get a drink yet? I’ll make you one!”
“Make that two, please.” Woozi called up to Mingyu. A few months ago the taller boy had taken a bartending course at a local bar by the campus. A few of their friends doubted him but holy shit were they wrong. Mingyu mixed drinks like he was made for it, and on top of that he knew which foods to pair them with. If he wasn’t such an idiot Woozi might have been more interested in having him as a roommate instead of Hoshi.
“Alright sweet, come on,” he flashed a smile at them both before sauntering into the kitchen and grabbing a few bottles of alcohol. “A swimming pool for Wonwoo and you, Wooz?”
“Uhh. . .I dunno, something with juice.”
Mingyu nodded and started pouring different drinks into different sized glasses. He and Wonwoo chatted about things they’d need to pick up from the store later on that week as Woozi watched from his spot at the kitchen bar.
He looked over towards the mass of people grinding in the next room and wasn’t surprised to see Hoshi and Jun already on top of a table. Rihanna's “work” was blasting through the speakers set up around the house and Jun was body rolling like no tomorrow. Hoshi kept letting out embarrassing squeals as he popped and locked around him, hyping him up.
Minghao walked into the kitchen and stood next to Wonwoo, giving them all a smile.
“Mingyu’s playing bartender? I’ll take a martini!” he pulled a quarter out of his pocket and flipped it at him, “keep the change”.
“Okay I’d be upset by your lack of respect for the foodservice industry, but I need to do laundry so thank you.” He pocketed the quarter and pushed Wonwoo’s drink over towards him. A minute later a cup was pushed towards Woozi, and another towards Minghao.
They all thanked Mingyu, who smiled and opened a beer before turning to Minghao.
“You gonna go jump on the table and show them what you’ve got?”
“Nah, let those two give them a show. But maybe later when I’ve had a few shots.”
Wonwoo laughed and Woozi swore he saw stars in Mingyu’s eyes when he glanced over at him, “Just don’t kick anyone in the face.”
“I have excellent control over my body, thanks.”
They heard cheering in the next room and looked back to see Hoshi and Jun hopping off the table and heading in their direction. They stopped in front of Mingyu and gave him their orders before slumping over in seats next to Woozi.
“Are you finally done? Can I go home now?”
“We just got here! And you aren’t even tipsy! We aren’t leaving here until you have fun!” Hoshi wailed, pointing an accusing finger in his direction.
“I’m having fun. Mingyu made me a drink, I’m talking to Wonwoo and Minghao, we’re having a blast.” To prove his point he held up his drink and flashed him a peace sign.
Hoshi threw his head back and laughed, “That’s literally one drink, so no it doesn’t qualify as fun.” He watched as Hoshi lined up a few shot glasses on the counter and instructed Mingyu to fill them up. “Okay, so here’s the game. We all take a shot, just one, of something totally random. And whoever makes a face of any kind has to lick something gross.”
“What kind of ga-”
“I like it!” Jun reached forward and grabbed one of the shots in front of him, “Just don’t make a face, easy.”
The other boys shrugged and picked up their glasses, peering into them to try and guess what sort of alcohol they would have to really love for the next few seconds.
“Wait aren’t we going to decide on the gross thing?” Woozi assumed everyone would have this question, so why was he the only one asking?
“Ah yeah, okay, hmmmmm how about. . .”
Hoshi looked around the room, dipping under Wonwoo’s arm in search of something gross enough to be the punishment.
“Oh! How about this, the loser has to lick that bar of soap!” he motioned over to a basic bar of soap on the kitchen sink, totally unaware of the situation.”Yeah, so make a face and you gotta lick the soap. And a full lick too! Not a bitch lick.”
Mingyu choked on his spit and gave Hoshi a weird look, “What’s a bitch lick?”
Minghao cleared his throat, “A bitch lick, my dear uneducated friend, is when you poke something with your tongue, instead of flattening it out and sliding it from top to bottom.”
Woozi almost died laughing when he saw the look of disbelief on Jun’s face. Minghao didn’t seem to notice, or care about what Jun was doing.
“Y’know, like when you have a really good popsicle and you don’t want it to melt.”
Not sure what to say, everyone nodded their heads and made noises of affirmation. Jun cleared his throat and threw the shot back immediately. Hoshi laughed and leaned in close, watching his friend pointedly to ensure he wasn’t going to make a face.
After half a second of silence Jun broke out in a grin and opened his mouth to prove he hadn’t lost the game. “Malibu.”
Minghao gave his glass one last look before downing it quickly. He laughed not even a second later, “Green apple pucker!”
Wonwoo shook his head and tilted his head back to take his shot. He looked back at all of them and did a little dance, “Duh duh duh duh, duh.”
“Tequila!” was the resounding cry from the small group, all of them taking a second to join in on Wonwoo’s little wiggle.
Laughing, Mingyu took his shot, “Fireball!”
“Oh thank you, wowee I really didn’t want fireball,” Hoshi laughed.
“Oh my god Hoshi, this was your idea!” Woozi laughed, giving his arm a small smack.
“Fireball isn’t even spicy Hosh.”
“Aye Junhui, just because you’re the prince of China and have sriracha running through your veins doesn’t mean the rest of us can handle eating Jack in the Box jalapeno poppers without ranch, okay?”
“Uhh, actually I can.”
“Yeah, same.”
"Sriracha is from Thailand, you racist."
“You?? You can’t handle them without ranch?”
“OKAY SO WOOZI IT’S YOUR TURN.”
“You skipped yourself, but whatever.” Woozi looked down at the tiny glass in his hand and hoped to whoever was listening that it wasn’t vodka. He wasn’t a big drinker, and honestly no one he hung out with was so that was nice, but he had a beer occasionally and Mingyu always asked them to let him practice on them from time to time. But he just couldn’t handle the taste of vodka. It was like drinking nail polish remover, and he would know. When he was in third grade Suengkwan had dared him to try it after he had been dared to hold Vernon’s hand for ten seconds and sing to him. In hindsight, he should have known better than to do anything the younger boy said, and the next four hours of chills and vomit would definitely be a reminder of that.
With a sigh, he took the shot, the dry taste of vodka hitting his lips.
Fuck.
He coughed and made a face.
“oHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH”
“Oh shit, he’s gotta lick the soap.”
“Wait maybe this isn’t a good idea, should he rea-”
“Nah, it’s soap, it’s clean.”
“...Mingyu I don’t think you understand.”
“Wait,” Woozi in between sips of the drink Mingyu had made him (sweet sweet malibu sunset), “Hoshi hasn’t gone yet.”
Hoshi cackled, “I can take anything!” with a battle cry he took the shot, smiling from ear to ear once he had set the glass down. Within seconds his face changed from gleeful to regretful.
“WHAT. What is this? Mingyu what was that??” he wailed, downing his margarita, along with Jun’s.
“Wow assmunch, that was mine!”
Mingyu grabbed the bottle from behind him on the counter, holding it up with a laugh. “It’s Jun’s blood, flowing angrily through your body.”
“Who the fuck owns sriracha flavored vodka? Why is that even a thing?!”
Jun was on the floor dying of laughter while Minghao held onto Wonwoo’s shoulder for support so he wouldn’t fall down as well.
Wonwoo bent forward and clapped his hands, laughing at his friend. “That was great, holy shit Mingyu you’re a genius.” he wiped a tear from his eye and placed his hand on Mingyu’s arm.
“No, don’t touch him Wonwoo, he’s the enemy! He poisoned me!”
“Dear lord Hoshi just lick the soap with me.” Woozi walked over to the sink and picked up the bar of Ivory by the sink. “Wait this isn’t even dish soap. Do these guys know they’re using a body wash on their dishes?”
“Probably not, but hey, at least our breaths will taste like lumberjacks.”
“I. . .okay.”
Hoshi took the bar from Woozi and gave it a lick from top to bottom, a visible shiver running through his body as he shook himself and scrunched up his face.
“Oh god, it’s gross. Lumberjacks taste fucking gross, what the actual fuck.” He reached over and grabbed Woozi’s drink off the counter, finishing it off.
Rolling his eyes Woozi gave the bar of soap a lick, his pride pushing him to do it the same way Hoshi had. It was fucking disgusting.
Reaching blindly he grabbed a cup off of the counter and downed the liquid inside of it.
“Wait Woozi that was-”
It was like time stood still as the raw taste of moonshine slapped him in the face. It was like his nail polish remover nightmares piled on top of every cheap vodka in the world and shoved themselves down his throat. It was the worst.
“Oh my god,” he whimpered, bringing his hands up to his mouth.
All at once his friends began to crowd in on him.
“Shit has he ever had moonshine before? He usually doesn’t drink much at all, he’s a fucking lightweight.” Jun was directly in front of him, looking into his eyes with a look that was both amused and worried.
Jun was replaced by Hoshi, sliding into Woozi’s already swaying view, “He should be okay if he just hangs out on the couch and drinks water, he only had-. Wait, how much did he have?”
Mingyu grimaces and looks over at the other room, “The only one who drinks moonshine here is Seungcheol and he puts like 60% of it in his cup.”
Hoshi moves as Wonwoo tells him to get a bottle of water from the fridge. He steps in front of Woozi and extends a hand to him, “C’mon Wooz, let’s go sit on the couch and talk crap about the people here, huh? It’ll be a blast.”
Nodding, he follows Wonwoo out of the kitchen and towards the couches they saw earlier. His head is starting to feel heavier on his neck than usual. Or was it always like this? He can’t remember anything anymore. Where was he? Why was he there? WHO WAS TOUCHING HIS HAND?
With a sudden lurch he yanks his hand from Wonwoo’s grasp and backs up from him, slowly.
“Wha- Woozi? What’s wrong?”
“Is he okay?”
Panicked, he looks at the tall boy in front of him, and then to the even taller boy next to him.
Where was he, the land of giants? Why was everyone so tall? What did they want from him?? Turning his head slightly he saw people flailing parts of their body at each other, like some fucked up ritual dance. The taller boy was trying to tell him something, but all he heard was moaning. A hand reached out towards him and he felt every cell in his body scream at him to run.
So he did.
Wonwoo, Mingyu, Hoshi, Jun, and Minghao watched as their usually composed friend booked it across the livingroom and down the hallway to god knows where. They could faintly hear garbled screaming, but that could have been anything really.
“Fuck, we have to go get him,” Mingyu said what they were all thinking, “He’s going to be pissed tomorrow.”
“Shit, let’s go.” Hoshi agreed, taking off after the blur of pink that had a head start on them.
Moving their way through the hallway they saw a few disgruntled couples fixing themselves as if someone had interrupted what they had been doing a few moments before.
“Hey dude, you seen a guy about ye high, pink bangs, possibly running for his life?” Hoshi tried.
“Uh, yeah actually. He ran towards the back yard muttering something about ‘land of the giants’. . .”
Jun let out a laugh, covering his mouth and stabling himself on Minghao’s shoulder to avoid falling over. “Oh my god, he’s lost it. Wonwoo and Mingyu probably scared the shit out of him with their freakishly long legs.”
“Yah, Junhui you’re not even an inch shorter than me!” Wonwoo defended, giving his friend a light shove.
Jun only laughed harder, before Minghao pushed off his hand and he stumbled forward.
“Lame, Hao Hao, lame!”
“Get over it. We have to find Jihoon.” He thanked the couple and lead the way to the back door, wondering to himself if this place had a pool and if Woozi knew how to swim. If this went south quick he could always tell him Hoshi or Jun were the ones to blame. They would never be able to convince Jihoon otherwise anyway.
Woozi made it out the back door and away from the chaos happening in the house behind him. Then he kept going.
He ran faster, his legs taking him back onto campus and to a small patch of grass considered a park somewhere near the administration building. He hunched over and attempted to catch his breath, to gather his thoughts, to just calm down really.
First, what was going on? He was with people he knew. He had been at a party. Christ, how much did he drink? What did he drink? He’d never been this bad at focusing before, then again he’d never drunk this much before. Who was he here with? Where did they go? Did something happen to them?
Finally catching his breath he plopped down into the grass, feeling the cool itch begin to sneak up his legs. Everything was spinning. He felt gravity pulling him farther and farther down to the ground, until his back was in the grass and he was staring up at the sky. He tried to concentrate on a star above him, but it kept moving just when he finally caught sight of it. He heard movement near him but wasn’t able to turn his head, his entire body felt like it was melting and becoming one with the ground.
Someone laughed. Were they laughing at him? He must have looked like a fool, laying on the wet grass at an ungodly hour, on a small patch of grass that should not be considered a park. There wasn’t even a bench. What kind of park doesn’t have a bench?
He heard more voices, and then the sound of footsteps coming closer to him. Panicked, he started to pull himself from the pull of his drunken haze. Curse his unwilling limbs, he was about to get murdered on a crappy patch of grass and no one would even know! He had so many things left he needed to do in this world, so many achievements left to be achieved!
No, this was not how it was going to happen. He closed his eyes and pushed every ounce of willpower into moving his body off of the ground, standing up and coming face to chest with another. Fucking. Giant.
“Hey are you o-”
“Fight me.”
“WHAT?”
“Fight me, punk!”
“I’m not going t-”
“RAAAARGHHHHH!” he leaped at the monster in front of him, punching every inch of it that he could reach.
“H-hey, wait! What’s wrong with you? I’m not going to hurt you!”
“Don’t lie” -punch- “to me” -punch- “you ugly thing!”
“Well that’s ju-. Hey!” Woozi had shimmied onto it’s back and was grasping it’s hair. With a grunt, the giant grabbed his arm and threw him off and back onto the grass.
“I’m not finish-!” With a resounding thunk Woozi fell to the ground, vertigo taking over his lightweight, dehydrated self.
“Holy shit.”
“Holy shit.”
“Mhmm, that’s what I said too.”
“So I just. . .attacked you, and then PASSED OUT?”
“Yeeeeup, just like that. A few minutes later your phone rang so I answered it and found out you knew Hoshi. We were in soccer together in middle school and stayed friends through the years, but I never learned his roommate's name. Well, until now anyway.”
“Wait, they just let you take me to your house? And you changed me out of my clothes?? Did yo-”
“Noooooo,” DK waved his hands in front of him, his ears turning pink, “I would never! You threw up when I was carrying you back, and actually you were on my back so I got the worst of it, but anyway I didn’t want you to sleep like that so I helped you change. You just stood there giving me dirty looks but couldn’t actually lift your arms,” he laughed. “Oh, but once I told Hoshi where you were he asked me to take you back to my place and he’d pick you up in the morning. He said something about. . .having the time of your life? I wasn’t sure what he meant but he just cackled into the phone and hung up.”
Woozi’s face immediately shifted into a deadpan expression, earning a laugh from DK. With a small sigh he looked up at the taller boy who had not only tried to save him from getting frostbite, but had carried him to his house covered in vomit, put him to bed, and was now making him eggs like it was totally normal.
“Listen, Seokmin. I. . .am really sorry. Thank you for not leaving me at that patch.”
DK set a plate in front of Woozi, giving him a gummy smile, “Any friend of Hoshi’s is a friend of mine! And hey, it isn’t every day I get to rescue a cute warrior from the land of giants.”
“...I take it back, I’m glad I threw up on you.”