Archive of Our Own

Dohoon already feels like a hot mess, even just walking up to the apartment door.

Well—at least he’s hot. Whatever. He probably shouldn’t be obsessing over it this much unless he wants people to notice. He punches in the door code; he’d been texted it in the group chat a few hours ago, just like everyone else. Dohoon had sent Jihoon a message when he’d stepped off the subway train, but he hasn’t gotten a reply until now, so he’d just headed up the elevator on his own. Just like everyone else. 

So much for being a guest of honor—though Dohoon supposes that’s fair enough, given that he’s spent the past two weeks insisting that he wasn’t even going to show up to this thing. He knows that he’s invited because he’s Jihoon’s best friend, even if the rest of the party would be filled with people that Dohoon just sort-of barely knows—and maybe that would be fine if the little gathering would be the size of a nuclear family or a small crowd—but they’re a messily interwoven group of not-quite-strangers, all connected by a single person, a mismatched group at the perfectly awkward number of seven. Or eight? Who hosts a party this intimate with eight people who aren’t even close, anyway?

Regardless, Dohoon’s here. The door beeps after the right code is punched in, and Dohoon walks through with as much confidence as he can muster, almost relieved when no one really greets him at the entryway. His outfit is something he’d spent too much time mulling over in the mirror for something that he’d hoped would come off as laid-back—a normal tank top and normal pants, just with a cool jacket and matching shoes—something that turns heads at the door but is easy enough to shrug off once he comes in. Sure enough, once Dohoon’s got his shoes off and walks further into the apartment, he’s greeted by enthusiastic cheers of the people gathered in the living room, Jihoon included. Dohoon snaps to attention almost immediately, molding into the well-practiced part of himself that’s built to perform, to entertain. He waves wordlessly from the kitchen without bridging the distance between them and himself, lets his bright smile speak for itself. He’d better get something to hide the cracks in his façade, first, before anyone gets too close.

When he turns his back to go and look in the fridge, no one really minds him. He doesn’t know if the feeling that washes over him is relief, or actually the complete opposite. The lines tend to blur together when he’s not sober, but not yet all-the-way drunk—and the fact that he’d swiped one of his roommate’s beers from their dorm room minifridge before coming here is nobody’s business but his own. (It’s the liquid courage that got him to even step foot outside of his door, normal laid-back outfit and all.) He’s lucky that there’s a note on the fridge door that says simply, take a drink!, in what he assumes is Hanjin’s handwriting—and he goes for that first, knowing it will take the rest of that anxious edge off. 

It’s already jarring enough to walk into a place this… expensive, for lack of a better word; it’s the sardonic cherry on top of all the other layers about this whole evening that make Dohoon feel so viscerally out of place. It’s supposedly a little birthday party for Jihoon, so Dohoon doesn’t know why Hanjin is throwing it, and why it’s so far from little. Dohoon was confused when he received the invitation saying it would be held at a ‘small, luxury apartment’ that Hanjin would be renting out for the night—and now that he’s here, Dohoon knows he’d been right in his assumption that the apartment wouldn’t be small at all. It’s small for a luxury apartment, he supposes. It’s still insane to him, even as he’s raiding the fridge and feeling smooth tile under his socks. It’s so, glaringly clear that he doesn’t belong here. 

He settles on a canned whiskey cocktail. Finally. Dohoon pops it open right there in the kitchen, tipping the drink back while it’s still making that bubbly hiss. 

It’s grounding enough, for a moment. Dohoon remembers himself while the bitter alcohol warms his throat and settles onto the back of his tongue—he’s here because it’s Jihoon’s party, and Dohoon is going to show up for him, no matter how much of a fucking humiliation ritual he expects this to be. He’s safe in the knowledge that he and Jihoon have their own plans for the weekend anyway, where they can celebrate Jihoon’s birthday in the easy familiarity of just each other’s presence, without this grandiose apartment and an extravagant amount of alcohol and food for eight people—but he also knows that all of this is a part of Jihoon’s life, too. These people and this party and this unfamiliar atmosphere. And maybe it’s simply an imagined fear in Dohoon’s own, anxious mind, but he’s wrestled so much with the idea of being invited to this and not showing up and then coming off like he thinks he’s above things like this, like he isn’t interested in the life that Jihoon has outside of him—and, okay, maybe he is. Maybe, deep down, Dohoon does kind of just want to exist outside of everything that isn’t just Dohoon and Jihoon and nothing else. But he doesn’t want people to think that. 

Dohoon wants people to think he’s cool—that he isn’t insecure, or snobbish, and that he’s fine just being one amongst many in a room where Han Jihoon is the anchor point that ties all of them together. Dohoon feels it crackling louder and louder under his skin as he rounds the kitchen counter to finally walk over to where the ‘party’ is actually happening. There are a few faces he recognizes—some more than others, to be fair—but in the grand scheme of things, Dohoon is an extension of Jihoon, to a crowd of people who know each other more than any of them know him. Dohoon has to sit with that, settling into the role with every swig of whiskey and coke. There’s a dining table off to the side with a pile of gifts sitting on top of it, and Dohoon has mixed feelings about not having anything to add to it. He thought he’d give Jihoon his present this weekend, instead. His mind starts going in circles about what he’s signaling by a simple lack of action. Is Dohoon more special than everyone else? Does that make him an outsider?

“Hey, Dohoon-hyung!”

The thoughts are drowned out immediately by Jihoon’s excited voice, the crescent moons of his eyes that top off the sheer brightness of his smile. He’s making grabby hands from the couch that he’s sitting on, and Dohoon has to turn his head away when he goes to give him a hug. Suddenly, Dohoon’s self-conscious of a different thing entirely. Jihoon smells like soju and cologne. He doesn’t comment on the scent of alcohol that lingers on the leather of Dohoon’s jacket, distinct from the whiskey and coke on his breath.

Dohoon realizes then that despite the scattered greetings from the rest of them in the circle, his presence doesn’t shift the room in any grand, momentous way. Jihoon lets go of Dohoon, and the two people beside him—Shin Junghwan and Choi Youngjae—send a curt wave his way. It’s a perfect opportunity for Dohoon to prove—whether it’s to the room or to himself—that he’s perfectly fine just acting like himself for the night, that he’s perfectly capable of acting normal around these people without the need to cling to Jihoon like an overgrowth at his side. Dohoon traipses over to the couch on the other side where there’s one empty spot left, takes another sip of his drink, and listens to the ongoing conversation as he picks up a cold chicken wing. It’s fine if Jihoon doesn’t pay attention to him. Dohoon didn’t come here expecting a hundred percent of him, after all.

“We thought you weren’t gonna show up, Dohoon-ah.”

It’s Junghwan who makes the first move to include him in the conversation, after the two guys beside Dohoon on the couch wrap up a conversation about some dance class mishap. Kim Woonhak and Han Yujin, if Dohoon remembers correctly from the group chat. Jihoon’s closest friends since entering university. Dohoon’s never met them properly before.

“I figured I should meet the people you’re always telling me shit about,” Dohoon jokes in Jihoon’s direction, before directing a playful gaze to Woonhak and Yujin beside him. “Mostly good things, don’t worry.”

Woonhak scoffs in Jihoon’s direction, affronted. He braces a palm onto Dohoon’s knee, like he isn’t even thinking about it. Dohoon is surprised, mostly—but he doesn’t let that show. “Yah, Han Jihoon! Mostly good things?”

Jihoon rolls his eyes. “Dohoon-hyung, it’s been two seconds, and you’re already stirring the pot?”

Dohoon shrugs, easily playing into their usual dynamic. “Me? Stirring the pot? I just told the truth.”

“I didn’t think you were even gonna show up, you know.”

“You’d sulk if I missed it,” Dohoon sticks his tongue out, teasing. Then he gestures to the space beside Jihoon, where Junghwan’s got both his arms around the backrest of the sofa, sitting back comfortably with Jihoon and Youngjae on both sides. Dohoon scoffs, “Besides, I haven’t seen those two in a while, either.”

Junghwan interjects, “Those two? Yah, Kim Dohoon, mind your manners!”

His interruption goes unnoticed, though. Jihoon keeps his amused eyes on Dohoon while he retorts, “Who says I’d sulk if you didn’t come? I see you often enough, anyway.”

Dohoon finally freezes at that, all of earlier’s self-consciousness suddenly returning at full-force. So much for escaping the guest of honor status. He can’t believe it had only taken one look and such little words to get Dohoon to play right back into acting like no one else is around, except the two of them. Dohoon wishes he was better at disappearing into something not too big, but not too small. It’s just that he’s programmed to exist in extremes. He takes another sip from the can in his hands; how is it almost gone? “Hey—I thought there were supposed to be eight of us? Where’s the guy who rented this place, anyway?”

Thankfully, Dohoon evades the weight of too many eyes lingering on him, somehow. He simply has to follow when everyone’s heads turn toward the balcony, where Dohoon sees a vague outline of two people sitting side by side, one’s arm around the other’s shoulders, unmoving. It’s Youngjae who explains, “Hanjin got a headache earlier, so Kyungmin went to go and sit with him. Should we let him know you’re here?”

“No, it’s fine, let him rest,” Dohoon answers. He can be casual and cool and can entertain without needing to be entertained for one night—so he snaps out of his funk again fully, flips on the switch who makes him likeable enough for acquaintances to take a chance on turning into friends. His eyes zero in on a target he knows enough about to leverage to his advantage, and it only makes it easier that— “You two aren’t even trying to hide it anymore, huh? Are you finally together?”

Dohoon waves his half-eaten chicken wing at the non-existent space between Junghwan and Youngjae on the couch, and thankfully enough, the teasing lands.

“I’ve been trying not to say anything the whole night,” Woonhak jokes, hitting Dohoon lightly on the shoulder.

“So this is what Jihoon meant when Dohoon-ssi was a moodmaker, huh?” Yujin muses, egging Dohoon on further.

Jihoon, of course, plays into the bit, laying his head down onto Junghwan’s other side, taking full advantage of the fact that despite the teasing, Junghwan and Youngjae refuse to move. “I get why Youngjae-hyung likes it here, though. Junghwan-hyung’s got comfortable shoulders.”

Dohoon pushes quickly past the immediate reaction that he has to that, and he lets the conversation flow freely from there. It gets easier when Woonhak and Yujin pour him a bunch of soju shots after he finishes his cold chicken wing, and time moves in a honey-like drip of laughter and music and carving out a space into a dynamic that he wants to pretend hasn’t changed since he got here. He exists a safe, small distance away from Jihoon, without taking up too much space. Jihoon’s friends like Dohoon and his cool jacket. Maybe he can belong with them, after all. Maybe he really could.

Youngjae doesn’t react much to anyone commenting on how comfy he’s gotten, sitting with Junghwan on the cashmere couch—because, duh. Anyone with eyes can see that Youngjae’s practically half-laying on him, and it’s not like he’s trying to hide it. The two of them had simply ended up that way somehow, because it feels nice. It feels comfortable. Youngjae’s not going to move in service of something as fickle as pride, for as long as Junghwan doesn’t push him away. It’s just a sitting position, for god’s sake. Junghwan and Youngjae are the only two people in the room who get to decide if it means anything more.

To be fair—it’s not like the two of them have ever gotten anywhere close to that, though. Youngjae understands that he and Junghwan are something of a will-they-won’t-they spectacle for most of the people in this room, not in small part due to Jihoon’s enthusiasm about them supposedly being some kind of ‘fated match.’ Frankly, Youngjae thinks he does well not to believe in things like fate—but he doesn’t say that kind of shit to Jihoon, nor to Junghwan. It means too much to them, and Youngjae is unfortunately not noble enough to go out of his way, clarifying the things that Junghwan has chosen to assume instead of ask him. Youngjae is happy to let Junghwan think that the two of them are meant to be together, and Youngjae doesn’t see any good reason to tell him otherwise—whether that’s because he doesn’t believe in fate, or he’s not quite sure yet if he believes in them.

It’s been a good, twenty minutes now since Kim Dohoon walked into the room. Woonhak plays some music to go over their spirited conversation, and Youngjae mostly observes silently from his place huddled up into Junghwan’s side. Jihoon seems to be enjoying himself a fair amount, eyes sparkling as he watches his childhood best friend grow closer, lightning fast, with his new, college buddies; Dohoon, on the other hand, has barely looked Jihoon’s way even once, since that single, fleeting sliver of back-and-forth, right after he’d sat down. And Youngjae thinks it’s a little funny—in the way that he thinks most things with Dohoon are always going to be amusing to him—because Youngjae knew Dohoon before he knew that Dohoon was this mess of a person, throwing back soju shots and a Jim Beam, trying to be ten different people at once as if he isn’t sitting right across from the one who knows him best.

And it’s funny, because Dohoon knew him before he knew that Youngjae was this mess of a person, too—Youngjae isn’t denying that—but that’s exactly the thing that feels so different between them. Youngjae may not be being completely honest with his feelings for the guy whose arms he’s literally laying in, but at least he isn’t in denial, shying away from even a look as if it will make those deep-seated feelings go away. With Youngjae and Junghwan, it’s different; they aren’t two childhood friends who don’t realize their feelings because they’re both idiots. Youngjae and Junghwan are worse than idiots—they’re just scared. They’re just complicated.

(Which is, in Youngjae’s opinion, a billion times more embarrassing than whatever Dohoon and Jihoon have going on—or lack thereof—so he doesn’t know why it’s Dohoon who’s throwing back shots and trying so hard to impress everyone, as if all of the six other people at this party had shown up intending to rip him to shreds from the very start.)

“Hey,” Junghwan says softly, a whisper that rises above the noise, soft enough for just Youngjae to hear, to feel along with the vibration of Junghwan’s voice against his ribs, “you okay?”

Youngjae just nods. He’s had a few drinks, too, and he isn’t drunk, but he tends to get quiet when the alcohol starts to kick in for him. He observes more than participates. Junghwan knows this. “I’m fine, just… thinking.”

Youngjae looks up at him through his lashes. The curve of his head settles warmly onto the broad plane of Junghwan’s chest. He can see the the bunching fat under Junghwan’s chin where he looks down at him—gentle, caring. It makes Junghwan look a little funny, and it makes Youngjae look away.

Dohoon is suddenly talking to Woonhak about his roommate, Han Dongmin, who is apparently Woonhak’s sworn enemy, or something. Small world.

“What are you thinking about?” Junghwan asks in the same, soft voice from earlier. Youngjae thinks it might be weird to answer him and say, Wow, Kim Dohoon sure does light up a room, huh?, for fear that Junghwan won’t catch the sarcastic edge.

So, Youngjae doesn’t answer—but the thing with Shin Junghwan is that he still knows when there are words that Youngjae doesn’t say. The arm swung over the couch backrest snakes its way slowly around toward the contours of Youngjae’s shoulders instead, and soon, Junghwan’s palm is tracing gentle patterns onto the skin there—until he’s pulling back all of sudden, letting his hand settle instead atop the fabric of Youngjae’s clothes like the searing heat of skin against skin burns his delicate fingertips, as if it can turn into a spark into an ember into a full-blown fire, ready to consume them both whole.

Something about being with Junghwan feels so illicit in that way, sometimes. It’s ironic, because Youngjae is used to being desired—he’s given in to so many forms of that depraved want so many times, so many more times than it should have taken for him to learn his lesson—but the way that Junghwan clearly desires him lives in a different realm completely. It’s a lot quieter; Junghwan’s desire is the kind that Youngjae notices only because of those sudden, but subtle actions that Junghwan takes once he realizes that any of the desire has slipped out from under the shell of his composure at all. Junghwan catches himself when his fingertips so much as brush against a bare expanse of Youngjae’s skin, Youngjae feels a little dirty for gobbling up something as simple as basic respect. He and Junghwan seem to have lived such different lives, at least in the realm of things like this. It’s maddening—but it’s easier for them both to pretend like it’s not.

When Jihoon had first set them up because Junghwan was too modest to make a move, he probably didn’t know the kind of mess of a person that Youngjae was, and Youngjae doesn’t blame him. Youngjae’s feelings about the whole situation are a double-edged sword whenever he thinks about it for too long, because Junghwan is a nice guy, but Youngjae doesn’t exactly know what to offer to a guy who’s nice. They barely even do anything together; they share meals, talk over coffee, show up together to small gatherings like this—and they always say it isn’t anything, even if they both know that it’s not nothing. Junghwan has gotten to know Youngjae so deeply, so intimately for the past year that they’ve been in the limbo of will-they-won’t-they, seemingly by accident—and they’ve never kissed nor touched, but it almost feels like they have, because Youngjae has this implicit knowledge that Junghwan has kissed and touched him so many times in his own head. It’s fucking scary, because Junghwan barely even has to lift a finger—nor lay a single hand on him—to make Youngjae feel safe enough to let himself be seen. Really, properly seen.

Youngjae doesn’t know if he wants that—and even if he does, he isn’t quite sure if it’s quite enough.

Junghwan shifts on the couch. His limbs must be getting stiff from trying not to move under where Youngjae’s laying on him, but he squeezes Youngjae’s shoulder to pull him in closer, anyway. Junghwan is the person who’s made Youngjae finally understand what people meant when they said that staying for too long in sick places makes good things feel like a disease. Youngjae’s just never been good at attracting good guys, and he’s suffered through so much of the terrible ones now that something in his body just refuses to let him go for someone like Junghwan—someone who feels like safety, but not like salvation. Youngjae doesn’t know what he’s meant to offer to someone who wants him, but nothing from him, either.

It makes it all the more frustrating when he goes back to observing Dohoon again, who’s still talking animatedly with the two other guys beside him on his couch. Youngjae’s just barely able to check himself back into what the conversation’s even devolved into—but the image of it all stays the same. Dohoon’s fidgeting with an empty shot glass in his hand, he’s got a leg curled over Woonhak’s thigh and they’re laughing and quipping and bantering, and Dohoon’s not looking in Jihoon’s direction at all. 

“...saying Han Dongmin’s actually a decent roommate?! I cannot believe that, even for a second—”

“Hey, I don’t know what he’s done to you, but he keeps to himself, and even shares his food sometimes. Honestly, you wouldn’t be talking about him this much if you didn’t care about him, right?”

Youngjae doesn’t even know how they’ve spent so long still talking about this same damn thing. He can tell that Dohoon is starting to act a little paranoid, almost desperate to try and fit in, make an impression on Woonhak and Yujin who he’s never met before—but it’s in a way that’s not immediately obvious, at least not to those two, whose first impression of him is this. 

“I don’t care what he thinks! I just know that he thinks he’s so much better than me, and he’s always acting all smug about it!” Woonhak complains, face scrunched.

Yujin chimes in, “Yah, he’s just teasing you. Letting it get to you is as good as letting him win, I’ve told you this a billion times.”

Dohoon nods in agreement. Youngjae finds it almost patient to watch the gears turning in his head. “He’s right, Woonhak-ah. It doesn’t sound like you’re enemies at this point. You kinda sound like you want to make out with him—”

“I do not want to make out with him!”

“Okay, defensive,” Dohoon snickers, eyes darting around the room for approval, “there’s no shame in admitting that, you know? I mean, I’d make out with Dongmin-hyung if he asked. He’s hot!”

Jihoon suddenly pipes in, voice low, “You’re saying that like you have made out with him, Dohoon-hyung.”

“I haven’t,” Dohoon says, only looking at Jihoon for all of a split-second, again. It’s almost painful to watch. “I would have told you about that. I’m just saying!”

Jihoon just laughs at that, seemingly just perplexed about what to do, while Dohoon turns back to Woonhak and continues their conversation. Youngjae is kind of morbidly fascinated with Dohoon’s ability to play the least important room while failing to read the one that actually matters.

“Making out with your college roommate is, like, a formative experience for some people! I’m sure at least one person here has done it. Yujin—”

Yujin nearly chokes on the shot he was sipping, and holds his hands up to answer before Dohoon can even finish asking. “Absolutely not. Gross.”

Dohoon pouts. “Okay, maybe not—”

“Wait, but you have,” Yujin suddenly adds on—his finger pointing unmistakably in Jihoon’s direction, “right?”

All eyes fall on Jihoon now—though Dohoon’s head turns slower. Jihoon’s eyes widen, and for a second, he’s lost for words.

Dohoon façade is starting to crack, and he says, “What? I never heard about that.”

“That was one time! It was a peck, during spin the bottle at a dorm party!”

“Well, see, at least one person here’s done it,” Dohoon trudges on down that path, immediately diverting his attention away—until his eyes land on Junghwan, and his next target is sealed. “How about you, hyung? Have you kissed a roommate when you were in college?”

Junghwan just laughs at that, shaking his head. Youngjae can feel just by the way his body moves underneath him that Junghwan’s just about equally as confused as he is about Dohoon’s behavior, the little twitches in his expression now that he’s starting to lose the room.

“What? No?” Junghwan’s tone is amused, bordering bewildered. “I only kiss people that I like.”

Youngjae tries his best not to visibly react to that, even if he can feel that everyone’s eyes fall on him, even for just a second. The message is clear: Youngjae is the one who everyone knows that Junghwan likes. It’s another small thing made more potent by the fact that they’ve never kissed. They always just act like they have.

Dohoon looks a thousand times more fidgety now. There’s a time crunch before the silence starts to feel more awkward than comedic, and if Youngjae notices how Dohoon is weighing his options in his head about how to dig himself out of this hole, he’s sure that Jihoon probably notices it even more. It’s so, so painful to watch. If Youngjae had the privilege of knowing Junghwan before the world messed up how he thinks about love—like Dohoon and Jihoon do—then he sure as hell wouldn’t be acting like this. 

Sure enough, Dohoon’s eyes land on Youngjae, lying on Junghwan’s arm. He’s the only one who hasn’t been asked the kissing a roommate question, and at this point, Youngjae’s kind of willing to put him out of his misery and salvage this conversation. To be fair, Youngjae has made out with a roommate before, when he used to have one. The guy was a piece of shit. How could he forget?

Sure enough, Dohoon catches Youngjae’s eye for a moment, and then parts his lips to start running his mouth.

But before Dohoon can even speak, he’s interrupted by Junghwan’s voice—steady and deceptively gentle—telling him, “You’re actually really good with Jihoon’s other friends, Dohoon-ah.” Junghwan gestures vaguely at the places where Dohoon’s clinging to Woonhak, while simultaneously squeezing at Youngjae’s shoulder, pulling him into his side. “You should come hang out more often. Should be fun.”

Youngjae swallows thickly as Junghwan holds him, and it feels like everyone in the room notices the exact moment that the atmosphere begins to shift. Junghwan’s little comment saves Dohoon from barreling further down his (likely drunken) spiral, but Youngjae just knows that Dohoon is reading into it way more than he should, now that his momentum has been disrupted and everything he’d been trying to hide under the alcoholic buzz starts to catch up to him. Woonhak tries not to pay it any mind when Dohoon gingerly untangles himself from him, Yujin grabs a chip from the bowl in front of him as a distraction, Hanjin and Kyungmin are still out on the balcony and are lucky enough to not have to bear witness to this mess, and Jihoon… Jihoon just looks concerned. Like he’s never seen Dohoon act this way. Suddenly, Youngjae understands why Dohoon had been insisting in the days prior that he wouldn’t show up tonight, saying he barely knew anyone and didn’t want to cling to Jihoon like a koala the whole night.

Well, Dohoon certainly isn’t clinging to Jihoon, if that was what he was aiming for, all else be damned.

“I’m, uh…” Dohoon breaks the silence with a nervous chuckle as he stands up from the couch, his balance surprisingly stable, “...gonna grab a soda from the fridge. Anyone want anything?”

They all just watch, stunned, as Dohoon turns away without waiting for an answer—and while Dohoon shuffles his way into the kitchen by the front door, Youngjae can’t help but let out a heavy sigh. 

Youngjae just feels bad for him. Not in, like, a pity way, or anything—but they aren’t exactly strangers, after all. And Youngjae mostly just can’t stand how stupid Dohoon’s acting, because he himself knows what it’s like to have acted that stupidly before.

So—even if he’s a bit nervous as he wiggles out of Junghwan’s hold—Youngjae does so anyway, trying to play it off as nonchalantly as he can even if he’s wobbling a little when he tries to stand up.

Junghwan holds his hands out to try and steady him, but he only goes as far as to hover them in the air, just a few inches shy of Youngjae’s waist. It feels like it burns more than if he’d just touch him properly. Youngjae asks him, and only him, “Do you want anything, hyung?”

Junghwan shakes his head, eyes wide, a deer in the headlights. Youngjae hums, and then walks over to the kitchen—because even when he’s been dropped into a safe haven in someone’s arms, he can’t help but keep on looking for something he can fix.

By the time Youngjae makes it to the kitchen, a safe distance away from the rest of the group, Dohoon already has another drink in his hands. Youngjae raises an eyebrow at the same time that the fridge door clicks closed. “Kim Dohoon. Are you okay?”

Dohoon opens his new can of whatever the fuck he’s drinking, and chuckles at Youngjae over the bubbly hiss. “Aw, you’re worried about me now?”

“I meant it more like an insult, actually,” Youngjae rolls his eyes, resting one hand on the counter and the other on his hips. “Like, you’re acting like a fucking mess, are you okay. That’s what I mean.”

“I think I need to leave,” Dohoon answers with a sharp inhale, getting ready to tip back the can in his hands. 

Youngjae reaches forward, and snatches it right out of Dohoon’s hands— “Give me that,” —before he can even taste a single drop. 

Dohoon just laughs again, throwing both his hands up in the air. “What the fuck?”

“Do you want to leave, or do you just need to calm down?”

“I don’t know, Youngjae.”

“‘Cause if you need to calm down, more alcohol isn’t going to help with that, at this point.”

“Then give me an errand, or something,” Dohoon scoffs, sinking his face down into both of his hands for a few seconds, all while Youngjae watches with a raised eyebrow. “Come on. I saw a convenience store and a twenty-four hour coffee shop on the way here. Pick one.”

Youngjae huffs at Dohoon’s attemps at deflection. “You have a drinking problem, you know that?”

“I have a drinking problem tonight, ‘cause I shouldn’t have shown up here,” Dohoon answers, his words just a bunch of slurred whispers into his hands. “I knew this was a bad idea. Now Jihoon’s gonna think—”

“Jihoon’s not gonna think anything, ‘cause you haven’t paid attention to him for the whole, whopping half-hour that you’ve been here,” Youngjae tells him directly, clicking his tongue in disapproval. “Why are you trying so hard? Who are you even trying to impress?”

“I’m not trying to impress anyone—” Dohoon argues, though he stops short in the middle when Youngjae continues to glare. “Whatever, I just wanted to get along with all of Jihoon’s friends, not just stick by his side the whole time like we’re attached at the hip. Is that so wrong?”

Youngjae shrugs. He’d figured as much. “You tell me, Dohoon-ah. Does it feel right?”

Dohoon rolls his eyes. It’s funny how such a simple action can look so different after even just the amount of times that Youngjae has encountered Dohoon like this, face to face. Youngjae can count the number of those times on one hand, and yet the emotion behind Dohoon’s stupid eyeroll is so different now than it was on that first time. It’s kind of fascinating how the two of them ended up here; Youngjae used to pick and choose his one-night stands specifically so that they wouldn’t have to see the rest of each other’s messy lives beyond that—but that was way before Youngjae ever met Jihoon, and in turn learned that the childhood best friend he’d always talk about was some guy that Youngjae had slept with in freshman year, after meeting him at some shitty bar. Small fucking world.

It also feels like looking in a mirror, in some fucked-up way. Youngjae’s sure that Dohoon feels that at least a little bit, too. If he’d known back then that their lives would end up intersecting this way—where they can see each other’s nueroses and flaws and fumbles with the things that actually matter—then yeah, Youngjae probably wouldn’t have slept with him in the first place. But alas, they’re here now, and maybe it’s a good thing that they’re way past the point of staying out of each other’s way just to be polite. 

“Dohoon-ah,” Youngjae starts back up again, stern but less cold, “you know, it never works when you try to act nonchalant with someone you like. It only comes off as indifference—especially if they like you back.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Dohoon snaps back all of a sudden, a little louder than he’d probably been intending to. Youngjae tries to remain unfazed, though his breath hitches a bit—and thankfully, Dohoon lowers his voice accordingly. He looks Youngjae straight in the eye, shaking his head. “Are you gonna take your own advice, Choi Youngjae?”

Youngjae laughs. Fair. He walked right into that one. “So, that isn’t what we’re talking about right now—”

“Whatever. I don’t even like Jihoon.”

“I didn’t even say that you liked Jihoon. Asshole.”

Dohoon laughs, clearly desperate for this conversation to end as he rubs the heels of his palms into his eyes. “Whatever, Youngjae-yah. You can have him, if you want. I don’t need to be in some convoluted love square with the three of you.”

“Wh– There’s not going to be a love square,” Youngjae answers, trying not to laugh too hard. It won’t do anyone any good if Dohoon gets any more confirmation that he’s funny when he’s drunk. “There’s not even a love triangle. Matter of fact—there’s barely even a love line.”

“Okay, now you’re just fucking with my head,” Dohoon laughs, leaning forward onto the counter to point a finger right at Youngjae’s face. “I can respect your assumption about whatever’s going on with me and Jihoon, but if you’re in denial about the goo-goo eyes that Junghwan-hyung’s giving you, then you’re beyond help. I wouldn’t be able to help you even if I was sober.”

“Then it’s just my luck that you are so, goddamn drunk,” Youngjae scrunches his nose, attempting to smile through his more-than-mild concern, at this point. It’s worth ignoring Dohoon’s own, cutting words—for now. “Why are you so drunk, anyway?”

Dohoon throws his hands up in the air again. He runs all of his fingers roughly through the mess of his hair. “I don’t know. Whatever. I was about to leave, anyway. It’s time for me to leave. I’d better go.”

“No one here’s out to get you, you know?” Youngjae tells him calmly. He’s not rushing to stop him because he knows that Dohoon isn’t really itching to leave, either. “Can you seriously not tell that Jihoon’s really concerned about you, too? You don’t have to try so hard. Even I know that when you just let yourself relax a little—Kim Dohoon’s a likeable enough guy. So can you go drink some water, come back to the living room, and stop acting like… like this, this—manic pixie dream girl, caricature mess?”

Dohoon just blinks for a few seconds, dumbfounded. Unresponsive. Youngjae remembers that the guy is wasted—so much more intoxicated than he’d been on their first meeting, even—and he starts to worry that maybe he’d actually struck a nerve, hurt Dohoon’s feelings. He’s already starting to think of some nicer words to say.

But then—true to form—Dohoon just responds with a nod, a simple acknowledgment that he gets it, regardless of what words come out of his mouth next.

“I didn’t ask you for advice,” Dohoon says, sighing slowly, fingers kneading at his temples. “I asked you to just, please, give me an errand to run.”

Youngjae nods, accepting the compromise. That’s good enough. His head quirks to the side as he tells him, “I’m going to get Hanjin’s card, and you’re going to walk to the convenience store, sober the hell up, and not run off like I know you’re planning to. Deal?”

Dohoon sighs. “Fine.”

“At least do it for Jihoon’s sake—”

“I said fine,” Dohoon repeats, his voice louder. “Do you seriously need to get Hanjin’s card? The guy hasn’t even left the balcony this whole time. Aren’t we leeching off of him too much?”

“The guy rented this place out, Dohoon-ah. He got all of this food and threw this big party and has a new phone case every day. His card will be fine,” Youngjae chuckles. He picks up the drink that he’d snatched out of Dohoon’s hand earlier, and takes a sip. Peach. “You owe me one, Kim Dohoon.”

Dohoon shakes his head, resigning himself to his fate. “We’ll see about that.”

And Youngjae turns back around, makes his way past the partitions and back into the living room, running on what little liquid courage is left in his system to give him a second wind—

“Guys, I want ice cream!” Youngjae announces, as cheerfully as he can muster. “Anyone else?”

Hanjin can’t quite get rid of the lingering crick in his neck, no matter how much he shifts the way his head lays on Kyungmin’s shoulder as they sit together on the balcony under a starless night sky.

Still, it’s nice to be here. Away from the noise. Hanjin is starting to feel like he’s been away from the party for too long—the party that he himself had inssisted on throwing—but it’s a delicate balancing act that happens in his mind whenever he thinks about maybe going back. All of Jihoon’s friends are nice; Hanjin knows this because he’d met them all through Jihoon, and they’ve all become just as much Hanjin’s friends, too. Hanjin’s had a lot of fun with everyone already tonight, laughing over dinner and drinks until the atmosphere was comfortable and not so saturated, and connecting with each other mattered more than making a good joke or filling every single second with conversation. Hanjin was grateful for it, and he was happy to take a bit of step back from being a full-blown host and to being just another friend who showed up to celebrate Jihoon’s birthday—but soon enough, when the alcohol started to catch up to him, it brought along all the silent signals that he’d been ignoring in the stress of getting all of this sorted, too.

And now, Hanjin is here with Kyungmin on the balcony, having stepped away from the party with a mild but lingering headache, and a deep soreness embedded in the spaces between skin and muscle and bone—hence the crick in his neck. Kyungmin had been quick to insist on being with him when Hanjin announced that he’d like to get some fresh air out on the balcony, and with the way that Hanjin had been feeling, the promise of that soft comfort just wasn’t worth denying. And Hanjin is used to this, really—he knows that he has a habit of spreading himself too thin when he sets his mind on something, so much so that he’s quick to brush off his own body and mind’s warning signs the very moment he notices them. It’s something he always ends up regretting but never ends up fixing, because he tries not to think about it too much after the fact. In his mind, it doesn’t make sense to dwell on a problem that can be solved by some rest and a moment of calm, which was what he’d intended this whole sitting on the balcony thing to be.

So he’s not sure why it feels, just… different, this time. Particularly, Hanjin isn’t sure why he’s hesitating to get up, and just go back. He and Kyungmin have been out here long enough, anyway; it has to have been at least half an hour by now, at least. They’d spent the first few minutes of that time in relative silence, Hanjin’s head on Kyungmin’s shoulder, his legs curled up uncomfortably onto the dusty, faux leather cushion on the bench. Hanjin distinctly remembers feeling so much more relaxed, having someone with him, even if Kyungmin’s arm around his shoulders wasn’t exactly some miracle drug for the dull, all-over ache. Kyungmin had waited patiently until Hanjin gained enough strength to start a quiet conversation—and they’ve spent the rest of that time, from then up to now, just talking like they normally do. Time had passed in an imperceptible blip like it always does when it’s just the two of them, and they share stories and little thoughts with each other in the way that made them fall in love in the first place: mundane and ordinary, but always personal, always honest and at least a little bit vulnerable. Enough to build trust. Every conversation that Hanjin’s had with Kyungmin since he’d met him, more than a simple exchange of thoughts, has felt like the shared creation of a moment—the simultaneous making and claiming and cultivating of something that is fully and only theirs. 

Hanjin’s headache is mostly gone, really. Kyungmin feels like a human battery in that regard, sometimes, giving Hanjin back the energy he needs to pick himself up and face any kind of noise—so Hanjin doesn’t know why, for some reason, he can’t bring himself to look Kyungmin in the eye and say that he’s ready to go back inside. That he feels enough like himself to go back and be somewhat of a host and an at least decent friend.

Conveniently, the thought is knocked right out of the forefront of Hanjin’s mind when he suddenly hears the balcony door opening behind them, and both he and Kyungmin turn their heads toward the noise just in time to hear Youngjae asking in this funny, overly-cute tone, “We’re getting ice cream from the convenience store! You two want anything?”

Hanjin and Kyungmin both seem to have the same thought, eyes darting to look toward each other for just a second, before turning their heads back toward a slightly tipsy Youngjae at the door. It’s Kyungmin who says first, “Oh—what? Is that Dohoon-hyung in the kitchen? Why didn’t you tell us he was here—”

“No, no, no, sit back down, sit down, it’s fine, he’s gonna get the ice cream for us,” Youngjae says, giggling, sticking his arm through the door to wave it in Kyungmin’s face. His eyes dart toward Hanjin next. “Ice cream, Hanjin-ah?”

Hanjin just shakes his head, already reaching for the wallet in his cardigan pocket. “I’m good, Youngjae-hyung.”

“I’ll tell him to get you a bubble tea bar,” Youngjae says, with no room for argument. Hanjin just chuckles, trying to look past the glass door to get a glimpse of Dohoon, who’d apparently shown up to the party at some point while Hanjin and Kyungmin were out here. He’s snapped back into reality again when Youngjae asks, “Ice cream, Kyungmai?”

“Strawberry melona!” Kyungmin says with a smile on his face, before turning back to Hanjin to ask, “You don’t want anything, Hanjinie-hyung? Are you sure?”

Hanjin just shakes his head, and shifts his posture on the bench to wordlessly slip Youngjae his credit card. “Get extra melonas. And whatever Jihoon wants, obviously.”

“Obviously,” Youngjae parrots back, the smile never leaving his face. He takes Hanjin’s card, and then kisses the corner of it, which makes both Hanjin and Kyungmin laugh. “You’re the best, Hanjin-ah. You need anything from us, or do you wanna stay here a bit longer?”

Hanjin blinks slowly, caught off-guard at the sudden choice he has to make, and— “Uh… Um—”

“We’ll just stay here for a bit longer, hyung.”

Hanjin’s eyes land back on Kyungmin’s face, confident and assured as he makes the choice for him—just for now. It shouldn’t be this surprising, how easy it is now for Kyungmin to somehow read his mind these days. It’s fascinating, and frightening at the same time.

“Alright, come back whenever you’re ready,” is Youngjae’s simple answer—and just like that, the balcony door is closed, and they’re plunged into the ambient silence on the balcony once again.

The very moment that the two of them are alone again, Kyungmin falls back into their earlier position without even thinking about it. He swings his arm back around the bench backrest, and smiles fondly at Hanjin beside him. Hanjin just smiles back, before his eyes fall forward and out into the distance once again.

“Aren’t you worried about people taking advantage of you?” Kyungmin asks, mostly playfully, coaxing Hanjin back to attention. “I mean, not that I don’t think they’re all good people, but, still.”

Hanjin giggles as he conjures up the mental image of Youngjae—or Dohoon, actually—being so ridiculously frivolous with his credit card at the convenience store. What else besides ice cream could he end up overbuying? “Why would you think that, Kyungmin-ah? Are you taking advantage of me, mm?”

Kyungmin just pouts, scrunches his nose. They both know it’s a joke, because the reality is quite the opposite, actually; ever since they started dating, Kyungmin has always insisted on paying for at least some of their dates, or at least splitting costs equally, most of the time. Hanjin had wondered in the beginning if maybe it was his way of still keeping a little bit of distance between them; that is, until Hanjin had told Jihoon about in passing one time, and Jihoon had told him amusedly that it’s probably just a pride thing for Kyungmin as a younger boyfriend—and Hanjin has been better about letting it slide, ever since. It only makes Kyungmin even cuter in his eyes—even if that maybe wasn’t exactly what he’s gunning for—but Hanjin adores it, nonetheless. How could he not?

“Kyungmin-ah,” Hanjin starts up again after another beat of silence, still trying to push past the strange, restless feeling brewing all throughout, “we should probably go back in now, shouldn’t we?”

But Kyungmin is sharp. He takes one look at Hanjin and somehow he knows that there’s something—something that even Hanjin himself couldn’t pinpoint, but apparently isn’t doing a great job of hiding on his face. Kyungmin’s voice is sweet, forgiving. “It’s okay, Hanjin-hyung. We can stay for a bit longer, if you want. Don’t worry. It’ll be fine.”

Hanjin hums. It feels nice to hear—even if he can’t quite pin down the reason, the thing that Kyungmin actually means when he says it will be fine. Hanjin allows himself to lean back into his boyfriend’s side anyway, nuzzling just slightly against his neck.

They settle into another beat of buzzing silence again—the distant sounds of city traffic, the thrum of all the faraway lights. There are slow flashes of light behind the clouds that Hanjin isn’t sure of the source of—airplane signals or distant lightning or the moon and stars fighting to peek through thick fog—and the forecast didn’t say anything about rain tonight, but Hanjin’s learned that spring weather is always the most unpredictable, no matter where he goes.

They only snap back to attention once they spot a figure walking on the streets below them, guided by streetlights toward the direction of the nearest convenience store—and even from a decent ten floors up, both Hanjin and Kyungmin can tell pretty clearly that it’s Dohoon, running out to go and get them ice cream like Youngjae had said. He’s got both hands in the pockets of the jacket he’s wearing, and Hanjin thinks the first thing he’s going to ask when Dohoon gets back is where he picked it up. It’s a cool jacket. Hanjin doesn’t really know him that well, considering—but if anything, he’s always liked the guy’s style.

“Guess he needed to escape for a bit, too,” Kyungmin jokes casually, his eyes falling right back on Hanjin before Dohoon’s figure is even out of view.

Hanjin just blinks at him, sheepish. “It’s not like I’m trying to… escape them, you know.”

Kyungmin tilts his head, confused, until realization dawns on his face a few seconds later, and he waves his free hand to clarify, “Oh, no, I know. I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know,” Hanjin replies instinctively, already shrinking into himself a little. He’s not really used to being so vulnerable. He’s always wanted to find someone with whom he could—but he’s been learning lately that wanting something doesn’t necessarily make it easy to do. They’re alone on this balcony together, and Kyungmin has his full attention on only him—and yet Hanjin can’t help but freeze up, choosing to smite every word that comes to mind instead of tripping on them when they come out of his mouth. “Does it… Do you think, like… Okay, nevermind. I lost it.”

“No. Tell me.” Kyungmin looks at him with wide eyes, and Hanjin tries to look away. He tries.

“It’s nothi—”

“Tell me,” Kyungmin asserts—not forcefully, but not unresolved, either—and he lifts Hanjin’s chin up with two fingers when Hanjin tries to lower his head. “Look at me, Zhen-ge. Do I think… what?”

Hanjin breaks into a smile as he looks into Kyungmin’s eyes, the pet name dripping with so much affection off of his tongue. There’s no reason for Hanjin to resist the way that Kyugmin’s gentle fingers hold him there, warm skin pressed lightly against his chin, and he wonders if it’s possible to get another headache from the heat-rush to his face.

Still, Hanjin takes a moment to think first. He hopes his smile looks reassuring enough as he takes Kyungmin’s hand away from his face, presses a kiss to the knuckles, and brings their interlocked palms down over his knee—and even when his mind conjures up something coherent enough to say, his voice comes out timid, small. “Do you think, maybe… it was a bit selfish of me? Throwing this party?”

Kyungmin gives him a bewildered look, just as Hanjin had expected, and counters, “Why would throwing a birthday party, for Jihoon, be selfish?”

“I mean, it’s not like it’s something he asked for,” Hanjin admits, suddenly feeling so exposed as he rehashes all of these looming thoughts—the kinds that only haunt him when he’s alone in the silence, and yet he never speaks aloud, even then. “Part of me did this for me, right? I mean, Jihoon’s helped me a lot since freshman year, obviously, but…”

“But…?”

Hanjin shrugs. “I feel guilty, being out here. Like, I worked too hard to make sure this was all perfect—only to miss out on the part that was actually important. You get it, right?”

“I do,” Kyungmin nods, though his tone makes it clear that there’s a— “but, it’s not like you dipped out after one drink and some chips or something. You stayed there for almost two hours even if I could tell you were already tipsy by the time Junghwan-hyung arrived! That’s not nothing.”

Hanjin rolls his eyes. “Okay. Fine. But I still… I wish I could say I did this 100% selflessly, but I know that I didn’t. I guess I just like being the reason that people have something to gather around.”

“Okay,” Kyungmins nods, “and what’s wrong with that?”

“I’m not good at the actual gathering part, I guess,” Hanjin says, rolling his eyes. It sounds so stupidly convoluted, actually coming out of his mouth—it’s such a convenient problem to complain about—but Kyungmin’s still looking at him with earnest, wide eyes. So he carries on. “It’s like… I always love the idea of bringing people together, but I don’t— that doesn’t— it doesn’t always mean I’m good at fitting into the situations that I… create? I… Yeah.”

Kyungmin’s lips part slightly, seemingly surprised by Hanjin’s sudden rambling. All that he says is, “...You know that everyone in there is actually your friend, right? I’m sorry about the joke I made, earlier. I didn’t think you actually thought about it this much.”

“No, no, I wasn’t thinking about that at all. It’s fine,” Hanjin chuckles, tipping his head back onto Kyungmin’s shoulder. He mulls the words over in his head, and thinks he does know that he’s a lot closer to everyone inside the apartment than his mind would let him believe, sometimes—but knowing is different from believing, and it’s moments like this when it’s a little bit harder to really believe. “It’s just that… you know, when I step away and check out like this—and I kinda do it at every party I throw—I can’t help but feel like I always keep people around me, but not with me. It’s like, when the best matchmakers are always single. When professional chefs rarely ever cook for themselves. It’s…”

Hanjin trails off when—conveniently, again—he spots another figure on the street below them, zipping past the dimly lit roads much faster than Dohoon had been walking, just minutes ago.

Hanjin’s eyes widen in confusion, and he sits upright to get a better look past the balcony grates, even though they both probably know immediately that it’s Jihoon, chasing after his best friend like a madman through the empty streets.

Instinctively, Hanjin tries to turn his head backward, to look into the room and try to confirm what he’d just seen. He’s mostly curious about what’s gotten Jihoon to sprint away so urgently under the dark cover of night, and a little bit worried that neither he nor Dohoon seem to have gone with an umbrella, oblivious to the weather brewing above them. If Hanjin listens closely enough, he thinks he can hear the soft rumbling of thunder now, too. He wonders if it’s been there for a while, and his mind had learned quickly how to tune it out.

“Hey.” It’s Kyungmin who calls him back again, not unlike the way he did earlier—with soft fingertips turning Hanjin’s cheek, back toward him and away from the chaos that’s still waiting for them—and Hanjin realizes that he’d been so lost in his own thoughts that he hadn’t even registered a single thing that he’d seen inside. “Hey. Are you gonna do that again?”

Hanjin’s eyes widen, confused. “Mm? What?”

“You have this habit, you know,” Kyungmin pouts, squeezing at the hands they still had interlocked atop Hanjin’s knee, “you’re good at switching the subject just when you’re about to stop hiding what you actually feel.”

Hanjin’s breath hitches. His heart clenches. The words cut deep, but Kyungmin’s voice is still calm. Not aggressive, but not coddling, either—just honest. Hanjin has always appreciated that about him. He wants to give that same honesty back. “I don’t… I don’t do it on purpose, for what it’s worth.”

Kyungmin laughs. Hanjin is telling the truth, anyway, and he knows just from his soft smile that Kyungmin trusts that. “It’s easy not to notice if you aren’t paying attention… but I notice, hyung. I noticed when you started not to feel well earlier in the night, too, right? I’m not upset, just…” he huffs, “...fine, maybe I’m a little upset. I get not wanting to disappoint the people at the party—but why would you still hide things from me until now? When it’s just the two of us? You do know that I’m on your side, right?”

Hanjin nods. He squeezes Kyungmin’s hand back, and says, “Hyung’s sorry, Kyungmin-ah. I never thought about it that way. I didn’t mean to make you upset.”

“What are you thinking, hyung? Hmm?”

“I just don’t want to make you worry about things that I know I can handle on my own, yeah?” Hanjin says with a smile, trying to lighten the atmosphere a little. “And I’m not just saying that. Really. You know that I’ve always been pretty independent, and even when I think about stuff like that sometimes, it’s not like there’s anything really serious that’s troubling me. I would have told you if there was. I would. You know that, right?”

“But I don’t just want to know about those big, serious things,” Kyungmin answers, a determined set in his jaw. “I’m not saying you have to share everything with everyone… but I do wish you’d share even those little things with me. I mean, if we’re being honest—if you’d told me sooner that you weren’t feeling good earlier, even when it wasn’t that serious yet—I could’ve taken care of you sooner, too. I would have wanted to.”

Hanjin chuckles softly, looking on at his sweet, sweet boyfriend with a smiley pout. “I guess you’re right, but I’m… It’s not what I’m used to. I didn’t really have much of that growing up, either, so…”

Kyungmin sighs. “I know. But that is part of what it means to have people with you, isn’t it? We do things for each other, and we let other people do things for us. You understand how good it feels to care for people, so you let them do the same for you. Doesn’t that make more sense than keeping everything to yourself?”

It’s a little bit humbling sometimes, how much Hanjin learns from Kyungmin that in hindsight, sounds so simple. Kyungmin is looking at him with wide, hopeful eyes, waiting patiently as always for Hanjin to parse out every word before he can really take the meaning in; Hanjin wants to believe that he can be changed by just being given that soft permission, but he knows it’s always an uphill battle to fight against the habits he’s grown into, his whole life.

“I wonder what Jihoon and Dohoon-hyung are doing right now…” Hanjin mutters unconsciously instead of giving him a real answer—and Kyungmin, of course, doesn’t let it slide.

“Han Zhen-ge,” he clicks his tongue. It comes out sounding more adorable than stern, but it gets Hanjin’s attention anyway. “You’re doing it again.”

Hanjin giggles upon being caught, and then lets go of Kyungmin’s hand to sink his face into both his palms, mumbling, “I am, aren’t I?”

Kyungmin laughs along with him. Hanjin’s heart sits a little lighter in his chest when he catches Kyungmin’s eyes through a gap in his fingers, and he looks at him with such fond, tender affection. 

The love that Kyungmin shows him is overwhelming, sometimes. Hanjin is still getting used to the sheer warmth of it—the kind that stays behind even long after they’ve said their goodbyes, the kind for which Hanjin never has to do the work of filling in any gaps. With Kyungmin, there’s no room left for any nagging doubt; whether his love is loud or quiet, it’s certain. Hanjin wants to hold onto it—and he wants to be the kind of person who can give that same kind of love back, in whatever way that Kyungmin needs.

“If Dohoon-hyung would just open up to Jihoon about even those kinds of smaller things…” Hanjin starts off, joking a little,”...then he probably wouldn’t be making Jihoon run away from his own party to chase after him, right?”

Kyungmin makes a surprised, questioning face—but not long after, it becomes clear that he agrees. “Yeah. Probably not.”

It works well enough to ease the thickness of the air around them. Despite not knowing what exactly had been going on inside, they both have a good enough idea—knowing Jihoon, and all he’s said about the subject of Kim Dohoon—that Jihoon hadn’t just run after Dohoon like that for the hell of it. 

“I get what you’re saying. Thank you. And lucky for you, Kyungmin-ah, I listen well.” Hanjin reaches for Kyungmin’s hand again, and their hands fit together like puzzle pieces in the space between. “That’s why we’re figuring out how to get better at this whole… relationship thing, right now, while those two are still chasing each other in circles despite being in love for years.”

Kyungmin starts laughing. “Woah. When did you figure that out?”

“I don’t know,” Hanjin scrunches his nose, laughing along. “Doesn’t it just make more sense to believe that than not to?”

Kyungmin scoffs, shaking his head. “Seems like you’re feeling better.”

“Thanks for staying with—” Hanjin is cut off when he feels a droplet of water fall onto his forehead, now dripping down the side of his nose. He wipes it off before he even registers that it’s starting to drizzle. “Thanks for staying with me.”

Kyungmin scrunches his nose. “We could stay longer…”

“Mmm…” Hanjin giggles, somehow still trying to hold onto the hope of that, even as a pattern of droplets forms on the paneled floor, “you think so…?”

“It would be so romantic,” Kyungmin laughs—and then the drizzle turns into rain much faster than either of them were expecting—and he eventually stands up first, still holding Hanjin’s hand, “but I don’t want you getting any more sick. Come on, let’s go inside.”

This time around, though, it’s Hanjin who resists. Just for a second, Hanjin tugs Kyungmin back down beside him onto the bench, the wind blowing rain droplets toward them—and he pulls him in for a kiss, short and sweet. Kyungmin’s eyes are wide when they pull away. “Kyungmin-ah.”

All he can muster up is a stunned, “Mhm?”

Hanjin chuckles at himself before asking, in his smallest, poutiest voice, “Can you tell Youngjae-hyung I don’t actually want a bubble tea bar?”

Kyungmin shakes his head fondly, brings them both inside before the rain gets stronger, and tells Youngjae to text Dohoon to get Hanjin an ice cream sandwich instead. Everyone fills them in when Hanjin and Kyungmin return to the party. Hanjin jokes that it might be a good thing for Dohoon and Jihoon to get caught in the rain.

Jihoon only regains enough wits to stand up once Youngjae returns from the kitchen, and they hear the loud click of the apartment’s front door being shut, presumably from Dohoon just suddenly running off.

When Youngjae clocks Jihoon’s confused expression, he puts an incredulous smile on his face and explains to everyone in the room, “Dohoon went out to get the ice cream.”

Jihoon just blinks, still processing everything that had even just happened. He wasn’t really going to say anything at first—but even when it was becoming clear that Dohoon was getting progressively more intoxicated, he’d been so immersed in conversation that Jihoon could never find the right timing to step in and say something—not to mention the fact that Dohoon would barely even look his way. Now is the only time that Jihoon gets to worry out loud, and ask, “He’s not leaving, is he?”

Youngjae shrugs. He looks at Jihoon with this indecipherable smile on his face—not soulless, but not exactly pure. “Don’t worry. He has Hanjin’s card.”

Jihoon sighs. He’s starting to get concerned about whatever they might have talked about in the kitchen for Youngjae to emerge with this crazy glint in his eye, and Dohoon to run right out of the door. “Okay… Is he okay? What’s going on?”

“He’ll be fine,” Youngjae assures him, reaching out to pat Jihoon’s shoulder in snappy succession, tap-tap. “I think you should probably go after him.”

“What?” Jihoon shakes his head, head still a little bit lost as it fills with concern. “Why? If he’s fine, and you said he was coming back—”

“Stop asking questions, Jihoon-ah,” Youngjae sighs loudly, the smile dropping from his face. He points at the door. “Just trust me on this.”

JIhoon blinks stupidly at him again. He already knows that he’s probably going to end up doing that, anyway, but there’s a familiar voice within him that resists, pushes back— “But— if he left, he clearly doesn’t want me of all people to show up th—”

“Yah, I’m sure you know that’s not true, so why are you being so stubborn?” Youngjae finally snaps—and in the midst of the charged silence, Jihoon swallows thickly as he suddenly feels the weight of all the other pairs of eyes in the room, dead-set on their heated exchange. Distantly, Jihoon has the thought that Youngjae must be at least tipsy enough to continue going off on him despite that. He’s sure they’ll laugh about this later. “You know, I would have gone myself if I didn’t know that there’s clearly only one person whose attention he wants. Wouldn’t you know, better than anyone here, why he’s acting up like that?”

Jihoon pouts. He hates to admit that even after so many years of knowing each other, Kim Dohoon still manages to elude him completely. Maybe Jihoon hasn’t been paying as much attention to him these days as he should. “He’s— He’s barely even spoken to me the whole night, he’ll just get ticked off even more if I go and pester him—”

“Han Jihoon—” Youngjae interrupts, this time by taking him by the shoulders and shaking—which makes Jihoon a little bit dizzy, and gets a muffled reaction from the people watching their conversation unfold—and Youngjae just hangs his head, looks right into Jihoon’s eyes. “Just go and get him. Yeah? Stop making excuses.”

Jihoon raises an eyebrow. Youngjae has a point—that’s fair enough—but Jihoon can’t help but to echo the sentiment back.

“Fine,” Jihoon answers, resolved. He taps at Youngjae’s chest in earlier’s same rhythm, a gentler tap-tap, and glances briefly behind him at the couch they’d both just left. “You, too.”

Youngjae lets go of him gently, even smoothing out the sleeves of the sweater Jihoon’s wearing. Everyone in the room watches with bated breath as Youngjae walks around him, takes back his designated place at Junghwan’s side—and then quietly slips his hand into Junghwan’s like it’s nothing. Jihoon’s pretty sure he wasn’t even imagining the light squeeze. “What are you waiting for? Go.”

Jihoon shakes himself out of his mix of frustration and stupor—he has bigger problems to deal with than those two, for now.

And his footsteps only get lighter as Jihoon makes a run for it, running out the door with nothing but the coat he’d hung up before.

There’s not really much sense to the urgency with which Jihoon runs. Sure, maybe he’d taken a bit more convincing than Youngjae was hoping for when asking Jihoon to go and get Dohoon in the first place, but the corner mart isn’t too far away, and Dohoon may be a bit reckless, but he’s far from a lost cause. And though it’s pretty clear that Dohoon hasn’t been acting much like himself tonight at all—JIhoon kind of can still see the more delicate parts of his best friend that are hiding under his perfect makeup, the cool jacket, the too-bright smile. Jihoon supposes that that’s the person he’s trying to reach as he runs after Dohoon now. The night air whips past his face as Jihoon runs past each, dim streetlight,  the wet scent of ozone and fresh soil filling his lungs with every ragged breath. It doesn’t take long for him to see the light spilling from the street corner that his feet had somehow taken him to. There’s no longer a single shred of doubt in Jihoon’s mind as he steps into the boundary of that new space, lit fluorescent and bright.

Immediately, Dohoon is there. He’s standing right over the ice cream freezers, a basket hanging on one arm while he rests his weight on the other. His hair is messier than Jihoon remembers, a telltale sign that he’d been harshly.running his fingers through it the whole way here. It’s a wicked habit. Jihoon approaches without another thought.

“You got here so fast,” is what Jihoon says when he goes to stand beside him, trying to hide how out of breath he is, and peering over the ice cream both in Dohoon’s basket and in the freezer below them.

Dohoon isn’t as surprised as Jihoon expects when he looks over. As it always happens with them, Dohoon just goes right back to perusing the ice cream, all straightforward as he asks, “Why are you here?”

Jihoon keeps his eyes on him. “Who else would come to get you?”

Dohoon catches him off-guard yet again, with, “Did Choi Youngjae send you?”

“What… well, yeah,” Jihoon decides to just admit, shaking his head at the bunch of green melona bars in the basket. “Clearly, he was right, though. You’re acting all weird. And I think Kyungmin asked for the pink melonas.”

“I knew that,” Dohoon argues, petulant, sliding open the freezer door. He starts grabbing strawberry ice cream bars with his free hand and shoveling them into the basket like a generous claw machine, and even if Youngjae had said to get extras, it feels like Dohoon’s doing… a bit much. “The green ones are for everyone else.”

Jihoon takes in a deep breath. He thinks about retorting that no one had asked for those, but he decides against it.

“Give me that,” Jihoon says instead, already going for the basket on Dohoon’s arm. “Let me help you.”

“It’s fine. I’m fine.” Dohoon pulls his arm away as he refuses, all stubborn, and Jihoon knows better than to go in on him too hard, too fast. Sure enough, when Dohoon picks out more ice cream and Jihoon goes the whole time without any response, Dohoon is the one who picks the conversation back up. “Are you sure we should really be using Hanjin’s card for all of this?”

“He offered, didn’t he?” Jihoon shrugs. “Don’t worry about it. He threw the whole party, and we’re in a neighborhood with a convenience store that has a separate freezer for Häagen-Dazs.”

“And he has a new phone case every day, yeah. I know.” Dohoon finally looks at Jihoon when he says it—his eyes lighting up with a softer glow than Jihoon has seen all night—and Jihoon’s shoulders start to feel lighter, too, even as Dohoon looks back into the freezer to pick up a few more things. “Go and pick out what you like, Jihoon-ah.”

Jihoon smiles at the affectionate way that Dohoon says his name. It’s still the same, underneath everything. It always is. “You know what I like, hyung. Take your time. Wait here.”

It leaves Jihoon at least reassured enough to leave Dohoon to his own task for now, despite the little part of him that worries about all of Kyungmin’s melonas turning into soup while they wait. Now that Jihoon has at least gotten to somewhat of a more grounded level with Dohoon, he’s confident enough that he can try to take care of him with a bit of coaxing. Jihoon walks over to the refrigerators at the back for a bottle of water—it’s clear that he needs to get Dohoon to sober up, if anything—and then he picks up an asyatchu without much thought when he sees it out the corner of his eye. 

Jihoon walks around the store for a bit more after that, until he circles back around to where the counter is, manned by a sleepy-eyed part-timer with headphones over her ears, which come down around her neck as she spots Jihoon approaching. “Hello. Are you two together?”

“Uh– Yeah,” Jihoon answers, pursing his lips to hide how he flusters at the wording. He puts down the bottles he’s holding and looks over at Dohoon, just a couple of meters away. He asks the woman at the counter in a quieter voice, “Actually, if it’s okay—do you think we could leave the ice cream in the freezer for a bit after we pay? I, uh… I just need to get my friend to sober up a bit before we go…”

“Sure, I’ll put it in a bag for you, then you can leave it for a while,” she answers, cordially enough. “Make sure to take them before you go.”

“Will do. Thanks!” Jihoon smiles brightly, and the woman returns a small smile of her own. She scans two bottles in front of her, just in time for Dohoon to start walking over.

“Is Hanjin paying for those, too?” Dohoon comments in jest, pointing at the bottle of water and the asyatchu, as if he hadn’t just set down a basket full of way too much ice cream, even for eight people. Jihoon just laughs at him anyway, and the part-timer doesn’t comment as she takes Hanjin’s foreign credit card. They’re done paying in no time, and Jihoon takes the plastic bag of ice cream before anyone can say anything. Luckily, he brings it back to the freezer before the melona bars turn into soup.

Dohoon only reacts once Jihoon gets back, grabs the drinks and Dohoon’s hands, and walks them both out to the deck of tables with a grateful nod in the part-timer’s direction.

“Hey– What— Han Jihoon, hey, what are you doing—?”

Jihoon ignores Dohoon’s weak protests as they step back out into the warmth of the night, with the earthy, ozonic smell still lingering in the air. There’s a breeze that brushes against their skin and the chime above the door as they walk out, and Jihoon is reminded of the dryness of his throat from how embarrassingly quickly he’d run—but right now, he has only one goal.

Jihoon somehow manages to wrangle Dohoon into sitting on one of the chairs at the far end of the little deck outside the convenience store, the furthest away from the door. He still looks all dazed and confused as Jihoon looks down at him—it’s the way that Dohoon always looks at Jihoon, when he gets carried away and a little too drunk—and Jihoon handles him the same way he does all those times, too. Even if they both know that tonight, it’s different. 

“What are you doing?” Dohoon asks petulantly, a furrow in his brow as he watches Jihoon sit down on the railing beside him, instead of the chair across. Dohoon has the gall to giggle after, pointing at his favorite drink when he spots it on the table and asking, “Did you get that for me?”

“I’ll give it to you if you behave.” Jihoon narrows his eyes, swats Dohoon’s hand away, and picks up the cold bottle of water instead. “Water first.”

Jihoon doesn’t give him any room to argue. The very moment after he twists the bottle cap right off, he grabs Dohoon’s face, tilts his chin up, and brings the water to his mouth.

Unsurprisingly, Dohoon attempts to wriggle away, protesting, “Yah, I can do that myself—”

But Jihoon is relentless. He’s well-versed in the art of subduing someone as flighty as Kim Dohoon. “It’s my birthday,” is all that he has to say—and then Dohoon’s just letting Jihoon tip his head back, the water going into his mouth. It certainly isn’t as efficient as if he’d just let Dohoon do it himself, yes—but Jihoon is good at it. Jihoon is always the first person that anyone calls whenever Dohoon needs somebody to pick him up and take him home; but tonight is different, because Jihoon isn’t only present for the aftermath. His heart aches a little bit more because, right before this, he’d witnessed the entire, downward cascade.

Still, like on any other night, Dohoon drinks the water. Like any other night, he’s trying to blink himself into awareness as if he can hide the state of himself, even as he looks right into Jihoon’s eyes. Dohoon chuckles as he mutters half-heartedly, “Your birthday isn’t until the weekend, Jihoon-ah.”

Jihoon just huffs, takes the water bottle away, and takes a few sips of his own. He’s only reminded now of the parched his own throat is, how he’d tired himself out running all the way here.

“Are you gonna tell me what happened back there, Dohoon-hyung?”

Dohoon laughs. That’s better than a raised brow, Jihoon supposes; at the very least, he’s no longer feigning ignorance. There’s something disarming about the white lights and the slow silence. It’s just the two of them here. “You’re gonna have to be more specific.”

There’s a lot of things that Jihoon could say to that. If he’s being honest, he hasn’t even really thought about where to begin. He’s positive Dohoon’s going to shut down if Jihoon leads with Dohoon going off the rails with the drinks like it was an open bar. It’s concerning, for sure—but in bigger words, Jihoon just cannot, for the life of him, fathom why Dohoon felt the need to act so wild and uncouth and over-the-top, seemingly out of nowhere. JIhoon doesn’t think it’s anything he did—but Dohoon can still be unpredictable, even to Jihoon. Infuriatingly so.

What Jihoon asks eventually is, “Why didn’t you sit beside me earlier, when you arrived?”

Dohoon seems taken aback by that. He leans back into his chair, tries to shrug it off. “‘Cause the couch you were sitting on was full?”

“I could always make space for you.”

Dohoon pouts playfully, “We don’t have to be together all the time. I sat across from you anyway, right? It’s not like I was avoiding you, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“So you aren’t upset with me over something? Anything?”

“What?” Dohoon laughs, shaking his head. “No. Unless you’ve done something I should be mad about—”

“But you were ignoring me the whole night,” Jihoon interrupts, only now registering Dohoon’s ‘I wasn’t avoiding you’ comment. “And—you know you can’t play dumb with me, Dohoon-hyung. You barely even spoke with me, you kept acting like I wouldn’t know that you were acting… Were you that uncomfortable? Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I wasn’t! At all!” Dohoon laughs, a little too brightly, and it makes Jihoon scratch his head. “If I was ignoring you, I didn’t do it on purpose. I just wanted to get to know your friends better. Don’t we all adjust ourselves a little to the people we’re with?”

“Hyung, you were with me, too.”

“But not just you.”

“But I was the one that should have mattered, mm?” Jihoon asks, chuckling a bit to soften how bold it suddenly sounds, actually coming out of his mouth. “You don’t have to try so hard to get them to like you. Actually, most of them in there already like you, even.”

Dohoon pouts. He’s contemplating it this time, instead of jumping right into another defense; Jihoon can practically hear the gears turning in his head.

“It’s different, when everyone’s all in a room,” Dohoon says with a resigned expression, “I thought you’d appreciate it. Me not bothering you too much.”

“I’d rather you bother me, if that’s what you want to do. It’s better than pretending,” Jihoon sighs. “It doesn’t even matter if they like you, hyung. I like you. That’s why I wanted you there. But if you told me that you were overthinking it this much, then I wouldn’t have forced you to come, or anything.”

“But I wanted to,” Dohoon admits, his voice small. Jihoon waits patiently for him to gather the rest of his thoughts—an apology, some more explanation, maybe even just soft assurance that Jihoon’s words had gone more than skin deep—but eventually, all that Dohoon says is, “You like me?”

Jihoon blinks, confused. There’s a gust of stronger wind that blows across his back and through the already-messy fluff of Dohoon’s hair. He forgets what Dohoon had even said for a second, and when he remembers, he forgets what he had said, just seconds before. He supposes he might have let that slip. It’s not like it isn’t true, anyway. “Did I say that?”

Dohoon nods. He runs his fingers through his hair again, and then looks right into Jihoon’s eyes without shaking it out. “Didn’t you?”

“Well,” Jihoon smiles, stepping off the railing, surprised when another gust of wind nearly knocks him a step over. Dohoon is still looking up at him with wide eyes when Jihoon steadies himself—and he’s not sure what to do about the warmth it incites in his chest. “I don’t dislike you.”

Dohoon’s lips quirk up at the corners for just a split-second—and then he looks away, and reaches for the drink still across him at the table.

“Sorry for this, Jihoon-ah.”

Jihoon hums. “Mm? For what?”

“For, like—”

Dohoon doesn’t get to finish his sentence when, all of a sudden, there’s a sudden downpour of rain all around them, drowning out every other trace of noise.

Next thing Jihoon knows, Dohoon is grabbing his hand to pull him off of the railing, gently bringing him in closer to where the roof can still cover him from the rain.

“Sorry for being a mess, I guess,” Dohoon finally says now that they’re much, much closer. “Sorry you’re stuck in this weather now, ‘cause of me.”

The rain pours harder. There’s a crack of thunder, and Jihoon jumps back a bit before he can even answer. Dohoon has the fucking audacity to laugh at that, even Jihoon could swear that Dohoon had squeezed his hand harder at the sound, too—but it doesn’t matter. Dohoon is finally smiling again; this time, it’s the kind that’s raw, stripped back, bubbling up from a real, warm place in his soul.

Dohoon eventually stands up when the rain only gets stronger, and the wind starts to send a misting of the rainwater toward them. Jihoon’s hand finds the small of Dohoon’s back on pure instinct, a grounding touch as they stand by the convenience store window, both still frozen in place as they weigh their options quietly in their minds.

“...You didn’t bring an umbrella, did you?” Dohoon leans down to ask right into Jihoon’s ear, one hand over his forehead to stop the water getting in his eyes.

“No…” Jihoon answers, gesturing back into the store, “We could probably get one here, right?”

“Are we really gonna use more of Hanjin’s money to buy an umbrella?!” Dohoon argues back instead of following Jihoon’s lead, his voice louder to compete with the sound of rain on asphalt. 

“Can we at least bicker about this inside?!” Jihoon laughs. “It’s a sudden shower, so we could probably just wait it out—”

Dohoon argues back, again, “Well, we probably should get back if you left Woonhak and Yujin with fucking Will-They and Won’t-They—”

“Hey! They will! They just need some time!” Jihoon protests defensively—before breaking into another fit of laughter, once he realizes how ridiculous they both sound. “Besides, I’m sure Kyungmin and Hanjin have gone inside by now, too! Unlike a couple of dumbasses I know!”

Dohoon laughs. Or maybe it’s Jihoon who laughs. Either way, one of them starts to just lose themself in laughter, and the other follows like it’s muscle memory, second nature. Dohoon doubles over, Jihoon tips his head back against the glass; at some point, it stops mattering how they got here, where they’re going, and how rain-drenched they’re going to be when they get there. All that Jihoon knows is that no matter how much or how little they say—this is where they both want to be. It always has been.

JIhoon takes Dohoon’s hand again, and they stumble back into the convenience store together, and buy the tiniest umbrella they can find. Dohoon holds it over them both while Jihoon carries him on his back the whole way there, like always. It’s a weight on his shoulders, but Jihoon will always, always do what it takes to bring Dohoon back to him, time and time again.