Archive of Our Own

Monday

Wonwoo brings half the bed out with him. He's a king the first steps out the door of his room, dragging his majestic comforter and the pillows it brought with it. One by one they're disengaged pathetically, without putting up a fight. The trail goes from the open door to along his hallway to along the length of his living room floor, which really just says a lot about the amount of pillows he unnecessarily owns. Jeonghan's moved on to doing a wood knocking rendition of Wonder Girl's Nobody by the time Wonwoo's shut all curtains half-blind and opened the door, finishing it off with a cheeky "--but you!" to Wonwoo's unamused face. How he manages to even identify the song, Wonwoo doesn’t want to know.

“You look like--”

“Shit? I know.” Wonwoo sniffs. “Good morning to you, too.”

“I was going to say you look like you needed company, but that works, too.” Jeonghan grins, and then he’s walking in, patting Wonwoo’s cheek with his cold fingers as he passes by.

Jeonghan’s intrusion isn’t unlikely, nor is it unwelcome either. It’s the oddly warm smile on his face. Wonwoo squints at it through his glasses, and it’s there: concern, and then, underneath everything else, something akin to pity. Wonwoo dimly thinks, What.

Jeonghan is anything but openly accommodating, rare to be the one initiating anything, rarer still to visit Wonwoo without first yelling about his impending deadlines. Granted Wonwoo hasn’t written in almost 2 years, and Jeonghan hasn’t visited him as his editor in that time, so maybe he’s just unused to his presence that instead of immediately feeling gratitude for Jeonghan’s muted concern (shown through a surprise visit where he waits patiently by the door instead of barreling through with his own key and pulling Wonwoo awake by the ankles much to Wonwoo’s often subsequent nightmares), he feels heavily suspicious, first.

In the kitchen Jeonghan sits Wonwoo’s still cocoon of a body by the shoulders and says, grinning down at his grimace, “You know what’d cure your hangover? More alcohol.” It’s a joke Wonwoo doesn’t react to, feeling like death incarnate. He'd pass out if not for the noise Jeonghan makes as he opens up cupboard after cupboard, making offhanded comments about the lack of variety in Wonwoo's few assorted liquor. "The fuck is this?" he'd say, squinting at a bottle, and Wonwoo would just groan back, cheek planted on the surface of the table, "Seungcheol-hyung."

(Seungcheol’s a strict mom.)

When Jeonghan gets bored, he reaches for a mug instead. Jeonghan makes shitty tea (he steeps it too long and doesn’t bother remembering Wonwoo’s preferred amount of sugar ever), and while Wonwoo’s never been anything but open about his hatred for it, he stays mute when it’s Jeonghan’s trademark too-sweet coffee he places in front of him instead. It's Jeonghan's talent, making coffee too sweet calling it coffee would be a lie. Still it's an obviously nice gesture, albeit grimace-worthy, so Wonwoo makes sure to duck politely when he has to gag. He misses Seungkwan, suddenly--Boo Seungkwan the college intern turned PA Jeonghan's pretty much adopted. He's always made the better coffee, the good cop to Jeonghan's bad. While Jeonghan usually talked over Wonwoo's prone form on the couch reprimanding him of the nerve he has to conveniently just forget to take the hundred calls he did (it was 10, Jeonghan liked exaggerating as much as he liked reminding Wonwoo there actually exists a hell on earth when there are deadlines to be met), Seungkwan would pull him up and steer him to the kitchen, hand him a mug of coffee, and ask, "Where'd you lose your phone this time, hyung?"

If Jeonghan noticed Wonwoo's horribly masked pained expressions, he doesn’t comment on it. He’s still weirdly warm, still weirdly gentler than usual, still weirdly quiet when he should be anything but. Wonwoo sees only half his face in the dark of his apartment, and looking at it is unnerving, not so much the half-hidden smile but what it implied.

Wonwoo finishes the coffee anyway, feeling himself wake up fully. It feels funny, waiting for your heart to feel like it's beating normal again. In a while he's moving his toes in his socks, now significantly warmer. Jeonghan's more a friend than an editor, in the end; he knows how to take care of you, and to what extent. Never the kind to try overstepping boundaries unless you need them.

Still, he's an editor, so he manages to ask “How’s your manuscript going?” with a straight face. Common procedure. Wonwoo'd tried writing again, very recently. Told Jeonghan about it a few weeks ago in a spur of inspiration that died down as quickly as he'd felt the thrum in his fingers, the spark in his brain. Jeonghan's voice is down by a few decibels, the shrillness of it gone. Again, Wonwoo realises: it’s so out of place, Jeonghan’s concern. Not that it’s unwelcome, no--just unbecoming. Like the snub cat outside that always steered clear of Wonwoo's path when he tried approaching it suddenly rubbing its orange fur against his leg when he brought home treats that one time. Jeonghan actually visiting as a friend, making Wonwoo coffee, keeping his voice low? He's waiting for something in return.

“It’s going well," Wonwoo mumbles, except it’s not. If Jeonghan craned his neck sideways, looked down, located the trash underneath the sink, he’d see the crumpled remains of what could’ve been a few chapters of his new book. “I might just be able to finish a book before the next year ends,” he lies. He's never finished anything in that short a time. Brain slower than usual he panics, slightly, but ultimately the drive to care is still extinguished, a few weak embers at most. It’s like the writer’s block has taken a liking to his soul at this point, settled into the seams of his waking hours. He doesn’t want to write right now, can’t really write right now, even if he wanted to.

Jeonghan just hums, obviously distracted enough that he doesn't even raise an eyebrow at Wonwoo's outrageous claim. There’s something he’s itching to say, pushed aside for a while because he’s still Wonwoo’s editor, still the guy who needs to make sure Wonwoo hasn't given up on trying, at least. Months ago Wonwoo'd said, the only sure thing in his life, that he couldn't write. I think I need a break, he'd added, bore a hole on the floor so he wouldn't have to look up and decipher the unreadable expression on Jeonghan's face.

Okay, Jeonghan simply said, and didn’t bother him for a while.

“How many chapters have you written?”

“Three." Wonwoo mutters. Jeonghan's still distracted. “Working on the fourth tomorrow.”

“Have you thought of an ending you’re going with?”

“Two. I’m still picking which.”

“Will you show it to me today?”

“No.” The quickest reply he’s had yet, and the way Jeonghan suddenly narrows his eyes at him makes Wonwoo think Jeonghan’s caught on. “It’s still…” embarrassingly in the works, rife with errors born more out of laziness than lack of skill. Not to mention they’re in the trash, crumpled and irredeemable. Also horribly hidden and dangerously out in the open, if Jeonghan simply stopped shooting Wonwoo weird looks and actually looked down. Chances of it getting salvaged is close to 0. Chances of it getting discovered, though? Pretty high.

As if on cue Jeonghan looks to the side, eyes downcast. Wonwoo panics, eyes glued on Jeonghan's face to see any slight shift in his blank expression. When Jeonghan opens his mouth Wonwoo doesn't catch what he said, way too relieved to see Jeonghan look back at him unperturbed. Still, he catches the tail-end of the sentence, lets context clues take over.

Are you “--in love with the groom?”

Wonwoo blinks. “No?” The question mark is on purpose. He's confused, and also way too taken aback to have properly asked Why are we having this conversation?

It's the wrong response, Wonwoo realises, when Jeonghan's expression curls into a small frown. Wordlessly, but not before a minute-long interval wherein he squints at Wonwoo's face, he passes Wonwoo his phone.

4:07 AM

hhoh no????
my muse hes bdvk
bavk
BACK
stil in lve wiyh hum qprentlu
aprently********++++

4:34 AM

M sad

To be fair, he isn’t sad now. He tells this to Jeonghan.

Jeonghan sighs, gets his phone back, and looks at Wonwoo with the concern he first saw when he opened the door. Ah, Wonwoo realises. This is what he visited for.

“Wanna talk about it?”

Truth be told he really isn’t in love with Lee Jihoon. Last night he made sure to always mention how suspiciously tall he looked next to Amy, showing her around tables and greeting people. It's probably the poofy hairdo, Wonwoo'd reasoned, but Soonyoung leaned precariously on his chair and whispered, “Bet he’s got a dozen insoles,” when he got the chance to, as Jihoon walked farther and farther away from their table.

“That’s ridiculous,” Wonwoo had replied, shoulders quivering so badly the table shook. Jihoon turned to pin him a glare, as if he'd heard. By then he'd schooled his face into a calm one, as if he hadn't just teared up thinking of the shit Jihoon hid in his shoes. Soonyoung's chair didn't move back to its position even as Jihoon turned back to his wife and guests.

Yeah, so, he isn’t in love with the groom. But he knows someone who is. Correction, was. Soonyoung made sure he remembered it every chance he got, screaming into his ears over the loud music during the after party saying something about getting over it like, millenniums ago. Light years ago, he'd said, before he remembered that, "Right. Distance. My bad." Whenever the alcohol got to him he'd turn red first, and then turn noisy, and then turn into whatever version of Soonyoung that started willing talk about their college on-and-off flings when people asked, intrigued. Jihoon wasn't there to hear it, having already gone away with his new wife, so Wonwoo took it upon himself to shut Soonyoung up. What would Jihoonnie do? he'd thought, watching Soonyoung speak with great detail about the fourth time they fought over dinner. Soon he'd stopped talking altogether, heaving with his forehead on the counter of the bar. Cheeks wet he'd looked up at Wonwoo and said, "Missed you, man," which he had to repeat a couple of times because Wonwoo couldn't hear anything past the music, lost in the way Soonyoung's eyes shone, oddly wet, too. Was he crying? Wonwoo couldn't be too sure, the same way he also couldn't be too sure about the drive behind what made Soonyoung down shots like a pro. "Missed you, too," he'd said, when he finally heard and understood, but Soonyoung's already asleep, face mushed against the marble.

“I was drunk,” Wonwoo explains feebly. A headache’s made territory on his mind now, and it's not born of the hangover. “I wasn’t thinking. I don’t have a muse. What muse? My head really hurts right now, why are we talking about this?”

Jeonghan snorts, but he readily produces an aspirin from his pocket, slides it over the table to place it on Wonwoo’s hand. His hand had been clenched tight; from the pain or the summoned flashback, he doesn’t know. “Whatever,” Jeonghan sighs, unfolding Wonwoo's fingers with his own, movements gentle. “Take care of yourself, Wonwoo-ya.”

*

Tuesday

“I wasn’t really sad,” Wonwoo had always said. Nobody was asking. He just felt the need to address their pitied glances whenever he so much as spaced out. He spaced out a lot, but not on purpose. It was ridiculous. They could’ve given Seokmin or Jihoon the same treatment, and yet it was Wonwoo they were concerned about. Wonwoo the initially unwilling roommate, who before Soonyoung had never lived with anyone who wasn't family and was okay with it, who Seokmin took one look at and said “You looking for a roommate?” and Wonwoo had replied “Naw,” to. He was going through a phase, saying things weirdly on purpose. University stress did that to him.

The next day Seokmin brought Soonyoung, who was tolerable and prone to days of moody distance Wonwoo wasn’t sure how to deal with at first but learnt to live with in the 3 years they lived together. He's surprisingly quiet, he used to tell people, when they asked how he'd managed to live with The Kwon Soonyoung. He's had the article pinned to his name ever since he'd tried running for a position in his organisation and won. Mostly they remembered the yelling of his party slogan more than his platforms.

Wonwoo had spent 3 years mostly waking up to unabashed singing, loud enough to be heard even from the other side of his room.

Now, as if summoned from a dream: the same voice, but it’s softer, less obtrusive but more unmindful. The voice carries through Wonwoo’s empty living room, unheard if not for its stark contrast against the quietness of his room, not so much to cause a commotion as just an unaware habit.

Wonwoo opens the door feeling like he’s living a dream. Soonyoung’s busy with his phone, and when he looks up his cheeks are pink from the cold. His voice dies down, like a missile. Except instead of it ending in a loud bang it ends with a grin--small, almost shy. Wonwoo feels the corner of his lips tug up, and then down.

“Uh,” Wonwoo says, first, because the shock has taken home in his body. "Um."

“I was gonna call,” Soonyoung says, pocketing his phone. His hands stay in his pockets, shoulders squeezing into his body. He looks small and big at the same time, covered under layers of padding. “But I realised I didn’t have your number.” He’s being suspiciously sheepish. Uncharacteristically sheepish. It's contagious; even Wonwoo's feeling shy for no reason.

“You got a new phone?” Wonwoo asks, but it’s not like Wonwoo has Soonyoung’s number saved on his phone, either. Soonyoung’s changed phones more times than he can count Wonwoo’s long given up saving it and giving him a name. Currently he’s a message thread from half a year ago Wonwoo hasn't deleted. You spend so long talking to a number so much you start memorising it. It's been half a year. Wonwoo can close his eyes and the first few numbers would still burn behind his eyelids, more familiar than the Kwon Soonyoung that stands in front of him now.

Soonyoung nods. “Can I come in?”

Wonwoo steps aside to let Soonyoung shiver his way in. 

Inside, Soonyoung strips to just a sweatshirt and jeans and immediately passes out on Wonwoo’s couch. Wonwoo left him to fetch them tea and comes back to him curled up, dead to the world.

Later when he wakes Wonwoo’s halfway through completing notes for a chapter, debating with pursed lips whether to continue scribbling or scrap the poor excuse of a draft altogether. Half an hour staring at his lazy scrawl of a writing and he’s inclined to do the latter. There's only so much to do when even your inspiration gives out. Why fan at a fire when it's gone dead, left with smoke. It gets suffocating after a while.

“I think I have residual hangover,” Soonyoung announces, voice scratchy with disuse. Wonwoo hands him a mug, amused at his crazy hair.

“Is that even a thing?”

“Yes,” Soonyoung says, grimacing. “Tea’s gone cold.”

Wonwoo would say, Boil water, then, but when he turns around, Soonyoung’s gone back to lying down, body turned to the side so he’s facing Wonwoo fully. His cheek squishes as he stays still, and the marks caused by the couch are something Wonwoo pointedly ignores. And fails to.

Soonyoung yawns. “What are you doing?”

Staring back at Soonyoung’s tired eyes, heavy with sleep and something else, Wonwoo decides to go with the second choice. The way Soonyoung’s eyes widen in shock as Wonwoo crumples the papers is funny, the reaction predictable.

“It was a shitty story,” Wonwoo explains, standing up to throw the papers in the kitchen. It joins its brethren in the trash. He boils water after, leaning against the counter in silence. Soonyoung’s quiet, probably asleep again. “Coffee or tea?” Wonwoo calls out anyway, except he’s already reaching for the teabags, as if on autopilot. Years have passed and still Wonwoo knows how long he should steep the tea for, the amount of sugar he has to add to avoid Soonyoung’s repeated complaints of It’s too bitter, Wonwoo-ya.

When the water’s hot and he’s brought two new mugs to the living room, Soonyoung’s got an arm draped over his eyes, body as still as if he were asleep. The only sign he's awake is the wiggling of his toes.

“You okay?”

“No,” Soonyoung groans, before sitting up with actions so heavy you’d think he was glued to the couch. He reaches for the mug with outstretched arms, fingers splayed. Wonwoo snorts at his childishness. “Don’t you feel that?” Wonwoo shakes his head. “The brain-splitting headache,” Soonyoung elaborates, and not for the first time, grimaces. “Tea’s too sweet.”

“Ya,” Wonwoo chastises gently, punching lightly on Soonyoung’s knee, action reminiscent of how past Soonyoung would recoil in mock-pain and complain about the horrible way he treats his friends. He’d gear up afterwards, ready to retaliate. The Soonyoung now simply grins back. “You going to keep complaining, or what?" 

The answering smile is conspiratory, hidden behind the mug. Wonwoo wouldn’t be surprised to know he’s mimicking the same expression.

“You know I don’t like coffee,” Soonyoung says as he puts the empty mug down.

Wonwoo feels himself warm, and not because of the tea alone. “Yeah, I know.”

It’s a struggle to keep his voice nonchalant enough to seem casual, not when it's the only thing on his mind right now. “Why are you here, again?” he asks, with horribly veiled curiosity. So horrible he actually squeaks the last syllable out. Either Soonyoung’s caught on on his horrible acting, or he hasn’t. Wonwoo waits anxiously all the same, forces himself to meet Soonyoung’s way too-knowing eyes. Soonyoung has never mentioned visiting, nor staying this long. It’s been way too long, being in a room alone together like this. Wonwoo’s almost forgotten what it felt like, being friends with Soonyoung not on the phone but in real life, not in front of a digitally displayed number but the face associated with it. The real deal. It’s like being on a familiar road, except everything else in the vicinity has changed; only the road remains as is, the only assurance.

Soonyoung’s answering smile is friendly, but subdued. He’s already burrowing himself against the couch, getting Wonwoo’s blanket from where it lay in a pile on the floor. “I was lonely,” he says, and it’s as simple as that, the answer.

Wonwoo thinks of the road, takes the first metaphorical step. Traverses it.

*

Back when they were still roommates, Soonyoung said “I’m gay,” and Wonwoo said “Okay?” because that came out of nowhere, but not really. This was after Wonwoo had caught him sucking face with Seokmin the other night. Completely by accident, of course; the shock that settled was immediate, but dim, compared to the numbness that took over after.

Soonyoung had felt the need to explain, even if Wonwoo wasn’t asking. They’d broken up, many months ago, civil and mutual, but it was hard to deny that it was great with Seokmin. They'd been together for so long it felt weird to just--stop. As if sleeping with your ex wasn't weird, Wonwoo's quick thought, immediately replaced with Huh. Everything made sense, all of a sudden: the constant intrusion, the late night visits, Seokmin’s shirts in their laundry basket mixed in with theirs more often than not. Wonwoo was in no position to judge, and yet he’d felt something close off inside his chest, a resounding thud.  

Jihoon came later, when Seokmin moved on to seriously pursue Yuna, a classmate from elementary he used to have a crush on. The crush became something more in the days that went with them reminiscing. Wonwoo watched as Seokmin fell in love, little by little. Soonyoung, unsubtly, looked the other way.

Afterwards Soonyoung liked to say “Jihoonnie, give me a kiss,” and have Jihoon seething with embarrassed anger. He’d reply with “I want to break up,” and that was when Wonwoo realised, Oh? This went on for months. They were undergoing a very elaborate courting phase. The threats became less outbursts and more automatic responses, Jihoon’s presence in their flat less nerve-wracking. Jihoon was Soonyoung’s friend first, after all. Wonwoo just happened to be Soonyoung’s friend as well. When he slept over he stayed in Soonyoung’s room, walked in the kitchen the next morning wearing Soonyoung’s clothes.

Wonwoo learned to effectively ignore everything, more out of unrealised revelations than of courtesy. He also respected Soonyoung, except maybe during the times he blatantly displayed affection, which was not so much annoying to see as just something Wonwoo felt the need to not so discreetly turn his back on, a knee-jerk reaction he’d been conditioned in the first few times he’d witnessed it happen.

It was a strange thing, watching Soonyoung fall in love. Wonwoo had thought, Is this is what it was like, falling in love? and not realise it wasn’t Soonyoung he was referring to.

*

Wednesday

Wonwoo jolts awake the moment knocks land on his door. They’re unbearably loud, the next successions. Wonwoo half-crawls, half-groans into the kitchen, gets a spare key, and goes back to the living room to open the door and thrust it to Soonyoung’s face. He’s red in the face again today, hair littered with snow. “Take it." 

Soonyoung’s hand is cold when it touches Wonwoo’s. “Really?” he asks, holding it close to his heart in mock reverence. “I’m not ready for this kind of relationship, Wonwoo-ya.”

Wonwoo shoots him back a glare, and Soonyoung’s look of mock surprise melts into an amused one. “You sure are touchy today.”

“I’m tired and awake at this ungodly hour, spare me.”

Soonyoung must’ve seen the bottle of wine by the sink as he sinks down on the couch because he says, “You drank when I left?” as Wonwoo walks around picking up scattered paper. He’d drunk when Soonyoung slept, actually. Watched the peacefulness there, the odd softness his cheeks possessed, even as his whole body lacked the fluffiness it had in college. It wasn’t a big deal. Lasted for only a second, but the effects lingered longer, even when Wonwoo ripped his eyes away to work on his manuscript.

“I think better when I drink,” Wonwoo explains, and doesn’t mention he’d finished another bottle after he left. “You here again?” He looks back in time to see Soonyoung’s overly enthusiastic nod. “Can I ask why?”

“I was bored.”

Wonwoo looks at the clock. “It’s 10 AM. How are you this bored this early?”

“I went for a jog.”

“In this weather,” Wonwoo deadpans.

Soonyoung grins. “It felt great! Join me sometime.”

Wonwoo doesn’t even deem that worthy of a reply.

“Oh, right,” Wonwoo says anyway, hitting Soonyoung’s head with papers he’s rolled up. “You were such an exercise junkie, how could I forget.”

“And you were such a couch potato,” Soonyoung retaliates. “You writing again today?”

Wonwoo feels himself age just by the question. “Yeah.”

Later when he’s properly washed up and fed (Soonyoung made eggs as he bathed, all the while complaining about the lack of anything edible inside his fridge. “My friend hasn’t visited in a while,” Wonwoo confessed, “he brings me food sometimes.” Sometimes, as in every other day. It’s unfortunate Seungcheol’s half a country away.) he takes his usual place by the coffee table, and faces his laptop. The cursor blinks back at him.

“What’re you writing?” Soonyoung’s breath hits the top of Wonwoo’s head, ruffling hair there. It’s so cold his fingers are trembling a little, poised over the keyboard unmoving, but the simple act gets him warm.

"New book," Wonwoo explains curtly, rubbing his nape. "Leave me alone."

Wonwoo expected him to do otherwise, maybe convince him to do anything but work if he wanted to, but instead he hears the couch give at Soonyoung's weight as he sinks back into it, oddly silent. Wonwoo looks back to check if he's fallen asleep again. Soonyoung's awake, eyes trained at the spot between Wonwoo's eyes, like he'd been staring at Wonwoo's scalp and found it stuck on that position even as Wonwoo turned and it's his face he's staring at instead. Wonwoo loses focus, lost in the sudden silence. The place is quiet, a world of their own separate from everything else. Soonyoung stays still, as if suspended in time, until finally his eyes move down, lands on Wonwoo's lips, and stays there. Wonwoo waits, holding his breath, killing the impulsive urge to reach out and--what, probably grab hold of Soonyoung to check whether he's an apparition, whether he's actually there and Wonwoo's actually seeing him.

The gaze goes back up. Soonyoung smiles, and it’s sad. "Can I read your book? 'Can’t see the end’," he asks.

It’s Wonwoo’s third book, the one that got him rising to fame. More than the recognition and attention, what Wonwoo remembers are the sleepless nights and being awake even before Jeonghan could march into his room and pull him out of bed. Those days Jeonghan was especially nicer, opting to not say anything as Wonwoo passed out on the dining table while Seungkwan prepared his coffee. His laptop was beside him all the time. Deadlines weren’t getting pushed back, even if he wanted to. There were days when Wonwoo took a 10-minute break and closed his eyes, rubbed them so raw they were red on the edges. His phone had been dead for hours, hidden underneath papers. He himself felt less alive, like he'd already stepped a few feet into his grave, had stayed unmoving waiting for his heart to give. That kind of numbing exhaustion. He’d wanted so badly to call anybody, but that was a lie. He wanted to call just one person, except that person was halfway across the globe, probably had forgotten he even existed.

Said person is staring at him now, leaving Wonwoo breathless with just a look.

Wonwoo wordlessly stands to retrieve the book from his room, and comes back to Soonyoung still there, half-thinking he wouldn’t be.

*

Wonwoo and Soonyoung rarely ever fought. The only fights they ever did have were when Wonwoo hit Soonyoung, Soonyoung hit back, and Wonwoo hit Soonyoung back harder. Soonyoung was quick to anger, especially so when he was exhausted, unwilling to look past the stress that's taken home in his body. Provoked further and he was a ticking time bomb, but he didn't explode; he'd implode instead, wallow in silence, shut everybody out. Seokmin calmed him down most of the time, when he was stripped clean of his optimism and reduced to an angry ball of pent up frustrations. Wonwoo didn't know what to do, usually. But he knew when to leave him be when he wanted to be, and it just went well from there.  

So anyway, they never really fought with each other. There were times of loaded silence Seokmin could diffuse in seconds, but none that could ruin any friendship.

When Wonwoo heard the news of Soonyoung leaving it wasn’t even from Soonyoung’s own mouth, but from Jihoon’s. It took Soonyoung a week after Wonwoo had already known to sit him down, buy him his favourite meal, and then tell him. Food didn’t taste so great anymore, accompanied by Soonyoung’s somber tone. 3 years of waking up to each other’s presence, sometimes watching with bleary eyes as one perused your cabinet half naked as if it’s theirs, once or twice a month hearing the telltale signs of one jerking off in the middle of the night through the thin walls, loud against the backdrop of eerie silence, and you’d think Wonwoo’d be the first to know he wouldn’t be having a roommate in less than a month.

Of course Wonwoo would get mad. It just sucked that Soonyoung got mad with him--a domino effect, a continuous fall until nothing was moving anymore, the echo after the last piece fell. 

“He’d accused me of not understanding his passion, or something,” Wonwoo had admitted to Jihoon, years later when he’d finally let himself talk about it with other people. “I’ve gotten over it by now. For real.”

Jihoon raised an eyebrow, indiscreetly, as if to say, For real, Shmeal.

Jihoon had asked how he was, did Soonyoung ever contact him? We talked, Wonwoo said, remembering his last conversation with the guy half a year ago. That was what their friendship had been reduced to, half-hearted calls Wonwoo didn’t have the heart to sustain, but didn’t have the courage to never pick up, either. He could say he’d gotten over it more times than he can count the same way you repeat something to yourself until it became truth, and yet his mind would still replay to the disappointment in the curve of Soonyoung's brow, the heart sinking accusation of not trying to understand Soonyoung the way Soonyoung thought he would. It was hard to think past the fact that Soonyoung was leaving--leaving him. 

Jihoon's hand hovered over Wonwoo's head, awkward. In the end he let it fall on his shoulder, patted that instead. Comforting people was never Jihoon's specialty. 

“That was probably his shitty way of saying he was going to miss you.”

“I missed him, too,” Wonwoo had replied, the first honest thing he’d said that night. “I still miss him.”

*

Another bottle of wine later, Wonwoo’s deleted 8 pages of writing and is pink in the face, curled up on one end of the couch as Soonyoung unsuccessfully tries dozing off on the other. 

“Sorry for being a--" Wonwoo starts, and doesn't know what to end with. An ass? A jerk? A sucky friend? The seconds pass until finally he gives up trying to follow it up with anything. 

Soonyoung seems to get it, staring back at him with half-lidded eyes that still betray no emotion, as usual.

“Sorry for being mad,” Soonyoung replies just as readily, extending a leg out. His cold toes reach Wonwoo’s bare ankles, and Wonwoo retracts them, pulls them back to his body. The leg goes with it, wrapping around his own. It’s warm where they touch, a hearth in the cold of Wonwoo’s suddenly too-lonely apartment. “I was mad I got mad,” Soonyoung confesses, and then frowns, confused. “Did you get what I meant?”

Wonwoo nods, because he does. Soonyoung’s harder on himself than anyone else. “Missed you, Soonyoungie,” he says, snuggling against the comforter he’s brought from his bedroom. He hears Soonyoung sniffle, but when he looks back at him, Soonyoung’s got his face hidden under his forearm, the only telltale sign he’s awake the slight trembling of his lips.

*

Thursday

Wonwoo wakes up, alone, his ass still feeling the aftershocks of his phone vibrating. He checks and sees Seungcheol’s called a million times while he’s unconscious. There is only one message. ya have u been eating well?, it says.

yes mom, Wonwoo replies automatically. Seungcheol doesn’t call back as immediately as he expected. The reply that comes arrives a whole minute after, while Wonwoo’s trying to feel his toes and remember what century he’s in. Last night he’d woken up on the floor. Soonyoung had occupied the couch with his splayed limbs, probably had unwittingly pushed him off in his sleep. Wonwoo tucked him in, wrapped his comforter over his entire body, and raised the temperature a little. He’d slept in his own room, but to choose whether or not to leave Soonyoung alone proved hard to make.

i called jeonghan

And then, Wonwoo realises, there are voices, streaming in from the crack of his open door. If he listened closely there’s the shrill of Jeonghan’s voice, and with it, the all too familiar laughter in Soonyoung’s.

“Good morning!” Soonyoung greets brightly from his own dining table, when he’s stepped outside of his room to see the strangest scene unfolding: Jeonghan and Soonyoung, apparently getting friendly with each other. Soonyoung has his hands around a cup of coffee, and it’s as if he’s always belonged there, in Wonwoo’s kitchen, cozy and warm. It’s fucking surreal. Wonwoo blinks and he’s still there. Jeonghan sits across him with his own cup. He turns back to shoot Wonwoo a lazy, annoyingly all too-knowing grin.

“Please give me my spare key back,” he tells both of them with a straight face. And then to Seungcheol, u didnt have to.

:*, he immediately replies with.

If they noticed Wonwoo’s struggle to keep the goofy smile the message caused, they don’t say.

Wonwoo boils water, leaning on the counter, pretending the people around him didn’t exist. It proves to be difficult. They talk about him as he wasn't even there, unabashed with renewed courage, as if his presence is mere fodder for their gossip, definitely not a threat. It gets especially harder when Soonyoung says, as shameless as he can possibly be, leaning back in his chair it's tilted backwards so far a breeze could probably send him down, “Jeonghan-hyung here says I’m your muse.”

If death had a look, it would probably be the face Wonwoo stares down Jeonghan with. But because he’s Yoon Jeonghan, it doesn’t faze him at all.

“I didn’t say that,” Wonwoo lies. The kettle whistles as if on cue. If you listened closely you’d probably hear it hissing Liaaaaar. Amidst the noise and Soonyoung’s obnoxious giggling, Wonwoo tells Jeonghan, “Tell him I didn’t say that, hyung.”

“He didn’t say that,” Jeonghan repeats obediently.

But Soonyoung’s good mood is impenetrable at this point, might even just power him up for half a year. If Soonyoung could bring something to him on a deserted island that isn’t food or drinks or a person, it’d probably be his pride. He lives for shit like this.

“It’s great that I’m here, then.” Soonyoung is on a roll. Wonwoo has half a mind to chuck his empty mug at him; he’s so fucking embarrassed, holy shit. “Want me to pose in front of you while you write?”

“That’s not how it works, you idiot.” Wonwoo snorts. “Also if you haven’t noticed, I haven’t even written anything good because of you--” At Jeonghan’s sharp glance at his way, eyes narrowed, Wonwoo backtracks, “I mean. Uh.”

Jeonghan’s gaze only softens. “Salvaged your discarded drafts, then?” he asks, and it isn’t meant to tease. He’s genuinely curious. He’d seen, then, Wonwoo’s trash.

“I threw them away,” Wonwoo replies, voice small.

“That’s fine,” Jeonghan says, and the calm there is freaking Wonwoo out now. Jeonghan is rarely ever this indulgent. Soonyoung hasn’t stopped grinning at him, will probably probe him about being his muse later once Jeonghan’s left, but right now Wonwoo’s stuck in place, trying to decipher the out-of-place smile on Jeonghan’s face, the weird glint in his eyes. Jeonghan turns his sly smile to Soonyoung. “Welcome back, muse.”

Soonyoung’s grin grows ten times larger.

*

Full disclosure is that a month after Soonyoung left, Wonwoo went into a binge writing phase. All his works were bitter, read not so much as literary pieces as actual weaponised works aimed to hurt with words. In reality they were thoughts, spilled. An outlet, because otherwise they’d turn to him instead, the words. Jihoon enjoyed them. After the breakup they'd stopped talking for a while, before Jihoon realised it wasn't worth it and actually answered Soonyoung's calls when they happened, which weren't so much often as just totally spontaneous, sometimes even wrongly timed. He'd called once when Jihoon was taking his finals. He'd forgotten to set it on Do Not Disturb. It didn't help that the ringtone Soonyoung had set for himself was very inappropriate. Jihoon had passed, but never looked at his professor in the eye ever again. 

Anonymously, Wonwoo published them in the university paper, written under the name WW. Mingyu, their campus DJ, mentioned him once or twice on air weekly, talking about his controversial pieces, detailing his emotional prose. Wonwoo, slowly and surely, became some sort of enigmatic celebrity. Mostly everybody was just curious about who WW was and why he was so--"Vulnerable," Mingyu had said, crooning at the mic, "A poor soul." Jihoon said he was being such a baby, but it wasn't like he didn't compose songs about Soonyoung himself, so who's the real winner here. 

It took him a whole year to get over it, let the bitterness die. Wonwoo grew a storm inside him. Passing over the seas, gaining strength, growing in size. Nobody realised until the storm's passed and they saw the damage, the unwillingness to write anything again. He’s been stripped bare of his creativity, left with the barren land of emotions he was full to the brim of, just a year past. The casualty of a storm. Recovery was sure, except there's only so much anyone could if the victim themselves refuse to help themselves.

A month before graduation his self-proclaimed number 1 reader Lee Chan managed to identify who WW was. Mingyu broadcasted his name the entire week, adding fuel to the fire. Wonwoo was talked about everywhere, and every time he would just slink off to the shadows, hiding behind his hoodies and a fringe he’d overgrown. 

Jeonghan came after, once he’d already graduated. He’d visited him in his own home and got straight to business. “I’ve read your works,” he said seriously, words clipped, handing out his business card. "Want to write for us?"

Wonwoo didn’t even need to think twice about agreeing.

*

Surprisingly enough, when Jeonghan leaves, Soonyoung lets the muse thing go. He hovers as Wonwoo tidies up the coffee table area to start anew; he hasn’t written a single word last night after they’ve decided what a great idea it was to just finish Wonwoo’s last bottle of wine. Jeonghan’s probably contacting their PR team at the moment talking about Wonwoo’s impending comeback, and the thought is scary, if not a little flattering.

“Lend me your other book,” Soonyoung says, still hovering.

“Can you stop that?” Wonwoo huffs. He meant the constant hovering. It’s making Wonwoo anxious. When he turns, Soonyoung’s there, closer than he initially thought he’d be.

“Stop what?” Soonyoung asks, but Wonwoo suddenly cannot hear.

Current Soonyoung looks the same as college Soonyoung, except his eyes have grown heavier, lines littering the corners. He’s grown out of his acne phase. When he smiles it’s still the same 10:10 one, the one Wonwoo’s gotten used to seeing everyday, that when he left everybody else’s smile seemed dimmer in comparison. Soonyoung wasn’t a muse, but what do you call that one thought that plagued your mind even if you didn't try and summon it, an embarrassing memory you tried your hardest to forget. Except Soonyoung wasn't embarrassing, and also isn't just a memory.

It'd be a lie to say that he never thought of Soonyoung when time allowed him to. He never thought of him willingly, instead pushed him back to the corners of his mind so the bitterness couldn’t resurface; Soonyoung just floats back up, unrelenting.

“That,” Wonwoo replies, and even he is confused.

“Woah. This close and it’s as if you haven’t changed,” Soonyoung says, as if in awe. He brings a hand up to gingerly touch the side of Wonwoo’s face. Wonwoo shifts backwards, and the only reason he stays in place as Soonyoung places both hands on his cheeks is because the coffee table’s blocked his way. “Do you never age?”

“Surrender under my ageless beauty,” Wonwoo deadpans, and Soonyoung doesn’t even refute it, just grins back with renewed amusement.

“Says the guy who tells people I’m his muse.”

“Like I’ve said, you are not my muse--”

“Yeah, yeah,” Soonyoung pats his cheek twice before letting his hands fall. “No need to tell me a million of times. I get it. You’re hurting me.” Me, Wonwoo thinks. Not his pride. 

Feeling guilty all of a sudden, Wonwoo blurts out, “You haven’t changed as well,” and it’s the worst possible thing Wonwoo could’ve told someone he hasn’t seen since college. It’s something you say without thinking too much of, a large neon sign telling Soonyoung that he hadn’t given it as much thought as Soonyoung had, blurting it out like that, like it's been forced out, but it’s too late to take it back now. College was a long time ago. Jihoon’s married, Seokmin’s thinking of marrying, and in half a year Wonwoo’s turning 32. It’s been a long time since Wonwoo’s seen Soonyoung’s face this close it’s as if he’d forgotten everything until he saw him again for the first time a few days ago. Even if it’s true, even if college Soonyoung and the Soonyoung now did look alike, there is no denying the missing gaps there Wonwoo had filled in with buried memories. Like, Has Soonyoung always had a scar in this place? Has Soonyoung always been this tall up close?  Maybe Wonwoo’s just imagined it.

Soonyoung smiles back a little wistfully, as if he gets it. “Thanks? You can stop staring now, it’s making me uncomfy.”

Wonwoo doesn’t, but he lets the frown melt from his face. “Not yet,” he replies quietly, and where the courage to say the things he’s saying right now comes from, he doesn’t know. “Let me see you properly. I want to remember your face.”

Who knows when he'll see Soonyoung again.

*

Friday

When Jihoon was at his lowest, which was whenever he had a fight with Soonyoung while they were dating, meaner than what Wonwoo was used to, he used to say, “You’re next.”

(One time: Soonyoung had caught him talking to Jihoon on his phone. Soonyoung had said, Who's that?, to which Wonwoo had replied, in panic, Junhui? Jihoon continued his inebriated drawling, even as Wonwoo realized, fuck, Junhui’s passed out on their couch, he’d stayed to help Soonyoung study Chinese, fuck, how could he just let it slip like that fuck fuck fuck--Did I say Junhui? I meant Minghao. Yeah, Minghao.

Soonyoung, as if he saw right through him but decided not to say anything else, carefully raised a brow.)

What Jihoon meant was Wonwoo’s next in line for Soonyoung to fuck. It was, in Jihoon’s own honest and rather quite callous opinion, the most logical thing to happen next. Why not? He’d gone through his friends through the years: Seokmin, Jihoon, and then, according to him, Wonwoo. What’s stopping Soonyoung from writing Wonwoo off of his Bingo list, right?

“You don’t mean that,” Wonwoo used to tell him, always, whenever it got brought up. There was no Bingo list; it simply didn’t exist. It was getting tiring, not so much listening to Jihoon’s romantic woes but the insinuations. He felt sick. “Soonyoung loves you.”

Jihoon pinned him with an unreadable look. “Does he, really?”

And the answer was, at that time, an irrevocable, honest, yes. It was foolish to think otherwise. Soonyoung would sacrifice a fucking limb for Jihoon if he needed to. Wonwoo would to, of course, but probably not as fast as Soonyoung would if the choice presented itself.

“Soonyoung would cry if he heard you talk about him like that,” Wonwoo had told him, and the pain he felt then was real, even if it was at the expense of someone else, someone who wasn’t even there to hear it. “Don’t ever say that, Jihoonnie. That’s not true.”

And it wasn’t. Jihoon and Soonyoung broke up for real a few months before Soonyoung left. Wonwoo and Soonyoung stayed as is. You’d think there’d be life altering shit like falling in love and yet--Soonyoung never made a move. Wonwoo didn’t expect him to.

And then Soonyoung left to pursue a dream Wonwoo apparently had no place in. Life went on.

*

“You left it,” Wonwoo is saying, phone pressed between a shoulder and an ear, as Soonyoung stumbles into the apartment wearing twice what he wore the first time he visited, “get it when you come back. When will you come back, again?" 

Soonyoung hangs his coat and scarf and promptly hops his way to Wonwoo’s couch. Wonwoo vehemently uses his arms to make a cross sign. “You’ll be staying there for more than a week? No, no, it’s fine. Text me when you need a ride. Okay--yeah, okay. Bye.” Soonyoung dives in anyway, and the telltale signs of paper crunching under his weight reach Wonwoo’s ears from where he’s standing. 

“Ya!” Wonwoo yells out, and Soonyoung rolls over with a surprised laugh, falls to the floor with a soft thud.

He’s brought movies with him today. “For someone who’s supposed to be my muse, you never let me write, do you?” It slips out accidentally. Wonwoo turns to busy himself in the kitchen but not before he sees Soonyoung’s expression visibly brighten.

“So you do admit it! I’m your muse!”

Wonwoo ignores him.

When he comes back with the popcorn, Soonyoung’s booted up a sci-fi movie he’s never heard of before. He’s gotten Wonwoo’s comforter from his room and wrapped himself with it, his head disconnected from his entire body underneath. “I took your comforter, do you mind?”

“Yes, I mind,” Wonwoo deadpans, unfurling the thing so he can sit under its warmth. Soonyoung is radiating heat, as usual, and the proximity is making Wonwoo more anxious that he initially thought it would. “Want some popcorn?”

Halfway through the movie, the bowl’s empty. Soonyoung’s gotten so bored he’s playing with the leftover kernels, making words. He writes Im A Muse, shows it to Wonwoo, to which Wonwoo just ignores, even as warmth fills his cheeks. He takes the bowl and pushes it away, out of Soonyoung’s reach.

Soonyoung moves on to just spacing out afterwards, eyes glazed over, distracted. Wonwoo glances at him occasionally to see if he’s fallen asleep, but no, he’s just eerily quiet, lost in thought. Soonyoung said he’s watched this movie before, maybe he’s just thinking about things he hasn’t noticed?

Soonyoung looks back at him, suddenly. “Parallel universes. She’s going to try kill herself from a better reality. Meteor passes, and the boyfriend gets suspicious in the end.” He says this in one breath; Wonwoo doesn’t even get the chance to get mad at being spoiled. Disbelief slowly settles in his gut because, fuck, he was actually getting into it, why is Soonyoung so--“You seeing someone?”

Seungcheol comes to mind, unbidden. The image disappears just as fast though, afterwards. It takes the disappointment with it, replaced now with apprehension. “No.” 

Soonyoung looks unconvinced, but he doesn’t push further. The movie goes on in the background, and the girl in it walks through the darkness on the street with a determination Wonwoo tries focusing on, and ends up failing at. 

“What made you ask that?” Wonwoo is genuinely curious. 

“Your room,” Soonyoung replies quietly, after a while. He looks guilty, a little upset. “I didn’t mean to snoop, really, I didn’t, but you had this shirt--”

It’s Seungcheol’s, Wonwoo immediately knows. A shirt too big on him, shoulders so broad when Wonwoo wears it he feels skinnier, in comparison. See it and you’d ask, That yours? And have Wonwoo answer back, No, not mine.

“Not mine,” he tells Soonyoung now, and the admission feels like letting something slip unknowingly, like he shouldn’t have said it, should’ve just lied about it. “It’s a friend’s.” 

“We’re not kids anymore, Wonwoo-ya,” Soonyoung says, gently bumping Wonwoo’s shoulder with a loose fist. He has a sly smirk on, but his eyes are dim. “You can tell me you’re dating him.”

Big words from someone who never said anything about his relationships during college until you yourself see someone else's toothbrush in your own bathroom. “Really, I’m not.”

Soonyoung pouts.

Feeling like he at least owes him an explanation, Wonwoo relents. “He’s... my Seokmin,” he says slowly, hoping Soonyoung understands. Someone you love, but aren’t not in love with. It’s a shame the other party doesn’t agree. Seungcheol’s an amazing friend slash babysitter slash mom, which means he will also probably be an amazing boyfriend to someone who isn’t a Jeon Wonwoo. Seokmin to Soonyoung was like that, before. They happened way before Wonwoo even met Soonyoung, continued on for an indefinite amount of time because Soonyoung didn’t know what to do, because what better way to lose your best friend than by falling in love with them, right?

You either reciprocate to keep them, or deny them and watch distance be the tide to wash away the path to each other. Soonyoung should know.

“He keeps me company when I’m lonely,” Wonwoo continues, suddenly missing Seungcheol’s figure by his refrigerator, inspecting the junk Wonwoo’s bought. Where’s the milk I bought for you? Did you let it expire again?  Wonwoo doesn’t bother elaborating. He doesn’t need to.

“Were you lonely?” Soonyoung asks. The atmosphere’s somber somehow. “These years, I mean.” The hidden question there, Wonwoo doesn’t miss. Without me, he meant.

Slowly, Wonwoo nods.

The years that followed Soonyoung’s leaving were years of sporadic messages and calls. It didn’t help that Soonyoung was still mad at Wonwoo’s lack of support, and Wonwoo was madder because of some other thing he didn’t want to address. That said, messages were mundane and repetitive and never about anything serious. They video chatted sometimes, when Soonyoung was at a country with a reasonable enough timezone. He talked about choreographing for a boy group he was accompanying the concert of, and Wonwoo let the information wash over him in calm waves, bitterness now turned into negligence. He just--didn’t care, anymore. It was hard to be happy for him, even if he tried. It wasn’t as if he ever stopped trying, anyway. Messages became shorter, calls became a burden of obligation than anything else. Nobody had the time to contact anybody anymore, the later years revealed. Wonwoo drowned in manuscript, Soonyoung traversed the globe boy group after boy group. He hadn’t seen the guy in years even if he had the chance to, when Soonyoung was in the country. He didn’t know if he wanted to see him, see the change there, make peace with the fact that the Soonyoung of college years was gone. Of course he’d been lonely.

Even now, facing Soonyoung in the dark and seeing only the mutual understanding in his eyes, near enough he can feel his warmth, it still is. The emptiness hasn’t gone away.

“I was, too,” Soonyoung whispers. He closes his eyes, and the honesty there is unmistakable.

*

 Saturday

On Saturday morning Wonwoo sets out to buy more groceries. Jeonghan’s only brought enough for half a week, but Soonyoung’s presence shortened that by a lot. He isn’t complaining, but it’s not something he wants to get used to, having Soonyoung around. Last time that happened it ended with an ambiguous friendship break up and entire books written.

In the store, Wonwoo picks up the usual stuff Seungcheol’s always bought (eggs, milk, kimchi, vegetable crackers) and then some he’s never let Wonwoo get when they shopped together (wine, wine, more wine). The trip back is quick, easy, and as he waits for his to-go at the corner coffee shop by his apartment, he watches a muted replay of a recent awards night, watched fervently by a lone worker as she fixes him a drink.

Oh, Wonwoo realises, squinting at the screen. It’s YeahMan. They’re giving out a speech no one can hear, and then, “...like to thank all of our fans…” The worker’s turned up the volume when she saw he was watching. “You’re a fan?” she asks, sheepish.

Wonwoo shakes his head politely. “I have a friend who works with them,” he admits, realises too late that he shouldn’t have said it when the girl visibly brightens, and then deflates. Wonwoo prays she doesn’t ask him for their autographs.

“Choreographer,” Wonwoo explains at the silent question the girl shoots him with.

“Kwon Soonyoung?”

Wonwoo blinks, and then nods, slowly. “Yeah, actually. You know him?”

“He’s famous! Kind of,” she replies, with more enthusiasm than he’d ever seen her with. She looks back at the screen, now playing a song Wonwoo’s heard of everywhere in the city for the first half of the year. He’s gotten the lyrics memorised at this point--completely by accident, of course. Especially not because he’d watched the making more times than he’d like to admit, tried locating Soonyoung in the mass of backstage people rushing about in panic in the background as Joshua said I feel great! and Vernon replied This is for you, as in, you, the one watching this right now, because he was cheesy like that. Wonwoo could follow the way Vernon said it with precise mimicry, but only because it was at that moment that a voice yells in the back, yelling, SHOWTIME, GUYS. He’d replayed that part even if he’d been sure of the owner the first time he heard it. It was Soonyoung’s. He appeared in the music video for a whole 3 seconds, at a scene where they showed the duo practicing in the dancing room. You couldn’t see his face, even if you wanted to. It was the distinct shape of his back Wonwoo remembered, burned in his memory so permanently he wouldn’t be able to forget it, would still be able to pinpoint his stance in a crowd, at a studio, half his body cut off from the screen. 

“Oh!” the girl suddenly exclaims, as YeahMan finishes the performance and has now moved on to exiting the stage. The music that plays as they run off is familiar. “He composed this song!”

While Wonwoo processes the information, she hands him his cup. “Please love our boys,” she tells him, pink in the cheeks. “They’re hardworking kids, even Soonyoung-ssi.”

“I will,” Wonwoo promises, but even he feels shy for her. On the walk home he looks the song up, listens to it through his earphones with religious intent after the first line’s done, listening to Joshua croon about not wanting to leave, but needing to.

When he arrives on his floor there’s Soonyoung crouched by his door, as still as if he were asleep.

Wonwoo approaches, and Soonyoung looks up at the sound, stands up with both hands inside his coat pockets. His scarf swallows half his face.

“Forgot your key in there,” Soonyoung explains, grinning.

Wonwoo hears Vernon rap about wanting to see people again in his ears. Soonyoung composed that song, she said. Almost 6 loops in and it’s still difficult to associate it to the Soonyoung that stands in front of him now, hear his thoughts in another person’s voice.

Soonyoung stands before him, like a dream he’s always had, looking cold and lonely at the same time.

“What if I’d left the city for a meeting?” Wonwoo finds himself asking. Soonyoung raises a brow at his groceries.

“You wouldn’t do that.” The smile Soonyoung wears is irritatingly smug. “Not when you know I’d visit you today.”

“I actually didn’t know.” 

“You know, now,” is the only reply, told like a promise Wonwoo chooses not to think much over.

*

Jihoon stayed in their dorm room to compose, sometimes. Soonyoung helped him, sang him tunes he thought would be good. When Jihoon was especially wound up and tired from all his composition classes he used to snap, I can’t fucking hear myself think, which was code for Soonyoung to leave. He’d lock himself inside Wonwoo’s room. Bad day? Wonwoo used to ask, but Soonyoung would just avoid the questions with a small smile, grab for Wonwoo’s guitar and have him teach. Wonwoo had been studying for an exam, why would Soonyoung bother him? Because he’d let him anyway, of course. Wonwoo would mutter things about failing his tests and not knowing the right time to ask for guitar lessons and having Soonyoung pay for them in the future, but he’d scoot over so Soonyoung could sit beside him anyway, wrapped his hands on his guitar and say, So first, put fucking pressure on your fingers, even if it hurt, okay? From the living room Jihoon was oddly quiet.

In the end Soonyoung never learned to properly play the guitar. Later Jihoon would confess, “I hated it.” He said this after Soonyoung had left, when he visited Wonwoo one summer to return some of the stuff Soonyoung had accidentally left behind. “When I got angry and pushed him away, he never fought back. He was such a goddamn martyr, what the fuck, and every time it happened he’d always, always, without fail,” here he pinned Wonwoo a look of, not anger nor pain, but of someone who just had an epiphany, “go to you.”

“Stop,” Wonwoo had said, ripping his eyes from the truth in Jihoon’s. He didn’t want to think about it, the could have’s and would have’s. The wound from Soonyoung last words were raw, told not with venom but the silence of a disease creeping up on you as you age. You wouldn’t understand, he’d said, and Wonwoo heard what he didn’t say, what it implied. Wonwoo wouldn’t understand because he was never as passionate, as focused, as driven. Wonwoo took up literature because it was a hobby. Soonyoung’s life was basically dancing; take that away from him and he wouldn’t be the same without it.

What’s this for passion, he thought bitterly, more often than he’d like, typing furiously on his laptop. Lee Chan used to flood school forums of where r u WW-nim T T i can help w ur heartbreak!!!!!!!! Mingyu mentioned his pieces whenever he had to play breakup songs for the school, once or twice purposely making his voice hoarse so it’d seem as if he were crying about it. Minghao told him it wasn’t fake, the crying; he'd uploaded videos of him through the glass window of the studio: Mingyu speaking into the mic, all the while rubbing at his eyes. One video included a 10-second clip of Mingyu just staring at a spot above the camera, frowning, even as tears ran down his cheeks. Fuck you, he'd mouthed at Minghao. In the background you can hear Minghao's high pitched laugh. Wonwoo looks them up sometimes, watch in wonder at how even now it still hasn’t been deleted.

It was only Jihoon who knew it was him, those first few months. When the mask’s been pulled off he stopped writing altogether, and only started again when Jeonghan came.

*

In the kitchen, he sets down the bags and immediately gets to working on breakfast. He hasn’t eaten, made evident when he’d gotten inside and had his stomach greet the quiet apartment. “Shut up,” he’d said, when Soonyoung snickered.

“Let me cook the rice,” Soonyoung offers. Wonwoo squints at him. “What? I’m great at rice.”

When they still lived together, nobody knew how to cook. It was Seokmin who made enough for not only the both of them, but also for the next day’s breakfast. In a while Wonwoo learned the basics: eggs, fried rice, stir-fried whatever when he felt like experimenting, and when he couldn’t stand up, body too weak from a fever he didn’t know how he’d gotten, it was Soonyoung who stood up to the plate. Soonyoung was going through an I’m Moving On, I Don’t Want To Talk About Seokmin phase, so Wonwoo settled for the rice slash porridge Soonyoung tried hard to make when he refused to have Seokmin over to make them dinner. It tasted like water, felt like cotton. It was the worst. When he sobbed over the bowl Soonyoung mistook his disgust for gratitude, and started crying himself. Their emotions were out of control. Wonwoo gulped down the concoction and comforted Soonyoung, even when he was the one with the fever. Soonyoung covered his face with both hands. Wonwoo had a hard time trying to decipher his words, muffled and wet, but he caught some of them. The important ones. “Seokmin doesn’t hate you,” Wonwoo assured him, pulling his hands away from his face, and ended up pulling the entirety of Kwon Soonyoung’s weight with them. “You’re not a bad friend. You’re a bad cook, sure, but you’re okay.” Soonyoung was a dam, opened; the waterworks were not stopping at all. “Please stop crying. You’ll dehydrate yourself.” Wonwoo’s entire right shoulder had been wet with his tears. Later when he’d calmed down enough to breathe properly, Soonyoung sniffled, “Thanks.” His eyes were sore from all the crying. Wonwoo felt something, then; Be happy, he’d thought, with clarity, even as his mind clouded from the fever and the headaches. That night they’d slept together, but not like that. Just Soonyoung facing Wonwoo’s back, not touching.

When he woke, Wonwoo saw Soonyoung’s face first. The weight of Soonyoung’s arm across his torso was light, compared to the heaviness that ran through his veins at that exact moment, the sluggishness that had accompanied it caused not by sleep but with a realisation he’d deemed dangerous enough to never voice out loud. The fear came next.

Soonyoung’s great with the rice, now. Actual, soft rice. Not porridge substitute. Wonwoo could cry at the improvement, a far cry from the first time he tasted Soonyoung’s cooking.

“You don’t need to thank me, Wonwoo-ya,” Soonyoung grins, folding his arms across his chest. “But you’re welcome.”

He was going for Shut the fuck up, Kwon, but what comes out is: “I could eat this forever.” He winces at the admission, and also at the fact of its impossibility. What a funny thought, having Soonyoung around forever.

“Anything for you, babe,” is what Soonyoung replies with, and when Wonwoo rips his eyes away from his rice to give Soonyoung a venomous, albeit heatedly embarrassed, Look, he sees Soonyoung already looking away, the cheer and cheese his previous statement had now strangely gone. Don’t leave, is Wonwoo’s panicked, and quick, thought.

Soonyoung looks back at him as if he heard, and smiles.

*

Halfway through a rerun of a drama Wonwoo found boring (but Soonyoung found interesting enough to force Wonwoo to abandon his work and watch with him to), Soonyoung’s phone starts ringing. It isn’t weird, Soonyoung getting a call; it’s the annoyed look he shoots it, something Wonwoo wouldn’t have seen if he didn’t look back to ask why Soonyoung wasn’t answering it. Soonyoung mutes his phone, face closing off.

Wonwoo would ask, but then the phone vibrates again, and this time Soonyoung gets up and answers it outside. Soonyoung’s voice is so surprisingly soft, Wonwoo can’t hear it even as he mutes the TV so he can listen in. The loud beating of his heart drowns out even the softest hum of the night outside, ears clogged up with static.

When Soonyoung comes back he’s still as unreadable as ever. “It’s work,” he says curtly, at Wonwoo’s concern. “I gotta leave now, sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Wonwoo replies with ease, heart heavy. He shuts off the TV and gets up to clean their mess as Soonyoung gathers his coat.

Soonyoung is still hovering by the door when Wonwoo comes back from the kitchen. His hand’s already on the door knob. He wants to say something, looking fidgety, and Wonwoo tenses at the familiarity of the look on Soonyoung’s face. It’s the same expression, Wonwoo realises. The trepidation that quickly settles is reminiscent of the past. When he told Wonwoo he was leaving, he’d worn the same constipated face. Wonwoo feels the cold travel from the hollow in his chest to every part of his body, bracing himself for whatever Soonyoung has to say.

Years back Soonyoung had sat him down and didn’t start eating until Wonwoo was already half-done with his food. Wonwoo was shoving everything in so he wouldn’t have to talk, wouldn’t have to look up to see the face Soonyoung was wearing. Soonyoung drawled on about mundane stuff Wonwoo couldn’t focus on, seemingly endless anecdotes he was spouting from the top of his distracted mind, until finally it came: “I’m leaving.”

“For?” Wonwoo asked first, even if he knew already.

Soonyoung was approached at a dance competition, and they wanted to see him try choreographing for this boyband they wanted to debut. He wasn’t going to do it alone, of course, and there was no reassurance that he was going to actually be able to choreograph the entire thing. There was a chance they’d reject him. It wasn’t impossible.

Except Wonwoo knew it was impossible. He knew Soonyoung, knew how he worked. They’d simply see him in action and they’d understand. Soonyoung wasn’t coming back. They’d keep him.

Wonwoo didn’t know what to say. He had a week to prepare himself for when Soonyoung finally broke the news to him, had written and memorised various renditions of Wow That Sounds Great that ultimately still segued into a frustrated Why Didn’t You Tell Me Sooner?, but when the time actually came he was still as unprepared as when Jihoon had first told him.

“That’s great.” The food didn’t taste great anymore. You’d think Wonwoo was eating Soonyoung’s horrible rice porridge. Even then he’d still take that over--this. Through the years, Wonwoo would never step into this establishment again. “When are you leaving?”

“Um,” Soonyoung was blinking too much, fidgety. If he noticed Wonwoo’s lack of enthusiasm, he didn’t show. “Next month.”

Wonwoo saw an opening, and took it. “And you only tell me this now because...?” He let the question trail on purpose. Rerouted Soonyoung’s emotions from guilt to anger so it wouldn’t feel as painful. Like a switch, Soonyoung shut up, stunned. Then he got defensive.

“That’s all you’re going to say?”

“I think it’s great, Soonyoung,” Wonwoo replied. The words had left him, then. All his memorised scripts suddenly gone, just like that.

“Fuck,” Soonyoung had said, pressing the heels of his hands to his eyes. He stayed like that for what felt like years. It was laughable how easy it was to segue Soonyoung into anger, steer his thoughts into frustration. Otherwise he'd venture, stray from the acute feeling of betrayal, realise Wonwoo's drive to push him away, to close off. Wonwoo was a good friend, but not the most selfless. “And to think I’d thought you’d be the one to understand,” Soonyoung removed his hands so the words weren’t muffled, were clear for Wonwoo to hear.

“You don’t understand, Wonwoo-ya.” Soonyoung had said. He wasn’t crying, but he might as well had been with how bright his eyes were. Still his voice was oddly stable, and because Soonyoung was mean when he wanted to be, Wonwoo knew he was meaning to hurt when he said, not unlike a dismissal, “You wouldn’t understand.” 

“I’ll come back tomorrow, okay?” Soonyoung says now, like a promise.

Wonwoo nods. “Okay,”

*

Sunday

Last Sunday, Wonwoo showed up in a tuxedo that looked too big on him, if you stared at it hard enough to really notice. Good thing he wasn’t getting attention, not when everyone’s busy ogling at the pair that was music producer Lee Jihoon and singer Lee Amy. It was a modest wedding, for a big time couple like them. He sat with Seokmin during the ceremony, who, while Wonwoo was busy staring at Amy as she walked the aisle and tried her hardest not to cry, was busy staring at someone else.

“It’s Soonyoung,” he’d whispered, and Wonwoo felt it, the weight of a stare. He turned and locked eyes with the perpetrator, seated at the end of the rows, looking alone and out of place. He looked like an apparition. Seokmin gave one final squeeze to his forearm and looked back to the front, where everybody was already looking at. Amy had arrived at the altar. Wonwoo fixed his eyes on Soonyoung lest he suddenly disappeared. It was a while until Soonyoung finally moved, raising a hand to give him a small, shy wave. Wonwoo ripped his eyes away and looked to the front, but wasn’t seeing anything. For the whole ceremony it was just about calming himself enough so he can fucking breathe. If Seokmin noticed the color draining from his face, he didn’t show. He’s here, he’d thought, the only clear thing on his mind. Everything was a mess inside--his emotions, his fucking repressed memories--and yet one thought dominated everything, rooted him to ground when he felt himself slipping: Kwon Soonyoung is back.

*

Wonwoo wakes to a quiet apartment. Even as he stays prone, staring at the ceiling stalling for time, waiting for the knock or the sound of his front door opening, nothing comes. In the end, he falls asleep again. The next time he wakes, it’s the afternoon, and only because Seungcheol’s been calling again. answer ur goddamn phone or else im sending jeonghan back, is what 5 of the 6 messages he sent says. The last one is a defeated nvm hes busy.

Wonwoo stares at it, tries to formulate an apology, and ultimately decides to just not say anything back. He’s going to call again anyway, sooner or later.

Because he can’t bear to be in his kitchen right now, he slips into a coat and heads outside to buy something to eat.

“You alone today?” The waiter asks him when he’s sat down. Seungcheol comes with him when he goes here, usually. When Wonwoo nods, the waiter smiles at him. Wonwoo shrinks back at the look of pity on his face. “It’s on the house, then. You look like you need it.”

This again. The gut reaction of needing to tell people, For fuck’s sake, I’m not sad, because he really isn’t. In the end he says, “Thanks,” with a tight smile, because he’d be dumb to say no to free food.

Wonwoo checks his phone while he waits. No new messages have arrived, and Seungcheol has yet to follow up on his calls. Wonwoo mutes it anyway.

YeahMan prepares for comeback. Album release in a month! the article read, when Wonwoo strayed and typed in the name on his browser. No mentions of a familiar name on it, but he understands all the same. He’s leaving again. The thought is disorienting. I’ll come back tomorrow, Soonyoung had said, but it’s already 10 past 4. Wonwoo searches his brain and remembers timetables and hours of travel and thinks, heart sinking, It’s not going to happen. He’s going to be busy, wouldn’t have enough time to do anything but prepare, much less leave Seoul, ride the KTX for more hours than he will ever be free for to where Wonwoo is, spend time there, and then go back just in time to do it all over again. Soonyoung had been on a break this past week, and it's taken this long for Wonwoo to fucking realise.

And now he’s going back to where he belonged.

“Here.” The waiter comes back with his food. One look at Wonwoo’s face and his entire countenance changes, suddenly concerned. “Are you okay?”

He’d say I’m fine but he wouldn’t be able to, not with this lump in his throat. Wonwoo stands to take his food wordlessly, and bows his thanks.

*

Three cans in, Wonwoo starts feeling warm all over. An hour ago he’d told Seungcheol sry for never replying i was sleeping, and didn’t reply when he answered with FOR A WHOLE DAY?

are you okay? Seungcheol asks now, and Wonwoo doesn’t even get to type in a response because his phone starts ringing.

“Hello,” Wonwoo says into the receiver, shutting his eyes. The floor feels nice against his back, cold when his body’s a furnace. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. Come back soon. Stop calling Jeonghan over, he makes the worst tea. Stop calling me so early in the morning. I’m alone now, but it’s okay. I’m okay. I’m not sad. But come back soon,” Wonwoo sniffs, realises with horror that he’s tearing up. “Seungcheol-hyung--”

“ARE YOU CRYING?” The other end yells. It’s not Seungcheol, holy fuck.

Wonwoo’s reaction time has slowed, his mind muddled. “Who?”

“What the fuck, Wonwoo. Let me the fuck in, I think I forgot my key--no, wait.”

“You’re not Seungcheol-hyung.”

The door opens as if on cue, and Wonwoo squints at Soonyoung from where he’s sprawled on the floor. He looks frazzled.

“Um.”

Soonyoung rushes in after he closes the door and immediately kneels down to cup Wonwoo’s face. His fingers are fucking cold. “Were you crying?”

Wonwoo pushes him away with resolve, succeeds after three lame attempts. Actually Soonyoung just plops down on his own, taking pity on him. When Wonwoo sits up the world flips, and he closes his eyes against it, feeling dizzy.

“I told you I’d come back, didn’t I?” Soonyoung continues.

Wonwoo opens his eyes to look at the clock. “It’s 2 AM, Soonyoung.”

“Actually it’s still 9 and you need to get new batteries,” Soonyoung huffs, and grins. “I brought soju.”

Another two bottles later, and Wonwoo’s just about ready to pass out, eyes heavy. He’s migrated to the couch this time. Soonyoung’s talking over the movie’s they’re watching, complaining about the lack of anything of substance in the thing. He’s still engrossed though, the little weirdo. Absentmindedly, he plays with Wonwoo’s exposed ankles, distracted. It’s lulling Wonwoo asleep. He lets himself finally shut his eyes, senses focused only on the one place he and Soonyoung touch.

And then the phone rings, Soonyoung’s.

His ringtone reaches the chorus before Wonwoo says, annoyed, “You going to get that or what?”

The look Soonyoung shoots him is unreadable. “Nope.”

“They won’t stop until you do.” Wonwoo should know. Some days when he’s too engrossed in writing he checks his phone to see a hundred missed calls from Seungcheol. Seungcheol visits him afterwards, usually. His anger has a 1-second lifespan. He sees Wonwoo drowning in manuscript and deflates, saying, “Here, let me cook you something.”

The ringing stops. A second later it starts up again. Soonyoung keeps ignoring it, eyes trained on the TV. His hand is still on Wonwoo’s ankle, unmoving. Wonwoo reaches for it, annoyed at the loud ringing, to mute it. And then he sees: Lee Jihoon.

“Why’s Jihoonnie calling you?” he asks. The inside of his mouth feels like cotton.

Alarmed, Soonyoung snatches the phone away. This time he mutes it for real so all they hear is its vibration against the wood of Wonwoo’s coffee table.

The emotions that surge afterwards are sudden, overwhelming;it's impossible shutting them all down at once. Like a checklist, he reminds himself of the facts, ticking each bullet one by one: Jihoon’s married now. Soonyoung’s moved on. They happened years back, during a time when they were still young and confused and hot-blooded. It’s just a phone call. There’s no way it’s true, whatever Wonwoo’s inebriated mind has conjured up.

You’re next, Jihoon had said. Planted the thought it in his mind. It’s been almost 10 years. Wonwoo, against his reasonable mind and judgment, had waited. He’d let it grow, watered the damn thing, and waited for Soonyoung. Fuck.

“Hey, Soonyoung.” Soonyoung remains motionless, eyes on the TV. “Answer me, Soonyoung.”

Still nothing. Wonwoo thinks it’s because he’s whispering, but any louder and Soonyoung would hear the plea there. “Soonyoungie. Soonyoung. Soonyouuuung.”

“Your books,” Soonyoung says finally. He turns the TV off. The silence that follows is harsh, unwelcoming. Even Jihoon’s stopped calling, as if on purpose. The pause lasts for a century, and then finally, he continues, “Were they about me?”

Says the guy who composed a song about Wonwoo himself, Wonwoo thinks. Soonyoung's thoughts in a voice distinctly not his own: softer, where Soonyoung's gruffer, but still possessed the same sweetness. The same nostalgic baritone. If Wonwoo were sober, he’d say just that. But since he’s not, what comes out is a garbled, “I don’t know,” and it’s the truth. The bitterness festered, even when Wonwoo tried killing it down. It’d shown everywhere; he couldn’t control the damn thing. He didn’t mean to write Soonyoung into everything, didn’t mean to wove his existence permanently in his characters, the main ones or not. By the time he’d realised it, it’d been published, sold to the masses. Seokmin had called to congratulate him on the first book’s success, but even he knew what was up. Wonwoo was tied down, unable to let the idea go. You’re next, Jihoon had said, not unlike a prophecy. And yet nothing came.

Wonwoo pushes the heels of his palm into his eyes, aiming to cave everything in.

Soonyoung moves from his side of the couch. Softness underneath him dips with Soonyoung’s weight. There are hands on either side of his head now, Wonwoo knows. If he opened his eyes he knows what he’d see there, and he’s scared to.

“Look at me, Wonwoo-ya,” Soonyoung says from above him, and the distance is immeasurable. This close and Wonwoo feels as if Soonyoung’s as far away as ever, a distant memory he never wanted to look back to. 

Years ago, at a party Wonwoo doesn’t remember whose, sitting in a circle in the host’s bedroom: Wonwoo’s wobbly from the drinks Seokmin’s handed him throughout the night, head slotted against Soonyoung’s shoulder and jaw. An arm’s around him, grounding him. On Soonyoung’s other side, Jihoon’s laughing into his own drink at a joke Wonwoo didn’t catch. What he did catch: someone yelling over everything else, demanding Soonyoung, ME OR JIHOONNIE, and Soonyoung yelling back just as loudly, OF COURSE JIHOONNIE, YOU FUCKER, and then more laughter--Wonwoo’s slipping, eyes heavy--until someone yelled WONWOO OR JIHOON, and then, without preamble, Soonyoung yelling out, a response so quick there was no questioning it, WONWOO--Oh. Oh. Oh. Soonyoung had stiffened underneath him. The noise had dimmed, and Wonwoo heard only the loud beating of his heart and the pounding of the impending headache. The loud truth there. Soonyoung’s unwitting confession. Jihoon was eerily silent, Soonyoung even more so. Years after this is what the memory had been reduced to, not the subsequent coldness Jihoon had showed, not the discreet glances everybody shot Wonwoo when he so much entered a room with Soonyoung. Soonyoung’s lips, warm against his temple, tucking him in that night--the feeling was fleeting, as if it didn’t happen. You’re next, Jihoon had said. And Wonwoo didn’t understand, then. Not now, even.

For what feels like forever, Wonwoo finally removes his hands from his face. Soonyoung’s staring down at him with eyes dark enough to look black. Wonwoo has never seen them before.

“Why’d you come back?” He asks now, forcing his eyes to meet Soonyoung’s, even as his body itched to push him away and run. His legs, trapped in between Soonyoung’s. It isn’t impossible, him running away. He could easily knee Soonyoung in the crotch and rush out, relish in Soonyoung’s scream in pain, probably. The thought is tempting, but Wonwoo remains still, needing to know the answer himself. 

Soonyoung growls, low in his throat. Cornered like this, he’s defensive, unwilling to yield. “You wrote all those things about me, Wonwoo-ya. How can I not come back?”

Wonwoo’s chest hurts, ready to burst. There’s something that isn’t being said. What is it? Seungcheol told him he needed closure. Nobody could ever move on from anything without closure. Close it off, lock it away, and it would always seep right back up, haunt your mind and remind you of your failures, could’ve’s, would’ve’s. When Soonyoung left, he could’ve made him promise to come back. And yet.

“Tell me, Wonwoo-ya,” Soonyoung probes. He leans closer, and Wonwoo shrinks back, lets his head fall from the armrest to the couch, putting some distance. Soonyoung just moves in closer, an unrelenting star. It's impossible to look away. “Did you not want me to come back?”

Caged in, Wonwoo opens his mouth to speak. Soonyoung doesn’t even wait for him to answer, eyes already trained on the movement, and just dips his head down and plants a chaste kiss on the corner of Wonwoo’s lips. His lips quiver, Wonwoo notices, first. Against the influx of everything else it is what he focuses on, the warmth that spreads from there, the centuries put into thinking about doing it. It’s nothing extraordinary, just a fleeting touch, like it’s always been with Soonyoung. A tiny act, but it detonates something inside Wonwoo all the same. 

He pulls away then, slightly. “Have you always…?” Soonyoung starts, doesn’t finish. At Wonwoo’s stunned silence, he barrels on, words quiet but with weight. “I didn’t know, I never knew. You never told me. Nobody ever told me anything. All those years I was with you and I never noticed. When I lef--it was hard, fuck--” Soonyoung closes his eyes, and Wonwoo feels it resonate, the pain. “You wrote all those things about me, and I just couldn’t--I couldn’t just leave it be. If I’d known, fuck, if only I’d known, years back, I wouldn’t have--I would have--”

Something in his chest swells up, and the heat inside spreads, warming Wonwoo’s cold fingers. The feeling is immediate, and it stays. “Soonyoung,” he starts, doesn’t trust his voice enough to continue.

“I’ve always wanted to,” Soonyoung replies, and it's quiet everywhere, as if with Wonwoo the world decided to wait, to finally let Soonyoung speak.

Soonyoung opens his eyes. The illusion shatters, and for once Wonwoo sees him, the Soonyoung now, and doesn't look for the Soonyoung of the past. For once accepts the fact that this Soonyoung isn't the same one, would never be the same one, and yet is still the one he'd always open the door to, the one he'd always react to. That one call he'd always take. 

"I've always wanted to," Soonyoung repeats, the only sound in the universe, "if you'd only let me."

“Fuck,” Wonwoo feels winded. Skin pulled taut, ready to rip at the seams. His heart, strangely calm, after what has felt like an eternity. Years in the making and this is what it boils down to, Wonwoo cornered like this, unable to run away even if he never intended to. The moon aligning itself with its planet, forever pulled in.

When Soonyoung leans down again, Wonwoo meets him halfway, opening up.

*

Monday

Jeonghan’s kindness lives through a week. Unbelievable. Today, he actually knocks properly like a normal person. When Wonwoo doesn’t get up to let him in, he lets himself inside on his own and makes himself his own cup of coffee. It’s what Wonwoo wakes up to, the ruckus he’s causing as he knocks over shit like Wonwoo’s sugar container and the yells of triumph he lets out when none of them shatter. Wonwoo groans, sitting up. The foot that was wrapped around his ankle uncoils itself, retracts to its owner’s body. Wonwoo picks up a discarded shirt from somewhere and goes out to greet Jeonghan.

“Did I wake you?” Jeonghan has the nerve to ask, seated in Wonwoo’s kitchen as comfortable as if he lived here. And then, seeing the state Wonwoo’s in, Jeonghan’s smile slips. Wonwoo can actually see realization dawn on his face. “Oh? You look happy today, can I ask why?” Jeonghan already knows, how the fuck.

“I’m telling Seungcheol-hyung to never call you over when he’s away ever again.”

Jeonghan smirks. “I came on my own, though?" 

“I’m getting new locks, then.”

“Don’t,” a voice says from behind them. Jeonghan laughs into his mug as Wonwoo reddens everywhere, the heat in his cheeks spreading. Soonyoung steps into the kitchen wearing nothing but Seungcheol’s large shirt, the one he’s seen days ago. “It’d be a hassle to get new ones.”

“Good morning, muse,” Jeonghan greets, much to Wonwoo’s added chagrin.

Soonyoung perks up, weirdly enthusiastic this early. He grins at Wonwoo’s direction, and it’s disorienting, how bright he is. Wonwoo can’t help but grin back, even as he’s still mortified as hell. Jeonghan watches them ogle at each other until he gets bored enough to clear his throat with a loud “E-HEM.”

“You okay with writing again?” He asks, eventually.

Weirdly enough, for the first time in years, Wonwoo’s sure of the answer. “Yes.”