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“Don’t lie to my fucking face!” Hyojin’s voice rang through the apartment, venom stilled inside. Changyoon heard Seungjun’s sarcastic chuckle before he screamed back.
“You’re a moron!”
“W - what’s going on?” Jaeyoung questions worriedly, stepping in front of Changyoon towards the room and the older puts a hand on the man’s chest with a pensive look.
“Don’t.”
“Someone should stop them. They never fight like this.” Changyoon sighs, the burden of living with the two usually best friends for years settling on his tired shoulders. He rubs at his temples.
“What’s the date?”
“The thirteenth, why?” Jaeyoung was so innocent, so naive. Every confused expression made Changyoon want to just pat his head and tell him he’s a good boy, envious of the ignorance of everyone in their friend group when it came to this period of their lives. Changyoon really wishes he had smarter, less emotionally constipated friends - or at the very least, friends that listened when others told them the feelings are mutual. He gave up ages ago.
“Leave them alone. You can’t stop it. They’re too dense.” Changyoon sits dramatically on their couch, becoming one with its sticky brown cushions. Jaeyoung hesitantly follows, sitting down more slowly as he looks at him for explanation. “It’s Valentine’s tomorrow.”
“And?” Changyoon looks at Jaeyoung, smiling pitifully. It’s time to explain, no longer needing to hold it to himself now that someone else has heard the chaos.
“You know they’re in love with each other, right?”
“Who doesn’t?”
“Every year, Seungjun tells Hyojin he’s getting a date for Valentine’s but won’t tell him who.”
“Why not? They tell each other everything.”
“ I thought we told each other everything you backstabbing snake! ” Hyojin sounds in tears now from his and Seungjun’s shared bedroom, Changyoon can hear the muffled sounds of pillows hitting flesh. He’s heard this exact sentence yelled the past three years. He stares at Jaeyoung until he can see the younger understand and grow ashen.
“How long-”
“This is the fifth.”
“Oh my god.” He whispers in defeat and sinks into the cushions, much like Changyoon, soul destroyed at the newfound knowledge of just how brain dead two people can be. They sit there listening to the sound of crossfire that means nothing, that will never mean anything until the two actually talk to each other. .
The war rages on.
“Never fall in love Yuto,” Seungjun slurs as his head wobbles on his neck. The maknae holds onto his shoulders, keeping him from falling face first into his maekju. “It’s so stupid.”
“It’s as stupid as the owner.” Yuto grumbles, flinching as it seems Seungjun understood him and raises his hand. “Hyung, why don’t you just tell him? How long are you going to keep telling him this stupid lie?”
“Itsh noooot a lie !” Seungjun sounds absurd, taking another drink down. “Always mean to ashk, I just dunt ashk!”
“You haven’t had a date the five years you’ve told him you have a date, and you haven’t asked him to be the date. So just stop telling him anything at all.”
“Noooo,” Seungjun whimpers, actual tears falling down his long lashes. Yuto feels bad for him, he’s stupid and he’s silly but he’s genuinely in love with his best friend. It must hurt sometimes. “Howmai suppsed to nooo,” are Seungjun’s last words before he fully passes out onto Yuto. He rubs the ailed man’s back softly as he groans in his sleep. Yuto leaves the money on the table as he starts to carry his friend to the outside world, where he will throw him inside a taxi and let the world decide his fate. If Yuto was less of an angel, but he is, so instead he’ll take Seungjun all the way home - maybe tuck him into bed and leave an aspirin with a cup of water on his bedside table. He calls up Changyoon as the two men get into the taxi, the other answering quickly.
“Hyung, I’m taking Seungjun home.”
“Are you? Oh, good. Listen, I’m not going to be there for the night. Just drop him off and go home.”
“Where are you going?”
“Yuto, I have a girlfriend and it’s Valentine’s Day. The night is not for taking care of my loser roommates.” Yuto blushes to his toes.
“Oh. Okay, I’ll take care of him.”
“No, Yuto. Drop him off and leave . Hyung is going to help us all.” Changyoon’s words are cryptic and strange but Yuto is tired and Seungjun won’t let go of his hand that’s turning numb from how hard he’s gripping it. He acquiesces and does as he’s told, leaving the older on his bed after he helps him take off his shoes and get some water. He’s afraid of what Changyoon meant, but there’s a limit to how angelic one can be and still be mortal. So Yuto leaves him and heads to Jaeyoung’s apartment, hoping the other won’t suffer too much.
Seungjun’s head is throbbing as he wakes, the room dark and empty. He sniffles, wiping at snot that dripped from earlier and grimaces. It’s Valentine’s Day and he’s hungover in his own bed, no one else in sight. Why would someone like Hyojin even want him? As Seungjun laments over his own stupidity, his bedroom door slams open and a livid Hyojin steps through - breathing as though he ran a triathlon five times.
“I know who it is!” Hyojin roars. Seungjun feels fear deep down to his core, barely able to vow to murder whoever told him as he faces the man in front of him. He’s about to get beaten to death by his best friend, enraged at the stupid game Seungjun has played with him for five freaking years. The first two it was purely accidental, but after that - Seungjun always knew he would never follow through with asking Hyojin to be that date and still told him about the enigmatic figure every year hoping that he would get angry - as he often did - and show that he cares somehow. The fighting, the pillow throwing and tickling was their Valentine’s date to Seungjun - even if Hyojin wasn’t aware himself. “I can’t believe I didn’t realize before. I’m so stupid.” Hyojin continues to talk in a raised voice, and Seungjun doesn’t want the anger anymore. He wants his best friend to hold him and let him down easy. He wants everything to just go back to normal, to pretend like he hasn’t been in love with him since they were in high school and sexually confused.
“Can we just forget about this?” Seungjun swallows the tears, prays he can stay strong enough to not look as pathetic as he feels. “I’ll help you find a date! You know I’m a good matchmaker.” The thought of leading Hyojin to the person he spends the rest of his life with makes his heart ache.
“Shut up. Shut up. Why didn’t you just tell me?” Hyojin is fully inside the room now, and he turns on the light. “Why do you reek of alcohol? You look terrible.”
“How am I supposed to just tell you?” Seungjun wails, not able to hold the tears in at all. Hyojin is taken aback.
“Why are you crying?” Hyojin yells as his own eyes tear up, unable to see the love of his life in pain. Hyojin himself is in the most aggravating pain of his life - after finding out that stupid Valentine’s date that he had always been foolishly hoping was actually himself was actually someone they both knew well.
“You’re the one crying,” Seungjun deflects, sobbing harder. “I didn’t want this day to come.”
“You didn’t want it to come? How do you think I feel? Keeping it a secret for this many years, for what? Did you think I was that petty?”
“I don’t know.” Seungjun wipes at his eyes, the lids hurting from the amount of crying he’s done in the last few hours.
“I will strangle you, Lee Seungjun. I am not petty.”
“I just didn’t want to ruin what we have. You know you’re my best friend.” Hyojin looks at Seungjun, soft as always for the man he’s grown up with. When did he become so handsome? Wasn’t he always like this though?
“No one is ever going to come between us, Seungjunnie, but you can’t lie to me like that. I’ve been thinking insane things all these years.” Hyojin collects the other in his arms, falling forward and sandwiching him to his mattress. He needs to make the situation feel normal, they’re just best friends. Hyojin isn’t being broken up with, it’s just a bro talk.
“What could be more insane then this?” Seungjun laughs, no mirth in the sound.
“I thought maybe it was me.” Hyojin lets it slip, maybe out of his last hope that it is even though he knows it’s not possible anymore. “I never even once considered you were worried about dating my old ex.”
Seungjun freezes, not even breathing. What? What was Hyojin thinking?
“You think I’m dating who?” Seungjun finally asks after eons of silence.
“Hwitaek, it’s okay. He told me.”
“Who told you?” Seungjun squirms, wiggling his way out from under Hyojin’s form. “Who told you that stupid bullshit?”
“Hey, I’m not mad. Seriously, you guys are cute together.”
“Can you just for once not jump to fucking conclusions, Hyo.” Seungjun is angry. This whole time he thought they were talking about them and they weren’t even reading the same book let alone on the same page.
“Ya! What conclusions? Changyoon told me himself.”
“Changyoon lied to you.”
“Do you want to have a secret from me that badly?” Hyojin jumps to his feet, slamming his fist onto the bed. “I already know so drop the act, will you?”
“Hyojin, you’re really a moron. It’s not Hwitaek.”
“What’s wrong with Hwitaek!? He’s a great guy! I had a good time when we dated.” Hyojin doesn’t know where this comes from, it’s not even true. Hyojin used Hwitaek to cover the pain of being in unrequited love with his best friend and Hwitaek was too smart to not see through him. Their friendship only grew from there and soon enough Seungjun found Hwitaek, they got along better. They looked good together. Hyojin was happy for them.
“It’s you!” Seungjun screams, truly screams - as if he wants the world to hear him. “How could I look at Hwitaek when I’ve been in love with Kim Hyojin for over ten years! How could you be so blind? I thought you were letting me down, thought we were breaking apart our friendship and you’re talking about some stupid lie you believed?”
Hyojin isn’t talking, can barely stand anymore before his legs take him forward and he knocks Seungjun back down onto his own bed. His hands pinning the smaller man’s shoulders as he stares into his watery eyes.
“I don’t want to play, Hyo.” Seungjun mumbles and Hyojin covers his mouth with his own. He presses too hard, too desperately but he’s taking back the ten years of life they’ve wasted. The five years of stupid fights that always tore him apart, wondering if he was a lunatic for thinking it could be him - when all along it has been. He kisses him more, opens his mouth and dips his tongue in, takes every single breath he can from the other and gives him his own instead.
“I’ve been in love with you for over ten years, Lee Seungjun.” Hyojin says breathlessly when he pulls away and Seungjun’s big doe eyes are staring at him. “I think since that night we snuck out to the-”
“- the convenience store in ninth grade.” Seungjun finishes. It makes sense really, that they would be in love with each other from the exact same moment and doubt each other’s feelings for just as long. “You’re a moron.” He grabs Hyojin’s collar pulling him down to kiss again, shorter and slower this time - Seungjun’s own preferences. “Can you be my moron?”
Hyojin can’t even imagine saying no.
“Yuto, can I sleep at your place?” Changyoon asks, a backpack of his things in hand.
“I’m not home, hyung. I’m with Jaeyoung.” Changyoon grimaces as he hears the other’s morning voice far from the receiver. “Why?”
“Not safe to go home.”
“Are they finally boning?”
“Probably, but it’s my life I’m afraid for. Seungjun has never looked at anyone with as much bloodlust as the one second I stepped foot into that apartment.”
“That’s what you get for lying, hyung.” Yuto laughs on the other side of the line.
“It was for everyone’s sake!”
“You know they’re going to claim all the credit anyway.” Chanyoong hears kissing noises and screams.
“Can you not make out while you’re on the phone with me?”
“Sure.” Changyoon checks his phone to see that Yuto has hung up, clearly favoring his boyfriend’s desires over his hyung’s need for shelter. He really hates his friends, he smiles to himself, happy to finally have them all happy together - even if he’s kicked out in the cold for a few.