Chapter Text
“Obviously, Jeonginnie’s the baby.”
“Not a baby!” Jeongin protested. “I’m four!”
“You’re still the youngest,” said Seungmin. “It’s either that or the family pet.”
Minho glared at him for that, but Jeongin seemed delighted.
“Family fox! I’m a fox!”
“Okay then, Jeonginnie’s the family’s pet fox,” Chan declared. “Now for the rest of us…”
Ever since the playhouse got installed on the playground, the eight of them had laid claim to the place. They could only play so many games of Legendary War or racing when half of them still had training wheels, with Jeongin still on a squeaky trike and after Jisung had taken a tumble skidding a puddle and how it would’ve been a real disaster if Chan hadn’t jumped off his bike to get him to safety at once. And ever since Seungmin dived into a ditch during hide-and-seek and had to be unstuck, they collectively decided they needed a change of pace.
The playhouse wasn’t a huge house. There was really only room in there to sit down and peer out the windows, plus only three of them could be in there at once. Then Minho suggested they should make up some rules, and then Chan suggested they make it into a game so it’d be more fun than just pretending they all lived in the house. And because he was their hyung, Minho agreed.
Well, that was just what he told everyone. The real reason was that Minho liked Chan. No, liked liked Chan. He didn’t need to worry about having a snotty nose because Chan would give him a tissue, laugh even if his joke wasn’t that funny, and he smelt like fresh milk but in the honey-washed way and not the cloying, heavy stuff it turned into if left out by accident. If Chan got too quiet from thinking about everything, Minho would hold his hand till Chan got happy again, and swung their hands up and down to show it. Even when the summer went on forever and their palms got sweaty, Chan wouldn’t let go until Minho did first. And Minho found it harder and harder to let go each time.
It would have been HIS secret if Hyunjin SOMEONE hadn’t blabbed to everyone else because Minho wouldn’t let him have an extra turn on his Nintendo. But it was okay. Some days later Chan told Minho that he liked liked him, too, and when everyone else was roughhousing on the slides the two of them walked around the playground holding hands. It was only the best day of Minho’s life, but whatever.
“Seungmin’s our baby, then,” said Chan.
“Eeew.”
“You’re the youngest if Jeongin’s our pet!” said Felix.
“Then I’m also the family pet,” Seungmin decided, and did doggy paws. “I’m a puppy now. Ruff ruff.”
“You’re impossible!” Changbin groaned, but Felix put a stop to it.
“Okay, okay. I’ll be the baby. I’ll be the best baby ever and won’t ever cry or do poops.”
“EEW!” Jisung laughed.
“I wanna be the cool uncle,” Changbin said. “Clear the place of puppies and foxes,” and he tickled their maknaes, squiggling and shrieking away.
“That means I’m the oldest kid!” Hyunjin cheered before he realised only Jisung was left. “Wait, is Sungie a baby too, or…”
“What? Why am I a baby?”
“You’re a day older than Lixie!”
“Ugh. No. I don’t wanna be a baby,” Jisung grumbled. “Sorry, Felix.”
“Okay, so that’s two pets, three kids and one uncle,” Chan noted.
“And we’re the parents.” Minho grinned. Of course they would be; they were the oldest.
“So is Chan-hyung or Minho-hyung our mom?” asked Jisung.
Chan and Minho blinked at the same time. They looked at each other. Then they were playing rock-paper-scissors for it.
“Best two out of three!” Chan griped when Minho’s rock beat his scissors. “I’m older than you, I should be the dad—”
“You ARE the dad.” Minho grinned. “Everyone knows moms are better.”
“Wh— Hey!”
“Now go to work, jagiya,” Minho teased. “Come back in time for dinner!”
Their first few games of House went like that. Chan left in the morning for work while Minho cooped their three kids in the playhouse and went outside to tend to their puppy and fox. Then Cool Uncle Changbin came by to break the kids out, and helped mess up the invisible kitchen while Minho made five-star meals for everybody.
Right after the food was ready, Chan would come knocking at the imaginary playhouse door.
“Honey, I’m home!”
“Yah, finally, your dinner is cooling.” Minho would snark, because that’s how they did on TV. But then Chan would hug him from behind.
“I missed you so much, Minho-yah! Work is so boring!”
“Go take a bath!” Minho would huff, and then Chan would kiss his cheek. The first time, Minho got so surprised he sank to the floor and yelled that he was stinky while Changbin and Hyunjin and Jisung and Felix and Seungmin and Jeongin's eyes and mouths went wide open to OOOOOOOHHHH at them.
And Chan, who knew him all too well, stinked up the place even more with his dimply smile.
Minho needed it in his life, Chan’s dimply smile.
Then one day in the ever-long summer, Minho decided today would be the day he kissed Chan’s cheek. They’d start their regular game, take their places, and when Chan came home from work he would just go for it first. He still went crazy whenever it happened, but this was in case Chan somehow forgot that Minho liked him, too. He had a feeling Chan never understood how much Minho adored him. How much they all adored him, actually.
But not even halfway into the day’s game, Jeongin suddenly gasped.
“Waittttt!” he yelled, and everyone stopped. Maybe he needed a water break, or a quick trip to the bushes.
“What is it, Iyen-ah?” Chan asked.
“Mom and Dad aren't married!”
Chan and Minho blinked.
“Mom-and-Dad-hyungs need to get married or the house isn’t a house. I saw it on TV.”
“Also, it’s illegal,” Seungmin added.
“What does ‘illegal’ mean?” Felix asked.
“I dunno, but we forgot to do it and hyungs didn't get married.”
Minho stared at them all with his mouth suddenly dry and open wide enough to catch flies. He looked out the nearest window at Chan and found him doing the exact same.
“Well, all parents are married,” said Jisung. “How else can they have kids?”
“I—” Minho found his voice. “Chan, tell them they’re crazy.”
“You guys are—” Chan almost said. “Wait, is it really illegal?”
“No, but it’d be… romantic,” Hyunjin said dreamily, because he constantly read too many fairy tales. “We should totally hold a wedding!”
“YES!” Changbin bellowed, which sent everyone jumping out of their skins a bit. “Dibs on being Chan-hyung’s best man!”
“What’s a best man?” Chan asked, but he was quickly ushered out of his make-believe workplace and Minho out of the playhouse by Seungmin and Jeongin, to the big tree at the end of the playground with a bunch of pink-and-yellow flowers growing on the grass below it.
“My grandpa says the best man is the guy who makes sure the guy getting married doesn’t faint,” Felix explained as he got up and ran over with Hyunjin and Jisung. Chan still looked at Minho worriedly.
“Do we have to get married now? We’re not dressed for it or anything.”
Yeah, no shit! Chan looked okay in his crisp tee and trousers, but Minho was wearing a shirt with a faded Pororo the Penguin on it and jean shorts. But if Hyunjin’s grand fairy stories were to be believed, it was how you were on the inside that mattered at weddings and not the outside. But nobody ever got married wearing what he was wearing.
“I wanna be Minho-hyung’s best man!” said Jisung. “So yes!”
“We have the best men; now we need the priest,” said Changbin.
“Innie do it! Innie wanna!”
“You don’t know any of the words!” Seungmin chided.
“Innie do it! Innie do it!”
“I’ll help you,” Felix said. “I was flower boy at my big cousin’s wedding last year. I remember some of the words.”
Hyunjin, who had also attended a wedding last year, fought to join in. “Wait, me too! I want the death do us part bit!”
Minho gasped. “We won’t die!”
“No, hyung, that’s just what they say what weddings,” Changbin explained. “Can I say the sickness and health thing?”
"Yah! Don't curse me! I haven't had any bugs in weeks!”
“Hyung... have you ever been to a wedding before? One that wasn’t on TV?”
“No.”
“Me neither,” Jisung admitted quietly. “Do I have to hold Minho-hyung up so he doesn’t faint?”
Minho looked at Chan for comfort, and then he had to look away. It seemed like he suddenly got 1000 times brighter and Minho’s heart got 10000000 times tighter, like it was trying to break out of his chest and get to Chan. Chan looked at him, all apologetic and embarrassed. How did we get here? Aren't they totally nuts?
But then he smiled.
“No, Jisung, I don’t think so… anyway, we’ve forgotten to do something else.”
And he got down.
On one knee.
“Minho, I don’t have a ring for you…”
“That’s… that’s fine.”
“Will you marry me anyway—”
“Yes!”
Minho went shivery slotting his hand into Chan’s. Their friends cheered for all of ten seconds before they hurried to get into place — except Seungmin, who was apparently still a puppy. He took a seat on the grass in front of them as the wedding’s only guest.
Chan got up, still holding Minho’s hand. If getting married to him was like this, then Minho wanted to be married to him more than anything.
“Thank you, my love,” Chan said softly, and Minho’s heart melted into a mess.
“Are you crazy?”
“Yeobo-ah...”
“Don’t, I’ll punch you,” Minho said, and demonstrated by throwing a feeble fist at Chan’s shoulder. Then he put his arms around him to hug him, if only so he wouldn't go completely crazy like he’d done so many times in the playhouse.
When Chan’s arms wrapped around him, too, Minho realised he smelt exactly like his baby wolf plushie, the one he still snuck into bed every night while everyone was saying he should’ve given up ages ago. Their hands stayed together even when they pulled themselves apart.
“Hyungs promise to be married to each other?” Jeongin asked.
“Mm-hmm.”
“For better or for worse?” Felix asked.
“Yeah.”
“In sickness and in health?” Changbin asked.
“Always.”
“To always love and cherish till death do you part?” Hyunjin asked in a grand, sweeping voice.
“Yes,” Chan said.
“Dying is for wimps!” Minho stated as Seungmin got up and applauded.
“Congratulations?” Jisung said uncertainly. “Are they married now?”
Before any of them could answer, Jeongin’s smile somehow widened even bigger.
“Hyungs kiss.”
Chan and Minho looked at each other with their eyes SUUUUUUUPER wide open. Everybody else had the GALL to go ooooooh scandalously and snicker.
“Oh,” Chan said.
“Everyone look away!” Minho shouted. “Look away now!”
“But this is your wedding!” Hyunjin protested. "What's the point of a wedding if we don't see the kiss????"
“LOOK AWAY, JINNIE!”
When everyone looked away, grumbling — and Felix, hand over his eyes, turned Jeongin around with him, Chan turned into a statue. He looked like he had swallowed a frog and all his bravery was gone. Minho didn’t suppose he fared any better.
“Um, d-do you want…” Chan pointed to his cheek. “… do you want it here, or…”
Minho’s voice was the whisperiest it had ever whispered. “No.”
“But… but Min… have you ever… you know…”
“No, have you?”
Chan shook his head fiercely. “I… wanted it to be with you.”
Minho wanted to dig himself a hole in the dirt and do a flip into it. And also punch through the clouds in the sky, how high he was flying. He’d never been happier. Chan wanted him to be his first kiss? Okay fine, he's already his, but Minho would never get over it. He moved just a little closer to Chan and looked up into his face, eyes blinking hard from cloud-mist and NOT tears. Nope!
Chan was as pink as a strawberry pudding. It was too cute and that should be illegal.
“Let’s…” Minho gestures at the air between their lips. “So it’s only once.”
“Okay. Okay. Oh my gosh, everyone’s here.”
“They won’t see. They BETTER NOT BE PEEKING!” Minho yelled, just in case. He swore he saw Seungmin rapidly flinching before he stood firmly with his back to them. “Whatever. It’s our… you know.”
Chan made a whiny noise as he bent backwards a little, but their hands were still connected. His deep breath was bigger than the one Minho had to take.
“Do you want me to go first? Or do you wanna go first?”
"At the same time,” Minho said when he summoned his spine. “Then we’re even.”
“That sounds like we’re in a fight,” Chan pouted.
“Maybe, but…” Minho looked around to check that none of their friends was peeking, and they weren't. He and Chan could run off together right there. But that wasn’t important right now, not as important as him pulling Chan closer to whisper the words he’d been carrying in his heart for him all day.
“...you do?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Minho-yah…” Chan whined again, then plonked their foreheads together. It was the NEW most beautiful, most perfect day in all of Minho’s life, hands down. It couldn’t possibly get any better—
“I love you too.”
HHHHGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
“Close your eyes when I go in, okay?” Chan whispered, and Minho just knew that if not for his hand in his, he'd have fainted for real. “I’ll close my eyes too.”
“Yeah, okay." Minho scrunched himself blind.
“Mm. Okay... I’m gonna… I’m gonna kiss you now…”
Minho immediately opened his eyes — and Chan looked like a duck. Minho swallowed his giggles. At least his husband was cute. He also leaned in, slowly, but then caught sight of Chan’s eyes fluttering open-shut like butterfly wings.
“Yah, Chan-ah, keep your eyes closed or I can’t kiss you.”
“Where are you?” Chan whispered, sounding so sad that Minho’s heart plummeted. He leaned in a little more — as Chan opened his eyes just a fraction.
Minho’s lips touched and pressed against Chan’s.
Both their eyes opened all the way.
“ARE YOU DONE YET??” shouted Jisung. And then he turned back around.