Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Yeonjun hasn’t been to Daegu in years.

When his parents had decided they wanted to move to Seoul, back when Yeonjun was 15, he’d been devastated. Daegu was Yeonjun’s whole life—he was already one of the best players in his high school’s soccer team and a sure candidate for captain in the coming years, he was his teachers favourite student in the dance studio he’d been taking classes at since the age of seven, and he’d made a habit of spending the weekends playing video games in Soobin’s room and indulging in his mom’s cooking—which was leagues ahead of Yeonjun’s own mother’s, but don’t tell her that. Daegu, small and cozy and close knit, was Yeonjun’s whole world (not that he’d seen much else).

Yeonjun had everything he needed in Daegu—his best friend Soobin; his cousin Taehyung, who lived down the street and bought him and his friends alcohol and cigarettes whenever they wanted; his dance teacher Jimin, who doted on him like Yeonjun was his own son; a soccer team filled with members he loved; a dance class filled with peers he respected, and basically everything else a teenage boy could want. That being said—leaving Daegu hadn’t actually ended up shifting Yeonjun’s world too much.

Yeonjun had never been an ugly duckling or a black sheep by any measure, but Daegu and the people there had seen all of Yeonjun’s awkward-middle-school-puberty phases. Like the summer he turned 13 and decided he would grow a moustache. Or the time he had very unintentionally and very publicly pined after his babysitter, Kim Jisoo—4 years older than him, utterly out of his league, and also a very out and fairly loud lesbian—for a good 3 years. In contrast, by the time Yeonjun’s parents packed up and moved the whole family to Seoul, Yeonjun had more or less grown up. His skin had cleared, he’d grown into his long, gangly limbs, he’d lost most of the baby fat from his cheeks and he’d figured out that no, Yeonjun, you cannot pull off a moustache. (Or successfully grow one for that matter.)

Because of this—and Yeonjun’s killer charm, mountains of talent, and undeniable good looks, thanks—when Yeonjun started his last few years of school in Seoul, it was like he was a celebrity. Gyeonsin Boy’s High School, the school he’d attended back in Daegu, had been small and close knit. It was filled with boys who’d all more or less grown up together, and while they hadn’t all been best friends, they’d certainly all known each other. Seoul Global High School was not Gyeonsin. For starters it was co-ed, and sure Yeonjun had interacted with girls back in Daegu—mostly girls that attended the same dance studio as him and, of course, Jisoo. He'd even dated one of them, but he certainly hadn’t been as exposed to them as he was now. Second, Seoul Global was at least four times the size of Gyeonsin, filled with tons and tons of students and, therefore, tons and tons of new people to gawk at Yeonjun when he’d stepped into school on his first day.

Yeonjun wasn’t an anxious person, born naturally with what more than a few people would say was a little too much confidence, but he certainly hadn’t expected the reception he’d gotten upon stepping into SGHS’s long, cream coloured halls. Girls and boys and literally everyone else had flocked to him, complimenting his looks and asking him about his interests and wondering if he wanted to come to a party someone was having at their massive mansion this weekend. As a result, Yeonjun had made friends quickly. Many were a means to an end, people who were little more than an invitation to a party or a quick fuck, but just as many were people he really, truly, loved. And while they hadn’t quite replaced Soobin—who, thankfully, Yeonjun managed to keep in touch with, Changbin and Wooyoung were still some of the best friends Yeonjun could ask for.

As a result, Seoul had, a little too quickly, eclipsed Daegu. Seoul was bigger and brighter and grander and so quick to absorb unsuspecting young people like Yeonjun, itching for action and ready to dive headfirst into anything the city threw at him. Soon enough, Soobin became his only remaining link to his birth town—even his cousin, Taehyung, moved to Seoul to get his masters degree. Yeonjun even unfollowed Kim Jisoo on Instagram (she’d never followed him back).

And then, last September, Yeonjun’s very last link to Daegu moved into his college dorm room.

Soobin and Yeonjun had both been accepted into SNU—this was of course a planned decision, Yeonjun and Soobin had even opened their decision emails on video call together before both of them had said hasty, excited goodbyes and rushed off to tell their parents. It was perhaps the most excited Yeonjun had ever been—especially given that neither boy had seen the other in well over 3 years, ever since Yeonjun had moved to Seoul before they began the ninth grade. They’d pulled some strings, begged administration, and managed to get a dorm together, with Changbin and Wooyoung and a good chunk of Yeonjun’s other friends just a couple buildings over. It was perfect, even though Soobin spent most of his time at home watching anime and playing video games and Yeonjun went out every other night to go to a house party or some new club Changbin wanted to visit. They were deeply different in an inherent sort of way—but Soobin would still be up when Yeonjun got home drunk, taking a break from his video games to let Yeonjun into their room, ready with a pack of Advil Nightime and and plastic bin in case Yeonjun needed to throw up. In return, Yeonjun made sure to get Soobin out of the house at least once in a while and made him ramen when Soobin’s pre-med classes started to really kick his ass.

With Soobin moving in with him though, thoughts of Daegu completely left Yeonjun’s mind. Before, Yeonjun had thought about visiting, maybe between the end of high school and the start of college. He’d have crashed at Soobin’s place for a week or so—Soobin’s mom wouldn’t mind, Aunty Sandara loved Yeonjun, and boy had Yeonjun missed her cooking. Soobin’s dad loved him just as much and everyone in Daegu knew about the massive (entirely unreciprocated, thank you very much) crush Soobin’s little brother, Beomgyu, had harboured for Yeonjun when he was a kid. They’d let him crash there no problem.

But then Soobin had moved to Seoul right along with him, and Yeonjun hadn’t thought about visiting Daegu since. The city, as much as Yeonjun did love it, stayed cradled in the back of his mind. A comforting little notion, but not one Yeonjun dwelled on regularly. He remembered it fondly, just not often. And then, the day Yeonjun sat for his final exam for his History of World Dances class, Soobin asked him the question.

Yeonjun had been lying flat on his bed, scrolling through his phone. He’d just finished taking a cigarette break and the headrush was quickly wearing off. Soobin was sitting at his desk, still pouring over his organic chemistry notes—Yeonjun was so far the only one done with his exams, the only reason he’d stayed at home tonight instead of going out to celebrate having (probably) successfully finished his first year of college. He’d celebrate for real this weekend when their whole friend group would officially be done with finals. 

Yeonjun remembers the moment rather clearly: the room had been silent, save for the squeak of Soobin’s chair as he shifted nervously. One moment he was muttering under his breath about "carbon compounds" and "hydrogen particles" and a hundred other things Yeonjun didn’t know nor care about, and the next Soobin was swivelling around in his chair, so fast and so suddenly it actually got Yeonjun to look up from his phone.

“Do you want to come to Daegu with me for a bit in the summer,” Soobin said, he had the kind of crazed look in his eyes one can get when one has spent several days reading about Alkyl Halides and Nucleophilic Substitution, whatever that was. “I was talking to mom when you were at your exam and she said she missed you! Apparently no one has an appetite for her cooking like you do—Beomgyu eats like a bird and I’m, well, here, and all that stuff.” He pauses for a minute, looking up at Yeonjun with crazed, wide, sleep-deprived-caffeine-fuelled eyes (there’s an entire wall in Soobin’s side of the dorm room dedicated to his steadily growing collection of monster energy). “You can crash at our place, obviously.”

The answer had been obvious.

The drive to Daegu is familiar in a bittersweet, nostalgic sort of way. After begging and pleading and finally convincing Soobin to beg and plead with him, Yeonjun's mom had let them borrow her truck for the trip—on the condition that Yeonjun bring it back without a scratch and under no circumstances drive it intoxicated. Now, Yeonjun is 2/3rds of the way to Daegu. Soobin doesn't drive unless he's absolutely forced to, and can admit he's not the best driver either, and is instead nestled in the passengers sheet nervously checking and rechecking google maps like a crutch—they literally cannot take a wrong turn, they still have a while to go on the highway, there is literally no other road for miles. Unfortunately, when Yeonjun voices this (along with a warning about how Soobin's phone is going to run out of battery if he keeps checking it this often and how we only brought one cable and we need it for music and you refused to drive which means I have to do it and everyone knows the driver gets to pick, Soobin-ah), Soobin ignores him. Maybe it's Yeonjun's fault for being best friends with someone chronically anxious.

Yeonjun has only driven down this road once before, and it's been ages since he did it, but something about it is achingly familiar. They'd taken the same route when they came to Seoul from Daegu, and Yeonjun from five years ago had spent the entire car ride pressed up against the window, staring behind him at his old hometown long, long after Daegu had faded completely from view. This time he's driving down the opposite direction, and something about it feels both brand new and like coming home for the first time in years. Both their parents call intermittently throughout the journey—far too often for what is, really, a three hour drive. Yeonjun's mom calls twice to make sure the car is okay, Soobin's mom calls once to ask what time they were going to reach and wether Yeonjun and Soobin wanted to share a room like they did back when Yeonjun used to live in Daegu or if Yeonjun would prefer sleeping alone in the guest room. Yeonjun says either is fine and Soobin cuts the call quickly.

Yeonjun hums, eyes fixed on the road. "Did you guys always have a guest room?" He asks, "I could have sworn you didn't, I can't remember one at all."

"Oh!" Soobin exclaims, "I forgot that you were already gone when we remodelled the house!" Yeonjun hums to show that he's listening and Soobin continues. "Yeah, a little after you left, Dad decided he wanted to make use of his interior design degree or whatever and redid a bunch of the house. Then Beomgyu rewatched Little Women and decided he wanted to live in the attic because Soarise Ronan's character used to write there and shit, so dad turned his room into the guest room."

Yeonjun whistles, thoroughly amused, “Huh. Same old Beomgyu, then?”

"Eh," Soobin says, his hand moves back and forth in a ‘neither here nor there’ movement, “I mean, kinda? He’s still a pretentious little brat, but thankfully he's all grown up now and probably too busy to give us any trouble." Soobin pauses for a minute, thinking. “He’s also taller—like, not anywhere near me, and probably still you, but he’s definitely taller than when you were last here.”

Yeonjun snorts. Choi Beomgyu—he remembers Choi Beomgyu.

The last time Yeonjun had seen him, Soobin's little brother had been twelve or thirteen. Although their age gap wasn't too big—he was just a year younger than Soobin, two grades below him and Yeonjun at school—it had been big enough for Soobin's parents to pawn Beomgyu off on his older brother and his friends, and it was big enough for it to feel like they were babysitting him. In Yeonjun's memories Beomgyu is a lightning flash, all over the place, at once both too shy and too loud for his own good. Yeonjun remembers him as a gangly little thing, small and skinny, still not tall enough to have grown into his too long limbs. He was always a cute kid though, with big brown eyes and an an even bigger smile, a tad too excitable. He was a series of extremes Yeonjun had never quite managed to wrap his head around, sometimes he'd be too shy to talk to Yeonjun, peering at him from behind his big brother, sometimes he'd follow both of them around with stars in his eyes, ignoring Soobin's pleas for him to go away. 

Yeonjun hasn't seen him in ages—he’s heard Soobin talking to him on the phone every once in a while, but that’s mostly just them arguing with each other, Beomgyu’s voice is whiney and exaggerated and somehow still endearing, coated in static as it fills their dorm room. It's a good few octaves deeper than Yeonjun remembers it being, he finds he quite enjoys it when he hears it echoing through their room. Soobin and Beomgyu don’t video call ever so Yeonjun has no clue what the younger boy looks like, but he can’t look all that different from the last time Yeonjun had seen him. He was cute, the kind of little boy mothers cooed at and older siblings (save for Soobin) doted on—eyes too big for his face, cheeks still carrying baby fat, a head of short, brown hair combed back neatly, and dressed up in Mrs. Choi’s affinity for little sweaters and smart slacks, the same way Soobin had dressed until he’d come to college and escaped his mother’s clutches (and the financial backing she provided for his closet).

It had also been fairly clear, especially in the early days, that Beomgyu had had a bit of a crush on Yeonjun—an echo of Yeonjun's own childhood crush on his babysitter. Yeonjun remembers thinking it was mostly cute and mildly annoying, and he has rather distinct memories of placating Beomgyu's pouty attention seeking face with head pats and promises of telling him where Soobin kept his secret stash of gummy worms (in his desk drawer, directly under a packet of sharpies that had long since dried up). But Yeonjun hasn't seen Beomgyu since he left, and he really has no clue what the younger boy is like now—he's sure Soobin's mom isn't too different from when he'd last seen her, but (almost) five years can mean a world a difference when one is a teenager. Yeonjun's exposure to Beomgyu since leaving Daegu has also been limited more or less entirely to sometimes hearing him on the phone with Soobin and the fact that Yeonjun still follows him on Instagram—except Beomgyu is chronically offline and only posts pictures of the sky and his pet parrot, Toto, so this isn't very helpful. Even the family picture Soobin keeps on his desk is from years ago, and features a rosy cheeked, gap toothed, 10-year-old Beomgyu and a barely older, 11-year-old, equally gap toothed Soobin.

"That takes me back," Yeonjun whistles, the trees speed past him in a haze of green, “what’s he been up to? I feel like I haven’t seen him in ages.”

“That’s because you haven’t,” Soobin teases, eyes back on his phone, google maps still plastered across his screen. “He’s good though, I think. He’s probably going to be in Seoul with us next year, trying to get some sort of fine arts degree, I don’t really know the nitty-gritties.” He says, “he’s good at it, though—god knows I don’t know anything about art but I know he’s talented enough to get in anywhere he wants to if he actually tries.” Soobin sounds at once proud and exasperated, it’s moments like these that had a younger Yeonjun cursing his parents for him being an only child. Soobin continues, “oh my god, and he got, like, annoyingly popular once he got to high school. I had people asking me about the fucker like that isn’t the most humiliating thing you could do to an older brother—”

Yeonjun hums, tuning Soobin out as he continues his tirade. He's excited to meet Soobin's family again—it feels like a long awaited reunion and Yeonjun is itching to get out of the car.

They pass the rest of the drive in relative silence, alternating between Yeonjun and Soobin's playlists. It's a stark mix of alternative rap and r&b, courtesy of Yeonjun, punctuated with Soobin's collection of 2nd and 3rd generation kpop classics—Yeonjun doesn't think he's ever listened to this many K-ara songs in one go before. It's comfortable, like everything about Soobin and Yeonjun, the way it has been for as long as he can remember. 

Yeonjun knows they've finally arrived when The Daegu 83 Tower comes into view, towering high over the rest of the city. Almost immediately, familiarity hits Yeonjun like an off target bullet barrelling past him at full speed. The memories come crawling out of some long forgotten recess of Yeonjun's mind, and Yeonjun remembers everything—the trees that line the street they're driving down, the 24/7 convenience store that has stayed dependably open since Yeonjun was a child, the way the colours pop off the sprawling murals near Bangcheon Market, the animal shaped flower arrangements that can be seen as you drive passed the Daegu Arboretum, Soobin's favourite cafe complete with colourful interiors and macadamia-nut-white-chocolate-chip cookies, everything, exactly how he remembers it. 

Yeonjun had forgotten that he remembered any of it at all. Suddenly, he's 15 again. 

Soobin had mentioned they’d redone the house, but from the outside it’s just as it is in Yeonjun's memories. All white wall and exposed brick work with large windows, the whole house covered and crawling with sprawling ivy, as if Aunty Sandara’s garden was going to swallow it whole. It’s slightly smaller than Yeonjun remembers it being, or maybe he’s just bigger now, but it still inspires the same excited comfort it did all those years ago—and before they’ve even parked the car, Soobin’s mum comes barreling out.

Despite Soobin’s frankly ridiculous height, Choi Sandara stands at just barely 5 feet, with a wide, heart shaped smile and soft features, eyes crinkling at the sides as the car pulls to a stop. She’s on him the second Yeonjun’s out of the car, limbs wrapped around his shoulders. “Yeonjun-ah, gosh, I haven’t seen you in ages!” She says, “oh my, you’ve gotten so big and strong—I’m glad you’re keeping healthy! How are you? How have you been? How was the drive over—“

“I’m here too, Ma,” Soobin pouts sulkily, getting ready to unload their luggage from the car.

Sandara rolls her eyes teasingly and lets go of Yeonjun with a final pat on the shoulder. "Yes, yes, you big baby,” she says, walking over to Soobin to engulf him in a hug. It’s rather funny really, Soobin is well over a foot taller than his mother is, Sandara stands up on her tippy toes as she tries to to hug him and Soobin has to bend down so she can. 

They grab their suitcases and follow Mrs. Choi indoors. Despite her small stature, she’s quick and moves rapidly—Soobin’s clearly used to it, using his stupidly long legs to his advantage, but Yeonjun finds himself having to jog lightly to keep up. The inside of the Choi Household has in fact changed since Yeonjun had last been there, the house looks modernised and elevated, the frilly lamps and floral prints Yeonjun remembers have been replaced by sleek overhead lighting and prints that are less akin to what your grandma may have at home and more to what you’d expect to see on the next edition of architectural digest. Still, some things remain the same—the walls are plastered with art, many that Yeonjun remembers from his time spent in the Choi Household as a child, and more that are brand new. Sandara’s plants still take up nearly every empty spot the house may have had, and Mr. Choi’s massive, room spanning record collection has only grown. Even though Yeonjun has never seen this room in this avatar, it feels like coming home. 

“Since you’re going to be spending a whole six weeks here I thought it’d be better to set you up in the guest room than in Soobin’s, figured you two could use a break from living in the same room,” Mrs. Choi says. Just as Soobin had mentioned, it’s the door he remembers as being Beomgyu’s. This room, by far, is the one that has changed the most (in contrast, Soobin’s is the one that’s changed the least, looking more or less identical except with a fresh varnish and a new coat of paint). Gone are the emo band posts and fairy lights and silly polaroids that Yeonjun remembers, instead replaced with a nice sage green wall, a densely patterned ornate carpet, and a distressed wooden desk facing a large, sunny, window with a view of the large acorn tree in the Choi’s backyard. The window is the only remnant of Beomgyu’s time in this bedroom, adorned with an attempted stained glass piece that, despite being made by a 12 year old Choi Beomgyu, really was rather nice—bright, hazy colours depicting a sun framed by a pair of simply drawn clouds, gazing down at a city skyline. 

It’s nice, the room, and after spending years in a cramped Seoul apartment and then an even more cramped college dormitory, Yeonjun can more than get used to it.

“Now, the room doesn’t have an attached bathroom, so you’ll be sharing with Soobin and Beomgyu—I’m sure you remember where it is,” Sandara says, and she’s right, he does, “oh, and speaking of Beomgyu,” she says, ducking out of the room and motioning for Yeonjun to follow, “I should get you familiar with the attic.”

Yeonjun drops his suitcase on the ground and immediately follows Sandara outside, where she’s staring up at the ceiling. He follows her gaze and notices a large, square, access door above him. Sandara huffs as she gazes up at it. “I’m not sure if Soobin told you already but when we were renovating Beomgyu asked if he could live in the attic and, well, you know how Jiyong is, he can’t say no to the kid.” Her words are exasperated, but the smile on her face is large and happy and genuine. “Anyway,” she chuckles, pointing up at the hatch, “Beomgyu lives up there now, so if you ever open your door and see someone crawling out of the ceiling just know that it’s him—if you ever wanna get up access is pretty easy, you just pull down the hatch using this,” she grabs a thin, steel rod with a hook attached to the end from the supply closet beside Soobin’s room. She makes quick work of pulling down the hatch and a black, steel ladder emerges from the ceiling—Yeonjun wonders how Beomgyu lives like this, but he’s always been a little odd. “The process is pretty simple, just be careful when opening the door to your room ‘cos it’s directly in front of the where the ladder will be if someone’s trying to get in or out, god knows how many times Soobin has rammed the door into it—just open the door carefully and you’ll be fine.”

“Thank you,” Yeonjun says, when Mrs. Choi is done with her demonstration and the ladder has retracted from the hallway back safely into Beomgyu’s attic, “I’ll try my best not to knock Beomgyu off his staircase.”

“That makes one of us,” Soobin says, appearing from his own room to stand beside Yeonjun. He just barely evades the smack his mother sends his way and says, “where is he anyway?”

“Oh, he’s with Heeseung-ah, said he’ll be back by tomorrow morning,” she turns on her heel, seemingly unbothered by the complete mystery that is Beomgyu’s location, and gestures for them to follow. “Now come along, I’ve laid out lunch in the kitchen. I’m sure you two are exhausted from the drive!”

As they follow Mrs. Choi down the stairs, Soobin nudges at Yeonjun’s side. “By the way “with Heeseung-ah” is Beomgyu for “going out tonight and coming home plastered at ass o clock in the morning”—just so you know,” He whispers, so quiet Yeonjun would miss it if he hadn’t been trained in all things Soobin since the age of 3. “He usually sleeps in the guest room when he pulls this shit, but he’ll probably figure out how to scramble into the attic tonight so don’t worry about that. Just know that if you hear, like, strange noises at 4am, it’s Beomgyu trying to climb into his room.” Soobin pauses for a second. “Probably.” 

The rest of the day passes easily. Soobin and Yeonjun decide to spend it at home catching up with Mrs. Choi, telling her about college and answering each and every one of her innumerable questions to the best of their abilities. Soobin’s dad comes home around dinner time and gives Yeonjun a hug just as big and warm and familiar as his wife had. Choi Jiyong is the mirror image of his oldest son, tall and lanky with bright eyes and deep dimples. His hair’s grown greyer since Yeonjun had last seen him, and he certainly wears his age more than his wife does, but he still looks solid and dependable and comforting, the way he always had to Yeonjun growing up. 

“Look at you, bulking up and hitting the gym for the summer, huh?” Mr. Choi jokes when he first sees Yeonjun, patting his bicep appreciatively. “Beomgyu’s friend Taehyun keeps coming over trying to get Beomgyu to the gym with him, but Beomgyu somehow manages to switch it up and convince the poor kid to stay at home and play video games with him instead," He says, warm eyes tinted with a spark of mischief. "Can’t say I blame him, I’d do the same!” He laughs, wrapping his free hand around Soobin and laughing freely, “Chip off the old block, both of ya,” he laughs, ruffling Soobin’s hair.

“The gym is gross and smells like sweat,” Soobin says plainly, wrinkling his nose. Mr. Choi laughs, nodding wholeheartedly in agreement—his wife huffs, mumbling under her breath about how they’re both getting old and maybe going for at least a walk or two every once in a while is a good idea.

Dinner is delicious. Soobin’s Mom is perhaps the best cook Yeonjun has ever met and she defends this title to the best of her abilities, producing a massive pot of Yukgaejang and a tray of Bossam which Yeonjun all but inhales after two semesters of SNU cafeteria food. The whole day is light and easy, Yeonjun gets to talk about himself—something that he admittedly quite enjoys doing, telling Mr. and Mrs. Choi about his dancing and that no, he isn’t seeing anyone right now and yes, his parents are doing well. 

When they wrap up and go to bed, Yeonjun is still buzzing. He takes a quick shower and helps Mr. Choi clean up in hopes of expelling some of his leftover energy, but it’s still barely past 11 and college has all but completely fucked up his sleep schedule, so really he doesn’t get anywhere close to sleepy until 3 or 4 in the morning. Still, despite having driven for three hours, Yeonjun had spent the rest of the day doing more or less nothing, so he isn’t too tired out either. He’d go bother Soobin but Soobin crashed the second they got to their rooms, already passed out in his childhood bed when Yeonjun had let himself in after his evening shower. With no social gatherings to attend and no more work left to finish—the semester is over, thank god— Yeonjun’s not entirely sure what to do with himself. Now that there aren’t a 100 assignments breathing down his neck, Yeonjun finds himself at a bit of a loss. He’s not bored, that isn’t the right word for it. But he is restless, itching for something exciting.

He finds ways to entertain himself; goes out for a little walk around Soobin’s neighbourhood before sneaking back into his bedroom, walking up the stairs as quietly as he can; catches up on some drama he’d stopped watching a while ago mid way through; makes a new playlist for the summer. It’s almost nice, having nothing to do, and then finally around 2 a.m the day starts to hit him. He’s not nodding off to sleep just yet, but the bed seems to suck him in deeper and deeper as the minutes pass, and the off switch on his bedside lamp looks more and more enticing.

Around an hour later, just after Yeonjun’s turned off the light but before he’s fully fallen asleep, scrolling through TikTok in the dark, the door opens.

The silhouette at the door is tall and slim, haloed by the light leaking in from the hallway. Yeonjun can’t make out a face, and he’d be scared if Soobin hadn’t mentioned Beomgyu’s habits of returning home and heading straight to this very room earlier in the day. The younger boy hasn’t noticed him yet, even when he closes the door behind him—Yeonjun doesn’t clue him in, amused by Beomgyu drunken staggering and the curse he lets out as his hand wanders the door blindly, trying in vain to find a light switch. It’s an odd situation, one reminiscent of Yeonjun’s own drunken arrivals late at night, on days when Soobin hasn’t stayed up studying and the dorm room is dark upon his return. Beomgyu’s movements are hazy and sluggish, Yeonjun can tell he’s drunk even without being able to see him. Something falls to the floor with a halfhearted clang and Yeonjun picks up a softly murmured “fuck!” Yeonjun, thoroughly amused, decides to take pity on him.

When he switches the light on, Yeonjun is the one that’s surprised.

He’d conjured an image of a fully grown Beomgyu in his head, the same face he remembered growing up but on a taller, older body, with neatly cropped hair and a cute little cardigan. The way Beomgyu had looked in most of Yeonjun’s memories, even after turning thirteen and discovering My Chemical Romance and The Perks Of Being A Wallflower.

This Beomgyu is anything but that.

His eyes are hazy and his eyebrows are pinched in confusion, he’s noticed the light but in his drunken haze has yet to notice Yeonjun. The expression is familiar. Yaeonjun’s seen sleep hazy Beomgyu before and his expression now is definitely reminiscent of those early morning memories in the backseat of Yeonjun’s moms car, when they used to carpool together to school—but that’s about where the similarities stop.

This Beomgyu is tall and impossibly lithe, waif-like in his build, wearing a figure hugging black satin blouse and a pair of form fitting, velvety, brown pants with some sort of animal print on them. He’s covered in glitter, remnants of a long night out, it catches in the lamplight and bathes him in a light shimmer. 

His face has traces of the Beomgyu Yeonjun remembers, large eyes and a straight nose, but everything else is different.

In Yeonjun’s memories Beomgyu’s eyes are bug-like in their largeness, now, even droopy with drunkenness, they’re wide and luxurious, lined with smokey kohl and framed by long, dense eyelashes so perfect that, for a moment, Yeonjun wonders if they’re false. His face used to be full, in Yeonjun’s memory Beomgyu looks all too much like a circle, now his cheeks are still plush but his jaw has sharpened so much Yeonjun worries that, were he not careful, he’d cut himself on it’s edges. His nose is straight and elegant, and Yeonjun remembers it as looking out of place on Beomgyu’s boyish face. Here, it’s impossibly perfect. The kind of nose people show they’re plastic surgeons. His hair, that had previously been kept short and neat and boyish, is so long it’s starting to graze the skin of his shoulders, thick and shiny and begging for Yeonjun’s hands to grab at. His lips—Yeonjun has no specific memory of Beomgyu’s lips, now he wonders why. They’re lush and pink and doll like, softened around the edges by fading gloss, so plush and shiny that the light catches here too. When Yeonjun looks closer, they look swollen, like Beomgyu’s been thoroughly kissed. 

There’s more still, things that had escaped Yeonjun’s memory and now come barrelling at him with full force. Like the delicate little mole by the side of Beomgyu’s lips, or the perfect arch of his dense, dark eyebrow. The little heart tattooed on his neck, so small one might easily mistake it for a mole or a birthmark. The glittering silver rings that run up his ears. The way his shirt wraps around his waist, so small that if he were to try, Yeonjun thinks his hands alone could wrap themselves all the way around it. Yeonjun feels vaguely like he’s tied to the tracks, about to be run over by a speeding train. 

He gulps so hard he worries Beomgyu can hear it.

The boy has yet to notice his presence, confusion from the sudden light melting into a dismissed relief as he closes his eyes and stretches his arms high over his head, working out the kinks and aches from what has clearly been a long night of drinking and probably dancing. Yeonjun can’t look away from him. Beomgyu tilts his head to the side, working out the long, graceful arch of his snow white neck, and opens his eyes, immediately meeting Yeonjun’s.

For a second he’s scared, then confused, then a look of realisation melts onto his face and a bright, pretty, embarrassed pink settles onto the apples of his cheeks.

“Oh,” Beomgyu slurs, voice heavy with drunkenness. “It’s you.”

Yeonjun gulps once again. Beomgyu’s arrival is still sinking into him, electric deep in his bones. His mind is reeling—of all his thoughts about reuniting with Choi Beomgyu, never even once had he entertained the possibility of being attracted to him. Yet here he is, Choi Yeonjun, all but speechless at the sight of his best friend's little brother. His best friend's incredibly hot little brother, who Yeonjun has known since before he could form complete sentences.

Soobin had lied, Beomgyu was decidedly not "more or less the same" since the last time Yeonjun had seen him.

He clears his throat, trying his best to break out of the stupor Beomgyu—and probably sleeplessness—had just put him in. “H-hey,” he croaks, wincing at the near prepubescent break in his voice. “Been a while.”

Beomgyu, still hazy, stays silent for a moment, taking him in. Yeonjun squirms under his gaze, his black tank top and plaid Uniqlo pyjama pants at any other occasion would serve to only enhance Yeonjun’s confidence—his tank may be old and ratty, but boy do they make his arms look good. But here, with Beomgyu looking down at him dressed to the nines with club mussed hair (and, realistically, probably sex mussed as well) and a sheen of glitter, Yeonjun feels small and naked and unworthy to be basking in the newfound glory that is Choi Beomgyu. 

The pink is still bright on Beomgyu’s cheeks, getting darker and spreading wider the longer he stares down at Yeonjun. His eyes wander the room, alternating back and forth between the floor, Yeonjun, the desk, Yeonjun, the cupboard, Yeonjun. “Yeah, been forever,” he mumbles eventually—there’s a shyness to his words which, coupled with the way Beomgyu looks away from Yeonjun’s eyes hastily, turning to face the lamp instead (which only serves to illuminate his impossibly pretty, impossibly pink face further) makes something in Yeonjun’s chest clench. “Sorry for, uh, intruding,” Beomgyu continues bashfully, hands twisting together by his stomach. “I drunk I’m a little think right now and I forgot you and Hyung were back—wait, fuck, I-I mean, uh, sorry, you get it, I’ll get out of your hair!”

His words slip slide over each other, breaking Yeonjun out of his frozen state. Except now, instead of awe, he’s drowning in what can only be described as cuteness aggression, thoroughly amused and bone deep endeared by the younger boy. “Don’t worry about it,” he says softly. “You going to be able to get up to your room okay?”

Beomgyu’s already opening the door when he replies. “I’ll, uh, probably just crash on the couch tonight, don’t worry. Good night. Talk to you tomorrow.” And then the door slams shut behind him and he's gone as suddenly and surprisingly as he arrived.

Yeonjun remains frozen for what feels like hours afterwards, staring at the phantom of where Beomgyu had been by the door, heart beating faster than it has any right to be. When he manages to collect himself enough to turn off the light and pull the covers over himself, panic settles into his bones. He’s hit by the jarring, sudden, and rather devastating realisation that Choi Beomgyu may just be the most beautiful person Yeonjun has ever laid his eyes on. He’s then hit by several realisations that are rather worse.

1) Choi Beomgyu is stunning.
2) Choi Beomgyu is Soobin—Yeonjun’s best friend’s little brother. 
3) Choi Beomgyu is therefore 100% off limits. 
And 4) despite this, Yeonjun really, really, badly, shamefully, desperately, wants him.

The final realisation is that, by his own doing, Yeonjun is stuck in The Choi Household for a month and a half. With Choi Beomgyu. 

Yeonjun really needs another fucking cigarette. 

Chapter Text

Yeonjun wakes up too early.

When he turns on his side to check his phone, it’s barely past 6:30. Yeonjun never wakes up before 9, even on days when he probably should. He attributes this strange new sleep pattern to the even stranger dream he’d had last night—the one with that strange (incredibly beautiful) man breaking into his room (Soobin’s family guest-room) and leaving just as quickly. The man who bore a striking resemblance to his best friends little brother, but could not, in any possible shape, manner or form—even in Yeonjun’s simulated dreamscape of a world—have been him. 

He decides, in the 45 minutes or so that it takes for him to actually get out of bed—at a little past 7, which is still entirely too early, especially given that he’s on holiday—that his brain must have conjured up the whole incident. Must’ve picked up remnants of Beomgyu from his memories and fused them with more modern streams of thought. Like Han Sohee in that one music video Yeonjun had watched six times last night in his long winded attempt to fall asleep. Or the way Yeonjun’s preferences in terms of his partners had developed since he started, well, fucking—and how whoever it was that had showed in his dream last night had been the perfect culmination of all those preferences. After all, a person so perfectly tailor made to check every single one of Yeonjun’s little boxes, could decidedly not be real. Least of all Choi Beomgyu.

The realisation—or perhaps it’s a decision?—makes him feel better about the whole thing. Yeonjun isn't attracted to Choi Beomgyu, that's ridiculous! Not the same Choi Beomgyu who’d spent most of his childhood years following Yeonjun around like a lost puppy. Not the same Choi Beomgyu who listened exclusively to Paramore, Gerard Way and bad conspiracy theory podcasts after turning 11. Not the same Choi Beomgyu that is Yeonjun’s best friend’s annoying little brother. There's no way. It, quite simply, isn't possible. Just a silly little prank his brain had decided to play on him in the wee hours of the morning after an altogether too-long day. 

At 6:30 in the morning, after Yeonjun's had some rest, the thought almost makes him giggle.

It is this rather relieving realisation that manages to drag Yeonjun out of bed and guide him down to the kitchen to make himself a cup of coffee. Yeonjun’s been in the Choi household enough times to know where everything is. Even after they’ve remodelled, he easily figures out his way around the kitchen. He grabs a coffee pod and slides it into Soobin’s dad’s most prized possession (second only to his record collection and sometimes his sons)—his Nespresso Vertuo Premium Coffee Machine. It’s the best coffee Yeonjun’s had in months, since the cafeteria at school only has instant and the only coffee shop on campus is a Starbucks which has coffee that is nearly worse than what they've got in the cafeteria. This stuff is good though, really good, it runs down Yeonjun’s throat rich and bitter and warm and exactly the way he likes it.

He basks in the sunlight streaming into The Choi's kitchen as he sips his way through the cup. He's not used to being awake so early, but he finds that he quite enjoys the haze in the early morning sunlight, just a little easier on his sleep weary eyes. He heads to the living room, taking a seat on one of the large, brightly patterned sofas and sighing into a long, happy sip from his coffee. Maybe he should buy a Nespresso Vertuo Premium Coffee Machine. 

Little by little, the house wakes up. It’s a monday morning, so things move slow. Yeonjun stays by himself in the living room, gazing out the window, for a good hour or so before anyone else joins him. In fact, it's already 8:30 when Mr. Choi shows up, apparently having had the same idea as Yeonjun, and walking straight to his beloved coffee machine. He easily draws a silky smooth shot of espresso—without any of the clumsy fumbling Yeonjun had endured while figuring out how to operate the machine. When he notices Yeonjun on the sofa, he flashes him a smile. While in every other regard Mr. Choi is the perfect mirror of his eldest son, his smile is like Beomgyu’s. Large and broad, eyes curled into half moons, dimples whiskering up from his lips all the way to the apples of his cheeks—the same way Beomgyu’s do. Completely different from Soobin’s, which settle into either side of his lip in deep, concentrated crescents, like his mum’s. 

Yeonjun’s brain flashes back to the dream he’d had list night. He swallows it down. He doesn't know why, but for some reason he feels guilty.

“Morning!” He says instead, as cheerfully as he can manage.

“Morning, Yeonjun-ah,” Mr. Choi replies. He walks into the living room idly, body loose and relaxed. He settles himself into a sofa facing Yeonjun and relaxes into it with a hum. “I hope you slept well," he says warmly. "The guest room can get a little noisy at night since it’s right under Beomgyu’s bedroom. The walls in the attic are just a little thinner than the others.” There’s an ease to everything Mr. Choi does and says, the way he melts comfortably into the couch, the way he sips languidly at his coffee. At any other occasion Yeonjun would be the same. He’s fairly laid back in most senses of the word, quick to make himself comfortable. But this morning, a nagging guilt stabs at his skin, like very soon something is going to go very wrong.

“I slept well, thank you,” he says politely. “I think I’m only up this early ‘cause I’m excited. Kinda restless to see how everything’s changed.”

Mr. Choi blinks at Yeonjun, a little confused, and then he shoots up, back straight in realisation and eyes a tad brighter. “Ah yes! It’s been a while since you were last in Daegu, hasn’t it? What, five years?” He says, smiling blithely. “Gosh, seeing you sitting here made me shoot right back to when you used to come by everyday with Soobin, I nearly forgot you’d been gone.”

It’s funny, how five years can mean so little to Mr. Choi. It makes sense, in the grand scheme of things five years is a barely-there chunk in the life Mr. Choi has lived. It’s crazy how in Yeonjun’s, five years has already made this many utterly damming changes.

For a while no one else comes down. Yeonjun and Mr. Choi engage in easy, mostly meaningless conversation. Mr. Choi asks him again if he’s seeing anyone and Yeonjun laughs and brushes it off, saying that yes, there have been a few but nothing really serious (the face from last night rears it's lovely, imaginary head once again). Soobin is both a heavy sleeper and a late sleeper, so Yeonjun isn’t expecting to see him out of bed for at least another 2 or 3 hours. If Yeonjun remembers right, Mrs. Choi is similar. Back when Yeonjun used to sleep over all the time, Beomgyu would usually be the one up first. He'd wake up early in the morning, mostly so that he could sneak a strawberry pop-tart for breakfast before anyone (Mrs. Choi) was awake to say or do anything about it. He’d already be up by the time Yeonjun ambled down from Soobin’s room, usually either playing video games in the living room or guzzling down a cup of coffee considerably larger than it should’ve been, especially given that Beomgyu had been twelve at the time.

This reminder only serves to further itch the unease rubbing against the back of Yeonjun’s neck. He decides not to question why.

He manages to ignore the feeling, putting away all thoughts regarding Beomgyu and the mysterious, hallway-light-haloed figure from the night before. Instead, he focuses on listening intently to Mr. Choi talk about how the neighbours, Mr. and Mrs. Min, were going to be having a dinner party next week and how Mr. Choi really didn’t want to go. It’s so easy to lose himself in the conversation that Yeonjun almost forgets why he's so nervous in the first place—the answer comes around half an hour later, in soft, sock padded footsteps descending down the stairs. 

“Morning,” a soft voice mumbles out, velvety and deep and thick with sleep.

Mr. Choi, who Yeonjun’s eyes are still trained on, brightens instantly, facing away from Yeonjun to look towards the stairs. “Ah, Gyu,-yah!" He says, “when did you get home?”

“Uh,” the voice replies—Yeonjun still hasn’t made an attempt to look at him, hands fisted and eyes still nervously trained at Mr. Choi, afraid of what awaits him when he looks away. “Around 8-ish.”

He’s lying. Yeonjun had already been down here at eight. Beomgyu had to have come home before that, unless he’d crafted some sort of special secret entrance into the house that Yeonjun didn’t know about.

“Heeseung drove me home on his way to morning football practice." Beomgyu continues, "I was planning on going back to sleep but Mom sent me a bunch of messages late last night about how I should properly greet Yeonjun-hyung when I woke up, and I felt bad.”

The sound of his name coated in that dense, honeyed voice sends a trickle of electricity running down Yeonjun’s back. He finally, finally looks away from Mr. Choi, swallowing tightly, and comes face to face with one Choi Beomgyu.

Last night had not been a dream.

Yeonjun now knows for sure that Beomgyu is lying to Mr. Choi about coming home at 8 in the morning, because there, at the foot of the stairs, stands the same man from the night before (who’d been home around 4 hours earlier than he claimed to be). Yeonjun now also knows that he hadn’t made up anything at all last night, that the person he’d seen had in no way been some imagined phantom that existed purely in his mind. The glitter has been meticulously scrubbed off his skin, and the only remnant of last night’s makeup is the barely-there smudge of kohl he hadn’t fully managed to wash off, but it is still undeniably him. The clothes are different too, tight, black, all too-enticing silk top replaced by a too-big t-shirt with some band poster on it that Yeonjun's never heard of. The t-shirt swallows his frame entirely and, complete with a a set of pyjamas with some sort of teddy bear pattern on them that swamp around his sock clad feet, succeeds utterly and completely in making Yeonjun’s heart cease up in his chest. 

The Beomgyu from the night before, at least on paper, had been more Yeonjun’s type. Smokey and dark and sexy. But this Beomgyu, washed clean in the early morning light—long, dark hair sleep ruffled and thick and still begging for Yeonjun’s hands, and legs still so long they seemingly never end, even when drowned under pants that are at least two sizes big for him—has Yeonjun feeling just as disoriented as the night before. There's just something about the faint acne scars now visible on his cheeks, no longer hidden under a layer of concealer, and the fading bruises on his elbow, and the scar next to his right thumb that Yeonjun remembers witnessing—Beomgyu had tried and failed to cut a cucumber once. In his defense he'd been four.

Heat runs through Yeonjun's body, hot and heavy and coursing, racing, sprinting through his veins at the speed of light.

Choi Beomgyu is still so, so, so beautiful. 

Why the fuck is Choi Beomgyu still so, so, so beautiful?

Mr. Choi’s voice cuts through Yeonjun’s haze. “Good boy,” he says, smile easy, entirely unaware of the turmoil currently speeding through Yeonjun’s mind. “It’s been a while since you two last saw each other, huh?”

“Yeah,” Beomgyu says, making eye contact with Yeonjun for the first time in what feels like a lifetime. Last night’s pink lightly dusts his cheeks again, probably from the embarrassment of interrupting Yeonjun’s sleep at 4 am. Those impossibly large, impossibly dark eyes, framed by those impossibly long lashes, seem to stare straight into Yeonjun’s soul when Beomgyu speaks again. “5 years.” He says, “right, hyung?”

“Mhm.” Yeonjun chokes out, he can feel the heat in his cheeks and he prays to god that it hasn’t manifested into a blush, “that’s right, 5 years.” He swallows thickly, his voice both sounds and feels like gravel. “You’ve grown up well, Beomgyu-ya,” he says, trying his best attempt at a proud, brotherly smile. “It’s good to see you again.”

Beomgyu brightens, breaking into a smile so wide and so pretty that Yeonjun nearly feels faint. It’s the thing that’s changed about him the least, still wide and boyish and effortlessly charming—except, back when he’d been a kid, it hadn’t made Yeonjun’s heart hammer in his chest. “Thank you,” he says, almost a little shy. “You have too! Grown up well, I mean, um—I’m, uh, going to make myself some coffee.” 

His words, while more solid and less slurred than earlier, still trip over each other nervously, and like last night, he scurries off as quickly as he appears. When he’s gone, Mr. Choi is giving Yeonjun a look he can’t quite decipher. It’s gone as soon as Yeonjun notices it, but it leaves something uneasy swirling in Yeonjun’s chest. He feels a little out of the loop, as if everyone but him knows something he doesn’t, something he probably should.

“Oye, Beomgyu!” Mr. Choi calls out instead, “make me another cup, will ya?”

A snort comes from the kitchen. “As if, old man,” Beomgyu replies. His voice is easy, relaxed. He's in his element now, no Yeonjun-induced hint of the shyness or nervousness from a few seconds ago. “I saw the cups on the coffee table, I know full well you’ve already had a cup today–if not two.”

“It was just the one!” Mr. Choi retaliates, sounding all too much like a petulant child—or Soobin when Yeonjun tries to drag him to a party. "Really! Yeonjun can back me up, right Jun-ah?" Yeonjun makes a sound of agreement, and then snorts when Beomgyu pointedly ignores both of them.

"Anywho," Mr. Choi says, turning back to Yeonjun, apparently haven given up already on that second cup. "What's on the agenda for today? You and Bin-ah got anything fun planned?"

"I honestly have no idea," Yeonjun chuckles. "Bin mentioned a couple things he wanted to do, and there's a few people I want to meet while I'm here. But really, aside from that I have no idea what he's got planned." As he finishes speaking, Beomgyu shuffles into the living room. He's got a cup of coffee in one hand and his phone in the other, with his eyes fixed firmly on the latter. He settles into the sofa next to his dad, leaning into Mr. Choi's side. It's awfully endearing, and Mr. Choi seems to echo that sentiment, leaning a hand down to ruffle his sons hair.

"What about you, Beoms," he asks, "what's on the agenda for today?"

Beomgyu shrugs in response, still scrolling through his phone. "Nothing much, I'm kind of tired out from last night." As the words leave his mouth, his eyes hastily climb up to meet Yeonjun's, looking nervous, before landing back on his phone in a lightning flash. Yeonjun smiles, cute. "I've got some college app work I need to do and then Mom's making me sort through all my high school textbooks to see which ones are okay enough to give away."

Yeonjun raises a brow. "Why wouldn't, like, all of them be okay enough?" He asks, confused—it's the first piece of actual conversation he's made with Beomgyu.

Beomgyu huffs, "I draw on my textbooks, more than the normal amount. Like, all my old geography textbooks are essential incomprehensible because i drew over all the maps!" They exchange a smile, and some of the tension melts from Yeonjun's shoulders. "Oh!" Beomgyu exclaims suddenly, turning away from Yeonjun to face his dad, "Kai and Taehyun are coming over tomorrow though—"

"Taehyun?" A voice calls from the stairs. Soobin is awake and out of bed—a novelty really, given that it isn't lunch time yet. Maybe Yeonjun should give Soobin a little more credit. "Did you just say Taehyun was coming over?" Soobin says again, he's closer now, hopping down the stairs with more energy than Yeonjun's ever seen him have in the morning. In fact, it's probably more energy than Yeonjun's seen him have period. And Taehyun, the name is a familiar one. One of the two other kids on their street that Yeonjun remembers Beomgyu used to play with . He was about three years younger than Yeonjun, so he hadn't payed the kid all that much attention—he remembers the other one more, Huening Kai, mostly because Yeonjun was friends with his older sister, Lea, who was the same age as him. Soobin's seeming excitement upon hearing Taehyun's name, however, is unprecedented.

Now it isn't like Yeonjun and Soobin don't talk about their feelings, it's just that they don't talk about their feelings often. Yeonjun knows everything that happens to Soobin now, given that they live together, but Soobin's life in the five year gap where they hadn't been joined at the hip—due to, well, living hours away from each other—is a bit of a black hole in Yeonjun's memory. Probably because Soobin hadn't told him very much about it—Yeonjun's can't blame him, whenever they'd called it was mostly to complain about classes or to tell each other about a new drama one of them had started watching. 

Beomgyu's back straightens upon hearing his older brother's voice, eyebrows furrowing as Soobin squeezes into the sofa next to him—there isn't enough space for a third person, least of all for someone of Soobin's size. Soobin leans into Beomgyu's space in a show of affection entirely alien to their dynamic, he opens his mouth to say something, but Beomgyu slaps his palm over his lips before he gets the chance.

"No," he says, voice taking on the same decisive tone it had when he'd denied his father a second cup of coffee, "you cannot flirt with Taehyun."

"And that is my cue to leave," Mr. Choi says, rising from the couch and making his way back up the stairs, abandoning his (admittedly, mostly empty) cup of coffee and a densely confused Yeonjun in the process. He shoots Yeonjun a meaningful salute as he goes, and mouths the words "good luck", Yeonjun nods back, amused, and a little dazed.

The Choi brothers, clearly unbothered by their dad's quick exit strategy, continue on unperturbed—in fact, in Soobin's case, it only seems to rile him up further.

Yeonjun watches in amusement as Beomgyu slides away from Soobin, making space between the two of them as he takes over his dad's old seat. Only for Soobin to scoot right up next to him all over again, pressing his body to Beomgyu's and pushing him into the side of the couch in a way that couldn't be comfortable. His voice is a lilting whine, a garbled repetition of the words "please" and "come on, Beoms" and "just this once".

"Get off me!" Beomgyu exclaims, pushing away Soobin's face with the full force of his arm—but Soobin is a good deal stronger than he looks and refuses to budge, putting the two brothers in an awkward twist-turned knot. Yeonjun knows the feeling, there are few things harder than getting Soobin to move when he doesn't want to. "I already told you," Beomgyu fires, sounding decidedly unhappy with his current predicament, "no flirting with Taehyun! You can't date him! He doesn't want you!"

"He'd want me if you let me flirt with him!" Soobin fires back, but half his face is squished against Beomgyu's palm so it really comes out more like: "Hewd wawth mwe iv oo wed we fwird wih im!"

Beomgyu huffs, and, in a final show of rather impressive strength, manages to push Soobin off of him. He gets up off the sofa and stands in front of Soobin, hands on hips and frown firm on his face, likes he's getting ready to scold a young child. "He's coming over tomorrow with Hyuka and we are going to be in the living room and you are not allowed to talk to him!"

"Come on! I just got back! Don't be so mean to Yeonjun and I, let us coooome!" Soobin says, crossing his arm over his chest and giving Beomgyu what can only be described as the least convincing set of puppy dog eyes Yeonjun has ever seen—he may be biased, but Beomgyu's regular, normal, non-puppy dog eyes are more convincing. Soobin doesn't stand a chance.

Beomgyu shoots Soobin a scathing glare—Yeonjun thinks that he'd find it rather scary if he weren't hopelessly endeared by seemingly every little thing Beomgyu did. "Yeonjun can come if he wants—you're the one who isn't allowed." He says with finality, and with those words Beomgyu turns on his heel and marches up the stairs, probably to his attic, his formidable footsteps echoing decisively behind him—although, not before he turns around one last time and sticks his tongue in Soobin's direction.

Soobin returns the gesture, as is customary for any grown man. 

It's quiet as Soobin stays staring at the receding form of his brother, wearing a pout that is half angry and half deeply, deeply, sad.

Yeonjun stays staring at Soobin, half amused and half so, so curious.

"So," he says eventually, "Taehyun?"

Soobin freezes for a moment, before shooting Yeonjun a bashful, toothy grin. "Didn't mention him?" He asks, the words sound almost guilty.

"Nuh-uh," Yeonjun replies, grinning, "this the same kid Taehyun that Beoms used to hang out with way back or....?"

Soobin laughs, but there's a small dusting of bright pink on his cheeks that hadn't been there prior. "Yeah," he says, reaching back to scratch the nape of his neck bashfully, "I know you last saw him when he was like 11 or something, but he got like super ripped and dyed his hair blonde and I want him so bad." Soobin says the whole thing with a straight face and just dripping sincerity, so earnest it makes Yeonjun giggle. "Don't laugh!" Soobin replies, reaching over to jab a finger painfully into Yeonjun's bicep—it doesn't do much, Yeonjun is rather proud of his biceps, but it does get him to stop giggling. "He's actually really hot, okay? You'll see him tomorrow—and also, you can't flirt with him either, by the way. Just because he's off limits for me doesn't mean you can just swoop in!"

Yeonjun raises his arms in surrender. "Don't worry, don't worry," he replies, slightly taken aback by the intensity of Soobin's words, "I'll stay far away. Bro code or whatever."

Soobin sighs, sagging into the sofa like an enormous weight has just been placed on his shoulders. "Nah, I'm sorry, I got too heated about it." He says, waving a hand dismissively, although the borderline somber expression on his face seems to say otherwise. "You can flirt with him if you want," he continues, although saying the words seems to be causing him actual, physical and mental anguish, "it's not like I would ever actually try anything on him, you know, brother's best friend and whatever." Soobin shrugs, arms once again crossed against his chest, he looks like he's deep in thought. He's silent for a long, lingering minute, before he speaks up again. "No matter how hot the guy is, your little brothers best friend is kind of just off-limits, you know?" He says, "like, imagine if the reverse happened and Beomgyu started dating one of our friends."

He keeps talking, but all sound turns to static in Yeonjun's ears. Guilt bites at his chest.

"Yeah," he replies after a minute, "makes sense."

There's silence for a minute after Yeonjun replies, a dense, dripping, tension hanging over the two friends like a leak in the ceiling. Nobody makes any moves to talk, Soobin is staring out one of the windows, looking contemplative, and Yeonjun looks at Soobin, a strange, rather unfamiliar, concoction of emotions boiling and bubbling in his stomach. Soobin is the first one to break it, springing back into action. He jumps onto his feet and stretches his arms high above his head. Like Yeonjun, he's still in his pyjamas—a ratty old Pokémon number he's owned forever, Yeonjun's been seeing it since it was 12. It used to be way bigger, now it desperately clings to Soobin's skin, rising up with his arms and sitting awkwardly high above his ankles.

"Anyway," he says, "I gotta go meet my plug today to pick up the goods, wanna grab breakfast somewhere and come with me."

Soobin's "plug" ends up being a barely graduated ex High School student named Huh Yunjin. She's funny and pretty, with a nose ring and long bleached blonde hair—it isn't a very good dye job, patchy in some places and uneven overall, but somehow she makes it work. She siting semi-suspiciously in a currently empty playground not far away from Yeonjun's old dance school, cross legged on one side of a see-saw she is altogether too big for, with a pair of wired earphones dangling against her neck. She straightens up when she spots Soobin, waving him over with a short smile.

"Hey," she says, as they approach. Her voice is relaxed and apathetic, everything about her at ease, and she makes no move to get up and greet either of them, staring up at them from her spot on the floor. "Long time no see," she says, patting the area next to her, "the weed better in Seoul or what?"

Soobin shrugs, "some of it," he says sitting down on the padded play area—it used to be a sandpit when Yeonjun was little, this is less fun but probably safer. "This is my friend Yeonjun by the way." He says, "this is Yunjin."

"Hey," Yunjin says, as Yeonjun takes a seat next to his best friend. She shoots Yeonjun a quick smile before turning to Soobin once again. "I don't know why you made me come all the way out here, I could have just given your shit to Beomgyu, you know? I'm literally going to see him on Friday."

Soobin rolls his eyes, "we've had this conversation before, Gyu can't find out I smoke! It's, like, my one responsibility as an older brother." He looks proud as he says it, chest puffed up and back straighter than it usually is, his eyes are closed sagely and he rests his palms on his thighs like some sort of play buddha. Yeonjun snorts, earning a glare from his friend, and Yunjin looks altogether unimpressed, a judgemental eyebrow raised high on her forehead.

"He knows I sell to you, you know that right?" She says, and Soobin balks, going pale in the face, "besides, he smokes too—in fact, this new years we got your mom to smoke up with us—"

"Okay, okay, I don't wanna know more!" Soobin interrupts, clasping his hands over his ears, "just give me the stuff please!"

Yunjin rolls her eyes, seemingly used to Choi Soobin's theatrics. She reaches into her bag and pulls out a small packet wrapped in a layer of newspaper, before sliding it discreetly towards Soobin. Soobin proceeds to grab it, stuff it into his right pocket, and immediately slam his hands over his ears once again, giving Yunjin what can only be described as the stink eye. Yunjin ignores him and turns to Yeonjun instead. "So, how do you guys know each other?" She asks. "I'm so sorry you guys know each other," she adds as an afterthought.

Yeonjun laughs openly. "Childhood friends," he snickers, "I lived in here most of my life before moving to Seoul like five years ago, this guy lived down the street from me." He stabs a thumb in Soobin's direction, who's still got his palms stubbornly clasped over his ears. "How do you know Beomgyu?"

Yunjin smiles, it's genuinely excited this time, as if just the mention of Beomgyu's name makes her happy. "My dad's a Gyeonsin alumni so when they made it co-ed two years ago he made me transfer," She says. As she speaks she pulls a cigarette out of one pocket and a lighter from the other, "Beomgyu was my first friend in the eleventh grade—and my first customer in Gyeonsin," she says, making sure to shoot Soobin a pointed look. She draws the cigarette to her lips before lighting up and taking a long puff, "anyway," she says, "Beomgyu invite y'all to the thing on Friday?"

This finally gets Soobin to pull his hands away from his ears, curiosity peaked. "What thing?" He asks.

"So that's a no," Yunjin muses. She mulls it over, as if wondering whether or not she should say anything. To Yeonjun's surprise, she exhales a puff of smoke and then turns to him. She eyes him, like a detective putting together the final clues before an epiphany, and says, "what did you say your name was again? Yeonjun? Right." Yeonjun's confused, but he nods regardless. Yunjin exhales another long puff of smoke, making sure to not blow into Yeonjun's face even if she misses it by mere millimetres (it's not like he would've minded, but the gesture is nice), before squaring her shoulders and nodding sagely, as if finally making her decision. "The final big soccer game of the season's on Friday and we're all going—couple of friends are on the team and what not." She says, speaking through a cloud of smoke, "then there's a party afterwards at one of our rich friends houses. Everyone cool is coming—even a couple of people from when you were still in High School, you know how it is."

"Then why's Beomgyu going?" Soobin says, an attempt at a joke.

Yunjin shoots him a side-eye so fierce it sends a shive down Yeonjun's spine—it's clear where her loyalties lie between the two brothers. "Wonder what that means for you," she muses, and Soobin wilts like a dying flower. 

"Whatever," he says, trying to grasp onto his last, albeit small, morsel of pride, "we'll be there."

Yeonjun elbows him lightly. "We should make sure Gyu-yah's cool with us being there first," he suggests.

Soobin rolls his eyes. "What? Like he'll say no."

"No," Beomgyu says, "no way."

There's a decisiveness to his voice that Yeonjun finds almost hard to process—kid Beomgyu had fought with Soobin, sure, but his arguments had been always whiney and loose. A battle he was always sure he would lose. Now, Beomgyu's voice booms, filled with an easy confidence Yeonjun couldn't begin to imagine coming from kid Beomgyu.

They're in his attic, Soobin dragged himself and Yeonjun up there the second they got home from their rendezvous with Huh Yunjin. In his room, Yeonjun sees glimpses of the Beomgyu he knew. The old acoustic guitar, covered in Pokémon stickers with plastic peeling off the pick guard, is displayed on the wall like an artefact at a museum. It's surrounded by old pictures of Beomgyu's friends and family from when he was little and memento's from his childhood like a shrine—a poster advertising the first exhibit Beomgyu's painting were displayed at from his old art class, a ticket stub from when Beomgyu played Puck in his middle school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, and a boarding pass from Beomgyu's first trip abroad, when the Choi Family had visited Japan over the summer. Yeonjun even spots a familiar looking Ryan plushie that Beomgyu used to carry around everywhere he went, and a lego Millenium Falcon Yeonjun and Soobin had helped build. There's even a few of the old band posters that have survived the shift to the attic, Yeonjun recognises a Riot! era Paramore poster, a Hamilton window card, and a framed picture of Julian Casablancas that Beomgyu used to keep on his bedside table. Much in the same way Yeonjun's grandmother kept her own framed picture of Jesus Christ.

The rest of the room, is an ode to an older Beomgyu. Full of various pieces of mood lighting painting the room over like a still from an over-stylised A24 movie. There's a corner for where Beomgyu paints, an easel set up directly in the light let in by the attics only window, and a stool that's been splattered by so much stray paint that Yeonjun finds it hard to make out it's original colour. There's a few canvases littered around the area, put they're shielded over by stray pieces of cloth to hide whatever's been painted on their surface. There's two new guitars, a shiny black electric number with three glow in the dark stars on the body, and a dark brown fender acoustic. Over his bed are a plethora of posters featuring bands Yeonjun's only ever heard of, Black Country New Road and Boygenius and Parannoul and Big Thief. They're punctuated by happy polaroids of Beomgyu's friends—Yeonjun spots Yunjin a couple times among the masses, and a photograph with Beomgyu, Huening Lea, and two other people Yeonjun can only assume are grown up versions of Lea's two little siblings. There's even a few of Soobin. At the foot of the bed, is a colourful abstract carpet and a bunch of bean bags. Next to his painting nook, is a large wooden desk and an adjoining bookshelf—Mr. Choi's collection of Murakami novels and Wong Kar Wai DVD's have evidently been moved here, and theres a pack of Marlboro Reds and a shoddy handmade ash tray sitting on the desk next to a stack of worn out high school textbooks. The room is wide but short, if Yeonjun reached up he'd be able to lay his hand flat on the ceiling, but it exudes a cool, cozy energy Yeonjun has only ever seen matched in coming of age HBO shows and indie movies. 

"Why would you even want to go, it's just going to be a bunch of high school students," Beomgyu presses. "Creep," he adds as an afterthought. He's sitting on one of bean bags with his laptop in front of him, still in the oversized band tee and pyjama set he'd had on in the morning, hair delightfully ruffled and a set of Marshall's headphone slung around his neck. 

"Yunjin invited us," Soobin bites, although "invited" is a liberal word for what Yunjin did.

Beomgyu snorts. "Yunjin invites everyone to everything," he says, "she even invited Mom when we were seshing on New Years eve."

"Drugs are bad for you," Soobin says, folding his arms over his chest and peering down at Beomgyu from where he's perched on Beomgyu's desk chair. This time the snort comes from Yeonjun. Soobin shoots him a quick glare before turning back to Beomgyu. "Come onnn," he whines, "we're cool! You'll get street cred if you take us."

"I don't need any "cred" from you," Beomgyu replies curtly.

"We'll stay out of your hair!" Soobin says, having apparently made the switch from arguing to begging, "right, Jun? Tell him!"

Yeonjun looks at Soobin, then at Beomgyu, then he shrugs. "Sure, we'll be on our best behaviour."

Beomgyu frowns. "You're not the one who's behaviour I'm worried about."

"If anything Yeonjun's the one you should be worried about!" Soobin says, "he's the one who goes out all the time and doesn't come home till the next morning! I stay home and watch anime and play League of Legends!"

An itch starts to scratch at Yeonjun's side. He doesn't want Beomgyu to know about his promiscuity—he'll unpack why later. He raises his hands in surrender in lieu of a response. 

"Well, Yeonjun doesn't want to fuck my best friend!"

"He could! He hasn't met him yet! He could even want to fuck a different friend! What if he wants to fuck Kai!"

"Well Yeonjun's not my brother!"

Yeonjun's not sure what to do in this conversation. As far as he knows, he really doesn't want to fuck any of of Beomgyu's friends. Granted, he hasn't met them yet. But really the only one Yeonjun wants to fuck right now is Beomgyu, and it isn't like that's going to happen either way. Really, Yeonjun's rather ambivalent to this whole party thing anyway. He'd been to a few Daegu high school ragers right before leaving, they'd been fun but near identical to the parties in Seoul despite being noticeably smaller, he hadn't felt like he'd missed out on much. Still, Yeonjun was nearly always down for a night out, and he would like to see Beomgyu dressed up again like he'd been the night before.

"Please, please, please, please," Soobin says. He gets off the bed and kneels, clasping his hands together and shoving them straight into Beomgyu's face. "I'll be good, I'll be so good! I'll do all your chores until I go back to school! I'll pay for your next piercing! I'll buy you your next batch of cigarettes!"

Older brother responsibilities appear to be null and void if they can be twisted to achieve a goal.

Beomgyu remains stoic for a minute, but when it's evident that Soobin isn't going to relent, he sighs. Pushing Soobin's clasped hands away from his face, he replies. "Fine," he says, although his voice sounds anything but happy, "but you better stay far away from me the entire party! And you can't lecture me if you see me smoking a joint, I know full well that Yunjin's your dealer."

Soobin, quite literally, jumps for joy. This ends up being a bad decision. As previously established, Beomgyu's ceiling is low. Soobin is tall. When he gets off the floor and jumps up in a show of excitement, his head loudly and near immediately smack straight into the ceiling. Soobin yelps, grabs his forehead, and then runs out of the room in record speed, mumbling about getting ice and this is what fucking happens when you live in a goddamn attic as he climbs down to the foyer. The incident is as funny as it is quick, and while Yeonjun is processing what the fuck just happened, Beomgyu starts to laugh.

Not the snorts and chuckles at Soobin's expense, no, a full bodied laugh. It takes over his whole body, he shakes on the floor, arms clasped over his stomach as peals and peals of laughter leak out of his lips. He eyes are scrunched shut, his lips spread into a smile so wide it near splits his face in half, and a happy, pink invades his cheeks. He laughs so hard, a pearly tear slips out of his eye and slides down his reddened cheek. The sound is something else altogether, boyish and playful, escaping in quick, successive, utterly overjoyed spurts, occasionally punctuated by a little snort or a delighted squeak. His voice is simultaneously deep and high, his laughter both a raucous roar and an overjoyed giggle.

It's the cutest thing Yeonjun's ever seen. He could drown himself in the sound.

It's so cute that Yeonjun forgets to laugh for himself, despite the hilarity of Soobin's accident. 

Beomgyu only stops laughing when he makes eye contact with Yeonjun, probably because he notices Yeonjun doing nothing but staring at him. He coughs into his fist, still teetering from leftover giggles. "He's an idiot," he says, a happy flush settled high on his cheeks. 

Yeonjun smiles back, big and broad and missing the sound of Beomgyu's laugh already. "Well, our idiot," he says.

Beomgyu snorts. "Speak for yourself," he says. It's a comfortable exchange, but an air of awkwardness hangs over them at Soobin's departure. Yeonjun's not entirely sure how to talk to Beomgyu without the buffer that is Soobin, and if Beomgyu's fleeting eye contact and tense body language are anything to go by, Beomgyu is very much in the same boat. Yeonjun opens his mouth to say something, anything, to break them out of silence, when Beomgyu beats him to it.

"I"m sorry about last night!" He says, voice earnest. His words come out fast and hurried, as if they leave his mouth before he's ready for them to. "I don't know if you could tell but I was kind of faded and forgot all about Soobin Hyung and you being back," he hands twist in on each other, fingers curled together nervously. "I'm just, uh, yeah, sorry for waking you."

Beomgyu tends to ramble, Yeonjun, for the millionth time, finds him unfairly cute.

Yeonjun, glad for the conversation, grins back. "I could tell," he says simply, and then hurries to do damage control when Beomgyu seems to start shrinking in on himself, sinking deeper into the bean bag as if he wants it to swallow him whole, "but don't worry! It's nothing I'm not used to. And, like, it was nice seeing you! You, uh, looked good." Yeonjun's face burns with warmth, words tumbling off his tongue before he has a chance to reign them in. "Besides, it was cute seeing you drunk tumble over your words."

"Th-thanks," Beomgyu stutters, half-shy-half-sardonic with his eyes bashfully trained on the floor. "Still," he says, "sorry for waking you up."

Yeonjun waves a dismissive hand. "You said that already," he says with a grin. "And I do live with your brother, last night was far from the worst offence I've faced at the hands of one of The Choi's."

Beomgyu giggles again, that adorable, heart shattering giggle, and finally makes eye contact with Yeonjun. "Thanks for saying that," he says.

Yeonjun nods, making sure to shoot Beomgyu as reassuring a smile as he can manage. "I'm excited to meet your friends though—we met Yunjin today, she seemed nice."

Beomgyu brightens at the mention of his friends. "Yeah, 'Jin's great!" He says happily, "I don't know if you remember them at all, but Huening Kai and Taehyun are both excited to see you again too! Hyuka couldn't stop gushing about how cool he used to think you were when we were little."

Yeonjun laughs. He feels warm all over, something about being acknowledged by Choi Beomgyu makes him embarrassingly happy. "I remember them vaguely, the two kids from down the street you used to play with, right?" Beomgyu nods, and Yeonjun continues. "Really, I'm more surprised anyone remembers me."

Beomgyu rolls his eyes playfully. "Of course they remember you!" He says, "everyone remembers you—you're Choi Yeonjun!"

Yeonjun burns, sure his blush is manifesting itself on his face this time around. "Please," he says, "I wouldn't say all that." Yeonjun isn't dense, he knew he was popular—still is really, even in Seoul. But it's different here, in Daegu. Daegu is small, everyone knows everyone, and everyone had most definitely known Yeonjun. When he was younger he'd worn it like a badge of honour, gloating (mostly to Soobin) about his many feats and achievements. Now, the notoriety makes Yeonjun embarrassed, and he finds himself yearning for the relative anonymity he has in Seoul.

"I hear you're in the same boat, too," He says instead, grinning, "congratulations, who would've thought."

Beomgyu snorts, waving Yeonjun off dismissively. He looks for a moment like he's going to deny the claim, but he doesn't. "I can't say I like it," He says instead, stretching his arms over his head, "everyone knows everything about me, like, all the time. Honestly, it makes me wanna get out even more." Beomgyu's words come out through a chuckle, but they're honest and earnest, Yeonjun finds he can resonate with the sentiment.

"Soobin mentioned you were applying to schools in Seoul?" Yeonjun replies, and grins when Beomgyu nods. "Well, I for one am looking forward to you coming, I'd love to introduce you to our friends—Soobin gets no say in the matter, of course."

The air of awkwardness, while not entirely gone, no longer feels stifling. Beomgyu tells Yeonjun about the places he's planning to apply to and Yeonjun offers what few bits and pieces of advice he can. The conversation, much to his surprise, is smooth. No awkward bouts of silence, no unintended interruptions, even though it's evident they're both being more polite than they would be around friends. Yeonjun feels like a wall he never intended to put up is slowly breaking down—having said that, a wall he's never planned on building up, definitely isn't a wall he's sure he's ready to do away with. Like Beomgyu is breaking his way in, quiet as a mouse, guns and eyes blazing.

The first Monday morning after a year of classes feels, for lack of a better word, wrong. Yeonjun spends most of the morning ambling around the house, hanging out with Soobin and his parents, doing nothing—he isn't used to having nothing to do, and he's not sure he enjoys it. Beomgyu, for what it's worth, stays in his room for most of the day, apparently working through school stuff and college applications. Yeonjun only sees him for brief flashes when he comes down to make himself too-strong coffee. 

Yeonjun's almost thankful for it—Soobin can be dense, incredibly dense, but he knows Yeonjun better than Yeonjun knows himself. Frankly, Soobin probably knows Yeonjun better than he knows Soobin. Either way, Yeonjun's not sure he can hide whatever fleeting feelings are brewing in his chest, not from Soobin, he isn't really used to hiding anything from his best friend. 

Around 4 in the afternoon, the doorbell rings. Soobin and Yeonjun are on the living room floor, they've brought out all the video games that had been rotting in Soobin's room ever since he left for college and are arguing over a particularly spirited game of Super Smash Bros when it happens. The sound of the doorbell interrupts Soobin mid-rant about how Yeonjun must be cheating—"You don't even play video games! How the fuck are you winning?" He abandons the argument with a sigh to go open the door. "I'll get it," he mutters, "I'm losing anyway."

"Damn fucking right you are," Yeonjun says gleefully. He loves his best friend, but he does delight in Soobin's video game losses.

"Shut up!" Soobin responds, before he opens the door and freezes in place. Yeonjun watches from the corner of his eye.

"Soobin-Hyung!" An excited voice says—it's vaguely familiar, the intonation cute and boyish, "oh my god, how are you?" Every sentence the voice speaks sounds like it's been punctuated by a million exclamation marks.

Soobin's grinning, a brotherly smile on his face. "Hey, Hyuka," he says, before the smile slips off his face entirely and is replaced by a surprised, nervous gape. Yeonjun observes a second of silence, before Soobin coughs into his fist. "Oh, and Taehyun-ah here's too." He aims for nonchalance, smiling, but Yeonjun can tell it's forced. A little bit too wide, eyes rocking back and forth between the door, the floor, and Yeonjun in the living room. 

"Hey, Hyung," it's a different voice this time, a little bit deeper, no cute intonation, "you going to let us in?"

Yeonjun can't help but giggle.

"Uh, yeah, yeah," Soobin says—Yeonjun can hear the nerves dripping from Soobin's voice. He decides he's going to enjoy this interaction.

Two boys walk into the living room behind Soobin. One Yeonjun recognises, not because of the boy himself but because he's the spitting image of his older sister, Lea. Huening Kai, much like Beomgyu, is a lot different from when Yeonjun had last seen him. For starters, he's tall now. Really tall. Almost as tall as Soobin—when Yeonjun had last seen him he'd been the shortest of the three siblings despite being the middle child, now he probably towered over even Yeonjun. He's grown handsome but retained a youthful softness, like if Pixar animated a marble sculpture from renaissance Italy. He's got a wide, near infectious smile on his face, and is dressed up in a pastel yellow hoodie with some sort of cute Sanrio character on it and a pair of sweatpants. Next to him stands another boy, also vaguely familiar but not quite as much. Yeonjun suddenly understands why Soobin had been so nervous at his arrival—this boy must be Beomgyu's friend Taehyun, and he was a near carbon copy of the time Soobin had described his ideal type to Yeonjun in excruciating, painful detail. (Yeonjun wonders briefly if this boy just happened to have all the things Soobin liked in his partners, or if Soobin liked all those things because of this boy.) He stands a head or so below Soobin and Huening Kai, but he's wide and well built, all hard lines and bulging muscles with wide shoulders, a trim waist, and veins running down his muscled arms. He clearly liked to flaunt them, given the tight black tank top he has on. He's handsome, although not in the same way Kai is. He's sharper, sharp nose, sharp jaw, sharp brows, juxtaposed against wide, round, intelligent eyes. Soobin's gaze seems to follow him everywhere he goes.

"You guys remember Yeonjun," Soobin says, gesturing at him. It should be a question but it comes out more as a statement, the two boys nod along regardless. "Jun this is Huening Kai and Kang Taehyun, Beomgyu's friends from way back?" This time it is a question, and Yeonjun grins in reply.

"Yeah, hey," he says, getting up to shake Taehyun's hand, "I remember you guys." He goes in to shake Huening Kai's hand as well but the younger boy pulls him in for a hug instead. Yeonjun's a little surprised, but the hug is warm, so he wraps his arms around the boy and pats his shoulder.

Kai pulls away, grin so blinding it could almost rival Beomgyu's (almost). "Hyung!" He says brightly, he's released the hug but his hands are still firm on Yeonjun's shoulders. The use of the word "hyung" so suddenly takes Yeonjun a bit by surprise, but he finds he doesn't mind, not when Huening Kai practically oozes little brother. "I don't know if you remember me but I sure do remember you!" The boy says, his eyes are curled into little crescents and his teeth are pearly white, bared in what almost seems like a permanent smile. "I'm Huening Lea's brother, we live just down the street—our moms are friends too! Mrs. Choi comes over every time she comes by to visit Daegu, although I haven't seen her in a while either. Anyway, it's nice to see you again and—woah, you're even more handsome than I remember, is your hair naturally like that or did you dye it black? Beomgyu dyed his hair black a while ago and I could've sworn it was natural even though I've been seeing him everyday for years and his hair is obviously brown—"

"Hyuka," Taehyun admonishes, cutting off Huening Kai's rambling with a perplexed but amused huff, "let the man breathe."

Kai's cheeks colour pink, and soon he's pulling his hands away from Yeonjun's shoulder and shoving them into his pockets instead. He laughs, a little awkward. "Sorry about that."

"No worries," Yeonjun replies, wearing his most comforting smile, "and don't worry, I remember both of you—Soobin here wouldn't let me forget."

This is a lie, but it's worth it for the way Soobin squirms in his place and turns bright red. 

Just then, Beomgyu comes running down the stairs. It's the third time Yeonjun's seeing him today, but every time Beomgyu appears Yeonjun feels like the airs been knocked out of his lungs. He's wearing another oversized graphic tee, this time with a show Yeonjun's never heard of instead of a band, and a pair of soft looking plaid pyjamas. But the real kickers are the thin, wire framed glasses sitting primly on his nose. Yeonjun never thought he had a thing for men in glasses, but he finds himself reconsidering.

Beomgyu comes down the stairs in a flurry, so quick Yeonjun blinks and he's already in the living room. In a flash he throws himself at Taehyun, wrapping himself around the boy like a koala. They're about the same height but Taehyun manages to support his weight, apparently used to this. He huffs again just as perplexed and amused as he had been with Kai, and tells Beomgyu's he's heavy. Beomgyu makes a point to ignore him."Taehyun-aaaaah," Beomgyu whines instead, before he shoves his face against Taehyun's shoulder just as an unpleasant feeling crawls down Yeonjun's back (again, he'll figure that out later), "where were youuuu."

Taehyun laughs, it should be a little strained, considering that he's supporting all of Beomgyu's weight and Beomgyu—while shorter than Yeonjun and Soobin—is certainly not small. But Taehyun sounds at ease, practice even. "Sorry," he says, "I was at the gym." Beomgyu simply whines in response.

Kai pouts, apparently capable of wearing an expression that isn't a smile. "Hey, where's my welcome?"

Taehyun rolls his eyes. "Please, you know he only gets like this when he wants something," he says, before walking both himself and Beomgyu over to the cluster of sofas and dumping Beomgyu unceremoniously onto one of them. "What have we talked about, Hyung," he says, "warn me next time you decide to climb me like a tree." Beomgyu grumbles as he hits the sofa, looking up at Taehyun with big, bleary eyes. Taehyun sighs, "what do you want?"

Yeonjun shoves down his own wish that Beomgyu would climb him like a tree. Taehyun doesn't know how good he has it.

At Taehyun's offer to help, Beomgyu immediately bursts into a victorious grin (Yeonjun redoubles down on the fact that even though Huening Kai has a bright and infectious smile, it has yet to be quite as bright or as infectious as Beomgyu's, although Yeonjun might well be biased). His grin only grows wider as he lets out a holler of victory and latches onto Taehyun again, this time grabbing him by the arm and pulling him up to the stairs. He mentions something about needing help with an essay as they ascend towards Beomgyu's attic and Taehyun whines but lets himself be dragged away anyway—if those arms were anywhere as strong as they looked, he would have no trouble breaking out of Beomgyu's much skinnier grasp, so it perhaps isn't as much of an abduction as it appears to be. "We'll be back in 5 minutes!" Beomgyu calls from the final step, before him and Taehyun disappear into the foyer. 

The three remaining boys stare up at the empty staircase. Yeonjun coughs. "So," he says, voice pensive, "are they, like, you know?" 

"Fucking?" Huening Kai asks, the word feels wrong, too vulgar to be coming out of his mouth. "Nah, they're just like that—thank god, right Soobin Hyung?" He sends the older boy a teasing grin and Soobin immediately freezes up. His cheeks are bright red again.

"I have no idea what you mean," he says primly, face pinched up like he'd just bitten into a very sour lemon. 

Yeonjun chuckles, ignoring his own overwhelming relief to further make fun of Soobin. "Subtle."

"Shut up!" Soobin says, he probably means for it to be intimidating but it comes out like a whine, voice lilting. "Besides, it doesn't matter anyway."

"Gyu-Hyung still giving you a hard time about your crush on Taehyunnie?" Huening Kai asks, grin still just as wide and just as teasing. Yeonjun decides he likes the kid.

"Keep it down will you—what if he hears you?" Soobin hisses, knocking his knuckles against the back of Kai's head lightly.

"Please," Huening Kai says, rolling his eyes and swatting Soobin's hand away, "Taehyun may be the smartest person I know but he's also dense as shit. If he was going to find out about the four year crush you've had on him he would've known already." He sighs as he speaks, as if this is a conversation they've had before. "You're not even subtle about it," Kai continues, "if it was anyone but him he would've figured it out years ago."

Yeonjun lets out a low whistle. "Four years?" He says, jabbing an accusatory finger into Soobin's chest, "and you never told me?"

Soobin holds his hands out in surrender. The blush has apparently permanently settled onto his cheeks, he looks simultaneously exasperated and embarrassed. Huening Kai laughs, a pleasant, although loud, sound. It reminds Yeonjun vaguely of the excited clicks of a dolphin call. "Don't worry about it Yeonjun Hyung," he says, patting Yeonjun's back to comfort him, "Beomgyu didn't tell us about the crush he used to have on you until he'd already been over it it for like 3 years. Granted everyone knew, but still. Maybe it's a Choi thing."

Yeonjun's heart skips a beat—in his frenzied attempt to come to terms with whatever supernatural spell Beomgyu had cast on Yeonjun, he'd almost forgotten about the long, long crush the younger boy had had on him. It hadn't been much more than a mild annoyance when they'd been kids, now it makes Yeonjun's heart seize up in his chest alongside an emotion that feels suspiciously like yearning. Huening Kai had made a point to mention the crush Beomgyu "used to" have on him, and that he was "over it", past tense. Twice. It leaves an unwelcome, unearned, sour taste in Yeonjun's mouth.

"Ugh, don't remind me," Soobin groans, flopping down on the same couch Taehyun had dumped Beomgyu on prior and hooking a long leg over the back of the sofa, looking vaguely like a fucked up barbie doll with their legs twisted the wrong way. "He'd never shut up about you—Yeonjun Hyung this and Yeonjun Hyung that. I was so relieved when he got his first boyfriend because it meant he was finally over all of that." He seems to mull it over for a minute, before fake gagging. "No, no, just thought about it again. Ew. The thought of you and Beomgyu dating might make me actually sick."

Yeonjun gulps. He wonders why that stings.

Huening Kai hums thoughtfully. "I don't know," he says. voice contemplative, "I think you guys would have looked hot together."

Yeonjun wonders why that makes him so happy. He ignores Soobin's sounds of protest but doesn't respond to Huening Kai either.

The rest of the interaction goes smoothly, Beomgyu and Taehyun are back from the attic in around 15 minutes and they spend the rest of the day playing video games and making dinner for themselves and Mr. and Mrs. Choi—really it's mostly just Taehyun, with Beomgyu and Yeonjun acting as half competent sous chef's when they're called upon, even though Beomgyu almost cuts his finger twice in the process. Taehyun manoeuvres his way around the Choi kitchen like he's been there a hundred times, which, if his relationship with Beomgyu is anything like Yeonjun's with Soobin, he probably has. From the corner of his eye, Yeonjun catches the on and off glances Soobin throws Taehyun's way—he also notes, that for all of Beomgyu's reprimanding about how Soobin was not allowed to talk to Taehyun, Beomgyu doesn't actually seem to be doing much of anything about them talking to each other all all. Still, Soobin's glances mostly seem unreciprocated, but every once in a while Taehyun will glance around the room and accidentally-on-purpose flex his arms. He's a lot more slick about it than Soobin is but clearly he's trying to impress someone—Yeonjun's just not quite skilled enough in the art of people-reading to figure out wether or not that person is Soobin.

There's a desperate, upsetting, clawing voice in the back of Yeonjun's had that wonders if it's for Beomgyu. He shut it down as quickly as he can—Yeonjun is not a jealous person, especially when he has no earthly reason to be jealous at all—but the voice stubbornly remains, murmuring quietly in the depths of Yeonjun's brain.

Still, Yeonjun has fun. Huening Kai is a ball full of energy Yeonjun can't help but love, he latches onto Yeonjun (and, really, everyone else) like a puppy, handing out belly rubs and earnest compliments. Taehyun stands starkly opposite from his best friend, but Yeonjun likes him too. He's smart and mature and promises to show Yeonjun the gym he works out at if Yeonjun ever finds himself bored in Daegu. (Especially given that the last place Soobin would take him is the gym, unfortunately Yeonjun doesn't have the same crazy metabolism as The Choi's do.  He can feel his abs fading away already.)Their dynamic with Beomgyu is perhaps the most entertaining part of the whole evening—despite Beomgyu being the oldest amongst the three, they treat him like the youngest, cooing and fretting over him and throwing him around the living room like a rag doll. Beomgyu whines and complains the entire time, but always ends up snuggled into one of their sides.

The house settles into silence once Taehyun and Huening Kai leave, and Yeonjun and Soobin are once again left alone in the living room as Beomgyu sees the two of them off. The warmth from the interaction still lingers, Yeonjun finds he can't stop smiling. 

The rest of the week passes as a bit of a blur, despite Yeonjun not really doing much of anything. Still, him and Soobin make do, wandering around the city, visiting spots they frequented as kids, and drinking beers by the pool at sunset. Mrs. Choi manages to keep them busy too, designating them odd jobs around the house and assigning them tasks like grabbing groceries from the nearest supermarket and washing the car. Soobin complains every time she gives them a new chore, but Yeonjun finds he doesn't mind—he likes being busy, it keeps his mind off more complicated matters. 

Speaking of more complicated matters, Yeonjun finds himself inching closer and closer to Beomgyu every day. Any leftover awkwardness has worn away near completely by now, and Yeonjun delights in the back and forth the two of them can maintain, every conversation revealing more and more about Choi Beomgyu—and Yeonjun makes note of every little detail, greedily sucking up any tidbit of knowledge Beomgyu offers up about himself. He mostly has Mrs. Choi to thank for this, because every once in a while she'll give Soobin and him different tasks and then insist that Beomgyu help out with his.

They get closer over small interactions. When they do the dishes together while Soobin is tasked with raking leaves off the front lawn, Yeonjun discovers that Beomgyu is meticulous. Despite how his clothes are always paint splattered and his arms are often dotted with little bruises, when he cleans Beomgyu is exact, scrubbing the dishes until they shine before he hands them over so Yeonjun can rinse.

Beomgyu also seems to oscillate between quiet and chatty, but when he's concentrated like this one are more of the latter. Beomgyu has the uncanny and rather impressive ability to talk about more or less everything even when his hands are occupied, ruthlessly scrubbing dinner of off one of Mrs. Choi's porcelain plates. He's a bit of a yapper, much like his older brother, although Beomgyu's seems to bother him a lot less than Soobin's does (Soobin's yapping is endearing in his own right, but Yeonjun would have tuned him out instantly if he got nearly as in depth into why AI art was terrible as Beomgyu did). He prattles on that night about this and that, shows he's been watching, his favourite movies, telling Yeonjun about films he likes that feature dance since he knows Yeonjun dances too—Yeonjun, chatty in his own right, finds that it isn't hard to reciprocate interest, keeping up an ongoing stream of back and forth chatter. 

"It's called Climax," Beomgyu says, "don't make that face, I know what it's called, it's not about sex."

Yeonjun, barely holding in a laugh, responds with: "I never said it was!"

"Please, I can see how badly you want to laugh, Hyung!" Beomgyu's voice takes on a whinier note when he's tired and trying to make it a point. Yeonjun finds it adorable.

"Okay, so what is "Climax" about?"

"Don't say the name like it's porn! It's this french film. Basically the members of this dance troupe thingy accidentally take a shit ton of LSD—"

"How do you accidentally take LSD?"

"Somebody spikes the sangria."

"With LSD?"

"Hey, it could happen!"

When Mrs. Choi makes Beomgyu get groceries with Yeonjun while Soobin takes her to her yoga class in the community centre, Yeonjun learns that Beomgyu is a brat. For all his growing up he maintains that often hyper, loud, excited disposition in a way that is considerably less annoying this time around. In fact, it gets Yeonjun blood pumping in a totally different way. A way Yeonjun decided to ignore as he watched Beomgyu dance through the supermarket isles like it was second nature, carefree as he threw in item after item into their shopping cart—even when they weren't on Mrs. Choi's list.

"Hurry up, Hyung!" Beomgyu says, speeding through the cereal isles, "do you like Reese's Puffs or Lucky Charms better? Oh! Maybe we should get frosted flakes? But wait, there's a sale on Cinnamon Toast Crunch—maybe we should just get a couple different ones, to be safe."

"Safe from what?" Yeonjun says, wrinkling his nose, "avoiding early onset diabetes?"

"Shut up, old man." Beomgyu says, sticking out his tongue.

"I'm not old," Yeonjun replies, gasping in (semi) faux offence, "take that back!"

"Make me!" Beomgyu says, running off towards the condiment section.

"I'll get you for that!" Yeonjun calls out, taking off after him.

They spend about 20 minutes chasing each other through the isles—Yeonjun almost loses Beomgyu by a crate of oranges (Beomgyu's t-shirt is almost identical in colour)—before a voice blasts over the PA system: "We request all customers to refrain from running inside of the store, I repeat, we request that all customers please refrain from running inside the store!"

In the evenings, when Soobin retires early (that is to say, before midnight) and Yeonjun and Beomgyu are the only ones still awake, Yeonjun revels in Beomgyu's quieter moments. This usually involves the two of them sitting by the poolside, after Soobin has headed off to bed and Beomgyu has returned from an evening out with friends—sometimes Beomgyu will bring out a joint and his portable pill speaker, but there's something consistently quiet and intimate in these instances. Yeonjun finds that Beomgyu oscillates between zero and a hundred, always one or the other, never something in between. Sometimes Beomgyu is a constant stream of conversation, telling Yeonjun about a million different things in rapid succession, at others Beomgyu is quiet, listening to Yeonjun in silence, with keen, sharp eyes latching onto every movement of his lips. 

In the evenings, when it's just the two of them, Beomgyu is more of the latter. His features are softened, bearing the weight of a long day out, and his eyes pick up speckles on moonlight and reflect the stars overhead. There's often silence between the two of them, but it's comfortable, just Yeonjun and Beomgyu basking in each others presence under the light of the stars. 

"You ever think about coming back to Daegu, Hyung?" Beomgyu asks, he's rolled his jeans up to his knees and sits with his ankles submerged in pool water, a joint dangling from his pretty hands. The smell of chlorine and weed permeates the air.

Yeonjun shrugs. "Sometimes," he says, "but only to visit—really, until Soobin asked if I wanted to spend the summer here, I'd almost forgotten about it."

Beomgyu hums, dipping a hand into the water before passing over the joint. "How come?"

Yeonjun sighs. "I'm not really sure—and, what little I'm sure of is hard to put into words." He takes a long puff and exhales into the night air, his eyes following the smoke as it travels up towards the stars. The stars are brighter in Daegu than they are in Seoul, Yeonjun had forgotten about that.

"Well, we've got all night."

Yeonjun chuckles. "That we do."

"Go on," Beomgyu urges, his voice is soft but adequately pushy, hazy under a sheen of smoke. "If it's any consolation, I could never imagine wanting to come back here—imagine seeing the rest of the world and still coming back to Daegu."

Yeonjun laughs, something bittersweet tickles at the back of his throat. "There's things here you can't see anywhere else in the world, you know? Not that I've been too many places, but still."

Beomgyu snorts. "Like what, O' Wise Old One ? Enlighten me."

Yeonjun huffs, reaching over the small pool (it was more jacuzzi sized really) to flick Beomgyu lightly on the forehead. He ponders it over a long minute, his eyes circling the Choi's backyard. "Fireflies so bright they almost seem to glow blue when you look at them right," he says, voice decisive, "or matcha, white chocolate, macadamia nut cookies that sell for or less than 10,000 won, or an entire street dedicated to national treasure Kim Kwangseok," his words come out with a chuckle, warmth blooms in his chest.

A small smile grows on Beomgyu's face as the words escape his lips. Yeonjun finds his mouth moving before his brain does.

"You."

Beomgyu looks surprised, beautiful brown eyes blown wide and lips open in a small gape. A flush so bright Yeonjun can see it even in the moonlight settles on the apples of his cheeks. He coughs into his palms, the pink has spread up to the tips of his ears and down to his chest.

"We should head back in," he says quietly, voice shaky, "it's getting late."

With every interaction, Yeonjun finds himself getting sucked deeper and deeper into Choi Beomgyu's web.

Beomgyu likes strawberries. When they go grocery shopping he spends 10 minutes at the produce section deciding on which box of them looks most promising. It's worth it to see how the fresh fruit stains his lips, to hear the happy sigh he lets out every time he takes a bite. Beomgyu hates bugs. When a mosquito shows up by the pool—as is to be expected on a hot summer night in Daegu, South Korea—Beomgyu returns indoors and refuses to come back outs until Yeonjun manages to kill it. When he deems it safe enough to return, he sits ever so slightly closer to Yeonjun than he had been before. Their knees accidentally brush against each other, and their knuckles miss each other by centimetres. Beomgyu loves art. When Mrs. Choi drags the entire house out to go see a local pop-up gallery, Beomgyu is the only one who goes willingly and without complaint. He spends time in front of every painting, leaning in close, refusing to take any of it at face value. On the drive home, he talks their ears off about each individual piece. Yeonjun's never been one for museums, but he could hear Beomgyu talk about paintings for hours.

Beomgyu doesn't use any streaming services. He pirates shows and movies online because he doesn't want to support corporations, and after discovering someone called Joanna Newsom, he asked Mrs. Choi to take him off the family Spotify Premium plan. He still buys music on the iTunes Store, and songs take up approximately 60% of his phone storage. Beomgyu's favourite movie is August Rush. He doesn't think it's particularly good (his top four movies on Letterboxd are a Wong Kar Wai film, Before Sunrise, some mid 2000s classic rom-com, and Disney Pixar's Ratatouille) but he's been nostalgic from an early age. Plus, Robin Williams—and the dude that played André on Nickelodeon's Victorious—is in it. Beomgyu drinks 6 cups of coffee and smokes 3 cigarettes per day, unless he's out with friends, then he smokes more. He doesn't play guitar as much as he used to, but he has a band with Yunjin and a couple other friends and sometimes they play gigs at local open mics. He has two guitars, one acoustic and one electric. They're called Haruka and Michiru, Haru and Michi for short, he named them after the lesbians in Sailor Moon.

With every interaction, Yeonjun learns more and more about Choi Beomgyu.

Frankly, with every passing interaction, Yeonjun is a little more fucked. 

On Friday, Yeonjun is nervous.

There's a full length mirror in the Choi's guest room and Yeonjun spends an admittedly embarrassing amount of time in front of it, swapping out outfit for outfit. He puts on a pair or well fitting trousers and a blue shirt first, finishing the outfit with one of his ties, but decides it's too formal. His favourite cream coloured cardigan-and-skirt set proves to be too warm to weather a Daegu summer, so that's a no-go as well. He settles ultimately on a pair of baggy black jeans, one of his trusty white muscle tees, and a big, white and blue, striped button down, left open. He finishes the outfit with a black belt, sneakers he spent too much money on, a sleek looking pair of black sunglasses that he leaves hanging off one of his belt-loops. He looks good, if he does say so himself.

"Why are you even trying so hard," Soobin complains. He's sprawled across Yeonjun's bed, swiping through his phone and looking up intermittently to check on Yeonjun's progress. Yeonjun doesn't ask him for outfit advice—he wants to look nice tonight, but he's not desperate enough to go to Choi Soobin of all people for fashion advice. "It's a high school party, anything you wear will be fine."

Despite his words, it's fairly evident Soobin has put some effort into his outfit himself. He's switched out his usual combo of oversized t-shirt and sweat pants for a short-sleeved white button down and a pair of dark blue pants, he's even stuffed his usually unruly black hair into a beanie. He looks good, even if Yeonjun won't give him the satisfaction of telling him. He also looks, at least according to Yeonjun's suspicions, like he's trying to impress someone. Yeonjun has a good idea of who it is.

"I'm not trying so anything," Yeonjun defends, eyes glued to the mirror as he fiddles with his belt, "it's just, you know, the first time since coming back here that we're actually going some place exciting. I wanna look nice."

Soobin rolls his eyes. "Whatever you say," he says, "just be careful that whoever you fuck tonight isn't one of Beomgyu's besties."

"I'm not fucking anyone," Yeonjun protests, "I'm just going to get a little drunk, maybe smoke a little weed. Have some normal, no-sex, regular old fun."

Soobin snorts, but doesn't press further. "Just tell me when you're ready to leave. We have about 30 minutes before the game ends and it takes 15 minutes to drive there. So, chop chop."

They'd decided to skip the game and instead pick Beomgyu and his friends up from Gyeonsin and head straight to the party with them. Beomgyu had seemed thankful for it, happy to at least spend some part of the evening away from the not-so-watchful eyes of his big brother. Besides, Yeonjun and Soobin went to enough games already, what with Yeonjun, Changbin and Wooyoung all being a part of the SNU soccer club (mostly so they could get a relatively effort-free P.E credit). They'd been to more than their fair share of soccer matches over the last year.

Still, Yeonjun is nervous for tonight. He's used to being pretty high on the pecking order no matter where he goes, so going to a strangers house with a couple of people he remembers vaguely from his childhood and a bunch of people he most probably doesn't know, isn't exactly what he's used to. But Yeonjun isn't usually nervous for nights out—he thrives at parties, capable of engaging just about anyone he meets in conversation, pretty darn good at beer pong, and usually capable of smoking enough to at the very least not be the first one to tap out. Parties come to Yeonjun like second nature, he's good at them. Beomgyu is the outlier in his equation, a previously unknown factor. He doesn't know how Beomgyu's presence is going to change things, and while he's excited to meet Beomgyu's friends, he's nervous about getting drunk anywhere near him. 

To his credit, Yeonjun has shown tremendous restraint and willpower so far. What's the worst a couple shots of vodka and a Marlboro red can do anyway?

"I'm ready, I'm ready," Yeonjun says, grabbing his phone and tucking his emergency card and ID into his phone cover. "Let's go." 

Gyeonsin looks the same as Yeonjun remembers it, a big brown building dotted with spots of green, covered head to toe in pink rhododendron flowers. The notable addition is the presence of women. Sure, girls used to come to big games at Gyeonsin even when Yeonjun used to go here, but clearly opening up the student body to all genders has changed up the numbers. The match is almost over when they arrive, the game essentially won unless Gyeonsin's soccer team manages to score two more goals in the next 5 minutes. Still, they put up a good show, they made it all the way to the finals and what not. Yeonjun's almost proud.

Him and Soobin wait at the edge of the field, staying away from most of the students and parents that fill up the seats. "You think you would have won your season if you stayed around long enough?" Soobin asks, and Yeonjun shrugs. He's not sure, although he'd like to say yes. The field is crowded, and the energy still electric despite the game almost being over—Taehyun's on the field too, apparently one of Gyeonsin's defenders, Soobin keeps a watchful eye on him and Yeonjun decides to be nice and not bother him about.

When Yeonjun spots Beomgyu, sitting amongst a large group of students a little across the field, he almost short circuits.

Beomgyu's jeans are so shredded they show more leg than they cover, exposing large expanses of honey skin. He's wearing an oversized white band shirt, nicer than the ones he wears at home, over a red and black striped long sleeve, and a pair of red converse. He's dotted with silver jewellery, a chain hanging off his belt loop and series of delicate silver necklaces draped over his neck, messy but purposeful. It's a lot more casual than the the black silk number that still blesses haunts Yeonjun's dreams nightmares, but looking at him still makes Yeonjun's breathing uneven. He looks good, effortlessly good, hair wind tousled and face flushed after hours in the sun. 

The game ends a little overtime, customary for most matches at Gyeonsin by Yeonjun's experience—Gyeonsin loses but to their credit the team takes it in stride, they did lose by only one goal. Yeonjun and Soobin return to the car to wait as students around the filed disperse, excitement from the match still electrifying the space. Yeonjun leans against the hood of the car, blocking the sun from his eyes but refusing to put on his sunglasses, when suddenly Beomgyu and several of his friends start approaching. Yeonjun recognises Yunjin but the rest of them are strangers, all more attractive and intimidating than the last. Yunjin walks hand in hand with a girl around the same height as her, with long dark hair. The girl is startlingly pretty, like, model pretty, Yeonjun almost does a double take. Beomgyu is surrounded by three boys, two slightly taller than him and one a good deal shorter. Two of the boys are still in their soccer gear, slightly sweaty and bearing the green and white Gyeonsin High soccer jerseys. The last boy is the tallest of the bunch and textbook attractive, the kind of boy you'd take home to your mother, tall and broad with sparkling eyes and head of neat, brown hair. The six of them are a sight together, like the cast of a high school romance k-drama, all cable tv attractive, chattering away amongst themselves. 

Yeonjun whistles lowly before they're close enough to overhear. "Damn," he mutters, "if I didn't know they were Beomgyu's friends I'd be scared of them."

Soobin nods sagely. "They're my little brother's closest friends and I am scared of them," he says. "Imagine going to school and that shows up," he gestures vaguely at the group, "I'd drop out immediately." 

Yeonjun gulps, but schools his features into a practiced smile as the group gets closer. Beomgyu grins as they make eye contact. "Yeonjun Hyung!" He says excitedly, and Yeonjun can't help but widen his owl smile in response, suddenly it's no longer practiced, "and Soobin Hyung," he mutters under his breath, throwing Soobin a "stink-eye" and ignoring the stuck out tongue he receives in return. "Did you guys catch any of the game? Wasn't Taehyun amazing!"

Before Yeonjun has a chance to respond, one of Beomgyu's friends speaks up. It's the shortest boy, bleached blonde hair still matted with sweat. His football jersey has big white 7 on it. He's got sharp dark eyes and boyish features, a small, mischievous spark in his eye. "Hey, what about Heeseung-ie and I!" The boy says with an offended gasp, "weren't we amazing too?" The taller boy—Heeseung-ie, Yeonjun assumes—nods sagely in agreement, a fond, exasperated look on his face. He's got long brown hair and wide, deer like eyes that remind Yeonjun vaguely of Taehyun's. His own jersey has the number 1 on it, Yeonjun remembers he's Gyeonsin's goalie.

Beomgyu rolls his eyes. "Yes, yes, you were both great whatever," he says, waving them off dismissively, before turning back to Yeonjun. "Wait, Hyung, I should introduce you to everyone!"

The two soccer players are introduced as Jeongin—the blonde with the toothy grin—and Heeseung—the taller, quieter one. The girl next to Yunjin is introduced as Kazuha, an exchange student from Japan and also clearly Yunjin's lover, although neither of them give any confirmation. The last boy, the tall buff one, is Jimin, apparently the outgoing student body president of Gyeonsin. There's a slight air of awkwardness around him and Beomgyu that the group around them leaves unacknowledged, Yeonjun doesn't pry but makes sure to take a mental note to ask Soobin about it later. They're all wildly different, Jeongin is evidently the extrovert of the group, with Beomgyu and Yunjin oscillating between quiet and chatty and the other three coming off as quite shy. Given that there's no prior connection—save for his and Soobin's short interaction with Yunjin in the playground—Yeonjun doesn't click with them as quickly as he did with Taehyun and Huening Kai. But Yunjin and Jeongin are both a blast and Heeseung has the energy of nervous puppy, so Yeonjun's sure he'll warm up to this set of Beomgyu's friends soon enough too.

They file into different cars, the two soccer players and Jimin heading off in a different direction as Beomgyu, Yunjin and Kazuha file into the back seat of Soobin's car. Yeonjun grabs shotgun and then the five of them are off.

"So, where is this place," Soobin asks, pulling out of the Gyeonsin parking lot, "and also who's place is it and also why am I the one driving? I want to get drunk tonight."

Kazuha and Yunjin sit pressed so close to each other they essentially occupy one seat, and laugh openly at Soobin's misfortune in the back. Beomgyu rolls his eyes. "Remember when you literally begged me to let you come tonight?" He says, wearing a self-satisfied smile at Soobin's answering huff—a clear admittance of defeat. "Also it's our friend Chenle's house, you know, the giant mansion near Sincheon."

"That's far," Soobin whines, and for once Soobin isn't exaggerating.

Sincheon stream is a body of water in the deepest, most rural, parts of Daegu. The city in and of itself is small, but the area around Sincheon is almost entirely farmland. Yeonjun's been there more times than he could count, whenever he wanted to engage in debauchery outside of the keen and knowing eyes of Daegu's adults (who all, most likely, had his mother's phone number on speed dial) Yeonjun and his friends would go to Sincheon. The area is vast but mostly empty, lonely but beautiful, the way the stars are in Seoul. It's almost an hour out from the actual city, but the drive passes by faster than Yeonjun expects it to—especially given how terrible of a driver Soobin is, going so slow they get overtaken by several bikes and breaking so hard the car almost comes to a stop every time they come across a speed bump. Still, despite getting jostled and lurched around in the backseat, Yunjin and Beomgyu keep up a constant conversation with the rest of them intermittently cutting in, the two of them occasionally joining forces to relentlessly pick on Soobin or equally relentlessly pile love onto Kazuha. 

The house is gigantic, even putting some of the mansions Yeonjun had partied at in Seoul to shame. It's big and white, with large glass windows and even larger balconies, right on the streams edge almost as if it runs through the house itself. It's also absolutely teeming with people, teenagers practically spill out of the house, Yeonjun didn't even know this many people lived in Daegu. Still, the atmosphere is notably different here—for one, nobody is particularly dressed up, decked out in tightly fitted dresses or silk shirts. They look nice sure, but distinctly comfortable, casual even, with most party goers wearing jeans or light summer dresses that flow in the wind. There's no flashing disco lights and servers carrying trays of shots, instead there's a large bonfire right by the water, littered with discarded empty beer bottles, and a massive barbecue pit where several people appear to be taking turns grilling meat. Music blares loudly. When the house first comes into view they're playing some radio friendly Kpop hit Yeonjun remembers listening to while scrolling through TikTok, but the second the song ends it switches out to an older, Abba-esque, 80s disco number.

"Chenle's parents are loaded," Yunjin explains as Soobin parks the car, "they live in China but Chenle's at Gyeonsin on the same exchange program as Kazuha so they built this place for whenever—or if—they visit." Yunjin pauses for a bit, her eyes lingering on the house as the five of them exit the car. "I mean, I'm all for eating the rich, but it's fun indulging in their perks." 

"One job and all that socialism will spill right out of you," Kazuha jokes, nudging Yunjin gently.

"Nuh-uh!" Yunjin protests, a hand on her heart and the other reaching for the stars, "you can't stop the guillotine! The revolution will not be televised!"

"You're using that wrong," Beomgyu says.

They spend some time outside, Beomgyu, Yunjin and Kazuha greeting several classmates out by the bonfire while Soobin and Yeonjun linger awkwardly on the sidelines until they're introduced, but eventually—after they've greeted approximately 20 people and Yunjin has smoked a cigarette—they head inside. It hit's Yeonjun like a truck. The entire house smells like weed and sweat, it would be unpleasant if it wasn't so nostalgic. Inside, given the size of the place, the amount of people seems smaller. They aren't packed in their like sardines in a can or a dancers at a club in Seoul, but spread out. Sprawled over sofas engaging in raucous conversation or sitting in circles of people playing spin the bottle, in one corner Yeonjun spots a group of people surrounding a boy playing a guitar and isn't the least bit surprised when Beomgyu makes a beeline towards them. "Wonbin-ah, if you're playing Wonderwall right now, I'll kill you."

Yeonjun is introduced to many more people, even meets some he went to High School with—including Huening Lea who immediately insists they do shots together. But in a haze of mysterious faces and even more mysterious drinks being shoved into his waiting hands, Yeonjun finds he can't really remember too many of them. He lets himself bathe in the atmosphere, losing track of the people around him as both Beomgyu and Soobin are whisked off to who knows where, and Yunjin and Kazuha disappear together, probably to make out or further deny their feelings for each other. It's okay, Yeonjun is well taken care of, there's a pretty boy who's name he didn't catch hanging off his arm as he talks to whatever remnants of Beomgyu's friend group still surround him, he's got a nice buzz going, Yeonjun is just fine.

The boy is clearly flirting with him, big eyes blinking up at him shyly and a hand resting ever so slightly on the muscle of his right arm. He seems nice, is pretty, with kohl smudged around his brown eyes and bottle blonde that stops a little past his shoulders. Really, he's pretty much Yeonjun's type. So, when he stands up and offers Yeonjun his hand and a dance, Yeonjun takes it, following the boy to a makeshift dance floor set up somewhere in the too-large house where too many people dance to too-loud music. It's fun, Yeonjun feels right at home in the throng of bodies, jumping up and down to a series of nostalgic early 2010's club bangers. The boy laughs and moves with him, he places a hand on Yeonjun's shoulder and moves closer, staring up at Yeonjun through his long lashes as he moves his hips to the music. Yeonjun reaches up, ready to put his hands on the boy's waist and sway with him, when he stops cold.

Ten steps in front of him, occasionally obstructed by a gesticulating body, is Choi Beomgyu.

He's got his head thrown back as he moves to the music, the pink and purple lights bathing him in a pretty glow and illuminating the perfect profile of his face as he looks upwards into the light, as if letting them wash over him. His hands run up and down the sides of his body, until they got thrown up into the sky at a particularly momentous beat or lyric, before they crawl right back down and resume they're caressing. His hair sways with him, as if it's got a life of it's own, frizzed up ever so slightly and surrounding him like a dark, glowing halo. His eyes are closed, he looks entirely in bliss, a serene, happy smile gracing his perfect lips. 

Right then, Yeonjun can't see anyone but Beomgyu. The boy currently in front of him, confused by his sudden lack of movement, fades out of focus. As does everyone else, all these people reduced to moving blobs of light in the magnetism of Beomgyu's presence, as if Yeonjun's zeroed in on him with a camera. Yeonjun's didn't drink enough to get shitfaced, but suddenly he's too disoriented to make out what he's doing, barely processes that he's moving at all. But suddenly the boy from before is nowhere to be seen, and Choi Beomgyu is standing right in front of him, looking up at him in surprise.

When his eyes meet Beomgyu's, Yeonjun decides he could drown in them. Beomgyu's eyes are bigger than the whole world, they are vaster than the seas, they are brighter than every sun in the endless expanse of the universe. It could be the alcohol talking, but Yeonjun feels like they're about to swallow him whole. 

"Oh," Beomgyu says, his voice soft and airy, "it's you." Yeonjun just about catches it over the noise. 

"Yeah," he replies, he sounds as out of breath as he feels. "Hey."

Beomgyu smiles a wide, hazy smile. "Hey."

Neither of them move, standing still in a sea of crashing bodies. But Yeonjun doesn't feel the need to. He looks into Beomgyu's eyes and the lights there seem to be dancing enough for the both of them. Beomgyu doesn't move either, up close Yeonjun can see the drunken flush on his cheeks and the bleary look in his eye, glistening under the flashing lights overhead, reflecting glimmers of pink and purple and every other colour the human eye can see. He's transported to that very first night in back in Daegu, Beomgyu had had the same bleary look in his eyes and the same pink burns on the apples of his cheeks.

"How drunk are you right now?" Yeonjun says, pitching his voice louder so Beomgyu can hear him over Baby Got Back being played for the second time.

"Pretty drunk," Beomgyu calls back, raising his voice to match Yeonjun's. His words are slightly slurred, his voice deeper, sweeter, more honeyed than usual. He looks around himself thoughtfully, as if trying to decide something, and then says, "do you wanna grab a smoke with me outside?"

The air is crisper than Yeonjun remembers it being. It's unseasonably pleasant for a summer night in Daegu and the wind rustles Beomgyu's long hair. They stand at the foot of the stream, if they dipped their feet down just a little, the water would wet their shoes. Beomgyu pulls out a box of Marlboro Reds and a purple plastic lighter from his pocket. He pops one between his lips and offers the box to Yeonjun, who takes a cigarette gently from in between Beomgyu's grasp. Beomgyu lights Yeonjun's cigarette before his own, and breathes in deep. A cloud of smoke erupts into the air. Yeonjun follows.

Most people have cleared out from the area, and if they remain outside, are huddled close to the barbecue cooking off whatever meat is still left. None of them pay Beomgyu and Yeonjun any attention, engrossed in their own conversations—or food, for that matter. They stand close to each other, when Beomgyu pulls the cigarette away from his lips his elbow brushes against Yeonjun's arm. The wind blows softly, but it's sound is overpowered by the burbling stream, and when Yeonjun looks into the water he finds it reflects the stars overhead. Somehow, they're less bright here than the lights had been in Beomgyu's eyes. They don't talk while they smoke, blowing curls of white back and forth until Beomgyu chucks the butt of his cigarette into the river and Yeonjun stamps his own out under his shoe. 

"So," Beomgyu slurs, "Hyunjin, huh?"

Yeonjun is more or less entirely sober now, smoke clearing out the drunken haze from his system, but he still has no idea what or who "Hyunjin" is.

"Uh," He says, squinting at Beomgyu, "Hyunjin?"

Beomgyu looks puzzled for a moment, eyebrows knitted together and face cocked to the side like a curious puppy. He watches Yeonjun curiously, Yeonjun blinks back, and then Beomgyu bursts into peals of drunken laughter. It's the same laugh as before, when Soobin had bumped his head into Beomgyu's roof, but with a drunken edge to it. Looser, more carefree, almost involuntary as it spills free. (It takes over his whole body...arms clasped over his stomach as peals and peals of laughter leak out of his lips. He eyes are scrunched shut, his lips spread into a smile so wide it near splits his face in half...)

"I-" Yeonjun starts, confused, although the sheer joy of hearing Beomgyu's laughter slowly permeates his brain, "I don't get it."

Beomgyu stifles his laughter by biting into his fist, his movements are still sluggish, the alcohol clearly still sitting heavy in his system. The grin doesn't slip off his face even as he begins to talk. "The guy, Hyung," he giggles. "From earlier, my friend? The one who's, like, really really really pretty? Who you were, like, dancing with." The word "like" is a lot more frequent in Beomgyu's vocabulary when he's drunk, as is the satori dialect embedded deep into his even deeper voice.

"Oh," Yeonjun says. "Him."

"Yeah," Beomgyu replies, the giggles slowly leaving his voice. "Him."

Yeonjun ponders it for a long minute. He doesn't remember much of his conversation with "Hyunjin". The boy had been perfectly charming, the right amount of flirty, and Beomgyu had been correct about him being really really really pretty. He'd even been good at dancing, at least from what little Yeonjun had seen through his alcohol impaired gaze—and Yeonjun knows a thing or two about dancing, it's the thing he's best at, the craft he values most. But Yeonjun's brain has already written Hyunjin almost entirely out of his memory. The wind billows around them, and in it's excitement pushes one of Yeonjun's shirt sleeves off his shoulder, Yeonjun doesn't try to fix it, enjoying the cool air on his skin. He hums. "He was cute," Yeonjun says, "didn't catch his number though," he nudges Beomgyu lightly with the point of his elbow. "Got too distracted by you."

Beomgyu laughs airily and slumps into Yeonjun's side, body loose and unstable as the alcohol courses through his system. His hair tickles Yeonjun's bare shoulder—it's soft.

"If you told me that 5 years ago I would have fallen in love with you all over again."

Yeonjun freezes, his heart jumping to his throat and beating so hard it feels like it's going to jump right out. If it succeeds, Yeonjun thinks it would jump into Beomgyu's arms and make a home nestled in his chest. Yeonjun thinks he'd let it.

For all their years of knowing each other, and for all of Yeonjun's years of knowing the crush Beomgyu had had on him when he was a child, they've never really discussed any of it. Hell, Yeonjun's barely discussed it with Soobin. Their conversation with Kai earlier this week is perhaps the most him and his best friend have ever discussed Soobin's brother's affection for Yeonjun. So when those words escape Beomgyu's lips, the closest thing Beomgyu's ever given him to a confession in all his years of obvious infatuation, Yeonjun feels his world tilt on it's axis.

Beomgyu's still draped against his shoulder, but now he's tilting his face up to gaze at Yeonjun, beautiful mouth slightly agape and eyes half-lidded. Yeonjun's heart sinks back into his chest, and then jumps up again when Beomgyu pushes himself even closer. Yeonjun doesn't have the strength to push him away.

"You know I used to have, like, the biggest crush on you, right?" Beomgyu says, his voices is more air than anything else as he slinks into the nook of Yeonjun's shoulder, nuzzling Yeonjun's skin as his eyes close sleepily. They stand chest to chest, if either of them had the courage to move their arms, they'd embrace. This close, Yeonjun can almost taste the smoke and liquor on his breath, can feel it tickle his neck, burning any skin it touches. "You were basically my first love," Beomgyu giggles, "I can't believe you're, like, even prettier now than you were back then." His voice is soft, almost as if he's talking to himself, and clearly entirely unaware of the weight of the words leaving his plush, perfect, lips. "So tall and strong and pretty," he purrs. He opens his eyes and they meet Yeonjun's, who can't drag his gaze away from the boy pressed against his side.

"Has anyone ever told you you're, like, really hot." He slurs. He pushes even closer to Yeonjun, although not putting any strength into it. Yeonjun could push him away if he wanted to. He doesn't.

"Once or twice," Yeonjun chokes out. The words burn as they escape his throat.

Beomgyu giggles again, the sound feels like nectar running down Yeonjun's throat. 

Yeonjun's mind is running a mile a minute. Their lips are close, too close—if Yeonjun pushes an inch forward they'd lock. His head reels. He thinks about Soobin, and an ugly, clawing, cloying guilt gnaws at his system. He thinks about Hyunjin on the dance floor, and for the first time feels bad about leaving him there. He thinks about Mr. and Mrs. Choi, who welcomed Yeonjun so willingly into their home—thinks about how badly he wants to kiss their son, and wether or not they'd approve. He thinks about every beautiful person Yeonjun has ever kissed before, thinks about the moment right before he did it, thinks about how none of them looked nearly as pretty as Beomgyu does now. Then he thinks about Beomgyu, beautiful, perfect, untouchable Beomgyu, standing right in front of him, very much touching him. This close, the rest of them don't seem to matter.

Still, this is wrong. The guilt gnawing at him isn't just about Soobin, or Hyunjin, or Beomgyu's parents, or anyone else—Beomgyu is drunk. Beomgyu hasn't been in love with him for years. Beomgyu will regret this in the morning. But then he pushes closer, and his eyes stare meaningfully into Yeonjun's, and then they flutter close. The tips of his long eyelashes brush against the flushed skin of his cheeks, and he runs an enticing, unknowing, waiting tongue against the seam of his lips. Yeonjun feels his restraint start to splinter.

Just as he's about to lean in, just as his eyes flutter close, just as he does the unthinkable—

"Beomgyu Hyung! Yeonjun-Ssi!" 

It feels like Yeonjun's been struck by lightning, the electric current shocking his system all the way through from his feet to the ends of his hair. He immediately pulls away, taking several steps away from Beomgyu. Beomgyu falters, not expecting the sudden movement, but manages to stay on his feet. He doesn't look anywhere near as mortified as Yeonjun feels, simply turning around to search for the voice that had just called out their names, movements still drunken and sluggish, eyes squinted. Yeonjun wants the earth to swallow him whole. Guilt and fear and a hundred other emotions biting and screaming and clawing at him. He can't take his eyes off of Beomgyu, his palms are suddenly sweaty, a hot, unpleasant, heat settles in his chest, he gets the overwhelming urge to run. Beomgyu seems entirely unaffected. 

In the distance, right outside the house, Kang Taehyun comes into view. The sight would be funnier if Yeonjun's heart wasn't threatening to burn through his chest. Taehyun stands slumped under the weight of a taller, bigger, man. For all his strength it is clear that Taehyun is struggling to shoulder Soobin in his entirety—Yeonjun sympathises, he's had to lug a drunk Soobin back to their dorm several times, he knows how hard it is. Soobin is entirely out of it, although still conscious. He's mumbling nonsense loudly and directly into Taehyun's ear, who winces every time the taller boy opens his mouth. His legs are entirely jelly, swishing right and left as Taehyun tries in vain to keep him upright.

The sight sobers Beomgyu a little, although his eyes are still bleary. "Oh my god," he slurs, taking shaky steps forward towards his best friend and his brother. Yeonjun follows, keeping a distance.

"I thought he wasn't going to drink tonight!" Beomgyu says, it's equal parts whiney and worried.

"He wasn't," Taehyun says, voice cagey, teeth gritted under Soobin's weight. "Some stuff happened, I'll tell you when you're sober."

Beomgyu pouts. "I'm fine."

"Sure," Taehyun sighs, "but you're still drunk, Yunjin-Noona and you took 10 shots each I was there—now come on, lets get to the car. I'm going to drive the three of you home and I can't do it if I have to lug your stupid brother around any longer, like, this dude is heavy. Also, I would preferably like to get him out of here before he gets alcohol poisoning."

"I'll help," Yeonjun says, his voice feels like gravel as the words escape his mouth, leaving trails of unpleasant heat against his tongue and throat. He slings Soobin's free arm around his shoulder and helps Taehyun carry him to the car. They grunt as they go, but carrying Soobin with Taehyun's help is considerably easier than all the times Yeonjun had had to do it alone. Beomgyu leads the way holding up his phone as torchlight, he sways every so often as he walks, but by some miracle manages not to fall over. When they get to the car, Soobin has all but passed out, face lolling back and forth between Yeonjun and Taehyun's arms. They somehow manage to force him into the passenger seat, Taehyun fastens his seatbelt and pulls the car keys out of Soobin's pocket.

He fixes Beomgyu and Yeonjun with a meaningful look. Yeonjun is standing dazed, staring at his feet, and Beomgyu is fretting over his brother—if Yeonjun wasn't so out of it, he'd find it all sickeningly sweet. Despite all their bickering, Beomgyu and Soobin loved each other an unbelievable amount. Now it just makes his guilt burn even hotter. Taehyun, who had probably seen how close they'd been standing by the stream, regards the two of them cautiously. When Yeonjun looks up to meet his eyes, he finds that his gaze is hard. Taehyun looks at Yeonjun like he's trying to solve some sort of puzzle, eyes sharp and eyebrows clenched. When he pivots to look at Beomgyu, his eyes soften.

He lets out a heavy sigh, walking over to the drivers seat. "Both of you okay?" He asks, "anyone wanna grab some food or water before we head out."

Yeonjun shakes his head silently, Beomgyu echoes the movement. "I'm okay," he says, "and there's a water bottle in the car, don't worry."

Taehyun nods, stoic. "Okay," he says, "let's go." He slides into the drivers seat and Yeonjun and Beomgyu silently follow him. The second he's sitting in the car, Yeonjun feels the weight of the night crash onto him, he slumps against the door. His head knocks against the window every time the car jerks, Yeonjun doesn't have it in him to move. Next to him, Beomgyu drifts in and out of sleep. He's trying desperately to stay awake, checking up on his brother more often than he really needs to, but the alcohol has rendered his eyelids heavy and he struggles not to fall asleep. 

"Uh," Beomgyu says, rubbing his eyes. "What about Yunjin and 'Zuha?" He asks through a yawn, "we were supposed to drop them home."

"Chaewon said she'd drive them back," Taehyun says, pulling the car out of the parking lot. "I was gonna look for them so I could take all of you back together but nobodies seen them all night." The house falls behind them and Yeonjun watches it get smaller and smaller in the distance

Beomgyu giggles, even in moments of turmoil the sound makes Yeonjun feel a little lighter. "Those two," he garbles, eyes falling close as he presses his face against the window. "When are they going to admit they, like, like like each other. Like, everyone knows it but them." Beomgyu rambles drunkenly, voice getting softer the longer he speaks, before he falls asleep leaning against the car door.

"Yeah," Taehyun says. He makes eye contact with Yeonjun through the rearview mirror. "Them."

Yeonjun remains awake for the duration of the car ride. Him and Taehyun don't speak, Taehyun's too focused on getting them home as quickly as possible and Yeonjun's too wrapped up in his own inner monologue. He finds his eyes drifting to Beomgyu without meaning too, and drags his gaze away from the sleeping boy as soon as he notices what he's doing. Beomgyu is a pretty sleeper, his lips part ever so slightly and his eyelashes brush the skin of his cheeks, just like when they'd almost kissed by the stream. 

When Taehyun pulls into the driveway he heaves a heavy sigh. "I'm going to take Beomgyu Hyung up to the attic," he says, getting out of the car and approaching Beomgyu's side of the back. "I'm tired from driving and he weighs nothing—you got Soobin-Hyung?" Yeonjun nods stiffly as Taehyun scoops Beomgyu up in his arms, he walks up to the front door and with practiced ease grabs a key from under a potted plant Mrs. Choi keeps by the door. Beomgyu nuzzles into him, mumbling something Yeonjun doesn't pick up as the two of the disappear indoors.

Yeonjun sits in the car in silence for a while, ruminating in the darkness of Mrs. Choi's car. The lights in the house are all off, except for the ones all the way up in Beomgyu's attic that have just been turned on. The stars are less bright here than they were by Sincheon. Taehyun doesn't come back outside for a while, and when Yeonjun notices the clock on his phone has hit 4 a.m he finally makes a move. He stretches first, working out the cricks in his joints, before slumping forwards and falling into his hands, sighing. Soobin snores carefree in the front seat, Yeonjun isn't excited to lug him up the stairs, but it isn't an experience he doesn't know how to navigate. 

"Come on, Bin-ah," He sighs, "let's get you to bed."

Yeonjun doesn't sleep that night.

After he'd managed to tuck Soobin into bed—following a long, arduous battle between Yeonjun, Soobin, and the door to Soobin's bedroom—he'd spent the next 2 hours chain-smoking cigarettes on the porch. He'd tried, mostly in vain, to distract himself from the events of the night, scrolling through TikToks and emails and messages from people he'd never responded to. It hadn't worked.

Every time Yeonjun blinks, he sees Beomgyu's face. Every time he lights a new cigarette—he smokes American Spirits, the blue ones—it reminds him of how Beomgyu smoked Marlboro Reds instead. When the fire starts to burn too close to his fingertips, the heat is eclipsed entirely by the phantom warmth of Beomgyu's body pressed to his.

Yeonjun returns inside once the sun comes up. He tosses and turns in his bed, exhaustion weighing him down but refusing to let him fall asleep. The silence is too loud when he tries, the darkness too vast. Instead Yeonjun distracts himself like any young person would in the 21st century, by scrolling mindlessly through his phone and hoping to feel something, anything, that isn't a direct fucking consequence of Choi Beomgyu. Around 8 in the morning, he starts to drift in and out of consciousness, eyes fluttering shut and then bursting open ten minutes later—Yeonjun's almost glad every time it happens, since every time Yeonjun falls asleep he dreams of big brown eyes staring up at him expectantly. Of a delicate little tongue poking at soft pink lips. Of Beomgyu's guitar calloused fingertips against the soft skin of Yeonjun's shoulder.

By 9, Yeonjun gives up on sleep entirely. Through his open window he hears Mr. and Mrs. Choi leaving the house, their cars pulling out of the driveway within minutes of each other. Soobin wakes up next. For whatever reason, he leaves the house immediately. He doesn't say anything, doesn't even leave a text—if Yeonjun hadn't been wide awake to hear Soobin opening and closing doors in rapid succession, slamming them louder and harder than he would have if he weren't hungover, Yeonjun wouldn't even have known Soobin was gone. His heart hammers when he hears Beomgyu from above. Soft footsteps echo down from the attic overhead as Beomgyu wakes. Yeonjun doesn't know what to say when he sees Beomgyu next, doesn't even know wether he remembers anything that happened between them the night before.

Soobin remembers almost everything after a night of drinking—which is a problem, because drunk Yeonjun likes to make bets and wagers, and sober Soobin remembers every one the next morning. Soobin is also decidedly petty and college student broke. He'd made Yeonjun go to class wearing Soobin's Pokémon pyjamas once. Yeonjun's a fashion major. It had been a blow to his reputation. But Soobin and Beomgyu are barely alike, so maybe they're different here too.

Or maybe Beomgyu remembers every chilling second from the night prior. The words they'd exchanged, the way Yeonjun had looked at him, how Yeonjun had leaned in for what was intended to be a kiss. 

Yeonjun isn't sure which one he'd prefer.

He gets his answer a couple hours later. The clock says that it's almost noon already but Yeonjun hasn't done anything except brush his teeth until the taste of last night's liquor had been scrubbed free from his mouth. And wallow in bed, Yeonjun had done that too. He hasn't even drunk his coffee—coffee means the night is truly over, Yeonjun's still hoping to get some sleep in before truly starting the day. He lies flat on his back, staring up at the ceiling, trying the shut out the rest of the world. He's got his phone propped by his ear. The sultry voices of Brent Faiyaz and SZA and Daniel Caesar, and really any of Yeonjun's favourite RnB artists, do little to calm his restless brain. Then there's a knock on the door. 

At first, Yeonjun assumes it's Soobin, having returned from wherever it is he'd fucked off to first thing in the morning. But Soobin would never knock, has never knocked in the past—it's lead to it's fair share of rather unfortunate situations (mostly on Soobin's end, but often on Yeonjun's), but Soobin is nothing if not a creature of habit. Besides, if Soobin did knock, it would never be like this one. Shy, a little hesitant, quiet, so that if Yeonjun had been asleep it wouldn't have woken him up.

Yeonjun calls out a "I'm coming!" and takes slow, sluggish steps towards the door. He isn't particularly presentable right now, hasn't even forced a shirt on, but his legs move before his brain can process his state of undress. Yeonjun knows who it is before he even opens the door, can feel the nervous energy from the other side and can only come to one conclusion.

"Hey," Beomgyu says. There's a quiet shyness to his voice that hasn't been there in days, and it makes Yeonjun's heart ache.

"Hey," Yeonjun echoes. "Wanna come in?"

Beomgyu nods silently and follows Yeonjun inside, closing the door behind them. "You, uh," He stutters, a blush rising to his cheeks, "you lost your shirt."

Yeonjun looks down and sees that yes, he has indeed forgotten his shirt. His face flushes hot. "Fuck," he hisses, he looks around failing to find a shirt hanging off his desk chair, where it usually is. In the frenzy of last night he must've forgotten. "Do you mind? I can just grab one real quick—"

"No! No! It's okay," Beomgyu insists, eyes wide and alarmed, arms twisted uncomfortably at his sides. "I'll be quick."

"Cool," Yeonjun says, sitting down on the bed. He gulps heavily. This conversation had to be coming, he knew that last night itself, he just isn't sure where Beomgyu wants to take it. "What's up?"

Beomgyu takes a deep breath. He's standing all the way by the door and the distance between them feels vast and heavy, so different from how they'd been last night. Beomgyu fiddles uncomfortably. His fingers twist into the fabric of his shorts—they're grey, and sit far too high on his thighs, leaving miles of creamy honey tan skin on display. Strong calfs and plush thighs, if the air wasn't so stifling, Yeonjun would be overjoyed to see them. Beomgyu's knees are pink, his legs dotted with the occasional bruise, and there's a stick and poke star tattooed high on his right thigh—it's clearly not professional, the line-work uneven and in desperate need of a couple touch ups, probably the result of being drunk and in close proximity to tattoo ink and a needle, but Yeonjun finds it heart wrenchingly cute. His fingertips ache to map it's uneven edges. 

"Um," Beomgyu starts, his voice is stiff and stilted, on edge. "About last night—"

Yeonjun opens his mouth to apologise, guilt so potent it feels like it's leaking out of him. For whatever reason, Beomgyu beats him to it.

"I'm so sorry!" He says, eyes suddenly bleary and voice painfully, openly earnest. "I can get really, really, really clingy and touchy and gross when I'm drunk and I'm so sorry I came onto you. And I'm so sorry I dragged you away from Hyunjin, I'm sure you guys were having a really great time." He gesticulates widely as he speaks, clearly distressed, Yeonjun doesn't know what to do or say. "And I'm so, so, so sorry for making things awkward and, like, reminding you about the stupid fucking crush I had on you as a kid, and I'm sorry I tried to kiss you even though you didn't want it and—" Beomgyu takes a deep gasping breath, cutting off his own rambling. His eyes are squeezed shut, eyebrows crushed close against his eyelids, and his hands lie in little fists by his sides. "I'm just so, so sorry." 

He looks down at his feet, refusing to look up at Yeonjun—Yeonjun doesn't know what to say.

How could Beomgyu think any of it was his fault? Yeonjun had left Hyunjin entirely on his own accord, Yeonjun had been just as flirty, Yeonjun had tried to kiss him just as much. How could Beomgyu have been clingy and touchy and gross when every scrape of his fingertips against Yeonjun's skin had set him on fire, had jumpstarted his entire body, turned him into liquid lightning. How on earth could Beomgyu think Yeonjun hadn't wanted to kiss him, when kissing him is all Yeonjun's been thinking about since he failed to do so by the stream. 

Yeonjun's by his side in a flash, feet moving before he knows what he's doing. Beomgyu flinches as he get closer, but Yeonjun grabs his palms, twisting their fingers together. He leaves his grip loose so Beomgyu can pull away if he wants to—he doesn't. They stand face to face, hand to hand, but Beomgyu refuses to look up from his feet.

"I wanted to kiss you too," Yeonjun says simply, not knowing what else to say.

Beomgyu jerks up, teary eyes wide. "What?" He whispers, as if he doesn't believe a word he's just heard. "Hyung, you don't have to—"

"I know," Yeonjun interrupts, he pulls a hand free to wipe a tear from Beomgyu's cheeks. Beomgyu's eyes are wide and his eyebrows raised so high they look like they'll fly off his forehead. He's frowning. "I don't have to anything—I don't now and I didn't then, by Sincheon," Yeonjun says, injecting every word with as much sincerity as he can muster. "I wanted to, Beomgyu-yah," he says, "I wanted to then, I want to now."

Beomgyu's frozen in place. "You want...to kiss me?" His voice is hesitant, confused, as if he could never imagine that Yeonjun truly desired him.

Yeonjun hadn't meant to spill all that, but what's done is done. He nods stiffly, shy but resolute. How could Beomgyu not know how badly Yeonjun wanted him, how desperately Yeonjun needed his lips on his, the hours he'd spent craving him.

Beomgyu looks at him. Yeonjun stares back. 

And then Beomgyu's lips are on his, and every worried, guilt-ridden, sleep taking anxiety is replaced by the taste of mint on Beomgyu's tongue, by the smell of vanilla and cherry rising off of Beomgyu's neck, by the way soft, unsure, guitar calloused fingertips press against his own. Beomgyu's lips are pillow soft, hesitant and shy against his. His hands crawl up Yeonjun's arms, momentarily squeezing the muscle of Yeonjun's bicep, before they rest feather light against his neck, as if Yeonjun could push him away any second. Yeonjun doesn't, he pulls them closer instead, wrapping one arm around Beomgyu's slight waist and cupping his face with the other. He leans in closer, presses harder, and Beomgyu follows the movement. His hold tightens around Yeonjun's neck, mere fingers replaced by the full force of Beomgyu's arms, pulling them impossibly close together.

The kiss isn't perfect, but it's everything Yeonjun's ever wanted. Calm as the sea and raging as a storm.

Beomgyu slowly breaks out of his shell, opening his mouth with a gasp as Yeonjun pushes in even closer. Beomgyu is pliant in his grasp, but his body is firm and steady. Beomgyu sucks on his tongue and Yeonjun feels his knees get weak. The kiss is mere seconds and long, yearning hours all at once—when Beomgyu pulls away to catch his breath, Yeonjun feels like it's been days, or maybe several startling, life altering seconds, perhaps both at once. 

It isn't long before Beomgyu leans in again, hungrier this time, filthier. He pulls his arms away from Yeonjun's neck to run his palms down his body, thumbing a nipple gently as he goes before stroking Yeonjun's stomach, shivering in delight. Beomgyu's touch leaves pinpricks of electricity on Yeonjun's skin, lasting long after Beomgyu's fingers are gone, setting Yeonjun on fire. He squeezes tighter, Beomgyu's waist is sinfully small, his legs are imposingly strong, he's just a little bit soft all over. Yeonjun can't imagine ever getting enough. They pull away with a gasp, but stay close, panting into each others open mouths. Yeonjun feels like a speeding train, unable to stay away from him. He dips his head down, licking a stripe up Beomgyu's neck as he shudders in Yeonjun's grasp. Beomgyu gasps his name, and Yeonjun presses hard, leaving a light, barely there bruise on Beomgyu's neck.

He thumbs the edge of Beomgyu's t-shirt. "Can I," he says, his voice losing itself. Beomgyu nods quickly, desperate, and Yeonjun makes quick work of discarding his t-shirt. He barely holds back a gasp when he sees what's underneath, but his breath hitches anyway. Beomgyu is soft and smooth, a lean stomach and glorious, delicate brown nipples. There's disparate moles doting his skin, and a sparse smattering of hair trails into his shorts from below his belly button. His pierced belly button. It's unfair how gorgeous Beomgyu makes a simple metal barbel look.

"Shit," Yeonjun gasps, thumbing the metal, "you're unreal."

If Yeonjun was more conscious of himself, he'd be embarrassed of how utterly in awe he sounds. But with Beomgyu in front of him, beautiful, pliant, waiting, Beomgyu, Yeonjun can't bring himself to care. Beomgyu shivers as Yeonjun fiddles with the ring. "It was a bit of a mess at first," he says, his voice mostly air, "Yunjin did it with a sewing needle and vaseline."

"Remind me to thank Yunjin next time I see her," Yeonjun says, eyes transfixed as Beomgyu giggles. Every inch of skin is painfully enticing. Yeonjun is tempted to lean and bite, to leave little marks against his honeyed skin, he takes a nipple into his mouth instead.

Beomgyu mewls at the sudden heat, hands clawing up Yeonjun to grasp his shoulders, holding on for dear life. Yeonjun draws him between his lips, gently at first, showing a truly commendable amount of restraint. Beomgyu’s head falls back in a low moan, his fingers come up to grip Yeonjun’s hair, clutching onto dark strands like a crutch. He tugs hard, just shy of painful, sending an electric shock of pain-pleasure running down Yeonjun’s spine.

He sucks harder, hard enough that slick, lewd sounds echo around the room alongside Beomgyu’s deep, quiet gasps. By the time he actually adds his tongue, Beomgyu is already unraveling in his waiting arms. He cants his hips forward, grinding into Yeonjun’s crotch, and his hands tug on Yeonjun’s hair again, a little bit harder this time, just enough to sting at the root. Yeonjun bites down on his nipple in response.

Yeonjun registers Beomgyu’s hand moving to the wall, steadying himself as he shakes like a leaf in Yeonjun’s hands. Yeonjun feels like an animal, driven by harsh, unbridled lust as he continues with his teeth and lips on the opposite nipple. He finds a rhythm, moving back and forth on Beomgyu’s chest until Beomgyu’s breath is ragged and his hips roll unconsciously into Yeonjun’s. Beomgyu is addictive, frighteningly so, Yeonjun pushes and pushes and pushes, unrelenting in his pursuit for Beomgyu’s pleasure, in his pursuit to feel Beomgyu surrender completely to his touch.

“Fuck,” Beomgyu mewls, his voice reduced to something needy and raspy, cracking brokenly halfway through his sentence.

Beomgyu tugs on Yeonjun’s dark hair weakly, half-hearted in his attempt to pull him away. It’s not nearly enough to deter Yeonjun, and he sticks out his tongue out, defiant, looking up to meet Beomgyu’s eye, at least as far as the angle will allow. The very tip of his tongue brushes Beomgyu’s nipple, turned purple red from its original brown and delightfully swollen. Beomgyu rewards him with a long, keening mewl, pulling him away with a weak grasp.

“If you don’t stop now, I’ll come.” Beomgyu rasps, trying to ground himself by leaning against the wall.

“Sensitive?” Yeonjun teases, dipping back in for another lick.

"Shut up." Beomgyu whimpers, pulling him away again, harder this time. He’s panting heavily, utterly overwhelmed, stained pink. “Can I suck you off?” He rasps, and fuck, who is Yeonjun to say no?

The second Yeonjun nods yes, Beomgyu is pushing him across the room and onto the bed, taking a seat on his knees in-between Yeonjun’s spread thighs. He looks small like this, narrow shoulders and big brown eyes gazing up at Yeonjun, large and wide and hazy with lust. Yeonjun leans down to give him a quick, fleeting kiss before Beomgyu gets to work.

It flashes, in the back of Yeonjun's head, that this might no be a good idea. That they haven't discussed it, haven't set any boundaries, haven't done anything they should be doing before taking a step like this. The risk of what they're doing settles into his chest—sure, no one was home when they started, but Yeonjun's been too distracted by Beomgyu to make note of any opening and closing doors. They haven't locked themselves in either, anyone could walk in at any given moment, Soobin never fucking knocks asnyway—and fuck, the Soobin of it all. What would Soobin do if he walked on his little brother tonguing his best friend's cock—

The voice whispering these thoughts into Yeonjun's ear quietens. It's silenced entirely when Beomgyu's fingers brush against Yeonjun's sensitive cock.

“Fuck! Beomgyu—”

The drawstrings to his sweatpants are pulled free and soft hands hook into the fabric, brushing against Yeonjun’s sensitive skin. It stuns Yeonjun, who hasn’t been paying very close attention to Beomgyu’s progress, too distracted by Beomgyu's beautiful, dark, pupil-blown eyes. But Beomgyu seems to have a particular talent for doing this—throwing Yeonjun’s focus off-course with very, very little effort.

Drawing his bottom lip in between his teeth, Beomgyu jerks Yeonjun’s pants and boxers down in one quick swoop, fitting the waistband below his balls. Yeonjun’s cock tumbles free, stretching up from a dark tangle of pubic hair. He’s not massive, but he’s also certainly never had anything close to a complaint, and Beomgyu gives a sharp little inhale as his eyes land on him. Hesitantly, Beomgyu closes his hand around the shaft. His mouth forms a small “o”, one that near immediately sends a jolt of liquid arousal running, coursing, burning through Yeonjun. Spine tingling, all the way from his toes to the tips of his hair. It makes his cock harder, large and flushed and curling up towards his stomach, harder than he remembers being, well, maybe ever.

“You’re big,” Beomgyu whispers, like he’s telling Yeonjun’s cock a secret.

“Uh, yeah.” Yeonjun clears his throat. He hesitates as Beomgyu all but inspects him. “Listen, you don’t have to, we can stop if you want—”

Beomgyu immediately sends him a cutting glare, looking up at him wearing an angry pout. Still, there’s a heated look from under his lashes, his gaze burning. His expression is stubborn, it leaves very little room for doubt. He drops Yeonjun’s gaze and instead presses a soft kiss on Yeonjun’s skin, just shy of where Yeonjun craves him, so light he barely feels it. “No,” Beomgyu says, voice firm despite how it shakes with nerves. “I-I want to, Hyung.”

Yeonjun’s inhales come heavier now, working in double time, escaping him in quick successive gasps. He lays a hand on the bed to brace himself, clutching the bedsheets for dear life as a new and powerful wave of lust all but devours him. It travels through him like a second lurch of electricity, liquid light.

“I really, really, want to,” Beomgyu says, earnest and soft and Oh God, Yeonjun is so fucked. Beomgyu blinks up at him. “Can I?”

“Shit,” Yeonjun curses

“Hyunggg.” His voice is long and lilting, sonic honey, Yeonjun couldn’t say no if he wanted to—and he really doesn’t want to.

"Yeah, yeah, you can," He says. Yeonjun’s voice is all air, heavy and whinier than he remembers it being. “Tap my thigh twice if it's too much, okay? Whenever you want.”

“Okay," Beomgyu replies.

Yeonjun shoves his knuckles into his mouth, biting into them to muffle his voice as Beomgyu narrows the circle of his fist, tightening his hold on Yeonjun’s cock. His hands are dry but pillow soft. When he gives Yeonjun’s shaft a few slow pumps, it’s almost embarrassing how quickly Yeonjun slicks up, precum wetting Beomgyu’s palm. Beomgyu stares at him in presumed awe, eyes wide and steadily fixed on Yeonjun as he pulls at his cock, gliding the slick curve of his palm around Yeonjun’s tip.

“It’s throbbing,” Beomgyu says, he sounds like he's in awe.

“They do that,” Yeonjun says, out of breath. It isn’t meant to be funny, Yeonjun’s just too shellshocked to know what’s coming out of his mouth before it spills free. But Beomgyu giggles anyway and Yeonjun shoots him a startled look, utterly transfixed. A bead of precum rolls down the reddened tip of his cock, and in a flash Beomgyu is dipping down to lick it up.

Beomgyu is precise when he sucks cock, every movement earnest and purposeful. He’s confident in a way Yeonjun hadn’t expected, not a hint of teeth, hands making up for the parts he can't swallow. But Beomgyu is also messy, adorably, wonderfully, cock-throbbingly messy, drool running down one side of his lips and eyes blown wide. He's noisy too, lips slick, panting around Yeonjun. His mouth is something else all together. It's too much, too tight, too plush, too warm—Yeonjun doesn't let himself think about why Beomgyu is so good at this, lest the jealousy swallow him whole—Yeonjun feels like he's melting, legs unsteady, hand clutching onto the bed-sheet for dear life. Beomgyu looks up intermittently, watching Yeonjun watch him. The shared vulnerability of studying each other during a moment as intimate as this is startlingly intense, and Yeonjun finds himself fighting against his own dead weight, feeling all too much like a zombie. Yeonjun is brainless, useless, utterly inept, and completely at the mercy of the boy in front of him.

Beomgyu hollows his cheeks with an obscene, wet slurp, fingers fisting into the fabric of Yeonjun’s sweatpants. Everything is dripping wet and incessantly pulsing—mouth, cock, balls, lips, fingers, eyelashes—and they’re dragging Yeonjun hurtling, speeding, rushing towards a slow and unwilling end. Yeonjun aches. He manages to hold off his orgasm by the thinnest, fraying thread, eyes trained on Beomgyu working away at his wet cock, letting out small, deep, determined little noises.

“God, just like that,” Yeonjun pants. "So good, Gyu, fuck,” he garbles. He feels drunk again, words escaping his lips before he’s ready. “Perfect little mouth,” He rasps, his voice barely more than a gasp, “think—I, fuck—gonna come!”

Sensing the beginning of the end, Beomgyu throws himself into his task, sucking Yeonjun’s cock feverishly. Noisy little gulps and wet, gagging swallows ring around the Choi’s guest room like gunshots. He looks up to meet Yeonjun’s gaze, lashes wet and heavy with pearly tears, big eyes wide and earnest and so, so beautiful.

Yeonjun comes down his throat.

He pulls out halfway through his orgasm, mostly to spare Beomgyu a mouth full of cum, spilling the rest of it into Beomgyu’s waiting fist. His cock jumps in Beomgyu’s grip, and a single speck of white lands on Beomgyu’s cheek. Yeonjun feels like he’s going crazy, murmuring a chorus of fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck as he grinds into Beomgyu's fist, riding out his orgasm.

“God,” Yeonjun mutters as he catches his breath, heaving, committing the image of an incredibly disheveled Beomgyu to memory. Hair slick with sweat, lips swollen red, eyes shining with tears. He thumbs the single fleck of cum that mars Beomgyu’s perfect face. Yeonjun swallows his apology and swipes it away gently, his fingers lingering against Beomgyu’s flushed, hot skin.

Beomgyu moans brokenly and sucks at his finger, eyes fluttering shut as he cants his hips up, needy. Yeonjun wishes he could snap a picture. Beomgyu looks unearthly.

“Come here.” He says, his voice sounds impossibly soft, pulling his finger free and offering Beomgyu a hand instead. “Stand up so I can—”

“Please,” Beomgyu  interrupts, his cheeks are so pink and his eyes unfocused. A picture of sin not meant to be seen by mere mortal eyes. “Please, Hyung,” he begs, “need you.”

Yeonjun blinks, his voice abandoning him as Beomgyu gets off his knees and crashes against Yeonjun's chest, rutting on his thigh as he sits on his lap. He's slick all over, sweat running down soft skin, and so, so warm. Yeonjun makes quick work of him, pushing his hands into Beomgyu's too-small sleep shorts and tugging at his cock. He's impossibly hard, hot to the touch, and deliciously wet. He's so warm Yeonjun's palm feels like it'll melt right off. Beomgyu mewls as Yeonjun strokes him, voice syrupy sweet, dark and honeyed. Up, down. Once, twice, a third time. Then Beomgyu cums all over his fist, shaking violently, with a keening call of Yeonjun's name.

"Yeonjunnn!"

If Yeonjun wasn't bone tired, if Beomgyu hadn't just sucked the soul out of his body, he'd have gotten hard all over again at the the sound of Beomgyu's saccharine voice calling out his name.

They pant heavily against each other, saying nothing. Yeonjun's eyes are glued to his palm, dripping with pearly white come, making a mess of Beomgyu's shorts. He drags his hand up to his mouth, tonguing at Beomgyu's cum. Beomgyu shudders as he follows the movement with glazed over eyes, a soft whine leaking from his lips. It taste, well, like cum. Yeonjun's never particularly enjoyed the taste of it, but he could make an exception for Beomgyu. Yeonjun catches sight of the two of them in the mirror, they're a mess. Yeonjun's never looked like this before, face stained red, dripping sweat, pupils blown so impossibly wide that they dye Yeonjun's brown eyes a dark, endless, black. Beomgyu isn't fairing much better, still panting with exertion, bleary eyed and slack jawed. He's so incredibly pink, from the apples of his cheeks to the flushed skin of his chest all the way down to his strong thighs. Yeonjun makes a mental note, he wants them marked up next time.

"That-that was," Beomgyu pants, sentence trailing off.

"Yeah," Yeonjun chuckles, his voice is tender. Too tender, given that he's just cum down Beomgyu's throat and then licked Beomgyu's release off his fingertips. He wipes the rest Beomgyu's cum on his pants—that's a problem for later—and cups Beomgyu's face, brushing a strand of sweat soaked hair off his forehead. "Let's get you cleaned up."

Beomgyu whines, pressing his face into Yeonjun's sweaty shoulder. His breath tickles. "Tired," he whines, "sleep now, clean up later."

Yeonjun, and this is becoming a bit of a trend now, can't say no to Beomgyu.

They somehow fall into the bed, Beomgyu's knees buckling under his weight as he weight as collapses into Yeonjun, pulling the two of them into the sheets and wrapping his arms around Yeonjun like a teddy bear. "You're comfy," he murmurs, half asleep already. Yeonjun laughs quietly, adjusting them into a more comfortable position. Beomgyu holds him close the entire time, fingers fiddling with the ends of Yeonjun's short hair almost unconsciously. His skin is so soft, because Beomgyu is soft all over, pillowy and so comfortable Yeonjun starts to drift off the second his head hits the pillow.

"We're going to talk about this later," he slurs sleepily. Beomgyu lets out a non-committal hum in response, pulling him in, closer, tighter.

Yeonjun sleeps better than he has in months.