meri @hanjislxt - Tumblr Blog

｡𖦹°‧ better off as lovers, not the other way around seo changbin x f!reader x hwang hyunjin

summary: Changbin is in love with his two best friends. When he introduces you and Hyunjin to each other and Hyunjin ends up asking you out, Changbin has to finally confront the feelings he's been ignoring for 7 years. it doesn't go so well.

word count: 24.9k words

author's note: ♫ racing through the city, windows down, in the back of yellow checkered caaars ♫ bonus points to whoever notices my song reference hehe anyways HI! I've been really liking writing longer form, more serious stuff, and this is my first foray into the question of "what if they didn't slip so easily into polyamory"? I like how it turned out. It's pretty sad, but I promise, there's a happy ending on the horizon big thank you to @hyunjins-dimples for being my voice of reason and giving me feedback when I was losing my mind kjsadhjsh I adore you

warnings: angst with a happy ending!; unprotected sex; mxm action; friends to lovers; mentions of panic, could be categorised as panic attacks, but aren't written as such; no cheating but kissing someone even though they're casually seeing someone else; implied bottom/switch!changbin; a tiny bit of internalised homophobia

skzms masterlist // ko-fi

Changbin thinks he might be the stupidest motherfucker alive.

He doesn’t usually think that way about himself, no. If you asked him on a normal, he’d probably say he’s pretty smart. A good dancer, good singer, even better rapper. Well-adjusted. Always willing to go the extra mile. A good support system for his members. A decent person.

And in his defence, how should he have known.

How should he have known that the dumbest thing he could ever do is introduce his two best friends to one another?

Chan would tell him to cut it out, to not talk about himself like that, but Chan isn’t here. He isn’t here because this is so bad that he hasn’t even told Chan about it – and he tells Chan everything.

What would he even say? “Chan! You know Y/N, my best friend from when we were trainees? I invited her out to bowling and galbi with me and Hyunjin two weeks ago. Yeah, isn’t that nice? Why am I bringing it up, you ask, did something go wrong, did they hate each other? Ha! No, actually! The fucking opposite! They met and there were sparks fucking flying everywhere! There was blushing and lingering glances, they got along like a house on fire. They even exchanged numbers at the end! Holy fuck!”

No, he couldn’t say that, because then Chan would ask why that’s a problem and Changbin would have to tell him that he’s been in love with his best friend ever since the day you walked out of JYP Entertainment with your head held high to pursue your own, independent music career at a company that actually valued you – and how he never stopped being in stupid, pathetic puppy love with you. He would have to tell Chan that it was because of that stupid, pathetic puppy love that he sometimes dropped everything and abandoned Chan to his own devices. Because he couldn’t resist sinking into the couch in your warm, cozy apartment, far away from the rest of the world, your cute little socked feet pressing into his thighs, and sometimes when he's lucky, your bare, cold feet digging into his thighs seeking warmth, the TV on some random drama, sipping ciders and snacking on things and talking about everything and nothing until the early hours of the night.

If Changbin was lucky, that would be all that was needed to explain it to Chan, but Chan had always known him too well. He would be his usual, annoyingly perceptive self, and ask what else it was, force Changbin to spill his fucking guts until there was nothing left. And then, boy then he would have to look his leader in the face and admit that for all these years, every single time he flirted with Hyunjin ‘for the camera’, it wasn’t for the camera at all. It was actually a chance for him to be really selfish, to vent some of his very much not platonic, probably gay (bisexual?) feelings for his member, feelings that have been haunting him for the better part of two years.

And then, if Chan wasn’t distracted by the fact that Changbin just basically came out to him, would probably ask “both?” and Changbin would nod and Chan would ask something along the lines of “but what if one of them likes you back? Then what about your feelings for the others?” and Changbin would probably either run out or just start crying. Because he doesn’t know.

But ironically, it seems that neither will be an issue because he’s here, sitting across from you in your company’s cafeteria, willing his heart to start beating again.

“You … what?” he asks, dumbly.

“Hyunjin and I have been texting,” you repeat, seemingly nonchalant, but you’re not looking at him. He knows you well enough to know that this is you being nervous.

“Okay …” Changbin hears himself say, but even he can hear the trepidation in his voice.

“At first it was just about that portable watercolour set he talked about, and then we just kinda … kept talking. It’s nothing crazy, I just … thought I’d tell you, you know. Since he’s your friend.”

“Best friend,” Changbin mumbles, and you lift your head from the straw of your Americano that you’ve been jiggling around the ice in the cup with for the last five minutes. If it had been anyone else, Changbin would’ve told you to cut it out within 20 seconds. But you’re you.

You blink at him, laugh awkwardly.

“I thought that was me,” you joke. Changbin doesn’t laugh. You stare back at your coffee. Swirl the straw around the ice.

“He asked me to go to this art exhibit with him this weekend.”

Oh, good. You have common interests.

Changbin tries to will the bitterness away, but it only settles deeper into his chest with every one of your words.

“Apparently it’s this design exhibition, he said it would really match my vibe.”

Stupid fucking suave, charming, fucking PERFECT Hwang Hyunjin.

“Ha, that sounds fun.”

Changbin cringes. The bitterness in his voice is really fucking obvious.

“Does it?” you ask, eyeing him across the table, something unreadable in your face. He feels like you’re staring right into his soul.

“Didn’t think that was your kinda thing.”

Anything would be my thing if I was with you. Or if he asked me to go. Goddammit.

He shrugs.

“Maybe not, but it sounds like something you two would enjoy.”

Why the fuck would you say that, Seo Changbin.

You eye him suspiciously before you pick up your iced coffee again.

“I think so, too. And to be honest, I’d love to spend some more time with him, we really hit it off the other day.”

Changbin forces a smile onto his face.

“You did.”

It’s not a question, just a … confirmation? Changbin has long lost any idea of what he’s trying to do.

You swirl the ice around in your cup in silence for so long, Changbin nearly reaches out and rips the cup out of your hand, but then you say something that pulls the floor right out from under his feet.

“And I mean he’s obviously stupidly attractive …”

Changbin swears his eye twitches.

“He’s alright.”

Your head snaps up, eyebrows shooting up to your hairline. There’s an obnoxiously smug grin on your face.

“Sorry? You’re literally always gushing about him. Flirting with him for the fans. You’re like his biggest fan. President of the Hwang Hyunjin fan club. Ready to drop to your knees to ask for his hand in–“

“Alright, I get it!” Changbin interrupts you, too fast, too loud. Some people in the cafeteria turn to look his way, disapproval written all over their faces.

You don’t care about them. You’re just sitting opposite him, giggling. “So, do you think that’s what this is? That he’s asking you on a date?” Changbin asks, tries his best to keep his voice down.

You shrug, seemingly nonchalantly, but there is a dusting of a blush on your cheeks. It suits you so well. The fact that it’s for Hwang Hyunjin makes Changbin want to do something drastic.

“I don’t know. I’ll just see how it goes. Go in with no expectations. But if it ends up being one … I wouldn’t complain.”

Changbin swallows down a hysterical scream.

A few beats of awkward silence stretch between you before you get up, and nearly knock your coffee over in the process. Changbin’s hand shoots out on instinct, but you manage to catch it just in time, your hands meeting on the cold, wet plastic. You stay suspended, in that moment, for a second before you shake it off.

“I gotta go back to work, they’re probably waiting for me in the studio.”

Changbin rises. His body feels two sizes too large, his brain a foggy mess.

“We still on for tonight?” he asks. Movie night. At his dorm. He doesn’t know if he wants you to say yes, so he can see you again because, god, it’s the highlight of his fucking week, or no, because he doesn’t know how he can sit next two you for several hours while Hyunjin’s contact is in your phone, and you’re probably flirting with him and sending him winky faces and hearts and those witty little innuendos you’re so good at and–

“Yeah, for sure. I really wanna see that movie, and I really wanna see if it works, to point your projector at the ceiling. It sounds magical.”

Changbin smiles, somehow. Walks with you to the exit of the cafeteria. Folds you into a hug that makes his heart sing in his chest, breathing in your smell from your hair, feeling your fingers dig into the meat of his shoulders. The phantom of it accompanies him past the front desk, all the way out into the street and down the few blocks he has to walk back to JYPE.

When he walks into the studio, Jisung is asleep on the couch, wrapped in his big puffer jacket, snoring quietly. Chan swivels around to him, takes one look at him and furrows his brows.

“How’s Y/N? Is everything okay?”

I love her, Chan. I love her, and she’s going on a date with Hyunjin.

“She’s fine. Going to the museum with Hyunjin this weekend.”

Chan freezes, blinks at him once, twice.

“Uhh … she is?”

Changbin drops into the chair next to Chan, busies himself studying the waveforms of the song Chan has pulled up. He makes a casual sound.

“Like … like a date?”

Changbin wants to scream. He swallows it. Shrugs. Pretends he doesn’t care.

But Chan’s confused, concerned gaze keeps returning to him, boring into the side of Changbin’s head until Changbin can’t stand it any more.

“So, did you figure out the pre-chorus?” he asks, a little more forcefully than he has to, but Chan gets the memo. He only sighs before he turns to the computer and shows him what he worked on. But his brain doesn’t allow him any such mercy. Every time he gets distracted for a few minutes, gets lost in figuring out how to make a line of his rap flow better, or finds the perfect little percussion to add to a track, it only takes a few minutes, like clockwork, before the thoughts come back.

Falling in love with you had been as easy as breathing.

He didn’t plan on it, god no, if anything, he didn’t want to fall in love with you. Or anyone for that matter. He just joined the company, too young, ripped from anything and anyone he’s ever known on a mad chase for some bigger dream that he didn’t know if he would ever achieve. He met you a week in, and you immediately clicked. Not in a way that made sparks fly or his heart race, no, quite the opposite. You just slotted yourself into his life like you were always meant to be there. Like there had always been a hole where you belonged until you filled it.

He didn’t know anyone, and you weren’t the most outgoing, so it was easy for you to seek each other out during breaks, during mixed dance practice, after gruelling days of evaluations to eat chicken in secret and cry about how fucking cruel everything was until you somehow managed to laugh again.

And even as the months went on and you both settled in, found your footing in this new world you were dropped into, and found more friends among the other trainees, nobody ever could come between you. Like you found each other and mutually decided to never let go again.

He didn’t fall in love with you right then, neither could he blame anything on the hormones because the two of you never went there. And it’s not like you were the only girl around, far from it. And trainees were hooking up left and right. Even he got roped into a one-night stand here and there and one very messy love triangle situation at some point, but you never went there with each other. When you hooked up with Chan at the company party one year, right after the latter joined, Changbin chalked up his discomfort to the fact that he and Chan and Jisung were starting to make music together, and he didn’t want any potential drama between you and Chan to get in the way of that.

As things for Changbin started going better and better, as him, Chan and Jisung really found their footing as 3Racha, making music and gaining so much respect from the other trainees and from all the managers and teachers, everything started falling apart for you. You were overlooked for several groups, dismissed for your talents. And Changbin tried to be there for you, but you must’ve felt it, too. The distance between where you were and where he was, where you wanted to be, grew too big. So before long, you stopped confiding in him. Stopped letting him see your tears, only the remnants of them in your bloodshot eyes the next morning. And he felt awful about it.

But then you did the unthinkable. Something he’d never seen anyone do. You walked out.

And it wasn’t just that you quit, no, you went out with a bang. A screaming match in a meeting room right down the hall from the dance practice room where everyone was gathered for evaluations, then a slam of the door and you, stalking down the hallway, with your head held high.

Changbin followed you, watched stupidly as you raged, emptied your locker, stuffed everything into a big plastic bag. He didn’t even say goodbye, frozen in place, suddenly hyper aware of two things.

One, his best friend was leaving, leaving him behind in the lion’s den, and he had no idea how he would manage it all on his own. The thought of not being with you made him sick to his stomach. He wanted to be with you, always, in every single way.

Because, and that was the second thing he realised as he watched you walk away from him, he was in love with you.

He didn’t hear from you for three weeks, three weeks he spent distracted and irritable and so, so sad and experiencing what Chan had to tell him was a broken heart. How should he have known?! He had never been in love before.

He was still reeling when he met Hyunjin. Gorgeous, tall, ethereal Hyunjin, who danced like his body was made for it, who had the cutest, dimpled smile that lit up Changbin’s whole body with fireworks when he aimed it at him.

And Changbin suddenly had to deal with the knowledge that he might be bisexual.

You texted him for the first time a month and a half after you walked out. You apologised for disappearing on him, citing your own bitterness, how you couldn’t face him while his life was so clearly headed for the stars and yours was so uncertain. But there was something else in your voice, too. You told him you were with a new company now, and if he wanted to hang out. Like old times. You phrased it like a question.

You met at your favourite sushi restaurant, not far from JYPE. You told him about your new company, about their plans for your solo career. And Changbin told you about Hyunjin. He didn’t say that he was in love with him in so many words, but in retrospect, he always knew that you knew. And, of course, you accepted him. And just like that, you were friends again.

Changbin figured he would grow out of his crush on Hyunjin, out of his unrequited love for his best friend, but that day never came. And slowly, Changbin accepted that this was just how things were going to be. At least until his worlds collided, and he introduced you to each other.

He carries his bitter thoughts around with him, hiding them, as best as he can, all day. Through work, dinner with Chan and Jisung in the studio. Through a quick gym session and into the shower, where he stays for way too long, letting the boiling water scorch his skin until it’s red.

Maybe it’s not a date! With the way you were stealing glances at Hyunjin? The way Hyunjin always served you first? Asked you so many questions about your career? Got excited when you said you liked art?? Two beautiful, single people with common interests don’t meet and stay friends. Not when they’re Y/N Y/L/N and Hwang Hyunjin.

Maybe it’s not so bad! But it is. What is he going to do? Will he have to go to your wedding? Organise your stag do? Can he be trusted not to turn into the worst kind of person and get horrendously drunk and try to kiss you before it’s too late? Will he even be friends with you still when your wedding day comes? Maybe he manages to fuck it all up way before then.

Maybe it won’t work out between them! That’s not any better. The thought of his two best friends heartbroken about each other, avoiding each other when they inevitably have to meet again … Having a lapful of either of them, upset about someone else? God, no. And it’s not like it changes anything about the fact that Changbin is hopelessly in love with you both. Though the status quo, him, pining secretly, quietly, seems likely to be the best thing he’s ever going to get.

No, it won’t do. He’s stuck. He’s stuck and doomed to sit here, with his hands tied, to watch whatever it is that’s happening between you and Hyunjin unfold, from the sidelines. It makes his skin itch.

By the time you text him that you’re outside, asking him to buzz you in, he actually considers making something up about not feeling well, about being held back at the company, anything … But he’s always been weak for you. So he lets you in.

The moment you turn the corner of the hall and see him, a wide smile lights up your face and Changbin can’t help it, his whole body relaxes a little, the warmth of your presence melting some of the pressure of his shoulders. And then you skip the last few steps to make it to him and fling yourself into his hug, and he holds you tight and thinks that maybe this is enough. Maybe he’ll be alright as long as he can have this.

It’s casual, familiar, the way he invites you in without a word, the way you know where to put your shoes, where to pull out the guest house slippers, and immediately pick the pink ones you always use. For a brief moment, Changbin wonders if a few months down the line you will be doing all of this when you visit Hyunjin. If it will be him, then, watching you go through these motions, before he gets to lead you to his room and kiss you and touch you however he wants to and know he can have you for the rest of his life.

“Where is everyone?” you ask as you walk into the kitchen, set down the convenience store bag Changbin hadn’t even noticed was dangling off your wrist.

Changbin shrugs.

“Chan and Jisung are still at the studio, and probably will be for a while. They looked like they were getting into one of their zones when I left.”

You give him an adorable, playful smile.

“Aw, you skipped out on one of your intense 3racha studio nights for me? Why do I actually feel flattered?”

Changbin forces a smile. Silly you, I would do anything for you. He shrugs.

“Wasn’t feeling it today. Plus, I wanted to hit the gym.”

You nod absentmindedly, stare at the convenience store bag for a second, before you speak again.

“… and Hyunjin?” you ask without looking at him. Daggers. A hundred daggers to his chest. He clears his throat, tries to sound as casual as he possibly can.

“Honestly, no idea where he is, I haven’t seen him since I got home, so I guess he’s out somewhere.”

You hum, nod, then busy yourself with rooting around the bag.

“So I got us a bunch of savoury snacks, since I know you like those better,” you say, your voice back to being upbeat. Changbin does his best to catch up with his heart still aching. “But I also got some sweet ones.”

You lift up some Chocosongi with a smile and Changbin forces a smile back.

It hurts, how simple it all is. How easily you slip into habit. How normal it feels for him to hand you a pair of his sweatpants to change into in the bathroom, to unpack the snacks while you’re changing, dig up the projector from the bottom of his backpack, pile up the pillows on his bed until they are at the perfect fluffiness. How sweet you look when you skip back into the room and collapse on his bed, on your dedicated side, curling up on your side, pretending to go to sleep, with a devastating little fake snore, because “your bed is way too cozy, Bin.”

It hurts, but he smiles, because how could he not. He plays along, exclaims a soft “Yah! you wanted to see this movie!” and turns off some of the lights until the whole room is bathed only in the soft warm glow of the lamp on his bedside table, ignores the ache and settles in next to you.

He remains on his back as he fiddles with the projector, and once he’s got it on and connected to his phone, he sets it on the sheets between you, and you squeal with pure delight. It looks great, even he has to admit, the size of the movie just right, the colours vivid but soft against the white of his ceiling, the warm glow of light in his room making it look nothing short of magical.

Changbin wishes he could turn and see it reflected in your face, your eyes probably sparkling with it, but he doesn’t trust himself not to break down crying or say something he might regret. So instead, he just clicks up the volume another notch, takes the opened bag of chips you offer him, and settles back.

He hadn’t realised just how exhausted he was, but lying here, the pillows, the duvet, so soft and inviting underneath him, your warm body next to him, calmly rising and falling with every breath, not really touching much, but still comfortingly there, your socked foot pressed against his calf, the back of your hand resting against his shoulder where it’s curled under your cheek, brushing against him every time you reach for one of the little chocolate mushrooms … the exhaustion sinks into his bones and makes him melt into it. The movie, its music and dialogue coming through the speaker of his phone between you, the taste of the salty snacks on his tongue, your soft voice when you give your commentary on something that’s happening. How the sheets rustle when you move to reach for another little chocolate mushroom. He can smell you, your perfume like a soothing balm on his nerves, and he wishes he could freeze time and just stay here, with you, like this, forever.

He’s almost dozing off when you mumble something and Changbin turns his head to you without thinking and suddenly, you’re face to face on his pillow, your nose only a bare few centimetres from his. Changbin is suddenly wide awake and he holds his breath.

And you … do, too. You suck in a breath, eyes wide, blinking rapidly, gaze dipping down to his lips. There’s so much softness in it, softness that Changbin never thought he would get to see directed at him. That and … fear?

“Bin,” you mumble, absentminded, like you’re just saying his name to see what it will taste like. Your warm breath, sweet and chocolatey, fans against his lips, and he watches, frozen, entirely helpless, as you carefully tip your face forwards and press your lips to his.

Any thought he could’ve had evaporates the moment you kiss him. His eyes flutter shut readily, and he gasps into your lips in a way he’s sure he would be embarrassed by, if he had his wits about him. It’s a soft kiss, just a touch of your lips to his, then another even lighter one. Only when you hesitate, make as if to pull back, he realises he didn’t kiss you back. His hand shoots out, cradles around the soft expanse of your cheek, your jaw, and he pulls you back in because if this is all he’s ever allowed to have, he needs you to at least feel how much he wants you.

And he kisses you now. Properly. Presses his lips against yours firmly, but gently, tasting every ridge of them, greedily breathing in the dizzying scent of your skin where his nose is pressed into the soft skin of your cheek.

It’s like every single one of his daydreams, but better. Because when your lips open up for him, you taste real, the chocolate on yours mixing with the salt on his own tongue to create an intoxicating balance and underneath it all, he can taste something he knows, is undeniably the taste of you.

This time, neither of you pull back. It’s like the floodgates have opened and Changbin’s desire has finally been unleashed and there’s no stopping it now. Pandora’s box is open, and it’s all right there. Halfheartedly, he tries to keep his hope locked away, but his desire is free, trembles through him with every swipe of your tongue until you’re panting, gasping into each other’s lips with every wet slide of your mouths.

Changbin’s tongue is hungry, but his shaking hands hover helplessly, one still cradled around the side of your face, the other resting on his own stomach, itching to reach out but … he’s not sure how much he’s allowed. He doesn’t want to overstep, to make you uncomfortable, but then, as if you can read his mind, you scoot closer, so eagerly you knock over the projectors, fist your hand into the material of his t-shirt at his waist to pull him closer and Changbin’s entire brain short-circuits. He needs more.

Parting his lips from yours is a superhuman feat, but he does so, only enough to be able to blearily reach between you and get the damn projector and his phone out of the way, locking his phone, shutting off the movie in the process, and blindly shoving both it and the projector onto his nightstand. His phone thuds onto the carpet, but he doesn’t care, because you’re pouncing on him again as soon he turns back, pulling him against you with greedy hands until he can feel every inch of your warm body pressed against his, every arch of your back, slide of your foot against his calf.

In the silence of the room, without the movie playing in the background, Changbin can hear the slick slide of your tongues, every single hitch of your breath and all of it is so much, entirely too much almost in a way that is addicting.

And he doesn’t know if he’s crazy, but somehow, you’re still here, kissing him, trying to press even closer, as if it was possible, making the prettiest sound into Changbin’s mouth, until you throw your leg over his hips and grind forward and Changbin moans, pathetically. He’s hard. Embarrassingly so. Pulsing and aching, probably leaking into his underwear, and you seem to like it, because you grind (what Changbin can hardly think about without losing his damn mind) your clothed pussy down harder and moan right back.

You want this.

The thought drowns him, and he finally stops resisting, flips himself until he’s almost on top of you, dragging his palm down until he can grab your ass and grind you over his cock and oh, fuck.

You whimper, your mouth momentarily going slack against his, allowing him to suck your bottom lip between his own, drawing another perfect little mewl from you. Your hips twitch, make an aborted little move, chasing the friction of Changbin’s body, and he doesn’t have to be told twice. He ruts forward, uses his strength to grind you to meet him over and over again, and it feels so good, makes pleasure pool in Changbin’s abdomen at an alarming rate, his mind going fuzzy with the chase of his orgasm.

But before he loses himself, in a moment of lucidity, that he has no idea where it came from, he pulls back.

Which he almost immediately regrets, because you’re staring up at him, chest heaving, face flushed and dewy, lips shiny and swollen, your gaze so glassy and filled with so much trust, it makes reality crash over him.

“Y/Nie … baby …” he mumbles, and you must’ve heard something in his voice because panic flashes over your face, and you shake your head.

“N-no, Binnie, please,” you whisper, shaky hands reaching out, trying to pull him in again, “I need you.”

Changbin doesn’t know how he resists the gentle demands of your fingertips, how he pulls away another few inches before you make a sound that is so heartbreaking it keeps him frozen in place.

“Y/Nie I can’t …” he starts, but words fail him. What was he going to say? Tell you not to go out with Hyunjin? Tell you he loved him? That he loved you? Tell you, right here, right now? You deserved better than that.

You blink, blink again, and suddenly water is gathering at your lash line.

“It’s okay, Binnie, it doesn’t have to mean anything,” you beg, and the words feel like a slap in the face. “Just … just please, kiss me, touch me, fuck me. I need you. Please. Just … just this once, we can never talk about it again.”

Changbin should walk away. He knows it. He should get up, put some distance between you, save himself a lot of heartache and you the embarrassment of having to break your best friend’s heart.

But …

But this might be your last chance a selfish, petty part of him pipes up.

He doesn’t know how he is going to live with just this one time. How he’ll go for the rest of his days knowing what your body tastes like without ever getting to have it again, but he’ll learn. It can’t be worse than the heartache of never knowing.

When he dips back down, presses his lips against yours, you sigh in relief.

Your hands are everywhere – buried in his hair, running down his arms, tugging at the waistband of his sweats, slipping under his hoodie, colder fingers against heated skin, eagerly trying to feel more and more of him until you seemingly have enough. Your fingers tighten in his hair, and you pull, and the sting of it sends a shiver down his spine.

With a surprising amount of strength (though not enough to move him, was he not so ridiculously down bad and pliant for you) you push at him until his back hits the mattress. You swing your leg over his hips and, with a single-minded determination in your eyes, sit yourself right on his cock, making him gasp out your name, before you shove your fingers back under his shirt, rucking it up until he half sits up and lets you pull it off him.

And yeah, he feels exposed like this. Shirtless, underneath you, at your mercy, pressed against the sheets, his belly probably a little softer than usual because he’s been bulking.

But the way you stare at him, rake your eyes over his torso, the way your fingertips trace his skin, the way you bite your lip when goosebumps follow in their wake – he forgets to be self-conscious. Because, yes, you want him, and you’re not holding back an ounce of your admiration, but also, it’s you. He’s never felt as safe with anyone as he has felt with you.

You lean down and kiss him, a lot sweeter now, though still demanding, your palms smoothing over his pecs, up to his shoulder, over his bare arms, like you’re trying to feel every inch of his exposed skin. It makes him feel dizzy.

You pull back and stare at him, breathing heavily, your sparkling eyes so close to his that the barely contained I love you nearly slips past his lips.

“C-can I suck you off?” you whisper, and Changbin briefly wonders if he’s going to survive this.

He lets a tentative hand travel up your arm until he can smooth your hair out of your face. You blink, lean into his touch, and your breath hitches. He burns.

You’re still staring at him, waiting for the answer to your question, and he breathes out a shaky laugh. Instead of answering, he, as carefully as he can, flips you back underneath him. But now the way you’re staring up at him is even worse for his heart.

“I’m going to bust so fast if you do that,” he confesses and watches you giggle, “maybe next time.”

Next time?

He wants to slap himself.

You blink at him, something unreadable in your eyes, and then you nod.

“Next time,” you whisper, sadly, wrap your hand around his neck and pull him down. It’s the sweetest kiss yet, something in it that Changbin can’t place, that makes his heart thud heavily in his chest.

One of your legs wraps around his waist and pulls him down, his cock grinding down right where you need it, and it makes a heavy moan rumble out from deep in your chest. The kiss turns heavier and wetter until Changbin has to come up for air. He keeps his eyes closed, presses wet kisses down your cheek, your jaw, until he hits the neckline of your shirt.

He pulls back, forces himself to breathe, to slow down, to look into your eyes even though it hurts.

“Do you want this? We can stop …” he mumbles. He’s ready — ready to accept this is all he gets, ready to ignore his heart burning a hole in his chest with the inhuman need to slip you out of these clothes and worship every inch of your body. But one word from you, a single shred of doubt in your eyes, and he would stop.

But you shake your head, your face so vulnerable it makes him want to wrap you up in his arms and keep you safe, here, for the rest of your life.

“I want this, I really do,” you whisper, and then, brokenly, you make Changbin’s world spin out of control. “I’ve wanted you for a long time.”

The words hurt like a knife, because he knows you don’t mean them the way he does.

He doesn’t respond, instead kisses you again, tries to drown everything he can’t say in the rapture that is your lips. He lets his hand wander over the legs he’s been dreaming about, legs wrapped in his sweatpants, wrapped around his hips. He slides his palms up, until he can slip it underneath your shirt and ruck it up and off and tries his best not to lose his head when you’re bared to him and then again when he unclips your bra, mercifully with little to no fumbling, and your nipples and soft skin of your tits and your belly are pressed against his own.

You sigh into him, fingernails digging into his bicep so hard he shudders. He hopes it will leave a mark.

“God, you’re gorgeous,” he whispers. He keeps his eyes closed, unable to face the effect his words may have.

“Touch me, Binnie,” you whisper back, and he shudders again. The way you say his name makes his body thrum with need.

“I will,” he finds himself mumbling, pressing a wet kiss to your jaw, “I will, angel, I’ll make you feel good.”

And with no further hesitation he sits up, places his shaking hands on your hips, thumbs smoothing over the skin right over your waistband.

He’s thought about this a lot, he’s ashamed to admit, but nothing comes close to you right in front of him because — you’re perfect. More perfect than he could have ever imagined, because now he can see all the little birthmarks, all the tiny scars and the light lines of stretch marks, and he tries to drink it all in, tries to catalogue every single thing so he can conjure them up in all his worst fantasies for the rest of his life.

But maybe he took a little bit too long because you’re saying his name again, in that small, vulnerable voice and every single inch of his body is consumed with the need to please you.

So he pulls at your waistband, slowly pulls it down, leaning in until he can press his lips against the skin of your tits, swirl his tongue over your gorgeous, hard nipples, before he goes down, down, over the softness of your belly, your hips, then down your thighs as he tries not to lose his goddamn mind.

Because he can smell you now. You, the smell of your skin, remnants of your shower gel and the lotion you rub in after, but also your arousal, the sweet tang of it coating his tastebuds already before he has even gotten the chance to get his mouth on you.

He slides one leg, then the other out of his sweats, and you let him, one arm slung over your face in overwhelm, making a pretty little noise when they’re all the way off, and you’re naked in front of him.

Changbin can’t resist it. He lets his eyes roam over you as he tentatively palms his rock-hard cock over his own sweats, and pleasure rolls heavy through his whole body.

“Oh, pretty,” he sighs. It just slips out. You whimper, breathe out his name. One of his palms slides up your calf.

“Can I, pretty? Can I touch you?”

You breathe out an airy chuckle that Changbin thinks for a moment feels almost a little sad, before you nod.

“Of course, Binnie, of course you can. Please touch me.”

It’s all he needs.

He lets his palm slide further up your leg, up to your thigh, you part your legs for him effortlessly, offer yourself to him. He lowers himself onto the mattress slowly, eyes glued to where you’re glistening and quivering and smelling so divine his mouth is watering, before he leans in and laves his tongue gently over your clit a couple times, easing you into it.

Your taste sears itself into his taste buds, sweet, tangy, intoxicating, and he wants more, wants to fucking drown in it, in you, and he leans in and attaches his lips to your core, darts his tongue out, laves at your pretty little hole, dips into the wet heat of it, before travelling back up, slick smearing all over his chin as he sucks your clit between his lips.

He’s being messy, and he knows it, his fingers digging into your skin probably a little too deep for comfort, but you’re not complaining, no, of course not, you’re perfect, one of your hands cards through his hair, the other arm thrown over your face as you make the sexiest breathless little noises that almost sound like sobs, and you take it all, every single thing Changbin has to give you.

Your thighs tremble in his hands, your hips stuttering upwards in aborted little movements, your little moans growing in volume, one of your ankles digging into his back and, nonetheless, when you come, whole body shivering, chanting his name, spurting the sweetest sweetness he has ever tasted right into his mouth, it takes him by surprise. He didn’t expect you to come for him so easily, so effortlessly, but you don’t seem to be holding back.

Changbin laps at your release, licks it up and swallows it down while he can before you gently push him away, trembling with the oversensitivity. Your eyes are lidded, your hair a mess and there’s a wet stain on his sheets right underneath your hips, and Changbin can’t believe he gets to see you like this, let alone the fact that he did this to you.

You sit up, gloriously naked and unbelievably beautiful, and reach for him, soft fingers curling around the back of his neck, pulling him forwards until your lips are on his again, and it feels like coming home, sends warm shivers down his spine. He sighs into your lips, and you sigh back, dragging him back down to the mattress with you, skin against skin again, his chest moulding against yours like they were made for each other. He could stay here forever just kissing you, but there’s a fire in his abdomen, a hard, insistent pressure against your body, and your fingers slip under his waistband.

You tuck his sweats and underwear down quickly, one hand still curled around his neck and slipping into his hair, the other shoving at the offending fabric until you can’t reach any more and use your feet to shuck them the rest of the way off — something Changbin shouldn’t find as hot as he does, though he is mightily distracted by the way your tongue is licking against his, the way you’re tugging at his hair, dragging him this way and that into the kiss, making his brain go fuzzy.

When your hand curls around his cock, he physically jolts, his body more sensitive than it’s ever been. He wants to say something, anything, self-consciousness curling in his belly, something about how he knows he isn’t too big, but you don’t give him the chance.

Your hand tightens on him, and he keens, and you whisper a breathless, appreciative fuck into the tight space between you. Wordlessly, with your heels digging into his lower back, you pull him closer, until his lips are back on yours and his cock is pressed against your entrance, and it doesn’t take any convincing for him to follow where you’re leading him and press inside. His moan collides with yours when he bottoms out, your back arching into his arms, and he holds you closer, noses against your jaw, trying to ground himself.

It’s unreal, the feeling of you. Hot, tight, velvety, wet, you. He’s inside of you. His cock throbs and his breath stutters out of him, and somehow you’re right there with him, your fingers shaking as one of your hands anchors itself back into his hair and drags him close.

He doesn’t know how he manages to start moving but when he does, it’s unlike anything he’s ever felt. He grinds forward, buries himself as far as he will go, and you follow him, open your mouth into a gasp, and when he pulls back you chase him, smear your lips against his. Your bodies moving together, sweat slick skin sliding against sweat slick skin, hot breath mingling until he forgets where he ends and you begin. It’s so intimate it makes him feel insane, utterly out of his mind with how overwhelmingly good it is.

He fucks forward harder, and he is rewarded with a gorgeous moan, punched out of you at the same time as his headboard smacks against the wall, and he says a quiet thanks to whoever’s listening that they’re alone in the dorm, because he can do it again, draw another moan out of you.

“B-binnie,” you mewl, and his arms nearly give out. He vaguely registers himself making a shaky, helpless little noise in response. “So … fuck … good … harder.”

He doesn’t need to be told twice, his body responding as if it’s an entity entirely separate from his reason, only focused on giving you what you need. He plants his palm against the headboard for leverage and fucks you harder, lets himself go, his own moans colliding with yours between your heated lips, deafeningly loud in the previously quiet room, now resounding with the sound of his hips slamming into yours, the wet slide of your pussy as it swallows his cock, the headboard thunking against the wall – it’s filthy, but it’s like music to him. You’re the best he’s ever had.

You whimper into his lips, drag him in for another kiss, scrape your fingernails over his bicep and heat curls dangerously, deep in his guts, a kind of barbed wire pleasure, building and building. And no matter how much he wishes this could last forever, he knows he won’t last much longer.

He drags his hand from the headboard, down your body, shoves it between your bodies, unwilling to part more than he has to. When he reaches between your legs, where his cock is pumping in and out of you, it’s soaked, and he moans out pathetically. With the first touch of his fingers against your clit, you throw your head back, eyebrows knitted together, lips parted in a beautiful little o and Changbin dives down, peppers kisses all over your jaw and down your neck. He can taste your skin, salty from the sweat, bitter from your perfume, sweet in all the other ways.

Your legs wind around his waist, and it changes the angle, makes his cock drag against your walls just right to make him shudder, and you gush around him, and he sinks his teeth into your shoulder, trying to hold on.

“P-please,” you sob out, “d-don’t stop … ‘m so close …”

As if he would, Changbin thinks. His fingers are sliding over your clit, and he pumps his hips forward, lets himself chase his own pleasure, just a little bit, and you’re clenching tighter and tighter and then …

You come with a choked moan of his name, walls locking around him, pulsing and fluttering, and it’s almost too much, the knowledge of it, of you underneath him, letting him take you apart like this, trusting him with your body, your pleasure.

With the last, tattered remnant of his reason, he pulls out, wraps his hand around his slick cock and pumps furiously only for a second before pleasure explodes through his body, and he comes in ropes and ropes, all over your belly, the pleasure zinging through his veins so strong it almost knocks him out, if it weren’t for your grounding fingers carding through his hair.

It’s everything he’s ever wanted. It’s entirely wrong.

He shudders through the last dregs of his orgasm, a bead of sweat rolling down the slope of his nose before it drops onto the pillow next to your head. If he breathes in, he knows he’ll smell the combined smell of you and him in your hair.

He pulls back quickly, but is stopped by the opposing force of your hand on his neck, and he realises a beat too late that you were trying to pull him closer. But the damage is done. Your face falls, your hands dropping to the mattress on either side of you. You turn your head as you wait for Changbin to pull out, to climb off you. And in his stupor, in the turmoil of heartache and confusion in his heart, he does.

You look fragile like that, head pillowed on his sheets, knees knocking together as you try to hide, his cum beaded all over your pretty belly.

“I’ll get you a towel, okay?” he mumbles, trying to be as gentle as he can, but it can’t contend with the awkwardness that’s hanging thickly in the air.

He somehow manages to pull on his boxers, stumbles from the room, into the bathroom; he catches a glance of himself in the mirror, his face pale, his eyes wide and scared, and nearly loses his head. In and out, he tells himself. You can’t lose it now, you’ve got to take care of her. No matter what, you’ve got to take care of her.

Eyes glued to his hands, to the sink, he fishes out one of the hand towels under the sink, wrenches the tap to the hottest setting it will go, willing it to heat up faster. He needs to get back to you. He needs to fix this.

As soon as the water is lukewarm, he drenches the towel, squeezes it out and just about resists the urge to run back to his room. But as soon as he steps in and meets your eyes and dread almost overwhelms him. Everything is so wrong.

He approaches the bed, and he can see his own hesitation mirrored in your face, mirrored in the cold hard hurt shivering across your face. He’s frozen with helplessness, unable to figure out what to do, how to fix this thing he’s broken.

You pull the towel out of his numb fingers where he’s standing next to you without moving and start cleaning yourself up, wiping at the sticky residue of his cum, until you’re clean, hurriedly dropping the towel onto the bed next to you and swinging your legs over the side.

“Uh … I should get going,” you mumble, as you awkwardly step around him where he’s still rooted to the spot next to the bed. Only when you’re dressed, does he dare to turn around.

When your eyes meet, it punches the rest of his confidence out of him. You blink and make to turn around, but Changbin takes a step forward, catches your wrist in his hands, holds you back with a desperation that he’s unable to mask.

“Y/N …” he mumbles, his voice hoarse with emotion. You stop easily, let yourself get pulled back to him, just like that. His heart throbs.

“We’re okay, right?” There’s a beat of silence, then you soften, just a little. You nod, and he lets out the breath he didn’t know he was holding.

“Yeah,” you breathe, “of course we’re okay.”

What washes through him isn’t relief, but it’s something. Maybe hope that he hasn’t irrevocably fucked everything up. He needs you, needs you with him, in his life, however he is allowed to have you. He can’t do this without you. He never could.

He gives your wrist the smallest, gentlest tug – just a suggestion. You step forward and right into his waiting arms.

He folds you against his bare chest, breathes out a shaky breath. He can feel your breath against his collarbone, the softness of your cheek against his shoulders. The comforting weight of you against him. You’re okay. You’ll be okay. He doesn’t know if it’s true. He has to believe it.

It’s only a few moments before you pull back, barely looking at him.

“I still … I’m gonna go …” you mumble, and he nods.

He follows you to the door, uselessly. Watches as you pull on your shoes, carelessly leave the house slippers out, something you never do. You always put them back.

With one last shaky smile, you pull the door shut behind you and Changbin is left behind in the dead silence of the empty dorm to deal with the aftermath.

He manages to make it back to his room before the first sob racks through him, his chest constricting painfully until he can barely breathe. Through his blurry eyes, he rips the sheets off his bed, a button pinging off the pillow case, but he can’t care. He doesn’t bother putting new sheets on, only crawls into bed. And he cries.

And because he really does seem to be the punchline of some cosmic joke, the first person he sees when he stumbles into the kitchen the next morning, is Hyunjin.

He looks up when Changbin walks in, and he freezes, before he turns sharply.

Changbin didn’t even bother looking in the mirror before stumbling out of his room on a desperate hunt for a cup of coffee that would cure his pounding head. He knows he probably doesn’t look dewy fresh and his eyes are probably swollen, but Hyunjin’s reaction nonetheless makes him falter. He hesitates in the doorway.

Hyunjin doesn’t say anything, only keeps his back to him, hands aimlessly fiddling with the coffee machine, pulling out the drip tray, emptying it into the sink even though it’s barely half full, then shoving it back into the machine. It catches on something and there’s a sickening crunching sound that startles him. He pulls it back out and shoves it back in, a little softer this time, though Changbin can see it now. His hands are shaking.

Hyunjin turns abruptly, makes for the door, but then realises Changbin is right there, blocking it, and stops.

A beat passes where Changbin can finally see Hyunjin’s eyes, and he can’t read them at all. He looks … vaguely annoyed. Confused. Upset? Why?

Chan’s door opens and his voice travels down the hallway.

“Yo, is the coffee machine still on?”

Hyunjin opens his mouth, though his answering yes takes a long moment to come out. It only makes its way past his lips when Chan is already pushing past Changbin and into the kitchen.

When Chan’s eyes fall on Changbin, he hesitates, eyebrows knitting together in worry.

“Woah, Bin, you alright? You look rough.”

Changbin drags his eyes away from Hyunjin’s, forces a smile onto his face.

“Yeah, just didn’t sleep well,” he croaks out, and Chan nods understandingly, gives him a pat on the shoulder.

“Did you and Y/N watch something scary again even though neither of you like horror?” he chuckles, as he makes his way to the coffee machine, past Hyunjin who’s now fiddling with his phone, leaning against the counter next to the sink.

Changbin murmurs something to the negative, his heart aching somewhere deep in his chest at the mention of you. Ah, remember when things were normal, he thinks. How they could’ve remained normal, if he hadn’t been so fucking stupid and ruined everything …

“By the way, Jinnie,” Chan asks, slides his stupidly large to go cup under the spout, and presses the button, “did my package arrive last night?”

The coffee machine screams to life, and it makes Changbin’s ears ring.

“W-what? Package?” Hyunjin asks, when the noise stops, shifting his weight from one foot to the other uneasily.

Chan nods.

“It was meant to come yesterday and I figured, since you and Bin were both home, but he was watching a movie with Y/N, maybe you would hear the door? You were home last night, weren’t you?”

Changbin prays. He prays to whatever deity is out there that Hyunjin doesn’t say yes, tells Chan no, he was out, at the other dorm, hanging out with Jeongin or Seungmin or …

“I was,” Hyunjin says quietly, “but I didn’t … hear the door. I was painting.”

Chan nods and pulls out his phone.

Changbin is frozen in place, staring at Hyunjin, who avoids his eyes. If he was home, then he heard. He must have, right? There was no way …

“Ah, typical,” Chan exclaims, makes both Changbin and Hyunjin jump, “it got delayed. It’ll be delivered this afternoon when we have dance practice. Oh well, I’ll let the doorman know. Thanks though!”

He slides the lid onto his to go cup and makes for the door.

“You ready to go, Bin? We have a meeting with the mixing agent in 40.”

Changbin has never been more grateful for an excuse to get the fuck away from Hyunjin for a few hours.

“Y-yeah, just … need a quick shower,” he mumbles, and Chan nods, already walking down the hallway.

"Make it a quick one, I’ll wake Jisung."

Changbin flees from the kitchen without looking back. He thinks he doesn’t breathe until the bathroom lock clicks shut behind him.

Hyunjin heard. Hyunjin heard. It’s … bad. It’s confusing. Most of all, it’s humiliating.

He strips as quickly as he can, faster still when he drags his shirt over his head, and he catches a whiff of your perfume, and it nearly makes him nauseous. He steps in the shower and turns it all the way to cold.

What’s humiliating is not the sex, no, god, it couldn’t have been the sex. That, itself, was earth-shattering, life-changing, nothing short of magical. But the thought of him hearing you like that? Exposing you, exposing Changbin himself, when you trusted him that you were alone? It makes him feel sick.

Worse, what if he heard the awkwardness after. What if he heard Changbin crying. Fuck.

He scrubs shampoo into his hair, body wash down his body. When he rinses away the suds, they expose faint red lines along his shoulder, down his biceps. They ache with the memory of your nails. Changbin shudders.

There’s a knock on the door.

“We’ve got twenty minutes, Bin, we really need to go.”

“Coming,” Changbin shouts back and turns off the water.

He gets out, towels off and finally takes a glance in the mirror. He looks normal, except for the faint red lines … well, those and the giant bags under his eyes. As he stares himself down, he sees his phone light up, and he picks it up at lightning speed. But it’s just Jeongin. Asking if he was going to hit the gym today.

Changbin sighs, puts his phone back down.

It was going to be a long fucking day.

You don’t text him that day. Or the next.

Changbin’s a fucking mess.

He’s distracted. Takes 20 takes to get one part of his rap right. Snaps at Jisung so hard he actually makes him cry. Forgets a meeting. Steps on Felix’s foot during dance practice.

Not that anyone noticed. They all treat him the same, nobody looking at him twice. He doesn’t know what’s pissing him off more, their ignorance, or his own petty, way too emotional reaction to it.

Between that, and Hyunjin’s severe mood swings, Changbin feels like he’s at sea, being tossed back and forth by the whims of anyone but him. And that pisses him off, too.

Hyunjin … he doesn’t know how Hyunjin feels. Because one second, he’s meeting his eyes staring daggers at him through the mirror in the dance practice rooms, muttering something to Felix that Changbin can’t shake the feeling is about him. The next, he bumps Jisung aside when they get into the car to go home and forces himself into the seat next to Changbin, his thigh falling against his – all while stubbornly refusing to look at him. Changbin doesn’t even dare say his name. What was he going to say anyway? “Hey, Hyune, did you hear me and Y/N fuck? Is that why you’re insert-whatever-adjective-here” because it’s not like Changbin can figure it out.

Because Hyunjin drags his palm over his knee before he gets out, but the next morning he slams the bathroom door into his face so hard it nearly breaks Changbin’s nose. But then he fucking stares again, in the dressing room, big, dark eyes burning into Changbin’s back as he is shooed around by the make-up noonas.

But all of it, it doesn’t make any damn sense. Hyunjin’s upset, clearly, but Changbin can’t figure out what he’s upset about – or what he plans to do about it. Is he upset because Changbin fucked you the week before he was meant to take you out? Is that it? Does he think it was some petty move to keep his best friend to himself? Except that logic doesn’t hold up very well, now, does it, since Changbin’s pretty sure he fucked up your friendship entirely.

Sometime on Thursday afternoon, he has convinced himself that Hyunjin’s mad because you cancelled on him. It took a while to allow himself to think that way, because the delusions – well, he would love to tell himself you probably just cancelled because you hooked up with anyone, and it didn’t feel fair to Hyunjin, but then again he knows you’re not like that, and then his brain starts to feed him hope, hope that you cancelled because you can’t stop fucking thinking about him the way he can’t stop thinking about you, replaying every single moment, both the good and the bad, until he’s sure he will never forget a single one of your noises, a single one of your unbelievably sexy moans of his fucking name …

But Felix skips and jumps over and makes his whole world turn upside down again.

He bounds over to where Hyunjin is sitting on the floor next to where Changbin is lounging on the sofas, Hyunjin’s hand resting on Changbin’s shoes. He’s still refusing to look Changbin in the eye – but his pinky finger is tracing the line of Changbin’s ankle through his sock.

Changbin wonders if this is what the first symptoms of insanity feel like.

“Hyunjinniiiiieee,” Felix sing-songs, plops himself down on the floor next to Hyunjin and slings one arm over his shoulder. “Do you have plans on Saturday and do you want to go shopping with me?”

Hyunjin hums, leans into Felix’s touch, his hand leaving Changbin’s foot in favour of patting Felix’s hand.

“Sorry, Yongbok-ah, I’m busy,” he hums, his voice calm and honeyed, though Changbin doesn’t miss how he starts fidgeting with his ring.

“Ah, right, you’re going out with Y/nie right?” Felix exclaims and gives Changbin a wide smile, before his attention is back on Hyunjin.

From where he’s sitting, Changbin can’t see Hyunjin’s face, only sees him turn to Felix and nod slightly.

“Forgot about that, sorry, Jinnie,” Felix mumbles, brings his hand to Hyunjin’s back and starts kneading the muscles there. Hyunjin’s head falls forward with a little moan that, on any normal day, would send Changbin’s thoughts straight into the gutter. “What are you gonna do? Or where are you taking her? Wait … is this a … you know?”

Hyunjin bumps Felix with his leg, so hard, Felix lets out a little yelp. He blinks at Hyunjin, then Changbin, before he blushes.

“We’re going to see that exhibition I told you about. The one none of you wanted to go to with me,” Hyunjin states, bluntly, both of his hands now busy twirling his ring around his finger in his lap.

“What?! You didn’t ask me! I would’ve said yes!” Felix exclaims, indignant and wide-eyed.

Changbin doesn’t need to see Hyunjin to know he’s glaring at Felix. There’s nothing Hyunjin hates more than when someone forgets something he said to them.

“Yes, I did. Three weeks ago. When we got chicken. I asked everyone, even manager-hyung. And you said you didn’t care for modern art.” Felix falters, freckled face falling into an expression of embarrassment.

“Oh,” he mumbles, “well, I would’ve gone with you if I’d known nobody else wanted to go.”

Hyunjin scoffs, tosses his hair out of his eyes. He brings his hands up to his face, as if he’s inspecting his cuticles.

“Well, she wanted to go. Really wanted to, actually. She asked me to take her.” He says it nonchalantly, his voice the picture of calm confidence, but Changbin can see the muscles tick in his neck.

‘He asked me to go to this art exhibit with him this weekend’ the memory of your voice says. Changbin tries not to let it get to him. He fails spectacularly.

Hyunjin tosses his head again and gets up, his arm brushing sparks against Changbin’s leg as he gets up.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m gonna go shower.”

He’s out the door before Changbin or Felix can say another word.

Then Felix looks at Changbin and Changbin is out of his seat at lightning speed.

“Hyung …” Felix sighs, his eyes big and round and full of pity. Changbin shakes his head.

“You don’t like that Hyunjin and Y/N are going on a date?”

Changbin doesn’t answer, focuses instead on shoving his towel, his bottle, his phone’s portable battery, all of it into his backpack.

“It’s okay if you don’t, you know?” Felix tries again, “but then I think you should tell them, instead of keeping it inside.”

“Yongbok-ah …” Changbin says, warningly, and it comes out a lot meaner than he intends to. He watches Felix flinch and sighs.

“Please, drop it.”

Felix deflates and Changbin feels even worse.

“Fine,” he mumbles, “but if you do end up wanting to talk about it, I’m here, okay?”

Changbin nods, pats Felix’s shoulder and gets up.

Changbin knows that he won’t. He can’t even begin to think of confessing all of this to Chan, how could he unload it onto Felix, his most precious dongsaeng. But he knows Felix will feel better if he agrees. So he lies.

“I will, thank you, Yongbok-ah.”

When Changbin’s phone buzzes on the mixing desk next to Chan at 1am on Friday night, 12 hours out from when he presumes your date with Hyunjin is, Changbin doesn’t even bother to check it.

But Chan glances over and picks it up.

“Y/N’s texting,” he says, casually, and hands Changbin his phone, like Changbin’s heart didn’t just fall into his ass.

If he was alone, Changbin doesn’t know if he would’ve checked it. But Chan is right there, and he doesn’t have the strength to make up an excuse for why he would be ignoring a text from his best friend. So he unlocks his phone.

from: Y/Nie hey hey Y/Nie is typing….

“Do you think we should keep Seungmin’s first or second take?” Chan asks. Changbin blinks at him and Chan presses play, brows furrowed, eyes glued to the screen.

They sound identical.

“I think the first one’s better, right?” Chan muses, and Changbin’s phone buzzes in his hands.

“Yeah, totally,” he mumbles, and whips his head back down. You texted again. His heartbeat picks up.

from: Y/Nie sorry for the radio silence 😅 kinda had to convince myself you didn’t hate me because you didn’t text me either but then I realised that that is hypocritical of me so here I am … please don’t hate me

Butterflies. A swarm of them. Something warm, dripping down Changbin’s spine. Regret, still, too much of it to put into words, but mostly … relief.

As quickly as he can, he replies.

from: me of course, I don’t hate you I could never

He tries to calm down, tells himself not to be too honest. Not when the situation is so fragile. Not over text.

from: Y/Nie THANK GOD

The message makes him huff out a laugh, and Chan looks over and gives him a little smile. Changbin blushes.

The dots, the little Y/Nie is typing…. text blinks in and out of existence for a solid minute before your next message pops up.

from: Y/Nie because I kinda really missed you

Changbin takes a deep, steadying breath.

I missed you, too is what he wants to say. I missed you, too, I always do. I wish it hadn’t ended the way it did. I wish I could stop loving you, but I can’t. But I want you in my life in whatever form I can.

from: me I missed you, too I think chan is sick of me actually being at the studio instead of disappearing at some point and leaving him to do his work

Changbin looks up. Chan is humming under his breath, completely relaxed, editing a midi track, his knee bouncing under the table. Sorry, Chan

from: Y/Nie well, we can’t have that! chan needs to write the next big stray kids hit, we can’t have you distract him like that!

from: me yah! you say you missed me and the first thing you do is bully me

from: Y/Nie gotta keep you humble ;)

Changbin sighs. He knows this probably isn’t a solution, pretending like it never happened, just going back to how things were before. But it feels so good. And everything … it’s too big, it’s too much. And if this is the only way your friendship will survive, then he’ll take it. He’ll take whatever you give him.

It’s silent for a few seconds and Changbin wonders if that’s it, but then you text one last time.

from: Y/Nie I gotta sleep now but let’s get lunch next week?

from: me I’d love that night, y/nie

from: Y/Nie night, bin <3

It’s the heart that sustains him, makes him breathe easier for the next half hour and all the way home and into bed. He falls asleep easily for the first time in days, sleeps a dreamless, restful sleep until he wakes up to the sun peeking in through the blinds, the warm sheets – and Hyunjin yelling at Jisung to get out of the bathroom.

The realisation crashes over him without mercy.

Hyunjin is getting ready. To go out. With you.

Dread collects and settles thickly into his bones, makes him bury himself further under the sheets as he fishes for his phone and opens his chat with Chan.

from: me yo what are you doing today? wanna hit the gym and write some music?

He places his phone down on the mattress, and he waits. Listens to the sounds of the traffic outside, of the dorm slowly waking up; hears Jisung screech, then Hyunjin yell something, before a door slams.

His phone buzzes.

from: cb97 sorry, man, already at the gym now having lunch with young-hyun later probably won’t make it to the studio at all today

Changbin buries his face in his pillow and sighs. Hyunjin’s cackle sifts through the cracks in the door.

He can’t stay here. He can’t witness Hyunjin getting all dolled up, wearing some cute outfit, bouncing out of the front door on his merry way to a date that might as well seal Changbin’s fate. No, he needs to figure something out, he needs to go.

So he texts the only other person he knows would willingly spend a Saturday buried in a dark, lightless studio.

from: me yah jisung-ah what are you doing today

If he mentally says a prayer as he waits for his answer, that’s between him and his pillow.

Jisung, predictably, texts back almost immediately.

from: j.one morning hyung~~ probably gonna to the company work on some songs why?

from: me need any help? or want some company? I need to get out of the house today

There’s silence for a minute, and even Jisung’s and Hyunjin’s bickering has gone silent. Changbin tries not to let his paranoia get the best of him. Hyunjin’s getting ready. Jisung is probably just on his phone on his bed. Or texting Minho.

It takes a few minutes before Jisung finally responds.

from: j.one sure! I actually got this rap I would love to get your input on

from: me cool leave in an hour?

from: j.one 👍

And it’s so quiet that Changbin really, really thought he could get away with it. That he could leave the dorm, with Jisung, without bumping into Hyunjin but, of course, he couldn’t.

He opens his door, takes one step, and collides with Hyunjin’s shoulder.

The impact isn’t strong, only enough to send Changbin reeling back a few steps, his backpack dropping from his hand and onto the floor, but that’s not what slams the breath out of his chest.

It’s Hyunjin’s perfume, the one he only wears for special occasions, thick and floral and, at the same time, somehow manly, laced with the smell of his shampoo and his hair, curling into Changbin’s nose and making his mouth water. And it only gets worse when he looks up and meets Hyunjin’s eyes. He’s always been a master at dramatising himself. Unlike Changbin, who’s always just the same, just … Changbin, Hyunjin knows exactly how to dress himself to look the perfect level of casual, yet fuckable. His long black hair is a little wavy, casual and he’s wearing make-up. Not a lot, for their standards, but just a bit. Just enough. Foundation, a light shade of brown around his eyes that renders them big and soft, soft pink lip balm on his full lips that makes them look obscenely kissable. If Changbin wasn’t already terminally, irrevocably in love with him, he’s sure he would fall in love with him then. He swallows bitterly when he realises that that’s probably actually exactly what Hyunjin is going for. With you.

Hyunjin’s dressed simply, but clearly with intent. Blue jeans, a white t-shirt, that’s just tight enough to sit snugly over his shoulders and his biceps and his … Changbin swallows … his pecs, and …

“Are those Jisung’s shoes?”

The words tumble from his mouth before he can stop them. The first words he and Hyunjin have exchanged in three days, and he’s asking about Jisung’s shoes?!

Hyunjin falters for a second, clearly stupefied by Changbin’s question. He nods slowly.

Changbin just nods back, barely manages to look Hyunjin in the eyes.

They didn’t get dressed together. Jisung knows nothing. I’m being paranoid. I’m being paranoid. Changbin, you’re being paranoid!!!!!!

Changbin must really be losing it because Hyunjin’s brows pull together in a grimace of concern that somehow makes him look even more like an angel.

“Hyung, are you okay?”

He sounds like he cares so much. Changbin wants to laugh. Or cry. Or both at the same time.

“I’m fine, Hyunjin-ah,” he forces out, forces a smile as he bends down and picks up his backpack.

“Are you sure?” Hyunjin adds, almost too fast. He sucks his bottom lip, starts gnawing at it. He looks like wants to say something else, but Changbin doesn’t let him. He can’t. Who knows what this conversation could turn into. Hyunjin needs to go meet you and Changbin needs to go to the studio with Jisung. It’s better this way.

“Don’t worry about me,” he chirps, so fake it makes his teeth ache with it, and pushes past Hyunjin as fast as he possibly can. He ignores the new wave of Hyunjin’s perfume that slams into him as he makes his way to the kitchen, where, thankfully, he finds Jisung already waiting.

Jisung’s head whips up when Changbin barges in, and they only widen more when Changbin beams at him and waves him towards the door.

“Let’s go, Jisung-ah!” he exclaims, much too loudly, and turns around before he can see Jisung throw a glance towards the hallway he just came from or look at him with any more of the surprise or the concern that makes Changbin’s stomach turn.

Thankfully, Jisung follows him, doesn’t ask any questions. Only falls into step with Changbin and when Changbin asks, talks about the song he wanted help with. Jisung had always been his favourite dongsaeng.

Changbin manages not to think about you and Hyunjin for most of the day. But what he does think about, a lot, is the moment he would have to face Hyunjin. By the time he drifts off to sleep he’s sure he’s imagined all the worst possible outcomes, Hyunjin stumbling in late at night only half dressed, Hyunjin walking into the kitchen the next morning with hickeys on his neck, Hyunjin with literal hearts floating around his head for all Changbin knows – but none of that happens.

He meets Hyunjin the next day in the kitchen when he goes to get a snack. Hyunjin, dressed in his ratty old sweatpants and his hair tied up haphazardly, is filling the little transparent cup Changbin knows he uses for painting with water by the sink, looks just like he always does. He turns around, sees Changbin, and smiles. A little sheepish, a little awkward, maybe, but he smiles. And Changbin does what he does best. He takes the excuse to delude himself, and he runs with it.

On Monday, they have a schedule. Hyunjin picks the make-up chair next to him. They don’t talk much, but Hyunjin knocks his foot against his and shows him a meme of a little piglet and a bunny being friends about halfway through, a devastatingly pretty smile on his lips. Changbin smiles back.

On Tuesday, Changbin meets you for lunch at your company. You hug him hello, wrap your hand around his arm so you don’t lose him as you pull him through the packed cafeteria. You pick out his favourite melon soda from the refrigerator without him having to ask. You chatter about this album you’re working on, about your parents coming to visit in a couple weeks. You don’t talk about Hyunjin. When you smile at him and sneak half of your helping of chicken onto his plate in exchange for one of his mushrooms, he can’t bring himself to ask. He hugs you goodbye.

On Wednesday, he stays late at the studio with Chan and Jisung. They get into a flow, manage to finish the demos for two songs. Write another, late at night, delirious off sugar and lack of sleep, one that will probably never see the light of day. He loves them. He comes home smiling, waves them off down the hallway to their rooms before he gets himself a bottle of water from the fridge. He takes a little detour past Hyunjin’s room almost automatically. His door is ajar, the light on, but he can hear Hyunjin snore quietly. He creeps in, tiptoes over to the bedside table, where the light is still on, throwing a hazy warm glow over Hyunjin’s sleeping form. Glossy lips parted, eyebrows slightly drawn up, almost like he’s surprised, his hair messily fanned over the pillow half his face is smushed into, he’s the most beautiful thing Changbin has ever seen. He indulges himself, brushes a few of his strands out of his eyes, lets his fingertip drag over the curve of his cheek, before he switches off the lamp and leaves, closing the door behind him.

On Thursday, he catches Hyunjin giggling at his phone, but he’s already convinced himself that the date on Saturday was most likely a dud. Maybe not even bad, just … not as exciting as you’d hoped. Maybe you’d met and the spark you’d both felt wasn’t there. Maybe you said something about the art that gave Hyunjin the ick. Maybe his dreaminess was too much for your pragmatic nature.

Because if it had been any other way, Hyunjin wouldn’t have just gone back to normal, right? Back to leaning against Changbin in the elevator and giggling with him in the kitchen. And you, you would’ve brought it up, right? That first day at lunch, or the countless times you texted after that. Right?

If Hyunjin and you had had a good date, if you’d kissed (a notion Changbin can’t entertain for too long because the mere idea of it makes him dizzy with a lot of confusing feelings that he refuses to decode right now) or if you’d agreed on a second date, if you were still talking, he wouldn’t be here right now, two weeks later, sitting on your sofa at some ungodly hour, ripped from the studio, from Chan who watched him go with a knowing, unsurprised grin, the remnants of delivery tteokbokki and dumplings still on the table and some random drama on the TV.

Your body wouldn’t have been slowly drifting towards his over the last hour, you wouldn’t have slung your leg over his, you … you wouldn’t have fallen asleep snuggled into his shoulder the way you did. Breathing softly, fingers twitching where they were still holding on to him.

And when he carried your half awake form to your bedroom later, tucked you into bed, you wouldn’t have leaned up, murmured his name, wouldn’t have pulled him into the softest, gentlest, kiss, just the pressure of your soft lips against his …

Right?

Except you would, apparently.

Changbin wasn’t meant to go to the company the next day. He was meant to have a day off, and he didn’t mean to work, he just wanted to get his laptop because he forgot it the night before because he was so eager to get out of there to get to yours–

Changbin wasn’t meant to be here.

He wasn’t meant to round a corner and see Hyunjin, standing between your legs where you’re sitting on the shoe storage outside the dance practice room, one hand caressing the skin of your back under your shirt, the other pulling your hips closer against his, as if your legs aren’t wrapped around him. He’s not meant to see you, tonguing into Hyunjin’s open mouth, the lips that were pressed against his not even 12 hours before pulled into a delirious smile as you devour each other.

Nausea rises in Changbin’s throat when Hyunjin giggles, when you bring your hand to gently cup his face. It’s so intimate. It doesn’t take a genius to see that this isn’t the first time you’re kissing either. Changbin’s stomach turns.

He turns on his heels, makes sure not to make a sound until he rounds the corner again, and then he runs.

He makes it into one of the studios before the first tears fall.

Fuck, this hurts worse than he thought it would.

Oh, he’s so fucking stupid.

Fuck, it hurts.

Now that he’s thinking about it, really thinking about it, there had never been any indication that you stopped talking after your date. Hyunjin had gone back to normal, and so did you because … he slams his fist against the side of his head so hard that it aches. He’s so fucking stupid. Of course, you went back to normal – because that’s all you were. Friends. You and him. Hyunjin and him. Friends.

But now that he’s seen it, he can’t stop thinking about it. Your date went well. You met Hyunjin at the museum, probably looked at his stupid casual outfit that showed off his stupidly attractive body, and you had probably worn something equally casual but flattering because you, too, were good at that. And then the two of you had probably walked through the museum and talked about art and life and the human condition, with sparkling eyes, maybe your hands had brushed, maybe Hyunjin had booked the museum for after-hours so you could have it to yourself, and maybe he kissed you in front of some painting and …

His stomach feels like it’s filled with lead.

He wonders if Yongbok knows. If Hyunjin came back from his date and told Jisung and Chan.

Why hadn’t he told him?! A part of him knows, it’s because he heard you and Changbin and … maybe he felt it even before then, Changbin’s resistance to the idea of them dating. Of course, he would. Hyunjin probably knew how fucking pathetically in love Changbin was with you and probably knew that you weren’t and …

But then why did he even date you? What happened to bros before hoes? I mean he saw the sparks, he saw the glint in Hyunjin’s eyes, the smile on your face but … was it worth it to Hyunjin? Was the connection that strong?

Also … why did you kiss him last night? He knows you were sleepy, but not that sleepy, right? And you weren’t aiming for his cheek, there was no way …

Changbin’s head hurts. And so does his heart. He still doesn’t have his laptop, because he would have to walk back and past where he saw you to get it, but it’s not like it matters anyway. And he wonders how on earth he’s going to navigate this new reality.

The reality where you and Hyunjin are … well, whatever you are. His heart cracks a little in his chest when he thinks the words.

In love.

“Right,” the staff member who’s always in charge of their SKZ Code episodes says and claps her hands. She looks oddly excited. “For today, you are going to pretend to be doctors. Surgeons, nurses, whatever, get funny with it!”

She grins, takes a look at the eight boys all lined up in front of her in fake scrubs and white jeans and lab coats.

Changbin feels stupid.

He’s also in a bad mood, which doesn’t help, but the outfit makes him feel stupid. Where there was sadness, there is a slowly simmering, building rage now. Changbin’s been watching it build slowly, watching his resentment thicken, his mood sour, and he hasn’t even bothered to try to cool himself off, because what’s his other option? Going back to heartbreak? No, he’d rather be angry. At himself sometimes, but also at Hyunjin, at you, pretending everything is fine — at being forced to watch Hyunjin giggle, bite his lip at his phone at least once a day. Sometimes he even nudges Yongbok, tilts his screen, points at something and whispers and Yongbok wiggles his eyebrow. And it’s not like Changbin would’ve talked to Yongbok, even though he offered, but the idea that that option was taken from him? It also pisses him off. So Hyunjin doesn’t just get you, he also gets Felix, huh? What does Changbin get? He gets fucking nothing.

He’s still brooding as the staff sorts them into groups, chatters to them, about the games they’ll play.

“The first group is Changbin, Chan, Hyunjin and Jeongin, the other Jisung, Minho, Seungmin and Yongbok,” she announces, pointing to the two tables set-up between them, “go to your team and pick what kind of doctors you want to be. That’ll be your team name.”

Chan shimmies over to him with a blinding smile, throws an arm around him and coos his name, his usual affection, just a little bit ramped up for the cameras – and trying to lift Changbin’s mood, because of course Chan knows.

“Binniiiiie,” Chan coos with a giggle, “we’ll be in a team. What kind of doctors should we be? Brain surgeons?”

Jeongin scoffs as he makes his way to Changbin’s other side. “We’re so not smart enough for that.”

Hyunjin is the last to find his way to them and Changbin tries not to look, but of course, he does. Hyunjin looks between Changbin and Chan and Jeongin, and Changbin does his best to tell himself that what he sees in his eyes isn’t disappointment.

Hyunjin makes his way over to them, a too bright smile plastered on his face.

“We could be doctors for like muscles and stuff, because we dance so much,” Jeongin muses, half distracted by Seungmin making faces at him across the room.

Hyunjin chuckles, tips how head to the side, makes eye contact with Changbin.

“Or we could be heart doctors?” he singsongs, making Chan chuckle into Changbin’s ear.

Changbin blinks. He can’t be serious …

“Ooh, Hyunjinnie, you want to be a love doctor?” Chan coos.

Hyunjin just giggles, his eyes crinkling at the edges.

Changbin stays quiet. Usually, he would’ve taken the opportunity. Would have walked right over there with a dramatic sigh of Hyunjin’s name, mumbling something about him not needing a love doctor when Changbin was right there, to take care of his heart, or some bullshit. But he doesn’t. He stubbornly crosses his arms and stares at the wall.

Jeongin next to them is oblivious.

“I like it, very macho,” he chuckles, and so it’s decided.

Chan announces the team name once the staff asks, Seungmin does his usual MC duties and they play. Rock paper scissors to decide the order. A spelling game.

Changbin knows he’s quiet, but he hopes it’s not too noticeable. Or at least Stay can forgive him just this once when the episode comes out. Because he’s trying his best to stay as far away from Hyunjin as possible, and it’s equally difficult as it is heartbreaking. Because Changbin misses his best friend.

Hyunjin cackles about something Jeongin said, and throws his arm around him. And Changbin aches. He feels like he’ll never stop aching.

“Next,” Seungmin monotones, “we’re going to be diagnosing each other as — each other!”

Everyone dutifully makes confused noises. Seungmin continues.

“One member will put on a blindfold and sit in front of the cameras, and another member will be chosen to use this microphone, which distorts your voice, to give the member in front of the camera a compliment – but not as themselves, but a compliment that someone else would make.”

Oohs and aahs.

“So if it was my turn to sit there, and Jisung’s to do the compliment, and his task was to pretend to be Minho complimenting me, he would probably just go ‘good dog’.”

Jisung and everyone else laughs, and Seungmin smiles at Minho’s offended noise. And Changbin thinks this is a safe game.

Except it’s not. Of course, it isn’t.

It’s all fun and games. They have a good time, make some jokes that will surely have to be cut out, especially when it’s Jisung’s turn and Jeongin makes an obscene sound instead of a compliment Minho would make, but there’s also lots of squabbling that he knows Stay will love. But then it’s Hyunjin’s turn.

Changbin watches him sit, slide the blindfold over his silky hair, a motion that would make Changbin dizzy on a normal day. But then Felix gets shown which member he’s meant to imitate, and it’s Changbin.

“Yaaah, Hyunjin-aaah,” Yongbok scream-whispers into the microphone, to the great amusement of everyone else. “When will you finally stop playing hard to get and be my boyfriend, Hyunjin-ah? You’re so beautiful! You’re an angel! You’re the most exquisite being God has ever created …”

Jisung slaps Yongbok’s arm and Yongbok breaks out into a slew of giggles.

Everyone’s laughing. Hyunjin’s ears are bright red. Changbin feels like he’s about to cry.

He’s always been pathetic, huh, he realises. He never cared if he looked a little silly, especially because Hyunjin loved it. But now, hearing Yongbok make a joke of it, seeing everyone else cackle and throw him looks, Changbin realises he’s been making a fucking fool out of himself. His eyes burn hotter than his cheeks do. He wants to fucking die.

“Ah,” Hyunjin chuckles awkwardly. Oddly enough, he doesn’t sound like he finds it funny either. “Changbin-hyung.”

Not a question, no surprise when everyone cheers and tells him he’s right.

Hyunjin removes the blindfold with a crooked smile, and when he turns, his eyes immediately fall on Changbin. His smile falls slightly. He gets up and walks back over to them and this time, Changbin’s side is exposed, so he slots himself right in. He slings an arm around his shoulders and Changbin gets a whiff of his shampoo and Changbin …

Changbin shrugs Hyunjin’s arm off his shoulders and steps away from him in one quick motion, and everyone falls silent. Changbin can’t bear to look at Hyunjin, but based on Yongbok’s expression, Hyunjin must be upset. Changbin swallows the guilt, lets it get swallowed up by the pool of resentment bubbling inside of him. Serves him right.

Minho puts them back on track quickly, steps forward to take his place, and everyone starts babbling, recovering quickly, practised, bouncing back to their camera personas, but Changbin tunes out. Yongbok’s distorted voice keeps repeating the words over and over again in his head until Changbin feels like nothing but a cheap distortion of himself.

The last game, or rather, the last thing they film, because the segment where they have lunch mercifully was filmed when they were actually having lunch today instead of at 4pm, is a dance challenge, but with a twist. They have to spontaneously dance to whatever songs come on, their own choreographies from over the years, but with another member and a balloon lodged between the two of them. And Changbin prays, tries to catch Chan’s eyes, or Jeongin’s, but the way they’re standing, they already paired up, and the only other person left on their team is …

“Hyung, we’ll kill it,” Hyunjin chirps as he walks over to him, balloon in hand. “Remember when we did this last time, and you turned to me. Our height difference was actually helpful. I think we’ve got this one in the bag.”

Hyunjin is avoiding his eyes, chattering on, an anxious smile on his lips, and Changbin just hums. Any energy he might have had to fight the tightness in his chest is slowly draining out of him.

Hyunjin places the balloon against his own chest, steps forward and, once it’s securely held up between their bodies, drapes his arms over Changbin’s shoulders. From this position, Changbin doesn’t have a choice but look at Hyunjin.

His heart fucking aches when he does. He’s pretty, as always. No, gorgeous. Subtle make-up, hair purposely fluffy and messy, of course, but what really gets Changbin every time are his eyes. They’re big, warm, they feel like home. Especially when they’re pulling into little crescents when he smiles. Like he is right now. Smiling at him with more warmth than Changbin has felt in such a long time.

“Hi hyung,” he hums, a teasing lilt to his voice. Changbin swallows down the urge to glare at him. “Fancy seeing you here. Come here often?”

Changbin swears his eye nearly starts twitching. Hyunjin’s breath puffs against his face.

“Ha,” he huffs out, but it lacks all humour. “Very funny, Hyunjin-ah.”

Hyunjin doesn’t seem to get the memo. But then S-Class blasts through the shitty little speakers the staff brought and Changbin’s body automatically responds with the dance, and so does Hyunjin’s.

But he’s grateful that, as he goes through the motions, he has an excuse to stare at the stupid blue balloon between them. Though the song ends before long, Jisung and Seungmin unsurprisingly already eliminated.

“Hyung,” Hyunjin mumbles, and Changbin makes the mistake of looking up. Hyunjin’s face is so close, Changbin can make out each individual eyelash framing his eyes.

The notes of Silent Cry slice through the room and Changbin momentarily forgets to be mad as he tries to remember the choreography – and promptly all thoughts leave his mind when Hyunjin swivels his hips and brushes his thigh against Changbin’s and Changbin swears he did it on purpose. When he looks up and meets Hyunjin’s eyes, Hyunjin is already staring at him.

Their balloon nearly drops with how fast Changbin tries to put distance between them. He tries to think of something unsexy, grandmas and dogshit, you and Hyunjin making out and probably doing a lot more than just grinding on each other, but that does shockingly little. Quite the opposite.

Thankfully, the song ends, but because nobody was eliminated, staff plays the next one right after. Maniac, now, and if Changbin’s heart didn’t feel like it was about to shatter and his dick didn’t feel like it was about to chub up embarrassingly fast, he would’ve laughed at how stupid it looked, everyone trying to do a half-assed twirl with the balloon between them. Somehow, he and Hyunjin make it, though, a little twirl, then hand to forehead. Hyunjin’s intense stare catches on Changbin’s, and he winks, lets his tongue slide over his bottom lip. Changbin almost moans.

The song ends, the game is over, everyone else is slowly peeling apart, but Hyunjin isn’t going anywhere. His arms fall back over Changbin’s shoulders, he tips his head to the side and stares at Changbin, eyes dipping down to his lips so quickly, Changbin thinks he might have made it up. And then Changbin feels his fingers at the nape of his neck, scratching up his scalp, and something in Changbin’s stomach turns.

He steps back so abruptly, Hyunjin’s arms and the balloon fall to the ground. The balloon pops, making everyone jump and stare over at them, but Changbin is beyond caring.

“We’re done, right?” he asks the staff, and stares them down until they nod apprehensively. He doesn’t know how manic he looks, he needs to get the fuck out of here.

He makes it out of the main room, back into the hallway that leads to their haphazardly thrown together dressing room, but he doesn’t get far before he hears steps behind him.

“Changbin,” Hyunjin’s voice echoes through the room and Changbin stops as if rooted to the spot, for one second, before he turns around and stalks towards Hyunjin, who stares at him.

“What the fuck?!”

It’s the only thing Changbin manages to say, his mind a mess, the resentment threatening to bubble up and over.

“Why the fuck would you … what the fuck was that?!”

It’s barely more coherent, so it’s no wonder Hyunjin just stares at him, mouth agape, eyes wide. Not understanding.

“Why were you … I wasn’t flirting with you?!” Changbin yells, “why were you … that’s not … why the fuck would you do this now?!”

Hyunjin shakes his head, takes another few steps toward Changbin, his arms stretched in front of him in an expression of utter disbelief.

“What?! I … I don’t get! I thought you wanted everything to go back to the way it was!? I was just trying to do what seemed to make you most comfortable!” Hyunjin yells, and Changbin shudders with frustration.

“Now you’re just being fucking cruel, Hyunjin,” he hisses, and Hyunjin’s big eyes turn narrow.

In two steps, Hyunjin is right in front of him, staring at him from where he’s towering over Changbin.

“Cruel? I’m being cruel? You’ve been flirting with me for years, off camera, on camera, and you waved it off every single time, and now I’m asking you to stop with the games and put your money where your mouth is before it’s too late, and I’m being cruel?” Before it’s too late?

Hyunjin takes a step forward, invades Changbin’s space and Changbin stumbles backwards into the wall with a thud.

“Fuck you, Hyunjin. I don’t know what you’re doing, but it’s not cool,” he manages to hiss out, but Hyunjin just shakes his head. His eyes are glued to Changbin’s lips.

“If you would just let me explain …,” he mumbles, and then Hyunjin is kissing him.

Kissing Hwang Hyunjin is everything Changbin ever thought it would be and so much more. He’s overwhelming, crowding him against the wall, his hand strong where it’s resting against the nape of his neck. He also smells incredible, his pomegranate chapstick smearing against Changbin’s lips in a kiss that is equal parts elegance and raw, desperate want.

Hyunjin presses Changbin into the wall harder, towering over him, and Changbin moans, his hands back on Hyunjin’s waist, trying to pull him closer, kiss him deeper, get more, and Hyunjin sighs into the kiss, links his fingers with Changbin’s and presses it over his chest and …

Reality catches up to Changbin all at once and his eyes shoot open and he pushes Hyunjin away so hard, Hyunjin nearly slams into the wall opposite.

“Don’t … What?!” he gasps out, wipes his mouth with the back of his mind, staring at Hyunjin. He’s so fucking gorgeous like this, all flushed and wide-eyed and–

Oh fuck.

“What the fuck, Hyunjin?!” Changbin yells, before he can think better of it. Hyunjin stumbles further back, but he opens his mouth. “Do you think I’m fucking stupid?! That I don’t know you and Y/N are seeing each other?!”

“No, Binnie, …” Hyunjin tries to say but Changbin can’t … He can’t believe Hyunjin would do this.

Hyunjin raises his hands, eyes big and entreating, and tries to take a step towards him, but Changbin stumbles backwards. It’s no longer resentment he feels, now it’s just … anger. Disgust.

“So what, are you cheating on her?! Are you trying to prove something? What the fuck?!”

“Changbin,” Hyunjin says again, but Changbin just shakes his head. Slowly, he starts walking backwards, away from Hyunjin, because he doesn’t trust himself right now.

“She deserves better than that, Hyunjin. And I deserve better, too, than to be used like this. You can find someone else to fuck with.”

“I swear, Binnie, please …”

“Don’t get fucking near me, Hyunjin. I don’t want to see your face any more,” Changbin spits, and the venom of his words feel like daggers in his own chest.

He turns, walks down the hallway as fast as he can. This time, there are no footsteps following him.

Somehow, he manages to make it through the process of undressing, of filing into the cars, without crying.

Changbin barely looks at Hyunjin, the handful of glances nearly enough to make him break down, right there, in the middle of some random shoot location. Hyunjin looks about three seconds away from crying, but he won’t stop staring at Changbin. Changbin can feel his eyes, boring into the back of his head, like he’s taunting him. He can’t get the taste of him, the feeling of him so close, out of his goddamn head.

He gets in the car first and when the others don’t join, he watches through the tinted windows as Chan mumbles something to Hyunjin and Jisung, who nod, throw weary glances at the car, before walking over to the other car.

Chan turns and makes for the car Changbin’s in, climbs in, and closes the door behind him.

“Just us today,” he says to the driver, who nods and pulls away.

Changbin doesn’t look at Chan during the drive. For an hour, he sits next to him, his chest burning with unshed tears, his fists balled at his side, his brain running amok, white noise and pain.

Somehow they make it to the dorm.

Chan says goodbye to the driver, follows Changbin into the elevator, up to their floor, down the hall. He waits patiently until Changbin has punched in the code, until the door has fallen shut behind them, and they’ve toed off their shoes. He drops his backpack by the door, follows Changbin into his room, where Changbin drops his own, shrugs his jacket off.

When he turns around, Chan folds him into a hug and Changbin breaks down.

White noise. Static. His chest like a balled fist.

“H-he kissed m-me,” he hiccups, a string of drool dripping onto Chan’s shirt. Chan hums, rubs his hands over Changbin’s back soothingly. “H-he f-fucking k-kissed me, after a-all this f-fucking time, Channie.”

Chan’s arms tighten around him, and more sobs tear out of Changbin.

“I’m sorry, hyung. I’m sorry. I love him.”

He sobs again, so hard his legs nearly give out.

Chan shushes him quietly. “I know, Binnie, I know.”

Changbin can’t even pull back, he only clings onto Chan tighter.

“H-how the fuck do y-you know,” he wails, “why are you s-so fine with th-this.”

It’s overwhelming. And it’s getting worse, the idea of Chan knowing makes Changbin wonder who else knows. Who else has been witnessing this whole train wreck knowing more than Changbin does.

His chest tightens until his sobs turn into gasps for air and Chan somehow drags him over to his bed, guides him to sit, all without ever taking his arms from where they’re protectively, soothingly wrapped around Changbin’s body.

“It’s okay, Binnie, it’s okay to love him,” he murmurs, trying to be calm, but Changbin only cries harder. He sobs, spit and tears and snot staining Chan’s shirt.

“It’s not o-okay,” Changbin somehow manages to whimper out, “b-because I l-love her, too. I love him and I love her. I love them both.” Chan’s hands freeze momentarily, before they resume their calm movements over Changbin’s shoulders and his back.

It’s like a dam has broken and Changbin can’t stop spilling his fucking guts.

“And neither of them love me,” he wails, forces the words out between sobs and hiccups. “They love each other. And they’re beautiful together, Channie, they’re so beautiful. And I thought I would be f-fine w-watching because how can I be with either of them when I love the o-other, too, b-but it’s s-so hard, hyung, it’s so f-fucking hard.”

Somewhere along the way he has started hyperventilating again, Changbin realises, because Chan is now rocking him back and forth.

“A-and n-now … he k-kissed me?! A-and sh-she kissed me the o-other … day and … we hooked up, too, Channie, right before her d-date with H-hyunjin and I don’t even know h-how that happened but afterwards it was a-awful and then I s-saw them and now Hyunjin k-kissed me?!”

Chan rocks him hard, tries to shush him, but Changbin is on a roll now.

“Like, how could he ch-cheat on her, right?! Hyunjin, of all … of all f-fucking people. And on h-her?! H-how?! How could he th-throw a chance with her away like that, when it’s a-all I’ve e-ever wanted. How f-fucking d-dare he?! And wh-why the fuck would he use m-me to do it?! There are other p-people, so many people, h-hotter people, probably lining up to kiss Hwang fucking Hyunjin. Why d-did he have to drag m-me into this?! It’s s-so c-cruel.”

“Binnie,” Chan mumbles, but Changbin shakes his head. “Binnie, don’t talk like that.”

Changbin scoffs. A wave of self-hatred washes over him, so strong it nearly blinds him.

“W-why?! Isn’t that what the problem is?! That I’m s-so f-fucking unlovable that w-who I thought were my b-best friends are just … u-using me to play some s-stupid games with each other?! Like I’m just some t-toy. B-because Changbin won’t complain.”

Chan pulls Changbin from his chest so fast Changbin can’t even cover his face, his stupid sweaty, red, face, but Chan doesn’t seem to care. He shakes him. Gently, but Chan shakes him.

“Not another word, Bin,” Chan warns, gives Changbin one of his dad looks, and it’s so intimidating that Changbin actually doesn’t dare say anything else. “I don’t know why they would do what they did, but I’m sure it wasn’t because of that.”

Changbin sniffles.

“Th-then, w-why?”

Chan sighs.

“I don’t know, but it’s not because you don’t mean anything to them. If anything, I think it might be the opposite.”

The thought of that hurts more than all the anger that came before it. Changbin starts sobbing again, and Chan pulls him back into his chest.

“It’s okay, Bin. We’ll figure it out, okay? You’ll figure it out.”

Changbin doesn’t believe him then.

But Chan stays, holds him until the worst of Changbin’s sobs have subsided, waves away his hoarse apology for crying and snotting all over his shirt. Chan brings him water and painkillers and tucks him into bed so gently it would’ve made Changbin start crying all over again, if his body hadn’t utterly exhausted itself. Chan leaves and exhaustion drags Changbin into a deep, dreamless sleep, even though it’s only 8pm.

He sleeps for 14 hours and when he stumbles out of his room the next day, Chan tells him that Hyunjin and Jeongin will be switching rooms for a while.

When Changbin asks what he told them, Chan shrugs, says he just told them Changbin and Hyunjin had a fight. Most of them knew, apparently, about you and Hyunjin dating, about Changbin and his unresolved feelings about the matter, but nobody had dared push the question. On account of “Changbin acting like a ticking time bomb”, according to Chan, which makes Changbin crumple in on himself with more self-loathing.

Nonetheless, Changbin is more grateful than he can even describe. He mumbles as much to Chan, gives Jeongin a half-mumbled thank you as well, but Chan just pats him on the back.

“Told you we’d figure it out, yeah?”

And Changbin nods; realises he should’ve talked to Chan a long, long time ago.

Chan arranges for Changbin to take a couple days off, days which Changbin spends … heartbroken. Wallowing. Crying and eating ice cream, the whole nine yards. Except it’s even worse, because he didn’t just get his heart broken by one person, but two. And along the way he also lost not one of his best friends, but both.

There’s a you-shaped hole in his soul. Every now and again, he picks up his phone, and he sees your chat pinned to the top of his KakaoTalk and the last sticker you sent, and he wishes he could message you. He wishes he could open your chat and go ‘today sucked, wyd?’ like he used to and see your little message bubble pop up immediately, always ready with some words that somehow always made him feel better, even if it was just the stupidest little joke.

And he wishes that in the mornings, he didn’t hear Jeongin’s laugh echoing through the dorm from Jisung and Hyunjin’s bathroom. He wishes Hyunjin were here and everything was normal. He wishes he could knock on Hyunjin’s door like he always did when he had a hard day. Hyunjin always knew, somehow, only had to take one look at Changbin to know. Because on those days, there was only softness, no edge to his pretend words of resistance when Changbin asked if he could come in. He would let Changbin come into the sanctuary that is Hyunjin’s room, like a parallel world, a calm refuge, always smelling slightly of the dried roses hanging from his bedpost, the paint that’s always drying on some canvas or another.

But he has nothing now. He’s in his room, alone, in the empty dorm, while everyone else goes on with their life. And he keeps wondering if somewhere along the way he went wrong.

He didn’t think he did. His love for you and Hyunjin? There was never a question of it ever stopping. And the existence of two loves, his two loves, because they were always going to be a part of him, stitched into the fabric of his heart by fate itself, meant he could never have either. Because both of you deserved more than that. It’s what he always came back to. That part he was sure of. This was always the way it was meant to play out. Right?

A few days, he has lost count in his desolation, Changbin wakes up from a nap to laughter and chatter in the kitchen. One glance at his phone tells him it’s 8pm. He must’ve slept for an hour and a half somehow, though he doesn’t remember even falling asleep.

Groggily, he peels himself out of bed, throws a look in the mirror and runs a hand through his hair before he makes his way out of his room.

Though what he sees when he rounds the corner to the kitchen, makes him freeze in his tracks.

Everyone’s here. Jeongin, Seungmin and Yongbok are unloading containers and containers of takeaway food from countless white bags, Minho and Jisung are bickering and giggling while setting the table, and Chan is talking to …

You and Hyunjin, next to each other, laughing at something Chan said, fiddling with something in a big plastic container, trying to get it out of a brown paper bag …

When your eyes meet Changbin’s, you freeze. Chan whirls around, and Hyunjin sees him last, his face immediately falling as his eyes race up and down Changbin’s sleep-mussed form with badly contained worry.

“Binnie!” Chan exclaims and everyone else turns around. Changbin wants to disappear.

“Wh-what are you all doing here?” he somehow manages to rasp out, and Chan walks up to him.

“What do you mean? It’s your birthday, Bin, do you think we would let you wallow alone on your birthday?”

Oh.

He didn’t realise … Was it really … Wait, did he forget his own birthday?!

Chan seems to see the turmoil in his eyes, because he throws an arm around Changbin’s shoulder and leads him back down the hallway, back to his room.

“Why don’t you take a quick shower, and we’ll be right here, with food on the table, when you’re done, yeah? When’s the last time you had a proper–”

“Why are they here?”

It breaks out of him, interrupts Chan mid-sentence, but Chan doesn’t let it phase him.

“It’s your birthday, they wanted to celebrate it with you. Plus, they wanted to talk to you …”

Changbin panics, opens his mouth to say something, anything, to tell Chan that he isn’t ready, that he can’t face them, especially not together, but Chan shushes him.

“I think you should hear them out. Promise me you’ll hear them out?”

Changbin stares at Chan. He doesn’t know what they could possibly say that wouldn’t end with Changbin’s heart shattered on the floor of his room all over again, but Chan looks so convinced, so optimistic, so determined, that Changbin nods.

“Okay, now off to the shower with you. I’ll tidy up in here a bit, okay? Change your sheets, let some air in.”

Changbin nods again, lets Chan steer him to his drawers to get him a change of clothes, and then into the bathroom. And when he stumbles out of the steam ten minutes later, Chan is sitting on his clean, freshly made bed, scrolling through his phone.

“There you go, much better!” Chan exclaims with one of his patented smiles, and jumps up. “Now let’s get some food before it gets cold, and they kill us because they have to wait any longer.”

Everyone’s already crowded around the big dinner table, cheers erupting when Changbin and Chan come back. Jeongin mumbles a “finally!” and Changbin has no time to think before he’s steered into one of the empty seats, Seungmin to his left, Chan sitting down to his right.

When he looks up, he meets Jisung’s eyes, who smiles brightly at him, playing with Minho’s hand in his lap.

“Happy birthday, hyung! We missed you in the studio today,” he chirps, easily, dripping with sincerity, and Changbin’s heart convulses almost painfully. He had barely thought of the group these last few days, too focused was he on his broken heart. He feels almost bad.

“None of that,” Minho chides, as if he read Changbin’s mind. Though Changbin assumes it was written all over his face anyway. Clearly, his pokerface is lacking these days. “You needed the rest.”

Jisung next to him nods, and Changbin gives them both what he hopes is a genuine smile. But it’s hard. As Chan loads up his plate, he finally dares to let his eyes stray down the table where you and Hyunjin are, sat next to each other.

To his relief, neither of you are looking at him. You’re talking to Jeongin about something, Hyunjin is busy trying to get a drink from the kitchen island without having to get up, before he gives up and does, grabbing two diet cokes, placing one in front of you automatically. The gesture is so domestic it makes Changbin feel sick with jealousy. He can’t do this. He can’t watch this. What the fuck was he thinking?!

But then Hyunjin’s eyes meet his and Hyunjin smiles. It’s small, sheepish, and impossibly soft, big eyes round, mouthing a quiet “hi” and Changbin’s chest erupts into barbed wire butterflies. He wonders how long it will take for him to get over this. He wonders if he ever will.

“Come on, Bin, eat up,” Chan exclaims, rips Changbin’s attention away from Hyunjin and to his plate, filled to the brim with all his favourite foods and when he looks up, Seungmin is smiling at him.

“Eat, hyung, we had to go to like five different places to get all of this, so you better enjoy it,” he teases, and Changbin huffs out a laugh, but digs in.

And really, he didn’t eat very well the last few days, his appetite having all but disappeared, swallowed up by the heartbreak until there was nothing left. So he lived on leftovers left by the others, off cup ramen and convenience store kimbap. And he didn’t care, but now, with all of this in front of him, he realises he’s starving.

So he eats. Lets himself be dragged into different conversations, lets Jisung whine about how fast his rap is in the song they were recording, listens to him and Seungmin discuss singing techniques, to Chan talk about this new machine his personal trainer made him use the other day.

Every now and again, he steals glances at you and Hyunjin, and he doesn’t know if you’re doing it to be kind to him, but there’s no lovey-dovey-ness between you; no whispering, no touching, no stolen glances. Changbin is grateful, but he’s also confused.

But before long, everyone’s done eating and you and Hyunjin disappear into the kitchen only to reappear side by side, holding a giant cake. Everyone starts singing the most disjointed rendition of happy birthday which should be criminal considered they’re all singers, but Changbin doesn’t care. Tears prick in his eyes before the song is even over.

The cake is pink. Impeccably frosted. And it’s dwaekki-themed. Ears, little pigtail and face and all. On the bottom it says, “Happy birthday, Changbin!” and there are at least 10 candles, burning, flickering precariously with every step you take.

You and Hyunjin carry it in together, smiling at him, placing the cake in front of him on the table just when the song ends and Changbin tries his best not to cry. Before you pull away, he can feel your hand on brush against his neck, rubbing your thumb over his skin, then Hyunjin’s stronger one, squeezing his shoulder. They’re small touches, barely anything, but his whole body erupts into goosebumps.

But he doesn’t have time to dwell. Someone hands him the knife, tells him to blow out the candles and make a wish, and he does, wishes that one day he will be able to have his friends back.

They wanted to talk to you.

Changbin tries not to freak out about the prospect of it, but when everyone’s had cake, when Minho and Jisung and Chan are done tidying up the kitchen, and everyone slowly starts to make to leave except for you and Hyunjin, it all becomes a little too real.

“Bin?”

You say his name so sweetly, so quietly.

He turns and is met with you and Hyunjin, who’s hovering behind you, gnawing at his lips nervously.

“C-can we talk?” you ask.

Changbin doesn’t respond. He has the urge to say yes, because you clearly want to. He can see the worry and the stress in your tired eyes, wants to do anything he can to alleviate it, but … he doesn’t know if he can do this. He feels like he’s made of glass and one wrong move will shatter him all over the floor.

“Please, hyung,” Hyunjin mumbles, opens his mouth like he wants to say something else, but Jisung screeching in the hallway, makes him falter. “Just, please?”

So Changbin nods. He tries to regulate his breathing as everyone files out with little waves and hugs and more “happy birthdays”, and even manages to hold it together when Chan hugs him and mumbles “you can call me if anything happens, okay?”, only when the door falls shut behind them, and he’s left alone with you, he starts panicking.

He turns around and finds you exactly where you were before, aimlessly fiddling with one of the containers of leftovers, Hyunjin leaning against the kitchen island, running his hand through his hair for the nth time, his foot tapping the floor nervously.

Changbin can’t stand it any longer.

“I … I can’t be your friend. I’m sorry. I really tried, but I-I can’t,” he forces out, “or maybe I can, one day, but not right now. It hurts too much. You hurt me a lot. I need time.”

You straighten up, a look on your face like you’ve been slapped.

Hyunjin winces, takes a step towards him.

“Hyung, I’m sorry,” he starts, and Changbin’s brows furrow, but Hyunjin just takes another step towards him, “I know, I fucked up, I shouldn’t have just kissed you.”

Changbin freezes, whips his head over to you, but you don’t seem surprised. Quite the opposite. Hyunjin is right in front of him now, his breath puffing against his face, just like it did a few days ago, right before …

“I shouldn’t have done it,” he says, his determined gaze racing all over Changbin’s face, “and I should’ve explained, but it was all so … I was so confused and so unsure because I couldn’t believe you’d really want me …”

“What?!”

His disbelief is genuine. Hyunjin blushes, and nods.

“Y/Nie kept telling me, but I just couldn’t believe it? I thought you were just teasing me all these years. Ironic, because the one person I wanted, didn’t want me back. Because it was always so obvious to me that you wanted her …”

Changbin’s head spins and for a second, he thinks he might pass out. You seem to be able to sense it. You mumble, Hyunjin’s name, who blinks, then takes a quick step back. Changbin feels like he can breathe again.

“Hey, why don’t we take this to your room, Bin?” you say gently, give Hyunjin a look. Hyunjin nods, steps back another few steps, and lets you take Changbin’s hand and drag him back to his room.

You lead him to his bed, make him sit down, Hyunjin immediately taking the spot next to him, just close enough, so his knee rests against the side of Changbin’s thigh when he crosses his long graceful legs underneath him. There’s more space between them now, which Changbin is grateful for, because even just that touch when it’s just the three of you here in his room, makes him a little dizzy.

You don’t sit down, instead you come to stand in front of him. Changbin blinks up at you. He feels like he’s staring straight at the sun.

“We’re sorry, Binnie,” you announce with a deep sigh, giving Changbin a look that melts his heart, “we’re sorry we didn’t talk to you sooner. Everything was so messy, and it took us ages to figure it out between ourselves and … and we didn’t know how much you were hurting, how much we were hurting you. We’re sorry.”

Hyunjin makes a soft sound of agreement next to him.

“The thing is …” you take a deep breath, ”both Hyune and I … we both went into our date with each other trying to get over you.”

Changbin’s whole world tilts on its axis.

“I kinda … I loved you for so long, and I figured you’d never want me back, I honestly always thought you were in love with Hyunjin, ever since you told me about him, but … I don’t know, it’s been like, what 7 years, and you never made a move and when Hyune and I met, there was so much chemistry and I thought maybe, just maybe, I should try, you know? And I didn’t know if it would last or anything, but I was kinda desperate because I really needed to get over you.”

You flush, fidget awkwardly where you stand.

“But then … I don’t know, I fucked up, I kissed you, and we had sex and afterwards it was so obvious how much you regretted it, and it hurt so fucking bad to see, so when Hyunjin kissed me in the museum and my heart nearly beat out of my chest, I, uh, I was so relieved. Like, maybe there was a chance, maybe I could get over you. But I couldn’t … of course not.”

Hyunjin’s hand splays over Changbin’s thigh, and Changbin shivers.

“And neither could I …” he murmurs, voice thick like honey in Changbin’s ears. “I really tried … and I was so confused that on Y/N and my second date, I just kind of … freaked out. Told her I heard you. Told her that I was sorry but also that I wasn’t, because it … it turned me on so bad.”

He breathes out the last words, and Changbin nearly chokes on his spit.

“But also that I was really jealous and that I was pretty sure I was in love with you but also liked her and … well, long story short, we realised in a, uhh, very explicit way, that we were both in the same boat, but also really liked each other … But it almost felt like … something was missing. You were missing.”

Hyunjin moves a little closer, lets his hand trace over Changbin’s arm, down to his wrist, before linking his hands in his.

“And we wanted to talk to you, but then you were so cold to me when we were filming that last SKZ code episode, and I kinda just … lost my head. I got so scared. And I followed you because I wanted to tell you all of this, but you were so angry, and it was so hot, and you kissed me back so hard it knocked any coherent thought out of me and I messed it all up. Chan told me as much, when he came to the other dorm. Yelled at me so loud in front of the others …”

Hyunjin shivers, and you take the break in his rant to sit down on Changbin’s other side.

“When Hyunjin told Chan we wanted to talk to you, he had this big, long dad talk with us, about our feelings and our intentions,” you mumble, and shiver. “He basically gave us the shovel talk, it was scary.”

Hyunjin giggles quietly.

“But the long and short of it is,” you take a deep breath, but it’s shaky. Hyunjin’s hand leaves Changbin’s only for long enough to reach over his lap and squeeze yours, before returning to lace into Changbin’s again. “We wanted to ask you … if there was any possible way you might have feelings for us. Because we do … have, like, a lot of feelings … for you.”

Changbin’s heart feels like it’s about to beat out of his chest. He wants to pinch himself, to make sure he isn’t dreaming, but Hyunjin’s warm presence, his thumb rubbing circles into the back of his hand, your leg jumping nervously, it all feels too real to be a dream.

“It’s okay if you don’t,” you breathe out with an awkward chuckle, “just … you just need to tell us. We didn’t really think that far because we’re both romantics and also both kinda delusional,” you laugh again, though Changbin can hear the sadness, “That’s something we learned about each other in the last weeks. But we’ll figure something out. If you just love Hyune, it’s okay, I … I’m not mad, I promise. At least I’ll know. I just can’t pine over you any longer.”

Changbin’s head whips up so fast he nearly pulls something.

“Is that what you think?”

You shrug, avoid his eyes.

“It seemed pretty obvious,” you mumble, “with how you talked about him from day one. How much you regretted sleeping with me, how you kissed him back …”

You look so devastated, it makes Changbin’s chest ache.

He shakes his head. He reaches for you, his hand as shaky as the day you kissed him, cupping your face. His whole body is thrumming with something he can’t name.

“I … wow, is this real?!” he huffs out, with a disbelieving laugh, “Angel, I’ve been in love with you for years …”

Hyunjin hums approvingly, and Changbin’s face snaps over. Hyunjin is right there, staring at him with wide eyes.

“You …” Changbin mumbles, and Hyunjin’s eyes suddenly widen, almost in fear, “Do you think I would flirt with you for so many years without meaning any of it?! Are you crazy?”

Hyunjin pouts, and Changbin wants to kiss it off him. The thought that he might have wanted him to all along, makes him feel insane.

“Well, you never shut up about her! It was always ‘Y/N this, Y/N that’ and ‘Ah, no, Changbin isn’t coming home until later, he’s at Y/N’s’. At some point, I figured the two of you were together and just didn’t tell anyone.”

Changbin blushes hard, but before he can overthink it, he decides to be brave. He frees his hand from Hyunjin’s reaches up, and pulls Hyunjin into a kiss. Hyunjin squeals into his lips, before he relaxes, presses himself closer, until half his leg is in Changbin’s lap and his hand is ghosting up his back. And then he pulls back, blinks his eyes open and looks past Changbin, and Changbin turns and meets your eyes. Your pupils are blown, and despite all of his words, there’s something so uncertain in your face.

“Come here,” Changbin whispers, and you do. Effortlessly, easily, shimmy forward until he can wrap his arm around your waist and press his lips to yours, and he wonders once more if he’s dreaming, but when Hyunjin’s lips find his neck, your fingers travel over his legs until they find Hyunjin’s …

When Changbin pulls back, he’s dizzy. Hyunjin is all but folded around him, nuzzling his face into Changbin’s neck, and you’re staring at him so intently and Changbin has a hard time figuring out what’s right and wrong.

Hyunjin shifts and Changbin feels him half hard in his pants, and he panics a little bit.

“C-can we … can we just … can we just hang out tonight? Watch something or cuddle, or I don’t know,” he asks, shakily, squeezes his eyes closed, “this is … this is a lot, I think I need a minute.”

Hyunjin pulls back, soothes his hand over Changbin’s back and you nod.

It’s only when the light is off later, the three of you tangled into each other in Changbin’s double bed, that’s just about big enough to hold you all, with you curled up against his chest and Hyunjin’s body plastered against his back, that Hyunjin dares bring it up again.

“This feels right, doesn’t it?” he whispers into the darkness, and Changbin’s heart skips a beat. You giggle and hum out a sleepy yes against his chest, and Changbin can’t even find the words. It does.

It’s scary, so, so scary and new, but it feels right in a way that only his soul can understand.

And his soul? Well, it seems that overnight, it found its way, back to where it belongs – in the spot right next to his beating, aching heart, beating and, maybe, just maybe, if last night wasn’t a dream, no longer aching for you.

And it wasn’t a dream, Changbin notes, with a relief that makes his toes curl. Because before he even opens his eyes he can feel Hyunjin’s hair tickling his nose, your soft arm thrown over his waist, your feet tangled with his, and the sun shining in through the crack in the curtains, and he feels like he’s finally come home.

You stir against his back, arch into him as you stretch, your fingers absentmindedly slipping under his shirt, brushing against the skin of his lower stomach. You nuzzle back against him, press a soft kiss to his back, and he sighs. Gently, he covers your hand and with his, gives it a squeeze that makes you hum softly.

Hyunjin wakes then, too, huffing out a breath, the little pout on his angelic face pulling into a yawn, before he detaches himself from Changbin’s side enough to roll onto his back. Changbin watches as he stretches his arms above his head, cursing Hyunjin because he clearly knows how good he looks like this, the lean muscles in his biceps bulging, his shirt riding up enough to expose his toned stomach, the little trail of dark hair leading into his pants where …

Jesus christ. Changbin had seen Hyunjin naked before, plenty of times, and distantly, he knew Hyunjin wasn’t exactly on the small side, but right here, right now, morning wood impressively hard in just his thin cotton boxers? His cock is fucking massive. The mere thought of getting his hands on him makes Changbin’s own half-hard cock twitch in interest.

And you seem to have felt it, because you chuckle deviously and the hand that was trailing over his stomach dips lower.

Hyunjin blinks his eyes open at the sound of your giggle, a pretty little smile on his face as he faces Changbin, his eyes falling down to where your fingers are tracing the waistband of Changbin’s briefs and he hums.

“Good morning,” he rasps, scoots closer, lets one of his hands trail up Changbin’s arm, up over his shoulder, until he can trace Changbin’s cheek. He’s gentle with it, his eyes constantly on Changbin, watching every single one of his reactions with a loving diligence. But below his gentleness, simmering somewhere deep in his eyes, is a hunger than Changbin has never seen before. His cock is rock hard now, your teasing fingertips keeping him teetering on the brink of insanity.

“Please tell me you haven’t changed your mind …” Hyunjin breathes out, and Changbin huffs out in disbelief. He shakes his head and that’s all Hyunjin needs before he leans in to kiss him, morning breath and all. But Changbin doesn’t care. He’s in his bed, with the sun on his face, your body pressed against him and Hyunjin kissing him. He has never been better.

Your fingers dip underneath his waistband like a question.

“Is this okay?” you ask, your voice a breathless thing against the nape of his neck.

Changbin nods, whines a yes into Hyunjin’s lips, and then your hand wraps around his cock and he moans. Hyunjin sighs happily, pulls back only enough to murmur a pleased little “so loud” against his lips, before he presses closer and kisses him even harder.

It’s mind-blowing how good your simple touches feel, nothing grand, only your bodies pressed together, your hand sliding up and down his cock, Hyunjin’s tongue licking against his.

When Changbin’s hips stutter, Hyunjin makes a noise into his mouth and pulls back. Changbin nearly comes just from the vision of him, eyes darker than he’s ever seen them, his sinfully plump lips bitten, chest rising and falling harshly. He looks like some kind of greek god of sex, even more so when he looks past him, over his shoulder, and then pushes Changbin until he’s all the way on his back.

When Hyunjin grabs you by the chin and pulls you in for a kiss right in front of Changbin, Changbin thinks he might actually still be dreaming because holy shit. You’re greedy, pull Hyunjin in with a hand in his hair and Hyunjin matches you effortlessly, parts his lips, lets you lick into his mouth before he returns the favour, kisses you so filthily, Changbin’s belly does a swoop and his cock twitches pathetically in your hand, that’s still pumping, albeit erratically, too distracted by Hyunjin’s assault on your mouth.

But before long, Hyunjin pulls back and turns his hungry eyes back on Changbin, keeps him pinned to the mattress with them as he shoves the covers aside and slithers down his body.

“Fuck, Hyune-aahhh.”

Changbin’s words are cut off when Hyunjin nudges his nose and open mouth against his clothed cock with a hum that travels all the way up Changbin’s spine. There’s an embarrassing wet spot where the head of his cock is leaking, and it’s only getting wetter by the minute.

"Let me make it up to you, hyungie," Hyunjin purrs.

“I’m not gonna … fuck me sideways,” he moans out when Hyunjin rips his briefs down and off his legs in one fell swoop.

“Some other time, gladly,” Hyunjin teases, and Changbin would’ve made a pathetic sound in the back of his throat if Hyunjin didn’t choose that exact moment to swallow his cock into his hot mouth.

He hollows his cheeks, hums, does a little flick with his tongue against the underside of Changbin’s cock and makes a whole show of rolling his eyes before he pulls off and grins up at Changbin.

“Your cock is so perfect, hyungie,” he teases, and Changbin tries to hide his burning, probably embarrassingly pink, face with a whine, only to awkwardly bump his nose into the side of your face. You giggle.

“What? Don’t like the dirty talk?” you hum, and Changbin gives you a mock glare, one that is horribly interrupted by his eyes rolling into the back of his head when Hyunjin sinks his cock back into his mouth.

“If I’d known … fuck, Hyunjin,” Changbin moans, his hand reaching down, tangling in Hyunjin’s hair, though feeling the bob of his head only makes him hurtle towards his orgasm faster, “if I’d known you had such a mouth on you …”

Hyunjin pulls off again, his eyes watery from the effort, and lets the head of Changbin’s cock rest against his plump bottom lip and smiles up at him. It’s an image that not even Changbin’s filthiest desires could’ve cooked up.

“Then what? You would’ve let me hit sooner?”

His tongue darts out and digs into Changbin’s slit, and Changbin curses. He’s going to come, and soon.

Your fingertips trail under his shirt, up the side of his chest, until they reach his nipple. Your touch makes electricity prickle through his veins, and then you turn his head towards you and your lips find his and Changbin loses any shred of sanity.

He comes with an arch of his back and a strangled moan that’s muffled by your lips, one hand buried in Hyunjin’s hair, the other holding on to your arm for dear life. Pleasure rushes through him so fast he thinks he might black out, his whole body shivering again and again, toes curling, until he has nothing left to give, and he collapses into the pillows, breathing heavily, one arm slung over his face.

Distantly, he feels Hyunjin pull off his cock, and he tries to slur out an apology, one Hyunjin promptly ignores.

“Did he just …” Hyunjin asks, fondness laced through every word.

“Did you just come from kissing me?” you ask with a giggle, but it’s so gentle, so fond, that the embarrassment burning Changbin’s ears can’t even harshen his post-orgasm glow.

Hyunjin giggles, then there’s shuffling. Hyunjin murmurs a quiet “come here, baby” and your warmth disappears from Changbin’s side with one more kiss to his forehead, and then the bed dips on his other. When Changbin lifts his arm and cracks one of his eyes open, he is greeted with the view of you and Hyunjin kissing again, though this time it’s different. A lot softer, more coordinated.

You’re straddling Hyunjin’s waist, one knee on each side of him, draped over his chest, one hand supporting yourself in the pillows next to Hyunjin’s head, the other cupping Hyunjin’s face like it’s the most precious thing you’ve ever touched. Hyunjin’s hands on the other hand, are all over you – one smoothing under your shirt and over your belly and, if your gasp is anything to judge by, grabbing your tits, the other on the back of your legs, travelling up and under the boxer shorts you borrowed from Changbin. Changbin can’t see, but when you moan and arch into his hand, he assumes Hyunjin started playing with your pussy.

Changbin’s mouth waters just watching, but then you sit back enough to pull your shirt over your head and do the same to Hyunjin and suddenly, Changbin’s mouth is very, very dry. His cock twitches valiantly.

Skin. So much skin. Your plushness against Hyunjin’s lean, wiry muscles, his strong hands digging divots into your skin, one of them wrapped around your breast, playing with your nipples. Hyunjin is still hard, straining against his boxers, and when you grind forward, dragging your core against the base of his cock, Hyunjin moans, low and melodic and needy.

Changbin’s hard again. It must be some sort of record, but how could he not, with the two most perfect people he has ever seen, making out half naked after sucking soul of out him.

When you scramble off the bed to shuck off your (his, Changbin’s brain supplies unhelpfully) boxers and see him watching you, a smile so gorgeous yet so devious it gives him whiplash, pulls at your lips.

Hyunjin scrambles out of his boxers, too, and Changbin can’t help but stare when Hyunjin’s cock springs free and slaps heavily against his abdomen because fuck, that might be the most beautiful dick he’s ever seen in his life, long and straight, beading precum at the tip. And lord knows he has imagined having Hyunjin every which way, but the thought of him putting that inside him makes Changbin a little more than just dizzy.

Changbin gets distracted by Hyunjin reaching out, wrapping his fingers around his wrist and pulling him closer.

“Get over here,” Hyunjin rasps out, his eyes hooded, and Changbin doesn’t have to be told twice.

He leans in, captures Hyunjin’s lips in his, kisses him with everything he has because, oh god, he can just do this now. He can just kiss Hwang Hyunjin whenever he wants. And Hyunjin seems to like it, because he turns into putty underneath his hands, pliable and pretty, chasing Changbin’s touch until Changbin gives in, runs his palms over his stomach, down, wrapping his hand around his beautiful, heavy cock, and stroking him, swallowing his moans, until Changbin feels the bed dip and your leg against his again. Then he trails his hands up again, over his abs, until he can run his fingers over his pecs. When he brushes over his nipple, Hyunjin gasps, throws his head back.

“Binnie,” you murmur softly, and when he looks over, you sink down on Hyunjin’s cock, taking it all the way to the hilt with a choked moan, your fingernails digging into Hyunjin’s thighs and Changbin nearly comes on the spot. Hyunjin moans prettily, one of his hands finding your waist, eyebrows knitting together in an expression of pleasure-pain that is more gorgeous than anything Changbin has ever seen.

But when he looks over at you, you, with your hair wild, your back arched, goosebumps on your glistening skin as you throw your head back, circle your hips in a slow grind – Changbin is at a loss where to look because surely this cannot be real.

Hyunjin makes the decision for him, whines, demands his attention back by sinking his fingers into Changbin’s hair and yanking him down into his lips so hard pain zaps through Changbin’s scalp, only to be replaced by molten arousal when Hyunjin licks into his mouth like a man starved. And his moans only get louder when you start bouncing on him in earnest, getting up on your knees and letting yourself fall down on Hyunjin’s cock until your legs start shaking.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Hyunjin curses out, his hips bucking up to meet yours with every one of your bounces, and you mewl, falling forward and into Hyunjin’s chest weakly.

“C-can’t, legs h-hurt, p-please,” you whimper, voice so brittle and desperate it sends Changbin into a tailspin. He mashes his lips against yours and Hyunjin moans, plants his feet and starts fucking up into you, and the sound you make is outright obscene. Changbin’s patience snaps, and he reaches down, wraps one hand around himself. The relief of his touch makes him almost delirious.

You’re still kissing him, though it’s more teeth and spit than anything, and then you turn your head and Hyunjin catches you, cradles you against him and fucks up into you harder, until Changbin’s headboard is thudding against the wall in an erratic rhythm that Changbin knows all the neighbours can hear.

“C-close,” you mumble and Hyunjin whimpers into your mouth, turns, drags Changbin closer until his mouth is in the mix, too, and it’s filthy and messy and so entirely uncoordinated that it shouldn’t be hot, but, it is, because Changbin is swapping spit with the two loves of his life.

Somehow, he comes first, spills weakly over his fist as another desperate orgasm racks through him, renders him entirely boneless, watching as Hyunjin ruts into you until you come with a choked moan, muttering Hyunjin’s then Changbin’s name, and Hyunjin’s whole body arches when he follows you over the edge, burying himself in you to the hilt with a weak moan.

Then he collapses, and you along with him, cheek squished against his chest, fucked out and gorgeous, before you slowly let yourself slide off his chest, and into the space between them. You mewl weakly when Hyunjin’s cock slides out of you and his cum starts dripping out of you, a sight that makes stars dance in Changbin’s vision and his spent cock throb.

It’s a little gross. Sweat and cum and spit drying on skin, but neither you nor Hyunjin make any effort to move. And neither does Changbin. So the three of you just lie there, basking in the glory of it all, Hyunjin and your hands linked on his chest, Changbin wrapped around your back, drawing shapes onto Hyunjin’s abs.

“Are we … are we dating now?” you ask into the silence, sheepish, and Hyunjin cracks an eye open, before he turns on his side, presses a kiss to your nose that makes Changbin’s heart flutter.

“I’d be honoured to be your boyfriend,” he murmurs, and Changbin can see your smile mirrored in the one that takes over Hyunjin’s as he looks at you.

Then you turn around, enough to be able to stare up at Changbin.

“What about you? Wanna be my boyfriend, Binnie?”

“And mine!” Hyunjin chirps. You giggle.

“And Hyunjin’s?”

Changbin doesn’t even try to play coy. He smiles, big and uninhibited, so wide he knows his dimples are probably showing, but he doesn’t care.

“I’d love to be your boyfriend,” he says. He means it more than he has ever meant anything in his life. His heart threatens to leap out of his chest.

“And mine?” Hyunjin asks, fluttering his lashes at Changbin with a pretty little pout on his lips.

“And yours, silly,” Changbin laughs out and Hyunjin smiles, leans up to kiss Changbin, then you, watches as Changbin kisses you with a smile on his lips, before he settles back down, cuddles back up to you. Changbin yawns.

“We should shower …” he says, half-heartedly, but you huff, pull his arm closer around you.

“Just … a few more minutes,” you mumble, and Changbin can hear the sleep already tugging at your consciousness.

“Yeah, this is nice,” Hyunjin adds, scoots closer until his forehead is resting against yours on the pillow. His eyes are already closed.

And Changbin? Well, what is he going to do. He ignores the stickiness between his legs in favour of the soft body of his love in his arms, and when sleep tugs at his consciousness, beckoned by Hyunjin’s soft snores, he lets it overtake him. They can always shower later. They have all the time in the world now.

A year later, on his birthday, they’re all out together at a Korean BBQ place, one that Jisung and Minho go to so often that they’ve become friends with the owners, and always get a private room in the back where they can truly have privacy.

You and Hyunjin disappear after the meat is all eaten, and then you walk back in, moments later, side by side, holding a giant cake. Everyone sings happy birthday.

The cake has a picture of the three of you on it, because his birthday is now also partly your anniversary. You usually celebrate twice, though. Not like any of you need an excuse to be sappy and romantic on any given day. You may be the sappiest couple, or throuple, Changbin knows. He loves every second of it.

In the picture on the cake, Changbin is standing in between you two, Hyunjin’s arm slung around his shoulders, you folded into his side. You took it at Namsan Tower a couple of months ago, asked a stranger to take it in front of the famous hearts, giggling when you pulled down your masks and the stranger looked confused, like he was trying to figure out where he knew you from. It was a beautiful night. You ate ice cream and stole sticky sweet kisses in alleyways and behind trees and then went home and fucked each other’s brains out until Jisung was pounding on the wall separating his room from Hyunjin’s begging you to stop.

You place the cake down on the table in front of him as the song ends. Someone tells him to blow out the candles and make a wish. He blows them out and wishes this – you, Changbin and Hyunjin – will last forever.

Everyone cheers, you squeal, wrap your arms around his shoulders from behind. Hyunjin sits back down at his place to Changbin’s right and laces his fingers with his. He gives Changbin the biggest, fondest, smile, and leans in until he's cuddled into his side. Changbin’s heart melts.

You pepper sweet little kisses all over his cheek and over his neck.

“Happy birthday, Binnie,” you whisper, happiness evident in your voice. “I love you so much.”