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That eternal castle, the only remaining lonely island. No matter who warns me, I won’t listen
To block the waves for them, how tall a tower must I become?
— Hai Cheng (The8)
*
Kim Mingyu is waiting at Seokmin’s dinner table when he gets home.
“Oh,” Seokmin enters the room carefully, hand trailing over the doorknob. He isn’t too sure what to make of the scene before him. Minghao looks caught, a frog in the headlights, eyes wide and mouth small.
“Seokmin,” Minghao blinks. “You’re home.”
“Yeah, they let me go early.” Seokmin pulls the strap of the duffel over his head and gently places it on the floor. “Good behavior, or something like that.” He laughs but the gesture is not well worn. It falls short in the middle of the room, careening spectacularly.
Seokmin can feel both of their eyes on him, the weight of their gazes laden with… something.
Seokmin wasn’t planning on this, to be honest.
He’d wanted to go home — home , to Minghao, his husband. Wanted to sit in the dark of their room and figure everything out, to reach out for Minghao’s hands, to take them in his own, while they map out different versions of Where do we go from here ? and pick which suited them best. One moment of rest before the world catches up and he has to deal with everything again. Just the one. He’d figured it wouldn’t be too much to ask.
But there Kim Mingyu sits, at his dining room table.
There is an audience in front of him. Seokmin lets out a breath at the nauseating thought, takes a second to squash the thing in his stomach that is churning and churning and churning. There is an audience in front of him. Remember, he thinks. Be good. Everything is fine. He’s good.
Seokmin gathers all his strength and smiles. “How are you doing?”
*
Mingyu had dropped everything once he heard.
Seokmin’s first thought was that he hadn’t asked Mingyu to.
It’s a knee jerk reaction, irritable and mean, he knows, but he thinks it anyway. Because he's allowed to. Because he wants to.
Seokmin creases it over with another drawn, watery breath, tucking it neatly underneath. Affixes his face with what he hopes is a neutral expression.
Mingyu is looking at him with something like kindness scrawled across his face. It softens Mingyu’s features, his hope.
It’s funny how certain people can turn back the clock. That you’re always going to be the same person you were when they knew you best. With Mingyu, Seokmin will forever be trapped in his earlier years, awkward and gangly and brace-faced, young and naive and smiling the right way — mouth curved wide, up until it reached his eyes, with all his teeth. A time when he didn’t know any better. When they were still friends.
Seokmin hates it.
He smiles back, to be nice.
*
“What happened between you guys?” Minghao asks, quietly, when Mingyu finally leaves. He’d just been stopping by, he was in the area now actually, maybe they could reconnect sometime, Mingyu had explained in a tumble of teeth and tongue, so quick and close together that Seokmin has to pay extra careful attention in order to separate the words. It had annoyed Seokmin even further, fraying already frayed nerves after having seen a ghost from the past standing in his own home.
Their past, Seokmin amends. Mingyu belonged — belongs? — to Minghao just as much as he did to Seokmin. For some portion of their lives, at least.
“Seokmin?” Minghao’s voice pulls him back to the present. “The full story, please,” he repeats as firmly as he can without pushing it.
“The full story?” Seokmin repeats.
“Yes,” Minghao slides a hand around Seokmin’s, face open with expectation. He looks a little bit like Mingyu did, sitting at the dining room table just a few hours earlier. Hope shapes all features the same, no matter who wears it. “All of it.”
Seokmin tries to bring forth the words, but nothing leaps into his mouth. Everything settles into his stomach, heavy and insistent and terrible.
“I’m tired,” Seokmin says instead. “Can we just go to bed?”
The corners of Minghao’s lips start to curl downwards, like he does when he’s incredibly displeased but — out of consideration, kindness, love, some convoluted version of all three — trying not to show it. Seokmin reaches a hand out and wipes it away with trembling fingers, a spoken unspoken apology. Minghao closes his eyes and leans into Seokmin’s touch. A ceasefire. Seokmin takes this privilege to heart. He traces over the landscape of tiny indents and valleys that mar Minghao’s face and makes a promise, right then, right there that he will tell Minghao. One day, Seokmin will have finally gathered all his courage, and the words, and he will sit Minghao down and tell him all of it. One day.
Seokmin looks at the boy he holds in his hands. Sometimes, with Minghao, Seokmin feels like he is standing at the edge of a precipice, teetering precariously. Feeling, with a dizzying sort of clarity, that if he fell he might not ever resurface. It is incredibly tempting to surrender. To let Minghao in, to close that distance between them.
Seokmin knows Minghao would understand. Seokmin knows, logically, somewhere in his brain, that Minghao would understand. He would. If not Minghao, then who? No, it would be him. It has always been Minghao, for Seokmin. Nobody else.
And yet —
Seokmin is a coward, first and foremost. He’s terrified of heights.
Today is not that day.
Today, they shuffle their feet on the floor of their shared apartment and pull up to the sink, brushing teeth in sleepy rhythm, matching pajamas. Today, they fall into bed without saying anything else. Minghao wraps his arms around Seokmin’s stomach, head pressed to his back so that he can hear each and every breath, feel each rise and fall. Seokmin curls one hand over Minghao’s and keeps it close to his heart so he can feel it beat, fingers idling over a nondescript silver band, one that matches Seokmin’s own.
*
Everybody has a story.
Sometimes, it feels like Seokmin’s own doesn’t even belong to him.
Not entirely, anyways. Like someone set up something in the next room over and Seokmin has been made audience to all of it, a spectator to his own spectacle.
When Mingyu told, Seokmin wasn't sure what to think. He wasn’t sure what to say. He’s not sure if he did.
All he remembers now is the shame.
Get over it, they had advised him. Everyone had their own opinions and felt they had a say in it. Seokmin was “that boy”, the one they read about, on the news, you know, the son of a friend of a friend. Someone else’s kid. Seen but never truly heard. A ghost of other people’s words. The bad thing that happened to a good person, yeah, that was Lee Seokmin.
The gist of what everyone said: just keep going. Get over it.
He didn’t talk about it if he wanted to be considered strong. He couldn’t. He just had to keep his head down and bear it and throw away everything that it had touched. His fingers were sticky and his tears even stickier after he locked his voice up and took great stakes to hide away the key. They called him good and tough without ever acknowledging the soft parts, the parts that bled all over, the parts that were in need of repair the most.
He got over it.
Until he realized he wasn’t over it, he probably never would be, not unless he reached back down and pulled up the boy that he’d long thought he’d buried, all those years ago. Unearthed all those feelings and choices and ghosts of history long past. Left turns instead of right, right turns when he should’ve gone left, going around in circles, like a pinwheel, a cycle he never quite learned how to break out of. Choices that piled up on top of one another, faster and faster, quicksand beneath the feet. Until they wove themselves together, piecing together a life that wasn’t exactly like what he’d dreamed.
Was he happy?
Standing at the end of that long tunnel was someone he’d have to talk to. Kim Mingyu.
*
Here’s the thing about bad things born out of good intentions.
I didn’t mean for this to happen. I meant well. It shouldn’t have turned out like this. I’m sorry.
Well sometimes, it does. No one particularly means for it to happen, but it does anyway. The nature of the world is to turn, and turn, and turn. Maybe it’s no one’s fault. Maybe they just shouldn’t have expected any better. And so when Seokmin ends up being the one standing with the smoking gun and Mingyu is looking very afraid for having lit it, well — what then?
What is Seokmin supposed to do with sorry?
*
Seokmin’s first day back at the office is… well, interesting, to say the least.
He gets it. He wouldn’t know how to act around someone who tried to kill themself either. And on a Thursday night at that. It’s not something the supervisors talk about in their onboarding process, nor is it mentioned in the handbook on workplace etiquette; Seokmin has checked. The closest thing in there starts with Has a coworker lost a loved one? and ends with, Offer your condolences. Buy flowers, but make sure to write the greeting yourself, it feels more personal and genuine that way.
Does it really?
Everyone passes by with polite nods. They limit contact, as if he’s contagious, to be treated with gloves and lots of bubble wrap. If someone does end up having to talk to him, they adopt gentle tones and wide eyes, like he’s a wild animal that could bolt at any second.
It somehow feels worse. Everyone in the room has singled Seokmin out by sheer desperation to not talk about it.
Wonwoo is the only one who treats him normally.
Seokmin shows up to his cubicle and realizes how little of himself was there. He makes a mental reminder to bring something , anything , to fill up the space. Make it more permanent.
Maybe he should get something bright and garish. A sight for sore eyes. Something daring, glaring, as if to say Look at me . I’m here. I exist.
A derisive snort escapes at the thought, without Seokmin meaning to.
Wonwoo peers over the divider separating their desks, looking at Seokmin with a curious gaze. His eyes are thoughtful, as if debating an internal question.
“Take a picture, hyung. It’ll last longer,” Seokmin tilts his head cutely, a smile unfurling across his face, purposefully oozing aegyo. This is familiar, this is something he can do. He knows this.
Wonwoo makes a face. He disappears as he ducks back beneath his desk. There’s a grunt, then some shuffling and a muffled curse or two, then he pops back up with a poorly wrapped figurine, held together by spirit and scotch tape.
“For your desk,” Wonwoo intones thoughtfully, though he pitches his voice lower and his ears pink with embarrassment. “Figured you would want to do some redecorating.”
There’s a long pause as they both stare at the little present between them. Seokmin doesn’t say anything at first, too overcome with emotion. He always feels one step away from breaking, wounds still blistered and raw and aching. Volatile, like the tiniest thing could send him teetering over the edge. He never means to be. It just is.
The quiet drags on long enough that Wonwoo starts to draw his jacket sleeves over his hands. Nervous habit, he’d explained to Seokmin one time.
Seokmin reaches one hand out to still Wonwoo’s arm. He smiles. It is tentative and shaky and small. But it’s real. “Thank you,” Seokmin says, looking Wonwoo in the eye after he unwraps it.
It’s a tiny little sunflower.
“I heard they always face the sun wherever they grow.” Wonwoo’s voice is gruff. He reaches over to tilt the bauble towards Seokmin. The sentiment warms Seokmin up from the inside out.
The rest of the day he finds himself admiring the small sunflower dancing this way and that on his desk. Bobbing up and down to some invisible melody just out of earshot.
It is a little silly, Seokmin decides. But he likes it. It looks right at home.
*
It’s dark in the office by the time Seokmin realizes how late it is, the crick in his neck growing crankier by the second, having been held at an awkward angle for far too long. Wonwoo patiently waits for Seokmin to finish the last bit of the report before he gets up too.
“You didn’t have to wait for me, hyung,” Seokmin protests.
“I know,” Wonwoo replies, dutifully pushing in his chair and holding out Seokmin’s briefcase to him. He ducks his head downward, pushing up his glasses with an index finger. “I wanted to.”
On the commute home, Wonwoo leans over Seokmin’s shoulder, bony chin digging into the jut of Seokmin’s collarbone. Nosy. Seokmin has just finished sending Minghao a flurry of animated stickers from a pack he’d just bought. Wonwoo takes the opportunity to ask what’s for dinner.
“Aish,” Seokmin shakes a finger at Wonwoo, taking care not to jostle Wonwoo too much. “So that’s your angle.”
“I can’t do both?” Wonwoo asks innocently, but by then the charade has been given up and their laughter fills up an entire subway car, booming and bright.
*
“Stop bringing home strays,” Minghao chides when Seokmin and Wonwoo walk in. He’s waving a spatula at both of them, but it’s all for show — Seokmin is the cook of the house. The closest Minghao has ever gotten to the kitchen is the plethora of takeout menus they keep in a basket stowed beneath the kitchen counter.
“You fed him first,” Seokmin places his briefcase down, eagerly unknotting his tie and slipping it over his head. “He’s learned we’re friendly.”
Minghao makes a noncommittal hum as he continues stirring the pot and heating up the takeout, which makes it Seokmin’s duty to set the table. He leans into the kitchen, pulling mismatched utensils and janky placemats out of their respective drawers, stained from years and years of use.
Wonwoo appears thoroughly spooked by the threat, freezing awkwardly in the doorway. He still looks unsure of where to be, even though this is the fifth time he’s joined them for supper in the past week.
“Sit down,” Seokmin rolls his eyes, coming around to tug Wonwoo forward. “You have to know by now that we’re joking.”
Minghao makes a noise of agreement, gesturing warmly to the spot at the table that Seokmin has already cleared out for Wonwoo. “I was kidding, Wonwoo-yah. Eat, eat.”
Wonwoo stiffly nods, finally putting down his briefcase and unknotting his tie. He beckons at the bundle of utensils currently in Seokmin’s possession, desperate to prove himself useful (Wonwoo is also, unfortunately, a terrible cook — his one redeeming quality is that he’s fantastic at dish duty).
Hands freed, Seokmin takes the opportunity to hug Minghao from behind. The smell of sandalwood, soft and spicy, fills Seokmin’s nose as he takes a deep breath. He can feel his heart swell the moment Minghao sighs happily, leaning back into the embrace. He’s home.
“Sorry, we had a late lunch.” Seokmin places a quick kiss into Minghao’s hair. “Did you eat?”
“Not yet,” Minghao grumbles grumpily, but his body betrays him, insistently remaining in Seokmin’s space. “I was waiting for you guys.”
“It’s Seokmin’s first day back and he’s already working so hard,” Wonwoo remarks lightly, chopsticks clinking together as he places them down. He doesn’t mean much by it, Seokmin knows, but Minghao picks up on it right away.
Seokmin feels rather than hears the slight stiffening in Minghao’s voice, shivering at the way it chills the air.
“Really?” Minghao asks Wonwoo sharply, quickly. Protective as always. “Already?”
Seokmin smiles nervously, out of habit. Hopes that the gesture is enough to deter Minghao from asking any more questions. From worrying.
“I’m fiiiine ,” he exaggerates, swinging his entire body with the force of it all. When Minghao doesn’t budge, Seokmin pushes gently at Minghao’s shoulders. “Nothing I can’t handle, Myungho-yah, I promise. Let’s eat!”
Minghao turns around to give Seokmin a skeptical glance, one so full of concern, so full of love, that it takes all of Seokmin’s strength not to kiss him right then and there. There is something tugging at Seokmin’s heart, guilt enmeshed in gratefulness, the hot sting of tears ready to start up at a moment’s notice.
“Before it gets cold,” Seokmin says softly, pushing past the lump in his throat. “I can hear Wonwoo-hyung’s stomach growl.”
“It’s not that bad,” Wonwoo protests, just before his aforementioned stomach invades the conversation, loud and rumbling.
And just like that, a flip switches. It’s almost as if the last five minutes haven’t happened in the first place. It’s easier if they all pretend it didn’t, if Seokmin is being entirely truthful.
Minghao’s eyes slide over to Wonwoo as he bustles his way over, making sure that Wonwoo has enough food on his plate. Minghao coos and clicks his tongue. Mandarin spills out, soft little remarks that gently chide, barely sharp enough to sting. Wonwoo makes a giant fuss about being fussed over, but he stills under Minghao’s attention anyway, not so secretly preening.
Seokmin can breathe again. The spotlight’s off of him. For now, he’s reminded, as Minghao sends him another quiet worried glance, brows knitted in concern. The conversation is far from over, but it’s pushed back, at least.
Seokmin is in a room full of people that matter so much to him, who value him just as much as he does them. They’re here , together, in the present, cheeks flushed with warmth. This is all that matters. It’s all that should matter. It’s fine. He’s fine.
He smiles once again, a slight shake of his head. Gestures for them both to dig in, while the food’s still warm.
Minghao lets it go, thankfully. This time.
Seokmin’s fine. Right?
*
They send Wonwoo back to his own apartment, across town, with a box of their leftovers. Minghao makes sure to package it in their good glass Tupperware, just so that Wonwoo knows he has a good excuse to return.
Seokmin watches Wonwoo go home, one arm around Minghao’s waist.
“Text me when you get home,” Seokmin calls out. Wonwoo raises a hand in acknowledgement, silhouette growing smaller and smaller in the distance.
“He won’t,” Minghao complains.
“I know,” Seokmin laughs. “But he won’t move in with us either, so we have to do it this way for now. Let him think he’s winning.”
“Stubborn brat,” Minghao murmurs. Seokmin hums his agreement, but it's fond all the way through. Wonwoo can be awfully proprietary about certain things, much more than Seokmin would have thought, stubborn and unyielding when push comes to shove.
And then it’s quiet in the house.
Seokmin ends up pulling Minghao close and tucking him underneath his arm. He doesn’t let go, his hands lingering by Minghao’s waist. Minghao doesn’t move back either, leaning into it drowsily, with the satisfaction of someone who has had a very successful dinner – 3 plates, Seokmin was counting.
“Hey,” Minghao looks up at Seokmin, murmuring softly as he sifts his fingers through Seokmin’s hair. “How was your day, really?”
Seokmin tries his best to think about it, to answer truthfully, instead of the awful instinctive knee-jerk reaction to cover up, to save face, to gloss over. It should be easy. But sometimes the easy thing to do isn’t always as simple as it sounds.
Seokmin lifts one shoulder up in a half-hearted shrug. “It was work. What else is there to say?”
“Ah,” Minghao deflates. “Wonwoo-hyung said that I shouldn’t push. That it takes time.” Minghao retracts his outstretched hand. Seokmin pretends it doesn’t hurt as much as it does.
In some convoluted sort of way, Seokmin thinks he deserves it. He brought this upon himself. Upon them, their house. And now it stands between them, surrounds them, all around them.
How do you fix that?
Every apology that Seokmin packages and sends out steals a little bit of himself, chipping away until he’s folded himself in all he can and there’s nothing left to give any more, corners cut and chafing on himself.
I’m sorry , he thinks, tucking Minghao’s head under his chin and hearing his steady breaths. Please wait a little longer.
He hopes it’s enough.
*
“How are you?” Heeae asks Seokmin when they run into each other at the coffee machine in the break room.
They’ve never been very close, even though Seokmin passes Heeae’s desk nearly every day. She’s a decent coworker. Shows up to everything right on time, clocks out on the dot too. Keeps her head down and meets all the deadlines. She waves when waved at, smiles when she’s supposed to. There’s a small picture frame of her and her siblings from when they were younger— their hair wild and curly, unlike the neat silk straight hairstyle she chooses to wear to work. Seokmin thinks she has a boyfriend; he’d overheard her complain about him during company dinner once.
Other than that, he doesn’t really know Heeae at all, Seokmin realizes, probably just as she does.
Heeae’s mouth twists sheepishly. “You don’t have to answer that. You probably get enough questions as it is.”
The reply is automatic. “I’m fine,” Seokmin grins when it comes out of his mouth. He bears it, even if he wants to break it off, cringing at the blandness of his answer.
Because most of the time when people at the office ask if he’s alright, they’re not really asking. It’s a formality. The right thing to do, the humane thing to do. It’s just another perfunctory check off the list. Seokmin has a script for this too: he is expected to say yes, he’s doing well, just fine, so Heeae can breathe a sigh of relief, cross out another box, and get to the next thing on agenda.
It’s what Seokmin has been doing his entire life.
He’s good at this. Meeting other people’s expectations. He’s gotten so good that he forgot what it was like to pay attention to his own, part of the reason why Heeae is asking how he’s doing in the break room in the first place.
“Great.” She grins too widely to be comfortable, the silence stretching out between them. She shuffles awkwardly in place, clearly wanting to abandon the conversation she’d started.
Seokmin gives her an easy way out by turning around to make yet another cup of mediocre instant coffee, a kind dismissal. He’ll hand it to Wonwoo or something later.
Heeae’s ID badge jingles as she walks away, heels quiet on the plush of the carpet floor.
“I’m doing better,” Seokmin amends, quietly, once Heeae is out of earshot. He says it out loud, the lone coffee cup steaming on the counter bearing witness, so he can hear it too.
*
The next time Seokmin sees Mingyu, he’s sitting on the doorstep to their apartment, back hunched and looking infinitely smaller than a man should with his ridiculously large build. A drowned puppy waiting to be let in.
“You didn’t text me to let me know that you’d be here,” Seokmin smiles through clenched lips. It starts to break off in his mouth, threatening to snap. He didn’t realize he’d gotten this brittle.
Mingyu blinks, like this is a realization that he himself has just come to. “I didn’t have your number.”
“I never gave it to you,” Seokmin says back sweetly.
Mingyu opens his mouth, then frowns.
Seokmin takes one look at him and internally sighs. He opens the door and pauses over the threshold. He thinks about how easy it would be to slip inside and lock Mingyu out. He thinks about just leaving it be and crawling underneath his covers while pretending Mingyu isn’t sitting right here, right on his doorstep.
Seokmin huffs forlornly. It would be easy. But it wouldn’t be the right thing to do. He whips back around and Mingyu is already standing, unfurling his stupidly long legs and towering up, up, up over him. Seokmin crosses his arms in what he hopes is a threatening manner and blocks the entryway.
“You’re doing it again, you know,” Seokmin leans against the doorframe, loosening his tie with nimble fingers. “Butting in.”
Mingyu laughs, a huff of air escaping out the lungs. A canine peeks out, still snaggled toothed and crooked. Seokmin would have thought he’d corrected it by now. The fact that it hasn’t been, well. His heart is charmed, just a little. Traitor.
“I know.”
Seokmin considers Mingyu for another moment more.
Maybe it is time to wave a white flag.
“Not here,” Seokmin pushes himself off, striding with much more purpose than he feels. “I’m not ready to tell Myungho yet.”
He feels Mingyu’s breath catch, hears him suck in. Feels the air sharpening between them. “Don’t,” Seokmin reminds Mingyu, trying his best to disarm it. Shaky but steady.
Mingyu clamps his mouth shut and follows, silent. Obedient as ever.
*
They get coffee across the street. Mingyu offers to pay. Seokmin orders the most expensive thing on the menu and tries his best to enjoy it. He wishes they added more sugar, but he’s too anxious to ask for any changes, especially when they’re already swamped with kids flooding out from cram schools as it is. Seokmin politely sips his drink and decides he is perfectly fine with letting Mingyu squirm a little bit in his seat before starting the conversation.
Mingyu seems to be taking Seokmin’s previous instructions well — so now he wants to listen, Seokmin thinks, barely resisting the urge to roll his eyes — and doesn’t say anything. Just stares at Seokmin, expectant.
“So,” Seokmin starts lamely, awkward all the way through. “How are you doing?”
“I’m doing well,” Mingyu’s smile lights up his entire face, tilting crookedly to one side.
They both know how to play this game. Surface level, the harmless stuff. Keeping up pretenses.
Mingyu continues. “I met someone. He’s…” Here, the other side lifts up to match. Seokmin is well versed in the art to know that this one is real, that it harbors the truth. “He’s good to me,” Mingyu finishes by ducking his face into his coffee.
“Yah,” Seokmin points across the table. Part teasing, part accusatory. “Kim Mingyu-yah, are you blushing?”
Mingyu, definitely blushing, blushes even harder into his drink. “No,” he mutters, in a tumble of letters.
“…Yes,” Mingyu petulantly admits, after a while. “Fine, I was, are you happy?” Seokmin can’t help it — he laughs. Kim Mingyu, at 31, is still so goddamn familiar to the Kim Mingyu Seokmin knew at 18.
Mingyu looks unsure, caught between wanting to join in with him and terrified to do the wrong thing. He ends up waiting for Seokmin to sober up, leg bouncing up and down, mouth stuck on a nervous grin.
“And how are you doing?” Mingyu pales when he realizes his slip of the tongue, that he’s inadvertently mentioned the Unspeakable Thing standing in the room separating them.
“I mean,” he backpedals. “Obviously—“
Seokmin lends him a rope. “It’s okay,” he says quietly. “We can talk about it. We should, actually.”
Where does Seokmin begin, with a distance like this?
“Do you hate me?” Mingyu whispers quietly, answering for him. Mingyu looks pained to admit it, mouth twisted up in displeasure. He never did well when people openly didn’t like him. Mingyu was always trying to soothe and smooth over, reducing the amount of ripples left in his path, packaging things down smaller and smaller until eventually they disappeared. Out of sight, out of mind.
Seokmin tries not to get too agitated. Mingyu never means for anything to become of anything, but somehow it always happens when they’re put in a room together.
“No, I don’t.” Seokmin constructs his words carefully, rounding out the letters.
“You’re a terrible liar, you know.” Mingyu laughs into his coffee, but it’s sharp and wry, full of second meaning. Seokmin sips on his coffee and pretends not to catch it.
He knows he has a memory like water, a habit of clinging on to things and never letting them go. Mingyu, on the other hand, is so very willing to forgive and forget. He’s so much nicer than Seokmin could ever be.
But Seokmin’s trying. He’s trying, isn’t he? That’s what this is, that’s what they are, that’s why they’re here now, in the present, sitting across from one another.
Mingyu huffs, mouth twisting even further. He looks like a little mouse, which makes Seokmin want to laugh despite the absurdity of it all — how someone so large could look so small, could make someone want to look after them.
Seokmin shakes his head slightly at the thought. That’s not his business anymore.
“No, I don’t hate you,” Seokmin repeats. He places his mug down, tracing the rim of it with his fingers. It’s hard, untangling the thing that describes how he feels about Mingyu. Seokmin has a difficult time placing the sticky feeling that sits in his chest every time he thinks about what happened back then. There’s not a name for it, he’d concluded long ago — only that it never quite fades, even with time.
“I miss you,” Mingyu whispers, like he’s not quite sure if he’s allowed to say it. “Minghao, too. I’ve missed you both.”
Seokmin makes a bruised sound in the back of his throat. “Mingyu, I —“
Everything is happening too fast, too soon. Seokmin feels trapped, nearly claustrophobic, the corners of his cage pressing in; he hadn’t prepared for this, he didn’t think Mingyu would —
“I meant what I said earlier, at your house. I want to help.” Mingyu bulldozes through, sharp and insistent. “Let me help you.”
Seokmin wants to laugh. He’s sure he does. It feels like he’s out of his body again, on the outside looking in. A stranger to his own story. Mingyu is charging forward with his whole heart and not a thought about what Seokmin wants, about what he needs— because Mingyu could help.
Thirteen years down the line and things really haven’t changed. Fucking Kim Mingyu.
A small thought, floundering in the back of Seokmin’s mind: maybe Mingyu’s not the problem. Maybe it’s Seokmin. Maybe he’s been the problem this whole time. Maybe he’s being unreasonable. Maybe he does need the help.
Whatever it is, Seokmin doesn’t want to face it right now, certainly not in a public place surrounded by strangers, sitting across from someone he thought he’d written out of his life years ago. He forces himself to be cordial. Polite. He doesn’t remember how the rest of the conversation goes, he doesn’t want to — Seokmin’s not sure which is which but they make the stumbling switch, stampeding through other topics until they’ve exhausted everything.
Seokmin doesn’t touch the topic again, no matter how much he sees Mingyu itching to bring it up. Old wounds, battle scars that never healed just right. Still angry and sore and pulsing. Seokmin smiles through all of it, never faltering once.
“We should do this again,” Mingyu tries one last time, at the very end.
“Mhm,” Seokmin says, but he’s already slipping through the door, smile dropping the moment his back is turned. Like he can’t get away fast enough. Like he’s still running.
*
When Seokmin lets himself in later that night, Minghao is fighting to keep his eyes open. The TV is playing some documentary about the Han River, how they’d found strangers’ bodies in the silt. Seokmin remembers watching it together, a strange horror creeping up in the back of his mind.
Minghao switches the program immediately when he realizes Seokmin has stopped to stare.
“Where have you been?” Minghao asks, tone deliberately light.
Heart hammering, Seokmin tells a story about Wonwoo and another coworker who still hasn’t learned how to use the copy machine, until Minghao is bursting at the seams with laughter, pink blooming on his cheeks.
Will he know? Seokmin wonders. Just by looking at me, will he know?
He holds his breath the entire time. Minghao comes close and Seokmin thinks, this is it. This is where Minghao will see him for what he is. For whom Mingyu saw him as in that cafe, helpless and wanting and in need. Broken and in need of desperate repair, but with no clue as to where to begin, or how to even start, or to even find the right words to ask for it in the first place.
Instead, Minghao ruffles Seokmin’s hair and places a kiss to his cheek. “Let’s get ready for bed,” Minghao murmurs. “It’s getting late.”
Seokmin is not sure if it’s disappointment or relief that comes crashing over him. He’s too exhausted to examine it any closer.
Afterwards, Seokmin looks at himself in the mirror. Stretches his mouth wide open in imitation, until he can see the white of his teeth and the pink of his gums. See? I’m fine.
It barely takes a second for the foundation to crumble.
He hardly recognizes the creature staring back.
*
Seokmin rehearses every day, what he’s going to say to Minghao. He’s trying to make good on his promise. It’s just not… working out.
“Don’t feel guilty,” Seokmin blurts out. His reflection looks displeased.
“Everyone asks for help in different ways,” Seokmin tries again, immediately cringing. “I tried hard not to.”
But every time they approach the topic, all Seokmin ends up doing is reverting back to his old habits. It’s fine, don’t worry about me, isn’t Junhui supposed to call you sometime later tonight?
“Are we ever going to talk about it?” Minghao asks, hurt creeping into his voice.
The shame makes the words stick hard.
He can’t. Seokmin hangs his head. He can’t.
His apology already sits in hand, wrenched from his throat.
*
Additionally: every night, like clockwork, a text from Kim Mingyu. Menial things, brief phrases like hi! and whatcha doing? and other snippets of that variety. Creating opportunities, openings to deeper conversations, doors to rediscover the people they’d been in the years that they’ve been apart.
It takes so much effort to respond. Too much effort.
So Seokmin doesn’t.
He watches the KaTalk notifications pile up; the number slowly, steadily increasing, higher and higher and higher. He doesn’t know how to say sorry for it either — stubborn and petulant and if he’s being honest, a little childish — so in the end everything just piles up, little rocks into a mountain, until the pressure and the guilt looms over him and it feels like the whole world is waiting in the wings, threatening to swallow Seokmin whole.
*
“Hyung,” Seokmin whispers. “Can I talk to you?”
Wonwoo tears his eyes from his monitor, flushed bright with the glaze of looking over rows and rows of numbers for the semi-annual performance reports.
“Hm?”
“Nevermind,” Seokmin says hastily, already regretting the question. “Forget about it, it was a stupid question.”
Wonwoo makes a big show of putting everything away, folding his hands underneath his chin and resting his head on it. “Now this I gotta hear.”
“It’s about Mingyu,” Seokmin starts, and then is immediately thrown into despair. It sounds stupid already.
What is Seokmin supposed to say? That Mingyu is being way too nice and understanding for someone that was cut out of his life? That Mingyu wants to keep being around Seokmin, despite how terribly he’s treated him? Nothing that Seokmin cycles through sounds any better, and regret rises to the surface. He wishes he’d kept his mouth shut.
“Smoke break?” Wonwoo asks simply, cutting clean through Seokmin’s internal debate.
“I don’t smoke,” Seokmin blinks slowly, confused. He thought it was common knowledge in the office, but maybe Wonwoo is more oblivious than he looks.
Wonwoo is already chuckling, shaking his head slightly. “I know,” he says, scooting out of his chair and gesturing down the hall. “But it gives us some privacy to talk, if you want?”
“Right,” Seokmin laughs, understanding what Wonwoo’s trying to say now. He takes the excuse.
They huddle into a corner, away from the door, so that no one can come in and accuse them of shirking their work. Not that they would anyway, given Seokmin’s recent circumstance (he had peered over at Wonwoo’s inbox one day and that was the phrase HR had used to describe it; obviously someone had to find it funny, so Seokmin did). Old habits die hard.
“You were saying something about Mingyu,” Wonwoo prompts gently, nudging Seokmin with a shoulder.
“Right,” Seokmin repeats. Then finds himself so embarrassed for what words he can’t say, so he tucks his face into his knees to muffle a frustrated scream, much to Wonwoo’s alarm. Seokmin doesn’t blame him. There probably isn’t a section for this in the employee handbook, either.
Wonwoo makes a comforting sound, but doesn’t say much else, content with the silence.
Maybe that’s what unlocks the floodgates, what prompts Seokmin to spill it all – Mingyu in the past, Mingyu in the present, the horrid messy thing between the both of them. Nights spent in silence because Seokmin doesn’t know how to say the right thing. If there’s even a right thing to say, if there’s a way to ask for help without the weight of it burning his hands.
Seokmin doesn’t look up once from the floor during the entire tirade, too terrified of what he’ll see in Wonwoo’s eyes. Courage can only take him so far.
He’s breathing heavily, flushed with exertion with the weight of his confession. His palms are sweaty, the way they get at the mere thought of any sort of confrontation, even if it’s sideways and not quite head on.
“Seokmin,” Wonwoo utters it so quietly that Seokmin wouldn’t have known it was him if it wasn’t for the fact that they’re only two people in this room. “You’re not really mad at Mingyu.”
Seokmin inhales sharply, instincts primed to defend himself.
Wonwoo’s features are drawn taut, like he’s not too sure if he’s allowed to say it, but he pushes forward bravely. “You’re angry at yourself. If Mingyu hadn’t shown up at all, you wouldn’t have had to talk about it all. You would have continued pretending like everything was fine, even if it killed you.”
All of the fight deflates from Seokmin’s body. He can’t tell if he’s grateful or resentful. Maybe he’s allowed to be a mix of both. It’s hard to put a name the things that you run from, the things that keep you up at night. It’s even harder to sit someone down and point it out to them. The world is full of sharp thorns and Seokmin is tired of pricking himself on them.
“Aren’t I terrible,” Seokmin says quietly. “I can’t even tell the one person I love above everything else how I’m doing.”
Wonwoo nudges him with a shoulder. “No,” Wonwoo murmurs gently. “That’s called being human.”
“Can’t I blame Kim Mingyu though?” Seokmin asks a little pathetically, head lifting up from where he’s leaning it against the top of his knees. “Just a little bit?”
Wonwoo makes a hmm sound, seeming to genuinely consider the proposition. Seokmin’s lips quirk up, just a little at that. “No,” Wonwoo concludes a moment later, “it wouldn’t be the right thing to do.”
“Life is so hard,” Seokmin whines, leaning his head on Wonwoo’s shoulder. Wonwoo’s hand comes up to adjust Seokmin’s head automatically, so it’s on the softer part, so Seokmin doesn’t inadvertently hurt himself on Wonwoo’s bonier parts.
“Yeah, I know,” Wonwoo intones softly. “But I believe in you. You can do it, Seokmin-ah. Out of us all, you can do it.”
Seokmin doesn’t know what to say to that, so he doesn’t. He finds Wonwoo’s hand and brushes his fingers across Wonwoo’s quietly. Asking permission. Wonwoo complies wordlessly, curling his hand over Seokmin’s.
They’re quiet for a little more, then —
“Sorry,” Seokmin blurts out automatically. Wonwoo shakes his head, a small smile on his face.
“Seokmin-ah,” Wonwoo says so kindly that Seokmin wants to cry. “You don’t have anything to apologize for.”
Seokmin knows that. He does.
But still, he’s sorry.
*
Seokmin is in his little “Kiss the Cook!” apron because it’s his turn to do the cooking, humming the words to songs they listened to and loved years and years ago, when they were younger and in a completely different country. Minghao is laying down on the couch, shielded from view. The only telltale sign that he’s there at all are the two bony legs extended outwards, and the occasional swing of his hands as he swoops them in time to Seokmin’s singing.
“Seokmin-ah? I love you.” Minghao says out of the blue one, completely unprompted.
Seokmin nearly drops the hot plate, startled at the sudden declaration. “What was that about?” he scolds Minghao.
Minghao props himself up on his shoulders and peers over the couch, smiling gently back at Seokmin. There is nothing hidden in the shadows of his face, and all the love reflects back onto Seokmin whole. Unshattered.
“I wanted you to know, that’s all. I love you. Okay?”
“Okay,” Seokmin says, utterly disarmed.
Minghao beams at him back, and all Seokmin can think is, oh . His heart sings the rest.
*
Seokmin hears Mingyu before he sees him, bike chain rattling angrily amidst the bustle of pedestrians on the sidewalk. He tries to desperately slot his key into the apartment complex before he needs to acknowledge Mingyu’s presence. As always, the higher beings decide to be absolute menaces and thwart his plans for a quick getaway.
“Hey!” Mingyu grins, unbuckling his helmet and sweeping a hand through his hair. It doesn’t even look flattened, just windswept and perfect. “Fancy seeing you here, neighbor.”
Mingyu dismounts perfectly, gracefully, long legs easily swinging over the seat, much to Seokmin’s chagrin. The last time Seokmin had tried to ride a bike, his pant leg had gotten caught in one of the gears and ripped, leaving an unfortunate hole in the seat area. Minghao laughed the entire time, but the rest of the time Seokmin was anxious, worried that he’d accidentally flash one of those judgy halmeonis that liked to speed walk up and down the Han.
Just perfect.
“You don’t live near me at all.” Seokmin grumbles, but he turns towards Mingyu anyways, just barely remembering to mirror his smile.
“Close enough,” Mingyu shrugs, gesturing to his bike. Seokmin snorts because no, it’s really not, but Mingyu has always been the type to leap over mountains at the merest hint of a treat.
“Why are you here,” Seokmin asks without turning it into a question. He keeps his tone light and pleasant enough that Mingyu can choose to ignore the barbs, if he wanted to.
Mingyu – ever the bigger person – does, shrugging it off and shoves his hands into his pockets. “Can’t I just see my friend?”
Seokmin gives him the most evil glare he can muster, which isn’t saying much. Mingyu cowers anyway, because he’s very perceptive to the airwaves. Seokmin takes some satisfaction in that, even if he feels a little terrible about it afterwards.
“What do you want?” Seokmin tries again, but the tiredness seeps through. Work had been rough again today, and honestly all Seokmin wants to do is go home, as soon as possible. He hadn’t planned to see Mingyu in the street. He hadn’t planned to see anyone at all.
Mingyu swings his rucksack around. “I made you some food. I wasn’t sure which banchan you liked,” Here, Mingyu makes an embarrassed sound, hunching his shoulders to compress himself down even further, like it was an extremely shameful thing to not know an estranged friend’s tastes. They haven’t seen each other in years.
Mingyu’s stumbling stilting speech: “… and I couldn’t remember, so I just made all of it. The kimchi’s really good, and so’s the pickled radish.” Mingyu positively beams, practically begging for some sort of acknowledgment. Seokmin gets the feeling that if he patted Mingyu on the head and called him good boy, Mingyu’s metaphorical tail would be wagging at supersonic speeds.
Mingyu continues to talk but nothing is really registering. Just the packed Tupperwares of food as Mingyu waves them around. There is a dull, faint roaring in Seokmin’s ears.
“Can’t you just take it,” Mingyu says frustratedly, shoving the package into Seokmin’s hands. Seokmin feels a thousand times smaller. Infinitely worse than just moments before.
“No,” Seokmin whispers, tears building in the corner of his eyes. “I can’t.”
Mingyu stills and looks up into Seokmin’s face, sensing more than anything, the hurt that pulses through Seokmin in waves. They’re not talking about the meal anymore.
Mingyu’s eyes are asking, Has it ever been about the meal?
The shame is so palpable it burns through Seokmin. It starts in his throat and flies down to his toes and paints his cheeks hot.
Some things take time. Some things he has to do for himself. Like this. Like everything else in his life right now. He just needs to find the right words to say it.
“Oh,” Mingyu says softly, understanding dawning across his face. And somehow that’s even worse.
*
kim mingyu-ssi
hey
you and minghao should come over
jeonghan heard that you’re a good cook and he wants us to “fight to the death”
not actually, just a culinary cook-off
i told him he’s been watching too much american tv
Then, much later, as if curbing his enthusiasm, remembering where he is, who he’s having a conversation with: you can say no if you’re not up for it yet. jeonghan always manages to find the knives even if i’ve hidden them from him and i’m not sure if you want that in the kitchen with you.
Seokmin opens his phone. His thumbs hovers over the keyboard. When he closes his eyes he can see Mingyu’s face, open and unassuming, hand outstretched.
Can’t you just take it?
okay , he types. yeah . let’s do it.
He even sends one of his precious animated puppy stickers for good measure.
Mingyu’s reply is immediate.
thank you, seokmin-ah :)
*
As it turns out, Seokmin doesn’t have to start the conversation at all. It's never just been his alone to have, he realizes. There is someone else here with him too, someone who loves him enough to sit right next to him and hold his hand and brave the weather together. Just like when he'd been so flustered trying to propose, fumbling with the thin band in his pocket - Minghao beats him to it.
They’re getting ready to go to bed when Minghao sits tentatively at the edge of it, instead of crawling right under the covers like he usually does. Seokmin is immediately alert.
“Have things…” Minghao swallows, fisting his hands in the sheets, as if the thought itself hurts. He takes a shuddering breath and steels himself, forcing himself to move onwards. “Have things been bad for a while?”
Seokmin looks up, tears welling before he can even react. There are still no words, but he tells himself to nod.
He does.
They’re both crying by the time Minghao meets him in the middle.
“Shh,” Minghao hums, rubbing circles into Seokmin’s back. “I’ve got you now. Go to sleep, Seokmin-ah. We’ll face this in the morning.”
Seokmin burrows his face deeper into Minghao’s chest, pausing in his sniffling to eke out one sorrowful, pitiful, “Together?”
“Mm,” Minghao affirms. The laugh he answers with is weak, but it grows steadier, stronger. An answering promise. His arms tighten around Seokmin. “Together.”
Thank you , Seokmin thinks. Thank you .
“I’m sorry it took so long,” he says instead. He’s sure that he looks awful, eyes red and runny, snot dripping down his nose and into the bed sheets – Minghao is definitely going to make him do laundry later – but Minghao doesn’t do anything but hush him gently, cradling his face in his hands.
Minghao looks down at him with so much love that Seokmin knows, without either of them saying anything, that Minghao gets it. He does.
Seokmin closes his eyes and falls asleep next to the love of his life. The rest of the days go on like that, too.
*
Seokmin looks up when Minghao enters the apartment. His husband’s eyes are wide, the shock evident on his face. Seokmin is not sure what Minghao sees, but here’s what he knows: Kim Mingyu, a behemoth in their tiny kitchen, is wearing a pink frilly apron and peeling the potatoes. A Yoon Jeonghan stands not too far off, looking pleased at having managed to shirk all responsibilities entirely.
Minghao’s voice comes low, surprised. “I thought we didn’t like Mingyu.”
Seokmin shrugs, gesturing at Mingyu with his knife. Blade first, obviously, so he doesn’t get the wrong idea. “He’s growing on me.”
Mingyu visibly perks up at this, so Seokmin adds, “Like a fungus.” Seokmin’s grin may or may not be a result of the way Mingyu viscerally droops, the puppy tail stopping its wag.
“Fungi are incredibly resourceful,” says Jeonghan cheerfully, warmly. “They’re cool, Mingyu-yah. It’s a compliment.”
Mingyu positively preens under Jeonghan’s praise. Seokmin laughs. Allows himself to be fond. He, more than anyone else, knows what it looks like to bloom under someone else’s care.
He reaches for Minghao’s hand, and Minghao lets himself be held, swaying gently to an invisible song. Locks eyes with Wonwoo, situated on the couch across the room, and smiles.
Yeah, he thinks to himself. He’s working on it.
*
It's gonna be okay, like the hands on the clock
They'll go in circles back to their places
Remember, we are together always
I won't let go of your hand
— Circles (SEVENTEEN)