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1. If you want to be a dog, first you must learn to wait. You must wait all day until somebody returns, and if somebody returns late, you must learn to wait until then.
The primary issue with Hyunjin’s fascination with him was that Seungmin couldn’t wrap his mind around why someone like Hyunjin would even want him in the first place. He didn’t know why anyone would want him, really, but especially Hyunjin.
Hyunjin already had someone.
And Changbin was a better man than Seungmin could ever hope to be.
Seungmin was still unsure about the whole matter, even after Hyunjin had bounded over to him after a rehearsal that ran a little too long. Changbin had trailed behind Hyunjin, slightly slower, but he had backed Hyunjin’s crazy proposition.
“Right. Okay. So,” Hyunjin had started, looking at Seungmin. “We want to ask if you would want to mess around with us. With me. With us. Sometimes.”
He gestured between himself and Changbin and let out a nervous giggle.
“Together.”
It was Hyunjin’s idea, because of course it was, but Changbin wasn’t arguing against it either.
Seungmin had always had a small suspicion that Hyunjin was obsessed with him. Whenever their schedules overlapped, Hyunjin gravitated like a moth with perfect aim into Seungmin’s orbit. When they were younger, it was funny, that reverence that Hyunjin treated Seungmin with.
Seungmin used to find it amusing to watch Hyunjin out of the corner of his eyes at dance practice and wonder how he managed not to trip over his feet when he was so distracted looking at Seungmin.
As they grew older and became more established as idols, as a group, as people, the intensity with which Hyunjin looked at Seungmin didn’t fade. Seungmin didn’t know what to do about it.
He didn’t know what to do about Changbin either.
Changbin was less fervent with his attention towards Seungmin than Hyunjin was, sure, but that didn’t mean that attention didn’t exist.
It just existed as a proxy to Hyunjin’s. And Seungmin was acutely aware of that fact.
Anytime Seungmin felt Hyunjin’s watchful eyes, he’d glance back, and the two would always be together. Hyunjin, his eyes flickering between Changbin and Seungmin, and Changbin, with his gaze fixed firmly on Hyunjin.
Really, to Seungmin, Changbin’s desire to keep Hyunjin happy probably had more to do with this whole proposal than Changbin’s desire for Seungmin. If Hyunjin asked, Changbin would hand him the moon in a heartbeat, with an extra star thrown in as a gift.
That’s what Seungmin was in this situation.
Changbin and Hyunjin could live their perfect husband and wife relationship together, and Seungmin was a gift. A way for Hyunjin to finally satiate his fascination with Seungmin that had been building for eight long years and a way for Changbin to spoil Hyunjin, like he always did.
Of course, he was the gift.
At least, he was temporarily.
Of course, when Hyunjin’s obsession ran its course, he’d move onto something else, and Seungmin would no longer be allowed to sneak his way in between the two. Hyunjin liked the chase and, once Seungmin was caught, Hyunjin would grow bored, losing the fun of pining after someone for so long.
2. Then you must learn to speak in one of the voices available to you, high and light or mellow thick and low or middle-range and terse. Whichever voice you learn to speak, you will meet somebody who does not like you because of it, they will be wary or annoyed or you will remind them of something or someone else.
It hadn’t always been like this, though, this thing between Seungmin and Hyunjin.
Back then, it had been simple. Or, at least, it had been simple enough that Seungmin could pretend it was.
They were trainees and then rookies and then global superstars together. Hyunjin had attached himself to Seungmin early, like some sort of (relatively) tall, overexcited barnacle, and Seungmin hadn’t questioned it much. Hyunjin liked pretty things, and Seungmin sang pretty.
It made sense.
Hyunjin’s clinging affection slotted nicely into Seungmin’s mind, carefully sorted into the category of Hyunjin is just like this with everyone. It was easy to believe that, as long as he ignored the fact that Hyunjin always seemed to end up in his bed when he wandered around at night, and that Hyunjin’s eyes in the practice room mirror always found him first.
It wasn’t until much later that Seungmin realized that Hyunjin wasn’t actually like that with everyone.
They had been in one of the vocal rooms, working through a guide Jisung had given them under Chan’s supervision. Their illustrious leader had stepped out for a moment to put out yet another fire, but they had stayed behind to keep working. Hyunjin messed up his harmony again and giggled, helplessly thunking his forehead against Seungmin’s shoulder.
“Fuck,” Hyunjin said, slightly muffled by Seungmin’s shirt. His breath was warm through the cotton. “Sorry.”
Seungmin turned his head, ready to tease him for being stupid, but stopped short when he realized how close Hyunjin was to his face.
Hyunjin was looking up at him, through his thick eyelashes, and Seungmin suddenly found his throat very dry, any sharp remarks vanishing from his mouth.
“I really like you, you know,” Hyunjin had said then, like it was the most obvious thing in the world and not the scariest sentence Sengmin had ever heard. “Like, a lot.”
Hyunjin’s statement landed in Seungmin’s chest hot and heavy.
For a moment, he couldn’t breathe. He felt like a spotlight had been turned on him, exposing every ugly corner of himself he’d spent years carefully tucking away. All the ways he knew he wasn’t enough, too sharp-tongued, too stubborn, too ordinary, lit up neon under Hyunjin’s piercing stare.
It terrified him.
People like Hyunjin didn’t end up with people like Seungmin. Not for long. Seungmin had seen enough of the world already to know that some things were simply out of his league, like long family vacations and full nights of restful sleep and being someone’s favorite on purpose.
He couldn’t bear the thought of letting Hyunjin try and then watching it crumble when Hyunjin realized what he’d really signed up for.
So Seungmin did what he did best and pulled away.
He didn’t stop talking to Hyunjin, of course. He wasn’t cruel. He just shifted the balance a little.
He stopped going out for late-night walks and meals with Hyunjin, pawning the dancer off on another group member who would be able to connect to him a little more. He stopped watching dramas with him, feigning indifference when Hyunjin brought up another new show he had started.
Still, Hyunjin noticed and fought against it, but Hyunjin’s persistence was no match for Seungmin’s self-loathing.
Eventually, Hyunjin stopped too, shifted his attention to someone more deserving.
He started seeing Hyunjin and Changbin together everywhere. Changbin’s hand resting on the back of Hyunjin’s neck while they waited to go on stage. Hyunjin leaning into Changbin’s side on the couch, half in his lap, giggling at something on his phone. They started calling each other “husband” and “wife,” and Seungmin laughed along with everyone else.
He didn’t let himself be bitter. He didn’t have the right.
This distance was something he’d built with his own hands, brick by brick, but even still, it hurt.
So, years later, when Hyunjin came to Seungmin, hand-in-hand with Changbin and with a wild look in his eyes, how could Seungmin say no?
3. Once you have learned to speak you must learn not to speak unless you absolutely must, or to speak as much as you feel you must regardless of how many times you are told to stop, or hit, or placed behind a door—this will depend on what kind of a dog you want to be. And indeed there are many kinds. It may not feel as though you get to choose, and that too is a kind of dog.
They end up in Changbin and Hyunjin’s dorm, because Seungmin doesn’t know how to explain to Felix what is happening, because none of them want to hash out this messymessymessy situation in front of the rest of their group.
Seungmin is a secret best enjoyed in private, it seems.
They make their way into Changbin’s room. It smells faintly like gym disinfectant and pencil shavings, so distinctly HyunjinandChangbin, and Seungmin doesn’t want to think about the fact that this is very clearly a room occupied and loved by two people in a relationship he is crashing into blind and confused.
Seungmin took the desk chair. Hyunjin and Changbin sat on the bed, close enough to be one body with two heartbeats.
The discussion that followed feels absurdly formal.
Seungmin listened, silent and polite, while Changbin and Hyunjin talked.
Hyunjin was all description and want when he outlined why he wanted this. It all spilled out when Hyunjin was finally able to talk: fascination, the way Seungmin rolled up his hoodie sleeves when recording, the shape of his mouth when he hit a high note, his legs, his shoulders, his smile, his laugh.
Seungmin had never felt so stripped clean and seen.
He’s not sure if he liked it.
Where Hyunjin waxed poetic, Changbin was all rules: no changes to Hyunjin and Changbin’s relationship. No secrets when one of them isn’t there. No photos, no phones, no mess after late-night schedules that would leave anyone too tired to make good choices.
If they got sloppy, it ended.
The word “ended” echoed through Seungmin’s mind. A proverbial Sword of Damocles swinging over his head, waiting for when Hyunjin and, by extension, Changbin decided they were done with him.
Still, Seungmin nodded.
He knew his place; at least, he thought he did.
He didn’t realize how exposed he felt until Hyunjin’s hand rose to cup his jaw, and he flinched back slightly.
Hyunjin’s hand paused, and Seungmin rushed to reassure him, not wanting to fuck this all up before it even started.
“You can,” Seungmin whispered, half afraid that Hyunjin would snap out of it and tell him to leave, that Changbin would wrench Seungmin out of the chair and throw him out for ruining everything.
They don’t.
Everything after that happened simultaneously too fast and not fast enough.
Hyunjin tasted like the sports drink they can buy from the vending machines outside their practice room, and Seungmin briefly forgot what to do with his hands until Hyunjin laughed into his mouth, delighted, and guided Seungmin’s fingers to the back of his neck.
Seungmin collapsed into Hyunjin, like a star being sucked into a black hole.
He’s so unused to being the object of someone’s single-minded devotion that the floor felt like water, and Hyunjin’s hands were the only thing tethering him to solid land.
Changbin was still there. Watching.
When Hyunjin had his fill of Seungmin for the evening, Changbin walked him to the door.
Before Seungmin could leave, because of course he had to leave, that was an unwritten rule, Changbin stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Be better for him this time, Seungmin.”
Seungmin cast his eyes to the ground, ashamed, and nodded.
“I will, hyung,” Seungmin responded, and meant it.
He was given a second chance and, even if it was temporary, it was something, and Seungmin was too scared to let it slip through his fingers again. He knew how precious Hyunjin was, and he was just grateful Changbin was allowing him this much.
Then Changbin was smiling and ruffling Seungmin’s hair and telling him to get home safe, and Seungmin was walking home.
Alone.
4. Next you must learn to relinquish all control over everything you might wish to control. You must learn to prefer to be led about by the neck on a piece of string, or staked to a neglected lawn by a length of chain. You must learn, once you have sampled the freedom of a life without a chain, that it is better to return and be chained again.
Nothing much actually changed, despite everything changing.
Hyunjin’s eyes still skimmed across the dance room mirror to find Seungmin’s, before sliding away when he caught Seungmin looking back.
Seungmin was still unsure if he was allowed to look back.
Hyunjin and Changbin still hung all over each other at dance practice and at schedules and still called each other husband and wife on Bubble, to the delight of their fans. Seungmin knew not to interfere with their relationship.
Seungmin may be oblivious sometimes, but he knew not to involve himself unless Changbin deemed it okay first. Another unwritten rule.
He started going over to their dorm a few times a week, whenever they asked. He sat on the couch or the chair or the floor, wherever felt least like he was staking a claim, and let Hyunjin close the distance between them.
He never initiated.
Despite Seungmin’s hesitations, whatever the three of them had going on developed rather quickly.
Seungmin started spending more time at Hyunjin and Changbin’s dorm.
At first, they would just sit around and talk about anything but that thing that was going on between them. Seungmin sat with his hands tucked under his thighs so they don’t reach for what they’re not sure they’re allowed to want.
That phase never lasts. Without fail, Hyunjin would give in to his fascinations.
Hyunjin’s fingers would slip under the hem of Seungmin’s hoodie, curious and reverent, mapping the warmth of Seungmin’s skin. Seungmin’s breath caught, and Hyunjin swallowed the sound with a grin. He said Seungmin’s name into the line of his throat, into the hinge of his jaw, like a prayer.
Every time, heat rose to Seungmin’s ears like he was a teenager all over again. Hyunjin cooed about it shamelessly, mumbling “pretty” into Seungmin’s mouth, until Changbin coughed loudly from the kitchen and entered the room to set a glass of water on the coffee table with a thunk that made both of them behave for exactly thirty seconds.
Changbin doesn’t always hover, but he was always undeniably there.
After, they sprawled in a tangle of knees and blankets, talking senselessly until the room cooled back down. Changbin ordered late-night food, and Seungmin pretended not to like it when Hyunjin tucked his freezing feet under Seungmin’s thigh.
Those were the parts that undid him more than any of the physical things. The ordinary sweetness, the domesticity of it all, and the way his name sounded in casual conversation.
Still, every night ended in that same quiet, necessary exile.
Seungmin hated how gentle Changbin tried to make it, always the one to call time, reminding them of early schedules and the importance of a good night’s sleep. Changbin was nice about it, but, deep down, Seungmin knew he was happy to have Hyunjin to himself again.
Seungmin couldn’t even blame him.
He never protested when he left.
Changbin always walked Seungmin to the door in an eerie mimic of that first night, but there hadn’t been any more warnings. Instead, Changbin had started hugging Seungmin goodbye. Seungmin ignored the burst of warmth that happened in his chest each time his hyungs arms wrapped around him and squeezed.
Still, Seungmin felt like he was walking on eggshells, waiting for the day that Changbin would ban him from their dorm.
One night, he had just hit the button to call the elevator to head home, praying desperately that Felix was already asleep, because his roommate had started to ask one too many questions, when the door to Changbin and Hyunjin’s dorm slammed open again.
Hyunjin rushed out and grabbed Seungmin’s arm, yanking him back towards the dorm. Seungmin panicked, running through the events of the evening in his mind, trying to figure out if they were mad at him for something.
He was panting when Hyunjin finally let go of him.
“Did I do something?” Seungmin asked.
“What?” Hyunjin replied, baffled, turning to stare at Seungmin with big bug eyes. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” Seungmin started, slowly, “You come racing out of your dorm and wrestle me back in here. What am I supposed to think?”
At that, Changbin huffed a laugh.
“Seungminnie, it’s snowing.”
Seungmin looked out the kitchen window and realized Changbin was right.
“Oh,” he replied, stupidly. “It is.”
“Yeah, Minnie,” Hyunjin said. “You can’t walk home in that. You don’t even have your thick jacket.”
Seungmin looked down at himself. Hyunjin was right. He had taken a car over to their dorm after a recording session and hadn’t thought to bring anything warmer than a sweatshirt.
He shrugged.
“I’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll run. It’s not that far.”
“You’ll freeze,” Changbin said, and then he surprised Seungmin. “Just stay here.”
Seungmin blinked back at both of them in shock. Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, he agreed.
“I can take the couch,” Seungmin blurted out.
“You’ll be so cold and lonely out here,” Hyunjin whined, grabbing his arm and pulling him towards Changbin’s room.
Seungmin kept protesting the entire way until a very tired Changbin swept both of them up and his arms and deposited them on his bed.
Seungmin tried valiantly to crush the butterflies that kicked up in his stomach at the casual display of strength. He failed.
So that was the end of that.
The bed was a tight fit for three fully grown men, despite how often STAY liked to make fun of them for being so short, but it was comfortable once Seungmin convinced himself he was allowed to have this and forced himself to relax.
Seungmin woke up the next morning tucked under Changbin’s arm with his legs tangled in Hyunjin’s. He detangled himself quietly and was in the process of slipping out of the bed when Changbin reached up and pulled him into his chest again, his eyes never opening.
Seungmin closed his eyes and buried himself in his hyung’s warmth.
It was easier to pretend you were loved when you weren’t faced with the evidence of how out of place you looked.
The next time Seungmin visited their dorm, he wore his thickest jacket, but Changbin still extended the offer to stay the night.
So it kept happening. Not always, but enough. If there’s another storm, if it was too late for Seungmin to walk home alone, if Seungmin’s shoulders clenched up near his ears, tensed with stress, he got the offer to stay. The offer always came from Changbin, despite Seungmin knowing that his hyung didn’t actually want him there.
This, Seungmin reminded himself, was the problem with Hyunjin and Changbin.
Fundamentally, they’re both kind.
The problem with kindness was that it bred hunger.
Seungmin wanted more.
He’s not allowed to want that.
5. Or you may learn that it is not—a fugitive is also a kind of dog. Of course you must learn to love, to love always and love entirely and to be wounded by nothing so much as the violence of your own love.
Seungmin started aching.
That, in itself, wasn’t a new feeling. He had always ached when looking at Hyunjin and Changbin together. The problem now was that he ached to be a part of it too, in a real way, not whatever bastardized way he was now.
That aching crept up on him in small, ordinary moments, like this one.
Hyunjin was sprawled across the couch with his head in Seungmin’s lap, whining about a schedule he didn’t want to attend alone, while Changbin sat on the floor between Seungmin’s knees, leaning back against the sofa as he sorted through a mess of lyric drafts. At some point, Changbin had reached back, fingers curling around Seungmin’s ankle, thumb rubbing absent circles against the bone like it was the most natural thing in the world.
Seungmin had frozen, his hand hovering halfway through carding through Hyunjin’s hair, to stare at Changbin’s hand on his body.
A picture came into his mind so vividly that it almost stole his breath away. The three of them in this exact position, but older. Tired from some future tour, domestic and soft, and still like this.
Seungmin wanted it so badly that it stole his breath away.
Oh, he thought, faintly horrified. Oh no.
Liking Hyunjin, he’d already half-accepted somewhere in a deep, hidden corner of his mind. That ship had been sinking for years and years by this point. He’s grown to live around the gaping hole he’d carved into his own heart. But this? This yawning, slow-growing affection for Changbin, too, had snuck into his soul under his nose.
Seungmin wanted them both.
He tried to be normal about it, he really did. Hyunjin already kissed him and touched him, and Changbin already held him during cold nights like he wasn’t the scum of the Earth. He could be happy with that. They’d grow tired of him, and he could learn to live with two holes in his chest instead of just the one.
All Seungmin needed to do was not make it weird.
All he needed to do was not let the aching want that was festering inside him leak out in ways they could see.
The breaking point came on a night that should have been perfect, really. It would have been perfect if Seungmin were capable of being normal about anything in his life.
They had had a rare early finish to their schedules for the day, blessing them with an unexpectedly free evening. Jeongin and Felix had immediately disappeared to a new gaming cafe they’d been talking about for ages, Minho and Jisung had slunk off to a chorus of wolf-whistles, and Chan had, for once in his life, headed home to sleep.
Seunmin was preparing for an evening alone at home, but Hyunjin practically flew across the practice room to grab his wrist before he could leave.
“Come over,” Hyunjin pleaded. “We can order that tteokbokki from the place you like. Changbin wants to watch that new horror movie, and I cannot be the only person scared.”
Seungmin hesitated, but Hyunjin’s hand was warm around his wrist, and he was so tired of being scared.
“Okay,” he said.
For a little while, it really was perfect. Seungmin burned his mouth eating food and laughed at the horror movie’s terrible effects. Hyunjin buried his face in Seungmin’s shoulder at all the jump scares, and Seungmin pretended like his heart was pounding because of the movie and not because he was squished between Changbin and Hyunjin on their couch.
At some point, Changbin’s phone buzzed, and he glanced at it with a scowl for disturbing their night.
“Skijigi,” he said, already getting to his feet. “I need to look over some last-minute lyrics changes. I’ll be in my room for a bit, okay? Be right back.”
He pressed a quick, familiar kiss to Hyunjin’s hair, squeezed Seungmin’s knee in passing, and then he was gone.
Hyunjin looked at Seungmin.
“So,” he said, dragging the word out. “Alone at last.”
Seungmin’s pulse jumped.
“You’re so dramatic.”
Hyunjin scooted closer until their knees touched.
“Can I kiss you?” he asked.
It was ridiculous that Hyunjin still asked. Seungmin could never tell him no to his face.
“Yes,” he said, because he was weak and he wanted.
He wanted so badly.
The kiss was slow. Hyunjin’s mouth was soft against his, hands cupping his jaw and tracing small patterns there. Seungmin’s fingers twisted into the hem of Hyunjin’s sweatshirt on instinct, pulling him closer.
For a blissful few seconds, his brain went beautifully, mercifully quiet.
Then a thought crashed through him like ice water.
Changbin wasn't here.
He jerked back so abruptly their teeth clicked.
Hyunjin blinked back at him, stunned.
“Minnie? What? Are you–”
“I’m sorry,” Seungmin blurted out, already scrambling back, putting space between them like distance could make this any less of a catastrophe than it already was. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t– We shouldn’t– Not without Changbin-hyung, I didn’t mean–”
He was stumbling over his words, and he knew he wasn’t making any sense, but he was terrified that he would lose even this, this false relationship he had managed to get himself tangled up in.
If they got sloppy, it ended.
Ended. Ended. Ended.
“Seungmin,” Hyunjin said, reaching out for him, but Seungmin flinched back further.
Seungmin scrambled to his feet.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m messing everything up. Fuck. I’m sorry.”
He could feel his throat closing, and that horrible, childish urge to cry was pressing at the back of his eyes. He couldn’t do that here. Not in their space, not on their couch, not with Hyunjin watching.
The door to Changbin’s room clicked open.
“Hey, I’m fin–” Changbin’s voice cut off abruptly as he stepped fully into the room and took in the scene.
Hyunjin, on the couch, lips kissed red, and Seungmin, halfway across the room, eyes wide and panicked.
“Seungminnie?” Changbin asked, eyebrows furrowing. “What’s going on?”
Ended.
“I’m sorry,” Seungmin said again, because apparently that was the only thing he could say.
His chest felt tight, like he couldn’t get enough air. If he closed his eyes, he could already see the disappointment settling over Changbin’s face, the realization that Seungmin didn’t know how to follow rules.
He didn’t want to open them to see that look in reality.
Ended.
Seungmin’s fight-or-flight response screamed at him to run.
He ran.
6. You must learn how to wait at the foot of the bed and hope, silently, that somebody is drunk enough or lonely enough to invite you up, and you must learn not to show your excitement too much or overplay your hand.
He ended up at Minho and Jisung’s apartment.
He couldn’t go home yet; he didn’t deserve the comfort of Felix and his soft, knowing smiles.
Minho opened the door a few minutes after Seungmin knocked, visibly sleepy and confused, but he straightened up the moment he saw Seungmin.
“You look like shit, Kim Seungmin,” he said in lieu of a proper greeting.
“Hi, hyung,” Seungmin replied, voice thin and scratchy.
He’d been crying his whole walk from Hyunjin and Changbin’s apartment.
Minho stepped to the side, jerking his chin toward the inside of the apartment.
“Come in,” he said, like this was a normal visit. “Shoes off.”
Seungmin toed his sneakers off and lined them up next to where Minho’s were neatly placed next to Jisung’s boots.
Minho didn’t ask any questions, which is why Seungmin had come here in the first place. He just padded to the couch, flicked the television on, and booted up a racing game he and Jisung must have been playing earlier, before wordlessly handing Seungmin the second controller.
They played in silence for a while, the familiar rhythm of buttons and joystick movements soothing some of the static that was playing in Seungmin’s brain. Minho cursed under his breath when he died in a particularly stupid way, and Seungmin snorted despite himself.
At Seungmin’s laugh, Minho paused the game and turned to face him.
“Okay,” his hyung started. “What happened?”
Seungmin stared at his hands, silent.
“Nothing,” he mumbled eventually.
Minho hummed, not believing Seungmin’s obvious lie.
“Cool, I totally believe that. You always show up on my doorstep looking like a kicked puppy for no reason at all.”
Seungmin winced.
“It’s just,” he paused, searching for words that didn’t make him sound completely insane. “Hyunjin and Changbin-hyung.”
“What about them?”
Seungmin told him. Not everything and not in detail, but enough for Minho to get the picture. He told him about the proposal and the rules and the way he’d started wanting things he wasn’t allowed to want.
“And I just,” Seungmin exhaled, coming to the end of his story. “I feel like I’m ruining something that was good before I got there. They’re them, you know, hyung? And I’m just this extra thing Hyunjin wanted, and Changbin only agreed to because it would make Hyunjin happy. But they’ll get tired of me eventually, and then I don’t know what I’ll do. If I stay, I ruin it, like I did tonight. If I go, I’ll ruin it too. Hyung, I don’t know what I’m supposed to do.”
Minho was quiet long enough that Seungmin looked up from where he’d been fixated on his hands.
He was staring at Seungmin with a look that could only be described as a mix between horrified and unimpressed.
“What?” Seungmin snapped, defensive heat creeping up his face.
“You’re so dramatic, Kim Seungmin.”
“Hyung–”
“Seungmin, Hyunjin has been making heart eyes at you since long before debut. At this point, even the staff know this. You know this. I know you know this because I watched you self-destruct about it and very kindly did not make fun of you while you were doing so. And Changbin has been looking at you the same way every time you walk into a room for at least a year.”
Seungmin blinked.
“No, he hasn’t.”
Minho raised a singular eyebrow.
“He shares his fried chicken with you. He doesn’t even do that with Hyunjinnie sometimes.”
Seungmin curled himself further into the couch. He can’t think about that. Not right now, after he’d already ruined everything.
Minho’s expression softened around the edges.
“Seungminne,” he said, voice quieter. “You’re not unlovable.”
Seungmin looked away, blinking hard against the sting in his eyes.
“Changbin didn’t even want me, hyung. He told me I was only allowed to be with Hyunjin when he was there. I kissed Hyunjin tonight without him in the room. I broke the rules.”
Minho sighed.
“Did Hyunjin ask first?”
“Hyung, it doesn’t matt–”
“Did he?”
Seungmin nodded, miserable.
“Listen, Seungminnie,” Minho said. “I think you’re all being idiots about this. From what you’ve told me, Hyunjin asked, and Changbin wasn’t mad. You don’t get to decide for them how much they care about you. That’s not your job. Your job is to be honest about what you want and what you can handle, and then you all decide together.”
“I don’t know how to do that,” Seungmin admitted.
“Talk to them, puppy.”
Minho reached over and ruffled his hair.
“But first,” he said, “you need to go home and sleep.”
Seungmin nodded, before dragging himself off the couch and back to his and Felix’s apartment.
7. If you want to be a dog, you must learn to believe that you are not in fact a dog at all.
Someone knocked on his apartment door early the next morning.
Felix hadn’t been home when Seungmin finally stumbled into their apartment late last night, so he assumed the knocking was his roommate returning home. Felix never remembered his keys, no matter how many times Seungmin reminded him each morning.
Seungmin walked up to open it blearily, rubbing his eyes.
When he saw who was waiting for him, he was suddenly very awake.
Changbin stood there.
He looked tired. His hair was messier than usual, like he’d been running his hands through it, and there was a line between his eyebrows. But his eyes softened the second he saw Seungmin, relief flickering across his face so fast Seungmin nearly missed it.
“Oh,” Seungmin said, stupidly. “Hi.”
“Hi,” Changbin replied. He shifted his weight, glancing past Seungmin into the apartment. “Can we talk?”
Seungmin’s stomach dropped. Changbin was mad at him, Minho was wrong, and he was here to end it.
“Right. Okay. I’m sorry. Just do it quickly, please.”
Changbin’s face did something complicated.
“What?” Changbin questioned. “No, I meant go back to our apartment to talk. Hyunjin is losing his mind. He’s convinced he did something wrong and that you hate him now.”
“I don’t hate him,” he said quietly. “Or you.”
“I know,” Changbin said. “That’s kind of the point of why I’m here. Will you come over?”
Seungmin hesitated, fingers tightening on the edge of the door.
“Please?”
Seungmin looked at Changbin. He saw the way he was standing there in the hallway, patient and hopeful and not at all like someone who was about to cut him out of his life.
“Okay,” Seungmin said. “I’ll come.”
Changbin’s shoulders loosened, just a little.
“Good,” he said, voice soft. “Don't forget your jacket. It’s cold.”
The walk to their dorm felt longer than usual, but when they arrived, Seungmin still wasn’t prepared.
Hyunjin was waiting in the entryway like he’d been pacing there for hours. His hair was messy and clipped back with too many pins, and his eyes were rimmed with red like he’d been crying for a while, or at least very close to it.
“Seungmin,” Hyunjin breathed when he saw him.
For a second, nobody moved.
Then Hyunjin took a step forward, halted, and visibly forced himself to stop.
“Can I hug you?” he asked.
Seungmin had never been able to tell him no before. That didn’t change now.
“Yes.”
Hyunjin launched himself at him with all the force of an oncoming train. Seungmin stumbled but stayed upright, arms coming up to wrap around Hyunjin’s back. Hyunjin burrowed into his neck.
“I thought you were gone,” Hyunjin mumbled, voice muffled. “I thought you’d decided I was too much and you’d never talk to us again, and Changbin kept saying to wait, but I’m bad at waiting and–”
“Breathe, baby,” Changbin reminded him, resting a hand on both of their shoulder blades.
Hyunjin inhaled shakily and pulled back, but he didn’t go far, still keeping his hands on Seungmin’s arms.
“Let’s sit,” Changbin said.
They ended up on the couch, Hyunjin and Seungmin side by side, with Changbin in the armchair. For a long moment, no one talked. The clock on the wall ticked too loudly, and Hyunjin’s knee bounced against Seungmin’s, jittery.
He didn’t know why Hyunjin was the nervous one here. Seungmin was the one about to be cut out.
Right?
“Okay,” Changbin said at last. “Can one of you tell me why you sprinted out of our apartment like you were set on fire?”
Seungmin flinched.
“I broke the rules,” he blurted out.
Hyunjin and Changbin both blink.
“What?” they said at the same time.
Seungmin stared hard at his hands.
“We weren’t supposed to do anything without you there,” he said, voice wobbly. “That was the rule. Nothing if one of you isn’t there. You said that. So when we– When I kissed Hyunjin without you, I messed it up. I made it unfair. I thought you’d be mad. I didn’t want to see you mad at me.”
Hyunjin’s head whipped toward him so fast the pins in his hair rattled.
“Mad?” he echoed. “At you? For kissing me? I practically tackled you, Seungminnie.”
“It’s not just that,” Seungmin protested, unwilling to let Hyunjin take the blame for something that was his fault. “That rule was there for a reason. For you guys. To protect your relationship from me. The rule was there to make sure I didn’t get between you. And then I did, as soon as you left the room.”
Hyunjin made a small wounded sound and folded in on himself like he had been punched.
“Seungmin,” he said, hoarse. “That’s not what the rule was for.”
Seungmin cocked his head to the side, confused.
“Then what was it for?”
“To stop us from being idiots,” Changbin answered. “To make sure neither of us had to sit alone, imagining you and the other together and getting too jealous. It was like training wheels, for Hyunjin and me, not for you. We wanted you so badly, Minnie. It wasn’t a sign that you weren’t a part of this relationship.”
Seungmin took that in. Rolled it around in his head a little bit.
“So you’re not mad that I broke it,” he said slowly.
“We want you, Seungmin,” Hyunjin said. “If you want us.”
“But what if it doesn’t work?” he asked. “What if I say yes and then it all falls apart and you two resent me because I ruined your relationship and–”
“Then it doesn’t work,” Changbin said bluntly. “And it’ll hurt, and we’ll all be sad, and then we’ll keep going. But we’ll know we at least tried honestly instead of being afraid.”
Seungmin is so tired of being afraid.
Hyunjin nodded in agreement.
“I would rather try and get my heart broken than never get to love you properly at all,” he said. “It’s been eight years, Seungmin. I’m so tired of pretending I don’t feel like this.”
Seungmin stared at him.
“Eight years?”
Hyunjin’s ears went pink.
“Give or take,” he mumbled.
“And hyung,” Seungmin said, turning to Changbin. “You’re okay with all of this? Really? You’re not just doing it because Hyunjin wanted it? You actually want me?”
“I like you,” Changbin said. “A lot. I like the way you argue when you think you’re right, even if it’s over something stupid. I like how seriously you take your work. I like waking up and seeing you drooling on the pillow between us.”
“I do not drool,” Seungmin protested weakly.
“You do,” Changbin teased. “And I like that about you, too. If this were just about indulging Hyunjin’s crush, I would have shut it down. I’m not interested in watching the person I love fall apart over someone else who I love who doesn’t want to be there. But you do want to be here, don’t you?”
Seungmin nodded.
Changbin got up from the armchair then and crossed the small space between them. He hesitated only a moment before reaching out, large hands warm when they framed Seungmin’s face. Hyunjin reached over and took one of Seungmin’s hands, squeezing it tightly and grounding him.
“Can I?” Changbin asked.
It was ridiculous that they both kept asking.
He would never tell either of them no.
Never again.