Chapter Text
BEOMGYU
Beomgyu hasn’t been to his childhood home in months.
You need a clean break, is what Taehyun told him. Beomgyu still hasn’t found his own therapist—thinking about it, even just contacting one of the counselors at his college, fills him with a jittery, anxious feeling—but it turns out that Taehyun has spent plenty of time rambling about Beomgyu to his own. You need to heal, and it’ll be hard to do anything other than survive while you’re there.
So Beomgyu had run, and he’d intended on never looking back. Only his heart is soft, and he’d known that something would call him back eventually. He can try to banish the ghosts of his past, bury them, but every so often they crawl out of their graves and sit with him for a while.
Maybe it’s not a bad thing to remember. But he’d like to do so as little as possible. He’d left for a reason, hadn’t he?
Please come back. Just for an hour. It’s not a trick, Beomseok had written. He’s asked Beomgyu to return a handful of times, just to talk. Even though he’d taken the news of Beomgyu’s departure well, Beomgyu hasn’t been able to trust that there won’t be trouble waiting for him in his old home.
It isn’t personal. Beomgyu used to spend every day on edge, and he hasn’t completely grown out of that.
Your college has been sending your documents here. I wish I knew why—they must have been delayed. I would send them to you, but I know you’d rather I not.
I’ve kept everything safe for you. It’s here for you whenever you’re around, but I don’t know whether it’s important or not, so you should probably come soon.
Beomgyu hadn’t given his brother his new address, petrified that some kind of paper trail would lead his father to him. Two weeks or so after Beomgyu had left, he’d run into Beomseok at a café. and had offered to tell him his new address—as long as he didn’t write it down.
“I would never tell,” Beomseok had said. “But it’s okay. I understand. Let’s just meet each other when we can.”
When we can turned into never, but they text on occasion. Less than before, since they don’t have many reasons to communicate.
The first thing Beomgyu had done after he’d received Beomseok’s texts was dig through his email to try and hunt down any potential missing documents. And then he’d called to check that college does have his new address, to ensure that it won’t happen again.
Beomgyu had considered asking Beomseok to just open the mail and check its contents for him, and then he’d written out a message asking Beomseok to meet him at the café again. But before he could do either, something had come over him, and he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the alternative. He’d let the messages sit for a day before finally coming to a conclusion. That was how he’d ended up here—
“Just ask him to come outside, baby,” Yeonjun says. He leans over from the driver’s seat, reaching for Beomgyu’s hands. “Based on everything you’ve told me, I don’t think he’d have a problem with that.”
“No, I… I think I have to do this,” Beomgyu says. He can’t explain why, but there’s a tug in his gut that just won’t go away. He has to do this. There are too many loose ends to tie.
Getting out of the car has proven to be a challenge, though. They’ve been sitting outside for five minutes. It’s not very fun—Yeonjun’s heating system is unreliable, and it’s a chilly day.
“We’ll be right here,” Soobin says from the back seat. He looks somewhat uncomfortable. He’s been quiet ever since they left the apartment, and Beomgyu doesn’t blame him. Yeonjun has entirely carried the conversation by nervously rambling about what he wants to cook Taehyun and Kai for dinner, even though it’s Soobin’s turn to cook tonight.
I need you to be there for me, Beomgyu had wanted to say. To be strong, because I don’t know how. He hadn’t figured out how to voice it. He wishes he could soothe their pain, too, but it’s the pain he himself has carried his whole life. When he thinks about it like that, he realizes that it’s not his responsibility.
They’ve been taking care of him in other ways, though. They always do.
“I’ll only be a few minutes,” he says. Just a few minutes. That’s what he’s been telling himself this whole time. Just a few minutes, and then he never has to come back. Just a few minutes, and he’ll be back in the car, on his way home, and all of this will be nothing more than a memory. All he has to do is rip the band-aid off.
It’s not that simple, actually. He’s done lying to himself. But the sooner he steps inside, the sooner he gets to leave, and the sooner this will be over.
Neither of his boyfriends will let him leave until they’ve kissed him. It gives Beomgyu a strange sense of déjà vu—how many times had they dropped him off just like this, consoling him with physical affection? The night before the trip, they had kissed his face and hugged him and held his hands before bidding him good night.
That night had changed everything. The last night where he’d held his tongue, waiting and waiting and waiting. The last night before he’d finally felt freedom.
He thinks back to that freedom on the worst days. Sometimes it feels so far away that it almost doesn’t seem worth pursuing, but now he has a very real piece of it. He gets to come home to it every day.
Despite the brave face he’d put on as he’d stepped out of the car, Beomgyu’s heart thuds wildly in his chest as he walks down the street. He’d asked Yeonjun to park a couple streets away, paranoid that his car might be recognized. Beomgyu had felt guilty asking for it, too needy, but Yeonjun had agreed without question.
Originally, he’d planned to make the trip alone. Yeonjun and Soobin had insisted that they drop him off nearby, so they can retrieve him quickly if needed, and because he’s more likely to be recognized while walking than driving. Not that there is any reason Beomgyu should be recognized—he’d refused to step into the neighborhood until Beomseok had proven to him that their father is long gone, and that won’t be back for a few more hours.
Now that Beomgyu’s alone, he’s even more grateful that his boyfriends offered to come. He isn’t sure he would have made it this far if they hadn’t encouraged him—he probably would have quit halfway. He would’ve felt safer, more secure, if he’d asked them to come with him, but he wants to do this alone. For closure. Soobin and Yeonjun have never truly been part of this aspect of his life, and he doesn’t want to involve them now.
The sickening, fluttery feeling in his chest only worsens as he approaches his old apartment building. His consciousness feels totally separate from his body—his limbs move on autopilot as his mind screams in protest. He tries not to think too hard about what he’s doing as he takes the stairs, as quietly as possible, gingerly stepping over the squeakiest ones.
He’s been gone for months, but it’s still so easy. He still knows exactly where to step. In a short time, so much has changed, and his days of living here feel years away.
In reality, it hasn’t been long at all, and so the wounds are still fresh. He reaches the top of the stairs, and it takes every bit of willpower in him to convince himself not to run back down them. Soon, he gets to leave. Soon, he’ll be free….
Beomgyu takes a breath, counts to five, and knocks on the door.
It’s the longest fifteen seconds of his life. The lock on the door clicks, and Beomgyu feels frozen to the ground, wishing he were a statue, invisible and unbreakable. A wave of regret passes through him.
But when the door swings open, it’s Beomseok—just Beomseok.
“Hey. You came,” Beomseok says.
They don’t really look that much alike. Beomseok is taller, and has an air of maturity about him that relatives would always fawn over. He’s a carbon copy of their mother, from what Beomgyu can tell from the photographs.
It’s Beomgyu who resembles both of their parents, a proper mix of their features. When he was younger, Beomgyu felt so jealous of Beomseok for reasons he didn’t understand. When he was older, sometimes family friends and acquaintances would come into his first job, and they’d compliment Beomgyu on how much he looks like his father. Beomgyu would spend the rest of his shift with a knot in his stomach.
Beomseok isn’t much different from what Beomgyu remembers. He looks tired, rough around the edges, typical of a person who works longer hours than they should and sleeps less than they should. Beomgyu’s like that too, although these days Yeonjun cheers for him whenever he sleeps on a normal schedule or manages to gain weight.
Beomgyu just nods. He steps inside, and gently closes the door behind him. It clicks shut.
The apartment is entirely unchanged. A few things have been moved around, but only small things. Chairs pulled out from the table rather than tucked into it. A stack of unwashed dishes. The faint smell of soju from poor cleanup. Other things are neater, Beomseok’s possessions. The difference is like night and day.
The windows are open, filling the room with light. In the early afternoon, when it’s empty, it’s not a scary place. Beomgyu breathes in, out.
He glances once in the direction of his old bedroom, at the closed door, morbidly curious. He doesn’t need to know what it’s like now.
“Um. Would you be more comfortable outside?” Beomseok asks.
Outside, where Yeonjun and Soobin are waiting a block away. Beomseok had offered to go out, just like Yeonjun had said he would. Beomgyu must not be doing a good job of hiding his anxiety.
“This is fine,” he says. It’ll just be a few minutes.
Nothing can go wrong in just a few minutes. He has to keep telling himself that.
“Okay, well….” Beomseok steps to the kitchen table to retrieve a folder. It’s nondescript, worn blue, like the folders Beomgyu would carry with him in high school. He hands it to Beomgyu. “This is it. I’m the one who goes through the mail, so… everything should be there. And nobody else has touched it. Hopefully it’s not important. Some of that is months old.”
Beomgyu flips it open. There isn’t much there, the kind of mail that Beomgyu would hardly glance at if it arrived on his own doorstep. It’s still worth checking. Probably. Now I can leave.
Beomgyu clears his throat. “Thank you.”
Beomseok smiles. “It’s no problem. Thanks for coming. I haven’t seen you in….”
Weeks. They rarely used to see each other when they technically lived together—Beomseok was never home, after all. But now, Beomseok feels closer to a stranger than a brother, more than he ever has.
Beomgyu holds the folder close to his chest. He looks down at his shoes. “Um. How are you doing?”
A beat of silence. “Honestly, Beomgyu….” And Beomgyu’s heart freezes. “It’s okay. I mean, it’s not okay. But I can take it.”
“It’s not any… worse, because of what I did. Right?” Beomgyu asks. His voice is higher than usual, too thin and shaky, and he hates it.
“Not anymore,” Beomseok says, and for a moment, Beomgyu can’t breathe. It was worse, and he got hurt because of me, and I’m a terrible person for what I’ve done to him.
But he forces himself to inhale. What else could he have done?
“How’s your new place?” Beomseok asks.
Beomgyu lifts his chin. Beomseok had spoken so casually, and his expression is open, gentle. He’d asked a few questions about the apartment when Beomgyu had first moved in, but after it became obvious Beomgyu didn’t want to reveal much, he’d stopped requesting details.
“It’s good. Um. We have an ant problem. But we had one here, too. Other than that, it’s perfect,” Beomgyu says.
Perfect is an understatement. It’s a tiny apartment, enough for three people to sleep and a few items of furniture, and that’s about it. Not a lot of privacy, although Beomgyu isn’t worried about hiding. Most of his time outside of classes is spent working so that he can accumulate his share of rent each month, and it’s exhausting.
But it’s perfect because it’s his, and it’s safe. It’s closer to school, so the commute is easy, even on days when his schedule doesn’t align with Yeonjun’s and Yeonjun can’t drive him—but he’s learning how to drive, too. Some mornings he wakes up with one of his boyfriends beside him, but every morning they’re close by. After work, he can crawl into bed without a care in the world, without staying on guard.
He has less time to play his guitar, but finds ways to squeeze it in. His projects with Kai have multiplied, and they’ve started looking into ways they can perform together. Even if Beomgyu can’t make a living off of his art—not yet, at least—he refuses to let it go. He’s still working on covers, and his original work has been well-received so far. It’s a small amount of support, but he’ll take anything.
Regardless of whether his music is working out, though, he won’t be discouraged. It finally feels like a feasible dream, rather than wishful thinking.
“That’s great,” Beomseok says, and he sounds like he truly means it. “And your job?”
“Haven’t gotten fired yet,” Beomgyu says. The first few days had been scary, but his manager isn’t much older than him and treats him more like a friend than a coworker. The owners are nice, too, and the store isn’t usually very busy. Being partially responsible for so many animals makes him nervous, but the experience is good.
Beomseok smiles gently. “And how’s… Soobin?”
There’s something about the way he says Soobin’s name that makes Beomgyu pause. He tries not to think anything of it. He’s probably imagining it. There’s nothing he can do about Beomseok trying to guess what Soobin’s relationship with him is. Beomgyu can’t exactly deny it, even though he has absolutely no intention of telling Beomseok any time soon.
Even if he was sure he could trust Beomseok with that information, if he knew Beomseok would have a positive reaction, he wouldn’t want to talk about it now. Definitely not while he’s alone. Definitely not here. But right now, it’s difficult for Beomgyu to imagine telling anybody.
“He’s fine. We… we have a few classes together,” Beomgyu says. “Yeonjun’s fine, too.”
Beomseok tilts his head. “They look after you?”
“Always have,” Beomgyu says.
He leaves it at that. No need to explain the intricacies of their relationship, which would probably lead to more questions, with answers that Beomgyu wouldn’t share with anyone. If he were braver, bolder, he might explain how Yeonjun and Soobin have always looked after him in ways no person had ever done before. That the reason he’d chosen them was because they keep him safe, and that they had proven to him that he can be loved.
In the silence, Beomgyu’s heart races. Conversations with his brother have become more and more awkward lately, and today is no exception. But he has his mail now, so he doesn’t need to stay any longer. “Maybe I should just—”
“Yeah, you can go now. Sorry for keeping you,” Beomseok says, and Beomgyu cringes. He should be able to make it through small talk without panicking. “I just wanted to say—you did the right thing.”
Beomgyu pauses, halfway to turning around and reaching for the doorknob. “Huh?”
“Leaving,” Beomseok says. “I’m sorry I’ve been—when I said it felt like you were running away, I didn’t mean to imply that you shouldn’t run away.”
Beomgyu just stares at him. Beomseok continues, hurriedly, “I was worried for you. He’s always been worse to you than me, so… I wanted to help you leave quietly. I haven’t been able to leave, though. So I probably couldn’t have helped anyway.”
Beomgyu blinks a few times. “Oh.”
“I really was worried. I thought you wouldn’t… I don’t know. I’m just glad you did it on your own,” Beomseok says.
A few months ago, this would have infuriated Beomgyu. You should have done something. You just watched me suffer. Those feelings haven’t completely gone away, but it doesn’t hurt like it used to, now that he’s free. Eventually, it had become easier to admit that Beomseok hadn’t really had a part in it.
Still. “I had to do it on my own. You weren’t here,” Beomgyu says, holding the folder tighter.
Beomseok doesn’t flinch away, or deny it, or do any of the things Beomgyu had expected he would. Instead, he just shakes his head. “It was hard for me, too. That’s why I wasn’t around. But it was harder for you, and I should have been here.”
“I know,” Beomgyu says. He’d always been bitter that just one of them had been able to spend time away, that Beomseok was seemingly able to bear it while Beomgyu crumbled every time their father spoke to him. But wouldn’t he have done the same, if he were in Beomseok’s position?
He likes to think that he would have stayed. That he would have been able to take care of Beomseok, too—but months have gone by, and today is the first day he’s had the courage to confront the full consequences of his actions.
“I’m really impressed, actually,” Beomseok says. “How did you do it?”
“It wasn’t really me,” Beomgyu says. He picks at a corner of the folder. “Um. My friend found the apartment. And Yeonjun pays for more things than us. And we’re all really broke, so it’s not like….”
He won’t lie and say it’s easy, but he doesn’t want Beomseok to think they’re struggling. He cuts himself off.
“But you did it,” Beomseok marvels. “You’re brave.”
“I’m not brave. I just had to,” Beomgyu says.
“You shouldn’t have had to,” Beomseok says.
Beomgyu doesn’t like to think about his first few days back home. Actually, the first few days were spent between Yeonjun and Soobin’s houses—first Yeonjun had taken him home, because he’d felt too guilty trying to drop Beomgyu off. And then Beomgyu had met up with Beomseok before spending a night with Soobin. Then, when he’d worked up the courage, he’d left his guitar and his camera and the scrapbook—the important things—and gone home.
He’d ended up limping back to Soobin’s house. He’d spent that night in Soobin’s arms, letting Soobin tend to him, and had cried until there were no more tears left to shed. Yeonjun had begged to join them, but letting one of them see him like that was hard enough.
He’d met Yeonjun after his café shift the next day, before trying to go home again. Beomgyu had refused to tell Yeonjun exactly what had happened, and Yeonjun had still been teary the whole time. It was obvious even though he was trying to hide it. That had made Beomgyu emotional, but he’d done a better job of hiding it than Yeonjun, and eventually, he convinced himself to try going home again.
It wasn’t fun. It was easier than the night before, though, and Beomgyu had gotten a broken night of sleep in his own bed.
That’s what he had to tell himself. Tomorrow will be easier, and sometimes it wasn’t always true. But he became better at managing it, and he survived. His new job provided a distraction. It gave him a reason to be out of the house, and a sense of purpose.
The date with Yeonjun and Soobin was nice, at least. The perfect distraction. As perfect as the day on the beach, even though their dinner had been out of their budget and the movie was terrible. It had been more emotional than planned, but Beomgyu had ended the day feeling happy and loved and safe, falling asleep squished between his boyfriends in Soobin’s much too small bed.
The morning after had also been memorable. Even more of a demonstration than the night in the hotel—Yeonjun had shown Soobin exactly what he’d missed while they were camping, and then Soobin had gotten his own turn. The first of many nights like that, but Beomgyu still blushes when he thinks about it.
Beomgyu shouldn’t have had to leave, but the trip had made him more desperate. It had given him a taste of what life would be like when he got out. Getting an apartment together is only their first step towards a better future, one away from this town, but it’s infinitely better than staying in one place.
His old wounds haven’t stopped hurting, but they’re starting to close. They’ll never fade, but someday they’ll be a scar.
“You shouldn’t have to, either,” Beomgyu says. His throat feels like it’s closing.
Neither of them say anything for a moment. Beomseok lets out a sigh, running his fingers through his hair.
“I’m going to leave, too,” Beomseok says. “Probably not for a few months. It’s still really hard to save. But I have a few friends at work, and their lease is running out. I mentioned that I was going to start looking for a place, and they said they’d look with me. Since you’ve moved out, I don’t have any reason to stay.”
“Wait, really?”
Beomseok nods. “Maybe this year. Hopefully this year. I was thinking about going back to school, too, but we’ll see how it goes.”
“That’s really good,” Beomgyu said. His mouth is unexpectedly dry. Before they’d grown apart, there had been a time when Beomseok had felt some loyalty to their family, taking it upon himself to hold them together and take care of what their father neglected, taking care of their father. That last trace of loyalty must have fizzled out. “Um. I didn’t know you were planning to….”
“I didn’t think that I could, until recently,” Beomseok says. “Maybe we’ll be able to see each other more, then. I’m not going to ask you to come back here.”
Beomgyu looks down. “I’m sorry I couldn’t….”
“I get it,” Beomseok says. “You don’t have to tell me where you are. You’re safe there. But if you ever want to talk to me—I’m really sorry I couldn’t do more for you then. I don’t blame you for being distant. I was, too.”
Beomgyu’s eyes fill with moisture. “It’s okay.”
“It’s not.”
“I know why you did it, I just….” Beomgyu takes a shuddering breath. “You didn’t… you didn’t even see it. The things he did to me. Not all of it. If you’d been there, maybe….”
“I know. I think about it all the time,” Beomseok says. “I doubt I could have changed anything. You know how he is. But he was taking everything out on you.”
Beomgyu blinks away his tears. “It felt like you didn’t care.”
“Fuck, I’m… I’m so sorry.”
“Because you—you always said you were worried, but you weren’t there when I needed you,” Beomgyu continues. “And I-I—I wish you could have helped.”
“I wish I could have, too,” Beomseok says softly.
Beomgyu swallows. “I hope you get the apartment.”
“If this doesn’t work out, I’ll get another chance. Don’t worry about me,” Beomseok says. He steps closer to Beomgyu, and Beomgyu lets out a breath. “Just focus on yourself and your… friends. Don’t worry about what’s here.”
It had been easy to avoid thinking about his brother while they’d been physically separate, when much of his time had been spent stewing in resentment. How can Beomgyu stop lingering on it? Moving on doesn’t mean he’ll forget. Even though he’s barely spoken to Beomseok in the past few months, his feelings haven’t become less complicated. He still has regrets.
What can he do about it? “...Okay.”
“But if you ever need anything—I’m here. Not like before.”
Beomgyu frowns. “I think I’ll be okay on my own now. Not that I’m all alone, but….”
“I understand.”
Beomgyu shifts on his feet. Beomseok reaches out to pat his shoulder, and Beomgyu nearly flinches. “Have a good night,” Beomseok says. “I’ll see you around. Let’s talk soon, though.”
The conversation is stiff in a way that Beomgyu will cringe at later, but it’s somehow not as bad as half of their interactions before Beomgyu left. Maybe, someday, they’ll be able to have something closer to a normal sibling relationship again. “Yeah, I’ll—I’ll text you later.”
When Beomgyu was younger, he’d spent hours and hours dreaming of what things might be like if his life were different. He’d thought about how things might change if his father actually loved him, or if his mother had taken him with her, or if he’d grown up somewhere else entirely. He’d dreamed about what it would feel like to have a home that truly felt like a home, to feel the same nostalgia his college friends now describe whenever they talk about visiting their parents’ homes. He’d thought that one day things might be different, and soon enough, he’d become bitter. Why couldn’t he have that?
The answer doesn’t matter anymore. He’d stopped wishing for a change a long time ago.
Beomgyu doesn’t waste a second before stepping out of the apartment. He closes the door for a final time, and for once, feels nothing but relief.
He practically sprints back to the car, his nerves suddenly alight. Outside of the apartment, he can breathe again, his lungs full of chilly winter air. Right now, the trees are spindly and bare, but in a few weeks, they’ll begin to bloom again. The days will grow longer, and carry on.
Yeonjun and Soobin are waiting exactly where Beomgyu left them. “Hey,” Yeonjun says as Beomgyu scrambles into the passenger seat. “How’d it go?”
Soobin is sitting on the edge of his seat, leaning forward into the space between the front seats. “We thought you’d be in and out.”
“We talked,” Beomgyu says. He pulls the door shut, and a sense of calm immediately washes over him. His heart has begun to slow. There’s no risk here, and soon he’ll be back home, waiting for his friends to arrive, working on his music. “About, like… his plans, mostly. And how we haven’t been talking. He wants us to talk more.”
“Do you want to?” Yeonjun asks.
“I think it’d be easier now,” Beomgyu says. Going back had forced them to have a conversation he might never have started on his own, but without that conversation, would they ever have been able to move on? Trusting Beomseok in any capacity had been difficult.
Yeonjun leans forward, nuzzling Beomgyu’s forehead. “I’m proud of you, darling,” he murmurs. He kisses Beomgyu exactly the same way he had before Beomgyu had left the car, and Beomgyu melts. The best reward.
“Me too,” Soobin says, and when Yeonjun pulls away, Soobin replaces him, kissing with such enthusiasm that Beomgyu is swept away by it. He could never become tired of this.
“Wait, I wanna sit with Soobin this time,” Beomgyu says, and Yeonjun watches with amusement in his eyes as Beomgyu clumsily climbs into the back seat.
“So you can make out with him while I drive you?” Yeonjun teases. “I was going to hold your hand.”
Beomgyu pauses, halfway to pulling Soobin down on top of him. “You can still hold my hand. I have two.”
Yeonjun laughs. He shakes his hair out of his eyes—it’s slightly overgrown, the ends an unflattering greenish blond, the product of too many months without fresh dye. Taehyun and Kai's bleaching work from their trip had held up for a while, but he's been saving to have it done at a salon. Beomgyu has been begging him to try pink. Soobin jokes that he should do green. “You can have Soobin for now. I’ll hold you at home.”
“Do you need a distraction?” Soobin asks. His eyes are round, expression sweet and concerned. One of hands rubs Beomgyu’s thigh, a comforting source of warmth.
Beomgyu nods. “I want all of that to be in the past. I'm ready to move on.”
Soobin gives him a kiss, then another, then more scattered across his face. Soobin has become freer and freer with his affection these days, and it makes Beomgyu’s heart feel feather-light.
“Hyung,” Beomgyu squeaks, and Soobin gives him one last kiss before letting go. With each kiss, his time in his old apartment starts to feel further and further away.
Yeonjun smiles at them. “Then let’s go home.”
TAEHYUN
Taehyun had never realized how fluffy Hobak is in winter.
He’s always loved Hobak’s winter coat—how he’s extra cuddly and extra furry when it gets cold, how it feels when Hobak curls up on his chest and lets Taehyun sink his hands into his fur. But it’s always been a gradual transition. He’s never quite been able to pinpoint exactly when Hobak’s coat grows thick, never felt an obvious difference as he shed out each spring even as it seemed like everything he owned was covered in Hobak’s fur.
He feels it now, though. When Taehyun had visited last semester, Hobak still had his sleek summer coat. Not anymore—every time he’s seen Hobak since, the cat has become dramatically more fluffy. By now, Hobak is massive.
His fur is soft but slightly disheveled—patchy in some spots, thin and worn but thick in others. “Have you been brushing him?” Taehyun asks, although as soon as he says it he realizes that it’s an unfair question. Hobak is an old cat now. Even on his best days, he’s somewhat grizzled and scruffy.
“Of course,” his mother says. “He looks better than last week. You should have seen him.”
A dig at Taehyun for not visiting more, or a thoughtless, merely consequential comment? On the surface, his parents understand his main reason for a lack of visits—his class hours during the week are long, and weekend time is valuable. At best, he visits once every two weeks or so, usually prompted by Yeonjun, who offers to drive him. He feels guilty saying no to Yeonjun, even when he’s in the middle of working on something.
Usually it’s far less than that. There had been a point where he’d wanted to go home every day, mostly for Hobak, but it simply hadn’t worked out that way. All of Taehyun’s friends visit their parents less frequently, so he shouldn’t worry about it.
“You sent pictures,” Taehyun says. “Beomgyu-hyung said he’d be a hit if I ever brought him to the dorms. Instant conversation starter.”
His parents send pictures every week, usually at Taehyun’s request but sometimes on their own. Those pictures are what gets him through the week. When he goes through his camera roll every few months, he usually has to scroll through hundreds of pictures of Hobak to reach what he needs. Now there are only a few dozen pictures.
Hobak crawls up from Taehyun’s arms and drapes his front half over Taehyun’s shoulder, purring loudly. Taehyun had grown up with a cat in the house at all times, which might have been what was most jarring about moving into the student dorms for college—no Hobak means that his room is painfully quiet even when Kai is home to fill up the space.
“Taehyun,” his mom says, and fixes him with a glare. “Don’t even think about trying. What if your roommate is allergic?”
Taehyun had never told his parents about his last-minute roommate transfer, or how he and Kai had started dating again. He’s spent months agonizing over how to break the news—at first, he thought he’d do it over the holidays, so then he could explain how he and Kai had reconnected at college. Or he could wait to tell them about the relationship, and explain that Kai had been a convenient choice for a new roommate after his “previous roommate decided to stay with a friend.”
Or he could stand his ground and reveal both truths at once, dealing with the fallout later. In all the months that have passed, though, he hasn’t gotten any closer to reaching a conclusion.
His parents have always been kind to him, but their relationship could easily start to crumble if he doesn’t handle this right—if he’s confrontational rather than honest or harshly defensive rather than willing to understand why they worry for him. Then again, if they’re equally unwilling to listen to him, no amount of careful preparation could prevent an inevitable argument.
It’s easy to avoid the topic when he’s barely home to talk about it anyway, no risk of slipping up and mentioning something he shouldn’t—and dating Kai while away, in a place where they can reinvent themselves as something new, is a very different experience from dating him in their small, close-knit hometown.
“He isn’t,” Taehyun says. “He loves cats.”
“Oh? Maybe you should have invited him today…”
Instead of Kai goes unsaid, but the message is loud and clear. Even though Taehyun had told his parents stories about the trip—carefully selected stories—that they hadn’t reacted to, he still can’t stop thinking about the way his mother had worried that Kai might be manipulating him before the trip.
Overprotective, and doubtful of Taehyun’s judgment. Taehyun will admit that he’d made mistakes before, but it still hurts.
Regardless, who is Taehyun to deny Kai Hobak time after he had seemed so excited at the prospect when Taehyun had mentioned going home that weekend? Kai met Hobak the first week after Taehyun brought him home as a kitten. He’s always been a big fan of the cat, and he’s only seen him a handful of times since their summer trip, even though so much has changed.
More than just the frequency of Taehyun’s cat cuddles has changed since the trip, although Taehyun has barely had time to process any of it with how soon after his first semester at university had started. Suddenly, he was thrust into a world of new classes and new faces, of independence and growing pains, of study dates and nights spent bantering over the best way to share a twin bed.
(Pushing their beds together was a no go, as was sharing a bed every night. The room is tiny, and the beds are almost too small for one. But they soon discovered that it’s very convenient to have a spare, clean bed after they do share.)
With all of that had come avoidance of his parents, although this is partially unintentional. As homesick as he is—and he is, quite frequently, homesick—it’s difficult to summon the energy to go out of his way to go home for the weekend, even when he’s caught up on work. He knows that he’ll be met with his parents’ quiet disapproval, simmering ever since he had quit his summer job and run away with his friends for nearly two weeks. He hasn’t done anything like it since, but there seems to be a lingering suspicion that he could.
“Kai made sense, eomma,” Taehyun says, scratching Hobak’s ears. “Kai went home this weekend, too. And we’re both going to Beomgyu-hyung’s apartment after this. My roommate is from the city, anyway.”
An elaborate lie likely isn’t the best solution to his parent’s questions about his mysterious roommate, but Taehyun had panicked the first time they’d started prying. After that first conversation, he’d gone back to the dorm and spent the night plotting with Kai, trying to come up with a more solid story. He’d been saved by Jongseong, who he’d bonded with at the gym. He’d known of Jongseong in high school, but it turned out that they were going to the same college. Jongseong had been understanding when Taehyun explained the situation, and volunteered to cover for him if necessary.
“Oh. Hm.”
Taehyun’s parents had always liked Kai as a friend. Aside from being somewhat dismayed at the complications his sexuality had caused, they had liked Kai as a boyfriend, too. This like had been turned into something like dismissal when they broke up—not outright disdain, but something adjacent to it, and they’re still skeptical regarding Taehyun and Kai’s choice to remain friends because of both the complicated history between them, and the hurt that Taehyun hadn’t been able to hide even around his parents.
The trip hadn’t exactly helped with this, but their grudging respect for Kai—and Taehyun’s decision-making—seemed to increase when Taehyun returned home in one piece. They’d sounded somewhat impressed, and even though their approval is rarely visible, it’s there.
Taehyun doesn’t need their approval. He knows that he’s doing more than enough to make his parents proud. Now is when he gets to make himself happy, even if he doesn’t get it right the first time.
“It’ll just be for a few minutes,” Taehyun says, prickly. “I can just tell him we’ll meet at the apartment.”
That wouldn’t make any sense, though. Kai will arrive at any moment, and they would just find another place to meet up before heading over if they didn’t meet here, most likely at Kai’s house. Not that Taehyun wouldn’t appreciate the opportunity to cuddle Kai’s chickens, but he had already snuck over to his house last night, where he’d received a warm welcome both from Kai’s dad and his sisters.
Kai’s parents hadn’t been happy that Taehyun and Kai are rooming together, but they’d reacted better than Taehyun had expected. He’s still a little anxious around Kai’s family, but after the first few visits, things had mostly returned to normal. Still, Taehyun knows better than to let his guard around Lea and Hiyyih.
“It’s not a problem,” Taehyun’s mom says stiffly, a tone that implies that it’s not a problem, but it isn’t ideal. Then, of course, she changes the subject. “Do you have any exams coming up?”
It’s just something to break the silence. Taehyun had filled her and his dad in on everything related to his academics the day before, when they’d gathered together for dinner and made small talk. Even though his parents had been happy to see him, there was still an undeniable undercurrent of tension. They would sometimes ask about his social life or dorm life, but it felt more like they were asking out of obligation than out of genuine interest.
Taehyun is at school to study, and nothing else. He’s always been focused on academics, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that his parents assume his interests are all academic.
It would probably help if he invited more conversation instead of ending it as soon as possible, fearing negative reactions. Still, there were plenty of details his parents weren’t keen on listening to.
They were at least pleased to hear that he’s enjoying his classes, but this part had never been in doubt. Classes starting was what Taehyun had focused on when they returned home—classes meant endless potential for Taehyun to become the person he wants to be.
It was also terrifying to face the thing that had first torn him away from Kai, and crushed his sense of self. On the bright side, he’d been able to spend his first month at college reassessing all of his previous unhealthy habits. He’s far from perfect, but he’s made some progress. It’s certainly easier to remind himself of the importance of balance when he sees Kai every day.
It’s absolutely not Kai’s responsibility—Taehyun has reminded him of this more than once—but he’s gotten good at pulling Taehyun out of his own head. He’s the best and most welcome distraction Taehyun could ask for, a grounding force amidst the newness of everything.
It doesn’t matter that Taehyun can manage just fine on his own—what matters is that Kai makes him happy.
“Not really. Not until finals,” Taehyun says. He’s saved from useless elaboration by a knock at the door. Relief floods through him as he opens the door, Hobak leaping down from his shoulders to rub up against Kai instead.
Kai is bundled up in a thick coat and a scarf that somehow makes him look younger. He’d gotten a haircut after weeks of complaining that his bangs were getting in his eyes, but he’d continued dying it the same caramel blond color from last summer after Taehyun had begged him not to change it. It’s handsome.
“Hey,” Kai says, grinning in a soft, fond way that makes Taehyun’s heart skip a beat even though he’s been Taehyun’s for months, years. “Missed you.”
Then he dips down for a kiss, pressing his lips briefly against Taehyun’s, just long enough to make his stomach swoop. He pulls away before Taehyun can kiss back—which is for the best, because Taehyun quickly remembers that they aren’t alone.
Fuck, he thinks, although the thought isn’t accompanied by even a shred of regret. This definitely isn’t how Taehyun meant to tell his mother that he’s dating Kai again. Her inevitable disappointment seems enough to warrant a real conversation about it, even though Taehyun is an adult.
When he straightens up, Kai jolts, as though he hadn’t realized that they weren’t alone. But he doesn’t look particularly shocked, and Taehyun remembers guiltily that Kai’s family were the first people he told about his new relationship with Taehyun, after their best friends. Taehyun had told him that he was going to wait before telling his parents, but he probably hadn’t expected that he would have waited this long.
Maybe this is enough. Taehyun’s parents don’t need to know all the details of his dating life, and a kiss speaks for itself. By now, Taehyun should be mature enough to make his own decisions.
The thought makes him a tiny bit smug, a sort of confidence that overtakes his lingering anxiety.
“Oh, hi! So sorry to intrude,” Kai says breathlessly, closing the door behind him and holding up the carton in his hands. “I brought eggs. The hens haven’t been laying many, but we still have more than we know what to do with.”
It’s impossible for Taehyun’s mother to react poorly when Kai has brought a gift. She takes the eggs with an easy smile. “You shouldn’t have. You should take them to school. Have you been eating enough?”
Kai waves his hand. “I brought some to school last week. No worries.”
Taehyun ignores the glance his mom shoots him. If Kai can visit home so frequently, why doesn’t Taehyun? Maybe Taehyun doesn’t have a good reason not to. His parents are loving and supportive, strict but not severe. He’s had plenty of room to grow under their care.
He avoids home, but it’s not because he wants to stay away. There are things he misses. But things are changing, and he can’t stop that no matter how badly he wishes he could. He can’t pretend things are the same as they were last year, and he doesn’t want to.
A part of him longs for home. Another part of him knows it hasn’t gone anywhere.
Kai doesn’t seem to react to the tension between Taehyun and his mother. He bends down to pat Hobak instead, eyes lighting up as Hobak purrs. “Hobak-ah, kitty,” Kai coos, stroking Hobak’s head as he weaves between his legs. “How are you?”
“Needs grooming,” Taehyun says, kneeling down to let Hobak climb into his lap.
“Don’t cats usually take care of that themselves?”
“He’s old. He should be pampered.”
“Speaking of,” Kai says. He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out another small package. The same cat treats that Taehyun has been buying Hobak for years, that he and Kai used to buy in bulk for Hobak’s birthday. “I brought these. I couldn’t remember which flavor was his favorite. Is this good?”
“Perfect,” Taehyun says. Kai rips open the seal on the bag and takes out one of the treats. He crouches on the ground, and Hobak immediately reaches for it, tail twitching.
Once he’s finished, Hobak meows and licks Kai’s fingers. Kai beams. “It tickles,” he says. He seems to be holding back a flinch as Hobak searches for more treats. “Can he have more? Is he still on a diet?”
“It won’t hurt him,” Taehyun says. Hobak deserves a dozen more treats, to make up for all the ones Taehyun hasn’t given him while he’s been away.
He has to start visiting more. Leaving Hobak has only gotten harder and harder.
“Here you go,” Kai says softly. Taehyun sits beside him, and Kai shakes one of the treats into his hand. Hobak climbs into his lap, meowing even louder.
“Should I make him do a trick for it?” Taehyun asks. “I think he still knows how to sit pretty.”
He holds the treat above Hobak’s head. Hobak lets out another dismayed meow.
“You’re so mean,” Kai says. He gives Hobak a comforting pat.
Taehyun holds the treat out to Hobak, who takes it delicately. “Next time.”
Silence falls again. Kai scratches behind Hobak’s ears. Beside Taehyun, Taehyun’s mother shifts uncomfortably. The atmosphere in the room is stifling—the product of being together with two people who don’t know what to say to each other. It makes Taehyun feel powerful in a way he can’t quite pinpoint.
“Has school been going well for you?” she says, defaulting to the same small talk topics she uses with Taehyun.
“Yeah! I love it,” Kai says. He holds out one of Hobak’s treats on his palm. Hobak takes it delicately between his teeth. “It’s been hard. A big adjustment. But I like my classes a lot.”
“What’s your major again?”
“Education. My minor is music.”
“Right,” Taehyun’s mom says. “You want to teach music.”
Her tone is neutral, but any tension having to do with something so personal to Kai is a no go. Kai takes it in stride, though. “That’s what I’m hoping to do. It’s been fun. I think it’d be nice if I could teach people to feel the same way about music as I do. But we’ll see how it goes.”
He gives a nervous laugh. Taehyun’s mother gives him an equally awkward smile. “That’s nice.”
“When do you want to head to hyung’s?” Taehyun interrupts. He feels bad leaving Kai to fend for himself.
“Whenever you’re ready,” Kai says, still fixated on Hobak, who has taken to kneading Taehyun’s thighs.
“I’m ready,” Taehyun says, and gently deposits Hobak in Kai’s arms to shrug on his backpack.
When he straightens up, his mom is waiting to embrace him. Whatever mixed feelings she may have about Taehyun’s relationship, it hasn’t changed this.
The hug is short, of course, but Taehyun lets himself feel comforted by her warmth anyway, no matter how grown up he is. “Visit more often,” she says. “We miss you.”
Taehyun only nods, bending down to give Hobak one last pat, schooling his expression into something determined. He’d been so fixated on Kai that he’d forgotten how difficult it is to leave home, even now.
What happens if he misses another season? He has so many summers left to grow up through.
Kai gives Taehyun’s mom a little wave before they set out. It’s so adorable that, for a second, Taehyun struggles to recall why he’d been worried about them interacting again.
He feels like he can breathe again once they step outside, the bite of the late winter chill grounding him. The air is fresh and clear, the breeze a gentle wind of change. The days are already starting to grow longer. Will Hobak have started to shed before he can visit again?
No. He can’t let that happen.
“Earlier, when I kissed you…,” Kai starts to say. Taehyun hasn’t mentioned his conflicting feelings about his parents to Kai in a while, but he must have picked up on it. Kai is perceptive like that, but it isn’t a secret—and he’d confessed his worries about causing issues in Taehyun’s family.
“It was nice,” Taehyun says simply. It’s nothing Kai should be worried about. There might not need to be a reason to worry at all.
Kai nods and reaches for Taehyun’s hand. “Ready to go?”
He doesn’t need to elaborate. There’s no need for words after all, the way it’s always been.
Taehyun weaves their fingers together.
“Ready,” he says, and he lets Kai lead the way.
YEONJUN
The first thing Yeonjun does every morning is feed the fish.
It’s the most important part of his morning routine. He pulls himself out of bed, and he feeds the fish before he feeds himself. The tank is in a corner of their living room, on the way to the kitchen, on top of a bookshelf filled with a messy arrangement of Yeonjun’s poetry, Beomgyu’s textbooks, an arrangement of graphic novels from Soobin, and an assortment of other books that Yeonjun will admit creates a bit of an eyesore. It’s the only available surface in their little apartment, since Soobin had been adamant against housing their pets in the kitchen.
Originally, they’d made a chart to keep track of rotating fish chores, but Yeonjun is often the first to rise, so he’d gradually taken over the feeding. Sometimes he waits until Soobin and Beomgyu are awake. The fish are most active at mealtimes, and Beomgyu likes to watch them chase the flakes of food around the tank.
There’s ten of them—guppies—and although Beomgyu says they’re often kept in larger schools, Yeonjun feels as though he’s already losing track of how many there are when he watches them for too long. They’d settled on guppies because they’re smaller than goldfish and easy to take care of. They’d also looked the healthiest out of all the fish at Beomgyu’s store, and all of them had been nervous about adopting an animal.
After the first successful month, Soobin had said that they needed names. They’re working on it, but none of them can keep track of which guppy is which. All of them are yellow and orange, and Beomgyu swears that he can differentiate between them based on the odd discolored scale or ripped fin. Yeonjun thinks they’re identical.
The fish had been Beomgyu’s only request when they’d started moving in, though he hadn’t asked with words. Soobin had had to coax it out of him, and even then he’d said, “I know I shouldn’t be thinking about things like that. Maybe in a few months?”
It turned out that the supplies weren’t that expensive, especially not with Beomgyu’s employee discount. Yeonjun had slipped him some cash to cover it, and he thinks it’s the best money he’s ever spent. The actual fish were even cheaper, and Beomgyu paid for them with money saved out of his first paycheck. Soobin buys new food every few weeks when the container runs out.
They could have waited a few months. They’d put their apartment plan in motion as soon as Beomgyu and Soobin had amassed some funds, and even with help from Yeonjun’s father, it had been ambitious. Furnishing the apartment had come with some sacrifices. What Yeonjun has learned, though, is that sometimes indulging is necessary. If splurging on a fish tank will make Beomgyu smile at his lowest, Yeonjun will buy him the fish tank.
Caring for the fish might be Yeonjun’s favorite part of his morning routine. As far as he knows, guppies aren’t that smart, but he’d gotten into a debate with Taehyun about it. Taehyun had sent him a dozen articles about fish intelligence that had made Yeonjun feel like the unintelligent one, so he likes to say that the fish recognize him. They swim to the front of the tank when he walks over every morning.
More than anything, they’ve probably memorized breakfast time, but Yeonjun pretends it’s personal.
The guppies make good companions. They’re terrible conversation partners, but the silence helps Yeonjun focus. He sits with them while he writes his essays and works on his other assignments, spending his breaks watching them swim around the tank in one school.
“I think you’re better friends with the fish than me,” Beomgyu sometimes jokes, which Yeonjun is almost certain is just an excuse to provoke Yeonjun into “proving him wrong”—although he says that bedroom-related activities need to actually stay in the bedroom, for fear of upsetting the fish.
“Aren’t fish nearsighted?” Yeonjun will complain as Beomgyu drags him off of the couch. “Isn’t the point of having our own place so that I can have you wherever I want?”
That has been another exciting development in recent months. Although the act is more exciting in inconvenient places, the cleanup is twice as shameful. Beomgyu is more choosy, prioritizing comfort and quick to remind them of unnecessary cleaning expenses, but Soobin doesn't have a preference as to where they end up.
Today, though, Beomgyu has opted to hole himself up in the room he shares with Soobin, working through the notes for a song Kai had sent him earlier in the week, while Soobin bakes and Yeonjun frantically attempts to finish an essay before Taehyun and Kai arrive. He only has a page left, but the last page is the worst, because he’s run out of words.
Watching the guppies is definitely more entertaining. Yeonjun doesn’t know how long he’s been distracted for, but his laptop screen has gone dark. “You’re lucky you don’t have to do this,” he tells the guppies. One of them has been swimming circles at the front of the tank, but on cue, it swims into one of the plants as if it had heard Yeonjun’s words. The other guppies are also hiding in the back of the tank.
Terrible conversation partner indeed. Yeonjun sighs and reopens his essay.
Yeonjun has always had trouble completing these assignments. It’s not something he’s naturally good at, so he has to spend extra time making sense of the concepts. It’s rare that he ever feels genuine passion about them rather than a sense of obligation, but he’s already made it this far. There had been a time when he’d doubted that he ever would.
Whenever he tells his classmates that he’s a dance minor, they’re surprised—although these days people are usually just surprised that someone like him would also study business. When he works with classmates on group projects, they ask how he balances two opposite schedules and requirements, switching from art to marketing. His friends have expressed concern, too, wondering if his degree will stifle his creativity.
Yeonjun won’t pretend to love it—after all, he’d agreed to the major for financial support. He’d been passionate enough about dance to want to make his dream a reality despite the possibility of an unreliable future. At the same time, it has opened up a new dream for him. Earning a business degree doesn’t mean he has to be a businessman. It’ll look good on his résumé, and then he can do whatever he wants.
Still, his dance classes are a challenge, but his business classes are endlessly tedious. He lets out a groan, pressing his palms into his eyes. Lately he feels like he can’t stay on top of the work no matter how hard he tries, especially since he’s been taking more hours at the café. His classes this semester aren’t very difficult, but the workload is heavy, and the responsibility endless—
“Hyung. What are you working on?”
Soobin’s voice pulls him out of his trance. Yeonjun lifts his head to find his boyfriend, looking down at him with soft eyes.
“Paper. The long one I told you about,” Yeonjun explains, and Soobin nods. “I’m almost done, it’s just….”
“I can read it over for you when you’re done. Hunt for typos,” Soobin says.
Yeonjun gives him a smile. “Sure. if you want to. It’s really boring. I feel like my brain is going numb.”
“You say that about all of your papers,” Soobin says. He flops down on the couch beside Yeonjun, and Yeonjun rests his head on Soobin’s shoulder. “Is this one really bad?”
“I’ve run out of outline. I can’t keep explaining my other points,” Yeonjun says.
Soobin shrugs. “Don’t bother writing more if you don’t have anything else to say. You’ll probably do fine.”
“I want to guarantee that, though,” Yeonjun says. This is a sentiment he knows Soobin can relate with. Soobin has always struggled with college, but still puts consistent effort in. even when he’s completely directionless. “I can’t quit now.”
“I think the fact that you’re so worried about it means you’re probably doing okay. Even if you don’t like doing it,” Soobin says.
“I’m starting to like it a little more,” Yeonjun says. “I think it’s easier now that I’m living away from….”
Yeonjun moving out had been the final nail in the coffin of his parents’ marriage, the excuse to finalize their divorce and sell their old house. His mother lives in an apartment not far from him, and his father further away. He hasn’t seen his father since the holidays, but he visits his mother every so often. She’s quieter, more subdued than she was in his childhood. It makes his chest ache, even though he knows that it’s best for her.
It’s a strange feeling. His earliest memories are by the sea, but the vast majority of his childhood memories take place at that house, a house that no longer belongs to the tattered remains of his family. “You can stay with me if you need to,” his mother had told him when she’d signed her own lease, but she hadn’t sounded enthusiastic. As much as it obviously pains her, she’s still the first to point out that his father’s apartment has more room, that his father could give him connections that will further his career.
The new apartment’s atmosphere isn’t particularly welcoming. His mother welcomes him with empty words, but it’s an unfamiliar place. Yeonjun hasn’t spent more than a night there, and he feels like he’s intruding when he does, even though his mother is his closest family, physically and metaphorically. She says she’s proud of him, for becoming independent and doing well in school, but all he can think about is the way her life has changed.
They’re not close anymore, but it affects him so much. He has no idea what to do with that emotion.
Yeonjun had barely spoken to either of his parents in the first few weeks after he’d moved out, terrified to hear about their arguments. His parents have never made an effort to hide their conflicts, and Yeonjun has never had the courage to ask them to leave him out of it, even though listening to it makes him feel like his chest is caving in. He’s gotten exceptionally good at pushing it from his mind, at ignoring the pain.
Distance is for the best. Yeonjun doesn’t have to be reminded of the past, and he can keep growing as a person—beyond the hurt, beyond the person his mother and father once thought him to be. He doesn’t have to think about, for better or worse, the life he’ll never have again.
Letting go aches, even though holding on had been unbearable. Letting go means acknowledging that he’d had a reason to be afraid. But he’s free here—free to be himself, the person he’d once locked away, too afraid to confront. This is his first step towards doing something truly meaningful with his life, like he’s always wanted.
“You’d be good at anything,” Soobin says. Yeonjun doesn’t think he deserves that kind of praise, but Soobin has always been honest. He’s never stopped feeling lucky that he’d earned Soobin’s trust.
“At least I feel like I’m doing this for myself now,” Yeonjun says. He tilts his head back, looking at the fish tank out of the corner of his eye. One pair of guppies is chasing each other around the tank, weaving in and out of the plants. “Not just so my father keeps paying for my degree. I feel like I can actually do something with it now. Like I can work at a dance studio for a little while after I graduate, and then open my own.”
Soobin has already heard this particular monologue many times, and is the first to reassure him when he becomes insecure. Yeonjun worries that his concerns are a sign he’s on the wrong path, but it’s oddly reassuring to talk with Soobin, who has the same doubts.
“If anyone can do it, you can,” Soobin says, earnest as always. He sounds so genuine that Yeonjun’s heart aches.
“I don’t know what I did to deserve you,” he blurts.
Soobin tilts his head. “What do you mean?”
“You believe in me,” Yeonjun says, and it’s so simple, but the weight of it is so heavy. “I don’t know why. I haven’t done anything.”
He sounds like a child begging his parents to answer a why for every small thing in the world, but he needs to know. As they’ve settled into their relationship, Soobin has become more and more generous with praise and verbal affirmations, and this is one thing that he hasn’t been hesitant to share.
It perplexes Yeonjun endlessly. Sometimes people compliment him for being ambitious, but coming from Soobin, it sounds much simpler than that.
“It’s just who you are,” Soobin says. “You always take everything seriously. Everyone knows how much you care.”
“But I’m just—” Yeonjun falters. Soobin watches him with curious eyes, but doesn’t push him to elaborate. “I don’t even know what I’m doing.”
Soobin considers him for a moment. He leans in, one of his hands resting on top of Yeonjun’s. “You know I feel the same way about you. You make it seem easy.”
“What?”
“Everything,” Soobin says. He ducks his head, embarrassed, breaking eye contact, but Yeonjun flips his hand over to entwine their fingers. “You’re so good at what you do, even the things you don’t like. And the things that are hard for me. I don’t even know how to be a good boyfriend—”
“Huh? But you are.”
“I’m kind of just guessing, though. Following your lead,” Soobin says. “I’ve never really… nobody showed me how, so….”
“Me neither. But I like what we have, and that’s what matters,” Yeonjun says. He gives Soobin’s hand a little squeeze. “You’re happy, too??”
The tension dissolves from Soobin’s face. “So happy,” he says. “I wouldn’t want anything else.”
When they’d started dating, Yeonjun had secretly been terrified. He’d never been fully satisfied in his previous relationships, even when he’d thought he’d been in love. There was always an underlying discomfort, and he’d never been able to pinpoint the reason for it. Polyamory didn’t seem like the answer to his problems. If anything, having to care for multiple partners sounded like it would take a toll on him.
Growing older has allowed him to realize that there are actually multiple reasons. Polyamory hadn’t been the answer to why he’d felt stifled in his previous relationships, but being honest with himself had allowed polyamory to work.
“Me neither,” Yeonjun says. “And we haven’t had a guide for this, either. But giving it a chance was the right thing to do.”
Soobin nods. “I used to think I’d lose you, but now….”
“Better together,” Yeonjun says simply.
Yeonjun knows that Beomgyu feels the same way. He’s probably checked in with Beomgyu dozens of times since the summer, making sure that he’s content, the same way he has with Soobin. Even without asking, Beomgyu’s answer is always obvious in his smile.
Not all of it had been easy. Brief pockets of jealousy to smooth over, usually when one of them felt neglected. The added complication of three-way communication—their first fight had left Yeonjun a shivering mess, although they’ve since figured out how to keep their debates civil, even when only one of them disagrees. The general chaos of classes and work and their complicated lives tend to leave them with little time to spend on each other, and even though they live together, it’s the kind of stress that would bring tension to any relationship.
Then there are smaller things, like sleeping arrangements—Yeonjun likes his space, but with Soobin and Beomgyu sharing a room, it takes more effort to coordinate—although the smaller things sometimes make Yeonjun smile. Nothing about their relationship is conventional, but it’s the happiest he’s ever been.
Sometimes it hurts to think that he might never be able to tell his family, or be public about their relationship in any capacity. But that discomfort isn’t worth sacrificing the happiness that comes with being with them. The more they settle into their relationship, the more opportunities emerge—the kinds of opportunities he’d thought he would have to sacrifice.
“Besides,” Yeonjun says, shifting the conversation. Enough lingering on that. “You even offer to read my boring essays over. You’re a great boyfriend.”
“Are you sure it’s that bad? I’ve had to write boring essays, too,” Soobin says. “Try to explain it to me. Maybe that will help you write the last part.”
“Trust me. You’ll regret it,” Yeonjun says. “I’d rather me doing anything else.”
Soobin looks at him with a mysterious glint in his eye. “Perfect. What if you explain to me how you’re going to write the rest of it, and then I give you a reward?”
One of his hands creeps up Yeonjun’s thigh, positioned in a way that could pass as simple affection while simultaneously being all too suggestive. Yeonjun hates that it makes him shiver.
“When did you become so horny? You weren’t like this when we started dating,” Yeonjun says, hoping to play it off cool.
“No, you’re definitely worse than me. You and fucking Beomgyu. You kept me up last night,” Soobin complains.
Yeonjun smirks. Soobin had gone to bed early last night, but he doesn’t sound too upset about the disturbance. “Yeah, me fucking Beomgyu. He already told me he has an early morning tomorrow, but you should come to my room tonight. I’ll show you what you missed.”
“Beomgyu isn’t as strong as me. He won’t be able to resist if he hears,” Soobin says. “We’ll have to be extra quiet.”
He leans in to kiss Yeonjun, and Yeonjun’s heart flips—but he stops Soobin at the last second. “What were you working on for Taehyun and Kai?”
Soobin pulls back, looking slightly dazed. If it were up to Yeonjun, he’d keep kissing Soobin until Soobin doesn’t remember his own name, but they don’t have long before Taehyun and Kai arrive. An hour at most, and Yeonjun likes to take his time. “Uh, there’s this—there’s this cookie recipe that Kai sent me? Red velvet. That’s what I just finished with, and then….”
“Are we going to cook them an actual dinner?” Yeonjun asks, teasing. He’d gone through their refrigerator earlier in the day, trying to piece something together for Taehyun and Kai, but hadn’t settled on a recipe. After listening to him ramble about it, Soobin had volunteered to take over the cooking.
Instead, his eyes widen. “Wait, I forgot!” he says, jumping up. Yeonjun shakes his head.
“We have to feed them,” he says. “I know they’d just eat cookies, but Kai says he’s sick of the dining hall food.”
Soobin rakes his fingers through his hair. “He’s mentioned that to me, too. I can’t believe I forgot. He won’t have any homemade food if I don’t feed him.”
“He’s spending tomorrow with his family,” Yeonjun says. “If he were desperate, he could just bring Taehyun to his parents’.”
“Taehyun’s visited a couple times, but I think Lea and Hiyyih still make him nervous,” Soobin says. He holds his hand out to pull Yeonjun up, and Yeonjun takes it. “Want to sit with me while I start? You can keep working.”
“The fish might be sad without me,” Yeonjun says, just to watch the way Soobin’s nose wrinkles. “I’m kidding. I’m basically done with my work, anyway.”
Sometimes, cooking together is a form of domestic bliss. Other days, it’s a very inefficient process, one of them actually trying to cook while the other attempts to distract him—it doesn’t help that their kitchen is barely large enough for all of them to fit. Today, neither of them are actually trying very hard. Yeonjun pulls a chair up to the kitchen counter as he watches Soobin pull ingredients out of their refrigerator.
“Stop looking at me like that,” Soobin complains as he briefly makes eye contact with Yeonjun.
“Like what?” Yeonjun asks innocently. He turns back to his essay. Just a few more paragraphs. He’d typed out another while waiting for Soobin.
“Bedroom eyes. And I can’t have you,” Soobin says, followed by a loud metallic clanging.
“Need help over there? Pan got you?” Yeonjun asks. Beomgyu is probably the neatest out of all of them, which is to say that their standards for neatness aren’t very high—although the kitchen is the best-kept area of their apartment. If dishes often end up in the wrong place, though, Yeonjun won’t fuss over it.
“Taehyun taught me to cook pork belly. I don’t know why I’m doing this,” Soobin frets, fidgeting with the oven’s temperature. “We should’ve just ordered out….”
“He’ll appreciate whatever you make him. I don’t think he actually cares about quality. Food is food,” Yeonjun says. No amount of reassurance will win against Soobin’s high standards.
Yeonjun tries to focus on his essay, but Soobin is far more enticing, and that’s why he can’t resist distracting him. He sticks to simple teasing, until Beomgyu emerges from his room—and Beomgyu is the true menace between them.
“I can’t cook if you’re like this,” Soobin says, but he’s not fighting Beomgyu at all—instead, he lets Beomgyu cling to his back as he cuts vegetables into tiny chunks. Beomgyu had offered to do the chopping first, but he’d made a beeline for Soobin after getting up and hasn’t let go since. His clinginess makes Yeonjun’s heart soft.
“Should’ve just ordered out.” Beomgyu sighs. One of his hands creeps down from Soobin’s chest, landing on his belt, and he flinches.
Soobin gently nudges Beomgyu’s hands away. “Not you, too,” he groans. “You know we don’t have time.”
“In the kitchen?” Yeonjun gasps exaggeratedly. “How could you!”
“I don’t want to keep him in the kitchen,” Beomgyu mumbles against Soobin’s shirt. He reluctantly detaches himself from Soobin, slinking over to Yeonjun’s side. If Soobin looks at all disappointed, Yeonjun won’t be the one to mention it.
By some miracle, the dish is pieced together, and Yeonjun finishes his essay. He’ll probably have to rewrite chunks of it later—watching Beomgyu grope Soobin out of the corner of his eye doesn’t exactly agree with typing.
“We can just do the dishes later. We’ll be making more,” Yeonjun says, but Beomgyu volunteers to rinse everything Soobin had cooked with. Maybe it takes him three times longer than it should with Soobin shadowing him, nuzzling into his hair and offering encouragement that sounds far too suggestive for washing dishes, but it gets done.
Sudden emotion wells up in Yeonjun’s chest as he looks at them. It’s something out of a fairytale. If someone had told him that he would be able to have this a year ago, he would have thought them completely unreasonable.
Yeonjun’s boyfriends call him brave, but the truth is that he’s a coward. His greatest flaw is his tendency to avoid his problems. It hurts less to pretend they don’t exist than to struggle with a solution that might not even work. But last summer, he’d taken a chance, and it had had the greatest results he could have asked for.
Soobin’s phone vibrates, snapping Yeonjun from his thoughts. “Taehyun said they’re going to be here in twenty,” Soobin says, reading the text over. “What should we do?”
Cooking must not have actually taken Yeonjun as long as he’d thought—or Taehyun and Kai had left exceptionally late, but Yeonjun isn’t too concerned. They have most of the night to spend together.
Despite all of their earlier innuendos, their next twenty minutes aren’t particularly eventful, although Yeonjun is proud to say he now knows how to maximize that time. Instead, he teaches Soobin how to dance.
“Normally I’d record this so I can correct myself, especially since I don’t have a mirror,” Yeonjun says, and Soobin frantically shakes his head. “And I’m still practicing this one.”
“But you know how to do it,” Beomgyu says. He’s sprawled across their couch, head pillowed on his arm, looking sleepy and content.
“Mostly. I need the details, though,” Yeonjun says. “A neat finish is important.”
Yeonjun starts the music, and they work through the steps together. The song is upbeat, and it shouldn’t be too challenging for Soobin. It’s meant to be performed in a group, but they can make do with two people.
Soobin is lanky, somewhat awkward, but when he actually tries, he’s an unexpectedly graceful performer. It’s not often that Soobin volunteers to dance, but Yeonjun treasures the opportunity, endlessly grateful that Soobin indulges him in his hobbies.
Soobin is particularly beautiful like this. He’s also an attentive learner, watching Yeonjun closely and copying his moves almost exactly. Yeonjun has to consciously slow himself down, but it isn’t long before Soobin is keeping pace with him.
And he actually puts effort into the girl group dances, unlike many of the other boys in Yeonjun’s club. Yeonjun’s seniors decide what they learn, but they’ve started to give him more authority in the group.
After a few attempts, Soobin turns to Beomgyu. “You should try this,” he pants. “You’re always complaining that you’re winded after we walk across campus. We can exercise together.”
“You’re the one who complains,” Beomgyu says. “Besides, I’m enjoying the view.”
Soobin’s ears immediately redden. Yeonjun laughs breathlessly, grabbing Soobin’s hands and leading him back into formation. “Hyung, you’re too intense. I’m just a beginner. Go easy on me.”
“I want to reap the benefits of your cardio,” Beomgyu says. “You can carry me around.”
“You’re awfully ambitious,” Soobin says,
“Just one more try. You almost have it,” Yeonjun says. Teaching Soobin is beneficial for him, too. It gives him the opportunity to review the basics.
He knows the power he has over Soobin. Soobin has always been easy to please, and he’d never turn Yeonjun down, even if it involves trying something new and terrifying. Yeonjun is proud of his newfound confidence—him and Beomgyu, who has become more determined to face his fears every day.
Naturally, one more try turns into three more tries, and Soobin is only saved by a knock at the door. “I’ll get it,” Beomgyu says cheerfully, jumping up from the couch. Soobin, meanwhile, wilts, collapsing on the floor. Yeonjun hurries to shove a glass of water into his hands.
Taehyun steps inside first, Kai on his heels. “Hyung,” he says, pulling Beomgyu into a hug.
“You’re so cold,” Beomgyu says. Taehyun’s face is flushed, the tips of his nose and ears red.
“I’ll drive you home,” Yeoinjun says. He pulls Soobin up with him. “You should have let me pick you up.”
Kai shakes his head. “You’re already feeding us. That’s enough. Anyway, I brought eggs! From the chickens. They’re all different colors, but that’s normal.”
He reaches into his bag and takes out a carton, which he passes to Beomgyu. Beomgyu pops the lid of the carton open and grins. “Oh, they’re pink!”
“Let me see,” Yeonjun says, and Beomgyu holds the carton out. Sure enough, the eggs are pink.
“They’re not laying that many because it’s winter,” Kai says. “But it’s more than we can eat. I’m sure you’ll be able to use them.”
“You’re too good to us,” Yeonjun says. He leans in to hug Kai, who drapes himself over him. “Wow, Kai-yah, did you get taller?”
“You saw me three days ago,” Kai says, smiling. He lets Yeonjun hold his face and kiss his cheeks anyway. Just a moment later, Taehyun joins them, weaseling his way into their hug until Yeonjun kisses him, too.
It’s surprisingly difficult to coordinate their schedules, even though they’re all on campus every day. Usually two or three of them will spend their free hours between classes studying together. Yeonjun has lunch with Taehyun every Monday, and Kai every Wednesday. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, Soobin and Beomgyu have class together, and Yeonjun will drive them home before heading off to his café shift.
On Fridays, Yeonjun, Soobin, Beomgyu, and Kai meet in the library, waiting for Taehyun to finish one of his labs. Sometimes they’ll simply bid each other good-night, and other times they spend the night together, piling into Taehyun and Kai’s dorm room to watch movies or work in silence, depending on the day.
For logistical reasons, it’s rare that they meet up off campus, especially since Soobin and Beomgyu work for part of the weekend. Spring semester has been easier, at least. There was one memorable day a few weeks ago, when classes had been canceled during a heavy snowfall. Once the weather had cleared up, they’d gone to the park together and frolicked in the snow like children—even Taehyun, who had initially planned to spend the evening studying. It made Yeonjun feel alive.
When it’s just the five of them, Yeonjun doesn’t have to think about anything else. The rest of the world feels so far away, even when they spend their time discussing what’s been troubling them and comforting each other. They expect nothing of Yeonjun, and supporting them is something that comes easily.
How lucky is Yeonjun to feel love like this, to always have people he can come back to?
“I made cookies,” Soobin says, and Taehyun and Kai let go of Yeonjun. “I’ll send you home with a bunch, but you can try them now. They’re done cooling.”
“He almost didn’t make dinner,” Beomgyu snickers. Soobin nudges him playfully.
“Are we sure they’re edible?” Kai asks, innocently teasing. Soobin makes a painted noise, but Kai gets away with the jab, because he’s Kai.
Soobin drags them to the kitchen and passes the cookies out. They’re the perfect texture, deliciously soft and still warm, but not so gooey that they fall apart when Soobin picks them up.
“What do you think?” Soobin asks earnestly.
Kai shrugs. “It’s alright.”
Kai squeals as Soobin grabs him and shakes him vigorously. “So rude, Kai-yah,” Soobin complains. “I put my heart and soul into those.”
Taehyun smiles mischievously. “You’ve done better. Hyung, are you off your game?”
It’s all gentle teasing. Kai steals another cookie as Soobin turns his wrath on Taehyun, splitting it with Taehyun when Soobin finally gives in. “I lied. You’ve outdone yourself,” Taehyun whispers to Soobin as they settle at the table for dinner. Yeonjun would have to agree.
Nights like this might be a rarity, but they’re the kind of nights that Yeonjun looks forward to most of all. Dinner is always somewhat of a loud affair—Soobin rambles about the pastries he’s learning to make at work while Taehyun and Kai lightheartedly bicker over where they should get dinner on Monday. Beomgyu has been quieter than usual today, exhausted from a stressful morning, but he comes alive between Taehyun and Kai.
Somehow, everything feels more complete with the five of them together, as though their lives have been inexplicably, irreversibly knotted together. Even if their friendship hadn’t lasted this long, Yeonjun knows he would have treasured their time together for the rest of his life. They’ve given him something irreplaceable.
“—and they’re finally letting me decorate cakes, too. Not just bake them,” Soobin says. “I’ll get to start fulfilling orders soon.”
“We’ll have to request one from you, then,” Taehyun says.
“I’ll decorate your cakes for free if you ask nicely,” Soobin says.
“There aren’t any special occasions soon,” Yeonjun says. “But you need the practice.”
“We don’t need a special occasion,” Kai says.
“Maybe it’ll go better than our last birthdays,” Taehyun says, glancing at Beomgyu.
“Hey, that was before I found a good buttercream recipe,” Soobin says. He stands from the table and collects their dishes. “I’m still sad I didn’t get to make Kai anything while we were on our trip.”
“We can redeem ourselves this year,” Kai says. “Unless….”
Suddenly everyone is looking at Yeonjun—even Soobin, who had exchanged their plates for the tray of cookies. Yeonjun is starting to grow concerned by the seemingly never-ending pile of them. How many had Soobin made? “We’re going,” Yeonjun says. “For sure. Don’t worry about that.”
“Oh, I meant that we might want to go earlier in the year,” Kai says with a little laugh. “So we don’t have to rush back home before classes start.”
“We haven’t even decided where we’re going yet,” Taehyun points out. “Can’t hurt to start planning now, though. I have some ideas. I wouldn't mind going back to the same campgrounds, either.”
Beomgyu pauses, halfway to reaching for a cookie. “You think so?”
Last year, when they’d started planning the trip, a door had been opened. Everything Yeonjun had thought he’d known about what he’s capable of had shifted slightly. For once, he’d been in complete control.
Months have passed, but Yeonjun still remembers how that first day had felt. They’d made it happen once, so it can happen again.
“There’s nothing stopping us,” Yeonjun says, and he can’t help but smile, nervous excitement bursting within him. “Let’s write another list. What do you think?”
Their scrapbook has a special place on the bookshelf near the fish tank. After the trip, Beomgyu had printed their photos, and they’d spent a day organizing them, finalizing the layout of the scrapbook. They’d worked on it on and off through the next few weeks, arranging photos, assembling souvenirs, writing notes to each other. It had started as such a casual project, but Yeonjun thinks the final product is something to be proud of. His heart feels lighter whenever he takes it out to look at it, running his fingers across the pages and reminiscing on how they’d filled them with ink. But Beomgyu has other notebooks, and Yeonjun is itching to fill their pages.
Last year, the trip was a necessity. Yeonjun had been drowning, spending his days fighting to the surface, fighting the current. He couldn’t help himself, never mind the others. It had felt like their only way out, even though it was a temporary solution.
But things are different now. Not everything, but the important things. He can think of the trip as a new beginning, not a moment of weakness. And this year, they won't be running away from their lives. They'll get to reminisce. The five of them, together like they’ve always been.
They’re his home. They always have been.