Archive of Our Own

Minho’s alarm rang, like it did every day, at exactly a quarter past six in the morning. He stirred in his bed, stretched his arms a bit over his head and then, reluctantly, opened his eyes. It was a Wednesday, which, at least, meant that he only had three more days of classes left before the weekend. Practice, though, was another issue. But he enjoyed practice more, anyway, so it wasn’t really a problem if he had to go there on Saturdays, too. 

Like he did every day, he got up, opened the window in his bedroom and the one in the small kitchen that completed the tiny space he rented, and headed to the bathroom to get washed. He changed into a pair of sweatpants and the T-shirt he would soon soak with sweat in dance class. Then, he pushed more clean clothes into his backpack, along with the notebook for the Nineteenth Century Art History class of the day, and off he went. The subway ride was uneventful, he spent it all scrolling through the messages on the group chat that, somehow, had accumulated during the night, because all his friends seemed to be in the habit of never sleeping. Changbin had even texted him privately, asking to meet him in the afternoon. Minho wondered if this was going to be about something relevant or if it was just the usual Changbin urge to please have Minho put in a good word for him with Hyunjin. He replied with a laconic I gotta study, exam next week , and left it at that. 

Minho headed to the cafè right in front of his lecture hall, queued for about five minutes and then placed his order for a double espresso macchiato and watched the usual barista, a girl with round glasses, ask for his name for, possibly, the thousandth time. “Minho,” he said. After all, he was the most unassuming person ever, with the most common name in the Republic of Korea for men under thirty. So, the girl had every right not to remember him, even if he bought the very same coffee from her every single day. And he’d been doing that for, like, three years? Maybe more? Well. 

“So have you heard back from that company?” Minho’s classmate, Yejun, asked him, as they both stretched themselves on the barres before class. 

Minho sighed, walking back to a straight position. “They said they focus more on hip-hop,” he said. “And that my hip-hop is very good, and my resumé impressive, but if I want to go on with this fucking university, then I’ll end up ditching them.” Yejun made a disgusted expression. It was what it was. Minho was trying to improve his impressive resumé with a damned degree, anyway. So, whatever. It wasn’t like he wouldn’t get a job, he was a damned good dancer, and he knew it. He’d been dancing, professionally, for years before even enrolling in this stupid course. So it was just a matter of time, really. 

“Well,” Yejun said, and she took off her socks to exchange them for ballet shoes. “It’s their loss,” she went on to fixing her hair, rolling up her ponytail in a chignon. 

“Of course,” Minho said, and he changed into the appropriate shoes, too. The fact that he had to take ballet class every day was something he’d quickly grown used to. It didn’t matter how many years he’d spent perfecting other dance styles, it didn’t matter that he also had contemporary and hip-hop lessons throughout the week: if he wanted this degree he had to be a perfect ballet dancer. He knew it helped. He knew it, he knew that his core muscles were stronger now, and his control, too. He knew that the flexibility was also an advantage, but sometimes he wished he could get this very same degree with just a little fewer port-de-bras . 

Their teacher, Mrs. Moon, yelled for five minutes on end about someone’s use of their head during turns and jumps. Minho wanted to go back to bed, if he was honest. Truly, it was 8.30 AM, this woman needed to chill. And this Yeonwoo kid needed to fucking learn some technique. “It’s Wednesday,” the teacher said, “so you can’t jump like it’s Monday.” Minho cursed Cecchetti and his disgraced week-days method silently. 

“Good work, everybody,” the teacher concluded. Minho wished she would praise the worthy more than the others. To be completely honest, he wished she would praise him , he knew he’d done an excellent class today. He knew he was giving his all to this degree. He knew he was doing the most and he was improving every day. 

“Lee Minho-ssi,” the teacher called for him, as he was gathering all his things from the floor. He turned to her with his bottle and shoes and towel in his hands. “You still use too much strength in your jumps.” 

Minho nodded. She was looking at him with a very stern expression. He put his stuff back on the floor. “Can we go through them again, seonsaeng-nim?” 

Everyday, Minho crossed the courtyard between the practice rooms and the lecture halls while listening to music in his headphones. He kinda always crossed the same people, too, the Performance arts department not being that crowded at 10AM. So, on that Wednesday, he pressed play on his phone, shoved it into his jacket’s pocket and headed to the building on the other side. “Hi, hyung.” 

Minho focused on the voice calling him  —  or, at least, he thought it was calling him  —  and his eyes focused on the very same boy that always said hello to him: Han Jisung. Now, Jisung wasn’t a bad kid, he was Changbin’s friend, mainly, so he thought he was also Minho’s friend. But, to be fair, Minho and him had talked maybe for a total of fifteen minutes across fifteen different occasions, so Minho didn’t really believe they were friends. Jisung was loud, always dressed like he came straight from the 90s, never failed to mention that he was a rapper and, most importantly, he went nowhere without his skateboard. Minho felt like he didn’t get him. If he was such a good rapper, why was he studying at university? If “skate was life”, to him, why did it seem like everything else made up his life, as well? 

Still, Jisung was one of Changbin’s best friends, and Minho dealt with him as such. Which meant that, if he was able, he enjoyed meeting Changbin alone, or, at least, with Seungmin and Felix. But then Felix tended to bring Hyunjin, and Changbin got distracted, and Changbin would bring Chan and Jisung. And Minho, poor soul who’d just wanted to see Changbin, found himself regretting his decision to meet up with his friends.

Still, he nodded in Jisung’s direction, just before he passed by, and replied with a short, “Have a nice day.” 

Minho’s classes went by. Art history was not so bad today, although he would have liked to have been able to answer at least one of the many questions the professor had asked the class. Then he had lunch, while revising his notes from the course, and then he headed to the library. A few hours later he walked back to the practice rooms, hip-hop class waiting for him. The lesson was very fun, he ended up sweating through the second shirt of the day, which made him wonder just how many T-shirts he ran through every week. Was he going to have to buy more? Were there any discounts going on right now? He’d have to see. Maybe he could call Hyunjin and go shopping together this weekend, although shopping with him was too much of a hassle, because he would make him spend a fortune on an Adidas shirt, when he could have bought at least ten no-logo ones for the same price. But still, he could meet with him for something different. Minho believed he had few friends, but those he had were everything he needed. Hyunjin was the most recent addition, brought in by Felix, as his flatmate. Changbin was Minho’s oldest friend, they’d met when Minho was a hip-hop teacher and Changbin came to his class. They’d become quick friends, and when Minho had met Felix, through a workshop, and Seungmin, at a students’ union meeting, he’d felt like he’d reached his saturation for friendships. But then Hyunjin had been introduced in the picture, and Minho had found that, maybe, he had space for more people in his life. Just, not as many as the ones Changbin kept around himself. Still, he texted Hyunjin. Do you maybe know of a massive sale on T-shirts? As he changed and got ready to commute back home, finally free of classes and lectures, his phone lit up with Hyunjin’s answer: We could go thrifting! Not what Minho had asked, but, alright, he would look for something on the Internet. Or he’d just ask his mom to go to some of the stores she knew and please restock her only son’s wardrobe. He got off the train at his stop, climbed the stairs back to surface and then the stairs to his apartment and, at last, he let himself enjoy the satisfying thought that this day, too, was over. 

Minho’s alarm rang, like it did every day, at exactly a quarter past six in the morning. He yawned, loudly, grateful that no one would hear him, and got up to go through his usual morning steps: windows, bathroom, clothes. And off he was to get on the train. He got his usual coffee and headed to his usual ballet class. Yejun asked about a company, once more, maybe the one whose website they’d seen together the day before, but Minho replied that he hadn’t heard anything new and the conversation shifted to Yejun’s own misadventures on the work front. She was ballet trained but she wanted to shift to modern, which didn’t seem so easy. Minho listened, as he let his tendons warm up slowly. Class started, Mrs. Moon told Yeonwoo off again for his terrible use of his head and Minho felt very frustrated. If it were him, being corrected for the same mistake two days in a row, he would wonder if he should be a dance major at all. He tuned out Mrs. Moon’s final comments, too focused on the burn of his legs after being subjected to the same jump routine two days in a row. When he was about to leave, once more, she stopped him. “Lee Minho-ssi,” she said, stern. 

“Yes, seonsaeng-nim?” he turned to her, wondering if he, too, would have to hear the same criticism two days in a row, despite how much he’d focused on jumping just like she’d told him. 

“Good job with the jumps,” she said. Minho tried to keep his face neutral, and not break into a painfully surprised face. “Now you should just relax your shoulders some more,” she said. 

He nodded, thanked her, and moved to get changed for class. Crossing the courtyard, he bumped into Han Jisung, again. He said something like “Hi, hyung,” to which Minho said something like “Have a nice day.”

Then Minho realized he must have been distracted after yesterday’s class, because instead of Dance History 301, it was the same teacher from yesterday, clearly recycling her lesson from yesterday. And Minho was sure that, on Thursdays, they had Dance History, not Nineteenth Century Art History. Anyway, he must have missed some email warning him about this. But at least he would be marked as attending today, too. He elected not to pay attention, in favor of texting back and forth with Changbin. 

are we even sure he’s into men

duh?

so i do have a chance?

i don’t know seo changbin. he may well be gay AND not into you, that’s possible.

i think that’s actually impossible

everyone likes me

okay dude

for the record, i don’t

that’s a different issue

you don’t like anyone

yah!

i don’t have time for liking people rn

sad life you lead

anyway, u free tomorrow?

i should be, it’s friday

i’m always free on fridays

lol hyung

it’s wednesday today

what?

then no

Minho frowned at his phone. How could it be Wednesday? Wasn’t yesterday Wednesday? If yesterday was Wednesday, and Minho was sure of it, then today should be Thursday. That’s how the world works, right? So, if today was Wednesday, yesterday must’ve been Tuesday, and Minho must have been totally out of it the entire day, believing it was Wednesday already. Maybe he just wanted the week to be over so bad that he was skipping days in his head. Well. It was was it was. 

Hip-hop class was fun, again and then he commuted back home and, again, he tried to enjoy the idea of the weekend coming faster. He flipped on the old TV that came with the apartment and let it play in the background, an old movie being broadcasted. Minho didn’t know anything about this movie, but the lead actress was beautiful and the dialogue was stupid. And that was everything he needed to know that he could enjoy it, if he chose to pay attention to it. He washed the dishes, then he grabbed his laptop, opened YouTube and waited for the time his brain actually started falling asleep. 

Minho’s alarm rang, like it did every day, at exactly a quarter past six in the morning. The first thing he did, today, was to check on his phone what the date was. Not just the date. The day . A shiver ran through his spine when he read the three syllables under the date. Wednesday. October. Twelfth. Wednesday. Again. It was outright impossible, there was no way Minho was waking up on Wednesday morning for the third time in a row. But he was sure that yesterday  —  his yesterday, at least  —  was the same day as today. Which sounded crazy. Insane. Mental hospital worthy. He texted Changbin. 

what day is it

am i forgetting something relevant?

isn’t your birthday in like two weeks

day

of the week

which one is it

wednesday?

are you free today? 

no.

i told you yesterday, i’m only fucking free on friday

we didn’t talk at all yesterday

hyung?

u ok?

im great bye

So. Minho had talked to Changbin yesterday. All throughout the class he’d been texting with him. But Changbin didn’t remember. Why? Minho started feeling like breathing was coming fainter and shorter to him. This was madness. Insanity. Was it in his head? Was he hallucinating that he’d already lived through this day twice? Maybe he was making this bigger than it was. Maybe it was all a mistake of sorts, like maybe the phones, the internet or whatever witchcraft made them function, had broken and it kept saying it was Wednesday when it wasn’t. Yeah. Alright. Minho was late for class, so he skipped the coffee stop in his morning routine, choosing to go straight to the rehearsal room. He had a test to run on his classmates. The test was titled: is today the same as yesterday? So he patiently waited for Yejun to show up, and just as she made to speak he started talking.

“Have you heard back from that company?” he asked her. She broke into a smile, her nose curling up. 

“I was about to ask you the same!” she giggled. Minho knew . It was the third time they had this conversation. “They didn’t call me back,” she said, with a sadder expression. Minho tried to come up with something to say, anything , that would give him the sad confirmation that he was living through the same day again. 

“Do you know why I was rejected?” he asked. She shook her head. He’d told her. The first time it had been Wednesday this week. “They said I was too qualified,” he said, in the end. Then he stopped talking, as Yejun kept rambling on about some terrible date she’d had the day before. Minho tried to reason. It looked impossible, but it was happening to him, therefore it was possible. Now, if he was actually living the same day again and again the only thing this could mean was that this was, somehow, a time loop. He tried not to burst out in a hysterical laugh. What the actual fuck? How did he even find himself in a time loop? Minho, ordinary Minho, with his ordinary, borderline boring, life. He would go crazy, if he hadn’t already, that was. How could he survive living the same day over and over again without losing his mind? At least he was lucky this had happened in an age with the Internet, he tried to reason. What if he had to be stuck with the same two TV channels forever. 

Mrs. Moon shook him out of it, starting her ballet class for the day. It was the third time Minho took this very same lesson. And it would be the third occurrence of Mrs. Moon yelling at Yeonwoo. Minho wasn’t up for it, today, but he was also too far from Yeonwoo to whisper something to him. Like “remember to use your head, she’s obsessed about it”. Or “Spot your pirouettes, you dumb bitch.” What he did, instead, was claim that he had to run to the bathroom, in order to skip the following three minutes of the lesson.

He looked at himself in the mirror. His face, round-ish, slightly tanned under a fringe of black hair, looked back at him. “It’s only me, here,” he said, to no one. “They know nothing of what’s happening.” He took a deep breath. If he’d entered the time loop, there should be a way to get out of it. There had to be. 

Minho had fun in Nineteenth Century Art History class. Whatever question the teacher was asking, he remembered the answers from the previous two times. He felt like the top student of this class, and he’d never even opened a book. Okay, see, this was the fun part of being stuck in the same day, living it again and again: he could achieve the perfect Wednesday, if he tried hard enough. He got complimented by the teacher and he smiled through the following three hours. He went to the library and did: absolutely nothing. He napped. It wasn’t like he really had to study, he’d done it the day before, and the one before that. Which were the same day as today. After a while he gathered his stuff once and headed to the rehearsal room for the hip-hop class. He got there earlier, alright, but what else did he have to do? He warmed up, stretched, revised some old work, chatted with classmates. Suddenly it occurred to him that tomorrow would be the same. Until he found a solution, this was all he would do for the rest of his life. A group of people walked into the class, one of them openly scoffing at Minho and the two people close to him as soon as he spotted them.

“Jaesung-ah,” he addressed his classmate, a boy with a terrible attitude Minho tried not to fight with every day. But if he fought with him today, he wouldn’t remember tomorrow. “What’s the matter?” 

The boy squared him up and down, and sighed. “You don’t want to do this, Lee Minho.” But, you see, Minho needed to get some frustration out of his system. So he got up from where he was sitting. 

“Sorry,” he said, also realizing that he was way shorter than this Jaesung kid. If it came to that, Minho would lose. But, time loops should grant that he would wake up unscathed. “I’m just sick and tired of you looking down on us, what’s the issue?”

“It’s not about your little friends,” the asshole specified. Even better. Minho would take so much pleasure in punching him. “It’s about you. I hate that you act like you’re better than everyone. I hate that you never get anything wrong. People like you shouldn’t have it that easy.”

Minho just stared at him. He felt kinda confused. “People like me? Professional dancers?”

Jaesung let out a raspy laugh. “Come on,” he said. “You know what I mean,” Minho had no idea. “You-”

“ Hey ,” Minho’s friend, Yunseo, got herself between them. She threw a puzzled glance at Minho, but then she turned to Jaesung, squaring her shoulders, jutting her chin. She was strong, and looking at her biceps, Minho wouldn’t want to make her angry. “Don’t finish that sentence, Jaesung-ah.” She stated. 

“Or what?” Minho wanted to punch him so bad. Maybe punching him would somehow make it bearable to be in this fucked up loop. “Or noona will make me regret it?” 

Yunseo scoffed. “There’s school rules,” she said, clear-voiced. “I don’t care if you were the top bully at your high school and never got reported for it,” oh . “But this ends here.”

“Your friend Lee Minho picked the fight,” and he was right, but Minho didn’t give a shit about being punished. “And he couldn’t even finish it, he needed you .”

Yunseo sighed. Minho couldn’t see her face very well but he knew she looked angry as hell. Minho wished she hadn’t stepped in. “I could,” Minho said, letting a smile spread on his face. “She’s just making sure you won’t get hurt too bad.”

“ Minho ,” Yunseo looked at him with her eyes wide. He shrugged. “What the fuck?” she mouthed.

Minho smiled wider. “So, what’s people like me ? Huh?” Jaesung’s face fell a bit. “Good students? Good dancers? People who work their ass off?”

Jaesung took one more look at Yunseo, her crossed arms, her fierce stare. Then he looked at Minho. And he rolled his eyes. “Sure,” he said. “Precisely what I meant.” He walked away. Minho let out a sound of frustration. Stupid, righteous, Yunseo. 

“Are you out of your mind?” she said, instantly. “What if he’d hit you?” Minho rolled his eyes at her. Maybe he wanted to have some physical pain to focus on. 

“Noona,” he said, “do you think time paradoxes are real?” 

Her face would have been the funniest ever. Minho only felt despair. “I’m a dancer, Minho. What would I know about it?” Yeah . Exactly. 

“I think I’ve lived this day three times,” he said. She frowned, but she didn’t call him crazy. Not outright. 

“Did you take drugs?” she asked, instead. “Do you need to go to the ER? I can take you. Please, talk to me.” Minho thought that he, too, wanted to forget this conversation. 

Minho kept going to the university. He skipped some classes, well aware that they’d be the same the next day, too, but making sure not to skip the same one twice in a row, afraid that he’d forget parts of the choreographies he was working on if he didn’t keep a sort of regularity. He never skipped the morning ballet class, and then he crossed the yard and holed himself up in the other building. He started looking things up in the library. Time loops, time paradoxes, such things. He spent an entire afternoon making notes while watching Groundhog Day on his laptop. 

“Who could I fall in love with to get myself out of here?” he wondered, aloud, well aware that there was no one else around him like him, able to remember. A girl at his same table in the library looked at him as if to say mood . If only she could understand what he meant. Minho sighed. 

So far he’d gathered the following information: 

1. A time loop is a closed portion of time, with a starting and finishing point. Everything in between these two points repeats ad libitum. 
2. There is no scientifically proven theory about the existence of time loops. Which is bullshit, because Minho is in one, whether a white guy with glasses has developed a formula about it or not.
3. Every film or book or webtoon or whatever made about time loops tackles them in a different way. 

In short. Minho had nothing. He got back to watching Groundhog Day , going through a series of articles explaining the plot of the movie. All of them seemed to agree that the protagonist had been given a “chance” to reflect on his attitude, in order to make it better, through the time loop. To heal himself. 

Minho didn’t need to do that. He didn’t feel like he was a bad person. Or that he had unsolved issues that needed solving before he could go on with his life. If anything, it would be the passing of time that would fix them. He stared at his notes, as if looking at them could change things. 

In the evening, he watched the old movie on TV. He decided that it was a better story than Groundhog Day , even if the woman didn’t marry the lead in the end, and she ended up with a man coming out of nowhere. 

If someone  —  a hypothetical someone, because, realistically, who could ask him that  —  asked him why he kept up his routine even if he’d lived the same Wednesday six times now, Minho would say that he had nothing better to do on a weekday. See, if fate had been nicer to him, he would have got stuck on a Sunday. If fate liked him, anyway, he wouldn’t have gotten stuck at all. So he walked out of the coffee shop and then into ballet class. Today, as he’d done the day before, he stopped Yeonwoo as soon as he appeared, and told him to pay extra attention to spotting his turns correctly. Yeonwoo was surprised, but Minho held his gaze peacefully. Mrs. Moon didn’t yell, Minho was happy. And then he got praised for his good memory and for his attention to detail. He was cheating, but she had no way of knowing that. 

Minho went easily through his dance class, washed up, changed into his clean clothes and repacked his bag. He’d been happy to notice that every morning he could get the same clean clothes, because the day would be completely reset, except for his memory. This was definitely a nice benefit: he never had to do laundry. He connected his earphones to the phone and walked across the courtyard, well-determined to walk out of the building, once he’d reached it and go back home or something. It was actually useless to stay in class today. The people he crossed on this little walk were literally always the same. He got ready to watch Boy With Gray Hoodie apologize to Girl With Ponytail on his right. And, as if on cue, “I’m really sorry,” Boy With Gray Hoodie said. Minho anticipated in his head Girl With Ponytail’s answer: “You’re just an asshole!” Back to Boy With Gray Hoodie: “But I really love you,” Minho loved that he knew it by heart already. Some day he would stop them and ask what that was about. Now was the turn of Girl With Broken Backpack, she would lose a sheet in 3, 2, 1… “Excuse me, unnie,” this was Girl Who Blushes, “You lost this!” And now, Han Jisung, lining up to say- 

“Looking good, Minho hyung!”

No.

His line was: “Hi, hyung.” And Minho was going to reply: “Have a nice day.” 

Minho stopped in his tracks. He turned to face Han Jisung. He looked unbothered, still going on about his way. “You didn’t say Hi ,” Minho said, forcing the voice to come out of his throat. “You always say hi, hyung .”

Jisung turned to look at him, a smile playing on his lips. He looked amused. Minho’s mind wasn’t keeping up. “Today’s different, I guess,” Jisung shrugged. “I went with a variation.” Minho would have found him insufferable, but he didn’t have the mental capacity to process the frustrating sensation that usually accompanied Jisung’s presence. 

Minho blurted out something that might have him sent to a madhouse. “No. I’ve lived today six times. You- you always say hi, hyung .” He felt crazy. More than usual. 

Jisung laughed. “What the fuck,” he said, and Minho knew he sounded insane, but could this kid please not be so arrogant? “Me, too. I thought I was the only one,” he continued, and he changed Minho’s life.

It took a while for Minho to find the words. He felt like he'd been standing in the middle of the courtyard for hours, when he finally managed to say something. “I thought I was the only one too,” Minho said. And then he thought that possibly there were countless people like them, because it was highly unlikely that two people who already knew each other could be the only ones stuck in a time loop. 

“Do you want some pizza?” Jisung said. 

“It’s ten AM,” Minho replied. Jisung shrugged again, his battered backpack swaying with the movement. 

“Brunch,” Jisung elaborated. “It’s popular, I hear.”

Minho felt a smile spread on his face. He was so fucking relieved. “It wasn’t a no, Jisung-ah,” he said. Jisung’s smile was really bright. Minho didn’t know he could be so happy about having to spend time with Jisung, of all people. But here he was. Life had become really unpredictable, for a day that repeated the same in a loop. 

“Do you know a place?” Jisung asked, as he got closer to Minho, moving his skate from one hand to the other.

“It was you who suggested pizza,” Minho half-protested, but he was already unlocking his phone to look something up. He could see Jisung smile sheepishly in the corner of his eye. 

They were sitting at this tiny table, with a slice of pizza each, trying to make sense of whatever was going on. And failing. Minho was surprisingly relaxed, and it was weird, even for his own standards. He should have panicked about this whole situation. He should have felt a sense of loss, of mourning. But all he’d felt was that he had to adapt to it, in order to eventually get out of it. And now Jisung, Han Jisung, the person whom he’d never really become friends with, was sitting in front of him and was spewing a lot of nonsense about how time loops are physically impossible or something. What did Jisung know about physics anyway? “Are you a Nobel Prize candidate or something?” Minho asked, still chewing on pizza in the meantime. Maybe he was a disgusting man. Maybe he didn’t care either way.

Jisung laughed. Loud. Minho had the sudden thought that both of them would remember this conversation the next day. Amazing, how such a stupid, obvious thing can be life-changing in this context. “ Hyung ,” he whined, a large smile still on his face. “I studied. Like, for real. Ever since I knew I was stuck in a loop, I tried to understand what’s happening.” 

Yeah, Minho, too. But, clearly, Minho was kinda stupid, if compared to Jisung. “I only watched some movies about it,” Minho muttered. And he bit into the pizza once more. “And then I kept attending the same dance class because I wanted to be the best one to do everything. And I couldn’t let this advantage go, you know.”

Jisung snorted. “Why do we never hang out?” he asked. Minho thought that it wouldn’t be nice to tell him that he just felt like they were completely incompatible. That Minho only used to talk to him out of courtesy and because they were both close with Changbin. “Like, it took us this supernatural happening to talk to each other for, like, ten minutes.”

Minho hummed. Jisung wasn’t wrong. And Jisung wasn’t even that bad, to start with. “Great, now that we’ve started talking to each other and promised each other to be best friends forever, maybe tomorrow will finally be Thursday.” Minho didn’t know if he was joking or not.

“You really want to be friends?” Jisung’s eyes were really big. And he looked like he was a sort of cartoon animal. Or cartoon child. Anyway. Minho didn’t have a real answer about this. “Well,” he said, smiling. “If being your friend gets me out of this, then yes.” Now he was joking. And, somehow, Jisung caught onto it and laughed, shaking his head. 

It was more or less okay. They skipped their afternoon classes to run back and forth some ideas, trying to figure out how to get back to their normal lives. Somehow, they didn’t do any of it. Jisung insisted they should take advantage of the sunny day. “It’s literally always sunny,” Minho said. “It’s literally always going to be sunny, it’s the same day over and over.” Jisung ignored him and dragged him to an outdoor café on campus that Minho had never seen before. Five minutes after they tried reasoning about how time works, on a physics level, Jisung started narrating how he’d noticed he was in a loop because his files on his computer weren’t updated with the day’s progress. 

“I thought my computer was leaving me,” he looked really passionate while telling this, and Minho found himself compelled to listen to him. “I would wake up and bam , everything I’d recorded or done was gone. Frustrating, right?”

Minho nodded. “I noticed because I took the same class three times,” he said, quietly. And Jisung’s eyes went wide, once more. 

“What?” Jisung was laughing, and Minho didn’t think he was that funny, but okay. “ Three times? Didn’t it hit you on the second iteration?”

“I’m sorry,” Minho said, faking his regret. “I’m really sorry I didn’t immediately think about the chance I was stuck in a time loop. You know, the thing that always happens to everyone, and they always tell you about it and then you’re very ready to go through.” By the end of this, he was also laughing. “Shit, this is all so absurd.”

“Yeah,” Jisung said. “I don’t really like being out,” he said, suddenly. “But this shit is, fuck. It’s already suffocating and it’s been like six days? And I don’t know how long it will take to get out of it and I don’t deal well with, you know, things where I don’t have an out.”

Minho had never talked to Jisung like this. And it would be unusual to get to this depth of conversation in such a short time, but it was also true that nothing about this situation was usual. Minho, himself, felt like he was unusual. And maybe Jisung was, too. 

“I mean,” Minho said, ventilating the hypothesis as he was saying it, “we don’t have to go to class every day. We could go do other things, too. What would happen if we took a plane to a different country?” Jisung’s eyes were very fixed on him. Minho discovered that he didn’t mind the attention. “What would happen if we went to Jeju island tomorrow morning?” 

“Do you want to go to Jeju?” Jisung’s voice was small. 

“No,” Minho replied, honest. “I don’t care about Jeju, nor going to Japan or anything. I’m just saying. We could go to the National Library.”

“And do what?” Jisung replied. Minho sighed. 

“Get you your Nobel Prize,” he said. Jisung smiled. Minho laughed, letting out a big sigh, once more. “Have you tried understanding if our friends are like us?”

Jisung frowned slightly, then he seemed to grasp what Minho meant. “Changbin hyung sends me the same text every day,” he said, annoyed. Minho nodded emphatically. “Chan hyung resurrects at 12PM and keeps texting about the same two issues, so he’s out of the question, too.”

Minho chipped in. “Hyunjin, too. No use.” 

Jisung took a deep breath. “So it’s you and me,” he said. And he wasn’t looking at Minho. Ouch. 

“I’m not the brightest head around, I’m sorry,” Minho said. “I don’t know how useful I can be in getting us out of here.” Jisung looked at him once again, biting his lower lip in an anxious gesture. 

“I’m not a genius either,” Jisung said, lying. Minho knew enough about him to know this was a complete falsehood. Jisung, who had graduated early from high school. Jisung, who was a great musician. Jisung, who always read a lot about everything before even trying to write anything about it. 

Still, he pretended to believe him. “Then we’re stuck here for eternity,” Minho said, relaxing into his chair. “It’s like growing old together, except we won’t ever get old. Oh, this is actually nice. No wrinkles, no grays. No old age pains. I could live like that.” Jisung was looking at him weird. “Don’t you want to be with me forever?” Minho laughed. 

Jisung sighed. “I mean,” he said. “There could be worse people to be stuck with,” he said. Minho agreed, wholeheartedly. “But I kinda would have liked to see us grow old,” he added, completely insanely. “Together.”

Minho just stared at him. “Jisung.”

“Yeah?”

Why was Minho feeling like that? Like Jisung had said something relevant but he wasn’t getting what he was saying? “I want to eat bulgogi.”

“Now?!” Jisung was incredulous. Then he shrugged. “Okay, let’s go.”

Every day  —  or, to be more exact, every new repetition of the same day  —  Minho got up, took his ballet class, and then he met Jisung. They were trying to compile a list of all the possible solutions to the loop they were stuck in. Minho wasn’t a fan of lists or generally well-organized things, he was tidy, but that ended there. He liked spontaneity, and all that To-Do stuff and planning and organizing his friends seemed to be fond of looked suffocating. But Jisung had suggested they came up with a list of hypotheses and they were trying to. It didn’t help that the list never survived to the next day, but, you know, at least it kept them occupied. “We might have to save someone’s life,” Jisung said, completely serious, as he clicked repeatedly on his mousepad. 

“I think that’ll take us forever to understand,” Minho said. “I think there are way too many accidents in Seoul in one day.”

“Yeah, but, you know , that’d be so cool,” Minho laughed at Jisung’s words, earning himself a judgy look from a kid at another table in the library. “Like, can you imagine, we’d get to tell everyone we know that we had this misadventure and we got out of it by saving a life .” 

Minho had no heroic aspirations, he just wanted to be a dancer. He shrugged. “At that point, though, anything goes. Like, maybe we have to help the police solve a crime, or commit a crime ourselves. Woah , can we commit a crime?”

Jisung looked at him weird. Well, maybe it was understandable, given what Minho was suggesting, but it came out of a good reasoning. They weren’t going to be caught: the day would reset, and Minho would get to know what robbing a bank felt like. It’s an experience everyone should have. Helps you grow. “What kind of crime?”

Minho didn’t even try to stop the giggle coming out of his throat. “Ah, Jisung-ah, you really are my new favorite person,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to commit arson,” Jisung’s eyes widened, and his mouth fell open. “But I also think that robbing a bank would be super easy given the circumstances. You’d just have to watch what the employees and security do for one day, and the next you can already act. Isn’t it amazing?”

Jisung looked perplexed. Then he shook his head. “Do you know your eyes sparkle when you talk about being a criminal?” Minho laughed again. What could he say, it was a dream like any other. 

“Are you rejecting my suggestion, Han Jisung?” Minho wasn’t actually worried about being told off. Jisung liked when he said stupid stuff, and Minho, too, liked saying stupid stuff in front of Jisung, because Jisung never lectured him, or judged him. He just gave into whatever insanity Minho would sprout and that was it. 

Jisung scrolled the search page on his laptop once more. “We could also try to work through our personal issues keeping us stuck and see if, by solving them, we manage to break free of the cycle.”

“I don’t have personal issues,” Minho replied. “I am a simple man.”

Jisung stared at him, his eyebrows raised. “You’re insane, Lee Minho.” Minho smiled right back at him, winking in the process. He was actually very boring, right now, but his mind was kinda wild, if he allowed it to be. 

The list of possible way outs included: saving someone’s life, committing crimes (although Jisung wasn't very keen on this), psychoanalyzing the shit out of themselves (Minho hated the option), helping someone random get over some obstacle in their daily life, trying out every single coffee option at the campus bar, spending all their money on something really stupid just to see how it’d feel (but, if it worked, they’d be penniless), trying to make everyone of their friends really happy (Minho thought this was dumb, and childish, and very cool if one were to write a Christmas movie), making sure their parents had good pension plans.

“Won’t a tarot reading help?” Minho said, at a certain point. It was the fifteenth tarot-related TikTok that had shown up on Jisung’s phone, which Minho was looking at, too, because they were splayed on a couch in a relaxing area of the uni. 

“Aren’t you an atheist?” Jisung didn’t even turn to look at him. They were comfortable, like that. 

“That’s because religions are boring and complicated and mostly homophobic,” he said. “But time loops exist, so maybe tarots can work, too.”

Jisung hummed. “Keeping your options open,” he said. “Why do you care they’re homophobic?”

Minho groaned. They had mutual friends, Jisung should’ve been informed, so that Minho didn’t have to explain his life to him. Wasn’t that how talking about people worked? You introduce someone to someone else and you tell them: this is Minho, he studies dance, he is obsessed with his cats and he’s gay as hell. The end. “Because I’m a selfish bitch,” he said. “And I like to feel welcomed, you know.”

Jisung seemed to consider his answer for a while, as if Minho had said something worth reflecting on and not just the first thing out of his head. “But you’d go for a tarot reading,” he said, in the end. Minho just sighed. 

“Just to try it,” Minho smiled. 

The next day  —  the next iteration, as Jisung had started saying, because, apparently, if you used the right words everything was different, or so he was saying, but Minho didn’t necessarily believe him  —  they had a mission. Change as many things as you can. 

Minho didn’t get up at six, he got up at seven. Seven thirty, even. Rebellious behavior, clearly meant to make him skip his dance class and start his day in a totally different way. He cooked himself breakfast, wore jeans and a sweater and left his training clothes at home. Jisung’s phone call caught him as he was going down the subway stairs. “Hi,” he said, “I kinda feel guilty for not going to class. Shall we go do something useful?”

Jisung laughed. His laughter was nice, it was quiet and honest and it always caught Minho by surprise. “I’m not going to campus,” he said. “Do you want to learn to skate?”

Minho thought he was going to break his neck, and with the luck he had he would probably not die and the pain would linger through the next iteration. “Are you going to be able to teach me to?”

Jisung was waiting for him in front of a deserted skate park. Minho had ignored the very existence of this place until now, which said everything about his interest in skating. Still, they had to pass the time, and who knew if the reason why Minho had to live through the same day over and over again wasn’t learning how to skate. Maybe Jisung’s reason would be having to teach him. And maybe that would explain why they were stuck together. Jisung’s hair was falling a bit into his eyes, and he was wearing a very large sweatshirt that made him look like he was too small for it, and maybe too small to be a grown adult, but Minho thought that he should keep this opinion for himself. “Do you know how to perform CPR?” he asked, first thing. 

Jisung stared at him, before smiling very widely. “Not really,” he said. Minho thought he should tell him, as nicely as he could, that he wasn’t going to jump on a skate. It was too dangerous, Minho was a very easily-scared man, and the time loop thing might suck, but not as much as the idea of dying at twenty-five. “But I’ve heard that if I call the 119 they’ll guide me through it.”

Minho felt a headache grow behind his eyebrows. He frowned. “You better not let me get killed, alright?” 

Jisung tried to teach him how to stand on the skateboard. It was already hard. Minho kept losing his balance, and it was infuriating because he trained in ballet every day and he didn’t even like ballet that much but it was supposed to help you with your core strength, but, clearly, it wasn’t helpful in the slightest. Jisung was laughing his ass off, and it made Minho want to just yell and give up and go back home. He was a dancer. A dancer . Not a fucking skater. Jisung got a bit closer, his eyes turned upwards in unshakeable laughter. He had no right to look like he was having the best day of his life, while Minho was struggling to save his dignity altogether. “Can I?” Jisung asked. What was he even asking? If he could make fun of Minho? Because the answer was no, but he was already doing that, and what even was the point in asking- Jisung’s fingers got closer to Minho’s waist and: oh. This was what he was asking. Minho nodded. Jisung was steadying him a bit, telling him to push himself with his foot and helping him get the feel of balancing himself on the board. Okay. Minho might be able to do this, without dying. Or, at least, without dying from hitting his head, because having Jisung’s hands on his hips was a bit weird. Not weird enough to die from it, but if Minho didn’t focus on something else, well. 

“Show me how good you are,” he said, stepping off the instrument of the devil that almost slipped under his feet as he was dismounting it. Truly, who ever had thought that skateboards could be something worth inventing and making famous. Jisung raised his eyebrows. “Aren’t you known for your skating skills?”

“You’ve heard that about me?” Jisung shot back, and maybe he looked good in the way he tried to sound cocky. Minho could admit it, it wouldn’t hurt him, Jisung was cool, and he was rather easy to spend time with, and, if Minho were not forced to spend every iteration with him, and if this was just a normal day in a normal life, and if tomorrow was going to be a different day, Minho would indulge a bit longer in the fantasy of finding Jisung hot, and pretty, and ultimately very, very , cool. But, since they had to see each other, and only each other, all the time, this was not a very wise train of thought. 

“No, Jisung-ah,” he said, “I’ve heard you say that about you. At Changbin’s house, when Hyunjin brought up the subject of your really unfashionable shoes, and you objected that they were comfortable for skating.” It had been the first time Minho had met him, possibly. Which meant that it had happened around two years prior? More or less. And Minho remembered, distinctly, this piece of conversation. And he remembered, also distinctly, that he’d thought that this Jisung sounded like he was really full of himself. And then Seungmin had started complaining about something, and Minho’s mind had been taken elsewhere. 

Now, though, Jisung was staring at him, a bit bewildered. “How do you remember that,” he said, and it wasn’t even voiced as a question. Minho shrugged, which didn’t stop Jisung from looking at the ground, his shoulders tensing up. “Okay, maybe that was a stupid thing to say back then,” he argued. “But I was with all these new people and I had to look interesting, okay?”

Minho laughed. It sounded so idiotic and so normal, and he thought that he kinda missed seeing all their friends together. “You just looked dumb,” he said, shrugging again. “It’s okay, though. Show me how good you are for real.”

Jisung was good. Not that Minho had ever doubted it, what with how natural everything seemed to come to Jisung. Jisung looked like he could do anything he set his mind to. Writing music, singing and recording songs, getting good grades, being the best friend Changbin could ever have, according to Changbin, at least, skating like it wasn’t Satan’s favorite way to ensure humans got hurt. Minho watched him roll up and down the slopes of the skate park with utter ease, as if it was the most natural thing to do. Minho knew nothing of skating, didn’t know the names of the varied, complex, dangerous , jumps he did, but Jisung landed every single one of them, and then he came back to Minho, smiling in the same cocky way as before. Minho wondered if he’d been brought here to be impressed by Jisung, like, on purpose. Then he told himself that, whatever the answer, it didn’t change that they were living through the same Wednesday for the seventeenth time. “How was I?” Jisung asked.

“I guess you were decent,” Minho replied. And then he laughed, because Jisung’s eyes had turned completely round at his answer and it was, honestly, hilarious. “Our Jisungie is so good at skating,” he said, and he made it sound totally lifeless. 

“Hyung,” Jisung looked a little hurt. “I worked very hard to impress you.”

Minho leaned back, his arms stretched behind him, as he sat on the edge of one of the park’s slopes. He looked at Jisung, his lean body, his very expressive face, his smart eyes. “Oh, but I’m hard work, Han Jisung,” he said. And he hoped that, somehow, Jisung got what he meant and broke the energy of the conversation, that was becoming flirtier and flirtier and Minho didn’t want it, because, again, on normal Wednesdays, he wouldn’t have spared a glance at Jisung, and this was an exception, and this was unfair, to both of them. He hoped Jisung gave up, he hoped he, himself, could stop caring. “I’m the hardest to impress, and I get bored easily, and I don’t know anything about skateboarding. Also, I never compliment anyone, and-”

“Stop,” Jisung was still smiling. No, he was smiling again , this time fuller and brighter and Minho thought that it wasn’t fair, because he was trying to tell Jisung to only focus on getting the two of them out of this madness. And Jisung, instead, was being cute. Minho had been fine with the idea of spending his upcoming eternity living though the same day over and over. Would he still be fine if, in addition to that, he started thinking that he and Jisung could become something more than the relaxed friends they’d become in the last nine Wednesdays? “Hyung,” Jisung went on. “I won’t let you get bored. Let’s go,” he said, and Minho allowed him to pull him up. Jisung tried to get him to skate again, but they didn’t get any result. Minho was not going to become a skater, that much was evident, but Jisung was having fun, and, in the end, Minho was having fun, too. Not because he was skating, no. But because it was fun, being out and doing something different, with someone not that much different, but also with the only person who could be different, in a situation where everything was forced to stay the same. 

“So,” Minho said, as they were waiting for a bus to get closer to where they lived. Not that they lived in the same neighborhood, but they were both far from home now. “You have to let me teach you dance, now.”

Jisung laughed. “Alright,” he said. “Be prepared, I will either be the best or the worst student you’ve ever had.” Minho rolled his eyes at him, and went back to stare at the road. 

When Minho came back home he was sure that this had been the most unusual day he’d had in a while, which was a bold statement, given that he’d found out he was stuck living the same Wednesday just a few days before. Somehow, that didn’t even come close to the sense of disorientation of today. He lingered in front of his door, as if it was too much to cross that threshold with such a mess in his head. It wasn’t like something hyperbolic had happened, but the shift had been there, enough to make Minho wonder if life would always be like this. Jisung had taken a place in his days, and it was unthinkable that tomorrow could be a different day than the same Wednesday and Minho would have to go back to only saying hi to Jisung in the quad. They could still be friends, after, right? Minho could ask Jisung to go eat beef or fried chicken with him, even if they got out of the loop. So. Okay, they would break this loop, and then things would go on as usual, but with some improvement, too. 

“Oh, hi,” Minho turned to see a skinny kid getting out of the next-door unit. He knew there was a new tenant of the place, but he’d never met them. Minho’s regular schedule hadn’t allowed for that. Now he realized that his neighbor was possibly just a bit younger than him.

“Hi,” Minho said, turning to greet the kid in full. “You’re the new resident, right?”

The kid smiled, nodding. He also bowed a bit, which was totally foreign to Minho, did he look that old? “Yeah,” the neighbor said. “Yang Jeongin,” he added. “That’s my name. I came from Busan to study.” 

Minho nodded, it sounded quite a normal arrangement. Minho, too, had moved closer to his university, because with his ten thousand dance classes it was impossible to commute back and forth every day. “I’m Minho. Lee. Lee Minho,” he laughed of his own clumsiness. “What do you study?”

Jeongin looked at his own shoes. “Uhm,” he said. Minho’s eyebrows shot up. “Fashion,” Jeongin half whispered. He was one of Hyunjin’s juniors? Amazing. What were the chances. He had to tell this to Hyunjin immediately. He would tell him every iteration until it finally stuck. 

“ Ah, ” Minho was excited. “My best friend studies fashion, he’s older than you, I think. Were you going somewhere? Do you want to come in?” Minho might have gone completely insane, but it looked like this Jeongin who lived next to him was a cool kid to befriend. 

“Oh,” Jeongin smiled. He had a nice smile, warm. “Honestly, I already had plans tonight? But, you know what, leave me your number, Lee Minho hyung. We’ll make plans, maybe this weekend?” Oh . Yeah. Minho forced a smile out of himself. Jeongin would wake up one day and live through a Thursday, thinking that yesterday had just been the only Wednesday of the week. Minho hoped he could remember to cross into him deliberately. 

“Yeah,” he said, a bit too cheerfully. “You can text me tomorrow.”

minho-ssi, lee minho hyung, i’m glad i brought you skating today

are you home?

jisungie!

yeah, sorry, i ran into a new neighbor

oh!!

see, a day full of new things!! 

do you want to do this tomorrow, too?

i think i need tomorrow to be normal, if it’s wed again

unless you promise to let me commit a crime!!!!

????

a minor one

>:(

hahahhahahahahhahha

skip the morning class minho! let’s go for a fancy breakfast

oh?

do you know that there is a movie on tv that i’ve watched every day

you should watch it

i want to know what you think about it

i think she shouldn’t have married that guy

she should have fallen in love with that other man, i liked him better

did you

just spoil me the whole movie before i even watched it?

can you just watch it?

i still want your opinion.

also tomorrow i want to go meet some of our friends

they won’t remember tho

but okay let’s go

did i ask you to come along?

hyung.

if you watch that movie i’ll tell you who i’ll meet and when 

jesus, you ARE a lot of work. 

okay, turning the tv on.

Minho waited for Changbin to show up at the campus lunch hall. He was late. Had something happened to him? But, no, nothing ever happened to him. So, unless Jisung had gone and fucked up Changbin’s schedule on purpose, he should be okay. Or not, because it was still a deviation from the fixed structure to go to lunch with Changbin. 

“Hello!” Changbin had materialized behind him. Minho thought he would have a heart attack. “Sorry, your sudden invitation threw me off, let’s go, I’m starving.”

Minho didn’t let him talk, he started telling him all about a series of things that couldn’t have possibly happened since they’d last seen each other. But, in Minho’s warped timeline, they had. He told him that he’d met the new neighbor, that he’d aced the jump combination in dance class, that he’d visited a couple new cafés and all. He kinda left out Jisung. He didn’t know how to explain Jisung. 

Jisung walked in, making it look casual, as if Minho hadn’t texted him to join them a bit later, and Minho watched Changbin turn into a version of himself that always smiled and looked like the fondest friend ever. Changbin, after all, was Jisung’s biggest fan. He’d always been. 

“Hyung!” Jisung said, to Changbin. “Minho hyung!” to Minho. He looked like he didn’t know how to act. This was insane. In Changbin’s perception, they weren’t friends, they’d barely talked three times, never on their own, always awkwardly. 

“Jisungie, Minho-ssi was telling me that he went to your favorite cafè, he never knew it existed.” Yeah, because Jisung had brought him there. 

Jisung looked at him, then back at Changbin. “Fancy that.” What? Jisung’s laughter was as awkward as it’d always been. 

“Yeah, right,” Minho said. “Maybe I’ll get going,” he couldn’t do this. It didn’t make sense.

Changbin protested with a loud groan. “Come on,” he insisted. “You always avoid Jisungie,” he pointed out.

“I don’t,” Minho was quick to react. “I truly don’t. I spend a lot of time with Jisung-ah,” why was he even this upset. “Tell him.”

Jisung’s eyes were round, but then he laughed. “It’s fine, Changbin hyung. Minho and I see each other all the time, our class schedules are really similar.” He turned to look at Minho. “So, you’re going to class now?”

Minho felt cornered. “Of course I am.” He left them, he didn’t go to class. He wanted to hit something.

The iterations went like this. Minho would wake up, he would text Jisung, their chat empty, every morning, as if they’d never talked to each other before. Jisung would tell him his ideas for the day, Minho would reply with his own. They’d go do the things they’d planned. Repeat. So far, they’d ordered all possible combinations of coffee and pastry at the college cafè, the barista totally unaffected by the increasingly insane orders they put her through with every passing iteration. They spent hours and days walking through every single park they could manage to come up with, not because there was a point, but because it was always nice out, and they liked the feeling of the sunshine on their skin. They rode buses and subways and they visited places, and they talked to people who had no idea they were living through a loop, and they made fun of their friends in whichever way they could, by telling them the most insane things ever, with the certainty that they would forget them by the end of the day. They’d told Chan that Jisung had been selected for a rock band, Chan had gone insane, already begging him to please let him produce at least one of their songs, just once, just to get his name out there. Minho had convinced Changbin that Hyunjin had agreed to go out with him, and would see him the next day. Maybe it’d been cruel. But, honestly, he had talked to Hyunjin about it, before texting Changbin. And Hyunjin had said nothing about the following day, but he’d gotten really shy and he’d said: “Oh,” and then. “It should be him who asks, though?” and then. “But if he needs any incentive to ask, tell him I’d say yes. It’s just, you know, a formality.” Which really had warmed Minho’s heart, but also it had kinda broken it, because all this was  —  well  —  an impossibility. Not until he and Jisung found a way out. But finding a way out was impossible. 

“I miss my parents,” Minho said, one day. It was still early in the day, Jisung wasn’t even out of his room, yet, Minho was talking to him through a video call. “Let’s go visit them.”

“Won’t they be working?” Jisung countered, rationally. Minho considered his options. He wanted to go home, he wanted to ask his mom what she’d do if she were in his shoes. He wanted to hug his dad and have him tell him: Minho-yah, you can always count on us, but please cut your hair. 

“They’ll take a day off,” he said, in the end. “If I ask them, they’ll do it.” So they took a bus, and then a taxi, because buses didn’t quite reach the area his family lived in. Jisung had been brought along, not because Minho thought that they had to spend every single minute together, every single day. Because he wanted Jisung to meet his parents, mainly. Because Minho had a great relationship with them, and he wanted his new friend to see them, to know what they were like. And because he felt like Jisung could do with some homemade affection right now. How he knew that? Better not to focus on that. Jisung was somewhat nervous when they stepped out of the taxi, and he kept blabbering on about how he’d never been to this side of the city, and how cool it looked, and should he have brought something for Minho’s parents? “Jisung-ah,” Minho interrupted him, putting his hands on his shoulders, “Even if they hated you, which they won’t, they won’t remember anything when they wake up.” Jisung nodded, a shy smile spreading on his face, as he shook out of Minho’s grip. 

“I’m not nervous,” he said. Yeah. Right. Not at all. Minho sighed, and rang his mom’s bell. 

Jisung fit into Minho’s family home like he was meant to be there. And it should have scared Minho a lot, instead, he let himself observe it quietly. Jisung had immediately been befriended by two out of three cats, the third not leaving Minho’s side not even by mistake. This had made Jisung joke that he’d won, he’d attracted the highest number of cats, and Minho had thought that in another world he could have told him you’re missing one, you attracted three. There’s me . But this wasn’t the reality in which he could say this, so he’d kept quiet, and he’d started chatting with his mother. He’d missed her, and she’d missed him, too, although their perceptions of time weren’t aligned. She was Minho’s favorite person, and she’d bought all of his favorite foods to cook for lunch, and Minho wanted to cry a bit, because he didn’t deserve all this love, and yet he wanted it and craved it. 

“Hyung,” Jisung materialized in the kitchen, where Minho was stirring sauce in a pot. Minho’s mom was cutting onions on his side. “Can I help in any way?”

“You can keep talking to dad,” Minho’s mom replied, before Minho could say something about laying the table. He turned to his mom with the widest eyes. Jisung looked at him, similarly confused. Still, he shrugged and went back to the living room. 

Minho was still looking at his mother. “Mom?” he said. “What was that?”

She smiled. She resumed cutting, this time she was cutting cabbage. “Your father likes to talk about music, and your friend likes music,” she explained. It was no explanation at all. “Will we be seeing him often, Minho?”

Minho felt like the world was stopping. It was as delicate a way to pose the question as there could be. Still, it was a very frightening question. “I don’t know,” he said, carefully. “Would you like to?”

His mom laughed, hitting him playfully with a dishcloth. “It’s not about me, baby,” she said, still laughing. “It’s about what you like. And I think he makes the cut, doesn’t he?” Minho considered the question. It was intrinsically impossible to answer, with Jisung just in the next room. He couldn’t separate his true thoughts from the anxiety of being heard. But, his mom had asked, so he was going to at least try and reply. The problem was that he didn’t know, in all honesty. He did like Jisung, of course. He would have found a way to get rid of him if that wasn’t the case. But, did he like it in the sense his mother meant? 

“Maybe,” he said. “But it’s still early,” he added. And he found that he meant it, that he really needed some more time. Wasn’t it ironic? All they had was time precisely. “Do you think I’ll be able to find an answer?”

His mom stopped doing whatever she’d started doing. “I think you will,” she said. “But now tell your friend to help you set the table.” 

It went well. It did. And then Minho couldn’t think about anything else: his mother’s questions, Jisung’s happy smile when Minho’s dad drove them back to the bus stop, the hug both his parents gave Jisung, Jisung in his home, Jisung in his life. Jisung. Jisung . He didn’t go home, not straight away. He walked and walked until his legs ached and he felt like he had finally outrun his thoughts. It would be okay, he thought. It had to. He would keep seeing Jisung, wasting their days together, and if a revelation had to happen, then it would. And, if they were lucky, they would break this loop, and if they weren’t they would be together inside it until they got bored of each other. 

hyunggg

you promised me you’d teach me to dance

jisungie!!!!!! do you want to learn how to dance?

ballet or hip hop?

hip hop

duh

do i look like a ballet guy what would i even do i’d look ridiculous

i’d love to see you at the barre :) 

but okay i got hiphop class at 6

what?

i’m not coming to your pro class 

suit yourself

i’m not giving you another chance though han jisung

what 

the 

fuck

Jisung showed up wearing jeans. And it was already too funny to be true, Minho just handed him a pair of his sweatpants and left him to change. His classmates weren’t even surprised, sometimes people did bring guests to classes. It was not unusual, but, usually, the guests were also dancers. Jisung, instead, claimed that he’d never set foot in a dance class. Or on a dance floor, whether a linoleum covered, mirror-lined, dance academy one, or an alcohol-sticky, overcrowded club one. Minho waited for him to walk into the room, then he, too, started warming up with the others. 

“Jisung-ah,” he said, signaling him to join him. “Move a bit and loosen your muscles.”

“Which muscles?” Jisung grinned. “I’m not muscly.”

Minho felt himself walk straight into the trap lying in front of him. Yet, he couldn’t stop. “And what’s this, then?” he said, and he was already spreading his fingers around Jisung’s bicep. Which was large. And Minho had noticed, a while ago, too. Jisung had the decency to blush. Minho smiled at him. He slapped him on his butt, too. “Warm up, Hannie.”

“ Hey ,” Jisung sounded like he didn’t expect it, and like it kinda embarrassed him, too. Minho raised one eyebrow. 

“It’s a dancer thing,” he said, and if no one else in the room was doing anything similar, that was not Minho’s problem. Jisung managed to follow the class, with little to no problems. And it should have angered Minho to no end, because he’d been studying and practicing for years, since he was a child. And yet he was amazed, and he felt somewhat drunk on Jisung’s sheer talent in everything he did. He wanted to spend all his time basking in the pure light that he emanated, and he was sure that it was evident in the way he was looking at him, because he felt breathless just by looking at his thin frame, collecting praise from the teacher. 

“Do you want to stay a bit longer?” he asked Jisung, when the classroom had been vacated by everyone except for them. 

“Can you show me how you dance, hyung?” Jisung replied. “I couldn’t watch as much as I’d have liked.” Minho blinked. Once. Twice. It was almost too much. He moved to the center of the room. He let go of everything, he knew how to do that, it was his job, performing was his life. And so he did, but Jisung’s stare was always on him and it was maddening because it was fuel to his dancing and he wanted to be watched like this forever. He wrapped it up, and, wiping sweat from his forehead, he went to get his water bottle. Jisung anticipated him, holding it out for him. Minho took it silently. He waited for Jisung to say something, anything that would distract him from thinking that he was going insane about Jisung.

“No one moves like you do,” Jisung said. Minho stopped breathing. “You dance like you could move mountains with it.” 

Minho was struck. By the words, certainly, but mostly by Jisung’s expression as he was saying them. He’d never looked like this. Honest, transparent and wide-eyed as if he couldn’t believe what he was saying, either. “I-” Minho said. What would he say? He had no idea. “It’d be amazing if I had dancing superpowers,” he heard himself say. “But, alas, I’m a very normal, very basic person.” 

Jisung didn’t change expression. Minho waited. “You’re not basic, Minho,” he said. 

Minho wanted to teleport elsewhere and to yell into the void. “Thank you?”

When they parted, Minho realized that he was hoping that the loop never broke. Not now, at least. He needed tomorrow to be identical to today, too, please, just once more. Because he needed to talk to Changbin. And he needed him to forget what he was going to tell him. He showed up at his house, without warning whatsoever. Changbin still lived with his parents, it was close enough to the university and the house was objectively beautiful, all fancy floors and expensive furniture. Minho toed off his shoes as soon as the door opened: Changbin was only frowning slightly. Minho silently followed him to his room, stopping shortly on the living room’s door to say hi to his parents, who were watching TV. Changbin closed the door behind them. He was standing with his back to it, studying Minho with his clever, all-seeing, eyes. “So, what’s with you, hyung?”

Minho plopped down on the mattress, bouncing a bit on it, with the way he’d just let his knees give out. “Han Jisung,” he said, with no preamble. “He confuses me.”

Changbin was ostensibly guarding his expression. He didn’t react to Minho’s words, at all. He just moved, in silence, until he reached his chair  —  not the one in front of the desk, no, a whole armchair he kept in his rich boy room  —  and he sat down. “How so?”

Minho silently prayed that, for real, once more, the loop rebooted itself. “I’ve been spending a lot of time with him,” he said. “Like. A lot.”

Changbin sighed. “And?” Minho wished he could put it into words better. He wished he could tell him: from the time I wake up, until I go to bed, I’m with him, either in practice or in theory. But this was too incompatible with the version of reality Changbin knew. 

“He’s like the only person I see, aside from going to classes, and talking to you. But. I don’t understand it,” he said. “I used to not stand him, and now-” he sighed. “Now he’s always by my side, and I don’t mind it. I kinda like it. And I think.”

Changbin waited for him to go on. When he didn’t, because his voice didn’t seem to be able to collaborate, and his heart was beating, rabid, in his chest, Changbin spoke up. “I think the two of you are quite similar, in some ways, so it shouldn’t be surprising that you get along.” Minho agreed, but this wasn’t the actual point, was it? The point was that Minho was falling for him, and it was just wrong, because you don’t fall for the people you can’t stand, and they don’t monopolize your mind the way Jisung was monopolizing his, and they don’t make you doubt every single thought you have. And Minho wanted to know if it was normal to obsess over someone like this. And if it was okay that he couldn’t imagine his life without him, now. “But,” Changbin went on, “it’s a bit surprising that you let him get close to you like that. I felt like it was never going to happen.”

Minho turned to him quite violently. “What do you mean?”

Changbin actually laughed. “Hyung,” he said, placatingly. “You were downright hostile towards him. The poor kid was waging a war against your invincible walls.”

Minho wasn’t getting it. “No,” he said. “You don’t understand. He’s the one who’s confusing me, not the other way around. It’s me not understanding how it happened, how it’s come to be, how it's possible now that I’m here and I can’t shake him off my head.”

Channgbin looked at him for a couple seconds. “You like him, right?”

Minho shrugged. “Maybe,” he replied. Changbin just stared at him. “Fine. I do. I like him. I like Han Jisung. And I don’t know what to do, because, how do I act now? Do I ignore it? Do I pretend I don’t like him?”

Changbin took his head in his hands, then he started laughing really loud. “Oh, lord,” he said. “When Jisung first saw you,” he went on, “he came to me and he told me: Minho hyung is the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen and I don’t think I can live if he’s not in my life.”

What. “What?”

“He likes you, Minho.” Changbin was mistaken. Changbin was lying. “He’s always liked you.”

Minho didn’t mean to be an asshole. He just couldn’t bear to see Jisung. He needed time. Time to think about what he’d done, what he was actually feeling, what he thought he was going to do. He didn’t even leave his apartment, for the most part. He didn’t pick up the phone when Jisung phoned him. He’d go back, he was sure of it, he didn’t doubt it, not for a second. But he needed to focus on what his attitude would have to be like, going forward. Had he led him on? Had he unintentionally hurt Jisung by spending all this time with him? If Changbin had told the truth and Jisung had liked him since the start, this meant that Minho had been an asshole over and over again. At first, because he didn’t like Jisung, he couldn’t stand him, the way he kept trying to look cool and everything. And it made sense, in retrospect, that Jisung wanted to impress him. Fuck. Why hadn’t he said anything, though? He should have told him. Minho would have told him he wasn’t interested, and that would have been it. But no, Jisung had to be the type who keeps silent and doesn’t even do anything out of place. And Minho had to fall for him, in turn. But if he’d known- what would he have done? He almost burnt his lunch on the stove, because he kept thinking about all the flirty things he’d been saying for longer than a month, now. How many times had they lived the same day now? Forty? Forty-five? Minho had lost count. Not that it mattered, but he’d been acting in a horrible way, hadn’t he? He’d played with Jisung, because he hadn’t known that Jisung was so taken with him. And this might have hurt him. Surely, Jisung must have felt like Minho was making fun of him, with the way he kept making one step forward and three backwards. But Minho hadn’t lied. He hadn’t deceived anyone. He’d been acting just like he felt, like he always did. He never thought too much about anything, but maybe he should have, just this time. He should have wondered why Jisung was so eager to spend time with him, why he’d accepted to go along with all of Minho’s nonsensical suggestions, why he’d agreed to go to his dance classes, why he’d visited his parents. Fuck, his family. What must have Jisung thought about it? Shit. Minho had been a horrible person. He should have kept his distance, he shouldn’t have let it get so blurred up. He sighed once more. What should he do? 

So. Things were like this: he liked Jisung. This wasn’t going to change, no matter how bad he might feel about the whole situation. Because, when Minho liked something, he didn’t change his mind easily. And, apparently, Jisung liked him, too. This didn’t mean anything, though. Because maybe Jisung had changed his mind, throughout the countless iterations of the same day, or maybe he did like Minho still, but he didn’t want to act on it. Just like Minho didn’t want to act on his own side. Because, what were they going to do? Be together through the same day forever? No, they needed to get out of this fucking loop. This was still the priority. The only important thing. And, in this perspective, Minho hadn’t done anything wrong, at all. He’d done his best. But his best hadn’t been enough, so he would have to amp it up. And maybe Minho’s mistake hadn’t been how he’d acted towards Jisung, but how he’d kinda given up using his brain to solve their situation. He’d forgotten that he could be very stubborn when he wanted. He was still the same Minho who’d started dancing professionally at sixteen, he was still the same Minho who’d enrolled in university just to advance his career even further, even if he didn’t need to. He was still the same Minho who hadn’t ever shied away from hard work. So he set himself to work. 

Minho’s alarm hadn’t rang yet when he woke up at four in the morning. He turned the light on, He took out his laptop, turned it on, and started writing on it. He emailed the list to Jisung at six. Jisung replied at seven. At eight thirty, they were sitting in the library’s lounge. 

“I’ve put together a list of major things that could stop the time loop,” Minho said, as soon as Jisung sat in front of him. 

“I’ve read it,” Jisung replied. “But how can we know which accidents to try and stop?”

“Today, we’ll check news outlets all day long. Car accidents and accidental deaths. Tomorrow we’ll act on it. The day after, if we’re still here, we’ll move on to murders. Then suicides.” 

Jisung nodded. He looked a bit off. Maybe he was wondering why Minho hadn’t contacted him in two days. Minho wasn’t going to give an explanation, if he could. “I didn’t know you could be so methodical, hyung,” he said, instead.

Minho kinda smiled. “Dancing requires discipline,” he said. And then. “I’ll check the TV, you take the websites.” 

The hardest part was remembering the details, when they couldn’t write down anything that would make it to the next iteration. But they made it on time to the place where a horrible car accident was supposed to happen. Except, they weren’t supposed to be there, and the taxi they were in wasn't, either. It was enough to prevent a truck from obliterating a motorbike and a car while taking a turn. It felt like being sort of very ill-equipped superheroes. They showed up, running, covered in sweat, where a young woman was about to get hit by a tteokbokki gazebo. She would die, because the metal pole would hit her right on her head, and the fabric would suffocate her. Minho yelled, as soon as he spotted the gazebo. A woman stopped in her tracks, turning towards where he was screaming at the top of his lungs. He’d been running, and this wore him out completely. He stopped, panting. Just a half meter from the woman, the gazebo collapsed. Jisung kept running to her, to talk to her. They actually did this more than once, for longer than ten iterations, too. Saved children from getting badly hurt, dogs from running away from their owners, criminals from escaping from the police. Each day was the same as the previous one. At least they never got bored, Minho reasoned. 

They were on campus, and the same couple Minho had observed for the first iterations of the loop was fighting again. Minho had kinda forgotten about them, but now he wanted to meddle in this, too. From what he and Jisung had heard, Girl With Ponytail was angry because Boy With Gray Hoodie had forgotten about some date they had to go on, and had deduced he didn’t love her. He claimed he’d been caught in reading for school and had missed the time, but he loved her. 

“Sorry,” Jisung said, getting right in the middle of their fight. “Your boyfriend looks like a really devoted scholar, isn’t that a good thing?”

She looked like she would hit Jisung in a split second, so Minho stepped in. “Let’s just all get some coffee, okay?”

“Who are you guys, anyway?” the guy asked. 

Minho and Jisung exchanged a smile. They were closer than ever, right now. “Let’s say, we try to set things straight,” he said. 

“You’ll thank us later,” Jisung said, presumptuously. Minho was kinda in love with him.

It was fun. It could be fun, he guessed. But it was also frustrating. Because countless iterations of the same day had already gone by, and they were no closer to a solution than they’d been in the beginning. And Minho wasn’t deterred, he could keep looking for any solution, but Jisung wasn’t faring well. Minho noticed, he just didn’t know how to bring it up. Jisung was tired of this, it was clear in the way he hid himself behind silly puns and stretched smiles, and in the way he would come up with increasingly unbelievable lies to get out of their enterprises. Once, he’d even claimed he must have developed a cavity and needed to go to the dentist. Minho had just agreed they should do something different that day. But the thing, anyway, was that Jisung was giving up. Minho didn’t know what to do. 

“I’m freezing,” Jisung said. They were sitting in a small park, a few kids playing around. The sun was going down, and its warmth was leaving alongside it. Minho was unable to look away from Jisung’s sad expression. 

“What do we do?” he asked. He wished he was better than that at comforting people. He wished he knew more about how to ask Jisung if he could help him, in any way. 

Jisung shrugged. “Can we go home now?” Jisung’s tone was so tired. Minho felt his own heart break. Yes, they could go home. But tomorrow would be the same as today. And Minho didn’t know how long it would go on like this, until they found a way out. And if there was no way out? If they had to be like this forever? Minho used to think he would be able to survive it, but, clearly, Jisung wouldn’t find it as easy. And, if that was the case, would Minho still be able to go on? Because he knew now that he’d only managed to get here thanks to Jisung. Without Jisung, he wouldn’t be able to go on. Without Jisung, he wouldn’t be able to live. Wake up on the same morning hundreds of times more, and be alone? Impossible. Look, by himself, for a solution? No way. He needed Jisung. Minho couldn’t live inside the loop without Jisung. And, possibly, he couldn’t live outside of the loop without Jisung, either. 

“We can do whatever you want,” he said, and it came out a bit breathless. Because now he was thinking about what would happen if they succeeded in breaking the loop. Jisung and him hadn’t really been friends before all this. Were they supposed to go back to ignoring each other? Was he supposed to walk past Jisung every day and say hello to him, lazily, like he wasn’t in love with him, by now? Would he remember anything about all this, when the loop broke? Or would he go back to the real world, and think that it was all the same as before, not knowing that he could fall in love with Han Jisung? 

“I want to go back,” Jisung replied. And he didn’t mean back home, Minho knew. He meant back to their lives. 

“Me too,” he said. “And we will,” why did he still believe in this? “We’ll get out of here, I promise. But I can’t get us out of here on my own, I think.” Minho was rambling. Jisung had turned to look at him with a frown, and Minho had no idea what he was saying, he just wanted Jisung to know that he couldn’t breathe if Jisung wasn’t with him, and that “I couldn’t have gone this far without you, Jisungie. I- I can’t live this day just one more time, if you’re not here with me.” Jisung was still frowning. Minho’s eyes were stinging, but he was fighting so hard against tears, because the last thing he needed now was to tear up. He just wanted Jisung to understand that he wouldn’t abandon him, but he needed not to be abandoned in return. He turned to stare at the ground. “How annoying,” he said, blinking one tear away. “I think I can’t live any other day without you.”

When Minho looked up, he found Jisung much closer than he was before. He looked surprised, and he looked like he wanted to say something. Minho waited for his reply, then. But Jisung was only staring at him, and from this close, and Minho wondered how could he have not noticed how pretty his eyes were, and how lovely the shape of his mouth was. They were really too close, but Minho found he couldn’t move away. He closed his eyes. Jisung kissed him. 

Minho was crushed by the relief he felt, Jisung’s warm lips against his making him feel as grounded as he’d ever felt. He let him, let him kiss him, soft, gentle. And then it was not enough, and Minho found himself hungry and burning up with the need to have more . His hands moved to Jisung’s neck, bringing him closer. Keeping him where Minho could kiss him, where he could let him know that he wanted him, he wanted everything that had to do with him. Jisung’s hands were on Minho, now, one on his waist, one on his thigh, and, when Jisung gripped, Minho let out a gasp. Jisung licked inside his mouth, Minho wrapped his arms around Jisung, chasing a closeness that was almost impossible. Jisung moved back, Minho didn’t want him to, he didn’t want this to be over already, not when it was so good, and so nice, and. Shit. Minho was in too deep, wasn’t he? He didn’t give a fuck, he just kissed Jisung again. Jisung sighed into it, and Minho felt like this was what heaven should feel like. “Jisungie.” Minho’s breath was still kinda labored. On his side, Jisung was staring at Minho’s hand on his leg, like he couldn’t understand why it was there. But it was simple, wasn’t it? Minho liked him, Minho loved him. It was all there was to it. “Why?”

“Why?” Jisung’s eyes were wide, and Minho loved the way you could see the light play in them. “Why what , hyung?”

Minho had never felt so scared, and so relaxed at the same time. He flipped the hand on Jisung’s leg, palm upward. Jisung hesitantly took it, slotting their fingers together. “Why did you kiss me?” Jisung made to retreat, Minho stopped him. “I’m not complaining. I want to know, though.”

“You said those things,” Jisung said. “And your eyes were, like, sparkling. And you have such pretty eyes, hyung, have I ever told you? I haven’t, right? Well, they’re pretty. You’re pretty. I mean.” Jisung was blushing really hard, and it was so cute, and everything felt stupid and ridiculous. “I just. You’re attractive. More than that. But it’s not why I kissed you. Or, well, not just because of that.”

“Jisung-ah,” Minho tried.

“No,” Jisung protested. “Let me speak. I’m making a mess, I know. But. You’re the best person I know. You take care of me. You care about me. You’re bold, and you’re never ashamed, and. Minho hyung.”

“Yeah?”

“I kissed you because I like you. I really do.” Minho smiled. And then he started laughing, uncontrollably, and it was so strong that tears came up to his eyes, and he found himself hugging Jisung and laughing against his shoulder. Jisung started laughing along with him, and Minho couldn’t have asked for anything else. His laughter was everything he would ever need. 

Jisung had looked like a shy mess when he’d told Minho he liked him. None of the same shyness was there when  —  a couple hours later  —  he asked Minho to spend the night. The loop would reset, Minho argued, and they would be zapped back to their respective houses. But Jisung could be persuasive, especially when his hands were under Minho’s shirt, roaming along his stomach and his chest, and his mouth was on Minho’s neck, and, honestly, Minho wasn’t going to be able to resist anyway. Not when his only thought was the need to discover what being taken apart by Jisung felt like. “Fine,” he relented, and Jisung sank his teeth in his skin. Minho was breathless, when he added: “It’s only for the best if I don’t have to walk home.”

Minho hadn’t expected the loop to magically break just because Jisung had kissed him. Surely, the fact that they’d slept together  —  and, wow . Minho was a different man, now, he was addicted to Jisung, and to the way he touched him  —  couldn’t hold such universal value to reset the time loop for good. He hadn’t expected time to go back to flowing normally after he’d quietly admitted, in front of a can of beer and a box of fried chicken, that he loved Jisung, more than he could put into words. (Jisung had kinda insulted him, because it was too mundane an occasion, but he’d kissed him, too. And, naturally, he’d said it back. Not that Minho had doubts.) The days were repeating, as if nothing had changed, as if every new thing, small or big, inward or outward bound, was the same, irrelevant and unremarkable. Minho was happy, he couldn’t deny it. He was happy when Jisung waited for him after dance class, he was happy when they skipped class to go to the cinema, he was happy when Jisung got excited about some random thing and he wanted to show him. And he knew Jisung was rather happy, too. He saw it in the way he smiled quietly when he thought Minho wasn’t paying attention to him. He also saw it in the way he fantasized about all the music he would make, when he would be able to.

If Minho was honest, he had his own set of wishes for when time would start flowing again. Obviously enough, they all involved Jisung. He wanted to involve him in his real daylife. He wanted him to meet his family for good, his grandma too, this time, and he wanted him to meet the people he danced with, and he wanted their friends to know. He wanted to tell them that they were so happy, and so in love, and that it all felt kind of unreal. Maybe because it was kind of unreal. This wasn’t the real world, this wasn’t real life, where real things happen and you get angry about bad grades and take it out with your boyfriend even when he has no fault. But Minho knew that they would be able to weather that, too. He just wanted to prove it. 

“The first one I’ll tell,” Jisung was saying, wrapped up in Minho’s duvet, “will be Chan hyung.” Minho smiled at that. Jisung loved Chan so dearly, he had the deepest respect for the man. He guessed he deserved it, he was hardworking and cared a lot about everything and everyone, too.

“I think I’ll go to, like, Seungmin first.” Minho said. 

“What?” Jisung sounded too weirded out, like Minho had said something absurd. “Why not Changbin hyung? Or Hyunjin? You always say you can’t stand Seungmin.”

Minho shrugged, and then he pulled some of the duvet for himself. “Yeah, but he won’t care. At all. So he won’t ask any questions, nothing. Then when I’ll tell the others, they’ll be like: Oh gosh, Seungmin-ah, did you know? and he’ll be like Yeah, but so what . And they’ll be like Oh my god you’re insane, and Minho hyung is insane too, actually . But then Seungmin will say No, he’s actually insane, I’m perfectly normal, and it’s normal that people don’t care so much about other people’s business. And I’ll be okay. Don’t you see why this is genius?” 

Jisung shook his head, Minho was going to explain better if he wasn’t persuaded, but Jisung just shut him up. And Minho was really happy to forget about this discussion. 

One morning, at exactly four AM, Minho was woken by his doorbell ringing insistently. At the same time, his phone was ringing. Double attack. He dragged himself to the door. Jisung was there, looking at him like he’d seen a ghost, wearing some really ugly pajama set that Minho had never seen him wear. Was this what he’d been wearing at night when the loop started? “Jisungie,” he kinda yawned in his face, half dragging him inside. 

Before he managed, the neighboring door opened. Great. Minho threw a dirty look at Jisung. “Everything alright?” the young neighbor  —  who didn’t remember anything about Minho  —  said. 

“Yeah,” Minho smiled, as kindly as he could. The neighbor  —  Yang Jeongin, he remembered  —  fixed his eyes on the way Minho was clasping Jisung’s arm. He let go of him. “My boyfriend got locked out,” he explained. 

Jisung let out a whimper. Jeongin looked unconvinced. “Do any of you need anything?”

“No, seriously,” Jisung cut in. “I got locked out. I’d gone to,” Minho waited for the bullshit excuse that would come out of his mouth. “Buy condoms.”

“Han Jisung,” Minho felt like he should just die already. He prayed, once more, that this wasn’t the last iteration of the loop. The neighbor looked a bit disgusted. Which was better than whatever he looked before, honestly. Because this look right here? It meant something like: you guys are horrible people, I don’t want anything to do with you, you’re nasty and you possibly have some weird habit I don’t want to know about. But the look before this? It meant: I’ll call the police in three minutes if you don’t dissuade me. “Forgive him,” Minho said in the neighbor’s direction. “We’re both really sorry for waking you up. I was actually trying to avoid waking the whole floor up. But my Jisungie, you know. He’s impatient.” Jisung kicked him in the shin. “Bye bye.”

“I’m impatient?” Jisung repeated, once they were both back in Minho’s bedroom. Honestly, they’d both fallen asleep there, but everytime they did fall asleep together, they would wake up separately. This, too, was on Minho’s wishlist for the future: waking up in the same bed. “If I recall right-”

“You said you’d gone to buy condoms . At four AM. Jisung-ah, who in their right mind would do that?” Then, he focused back on the present situation. “What are you doing at four AM ringing at my door, by the way?” 

Jisung threw him a look that was, this time for real, impatient. “I see your brain’s finally back online, hyung.” Mean. “I was awake at the reset time.”

Minho blinked. What did he mean? “This is huge,” he said. “Tell me. I’ll make coffee. But tell me.” He turned to the door leading to the kitchen, and then back to Jisung. “I really love you, Jisungie,” he added, because he couldn’t quite avoid it. 

Jisung kissed his nose, and followed him to the kitchen. “I couldn’t fall asleep,” he said. “You were sleeping, and I didn’t manage to, I was kinda lost in thought.” 

“What about?”

Jisung hummed. He wasn’t willing to share, Minho gathered. “Just. Us. More or less. But it doesn’t really matter now.” Minho wanted to know, though. He would have to ask later. “Anyway, I was staring at your ceiling. And I was wondering if I should wake you up, because I hate it when this happens, and maybe talking to you would help, but you were sleeping so deeply, and so I was waiting. Maybe you would wake up,” Minho left the two cups he was holding on the counter. He walked closer to Jisung, and he just hugged him from the back. “ Anyway ,” Jisung picked up his tale. “I was rolling on your bed, and then I was rolling on mine. It was absurd . Unbelievable. It was inexplicable, too. Like, I didn’t even notice, there wasn’t actual movement, it was like the film started again and my mind failed to rewind along with it.”

Minho was amazed. “So, you’re saying that it happens, like, a bit before four AM.”

Jisung nodded, emphatically. “Yeah,” he looked energized, as if this was brand new information that held in itself the key to the loop mystery. “I don’t know the exact time, though. But maybe it’ll help us find the exit?”

Minho was giddy. They would get out. They would be free. “Let’s find out tonight.”

They wasted their day doing nothing. They walked a bit, getting closer to Jisung’s place. They bought supplies, Minho cooked, Jisung picked some animation movie to watch. He remembered to have looked at the time at around three AM, so they actually had to only pay attention to a reduced time span. They’d set an alarm for three, because they didn’t trust themselves not to fall asleep. They also didn’t trust themselves not to get distracted in other ways. 

“It’s three sixteen,” Jisung said. They were counting every minute. “And it’s my turn to ask,” and they were also playing a ripoff game of twenty questions. “What’s your dream job in the future?”

Minho laughed. “Dancer,” he wiggled his eyebrows. Jisung had just wasted a good question. What else did he think Minho wanted to do, with his major and his many years of dancing? “My turn. Most likely cause of arrest for you?”

Jisung slapped his thigh. It hurt, just a bit, on his naked skin. “Obstruction of justice,” Jisung replied. “Three seventeen, by the way. Because I’d probably not understand anything they ask of me.” Minho could imagine it quite well. Jisung panicking and sending an entire investigation upside down. “What’s your favorite of your cats?”

Minho wasn’t going to reply. He made a point of never picking favorites. “No,” he said. 

Jisung’s smile was a bit evil, in clear retaliation for the unsatisfying answer he’d received earlier. “You have to reply, it’s the game,” he said. And he had no right to look that hot saying something so infuriating. Minho crossed his arms on his chest. 

“No,” he said. “I’m not picking, stop it already,” he protested. But now Jisung was looking at him in a very different way. It made Minho’s breath get shallower, and his hands sweatier. Jisung smiled, and Minho hated that he was so affected by him. He let him lean closer, over from where they were sitting on the mattress, both of them cross-legged. He let Jisung kiss him, he let him bite his bottom lip gently, he let him take his face in his hands. He only pulled back when Jisung shifted his own weight to his knees. “Three twenty-three, Jisungie,” he said, and he scooted a bit closer to the edge of the mattress. Jisung nodded, a smile of understanding on his face. Minho laughed. “Which planet would you like to visit?”

“Hey,” Jisung exclaimed. And he went on in English, well aware that Minho wasn’t exactly fluent. “You never answered mine.” Minho pretended he couldn’t understand him, smiling serenely and with a totally neutral expression. “Saturn. No, Jupiter. All those moon-”

Minho was back home. Like Jisung had said, he hadn’t felt anything, just like a video had started again from the beginning, badly cut, and he’d been left with the uncomfortable feeling of a whole scene cut in half. He scrambled to find his phone, on the nightstand. He pressed the call button, as he was already getting dressed. “Three twenty-five,” Jisung said, as he picked up. 

“I knew you’d spot it, jagi-yah,” he said. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes, boil some water, I want tea.”

Why did the loop start (and end) at three twenty-five AM? What could they do to stop it for good? They looked, once more, for everything they could find. Births, deaths, whatever. It took a lot of energy, and a lot of time. Most of the time, they split up, in the hope that it could help in their efforts for efficiency. Minho was tired. Every time they felt like they had a new lead, a new way out, all it happened was that they only failed harder. And Minho didn’t know how longer he could try for. Every morning he got up and he had to remind himself that getting out of the loop was up to them: if they wanted out, they had to work for it. But they were working for it, they had been working non-stop, and what had they got? Nothing. He couldn’t think about anything, or he would go mad. He was also violently stopping himself from thinking about his future with Jisung, because, at this point, it straight-up hurt. There was no future. Only an eternal, never-changing, present. 

“You’re tired,” Jisung kept saying. And Minho kept denying, because it wouldn’t help. Admitting he was completely wiped out, demotivated, would only bring down Jisung’s morale, along with his own. And Jisung, instead, was quite in high spirits, he kept coming up with theories, and Minho was more than happy to support him, help him test all of them. Just. He couldn’t pretend he was satisfied with all of this. And, yes, Jisung was enough. Of course he was enough. Minho couldn’t complain about him for one second, he wouldn’t exchange Jisung’s presence with anything else, not even with the key to get out of the loop. But, on the other hand, Minho needed to bring both of them out of this fucking Wednesday. 

“I’m not,” Minho smiled. “Let’s keep walking, we won’t get to the power station if we stop now.” Jisung actually stopped in the middle of the pathway, his backpack hanging flaccidly from his shoulders. 

“It’s fine if you’re tired, hyung.” Minho rolled his eyes. He didn’t mean to be ungrateful for the attention, but Jisung was too insistent right now, and Minho had already told him he wasn’t tired. To show how not tired he was, he started jumping up and down the path. 

“See?” he said. “I’m perfectly well-rested, energetic, whatever! I’m fine, I swear.”

Jisung looked away. Was he the one who was tired? Was this his convoluted way of asking to rest a bit? “So what’s wrong? Because you’re not fine, Minho.”

What did he want? Did he want Minho to break down in front of him and tell him that no, of course he wasn’t fine, he’d lived the same day ninety times by now. Three month’s worth of time. “I want to get the fuck out of this loop, Jisung-ah,” he said, and his voice was quiet, no matter how angry he felt, how frustrated. He wasn’t going to yell. He wasn’t going to make this uglier than it was. 

Jisung was still looking away. Minho walked towards him. “I know,” Jisung said. “I want to get out too. But.” He stopped. He was nervous, there was something else behind this, Minho gathered. 

“But what, Jisungie?”

Jisung’s eyes finally met his, and they were shiny. Minho felt awful. Was he crying because of him? “I kept thinking that any day would be the last, now. It was only a matter of time, in my mind, until it happened, until it unlocked and everything fell into place. But, you see, it isn’t happening.”

Minho frowned. “What are you talking about? I don’t-” he took a shaky breath. “I don’t think I understand.”

“I thought you would love me back, Minho.” Minho actually took a step back. It was like a blow had been dealt to his stomach, he had no air left in his lungs. “I thought that we were getting there, but this fucking loop just goes on . And-”

“I do love you,” Minho said. His voice was barely above a whisper. “What do you mean I don’t?”

Jisung’s tears were heavy. But Minho didn’t understand what was going on. “No,” Jisung said. “You don’t. You think you do. But you don’t.” Minho’s voice kept being stuck in his throat. “If we were really in love, the loop would’ve broken.”

Minho was trying not to cry, too. “You don’t believe it,” he said. “You’ve never believed it. We’ve always been looking for a material cause-”

“I lied.” Minho wanted to set the whole world on fire. So it would match the kind of pain he was feeling inside, right this moment. 

“Okay,” he said. He also looked at Jisung, who was suffering, too. But everything he’d been saying was sinking in, and Minho couldn’t look at him right now. Maybe Jisung didn’t mean it, maybe he would take it back. Or maybe this was it, the end of everything beautiful Minho still had in his life. “I’m going back home.”

Minho wanted to be angry. He wanted to feel the kind of rage that comes with being wronged, and not being recognized in all the efforts you make. But he only felt like he was broken, and there was something wrong with him. Because maybe Jisung was right, and he only thought that he loved him. Minho must be unable to love, he must be unable to make others feel loved and seen and appreciated, and all those things, because he was selfish, and he only cared about his own feelings, and- And this was why he never dated anyone, okay. Because he wasn’t good at it, he sucked at it. He knew it. He’d never even tried, because he’d always known that it would end like this, with someone he cared about getting hurt by his inability to love them right. But then Jisung had felt different. He’d wanted to be with Jisung, he hadn’t lied about it, he hadn’t deceived himself into thinking this. Because Jisung was the only person Minho could actually see himself with, it was Jisung or no one else. Jisung was the only one for him in the whole world. In every world. But this meant that he, Minho, wasn’t the one for Jisung, didn’t it? What a sick twist of fate, to only discover late that Jisung had always liked him, to think that he could be enough to make up for all the time he’d spent liking him and wanting him in silence, and then discover that he wasn’t up to Jisung’s expectations. He’d never been. Would their shared heartbreak solve the loop, at least? Would he be spared the agony of living again in a world in which the only other changing person was the one who was breaking his soul to pieces? 

changbinah

don’t ever date anyone

?? 

sorry i won’t take this generous advice 

hyung

you’ll fall in love (ew) and they’ll break your heart

are you okay?

for the most part

can i help?

just

if i ever ask you about jisung

tell me he’s the worst

?????

han jisung?

my jisung??

minho hyung!

what’s going on!!!

nothing, really

nothing worth dwelling over

did he try to get you on campus to talk about skateboards again?

again?

when did he do that the first time??

he never did it?

not that i recall???

he told me he would do this? i told him it was dumb

he insisted it was genius

see

let me stay away from him okay?

this is all kinda weird

do you want to meet up?

no binnie

let me talk nonsense don’t mind me

okayy

When Minho woke up the next day, after ignoring three different alarms, it was nine AM. He decided that he deserved convenience store pudding, and he got up to go and buy it. While getting out of his door, he almost decapitated someone that had been sitting on his doorstep. Jisung.

“Minho,” Jisung said. 

Minho should have said: fuck off , or I don’t want you here , or even You broke my heart, so please leave . But he didn’t, because as soon as he saw Jisung, the first thing he thought was: oh, thank God . “Aren’t you cold?” he asked.

Jisung was now standing in front of him, his clothes rumpled and his eyes swollen. But there was a very determined light in his eyes, too. “I think I found the cause.”

So it wasn’t me , Minho should have said, and you should not be here if you really think I’m not able to love you. “I was going to buy breakfast,” Minho replied, closing the door behind his back. “Aren’t you hungry?”

Jisung trailed after him, a bit awkward, too. But he didn’t say anything more until they were both sitting on the plastic chairs in front of a convenience store. Minho wasn’t going to talk. It was bad enough as it was. He wasn’t going to ask Jisung to apologize, he was old enough to do what he wanted. Mainly, though, he was upset at himself. He hated the way he knew he should have reacted differently to seeing Jisung again, he knew he should have demanded an apology, or an explanation. But he’d just felt relieved, by the fact that Jisung was still here with him, that he hadn’t given up on Minho completely, that he wouldn’t have to live his life without him. Because he couldn’t. It occurred to him in front of a row of juice, his hand stuck between a grape and an orange one, and Jisung was a few steps back, looking with striking focus at a bottle of Monster, and Minho’s heart just swelled. He still wanted Jisung. He would always want him. It would have been frustrating, but Minho just picked the orange juice box and then he also grabbed Jisung’s hand.

“So,” Jisung started, an ice americano in front of him. “I’m sorry.” 

Minho nodded, taking a sip of his juice. It didn’t really matter, did it? Of course Jisung would be sorry, of course he would regret the things he’d said. And it wasn’t like Minho would hold a grudge or anything. “It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not,” Jisung said. “It’s not fucking okay. I was horrible to you, all because I get anxious and bitter and I take it out on the people around me. And it’s wrong , and you should be angry about it, because it’s not fair.” Minho waited. Jisung sighed. “I’m sorry. And I don’t think you don’t love me.”

“I got it, Jisung,” Minho whispered. “But this loop is sending both of us insane. I don’t blame you.”

“You should,” Jisung insisted. Minho rolled his eyes. He wasn’t going to hold it against him, he just wasn’t. “But anyway. I found the cause, I think. Last night. After you went home. I went to Chan’s. Who yelled at me.” Minho laughed, Jisung’s eyes curved a bit, with the first honest smile of the day. He went on: Chan had told him off for the fight they’d had, Jisung had tried to defend himself and found out he was unable to do it. It had gone on long enough that the two of them had kept chatting about everything and nothing and then they’d moved on to music, because Chan wanted Jisung’s opinion, while they were at it. And, suddenly, exactly at twenty-five minutes past three AM, Chan’s computer had short-circuited with the wall plug. 

“It can’t be a coincidence,” Minho said. “Can it?”

“Hardly,” Jisung was smiling. “Shall we go and check together tonight?”

Minho looked at him for a few seconds. He looked too hopeful, and he also looked like he was nervous about Minho’s answer. Minho didn’t need to forgive him, he’d already done that the minute he’d walked away from him last night. “Sure,” he said. And then he took a deep breath and he added. “But you need to talk to me if you feel so unsatisfied about us.”

Jisung’s eyes filled up with tears in a split second. Minho sighed. Jisung scooted closer to him. “Okay,” he said. “But I think I also need therapy once we’re out of this thing.”

Minho nodded. “Then let’s get out.”

Chan’s dorm room was a disaster. Minho had been here before, of course, but every time he wondered how he could live like this. It was a mess of tech equipment  —  cameras, a drone , three different computers, mixing equipment, microphones  —  clothes and school supplies. “Isn’t he out of school now?” He checked with Jisung. 

“He never throws anything away,” Jisung whispered back. Well. It was kinda evident. Minho was awkwardly waiting for Chan to get back from his kitchenette with the tea he’d promised them, and then, in the familiar space, it hit him. He’d dreamed about Chan, before this loop began. It came back to him with striking clarity. In the dream, Chan was the same as real-world Chan, but he was also more muscly. He’d sat Minho down at a table, and he’d started talking about another leg of their tour. Minho smiled at the memory. Dream-Chan had mentioned cities all over the world, and dream-Minho had felt like it was just ordinary to talk about a world tour, with Chan, and had also pitched in ideas about setlists and performances. Then, other people had made themselves known in the same meeting room, in the way people appear out of nowhere in dreams but feel like they’ve always been there. Changbin, sitting next to Chan as if he were his second-in-command, said something stupid, and he laughed. Felix, too, was there, sitting on Minho’s side, with Seungmin and Hyunjin, too. There was a boy that looked too much like Minho’s neighbor, but Minho hadn’t met him yet, but dreams are weird creatures and scary ones, too, so Minho wasn’t going to ask any question he wouldn’t like the answer to. The dream was weird, because Minho had been sitting in front of Chan, at the beginning, but now he was sitting on his side, just like Changbin, but on the other side. And he could clearly see that there was another person: Jisung.

“Jisungie,” real-life Minho said, in Chan’s room, still waiting for a tea that wasn’t coming. “I dreamt about you, before the loop, before everything. And I dreamt about all our friends, too.”

Jisung tilted his head to look at him, “What were we doing?”

“Discussing a world tour,” he said. “Like, we were a band? No, more like, a boy band? And Chan hyung was the boss, and Changbin was very cool and assertive, and you-”

“Me?” Minho felt his ears catch fire. He looked away for a second. 

“In that dream, I think I found you incredibly hot.” It hadn’t occurred to him at first, hell, he’d forgotten all about this dream up until now. “Anyway.”

Jisung was laughing, quietly and steadily. “So,” he said. “Do you also find me incredibly hot in the waking world or what?” Minho scoffed. Of course he did. It wasn’t two hours ago that he’d been busily showing Jisung just how crazy he could send him. Did Jisung need a repeat performance? Minho could do it. Just, maybe not in Chan’s dorm. “Shit,” Jisung sounded worried. 

“Jisungie?”

“I had the same dream, you were sitting on Chan’s side, and you were discussing performances, and you were super technical and stage-wise, and you were mentioning different stage structures and setlists.” Minho felt the blood freeze inside his veins. It was the same scene he’d just remembered. How was it possible?

“When did you dream it?” he asked. 

Jisung paled. “The night before the first iteration,” of course. Of fucking course. So, this was why they were stuck together, just a fucking improbable coincidence. Jisung would call it fate, he was sure. To Minho, it was just the cruelest irony of fate. 

Chan was wondering why they’d visited him together, it was unusual, he said, it was a very bizarre coincidence. He laughed. Minho was sitting a bit further from Jisung than he usually would, this was awkward as it was. “We bumped into each other just outside your building,” Jisung lied. Minho nodded. 

“I wanted to ask you for help with a track for a performance,” Minho said. And it wasn’t exactly a lie, he did want to for this, just, in two months’ time. Chan perked up, and started saying a lot of things, and Jisung pitched in. Minho regretted it. Hours passed, Jisung got heated while discussing music with Chan, and Minho hoped to god that Chan was as engrossed in the conversation as not to notice that Minho was unable to look away from Jisung. Bumped into each other his ass. He got up to go wash the cups, but, predictably, Chan joined him soon enough. 

“You and Jisung?” Chan asked, with the kind of certainty that always accompanied him. Minho finished washing the last mug, put it to dry on the rack. 

“Me and Jisung,” he said. Chan’s eyes got wider by a tiny fraction. “Things happen, Chan-ah.”

Chan raised his eyebrows. “You don’t usually let things just happen,” he said. And he was absolutely correct. Minho wasn’t going to explain anything. “Are you happy?”

Chan and his easy questions. Minho dried his hands. “I like him,” he said. And it didn’t answer the question. Chan was looking at him with a weird expression. “It’s not just sex, Channie.” Chan took a sharp breath. 

“Are you sure?” Chan hadn’t lived the same day more than ninety times. Chan didn’t know that Minho had been falling slowly and surely, for the better part of two months. And he didn’t know that Minho was sure. He only knew, in all likelihood, that Jisung had been crushing on him for years. 

Minho sighed. “Yes,” he said. “I’m sure.” Minho had always been a little shit, though. “But, don’t worry. The sex is great, too. Especially when-”

“ Jesus Christ ,” Chan held his hands up, declaring defeat. Minho’s victory tasted the sweetest. 

“He goes down on me,” he finished, angelically. “Or, speaking of his mouth, he’s great at-”

“ Minho ,” Chan threatened. His face was red. If they managed to stop the loop, Minho thought, he’d live with these images forever. 

“Well, you can fill it in,” he shrugged. “There’s only one more thing he could do with it, after all.”

When the time for the short-circuit came, they tried to stop it, unplugging Chan’s computer. Satisfied with their prompt action, Minho and Jisung shared a glance. They were instantly zapped back to their respective beds. 

that was foul

what did you tell chan hyung btw??

it doesn’t matter, the loop restarted

he won’t remember it anyway

he looked shocked

oh, did he?

Their attempts at solving the short-circuit became very focused. The plug wasn’t enough? They switched off the entire unit. Very funny, too, with the way Jisung disappeared mid-conversation to go look for the general switch. It didn’t work, either. 

“So, maybe we need a bigger short-circuit,” Minho said. 

“Or more than one.” Jisung countered. 

They counted down to 3:25 together, hoping that they didn’t get electrocuted in the process, each in his own home. Minho had turned on every appliance he had. He prayed. He opened his eyes in his bed. 

“I hate this,” he said, into his phone. 

“I love you,” Jisung replied. “You’re the love of my life,” he added.

“Okay, but get me out of here, you sappy bitch.”

Minho felt a bit too stupid to solve this electricity mystery. He barely passed his physics exams in high school, so why was it up to him to get this over with? But Jisung was smart. Oh, he was. And Minho was so in awe of him. He listened closely when he told him that he’d had an idea, but Minho would need to trust him a hundred percent. “I always trust you,” Minho said. 

“I know, baby,” Jisung’s gaze was a bit worried. “But now you’ll have to force yourself not to intervene, okay? Trust me,” he repeated. 

Minho nodded. “I do,” he said. He also took Jisung’s hands and pulled him close. Jisung hugged his waist. He kissed him lightly, then he rang Chan’s bell. Minho reluctantly moved away. 

They let the evening go on as usual, Chan chatting about music with the both of them, Minho trying not to get lost in his head, and forcing himself to contribute to the conversation. And then the plug started sending the first sparks, as it always did. As it’d done ninety-seven times, apparently. And Jisung sent Chan to the kitchen to bring something for all of them. 

“Go out,” he also told Minho. 

“But-” this was a fire, which would grow bigger. And Jisung wasn’t moving away from it, he wasn’t stopping it. He was going to get hurt. Minho pulled at his hands. Jisung smiled at him, took his face in his hands and kissed him straight on the mouth, in the middle of Chan’s dorm room, uncaring, unrepentant. “I love you, Minho.”

Minho kissed him again. “You better get out of here alive,” he said. “Or I’ll kill you.” Jisung laughed, kissing him one last time. 

He checked the clock: 3:23. He went to the kitchen, keeping Chan very busy with the stupidest things he could come up with. Jisung was on Chan’s room’s door, smoke growing behind him. 

3:24. Minho closed his eyes. Maybe they’d be back in their own beds in a minute. 

They’d never been here together, this was new, at least. The hospital corridors were white and there were only a couple of nurses and doctors walking up and down with their files. Minho fixed his jacket, nervous about something he didn’t even know. Jisung just squeezed his hand, letting it go to open the door. 

“Minho,” Chan called from the bed he was lying in. “I didn’t know you were coming, too.”

“How are you, Chan-ah?” he asked, smiling. He’d called the ambulance the night before, when Chan had still been fighting against the fire in his room, trying to smother it. In vain. His computer had completely melted. The rest of his stuff was more or less intact, though. He’d gained a couple of light burns, but he was being observed for all the smoke he’d inhaled. He’d be well soon. 

“I’m good,” he said. “Bit sad about the PC,” he added. Yeah, Minho could understand. It had a lot of his work on it. It would take a long time to get it back. 

“We’ll make some good music together to make up for it,” Jisung chimed in, from the opposite side of Chan’s bed. He’d left Chan’s dorm unscathed, in the final supernatural act of the time loop’s magic. Prodigy. Phenomenon. Whatever. 

Chan chuckled. “Yeah,” he said. “Did you bump into each other on the way here?” he asked. Minho felt his eyes widen, his body stilling completely as he watched Jisung nod nonchalantly. 

“Yeah,” Jisung said. “What, did you think we’d texted each other to come visit you?” Minho laughed. Nervously. Did this mean that Chan didn’t remember anything about them last night in his home? What version of the now infamous Wednesday did people remember? 

“I wonder who called the ambulance on me last night,” Chan said, and then he yawned. “I’d like to thank them.” 

Minho smiled, then he pushed it back. “The firefighters must have called it,” he said, with a shrug. “And someone in the building must’ve called the firefighters. When you want a hand in painting your room again, let me know. Also, does this mean goodbye to your deposit?”

Chan was looking at him like he was giving him a pretty bad headache. Which might also be the case. “The plug was the cause of the fire, they said. So it’s the landlord’s fault. But, yeah, when you’re free we can paint the walls together.”

Minho nodded, happily. He couldn’t avoid looking at Jisung, who was also looking at him. They were free, now. Everything they had to do, at this point, was break the big news to everyone. “I have hip hop class, so I have to get going,” Minho said. “Do you need anything, Chan-ah? Any last wishes?” 

Chan looked like he wanted to yell at him, but he sighed. “You know what,” he said. “Yes. My last wish is that you take Jisung with you. And maybe pay for his coffee or something. Take him out.”

“Like, on a date?” Minho said, his face carefully neutral. “Or on an assassination attempt?”

Minho’s neighbor, Yang Jeongin, was absolutely a pleasure to talk to. And now everyone wanted to talk to him, and they were all dying to meet him, because Minho had talked about him exactly twice and now they were all cramped in his small apartment, to have dinner together and “meet Jeongin”. It was too many people, and Minho wanted to throw them out, honestly, because Changbin was too loud, and Hyunjin never stopped laughing, and Chan was fidgeting with his sound system, and Seungmin was rummaging through his fridge.

“Stop that,” he said, slapping Seungmin’s nape. “Yongbokie,” he called for Felix. “Help with these plates.” And Jisung was on the couch, talking to the star of the show, Jeongin. Minho wanted to get out of this madhouse. 

“Your boyfriend’s fun,” Jeongin said, after a while. “He’s been telling me that he tried to teach you to skate,” Jeongin laughed at Minho’s groan at the memory. He had a nice laugh, and he was really nice, altogether. But, maybe, Jisung wasn’t supposed to go and embarrass him at every given chance. 

“What boyfriend?” Seungmin cut in on the conversation. “Minho hyung is too cranky for anyone to date.”

Minho tried to stop Jeongin from replying. “That one, Jisung-ssi,” Jeongin said, immediately, pointing at Jisung, now filling his glass with beer and talking to Changbin, who was also draping his arm around a very red-faced Hyunjin. 

Seungmin stared at Minho, then he took another look at Jisung. And back to Minho. “Oh. Oh . Minho hyung, you’re done for.” Jeongin, if anything, looked apologetic. Minho shrugged. “Hey guys,” Seungmin kinda yelled. “Did you know that Minho and Jisung are dating?” The noise that ensued would surely have Minho get noise complaints. Surely. What . Since when . Someone yelled a curse word. Is it because I suggested it? Chan’s omnipotence delirium. Why didn’t anyone know? Hyunjin’s laughter, shrill and full. No, but, hey, congratulations, Jisung-ah. Yah, tell me more . Changbin’s attempt at the dirty gossip. Minho just turned the tap on, starting to wash some pans. 

It died down, at a certain point. And then the interrogation started. Minho was more than happy when they all left to go to their own houses. He bore the knowing looks and the wolf-whistles with good grace, even when they realized that Jisung was staying, as they all were leaving. Finally, he closed the door behind himself. “Don’t say anything,” he told Jisung. 

Jisung, good boy that he was, didn’t say anything. Or, well, at a certain point he did. But the words were “let’s take this to your bed” and Minho liked those words, by a lot. He let it all fall to the background, because the only thing that mattered, in the end, was just Jisung. And Jisung, luckily, was taking all of his attention. 

hyung i’m sorry if i outed you and your bf to your friends

you aren’t upset, right?

oh, sorry, jeonginnie

nothing to be sorry about!!

we were just waiting for any occasion, so thanks!!!

oh okay great!!

i liked your friends btw!!!

can i hang out with you all again, sometimes?

well, i think you’ll regret it at a certain point but sure

i can add you to the group chat

owo

thank youuu

wait. why’s it called strays

are y’all homeless? 

don’t ask questions, innie

you almost never want the answers

you’re weird!

say hi to your bf, i know he’s still over <3

stalker.

or are you just loud?

no.

anyway.

he says hi

SIX MONTHS LATER (right?)

“Mmh,” Jisung was staring at the cafè’s menu, as if he hadn’t memorized it by heart, what with the seven thousand times they’d been here just in the last six months. Plus the times in which they’d sent the barista crazy while they were stuck. 

“He wants an iced americano,” Minho said, after a while. “And I want a caramel macchiato. The name’s Minho, I’ll pay by card.”

As she’d done every single time for the last three years, like she was a person whose life repeated the same, no changes, no variations, just Barista With Brown Hat, she said: “Please, put your card here, sir.”

Minho threw a glance at Jisung. Jisung threw a glance at the screen of his phone. It was Wednesday, again. But the date was different. And tomorrow, naturally, would be Thursday.