“Yes, I’m fine.” Kibum said again. “You don’t need to worry.”

“Are you sure everything’s okay?” Tiffany asked, concerned. “You can talk to me. Does it have anything to do with Jonghyun?”

“No.” Kibum wanted to end the conversation but, at the same time, he wanted to talk with someone about it. “Well, yes. He talked to me the other day, at your birthday party.”

“Oh. About that-“

“No, you don’t need to explain, we’re both your friends, it’s okay to invite him.” Kibum hurried to interrupt. “It’s about me. I wasn’t expecting him to talk to me, he caught me by surprise.”

Tiffany sighed and smiled sadly at him. “You two can’t stay mad at each other for too long.”

“Yeah.” He nodded but was still feeling uncomfortable talking about that. “Look, I have to go home now, okay? I had a really long day at work today.”

“Oh, of course, I won’t hold you any longer.” She chuckled, caressing his arm from the other side of the table. “Get some rest. And you need anything-“

“Don’t hesitate to call me, I know.” Kibum rolled his eyes but was secretly thankful. “You’ve been saying that to me since we’ve started to be friends.”

Tiffany giggled again and slapped his arm making him laugh and wave at her, before finally exiting the restaurant. Kibum sighed in relief when the night air hit his face and he felt more at peace.

He started to walk in his car’s direction when his phone started to ring, startling him. Who could it be? He thought as he grabbed his phone and looked at the screen. Jonghyun? Why was Jonghyun calling him?

“Hello?” Kibum answered the phone, expectant. “Jonghyun?” On the other side he could only hear noise, so he tried again. “Hello?” He paid attention, trying to hear Jonghyun’s voice. He was so quiet that he was finally able to hear him, despite all the noise around.

More rustling and then Kibum started to distinguish voices. “Yah!” Jonghyun cried, startling Kibum. “Give me that! Who are you calling, you moron?”

The line went dead and Kibum was left speechless and motionless. His phone was still flat against his ear and there was no sound on the other side but he couldn’t move. He felt sick like he was about to throw up so he took tiny deep breaths, trying to calm down himself.

He needed to talk to someone, so he thought about Tiffany. However, when he was about to call, he thought that it would be awkward, talking to her about Jonghyun again, knowing that she was his friend too. He could call Woohyun, Mir or Nicole, but it was the same situation, because they were all friends with Jonghyun.

Sitting on the driver’s seat and without thinking too much, he searched for the last calls and called the number from some nights ago. It ringed two times before the call was picked up.

“Hello?” Kibum said, when the stranger answered the phone.

“Hm, hello?”

“I’m sorry to be calling, I know it’s weird.” Kibum continued, being immediately interrupted.

“Oh my God, you’re that ert! The one I called by mistake the other day! Why are you calling me? I’m not doing that again! I told you I thought it was my boyfriend!” The man on the other side kept talking, leaving no time for Kibum to explain himself. “And why did you keep my number? Delete it!”

“Yeah, I’m sorry, it was a bad idea.” Kibum finally talked, sobbing again. “Don’t worry, I’ll delete your number right now.”

“W-Wait.” He talked more softly. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” He lied. “I don’t want you to do anything. That’s not the reason why I called… Well, forget it. Bye.”

“Why did you call then?” The other sounded curious, trying to understand what was going on. “Are you crying?”

“I’m not-I’m not crying.”

There was a snort on the other side and then the man chuckled. “Obviously you’re not. Want to tell me your name?”

Kibum sniffled and sobbed some more before he told his name. “Kibum.”

“Well, hi Kibum, I’m Minho.” When Kibum’s answer was more sobs, he sighed. “Tell me what happened to you?”

“I’ll be fine in a second.” He paused, taking a deep breath. “It’s my boyfriend. Well, my ex-boyfriend. I was feeling really sad, so I wanted to talk with someone, but all my friends are his friends too, so I thought it was better to talk to someone I don’t know. And yeah, you crossed my mind so I end up calling you. But now I see it was a terrible idea. You can hang up if you want.”

“It’s okay, ert. We can talk. What is going on?”

“First of all, can you stop calling me a ert? You were the one who called saying all those things, if you can’t remember.” Kibum said, clearing his throat. “I’m lying so comfortably in my bed.” He imitated. “My hand is travelling through my chest.” He continued, pretending to ignore the other’s voice telling him to stop. “I’m reaching-“

“STOP.” Minho yelled, surprising Kibum. “Okay, I got it. But you’re still a ert because you kept hearing me instead of disconnecting the call. But you said that’s not why you called me.”

“And it’s not, but…” Kibum stopped himself, not sure about what to say. That man was a total stranger, and he was about to tell him some things about his life. “Hm, my boyfriend and I, we… We broke up two months ago.” He decided to keep talking. After all, they weren’t going to talk ever again. “But I still love him, we were happy together, you know? And I saw him the other day in a party, and he even talked to me.”

“It’s good, isn’t it?” Minho tried to help, not knowing exactly what to say. “Maybe it’s because he still thinks about you, and wants to talk to you.”

“Yeah, but… He left the party early, and I decided to leave too, to tell him that I miss him. But he wasn’t alone. There was another man on his car.”

“Oh.” Minho said, when he noticed that Kibum wasn’t going to say anything else. “Maybe a friend?”

“Hm, I think you’re right, maybe he was a friend. But there is more. Today, a few minutes before I called you, he called me.” Kibum stopped, uncomfortable. “Are you there?”

“Yes, I’m here. Did you talk to him?”

“No, I think he called by mistake because I kept talking and he didn’t say anything. I could only hear noise, and his voice talking to someone and I heard other person laughing too…” He stopped talking again.

“And you think it was the same man from the other day, right?” Minho asked, almost sure of the answer. So it wasn’t a surprise when he heard Kibum agreeing. “Listen, you’re not sure about that. And, as you said, maybe he’s a friend, since you two broke up not a long time ago. Do you think he was cheating on you?”

"No, he wasn’t.”

“You see? There’s nothing to worry about. Call him and talk to him, or go meet him somewhere. You need to talk to him.”

“What if he doesn’t want to talk to me? I’ll feel bad and-“

“Just try! Look, my boyfriend’s here, I have to hang up. Go talk to him, ert. Bye.” He said, disconnecting the call, and leaving Kibum looking at his phone.

At least, he wasn’t crying anymore. Strangely yet thankfully he felt a lot better than he did when he got out of the bar and all thanks to the random stranger who now he knew was called Minho.

**

“Who were you talking to?” Taemin asked, lying flat on top of him and kissing his neck, making him squirm. “Will you tell me?”

“No one special. It was just-“ He shook his head. “Just no one. Did you like my surprise?”

Taemin hummed and snuggled on Minho’s neck. “A lot.”

Minho almost purred in delight; Taemin was being extremely affectionate and it was making him the happiest man on earth yet a bit apprehensive. Minho knew his boyfriend well enough to know that this meant that he was trying to make up for something.

Trying not to have those thoughts, Minho gripped Taemin’s waist and pulled him closer, directing his mouth to Taemin’s, kissing him passionately. Taemin moved a little on top of him and Minho groaned, turning them around, coming on top.

His hands were already venturing inside Taemin’s shirt when the last one stopped him, pushing him away with his tiny hands on his chest.

“What?”

“Aren’t we going to fast?”

Minho sat on his heels, lifting an eyebrow not understanding where this came from. They had been dating for four years; they had done everything they could’ve done as boyfriends, so how could they be taking it too fast?

“What are you even talking about?”

“I’m… Sorry, I just… I’m not felling too good.”

“Oh? You could have told me sooner.” Minho scolded, looking at him with worry feeling his eyes. “We can just stay here on the couch and cuddle, baby.”

Taemin moved a little uncomfortable and put in his feet on the ground. “Actually, I think I’m going home.”

“You’re going home? Why?”

“Well, I have things to do and I don’t want to bother.”

Minho got up from the couch at the same time as Taemin and grabbed his arm. “Taemin, you’ve stayed here a million times already and it’s just me, why would you think you’re bothering me?”

“I just have things to do, okay?”

“What things? At this hour?”

Taemin’s stare turned hard and he snapped. “What is this? An investigation? Am I not allowed to want to be on my own for a while?”

“Of course you are, I’m just worried.”

“You don’t need to worry, I’m perfectly fine!”

Minho sighed and tried to reason. “Taemin, you just said you were not feeling good. Why don’t you stay here and do the things you want to do tomorrow? I would be more at peace knowing you were close and I could help you if you needed anything.”

“You, you, you!” Taemin screamed, throwing his arms in the air. “It’s always about you, isn’t it?”

“What? What the hell are you saying?”

“I’m just so sick of it, you don’t let me breath! I just want to go home tonight. Is that much to ask?”

Minho stopped and took a step back, giving space to the other. “Go. Just go then.” He pointed to the door, tired of arguing with the Taemin. “I won’t hold you any longer if that’s what you want. Just don’t come running to me after this saying you’re feeling worse.”

“I won’t. You can be sure that I won’t.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Taemin glared at him and passed by him, furious. “Nothing!”

The door slammed and Minho was left alone, fuming with anger. He grabbed one of the pillows and threw it across the room. He groaned and felt tears running down his cheeks, which got him even more irritated.

Who did Taemin think he was?, Minho scoffed as he thought about it in his head. Discarding him whenever he wanted, not having enough time for him when he had all the time in the world for other things. Some boyfriend he was. He couldn’t even believe they came to that. They used to be so happy all the time and now there were only arguments over everything.

Minho couldn’t even remember when was the last time Taemin had spend the night at his house. It seemed to him that he was the only one trying to make their relationship work but he was becoming so tired of it.

Sighing, he looked around and his eyes fell on his phone. Picking it up, he went to the recent calls and selected Kibum’s number.

“Hm?”

Minho sighed, pouting. “Did I wake you up?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.” His voice sound raspy and Minho suddenly felt bad for calling him so unexpectedly. “What time is it?”

“I’m sorry for calling you, Kibum. I’m going to let you go back to sleep, okay?”

“No, wait!” He said, before Minho could hang up. “You don’t sound too good, to be honest. Do you want to talk about it?”

“I-You were sleeping, I don’t want to bother you.”

Kibum chuckled on the other side and yawned. “Come on, I bothered you not so long ago and I didn’t even had a valuable excuse. I think you could use some help.”

Minho sighed and let his body sink further into the pillows around him. “It’s my boyfriend. I mean, it’s our relationship… We’re never together and when we are we spend all of our time arguing.” Kibum made a sound on the other side and Minho continued. “And it’s so hard to deal with it. We used to be so close, I grew up with him and then we fell in love but recently it’s like we’re just back to being friends…”

“Have you tried talking to him?”

“I’ve tried everything but every time I start to talk to him, he makes up some lame excuse and leaves.” Minho cried, feeling his throat burning. “I don’t know what to do. He doesn’t even want to sleep here anymore! Am I really not good enough?”

“I’m sure that’s not the case.”

“Then what is it?” Minho shouted, frustrated. “I’ve done everything I could. It just seems he doesn’t care about me anymore.

“Have you tried to seduce him?” Kibum asked on the other side.

Minho hissed, remembering the last night. “Last time I tried, I ended up calling you.”

“Okay, that didn’t go too well. Maybe he just needs some time by himself? Give him a little space and maybe he’ll realize that he misses you? I don’t know. I don’t know you or him so it’s hard to give advice. Just… just take it easy, okay?”

“I’ll try.” Minho muttered, still feeling sad albeit a little better than before. “Thank you. You can go back to sleep now.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m starting to feel sleepy too.”

“Oh really?” Kibum chuckled while Minho yawned. “So what do you do?”

Confused, the other frowned. “What?”

“Do you think I’m letting you sleep that easily after you woke me up in the middle of the night? You wish. Now, start spilling.”

Minho laughed out loud and suddenly felt a lot better. Talking with Kibum actually helped him feel better even if the other didn’t say anything too helpful. At least he wasn’t angry anymore.

They talked and talked until the wee hours of the morning where they kept learning about each other, exchanging ideas and opinions and joking around. It wasn’t until Kibum was dragging his voice and almost falling asleep on Minho that the last one decided to hang up but not before promising Kibum that he would call the next day after talking with Taemin.

A.N: Thank you to everyone who commented and subscribed! I hope you can continue to like the story ♡