Jun's car was much nicer than Vernon expected of a university student. Vernon thought it would resemble Seungcheol's car - dented with mismatched panels - but it was all the same colour and the light from the street lamps reflected off it smoothly.

"Nice car," he commented.

Jun shrugged as he opened the driver's door. "I bought it off a friend a few months ago. Minghao's obviously in the passenger seat, so you get the back."

Vernon hesitated before climbing in. He remembered Minghao telling him and Chan once that he'd given Jun a in the older guy's car.

"I jerk him off in the driver's seat, don't worry," Minghao scoffed as he got in the car. Vernon slid into the backseat on the passenger side, and saw Jun looked nervous. The elder said something to Minghao in Mandarin, who then replied back. Jun shook his head and said something else.

Vernon put on his seatbelt. "You know, Jun, you can legally have with Minghao," he said, guessing they were arguing about Minghao telling him what they'd done.

"I know, Vernon, but it isn't about the legalities. It's morals. Minghao's still a teenager-" Minghao interrupted Jun with what sounded like only a few words. "Right, eighteen and five days internationally - still a teenager. I'm - it wouldn't feel right. I feel like I'm taking away enough of his innocence with what I've agreed to doing already."

Minghao whined something else at Jun. Jun snapped something back, and Minghao didn't answer.

"Let's all talk about something else," Jun announced calmly.

"Maybe he wants you to take hi-"

"I said 'something else', Vernon. Mine and Minghao's life - or lack of - isn't any of your business. He can tell you about it, but don't try meddle in it. I don't need two people telling me something's fine to do when I don't think it is."

"So, why'd you call me?" Minghao turned around in his seat to ask Vernon.

"Seungkwan finally agreed to talk to me. He said a few things that got me angry, and I decided I should spend the night away from everything to process it."

"What'd he say?"

"He's been manipulating me so he can get his way and fake dated Jihoon to get me jealous, basically."

Minghao seemed unbothered by it, but Jun made a small "ahh" sound.

"What, Jun?" Vernon asked, turning to him.

"It sounds like the average case of one soul switching needs before the other, to me. He's still at fault because he could've just told you how feels - which in a lot of cases triggers the other to start switching needs, too - but he didn't. I've read heaps of accounts like yours and Seungkwan's. It usually happens to soulmates that meet early on in life."

Vernon nodded. "That's what the specialist told me - not the 'confessing can trigger switching needs' bit, though. Thanks for the recommendation, by the way - she was really nice and patient."

"No problem. The confession of feelings triggering a soul to switch needs isn't proven, there just seems to be a correlation - it's kind of difficult to prove. One of my textbooks has a chapter or two on soulmates switching needs, you can read it when we get to mine."

"Thanks, Jun. I'd like that."

Jun his stereo, the volume low. Vernon couldn't understand the words, so he assumed it was Chinese music.

When they reached Jun's, Jun disappeared to look for the textbook he'd been talking about in the car while Minghao showed Vernon around. It was fairly nice, much like his car. Small kitchen, one bathroom, one bedroom, a living room, clean, nothing falling apart, tastefly decorated, and a freaking gigantic bookshelf. It was probably the shortest house tour Vernon had ever been given.

"Jun always makes me sleep on the couch. While we were driving to pick you up he told me he'd let me sleep in his bed with him as long as I didn't try anything," Minghao complained as he flopped onto the couch after showing Vernon around.

Vernon hummed noncomittedly.

"You can sit down in the middle - he really does make me finish myself off far away from him," Minghao told him offhandedly. "We also have clean sheets if you want to put one over the couch to sleep - it can get itchy."

Vernon tentatively sat down on the middle cushion.

"I have clean sheets. You don't live here, Minghao." Jun held out a book to Vernon.

Vernon took it, and opened it up. "Chapters eight and nine," Jun told him. Vernon turned to chapter eight and started reading.

"You're so boring, Vernon. Get Junhui to photocopy the pages for you and we can all do something else - get your mind off the soulmate stuff. I swear you know know more about it than me and my boyfriend's studying to be a specialist."

Vernon begrudgingly passed the book to Jun, who went to his bedroom to photocopy it.

"What are we going to do?" Vernon asked.

Minghao got up and went over to the bookshelf. "Jun has a couple boardgames," he suggested, crouching down to look at the bottom shelf.

"Anything else?"

Minghao shook his head. "Not really - my boyfriend's actually pretty boring despite the leather jacket and torn jeans. One time I came over and he was drinking a glass of wine while he was organizing his notes or something, and he put it away until I left."

Vernon chuckled - the image was different from the greasy Jun he knew from the cafe.

"I'm not being held accountable if you fly off the rails," Jun said, a slightly joking tone in his voice and smirk playing at his lips. He held out the photocopied paper to Vernon, who took them and went over to his bag to shove them inside it. Minghao muttered something under his breath, and Jun chuckled.

"We'll play Scattergories until eleven, then it's off to bed for all of us. Minghao, I'm saying this in Korean so I have a witness; if I wake up at any time tonight or this morning to you blowing me, I will kick you out of my bedroom for you to sleep on the loungeroom floor, and you and I won't sleep in the same bed for six months."

"No problem, I'll respect your wishes." Jun nodded and sat with them. Minghao got out the game and put it on the floor. "See?" he told Vernon, "I told you he was boring. Boardgames, bedtimes, and no morning head."

When he went to sleep that night (a sheet on the couch), just as he was dozing off, he heard Minghao and Jun arguing quietly. He hoped Minghao hadn't crossed any boundaries, and resolved somewhere in the back of his mind to ask his friend about it the next day.

Vernon didn't know what it was that woke him up, the light streaming through one of Jun's windows, his phone's alarm, or pipes screaming in protest at the shower being .

He reached around for his phone before realising he didn't have any alarms set. Right, he was at Jun's.

He sat up and rubbed his eyes. The phone alarm stopped, and seconds later the couch sagged.

Minghao said something that sounded vaguely like "good morning". Vernon grunted back an appropriate reply.

"There's leftovers from dinner last night if you guys are hungry," Jun said a few minturs later as he came out of the bathroom, a pair of jeans riding low on his hips and a towel around his shoulders.

"Aren't you cold?" Vernon asked. Jun shrugged and messed his hair.

"Eyes off my boyfriend." Minghao shoved Vernon off the couch playfully. Vernon stayed sprawled across the floor. "Leftovers sound great." Minghao got up and grabbed something out of the fridge, then put it in the microwave.

Vernon sat up when Minghao pulled it out and the smell wafted over to him. "That smells good," he gave an exaggerated sniff, "any for me?"

Minghao held up a bowl of steaming food pointedly, his mouth already full of food. Vernon went over, grunting as he stood up, and took it off him.

"Fifteen minutes until I have to be at the cafe," Jun told them as he headed into his room, presumably to find a shirt and jacket.

Vernon groaned. He wanted some time away from everything, going to the cafe in the morning before school was a great way for him to accomplish the opposite.

"He could drop us off at school first, or we could go to the dance studio," Minghao suggested.

"Dance studio, who wants to go to school so early?" Vernon answered.

They wolfed down their breakfast and went to get changed into their uniforms. Vernon in the bathroom, Minghao in Jun's room.

When they got into the car Vernon decided he should check his phone. A missed call from his mum from about the time his family would've gotten home the night before, and two texts, both from his mum saying she loved and trusted him.

Huh, not as bad I expected, he thought to himself.

The rest of the say was a blur. He remembered talking to Chan's girlfriend at the dance studio (she was there with Chan) and helping Chan erase the pencil markings on his desk at the start of lunch, and Minghao missing during lunch.

Which brought Vernon to after school. The bell had just rang, and his heart was hammering. He'd seen Seungkwan across the cafeteria at lunch and hadn't been angry, only a little disappointed and frustrated. So, the next talk with Seungkwan could happen that afternoon.

Vernon waited outside the school gates for Seungkwan. The boy passed by him within arms reach, walking with Mingyu of course, so Vernon stuck out his hand and grabbed the back Seungkwan's bag.

Seungkwan let out a strangled noise of surprise before he looked behind himself and realised it was Vernon that had a hold of his bag. Seungkwan grabbed Mingyu's arm and pulled him closer to explain the situation to him.

"So, we're talking again tonight?" Seungkwan asked once Vernon had pulled them away from the throng of students trying to get out of the school grounds.

"Yeah, we are."

They walked towards Vernon's house in silence for a few moments before Seungkwan spoke up.

"Apparently you went AWOL last night." Vernon nodded. "Where'd you go?"

"Spent the night at Jun's with him and Minghao." Vernon sensed the next question would be "why?". "I needed a night away to process what you said."

"Sorry," Seungkwan murmured.

"Sorry isn't good enough, you need to not do it again. I need to be able to trust you to not play with me or do things to elicit the response you want. I have some pages that might help."

"I want you to be able to trust me." Seungkwan kicked a rock. "I want to not be manipulative."

"We should probably stop our discussion until we get to my place."

They walked in silence the rest of the journey.

"Seungkwan's here again - we're going to talk again," Vernon announced as he walked in.

"No problem, sweetie. Your sister has a play date anyway, and Joshua's probably staying back at uni to study for the evening," his mother called back.

Sofia appeared from her bedroom. "It's not a play date, I'm not five."

"Yes, of course it isn't. Silly me." His mother came out of his parents' bedroom, make up freshly applied and hair straightened. "You ready?" she asked Sofia. Sofia nodded. "Good, cause we need to leave now. Shows on," she hurried.

Vernon sighed and dropped his bag once the car took off.

"We should talk now. In the loungeroom, again." He and Seungkwan took off their shoes and made their way to loungeroom. They sat in the same places as yesterday evening.

"I don't want to manipulate you anymore if you don't like me doing it. Like, obviously I'm going to try get you to buy me low fat ice cream and stuff, but I'll be obvious about it."

Vernon had expected a silence, an awkward scramble trying to figure out what they had to discuss. Seungkwan had just jumped straight into it immediately.

"Sure," Vernon nodded, "normal things like trying to get me to buy stuff, or go places with you, or do sappy things are OK. If you do something I'm not OK with, I'll tell you. You tell me if I do something you don't like or don't want, too, deal?"

"Deal."

"Anything you want to bring up? You're half the relationship, Seungkwan."

Seungkwan puffed up his cheeks. "I know," he let out a puff of air, "I just don't know what we should talk about."

Vernon understood. Now he'd calmed down about the controlling manipulative thing, he couldn't think of anything that was anywhere as near a big deal as that.

"We could talk about us. Our relationship. We can discuss anything that comes along as it comes in our relationship."

Seungkwan smiled. "I'd like that. I don't think I can go back to being just your best friend anytime soon."

"Me either. I have - you're my soulmate. I can't imagine how you must feel since you've liked me so long."

Seungkwan settled into the couch. "It's like a dream. I've wished and hoped for so many years that you'd be mine. And you are. I just want to sort this all out so we can be boyfriends."

"You get to ask - you've been pining after me for so long and didn't confess. But first, we should probably read all the brochures, pamphlets, and pages of information I've been given."

Seungkwan nodded. "Sure, I want to know as much about all this soulmate stuff as you do."

Vernon stood up, and went over to Seungkwan to help pull him up before leading the boy to his room. He pulled out the desk drawer he'd stored everything in.

"You go through those, and I'll go get a couple more pages Jun gave me out of my bag."

When he got back not even a minute later, Seungkwan was laying on Vernon's bed, the informative texts were spread across it, too.

Vernon held out the pages Jun had photocopied for him. "These might help with whole manipulation, attention thing."

Seungkwan's eyes widened, and he took the papers off Vernon. Vernon sat down next to him. "I haven't read it myself, yet."

"Well then, we might learn some things at the same time."

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A/N:

This chapter took so long to write - I kept getting stuck with how to trsnsition.

So, you guys seem to think the pacing is fine - thank you for voicing your opinion on that. I think I was just being picky.

Verkwan is progressing! Yay! I might even get to write fluff soon!