Being all together is always the best thing. It’s fun and warm and Mark can’t help feeling blessed. Whether it’s on stage or going to eat together, he is always so happy when it’s the seven of them. He loves how loud it is, how they laugh so hard with every stupid thing any of them does.

Mark enjoys it most when Jackson is by his side, his hand occasionally on the elder’s thigh, giving a light squeeze before he’s back to eating. As he watches them all around he can’t help feeling so content with his life, hoping things would never change. 

He takes pictures and videos, he might post something, but at the end, these are all for himself, to look back to those times when he felt so happy.

That happiness leads him to eat too much, but Mark can endure it. However, Jackson isn’t the same. He starts feeling poorly on their ride back. By the time they are home, the younger is looking pale and sweating, so he runs to the bathroom. Youngjae is knocking at the door and telling him to hurry, because he isn’t feeling quite well either.

Mark is worried, of course he is, so while Jackson’s in the bathroom, he makes sure to prepare one cup of the organic green tea Jackson enjoys that would help him settle his stomach. He also runs to get some medicine for food poisoning and wishes he knew how to properly do the acupuncture trick to help his friend. Mark doesn’t dare to prick Jackson’s finger. Instead, he can only buy medicine for the two boys having troubles after eating so much meat.

Without asking, Mark leads Jackson to his room and makes him lean on his bed, giving him the medicine and the green tea that the younger sips at slowly, looking so tired. He’s so pale and there’s a thin layer of sweat over his skin, so Mark has to come with warm towels to wipe it. At least Jackson doesn’t have a fever.

“Why did you let me eat so much?” Jackson asks, more like whines, though.

“Because you wouldn’t listen and say you were starved and needed to eat for a thirty members idol group,” Mark reminds the other boy, sitting by Jackson’s side and watching him carefully.

“Have you seen a group like that?” the younger boy asks and by his expression Mark can tell he’s seriously thinking about it. “How messy would that be?”

“Imagine how many vans you’d need to carry them from one place to the other,” Mark muses, following Jackson’s train of thoughts and not missing the way his expression changes.

When people talk, Mark likes looking at them in the eyes or just giving them his full attention. When Jackson talks, Mark is hypnotised. He can’t look anywhere and everything about the boy is fascinating, and he knows his own expression is adoring whilst he stares at Jackson talking, laughing or doing anything.

Mark doesn’t mind.

“You think they’d fit on a stage? Like M Countdown’s stage?” wonders the boy while still holding the mug, his hands around it comfortably, looking already a bit better after the medicine and warm beverage.

Naturally, they end up talking about the fictitious thirty-members idol group and their performance, what type of music, how they would go around and such. They don’t even know why or how they end up talking so seriously about it, although it’s mostly Jackson telling what he imagines, even coming up with a bit of a song that he’s totally going to sell to that group when it comes.

As they talk, Jackson drinks all his tea and Mark ends up lying next to the younger boy, even under the sheets with Jackson curling to his side, comfortably. By this point, the Jackson looks a lot more like himself.

“How long do you think a group like that would last?” Jackson asks after possibly an hour talking about the group they’ve decided to name TMTC (Too Much To Count).

“Not much. It must be too hard living and working with so many people. I mean, you’d even need like at least three leaders, don’t you think?” Mark answers, trying to do the math to balance their imaginary group.

“How much longer do you think we’re going to last?” Jackson asks then, cuddling a bit closer as if talking about that topic was something that made him feel vulnerable.

Mark tightens his arms around Jackson in response, feeling like that himself.

“Many more years, I hope,” comes Mark’s answer. “I don’t want to stop anytime soon. I love this life. I don’t even move out of the dorm.”

“Me neither,” Jackson admits, taking a deep breath as his head rests on Mark’s chest. “But I know we won’t do this forever. What do you think it’ll happen to us then?”

“Hmm… I’m sure Jaebum will end up as a producer and song writer, Jinyoung is gonna becoming one of the best paid actors. Yugyeom is going to become a choreographer, Youngjae is gonna continue as a solo artist and selling out venues for his concerts. BamBam will