It’s Thursday, Minhyun wistfully thinks, again. It has only been what, a week(?) since his sudden bizarre outburst and he really would like to think he’s coping pretty well with everything around him and beginning to accept the fact that he turns somewhat psychotic whenever the lack of sleep attacks. But there’s one thing that he couldn’t fully accept even after welcoming all the oddities that had happened so far.

His feelings.
Yep, those absurd feelings.

Those darned feelings that weren’t supposed to exist, to be real in the first place, that weren’t supposed to be there, somewhere located in his empty freaking heart because 1) well it’s empty and he believes he doesn’t have a heart in the first place meaning he is in no way possible of having any feelings other than platonic. 2) So what if he does have a heart, it would be frozen by now because he is a cold guy. 3) FEELINGS AREN’T ALLOWED BETWEEN BROS.

Minhyun literally spent the few last few days searching for answers on psychiatrist portal sites, going through posts on internet because that’s what Jisung offers as an alternative to move on and he tried, god knows how hard he tried, to hate on Dongho and his stupid smile, his stupid obnoxious laugh, his idiotic actions, his annoying naggings and everything he could think of. Well, let’s just say it ends with more realization that Minhyun is really, helplessly, hopeless and has literally no good reason and basically nothing against his best friend, or more like his crush now.

He even went as far as consulting his father, who happened to be a doctor, and asked for some medicines or drugs that could help him stop feeling antsy whenever a certain someone is around. The only answer he received was a ‘you are more pathetic than when your sister first fell in love’ and a little encouragement of ‘get him to come home for New Years in Busan and I’ll try to brainwash him to at least tolerate your weird antics because there’s no way in hell that boy will fall for a bumpkin specifically one like you. Good luck.’

It seems that the world is against him, including his family.

 Since the kids have been trying very hard for the past few days; learning, studying, pulling all-nighters and stuff, Minhyun decided to bring boxes over boxes of everyone’s favorite pizza to campus for the sake of entertaining the poor souls. He originally planned to eat it together on the lawn outside and enjoy the sun but he forgot that it’s early winter and the weather has clearly turned for the worse so instead he waits in the cafeteria and hopes that the pizza won’t turn cold. He waits at the empty cafeteria and stares dully while waiting for someone to come.

“Hyung!” Seonho shrieks all the way from the entrance. He prances his way to Minhyun with a -eating grin and the older wonders if the kid has finally experienced the effect of energy drinks first hand.

One by one, the exam goers crowd the particular table near the window and dig in wordlessly to the provided energy booster that comes in the form of cheese-filled pizza. Everyone has the similar dark circle under their eyes, red and soulless pupils, and hair unruly. After eating at least a slice of what they call heaven, the boys start to go back to the routine of emitting unintelligent noises that usually accompany their lunch time with the younger kids bickering on who get the question right on the test and the hyung line complaining about their aching backs and unhealthy kidneys. The last one to join the group, unsurprisingly, is Dongho.

“I’m the one stressing out but you’re the one who looks terrible,” Dongho chuckles as soon as he takes his seat across Minhyun.

Okay, it’s fair enough to say that Minhyun looks horrible because he spent sleepless nights thinking on what to do with his not-so-secret crush which grants him the features of a walking corpse. Yes he still spends the entire night trying to deny every bubbling feeling and ends up nowhere thus creating ugly lines under his eyes. And it’s totally unfair for Minhyun because right now Dongho looks so damn good with his hair tousled messily, unlike every other day when he’d use a cap to cover his head and the grey hoodie the dude is wearing does not help Minhyun’s quickening pace of heartbeat. It’s freaking unfair because Dongho’s not supposed to smile that happily during the finals, not supposed to be so boyfriend material because this might make Minhyun fall deeper and deeper and…

“Dude, you okay?”

Minhyun snaps back to reality. “What makes you think I’m not?”

“You’re eating with a fork…” Dongho worriedly stares at Minhyun’s hands, earning attention from the rest of them.

“I can’t?” he retorts back almost sassily.

“You’re eating chicken soup though.”

Minhyun stares at the plastic bowl placed conveniently right in front of him, steam of cream soup hitting his face to slap him back to consciousness. Dongho has a point. He’s been out of it the past few days for goodness sake. The world must be testing him right now.

Minhyun studies Dongho’s amused expression, his irritatingly radiating grin and to the light brown plaster sticking on the left of his jaw.

Hansaplast? Out of all the normal looking ones, he had the decency to choose those with cute tiny animal prints on it.  

“What happened to your face?”

Dongho’s hand reaches up to his face to supposedly hide the covered wound from everyone’s curious eyes. “Scratched myself with a knife. Nothing much.”

Minhyun scowls, “how do you scratch yourself with a knife?”

The other male replies with a big laugh. “Actually it’s a funny story.  I was studying on the kitchen counter and in the midst of it I got pretty hungry so I peeled myself an apple. And in my sleep-deprived state, my face was a bit itchy and my brain thought I was holding a pen. Ta da!”

“You still look cool, dad!” Guanlin hollers from the other end of the table.

Dongho raises a thumb up in approval. Minhyun is really concerned for the father-son duo that doesn’t seem to know the danger and hazard of a knife. Shrugging the matter aside, everyone went back to their meal, now slightly in a better mood and forgetting the real struggle of being a student.

“Hey,” Dongho called in a whisper that Minhyun almost didn’t catch. He looked so uneasy that Minhyun suddenly feels extremely bad for him for no good reason but it might be the best friend instinct that tells Minhyun that Dongho is clearly bothered.

“What?”

“Look at direction 3 o’clock. Are they still there?”

Minhyun peers through the sea of students that starts filling up the cafeteria and inspects the usual crowded mess, neck craning while searching for Dongho’s source of discomfort. Well he found them. A group of girls, the gossip ones, are staring not-so-discreetly to their table and even raising a phone to take a picture of them, particularly on Dongho. Seriously, were they stalking out in the open?

Minhyun gotta say that his particular group of friends consists of kids whose looks are above average and it’s no rocket science to connect the dots that some people may actually find them precious enough to be ‘stalked’. This will attract infatuation as well as fans because to be honest, the younger kids are cute and adorable enough to gain adoration while the hyung line is considered as the cool guys that deserves at least a few confession letters every day. Gathering admirers is no hard feat but out of all the members of his squad, Dongho attracts least attention to himself, sometimes dressing like a hobo to campus and never bothered to look presentable during school days even when everyone is clearly comparing him to his fashionable friends. So it comes as a complete surprise to Minhyun that anyone might actually start taking pictures of his best friend out of nowhere.   

“Dude, do I look that scary? I mean, I’m not a criminal.”

“Stop being paranoid, maybe they’re just trying to take a pic of Jihoon? He’s sitting next to you.”

“Yeah maybe you’re right but it’s been happening all day. At this rate I’m actually scared that they might break into my house and kill me in my sleep.” The distressed male chuckles nervously but Minhyun knows it’s a sign of discomfort.

Minhyun offers a sympathetic glance to the guy and glares to the table of those still-gossiping girls. They are a little surprised that the ever-so-cold Hwang Minhyun took time to give them an intimidating stare. It was uncomfortable of course but Dongho managed to brush the stares off and focus only on his food and Daehwi’s endless rants on where to eat after this.

--

“You were the one who woke me up last night ! How dare you blame me when I’m the victim here!”

“Hey, you said it was okay to turn up the volume and I did not accuse you of anything stop being sensitive!”

“I said you can play some soothing music and not heavy metal rock when I was trying to sleep! And Jihoon, you also can’t just blast Bang Bang Bang in the middle of the damn night. WE HAVE NEIGHBORS!”

Minhyun tunes out the usual bickering from the two roommates as Daehwi tries to stop Woojin from clawing Jihoon’s face and vice versa while walking out from the school territory with the rest of his friends in tow. And that’s when he sees them again, the stares. Now, it is completely obvious that they were directing their attention to Dongho and to be honest, it is irking Minhyun to no end. What the hell is wrong with them today? Every ten steps they made out of campus, at least three pairs of eyes are staring at Dongho. And some of them are even eyeing him up and down. Minhyun thinks this is no longer just judgemental gazes but more of interest.

“What and why on earth are they looking at me?! Do I have something on my or my face that deserves this mockery?” Dongho groans out loud and hides himself behind Minhyun’s body, checking his face for signs of any mishaps but found none out of norm. Minhyun wants to ask the same question. “Really I didn’t even exit my house for the past few days so if they somehow believe a rumor that I killed someone, I swear it wasn’t me. I really had a terrible headache the whole week from the lack of sleep and I’m sure as hell not able to function without my nap.”

Minhyun wants to hit himself with a stick because, wow he’s actually harboring feelings for a big whinny baby and that’s how Dongho usually acts around him but it only downs on him now that the guy is actually taking a huge space in his heart and that’s not healthy.

“Minki, check why everyone’s suddenly interested in Dongho’s life. I’m tired of his whining so please make him stop,” Minhyun sighs.

“Already on it,” Minki says while browsing through his numerous social media accounts. He has the golden connection so no one questions anything. A few seconds pass and Minki snaps his fingers with a smug smirk.

“It looks like our resident idiot Kang Dongho gained himself a few dozen fans courtesy of Boo Seungkwan.”

Dongho visibly pales. “Oh no…”

Minki’s grin brightens even more as he typed furiously on his phone. “Oh yes. It is found that Kang Dongho’s shirtless photo, taken in a hot spring in Jeju, had made him viral through internet and now proclaimed as the current internet ‘it’ boy. Boo Seungkwan is the culprit who posted it on his personal instagram and twitter accounts, getting more than 5k likes and almost a thousand retweets for those in less than a day. Main reason for the sudden interest? broad shoulders, nice body, and as weird as it seems, girls dig the tattoos. I mean, bad boy concept really makes them crazy huh? Hard to believe but it even got into almost all of the university’s group chats, which explains the stares. Some people find him quite attractive.”

Jonghyun is already cackling with Jisung at the back as Dongho takes a moment to dwell in his misery and self pity because of the piling embarrassment. He has never been quite fond of receiving too much attention since childhood and to receive this much after so many years of living in ignorant bliss, this turns out to be very uncomfortable. Minhyun’s eyebrows furrow as his anger slowly consuming his rationality.

“Attractive? Now people claim him good-looking only after they’ve seen his abs and tats? They’re just weird enough not to notice him from the start because, shirtless or not, Dongho’s already good looking and they’re just stupid enough not to realize.”

Everyone blinks in shock, stopping whatever they were doing before, as Minhyun’s words finally registered in their brains. The group, originally walking down the path towards the campus gates, comes to a halt. Daehwi is currently using his hand, furiously swaying it in front of his neck as a gesture to abort the mission, hyung!  Which immediately alerts the tall guy. Minhyun breaks into cold sweats.

Seongwoo snickers quietly, “so much for a ‘tiny’ crush.”

Minhyun glares at him and Seongwoo automatically shuts up but still remain smug. Daniel comes into the picture with an equally annoying smirk on his face. “is it jealousy I smell burning in the air? Does this jealousy bring the ever so poised Hwang Minhyun in blurting his feelings out?”

“Shut it.” Minhyun grits his teeth.

Now everyone turns to Dongho, waiting for a reaction because it is hell sure that Minhyun’s voice can be heard in their radius. The guy of topic seems surprised, brown eyes open wide as his jaw remains unhinged. He quickly breaks out of his reverie though and strides confidently to his best friend. Dongho puts his hand on Minhyun’s forehead with a glum expression, pressing his palm to feel any sort of heat.

“This is the nicest thing you’ve said about me in our whole 15 years of friendship. Are you sure you’re not sick? The last time you said less mean stuff about me was when you’re not exactly in your right mind and when you were guilty for breaking my phone last summer. So which one is it now?”

Everyone released the deep breath they had unknowingly held. True, Dongho shouldn’t be this smart nor sensitive to this kind of topic especially those involving feelings and emotion. Why should they even be worried in the first place? There’s a reason Kang Dongho doesn’t do romance. He’s an idiot.

Minhyun is somehow glad that his secret is safe. For now.
But on the other hand he is slightly disappointed and very upset because how can someone be so insensitive and oblivious?! From his previous comment, it is almost clear that Minhyun is stating a very biased opinion and it is based on an impulse to defend his loved one friend. Also, everyone’s reaction was just a dead giveaway. The guy should have been able to guess by now but it seems Dongho is still a clueless piece of .

Minhyun wonders why he even has feelings for this guy.