Kihyun stirs awake in the dim morning light, warmth spreading through his chest at seeing who’s lying beside him. A faint smile plays its way across his pink lips, and it quickly morphs into a smirk as his companion from the night before turns to face him. The man’s eyes slowly creek open, and a smile of pure delight spreads across his face. Kihyun finds himself bending his legs backward, as he’s lying on his stomach, and impishly swinging them underneath the covers as he points his toes towards the ceiling.

“Morning, doll,” Kihyun greets cheekily, his voice thickened by morning grogginess. He moves closer, pecking at the man’s bare chest with soft, feather-like kisses.

“Morning, aga,” he sighs, wrapping an arm instinctively around the smaller male. Kihyun’s heart stops for a moment at the nickname, and it takes all he has to fight back a tired sigh.

And so it begins… he thinks in exasperation. His warm, fuzzy feeling from awakening after a night of good dissipates, and he stiffens in the man’s hold.

“I’ve gotta go, hyung,” he says, already sliding out of the man’s hold without even waiting for a response. Jaekwan frowns in confusion at his sudden shift in mood, and props himself up on an elbow to watch as the younger begins searching for his clothes.

“… You don’t wanna stay for breakfast?” he asks slowly, raising a single brow. “I thought I could make us—”

“Sorry,” Kihyun interrupts, slipping on his slightly-wrinkled shirt from the night before, “I can’t. Maybe next time, okay?” He glances over his shoulder to shoot Jaekwan a reassuring smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes, but the older seems none the wiser. His anxious frown goes away, and it’s replaced by an easygoing grin.

Kihyun returns the smile, ignoring his churning gut as he continues getting dressed.

It would be a walk of shame into his shared apartment if he had any shame about where he’d been the night before, or why he’s just now getting home in the same clothes he left in then. But, Kihyun doesn’t see the point in having shame in doing something he has been ever since coming to university… or at all, for that matter. But, that’s beside the point.

“Aigooo,” the raspy voice of his roommate, Minhyuk, comments from the couch. “You’ve got that look in your eye again, Kihyunnie… You gonna cut Jaekwan loose?” Kihyun chuckles breathily, pausing on his way to his bedroom to take a momentary seat beside his same-age friend.

“Yeah,” Kihyun answers simply, resting his head on Minhyuk’s shoulder. Minhyuk hums, though his eyes don’t leave the television in front of them.

“And what was his cardinal sin?” he asks, noting how Kihyun’s body relaxes dramatically against him. “Whatever it was must’ve been real bad… You two have been crazy about each other all week…”

“He called me aga,” Kihyun replies, his face scrunching up in dismay. Minhyuk laughs breathily, shaking his head at his roommate.

“Well, then he should be flayed alive,” he teases. Kihyun in a breath through his front teeth and pushes himself off the couch, deciding it better to pass out before his shift today than to hear Minhyuk’s typical commentary on his love life.

“One day all these broken hearts are gonna catch up with you, Kihyun-ah!” Minhyuk calls after him in a singsong voice, rattling off his typically overly dramatic warning. Kihyun rolls his eyes, blatantly ignoring the man’s words with the definitive slam of his bedroom door behind him.

Hoseok heaves a deep breath as he sits down on the only bench in the practice room. He reaches beneath him for his water bottle, and he empties it halfway in one gulp. He stares at his own reflection in the mirror, and wipes tiredly at his own face with his sweat-soaked shirt. It doesn’t do much to help his current dampness, but it at least helps him feel better.

The tinny sound of a popular pop hip-hop song suddenly blares through the still calm, and Hoseok reaches tiredly for it.

“Hoseok-ah,” his roommate’s deep tones greet before even saying hello, “I uh… just thought I’d call to check on you. Are you still practicing?” Hoseok can’t help but chuckle warmly at Hyunwoo’s clear uncertainty. Despite having known each other for years, the slightly-older still gets a bit nervous about having to ask him where he is in fear of sounding too much like his dad.

“I’m almost done,” Hoseok replies with a smile, though he knows the older still can’t see it. “I—” He’s cut off by scuffling on the other end, and suddenly Minhyuk’s boisterous tones are yelling at him.

“Are you gonna be around for dinner, hyung?” Minhyuk asks, causing Hoseok to shirk away from the phone at the overly-bright tones assaulting his ear. He quickly adjusts, though, and hums in reply. “Good. My roommate is gonna be home tonight, and he’s making enough food to feed twenty. So, I’ll see you both at my place around seven.”

The invitation isn’t so much as a request, but more of a demand, but Hoseok doesn’t really mind. He’s heard from Jooheon and Changkyun that Minhyuk’s roommate’s—wasn’t his name Kihyun, or something?—cooking skills are unsurpassed. Of course, they could just be saying that because they’ve both slept with the man in question, or the fact that they get free food whenever Kihyun cooks, and that’s such a rarity for college students that most jump at the offer.

Minhyuk hums on the other end, as if satisfied with Hoseok’s compliant sigh, and ends the call. Hoseok can’t help but laugh at the typical behavior of his roommate’s boyfriend. He stands then, his fatigued body protesting all the way as he gathers his things and leaves. It’s already so late in the afternoon, he should probably head on home and start getting ready.

As he walks home, he replays all the things he’s heard about this man he’s never met from the others. Everyone else knows him, has even hung out with him on occasion, but Hoseok’s always been so busy with work and studies that he’s never been free whenever they made plans.

He’s been told Yoo Kihyun is a great cook, an incessant nag, and a stress-cleaner. He’s apparently a great singer, but he and Minhyuk are so similar—as described by Hyungwon, Jooheon, and Changkyun—that they clash a lot. It’s supposed to be really entertaining, though, to watch them go back and forth, so it isn’t all bad.

He, also, apparently has slept with every single member of their group, and most men you run across on campus. In fact, a fellow dance-mate of Hoseok’s, Jaekwan, is supposed to be dating Kihyun right now. Hoseok had warned him not to get his hopes up, as Kihyun has a heartbreaker-kind of reputation around, but Jaekwan had insisted that he could tame the man’s wild ways, that they were for real.

Hoseok chuckles to himself, remembering the naïve innocence shining in Jaekwan’s eyes. He’s known guys like Kihyun before, and they’ve never been “tamed”.

Tonight’s definitely gonna be interesting… Hoseok muses silently, wondering just how well he and this mysterious Kihyun would get along…