Chapter 18: I Am (Not) Ready

“His what?!”

Himchan stood a little too fast, hearing that. It felt like his world took a wild spin. Evidently, he had a little too much to drink. He sat back down just as quickly as he stood up, clinging to the sturdier man who had caught him half way despite the evident surprised look on his face.

The blonde man snorted and gave a clearly annoyed laugh as he scratched his hair quite violently. Yongguk sat there, supporting Himchan still, as the man looked at him – probably adjusting in disbelief.

“So I bleached my hair, laid off the eyeliner because you said I looked like a raccoon,” he said.

“You had a feeling didn’t you? Back at the café when you stared at me,”

“How could you forget?” Himchan caught that’s mall shove the man gave his Yongguk.

Thoughts swirling in his head, he couldn’t think straight. He shouldn’t have drunk that much. He looked around, dazed, foggy and misty sheets filtering his eyes as looked around. Trying to register the faces of the people around him and exactly how they looked at the moment. He looked at Jieun, mouthing “vodka?”, as if taunting him more that he drunk a little too much.

But did he just say first love? Was this little weasel his first love? Yongguk was not denying it at all and they just stared at each other. There were wild thoughts in his head and he could not simply decipher anything. For a moment there it looked like Zico’s hair was on fire. Or maybe that was just the alcohol talking? What was he saying? He was mouthing words, but he couldn’t understand them anymore. Yongguk spoke in his low baritone, talking back to the man who appeared to be flailing now. Himchan couldn’t support himself any longer, clutching to the man who sat next to him, feeling his head and his face getting flushed by the minute, leaning to the man’s chest and hearing his chest wildly beating.

What was he saying?

Is this Zico, this Woo Jiho, your first love?

“You said rapping in Hongdae was and will always be your first love,”

“What happened to you?”

Rapping in Hongdae…

… is first love.

Oh.

And he passes out.

- - -

Himchan felt like he fell off a cliff and fell into an endless vortex. It was quite unpleasant. Like dying. Or maybe not. Just falling endlessly then hitting a hard rock and getting that rock permanently attached to your head. His head felt heavy. For some reason. He didn’t exactly remember everything that occurred last night but he remembered bits and pieces. He remembered how that weasel tried to get Yongguk drunk. Date , much? Asked him to dance with him and then throwing a hissy fit about first love and some other crap. Then again, he remembers leaning into Yongguk, and staying by his side.

He was warm. And sturdy. Smelled pretty pleasant, too. His scent was like a combination of manly sweat and some fresh mint, like the ones you smell in the middle of summer. That kind of scent. It felt like it had engraved into his senses that he could smell him.

Wait.

He could actually smell him.

Himchan darted his eyes open. It was dark, and it felt like he was trapped in some place wrapped with something really heavy. What the was going on?

Trying to move his head, seeing nothing but black, he panicked and tried to shove his way out of whatever was keeping him locked in… only to wish he hadn’t.

There was a small grumble, and a mumble. The ‘darkness’ getting shoved off… or more like, Yongguk’s shirt moving away. The man gives him the space he wanted…or the space he didn’t know he didn’t want. Himchan looked around to see him in an unfamiliar room, as the he glances over to the arm that he used as a pillow and Yongguk stretching the one arm he had covered Himchan with. Did they… sleep like that all night? It was anybody’s guess, but Himchan’s imagination was quick to oblige. Imagining them in each other’s arms, it was the perfect scenery for a love sick puppy like him.

Then slowly, Yongguk’s eyes slowly crept open, looking at Himchan, and that soft smile that the man had always dreamed of, waking up next to him, brighter than the morning.

“Morning, Channie,” he said, as he slowly brings back the arm he was stretching and placing it by the dreaming man’s face.

Channie...?

Unexpectedly, he taps the man’s nose once, “You,” twice, “are not”, thrice, “allowed to drink anymore,” he says.

“I won’t allow it,” he laughs.

Himchan feels himself get flushed by that remark, embarrassed, but he smiles. It was the perfect morning. And even if getting this same scenario meant drinking again, he knows he wouldn’t exactly mind. It was perfect, it was –

The ?!

A second hand smashes Himchan’s face.

How many hands does Yongguk have?!

Panicking, Himchan flails and removes the hand on his face, only to see that damn weasel leaning into Yongguk as the man faces him.

“What the hell are you—”

“Hyung, I couldn’t sleep well last night, Himchan-hyung snores really badly,” he complains.

Yongguk laughs and pat the younger man as he removes the arm he had on Himchan. That small space suddenly felt a little cold, a little empty and a little lonely.

“That’s not how I remember it,” he laughs again.

That's not how you remember what?

Yongguk stretches once more, before finally sitting up. Himchan notes that there was a bed on the other side of the room but they all sprawled on the floor, laying in covers and pillows.

“Where are we?” Himchan finally asks, looking around the neatly arranged room with posters and dolls. It looked like a shared room between a brother and sister.

“Hyung’s room!”  Zico exclaimed.

“Hyung, who?” Himchan, pretty dumb question.

“Mine,” another laugh from the man who had just placed a lone Tigger toy by the bed that Himchan didn’t notice he was using as a pillow before.

“You were super drunk you couldn’t find your keys, so Hyung brought you here,” Zico supplied. Himchan didn’t really need him to tell anything. In fact, he just wanted him to leave.

Many times has Himchan imagined this scenario. Sleeping next to Yongguk and waking up next to him. Feeling the sun rays bathing the two of them as they wake up lazily. That blonde weasel didn’t fit in anywhere in that beautiful scene.

“And you’re here… because?” cocking his head, showing him his clear dissatisfaction.

“Haha, what, you didn’t think I’d leave hyung to someone like you, no? Drunk , much?”

Yongguk laughs, ruffles the boy’s hair and invites them to wash and eat breakfast. The blonde man cheers and clings to the older man. He was pretty ‘out there’, and this worried the ulzzang. And when the calmer, older man was no longer paying attention, he looks back at the languid Himchan on the floor and mouths to him, “Yongguk is mine,”

The jig is up.

- - -

Note: This wasn’t supposed to be up until tomorrow, but everyone got a little too agitated, haha. Enjoy! Also, can you see the finish line? This fic is almost done. I hope you've enjoyed it thus far : )