Yixing’s a bit nervous as he walks with Luhan to his car, the other’s luggage in his hand.

He totally sympathizes with the boy for his innocent mistake. Yixing was known for being a clutz, and a bit forgetful, and overly panicked at times, or flustered, or-

“Thanks.” Luhan says with a smile, taking his suitcase to load it into the trunk of his rental car.

“Yup,” Yixing replies before they hop into the car, with Yixing giving directions to his shared apartment.

Yixing knows this could have been dangerous for the both of them, but for once he doesn’t seem worried about this decision to take Luhan in—not even the slightest bit of anxiety or increase in blood pressure.

It feels as if he and Luhan had known each other in a past life or something.

They pull into the apartment complex’s basement parking lot in just minutes, and the as they enter the elevator, Luhan hums, “So, your roommate?” he inquires, figuring he should at least know his name before they start living together, though Luhan has no idea how long.

“Oh!” Yixing exclaims, only now remembering that he had forgotten to inform Luhan on the car ride over, too caught up in his own thoughts. “I was on the phone with him while you were getting your things from the firemen,” Yixing explains, and Luhan nearly flushes in embarrassment recalling the memory, “Actually, I should give you my number first, just in case.”

“Oh, right.” Luhan says, pulling his phone out of his pocket, surprised that it’s still working despite how his clothes were still wet from earlier.

They finish exchanging numbers—Yixing adding Kyungsoo’s number to Luhan’s phone as well—when the elevator stops on the first floor, which is not their destination.

A man enters, smiling when he sees Yixing, but he raises an eyebrow when his gaze lands on Luhan, his nose scrunching in distaste.

Luhan’s eyebrows furrow in confusion seeing the reaction before realizing his physical appearance—very damp clothes with a haphazardly strewn bathrobe across his shoulders.

“Hey, Baekhyun,” Yixing greets, seemingly unaware of Luhan’s bright blush and Baekhyun’s judging gaze.

“Hi, Yixing. And…er…” Baekhyun speaks, looking Luhan up and down, in which the latter barely rips his gaze away from the floor as Yixing speaks.

“Oh, this is Luhan. Say hi,” Yixing smiles as if he’s introducing a shy child.

Nevertheless, Luhan introduces himself, extending a hand while he barely fights off the urge to shut his eyes and wish that this is all a dream.

“Hi, I’m Luhan.”

Baekhyun hesitates before taking Luhan’s cold hands and oh—Luhan notices, his hands are pretty—and he gives a surprisingly firm handshake.

“Baekhyun,” he replies, still questioningly eyeing Luhan’s appearance.

Yixing shakes his head and sighs as he finally understands Baekhyun’s body language, and Luhan swears his blush couldn’t get any redder.

“Long story…” he squeaks out, and Baekhyun nods in more understanding, and a hint of sympathy, though it may have been pity, Luhan doesn’t know.

“Got it.”

The trio get off once the elevator had stopped at the fourth floor, and Luhan’s surprise is probably a bit too noticeable because Baekhyun answers his unvoiced question.

“Yes, I’m this floor. My apartment’s the one just across from Yixing’s…and yours, I’m assuming.”

Luhan nods, starting to shiver again because the air conditioning is really cold, and he hopes the sound of his chattering teeth isn’t too loud.

Baekhyun leaves with a wave, disappearing into his apartment just as Yixing knocks once on the pretty bright yellow door, and it flung open to reveal a male with very worried looking eyes.

“Kyungsoo!” Yixing greets, and that’s when Luhan realizes he and Yixing hadn’t finished the conversation they barely started from earlier, and that he knows nothing about his other apartment-mate.

“Luhan! Nice to meet you!” is all Luhan hears from Kyungsoo before the shorter male is pulling him and his bag into what he assumes to be the spare room.

Luhan’s too stunned to comprehend much, but he nods after hearing: “Change,” and “food,” and opens up his suitcase one the door clicks shut.

Kyungsoo rushes to the kitchen to warm up the stew he had hesitantly made after getting Yixin’g phone call. He knew his friend could be a little naïve and too nice at times, so Kyungsoo wasn’t so sure about his friend’s spontaneous decision to bring a stranger home.

But nevertheless, he had cooked some food and prepped the spare bedroom they had for their ‘guest’, whose name he had just recently found to be Luhan.

In fact, when Yixing knocked on the door, he was already jittery and anxious because, what kind of person invites a stranger to live with them?!

But just one glance at Luhan convinced Kyungsoo that Yixing had made the right decision, especially with the way the male was shivering. Kyungsoo had always been a good judge at character, and he could tell Luhan was genuine and trustworthy.

“Glad you’re no longer panicking, Kyungsoo.” Yixing’s voice rings from the hallway before removing his jacket, coming into the kitchen where the other’s working.

“Shut up,” Kyungsoo retorts with a scrunch of his nose, ladling a bowl of soup for Luhan.

Just as the short male has three bowls of stew and three cups of coffee set out on the table, Luhan emerges from the room, still in a bit of a daze.

“Come eat,” Kyungsoo calls to him from the kitchen, where he and Yixing are already sitting.

Luhan obliges easily because the food smells heavenly and his stomach is twisting and growling with hunger.

“Thanks,” he murmurs softly under his breath, eating ravenously and slurping inappropriately loudly despite his slight discomfort in the new environment, though nobody seems to mind or care about his frantic meal etiquette.

Once Luhan has finished eating like a wild animal that hasn’t seen food in days, in Kyungsoo’s opinion, that is, he sighs contentedly, rubbing his stomach softly.

“So, tell us about yourself?” Yixing speaks, and Luhan realizes that if these people have so graciously invited him to stay with them, they ought to at least know a little about him.

“Don’t be like that, Yixing,” Kyungsoo scolds just as Luhan hesitates, wondering where he should begin his story, “We should go first.”

Luhan’s left feeling a little bit lost, because Kyungsoo and Yixing seem to be able to communicate without words, though it’s probably since they’ve been in this same apartment since graduating high school together.

“Okay then, Luhan, you can call me Kyungsoo. I graduated high school a few years ago and went into medical training,” Kyungsoo explains, faintly reminiscing what a pain in the it was to get into medical school.

“Straight into medical training?” Luhan asks, and Kyungsoo sees the confusion clear as day, and he chuckles to himself, letting Luhan speak even though he already knows what the other’s question is, “Don’t you have to go to undergrad first or something? And then apply to a medical school? Then take a bar exam or something too?”

Kyungsoo shakes his head, about to explain his story that he’s told so many times before,

“I was lucky. I heard about a huge number of fatalities that occurred around here one summer from a crazy forest fire some camper started by accident. The medical teams really needed all the help they could get, and I guess they accepted me early.” Kyungsoo finishes explaining, hearing a hum in understanding from the other because, hell—who didn’t hear of that freak accident?

The fire was so bad for such an idiotic accident that the smoky bear commercials increased at least ten-fold, in addition to all the news networks reporting the same story.

Luhan’s nodding, but Kyungsoo hears Yixing let out a snort, shaking his head to himself.

“Maybe the fact that Kyungsoo was a brilliant student plays as a factor too.”

Luhan hears Yixing’s murmur and his head in interest, his gaze trained on Kyungsoo, who can’t help but sigh softly.

“Just valedictorian…and student council president…with a 5.0 GPA…but that’s really all!

“And nod to mention modest…” Yixing mutters under his breath, and Luhan’s comfortable enough to chuckle.

He can already tell that these two people are great, even having just men them an hour ago.

Yixing hears the silence afterwards, though he really doesn’t mind because it feels perfectly comfortable to him, even if Luhan seems to be awkwardly staring at the table, and Kyungsoo’s shooting glares at him that say: “TALK”

He decides to clear his throat, and Kyungsoo takes the opportunity to force Yixing to talk, “Why don’t you properly introduce yourself, Yixing?”

Yixing sighs, but nods, even if he’s never been the best at holding proper conversations.

“Hi, as you know, my name is Yixing. My full name is Zhang Yixing, by the way, oh—and he’s Do Kyungsoo,” he explains, gesturing at Kyungsoo, “I actually can’t believe we didn’t even tell you our full names yet!” Yixing explains, unconsciously falling into a tangent, “That’s insane, I mean, what if one of us got stranded somewhere, and we really needed Luhan’s help or something? He wouldn’t even know our full names to identify us! Though, I mean, our names are pretty unique, if you ask me. Oh! Good thing I already added our numbers to your phone, Luhan. It would be terrible if something bad really did happ—“

“Yixing,” Kyungsoo interrupts knowingly, “You’re rambling again.”

Luhan nods in agreement slightly when Yixing’s gaze falls onto him, hoping the confession doesn’t hurt his feelings even though it’s true. He had been, after all, staring a bit awkwardly down into his lap as his hands when Yixing began sidetracking.

“Oh. Sorry, Luhan,” Yixing apologizes, though he doesn’t seem to be very embarrassed at all. It must happen often, Luhan internally notes as Yixing continues speaking,

“I tend to do that a lot. Where were we again? Ah, yes. Kyungsoo and I graduated high school together, hence us sharing this very well furnished apartment. As you learned earlier, I’m currently running the hotel you had your accident in.”

Luhan pinks at the mention of that, the memory still fresh in his mind, and Kyungsoo chuckles, remembering the explanation Yixing had given him on the phone.

“I tend to jump from job to job a lot. I don’t see why I ever got let go though…I think I did a pretty good job at that baby nursery…”

Kyungsoo laughs, turning towards Luhan as he covers his mouth with his hand, blocking Yixing’s view of his lips as he whispers loudly, “He nearly forgot the baby’s meal times.”

“Hey! ‘Nearly’ is the key word! A co-worker reminded me, so really no harm done!” Yixing replies, receiving a quick response from Kyungsoo,

“The very same co-worker who reported you and ultimately got you fired.”

Luhan started to chuckle softly, and soon the sound of the trio’s laughter filled the air. Once the laughter died down, Luhan felt two pairs of eyes on him.

“Your turn.” Yixing said, finished with his ‘interesting’ introduction.

Though he felt more relaxed, Luhan couldn’t help but be just a bit shy again as he spoke, “Well, I’m Luhan, and I’m a photographer.”