Happy birthday, Valexo!  (And a shoutout to your friend Lucy692 for being lovely and awesome as well.)  Hope you have a great day!

Deer Luhan,

Is there a word for a phobia of closets?  Because I think I have closetrophobia.  It's not claustrophobia, either way.

Leigh

Luhan went to bed early.  I was pretty certain it was as much to do with wanting some privacy after trying not to cry on my shoulder as it was to do with him being tired, so I made his excuses to Kris and found myself being roped into the whole-group video chat we were having that evening with EXO-K.

“Do the managers really have to join in with this?” Chen complained as I set up Luhan’s computer for the call, since it was the one with the best quality video and sound.

“Our one, yes,” Kris threw back over his shoulder as he headed down the hallway.  “He’s the one organising what happens when they arrive on Friday and he wants to brief all twelve of us together.”

“Why?” Chen whined softly, slumped further down the sofa beside me.  I ignored him and put through the call, even though I secretly agreed: it was an annoyance that the manager had to be there.  I was pretty sure everything that needed to be said could be relayed to the K boys later in the week.

“You’ll live,” grunted Xiumin, plopping down on my other side.  Lay settled himself in Xiumin’s lap.

The call was answered by Chanyeol and Baekhyun, both seated comfortably on the sofa in their dorm and grinning broadly.

“Hi!” they chorused.

I was about to greet them in return when I felt somebody breathing down the back of my neck.  Screaming, I flailed about on the sofa for a few seconds (Lay steadied the laptop) before I turned my head and saw Tao, who was looking a little amused.

“Let me guess!” Chanyeol clapped his hands together.  “You’re….”  He squinted.  “Bambi?” he tried.

“That joke is not new.”

“Apparently you’ve been talking about Sehun in your sleep,” said D.O.’s voice in English, followed shortly by his head appearing between Chanyeol’s and Baekhyun’s.

“ off, D.O.  I know I don’t sleeptalk.”

“It’s Leigh,” D.O. informed the others, returning to Korean.  “See, she automatically thinks it’s to do with her whenever anybody mentions Sehun.”  Apparently my knowledge of English didn’t factor into this at all.

“Who’s mentioning me?”  Sehun appeared, eating a rice cake.

“Nobody,” said D.O.  “And sit down – you’re too tall.”

Chanyeol grinned at him.  “We should water you and stick you out in the sun.”

D.O. just gave him a bland look.  “Photosynthesis is not my style.”

Chen let out a dramatic sigh.  “D.O., don’t cramp Kris’ style.  It doesn’t suit you.”

D.O. ignored him and turned to address me in English.  “We’ve been hearing whisperings of visas for you from the SuJu guys,” he said.  “You are absolutely not allowed to fly home before we get to China on Friday, even if it means hiding in a closet for the next few days.”

I gave him a wan smile.  “They said at least a week to get the papers ready.  I’ll be there whether I like it or not.”

“Sweet!” cooed Kai’s voice from offscreen.  “I get birthday cake baked by Leigh!”

“Who ever said I was going to cook it for you?”

Sehun glanced sideways and started laughing.  “Chanyeol, Chanyeol, move the camera so she can see the puppy eyes he’s giving her.”

Chanyeol leant forwards to adjust the computer, but he was interrupted by the appearance of a flustered-looking Suho.

“Oh, you’re all already here?” the leader said, thanking Baekhyun when the latter offered up his seat for him.  “Sorry I’m late – got held up with demo tracks – you guys are going to absolutely love our title song for the next comeback.”

The dorm door clicked shut and there were footsteps in the hallway.

“’Sup,” drawled Kris’ voice as he came into the living room with the manager.  “Oh, good, you’re already online.”

All casual chatter ceased at once.  Chen pulled me over onto his other side so the manager could sit in the middle and so that I wasn’t too much under the man’s scrutiny, and Kris for some reason decided it would help my non-existent nerves to keep a hand on my shoulder as the manager began reeling off a list of instructions to the K boys.  With the exception of Suho, the guys on the screen appeared to be taking a fair amount of (thankfully, subtle) interest in Kris’ hand, though I did notice Sehun glaring at it like it was a particularly nasty bug on a couple of occasions.

We wound up discussing our recent schedules as a debriefing, the manager dominating most of the conversation.

“Oh, the fanmeet yesterday actually went really well,” Suho reported when he could get a word in edgeways.  “There was a huge turnout and a fair number of international fans, too.”  He clapped a hand on Sehun’s shoulder, though his expression turned a little confused.  “Sehun’s picked up some absolutely mad English skills recently.  There were a couple of American girls who came along without speaking a word of Korean and he held a totally fluent conversation with them in English.  The response from the international fans has been absolutely explosive.  They’re all going on about how dreamy his accent is—”

The manager narrowed his eyes at Sehun, who was acting a little abashed and biting on his bottom lip.

“Sehun, you’re not dating an English girl, are you?” the manager asked suspiciously.

Baekhyun choked and hastily ducked out of the camera with a rather spurious-sounding coughing fit.  Sehun’s eyes flew wide and he jumped.

“Wh-what?”

“You were no way near fluent in English a month back,” the manager said.  “Are you dating an English girl?  Because it would explain the sudden improvement.  Is Luhan taking the brunt of this for you to keep it secret?”

There was a split second’s pause as Sehun’s eyes flickered to me and then away again, and then Kai, Chanyeol and Chen exploded with laughter.

“Uh, hyung,” said Lay in a very bad form of damage control.  “You do know Sehun’s gay, right?  You’re not going to find him dating any girls or pretending to date girls.”

“HunHan is real!” Chen crowed, causing Tao and Xiumin to crack up.  Sehun’s expression had turned dark, but Suho looked bemused and Kai seemed to be asphyxiating from hysterics.  The manager turned towards Lay.

“Wait, if it’s real, then Luhan must be gay as well,” he said.  “So is Luhan dating his twin brother, too?  The accounts and photos made that shopping trip seem more like a date than anything else.”

Lay just gave him a dazed smile.  I tried to bite back a grin as Chen hooted gleefully.

The manager turned to address me and Sehun, eyes flickering between us.

“You two really need to tone it down with the fan service.  You know you shouldn’t be dating.  I completely don’t approve, but at least it’s not like one of you can get pregnant—”

That was what did it.  Everybody, with the exception of Suho and the manager, who both had no idea about my real identity, and Sehun, though he did actually look a little amused, broke down in hysterical laughter.

Suho looked around at us all, utterly bewildered.  “Am I missing out on something here?”

Schooling my expression into an imitation of Sehun’s classic poker face, I pushed a practically crying Kris off my shoulder.

“It’s all the mpreg fan fictions,” I said.  “For some reason there are just a hell of a lot around involving me as a pregnant guy.  Either by courtesy of Xiumin or Sehun, though it’s usually Sehun.”

All of M knew about Kris getting me to read EXO fan fictions, but I hadn’t told anybody in K (except Sehun, because I needed somebody to whine to about the more traumatising ones), and it showed because Baekhyun popped back up onto the screen.

“Wait, you’ve been reading fanfics?”

“Yeah.”  I blinked at him.  “Did you know that eighty-nine per cent of Baekyeol fanfics feature the pair of you in a relationship with you as the submissive?”

Chanyeol stopped laughing and glanced over at Baekhyun with a surprised yet delighted expression.

“Wait, really?  Eight-nine per cent?  I’m the dominant one?”

“Boys,” sighed the manager.

“Actually,” I interrupted, “you know what I find weirdest about this?  You two are the most heavily shipped after Kai and D.O. and Baekhyun is probably the straightest guy I know.”

“Boys,” repeated the manager.  “Fan fiction is not important.  What’s important is a potential dating scandal—”

“Oh,” said Kris, “weren’t you going to go through the M schedule for this week as well?  After the photo shoot tomorrow, we have nothing until Thursday, right?”

The manager was successfully distracted from the idea of me – or Luhan – and Sehun dating.

“No, there’s an interview and a commercial endorsement on Wednesday, too; you need to make sure everything’s prepared for that….”

I was woken up the next morning by a startled Luhan wrapping me up in Lay’s duvet and shoving me into the closet.

“Wha—?” I began sleepily, but he jerked a finger up against his lips, warning me to be silent, and then shut the door, plunging me into darkness.

Moments later, I heard somebody enter the room and the manger’s voice spoke.  It turned out that the idea of Luhan and Sehun dating had been bugging him since the previous evening (I could tell without having to peep out through the keyhole that Luhan was somewhat bewildered and trying his best to play along, even though he clearly had no idea whether it was better to deny everything or ‘admit’ to being in “that” kind of relationship).

His hesitation to commit to anything led to the manager – who had a sense of curiosity almost as bad as a cat’s – asking whether or not Luhan had uous feelings for his twin brother.  At that, Luhan understandably got ratty.

“I’m straight,” he snapped.  “So’s Sehun.  Lay’s just being a total tool and it’s pissing me off.”

“Oh,” said the manager, taken aback.  “I