NIGHTMARE

Minseok groans sleepily as she wakes but doesn’t open her eyes, content with nuzzling her cheek into the firm body she’s leaning against. There’s an arm looped loosely around her shoulders and it tightens around her when she shuffles closer. A hand rubs comfortingly rubs up and down her arm and she sighs, almost feeling as though she can go back to sleep if she just ignores the chattering around her.

“Han, what do you want from the Chinese restaurant?” Jongin calls out.

“Hm?” The hand on her arm pauses. “I’ll share a large thing of sharp fried rice with Min. And throw in some spring rolls,” Han says in a half-whisper.

There’s the sound of footsteps and then Jongin speaks again, his voiced toned down to match Han’s. “Is she still asleep?”

The hand on her arm starts to move up and down again. Minseok almost smiles but she keeps her face relaxed, not wanting to alert anyone of her wakefulness.

“Yeah,” Han answers. “She said she stayed up late working on a project but I didn’t think she’d be this exhausted. I’ll wake her up when the food gets here.”

Jongin sniffs. “Well, Yixing’s trying to bore us to death by making us play Monopoly so we’ll be in the dining room if you need us.”

Han tries not to laugh and ends up snorting.

Minseok listens to the sound of Jongin leaving the room again and all is silent for a second before there’s the click of Han unlocking his phone. She can still hear the others talking in the dining room — it’s close enough for their voices to carry — but the emptiness of her thoughts and the last tendrils of exhaustion start to pull her back into sleep.

“Are you ever going to open your eyes?” Han whispers but she can tell he’s talking to her and expecting an answer. “Kinda have to pee.”

“I was about to fall asleep again until you opened your big mouth and ruined everything,” she replies, finally blinking her eyes open and glancing up at him.

He meets her gaze and smiles cheekily. “Then it’s a good thing I did because I’m sure you wouldn’t like me any more if I wet myself right next to you.”

Minseok rolls her eyes. “Who ever said anything about liking you in the first place?”

Han shakes her since she’s still in his hold and laughs through the pain when she backhands him in the chest heavily. “You know you want me.” He wiggles his eyebrows. “Don’t deny it.”

Raising her hand to slap him again, Minseok’s caught off guard when she grabs her hand and fits their fingers together. She looks at him confused and his smile has morphed into that stupid smirk that she hates but before she has the chance to tell him to not be weird, he quickly leans in and presses their lips together in a chaste kiss. It’s quick and when they’re at a reasonable distance from each other again, she makes a face. Part of her knows she should be completely repulsed but there’s another part of her that feels giddy and lighter than air.

She kind of wants to kiss him again. For longer.

But purely for science.

To test out the mixed emotions coursing through her.

“You know, I’m taking the fact that you haven’t ripped my lips off my face with your bare hands as a sign that you—” He stops short when her free hand cups his cheek and forcefully tilts his head down.

“You expect me to get mad over that?” She huffs, purposefully looking to get a rise out of him. “At least kiss me properly. A dog can do better than that.”

His left eyebrow rises into a perfect arch. “Oh? Is that a challenge, Kim Minseok?” The grin creeps its way back onto his face.

She’s not sure which of them leans in, or maybe they both do, but she is sure that those are definitely butterflies that flutter in her core as they curiously explore each other’s mouths. She squeezes his hand and he responds by rubbing circles into the side of it with his thumb.

The sound of the others arguing over Monopoly is suddenly replaced by that of birds chirping which is weird because they’re sitting in Jongin’s living room in the middle of the day and the birds outside shouldn’t be nearly as loud. In the back of her mind she knows it’s her phone but she doesn’t want to pull away. Groaning in annoyance, she detangles their hands in order to pat around her on the couch, blindly looking for the device.

When she gets her hands on it, she blearily opens her eyes and pulls it front of her face. The screen is way too bright for her tired eyes and she quickly swipes her finger over the screen to stop the 6AM alarm. Tossing the phone beside her, she (ungracefully) drops her face into the plush comfort of her pillow. She sighs, not wanting to start the day. As she lies there, allowing herself to slowly wake up, the contents of her dream hit her like an eighteen-wheeler.

She had a dream about being affectionate with Han.

She rolls onto her back and blinks.

She had a dream about kissing Han.

Kissing.

Han.

And liking it.

WANTING IT.

Eyes widening, Minseok sits up faster than she’s ever done in her life and stares unseeingly at her desk in front of her bed.

And screams.

i started writing something else for this story when i had the sudden idea 'what if minseok had a nightmare dream she was dating han' and this happened. it's short but i like it