Wonshik tried a lot to sleep. He used to sleep so easily in the past, basically sleeping anywhere that can be made into a sleeping spot. But too many things have been invading his mind. It’s already 3.15am in the morning and he’s still as restless as he is in his bed. No matter how hard he tried to close his eyes and let himself drift into wonderland, it never proved successful.

He’s left into staring at the ceiling of his wall. Very uninteresting indeed, but he still can’t sleep.

He groaned out.

“Wonshik-ah.”

Wonshik turned to his right. Jaehwan’s awoken from his sleep, his eyes very hazy from sleep and mouth pouty. For a while Wonshik felt guilty, but at the same time he wanted company.

“You have to sleep now,” Jaehwan spoke, voice slightly cracking.

He reached for his phone and clicked on the button, lighting up his face. His eyes were squinting due to the sudden blast of artificial light.

“We only have 2 hours to sleep before we have to go to our schedules.”

“I know… I’m trying my best.”

Then the silence began again.

This has been going on for a few days already. Wonshik’s close to banging his first on the wall, ease the pain by numbing it through sleep but he can’t. It’ll cause a whole lot of trouble to tend to due to the noise and his injury. He balled his hands into a first and willed himself to sleep.

There’s the sound of rustles of bed sheets on the other side of the room, probably Jaehwan and his adventures in his dreams. There was a time Jaehwan threw his pillow at Wonshik at around 4am in the morning, nearly scaring the out of him.

Then there’s a dip on his bed.

Wonshik opened his eyes to Jaehwan next to him.

“My mum used to hug me to help me to sleep. Come here.”

And Jaehwan’s embracing Wonshik, pulling Wonshik to his chest and wrapping his arms around him, one around his head and another around his waist. Then he ruffled Wonshik’s hair.

“Now sleep.”

Wonshik was left to rest his head on the junction of Jaehwan’s neck. His arms felt too awkward by his sides so naturally he wrapped his arms around Jaehwan’s waist as well.

He didn’t know why, but it did helped him to sleep better.

Maybe it was the warmth.

Maybe it was Jaehwan’s soothing scent.

Wonshik didn’t want to think more about the reasons.

“Jaehwan hyung, Wonshik hyung, why were you guys hugging each other while sleeping last night? It was quite a strange scene to walk into,” Sanghyuk asked idly while scooping some cereal into his mouth.

Wonshik stopped in his tracks while Jaehwan just casually continued pouring milk into his bowl.

“Wonshik was having a hard time to sleep yesterday and the past few days as well. So I helped him by hugging him to sleep. It was what my mum did back then.”

Sanghyuk gave Jaehwan a weird look.

“Hey! It worked okay,” Jaehwan protested and pouted, proceeding to take his bowl and moving to the dining area. “Wonshik was sleeping like a log and wasn’t moving around after that.”

Wonshik just nodded at the corner.

“Thanks, hyung. It helped me a lot.”

“No problem, Wonshik-ah.”

Jaehwan then ruffled Wonshik’s hair, and he didn’t flinch away.

But when Hongbin came in a few seconds later to playfully ruffle his hair, he immediately flinched away and scowled.

If Sanghyuk noticed the differences, he didn’t mention of it.

This time it was around midnight.

After taking turns to wash up and let the warm water seep into his tired muscles, Wonshik plopped down into his bed, waiting for sleep to overcome him. Jaehwan was already at his bed and beginning to fall asleep.

Tick. Tock.

And it’s already half an hour but he’s still as wide awake as ever. He wondered why. They had a full day today, barely any rest between as they were rushed from one schedule to another. He didn’t even sleep in the car. He didn’t want to disrupt his sleep later at night.

He huffed out.

This can’t be happening again.

He turned to his right and saw Jaehwan’s eyes staring straight right at him. For a moment he was caught off guard by him. I thought he was asleep.

Jaehwan smiled.

“Can’t sleep again?”

“Yeah…”

Then Jaehwan’s rising up from the bed, tossing his bed sheets away and approached Wonshik’s bed. Wonshik just moved further to the left to give space to him. Jaehwan settled himself on his bed and stretched out his arms.

“Come to mama.”

Wonshik laughed. He settled himself on the junction of Jaehwan’s neck again, just like yesterday. Today as well, he wrapped his arms around Jaehwan. Jaehwan too, wrapped himself around him like yesterday, one around his head, one around his waist. He ruffled his head in the process.

Somehow, it never annoyed him when he ruffled his hair.

“Thank you,” Wonshik spoke out of the silence, his voice slightly muffled by Jaehwan’s shirt.

Jaehwan just patted his back.

And they both went to sleep soon after, with warmth and Jaehwan’s usual scent invading Wonshik’s senses as he drifted off to wonderland.

These kind of nights began to be of a routine after that.

Sanghyuk didn’t even give them any strange looks anymore in the morning, just learning how to understand Wonshik’s problem and Jaehwan’s way of solving it. Neither do Hakyeon ever bother them anymore. No snickers in the morning.

At night, Wonshik doesn’t even need to turn to his right and prompt at Jaehwan. It became of a natural for Jaehwan to approach Wonshik’s bed instead of his own.

Inside Wonshik felt slightly guilty, but he didn’t want this to end.

“Jaehwan hyung!”

The moment Jaehwan opened the door to his room Wonshik had already appeared in front of his eyes like a giant bear with arms spread out, smile so wide it might injure his mouth.

“What… Why…”

He immediately hugged Jaehwan. Jaehwan was mumbling incoherent words into his hoodie but all Wonshik did was ignore and exclaim, “Let’s go to sleep!”

Wonshik was just… suddenly excited to sleep that night. He didn’t even know why.

He dragged his poor roommate along to his bed while still embracing him and dropped both of them on his bed.

“Yeah that’s good ey okay ey hyung let’s go to sleep sleep sleeeep!”

He felt a sort of vibration on his chest. It was Jaehwan laughing. Wonshik nearly wanted to cry. It’s too cute. His hyung is too cute. Everything is like fluffy cotton candy and bright colours for him right then.

“But um don’t you want to close the lights or something.”

“Too lazy to move.”

When Jaehwan’s stare on him persisted and he almost wanted to get up, Wonshik grabbed the heaviest thing he could reach for on the night table and threw it on the wall. The lights went off. Bingo.

“That’s amazing man,” Jaehwan gasped out and patted Wonshik on the back for his huge effort.

And so their steady breathing filled the room.

They remained silent, until Jaehwan decided to break the silence.

“Wonshik-ah, you still awake?”

Wonshik just hummed.

“Don’t you feel… this is somewhat weird?”

“What?”

“Me helping you to sleep by hugging… isn’t it a bit strange?”

Wonshik snorted.

“Why would it be strange? And hyung, weren’t you the one who suggested this? Why would you think it’s weird?”