Kyungsoo picked up the last of his and Jongin’s clothes and folded it into the suitcase. With all their Christmas gifts, the bags were impossible to close. Those had to go separately. He glanced at Jongin, sleeping peacefully, until a knock at the door startled him out of his daze.

“Hey,” said Jongdae with a smile. “You all done?”

Kyungsoo smiled back. “Yeah.”

“Okay.” He stood there for a moment, staring at Jongin as well, rocking back and forth, until it became awkward. “Hey, can I talk to you for a minute? In the kitchen?”

The younger boy tried to read the older one’s face to no avail; Dr. Kim must be good at poker. “Sure,” he said, finally, and let go of the shirt in his hands.

Together they went into the kitchen and closed the door, making the room much smaller than it already was.

Jongdae takes a deep breath, exhales, and inhales once more. “I’m not going to beat around the bush. It’s about Jongin,” he starts.

Kyungsoo had figured as much.

“His condition is… worsening.”

***

Chanyeol’s last night with his mother was more stressful than anything else. On one hand, Baekhyun was asking, well-meaningly, when he would come out to his mother. On the other, his mother was telling him, drunkenly, that she wanted his bride to wear her veil. She was adamant.

“Hey Mom, what if I don’t have a bride?” he asked. Baekhyun was in his room packing his stuff.

“Nonsense. You are a dashing young man, I’m certain the girls are falling head over heels for you.”

“No, what I mean is… what if I don’t marry a girl?”

“Why? Are you afraid of commitment? Your father’s father was. That’s why you don’t have a paternal grandfather. Did anyone ever tell you that?”

Chanyeol his lips in and shook his head. “No, everyone just said he died of illness when Dad was young.”

“Yeah, the illness was multiple STDs he got from ing .” She let out a single laugh, and swayed from side to side. “Sorry, excuse my French.”

“We both know you don’t speak French,” said her son.

“Your grandfather was found a couple years after he abandoned his family. By then it was too late, and your grandmother had too much pride to take him back anyway. You know, your father doesn’t know any of this? For all he knows, his father was still very much a family man at his time of death. Your grandmother told me this herself.”

“That’s… sad.” There was nothing else he could say about it. He hardly knew anything at all about his paternal grandfather. “But no,” he concluded, bringing things back to himself, as selfish as that may sound. “I’m not afraid of commitment.”

“Right. That’s what we were talking about.”

“No, what we were talking about is me. Not marrying a woman.”

“Why? Are you thinking of devoting yourself to God? Is Sohee religious? Is that where this is coming from?”

“No, Mom. What if I wasn’t attracted to women? What if I was attracted to men?”

His mother laughed. “Chanyeol, don’t be silly! I’ve walked in on you having with girls!”

All of the colour in his face disappeared. “You have?”

“Yeah! All the time in high school!”

“O-okay, but, like, what if I didn’t know that I was attracted to men before?”

She laughed again, and repeated, “Don’t be silly.”

Chanyeol knew that there would be no use in going forward. She had made her point.

“Come on Mom, it’s time for bed.”

***

Joonmyun ate alone in the school cafeteria. None of his friends were back from their break yet, in fact, most of the school was still not back. The cafeteria was eerily empty.

From across the room, he saw Chanyeol’s roommate Kris sitting with someone else, but they looked heavily in conversation, besides, he wasn’t very close with him. He saw some classmates here and there, but again, no one he was overly chummy with. So he opted to eat alone.

He scrolled through his Instagram, through pictures of his friends with their families, pictures of food, and pictures of beautiful winter landscapes, and he regretted not taking enough photos in the States. He closed the app, a grim reminder of how little he had to photograph, and turned to Facebook instead. In some ways, it was the same. Photos everywhere, people tagging friends in statuses, showing off their closeness. In others, it helped him feel grounded. People he cared about posting about promotions, or deaths in the family. Videos of his loved ones’ pets doing cute things. Inspirational quotes and cringey soccer mom memes.

Things that made it feel like there was good in the world.

He saw that someone had posted an old class photo, from freshman year in highschool, it looked like. Before looking at who it was, he wanted to try recognizing someone. He spent five minutes on each face starting from top-left, and going through the rows like reading a book. In the bottom-most row he found two big owl eyes that was impossible to mistake. None other than his good friend, Do Kyungsoo.

He leapt at the chance to comment, and wrote, “Aww, you’re so cute~!” underneath the photo.

Within seconds, he was no longer alone. “Hey, man, I didn’t realize you swung that way. Of course, I should have known. Unfortunately, I’m sorry, I thought it was clear that I have my eyes set on someone else. I didn’t mean to lead you on like that.”

He looked up and was met with the orange hair that had already caused him so much trouble, only it was a brighter orange now. Yixing must have freshened it up over the break.

“What in the world are you talking about?” Joonmyun asked.

“Your comment. On my class photo? ‘Aww, you’re so cute~!’? I mean, I know I’m cute, you don’t have to be shy about telling me so.”

In horror, Joonmyun looked back down at his screen. Sure enough, the poster of the picture he had just commented on was none other than Zhang Yixing himself. “No, I was talking about Kyungsoo. I swear! I thought he’d been the one to post the photo. Are you even in this photo?” he rushed to explain.

“I am,” Yixing replied. “Right next to Kyungsoo.”

His hair wasn’t orange but the dimples were a dead giveaway that the man sitting next to Kyungsoo in the picture was the very man sitting across from Joonmyun at the moment. “No way,” he mumbled. “I mean, I guess you were cute, too?”

Yixing’s eyes narrowed into slits, and his lips were pursed. “What do you mean, I ‘was’ cute? I am cute.”

“Uhhh… sure.” He stabbed a piece of broccoli with a chopstick and shoved it into his mouth to have an excuse not to have to say anything for a bit. And then it hit him. “Wait. What do you mean you ‘should have known’ that I ‘swung that way’?”

Yixing took the chopstick out of Joonmyun’s unexpecting hand and stabbed the last piece of broccoli in his bowl, shoving it into his own mouth. Then, pretending like he couldn’t talk because his mouth was full, he got up and moved tables, going as far as the table Kris was sitting with the other man.

***

Zitao did not like that he couldn’t meet Kris’ friends yet. “Why aren’t they here?” he whined.

“It’s Christmas,” Kris said, trying hard to keep his cool.

“Christmas was like a year ago, why aren’t they back yet?”

“Relax, Zitao. You’re going to meet them eventually. What, are you bored of me already?”

Zitao bit his lip. “No, but you’re already bored of me.”

Kris let go of his chopsticks in shock, and it caused a small clatter. “No such thing, Tao.”

The smaller one of the two leaned forward and said, “It’s the truth, Yifan. Don’t act like I don’t know why you left to study here in the first place, and why you were so against me following you. You’re bored of me!”

The other leaned forward as well. “I am not!”

“Are too!”

“Am not!”

“Are too!”

“Am not!”

“Are t--”

At this point, they were so close that Kris could shut him up with a prompt kiss. And he did. And it worked.

“Hey, guys, am I interrupting something