"I love your ugly face"

"I love your huge- ears"

"I love your spider legs"

These were the phrases written on a set of three shirts that Chanyeol had purchased for his lovers while in America to buy a particularly rare piece for Luhan. His boss had loved the idea of getting customized couple shirts since finding ones for a homoual couple—let alone a relationship of three—was practically impossible in South Korea, and Chanyeol had thought his boyfriends could appreciate the deprecating humor of his present.

"Look, my babes," Chanyeol was too excited for how jetlagged he was supposed to be. "I bought up couple stuff! Isn't this great?"

The first he pulled from his bag was black and red striped with the comment about ears written in huge letters; "I love" across the front, and "your huge- ears!" On the back. Sehun chuckled from where he stood against their bedroom door with his arms crossed, but Minseok frowned at the words. He was laying against the headboard of the bed, arms wrapped around his knees, which were folded up against his chest comfortably and on which his head rested tiredly.

"I think your ears are just fine, Yeol," he defended petulantly, "they're part of my physical attraction to you!"

Chanyeol winked and his lips before leaning down over his open suitcase to kiss Minseok. "I know," he teased, "what a strange place to leave hickies, don't you think, Sehun-ah?"

Sehun laughed; he liked that his lovers could joke like this even when both clearly exhausted. "Personally, I prefer nibbling at shoulders. They're not my favorite, but they're a good substitute since it's not super y to bite a co–"

"Yah! Oh Sehun!" Chanyeol shouted, blushing furiously. "When did your language get so vulgar?" He shot their eldest lover a look because Minseok was sniggering behind his hand. "What on earth did you to get up to while I was gone?"

"Oh, you know," Minseok began with a tired, though bright, smile.

Sehun interrupted before he could finish. "Lots of fuc–"

"Omo!"

"Yah!"

Sehun's two older lovers emitted shocked noises and now Minseok's face was even bright red to match Chanyeol's. The youngest just shrugged and grinned mischievously. "But we did."

The others rolled their eyes, even though Minseok nodded in confirmation when Chanyeol shot him a searchingly curious look.

"y," Chanyeol decided with a sad smile that both Sehun and Minseok recognized. He'd have loved to be there, at home, with them, just as they would have loved to have him stay. No one mentioned the heavy atmosphere that was suddenly tinged with a sad sort of bitterness, and Chanyeol reached into his suitcase to hastily pull out the next shirt.

"The red one's mine," he explained, "obviously. But this one's yours, Sehun-ah!"

The object in question was still striped, though this time the colors were black and blue, with "I love" written on the front and "your spider legs!" across the back.

Minseok, who didn't see the words on the back because Chanyeol displayed them eagerly to the intended recipient first, joked "Sehunnie, when you wear that you'll look like a bruise!"

Both of the younger men chuckled at that, and Chanyeol even replied, "Wow, Minnie-baby, our humors are starting to match!"

Minseok made a face which deepened into a real frown when he realized that Sehun's couple shirt was just as negative about his appearance as Chanyeol's was. This should have spurred some sort of worry about what his own shirt would say, but in that moment Minseok cared more about making sure his lovers knew that Sehun's legs were wonderful.

"They make you so gloriously tall," Minseom defended again. "And you're not even skinny enough for your legs to look like a spider's!"

"It's supposed to be facetious," Chanyeol grumbled, kind of upset that his older lover couldn't see why the couple gifts were funny.

"Yeah, Min-min," Sehun chorused in agreement, while Chanyeol tried to figure out where the seemingly new nickname came from. "I know he doesn't really think I've got skinny legs, and even if he did, Yeollie loves me regardless."

Minseok looked skeptical, though not at the idea that Chanyeol loved Sehun—because he clearly did. Instead, he still wasn't sure how he felt about these presents, and it was then that he began to dread receiving his own. He yawned widely as Sehun made his way from the doorway to the bed, stripping off his wife beater to slip into the gifted shirt before sitting down abruptly and pulling Minseok into his lap.

Chanyeol watched them and observed the ease with which his two lovers read each other's needs so fluidly. He hadn't even stopped to think that Minseok might not like the presents, but Sehun was even able to read their oldest lover's mood about the whole thing without a single word about it. Jealousy wasn't the exact way Chanyeol would describe his emotions in that moment, but he certainly wasn't as happy as he'd been when he'd finally gotten home.

"Here's yours, Minseok," he said with so little emotional his voice that both his lovers looked toward him in a mixture of hurt and confusion. Chanyeol tossed the purple and black striped t-shirt onto Minseok's lap and snapped his suitcase closed before disappearing into their bathroom.

Sehun thought he heard the toilet flush a minute or so later, but in the time that it took Chanyeol to use the restroom, Minseok had burst into tears at the words written on his own shirt. Chanyeol didn't emerge, even though he was clearly finished, so it was up to Sehun to rub Minseok's back soothingly and whisper comforting things like "It's just a joke," and "You know Yeollie doesn't really mean it."

Sure, Minseok knew that logically, but he was so tired that he didn't think he could be logical even if he wanted to be. Which he currently didn't. Chanyeol knew how self-conscious Minseok was about his fat cheeks, so to tease about them, even lovingly, was kind of insensitive. That's what he told Sehun at least, when he'd first started to cry and the younger hadn't read the shirt's words yet to understand why. Truthfully, though, what hurt the most was the coldness with which Chanyeol had said Minseok's name, and the obvious way in which Chanyeol was being evasive by hiding in the bathroom.

"Yeollie," Sehun called quietly, though his voice was firm. "Min-min doesn't need me right now." Minseok made a pitiful noise of protest, so Sehun amended his statement slightly. "At least not as much as he needs you."

"You sure about that?" Chanyeol sounded almost angry as he slid open the door and stalked out of the bathroom. "Since when is he Min-min? Since when were the two of you so close without me? Since when did I not know my boyfriends well enough to realize Minseok wouldn't get the joke?" This last question he asked himself, nearly silently under his breath, but Minseok heard him regardless.

"I get the joke," he hiccuped, sounding sad. "I just don't appreciate it. You had to go and give us presents highlighting our worst features, the ones we're most sensitive about. What about that is funny exactly?" Minseok's voice increased in volume and intensity as he spoke, and not even Sehun's cool kiss against the top of Minseok's head could calm the eldest.

"That's the whole point!" Chanyeol was shouting too, now. "I'd rather we laugh about something than cry about it. At least then we can try to overcome it. I was just–" He stopped himself then, still upset by the other two's closeness and Minseok's lack of understanding.

Sehun gently placed Minseok next to him on the bed and pushed himself up to walk to Chanyeol and give him a strong back hug. "You just what, Chan-chan?" He asked in a muffled question against Chanyeol's shoulder blade.

The nickname and Sehun's embrace took the edge off his anger a little, so Chanyeol muttered in defeated exhaustion, "I was just trying to help." He felt a light flutter of kisses across the back of his neck and the tightening of strong arms around his waist, so Chanyeol continued. "I think every inch of you in beautiful. I love that your legs give you a height nearly matching mine, Sehun-ah." He paused to bite his lip, and after a few seconds seemed to make a decision, holding out his own arms to invite their third loved into the embrace. "I love that your cheeks puff cutely when you're concentrating, and especially the way they look framing your lips around my co–"

"Now who's being vulgar?" Sehun teased lightly, trying his best to lighten the mood and succeeding at least slightly when Minseok offered a small half-smile.

"Anyway," Chanyeol continued valiantly; he didn't want his lovers, especially Minseok, to think he wasn't taking this seriously—even though Sehun's little interjection had been funny, to say the least. "I love you both, exactly as you are. And I know that you love all of me too—including my ears—even when I think I can't. That's why."

Minseok, who'd slowly made his way from the bed into Chanyeol's waiting arms, sighed contentedly with his face pressed against his lover's chest and his hand curled around Sehun's forearm. "I know," he forgave instantly, "I know."

"I hate it when we fight," Sehun added in a small voice that made Chanyeol's shoulder vibrate against the top of Minseok's head.

"Me too," his lovers replied simultaneously, and Minseok took the first step toward complete reconciliation by leaning back and tilting up his face to press a chaste kiss against the corner of Chanyeol's mouth.

"This one is on me." Minseok sounded exhausted, and sheepish, and apologetic, all at the same time. "I have a hard time sleeping when you're gone, Yeol, and that makes me overly irritable. I'm sorry, okay? Really, I am."

Minseok had never really discussed with either of his lovers what he went through when Chanyeol was gone, so even though Chanyeol wanted to interject with sweet coos of comfort, the shake of Sehun's head against his back kept him silent.

"And then I just feel like I'm weighing Sehunnie down, too. So then, every time when you come back," Minseok kept speaking, not noticing that it was now Chanyeol who kept Sehun silent instead of the other way around. "I'm just feeling absolutely horrible about myself and here's this shirt, and I," his voice cracked suddenly, "I just couldn't take it."

He finished and the silence enveloped them like a wet blanket for a good forty seconds. When it became clear to Chanyeol and Sehun that their oldest lover wasn't going to say anything more, Sehun moved to switch his back hug from Chanyeol to Minseok, while Chanyeol started speaking slowly.

"I didn't know, Minnie-baby. You have to believe I would never be malicious like that." Chanyeol sounded as close to tears as Minseok felt.

Sehun's long arms threaded themselves securely around Minseok's waist so the youngest' hands could grip Chanyeol's shirt tightly to them as well. "You don't bring me down, Min-min," Sehun contributed softly with his lips brushing lightly against his boyfriend's cheek. "Yeollie leaving makes me sad too, you know that." Chanyeol felt a nod against his chest, because yes, Minseok knew that—they all did. "I do what I can to cheer you up because I love you, not because you're a burden, alright?"

Sehun waited until he received a hum of understanding from his eldest lover before turning his attention to Chanyeol. "I like the shirts—at least, I appreciate what you were trying to do. Just," he paused to lock eyes with his gangly lover, "next time maybe a warning?"

"Call!" Chanyeol agreed enthusiastically, though he doubted he'd ever bring a present quite like that ever again.

"Call," Minseok agreed as well.

"Me too," Sehun was glad they'd made up and the happiness was evident in his tone when he added, "Call!"

"I love you," Chanyeol's voice was choked. "Both of you."

He pulled himself from their group embrace so as to better reach Sehun's mouth for a conciliatory kiss. Chanyeol kissed Minseok, too, afterward, and then admitted to his earlier jealousy with a sheepishly guilty smile on his tired face.

"And I'm sorry for being silly about that too," he muttered, though his tone wasn't sad as he spoke, particularly since Minseok had just changed into his third of their couple ensemble.

"I do like purple, though," Minseok offered peaceably, choosing not to comment on Chanyeol's confession because jealousy was an unfortunately unavoidable part of a three-way relationship, and Minseok didn't need to offer an opinion when he suffered from it too sometimes. "And I love you too."

"Same here," Sehun's voice carried lightly from where he now lounged across the bed to where Chanyeol stood admiring Minseok's muscular arms in the new shirt and Minseok leaned against the bathroom door blushing under the scrutiny. "Love and stuff," he continued, adding one more comment before his two lovers shot him a look and joined him to snuggle, all three together, comfortably in love.