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secrets that I have held in my heart (are harder to hide than I thought)The first to realize is Junmyeon.
As newly appointed leader, it’s as if he’s grown a third eye specifically for keeping watch on s. Not in a particularly bad light, but also to make sure they weren’t being modest when saying they didn’t need a break. He's grown to be naturally perceptive of his surroundings; it's unlikely anyone would have noticed before he did.
Junmyeon is present when Jongin and Kyungsoo first meet officially. The only thing he is worrying about at the time (concerning the two of them, anyway) is the fact that the younger hides behind Junmyeon like a child in fear. Do Kyungsoo did have that effect on people, what with those wide, unsettling eyes. Junmyeon hopes for only one thing, just one simple thing God could maybe grant him?
Please, just please let s get along.
The way Kim Jongin is behaving, hiding from his new members, made Junmyeon purse his lips.
Do Kyungsoo too is going to be a problem, Junmyeon thought. When he wasn't standing there stiff as a board and looking like a scared little deer caught in the headlights, he was quiet and unapproachable, those defined eyebrows screaming at you to leave him alone.
Junmyeon took the initiative, loosening Jongin's grip on his t-shirt, pulling on his hand as they headed towards Kyungsoo. Junmyeon makes a mental reminder to laugh later about the fact that Kyungsoo now looks like a fearful little meerkat trying to find a hiding place.
“Kyungsoo-ssi,” Junmyeon greets amiably, “this is Kim Jongin. He’ll be our co-member.”
The shorter parts his mouth like he wants to say something, but it shuts once more, and the little sliver of hope Junmyeon had fades away. Kyungsoo settles with putting his hand out for a handshake.
Jongin remains unmoving, so Junmyeon pulls his hand and places it into Kyungsoo’s grip. They shake, but afterwards, they don’t let go.
“Hello, Kyungsoo-ssi,” Jongin says politely. Junmyeon’s head shoots up when he realizes Jongin is speaking. On his own accord. To a new member.
“I’m looking forward to working with you,” Jongin continues. Junmyeon cautiously turns his attention to Kyungsoo to await his reaction, but he doesn’t expect much, because he can’t have everything now, can he?
Kyungsoo smiles. Bright and wide and toothy.
“I’m looking forward to working with you too, Jongin,” he says.
The corner of Jongin’s lips flicks upwards, but Junmyeon is more preoccupied by the flash of something else entirely indeterminable in the younger’s eyes. His gaze drifts to their hands, which still hold each other even after their handshake has long ended.
He suddenly thinks that Jongin’s prior anxiousness was not due to meeting a new member, but because of something else. Something that has to do with their combined hands, the pink tinge in both of their cheeks, the lingering smiles.
Junmyeon did not want to go there.
However, over the next few months, Junmyeon thinks that Jongin’s found a very deep attachment to Kyungsoo. It becomes a normality within their group - Jongin and Kyungsoo. Jongin and Kyungsoo, who always sit besides each other at lunch dates even if there’s twelve of them (and if a member notices that they’re not sitting together, they immediately question it and offer to switch seats to make it happen). Jongin and Kyungsoo, who seek each other out after practice sessions to spend time with the other (even if it is not talking, they enjoy each other’s company, and the silence is never uncomfortable). Jongin and Kyungsoo, who huddle up with each other under the same blanket in the living room during late night conversations with the twelve members, bonding about how everyone misses their families.
The leader sees the tightness of their relationship, and if he was being poetic, he’d say there was an invisible rope binding the two of them together. They get along with the other members more than fine, and at first glance, it appears that Kyungsoo and Jongin just have a normal relationship any co-members of a group would have. Junmyeon looks closer though, and he reads between the lines, hears the fondness in their voices when they speak to each other, sees how Kyungsoo is less reluctant to smile when it’s Jongin causing it.
Junmyeon thinks that they’re good for each other - not necessarily in the romance way, just in the person way.
Chanyeol’s thumped his head on the headboard again.
He thinks that, for a world-wide famous Idol, he deserves more than the tiny little bed given to him.
He wakes up and rubs at his eyes blearily, blinking in the darkness. The clock on the bedside table reads 3:23 am. Chanyeol drops his head on his pillow with a sigh, careful not to hit the headboard again. Down below, his feet hang off the end of the bed, so he bends his knees and drags them up.
Turning to his left side, he wraps his long arms around his knees, breathing out deeply. His eyes scan around the room as he waits for himself to fall asleep again. He grazes over the outline of Kyungsoo’s back on his own bed on the opposite side of the room, thinking that - man, Kyungsoo really has been working hard in the gym lately. His shoulders are broader than he remembers.
A little too broad, Chanyeol notices. He looks closer, narrowing his eyes, and finds that it’s not really Kyungsoo at all he’s seeing. It’s Kim Jongin, lying in Kyungsoo’s bed, when he should be sleeping soundly above Chanyeol in the second bunk.
Chanyeol sits up a bit and uses his arm to hold himself as he peers over Jongin’s shoulder and, yes, Kyungsoo lays on the other half of the bed. Twin bed. That tiny little bed even smaller than Chanyeol’s is holding the two of them.
It’s 3 in the morning, and he is very well aware of Jongin and Kyungsoo’s close friendship, and also it’s 3 in the morning and he’s dead tired, so he doesn’t think much about it, dropping his head once more and cuddling himself into the blankets.
It comes to mind again only the next morning, when Kyungsoo and Jongin walk into the kitchen at the same time after having freshened themselves up. He thinks about how close they were sleeping and he thinks about how close they are standing now. Okay. Did Jongin just give Kyungsoo a little hip bump? And did Kyungsoo just smile back? If Chanyeol would have done that, his head would be above the fireplace by now. And Kyungsoo would be in a large armchair sipping at tea while staring at his new trophy and laughing manically.
Chanyeol only purses his lips and quirks an eyebrow suspiciously, For the first time in his life though, he shuts up and doesn’t say anything.
Unbelievably, he bumps his head awake on the headboard again a week later. After he’s done cursing SM for underestimating his height, curiosity gets the best of him and he’s looking over to Kyungsoo’s bed.
Kyungsoo is on the side closer to Chanyeol now, and Jongin is on the other, facing him. From this view, Chanyeol could see their hands folded around each other as they sleep peacefully.
The sight is so sweet it has Chanyeol smile a little. But it also has him reeling in confusion because damn, he knows that his culture likes skinship and all but this is awfully close for two supposed friends.
The next night, before he goes to bed, he sets an alarm on his phone to wake him up at 3:00 am. He lowers the volume on halfway only though, so that it wakes only him up and not the other two.
After they give their goodnights and try not to dream about me’s and shut up chanyeol’s, they settle into their respective beds. Jongin climbs into his bunk above Chanyeol tiredly. The oldest can’t help but smirk, seeing how Jongin is behaving like an innocent little angel who doesn’t sneak into their hyung’s bed at night. Sure, Jongin.
His phone blares into his ear at 3am, and Chanyeol quickly shuts it off before it could wake anyone else up. Too late though, because he sits up just in time to see Jongin flying across the room and rushing up the mini staircase to his bed. Kyungsoo remains sound asleep.
“Jongin?” Chanyeol says, fake-confused. The burst of chuckles dare to stream from his mouth, but he holds them back, laughing silently into his pillow. His fatigue’s faded the moment he spotted the younger’s body blurring as he leapt back towards his bed. Kim Jongin, caught in the act.
“Uh,” says Jongin, quietly, out of view. The bed above Chanyeol bounces a bit as Jongin settles himself. “Yeah?”
“Why were you out of bed?” Chanyeol says, trying to make his voice sound weak with exhaustion.
“Um. Kyungsoo hyung looked cold so I just put more blankets on him.”
Chanyeol looks over to Kyungsoo, and sees that there aren’t any blankets on him at all. Also, it’s the middle of summer and the AC isn’t blasting as it usually is, so their dorm is as sweaty and sticky as ever.
“You mean take the blankets off of him because he was hot?” says Chanyeol, playing along. He can almost imagine the pink tingeing Jongin’s face and neck right now.
“Y-yeah, that.”
“M’kay,” Chanyeol says, grinning and biting his lip to keep from laughing too loud. “Just go to sleep then.”
There are so many other questions he wants to ask to humiliate Jongin even further and push him to confess the truth (why did you run away so quickly when I woke up then? Why is there a big empty spot on Kyungsoo‘s bed, all wrinkled?), but he figures it’s better like this, the way Jongin doesn’t know that Chanyeol knows.
Also, it means that Jongin has something to hide, and he’s pretty much just confirmed Chanyeol’s suspicions.
Kyungsoo and Jongin were two of his favorites, despite his initial notion of don’t play favorites, Minseok! They’re all your band members and only that. He sees clearly how close they are to each other, but it doesn’t go any further than that, because he gets it - he gets their brotherly bond and doesn’t question it further than a friendship.
That is, until a certain fan signing event.
The girl wears a headband exclaiming XIUHAN! in bright pink letters. The sight hardly has Minseok blush anymore, far too used to fans wanting him and his best friend to make out in front of them.
Jongdae slides the poster to him to sign and the girl comes over, smiling shyly. Minseok smiles back kindly.
“Do you like my headband?” she asks in Chinese, and Minseok has to process this for a few seconds before he understands.
“Yes,” he says politely. “It’s very prettily made.”
The girl blushes. “Xiuhan is my EXO-M OTP,” she says brightly, almost proudly. “I have a Kaisoo headband for EXO-K.”
Kaisoo, Minseok doesn’t have to think much about it to realize that it is for Kai and Kyungsoo. He almost raises an eyebrow, but as he signs the poster, he figures - yeah, it makes sense. They spend an awful lot of time together, apparently enough so that fans have noticed as well.
And that’s all he thinks about it. For now, anyway.
Later, when they’re rested and well settled into the dorm room, Minseok can’t help glancing over to where Jongin and Kyungsoo sit not so far away. The rest of the members are discussing the day’s event and what they are to do tomorrow, but Jongin and Kyungsoo - Minseok notices - are behaving as if in their own world.
They face each other on the couch, and have their hands in each others - not romantically. They’re playing the ABC slapping game, the game that gets rather violent when Yifan and Chanyeol are playing with each other (or Chanyeol with anyone, really… Yifan just ups the aggression even more). With Jongin and Kyungsoo though, Minseok thinks it’s nothing short of precious.
Kyungsoo’s lilted smile is laced with something indeterminable, something rare. Not that the boy never smiled. It was just that his smiles were never as… pleasant as they were now, as he bounced on the couch in agitation from continuously losing. Jongin’s smiles were much more frequent, but the way he plays with Kyungsoo is different from how he plays with the rest. When Minseok and Jongin play, the latter is often teasing him - “Come on, hyung, you can be faster than that!”
With Kyungsoo though, he is noticeably gentler, telling him “It’s okay, just try again.” And one time, Minseok notices that Jongin has let Kyungsoo win on purpose. Of course, Kyungsoo wasn’t having any of it and shoves Jongin’s shoulder playfully to tell him to play fair.
Generally, Minseok would brush over them, thinking nothing of it because this was usual, typical behavior from the two. But now aware that they were a ship popular amongst their fans, he’s looking at them differently - he’s looking at them closer, watching for what the fans see. Then again, the fans see romance between himself and Luhan, and they’re definitely wrong in that aspect.
He thinks, however, that the fans may be on to something. He really doesn’t want to think like this because he wouldn’t want anyone think this way about himself and his band members but damn it, they really do suit each other well.
Jongin is a good half-a-head taller than Kyungsoo, so Minseok marks the mental checkbox in his head that reads height difference.
Minseok would never call Kyungsoo unapproachable or antisocial, because he truly wasn’t, no matter what anyone thought. He would say that Kyungsoo was introverted and preferred alone time. On the other hand, Jongin was charismatic and charming when he needed to be. He was also always very positive and bouncy and cheerful in general, whereas Kyungsoo kept his own emotions in order.
Opposites attract. Check.
Even if they were opposites in many aspects, Minseok isn’t blind, so he doesn’t dismiss their similarities. Kyungsoo and Jongin stood out from the rest of them in the way that they were both adults. In that they behaved like adults, and thought like adults do, and held the responsibility of an adult. They shared the same sense of humor as well, laughing at the smallest, silliest things that really just had the rest of the members confused.
Getting along. Check.
Minseok runs through his mental checklist, and concludes that, yes, perhaps the shippers aren’t delusional at all. In fact, as he watches Kyungsoo lean his head on Jongin’s shoulder, hiding his blushing face from humiliation, he thinks he’s silently starting to root for them.
He wonders if this is how it starts for most fangirls.
“Do you know where Kyungsoo is?” asks Yixing, strolling into the dorm after a good three hours in the studio.
Yifan, the only occupant in the room, peers up at his entrance. His gaze drifts back to the video game on the television when he sees it’s Yixing. “He went with Jongdae and Minseok to get us lunch.”
“He left his phone in the dance room,” the younger frowns. Pursing his lips, he sets Kyungsoo’s phone aside on the table besides the couch, plopping down next to Yifan. “I’ll give it to him when he comes back. Can I play too?”
At Yifan’s nod, Yixing grabs a controller.
Amidst the gunfire blasting from the television, there were several pings! that rang through the room, accompanied by the violent vibrating of the phone it came from on the coffee table. The first time it was easily ignored, Yixing and Yifan far too preoccupied with their game to give it the slightest second’s notice. The second time was the same, but by the third, Yixing glanced at it, especially because it came so soon after the second.
PingPingPingPing!
“Our Kyungsoo is popular,” Yixing casually notes, fingers fumbling with his controller. Yifan only makes a hum of affirmation.
PingPingPingPingPingPingPingPingPing!
“Oh my god, shut that up, will you?” Yifan says. He groans when Yixing pauses the game to reach over to silence the phone.
“Whoa,” he says suddenly. “Uh. Is Jongin the one sending him all these messages?”
At Yifan’s questioning noise, Yixing turns to show him the locked phone screen, packed with messages all from the same recipient: Jongin.
Jongin: hyuuUuUuUuuuung T.T
Jongin: I’m so bored Hyung
Jongin: why aren’t you replying to meeee
Jongin: baekhyun keeps bothering me
Jongin: send me a selca
Jongin: and smile for once u punk
Jongin: I love your smile
Jongin: Your eyes are ok too
Jongin: JK they’re cute
Jongin: Come on
Jongin: I miss u
Jongin: u should puff out ur cheeks too when you take the pic it’s really cute when you do that
Jongin: I know you hate aegyo but you’re aegyo personified srry
Jongin: pleeasseeeeeeeeeeee
Jongin: replyyyy to meeee
“Is this Jongin’s version of ting because that makes complete sense,” Yifan says, eyes scanning as Yixing continues to scroll through the texts.
Yifan looks away for a moment, off to the side, and Yixing thinks he’s lost in one of his dazes again, but then the former bites his bottom lip thoughtfully, and wrinkles form on his forehead.
He looks at Yixing then, eyes cautious, and speaks in a hushed voice. “Do you know Kyungsoo’s passcode?”
“Are you going to hack his phone?” Yixing asks, tone raised slightly.
“I’m just - curious,” Yifan says. “I mean… when Jongin texts me, he’s never this… uh..”
“Needy? Clingy?” Yixing offers.
Yifan nods. “When I don’t reply, he’s just like, yeah, whatever, but geez.”
Yixing looks tired of the conversation and waves his controller in the air as he speaks, as if to signify that he wants to return to the game. “Kyungsoo and Jongin are really close, you know that.”
“Yeah, but I mean, even friends don’t ask their friends to send them selcas of themselves… puffing their cheeks out. And call them cute while they’re at it.”
“What are you implying?” Yixing asks
“I don’t know,” Yifan says, “but I will if you let me hack Kyungsoo’s phone.”
Yixing appears hesitant, eyes darting from Yifan back to Kyungsoo’s phone. Yifan considers jumping him and snatching the phone away, but this is Yixing. He might literally break if jumped.
“You’re not going to hack into Kyungsoo’s phone,” Yixing says finally. Yifan rolls his eyes and is about to present a not very well thought-out counter argument (“It’s not hacking if I don’t use any fancy tech things. I’m just making random attempts at his passcode”) but Yixing stops him.
”You’re not going to hack into it because you don’t need to. Not when I know his passcode.”
A grin grows on Yixing’s face, mirroring onto Yifan’s as they huddle around the phone. Yixing quickly punches the code in.
“2-0-0-1?” asks Yifan. “How do you know the code anyway?”
“Because I’m the only person besides Junmyeon that Kyungsoo trusts with his phone. And now I'm betraying that trust.”
“Only because Kyungsoo is betraying our trust in not sleeping with other members.”
“Ah, stop,” Yixing says, hands flying to his ears. “Gosh. I’m sure they’re not sleeping together. We live in the same dorm.”
“I’m sure they have ways.”
Yixing throws Yifan a revolted look before his attention wavers back to the phone screen. He’s scrolled down quite a bit, to a few weeks back.
“So many heart emojis,” Yifan notes quietly.
Jongin: Hyung, I want to tell you something.
What?
Jongin: Idk I wanted to wait in person but uh Idk if it can wait
Ok just tell me
Jongin: Never mind it can wait
-.-
“They’re not sleeping together,” says Yixing. “Look, Jongin hasn’t even confessed yet.”
“Okay but that doesn’t mean they’re not sleeping together. It could be a friends with benefits thing and suddenly Jongin caught feelings and he wants to confess but is afraid of how Kyungsoo would feel about their relationship outside of .”
“You’re disgusting and you watch too many movies,” Yixing says.
“You’re the one who hacked into Kyungsoo’s phone.”
“Because you pressured me,” Yixing defends.
The dorm’s front door rattles then, the knob shaking before it swings open. Yixing squeals and switches off Kyungsoo’s phone, throwing it onto the table. Yifan unpauses the game and puts on his best 'We weren't looking through your phone' face.
“Have you guys seen my phone?” Kyungsoo asks when he walks in, trailed by Jongdae and Minseok.
Yixing clears his throat. “You left it in the studio so I brought it up.”
Kyungsoo’s face brightens at the sight of his phone on the table. “Thanks, Yixing! I was panicking for a bit. You’re the only one I could count on, to be honest.”
Yixing gives Kyungsoo a sweet smile, while Yifan scowls behind him, eye rolling.
Luhan has a hypothesis.
Or was this a theory?
Is there even a difference?
He never paid much attention in school.
Vaguely, he remembers - in order to prove a hypothesis correct, one must perform an experiment.
He finds an opportunity to conduct his experiment when they're filming for their show, and he sits besides Kyungsoo: unfortunate victim and test subject A.
Casually, he brings his arm around Kyungsoo’s shoulders, gently setting his hand on his upper arm, just below his shoulder. He makes sure to keep laid-back though, pretending to be listening to whatever s are saying. For good measure, he rubs his hand on Kyungsoo’s arm, just a little - up and down, up and down. Something to capture his attention.
Not Kyungsoo’s attention. Jongin’s.
(Test subject B.)
Kyungsoo sits squashed between Jongin and Luhan, and the latter thinks that if he doesn’t test his hypothesis now, there would hardly be another time for it. He disregards the cameras, and thinks that even if they capture this skinship, fans will love it.
What he’s really interested in though, is if Jongin will not love it.
Luhan’s caught him not-so-subtly directing his gaze to Kyungsoo multiple times, especially when another member digs their head into the crook of Kyungsoo’s neck, or if they take his hand into their own. He’s caught the slight pout on the boy’s face when anyone but him is touching Kyungsoo. He’s caught the sudden lack of enthusiasm from Jongin’s dances when Kyungsoo says he’s fine, he’s got the dance down and he doesn’t need any help, thank you, Jongin-ah.
And Luhan is a little more than curious about it all.
Kyungsoo is practically immune to any of s’ touches now. Luhan assumes he is used to being harassed by them on a daily basis and has decided to just accept it. So the younger hardly notices when Luhan squeezes his upper arm affectionately.
With the experiment in place, Luhan must see if his hypothesis is proven correct.
He leans back into the couch, and lets his eyes flicker briefly to Jongin, two seats away.
A miniature Luhan squeals up in real Luhan’s head when he sees that Jongin’s eyes are, in fact, focused on Luhan’s grip on Kyungsoo’s arm.
The miniature Luhan leans back in the miniature imaginary chair and smirks smugly, crossing his arms. Real Luhan can’t help the smug smirk either. He keeps his hold on Kyungsoo’s arm to see if Jongin will react further, but he doesn’t aside from the occasional glance. His eyebrows are pulled together though, and the sight makes Luhan fold his lips inwards to hold back a chuckle. He wants to torture Jongin a little more, but Kyungsoo moves away to arm wrestle Sehun. His arm drops, and he peers over at Jongin. The younger has visibly relaxed, and Luhan thinks he sees him blow out a slight sigh of relief. This time he lets himself chuckle, just slightly, but very knowingly.
Kim Jongin, you aren’t subtle at all.
It’s only the next day when Luhan tries again, sauntering over to Kyungsoo and throwing an arm around him.
One must make multiple observations during an experiment to reach a conclusion, right?
Or maybe Luhan just wants to mess with Jongin more, now that he knows his weakness. Jongin watches them from a distance, leaning against the kitchen counter with his arms crossed and an actual, literal pout on his face.
Miniature Luhan lets out a tiny, squeaky MUAHAHA.
Jongdae loves taking care of s.
It’s really Junmyeon’s and Yifan’s jobs, but there wasn’t a rule that said he couldn’t spoon feed them if he wanted to (the only one who actually appreciates this is Zitao, precious child). Besides, Yifan does a job for EXO-M, so someone’s got to step up.
So when he finds Kyungsoo in the kitchen with his hands full (literally - one holding a whisk, another stirring the pot on the stove, his armpits clutching oven mitts to his chest), his first instinct is to help.
“Do you want me to stir the pot for you?” he asks, coming to take the ladle from him. Kyungsoo immediately side steps him, glaring.
“Don’t touch it!”
“I wanna help -”
“No, don’t, you’ll stir it wrong.”
Jongdae stares at Kyungsoo in slight disbelief, looking closer to see if he’s joking or not. “It’s stirring. It’s spinning a spoon around in a pot. What can I get wrong about that?”
“You’ve got to stir it specifically. Two half circles to the right, two to the left, three full circles clockwise, four full circles counter clock-wise.”
“What the hell?” Jongdae mutters. “It’s just stirring.”
“Stirring is an art, Jongdae, and if you can’t appreciate that, you need to get out of my kitchen.”
Jongdae grimaces at Kyungsoo before he shifts on his heel and exits the kitchen. He knows the boy is something of a perfectionist, but this was beyond what was normal.
Later, after he’s gone through a spirited game of Go Fish with Baekhyun and Luhan, he strolls into the kitchen once more.
Jongin stands where Kyungsoo stood before, stirring at the pot. His tongue is jutted out between his lips, and he looks far more strained than he should be.
“How come Jongin gets to help you?” Jongdae asks in an accusing tone. Kyungsoo looks behind himself curiously from his position at the sink, washing vegetables. Jongin speaks for him before he can.
“I can stir it right,” he says with something of a proud grin.
Jongdae just stands there with an open mouth and narrowed eyes as he slowly shakes his head. “It’s stirring a ing pot!”
“No swearing in my kitchen, Jongdae-yah,” Kyungsoo murmurs.
“It’s not just stirring,” says Jongin. “Look. Two half circles to the right, two to the left, three full circles clockwise, four full circles counter clock-wise.”
“Isn’t two half circles to the right just one full circle?”
Jongin looks over to Kyungsoo for an answer. The latter shakes his head and mutters something that sounds oddly like “amateurs."
Jongdae spins on his heel once more to leave, but not before sending the both of them a glare paired with a scowl.
Two weeks later, Kyungsoo is cooking broth again, and Jongdae jumps up at the opportunity. It’s not that he’s so eager to help Kyungsoo - it’s that he needs to show Kyungsoo that he can master the 'art of ing stirring', whatever that means, and that Jongin is not better than him in that field.
Kyungsoo gives Jongdae the ladle warily after many assurances from the elder, and Jongdae takes it with a grin. “I’ve studied,” he says, just for his own amusement. “Two half circles to the right, two to the left, three full circles clockwise, four full circles counter clock-wise”
He stirs the pot as such, and when he’s finished, he looks anticipatedly at Kyungsoo for approval. The younger is frowning, though, at him, at the pot, probably at Jongdae's decisions in life.
“You’ve ruined it,” Kyungsoo mumbles.
“What the hell!” Jongdae exclaims. “What did I do?! I did it exactly the way you said.”
“Jongdae hyung!” says a new voice. Jongin enters the kitchen then from the other doorway, arms wrapping around Kyungsoo’s small frame easily and without hesitation. Jongdae shoots up an eyebrow at Kyungsoo's reaction, stepping closer to the younger.
“What have you done?” Jongin inquires, eyes wide. Jongdae lets out a sigh of frustration.
“You tell me.”
“You’re holding the ladle wrong!” Jongin says, as Kyungsoo huddles into his chest (really, only Kyungsoo would be so upset over something such as a pot of broth). Jongin takes the ladle and shows him how a proper stirrer holds it, like a pencil, unlike Jongdae’s tight grasp.
“And that’s enough to ruin the pot?”
“Of course! Stirring is an - “
“Art, okay, yeah.”
Jongdae leaves the kitchen for the third time, this time less in frustration and more in speculation as he thinks about the way Kyungsoo had clutched onto Jongin’s shirt.
---
“There is no method to stirring.”
Yifan tells him this later on that day, when it’s just them two in the dorms, the rest of them having gone to their respective schedules.
“Kyungsoo says there is.”
“You’re an idiot if you believe him,” Yifan says. “That’s what he tells everyone that tries to help. He uses that excuse to make no one want to help him, because he’d rather cook alone. Or, y’know, with Jongin.”
Jongdae once again thinks about the way Kyungsoo was so quick to fall into Jongin’s chest, the protective way Jongin had grabbed Kyungsoo.
“But Jongin says there’s a method.”
“Jongin’s an idiot, too,” Yifan says, using his phone as a mirror as he fixes his hair. “Kyungsoo tells him that because it’s what he tells everyone else. And then Jongin just does whatever, and Kyungsoo says it’s right no matter what because if you haven’t noticed, he’s got a soft spot for our little second maknae.”
Jongdae considers this when he watches Jongin and Kyungsoo in the kitchen a night later, working at cutting the vegetables. No broth this time, Jongdae thinks bitterly.
They laugh as they work. It doesn’t even look like work when they do it. As they throw the vegetables in the pan, Jongin makes a little piece of broccoli dance on Kyungsoo’s arm before the latter squeals and laughs.
They’re completely vomit-inducing, but also kind of cute, and Jongdae doesn’t go to harass them like he originally planned. He turns his attention away and tells Luhan Go Fish.
For Baekhyun, it’s not a singular moment of sudden epiphany. He plays silly and dimwitted for the cameras, but a lot more goes on in that mind than what many think. He’s seen it the moment they’ve met, the vague flash in their eyes. It was no hint that they felt attraction to each other, no - that would be more akin to a twinkle. This flash, though, was something like singularizing each other, distinguishing them from the others.
It's no unknown fact that Baekhyun likes to mess with Kyungsoo. He teases him and pokes fun at him, and it always results with Kyungsoo coming over with that look on his face (eyebrows drawn together, eyes hooded; sometimes his fists were clenched and that’s when Baekhyun figures he should run).
But when he teases Kyungsoo about his close relationship with Kim Jongin, there is no reaction other than the bright red that creeps up Kyungsoo’s neck and into his cheeks, and a barely audible “shut up, Baekhyun,” mumbled under his breath.
---
3-6-5 nan maeil achim~!
Baekhyun comes to a final conclusion when they’re at ExoLuxion. Sweat sheens on his face, a towel hanging limply on his head as he jumps to the chorus of the upbeat song. The silver sea before him never fails to keep him pumped, reminding him of the unconditional love of EXO-L. With all the energy in the room, he wonders later how he even spotted the two of them, but then realizes he probably wouldn’t have been able to miss it.
Kyungsoo and Jongin are fond of skinship with each other, that’s no secret. So when Baekhyun eyes them somewhere on the other side of the stage, busting those little cutesy moves of theirs, he glazes over them. It’s only when he does a double take that he quirks an eyebrow. Jongin moves closer to Kyungsoo, but not in the same way that Baekhyun does when he goes to attack Jongdae with the heart pillows. Jongin takes slow footsteps towards the smaller, a gentle smile gracing his face. Kyungsoo in turn takes the moment to adjust Jongin’s collar, pulling the sweatshirt’s hood onto the boy’s dark hair, and the movement has Jongin’s small smile grow into an ear-to-ear grin. He brings his finger up to gently tap on Kyungsoo’s nose, the latter jumping in surprise and swatting at it playfully.
This is all very normal and whatnot and Baekhyun doesn’t want to over think it, but then he notices their entwined hands, and he looks a little closer, a little past the immediate surface. Their gazes stay on each other a little longer than necessary, eyes filled with something indeterminable but slightly akin to admiration. This is the twinkle.
For a brief moment, Baekhyun thinks that they could simply be doing this for show, for fan service. Then he thinks about the fact that Kyungsoo didn’t believe in such a thing, in terms of member skinship anyway. Perhaps the producers finally got onto him about it and demanded that he better start showing some good ol’ member lovin’ soon or else.
They can’t force him to, though. And the producers know that that was kind of Kyungsoo’s image, anyway. D.O. was known to the fans as the kind of distant one, the one who loathes aegyo and is, in general, pretty emotionless in interviews. So why would they force it upon him now? Never mind the fact that Kyungsoo was his own person and it had been very hard to even get him to dye his hair red during Wolf promotions.
The two skip off merrily, hands swinging between them for the briefest of seconds before they release each other. Like they’ve just remembered where they are.
Baekhyun lets the corner of his lip turn up at the sight of them. They’re cute, he thinks.
They’re pushed to the back of his mind as he lip-synchs his next line, fist pumping with enthusiasm.
“Tao, have you been using my hair product again?”
Sehun barges into Zitao's and Yifan's dorm room without knocking, his booming, slightly irritated voice arriving before he did. Zitao lays sprawled across his bed, legs crossed and eyes attached to the screen of his phone.
“Which one,” he says in an indifferent tone.
“The one that makes my hair all poofy.” Sehun's hands mimic the said poofiness by patting the air around his head.
“Yeah, I did. Check in my bag.”
Using his feet, Zitao gestures to the backpack that lies at the foot of his bed. Sehun leans over to it, but he stops as he glances back at his friend, whose eyes were still kept solely to the screen of his phone.
“What are you doing?”
“Reading.”
“You, reading?”
“Yes. Don’t be a cliché comedy and act all surprised that I’m reading because ‘oh, Tao, you never read.’”
“But…you never read.”
Tao sighs.
Sehun continues. “If we were a cliché comedy, you’d be like, the goofy, kind of dumb friend in our group. I’d be the one that makes all the memorable cheeky one-liners.”
Tao sends a scowl and a glare in Sehun’s direction briefly before his eyes flicker back to his phone. Clearly not the response Sehun wanted, the younger leaps across the room, hair product forgotten, and throws himself on Tao’s bed, huddling in close to the latter so as not to fall off the edge. Tao is immediately protesting and shoving him away, but Sehun clings onto his arm, attempting to peek over at his phone screen to see what he was really doing.
“Sehun, what the he-”
He frowns. Tao’s phone screen is littered with letters and words against a white background, and the punk really is reading.
“Get off of me,” Tao mumbles in impatience, pulling his phone to his chest. Sehun attempts to pull it back in his view.
“What are you reading?”
“Just a book.”
Sehun knows better.
“Stop lying. It’s gotta be weird or something if you’re suddenly reading.”
“It’s just a book,” Tao mumbles once more, but his voice has noticeably hushed. His cheeks fade into a light pink color, and Sehun thinks he’s got him caught.
“Let me see then, if it’s just a book,” says Sehun.
Ziao gives Sehun his infamous offended look, the look that only makes Sehun mockingly mimic it in return, along with a laugh.
“Please, ge,” Sehun says, lowering his voice and pouting his lips. When Zitao's eyes glance towards Sehun's jutted lip, the latter makes it even more of a point to jut it out further. Then, a complete 180 - "If you don't show me, I'll tell the rest and we'll jump you and then everyone will know."
Sehun thinks he sees literal flames in Zitao's eyeballs when he looks at him. He doesn't flinch back though, because sooner than not, Zitao is sighing in surrender.
“You can’t tell anyone I was reading this.”
“Oh, you make it sound so bad. Whatcha reading’ that’s so secretive, Taozi?”
Zitao leans forward to Sehun and shows him the screen so the latter can take a closer look.
asianfanfics [dot] com
Bad Boy, Good Boy
Author: SooKaiLoveLoveBunny1992
Updated: October 23rd, 2013
Published: April 26th, 2013
Status: M [Completed]
Tags: exo kai kyungsoo kaisoo romance highschoolau
Do Kyungsoo is his high school’s resident nerd. The go-to for unfinished homework, the goodie two shoes sitting at the front of the class reminding the teacher to collect your assignments. His life is as neat and tidy as the laces on his shoes. Kim Jongin, the new kid with the plastered smirk permanent on his face comes to mess it all up.
Sehun wrinkles his nose and peers at Zitao. “What the hell is this?”
“It’s. Uh.” He looks incredibly uncomfortable, repositioning himself on the bed and rubbing at the lower half of his face. “Have you heard of fan fiction?”
“I know what it is, Tao,” Sehun says. He can’t help the growing smirk on his face. “I’m wondering why you’re reading it, though.”
Zitao gives in, and breaks down. “I don’t know? Okay? I just. Someone linked a fic in the comment feed of my instagram with Jongin and so I clicked on it. I was curious. And then that led to another, and that led to another, and that led to this.”
“You mean you’ve been an active reader of our fans’ works? About two of our band members? Being in a romantic relationship?” Sehun doesn’t try to resist his laughter, the echoes of it filling the room. Zitao would have clamped a hand over his mouth, but he's sure the other members are much used to Sehun's boisterous and obnoxious laughter by now, and that they'd brush it off without hesitation. "Bad Boy, Good Boy. I’m laughing if anyone thinks Jongin is a bad boy.”
Tao pouts. “It’s just imagination. He fits the part visually, right?”
Sehun looks at his friend incredulously, then at the ceiling in thought. “I guess. If he fixed his hair up good occasionally, he might. He does have that ‘permanent smirk’ thing down. But that‘s just because he‘s a cocky little , not because he‘s a ‘bad boy‘.”
Tao tries to return back to reading, not before rolling his eyes, but Sehun barges in again.
“Is this the first chapter?” he says, voice raised with interest. Zitao wants to be the one to poke fun at him this time, but he's irritated and just wants to go back to reading. He just nods curtly.
To his surprise, Sehun doesn't make some stupid remark back, and they sit in silence, eyes flying across the screen.
---
Later that night, they're at the dinner table with the other ten members.
It had been two and a half hours of them sitting on the floor of Zitao’s dorm in silence, one of them occasionally muttering “Oh ,” or “That’s ing cute,” or “Aww, Jongin.”
The story had quickly drawn Sehun in, and he marveled at the characters, so real and lifelike. There was a character named Sehun in the story, Jongin’s best friend, and he had delivered some of the more witty lines (as he’d predicted he would earlier).
At the table, both Sehun and Zitao can’t take their eyes off of Jongin and Kyungsoo, who sit besides each other.
Kyungsoo feeds Jongin a dinner roll from his fingers, and at this motion, Sehun squeals dramatically. He clasps a hand over his mouth and avoids the gaze of Jongdae, who is staring at him curiously.
“Just like Bad Boy, Good Boy,” Sehun whispers to only Zitao, who nods in agreement, appearing as if he was going to cry from watching Kyungsoo feed the roll to Jongin.
“Good?” Kyungsoo asks Jongin with a smile. Heart-shaped, beautiful smile, Sehun thinks, recalling the description of Kyungsoo in the fanfiction. He’s never quite noticed it until recently pointed out to him.
Jongin nods, chewing and smiling gratefully.
“Damn it, Jongin,” says Zitao, low enough so that only Sehun hears. “You were supposed to say ‘no’ and then tickle Kyungsoo onto a bed thus resulting in a vigorous makeout session. What the hell.”
“Fanfiction Jongin is way better. Also, your vocabulary has noticeably improved, good job.”
“It’s all the reading.”
“What the hell are you two rambling about?” asks Luhan, who sits next to Zitao.
“You wouldn’t understand,” Sehun says with a breathy sigh.
“The maknaes are being weird again, Junmyeon,” Luhan calls. The leader only rolls his eyes with a chuckle and mutters “What’s new?”
Meanwhile, Sehun and Zitao’s food remain untouched. The latter has gripped Sehun’s forearm under the table tightly in anticipation as they watch Kyungsoo and Jongin’s every move, watches their every interaction. It’s not long before the two themselves notice, and they look back at the younger two with confused stares.
Sehun coughs awkwardly and realizes they’ve been hunched over the table, leaning in to hear every bit of their conversation. He clears his throat and nudges Zitao, who too coughs and leans back in his chair, adjusting his collar.
"O..kay," Jongin mutters,.
---
Later, Sehun barely exits the bathroom after taking a shower when Zitao jumps him, waving his phone around frantically and appearing as if he was going to explode from glee.
“Sehun, Sehun, Sehun.”
“What, what, what.”
Tao's eyes are wide, but they've got nothing on the grin on the boy's face.
“Jongin’s just proposed to Kyungsoo!” he bursts.
“What? Sehun says, eyes matching Zitao's, but his mouth falls open in dismay instead of delight. "What the hell, Tao? Did I ask for spoilers?”“I couldn’t hold it in, oh my god, this is so amazing, oh my go-”
Sehun begins bouncing on the spot, clamping onto Zitao's shoulder to look at his phone. “How did he do it? Did he use the calla lily from their -”
“First date? Yes.”
“Oh my god, I so called it. I called that a long time ago. . That’s hella cute. I hate you. Let me see.”
Nine out of the twelve members are in their living room - each of them huddled into a little group as they do their own things. Chanyeol, Jongdae, and Minseok are gathered in front of the television, playing an old James Bond Nintendo 64 game. Yixing and Zitao are sitting besides each other on the couch, waiting their turns and watching with amusement, but also judgment when Minseok’s character dies at the hands of Chanyeol’s (“How could you lose to Chanyeol?”). Yifan, Junmyeon, Luhan and Baekhyun lay scattered around the room on their phones, either sprawled on the floor (Yifan, Baekhyun, Luhan) or hanging upside down on the couch (Junmyeon).
Sehun enters the dorm, throwing his gym bag to the side as he plops down next to Junmyeon.
“Where’s Jongin?” Sehun says, looking around the group. “He was supposed to run over the new moves with me.”
“Aw, did someone get stood up?” teases Jongdae, eyes never leaving his game.
Sehun only rolls his eyes and starts mindlessly poking Junmyeon’s stomach that peeks through his shirt. “Seriously, where is he?”
“Last I saw him, he was going to bed,” Chanyeol says.
“In the middle of the day?”
Nearly everyone gives him a look - all with quirked eyebrows that say are you serious?
“As if that’s new,” says Baekhyun.
“Why would he go to sleep when he was supposed to be in the studio with me?” Sehun says, though his care for the situation was slowly fading as his aching body sunk deeper into the couch.
“I don’t know. You know how he is,” offers Chanyeol. “I was going to get the other controller so Zitao or Yixing could play but the door was locked. I figured he wanted to be alone.”
Yifan snickers from his position by the fern in the corner. “Yeah. Alone with Kyungsoo.”
It’s almost eerie how everybody’s head shoots up at the same time, eyes darted towards Yifan. The lack of a bold comeback has everyone realize that Kyungsoo was absent from the room as well.
“So you’ve noticed their…more-than-friendship-ness… too?” Minseok speaks in an almost whisper, as if the topic is taboo. The game on the television is paused as he stares wide-eyed at Yifan.
“Who hasn’t?” says Luhan, a smile growing on his face.
“We were looking through Kyungsoo’s phone the other da- I mean, we happened to come across Kyungsoo’s phone and we saw text messages from Jongin. Using the heart emojis and and telling him he loves his smile. He doesn’t tell me he loves me,” says Yifan.
“He also gets jealous really easily,” says Luhan.
“They do seem a lot closer to each other than the rest of us,” says Jongdae.
“Yeah. A lot closer,” smirks Baekhyun.
“Okay, but guys. Focus on what’s happening now,” Chanyeol says, bringing his voice down to a whisper. His eyes flicker towards the closed door in the hallway, the one that leads to his, Jongin’s, and Kyungsoo’s room. “Jongin is in the room and Kyungsoo is not here,”
“The door was locked too, wasn’t it?” says Zitao, face falling into what appears to be either disbelief or disgust, or both. Sehun shoots him a judgmental glare - as if you don't read gay on a daily basis. Chanyeol nods slowly, eyes widening. Silence falls between them as all turn their heads towards the door, the realization settling in the air thickly.
Baekhyun makes the first move, putting his finger up to his mouth in a shh motion. He stands up and tip-toes past the couch into the hallway.
“Byun Baekhyun, you ert,” Jongdae whisper-yells. Baekhyun waves him off and narrows his eyes as he crouches besides the door, ear placed warily against it.
“You’re the ert if you think that’s what they’re doing,” Baekhyun whisper-yells back. “I don’t even hear anything.”
“Maybe they’re the slow-and-romantic- type,” says Sehun.
“That’s sweet,” says Yixing.
“Get away from there, Baekhyun,” says Junmyeon in a normal voice, and at once everyone shushes him loudly, making much more noise than Junmyeon had made in the first place. The latter only rolls his eyes, not bothering to remind them that Kyungsoo and Jongin would be much more suspicious if the dorm had suddenly grown quiet than if they were being their normal, noisy selves.
“Wait,” Baekhyun says, pressing hard against the door as if trying to become one with it. His hands splay against the wood as an eyebrow shoots up. “They’re…talking…”
“Oh,” says Jongdae. “They’re those types.”
“Shut up, Jongdae,” Baekhyun whispers. “It’s not like that. They’re just talking normally.”
“It’s not strained or anything? Or breathy?” says Luhan, and Zitao slaps him on the arm for being disgusting.
“No. It’s just talking.”
“About what?”
“Hold on,” Baekhyun says, tongue jutting out between his lips as the dorm grows silent once more. “I can’t hear what they’re saying…”
Chanyeol jumps up then, leaping across the room in long strides. He stands over Baekhyun, mimicking his position against the door. His eyes dart around as he listens. “They are talking normally.”
“What are they saying, damn it?” says Jongdae, before he too drops his controller and joins the two.
It isn’t long before they’re all huddled besides the door, curved against each other or crouched on the floor or hanging over the others. Minseok and Luhan get there too late so they settle with listening through the walls. Junmyeon comes last, though, curiosity and peer pressure getting the best of him.
----
“I really like you, hyung.”
Kyungsoo feels a deepening heat creep up his neck, and he wants to shoot his head up to look at Jongin and see the look in his eyes - whether it’s playful and joking, or genuine and sincere. He doesn’t though, because he’s pretty sure he’s a very ripe tomato by now.
“Not like… friends, though,” Jongin continues.
This is what Jongin pulled him in here for? Also, this is where he chooses to confess? In the dorm with all the other members?
Really, he shouldn’t be surprised. Even if the words I really like you, hyung were never spoken out loud until now, they’ve been said in different ways. In the way Jongin climbs into Kyungsoo’s bed almost every night, grasping his hand but afraid to move any closer. In the way Jongin reserves that certain smile just for him, delicate and sweet and so, so very Jongin. In their “accidental” brushes of skin, fingers falling next to each other and itching to grasp onto the other’s.
He hears the confession every day, every night, with every laugh and every smile. He hears, but he’s never bothered to listen, thinking it was impossible. Until now, when it’s blunt and clear and out in the open.
Kyungsoo stays silent, tongue frozen in his mouth.
“I like you,” Jongin repeats. Kyungsoo watches how Jongin fumbles with the edge of his blanket, hanging off of his bed. He’s nervous.
Kyungsoo gains the courage to look up. “Um,” he says stupidly. IDIOT.
The younger boy’s eyes widen slightly in panic at Kyungsoo’s one-word reaction, if it could be counted as even that.
“I, uh, I like you too,” says Kyungsoo, trying to mend his dumb reply.
“Like a friend, or what?” Jongin says, somewhat impatiently, picking at the stray strands of thread. Kyungsoo mindlessly mimics his movements, picking at his own blankets on his own bed.
“I -”
Kyungsoo’s response is delayed momentarily, for there’s a thump at their room door. Both of them turn to look towards the noise, but when nothing else happens, Jongin shrugs it off. He looks back at Kyungsoo expectedly.
“I like you too…as…not a friend,” Kyungsoo says, his eyes still unable to face Jongin.
“You don’t want me to be your friend?” Jongin asks confusedly at Kyungsoo’s words.
“No!” Kyungsoo almost shouts, and there’s another thump outside the walls but they ignore it. “I mean.. I’m sorry.”
Jongin just chuckles. Stupid smile.
“I like you as more than a friend is what I mean,” he says, enunciating each word clearly. He looks up only then, when Jongin has been quiet a little too long. The other boy is grinning though, widely. And before Kyungsoo could react, Jongin is walking over to Kyungsoo’s bed. It dips as Jongin sits besides him, grin still wide and bright and toothy and Kyungsoo loves that smile so, so much. He smiles back, close-mouthed and still a little nervous, which he can’t really understand because he has never been shy with Jongin.
“That takes a load of stress off of me,” Jongin says quietly. “Can I kiss you?”
Kyungsoo surprisingly manages to maintain his cool before he laughs at Jongin’s forwardness, despite the growing redness in his cheeks. “Jongin-ah. You don’t ask if you could kiss someone. That completely ruins the mood.”
The younger frowns, almost pouts. “I just want to make sure it’s consented.”
“Okay. Well, here - just know that everything you ever plan to do to me is consented.”
Jongin frowns further. “Gross, hyung.”
Kyungsoo rolls his eyes and slaps Jongin’s thigh. “Not what I meant.” They’re laughing together and Kyungsoo can’t think of a better way to spend his free day.
“So can I?”
Kyungsoo purses his lips, pretending to consider it, though the answer has been long decided. “Nah. You ruined the mood. I don’t feel it anymore.”
The younger parts his mouth in disbelief at Kyungsoo. “Hyung!” he yells, agitated. Kyungsoo only laughs at him, taking Jongin’s hand before it can slap his shoulder playfully. When his laughter dies down, Jongin smiles softly at him, and his eyes are so, so tender. Kyungsoo wants to be lost in them forever.
He leans in first, and Jongin comes in soon after, and their lips meet. It’s a hesitant little brush at first, but then they press together harder, and their lips are soon slanting against each other.
They’ve only been kissing for three (blissful, amazing) seconds before yet another thump resonates through the room, and they plan to ignore it again. Only, they can’t this time, for it’s accompanied by an irritated voice - “Ow, Jongdae, scoot over.”
Kyungsoo and Jongin part in surprise, and they listen closer. “SHH,” says another voice loudly.
“I don’t hear anything anymore,” says another, clearly. Deeply.
Chanyeol.
Another SHH follows.
Kyungsoo bites his tongue and looks away from Jongin. “Are they serious?”
Jongin only smiles, and it’s enough to calm Kyungsoo down. “I think we should open the door,” he near whispers, so that their audience won’t hear. Kyungsoo allows himself to be led by Jongin to the door. The latter begins unlocking and turning the knob, and Kyungsoo hears an “OH , , abort,” before Jongin pulls it open.
Ten boys fall onto each other like dominoes when the door opens, muttering swear words and becoming a tangle of limbs. Jongin and Kyungsoo look down at them with accusatory glares.
“What’s up?” says Jongdae nonchalantly, giving a little wave from where he lay atop Yixing.
“What were you guys doing?” says Kyungsoo, his hand still gripped to Jongin’s.
“Uh,” says Baekhyun, voice muffled from being pressed tightly against Junmyeon’s shoulder. “Manager hyung told us to check the wood of our doors. Make sure they’re still…uh. Wood-y.”
“Yeah,” says Luhan, removing his arm from under Minseok’s leg with a grunt. “Uh. They said the building’s full of those wood-eating bug things so we had to check.”
“Really?” Jongin says. “”All of you at the same door?”
Most of them nod weakly, giving sheepish grins. Junmyeon only stares up at the ceiling and shakes his head as he wonders how he was dragged into this, ignoring Zitao’s complaints that he’s ruining my hair, please get off of me, hyung.
“Get up before you embarrass yourselves further,” says Kyungsoo, and it’s weird speaking to s aggressively while at the same time holding onto Jongin’s hand.
The two of them walk over the bodies sprawled across the hallway, stepping between arms and legs and remaining close to each other, letting their arms brush. The ten members on the floor watch as they do so, gazes locked on their entwined hands and the way Jongin flicks Kyungsoo’s hair out of his face.
“They’re holding hands,” says Yifan.
“That’s sweet,” Yixing says dreamily.
---
Later, Jongdae finds Jongin in the studio.
“I hope you know that stirring is not an actual art and that Kyungsoo lied just because he liked you,” he says, very matter-of-factly.
“Oh, I know,” says Jongin, shutting off the music with the remote.
“W-what?” sputters Jongdae.
“I know. And he didn’t lie to me. I’m not that dumb, you know. We did that just to mess with you," Jongin smiles smugly at him. "When we saw you practicing the stirring motions in air, we laughed so hard. Thanks for that.”
“You’re both bastards,” Jongdae grumbles. “And perfect for each other.”
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