"You totally didn't shower yet," Jongdae accuses. "You didn't, right?"

At a nod from a smug Junmyeon, Jongdae scrunches his nose up in disgust and makes sure to further express his displeasure by pressing his ears flat against the top of his head and muttering "Insufferable dog" loudly under his breath. Junmyeon's answering smile as he remains draped across Jongdae's lap where they're sitting together and watching TV on Yixing's heavenly couch is a little too bright, a little too proud, and shows a lot more teeth than Jongdae is strictly comfortable with. That discomfort might also be the small flutter of the butterflies in his stomach talking—the feeling has a horrible habit of appearing anytime Junmyeon casts this particular gummy smile in Jongdae's direction—but Jongdae ignores that possibility resolutely. He puts up with Junmyeon—and has spent many long hours in Junmyeon's presence to develop a general immunity against the permeating scent of dog—for Yixing's sake; there is no other reason.

Only that logic doesn't quite cover the way the cat and the dog are snuggled up against each other, their legs a tangled mess under the single blanket that Junmyeon pulled over them when he first collapsed onto Jongdae's lap, and that Jongdae shares without even the thought of a complaint.

It doesn't exactly explain Jongdae's obsession with unearthing the crinkling half-moons that Junmyeon's eyes become when the dog hybrid laughs particularly hard at something; nor does it address the pleasant warmth that seeps through every one of Jongdae's pores when he wakes up from his afternoon naps to find the lean arms of a slumbering Junmyeon wrapped tightly around him.

And it certainly doesn't clarify the sinking loneliness that deprives Jongdae of sleep on the nights when Yixing and Junmyeon go to bed together in Junmyeon's room and leave Jongdae to sleep alone with his tail curled around his body in a poor replacement for the comfort the cat knows he would find in the embrace of the two men across the hall.

It used to be that Jongdae would huff in annoyance every other evening when Yixing would kiss the top of his head goodnight, disappear with the door closing behind him into Junmyeon's bedroom, and then appear the next morning completely drenched in canine pheromones and another scent that Jongdae could never quite identify. Yixing always smelled so strongly after those nights with Junmyeon, and the cat in Jongdae didn't like that; it wanted to scratch its own marks of possession into Yixing's pale skin so that Junmyeon would look at Yixing and know that the human isn't just his anymore—now he belongs to Jongdae, too.

Recently, though, something has changed, and more often than not Jongdae finds himself spending those particular mornings with his hands clenched into fists because the urge to claim them both with his claws is overwhelming.

Falling for Yixing was easy, he thinks. With the dull ache of a slowly healing wound, Jongdae remembers his desperation for loving attention and how completely willing Yixing was—and still is—to give that to him. How could Jongdae not love a person like that?

As he sits in quietly content contemplation with Junmyeon's head pillowed in his lap and his hands threading through Junmyeon's hair, it strikes Jongdae that falling for Junmyeon is no less easy to do—was no less easy—maybe just a little harder to accept. At any rate, such emotional attachment to his fellow hybrid certainly accounts for Jongdae's altered opinions on the even split of their nights with Yixing.

"I think I'm in love with you," Jongdae finds himself blurting out before he can catch the words that give Junmyeon so much power to hurt him. His ministrations to Junmyeon's scalp halt in surprise at his own admission, and Jongdae's tail twitches with sudden nervousness.

Junmyeon turns a little so he's facing Jongdae now instead of whatever had held his focus on the television. His smile is softer than the gummy one from earlier and the sight of it sends Jongdae's heart into overdrive. "You think?" Junmyeon teases his question as he reaches up to pet gently at the sensitive fur of Jongdae's ears. The cat can't help it when he purrs in delight and his eyes fall shut involuntarily, just like Jongdae knows Junmyeon can't help the steady thump of his wagging tail against the couch's leather cushions.

"You still smell," is Jongdae's only answer, even when Junmyeon's response is to brush his lips against Jongdae's palm where it rests near his head and to whisper a lilting "So do you."

Neither feels the need to continue the conversation and nothing more is said on the matter, even when Yixing comes home a few hours later to find both his hybrids cuddled up and asleep on the couch. The human runs a hand along the top of Jongdae's head in a gentle wake-up call that startles the cat just enough to awaken Junmyeon too, but not enough to injure anyone; Yixing's learned from experience that a little goes a long way where Jongdae is concerned.

"Hello, my little sleepyheads," Yixing coos at them as Junmyeon sits up and blinks blearily while Jongdae stretches his arms above his head, cracks his back with an adorable little grimace, and yawns. Their combined cuteness is almost to much for Yixing to handle and he grins with his dimples in full force before dropping a kiss to each of their foreheads and wandering into the kitchen to get dinner started. When it's ready, Jongdae eats much better than he did when he first arrived, and Yixing and Junmyeon look so ridiculously happy that the cat even asks for seconds. Now that he knows for sure that he loves them both, Jongdae finds that their happiness is his happiness too. His good mood is palpable throughout the rest of the evening as they clean up, wash the dinner dishes, and sit through two episodes of that horrible reality show that the hybrids only bedgrudgingly watch because Yixing's obsessed with it.

But then Jongdae's plummeting emotions are obvious, too, when the clock strikes 11pm and Yixing bids him a customary goodnight and disappears in Junmyeon's bedroom. The cat's heart sinks when he recalls that tonight isn't his night with Yixing—with either of them. And though today was a big day for Jongdae in terms of revelations, it seems that whether he loves both the human and the hybrid or not, nothing is going to change. This anxiety is further reinforced when Junmyeon follows Yixing into his room a few seconds later with a searching look in his eyes but no invitation on his lips. Jongdae doesn't know what it was that Junmyeon was looking so desperately for, so he sighs, resigned, and burrows a little deeper into the crevices of the couch—if it's good enough to nap on, it's good enough to lie miserably awake on too.

Except when making this decision Jongdae doesn't account for the tears that come memer moments later and make his body shake with sobs until he's too exhausted to do anything other than sleep. When Yixing adopted him, all Jongdae asked for was attention: a simple touch here and there to let him know someone cared. He didn't ask to fall in love with his owner; didn't ask to fall in love with another hybrid either; definitely didn't ask for the attention that he used to crave to suddenly not be enough anymore. Now Jongdae wants something that Yixing and Junmyeon won't give—can't give because they already have each other and they don't need him like he needs them. It's the despair of that realization which pulls Jongdae into sleep much earlier than he usually succumbs on these alternating nights when left alone.

That's why the heavy and familiar weight of Junmyeon's arm thrown lazily across Jongdae's waist and the comforting solidity of Yixing's chest against Jongdae's back are such a shock when Jongdae's eyes flutter open the next morning: because sandwiched between the two of them like this, the haunting loneliness that chased Jongdae into slumber is nowhere to be found. The cat doesn't know how he got from the couch to his bed without waking up, but much like that first time he and Junmeyon napped together, Jongdae doesn't question it. Instead he lets his eyes fall shut again, takes in the tiny yips that Junmyeon makes when he's dreaming, feels the tingling caress of Yixing's steady breaths against his neck, and tells himself that this attention is enough because it has to be.

A few hours later, Jongdae wakes up once more. This time the other two are awake as well, and have been for a while if the soft lull of their conversation over his head is enough to go by. It's Junmyeon who catches that Jongdae's awake first, and his grip around the cat tightens as he scoots a little closer to Jongdae so he can rub their noses against each other. Yixing catches the action and buries his face in Jongdae’s nape to press a single kiss against the hybrid’s skin.

“Junmyeon tells me you’re in love with him.” Yixing’s voice is low and gentle, but there is no question in his tone. Jongdae feels his face flush. Yixing, lips still trailing across the back of Jongdae’s neck, continues. “And that he was waiting for the right time to tell me this, but apparently he’s in love with you too.”

Jongdae had figured as much—had hoped as much—after his and Junmyeon’s intimate moment on the couch yesterday. Still, hearing it in so many words has Jongdae’s heart soaring, especially after his crisis of doubt the night before, and he waits with bated breath for the bad news that he’s sure will follow.

It comes quickly and hurts as much as Jongdae feared that it would. “But Yixing loves me.” Junmyeon admits to something that Jongdae is already heartbreakingly aware of when the dog hybrid adds “And I love him.” Jongdae thinks about the way Junmyeon always makes sure to leave traces of his scent wafting from Yixing’s skin, thinks about the way Yixing knows this but doesn’t bother washing it away, and reminds himself bitterly that there is no room for a third person in their love for one another. Jongdae doesn’t understand why the other two insist on dragging the discussion on and hurting him like this, but when Junmyeon pauses to take a deep breath before asking haltingly, “Do you?” Jongdae’s answer is still immediate and resolutely honest.

“How could I not love Yixing?” he wonders aloud as he remembers that fateful Valentine’s Day less than a month earlier when the human took a chance on an already grown-up cat and changed Jongdae’s life forever. “How could I not love you both?”

Yixing smiles into Jongdae’s hair at that, and Junmyeon does too, his eyes curving upwards in the expression that never fails to take Jongdae’s breath away. “Exactly,” Yixing agrees with a relieved sigh that Jongdae feels in a shiver all the way down to his toes. He skims his lips across the planes of Jongdae’s bare shoulder and watches with almost reverent focus as Junmyeon leans a little closer to tentatively press a kiss to Jongdae’s open mouth. When the human gets a chance to kiss his cat hybrid a few moments later, he does so with one hand cupped around Jongdae’s cheek and the other entwined tightly with Junmyeon’s. Jongdae catches sight of their hands clasped together and sighs in perfect contentment when Yixing echoes against his lips. “How could I not love you both?”