The word 'crush' seems so childish, but in Seungcheol's case, it's not inaccurate. He'd probably prefer the term 'attraction'.

Jeonghan wasn't the first boy he found attractive. There was this other guy in high school that he thought was pretty cute – right up until he declared the following:

"I dunno, I just think gay guys are kinda gross. Lesbians are hot, though."

Seungcheol was terrible at maths, but he sure did learn the meaning of a 180.

It was another one of those dreaded early morning dance practices. Wake up at 2 am, and keep working until the sky regains colour. After a few back-to-back rounds of sluggish dancing, the members took their breaks, immediately gravitating towards their phones, like hordes of zombies.

Seungkwan began ad-libbing loudly in an attempt to fully wake himself up, and in turn, everyone else. Woozi dazedly mumbled something about needing to finish a song. Dino seemed irritatingly content with having to do hard exercise at three in the morning. Coups had to admire that kid. He isn't even old, but compared to some of these guys he feels like a grandpa.

Jeonghan sat with Joshua, who was showing him an American artist he'd found on YouTube. Seungcheol - the super-cool-and-definitely-not-desperate person that he is - gathered all of his willpower and sat next to Joshua instead of the longhaired boy.

"Who's that, then?"

"Oh, just a YouTube guy. You probably wouldn't have heard of him."

What an absolute hipster. Josh is nice though, and he might've persisted just to continue the conversation, but darn it, it was too early in the morning. The musician isn't even that good.

"He's really good!" said Jeonghan.

Well, fine then.

"Yeah, what's his name? I'll look him up," Coups chimed in with feigned enthusiasm.

"Since when are you into indie?" asked the American boy, with a suspicious tone.

"Uh, I try to listen to all kinds of music. Adds influences to my lyrics."

The other boy didn't seem entirely convinced, but he wasn't being untruthful, to be fair.

"Yo, Josh, come look at this!" bellowed Vernon embarrassingly in English from the other side of the room, his phone screen glowing in their direction. 

"Yup!" Joshua yelled back weakly, moving away from the other two boys, and very quickly putting the leader in a difficult situation. His mind rattled for something to say before the awkwardness really started to kick in, and all he could come up with was:

"Man, I'm tired."

"Me too."

It was awkward. Damn.

"Uh, do you really like that singer?" The older boy inquired.

"Do you?"

"I think he's pretty good."

"Really? I think he's a bit boring. Don't tell Jisoo that, though."

'Well, there's a lesson in honesty for you,' Seungcheol thought to himself.

"If you don't like it, why'd you say you did?" 

A hypocritical question, but he was curious to know the other member's reasons.

"Just easier to go along with it, I guess. It avoids disagreements."

"Disagreements aren't always a bad thing."

"Well, yeah, but I'd rather avoid them."

"Is it the group you're worried about?"

Jeonghan quietly scoffed.

"Are you my counsellor?" he said with a sly grin.

"I'm just asking."

"I know," the younger boy replied. "I get that you're just looking out for your members, but it really doesn't matter."

"Why doesn't it matter?"

A pause.

"Why should it?"

There was no response. As though by cue, they were promptly called for another series of practices, and the conversation ended, just like that.

It's not a problem; they'll pick up the conversation again at some point. Seungcheol will make sure of it.