If it was awkward between them before, it was unbearable for Wonwoo now. Being in the same room incited a new kind of tension, one that Wonwoo did not even want to think about.

Mingyu and his ing hands, Wonwoo groaned to himself. It was all his hands’ fault. If only they weren’t so ing soft, they would not have turned Wonwoo into this hormonal weirdo.

As Wonwoo was lamenting his strange attraction to Mingyu’s hands, Jeonghan texted him: “The hot technician seungcheol came in today. Guess what? i asked him on a date and he said YES.”

“congrats! Im happy for you,” Wonwoo replied, truly meaning it.

“thanks wonwon! anyways, how are things with YOUR crush?”

 “are you talking about mingyu -.-”

“who else?”

“he's not a crush omg”

“sure he's not.”

“why do I sense sarcasm”

“because I was being sarcastic.”

“jeonghan you know im straight wtf.”

“lol”

“what???”

“you know that someone can track your internet history through the wifi router, right?”

No, Wonwoo did not know that. But he did know that he wanted to jump off a building and die. Wonwoo had earlier connected to Shining Diamond Café wifi in order to watch videos that totally did not help his case of being straight.

“do you have a hand ?” Jeonghan asked. Wonwoo could almost see that obnoxious smirk on Jeonghan’s pretty face.

Wonwoo closed the chat with Jeonghan. He was way too ashamed to talk to him now. Especially because he didn’t know how he could defend himself from this...

-

Wonwoo found himself naturally looking for more jobs and places to rent, because the awkwardness was too great and he figured Mingyu probably hated it too. He didn’t want to burden him anymore. Plus, he was way too free for his own good; he missed having a job.

Maybe if he had a job, he would stop turning into the freak he was becoming.

Stupid Mingyu and his stupid hands, Wonwoo thought.

When he went back into the room, he saw Mingyu with another boy, who had his head laid against Mingyu’s chest. Mingyu was the boy’s arm, and when Wonwoo entered, the stranger sat up straight, looking uncomfortable.

“Sorry,” Wonwoo said, realizing he interrupted something and that he probably should have knocked. He turned to go away and leave them alone, but Mingyu called him back saying it was okay.

“Wonwoo, this is Minghao,” Mingyu introduced him. “He lives downstairs.” Wonwoo and Minghao exchanged awkward greetings.

Minghao and Mingyu seemed to be more than just friendly neighbors, Wonwoo concluded after seeing them in that intimate position. The only impression that Wonwoo really got from seeing them together like that was from the way Mingyu was Minghao’s arm. Must have felt nice, given the smoothness of Mingyu’s hands and all…

“I have to go meet friends now,” Minghao told Mingyu. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

When Minghao left, that dreadful awkwardness resurfaced, and Wonwoo wanted to break it, and so asked the question: “are you two dating?”

Mingyu looked thoughtful for a moment and then answered, “well, it’s complicated.”

“You looked like you two were more than friends,” Wonwoo remarked.

Mingyu nodded, “we are. Kind of. Like I said, it’s complicated. Minghao is… not very clear about what he wants. He’s kinda like you actually.”

“Looks like you have a type then.”

Mingyu laughed out loud at that remark. Wonwoo smiled; he liked hearing Mingyu laugh. “You’re right, I do. My type is cute ambiguous boys that lead you on.”

“Well, I hope this cute boy doesn’t shut you off completely like that other loser did,” Wonwoo told him, and Mingyu laughed again. Wonwoo wanted to keep making him laugh. Somehow, every time Mingyu laughed, some of the overwhelming awkwardness was lifted.

“I hope so too,” Mingyu replied with a bright smile on his face. “But I have good feeling that tomorrow, it will be official, whatever it is.”

“Feel free to ile me whenever you need...” Wonwoo replied as a joke, wanting to keep that lighthearted atmosphere alive, and wanting to keep hearing Mingyu laugh.

Mingyu did laugh. He even blushed a little, and Wonwoo was more proud of that then he would have liked to admit.

Mingyu had such a nice laugh, Wonwoo thought. And it really did feel like his laugh eased away the awkwardness. Feeling like he was on a roll, Wonwoo was compelled to keep making Mingyu laugh somehow.

“He seems like a funny character to be honest," Wonwoo stated. "On one hand, he looks innocent and sweet, but on the other hand, I feel like he’s part of the Chinese mafia,” Wonwoo joked, and Mingyu kept laughing, much to his delight.

“You just described Minghao perfectly,” Mingyu said as he laughed.

Wonwoo smiled and, wanting to keep alive the first unawkward conversation they’ve ever had, asked: “so how long have you two been in this complicated relationship?”

“I met him the beginning of the semester, but things only really started happening between us like a month ago. You probably think I’m a for pursuing you in the time, but Minghao actually knows about the pursuit, so I wasn’t doing it behind his back or anything. We aren’t really boyfriends anyways. I had asked him to be my boyfriend many times, but he keeps saying ‘ask me later.’ I think it’s because he’s still in the closet, so he wants to keep it lowkey with me, but I do like him very much. He’s aloof sometimes because his Korean isn’t great, but he has this spunky charm to him that makes me want to get to know him more.”

“Well, good luck,” Wonwoo said. “I hope it comes together between the two of you.”

“Thanks,” Mingyu said. “And please don’t tell anyone about this. He wouldn’t want that...”

Wonwoo nodded, “I won’t.” The conversation was dying, and Wonwoo wanted to save it, and so he continued asking questions: “how long has he been in Korea?”

And so, they had a conversation about him. Mingyu told him everything he knew about Minghao: the city he was from, how long he was in Korea, what he was studying, his love of b-boying, his cute antics, how he could fluently curse in Korean but had trouble remembering the days of the week, how obsessed he was with snapbacks, how he put on this tough façade but his cuteness made it so laughable…

From the way Mingyu spoke about him, this Minghao person seemed quite dear to Mingyu.

But Wonwoo was not very interested in Minghao, he was more interested in having Mingyu talk about him. Having something to talk about seemed to overcome the agonizing awkwardness, and plus, Mingyu smiled and laughed a lot when he spoke about Minghao. Wonwoo really loved to see Mingyu laugh.

Things seemed to be getting better for Wonwoo too. He managed to have the conversation without thinking about Mingyu’s hands once, which was an improvement. Plus, the fact he was in no way peeved by Mingyu’s potential romantic attachment to another guy settled all doubt he had about his feelings for Mingyu. He did not like Mingyu in that way. In addition, this one conversation seemed to undo all the knots in their relationship that had made it unbearable to be around one another.

-

Mingyu the heater and got into his bed to sleep. Wonwoo, also extremely tired having not slept last night, laid down on the sleeping bag. He fell asleep almost immediately, despite how hot it was next to the heater. He was just so tired.

Wonwoo didn’t know how long he slept before he woke up crying out in pain and jolting upward. His elbow had come in contact with the heater.

Mingyu shot up from bed and the light.

“Are you okay?” he asked with concern.

“I’m fine,” Wonwoo managed to say while cringing in pain. He got up to run his now burned elbow under cold water in the bathroom.

“That stupid heater,” Mingyu muttered as entered the bathroom and stood behind Wonwoo to see the damage.

When Wonwoo turned off the cold water, Mingyu neared.

“Can I see?” Mingyu took Wonwoo’s arm in his hands, and pulled the burned elbow towards him before Wonwoo could even grant him the permission.

You know what burned even more than that wound on his elbow? The memory of what had happened in the very bathroom they were standing in, a memory triggered when he felt Mingyu’s soft hands over his arms. The memory burned; it burned a lot.

Wonwoo had been so happy that he had forgotten that strange occurrence, but here it was resurfacing in his head while he was tired and half-asleep, and all because of Mingyu’s stupid hands.

“It’s not that serious,” Mingyu said, letting go of Wonwoo’s arm. “But now I see that your placement next to the heater wasn’t a very good idea. I’ll move around the furniture tomorrow to make space for you far away from that thing. For now, you can take the bed.”

“No, it’s your bed…”

“Don’t worry about me,” Mingyu replied. “Now I have excuse to go sleep at Minghao’s again,” Mingyu winked. “Good night!” Mingyu said, leaving Wonwoo alone to sulk about the stupid hand he was starting to develop.

After applying the medicine on his elbow, he climbed into Mingyu’s bed, adjusted himself so that the medicine stays on his skin, and drifted off to sleep within seconds.

-

He was awoken in the morning with the sound of the door opening. Wonwoo saw Mingyu walk into the bathroom tiredly, eyes half-open and almost tripping many times. Wonwoo was still tired, and so tried to go back to sleep. Before he knew it, he was woken again by Mingyu climbing into the bed from behind him.

“Can I sleep here?” Mingyu asked, yawning. “The floor is too hard.”

“Yeah,” Wonwoo replied softly, getting up from the bed and preparing to lay on the sleeping bag himself, but Mingyu held him back.

“No, no. Stay here,” he said sleepily, pulling Wonwoo closer to him and spooning him, wrapping his arms around him.

“Um…” Wonwoo was startled by the sudden intimacy, and he would have put an end to it, had he not felt Mingyu’s soft fingers brush over his arm in a light massage. It felt so… nice, and Wonwoo didn’t want to put an end to it anymore.

“Yay, you’re not pushing me away! I thought you would,” Mingyu said before he yawned again. “I really, really like holding you like this, please let’s stay like this for a while longer,” he hummed, nestling closer against Wonwoo’s back.

Wonwoo felt like he was frozen in place with Mingyu against his back, with Mingyu’s breath on his neck, with his velvety fingers caressing his arm. It would be a lie to say that it was uncomfortable, far from it actually.

“I really, really, really like you,” Mingyu said suddenly.

Mingyu had said it before, but this was the first time that it ever made Wonwoo feel the way it did now. He was flustered and blushing a little, and his heart was beating slightly faster than it usually did.

Wonwoo felt like his should break the intimacy now. He didn’t want Mingyu to feel led on. But whenever he thought about moving to do that, his muscles objected and wouldn’t move. He wanted to stay like this for as long as he could.

But he couldn’t move a muscle, even when Mingyu began to kiss his shoulders and neck as if he’d done it a thousand times before.

“Mingyu…” Wonwoo voiced faintly, thinking that this was now going too far.

When Mingyu heard that, he froze. He then unwrapped his arms from around Wonwoo and shot up from the bed, getting off of it immediately.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry,” Mingyu said. Wonwoo’s body was stilly tingly from the intimate moment he just shared with Mingyu, but he managed to turn his body around to see a horrified and guilty expression on Mingyu’s face.

“What was that?” Wonwoo managed to ask.

“I thought I was still in Minghao’s room. I thought you were Minghao, honestly. I’m so sorry!”

Oh, Wonwoo thought.

“, I’m such an idiot,” Mingyu muttered, looking embarrassed.

“Uh, it’s okay,” Wonwoo replied, feeling quite embarrassed himself for not stopping Mingyu’s advances earlier, and actually feeling flustered by them.

“Go back to sleep. Sorry for waking you,” Mingyu said, turning towards the door as he scratched the back of his neck.

Wonwoo could not go back to sleep though. He was too busy trying to shake off the sensation of being so close to Mingyu, trying to tell himself that he did not like it as much as he subconsciously knew he did.

A/N: sorry if this . can you guys feel my struggle when writing this chapter TT? thank you to the person who gave me the idea though honestly without you idk where i'd be lol