D-8

October 23rd,  3:45 AM

“Vernon! Psst, Vernon. Wake up! Hansol, wake up!”

Something heavy and awfully persistent lands itself onto Hansol's bed. He immediately jumps awake as a result — startled by a humid and ticklish sensation lashing savagely at his forehead.

Hansol's head collides with the upper bunk with an audible thud, and he curls into himself, blurriness lining the edges of his vision in dark spots.

“Switch costumes with me,” is all that Jeonghan says when he finally brings his face up from his forearms, blinking himself back to consciousness.

“What?” Hansol croaks out, “why?” He can feel the mattress slowly swelling up to its original form, the big dip in the centre gradually disappearing as Jeonghan backs away from his body — shuffling on his knees to sit at the side of the bed, feet now touching the floorboards.

“Don't you think sleeping beauty will fit my overall character much better than the big bad wolf would?”

“But Mingyu-hyung is the wolf,” Hansol mutters tiredly in the midst of a yawn, and runs a hand down his face.

“Yeah, well,” Jeonghan starts in a laidback tone, just loud enough to be considered more than a slumberous mumble, yet way inappropriate at the late hour they're having their discussion. “He had a sudden change of mind after we talked it over today, and being the benevolent person I am, I agreed swapping characters with him.”

Hansol is pretty sure that at some point or another while Jeonghan’s been talking, he started dozing off. But it's not like he doesn't want to listen to what the other has to say. He really can't help it — his fatigued brain won't permit him to snap out of the sleepy state it's been working so diligently to get into these last few hours.

“He looked pretty excited about his costume to me.” Hansol shrugs when he finally takes notice of the long silence that's been created due to his lack of alertness.

“You'd think that, right? He came to a conclusion that Cinderella is someone he can really sympathise with. How exactly did he put it, again? She cleans after other people’s mess without getting a single thanks in return, and gets constantly bullied,” Jeonghan chooses to speak the last sentence in a slight lisp, thick whininess underlining his voice. “Apparently that's like, a perfect description of him.”

Thinking he should probably give some sort of reaction to that, Hansol hums, and nods repeatedly to show his attentiveness. And although not quite having registered the meaning behind Jeonghan's words beyond the vague understanding it has something to do with his Halloween costume, he ends up successfully vocalizing a somewhat comprehensive response, “Umm… well, I guess if you really want to be sleeping beauty then I—”

“So you agree to be the big bad wolf!” Jeonghan yanks Hansol’s feet from under his blanket, and bounces them on the mattress happily, his mouth curving into a small sly grin, which is plenty visible even without any light.

“Sure? If it's so important to y—”

“Great!” Jeonghan Hansol's knee in final reassurance, before quickly scrambling off of the bed. "Goodnight then, Sol-ah,” is the last thing he says before leisurely making his way out of the bedroom — leaving as abruptly as he came.

Hansol groans and drops back on the mattress once the room turns completely quiet.

What the hell was that just now?

Well, whatever. He should probably try getting a good night rest now that the other has left. Though, as he soon discovers, that task proves to be a lot more difficult than what he originally expected, and his brain stays awake for a long, long time before he can eventually force it to shut up.

When Hansol is finally being pulled back into unconsciousness by the comforting embrace of sleep, the sun is already up in the sky, and the dorm starts to fill up with the noises of the early morning risers as they trudge over to the bathroom to wash the night's grime away. Just when the illusion that he’d be able to sneak in one or two additional hours of sleep if he’d make an effort to concentrate hard enough starts settling in, some unknown individual bumps into something big enough to produce a sound that has him choking on his own spit. The noise his head makes when it hits the upper bunk is nothing short of sickening.

And just like that, Hansol’s wide awake. Yet again.

“Urghh…”

Good thing his personal schedule starts at noon, or else Pledis would most likely have to go on a statement explaining why one of the members of SEVENTEEN suddenly expired overnight.