Jaehwan heaves a sigh, fist hovering over the door to knock. His chest feels tight, emotions strung taught from the most awful day in a while he’s had to bear by himself. It’s taking all of his mental energy just to stop himself from breaking down, emotionally worn out. The thick metal band of his choker feels suffocating around his neck, hot over the roses burning warm on his neck being so close to home even though it had started to rain on his way home. Behind the front door, he can hear Hongbin’s deep laugh, the simmer of boiling water on the stove, and the smell of cream pasta permeates past the front door. His tattoos are pulsing with warmth at each beat of laughter, though instead of calming him like it normally would the heat clutches tight around his heart, vines of thorns digging painfully into his chest and making his breath fall short.

He’d left both his keys and phone at home that morning, so he finally swallows back the thick lump in his throat and knocks. The laughter dies down in a second and he can hear the shuffling of socked feet approach the door. His chest squeezes tight as the door opens and a wave of heat rushes over him, making his shoulders hunch with the heavy weight added on to them. The light from the apartment floods the hallway and the scent of dinner makes his chest ache.

He looks up and finds Hongbin looking right at him, smile pressing dimples into his cheeks and eyes twinkling like raindrops reflecting the moonlight. Beneath his choker, the tattoos of roses flare burning hot and the smile he tries to reciprocate looks more of a grimace.

It doesn’t escape Hongbin. He hadn’t expected it too, but he had still hoped.

Hongbin takes his cold hands in his warm ones, fingers delicate as he pulls Jaehwan inside and leans up to kiss the corner of his mouth. He squeezes Jaehwan’s hands between his before going to shut the door behind him. He shivers as the last of the cold leaves their home, but Jaehwan doesn’t miss the subtle press of his hand to his hip.

“Welcome home,” he says, standing up on his toes to kiss Jaehwan’s cheek. He smiles, but it’s not wide enough to hide the concern clinging to the edges of his dark gaze. “Taekwoon is almost done with dinner.”

Jaehwan nods silently, sliding off his wet shoes and shuffling into the house after Hongbin. Being home was all Jaehwan had thought about today with every bad thing that happened, and now that he was home, he was just so close to finally letting the walls around him crumble.

He dumps his backpack off by the shoe rack and slides out of his wet jacket. Even though the weather was on the cusp of spring, he hadn’t dressed warmly enough that morning in his rush to make it to his exam on time. Hongbin holds onto his arm, whether to warm him up or keep him together, he couldn’t discern. He’s trying his best to stem the tremble in his hands, his shuttered breathing and the erratic beating of his heart as his chest films with the warmth of being home with his soulmates and so far away from the outside world that had crushed him today. Taekwoon turns away from the stove, smile warm as he holds his hand out for Jaehwan to take.

Jaehwan meets his gaze, staring into the kitten-like mischievous glint in his boyfriend’s eyes, and it feels like his heart is hammering against his ribs. “Hi,” Taekwoon murmurs, intertwining his soft, thin fingers with Jaehwan’s rougher ones, gently pulling him closer into his side. He squeezes, just to stop the tremble in his hands. He’d hoped that it would stem the tears welling up behind his eyes, burning as he bites down on his lip and leans in to kiss Taekwoon’s cheek. The effect is almost instant; Taekwoon’s hand loosens just a fraction with the heat of the soulmate mark searing through his wrist. Jaehwan feels the reciprocal effect, but bites down harder on his lip to stop the audible gasp from leaving his mouth. Taekwoon has the most control over his emotions, and he looked down apologetically at Jaehwan and the moon phases on his thigh immediately turn ice cold to soothe the ache he’d caused.

He doesn’t have to look up to know that Taekwoon and Hongbin are looking at him with the same gaze.

Taekwoon grips his hand tighter and pulls him into his side. Jaehwan sighs and rests his head against Taekwoon’s shoulder, burying his face in the crook of his neck. Hongbin comes up behind him and combs through his hair pressing his lips to the base of his neck. Like that, the heat of his tattoos drops to a comforting warmth, a mindful presence.

He in a shuddering breath. The worst thing about today had been the feeling of isolation as his own darkness picked away at the edges of himself.

Taekwoon shifts slightly to turn off the stove. He presses a kiss to Jaehwan’s forehead and runs his fingers down the back of his neck, urging him to look up. Jaehwan’s eyes are unmistakably wet, his lip is bitten raw, and Taekwoon can only manage a sympathetic little noise. Jaehwan frees up his hand and instead clutches his waist while Taekwoon transfers the pasta into a large bowl and hands it off to Hongbin to take into the living room. He grabs three plates and three forks and leads Jaehwan off behind him.

Jaehwan doesn’t push Taekwoon or Hongbin away. He lets them cage him in between them on the couch, shoulders brushing together as they reach over to put pasta on their plates. His chest still aches but neither of his boyfriends push him to talk. Somehow, it feels like they understand without any words anyway. Taekwoon puts on the cringiest drama he can find, letting the white noise fill the empty silence and drown out the pouring rain. Jaehwan, who had only eaten a packet of gummies all day because that was the only change left in his backpack, still doesn’t make an effort to eat. Taekwoon, however, still spirals the pasta around his fork and feeds Jaehwan after he takes a bit and Jaehwan can’t seem to refuse him. His hands stay clutched tight onto the hem of Taekwoon’s shirt even as his fingers begin to ache.

It stays comfortably silent between all of them until Hongbin audibly hisses at the drama, shoving a forkful of pasta into his mouth. “This drama is so disgustingly gross,” he mumbles, pouting as he squints at the television. “I mean, whose love life is actually that complicated. Just get with the dude and get over it!”

Jaehwan snorts, quickly shoving a hand over his mouth as his face begins to burn red. Hongbin just turns at him and smiles, laughing quietly under his breath.

Hongbin continues to nitpick the drama, gagging at disgustingly typical drama romance and groaning as the main characters begin bickering with each other about something stupid. Taekwoon wiggles out of Jaehwan’s embrace enough to land a well placed kick to Hongbin’s shin, the silent sign to get him to shut up. Hongbin just continues to whine under his breath and Jaehwan, despite himself, can’t help but laugh.

“Seriously disgusting,” Hongbin says, shoving a giant amount of pasta into his mouth and finally reaching for the remote to change the channel. “I think I’m actually going to be sick if I watch another drama where the main characters hate each other before they fall in love.”

Jaehwan opens his mouth to accept the last bite of pasta from Taekwoon’s plate before pressing into his side and turning to look at Hongbin. “You can’t fake it. I know you love it the most. Why else would you have sat through the whole episode?”

Hongbin sputters and Taekwoon laughs behind him. “Just because I watch the whole episode doesn’t mean I like it. I’m just watching this drama for Lee Hyunwoo,” Hongbin adds, sticking his tongue out at Jaehwan in response. Jaehwan just grins mischievously and pokes Hongbin’s side.

After working their way through a variety show and the last of the sweet cream cake in the fridge, Hongbin pulls out three PS4 controllers and syncs them all up to play Overwatch. Taekwoon only plays because they do, but he isn’t half bad with Tracer. Jaehwan ends up going for Reaper this round and Hongbin goes for Hanzo, as per usual.

They play on a team in the beginning, picking battle stages and coming out victorious after each one. Hongbin is the best out of all of them, but Jaehwan can hold his own and Taekwoon is at least good for distracting the other team. All of them are far too competitive, too riled up as someone gets a good shot on Taekwoon and he nearly throws the controller at the floor. Hongbin is gripping the controller so hard that it could possibly break when someone finally picks him off, almost ready to curse at the game. Jaehwan is too tired to care today when people shoot him out, but there’s still the simmering energy of revenge when it happens.

“Let’s play against each other,” he suggests after they’ve taken on a fairly impressive win streak. Hongbin looks over at him and smiles eagerly but he can hear Taekwoon huff a sigh behind him.

“Alright,” Taekwoon murmurs, flicking through the menu screen to select the stage. “You’re going to regret this the most.

Jaehwan doesn’t regret it at all. Right as he’s about to shoot Taekwoon, Hongbin presses fingers in his side to distract him and letting Taekwoon get away. Right as Taekwoon is about to grab Hongbin, Jaehwan shoves his hand over his controller and laughs as Taekwoon starts to yell about him cheating. And just as Hongbin is about to win it all, Jaehwan leans over and starts kissing his neck, biting down on the hickey still evident from yesterday. Hongbin, gasping softly, ends up dropping his controller.

“I can’t believe you’d cheat like that!” he says, pausing the game long enough to push Jaehwan onto his back, head resting in Taekwoon’s lap while he sits on his pelvis.

Jaehwan laughs loud, his entire chest warm with the glint in Hongbin’s eyes. “You started it didn’t you?”

Hongbin growls and leans down to kiss Jaehwan, more gentle than he’d expected. Hongbin is still rough though, Jaehwan’s bottom lip between his and biting down before slipping his tongue into his mouth until Jaehwan is panting beneath him. But the look in his eyes is of warm satisfaction when he pulls away and admires the bitten shade of red of Jaehwan’s lips.

“Cheater,” he murmurs, leaning down and pecking Jaehwan again. He tugs on Jaehwan’s collar gently, fondly.

Taekwoon looks down at Jaehwan, combing his bangs back with his fingers. “You’re both idiots, frankly,” he says, eyes curving up with his little smile at both of them.

They settle back on the couch, this time switching out Overwatch to continue playing Final Fantasy 15. Jaehwan, still laying in Taekwoon’s lap, finally relishes in all the anxiety and stress of the day that had melted away from being home. For a moment, he’d forgotten all about the exam he was late to, the failed test crushed at the bottom of his backpack, the project that he’d spent hours on last night that had fallen apart when he got to the studio this morning, and all the time he’d spent in the rain for the buses he missed.

But even if he doesn’t have to tell his boyfriends any of those things because they understand that he’s struggling with his major, there’s the small bubble of anxiety that hasn’t quite popped yet- the most poisonous out of all.

With the lull of the game’s soundtrack and the warm silence that had befallen them, Jaehwan ends up falling asleep for a solid hour. Reasonable, he thinks, because he’d only slept two hours the night before. Hongbin is still half laying on him, head on his stomach and legs thrown over the couch. Taekwoon is still playing the game, arms long enough to reach over Jaehwan and comb through Hongbin’s hair during a cutscene. Jaehwan sleepily glances over at them both and swallows back the heavy ache in his chest still lingering.

Eventually Taekwoon gets up to turn the console off and drags all of them into the bathroom. Hongbin tries his best to protest but Taekwoon kisses him into silence and tugs on the hem of his shirt, telling him to take it off. Jaehwan strips slowly, limbs still heavy with exhaustion. He finally gets down to just his choker and Taekwoon taps the bottom of his chin, making him look up into his understanding gaze. Taekwoon kisses the corner of his lips and then undoes the clasp at the back, letting the choker fall into his palms while Jaehwan just stares at him dazedly.

Suddenly filled with so much warmth and love from his boyfriends from the tenderness they’ve shown just taking care of him after such a day, his eyes unwillingly well up his tears again. Taekwoon stutters for a moment, eyes flickering at Hongbin, before he pets Jaehwan’s neck and leads him into the shower.

Jaehwan can’t say much, still feeling choked up. He lets Hongbin and Taekwoon spoil him because that’s what he really wants- the attention and love from them that he’d been craving for all day. The tattoos, bared for his soulmates, burn warm as Taekwoon and Hongbin laugh around him, splashing water at each other and wiping bubbles on each other’s cheeks. And so overwhelmed with the realization that there will be two people who will always love him even if he fails at his own major and feels useless sometimes, he lets out a watery laugh as Taekwoon wipes soap on his cheek and Hongbin kisses him and his tattoos surge hot.

They get out of the shower and start drying off. Jaehwan slides into Hongbin’s pajama pants and long sleeve shirt and looks up at Taekwoon beneath the towel over his head. “I met my ex today,” he murmurs, finally shoving the pit of fear that had started blooming in his chest down to speak around it. Taekwoon stops for a moment, gaze dropping down to meet his and eyes suddenly full of concern before resuming drying off his hair. The moons on his thigh pulse, and he knows Taekwoon is already invested, just as Hongbin is as the roses on his neck burn slightly.

Jaehwan swallows thickly, absentmindedly touching the roses. “I was leaving the studio when he happened to catch me on my way to the bus stop. Asked if I was still messing around and wanted to hook up again. I told him off and nearly cussed him out on the street,” and Jaehwan gives a wry, choked laugh after that.

Seeing his ex-boyfriend had reminded him of all the things he’d put in the past. Ever since he’d turned 18 and the soulmate tattoos had finally appeared, he’d hidden them because he didn’t want them to define his relationships. He firmly believed that he had his own free will in love and nothing like fate and soulmate tattoos could tell him who he was going to love. But his ex had taken advantage of that, had never really loved him but had fooled him into thinking it. Seeing him again had brought back all the hate and sadness Jaehwan had buried a while ago.

“He tugged on my collar and told me to call him. I told him to off and left,” he says, unable to look up at either of his boyfriends. Somewhere along the story, Hongbin had taken his shaking hands in his and Taekwoon had stopped drying his hair. He looks over curiously at both of them, catching the flash of white hot anger before they awkwardly smush him between hugs.

Neither of them say anything, but Jaehwan doesn’t need them to. Falling in love with Taekwoon and Hongbin had been easy, almost scarily so. Though Taekwoon and Hongbin had known each other for years, they had never made Jaehwan feel left out. They had listened when he set his terms when they started dating- that to him, the soulmate tattoos didn’t mean anything and he wasn’t going to be in a relationship with them if it wasn’t working out. If he wasn’t in love with them, if his heart truly wasn’t in it, then he wasn’t going to stay. He wasn’t going to get his heart broken again. But Taekwoon and Hongbin had understood all of that, had treated him better than any of his previous relationships, and had made sure that he knew just how much they loved him.

And Jaehwan was so unbelievably in love with them both.

He ends up getting tucked into bed in the middle, all of their work forgotten for the morning. He rests his head on Hongbin’s shoulder and Taekwoon wraps his arms around his middle, pressing his back against his chest. On any other day he’d feel smothered, but today he’s too tired to care and greedily accepts all of the cuddles.

The rain continues to patter softly against the window, thunder cracking in the distance. He’s just about to drift to sleep with Hongbin combing through his hair, listlessly staring at the ceiling for a couple minutes before he breaks the silence. “You mean a lot to me, Jaehwan- both of us,” he says, looking down to meet Jaehwan’s gaze. The tattoo of roses sparks like electricity suddenly buzzing through the ink. Jaehwan can see him swallowing thickly as he tears his gaze away. “It wouldn’t be the same, living without you.”

He feels Taekwoon nod against his back, the arms around his waist tightening even more. “We love you, Jaehwan-ah, no matter what,” he murmurs, lips pressed to his back. Jaehwan involuntarily shivers as the moons on his thigh spark and Taekwoon kisses where the vine of roses meets at the back of his neck.

“I know,” he whispers, sinking deeper into the bed and letting the heat of their bodies close in around him. He knows they love him even if he’s sometimes too loud and too excitable, if he’s bad at school or feeling too overwhelmed that he closes in on himself. They love him even on the days when he feels like it’s a struggle just to love himself and on the days he doesn’t want to be alone.

Jaehwan feels it as he drifts to sleep, catching glimpses of the moonlight casting shadows on Taekwoon and Hongbin and the constellation of stars inked on their bodies. “I love you both, too.”