Dongwoo wakes in the night, covered in cold sweats and chilling tremors of a whispery shiver slithering down skin as he calmly waits for the fear to abate and his reality to set in. He takes shallow breaths and stares up at his ceiling because it’s the only companion he has now. It’s all he’s ever going to get.

Finally regaining feeling in his limbs, Dongwoo climbs out of his bed and pads to the kitchen, feeling heavy with each step but praying for a lighter day. It’s just nightmares. They don’t mean anything. Now that he’s awake, they’re gone anyway. There’s no reason to fear. No need to worry.

But as he sits in the kitchen with a glass of warm milk clapsed in his hands, Dongwoo wonders why he should breave his bed anymore. It’s almost morning anyway. He’d only just gone to sleep a couple of hours before he woke but he was pretty sure he could take the three hours ahead of him sitting down. Right there. On the kitchen island.

*****

A scream dies on his lips when his eyes open.

It’s a new day with new worries.

But it’s the same old demons that chase him. He’s since learned the trails they’ll always take and so he knows to run in the direction but. But now, his fears are waking with him. He’s jolting himself to consciousness with the freshness of a hard night’s chase on his mind and almost on his lips. He doesn’t want to admit it. But it’s starting to be a problem.

*****

“I’m sleeping over tonight.” Howon informs him.

“Why?” Dongwoo asks, choosing that moment to wipe nonexistent perspiration from his reddening neck. He knows why. He’s seen why. The members watch him warily and only fail to look away in time when he looks back. It’s been freeing and a process for growth for them all to move out of the dorms and get apartments.

But for Dongwoo, it’s been hell.

“I need to work on something with you.” Howon says.

“Let’s stay late on it here.” Dongwoo says. “No need to follow me home.”

*****

Woohyun comes to visit. He brings food and cloths and pretends that he needs to spend some time with Dongwoo for his own sake and not Dongwoo’s.

But Dongwoo makes him finish his laundry quick and helps around with the food so Woohyun is done before it is too late.

“I’m tire. I’m sleepy.”

“I’ll call you a cab.”

And that’s that.

*****

Dongwoo cries now, when he wakes. It’s nothing serious. He just opens his eyes and there are tears there, leaking out the corner down the side of his face. He wipes them away and pretends that nothing’s going on. It’s no hard to wake with tears. It’s better than the screaming he’d done last week. But he wasn’t sure which was more humiliating.

*****

He comes back from recording one day and there’s a ten foot cuddle bear in his sitting room. Attached to it is a letter from MyungJong.

Dino-hyung needs to be cuddled… even if he doesn’t want to be.

-M, J

Dongwoo laughs and laughs and laughs and then suddenly, he’s crying and falling into the bear and crying some more. He can’t even control it. He lies between the bear’s legs and bawls his eyes out, letting the heavy arms enclose him in an inanimate embrace. But anything is better than nothing. So Dongwoo doesn’t question it. Doesn’t fight anymore.

He just lays there and cries till sleep decides to come.

*****

Dongwoo struggles. He really does. But he has made up his mind not to let that be his focus. He won’t let it affect the work.

So he follows the members for shows and does his part and prays that when he goes home, he won’t hate his bed as much as he does. He’s almost sure that he succeeds when he spend a week with Cuddle Bear and he doesn’t wake up feeling like a needy failure. He tries his best to be positive before he sleeps and even though sometimes he slips up and wakes shouting or crying, Dongwoo believes it’s a change and its growth.

And he’ll welcome that any day.

*****

Sungyeol buys him beers now. Stocks his fridge full of Soju.

Dongwoo has never been much of a drinker.

But he acknowledges the sentiment and manages to take one bottle a week for Sungyeol’s effort.

*****

A year to sleeping in his own house. Sharing his bed with no one. Leaving food in the fridge and coming back to find it there. Having his clutter grow without nagging from members. Leaving the report under the cushion where he liked it and coming back to find it there.

One full year.

And Dongwoo had finally mastered how to sleep on his own and survive the night in silence.

He’d always loved to sleep anyway. That he was now doing it all alone was not something he was going to change. If he wanted to see his mom, he could always go visit. It had never really sunk in. not until he was living on his own. But Dongwoo was a grown man now.

The members made fun of how he never woke for an alarm. But he had to these days. Or else it would be a disaster for him and his appointments. So every night, instead of just falling asleep, he’d take the time to set his home-wide, bell-blaring alarm to fit two hours before he had to leave the house. His manager usually reminded him once in a while. But Sunggyu was always adamant about setting the alarm. Almost as if he didn’t trust that Dongwoo would.

So every night, he’d set his alarm. And then he’d wake in the morning, bright and early and ready to work. Luckily, this routine doesn’t include the cold sweats anymore… or the crying… or the falling off the bed. He knows that he sleeps through the night and never wakes to pee. It’s his way and he’s grown into it over the years.

But just as he’s about to sleep, he suddenly remembers that he needs to wake up a couple of hours before his normal couple of hours for Infinite events. It’s a personal thing and he doesn’t want it to eat into his work time. He goes to the panel by his bed where the alarm is controlled and resets it for an earlier time. When Sunggyu had installed the alarm, he’d made sure the alarm was in the room but that Dongwoo would have to get up to go and turn it off.

He sleeps off not long after he’s closed the panel.

But just like that, the night is over.

The alarm is blaring in the house and Dongwoo moves to turn when he feels a body plastered to his.

“!” Sunggyu cusses as he rolls away from Dongwoo and Dongwoo finds himself missing the warmth even though he’d never known it was there.

Dongwoo takes a moment to blink himself awake and realize that there’s a noisy alarm seeking his attention. He gets up, rushes to the panel and flicks it off. By the time he turns back, Sunggyu is sitting up on the bed with his legs folded up and encased in his hands that are clasped around his knees.

“You set your alarm early.” Sunggyu says, looking guilty.

“I have a thing.” Dongwoo says, not sure what’s going on. “Hyung, why are you here?”

“I was sleeping.” Sunggyu says, pouting at Dongwoo. “You should have told me you had something in the morning.”

“Why?”

“Then I would have known you’d be waking earlier and I’d have gone by then.”

Dongwoo tilts his head in thought as his eyes widen.

“Hyung, have you been sleeping here?” Dongwoo asks. Sunggyu doesn’t need to answer because Dongwoo already knows the answer is yes. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because,” Sunggyu says, climbing off the bed as he begins pulling on his jeans. “You’d have said no and pretended like nothing was wrong with you.”

“Nothing is wrong with me.”

“You’ve been having nightmares, Woo.”

“I haven’t had them for almost four months.”

“And why do you think that is?” Sunggyu asks, pausing in his dressing as he looks back at Dongwoo and everything just suddenly clicks.

The alarm. The lack of nightmares. The compulsory reminders that Dongwoo set his alarm. Sunggyu’s been sleeping over for the past four months and leaving before his alarm rang. Treating him like he was an invalid baby. Anger wells up in Dongwoo as he faces the leader.

“I didn’t ask you to look after me.”

“It’s my job.”

“Your job stops when we clock out.”

“Infinite never clocks out. You’re Infinite in the morning and you’re Infinite at night.”

“So you’ll treat me like a baby?”

“I’ll treat all of you like babies.” Sunggyu says.

“I don’t see you spending the night in Soo’s house.”

“That’s because I spend the first two weeks at his house. And then I had to stay at Yeolie’s until he went for his shooting. Jong is leaving with his parents but Woohyun and Howon? They crash at my place all the time. The only difference between all of them and you is that they haven’t been stubborn about all of this.”

“Hyung-”

“Do you think you’re the only one with issues? We’ve spent years living together… depending on each other. It’s not supposed to be easy to just suddenly leave each other and move out. We still need each other. Even if it’s not in the same way. We’re still Infinite.”

Dongwoo thinks about it and Sunggyu sounds about right. He spent the first few months going through withdrawal and now that he’d been getting dosing of s in the form of Sunggyu, he was finally sleeping right.

“I’m sorry that I’ve been doing it without your consent but Woo, you were being unreasonable. Every one of us has been trying to help and you wouldn’t let us.”

Dongwoo doesn’t say anything. He’s not sure he’s got anything to say.

So Sunggyu pulls on his shirt and picks up his wallet and his keys as he begins to head out of the room.

“Stay.” Dongwoo says, reaching for the back of Sunggyu’s shirt as Sunggyu walks passed him. “Sleep.” He says. Sunggyu looks back at him, surprised but happy as he purses his lips.

“You’re not mad at me.”

“You’re my leader.”

“You didn’t answer my question.” Sunggyu prods.

“You’re my leader.” Dongwoo replies. “If you think this is what I need, then this is what I’m going to get.”

He laughs and Sunggyu laughs with him.

*****

Minutes later, Dongwoo has Sunggyu back in his bed, shirtless and without his pants as Dongwoo attempts to get comfortable as the small spoon with his hyung holding him from behind.

“I thought you had a thing to get to.” Sunggyu says.

“Things come and go.” Dongwoo replies, closing his eyes as he finds that it’s more than comfortable in Sunggyu’s hands. It’s warm. And it’s lovely. And Dongwoo doesn’t feel so apprehensive.

“Want me to send Soo next week?” Sunggyu asks, pulling him even closer.

“Okay.” Dongwoo says. “If he’s free.”

“He’ll make time.” Sunggyu says. “He wanted to come once but I figured he’d oversleep and get caught.”

Dongwoo laughs.

“You should have let him come.”

“You’d have gotten mad. And he’d have cried. And Infinite would have broken up.”

Dongwoo pinches Sunggyu’s hand as he listens to Sunggyu’s groan of pain.

“I could never get mad at Soo.”

“I know. Now sleep. We have to be up in an hour.”

“Okay hyung.” But then he remembers something. “We’re grown men, hyung.”

“Huh?” Sunggyu says, sounding like he’s already drifting back to sleep.

“We’re not babies anymore.” Dongwoo says. “We’re all growing up and changing.”

He snorts out sleepily.

“You’re all my babies.” Sunggyu says. “Grown men or not.”