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CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN

 

 

“Whoops, you have something in your hair.” Soonyoung jumps back, carefully leaning towards the shorter. He fixes Jihoon’s hair and blows the piece of dust laid on there. “There, you look handsome again!”

 

The older smiles, and Jihoon looks away as mumbles something along the lines of ‘Soonyoung can you not...’

 

Not too far from them, stood Mingyu on his phone, angrily staring at his phone and tapping away on the screen, while Junhui leans over the younger’s shoulder, nervously waiting like Mingyu. Junhui pulls out his phone too, to text Seungcheol and find out where he is as well. 

 

And at the same time that was happening, Minghao was busy appreciating the scenery and asking people to take his picture of his surroundings.

 

Stood at the main road, was Vernon and Wonwoo.

 

“Seungcheol hyung is never going to come for us, he’s going to leaving us leave us here, which leaves us to stay here for the rest of our lives and starve on these streets without anyone knowing we’re in Japan and our only source of hope is to beg for tortilla chips that we could get our hands on, but no one understands us since we’re Korean so we’re doomed.”

 

“Uh... Vernon, you should calm down.” Wonwoo steps further away from Vernon, wondering if the latter was okay — But they both know that he wasn’t. “Just take deep breaths-“

 

Wonwoo says before he shrieks as a dog runs towards the two males and Vernon watches Wonwoo run away. Once he realises the random dog approaching in his direction in a hurry, Vernon lets out a quiet ‘Oh’. “Cool, a dog. I’m terrified of dogs.”

 

Meanwhile, Wonwoo runs to Mingyu and Junhui and hides behind them, ducking behind the tall duo so he won’t be seen. In unison, Mingyu and Junhui say, “Wonwoo what the are you doing-“ Before a dog barks in its high pitched voice and soon chases Wonwoo around in circles and circles.

 

“Dammit Wonwoo-“ Mingyu sighs at the sight, wondering whether to help Wonwoo or not. Luckily, Vernon’s hesitant mind comes to a conclusion and he jogs to the dog, and with his shaky hands, he picks up the dog and carefully carries it away from the out of breath Wonwoo.

 

Accidentally, Vernon drops the dog.

 

“I’M A MURDERER.” Vernon yelps, watching the dog laid on the ground and getting itself up on its legs. Everything was okay — Vernon didn’t turn out to be a murderer — But with the dog circling around his legs and tiptoeing joyfully around his feet, Vernon was in pure discomfort.

 

Sadly, and not to his surprise, no one noticed the poor male’s suffering. First, his eyes look toward Soonyoung and Jihoon acting ‘gross’ — ‘Hyung is whipped.’ He thought. Turning again, he sees Junhui with Minghao this time, both taking pictures of each other in the most chic way — ‘I’m jealous… They’re so stylish…’ Vernon pouted at the thought. And finally, his pout turned into a smile when his eyes crossed Mingyu cupping Wonwoo’s smushed and worried face, making sure the older is calm after being chased by the dog — ‘Why aren’t they married yet?’

 

His mind and world came to a halt when he suddenly hears a hoarse yet loud voice that belonged to a man that was running toward his direction. “Tsuki- Tsuki!”

 

Violently, Vernon looks left to right at his friends and realises how much of a seventh wheel he is, which was proved when he said, “Oh a person — Hyungs help, please?! Anyone?! HYUNGS YOU SHI-“

 

But once the man came over to Vernon, he tuts a quick, “Oh, Tsuki…” As he pets the dog and picks her up in his arms. He looks up at Vernon with an apologetic smile and chuckles awkwardly. “Sorry, she’s a bit hyper, my apologies.”

 

And Vernon would understand the male — If only he understood Japanese. Having no clue of what the man said except ‘Sorry’, Vernon forces himself to quietly choke out “K… Korean.” As he points at himself and deeply bows.

 

“Oh!” The man raised his eyebrows (Which Vernon didn’t know whether that was a good thing or not). “You’re Korean? I am too!” He soon switched to the language Vernon could understand, so the thought of begging for tortilla chips was crossed off his list. “Ah… Sorry about my dog, she’s a bit hyper.”

 

Not knowing what to reply with, Vernon nods hesitantly and paints an uncomfortable smile on his face. “O… Oh… Yeah-“

 

Junhui somehow noticed the younger talking to the stranger (“Took you long enough Jun…”) and tilted his head at the sight. “Hey Vernon! Who ya’ talking to?!” He yells, which attracts both Vernon and the man to him.

 

The smile on Junhui’s face instantly drops to disbelief and shock. Rapidly, he taps Mingyu’s shoulder as he was speechless. “What now?!” Mingyu groans, but stops once Junhui started to run as fast as he could to Vernon.

 

“Hyung? Hyung! Seungcheol hyung!”

 

Seungcheol’s squinted eyes widen and gasps as he recognises the voice from afar, “Huh, Junhui? Junhui, you punk!” Seungcheol mirrors the smile on Junhui’s face and runs towards him too before they clash into a warm and welcoming hug — It was so sad yet happy at the same time. “You big baby, if you cry right now I’ll hit you.” The older teasingly scolds him; He knows what Junhui’s like.

 

“Too,” Junhui sniffs, “Late!” Which were the last words he says before they all turned into sobs and inaudible sounds that no one had a clue of what he was trying to make out.

 

Once Mingyu and Soonyoung realise the male they’ve been dying to see was hugging Wen Junhui, the both of them join in with the group reunion hug while Seuncheol ruffles all of their hair until they look messy — Of course, he missed doing that to them.

 

“I never thought Junhui could pull off that hairstyle.” He chuckles while playing with Junhui’s hair. He turns to Soonyoung and pats his shoulders, widely smiling. “Soonyoung! You haven’t changed one bit, I can’t wait for you to liven up the house again.” Yet once he turns to Mingyu, he says, “And you. STOP GROWING.” And from there, Seungcheol continues to complain about Mingyu’s height as is it’s an unexplainable thing and they laugh in unison and overlap each other as they try to catch up with everyone.

 

Then there’s Vernon who’s just… There.

 

Blankly, he stares at the four of them laughing and smiling like they had no worries. But as he continued to watch more, a rush is sent through him, and the doubts and questions some to his mind.

 

‘Was it right to come here with these guys? Will I be replaced? Are they leaving me behind? Stop thinking like this Vernon- What if they forget me? Do they… Hate me? No Vernon, you’re doing it again. Why am I like this? Vernon, get your head together! I wanna go home. I’m stupid thinking this was a good idea. Why are you making it such a big deal-‘

 

“Hansol?”

 

Wonwoo touched the male’s arm as his face looked bothered. Vernon gasps for air as he comes out of his thoughts.

 

“Calm down, you’re breathing very rapidly… I got scared for a moment… Take a deep breath.”

 

Once Vernon hears those words, he closes his eyes to give himself a moment to himself. After a while, Wonwoo taps the younger’s arm again and this time Vernon responds to the touch quicker than he did when Wonwoo tried to get him out of his sea of thoughts. 

 

“Better?” Seeing the sight of Wonwoo made Vernon feel a lot better, so he nods and lets out a long sigh.

 

“A… A lot. Thank you… You really didn’t have to…”

 

“Yes I did, I don’t want to repeat what happened last time when it happened.” Wonwoo says, reminding Vernon of a memory he would want to forget. “But you’re welcome nonetheless — Anything for a friend, right?” Placing a hand on the younger’s back, Wonwoo continues, “Now look at them, ‘Sol. Tell me how you feel.”

 

Cautiously, Vernon gazes at his band mates and Seungcheol and says what’s on his mind. “They look happy. They look happy… Without me…” They were blunt, but those words were a lot for him.

 

“Hansol, just remember that these guys have not seen each other for almost a year. They have a lot to get caught up with… These guys miss each other, even if they deny it — Especially Mingyu and Jun.”

 

“Yep, it always has to be Mingyu and Jun…” Vernon slightly smiles, but he does the mistake to look at Al1 again. “But… They have so much history together… And I feel like I’m the one who broke that-“

 

“I’m sure they don’t feel that way. In fact, I’m certain they’ll never feel that way.”

 

“You think?”

 

“I more than certain.”

 

“What about Seungcheol?”

 

“Him? Don’t worry about him — He’ll be over the moon to know Al1’s reunion and their new addition, who is the best member yet!” Wonwoo soon points finger guns at Vernon to cheer him up. It worked.

 

“I’m getting déjà vu from you — Jiwoo does this to me all the time.”

 

“She isn’t wrong.”

 

“Well, she’s never wrong.”

 

Soonyoung then calls out the male’s names with his cupped hands and loud voice. “Yo! We’re going before the rain starts pouring! I’m not telling you to take your time, but that’s what I’m exactly telling you!”

 

The older gasps once he hears Soonyoung and quickly gets up with Vernon as they rush with their suitcases and backpacks to the group. Vernon, by power walking, walks to the front first to avoid any interaction — But allows himself to talk to Minghao because Minghao couldn’t keep his mouth shut on everything that he sees.

 

What he didn’t know, was that Tsuki was cutely skipping along behind him and that the dog even ignored her own owner when he called her over.

 

“How cute,” Soonyoung coos, “Vernon has a small cutie like her following him. I have my own y’know.” The male then points to a sneezing Jihoon walking behind him like a baby duck.

 

Seuncheol furrows his eyebrows, shifting his eyes to Mingyu. Pointing at Vernon with a confused look, he says, “He’s with you guys?”

 

“You have a lot to catch up on, hyung.”

 

—♩—♪—♫—♬ —

 

“Woah, a house!”

 

Minghao exclaims, even though it was like every other house he’s seen. However, he wasn’t wrong — The house was impressive once they enter the living space. At first, they climb a few stairs to get there and all have to wait for Seungcheol to pin in the code, where they then have to stand in a crowded entry while trying to remove their shoes and put their luggages inside the house.

 

“I have to say, you’re house is nice.” Junhui smiles, wondering around the house once he takes off his shoes.

 

“It was the best I could afford.” Humbly, Seuncheol chuckles as he sets everything aside (With the help of Jihoon since he offered to help). “Put your belongings to the side, I’ll put them in your rooms.” But everyone disagrees with him in unison and say something along the lines of ‘No’ and ’Shouldn’t we sleep first? We’re like, tired… And jet lagged’, so Seungcheol shrugs and gives in, saying, “A’ight, at least I can get shut-eye too.”

 

It was already mid-day, and Seungcheol was drained out after twenty-two hours of driving in a car alone for half of the ride, then with 7 noisy people either sleeping or playing silly car games in the remaining hours.

 

Soonyoung laughs to himself for a bit. “Hey Vernon, are you ready to sleep on the couch tonight?” But instead of a laugh from Vernon, the latter continues to look down at the floor like he has been for the past few hours. “O… Okay?”

 

“Well I think I have enough rooms. There’s seven of you, correct? So that means four of you can go in pairs and there can be tree people in a room — It’s kind of lucky Jeonghan bought that bunk bed…”

 

“You have a lot of rooms.” Says Jihoon.

 

“Before I bought this place, it used to be a share house or something like that. Anyway, who’s going to be in which room?” And since everyone knows who they’re going to be paired up with as if it was second nature, that only left Vernon in the equation.

 

“Dibs on Vernon!”

 

“Dibs on ’Sol!”

 

“Dibs on Hansol!”

 

All of the Al1 members say in unison, pointing their fingers at the boy and soon giving death stares to each other — Vernon was taken aback by this, but he still looked down at the floor and played with his fingers. As a result of this, Al1 find themselves in a hardcore battle of rock, paper, scissors ‘to the death’ (As said by Soonyoung) that led to Junhui being the proud winner.

 

“Yes! In your FACE Mingyu-“

 

“ing shut up.”

 

“Ha! No thanks!”

 

“Then that’s settled — Soonyoung, you can take the first door to your left, Jun takes the first door to his right and Mingyu can take the room at the end of the corridor.”

 

“You know, whenever someone gets the room at the end of the corridor in a scary movie, they would die first.”

 

“Unless someone kills you first. Wouldn’t that be sad, huh Jun?”

 

“Don’t get so worked up ‘Gyu,” Wonwoo interrupts, holding Mingyu’s clenched fist, “I don’t see that happen in the movies anyway — It’s the stupid characters die first in the movies, so you’re on the losing side Jun.”

 

Wonwoo cheekily smiles as Junhui’s jaw drops massively.

 

“Make yourself at home,” Seungcheol nods his head to prevent a heated battle happening in his house, “Our home is yours too. Jeonghan will be back in a few hours, and I have a lecture to go to later too. Sleep well guys.”

 

“You too!”

 

After that, everyone carried their belongings to the rooms and cheered (And maybe danced in a small cricle) for a little while — Still shocked that they made it to Japan — Before they tell each other to sleep well as they walk to their rooms to unpack.

 

“Hey, you have my watch right?”

 

“The one my mom gave you? Yeah, it’s here.” Mingyu passes the watch to Wonwoo while he continues to search in his luggage as he sighs in relief.

 

“Ah, thank you — You’re a life saver.”

 

“Don’t mention it. What about my laptop? Do you have it?”

 

“Yeah… You worry about that thing too much. It’s in my bag, like I’ve said for the twentieth time we’ve got here.”

 

“Oops.”

 

“‘Oops’ indeed.”

 

After a small sound of laughter coming from the both of them, and a few more exchanges of a few more items from each other’s luggages (Since they could fit in things that the other one couldn’t), Wonwoo gets up from the floor to strech his sore body and glance at the view of Tokyo through the window, feeling relaxed by the sight.

 

Not long after, Mingyu back hugs him and hums a small tune, pecking the small skin on the crook of Wonwoo’s neck. “Weirdo.” Wonwoo mumbles before he smiles in defeat, and Mingyu holds his hand as he slowly stakes him to the bed.

 

The pair lay down together, staring at each other with no words escaping their lips. Mingyu pecks Wonwoo’s lips. “You look tired, lets go take a shower together, okay?” But as Wonwoo looks away to cover his reaction, Mingyu whines. “Get any more cuter and I’ll explode-“ And he giggles as he takes the older’s hand again and drags him to the bathroom with clothes and a towel in his other hand.

 

And instead of sleeping for a ‘few hours’, they all ended up sleeping for a whole day and the next day as well — Including Seungcheol, he even missed his lecture.

 

—♩—♪—♫—♬ —

 

Quiet humming, shirts thrown to the floor, the fresh breeze coming through the windows — It was a calm morning.

 

With the two males already awake, they have a small staring contest in awe and admiration — And the first one who falls in love first, loses.

 

But they know they already lost before the game started.

 

Like reading each other’s minds, they lean closer until the tips of their noses touch and nod playfully in an syncopated rhythm until they smile and burst into breathy giggles. 

 

Wonwoo moves his hand from his cheek and runs his fingertips up Mingyu’s arm, which soon moves to brush the bangs away from the younger’s eyes.

 

“Morning, princess.” Mingyu finally comments, deeply exhaling afterwards.

 

“Good morning... Narcissist...”

 

“Did you have a nice rest?” In reply, Wonwoo nods tiredly, rubbing his eyes. Suddenly, Mingyu grabs the bedsheets and pulls them towards him, exposing the older’s bare chest. Teasingly, he smirks and clicks his tongue.

 

“Mingyu...” Wonwoo whines as he crosses his arms. “It’s cold...” But it doesn’t stop the hand peeking out from the sheets, gently tracing the tattoo on his hipbone.

 

‘He looks so perfect.’

 

“You look so perfect.”

 

Speechless, Wonwoo attempts to hide his flustered face and proceeds to take back the covers as the both of them lazily hang their arms around each other. “What do you think we’re going to do today?” Wonwoo ask, closing his eyes.

 

“Can’t we just stay here in bed together?”

 

“‘Gyu...”

 

“Kidding! Kidding...”

 

“Do you think the others are awake now?”

 

“Nope. They might still he sleeping, just leave them like that.”

 

“Mhmm...” Wonwoo hums. 

 

Mingyu pulls Wonwoo closer to him and sniffs his fluffy hair, cheerfully humming too. “I don’t know why,” His fingers start to weave through the older’s hair, “But I want to look after you, and stay with you. Forever. I just feel like I do.”

 

Wonwoo pulls the covers to hide his face and with a muffled voice he replies, “It’s too early to be like this ‘Gyu... I can’t cope with it.” Even though the hidden smile on his face completely says otherwise. His legs start to kick the mattress — Which meant ‘whiny and cheesy Wonwoo’ mode was on. “Ugh, I hope you get diabetes for being too sweet.”

 

“I hope you get lactose intolerant for being too cheesy.”

 

“I hope you get arrested.”

 

“Why? This one’s new.”

 

“You’d hate me if I say why.”

 

“Go on...”

 

“Because you stole... My heart?” Even Wonwoo hates how cheesy he sounds as he expresses it with a sound of disgust.

 

“Okay that’s being a bit too much, Jeon Wonwoo-“ But Mingyu laughs off Wonwoo’s attempt, and Wonwoo joins him to quickly throw away the ‘stupid’ moment. 

 

The laughter dies down when Mingyu notices Wonwoo’s face staring at him in awe yet sadness.

 

Worryingly, he tilts his head. “Is... There something wrong?”

 

Almost instantly, Wonwoo comes back to reality and shakes his head, kissing Mingyu before he buries his head further in the latter’s chest.

 

“Let’s stay like this.” He says.

 

“Of course.”

 

—♩—♪—♫—♬ —

 

“Fifteen miscalls from ‘Kwan... Whoops.”

 

Suddenly, a loud ping surprises Vernon, making him almost drop his phone from the top bunk. Almost.

 

JiWoOoO

JiWoOoO: HANSOL

JiWoOoO: HANSOL

JiWoOoO: HANSOL

JiWoOoO: ARE YOU AWAKE??

JiWoOoO: HOW ARE YOU

JiWoOoO: ARE YOU THERE NOW?

JiWoOoO: SAFE TRIP? OR NOT A SAFE TRIP???

JiWoOoO: HANSOL I NEED THEM ANSWERS-

vernon: yes im here jiwoo chiLL

JiWoOoO: YAY! I CANT BELIEVE YOURE IN JAPAN

vernon: same... :s

vernon: its scary but not really

JiWoOoO: i get you, but i don’t get you

vernon: yeah same. By the way there’s a dog where we’re staying, and it really reminds me of you

vernon: bork bork.

JiWoOoO: THERE’S A DOG,,, SICKK-

JiWoOoO: TAKE A PICTURE OF IT FOR ME

vernon: how can i not??

vernon: do you want anything from japan while im here?

JiWoOoO: it’s really simple, but win me one of those anime figures at the arcade’

vernon: im on it ٩( ᐛ )و

JiWoOoO: YAYAYA YOURE THE BEST THANK YOU HOMIE ;;;

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