Just pick me up
And never let me go
We don't need much
As long as we're together, together, together 

Together - Martin Garrix

~~~~~~~~

"Together, 1 2 3" the dance teacher yells and claps the beat in his hands.

There they go again, repeating the dance they just learned today. NCT DREAM were preparing for their comback, which would again just be the 6 of them. Mark looks at Haechan through the mirror and notices him looking at himself. Walking up to him, Mark lays a hand on his shoulder as if to say, are you alright?

Haechan shakes his hand off, nods and walks to his backpack, taking out his water bottle. Mark probably thought he was tired from constantly being in 2 units, which just reminded him that they have another 127 practise after this one.

Which was technichly true, but Haechan's mind was filled with other kinds of worries.

Renjun keeps following Haechan with his eyes. He notices the way he stared at his reflection. He walks up to him, sitting next to him on the floor.

Taking out his Mars bar, Renjun holds it out to Haechan, worried he wasn't eating again. Glancing at him, Haechan lightly shakes his head.

"Eat"

Renjun orders him with a frown, forcing the bar of chocolate in his hand. Haechan looks at his hand, then at Renjun and slowly begins to rip the packaging open. Taking a small carefull bite, Haechan casts a smile at his friend.

Of course, while everyone else was resting, Jeno was repeating the choreography.

Sighing, he starts again.

Only this time with small, weak steps that were supposed to look like dance steps. "Hey stop dancing, come here!" Haechan shouts gesturing him to come over. Jeno considers ignoring him, but eventually allows himself to stop daning for a while. Sitting next to him, their thighs and knees touch. Looking at his best friend slowly eating, he throws the thought of practise away, for now atleast.

But soon, the practise started again along with Mark's orders about staying focussed. 

After they were all finished the other boys waited for Haechan and Mark while they started their 127 practise. Compared to Dream's practise it was shorter and less tiring, because they only needed to go over their current choreography a couple of times.

Throwing his shoes somewhere, Renjun steps into the living room of their dorm and flops himself down on their couch. Not even a minute later.

"Ooowwww!!!"

Haechan had apparently decided to just comfortably lay himself down on Renjun's small and tired body. Groaning, he tries to push Haechan off of him by pushing against his shoulders. Of course, that wasn't going to work. Giving up, he sighs and just closes his eyes.

As soon as they entered the dorm, Jeno speed walked into his room.  Fishing out his phone while lying down on his bed, he quickly opens the Kakao Talk app and goes directly to one specific person. 

Jaemin.

Opening their chat, Jeno starts typing with a small smile. 

Hi -  Jenojam

When are you coming -  Jenojam

Nana - hey 

Nana- idk i think ill be there by 5

Jeno lifts his head to look at the clock that is hanging above the door. It's thirty three past two.

Ok see you soon - Jenojam

Nana - See ya

After turning of his phone, Jeno sits up and goes to tell the other members. Ever since he entered his room he heard loud groans coming from the living room. So the sight he is welcomed with is surprising but at the same time completely normal for their dorm. 

Haechan was lying on someone with his back against them. All you could see were skinny arms gripping Haechan's waist with the intention to throw him off. Of course it was Haechan's favorite toy, Renjun.

"Guys.."

"AHH, Haechan get the off!!" 

"Kids, no swearing!"

"GUYS!!" Jeno yells out. Suddenly not even a breath was heard. Heachan finally gets off poor Renjun and smiles sheepishly at his friend. He ignores Renjun's complaints and stares at Jeno, awaiting his news.

Taking a deep breath he starts, "Jaemin will be here around 5 pm." And what else could he have expected. Immediatly everyone apart from Mark began panicking. 

"WHAT, we haven't even started preparing!" Chenle screams at Jeno's face.   

Mark immediatly steps forwards and declares, "Let's keep calm alright, Jisung, Chenle, clean this place up a bit. Donghyuck and Renjun, you guys are in charge of the food. Lastly Jeno and I will take care of the decorations and inform the other members."

And with a small wave of his hand, everyone rushes off to different parts of the house. The maknaes start sauntering to get the vacuum and a duster, while complaining of course. Jeno and Mark first called Taeyong to inform the remaining members of Jaemin's arrival. And Haechan and Renjun went straight to the kitchen.

"So, what else will we need beside the basic snacks, crisps and stuff?" Renjun asks Haechan, turning to face him. Haechan purses his lips, an old habit he does whenever he is thinking.

"Maybe a cake, you know it is a birthday party after all, and what bithday party doesn't have cake." He answers.

"But you know we'll have to buy two cakes right, with 18 members one cake is no doubt impossible.And what birthday party has two cakes, huh?" Renjun shoots back with a slight grin on his face. Haechan rolls his eyes and slaps his arm quite harshly.

"Well we'll just buy two cakes then is it that big of a deal, jeez."

Renjun childishly sticks out his tongue behind Haechan, who has turned around and was walking to the hall to put his shoes on. Luckily there was a cake shop 10 minutes from the dorm so they wouldn't have to walk a lot.

He puts his own shoes on while reciting all the things they would need in his head. And so both Haechan and Renjun were out of the door.

In the mean time, Jeno was busily trying to tie a balloon. He had only blown up 5 balloons but he felt as if his lungs were going to fall out of his corpse. Where his partner has gone, Jeno had no idea, all he knew was that his fingers couldn't cooperate today.

Only about an hour left.

Renjun and Haechan were still not back, Jeno hasn't seen Jisung and Chenle since they separated, He had absolutaly no idea where their leader was and Jeno was still trying to tie his 6th balloon.

Things were going great.

____________

Just when Jeno thought everything was going downhill, the door burst open. Renjun and Haechan had returned. But it seems they were hiding something.

Jeno stood up from the floor, that was currently covered with 17 red balloons. "Finally, I thought I was about to die from silence!" he spits out. "We've got a bit of a problem.." Haechan murmurs after a moment of looking at Renjun with hesitation. 

Jeno could feel his blood begin to boil, what could they have done now? He closes his eyes and sighs out loud. There was no response. He looks at both of them with an exhausted look. 

"What?"

"Well you see umm..."

"It isn't totally our fault I swear."

"Just spit it out already!" Jeno shouts having enough of their stalling. Exchanging one last look, Renjun whispers, if Jeno wasn't paying attention he would have never heard it.

"The cake accidentally says 'Happy 70th Birthday' instead of '17th'." 

"The shop owner must have misunderstood us, it isn't our fault really." Haechan quickly adds before Jeno could get any madder. Sighing once again, he reaches his hand out. They hand it over before they speed walk somewhere else. Jeno sets the cake down on the coffee table, not even looking at it. 

Half an hour left, there was no time to go order a new one. 

Renjun walks into the kitchen after his nerve wracking encounter with Jeno. But something didn't feel right. Where were the others? He's just seen Jeno and Haechan was with him. So where were Chenle, Jisung and Mark? 

"Jeno, where are the kids?" He shouts from his seat in the kitchen.

"No idea, Mark's also disappeared." Came the reply from the living room.

Renjun frowns and takes his phone out of his back pocket. He decides to call Mark. Letting his phone ring, after a while it turns into a beep. He tries again after a couple of minutes. This time he hears a voice at the other end of the line.

"Hello?"

"Mark, where are you, Jaemin will be here in half an hour!" Renjun utters loudly.

"Sorry, just got caught up. Johnny wanted me to help evaluating Jaehyun's fashion..it's a long story but don't worry we'll be there as quickly as we can."

"Huhh, alright just..don't forget!" He hangs up after his warning.  Now those brats, they were supposed to clean up. 

Renjun starts searching the house. They weren't in the kitchen nor the living room. They weren't in any of the bedrooms nor the bathroom. So where else could they be? The last room in their dorm was the laundry room. Opening the door, Renjun immediately closes it. Trying to erase the image out of his mind, he slowly walks into Haechan's room and lies down next to him. 

Haechan pulls his hand into his own and plays with his fingers. Haechan turns around and rest his head in the crook of Renjun's neck while still holding his hand. "You alright?" He whispers lightly into his ear. 

"Yeah."

This time it wasn't a lie, Renjun stills misses his family of course but he realised that having s by his side was enough for now. 

"Care to tell me what's on your mind?" Heachan asks looking up at Renjun's closed eyes.

Renjun doesn't respond, instead he just rolls over, puts his arm around Haechan's waist and nuzzles his face into his soft hair.

  ____________  

Suddenly a loud bell wakes Jeno, who had fallen asleep trying to stick a balloon to the ceiling, Haechan and Renjun up. They both race out of their room and meet an equally alarmed Jeno.

Haechan mans up and walks to the door, with Renjun and Jeno close behind him. He twists the door knob slowly and pulls the door open. Can you guess who it was?

"JAEMIN!!!" Jeno pushes Haechan out of the way to attack his best friend who he hasn't seen in 5 months. Jaemin chuckles and hugs Jeno back tightly. 

"Wait why are you here so early?" Haechan asks looking around at the failed decorations and the failed cake still on the table. They weren't able to finish their surprise. "Oh who cares he's here that's all that matters." Renjun doesn't let Jaemin answer and squeezes him tightly. 

"But..." Haechan wanted their friend's return to be special, with a bomb cake, bomb decorations and with all the other members. But the cake says 70, there were currently only 3 ballons on the ceiling and no one was their except the four of them.

Jaemin just laughes and hugs Haechan with a smile on his face. He turns to his three best friends and says, "It's been a long time, I've missed you guys a lot." 

It feels good to say that.

"Want to eat some cake?" Jeno says with an awkward grin holding the cake up. Jaemin takes one look at the chocolate goodness and bursts out laughing. The others look at each other and begin laugh with him. 

The four leave the balloon mess in the living room and go to Haechan and Renjun's room. They lie down together on Haechan's small bed, legs and arms intertwined. Jaemin talks about his time back home and in exchange Haechan, Renjun and Jeno talk about their MFAL promotions. 

Jaemin laughes at the story about Haechan's failed rock paper scissors with Mark. He looks at the others and sees their laughing faces, he hasn't seen those in a while. 

Renjun listens to Jaemin's story about his family. And he doesn't even for one second think about his own.

Haechan takes a bite out of the delicious cake, while laughing loudly. Not caring about the amount of calories in it.

Jeno takes Jaemin's compliment about his dancing with a light heart. Not even denying as he says thank you.

But then suddenly a thought came to Jaemin's head, "Where are the others?"

They could hear their front door bang open, followed by-

"Is Jaemin here yet!?" 

There they are.