Pause

The next morning Hoseok wakes up and looks to his side. The light in the room is on, which means Hyunwoo is already up. Confused as how their leader can wake up so early with that less amount of sleep. They made a rule in their room that whoever leaves first will put the light on for the other members, which is most of the time their leader.
Hoseok moves his head and sees the still sleeping Hyungwon next to him. He is still lying on his arm and the other arm of Hyungwon is tightly wrapped around Hoseok’s body. Hoseok smiles as he feels save. He feels the heat of Hyungwon next to him and even though the room is very warm it isn’t unpleasant. Hoseok moves the blanket a little lower towards his chest and stairs at the bottom of Hyungwon’s upper bed. ‘What do I do with myself like this?’ he asks himself as he knows his mind will not come up with an answer.
Usually he goes dancing or working out whenever he feels bad, but that doesn’t really help with the build of his body since this will cause only more muscles.
He feels dizzy as he tries to get up and lies down again.

Hyungwon wakes up from the movements of Hoseok next to him. He opens his eyes and sees the tired eyes of Hoseok looking into nothing above him.
“Hyung, how are you? Did you sleep well?” Hyungwon asks with a sleepy voice. Hoseok wants to answer but his throat is sore and hurts.
“Are you ok?” Hyungwon asks with a worried expression and sits down on the bed. He places his hand on the forehead of Hoseok and the other one on his own.
“Hoseok! You are burning!” Hyungwon says.  “You got sick?”
All Hoseok does is nod since that would explain the dizziness he felt before when he tried to get up. “Stay in bed, I get you some soup” Hyungwon says as he gets up.
Hoseok watches Hyungwon leave the room an turns to his side facing the wall. He rests his head on his arm as he closes his eyes. ‘A little more sleep’  he thinks to himself as he drifts off in a sleep again.

When he wakes up he sees the Kihyun sitting next to him on his knees. Next to him is a cup of hot soup. Hoseok smells the food and turns around to his side. He looks up at Kihyun.
“You dummy for getting sick again” Kihyun says and Hoseok pouts. “I can’t help my body is weak in that”.
Kihyun places his hand on Hoseok’s forehead. “You are still warm” he says and Kihyun wrings the cold water out of a small towel and places it on the forehead of Hoseok. The cold towel feels nice and Hoseok sighs as he feels his head cooling down.
“Can you eat for a bit? You need to take medicine after it.” Kihyun  says with a worried look on his face.
Hoseok smiles and nods. No wonder Kihyun is considered the mom of the group. Hyungwon probably told Kihyun Hoseok was sit and Kihyun decided to make some food for him instead.
Hyungwon walks in and sits down on the edge of the bed, next to Hoseok’s feet.
“Are you feeling better?” he asks and Hoseok’s nods, but he can see on Hyungwon’s face that the younger doesn’t really believe him.
 

Hoseok removes the wet towel from his forehead, which is to his surprise warm already and he realizes his fever might be worse than he thought.
He lifts himself to his elbows and feels the dizzy feeling hit him again. He quickly sits with his back against the wall to give him some support.
“Can you eat by yourself?” Kihyun asks and Hoseok nods. Kihyun places the tray with soup next to him on a small table on the bed. Hoseok takes the spoon and with slightly shaking hands he eat the salt soup. The hot liquid feels nice in his throat and Hoseok enjoys the chicken flavor that is added to the soup.
“I also have cooked some ramyun, do you want me to add a bit of it to the soup?” All Hoseok is nod, since no matter how sick he is, ramyun is always good.
Without saying a word he finishes the bowl in an instant. Kihyun hands him some medicine and Hoseok swallows it with some water.

After sleeping for a few more hours Hoseok wakes up again and lifts himself. The dizziness disappeared a little and he feels lots better. ‘I guess the medicine must be working’ he thinks as he sits on the edge of the bed again. He lifts himself and holds the side of Hyungwon’s upper bed to stand. As soon as the dizziness and the black dots in his view has left he walks slowly and steady to the door.
When he opens it he sees Hyungwon sitting on the couch reading a book. His long legs curled up on the couch. Hoseok smiles and walks closer.
As soon as Hyungwon sees him he closes his book and moves his feet down on the floor.
“How are you feeling?” Hyungwon asks as Hoseok sits down.
“A lot better” Hoseok answers him and Hyungwon places his hand on Hoseok’s forehead. “The fever seemed to have gone done a bit indeed” he says.

“Are you able to perform tomorrow?” Hyungwon asks and Hoseok nods as he knows he has no other choice. “I just take a bit more medicine tonight and tomorrow morning and I will be fine” he says, but in his mind he knows it will probably acting again telling everyone he is fine while all he wants is sleep.

Just like this the day passes by and Kihyun calls all  the members to the kitchen to tell them dinner is ready.

The 7 of them sit down around the small table and somehow all of them seem more quiet than normal. Hoseok doesn’t mind since he likes silence for a bit, but he has a feeling something is bothering the other members.
Hoseok isn’t sure what to do in this silence and he takes his spoon. He looks down at his bowl of rice, not sure if he should ask the members.

In silence the first 10 minutes pass as suddenly Minhyuk jumps up. “Why is he doing this? It doesn’t make sense!”
Hoseok looks up in shock.as he has no idea what Minhyuk is  talking about.
“Minhyuk, calm down” Hyunwoo says as he takes the hand of the younger one in his hand.
“No!” Minhyuk screams “it doesn’t make sense he said this today!”

“Minhyuk” Jooheon says softly as he takes the others hand again and pulls him down. “Please calm down, you don’t need to scream”.
Minhyuk pouts and sits down again “it still is not right” he says this time softer.
Hoseok look confused at Hyungwon next to him. The younger member gives him a soft wink which tells him he will tell him later. Hoseok looks at Minhyuk and understood it probably wasn’t a good idea to do it now.

The rest of their dinner was silent and a certain tension was felt within the group as they all looked at their own bowl of rice. Jooheon tried to cheer everyone by asking who wants to go and watch a movie with him, but since nobody accepted his offer he stayed silent as well.

After they finished Hoseok pulled Hyungwon to their bedroom and closed the door. He quickly locked it so the other members wouldn’t disturb them.
Hyungwon stood in the middle of the room, confused at Hoseok as he sits down on the bed. “Explain” is all he says since he feels angry they left him out.
“We didn’t want to worry you with the problem now since we wanted you to recover first” Hyungwon says as he sits down next to Hoseok on the bed. He can feel the heat of the older member and knows Hoseok is still sick. “We wanted you to recover first” he says looking down at the floor.
“What’s wrong? Who told you something? Was it the manager?” Hoseok says and by the sudden sad look in Hyungwon’s eyes he must have guessed right.
He turns Hyungwon roughly by his shoulders so the younger had no excuse but to face him.
“Tell me” Hoseok demands.

“We have to go to the studio this upcoming Saturday again, since manager planned a new MV-shooting for next week and we need to record”. Hyungwon says.
Hoseok his mind is working at full speed as he recalls the anger of Minhyuk. The boy was happy he was able to get some free time since he wanted to visit his family, but it must have been cancelled because of their sudden studio appointment.

“Why another MV? We just made a comeback right?” Hoseok asks and Hyungwon tells him about the Japanese song that was planned, but was moved forward a little faster.
“We didn’t want to worry you, since you were sick and you need to recover your body and voice” Hyungwon says. “I am fine” Hoseok says but he knows his appearance is looking far from fine, by the worried look of Hyungwon as he faces him.
“Just rest and don’t worry too much about it” Hyungwon says as he rests his head on Hoseok’s shoulder. “I was happy we got some time off and wanted to visit the ocean, but guess I need to cancel that trip as well” Hyungwon whispers, but Hoseok hears him. He softly the hair of the younger on his shoulder as he closes his eyes.
“We all wanted some free time” he says in the same soft voice.
“The perks of being a famous idol” Hyungwon whispers and both of them laugh.

That evening the same negative feeling stays in the dorm and Hoseok feels bad. He is looking at the TV together with the other members in the dorm. Jooheon went outside to visit the cinema with Changkyun, Hyunwoo decided to go for a run at the Han River and the others are watching a show. Hoseok not sure what they are saying stares at the TV, but his mind isn’t picking up anything that happens. His thoughts are with the comments he read.
‘What would they think if I work out more. Should I lose weight?’
Hyungwon is laying on his lap and he looks down at the closed eyes of his group member. ‘You have a nice and slim body’ he thinks as he looks at Hyungwon’s legs curled up on the couch. His gaze returns to the TV-screen.

Minhyuk is staring at the screen and sometimes a small giggle comes from his mouth as he seems to enjoy the show. Kihyun decided to make some tea for the others and returns with four hot steaming cups of tea. Hoseok wakes Hyungwon who looks confused as he gets up. The smell of vanilla hits Hoseok’s nose and he knows Kihyun made it for them to sleep well later on. Somehow Kihyun always knows a way to cheer up the mood as he is taking care of the others.
Hoseok thanks Kihyun for the tea and start blowing it. He folds the sleeves of his hoodie over his hands and holds the cup with both hands, curls his legs up the chair and rests his chin in his knees. Like this he stares in front.
Kihyun sits down next to him and gives him the medicine he was supposed to take, together with a glass of water. “Here” he says softly and Hoseok nods.
“I hope you feel better soon” Hyungwon says. “I feel so bad looking at your sick body”.
Hoseok smiles as he knows as no other how much the member care about him. “Thank you guys” he says.

After he finished his tea Hoseok gets off the couch and tell the other member he is going to sleep. All of them seem to agree his is going since he is still ill.
“Goodnight guys” Hoseok says and the other four repeat his answer.
He walks to the bathroom and washes his face quickly with some lukewarm water. He looks up in the mirror seeing the drops of water on his skin. His eyes hollow as if he isn’t looking at himself. He isn’t really sure where this negative feeling comes from. It could be because everyone is feeling bad, because he is sick or because of the comments he read last night, but one thing is sure; he isn’t feeling like his usual self.
He dries his face with a towel and rubs is quite hard, cursing himself for the painful burn it leaves.
He walks towards his bedroom without saying a word to the other members and decided to borrow some of Hyunwoo’s skincare to ease the pain on his cheeks from rubbing it too hard.
Slowly he walks towards his bed and lies down. The blankets at his feet, but Hoseok doesn’t care as he is too tired to actually pull them up.  He falls off in an uneven and light sleep.
An hour or so later he hears the door of the room opening and a soft whispering. Too tired to open his eyes Hoseok stays silent. He hears Hyungwon telling their leader a goodnight. He feels the blanket at his feet being moved and a second after the warmth of the blanket on his shoulders. He realizes Hyungwon must have put the blanket over his body as he hears the small ladder next to his pillow making a sound, knowing Hyungwon is climbing up to his own bed. He softly smiles as he drifts off in a little deeper sleep.
He knows he needs his energy for tomorrow, their last concert before they start their recording schedule again. Hoseok sighs and turns to his other side. He closes his eyes again and falls asleep as he hears the soft snoring of his other two room members