Mino sits at the lobby of his dorm, trying to make sense of what the hell just happened to him.

“Yes, Jinwoo hyung is attractive, I don’t have to be necessarily attracted to him, I can appreciate him like I appreciate art. His face can be said to be a work of art, he has large doe eyes that most artists like, his nose bridge is high and his lips are full and heart-shaped, he has a golden proportion face, artists really like that and his body…” Mino’s thoughts come to a standstill as he thinks of Jinwoo in the bathroom, shirtless and a smattering of water drops rolling off his chest.

Mino ruffles in his hair in frustration. He wasn’t gay, was he? He had never been attracted to guys, only had crushes on girls, relationships with girls. He has friends who are bi, who are gay, but he thought of himself as strictly straight. A guy could think another guy is hot and incredibly handsome without wanting to kiss him, right? But, how to explain his feelings, if they were even feelings, towards Jinwoo?

“Must be the fake relationship getting to me. Is my acting that good that it’s confusing myself?” Mino dismisses whatever feelings he had today, attributing them to the confusing nature of a pretend relationship.

He steps into his dorm room and a shower of rainbow confetti falls on him.

“What the , Kang Seungyoon.” Mino glares at his roommate, currently clutching his stomach and laughing at confetti-covered Mino.

“Congrats on your first gay date!” Seungyoon throws a handful of confetti at Mino again, much to his annoyance.

“You are too dramatic, Yoon-ah. And I’m not gay, I’m bi! I already told you that yesterday.”

“I know, I know, gay is a catchall term nowadays, Mino. Anyway! Tell me all about your big bi date then?” Seungyoon slides to his chair just up to Mino and stares eagerly.

“It was fine, good. We just went to the open air cinema. I spilt soda on Jinwoo-hyung so we left early.”

“Just fine? Where are the details? Was there skinship? Did you guys kiss?” Yoon fires off his questions, “It’s Jinwoo hyung we’re talking about here. He’s like, one of the top 3 best looking guys in our faculty, or even the whole university. The juniors in our faculty talk about him non-stop.”

Mino thinks about him hiding in Jinwoo’s chest during the horror movie, their incident in the bathroom and the long hug in front of Jinwoo’s dorm.

“Nothing much happened. We just held hands.” Mino lies, somehow wanting to keep those details to himself, but a slight smile appears on his face, against his will.

Seungyoon picks on the smile immediately and shoves Mino, “Yah, you’re lying. You, moving this slow? You went to second base on the first date with that ex of yours, err whats-her-face. C’mon, spill the deets!”

“Nope, I’m not talking.” Mino knows he should reveal some of the details, what was the point of a pretend relationship if other people didn’t know? But somehow, weirdly, he just wanted the memories of his ‘date’ with Jinwoo all to himself.

“I’ll tell you only one thing.” Mino decides he has to reveal something, hell, must as well have something for Seungyoon to spread around the faculty.

“What? What?”

“Jinwoo hyung is extremely ticklish.”

“…And how did you know that?” Seungyoon pesters Mino further, but only receives a smirk.

“I’ll leave that to your imagination.”

-

Over the next few days, Mino finds Jinwoo regularly for lunches and dinners. He wonders why didn’t he notice Jinwoo more when they were project mates.

How Jinwoo laughed so easily at Mino’s jokes, even if Mino himself didn’t think they were really funny. How Jinwoo’s smile light up his entire face and the room and possibly the sun, Mino was going off track there, but really, Kim Jinwoo was the most charming when he was laughing. His two dimples appeared whenever he laughed and Mino kinda, sorta, badly wanted to poke them?

-

15 minutes before they were supposed to meet for dinner, Mino received a text from Jinwoo, apologising that he couldn’t make it for dinner today as class was dragging on later than expected. Mino feels a tinge of disappointment, but as he turns to leave the cafeteria, he spots one of Jinwoo’s classmates.

“Seungri hyung! You left your class early?”

Seungri looks at Mino in confusion, “Huh? My class ended on time, Professor Yang couldn’t wait to leave even!”

“Ehhhh? Did you see Jinwoo hyung then?”

“When I left, he was still sitting down I think…”

Mino makes his way to classroom, perplexed on why Jinwoo lied to him about his class dragging. Maybe seeing Mino everyday that week had been too taxing on him? Still, Jinwoo could have just said that straight to Mino, he didn’t seem like a kind of person who would just hide instead.

He reaches the classroom, which already had its lights off. He tries to open the classroom but finds the door locked instead. The messages he sent to Jinwoo asking when is his class ending, where was he were all read but left unanswered. He even called Seungyoon but Yoon said Jinwoo hasn’t been back in the dorm the whole day.

Mino grows increasingly anxious. He’s not even sure why he is so intent on finding Jinwoo when Jinwoo clearly doesn’t want to be found, but he has a nagging feeling that something might be wrong. He remembers the spot that Jinwoo usually studies at and hurries over. From far, he could spot a figure hunched over the table.

It was Jinwoo, staring expressionless at the table, but hands reaching up over so often to wipe away tears that rolled down his cheeks. Mino halts in his steps, unsure if he could, if he even should proceed. The soft cries Jinwoo emits clutches at his heart, and before he could stop himself, Mino calls out “Hyung? Are you okay?”.

Jinwoo whips in his head in Mino’s direction, clearly startled. He rapidly wipes away his tears, “Wha-what are you doing here?”

“I saw Seungri hyung at the cafeteria, so I knew your class ended. I got worried, so I came looking for you. I guess you didn’t want me to see like this, but…I’m here, hyung.”

‘I’m fine, Mino-ya. Ahh this is really embarrassing.” Jinwoo attempts to smile at him, but the smile doesn’t reach his ears, doesn’t have the usual sparkle.

“Hyung, what kind of fake boyfriend would I be if I don’t fake listen to my fake boyfriend’s worries? Go on, I won’t even listen!” Mino jokes, trying to cheer Jinwoo up while placing a hand on Jinwoo’s. Jinwoo’s lips upturn slightly at Mino’s attempt.

“I’m just-ah this is really…it’s just a bad day, a really bad day.” Jinwoo recounts how he was late for his part-time job because he accidentally set his alarm as PM instead of AM, leading to a huge scolding from his boss. When he was returning to campus, it suddenly started raining heavily, leaving an umbrella-less Jinwoo to run through the rain. He was not only completely soaked, but had the great misfortune to slip and fall. To top the cherry off, he received a C- for the most recent essay in Professor Yang’s class even though he worked really hard on it.

“When I saw the grade, my heart just kinda dropped, y’know. I worked really hard on this, I really loved this class. Then I texted you. After class, I came here and sat, and then the tears just came. Gosh…” Jinwoo raises his hand to wipe off a fresh batch of tears, but instead Mino beats him to it, one hand dabbing at Jinwoo’s tears with a tissue, while the other cups Jinwoo’s face.

Jinwoo freezes. Mino is too close, the gesture too tender, especially since there was nobody around them to witness it. Jinwoo doesn’t dare to move, afraid any slight movement might spoil the moment. Mino doesn’t notice anything and instead, moves his hand to curl around Jinwoo’s nape and brings Jinwoo to rest to his shoulder.

“Sorry you had such a ty day, hyung.” Mino pats Jinwoo on the back, drawing soothing circles. Jinwoo relaxes into Mino’s warmth, arms winding around Mino’s waist to clutch tighter. “I’m sure you will do better in the next essay, hyung. You can’t go anywhere but up now, right?”

Hearing Mino’s words brings a fresh batch of tears to Jinwoo’s eyes. Mino feels it, and pulls back, alarmed, “Why are you crying again, hyung? Did I say something wrong?”

Jinwoo shakes his head and smiles, the sparkle back in his eyes, “No, Mino-ya, these are tears of happiness. I’m thankful you said all that.”

Jinwoo feels a lot better, and eases himself out of Mino’s arms, embarrassed that he threw a mini fit over a bad day. However, Mino just grins at him and pulls him up, “C’mon hyung, I bet you haven’t had dinner yet! Let’s go to your room and order delivery. I know Hoon hyung isn’t in and we can steal all his fancy snacks!”

They ended up ordering jajangmyeon and sweet-and-sour pork and Mino insists that they could watch Jinwoo’s favourite drama. Mino makes comments on the male lead’s cheesy actions, emulates them speaking in funny voices, and insists he could do better than the male lead. Jinwoo doesn’t remember when was the last time he clutched his stomach and laughed till he teared. They fight over the piece of pork and try to sneakily dig out all of Seunghoon’s beloved snacks.  

Jinwoo had bad days before; sometimes he mopes alone in a secluded library corner, sometimes Hoon finds him sniffling and tries to cheer him up, but he always rejected any company. Jinwoo is thankful for Mino for sticking with him even when Jinwoo tried to brush him off.

The night ends when Seunghoon bursts through the door with an ‘AHA!’, seemingly trying to catch Mino and Jinwoo in some sort of act, but instead caught Mino funnelling down his truffle potato chips he specially shipped from the US.

After Hoon’s dramatic display over the loss of his snacks, Mino got up to leave.

“Well, it’s getting late. Night, Jinwoo hyung, Seunghoon hyung.”

Seunghoon stares at Mino, and his gaze darts back to Jinwoo, seemingly expectant. Jinwoo stares back, confused.

“Go on, I don’t mind the PDA.” Seunghoon singsongs.

Mino and Jinwoo both let out nervous tittering, “Hyunggg! If you say it like this, it’s even weirder!” Mino gives him a hard shove and turns to leave again, embarrassed.

Instead, he feels a hand tugging on his wrist. He turns, and sees Jinwoo moving closer, closer, closer…until Jinwoo’s soft lips…lands on his cheek.

Wait, soft??????

 “Good night, Mino-ya. Thanks for tonight and dinner.” Jinwoo beams.

“It’s-it’s nothing, hyung.” Mino stammers, a little shell-shocked from the kiss. Just a cheek kiss, he tells himself. “Any time spent with you is worth it.” He gains back his composure and meant to say a cheesy line, but finds himself sincerely meaning it.

-

A/N:

I'm really thankful for all the comments I've gotten, thanks all for liking and supporting this fic (ღ˘⌣˘ღ)

Not sure how slow burn I want this to be tbh, but again I'm not very confident in writing fics with many chapters. Let me know if the fic is going realistically enough for yall (it's a great concern for me ;;), if not any comments are really appreciated!