:(

Guys, I don’t have internet. The whole network of the country has been glitching on and off for ten days now, or nine. I’ve been pretty available considering I didn’t have anything to do — no internet means no assignments to give — and so I had been able to write a chapter pretty early. However, I couldn’t post it because this website requires a lot of internet or even a fraction of WiFi but I don’t have any, which would explain why the chapter never came. The same goes for my other account, BlackWhispers. I’m trying to post a chapter with the minimal internet that has been growing little by little the couple two days, so I might not be able to do any editing or posting anything until the internet is fully back. You don’t know how long I have been trying to post anything, or read anything, or respond to you guys. I’ve never felt so empty without AFF before. I realized I’m depended on it, actually. 

Anyway, here’s the chapter: it had a Jongdae part to make it longer, but after his dating news I felt awkward about writing it, lol, so I’ll post his part the coming chapter when I begin to dispel myself ot the awkward feeling of writing about a soon-to-be-married man. I support him, however, and I wish him all the best. Can’t believe some immature fans actually want him to either leave EXO, or stop stanning him. He’s a human being and feeling conent with someone and starting a family is a basic need you all want to deprive him from. I’m sure most of the international fans are okay with it, it’s the Korean fans that are causing an aproar, smh. 

-

Mina was yanked back to the materialistic world, rather violently, and out of her dream by a rapid thudding on her door. Knock-knock. It was annoying, and if she was in her right head (which was the source of her annoyance, the fact she was not in her right mind) she’d have yelled a profanity. She decided to ignore it.

But it didn’t stop.

The knocking continued for a few seconds, and in hoping it’d muffle the sound, she brought her blanket around her head, squeezing it over her ears. The sound was reduced, and quickly, it was gone. Feeling happy that whoever was knocking was no longer knocking, she relaxed her mind, actually considering going back to sleep. 

“Mina?”

When someone just outrightly called her out.

She was disoriented, a sort of haziness to her mind; heaviness to her shut eyes. She pulled the blanket away, hoping the gesture would spark light over her sealed eyes and wake her up, but everything was yelling at her to go back to sleep; her limps squealing in protest. Mina didn’t feel this drowsy and exhausted since her final exams in her last year of Highschool, and that felt so long ago. Who could blame her, though? What happened to her recently hadn’t been a positive highlight of her life. A vampire attacked her; her friends want to turn her into a werewolf which was actually quite terrifying; her father’s bordering on -syndrome, and there was an ugly, agonizing scar of a claw on the side of her neck that might stay there for the rest of her life. 

She was more that exhausted, actually, she was halfway buried in her tomb, and it wasn’t funny. 

“Yeah?” She called back, her voice coming out scratchy, dehydrated, and throat. She cleared , or tried to clear because even that hurt, and slowly began to open her eyes. “What, I mean, yeah? What’s going on?”

“What’s going on is that you’re still asleep, Don’t you have morning classes?” She heard the one standing behind her door, who happened to be a very annoyed Sehun, say, the soft of his feet smothered over her multiple rugs, and the fact they were simply as agile as a ghost. 

“Yes? And?” She might be tired as but that didn’t mean she wasn’t sassy as . 

“I don’t want to put you under cardiac arrest or anything, but it’s ten AM already.” Came his equally as sassy reply, because he wasn’t Oh Sehun if he lowered his tone and became at least ten percent respectful. 

Mina kept mum for a long, long five minute, five minute in which she kept staring at the ceiling, the tired vision of hers making the ceiling van blink in and out like stars through the harsh lighting of the sun coming from the window. She closed and opened her eyes, hoping by doing that she’d focus back to the land of the living. There was a heaviness to her back that prevented her from stretching, rolling on her sides, or even sitting up. She kept fuzzily looking upwards. 

Sehun came closer inside, leaving the door open behind him. He walked towards the side of her bed and peered down at her. His face was its usual blank paper, his eyebrows drawn together in a minimal way that strangers who don’t know him wouldn’t have seen it, and there was a glitter of sorts in his iris, colored fair golden but also dark brown. Worry. He was worried but he also didn’t, couldn’t let it show. 

“Are you listening to me right now?” He murmured from above her, and her eyes focused on his face instead of the haziness of the transparent, foggy air. “You’re still lying down on your bed in a starfish position.”

“... What, Sehun? What’s going on?” She mumbled, or gurgled, really, her voice coming out shaken up and incomprehensible. Sehun released a long sigh, and at that she closed her eyes, groaning, twisting and turning in her bed like a turtle trying to cave back into its shell. 

“Okay, you’re starting to creep me out,” he clapped his hands rather harshly, the noise of their connection reverberated everywhere in her room. “Get up, you’re late to Uni. When did you go to sleep yesterday?”

“Um,” she pulled her face off of the blanket to blink innocently at him, a shade of redness coating her cheeks, “At ten PM?”

“That’s not very late, Mina,” Sehun rolled his eyes in the old-man side of his he never believed he had, “You should have been up by seven! Or six!”

She flopped her head back on the blanket with a hoarse strength, groaning deeply from her chest and ignoring the pound in her head that grew over by that childish smash of hers. When she spoke next, her voice came out muffled and soggy. 

“The past few days have been a little difficult for me, if you haven’t noticed—“

Sehun’s heart flopped in his chest the same way she flopped her head on the bed, remembering something he shouldn’t, shouldn’t, shouldn’t have remembered, his throat feeling incredibly dry as he swallowed. 

“— and I guess they caught up to me? I don’t know, I still feel very ed.”

“Okay?” He cleared his throat so he’d feel more upturned; harsh, than how he really felt, yanking the blanket she was hugging and entangled with roughly, “That’s very nice but you still need to get up.”

She threw her pillow to his place in a surprising agility considered her lazy aura, and it slammed onto his face with a harsh ‘THAWCK’. It fell back on the ground beneath his feet pathetically, and Sehun didn’t look very impressed.

“I swear to God I have no idea how you maintain your scholarship with this attitude of yours.” He muttered darkly, his eyes still positively glittering pretty gold, which now looked less worried and more irate than anything. 

“I have my professors wrapped around my little, dainty, manicured fingers.” She wiggled said fingers towards his direction, hoping he was a little closer so she could smash them directly to his eyes where he could get a perfect glimpse at them, her lips curled into a cruel smirk. 

He didn’t look impressed, still.

“Are you getting up or not?” He questioned rather blandly, crouching down to lift her askew pillow from the ground and placing it — gently — on her bed beside her head. She instantly snatched it to hug it close to her chest, groaning loudly to show him her real irritation, and her real looming tension.

Sehun hesitated, a certain fire he had thought he forgot glinting on inside of him and making him want things to her, for her, that he hadn’t considered before. He swallowed again, his throat and mouth tasting like burning acid, before saying, “I’ll prepare breakfast for you?”

She yanked herself down on the bed so quickly, she might as well break some bone. She gave him a long, calculated look, her hair looking dangerously ruffled like it had been tugged by claws, and the images this scene sparkled in his head were not images he particularly found amusing, or alluring, but still made him want to barf. He gulped, fearing she’d look past his transparency; but she soon whooped in happiness. 

“Yes, please!” She flung her arms around, looking nothing like the tired girl from five seconds ago, “Oh, thank you so much, Oh Se, you have no idea how happy this makes me!”

The harsh, angular cranes of his face relaxed, and he wasn’t exactly smiling or beaming at her, but there was a kind of softness in his eyes that showed when he stared down at her.

-

Mina pranced downstairs with large, hopping strides and a giant smile on her face. Why? It was simple: Sehun was making her breakfast. How many times does Oh the Great Sehun make breakfast for people? Practically never. He was a good cook regardless of his below ninety IQ, and he made edible food that actually tasted good and made people happy despite the face and the y attitude. The reason why he never did anything of that sorts to anyone, even himself unless it was necessary, was because he was the one who was babied, not the other way around. He believed himself to be important enough that he should always be on the receiving end, never on reverse, never to give.

So a breakfast given by him without blackmail or any dirty way was a blessing of its own.

Mina rushed towards an unsuspecting Kai, who was eating his cereal while trying to hunch himself and his large body on the tiny chair their small breakfast table allowed them with a spoonful of milk dripping past his lips, which he tried to erase by off using his tongue. She leaned against his side and smacked a large kiss on his cheek, making him freeze them blink at her, his dark, broody eyes looking honey brown in the reflecting light of the kitchen window behind him.

“Why are you so happy?” He murmured, tone low, between busily munching lips, now taking an actual tissue to wipe his chin. Mina sat in front of him and gave him a smile, a big smile that was bordering on creepy, that smile of hers guiding upwards to shoot at Sehun, who was doing something in front of the kitchen stool, his back to them.

Before Mina could answer him about why she was so happy; Sehun came towards her and placed a plat full of breakfast bread, eggs and bacon and a glass of honey-milk beside her, taking his seat next to her and avoiding her smirk, and Kai’s flabbergasted look. He looked flustered, eyes avoidant and ears flopped like a drenched puppy. If one hadn’t looked so close to him, they wouldn’t have noticed how pouty he was. 

“And why is Sehun serving you your food?” Kai finished, giving Sehun an odd, if not disgusted, look. 

She smiled, big and wide, at him, making him blink his eyes even more. 

“I’m in a good mood because Sehun’s serving me my food.”

“And I just asked why? Like..?” Kai flickered his eyes from annoyed, pouty Sehun to giddy Mina, still looking positively quizzed and terrified, “That’s not a Sehun thing to do?”

He was very, very confused, bless him, his eyes continuously going from the two like a frightened cat that didn’t know where to pause her eyes on. The fact he was squishing his shoulders together, milk frizzing between his mouth, and lips slightly parted made him look completely adorable.

“I know, right!” Mina exclaimed in one breath, eyes flashing in a predatory way. She was very clearly teasing him, and by the huff coming out of Sehun’s annoyed lips yet doing nothing to acknowledge it, Kai knew Sehun knew of his prey situation, “It’s a very un-Sehun thingy but we learn to appreciate the good things in this miserable, miserable world, like Sehun’s existence and his willingness to make me food!”

“That’s so very satisfying,” Sehun interrupted, twisting his head to look at her with a screw between his lips to hide the fact he’s smirking, “But where’s my cheek kiss?” Sehun actually offered her his cheek for her to kiss. 

Her face became scarily blank. “You’re pushing it, kid.”

He pursed his lips in dissatisfaction, taking his silence into consideration and forking through his eggs with a bored sort of aura surrounding him, like he didn’t care. But his blush didn’t go unnoticed under the bus, as Kai’s eyes glanced at it with a sort of emotions going high-ware inside him, such as terror, frazzled astonishment, and then amusement.

Was there something he missed?

He didn’t want to think so much about it so he resumed his eating, slowly so he could watch the two interact more. Unlike what he expected, the two bickered around like they usually did, with Mina stealing some of Sehun’s food while Sehun yelling about how much more her portion has been than his and yet she still stole from his. He smirked, the action unnoticed by the two busy pair, but he still hid it away with a spoon full of cereal. 

After Mina finished her food — finally! — She wiped with a tissue and leaned over to quickly smack a kiss on Sehun’s cheek, rendering the two boys speechless. 

“Alright, I’ve relented.” She told him gently, after he have her a surprised look. “The food you make is also good; you should make more instead of nagging around for my cooking.”

“Well noted.” He sarcastically replied after an obvious clear of his throat, his eyes bored, but there was still something incredibly soft in his tone.

She shot him a smile, knowing that deep inside, despite not showing it; he wanted to give her a smile as well. She lifted herself up, waved a cheerful goodbye to Kai, and then walking towards the front door. As soon as Kai heard the door shutting closed; he gave Sehun a look which spoke volume in spite of Kai’s introverted nature. Sehun just blinked like a clueless idiot. 

“What?”

“Nothing,” Kai was smiling a little as he said that, almost victoriously, “Absolutely nothing.”

Sehun didn’t know what the heck that was about, but he might have a hint. He wasn’t a complete idiot, you see.

-

Mina was finished with university after a long and tedious day. She had four classes today, each one an hour long, which she didn’t really like that much because she was hardly stimulated but learned to get along with it. She practically had to drag her legs on the pavement as she walked out of her classes, waving a falsely cheerful goodbyes to all the good colleagues she acquainted herself with, hoping they wouldn’t see through her tired facade.

The walk towards her car felt monstrous, having some of the remaining drought from this morning still in her body, and she had an actual thought to call Sehun or Kai out of their class so they could drive the car for her and take her home; their classes be damned. However, she got herself a pleasant surprise in the form of a waiting Baekhyun outside her university, his head poking out from the window of the driver’s seat and lazily flickering his eyes here and there, searching for her familiar face amongst the strangers. His nose seemed to have picked her up when she was close enough, and his eyes went straight to her body, brown and inviting, having a glint to them that softened the bored look he had on. When he noticed her, his lips curled into a soft, tender look.

Her heart skipped a beat.

She walked towards him, watching him as he popped back inside the car, waiting patiently for her. She leaned against the window once she was relatively close and crossed her arms on the rims, so she could put her chin on them, eyeing him in the same tender puzzlement that his eyes were. 

“Is your presence outside my university grounds whenever I’m off duty going to be a permanent thing?” She , opening up in a smile, although softer than her usual ones. Baekhyun leaned towards her, their faces centimeters apart, and switched gears on the car.

“Get up, loser, I’m taking you for a date today.”

“Ah-huh,” she pulled herself off of the car to straighten, a look of calculating intelligence going on her face, “And did you and Jongdae talk about this? Like made mutual plans where you won’t attack each other?”

“We did,” he sighed; his mouth closing in into a pout, “But he threatened me with camping outside our apartment so he’d snatch you immediately if you stepped out of it even for a second when he knew I’ve planned a nice home date for us.”

“Aw, you, Byun Baekhyun, with a homey date?” She grinned, showing all of her teeth at him, looking nothing less than a predatory demon, “Get out!”

“I can be romantic and tender, too.” He continued to pout, sniffling to complete his pathetic act. 

“I know that, you baby,” she walked around the car to the passenger side and entered the car; he immediately switched gears to drive away. “You’re a softie from the inside. What did you plan for us, anyway? To sit in your room, cuddled together while watching movies and whispering compliments to the other like teenagers?”

His ears burned, his lips pursing into an annoyed sort of expression, his eyes suddenly avoiding hers. Mina’s whole face broke into a radiant smile, the beginning of a laugh bubbling in .

“No way!”

“Oh, shut up!” He exclaimed, his whole face going angry red like hers, but with harsh irritation instead of suppressed glee. He shot her a glare, but he really looked like a pouting child, “What’s so wrong about these domestically cute dates? What, you want me to take you to a club or something? So we’d both grind on strangers and hook them up? That’s your scene?”

“Hmm, I wouldn’t mind a club. It’s also your scene so it’s going to be a win-win situation—“

“Mina!” He exclaimed, cutting her off and sounding whiny. Mina laughed out loud, actual tears coming alive in the rims of her eyes. A second away and he’d smash the wheel with his hands like a deprived child.

“I’m just kidding! Gosh, I was teasing you,” she laughed more, pure mirth in her tone and her face. She tried to calm down, wrapping her arms around her stomach to make him believe she was enjoying this too much to be able to control it, “C’mon, Baek, I was really just messing with you. You don’t have to be so pouty.”

This made him purse his lips in a thin line to wipe this ‘pouty’ face she was talking about, staying silent and ignoring her, his eyes squinting at the road ahead of him. Noticing this, she took deep breaths in and stopped laughing, wiping at her face so it’d help her holding herself together. As strange as it was, squeezing her own cheeks, her whole face, and pressing her palms on her forehead, helped her reduce her roaring laughter. 

“Baek, you’re angry?” She asked him, peering down at him with genuine worry, hoping she hadn’t offended him. But from the look of it, she clearly did.

“Nope.” He still sounded angry, frustrated to a default, and she felt like a for upsetting him and laughing at him like a hyena. 

“Okay, I’m sorry, don’t be upset. I actually quite enjoy simply spending time together without all the fuzz of going out and stuff,” she murmured, “Hey, look at me,” she went forward and wrapped her palm around one of his arms, her eyes going comically wide at the feeling of his strong muscles. “Woah, Baek, have you been working out? You have some tight muscles going on here.”

His lips quirked up just the slightest. Boosting his confidence always won her over him, she knew this, and although she didn’t like using it against him, difficult times called for difficult measures. Knowing that some of his anger had been eased, she smiled herself, sniffling and twisting around her seat to look behind at the back seats.

“Is that food I’m smelling?”

“Yeah, Chinese food,” he replied, which she didn’t think he’d looking so red, but she was glad he was and didn’t point that out, “I brought your favorite, Shrimp with Vermicelli and Garlic and Dumplings, I also bought some snacks for you.”

She, ever so slowly, brought her eyes back on him, and they were twinkling in lively joy.

“Ooh, Baekie, you’re getting all out. I like it.”

He rolled his eyes fondly, taking a left. “Just sit tight, Mina, and wear your seatbelt. You’re not a damn wolf, woman. You’re fragile enough to be hit, so put the seatbelt on.”

“Oh, fragile, I’m fraaaaagile,” she giggled like a drunken old lady in a club, sitting on a twisted angle in her seat and wiggling like a worm, “I hate that word so much, like—“

“Shut up now, Mina,” he cut her off, his tone of voice low pitched and dangerous; serious, “I’m serious, put on your seatbelt.”

She shut up in a surprised puzzlement, and turned to look at him. He wasn’t looking at her, his face focused on the way across him, but his side profile looked sharp enough to cut someone, and her heartbeats began to race, not like they ever stopped pounding so harshly. She fixed herself in her seat, and quirked her lips upwards, “I like it when you get all bossy on me, Baekhyun.” She breathed out, putting on her seatbelt like he requested, or demanded.

He snorted, and when he turned to give her a mocking look, his eyes were prickling gold, like the color of an actual jar of fair honey, sitting upon transparent glass that reflected the whitest of lights from the morning sun. She breathed down harshly, her heart feeling rugged and heavy within her; she wasn’t the only one affected, “You have the weirdest of kinks, I swear.”

She winked at him cheekily, as if she didn’t see his reaction to her so clearly on his face, or as if she wasn’t just as damned as he was. Mina was good at this, pretending she wasn’t feelings things as twice as she was, “Don’t worry, you’re my favorite kink.”

He just chuckled, the sound small yet grating against her ears like a distant memory, going on a broken radio without repair. It was a good melody, anyway, one she wouldn’t mind sleeping and waking up on. 

-

“I’m surprised Jongdae actually got himself out of the apartment, knowing his possessive , you must have bribed him with something really good to make him agree on letting us off the hook.” She tittered, half trying to suppress her laughter because she didn’t want to upset him again by her apathetic , and half trying to show him she was just joking with him. She disposed of her sneakers and flaunted herself inside the apartment, throwing her bag on the couch in the open, branching living room and then turning around to watch him come in behind her. 

“Oh, he put on a fight, alright,” Baekhyun bitterly commented, his tone coming out dark and his face looking darker. He throw the keys of his car on the fish bowl on the table across her, heading for the kitchen. She followed, “I had to grovel down on my knees to make him agree without any interruption; but he expects the same attitude from me when it’s his turn.”

“Why do you guys fight about this too much anyway?” She clucked her tongue, twirling around the kitchen because there was a soothing lightness to her body, her soul, and she couldn’t keep herself from feeling lightweight because of it, “None of the others are acting upon their jealousy much like you es.”

He shrugged casually, placing the bags of food he was holding in his hands on the wide, spacious and glittery surface of the kitchen counter, “Jongdae and I are best buddies. We share a lot of in our lives, and we live together. We have a different bond than the bond we have with everyone else. Why do you think his bond with you was like a chain reaction to mine?”

“You’re right.” She nodded her head understandingly, watching him pull out wrapped boxes, plates, small appetizers and chip bags, sodas and crackers. It seemed like he had brought a lot of things for them, and his dedication for the date, for her bottomless pit stomach made her feel all tingly from inside. 

“We’re just showing our love and support like this, I guess.” He snorted in amusement.

She just chuckled, going to stand beside him and distributing the foods on the table with him, breaking open the boxes of food, putting them on plastic plates because the two of them were prone to accidents, especially when those accidents had glass plates and glass cups. She brought cups for the sodas and put them next to the food, thankful that she had worn jeans for uni today and not a skirt, because this date was already feeling quite comfortable, and she wanted to be in clothes that were comfortable, too. 

“What kind of a movie are we watching anyway?” She asked as she watched him fix their food with outmost care like the secret perfectionist that he was.

“I’d wanted you to choose, originally, but I actually want to watch the latest movie that came on Cinema. It’d be a nice change from your sappy chicklits.”

“Hey!” She did a whole gasp pretense, shooting him a look he smugly smiled at, “Don’t patronize my taste in movies! It’s not like boys have a right to that; all you ever want to see is stupid action movies.”

“Don’t stereotype!” It was his turn to gasp, looking at her with poorly concealed interest, eyes flickering with dazed honey and going back to dark brown, like he couldn’t control his emotions, “I actually happen to like well-plotted movies, regardless of the genres. I watched Gone Girl with you and it was ing awesome.”

“True,” she eased herself against the counter like flopped jelly, “But you gotta admit, Gone Girl is a whole genre of its own.”

“I was thinking of doing that, you know,” he started, popping a carrot pickle inside his mouth, “Watch a movie, laze around, and talk about our darkest secrets.” He gave her a teasing look at this, his lips lifting up in a dark smirk. She nudged his shoulder with hers playfully, and he broke into snickers. 

“You probably know all of my darkest secrets.”

“True, but you don’t know about mine