“i can’t believe it’s already july,” jinwoo yawns, the front door falling shut behind them as he toes off his shoes, and makes a beeline for the couch. it’s 1am and dark, and he squints at the cushions to make sure he’s not going to end up sitting on any cats before he lets himself collapse on the sofa.

“half the year is gone,” mino says, dropping his bag on the floor and pressing himself up against jinwoo on the couch.

thunder rumbles in the far distance, and jinwoo stretches over the back of the couch to look out the balcony at the lightning cracking across the night sky.

“and the rainy season is coming,” he says. “all that rain.”

“a storm, maybe,” mino murmurs from where he’s slouched into the sofa, so quietly that jinwoo has to strain to hear him. “that’s what you are, to me.”

“a what?”

“a storm. a thunderstorm.” mino’s eyes are bright in the darkness—he shifts and puts an arm around jinwoo’s shoulder, and jinwoo leans into the touch.

“that’s what i am?”

“not the terrible ones you always hear about in the news that wreak all sorts of damage and kill people elsewhere, though,” mino says, and it’s so dark that they can barely make out each other’s faces, but jinwoo knows him so well that just from mino’s tone of voice he can almost imagine the small frown creasing mino’s eyebrows. “i mean the ones that come and plow through seoul when summer comes, during the rainy season. with thunder and lightning and so much rain.”

“why am i a summer thunderstorm?” jinwoo asks.

“you know the kind where one moment it’s dry, and three seconds later it’s pouring like .”

“how is that a good thin-" jinwoo tries, but mino ignores him and ploughs on.

“the kinds where the rain pours so bad you can barely see ten feet ahead of you, when you’re driving out on the roads. and you know it’s that time of the year when everybody starts wearing out their rain boots.”

jinwoo gives up, turns his head in to press his lips to the warm and dry skin of mino’s neck.

“you know how we sleep best, though, safe and warm in bed when it’s storming outside, and maybe that’s what you make me feel.

and perhaps also when i first realised i liked you it felt like the madness of stepping out into one of those july thunderstorms—knowing you’ll get rained on, where umbrellas are useless because you’ll still get wet anyway.

it’s not the regular rain showers you get occasionally, it was the madness and intensity of the july thunderstorms and it's been awhile but i knew it was coming, i knew it as sure as i knew the rainy season would be coming in july.

i think from the first time we met i knew i would like you, inevitable as the july thunderstorms.”

jinwoo doesn’t know what he's doing—it almost feels as if he's watching from outside his own body as he reaches a hand up to curl his fingers into the hair at the back of mino’s neck, pulling his mouth down to his own, kissing him so roughly he knows their lips will bruise later. he’s jerked, almost harshly, back into his own body by the wave of sensation hitting him as mino groans into his mouth, gives back as good as he’s got, fingers digging bruises of their own into his hips.

he's never done this before, and neither has mino, he thinks, but when he's got mino bare and pressed into the cushions of the couch he murmurs into the shell of mino's ear, will you let me you, feels his response in the jump of mino's against his thigh, hears it in the choked moan right in his own ear.

the want surfaces from the lock and key he'd been keeping it under, the way he represses so many other things he leaves unsaid. mino has had the key all this while, he realises.

he vaguely wonders when he gave it over, through the haze clouding his mind as mino wraps shaky hands aorund his . he doesn’t know what he’s doing—story of his life, he manages to think, but his brain is interrupted by mino taking him into his mouth, and he lets his body and the fire under his skin take over.

they’re lying all ed out, later, sprawled hot and sticky and over each other on the couch, and a particularly large clap of thunder sounds. jinwoo buries his face in mino’s throat and mino chuckles softly, raising a hand to card through jinwoo’s hair.

“i wasn’t done talking, by the way,” he says. “you interrupted me.”

“you were the one who said a summer storm comes around in three seconds. i’m unpredictable.”

“so i did,” mino murmurs, the ghost of a laugh echoing in his chest, and he presses a kiss to the top of jinwoo’s head.

“storms aren’t easy to love, though,” jinwoo mumbles.

“i don’t love you,” mino tells him, and jinwoo slaps him on the chest in retaliation, and mino’s full-bodied laughter rumbles through both their bodies this time, and he pulls jinwoo tighter to himself.

“it’s still too soon—i don’t love you, not yet, but i know i will, if i let myself. i will be crazy in love with you someday.”

“you must be mad, letting yourself love a storm.” jinwoo’s voice does not tremble. it does not. ”not everybody can love a storm like me.”

he knows mino will know what he’s talking about. he knows mino knows, even if he has never told a soul, because he doesn’t know how to put his feelings into words. the occasional bouts of crippling insecurity, the fear that he’s not doing well enough, the tears that sometimes come alone at night without reason.

“not everybody, but i will be that somebody, someday,” mino says, and the constant slide of his fingers through jinwoo’s hair is so reassuring, even though jinwoo knows his hair is probably really gross right now, damp with sweat and clumpy with hairspray.

“when that day comes, i will love you back with all the power of a thunderstorm,” he murmurs into mino’s collarbone, so quietly he doesn’t know if he actually intends for mino to hear, but mino’s arm tightens around him.