Taemin is 19 when he met Minho; wonderful, handsome, incredibly out-of-his-league 26 year old Minho. They met during a meeting held by Lee Jinki, a well-known tourism activist Taemin knows and loves. He’s the youngest out of the group of 9 people, and was a little too rough around the edges compared to the older, more professional members of the group. Jinki assured him he’s fine, though. He told Taemin that he had, with the help of a supervising committee, handpicked each and every one of the 8 people who would eventually be the founding members of a new non-profit organization focusing on concerns of tourism development in the smaller towns of South Korea. Taemin had a hard time believing Jinki, because he knows Jinki thought too highly of him sometimes and it makes Taemin more than a little uncomfortable. Still, as he sat down on one of the chairs and returning the greetings from the other members, he felt his confidence surging up.

They talked, then, and talked, and talked, and talked, and before he realized it, the clock struck midnight and they had to bid each other goodbye. Taemin made a crack or two about the older guys and girls having to go to work tomorrow, they returned the jab with calling him a high-schooler, and it was, all in all, a very satisfying meeting. He was on his way out when Minho caught up with him, backpack slung over a shoulder and long legs striding effortlessly.

“You got a ride?” Minho had asked, falling into harmonious steps next to Taemin. He’s got his big, puffy, brown jacket on, hair mussed under the carelessly thrown-on hood. Taemin raised an eyebrow at him, smiling challengingly.

“If I say no, are you going to drive me home?” to his surprise, Minho had shrugged and jerked his head at the direction of his motorcycle. Taemin eyed the bike; it’s bigger than he would have liked, but the overall masculine vibe it gave off suited Minho well, he supposed. “Seriously?”

“Why not? It’s not like I have to take a detour,” Minho handed him the spare helmet he kept on his backpack and Taemin, more than a little surprised that Minho had apparently taken a liking on him enough to be this casual, took it. “Besides, I have an idea I wanted to spill to you.”

“Why didn’t you spill that before, then,” Taemin put the helmet on, secured it, and tried not to think too much about how good Minho smelt as he slung his leg over the bike and pressed himself close to Minho’s back. For a second, he wondered if he’s being too close or too clingy, but Minho didn’t say anything as he roared the machine to life, so Taemin figured he’s doing fine.

It took a while for Minho to answer. So long, actually, that Taemin thought Minho had decided to drop the subject. “Because I only just remembered,” he said, almost absently. The road is not exactly deserted, but it’s not as busy as it usually was. Taemin wondered what day it was. “’Sides, I wanted to talk about it with you, first.”

“Why?” Taemin asked, tightening his hold on the sides of Minho’s waist when he did a particularly sharp turn. Minho tilted his head to the side just a bit, pulling his mask down so Taemin could hear him better.

“Your mind works with mine the best.”

*

Taemin is 20 when Minho moved to Japan for a year. Their project had taken off so well that year. Their YouTube channel gained more than fifty thousand subscribers in the span of 6 months, and it definitely had a lot to do with Minho and Jonghyun’s state-of-the-art video editing skills. Taemin managed to reel in a surprising number of stakeholders to help fund their next projects, and Minho had called him one night, out of nowhere, just to tell him how crazy good Taemin was.

After that, midnight phonecalls became their thing. Taemin was busy with college and Minho busy with his work in Japan, but at the end of the day, they always make time to talk to each other. At first, it was about the projects; Taemin telling Minho every grand plan Jinki had wistfully spoke to him about and Minho telling Taemin ideas and sly negotiation techniques that could make those happen. After a few weeks, their conversation evolved into things that are more personal than Taemin thought possible.

The thing was, Taemin himself wasn’t quite sure just how close he was with Minho. He wasn’t sure if Minho ever really considered him friends, because, well, the age difference was pretty staggering, and besides, they only ever met each other during the meetings. Neither Taemin nor Minho had ever called each other up just to hang out, but then. Then Minho was talking Taemin’s ear off about the promotion he just got and the dilemma he had about whether he should stay in Japan for another year or return to Korea to open a business. Then Minho was talking about his mother’s concerns on him not having a partner. Then Minho was talking about how much he missed his father and how much he regretted not making him proud before he passed away.

The conversation flowed so easily and not once had either of them ever fall asleep on each other. They always hang up with laughter or with sleepy ‘goodnight’s or with a huff of amusement at the other’s very obvious tired yawn. Taemin couldn’t quite understand what was going on between them, but he enjoyed it.

Five months after they began their bi-weekly ritual, Taemin began dating Joon. Joon was three years older than him, a senior, and he was the absolute heartthrob of the campus. Taemin was a busy bee, but Joon was even busier; he’s in both the student council and in fraternity, and Taemin had no idea how he handled all that . Their dates were always short, often just shoving food next to each other during a 15 minute break between meetings. Taemin had enjoyed their interaction, but he had quickly grown tired of the public attention (he gained 400 new followers on Instagram within their first month of dating) and the constant demands from Joon to up the physical aspects of their relationship. After the fifteenth time Taemin told Joon that he was not ready to do anything physical, Joon had kissed him, forcefully, taking Taemin completely by surprised. Taemin had been so ing furious that he couldn’t do much of anything except shove Joon away and slammed the door in his face.

After that, things went downhill really fast.

By the time they reached the second month mark, Taemin decided he had had enough. He broke up with Joon.

The next night, while he was on the phone with Minho—and the fact that the weirdly intimate routine didn’t stop at all even when Taemin was dating someone made him realize that perhaps this was just… completely platonic; either that or Taemin is a cheater—he let it slip that he had broken it off with Joon. Minho had been quiet for three whole seconds before he let out an inelegant snort of laughter.

“Well,” he sounded like he was shaking his head. Taemin frowned, not appreciating being laughed at. “That was fast.” Their conversation had quickly taken a turn to Taemin digging about Minho’s love life, and by the time 2 AM rolled around, he was tired of grinning and his mind could barely come up with a proper insult to throw at Minho. Minho bid him goodnight and requested for Taemin to call him tomorrow morning to wake him up.

(And, to this day, Taemin still hadn’t told him how much it affected his hormone-addled brain to hear Minho’s rough, sleepy voice).

*

Taemin is 21 when Minho came back to Korea. They met at Jongin and Krystal’s wedding, and it was nothing special. Minho was busy with his camera the whole time, and Taemin was busy handling the gift registry, so they didn’t do much but greet each other. The casual way Minho acted made Taemin wonder if he even remembered their intimate midnight phonecalls at all, or if those were just something Minho liked to do, with a lot of people. He didn’t dare ask, though, because Minho didn’t bring any of those up, and he wasn’t acting any different.

After the wedding, they began to see each other a whole of a lot more. Minho told him of his decision; he had decided to stay and began a start-up in Seoul, so that he could stay with his mother and work on their organization. Taemin wanted to joke about how Minho could never be away from him for long anyway, but it seemed like overstepping their relationship. He still didn’t quite know where he stood in Minho’s life.

“I took some good pictures of you,” Minho had told him one day, pulling out his personal phone. Taemin was busy looking at the list of the potential members, trying to figure out which interviewer they belong to because there were just too many scribbles that were not his on the paper. Making some noncommittal noise, Taemin simply waited until Minho opened the picture and shoved his phone to Taemin’s face.

He was right. Those were some good- pictures. There were a lot of candid shots of Taemin at the wedding, obviously taken with care if the angle and the play of the light were anything to go by. Taemin wanted to ask if Minho took such gorgeous pictures of other people, too, but, again, he couldn’t bring himself to do that.

So he simply asked Minho to send the pictures over to his e-mail. When he finally uploaded it to his Instagram, Minho had left a winky face in the comment section, but no elaboration whatsoever. Taemin didn’t bother reading too deep into it.

*

Summer break came up on Taemin like the sun after a storm, but he quickly realized that the sun was too hot and the air too suffocating, so that , too. He was off-duty on two of the in-campus organization he’s leading, but the Generation IYK projects were going strong, so he barely had time to rest at all. Still, he got to see a lot of Minho, so that was… good, he supposed.

Even with the high intensity and frequency of their interactions, Taemin and Minho still never hang out together. Taemin thought about asking Minho out every now and then when he was especially fed-up, but the more he thought about it, the worse that idea became to him. He didn’t want Minho to think that Taemin’s advancing on him. He didn’t want Minho to think that Taemin thought there was something more between them, because Taemin knew, perfectly well, that there weren’t anything going on.

Besides, he’d rather have Minho as a friend and a brother than nothing at all. It was a risk he’s not ready to take.

So they continued their routine, driving back and forth to one place to another, meeting important people after important people, always with Taemin tagging along with Minho. Sometimes they’d take the car, occasionally th