“What?”

“I got it, look!” Taemin said as he, very nonchalantly, showed Minho his arm and his thighs, both adorned with small red dots. Anyone who saw his body would assume he had gotten measles, but this was not the case; it was not just that. Taemin kept looking at them, zooming in and out the facetime app to emphasize that he got it. His cheery tone did not go unnoticed by Minho.

“And is this excitement I hear?” Minho asked, confused. Taemin’s shrug did not surprise him, but it did worry him a little bit. Getting “it” is not something to be excited about. Nobody was excited about that.

“I mean, everyone’s got it, except me. Even you got it.” Taemin said, his facetime screen moving a whole lot as he tried to prop the phone in a way he’s visible and won’t need to hold it. It failed a few times, but at the end the phone stayed still. The image wasn’t as close as before, but when Minho saw Taemin writing, he remembered they are on finals week. They’re not even supposed to be facetiming at all.

“Yeah, and you saw how that worked for me.” Minho said, standing up from his bed. Taemin’s eyes went back on him for a few seconds, seeing how Minho walked around his apartment and ended up on his desk – he definitely forgot that he, too, had studying to do. “I could barely stand up.” Minho remembers. It was a hell-week, that’s his only way to describe it.

Their country has been going through a small epidemy. There was a new virus going around that was transmitted by a mosquito bite. It wasn’t contagious from people to people, but if a mosquito bit an infected person, that mosquito will turn into a carrier of the virus and can infect others as well. The symptoms are high fevers, intense joint pain, headaches, muscular pain and measles. What is funny is that there’s no medicine to treat the virus, there is only medicines to try to reduce the symptoms. The people who get it are stuck with the virus for approximately a week, and then it should decrease until it completely disappears on its own.

Minho got it a few weeks ago, and he’s still recovering from the aftermath of it. He just started training with his team again, and his body doesn’t feel the same yet. Taemin saw all of it; how it slowed down his family members, how it took down Minho and half of his track team, how it took his own choir mates to bedrest and yet, he wanted to have that. He was incredulous. He didn’t believe his older brother when he couldn’t get out of bed --Taemin believed Minho just a tiny bit-- but overall, he was curious. He wanted to see it and feel it firsthand.

“Bring it on. And besides, you are like a baby when you get sick, so that doesn’t count.” Taemin mumbled the last part, but not enough for Minho not to hear –deep down Taemin wanted Minho to hear how much of a crybaby he is when sick. Minho only glared at him, and Taemin gave him his best smile in return.

“You won’t be this happy tomorrow. You don’t have a fever yet?” Minho asked. From where Taemin’s phone was situated, he could see most of the right side of his face and torso, and even with the bad lighting, Minho could see more red spots around Taemin’s neck and collarbone. He must be covered in them.

“Not yet. I feel great, actually.” Taemin sing-songed, bobbing his head along the music that was playing somewhere in his room. “I’ll call you later, I’ve been bullting this paper this whole time.”

“Curiosity killed the cat, babe.” Minho said, teasing Taemin’s curious nature, and laughed when all he got was an eyeroll and Taemin’s tired eyes glaring at him.

“Shut up.”

-

The next morning, Taemin woke up feeling odd – not bad, just odd. When he looked at himself in the mirror, he noticed the red spots were still there. They weren’t many, but a lot of parts of his body had a few scattered around; his neck, his arms, his thighs, even his tummy had some. It reminded him of when Minho got it, he looked like a he was bitten by multiple ants – or in this case, mosquitoes.

Going downstairs wasn’t painful, per se. It felt like those days he was bored and decided to join Minho in his training - that discomfort he usually feels the next day its what he feels now. It’s not terrible.

At university, things started to get a little bit worse. He didn’t have a fever at home, now though…

“You got a fever.” Minho said after their good morning kiss and hug. His arm went around Taemin’s neck as they walked, and he could feel the unusual warmth of his skin.

The smug look on his face made Taemin hit him on the chest, as if he didn’t know it already.

“I just got it, but I’m good.” Taemin said as he hugged Minho’s waist and walked together to the only class they shared. He was starting to feel tired, but he wouldn’t dare to say that aloud. He’d just cling to Minho with the excuse of wanting attention, which is never a lie.

He fell asleep during class, and Minho ended up taking notes for him. But Taemin just shrugged it off saying he stayed up too late studying, since he lost precious time when he facetimed Minho.

-

During the next class, Taemin started to notice that his shoulder hurt, and it hurt a lot. He had stretched his arm to take some papers a classmate was passing him from the seat in front of him, and the shock of pain that went through his entire arm and concentrated on his shoulder was no joke. And soon, as the day progressed, that pain progressed too.

And it multiplied, and it spread, and it never left.

He was late for the classes that followed, and everyone that even grazed him would get frightened by the fever that was attacking his body. This virus was no joke, and it was eating Taemin from the inside-out.

“Babe, what are you doing?” Minho asked. He had finished his last class of the day, and he was taking a short-cut through some of the building’s hallways to get to his car without having to be exposed to the heat when he found Taemin. He was leaning onto the wall, seemingly asleep. But that didn’