Always Sunshine

He was late.

He was late and tired, he realized while watching Minho sneaking into the class. Minho waved at him with a weary smile, exhaustion emphasizing the black shadows under his eyes.

Minho sat next to him with a heavy sigh, hands covering his face, head banging against the desk, ignoring the reproving look of their teacher, who was trying to explain some useless stuff.

Minho’s hands and clothes were stained with an impossible explosion of hues. The fingers that were holding a pen were blue, and his cheeks were a disappointing shade of yellow. Overall, Seungyoon noticed that he was high on caffeine and on too little rest.

It so happened that Jhonny had decided to contribute to Minho’s art project last night, the one that was due the next day and that he kept postponing, the one that would grant him a pass for the rest of the semester, the one he has been working on for weeks with no success. In the middle of the night, a bolt of inspiration hit him, but his beloved cat left a trail of colourful paw prints on his canvas, ruining his masterpiece.

Whenever Minho lacked sleep, he was grumpy, and today was no exception; he was cranky, cross, and chatty, grumbling to his friend about his unfortunate day. He complained about everything during class, annoying the always responsible Seungyoon, interrupting his attempts to catch up on the lecture or scrabbling at his papers with sleepy eyes.

It was when Minho was half-sleeping, laying flat on the desk, drooling on his notes, and snoring over the teacher’s words that Seungyoon noticed it. It was on Minho’s collar bones, a little doodle inked in black, something small that looked like storm clouds on a raging sky. Seungyoon peeked at it with curiosity, thinking it was strange, but then Minho might have done it himself or maybe it was just a shadow or a spot – after all he was covered in acrylic paint. He will ask him about it later if he remembers, Seungyoon told himself, shrugging his shoulders. In the end, it was nothing. He smiled fondly at his friend just before smacking his nape to wake him up.

Like the good friend that Seungyoon was, he did his best to not dwell on Minho’s bad mood and decided to treat him to lunch when their class was over. Food can brighten up Minho’s hard day – as he told Seungyoon, he had to deal with Professor Choi Seunghyun’s snarls because he was expecting his piece to be much better and, therefore, he will have to take the finals like everybody else. He had all the right to be mad and frustrated and moody.

Seungyoon’s lunch offer did its work and Minho was now sitting in the cafeteria, grinning at his plate of steaming noodles.

He looked up, and suddenly, all the weariness, all the tiredness in his face dissipated. He stared, his mouth falling open in awe, and when Seungyoon followed his glance, he understood.

Minho was a er for pretty people but the boy at the end of the queue was more than pretty. He was far from regular prettiness - he was art, like a Renaissance angel, like a Botticelli painting. All his features were alive, gleaming; eyes sparkling, soft and tender and perfect. Minho’s heart pounded hard, his breath was taken away, his pupils drawn to him like magnets.

Minho was doomed, Seungyoon knew, smiling at the situation. Minho was all heart eyes for the man who was totally unaware of eyes following him, all innocent and naive. Minho was doomed and so was he, because Jinwoo finally looked around and found him, and now he was waving at him, beaming.

“Who is he?” They were walking back to classes and Minho couldn’t keep his mouth shut. “Are you going to introduce me to him?” He could sense sparks igniting in his voice at the prospect of a meeting, but Seungyoon wasn’t keen on it. Jinwoo was quiet and shy, the total opposite of Minho; there was no way they would click, get along or be friends. It wasn’t even worth trying, not even if that meant watching Minho embarrassing himself.

Back home, Seungyoon swore that the little spot on Minho’s neck has now taken on a different form; from afar it looked like a smiling sun. He rubbed his eyes, blinked at the light tiredly, and went to bed.

Seungyoon was finishing his breakfast when Minho appeared, dripping from the shower. He plopped onto the stool next to him, grinning with his eyes still filled with sleep. He looked fresh but deathly exhausted from another night in his art studio, working. The smiling was out of place until he started to talk about Jinwoo and it all made sense.

The spot on his neck was still there, Seungyoon noticed. It was odd since Minho had clearly washed. And, under the dim light of the late morning, the figure that before seemed a sun now appeared like a cloud. He squinted and turned his head around, watching it intently to the point that even Minho, who was deep into praising Jinwoo, noticed.

“Did you get a new tattoo, Minho?” he asked in answer to Minho’s curious gaze wondering what he was looking at. Minho shook his head, raising a brow. “Then, are you doodling on yourself again?” It wouldn’t be the first time that Minho had used his own body as a sketchpad, and it would explain the changing shapes of the spot. But Minho denied it again.

“It must be some paint. That sticks onto you like a second skin,” he explained, not caring. Seungyoon his thumb and rubbed Minho’s skin until it was red but the stain remained.

“What the hell?” Minho looked down, seeing the spot for the first time. The reflection on the mirror confirmed what Seungyoon said. He tried scrubbing it with a soaked cotton pad but nothing happened. It was still there.

Unlike Seungyoon, Minho quickly forgot, not caring about the strange mark branding his skin and that changed under mysterious circumstances. There had to be a meaning, and Seungyoon, stubborn as he was, would do anything to find out.

The little tattoo changes according to Minho’s moods, Seungyoon would find out a month later. It’s a cloud when he is feeling blue or tired. It’s stormy when he is mad. A sun when he is happy, and snowy when he is indifferent, feeling cold inside. And it’s always sunshine when Jinwoo is around. He’d been forced, obligated, to introduce them because Minho didn’t stop ranting, nagging and begging.

Against all odds, Jinwoo clings onto Minho unexpectedly after their first meeting. Jinwoo laughs at everything Minho says, he lets Minho hold his hands and listens to him talking about anything, giving him his full attention, ignoring his old friend in order to uplift Minho’s spirits, the little sun always embroidered on his collar. With Minho, Jinwoo isn’t quiet but a ball of laughs, hitting Minho’s arms joyfully, smashing Minho’s heart with his bright smile.

And Minho has a massive, whopping crush on him. So big, it was incredible that he could hide it from Jinwoo.

It’s not that Seungyoon is jealous of Minho, but he finds it curious how easily their relationship is going, how smoothly they get along, how simple it is for them to forget that he is also around. In a month, Minho has become Jinwoo’s best friend – much to his dismay, since friendship is not exactly what he wants.

Seungyoon was meditating about their dynamics when it hit him like lightning. What if they were soulmates and the symbols on Minho’s chest are the signs? Things like these happen all the time: red strings around the middle fingers, prophetic dreams about your counterpart… He has heard of them before, he has met soulmate pairings before. But Jinwoo’s skin was clean, only tiny freckles covering his paleness. He has showered with him enough times after their dance practices to know. That had to be it. Soulmate sounded like the perfect explanation. It fit as perfectly as Jinwoo fits inside Minho’s heart, a match handmade by Seungyoon who never thought they could be so good together even as friends.

And no, it isn’t friendship. Not if Seungyoon believes what he can hear between the lines whenever Jinwoo talks about Minho; the way he speaks about him is filled with emotions, sparkles and honour. It’s more than what it seems. It’s deeper than the sea even though he can’t grasp the full meaning of it yet.

It’s been four months since he first introduced them and he is sure that Jinwoo is in love, too. He has become Minho’s official inspiration and muse, and Minho is always there to cheer him, to watch all his plays. He is always there as his number one fan, bringing him flowers and all. And there is something adorable in the way Jinwoo’s cheeks flush pink, or how his eyes linger on Minho, following him with dragonflies and fireflies swirling in. It is beautiful to see it growing, to witness the way they are weird and obvious.

“Minho, you should confess.” Seungyoon sits next to his friend on their couch, looking at his shape-changing tattoo transforming from sunshine to a cloud. He is unsure, nervous.

“He will reject me, I know. There is no point,” he replies, in a foggy voice. But Seungyoon knows better, he knows them both and their feelings aren’t a secret – they are so clear like the summer sky, a perfect shade of blue.

“You can’t know that,” he says, grinning. Of course, Minho doesn’t know. He is too focused on his own feelings to realize Jinwoo’s. “I think he might be your soulmate”, Seungyoon explains, pointing at his neck, his finger caressing the magical ink on his flesh.

Minho’s eyes open fully in awe.

“Does he have one, too?” There is wonder and expectation and anxiety. Seungyoon feels it is unfair to burst the bubble of Minho’s instant fantasy.

“No, but I’m sure it appeared the day you first meet him,” he says. “And it’s always sunshine when he is with you. It is always sunshine for a reason. Tell him or kiss him. Just do something. It’s becoming annoying to see you two dancing around each other.”

It takes Minho another week to conjure up his courage – not that he has much, to begin with. His tattoo is now showing a clear sun even though he is feeling rather tempestuous, his heartbeat raging. Jinwoo is looking at him radiantly, with all his attention and care, softly. Minho can’t think, Jinwoo’s smile is capable of deleting what’s on his mind, of emptying his chest of everything but the love that he has for him – like flowers withering, the only one standing is him.

“Hyung, do you know that it’s always sunshine with you?” His voice is shaking but Jinwoo laughs gently, brushing the fear off his face, his eyes gleaming like starlight. Jinwoo looks at him, puzzled, not understanding a thing but still curious about what he is thinking.

“But yesterday we were together and it was raining,” he says, all innocent, all oblivious.

“This,” Minho says, pointing at his heart. “It beats for you, it draws on me because of you.” He holds Jinwoo’s hands and traces the outline of the sun-shaped doodle with his fingers. It feels warm under his touch, like millions of butterflies caressing his chest, hovering over his flesh. It’s beautiful. It feels like magic.

It has to be magic, he thinks when the ink starts dissipating as Jinwoo’s fingertips touch it, erasing all the odd traces out of his system, out of his life. Jinwoo stares at it marvelling, watching the black ink dissolving into his veins, seeping into his blood that is running dark with all the paint that lived in Minho and that now belongs to Jinwoo.

It is magical, the way Jinwoo pulls him in, the way his lips find his own, the way he tastes like spring, like fireworks.

When they break apart, gasping for air, the little sun has faded away, replaced by Jinwoo’s name embossed on his chest, beating like a new star on a far-away constellation.