The first thing Renjun said to him as he emerged from the bathroom that morning, still towel drying his hair was not ‘good morning’ but “You really need to stop.”

Jaemin threw his towel onto the back of the couch and sighed. “Stop what?” he asked. His friend was wearing his ‘about to launch into a lecture’ face and Jaemin just didn’t have the time for it. He was already running late as it was.

“Well for one you need to stop treating the apartment like it’s one giant laundry basket.” Renjun said pointedly, his gaze going to the towel Jaemin had just abandoned on the back of the couch.

Jaemin sighed again and picked up the towel but he didn’t argue. He did have a habit of leaving his clothes where they dropped, whether that be on his bedroom floor, in a pile outside the shower or when he’d had a particularly long day and he was about to collapse from exhaustion, in a trail down the hall that ended at the foot of his bed and he knew it drove Renjun to distraction.

Renjun, somewhat pacified now the couch was towel free continued. “But more importantly you need to stop biting my head off every time I open my mouth. I know the last couple of weeks have been stressful for you but it’s getting old now.”

Yeah, Jaemin really didn’t have time for this at all. He’d already missed one bus that morning, he wasn’t about to miss another. “You’re imagining things.” He told his friend and he made his way across the room to grab his bag.

“So you snapping at me this morning when I came in to wake you up, even though I was doing you a favour because you’d slept through your alarm, that was all in my imagination? If I wanted to spend my time tip-toeing around because of somebody's mood swings I’d have moved back in with my aunt and cousins.”

Jaemin had heard the horror stories. Renjun had been between residences last year and his aunt and had let him stay with her while he looked for an apartment. His aunt had been recently made redundant from her job, his older cousin had been pregnant at the time and living back at home because her house being renovated and his younger cousin had just broken up with her boyfriend so it had not been the most stress-free experience for him. But while Jaemin didn’t appreciate the comparison being made, he wasn't that moody or dramatic thank you very much, he just didn’t have the energy to argue. “I woke up with a headache, I’m sorry.” He said in his defence instead hoping that would be the end of it. The headache was still with him even after his shower and the conversation he was having with Renjun was only making it worse. The sooner he got out of there the better.

Unfortunately for Jaemin that was not the end of it.

“That was your excuse on Monday when you had a temper tantrum because I bought the wrong choco pies.” Renjun reminded him.

Jaemin slung his bag over his shoulder, feeling his face redden. He’d had a pounding headache that day and on top of that he’d had lecture after lecture at school. Then he'd he'd received a message from Renjun to say he'd been grocery shopping. This had implied to Jaemin that there would be banana choco pies at home, and as childish as it might sound the promise of this had been enough to get him through the rest of the day. So when he’d finally made it home, opened the cupboard and found it filled with every flavour of choco pie under the sun other than banana he’d exploded. Thinking back on it now was making him feel embarrassed to say the least. “I already apologised for that.” He reminded Renjun, his eyes going to the floor.

This time it was Renjun’s turn to sigh, his expression softening. “I know you did. The point I’m trying to make is you’ve had a lot of those recently. Headaches I mean. And when you’re not about a headache you’re complaining that you’re exhausted. Isn’t that telling you something?”

Renjun sounded worried and it was making Jaemin feel guilty as well as embarrassed. So he hazarded a smile in an attempt to make him feel better. “It’s telling me I need to drink more water and go to bed an hour earlier. I’ll start working on it.”

It didn’t do much good, if anything Renjun looked more worried now than he had before. He probably shouldn’t have forced the smile Jaemin belatedly thought, Renjun had a nasty habit of seeing right through him. “Well what it’s telling me is that you’re over-working yourself and that you need to slow down before you make yourself ill.”

“I’m not over-working myself.” Jaemin assured him, the words sounding hollow even to his own ears because he had to admit that Renjun did have a point. What with school, volunteering with a local youth group at the weekends and working evenings at the bar in order to make some actual money, he’d been pretty busy lately. So yes, he was exhausted. But he didn’t want Renjun to worry about him. He could cope.

“Yes you are, and you’re going to end up with the flu or worse if you keep it up.” Renjun insisted, his frown deepening.

Jaemin looked up, intending to tell his friend not to be so overdramatic but before he could he caught sight of the clock on the wall. “I told you, I’m fine. Can I go now? I have class in half an hour.”

“Not without breakfast.” Renjun told him.

Jaemin ignored him, dropping the towel again and heading for the door.

“Hey you need to eat!” Renjun shouted after him.

“Who are you? My brother? I’ll grab some coffee when I get to school.” He still wasn’t fully awake yet, he could probably do with the caffeine.

Renjun snorted. “Coffee, right. Of course. Well if you end up passing out in class because you skipped breakfast don’t come running to me.”

---

Jaemin blinked bemusedly at the hand being waved in front of his face. “Uh… what?” he asked looking up at the person doing the waving.

Jeno, who was sitting opposite him at the lunch table, lowered his arm and shook his head. “I’ve been trying to get your attention for the last five minutes. What is with you today?”

“I’m not feeling too great.” Jaemin admitted. He hadn’t had time to stop for coffee before his lecture either so it was no surprise really that he was having trouble focussing, not when all he wanted to do was sleep for a week. It was a wonder he’d made it to lunch time at all.

Jeno considered this for a moment before nodding his head. “Yeah, you do look pretty terrible. What is it, a hangover?”

“I wish.” Jaemin said, a hand going up to rub at his temple. His headache was being annoyingly persistent today; it was enjoying messing with him too, fooling him into thinking it was gone then coming back worse each time. “I was working behind the bar last night, not sitting at it.” He explained when Jeno raised an eyebrow in doubt. The last time he’d had a hangover had been about a month ago. He’d been celebrating surviving his first full week back at school. He and Jeno were now in the final year of their teaching course and and they’d thought it was an achievement worth marking. It was something he’d ended up regretting. Why they’d thought it was a good idea to celebrate at his workplace he didn’t know. It had someh