Days passed since Hyunjin and Yohan restarted their friendship and as time passed Hyunjin got closer to Jisung as well, he couldn’t be happier he made friends for the first time since middle school and although he really liked it he still found it hard to hide his feelings for Yohan.

They just made up and he really didn’t want to ruin it all by confessing, so he tried really hard to act just as a friend so he wouldn’t make Yohan uncomfortable but what he didn’t realize was that he was being really distant from everyone the more he tried to hide it. 

With his dance performance coming up Hyunjin had the perfect excuse to distance himself a little, because he was busy with the practice for the swim team and then for his dance performance as well, he got really close with Felix and a senior in his class named Minho, mainly because they shared similar practice times and sometimes stayed behind to help one another out.

But what Hyunjin didn’t expect was getting a call from Jisung mid practice.

“Hyunjin! Yohan won’t be at school for a bit, he got really sick the other day, Mr. Kang said he is keeping him at home and their neighbors are checking in on him” Jisung told him, Jisung was quite calm about it almost as if it was something normal but for Hyunjin he wasn’t as calm.

He knew Yohan for a long time, the boy never got sick, he never missed school even if he did get sick, so he couldn’t help but worry.

“Ah I see, can you ask Coach to wait for me? I want to go check up on him, but I don’t know where they live” 

“Sure, you just need to hurry up since practice is almost over,” Jisung told him, he hummed and soon hung up.

“Guy’s I can’t stay, Yohan’s sick so I’m going to take care of him,” Hyunjin said to Felix and Minho.

“Sure go ahead lover boy,” Minho told him with a smug look.

“Hyung you can’t talk, you panicked when you went on your blind date with Jisung and now you’re too scared to go up to him and talk so you just talk to him through messages,” Felix told him causing Hyunjin to laugh, he still remembered Jisung pouting for days on end about that.

Hyunjin collected his things as quickly as he possibly could and bid his goodbyes before rushing out of the dance room towards the swimming pool. When he got there he saw that everyone already left and that Coach Kang was waiting patiently for him.

“Thank you for waiting Coach,” He said with a big smile, the older man smiled with a small nod, “no problem Hyunjin, let’s get going shall we?” Hyunjin nodded and followed him.

When they arrived at Yohan’s place they saw someone sitting outside their house.

“Ah, Mr. Kang,” the young boy said.

“Thank you for taking care of Yohan, Jeongin,” he said to the younger boy who happily nodded.

“Yohan hyung took care of me so many times it feels nice to help out” 

Hyunjin didn’t know why but he felt a pang of jealousy, the boy looked so fond whenever he spoke of Yohan, or even with his name just being mentioned it made him feel like the boy might just have a crush on Yohan and he didn’t like it at all.

“Oh Innie this is Hyunjin, he will take care of Yohan for a bit” Jeongin smiled happily at Hyunjin.

“Ah, so this is Hyunjin hyung? Yohan hyung mentioned him earlier, Hyunjin looked at him a little surprised, he felt his face heating up.

“Aww look he’s blushing,” Mr. Kang said and Jeongin laughed.

They bid one another goodbye and headed in.

“I’ll go get you some clothes from Yohan’s closet then you can go take a shower and change into something more comfortable,” Mr. Kang said and Hyunjin nodded, he waited a bit, and when Mr. Kang brought him clothes and a towel he went to wash up.

He changed his clothes once he was done and left the bathroom, he walked around a bit trying to find the coach, who he eventually found in the kitchen busy making dinner.

“I’m almost done with Yohan’s food, I placed some medicine on the tray over there with some water, once this is done can you take it to him? I will prepare us food once I’m done with these” he said and Hyunjin happily agreed.

After a bit, Mr. Kang dished up Yohan’s food and added it to the tray and Hyunjin took it to Yohan’s room, he opened the door carefully and found the boy sleeping peacefully in his bed, he smiled a little and took the tray over to the boy, he placed it on the nightstand and shook the boy awake.

“Yo you need to eat and take your medicine,” Hyunjin said softly and Yohan groggily agreed.

The boy slowly sat up and looked around as he let out a yawn out.

“Cute” Hyunjin said as he watched the boy.

He handed the boy the bowl and waited for him to eat.

“Why are you here?” Yohan asked looking at Hyunjin curiously.

“Well you’re sick and you never missed school because you got sick so it must really be bad” Hyunjin said to him.

“But you didn’t even speak to me for like the past two weeks? Why do you care now?”  Yohan told the boy, Hyunjin could tell he was annoyed with him.

“Uh about that… I had my reasons”

“I guess we really spent too much time apart, there is no way for our friendship to happen,” Yohan said softly with a small pout, Hyunjin felt guilty, he was the one who wanted to make up but instead he was only messing up everything because he was scared.

“I’m just really stressed with the dance performance. I feel like I can’t catch up with anyone,” Hyunjin said, it wasn’t a complete lie but it wasn’t the complete truth either. 

“But your training with Felix and Minho now right?” 

“Yeah but… I shut people out easily and sometimes it is really hard to be around them”

“Jinnie” Yohan said softly and took the boy’s hand.

“It’s okay don’t worry about it, sorry for being distant lately I promise I will be better soon,” Hyunjin said with a smile, Yohan looked at him for a bit, ‘Ah this kid still can’t hide his sadness well, your smile is too fake Hyunnie’ Yohan thought to himself.

“You better be” 

“Finish eating so you can take your medicine and get rest,” Hyunjin said, changing the topic, Yohan nodded and finished the food, he took his medicine and went back to sleep.

Hyunjin took out the tray and ate with Coach Kang before taking his backpack and going back to Yohan’s room and studied a little before moving to Yohan’s bed, he sat there and watched the boy for a bit.

He reached forward and played with the boy’s hair, “Ah you make it hard to stay away” Hyunjin said softly, but it still woke up Yohan, but he continued acting like he was asleep, hoping that Hyunjin was finally going to open up to him.

“Sorry Yo, I am really trying but my heart won’t listen to me, it won’t let me see you as just a friend and it is really hard sometimes, I get jealous of Jisung sometimes even though I know you two are just friends, and then there’s Chan hyung, you two got close really fast lately… and even Jeongin, I just met him but I got jealous,” Hyunjin said.

“You know, I realized I loved you when I got into high school and started to understand myself more, but you were already long gone and then when we met again that day in the swim team I was really happy but you didn’t want anything to do with me, somehow I understood it, I caused you a lot of pain and you had to suffer so much but my heart really broke when you told me to stay away from you and now the only thing I can do is staying away from you because the more time I spend with you the more I fall in love with you and it’s getting harder to hide” 

It took everything in Yohan to keep acting, he could hear how hurt Hyunjin was from the way he spoke, the boy’s voice would crack every now and then as he spoke, he let everything out and Yohan felt a little dumbfounded… Hyunjin liking him? He never thought about that, but then he also had a crush on Hyunjin when they were kids, during that project he had a really big crush on Hyunjin, that’s why he told the boy in the first place that he was gay, he wanted it to be out in the open so that the boy knew and that it wouldn’t come as a surprise if he did confess one day.

But hearing that Hyunjin liked him now and that the boy liked him that much was surprising, but he couldn’t help but want to smile as his face heated up more and more, he felt his heartbeat increase and he wondered what Hyunjin would do if he kissed him right now, but then again Hyunjin only opened up about all this because he was asleep so it would be better to stay like this right?

Just as he was giving up Hyunjin leaned forward and placed a small kiss on his temple.

“I will return to your side soon, as a friend who has no feelings for you, or at least when I know I can hide them better,” Hyunjin said softly.

Yohan wanted to tell him not to do that but he couldn’t get his body to move at all, he cursed the fever that was making it hard to react to anything.