Seungri decided to resume sulking around his house after what had happened with Youngbae. He spent the remainder of the morning in his room listening to songs that appealed to the most dramatic parts of him while consuming copious amount of junk food, junk food he would wear, his mother reminded him. When his sister got home he continued to torment her as big brothers should, refusing to leave her room and tossing her stuffed animals around.
            “Ugh, stop it. Get out.” She began pushing against his body, her voice straining with her futile attempts.            
            “I’m depressed. How can you reject your depressed oppa?”
            “Go do something. Get out of the house. Or go exercise your fat.”
            “I don’t have any fat,” Seungri said, his tone legitimately hurt.
            “You’re getting there.” His sister gave up, flopping on her bed.
            Seungri sat on the floor. He didn’t want to be out of the house, but he didn’t want to stay in either. Ugh, he had been a jerk, really. He didn’t even know what he was doing. He didn’t know how he felt. He hadn’t seen Seunghyun since the performances, and he didn’t know how he’d feel when he saw the older boy again. Would his heart start beating faster, like it usually did, or was that something only Youngbae made it do now? Part of him wanted to sulk about Seunghyun, about the fact that him and Jiyong were probably together at that very moment, but somehow it had all moved to the back of his mind. He felt fickle and superficial. Superficial he could deal with, but fickle, he didn’t like that being on his record.
            He heard a pebble hit the room’s window. She sat up suddenly.
            “Omo!” she gasped.
            “Is that your boyfriend?” Seungri looked to his sister frowning.
            “No. What do you think, I hang out with hooligans?”
            The older brother in him kicked in as another pebble hit, and he rushed to the window, ready to scare off any boy trying to talk up his darling dongsaeng. He looked for some snotty nosed middle school kid in his yard, but instead he saw a tall, familiar figure. He sighed, exasperated.
            “Seungri, come here,” Seunghyun called.
            “Why wouldn’t you just message me?”
            Seunghyun looked around as if thinking about it, and then the reason occurred to him, “I don’t have a phone.”
            Of course he doesn't have a phone. Of course. It was as though Seunghyun needed to be difficult to deal with.
            “This isn’t my room,” Seungri called down, cross with his hyung.
            “But I got a hold of you,” Seunghyun said, smiling. “Hurry.”
            Seungri closed the window. His hyung’s smile was something he couldn’t say no to, so he started to rush out of the room and down the stairs.
            “Hey! You’re just going to leave?” his sister called after him.
            “I thought you wanted me to like three minutes ago.” Seungri yelled back as he put on his shoes and grabbed a fitted cap.
            “Yeah, but-“ his sister started before realizing her oppa had already run out.
 
           
            Seungri walked alongside Seunghyun, trying to match his steps with his hyung’s long strides.
            “Why would we go to the festival?” he asked, vexed.
            “I thought you’d want to see the fireworks show.”
            “Why would I want to see that?”
            Seunghyun sighed as though frustrated with Seungri. “Youngbae’s class did the show. It’s a light show that ends in fireworks. They strung yards and yards of it all week.”
            “Why would I care about what Youngbae’s class did?” Seungri said, scoffing, although on the inside his curiosity had been peaked. How did Youngbae find the time? Seungri found himself worrying, and shook his head. “Hyung, what did you do for the festival?” He asked.
            “Converted my patent into a compatibility crossword.”
            “What?” Seungri said, wondering how his answer couldn’t be any less mundane.
            “I patented a design for a blank crossword. As long as you answer within the amount of spaces, no matter what word you choose, there’s a eighty-six percent chance everything will fit,” Seunghyun explained. Seungri expected the words to be accompanied with a smug smile or a boastful grin, but Seunghyun displayed neither and merely put his hands in his pockets before adding, “If it’s in English anyway.”
            “Why’d you do that?” Seungri asked, readying himself for an answer with words too complicated to understand.
            “I was bored,” Seunghyun shrugged. “The class remembered it and converted it into this compatibility thing. You take it with someone and if it works, you’re said to be compatible. It fits into the literacy thing, since most of my class are literature majors… and there’s the push in our class for English comprehension.”
            “English what?”
            “Never mind.” Seunghyun sighed and kicked a lump of snow that still remained despite most of it melting that morning. “Jiyong told me you were with Youngbae,” Seunghyun said after a while, catching Seungri by surprise. He was obviously going to continue before Seungri interrupted, but the younger boy didn’t care, upset that Jiyong would say something completely ungrounded.
            “When? How? Well, I’m not. I’m tragically single so I don’t even know where he got that from,” Seungri crossed his arms as he spoke, outdone with frustration.
            “You know, he didn’t want me to take you. Jiyong. He wanted to go instead. Here, I mean, to the festival. I think he’s jealous.” Seunghyun looked up at the trees hanging above him. He took a deep breath before stopping completely and walking off to the side. It was awkward, his choice to sit down on the sidewalk. Seungri reluctantly followed suit, wondering what had come over him but too curious not to just watch him. “You know Youngbae used to say the three of us were like a tree,” Seunghyun started, “I was the roots- No. No, Jiyong was. The common thing that held us together, that rooted us in one spot. I was the trunk. I kept us strong. The most even tempered, which wasn’t saying much at the time, really, and Youngbae…” Seunghyun's voice trailed off for a minute. “Youngbae was the branches. He would protect us and keep the shade, slow down the rain, whatever we needed. If we were unhealthy, he would be unhealthy too. If we were dying, he’d be dying too.” Seunghyun stopped, interrupting himself with a humph. “He’s surprisingly sentimental, right?”
            Seunghyun looked to his dongsaeng who nodded slowly. “We acted like he was an idiot and he was being creepy, but we wrote it everywhere, on everything. It’s on my bedroom door. Namu."
            “But I don’t understand…”
            “What?”
            “About Jiyong, about you.”
            “You mean about me and Jiyong.”
            “Well… Maybe,” Seungri said meekly.
            Seunghyun stood up abruptly. “Let’s get to the festival.”
            “Hyung,” Seungri whined.
            “We’ll talk about it later.”
            “I don’t want to wait for later. Hyung, the way you seem- I don’t know what to think.” Seungri thought about the studio incident and the fact that Jiyong seemed so angry with him and in a moment they had forgiven each other.
            Seunghyun looked at Seungri.
            “Jiyong- it’s easy for him. He doesn’t have the same guilt.”
            “What guilt?”
            Seunghyun was exasperated, not wanting to spell it out. “I didn’t want to be… with Jiyong. He could easily walk away from me and go date a girl but I- I’m not like that and after things went so far, I just wanted him, only him. We’re supposed to be with girls. It was so terrifying that I pushed him away.”
           We're supposed to be with girls. The sentence was uncharacteristic and sounded like it should have come from someone younger, someone with a narrower view. “How?” he asked quietly.
            “I said mean things. Things I didn’t mean. Things I regret.” Seunghyun sat back down on the sidewalk, next to Seungri and Seungri took in the scent of him. He looked down at the grass in front of him. So that's how it is. They should be together; he knew that as he sighed. He wished he could bring himself to hold on to his hyung or that he could stop his mind from thinking that, but he couldn’t, and most of all he wished he was sure he wanted to.
            “The last time I told him none of it meant anything. That it was just a phase a regretted. That I wished he would stop clinging to me... and then he did.”
            His hyung seemed lost in thought, like the words weren’t even directed to Seungri. His jaw clenched as he closed his eyes. “The things I said, I never should have. I never should have said those things.”
            “But now you’re together?” Seungri asked hopefully, trying to find some kind of light. Seunghyun answered the question with a small smile as he turned a ruffled his dongsaeng’s hair.
            “Something like that,” he said lowly. “We talked things out.”
            Seungri nodded. “Well, that’s good.” He found bitterness in his voice and didn’t know why. He was envious, but he didn’t know why. Was it because it was Seunghyun- his high school crush, being in a relationship while he was alone, or was it just because any time he simply tried to talk to Youngbae it ended in some sulky, sour parting? He settled on it being all three and really just wanted to close his eyes and cry. He felt Seunghyun pull at his sleeve, bringing his head down to the older boy's shoulder, a place for him to lean. His hyung remained silent as if knowing what he needed, looking ahead of him, slowly watching the snow melt in the sun as Seungri closed his eyes.
            “I’m glad for you, Hyung,” Seungri said in a voice a bit higher than a whisper, giving in to the deepest need in him to just pretend he knew how he felt about anything.
 
 
           “Hyung. I want to fill one out.”
           Seungri found himself surprisingly okay by the time they had reached the festival and gone to Seunghyun’s class’ booth.
            “Can we just not and say we did?” Seunghyun grumbled before looking to Seungri’s face. Somehow the freshman’s pout worked, and five minutes later they were sitting down filling out the puzzle.
            “Favorite movie?”
            “My Boyfriend is Type B.”
            “Within the spaces. And watch it.” Seunghyun said narrowing his eyes.
            “Well how am I to know how many spaces it takes in English?” Seungri pouted before continuing, “Are you type B?”
            “Aren’t you too?”
            “Uhm, no. I’m not difficult to deal with,” Seungri smiled widely. Seunghyun shook his head and began answering his side of the puzzle questions, and Seungri felt a small jolt curiosity run over him.
            “What’s Youngbae’s blood type?”
            “I don’t know, man. It’s Youngbae.” Seunghyun continued filling out the puzzle.
            “How can you not know something so basic? You’ve known him your whole life.”
            Seunghyun looked up at Seungri frowning before his face displayed some small semblance of realization, “It’s B… I think. I’m pretty sure it’s B too.” He smiled smugly after certainty set in. “So ha! You’re stuck with a type B anyway.”
            “Who says I’m stuck? I don’t even know if I like him,” Seungri said looking down at the paper as Seunghyun filled it out.
            “I say you are because you do like him. Do you know how often you’ve brought him up today?”
            “Well… Whatever.” Seungri didn’t feel like arguing. He wasn’t sure he could. It was becoming more and more of the truth.
            “Besides, you’re compatible,” Seunghyun said as he set aside the paper fully completed. Seungri looked over the answers, “These aren’t your answers?”
            “Nah. They’re Youngbae’s.”
            Seungri frowned and crossed his arms as he pouted, “Hyung.”
            “You’re happy it worked out though. Aren’t you?” Seunghyun asked before getting up from the picnic table and walking towards the school, saving Seungri from swallowing his pride and admitting he was right.
 
 
            “When you fought Youngbae, was it about Jiyong?” Seungri looked at the lights below them, avoiding Seunghyun’s face, and Seunghyun did the same. The senior had led him up to the roof to see the light show, and he was impressed, though he hated to admit it.
            “It was to me, but I don’t think it was to him.”
            Seungri looked to Seunghyun. He was confused.
            “Wait-“
            “Seungri, do you like Youngbae, honestly?”  Seunghyun asked, cold causing his cheeks to turn red.
            “No. Yes. I don’t know. He’s so frustrating. He’s blunt and rude and he can be cold when he wants to be.”
            Seunghyun shuddered into his jacket, “But you like him all the same.”
            Seungri let words slip out of his mouth before he thought of it, “Yeah, but I like you, though. I like you both.”
            Seunghyun didn’t react, but continued to look at the lights. “Seungri, you don’t. I’m mean and impatient. I don’t really care about anybody's feelings except my own. You don’t see it, but just like Youngbae, I have a ton of faults. Lots of them.”
            “Who doesn’t? Everyone does.”
            “I know that. For instance, you’re blind to how you feel,” Seunghyun raised his eyebrows, “At all times, actually.”
            “No I’m not,” Seungri protested, frowning at his hyung. “I’ve- I’ve liked you for a while. I mean, I know you have Jiyong now and everything, but I guess I just need to tell you. Finally let you know how I feel.”
            Seungri clutched the fabric of the inside of his pocket. He was supposed to feel better about it after getting it off his chest, but he didn’t at all.
            “What about me using you to get to Jiyong? It’s not like I didn’t do that.” Seunghyun looked to the side, obviously feeling guilty.
            “Because you missed him. And I get it. Now that you’re together, I guess it’s justified. Even though you’re the worst ever,” Seungri said side glancing Seunghyun. Seunghyun wore a small smile before speaking lowly.
            “What if I wasn’t with Jiyong?”
            “What?”
            “What if I wasn’t with anyone?”
            Seungri found himself frozen. His heart racing as Seunghyun came forward towards him, leaning into his space. He found himself pulling back, turning his head. He looked back to see a smirk on Seunghyun’s face.
            “I thought you liked me.”
            “I do. I was just surprised. I-“ Seungri stammered.
            Seunghyun leaned in again and Seungri still pulled away. It wasn’t something he wanted at all. Seunghyun was his hyung, his friend.
            “Are you sure?” Seunghyun asked, looking back down to the lights.
            Seungri thought about it. He hadn’t pulled away from Youngbae at all. In fact he kissed Youngbae first and here it was, the one thing in front of him he would’ve sworn he wanted more than anything, and yet he didn’t feel an ounce of regret for turning it away.
            “I did… I guess.”
Seunghyun looked up, “The fireworks are starting. I should get going.” He turned behind them, stepping back over the ledge. “You should watch them.”
            “Where are you going?”  Seungri looked up as he watched Seunghyun stood up.
            “I think someone wants to talk to you.” Seunghyun looked to the rooftop doorway, causing Seungri to turn and see Youngbae shuffling his feet. Seunghyun ruffled Seungri’s hair before stepping forward and walking away.
            “Later dongsaeng,” he said before walking past Youngbae’s angry glare and going down the stairs.
            Youngbae came over with his hands shoved in his pockets. “What did he say to you? Ugh, I really hate that guy.”
            Youngbae looked over the rooftop as he stood. He was silent for a minute, nervously looking away from Seungri who couldn’t help but smile. “You know, I wasn’t following you or anything. Jiyong called me over to come up here. He’s in the stairwell. I didn’t know- Look, he just- Why are you up here with him anyway? You’re such a dummy. Jiyong knows you were up here. I don’t know what they’re trying to do. Just don’t- Ugh. Seungri, why don’t you listen-“
            Seungri pulled on Youngbae’s arm lowering him so that their faces were in front of each other, eye to eye.
            “I like you… I like you back.”
            Youngbae turned red, hoping it wasn’t noticeable in the light of the first firework of the night. He responded lowly, unsure of himself, “What about-“
            “He doesn’t matter. I see that now.” Seungri thought about how to say what he needed to say. “Hyung, I like you.” He kissed the older boy on the cheek before leaving a quick peck on his lips, making Youngbae smile and his eyes pull up into crescents. His warm hand grabbed Seungri’s, and neither of them noticed the older couple watching them from the stairwell, smiling as they held hands and fireworks spread across the sky in front of the four of them.

I've finally got the final chapter reposted. ^_^ Thanks so much for reading, subscribing, and commenting, everyone. 

Remember to check out the author, graphikmarsxd. You should read this oneshot by her, too. :]

READ THE SEQUEL! :D

I LOVE YOU ALL. ♥