Kibum, Minho and Jinki were lazing around in the living room on a rare day off right before the release of a new album, although it was a repackage. Taemin was at school and Jonghyun hadn’t bothered telling anyone where he went and when he was coming back, so it ended up with Kibum and Minho sitting as comfortably as they could get in the sofa, (Kibum’s legs on Minho’s lap, allowing him to spread out as much as he wanted and Minho lying diagonally across his half of the furniture) channelsurfing, while Jinki was sprawled out on his stomach on the floor, reading a book. Although Kibum had rather gone out shopping, this was a day he didn’t feel like being alone and since his friends weren’t able to meet up, he was forced to sit beside Minho with nothing better to do at the moment.

Jinki turned a page and pushed his reading glasses up a little higher on his nose as Kibum sighed.

“Is anyone hungry, yet?” Kibum asked, while his hands fumbled lazily with the hem of his t-shirt. He knew that it was a silly question since they had just eaten lunch, but he simply needed to do something other than sitting still.

“Mmm...” Jinki hummed thoughtfully without looking up from his book. “If there’s any chicken left, then yes.”

Kibum rolled his eyes. Of course. “No.” He said shortly and turned his gaze to Minho expectantly since he was the one who ate second most to Taemin (if you didn’t count Jinki and his chicken), but he hadn’t bothered to look at Kibum either. When he felt the other’s gaze, however, he shrugged and opened his mouth to say something only to be interrupted by the front door opening.

“Hello?” Their manager’s voice boomed through the dorm.

“In here!” Minho called back and shot Kibum a look followed by another shrug as an answer to the previous question.

Soon the quite short and a little round man stood in the doorway to the living room. They greeted him without looking at him. They were too lazy to be bothered at the moment. His eyes swept through the place once and then narrowed.

“Where is Jonghyun?” He asked.

All three looked up at him then, because his tone held something foreboding, and that kind of scared them a little. It could mean everything and anything, that wasn’t supposed to happen, had happened.

“We don’t know, he didn’t tell us.” Jinki answered and the other two nodded.

Their manager sighed, pushed Kibum’s and Minho’s legs away and sat down on the sofa in-between them. “I’ll just have to wait until he comes back then.”

Kibum and Jinki shared a puzzled look. “Is...” Kibum cleared his throat. “Is something wrong?”

Once again the door opened and cut off whatever their manager wanted to say. Everyone knew exactly who it was and the three band members saw with horror how their manager’s face darkened. There was a shuffle of shoes being kicked out of the way as their manager stood up and went out into the hallway.

“Kim Jonghyun-sshi.” The sound stopped abruptly. The tone of his voice was overly polite but deadly all the same. “May I inquire as to where you have been?”

The others left in the living room heard Jonghyun mumble something in response. Then they saw how the two of them passed the living room entrance and continued to the kitchen, the door slamming shut behind them.

All three of them scrambled to their feet at once and ran as quietly as they could over to the door pressing their ears to it. Kibum and Minho hunched down, facing each other and Jinki pressing the right side of his face against the door above them.

“-begin to understand your level of stupidity!” Their manager’s voice said a bit muffled.

“What?” Jonghyun shot back angrily. “Am I forced to live in celibacy just because I happen to be part of SHINee?”

Kibum frowned. Jonghyun was living in celibacy? From who? Had he gotten a girlfriend? Kibum drew in a surprised breath when he felt a sudden streak of contraction in his chest area at the thought.

Minho caught Kibum's eyes and gave him a questioning look but Kibum just shook his head and pressed his ear a little closer to the door. He didn’t know how to answer him.

“I know you don’t mean that.” Their manager said. “I know SHINee means a whole lot to you and that you don’t want to jeopardize the group.”

Jonghyun scoffed. “I have my needs as a man too! And if I fall in love I’m going to act on it!”

He is in love? Kibum thought and scrunched up his face. The thought hurt, there was no denying it. He had known for a while now. It had dawned on him during one of their more intense dance practice sessions. He had with mortification realised that he had become hard just by watching the muscles, glittering from sweat, on Jonghyun's bare stomach flex through the mirror. He, Kim Kibum, had become hard in public. Kim Kibum never got hard in public. And that was when Kibum was forced to realise how the fan service he and Jonghyun gave wasn’t just fan service for him and that all their little moments in private wasn’t just out of friendship.

But Kibum had liked to believe that it had just been a stupid mistake on his part. That he had been exhausted and unsatisfied. That was until his body now, once again, gave clear signs of him being in love with his best friend.

Minho suddenly pulled him away from the door, and out of his thoughts, and urged him towards the living room. The trio narrowly managed to make it past the corner before the kitchen-door opened and their manager stepped out. Jinki threw himself down onto the floor again and Minho and Kibum dived for the sofa, barely managing to look casual with their eyes glued to the TV when their manager appeared in the doorway.

He eyed them suspiciously for a second and then shook his head ever so slightly with a sigh. They looked at him. “I have a meeting to attend, but I want all the members to sit down and talk as soon as Taemin comes back, understood?”

They nodded simultaneously, in lack of anything better to say or do.

“Good.” He his heel and soon the front door slammed shut behind him.

Jonghyun’s head poked around the corner just a few seconds later.

“Hi, guys.” He said tentatively. They stared at him and he fidgeted nervously looking down at his feet. “You probably heard that, huh?”

Jinki sat up. “It’s alright we know you didn’t mean what you said about SHINee.”

Jonghyun bit his lip. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright, Hyung.” Minho assured.

Kibum couldn’t find anything to say and a hard lump had formed in his throat. He hadn’t heard most part of the conversation because of his reverie but it was starting to hurt in his chest again. He stood up, unable to look at Jonghyun any longer and mumbled something about a shower. Then he squeezed past him in the doorway and almost ran to the toilet.

Behind doors and lock, protected from questioning gazes, Kibum sunk to the floor and let the lump in his throat dissolve into tears. The reason for Kibum’s tears weren’t because Jonghyun had gotten a girlfriend, that was just the small part of it. No. The bigger part was because Kibum was feeling for Jonghyun the way he was. For weeks he had managed to make explanations and excuses for himself. He had found every possible way to get out of the most logical reason why his heart started to beat faster every time Jonghyun shot him that million dollar smile or how he seemed to forget how to breathe every time they touched. He had started to control the way he behaved around Jonghyun to not raise any suspicions and had come to fully believe that he had just been mistaken. That he hadn’t been thinking clearly and gotten brotherly love and actual love mixed up. Kibum could only congratulate himself with how well he had acted since he had managed to fool even himself. Now, when the dam had broken, though, he didn’t know if he would be able to look Jonghyun in the eyes anymore or even be able to be as close to him as he had been. Because now that he was forced to look reality in the eye he had no escape, he had no excuses and he was left with wondering how he would ever live through it all, coming up with different scenarios involving everything from breaking up the band to somehow steal Jonghyun from his girlfriend. Although he knew he could never do anything of the sort it still felt like a relief thinking about leaving the band or offing the girlfriend for just a while.

Kibum spent well over an hour in the bathroom with thoughts like that running through his head and crying until his eyes felt like sandpaper and he could hardly see because they were so swollen. Then he sniffled one last time, stood up and washed his face with cold water to pull himself together without looking in the mirror. He was sure he looked awful, anyway. Before going out he pressed his ear to the door tentatively and listened for any signs of a member close to the bathroom door. To his relief he heard the TV in the living room and Minho’s and Jonghyun’s voices. He opened the door slowly and soundlessly, just enough to see out. The sounds got louder but the hallway was empty so he quickly slid out of the bathroom and tiptoed to his shared room with Jinki and Taemin. Well inside he didn’t turn on the lights. The blinds were down and helped to darken the room so that it was almost like at night. It didn’t matter. He knew the way to his bed without having to look and besides, the darkness felt good on his eyes. All Kibum longed for now was to take a nap before Taemin got home and they would eat dinner.

Suddenly a throat clearing rung through the silence and Kibum almost jumped out of his skin in fright, giving a little shriek. Then he was slammed into the door and a hand came down on his mouth.

“Jesus, Kibum, do you want the whole neighbourhood to hear?” Jinki’s voice murmured in his ear.

Kibum wriggled himself out of Jinki’s hold. “If you don’t want anyone to hear then why did you have to scare me in the first place?” he hissed.

Jinki sighed. “I need to talk to you and I don’t want the others here. I told them I was going to take a nap.”

Kibum glowered in the direction of Jinki’s voice but didn’t say anything. Instead he went to his bed and sat down.

He heard Jinki shuffle his feet uncertainly. “Should I turn on the light?”

“No.” Came the answer curtly. He didn’t want Jinki to see his face. “Talk.”

“Okay... um...” Jinki said. Kibum tapped his foot against the floor so that Jinki would know that he was waiting impatiently for whatever it was. He sighed again. “I don’t really know where to start...”

“How about why you decided to be all crazy psychopathic murderer on me?” Kibum said irritably.

Jinki took a deep breath and blew out what seemed to be all the air in his lungs before he said: “What the hell are you doing?”

Kibum blinked. “I... don’t know what you mean.”

“Was it really real?”

“Was what real?”

He felt his bed dip a little as Jinki sat down on it beside him. “Kibum.”

Kibum knew what Jinki was getting at, but he certainly wasn’t going to make it that easy for him to get it out of his mouth. How the hell had Jinki of all people noticed?

“Fine.” Jinki said after a few minutes of silence. “Should I get Jonghyun here so you can confront him directly? Would that be easier for you?”

That made Kibum panic and he grabbed Jinki’s arm to prevent him to get even an inch closer to the door.

“Wait.” He pleaded.

Another few minutes passed while Kibum debated with himself. It would be better to talk about it with someone, right? He reasoned with himself. And Jinki had to be the most compassionate person he knew. He had come to a conclusion, even though he didn’t like it, and gathered his courage

“I’m in love.” He stated before he could change his mind.

He felt Jinki stiffen. “With?”

Kibum shot him another glare although he couldn’t see it. “I think you already know the answer to that.”

He felt more than saw Jinki nod. “When?”

“I don’t know, Onew, a few weeks ago.” He groaned. “At least that’s when I realised.”

“Okay,” he heard Jinki shift to face him, “what are you going to do about it?”

Kibum threw himself down on the bed with an arm over his eyes. “Nothing! It’s Jonghyun! He’s straight as a pole!” Kibum exclaimed exasperatedly. “Besides, he’s my best friend.”

Jinki seemed to be debating whether to go deeper into the matter or not. To Kibum’s relief he decided to leave and stood up. “Alright, that’s all I need to know for now I guess. Just... come and talk to me about your decisions in this matter from now on, please? I want to help you and I need to have a better idea of the situation at hand if anything were to happen, you understand?”

“Yes, yes, I got it.” Kibum muttered and turned to face the wall ready to close his eyes and succumb to the sleepiness that was creeping over him from all the crying. Then he turned back as something dawned on him. “Wait, how did you even know?”

Jinki chuckled. “I have been your friend for years now. We even live together, I must get some credit. Besides, I’m not the leader for nothing. I’m supposed to be able to sense when something’s amiss.”

Kibum’s breath caught and his heart went into panic mode again. “The others...”

“No, they’ve been too busy with other things to notice. I actually thought I was imagining things when I first noticed though, because of all the JongKey fanservice you guys give. But I guess...”

“As long as they don’t know.” Kibum choked out. “Promise you won’t tell them.”

Jinki opened the door and Kibum could see him give a small smile in the light from the hallway. “I promise.”

Then Kibum was left alone, once again, swallowed by the darkness.