Minseok shifts the bag of groceries in his arms, trying to reach for his apartment keys which are currently sitting at the bottom of his messenger bag. After nearly dropping the paper bag - twice - he manages to dig out the keys, with a triumphant grin on his face.

When he steps through the door into the studio apartment, he catches sight of a pair of worn-out loafers piled on top of one another in the middle of the hallway. Trying not to twitch at the untidy sight, Minseok nudges at the loafers with his feet until they’re properly aligned and pushed to one side.

He finds the owner of said loafers seated crosslegged on the floor, head bent over papers that are strewn across the coffee table, while his hand moves across the pages, scribbling intently.

As Minseok walks in, Yixing doesn’t look up to greet him. Nor does he react when Minseok places the groceries onto the kitchen counter. He’s deep in concentration again, Minseok realizes, the tiny furrow between his eyebrows giving him away. It’s something that he’s used to seeing, so he ends up waiting patiently for Yixing to finish, leaning back against the counter.

Yixing hums, softly, as his pencil scratches across the surface of the sheet, scribbling lyrics and drawing notes and sharps and b-flats between the lines. Minseok strains to hear the tune, itching to move closer and to slip his arms around his waist and pull him against his chest, so he can fall into the sound of Yixing’s voice.

(He doesn’t however, because if it’s one thing he’s learnt over the past six months of living together with Yixing, it’s that he should never interrupt his boyfriend when he’s caught up in that ‘moment’ of inspiration. The last time he had done that, Yixing had leaped up like a startled cat and knocked over a glass of water onto his music sheets, thus ruining an entire day’s worth of hard work.)

They had met, two years ago when Minseok had just sat down in his favorite coffee shop with a cup of coffee and Yixing had landed in his lap, headphones askew and music sheets flying everywhere.

Once the initial shock had passed, (the coffee thankfully unspilled and placed as far away as possible from the blushing and panicked guy in Minseok’s lap), it was discovered that it had been Minseok’s bag, left on the floor, that had tripped him up.

Minseok had been horribly embarrassed and had immediately bought the guy a drink as an apology. One drink turned into two and then by the time the evening sun had casted its shadows over the streets outside and slipped through the blinds of the coffeehouse, Minseok had discovered that not only was Yixing a music major in the same course that Minseok was taking, although he was a junior while Minseok was only months away from graduating, but he also had a sweet smile and liked listening to Minseok talk. They had parted after that, reluctantly but with each other’s numbers keyed into their phones, and it had taken Minseok two weeks to gather up his courage to ask Yixing out on a date.

A year later, Yixing had moved into Minseok apartment, adding to Minseok’s happiness.

His patience is finally rewarded when the pencil stops moving, and Yixing lets out a pleased sound.There’s a small smile playing on the edge of his lips, the dimple appearing against his cheek faintly. When he looks up and catches sight of Minseok, he lets out a startled sound. “Hyung,” he says, finally realizing that he hadn’t been alone in the room. “I didn’t hear you come in.”

“I was waiting for you to finish your piece,” Minseok replies, moving from his earlier position and stepping closer towards middle of the room. He settles onto the couch behind Yixing. Leaning down, he rests his chin on the other boy’s shoulder. “What were you working on?”

“Fixing my composition. Professor Kim said it sounded too ‘depressing’.” The expression on Yixing’s face is passive, but behind the tone of his voice Minseok can read the frustration and unhappiness. “He said it didn’t fit the rest of the song.”

Minseok can sympathize, however. He recalls how tough Professor Kim’s classes had been when he had taken his classes, and there were days when Minseok wondered if music was his calling. Yet somehow, by a of luck, he had managed to scrape through, his degree clutched in his hand on his graduation day to prove it.

“Can I see it?” Minseok attempts to peek over his shoulder, but Yixing scrambles to cover up the sheet he had been working on with his hands. “Yixing--”

“N--no.” He sounds embarrassed. “I don’t want you to see it! Professor Kim’s right, it’s not good and I don’t you to think that I-- it’s bad.” His ears are red now, and his shoulders slumped forward in defeat.

Minseok sighs. Another thing that Minseok’s learnt is that Yixing’s is terribly shy about his music, and berates himself for being not good enough. It’s led to Yixing staying up till late at the music department, practicing on the piano over and over again trying to capture the right flow and melody of a song.

“Yixing, don’t do that,” Minseok tells him gently. “Don’t put yourself down because of one comment like that.” He Yixing’s hair, petting down an errant lock that was sticking out messily. Yixing leans into his touch, not saying anything, but Minseok can see that he’s still unhappy; his eyes are too bright, as if he’s about to cry.

Oh, no, this won’t do at all, Minseok thinks, and before he can stop himself he’s reaching over to pluck the pencil out of Yixing’s hands - aware of the consequences of interrupting him, but ignoring it because Yixing is his boyfriend and Minseok just wants to wipe the unhappy look on his face away and make him smile again - before tilting Yixing’s face towards him with a hand cupped under his chin and covering his lips with his own, trying to calm him down, to distract him.

Finally, when he feels Yixing’s panic subside, the way his shoulders and arms are less tensed, Minseok releases him. “Better?” he asks, rubbing his hands along Yixing’s arms, and receives a nod in reply.

After several long moments, Yixing moves his hands away slowly. “Okay,” he says, glancing over to look at Minseok. “But if you hate it--”

“I won’t,” Minseok kisses his cheek lightly, feeling triumphant, He leans over Yixing’s shoulder to read the sheets while Yixing chews his bottom lip nervously.

“Well?” Yixing asks, still looking worried, as Minseok skims through the notes and lyrics.

“I like it,” Minseok tells him. “It’s not how you would have done it before, but it gives a different feeling to the song.” He reads the lyrics, hangeul mixed with Chinese characters scribbled hastily at the bottom. “Although I think that this word means ‘butts’’,” he points at one of the words.

“What?” Yixing glances at the paper, and his eyes widen. After a moment, his eyes narrow, and he looks up at Minseok. “Oh my god, I didn’t write it like that - you’re messing with me--” he wails, rolling the paper and thwacking a grinning Minseok on the shoulder with it. He succeeds in landing two smacks before Minseok wraps his hands around his wrists and tugs him close.

It’s easy to distract Yixing, especially when it involves Minseok kissing him breathlessly, his hand firmly keeping Yixing from moving away. Not that Yixing wants to, judging by the soft whimper he emits when Minseok thumbs against the side of his neck, brushing past his sensitive spot. Urged on by this reaction, Minseok releases Yixing’s lips, and drags his lips down towards the spot and pressed his lips onto it instead, latching onto it and at the skin lightly--

Suddenly he finds himself being pushed away gently. Minseok whines in protest, feeling a little dazed, still caught up in the euphoria of kissing.

“Later,” Yixing tells him gently. “I have to finish this first.”

Sighing, Minseok releases his hold on Yixing. He wants to continue, but he recognizes the determined glint in Yixing’s eye. “Only if you promise not to bring yourself down again,” Minseok scolds him. “You have so much talent, so stop saying that your work isn’t good and making yourself depressed.”

“I’m not--”

Minseok makes a garbled noise. “If you say anything else I’m going to have to kiss you again just to keep you quiet,” he threatens, and then slaps his own forehead at how terrible and cheesy that was.

Startled, Yixing bursts out laughing, and soon after Minseok joins in, chuckling. It takes them a while to settle down, and by the time Yixing has calmed down, he gives Minseok a fond look. “Thank you,” he says gratefully. “For making me feel better.” He lowers his head shyly, before adding, “And for believing in me.”

His ears turn hot - gods, when did he become affected by Yixing’s honesty - Minseok mumbles, “Seeing you happy is worth it.”

Yixing smiles, and the dimple in his cheek deepens. The dimple is one of Minseok’s favorite things and he leans forward to press a kiss against it, once, before moving his lips in a series of soft, gentle pecks across Yixing’s cheek until he reaches his mouth again.

This time the kiss is chaste, reassuring, and sweet.

As Minseok excuses himself to unpack the groceries, Yixing continues to work on his piece. By the time he is done, he looks ecstatic. Tomorrow he’ll head to the music department early and work on the rest of the tune with the accompaniment of the piano there, but for now, this is enough.

After putting away the music sheets (no amount of pouting that Yixing tries on Minseok will get him to accept that it’s perfectly alright to just leave them on the table in case he feels the urge to continue his composition), Minseok makes Yixing help him set the table while he heats up their dinner.

When they’re done eating and cleaning up, they find themselves back on the couch. Somehow it feels like a simple sort of night; the type that calls for two cups of chamomile tea and a book; the type that has Yixing curled up against Minseok, his feet tucked under him as he plays idly with Minseok’s fingers, poking at the book in Minseok’s lap; the type that’s quiet and domestic and comforting.

Between the first and second chapter, Minseok looks to the side to discover that Yixing is already fast asleep, soft snores escaping from his lips as his head rests on Minseok’s shoulders.

“I guess we’ll finish this book another day,” Minseok says with a soft chuckle, setting it aside. He tries not to jostle Yixing too much when he leans over to pull the blanket that Yixing had been bundled up in earlier, arranging it so that it’s covering the both of them across their shoulders.

When Yixing snuggles closer, still asleep, Minseok tugs the blanket to wrap tighter around them and thinks, he could stay in this moment forever.

ramblings:

-why isn't there more xiulay in this fandom TT_TT
-idk it’s just been a depressing day and i needed something fluffy and distracting
-so much cheese tho jfc minseok you’re so embarrassing go home
-i might write xiuchen next and call it the start of the xiuharem chronicles
-also i know nothing about professional music courses so if some of the stuff written here makes no sense i am so, so sorry.
-kisses to jo for betaing this and correcting my crappy italian in the title, grazie cara ~~ ♥ ~~
-crossposted at livejournal