Seunghyun froze, wincing visibly at the harsh tone of the younger male that had entered the room. He had no idea what to say. He knew the smartest thing to do was give Jiyong the complete truth, but... a voice deep inside still wanted to protect Jiyong from anything that could stress or harm him. Seunghyun was sure that Jiyong would not appreciate the hidden knowledge, but he wanted to protect Jiyong. He would deal with the rumors himself.

"Jiyong," he began, racking his brain for the right words to say, "it's, um... Nothing."

The leader of BIGBANG did not look satisfied with that answer in the least. "Nothing? Don't you lie to me, Choi Seunghyun."

"I..." Seunghyun was aware of both Taeyang's, and Jiyong's gazes on him, and he tried hard to look as his world wasn't crumbling around him. "We were planning, uh, a party for you. Heh, guess it isn't a secret anymore."

"A party?" Jiyong narrowed his eyes. "What for?"

"What, we can't throw our amazing leader a party for all that he has done for us?" Taeyang broke in, putting on a smile. Seunghyun almost sagged in relief. Taeyang had realized what he wanted.

Jiyong didn't look convinced, although he relaxed a little bit. A little bit. "I don't need a party," he said. Seunghyun stood and walked to his side.

"Jiyong, come on," Seunghyun purred, putting his acting skills to work. He was no longer the stressed-out, depressed Seunghyun who knew that his and Jiyong's relationship could end any second now; he was the calm, cute Bingu who only wanted to bring some joy into Jiyong's life. He slung an arm over Jiyong's shoulder, smiling down at him. "Let us do this for you."

"But, if I already know that it is happening, what's the point?"

"It doesn't have to be a suprise party. It's just your party."

"Seunghyun..."

Seeing that Jiyong wasn't fully convinced, the older rapper sighed and planted a kiss on his lips, making the bystanding Taeyang wince visibly.

Jiyong blinked at him, looking dumbfounded and in love all at the same time. "I think I could deal with a party," he finally said.

Staring down at the younger, Seunghyun found it hard to think about the looming threat of the rumors that practically waited outside their door. Only one thing remained: Seunghyun would have to throw this party, or Jiyong would never believe his story. The things I do for this man, Seunghyun thought. "Why don't you go ahead and let us talk some more?" he suggested. "You may know what is coming, but it might be more of a suprise than you think."

"Like you guys feel when you have ?" Taeyang muttered, rolling his eyes.

Seunghyun shot him an icy glare.

Taeyang raised his hands in defense but did not reply.

"I guess I'll go," Jiyong began hesitantly, "but... you guys really don't need to do this."

"Yes, we do," replied Seunghyun gently.

Jiyong stared at him for a moment, then nodded and walked away. As soon as he was out of earshot, Taeyang stomped up to Seunghyun with his arms crossed. "What the hell was that? Why are you lying to the leader?"

"Technically, we are lying to the leader."

Taeyang glared at him, not happy about this one bit. "Why? He deserves to know! It's involving the both of you; he shouldn't be left in the dark like this."

"Taeyang-"

"Do you think he'll be happy about this at all? He will find out, Seunghyun, whether it be from the TV or something a fan says. You can't expect to keep from him."

"Taeyang! I'm trying to protect him," Seunghyun said. "How stressed do you think he will be if he finds out? I don't want that put on him. I really don't. Just - stay here, and I'll go talk to Yang and see what he wants us to do. I highly doubt he will believe that we are actually dating. I can convince him that it was all just some crazed GTOP shipper who decided to make fake rumors."

Taeyang looked more subdued but no more happy than five minutes ago. "You want me to make sure that he doesn't watch TV or anything? How will I do that?"

"Make something up. Use the sickness card. He'll want to keep it a secret that we - dammit." Seunghyun winced at Taeyang's horrified look.

"You two- I ing knew it!" Taeyang exclaimed.

Seunghyun sighed heftily. "Please, Taeyang. Do this for me. I'll go and talk to YG."

After a moment of thought, Taeyang nodded his head slowly. "Alright. But I'll only do it for Jiyong. It's your fault if this ricochetes on the both of you."

Seunghyun let out a breath through gritted teeth. "I'm willing to take the blame for that."

~~~

Taeyang watched Seunghyun leave, anger still boiling beneath the surface. Did the man really think that he could protect Jiyong so easily? One way or another, the leader was going to find out, and he would not be happy with Seunghyun for keeping it all from him.

Taeyang had half a mind to go and tell everything to Jiyong. But... there was still a chance that the rumors could disperse before Jiyong even noticed them. Keeping that in mind, Taeyang made his way to Jiyong's door.

"Jiyong? Hey, I never got to give you that soup." The soup was probably room temperature now, but if Jiyong found that a problem he could deal with it himself.

Jiyong pushed his door open, eyeing Taeyang warily. "Where's Seunghyun?"

"Party stuff," Taeyang replied as an instinct.

"Oh." Jiyong moved past Taeyang, towards the bathroom. "Let me clean up and I'll see if your soup is actually edible."

Taeyang glared at him, but found the distraction welcome. He rushed to the living room and turned the TV off, and then hurried to grab Jiyong's phone. As he had expected, there was an urgent message from Jiyong's manager. He deleted it quickly and set the phone back down, hoping and praying that Seunghyun's plan wouldn't backfire. They were doing this for the right reason. He had to believe that.

"What are you doing with my phone?"

Taeyang jumped, spinning to face the rapper. His only response was, "I thought I heard it go off. And I was curious. But I was wrong." Unfortunately, Taeyang was not as much of an actor as Seunghyun was; his words came out too quick and stammered and if he had been Jiyong, he would have never believed them.

But Jiyong nodded. "Okay. That 's private, though. Don't touch my phone again."

Taeyang raised his hands in defense. "I won't."

"Good." Jiyong grinned and took his phone, walking back in the direction of the kitchen. "Where's this soup of yours?"

"On the table," Taeyang replied, following his bandmate into the kitchen. He sat down at the table. "Enjoy."

Jiyong eyed it warily. "Did you poison this?"

Taeyang rolled his eyes. "Just eat it."

Shrugging, Jiyong grabbed the bowl and tipped it so that the soup would pour into his mouth. He drew back, his lips. An expression of clearly forced joy crossed his face. "It's, uh, great."

"It's terrible, isn't it?"

In answer, Jiyong rushed to the sink and turned the water on, pushing his head under the faucet to wash out the supposedly terrible taste. Taeyang snorted, not even bothered by the harsh critisism against his hard-worked-on soup. Honestly, he probably could have made it better, but he hadn't been given a lot of time. Which reminded him, he had schedules to attend to. He supposed he could call his manager and tell him that he needed to stay home for the rest of the day, but what good would that do? His manager probably wouldn't let something like taking care of a bandmember be a problem, especially since Seunghyun was his caretaker for the day, as the manager knew well. What could he do?

"If you ever want to make soup again, please, please, do me the favor of not doing it." Jiyong was still pawing at his tongue as if the soup had burned it or something to that effect.

Taeyang grinned. "Ha! You look like you just swallowed a spike ball."

"I pretty much did!"

Jiyong poured the terrible soup down the sink, just as the sound of the front door creaking open echoed throughout the house. At first Taeyang thought that Seunghyun had arrived back at the dorm, but instead it was Seungri that came in.

"Hyung, what are we going to do about-"

Taeyang fixed Seungri with a stare strong enough to burn leather. Getting the gist of what his hyung was trying to say, Seungri coughed awkwardly as if he'd just made a mistake. "Don't worry. Jiyong already knows about the whole party thing," he said, drawing each word out as a you'd-better-play-along threat.

"Oh. OH!" Seungri put on a confused expression. "I thought we agreed to hide it from him." There was a hidden message in the words.

"We did," Taeyang replied, "and we should have tried harder to hide it." He hoped his eyes conveyed his real thoughts: "Try hard to hide it or I will kick your maknae even though I don't entirely agree with this anymore than you do."

Seungri nodded. "Okay. Guess the party is off?"

"Nope. Seunghyun is out getting stuff for it," Jiyong said. "Or so I've been told."

"Oh. Um. Okay." Seungri gave Taeyang a look. "Hey, hyung, could I talk with you? It's about the party. A secret."

Jiyong scowled at the word 'secret' but Taeyang ignored him and followed Seungri into his room.

"What's going on?" Seungri said, his voice confused and desperate for answers.

Taeyang sighed and relayed the whole plan of Seunghyun's. Immediately afterwards, Seungri said, "He's going to find out."

Taeyang rolled his eyes at the ceiling. "That's what I said, but Seunghyun is convinced that it's best for Jiyong if we keep it to ourselves."

"Maybe..." Seungri looked thoughtful. "Maybe it is for the best. How do you think Jiyong would act as the leader if he found out about the rumors? He'd feel like he failed us. And he won't forgive himself easily."

That brought Taeyang up short. "I- I didn't think of it that way..."

Seungri smiled. "Well, I guess you have to think of it that way now. Don't you have schedules?"

"Unfortunately." Taeyang grimaced.

"I'm done for the day. How about I take over for you?"

"Would you?" Taeyang looked at Seungri hopefully.

Seungri nodded. "Of course."

Taeyang grinned. "Thanks. Just keep him away from TV and his phone if possible."

"Okay." Seungri smiled, his eyes suddenly taking on a mischievious glint. "And Taeyang?"

Said man glanced at Seungri, raising an eyebrow.

"Please, don't ever give me any of your soup."

~~~

Meanwhile, in the living room, Jiyong was trying hard to turn on the TV. It wouldn't come on, to his dismay. The plug was still in, and the cable box was fine; why wasn't it coming on? How dare they take away his chance of amusement while he was stuck at home?

"Jiyong!" Seungri yelped, bouncing into the room. "Uh, um, why don't we go out and get something edible to eat?"

Jiyong blinked at him and reluctantly said, "Yeah, I-"

In a second Seungri was pulling an oversized scarf and jacket on Jiyong, next putting on a pair of sunglasses. Jiyong struggled to get away. "What the hell?" He gasped.

"We don't want you catching a cold, now do we?" Seungri asked hurriedly. "Or, well, more of a cold."
Narrowing his eyes, Jiyong fought to find a real explanation for these strange occurences. It felt like Taeyang and Seungri were babysitting him. And they were acting like watching TV was a sin or something. Were they going through a phase?

     Or was something even bigger going on?

_____________

I have been a TERRIBLE author for this story and I take complete responsibility for the slow update of the last chapter. It was my fault; I could have done more to write it instead of putting it all on TheOfficialVIP.

So, this wasn't the longest update I've ever done, but... I tried to make it kinda cute, like in the beginning and the things between GD & Taeyang and Taeyang & Seungri. Sorry if this didn't reach your GTOP criteria. And I did update super fast, so...

Bye!

~KpopGirl4Life