Sanghyuk was at a loss of what to do with himself from the moment his hyungs stepped out of the shared apartment. Each of them had different summer schedules or time off to attend to that all happened set into motion on the eve of the maknae's twenty-first birthday. He would have been leaving with them to set out to visit his family for the occasion, but they had called the night before to let him know they wouldn’t be back in town in time for his birthday.

That’s fine, Sanghyuk had thought to himself. It’s not like they couldn’t celebrate another time once his family was back. Besides, he’d already had a celebration of the sorts when they went out for Hakyeon’s birthday only a few nights ago. So maybe the guests were all mostly strangers to Sanghyuk and the cake only had the leader’s name spelled out across it, but Hakyeon had insisted that they both blow out the candles. That was more than enough to make Sanghyuk happy, just having a bit of reassurance that they hadn’t completely forgotten his birthday. It wasn’t like he thought they would ever actually forget him, but birthdays were kind of a big thing to their group. There was always some sort of spectacle for whoever’s birthday it was and at least two cakes, as they’ve learned that the first will inevitably be ruined if not by Taekwoon’s fingers scraping the icing then by one or more members taking chunks of it with their bare hands to smash in the birthday boy’s face. This would be the first time they weren’t all together for someone’s birthday and Sanghyuk couldn’t help but be somewhat bitter that not one of his hyungs had even wished him a happy birthday in advance before leaving.

Sanghyuk has never been one to complain about anything no matter how unfair the situation but it was his birthday, the one day he’s entitled to have his own selfish wants and that just happened to be wanting his hyungs around. Anyone around, really.

It’d only been a few hours but what had always seemed like a packed sardine can of an apartment now felt way too spacious and far too quiet. Sanghyuk connected his iPod to the surround sound speakers and put his favorite playlist on blast before heading to the kitchen. It was already nearing 8PM and he’d yet to start making dinner for himself, an odd concept he never considered having to face seeing as Taekwoon and Hongbin always did the cooking for the six of them. Sanghyuk had tried killing time by playing video games and watching TV but it just wasn’t the same without having Wonshik playing against him -the only worthy opponent amongst the rest of the hyungs- and as annoying as Jaehwan’s constant commentating on whatever show they watched was, he missed it. And even though he would never admit it to anyone, what Sanghyuk missed the most was Hakyeon’s never ending chatter that practically rang throughout the entire apartment no matter which room he was in. It wasn’t his fault that Hakyeon had a calming voice that was soothing to listen to and though he teased his eldest hyung the most, it was always out of love. As much as Sanghyuk would outwardly complain about Hakyeon always asking him for a massage, the younger never really minded for it gave him a reason to listen to his hyung aimlessly babble on about nothing in particular for however long. He could always just call Hakyeon if he missed him that much, but the older should already be in Jeju Island with his family and Sanghyuk wouldn’t want to take any of Hakyeon’s time away from them.

Sanghyuk nearly jumped when the refrigerator began beeping from the door being held open for too long. He sighed at the pitiful sight of their almost nonexistent cold food selection and looking through the pantry only furthered his already sour mood. There was hardly anything that he could use to make a meal out of, unless you counted potato chips and pudding cups as dinner. He figured that their manager should have at least made sure there was food for the maknae to survive on for a couple of days. Sanghyuk tried looking in the fridge once more even though he knew there was nothing but various condiments and half-empty soda bottles.

A frustrated groan filled the kitchen as he slammed the refrigerator door a little too harshly, causing a couple of magnets and pictures to fall to the floor. Sanghyuk snickered at himself with thoughts of his hyungs commenting on him being the Incredible Hyulk while he picked up the fallen magnets and photos. He placed them neatly back to the door of the fridge and that’s when he noticed the bright colored bills attached to one of the magnets that survived his small tantrum. Behind them was a note with his name scrawled across the top line.

‘Hyukkieee~ here’s some money for food, buy whatever you like okay? Make sure that it’s really delicious -that’s an order from your leader-! Sorry that we can’t be together for your birthday, but your hyungs will be thinking of you no matter what! I promise to bring you back a really nice present to make up for it ^^ I hope you aren’t too lonely without us, we’ll be back before you know it! Happy Birthday, our dear Sanghyukkie <3’

Sanghyuk couldn’t hold back the small smile on his lips as he read the note. It was signed by all of the other members individually but the note itself was written in Hakyeon’s neat handwriting. So they had been thinking of him all along. He tucked the note away in his pocket and stored the bills in his wallet before getting ready to head out of the apartment. Sanghyuk was about to leave when he thought to do something only the leader had ever done in the past. He changed the passcode on their door to his birthday with a triumphant smirk before continuing his journey for food.

There was more than enough money to buy just a few meals with so after picking up dinner from his favorite restaurant Sanghyuk went grocery shopping for himself. He was so used to shopping for all six members and found himself grabbing things like Taekwoon’s favorite coffee creamer and banana milk for Hakyeon. Even when he was meant to be buying food just for himself Sanghyuk couldn’t help but wonder which flavor of potato chips Jaehwan would have preferred so he put both in the shopping cart. Shopping like this made him feel so much better once he was back in the empty apartment, his mood having done a complete 180° from earlier.

He put away the groceries and stored the note from earlier in a small box he kept by his bed and changed into a comfortable pair of pajamas before settling on the couch with his dinner, a fluffy blanket, and his stuffed Leo doll. Sanghyuk made sure to send a quick thank you text to the older members before digging into his food while watching whatever show was currently on the cooking channel. Of course he didn’t actually intend on learning anything by watching the cooking channel, but the maknae was easily fascinated by anyone that could cook meals that sometimes looked too pretty too eat.

It was going on 2AM when his text tone went off, the first of many small noises that would cause Sanghyuk to jump a little too high or squeal a little too loud to his liking. Around the others he had a fearless image to protect but without them he was just as skittish as their beloved leader.

“Speaking of the devil,” Sanghyuk said to himself as he opened the text.

HakyeonieHyung: glad you found it!! ^^ hope you enjoyed the meal. sleep well! :)

Sanghyuk rolled his eyes at the mom-like response his eldest hyung had sent back. And maybe that’s why he missed Hakyeon and the others so much. Being away from his actual family for so long the members had become somewhat of a second family to him. Hakyeon and Taekwoon reminded him a lot his his mom and dad while the other three were like older brothers he never had and he loved them each as if they were of his own flesh and blood.

Deciding that he’d put off sleep for long enough, Sanghyuk cleaned up his dishes and headed to the bathroom to brush his teeth before falling into his bed. He considered plugging in his earphones and listening to music to help fall asleep, but after watching a couple of horror movies he was on edge. What if someone tried to break in and the music made it to where he couldn’t hear anything? No, no music tonight. He blindly felt around under the bed until he found one of the solid wooden baseball bats they got to bring home from the Nexen game while back. You know, just in case.

Sanghyuk lay there for what felt like an eternity, his mind still in post horror movie mode. Wonshik’s desk chair looked like a silhouette in the dark and if he stared long enough it looked like one of doors on their wardrobe was opening on it’s own. The maknae sighed and turned so that he was facing the wall and clenched his eyes shut. He constantly had to remind himself that the ice maker in the refrigerator wasn’t someone knocking on the front door, but that didn’t stop him from tensing up every time he heard it. Even bugs hitting the window had him thinking about what it would sound like if someone had tried to break in through the window. Then he remembered that their apartment was seven stories from the ground and you’d have to be insane to climb that high up to break in. It wasn’t until the air conditioning kicked on and filled the otherwise silent apartment with white noise that Sanghyuk finally felt himself slipping into unconsciousness.

Thirty minutes. Sanghyuk only slept for thirty minutes when a beeping noise coming from the living room had him sitting straight up in bed. He recognized the beeping as someone entering in the passcode to the front door and immediately grabbed the bat from under his bed, thanking himself for changing the code earlier on. He sat frozen on his bed to listen out as whoever was outside tried the code again and again, sighing in relief every time the person failed. He had half a mind to walk out to the living room and wait in front of the door ready to attack if it was some sort of intruder, but any thoughts of moving left him as he heard the code being entered one more time followed by a lighter beeping noise and the click of the handle turning.

-

Hakyeon was amazed that he was able to make it all the way to the kitchen counter before letting go of all the bags he was holding, save for the small box that had a cake in it. Leave it to Hyuk to change the code on him when he was trying to surprise him. But Hakyeon didn’t have it in himself to get mad at the younger, it was undeniably cute that he’d changed the code to his birthday, something only Hakyeon had ever done in the past. He moved around the kitchen as quietly as possible assuming that Sanghyuk was already asleep due to the lack of answer after the text he sent earlier.

He worked around the kitchen quickly, taking decorations out of the plastic bags and unboxing the small cake to poke a few candles into the top. Hakyeon feared that he’d been too loud when he heard the sound of footsteps slowly approaching the kitchen. He was quick to grab the cake from the counter and was about ready to turn and yell ‘surprise’ but the words were caught in his throat when he was met with an alarmed looking Sanghyuk, arms raised above his head with a wooden bat as if he were about to attack Hakyeon. And Hakyeon, being the clumsy scardey-cat he was well known to be, dropped the cake as he jumped about a foot off the ground.

“Wha- what?” Sanghyuk sputtered as he lowered the bat. “Hakyeon-hyung? I thought you were supposed to be in Jeju Island with your family!” Hakyeon faked a surprised gasp as if he’d been caught in the act and scrambled to find one of the party noise makers, blowing on it weakly in an attempt to look guilty.

“Surprise… sorta.” He frowned at the splattered cake-y mess on the floor. “I made all that up and spent the entire day at the studio until I could go shopping for all this.” Hakyeon explained, gesturing towards the half-assed decorations.

“I mean, it might have worked if I was actually asleep when you came in, but I kinda watched a couple horror movies earlier. Apparently I’m not that brave without you lot around.” Sanghyuk admitted without a second thought, even though he knew this would give Hakyeon leverage on him later on.

“Well, I’m here now so there’s no need to fear!” Hakyeon joked, earning an expected eyeroll from an exhausted looking Sanghyuk. “Let’s just go to sleep then, surprise ruiner! We’ll go out for a celebratory lunch tomorrow to make up for my lame attempt to surprise you.” Hakyeon ruffled Sanghyuk’s hair, keeping in mind how much the younger usually hated being squished from his hugs so it was a complete surprise to him when Sanghyuk arms were suddenly around his waist as he was pulled into a hug for the first time by the maknae.

“Thank you.” Sanghyuk mumbled into Hakyeon’s shirt once the older had secured his own arms around him in return. The leader savored the embrace for as long as possible since he knew that his dongsaeng had difficulty in expressing his sincere thanks and this would probably be a one-time thing.

They cleaned up the cake mess, but not without Hakyeon smearing a stripe of icing across Sanghyuk's cheek, declaring that it was payback for three years ago when the maknae smashed an entire handful of cake on his face. The younger didn't even bother getting angry about it because the small smear of icing was quite tame to what he would have considered a worthy form of payback. He instead laughed along with Hakyeon as he wiped the sweet frosting off with a finger before eating it and going to wash his face for the second time as they settled down to sleep.

Sanghyuk didn’t know whether it was the fact that he was snuggled into Hongbin’s sheets or that his eldest hyung was only an arm’s length away, but he had no trouble falling asleep this time around. He slept soundly through the entire night and well into morning. It was nearly noon when he felt Hakyeon shaking him awake saying that he was going to sleep through his birthday lunch if he didn’t absolutely get up right this minute. He got up after that, went to the bathroom to wash up and change into day clothes smearing on a bit of eyeliner since it was a special day after all.

Hakyeon told him to check his social media while they were waiting to be seated at Sanghyuk's favorite gopchang restaurant. The younger did as he was instructed and saw that '#HAPPYHYUKDAY' was trending in the top spot for Korea. He went through the tag at various times throughout lunch and favorited a lot of the sweet messages his fans were sending him before tweeting his own thank you for the birthday wishes.

After lunch the two of them walked to the nearest cake shop and Hakyeon let him pick out whatever cake he wanted seeing as the one he'd bought before had been ruined. The birthday boy chose a cake that was similar to the small one Hakyeon had tried to surprise him with, but it was considerably smaller, just enough for two or three people to have a piece. Sanghyuk didn't want Hakyeon to have to pay too much for yet another cake and they didn't need a big one if it was going to be just the two of them anyway.

Hakyeon seemed to almost be ignoring him on the trip back to the apartment. Sanghyuk tried to strike up a conversation more than once and each time the older would just nod or hum in response and his eyes hardly ever left the screen of his phone. It wasn't until they were in the elevator going up to their floor that Sanghyuk had given up on conversation altogether. Now it was just his selfish want for attention that had him flicking the older's forehead as the elevator came to a stop.

Hakyeon froze whatever he was doing and slowly looked up at Sanghyuk with an all too familiar death glare. Sanghyuk had no idea if he should be scared or not, but he couldn't help but grin at how serious the leader had turned at his action.

"Yah! How dare you do that after all the stuff I've done for you today! This punk.." Hakyeon brought his free hand up to grab a hold of Sanghyuk's ear and began pulling him towards the apartment, muttering curses and accusing the younger of being ungrateful all the while the latter couldn't control his laughing, stumbling along with the cake in his hands.

"I ought to take that cake back, honestly. Get inside before I make you go buy your own cake!" Sanghyuk was shoved lightly toward their front door before Hakyeon finally let go of his ear and he was still trying to calm his giggles as he punched in his birthday for the passcode.

"SURPRISE!" Sanghyuk jumped back and thought he might have bumped into Hakyeon if the latter wasn't already walking around him with his phone out to record as the group of people in their apartment began singing Happy Birthday to the younger.

Sanghyuk felt tears filling his eyes when he spotted his family members walking towards him with a huge cake, the small one in his hands long forgotten. Looking around he took notice of each of the other members, their manager, and some of his closer friends. The place was now fully decorated with everything he remembered sitting on the counter before he and Hakyeon had left for lunch. It was all a setup. Had they really gone that far just to throw him a surprise birthday party in the end? Well mission accomplished, Sanghyuk thought to himself as he blew out the candles on his cake and proceeded to greet his family members with hugs.

Hakyeon watched everything from afar and not once did his smile waver throughout the entire party. He figured he got to spend a lot of time with the maknae already and let everyone else have their time with him. Everything had fallen into place perfectly, Sanghyuk was clueless the entire time and it was so worth dropping the cake the night before. It wasn’t until later when he spotted the younger escaping to the kitchen to refill his drink that Hakyeon felt the need to be near him again.

“Do you know how incredibly difficult it is to actually surprise someone like you? Happy birthday, Hyukkie.” Hakyeon whispered as he held the squirming younger in one of his suffocating hugs and planted a kiss on his cheek.

A/N: hey everyone, long time no see for this series i knooooow. I knew i wanted to do Hyuk's next but I didn't have any ideas for ages until this week for his birthday. This one is also a bit different since it's mostly from Hyuk's POV rather than Hakyeon's, just to give it a different perspective mostly. Hope you guys like it<3333