♡

DECEMBER 8

    Having showered, eaten (a little), and taken a nap, Minho felt mostly better. Mostly.

   The next item on his agenda, as he tried to get his first day of Christmas break on track, was to see his children. His room was so lonely without them. They were his perfect companions, he'd always thought, because they were animated, living things that made him feel like he wasn't entirely alone, while keeping all the huge perks of being alone intact (namely: being comfortable, and not feeling the need to keep up appearances, or overthink the appearances one was trying to keep up). He missed them, and he hadn't remembered a time when he was so desperate to feel their soft fur under his palms before now.

   It was only a ten minute drive to his cousin's house, where his cats had been living while he was at college. He grabbed a bag of treats that he'd left on his dresser before he left for college, put his coat back on, and got into his car. Unfortunately for him, his mother and oldest sister were home by then and milling around, so he bumped into them on his way out— not literally, thankfully.  Their meeting was rather uneventful, and if Minho weren't entirely preoccupied with overwhelming relief that no one had even tried to touch him while he made his way to the door, maybe he would've even been the tiniest disappointed that they seemed almost indifferent.

    Once he got into his car, his body melted into the seat as he breathed out a relieved sigh. He was gonna be fine for the rest of the day. No one would disturb him for the rest of the day, and in a few minutes it would just be him and his cats.

   The sun was starting to dip into the bare trees off to Minho's right. A chilly December wind nipped his nose and ears and stung his eyes as he stepped out of the car and headed to the door. It was winter, alright. Bitterly cold already, making Minho shift from side to side on his cousin's porch after he rang the doorbell.

    "If that's Minho, it's not locked! If not, go away!" An impressively loud voice that penetrated the wooden front door called from somewhere inside, and Minho chuckled while he turned the knob and stepped inside.

    "It's me. Hi, Danbi," Minho called back, though not nearly as loudly, as he stepped out of his shoes and neatly set them by the door (despite the fact that Danbi's shoes were littering the entire front rug). Hardly using his voice on the daily made him pretty bad at yelling (even though he'd stupidly, impulsively tried doing that the other night— please let him forget about that already)

       Heading into the kitchen, he first noticed that Soonie, on the counter, and Minho immediately scooped up the mewling cat without and pressed his face into its soft, orange fur. It felt so good. He missed his cats so much. Evidently, Soonie missed him, too, as the tabby crooned back in response to the groan Minho muffled in the fur of its shoulder. Minho felt genuine peace, and he hadn't felt that in months.

    He was too engrossed in feeling the comfort of the warm little body in his arms to notice, or maybe to calculate a correct-seeming response to the quick footsteps of his cousin bounding down the stairs. "Welcome back! How's college been?" As soon as Danbi poked her smiling head into the room, Minho felt the need to remove his face from his cat's fur and straighten out the wrinkles of his scrunched up expression as fast as humanly possible.

   He realized that... he didn't want anyone to see him hold the cat, for whatever reason... it just felt weird. And, in a way that seemed almost robotic, as if you could hear his arms creak like squeaky hinges, he set the tabby back on the counter and gave its head an apologetic pat.

    "Thanks." That was the first welcome-home he actually appreciated. "..Good, it's been good," he lied. Why would he tell Danbi about something he didn't want to think about and probably couldn't even put into coherent sentences? That would be shockingly out-of-character.

    A couple minutes of sparing, polite chitchat later (which Minho had participated in as courtesy, utilizing his knack for answering slightly-too-personal questions with answers that seemed satisfactory but gave away just about nothing), Minho smiled as he thanked his cousin for the past several months of pet-sitting, and waited for her to say goodbye to each cat, then struggled to get each of them into carriers. He drove home with the setting sun stabbing into his eyes, and the disgruntled yowls of cats filling up his ears.

   Once his cats were out and exploring his room again, Minho laid on his bed, finally enjoying the feeling of being home, with the thought of what happened earlier being mostly put out of his mind. He happily let himself be overwhelmed by the comfort that his own bed and three cats provided him. Comfort had slipped away from him piece by piece when he headed off to college, and it was the strangest thing to get some of it back.

   He felt the heat come on, pouring out of the vents in his room. That was something he'd been missing at college since late fall, when the cold set in and seeped through the concrete walls. He and Hyunjin had not gone and bought a heater, like many of the other pairs of roommates had.

   After thoroughly checking out Minho's room, which was really their room, too, the cats mostly settled down. Dori climbed onto the bed with Minho and took to walking over his chest. Minho chuckled and stroked his head, watching him stop in his tracks and melt underneath his hand. Minho had been smiling fondly—it was cute, after all. He had started purring almost instantly, and shoved his head into Minho's hand.

   And then something struck Minho. It wiped the smile from his face, and instantly sent him deep into thought.

   Dori wanted to be petted. He liked it. When Minho touched him, he relaxed, and got comfortable. Minho knew this, almost subconsciously. 

so why would it be so weird for m— ...for a person to want this, too? 

   The thought was uncomfortable. It spurred Minho to start fiddling with his fingers and knitting his eyebrows while he continued to ponder. He didn't want to imagine himself in Dori's place, as he was melted into a puddle while he petted him gently. It felt so disgustingly weird, to think about himself enjoying being touched like that.

   But when Dori did it? It was just normal.

    It was a good thing no one else was in the room, because if anyone had been there, Minho probably would've gotten needlessly anxious and panicky about them being able to hear his thoughts. Those were thoughts he was embarrassed at himself for having, even if no one else would ever know about them. He couldn't imagine the agony it would put him through were anyone else able to hear them.

   He thought back to times when he would see the guys at college act, come to think of it, similarly to Dori. They would lean into each others' arms and run their fingers through each others' hair, and to them, that was normal, too. Minho didn't know why he always felt compelled to stare when they did that. He always felt some kind of reaction to it in his mind and body, but he couldn't tell if it was good or bad, or both.

    He did know, however, that he absolutely didn't want that to happen to him. If he really imagined himself being in their places, he knew he would hate it inordinately. He knew how hugs felt. He didn't want to feel that kind of disgust that he always did when he was touched. He wondered why no one else seemed to feel it.

   He tried to stop thinking about it at that point. It was giving him a headache, the more he thought about it, and it was making him feel weird. Made his skin crawl. Not to mention, it was dangerously close to getting him back to thinking about what happened earlier. He stopped petting Dori and closed his eyes.

   To distract himself, he focused his mind on his amazingly comfortable mattress. He finally wasn't feelings springs press into his back as he laid flat. Finally, he'd be able to get a decent night of rest. Refusing to tear his tired body away from the bed again, he reached down and grabbed a hoodie off the floor, balling it up and throwing it at the light switch, and uttering a short little noise of celebration to himself when it actually worked and the room went dark.

꘎♡━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━♡꘎

literally just this morning after having this written and sitting and drafts for months, i saw someone saying that all of minho's cats are male? ? ? ? ...so i changed all of the pronouns just now

yeah okay so it's technically tuesday now but idc this is the monday update <3

i need sleep

i have two presentations tomorrow

ah

save me