♥️♥️♥️

"How do Europeans survive? I've never been so hot in my whole life.", Changbin whined, fanning his face with the new planner Felix had made the night before, after making their lives miserable for the rest of the day as they hung out with Chan's group.
The Australians had bonded after finding out they had both lived there, and the shorter was left to see his boyfriend being his touchy self with his new friend, which was why he slapped the taller's hand as Felix reached out to him.

"You're still sulking?", he sighed, slapping the shorter's hand back and cleaning the sweat off his face with a tissue. "You're such a baby."

"He was looking at you with heart eyes."

"We talked about this, Bin, we will probably be great friends and-"

"And You'll prefer him over me and when I finally open my eyes it will be too late and-"

"Can you two shut the fuck up?", Hyunjin whispered, behind them, pointing up at the bridge they were passing by. "I can barely hear the guide and I'm not exactly fluent in English."

"Sorry.", Felix whispered, cleaning more seat off of Changbin's face and rolling his eyes at the general mood of the day. "Why is everyone so annoyed today?"

Jisung chuckled next to him.

"The sun, it's too hot. You're used to it from back in Australia maybe but I swear I feel like I'm melting, Lix. Hyunjin hates hot weather in Korea, let alone in here, and Changbin is a negative bitch.", he shrugged. "He'll be okay tonight, and probably Hyunjin too."

"He didn't even sit in the row with us.", Felix pouted, looking at the place their guide was talking about in one of the sides of the river. "And Chuu didn't even leave the house."

"She hates boats.", Jisung was quick to answer. "We couldn't force her to come even if we wanted to."

Felix bit his lip slightly, letting the silence take over them for a few seconds.

"You didn't want her to come?"

"What? No I- of course I wanted her to come, but she doesn't need to come to every single thing we do.", he tries not to stutter, and thought he did quite a good job. "Is that bad?"

"Not wanting to be with her all the time? I guess not. Every relationship has it's ways, I just wander...", he waved a hand in front of his face. "Forget it, it's just me overanalizing shit that's not even meant for me to think about."

"You know it's fine, right? Wandering about our relationship and my life. You're my friend, Lix.", Jisung smiled, nudging his shoulder.

Felix nodded, but seemed to take a while to think about what he was going to say.

"You knew Minho and Seungmin already before we met them yesterday.", Jisung gulped immediately, feeling his heart stop and start again at the mention of the older's name. "Seungmin said you kept wandering around Minho's paintings. I thought you hated art?"

Jisung considered turning to the side and trying to focus on the boat trip, following the other people's gazes down the water, feel the fresh wind that sometimes cut the excruciating heat, but he knew he could not take Felix for anyone. The guy was smart, anything he did to avoid the subject could make him think even more about the situation.

So he shrugged, trying to keep a poker face.

"I like the way he paints, I think. I'm not sure about what exactly is the... like, the technique he uses or something. Why?"

Felix sighed, seeming to get lost in thought for a while.

"Not sure, I have a feeling, but I'm not sure about what it means."

"Grab your magic ball and find out.", Jisung played, and the other rolled his eyes. "Your boyfriend fell asleep."

"What? No!", Felix turned to the shorter and sighed in frustration as he saw the older, head fallen on the seat as little snores came out of his mouth.

"And Hyunjin too." Felix turned back as well, pinching the bridge of his nose.

"Why are they so high maintenance? I hate life. Lord, I'm glad you came with me."

Jisung could not help it but to smile at his friend, knowing he had escaped that conversation for a while, not knowing how he would keep escaping. He spent the rest of the trip pretending to hear the guide, hating himself for not being able to enjoy the trip as he should. He couldn't enjoy the views with no worries, hear the history interested, his mind kept going back to that night, back to all the times their eyes had met.

He should appreciate the beauty of the city, of it's old streets and charismatic people, beautiful language and flowering parks. But how could he? When his eyes had laid on the prettiest view he had even seen a week before that?

—————

"I like it when we have dinner at home.", Chuu smiled cutely at the other four, the table filled with the most weird things Felix and Changbin had found at the market after the shorter stopped sulking over Chan for the time being. Most of the things were hard to pronounce, but they liked the taste and kept eating and talking, enjoying the end of their first week there. "But as I was saying-"

"No, that conversation is over!"

"Come on!", she whined, throwing Hyunjin a bit of bread and pouting. "You know I'm right!"

"There was nothing going on!"

"He totally was checking you out, Hyunjin!"

"He barely spoke to me!", the guy threw the bread back, smiling a bit at the girl. "Literally said my name wrong twice."

"He was flirting! Teasing you! Didn't you see how he used you to protect himself from Minho?"

Jisung's hand trembled on the table at the mention of the name, along with every single nerve on his body. Chuu saying the man's name was something his mind could not react too.

"I am the tallest, he could be seeing me as a lamppost os something?"

Laughter erupted on the table.

"You're a clown. I agree, Seungmin was definitely checking your ass out when you were asking for the frappes yesterday."

The long haired widened his eyes, seeming flustered for the first time since they started that conversation.

"I- oh my god shut u-up!", he rubbed his face. "He was not! Leave me alone!", he cried, softly slapping Chuu's hand away as she tried to playfully hit his forehead. "I hate you all."

"I mean he is hot.", Chuu shrugged. "I say go for it."

"That's no reason to simply-", Hyunjin stopped talking mid sentence, looking over at Jisung as a reflex, intending to check out his reaction to Chuu calling another guy hot, but instead saw how switched off his friend was. "Ji? You okay?"

The shorter didn't snap out of it, he simply smiled and nodded.

"I have... I have somewhere I need to go tonight, are you guys going out?"

"I'm not taking my pijamas off today.", Chuu said, followed by Hyunjin's back up. "Where are you going?"

He gulped, hating the knowledge that Felix was burning holes into his scalp.

"Chan... I'm meeting Chan, he promised to show me something."

He waited for the reaction. Waiting for Hyunjin to tell him Chan would be working, he could not show him anything. Waited for Felix to say he'd go with him and ruin it. Waited for Chuu to doubt him.

"Ok, have fun."

"You didn't need to tell us that.", Felix shrugged after Hyunjin's answer.

"Be careful.", Changbin pontes his finger at Chuu. "He might steal your man."

Felix dropped his knife on the table, rolling his eyes.

"What even is your problem with Chan?"

And then Jisung stoped listening.

He didn't listen to them talking the rest of the dinner, nor Chuu asking how late he would be back that night.

He didn't hear Felix coming out with him and dragging Changbin to the street nor his goodbye as they parted ways.

He didn't hear the water calmly hitting the walls after he left the busy part of Paris, the lively streets and into the older ones.

He didn't even hear himself knock on the door, hands shaking, knot on his throat as the old wood creeped open.

The only thing he heard was the soft voice that had been running around in his mind since the moment he put the paper with that address in his pocket.

"Hey."

Jisung looked back into the cold street.

He should never had gone there.

And yet, when Minho offered him his hand, he took it without even thinking twice, and as the door closed behind him, his heart skipped a beat.

What a terrible idea.

—————

Shit it about to get messy... quite literally :)