The muffled sounds of chatter through the walls of the house were not much of a bother to Han Jisung... as the boy's attention was fully taken by more important things.

It was rather late at night, the sky dark and shadowed by cascading sheets of rainfall. Not that Jisung particularly cared about that— he couldn't see the window from where he was anyway.

Well, to be completely honest, he couldn't see much of anything besides the face of Minho, tantalizingly close above him, staring him down with the same look a starving wolf might give to an injured elk.

Let's just say that some rather interesting developments had happened between the two since that fateful day at lunch.

"Ah, Minho," he tried to grab the other's attention. "Don't you think thAT... HEY—" Jisung almost swore in surprise as Minho buried his face into the crook of his neck, nuzzling him affectionately.

"Mm, what?" Minho asked, planting a little kiss below Jisung's jawline.

"Your parents..." Jisung glanced towards the door of Minho's bedroom. "They have people over right now. Are you sure this is a good idea?"

Minho rolled his eyes at this. "It's just my best friend's aunt and uncle. They're practically family, so they don't care. Plus they're just talking about wealthy business crap," he stated matter-of-factly.

Jisung sighed. "Fuck rich people..." he mumbled, only making the other boy laugh.

"I mean, if you really want to..." Minho said with a stupid smirk, and Jisung promptly hit his shoulder in return.

It was honestly still surreal to Jisung that this was even happening. He could only imagine how excited Felix would be for him right now... he'd always been the best hypeman anyone could ask for.

A dull feeling of sadness washed over him at the thought. As expected, he wasn't really over the whole thing yet. He did still like to be optimistic that one day, Felix would show up to school as usual, and they would cry and hug and have a ton of things to catch up on.

Optimism could only take him so far, however, and each morning proved that hope wrong over and over again.

He didn't want to think about it much if he didn't have to.

"Hey, baby," Jisung laid his hand on the back of Minho's neck, grabbing his full attention. "I'm gonna go to the bathroom and then get a drink real quick, okay?"

"Sure," Minho smiled. "Come back quickly."

He leaned down to give Jisung a little kiss on the lips before rolling off of him, freeing Jisung to get up and go wherever he wanted.

Minho's house was, to put it lightly, distressingly large. Jisung had been there a few times by now, but still barely had any grasp of where certain rooms were located.

So, after wandering around for a few minutes, he found himself outside of the dining room, hearing the chatter of numerous older adults through the entranceway.

"Really, I think you should send someone to check it out," the warm voice of a woman resounded: Jisung knew her to be Minho's mother, who he'd met before.

"I'm just concerned about a leak or something of the sort. I'll probably get my niece who lives over there to look at it," an unfamiliar woman spoke, and Jisung deduced this to be one of the guests... Minho's best friend's aunt, he supposed.

Knowing the bathroom was across the way and he couldn't reach the area without being seen by the guests, Jisung only braced himself. His presence in the house wasn't a secret or anything, but it still felt awkward to be under the gazes of any high class, pearl clutching group of society's elite while being... well, himself.

He tiptoed into the large dining room area, trying to make himself absolutely as unobtrusive as possible as he slipped behind the table of diners.

"Oh, Jisung! Nice to see you here!" the same kind woman's voice rang out. To him, this was a death sentence.

"Ah... hello!" he forced himself to put on a smile and turn around, cringing himself half into the grave as he saw the whole table of people looking at him now that the mother had drawn attention to the boy.

"Come here, come here!" the lady beckoned him over. Her sweet smile was ever so naive... she clearly had no idea how much distress she was causing the poor kid.

Minho's father gave him an apologetic smile as Jisung dragged himself over to the table against his own will. At least that comforted him a little bit.

"Jisung, these are our good friends from the Hwang family. I'm sure Minho has told you about them?" the mother asked, and the Hwang couple in question both gave polite waves in response.

"Yes, he has," Jisung tried to make his voice sound as friendly and un-nervous as possible. "Nice to... meet you both."

It was a good thing that Minho's mother and father had taken a liking to him, because in any other situation he would have probably been dead right now from the anxiousness.

"So, how exactly is this young man related to you?" the other lady questioned, glancing between the boy and Minho's mother.

"My son is courting him!" she answered excitedly.

Never mind. If Jisung hadn't already been dead from the social aspect of this, that phrase right there would have killed him.
Courting? What year was it, 1895? Not to mention, how the hell did Minho's mother even know anything was going on between the two?

A poignant silence fell over the room following that answer.
"Courting...?" the lady of the Hwang couple repeated the word as to make sure she had heard correctly. "And you're allowing that?"

"Of course," Minho's mother laughed. "Why shouldn't I?"

The aunt simply gave an uncomfortable smile. "Well, no reason. You ought to be considering inheritance, however? Producing an heir...?"

"He's just a teenager, dear," Minho's mother countered, her interpretation of the comment clearly wildly incorrect in many ways. "How could I be thinking of him raising a child yet?"

Jisung was probably experiencing more discomfort right now than any human in known history. This was the absolute worst possible direction for the conversation to take, and all he could do was stand there, still as a statue, bearing this monstrosity of a topic.

"I mean, when that time comes, he won't be able—" the aunt's voice was cut off by Minho's father standing up, holding an empty pitcher of water that sat on the table.

"I'm going to refill this, call for me if you'd like me to bring another beverage back instead," the older man backed away from the group, striding towards the kitchen.
"Jisung," he beckoned, "come and help me over here."

Thank god. In his mind, Jisung was already preparing to give Minho's father the most elaborate Christmas gift known to mankind for getting him out of this one.

He bowed a quick apology to the table before following the father away into the kitchen, out of sight.

"Sorry kid," the father spoke once they were alone, and slightly ruffled Jisung's hair. "They like to talk a little too much in my opinion. Get going to wherever you were headed."

"Thanks," Jisung said rather awkwardly, but his gratefulness definitely shone through. He gave the father one last little wave before ducking out into the hallway where the bathroom was.

He glanced for a moment out the nearby window at the rain, noting the fact that the weather had been rather dreary for the past couple days. He couldn't imagine this was too good for Chan's mental health at the moment...

Jisung sighed as he pulled out his phone, setting a little reminder for himself to call his best friend later just to check on him. As much as the Aussie tried to hide it, Jisung could tell that guilt was still constantly eating him up inside.

His gaze stayed fixated on the lock screen of his phone for a moment: a picture of himself, Chan, and Felix having a picnic a year or so prior.
Oh, what he would give just to have that again. Jisung had just dyed his hair blonde at the time, and had begged and begged the slightly younger boy to do it with him to no avail.

He knew he needed to return to Minho's side fast, before his thoughts on the subject went spiraling again.

Thus, Jisung hurried the hell up on his way back to the bedroom, where Minho laid in waiting under his warm blankets.

And speaking of bedrooms, and warm blankets, under the pouring rain, Jisung wasn't the only best friend holing up under the weather.

Jisung's number one hypeman and confidant, Lee Felix, was certainly in a situation of his own at the moment.

Long story short: the poor kid couldn't sleep at all.

He'd tried and tried for ages, and even snuck out of bed to get a warm drink at one point, all to no avail. The sudden bout of insomnia was incredibly confusing to him, but he had a sinking feeling that the lingering ball of anxiousness in his chest was preventing him from falling asleep.

Of course, this was due to the boy laying under the sheets next to him, completely passed out. Hyunjin looked quite peaceful while sleeping, even though his long black hair was strewn about everywhere on his pillow. And he was apparently a heavy sleeper, as well: Felix had accidentally kicked him in the side at one point without waking him up.

That was fortunate for him, at least. Felix remembered that ages prior, at a sleepover with his best friends, Chan would wake up at every single noise or movement that Felix made. Quite an upgrade here, he thought.

He just sat and watched Hyunjin for a while, having nothing better to do. The elder's face was serene and pretty as usual, and he laid on his side, both hands resting beside him on the firm mattress.

"Hey," Felix whispered at him, not really expecting a reply at all. "Would it kill you to leave me more of the blanket?"

Silence. Felix sighed,  leaning back against the headboard. Outside, crickets chirped, and nocturnal birds cooed softly in the distance.

He looked down at the bedsheets beneath him, seeing Hyunjin's hand there, and felt an indescribable urge to do something.
He glanced quickly at the elder's face, making sure he was asleep, before timidly poking at his hand as a test.

Was this an incredibly strange thing to do? Yes, obviously, but Felix figured that it was completely harmless.
He gently placed his hand flat atop Hyunjin's, comparing the size difference with a dull interest.

He'd known before that the boy's hands were bigger than his own, thanks to an impromptu comparison that day in their motel room. Yet, as Felix carefully laced his fingers in between Hyunjin's, the thought at the forefront of his mind was simply how nicely his fit into the other's. Simply that, and nothing else.

The birds of the night still chirped outside, and the rain was lighter now, a faint drizzle if anything.
Felix's unoccupied hand played with the beaded bracelets on Hyunjin's wrist and found that somehow, he felt indescribably calm.

"You know, if you wanted to do this, you could've just asked," a quiet voice interrupted from the side.

"Fuck!" Felix instinctively released Hyunjin's hand. "God! You're— When— How long have you...?" he stumbled through an array of questions as he made eye contact with Hyunjin who was quite evidently not asleep.

"It's cute that you think I wouldn't wake up during all that," Hyunjin mumbled, closing his eyes again, relatively unbothered by the situation.
"Keep going. I don't mind."

"What? No... I," the younger struggled to get over this absolute bomb of embarrassment.

"Calm down. I already said it's okay," Hyunjin insisted, holding his hand back out as if in offering.

Felix only stared at it, too awkward to take any action at all.

With a slight annoyance, Hyunjin blindly reached for the boy's hand and grabbed it instead, not willing to wait that long.

"Try to sleep. For a little while at least," the elder reasoned with him as he brought their hands down to rest on the mattress between them.
"I wanna go to the beach tomorrow. Take advantage of this spot for once."

"Oh... okay," Felix agreed hesitantly. "Why? Just because?"

"We're at the damn beach anyway. Might as well."

"True," Felix nodded mostly to himself. He let out a tired breath, shifting to lay his head on the pillow and face the other boy. "Fine then. I'll try to sleep. No promises."

"Good luck," Hyunjin gave a light laugh at the statement, sending the other a warm smile.

All Felix could do was stare at him for a second.
"Yeah. Thanks," he murmured before shutting his eyes, begging his own mind to refocus on his new goal.

With thoughts of the morning and the ocean, his mind just wondered what the next day could possibly have in store for him this time.