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jake doesn’t know when the joke stopped being a joke, but somewhere along the way his heart started clenching in agony every time sunghoon or heeseung told him “no”.
it’s a silly little thing to get upset over, jake tries to reason with himself. yet, he couldn’t stop his silly little heart from being affected over those caught feelings, and then still making those same jokes.
it’s pathetic.
as far as sunghoon and heeseung are concerned, he’s just joking; he’s playing a silly little game for his members to have fun with, not knowing that he just had to catch feelings. the type of feelings that weren’t a joke to him anymore, even if the others only know so.
stupid heart, jake thinks to himself sullenly. he wants to rip it out of his chest and punish it by beating it to a pulp with his fists, just to forget his stupid feelings.
if he could go back in time and stop himself from starting the joke, and catching feelings for his stupid bandmates he 100% would. it’s not like they aren’t great people, no, absolutely not, jake adores heeseung and sunghoon and will continue to do so for the rest of his life.
it would just feel so much easier not having a crush on two people who also happen to be in a relationship with each other. jake is intent on keeping his feelings under check and not letting sunghoon or heeseung know about his feelings for either of them. it just means keeping to his same jokes so they don’t suspect anything.
to keep up the same jokes was very easy, jake realises. he’d been saying the jokes for so long that it just slipped easily into daily conversation with heeseung and sunghoon. even texting brought upon an easier time for jake to carelessly blurt out things like let me in, i wanna join in when the couple would flirt and talk about going on a date.
jake has referenced their song let me in so much in his jokes that it became synonymous with attempting to join the couple’s relationship. now, jake can’t listen to the song and can barely perform it when they do need to practice the choreography. he’s completely ruined the song for himself and he only has himself to blame.
he could never get made at the couple for not feeling the same as him. they’re already idols and dating as men isn’t exactly easy, so the addition of jake would just complicate things immensely.
polyamory isn’t exactly known either and jake didn’t even know what was wrong with him when he started to realise he was very much crushing on two men already dating each other. so, he’s sure sunghoon and heeseung would never accept him into their relationship. it just cements what sunghoon and heeseung have been saying to him ever since he started the dumb the joke.
jake isn’t sure if his other members have caught onto the fact that he’s into the two members dating, but he doesn’t know if he wants to know or not. if they were worried, jake feels like they would have already come to ask him about it, but they haven’t.
(jake doesn’t know if he thinks it’s a good thing or not. half of him wants someone to come up and ask him so he can spill his guts about how hard it is to live with having a crush on both of them in this type of climate. the other half of him however, wants to keep this knowledge locked inside with so many different seals so no one figures out how he feels.)
—
jake steps out of his shared bedroom with jay and what he sees is very much normal for enhypen on a day off.
his eyes hone in on the fact that heeseung and sunghoon most definitely are holding hands on the couch. niki and sunoo sit around them on the floor and jake knows that he just has to pester the couple.
the two on the floor see jake almost immediately and their eyes tell jake they’re both thinking what he’s thinking.
he drapes his whole body over the back of the couch, effectively startling the couple as his hand digs in between their intertwined hands. normally they’d see jake coming and tighten their grip on each other, but this time jake has the upper hand so his hand fits neatly between the couple’s hands.
(the delusional side of him yells that he fits perfectly into their hands, but the rational side of him argues that it’s just because he’s too infatuated with them both.)
he lifts their hands up and slides between them on the couch. the two grunt but they don’t say anything as jake sets their hands down on his lap.
sunoo and niki look at the three on the couch with humour in their eyes. jake ignores it.
the others come back but barely even blink in the direction of the three on the couch. it seems normal. it seems like they’re—excuse his delusions—meant to be.
he can’t think like this, even if he wants to, because they’d never invite him into their relationship anyway. the previous times he’s joked about joining they said no. why would it be different this time? (jake jokes anyway.)
“don’t i just fit here?” he says off-handedly, he didn’t even mean to, but the jokes just fall out anyway, like muscle memory. “i think all the signs are pointing to the fact that i should join your relationship.”
heeseung scoffs from his left and niki and sunoo smirk from their places on the floor. the other two eventually let go of jake’s hand and the actual couple doesn’t try to reconnect their hands together.
“absolutely not.” comes from his right (jake ignores the pang in his heart), and he cuddles up to sunghoon, pout on his lips.
he gives sunghoon puppy eyes and the younger stares somewhere else, pointedly not looking at jake.
—
heeseung is good at everything. and jake thinks that this is why he fell in love with the older man in the first place.
jake would say his crush on heeseung came a lot faster than his crush on sunghoon. it’s because he excelled at everything he tried, even if he tried to tell you he wouldn’t be able to do it. it’s just who heeseung is, too humble for his own good, even if he’s proved time and time again he will ace whatever he gets put up to.
the thing jake likes most about heeseung is his voice. singing, rapping, that one time he narrated with him and even when he just speaks has jake weak on his knees.
he’ll be honest when he says he’s asked heeseung numerous times to sing him to sleep. but who can judge him, he bets others wish they had what jake has.
heeseung looks good too. anyone who refuses to agree with jake is wrong. no one looks better than a certain lee heeseung he is infatuated with.
a lot of times he’d find himself staring at heeseung because his hair had been styled differently that day. or even seeing heeseung get out of bed causes his brain to melt at the sight of him. heeseung can’t look bad, it is just not in his vocabulary.
the man seems to know just what to say when jake is feeling down too. the way he talks to all of the members, not just him, makes him so much more admirable. if jake had been crushing on any other members he would have immediately gone to heeseung to talk about his feelings. (unfortunately, life isn’t that nice to him.)
he’s so comforting. jake would want to have the older all to himself if it wasn’t for the raging crush he also has on the older’s boyfriend.
sunghoon is just as pretty as heeseung. falling for sunghoon only came in due time.
jake feels very soft for sunghoon, like he wants to shower him with all the love in the world and kiss him to bed every night. it’s not fair that only heeseung is allowed to shower sunghoon with kisses.
he is also a very big supporter of sunghoon’s singing voice. jake’s favourite voice has to be park sunghoon. no one sounds like the beauty that is his vocal chords. jake would honestly pay to listen to his voice everyday if he didn’t have sunghoon next to him almost all the time.
walking on clouds is how jake would explain to someone else asking him just what listening to sunghoon sounds like. he’s enamoured by the boy’s voice, even if it’s just one note. honestly, he wouldn’t be afraid to admit that sunghoon owns his favourite set of vocal cords (sorry heeseung).
sunghoon also gives the best hugs.
in jake’s very right opinion, no one gives hugs like sunghoon, no one. it makes his whole body tingle when sunghoon wraps his arms around him. (very specifically his waist, if you wanted to know.)
he gets jealous every time he sees sunghoon hug heeseung, even though he has no right, because they’re boyfriends, jake is not in that equation.
there’s also sometimes the trouble of not knowing if he wants to be sunghoon or heeseung.
you just want to be in between them both, his mind supplies unhelpfully, but he would like to settle snugly between the couple. they’re taller than jake too, so he absolutely loves those rare moments when the couple doesn’t push him away from their hug.
the more he thinks about being in between heeseung and sunghoon the more painful the yearning becomes. he stops.
—
he remembers one moment while filming en-o’clock when he got sat next sunghoon and heeseung.
(getting put right in the middle of them just felt like a big fuck you to jake. the universe hates him, he’s decided. there’s no way being this unlucky is a mere coincidence.)
what they filmed exactly, he doesn’t remember, but what he does remember is heeseung and sunghoon giving each other a fist bump. he doesn’t remember why they did it either, but jake wanted one too, so he stuck his hand out balled up into a fist, but was completely ignored. they didn’t even look in his direction.
it just reminds jake of his place in their relationship. he’s just there to annoy the couple and provide some silly goofy laughs for the rest of his members.
this isn’t even the first time it’s happened. multiple times jake has put his fist out expectantly for a fist bump after sunghoon or heeseung had given the other one one, but either ends up completely ignored or he just gets in between them. (it’s almost laughable, would be laughable if he wasn’t the person in question.)
it shouldn’t be affecting him this much, it’s a fist bump for crying out loud! but he’s so fucking weak for sunghoon and heeseung’s attention. his heart can’t stop grasping in pain every time he basically gets rejected. this would not have even been an issue if not for the raging crush on the couple, and didn’t see rejection in every thing they ever did (or didn’t do) with jake.
he laughs it off to himself, but it hurts. they don’t see it at all, don’t know jake is paining. or maybe they do, and this is some kind of sick joke they’re playing on him. maybe his members are even in on the joke.
but it’ll be fine , it has to be fine.
jake can live knowing he’ll only ever be able to yearn to be with heeseung and sunghoon, even if it pains him. jake can live just being the comedic relief for his members when they need it. jake can live with the thought that every new joke crushes down on him with a little more weight each time he voices it.
he started it by annoying the hell out of the couple anyway, this is only punishment.
—
it’s right after their schedules and most of them are tired, jake included. his throat feels dry as he’s just dozing off in his bed, so he decides he can’t sleep until he gets water.
he catches sunghoon and heeseung in the kitchen. they’re hugging, bodies swaying from side to side and jake gets hit with an overwhelming sense of want. he wants what they have.
they don’t see him, too caught up in each other to notice him. no one else is in the room, so he can’t use the joke as an escape goat for wanting to squish himself between the hugging couple.
he walks past them, frankly not having enough mental capacity to deal with them tonight. they separate when they hear jake open a cupboard to get a cup for his water. he must look as sad as he feels, because heeseung asks him about it. jake’s too tired to lie, or to fix up the way his face looks.
“i’m fine,” he replies, it’s not technically a lie, but it’s certainly not the full truth, “just tired, like everyone else.” he makes sure to add on that last bit, to make sure that they can’t tell it’s something else on his mind.
sunghoon frowns and drags jake towards him by his wrist before he can get his water.
“you look like you could use a sunghoon hug.”
jake wants to hug him so bad—the offer is literally there—but his parched throat throbs at him and it’s too overbearing for him to ignore any longer. he wants to sleep and he certainly doesn’t want to deal with the onslaught of questions he feels like sunghoon and heeseung are about to spit at him, so he shakes his head.
he turns around and goes for the sink, breaking out of sunghoon’s hold on his wrist. the two don’t annoy jake as he fills up his glass with water and gulps it down in one go, so he assumes they’ve left the kitchen.
he’s proved wrong when he turns around from leaving his glass in the sink and runs right into sunghoon’s chest. the younger’s arms wrap around jake and he just melts into the hug. sunghoon feels warm, comfortable, loving. jake can’t help but reciprocate the hug. he loves it here (wants to be here forever) but he knows that he can’t. it feels like once in a blue moon this happens for real and not on the count of one of jake’s jokes.
jake falls more in love with sunghoon in this moment, and if heeseung joins in on the hug then that’s only for them to know.
and maybe niki too, who has to tell sunoo about the events that conspired last night.
“so,” niki starts and sunoo raises his eyebrows, “last night.”
jake flings himself back onto his bed with a groan. he’s so lucky jay is not in the room and hasn’t even attempted to enter the room.
“i’m fine, last night was nothing.”
“sure, hyung,” sunoo rolls his eyes, “you know you can’t hide your feelings from niki.”
jake sighs and sits up. niki is oddly observant for a fifteen year old and jake doesn’t know how to feel about it. (probably jealous, jake wishes he was as observant as niki.)
“i—” jay walks into the room and almost stumbles over sunoo who’s sitting against his bed. he feels bad for sunoo, but not for jay who wasn’t even looking where he was going.
“sunoo?” he questions, regaining his senses, “why are you here? get off the floor, you too niki.”
“why don’t you get off our asses?” sunoo grumbles, “shoo!” he says, kicking jay’s ankles, the older yelping in response.
niki drags himself off the floor and pushes jay out of the room with most of his strength.
“this is my room?!” he squeaks out, no match for niki’s strength. “what are you even doing in there? jake?!” his name comes muffled from the other side of the closed door. jay sighs heavily and they wait until they hear his footsteps receding down the hall before uttering another word.
“now,” niki says, sitting back down on the floor next to jake’s bed, “you should tell us how you feel about sunghoon-hyung and heeseung-hyung.”
“it’s clear something’s changed since you started the jokes to now.” sunoo adds right after niki. jake worries about how much they already know.
“why do you know that?”
“well, we put niki’s observation skills and my theory making skills together, so now you have to deal with the both of us.”
jake groans, just what he needs, the two brattiest, unable-to-take-no-as-an-answer members trying to help him with his love life and feelings.
“how can i even trust you to keep this a secret? you two probably gossip the most shit at school.”
sunoo giggles, “i guess you’re right about that, but when have you ever seen me gossip to the other members or about them?”
“maybe in the comfort of your own room maybe?”
“pfft, only jungwon is in there normally and he’s so boring to gossip with!”
jake readjusts his spot on the bed, jungwon is pretty boring to gossip with, he’d done it once, never again. the lectures jungwon gives are too close to parents scolding children; he should loosen up once in a while.
“and i’ve managed to keep that sunoo-hyung and jungwon-hyung are dating a secret!”
before jake knows it, sunoo is slapping niki as hard as he can on his back.
niki coughs in response, “hyung what the fuck?”
sunoo throws himself to the floor in a starfish position, a groan escaping his lips.
“i haven't told jake-hyung that you dipshit!”
niki splutters from his place on the floor, it’s a bit of a mess, “i thought you told him! everyone tells hyung things!”
“i only told you because you are stupidly observant and literally our roommate, but everyone else was busy focussing on jake joking around with hyungs!”
jake absolutely hates this conversation. he frankly doesn’t care that jungwon nor sunoo told him about their relationship.
“if you guys are going to continue talking about sunoo and jungwon then get out! and i don’t care that you didn’t tell me, it’s not a big deal, not as much as you’re making it out to be. if you haven’t noticed, i myself am busy dealing with my failing love life.”
sunoo huffs, “whatever, it’s not like you’d out me to the members anyway.”
jake shakes his head as sunoo finally sits up.m
“we’re getting sidetracked, hyungs, c’mon,” niki ignores sunoo’s little you started it! and continues, “jake-hyung, you’re in love with the hyungs aren’t you?” god, jake wants them to stop being so blunt.
there’s really no use in hiding it anyway, they basically have him and his feelings towards heeseung and sunghoon all figured out.
“yeah,” he breathes out, “i want to be romantically involved with my bandmates who are already romantically involved with each other. i have no chance with them guys, it’s no use.” jake shakes off the sick feeling in his stomach.
sunoo rolls his eyes in a judging manner. he hates being judged by sunoo the most, that little shit only ever judges and to be on the end of it feels like you’re a child getting scolded for making fun of someone when you didn’t even do it in the first place. (yes this is entirely pointed, jake will never forget that one kid.)
it feels bad, and not fun (but when is getting judged ever fun). jake would like to pretend he isn’t on the other end of sunoo’s judging gaze right now.
“and just why do you think that?”
“they always say no to me.”
niki scoffs at that, “really? do you know how dumb that sounds, hyung? it’s only after jokes that they say no! i fucking wonder why!”
“ok, niki,” jake says, affronted, “you didn’t have to say it like that.”
“unless we’re being mean to you, i don’t think you’ll ever get it. you’re so stupid, hyung.”
jake would be the first one to admit that he’s stupid, but jake is sad, they really didn’t have to say it out loud and make him feel worse. he wants to stop the tears that come with sunoo’s remark, but his body betrays his mind and his tears taste sweet freedom.
sunoo rushes to jake and apologises profusely, “wait, oh my god, don’t cry, i’m sorry, you’re not stupid, just in love.”
jake wails a little harder at that.
—
jake did have a conversation with heeseung and sunghoon when he had first started making the jokes. when he wasn’t in love with them and it was so much nicer to go about his day.
they gave jake the all clear, saying they didn’t mind when jake squished himself between them with every limb he has, didn’t mind that he begged to join their relationship, or did everything he could to join. he never did that without the members around, and never imposed on their more intimate moments they had by themselves.
it’s his downfall, the fact that they said they were ok with it, and let him continue. it would have been so much easier if they had just told him no, forbade him from making anymore jokes. here he is, though, so many months into the future and stupidly in love with said boys.
it’s almost like punishment for jake, the way his heart beats out of control around the couple and with absolutely no way to be able to confess to them and get a good outcome.
jake is 100% sure he has no chance with heeseung and sunghoon.
—
it’s friday and they have music bank.
while traversing the music bank halls, trying to find sunghoon, he thinks about how good he looks in his outfit and jake wants to sob just a tiny bit.
he’s too lost in thought and forgets where he’s going, only to end up running right into the jang wonyoung.
ah, she’s even prettier in person, he thinks.
“oh! jake-ssi, i’m so sorry about that!” wow, even the way she speaks is so pretty. “are you looking for sunghoon-oppa?” jake nods wordlessly, too stunned to speak, and wonyoung points him into the right direction. he thanks her and waddles off into the direction she pointed to.
jake spends an embarrassingly long time thinking about the way wonyoung said his name and before he knows it he’s opening a door which has the name sunghoon written on it.
heeseung and sunghoon break away from a hug. it’s fast, but jake catches it.
“it’s just me.” he chuckles, walking into the room as the couples’ bodies relax, realising it’s just their bandmate.
jake lets his eyes hone in on sunghoon’s outfit. it’s simple, but it draws out all of jake’s oxygen supply and leaves him feeling nervous and helpless.
“i ran into wonyoung-ssi,” he blurts out, not meaning to, but his palms start feeling clammy and he needs to distract himself from the rising panic in his chest. “she’s much prettier in person,” he continues before he knows how to stop, “the way she speaks is also stupidly pretty, why is she so pretty?”
jake wants to staple his lips together after seeing the way heeseung and sunghoon’s expressions and bodies droop at his words. god, he’s so stupid. sunoo was right about that one. he should think he has a good brain-to-mouth filter on him, but around sunghoon and heeseung it seems like it isn’t the case.
he ducks his head and leaves the room.
—
jake is very aware that along with romantic relationships, people have sexual ones, and it shouldn’t surprise jake that it isn’t all that different with heeseung and sunghoon.
but jake almost stumbled onto something he’d consider bad.
sunghoon was on his knees, in the bathroom, heeseung’s dick in his mouth. jake stood at the bathroom door, frown etched onto his face.
he couldn’t stop staring at the way sunghoon bobbed his head on the older’s cock, sometimes gagging when he took heeseung too deep. heeseung had his mouth open in a silent moan and his eyes were shut completely. it’s something that he’d seen in those crude pornos he watched with his friends as a pre-teen.
it was horrible, jake hated what he saw, he was uncomfortable, but he couldn’t stop staring at how intimate the act was, and the fact that he was watching sunghoon and heeseung do something so private.
(though, it was really the couple’s fault for keeping the door open, for not being careful enough to close and lock the door.)
jake was very aware that having sex was normal for couples, but it didn’t take away from the uncomfortable feeling that settled in his stomach at the thought of himself engaging in sex.
he thought he’d get over it, it was a little immature of him to feel this way anyway, he’s not a ten year old.
—
jake begrudgingly drags niki and sunoo to his bedroom (locking jay out for the second night in a row) and tells them about the events that conspired today. sunoo damn nearly hits him when he retells the story.
“now they’re going to think you’re straight and crushing on sunghoon-hyung’s new coworker. this is a step in the wrong direction hyung.” sunoo whines as niki nods and jake huffs.
“i came to you two for help, not for you to recite my failures back to me.”
“too bad,” niki says, “you need to know how stupid you are after what happened.”
jake remembers the last time sunoo called him stupid and he really doesn’t want to cry again, but he can already feel the tears burning in the back of his eyes. he really is stupid.
“i’m sorry.” his voice breaks and sunoo swipes at niki’s shoulder.
“idiot,” he hisses, “you made him cry.”
niki raises his arms in defence, “how was i supposed to know he’d cry again?”
jake sniffs.
“you’re not stupid, hyung, i’m sorry,” he apologises, “we have to fix this somehow.”
“we could… call hyung gay a bit…?” niki snorts, “you give us a better idea then!”
niki rubs at the back of his neck, deep in thought. “how did you and jungwon-hyung… y’know… fornicate?”
sunoo splutter and jake chokes on his spit. holy shit niki did not just say fornicate of all words.
“i’m sorry?! where the fuck did you learn that?”
“sunghoon-hyung and heeseung-hyung said it once and i looked it up… i thought it meant getting together? i wanted to seem knowledgeable.” he pouts.
“niki, i hate to be the one to say this, but it means having sex,” niki’s face blossoms a deep shade of pink, clearly embarrassed, “one, we’re minors, i would never engage in sexual acts, and especially not around the dorm. two, i think heeseung-hyung and sunghoon-hyung were the ones fornicating.”
“i guess there was a reason the hyungs used the word fornicate.” niki chuckles awkwardly.
this conversation is quite embarrassing to have.
his thoughts slip back to the scene in the bathroom he was unfortunate enough to witness.
is that what a relationship entails? he questions himself, already not liking the idea of having to fornicate with someone, much less two people. he just doesn’t want it.
“oh, well, it was pretty easy to get with jungwon to be honest,” sunoo moves on (jake’s lucky, he wants to stop thinking about sex), “i’m good at being open and so is jungwon, so it worked out perfectly. we were very open about our feelings towards each other and communicated well. it was easy to understand the tension between us after it.”
“but jake-hyung is not like that at all, how— oh! we’ll just train him or something. like a puppy!” niki suggests and jake groans, pushing out a not a puppy! they ignore him.
whatever, he’ll just have to go along with their silly plans for now. (just to test if it works, he reasons.)
—
jake had a dream that night.
it dug into his heart, his chest, his vocal chords, begging for release of the best kept secret of his life. sunghoon and heeseung were staring at him expectantly and it quickly became too overbearing.
the secret itches in his throat. he can’t hold onto it anymore.
“i-i like you both… so much…” his voice was quiet, uncertain.
the two he was confessing to just looked on, eyes widened before heeseung spoke up.
“we don’t like you back, there’s a reason we tell you no every time you ask. we’re not letting you in and that’s final. leave us alone.”
he woke up after that, feeling a dull throbbing in the back of his head. his face felt damp from the tears still running down his face.
it was starting to lighten up outside, but jake needed comfort and more sleep.
jay was still sleeping in his bed across from jake. he sat up in his up in his own bed, wiping away the residue of his tears before he crawled out, making his way to jay’s bed. he was closer to the wall, which gave jake an easier time to slip in behind jay.
the other grunted and turned around to face jake.
“jake?” he questioned, but the one in question only buried his head in jay’s chest. jay said nothing, just letting the two of them tangle up in each other’s arms.
—
jake tries to be more open with sunghoon and heeseung the day after his talk with sunoo and niki.
he starts by telling the couple that he’s gay, and certainly doesn’t have a crush on sunghoon’s definitely pretty, but certainly not the right gender for him to crush on coworker, the jang wonyoung.
he even steps past that vague line of friendship and tells sunghoon that he looked really good in the outfit he was given and it made him nervous, so he blurted out the last thing that was on his mind. though, admitting that his last thoughts were about how pretty wonyoung was, probably should’ve been kept to himself.
he gauges sunghoon’s reaction and he looks relieved to find this out, even heeseung looks relieved and it makes jake stupidly giddy.
i’m getting somewhere! he thinks happily, and decides that he’ll allow himself to be more delusional around the couples’ affections.
niki tells jake they seemed much happier when jake explained what happened and he takes this as a sign too.
there’s a knock on the door and jay’s voice filters through, “guys please, this is the third night in a row i’ve been locked out of my own room. what are you guys even talking about in there? let me sleep!”
the three in the room look at each other, they haven’t spoken about much tonight and jake has a feeling that jay wants to talk about what happened early this morning (jake doesn’t want to).
“we’re busy!” jake shouts back and jay huffs really loudly and stomps away from the door, probably to make sure the three in the room know he isn’t happy about being rejected.
they sit in silence for a few seconds.
“i had a dre— a nightmare, last night…” it takes a while for jake to muster up the courage to continue, “i-i confessed,” to heeseung-hyung and sunghoon goes unsaid.
“i take it that what happened was bad?” sunoo asks, his voice soft. jake doesn’t hear this side of the younger much.
he shakes his head, “th-they rejected me, it stung. i know it’s not real but it just felt so real. i’m sure it’s not like that, you guys agree right?” jake sounds desperate, even to his own ears, but he can’t bring himself to care.
niki purses his lips in thought, “do you want what i’ve observed or what i think?”
sunoo shakes his head at niki, “just give him both.”
niki nods, “from what i’ve observed they never really minded when you got in between them. you remember when jay-hyung got in between them and they both gave him death glares until he moved?”
jake does remember that, he had completely forgotten about that experience until now. he had immediately taken jay’s place in between sunghoon and heeseung after he had been scared away, hoping to piss the couple off, only to find that they didn’t mind.
“what i think is that they’re definitely into you.”
sunoo makes a noise of agreement, “i agree with niki, they’re so into you hyung.”
jake is now 50% sure they’re into him, even with niki and sunoo’s words.
—
jake remembers his time in high school, back in australia.
the boys he was friends with only ever really spoke about women, sex and sports. he tried to pay no mind to it all, but they were very pushy, very good a peer-pressuring jake into lying about his attraction towards women and sex.
australian high school boys, especially sporty kids, really knew how to say we’re a raging stereotype without actually saying it. actions speak louder than words after all.
jake fell for an acquaintance, another guy, he knew he was fucked knowing how high school boys were or could be. he was only ever an acquaintance, so he didn’t see him very much, but the weight of knowing he had a crush on another guy loomed over his head like a bad storm cloud. it was especially hard lying about having a crush on some girl when he knew full well he wasn’t into girls at all.
sometimes, his friends had decided to take up the fact that he had a (made up) crush on this girl and actually confront her about it. more often than not, jake found himself in the exact same position every time, with a girlfriend he didn’t even like. his acting skills did improve because of it anyway, so it wasn’t a total loss.
the relationships always ended exactly the same way too, when he’d refused to have sex with the girls. he’d used the fact that he wasn’t ready, but apparently it wasn’t accceptable for these girls.
jake had been popular in high school, but as people got wind of jake not wanting sex, he then started living a peaceful life.
—
even now, jake truly doesn’t understand what his whole aversion to sex is. he told himself that he wasn’t ready, but seeing heeseung and sunghoon in the bathroom that one day bought every thing back.
he needs to talk to someone, but this time he doesn’t go to sunoo and niki, opting to talk to his roommate instead.
“you wanted to talk?” jay asks, in english.
whenever the two know they’re about to speak about something serious they use english instead, because they’re the only two able to fully comprehend and respond in english, so it gives a hard time for the others to eavesdrop. heeseung’s good at english, but he certainly isn’t that good.
“uh, yeah,” they’re sitting across from each other, on their respective beds. “it might feel a bit personal and i’m sorry.”
“it’s ok, i’ll answer it, no matter how personal.” jake gives him a weird glance. “it’s not like anyone will hear, we’re fine.”
jake nods wordlessly, it does seem very nice that he’d answer anything though.
“have you had sex before?”
“yeah.” jake didn’t actually expect he’d be so nonchalant about it.
“you liked it right?”
jay nods, “of course, i was attracted to her.”
“do you think sex is important for a relationship?”
“no, not at all. i didn’t have sex with her because i thought i had to, i did it because i wanted to, because i was sexually attracted to her,” jake looks down and twiddles his fingers, “is there something wrong?” jay asks, voice incredibly soft.
“i-i don’t think i want to have sex. ever.”
jay smiles, “and that’s completely ok.” jake wants to cry.
“do you think my future partners will care?”
“if they love and support you no matter what, of course not.”
his mind slips to sunghoon and heeseung. they’re already some of the most caring people in the world. he doesn’t think they’d mind if he’d never have sex with them, especially not when they have each other to satisfy their needs.
jake feels like he doesn’t need to worry.
“come here.” jay calls him over, opening his arms and slipping back into korean. jake follows, crashing into jay’s open arms.
jake pushes his face to the older’s neck, breathing in his scent. he smells rich, like dark chocolate.
they fall onto the bed, once again tangling up together like the day before last. jake is dozing off when jay asks him about it.
“i had a nightmare.” he slurs, not wanting to go into detail.
jake falls asleep like that, tangled up in the arms of his best friend, feeling comfortable.
—
jake wakes up to hear rustling beside him when he remembers he slept with jay last night.
jay is a nice hugger (not as good as sunghoon though), so jake wakes up feeling so much better than he did last night.
“morning,” he says to jay, who turns and smiles, “i slept so much better last night with you in my arms.” it’s definitely more flirtatious than jake wanted and he should really learn how to tone it down around the others now that he wants to make sure sunghoon and heeseung know he’s into them.
“i’m glad, jake-ah.”
jungwon comes in a little bit later, when jake’s on his own bed, scrolling through his phone and tells the two of them to get ready for the schedules.
today, they get told about a fanmeeting that will be held both offline and online. jake feels his body shake in anticipation just hearing about it.
they have to decide what songs they’d like to perform and jake’s hand shoots up, very eager to suggest let me in. niki and sunoo give him a look but he pretends he doesn’t see them. jake will take this as an opportunity for him to get closer to heeseung and sunghoon. (even though he knows full well he doesn’t need to, maybe it’s more for confirmation than anything else.)
the others easily agree, listing off their own reasons for wanting to perform it. jake kind of feels bad for using it only for personal gains. they choose other songs to perform but jake blocks it all out, thinking about the things he could do while practising for let me in.
he’ll start off with the basic serenading when the end of the song comes around, but he wonders what else he can do to spice it up, because there really isn’t much he can do without repeating himself and they’ve already performed let me in one too many times.
he knows niki and sunoo would be able to brainstorm with him, so before they start their practice jake says he needs to go to the bathroom as he shoots pleading looks to niki and sunoo. they understand, and jake thanks whatever gods out there that the other members don’t also needs to go.
“can—”
“you must really be stupid,” sunoo huffs out angrily, “let me in? hyung really?”
“sunoo-hyung, basically everyone wanted to do let me in. we would have been performing in anyway.”
“at least then i wouldn’t have believed that you’re some masochist who loves hurting himself in the name of some crushes.”
jake frowns, “why are your panties so twisted? i’m making moves on the men i want, the ones that you gave me confidence about them liking me back.”
sunoo sighs heavily, pacing around the bathroom. “i’m sorry, i just feel like there could be better ways to do this, like actually talking to them.”
“i have to agree with sunoo-hyung,” niki agrees, “they’re just as in love with you as you are them.” jake’s frown deepens but doesn’t make a move to disagree with either of them.
“fine, i-i’ll talk to them.”
sunoo breathes out a sigh of relief, “thank you.”
when they get back no one comments on how long they were gone for, even jungwon knows to leave it alone.
let me in comes and goes and jake only says “that’s what heeseung-hyung and sunghoon should do with me.” the two mentioned only groan out a no that feels forced even to jake’s ears.
it seems to be getting harder for even them to pretend to reject him now. jake grins to himself.
jake does not talk to heeseung and sunghoon like he promised sunoo and niki. he can feel sunoo’s judging glare on his back and it makes jake feel irrevocably sad.
sunoo’s judging glare hurts.
—
it only takes a few days before something happens anyway.
jake was going to call over jay to talk to him about something, but the way heeseung and sunghoon are wrapped up in each other on the couch even around their members means another opportunity he can’t miss to joke around.
rounding the corner of the couch he pushes himself between heeseung and sunghoon.
“wow, don’t you feel like i fit here?” jake says, “i think you should let me into your relationship now.”
what comes next out of the twos’ mouths is unexpected to even his members.
“ok.” it gets said by both sunghoon and heeseung, so jake’s brain starts going haywire and malfunctions completely.
the two stand up the best they can with jake half on them both and starts to drag him away when they do get up. he gets dragged by the couple into heeseung’s solo room. he looks back to his members with pleading eyes but some of them just smiling, the others (niki and sunoo) smirking.
“uhm, hello…” jake chuckles nervously, sitting on heeseung’s bed as the bed’s owner and his boyfriend loom over him. it doesn’t really make jake feel very comfortable.
he’s only slightly unsure of how this will end up, as his thoughts slip back to his nightmare and the fact that he doesn’t want to have sex. but other than that, this whole thing can only be good thing.
“jake do you like us?” heeseung eventually pushes out and jake’s breath hitches. he didn’t expect them to be so blunt about it.
they look on, faces expectant. jake can feel his face burn up from the looks. it’s the moment of truth and the longer the silence stays between them the more uncomfortable the sunoo is jake’s mind gets.
his throat clogs up as he opens his mouth. what timing and only manages a squeak. this is embarrassing so he ends up only nodding in response to their question.
looking down, he twiddles his fingers. heeseung kneels in front of him, hands reaching out to grab his. their hands connect and jake feels his stomach twist into tight knots. he feels close to throwing up from how nervous he is.
“look at me, jaeyunnie,” heeseung says, voice soft but firm, making sure jake raises his head. looking at heeseung, his eyes crinkle where his smile is pulled so far up his face in what only can be described as happiness. “that’s good, really good, because we like you too, jaeyunnie.”
jake melts into heeseung at that, hands breaking away from where they held onto heeseung’s to wrap his arms around the older’s neck, heeseung’s arms wrapping around his waist.
“guys…” comes a chuckle from behind heeseung and jake remembers sunghoon.
“i like you too, hoonie,” jake finally manages to get out, looking towards a glowing sunhoon, “come here.” he opens his arms and sunghoon basically falls into the hug.
“don’t you think you just fit here, jaeyunnie?”