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Yeonjun has always been so pretty it hurts. Mouth red and parted slightly to inhale frosty air, cheeks pinked by the December cold, scarf wrapped haphazardly around his head, inky black strands of hair spilling carelessly out of it. There's a woodchip in Beomgyu's shoe slowly digging itself deeper into his heel, but the pain dulls in comparison to his sudden hatred for the beautiful boy on the swingset with the sad eyes and the too-red lips.
Choi Yeonjun is the new kid, has been for a few months and might always be, moved from the big city to live with his grandparents. Be kind to him, Beomgyu's mother had scolded. His family is going through a lot right now. Beomgyu doesn't fully understand the concept of a job, or the repercussions of losing one. He's nine years old with the world at his fingertips, and he doesn't plan on being locked down by a 'job' anytime soon. He's going to be an author-actor-soccer player-billionaire, with Soobin as his slightly less important but still very important partner. There's no room for being kind to pretty boys in his plans, they only get in the way.
He turns to Soobin who is, as always, right at his side, digging through the wood chips to the dirt beneath, running the splintery pieces through his fingertips, getting dirt under his nails. "What do you think his deal is?" Beomgyu asks, tilting his head in the direction of the swingset where Yeonjun glides through the air alone.
"I dunno," says Soobin, sounding bored. "My parents said his family is having a hard time and that I should be his friend because he probably doesn't have very many."
The thought of Soobin finding another friend makes Beomgyu's stomach crawl. "You don't need any other friends. You have me," he says, and hopes it doesn't sound whiny. His dad is always telling him that he whines too much now that he's almost double-digits old.
Soobin lets the wood chips all slide out of his hands with a dull plunk. He wipes his hands on Beomgyu's jeans, the heat of his palms seeping through the fabric. Beomgyu squirms away. "I know," he says. "I wasn't planning on actually listening to my parents about it. People say Yeonjun is weird, and you're enough weird for me already."
Beomgyu scowls even though his heart does a funny dance in his chest. "I don't trust him. He's too pretty. Boys shouldn't be pretty like that, it's not right," Beomgyu declares. He feels wise, bestowing his superior knowledge on Soobin like this.
"Okay," says Soobin in response, his fingers back in the dirt. Beomgyu wrinkles his nose at the way his nails come out tipped in the deep brown of the earth. "I don't know why you're so upset about Yeonjun. You glare at him every time you see him, it's weird."
"Stop saying I'm weird," Beomgyu snaps, shoving Soobin in the shoulder. "I just don't trust him." Beomgyu takes a particularly large woodchip, almost akin to a piece of bark, and flings it at the swingset. It hits Yeonjun in the shin and bounces unceremoniously to the ground. The boy whips around so fast his scarf comes off and goes swirling away into the breeze, landing on the limb of a tree nearby.
Yeonjun glares at Beomgyu, who narrows his eyes back, sticking his tongue out for a second before whirling around to face Soobin, feeling heat build in his cheeks.
"Why'd you do that?" Soobin asks. "He wasn't doing anything to you."
"I don't trust him," Beomgyu says again. He can't explain it more than that, can't explain the way his heart speeds up when he takes in the details of Yeonjun's face, the same way it sometimes beats faster when Soobin brushes their fingers together while they walk up and down the same streets they've carved paths in their whole childhood.
Beomgyu won't come to terms with what the fluttering behind his ribcage means for another few years, but this is where it starts, here, on the playground, making a rival out of someone just because he's too pretty for words. "You shouldn't trust him either. Because I don't. And friends are always on each other's sides, right?"
"Of course I'm on your side," says Soobin, pausing from picking dirt out from under his nails to give Beomgyu an exasperated but fond glance. The blush on Beomgyu's cheeks refuses to succumb to the chill of the winter air. "But I wasn't planning on ever being friends with him. And even if I was, you'd always be my best friend." He says it so simply, as if it's a universal truth, as if Beomgyu doesn't spend sleepless nights imagining what would happen if Soobin suddenly decided Beomgyu wasn't worth his time anymore and left him alone and friendless, if Soobin picked someone like Yeonjun, pretty and kind with sad eyes and a fractured home to take care of instead.
"Of course I know that," Beomgyu huffs. "You're my best friend too."
Soobin nods, as if he never doubted it, and goes back to playing in the dirt. Beomgyu watches him, tracking his movements, never willing to let him out of his sight, afraid he'll disappear. Yeonjun stands under a tree, reaching valiantly for the end of his scarf, dangling tantalizingly just out of reach. The playground is crowded but the three of them form their own corner of the world, inexplicably entangled. The wind is sharp where it paints streaks of pink on their faces, leaving the cool taste of change to linger in their mouths and burn their lungs.
Just as Yeonjun manages to tug his scarf out of the tree, the first snowflakes of the year begin to fall.
~~~
Soobin thinks he must have spent half his life watching Beomgyu, seven out of fourteen long years sitting back and observing his antics, always with a smile that falls somewhere between fond and annoyed, some witty quip or another poised on the tip of his tongue. He plans what he'll say in advance so that he isn't caught unawares when Beomgyu turns to him with a beaming grin and bright eyes and all the breath leaves him in a rush.
They're at the bank of the pond now, one of their favorite hideaways, sheltered in a forgotten corner of the public park, the ground covered in brambles and overgrown weeds. Beomgyu is kneeling so close to the pond that he might tip in any second, trying to catch a frog. He's been at it for almost an hour but they keep slipping through his fingers. The sound of his indignation every time a frog manages to escape his clutches fills Soobin with an unfair warmth. To be in love with your best friend is both the knife to the ribs and the bandage that heals the wound. Soobin is well familiar with the pain of it by now, unsure of when exactly the bumbling childhood affection he had turned into something more raw, the desire to hold Beomgyu too closely and too tightly, to keep him away from the prying eyes of the world and remain alone together.
Soobin is jolted out of his reverie as Beomgyu comes scrambling back up the shore, eyes fixed on a rapidly approaching figure picking their way through the brush. Beomgyu grips Soobin's arm tightly, leaning in to whisper frantically in his ear. "It's Yeonjun!" he hisses, his grip on Soobin's arm ironclad, burning through the thin linen of Soobin's shirt.
Beomgyu's eyes dart frantically from side to side, seeking an escape route, and Soobin suppresses a sigh. Beomgyu's inexplicable childhood rivalry with Yeonjun only grew over the years. Yeonjun became a constant in their life, Beomgyu's complaints about the way he talked, the style of his clothes, his pierced ears, the way he parted his hair, all following Soobin around like a dark cloud as they grew older. They were always getting in each other’s way, unable to avoid each other despite how much they feigned hatred and disinterest. Soobin never truly understood the obsession, seeing as they generally ran in a different circle than Yeonjun, whose popularity had grown with his beauty as they made their way stumbling from childhood into adolescence.
Yeonjun haunted their friendship like a phantom, lurking around every corner. He'd moved away before their first year of high school began, but Soobin is somehow unsurprised to find him here, shattering the bubble of peaceful contentment that had formed around him and his best friend.
Unable to find a way out of the confrontation, Beomgyu moves to hide behind Soobin, still gripping his arm, leaving nail prints in his skin that Soobin will run his fingertips over later, wishing they would stay, mark him as Beomgyu's forever, body and heart. Beomgyu is pressed up against him, breathing unsteady, air fanning across the back of Soobin's neck, leaving goosebumps in its wake. Soobin feels heat crawl over his skin, making him burn in the thick summer air. There's a moment of tension, Yeonjun still unaware of their presence as he moves ever closer, eyes trained on the ground to avoid tripping over a stray twig.
The world pauses when Yeonjun looks up. Soobin drinks him in in spite of himself, tracking the differences since he last saw him, a year that felt like a lifetime ago. Beomgyu was always the one who used to call Yeonjun pretty, saying it with disdain that almost made up for the blush that would color his cheeks. Yeonjun wields beauty like a knife, using it to wound anyone who might hurt him before they can get the chance. His hair has gotten longer, curling slightly behind his ears and over the nape of his neck. Soobin has the strange urge to run his fingers through it, to tug lightly at the strands, to hold pure beauty in his grasp.
When he finally meets Yeonjun's eyes, static buzzes in his ears. He inhales a shaky breath, feels the universe pause in its tracks, the breeze stilling, the humidity weighing thick in the air, as if nature itself has tuned in to this moment, responding to the tension that sits between these three boys who have been inexplicably intertwined. "Yeonjun," says Soobin softly, almost reverently, and he feels Beomgyu stiffen behind him, nails digging into Soobin's skin so roughly that a drop of blood wells up, threatening to fall onto the white linen of Soobin's shirt, a forever mark of Beomgyu's inability to hide his emotions.
"Hi," says Yeonjun, still a few feet away, shifting his weight from foot to foot as if he's about to throw a punch, unwilling to fully ground himself in the moment, to face the conflict in front of him.
"How have you been?" Soobin asks, and his voice comes out a little too rough, a little too desperate. "How's the new school?" These are the questions he should be asking, the polite ones, but Soobin knows deep down that they are wrong. They're too small to fill the rift that lies between them. How are you, he asks, when what he really means is why do your eyes still hold so much sadness after all these years, and why am I the only one who ever seemed to notice it?
Yeonjun takes a half step closer, and his eyes jump to Beomgyu for a split second before quickly jumping away. Beomgyu refuses to speak. "I'm good," he says, "the new school is nice, I'm liking it so far." He's smiling, but it doesn't reach his eyes, still so sad. They cry out for love, and, for a moment, Soobin wants to love him. Instead, he looks away.
"I'm glad. I miss seeing you around, though," he replies. It's not a lie, although Yeonjun probably thinks it is. Soobin never disliked Yeonjun in the passionate, obsessive way that Beomgyu did. But where Beomgyu went, so did Soobin, and where Beomgyu didn't step, Soobin didn't have the courage to go.
"Thanks," says Yeonjun, but he smiles in a way that shows he doesn't buy it. He glances at Beomgyu again, and his smile devolves into a grimace for a moment before recovering itself. Soobin thinks it must be so exhausting to shape your face into a lie all the time.
There's a moment of charged silence, no one wanting to speak but no one wanting to linger in the awkwardness either. Yeonjun clears his throat and says, "I was just going to sit by the pond for a bit, if that's alright with you two. I honestly didn't even know anyone else knew about this place. I come here when I need to think." It's the first bit of vulnerability Soobin has even seen from him, and the way the jagged edges of his smile soften makes Soobin's heart ache.
"We were just leaving," Beomgyu says, his voice shaky but cold. He moves to his feet in a series of jerky motions, moving so that he's standing a little too close to Yeonjun in the process. They share a glance that Soobin is locked out of, full of emotion that he can't even begin to track. He still can't understand what makes Beomgyu hate Yeonjun so deeply, if it even is hatred. They look like they could either kill each other or kiss each other, and Soobin doesn't know which thought makes his heart pound more. But they do neither, brushing past each other without saying a word, leaving Soobin to scramble after Beomgyu like a kicked puppy.
"Good seeing you, Yeonjun," he says, and the words taste like ash and lies on his tongue.
"You too," Yeonjun replies. "See you around."
It should feel like a final goodbye. After all, there's no reason Soobin should ever see Yeonjun again, at different high schools and then different colleges. But Soobin knows, deep down, that he'll be seeing Yeonjun again. So he just nods in response, feeling an understanding settle, if only for a moment, between him and Yeonjun before Beomgyu grabs his hand and tugs him away into the trees.
Neither Soobin nor Beomgyu speak until they're sufficiently out of earshot, Beomgyu's hand still sitting heavy in Soobin's, skin damp from the humidity, and Soobin hopes he never lets go. Once they're back into the main part of the park, Beomgyu drags Soobin over to the little playground, where they collapse onto the steps that lead up to the slide. Beomgyu is clearly fuming, filled with the rage that only Yeonjun has ever been able to drag out of him. "I can't believe he was at our spot!" he exclaims, letting go of Soobin's hand to tug roughly through his hair.
"If we want to get technical about it, the pond doesn't belong to him as much as it doesn't belong to us," Soobin says as mildly as he can with his heart still beating frantically behind the cage of his ribs. "It's public property."
Beomgyu narrows his eyes in a glare. "You know what I mean! We've never seen anybody else there before, and the one time we do it's Choi Yeonjun. Just when I thought I'd never have to see his stupid face again he shows up here, at our pond! And I never even got a chance to catch a fucking frog!"
Soobin knows there's no stopping Beomgyu once he's enraged like this, his eyes gleaming with a fervor that only Yeonjun could ever bring out of him. It's an obsessive hatred, balancing on the knife's edge between complete disgust and overwhelming interest. But Soobin has always been the one person who has been able to calm the raging tides of Beomgyu's emotions, if even just a little bit, so he reaches out and places a soothing hand on Beomgyu's arm. "It was just the wrong place at the wrong time, Gyu. We can come back again tomorrow, if you'd like."
Beomgyu pauses and takes a deep breath, and there's something flickering across his face for a moment that looks a lot like helplessness, like now that the sanctity of this place – a place where he and Soobin were free to be themselves without the shackles of anyone else's opinion, spending their dwindling youth entangled with nature and the sounds of each other's laughter – has been broken, he may never be able to see it the same way again. His eyelashes flutter once and then the rage of before is back. "I bet he somehow found out about it and came here just to spite me," he says, and Soobin can feel both the lie and the challenge to contradict him hovering thick in the air.
"I highly doubt that, Gyu. It seemed like he was just as surprised to see us as we were to see him. Can't we just let it go and move on?" Soobin says, and he knows it's the wrong thing to say as Beomgyu wrenches his arm out of Soobin's grasp.
"God, Soobin, who's side are you on, anyway?" He retaliates, and there's venom in his tone that reeks of insecurity. Soobin has always been able to see through this ruse, but he pretends like he doesn't every time, too scared to examine what might lurk beneath the surface of Beomgyu's desire to keep Soobin close at all times. "Don't think I didn't see how you were ogling him when he first walked up to us. You think he's attractive, and so you won't side with me against him, and I think that's fucked up."
Soobin sighs, fiddling with a thread slowly unravelling from his sleeve. "You're jumping to conclusions. I can't honestly say I understand why it always has to be sides with you, anyway, but of course I'm on your side. And I don't find Yeonjun attractive, and I definitely wasn't ogling him." The tips of his ears go hot, and he refuses to look Beomgyu in the eye.
"Ok," says Beomgyu, and after a moment, "sorry. I shouldn't have lashed out like that. There's just... something about him that gets under my skin. I can't explain it." Soobin can explain it, can see it clear as day, but he doesn't want to think about it.
"We're good," Soobin says, and he hears Beomgyu's soft sigh of relief in reply. "We've been friends long enough for me not to be bothered by a little lashing every once and a while." His forced smile is fragile, and he can feel his cheeks ache with false reconciliation. One of these days he's going to smile a little too wide and a little too jagged and his face will split right open. It will be to please Beomgyu, as it always is, to placate the raging tides of his emotion, his anger, his desire to grab onto things and claw at them until they bleed. Soobin doesn't mind bleeding, so long as it means Beomgyu still wants him to be close.
"It's not just every once and a while, though," Beomgyu responds, the dagger of his frustration twisting until it's aimed upon himself. He refuses to meet Soobin's gaze. "I yell at you a lot, and you don't ever get mad at me back. You're too nice to me, and I'm sorry."
Vulnerability typically bleeds out of Beomgyu like a wounded animal, hissing and clawing to protect itself, even as it cries out to be healed. It's part of why Soobin has always been so kind to him, has refused to get angry when Beomgyu lashes out, instead treating him with a patience that he might not deserve. Shows of direct vulnerability like this are rare for Beomgyu because of his innate desire to appear strong, so Soobin reaches out between them and squeezes Beomgyu's shoulder, letting his hand linger for a beat too long before pulling back, his hand falling awkwardly onto the grass between them.
Beomgyu smiles softly at him, and Soobin's traitorous heart flutters. "Thanks for not getting pissed at me when I'm being stupid," he says, and there's fragility in his voice that means something, but it's a dangerous sort of something that Soobin can't bring himself to name.
"You're welcome," he replies, and when Beomgyu's smile widens it outshines the warmth and light of the July sun. Soobin feels dazzled. "If you're really that grateful, you should let me win next time we play video games together," he adds, just to break the tension.
Beomgyu's relief at the break from emotional revelation is palpable in the air as he shoves Soobin in the shoulder until he flops his body to the ground, dirt immediately clinging to his hair and clothes. "I'll never be that grateful," Beomgyu says with a smirk as he towers over Soobin, haloed in sunlight, looking like an angel. There's a faint blush on his cheeks that can't entirely be attributed to the warmth of the afternoon.
Soobin lets himself smile for real this time, accepting defeat at Beomgyu's hands, as he always has and always will. Soobin breathes deep and tastes grass and humidity on the air, the taste of childhood, one he'll crave for the rest of his life. Something deep in his bones, in the subtle ache of the bleeding, beating organ in his chest, tells him that there won't ever be another summer like this, one where he can lie back and feel the heat of the sun on his skin and one where he can still tussle in the dirt with his best friend without people looking at them a little too closely, a little too strangely.
Sun pours down on him from above as Beomgyu retreats to lie down beside him, and their shoulders brush but neither of them flinch away from it for once. There's a delicate peace surrounding them that comes from the lazy pressure of the summer air, one that tugs their eyelids closed and lulls them slowly into the world of dreams.
They're fast asleep when Yeonjun comes traipsing past them, and neither of them will ever know how he pauses just to look at them for a moment, faces peaceful in their slumber, a soft innocence to their features that feels all too vulnerable for him to bear witness too. There's a deep loneliness that strikes him suddenly as he notices the casual way their shoulders brush and their fingers tangle in the grass, one that he has tried and failed to constantly keep at bay. His feet feel rooted to the spot for a moment, until Soobin stirs half-awake and Yeonjun stumbles away.
~~~
Beomgyu kisses a boy for the first time when he's sixteen, hidden behind the back of the high school during a football game. He leans in right as their team scores a touchdown, and the roar of the crowd matches the thunder of his heartbeat. It's not a particularly good kiss, clumsy and inexperienced as they both are, but it's pleasant just the same. It gives Beomgyu a firm answer to a question he'd grappled with since he noticed himself feeling a little too flustered when another boy would get too close.
He makes his way back to the bleachers in a daze, to where Soobin is waiting for him with a knowing smile already plastered across his face. There's something fake about it that Beomgyu misses in his blushing happiness, a sort of artificiality that's become routine for the two of them, to hide the truth that they both refuse to acknowledge. He tells Soobin about the kiss on the drive home, and this time he doesn't miss the way Soobin's knuckles go white from his grip on the steering wheel, even as he tells Beomgyu how happy he is for him.
When Beomgyu tells him that he doesn't think he likes the boy enough to date him, Soobin says that it's a shame with relief in his eyes, and he drives Beomgyu the rest of the way home in charged silence.
~~~
Beomgyu does date a boy, their last year of high school, and Soobin bears it with the same muscle-aching smile with which he bears everything. They break up a week before they're set to leave for college, and Beomgyu cries for an hour into Soobin's arms and Soobin tries to convince himself that the relief he feels is because the boy was never truly kind to Beomgyu in the way he deserved, rather than joy that Beomgyu can be wholly Soobin's once again.
The world keeps moving even for those who suffer from a broken heart, and Soobin and Beomgyu go off to college with teary eyes and too many bags and boxes that still don't seem enough to contain all the bits of home they want to carry with them. They go to separate colleges, and even though they're close enough for weekend visits, they feel the loss of one another's constant presence like an open wound. They both make new friends and pretend that it doesn't make one another jealous, and drown themselves in classes and overpriced coffee and the fragility of a college social life until things feel a little less tumultuous.
Loath as Soobin would be to admit it, the distance is good for them. He had never realized how overwhelming it was to be close to Beomgyu all the time, to be constantly agonizing over his every word as to not give the contents of his heart away entirely. When he's at college, he can almost convince himself that the all-consuming love he has for his childhood best friend is starting to fade away.
The first time Beomgyu visits Soobin's college there's a hint of awkwardness between them that has never existed before. They both speak over each other too quickly in their haste to fill the looming uncomfortable silence, and the sight of Beomgyu in Soobin's dorm room, his eyes slowly scanning every inch and pausing when he gets to a photo of himself and Soobin stuck to the wall amidst band and anime posters, his gaze softening and a smile pulling at the corners of his lips, feels strangely out of place. It's like an imperfect collage — like Beomgyu's a photo ripped out of a magazine and hastily glued onto a different photograph with jagged edges slowly peeling away. There's a cognitive dissonance there that feels like the start of a migraine, but Soobin pushes it away, refusing to believe that there could have possibly been a shift in his dynamic with Beomgyu since they've been apart, rejecting the awkwardness that threatens with every ounce of his will.
And the awkwardness does fade. Seconds before Beomgyu is supposed to meet Soobin's new friends he picks at the skin at the edges of his nails until a drop of blood threatens to trickle down his thumb, but it sinks back into his skin and he shakes Kai and Taehyun's hands without staining them. Soobin takes it as a good sign, and before long it feels like Beomgyu has always lived in Soobin and Taehyun's dorm room, has always had a place on the air mattress that lies slowly deflating on their floor, wedged perfectly in the space between their desks like it was made to fit there.
Beomgyu is a little shy but Kai is bubbly enough for at least three people and Taehyun somehow knows just what questions to ask to bring him out of his shell, and Soobin is reveling in the new joy of having a friend group — something he'd always secretly longed for but had known better than to yearn after out loud, fearing Beomgyu's particular brand of possessive insecurity would rear its head. There's something magical about the chorus of their laughter, their attempts to keep hushed as they approach and then pass the dorm's quiet hours making everything a little funnier, the moonlight trickling in through the window making everything look like something out of a painting or a coming of age movie.
At one point, Beomgyu makes a joke that has Soobin tipping over onto his shoulder to muffle his laughter, grasping the fabric of his best friend's shirt tightly in one fist. He breathes deep the scent of Beomgyu's skin and shampoo and feels something deep in his heart, a restless, wandering piece that he often refuses to acknowledge, settle. He sees Taehyun shoot him a questioning glance out of the corner of his eye and he pulls back a little, slowly unclenching his fingers from Beomgyu's shirt as his laughter dies. He hadn't realized he'd been holding on so tightly — it's as if his body knew more than his mind did that he wanted to keep Beomgyu close.
He shakes his head at Taehyun, who nods back a little in response. It's a conversation for later, once the weekend passes and Beomgyu has gone back to his school, leaving the part of Soobin's heart that is forever his to resume its wandering once again. For now, he allows himself to get lost in the laughter and conversation until they all eventually retreat to their own rooms (for Kai) and their own beds (for Soobin, Taehyun, and Beomgyu) and get a few precious hours of sleep.
The rest of the weekend passes in a pleasant blur. Soobin shows Beomgyu all his favorite spots on campus and in the surrounding sleepy college – the overpriced coffee shop where Taehyun works as a barista, the florist who gives out free flowers during finals to stressed students, the trinket shop run by an ancient woman who likes to talk about her old husband and always gives the students a discount – and spends time drinking in his presence like it's addiction. He doesn't realize how much he'd missed the sound of Beomgyu's laughter when it's free from the hiss of the phone, or the specific way the light reflects in his eyes when he smiles, bright enough to rival the sun.
This is the Beomgyu that Soobin dreams about sometimes late at night, fragments of hazy childhood memory intertwining in a dizzying kaleidoscope. This is the Beomgyu that Soobin fell in love with. He tries not to linger in it, tries to catch himself leaning a little too far into Beomgyu's space or grinning a little too wide with stars in his eyes, but it's hard. All the convincing he'd done over the past few months to try and think that he was no longer in love with Beomgyu, that his puppy-love crush days were over, begins to slowly slip away.
But before he can truly make sense of it, he's seeing Beomgyu off at the train station with a heavy heart and teary eyes. He gives Beomgyu a side-armed hug that doesn't convey nearly as much love as he wants it to, but he lingers for a beat too long and when he pulls back there's something he can't define lurking in Beomgyu's eyes. He steps onto the train with a final murmured goodbye, and then half of Soobin's heart goes speeding down the tracks into the distance.
All too soon, he's back into the fray of the semester, too busy to linger in the twisted workings of his fragile heart, and he manages to convince himself once again that he had imagined the depth of his longing.
~~~
They're a little more than halfway through the first semester of their sophomore year when things get complicated. Beomgyu has a strange one-week break in early November, a school tradition that no one can really recall the origins of, but that they're forced to uphold all the same, since it gets mentioned on college tours and in pamphlets they mail out to prospective students. This year, Beomgyu is spending his break sleeping on Taehyun's air mattress on Soobin's floor.
Soobin had managed to get a single room as a sophomore through a lucky blessing of the room-draw gods, and they've been planning this visit for months now, and Beomgyu is vibrating with excitement. His roommate, Jeongin, walks him to the train station and tells him to have fun with his boyfriend, a pointed comment that Beomgyu chooses to ignore despite the flaming in his cheeks. Beomgyu spends the hour-long train ride getting as much coursework done as he can in anticipation of spending all his time with Soobin and his friends. He's distracted though, unable to focus on his work for long, the words blurring together no matter how hard he concentrates. His fingers drum an unsteady rhythm on the train table, and the elderly man reading the newspaper in the seat next to him shoots him an annoyed glance. Beomgyu bows his head slightly in apology and tries to tamp down his visible anxiety.
One hour that feels like ten later, the train pulls into the station. Beomgyu grabs his suitcase and backpack and practically runs onto the platform, scanning the small crowd for Soobin. Once he spots him, he goes dashing forward, crashing into his best friend like a tornado, momentarily forgetting himself in his joy. Soobin brings one arm up to pat Beomgyu on the back, always endearingly awkward, and Beomgyu pulls away with a smile on his face that makes his face ache. "Hi," he says, beaming and breathless.
"Hi, yourself," says Soobin, grinning softly in that fond way of his, the one that always makes Beomgyu's insides feel all squirmy. There's something lurking beneath the fondness in Soobin's expression that Beomgyu can't quite put his finger on, a sort of trepidation that is unfamiliar to him, but he refuses to think about it now, not when the week he's been most looking forward to for months is finally here.
"I'm so excited!" Beomgyu replies, clapping his hands together like a child.
"Me too," says Soobin as he begins to lead them away from the station and through the sleepy college town that he temporarily calls home. Beomgyu likes it here, probably because it's an extension of Soobin, and he sometimes wishes that he had chosen to follow Soobin here, but he knows logically that the distance is good for them, no matter how much it sometimes makes his heart ache.
Soobin relays all the information on his friend group while they make the short walk to his dorm – not that there's that much to tell, Soobin has never been one for drama. Kai and Taehyun are still engaged in a will-they-won't-they that began early in their freshman year, both of them obviously in love with one another but unwilling to make the full switch from friendship to romance. A voice in the back of Beomgyu's head that sounds a lot like Jeongin pipes up to say sounds a lot like someone you know in a sly tone. Beomgyu finds it concerning that Jeongin has made his way this deep into his subconscious, and ignores the comment much like he would if Jeongin were standing right beside him.
Once Beomgyu has sworn allegiance to Soobin in his quest to finally get Taehyun and Kai together, Soobin pauses for a moment, a furrow in his brow, his mouth parted slightly, as if his words are frozen in his mouth, unable to spring free. "I have something to tell you," he says, and dread coils in Beomgyu's gut. "But you have to promise not to freak out. And I won't tell you tonight."
"What the fuck, Bin," is Beomgyu's eloquent response.
"It's nothing bad! It's a good thing, I promise, but you might be weirded out by it. There's someone I want you to say hi to tomorrow, and you have to promise not to freak out. That's all I can tell you, because I promised I'd wait until he could see you in person," Soobin replies, the tips of his ears going red.
The dread in Beomgyu's stomach curdles into full-on horror. There's only one thing this could mean – Soobin has a boyfriend. Logically, it was always going to happen. They both dated people in high school – Beomgyu with his half-hearted flings and Soobin with the girls he dated to impress his parents, no one that they had ever truly cared much about, no one who was ever truly of consequence – but something about Soobin's tone sets alarm bells ringing in Beomgyu's mind. He sounds nervous, with a hint of infatuation, a tone that Beomgyu knows well because it had for so many years been directed at him. Soobin has fallen in love, and he's left Beomgyu behind.
Beomgyu fights the urge to throw up, and gives some sort of halfhearted reply that has Soobin looking at him sideways. He must decide it's not worth commenting on, though, because he moves on to talk about how excited Taehyun and Kai are to see him, and rambles about their plans for the week. Beomgyu isn't really listening. There's a dull ringing in his ears, a thick dryness to his throat, and a seasick queasiness in his stomach. He makes it Soobin's dorm half in a daze, and fights the urge to collapse to the floor and cry.
He half-sprints to the dorm bathroom, Soobin still looking at him with a sickening mix of confusion and pity, and allows himself to silently scream into his palms and splash some cool water on is face before plastering a smile across his features and making his way back to Soobin's dorm. His skin-pulling grin must be convincing enough because Soobin seems to relax slightly as he gives Beomgyu a little dorm tour, not that there's much to show in his nearly-closet sized single but Beomgyu appreciates the gesture nonetheless.
A few minutes later, Taehyun and Kai show up with Taehyun's air mattress and a chorus of excited greetings and hugs for Beomgyu, who feels his chest warm a little at the sight of them. He loves Soobin's two friends in spite of himself and his innate and childish desire to mistrust anyone who might drag Soobin away from him. How could he not, when they both treat Beomgyu with such kindness, wrapping him up in their arms and welcoming him so easily into their hearts. Beomgyu plans on spending time with them when Soobin has class during the week, and he can honestly say that he's excited about it when they ask.
He promises to tell them embarrassing stories from when Soobin was a child and they clap with glee, and Beomgyu feels that tight coil of dread unwind just a little bit. The four of them walk arm-and-arm to the dining hall, tripping over each other and generally making a fool out of themselves, and Beomgyu largely forgets about Soobin's cryptic statement from earlier while he talks about his classes, his friends, his life, and slowly shakes off the layer of shyness that he typically winds tight around himself like a shield.
Once they're done eating (dining hall food is the same everywhere it seems – cold, overcooked, and largely flavorless), Taehyun and Kai blow kisses goodnight as they head back to their dorm. They'd chosen to room together this year, a fact that makes Soobin waggle his eyebrows at Beomgyu until they both burst into fits of giggles, Beomgyu slapping Soobin's arm as they go stumbling back to his dorm. He lets his hand linger a moment longer than he should, and there's an awkward beat when Soobin pulls away, the air hanging stagnant before they both turn away and choose to ignore it. It further confirms Beomgyu's earlier hypothesis that Soobin has finally found someone better than Beomgyu to direct his affections towards, and he feels some of his earlier nausea creep back over him.
When they're back at the dorm they inflate the air mattress and Beomgyu wraps himself up in some of Soobin's spare sheets and blankets that smell like his shampoo in a way that makes Beomgyu's heart ache. He tries very hard not to take a deep inhale while Soobin is looking. They make conversation until their speech is slurred with exhaustion and the moon hangs directly overhead, silvery light spilling in through the window. It's all painfully nostalgic, like when they had playdates-turned-sleepovers as kids, spending an hour saying goodnight, neither one wanting to stop talking and give in to sleep, not willing to say goodbye in the morning.
But they do say goodnight eventually, and Beomgyu falls asleep with the smell of Soobin all around him. He dreams in fragments, glimpses of Soobin's smile chasing him through dreamland as he tosses and turns, but when he does eventually wake up – air mattress a deflated pancake beneath him – Soobin is already gone, off to his 8am class.
He'd left a little sticky note on the door that said 'see you later' with a lopsided smiley face, and Beomgyu grins in spite of himself. Taehyun and Kai had promised to take him into town for brunch around ten, so Beomgyu gets ready and putters around the room until he hears a series of knocks at the door. He opens it to see Taehyun and Kai waiting for him, and they go off into town.
“After Soobin is done with class for the morning we're going to meet him and Y-" Taehyun starts, before Kai elbows him in the ribs, leading him to cut off with a cough. "Sorry," he mutters. "We're going to meet him and a friend."
Kai must see the discomfort in Beomgyu's face because he reaches over to intertwine their arms, jostling him lightly until Beomgyu manages a small smile. "Don't worry about it too much," he says, with the tone of someone who understands that it's easier said than done, especially for someone as prone to worrying as Beomgyu, especially when he's sure he's about to face his greatest fear.
But Beomgyu tries to put on a brave face, listens to Taehyun rant about his evil organic chemistry professor (while he thanks the heavens that he chose literature over any sort of science major) and listens to Kai talk about the mysterious person on the floor above them who has taken to moving furniture around at 3am every night. It's fun to listen to them talk animatedly about people he doesn't know but hates on principle for daring to be rude to the two people who have shown him so much kindness. He indulges in the spite of others until it's time to head back to campus, and his trepidation about Soobin's mysterious 'friend' grows too strong to ignore.
Taehyun and Kai keep up a steady stream of conversation on the way back, but it hits Beomgyu's ears, muffled, like he's underwater. He can't find the strength to reply more than to just nod and make little sounds of acknowledgement at what he hopes are the right times. Eventually, they make their way over to the academic quad, a rectangle of big brick buildings coated in slowly-decaying ivy, a large patch of grass in the middle with a few ancient trees at the corners, benches placed under them. It paints a pretty picture of college life, and there are a few students sprawled out with their coursework despite the chill that's begun to kiss the air.
Beomgyu spots Soobin sitting on one of the benches, a figure that strikes Beomgyu as strangely familiar by his side. As Beomgyu, Taehyun, and Kai get closer, the features of Soobin's friend get clearer, and Beomgyu's heart stops. Plush red lips, cat-like eyes, perfect features tinged pink from the cold, head tilted back as he laughs at something Soobin has said. Choi Yeonjun has made his way back into their lives, and Beomgyu thinks he might be sick.
Taehyun has to nudge Beomgyu forward to get him to keep moving, which he does, albeit robotically, muscle memory taking over while the gears of his mind whir faster and faster. Choi Yeonjun. Beomgyu's childhood enemy, childhood idol, is the one Soobin has heart-eyes for. It's a sickening twist of fate, and Beomgyu wants to curse whatever higher power has leveled this blow at him.
But Soobin is happy, and so Beomgyu will pretend to be happy too. Soobin and Yeonjun stand as Beomgyu's trio moves closer, and Beomgyu can see the nervousness radiating off of Soobin's posture. Yeonjun, by contrast, looks perfectly calm and content, a half smile on his face. Beomgyu finds that there is still plenty of immature resentment in his heart left for his childhood nemesis.
"Hi," says Soobin once their group of five is all together, his voice a little shaky. "Beomgyu, this is Yeonjun. I'm sure you remember him from when we were kids." An understatement. "He transferred here this semester and ended up in a room down the hall from me. We started hanging out and we really hit it off." He turns to Yeonjun with a soft smile, and Beomgyu can feel his heart begin to wither in his chest. He feels short of breath and dizzy, and he wonders if Soobin would even notice if he suddenly fainted, lost as he is in Yeonjun's eyes. It's a venomous and petty thought, but it makes him feel a little better all the same.
"We hit it off, and we started dating early last month," Yeonjun adds, as if it wasn't already obvious. Beomgyu feels like he's lost in a bad dream, and wishes that he could pinch himself and wake up.
"That's wonderful," he hears a voice say, and it takes him a moment to realize it's his own. "I'm so happy for you," he adds a little tonelessly while giving Soobin his very best what the fuck eyes. Soobin frowns back at him in response, a conversation for later looming over them.
"I have to get to the library, I'm meeting people for a group project," says Yeonjun with the perfect level of apologetic grace. Beomgyu hates him. "I'll see you guys later! Good to see you again, Beomgyu," he adds, and somehow, he sounds genuine. Beomgyu spares a half-second to feel a little guilty before he buries it in rage.
Yeonjun leaves with a wave to the group and a kiss to Soobin's cheek that makes Beomgyu's blood boil, and the remaining four are left standing in silence for a moment before Soobin says, "I was thinking the five of us could go to into town for dinner tonight, to this ramen place that Junie and I really like. He wants to get to know my friends better, and I'd love to bring him along."
Beomgyu says 'yes' while his mind is screaming 'no' and he tries to summon as much enthusiasm as Taehyun and Kai seem to have, but he fails. He's still reeling from seeing Yeonjun again after five years, and he hates the way something inside of him stirs to life, a whisper that Yeonjun is still just as dangerously beautiful as he ever was. Combined with Soobin, he is lethal.
Taehyun and Kai must sense the tension that lingers in the air between Soobin and Beomgyu, so they make their hasty goodbyes, leaving the two childhood friends to face each other, a chasm between them that had never been there before. Beomgyu breaks eye contact first, whirling around and beginning to walk in what he hopes is the direction of Soobin's dorm, before Soobin calls out to him to tell him it is, in fact, the other way.
"What's wrong?" he asks, and Beomgyu silently fumes.
"Why didn't you tell me?" he responds, voice icy. Soobin winces.
"We wanted to wait to tell you in person," he responds. The 'we' stings. Beomgyu has been part of 'we' with Soobin his whole life. He knows how wonderful it is, how safe it feels. The fact that Yeonjun is now offered that same comfort, that same warmth, strikes him as painfully unfair.
"You can't just drop something like that on me out of nowhere, Soobin," Beomgyu says, and he hates the way it comes out as a whine.
"Why not?" Soobin retorts, a little bit of heat backing his voice now, an argument brewing. "You never tell me when you're dating people, I typically only find out when you call me crying after they've broken up with you."
Beomgyu flinches back, his words hitting home. "This is different. This is Yeonjun."
Soobin rolls his eyes so hard it must hurt. "I knew you would be like this. You can't ever let go of a grudge, can you? What the fuck did Yeonjun ever do to you to make you hate him so much? I know I went along with it when we were kids, but this is ridiculous."
Beomgyu tries to wrack his brain to come up with some sort of logical response, but all he can think of is Yeonjun's pretty face, and the permanent fear that someday he would steal Soobin away. A fear that had finally come to fruition. "I just don't like him," Beomgyu responds, keeping his eyes trained on the ground, knowing that he sounds petulant. "He comes off as fake and manipulative to me, I don't know."
"You're being childish, Beomgyu," says Soobin, his voice like stone. "If you want to hate my boyfriend, you're going to have to come up with a better reason than that. I'm done following your senseless grudges like I did when we were kids."
"I was always afraid you would like him more than me," says Beomgyu in a whisper.
Soobin's gaze softens a little, and a rush of relief floods Beomgyu from head to toe. Soobin could never stay angry at him for long, too kind to harbor a grudge like Beomgyu could, always the one to give in first. "That won't happen, Gyu. I like you both differently. What I have with Yeonjun is new, but it's good and he's kind, and I want to keep dating him. What you and I have is different, but it's no less special. We've been best friends since we were kids, Beoms, that doesn't stop now."
And there's nothing else that Beomgyu can say that won't make the real reason behind his dislike of Yeonjun clear. He can't betray the innermost secrets of his heart, not now that Soobin has found someone good and kind to take care of him in the way that Beomgyu was never brave enough to. So he says, "I'm sorry," and lets Soobin give him a quick side hug. "I'm happy for you, I really am. It's just going to take some getting used to," he adds.
"That's ok. But I think you're really going to like Yeonjun, if you let yourself," Soobin replies.
"I'll try," Beomgyu says, and privately he thinks that if he tried too hard, let his guard down too much, he would end up liking Soobin and Yeonjun both a little too much.
~~~
Yeonjun has always considered himself to be a logical person. Sure, he cries at movies and sometimes lets himself get a little too angry, but he has always been the kind of person who sees the sensible side of things, who lets his mind rule in most situations, rather than his heart. The problem comes when someone who leads with emotion ends up in his life, and Yeonjun lets himself get swept away.
When he had first seen Soobin standing in the hallway of their dorm, half asleep on his way to the bathroom, he had thought he was dreaming. There was simply no way that this figment of his past had managed to arrive here – in the hallway of his new dorm, in the college that he had deemed his fresh start. But then Soobin had given him a delighted hello with a toothy smile, and Yeonjun was gone.
He had tried to be logical about it, to give Soobin some measure of distance, accepting his invites to coffee and study sessions and game nights with Taehyun and Kai with gratitude and mild trepidation, but his defenses were broken down before he could even really put them up. It had been a long time since he had been welcomed into a friend group with such unapologetic kindness, and as he found himself getting closer and closer to Soobin he shed some of the defensive layers that he had been using for so long.
There was something about Soobin that made you want to love him, and so Yeonjun let himself be selfish for once, and he fell head over heels. They started dating in early October, a month before Beomgyu's big trip to visit, the one Soobin couldn't stop talking about. That was the singular hiccup in their otherwise perfect romance – the way Soobin's eyes would soften whenever he mentioned Beomgyu's name, something he wasn't even aware of doing. So it's still like that, then, Yeonjun had thought, somehow unsurprised that the two best friends were still hopelessly pining after one another after all these years.
Once upon a time, Yeonjun had wanted both of them, had loved to tease Beomgyu until the angry flush on his cheeks deepened, had loved to strike up a conversation in the rare moments Beomgyu wasn't following him around like a shadow, to watch him stutter over his words endearingly. He had allowed himself the fantasy of fitting into their little duo, of being a part of something that he could only watch from the sidelines. But Beomgyu had hated him, for some reason, and whatever Beomgyu did, Soobin followed, so he had been permanently excluded, left to make fake friends who plotted against him behind his back and to drown in his loneliness.
Until now. Until he had somehow found his way back to Soobin and had managed to be braver than Beomgyu had. He had secured his spot at Soobin's side without any real effort, and without even planning for anything other than friendship. And now Beomgyu was here, and the trio was complete. Not that Beomgyu wanted any part of getting to know Yeonjun, of course, but Soobin would cajole him with big eyes and soft words until he had no choice but to at least pretend he could stand to be in Yeonjun's presence.
Yeonjun supposes it should make him jealous, but he's never been the kind of person easily swayed by the strictness of monogamy. In an ideal world, he would love Soobin and Beomgyu and have everything he wanted, but for now he's content to love Soobin and admire Beomgyu from afar, and to bask on the outskirts of the tangled love the two friends have for one another. Jealousy is not the logical person's trait, and Yeonjun has always been logical.
~~~
Soobin and Beomgyu spend their afternoon working separately on coursework, dancing around each other, neither of them willing to truly address the elephant in the room. So they work in silence until the sun starts to creep towards the horizon and Yeonjun shows up at their door.
It's like something out of a dream, or a nightmare, Yeonjun showing up in a room that Beomgyu had previously considered to be a sanctuary, a pocket of childhood joy. The moment he steps in through the door frame, Yeonjun shatters that carefully constructed bubble, and Beomgyu suddenly isn't sure what to do with himself, perched on the edge of Soobin's bed, skin buzzing with anticipation.
"Hi," says Yeonjun with a small smile. Something lurks behind it that Beomgyu can't quite put his finger on, and it makes his heart thump uncomfortably in his chest.
"Soobin's in the bathroom," Beomgyu says, his voice unsteady. "Said he'd be back in a minute."
"That's alright. It gives me a second to catch up with you," Yeonjun says, moving closer, leaning his tall frame against Soobin's desk, looking perfectly at home in a way that Beomgyu wishes he could reflect. "I meant it when I said it's good to see you. Binnie talks about you constantly, but I've been so excited to see you in person after all this time."
Beomgyu should feel some measure of triumph at the idea that Soobin talks about him so often in front of his boyfriend, but Yeonjun says it so calmly, so matter-of-factly, that he seems perfectly unbothered by it. "I've been alright. Sorry if I seemed a little out of it when I met you yesterday, it just took me so by surprise to see you again."
Yeonjun laughs lightly. The air in the room grows thicker, warmer. Beomgyu resists the urge to pull at his collar. "I think Soobin was worried that you'd still hate me, but I told him that we'd be on our best behavior."
Beomgyu's mouth is dry. It's a clear challenge, a question. "I don't hate you. I don't know if I ever did," he replies, but it's involuntary, too honest. Yeonjun raises an eyebrow. "I was an insecure kid, always worried that someone would take Soobin away from me. You didn't deserve all my rudeness, and I’m sorry.." Beomgyu had told himself he would apologize to Yeonjun to make Soobin happy, but he's shocked to find that as he does so, the hatred he had held onto begins to slip out of his grasp. The more he's forced to think about it, the more he's forced to realize that he means it. He feels a little pathetic for being swayed away from his convictions so easily.
Yeonjun's smile is soft. "You don't need to apologize. I would have liked to have been friends with Soobin then, it's true, but I never would have dreamed of taking him away from you in any way. Not that he would have even let me, since he adores you so much." The use of present tense does not escape Beomgyu's notice. It's an acknowledgement that Beomgyu's fears persist even now, and a reassurance from Yeonjun that he will not participate in bringing them to life. "I would have liked to have been friends with both of you, actually," he adds, and there's a little bit of vulnerability lurking in his tone that Beomgyu has never heard from him before.
"There's still time," Beomgyu says softly, feeling heat crawl up neck and into his face. "For us to all be friends, I mean. Not that you and Soobin are just friends, but..." he trails off into silence.
Yeonjun's smile refuses to fade. "I know what you mean," he replies. "And I appreciate it. Let's put childhood grudges behind us, hm?"
Beomgyu nods, and Soobin chooses that moment to come back in. "Oh!" he exclaims. "Junie!"
Yeonjun moves over to loop his arms around Soobin's waist and put his chin on his shoulder. It should be an obvious show of possession, one that should have Beomgyu fuming in anger, but instead he kind of just looks like a koala gripping onto its favorite tree branch. Yeonjun shoots Beomgyu a little grin and he feels his cheeks warm under the attention. He still can't quite wrap his head around his newly born mixed feelings for Yeonjun, and he wishes he could have a minute to collect himself, but somehow that would feel like Yeonjun had won a battle with unspoken rules, and so he stays put.
"Beomgyu and I were just getting reaquainted," Yeonjun says to Soobin, who looks understandably alarmed.
"I apologized for being a little shit when we were kids," Beomgyu says bluntly, and Soobin's eyes widen a fraction. Beomgyu feels a little hurt that his friend hadn't thought he'd keep his word.
"We're getting over old grievances and becoming great friends," says Yeonjun, and Beomgyu can't tell if the amusement in his voice is mocking or a joke that Beomgyu is being let in on. Soobin is looking back and forth between them slowly, trying to understand the sudden change in tension in the room. There's a spark, something brewing, one that Beomgyu can't quite name but he wants to lean towards all the same, wants to nurture until it's a blaze that consumes them all. The thought frightens him. Yeonjun looks right at him and winks, as if he can see all of Beomgyu's innermost thoughts. Beomgyu's blush deepens.
Yeonjun pulls suddenly away from Soobin and claps his hands, making both Soobin and Beomgyu flinch in surprise. "Well! Now that we're all buddy-buddy, we should probably get going to meet Taehyun and Kai! Wouldn't want to leave the lovebirds standing out in the cold."
Soobin seems glad that at least some of the heavy air has been dispelled, and jumps on the easy topic of his friends' love life with glee. "Yeonjun is also very much on board with getting Taehyun and Kai together, Gyu," he says, and as they begin the walk out to the dorm quad, where Taehyun and Kai will meet them, they scheme in hushed tones ways – that quickly get more and more outlandish – to make Taehyun and Kai get closer and finally admit their feelings.
It feels incredibly strange, scheming with Choi Yeonjun instead of against him, but if Beomgyu were forced to admit it, he might say it was a little fun. Yeonjun is clever, and cracks jokes that toe the line between sarcastic quips and silly puns, and Beomgyu is smiling in spite of himself when they spot Taehyun and Kai waving at them across the lawn. Beomgyu feels off balance, but he tries to put on a brave face for the benefit of his friends (and Yeonjun, who he doesn't think he could consider a friend, even after their little heart-to-heart in Soobin's dorm room).
Sensing some sort of impending awkwardness, Taehyun and Kai shoehorn Beomgyu in between the two of them as their group of five tries to walk in a line down the sidewalk into town, jostling each other but refusing to let anyone fall behind. It's a sweet sort of arrangement, and Beomgyu doesn't think any of them are even really aware of the way they've welcomed him so easily into their little group, and the way it makes him feel so at home. Even Yeonjun makes a point of including him in the conversation, explaining inside jokes and making sure Beomgyu can keep track whenever new names are dropped. It's frustratingly sweet, and Beomgyu realizes with a panic that he can understand why Soobin became smitten with Yeonjun so easily. It's not a thought he ever wanted to have, but it lingers in his subconscious like an unpleasant aftertaste.
Dinner is a strange affair, the five of them crunched into a booth with cracking polyester seats that groan in protest whenever someone moves – Yeonjun, Soobin, and Beomgyu on one side, Taehyun and Kai on the other. It feels both wrong and right somehow, that Soobin is in the middle of Yeonjun and Beomgyu, bridging the gap between them. Despite having more space, Taehyun and Kai are squished as close together as possible, as if a magnetic force keeps them from growing too far apart, and when Yeonjun notices, he catches Beomgyu's eye across the table and winks, waggling his eyebrows towards Taehyun and Kai. It makes Beomgyu's heart skip a beat, even though Yeonjun can't really wink to save his life, which is somehow even worse than if it had been a suave gesture – watching his face crinkle endearingly with effort somehow makes Beomgyu's heart squeeze.
There are flashing danger signs in Beomgyu's brain that he chooses to ignore, the telltale squirming in his stomach that means he's on the verge of a new unhealthy obsession – the blush that creeps over his cheeks whenever he gets some sort of attention from either Soobin or Yeonjun, the way he's shockingly unable to cling to any of the anger that used to come to him so easily. He's left disarmed and utterly defenseless, and he has no idea what to do about it. He had always imagined Yeonjun to be cold, or even mean, a projection that he had maintained throughout his childhood, but Yeonjun is sweet, and a little silly, tumbling over his words with excitement as he tells a story and clapping his hands with delight when he gets to order ramen for the table based on everyone's preferences (he takes Beomgyu's distaste for seafood and generally pickiness in stride, which shouldn't make Beomgyu so pleased, but brings a little heat to his face anyway).
And of course, Yeonjun isn't the only one that Beomgyu is enraptured by. His thigh burns where it's pressed into Soobin's under the table, their knees knocking anytime one of them shifts due to the forced proximity, and there's a permanent little smile on Soobin's face from watching everyone he loves get along that makes Beomgyu's heart melt. But this dull ache is a familiar one, an old friend that Beomgyu welcomes in the face of his new impending infatuation with Yeonjun. The deprecating part of Beomgyu finds it pathetic, that he should not only still be in love with his best friend after all these years of never truly acting on it, but that he should also lack the self-control to not fall for his boyfriend, too.
Beomgyu is quiet throughout the dinner, preferring to listen to the four college friends talk, trying to follow the flow of names, classes, and places that he's largely unfamiliar with. Every once and a while, Soobin leans in to make sure he's alright, that he's not bored, that he's enjoying his food, that he's happy here, at Soobin's side, the only place he's ever truly belonged. Beomgyu reassures him every time, and it's worth it to see the pleased tilt to Soobin's lips and the flash of dimples on his cheeks.
When Taehyun tells a particularly funny anecdote about his awful professor, Soobin collapses onto Beomgyu's shoulder with giggles, floppy and affectionate as always, and Beomgyu meets Yeonjun's narrowed gaze by accident. He flinches back, expecting to see accusation there, some sort of possessiveness, but instead all he sees is curiosity, before Yeonjun nods once, as if he'd finally gotten an answer to a long-standing question. By the time Soobin pulls back, a blush sitting high on his cheeks, Yeonjun has turned away, and Beomgyu wonders for a moment if he had imagined the interaction entirely.
The rest of dinner goes by without a hitch, and they make their way back to campus with stomachs full of ramen and hearts light with the joy of pleasant company. Beomgyu still feels a little dazed, and lets out a half-hysterical giggle that makes Taehyun look at him sideways when he imagines telling the Beomgyu of his middle school years about the night he's just had. He'd be considered a traitor to the Beomgyu of old for eating dinner with the enemy, laughing with his nemesis, sharing moments of charged eye contact. But the Beomgyu of now can't even really remember why he had hated Yeonjun in the first place. Was it truly because he had seen him as a threat to his friendship with Soobin? Had he been that insecure? He knows the answer is yes, and it makes him burn a little with shame. He wishes he could say he's overcome that insecurity entirely, but when he looks at Yeonjun and Soobin, walking a little ahead of the group, hands intertwined and swinging gently between them, something in chest squirms. He rips his gaze away.
Deep down, he knows there were other reasons for his mistrust of Yeonjun, ones that he never truly allowed himself to try and understand. He can recall them now, though, watching Yeonjun's inky curtain of hair blow in the wind, catching a glimpse of his perfect features as he turns to talk to the rest of the group. Yeonjun has always been too beautiful to be real, an angel on earth, and Beomgyu was terrified of it. He still is, perhaps even more so, now that he knows Yeonjun hides a sweet personality and endearing sense of humor behind the facade of perfection. When Yeonjun doubles back, dragging Soobin with him, to wrap an arm around Beomgyu's shoulders and pull him up to the front, their faces close together, Beomgyu's heart skips a beat, and he knows he's doomed.
~~~
Yeonjun follows Beomgyu and Soobin back to Soobin's dorm room, sprawling across Soobin's bed like it's his own. He watches the way Soobin and Beomgyu move around each other, so comfortable but so hesitant, tracking their motions, adding to his growing hypothesis about the affection they have for one another. How he fits into that equation, he's not quite sure, but he's tired of waiting around to find out. Yeonjun has learned to be bold to get what he wants over the years, and when Beomgyu leaves to take a shower, Yeonjun yanks Soobin down to join him on the bed and says, "So you're in love with Beomgyu."
Soobin pulls back, spluttering out some sort of denial, the tips of his ears immediately going flaming red. Yeonjun waves him off with a little smile. "It's alright, I've always known. Since we were kids. You two have always made it obvious. It didn't bother me then, and it doesn't bother me now. Maybe that's strange of me, but I'd rather we talk about it then to let you keep pretending that you don't have eyes for somebody else." And perhaps Yeonjun should be angry, should get loud and wave his arms around all accusingly, make a big show out of it, but he finds that there's calm in his heart, and so he clings to it, waits for Soobin to sort through his words and his feelings, pulling his hand out of his lap and intertwining their fingers together, squeezing gently.
"I don't want you to think that I don't care about you, or that I don't love you, because I do. So much. You're so important to me, and I wouldn't ever want to ruin what we have," is what Soobin eventually starts with, and Yeonjun's heart flutters. Sue him, he's a sucker for open communication, and words of affirmation never hurt. "I think I fell in love with Beomgyu the day I met him. I didn't know it at the time, of course, because we were five years old and had no idea what love was then, and I'm not sure I even understand what I feel for him now. It's just always been there, that tension between us, that desire to keep one another close. I couldn't tell you when it morphed into something more romantic, because it was so gradual I didn't even notice until one day I thought about holding his hand and giving him a kiss and I realized it was all I ever wanted."
Yeonjun nods and swipes a tear away as it slowly falls down Soobin's face. "It's okay," he says softly. "I'm not mad. I want to know." And he does. Something warm begins to spread in his chest, the beginnings of a plan, of determination.
Soobin takes a deep, shaky breath before continuing. "Neither of us ever acted on it, no matter how much we might have wanted to. There was always this fear of things changing, of losing our friendship and being left alone, and that kept us from ever breaking the status quo. It killed me, having him so close but never quite in the way I wanted to. And then we went to separate colleges, and we stopped seeing each other as often, and I had almost convinced myself that what I had felt hadn't been as all consuming as it was. But every time I see him again it's like it all comes crashing back. It's fucked up and you don't deserve that, and I'm sorry. I wouldn't blame you if you were angry, or if you wanted to break up or something. But you need to know that I adore you so much and that you're so special to me."
Yeonjun rests his head in the crook of Soobin's shoulder and speaks to the wall across the room. "I didn't understand why he hated me for so many years until I saw the way he looked at you. He was always so desperate, so obsessive over you, and I thought it was a little strange, until I started looking at you, too, and I realized that most people would do anything to be able to love you. I hope you know that. It was a little flattering, honestly, that Beomgyu thought I had any power to drag you away from him. I knew I never could. It would have been fine, I would have left you both alone, had I not been so hopelessly infatuated with you both." He pauses to give Soobin a wry smile when he hears his sharp intake of breath. "I was always a little too self-destructive for my own good. So I followed you two around and pushed Beomgyu's buttons and was a general nuisance because negative attention was still attention, right? And then I moved away and I dated around and I tried to forget you both, but I never quite managed it. All this is to say that I'm not mad, and that somehow I think it would always come down to this – to the three of us."
Soobin laughs, a little wet and a little hysterical, somewhere between a giggle and a sob. "Where do we go from here?" he asks, and Yeonjun squeezes his hand again.
"Let me talk to Beomgyu tomorrow, just the two of us. I know it sounds crazy, but I think we need to formally clear the air, let everything be in the open. And then, if we all want this – the three of us, together, we make it happen. I don't typically believe in fate, but I think there must be a reason that we're all back together like this after so many years, a reason that we never managed to get each other out of our heads. I think we take it slow, and we tread carefully, but I think it's time we all stop denying ourselves what we've always wanted."
Soobin doesn't speak after that, but he lets Yeonjun hold him for a while, until he sits up straighter and takes a deep breath in. There's determination in his eyes despite the tear streaks on his cheeks, and Yeonjun thinks he's beautiful. "We're going to make this happen," he says, although he sounds a little like he can't believe it.
Yeonjun nods. "I'm going to let you get some sleep, okay? And I'll talk to Beomgyu tomorrow. Try not to worry too much, I promise I'm going to be very charming. There's no one I can't win over."
Soobin laughs truly at that, smiling in that devastatingly fond way of his that always makes Yeonjun feel a little unsteady on his feet. "Good night, Junie. I love you," he says. Yeonjun has never doubted that 'I love you', not even once.
"I love you, too," he says, and he leaves with steps that feel lighter than they have in a long time.
~~~
Beomgyu lays on Soobin's bed, staring up at the ceiling, counting water stains and avoiding his feelings. His best friend had left for the library about half an hour ago, turning white as a sheet as he remembered that he had a paper to turn in the next day, apologizing profusely for leaving Beomgyu alone while both Taehyun and Kai were in class, already with one foot out the door. And so Beomgyu is alone when he hears a knock on the door. With both Taehyun and Kai in class, there's only one person it could really be. Beomgyu's heart leaps.
He swings open the door, heart pounding, and comes face-to-face with Choi Yeonjun. "Hi," he says, a little breathless.
"Hi," Yeonjun says back. "Soobin isn't here?" he adds, peering around the room over Beomgyu's shoulder. Beomgyu gets a whiff of his perfume, something pleasantly floral that makes him feel dizzy.
"No, he ran off to the library. Something about a paper he forgot about until just now," Beomgyu's voice is a little shaky, and he hopes that Yeonjun doesn't notice.
Yeonjun laughs. "He'd forget his head if it wasn't attached, right? Well, it's no problem, really. I was going to take both of you out for coffee, but if it's just you I only have to pay for the two of us! If you want to come with me, of course."
Beomgyu is frustratingly helpless to say no, disarmed by Yeonjun's soft smile and hopeful gaze. "I have nothing better to do," he says, and then winces. "Sorry, I didn't mean for that to come out rude or anything. I'd love to come with you, really. But you don't have to pay for me!" He quickly backtracks.
Yeonjun's smile grows wider. "You're cute," he says, and Beomgyu flushes. "And I don't mind paying at all. Consider it a peace offering, clearing the air from our childhood rivalry."
"But I'm the one who should be apologizing to you!" Beomgyu protests. "You never did anything wrong, really, I was just a stupid and insecure kid."
"Well, we can argue over who was the worse child over coffee. That I pay for," Yeonjun says, and he turns on his heel and marches out the door – pausing only once to make sure that Beomgyu is scrambling after him, a glimmer of amusement in his eye that Beomgyu finds frustratingly attractive.
Yeonjun takes him to a cafe in town, a cute place filled with students working on various papers and assignments and couples on first dates. Beomgyu tries not to flush at the idea that, to the outside eye, it might look like he and Yeonjun are on a date themselves. Yeonjun orders them both iced americanos and a slice of pound cake to share, and leads them over to a table in the back, where they can talk without bothering other cafe patrons.
Yeonjun pulls Beomgyu's chair out for him without hesitation, and suddenly Beomgyu is even more hyper-aware of the fact that, were it not for the obvious fact that Yeonjun is dating his best friend, this would seem an awful lot like a date. He mentally tells himself to get it the fuck together, taking a small calming breath and a sip of his coffee.
"So I don't want this to feel like a confrontation or like I lured you here with free coffee or anything, but I've been meaning to talk to you alone and this feels like a good time to do it. I think there are some things we need to clear the air about, and I want to be honest with each other," Yeonjun says once they're both settled in their seats.
Beomgyu's heart goes cold. "What do you want to talk about?" he asks, stumbling over the syllables, the words feeling heavy in his mouth, struggling to come out fully formed in his reluctance.
Yeonjun takes a deep breath, shutting his eyes for a moment. When he opens them, there is steely determination lingering in their depths. "I'm going to talk for a bit, and I need you to not freak out and just listen. And then we can have a conversation. Is that okay with you?" He pauses, and Beomgyu nods hesitantly, heartbeat racing, palms sweating, his cake and coffee left abandoned as his stomach begins churning. "I know we talked a little about the way we treated each other when we were kids yesterday, but I think we both need to be a little bit more honest with each other and with ourselves. I think we might be used to just leaving certain things unspoken, not changing the status quo, but I think if we're going to try and get closer to each other, we need to leave all this in the past, and that starts by talking honestly about it."
Beomgyu nods, and a little bit of relief goes through him. This, he can talk about. He could grovel forever if need be. Once again, he marvels a little at the way Yeonjun broke down years of resentment so easily, simply by being kind. But Beomgyu has always wanted to be adored, and Yeonjun knew just how to capitalize on it. "I said most of it yesterday. I was scared that you would take Soobin away from me, that you would be better to him than I was, would treat him more kindly than I could. The part that I didn't really say out loud was that I wasn't just concerned about our friendship changing." He pauses, staring down at the milk swirling in his coffee to avoid having to meet Yeonjun's gaze. "I always thought you were beautiful. Pretty in a way that scared me off from getting too close. I thought Soobin would see that and would want you, in all your kindness and your loveliness, and he would forget all about me. Obviously I didn't put all that together until we were all a little older, but I shouldn't have taken my insecurities out on you, and I apologize. I hope you can forgive me for it."
"Soobin is in love with you," Yeonjun says, and Beomgyu's head snaps up. He expects to see Yeonjun fuming, or to at least be upset, but instead, Yeonjun looks perfectly calm, as if he's talking about the weather instead of his boyfriend having feelings for someone else. "And to be honest, I'm not that far behind."
Beomgyu's jaw drops open, his head spinning, unable to wrap his mind around everything Yeonjun is saying. He opens his mouth to speak, but Yeonjun puts up a hand. "Just – let me talk for a minute? If I don't get this all out now, I never will," he says, and there's finally a note of desperation in his voice, something broken and pleading. Beomgyu shuts his mouth and nods slowly.
"There's a reason I spent so much of my time pestering you and Soobin when we were kids when I should have just left well enough alone. I didn't really put it together until I was older, like you said, until I had moved on to a different school with people I didn't care about half as much as I cared about the two of you. I've always been the kind of person who wants to win over those who dislike me, but with you it was almost an obsession. I spent all this time wondering why you didn't like me, when you were so determined to stay away from me and drag Soobin with you, but when I looked back at it in hindsight, it was clear that we were all entangled in some sort of strange love triangle that we were never brave enough to acknowledge. So we all just kept saying we hated each other when it was really quite the opposite."
Here, Beomgyu can't help but interject. "Soobin never hated you," he says. "He always thought the grudge I held against you was strange. But I made him follow me around too much, so he had to avoid you."
Yeonjun nods. "He told me that. Not with so much resentment towards you than you hold towards yourself, though. There was a part of me that was completely unsurprised when I saw him again after all these years. It felt like suddenly everything was right, except there was one piece missing. When I saw you again, that piece fit into place. I love Soobin, more than anything, but Soobin isn't fully himself without you. I know I should hate you for it, for taking some of his love away from me, but I don't really see it that way. The way I see it, his heart has always been in two pieces – one for you and one for me. That isn't going to change if you or I deny it. And it's not like we don't have feelings for each other either. I always thought you were beautiful, too."
"What are you saying?" Beomgyu asks in a whisper. "Why are you telling me all this?" His heart is beating so fast that he thinks it might fall out of his chest, and he struggles to draw in breath. Yeonjun's gaze is piercing, staring straight at truths Beomgyu has tried to deny for years, and he resists the urge to curl in on himself, to put physical barriers up between Yeonjun and his bleeding heart.
"I'm saying that no matter how convoluted our relationships have been over the years, no matter how many grudges, or secrets, or denials we've gone through, there is something between you, me, and Soobin that should be acknowledged. And, if you're willing, to act on. You and Soobin have spent so many years wallowing in shared feelings and pretending that it wasn't killing you. And you spent years hating me and pulling Soobin along with you because you were afraid that I would tip the balance, that I would fit myself in and change what already wasn't working. I want us to stop lying to ourselves and each other and try and make this work," Yeonjun says.
For a moment, Beomgyu is speechless. Everything in the cafe is blurry except Yeonjun, like the whole world has narrowed down to just the two of them – and Soobin, whose presence is felt even when he's not physically there. "I don't even know what I want," he says eventually, slowly, thinking through each word, carefully extracting them from the part of his mind that he is constantly running from. "I don't think I've ever stopped being scared long enough to want it."
Yeonjun reaches across the table and puts his hand over Beomgyu's cupping his trembling fingers. "Let yourself want this, Beomgyu. I want it, Soobin wants it. Let's figure it all out together, finally, after all this time."
For a brief moment, Beomgyu lets himself imagine it – having his deepest desire at his fingertips. Having Soobin in every way, finally, instead of carefully constructing walls between them like he has for so many years. Having beautiful Yeonjun as a boyfriend, rather than an enemy, laughing and teasing each other gently, endearingly, instead of hiding behind a facade of hatred. But the moment he lets himself indulge in this beautiful fantasy, he imagines it all crashing down. Losing the fragile relationship he's finally beginning to build with Yeonjun, losing Soobin, his greatest fear, his one true friend. It's too much for him to bear.
He looks at Yeonjun, and sees boundless promise in his eyes. He rips his hand away, and Yeonjun flinches. "I can't do this right now," he says, stumbling as he rises out of his chair on shaking legs and practically sprints out of the cafe.
Yeonjun calls once after him, but he can't bring himself to look back, knowing that if he did, he would drown in wanting. So he keeps going, until he's outside Soobin's dorm, realizing he has no one to let him in. The sky is a monotone shade of gray, swirling clouds that threaten potential snowstorms, and Beomgyu thinks it reflects his mood rather perfectly. There's a bench out back, an old one with rotting wood that no one ever uses. He sits there for a while, fingers slowly turning pink from the cold, and he lets himself cry.
It starts as a few tears slipping hot down his chilled skin, but soon it's a deluge, with muffled sobs and stinging eyes. Beomgyu isn't sure how long he sits there, knees pulled up to his chest, face buried in his arms, sobbing, until he's found. It's Taehyun and Kai, because of course it is, and they immediately put themselves on either side of him, wrapping him in their arms, rubbing hands over his back until his hiccuping sobs turn into full breaths of air.
"What happened?" asks Kai softly. "We were on the way back from class and we ran into Yeonjun. He looked totally panicked, and told us to go find you."
Beomgyu's tears threaten to come back when he thinks of Yeonjun. There's guilt swirling in his stomach, but he can't bring himself to face the idea of going back to see Yeonjun in this state. "If you had the opportunity to finally have the one thing you've always wanted at your fingertips, but it could ruin your whole life if it went wrong, would you take it?" he asks.
Kai looks a little confused, but Taehyun sighs knowingly. "What if it goes right?" he responds.
"It would still change everything," Beomgyu whispers. "I don't know if I can take it."
"You won't be doing it alone. If I have half an idea what this is all about, I know you won't. Yeonjun and Soobin are good people, and they both care about you so much. I know there's a lot of history there that I can't pretend to fully understand, but I've been spending a lot of time with them these past few months, and I know that the second you showed up, they both looked so much happier. You complete them, and they complete you, and I don't think you're a bad person for wanting that."
Kai makes a soft sound of acknowledgement. "They talk about you all the time," he says. "Both of them do. You can't have a single conversation with them without you coming up somehow. Yeonjun was so scared that you would still hate him when he met you again. I know he comes off all nonchalant, but he really wanted to make a good impression. And Soobin treasures you so much."
Beomgyu feels tears swell at his lash line again as the weight of their words sinks in. "Am I ruining myself if I don't take this chance?" he asks, and although it's not really a question for Taehyun and Kai to answer, they chime in anyway.
"I know we're not too close – although I want to be!" Kai begins. "But everything I know of you is wonderful, and Yeonjun and Soobin are wonderful, and so why shouldn't three wonderful people be together if they all want that? I can tell you're hurting yourself over this, and that hurts me to see."
Taehyun nods, resting his head on Beomgyu's shoulder. "I think you're too focused on what could go wrong to see everything that could go right. And I think it's time you try and do something to make yourself happy," he says.
Beomgyu slowly moves to get up, and Taehyun and Kai give him one last hug as he does so. "I should go talk to Soobin and Yeonjun," he says.
Taehyun and Kai both nod. Beomgyu swipes at his eyes, feeling them burn but feeling more settled, too, like some part of him that has been adrift for eons has finally come to a stop. He looks at Taehyun and Kai again, and smiles softly. "Thank you guys, for being so kind to me. You didn't have to do that, and I really appreciate it. Sorry for dumping all my problems on you. I promise that we'll hang out and do something fun and normal at some point."
Taehyun waves him off. "We're happy to help, really," he says.
Beomgyu smiles back. "And while we're on the topic of people that are wonderful and perfect for each other, I happen to know two such people who are sitting on this bench in front of me right now. And if I'm going to be brave and sort my shit out after years and years of being a baby about it, then I think they should, too."
With that, he turns on his heel and walks away, leaving Taehyun and Kai scrambling after him, the three of them realizing that someone has to let Beomgyu in the dorm at the same time. Beomgyu thanks them with flustered words and flushed cheeks, and goes stumbling into the dorm, Taehyun and Kai's exclamations of 'good luck' ringing in his ears.
He's visited Soobin enough times by now to know the way to his dorm, and he luckily doesn't run into any of his dorm-mates on the way there. His thoughts are whirling, going a mile a minute, still struggling to process the implications of his conversation with Yeonjun and subsequent breakdown and conversation with Taehyun and Kai. He has no idea what he's going to say to Soobin once he gets to the dorm (and he has a suspicion that Yeonjun will be there too), but he knows he has to see him, has to talk this through, has to finally reveal everything that he's been hiding, everything that he's left unsaid for years.
His sudden burst of conviction leaves him feeling slightly weightless, and he thinks that if he concentrated hard enough his feet would start hovering above the ground. When he reaches Soobin's dorm he's breathless with nerves as he pushes open the door. Immediately he pauses in the door frame, choking on a gasp at the sight that meets him.
Yeonjun is indeed in the room – halfway in Soobin's lap, kissing him soft and languid, one of Soobin's hands rucking up the back of his shirt. Beomgyu feels rooted to the spot, unable to look away, and not entirely willing to either. It's a scene from his most secret daydreams, one that makes his heart pound and heat lick across his skin. When Yeonjun shifts his hips down, pulling a muffled groan from Soobin's mouth where their lips are still pressed together, Beomgyu can't suppress his squeak.
The couple turns to him, with kiss-swollen lips and dazed eyes, and Beomgyu begins scrambling backwards away from them, stammering apologies. "I'm so sorry, I should have said that I was there, I'll come back later, I didn't mean to interrupt, I'm so sorry." He's unable to look either of them in the eye, the image of how beautifully they fit together burned permanently behind his eyelids.
"Wait," says Soobin, his voice rough and deep in a way that makes Beomgyu suppress a shiver.
"Don't go," says Yeonjun softly, and when Beomgyu finally musters up the courage to look him in the eye, he can see that his eyes are red and a little puffy, likely the twin to Beomgyu's own. Clearly he had been just as upset by Beomgyu's sudden departure from the cafe as Beomgyu himself had been. "We should talk," he adds.
Beomgyu takes a hesitant step into the room, shutting the door behind him. It feels final somehow, like now that he's fully in the room with them, something has to change before he can leave again. "I think we should," he begins, voice shaky. "I'm sorry I left so quickly, Yeonjun, that wasn't right of me. I was just..." his voice trembles, and he tries to swallow down his tears, but he chokes on a sob before he can calm himself down.
"Come here," says Yeonjun, reaching out his arms, and Beomgyu is powerless to resist.
He stumbles towards the bed, and collapses in between Soobin and Yeonjun. Arms go around him immediately, and he feels the soft press of lips against the crown of his head (Soobin, he knows, recognizing his particular brand of gentleness, always). He's trembling, taking shaking breath after shaking breath, finally feeling warm and safe in the embrace of the two people that he has always wanted close, no matter how much he may have denied it, how much he may have shielded himself with hate and insecurity. He is surrounded by warmth and love, and it scares him more than anything how much he wants it to always be this way.
"I'm terrified," he admits into Soobin's shoulder while Yeonjun runs soothing hands over his hair. "I could have everything I've ever wanted and I can't stop thinking about how it could all go wrong. Isn't that pathetic? I can't ever let myself want anything." The words are quiet and painful, like pulling splinters out of his lungs, scraping his throat raw on the way to his mouth.
Soobin makes a soft, pained sound, always so empathetic, feeling Beomgyu's weaknesses as if they were his own. Beomgyu pulls back slightly, struck with the sudden need to see his face, to confirm that this is real, that he's finally here, and that – despite the pounding of his heart – this could be the start of something beautiful, if he lets himself give in. Soobin is looking at him like he loves him, because of course he is, because he always has. Beomgyu had tried not to see it for years, had tried to convince himself that he was just projecting his own longing onto his best friend. It all seems so silly now, so obvious in hindsight.
When he turns to look at Yeonjun, all he sees is gentleness. It's a gentleness he's less familiar with than that of his best friend, but one that he is learning to treasure just the same. He still winces when he thinks about the fact that he could have had this loveliness so long ago, if he hadn't acted with hate and trepidation before anything else. But he also thinks that their shared past - of teasing and glowering and hating to disguise obsession - has made it so much sweeter to finally be able to sit here and look at Choi Yeonjun and feel nothing but softly glowing hope. Yeonjun reaches out and intertwines one of his hands with Beomgyu's and the other with Soobin’s. Soobin does the same to Beomgyu, and then they're all connected. Their twisted triangle, their three. It feels a little silly, a little cliche, but Beomgyu can't bring himself to mind.
"I'm scared too, you know," says Yeonjun, and he must see the surprise on Beomgyu's face, as he laughs softly. "I know I tried to seem all sure of myself and collected when I talked to you and Soobin, but I was terrified that I would ruin everything and lose both of you in the process. But as much as I'm scared, I'm hopeful too. I think we've all spent so much time focused on what could go wrong instead of finally letting ourselves hope. You especially, Beomgyu."
"I want to make this work," says Soobin, the first he's spoken since Beomgyu walked in. "I love Junie, and I love you, and that's the most important thing. More important than what could go wrong. I've wasted years worrying, and I'm ready to love you both so much that I won't let anything go wrong. And if it does, we'll fix it. I believe that."
And then there's nothing else Beomgyu can do but kiss his best friend. One of Soobin's arms goes up to wrap around Beomgyu immediately, drawing him in deeper, his other hand still intertwined with Yeonjun's, which makes something flutter in Beomgyu's gut. Kissing Soobin feels like coming home, like fireworks behind his eyelids and sweetness on his tongue. Soobin is achingly gentle but confident, too, in a way that makes Beomgyu feel weak in the knees. There's desperation in the press of their lips, years of pent up desire finally coming unravelled. When Beomgyu finally pulls back, he says, "I love you," with complete and utter conviction. His one truth, finally spoken out loud.
Soobin's eyes are a little watery, and Beomgyu has a hard time pulling his gaze away to look at Yeonjun, but when he does, he's immediately reassured by the way Yeonjun is smiling at him. "I'm going to love you," he says to Yeonjun, and it's a promise. "I'm going to love you so much, and you'll forget that I was so rude to you when we were kids, and I'll make you feel so, so wanted, for all the years that I left you out."
Yeonjun leans in to bridge the gap between them, and the final piece of the puzzle slots itself into place. Kissing Yeonjun is exciting. He plays tricks with his tongue and nips lightly at Beomgyu's lower lip. It's a battle that neither of them really want to win, teasing gently but soothing over it with softness. It feels right, so right, everything Beomgyu's ever needed right here in this room.
"I'm going to love you, too," says Yeonjun to Beomgyu. And to Soobin, "and I love you. And you love Beomgyu. And Beomgyu loves you. Isn't that wonderful?" He sounds just as dazed as Beomgyu feels and it's incredibly endearing. Tough, cool Choi Yeonjun, reduced to amazement by two pretty boys. Beomgyu realizes that he isn't afraid anymore.
He lets his eyes run slowly over the two people who have always been tied to him so inexplicably, their threads intertwined since youth, pulling taut but never snapping, and he feels something deep inside of him settle at last, that roaring animal in his chest circle a few times and then lay down to rest. "We're going to make this work," he says, and he dives back into his boyfriends' arms.
As the three lay there, arms wrapped around each other, blissful with fulfilled fate, the first few snowflakes of the year begin to fall.