悠久星涼

18+ content will be indicated on fics with mature content, minors do not interact

hongjoong • under covers — undercover cop x street racer • the fool's heart — royalty!matz x princess love triangle • keep quiet — frat & sorority president au • last words — prince x princess, arranged marriage

seonghwa • coming undone — jealous seonghwa x reader • stolen devotion — assassin x sorceress • hands on — street racer au ft. nepo baby!hwa • the fool's heart — royalty!matz x princess love triangle • take a seat — frat boy!seonghwa with benefits • poor connection — ice hockey player!seonghwa, long-distance au

yunho • ruin me — forbidden noble x princess au • before the fall — dystopian au, star-crossed lovers • nice guy — street racer au, childhood friends to lovers • hush money — frat boy!yunho • routine checkup — ice hockey player!yunho • mask off (+ part two) — spiderman!yunho

yeosang • cherry blossom — street racer au ft. sub!yeo • missed signals — frat boy!yeo friends to lovers • head shot — ice hockey player!yeosang, friends to lovers

san • hard drive — street racer au, friends with benefits • in for it — frat boy!san • sucker punch — ice hockey player!san • a gilded cage — artist!san x princess!reader, forbidden love

mingi • pink slip — street racer au, rivals with benefits • face time — frat boy!mingi with commitment issues • make up — ice hockey player!mingi x tutor!reader

wooyoung • speed dial — street racer au, exes to lovers • princess treatment — frat boy!wooyoung

jongho • gear shift — street racer au, enemies to lovers • end of the year — frat boy!jongho

“oh, no.”

you stare down at the thermometer in your hands, your head pounding as you blink the sleep from your eyes. a groan escapes you as you set aside the device, 101.4 degrees etched into its screen before it fades to black. shivers run along your skin, seeping into your bones and joints with a stiff, dull ache that fails to go away. the moment your throat felt itchy the night before after dinner, you already knew the inevitable was coming.

not that it was the only thing you were expecting.

san was returning from recent promotions for a well-deserved break, just in time for his birthday. for the past several weeks, you’d meticulously planned an entire evening itinerary; a visit to one of your frequented river trails where you could grab drinks at the end, a stop by his favorite restaurant for dinner and a slice of their beloved strawberry cream cake, closed out by a night at the bar with your friends.

of course, that was all well out the window now that you were half-alive and riddled with chills. you grumble as you shove your sheets aside, reaching for your phone to check the last thread of messages you’d gotten from san before he boarded his flight.

san: ahhhh so excited to come home

san: can’t wait to see u

san: can’t wait to give u 10000 smooches

your thumb hovers over the keyboard, biting down on your bottom lip as you debate letting him know that you weren’t feeling well. guilt settles in your stomach, enough to change your mind as you send a reply that you couldn’t wait to see him and that you looked forward to celebrating his birthday. as if on cue, your phone vibrates with an incoming call between your palms and you answer begrudgingly. 

“hello.”

“well, good morning to you, too,” wooyoung chides, his loud voice making your head pound even more. “what’s going on?”

“i forgot you got back a day earlier than the rest of the guys,” you mutter, your other hand pressed to your forehead as you fall back onto the sheets. a laborious exhale slips out of you, causing you to cough from the tickle that lingers at the back of your throat.

“are you good?” he asks, evidently concerned. “what, did you get hit by a bus?”

“ha, ha,” you rasp. “i think i caught something. terrible fucking timing, since i need to get ready for san getting home this afternoon.”

“do you need help?”

“plan for my funeral.”

“just text me if you need anything,” wooyoung assures you, ignoring your theatrics completely.  “feel better.”

the morning is an uphill battle, to say the least. you barely have the ability to brew yourself a cup of tea while you force a slice of dry toast down. fatigue weighs heavy on you, calling you seductively back to bed as you fight against it. you sift through your emails before another lifeless groan escapes you when you realize you need to run down to the package room to pick up san’s gift and subsequently wrap it.

“okay,” you say to yourself, “it’ll be fine.”

the elevator is freezing, with blinding fluorescents that lead into an even brighter and colder lobby. you don’t even care about the fact that you’re half-awake in your pajamas as you shuffle to collect the watch and sunglasses you’d ordered for san. it feels like an eternity before you’re able to make it upstairs and slump onto the couch. the blankets do little to provide warmth as you shut the blinds to keep the room dim.

“kill me now,” you grumble as you struggle to slip into a power nap so that you could stir what little energy is left inside of you to prepare for san’s arrival. you find yourself in and out of sleep until a knock at the door from an unexpected delivery jolts you awake.

a pharmacy bag awaits you, intact with electrolytes, cold medicine and painkillers. you can’t help but laugh at the message on the receipt from the delivery service, the words “DON’T DIE” etched in large font across the center. shooting a text to wooyoung to thank him for his emergency services, you glance at the time and nearly have a heart attack when you realize that san was set to arrive in less than an hour.

your body was still run down and you were still desperate to lay, but you knew better than to give san a reason to worry. anticipation mingles with the exhaustion stirring within you as you go through the motions of getting ready. mascara stings your already dry eyes, your lips chapped under your gloss. your wrists ache as you fiddle with strands of hair, but you somehow manage to pull yourself together enough to quickly wrap san’s gift and set it up nicely on the kitchen counter with a bouquet and a card you’d had ready from weeks prior.

the sound of the front door unlocking captures your attention and you hope that the painkillers are long-lasting as san bursts through the door with a smile stretched across his face.

“baby!” he cries out, pulling you into his arms the minute he sets his bag onto the ground. you laugh at the way he spins you before lowering you, quietly willing the dizzy spell to subside as you smile back up at him. just as he leans in to press a kiss to your lips, you back away awkwardly with a cough under your breath. “what’s wrong?”

“uh—” your mind races as you realize you’ve backed yourself into a corner of having to tell san you’re not feeling well. “i think i’m a little under the weather. but, it’s nothing serious! i still have so much planned for you today. speaking of which—” you gesture to the gifts behind you.

san narrows his eyes with you, silently scolding your overexertion before it’s quickly replaced by excitement as he observes each item carefully. he glances back at you and opts to press a gentle kiss to your forehead instead.

“all i wanted was to see you today, but these are a nice bonus,” he jokes, looping an arm around your waist so that you were able to rest your head against his chest. his familiar scent floods your senses, notes of linen and sea salt mingling with your own perfume for the first time in what felt like an eternity. “and, hey, if you’re not feeling well, we can—”

“no.”

“no?”

“i know what you’re going to say,” you scold, nudging his chest firmly. “we’re not ‘taking it easy’ today. we have plenty to celebrate. your birthday, finally coming back home. i have a whole evening planned.” you gesture to your outfit and the haphazard styling of your hair. “i put in work for this.”

“i can tell,” he teases, his eyes trailing over you in a way that ignites a heat beneath your skin. it’s quickly replaced by the chills from earlier as you mentally curse and remind yourself to take another dose of the medicine before you leave. “lead the way then, princess.”

and so, you do. at least, you attempt to.

as much as you were hoping the fresh air would do you good, the afternoon was chillier than you’d expected. even with your jacket, chills still ran through your body and enveloped your attention so much so that you were barely able to focus on your conversation with san as he recounted the events from recent promotions. you hold onto his hand tightly, as if it would ground you as your mind grew foggier from the fatigue.

san orders a beer when you make it to the end of the river trail, sipping on pale ale as you wait for your lemonade. you smile your thanks at the vendor and take a sip, the cool acidity of the drink a much-welcomed burn in your throat. you laugh at the way san’s cheeks flush near immediately as the alcohol settles in his system.

at dinner, you can tell you’re more than ready to clock out for the rest of the night. still, you try to focus on the menu in front of you as the waiter reads out the specials for the night. san orders a feast for one, glancing over at you as you look at the server with a sheepish expression.

“can i just have the seafood stew, actually?”

“how spicy?”

“as spicy as you can make it,” you reply, earning raised eyebrows from san that you quickly respond to with a playful kick beneath the table. he whistles as the waiter walks off to submit your order, sipping on his second drink of the night.

“how are you feeling?” he asks suddenly, the amusement in his voice gone as he scans your face for any signs or symptoms of just how under the weather you were.

“me?” you shake your head, gesturing back at him. “don’t worry about me. this is your birthday.”

“yeah, but knowing you’re not feeling well won’t make me feel better,” san replies, reaching across the table to interlace his fingers with yours. he sighs, narrowing his eyes at you as if to scrutinize your stubbornness.

“then, you better hope they make that stew as spicy as they can,” you joke, relieved when a smile replaces the growing concern in his expression.

the rest of dinner goes swimmingly, the pair of you stepping back out onto the street as the brisk night air kisses your skin. you shudder at the sensation, cursing yourself for not bringing along an extra dose of medicine for the night. ignoring the way your body begins to decline, you look through your phone for the group chat so you could let your friends know where to meet you.

without warning, san snatches your phone from your hands and holds it out of your reach, thumbing a quick message to the chat and hitting send before you’re able to stop him. a sound of protest leaves your lips as you jut out your palm before san drops your phone back into your hand with a satisfied smile.

me: hey guys change of plans

me: we’re calling it an early night so rain check

“when have you ever heard me say ‘rain check’ to anyone?” you scoff, rolling your eyes at his poor imitation of you before guilt returns to gnaw at you. “hey, i’m fine. we can still hang out.”

“baby, you’ve been run down all day,” he protests. “the last thing you need is a night around drunk people screaming and bumping into you.”

“but everyone wanted to see you and—”

“and they can wait,” san interjects, offering his hand. “you’ve done more than enough to make me feel special.” the moment your fingers are in his, he lifts you with his other arm so that he’s able to carry you.

“y’know, i can walk just fine.”

“eh,” he shrugs, unable to hide his smile, “wouldn’t want to risk it.”

the sounds of the city fade into the background, replaced by the muffled thump of san’s heartbeat as you rest your head against his chest. for the first time all day, you feel truly deserving of your eyes fluttering shut and the weightlessness that overcomes you.

you don’t even realize when you’ve made it back to the apartment until san sets you down gently to unlock the door. as much as you wanted to deny it, there was an overwhelming relief that washed over you the second you spotted the couch and dove straight onto it. san laughs to himself, finding a spot to lay beside you so that he could drape his arm over your waist to pull you into him. he buries his nose in the crook of your neck, his fingers tracing gentle strokes along your waist.

“did you enjoy your birthday?” you mumble, half-awake as you caress his hand beneath yours.

“more than anything,” he says, pressing a soft kiss to your collarbone. “and, no ifs, ands or buts tomorrow. you’re letting me take care of you.”

“but you just got back—”

“i will tie you down to the bed myself if i have to.”

“promise?” a teasing lilt in your voice captures san’s attention and he holds your gaze for a second too long before poking at your side.

“let’s fucking go!”

the sound of fists on metal lockers echoes through the inner halls of the stadium, followed by the cheers of the winning voyagers as they barrel through. mingi grins as wide as possible as yunho throws his arm over his shoulders, squeezing him in praise of his performance on the ice tonight.

“bro, that last assist went crazy,” san calls out as he begins to tear off his pads. the others mutter in agreement between conversations of plans for their celebration back at the apartment and who was responsible for picking up the extra bottles of liquor.

“dude, their right defense was insane.” mingi shakes his head as he recounts the last few moments of the game when he was able to shuffle the puck back to seonghwa with seconds left on the clock.

“and you still fucking crushed it,” yunho hollers, earning a resounding cheer from the other boys as the coach saunters in. his own smile matches that of the boys, his knuckles tapping rhythmically against the screen of his tablet as they welcome him in a round of sweaty embraces.

“that’s what i like to see out there.” the eldest man beams at them, nodding approvingly as the team settles onto the benches that curve through the locker room and look up at him expectantly. “you keep playing like that, we’re a shoo-in for frozen four.”

“keep up those last minute clinches,” he commends as he turns his attention to mingi, “well-deserved mvp tonight.”

“that’s fucking right,” wooyoung shouts, the boys laughing through their cheers as mingi shrugs in a feeble attempt to appear humble.

“now, you want to tell me why your calc professor is emailing me?”

the energy in the room shifts instantly, the boys falling silent as they begin to mumble amongst themselves awkwardly. each of them becomes incredibly focused on removing their equipment and hitting the showers, leaving mingi slumped on the bench under the now-stern gaze of the coach as he crosses his arms expectantly.

“what do you mean?” mingi asks, although he’s fully aware of what the elder man is referring to.

“oh, you don’t know?” a dry laugh escapes the coach’s lips as he unlocks his tablet to display a flurry of angry emails on the screen, each of them more exasperated than the last. mingi swallows, running a hand through his cropped black hair with his lips pressed in a thin line.

with the uptick in ice hockey season, mingi hadn’t been the most … exceptional student. it wasn’t exactly because he’d been engrossed in late-night practices or running drills when he should be in class. he was naturally an incredible player as right defense. the issue was more of … late nights celebrating wins in scrimmages and waking up next to girls whose names he wasn’t quite able to remember when the alcohol wore off.

“it’s not my fault calc is at eight in the morning,” mingi grumbles, rubbing at his eyes for emphasis.

“it is when i know the reason you’re missing class is being blamed on ice hockey,” coach scoffs, “and i don’t see you on the ice at six am after being out until god-knows-when. and it is when you can’t maintain a passing grade.”

“okay, okay.” mingi stands, his tall stature matching the coach’s as he begins to fiddle with the straps on his gear. anything to avert the coach’s gaze. “i’ll start showing up more.”

“no, you’re getting your shit together.” the coach sets aside his tablet and stares at mingi pointedly. “you fail your midterm, you’re getting benched.”

“i’m what?” mingi’s jaw drops at the threat, ready to protest before the coach presses a finger to his torso to quell him. “we’re literally about to qualify.”

“i’m well aware of the risk of benching you. but if i keep you on the ice while your grades are slipping, i’m gonna have a lot of people to answer to. and it’s not fair for me to let you get away with it while the other guys are busting ass to maintain their grades.”

“fuck,” mingi groans, burying his face in his hands to stifle the sound.

“you got, what, two weeks until midterms?” the coach grins at mingi, patting his shoulder as he  moves to leave the locker room and head back to his office down the halls. “better start studying.” mingi watches as his figure disappears, another string of expletives leaving his lips as he slams a fist into his locker.

you’re sitting in the tutoring center the next day, your phone perched between your fingers as you absentmindedly scroll through social media. the university accounts are littered with posts commemorating the ice hockey team’s recent win, the boys captured with mouths wide as they shout their cheers. you can’t help but laugh through your nose at the sight. you weren’t much of one to follow the campus athletes, but you knew enough from word-of-mouth that they were a rowdy bunch.

“why are you still here?” the senior supervisor for the tutoring center calls out to you from the doorframe, already on her way out as she narrows her eyes at you. with a groan, you set aside your phone and gesture to the clipboard in front of you with the day’s schedule.

“i’m waiting for my last person before i can clock out,” you reply. “he’s pushed back our session today like, four times.”

“girl, he should have just cancelled or rescheduled at this point,” she mutters, returning to you to glance at the name of your last student. her eyes widen as yours narrow in confusion at her surprise before a dry laugh escapes her. “oh, that’s your student? good luck.”

“what do you—”

“text me if you need anything,” she calls out, a smile lingering on her face as she waves goodbye and heads out.

“what the hell,” you mutter, shaking your head at her theatrics as you heave a sigh. maybe she was right; maybe you should just text your last student and tell him you were tired of waiting and that he needed to—

just then, a tall figure emerges from the doorframe. he stares at you blankly, emotionless as he approaches the counter. you rise from your armchair, staring back at him as you watch his hands fidget while he searches for the words. 

“hey, uh—” he glances around, as if the answer was lingering on the walls. “i’m here for tutoring.”

“well, this is the tutoring center,” you tease lightly, crossing your arms. “name?”

“song mingi.” he blinks at you, almost surprised by the fact that you even bothered asking. “do you not know who i am?”

“should i?” you arch a brow at him. you recognize him faintly from the ice hockey team, but you could imagine the kind of reputation he carried that you couldn’t be bothered to dive into.

“uh—i guess not.” he buries his hands in his pockets, pursing his lips at your apparent lack of awe at the fact that you were tutoring the song mingi.

“okay.” you ignore the fact that he seems offended by you not fawning over him and direct him into one of the rooms at the end of the hall. you flip through his application briefly, your eyes scanning over his current grades and what he needed from you for calculus. he follows you wordlessly before settling into the chair across the table from you. the overhead fluorescents keep you awake with the clock quickly approaching a much-too-late hour.

you settle into the chair across from him, brushing your hair from your eyes as you watch him nudge the wire frame of his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. “so, just to confirm. you’re looking for calc tutoring and you’re specifically trying to improve your performance on midterms?” he nods and you inhale sharply, glancing back down at your notes on his file. “you know, going to class is usually a good start.”

“spare me the lecture,” he huffs, drumming his fingertips on the tabletop as he narrows his eyes at you. “i’m here, aren’t i?”

“yeah, after telling me you’ll be late four times in a row in one day.” you match his gaze, watching as his expression shifts at the fact that you were willing to challenge him. he clearly seemed like someone that regularly got what he wanted and you were already dreading the coming weeks.

“alright, alright.” mingi throws up his hands in surrender. “i get it. this is the one class i’m fucking up in, i just need to make it through this class or i’m getting benched.”

“… then we better get to it.”

tutoring mingi is like pulling teeth.

his phone vibrates incessantly, he becomes mindlessly consumed by doodling in the margin of his notebooks. you genuinely believe you need to strap him to the chair in order to keep his attention. he struggles to grasp basic concepts—concepts that would have been a no-brainer if he’d just go to fucking class.

even worse, he schedules your sessions at the most ridiculous times. the ass-crack of dawn before his hockey practice, the middle of the night after hockey practice but before he’s able to go out for the night and everything he retains goes out the window. he was even so bold as to suggesting you come to his practice and tutor him there, in the bleachers. at this point, you wondered if it was worth the measly hourly rate that you were getting paid to keep this up.

it’s on a random thursday night when you’re in the middle of trying to explain derivatives to mingi that you’re just about ready to call it quits. he nods along until a call he “has to take” turns into a back-and-forth between him and a girl that seemingly was expecting his company for the night.

“baby, i promise—no, i’m gonna—c’mon—”

with an exasperated, guttural groan, you snatch his phone from his hand and press your thumb against the end call button. mingi gawks at you in disbelief, an expression you meet with pure rage as you slam your pen down and shove his notes back in his direction.

“dude, this is so not worth it,” you huff, shaking your head as you prepare to collect your things. “find another tutor, fail, get benched. i don’t give a fuck. this is way more hassle than it’s worth.”

“whoa, whoa, whoa,” mingi stutters, reaching for your wrist and holding onto it to prevent you from making any other attempts to leave. “i’m sorry.”

“are you?”

mingi looks at you, really looks at you for the first time since you’d become his tutor. for once, he doesn’t look like the cocky, overly adored star athlete that everyone fawns over. he looks nervous, biting down on his bottom lip as his eyes dart between yours. for the first time, you’re willing to believe him for whatever reason and set your bag down onto the nearby chair with a sigh.

“seriously, mingi,” you scold, rubbing a hand over your face before you glare at him. “i have a life outside of tutoring you. would be nice to get back to that.”

“a life, huh?” mingi chuckles under his breath and you roll your eyes at what you already know are his assumptions of you. a clean-cut, well-put-together bookworm that spends her free time holed away either in the library or at her job in the tutoring center. you shove him gently and he raises his hands in surrender, a sheepish expression washing over his face as he does. “i mean it, though. i don’t want to be a dick. i really just feel like a little bit of a lost cause when it comes to this.”

“well, if you focus—” you emphasize the last word, pressing a finger against the open textbook incessantly. “it wouldn’t be so bad. you’re not stupid. you just don’t give a fuck, but you should if you’re trying to stay off the bench.”

“… okay.”

the next several sessions are leagues better than before. as much as mingi struggles, you can tell that he’s trying. the phone stays in his bag, the doodles slow to a stop. on one occasion, he so much as shows up to your session before you do and you’re thoroughly convinced he was switched with a body double.

the morning of his exam, you make a mental note and shoot him a text for good luck.

you: you’re gonna kill it!! good luck

mingi: i don’t need luck

you: oh brother

you: so you’re not nervous at all?

mingi: ofc not

mingi: i had the world’s best calc tutor

you ignore the way your heart flutters, even just a little, at the response you receive and shove your phone back into your pocket with flushed cheeks before heading to your own exam.

midterms week crawls along, everyone exhausted and mentally spent by the end of it. you volunteer to pick up extra hours at the tutoring center, enough to cover the rest of your spring break expenses even though visitors slow down. a handful of folks preparing for make-up exams keep you busy to pass the time when you hear someone barreling into the center.

“one second,” you say to the freshman across from you with an apologetic smile in her direction before you hurry out to the lobby where mingi was waiting. he stood before you, hunched over as he swallowed down air to steady his breath. “what is happening?”

he doesn’t answer, still breathless as he fishes for his phone and displays his class portal to you. confused, you squint at the screen to make sense of his sudden intrusion until you widen your eyes and your jaw falls slack. 78/100 is at the center in full display, well above what you’d projected for how mingi was doing from your tutoring.

“no fucking way!” you cry out, a broad smile etched across your features as mingi nods wildly. without thinking, he lifts you into his arms and you find yourself spun before he sets you down. even then, his hands linger on either side of your waist. you stare up at him for a second too long before clearing your throat and taking a step back. “that’s insane. super proud of you.”

“it’s thanks to you,” mingi concedes, his eyes disappearing with his own grin before a string of notifications captures his attention. you watch him silently, ready to bid him farewell and return to your other student when he grabs your wrist. “hey, the guys are having a thing tonight at the house since exams are over. come out with us.”

“oh—” you blink in surprise. you weren’t one to hang out much with the hockey boys and their puck bunnies in the past, but you weren’t entirely opposed. “i mean—”

“what, not your kind of vibe?” mingi teases, gesturing to the walls of the tutoring center around you. “you rather stay out here tonight?”

“y’know, i will come out, actually,” you reply, a mischievous glint in your eyes as you send him off to finish your final session and mentally begin to assemble an outfit in your mind. “just text me the address.”

“bro, i can’t believe you passed,” wooyoung slurs to mingi later that night. the two stand against the kitchen counter, the party in full swing around them as they pour another round of shots for the team. mingi shakes his head with a laugh under his breath, knocking back the rest of his drink before lowering his cup for a refill.

“i’m just glad my ass is not benched for the next game,” he mutters before he takes a sip of the mix wooyoung poured him.

“didn’t you say you invited your tutor tonight?” mingi nods. “is she hot?”

“she’s …” he trails off, thinking back to his sessions with you. the way you were so patient with him, the sound of your laugh when he’d try to make a hockey analogy to a calculus problem. truthfully, he hadn’t given it much thought aside from the fact that you were … well, nice. “i mean, she’s chill. not my type.”

“hm.” wooyoung shrugs just as a knock at the door captures his attention. mingi watches as he goes to answer, nearly dropping his drink when he returns with the newest guest.

“hey.” you beam up at mingi before glancing around the kitchen to fix yourself a drink.

“she’s not your type?” wooyoung mutters under his breath to mingi as they stand in the corner and observe your every move.

mingi is speechless, his eyes trailing over your frame as he tries to steady himself with another sip of his own drink. the way your skirt hugged your frame, the hem of your crop top exposing a dangerous sliver of skin. it was a massive difference from the sweats and oversized hoodies he’d grown used to seeing you in. you glance at him over your shoulder, your kohl-lined eyes sparkling more than usual.

“you need a refill?” you ask, gesturing to the half-empty vodka bottle. mingi swallows, shaking his head before he swats wooyoung and his wandering eyes away.

“to be honest, i didn’t think you’d swing by,” mingi jokes, nudging you gently as you lean against the counter beside him. the scent of your perfume engulfs him, clouding his senses as much as the intoxication.

“what, you thought it wasn’t my kind of vibe?” you roll your eyes playfully and glance around the living room to see if you recognize anyone. aside from mingi, you vaguely pinpoint other members of the ice hockey team and a handful of girls from classes you shared. mingi follows your gaze and scoffs.

“i don’t know, you seem a little nervous.”

you look up at him and fight to stifle your laugh as you pour an extra dose of vodka into your solo cup. “yeah, okay.”

mingi quickly loses you in the crowd when a group of girls call you over to join them against some of the hockey boys in a game of beer pong. you happily oblige, unaware of the fact that a certain someone was watching you from the corner of his eye all the while. you relax more quickly than you expected and drift across various conversations, finding yourself particularly enthralled with the hockey boys as they shout over one another on the apartment balcony.

“dude, she was not looking at you.”

“yes, she was!”

“no, she wasn’t,” you interject with a lilt in your voice before you chuckle into your cup and take another sip. the boys holler in agreement, wooyoung cowering against the railing with a groan. you don’t notice mingi continuing to stare at you from his own spot on the balcony beside yunho.

“bro, blink.” yunho scolds him with a half-grin hanging from his lips. mingi clears his throat awkwardly, struggling to play it off as he notices the way you shiver from a gust of cool night air. without thinking, he shrugs his oversized jacket off and extends it to you with a shake.

“oh, i’m fine—”

“don’t worry about it,” mingi says, something foreign mingling with the buzz from the liquor as he ignores the way yunho hums suggestively beside him.

“guys, we’re gonna play flip cup,” a girl calls out from the opening in the sliding glass door that leads back to the living room. mingi meets her gaze immediately, recognizing her faintly from one of his many late-night hookups. if only he could remember her name. “we need one more.”

“i’ll join,” mingi offers, shuffling in after her without realizing that you’ve been watching him as much as he has you. the star athlete persona is in full swing, welcoming the cheers of his arrival and tilting his head back as vodka is streamlined from the bottle into his throat.

as much as you were having a good time, it was a reminder that this was who mingi was at the end of the day. the center of attention, the life of the party. and that wasn’t a bad thing, but it wasn’t necessarily you. suddenly, it feels as though you overstayed your welcome the longer you stare at the way mingi wraps his arms around the waist of the girl that had called him over. he rests his chin on the top of her head, swaying gently as the cups are assembled for the next round of their game.

you clear your throat, downing the rest of your drink before you bid a hasty goodbye to the rest of the boys on the balcony. they urge you to stay in a slur of drunken pleas that you laugh off, promising to join them another time as you slip back into the kitchen to head out. mingi doesn’t look at you anymore, unbothered by the fact that you’re still wearing his jacket. with a sigh, you slip it off of your shoulders and drape it over the back of one of the dining chairs before heading out of the front door.

later that night, mingi releases a satisfied sigh as he surfaces from beneath the bedsheets with the very same girl whose name he couldn’t quite remember. her skin glides along his, their limbs tangled as she dissolves into a string of tipsy giggles.

“can i have water?” she asks, her lips swollen after they’d spent the last ten minutes around the length of mingi’s cock.

“sure thing.” mingi slips out of bed and into a pair of discarded sweats, his muscles flexing as he saunters back into the kitchen for a glass. only then does he notice his jacket dangling from the back of the dining chair and stills, his mind flooded with the memory of you. he hadn’t seen when you’d left, his first instinct to sift through his messages to text you.

mingi: when did you leave

mingi: sorry i missed you

you pause in your doomscrolling from your own bed, a poor attempt to return to sleep as your eyes widen at the sight of mingi’s notification. the party had ended hours ago. his messages left you confused on how exactly to feel. on one hand, it was surprising he’d even bothered to check in on you. on the other, it took him an eternity to notice that you’d left. your thumb hovers over the reply button, tempted to answer before the voice gnawing at you reminds you that you were just his tutor and you had shown up out of courtesy.

you need to go to bed.

“got an update on your midterm grades,” the coach says as he gestures for mingi to join him in his office as the semester resumes. the pair sit on either side of the wide oak desk at the center of the room, staring at the monitor that displays mingi’s most recent transcript. “keep it that way.”

“so does this mean …” mingi trails off hopefully.

“as long as you can maintain this passing grade, we’re in the clear. i don’t care what you have to do.” he glares at mingi in warning. “but, i’m not playing with you. i don’t want to see any more surprise emails from academia when we’re in crunch time.”

“you got it.” mingi nods, relief flooding his senses.

“now, get on the ice.”

mingi trudges back into the locker room after a grueling set of drills, his hair plastered to his forehead with sweat and his muscles trembling from overexertion. he can’t figure out why his mind wanders to you. he hadn’t heard from you since the party. while a part of him wanted to text you and tell you the good news, a larger part of him felt an overwhelming desire to see you.

biting down on his bottom lip, he opens up the scheduling portal for the tutoring center.

“what the fuck,” you mutter under your breath as you sift through your scheduled clients for the week. beyond the usual freshmen and your regular upperclassmen, mingi’s name appears at the very bottom of the night’s schedule. he chooses the absolute latest slot you’d kept available for emergency sessions when someone needed help outside of traditional work hours.

you hadn’t heard from him since the party. the fact that he was choosing to submit a formal tutoring request versus just texting you irked you, but you ignore it and accept the request begrudgingly. you swipe back to your last conversation with him, staring at the messages he’d sent nearly a week ago before spring break from when you’d slipped away undetected.

with a sigh, you accept the request and mentally ready yourself for another late night with mingi.

“fancy seeing you here,” mingi says as he saunters into the otherwise isolated study room. you scoff, taking a sip of the coffee you brewed in a desperate attempt to stay alert at the late hour.

“funny,” you huff, gesturing for him to take the chair next to you. “so, how’d your convo with your coach go?”

“i’m actually in the clear for the rest of the season,” mingi beams, leaning back into his chair with his hands propped up behind his head. “thanks to you.”

“that’s great news,” you reply earnestly. “was that all you needed today? you didn’t have to make an appointment to let me know.”

“i know,” mingi hums as his eyes trail over you. “i just figured i needed to find a way to return the favor.” your cheeks burn as you avert his gaze, tension suddenly hanging over the pair of you in the increasingly small study room. your lips part as you struggle to respond, irritated by the fact that mingi was clearly enjoying the way he was able to get under your skin.

“repay what favor?” you ask. “i’m your tutor. you don’t owe me anything.”

“what if i really want to show you how much i appreciate the help?”

“leave a good review for me, then.”

“you know that’s not what i mean.” mingi stares at you earnestly, his hands fidgeting in his lap before he inches closer. your breath hitches in your throat, a dry swallow following as you bite down on your bottom lip. “there’s no way you don’t want to.”

you know exactly what he’s talking about, but you hold firm.

“we’re not having that conversation while i’m your tutor.”

you both stare at one another silently, teetering along the edge of a dangerous line you didn’t even realize you were falling victim to. you’d surprisingly grown used to mingi’s company, to the point that you looked forward to seeing him when you had sessions scheduled. the night you saw him at the party, when the lines blurred between your tutoring arrangement and just … you, as people, you knew you were in trouble.

but you also knew that he was trouble.

mingi blinks at your rejection, his jaw tensing slightly as he arches a brow at your response. a smile suddenly spreads across his face as he nods, drumming his fingers against the table once. “okay.”

“okay?”

“yeah, okay.”

“huh.” you narrow your eyes at him, half-expecting him to continue trying to egg you on. when you realize he isn’t, you shake your head and struggle to conceal your own smile. “then we’re done here tonight.”

you lay in bed later that night, cursing yourself mentally as you scroll through the ice hockey team’s account. a stray comment from what you assume is mingi’s account catches your eye and you pause. pursing your lips, you allow yourself to look at his photos and grumble at the fact that you’re even entertaining the idea of mingi.

the next several weeks feel like your own personal hell.

all you can think about is mingi. the way he looked at you that night, the fact that he opened the door to a dangerous possibility that you hadn’t given a second thought before then. you struggle to stay focused during your tutoring sessions, something mingi picks up on as he smirks to himself. he invites you to hang out with the teammates at other parties and trips to the bars downtown and you reject him each and every time, as if it’d preserve your resolve.

“you going to the game tonight or something?” your supervisor asks you during one of your last shifts of the semester. she catches you over your shoulder, following your eyes to where the poster for the final matchup between the voyagers and their rival team is being advertised across socials. you clear your throat, awkwardly tossing aside your phone as you shake your head and she laughs at you in response. “hey, no judgment here.”

“just keeping tabs on my students,” you lie poorly, earning another chuckle.

that’s all you were doing—making sure that your student was meeting all of his obligations. after all, the goal of you tutoring him was to secure his place on the starting lineup for the critical games. there was no reason for you to overthink if you wanted to go to the game. sure, you’d never been to an ice hockey game before in your life, but it didn’t have to mean anything.

it didn’t mean anything.

the second you set foot into the arena later that night, the adrenaline overwhelms you. the bleachers are filled with voyagers fans, their jerseys in matching colors with the university’s emblem etched across the front. the scent of spilled beer and popcorn fills your nose as you shuffle down to your seat near the plexiglass. the game is already in full swing, the sound of metal skates cutting across the frozen surface of the rink coupled with men yelling plays to each other.

you narrow your eyes, a shiver running down your spine when you notice the 89 on the back of mingi’s towering frame. he circles the back half of the rink, his eyes locked on the incoming players as they barrel towards the home goal. you become engrossed in the game, understanding very little but following along enough to at least cheer at the right time.

sirens blare through the arena, the voyagers securing their spot in the final with a 3-2 win. mingi circles the ice, fists high in the air as the crowd cheers him on. he skates to a stop to celebrate with the other boys, hoisting hongjoong up into the air to praise their captain. you laugh at his antics, clapping along with the rest of the fans as the team strips off their helmets.

mingi’s gaze travels across the ice, your heart nearly stopping when his eyes lock on yours. the rest of the arena grows muffled, replaced by a faint ringing in your ears as every part of you screams to look away from him. running a gloved hand across his hair in his face, mingi feels a smirk creep onto his face as realization dawns on him.

you came to see him.

even with all of the guardrails, even with being firm about not even entertaining the idea of crossing a line with him while you were his tutor, you couldn’t fight the fact that you wanted to see him. something that mingi quickly picks up on as he nods once before returning his attention to the rest of his team.

it’s not more than an hour after the game when your phone vibrates on your bedside table.

mingi: i don’t want you to be my tutor anymore

your blood runs cold at the sudden rejection, your mind reeling as you try to understand what the problem could be. you literally saw him for a session the day before, with plans to finalize his sessions until the week before finals. he told you himself that he didn’t want to risk not being tutored before finals, especially with the chance of the voyagers making it to the finals. you wonder if you did something wrong as your thumbs move faster than your mind.

you: ???

you: is something wrong

mingi’s bubble appears and disappears for what feels like an eternity before his reply.

mingi: no, just might switch to someone else until finals tbh

after all this time?

you narrow your eyes as you reread mingi’s messages, confusion growing with every passing second. there was no reason for mingi to suddenly want to cut your tutoring short. that aside, the ice hockey team just made it to the finals. there was no way he wasn’t actively at a party, three shots in with a girl in his lap. the mental image makes you grimace before you find yourself ready to dial mingi without a second thought.

and so, you do.

his end of the line is quieter than you expected. you clear your throat, quickly realizing you hadn’t thought of what you were going to say.

“uh, hey,” you start, “what’s going on?” mingi remains silent for a long while, too long as you feel your heart hammer against your ribcage. desperate to fill the silence, you continue. “are you not going out with the guys to celebrate?”

“later,” he finally replies, his voice eerily steady. “kinda wanted to figure … this out first.”

“and what exactly is this?” you ask, confused as ever.

“you can’t be my tutor anymore.”

“but, what did i—”

“you said you’re not having this conversation as long as you’re my tutor,” mingi says, recounting your exact words from when he’d first offered to ‘return the favor’ of you helping him stay off of the bench. “so, stop tutoring me.”

“… meet me at the tutoring center,” you say firmly, ignoring every warning bell in your mind as you grab your keys before hanging up.

the study room is dark as you enter, shuffling through the termination paperwork you’d printed before mingi arrived shortly after you. mingi stares up at you in amusement as you scan the documents quickly and slide them across the tabletop to him.

“seriously?” he scoffs as he reviews the exit paperwork in the dim lighting. you watch while he signs each sheet carefully, parsing through the final review feedback before sliding it back to you. without a word, you shift the papers to the other end of the table.

neither of you say anything for a moment, your eyes locked on one another’s as the weight of unspoken tension grows heavier and heavier. your mind begins to blur the line between mingi as your student and mingi as the man that looked at you in a way you’d never been looked at before. desire creeps along your skin, desperate to be satiated.

you assume mingi has nothing more to say as you stand. you take so much as two steps towards the door when he grabs your wrist, pulling you into him before his lips crash against yours. a whimper escapes you as he guides you by the small of your back to straddle him, your legs on either side of his waist as his fingers dig into your hips to hold you steady.

your mind races, struggling to keep up with the way every nerve ending in your body is on fire when mingi shifts so that you could feel every inch of him pressed against your inner thigh through the fabric of your sweats. the friction coaxes a gasp from you, a sound that he swallows as he slips his tongue into your mouth to glide against yours.

“fuck,” he mutters against your lips as he resurfaces, his chest heaving in an attempt to catch his breath before he pulls you into another string of messy, open-mouthed kisses. you finally succumb to the desperate need you’d been stifling ever since mingi had welcomed the possibility. you still knew exactly what kind of guy he could be. you still knew that you were mere seconds out of a strictly professional arrangement.

and right now, you could give no less of a fuck.

your hips buck against mingi’s, grinding into him as he tilts his head back with a blissful sigh. his hands never leave your sides, gripping your flesh as if it would tether him to the chair before you lower your mouth to the crook of his neck. a low groan rumbles in his throat as you trace the tip of your tongue along the sensitive skin just beneath his jaw.

he hums, sinking his fingers into your hips so that he could lift you onto the table. the wooden surface is cool beneath your skin as you lay back, the termination paperwork fluttering to the ground when mingi shoves it aside. his eyes trail over every inch of you, slow and predatory in a way that has you squeezing your thighs together for some kind of friction. his fingers curl around your throat with a grip that’s firm enough to have you gasping for air as his other hand lowers the hem of your sweats. the fleece fabric falls to the ground, exposing your already soaked panties.

“all that talk,” he chides, dragging one of his fingers along the fabric plastered to your throbbing clit. your head falls back, his fingers still latched onto your throat. “and you wanted me to fuck you, after all.” he hoists you up by the nape of your neck, his palm holding you steady as his free hand continues to stroke along the length of your folds.

“say the word and i’ll stop,” he continues, all while continuing to trace circles around your clit. “we can go back so you’re just my tutor.”

“a-ah,” you whimper, twitching against the tabletop as your toes curl from the pleasure. a half-smile lingers on mingi’s face as he hooks a finger on the hem of your panties to slide them down your legs before lowering himself onto his knees. you feel your chest tighten at the sight, anticipation stirring in your core as he peppers kisses along your inner thighs with his eyes locked on yours.

“no?” he asks, teasing evident in his voice as his breath grows closer and closer to your dripping entrance. “you don’t want me to stop?”

“no,” you breathe, the sound quickly replaced by a guttural moan when mingi’s tongue dips into your entrance and traces long, languid strokes. his hands settle on your knees, holding them apart until you’re able to push through his grip and nearly suffocate him between your thighs. he groans at the sudden pressure and flattens his tongue along your folds before he latches onto your clit. “oh, fuck, mingi—”

your hands thread through his cropped hair in a desperate attempt to ground yourself as you feel pleasure flooding through your torso. mingi eats you out like it’s his last meal on earth, his eyes never leaving yours as you whimper through a string of expletives at the way his tongue feels against your skin.

“i—fuck, i’m gonna—” before you’re able to get the words out, mingi stops abruptly and rises to his feet. you glower at him, ready to curse him out for the change of pace when he slips two fingers into you with ease. the sudden intrusion draws a cry from you as your back arches off of the table, enough so that mingi can slide an arm around your waist to hold you upright. his eyes scan your face for every sign of pleasure, from the way your eyes nearly roll back in your head to the way you bite down on your lip to quiet yourself.

“ride my fingers for me,” he commands gently, his lips swollen and glistening after going down on your. gripping onto his shoulders, you oblige and grind your hips down onto his hand before he curls his fingers deep inside of you. the familiar wave of pleasure threatens to spill over for the second time, something that mingi notices as he picks up the pace and thrusts his fingers in and out of you.

you don’t warn him this time, your clipped breaths and the sounds you make enough of an indicator that you were close. mingi reclaims your lips in a heated kiss, the taste of you lingering on his tongue as your fingernails sink between his shoulder blades. your orgasm ripples through you, so much so that you’re sure the room is spinning when you finally come to.

“good girl,” mingi praises lowly, bringing his fingers to his own lips to taste you. before you can steady your breath, the sound of him shoving his own sweats lowers so that he could free his cock from the restraints of his boxers has heat stirring within your core.

you glance down at him, your lips parted as you watch him stroke himself with what’s left of you on his fingers. mingi’s chest staggers with bated breaths of his own as his eyes meet yours, his pupils blown wide from the pleasure before he lifts your ankles onto either of his shoulders. your back hits the desk again and you swallow, mentally preparing yourself for how much you knew he was about to stretch you out.

mingi eases into you, a stifled groan rumbling in his throat as he bottoms out. you gasp, your nails clawing at the tabletop in an attempt to find anything you could grip onto before he begins to move. he falls into a slow, rhythmic pace, enough for you to adjust to his size before his hips begin to slam erratically into yours.

the force of his thrusts drag the table along the tiled floors, the sounds concealed by the way you were about to scream. mingi bites down on his lower lip hard enough he’s about to draw blood, outstretching a hand to cover your mouth. the taste of you lingers on his fingers, his palm firm against your lips as he picks up the pace so that he’s fully sliding in and out of you. if it hadn’t been for his hand, you were sure to have screamed bloody murder.

unexpectedly, mingi presses a kiss to your ankle before lowering it so that you could wrap your leg around his waist. you push your heel into the small of his back, urging him closer as he braces himself with his forearms on either side of you.

“fuck, you feel so good,” mingi growls against your ear, his voice lowered with every thrust. you moan in agreement, your walls clenching around him to draw him in deeper before he’s fully outside of you again. he backs away just enough to tower over you and nudges the side of your thigh. “flip over for me.”

like clockwork, you slide off of the tabletop and turn away from him on shaky legs. mingi nudges your thighs apart further with his knee, his broad palm pressing into your back to lower your torso back onto the table before shoving himself back into you. he fills you up even more from this angle and you grit your teeth when he lands a string of smacks against your ass.

“o-oh, fuck,” you groan, your knuckles white as you grip the edge of the table and arch your back into mingi. he fists a hand through your hair, already tousled from being fucked senseless before he lowers himself to the shell of your ear.

“you like that?” he asks, his thrusts beginning to grow erratic. “let me hear it.”

“yes,” you breathe, “fuck, yes—”

“you wanna cum all over my dick?” he huffs breathlessly as he pounds into you. “be a good girl for me?”

“oh, fuck,” you whine, your thighs trembling as you feel your second orgasm rack your body. the pleasure washes over you, another drawn-out cry escaping you before you fall limp onto the table. mingi follows soon after, filling you to the brim with hot streaks of cum that you feel trickling from your entrance as he pulls out of you.

the pair of you say nothing for a long while, focused on cleaning yourselves up and getting dressed. the room reeks of sex, the table askew and the windows fogged from the rising heat. your mind is flooded with voices reminding you that it was a terrible idea to have ever fucked mingi and that you needed to make it clear that it was a one-time thing.

“record in 3, 2, 1—”

yeosang stares motionlessly at wooyoung as he performs the choreography for the upcoming comeback. it’s not until he’s a good ten seconds into dancing that he realizes yeosang isn’t recording and stops dead in his track with an exasperated sigh.

“bro.”

“huh?” yeosang blinks, shaking his head as loose, blonde waves fall over his eyes. “sorry, what?”

“press the red circle!” wooyoung whines, throwing his hands out toward the phone for emphasis. “this is, like, the third time we’ve tried to record this and you’ve spaced out. at least, more than usual. what’s the deal?”

yeosang doesn’t respond, swallowing once as he tries to come up with an excuse. how could he explain that he was spiraling over the fact that you didn’t send your usual good morning text  before he left for schedules without sounding like a total maniac? of course, there were days where work kept you away or you’d forgotten to charge your phone overnight. but, he’d at least have expected you to be the first one blowing up his phone on his birthday.

“hello?” wooyoung waves his hand in front of yeosang’s face and snaps his fingers. “ah, forget it—i’ll go ask seonghwa to film it. he’s better at this stuff, anyway.”

with a sigh, yeosang surrenders the company phone as he watches the younger male hustle out into the hallway before disappearing. he reaches for his personal phone instead, scrolling through various apps for some clue as to whether you were alive or not.

yeosang: hey baby

yeosang: are u ok

[you: liked the message ‘are u ok’]

“a thumbs up?” he huffs in disbelief as he gawks at the icon beside his question. he usually didn’t nitpick how you’d respond, but he was hoping for something, anything more than a reaction bubble.

“what’s wrong?” hongjoong enters the practice room, clad in sweats and a beanie that were a sign of him planning to rehearse. yeosang whips his head up like a deer in headlights, a mix of confusion and concern etched across his features as he stammers.

“u-uh, nothing,” he clears his throat, forcing a smile onto his face. hongjoong blinks at him, clearly knowing yeosang better than he thought. “i was actually going to find yunho and mingi. you know, to film more content.”

“i think i saw them in the—” hongjoong points towards the door, unable to get another word out before yeosang bolts down the hall. “—conference room.”

the two tall men tower over either side of yeosang as he slumps into one of the armchairs surrounding the long, rectangular table. his phone is sat on the wooden surface, open to his conversation with you. the blue thumbs up taunts him, a reminder of the worst-case scenarios that were brewing in his mind.

“bro, it’s not that deep,” yunho reassures him, patting a hand on his shoulder. “she’s probably just busy with something and she’ll get back to you later.”

“are you kidding?” mingi scoffs, gesturing to the top of yeosang’s screen where notifications were flooding in from well wishes for his birthday. “everyone’s been blowing up his shit. he’s definitely in trouble with his girl if she hasn’t at least told him ‘happy birthday’ by now. it’s almost noon.”

“well, people get sidetracked,” yunho protests in your defense.

“what if i forgot to tell you happy birthday?” mingi asks, crossing his arms pointedly.

“you did forget to tell me happy birthday,” yunho scolds as he mirrors his stance. “you didn’t remember until you were three shots in with san and he screamed it in my face.”

“okay, that was one time.”

“this isn’t helping,” yeosang grumbles, dropping his head in his hands with a groan. “maybe i should just text her again. actually, no. then she’ll think i’m crazy.”

“look.” yunho sits on the edge of the table and heaves a low, deep exhale. “we have a lot to focus on right now for the comeback. we’ll celebrate later and we can double check on her to make sure she’s okay. sound good?”

yeosang nods once, but he doesn’t say anything. aside from your wordless response, he refuses to admit to the rest of the members that he had been looking forward to more than just a measly text from you. in the years you’d been together, you were the first person to truly make him feel special on his birthday by going above and beyond with your planning. he’d wake up to his favorite breakfast, surrounded by a myriad of gifts and an itinerary for the day. it wasn’t that he cared to be materialistic. it was just nice to be thought of so meticulously; something he wasn’t entirely used to otherwise.

yunho gasps and the three of them look down at the phone where you were typing and deleting your message, indicated by the rapidly reappearing speech bubble at the bottom of your chat. it’s not until it’s gone for a solid thirty seconds do they back up and watch as the phone screen returns to sleep.

“we should go get ready for the meeting with the managers,” yeosang says, forcing another smile back onto his face as he nudges the pair out of the room.

it’s well after noon and yeosang still hasn’t heard from you.

he’s sat in his makeup chair, the artists dabbing foundation delicately across his skin as he struggles to sit still without a grimace. his phone vibrates near-constantly with messages from other idol colleagues, fan letters and family members. 

by the end of the day, he’s wrapped up his shoot for teaser images for the comeback and he has to fight every urge in his body to sprint for his phone to check his notifications.

not a word.

he groans with a curse under his breath, brushing blonde waves out of his face as he watches the other members laugh to themselves as they leave the company for the night. since he was the last to shoot, they’d told him to let them know if he had plans.

by the looks of it, he sure didn’t.

he tries not to sulk as he greets the driver that was scheduled to take him back to his apartment. he makes a conscious effort to not scroll through messages, instead looking at old videos of league playthroughs so that his mind could wander. he doesn’t even realize that he’s made it home until the elder man clears his throat.

“ah—! sorry,” yeosang replies, color flooding his cheeks. “thank you so much, have a good night.”

he’s up the elevator and down the winding halls to his unit, fishing for his key blindly to scan himself in. the apartment is dark when he enters, the tall windows reflecting the skyline and the neon lights that scatter down below.

“surprise!” yeosang’s heart nearly drops to his stomach as his eyes dart blindly around the living room, the faint sound of thumping against the walls causing him to furrow his brows. “god damn it, where’s the light switch—ah—”

the overhead lights flood the apartment and yeosang stares back at you as you present him with a berry cream cake and a broad grin. you watch as he slowly processes the fact that you did remember his birthday, after all, that you were standing here waiting for him.

“what kind of cake is it?” he asks, pointing at the whipped cream concoction.

“i’m sorry,” you scoff, trying not to laugh as you set the dessert onto the counter and approach him with a pointed finger pressed to his torso. “you haven’t heard from me all day and your first question is about the cake?”

“well, yeah!” yeosang pouts, lowering his back onto the ground as he pulls you into his arms with a blissful sigh. the scent of your perfume, notes of lily and amber, flood his senses as he rests his chin on the crown of your head. “i’ve been wondering all day.”

“sorry.” you look up at him, pressing a kiss to his lips in apology. “i wanted to try surprising you for once. it was mingi’s idea to ghost you for the day so i’d throw you off.”

“why would you ever take advice from mingi?” he chuckles and rolls his eyes playfully as he releases you.

“never again,” you agree, shaking your head before your gaze flickers to the bedroom. “oh, there’s a few more surprises.”

you take his hand, leading him through the hall and feeling your heart skip a beat when a low sound of excitement escapes him. perched on his bed was a set of new accessories for his gaming setup, nestled beside a doberman plush and an enveloped letter with a kiss pressed to its surface.

“no way,” he exclaims, monotone as ever with his hand over his mouth to conceal how wide his smile had grown. you watch as he parses through each gift carefully, mumbling praises before he reaches for you. “this is so sick. it almost makes up for the fact that you didn’t text me all day.”

“i did it for a reason,” you counter with a frown, one that quickly disappears when yeosang presses a kiss to your forehead. “actually, there is one more—”

“what else could you possibly have done?” yeosang asks, gesturing to the pile of gifts beside him. you shrug nonchalantly, slipping back out of his grasp so that you could back away from him. he stares at you, confused as ever as you disappear into the bathroom.

tucked away in the linen closet is a bag with your purchase from earlier. you reach for it with a mischievous glint in your eyes, the lace fabric hooked over your finger as you lift the garment from the tissue paper wrapping. you’re not sure how much time has passed by the time you exit into the room, yeosang absentmindedly scrolling through birthday wishes before he looks up at you from the corner of his eye. he stills at the sight, his jaw tense as he arches a brow in question.

“and what’s this, now?” he asks, trying to stifle the smile that threatens to break across his face. you shrug, red lace hugging every curve and exposing just enough skin to have yeosang nearly doubled over and ready to beg for your touch. 

“just a little something,” you tease before settling into his lap. he leans against the headboard, hands on either side of your waist as his eyes trail down the length of your torso.

“oh, it’s something, alright,” he concurs, pressing the tip of his tongue into his cheek with a low chuckle. “all this just for me?”

“well, you deserve it,” you say, draping your arms over his shoulders so that you could press a kiss against his neck. he hums approvingly, his grip tightening on your waist when his phone vibrates incessantly.

“fuck,” he mutters, hongjoong’s contact flashing on his screen. he deliberates for a moment, the thought of you sat in his lap with the most delicious set of lingerie he’d ever seen awfully tempting. on the other hand, he knew that the group was in crunch time for comeback preparations and hongjoong could have been calling for any reason. with a sigh, he traces a gentle circle against your hip when he answers. “yeah?”

“get the fuck downtown,” san hollers into the speaker, his words slurred enough already to prove to yeosang that he’d had more to drink than he could handle early on.

“now?” yeosang asks, meeting your eyes as you hear a faint echo of the chaos on the other end of the line.

“do you want to celebrate or not?” wooyoung shouts over him. the music blasts behind them, an indicator that they were at your favorite bar to visit together as a group. you can’t help but laugh, the sound traveling to the other end of the line before wooyoung calls out your name excitedly. “oh, did you already surprise him?”

“did everybody know about this birthday plan but me?” yeosang asks, dumbfounded.

“why would i tell you?” with a shake of your head, you call back out to wooyoung that you’ll head downstairs soon.

“hurry!” he cries out before yeosang ends the call. setting his phone to do not disturb, he tosses the phone onto the sheets and flips you in one smooth motion so that he had you caged beneath him.

“are we not in a rush?” you ask, a knowing smile gracing your features as he presses a string of kisses from your collarbone until he settles against the shell of your ear. you shudder under his touch, your nails digging into his shoulders just slightly.

hongjoong

when you asked hongjoong to teach you how to dj, you didn’t expect to be thrown into a sound engineering crash course.

“so, you’re gonna want to make sure the bpms and the keys are both in sync,” he instructs you as he messes with the settings on his laptop before moving to the turntable console between you. “the camelot wheel can be helpful when you’re starting out to transition between songs.”

“the who?” you squint at him, growing increasingly frustrated as you try to follow along with his complex guidance. hongjoong looks up at you, a smirk etched across his features as he beckons you over.

“c’mere.” you follow his lead, allowing him to place his hand over yours as he guides you through a demonstration of operating the turntable. you watch carefully and listen as the speakers move smoothly from one rnb song into another. “see?”

only when you turn up to look at him do you realize just how close he was. his grip over your hand tenses slightly when he meets your gaze, something darkening in his eyes as he swallows. you part your lips to speak when he clears his throat and takes a step back.

“did … did you have any other questions?” he asks, his gaze flickering to your lips for a split second that you’re sure he doesn’t realize you notice. it was no secret that you and hongjoong had been dancing around the will-they, won’t-they of your relationship for months and you were starting to hit your limit with how patient you could continue to be.

“uh, yeah, actually,” you say, crossing your arms over your torso. “could you actually show me how to record and upload samples to use in mixes?”

“oh—! sure thing,” hongjoong answers with disappointment evident on his face as he shifts his focus back to the laptop. “do you want to send them over to me after so i can give you feedback?”

“i sure do.”

the next weekend, hongjoong is sat at his own desk in his dorm as he sifts through another mix for a campus event he was recruited to work on music for. he brushes a hand through his hair, sorting through files when a notification pops up from you with an audio file attached.

you: heyyy you: just got done messing with this, lmk what u think you: [1 attachment: audio file]

a smile tugs at his lips as he sets his headphones over his ears. he had been enjoying teaching you about one of his favorite hobbies, especially considering it gave him an excuse to spend more time with you. it impressed him how much of a fast learner you were, especially—

“fuck, hongjoong.”

hongjoong triple checks that his headphones were connected as he glances around his otherwise empty dorm. the sound of you whimpering fills his ears as he stares blankly at his screen, watching the timer on the audio file creep ever-so slowly. he shifts in his armchair with his fingers tightening around the handles as he feels a familiar heat rising beneath his skin and between his legs.

the sound of you nearly approaching your climax urges him to finally slam on the pause button before reaching for his phone to thumb a quick message to you.

hongjoong: you need to come over. now

seonghwa

“you’re distracting me.”

“i wouldn’t call this distracting.”

“i would.”

seonghwa peers up at you from where he sat cross-legged on his dorm room floor, nudging the frame of his rimless glasses further up the bridge of his nose. an assortment of plastic bricks surround him, neatly organized into piles by colors and shapes. the manual for assembling his latest starship is open in front of him detailing the next several steps to follow. even after several months of knowing him, it still astonished you that the campus-feared teacher’s assistant was a violently passionate lego enthusiast that spent his nights like this.

that is, when he didn’t have you bent over the edge of his bed while he fucked you senseless.

like many nights in the past, he sat on the floor fixated on his latest passion project while you observed him quietly from the comfort of his bed. there was something undeniably attractive about watching him as he worked. the way his brows furrowed in concentration, the muscles in his arms flexing with every brick perched between his fingertips. you spent these nights ogling him while he couldn’t spare you so much as a passing glance with his attention zeroed in on his legos.

he lets out something akin to a chuckle, the corner of his mouth upturned as he finally allows himself to glance back up at you. his eyes darken, at least for a split second, as he takes in the little black number you’d chosen to wear for the night. the lace lingerie clung to all of the right places, your thighs crossed over one another as you prop your head up in your palm.

“i have no idea what you’re talking about,” you tease, sliding off of the sheets and onto the cool tile floors so that you could drape your arms over his shoulders. seonghwa works to remain unfazed as he fishes for another row of bricks but you feel the way his pulse quickens when your palms come to rest over his chest.

“baby,” he mutters in protest, rereading the instructions in front of him as his focus begins to falter.

“hm?” you draw long, languid strokes over his torso with your lips pressed to the shell of his ear.

“baby,” he repeats, his voice stern in warning this time. your gaze flickers down to where the legos clatter to the ground in front of him as they slip from his fingers.

“keep going,” you urge him, “i just wanted to get a closer look.”

“no, you just want to torture me,” he retorts, picking up the pieces where he’d left off and quickly losing focus as he flips to the next page.

“well, is it working?”

“no.”

“okay,” you say suddenly as you release him and move to stand back up onto your feet. seonghwa glances over his shoulder at you, his expression unreadable until you feel his fingers close around your wrist to tug you back into his lap.

“i guess i could use a break,” he hums, wrapping broad arms around your waist as you lean into him with a triumphant smile.

yunho

“i can’t believe you guys are missing spring break at the beach to go to comic-con,” you call out to your boyfriend as he hurries around the room to pack his suitcase. he fishes through his closet for the various accessories to his spider-suit. you don’t know why you’d even questioned who he’d want to dress up as, considering he was easily the biggest marvel fan you’d ever met.

“it’s not my fault that it falls on the same week!” he protests, still fixated on collecting his things. “this might be the last chance we get to see the full cast together on a panel.”

“oh, the agony,” you tease, raising your hands in surrender when he turns to pout at you. “i’m kidding! it’ll be fun. make sure to take plenty of pictures. i’m still mad you won’t let me see the costume you put together.”

“it has to be a surprise,” yunho scolds, leaning over to his bed where you lay to press a chaste kiss to your lips. and a surprise, it was.

the second you opened yunho’s instagram stories from comic-con, the last thing you were focused on was the party surrounding you while you lay on the sand with a drink in hand. when he said he was planning to go as spiderman, you expected a halloween-quality costume. he’d spent so much time focusing on studying for midterms and getting ahead on his thesis research that you assumed he had no time for anything else.

your thumb remains pressed to your phone screen as you take in every last stitch of his costume. the way the red and blue fabric clung to his muscles, his hair tousled and falling over his eyes as he smiles at his reflection in the hotel bathroom mirror. his large hands were covered with the webbed material, curled around the edges of his phone.

after that, you could barely focus on enjoying your spring break. days at the pool or nights at the bar were interrupted every time you got a notification from yunho’s account. one minute it was a video of him perched on the hotel rooftop, dangling from a light pole, the next was another onslaught of mirror selfies with his friends that had joined him in their own superhero costumes.

in the years you’d known him, not once had you ever entertained the thought of what it would be like to hook up with him as a superhero alter ego. then again, there was a first time for everything.

you’re fast asleep in your dorm when you hear a soft knock at the door, one that barely stirs you awake as you shove the sheets aside and welcome in a jet-lagged yunho.

“hi, baby,” you mumble sleepily when he pulls you into a tight embrace. his familiar scent comforts you, the weight of his body on yours warm. “how was it?”

“insane,” yunho answers, pressing a kiss to the top of your head before pulling away just enough to meet your gaze. you recognize the look in his eyes immediately and arch a brow as he lowers his hands to your waist with a squeeze. “but, we can talk about it tomorrow. right now, there’s only one thing i really, really want.”

“oh?” you feign ignorance, tracing your nails over the nape of his neck and smiling when he shudders slightly. “and what’s that?”

“well,” yunho says as he presses a kiss just below your jaw, “i really want to show my girlfriend how much i missed her.”

“on one condition,” you reply, startling him as he looks back up at you in confusion. “the suit stays on.”

“the suit?”

“i need the friendly neighborhood spiderman to show me how much he missed me, too.”

yunho grins, already reaching for his luggage. “the suit stays on, then.”

yeosang

“you want to start streaming?”

yeosang stares back at you, partly without a thought and partly from the anticipation of your reaction. you glance between him and the onslaught of equipment he’d picked up at the department store—a mic, a new webcam, memory cards. everything was splayed across his desk that he’d often use for gaming instead of the assignments he needed to get done.

“i—” you stop yourself, thinking hard before you answer him. on one hand, your boyfriend was a naturally shy person that you couldn’t imagine being thrown into the pressure of becoming a popular web streamer. on the other, you knew he was the type that wouldn’t back down from the opportunity to become the best at yet another hobby. you finally sigh and mirror his smile. “i think it’s a great idea.”

“you do?” the elation that spreads across his face is unmistakable as he begins to fidget with the devices on his desk. he begins to ramble, much to your amusement as you settle onto his bed and observe him quietly. “oh, it’ll be so much fun. i can stream league and then when there’s competitions, i can do, like, maybe you can join, too! we can …”

it’d been at least a year since yeosang had introduced the idea of streaming to you. what was once considered a nerdy little hobby of his had become a near-full-time job in addition to your classes. truthfully, you had expected him to grow tired of managing a streaming account and move onto the next hobby. but, it consumed him and he became increasingly focused on it. almost, too focused.

it was to your misfortune that he was able to hit five hundred-thousand subscribers when you were planning to celebrate your third anniversary together. as much as you wanted to focus on spending time together—alone—you knew this was a huge deal for him and that it was a balancing act.

“why don’t you stream for a little and then we can head out for the night?” you suggest.

“are you sure? i’m totally fine with postponing and doing something over the weekend—”

“no, no,” you scold, a mischievous glint in your eyes when he tries to reason with you. “i insist.”

“thank you all so much for the support.” yeosang beams at the webcam later that night as celebratory comments flood the chat. “i couldn’t—hah—it means a lot.” he bites back a groan with his teeth sinking into his bottom lip, his hand gripping the edge of his desk until his knuckles turn white. “i have tons of new content—ngh—planned for the rest of the season.”

you try not to laugh from beneath the desk—although, it’d likely be impossible with your mouth occupied otherwise.

“huh?” he struggles to focus on the comments asking if he was alright. “oh—! yeah, yeah, i’ve never—ah—never been better.” you feel the way his thighs tense beneath your palms, a clear sign that he was close. he lets out a long exhale before he rushes to bid farewell to his viewers. “okay, i’ll see you all this weekend when the new skins drop, bye.”

the computer shuts off and yeosang shifts his chair away from the desk, bringing you with him until he guides you to your feet and onto his lap. he looks up at you with half-lidded eyes, his lips parted as he fights to catch his breath.

“you’re evil,” he scolds, forcing a smile out of you.

“i know.”

san

“i really need to rehearse these lines,” san grumbles as he flips through the script in his lap. he’d spent hours scouring through the material, his eyes dry and burning from staring at the words beneath the fluorescents. you had graciously agreed to listen and provide feedback—although, you weren’t sure how helpful you’d be considering you weren’t the one involved in theater on campus—while running through one of your assignments.

“you’ve sounded great so far!” you call out to him from one of the audience seats. he looks over from the stage, his face contorted into a near-permanent pout before he looks back down at the script. “c’mon, would it help if i helped you out?”

“maybe,” he replies, finally looking over to you. he gestures for you to join him on stage and points you in the direction of the extra scripts as you scale the stairs. you follow his instructions and turn to the pages he was reading off of, nearly stopping in your tracks when you see the scene he’s rehearsing.

“okay,” san sighs, rolling his neck and shoulders before standing across from you with his own script in hand. “ready?”

“uh,” you swallow, struggling to hold his gaze, “sure.”

you’d long been attracted to san, even since freshman year when you had orientation seminars together. by some stroke of luck, you became inseparable—something you found solace in, until you began looking at him differently against your will and noticing every last detail about him. the way his body flexed when he acted, the way his eyes disappeared when he’d smile.

“hello?” san waves his hand in front of your face with a laugh. “help me out here!”

“sorry, sorry,” you blurt out, shaking your head before taking a deep breath to prepare.

“past the point of no return,” san begins, his voice dipping lower as he slips into character. you hold his gaze and try to ignore the way your heart races at the sudden shift. “no backward glances.”

he takes a step closer, his eyes never leaving yours. “the games we’ve played until now are at an end.”

you swallow dryly, your eyes darting onto the page for your line before you return to him. “past all thought of ‘if’ or ‘when’.”

“no use resisting.” he lowers his hand to capture your wrist between his fingers and you feel your breath hitch as he draws you in closer. “abandon thought.”

you both lower your scripts entirely, your hand still in his as you notice the way san’s chest begins to shudder with every breath. he averts your eyes, instead focusing on your lips as he purses his with a hum. the auditorium becomes too hot, too quiet as you become painfully aware of how close you are.

“san?” you say his name quietly in question. he doesn’t respond, just reaches for your jaw to brush his thumb across your cheek and tether your gaze to his. the way he looks at you sends a shiver down your spine and your eyes flutter shut as he leans in to press his lips to yours.

the moment he pulls away, the tension between you becomes too heavy to ignore. he looks at you with pupils blown wide and a kind of desperation you hadn’t seen from him before.

“do you, uh … do you want to go back to my place to keep practicing?”

mingi

mingi pulls away from you in an attempt to catch his breath as you peer up at him through your lashes. textbooks are strewn across the dorm room floor, a stack of study guides piled high on his desk that you nearly knock over when he pulls you into his lap in his armchair. you swallow down air and brush the hair falling over your face before adjusting your hoodie.

“we need to get back to studying,” you grumble, finding it increasingly difficult to ignore the way mingi’s large hands caress the small of your back before settling on your waist. he snakes his way back under your hoodie, his fingers tracing soft, slow circles against your skin. “if i don’t do well on this test, i’m fucked.”

“i know.” mingi presses a kiss to your collarbone, shifting his weight in an attempt to quell the sexual frustration churning at his core. “it’s just—it’s a little hard to focus when you look so good.”

“mingi.”

“yes, baby.”

“i’m wearing a hoodie and sweats.”

“so?”

with a scoff, you roll your eyes and swat at him before sliding off of him begrudgingly to return to your study guides. it was a gift and a curse having mingi at your disposal. he was exceptional when it came to organic chemistry, which meant he made the perfect tutor for your weakest class. on the other hand, your little arrangement as friends with benefits meant it occasionally got in the way of your studying.

or, well—frequently.

“okay, let’s make a deal,” mingi says matter-of-factly. “let’s get through the organic reactions pathways and then we can take a break.”

“a break, or a … break?” you ask, arching a brow with a knowing smile in his direction.

“you tell me.” he shrugs, mirroring your expression.

the pair of you are sat across from one another shortly after, cross-legged on his bed as he begins to recite the material to you. he goes into a complex description of molecule structures that you try to follow along as you take notes, your mind quickly wandering when you think about the feeling of his hand on your throat from the night before as he fucked you into the mattress.

mingi snaps in front of your face and you blink rapidly, feigning attention with a dramatic nod. he narrows his eyes at you before pinching the bridge of his nose with a sigh and setting aside his laptop.

“i know that look,” he says, folding his arms as he stares back at you.

“what look?” you ask with the most innocent expression you could muster. you pray that your mind stops wandering as you look back down at the notes between you. “i’ve been listening!”

“okay, then repeat what i just said.”

“you were talking about how addition leads to a reduction in saturation.”

mingi blinks in surprise, his mouth slightly ajar as he tries to stop himself from lecturing you to pay attention. “that was right.”

“and i might have been thinking about last night,” you mutter under your breath, barely loud enough for him to catch as he whips his head back up at you.

“oh,” he says, mindlessly scrolling through his notes before he sets aside the laptop and reaches for you with a resigned sigh. “well, come to think of it … we might need to take that break a little early.”

wooyoung

when wooyoung asked you out to go stargazing, you couldn’t imagine anything more romantic. laying beneath the stars beside one another, your head pressed to his chest and the rhythm of his heartbeat while you talked for hours on end. you could see it now—sprawled across a picnic blanket, enjoying one another’s company as you finally have the opportunity to have him all to yourself.

you didn’t anticipate just how much of an astronomy nerd wooyoung was.

“okay, so right up there is the summer triangle,” he informs you, peering through the viewfinder on his telescope as he gestures to the stack of reference books he’d brought along. “there’s three huge stars—vega, deneb, altair—you can’t miss ‘em.”

“i think i see them,” you say, although your eyes are fixated on wooyoung’s every move as his excitement grows from your supposed discovery. he adjusts his glasses and narrows his eyes, his fingers fidgeting with the hem of his flannel. you glance up at the sky that was clear aside from scattered stars. he sighs contentedly, sitting back on his haunches.

“thank you for coming along,” he says earnestly, looking over to you with a broad smile. “it’s nice to be able to share this with someone.”

“of course.” you reach over and pat a hand over his, the gesture earning a flush of pink across his cheeks as he clears his throat nervously. “i think it’s cute that you’re so into astrology.”

“astronomy.”

“right.”

“well, i’m a sagittarius, in case you were wondering,” wooyoung replies as he bursts into a fit of laughter at your mistake.

you roll your eyes and shove his chest playfully, missing just enough to lose your balance and topple over onto him. his arms wrap around you instinctively, the scent of his cologne engulfing you as you grip the fabric of his shirt in tight fists. suddenly, the sounds of the night around you grow faint, nothing but your heartbeat thrumming in your ears while your breath escapes you, low and shallow.

“sorry,” you mumble, although neither of you move.

“i don’t mind,” he replies, his voice soft as his grip on your waist tightens ever-so-slightly. his gaze trails over your face, his lips parted as he thinks of something, anything to say in the moment.

“do … do you want to get back to stargazing?” you ask, about to shift your weight off of him when he holds you firmly against him with a renewed glint in his eyes.

“actually,” he says, brushing a strand of hair that had fallen over your face, “why don’t we take a break?”

“oh?” he turns you so that you’re laid back onto the picnic blanket, his arms on either side of you. he looked nothing like the bashful stargazing enthusiast from just seconds before, now staring down at you with a knowing grin threatening to break across his face. you take the opportunity to get under his skin and hook a leg around his waist so that he’s drawn closer to you. “and what did you have in mind?”

“i could think of a few things,” wooyoung hums before you hook a finger around the collar of his shirt and pull him into a kiss.

jongho

you had no idea what you were in for when you asked jongho out.

he always kept to himself; never stayed back when class ended, didn't seem to have much of a relationship with the other students. something about him intrigued you that you couldn't put your finger on. he seemed like he would be sweet under that rigid exterior and somehow it became your personal mission to uncover his personality, whether he liked it or not.

"hey, do you think you can help me out after class with this assignment?" you'd ask.

"sorry, i have somewhere to be," he'd answer, shuffling through slides on his laptop without so much as a glance at you. "but let me know how it goes."

"hey, would you be open to helping tutor some of the freshmen that are on track to take this class?"

"i don't think i have time for it," jongho would reply, dry as ever and making your blood boil. "but i think some of the others were mentioning being down to help."

it wasn't until one faithful evening when you somehow got him on the way to his car that you nearly cornered him in the parking lot. that is, if you'd consider flagging him down and running towards him with your heart nearly about to explode a subtle attempt. jongho stared at you through the lenses of his thick-rimmed glasses, his eyebrow arched in question as he observes you trying to catch your breath.

"would—hoo—look," you say, slamming a hand on the roof of his car. he doesn't so much as jolt. "i think you're hot. i don't know why, especially considering you never seem interested in hanging out. but, i do. and i've been trying to hang out with you outside of class and i'm tired of trying to drop subtle hints."

"oh, you weren't subtle," jongho scoffs, something akin to a smile etched across his features.

"funny," you huff as you watch him put away his backpack in his backseat before turning to you.

"i'm actually headed to hang out with some friends. you can join us, if you're free."

"oh, so you do have a life outside of class?" you ask as he rolls his eyes playfully and gestures for you to enter his passenger seat.

the ride to wherever jongho was taking you was silent, save for the baseball podcast he seemed to be intently listening to as he kept both hands on the steering wheel. you scroll through your phone absentmindedly, a small part of you wondering if you were about to be dragged to something that would bore you to death when you thought he might have been more interesting beneath the surface.

boy, were you wrong.

the second he pulls into the parking lot of one of the busier barbecue joints and a group of guys you recognize faintly from across campus holler at his entrance, you realize that he was the complete opposite of what you'd expected. it was as if he was swapped out with a clone, full of life and laughter and eager to accept a round of drinks. he sang at the top of his lungs, cracked jokes like it was nobody's business and downed beer like a forlorn sailor.

“so, you’re jongho’s girl?” one of the guys ask you. his question steers your attention away from the fresh bottle of soju you were about to crack open and you glance in jongho’s direction before answering.

“well, i—”

“yeah,” jongho interjects, “she is.”