Chapter Text
“Are you a serial killer?”
Seungcheol pushes his milkshake aside so he can lean his elbows on the table and squint. “If I was—do you really think I’d confess to it?”
It’s evidently not the right thing to say, because Jihoon starts looking uncomfortable. That is to say, more uncomfortable than he already was.
He’s been weirdly shy since Seungcheol slid into the seat across from his and introduced himself, but there’s considerable nervous energy coming from him now. So much so, the pen in his hand trembles faintly.
Seungcheol sighs, closing his eyes for a defeated moment.
“No. The answer is no. I am not a serial killer.”
“Oh, okay, Good.” Jihoon quirks a small smile, moving his pen across the paper. “Okay, next question—have you murdered anyone before?”
This is a bad sign—Seungcheol thinks, pinching the bridge of his nose. They’ve been at this for half an hour now. Thirty minutes of similarly weird and disturbing questions, so either Jihoon has an...interesting sense of humour…or he is genuinely worried about picking a new housemate who plans on killing him, maiming him, setting his bed on fire.
Which, fine—Seungcheol kind of gets it; he’s had his fair share of bizarre housemates in college and beyond, and Jihoon and his brother are taking a big risk sub-letting a room in their apartment to a perfect stranger—it makes sense to be thorough when vetting candidates. But there’s a huge difference between doing a basic credit or background check, and asking Seungcheol for a saliva sample so his DNA can be cross-checked against a database of murderous criminals.
What’s next? A Rorschach test?
Seriously, what kind of psycho vibes is Seungcheol inadvertently giving off?
“No. I have never murdered anyone.” He manages to say evenly, ignoring the nervous looks from the people in the next booth.
Jihoon pencils that answer in too, then says, “Have you thought about murder—”
“I have no violent tendencies whatsoever,” Seungcheol cuts in, gently, “I’m a pretty laid back guy, and I believe my last two housemates will attest to that if you check my references. So, uhm, maybe we can skip the psychological portion of your questionnaire?”
Jihoon looks conflicted, “Sorry, but I don’t think my brother would like that. He’s the one who insisted on this meet up in the first place. We’ve had a few bad experiences in the past, so he’s very particular about who we share our apartment with.”
“Where is your brother?” Seungcheol asks, because the ad he replied to online sounded very straightforward and rational, so there must be a reasonable Lee brother, and Jihoon is clearly not him, “I thought I was to meet you both here.”
Jihoon shifts uncomfortably in his chair. “Oh, uh, he’ll be here soon. He’s just finishing up his shift at—oh, there he is.” He scoots over in his seat, just as a slim, pink-haired guy, dressed in jeans and a build-a-bear uniform shirt, slides into their booth. “Woozi, this is Seungcheol, Seungcheol—Uji.”
Seungcheol flashes a polite smile, glancing between them. Then doubletakes.
Woozi’s got the exact same features as Jihoon, the same narrow build, same height, even the same cute little button nose. Except he looks ten times angrier, and if Seungcheol was the sort of person to jump to uncharitable conclusions, he would have also said that he’s seriously hungover.
“Oh…” He says suddenly. It’s just dawning on him. “You’re twins.”
Woozi just gives him a flat, disbelieving look and says, “No shit, Sherlock. Jihoon, you didn’t tell me this guy was a fucking genius.”
Seungcheol’s so taken aback by his gruff attitude, he can’t think of anything more to say. He can only look on as Woozi takes a sip of his brother’s banana milkshake, gags, then reaches across the table to drag Seungcheol’s over instead.
“This strawberry? You mind?” He asks, sticking a second straw in, then proceeds to drain the entire thing without waiting for an answer.
There’s a brief moment of respite while he drinks, where Seungcheol shoots Jihoon a ‘What the fuck?’ look across the table and Jihoon darts a ‘sorry’ one back, but the second the milkshake disappears, Woozi drops his hands on the table, palms flat. "So…what’s wrong with you?”
Seungcheol blinks at him for a minute.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“What are you hiding?” Woozi reiterates impatiently. When Seungcheol blinks at him some more, Woozi rolls his eyes. “In your email, you said you’ve been crashing at your brother’s since you got kicked out of your last place, that you’ve been looking for a new place for months, so we wanna know what kind of weird, quirky behaviours you have that are putting other potential housemates off. Like, I dunno, maybe you like to strut around the apartment naked, or take pictures of people when they’re sleeping, or have a massive gross collection of toenail clippings.”
Seungcheol narrows his eyes, wondering if Woozi is fucking with him; this has got to be some huge joke. Normal people—sane people—don’t ask these kind of questions. They wouldn’t need to ask these questions. In return, Woozi raises one eyebrow, like he is absolutely fucking serious and needs an answer.
Seungcheol clears his throat awkwardly, “No, I—I don’t do any of that shit. I’m just a regular guy. And I didn’t get kicked out of my last place, I don’t know where you got that from; my lease was up and it was really length commute for work, and since my housemate wanted to move in with his boyfriend, it made sense for me to find somewhere new. I just haven’t been able to find a place I can afford that’s in a decent location.”
Woozi gives him a pointed look.
“Or is it because you butchered your last housemate and hid his body in the ventilation ducts?”
“No. What? That’s—no.” Seungcheol flounders like a beached whale. “I’m…I’m just a normal guy. I swear.”
“I’ll be the judge of that.” Woozi says, settling back in his chair and smirking. “How far have you gotten with the questions Hoonie?”
“We’re half-way.” Jihoon murmurs.
“Only half? Let me see.” Woozi pulls the papers out of his brother’s hand and starts scanning through, shaking his head, “Oh no, this isn’t good. This is not good at all. Not gonna lie, this does not look very promising for you Mr Choi.” He blows out a breath then flings the papers back to his twin, “Might as well finish asking your questions Hoonie—he couldn’t do any worse than he already has.”
Jihoon nods. Then he takes a long sip of his own milkshake, swallows, draws in a deep breath, and says, “Have you ever thought about murdering someone?”
Squinting across the table thoughtfully, Seungcheol gives that question some genuine consideration.
“Honestly….”
The interview, such as it is, goes downhill from there.
Not that it was going particularly well in the first place, but Seungcheol hates having him time wasted, and deliberately matching their outlandish questions with his even more outlandish answers feels a little like payback.
They don’t reject him outright, they don’t say as much, but Woozi takes great pleasure in telling him he’s completely unsuitable for the vacancy, and he shouldn’t expect to hear from them again, ‘Bye!’, and Seungcheol pulls out the fakest, most insincere smile in his arsenal and counts his fucking blessings.
He’s desperate to move out of his brother’s spare room, but holy shit, he’s not that desperate.
A few minutes later, he’s out on the sidewalk, heading back towards his car, when he spots the Lee twins waiting at the bus-stop up ahead, chatting with some guy.
Arguing, he determines the closer he gets, which—yeah, really isn’t all that surprising. Of course, they would illicit that reaction everywhere they go. They’ve probably accused the poor guy of cannibalism or something.
Except…it doesn’t seem like they’ve initiated whatever heated argument is going on.
They’re just standing there, waiting for their bus, and it’s the guy who’s showing all the outward signs of aggression; he’s looming over them as he talks, loud and loutish and possibly a little drunk, and even though Woozi’s making a reasonable effort of consoling his brother while simultaneously glaring at the guy to leave them alone, it’s clear to see the twins are both becoming irritated, verging on distressed.
Seungcheol has never considered himself that much of a do-gooder. He prefers to think of his drive to generally be helpful as a basic requirement of being a decent human being, and lives his life accordingly. Butting in here doesn’t exactly qualify, and it’s really none of his business, but he can’t bring himself to just walk on.
“Hey!” Seungcheol barks, rounding on the guy, “Back off asshole.”
The guy sobers up instantly, eyes widening. He takes half a step back, then turns and staggers away.
When Seungcheol cuts a glance over at the Lee twins, they’re both so visibly scared and tensed up, they look like kittens that have been introduced to a vacuum for the first time. And okay, Seungcheol’s not blind, he knows how intimidating he looks when he’s pissed off at someone, but his irritation was clearly aimed at the guy, not the twins, and there’s no reason for them to huddle like that. Like he’s got designs for them.
He turns to walk on, then stops. It’s really late, the sun set hours ago and it’s cold out, and it’ll probably be even colder and darker by the time a bus rolls around, and as annoying as the Lee twins are, the thought of leaving them here for another drunk idiot to come along and pester just doesn’t sit right with him.
“Listen—” He starts, in the most neutral, non-serial-killer voice he can manage. “My car’s parked just a few minutes away—if you want a lift.” Then, because they’re still looking a little wary, “You know I was just joking when I said I befriend vegans so I can drink their blood. I don’t have any vegan friends actually.”
“How’d it go?” Seungmin asks, when Seungcheol’s standing in the kitchen later, eating pizza over the sink.
Seungmin’s girlfriend is a little too obsessive compulsive about cleaning, and crumbs, and how cushions should be arranged on the couch. Just some of the many reasons Seungcheol’s so desperate to find his own space again.
He’s done his upmost to be a considerate house guest, but there’s OCD and then there’s just being a bitch for bitch’s sake, and he doesn’t know how his brother has the patience for it sometimes.
“Not great, but I’m checking out another place tomorrow after work.” Seungcheol says, trying to turn the water on with his elbow with little success.
Seungmin nods and changes the subject, asks about how his work is going. They chat for a while, until his girlfriend is calling him away to complain about the how ‘someone’ is hanging towels lopsidedly in the bathroom. Not naming any names, but talking deliberately loud enough for Seungcheol to hear.
Later, he’s lying on the futon, messing around on his phone when the most unexpected message of his life comes through from an unknown number.
Hey, It’s Lee Woozi. When can you move in?
“Seriously?”
The upside of living out of a suitcase is that Seungcheol’s technically already packed, and he’s accumulated very little extra junk in the six months he’s been crashing at his brother’s, he doesn’t even have to hire a truck come moving day. He just drives himself over there with his bags and a couple boxes one Saturday afternoon and parks up. Easy peasy.
Except—
“Oh, it’s you.” One of the Lee twins says, answering his knock looking so sleekly annoyed he almost makes annoyed look good. Seungcheol’s not sure which one of them it is, because last he checked, one had light blonde hair and the other had jet-black hair, and this one has a red mullet, so it’s anyone’s guess who he’s looking at.
Unless…oh god…
Unless there’s three of them.
Red Mullet’s lips quirk up, almost like he’s laughing at Seungcheol.
“No—there’s only two of us. I’m Woozi, I’m just…” He gestures vaguely at his head, “—trying something new with my hair. Kind of regretting it now.”
Seungcheol reflects on the change.
“It’s…nice.” He says, and winces at his own voice. Flat and toneless, yeah, that’s real convincing.
“It’s just hair, it’ll grow back. But thanks for trying, I guess,” Woozi says, his smile bright and fake, then leans across to hauls Seungcheol bodily over the threshold by his jacket sleeve. “Will you get your ass in here already, you’re letting all the heat out.”
The apartment is pretty awesome—a tenth-floor place in Nampo with underground parking, an integrated smart-home system, and a massive wrap-around balcony overlooking a lovely view of an urbanised park just starting to show its spring growth. The living area is open planned but nicely segregated, with the kitchen unit in one corner, a dining area in the other, and two comfy looking corner couches dominating the second half.
Seungcheol barely has a second to set his stuff down and take a look around before Jihoon makes an appearance, bouncing down the corridor in a Battlestar Galactica T-shirt and shorts. He squeaks when he sees Seungcheol, and runs away. Then comes back a few seconds later, red in the ears, and shuffles over to present him with a little travel wallet.
“I…I made you this welcome pack. It’s got all your keys and cards and important stuff inside. But like, also some travel sized toiletries and a universal charger and some complimentary mints. I always forget to pack stuff when I go places, but I went to this convention once, and they gave me a pack just like this, and I thought it was a really cool idea, so I—I made you one.”
“Wow, that’s…incredible. Thank you, Jihoon.” Seungcheol can’t help but smile.
Jihoon catches his smile and returns it. Blushing.
“Yeah, yeah, it’s a cute idea,” Woozi cuts in abruptly, hip-checking his brother aside so he can round on Seungcheol, “But most importantly, it’s got a list of our ground rules inside—be sure to memorize each and every one of them. If your break a single one, you’re out on your ass. Got it?”
“Got it.” Seungcheol nods—then salutes him for good measure.
Woozi narrows his eyes at him, unimpressed. Then he’s gone, striding down the corridor and disappearing into what is probably his bedroom.
“Sorry, you’ll have to excuse him,” Jihoon whispers, padding closer, “He’s…uhm, he kind of broke up with his boyfriend. Again.”
The tight-lipped way he says it makes it clear he's not planning to volunteer any further information. Or perhaps, like he’s sick of talking about it. Either way, it’s not Seungcheol’s place to pry, so he just nods and lets Jihoon give him a tour of the place.
Seungcheol’s room is the last on the left—a little smaller than it looked in the pictures Jihoon had uploaded, but bolstered by the fact that it has an ensuite, brand new carpet and a private balcony with a decent view. There’s the bare minimum of furniture left over from the last occupant—a double bed, a wardrobe, a small bedside table—but it’s way more than Seungcheol was expecting, and he’d been planning a trip to IKEA anyway, so now he has fewer flat packs to fit into the back of his car.
He has the contents of Jihoon’s welcome-pack spread out around him on the bed and is carefully reading through the Ground Rules, when a message comes through on his phone from Woozi, inviting him to a ‘House Meeting’ in the living room in two minutes. Seungcheol hasn’t even started unpacking yet, but he’s guessing his attendance is non-optional and sure enough, when he pads down the corridor, he finds Woozi and Jihoon waiting for him.
Woozi’s tapping his foot impatiently, even though Seungcheol’s a whole 90 seconds early, and Jihoon has his laptop at the ready, like he’s going to take the minutes.
Oh, Jesus—what has he gotten himself in to?
“Okay, so you’ve been here, what? A day?” Woozi begins as he takes a seat.
Seungcheol checks his watch, “More like twenty-five minutes. But, yeah, let’s round up.”
“Well, I think that’s time enough. We need to discuss the main rule.”
“But I haven’t had a chance to memorize them yet.” Seungcheol says helplessly.
Woozi’s already shaking his head, “No, not the ground rules. The main rule. It’s not on your list, because it should go without saying, but I’ll say it this one time and then never again. Got it?”
More rules, Seungcheol nods, awesome.
“Good.” Woozi nods, then crosses his arms and stares him dead in the eye, “We’re not going to sleep with you.”
Seungcheol actually has to turn his head around to check if there’s someone standing behind him. Someone that might possibly be holding a sign that says ‘Sex?’ Because that’s really the only explanation for that non-sequitur.
“I’m sorry, what?”
Across the couch, Jihoon fidgets awkwardly while his twin begins to glare.
“We’re not having sex with you Seungcheol. Ever. Period.”
“I don’t remember asking.” Seungcheol huffs, throwing out a hand.
Woozi’s glare softens, just a tad, “Yeah, well, we just want to make it perfectly clear, just in case you’ve got some weird ideas about instigating a threesome someday down the line. I’m telling you now, it’s not going to happen.”
Dividing a careful look between the twins, Seungcheol sucks in a breath and says, “Has this been an issue with your previous housemates?”
Jihoon’s staring resolutely at his laptop, and the jaded look Woozi levels back seems to say that yes, yes it was. Seungcheol can't decide whether this is baffling or appalling. The twins are cute, sure, maybe even his type under different circumstances, but he can’t imagine a scenario where he’d try and sleep with both of them at the same time. That’s like having your cake and eating it. Except it’s two cakes, and they’re both identically delicious…
That actually sounds pretty awesome. Fuck.
Seungcheol shakes his head to clear it, “Right, well, uhm—you have nothing to worry about. I have no interest in pursuing that kind of relationship with either of you. Individually, or uhm, combined. We’re just housemates—nothing more. I can respect that.”
“Okay, good,” Woozi says at last, nodding and exchanging a look with his twin like they’ve reached some understanding. “Meeting adjourned.”
He disappears back down the corridor, leaving Seungcheol and Jihoon sitting across from each other on the couch.
“Right—” Seungcheol begins, clapping his hands down on his thighs. He’s suddenly eager to think about something else. Anything else. “I’m heading out to IKEA to pick up some stuff for my room, and I’m probably going to swing by the supermarket on my way back to grab some groceries. Do you…need anything?”
Jihoon looks hesitant for a moment, like maybe he thinks Seungcheol is trying to seduce him with Swedish meatballs, then scurries off and comes back baring a whole ass A4 page.
Thankfully, there is only one item on the page: a 24 pack of Coca-Cola.
“That it?” Seungcheol asks, bemused.
Jihoon nods. “I’m nearly out. There’s only 45 cans left.”
At first, living with the Lee twins feels a lot like living with one guy with multiple personality disorder; they’ve got the exact same height, weight, eyes, lips, nose, voice…everything, which is pretty fucking remarkable, even for identical twins—an illusion Jihoon and Woozi seem to be perfectly aware of and regularly exploit, possibly just to fuck with Seungcheol’s head?
It honestly feels that way sometimes.
In those first few weeks he rarely sees them side by side, so it’s easy to believe they’re just one person, and when they do decide the share the same space, they’re usually sitting in front of the TV, dressed down for the night, so it’s almost impossible to tell them apart from their distinct clothing preferences.
Hair colour would have been the most obvious differentiator, but they switch up their colour and style with such alarming frequency Seungcheol finds it hard to keep up. Eventually he notices Jihoon has a teeny, tiny mole under his right eye that his twin doesn’t, and that Woozi is the only twin with his ears pierced, and he can finally start to build up what he knows about them individually.
Jihoon is the nerdy introvert who likes banana milkshakes, science fiction movies and DnD, and wears adidas sliders regardless of the weather. He’s by far the more sensitive twin, or at least, the most transparent when it comes to expressing himself, and he’s also got a Coca-Cola addiction that Seungcheol both enables and privately worries about, because that’s just…way too much caffeine. That can’t be healthy. But hey—Jihoon must need that sugar to power his giant brain, because he’s definitely the smartest guy Seungcheol knows. At least, academically speaking. He’ll try and suck rice up through a straw, but put a computer in front of him and he turns into fucking Rain Man. He graduated top of his class in computer sciences, and his current job as a freelance coder earns the big bucks that helped them get their apartment in the first place. Saying that, he’s a total pushover when it comes to his brother.
Woozi is definitely the one in charge, and god help anyone who tries to suggest otherwise.
He’s the louder, bolder, more confident twin, who has a preference for strawberry milkshakes and will eagerly feign an interest in anything going, until a higher power on social media deems it to be irrelevant. He takes the lead in most situations and handles the big decisions for both of them, whether Jihoon is happy with the choices he makes or not. Impressively, he was a lead dancer with the Korean National Ballet for three years before an injury forced him to step down, and despite a swift recovery, he hasn’t been able to get his foot back in the door. He’s been drifting from one dead-end job to another since, in between managing an OnlyFans account that Seungcheol will not be subscribing to. Even under an alias. He hasn’t let that set him back though—he still practices every day, even gives private lessons, and he’s the most socially active of the twins, with an ever-rotating group of pretentious ‘friends’ he hangs around with, and an even more pretentious on and off boyfriend. Sehun.
Seungcheol’s only met Sehun in passing a couple of times and can already say in complete confidence, he hates his fucking guts.
He’s one of these artificially broody art types who likes to pretend he’s shouldering all the world’s problems just because he takes part in a little performative activism. That is, when he’s not sipping top-shelf Mezcal from Whole Foods in his designer outfits. He also has this really annoying habit of inviting random people over to the apartment, even though he doesn’t live there, and the one time Seungcheol attempted to be friendly and asked him what he worked as, the answer was “I don’t work man—I create”, which just…yeah.
As far as Seungcheol’s concerned, he can go fuck himself.
The fact that Jihoon isn’t overly fond of him either is somewhat reassuring, but the weirdest thing is, Seungcheol’s not even sure Woozi likes him all that much. The affection between them is tepid at best; whatever chemistry they had apparently fizzled out once Woozi stopped investing time and money in Sehun’s ‘vision’ and started focusing on his own life struggles. Now they can’t seem to be in the same room for five minutes without fighting, which really begs the question: why are they still together?
Woozi could, grouchiness notwithstanding, do so much better in the boyfriend department. He’s smart, he’s attractive, he has a wicked sense of humour, and Seungcheol’s seen him interact with people he genuinely likes, so he knows Woozi’s capable of smiling on occasion. And it’s a nice smile too. It has fucking dimples. So why is he still clinging to his deadbeat boyfriend?
It’s not Seungcheol’s business, it’s not his right to ask, but he has to wonder about it.
Rules aside, Seungcheol is pretty sure he has to work hard to earn his place in the apartment. Sure he pays rent, and contributes equally towards all the utility and grocery bills, but he kind figured that wouldn’t be enough, that he would have to bring something extra to the table to gain the Lee twin’s seal of approval.
Turns out, it’s a lot easier than he expected.
He part-way achieves it by just being a decent housemate; picking up milk on his way back from work, taking out the trash, changing out lightbulbs and toilet rolls and bust fuses when needed—things he doesn’t have to even think about doing, but were apparently failings in the previous housemates the twins had. That he’s also ready to take on some pretty basic DIY jobs earns him another big thumbs up, and becoming the designated ‘jar-opener’ and ‘high-shelf-reacher’ secures him several very sweet smiles from Jihoon and a hilariously dry ‘my hero’ from Woozi.
Of course, there’s still a way to go between securing someone’s approval and actually becoming friends with them, and as tightly-knit and high-maintenance as the Lee twin’s come across, Seungcheol would still like to have more than just a passing acquaintance with them.
They live together—it would be cool if they all got along too.
Unsurprisingly, Jihoon’s the easiest to win over, because even though he’s the oldest twin, (“by a whole ten minutes!”), the shiest, and the most financially independent, he’s actually the sweetest, neediest little baby.
He has very few friends IRL, and since his job means spending a lot of time in the apartment, working from home, his social life is practically non-existent, so having a second actual person to eat dinner and shoot the shit with is very much appreciated. The fact that Seungcheol can also cook, has a varied taste in games and movies and music, and will happily spend time with him discussing all those things is apparently the best thing ever. Seungcheol doesn’t even have to do anything extraordinary and he’s already been designated second best friend status. Woozi comes first, naturally, but still, the fact that Jihoon comes rushing out to greet him when he gets back from work is pretty fucking cute.
But what really seals their friendship comes three months after Seungcheol moves in.
“Uh, are you expecting a parcel or something? Cause it’s a little late for deliveries, no?” Seungcheol asks, because it’s difficult to ignore the way Jihoon’s been pacing by the front door for the last thirty minutes.
Jihoon’s silent, then he says, grudgingly, “I’m waiting for Uji. He was supposed to meet me here at four.”
Seungcheol checks the clock on the wall, 16:46, and spreads a little more cream cheese on his bagel.
“And I guess he’s not picking up his phone?”
Jihoon lifts one shoulder. “He answered once, said he was busy and would call me back. Now his phone is switched off and I have no idea where he is.”
“I’m sure he’s fine. He probably just got caught up at work.” Seungcheol mumbles around a mouthful of toasted bagel. “What do you need him for anyway?”
Jihoon stops pacing to look over at him, then quickly away again, “He’s supposed to come with me to my dental appointment. I’m getting my wisdom teeth taken out and I—” He stops talking, throat cutting off the words in a way that sounds frustrated.
Seungcheol’s bagel hovers in mid air for a moment, before he says, “I could...take you. If you want company. I’ve got nothing else to do.”
In truth, he’d actually planned to hit the gym, but he can always fit it in tomorrow instead.
“No, that’s fine. I’m a big boy, I can…I’ll take myself.” Jihoon murmurs. He stares down at his feet sadly, “I’m just…gonna wait for another few minutes. In case he missed his bus.”
Setting his bagel down, Seungcheol rubs his hands on a tea-towel and steps over to tilt Jihoon’s chin up. Up close like this, he can see how worked up Jihoon is, the anxious little quiver in his lower lip, the way he’s bitten it raw.
“Hoonie,” He soothes, “I can take you. I really don’t mind.”
Jihoon stares at him, eyes searching his face, and then seems to come to a decision and says, “Okay. If…if it’s not too much hassle.”
“Of course, not. Let me just grab my jacket.”
Jihoon’s quiet in the car, quiet all the way up in the elevator, quieter still while they’re sitting in the waiting room, watching a big bright yellow fish sail back and forth in the aquarium. Then his name gets called, and he shoots Seungcheol a pained little smile as he stands and follows the nurse down the corridor.
Seungcheol smiles back warmly and sinks into his chair to wait it out. Five minutes later, he’s flicking through a dull golf magazine, trying to get invested, when the same nurse reappears, looking stressed.
“Jihoon’s having trouble settling.” She says, clasping her hands together, “I think his brother usually comes in with him…”
She trails off, then raises her eyebrows expectantly.
Seungcheol can only blink at her for a long moment before it hits him.
“Oh.” He shoves the magazine aside, “Right. Sure.”
In the room, Jihoon’s already lying back in the dentist’s chair, a white apron tucked under his chin. He doesn’t take his gaze off the overhead light when Seungcheol follows the nurse in, but his fingers are white where they’re clamped around the armrest, and his breathing has that uneven, hitched quality to it that says he’s seconds away from panicking.
Without waiting to be asked, Seungcheol drags a chair over and sits down next to him, takes hold of one of his hands. When he squeezes gently, Jihoon squeezes back twice as hard, then he relaxes—melting into the chair.
It’s all over in just under an hour, and Jihoon’s slurred little murmur of ‘sanks you Sseunccgeholss’ as they’re climbing back into the car is extra fucking cute when his cheeks are so pink and puffed up and swollen.
“Anytime Hoonie.” Seungcheol grins, and is surprised to realise he really means it. “How about we grab some ice-cream on the way home? That way you won’t have to bite on anything, and it’ll help take the swelling down.”
“Threally?” Jihoon says, stiffening in surprise next to him, his head jerking sideways. “Thwe than thet tithe cweam?”
He’s waving his hands energetically now, looking excited but also sort of confused. It’s adorable.
“I’m not sure what you just said there, but I’m going to take it as a yes to the ice cream?”
Jihoon nods with his whole head, then says—“Pitpathio!”
Which turns out to be Pistachio, his favourite flavour of ice-cream. Seungcheol gets him three large scoops of it, in a tub, with extra hot fudge sauce, chopped nuts and lashings of whipped cream and drives them over to the beach, so Jihoon can enjoy it with a nice view. Jihoon ends up eating every single spoon while staring at him with honest to god Bambi eyes, then falls asleep on Seungcheol’s jacket, whispering, “I loth you Thengthool.”
Those are some pretty strong painkillers—Seungcheol thinks, as he’s carrying him bridal style back to the car.
There’s still no sign of Woozi when they get back to the apartment, but a few hours later, when they’re sitting in front of the TV eating dinner, he comes bursting through the front door, looking furious, and makes a beeline straight for his bedroom.
Jihoon quickly sets his tray aside and calls out to him, making a move to follow, but the scathing “Yeah, I know, and I don’t care!” followed by the faraway slam of the bedroom door has him wilting back into the couch cushions with a grimace.
“Just give him a few hours, let him clear his head.” Seungcheol says, patting him gently on the thigh.
Woozi’s apology, when he finally emerges from his bedroom, is quiet and guilty, and weirdly, not even aimed at his brother.
He appears in the kitchen as Seungcheol’s packing away leftovers, hovering there in his sleep shorts and a threadbare t-shirt from a college Seungcheol has never heard of, and looks, more than anything, exhausted.
He doesn’t say anything at first, so Seungcheol keeps himself busy by wiping down the counters for a bit. Then he has to stop because Woozi’s presence is hard to ignore under the best circumstances, but he’s downright distracting when he’s standing there, in the skimpiest of shorts, with eyeliner smudged to hell after another emotional blow-out with his dickhead boyfriend.
Seungcheol doesn’t know whether he wants to hug him or fuck his brains out over the breakfast bar. Then he feels like a horrible asshole for even thinking that.
The silence grows so long that Seungcheol wonders if he ought to say something, ‘Are you okay? What happened? Do you need me to punch someone? Because I will’, but just as he’s searching for the correct, reassuring thing to say, Woozi blurts out:
“Thanks for taking Jihoon to his appointment. It was good of you to step in. I…I didn’t mean to forget, I just had so much shit to deal with and by the time I checked my phone I—” He cuts himself off abruptly, leaning back, his fingers wrapped over the edge of the counter, his shoulders tight and bunched. “Anyway, thank you…I owe you one.”
Seungcheol’s honestly surprised he got even that much out of him. Woozi’s been all insistent distance since he moved in—this far, no farther, and Seungcheol has never figured out how to worm his way inside those lines.
“Hey, no, it’s fine. I was happy to take him.” Seungcheol says, scratching the side of his nose. “We got pithpathio ithe-cweam.”
Woozi laughs out loud at that, then quickly tapers off into a quieter giggle. It’s a nice laugh. Sweet. Seungcheol thinks he can get used to hearing him laugh more, and in his well-meaning simplicity, says as much.
It earns him a smile, which just as quickly morphs into something pensive. Woozi clearly has more he wants to say, but the kitchen area’s too small for him to pace or whatever he has in mind, so they just end up leaning against the counter, staring at each other.
“Woozi…” Seungcheol starts, because it had to come up eventually, “I don’t think Sehun is a…I don’t think he’s right for you.”
A tiny muscle in Woozi's jaw flexes a little, but his answer is almost immediate.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but it’s really none of your business.”
Seungcheol nods and shuts his mouth, because, well, it isn’t.
It becomes his business three months later, when Jihoon calls him at work, crying and frantic and not making much sense. It takes Seungcheol a few minutes to calm him down enough to get half the story out of him, because he only has half the story himself.
All he knows is Woozi has been admitted to the Pusan University Hospital earlier with a dislocated knee and a concussion, and as his next of kin, Jihoon has been notified even though he can’t do a damn thing about it right now, seeing as he’s over in Tokyo for the weekend to attend a tech convention.
Seungcheol speaks to his boss and takes some emergency holiday, then heads over to kill a few uncomfortable hours in a waiting room. He’s drinking a cup of tea out of a Styrofoam cup, reading a golf magazine to find out if he cares about golf yet (still no), when a police officer comes by to take a statement and he finally gets the second half of the story.
Apparently someone in a jealous fit, Seungcheol can guess who, hacked Woozi’s OnlyFans page a few weeks back and leaked his private information online, including his real name and where he works. The breach hadn’t succeeded in its original goal to teach him a lesson and have him fired, not at first, but it did succeed in encouraging an overzealous stalker to show up to his workplace and harass him, which then got him fired. The subsequent argument that broke out resulted in said stalker pushing Woozi down a flight of stairs at the subway station.
“You didn’t have to come,” Woozi slurs, when Seungcheol’s finally allowed to see him.
He’s sitting upright in the hospital bed even though he’s half awake, still doped to the gills on painkillers. Seungcheol’s got his fifth cup of tea cooling in one hand, just about to say—something, anyway. He hadn’t really planned anything out. He’d just wanted to see Woozi as soon as possible—was relieved to know he was going to be okay, that he can finally let Jihoon know he was going to be okay—and now he’s just floored by the sheer self-deprecation in that tone.
Like Woozi blames himself for getting attacked.
“Yes, I did. Of course, I did.” Seungcheol says, actually coming into the room.
Up close, Woozi’s arms, his throat, are covered in scrapes and heavy bruises; his knee is a thick bandaged lump underneath the blankets. Seungcheol takes it all in, then drops his gaze to the floor, feels the words he’s been wanting to say for months now build painfully in his throat.
“I know you said it wasn’t my business, but this isn’t right Uji. You—you deserve better.” He says, voice rough.
Woozi sighs and says nothing. When Seungcheol flicks his gaze up, he’s got his head tipped back against the headboard, staring tiredly at the ceiling. He looks like he might cry, or laugh. It’s a weird expression, anyway. It makes Seungcheol feel kind of weird, too. Like something is capsizing in his chest.
“Yeah, well—” Woozi finally mumbles, letting his gaze drop to his bandaged knee, “It’s definitely over now.”
Yeah, but for how long?—Seungcheol is tempted to say, but as satisfying as driving that point home will be, it’s not what Woozi needs to hear right now. He looks like shit, probably feels ten times worse, and the best thing Seungcheol can do for him is to get him home and into his comfort zone as soon as possible.
He looks so vulnerable by the time Seungcheol gets him into the apartment, very pale, shivering in Seungcheol’s heavy jacket even though it’s a warmish night and Seungcheol’s in a thin shirt. He doesn’t even protest when Seungcheol takes the crutches away and carries him into his bedroom, but he looks tons better after a few painkillers and a nap, eating udon noodles out of the plastic container on the couch, with his knee carefully cushioned.
They’re watching one of the Star Wars movies—Seungcheol’s not sure which one, he’s not really paying attention, and last he checked there was 400 of them—when someone starts buzzing the doorbell urgently.
It can’t be Jihoon, he knows, because even though Jihoon manages to lock himself out of the apartment every other week, he’s currently in Haneda airport, on standby for a flight home. So it could only be Sehun—coming over to grovel in apology and beg Woozi to take him back. Or, more likely, to recite some poetry and perform some apologetic interpretive dance.
Whatever—Seungcheol’s officially sick of this bullshit. Which is why he answers the door, then blocks Sehun from entering.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Sehun gives him a look over the top of his sunglasses. His eyes are bloodshot.
“To see Woozi.”
Seungcheol has to laugh, then he has to block Sehun from trying to slip past him with a pointed shove, “You’re shitting me, right? You actually think I’m going to let you see him after the shit you pulled?”
Sehun steps back, looking slightly apprehensive, then scoffs, giving him one incredulous—that’s a fucking once over, Seungcheol thinks.
“Who made you gatekeeper? You think just because you live with my boyfriend, you’re friends with him or something? You’re not his friend, you haven’t got the right to stop me from seeing him—you’re just the meathead he lives with.”
“Meathead huh?” Seungcheol echoes, tilting his head curiously.
He would never have labelled himself as a meathead; he doesn’t like to use his brute size to get his own way, but he has to admit, it has been remarkable effective when he does. Perhaps he needs to stop trying to be a reasonable person and just be the guy everyone thinks he is. If everyone’s going to misjudge him anyway, he might as well just be the best meathead he can be.
Really own it.
“Fair enough,” He says, then clocks Sehun right in the jaw.
Sehun goes sprawling on the floor, in an overly dramatic, artistic stretch. It almost looks like he’s attempting another one of his interpretive dances, flailing around like that, groaning, which is annoying enough that Seungcheol is tempted to punch him again. But one of their elderly neighbours, Mrs Kim, has opened her apartment door to rubberneck now, so instead he just steps over Sehun’s sprawled form, and stares down into his face, smiling.
“You were right—I am a meathead. So believe me when I say, if you come back here, I will kick you down every flight of stairs in this fucking building, then I’m going to carry you up in the elevator and do it all over again. Are we clear?”
Sehun groans something incomprehensible. Ayn Rand probably. Whatever—Seungcheol doesn’t wait around to watch him drag his sorry ass away. He just waves at Mrs Kim and heads back inside, locks the door behind him.
The hallway between the front door and the living area is too short to pretend like Woozi won’t have heard what’s just gone down, and sure enough, when Seungcheol pads back into the living area, Woozi’s staring at him, head poking up over the back of the couch like a little Meerkat, and about as wide eyed as one too.
Seungcheol’s half expecting him to say something snarky, another ‘mind your own business’ or maybe even a ‘who gave you the right’. But even as he retakes his seat on the other side of the couch, there isn’t a single peep out of him.
Seungcheol stares unseeingly at the TV screen for a while, so he doesn’t have to look at Woozi’s face. After a minute, he notices the hitched little sobs Woozi’s trying so hard to keep to himself and practically catapults himself over, whispering, “Hey, hey—it’s okay,”
He’s seen Jihoon get teary eyed when he stubs his toe, or when someone drinks the last cola, and even when ineffectual characters die in Game of Thrones, but he has never once seen Woozi so much as sniffle in the last seven months, and now he has no fucking idea what to do.
He settles for what comes naturally, scooping Woozi into his arms and into one of those hugs that are usually effective in soothing Jihoon, and it…kind of works?
Woozi doesn’t stop crying exactly, but he does start talking. Just babbling at first, then his breathing evens out and he starts making sense, talking about how scared he is, how miserable he was with Sehun, but how much his life has changed since his injury, since he had to stop dancing, and he just wanted to cling on to the last thing that connected him to it.
That saddest thing is he talks about how guilty he feels, because Jihoon’s salary is pretty much what keeps them afloat, and he knows no matter how hard he works, he doesn’t think he can ever pay him back. Even when Jihoon laughs it off, says it’s nothing, the guilt is still there.
Seungcheol does his best to say the right things at the right time, to give assurances, but he knows sometimes people just need someone to listen when they emote, to hold them while they do it. And it must help, because even though Woozi’s still clinging to him, still tearing up, he has this amazing look on his face the whole time, like he is... calm.
It’s weird, Seungcheol thinks, how you can get to know a guy pretty well and never realize that he was… holding back, or containing something, or suppressing something? Until he isn’t. It’s a wonderful feeling, being around to watch Woozi break apart, to help him put the pieces back together.
“Please don’t tell Jihoon I cried.” Woozi murmurs, a while later when he’s stopped sniffling, but still curled up in Seungcheol’s lap.
Seungcheol’s pulls him to rest more comfortably in the bend of his arm, plants a kiss on the top of his head, “I won’t.”
Jihoon arrives a little after midnight, looking dead on his feet, wearing a t-shirt with a marshmallow on it and a hoodie that Seungcheol is pretty sure might belong to him. He crawls onto the couch right next to his brother and whispers how sorry he is that he couldn’t have been here sooner.
Woozi smiles at him, bleary eyed, then his eyes narrow analytically, “Hoonie…where’s your luggage?”
The sudden wide-eyed expression on Jihoon’s face is both self-explanatory and the funniest shit ever. Seungcheol’s still laughing about it the next morning while he’s on the phone to the hotel, arranging for all Jihoon’s stuff to be shipped over.
With Sehun permanently out of the picture, and Woozi in a much better headspace, they all naturally settle into a nice little routine of sorts, one that means spending a lot more time together.
Seungcheol still does his own thing, occasionally; still visits his parents, his brother, meets up with old friends, still grabs drinks with a few guys from work—but if it’s ever just him by himself doing something, more often than not, the twins will want to come along too.
They’ll go with him to the gym; Woozi so he can do the recommended PT exercises for his knee, and Jihoon so he can float in the jacuzzi until he turns into a tiny prune. And when he gets tickets for a football match, they’re excited to tag along, dressed in his too large jerseys for the occasion, and he’ll buy them each a foam finger and all the snacks, and they’ll cheer at the completely wrong time. It’s adorable.
They eat dinner together most evenings too, whether they eat out, or order in, or tackle a home cooked recipe where everyone chips in, and on the weekends when they’re all free, they make a point of doing something fun. Trips to the beach, concerts, karaoke nights…helping Jihoon build a 10000 piece Millennium Falcon Lego set, which no—never again.
There were Lego pieces everywhere.
Places Lego pieces had no right to be.
There was a Lego piece in the toilet bowl for fuck’s sake—the implications of which don’t bear thinking about.
Then Seungcheol wakes up one Saturday morning, to sound of excited whispering and the smell of something burning, pads down the corridor and—“Happy Birthday Cheollie!”—shits a brick. (Not Lego related incidentally.)
“I—what? How did—” Is all he manages to say, before he’s being tinyman-handled over to the breakfast bar and shoved into a stool.
The kitchen is a fucking mess, but one square foot of the breakfast bar has been cleared and nicely decorated with balloons and banners and presents, and a place card that reads: Birthday Boy.
“How did you guys know?” He asks, because until ten seconds ago, he didn’t know himself.
“Oh, c’mon Cheol,” Woozi snorts, giving his shoulders a squeeze, “You didn’t actually think we’d forget your birthday.”
Seungcheol shrugs, “I did. I honestly can’t remember the last time I celebrated my birthday.”
“Aww, well, we’re celebrating it today,” Woozi says—the ‘whether you like it or not’ goes unsaid but is heavily implied in the way he’s aggressively wrestling a party hat on Seungcheol’s head.
“And we made you Birthday pancakes.” Jihoon chirps, setting a plate down in front of him. It’s covered with a napkin.
Seungcheol suppresses a dubious laugh, “Birthday pancakes huh?”
“Please don’t get your hopes up,” Woozi says, something wry and soft in his voice as he pours out a glass of orange juice. “I argued that we should take you out for breakfast, but this dork said you’d appreciate it a lot more if we made it ourselves.”
Jihoon pouts at his brother, then lifts the napkin to reveal some very lovely looking, and surprisingly unburnt, butt shaped, blueberry pancakes.
“They’re…they’re supposed to be hearts.” He murmurs. “But the skillet was too hot and by the time I dolloped the second half of the heart, the first half had started to cook and the batter settled to look like a butt cleft, and now they look like tiny butts. But…they’re…they’re hearts. We made you hard shaped pancakes, because we—”
“Oh my god,” Woozi throws his hands in the air, exasperated. “We get it okay. Let him eat!”
Seungcheol does eat his pancakes, and opens his presents, and has a little panic attack because Woozi thought it would be funny to hide his real present inside the box of the Millennium Falcon Lego set, and by the end of it, he’s a little choked up with emotion.
“You guys, this is all so unexpected, and so sweet. Thank—”
“Woah, hey—It’s not over yet.” Woozi cuts in, horrified.
“It isn’t?”
The twins exchange a look.
“You don’t really think we’d just make you pancakes for your birthday, did you?” Woozi laughs. “It’s 9.30 am Cheol. It’s just the start of the day, and we’ve got a whole day of birthday fun planned for you. Pancakes was just the beginning.”
“Two whole days actually!” Jihoon chimes in. He is practically dancing with glee.
“W-what? What do you mean, two days?” Seungcheol asks, which prompts Jihoon and Woozi to produce their itinerary.
It seems that by two days, what they really mean is, two separate schedules for how the birthday fun will proceed, because of course they couldn’t agree on what stuff Seungcheol would enjoy the most, so they each planned out their ideal day so Seungcheol can pick for himself.
And to be fair, they both seem equally fun.
Jihoon’s planned to take him to the Aquarium to see this cool new underwater performance, followed by a bike ride to the Samnak Ecological Park, where they’ll have a birthday picnic and enjoy the Kite festival. Then he wants them to stop at this new pizzeria in Jung-gu, grab dinner and head home for a movie marathon night. Whereas Woozi wants to start the day off at the beach, before they head over to this hip new French bistro for brunch. From there, they’ll head to Centum City for some retail torture, before returning home to get showered and changed for a night of bar crawling, that will start at some rooftop bar that’s all over his Instagram, and will end at club Kudeta in Haeundae.
Seungcheol contemplates both options for a good ten minutes, before determining there is only one sensible way forward that will spare everyone’s feelings.
“Let’s do it all.”
There’s a stunned expression on the twins faces now, one that slowly, carefully, morphs into incredulous delight. Clearly the idea of doing all the things never occurred to them until now.
“Really?”
Seungcheol shrugs, “Yeah, why not. It’s a Saturday. We have time. Let’s do all the things.”
This is why, fifteen hours later, Seungcheol finds himself propped up against the bar, writing out his will on the back of a napkin and wondering if he has time to call his family before he drops down dead.
Seriously though, he’s fucking wrecked. Wrecked.
It shouldn’t have been humanly possible to do everything on those lists, but they did, and every muscle in his body is paying the price now.
It probably didn’t help that he insisted on doing all the heavy lifting. Lifting Jihoon on his shoulders at the beach, carrying the bags when they went shopping, and doing 100% of the cycling when they hired the three-person tandem.
It was ridiculous levels of fun, sure, but now he needs to lie down somewhere and possibly never get up again. Which is a real shame, because he’s kind of missing out on what’s possibly the most entertaining aspect of the entire day: watching Jihoon and Woozi move on the dancefloor.
They’re…cute, is probably the safest way to describe them. They’re not dancing with anyone really, just dancing together, each moving in their own unique way. Woozi a little more effortless, Jihoon a little more enthusiastic. But cute. Both—
“Which one’s yours?”
Seungcheol jerks his attention away from the twins towards the guy that’s suddenly appeared at his elbow. He has open brown eyes and a cheerful smile, and a side parting that immediately puts Seungcheol in mind of a door-to-door salesman.
“Hey, aren’t you the guy who sold me a juicer once? If so, I want my money back. It was not a cost- effective alternative to buying juice from the store. I went through a whole bag of oranges once and got a thimble full of juice. A thimble.”
The guy shifts back a little, looking nervous now, but there’s a guy standing behind who’s obviously playing wing man for the night, and steps forward to reiterate, “My buddy here’s just trying to figure out which one of those guys is your boyfriend, so you don’t kick his ass when he makes a move.” He grins, gaze sliding past Seungcheol’s shoulder.
Seungcheol doesn’t have to turn his head to know what he’s looking at; the Lee twins have had eyes on them all night.
For a hot second, he considers just kicking the guy’s ass anyway. Maybe his friend’s too. But no—that’s not cool. They just asked a question, a curtesy most guys wouldn’t bother with, and it’s not Seungcheol’s place to play protective boyfriend here.
Jihoon and Woozi are single, and if someone wants to try their luck, he has no reason to get in the way. He’s just not sure if he should lie and shield Jihoon, who’s so shy about dating he tends to play possum whenever a stranger gives him the slightest bit of attention, or lie and shield Woozi, who’s still pretty raw about the whole shitty ex situation he’s taking a break from dating until the new year. He knows what he’d like to say—they’re both mine, fuck off—except there’s no way anyone would believe that, so in the end, he just settles for the sad truth.
“I’m not dating either of them. They’re just my housemates.”
The dude’s eyebrows twitch up toward his hairline, and then he grins and high-fives his buddy, and beings to saunter over, and Seungcheol immediately regrets not lying anyway. This greedy SOB is clearly planning to have his cake and eat it.
Except he doesn’t even get within a five-meter radius of the twins before Woozi stops dancing, stands in front of his brother, and proceeds to shoot lasers out of his eyes. Seriously, his glare is a live, angry thing.
Seungcheol struggles to hear the ensuing conversation over the thumping of the music, but he just about makes out the, “We’re with someone,” and the answering, “that’s not what he said,” followed by the scathing, “Go away. We’re not interested.”
Door-to-door salesman is starting to look seriously offended now, and just as Seungcheol’s beginning to think he’ll have to step in here, the dude just shrugs it off and walks away. Message received apparently.
Good—Seungcheol sighs, settling back in his place against the bar.
The twins don’t go back to their dancing though.
After the guy walks off, the start talking to each other in very low voices, darting glances in Seungcheol’s direction every few seconds. As Seungcheol watches, Jihoon leans in and whispers something in Woozi’s ear. Something that makes his eyes go wide. He jerks his head back, shakes it, says no, no Jihoon. Then no again. Jihoon seems pretty beat up about this and pouts at him, then drops his gaze to the floor, and then Woozi’s grabbing his wrist and dragging him off the dance floor towards Seungcheol.
“Hey, you ready to head out? We’re pretty beat.”
“Uh—” Seungcheol glances between them, wondering what the hell that was about, “Sure.”
Whatever it is, they don’t bring it up while they’re queuing at the coat-check, or when they step outside to hail a cab, so it’s probably nothing.
They’re in the back of the cab two minutes when Seungcheol feels a weight settle on his right shoulder—then before he can turn his head, a matching weight settles on his left. He breathes out a quiet laugh and carefully edges his arms back, looping one around each twin so he can tuck them closer against his chest.
He’s going to have to wake them up in less than twenty minutes anyway, but at least they’re more comfortable this way.
“Lucky guy.” The cab driver chuckles, meeting his eyes briefly in the rear-view mirror.
Seungcheol flashes him a smile, “I know.”
Two weeks later…
Seungcheol gets home twenty minutes early; lighter traffic than normal, and unlocks the door to hear, “Oh, uh, is that the time? We should probably get going—we don’t want to miss our reservations.”
When he pads into the living area, he spots two new faces sitting on the couch across from Woozi and Jihoon. Or, really, just one new face, but on two separate bodies.
So, yeah—another set of twins are chilling in his apartment, because clearly his life wasn’t confusing enough.
“Hey Cheollie,” Jihoon murmurs when he sees him. He’s looking sort of sad, sitting on the far couch with his knees drawn up, his cheek resting against one of them. The new twin that’s been trying to talk to him shifts around quickly. He’s tall and solid, with shaggy dark hair and full lips, and his eyes get big as he takes Seungcheol in.
“Oh, hey Seungcheol,” Woozi says, attempting a casual wave and missing by a mile. “Uhh, meet Junsu and Junho—guys, this is Seungcheol our housemate.”
Junsu—or twin number two—turns his gaze to Seungcheol and flashes an automatic smile, which quickly freezes.
“Hey,” Seungcheol nods, holds up a hand, taking in everyone’s stiff, uncomfortable, awkward expressions—the drinks sweating on the coffee table, the snacks sitting alongside, the way everyone’s weirdly dressed up for a Wednesday evening.
Wait…
It takes him a moment too long to realise he’s just walked in on what appears to be the pre-drinks segment of a double date. A double date with twins. Twins x Twins = 2Twins. Or would TwinsTwins be more accurate? If the evening goes well, it might even be twins/twins…
Okay, he needs to stop doing maths and get out of there.
“Uh, well—great meeting you guys. Have a nice evening.” He says, managing a swift exit before things get truly awkward.
He’s barely closed the bedroom door behind him before there’s a quiet knock, and he’s opening it again to see Jihoon standing there, dimpling sweetly at him.
“Hi… Can I hide in your room?”
“Hide?” Seungcheol laughs doubtfully, “Uh, what about your date?”
Jihoon pouts at him, “He’s not my date. Woozi set us up with those guys, but I never agreed to any of it. I don’t want to date either of them.”
Ah—Seungcheol thinks, inviting Jihoon in and watching him leap excitedly onto the bed. That explains why he looked so miserable earlier, and possibly why he’s dressed a lot more provocatively than usual. Woozi’s obviously tricked him into putting on some makeup, maybe even bullied him into trying one of his own outfits—‘We’ll go to that dorky science exhibition you wanted to see’, he said, probably, then pulled the double date idea on him at the last second, knowing full well Jihoon would make zero effort is he had any forewarning.
“I get why you’d prefer to be in here Hoonie,” Seungcheol says, working on loosening his tie, “But uh, don’t you wanna give Uji some emotional support or something? Even if you’re not interested in dating those guys, you could still play wing-man for the night so Uji can enjoy his date.”
Jihoon sits up, shoots him an incredulous look, “No, don’t you get it? Woozi doesn’t want to date them either.”
“Hmm—” Seungcheol clucks his tongue, “Then why did he set you guys up?”
Jihoon throws his hands up, like it’s obvious, “Because he’s trying to distract me, obviously.”
“Distract you from what?”
Another knock on the door interrupts them right then, and before Seungcheol can answer, Woozi’s poking his head in.
"Hoonie! There you are," He says, sounding like Cruella De Vil after hunting down a lost puppy. “Won’t you come on out? Jinho’s getting kind of lonely out there.”
Jihoon stares at him balefully, “Who the hell is Jinho? It’s Junho and Junso, you looser. You’re trying to make out you’re so into them, and you can’t even remember their names. Just give up Uji, it’s not going to work.”
Woozi steps away from the door, twisting his fingers around each other.
“Jihoon, you can’t—” He stops, darting an anxious look at Seungcheol, as if his very presence requires him to re-think what he'd been about to say. “We talked about this Hoonie.” He hisses at last. “We had an agreement.”
“Uh, no, we didn’t.” Jihoon spits, with surprising venom. “That is not what we talked about at all. We didn’t talk about setting me up on a date. I didn’t want that, and you can’t just make decisions like that for me. Are you forgetting I’m older than you? Because I am—by a whole ten minutes!”
Woozi takes another step forward, light tension has begun to coil through his body. “I don’t care—you’re still a giant baby. Now get out there right now and start socialising or I swear to god.”
Jihoon swallows, but Seungcheol has to hand it to him, for once he actually sticks to his guns.
“No,” He stops his foot. “Go away.”
Woozi rears back, gasping.
He’s so aghast, he even brings a hand up to cover his mouth, like he never in twenty three years! And, okay, fair enough, it’s a pretty unprecedented reaction from Jihoon. Jihoon never says no to his brother. Ever. But he’s saying no now, so maybe the amateur theatrics are called for.
What isn’t called for, is the way Woozi immediately recovers from his shock and begins to chase Jihoon around the room, and since Seungcheol’s standing in the middle of it and sort of in the way, chasing him around Seungcheol too. In never ending circles of ‘come here’ and ‘no!’.
Seungcheol gives up trying to stop them after a few minutes and starts undressing—they’ll tire themselves out eventually, he figures. Or maybe Junho and Junso will come looking for them, join in on the chasing fun.
He balls up his tie and sets it aside, narrowly avoiding an elbow in the gut from Jihoon, then he drags his shirt over his head and flexes his shoulders and—the twins just come to an abrupt stop, standing on either side of him.
He can’t see the expression on Jihoon’s face because he’s stopped behind him, but Woozi’s standing right in front and he’s staring at his naked chest, a little wide eyed. His whole face flushes up, a tendon jumping in his throat, before he runs out of the room like his ass is on fire.
“Uhm—” Seungcheol turns, scratching his head, “Did I do something wrong?”
Jihoon’s looking a little flustered too. The bridge of his nose is just slightly pink, and there is a little grin wiggling around his face like it can't decide if it wants to be seen or not. “Nope.”
“Right, well—imma grab a shower,” Seungcheol says, then pats him on the head and heads into the bathroom.
When he comes back out, his bedroom is empty and the apartment is deathly quiet. They’ve gone out for their double date, he guesses, and has half a second to wonder what he’ll cook himself for dinner before he pads down the corridor and finds them sitting together on the couch, dates gone, speaking in hushed whispers.
“You’re not allowed to just change the rules Jihoon,” Woozi is hissing, just loud enough for him to hear, “We’ve got a good thing going here, and you’re…you’re going to ruin it. Don’t you like things the way they are?”
Jihoon’s already shaking his head, arms crossed over his chest, “No. The rules are stupid and you know it.”
They both clam up when Seungcheol approaches, which compels him to tease, “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you guys were talking about me.”
Almost immediately, Jihoon starts fidgeting with a loose shirt button, while Woozi’s eyes dart uncomfortably past Seungcheol’s and—okay, maybe he just hit the nail on the head there.
What nail, and what it means, he has no fucking clue, so he quickly changes the subject.
“Uh…have you guys eaten?”
They both shake their heads.
“Are you hungry?”
The twins nod in tandem, then Jihoon whizzes down the corridor and returns clutching an open recipe book with a page folded down.
“Chilli?” Seungcheol says, checking through the ingredients to confirm they have everything they needs, “Ooh, good choice Hoonie.”
Jihoon smiles impishly and readily volunteers to take on chopping duties. Woozi pads over a few minutes later, still sulking, but clearly expecting to lend a hand. Seungcheol gets him started on deseeding chilis while he starts browning the mince.
By the time Seungcheol’s ladling the chili into three bowls and prepping their favourite toppings—guacamole and salsa for Woozi, sour cream and shredded cheese for Jihoon—the twins are standing off to the side, arms crossed, watching him so intently, he feels like a contestant on fucking MasterChef.
Seriously—he’s starting to second guess his presentation skills now, wondering if he should chop some parsley, as garnish or something.
Then Woozi turns to his brother, takes a deep breath and says, “Okay.”
“R-really?” Jihoon says, inexplicably breathless with excitement.
Woozi nods and holds up a finger, “But on one condition. Since you’re breaking the rules, I’m allowed to break them too.”
Jihoon seems less enthused about that, whatever it is, and scowls openly at his brother, who scowls back.
Seungcheol has absolutely no idea what’s going on, or why they’re suddenly glaring daggers at each other, but he’s compelled to interrupt and say, “C’mon you guys. There’s enough chilli for everyone.”