Equation to You | lmh x ksm

six.

“Felix,” Minho called, trying to control his composure as the younger walked towards him excitedly with that thing still in between his fingers. “Did you kill it?”

Felix, on the other hand, gave him a weird look. “What? No, of course I didn’t. Why would I? Mr. Cockroach didn’t do anything bad—”

“Didn’t do anything bad?! IT FLIES, LEE YONGBOK! It flies in our room!” Jisung took the courage to peek from Minho’s back to scream at Felix before he hid again.

Minho let out a long sigh as he created a distance between him and Felix. Gosh, why, of all bugs, it has to be cockroach?

“Okay, Felix. We need to put it outside, alright? Because we somehow need to stop this— commotion.” Minho gave Felix a signal with his eyes to his three friends who were still hiding behind Minho. Minho carefully stepped back as he told Felix and opened the door for the younger to throw Mr. Cockroach out from the house.

But Felix quite a prankster he is. He nodded to Minho but when he actually passed through the older, he jokingly shoved the little creature in his hand towards Seungmin, for which made the younger jump for his life onto Minho’s back. Minho’s arms instinctively supporting Seungmin’s weight on his back by holding the younger's bum to prevent both of them from falling. Meanwhile, Jisung and Hyunjin let out those high pitched screams that Minho could feel his ears go deaf for a moment.

And Felix…Well, he laughed boisterously before he went out of the house and the little gross creature carefully by the road, let it roam free from his fingers. Felix even bid goodbye to it before he walked back into the house. Hyunjin and Jisung still clung with each other and Seungmin—

Right, he’s still on Minho’s back, hiding his face away at the crook of Minho’s neck with his arms around Minho. Minho could feel the younger's still racing heartbeat due to the commotion that happened earlier.

"Hey." Minho softly called for the younger one by patting his bum that Minho is currently still supporting to avoid both of them from falling.

"Is the cockroach gone?" Seungmin's muffled voice was heard and Minho managed to sneak a quick smile onto his face.

"It's gone. Felix threw it out. Do you want to come down or do you still wanna stay up there, hm?" Minho feels like he wanted to tease the younger one a bit. As expected, Seungmin, as if he was just unfolding the situation, was struggling to get himself down from Minho before the elder stopped him.

"Stop moving like that! Here, let me–" Minho carefully crouched down and Seungmin untangled himself from Minho with very, very rosy cheeks.

Minho secretly enjoys his view.

"I– I'm so sorry. But thanks–"

And maybe they forgot about this, but there were another three heads who were also enjoying whatever was happening between Minho and Seungmin before Felix whistled playfully.

"I thought we were watching a romance drama." there's this smirk on Felix's face.

"I think we should leave earlier but yea, you're right. This is a romance drama." Hyunjin added and that was when they heard a roaring rumbling sound.

All of them switched their gazes towards someone who didn't respond to anything yet.

"What? I was panicking and scared the shit out of me. I can be hungry. Plus, we haven't had anything for hours." Jisung said with his linked eyebrows before the others also complaining about how hungry they are.

Of course they're starving. Given it's actually the time when the dinner was supposedly ready by then.

The five of them decided to just cook together since that would lessen the time they'll take to prepare the dinner. Well, that was what Minho thought. However, the scene that unfolds after proved him wrong.
It was a commotion after commotion.
But this time, there's no bug. It was–

"Ya, Kim Seungmin!! You're bleeding!!"

In between the chaos of Jisung almost burned their chives pancakes and Hyunjin mixed up the salt and sugar for their dessert, Seungmin cut his finger while cutting the vegetables. As Minho heard Seungmin’s little yelp from the counter, he stopped stirring the kimchi stew that he waited to simmer before his body involuntarily jumped towards the younger. He quickly took Seungmin’s hand and examined it for a moment before he put it under running water, trying to stop the bleeding.

Seungmin, on the other hand, just followed Minho’s steps around the kitchen quietly. Minho asked Felix to deal with the kimchi stew he was cooking before he continued to drag Seungmin into their shared room with an emergency kit in his hand that he found in the kitchen.

Seungmin winced a little when Minho started to apply the antiseptic on the cut. Minho quickly apologized as he applied the ointment more gently. After he's done with cleaning and treating the cut, he makes a few soft blows to let the ointment dry a little bit before he puts on a band aid on Seungmin's long finger.

After he’s satisfied with his work, Minho looked up to see Seungmin’s eyes were already on him. He softly threw a smile at the younger and placed Seungmin’s hand onto a pillow that Minho stacked it with another pillow to let it rest.

“Keep your hand elevated to ease the blood circulation. You’re lucky the knife didn’t go through the artery. I was worried for a moment there.” Seungmin slowly nodded.

“Thank you.” it was faint. Minho almost couldn’t hear it but thanks to the quiet bedroom at the moment without the other three around, Minho caught it.

“You’re welcome. Go and get some rest, we’ll bring you the food once we finish cooking, okay?” Minho ruffled Seungmin's fluffy hair and when he was about to leave, there's a sudden light tug at the hem of his shirt that made him stop.

“Can I…at least watch you guys in the kitchen? I won't go near the knife. Or anything sharp, I promise. It’s getting lonely to stay here by myself.” Minho’s eyes were deluded by an enchantment, as he thought. But Seungmin softened his gaze, turning them into a pair of puppy eyes. That successfully made Minho's heart have a roller coaster moment.

Minho blinked his eyes. Once. Twice. Before he managed an awkward “Sure.” out of his mouth and cleared his throat before he helped Seungmin up. The younger one followed him back to the kitchen like a puppy.

The three managed to continue cooking without Minho's presence. At least they're not burning the whole kitchen down. The chives pancake prepared by Jisung was a little bit crispy and– darker for Minho's preference but it's still edible, nonetheless. Same goes for the dessert that Hyunjin made. The peach cobbler tasted fine. Felix did a great job to continue cooking the kimchi stew from Minho and grilling the pork belly at the same time.

It was a great dinner.

But there's one thing bothering Minho's head. Well, not really bothering. It's just– Minho needs an explanation.

There are so many things that contradict this whole fake dating thing and one of them is Minho feels like he’s getting too comfortable when he’s around Seungmin. And that was how Minho decided there were so many similarities between Kim Seungmin and the square root of two. Both give him these irrational actions out of nowhere whenever he moves closer to them.

Minho feels the need to protect Seungmin all the time but that's clearly not in their agreement before.