After Dark 》Minsung

22 》So, Naturally, We Faked My Death

                                          ...right?
  

From the hammock, Changbin perked up with a wide grin, "He's a what? A camboy? What does he go by, maybe I watch him?"

"Oh-" Felix gagged.

"Shut up, Felix. I'm hot. You know I'm hot."

"Yeah but, you yanking it to my baby's streams? Not an image I want in my head."

Minho furrowed his eyebrows, an odd feeling swelling up in his chest as he looked between the other two rats. Quickly interjecting before they could continue any farther in their conversation,  "Your baby? That boy's ass is mine, screw off Lix."

"He was my best friend before he was your hookup."

"So????"

"So, I called dibs on him."

"DIBS DOESN'T WORK LIKE THAT."

"YES IT DOES, FUCK YOU!!!" 

The bickering siblings were subsequently interrupted from the shouting, violently and rather rudely in the midst of a completely valid argument by Minho's standards of what qualified as legitimate subjects of importance to argue for, by Chan bursting into the rat cave. Their eyes immediately turning to the rustling bags in his hands as he wandered in and tripped over the bass guitar case with the grace of a twelve year old discovering their parents left the liquor cabinet unlocked while they were gone on vacation, nearly face planting before narrowly catching himself in the brisk fall and sudden interjection to the ongoing conversation flinging hollering voices through the soundproof padded walls of the secluded studio. Urgent. Chan looked to be moving urgently as he scanned over the other three in the room.

Finding Changbin amongst the faces, Chan dropped the plastic grocery bags, probably filled with the various snacks Felix and Changbin had requested to devour while they were at the rock drummer's house, and stormed  beside the hammock. Minho watching in gentle curiosity, massive curiosity as he crooned his neck and held onto the back of the couch for support in order to see the faces of his friends interacting. Hands clasping down on the hinges suspending the fabric off the ground to stop the systematic rocking, Chan started, "Guess who I just saw at the store and had to have a conversation with because he recognized me."

Changbin just looked up to him with a shrug, fingers returning to plucking a melody on the metal grates of the strings to fill the uncomfortable air stagnating the rat cave with Chan's presence.

An oblivious look to his eyes.

Before Chan told,

"Yang Jeongin."

Oh.

Minho stilled.

Tossing a look to the man in the hammock as his hands froze atop the guitar strings.

Oh shit.

Watching as Changbin's usually unbreakable exterior of a jokester, a playful man with wild and wacky hair beneath a tailored tophat he crafted with his own skilled hands to set on his crown, shattered. Breaking apart bit by bit in the loosening of his terrified eyes looking up to the rock drummer, the gentleness of his jaw gaping wide  as if he was a hopeless fish gurgling desperately out of the waters he needed to survive in this automatic world,  the shifting of his body as he cautiously peeled himself off the stilled hammock and handed the acoustic guitar out to Chan, "Oh... fuck... Uh... How... How is he? Is he... Doing well? Was he okay?"

"He's doing well for himself. Got contracted with the nation's football team," Chan snatched the guitar from his grip, wandering off with it as he found a seat at the pedestal of his drum set. Set the guitar in proper playing position, taking care not to hit the delicate instrument against the drumheads or pure metal rims, busying himself with playing a gentle melody Minho recognized as a rift he and Changbin had been working on for a few years. A melody which came and went, appearing before being scrapped from the parts of the songs it occupied, never finding a permanent place anywhere beside the back of their minds finding comfort in the familiar chords they hadn't yet perfected. They hadn't yet been confident enough to show to the world, despite the complex mix of plucking and strumming that stuck in their heads.