Strawberries & Cream

Long Talks With New Friends

Having guests wasn't a common occurrence in the Ateez dorm. Partially because they were all usually too busy to be hanging out at home and partially because most of them didn't actually have any friends outside of the group. Wooyoung and Yeosang were kind of the odd ones out with that, having been trainees at a different company before joining KQ. Every so often, they'd still meet up with trainees from their old company and, on an even rarer occasion, Wooyoung would have Changbin over to visit. Today was one of those exceptionally rare times that they both had a day off at the same time, which was surprising to Seonghwa since he knew Changbin's group had just released a new album only a couple days ago at most.

Consciously, on a rational level, Seonghwa was not bothered by Changbin coming over. Wooyoung was allowed to have friends and he was allowed to hang out with them in the privacy of his own home, especially when most of the group wasn't even around. He liked Changbin, it was nothing against him, and he didn't mind that he'd brought another person along with him this time. Seonghwa wasn't annoyed with Wooyoung. He wasn't mad that Changbin was at the dorm. He wasn't bothered that Felix was there too. He was just annoyed with life and they all happened to be around. He had to spend every minute of every day surrounded by alphas already, it frustrated him to be subjected to two more. As soon as Changbin and Felix arrived, Seonghwa had shut himself away in his bedroom and tried to focus on his book. Which was, with how loud the three were being, totally impossible.

An hour or so after their arrival, Seonghwa left the safety of his room to rummage through the kitchen, hoping to drop a casual "watch your volume, please" while he was out. Before he even made it out of the hallway, though, he crashed into Felix coming around the corner towards the bathroom. Seonghwa stumbled back, startled by the sudden appearance of the shorter boy.

"Oh, shit-" Felix cursed in English reflexively, his deep voice never failing to catch Seonghwa off guard.

"Sorry." Seonghwa started to step around him but something made him pause.

The air around Felix stirred, wrapping Seonghwa in an unexpectedly soothing energy. He smelled sweet like marshmallows and just an underlying hint of cinnamon. While it wasn't unheard of for alphas to have sweet smells like that, it was definitely uncommon. Seonghwa wondered at first if it was just a soap or perfume he used, something he ate, maybe he'd been baking before coming over- but a second sharp inhale, his face shamelessly leaning in closer to Felix, confirmed that it was none of those things. It was his scent.

"Oh, whoa- Okay, uhm-" Felix flustered at Seonghwa's sudden closeness, his cheeks blushing a bit and his lips parting in a bright smile. "It's, uh, S-Seonghwa-ssi, right?"

"Right." Seonghwa nodded, looking at him curiously.

"I'm Felix, I came over with Changbin." Felix bit his lip, his eyes dragged up and down Seonghwa's figure.

"I know. We've met before." He cocked his head. "You smell different now."

"Hm? Oh! Yeah, Music Bank-" Felix was cute when he rambled. "-Or, wait, no, was it Music Core...? I know it wasn't Inkigayo- Oh, the smell, yeah, I have to wear those, uhm... what are they called-?"

"Scent blockers."

"Yeah! Scent blockers- When we go out to schedules, but when I have a day off-"

"You're an omega." Seonghwa marveled at him like he'd discovered a solid gold pig.

"Well, yeah. So are you." Felix looked perfectly confused by the observation but never lost the bright smile on his face.

"Are you the only one in your group?"