𝐝𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞, k. seungmin

06. backstage.

◛⑅·˚ ༘ ♡

jung-seok was supposed to arrive at 10am on the fanmeeting day, and was running late, like always.

it was 10:17am, and he had just left his apartment. not to mention he was supposed to be at the stadium, not the company building.

he drove his car hurriedly, running a bunch of yellow lights.

a ding sounded from his phone, and while stopped at a red light, he took a glance at it.

seungmin
where are you bro

did you die

he chuckled to himself and smiled at the message. out of all of stray kids, he didn't expect seungmin to be the one to text him.

he picked up his phone with one hand and recorded a voice message.

"i'm stuck in traffic, sorry for being late. i'm just outside the stadium, at the intersection." he said, before sending the message.

he rushed into the backstage area, hair messy and a half-drunken boba in his hand.

"sorry, traffic was bad." he panted. the first person he saw was seungmin, talking to changbin. the two seemed deep in conversation, before seungmin met eyes with jung-seok.

"he's here. we thought you died." seungmin said in a nonchalant tone. his arms were crossed, but he didn't look mad. nonetheless, jung-seok was slightly intimidated.

"sorry." he apologized again.

"no, don't apologize. i was just worried." seungmin smiled.

changbin gave him a sideway glance before stepping back a bit. "i'm gonna give you two some space." he smirked at seungmin and raised his eyebrows before leaving.

seungmin gave him a look of disgust before turning back to jung-seok.

"he's been very weird since yesterday. but he's always like that."

his eyes were locked on jung-seok's messy hair for some reason, the silhouette of a puppy could almost be seen in his eyes.

jung-seok chuckled. "so, when do rehearsals start?"

"we've been practicing for a few weeks, months now. i think one or two more run-throughs of each song should be good. we start at eleven."

jung-seok nodded, and an awkward silence filled the space between them, jung-seok looking at the floor behind seungmin and seungmin looking at his messy hair.

jung-seok slowly raised his head to meet seungmin's eyes, but seungmin was already staring at him. he quickly turned away, panic filling him.

"hey! jung-seok!"

the voice of chan interrupted the silence, which jung-seok was grateful for.

chan walked to them with a big smile and wave. "how are you? you okay? we got worried when you were a bit late." he asked jung-seok politely.

"i'm fine, thank you. sorry i was late." chan rolled his eyes.

"eh, don't apologize. felix is always late too. he only came like two minutes before you did. do you wanna, uh," chan looked around. "have a tour of the place? the stadium's quite big. even backstage is huge."