Step 1: Make Changkyun Stay

chapter sixteen

 When Minhyuk came waltzing back with no ice pack in his hands, the shortest sighed and asked him to follow Shownu since the latter knew where it was at.

"Where else could an ice pack be, in your ass?" Kihyun asked sarcastically as he took the ice pack and placed it over Changkyun's head and Changkyun immediately felt a little better.

"I didn't know it was in the top part of the fridge!" Minhyuk tried to explain himself, only to earn himself a "yea, right" from the shortest vocalist.

He let out a humph before focusing on their maknae. "How did you fall out though? Did you have a nightmare?"

"I will turn all your lives into a nightmare if you continue to disturb my sleep."

It didn't take a genius to know who said that and everyone merely ignored the tallest.

Changkyun smiled a little at the threat before reaching up to hold the ice pack himself. He adjusted it more to the back where the pain really was, before making eye contact with the members. "I'm sorry I woke you guys up so early in the morn-"

"Are you serious right now?" 

Changkyun looked up to see Jooheon staring at him with something unreadable in his eyes.

"You fucking injured your head but here you are, apologizing to us like you did something wrong."

"I'm sorry-"

"Stop apologizing!"

Jooheon stomped out of the room, leaving the members in bewilderment. Regaining his composure, Shownu silently asked their maknae to go back to sleep.

Changkyun nodded and was about to hop back onto his bed when Wonho stopped him.

"Sleep in mine. If you fall again, the impact wouldn't be that much." The elder gestured to his bed in the lower bunk.

Changkyun nodded once again, a bit shaken by Jooheon's outburst to mutter any words.

When the members are sure that Changkyun was tucked in and off to dreamland, they retreated back to the living room, where Jooheon sat, hands wrapped around himself.

"Why is he always apologizing when it's me who mistreated him?" Everyone noticed the tear threatening to slip out of his eyes and how the rapper was blinking rapidly, trying to blink the tears away.

The members watched, unsure of what to do. They exchanged worried glances while the rapper continued, hiccuping every now and then,

"Yesterday, when I finally caught up to him -hiccup- He thought I was one of his ex members and told me -hiccup- what should he do, and that -hiccup- " Jooheon took a deep breath. "Everyone hates him."

Jooheon wrapper his arms around his torso even tighter as he buried his head in between his arms, a soft sob escaping his vibrating body.

"Oh, Jooheony..." Minhyuk made the first move to engulf the rapper in his arms completely, the others closing in too.

"I'm a fucking monster - I made him think that he wasn't worthy of my friendship, when I was just being a complete asshole." The other members' hearts shattered. Wonho stepped forward to put a hand on the younger's shoulder, taking upon the responsibility to make the rapper feel better.

"We had all been a dic- I mean we were all really inconsiderate," Wonho quickly changed his sentence after earning a smack from Kihyun. "But, what's done is done and the best we can do now is make it up to him, Jooheon ah."

The members nodded, agreeing. 

"Plus, you said he thought you were one of his former members." Shownu finally spoke up.

All eyes focused on him as they anticipated what the elder has to say.

"That means that he was probably about to meet Taehyuk, which I believe he was about to agree to debuting with them." 

The others waited for the eldest to make the link.

"You stopped him, Jooheon ah. You stopped Changkyun from leaving us. You did a great job." Shownu finished off, and the members started to nod one by one, understanding what he meant.

Jooheon wiped away the tears roughly with the sleeve of his sweater. "I did?"

Shownu nodded.

"What else did you guys do yesterday, anyway?" Curiosity was apparent in the shortest member's eyes.

"I apologized - "

"Look at you! You already did a great job. And you apologized!" Minhyuk happily rubbed himself against the rapper while complimenting him.

"But the thing is, he forgave me before I even really apologized."

Silence dominated the room, until a soft whimpering could be heard from Wonho's room. They exchanged glances at each other.

"I'll go get him." Jooheon muttered before wriggling out of Minhyuk's grasp and rushing to the room.

"I have an idea."

"What?" The shortest asked the tallest in anticipation.

"Let's go back to sleep."

SMACK

"Ow!!"

And that was how they all fell asleep on the couch, entangled within each other.