When they woke up, both their rut and heat had ended. It felt weird having slept through the end of it, but Sunghoon was glad that was over. Heeseung was clinging to him and didn’t seem like he would let go any time soon. Sunghoon was not complaining, if he could stay in Heeseung’s arms all his life, he would. But they had to clean up and eat. They also had work to catch up to, probably, and since Heeseung had been out there, they also needed to explain some things. They would have to explain a lot of things to the managers and such, but all that stress could wait a day or two until their bond fully settled.
He guessed, for at least a day or two, Heeseung would be extra possessive of him and Sunghoon wouldn’t want to leave his side unless it was absolutely necessary. They would gross out the other members so much with how sweet they were going to be to each other. They would also probably kiss and scent each other as much as physically possible. And if he was honest, Sunghoon couldn’t bring himself to feel bad for the other members and what they would witness. Serves them right for all they had done. Jake was the only victim here.
“Hyung,” Sunghoon tried to get up, but Heeseung wouldn’t let him, “we have to get up.”
“In a minute,” he slurred sleepily and went to scent Sunghoon.
“Mm… you can do that after we shower, I feel gross,” he told him, but didn’t stop Heeseung from scenting him some more.
In the end, it took them over half an hour to get up. Getting to the shower was harder than anticipated, Sunghoon’s muscles ached all over and it pained him to move. Heeseung had almost no strength left to help him. Showering, once again, took them way longer than intended, though they were too tired to do more than just stealing kisses from each other.
When they got out, Sunghoon looked at himself in the mirror. As far as he could see, almost all of his body was covered in bite marks, hickeys and bruises in the shape of Heeseung’s hands. Had he not just gotten out of his heat, he would probably be turned on. He admired the mating bite for a bit longer, bringing his hand up to touch it. It ached in all the right ways. Heeseung came behind him and hugged his waist, kissing the mark. He started purring almost instantly, he’d have to get use to that as well, he knew he’d start doing it a lot more around Heeseung. He glanced in the mirror at the mark he had left on Heeseung’s neck, and felt his chest full.
“You don’t regret it, do you?” Heeseung spoke from where he was. Sunghoon smiled.
“No,” because he didn’t, no matter how messy, how spontaneous, how disastrous everything had been, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it. “Do you?” Heeseung shook his head.
“God, I love you,” Heeseung chuckled, “I meant it, you know? I’ll do everything to be the best for you.”
Sunghoon purred, blissed, “I’ll do the same,” he turned inside Heeseung’s arms to face him, putting his arms around Heeseung’s neck. They stayed like that for a moment, holding each other close and enjoying their bond.
“We should probably get dressed.” Heeseung broke the silence. They laughed as the realisation that they were naked, hugging in the middle of the bathroom came to them.
They walked around touching each other one way or another, being holding hand or straight up hugging. They managed to join the others for dinner after three days of, almost, not seeing any of them. They still probably reeked of sex, but so did Sunoo, Niki, Jungwon and Jay most other day, so they couldn’t complain.
When they sat down to eat, Sunghoon almost sat on Heeseung’s lap, he had no doubt Heeseung would have let him, but that would have been just a little much. He settled for holding Heeseung’s hand under the table, it did make it hard for Heeseung to eat, as he was holding his dominant hand, but Heeseung wasn’t about to let go either.
Sunghoon was also going to sleep in Heeseung’s bed, no one would stop him. His room smelled of heat and rut and sex, he’d left the window open and Heeseung had helped him clean up all the blankets and pillows. They threw everything into the washing machine, and even with new sheets, he was not sleeping there. He also needed to sleep with Heeseung, so the alpha’s bed made total sense. They weren’t going to have sex, they were too tired for that, they would probably just cuddle and sleep, so no one could complain.
For some reason, Sunghoon forgot he had a very notorious mating mark that the others would like to ask questions about. The fact that they could also see the bite Sunghoon left on Heeseung didn’t help them at all.
“Sunghoon, you were getting a boyfriend out of this, not a mate,” Jungwon sounded and looked tired, not physically, but mentally.
“We skipped a few steps,” Sunghoon murmured shyly.
“When I said ‘fix this’ I didn’t mean let him bite you as well,” Sunoo was ready to hit Heeseung, or Sunghoon, whoever needed to be hit.
“What? When did you say that?” Sunghoon didn’t know anything about that.
“When he ran out of your room, naked, and sat in a corner of the living room almost having a panic attack because he’s stupid.” Sunoo deadpanned, “don’t let him run around naked again, there’s things I don’t need and don’t want to see,” Sunghoon hissed at Sunoo, but was quick to recover from the possessiveness he suddenly felt.
“Oh no, Sunoo, I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to… hiss at you…” he apologised, feeling embarrassed. Sunoo just laughed in his face.
“Don’t worry, I’m not stealing your man, no matter how much he’s packing,” Sunoo laughed even more as Sunghoon face turned a deeper red. Heeseung kept minding his own business, putting effort into eating with his other hand. “Besides, I have my own.” And Sunghoon couldn’t see Sunoo’s hand, but seeing as how Niki had flinched and bite back a whine, he had a pretty god guess of where Sunoo had placed it.
“Sunoo, not on the table,” Now Sunghoon understood where Jungwon’s exhaustion came from, Sunoo was close to his heat and he always turned into a bit of an exhibitionist during that time.
“At least not while we are eating,” Jay added, knowing they couldn’t stop Sunoo unless they tied him up. Sunoo rolled his eyes but let go of Niki, who audibly sighed as he relaxed.
“Heeseung-hyung?” Jake called him, “I want to apologise for being so… harsh towards you.”
“Did that also happened when he was naked panicking in a corner?” Sunoo nodded as an answer to Sunghoon’s question.
“No, no, it’s fine, I needed that,” Heeseung told him after he swallowed. “And I… I felt better knowing others care about Sunghoon that much, that you would put him before you, that you’d protect him.”
“Of course, and just to make it clear, I will castrate you if you hurt him,” Jake calmly said, “I respect you and you are my friend, but that will not matter.”
“Maybe don’t castrate my mate, yeah? I’m sure if either of us does something to hurt the other we can talk it out and solve it,” Sunghoon interjected.
“Fine,” Jake stopped trying to look intimidating, it was doing nothing on Heeseung who seemed happy by how Jake was behaving.
“Hyung, would it kill you to let go of Sunghoon’s hand for like ten minutes so you can eat properly?” Jay finally asked, watching as Heeseung kept struggling with his food.
“It would kill me,” Sunghoon answered instead.
“Way to be dramatic,” Niki snickered. “You’ll survive for ten minutes, I’m sure Heeseung-hyung will even eat faster just for you.”
“I was going to sit on his lap, he’ll be able to use his hand freely then, do you want that?” Sunghoon looked at him like the idea of letting go of Heeseung even for a second was dreadful.
“Let them be, Niki, they just mated,” Sunoo defended them with a sigh. In that moment, Jungwon let his head hit the table startling everyone.
“I cannot deal with this, they’ll be annoying for days before they can start acting like they can live without touching 24/7,” he lamented, Jay rubbed his back attempting to comfort him. It helped a little.
Later, they went to Heeseung’s bed, Jake told them not to have sex about five times before he figured they were probably a little too tired to do more than just sleep, and maybe kiss a little. They cuddle, drained from the three days they spent together, finding they were completely pleased with how things had turned out. Sunghoon thought to himself, he’d gotten way more than he had expected from just offering Heeseung help with his rut. He needed to thank Sunoo and Jungwon for pushing him to do it.
He nuzzled closer to Heeseung and let sleep take over him. They could figure out a new room arrangement when the morning came, there was no way he was ever again sleeping anywhere else that wasn’t in Heeseung’s arms.