Forewarning: I think it's a given but the rat boys talk like boys
Minho kicked the door to the Rat Cave open. Pausing before blurting out loud, "I think I'm in love?"
"That's weird," Changbin didn't bother to look up from the guitar he was strumming. The jerk, happily swinging back and forth in Chan's indoor hammock as he played on the strings, hands sliding up and down the frets while he plucked a gentle melody.
"Right?"
"Who is it this time?"
"Same boy, my nicotine, the light of my life, a certain Han Jisung," Minho cooed to his friend, taking care not to trip over the devouring mouth of the bass guitar case set haphazardly by the wide mouth of the doorway as he sauntered inside. Ensuring not to close the door, just to piss off Chan. He can suck it up for a few minutes. While Minho's mind kept getting distracted, mercilessly yanked back time and time again to that camboy's bedroom. To his bedside. To his arms, situated on his lips, the thought of him, being with him, holding him, trailing over his weakening mind day by day. A drug. Cocaine. Jisung was cocaine, and Minho was hopeless every single time he could get a hit of that ecstacy in his bloodstream, "Ugh, he's damn addicting. Like fucking candy, last time I saw him, just, his face, his cheeks, when he was su-"
Someone cleared their throat.
Minho glanced to Felix, staring up at him from the black couch as he stilled on his bass guitar.
Staring for a moment.
Then looked back to Changbin.
"So, anyway, like I was saying, his cheeks-"
Felix covered his ears, muting them with the hem of his sweater sleeves as he screeched, "STOP IT! I DON'T WANT THE IMAGE IN MY HEAD!"
"No, no, I was going to say something nice! His cheeks puff up when he smiles and it's the cutest thing I've ever seen. He's super adorable, Lix! He gives nose scrunches and giggles. I want to hug him constantly," Minho quickly corrected himself. Words the farthest from what he was originally about to say, but he was feeling particularly kind today. In a decent mood. Teasing could be saved for another day. Another time, while he wasn't tossing his phone and his car keys down on the couch cushions to settle in with those two. Three quarters of the rat pack existing within their lair as Minho slumped down next to Felix on the couch, "Such a cutie. So adorable. I can't believe you didn't tell me your friend was so cute."
His little brother just scoffed at him. A disgust scrunching up his features as he looked at Minho. Raking up and down, scanning him over as if he was the scum of the earth. A rock stuck between the rivets of his shoe soles. A pokey lint ball stuck on the inside of the sweater he was engulfed in. The warm side of his pillow on an impossibly unbearable summer night while he wanted relief from the temperature. Adjusting the bass to sit easier across his legs, Felix scolded him with bared teeth and an upturned nose, "Sorry, Minho, but you're kind of a heathen. You, Chan, Changbin, are barbarians, I wasn't about to expose that pure ray of sunshine to you."
"Pure ray of sunshine?! He's a camboy! He's filthier than I am," Minho argued back to him in disbelief. And for the record, Jisung was not filthier than a particular Lee Minho with a newly discovered name kink. They were, more or less equal when it came to complete degenerates and disgusting beasts who needed to touch the verdure comfort of dwindling meadow grass they could sink their palms into to pet. A purity to restore them from being the foul-mouthed sinner both of them were. Still, it wasn't as if Felix would know the truw extent of the list of kinks Jisung proudly put on display for Minho. Right?
...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.
From the corner of his eye, Minho saw Felix's head swiveling around the solemn faces. Checking Changbin who statued on the hammock, then Chan who was too preoccupied with playing his melody to look up, before settling on his brother. On Minho, gladly turning his eyes to look back to Felix. His younger brother folding his arms atop the bass and leaning onto the slim ledge with the question of, "Who's Yang Jeongin?"
A heavy exhale left Changbin,"The most amazing person I ever dated with the worst fucking story."
"The soccer ball story," Chan hummed, a soft smile peeling his lips up while the guitar's lullaby rocked them all into that solemn gaze. Sorrow without solace.
Felix looked to them, then back to his older brother. A subconscious habit, almost. Looking to his older brother whenever he was confused with the world, lost in understanding a situation he was given, turning to him as if Minho was any wiser in the wilds of surviving the storms than Felix was. That routine from when he was young, growing up beside one another through a perilous childhood of mixing shampoos to create witch potions and lava monsters existing in the floorboards, even showing now as he wondered, "What's the soccer ball story?"
Changbin startled, "We never told you, Felix? Okay, listen, let's set the scene.
"I'm about 18. Worst year of my whole fucking life for all the WRONG reasons. Girl in my physics class, I'm crushing on her mad crazy. I was all over her, would've kicked anyone's ass for her, but she was dating this snobby rich kid named Yang Jeongin who's whole life was football. Soccer. Real football. Really loves football. One night I get so jealous of these two as a couple, I paint one of those pure steel medicine balls up like a football, a soccer ball, and drop it in the fields on the school's campus. That huge field out in front, the football field, you know? And I wait. And wait. In the morning, he comes by, runs up to it, BAM! Kicks the thing, drops, starts SCREAMING. Fucker broke his foot, fractured all the way up to his shin with the force of that kick," The soon-to-be lawyer recalled, slowly setting back down in the hammock as he continued on, "At this point, Seo Changbin, watching from the third floor library, is starting to see the flaw in his logic.
"This kid pretty much lost everything, his scholarships, his friends, his girlfriend, doctors are like, this shit isn't getting healed man, we're gonna take your foot off, the bones were annihilated. Literal mush underneath the skin, he even showed me the x-rays. 18 year old Seo Changbin goes... Hey... I got this great idea....Why don't I date him... to repent for my sins?
"So I date this bitchass motherfucker for like, TWO YEARS or something. He's awesome. Best human I've ever been in a relationship with. The lanky, kind of, foxy looking boy, I thought I introduced you two," Changbin paused, taking a moment to check for a response for Felix. The younger eventually making a hum of recognition and a quick nod jostling the newest set of hanging earrings he bought to confirm. Once having the response, Changbin continued, "Except for the fact I broke his fucking foot and cost him his future. Now, I am his future. We started making whole plans about university and living together and shit. I go up to Chan one day I'm like, man... He's great but, this is going too far, I can't do this anymore. And Chan says-"
Minho interrupted, angling his elbow against the back of the couch as he recalled that fateful day; While he relaxed in the backseat of the drummer's old car before he wrecked the hell out of it in an accident, laid across the bench while he devoured a hamburger and a milkshake he definitely was not allowed to eat at home due to his ataxia, those two sat in the front chewing on their own meals, Changbin barely prying the pickles off of the bun with tears on his cheeks, and Chan, who sipped on a soda before he cleverly spoke those fateful words Minho now repeated; "So? What? Want to fake your death or something?"
"So, naturally, we faked my death. Minho and Chan beat me up and let me have my dying breath. Ripped him apart but his foot healed fine, he went off to play football, I went off to get my law degree," Changbin finished off casually.
Despite the slight ache Minho could detect hidden in his voice. And the faint memories of the days which followed lingering in the corners of his mind while they tried to push that name to the farthest corner of their minds. Most of them a blur of that usually bubbly man upset while he scurried off to hide from the ruse being discovered. But the fact was, even if Changbin had come clean to Jeongin of what he did, when he did it, the purpose of his regret causing them to springboard into their relationship for as long as they were together. There wasn't a way to continue on as they were. Either way, their relationship would've been over starting from the second those condemning words left his lips.
Not that faking his death was the right decision but it certainly was a decision.
"You missed the part about Minho stealing Jeongin's goldfish," Chan pipped up in the silence. His fingers continuing to strum that typical melody on the strings.
His brother whipped back to him, "You had a goldfish?"
"He didn't say I kept it," The hacker shot.
Felix blinked at him.
Minho made a slurping noise.
"You ate it?!"
He leaned forward with a blank face and whispered, "Delicious."
And enjoying,
Relishing,
In the horror that spread on his younger brother's face as he gripped onto the bass guitar as if it was a life vest meant to save him from the heathens surrounding him. The complete frayed feathers of the dirty minded vultures he willingly walked himself into. That he now tried to shy away from. Disappear from as he leaned back, far back, farther and farther away, while the terror simply grew in his features.
Waiting a moment more.
Before he slumped back completely, arms folding over his chest in an idle manner as he backed off his teasing. Before Felix thought him to be any greater of a freak than he already was proclaimed and thought to be, though eating goldfish wouldn't have put him at the top of the weirdo list in Minho's head, didn't people eat goldfish normally? Cooked goldfish. Not the point. Point was, he slouched away, admitting to Felix with a weak upturn of his lips concealing the laughter wishing to push through his chest, "Uh, no, I didn't eat the goldfish. I gave it to that one friend you had, Hyunjin. The goldfish he has in that huge aquarium in his family's estate or whatever, Bloops, that was Jeongin's."
"Oh, Bloops! I love Bloops," Felix eased up as well. His bubbly smile returning to him while the horror drained away, himself deflating to to return himself to the bass guitar as he noted to himself, "I should visit Hyunjin to say hi to Bloops. I haven't seen him for a while."
Minho slumped over to Chan, "You ever seen a goldfish let someone pet them?"
"No?" The drummer stopped his movements. A puzzlement washing through his face.
"I don't know if I ever told you, but Bloops loves Hyunjin. Weirdest thing," Minho murmured to himself. Recalling gently the most recent memories of when Felix dragged him to see that old friend. 'Friend', Minho says sarcastically in his thoughts, due to the fact he always had the vibes there was more between those two during high school than only friendship, but never having the opportunity to confirm it amidst Felix's blushing denials of such. Regardless, he shoved the memories of the corner of his mind, and started rambling off, "Hyunjin is a great guy too. Total cutie. Felix and him used to always go to that cat café down the stree— Hey, Felix why are all of your friends super cute?"
Felix offered him a scowl back.
In his pocket, Minho's phone buzzed.
He tore the device out, hurriedly looking down to the familiar caller ID. That text causing his heart to soar as soon as grabbed sight of the name, an uncontrollable grin sliding onto his soul as he stood from the couch, "I have to go. The love of my life is calling me."
Before they could stop or comment, he was already bolting out the door. Escaping from the room and from Chan's house as he picked up the call with a whisper of, "Love."
"Minho," The gentle voice pressed into his eardrums. Honeyed sanguine dripping inside his heart as shuffling came over the speaker. Rustling. Bedsheets, maybe? A blanket. A huff from the camboy before he sung, "Are you nearby?"
The hacker stepped faster out into the evening air, approaching his car parked firmly for him to return, "I can be. Ten minutes."
"Make it six, please."
"Patience is a virtue, you know."
"Not when it comes to you."
"I'm on my way. Wait for me," Minho bit back a smile. His hand hesitating on the driver door handle.
A small noise back confirmed, before the call was dropped.
And Minho...
Minho did a fast victory dance before ripping the door open and jumping inside.
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Changbin when he doesn't know how to get out of a relationship: Guess I'll die.
Writing this story gives me serotonin 😭😭 it's so dumb but it makes me so happy