Jongin carried one of the last boxes of stuff that had come from Taemin's dorm room into his new bedroom, sitting it down on top of the pile of all the other boxes they had carried in together.
Taemin came in behind him, dropping a box onto the same pile and walking up closely behind Jongin. "So you wanna break in the bed?" He asked, smirk accompanying his words.
"Taemin! Your parents are in the other room - we can't." Jongin said, spinning around quickly.
Taemin quickly leant in, pressing his lips against Jongin's. "Calm down babe. I was only joking." He said, moving over toward the pile of boxes. "Although I wouldn't be against breaking in the bed soon."
Jongin didn't have time to answer before they both turned around at the sound of a knock on the open door. Lee Taesun was standing in the doorway, smiling.
"Hey, hope I'm not interrupting anything."
"Taesun!" Taemin said, smiling and rushing across the room to hug his brother. He took a step back and glanced over at Jongin, "Taesun - you remember Jongin right?"
"Of course I remember Jongin." Taesun said, smiling over at Jongin. "How could I ever forget Jongin after everything you've told us about him?"
Jongin laughed lightly, "It's nice to see you again."
Taesun nodded, smiling. "Same to you." He said, looking around the room. "So you really decided to move back in with our parents instead of staying in the Shinee dorm? Isn't this giving you less space and privacy than the dorm?"
Taemin shrugged, "I just decided that I wanted to be here to enjoy spending time with mom and dad whenever I get the chance to for a while before I buy my own place whenever I decide to do that. Being at the dorm kind of made it a little harder to spend as much time with them as I want to at the moment, so moving here seemed to be the best option."
Taesun nodded, "Yeah sounds like a solid plan to me. Jongin, you're still at the EXO dorm I'm taking it?"
"Yeah, I'm planning on staying there for a while. Maybe find my own apartment in a couple years or so." Jongin said, shrugging slightly. "Speaking of which, I've got to head back to the dorm. We have practice in an hour."
"Alright, see you later." Taemin said, shooting Jongin a smile. Jongin nodded before walking out of the room.
"So what's the deal with you two?"
"Nothing? I don't know what you're talking about, hyung."
"Yeah sure. You can cut the act, Taemin. You two aren't fooling me. Plus I've always figured you might be..." Taesun trailed off, shrugging slightly at the end of his sentence. It didn't really matter to him all that much that his brother could be potentially gay, but he just didn't know how he should approach the subject exactly. He was worried about saying something wrong, his words accidentally sounding different than he meant for them to.
"Always figured I might be what?"
"You know, I figured you might be gay." Taesun said, "It doesn't make a difference to me. You're my little brother no matter what, Taem. Then I overheard what you all were talking about before I came into the room – total accident by the way. So are you and Jongin officially together?"
Taemin nodded slightly. "Yes we are. It's not like public knowledge or anything. Most of his bandmates have no clue, and only a couple of my bandmates know for sure. But yeah, we're together."
"I take it mom and dad don't know."
"No, of course not. I didn't exactly want to drop that bombshell right before I moved in. I figured if anything I'd wait a while before bringing it up to them."
"So doesn't moving here kind of affect your all's relationship? Since mom and dad have no clue obviously."
"Yeah it does, and Jongin wasn't exactly on board at first with the idea of me moving here from the Shinee Dorm. We kind of had it worked out to a science almost of sneaking around the dorm. But I barely ever get to spend time with our parent's, I wanted to change that at least for a little while before I find my own place. So I kind of chose that over the convenience of Jongin and I living in the same building."
"If I'm being honest, I always kind of thought you'd end up with that Jonghyun guy from your group if I was right about you being gay, Taem." Taesun said, laughing and shaking his head. "You followed him around like a lost puppy. And when I found out that you all were sharing a room together in the dorm, I just kind of figured that maybe – maybe I was actually right about you."
"I had a serious crush on Jjong for a long time." Taemin said, laughing. "But no, Jjong and I – we've never been more than friends. He's practically my second brother, has always played the role of protective older brother for me whenever it was needed."
Taesun nodded, sitting down on the bed. "Sounds like I've missed out on a lot."
"It's never been your fault. If it's anyone's, it's mine. I've been busy with training ever since I was eleven years old, kind of cut into the time for you to be the protective older brother you would have been if I had of been there for you to protect."
"Either way, I'm glad you had four older brothers to take care of you in Shinee." Taesun said, "I'm hoping at least one of them has been scouting out Jongin and making sure he's good enough for my little brother. Otherwise, I'm going to have to play catch up on that."
"Yeah, Jonghyun has definitely done more than his fair share of being skeptical of Jongin."
■
Jongin was sitting in EXO's dorm, smooshed was more like it for his current situation, between Jongdae and Sehun on one of the couches in the living room – watching as they played some video game, he wasn't paying enough attention to really be aware of who was actually winning at the moment and who was losing.
Sehun had become one of his closer confidants within EXO since he found out about Jongin and Taemin, and Jongdae was always pretty easy for Jongin to get along with ever since they were trainees. So on a day that he was stuck without Taemin – these two were the easiest choices for him to hang out with. Even if it meant watching them play video games against each other until Jongin was bored beyond belief.
Which he was getting pretty close to at this point.
But Jongin wasn't going to complain. Not really. He couldn't figure out anything else to spend his time on and so he stayed seated on the couch between two of his bandmates as they continued to attempt to defeat each other. So there he sat, waiting until Taemin texted him to let him know that he was out of practice – if he didn't have to go straight home after practice to spend time with his parents.
He didn't want to rely on spending time with Taemin as being his only entertainment to his days - except for the fact that it was for the most part. It wasn't that he couldn't find other things to do besides constantly being around Taemin or screwing Taemin, it was just something that he enjoyed to spend most of his time doing.
Not screwing Taemin. Although that was something he enjoyed doing.
But Jongin just enjoyed being around Taemin. It gave him a legitimate break from focusing on all of the other stresses of their lives, of being an idol. He gave him a chance to forget that they couldn't be open about their relationship – because he was too busy focusing on Taemin enough to almost forget about the difficulties that came with them being together. And whenever Taemin and Jongin weren't spending a lot of time together, it was all Jongin could think about. All he could focus on was trying to figure out the perfect balance of being honest with the world about who he was, and also protecting himself from the same world. He was scared to be honest about their relationship with most everyone.
Sehun and Kyungsoo were still the only two EXO members that knew about Taemin and Jongin. And as far as Jongin knew only Jonghyun and Key knew for sure that they were together from Shinee. He didn't think Jinki or Minho had been added the group who knew for sure that Jongin had been fucking their maknae in the same dorm as them.
So it wasn't like he had many people around to talk to about his issues regarding their relationship. So he instead attempted to not pay attention to his issues and instead watch Sehun and Jongdae fight it out in video games.
"You look bored." Jongdae said, smiling over at him while Sehun got up from the couch.
"He is." Sehun replied, smirking. "Cause he's having to spend time with us instead of spending time elsewhere."
Jongdae laughed, "You got a secret girlfriend Jongin? You hiding her from us?" He asked, slapping Jongin's shoulder.
Jongin shook his head, standing up and shooting Sehun a small glare. "No, I don't have a secret girlfriend, Jongdae. Sehun's just blowing things out of proportion. I'm just tired."
Sehun laughed and walked into the kitchen, reappearing in the living room after a second with a bottle of water. "Yeah Jongin's totally not hiding anything from us."
Jongin shook his head, attempting to ignore Sehun as he sat back down beside Jongin. He knew Sehun was just trying to get a rise out of him - and he was very close to achieving that if Jongin was being honest.
He didn't care for Sehun dangling the idea of Jongin hiding someone around like he was. Because Sehun knew the truth and he knew damn well why Jongin couldn't be honest about his relationship. So Jongin found it rude that he was even joking like he was.
Especially in front of Jongdae, who was the gossip of EXO. If he found out, Jongin could guarantee that everyone else would know within the day. Then there would be everyone in SM knowing about them sooner or later if Jongdae found out.
Jongin stood up, shaking his head and walking out of the living room. He flopped down onto his bed and let out a sigh.
Jongin hated all the lying, all the sneaking around. But as much as he hated all of that, he really hated the idea of risking either of his or Taemin's careers and safety.