Sixty-One

"God! It's so good to be back home!" Mingyu threw out his arms when we entered our dorm after the anniversary party. We had come by earlier to drop off our luggage but we hadn't unpacked because we were set to fly again the day after tomorrow.

"I missed you!" Yeojun dropped onto the couch and hugged a cushion.

"Ya." I tugged at his collar "Up. You'll get comfortable and then won't be able to drag yourself to your room."

"Hyung, piggy back." Yeojun grinned at me.

"Aish…" This brat.

"Please." He wrinkled his nose.

All of us were weak to our Maknae's requests and he was an expert at taking advantage of that.

"Come here." I went and crouched before the couch.

"You spoil him too much." Hanseol chuckled.

"Can't help it." I struggled to stand up once he had climbed on and then adjusted him. "He's my Dongsaeng."

"I love you~" Yeojun gave me a good squeeze.

"Yes. Yes. I know." I chuckled and made for their room with Mingyu following us. "We can sleep in tomorrow at least. It's been so long since we got more than three hours of sleep."

"I just hope that I'm able to sleep." Mingyu scoffed. "I've gotten used to sleeping less."

"Welcome to my life." I chuckled. Getting to Yeojun's bed, I dropped him onto it and straightened my back. "Oof."

"You should also go and get some sleep, Hyung." Mingyu said as he began changing. "Jun-ah, change."

"Okay~" He drawled and stood up. "Thanks, Jeongwoo Hyung."

"Ey. Good night." I gave them both a smile and came out to an empty living room. Stopping by Hanseol's room to wish him good night, I went to mine and Jaehyeon's room. Jaehyeon was taking his watch off in front of the mirror, viewing himself. His white shirt had been untucked and he had already put away his coat.

"It's good to be back, huh?" I commented.

"Mm." He hummed, then dropped his arms and said rather seriously. "Sit down."

… Had I really pissed him off somehow? "Hyung, wha-"

"What were you thinking?" He questioned, looking at me through the mirror.

"Wha-What do you mean?" I had noticed at the party too but I hadn't thought that he was still angry. Then… this was my fault

"Where did you go in between the party?"

Oh. "That… I just-" Oh no.

"Don't say that you just stepped out for fresh air, if that's what you're thinking." He interrupted and turned to look at me. I was still just standing by my bed, frozen in place by the confrontation. He looked furious. "You look at your boyfriend before you leave. He then checks his phone and leaves too. Quite a few minutes later, he comes back and then you do, still stealing looks at each other. What are we supposed to make of that? No. What am I supposed to make of that?"

It… wasn't that obvious. You noticed those things only because you knew what to look for. And… why were you paying so much attention to us? Somehow, the way that he was questioning me threw me off but I could not say much out loud because I wasn't sure about what to say at all. Even if Jaehyeon knew about our relationship, the fact that we snuck out like that was not something I could easily reveal- not when he was this angry about our having even left the hall. "I-It was… just for a bit. We had not seen each other in so long so…" I looked down. How was I supposed to say this? Did I really need to explain myself?

"Where did you go? Outside? The stairwell? Washroom?" He frowned at me.

"Wh- Hyung!" Why did he even want to know that?! This was our private matter! More than because I had wanted to hide it, I had gotten defensive because of how he was interrogating me. When I realised that, I told myself to calm down. "We… took a room but-"

"A room!" He scoffed and looked away.

I was absolutely shocked. Why was he reacting like this?

"And then what?" He looked back at me with his hands on his hips. "Things got hot and heavy? How far did you go with him?"

I snapped but I did not raise my voice. "That… was unnecessary."

"Really? Why else would you have gotten a room?" He asked.

"Is it really that wrong to want to spend some alone time with the person I love? We were not even gone that long."

"You knew exactly what you were getting into when you both decided to start dating. This is the kind of relationship it is going to be. You won't be alone like you want to be when you want to be. I thought that you had understood at least that much properly."

"I understand but with the world tour and the past three months, we were a little…" How do I say this without pissing him off further? I really did not want to fight but after what he had said, I could not just give in either.

"'A little' what? Desperate for skinship?"

That offended me. "What do you think of us, Hyung? Changmin Hyung and I… We are in a relationship. What we do with each other has nothing to do with you."

"It has everything to do with me. It concerns all of S.T.A.Y and 04:00 am, if you have been too distracted to notice. That place was swarming with cameramen and the media. How could you have done something so thoughtless?"

'Thoughtless'? Do you even know what we were going through? Do you even know what this felt like? Do you know how sorry and guilty I feel to True and Coffee and everyone else who has supported us every time that I see Changmin?

Stop, Jeongwoo. Do not raise your voice. Jaehyeon was just worried.

"We were careful." I took a moment to stop myself from lashing out at him. "We had ensured that we weren't being followed or watched. We had gotten a room to avoid the risk of being walked in on or overheard."

"You're always being watched, Jeongwoo. Even if the media people did not notice, True surely will. Did you think that they wouldn't notice that you weren't there with us during a particular period? Did you think Coffee wouldn't notice that Sunbae wasn't with 04:00 am? It isn't so difficult to put two and two together."

I was at a loss for a response, mostly because there was no logical way to argue with that. So, I just ended up looking away. "We are both men. They won't think too much about it. I can just… come up with an excuse saying that I wasn't feeling well and that Changmin Hyung had come to check on me when he heard about it."

"Excuses…" He shook his head in apprehension. "Why would you put yourself in a situation where you have to think up an excuse? The media people and fans aren't the only ones to be worried about either. You can't blindly trust anyone. What if the woman at the reception had said something to someone? What if other hotel staff had seen you? The CCTV cameras have caught everything up till the room." He walked over while speaking and came to a stop right in front of me. "Even if you both are guys and could make up excuses, you know how these people are. It was too much of a risk. You cannot just throw all caution to the wind and do something so careless."

I could not say anything to that because he had a valid point. Changmin and I had been worried about the same things too. We were scared too. That was why we couldn't bring ourselves to stay there longer even though we had wanted to.

When I did not respond, he calmed down a bit and sighed in exasperation. "That Changmin Sunbae too… Not only you both but all of S.T.A.Y and 04:00 am were at risk. If at all a scandal broke out-"

"If anyone's at fault here, it's me, not Changmin Hyung." I interjected.

"What?" He frowned again.

"I'm the one who got the room and called him. This one's on me." You can't just accuse him of something like this. If anything, he had been properly keeping his distance from me till I called him."

"Changmin Sunbae's the elder one. He should have known better."

"This… is not on him." I said firmly.

He stared at me, unamused. "You love him enough to defend him this much?"

"Yes." What sort of question was that even?

"Ah…" He looked away and let out a shaky breath. "I don't like this."

"What?" 'I don't like this'?

"No." He looked at me again. "You both can just… do whatever you want." He went right back to the mirror and continued to change out of his formal clothes.

My feet had been rooted to the floor by his sudden cold attitude. I could not tell if he was angry at what we did or if he was angry with Changmin or me. We had fought before but we had never let a fight end without a resolution.

This did not feel like a resolution.

Before I could think of what to say to him again, he had disappeared into the bathroom. That was the end of the conversation.

I sat down on my bed and cradled my head in my palms.

Should I really not have done that? Changmin had had no complaints though and it had all worked out in our favour in the end. We really had been careful. While I was well aware of the fact that it was a risky move, nothing had gone wrong. I could understand why Jaehyeon was angry but we had never fought like this before.

I felt absolutely miserable.

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By the time Jaehyeon left the bathroom, Jeongwoo had already changed his clothes and gone to bed. Jaehyeon stood by the bathroom door and watched his roommate. It looked like he had already gone to sleep.

Jaehyeon let out a discreet sigh and walked over to Jeongwoo's bed Halting next to it, he thought back on what had just happened. He had been feeling irritable and on edge ever since the party and he had just gone and taken it all out on Jeongwoo. He felt bad about it but he was also aware of how Jeongwoo was the reason for the bad mood.

"I'm sorry, Jeongwoo-ya." He whispered and smiled helplessly at the sleeping young man.

He could not accept that Jeongwoo had gone off like that with Changmin. It was since that time that he had begun feeling this uneasy and annoyed.

Jaehyeon had gotten jealous, as he had become accustomed to feeling every time that he saw the two of them together. This time, it had been an ugly kind of jealousy- especially so after hearing what they had actually done and where they had actually gone.

'Things got hot and heavy?' 'Desperate for skinship?'

He really should have just shut up. It was evident from Jeongwoo's face that he had hurt and offended him. He had regretted it as soon as he had said it but he was in no state to apologise. At the end, he had just cut the conversation short and walked away without reconciling.

After all, Jaehyeon was supposed to be the closest to Jeongwoo. Changmin had left him and gone ahead. The relationship that Jeongwoo and Jaehyeon had, on-camera and off-camera, was not made what it was overnight. And yet, it felt as though he was losing his place overnight.

The small changes were what had begun really bothering him. There used to be a time when Jeongwoo would have been waiting for Jaehyeon to come out of the bathroom after his bath so that they could watch something together or just talk. Now, Jaehyeon walks out of the bathroom to hear him saying 'I love you' to someone else on the phone and then looking disappointed on seeing Jaehyeon because his conversation had been cut short. The way that he constantly checked his phone in anticipation even if he was in the middle of doing something with Jaehyeon had always pissed him off. But Jaehyeon could not say anything because all that was to be expected. They were lovers, after all.

Lovers.

The night that Jeongwoo had read Changmin's second letter and begun crying, Jaehyeon had been unsure of what to do. When Jeongwoo had admitted to liking Changmin too, he had been unsure of what to say.

Jeongwoo liked a man?

No.

Jeongwoo liked Changmin?

With how the two of them behaved with each other, it really should not have been surprise. In fact, had their interactions been more on-camera than off, as natural as they were with each other, despite being in different bands, they would had been shipped. Jaehyeon would not have come anywhere in the picture.

He knew their history and he knew exactly how much 'Changmin Hyung' meant to Jeongwoo but he had taken for granted that Jeongwoo would continue to look to him and seek comfort from him and stick by him no matter what happened.

All of that had changed though.

While they were still as close as no one else in S.T.A.Y was to Jeongwoo, Jeongwoo's priorities had changed. Even though Jeongwoo was still with him and he was clearly trying to maintain things as they were, Jaehyeon could easily tell what was on his mind. It was painfully evident who Jeongwoo would rather be with in all those moments.

No. Jeongwoo wasn't that kind of a person. Even if he wished that Changmin was with them he would never have wished that Jaehyeon and the others were not there. That was all on Jaehyeon and his senseless jealousy- he was the one who had assumed that Jeongwoo thought so.

He sat down on the bed beside Jeongwoo and placed a hand gingerly on Jeongwoo's head, stroking his hair. He had taken his own time in the bathroom so it was not surprising that Jeongwoo had fallen asleep.

He must have gone to bed feeling really bad.

Jaehyeon was not entirely sure about why he was in such a mess when it came to matters regarding Jeongwoo and Changmin though. The jealousy was obvious but what exactly was he jealous about? That he wasn't getting priority like he used to? That Jeongwoo was almost always a little distracted if they weren't working? That Jeongwoo seemed so happy whenever he was talking to Changmin? That Jaehyeon seemed to have lost his best friend a little bit? Or simply that Jaehyeon seemed not to be Jeongwoo's number one anymore? That he seemed to have lost Jeongwoo to Changmin? No. That he had lost Jeongwoo?

Jaehyeon had really begun playing along with the fans' fancies only for the sake of fan-service. Eventually though, they had both gotten used to the close proximity and display of affection. Jaehyeon had come to even enjoy it. Jeongwoo's reactions had always been too adorable. After a point, it had become natural between them. Even just then, after the fight that they had had, if Jaehyeon just climbed into bed with him and slept, Jeongwoo would not have minded. He would probably protest at first but then he would accept Jaehyeon's apology and go to sleep feeling happy again.

Maybe he could just do that.

But… why? Why was it Changmin?

If he had to come to like someone so much, why could it not have been Jaehyeon? Jaehyeon had never left him ever since they had gotten to know each other. Jaehyeon had never hidden how much he liked Jeongwoo. Although he had never thought about these affections as being romantic per se, if it meant that Jeongwoo would look for him like he looked for Changmin, he would have had no complaints. 'Complaints'? No. He would have liked it. He would have been happy. He had always been looking after Jeongwoo. He would have gladly continued doing it too.

He caught himself in that thought, withdrew his hand and looked away.

Such thoughts were unnecessary. He was merely upset about the fact that his Jeongwoo had someone more important than himself. There was no need to confuse that for being something else.

For everyone's sake.