Ship/Member: Wonwoo/Minghao/Junhui
Major Tags: N/A
Additional Tags: Non-famous AU
Permission to remix: Pls ask!
going for rarest pair


***


Junhui entered Wonwoo's bedroom, trailing after Wonwoo like a lost cat.

They had met ten minutes ago. It was Wonwoo’s birthday party, but Soonyoung had organized it, so half the people were dancers and friends of dancers. Wonwoo wasn’t a dancer or a friend of a dancer; he was a graduate student studying playwriting. At least he had been, before something had gone wrong.

“So what are you doing now?” Junhui asked.

“Taking everyone’s coats and stacking them onto the bed,” Wonwoo said, holding up the blue one in his arms that was from a latecomer.

Junhui laughed, startled and delighted at the sarcasm. “No, I mean–”

“I know. I proctor exams.”

Junhui had been very quiet earlier. Right now, though, he was talking fast and laughing often, somewhat nervously. “Sounds helpful. Well, I mean– it’s a necessary job! What kinds of exams?"

“The most recent one was for my former department.”

“Oh!” Junhui’s expression might have been described as intrigued, but that also could’ve just been his wide-eyed casual handsomeness, which made him seem somehow at once utterly unattainable but also only slightly out of reach. “Like an exam about plays?”

“Not exactly– well, from what I could understand, it wasn’t exactly about specific plays.” Now Wonwoo was the nervous one. He sat on the bed next to the coat pile, slowly, like he’d been hypnotized. Junhui stood still for a rare moment, then knelt down on the floor, his face near Wonwoo’s knees. “They were supposed to be writing a paper about a quote from, um, a critic, it was on the development of stage directions, like how the dancing in... wait. This is boring.”

“No, of course not,” Junhui said, smiling. He leaned a little closer. His hand snuck up, curling around Wonwoo’s calf. “And besides, I love listening to people talk. That’s why I came to this. That, and also to dance.”

“Dance." Junhui's hand was very warm. "It’s what you’re studying, right?”

“Right.” Junhui retracted his hand, carded through his caramel colored hair. A few strands stuck up endearingly with static. He put his hand on Wonwoo’s leg again, a little higher. "Will you dance with me sometime?"

"I don't—" His mouth was dry. Junhui's nose bumped his. His breathing was slow, deliberate. He closed his eyes because he wasn't sure what was happening or why. "I don't really—"

“Junhui?”

They sprang apart but not far enough. Someone new was at the bedroom door. He was in a scarf and gloves and had just come in from the snow. He glanced at Wonwoo, then at Junhui.

“You never told me you were going to be here this late,” the newcomer said icily.

“Sorry, Minghao,” Junhui muttered.

This time Minghao looked straight at Wonwoo even as he spoke to Junhui, stonefaced, appraising.

“You have class tomorrow morning. You can’t afford to waste time this late in the year.”

Junhui retracted himself from Wonwoo, from the easy lightness of his being, receding somewhere into his previous quiet and subdued self. He stood before Wonwoo could, but he looked over his shoulder as Minghao led him out, his face baleful.


***


Later Wonwoo was in the bathroom, sitting on the sink and smoking next to the open window, when someone knocked.

“Occupied,” he said.

“It’s Xu Minghao.”

Wonwoo stayed silent.

The voice was strangely insistent when it asked, “Wonwoo? Are you in there?”

“You and Junhui are both still here?”

“I wanted to apologize for earlier.”

Wonwoo gave it a second. Then he sighed, flicked the cigarette out of the window, then hopped off the sink and opened the door a sliver. Minghao poked his head in, looking strangely disheveled compared to half an hour ago. His nose was pink.

“I didn’t know it was your birthday party,” he said.

Wonwoo shrugged. He felt like disappearing even more than usual when Minghao came in, shut the door behind him, stood near. In the moonlight through the window Minghao looked softer than before. Kinder. Wonwoo had seen him a few times before but they’d never talked.

“Happy birthday,” Minghao said.

“Thanks.”

“I heard from Soonyoung you were away last year.”

Wonwoo stiffened. Shrugged.

“I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“I’m glad you’re glad.”

Minghao nodded, uncrossed and recrossed his arms.

“We’ve been together for four years, Junhui and I," he said. "We’re going— we’re going through a rough patch.”

He looked out the open window. He sighed, soft and slow. He didn’t strike Wonwoo as someone who would share something like this apropos of nothing. He seemed to be someone who cared infinitely about appearances, about clean and pretty exits and entrances.

“A rough patch,” Wonwoo repeated.

Minghao nodded a small, tight nod. He was fighting to stay composed. He reminded Wonwoo of one of the conventions of playwriting. It’s more interesting to watch someone try not to fall apart than to watch them fall apart.

“Well, Junhui’s still here.”

“Okay. And?”

“And he wanted to talk to you,” Minghao said, for the first time looking solidly unsure of himself.

“Why?”

“Because he thought you were interesting.”

Wonwoo blinked with genuine surprise.

“Me? He thought— he called me interesting?”

Minghao said nothing, only looked at him for an extra beat. The uncertainty in his eyes blinkered somehow. He opened the door and waited halfway over the threshold.



***



At two, Minghao entered the kitchen to pour himself a drink.

Junhui had been observing Wonwoo clean shotglasses quietly in one corner, talking as if they were alone, describing the final showcase he was preparing for. A little bit ago when the music was still playing he’d twirled around in the living room in his socked feet, looking at Wonwoo ever so often. His face was still flushed from then. The night felt like a dance Wonwoo could have nearly followed if he was the kind of person who didn’t think about things too hard. When Minghao came in the room felt hotter. Lines of tension. A stage.

“Enough about me,” Junhui said loudly.

He bit his lip, smiled. He backed away, jumped on top of the counter, his legs swinging back and forth. Wonwoo was acutely aware of Minghao a few feet away, standing there and pretending he wasn’t listening. Almost everybody had gone home. It was just them. Wonwoo had never been in a situation like this before. It felt messy. It felt, perversely, a little fun. His hands gripped the edge of the wet counter behind him to steady himself.

“Okay. What do you want to know.”

"How old are you turning?"

Wonwoo grimaced. "Older than Chekhov when—"

"Bad question! Never mind. Um, how did you meet Soonyoung?"

"We met when we were both eight. In a talent show. We were inseparable after that, decided to apply to university together and everything."

“Where did you go when you took a break from school?”

Over across the room, Minghao went very still.

Wonwoo did, too, before he shrugged in a violent, awkward jerky motion and smiled.

Junhui immediately knew he’d said the wrong thing. “Um, do you – I mean, were you working on a play? Or– writing something?”

“I wasn't. I haven't written anything in—”

“—sorry. Bad question again, huh. I'm better at this usually." Junhui picked a shotglass up, put it down. Shook his head. "Just– hey, it's your birthday, we should—"

“Yeah,” Wonwoo muttered. “Fuck. It’s my birthday.”

Minghao had come closer to their corner. Something smelled like rubbing alcohol. Wonwoo knew it wasn’t, it was probably just the cheap vodka Soonyoung liked to buy, and Minghao had just made a drink with it, but it smelled like rubbing alcohol. Like a hospital. He knew it wasn’t, he knew it was his own birthday party, he was in his apartment, he was in the kitchen. All the same something gave up in him. He blinked once and he had somehow slid gradually to the ground. His back was against the cabinets.

It was darker down on the floor, and quiet. The smell was gone. He took a deep breath.

“Wonwoo."

He wasn't sure who said it. “Had too much to drink,” he mumbled, but there were tears in his eyes, and he tipped his head back against the cabinet.

In his blurry periphery Junhui slid off the counter, smooth as an animal, and sat down across from him. Their ankles knocked together. Wonwoo looked to his side. Minghao was there, too.

“I think it’s normal to feel this way sometimes,” Junhui said, even though Wonwoo hadn’t said anything about feeling any way at all. “Sometimes I want to give up dancing.”

“I thought you said you loved dancing.”

“Do you love writing?”

Wonwoo wiped his eyes with his sleeve.

“Of course I do.”

Minghao's cold finger touched Wonwoo’s cheek, where the dampness was drying, and stroked back and forth so softly that Wonwoo had to grit his teeth to keep from shivering. Some complicated, prickly, warm understanding and acceptance had filled Minghao's face. Something brushed the side of Wonwoo’s neck. Junhui's lips. A hand on Wonwoo's thigh, a thumb at his mouth, a knee pressing into his waist.

“Tell Junhui one thing you love about it," Minghao said into his ear, soft and sure.

Wonwoo stayed very still and thought about saying, French scenes. You write exits and entrances and tick-tick-tick, everything goes by so beautifully. People come and go and come and go. It gets messy, but not too messy. Everyone has a clean exit. Everybody knows exactly where they need to be and why. I'm running out of time. I'm getting old and I'm running out of time. Maybe we should stay here a little bit longer, the three of us.