Bed of Roses, Chapter Three

[aquariuslover]

Title Bed of Roses
Author: Aquariuslover
Pairings: SungGyu/WooHyun
Rating: R
Genre: Friendship, Love, Humor, Angst
Length: Chaptered
Beta: tahoeturquoise

Summary: WooHyun’s perfect life…his bed of roses is tossed into disarray when SungGyu makes a bold move changing their friendship forever.

A/N: I love comments like a fat kid loves cake, so huge thanks to all that comment. Also thanks to my wonderful Beta. And last but never least…thanks to Amy! I can never thank you enough for always supporting me through all my whims!

Previous Chapters

Things had not gone back to normal, much to WooHyun’s heartbreak. He took little comfort in the fact that he was the only one that seemed to notice that SungGyu was treating him differently. The other members had been relieved when they were told the fight had been over singing techniques, and believed all was well. The managers, even the crafty Geonam, were under the false impression that everything was fine in the Infinite world.


WooHyun knew differently though. He knew that SungGyu spent less time looking at him, their friendly touches were almost absent, and their once glorious hugs were now one armed embraces that ended as soon as they started.

SungGyu never brought up their encounter in the supply closet, the horrible conversation in the van afterwards, or the meltdown in his Japanese hotel room. He did not move out of their shared bedroom, but he was less likely to engage WooHyun in late night conversations now. If WooHyun wanted to talk then he would politely join in, but WooHyun knew the leader’s heart wasn’t in it. SungGyu also did not ask WooHyun if he wanted to exchange bunks on their bed. The two of them usually switched back and forth sharing top and bottom bunks, but since they returned from Japan SungGyu had taken the bottom bunk and not budged.

But the biggest change was that he never crawled into bed with WooHyun when the younger man was restless and sleep evaded him. When they had first moved into their new dorm, sleep had been impossible for WooHyun. He had been used to sleeping on the floor beside SungGyu. Having their own bed had been a reward for all their hard work, but WooHyun had hated it. Sometimes when the pressure was too much, and his body was too tired to sleep…he needed SungGyu nearby to anchor him to reality, and ease his restless mind.

A heavy slap on the back snapped WooHyun back into the world of the living. “Good luck!” a much taller boy told him.

“Good luck to you, too!” WooHyun responded automatically with his trademark friendly smile. You could never have enough friends or acquaintances in this business, WooHyun often told himself.

WooHyun looked around the stadium from where he stood on the track. He was at another idol sports challenge, and about to run the hundred meter dash. The last one had brought in a record number of television viewers, so of course another channel was hosting one of their own now. He didn’t mind. He liked sports. He was good at sports. He looked at his competition along the starting line and was acutely aware he was the shortest by far. Some of them stood a foot taller than him. They looked like they had been grown in a genetics lab. They were the perfect Koreans, with their tall frames and perfectly constructed faces. WooHyun couldn’t help but be jealous. He had always wanted to have plastic surgery himself, but he lacked the funds and his entertainment company refused to pay for any. The CEO irritated WooHyun by his refusal to foot the bill for just a little eye work. It wasn’t like he was asking for a new nose.

WooHyun brushed his envy aside just as the start gun sounded. He took off like a flash after reminding himself of the real prize. Winning would mean celebrating, and celebrating would mean hugging. Wonderful hugs. Not half armed hugs without any feeling behind them, but joyful, happy, warm hugs.

L had gotten third in the high jump earlier and SungGyu had hugged him for nine seconds longer than was appropriate as far as WooHyun was concerned. SungGyu was a hugger though; earlier today he had hugged SungJong for no reason at all, other then for being the maknae. And when WooHyun won the gold prize…no stinking bronze medal, but the gold, then he would be the recipient of just such a hug. He sorely missed being hugged by SungGyu, so he ran with all his heart. He was soon crossing the finish line, while his long legged competitors were still lumbering far behind him.

He didn’t have time to catch his breath, before he was getting jumped on by his members. SungYeol was the first to reach him, holding his hands up, and spazzing like crazy. The others were close behind SungYeol, and just as excited. Hoya was beaming with pride, DongWoo was jumping up and down in excitement, and Sungjong and L were bear hugging him.

WooHyun struggled to recover his breath, between the hugs and the back thumping. Once his brain was fully oxygenated again, he was suddenly aware of a glaring absence. He pushed free of L and Sungjong to look around. Soon other idols were also congratulating him but he barely managed to thank them as he searched the crowd. The leader was nowhere in sight. How could SungGyu not be here? How could he not be here hugging him? How could he not be here celebrating his victory over the genetic marvels of South Korea?

WooHyun managed to grab a hold of DongWoo, who was still celebrating his victory with a weird dance that was only known to DongWoo, and demanded, “Where is SungGyu?”

The confused look on DongWoo’s face let WooHyun know that the older boy was just now becoming aware of their leader’s absence.

“He went over there. He had a phone call,” SungYeol, who WooHyun had not even been aware of, said from beside him, pointing to an area underneath the stands.

WooHyun instantly took off. He tried to control his anger, but he was doing a poor job of it. How could SungGyu ruin his victorious moment? How could he abandon him in his moment of triumph?

He hurried down the path that SungYeol had sent him on. He was going to give SungGyu a piece of his mind. Oh, yes he was. This ignoring him business was going to have to stop. WooHyun was not going to tolerate it anymore.

WooHyun was lucky the passageway underneath the stands were empty, because even he would have had a hard time pretending to be friendly at the moment. He saw SungGyu sitting alone on a bench and stormed forward.

SungGyu was on the phone, and when WooHyun came within hearing range he came to dead stop as he heard a very happy SungGyu say, “I can’t wait.”

“You can’t wait for what?” WooHyun demanded. Something in SungGyu’s tone shot his jealousy up to its maximum level.

SungGyu looked up, alarmed to see the younger man, and WooHyun could tell his hyung had not wanted anybody to hear him. “I have to go,” SungGyu said into the phone, ending the conversation.

“Who was that?”

“Just a friend,” SungGyu said, getting up from the bench. “I haven’t talked to them in a long time. They rarely call, so…I took it. How did the race go?”

“What friend?”

“An old friend,” SungGyu answered, walking up to the obviously distressed younger man. “So, how did you do?”

“I asked you what old friend you were talking to!” WooHyun shouted now, ignoring the leader’s inquires about the race.

“It’s nothing. You don’t know them. Are you going to tell me how you did?”

“I want to know their name!”

SungGyu, who was now standing in front of WooHyun, took a deep breath and answered, “It isn’t any of your business. This friend has nothing to do with Infinite or you.”

“They have something to do with you…you left my race so you could talk to them. You left my race! I deserve to know who they are!”

SungGyu reached up and tousled WooHyun’s hair, deciding to attempt to distract the younger man. “Are you ever going to tell me how you did?”

WooHyun pushed SungGyu away; he was fuming with anger now. “Don’t even act like you care! I guess we were never friends were we? I can’t even ask about your real friends…they are none of my business! I mean if it doesn’t have anything to do with work it isn’t my business!”

“Calm down, you know that isn’t true,” SungGyu said, remaining calm.

WooHyun clenched his fists, wanting to strike SungGyu. He wanted desperately to see the other man react to something…to anything. He was sick of how calm he was, and how he pretended everything was fine. It wasn’t fine, and then WooHyun told him what he really thought. “It was never my friendship you wanted. You wanted…you wanted…we know what you wanted! And now that you know you can’t have it…you don’t care about me. We were never friends! You just wanted to fu-”

The palm of the leader’s right hand was instantly covering WooHyun’s mouth, ending his tirade. The older man warned him, “Calm down. You can not act like this in public. Do you hear me?”

WooHyun swallowed nervously, realizing what he had almost said. SungGyu dropped his hand from WooHyun’s mouth and took him by the hand, pulling him toward the bench and making him sit down. SungGyu sat down beside him, not releasing his hand. “You might think we are alone, but you never know who is listening. Do you understand what I am telling you?”

WooHyun nodded his head.

“I know you are angry with me, and you are right that I should have stayed and watched you run. I just feel uneasy around you lately,” SungGyu whispered at a level only WooHyun could hear.

“Why?” WooHyun asked alarmed, not letting go of SungGyu’s hand.

“I swear, sometimes you are so dense.”

WooHyun frowned. “I don’t want you to be uneasy around me. I want it to go back to like it was between us. I hate this!”

“No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do! I hate half assed hugs! I miss being near you! I miss you looking at me, and I miss…I miss you,” WooHyun whispered to his hyung, barely managing to keep a reign on his stormy emotions.

SungGyu just smiled at his dongsaeng and shook his head. “Like I said, dense.”

“Why am I dense?”

“Because I care… I mean, cared for you more than I should have. You were right to put an end to it, and I have to respect your wishes.”

“I was right?”

“Yes, we have to get used to being just friends. This is what you wanted.”

“I did?”

SungGyu frowned and whispered, completely exasperated, “Do you want to kiss me? Do you want me to kiss you? Do you want to have sex with me?”

“No!” WooHyun exclaimed, standing up quickly, but still not releasing SungGyu’s hand.

SungGyu pulled WooHyun back down beside him. “See, that is where the problem lies. I want to do all those things with you, but I accept that you do not want the same things.”

WooHyun attempted to jerk his hand free of SungGyu unsuccessfully, as he glared at his hyung and spit out the words, “So I was right! You don’t want to be my friend. Our friendship was just you trying-”

“Shut up,” SungGyu snapped, interrupting WooHyun’s fit. “You know that isn’t true. We are friends. You are my best friend. I just need to get over my feelings for you, or learn to control them better. I know you miss me, but I can’t hug you or sleep in the same bed as you. It’s just too hard for me.”

“Oh,” WooHyun said as reality finally dawned on him.

SungGyu flicked WooHyun’s head with his finger. “Just like I said, dense.”

“I still don’t understand why you can’t tell me who was on the phone,” WooHyun complained. Now that he understood better why SungGyu was acting like he was, his mind focused immediately back on the mystery caller.

“Gawd,” SungGyu moaned, letting go of WooHyun’s hand, and covering his face with his hands.

“Why? It’s an innocent question? And what can’t you wait to do?”

SungGyu stood up and looked down at the younger man on the bench, completely exasperated. “You know, when you act like a jealous, territorial lover…it confuses me.”

“What…what!” WooHyun sputtered. “I’m a jealous friend! This is how a jealous friend acts.”

SungGyu shook his head and started walking toward the exit and yelled back at WooHyun, “No, not really.”

“Well…well, I don’t care who you were talking to,” WooHyun yelled as he stood up and hurried to catch up with SungGyu.

SungGyu’s phone went off and the leader reached for it just as WooHyun caught up with him. WooHyun nearly tripped SungGyu as he leaned over to see who was calling, but he quickly saw it was just Geonam, their strictest manager. WooHyun winced hearing the manager yell at SungGyu through the phone. SungGyu was immediately apologetic. “Yes, Hyung…I didn’t know…I will bring him straight there…I had a phone call…he was looking for me…he did…well, that’s great…no, we were talking about other things….yes, I am very sorry…we are on our way now…very sorry.”

SungGyu hung up the phone and slid it back in his pocket. He looked at WooHyun and couldn’t keep from laughing. “You won, you idiot! You didn’t even wait for the award ceremony? You are holding up the filming. You actually won?”

“Yes,” WooHyun answered, remembering his victory.

SungGyu wrapped a single arm around WooHyun’s waist as they walked back to field and gave him a gentle squeeze. “That’s great! You really can run like the wind.”

WooHyun said nothing; his victory now tasted like bitter ashes in his mouth as the warm embrace he had sought so desperately was lost to him. As he walked toward his gold medal with only one of SungGyu’s arms wrapped around him, he couldn’t help feeling like the biggest loser in the entire stadium.

****************

WooHyun, much to the surprise of the other members, had decided to celebrate his victory by cooking for his members. Cooking delicious food, delicious food that would put their always sleepy leader straight to bed. Not an hour after eating, SungGyu had crawled into the bottom bunk and surrendered quickly to sleep.

Then WooHyun just had to wait for the other five members to doze off. Much to his irritation Hoya and SungJong had gotten into a video game challenge that had gone on for hours. By two am, all was quiet in the Infinite dorm and WooHyun finally dared to do what he had been obsessed with doing since he had heard SungGyu on the phone with the mystery caller earlier in the day.

He had pretended that the phone conversation had slipped his mind, since SungGyu had ruffled his feathers by accusing him of acting like a jealous lover, but no such thing had happened. If anything, he had become more determined to find out who the mystery caller was. What couldn’t SungGyu wait for? Who had SungGyu so excited?

WooHyun slithered out of his top bunk without making a sound. He watched SungGyu sleeping for just a moment before snatching the phone that the leader always kept with him. Then he snuck out of their bedroom and into the living room, flipping on a lamp.

He sat down on the couch, turned on SungGyu’s phone and quickly entered in the password, only to discover it had been changed.

“When did you change it?” WooHyun whispered to himself, but felt confident the new one would be easy enough to figure out.

After the seventh attempt he was beginning to sweat. The phone was now making him wait before it would allow him to enter a new password attempt. He couldn’t believe that he had been unable to guess the password. He and SungGyu had lived together for years, shared the same dreams, and breathed the same air. He knew how SungGyu thought. This should not be so hard.

Five minutes passed and he was about to try another password, when he was whacked on the head. “You idiot, he obviously doesn’t want you in it. He isn’t stupid. He isn’t going to use a password that means anything to him. You’re not going to be able to guess it. He probably used something totally random.”

WooHyun looked up at his disrespectful dongsaeng and asked, “But why?”

SungYeol sat down beside WooHyun on the couch. “You tell me. What is going on with you two?”

“Ummm…I don’t know what you are talking about.”

“Bullshit,” SungYeol snapped back at the older boy. “There is obviously something going on between you two. Did you confess to him?”

“What! No!”

“Shhh…stop yelling. You’ll wake the others.”

“I didn’t confess anything! I don’t know what you are talking about,” WooHyun told the taller boy.

SungYeol sighed and explained, “You might be able to fool the other members into thinking your fight in Japan was over singing, but I know differently.”

“Apparently not, because it was just about singing.”

“Liar.”

“He sounded like crap at the concert. I told him so, and he got offended.”

“He didn’t sound like crap, and you know it.”

“Well, on one part he did.”

SungYeol grabbed WooHyun’s hand and looked his hyung in the eye and told him, “I know you two are in love with each other. I’ve known for a long time. You can tell me. I won’t tell anybody.”

WooHyun paled, looked away, and jerked his hand away from SungYeol. “I am not in love with him. You don’t know anything. It’s him that-”

“That what? What did SungGyu do?”

WooHyun shook his head frantically, realizing what he had almost let slip out, “Nothing…he would think you were crazy too. I will tell him what you said, and we will both have a good laugh over it.”

SungYeol ignored WooHyun’s words and studied the older boy, and then summarized the events of the past week, “After our concert, SungGyu pulls you away; you two are missing for a while; the manager goes to find you; the manager returns with SungGyu, but not with you; SungGyu assures us you are on your way, but you never show up. The manager goes and finds you; you don’t say anything in the van; you act like a jerk at the restaurant; you leave the restaurant early after throwing a fit; you go wait in the van; SungGyu goes to talk to you; that night you won’t share a room with SungGyu; you two do not talk that morning; SungGyu’s hair at the radio station was messed up and you didn’t fix it-”

“I’m not in charge of his hair! I’m a singer, not a stylist!” WooHyun said defensively, knowing exactly what SungYeol was referring too. Not being able to fix SungGyu’s hair that day had driven him crazy. He had sighed in relief when SungJong had finally spotted it and fixed their leader’s hair.

SungYeol rolled his eyes at his older hyung, and reminded him, “You pick his boogers when he doesn’t notice them. Can I please finish?”

WooHyun nodded his head, knowing better than to argue with SungYeol…especially when he was right.

“You do not sit together at the airport; you do not sit together on the plane; you never spoke directly to each other; he did not seek you out the entire day…wait, he didn’t reject you…you rejected him.”

WooHyun stared at SungYeol, in awe of the younger man and how he had pieced together the puzzle. “You are scary.”

“I just know you two,” SungYeol answered, looking truly confused. “Why would you reject him?”

WooHyun relented, and just confided in his sharp-minded friend, “Because I’m not gay.”

SungYeol asked with a furrowed brow, “No, really why did you reject him?”

WooHyun elbowed the other man in the side. “I’m not gay! I just want to be friends, but he kept on…and I didn’t like it.”

“He kept doing what?”

“Kissing me and…stuff.”

“What stuff?” SungYeol asked truly curious now.

WooHyun turned red and whispered, “Just stuff, but it went too far, and I had to make myself really clear to him.”

SungYeol, whose mind was still focused on ‘stuff’, asked again, “What kind of stuff.”

“I’m not saying!”

“Did you two have sex?”

“No, we did not…well, not the…the real kind…not the butt kind,” WooHyun explained, growing redder by the second.

SungYeol rolled his eyes, and said in a very condescending voice, “If you are under the illusion that anal sex is the only real sex that two men can have together, I must inform you that you have a very heterosexual mindset. Oral sex is still sex…I mean, how much more intimate can you get? Your dick is in somebody’s mouth. Also, a good hand job can be just as intimate as ramming your cock up somebody’s ass.”

“What are you, some kind of expert in homosexuality?” WooHyun asked, aghast.

“I read a lot,” SungYeol answered, unperturbed. “So did you blow SungGyu…no, you wouldn’t-”

“That’s right, I wouldn’t! Because I’m not gay.”

“No, you would not be the considerate, giving lover in this equation. He’s the more affectionate of the two of you, and you’re definitely a taker. I’m also sure you enjoyed it while it was happening, but then you decided to flip out after you came.”

WooHyun turned away from SungYeol and glared at the opposite wall, and said hatefully, “I don’t like you.”

“Because I am right,” SungYeol said smugly.

WooHyun folded his arms. “Anybody would enjoy…you know…it doesn’t mean I’m gay.”

“No, it doesn’t,” SungYeol conceded. “I just don’t understand why he got mad?”

WooHyun leaned his head back against the couch and admitted, “I handled it really badly. You were right, I did flip out. I said things I shouldn’t have.”

“You said you two had kissed before, did you like it?”

“No,” WooHyun lied. “And I always withdrew from him afterwards, letting him know I wasn’t happy with him.”

SungYeol smiled as another piece of the puzzle fell into place. “Ahh, now I understand, but why did he keep kissing you if you didn’t like it? I mean that just doesn’t seem like something he would do.”

WooHyun closed his eyes and confessed, “I might have liked the kissing a little…when the kissing was occurring. But after it was done and I thought about it…I didn’t like it. You know…he’s my favorite person. I am not gay, but that doesn’t mean I don’t…”

“That you don’t love him?” SungYeol finished.

WooHyun nodded his head. “I love you all, but I have always loved him more. He’s my best friend, and I just didn’t know how to tell him no.”

“So you led him on?”

WooHyun groaned. “Yeah, I think that is exactly what I did.”

“Jerk,” SungYeol muttered under his breath. “I wouldn’t talk to you ever again if I were him.”

“Don’t say that! I didn’t do it on purpose…I just kept pretending that everything was okay. I tried not to think about where it was going…I just liked the attention.”

“Not you…I mean you’re not an attention-seeking whore or anything.”

“Shut up!”

“So, let’s get back to why you are breaking into his phone?”

“I’m not breaking into it.”

“Then what would you call it?”

“I’m merely curious…about who is more important than I am!” WooHyun informed SungYeol with real bitterness in his voice.

SungYeol narrowed his eyes, curious now. “Nobody is more important to SungGyu than you are, unfortunately for SungGyu.”

“Hmmph! If that were true he wouldn’t have snuck off to take a phone call while I was running my race today,” WooHyun informed the younger man as he glared hatefully at the phone in his hand that refused to release its secrets.

“Did you ask him?”

“A million times!”

“What did he say?”

“He wouldn’t tell me! He said it wasn’t any of my business! Can you believe that? He said it wasn’t any of my business,” WooHyun said still finding the thought unbelievable. “None of my business.”

“The gall of him!” SungYeol sarcastically replied.

Sarcasm that was completely lost on WooHyun, who eagerly agreed, “I know!”

“You didn’t act like you had been greatly wronged at dinner though…you were overly nice, if anything,” the other man pointed out to his hyung.

“I had to act like I didn’t care, because he said I was acting like a…”

“Like a what?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Tell me.”

“No.”

“Tell me.”

“No.”

“I am going to start guessing.”

“He said I was acting like a jealous lover,” WooHyun finally admitted. “I wasn’t though! I was acting like a jealous friend. I have a right to know who he was talking to! I wasn’t being unreasonable.”

“No, you weren’t; I mean, how dare he breathe, take a shit, or talk to people without your full knowledge. Who does he think he is?”

“Are you being sarcastic?” WooHyun turned and asked the younger man, suddenly suspicious of how understanding he was being.

“What clued you in?” SungYeol asked with a big smile. “You big jealous lover!”

WooHyun glowered at SungYeol and explained, “My jealousy isn’t like that! It’s just that he has been distant with me lately, and what if he is getting with somebody else! I am thinking of Infinite! The leader of Infinite can’t have a boyfriend.”

“Oh, that is a horrible thought. Oh, wait; he could have a secret boyfriend. Say, if the boyfriend was in the same group with him; shared a room with him; and if, you know, any sign of affection between the two of them was labeled as fan service, thereby making fan girls everywhere titillatingly happy,” SungYeol told WooHyun, not bothering to camouflage his sarcasm now.

“Shut up!”

“Maybe it was just a friend.”

“He would have told me if it was just a friend. He wouldn’t have let me get so riled up over a friend.”

“How do you know it isn’t a girlfriend? He’s been with girls in the past,” SungYeol reminded WooHyun.

WooHyun pondered SungYeol’s words, and frowned as he remembered the MBC Idol championship they had attended. “Do you think it was that bitch, Bora?”

“She’s not a bitch.”

WooHyun stood up and clenched his fists, and said loudly, “They were all cozy! Did you see them? I thought I laid my claim on him, but that bit-”

“Be quiet!” SungYeol hissed as he pulled WooHyun back to the couch. “Oh, you are not jealous at all!”

WooHyun’s breathing had increased substantially by now at the mere thought of SungGyu with somebody else. “He’s mine…my friend…she can’t have him! I put my jacket on him! How stupid is she? He’s mine!”

“You really are bat-shit crazy! If you don’t want him, somebody else is going to want him, and it’s pretty obvious he wants to be wanted. You are going to have to learn to share him.”

WooHyun jumped up from the couch again, proclaiming, “I will not! I will only share him with the rest of the members, not anybody else.”

SungYeol arched his eyebrows and smiled evilly and then asked, “So can I get with him? I like a man who knows how to use his mou-” SungYeol stopped abruptly to cover his mouth to keep from screaming out, after WooHyun kicked him, hard.

“I know you think this is funny…that it is some game, but it isn’t,” WooHyun explained, distressed, as he lay down on the floor, feeling like he was going to faint. “This is my life. I can’t share him. Even thinking about him being with somebody else makes me feel sick. I can’t help that I am like this. I can’t explain it. I don’t want anything to change between us. I love that he loves me…that I’m so important to him.”

“You are really brave to lie down in front of me,” SungYeol hissed at WooHyun, holding his leg where he had been kicked. “I could kick you in the head. Maybe I could kick some sense into you. SungGyu would thank me!”

“He probably would…I know I must drive him crazy. Why can’t we be each other’s essential person, but not be gay? Why can’t we just be like we were before…before he ever kissed me? Why can’t things go back to like they were before?” WooHyun asked, sniffling, trying to control his rapid breathing. “I can’t lose him. It’s like he is drifting away from me, and it’s my fault. I can’t help it if I’m not gay. Why can’t we go back in time?”

SungYeol had mercy on the distraught man on the floor, and said softly, “Because time doesn’t work that way.”

“I don’t want things to change…I hate this so much.”

“WooHyun, you are such a fool. You imagine your life to be some bed of roses; you never remember that roses have thorns; thorns that can prick you.”

WooHyun wiped his eyes, cursing his emotions, and explained the hardest part. “You are wrong. I know what the thorns can do. I feel like I am bleeding on the inside…but it’s not just me. I hurt him. Like, really hurt him. I didn’t mean to say what I did, and I didn’t mean for him to take it the way he did, but I hurt him, just the same.”

“It can’t be helped. You want to stand still in time, and SungGyu wants to move forward. He knows you better than anybody. I am sure he knows you didn’t mean to hurt him,” SungYeol said, trying to soothe the man on the floor.

“I think he knows, he’s always so patient with me. But it doesn’t take away the hurt. I just wish…”

“What do you wish?”

“I wish we could always be together you know, all of us. That we could always live together in a big house, and our whole lives would be spent together, just the seven of us,” WooHyun explained.

A look of sadness crossed SungYeol’s face as he remembered something from years ago, and he whispered, “Don’t wish that, WooHyun…it’s like a jinx to wish such a thing. Before I know it you will be leaving Infinite with Hoya and L, and leaving the rest of us behind.

WooHyun looked up at SungYeol confused. “I would never leave.”

“Never say never.”

“I could never leave the group, but if I can’t live with all of you…I would just live with SungGyu, yeah, that would be nice.”

“But you don’t want SungGyu.”

“I do want him…just not like he wants me. I want us to be best friends forever. We could live together, but if he had to be with somebody…we could marry sisters!” WooHyun explained, suddenly excited as the idea came to him. “Yes, we could marry sisters, and live in the same house. Our kids could always play together! We could be one big family!”

“You would allow SungGyu to marry?” SungYeol asked full of doubt. “That doesn’t seem like you.”

“Not some stupid idol, but we would marry nice sisters…we could have a double wedding,” WooHyun explained.

“I don’t see you ever willingly accepting any wife of his, you would never want him valuing somebody more than you,” SungYeol reminded the older boy. “You would be terribly jealous.”

“He wouldn’t value her more than me.”

“When you have a wife… I think one tends to get attached.”

“We could share.”

“Share?” SungYeol asked a little fearfully, wondering if his hyung had finally gone mad.

WooHyun sat up, clearly excited, and explained. “We could trade off with the wives! We could each have one for a month, and then switch off. That way he wouldn’t get too attached to one.”

SungYeol fell back on the couch, somehow managing to keep from laughing, and said in a deadpan voice, “Oh, that’s a great idea.”

A smiling WooHyun laid back down, still clutching SungGyu’s phone, and agreed, “It really is. That way we will always be first with each other.”