Chapter Text
Contrary to popular belief, Kim Mingyu hasn’t always hated Jeon Wonwoo.
Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, they were just two kids with a fierce, life-defining, fate-defying friendship. To this day, no one could tell you exactly why or how they started hating each other.
Most seem to write it off as a natural part of growing up: outgrowing old friends and childhood habits.
(Others claim that something went wrong: an incident, a fight. Something so unspeakably terrible they couldn’t come back from it.)
No one knows the exact truth, or the whole story, and the only two people in the world who know would rather swallow glass than be forced to tell it.
Kim Mingyu hasn’t always hated Jeon Wonwoo, but right now, in all his twenty-one years of life, he’s never loathed another human being more.
Wonwoo’s half of the room is a disaster zone. There are stacks of notes, books, and textbooks piled on top of his desk, beside his bed and in small leaning towers of paper in random places on the floor. His gaming rig is a latticework tangle of wires and cords protruding from a power board shoved in the corner under his desk. An indigo blue sweater – Wonwoo’s favourite judging by the amount of time he spends in it – that probably hasn’t been washed in a few weeks lies draped across his desk chair and Mingyu can feel his eye twitching every time he walks past it.
Mingyu’s half of the room is clean, well-organised, tidied to perfection with everything in its right place. He doesn’t know how Wonwoo can lounge in his bed with his stupid Nintendo Switch playing his stupid games when it looks like a miniature cyclone tore through his side of the dorm.
He has a day’s worth of homework to catch up on but he can’t concentrate on anything other than Wonwoo’s dirty laundry dangling from the edges of his bed.
And look, Mingyu can admit he’s not the perfect roommate. He’s loud, distracting, and noisy when Wonwoo needs absolute quiet for reading or studying; he’s clumsy and prone to breaking or dropping or mangling not only his own things but other people’s too. The former, he’s sincerely tried to work on, and the latter is something he’s long made his peace with.
At this point Mingyu’s convinced Wonwoo’s just fucking with him. Which is extremely easy to do, unfortunately, when you’ve known someone your entire life.
Mingyu likes things to be neat; Wonwoo deliberately leaves all his shit lying around because he’s an asshole. Mingyu hates long silences; Wonwoo actively gets off on watching Mingyu wither and die from the lack of attention. Mingyu likes listening to music to lull him to sleep; Wonwoo can’t abide anything but absolute silence.
And so it goes: everything about Mingyu and Wonwoo and the unending war of attrition between them distilled down to the simple, fundamental fact that they can’t fucking stand each other.
“Wonwoo.”
Wonwoo says nothing, as he’s usually wont to do.
Not a good start but Mingyu persists. Take two: “Wonwoo.”
On the third try, Mingyu’s genuine frustration strangles any attempt at patience. “Jeon Wonwoo!”
Wonwoo, at last, looks up. Those dark, indecipherable eyes fixing on Mingyu with the casual disdain he might reserve for a mosquito buzzing in his ear.
“Kim Mingyu,” he drawls, voice low and unamused as his gaze flickers back to his book. “Who are you addressing so informally? Do I have to remind you to call me hyung for the hundredth time?"
That’s another thing Mingyu hates but no amount of burning loathing can change; Wonwoo never used to fuss about informalities like this before. The ten month difference between their birthdays a mere blip in the face of lifelong friendship.
“Wonwoo-hyung.” Mingyu grits his teeth, forcing a smile through the clench of his jaw. “Would you mind cleaning up around here before the weekend? I have friends coming over to hang out and I don’t want them to think I actually enjoy living somewhere in between a hoarder and a homeless person.”
Wonwoo says nothing for a long, long moment and Mingyu almost loses his mind waiting for him to reply. Just as he’s about to open his mouth in another informal outburst, Wonwoo lets out a single, one-note hum.
“Fine.” He flips his book closed, and slides off his bed, grabbing his jacket and backpack before he starts heading to the door. “Guess I’ll be out all weekend. Don’t wait up.”
The sardonic lilt to his voice has Mingyu nearly choking on his scoff. Asshole.
Mingyu gets it. He does. Wonwoo hates him, too. And why wouldn’t he?
They’re incompatible as human beings, let alone roommates. Mingyu hates living with him to the point that he’s sincerely considered transferring altogether and putting an end to this mutually assured suffering. The thought of disrupting his own education and his own life just to get away from Wonwoo — or rather, doing anything that would even remotely benefit Wonwoo — has always put a swift stop to any of these short-lived fantasises.
Just one more year of this. One more year and then they'll be done. Wonwoo graduates in February next year. After that, they’ll never have to see one other ever again. And everything that’s ever transpired between them will be relegated to a distant, faded memory.
Just one year. Twelve more months. That’s all he has to endure.
-----
The trouble with living with someone who you’ve known since you were seven, an age when it was socially acceptable to have only one best friend in the entire world, is that you know more things about them then you’d ever want or need to know.
Mingyu can tell just by looking at Wonwoo’s face and the dark circles beneath his eyes how much sleep he’s had that night. He can tell how much he’s been eating, or not eating, from the sad state of his shelf in the mini fridge and the lack of snacks accumulated on his desk.
In the early months of the purgatory known as their current living arrangements, this was the kind of information he’d use to antagonise Wonwoo on a regular, if not daily, basis.
A typical day would involve waking up, traipsing carelessly around the room as he went about his morning routine, making sure to make as much noise as possible before heading to the gym. Wonwoo’s always been a light sleeper and, well, it’s hardly Mingyu’s fault if he prefers to sleep in till twelve.
Around dinnertime, or sometimes even lunch if he knew Wonwoo didn’t have class, Mingyu would bring his self-made meal into the room and eat it while Wonwoo studiously pretended that he couldn’t smell the delicious scent of bibimbap or japchae or jajangmyeon wafting over. Sometimes, when Mingyu was feeling particularly evil, he’d make homecooked ramyeon as a midnight snack and eat it while Wonwoo studied into the late hours of the evening.
His antagonism wasn’t always driven by subtle but malicious intent, often it was out of straightforward vengeance. Payback for Wonwoo turning off his alarm the one time he couldn’t wake up for class because he’d gone out drinking the night before. Or refusing to help him get into the dorm all the times Mingyu left his ID card at home. Or gaming disruptively till 3:00am on the nights before Mingyu had morning classes.
It was petty, and immature, and in retrospect, the fleeting gratification he used to get from thinking up new and creative ways to ruin Wonwoo’s day was never worth the way his stomach would twist with a discomfort that felt eerily like guilt.
Mingyu doesn’t have Wonwoo’s cutting wit or razor sharp tongue. He isn’t cut out for cold, detached apathy and nonchalant cruelty. To everyone else but Wonwoo, he’s earnest and easygoing and effortlessly kind. Mingyu likes being someone people want to be around, genuinely enjoys making people happy — being constantly driven by hostility and retribution had made him feel small. Juvenile. Foolish, to let Wonwoo get so deep under his skin when nothing he ever did seemed to affect Wonwoo half as much.
When he sees Wonwoo later that night dumping his bag onto his desk and heading straight for the book he’d left on his bed, Mingyu can’t help but note that the shadows outlining his eyes look a little darker, a little heavier.
“You look tired,” he says, apropos of nothing into the still, silent air.
Wonwoo blinks, slowly as if he’s surprised to even hear Mingyu speak, before his brows lower, gathering in the centre like a seam pulled too tight.
“Excuse me?”
Mingyu falters, the words stumbling at the tip of his tongue when he sees how quickly Wonwoo’s face changes.
“I was. I was just saying...” He holds Wonwoo’s gaze knowing the moment he glances away he’s lost any foothold he has in this conversation. “You look tired.” More than tired, exhausted. “Hyung,” Mingyu tacks on as an afterthought.
Wonwoo’s eyes narrow, the angular slant of his eyes even more intimidating running parallel to the press of his lips in a flat line.
“And?” Okay. So, they’re onto monosyllabic answers now. Wonwoo’s speciality.
“Nothing. Just seems like you haven’t been getting enough sleep is all.” Mingyu hazards a guess that it has something to with the assessments piling up now that Wonwoo’s in his final year and the workload has almost doubled.
“I would be, if someone wasn’t always stomping around blasting their awful music first thing in the morning,” Wonwoo snaps, the first real slip of something like heat in his voice.
Mingyu arches a single brow, biting his tongue against the urge to snap back. “I haven’t done that in ages, hyung. If you’re not sleeping well it’s not because of anything I’m doing.”
“And what would you call interrogating me about my sleeping patterns?” Wonwoo’s anger reveals itself in shades of subtlety – nearly imperceptible to the naked eye unless you truly know him. Everything up until his breaking point is a distant, simmering rage no less deadly for its restraint. “As if it’s not hard enough trying to get through the day knowing I have to wake up to this every single morning.”
This, Wonwoo spits, like it’s some sort of curse. This, by which he means you.
Mingyu tenses against the chill of Wonwoo’s eyes, shrinking slightly at the unexpected bitterness he sees there. He’s seen every hint of frustration, annoyance and disgust in those eyes but the exhaustion that colours Wonwoo’s face, sunken in the unreadable black of his eyes is new, and alarming, and it makes Mingyu feel lower than actual dirt. As if maybe he really is partially responsible for Wonwoo’s current state.
In the first moment of clear-eyed sanity he’s had since Wonwoo stepped inside the room, he surrenders his ill-conceived crusade. Not that there was much to give up in the first place.
“Whatever,” he mutters. “I’m sorry I asked. I’ll go back to being unbearable to live with just by daring to breathe.”
Wonwoo doesn’t even deign to answer. Which serves Mingyu right for even trying. What did he think Wonwoo was going to say? Was he really expecting Wonwoo to stop and suddenly bare all the stress and anxiety plaguing him to the last person in the world who he’d want to help him?
Of course not. Mingyu swallows, balling up the twisting feeling in his stomach that his body keeps wanting to misinterpret as hurt and shoving it deep, deep down where he can’t be disturbed by it.
He brushes off Wonwoo’s coldness, and cold tone, and cold eyes, and slips into bed, tugging the covers over himself and turning away from Wonwoo’s side of the room to face the wall.
Why does he care if Wonwoo’s sleeping well or not? It’s probably just Wonwoo's conscience keeping him awake at night as penitence for being such a dick all the time anyway.
Whatever. It’s nothing. He doesn’t care. Not even in the slightest.
-----
“I can’t believe it’s been over a year and you two are really still going at it.” Minghao, to his credit, sounds mostly sincere in his disbelief. Granted, he also only moved to Seoul eight months ago, a whole two months before Mingyu and Wonwoo became roommates and this whole vendetta began.
Mingyu rolls his eyes, shoving a whole kimbap roll into his mouth a little more aggressively than necessary.
“What do you mean you can’t believe it? He’s my literal arch-nemesis. We’re destined to hate each other for the rest of time. Or until one of us murders the other in his sleep. Whichever comes first.”
Seokmin snorts, swallowing around his mouthful of noodles before speaking. “Talk with your mouth shut, you heathen. And Minghao, you weren’t here for the beginning of the end. You should’ve seen them back when it first started. I honestly thought you guys were either going to burn down your building or get kicked out before you made it to the end of the year.”
“Well, not going to lie, it has occurred to me once or twice. Arson’s a hard bet, but it’s probably also Wonwoo’s number one weakness given that all he does is surround himself with books and paper.”
Wonwoo would probably even cry. God knows the only things he’s ever really loved are his precious books.
“Isn’t he in his final year? He’s graduating soon, right?” Minghao easily brushes off Mingyu’s criminal proposition; he and Seokmin have heard him threaten to do as much at least once a week ever since he moved in with Wonwoo.
“Just one more year. One more year and then I never have to see that bastard again.” Mingyu hisses triumphantly, punctuating bastard with a particularly harsh jab into another kimbap roll that disintegrates under the force of his chopsticks.
“You’re really going to let things end like this then, huh? No making peace, no olive branch?” Trust Seokmin to try and find the non-existent silver lining. He wouldn’t understand, he hasn’t spent the last twelve months enduring the absolute worst of human agony that is Jeon Wonwoo.
“You don’t get it, Seokminie. There is no making peace. Wonwoo would never stoop so low. And even if I did, what would be the point? Two more semesters and then he’s gone. He’ll graduate, find a job, and we will literally never have to see each other again.
“Pfft, sure." Sekomin scoffs. "What about Seungcheol-hyung and Jihoon-hyung? Soonyoungie-hyung? Did you forget you two actually have a ton of mutual friends?”
Unfortunately, Seokmin has a point. Sometimes Mingyu forgets just how many mutual friends they have. With how much time Wonwoo spends inside their room it’s a wonder he has any friends at all.
It’s not that Mingyu resents that Wonwoo happens to know nearly all of Mingyu’s friends and sunbaes at uni, but his life these past few years would’ve been a hell of a lot easier if he didn’t have to share his immediate circle of friends with the bane of his existence.
“No, I didn’t. But that’s different. Seungcheol-hyung’s graduated. He’s got, y’know, a real-life job and Woozi-hyung and Hoshi-hyung will soon, too. We’ll only ever have to see each other at parties or performances and I’ve gotten years of practice at avoiding him in public.”
Seokmin levels him with a considering look, his usual bright-eyed expression tempered into something more solemn in his teasing. “Have you ever thought about how much energy you actively put into avoiding him? You spend more time talking and thinking about how much you hate Wonwoo than anything else you do.”
Mingyu splutters, disbelief warring with rage at the insinuation he’d go out of his way to talk about Wonwoo. “Because ruining my life is all he ever does! Do you know how easy everything would be if it weren’t for Wonwoo?!”
“Easy, but boring. Admit it, Kim Mingyu. Your life would be dry as hell without that guy. When was the last time you even went out on a date, huh? Gotten laid?” Minghao lifts his brows, crooked smirk taunting Mingyu.
“Shut up! That’s – that’s irrelevant! And what the hell does me getting laid have to do with Wonwoo constantly trying to destroy my happiness?”
“I’m just saying, maybe you two need to grow the fuck up, get over yourselves and fuck it out.
At this, Mingyu promptly chokes on his half-chewed kimbap. Seokmin reaches over to thump sympathetically on his back until he can breathe again.
Minghao shrugs, entirely unbothered. “It’s not healthy, but it works.”
“Wow. Wow. I can’t believe you just implied I should have — that I should—!” Mingyu coughs again, fumbling for his cup of water and downing the rest of it before continuing. “I can’t believe you’re suggesting that I should engage in sexual relations with Wonwoo.”
“You can say 'fucking', Mingyu.” Minghao says, like he’s some bona fide expert on the matter. “Technically, the official term is hate sex.”
Seokmin bursts into laughter, throwing his head back with sheer, high-pitched glee.
Mingyu hates everyone sitting at this table. He’s too stunned, and still recovering from his near-death experience, to speak.
“I’m talking purely last resort here,” Minghao demures. “You’ve tried everything from retaliation to outright war. And we all remember how that went down.”
Ah, yes. The three weeks of hell in the second month of Mingyu and Wonwoo living together, otherwise known as the Battle of Gwanaksa, the three-week long prank war Mingyu and Wonwoo had waged till Mingyu had nearly broken an arm climbing the outside of the building trying to stage a prank on their seventh-floor room.
Mingyu still has nightmares every time he sees tangsuyuk, and clowns. Wonwoo, unfortunately, had looked as characteristically handsome as ever even with his hair dyed acid green.
“Just saying. Sometimes you’ve gotta’ get dicked down to get closure. Might even help you two get over whatever unfinished business is lingering between you.”
Seokmin’s laughter trails off, the abrupt quiet stretching taut as Mingyu snaps his mouth shut.
Mingyu’s an open book when it comes to his life, his problems and his insecurities. The one thing he’s never talked about, the one thing that can get him to shut down and clam up is talking about before. This is the one thing about him that's always been off-limits.
“Anyway. Minghao’s right, but not about the enemies-with-benefits thing.” Seokmin, ever the peacemaker, smooths things over with a wave of his hand and a sunny smile. “You do need to get out more, Gyu. A distraction would do you some good.
“Don’t think you’re excused, I can hate you both equally. And I do get out! The art department’s always having parties, and when exactly I am supposed to have time for dating in between classes, society events, and all the extra training for the upcoming season?”
Seokmin just laughs, clapping Mingyu on the shoulder. “C’mon, Mr. Football Superstar, you can make time. What’s the point of being so tall and so handsome if you can’t get laid? Besides, you’ll have Minghao and I as your wingmen this Saturday at the Arts Society party. Aren’t you lucky?”
Seokmin locks eyes with Minghao, shooting him a cocky finger gun as Minghao sends him back a wink.
Mingyu groans, his head falling onto the table with a loud, defeated thump. “If Wonwoo doesn’t kill me first I really am going to end up dying alone.”
-----
So, apparently Mingyu shouldn’t have said that thing about Wonwoo and murder because as with most things in his life related to Wonwoo, the worst is always yet to come.
It’s Saturday night, Mingyu’s just spent ten minutes fumbling with the lock and he doesn’t even bother to flip the switch on when he stumbles in through the door, at last. His first mistake, of many.
Minghao and Seokmin, true to their word, had spent most of the evening attempting to set Mingyu up with a string of increasingly terrible and embarrassing pick-up attempts. Mingyu had spent most of the night reaching for the closest bottle of soju to drown his humiliation in. Luckily for him, most of the people dragged into Minghao and Seokmin’s antics had been good-natured enough, and nearly as drunk as them, to play along.
Which, of course, had led to a round of shots. And then an impromptu dance-off between Minghao and Seokmin. More shots. Mingyu lost his shirt at some point (or was it stolen? The details are a little fuzzy after the third hour in), and had nearly broken some poor guy’s face when he tried to hype them up in the final round’s death match when he’d tried to high-five Seokmin who was shaking his ass beside him.
The world around him is still spinning as he staggers blindly over his own feet. Mingyu struggles enough with gravity when he’s sober; a drunken Mingyu is a disaster with too-long arms and legs he never learned quite how to control after puberty hit and ran a homerun.
His knee slams into the corner of a bedframe, curses flying from his mouth as he doubles over, clutching at his leg with both flailing hands. The sudden, wild movement slams him off balance and he’s sent toppling, his hands scrabbling frantically to find for something to right himself at the last second.
The sound that comes from somewhere beneath him is immediate, and chilling, like the thinnest part of a bone shattering under pressure. Its barely a sound in the silence but inside Mingyu’s own head, the reverberations are deafening enough to drown out the shallow rushing of blood in his eardrums.
Crack.
Wonwoo’s glasses. The glasses he usually never goes anywhere without, the ones he physically can’t live without. The glasses that were a graduation gift from his dad. Mingyu only knows about them because his mom had commented on how handsome Wonwoo looked in the photos Wonwoo’s mom had proudly shown her.
Mingyu approaches the glasses like he’s trespassing onto a crime scene, stepping across the yellow police tape onto invaluable evidence.
The glass spider webs out from the site of impact like a bullet hole. The worst damage, though, is reserved for the clean break in the bridge. The delicate titanium snapped in a jagged edge.
His hand is trembling as he reaches out to brush his fingertips across the shattered glass, the severed metal.
He is so, so irrevocably fucked.
This is it. This is truly how he dies.
The next ten minutes pass in a haze of shock, the details blurry and obscure when Mingyu tries to recall them. He’s managed to tuck the two broken pieces of the glasses into a cradle of tissues. A quick Naver search of the brand name on the case had revealed that this particular pair of Pez Verde glasses retail for 225,000 won.
More money than Mingyu could ever dream of scrounging up on such short notice, even if he dipped into the meagre savings he has left over from his old part-time job.
mingyu
you wouldn’t happen to have 200,000 won lying around right
seokminie
dude what the fuck
what the fuck did you do?????
200,000 won???? ARE YOU IN DEBT
TO THE YAKUZA OR SOMETHING
oh my god are you going to die
they’re going to kill you when you can’t pay it back
or they’ll take you and sell your ass to some creepy old rich guy oh my gOD
mingyu
no omg no yakuza but YES I AM SERIOUSLY FUCKED
seokminie
i can’t believe they’re going to auction you off to some creepy old man to pay off your debt
mingyu
they probably will considering i broke wonwoo’s glasses
seokminie
holy shit you were better off selling your body to the creepy old men
mingyu
i know im fucked
HENCE WHY I NEED 200,000 WON
maybe i should sell my body
fuck
seokminie
oh gyu :(((((((((
i have it on v. reliable authority that ppl would pay good $$$$ for those killer abs and pretty face tho
mingyu
im so fucking dead
-----
The awful thing is, Wonwoo, true to his word, had cleaned before Saturday night. Mingyu had opened the door, braced like a rubber brand with his breath coiled in his throat, only to find the whole room sparkling and spotlessly clean. To a suspicious degree, even. He’d never given Wonwoo’s bookshelf a second glance in the past but he could’ve almost sworn it looked like Wonwoo had dusted.
And then Minghao had shoved a bottle of beer in his hands for the night’s first round of pre-drinks and Mingyu had forgotten all about Wonwoo and where the hell he could have found a duster on such short notice, and that had been that.
Mingyu wakes the next day to a pounding headache, a perfectly tidied room, and the aftertaste of regret on his tongue he can’t even attribute to drinking too much.
Wading through his memory of last night’s events is like pulling apart cotton candy only to feel it dissolve on his fingertips. With a sigh, he begins to pull himself reluctantly up onto his feet to find water and attempt a semblance of being a functioning human being. The sharp, unexpected pain in his knee jolts all the way through him like a spark of static electricity magnified throughout his whole body.
Oh, fuck.
Wonwoo’s glasses.
Panicked, he surges over to Wonwoo’s desk where he’d left them in their makeshift stretcher only to find they’re not there. There’s just Wonwoo’s lamp, and a small stack of books and papers straightened into a perfectly neat pile.
Fuck. Fuck. This is bad. This is apocalyptic levels of bad.
The glasses being gone and Wonwoo being gone, also — both the glasses and Wonwoo being gone can only mean one thing.
Wonwoo’s seen the glasses, broken, and knows Mingyu did it.
Mingyu’s heart stops, the blood in his veins freezing solid. Wonwoo is — Wonwoo is literally going to kill him. He’s probably somewhere at this very moment plotting his elaborate murder. He’d get away with it, too, with all the books he reads. Non-fiction books, because only Jeon Wonwoo’s still reading non-fiction books in this day and age as a source of personal pleasure.
He’d know exactly how to kill Mingyu and get away with it. They’ll never even find Mingyu’s body. And even if they did and could pin it on Wonwoo, he’d have the ultimate defence — an insanity plea. He’d claim that Mingyu drove him to it, that this — this was the straw that broke the camel’s back and finally did him in.
A wild, feverish laugh tears out of him. It's more a knee-jerk reaction of distress and astonishment than genuine laughter. Mingyu’s always owned up to the fact that he’s the clumsiest person over six feet that ever lived but he never thought having a habit of breaking things was going to one day lead to his demise.
He decides very quickly, in this one moment, that if this is really going to be his last day on earth, he’s not going to spend it in this room waiting for death. Mingyu grabs his phone, ignoring the shaking of his hands, and makes a run for it.
-----
He’s not in the mood to commiserate about his impending fate with anyone, and doing anything else right now when all he can think about is the broken glasses and how Wonwoo’s terrifying, cold face will be the last thing he sees before he dies seems futile. So Mingyu does the only thing he can do: he cooks.
Cooking is really the only activity he can do regardless of what mood he’s in. It’s calming when he needs it to be, soothing and quiet for when he needs a distraction, but it’s also fun and invigorating. Learning new recipes, trying out interesting combinations of ingredients and techniques. Cooking always feels a bit like coming home to him.
The scent of spice, ginger and onions mingling in the air in swirls of steam sends a thrill of warmth through his body, melting the tension in his muscles and letting him breathe with impunity. Combined with the smell and sound of sizzling meat, the promise of delicious food unwinds the anxiousness locked in his shoulders and chest. Unwinding from a long, exhausting day or week or month, in a kitchen surrounded by good food that he made himself, is probably one of his favourite things to do in the world.
If this really is the last thing he gets to do in this world, then there’s still a tiny chance he could die without any lingering regret.
Mingyu plates up the food, adding a sprinkle of chives to garnish. The delicious smells, as always, have attracted a small crowd of hungry vultures and Mingyu leaves them the leftovers to fight over, batting away their cries of gratitude with a boyish grin.
After a year of living in the dorms and being one of, if not the only, undergrad who can cook in a building of hundreds, he’s learned his lesson. Better to make a little extra and adjust his ingredients than to endure a trail of starving faces as he makes the long trek back to his room.
When he gets to dorm room no. 782, he pauses, staring at the closed door with a mixture of dread and helplessness. Without any hands to properly knock, his only remaining option is to head butt the door. Of course, slamming his head repeatedly against a solid surface also seems entirely too appropriate for his current situation.
There’s no answer, which is to be expected, but Mingyu can’t stand here with these plates in his hands all day so he tries again. Mid-head butt on this third try the door swings open.
Wonwoo’s standing there slightly bleary-eyed, in sweatpants, and with a blank look on his face that makes Mingyu want to sink right through the floor just seeing it.
“…What the fuck is this?”
“Um.” Mingyu starts, panic and terror rendering him mute, and concise. “Food.”
Wonwoo arches a single, dark eyebrow.
“Food. For you.” Mingyu mumbles, suddenly less confident than he was when he first came up with this ridiculous, ill-conceived idea. What the fuck was he thinking? “To eat.”
Wonwoo gives him a long, wordless look. He turns, leaving the door open without a reply.
Well, at least he didn’t slam the door in his face. Small mercies.
Mingyu trails after him, feeling very much like a bad pet awaiting a scolding. He sets the plates down awkwardly on Wonwoo’s desk, wincing at the slight clatter they make against the surface of the table.
“I. Um.” He bites his lip, hard enough to leave an imprint. What, exactly, is he supposed to say? Sorry, my clumsy, drunken ass broke your glasses. I know you hate my guts and everything about me but here’s some food I made that you’ll just have to trust isn’t poisoned?
“It’s ramyeon. And bulgogi. Nothing fancy but I… uh, made it the way you like. Or liked. It’s — you probably ate already, though. It’s cool. It’s fine. You, uh, you don’t have to eat it—” Mingyu reaches back down to clear the plates away, cursing himself for doing this so impulsively when it’s probably only served to piss Wonwoo off more.
“Leave it.”
“W-What?” Mingyu stiffens, head tilting slowly to gape at Wonwoo.
“I haven’t eaten yet. It’s only seven o’clock.” Wonwoo moves towards Mingyu, and Mingyu startles into action, leaping back almost half a foot in the limited space of their room to let Wonwoo sit at his desk.
“Uh, r-right! Right. Um — okay. That’s — that’s good!”
Wonwoo stares at the food, expression imperceptible as always. He doesn’t look angry, or disgusted, though, which is a good sign.
“Oh! Here.” Mingyu reaches into his pocket, taking out a pair of takeaway chopsticks still in their sleeve.
Wonwoo takes them, sliding them out and snapping them with a quick, efficient flick of the wrist. He has his chopsticks poised over the ramyeon, seemingly prepared to begin eating, before he turns to shoot Mingyu a look.
“Are you going to stare at me the whole time?” Wonwoo asks, voice level, nearly monotone. It’s not teasing, or accusatory, or anything. Just Wonwoo being Wonwoo in his usual Wonwoo-esque tone. Mingyu flusters, taking another step back before deciding to scurry over to the farthest corner of his bed, long legs tucked in front of him and his arms bracketed protectively over the top.
Mingyu fixes his gaze pointedly on the floor as Wonwoo begins to eat, and for some ungodly reason he can feel a bashful smile twitching at his mouth. After twenty seconds or so, he’s feeling brave enough to sneak a glance. Hesitantly, he lifts his eyes to peer at Wonwoo from a lowered angle only to find Wonwoo gazing placidly back.
Mingyu chokes, hand flying over his mouth and his eyes flickering rapidly away. He slips his phone out of his pocket to scroll mindlessly through his Instagram feed as a half-hearted distraction.
The next few minutes pass with Wonwoo eating, slurping down the ramyeon and taking bites of the slow-cooked beef. Mingyu takes to staring at the ceiling and the wall when he isn’t trying to steal looks at Wonwoo to gauge his reaction, his current mood, his face.
Wonwoo startles him, again, when he speaks up.
“If this is about the glasses, you really didn’t have to.”
Fuck. The peace was nice while it lasted. Maybe this show of goodwill means Wonwoo will make it quick and merciful.
“It is about the glasses, and yeah, I do. I broke them.” Mingyu exhales, running a hand through his hair, frustration at himself and the situation he can only blame on his own clumsiness rising. “I-It was an accident but I still broke them. And I’m really sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t say anything earlier and that you had to find out yourself. I was… I was drunk. I’m sorry. I would’ve told you straight away but I kinda fell asleep.”
Wonwoo doesn’t say anything, but he’s looking at Mingyu now which must mean something other than him planning cold-blooded murder.
“You were drunk.”
“Y-Yeah. I… Well, you know how clumsy I am when I’m not drunk. I’m sorry, again. Fuck.” Mingyu shrinks a little on himself, feeling very small and useless in his shame. “All I can do is say sorry, but I I really am. I’m so sorry. I just I’m so fucking stupid.”
“That’s a shitty apology.”
Mingyu’s stomach drops like it’s plummeting from a fifty-foot height, and he can only imagine something similar is echoed on his face, too.
“I-I know. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t—”
“No.” Wonwoo says, eyes settling on Mingyu. “I meant the part that involved you calling yourself stupid. You’re not.”
Mingyu opens his mouth, and then shuts it promptly.
“Clumsier than should be humanly possible, yes.” Wonwoo clarifies. “But not stupid. Don’t talk about yourself like that.” And just as easily as he’d started, he goes quiet again, returning to his food, leaving Mingyu wide-eyed and stunned silent.
“...What?!” Silences with Mingyu never tend to last long. “This coming from the guy who’d happily take any invitation to insult my intelligence and did so on many occasions all throughout last year.”
“That’s different. I’m allowed to say it if it’s warranted.”
“You spell hypocrite wrong one time. One time!” Granted, it was in red paint and splattered across Wonwoo’s bedsheets so if there was ever a moment for Wonwoo to call him out for shitty spelling, that would have been i.t
“Still,” Wonwoo says. “It’s not the same thing. Being terrible at spelling and accidentally breaking things doesn’t mean you’re stupid anyway. It was an accident.”
“It—” Mingyu blinks, a feverish look bordering on dangerously, tentatively hopeful lighting up his face. “Wait… You’re not mad?”
“Well, I didn’t say that.” Mingyu’s face crumbles.
A smirk curves across Wonwoo’s, painfully smug. “Although, it would be unfair of me blame you for something you can’t control.”
“God, I really thought you were going to go off at me. I’ve literally spent the past twelve hours living in a state of fear and anxety.”
“Unfortunately, it’s not a crime to be clumsy.” Wonwoo’s still smirking, but something in his expression knocks the tension loose from Mingyu’s chest, and suddenly it’s easier to breathe. To laugh, as he lets out a ragged, incredulous chuckle.
“Shut up.” Mingyu huffs, flopping backwards onto his bed, loose-limbed and deliriously relieved. He’d been expecting an execution and instead all he got was this… strangely sympathetic, bizarrely human, Wonwoo.
“You’re probably right. I think I’m a danger to society. I should be locked away in a room or something for the good of humanity.”
“Probably.” Wonwoo agrees, taking a bite of bulgogi. “But then I wouldn’t be able to eat your sad little home-cooked apology dinner.”
Mingyu buries his face in his pillow, letting a long, drawn-out groan in response before lifting his head so only his eyes peek out from the edge of it.
“I don’t know when I can pay you back, so this is the best I can do for now. I’m sorry. It’s a weak ass compensation, I know.”
“It’s fine, Mingyu. I already said it wasn’t your fault, didn’t I?”
For a reason Mingyu can’t begin to explain, at least not now, all it takes is Wonwoo saying his name to make him fall still. Chest falling and then rising as the beat of quiet passes and all Mingyu can hear is Wonwoo chewing softly.
“I guess. But still. I want to pay you back, and this is all I’ve got so… so shut up and take it.”
“What, are you going to force-feed me if I refuse?”
“Don’t test me, hyung. I’m stronger than you, remember?” Mingyu taunts, the beginnings of a self-assured smile hinted on his lips.
“When are you going to learn that brains always beat brawn? You’d think for someone who works out so much you’d spend a little more time on the muscles in your brain.”
Mingyu rolls his eyes, sinking his chin on top of his hands with a snort. “Whatever. Eat up, hyung. Your skinny ass needs all the help it can get.”
“Should I be concerned?” Wonwoo asks, chopsticks poised in the air with a strip of beef balanced between them.
“What, that I poisoned your food? I’ve thought about it many a time… but no. You’re safe, I swear. I’m not that much of a dick. I wouldn’t break your stuff and then try to poison you, too.”
Wonwoo hums, popping the bulgogi into his mouth with slightly narrowed eyes. Whatever conclusion he’s come to about the possibility of Mingyu poisoning him, the food seems to taste decent enough to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Mingyu watches him for a few minutes, torn between wanting to ask how it tastes, if it’s good, if Wonwoo likes it, and resentment at himself for wanting to know.
He looks at Wonwoo, taking in his dark hair with the few, messy strands sticking up from where he runs his hand through it, his long, thin fingers curled around the wooden chopsticks, the slight shadow cast by the lamplight across his straight nose and firm jaw. He can’t remember the last time either of them were close enough to each other to notice these things. Before, when they were at each other’s throats all the time, he was too busy plotting ways to permanently knock Wonwoo’s smirk off his face and wondering how his hair would look with frosted tips and a chunk missing from his bangs.
After their war had simmered to a more manageable hostility, all they ever saw of each other were closed doors and empty rooms, the absences carved out by hollow attrition — anything to evade the torture of enduring the other’s presence.
Right now, watching Wonwoo eat the food he’s spent the last few hours making, he’s struck by a nostalgia so strong it threatens to knock the breath loose from his teeth. It turns the warmth and light-heartedness of the moment, the warmth of feeling full just watching Wonwoo eat, cold in his stomach with a sickening churn of nausea.
He pulls himself to his feet, muttering something about needing to take a shower and disappears from the room without waiting for Wonwoo to say anything.
-----
Mingyu cooks for Wonwoo every other spare moment he has for the next week and a half. It’s part of a deal he makes with himself, feeding Wonwoo in exchange for the broken glasses he has no way of repaying.
Minghao gives him an odd, almost knowing look the first time he mentions heading back early one evening to the dorms to make dinner.
“You’re cooking dinner. For Wonwoo? What the fuck, bro, have you lost your mind?”
Logically, he probably has just as a by-product of spending so much time in close proximity with Wonwoo. But that’s beside the point.
“It’s to repay him, asshole, for breaking his glasses. Don’t get any ideas.”
Minghao simply stares, and Mingyu tries not to shrink under his all-too perceptive eyes.
“Alright, whatever you say.” Minghao shrugs, crooked smile already angling on his lips as he turns to leave. “Have fun with dinner, Housewife Min.”
He’s out of swinging distance so Mingyu lets him leave, scowling at his back.
Wonwoo’s an easy person to cook for. He doesn’t eat much on a usual basis unless reminded, usually by Soonyoung or Jun, but he’ll finish what’s put in front of him as long as it’s not seafood.
For a twenty-something year old university student, Mingyu knows he has a pretty impressive repertoire of cooking skills. Within a week, he manages to make over a dozen different dishes, something new every time he shows up at their door beaming in spite of himself.
A strange impasse has been struck between them, seemingly without them even realising it. In Mingyu’s mind, the whole week or so Mingyu’s been cooking for Wonwoo, he’s been working off a debt. This isn’t an act of kindness or sincerity, merely compensation for his little accident. Still, the fact remains that their long-standing war has lost its spark. What used to ignite fire and wrath between them has faded into dying embers, still hot to the touch but by now, all but harmless.
It’s a sign, Mingyu thinks, of a belated truce. Or maybe, in the end, they just got bored, stalemated, and deadlocked like they were. With Wonwoo’s graduation looming on the horizon and Mingyu’s various society events and sporting commitments, neither of them really have time anymore to play the same old childish war games.
Wonwoo’s sprawled at his desk gaming one night, bursting into random shouts and yells every now and then for his enemies to die or his allies to give him cover. If this were last year, Mingyu would be plotting ways to cut his electrical cords up or arrange for his laptop charger to go missing.
Wonwoo’s been stuck using contacts since the incident with the glasses, however, and Mingyu can see him rubbing at his temples every so often from the headaches he gets when wearing them for long periods of time.
Instead of his customary annoyance, Mingyu just feels slightly guilty. It’s nearing midnight so the common area should be empty anyway; it’s a perfect time for a midnight snack. Besides, Mingyu could make ramyeon with his eyes closed, or blindfolded, or in his sleep. It’s nothing to heat a pot of water, fry up some slices of bacon, and crack an egg over cooked noodles.
When he returns, sliding the bowl onto Wonwoo’s desk beside his laptop, Wonwooo looks up with evident surprise. He shoves his headphones back from his ears with a hand.
“You didn’t have to do this,” Wonwoo says, the disbelief apparent in his voice, too.
Mingyu shrugs, violently crushing the bashfulness threatening to warm his cheeks. “Eh, it’s nothing. I was hungry anyway so I thought… y’know, why not.” He sits at his own desk and starts eating from his own ramyeon, a clear out for Wonwoo to return to his game.
“Thank you, Mingyu.”
Mingyu lifts his gaze to find Wonwoo looking back at him with a strange expression. Mingyu clears his throat, blinking away and digging into his food.
“It’s cool, whatever, you’re welcome.” Mingyu says, slurring around a mouthful of noodles. “I only did it so you’d shut up for a while and stop yelling so much about your game.”
Usually, speaking with his mouth full would prompt some sort of wrinkled disgust from Wonwoo. Wonwoo doesn’t say anything, just lets a small, indecipherable smile lift at the corners of his mouth.
“Ah, I’m sorry about the noise. I’ll eat it well.”
Mingyu steadfastly does not choke on his food. Wonwoo doesn’t do apologies either, but this is also the first time Mingyu’s ever made midnight ramyeon for him so it’s a night for firsts, apparently.
Wonwoo’s quieter for the rest of the evening, voice carefully lowered every time he has to speak.
-----
“Mom, what? No, hang on, it’s loud here, hang on a second,” Mingyu jams his phone between his ear and his shoulder, collecting his books and backpack before heading for his room. The common room is particularly busy on a Friday evening and the usual suspects are sending him dangerous looks like they’re five seconds away from yelling inappropriate things in the background.
“Anyway, what was I saying? Jung Hayoung, you remember her? Her father used to be your paediatrician.”
Mingyu blinks, fighting back the sigh on his lips.
“Uh, yeah, I think? Why, what’s this about?” As if he can’t already guess.
“She’s always been such a pretty girl, don’t you think? Her mother wanted to know what I thought about setting you two up. Of course, I thought it was a wonderful idea.”
He knows his mum means well, he does, but she spends way too much time trying to match-make him the daughter of every friend, co-worker or distant acquaintance she knows.
“I’m insanely busy, Mom. I don’t have time for that kind of thing, remember?”
“I know, I know, but can you blame a mother for trying?”
Mingyu wants to argue but lets her change the topic as she tells him about how his dad’s up for a promotion, general neighbourhood gossip, and the act of rebellion Minseo is trying to test her patience with this week.
He unlocks the door one-handed, phone still pressed to his ear and is distracted for all of three seconds when she starts in on him again.
“Mom, for the last time, no, I haven’t found anyone here either. I don’t have a girlfriend. — What do you mean ‘Why not’?”
Mingyu glances up to find Wonwoo reading, shooting him a look of distress and exasperation as he gestures at his phone. Wonwoo snorts, brows arching wryly before returning to his book.
Mingyu sets his stuff down on his desk in a sprawl of notes and books before pressing the phone to his ear again. “Mom, I swear, you’ll be the first person to know next time a pretty girl decides to look my way,” he drawls sardonically.
Mingyu stretches out on his bed, letting the sound of his mother’s voice fade slightly into the background as he glances over at Wonwoo, his crossed legs, his slender fingers propping the book in his lap open.
“What? Yeah, I’m still roommates with Wonwoo.” A slight frown tugs at his mouth. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Uhuh, I’ll be sure to tell him. Tell Auntie I said hi, too.” He hangs up, chucking the phone down next to him on the bed as he lies there, boneless and vaguely exhausted. Conversations with his mom always feel like a cross between an interrogation and a briefing session.
“Our moms had lunch the other day. Auntie says she hopes you’ve been eating and wearing enough jumpers.” Mingyu smiles teasingly at the reminder, as if he hasn’t just spent the last half an hour or so having every facet of his life fussed over and scrutinised by his own mother.
Wonwoo flicks him a sharp look, not nearly as amused as Mingyu thought he would be.
“Good to know.” Wonwoo snaps his book shut, shifting to stand. “I’ve got work to do in the library.” With that, he grabs his laptop and leaves.
What the hell did Mingyu even say to set him off this time?
-----
The next night, Mingyu makes yukgaejang. Wonwoo’s inexplicable cold shoulder yesterday is forgotten, replaced by the familiar comfort of making food, and the anticipation of Wonwoo eating it.
Mingyu snaps a photo of it to his Instagram story, because there’s no point having cooking skills this good and Instagram-worthy if you can’t use them to make everyone else jealous.
Seokmin sends back a pout, posed cutely with the puppy filter, and a request for leftovers.
Minghao snaps back two snaps captioned on black backgrounds: “FOR A CERTAIN JEON WONWOO HUH”, and “CAUSE THIS IS TOTALLY THE KINDA SHIT U DO WHEN U HATE SOMEONE”.
Mingyu snaps Seokmin a scrunchy-eyed smile and a promise to cook for him next week, and sends Minghao a close-up of his face with a middle finger.
Not that a dozen or so meals are enough to repay the cost of his glasses, but after tonight Mingyu thinks the amount of labour and emotional effort he’s put into cooking is nearly enough to hold him over until he can make some more money working during the holidays. As much as he loves cooking, the grocery bill he’s racked up over the past week and a half has already burned a significant hole through his wallet.
He pushes into their room back first, carrying Wonwoo’s bowl over to his desk only to find there’s no space for it.
Wonwoo has his fingers pressed to the bridge of his nose, a book open beside his laptop scrawled with haphazard notes and entire sections crossed out with dark scribbles.
“Uh, hey.” Mingyu says. “I made dinner.”
His voice sounds timid, even to him, and he hates it. What the fuck does he have to be nervous or hesitant about? It’s not his fault Wonwoo’s always five seconds away from descending into a shitty mood.
“I can leave it here, or… You could — eat it later, I guess?” His words wing up at the end in a question and it makes him want to bite through his tongue.
Ungrateful bastard. He never should’ve done this for him in the first place.
Wonwoo’s jaw tenses, his fingers stiffening, but other than that it’s the only movement he makes, the only indication he’s heard Mingyu at all.
“Alright, well.” Mingyu shifts forwards, moving as if to clear some space on Wonwoo’s desk. He expects Wonwoo to be a cold-blooded asshole; he expects his standoffishness and apathy. It’s nothing he isn’t used to.
“—Would you just leave it, Mingyu?!”
What he doesn’t expect is for Wonwoo’s arm to shoot out, his elbow blocking him from moving any further at the exact wrong second. Mingyu stumbles at the worst moment causing his hand to slip—
The bowl tumbles from his grip, splashing against his hands, legs, and finally the ground. Some of the spray has left little flecks across Wonwoo’s clothes, and notes, and desk. The spicy sauce stains crimson, a little like blood, from where it drips from his fingertips.
“Fuck. Mingyu.”
Amidst the shock reeling through him, all he can think is how the soup is going to stain the carpet and he has no idea how to get yukgaejang out of carpet.
“Mingyu, I didn’t— I didn’t mean to—”
Mingyu inhales, throat shaking with something he doesn’t know how to name right now. Wonwoo stumbles to his feet to grab for the tissues on his bookshelf. Mingyu just stands there, dripping sauce and soup, some noodles clinging to his pants, feeling like the biggest fucking idiot in the world.
Wonwoo had said he wasn’t stupid but Mingyu’s not so sure he was right about that.
Maybe he is stupid. No, there’s no maybe about it. He’s definitely stupid. He’s stupid for thinking that this past week and a half has been anything other than a waste of time. He’s stupid for pretending that this gesture of goodwill has been anything more than wishful, foolish thinking on his part. Above all, he’s stupid for thinking Wonwoo would ever see him as anything more than an inconvenience.
Wonwoo might not hate him the way he used to but Mingyu recoils from the flash of pure aggravation in his eyes like a flinch all the same.
More than all the money and energy and emotional investment he’s wasted, that’s what hurts the most. After all this time, Mingyu hasn’t grown hardened or jaded enough to know he’s fighting for a lost cause.
Wonwoo’s always been sharper than him, more self-aware, less uselessly sentimental. He’s the stupid one still holding out for something more.
For the first time in a long time, Mingyu lets himself feel it.
All the practice he’s had in compartmentalisation, in shutting out the parts of him that want to fall soft, fold weak, with hope.
“Mingyu.”
It feels like forgetting how to breathe, his lungs falling out of sync with the beat of his pulse. Like the heaviness never far from his shoulders, the weight he’s been ignoring for years now is back, has always been here, will always be here, pressing down on his chest, tightening around his throat. The damning crush of it as inexorable as gravity.
He’d almost forgotten how easily Wonwoo could make him feel small.
“Mingyu, wait—”
Mingyu turns, heart burning where it lies shipwrecked in his ribs, and leaves.