"Stop. Please—get off me."
The words came out sharper this time, tangled with a soft, broken sound that made Tae-hyun's chest tighten before he'd even fully registered what he was hearing. He pushed the door open the rest of the way and crossed the room in a few quick steps, kneeling beside the bed.
Min-woo's face was twisted, brows drawn together hard, one hand fisted in the blanket like he was trying to hold something back that wasn't there.
"Hey." Tae-hyun kept his voice low, careful. He set a hand flat against Min-woo's back, rubbing slow, steady circles the way he vaguely remembered someone doing for him once, years ago, after a nightmare he could no longer name. "You're okay. You're safe."
Min-woo's breathing stayed ragged for another moment, chest rising too fast beneath Tae-hyun's palm.
"It's just me," Tae-hyun murmured. "Nobody's here. You're safe."
Slowly—so slowly Tae-hyun almost missed the exact moment it happened—the tension started to bleed out of Min-woo's shoulders. His fisted hand loosened against the blanket. The furrow between his brows smoothed, and his breathing evened out into something closer to actual sleep, deep and quiet.
Tae-hyun stayed crouched there a while longer, hand still resting against his back, watching the rise and fall settle into something peaceful.
He didn't move for a long moment after that either.
*What was that about?*
The question sat heavy in his chest, unanswerable from where he knelt. Min-woo had never mentioned anything—no offhand comments about bad dreams, no visible baggage beyond the easy, teasing exterior he wore like a second skin. Whatever had chased him through his sleep tonight clearly wasn't new. It had sounded practiced, almost. Like a nightmare that had visited before and knew exactly which words to use.
Tae-hyun looked at him for another few seconds, something unreadable pulling at his own expression.
Then he stood, quiet, and told himself it wasn't his business to ask.
He pulled the door mostly shut behind him and went back to his own room, the sound of rain still faint against the windows, and didn't sleep nearly as easily as the man he'd left behind.
---
Jae-min woke to sunlight and silence.
For a moment he just lay there, blinking up at an unfamiliar ceiling, trying to place why Min-woo's room smelled like someone else's cologne. Then the previous night came rushing back all at once—the noodles, the rain, Jihan's voice saying *I'll stay the night*—and Jae-min sat up so fast his head spun.
The apartment was empty.
He padded out into the main room, half-expecting to find Jihan still asleep on the couch, blanket kicked halfway off, but the couch was empty too, neatly made, throw pillow squared exactly the way it had probably never once been squared in the entire time Min-woo had lived here.
On the small kitchen table sat a covered plate—eggs, toast, something that smelled faintly of butter even cold—and beside it, a folded note.
Jae-min picked it up.
*Had an early board meeting come up, couldn't wait to say goodbye properly. Left breakfast, eat before it gets cold. My number's below if you need anything. I'll stop by once the meeting's done.*
Beneath it, a string of digits in familiar, careful handwriting.
Jae-min stared at the note for a long moment, something warm and stupid unfurling in his chest that he immediately tried to shove back down where it belonged.
*This is good,* he told himself. *This is exactly what we wanted.* A reason to text. An open line, offered without having to manufacture a single thing. The plan was working.
He didn't examine too closely why the thought didn't feel as satisfying as it should have.
He ate the breakfast—it was good, annoyingly good, buttery and simple in a way that made him wonder how many people actually knew Jihan could cook—and checked the time once he'd finished.
Past nine.
Min-woo still wasn't back.
*Where are you,* he texted. *You said two hours. It's been way more than two hours.*
No reply came.
He tried again a few minutes later, half-joking. *Did you get kidnapped by the supermarket.*
Still nothing.
Jae-min frowned at his phone, a faint, nagging unease starting to settle under the leftover warmth of Jihan's note, though he told himself it was probably nothing. Min-woo had a habit of losing track of time, getting distracted by whatever was in front of him. It was probably fine.
He set the phone down and tried not to think about it too hard.
---
Across town, Jihan arrived home just after seven, slipping in through the side entrance and heading straight upstairs to change before the meeting.
Tae-hyun caught him in the hallway, still in pajamas, hair a mess, one eyebrow raised in a way that promised trouble.
"Well, well." He leaned against his doorframe, arms crossed. "Sleeping out with a man. Bold choice, hyung."
"It rained," Jihan said flatly, already unbuttoning his shirt as he walked. "I stayed until it cleared."
"Sure." Tae-hyun's grin widened. "And the fact that you look like you actually slept well for once has nothing to do with it."
Jihan paused at his own door, glancing back. "Careful. You're one to talk."
Tae-hyun's grin faltered slightly. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Nothing." Jihan's mouth curved, faint and knowing. "Just that you're not exactly one to lecture anyone about who they let stay the night."
"I don't know what you're—"
"Your guest room," Jihan said, already stepping into his own room. "The one currently occupied."
Tae-hyun's mouth opened, then shut, cheeks going faintly pink before he found his voice again. "That's completely different. He got caught in the rain."
"So did I."
"That's—" Tae-hyun huffed, unable to find the argument fast enough. "Go to your meeting."
Jihan's low laugh carried through the closing door, and Tae-hyun stood in the hallway a moment longer, scowling at nothing in particular before heading back toward the living room.
By the time the front door closed behind Jihan twenty minutes later, Tae-hyun had already settled onto the couch with the television playing something forgettable, sunlight streaming warm through the windows.
He lost track of time somewhere in the middle of the second episode.
It wasn't until he glanced at the clock and realized it was past ten that a small, nagging thought surfaced—Min-woo still hadn't come out of the guest room. Not for breakfast. Not for anything.
Tae-hyun frowned, muted the television, and made his way down the hall.
The door was still cracked from the night before. He knocked lightly against the frame anyway.
"Min-woo?"
No answer.
"You alive in there?" A faint attempt at a joke, though something in his own voice had already started tightening.
Still nothing.
Tae-hyun pushed the door open the rest of the way.
Min-woo lay curled beneath the blanket, exactly where he'd left him hours earlier, except something about the stillness felt wrong now in a way it hadn't in the middle of the night. His face looked flushed, damp strands of hair sticking to his forehead, breathing shallow and quick even in sleep.
"Hey." Tae-hyun crossed the room fast, kneeling beside the bed. "Min-woo."
No response.
He tried again, louder this time, hand hovering just above his shoulder. "Min-woo, wake up."
Nothing.
Tae-hyun's stomach dropped. He reached out and pressed the back of his hand lightly against Min-woo's forehead, more out of instinct than any real plan.
The heat radiating off his skin hit him immediately, sharp enough that Tae-hyun actually flinched back for half a second before catching himself.
His face went pale.
"...You're burning up."
He grabbed for Min-woo's shoulder properly now, shaking him gently. "Hey. Hey, wake up, come on—"
Min-woo stirred weakly under his hands, a faint, pained sound escaping him, eyes fluttering without fully opening.
Tae-hyun was already reaching for his phone with his free hand, heart hammering, thumb fumbling twice before he managed to pull up the number he needed.
"Hyung," he said the second the call connected, voice unsteady in a way it rarely was. "You need to come back. Now."
"Tae-hyun? What's wrong—"
"It's Min-woo." Tae-hyun's hand was still pressed lightly against Min-woo's burning forehead, the panic in his own chest rising with every second that passed without a response from the man in front of him. "He's got a really high fever. He's not really waking up properly. I don't—" His voice cracked slightly. "I don't know what to do."
There was a beat of silence on the other end, sharp and immediate.
"I'm turning around now," Jihan said. "Call the family doctor. I'll be there in fifteen minutes."
"Okay. Okay, I—" Tae-hyun swallowed hard, eyes still fixed on Min-woo's pale, sweat-damp face. "Just hurry."
The line went dead.
Tae-hyun set the phone down with shaking hands and turned back to the bed, brushing damp hair away from Min-woo's forehead with a gentleness that surprised even himself.
"Hang on," he whispered, mostly to himself, mostly because the silence in the room felt unbearable otherwise. "Just hang on. Someone's coming."
Min-woo's brow furrowed faintly at the sound of his voice, lips parting around something too weak to actually form into words, and Tae-hyun stayed exactly where he was—kneeling beside the bed, one hand still resting against overheated skin—refusing to move until help arrived.