die for you // minsung

2

// accidental cuts

Minho had Jisung open the door to the room that housed the healthy cats and found an empty cage for the new tenant. They let the door swing shut behind them, and Minho deposited the orange tabby inside a newly cleaned cage. He filled the bowls inside with food and water, patted the cat's head, before locking the cage.

The employee sighed as he sat down, resisting the urge to lie back down on the linoleum floor, before taking out his phone and messaging the staff group chat, telling the veterinarians to give the new cat a check up.

Minho closed his phone and returned his attention to the boy in front of him, gazing through the cages at the napping cats.

"What shall we name her?"

"Her?" Jisung moved from uncertainly standing and sat down on the floor near Minho.

The older boy rolled his eyes. "I checked the sex, and unfortunately the higher ups are gonna assume the cat is cisgender and using she/her pronouns."

"That's not fair, you can't burden an innocent cat with the gender binary."

Minho's head suddenly shot up, concerned that he'd been misgendering the person in front of him, but Jisung assured him that he hadn't.

The elder sighed, leaning back on his sore arms. "Unfortunately I'm going to have to record the sex of it as female -" Jisung grumbled and Minho continued. "But you can use whatever pronouns you want for a cat."

Jisung grinned at that, and Minho couldn't help but return the same. "Okay, so what do you want to name them?"

"You found them, you have naming privileges."

Jisung pouted, feeling uncreative. "I dunno, Orange? Pumpkin? Basketball?"

Minho burst out laughing, and Jisung's heart jumped at the sound, before pretending to grow defensive. "I write lyrics, I can't name cats!"

Minho let out a choked noise that sounded like Basketball, before he hiccuped his way into calmness. "Pumpkin was cute, but it's sort of a generic sweetheart-type name. What about Soonie?"

Now it was Jisung's turn to laugh out loud, only stopping when the new cat meowed indignantly. Jisung stuck his tongue out at her childishly. "Isn't that old fashioned?"

"This is a distinguished elderly cat, excuse you. I think Soonie is a perfect name."

"Whatever you like is fine with me."

Minho crinkled his eyes curiously at the boy, before writing Han Soonie on the nametag on the cage. "Okay! Jisung ssi, it's time to take care of you now," he said, his tired annoyance at having to stay back late long forgotten.

He stood up and opened the cupboards above the sink and pushed around some plastic containers until he found the first aid kit. He opened the lid, pulled out some medical supplies, and washed his hands.

As Minho sat back down next to him, brushing his shoulder, Jisung toppled over from his squat in front of Soonie, falling on his side.

"I would've thought your shoes would've kept you glued to the ground."

Jisung smiled as looked down at the end of stretched out legs to his platform high tops and sat back up.

They quieted as Minho organized his medical supplies. He pursed his lips. "Do you mind if I hold your face?"

Jisung swallowed and gave his affirmation, so Minho took the bottom of Jisung's face with his right hand, turning it to the left and to the right, inspecting his wounds. "These are pretty shallow cuts. If they actually scar, they'll be pretty faint."

Minho rolled up his sleeves and squirted a bottle of antiseptic solution onto a cleaning pad. Jisung, smelling the scent of rubbing alcohol, cringed in anticipation and squeezed his eyes shut.

"Sorry, this is going to sting," Minho said gently.

Jisung quietly hissed through his teeth but didn't say anything as Minho quickly wiped his cuts.

His eyes fluttered open as Minho worked his way around his face and he got used to the pain.

Looking at Minho at work, acting professionally, Jisung's breath caught in his throat. He wanted to close his eyes again, but it was as if he'd been frozen, staring at the beautiful boy in front of him.

If Minho was uncomfortable, he didn't let on. "There, that wasn't too bad, was it?" He stood up. "Okay, I need to get antibiotic cream and bandages and then you'll be good to go."

"No, no, it's okay." Jisung said hurriedly, also getting to his feet. He already felt overwhelmed having Minho's face so close to his and didn't know how he would breathe being that close to him again. "I can do that myself."

Minho didn't protest, but thought for a moment. "You need to go to your doctor soon and make sure that you haven't caught a disease from the cats."

Jisung nodded and Minho looked at him curiously. "You're so quiet now."

Jisung froze, feeling caught, and now wasn't able to meet Minho's eyes. "I should get going now, it's getting late. Thank you for helping me!" He bowed to the other and waved as he made his way out. Minho returned the wave and watched him push the door open and leave.

Minho stood there for a while, staring after him, before remembering that he had to get going too.