cold | junhao

四十二

The next week passes by quickly, and soon enough the night of the launch party arrives. Although Minghao begs Jun to let him do his makeup, Jun refuses, instead letting himself be enthralled watching Minghao paint his eyes with wondrous shades that only make him look more gorgeous than he already is. Minghao catches his gaze in his bathroom mirror and grins, throwing him a wink before diverting his attention back to his makeup.

A few minutes later, Minghao leans back, stretching out his back with a groan. "You know," he says, letting out a small chuckle before he carries on. "Ever since you picked me up from class, everyone's been trying to shimmy up to me. Suddenly people are clamouring to be my partner." He rolls his eyes.

Jun smiles. "Did you let them down lightly?" He hopes that for Minghao's classmates' sake, he did.

"I told them I don't like working with other people, but maybe if they'd asked a year ago I might've said yes."

Minghao slicks a tint over his lips, patting it lightly with his finger and staring at it in the mirror, pouting his lips before standing straight again with a satisfied expression on his face. "I'm ready," he says, spinning on his heel and looking at Jun before walking forward. "Do I look okay?"

Jun nods, "You look amazing," he says. "How about me?"

Looking over Jun's outfit—simple black suit trousers, heavy combat boots and oversized flowing silk shirt—Minghao grins. "Gorgeous," he tells him, reaching to adjust Jun's collar and run his hand through his hair before walking past him into his bedroom, over to his bed where their jackets have been thrown across the duvet and handing Jun his blazer while Minghao wraps a long wool coat over his shoulders.

"Have you hired any reporters?" Hao asks him as they leave the house, starting the lengthy walk down the driveway to where Wonwoo is supposed to be picking them up in one of his fancy cars. 

Jun nods. "A couple," he says. "Only people I've worked with before and trust."

Their eyes are blinded by a sudden flash of headlights as the two of them reach the road and a sleek looking sports car pulls up in front of them. Jun gasps, "Oh no he does NOT own one of those! They cost more than I used to make in like three years!"

The window rolls down, and an ecstatic-looking Mingyu grins at them. "Wonwoo finally let me drive one of his cars!  Get in kids lets go run it in a ditch!"

Wonwoo appears in the passenger seat with a loud whack on Mingyu's chest. "Don't you fucking dare."

Minghao laughs and clambers in, immediately examining the interior of the car which is just as impressive as the outside. When Jun shuts the door behind himself and gets comfortable, Minghao's head drops onto his shoulder and he joins their hands together. 

Jun had spent all yesterday and this morning at the company building setting up and getting everything ready for the evening, so when they pull up all the lights are already on, but besides the couple cameras the pavement awaiting his arrival, there's nothing so out of the ordinary that lots of attention would be drawn.

"We're stopping outside and I'm getting out to open the door for you," Wonwoo twists in his seat to stare at Jun.

"You're absolutely not getting out to open the door for us, we agreed on parking down the road." Jun fires back. His expression drops when the pair in the front of them are two steps ahead, Mingyu coming to a halt and Wonwoo already getting ready to clamber out. "Fuck," Jun whispers, so only Minghao hears. The younger stifles a laugh, squeezing Jun's hand tightly instead. 

When Wonwoo steps to the side and bows to Jun, he stares at his friend in betrayal, jaw dropped and watching Wonwoo trying to hide his laughter. "I swear I will kill you," he says. Wonwoo shrugs.

The four of them made sure to arrive about ten minutes before everyone else, and after that time, their friends start to trickle in. It's no big event—as Jun planned, there's only a few reporters who he already is friendly with, so everything is casual and fun.

Although Soonyoung and Jihoon are the last to arrive, Soonyoung is the first to get drunk after the formalities are done and Jun has finished speaking. Jihoon watches after him with his arms crossed and an unreadable expression on his face, and when Soonyoung embarrasses himself, Jihoon rolls his eyes and walks away with his head in his hands, refusing to be seen near him and leaving Jeonghan alone to help.

Minghao and Jun stick together for most of the night, although there's a point where they get separated and when Minghao finds him again, Jun is stood by the door talking to people Minghao doesn't recognise. When he walks over, the pair stop talking.

"Minghao," Jun grins at him and gestures to one of the people in front of him. "This is Mr. Kim, Mingyu's father."

Eyes widening, Minghao swallows and immediately reaches out to shake his hand, introducing himself. "Nice to meet you, Sir."

Mr. Kim nods in return. "Anyway," he says. "Congratulations Junhui, I hope you are successful." With that he walks away.

"Thank you, Sir," Jun bows after him before turning to Minghao with a worn out look on his face. "God, this is hard. I'm already shattered. After this we can go home right? I don't have anywhere else to be?"

Minghao shakes his head. "Nope, nothing after this. Are you feeling okay?"

Just as Jun nods firmly, and breathes out a "Yeah, I'm fine," he gets bombarded as three people run into him and engulf him in a hug.

"Junnie!"

He pulls away, "Who just called me Junnie?"

Out of Seungkwan, Dino and Seokmin, Dino raises his hand proudly, "I did!" He yelps in pain as Jun pinches his shoulder. "Okay, I'm sorry." 

Jihoon also slips through the guests towards them. When Minghao asks him where Soonyoung is, he shrugs, "I don't know, somewhere over there telling Mingyu not to let me know he's awake." He rolls his eyes. "Every time he's seen me he closes his eyes until I look away."

Jun, Dino and Seokmin bite their lips to refrain from laughing—not wanting to see Jihoon's reaction if they were to give in—while Minghao and Seungkwan look on in confusion. "I think we're missing something here, Seungkwan," Minghao leans into him. 

Seungkwan nods in agreement. "I don't know whether I want to know or not."

Just as he finishes, the subject of their conversation appears behind Jihoon, with a defeated looking Mingyu standing helplessly behind him and Jihoon is involuntarily dragged away.

As fun as Jun finds the evening as a whole, and as much as Soonyoung's antics never fail to brighten up his mood, he'd be lying if he said he isn't a little relieved when everyone starts to leave. Most of the business people that Jun isn't particularly close with are the first to go, followed by the reporters and slowly, his friends drift off too. Mingyu and Wonwoo come up with the idea of hanging out back at Wonwoo's or something, but they notice the hesitancy in Jun's voice when he tries to respond and pat him on the shoulder, telling him to rest instead and going out to wait in the car.

Jun almost spits out his water when Renjun and Yuqi walk up to them, hand in hand and a little closer than he's used to seeing them. 

"What the fuck-" He's hardly seen them all night, so obviously missed something huge... "Since when are you two not at each other's throats twentyfour-seven?" 

And then they spend the next twenty minutes talking, as Jun demands to know every detail of when, where, why, and how about his friends' sudden change in relationship.

---
a/n: heh... sorry this took a while :/
I have like four weeks of school left and a hell of a lot of exams, there's only one chapter left but I dunno if I'll be able to finish it until after that so it might be another long wait again

hope you enjoyed this chapter even though not a lot goes on :)