How We Match // Hyunlix

Nine

F E L I X

The days stretch endlessly into one another until even a constant change of schedule can turn into a routine. And with a routine, nothing is stopping Felix's thoughts from going in a never-ending loop until they're all worn and used and he can't tell the difference between fiction and memory.

He hasn't talked to Hyunjin, not like that, even though they talk constantly. They don't avoid each other, yet Felix doesn't know where they stand, and he struggles with it, hovering in the air like that when Hyunjin does all but let him talk about it. Them. About what it means that Felix was the one to tell him he wanted to kiss him, but it was Hyunjin who did. Who moved. Who bent down and pulled Felix in.

They spend their days dancing, rehearsal after rehearsal for their new songs, and then schedules fill the times in between. The unveil concerts and then comeback are looming on the horizon, and with them comes the crazy schedule that doesn't leave much breathing room for anything else.

Once he's done with dinner and he's not needed for anything else, Felix often goes back to the company, adding a few more hours on the dance floor before he's exhausted enough that he can sleep. So that his mind doesn't replay the moment in Paris, doesn't let him run circles around that kiss and how much he wants to go back, rewind the time. Sometimes he wants to take back his words and not have anything change between them. Sometimes he just wants to experience every second all over again. He always tries to lose himself in the movements on the dance floor and to exhaust his body so his mind can rest.

His body doesn't hurt anymore tonight, and that should have been Felix's first clue. That he'd worked so much that the pain had faded, that his mind is not signaling him anymore. The music loops on the songs he's rehearsing, again and again, and Felix is completely immersed in the dance, the beats. His mind is finally quiet.

He doesn't hear when the door opens behind him, only startles when Changbin appears in the mirror, a dark figure Felix needs a moment to recognize. He stops and goes over to where his phone is sitting on the counter and turns off the music.

"I got him. He's at JYP," he hears Changbin say and then spots the phone in his hand. And then he sees his face.

Changbin is angry. Truly angry. The way he rarely is and which used to make all the members hide in their rooms until his mood was over. Felix remembers those times, and how Changbin would apologize afterward.

"What's wrong?" Felix asks, still trying to catch his breath. He's dripping sweat and the towel is right next to him but he doesn't dare move, weary of what's coming next.

Changbin looks at him with his mouth in a thin line, body tense, and Felix's pulse speeds up. "Jesus fucking Christ, Felix."

Felix steps back and flinches when he realizes that the anger is addressed at him. "What?" He asks with a small voice, raising a hand under his chin. He doesn't know how he made Changbin so angry, his mind racing through the day and what he did and what he said but it doesn't land on anything.

"Do you know what fucking time it is?"

The words throw Felix back to being ten years old and staying out with friends for too long, his father shouting at him once he returned. It's almost the same feeling, shame most of all. Felix reaches for his phone, but Changbin doesn't give him time to check.

"It's past three in the goddamn morning!"

"What? No, that's not-" Felix looks at his phone screen now, sure that Changbin must be wrong. He went back to the company at ten, had promised Minho he would only do another two hours to get the moves right. He pales when he sees the time.