multi stan ｡.★.*｡･ﾟ.littles ･ﾟ｡.★.*｡oneshots :]

1. strawberry pancakes💜💙💫

Little: Yeonjun (age range: idk he keeps switching around 1-5)

Caregiver: Soobin

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With how close they were now, it was almost difficult to remember a time when they were nervous of crossing lines with each other. They used to be so worried about making each other uncomfortable, by invading each other's personal space, asking too-personal questions, opening up too soon— when they met they were just like five little awkward penguins waddling around each other and trying not to bump into anyone.

And now they told each other just about everything and used each other as teddy bears whenever they pleased. They'd spent years together now, and they'd relaxed steadily as time went on.

So now they were completely comfortable being with each other, and especially their oldest hyung felt so relieved when the sweet strawberry taste of a secret that no longer had to remain secret hit his tongue, because he slipped into little space and remembered that he didn't need to hide it anymore.

But Yeonjun could look back and remember a time when...

Strawberries kept getting him into uncomfortable situations.

For the past few months, Yeonjun had been finding it increasingly harder to hide his headspace from his friends. It was a combination of having more stress piled on him recently which made it harder to suppress his little space when he wasn't alone, and having sadness creep up on him every time he had to force his little self into isolation. Little by little it was hard to tell if it was more stressful to avoid slipping or to avoid his friends after he'd slipped.

Soobin made it even harder for him. Soobin could tell when his hyung was stressed, and partly because he somehow got cuter at those times, he did a pretty good job of stepping up to take care of his hyung in little ways that would help him calm down, even just a bit. Even if it was just feeding him one little strawberry.

Today, Yeonjun was close to a meltdown; schedules piling up and managers prodding at him and sore muscles and a nasty, pounding headache bothering him incessantly. He was swallowing hard to keep down the feeling of tightness in his throat that accompanied his watery eyes.

He went, with the others, to get lunch, or a snack (or whatever they were deciding on calling it, he hadn't really been paying attention but he knew that they were talking about just getting something light), but he had no appetite and shook his head when Soobin offered to order for him.

All he was doing was staring out the window and spacing out when he felt something prod at the corner of his closed mouth, and he turned his head to see Soobin chuckling, before he saw the strawberry he was holding to his lips.

He was already so close to slipping and that little gesture made his head go even fuzzier. Without much of a visible reaction, he mouthed at the berry, not even making an effort to take it from Soobin's hand.

So much sweeter than the taste of the strawberry was the feeling of being cared for. This was something he never know how to ask for but always wanted. Soobin was looking at him in some way that made it feel like maybe he wouldn't think of it as a burden to take care of his only hyung for a little bit.

And then his eyes blew open with panic and his cheeks went pink as he realized: he slipped. He was little in front of all four of them and had nowhere to go, especially since he was stuck in a booth. He took the strawberry from Soobin's hand and nervously laughed along with the others, who assumed his reaction was because the strawberry was suddenly too cold on his teeth.