Leaf Me Alone // minsung

「⸙ ch.33 ⸙」

JISUNG

Chan brought us all out into the open school grounds - come to think of it, this was where I first met Minho. Peeking out from under my eyelashes, I watched Minho saunter along with his hands in his pockets, eyes dragging across the landscape as if he was looking for something. The corners of his lips tilted up into a little satisfactory grin, and I followed his gaze to a certain spot he seemed really interested in.

Shit. That was where the leaf pile was, wasn't it.

My eyes flicked back to Minho, only to be met by a galaxy that was looking right at me already. Casually (okay, it wasn't very casual) pretending that I was not, in fact, looking at him, I jogged to catch up to Seungmin. He was struggling to walk, making multiple attempts to keep a still grovelling Hyunjin from leaning his full weight into Seungmin. It wasn't working very well.

We came to a stop, and Chan turned towards us. Clapping his hands together like a teacher getting the attention of his class, he turned towards us and spread his arms out. "Alright, we're here. First round: racing!"

He silenced our cheers - and complaints - by raising his hand. "The first out of the pair to get to that tree over there wins. But first, a very important announcement: you are by no means allowed to cheat. That means no hair-pulling, no excessive yelling, no tripping your partner up, no taunting, no bribing other people to trip your partner up, no head-starts, no setting fire to things as a distraction so that you can win, no piggybacks, no cartwheels, no rockets and no comically tying your partner's shoelaces together, no matter how funny that would be."

I heard a whispered, "Dammit," under someone's breath, in a voice that sounded suspiciously like Seungmin's.

Changbin raised his hand. "Define excessive yelling."

Chan sighed. And the crowd is... wishing Chan good luck?

"Welcome, our first contestants... Jisung and Minho!"

I grinned at him, and he grinned right back at me. I raised an eyebrow at him. "Ready to eat dust, Lee?"

He scoffed, "As if. You really think you and your stupidly short legs can win this, Han?"

"Bring it on, asshole."

"Can't wait to hear the words 'congratulations for winning, Minho' come out of your mouth, squirrel." Winking at me, he strode towards the start line that Chan had marked out. I merely blinked at the audacity of this man before following him, sticking my tongue out at him like the mature person I was.

Chan was our referee, having already sent Changbin to the finish line to judge who would win.

"Ready, set... GO!"

I pushed off from the ground, each step sending me forwards, closer to victory, closer to the glorious two weeks of cooking from Minho. The blood pounded in my ears as the landscape blurred around me; nothing mattered apart from the finish line. I was sprinting, I was flying, I was... being overtaken?

And there was Minho, his galaxy eyes sparkling for a second as he glanced at me before he was running faster and farther away from me, until I could reach out and only touch him with the tips of my fingers and then he was over the finish like and whooping and I could only lean against the tree and pretend to look not miffed that I lost the first round out of three. Which meant that I had to win the next two, otherwise it's bye bye to Minho cooking.

Minho strutted - it was a strut, I promise - over to me, like a peacock preening his feathers, and cupped his hand behind his ear. "I'm sorry, did you say something? About me winning? The four words I was really looking forward to?"

I shoved him. "Fuck off, asshole."

"That's three words, actually."

Chan waved us two over, trying to keep a squabbling Jeongin and Felix from descending into a catfight. "Since you two are done racing, could you go buy eight packs of candy floss? It's for the next round." He managed to send us a smile between wrestling Felix's flailing arms. Arms that didn't stop Minho from smoothly reaching into Chan's pocket and taking his wallet.

"Thanks, Chan!"

Tossing Chan's wallet up in the air and catching it again, Minho also sent Chan a grin. Chan could only watch as Minho gave him a fake salute before turning and heading to the nearest store. I followed behind Minho, shrugging helplessly at a struggling Chan before jogging to catch up with Minho. Faking diplomacy, he extended an arm out towards me, giving me an overexaggerated wink as I fell into step beside him.

"Come forth, my lady, and let us walk arm in arm as we heed destiny's calling-"

Rolling my eyes, I pushed his arm away. "I thought we established the fact that I was the husband."

Minho faked a swoon, the corners of his lips upturning as he leaned his weight on me. "You refuse my hand? My love, you wound me."

Giving up trying to push him off me, I simply looked at him from the corner of my eye. Looked at his ridiculously long lashes and the flash of white teeth as he smugly settled against me. Looked at the curve of his eyebrows and the slope of his nose. Tried to memorise the way every single strand of hair was placed, able to see in my mind's eye the way that Minho ran his hand through his hair, effortlessly ethereal. And his eyes. His eyes that held stars, that drew me towards him like the moon drawn towards the earth. Always falling in, yet always keeping my distance. Always in his orbit, but never by his side.

"If you keep undressing me with your eyes, I'm gonna catch a cold."

I tripped on air particles, stumbling over myself to defend myself against these baseless allegations. "No one's undressing nobody! I was... in deep thought." Glancing over again, I caught sight of his unimpressed, I'm-calling-you-out-on-your-bullshit look. "Shut up."

Minho raised his hands in the air, and part of me hated the fact that I missed the weight of him immediately. "I didn't say anything!"

Growing tired of arguing with him, I simply grabbed a handful of his hoodie sleeve and dragged him forwards, marching on towards the store.

Minho let me drag him, all the way to the store, and although I refused to give him the satisfaction of seeing me look back at him, I knew there were stars in his eyes.

*****

so uh hi?

exams r kicking my ass right now so

im sorry alskdfjlj

but yay

is this... jisung finally recognising his own feelings????? woahhhh

the devil works hard but skz work harder because omg the new songs?????????? kill me now (positive)

song rec: hard times by paramore