The Great Pretender

Duets

Sitting at home while Jiyong was out with Joowon was torture. Granted, Soohyuk was with them, but still. Who knew what they were getting up to? Flirting, for sure. And more of those sickeningly sweet smiles. Joowon didn't have any qualms about showing his interest when Seunghyun was there so he could only imagine how much more blatant the guy would be when Seunghyun wasn't.

Seunghyun shoved one hand through his hair. Jiyong hadn't even been gone an hour yet, and he was already going crazy.

He'd tried watching TV and making himself a snack, but his attention kept slipping back to Jiyong and how he was spending the day with Joowon. They were out shopping, right now. Probably trying on clothes. Was Jiyong picking out stuff for Joowon the same way he'd done for Seunghyun the other night? Was he adjusting Joowon's sleeves? Unbuttoning his top button?

Seunghyun shook away the thought. He didn't want to think about that.

He thought about texting Jiyong. Something cute, or maybe just funny. Like: try not to let his smile blind you, you need your eyesight. Or: try not to drool all over his abs, it's unsanitary.

But what he wound up typing into the text box was: please don't cheat on me.

His fingers raced to delete it before it could accidentally send. He groaned and tossed his phone aside. Pathetic.

Not for the first time, Seunghyun wondered what made Joowon so special. Sure, he was good-looking, in that generic pretty boy way that the women of their country went crazy over. And okay, even Seunghyun had to admit that the guy was fit. But Jiyong had said that Seunghyun was hotter.

His chest puffed up at the idea of Jiyong preferring him over Joowon, but it deflated again when he remembered Jiyong's follow up comments about his personality. About his messiness, more specifically. It had been a throwaway joke, but still. Jiyong had named it as one of Seunghyun's flaws.

Seunghyun peered around his room, at the mountains of clothes piled in every corner, the carpet of dirty jeans and hoodies and castoff lyrics. He'd let it get so bad, the very idea of tackling it was daunting. But Jiyong was always bitching at him to do something about it, so...

Seunghyun rolled up his sleeves and got to work.

He carted load after load to the wash, and on his way back through, he scooped up the things he'd left in the living room. Youngbae and Daesung stared at him in varying degrees of surprise.

"What's gotten into him?" Daesung whispered.

Youngbae stared, brows raised. "No idea. Maybe he's sick."

Seunghyun ignored them, resuming his mission. He threw out two full bags of trash and dusted around each of his figurines. As his clothes dried, he hung them up and folded them away. Jiyong would be proud.

He was smoothing out the corners of his bed when Jiyong got home. Jiyong stopped in front of Seunghyun's open doorway, arms weighed down with bags.

"Wow," Jiyong said, scanning over Seunghyun's newly pristine room. "Someone's been busy."

Seunghyun grinned at Jiyong's reaction. "Who has the better personality now? Look, I even hung up my t-shirts."

Jiyong stepped into the room to get a look at his closet. "Amazing."

Seunghyun felt a disproportionate amount of pride in the face of Jiyong's approval.

"I can't believe you did all this," Jiyong said. He struggled to readjust one of the bags that was slipping. "Hang on, let me go put these down."