DREAM IN A DREAM. + TENNY / JOHNTEN

1: 熱

forgot to mention that the entire book's gonna be in lowercase

maybe it was the serene sounds of the soft music playing in the studio.

maybe it was the almost annoying squeaking  of the rubber soles of the shoes of the people that were in the same studio as chittaphon.

maybe it was the almost lukewarm water bottle in his hand that he was holding for almost 3 hours straight now.

maybe it was all of those things. or maybe, it was none of those things.

ten was almost lulled to sleep. he was barely exhausted from practice, and trust me, he'd dance to exo's "growl" again in a heartbeat, but something was off today.

it was absolutely blistering hot in seoul, and the window was open to apparently "save energy". 

the white appliance across the room from ten was tempting him to turn it on to feel some sort of euphoria from the damn heat, but he wasn't really in the mood to actually stand up, walk thirteen steps, plug in the damn thing, wait for it to cool the entire room, then sit back down in his nook next to the modest speakers. that took like, what, twenty minutes? ten wasn't gonna waste his time.

the silver-haired male sloshed his half-full water bottle around, making a "tiny tornado" in the plastic. was it half-full, or half-empty? chittaphon didn't want to question it right now.

he felt hazy. the heat wave in korea wasn't helping.

"can't summer end already?"

ten turned to the sound of the whine. 

as expected, it was haechan.

"donghyuck, summer isn't gonna end if you complan," renjun sassed, stretching in front of the mirror. the boy was glaring at the younger through the mirror.

"don't you think i know?' haechan groaned and laid sprawled out on the wooden flooring of the dance studio, the coldness of it disappearing fast.

"our choreographer will get mad if we turn on the air conditioning," jisung pouted, staring at the ceiling as if reflecting on his life.

chenle nodded, laying down on top of jisung, who was most probably too tired to even complain.

"we should probably go back to the dorms," jeno grunted, standing up and staring at the face of a lightly snoring jaemin.

"you guys can go ahead, i'll stay here and practice a bit more," ten hummed, dropping his water bottle on the floor.

"are you sure, hyung?" chenle said, rolling over and off of jisung. "taeyongie-hyung told us not to leave without you!"

ten looked at chenle in a questioning way and the boy just shrugged.

"you guys should just go. i don't want you guys having a stroke on the way back to the dorms," ten smiled. 

jaemin was carried by jeno and jeno willingly dragged himself and jaemin out of the studio.

"i guess we'll be going, hyung," jisung stood up and held chenle's hand to help him up too.

by the time jisung and chenle left the room, renjun stopped stretching and smiled at ten.

"thanks, hyung," renjun said. he received a tired smile and a short hug from the thai boy before he walked out of the room.

ten sighed before cleaning up the mess the dreamies made.

there were a few things strewn across the floor . . . chips, chip bags, candy wrappers, slippers . . . underwear?

ten shook his head and just threw away what he had to throw and kicked away whatever was left.

finally, he closed the window and lied down in the small "sleeping nook" the dreamies built. it was behind two of the wooden closets full of practice stuff, and the only entry was through a passage in the middle.

it was simple, any two-year old could make it. in the small space there, where it could hold three people at most, had a soft, fluffy cushion covered by an equally soft comforter, with the "walls" covered by pillows and a small air conditioner built-in through a hole in one of the closets.

how the dreamies got a hold of such things is beyond ten, but right now, he knows he needs to get a well-deserved nap after the entire day he spent suffering in the heat.