GLOW-UP

34 | week of woe

it was inevitable that the following week would be taeil's worst one yet. his fate was sealed even from the moment he got home after the wine night at sooyoung's after the hockey game... and he acted like a total ass to poor old sicheng who was only trying his best to diffuse taeil's unforgiving anger.

(which was usually an easy task, what with his adorable little smile and that charm he so easily turned on and off when it suited him.)

"hyung, is that you?"

taeil kicked his shoes off in the hallway, each sneaker hitting the wall with a dull thud. "fuck off," he muttered under his breath. he was still majorly hungover from an overabundance of wine last night, but that didn't really give him an excuse to be this fucking rude to sicheng.

"where were you last night?" sicheng asked as he came out into the corridor, "you didn't come home - we were worried about you!"

"slept over at sooyoung's," taeil grunted.

"sooyoung's?" sicheng repeated in surprise, "as in park sooyoung? are you guys-"

"no," taeil snapped, "i'm gay."

with that, he slammed his bedroom door in sicheng's face.

and that's where he stayed.

all weekend.

"geez," sicheng exhaled, taken aback by taeil's bad mood, "someone really pissed in his milk this morning."

"sichengie?" came a sleepy call from yuta's bedroom, and sicheng stopped floundering in the corridor, worrying over his housemate. he shrugged it off and padded along the wooden floorboards until he was peering around yuta's bedroom door.

yuta had crashed early after the disaster of a hockey match the day before, and although sicheng would often sneak into his bed when he thought taeil was asleep, he'd left him alone last night. yuta needed at least a couple hours of sleep to function, and sicheng knew that with the adrenaline coursing through him after the game, the japanese man might have had other ideas instead of sleeping.

and no one wanted to deal with a grouchy yuta in the morning.

"come here," yuta mumbled as sicheng appeared in his line of sight, eyes only half open and blurry with sleep.

sicheng smiled and pushed the door closed behind him, tiptoeing over to the bed and crawling under the covers. yuta curled him up in his arms from behind, swinging a leg over sicheng's hip as he nuzzled his face in the chinese boy's neck.

"was that taeil coming in?" yuta asked after a while, blinking his eyes open in the half-light.

sicheng sighed. he'd been enjoying the warmth of yuta's bare chest bleeding through the fabric of his pyjama shirt, and now he was forced to think about taeil's pissy mood again. "yeah, he was out all night apparently," he muttered in response, "or that's as much as i could get out of him before he slammed his door in my face."

yuta snorted, and the movement of his lips as he spoke tickled the back of sicheng's neck. "what's he got to be mad about?"

"who knows." sicheng wriggled round in yuta's grasp so that they were nose to nose, legs entangled, with sicheng's hands travelling up across the expanse of yuta's back. "he's been acting weird all week... do you think something happened at the halloween party?"

yuta wasn't concentrating, though. sicheng looked even more adorable this close up, fluffy hair sticking up in all directions from his head, nose scrunched up as he tried to analyse the situation. yuta was utterly drawn in by how sicheng's lashes seemed to flutter every time he blinked, and the way he pushed his lower lip out the harder his brain worked.