blue | lhs

03

You wake up to the sound of knocking on your door. In your one-bedroom apartment, sound travels farther than you'd like, and in your haste to answer, you forget to look down to see the messy state you're in. It only takes a moment for someone else to notice, and that someone happens to be Lee Minhyuk, who stands tall on your doorstep, an umbrella in hand.

It's raining outside, and you realize this as you open the door dejectedly. Minhyuk immediately steps inside, grabs your arm, and pulls you toward your living room couch.

"For fuck's sake," he starts, "Are you okay?"

You look up at him in surprise, only to see that while he does, in fact, look angry, the worry in his eyes far surpasses any other emotion you can count on his face.

"U-Uh, yeah," you stutter awkwardly, all the events of last night tumbling back into your head.

"You're still wearing last night's clothes," Minhyuk remarks, eyes scanning you up and down and making you curl into yourself beneath the safety of your couch cushions.

"You want to tell me what the hell that was?"

"Not really," you say in a weird combination of a groan and a whine, hiding your face behind the cushions too.

"Well, do you want to ask what happened after you left?"

You don't really want to know, especially if it will remind you exactly what went down in the club the previous night, but there's a heavy tug in your chest that has you nodding almost unwillingly.

"First of all, I was worried sick, okay? And then I went back to the club, and—" Minhyuk interrupts himself to clear his throat. "You should probably apologize, hm?"

You know exactly who he's talking about, but you don't want to speak his name. If there's one thing you despise about the entire situation is that: a) you're not over someone else, b) you're essentially breaking your promise to Minhyuk, and c) your soulmate happens to be part of the very crowd you've wanted to avoid since Minhyuk first introduced you to his hectic lifestyle.

"He wants to talk to you, if you'll give him a chance. Just a talk, he says," Minhyuk murmurs, nudging your cushion aside and parting the strands of your hair to softly stroke your face.

"Why'd you run?" He asks quietly.

"You know why," you mumble, sitting up from the couch and leaning into his side. Minhyuk pulls you into his arms, lips brushing your head as he hums in contemplation.

"Hoseok is not the guy you think he is," he begins, pulling away as you flinch at the name, "And maybe this is the sign for you to move on."

Your ex-lover's face reappears in your head. The very reason why he left you was because his own strip of white had faded into blue when he met the one he chose over you, and really, you had no right to hold him back. The only choice you had was to break a solid relationship of a four-year foundation for someone he barely knew. Why was this situation with Hoseok any different?

"I don't want to fall for Hoseok just because a strip of color told me so," you whisper into Minhyuk's shoulder. "And I'm not going to get involved in his lifestyle. You're different, Min. You're not like them."

Minhyuk sits in silence for a few moments before he says, "Hoseok is a lot more like me than you think. In the way that we're not what you see on TV, okay? Yeah, Hoseok has big buck tied to his family name, but why should that affect who he wants to be? His paternal family owns a chain of hotels, and his maternal family is connected to the President. So what? You think that makes Hoseok the same?"

For a moment, you contemplate what he's saying. Because Minhyuk should know Hoseok more than you do. But you're stubborn in your thoughts because that's the way you've always been. And that's the way you've kept your heart intact... until last week.