"Hi, uh, so." Wooyoung desperately tries to shake off the blankness that washed over him as soon as the pretty receptionist looked up from his laptop and smiled at him. "Do you have a phone?"
A moment passes. Wooyoung wants to facepalm.
~~~
Growing...
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"You don't need to panic." Hongjoong throws one look at the pile of clothes that Wooyoung has accumulated on the floor of his bedroom, distractedly clicking on his laptop, adjusting the tune, pitch or whatever of the new intro for his YouTube channel. "There are a lot of good clothes stores near your university. You don't have to take everything with you. Your dorm wardrobe might be too small for half the clothes." His gaze wanders from the pile up to Wooyoung, a typical frown appearing between his eyebrows. "Besides, your clothes are all black anyway. You could go for a wardrobe change in Seoul; this spring's trend colours are pastel."
Wooyoung doesn't dignify his hyung's suggestion with more than a snort. He's not wearing pastel, ever, and Hongjoong knows that as well as he does.
Unbothered, Hongjoong goes back to working on his intro.
"I'm not wearing pastel," Wooyoung adds after all, regardless. It must have stewed in the back of his mind because his mouth decides to add even more to that: "Something really impossible would have to happen before that. Like leaves turning pink in spring, or like San magically contacting me..." He was aiming for an offhanded tone, but of course it doesn't come out like that. Hongjoong sharply fixates him from behind his screen with a look that even makes Jongho quiver from time to time. "You should have given him your number then, but from what I've gathered, he wasn't the most open or enthusiastic guy."
Hongjoong is right, but his words still sting. Wooyoung sulks in response. His hyung is probably more than right; even if Wooyoung had given San his number or asked for his, like he so cringely did when they first met, San probably would have denied it, giving a weak excuse or not bothering with one at all. Besides the fact that Wooyoung is now still plagued by What Ifs, the way they parted was probably for the best in the end. A clean cut. San gave him that too-blue-to-be-natural stone, the only thing that could have reminded him of Wooyoung—and Wooyoung, because he couldn't stand looking at it, gave it to Kyungmin who had become a devoted stone collector over the holidays and was over the moon from Wooyoung's 'present.' That made at least one out of three.
San really hadn't changed within the one week Wooyoung got to know him. He opened up a bit, shared the smallest personal stories and took Wooyoung to beautiful places, but in the end, it came back to the same situation they've had at the start: no strings attached, no commitment. No phone number.
Wooyoung sighs. "I don't know why I keep thinking about him," he complains, absentmindedly chucking the rest of his socks pair by pair from his wardrobe in the general direction of his clothes pile.
This time, he gets an understanding look from Hongjoong. "It's natural, Young-ah," he says softly, which makes Wooyoung stop abruptly in his sorting, alarmed by the sudden change of tone, "he was some of your firsts."
That- That is true. Wooyoung pauses in his packing. "I would've even slept with him," he admits, thinking out loud, and ignores Hongjoong's spluttering followed by a flabbergasted, "He was that hot?!"
