Chapter Text
In all the years that Chan has lived, he's proud to say that most of it is him living on his own.
Or, as independently as one can be when you have Wonwoo and Seungcheol as your closest friends.
Yeah, Chan did live with his parents up until high school but the minute he graduated, he claimed to have claimed the rights to his own life then. He managed to save enough to pay for his tiny, little, comfortable "apartment" for a good whole twelve months which helped a lot in his first year in college. He saved up what he could by working the hours he's not spending studying or sleeping and it was all good until he got pseudo-adopted by the older couple.
"You're going to break, you know?" Wonwoo said. Only he didn’t know his name was Wonwoo at the time.
"Excuse me?" Chan asks, as annoyed as he can make himself sound while still wording it out as politely as he can.
"You're Lee Chan right? I saw you in our org assembly a while back and word is, you bark at anyone trying to get close to you. Seems like the rumors are true." Wonwoo says, smiling at him, and Chan didn't really have time right then. He was cramming for an exam for tomorrow and he can't study later in the night because he has a scale model to meticulously furnish for their interior class right after their exam.
"Is there anything I can help you with, sunbae?"
"Org rules. Do you remember rule one?" Wonwoo asks and he starts closing Chan's books and shoves them in his bag slung on the back of his chair.
"Uhm, be there for your orgmates? Sunbae, what are you-" "Come on. We booked a lecture room." Chan gets up. He had to, seeing that his bag was being kidnapped. Chan follows him to where the room is and Chan sees one of the prettier seniors sitting alone.
"Wonwoo, what are you doing?" He says and Chan just follows Wonwoo in the room as he sets Chan's stuff on one of the chairs.
"Being a good sunbae."
"He looks scared."
"I'm not." Chan quips and this got him two smiling faces. It's unnerving.
"See? He's not. He's cool." Wonwoo says and the other guy sighs.
"I'm sorry if he bothered you. He means well, even if it comes out as a bit stalker-ish." Seungcheol says, only Chan didn't know he was Seungcheol then.
But that's what started it all, really.
Wonwoo gave him his old-but-not-so-old notes on History of Architecture and Wonwoo tells him that it's still the same notebook he uses for his H.O.A.3 this semester. Chan felt like crying when Wownoo lent it to him for the night only with the promise to give it back the morning after. Seungcheol also told him a little tip about their scale model and that's to use a vinyl tile. "It's soft enough to easily use a cutter for it and sturdy enough if you stack them and glue them together." He even gave him an address for a hardware store that has them.
"You see? People are good to have around some time."
"Some times…" Chan agrees and Wonwoo snorts.
"Sorry, I just- People can only disappoint you if you let them." Chan says and only realizes what he meant after Seungcheol starts laughing.
"Well, hopefully we don't disappoint you." Seungcheol says and Chan nods.
"Hopefully." Chan adds and starts going through Wonwoo's notes.
Years later, Chan is still unsure if he made the right choice in sitting in that lecture room.
"I'm not going."
"But I need a plus one and-" "That usually means you take Cheol hyung and not bother me." Chan cuts him off. He turns around and grabs a random box of cereal as Wonwoo sighs.
"I need a plus one that isn't Cheol." Wonwoo says and Chan puts the box back.
"No."
"Oh come on. They're cool! They're all gay if that helps. Although I'm not so sure about Junhui. He seems sketchy sometimes." Wonwoo says and Chan sighs.
"No. I am perfectly fine spending my Saturday night the way I always do."
"You're going to re-watch another show you've already seen before while you drink soju and eat ice cream." Wonwoo says. And he's right. Chan gives himself that one moment every week all to himself. The tub of pistachio ice cream is already sitting in his fridge and he still has a few bottles of soju and beer in his apartment somewhere. He deserves some peace and quiet from time to time.
"But they're cool. And I've already been talking you up to them. I'm pretty sure Soonyoung's in love with you already."
"I don't care. I have plans on Saturday and I have floor plans that need elevations by Monday morning."
"You can finish those in three hours. I bet you can finish those Monday morning." Which is true. But still.
"Hyung."
"What if I said you can use our printer any time from this point onwards?"
No way.
No fucking way.
Seungcheol invested so much in that printer, both financially and emotionally, and Chan's sure it costs around six months worth of his rent. He's exaggerating, yeah, but that's an HP Design Jet XL 3600 dual roll 36-in Multifunction Printer with PostScript . Chan's pretty sure Wonwoo has to ask Seungcheol for permission when he so much as touches the printer. There's no way this isn't a scam.
"Cheol knows I need to have an edge for you to agree." Wonwoo says and Chan eyes him suspiciously.
"And he means it?"
"You two can talk about the paper and ink stuff and all that-" "Yeah yeah. Sure. But are you serious?" Chan asks and Wonwoo laughs at him.
"I'm serious hyung." Chan says and Wonwoo nods.
"I am too. That's the offer."
"That's… Okay, why are you so hell bent on making me come with you?"
"What?"
"Please. You always have an ulterior motive when it comes to these kinds of things. And I don't even wanna ask what you and Cheol hyung agreed on for him to give you permission to use the printer as leverage." Chan points out and Wonwoo sighs.
"Do you want me to be honest?"
"Always."
"Okay. You need more friends, Channie."
Wow.
Okay.
He did ask him to be honest.
"Not that I'm saying that you can't make friends on your own, but you kind of make it impossible for yourself Channie. The last friend you made is Soobin and I'm pretty sure he's just scared of you."
"Soobin is not scared of me."
"He is. But that's not my point. My point is these guys are cool and I trust them and I trust them with you. And it would be really nice to see you making more friends."
"That's really nice of you hyung but that's just making me seem pathetic, I think."
"You're not. You're just a little socially challenged because you think everyone's out to get you or something." Wonwoo jokes and then pushes him out of the cereal aisle, asking why they were even there when they don’t like cereal.
Wonwoo has a point, sort of… Chan just doesn't like new people. He's okay with life now, with the people he has now. Personally, he thinks Wonwoo and Seungcheol alone are too much for him as it is but they think otherwise. He would've ended up working with them, too, if Chan had let Wonwoo convince him to take the recommendation and apply for their company. But Chan's too stubborn to do that. Now, he's working in a firm he had applied to for his apprenticeship program back in college and they were more than happy enough to hire him after graduation.
"I feel like I shouldn't answer that, hyung." Soobin says and Chan sighs. If that's his answer to Chan asking if he's actually scared of him then that's probably an answer in itself.
"It's more like, I really respect you a lot, as a senior, and like, I feel like I'm gonna mess up out of nowhere and disappoint you." Soobin says and Chan almost laughs.
"You do know that we're like, in the same position in the office, right? Like, I'm not actually above you."
"You're still a sunbae."
"Yeah but it's just a one year difference Soobin."
"Still." Soobin says and he smiles. Chan just sighs and goes back to eating lunch. No one ever gets another say when Soobin smiles like that.
Chan did mention about his plans tomorrow and Soobin looks more excited than he is. And after he found out that Chan is capable of socializing outside of the office he immediately offers to go out sometimes for a drink. Chan says yes, a bit reluctantly, yeah, but he really thinks Soobin would be easier to hang out with than Wonwoo and his friends.
And if Chan was being honest, he didn't think Wonwoo had friends outside of Seungcheol. They did have a sort of crew back then but it's always Wonwoo, Seungcheol, Chan, and Seungcheol's friends. Come to think of it, Chan can't think of a time Wonwoo went out somewhere where it's just him. Seungcheol is always just there. It's annoying but it's mostly just annoying because Chan is jealous.
Yeah. Chan is incapable of letting people in his life but he's still capable of self realization. And with that self realization comes the fact that all his years of thinking people are dead weight in life has resulted in him having no one special in his life. And it's even more pathetic when the realization comes after reading another book Wonwoo had lent to him.
"You're not serious."
"Live life through another person's life. Or learning from somebody else's mistakes." Wonwoo says and Seungcheol sighs.
"He's serious. It's annoying but he is right." Seungcheol says and Chan sighs.
"Will he shut up if I took the book?"
"No. He'll shut up after you read the book and talk about it." Seungcheol says and Wonwoo glares at him.
"Don't look at me like that. I had to read a lot of books because it was your little crazy way of flirting." Seungcheol says and Chan laughs.
But all in all, the books did help. In a way. It's like seeing yourself in a character and getting a third person point of view of how you're fucking up. But that's all the more reason for him to trust Wonwoo even more, in a way.
But that trust still feels a little misplaced sometimes. Like when he barged into Chan's place to pick out what he had to wear for the night.
Chan can't help but feel like he's being dressed for show.
But… yeah. After meeting them, after being introduced to them, to him, Chan's good. Chan's great, actually. Wonwoo did great. Wonwoo definitely did him good.
"You don't seem like the type of person that's usually up for Wonwoo's stupidity." He says and just that one sentence speaks to Chan on so many levels that he had to hold himself back from jumping him.
His name is Jihoon. Lee Jihoon. From first glance, he looks more his age than Wonwoo's but the more Chan stares at him, at the way his body is built and how his eyes are constantly on a state of disinterest regardless of his smile, and the way his whole arm flexes when he grabs his beer to drink, the more Chan sees how much he got that wrong.
Chan's not one for social cues but he stared at him long enough to know that he stares back just as long.
"Yeah. Honestly, I was bribed to come here." Chan says, and he turns his body to face Jihoon as Jihoon takes Wonwoo's seat to his right.
"That kind of hurts." Jihoon says and Chan watches his eyes break into a smile for the first time tonight.
"Well, that's more of a consolation right now, actually. I'm glad I came." Chan says and Jihoon stares at him.
"Me too." Jihoon says and Chan raises his glass and Jihoon raises his bottle and clicks them together before taking a sip without breaking eye contact with him.
The night went on well after that and Chan wasn't even against the little game of never have I ever that Wonwoo had suggested. Chan's life is pretty boring for the game that he feels like he's not even part of the game at all. Jihoon on the other hand, has three fingers left from the ten he started with. From something so mundane as day drinking to something like having sex in a public restroom. And the thing is he does not show any kind of embarrassment from it. But the one that got him down to two fingers came from the person to Chan's other side.
"No way." Wonwoo says and Chan feels his throat going dry.
"That feels a little targeted, Soonyoung. And shut up.” He averts his eyes to Wonwoo. “It's not a big deal." Jihoon says and he glances at Chan and smiles at the table.
"A BDSM dungeon is a pretty big deal, Jihoon." Junhui says, the fourth from Wonwoo's friends. And the other three friends they've brought seem just as shocked as Chan is.
"It's not something I do regularly but it's a thing." Jihoon says and he gulps down the rest of his beer. Chan just stares as do the rest of them, and Jihoon laughs.
"Okay. The interrogation isn't part of the game. You're next." Jihoon says to Chan and Chan has to shake himself to keep his mind from combining what he knows about Jihoon with what he knows about BDSM. Chan makes up a lousy attempt at never have I ever and the game goes on. Chan's mind is half occupied by the thought of Jihoon in leather and being almost drunk is definitely not helping in making himself focus.
Chan is not at all guilty for not remembering most of everyone else's name that night because by the end of the night, he got to ask Jihoon for his number before Wonwoo drags him to Seungcheol's car waiting right outside. Jihoon asks him for his as well and just as Chan was about to go inside the backseat of Seungcheol's car, his phone starts ringing and he sees his name flashing on his screen. He answers it and turns to find Jihoon smiling at him. "Just making sure you didn't give me a fake number." Jihoon says and then he ends the call. Chan smiles, goes inside the car, and tries to at least hold back on the smile up until Seungcheol can drive off. Seungcheol told him he's welcome to stay the night and Chan nodded. He doesn't care, really. His mind is still stuck there, the car door open and his phone vibrating in his hand before turning around.
And that's the exact moment, that smile, that call, that very specific moment… that's the exact moment Chan knew he was fucked.
Seungcheol think's it's sweet and really ballsy of Chan to message Jihoon the following day and Wonwoo thinks he's pathetic. "Why did you have to pick Jihoon out of all of them there?" Wonwoo asks and Chan ignores him and keeps eating.
Jihoon-hyung
i'm surprised you actually messaged me
i was preparing myself for the worst
Chan
you're being dramatic
Jihoon-hyung
Wonwoo said to expect the worst
He said you'd make me fall hard and not even notice it until you're turning me down
and i just HAD to talk to you after knowing that
Chan glares at Wonwoo over the table and Wonwoo stops midchew to stare back. "What?" Wonwoo asks, mouth full of food, and Chan scoffs. "You're an idiot." Chan says and goes back to focusing on his phone.
Hes just messing with you hyung
He's an idiot
As you know
Jihoon-hyung
I think he has a point tho
You're pretty good at grabbing people's attention
i wouldn't know
I was just paying attention to you
Which you already know
"Is that Jihoon?" Wonwoo asks over the table and Chan puts on a glare as he puts his phone down and finishes his food.
"Jihoon's cool. He's a better influence on you than Junhui." Seungcheol says and Wonwoo snorts.
"Remember when you were in love with Junhui in our freshmen year?" Wonwoo asks and Seungcheol turns to glare at him.
"Oh you do not want to start shit with me, Jeon. I know shit you don't even want Chan to know." Seungcheol says and Wonwoo wraps his arms around Seungcheol's waist and leans his head on his shoulder as Seungcheol keeps eating.
"You two are gross." Chan says and picks up his plate and leaves it in the sink. He grabs his phone and heads towards the guest room, yelling that he's going to get ready to get back home.
Jihoon-hyung
That is very bold of you Lee Chan
But I appreciate the straight forwardness
Do you wanna go out for coffee sometime?
Chan checks his calendar, sees a few one-hour windows from Monday to Friday for the following week and frowns. He starts splitting his workload from Monday to Wednesday and then leaving his Friday afternoon completely free.
It's not a stupid crush, okay? Wonwoo says it is and that Chan hasn't had one in forever which is why it's making him act all gushy but honestly, he just really likes hanging out with Jihoon.
And yeah he does sort of have a crush but he's gonna deny that just because Wonwoo is insisting that he does.