[FOR KOJAFRAS] SLEEPYHEAD
RECIPIENT: kojafras
TITLE: Sleepyhead
RATING: PG-13
LENGTH: 5128 words
WARNINGS: N/A
SUMMARY: In which there are different lifetimes, and Lu Han would always end up finding the same guy passed out on a couch in each one.
FINAL NOTES: hello recipient! it was so hard to choose from the prompts you gave since all of them seemed really fun to write!! D: but i enjoyed writing this super qt prompt of yours, so i hope you enjoy reading this too he he he
(001)
Lu Han has never been this tired before. But it’s all worth it.
He feels sweat trickling down his neck, his forehead, his whole body. His head hangs down, and his vision blurs inconsistently. He takes note of every droplet of his own sweat, his hard work, and feels some sense of achievement as it splashes down on that space between his feet.
Lu Han knows that he can understand and fluently speak Korean, but the murmurs of the other trainees suddenly become too foreign in his ears. They pass by him, muttering words of concern, telling him he should rest, noticing how pale he is than he usually is. The moment he meets their eyes, Lu Han forces his face into a smile and nods politely. He replies with good-bye’s and see-you-tomorrow’s, alternating the words through his ragged breaths.
There is a buzz reverberating through his ear in time with his own rapid pulse that’s taking too long to calm down, and then the sudden realization that his whole body will ache after waking up from a good night’s sleep hits him hard. A fatigue that he’s never felt before is slowly starting to become evident and it courses through his veins, catalyzing the lethargic drag of his tired feet to the empty break room. He wants to lie down on the worn down couch for a while, his tired body aching for the usually uncomfortable foam peeking through the ripped leather. Lu Han would absolutely opt for anything other than the hardwood floor of their practice room, and he would deem it comfortable at this very moment.
The room illuminates under the fluorescence, and he sees someone sprawled on the couch. “Um,” Lu Han breathes out, an idle hand still on the light switch. He squints to see a mop of hair on top of a pale face beneath the shadow of a grey hood, a hand loosely cradling a phone, and a chest that heaves slowly in slumber.
The boy shifts in his sleep. Lu Han didn’t want to wake him up so he switches off the light in haste and swiftly leaves the break room. He closes the door behind him as gentle as possible, unconsciously holding his breath.
Lu Han exhales. He feels disoriented with an unfamiliar mix of emotions swirling around his head, his chest, and his slow exhales. Lu Han feels dead tired, and he feels fulfilled but disappointed, yet curious - and every single feeling in between.
He didn’t think his first day would be this exhausting.
-
“I heard you were popular with girls, oppa.” she playfully nudges him.
Lu Han tries his best not to cringe whenever a girl’s voice purposely turns high-pitched, but this is a lost case. He laughs it off instead and nudges her in return as they walk along the hall. “Rumors!” He replies to dismiss her comment then he bids her good bye as his hand hangs onto the door of his practice room.
“Will I see you again after training?” she almost smirks and almost pouts at the same time, her eyes analyzing his face.
Lu Han gulps and stops his hand from scratching the back of his head in slight discomfort. His hand suddenly retreats itself as the door opens and Lu Han jumpily steps aside in mere reflex. His doe eyes open widely in surprise, and his mouth hangs open with an idle apology lingering on his tongue. But the boy’s pale skin chokes him and keeps his words inside his throat, his brain working overdrive as he tries to remember why his too porcelain complexion seems unnervingly familiar.
The boy closes the door and bows at the both of them, once, twice, even thrice. The prominent bones of his shoulders peek bravely through his sleeveless gray top. “Sorry.” he mutters politely, a foreign twang melting through his tone.
“At the break room-” Lu Han says at the same time as the boy’s apology.
With his mouth hanging open, he blinks at Lu Han, waiting for the continuation of the unfinished sentence yet completely ready to leave any moment. Curiosity and confusion blends within the look of his eyes, droopy and hooded, as if the boy’s either high or sleepy. Lu Han focuses on him too much, his peripheral vision blurring out too much than usual. He seems anxious, and shy, and hesitant all at the same time.
“Oppa, I’ll get going!” he hears in the background. Lu Han slightly tilts his head to smile at the girl he was with, parting ways with her in finality. The moment he looks back, straight ahead, to speak to him, he was already walking away from Lu Han and something sinks within him.
Lu Han wanted to call out his name, only if he knew it.
-
“Damn it Lu Han, you’ve only been here for a week but you’ve got about a dozen of girls trailing after you in the halls.”
They form a messy circle on the floor of their practice room, extra bowls of jjajangmyeon and their own water bottles at the center, as Lu Han receives nudges from both sides and a chorus of disbelieved remarks overlapping one another. He smiles, shakes his head, and stuffs his mouth with noodles instead. He then receives pats on his back and heavy hands ruffling his hair.
“It’s not like that at all!” He says with a mouthful, words mushing up together with the noodles inside his mouth and his slight foreign accent.
He receives a series of deep adolescent chuckles and a few grunts along with disagreeing, shaking heads.
“Yixing!”
Lu Han pauses, both of his hands frozen on his water bottle and his eyes locked on the pale boy with his unruly bed hair emerging from the break room. Said bed-hair-boy opens his sleepy eyes a little bit wider, his gaze flickering to meet Lu Han’s own for a mere second.
“Hey, we ordered one for you too.” They scoot over to make space for him, one offers a bowl of jjajangmyeon, and another comments on how he sleeps damn too much.
Yixing laughs, his dimple introducing itself to Lu Han for the first time.
Lu Han gulps, hands peeling of the label on his water bottle.
Yixing has one hand on the back of his head, and one hand waving them off. “Thanks, I’ll pass.” He dismisses them with heavily accented Korean, and passively leaves the room no matter how much they persuade him to just sit with them for once.
There’s suddenly a fog forming up in Lu Han’s head and an elbow nudging his side. “You know I’ve read somewhere that when you peel off water labels, it’s like you’re sexually frustrated or something.”
Lu Han blinks at him, then he cranes his head to the side. “What? I couldn’t catch some words.” His mouth forms a slight pout and his eyebrows meet as he pretends his slow comprehension. He clears his dry throat, and stops peeling off the label.
-
Lu Han sort of wakes up at two in the morning, feeling all warm and disoriented.
Lu Han sort of remembers dreaming about a pale-skinned boy with lethargic eyes and a shy dimple, and he kind of buries his face into his pillow and roughly ruffles his hair.
He sort of feels frustrated and confused, and he kind of needs to cool down.
-
The very first time Lu Han’s actually paid attention when Yixing’s dancing, he mentally slaps himself for not doing so sooner. Yixing isn’t just good, nor is he the best in all the technicalities - he’s way more than that. When Yixing dances, he’s breathtaking and amazing and everything in between, and Lu Han regrets all the wasted time he’s spent running around a maze of hesitation and denial.
From every angled turn to the slightest movement of the tips of his fingers, Lu Han can feel the finesse, the accuracy, and the evident passion. The way Yixing dances is what completely separates him from the other trainees. Once Lu Han has set his eyes on the moving body, the rest of his vision pales down in comparison to the porcelain-skinned boy who shines the brightest with every fluid move.
Yixing catches his gaze for a few seconds, and Lu Han can feel himself gravitating towards him - and he’s not stopping himself anymore. He accepts how his stomach flips backwards and how he feels cold sweat every single time he thinks about Yixing. He accepts how this maybe some kind of late adolescent confusion and even misplaced infatuation, but he’s not restraining himself from taking another risk. He took a huge risk by landing here in Korea, why was he even so worried about a tiny risk such as this one?
“Hey,” Yixing calls out between uneven breaths, and heads over to where Lu Han’s grounded. “Lu Han right?” he talks to him in his mother tongue.
Lu Han blinks for a few seconds, and jolts in reply “Yeah, hi, um Yixing?” he offers a hand and cringes at how dumb he sounds.
Yixing smiles at him as he firmly shakes the other’s hand and Lu Han swears he feels electricity coursing through them.
“We’re heading out for samgyeopsal in a while.” Yixing tells him, tongue twisting at the Korean word.
“I’ll be there.” Lu Han smiles.
Lu Han doesn’t tell him about the time he barged into the break room. Lu Han doesn’t tell him that every time he hears the heavily accented Korean, he can’t help but feel a pang in his chest that craves for home. Lu Han doesn’t utter a word about Yixing and how he soothes that said pang in his chest in some way or another, and Lu Han couldn’t be more grateful.
-
“In a hurry?”
“Sort of.” Lu Han answers with a laugh and heads out of the practice room, only to come back about an hour later with the lights shut off and the whole room soulless. He feels himself smiling as his fingers clutch the pillow he’s holding just a little bit tighter.
He carefully slips into the quiet break room.
-
Lu Han has it all planned out. It will start with a very smooth and cool entrance to the break room, head up high and shoulders straight. He’ll tell Yixing that he left a pillow for him the other night, and that’s it, no confused feelings attached to the friendly gesture. No confused, messed up, unfamiliar feelings at all. His slim fingers suddenly twitch, his breath hitches, and Lu Han starts shying away from the break room.
He hears the twist of the doorknob. “Lu Han?” a voice calls out inside tiny room.
Lu Han pauses by the door of the break room for a while.
(002)
Lu Han pauses by the door of the break room for a while. He stands idly in thought, chopsticks on one hand to hold together the noodles, the lukewarm plastic cup of his instant staple food on the other. Lu Han sighs before gulping down the remaining contents of the cup noodles, simultaneously giving the interns a smile as they pass by and greet him. He calls out an intern over and coughs as the young kid scurries towards him.
Lu Han clears his throat before patting his shoulder and peeks at the intern’s nameplate before speaking. “You’re doing good, Zitao.” He also gives the empty plastic cup to Zitao, passing his own garbage to an innocent intern who seems elated to be acknowledged.
Zitao beams at him and bows, then he proceeds to run off in a hurry with Lu Han’s discarded cup noodles in hand.
He enters the break room, leaves his coat on the couch, and drops dead on a bunk bed.
-
He opens the door and sneezes quite loudly, his eyes drooping and his hand running over his face. Lu Han sniffs.
Doctor Kim walks by, his hand patting Lu Han on the shoulder, and the other holding a mug of coffee. “Wipe your nose, you’re disgusting.” Jongdae whispers before leaving the dark break room with a groggy Lu Han.
Lu Han exhales, groans, and leaves his coat on the couch before proceeding to the middle bunk bed, the sheets already starting to smell like him. It’s no wonder that the pillows already reeks of his shampoo, since it’s been months of pushing away a sleepily disoriented Jongdae who’s always trying to climb up beside him and getting rid of an already sleeping Minseok off of his territory. It’s always a well-fought battle with the two Doctor Kim’s.
Sleep’s already seeping into system when his brain suddenly alerts him as his eyes see his coat moving on the couch. Lu Han inhales sharply and sits up on the bed, completely awake. As manly as he claims to be, he carefully slides off the bed and gently walks toward the couch. He’s seen cadavers and heavily injured emergency patients gasping for life, so there’s absolutely no reason for him to be afraid now.
He squints his eyes and is disappointed to see a person beneath his white coat - but he quickly realizes that only the two Doctor Kim’s shares this break room with him. His breath hitches, his mind suddenly recalling all those graveyard shift ghost stories Jongdae’s been telling him a few months back.
He pokes the living thing with his index finger cautiously, and his eyebrows meet when the person groaned.
Lu Han inhales as he retrieves his coat, and brings his face closer to examine the person. With the help of the faint light peeking through the window blinds, he sees parted lips and a sculptured nose.
The door opens, the sound of the busy hall fills the dark room for a few seconds, and Lu Han meets Minseok’s gaze. Only then does he realize that his face was only inches apart from the sleeping boy on the couch.
“I understand,” a lethargic Minseok dismisses him and plunges down on his own bed before Lu Han could let an explanation out of his open mouth.
-
Lu Han surveys the interns’ faces before sending them out of his office. He drags down the blinds and peeks out of the glass window for one last confirming look, sees Zitao wave at him meekly as the group passes by, and is greatly dismayed that he couldn’t find the face he was looking for. Lu Han shrugs and thinks that an intern passing out on their break room would be ridiculous.
Jongdae’s face suddenly fills his vision, his eyes indifferent through his black-rimmed glasses, staring at him through the gaps. “Are you gonna have lunch with us or what?” he faintly hears Dr. Kim’s voice outside the room. Lu Han squints before closing the blinds.
-
It takes Lu Han about two minutes and a half to safely retrieve his white coat under a sleeping boy on the couch. He heard a lot of groaning, there was a lot of twisting and turning, and one moment he almost ran out of the door because Lu Han swears he could have seen his eyes open for about a second. But after a few minutes of calming down his heart and staring the pale boy’s eyelids in the faint midnight blue hue of the break room, he concludes him to be in the deepest stage of sleep so Lu Han has absolutely nothing to worry about.
Lu Han finally has his coat on and was about to fix his hair when the Sleeping Boy On The Couch was no longer sleeping. The boy rubs at one eye, the other staring down at the faux leather surface. He yawns before staring straight into Lu Han’s eyes.
Lu Han blinks at him. “Good morning,” he manages to greet with his a raspy voice that’s in dire need of hot coffee. He clears his throat and looks away, clumsily fixing his hair.
Minseok noisily barges in, sleepy eyes almost shutting. He stops to sit at the arm of the couch, forming a barrier between Lu Han and the boy with the hooded eyes. “Hey, Doc Zhang,” Minseok mutters before yawning. “You know you can sleep on my bed while-” Another yawn interrupts him.
“Doc Zhang?” Lu Han mutters, wide doe eyes sneaking a glance on the boy’s messy mop of black hair.
Doctor Zhang smiles and nods at him.
“While I’m gone, Yixing, you should sleep on the bed,” Minseok manages to breathe out as he leans against the wall, his butt comfortably positioned on the arm of the couch, almost falling into a deep slumber.
“I’m pretty sure he likes the couch.” Lu Han comments before giving Doctor Zhang Yixing one last smile as he heads out the door.
-
Yixing yawns. “I’m going ahead, Lu Han.” He says as he snuggles up further into his pillow on the far end of the couch, his legs curled up to barely fit himself on the space.
“Sure, sure. I have to get some rest too.” Lu Han replies, sitting crossed legged at the edge of his bed, facing the couch where Yixing’s starting to drift into sleep.
“It’s nice to finally talk to someone,” Yixing starts mumbling against the cold surface of the couch. “Who can understand me, literally.” He lightly chuckles at the end of his sentence before muttering a slurry good night to Lu Han.
Lu Han couldn’t help but smile, remembering how comfortable he felt talking to him and how he just felt an instant connection through Yixing’s familiar accent. The moment he heard Mandarin slip out of Doctor Zhang’s lips, he suddenly missed home. But the moment Yixing opened up with his animated stories and unusual laugh that broke the gloom of the dimly lit break room, he feels like he suddenly found a new kind of home.
Jongdae enters the room in haste, and it abruptly makes Lu Han realize that he’s been sitting dumbly on his bed, staring at a sleeping Zhang Yixing for about a few minutes.
“Forgot something?” Lu Han speaks in a low volume, scratching the back of his head and inching closer to the middle of his bed.
“Yeah.” He hears Jongdae rummaging through the bag on the foot of the bed next to Lu Han’s, a zipping sound coming not too long after. “Forgot to remind you to control your hormones.”
Lu Han’s extra pillow hits Jongdae on the head. Lu Han curses at him a little too loud that Yixing either grumbles or laughs as Jongdae exits the break room with his knowing smile.
-
Lu Han gasps as his dream suddenly wakes him up. With his eyes quickly adjusting to the darkness, he fumbles through the sheets for his wristwatch. He gets hold of his phone instead, and groans while squinting, the brightness almost too much for him to handle. It’s six-thirty in the morning, and he has half an hour to prepare for his next shift.
He hears the subtle cracks of his bones as he stretches. Lu Han yawns and rubs his eyes as he sits on his bed, his blurry vision barely capturing the image of a person dozing off on the couch. He shivers the moment he completely removes his blanket, and his eyes suddenly dart back to the couch.
Lu Han sighs. It’s getting even colder these days, and he still can’t comprehend why Yixing favors an old couch over the comfy bunk beds. He grabs his white coat hanging by his bed’s headboard, and his bed’s blanket with his other hand. It’s not a matter of profession, it’s not because he’s a doctor and he’s obliged to be concerned about everyone’s health around him. It’s not even a matter of age, it’s not as if he’s always obliged to look after those who are a few years younger than him all the time. Maybe it’s about giving warmth to person who, in one way or another, gives warmth and comfort to him in the dull and repetitive days of work. As a conclusion, Lu Han himself isn’t even sure what he’s doing as he drapes the blanket over a snoring Yixing.
Lu Han can’t conclude the internal grumble of his stomach that’s far from hunger, but maybe because his brain is just too fogged up from not enough sleep and overwhelming workload. Maybe he just cares too much for this pale-skinned resident doctor, and maybe the priority of busily running through the halls of their hospital hinders Lu Han from diving deep into his emotions.
Yixing mumbles incoherently, and sinks deeper into the blanket.
Maybe someday Lu Han can have the time to let things grow in their pace. “Sleep tight.” he mutters, and Yixing’s eyelids flutter open.
Lu Han exhales, a smile playing on his lips, and opens the door.
(003)
Lu Han exhales, a smile playing on his lips, and opens the door. He feels his pride getting filled up to the brim as he takes in the view of a cozy neighborhood café right before his eyes. His eyes could shoot hearts as he scans the warm-colored interior of his main investment.
“Manager Lu!”
Lu Han’s smile brightens even more the moment he sees Minseok behind the counter. “I missed you, Minseok.” he says dramatically, reaching out a hand to touch, maybe pinch, the shorter one’s cheek.
Minseok swats his hand, eyes turning into slants as he chuckles. “You mean you missed this shop.” he replies, before turning his attention to the customer eyeing the menu plastered on the wall. “How was your vacation?” he mutters to Lu Han in the sidelines.
“It was refreshing, I guess.” he shrugs and pushes himself off the counter, making way for another customer to order. Lu Han wanders around for a while, surveying the café as he courses through the wooden chairs and tables, the paintings from the art shows he’s been to, the posters he’d printed from Tumblr contrasting the beige fabric wallpaper, a few high school girls giggling to each other by the glass wall, and a sleeping man on the couch. Lu Han pauses, and raises an eyebrow at the sleeping figure.
He sticks out like a sore thumb, dozing peacefully against the hustle and bustle of the afternoon flow inside the homey café. Lu Han recognizes the uniform, and realizes that he’s actually an employee. Lu Han taps the shoulder of the sleeping figure, interrupting the person’s slow and even heaves of breath as the boy opens his eyes lethargically. “Excuse me?” Lu Han’s attempt at being gentle isn’t much of a success.
The person sits up, dazed and disoriented for at least minute before finally acknowledging Lu Han’s presence. His hooded eyes widen for a moment before reverting to their normal state as his mouth hangs open.
“You know, we actually have a break room.”
“Right, I forgot. Thanks.” The sleepyhead replies as he sluggishly heads over the cramped break room adjacent to the customer restroom.
Lu Han sees a curious Minseok eyeing him at the counter, as he freezes in his place with a mix of emotions ranging between awe and disbelief.
-
“Well, it’s not my fault he left so abruptly, so I guess I had to find a replacement.” Jongdae shrugs, leaning at the counter as the cookies on the oven beginning to set. “It’s also not my fault that Yixing sleeps all the time - hey, but it’s not even his shift yet okay, he goes here extra early just to get a few hours of shuteye before-”
“High school girls are staring at him! That’s one consumer segment I would never want to lose, Jongdae. Think about it. Think about the skirts.”
Jongdae chuckles. “I’m pretty sure they like what they see,” he raises his eyebrows. “Yixing’s a pro at doing nothing and making them wet their-”
Lu Han hastily leaves the kitchen and clings onto Minseok by the cash register the moment he’s out the door.
-
Since the new employee, Zhang Yixing, is still on probation, Lu Han decided to observe him.
Lu Han is seated on a table in the corner of the coffee shop, unable to move the pen on his hand and unable to remove the awe that’s clearly showing on his face.
One thing he observed about Yixing, halfway through his steaming cup of latte, is that the boy seems to move so lethargically, but tends to finish the tasks so swiftly. He had never expected this much from a freshly hired employee who had been sleeping on the couch on their first incidental meeting. His first impression on Yixing surely hadn’t lasted for even a day, because here he is, staring open-mouthed at Yixing’s somewhat slow but fluid motions. It’s as if the boy was dancing through all the work he’s doing.
Somewhere in between Lu Han’s last sips, Yixing flashes him a dimpled smile. Lu Han gulps down the last sip heavily, tasting a slightly sweeter aftertaste on his mouth.
-
“I think I’m in love.” Lu Han seriously whispers while stuffing humongous chunks of red velvet cake into his mouth.
Jongdae wipes his hand on his apron and thoroughly glances at the oven before replying “You’re just hungry.” He looks at Lu Han indifferently and leans on the counter by the sink.
Lu Han’s about to retort just as he sees Yixing’s back facing his view through the tiny window of the kitchen, the sides of his porcelain skinned face showing an evident smile as a girl giggles when her order is handed to her. Something twists wrongly inside Lu Han’s stomach for second, but is soon replaced by the longing for just a sample of the freshly baked lemon cake that’s carefully being handled by Jongdae.
“You’re right, maybe I’m just hungry.”
-
Lu Han randomly visits the café, Minseok greeting him happily like always, and he finds Yixing snoring soundly on the tiny break room’s couch. He tucks back the performance evaluation back into his folder.
Lu Han randomly visits the café, Jongdae greeting him with a smug face like always, and he stumbles with his words for the first time in a while when Yixing suddenly asks him about his evaluation results. Jongdae tells him he’s blushing.
Lu Han visits the café, Minseok silently eyeing him with a knowing smile, and he exhales in frustration while staring at a lifeless Yixing spread out on the couch. He dismisses all the well-deserved compliments he’s supposed to give.
Lu Han visits the café, Jongdae raising his eyebrows at him in expectation, and he’s at a loss for words as Yixing repeatedly bows to him for the kind evaluation. He knows he could’ve replied in a better way instead of stuttered words and a flustered smile.
-
Lu Han can’t take it anymore. It frustrates him that every single time he’s up and ready to talk to Yixing, he’s fast asleep on the break room. Though when Lu Han doesn’t even have anything planned - no icebreakers, no small talks thought out - is exactly the moment that Yixing chooses to be wide awake (flashing smiles at swooning girls in the sidelines, which makes the lines progress slower than before.)
The pang in his chest spreads deeper into his system for every possible moment lost in between Yixing’s snoring and Lu Han’s newly discovered conversational problems. He slams his palm onto the freshly printed poster, aggressively pounding on the edges to plaster it on top of the layers of the meticulously picked typographies and images from the internet.
“All the regrets?” Minseok reads, face confused as he looks at the seemingly out of place addition.
Lu Han sighs heavily. “Yes,” he slams a hand on the wall, curled fist landing clumsily on the wall. “All the regrets.”
Minseok blinks at him and leaves Lu Han to serve the tiny cakes he’s been balancing on his arm the whole time.
-
I would like to have a casual chat with you, since it is ethical to foster a caring relationship with my employees. Please call me within non-working hours.
Lu Han leaves his number and his written note - which took about seven revisions - plastered on Yixing’s apron hanging on the arm of the couch. He’s about to remove the note in haste, his indecisiveness drowning him, but Jongdae suddenly pushes the door open and loudly announces “Minseok’s looking for you.”
Lu Han stares at him, wide-eyed and struggling to restrain the desire to strangle Jongdae right there and then. Jongdae’s surprised and confused at the same time.
Yixing yawns.
-
Lu Han enters his bedroom, loosening his tie before plunging down onto his bed. His eyelids are nearly giving up on him when he suddenly scrambles around his sheets for his phone, hastily checking if anyone has called him. He’s halfway through getting disappointed, a dull, unfamiliar ache forming within his chest.
He’s about to doze off completely, and as if on cue, his phone suddenly rings.
(000)
He’s about to doze off completely, and as if on cue, his phone suddenly rings.
Lu Han panics, haphazardly flinging his hands on the pockets of his jeans, to the cushions of the sofa, to Yixing’s sides - Yixing’s vibrating pocket, more specifically. Lu Han sighs.
He leans closer to Yixing’s heaving chest, the younger boy’s arms loosely crossed over his stomach. The moment Lu Han pinches the phone’s edges that were peeking from his pocket, the buzzing stops. Lu Han’s a second too late before he gets to retreat his hand as Yixing asks “What are you doing?” His face scrunched up in confusion.
Lu Han gives a laugh that’s in between shyness and nervousness. “Your phone was ringing.” He says, leaning away from Yixing and resting his weight on the arm of the couch.
Yixing’s eyes widen and his mouth pops open before checking his phone. Lu Han checks his wristwatch and Yixing’s tired eyes.
“We still have ten minutes until practice.” Lu Han manages to slip the words out of his yawn while he stretches, his feet clumsily bumping against Yixing’s thighs. He exhales in contentment, feeling a small amount of fatigue from their comeback preparations disappear, thanks to the little naps they’ve been taking in between practice breaks.
Yixing discards his phone in between the couch’s cushions and leans all of his weight against an awkwardly positioned Lu Han. “Let’s make the most out of it then.” he replies, snuggling his head comfortably on top of Lu Han’s shoulder, dangling his feet off the couch.
Lu Han groans and Yixing softly chuckles.
Lu Han has never been this tired before. But it’s all worth it.
TITLE: Sleepyhead
RATING: PG-13
LENGTH: 5128 words
WARNINGS: N/A
SUMMARY: In which there are different lifetimes, and Lu Han would always end up finding the same guy passed out on a couch in each one.
FINAL NOTES: hello recipient! it was so hard to choose from the prompts you gave since all of them seemed really fun to write!! D: but i enjoyed writing this super qt prompt of yours, so i hope you enjoy reading this too he he he
(001)
Lu Han has never been this tired before. But it’s all worth it.
He feels sweat trickling down his neck, his forehead, his whole body. His head hangs down, and his vision blurs inconsistently. He takes note of every droplet of his own sweat, his hard work, and feels some sense of achievement as it splashes down on that space between his feet.
Lu Han knows that he can understand and fluently speak Korean, but the murmurs of the other trainees suddenly become too foreign in his ears. They pass by him, muttering words of concern, telling him he should rest, noticing how pale he is than he usually is. The moment he meets their eyes, Lu Han forces his face into a smile and nods politely. He replies with good-bye’s and see-you-tomorrow’s, alternating the words through his ragged breaths.
There is a buzz reverberating through his ear in time with his own rapid pulse that’s taking too long to calm down, and then the sudden realization that his whole body will ache after waking up from a good night’s sleep hits him hard. A fatigue that he’s never felt before is slowly starting to become evident and it courses through his veins, catalyzing the lethargic drag of his tired feet to the empty break room. He wants to lie down on the worn down couch for a while, his tired body aching for the usually uncomfortable foam peeking through the ripped leather. Lu Han would absolutely opt for anything other than the hardwood floor of their practice room, and he would deem it comfortable at this very moment.
The room illuminates under the fluorescence, and he sees someone sprawled on the couch. “Um,” Lu Han breathes out, an idle hand still on the light switch. He squints to see a mop of hair on top of a pale face beneath the shadow of a grey hood, a hand loosely cradling a phone, and a chest that heaves slowly in slumber.
The boy shifts in his sleep. Lu Han didn’t want to wake him up so he switches off the light in haste and swiftly leaves the break room. He closes the door behind him as gentle as possible, unconsciously holding his breath.
Lu Han exhales. He feels disoriented with an unfamiliar mix of emotions swirling around his head, his chest, and his slow exhales. Lu Han feels dead tired, and he feels fulfilled but disappointed, yet curious - and every single feeling in between.
He didn’t think his first day would be this exhausting.
-
“I heard you were popular with girls, oppa.” she playfully nudges him.
Lu Han tries his best not to cringe whenever a girl’s voice purposely turns high-pitched, but this is a lost case. He laughs it off instead and nudges her in return as they walk along the hall. “Rumors!” He replies to dismiss her comment then he bids her good bye as his hand hangs onto the door of his practice room.
“Will I see you again after training?” she almost smirks and almost pouts at the same time, her eyes analyzing his face.
Lu Han gulps and stops his hand from scratching the back of his head in slight discomfort. His hand suddenly retreats itself as the door opens and Lu Han jumpily steps aside in mere reflex. His doe eyes open widely in surprise, and his mouth hangs open with an idle apology lingering on his tongue. But the boy’s pale skin chokes him and keeps his words inside his throat, his brain working overdrive as he tries to remember why his too porcelain complexion seems unnervingly familiar.
The boy closes the door and bows at the both of them, once, twice, even thrice. The prominent bones of his shoulders peek bravely through his sleeveless gray top. “Sorry.” he mutters politely, a foreign twang melting through his tone.
“At the break room-” Lu Han says at the same time as the boy’s apology.
With his mouth hanging open, he blinks at Lu Han, waiting for the continuation of the unfinished sentence yet completely ready to leave any moment. Curiosity and confusion blends within the look of his eyes, droopy and hooded, as if the boy’s either high or sleepy. Lu Han focuses on him too much, his peripheral vision blurring out too much than usual. He seems anxious, and shy, and hesitant all at the same time.
“Oppa, I’ll get going!” he hears in the background. Lu Han slightly tilts his head to smile at the girl he was with, parting ways with her in finality. The moment he looks back, straight ahead, to speak to him, he was already walking away from Lu Han and something sinks within him.
Lu Han wanted to call out his name, only if he knew it.
-
“Damn it Lu Han, you’ve only been here for a week but you’ve got about a dozen of girls trailing after you in the halls.”
They form a messy circle on the floor of their practice room, extra bowls of jjajangmyeon and their own water bottles at the center, as Lu Han receives nudges from both sides and a chorus of disbelieved remarks overlapping one another. He smiles, shakes his head, and stuffs his mouth with noodles instead. He then receives pats on his back and heavy hands ruffling his hair.
“It’s not like that at all!” He says with a mouthful, words mushing up together with the noodles inside his mouth and his slight foreign accent.
He receives a series of deep adolescent chuckles and a few grunts along with disagreeing, shaking heads.
“Yixing!”
Lu Han pauses, both of his hands frozen on his water bottle and his eyes locked on the pale boy with his unruly bed hair emerging from the break room. Said bed-hair-boy opens his sleepy eyes a little bit wider, his gaze flickering to meet Lu Han’s own for a mere second.
“Hey, we ordered one for you too.” They scoot over to make space for him, one offers a bowl of jjajangmyeon, and another comments on how he sleeps damn too much.
Yixing laughs, his dimple introducing itself to Lu Han for the first time.
Lu Han gulps, hands peeling of the label on his water bottle.
Yixing has one hand on the back of his head, and one hand waving them off. “Thanks, I’ll pass.” He dismisses them with heavily accented Korean, and passively leaves the room no matter how much they persuade him to just sit with them for once.
There’s suddenly a fog forming up in Lu Han’s head and an elbow nudging his side. “You know I’ve read somewhere that when you peel off water labels, it’s like you’re sexually frustrated or something.”
Lu Han blinks at him, then he cranes his head to the side. “What? I couldn’t catch some words.” His mouth forms a slight pout and his eyebrows meet as he pretends his slow comprehension. He clears his dry throat, and stops peeling off the label.
-
Lu Han sort of wakes up at two in the morning, feeling all warm and disoriented.
Lu Han sort of remembers dreaming about a pale-skinned boy with lethargic eyes and a shy dimple, and he kind of buries his face into his pillow and roughly ruffles his hair.
He sort of feels frustrated and confused, and he kind of needs to cool down.
-
The very first time Lu Han’s actually paid attention when Yixing’s dancing, he mentally slaps himself for not doing so sooner. Yixing isn’t just good, nor is he the best in all the technicalities - he’s way more than that. When Yixing dances, he’s breathtaking and amazing and everything in between, and Lu Han regrets all the wasted time he’s spent running around a maze of hesitation and denial.
From every angled turn to the slightest movement of the tips of his fingers, Lu Han can feel the finesse, the accuracy, and the evident passion. The way Yixing dances is what completely separates him from the other trainees. Once Lu Han has set his eyes on the moving body, the rest of his vision pales down in comparison to the porcelain-skinned boy who shines the brightest with every fluid move.
Yixing catches his gaze for a few seconds, and Lu Han can feel himself gravitating towards him - and he’s not stopping himself anymore. He accepts how his stomach flips backwards and how he feels cold sweat every single time he thinks about Yixing. He accepts how this maybe some kind of late adolescent confusion and even misplaced infatuation, but he’s not restraining himself from taking another risk. He took a huge risk by landing here in Korea, why was he even so worried about a tiny risk such as this one?
“Hey,” Yixing calls out between uneven breaths, and heads over to where Lu Han’s grounded. “Lu Han right?” he talks to him in his mother tongue.
Lu Han blinks for a few seconds, and jolts in reply “Yeah, hi, um Yixing?” he offers a hand and cringes at how dumb he sounds.
Yixing smiles at him as he firmly shakes the other’s hand and Lu Han swears he feels electricity coursing through them.
“We’re heading out for samgyeopsal in a while.” Yixing tells him, tongue twisting at the Korean word.
“I’ll be there.” Lu Han smiles.
Lu Han doesn’t tell him about the time he barged into the break room. Lu Han doesn’t tell him that every time he hears the heavily accented Korean, he can’t help but feel a pang in his chest that craves for home. Lu Han doesn’t utter a word about Yixing and how he soothes that said pang in his chest in some way or another, and Lu Han couldn’t be more grateful.
-
“In a hurry?”
“Sort of.” Lu Han answers with a laugh and heads out of the practice room, only to come back about an hour later with the lights shut off and the whole room soulless. He feels himself smiling as his fingers clutch the pillow he’s holding just a little bit tighter.
He carefully slips into the quiet break room.
-
Lu Han has it all planned out. It will start with a very smooth and cool entrance to the break room, head up high and shoulders straight. He’ll tell Yixing that he left a pillow for him the other night, and that’s it, no confused feelings attached to the friendly gesture. No confused, messed up, unfamiliar feelings at all. His slim fingers suddenly twitch, his breath hitches, and Lu Han starts shying away from the break room.
He hears the twist of the doorknob. “Lu Han?” a voice calls out inside tiny room.
Lu Han pauses by the door of the break room for a while.
(002)
Lu Han pauses by the door of the break room for a while. He stands idly in thought, chopsticks on one hand to hold together the noodles, the lukewarm plastic cup of his instant staple food on the other. Lu Han sighs before gulping down the remaining contents of the cup noodles, simultaneously giving the interns a smile as they pass by and greet him. He calls out an intern over and coughs as the young kid scurries towards him.
Lu Han clears his throat before patting his shoulder and peeks at the intern’s nameplate before speaking. “You’re doing good, Zitao.” He also gives the empty plastic cup to Zitao, passing his own garbage to an innocent intern who seems elated to be acknowledged.
Zitao beams at him and bows, then he proceeds to run off in a hurry with Lu Han’s discarded cup noodles in hand.
He enters the break room, leaves his coat on the couch, and drops dead on a bunk bed.
-
He opens the door and sneezes quite loudly, his eyes drooping and his hand running over his face. Lu Han sniffs.
Doctor Kim walks by, his hand patting Lu Han on the shoulder, and the other holding a mug of coffee. “Wipe your nose, you’re disgusting.” Jongdae whispers before leaving the dark break room with a groggy Lu Han.
Lu Han exhales, groans, and leaves his coat on the couch before proceeding to the middle bunk bed, the sheets already starting to smell like him. It’s no wonder that the pillows already reeks of his shampoo, since it’s been months of pushing away a sleepily disoriented Jongdae who’s always trying to climb up beside him and getting rid of an already sleeping Minseok off of his territory. It’s always a well-fought battle with the two Doctor Kim’s.
Sleep’s already seeping into system when his brain suddenly alerts him as his eyes see his coat moving on the couch. Lu Han inhales sharply and sits up on the bed, completely awake. As manly as he claims to be, he carefully slides off the bed and gently walks toward the couch. He’s seen cadavers and heavily injured emergency patients gasping for life, so there’s absolutely no reason for him to be afraid now.
He squints his eyes and is disappointed to see a person beneath his white coat - but he quickly realizes that only the two Doctor Kim’s shares this break room with him. His breath hitches, his mind suddenly recalling all those graveyard shift ghost stories Jongdae’s been telling him a few months back.
He pokes the living thing with his index finger cautiously, and his eyebrows meet when the person groaned.
Lu Han inhales as he retrieves his coat, and brings his face closer to examine the person. With the help of the faint light peeking through the window blinds, he sees parted lips and a sculptured nose.
The door opens, the sound of the busy hall fills the dark room for a few seconds, and Lu Han meets Minseok’s gaze. Only then does he realize that his face was only inches apart from the sleeping boy on the couch.
“I understand,” a lethargic Minseok dismisses him and plunges down on his own bed before Lu Han could let an explanation out of his open mouth.
-
Lu Han surveys the interns’ faces before sending them out of his office. He drags down the blinds and peeks out of the glass window for one last confirming look, sees Zitao wave at him meekly as the group passes by, and is greatly dismayed that he couldn’t find the face he was looking for. Lu Han shrugs and thinks that an intern passing out on their break room would be ridiculous.
Jongdae’s face suddenly fills his vision, his eyes indifferent through his black-rimmed glasses, staring at him through the gaps. “Are you gonna have lunch with us or what?” he faintly hears Dr. Kim’s voice outside the room. Lu Han squints before closing the blinds.
-
It takes Lu Han about two minutes and a half to safely retrieve his white coat under a sleeping boy on the couch. He heard a lot of groaning, there was a lot of twisting and turning, and one moment he almost ran out of the door because Lu Han swears he could have seen his eyes open for about a second. But after a few minutes of calming down his heart and staring the pale boy’s eyelids in the faint midnight blue hue of the break room, he concludes him to be in the deepest stage of sleep so Lu Han has absolutely nothing to worry about.
Lu Han finally has his coat on and was about to fix his hair when the Sleeping Boy On The Couch was no longer sleeping. The boy rubs at one eye, the other staring down at the faux leather surface. He yawns before staring straight into Lu Han’s eyes.
Lu Han blinks at him. “Good morning,” he manages to greet with his a raspy voice that’s in dire need of hot coffee. He clears his throat and looks away, clumsily fixing his hair.
Minseok noisily barges in, sleepy eyes almost shutting. He stops to sit at the arm of the couch, forming a barrier between Lu Han and the boy with the hooded eyes. “Hey, Doc Zhang,” Minseok mutters before yawning. “You know you can sleep on my bed while-” Another yawn interrupts him.
“Doc Zhang?” Lu Han mutters, wide doe eyes sneaking a glance on the boy’s messy mop of black hair.
Doctor Zhang smiles and nods at him.
“While I’m gone, Yixing, you should sleep on the bed,” Minseok manages to breathe out as he leans against the wall, his butt comfortably positioned on the arm of the couch, almost falling into a deep slumber.
“I’m pretty sure he likes the couch.” Lu Han comments before giving Doctor Zhang Yixing one last smile as he heads out the door.
-
Yixing yawns. “I’m going ahead, Lu Han.” He says as he snuggles up further into his pillow on the far end of the couch, his legs curled up to barely fit himself on the space.
“Sure, sure. I have to get some rest too.” Lu Han replies, sitting crossed legged at the edge of his bed, facing the couch where Yixing’s starting to drift into sleep.
“It’s nice to finally talk to someone,” Yixing starts mumbling against the cold surface of the couch. “Who can understand me, literally.” He lightly chuckles at the end of his sentence before muttering a slurry good night to Lu Han.
Lu Han couldn’t help but smile, remembering how comfortable he felt talking to him and how he just felt an instant connection through Yixing’s familiar accent. The moment he heard Mandarin slip out of Doctor Zhang’s lips, he suddenly missed home. But the moment Yixing opened up with his animated stories and unusual laugh that broke the gloom of the dimly lit break room, he feels like he suddenly found a new kind of home.
Jongdae enters the room in haste, and it abruptly makes Lu Han realize that he’s been sitting dumbly on his bed, staring at a sleeping Zhang Yixing for about a few minutes.
“Forgot something?” Lu Han speaks in a low volume, scratching the back of his head and inching closer to the middle of his bed.
“Yeah.” He hears Jongdae rummaging through the bag on the foot of the bed next to Lu Han’s, a zipping sound coming not too long after. “Forgot to remind you to control your hormones.”
Lu Han’s extra pillow hits Jongdae on the head. Lu Han curses at him a little too loud that Yixing either grumbles or laughs as Jongdae exits the break room with his knowing smile.
-
Lu Han gasps as his dream suddenly wakes him up. With his eyes quickly adjusting to the darkness, he fumbles through the sheets for his wristwatch. He gets hold of his phone instead, and groans while squinting, the brightness almost too much for him to handle. It’s six-thirty in the morning, and he has half an hour to prepare for his next shift.
He hears the subtle cracks of his bones as he stretches. Lu Han yawns and rubs his eyes as he sits on his bed, his blurry vision barely capturing the image of a person dozing off on the couch. He shivers the moment he completely removes his blanket, and his eyes suddenly dart back to the couch.
Lu Han sighs. It’s getting even colder these days, and he still can’t comprehend why Yixing favors an old couch over the comfy bunk beds. He grabs his white coat hanging by his bed’s headboard, and his bed’s blanket with his other hand. It’s not a matter of profession, it’s not because he’s a doctor and he’s obliged to be concerned about everyone’s health around him. It’s not even a matter of age, it’s not as if he’s always obliged to look after those who are a few years younger than him all the time. Maybe it’s about giving warmth to person who, in one way or another, gives warmth and comfort to him in the dull and repetitive days of work. As a conclusion, Lu Han himself isn’t even sure what he’s doing as he drapes the blanket over a snoring Yixing.
Lu Han can’t conclude the internal grumble of his stomach that’s far from hunger, but maybe because his brain is just too fogged up from not enough sleep and overwhelming workload. Maybe he just cares too much for this pale-skinned resident doctor, and maybe the priority of busily running through the halls of their hospital hinders Lu Han from diving deep into his emotions.
Yixing mumbles incoherently, and sinks deeper into the blanket.
Maybe someday Lu Han can have the time to let things grow in their pace. “Sleep tight.” he mutters, and Yixing’s eyelids flutter open.
Lu Han exhales, a smile playing on his lips, and opens the door.
(003)
Lu Han exhales, a smile playing on his lips, and opens the door. He feels his pride getting filled up to the brim as he takes in the view of a cozy neighborhood café right before his eyes. His eyes could shoot hearts as he scans the warm-colored interior of his main investment.
“Manager Lu!”
Lu Han’s smile brightens even more the moment he sees Minseok behind the counter. “I missed you, Minseok.” he says dramatically, reaching out a hand to touch, maybe pinch, the shorter one’s cheek.
Minseok swats his hand, eyes turning into slants as he chuckles. “You mean you missed this shop.” he replies, before turning his attention to the customer eyeing the menu plastered on the wall. “How was your vacation?” he mutters to Lu Han in the sidelines.
“It was refreshing, I guess.” he shrugs and pushes himself off the counter, making way for another customer to order. Lu Han wanders around for a while, surveying the café as he courses through the wooden chairs and tables, the paintings from the art shows he’s been to, the posters he’d printed from Tumblr contrasting the beige fabric wallpaper, a few high school girls giggling to each other by the glass wall, and a sleeping man on the couch. Lu Han pauses, and raises an eyebrow at the sleeping figure.
He sticks out like a sore thumb, dozing peacefully against the hustle and bustle of the afternoon flow inside the homey café. Lu Han recognizes the uniform, and realizes that he’s actually an employee. Lu Han taps the shoulder of the sleeping figure, interrupting the person’s slow and even heaves of breath as the boy opens his eyes lethargically. “Excuse me?” Lu Han’s attempt at being gentle isn’t much of a success.
The person sits up, dazed and disoriented for at least minute before finally acknowledging Lu Han’s presence. His hooded eyes widen for a moment before reverting to their normal state as his mouth hangs open.
“You know, we actually have a break room.”
“Right, I forgot. Thanks.” The sleepyhead replies as he sluggishly heads over the cramped break room adjacent to the customer restroom.
Lu Han sees a curious Minseok eyeing him at the counter, as he freezes in his place with a mix of emotions ranging between awe and disbelief.
-
“Well, it’s not my fault he left so abruptly, so I guess I had to find a replacement.” Jongdae shrugs, leaning at the counter as the cookies on the oven beginning to set. “It’s also not my fault that Yixing sleeps all the time - hey, but it’s not even his shift yet okay, he goes here extra early just to get a few hours of shuteye before-”
“High school girls are staring at him! That’s one consumer segment I would never want to lose, Jongdae. Think about it. Think about the skirts.”
Jongdae chuckles. “I’m pretty sure they like what they see,” he raises his eyebrows. “Yixing’s a pro at doing nothing and making them wet their-”
Lu Han hastily leaves the kitchen and clings onto Minseok by the cash register the moment he’s out the door.
-
Since the new employee, Zhang Yixing, is still on probation, Lu Han decided to observe him.
Lu Han is seated on a table in the corner of the coffee shop, unable to move the pen on his hand and unable to remove the awe that’s clearly showing on his face.
One thing he observed about Yixing, halfway through his steaming cup of latte, is that the boy seems to move so lethargically, but tends to finish the tasks so swiftly. He had never expected this much from a freshly hired employee who had been sleeping on the couch on their first incidental meeting. His first impression on Yixing surely hadn’t lasted for even a day, because here he is, staring open-mouthed at Yixing’s somewhat slow but fluid motions. It’s as if the boy was dancing through all the work he’s doing.
Somewhere in between Lu Han’s last sips, Yixing flashes him a dimpled smile. Lu Han gulps down the last sip heavily, tasting a slightly sweeter aftertaste on his mouth.
-
“I think I’m in love.” Lu Han seriously whispers while stuffing humongous chunks of red velvet cake into his mouth.
Jongdae wipes his hand on his apron and thoroughly glances at the oven before replying “You’re just hungry.” He looks at Lu Han indifferently and leans on the counter by the sink.
Lu Han’s about to retort just as he sees Yixing’s back facing his view through the tiny window of the kitchen, the sides of his porcelain skinned face showing an evident smile as a girl giggles when her order is handed to her. Something twists wrongly inside Lu Han’s stomach for second, but is soon replaced by the longing for just a sample of the freshly baked lemon cake that’s carefully being handled by Jongdae.
“You’re right, maybe I’m just hungry.”
-
Lu Han randomly visits the café, Minseok greeting him happily like always, and he finds Yixing snoring soundly on the tiny break room’s couch. He tucks back the performance evaluation back into his folder.
Lu Han randomly visits the café, Jongdae greeting him with a smug face like always, and he stumbles with his words for the first time in a while when Yixing suddenly asks him about his evaluation results. Jongdae tells him he’s blushing.
Lu Han visits the café, Minseok silently eyeing him with a knowing smile, and he exhales in frustration while staring at a lifeless Yixing spread out on the couch. He dismisses all the well-deserved compliments he’s supposed to give.
Lu Han visits the café, Jongdae raising his eyebrows at him in expectation, and he’s at a loss for words as Yixing repeatedly bows to him for the kind evaluation. He knows he could’ve replied in a better way instead of stuttered words and a flustered smile.
-
Lu Han can’t take it anymore. It frustrates him that every single time he’s up and ready to talk to Yixing, he’s fast asleep on the break room. Though when Lu Han doesn’t even have anything planned - no icebreakers, no small talks thought out - is exactly the moment that Yixing chooses to be wide awake (flashing smiles at swooning girls in the sidelines, which makes the lines progress slower than before.)
The pang in his chest spreads deeper into his system for every possible moment lost in between Yixing’s snoring and Lu Han’s newly discovered conversational problems. He slams his palm onto the freshly printed poster, aggressively pounding on the edges to plaster it on top of the layers of the meticulously picked typographies and images from the internet.
“All the regrets?” Minseok reads, face confused as he looks at the seemingly out of place addition.
Lu Han sighs heavily. “Yes,” he slams a hand on the wall, curled fist landing clumsily on the wall. “All the regrets.”
Minseok blinks at him and leaves Lu Han to serve the tiny cakes he’s been balancing on his arm the whole time.
-
I would like to have a casual chat with you, since it is ethical to foster a caring relationship with my employees. Please call me within non-working hours.
Lu Han leaves his number and his written note - which took about seven revisions - plastered on Yixing’s apron hanging on the arm of the couch. He’s about to remove the note in haste, his indecisiveness drowning him, but Jongdae suddenly pushes the door open and loudly announces “Minseok’s looking for you.”
Lu Han stares at him, wide-eyed and struggling to restrain the desire to strangle Jongdae right there and then. Jongdae’s surprised and confused at the same time.
Yixing yawns.
-
Lu Han enters his bedroom, loosening his tie before plunging down onto his bed. His eyelids are nearly giving up on him when he suddenly scrambles around his sheets for his phone, hastily checking if anyone has called him. He’s halfway through getting disappointed, a dull, unfamiliar ache forming within his chest.
He’s about to doze off completely, and as if on cue, his phone suddenly rings.
(000)
He’s about to doze off completely, and as if on cue, his phone suddenly rings.
Lu Han panics, haphazardly flinging his hands on the pockets of his jeans, to the cushions of the sofa, to Yixing’s sides - Yixing’s vibrating pocket, more specifically. Lu Han sighs.
He leans closer to Yixing’s heaving chest, the younger boy’s arms loosely crossed over his stomach. The moment Lu Han pinches the phone’s edges that were peeking from his pocket, the buzzing stops. Lu Han’s a second too late before he gets to retreat his hand as Yixing asks “What are you doing?” His face scrunched up in confusion.
Lu Han gives a laugh that’s in between shyness and nervousness. “Your phone was ringing.” He says, leaning away from Yixing and resting his weight on the arm of the couch.
Yixing’s eyes widen and his mouth pops open before checking his phone. Lu Han checks his wristwatch and Yixing’s tired eyes.
“We still have ten minutes until practice.” Lu Han manages to slip the words out of his yawn while he stretches, his feet clumsily bumping against Yixing’s thighs. He exhales in contentment, feeling a small amount of fatigue from their comeback preparations disappear, thanks to the little naps they’ve been taking in between practice breaks.
Yixing discards his phone in between the couch’s cushions and leans all of his weight against an awkwardly positioned Lu Han. “Let’s make the most out of it then.” he replies, snuggling his head comfortably on top of Lu Han’s shoulder, dangling his feet off the couch.
Lu Han groans and Yixing softly chuckles.
Lu Han has never been this tired before. But it’s all worth it.