Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

They don't have a love story, Jisung and Minho. Love stories are about the falling and the resolution. Jisung doesn't really think they have either. He didn't fall in love with Minho, he just was. Maybe immediately, maybe not. It was hard to say. All Jisung knows is that there's a time before Minho, and there's a time after, and nothing in between made for much of a story. It sounded sort of sad put that way. That they have no story, but Jisung doesn't find it sad at all. It's all the more proof that what they had went beyond the modern understanding of love and wasn't that just beautiful?

Was that dramatic? Probably. Jisung was a musician and a poet at heart, so yeah, his thoughts tended to warp with his artistic whims. It was also true though. Minho had never been just anything to Jisung. He went from someone Jisung had never met to the only person that would ever matter and that was it. They didn't go on dates or get to know each other in that gradual, all-encompassing way that lovers did. They didn't have to. Minho understood Jisung on a fundamental level from the day they met. It was like the asshole could read his mind and he'd be upset about it if Jisung couldn't do the very same.

True mates weren't a real thing. Mates were chosen, and even if there were true mates, two omegas running parallel lines from hell were not going to be them. Still, Jisung felt like they could be sometimes. Minho saw him in ways no one ever had. He complimented him perfectly, the other side of Jisung's coin, and they slotted together like lock and key. Loving Minho was the easiest thing he'd ever done, like they were well and truly made for each other. Where Jisung ebbed, Minho flowed. Where Jisung shone, Minho struggled, and they evened it out by helping one another bridge that gap. They climbed the ladder hand in hand and got so much farther for it.

All this is to say that Jisung doesn't often put Minho into words. He doesn't have to because Minho is the only person Jisung really interacts with these days, and they don't need words to communicate something that they both understand. He doesn't call Minho his boyfriend in public, nor does he reference him as partner, or mate, or whatever else people are using these days. Jisung can't chase the wrongness from his tongue when he tries because none of that even comes close to describing what Minho means to him and Minho knows that. That, they had talked about when Jisung first started at No Easy Entertainment, six months after Minho had.

"Are we keeping us a secret?" Minho had asked, arms curled tight around Jisung's waist as his documentary played in the background.

Confused, Jisung had peaked up, popcorn stopped at his lips as he asked, "No? Why, do you want to?"

"No," Minho's quick to reply. "No, I don't want to do that, I just noticed that you weren't introducing me to people as your boyfriend. I wanted to make sure we were on the same page if we're going to be working together."

He didn't sound hurt, but Minho rarely did. He was hard to read when you didn't know him, but Jisung did. He could feel the tension in Minho's shoulders and see the carefully crafted distance in his eyes. Minho was hurt, Jisung realized, shooting up in his lap to face his mate with a frown.

"Min, I'm sorry. I didn't even realize. I'm not hiding it or anything, I just, I don't know, it just doesn't feel like enough, you know?"

"Enough?"

"You know," Jisung powers on, suddenly shy as he confesses his stupid thought process to his wonderfully patient boyfriend that he doesn't deserve. "Boyfriend is just so trivial, isn't it? It doesn't sound right because you're not just a boyfriend. You're not just anything Min, you're, like, forever. You're my Minho. That's the only way it makes sense. Shit, I sound like an idiot, okay. I hear it now. Yeah, no, I'm sorry. I wasn't doing it intentionally I swear. I love you and I don't care what people think of our relationship."

And Minho laughs because he's relieved, Jisung knows. Not out of malice. He laughs and when he looks back at Jisung it's so full of love that he chokes. Minho's pretty eyes flutter shut, his forehead pressed softly against Jisung as he whispers, "You have such a beautiful mind, Han Jisung. Call me whatever you want. As long as you say it with love."

"Cheesy," Jisung whispered back, but he was melting in Minho's hands all the same.

So Jisung still doesn't say it, but he means it every time he says Minho's name, and he likes to think no one cares enough to mind anyway. Besides, it wasn't like Jisung saw much of his coworkers after that first week of acclimation. The routine he'd fallen into was a perfect one that included minimal contact with anyone that wasn't Minho, especially throughout the day. Perks of being a junior producer and all that. Jisung doesn't do meetings, he does emails, and he doesn't do partnerships, he does wonderful, blissful solo time in his private studio that they'd allowed him despite his newness.

Jisung's interactions with his coworkers were limited to digital conversations and the odd run in when he couldn't avoid the bathroom any longer. He loved it that way, and it wasn't like he really felt the consequences of self imposed isolation. Minho drove them to work every morning and then home every evening so that Jisung couldn't hole himself up there overnight. Then, at whatever time Minho deems lunch, he makes the trek up three floors to eat lunch on Jisung's little ratty couch. It's a forced break almost daily, and Minho takes the opportunity to paint a picture of the people Jisung had never met but more than knew.

There were Minho's dance kids. The ones he'd been given as his first assignment that just never left his side. Lee Felix was apparently sunshine incarnate. Minho talked about him like he hung the stars in the sky. Beautiful, delicate features, but a voice like sin. They were required to wear scent blockers in public spaces to avoid incident, but Felix openly declared his status as omega whenever he felt necessary. Minho was endeared to him almost immediately, and really, they were both lucky that Jisung wasn't the jealous type because it had been a lot to take in. This Australian dancer who had Minho wrapped around his finger without even trying. Jisung would come to learn though, through Minho, that this was just the natural reaction to Felix. Nothing special.

Where Minho was endeared by Felix though, he was enraptured by Hwang Hyunjin. He wasn't as forth coming with his secondary gender, but Minho was strongly leaning beta. He was an excellent dancer, technical and strong in ways that made Minho practically drool talking about. That one, Jisung had had a harder time with, especially before he'd come to work at No Easy. Hyunjin was easy to be jealous of for some reason. Minho sent Jisung their dances and he'd zero in on the tall blonde fucking model until his head hurt because competing with that was impossible.

Except it wasn't. Jisung wasn't the jealous type for a reason. Simply put, he didn't need to be. He had no doubts in Minho. In their forever. He had none and so he'd chewed back that inkling of doubt until it no longer threatened to spill across his lips. He wasn't jealous of Hyunjin anymore, even as Minho continued to rave about the pair like they were God's gift to mankind. Jisung had fully mellowed out about three months in when Minho's rants went from compliments to whatever the pair had done to irritate him that day. That's when Jisung allowed himself to fully relax into the idea that Minho was making close friends and that was a good thing.

They were both too closed off. Jisung had been nineteen when they met, walking alone at three in the morning when he stumbled across Minho, perched on the railing of a bridge. He'd looked steady there. Relaxed. Somehow, Jisung had known that he wasn't. He read himself in Minho in seconds and it wasn't as hard as it should have been to talk him down. It wasn't hard to spend the night, backs to the railing and hands entertwined, sharing parts of themselves with a stranger that they'd sworn to take to the grave. It was surprisingly easy to become Minho and Jisung, but with other people it was infinitely harder.

Jisung tended to be better at superficial friendliness. Minho was a strong personality, firm in his opinions and unwilling to compromise himself for anyone or anything. That was why many assumed he was an alpha, stare too hard to meet and fists ready to be thrown. Jisung was a lot easier on the general public. He'd very carefully crafted the Jisung that they saw. Years of practice, years of experience, desperation, had created the perfect creature for survival. Jisung could do the small talk. He did good as the loud, whiny, comic relief character and that made him decently popular as they went through university.

Unfortunately, friendships built on lies are not lasting ones. It's Minho who's good at that part. His prickly exterior weeds out the fakes and regrets until all that was left were real, viable options for friendship. Knowing that, Jisung found himself eager to hear more about the people Minho was collecting at No Easy. He found himself asking after them as he finished up his degree and Minho did his best to get home before ten. He'd ask after Felix's classes or Hyunjin's injury of the week and Minho would oblige with far more detail than Jisung could ever need.

When he meets Seungmin, Minho has a lot to say. He's a very stereotypical beta, Seungmin. Calmer than the rest and quite analytical, though Minho had been observing long enough to note that Seungmin had a more hyperactive side he kept to himself. He was particular about his things, getting worked up if someone moved something or put it back incorrectly, and he had a habit of chewing on things he definitely shouldn't be chewing on. Minho hadn't liked him much at first, but with time, Jisung got used to hearing Seungmin's name just as much as the other two, and that was fine. It almost felt like they were his friends too.

The last one Minho acquires before Jisung starts work is Jeongin. Jeongin is apparently their love child, whatever that meant to Minho, and Minho adored the kid. He was only a year younger than Jisung, a vocalist with the agency while also going to school for a degree in elementary education. He's sweet when he wants to be, but rowdy and reckless with his words more often than not. Minho likes to poke fun at the kid. Teach him new ways to lovingly bully the others which Jeongin takes to like oil on fire. Jisung finds himself just as fond of the kid by the time his job offer arrives, more so than the rest. He even follows that one on Instagram when Minho shows it to him, not that he's picking favorites.

Chan and Changbin, ultimately, are Jisung's own fault. They are the ones who show him the ropes when he starts. He's not an entry level employee despite being newly graduated, but Minho assured him that that was what he should've expected. Jisung had a SoundCloud and multiple school showcases to speak for his work and No Easy wanted him as a producer. Not an intern, or an underling, but a genuine producer on their team with people like fucking Bang Chan and Seo Changbin. Musical geniuses the both of them and watching them work together his first day had been an almost religious experience.

Jisung was pretty sure he'd met Minho at the car in a daze of magic and music. It had been his turn to gush. To spill to his lover about the Gods of music that not only worked with him, but liked the shit he made. He'd loved that. Not enough to keep up more than polite contact with them after that first week, but enough that he was happy when Minho did the reaching out for him. Finding out the whole lot of them was a pack shouldn't have been as surprising as it was, in the end. Minho tells him at the end of his first month as a real producer. He's splayed out on his back on the wood, food demolished, when he suddenly sighs something deep and heavy.

"Can I tell you something you won't like?"

Jisung froze, fingers hovering above the keys of his laptop. "Sure?" he says, hesitant. "About what?"

"I've been worming my way up to Chan and Changbin, as you know."

"I do know," Jisung hums, tension coiling over his shoulders now. "I told you not to and you said, no, I'm adopting friends and you liked them. Then you became a stalker."

Minho glared up at him, affronted. "I did not stalk them. I made my way to Chan's studio to thank him for showing you around which is a perfectly normal thing for your mate to do, dickhead."

"That makes me seem like a little kid on my first day of school. Did you really do that?" At the pleased nod, Jisung groans, pulling his beanie down over his eyes as if he could will himself to disappear. "Right, of course you did. Okay. So you forcibly befriended some producers too. What's the bad news."

"They're a pack."

All six. Six people that, realistically, Jisung didn't know. It changed nothing but it changed everything because Jisung and packs were not things that went together. Minho knew that. Hell, even Jisung's acquaintances knew that, but he didn't have those here.

"Okay," he tries, tongue thick like cotton in his mouth. "That's cool, I guess."

Then Minho sends a bullet through his body as he asks, very seriously, "Do you want me to distance myself?"

"No," Jisung cries. "No, Minho, of course not. I'm not ever going to ask you to cut off friends because I have some stupid sensitivities. No."

"They aren't stupid," Minho says, sitting up and pinning Jisung with that dumb knowing look of his. "Your feelings and reactions are perfectly valid, Jisung. I like the kids, sure, but I love you, and that comes first. Is it going to be difficult for you if I'm getting close with a pack?"

That was the question, wasn't it? He felt like he knew them, not Chan and Changbin yet, but the other four. He felt like he did but he didn't. Minho had known them for months without them ever crossing Jisung's path and who said that had to change?

"No," Jisung decides even if it isn't sure. "No, I think- I mean- I don't think it's going to be an issue. I just don't want to get involved with it. I think they've been good for you though. I think, no, I want you to keep your friends. And you can still tell me about them. I promise I can handle packs existing near me. I'm not that fragile."

And he wasn't. Jisung knew that packs were unavoidable. His own trauma did not demonize the general existence of something and he'd managed twenty-three years of co-existence so far. He didn't let it bother him when Minho spoke about them. About their dynamics together. About their pack and their habits and their big fancy house that Minho went to by demand of Hyunjin for a birthday dinner that Jisung had been welcomed at as well. He'd opted not to go, for obvious reasons, but Minho had fun. He'd come home warm and tipsy, curling around Jisung in the nest with a content purr that made him smile.

That was the first stop sign on the way back to hell. They made his Minho purr. His Minho. His mate, his omega, his forever. Jisung had been too happy, high off Minho's own mood, to see the problem then. It took a few days for the uneasy feeling to creep back in. Three months of work and for the first time, Minho isn't in Jisung's studio for lunch. He breaks himself out of work and finds the texts on his phone that explain where Minho is. Where and with who and then the suspicion starts to creep in. Not of Minho, no, never that, but that pack? The pack that he knows is touchy and sweet and close to his Minho? Jisung can't shake the feeling that this is going to go south fast.

The second stop sign they blow past is the scenting. Jisung meets Minho at the car on a random Tuesday, tired and crabby and yearning for a hug from his lover to ease the roaring headache behind his eyes. He presses in close to Minho, breathes deep, and then hisses without even meaning to.

"Sung?"

Minho's looking down at him, startled and maybe a bit scared as he pushes away. "Why don't you smell like you?" Jisung asks sharply.

Eyes widening, Minho goes to sniff his own wrist as realization dawns on him. "Shit, I smell like Chan," he says. "We sort of puppy piled after practice. I think Chan scented everyone."

"What the fuck?"

"I'm so sorry, Sung, I think he just forgot he couldn't do that with me there. He's a little scatter brained at times, you know that. It's my fault, if anything. I didn't even notice. I'm so sorry."

But sorry doesn't do anything to stop Jisung's hands from shaking the entire way home. He's not mad at Minho. Not really. He wants to be mad at Chan, but he can't even bring himself to do that either because he does know Chan. He knows that he's a good guy. He knows that Chan almost always means well and Chan probably wouldn't knowingly slight Jisung like that. No, what had Jisung spiralling was the implications of the whole thing. Scenting the puppy pile. Unthinkingly doing it, too, it means something that Jisung doesn't want to think about. It means something he tries to scrub off his skin in the shower until he's taking too long and Minho's there to pull the cloth out of his hands.

They play a round of total forgiveness that night. A game Minho invented at the start of their relationship when they relied a little too much on intuition and not enough on communication. They set a timer for five minutes, Minho's phone between them, and they talked. The point of total forgiveness was honesty without consequence. Usually the time limit was shorter. That forced them to speak quickly and concisely if they wanted to beat the clock and usually they did. Total forgiveness could be called at any time, any place, and though they could have chosen not to participate, Jisung and Minho both respected the call when it came.

"You're upset," Minho stated as the timer starts. "Its the scenting but also not and I don't know how to help."

"They consider you pack," Jisung chokes out and it burns on its way. Saying it doesn't feel any better than thinking it, but at least this way Minho was tasting it too. "That's what that means. Not even thinking before scenting you. They consider you pack."

"You don't want them to consider me pack?"

"No. Do you want them to consider you pack?"

"Yes," Minho says and it isn't a surprise.

This was not something Jisung had been unaware of. Minho had suffered in life because he was alone. Before Jisung, there had never been permanence for him, and Jisung knew that Minho wanted a pack. He knew that they'd have to talk about it eventually, but that didn't mean he liked it. That didn't mean he was ready for it now.

Voice shaking, Jisung says, "They're trying to court you."

"I don't think so," Minho says, head tilted in adorable confusion. "I think they're just friendly."

"If they ask to court you what will you say?"

Minho considers this, quiet far longer than Jisung wanted him to be. His heart threatens to leave his chest and black spots swim across his vision. Jisung uses the burning of his abused skin as something grounding. He focuses on breathing as Minho thinks.

"I think that depends on too many things for me to answer," he settles on. "If they were to ask to court me, we'd have to have a discussion about you and the fact that I have no intention of leaving you. If they were okay with that then, well, we'd have to talk, wouldn't we? It isn't just my decision."

"Isn't it?"

"No," Minho says, this one sure. "Jisung, I love you."

"I know," he mutters.

He does know. 

Minho grabs both of his hands, squeezing in that reassuring way of his as he says, "Even if you know I need you to listen to me. I love you, Jisung. They're great. They're all great people and I could see a future with them. I could see them being my pack, but Sung, they aren't you. They aren't the ones who've been there for my worst moments. They aren't the ones who stuck by me, who picked up my pieces and put me together again. Maybe they want to be, but they aren't yet, and you are, and if I have to pick between a pack and you, I'll pick you. Every time."

Jisung would cry if he were capable. It had been years since tears had last fallen from the desert in his head. Total forgiveness helped as much as it could. It settled enough of Jisung's turmoil that he didn't give into the itch beneath his skin. That familiar niggling of anxiety that left him breathless and clawing at his own skin until all that was left was red. It pushed, fighting to be heard, but Minho was always just around the corner to fight it back. Jisung managed it with work. With music, the way he had since he was a child.

Music was in Jisung's bones. It slept between the walls of each vein and in the depth of his lungs. He adored music. The need to escape his own body had only ever silenced in the presence of a beat. Jisung found his escape in song books and shitty guitars when he was still a kid. He taught himself, absorbing sounds and instruments and techniques as he got older and better at sneaking things he wasn't supposed to. Now, Jisung had a studio. A studio full of expensive equipment that rested between his fingertips like the medicine he so desperately needed. Jisung pours his soul into music that no one will ever see and then he shuts it all away with the rest of his honesty in a folder long forgotten on his laptop.

Then it happens, and nothing could have prepared him for the reality to become, well, real. Minho texted him fifteen minutes ago. A simple, it happened. Coming up to talk. Remember to breathe . Which is hilarious, really, because Jisung forgets how to breathe after the first word and the only thing he registers after is that the world is almost certainly fucking ending. At the end of the day, he has every reason to be afraid because Minho wants a pack. Minho wants a pack. Jisung can only get in the way of that and they both know it, so it's a matter of time now isn't it? Not until Minho stops loving him but until loving him wasn't enough to justify staying anymore. 

Jisung was messy. Minho never made him feel bad for it, for his fucked up mind and fucked up habits, but that was because Minho had them too. He'd been so much better lately though. Minho had taken full advantage of the free counseling at their university and he was so much better now. Jisung was still just Jisung. He was still nightmares and smoking on the porch to forget his name when things got too bad. He was still panic attacks and scratching at skin and dissociating at will. Minho deserved better. Minho deserved a pack and love and people who were worth his time which, in all honesty, wasn't Jisung at all. 

"Jagi, breathe."

Minho's there, on his knees in front of Jisung's chair. He hadn't even noticed him come in, too busy catastrophizing in his head. Warm hands rest on either side of his face and Jisung focuses all of his attention on Minho's dark eyes, full of care and concern and so much love it hurts. 

"Sorry," Jisung chokes out, gripping onto Minho's wrist a little too tightly. "I'm sorry- I- I don't-"

Minho just shushes him, soothing him with even circles in his skin as Jisung forces himself to relax. They need to talk about it. The panic has to wait because they need to talk about it. Jisung has mastered the art of swallowing down panic attacks until it was safe to have one and he calls on that talent now. For a moment, they just exist in tense silence. Minho waits for Jisung to collect himself, the picture of patience, and then he stands again. Jisung yelps as Minho lifts him right out of his chair. He's strong. Jisung likes that about Minho. Likes that he can manhandle him when he wants to.

He's delicate about it now though, gently settling Jisung in his lap on the couch where Jisung can straddle his lap and collapse into the wonderful scent of Minho. Having a private studio is nice that way. Minho's allowed to peel off his scent blockers and surround them with sweet citrus and cinnamon. It's enough to bring him back to earth. Jisung is grasping at coherency when Minho says, "I told them they had to wait for an answer. We need to discuss it first."

"How'd they take it?" Jisung mutters into his collar bone. 

"They had no problem with that. They know I have a mate and they don't want to step on that.”

“Yeah, of course they did,” he replies, a choked laugh pulling out of his throat. “They’re all so fucking nice.”

Being held makes it better, but not by much. Minho wants a pack. Jisung doesn’t. There isn’t much else to say.

“You don’t have to be ready to talk right now, but is it okay if I do?”

Sweet Minho. Jisung nods into his chest, breathless and untethered.

“Okay,” he says softly, a hand coming to comb through Jisung’s hair in soothing circles. “First of all, they would really like to meet you. That’s not new. I talk about you a lot and it’s been a while. They’ve definitely been nagging about meeting you long before the courting started, I just didn’t mention it because you didn’t seem interested. Obviously, this is different. If they do court me and we do take steps towards a relationship, there will have to be some kind of relationship between you and them as well. Not as a romantic partner or pack but at least as my mate. I think it would be good for you to meet them before we make any other decisions.”

He’s met Chan and Changbin, Jisung doesn’t say. He follows Jeongin on instagram. He knows enough to make a decision. He knows enough to know that they’ll make great partners for Minho. That they’ll be kind and courteous and do what they can to make this work. Jisung also knows that it won’t work. It will come down to him or them, and even though the thought of losing Minho feels like drowning and burning all at once, Jisung knows which choice is the right one. He doesn’t need to meet them but Minho wants him to. Minho is sacrificing for him most of the time, Jisung can’t imagine a world where he denies him this too.

“Okay,” he whispers.

“Okay?”

“Yeah,” Jisung manages, grimace hidden away from the light of his life. “You value them a lot. I can handle a meeting or two, right?”

Right?