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fairyniceyeah · 3 months ago

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💎🐕I can't breathe

Title from HOT (SEVENTEEN)

Summary: Mingyu couldn’t breathe. His lungs filled with hot air but he couldn’t catch his breath.

CW: emeto, panic

Whumpee/Sickie: Mingyu Caretaker: Wonwoo + Seungcheol/S.Coups + Joshua

“I think I already sweated off all my makeup again”, Seungkwan groaned and flopped onto the couch next to Mingyu. Mingyu winced at the motion, the couch not seeming as stable as it should be. And why was Seungkwan so close? He just said it was hot.

“Maybe you will be a clown by the end of the performance”, Jeonghan teased. Seungkwan half-heartedly threw a couch cushion at him. It was as if even the pillow wasn’t interested in movement, flying in a small curve and then just falling straight to the ground far away from its intended target.

“Why are we doing a pillow fight when it’s like fourty fucking degrees outside?”, Woozi grumbled, tugging at his jean jacket.

“I’ll do you one better: Why is it fourty fucking degrees outside?”, Dino complained. “Hey, Seungkwannie-hyung, that’s my fan.”

“Not anymore. If you want it, come get it.”

Dino didn’t even think about moving, just flopping back down onto a chair.

“Well, apparently German summers are hot”, Seungcheol said, walking inside with his own jean jacket slung over his shoulder. Mingyu knew instinctively that the jacket wouldn’t last their first song.

Mingyu groaned. For a whole minute he had forgotten the reason why they were here - sweating to death - with all the bickering. But yeah, they were in Germany. They had about an hour left until their stage. Their first stage at Lollapalooza Berlin. Their first stage at Lollapalooza in general. And their first time headlining it.

It wasn’t that he was nervous per say. But they had never performed in front of German Carats before - and he had heard rumors that there were Carats from all over Europe there. They had just made their debut in Europe at Glastonbury and now they were back again.

Somehow his nerves were melting along with his body and his members.

“No shit, Sherlock”, Jeonghan grumbled. “At least you can take your jacket off.”

“Nobody is stopping you, Hannie”, Seungcheol said with a shrug.

“I’m wearing white, genius”, Jeonghan said, “I want to go out with a bang on my last stage but that doesn’t mean I want to flash Carats once it becomes see through with sweat. They won’t survive that so shortly before…”

Mingyu closed his eyes, trying to drown the resulting arguing out. He was hot. He was sweaty. He was supposed to stand in front of one of their biggest crowds yet, in less than an hour. He was going to perform in front of so many expecting Carats, Carats who likely only had this one chance at seeing them. He couldn’t fuck this up.

He couldn’t …

He couldn’t breathe. His lungs filled with hot air but he couldn’t catch his breath.

He couldn’t …

💎

“Mingyu-yah, you okay?”, Joshua suddenly asked, appearing from beside him, a hand on Mingyu’s shoulder.

He jerked under the unexpected touch but quickly opened his eyes and nodded. “I’m just hot”, he mumbled.

“That’s what you are supposed to be - according to Carats”, Hoshi quipped. Seokmin obnoxiously started singing the refrain to Hot on top of his lungs. He shut up abruptly with a pained yelp. Mingyu had no idea what had happened but he was thankful.

“Oh, fuck off, hyung”, Mingyu replied, glaring at him. “You’re not as funny as you think you are.”

Hoshi didn’t seem to get the memo. “I mean, just imagine them going crazy all over your sweat soaked body. Not everybody can get that reaction out of people.”

“Carats will definitely appreciate those muscles. I still don’t get how you and Jihoonie-hyung lift the same weights at the gym”, Seungkwan added mischievously. Mingyu closed his eyes again.

There was the sound of a smack and a protesting sound from Seungkwan. Apparently not only was Mingyu offended, so was Woozi - though for a totally different reason.

It was all in good fun, of course, but still Mingyu felt himself flush. It wasn’t like he didn’t know he was attractive and a fan favourite. But that was never an easy title, seeing other members stare at their phone screens waiting for photos and videos to get more likes and never getting as much as him. He hated it.

And right now he didn’t have the patience. He didn’t want to be teased. He just felt … grumpy.

“You wish you could do that”, he hissed towards Seungkwan and stood up, ignoring the headrush. He pushed past the other members, looking straight ahead so he could ignore their surprised looks. Mingyu didn’t know why he was so sensitive right now, so irritated. But he didn’t want to stay in that hot room, being the butt of a joke yet again.

💎

Outside in the coolish hallway he leaned against the wall, taking a deep breath and wiping his sweaty hands on his jeans.

“That wasn’t very nice”, a deep voice commented. Mingyu didn’t need to look to the side to see who had followed him, mirroring his position against the wall.

Still he turned his head towards Wonwoo who was mustering him with something akin to worry in his eyes. “What’s up?”

Mingyu wanted to say that it was nothing. That he was overreacting.

But the truth spilled from his lips: “It’s fucking hot. I don’t want to get teased again and again. I know they don’t mean any harm. But I’m already on edge. We’re about to headline one of the biggest festivals in the world. We’re about to perform in front of - hopefully - a lot of Carats who have never seen us live and might never get the chance to again. They are expecting so much, I am sure. There are going to be thousands of people who just watched OneRepublic, Louis Tomlinson and Niall Horan and … what if we fuck up K-Pop for every Lollapalooza festival because nobody wants to see us? What if I make a mistake? What if something goes wrong? What if ….”

As he kept talking Mingyu noticed how everything was swimming around him and his stomach started to feel off. His breath was … “Hyung, I can’t breathe!”

“You’re panicking”, Wonwoo replied, far too calm. He came to step closer to Mingyu, taking his hands in his. Mingyu wanted to reply something witty like ‘I noticed’ but he couldn’t. All that came out was a choked sob.

Wonwoo gently pulled him into his arms, a strong hand coming to rest on his back. “Shh, it’s okay”, his best friend gently whispered into his ear, “you’re okay. Everything will be okay. You’ll do great - as always.”

Mingyu wanted to believe him. Wanted to take a deep breath, nod and agree. But fear was gripping his chest like a vice.

His chest … and his stomach.

“Hyung”, he whimpered, suppressing the sudden urge to gag, “I feel sick.”

“Oh, baby”, Wonwoo mumbled, pulling away to look at him with a worried frown, “do you think you’re gonna throw up?”

Mingyu wanted to answer but he wasn’t sure that all that would come out would be words. So he just pressed his lips shut and nodded. He didn’t know how everything had escalated in such a short time but that wasn’t the pressing issue right now. He just … he clung to Wonwoo, trusting his best friend completely. He was too disoriented, too breathless, too overwhelmed to do anything else.

💎

In any other situation Mingyu might have laughed at the expressions on his members' faces as Wonwoo pulled him back into the waiting room. The bathrooms were pretty far away and neither of them had wanted Mingyu to puke on the floor of the hallway.

So a trash can in the waiting room probably was the best and only choice. Even if it was humiliating to vomit in front of the whole team due to … whatever this was.

Wonwoo managed to help him kneel in front of the impromptu puke bucket just in time. The first gag was painful and very loud. Yet not loud enough to drown out the indignant squeak from Seungkwan, the curse from Jeonghan as he ordered emetophobic Seokmin and Vernon out of the room and the “dude, really?” from Woozi (and the following squeak as somebody slapped him).

Mingyu wanted to reply, apologize, do anything but kneel hopelessly over a bucket in a waiting room not even an hour before their stage started, puking his guts out. But here he was. Another gag seized him and more hot vomit shot into his mouth, the taste awful and sour. He spat it out, coughing harshly and gasping for air. Cold sweat was dripping down his face and he was shivering, hot and cold at the same time.

“What happened?”, Seungcheol asked, standing apparently much closer than Mingyu remembered him being. “What’s wrong with him? He can't be having a heatstroke already, right?”

Their leader sounded a mix of panicked - worried for his dongsaeng and their stage. Mingyu swallowed. He was feeling so hot now, sweat dripping everywhere. Gosh, he hoped he wasn’t overheated. That would be awful. He did not want to be the one explaining that the management and how would the Carats react?

Another lurch of his stomach and Mingyu retched again, wincing at the sound of liquid hitting liquid. He swallowed harshly but it didn’t help much.

Wonwoo, a hand rubbing small circles between Mingyu’s shoulder blades, sighed. “He’s nervous.”

Could it be …? In all the hectic of the sudden irritation and swirling thoughts Mingyu hadn’t even thought much further than “I’m gonna puke”. Anxiety over the stage making him feel sick? That made a sick - he hated that pun - sort of sense. It wouldn’t be the first time and he feared it wouldn’t be the last time either.

“You could put it a bit … more dramatic”, Mingyu groaned, wiping his mouth. Being nervous sounded very bad. Having a panic attack due to stage fright sounded … a bit better. At least not as pathetic.

Seungcheol patted his shoulder in sympathy. Their leader had had his fair share of panic before stages before and he certainly - it was an open secret in the group - had thrown up before stages too.

“Are you done?”, Wonwoo asked gently and Mingyu nodded, slumping back to rest against Wonwoo’s legs, head lolling against the older’s thigh. He lifted his hand to wipe his mouth but a hand on his wrist stopped him.

“Don’t”, Joshua - where had he come from so suddenly? - said with a gentle smile, holding out a cloth. “Use this.”

Upon further inspection Mingyu realised that it was one of the bandanas the stylists had given some of them to go with their denim outfits.

“Noona will kill me if I dirty it”, Mingyu mumbled.

“Nah. She likes me and I will tell her it was for a good cause. Besides, I was ogling that one belt earlier and do me a favor and give me a reason to wear that instead”, Joshua explained and - impatiently - wiped Mingyu’s mouth himself with it.

Mingyu rolled his eyes and coughed, taking the cloth from his hyung’s hand. He didn’t want to be babied right now. Not when they had a stage soon.

“Will you be okay?”, Seungcheol asked and crouched down next to Mingyu. Neither of the three of them missed the way he winced as he bent his knee but they knew better than to point it out.

“I … yeah”, Mingyu mumbled. “I just need to drink something and then we can kill the stage.”

“That’s the spirit”, Wonwoo replied, patting his shoulder.

And as Mingyu stepped out onto the stage, surrounded by his members, and in front of thousands of screaming and happy Carats, singing along to all their songs and cheering them on, he realised he had never had needed to be nervous at all.

Carats loved them.

Notes: I know this isn't my best work and I probably could have improved it a bit with time but I hope you like it anyways. I just wanted to post something again and so I managed to at least write about Lollapalooza (which I miss terribly). Also, yeah, it was fucking hot there. I think I told you before but my tongue literally got stuck on the ice cream due to the temperature difference and I'm telling you it was bloody- pun intended - awful. But SEVENTEEN killed it and I am so happy I can rewatch it again and again!

Masterlist links: Fairy's Masterlist 2024 Fairy's Masterlist 2025 Fairy's Masterlist - SEVENTEEN

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