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miraclewoozi · 1 year

Text

UNDER THE COLLAR. -l.sm

your unlucky-in-love best friend goes on a date with someone who, by all accounts, should be his perfect person. so... how exactly do you end up being the one who tucks his sorry, drunk ass into bed?

pairing; lee seokmin x gn!reader. (he calls reader pretty once but that is all<3) content; fluff / some mild angst towards the middle / pining / friends to… still friends but with some ~tension~ and a snuggle? w/c; 4.6k and a smidge. warnings; swearing, alcohol consumption (offscreen), drunkenness, some suggestiveness (MINORS DNI), reader has some hard thoughts, a bit of affectionate touching but nothing deliberately sexual? seok is needy and cuddly (and a terrible flirt). let me know if i've forgotten anything! note; this was originally gonna be part of a mini-series/multi-chap situation but!! i ended up hating the full thing and only being attached to like. two parts of it lol so here we are! there could potentially be a second part to this? if people want it? i don’t know yet! but this kinda just works as it’s own standalone thing anyway i think~ happy sunday <3

The first text comes through just after you finally set your phone down on the bedside table. Your eyes are dry and have started to sting from a long evening staring at screens, your bones feel impossibly heavy, and you think maybe you’re settling down for a semi-decent night’s sleep when you hear the buzz of a notification. A buzz you initially plan to ignore. It can’t be anything that important: who would be trying to reach you at this time of night, anyway?

You roll away from the device and snuggle down into your pillows, pulling the sleeves of your — his — jumper down over your palms and resting them just in front of your face. This particular garment stopped smelling like Seokmin after the second time it went through your washing machine, but there’s a familiarity in the slightly rough inner lining that makes you want to wear it to sleep in every night, forever. He never liked it when his hoodies were too new, too soft, leaving balls of fluff all over his t-shirts and vests; you don’t know when you started to feel the same way, but you’ve realised recently that you do.

Your eyes flutter closed and your body relaxes, head starting to feel fuzzy in that calm, white-noise, lovely way. You haven’t felt this tired and genuinely sleepy for… months. It’s bliss.

And then your phone buzzes again. You squeeze your eyes tighter, determined not to lose this warm, comfortable feeling, but your phone vibrates and vibrates and vibrates and with an audible groan, you sit back up, reaching over to see what, exactly, is so damn important at 02:23 in the fucking morning.

Seokmin’s contact name flashes up on the lock screen and you see that there are seven unread messages from him in the space of the last 3 minutes. Instantly, your brows draw together: he’s seldom shied away from a double text, but you’ve never known him to pull a septuple, and you can’t feel but feel a little bit of dread in your stomach as you read through them.

> seokmin: yn

> seokmin: ynnnnnn

> seokmin: i lied

> seokmin: i didmt go homr yet

> seokmin: can you come get mr

> seokmin: mr

> seokmin: m e

You shoot back a message instantly asking where he is, turning on your bedside lamp and already swinging your legs out from under the covers. You keep hold of your phone in one hand, waiting for it to buzz again to tell you he’s given you his location. With the other, you search for and pull on some sweatpants, sliding into a pair of sneakers. His replies come simultaneously too quickly, and entirely not fast enough.

> seokmin: u knkw the bar in town with the bear statiiue oitside

> seokmin: lol

> seokmin: do you think i ciuld beat thsi bear in s fight???

> y/n: christ. okay, wait inside for me. i’ll be there in 15.

> y/n: also, no. you couldn’t. x

Your veins feel alive with adrenaline and worry as you grab your keys and head down the stairs to your car. The drive is quiet — you don’t even waste the few seconds it would take to plug into the AUX and pick a playlist, leaving it up to the radio to keep you company on the way. It doesn’t take too long: soon enough, you’re pulling up alongside the infamous bear statue to find your best friend sitting on the curb, propped up against the marble base.

“I thought I told you to wait inside?” you chide, rolling down the passenger side window so you can announce your arrival. It’s like he’s moving in slow-motion, or maybe your words just take an extra few seconds to reach him? Either way, he doesn’t lift his head until a silence has settled between you, and he doesn’t smile until his slightly glazed-over eyes land on your face.

“Y/n!” He cheers, lifting himself off the floor and staggering upright, pushing a hand through his hair. “Hi! Yeah, I know — but look, it was too hot in there. It was so hot. And I didn’t want you to wait-…” Hiccup. “To have to wait for me.”

He slides into the passenger seat with a contented sigh, a mess of long limbs he can’t quite control, adjusting the vent in front of him so that the cold from your air-con breezes against his flushed cheeks. As he settles, you reach over him, pulling his seatbelt across his chest.

“I was getting to that,” he whines, pouting his pretty lips at you, and you click the belt in place with a laugh. History tells you that when he’s drunk, Seokmin doesn’t always believe in the power of the seatbelt, among other things, so you think maybe you could be forgiven for not believing him this time.

“Okay, dumbass. Sure you were.”

He reaches down into the passenger footwell for your AUX cord, bumping his head on the dashboard and letting out an exaggerated hiss as he sits back upright. Nonetheless, he plugs his phone in and presses play on his own night-driving playlist, holding the device between both of his hands as you start off towards his place.

“So…” you prompt, because he’s staring blankly out the windscreen with a tiny smile on his lips and you’re concerned that maybe, this time, he has actually managed to drink himself stupid. He rolls his head over to look at you, and fond bliss is written into every line of his face. “What happened?”

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, still just… staring at you as you drive. Staring, even though every detail of you is committed to his memory already. Staring, even though he knows how your eyelashes flutter when you blink. Even though he knows how the muscles in your throat bob as you swallow the saliva on your tongue. Even though he’s sat in your passenger seat enough times to remember exactly how the late-night glow of the street-lamps overhead catch and illuminate the curve of your nose, how they highlight the point of your chin. He knows all this, but he can’t help himself. Staring is… indulgent. So, so indulgent. But he is pretty drunk and he can get away with it when you’re focused on the road — at least, that’s what he tells himself.

When he does attempt to speak, just as you slow to a stop at a set of traffic lights, the sparkle in his gaze falters. He faces forward again, shoulders rising and slumping in a meek ‘I don’t know’.

“She was… perfect, I think,” he tries to explain, and you glance across to look at him; his lips are both non-existent, pulled between his teeth and he has worry lines creasing up his forehead. With the hand not holding the wheel, you reach over, pressing your fingertips to where his eyebrows have scrunched to try and get him to relax the muscles there. It sort of works, if only because he releases an involuntary breath of a laugh.

“Not perfect,” you gasp, dramatic and teasing even though it stings a little to hear him say that out loud. “I mean, that definitely explains why you were out drinking, alone, three hours after you told me you were heading home.” He turns his head fully away from you, now, letting your hand drop dangerously towards his lap. You pull it back to yourself before it collides with his jeans, clearing your throat. The traffic signal changes to green, and you drive ahead. “I’m kidding. Come on. Talk to me.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he says, despondent, crossing his arms over his chest. You’re not sure you’ve seen him acting like this since you were teenagers. It’s a strange twist away from your usual, very easy-going banter.

“Seok...” You try again. “I won’t stop for nuggets if you don’t tell me.”

“Don’t stop, then.”

“Seokmin…”

“Don’t-…” It comes out quickly, the vein in the side of his neck popping until he takes a deep breath in and releases it slowly. “Y/n. I’m tired, I just-… I don’t wanna talk about it. Can you please just… take me home?”

He’s still struggling with his words, but he isn’t abrasive in the way he speaks; that’s something you learned about Seokmin very early on in your friendship. He doesn’t raise his voice at you. He doesn’t get deep and gravelly when he’s pissed off. He just… seems to let himself feel things super intensely for a few seconds at a time and then he short-circuits, goes flat. It might be convenient for him, but it gets frustrating for you. Especially when he encourages you to open up to him as much as he does.

His head is bowed and cradled in his hands when you pull up outside his apartment block, and you unfasten his seatbelt for him which jolts him upright. You stay facing front, though, guilt coursing through your veins at the thought of maybe having pushed him too far. You just want to understand. Why was his date being good such a bad thing?

“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, rubbing his eyes with his fingertips. “I shouldn’t have spoken to you like that.”

You shake your head. “Don’t be,” you tell him, and he scoffs, but quietly.

“Y/n,” he sighs, his crown falling against the headrest; he reaches over to you, places a hand just above your knee, and you try to ignore how it feels like someone has crashed their car into you from behind. How your heart lurches forwards in your chest. How your adrenaline spikes.

“I mean it. I shouldn’t have kept pushing. I’m sorry.”

He chews this over for a moment, but he doesn’t remove his hand, and you find that maybe you don’t want him to. Not yet, at least.

“Will you help me get up the stairs?”

“Of course I will.”

With one of his arms over your shoulders, your own supporting his waist, the pair of you begin the obnoxiously long ascent up through his building to his apartment. He’s lived here for a year and a half, and you think maybe the elevator has been working… for a total of about a week, since then? God forbid he ever got injured and couldn’t climb six flights just to get himself home. The climb is bad enough as is.

Somewhere around landing number four, Seokmin pulls away from you, mumbling something about having the spins and needing to sit down. You ease him to perch on one of the windowsills, sitting down next to him with your arm still around his hips to keep him balanced on the narrow ledge.

“You should’ve taken me back to your place,” he grumbles, doubling over with his elbows against his knees and his fingers linked behind his neck, taking deep breaths.

“Get your feet flat on the floor. Look at your shoelaces. Breathe slow. It’ll help,” you coo, and he shuffles a little so that he can do exactly that (not without wobbling and almost landing on his face, and he thanks you and your “super strong arms” for keeping him from such a fate). After a few more seconds of deep breathing and grounding, he lifts his head. Crisis averted.

“Are you-… like, a witch, or something?” he asks out of nowhere, and you snort so loudly that your throat hurts. He keeps staring at you, waiting for you to answer. Apparently your laugh wasn’t response enough.

“What are you talking about, Seok?”

He rolls his eyes at you, as if you should just know. “How did you know how to fix me? It’s like magic.”

“Because I know you, stupid. Come on. Two more flights and I’ll get you into bed.”

“S’that a promise?” he asks, grinning to himself as you haul him back to standing, and he stumbles slightly against you, hands braced on your ribs. Sweating a little, you manoeuvre yourself away from him, landing a gentle, playful hit to his side.

It doesn’t make your heart flutter, hearing what can only be a drunk rendition of his bedroom voice. It doesn’t. It doesn’t. It doesn’t.

“Save it for your next date with Ms. Perfect, would you?”

“Agh. You’re the worst.”

“I know. Now come on.”

After a few minutes of fumbling through Seokmin’s pockets yourself for his keys (it’s as if he’s forgotten how both hands and pockets work in his now very giggly stupor), apparently brushing every single one of his ticklish spots on the way, you’re inside his apartment and on your knees, untying his shoes for him, easing them off his feet. You don’t think he can be trusted to lean down to do it on his own without breaking something.

Or himself.

“If you go get ready for bed, I’ll bring you some water?” you suggest, sitting back on your heels, smiling up at him. There’s a weight in the gaze he’s looking down at you with, in the way his tongue darts out over his lips, and how his mouth doesn’t fully close after. You tell yourself he’s definitely only looking at you like this because he’s drunk, because you’re helping him — the boy doesn’t know ass from elbow, right now — but there’s no escaping the fact that your stomach drops a little at his intensity.

“Okay,” he strains after a moment, and you stand up and away from him, kicking off your own shoes. He heads in one direction towards his bedroom, and you move in the other towards his kitchen.

Stop it, you tell yourself, leaning over the sink and splashing cold water from the faucet onto your face. Stop thinking about him like that. He’s your best friend. Stop it.

But… shit, you can’t get those big brown eyes out of your head. The way he looked down at you, the softness of his brows, the heat radiating off him. There’s nothing you can do to stop the way your thighs press together standing in his kitchen, in clothes that— you realise now— are entirely his. The hoodie. The sweatpants you pulled on. They’re an old pair that he let you steal just after your most recent breakup, when you’d stayed on his couch for a week straight just so you didn’t have to look at how ugly and empty your own apartment was. Everything. Even down to the socks.

You thought it was hard enough hearing that he was going out for dinner to your favourite restaurant with someone who wasn’t you; nothing could have prepared you for standing in his kitchen at three in the morning, hot under the collar over five seconds of tipsy eye contact, knowing he’s getting undressed behind the door you’ve been staring at for… minutes, now. Actual minutes.

Oh, you think, feeling your blood run cold.

Oh.

I want him.

More minutes pass as you stew in this information — in the knowledge that you’re fucking desperate for the man who has been there for you through everything important enough to remember, and probably everything you’ve forgotten, too. The boy who took you to all of your school dances and was the perfect date, the perfect gentleman, the perfect partner. The man who has sat next to you in the doctor’s waiting room more times than you can count, waiting for results and sitting outside appointments that he told you that you were brave enough to book. Seokmin, who has been under your nose this entire fucking time — you want him, the man who went for dinner with his dream woman, today, and he said she was perfect. Acid burns the back of your throat as you fight not to run all the way back down to your car.

Fuck. It gets astronomically worse. I love him.

“Y/n?” you hear, and his whiny, gentle voice glides across the apartment like it’s been mounted on a cloud, blown straight into your ears. It floats around in your brain in the most beautiful way, and you think there could be love-hearts in the reflections on your eyes even despite the stress you’re now under. It occurs to you that his faucet is still running, and you still have two empty glasses sitting on the counter. How long has it been? Get it together.

“Just a second,” you call back. Your voice breaks as you say it and you can hear him fucking giggle from behind the ajar door to his bedroom. The fluttering in your stomach worsens, and by the time you’ve shut off the tap and you’re walking through to him, you’re wondering if it’s possible for people to grow butterfly gardens inside themselves without noticing. No-one has ever made you feel this nervous, before.

Breathe, you tell yourself as he comes into view, already snuggled down against his pillows with the top of his bare chest and shoulders visible in the low light.

Fuck.

This is the last thing you needed.

“Hi,” he greets you, pushing to sit up with eyes softer than the glow of the setting sun. “I missed you.”

You stand corrected. That is.

“You’re such a loser.”

You set his glass down on his bedside and crouch next to him. “Did you brush your teeth?” you ask, and his face transforms from a stupid childish pout at being teased to a devastatingly bright grin.

This running joke you’ve shared between yourselves since your first night on the town together illuminates him, and he nods, proudly, his hair falling down over his face. You reach up to push a few strands away from his eyes, despite yourself.

“Sure did,” he tells you, and you believe him but you raise a brow anyway. He’s so pretty. With his playful smile, tongue held between his teeth, his nose a little scrunched. Fuck, how can anyone be so pretty?

“So if I go check your toothbrush, right now…” His smile turns into a laugh, his head lifts into your lingering touch until his cheek is fully rested in the palm of your hand. Stupidly, you tell yourself that this could mean something. Maybe he wants to feel you more.

“You could find out another way,” he says, his voice dropping half an octave as his already heavy eyelids blink slowly at you. It’s a good thing you’re already on your knees because that tone could have you sinking to the ground in a split. He pulls his bottom lip between his teeth fleetingly and you think you’re one more line away from melting into the floorboards.

“You’re so out of it,” you murmur, shaking your head at him. “Did she make you get the oysters? Are you high on aphrodisiacs right now?”

He groans again and rolls onto his back, a hand dramatically coming up to cover his eyes.

“Stop talking about her,” he whines. “I’m with you. I don’t wanna talk— I don’t wanna think about her right now.”

“Seokmin-…”

“Y/n,” he interrupts, lolling his head to the side, looking at you through impossibly long, dark lashes from between his fingers. “Please.”

You’re not sure what the pull in his voice is in aid of but you force yourself to let it go, pushing yourself up to your feet before you can fall forwards into him.

“I’m gonna head home,” you say, the quiet between you laying thick and heavy against your skin. “Text me when you’re awake tomorrow, okay?”

He contemplates this for a second, frowning; he doesn’t say anything as you start backing towards his bedroom door. Then…

“Please don’t.”

He says it so quietly. So hushed, you think you might have misheard. So delicate, you hold your breath just in case you somehow manage to shatter the moment.

“Don’t what?” You ask, stopping in your tracks. He breathes deep and props up on one elbow, biting the inside of his cheek.

“Don’t go.”

Glued to the spot, you stare at him. You feel your head tilt to the side without really controlling it, and an eyebrow creeps up your forehead, slowly.

“I left some lights on in my apartment,” you say feebly, and even though it’s true, a selfish part of you hopes that he’ll still keep trying to talk you around. It won’t take a lot to convince you. It never does.

“So?” he asks, the duvet slipping just a little further down his upper half, baring more of his chest to you. “Please. I don’t want to be-…”

You swallow, waiting. The cogs in his inebriated brain are surely rotating at a few hundred miles a minute, his eyes almost desperate. Certainly glossy. Absolutely breath-taking.

“I don’t want to be alone anymore.”

Your already fragile resolve snaps under the pressure of his words and you’re moving towards his bed before you can stop yourself.

“I don’t have anything to sleep in,” you say, offering him one last out if he wants it, but Seokmin just shrugs and peels the duvet back for you to slip in beside him.

“Don’t care,” he mumbles, and you gesture for him to look away so, at the very least, you can shimmy out of his sweatpants. He does, and you do — a few seconds later, with the garment in question folded neatly on the floor by his bed, you’re pulling the sheets over your legs and burying down against his cushions.

His breathing matches yours inhale for exhale and the more you let yourself think about this, the worse you feel even though maybe you shouldn’t. How many times have you drunkenly shared Seokmin’s bed, or how many times has he shared yours? This isn’t new. Even sober, you’ve been curling up together on the couch to watch movies and sleeping with your heads in each other's laps for years. There’s no reason for the guilt that’s burrowing its way deep into your brain, but you can’t seem to get rid of it, no matter how hard you try.

“Y/n?” he asks after a few minutes of you lying stiff as a pair of boards, a few inches of cold mattress between your wide awake selves, both of you staring up at the ceiling. You hum an acknowledgement, and he clears his throat. “Can I hug you?”

Your heart does something you’re a little bit afraid of, but you nod in the dark anyway, before you realise he can’t really see you now all the lights are off.

“Drink some water first,” you tell him lightly. “Then you can.”

There’s something undeniably nerve-wracking about the sound of him obediently swallowing a few mouthfuls from the glass you brought him earlier, even more-so in the way he sets it back down on his dresser. The bed rustles a little as he moves towards you, the sheets shifting over your bare legs, and then he’s got an arm slung over your waist, his head is on the very edge of his pillow, right next to your own… he slides a leg over one of yours, slotting it between your calves, and before you know it, you’re completely wrapped up in him.

He’s warm, and soft, and his fingertips gently soothe circles into your waist where they’ve slipped just underneath the hem of the sweatshirt you’re still wearing. You hum gently, moving your arm so that it snakes beneath his neck, curling up to wrap around his shoulders. This close, you can smell the cologne he will have put on before meeting his date. It makes you dizzy, slows down the neurons firing away in your brain. You wonder what’s going through his own head — what he’s thinking about, being curled up against your side like this. Does he recognise the slight stuttering in your breathing? How cold you are in contrast to him? Will he even remember this, in the morning? Or will you just wake up on opposite sides of the bed tomorrow, all this just a weird, foggy memory in the dark?

His head burrows slightly closer to you and all of a sudden, you can feel him breathing. Every exhale fans against your neck, right where it feels sweetest; Seokmin breathes through his nose when he’s sober, but through his lips when he’s drunk. You’ve never noticed before. It’s maddening.

“Comfy?” you ask, your voice dry and unsure, and he wriggles a little with a nod to affirm that yes, he is. Something about that makes your cheeks go hot.

“Always sleep better with you,” he murmurs, and your face grows even warmer. You tell yourself he doesn’t mean anything by it. He’s just drunk. It doesn’t help.

“Then sleep,” you say as his hand moves just slightly further up beneath the hoodie, the tips of his fingers gently tickling your lowest rib. You have to fight back a whine. “I’m here. You can sleep.”

“Thank you, y/n,” he breathes, and you turn your head: now your eyes have adjusted to the low light, you can sort of make out his features, so very close to you. This proves to be a mistake almost instantly, but you can’t look away. His eyes are closed now; you’re glad. He looks too sweet. Too peaceful.

“What for?”

“Everything.”

“Seokmin…”

“No, I mean — everything.”

You move your hand up slightly, fingers playing with the strands of his hair at the top of his neck, and he whimpers softly at the touch. You freeze, and he nuzzles back against your hand to beg you to keep going, so you do.

“You can’t thank me for everything,” you tease him, and he chuckles breathlessly, his palm now laying flat across your rib cage, curling around your side. Holding you. Claiming you, just for now.

“Can,” he protests, and you shake your head.

“Nuh-uh. Against the rules.”

“What rules?”

“My rules.”

“I didn’t know you had rules.”

“I’ve got hundreds,” you tease, threading your fingers through his strands and gently massaging his scalp. Another whine from him, but you don’t stop. Especially not when he hugs you closer, arm and leg both tightening around you.

“Hundreds?”

“Mhm. Maybe even thousands.”

“Well. Fuck.”

You breathe a laugh at him, and he laughs back; within a few seconds, you’ve both dissolved into giggles, and Seokmin has squirmed even closer until he’s half-covering you, actively chortling into your covered collarbone.

“You’re s’posed to be getting to sleep,” you sigh as his own laughter picks back up following a few seconds of deep breathing and quiet.

“I can’t!” He says. You can feel the pout in his own voice, even with his face hidden. When did he end up practically on top of you? When did your arm slip down to around his waist?

“You have to. You’re gonna feel so shitty tomorrow if you don’t.”

“I know. M’probably gonna feel shitty anyway, though.”

“Come on. Close your eyes. Count back from a hundred. You can do it.”

It falls silent again, and you delusionally tell yourself that maybe it’s working. Until…

“Can you lie on your side?” He asks, and you sigh dramatically but nod anyway: as he peels himself off you, you roll over, facing the wall in the foetal position. He’s right back against you in a blink though, legs tucked up behind yours, trying to find your hand under the quilt.

“S’this okay?” He asks as he accidentally brushes your thigh in his search, fingers lacing through your own when he finally succeeds. Your now joined hands work their way into the hoodie’s front pocket, and everything starts buzzing when he rests his chin on your shoulder.

“Y-yeah,” you swallow. “S’good.”

“Good,” he mumbles. A few deep breaths later, his voice rumbles against your earlobe again. “You looked so pretty for me tonight, y/n. Dressed up in my clothes — you’re so pretty.”

“Go to sleep,” you whimper, grateful at least that at this angle that he doesn’t see how your face scrunches up, how wide your smile is, how ridiculously good he makes you feel.

Euphoria. This is euphoria; you never want it to end.

“Count for me,” he asks, dropping his head down so his brows rest against your back, now. So you do.

“A hundred… ninety nine… ninety eight… ninety seven…”

His breathing is slow and his grip on your hand is slack by the time you reach eighty three. You doze off too, not very far behind.

thank u for reading all the way to the end!! likes, reblogs, comments + feedback are all always appreciated<3

#dk fluff #seokmin fluff #lee seokmin fluff #dokyeom fluff #dk x reader #seokmin x reader #lee seokmin x reader #dokyeom x reader #svt x reader #seventeen x reader #j writes.#*#(in case we wondered: i am not better at tagging things this time around heh<3)

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