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Chan tells him the idiom the first time they share stories of silly youth and heartbreaks that weren’t quite worth it over a bottle of the cheapest wine Minho ever tasted or bought.
‘Opposites attract.’
After he hears it for the first time, it follows him wherever he goes, stuck to the walls of his mind like a residue.
Minho doesn’t believe it, thinks there’s too many factors of attraction and features of a person. It’s stupid to think anyone is an opposite of anyone. Most of all, he thinks those things never work out. Being too different makes you argue, makes you fight, makes you hurt and break apart forever.
He knows well from experience.
Chan laughs at him, tells him it’s funny that he thinks that when -
but Minho never lets him finish. He doesn’t have the time; he knows how it ends anyway.
Minho runs track, he does sprints and he’s very fast. He works hard to keep it that way.
Changbin tells him he’s scary when he runs, like a bull that’s seen red in the far distance that no one can stop him from charging. They say his eyes go slack, like all he can see is the track - counting seconds in his mind with every step of his feet. Minho doesn’t care enough to tell them why he runs, why every second is precious - why winning isn’t the point even if he gets first every time. Every second of life counts, and you can outrun seconds - challenge them.
Every lap, every click of the timer and the call of numbers is a mark. Every time Minho runs faster, lower numbers, less time.
Every time he isn’t satisfied.
Jisung’s first impression is rude and leaves Minho hoping they never have to meet again, the boy loudly greeting him in a public place when spotting Chan by his side - a mutual friend - and getting far too close to getting past the moat Minho’s built around himself, with crocodiles that eat children, that only Chan has been able to penetrate so far from just first glance. Jisung smiles a lot, smiles widely, and has so much energy that Minho thinks he might vibrate into another plane someday.
“I think you two will really get along. You should hang.” Chan smiles between them and Jisung looks eager, much to Minho’s dismay whose true love is peace and quiet.
It’s nothing short of a miracle when they’re best friends in just a matter of weeks.
“You live life in the fast lane,” Jisung crunches on a chip and offers the container to Minho who pushes it away with a scowl and keeps watching the anime the other’s picked out. They’re always so weird, something about mafia members becoming idols this time. Minho doesn’t really pay attention, just likes hearing the other’s giggles when a line tickles his funny bone enough. “Come on, you’re already sculpted by the gods. One chip won’t hurt your rock hard abs.”
“One chip turns to-” Minho starts again. They have this conversation so often. Jisung is a fan of food, and while Minho doesn’t not like it he has to have control for the sake of his body.
“I’m not rolling around yet and I eat like three of these boxes a day!” Jisung whines, pushing it towards Minho again. “I’ll feed it to you.”
Minho scoots to the right, away from the boy pouting petulantly with a duck face made from two Pringles, feeling uncomfortable at the thought of his face getting any closer.
Jisung loves to touch him, get up into every crevice of his personal space until the term doesn’t even exist and most days Minho is caught too off guard to stop him. There’s no point in it after.
“Maybe that’s why your butt is glued to the couch.”
It’s meant to be a tease, a harmless joke, but it lands wrong and Minho can see the hurt hit Jisung’s eyes as he breaks the chips in his mouth and throws the crumbs at the older in defiance.
“Maybe you’re always running around because you’re hungry!”
Minho knows Jisung stays in because of his anxiety, knows that the younger prefers to relax and take a load off after days working shifts at the convenience store to pay off the music equipment that keeps him company and working in those rooms he hides in. Jisung knows Minho can’t sit still without feeling like life is getting away from him, that every second spent sleeping, eating or showering is a moment wasted.
They know these things, even if they can’t understand each other’s sides, but it’s times like these that Minho knows he’s right - and Chan’s just wrong . All differences do is make you argue, make you bump heads and say you don’t ‘get it’, make you knock on the dorm door at a little past midnight with chicken and pizza as an apology because you know you fucked up.
“Maybe.” Minho gives Jisung a lopsided smile as a truce offering, shows him that he’s going to let this pass if he is and the spitfire settles down, comes into his personal space and lays his head on his chest like standard.
“You’re so fit you’re uncomfortable to lay on.” Jisung grumbles as he continues to prod every muscle he can reach, squeezing Minho’s arms with admiration and a sigh. “Your body is so nice.”
“Yours is too.” Minho likes to remind Jisung that he’s nothing to sneeze at, because with all his wilderness and ambition comes insecurity.
“You’re just saying that because you actually want a chip and you know I won’t share now.”
Minho laughs, wrapping an arm around the other’s shoulders and bringing him in closer.
“Got me.”
Minho frowns as the other squirms around in his arms, but takes the chips as Jisung hands him a small handful with mischievous eyes.
“That’s all you get though. Don’t beg me for any more.”
First place feels like victory against something impossible, and so Minho smiles whenever he rips that thin ribbon before anyone else can and lets the cameras capture it. Hyunjin tells him he always looks better when he smiles, and if he just did it more often people wouldn’t be so afraid of him - he might even have a girlfriend.
“He doesn’t want a girlfriend, idiot.” Changbin snorts, punching Hyunjin in the arm and watching him blush as he rubs at the spot. “He already has Han.”
“Han!?” Hyunjin shouts in distress. “That cutie in our Sound Design class?”
“One and only.”
“Han is hardly a rare surname.” Minho murmurs as he reties his shoes.
“That boy has the sun shining out his ass, what the hell is he doing dating this meanie?” Minho gives Hyunjin a glare that he reciprocates by sticking out his tongue.
“I’m not mean.”
“You have a recipe for how to air fry me.” Changbin laughs, high fiving Minho with a grin.
“It’s a necessity.” Minho looks up at the sky, it’s already afternoon and the sun will be setting soon. The day has felt too fast, making Minho’s skin crawl. “We’re not dating.”
He always adds that as an afterthought. It’s not his fault if others see them that way, and Jisung doesn’t really mind. He plays it up sometimes, gives them reason to talk, blowing kisses from the sidelines of the track or bringing coffee to his morning classes.
Minho tries not to think about why his chest feels heavy with every denial.
“Could have fooled me.”
“Nah, no way. These two just don’t make sense. They’re polar opposites.”
“I’m going to go shower. I’ll see you guys next practice.”
Minho says it too fast. Changbin looks at him like something’s wrong, but Minho is jogging to the gym before he can say anything.
He’s good at running away from things. If you’re fast enough, you can outrun anything.
Even your own feelings.
“Come with me,” Jisung whines, fixing the collar of his button up as it continues to slip lower than Minho wishes it would. He’s got eyeliner on, and pants that are going to be so hard to get off when he’s drunk.
“I hate parties, Jisung.” Minho moves around the kitchen, meal prepping for the week.
“You hate everything that isn’t about getting somewhere.” Jisung throws his hands up, putting on shoes that look like a mix of boots and loafers that Minho will never like.
“I just don’t find crowded places with people I don’t know getting inebriated all that fun.” Minho pins him with a look, wishing for once he would understand him. Jisung is a strange creature, anxious and all too aware of what everyone thinks of him but eager to meet everyone in the world and tell them all the facts he knows about cheetahs even if they look at him as though he’s got a third eye. Minho doesn’t think any of it is worth his time.
“I’m going. You know me.”
“You’re going to leave to dance and mingle as soon as we get there.” Minho sighs, closing all the tupperwares and stacking them in his decrepit fridge.
“If you get drunk it won’t be as bad.”
“Alcohol is terrible for your -”
“I’ve heard it a million times, dad . I’ll look after my beer belly when I turn thirty five, maybe.”
Minho doesn’t care what people think of him; for the most part, he barely cares about people. Jisung and his handful of friends are exceptions that wormed their way into his life, and respect his need for days alone with only his cats. Most days.
“Do you want me to go that bad?”
“I have the most fun when you’re with me.” Jisung pouts, making his eyes as big as the animals people compare him to. Minho has never been able to resist it. He hangs his head, nodding in surrender and taking off his apron to go change.
He doesn’t know if it’s true, if Jisung really has the most fun with him present, but the words are pretty enough from a pretty enough boy to get Minho to give in. He doesn’t care what people think of him, but Jisung isn’t just anyone.
Jisung is worth more than a couple of hours.
Minho doesn’t drink often, and he certainly doesn’t go to parties, but he loves to dance. Dancing makes time freeze, slip away without him noticing it for once, no ticking hands of the clock to keep him awake at night when he’s already eager to get up and do something. All he can hear when he dances is the beat, the steps he should take to move his body just right to make a story out of pain.
Dancing isn’t like running away. Dancing is the only way Minho lives in the moment.
He doesn’t think of it when Jisung, eyes low and burning with alcohol on his smiling lips, asks him to dance. He doesn’t think of how this will only add to any rumors, or how much it will hurt to deny them all, he just lets him take his hand to the middle of someone’s living room and move his hips to the rhythm.
Jisung is a glutton for attention and he uses Minho for all his worth, grinding up against him and putting his hands on the waist showing through under his rising top. Minho can hear Jisung giggling, can feel his smile against his neck as he leans back into him, and can feel the joy radiating from his heated body.
Jisung is having so much fun, and Minho is sort of trying not to cry in a room full of people.
They’re so different. They’re polar opposites.
It’s the only way that Minho knows his feelings aren’t mutual. No matter what they do, it’s not the same outcome, always two sides of the same coin.
Jisung likes to take his time with things, likes to perfect every note in his soundtracks before anyone gets to hear them. Minho turns in assignments as soon as he knows they’re good enough to pass, busier with more important things than class. Jisung likes to take naps, and eat as much as he wants without going to the gym afterwards. Minho has cheat days that he skips when he feels he needs to lean down more, and sleep is a punishment that he has a hard time receiving. Jisung likes to make new friends and let people know he’s here on this earth for a good time, not a long one, while Minho runs from the idea that he’ll ever die at all.
When they’re so different in every aspect, the exact opposite of everything, how could Minho’s feelings ever be returned?
If Jisung is red, then Minho is blue. If Jisung is yes, then Minho is no.
So if Minho likes Jisung -
“What'sya thinking about?” Jisung slurs his words, unsteady on his feet at this point in the night. The room is already whispering as they steal glances of the pair. He turns his body so they’re facing each other, continuing to move his hips in a way that Minho is starting to hate.
“I want to go home.” Minho makes sure his voice doesn’t shake, as his heart is rattling inside his bones like a macara.
“We just got here.” Jisung leans forward, rests his head on Minho’s chest like always and Minho isn’t ready for this - for Jisung to hear all the differences inside of him that make sure they can never be too close. Again, they’re different. “Just another hour.”
“I told you I didn’t want to come.” Minho stops dancing, he’s all too aware suddenly of every minute they’ve spent against each other in front of a room full of strangers that pry too much.
“I don’t get you,” Jisung continues to sway as he stands and as terrified as Minho is he doesn’t dare let go of the other’s waist, has to keep him safe because he won’t do it himself.
“I know.” Minho swallows against the lump in his throat, wills his chest to move regularly though his breaths are running out.
“You can go home, Minho.” Jisung sounds sober all of a sudden, like he’s gathered all his wits just to say this to him. They stand across from each other, Jisung’s back to the door as Minho faces it. “Run away again. Like you always do.”
Minho can’t hold back the tears anymore, he ducks his head and runs for it. Runs like Jisung told him to, like he’s right to tell him to, like he always does. He runs out of the house, the bass thumping through the windows behind him, past the lawn and into the road where he picks a direction and goes faster.
He runs so fast he’s sure he’s beating records like never before, like he’s racing time itself, like he’s trying to turn it back and shut his own mouth, make himself agree for once .
Minho isn’t blind to his own antics. He fights Jisung on the smallest things, over things that don’t matter, just to hold him back. He does it just so Jisung doesn’t worm his way any closer, past the personal space he’s already taken, past the heart he’s already stolen - embed himself into Minho like the soft center of a rough shell.
He becomes his opposite so the attraction feels impossible, because it only goes one way. They’re not magnets. They’re predator and prey and Jisung is too slow to run away from him, so Minho has to run instead.
It all feels unnatural.
Minho barely knows where he is when he stops, lungs begging for air after the runner’s high wears off and he can feel every bit of it through his body.
“Minho?” Chan is in his front door, watching him with concerned eyes. Minho can feel the tears streaming down his face but can barely hear the ugly sounds he’s making as he tries to breathe and cry at the same time. “What’s happened?” He’s already down the stairs, at his side, hands digging into his shoulders to get his knees to straighten up. “Let’s go inside.”
Minho stumbles up the stairs and into his friend’s living room, sinking into the couch and burying his face under his dirty hands that held Jisung’s waist while hiding his feelings - enjoying themselves in secret.
“Opposites don’t attract,” he wails, snot running down his hands and past his lips. Chan pushes tissues at him to try to wipe it all up, eyes full of worry.
“Is this about Jisung?” Chan’s voice is gentle, steady. Minho doesn’t know what time it is for once in his life, and can't be bothered to care.
“He’s so good. He’s too good for me. He’s too good.”
“What are you on about?” Chan is rubbing at his back, handing tissues every so often that Minho starts to use as his sobs calm and he’s left with sniffles and sore eyes. “It’s not like you’re bad.”
“I am.” Minho blows his nose, ignoring Chan’s disgusted expression at the sound. “I’m everything he’s not.”
“You’re kinda stupid,” Chan laughs. Minho can’t help his nature, he gives him his best mean look for the insult. Chan just laughs more. “You’re both just a little bit dumb.”
“You’re supposed to be helping.”
“Tell me why you’re bad.” Chan stands, moving to his kitchen to put a kettle on and take out two mugs for tea.
“Running is all I have. I have a one track mind,” he scoffs at the pun he’s made, “and Jisung is getting gold in every Olympic sport he tries.”
“Weird metaphor.”
“Shut up.” Chan grins with a shrug.
“Tell me more.”
“It’s just it doesn’t matter to him, you know. The things that scare him. He sees them, feels them but it doesn’t stop him. He just keeps going.”
“There’s nothing wrong with putting your energy into what you care most about. Not everyone is a jack of all trades.”
Minho remembers Jisung’s words to him as he stood there, eyes not backing down.
“I’ve only ever run away from life. Running, do I even really care about it?”
“Don’t you have that thing? With time?” Minho flinches, almost forgetting that Chan is one of the only people in the world that knows about this, about the obsession with time that landed him in a hospital for ‘special’ children when his parents got scared about the hours he was always counting down, how much time he has left to live if he’s seven years, three months, four weeks, twenty six days, and twelve hours old. The one that got him a scholarship to this school because he controlled his own time enough to get someone to care about it, to make money off it, where he met Jisung who’s a little lazy and late to anything he doesn’t care for and so very slow.
“It was the only way people understood.” Minho takes the cup Chan offers as he makes his way back to the couch, taking a small sip of the warm caffeinated peppermint tea and relaxing his shoulders. “Faster. Always faster. It made them cheer, but I was still only ever thinking of how my laps can’t ever hit zero. There’s no way to run fast enough to not waste a second.”
“No, there’s not.” Chan continues sipping on his own tea, mulling over Minho’s words that don’t even have much to do with anything about tonight. “So, what? You think because of this you and Jisung can’t work?”
“Not just this. Just,” Minho takes another sip and sets the cup down. “everything. I mean he needs someone like him.”
“You’re still stuck on that opposites thing from months ago?” Minho hangs his head, embarrassed because even he knows how silly it sounds, but nods in response. Chan and him went drinking last year, sharing heartbreak stories when Minho confessed that he has feelings for his best friend - that the whole campus acting like they’re dating when they’re not hurts like hell, where Chan told him about a girl he used to like who wasn’t like him at all but it just clicked. He claimed that was them too, opposites attracting, but he’s wrong. “Honestly, I was wrong.”
Minho blinks at him, hands shaking as he lets the words wash over him. He didn’t count on Chan agreeing with him, the only hope he had left. “What?”
“You’re not really opposites at all.”
“Of course, we are.” Minho can’t meet Chan’s eyes, who is trying his best not to lose his line of sight. He’s always been good at seeing through his friends, taking the frayed strings of their mistakes and braiding them into a solution.
“Come on, mate. You don’t even believe that yourself.” Chan stands, taking the empty mugs with a smile. “Sleep on it. I’ll be back out here in the morning for a report.”
“I don’t want to sleep.” Minho frowns, picking at the nails on his thumbs.
“I know.” Chan says with sympathy, brows drawn like curtains in thought. “Then, what should we do?”
Minho smiles to himself, then directs the smile at him.
“Always ‘we’ with you. You need to sleep.” He stands and walks on steadier legs, placing a hand on Chan’s shoulder. “Thanks, Channie. What would I do without you?”
“Let a good thing go by.” Chan laughs, putting his own hand over Minho’s in support. “I’m glad you came to me. You lock yourself away too often.”
Minho doesn’t have the heart to tell him he didn’t do it on purpose, but his mind took him to where he feels safe - when Jisung isn’t available. It’s not like Chan is a second choice; Minho just gravitates towards the planet that is Jisung no matter the time. Even now, he wants to see him.
“He’s probably crying in the corner of that party.” Minho sighs, knowing that Jisung would regret saying the words he did - drunk or not. His phone buzzes in his pocket and he barely has to look to see it’s him. “I gotta go.”
Minho doesn’t answer the call. He hangs up, but he sends Jisung a text telling him to meet him at home so they can talk. He tells him not to bring pizza or fried chicken, that it will get there before he does. Jisung sends a sobbing emoji and a thumbs up, and Minho’s heart beats his feet’s record.
Jisung is snuggled into Minho’s side, a familiar night, but nothing is playing on the TV and Minho’s every nerve is screaming to notify him the best thing to ever happen to him is in his arms. He still smells like cheap beer, and his nose is still a little red from the tears he spilled not only at the party after Minho ran away but all over Minho’s pajamas when he stumbled through his front door screeching apologies and ‘I love you’s.
“Do you think we’re ever going to get rid of the dating rumors?” Jisung jokes. Minho’s heart is put in a vice. He starts to shake it off, give a fake smile and some snarky retort but Chan’s voice rings in his ears.
You’re not really opposites at all.
When Minho considers them; he’s met with a softer reality than what his paranoid mind shoves inside him. They’re different, but they’re also alike. Minho likes to joke with friends as much as Jisung, and he’s not shy either - he’s just distant. Jisung isn’t as extroverted as Felix, Chan’s little brother who knows everyone around campus, and spends his fair share of days stuck inside. They play off each other well, and their arguments have never broken them.
Not even now.
“Could just make the rumors the truth.” Minho says, really more to himself than a joke or a confession - though it is just that. He feels Jisung’s body snap outside his space, and there it is. The difference.
Even if Jisung and him are opposites; Minho just doesn’t mind. He lets him climb him like a jungle gym, drag him to parties that drain him, and shove the greasiest foods known to man past his lips. He enjoys it. Because it’s him, because it works between them.
With Jisung, Minho lets down the drawbridge without so much as a ‘please’.
“What did you say?” Jisung’s eyes are huge, and Minho doesn’t shy away when they make eye contact.
“I mean, what’s the difference?” Minho takes a deeper breath, feeling like the sound of time rushing around him is inside his ears. “Between people that are dating and us.”
Jisung’s face grows red.
“They kiss.” Minho wants to say that he’s gotten a million wet kisses on his cheeks, thrown across fields with hands like helicopter blades, in text messages calling him a ‘loser’, but instead he sits up further and pulls Jisung closer by his nape. They pause, Jisung’s eyes growing impossibly wider and then he pushes him away with a heavier blush dusting his chubby cheeks. “Stop fuckin around.”
“I wasn’t.” Minho’s tired of running away from everything, from him. He wants to run towards something for once, towards something he wants. Someone.
“B - but, you’re just saying that because everyone else thinks so. You don’t actually like me.” Jisung laughs with a nervous, staccato sound.
“I do.” Minho sits across from him, earnest. “I like you.”
“It’s not funny, hyung!” Minho laughs, reaching his arms out and wrapping them around his Jisung like he’s always meant to. He holds his tomato head to his chest.
“It is though. Isn’t it?” Jisung nods silently, wrapping his own arms tighter around the other’s torso. Minho knows Jisung better than anyone, what makes him laugh, what hurts him, and what he likes. So of course, Minho’s always known. Jisung likes him too.
He spent all his time covering it up, spinning a web of lies around his own feelings and the word ‘opposites’ like it meant anything at all. Like Jisung wouldn’t tear it apart in the end, like all his walls and moats and bubbles just to ask him a question about the new National Geographic documentary that Minho hasn’t seen any more than he has but will Google just to answer.
“We can’t kiss yet.” Jisung pouts, looking up at him, lips ironically jutting out like he’s asking for what he’s denying out loud.
“Why is that?”
“You have to take me on a date.” Jisung shouts, loud as ever, pretending to be offended. Minho ruffles his hair. “It has to be super expensive and romantic or no kisses ever .”
“Why don’t you take me out on a date?” Minho raises a brow with a signature lopsided smile, and Jisung gasps.
“Is that what you want, Minnie?” Minho smiles freely, leans closer and rubs his nose against Jisung who squawks. “Eskimo kisses count!”
“I do. I want that.”
Running towards what he wants doesn’t feel like wasting time, like dancing, it feels like living in the moment - living for the future.
“Okay. I’ll take you on the fanciest date anyone’s ever been on. I have like ₩35,000, we can get over a hundred chicken nuggies!” Jisung chirps excitedly, squirming inside Minho’s bear hug with a grin.
“You’re gonna make me fat.”
“You run so much, that’s impossible.”
“I was actually thinking of taking a break next semester.” Minho admits. Jisung pauses, taking his hands and putting them on each side of his head. Minho’s cheeks jut out from the pressure.
“If you don’t eat sixty, I’m just eating all of them. Do you want me to die?”
“Well it’s an impressive feat, we could livestream it.”
“For your eyes only, baby.”
“I’m honored.”
“I have a lot of exams coming up though,” Jisung’s shoulders fall in disappointment “in the foreseeable future, for sure.”
Minho doesn’t mind. He can wait.