"Have a drink." Jeonghan suddenly appeared in front of Seungcheol with an opened bottle of beer. "No way. I'm on the job." He shook his head as Jeonghan frowned at him. "Ok then you're dismissed for the night." His eyes sparkled under the rows of strung fairy lights as he handed the bottle over. "You can leave if you want." Jeonghan was suddenly aware of Seungcheol's agitation and he pulled the beer back and took a sip of it. "Did you have plans tonight? I told you she could come...."

Seungcheol shook his head. "No, well I mean I guess we did, but I didn't know....." he looked around at everyone having fun and suddenly realised it had been a long time since he enjoyed himself. He took the beer from Jeonghan's hands and took a huge sip and Jeonghan smirked. "I just had my mouth on that." He winked and Seungcheol found himself blushing. The feeling quickly passed as Jeonghan grabbed him by the arm and dragged him over to a long table laid out with food. "Eat something please. I haven't seen you eat all day." Seungcheol took a plate and filled it up before Jeonghan was pulled away to dance by Minghao and Seungcheol found himself sitting next to Jihoon.

The silence was comfortable for a little but Seungcheol's curiosity got the better of him. He watched Jihoon's forlorn expression and had to ask. "So.... What happened with you and Soonyoung?" Jihoon turned to him in surprise before taking another huge sip of his beer. "I fucked up. That's what."

Jihoon sighed heavily and put the beer down and pulled his hands inside his hoodie despite the warm night. "I love my work and I'm in the studio sometimes 18 hours a day. Soonyoung wanted to do more, travel more, be together more. I couldn't see past my own needs and the more unhappy he got the more I stayed at the studio. I pushed us apart for my work and when I finally realised I was destroying us I caught him sleeping with his personal trainer. Seokmin."

Jihoon sighed and Seungcheol felt suddenly sad for the man. He understood him a little too well. "How can you sit here and watch them together?" Seungcheol asked quietly and Jihoon sniffed a little. "I still love him. It makes me happy to see him so happy. He was never that happy with me." Jihoon searched around for a new beer in the cooler next to the chairs and cracked it open before handing it to Seungcheol. He took another one for himself and smiled as he watched Soonyoung clamber onto the inflatable unicorn laughing hysterically.

"I couldn't love him the way he needed me to. I'm glad someone else can." Seungcheol stared at the short music producer as they sipped their beers in silence. He'd never heard anything so selfless in his life. "What about you though?" Seungcheol asked quietly and Jihoon just shrugged. "What about me? 'I'll move on too eventually. Or maybe I won't. Who knows? I've been making amazing music since the breakup." He drank the rest of the beer and dropped it onto the pile of empty bottles next to his chair. "Are you offering to help me get over him?" Jihoon's frown turned quickly into a smirk and Seungcheol blushed again. What was wrong with him? This is why he didn't drink. It went to his head too quickly.

Seungcheol sat back and drank down his second beer before looking for a third. He couldn't stop thinking about what Jihoon said about putting work over love. He could feel the love radiating out of Jihoon every time he looked at Soonyoung. He remembered what Jeonghan asked him about feeling the spark of love, of attraction and desire, and he wondered if he would leave Luda if she wanted him to choose between her and his work.

A sick feeling washed over him, awareness encouraged by the honesty of alcohol, and he realised he didn't really care enough to choose her. It was a relationship of convenience, of expectedness, all his life Seungcheol expected to find a pretty girl and get married and have a family. He never once considered that there might be something else out there for him, something exciting and overwhelming, a feeling of exhilaration and passion. He definitely didn't feel it with Luda and he searched for a third beer as he realised he had to break it off with her. It wasn't fair on either of them.

He watched Jeonghan dance with Minghao, the movements of his body giving away the amount he had already drank, and he realised there was no way he'd give this job up if she asked him. His instinct was too strong. When he watched Jeonghan dance, with the unfamiliar burn of alcohol in his stomach, the urge to protect him from whatever frightened him was overwhelming. He watched Jeonghan giggle, drink his champagne, throw his arms around Minghao as they moved around on the makeshift dancefloor.

"So, you and the bodyguard, how's that going?" Minghao asked Jeonghan as they danced a little. Minghao always took it easy on the wine but Jeonghan had already downed half a bottle of champagne in an hour. "Hao, you know, he's so cute and so sweet and so hot...." Jeonghan giggled a little as he sipped at his champagne again, "and I totally told him I'm a 23 year old virgin. How do I recover from that?" Jeonghan giggled again before tipping his head back and emptying his glass into his mouth. Champagne spilled out the sides and down his paper-thin shirt and he giggled and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "I don't know if you have to recover..." Minghao whispered as he leaned in close. "He hasn't stopped staring at you the whole time we've been dancing."

Jeonghan shrugged his shoulders and his face turned from happy to sad in an instinct. "It doesn't matter. He had a girlfriend Hao. A girlfriend .... and he's straight. And taken. And he has excellent taste and would never want someone like me. And he's too professional. He wouldn't cross that line. Or whatever." Jeonghan turned a little to see Seungcheol staring at him and he flushed pink. "Anyway what should I do?"

Minghao's giggles turned into full on laughter. "Jeonghan. No wonder you.... never mind ...... Just go over to him. Ask him if he wants another drink, ask him if he wants to go somewhere and talk, ask him to dance." Jeonghan blushed. "But he's straight. And, you know, the girlfriend...." Minghao laughed again. "Jeonghan there's no way he's straight the way he's been looking at you for the last half hour. And this girlfriend. Does he love her?" Jeonghan shrugged. He really didn't know. "Did he invite her here? No. So too bad. You snooze you lose and I wouldn't be snoozing on a hot man like that. Get him before Jihoon does!" Jeonghan looked over again to see Seungcheol and Jihoon leaning close as they talked. "A noodle's straight until you get it wet Jeonghan." Minghao winked at Jeonghan and pushed him away and towards the other two.

"You're staring at him." Jihoon said quietly as he sipped his next beer. "No I'm not." Seungcheol slurred a little as he sipped slowly at his fourth. "Yes. You are! You're also a lightweight!" Jihoon laughed and it was the first real expression of joy Seungcheol had seen from the quiet man. It was both stunning in its beauty and heartbreaking in its rarity and Seungcheol really thought Jihoon deserved to laugh more.

"So, um, does he talk about me? Like what does he think of me?" Seungcheol cleared his thought and shifted awkwardly in his seat. "You know, as an employee, like does he say I'm good?" Seungcheol's nervous questions made Jihoon laugh again. "Whipped man, never seen anything like it, he thinks you're God's gift to the universe... and he's totally paranoid that he's always embarrassing himself in front of you." Jihoon looked up with a smirk to see Jeonghan walking a little wobbly towards them with a bottle of champagne in his hand. "Oh good. Here he comes. This should be fun."

"Hi Cheollie..." Jeonghan's voice was soft and wavered a little as he approached them. "Um, do you want to, maybe get a drink with me." Suencheol frowned a little. "Ah, we both have drinks." His eyes wandered from his beer bottle to Jeonghan's champagne and up to Jeonghan's flushed cheeks. "Oh, yeah.." Jeonghan giggled a little awkwardly. "Maybe, um, I know! Can you take me inside to see Chan Chan. I can't go by myself. I'm, like, scared or something....." his eyes fell to the floor where he trained them firmly on his foot digging into the grass as he waited for Seungcheol's response. "Of course. Whatever you want Jeonghan." Seuncheol smiled. "You're the boss."

"Can you, ah, maybe hold my hand? I think it's the alcohol getting to me but I feel kind of, you know, scared...."

Seungcheol's mind said no but the words slipped out of his mouth of their own accord. "Okay Jeonghan," he said as he let Jeonghan slip his hand inside Seungcheol's.

As they walked past the pool to head into the house, their hands tightly entwined, Jeonghan remembered what Minghao said to him.

"A noodle's straight until you get it wet Jeonghan."

He squeezed Seungcheol's hand tighter and grabbed his arm and before Seungcheol knew what was happening they were both tumbling into the pool fully clothed.