Jaemin was alright. He was perfectly fine. Sure, he had been at the SM building for the past 5 hours, constantly going from the recording studio to the cafe to the dance practice room, and then repeating it all, but he was fine. He should be. Jaemin had heard that Mark had practiced for longer than he should have been practicing for because of how much workload he had to carry. Mark had stayed after Dream practice to join 127 alongside Donghyuck, before rushing over to the studio to help Taeyong complete a song for their album. Compared to what Jaemin had to do — which was to catch up with every choreography he missed — it was a lot more. 

"Wanna take a break?" Renjun asked, walking into the practice room to find Jaemin putting We Young on loop for the fifth time that week. He was so close to learning the choreography, but with the absence of the members, he wasn't able to get his positioning right. 

"Not yet," Jaemin breathed out, shaking his head and flashed a smile at Renjun. "I'll take a break in a bit."

"You don't need to exhaust yourself, Nana," Renjun placed a soda can against Jaemin's forehead and sighed. "I still don't understand why you're putting in so much more effort that you should be."

"I'm not," Jaemin chuckled, taking the soda can and popped it open. "It just seems like I am. I'm fine, really."

Jaemin leaned over and wrapped his arms around Renjun, who groaned about how his sweat was rubbing onto him yet made no effort to push the taller away. Jaemin's plan — to be the one to express his affection the most — had been very successful. Everyone had slowly stopped their barriers and accepted his hugs, because unlike Donghyuck, Jaemin genuinely wanted hugs and wasn't trying to tease everyone. At first they had been reluctant on accepting a random embrace, but then when Jaemin insisted the fact that he wanted a hug (and he huffed a little with a pout) they allowed him to cuddle with them.

"If you're ever feeling down," Renjun started, pulling away from Jaemin to pat his cheek. "Just tell me, okay? You can always rely on me."

"Yes, yes, dear Renjun hyung," Jaemin laughed loudly as Renjun hit him on the head for using the unnecessary honorific. "I need to get back to practicing."

"Don't overdo it and faint," Renjun warned, striding over to the door as Donghyuck called him name out from the resting room. 

"I won't!" Jaemin yelled back as the door closed behind Renjun. The smile on his face dropped and he slouched over. Although he had told Renjun that he was fine and that nothing was wrong, he was sprouting absolute lies. Jaemin's wrist hurt because of the number of times he fell on the ground. His legs ached as he had been dancing for so long. His chest and throat were in pain since he had been trying to see how much stamina he had by singing along to the song. Everything hurt. But no one needed to know, otherwise they would comfort him. No one was supposed to comfort him, that was his role.

Taking a deep breath, Jaemin returned to turning the music up. He walked back to the center of the room and stared at his reflection, anger tinting his view because of how unsatisfied he was with himself. The compliments he received from everyone didn't matter. They were only trying to make him feel better, nothing was genuine. 

Their latest song Go played and Jaemin jumped in his spot. Only after an hour passed and his lungs were giving up in him did Jaemin call it a day.

"There's something up with Jaemin," Jeno told Donghyuck, who hummed in agreement and elbowed Mark. 

"What do you mean?" Mark, who seemed to be oblivious about the change, asked. "He seems fine."

"He doesn't," Donghyuck shook his head, sitting up on the sofa and kicked Mark's feet away from his knees. "He was exhausted as hell but was making food for everyone."

"He spent more than half of the day at the studio," Renjun added and Mark looked from between the two in confusion. "He probably doesn't eat either."

"Why would he do that?" Mark frowned and Donghyuck held himself back from pinching his cheeks. "He should know that it's bad to do that."

"That's what we're wondering," Jeno sighed, running a hand down his face and then glanced at the door which Jaemin just happened to walk through the next second. "Hey, Nana."

"Hey," Jaemin smiled at them brightly before hurrying over to his room. The four sitting in the living room shared a look of understanding and Jeno, without any words, volunteered to be the one to question Jaemin.

Jeno got up from his seat and waved to the others, who mouthed to him, 'good luck'. He nodded at them and walked over to Jaemin room. Since Jaemin had not been part of promotions until recently, the staff had given him his own room, so that he wouldn't be bothered by the others who left the house in the morning and come home late at night. Little did they know that it bothered him more than it should've.

"Jaemin?" Jeno called out as he knocked on the door. He waited a few moments but no response came and Jeno wondered if Jaemin was in the bathroom. He knocked once again and continued to chant Jaemin's name, hoping the latter would finally respond to him.

"What?" Jaemin snapped, pulling open the door with a grunt and Jeno flinched at the sight. Previously, Jaemin had been wearing a mask and hat so his face was hidden, but now Jeno could see how Jaemin had dark eyebags, a frown etched on his face and his skin was paler than normal. 

"Are you okay?" Jeno asked, pushing Jaemin into his room and closed the door behind him. "You look like an absolute mess."

Jaemin's eyes widened at the words, but as soon as the shock (or confusion, Jeno doesn't know) was revealed in his face, it disappeared faster than that. Jaemin shook his head and ruffled his hair. 

"Yeah, I'm fine," Jaemin beamed, the strange and dreadful atmosphere that was surrounding him gone within seconds and the typical Jaemin was back. "Don't stress about me, Jeno."

Not letting Jeno say anything else, Jaemin reached forward and grabbed his hand, tugging him towards the bed and pushed him onto it with him. He climbed onto the bed and lay beside Jeno, throwing an arm and a leg over him and let the blanket sit upon their shoulders.

"Stay here with me, please," Jaemin mumbled, tightening his grip on Jeno when he felt him shift beneath him.

"Don't worry," Jeno reassured him, turning so that he was on his side and pulled Jaemin closer. "I'm here with you."

"Alright, spill your secrets," Donghyuck jumped on top of Jaemin, who was trying to read his book in peace in his room, but apparently Donghyuck had other ideas.

"I don't have any secrets," Jaemin chuckled and then brought up his free hand to tangle it between Donghyuck's soft strands. "Soft hair."

"I know, I take care of it," Donghyuck hummed in delight when Jaemin brushed his hand over his head, massaging his scalp and tugged in the strands.

"More like Jaehyun hyung forces you to use the same products he does," Jaemin snickered and laughed even louder when Donghyuck grumbled beneath him and hit his arm. 

"Stop changing the subject, tell me what's wrong," Donghyuck lifted his head and looked at Jaemin with expectancy.

To say that Jaemin trusted Donghyuck would be a lie, but it wasn't his fault. Out of all the people in their group, and there were many, Donghyuck was the only one who managed to always accidentally slip up and reveal secrets. He would be talking to someone and then he would remember something he had overheard and another issue would arise. So it wasn't a big surprise he didn't trust telling Donghyuck something like that. 

"Nothing's wrong, Hyuckie," Jaemin pouted, leaning forward to place a sloppy kiss on Donghyuck forehead (to which Donghyuck scrunched his nose up and pulled away). "I'm just a bit tired but I'll get over it."

Before Donghyuck could say anything else, Mark entered the room and kicked the younger off the bed, complaining about how he had ruined his new jeans by wearing them out to their trip to the beach. Jaemin watched as Mark grabbed Donghyuck's sweater and dragged him out of the room, talking about how he's gonna pay once they get home to their dorm. A chuckle escaped his mouth and he pulled his book back to his face. He managed to escape their attempts to find out what was wrong again.