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lieblingspulli · 1 year

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The Embrace : SKZ

W.C: 3.1k

Leeknow x Reader

Summary: Very soft Leeknow hours. Minho is a committed boyfriend, he’ll study what you study!

A.N: I know it’s unrelated to SKZ but Jimin’s Face album came out and it's honestly sooooo good. Y’all should listen to it 🫣ANYWAYS back to our regularly scheduled program. Hahaha, I listened to It's Not That Serious by ASTN, You by Vietra and other songs similar to these. It’s not related but the vibe is there. Also got inspired by lots of Renoir paintings and a particular Egon Schiele titled, The Embrace (1917). Enjoy!

Masterlist!

SKZ Masterlist

Minho felt strangely at ease. Here he was, reading, out of all people. Truth be told, Minho was never one to read. He always had something better to do, like practice his dance techniques or go out to eat with his friends. In fact, Minho would probably rather do anything else than read. He just wasn’t a reader. And that’s O.K. That’s what you always told him at least. Minho was never one to read, but for you, he’d do anything.

You owned hundreds of books. You loved to paint and you loved to talk about being creative. Minho thinks that most of your creativity comes from the books you read. Just thinking about you having fun made Minho relax. Whenever you painted, you loved to have him in your company. You would teasingly beg for him to be your muse, but he settled to be an observationist instead. He loved to just watch you paint, coming up with color combinations he could never have thought of himself. He loved when you got hit with inspiration and ran to your makeshift painting studio (really just the extra bedroom) in order to capture it.

These days, you were going to school for fine art and you were never really struck with spontaneous ideas. Minho could see this really bummed you out. The studio was always a mess, you never had enough time between assignments and class to clean everything up. Minho would have cleaned it for you, but he was afraid he’d disturb your method of madness. He knew what it was like to have a particular system to feed into your creativity. Every artist liked things a certain way. He thought of all the times he practiced by himself, having a carefully curated schedule of practice to keep his brain alert and ready to dance. To sing. To write. He knew that, out of all people, you’d be the most understanding of this and vice versa.

These past few weeks had been grueling and seriously draining for you. With critiques coming up, you were always frantically painting. The colors you chose seemed less vibrant to Minho. There was less spark to it. Less love in it. All he wanted to do was wrap you up in support and try anything to make you relaxed again.

He even forced you to go to the art museum with him to study other paintings, citing it was strictly for school purposes and not actually just to force you out of the studio. He had pushed you along the exhibits, pointing out the few paintings he did recognize. But he felt it wasn’t enough. His lack of knowledge didn’t bridge the gap between the two of you and Minho felt too far away from you to provide you the support you needed. The museum date was still fun, but it didn’t fulfill the goal for either of you two.

As soon as Minho opened the door after coming back from the museum, you hurried to the studio to survey your latest batch of portraits. Minho huffed in annoyance and got straight to work. Even though he couldn’t paint, at least he could still make the effort to know what went on in that brain of yours.

Without making a huge racket, Minho chose every book you had on art, art history, and art technique. Eyeing the pile, Minho decided it wasn’t enough. He set them aside in a hidden spot and ran to grab his keys and jacket.

With a quick kiss and goodbye, Minho feigned that he had to run to the store really quickly. You absentmindedly agreed and continued stressing over the lighting perspective in your portrait. He felt bad leaving you in such a dark place by yourself but he had to do it.

“Bye honey!” Minho yelled as he ran out the door.

For the next hour, Minho scoured the local library for books he could possibly gather intelligence from and he even bought some reading supplies, like a stupid cat bookmark with googly eyes and reading tabs that had llamas on them. Minho’s confidence was high as he carried his books in the tote bag that the local library gave him in through the front door. As expected, you were still in the studio, this time with a coffee. He peeked into the studio through the doorway and observed you for a second.

“Babe?” He called.

“Hm?” He heard you say, but you didn’t turn around.

“Are you okay?” Minho entered the room and padded over to you before eventually reaching for your shoulders and giving you a small massage. He kissed your shoulder and he felt you loosen up, relieving all the tension in your neck and shoulders. He heard you sigh in defeat.

“What’s wrong baby?” He whispered and kissed behind your ear. You closed your eyes.

“I can’t get this stupid painting right Minho. It’s driving me crazy. Batshit crazy!” You raised your voice a little and strained through your frustration. He massaged your shoulders deeply, thinking about how little help he provided.

“How about I make you dinner then? Let’s take a break.” He tried enticing you out of your chair and gently pushed you to lean back against him. “Sound good?” He kissed the top of your head. You looked up and he saw your glossy eyes, full of frustration, exhaustion, and anxiety. He gently smiled at you.

“Yea, let’s go.” You whispered as he petted your hair back.

A couple hours later, you were taking a hot shower and Minho was in bed, beginning to read from his pile of books. He had post-its and a pencil in hand as he flipped through the pages. He was currently studying the history of oil painting. Your favorite medium was oil, so he began with that.

While you showered, he read. While you painted, he read. While you took naps, he read. Whenever he wasn’t dancing and on tight schedules, with you or comforting you, and cooking, he was reading. Of course, you were so preoccupied with your deadlines, you thought he had just taken up reading as a hobby to wait out your lack of attention towards him. Minho was a sneaky one.

Luckily, Minho had a great attention span when applied. He could rotate through 3 books at the same time, which improved his reading efficiency. Minho felt like an old man, truth be told. Even the members noticed. He usually brought the smallest book in the pile with him to work and read while he was on breaks. Jisung and Changbin incessantly teased him, but he also had a lot of support from people like Hyunjin who often gave him tips from his own experience. Through this process, Minho rapidly expanded his knowledge of the world of art and its creative processes.

Although he primarily did this for you, he also gained inspiration for his own creative processes too, using the vivid imagery to evoke certain emotions in his dance and song repertoire. There was a noticeable difference in his demeanor now that he was so focused on his books. Everyone in the group was quite confused at first, but when he explained it to them, they were all gungho on the plan.

You finally began to become suspicious of Minho’s behavior after you got home one day and really looked at the books on his bedside table for once. You had just changed out of your class painting overalls when you happened to stroll by the bed and drop your hair clip. After picking it up, you made eye contact with his nightly stack of books that he usually read in bed as you got ready for bed. At first glance, the books seemed normal, but then you read the titles out loud.

Color and light techniques in Oil. Mary Cassatt in Practice. Renoir and Other Masters. Pencil, Pastel and Everything In Between? What?

You flipped through the pages, finding tabs on particular pages, marked with small post-its and even multiple bookmarks, all stupid looking animal bookmarks. You laughed out loud at first. You didn’t know Minho liked art. Usually he was so clueless about it that when you went to museums with him, you often had to explain to him the significance of basic paintings like Monets or Renoirs. What was he doing with advanced painting technique books?

Unfortunately, Minho was gone for the day, busy with press and recording sessions for his group’s upcoming comeback. You wouldn’t see him until at least 11 p.m. You put the last book down where you found it and began searching the apartment, convinced there was more. As you made your way through the living room, you found two large piles with museum catalogs, art magazines, books and more. You were astonished with the obviously large pile in front of you. Some had post-its on the front cover, marking them finished or for return. You were left with just as much confusion as when you began to look through the books. Was Minho learning this… for you?

You picked up a particularly interesting looking one called, “Toulouse-Lautrec in Color Study.” It had several chapters on the usage of color and lighting within his paintings. This book seemed to be bought, not borrowed, telling from the way Minho’s writing was scribbled all over the pages. Some were stupid comments, like her face looks gross and others were genuine observations such as the orange of the paper gives his skin a tone without using any extra color, suggest to Y/n? You continued reading through the comments, realizing he was marking these up for you. Almost all the comments were suggestions and notes to convey to you. You started to tear up, knowing that someone who hated to read and hated to study had willingly studied for weeks, gathering knowledge just to understand and help their partner. You gently placed the book back on its pile.

The sun began to set and you sat on the couch, feeling a headache come on. Not quite sure what to do with this newly acquired information, you ate a bagel and proceeded to take a nap. Your studio sessions at school had worn you out to the bone. Earlier today, your professor recommended a complete overhaul of your portfolio, citing it just lacked that special tonality of color and depth. It frustrated the hell out of you. You groaned and smashed your face into the pillow before slowly succumbing to the sleep you so well deserved.

Minho came home to a dark apartment. Usually it wasn’t loud, but it also wasn’t dark either. He set his stuff down at the doorway and carefully removed his shoes, trying to be quiet. Either you were gone, or asleep, he assumed. Minho walked through the apartment, scanning for any sign of life. When he finally got to the bedroom and peeked in, he found you face down on the bed, not even covered in a blanket. He laughed and carefully climbed into the bed, careful not to jostle you around. As you softly breathed, clearly in dreamland, he observed your fluttering eyelashes and your slightly parted lips. Your skin glowed in the soft lamp light. Your hair softly was pushed behind your ear. He adored when you looked relaxed, it made you look like an angel.

Recalling that you had class today, he carefully got off the bed and headed over to the kitchen to prepare a light dinner. As he fished the ingredients out of the fridge, Minho hummed a soft tune. He thought about how much he admired your tenacity to continue your art as he cut his veggies. Minho dreamily thought of you and him in the future, in a house, with cats and maybe a kid. He sighed, hoping he could relieve your stress.

When you opened your eyes, you blearily made eye contact with the stack of books on Minho’s side. As you blinked, you remembered your findings. The tears welled up in your eyes. You wiped them and sluggishly propped yourself up, still tired from the day’s work. Although most of the time, this was simply exhaustion from all the work you’ve been putting into your art. You heard some clinking from the kitchen and recognized Minho’s humming through the silence of the bedroom.

The apartment was warm as you trudged through the kitchen doorway. Minho immediately looked up at you and smiled. You gazed lovingly at him, in his kiss the cook apron and his teddy bear kitchen towel thrown over his shoulder.

“Good morning sleeping beauty.” Minho snickered.

“Oh stop it.” You felt the words coming thick out your throat, still not used to talking quite yet. “How was work?” You asked before sitting at the island. Minho grunted in response. You took that as not good.

“Choreo got changed for some performances and it didn’t go well. It was the first day of rehearsing these changes. Felix kicked my shin. Jisung bumped into Chan. Changbin is Changbin.” He scoffed. You giggled at the thought of Jisung running into Chan.

“What did Changbin do to you?” You laughed. Minho glared at you. You put your hands up in innocence. “I take it back.” Minho chuckled and turned back to his sizzling pan.

“How was your meeting today in the studio?” He asked behind his back. Now it was your turn to grunt. Minho raised his eyebrow even though you couldn’t see his face.

“Oh?”

“Yea, my portfolio basically got dumped in the trash.”

“Oh no, did Mr. Fuckface say that?”

“Yea, he said it didn’t have that ‘spark’ or ‘depth.’ ” You airquoted and chuckled bitterly. “I think it’s the colors. I just can’t get them right. The tones aren’t matching up or creating the depth of shadows I usually can do.” You sighed and leaned forward to rest your head on your hand. Minho poured the pan’s contents into a bowl and placed the pan down before turning around to look at you. He studied your posture and face.

“Maybe it’s the stress.” He suggested lightly. You looked up at him and gave him a face. He shrugged and wiped his hands on the towel. “Baby, you spend all day cooped up in that bedroom, trying to will out a painting that’s not there. I can see and feel the stress radiating off of you.”

“Minho, I have deadlines to meet.” You defended yourself.

“Y/n, you’re burnt out.” He countered and served two portions of the food he made. You grumbled a thank you when he set the plate in front of you and sat across from you. Minho reached out for your hand and you obliged. His thumb rubbed circles into your palm and you stared at his hand.

“I love you, you know that right?” Minho said. He continued to rub circles. Your mouth flattened to form a line.

“I love you too Minho.” You sighed and felt your throat close up with emotion.

“Baby, I think you should rest for a while. You’re clearly burnt out. Let’s do something fun, go somewhere cool. I just want you to relax.” Minho’s voice tightened. If you began to cry, he would too. It was a domino effect. Minho continued.

“You inspire me, you know. I love what you do. You work so hard, it makes me so proud to be called your boyfriend. It makes me want to create just like you do.” He lovingly gazed at you and you kept eye contact with him.

“You’re the idol here though.” You strained to talk. You felt defeated, honestly. By the lack of confidence in your work and by the mush of ideas in your brain. Then you remembered the books. This cheered you up considerably. You continued to listen to Minho speak.

“I know it’s hard right now, but I want to help you more. I want to pitch ideas to you and observe and help. I-” He hesitated with his words. “I just want to be there with you when you feel it’s too hard to keep going. I know I can do it.” His voice wavered. You wiped a tear from your eye.

“Hey, let’s not cry.” He laughed. You laughed in response.

“You’re actually the most angelic person ever Minho. You read all those books just to help me?” Minho’s eyes widened, caught in the spotlight. He blushed and his ears got red before he looked down at his plate. He shyly smiled at himself, nodding and looking up. “Yea, I just wanted to be able to help you more than I could have before. I felt limited. Dumb.” He rubbed his ears. Your eyes widened and you leaned forward to grab his other hand.

“Hey, Minho. You are not dumb. You are intelligent and kind and terribly creative. It drives me crazy how smart you are. Don’t say that.” You held both his hands in yours. “Baby. Seriously, you inspire me so much.” Minho giggled shyly. The apartment was silent.

“Did you seriously do all that for me?” You whispered, as if there were people around. He nodded. “Yeah.”

Your jaw dropped and he smiled widely.

“You’re crazy and I love you so much for it.” You kissed his knuckles. Minho’s neck got even more red than before.

“Come here.” You got up and he followed in suit. You wrapped his firm arms around your shoulders and yours snaked around his waist. Minho allowed you to do whatever you wanted with him, he was all yours to keep. He listened to your soft breathing as he gazed into your eyes and lips. He melted right into your arms and held you tight.

Not long after, he heard sniffles and felt your chest constrict sporadically. Minho gently rubbed your back and swayed, letting you cry your frustrations out. Little did he know, you weren’t just crying out of frustration, but out of so much love. You felt what it was to actually want to work harder, knowing that even though things were hard, you wouldn’t have it any other way. Minho kissed your head and you squeezed his shirt in your hands. His strong arms held you tight.

Nothing could compare to the ethereal feeling Minho felt in his heart, being held like this and feeling the warmth of the apartment you two had made a home together. He absolutely adored everything about you. He wasn’t ready to let you go quite yet.

“I love you Minho.” Your whispers were muffled by his chest. He sniffled. “I love you too Y/n. I always will.”

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