#if u read it then jaeyong is embarrassed | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

taelme · 5 years ago

Text

night night

genre: kind of acquaintances-to-lovers!johnny, radio dj!johnny, (a lot of fluff, kind of slow burn but not really)

pairing/s: Johnny / Reader, side Jaeyong ( ft some of the nct boys )

word count: 20k+

tw: they drink in this? Johnny just wants to kiss you ig

a/n: this was rly soft! for me at least lol, anyway I decided to upload this on christmas because it’s set during Christmas!! so yes Merry Christmas to all of you,, my present to u is... Johnny? read this on ao3

Youngho liked to think he knew all about love, he played love songs whenever he dj-ed (you know, a variety, from Michael Bublé at weddings to a Jhené Aiko remix at his college parties), and even gave Taeyong advice when he was having a month-long—or year long, Youngho lost track—panic about Jaehyun. After hearing (and seeing) it so much, he would’ve figured his idea of love was pretty similar to everyone else around him. You know, find someone you like, get to know them more, figure out if you can get along with them, fall in love, get married.

A little traditional of him, but he guessed there was no harm in that. But what Youngho never expected himself to believe, much less experience, was love at first sight- or first drunk encounter (despite what Taeyong has to say about that).

It’d been the same as almost every other night that Youngho spent while he wasn’t attending a party as a DJ. Wrapped up in his blankets, headphones hugging his ears comfortably, Youngho was about to doze off reading his book before it seemed like the bass in the song was just getting a little too loud. Removing one of the headphones, he heard the banging coming from the other side of the door, sighing to himself.

Taeyong must have forgotten his keys again.

“Alright alright, dude chill I’m coming.” Lifting the covers off his bed, Youngho padded over to the door, yanking it open harshly to see not Taeyong, but you. And a very drunk you for that matter.

Humming in confusion, Youngho’s eyebrows lifted ever so slightly in amusement, “Where’s Taeyong?”

“Ah!” you lifted a tired hand to wave your finger at him, leaning against the door frame for support, squinting at him.

“On the contrary, that is not my name. My name is Y/N,” you told him your full name, making Youngho not be able to do anything but laugh, not knowing what to do with this situation.

“Where did Taeyong go?” you asked, your hands moving to press against the door frame for extra support. Youngho let out an amused huff as he let his arm grasp your forearm, bringing you into the dorm and sitting you down gently on Taeyong’s bed only to have you flop down on the pillow with a loud sigh. “This pillow is so hard,” you mumbled, voice stifled by the fabric.

“I should be asking you that, he left for the party with you didn’t he?” Youngho knew you weren’t paying attention, but he didn’t really mind, getting a bottle of water out of the fridge and handing it over to you, using one hand to get you into a sitting position, your eyes blinking at him slowly (which Youngho thought made you resemble a cat, but not that anyone asked).

“Here, drink up,” he told you.

After a long period of silence only filled by the sound of Youngho tapping his fingers against his phone and your long sips of water, you declared yourself finally sobered up enough to set the bottle down after doing enough thinking about what had happened prior to you showing up at Youngho and Taeyong’s dorm room. Your embarrassment began to sink in at the fact that you’d ended up here of all places.

“Taeyong left with Jaehyun.” you spoke, making Youngho nod with a knowing smile on his face, “I think I followed them but how I ended up here is still a little fuzzy. I just remember craving beer and then ending up here.”

Youngho let out a small giggle, “ha, that rhymed,” looking at you before apologizing quickly, “sorry, bad joke.”

Youngho wasn’t sure why the atmosphere with you two felt so tense. It wasn’t as if it was the first time you were seeing each other, no. You’d come over many times before to raid Taeyong’s alcohol stash and hang out, sometimes even staying over, when your roommate was ‘being absolutely intolerable’ (your words, not his).

And it wasn’t like you didn’t know who Youngho was either. From all those times you came over, you recognized him to be the guy that always controlled the music at parties, most of the time with Taeyong. You’d never spoken to each other without Taeyong there before, since during the times you’d come to their dorm Youngho was always either asleep or doing work at his desk with his headphones on. Only occasionally would the three of you play drinking games whenever none of you were in the mood to do work.

Sure, it felt like you knew him still, after hearing your fair share of stories about him from Taeyong. But if you had to summarize it, what you knew about Youngho was that he was a big flirt, liked to read and had really pretty eyes. Whether that last bit was from you or Taeyong was something you were reluctant to reveal.

Youngho wasn’t sure what it was, the way you echoed his name after he (unnecessarily) introduced himself or the confident way you replied, “I know,” but whatever it was, it was making Youngho’s heart flutter and he was getting a little worried about that.

“How come you weren’t at the party today?” you asked, recalling that he would usually be there, his tall physique hard to miss in a crowd.

Youngho shrugged, “didn’t really feel like it today, so Taeyong went instead.”

Making an ‘o’ shape with your mouth in realization, you nodded slowly, fiddling with the bottle of water in your hands, not daring to look elsewhere.

“Are you going for the next one?” you asked, averting your gaze when you saw him tilt his head at you, a teasing glint in his eye.

“Do you want me to?” he asked, quirking an eyebrow at you in some sort of challenge.

Pursing your lips and shifting your gaze away from his, you shrugged as nonchalantly as you could, one of your hands accidentally squeezing the bottle making a loud cracking sound.

Youngho only grew more amused at your reaction, something in him stirring when you replied as nonchalantly as you could, “It’ll be fun.”

Youngho shot you a serious look, nodding just to tease you, “more fun with me there, of course.”

You ignored what he said for the sake of your heart, setting the water bottle down on Taeyong’s bedside table and standing up abruptly.

“Thanks for uh…not chasing me away. Even though you don’t like, know me, know me,” you told him, seeing him shake his head at you, mouth slightly agape as he hugged the small character pillow to his chest, one hand coming up to run his fingers through his rather long black hair.

“It’s nothing, really. Any, well most at least, friend of Taeyong’s is a friend of mine,” he smiled, a strange feeling bubbling in his chest when you smiled back, walking you over to the door, stepping back when he reached over to open it for you, holding it open with his foot as he leant against the doorframe, looking at you with a small smile.

“Get home safe, alright?”

You tried not to look too dazed, his eyes were really pretty in the soft dim lighting coming from his room and the hallway.

“Yeah, I will, I called my roommate. She’s coming over to walk me back.”

Youngho nodded, still clutching the big plushie close to his chest as if it would ease the rapid beating of his heart, suddenly thankful for the chain of events that led you here.

You’d gotten a text from your roommate saying she was waiting downstairs for you, making you gesture towards the lobby as a silent announcement that you had to get going, Youngho giving you an understanding nod, something about the way he was still smiling at you making you just the slightest bit hesitant to leave.

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

You grinned, unsure what confidence came over you, “night night.”

===

“They’re not your soulmate, for the last time, Youngho.” Taeyong tapped his pen against his textbook, waving his other hand in front of his friend’s face to get him to stop staring at the table you were sat at with your group mates in the library.

Youngho made a strangled sound of frustration, Taeyong bowing his head in apology at the people who had shot them glares. “I swear, dude, if you just heard the way they spoke to me that night you would’ve fallen too.”

Taeyong grimaced, his eyebrows lifting sceptically, “I really doubt so, I think finals is just getting to you,” the pink-haired boy sighed, tapping Youngho on the forehead with the pen, “focus, or you’re gonna end up sleeping here.”

Youngho was trying his best, really, as Taeyong explained another question to him, trying to focus his attention solely on his textbook, but just the knowledge that you were sitting so close to them was making the urge to approach you just for a chance to talk to you painfully strong.

“I’m gonna go get a drink,” he murmured to Taeyong, ignoring whatever data analytics explanation Taeyong had just been trying to give him, hoping whatever he could get in the shitty selection of drinks would be sufficient to take his mind off of you.

He just wasn’t prepared that he would’ve bumped into you there of all places. He’d been making his way to the vending machine when you’d walked out of the washroom next to the vending machine, eyes widening and a small yelp of surprise leaving your lips when you saw him.

“Studying for finals?” you asked, seeing him make a face at you, one of his hands going up to adjust the chain of his necklace, making you unconsciously touch the chain on your own neck as well, withdrawing your hand quickly to fold your arms behind you.

Youngho huffed, “do I have a choice? Taeyong’s been trying to recite his notes to me for the past hour.”

You laughed at that, peering over to see what drinks were in the vending machine, debating on getting one for yourself.

“What about you?” he asked, the question making you turn to him with raised eyebrows, his eyebrows lifting slightly in expectation.

You shrugged, “I’ve got some like creative writing submissions soon,” you told him casually, trying to divert the topic, “what are you getting?” You asked, reluctant to go back to your table to study.

Youngho hummed, almost forgetting he was looking for a drink since you’d shown up, doing a quick once-over of the selection and deciding on the canned coffee, the loud thud of the can dropping making you jump slightly.

“This sucks but it’ll do for now,” Youngho sighed, fishing it out from the compartment at the bottom.

“Is it that bad?” you laughed, seeing that he’d deepened his frown at your question, prompting you to elaborate, “I don’t drink coffee, so I wouldn’t know.”

Youngho’s eyes widened, before his expression softened, using his free hand to open the can of coffee, “I mean, I usually drink my coffee without milk.”

Now it was your turn to grimace.

“Noted,” you let out a huff of amusement, a small smile lingering on your features as you glanced behind Youngho to see Taeyong seated at his table, practically leaning out of his seat as he told you to go away, waving his hands in a ‘shooing’ action, mouthing that you were distracting Youngho, figuring that was your queue to leave.

“Alright, I’ll just be uh… heading back now. Good luck studying,” you told him, the boy returning you a quick nod before walking back to his table.

You were doing pretty well in terms of your writing progress, other than the occasional glances you would try to sneak at Youngho’s table only to be intimidated by Taeyong’s glare and look away.

“That guy’s been staring in this direction for the past half hour, are you sure there’s nothing going on?” your friend asked you, narrowing her eyes at you.

“It’s nothing, I swear. I don’t even know why he’s doing that. We’ve literally only had one conversation,” you shrugged it off, trying to be as nonchalant as your body allowed you to be, turning to look at Youngho’s direction only for him to turn away as quickly as you did.

“Isn’t he dating that guy at the table? They’re always together at parties.”

You snorted at that, shaking your head at your friend, “nope, not a chance, Taeyong’s already dating someone.” You twirled your pen in your fingers, not being able to help but feel distracted by the knowledge that Youngho was looking at you.

“Actually, we walked past their table just now and heard them talking about someone, I think they’re from our school. That guy thinks she’s his soulmate or something,” you frowned, nodding slowly, before shrugging.

“Whatever, that’s none of my business, let’s just get on with the project.”

You were already done with your discussion, resting your chin on your arm which was placed on the table as you used your phone, scrolling aimlessly as your eyes drifted in and out of focus, distracted from your break when your friend had started nervously tapping her pen on your notepad, “dude, they’re coming.”

“Huh?” you frowned in confusion, your chin lifting from your arm slightly.

“Taeyong and Youngho, they’re coming over to our table,” your other friend blurted a-mile-a-minute, their expressions all switching to polite smiles when the two boys had stopped to stand next to where you were seated.

Taeyong nudged you lightly with the elbow of his hand holding on to his bag strap, “When’s your last paper?” he asked, earning an unsure look from you, your friend chipping in quickly with a tiny, “thursday.”

“Thanks,” Taeyong murmured, directing his attention back to you, “you wanna come to a party with us Friday night? It’s gonna be at Jaehyun’s friend’s house.”

You hesitated, a reluctant hum leaving you, having initially intended for Friday to be your day set aside for rest and lazing around, not really having planned on using it to third-wheel.

“Youngho’ll be there too,” Taeyong offered, jabbing the boy next to him with his hand, Youngho nodding his head in confirmation.

Your eyes widened, shooting a look at your friend sitting across from you, seeing her wide eyes glaring at you, mouthing ‘go’ at you, making you finally agree, “okay, I guess I can go with you guys,” you shrugged, seeing Taeyong break into a grin, exchanging a look with Youngho as he nodded.

“It’ll be fun, I promise,” he said over his shoulder as he and Youngho took their leave, the jingling of keychains on Taeyong’s bag growing softer as they left.

That was how you found yourself standing at the door frame of the kitchen at one of Taeyong’s friends’ house parties, swishing your drink around in your hand in an attempt to distract yourself from actually drinking it.

Upon sighting you among the crowd, Youngho left his station to come over to you, dressed in a black shirt with white long sleeves, together with a pair of ripped dark blue jeans that showed off his physique.

“Hey! Almost thought you weren’t gonna show up,” he laughed, grabbing you by the wrist that wasn’t holding your drink to guide you to where he was previously, a rather comfortable spot in the corner of the place’s living room.

“I think some of us are gonna play some games soon, you wanna join?” he asked you, grabbing your cup from you and sniffing it, shooting you a look when he discovered what was in your cup.

“Drinking this so early into the night?” he teased, ignoring the eyeroll he received from you in return, “anyway, what do you say? You can just sit with us even if you don’t wanna play,” he offered, earning a nod from you.

“I’ll... see how I feel later,” you told him, receiving a thumbs up and a boyish smile from him in return, reminding yourself not to let yourself get too swayed by the attraction you felt towards him. Either way, your friend had already told you in the library about how he had someone he already thought was his soulmate.

Soon enough, you saw a rather buzzed Jaehyun show up to call the both of you to come up and join them for games.

“What are you guys playing?” you asked him on your way up the stairs, seeing him turn to you, smiling with his rosy cheeks on full display.

“Spin the bottle?” he giggled, and usually, you would’ve rolled your eyes, but you figured the drinks in your system were making you a little more open to stupid party games.

After a few rounds and people complaining that the game was rigged when it had landed on Taeyong and Jaehyun thrice in a row, a kid named Ten had suggested for everyone to do a round of rock paper scissors to decide who was next to spin the bottle, and surprisingly enough, Youngho won.

“Okay, Youngho’s turn.”

You watched him spin the bottle in the middle of your circle, your gaze flickering quickly to scan the people within the circle, not recognizing half the faces here yet not sure why you felt as if you wouldn’t have wanted the bottle to land on the other girls in the circle. Hell, you’d rather it even land on Taeyong than them.

Too caught up in analysing the people in the circle, your attention was only drawn back to the bottle when you felt Youngho shift in his seat next to you and shouts and whistles erupting amongst the people in the circle, Taeyong shooting Youngho a knowing look.

Youngho turned to you with a blank expression despite his knee bouncing nervously as you realized the mouth of the bottle was pointing at you.

Turning to you with a blank look, he ran his hand through his hair casually, the alcohol in his system giving him a calmer demeanour even despite the many thoughts in his head about how this must’ve been an act of fate, raising his eyebrows at you in question.

“You in or out?” you heard Jaehyun prompt, a smirk on his lips. Your gaze flickered between Youngho and the bottle for a while, knowing you would have to drink whatever strange concoction they’d made if you chose not to kiss Youngho.

You turned to him, your body almost unconsciously leaning towards him before you shook your head, reaching over to pick up the cup, ignoring Taeyong’s look of shock and downing it in one shot, standing up to leave the room.

It was safe to say that was the last college party you decided to attend. And the last you would see of Youngho for a while.

===

“Y/N, can you help me pack up tonight? Jeno and Renjun said they had some school meeting to attend,” Taeyong’s voice called out from the kitchen, followed by the clanging of bowls in the sink.

“You do know that by school meeting they mean they have a party right?” you laughed, closing the glass door of the display cabinet and sealing the scones into a paper bag, pasting a little sticker with the shop’s logo on it before handing it to one of your regular customers.

“Thank you for coming to Babycakes, have a nice day,” you smiled, repeating the greeting you’d memorized by heart, you could say it in your sleep.

You could hear the faint noise of his music he was playing in the kitchen stopping, the Christmas songs you were playing in the café sounding louder now.

Soon enough, the kitchen door swung open to reveal Taeyong, the little pink care bears painted on his jeans sticking out from under his apron, stepping out of the kitchen with a big tray in his hands, kicking a door stopper underneath it with a grunt so he could hear you better.

“I like to think otherwise to console myself, but yes. I know.” The now blond-haired boy spoke, hair pushed back by a thick headband as he worked.

“Anyway, to answer your question, yes, I can help you pack up today. I’ve nothing on either way,” you sighed, your elbows resting on the counter as you cast a wistful look out the window at the working adults and the occasional elderly person walking past the store, not many people being out and about at this time of the day, and you figured it was also because the shop was located in a more residential area of the town.

The lights flickering from the Christmas tree you’d set-up outside almost looked obnoxious at this point, since all it seemed to do was attract couples to take pictures with it.

Stepping out into the main counter area with a tray of freshly baked scones and muffins, using a pair of tongs to place them in the display case, side-eyeing you with a small smile.

Taeyong following your gaze to the Christmas tree outside, letting out an amused grunt, “if you’re so free, then stop rejecting my blind dates.”

You bent down, reaching your hands further in front of you on the counter as you let out a sigh at the stretch it brought to your back, "I can’t help it, man, I’m at a weird place right now in my…life, or love life to put it more accurately,” you shrugged, your voice trailing off towards the end of your sentence.

“Is that just code for 'don’t call me unless it’s Youngho’?” Taeyong waggled his eyebrows at you, a smug smirk playing at his lips.

Your mouth dropped, eyebrows knitting into a frown at him. It wasn’t the first time Taeyong’s brought up Youngho to you as a love prospect. Ever since graduation, you hadn’t seen him or heard from him at all, the only guide that let you know where he was or whether he was still alive being his Instagram posts, which you had to say gained a lot of traction after he graduated.

“Shut up, you know he isn’t an option and you always bringing it up isn’t making it any easier for me to forget about that, you know,” you gave him a pointed look. Despite your tone, you still found your hand gravitating towards your pocket, pulling your phone from your pocket to pull up Youngho’s Instagram page anyway.

You saw that his latest post showed him at some random resort in Bali, the sheer multitude of likes and comments on the photo surprising you, yet at the same time not so much. You always knew Youngho had a certain ease when it came to making friends.

The post had been uploaded almost a month ago, and you made a quick glance at whether you’d liked the post, swiping quickly to the other already-liked photos in his profile when you realized you hadn’t liked that post, not wanting to accidentally like it now and embarrass yourself if you got caught lurking on his profile.

"I know. I’m making it easier for you to think about it. What makes you think he’s not a viable option anymore?” Taeyong straightened up, his gaze challenging you almost, “you do know Youngho’s one of my best friends right? And if you want I can just call him up anytime and set you up on a date,” he shrugged, setting the tongs back on the now-empty tray.

Your hand slipped on the counter in shock, making your balance falter where you stood. Straightening up to shoot a glare at a very amused Taeyong, "don’t you dare, Taeyong. Besides,” you sighed, dismissing him with a wave, “you don’t even know where he is right now.“

"Do too!” He shot back in a child-like tone, tilting his chin up at you in defiance.

“Oh yeah? Where is he, then?”

“He’s... in town!” Taeyong insisted.

“Yeah, right,” you huffed, “doing what?”

Taeyong’s mouth closed shut quickly, mouth forming a pout as he thought, before waving you off.

“Whatever, be single forever.” He lifted the tray up as if meaning to throw it at you, walking back into the kitchen and you heard his music start to play again.

You grunted, “If you insist!”

You braved through the next few hours of the peak period, with numerous customers coming in to get their last-minute Christmas treats, and all-too-many couples and new parents coming in with their kids, making you wish you had more plans with people this Christmas other than to visit your parents and attend gatherings with your relatives. Taeyong had been cooped up in the corner of the café discussing something financial with Mrs Zhong over the phone, a parent of Jeno and Renjun’s friend Chenle that’d been helping the both of you with the café so far.

Though one little thing to note was that her and Taeyong were the same breed of ‘headstrong’, which you figured was the reason why Taeyong had his features etched in a permanent frown during the entirety of the phone call.

By the time you were done with both prep for the next day and washing all the dishes, you saw Taeyong practically storming towards you with both your things bundled up in his arms and his hair a tousled mess, “I need some drinks right now, you in?”

You sighed, welcoming his proposal with open arms, nodding gravely at him. “Let’s go.”

Finding yourselves in some sort of lounge that Taeyong seemed to frequent with his boyfriend (you’d only figured this out after one of the waiters had eyed you with evident confusion before asking Taeyong where Jaehyun was, earning a small grunt from Taeyong saying that he was at his parents�� place for the weekend), and you were barely half an hour in when you realised you’d do well on cutting back on your drinks, since Taeyong didn’t seem to have any intention to hold back.

“Tough phone call?” you joked, turning your glass half-filled with a mocktail on the table with one hand absently, seeing him nod, rolling his shoulders back before slumping down in his seat.

“Every time I think it’s gonna be a simple phone call with her... she just… surprises me. Every single time. She’s lovely but… I can’t wait to get a new financial consultant.” he shook his head, downing another shot quickly.

You pat him on the back, opening your mouth to speak when the group of working adults not far from the both of you that had just erupted in cheers, drowning out your consolation to Taeyong.

“I said,” you raised your voice, turning to cast a small glare at the group, “It’s alright! That new guy we’re hiring will take care of talking to her anyway,” you shouted over the noise, seeing Taeyong nod at you in acknowledgement, eyes already starting to look tired.

You noticed the group of working adults had started going up the small stage to sing Karaoke, making you slightly amused, but still annoyed nonetheless (maybe because they seemed like they were having more fun than you were babysitting Taeyong).

You took another sip of your drink as you watched a middle aged lady finish her scratchy opera rendition of 'moon river’ earning many whistles and scattered applause around the lounge. You decided upon looking at Taeyong’s slumped figure leaning against the table that it was about time to get him home. Booking a car on your phone, as Taeyong leant against your shoulder, blinking slowly, you heard a ruckus coming from the direction of the stage.

A tall man, with short black hair stumbled onto the stage, clearly having had more than a little to drink. Strangely enough, his stance reminded you of Youngho whenever he got drunk at parties, almost successfully eliciting a giggle from you. Though you couldn’t see him very well with how dim the lights were and how far the stage was from where you were.

Your gaze lingered in his direction as the boy stood at the mic for a while, meeting your gaze and frowning as though he recognized you.

“I would like!” your breath hitched at the sound of his voice, “to dedicate this next song….to the person standing um….where is…oh! okay, sitting not standing. Yes, over there,” the boy pointed at you, and you struggled to keep Taeyong up with how he was resting his weight on you, pulling his hand over your shoulder more firmly as he rest his head against yours.

“Are we leaving yet,” you heard him mumble, his hand coming up to pat your head in his attempt to coax you to hurry up.

“Okay…hit it dj!”

You weren’t sure how to react, not with the loud ‘Santa Tell Me’ audio echoing throughout the room and with the fact that you were almost 80% sure that whoever was standing on that stage was Seo Youngho himself.

You shook your head, “Taeyong, let’s go,” you said to the sleepy boy, feeling his grip tighten on your hand as you led him out of the lounge.

“It’s okay, you know what,” you murmured to no one in particular, “If it’s meant to happen, it’ll happen.”

===

“Y/N, Renjun made me eat the gross bagel again,” you grimaced at Jeno’s words when he came up to you, sulking.

Giving a quick glance to the very bagel that Yuta had brought to the café and left there the night before that he’d forgotten to eat, and it had turned bad rather quickly. Neither Renjun nor Jeno dared to touch it.

“Not so much made as tricked him into eating it,” Renjun shrugged behind Jeno, clearly unapologetic.

“Renjun, I told you to throw the bagel away. Jeno, stop being so gullible,” you laughed, letting the two have something to do by asking them to clean the display case and spray some of the fake snow decorations on the windows, figuring you’d might as well dispose of the bagel yourself.

The wall phone rang and you rushed to pick it up before Renjun could potentially ruin another order like he did the last time.

“I told you like twice already we don’t take orders for cakes? Oh, so you’re trying to tell me we’ve done that before? yeah from who? Buddy Valastro?”

You shivered at the memory, dismissing it quickly- not without sticking your tongue out at Renjun.

“Hello, this is Babycakes, how may I help you?”

You heard the tell-tale sound of a woman clearing her throat on the phone.

“Hi, dear, is this Y/N speaking? This is Mrs Kim.”

You recognized her to be one of your more valued customers, (meaning she just buys a shit-ton of everything whenever she places an order).

“You see, it’s been so hard to come down recently because of all the Christmas preparations, but is it alright if I order 4 dozen of those delightful little cream puffs you sell? And I’ll have another 2 dozen of those small fruit tarts,” You nodded, humming as she told you her preferences.

Holding the phone up with your shoulder, you took out the order book from under the counter, scribbling the order down quickly before punching in the number into the calculator.

“Alright, we can have them ready for you to pick up by tomorrow, it’ll be $35 dollars—”

“No, no, I insist…!”

You didn’t manage to catch the rest of Mrs Kim’s sentence due to a wide eyed Jeno appearing before you, blocking your view from the order book as he gestured wildly with his eyes towards your right.

“Cutie just came in! Hurry take his order!” he whispered harshly, sliding out of your way to join Renjun to gossip about whoever this customer was.

Brushing the distraction aside, you tried to resume the conversation.

“I’m sorry Mrs Kim, what was that, again?” you asked, not being able to help but let your gaze fall on the customer who was very much hidden by the display case, all you could see being that they were wearing a light beige turtleneck and a thick fluffy brown jacket over it.

You tried your best to listen to whatever Mrs Kim was saying, something about dropping by before her Christmas party but once the customer had straightened up and walked over to the counter you knew you were done for.

“Y/N?”

Youngho hoped he didn’t sound too breathless as he removed his earpieces, tilting his head at you with a smile as he fiddled with them in his hands, his styled hair falling over his eyebrow slightly as he did so.

Youngho wasn’t one to believe in the soulmate-verse, contrary to popular belief, but the moment he’d seen you in the bakery he knew this couldn’t be anything lesser than some cosmic sign of fate. Looking at you behind the counter of the café, Youngho was at a loss for words, not being able to process anything other than how you looked even prettier than he’d remembered.

You couldn’t help but gasp, your hand clutching the phone tighter.

“Hello? Dearie, is there a problem with what I requested?”

“No, no, Mrs Kim it’s fine!” you murmured distractedly, “thank you so much by the way, see you soon!“ you turned around to set the phone back on the wall, scrunching your eyes shut and breathing in deeply before you decided to face Youngho again.

"Hi,” you said, tone a little too high pitched for your liking, clearing your throat again.

“Hey,” you said, calmer this time. You were sure your heart was beating at a mile a minute, your mind churning up all sorts of things you’d wanted to ask him, though none seemed quite appropriate for this situation.

“I didn’t know you worked here,” Youngho gestured to the area around him, earning a nod from you.

You pressed your lips into a firm line, “yep, own it actually. Well, co-own…..with Taeyong,” you corrected, picking up your pen and scribbling whatever details you could remember about Mrs Kim’s order without looking at the book, your gaze too fixated on the man in front of you.

“Oh, so this is the café! Oh, wow, nice,” he drawled, a small smile on his face as he examined the interior of the café, his hands shoved into his pockets in his attempt to calm himself, letting a short silence fall between you two.

At the sight of his side profile, you’d been hit with the reality of the situation, how he was finally back home after travelling to more places than you could remember, having always been curious as to the reason behind it. Well, you guessed you were free to ask him now, at least.

“What uh… what brings you back? I mean, I don’t actually know where you went and anything- not that I’m saying it’s a must for you to tell me just—” you stopped yourself when you felt Renjun kick your foot.

Youngho’s eyes formed crescents as he smiled, his shoulders shaking as he laughed, not the usual burst of laughter and doubling over that you were used to seeing from him, this one looked more endeared than anything, which only served to make you more nervous.

“I actually took a gap year, and then I spent the second year just filling my resume and all,” his gaze was unwavering as he looked at you, and though you were definitely shy, it was as though you couldn’t bring yourself to look away, “you know, trying to get all the experience I could. And well, vacationing of course.”

Youngho gestured with his hand, almost knocking over the small display of cups stacked neatly next to him, his cool expression breaking as he rushed to catch them before they could fall, then straightening up as if nothing happened.

You couldn’t help but smile at his fumble, your hand coming up to fiddle with the chain around your neck, “oh, cool. So you’re back here for… work?”

Youngho nodded, resting a hand on the freshly-cleaned display case, earning a very dismayed look from Renjun.

“Full time, my office is pretty nearby actually,” he gestured outside, his eyebrows raising in realisation, “right, speaking of which, can I get six iced americanos?”

Your eyebrows furrowed in confusion, “At this time of the evening?”

“Don’t hate me if you ain’t me,” he shrugged, making you scoff.

“Jeno, six iced americanos,” you turned and saw the boy was already making them, causing you to close your mouth quickly and turn back to Youngho, who leaned over the counter to flash Jeno a smile, “can you add an extra shot for mine? Thanks.”

You frowned, narrowing your eyes at him.

“Had your dinner already?” you asked, glancing at the display case—you only had some blueberry muffins left, and the quiche Youngho seemed to have been eyeing just now.

He shook his head, short black hair bouncing as he did so, and you had to resist the urge to compliment it (well yet, at least).

“Please,” you gestured to the display case, “go ahead and choose from the display case, it’s on the house.”

Youngho was quick to refuse, his hand leaving the display case to wave at you dismissively, as he gave you a smile, “no, no it’s fine I had a late lunch-”

“Please, just take it, we’ll need to throw them away if nobody buys them anyway,” you insisted, frowning at him with a slight pout that Youngho knew he had no chance against.

Youngho’s gaze softened, a small sigh leaving his lips, "well, then at least let me pay for them,” he cut in quickly, earning a firm shake of the head from you.

“I’m serious, just take it, Taeyong will kill me if I let his best friend go hungry,” you shrugged, hearing Jeno snicker next to Renjun, and you were sure Youngho heard it too from how his gaze darted everywhere except you, mouth pursing in a horrible attempt to contain his smile.

You already started to pack a quiche and a muffin into a to-go bag, while Jeno and Renjun had packed the drinks into a holder for easier carrying, a special sticker on Youngho’s cup.

Youngho took a sip of his coffee, seeming to have gained more confidence from the sip alone, tilting his head at you as he smiled around his coffee straw.

“Alright but…” Youngho bent down slightly so he was almost eye level with you, looking at you with a smirk playing at his lips, “I owe you one, alright?”

You were more than a little flustered by the sudden proximity between the both of you, not to mention the sheer confidence in Youngho’s gaze that had left you feeling hot and bothered.

Eager to put an end to your rapid heartbeat, you shoved his to-go bag closer to him, trying to greet him like you would any other customer as you handed the bags to him.

“Thank you babycakes- I mean, shit,” you scrunched your eyes shut, “thank you for visiting babycakes,” enunciating slower, taking your lower lip between your teeth as Jeno and Renjun were practically about to lose it in the corner, smacking each other wildly.

Youngho’s eyebrows raised, shooting you a strangely calm smile, a polar opposite reaction from the Youngho you knew in university.

“No problem,” he grinned, “bye, Y/N,” he waved before leaving the shop promptly, the bells at the door jingling as you slid down behind the counter.

“Thank you babycakes,” Renjun imitated you, earning a strangled yell from Jeno, said boy’s face red from second-hand embarrassment.

Your hands had come up to cover your face,one of your hands moving to rest over your heart.

“I’m taking leave for a week,” you groaned, glaring at the marble countertop in front of you.

Jeno was quick to reassure you, him and Renjun both crouching in front of you, expressions of both amusement and pity on their faces.

“C'mon it’s fine it wasn’t that bad….” you shot an unamused look at Jeno, “okay, fine it was bad.”

“On the bright side, it didn’t look like he cared that much?” Renjun tried to console you, and now you knew you must’ve really looked pitiful if even Renjun felt the need to console you.

Taeyong stepped out of the small office with one of the newer staff you’d hired to take care of financial matters. Doyoung was his name, if you remembered correctly.

“Where’s Y/N?” You mustered a weak 'here’ from where you were slumped on the floor.

“What happened?” Doyoung asked, pointing at you.

Jeno and Renjun were quick to jump in, telling Taeyong and Doyoung about the 'cutie customer’ that you’d just embarrassed yourself in front of.

“It’s fine, at least you don’t know him,” Doyoung tried to reassure you, and you heard Jeno and Renjun instantly shut Doyoung down.

"Nuh-uh,” Jeno shook his head vigorously, “she totally did! His name is Youngho!”

“Youngho?” Taeyong’s tone was incredulous, and you yanked yourself up to a standing position to face him with a grim expression, nodding at him.

“It was him, he said he’s working full time nearby,” you murmured.

He knew Youngho was in town, he just hadn’t expected the both of you to meet so quickly, the coincidence of it all amusing Taeyong to no end, recalling how Youngho used to call you his soulmate in university.

“She called him babycakes,” Jeno giggled, covering his mouth to stop himself from laughing too much (to no avail).

“Who’s this Youngho person anyway? Why does it seem like such a big deal that he came here?” Doyoung asked, earning a loud “Yeah!” from Renjun, Jeno trying to calm him down.

Taeyong smirked, shrugging with feigned nonchalance, “Y/N has a big fat crush—”

“I do not!” You gasped, “he’s Taeyong’s friend,” you explained, earning a skeptical look from Taeyong, who shook his head insistently, not accepting that as an explanation after all Youngho had put him through.

“He was my roommate in university, and Y/N over here always came over to our dorm to drink, and I’m guessing from that….she may or may not have started wanting to marry him,” Taeyong finished his sentence quickly as he used the open order book on the counter to shield himself from you.

Deciding to retrieve your hand for the sake of your job, you dismissed the teenagers’ interrogation they were desperately trying to initiate, hearing Taeyong let out a sound of surprise, narrowing his eyes at what he saw on the book.

“Youngho made an order?” his tone was even more amused.

You furrowed your eyebrows in confusion, “no he didn’t, what are you talking about?”

You made your way to where Taeyong was, staring down at none other than your handwriting under the order for 4 dozen cream puffs and 2 dozen fruit tarts, that read Youngho’s name.

“Oh, what,” you laughed nervously, you grabbed the pen, Taeyong watching with a knowing look as you cancelled out Youngho’s name, scribbling Mrs Kim’s name underneath it in pen.

“All better,” you shrugged, hating the way how even Doyoung looked at you knowingly now.

“Might wanna consider that week-long leave now,” Renjun chirped behind you.

That night, Taeyong had swapped out your Christmas playlist for a radio show instead, and though you were about to protest, insisting that now was the best time of the day to listen to Michael Bublé’s Christmas album, you didn’t mind so much after you listened to it a little. Something about the radio show felt youthful, from the giggles between the radio hosts to the small comments and memories the radio hosts would talk about after the songs would play.

After they’d played one of the songs you remembered listening to a lot when you were in college, you heard the radio host speak, something about his voice feeling all too familiar, “It looks like good luck for us to share a meeting that made our hearts flutter, expectations and excitement like this make our ordinary lives shine. Have you seen something like this today? Today as well, night night.”

You just couldn’t help but think of Youngho.

===

The next time Youngho came into the café was the following day, asking for the same number of americanos, the only difference being that when you tried to give him more free food, he’d raised his note in an attempt to pay you, dropping it into the tip bottle when you’d refused.

“You staying here till closing time?” Youngho asked as casually as he could, pretending to be busy with carefully putting straws into the drink cups individually to stall time.

“I mean, that is what a closing shift entails…” you murmured, not being able to help yourself from quirking an eyebrow at him when he’d pressed his lips together in an attempt to conceal his smile, giving you a shrug.

“Yeah, I knew that, just…checking.”

You figured you should’ve expected to see both Youngho and Jaehyun waiting outside the bakery after you and Taeyong closed up the shop.

Renjun and Jeno were both eyeing Youngho suspiciously when he’d stopped leaning on what looked like a rather expensive (and big) car, only to unlock it seconds after.

“Need a ride?” Youngho asked, peering over Taeyong’s shoulder to ask you, a part of him already anticipating your refusal, so he couldn’t say he wasn’t delightfully surprised when he heard Taeyong cut in.

“You should, it’s pretty late already. Jae and I would love to send you back but we’re already sending the kids back,” Taeyong sucked in a sharp breath, though you could see right through his apologetic expression, knowing he wanted nothing more than for you to get into Youngho’s car.

You turned to Taeyong with wide eyes, spotting Jeno and Renjun next to him nodding innocently at you.

Jaehyun felt the need to add a, “plus Youngho lives pretty near you,” for good measure, eyeing his friend with a mischievous smile.

You turned to face Johnny, who had his hands shoved into his jacket pockets to fight the cold.

“Really?” the shock was evident on your features, Johnny’s lower lip between his teeth as he looked at you blankly, “where do you stay?” you asked.

“You know the uh, apartment complex next to the Italian restaurant?” he gestured to make a rectangle with his hands as he spoke.

Your eyes widened in shock.

“The one with the faulty sign?”

He nodded, making you turn to Jaehyun and Taeyong with wide eyes, “wow, that is near, that’s like literally a few buildings away from my place.”

Youngho’s eyebrows raised in shock, something about this tidbit of information giving him goosebumps as well, nodding his head slowly in understanding.

Renjun figured no more time should be wasted for you and Youngho, dragging Jeno in the direction of Taeyong’s car, “alright, bye goodnight!”

Left alone with Youngho, you clutched your bag tighter in your hand as you made your way closer to his car, about to open the door to the backseat of the car out of habit, but withdrawing your hand quickly when Youngho opened the door of the passenger side, gesturing a hand for you to enter, a soft smile on his face.

You’d tried calming your nerves during the mere 5 seconds it took Youngho to be seated in the driver’s seat, switching the radio on but turning the volume low. The radio at this time of the night was all love songs and little commentary so you weren’t surprised when you heard ‘Eternal Flame’ playing in the background, the song making Youngho smile.

“Have you had dinner yet?” he asked, earning a shake of the head from you.

Youngho didn’t bother hiding his dismay, “but it’s so late!” a gasp left him after that, eliciting an eye roll from you.

“I had a late lunch,” you shrugged, making him let out a small hum, his lower lip between his teeth again as he thought.

“Wanna go and um…get dinner together? We can go somewhere nearby your house or something,” he murmured, and you wondered how after all these years and all these changes, he was still so bad at hiding his shyness.

You couldn’t help but smile, shaking your head at him, “you’re just as bad as me, you haven’t had dinner either,” you scoffed.

Something about the way he’d simply shrugged, stopping at a traffic light and turning to you with a small smile, “well, I had a late lunch too,” he copied you, his feigned nonchalance making you laugh.

Choosing to nod at him, Youngho began to drive again when the light had changed to green, your answer making his smile grow.

“Yeah, I’d love to.”

You didn’t miss the way he tried to stifle his smile, nodding seriously at you as he made a turn, and you had a feeling you knew where he was heading.

“Actually… I was kinda curious. What made you come back suddenly?” you asked, fidgeting with the fraying hem of your work shirt. Mental note to get another soon.

Youngho shrugged, “strangely enough…felt like even though I was travelling to so many beautiful places and seeing so many beautiful things, there was just something I was missing out on, something I felt like I could only get back home,” he told you.

“I see,” you murmured, your pensive expression looking to serious for Youngho.

“You don’t seem very happy to see me again,” he teased, making you rush to dismiss that accusation, angling your body to face him and shaking your head vigorously.

“No! no! Oh m-no, really. I’m… I’m glad to see you again,” you told him, shyness taking over you and making you mumble the rest of your sentence.

Youngho smiled, nodding. Taking his bottom lip between his teeth in an attempt to control his smile, he fixed his gaze on the road, desperately telling himself not to let you distract him.

“I’m glad to hear that,” he told you, a small huff leaving him, “almost thought you’d run away like the last time,” he joked, though you couldn’t help but feel guilty about that.

It wasn’t as if you wouldn’t have loved to kiss him (God, if only Taeyong heard you now), you just didn’t want your first kiss with Youngho to take place in some sweaty tipsy house party.

“That was literally two years ago,” you whined, seeing him shrug, one of his hands coming up in surrender.

“How was I supposed to know we would meet again like this?” He parked outside what you recognized to be one of your favourite eateries in a mall you would go with Taeyong during Christmas in the past.

In your nervousness, you’d stepped out of the car before he could open the door for you, making him whine.

“See, you never let me do nice things for you!” his eyes formed crescents as he laughed, walking over to where you were, entering the place with you and feeling the cold breeze from the air conditioning brush against your face, eliciting a satisfied sigh from you.

The familiarity of the place made you instantly feel more comfortable walking into the place, strangely so, even though it was your first time coming here with Youngho.

You’d both made a beeline for the eatery, happy to have gotten seats so quickly. But you figured it was because of how late it was. Looking around the inside as Youngho led you inside, you couldn’t help but feel anxious, not just at the fact that it was basically just the two of you here save for a few other couples and working adults, but the fact that this was the first time you were getting dinner with Youngho, alone. And something about that had made you feel strange, almost as if you were on some sort of unspoken date.

Maybe it was because of what he’d said just now, but you didn’t miss how Youngho had even tried to pull your chair out for you, but you were so quick to sit down to have let him, making you feel bad for indirectly rejecting his gestures again.

“Look, Youngho,” you blurted out, cursing yourself mentally for getting ahead of yourself.

Looking up from the menu, he turned to you expectantly, eyebrows raised.

“I’m really sorry if what I did at that last party hurt you, I really didn’t mean for it to I just kind of, you know… panicked?”

Youngho fought to control his amusement, still looking at you pensively, not being able to help himself from teasing you about it.

“I’m sorry,” he began, “I don’t really remember, what was it that you did again?” Youngho fought to control the smile on his face, looking at you with what he hoped appeared as confusion.

Your froze, poking your tongue in your cheek as you averted your gaze down to the menu, “you know uh… when everyone was playing spin the bottle and then you uh…” you winced, seeing just the slightest of smirks on his face.

Your eyes narrowed at him, “you know what i’m referring to!” you scoffed, making Youngho burst into giggles, his laughter bubbling out in a way so endearing that made it hard for you to be annoyed at him.

“Yeah, that party, when you passed on the opportunity for us to kiss,” he calmed down from his laughter, nodding at you seriously, making you unknowingly smile as well.

“Well, don’t say it like that. I had reasons, okay,” you defended, your words piquing Youngho’s curiosity even more, tilting his head at you with a soft smile on his face.

“Oh, reasons? What kind?” Youngho prompted, making your lips part in shock, shaking your head quickly.

“That’s not important, but what I wanted to say was that it’s okay! ‘Cause I’m an adult now! And…well, now that you’re back home I just wanted to let you know that uh... I’ll be here if you ever wanna hang out… and Taeyong and Jaehyun of course.” You added quickly, picking up the order sheet and pencil from the side of the table and ticking off what you wanted to order.

Youngho contemplated looking upset for a moment, but couldn’t help himself from leaning over the table and holding a hand up to cup his ear, “I’m sorry what was that again? Didn’t quite catch that, are you asking me out on a date?”

Your expression switched from guilty to shocked in an instant, laughing as you swat at Youngho’s arm with the pencil, “you really haven’t changed a bit, have you, Youngho?”

Youngho’s breath hitched at the way you’d said his name again, the feeling he got when you said it for the first time ever present in him. You didn’t say his name much, he realised.

Inhaling deeply, Youngho let out a deep breath, shaking his head at you.

“I’d say I have,” he shot you a tired smile, running his hand through his hair, the short locks falling lightly back against his forehead, pulling his hood up to cover his head.

You’d almost forgotten to respond, murmuring a small “how so?”, curious to hear the kind of answer he would present you with, your fingers gripping the order sheet more firmly in your anticipation.

What you weren’t ready for was the way he stared at you so intently, realising that just a look from Youngho was enough to render you nervous, even after so long.

“I know what I’ve been missing out on now.”

You almost gulped from the tension that fell on you, a small huff of nervous laughter escaping your lips instead, “what do you wanna order?” you blurted.

And just like that, it was as if nothing had happened, Youngho taking the order sheet and pencil from your hands, filling in his order before beckoning the waitress over to give her your orders. You sat, impressed again at the way he spoke to her with a confidence that you had no choice but to admire, how he would give her a smile and thank her by name, you were sure that if you were in her position you wouldn't have known how to act.

“So,” he spoke, pausing to take a sip of his water, “what have you been up to the past few years? Taeyong told me it was nothing special but I wanted to ask you myself.”

You didn’t have the time to realize the implication behind his words that he’d asked Taeyong about your whereabouts, answering him quickly, “I actually spent a while job hunting, and I did have a job but I sort of gave that up to run the bakery full-time with Taeyong,” you explained, seeing his eyebrows perk up in some indication of a realization.

“Are you still interested in writing?” Youngho asked, and you hoped you didn’t look too shocked. That was the last thing you would’ve expected him to remember about you.

“Wait, how did you know I was interested in that?” You asked, turning to give an appreciative nod as the waiter had arrived to deliver your food.

Youngho shrugged, a huff of amusement leaving him, “you talk a lot when you’re drunk, you know that?”

Your eyes widened, your hand freezing around the handle of your fork as your mind went into a panic, not wanting to know what kind of things you may have told him in the times you got hammered in Taeyong’s dorm.

“I’m kidding, don’t look so scared. I knew you were a journalism major,” he laughed, and you’d instantly relaxed in your seat, shooting him a glare (which only made him burst into another fit of laughter).

“Damn, now that makes me kind of curious to know what else you’ve been hiding from me,” he sighed, shaking his head.

Scrunching your nose up, you dismissed his statement, making his eyes form little crescents as he laughed, amused at your sheer determination to avoid being flustered by him.

You nodded, “to answer your question, I guess I am? My first job was for the local newspaper, but there really…wasn’t a lot of options for me to advance in the field. I figured the bakery was something that would have better prospects for me, and I guess I enjoyed it a lot more.”

Youngho nodded, humming as he brought his glass of water up to his lips, “well, if you ever want a change of scenery, I have some friends that can hook you up with a job at the radio station to help with the writing,” he shrugged, and you nodded, knowing Jaehyun was one of those friends since Taeyong had mentioned that Jaehyun worked at the radio station.

You gave him an appreciative smile, thanking him, “I’ll let you know.”

Youngho chewed on his burger, scrunching up his nose at you.

“You don’t have to be so formal with me, you know.”

You scoffed, shaking your head as you brought a bite of your food to your lips, “who said I was being formal?”

The way Youngho’s lips pressed together firmly to stifle his smile had said it all, his eyebrows raising sarcastically, “well you’re a lot more formal now compared to when we were in university, that’s for sure.”

Your lips parted at that, a heat creeping up on your cheeks as you dismissed him quickly, swallowing down another bite of food, “that’s different, I was tipsy in almost every interaction we had.”

Youngho shrugged, “I personally quite liked the sober interactions.”

You shut your mouth at that, bringing your glass of water to your lips and taking a long sip, your other hand gripping tightly onto your fork.

This version of Youngho sure had a lot more confidence than you remembered. You brought your glass of water to your lips, huffing through your nose.

“Well, we’re sober now,” you offered, not expecting him to nod at you so seriously.

“Yeah, we are,” Youngho murmured, taking another bite out of his burger to distract himself.

“So, has all that travelling found you a partner yet?” you asked, giving him a playful smirk, only to have him roll his eyes playfully.

“Yeah, I’m totally married with three kids already—” he joked, stopping himself to laugh at the absurdity of the question. “I’m very much single, for your information.”

“Pretty interesting information, if you asked me,” you shrugged, enjoying both your food and the way Youngho shook his head at you with a smile.

“What about you? Anybody as good looking as me manage to catch your attention?” he teased.

Rolling your eyes, you shook your head, unsure why you were a little shy to talk to him about your love life, cursing yourself for posing the question to him in the first place, “not quite. Nobody’s been as annoying as you yet—”

“Hey, don’t lie, you love my company if not you wouldn’t be having dinner with me.”

“—but I’m otherwise single too. Taeyong’s been trying to set me up on blind dates.”

Youngho made a mental note to talk to Taeyong about that.

“Trying? So I guess it’s not going well?” he tilted his head at you, almost done with his burger as he took the last bite.

You shook your head, “can’t go well if I never actually take up his offers,” you couldn’t help but laugh in spite of yourself, knowing very well the reason behind your refusal of Taeyong’s offers.

Youngho frowned—his heart was jumping for joy—as he pretended to be concerned. “Oh, how come?”

You shrugged, momentarily distracted when you’d moved to scoop for more food but realizing you were just scooping air, turning back to Youngho once you’d secured a spoonful of food in your mouth, chewing slowly and unintentionally (or intentionally, it wasn’t like you knew what to tell him) prolonging the silence.

“Dunno,” you shrugged after swallowing your food, “wasn’t feeling it I guess.”

Youngho’s eyes widened, “poor guys,” he winced, making you swat at him, seeing him dodge and burst into yet another fit of laughter.

Once the laughter had died down, you sat in silence for a while, focused on eating your food, though Youngho was in the middle of debating whether or not to say what he wanted to say to you. His debate serving to delay any conversation until you were almost done with your food.

“You ready to go?” Youngho nodded, leaning back in his seat as he called the waiter for the bill, making you reach your hands up in protest.

“Youngho, please, can we just split the bill?” You asked the waiter, who was stopped again by Youngho.

“It’s fine, just put it on this card,” Youngho gave the waiter his card quickly before ushering the waiter away, earning a very displeased look from you, not realising his hand was grasping your wrist firmly until now.

Letting go of your wrist (albeit reluctantly), Youngho cleared his throat, mustering a close-lipped smile.

“Hey, think of it this way,” Youngho told you, standing up and shoving his wallet and phone and placing them in the pockets of his coat, “I got a new job here, and I was just celebrating that with you.”

You narrowed your eyes at him, glaring at his back as you walked out of the restaurant, “I don’t like owing people for things, Youngho.” You frowned.

Youngho turned to look at you, shaking his head, “neither do I, take it as a payment for your freebies at Babycakes, then,” he grinned.

You were walking past the main foyer of the mall when your attention was captured by the large Christmas tree in the centre of the foyer, eliciting a gasp from you, “look, the christmas tree is so pretty!”

Youngho glanced from you to the Christmas tree, nodding in agreement, “here, stand here, lemme help you take a picture,” Youngho guided you to a spot next to the Christmas tree, taking his phone out and walking back to a good spot to take photos for you.

“Wow, these are so pretty,” you heard him hum, making you more excited to see the photos, beckoning him over to show you when you were both stopped by an elderly couple who seemed to be finishing up with their Christmas shopping.

“Do you want us to help you take a photo?” the lady gave you a knowing look, making your eyes widen, about to refuse in your panic when Youngho had agreed, handing his phone to the lady before grasping your arm gently, leading you to the same spot at the Christmas tree you were at before.

At first you’d stood next to each other, too shy to go any closer, hearing the elderly man tut his tongue, “closer, closer!” earning a hearty chuckle from the elderly lady.

Spurred on by their encouragement, Youngho draped his arm around your shoulder, pulling you closer to him, your shoulder pressing against him, your smile widening with a surprised laugh, the feeling of him against you sending warmth through your body.

“Lovely,” the lady handed Youngho’s phone back to him, smiling at the both of you as she resumed linking arms with her partner, “merry early Christmas, you two!”

You and Youngho simply laughed, both not having fully recovered from the situation yet, “You too!’ you called back.

You walked with Youngho out of the building and towards the direction of his car, getting in and buckling your seatbelt as you heard Youngho let out a content sigh.

“I missed this,” he sighed, making you furrow your eyebrows, your brain immediately concocting a million possible things Youngho could be referring to.

“What?” you asked, tugging your jacket tighter around you.

“Spending Christmas at home. Just…being home in general. I’m really, really glad I decided to come back here.” He started the car, driving around the blocks in the direction of your house, his speed guaranteeing that you would be there sooner than you expected.

“Well, you know what they say…” you huffed, “sometimes the universe has a way of making things happen.”

Youngho smiled at that, nodding as he turned another corner and was already driving down your street, “yeah... sure does.”

Stepping out of his car once he’d parked the car, the streets were basically empty, nothing but the faint sound of Christmas music coming from the italian restaurant as the owners were packing up, sharing a look with each other but saying nothing.

“Oh, right, I’ll send you the pictures later, what’s your number?” Youngho reached into his pocket, holding his phone out for you to take, shocked at how naturally he’d asked you, but not minding in the least bit.

After you put in your contact into his phone, he shoved his phone back into his pocket, bringing a hand up to fiddle with his earring, your steps slowing as you grew closer to your building.

You hoped this meant the start of more days with Youngho, a part of you determined not to make the same mistake you did back in university, something about the sheer coincidence of everything that’d been happening was practically begging you to make good use of this opportunity.

“Will I be seeing you soon?” you asked upon reaching the front door of your apartment building, seeing Youngho tilt his head at you.

“Do you want to?” he asked, a hint of a smirk at his lips, something about his eyes looking soft under the light from the streetlamps and the faint light coming from your building’s lobby, reminding you of that day you’d ended up at his dorm when you were drunk.

You weren’t sure what sort of confidence compelled you suddenly, but you found yourself nodding firmly at him.

“I want to,” you told him.

Youngho felt something in him stir again, starting to question whether his reason behind returning was that he missed home, or he just missed you.

“Then you will,” he smiled warmly.

“Goodnight, Youngho,” you blurted quickly after realizing what he said.

Youngho scrunched his nose as he took steps backwards, waving at you as he nodded, “night night,” he sing-songed.

That night, you saw Youngho’s texts come in just before you were about to sleep, seeing the various solo pictures he’d taken of you.

Replying to one of the pictures of you, he’d typed:

Youngho 12:52am - this one came out really well -

But then, he’d sent a picture of the both of you together, his text sending waves of giddiness through you as you examined the picture, suddenly feeling more awake than ever.

Youngho 12:53am - but this one’s a personal favourite -

===

You’d been starting to develop a liking to the radio show Taeyong plays every night in the shop, the words of the radio DJs were so sweet and comforting, it just felt like it was what you needed at the end of each day, wrapping up the day with comforting stories, car rides and supper with Youngho and giddy dreams.

They would have different corners for different themes, and each day would have a different topic, so the more you listened, the more fascinated you grew with the show. It was only natural that you’d started to send in stories of your own or request for certain songs to be played.

You just didn’t expect your fate with the show to be so lucky, with the radio DJs never failing to read out your stories and play your song requests.

Today was such a day, you’d sent in a story after hearing that the theme of the broadcast was fate, a smile threatening to appear on your face when you heard the radio DJ’s voice read out your username.

“This story from one of our listeners,” he read out your username, “they say : Hi john-d and jae-d! When I saw the topic of fate, I thought of a friend that I had bumped into recently after not seeing them for really long! And by chance, we happen to live near each other as well, and this has made me really happy recently. I’m happy that we’re able to get closer after not seeing each other since we graduated. And I don’t know if this is the Christmas mood making me more in a romantic mood but…this is embarrassing…but I look forward to seeing them in my shop every day, even if it’s just for a few minutes. I hope they enjoy the conversations we have as much as I do.”

When the radio DJ had read that out, you were trying not to reveal your embarrassment while being in the middle of clearing the leftovers of the day with Jeno, who had let out a sound of confusion upon hearing the story over the speakers.

“This guy sounds like Jaehyun,“ Jeno told you, making your eyes widen in realization. He raised a finger when the other DJ had started to speak, "and this one sounds like your friend Youngho!”

You gasped softly, “oh…shit. Wow, Jeno, didn’t know you could be so sharp about these things.”

You weren’t sure if you were thankful or not for the fact that Jeno had just solved your dilemma of why you always found yourself so affected by that DJ’s voice in particular, only realizing now that it was because they sounded like Youngho. Maybe you should ask Jaehyun if he knew who it was doing this radio show.

“Thank you for sending in that story, I enjoyed hearing about how the listener progressed from just coincidentally meeting to becoming closer friends. There’s always something about meeting as adults and meeting as students that’s different, right Jae-d? Regardless of that, I too believe that sometimes no matter how you try you can’t change what is meant to happen.” The Youngho-sounding DJ said.

“Like fate?” the other DJ laughed, “are you trying to say the listener has fate with this person she met recently?”

You flushed at the thought of Youngho, your attention being taken away from hearing the DJ’s answer to look at Jeno who had just taken the tray from your hands.

He beamed at you, holding his fingers up in a peace sign up next to his face, “I think my brain works better when Renjun isn’t around,” he laughed, earning a nose scrunch from you in reply.

“Speaking of Renjun, what’s the update on that guy he said he was gonna introduce you to?” Jeno asked you, making you glance at him in confusion, before remembering Renjun had set you up on a blind date with one of his older brother’s friends.

“We’re meeting tomorrow for dinner, if I remember correctly,” you told him, hating the way Jeno narrowed his eyes at you in response, almost looking older than you with the vibe he was giving off.

“If you remember correctly?” his tone was incredulous, “well you sure sound excited,” he raised his eyebrows knowingly, earning a scoff from you.

“Shut up, I totally am.”

You heard the radio DJs start to wrap up the show, meaning it was time to close up the shop soon.

Choosing to divert the topic, you gestured to the glazed doughnuts Taeyong had bought as a snack earlier for the both of you.

“Hey, do you want any of these? I ate like three just now, you can bring it back for your cat or something,” you suggested.

Jeno made a face, offended that you would dare say such a thing, hand flying up to his chest as he replied, “Firstly, Seollie doesn’t eat glazed doughnuts. Secondly, why don’t you just give them to your friend when you see him later?”

Now it was your turn to look offended, “and why should I do that?” you scoffed, seeing Jeno raise a skeptical eyebrow at you, closing the display case.

“I think you already know the answer for yourself,” Jeno shrugged, dodging quickly when you swatted the back of his head.

“Stop hanging out with Doyoung, you’re getting more sarcastic as the days go by,” you glared at him playfully. Both of your attention was directed elsewhere at the sound of the office doors opening, Taeyong and Doyoung walking out looking tired and more than ready to go home.

“You guys look tired,” you commented, hearing Doyoung let out a loud sigh, dramatically leaning against the display case as Taeyong nodded at you, walking over to the coat hanger to retrieve both your coats.

Jeno swatted at Doyoung’s shoulder, “I just cleaned that!” he whined. Only earning a half-assed yawn of “and I just leaned on it,” from Doyoung.

“Is Youngho sending you home again today?” Taeyong asked softly, too tired to bring his volume any higher than a soft murmur.

Shrugging, you slipped your arms through your coat sleeves, “beats me, we don’t arrange it, I just take his car whenever he offers.”

“So everyday basically?” Doyoung teased, wrapping his cardigan tighter around his body.

You rolled your eyes at him, “I wish you were too tired to talk,“ you shot back, and the four of you made your way out to the pavement, letting Taeyong lock the store.

Jeno had kept insisting that you take the leftover doughnuts home, so you were stuck lugging the plastic bag around.

As you tried to be nonchalant about looking around for any sign of Jaehyun or Youngho, Doyoung seemed to be too tired to wait, saying goodbye first and leaving, waving a hand when Jeno shouted a “get home safe” to him.

"You should probably wait for Youngho, I’m having drinks with Jaehyun’s parents,” he grimaced, making you laugh, subtly slipping the bag of doughnuts into Taeyong’s hands without him realizing, simply carrying it because he was too tired to notice.

“Long night ahead,” you pat his back in pity, earning a frown from him, “and excuse me, what makes you so sure he’s even gonna come here?” you frowned at him.

Taeyong fished his phone out of his pocket, “first of all, his car is parked here for a reason,” Taeyong checking the notifications before putting his phone back in his pocket, “and second, when does he not? Jaehyun says they’re almost here,” you nodded.

Soon enough you heard the sound of a distinctly-Youngho type of laughter, turning your head to see Jaehyun and Youngho walking over to where the three of you were, Youngho was dressed more casually today, a simple baby blue coloured hoodie over jeans, his bag slung across his chest, returning a soft smile to you when you waved hello.

“Don’t let him get too drunk tonight,” you told Jaehyun as they were getting into Taeyong’s car, Jeno letting out a loud laugh at the comment.

Youngho turned to you with an amused expression, “he told you about the parents meeting?”

Youngho shook his head, watching Jaehyun’s car drive off as you started walking towards his car, “he was always a nervous wreck around Jae’s parents, ever since uni,” Youngho recalled, opening the door for you to enter his car, not missing the way he held one of his hands above your head so you wouldn’t bump into the car as you got in.

Entering his side of the car with a yawn, he started the car quickly, once again turning the radio on to play softly in the car.

“How was your day?” he murmured, a small sigh leaving him.

“Good,” you replied, before going into a slight panic at how short your answer was, not meaning for it to be rude.

“I mean it was just the usual, and stuff. Not much goes on actually, just….oh, I just remembered something funny that happened,” you laughed at the memory of Jeno’s encounter with a customer that rendered him absolutely flustered, recounting the story to Youngho.

Youngho simply smiled, glancing from the road to look at your face, smiling out of the sheer endearment he felt towards you.

“Poor kid,” he laughed, shaking his head.

A silence fell between the both of you for the rest of the duration of the car ride, Youngho having to consciously stop himself from reaching over to grab your hand, or rest his hand on your leg just to have some sort of contact with you, even going to the extent of debating in his head whether a goodbye hug would be too much or just appropriate.

Pulling the car into park and getting out, Youngho did as he always did, walking you to your apartment, still contemplating whether to initiate a goodbye hug, whereas you simply enjoyed the time you were able to spend with Youngho.

“You look tired,” you murmured, earning a huff from him, his hand coming up to grip the back of his neck as he walked.

“Yeah, not sure why, though,” he turned away to yawn, making you have to hold back from reaching out to smooth over his hair, inhaling deeply, not noticing you’d both stopped walking with how distracted you were.

“So… we’re here,” he murmured after a while of standing outside of your apartment building. A part of him wishing he could muster the guts to ask if you wanted to come over for drinks, but figuring he’d missed the window when you replied.

“Yep, you should get some rest,” you replied, a soft huff of nervous laughter escaping your lips as you rummaged through your bag for your keys.

Youngho’s hands almost instinctively opened for a hug, withdrawing quickly when you looked up from your bag with a grin, holding your keys triumphantly in your hands. Youngho settled for a wave instead, mentally scolding himself for missing his chance to hug you.

“‘Night,” he waved. You nodded at him, waving back with your hand that was already in the air, keys jingling with the movement.

“Night night,” you teased, the same way he had done a few days ago, earning a shy smile from him, turning to enter your apartment building quickly.

===

Youngho had surprised you when he’d sent you a text asking if you’d wanted to get brunch with him on Saturday morning, claiming you could both get your Christmas shopping out of the way as a reason to meet, since you’d talked about doing that a few days before. Though you knew you would’ve loved to call it a date, you figured the Christmas shopping would be your reason for going for the time being.

Only upon reaching the little café Youngho had agreed to meet you at, you couldn’t help the fluttery feeling within you, from the ambience of the café, the way it had pretty flowers and plants adorning the corners and display of the area, to how the chairs on the balcony were the pretty white garden chair sort, not to mention the way he’d brought his film camera with him, claiming he’d wanted to document the ‘area’. Yeah, if the ‘area’ was you and your drink, maybe you would’ve believed him.

“Where do you wanna stop by first?” he asked you when you were finishing up your croissant, taking a sip out of his coffee cup.

“I was thinking of stopping by the art store to get something for Taeyong, maybe the apple store after that to get gifts for the kids, you?”

Youngho hummed, “wanted to take a look at that antique shop down the road, was thinking of getting something for my mom that she’s been eyeing for a while.”

You couldn’t help but smile, “we can head there first, then, since it’s nearest to us.”

Finishing up your soda (which Youngho had insisted was more of a ‘dinner drink’ than a ‘brunch drink’), you’d managed to pay for the brunch this time while Youngho was distracted taking pictures of the café you were at, making your way downstairs to the antique shop.

Once you were there, though, you didn’t expect to run into one of your friends from university, who didn’t seem to find it necessary to hide her shock that you were there with Youngho.

“Oh, hey!” she greeted you with a hug, making your eyes widen at the look she’d given Youngho, looking back at you with a knowing smile.

“Oh, you’re back?”

Youngho smiled, nodding, “came back a few weeks ago, actually.”

“So uh... what’s going on? What brings you two here together?” You didn’t miss her wording, making you shoot her a pointed look, trying to dismiss her implication quickly before Youngho had cut in.

“We were just getting our Christmas shopping done, actually,” he explained, giving your friend a small smile.

“Oh,” she hummed, her eyebrows lifting in surprise as a hum left her, “wait so like... you two finally together or—” you cut her off quickly, asking her how her family was doing, though a part of you was secretly hoping that Youngho hadn’t heard you.

Youngho did, in fact, hear it, trying his best not to read too deep into the way your friend seemed to know more than she was letting on, making Youngho wonder if you may have shared the same feelings as him.

Dismissing the thought quickly, you had pulled your friend aside, letting Youngho pick out the vase his mom had been eyeing as you spoke with your friend.

“Dude, you were being so obvious!” your eyes widened, chiding her as harshly as you could while keeping your volume low, making her scoff.

“I couldn’t help it, you guys looked so comfortable with each other I just assumed you... you know, finally made a move or something,” she reasoned, making you groan.

“What do you mean ‘comfortable’?”

She rolled her eyes at you, “I’m not an idiot, Y/N, I have eyes, if anything he's been looking at you like this since we were in university.”

“Like what?” you scoffed.

Your friend shot you a look of disbelief, making a heart with her hands and covering her eye with it, “heart eyes,” she sighed wistfully, “I wish someone would look at me like that too.”

You dismissed her quickly, glancing aside to see Youngho cast a glance at you, a small smirk on his face as he nodded at your friend, beginning to follow the worker upstairs.

“Okay, whatever but... I don’t know, I want to but I don’t... know if I should.”

Your friend dismissed you quickly, “that’s bullshit! Look at him, he’s nice, he's hot, he’s here, what more do you need?”

Your hesitance seemed to be obvious in your expression, making your friend tut her tongue at you, a smile on her face, “okay, fine, I'll leave you two alone. I’ve gotta go now, anyway, but I expect updates, okay?”

You sighed, “If there’ll even be any,” you waved her off, bidding her goodbye with another hug as you made your way back upstairs to where Youngho was, spotting him standing next to the worker who was currently helping him wrap up the vase.

“Have a good catchup? You seemed to be in a pretty... heated discussion,” Youngho teased, making you hum distractedly, hoping he wouldn’t ask you more questions you didn’t have the answers to.

“More or less,” you folded your arms across your chest, averting your gaze from Youngho as you tried not to let your friend’s words affect your composure in front of him.

As you watched the man place the vase carefully into a bag, you’d almost startled when Youngho had leaned over to you, his hands behind his back as he asked, “just curious, she seemed like she knew more than I did about us, any reason behind that?”

You brought your hands up, waving them and dismissing his question, already walking away from him, “no reason, you should hurry and pay for your vase, we’ve got more places to go.”

Later on, after your visits to the art store and the apple store, you were more or less done with getting your gifts for the people on your list, however, there was just one more gift you needed to get, and that was Youngho’s.

Though there was one small detail, you were having trouble deciding what to get him.

You remembered that Youngho liked plushies, and that he was looking for a new headset, but those were things you could get him on any occasion, you wanted to get him something else for Christmas.

“What do you like?” you asked, seeing him narrow his eyes at you.

“You tell me first,” he murmured, the both of you aimlessly walking around the mall with your ice creams as you hoped either of you would walk into a store of your liking.

“I told you already, you don’t have to get me anything,” you reminded him, making him let out a grunt of disagreement.

“That’s no fun, it’s Christmas! The least I could do is get you... something.”

You hummed, “only if you let me get you something too.”

Youngho didn’t seem to hear you, distracted by the gadget shop you were walking past, grabbing you by the wrist and dragging you in as he made a beeline for one of the cameras, gasping at the display and proceeding to check the price, humming.

“You’re pretty into photography, huh?” you asked, earning a nod from him.

“Kind of got really into it while I was travelling, been looking at this camera since it came out but haven’t gotten around to buying it yet.”

Your eyebrows lifted, curiosity getting the better of you, “well, why not?”

Youngho shrugged, “dunno, figured it wasn’t urgent, I guess. I was planning on using my next paycheque to get it.”

You nodded, trying your best to conceal your smile as you finally had an idea of what to get him.

Youngho pulled you out of the store reluctantly after he’d spent all too long staring wistfully at the camera, choosing to distract himself from the camera by focusing on a gift he could get you.

“Would you at least give me a clue?” he pleaded, pouting at you exaggeratedly in the hopes that it would sway your determination to keep him guessing, his ice cream long gone as he carried your bag full of gifts for Taeyong for you, your hands full with Renjun and Jeno's gifts along with your parents’ gifts.

You sighed, a small huff of laughter leaving your lips, “well, I guess you could say I like gifts I can use?”

Youngho hummed, an idea sparking in him. “Gifts you can use...” he echoed, making you tilt your head at him.

“Don’t think so hard about it, Youngho, whatever you decide to get me will be more than enough.”

Youngho felt his heart skip at that, never having expected you to say something like that to him, though if anything, it had only filled him with more appreciation for you.

At this point, he wanted nothing more than to be with you and show you how much he appreciated you. Though he wasn’t sure what exactly to get you yet, he figured he more or less had an idea.

===

“I’m gonna get coffee now,” Youngho announced in the radio booth, earning a shake of the head from Jaehyun, who was currently using his phone.

“You don’t have to announce it, you know, we all know you’re just going to get your daily fix of Y/N,” Jaehyun said matter-of-factly, earning a loud gasp from Youngho.

“So, no coffee for you?” Youngho shot back, his hand halting on the doorknob.

“Have fun. Tell Y/N I say hi,” Jaehyun called out in a sing-song tone, hearing the door slam behind him seconds after.

Youngho entered the shop with a smile, nodding his head at Renjun, moving down further into the shop to look for you but only coming face to face with Jeno behind the counter instead.

Tilting his head in confusion, he was about to ask where you were when Renjun seemed to have beat him to it, “she’s not here today.”

“Why? Did something happen?”

Jeno couldn’t help but giggle at how worried Youngho sounded, the tall boy seemingly rendered into a mess whenever it came to you.

Taeyong came out of the kitchen, eyes widening when he saw Youngho at the counter, “sup,” he greeted.

“Where’s Y/N?” he asked, “also, 5 americanos,” he added as an afterthought, suddenly not feeling like drinking coffee.

“On a date,” Jeno told Youngho as he rang up Youngho’s order.

Youngho made a face, recalling your conversation about rejecting blind dates, wondering what made you agree to it this time.

“Oh,” he finally replied after a while, earning a snort from Renjun.

“Stop,” Renjun frowned, “you’re actually making me pity you,” he worked at snapping the covers on the plastic cups and pushing the carrier across the counter to Youngho.

“I was thinking of having movie night tonight, wanna come over?” Taeyong asked Youngho, seeing Renjun and Jeno perk up, “not you two, I wanna get drunk tonight so I’d rather not have more people to look after,” he added quickly, earning scoffs from the two teens.

Youngho heard Renjun mumble a, ‘he thinks we can’t drink’, and he would have laughed if he wasn’t still recovering from the shock of hearing you were on a date.

“Sure, I can bring over some drinks,” Youngho told Taeyong, adjusting his grip on the coffee holder, suddenly feeling like he couldn’t focus with how much he wanted to know who this date was with or why you were even going on a date or what was so special about this guy that made you agree to a date with him.

“Text me later,” Youngho called out before leaving the store.

Renjun shot a look at Jeno, letting out a low whistle as Taeyong stifled a laugh on his way around to the display case, “call me crazy, but that was the fastest I’ve seen him leave here.”

You were currently on your date with Renjun’s friend, not that Jungwoo was a bad person, not at all. You found him to be a sweetheart, in fact. But once you’d finished your dinner and were seated at an ice cream shop talking about anything you could think of, the more you felt like he’d been your friend for forever. Friend.

“Is it just me,” he took a bite out of his ice cream, “or does it feel like this is a meet-up of friends instead of a date?” he smiled, earning a vigorous nod of the head from you.

“Thank god you said that, I was beginning to wonder how I was gonna tell you at the end of the date,�� you laughed, seeing him shake his head with a smile.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, you’re a really nice person, but Renjun’s been nagging me to start dating again for ages, I swear,” he sighed, a small laugh leaving him.

“I know,” you sighed, “my friend too. But I guess this was kind of my fault, I've been pretty distracted,” you laughed.

Jungwoo’s eyes lit up at that, curiosity laden in his features, “is it someone else? Tell me, tell me,” he insisted, making you let out a groan in your embarrassment.

You shook your head, “it’s a funny story actually…” you went on, Jungwoo inserting his squeals and yelps every now and then (especially when you’d mentioned the spin the bottle incident).

“Do you think you would’ve done things differently? Looking back?” he asked you suddenly, making you frown at his sudden question, never having thought about it that way before.

You hummed, leaning back in your seat and shrugging, shaking your head eventually, “no, I don’t think I would’ve done things differently. I think… whatever’s been happening kind of let me get to know him better, which feels… different,” the end of your sentence sounded more like a question, Jungwoo’s smile seeming to have reassured you, nodding in understanding.

“Different in a good way?” Jungwoo asked, a small smile on his face, earning a nod from you.

“You said he lives near you, right?” he asked.

Nodding, you watched as he shook his head, a dramatic sigh leaving him, “now i’m curious, I really wanna know how things progress between you two,” he grinned, “you’d better let me know.”

You nodded, returning a smile to him as well, glancing at your phone to check the time, seeing a text from Taeyong asking how your date was going.

“It’s getting late, you wanna start heading back?” he asked, already making as if to gather his things.

Nodding your head as you finished the last bits of your ice cream cone, you checked your phone to see that it was already almost half past 11, you and Jungwoo seeming to have gotten carried away while talking.

You’d only realized upon getting into the car that you’d missed listening to the radio show today since you were having ice cream with Jungwoo.

“Shit,” you cursed, a small groan leaving you, seeing Jungwoo turn to you with a worried expression, trying his best to glance at you to make sure you were okay despite driving.

“What? What happened? Are you okay?” he blurted.

“No, no, it’s fine. Sorry, I’m fine. It’s nothing. I just remembered there was a radio show I wanted to listen to today but I missed it.”

“What channel does it play on?” You hummed thoughtfully, telling Jungwoo what you could remember, seeing his mouth open in understanding.

“Oh, I have this app that I downloaded a while ago, I can send you the link. It’s for the radio shows in town, it uploads replays for the broadcasts you miss, you’ll probably be able to find it on there somewhere,” he told you as if it was no big deal, shrugging.

You held a hand to your heart, awfully thankful for that bit of information, “thank God, Renjun set me up with you.”

After you had reached your apartment building, you saw that Youngho’s car was already parked at its usual spot, figuring he probably went home already, wondering if he knew where you went.

However, once you got to your apartment, you figured your question was more or less answered once you saw Youngho and Taeyong seated around the small coffee table in your living room.

“Why did no one tell me we were having movie night in my own house?” you sighed, opening the fridge and pulling out a chilled beer before dumping your things on the floor somewhere, heading over to your sofa.

Youngho had lit up when he saw you, pulling his black dragonball t-shirt down as he adjusted his seating position to make space for you next to him.

“Just in time,” Taeyong cheered, ignoring your dismay. Only then did you see the cans of beer and hard liquor on the table, already able to tell that Taeyong was in one of his moods again.

“Is Jaehyun not joining us?” you asked, setting your bag down on the table and seating yourself naturally next to where Youngho was seated, the look Taeyong had cast Youngho going unnoticed by you.

Taeyong shook his head, hair flopping around his headband.

“He’s at some kind of party, didn’t feel like joining him today,” he told you, gesturing to the bottles and cans on the table to silently ask which one you wanted.

You pointed to a bottle of something you remembered to taste nice from the last time you drank. Glancing over to see that Youngho was already almost done with his bottle, his hair sticking up in the side of his head he had just lifted from the sofa. And you had to resist the urge to reach over to smooth it out for him, opening the can of beer you’d taken from the fridge instead.

“What movie is it today?” You took a long sip, letting out a sigh at the taste, slouching down in your seat and bringing your knees up, resting your forearms on top of them.

Youngho shrugged, “We just clicked whatever looked interesting, to be honest. We just saw the description and clicked when we saw that ‘the rock’ was acting in it,” you nodded with a smile, leaning over the table to grab a handful of snacks, shoving them into your mouth rather unceremoniously, the sight reminding Youngho of your university days.

“Heard you came back from a date?” Youngho asked, hoping his curiosity wasn’t as obvious as it felt, earning a nod from you (and a very amused look from Taeyong).

“How was it?” Taeyong asked, tilting his head back to finish what wine was left in his glass.

Trying your best to speak around your mouthful of snacks, you replied, “wasn’t like it was bad or anything, just felt more like a friend than a date,” you shrugged before reaching over Youngho to grab more snacks, missing the way he brought his hand up to rest on his knee, blocking his mouth with the back of his hand in an attempt to conceal his smile.

“Who was it again?” Taeyong asked, grabbing the bottle of wine and filling his glass again.

“Kim Jungwoo,” you told him, not expecting for Taeyong’s eyes to widen, poorly stifling his laughter as he set the wine bottle down onto your coffee table.

“Wait…as in like…the 3 years younger than us Kim Jungwoo? He worked in our store when you were on holiday with your family last month.”

You nodded, though you didn’t know about the part where he worked at Babycakes, you’d have to ask Renjun more about that.

“Damn,” Youngho took a sip of his beer, surprised at the information, “didn’t know you were into that.”

You rolled your eyes, “he was very nice. But I feel like we both weren’t really feeling it,” you shrugged.

It wasn’t like you felt bad, no, you knew exactly why you weren’t attracted to Jungwoo, and you knew this said reason was sitting next to you practically chugging his beer down.

Taeyong slumped back in his seat, “at least it wasn’t bad, you never really know when it comes to Renjun,” Taeyong gestured with his glass, earning a nod from you, a small grunt of agreement leaving you.

Youngho wanted to ask you more, but figured it probably wasn’t the best idea to do that while Taeyong was there, figuring he could save himself more of the embarrassment from Taeyong’s teasing. But it seemed things were working in his favour that evening (or night).

It was barely halfway into the movie when Taeyong was already curled up asleep on the sofa, the movie having gotten boring, so you and Youngho turned the volume softer and adjourned to the balcony so you wouldn’t wake Taeyong. The boy barely got sleep as it is.

“What made you go on the date?” Youngho asked suddenly, turning to look at you as he sipped his beer, the night breeze pushing his hair back wildly, watching in (slight) awe as he closed his eyes slowly, a soft smile on his face.

You huffed, shrugging, “I guess I decided to give Renjun a chance, since he’d been bugging me about it for ages.”

Youngho let out a small giggle, “If I knew that was the way to get you to go on dates I would’ve started bugging you a long time ago,” he sighed, his tone seeming to have held no weight to it, contrary to his words.

You had to refrain from jumping to conclusions, shaking your head at him instead. If he was going to talk to you in cryptic messages, you would give him cryptic answers.

“You could just ask me nicely.”

This had caught his attention, opening one of his eyes before turning to you with his eyebrows slightly furrowed, his lips parted slightly and the corner tilted up in a hint of a smirk, his mouth closing as he narrowed his eyes at you.

“I’ll remember you said this.”

You rolled your eyes, not being able to help yourself from smiling, bringing your bottle up to your lips to take a swig, humming softly.

“What about you? Any bad blind date stories to share?” you asked, a teasing lilt to your tone. Though you didn’t expect the head shake you’d received in response.

“I don’t go on blind dates,” he told you simply, bringing his bottle to his lips and blowing air from his mouth, trying to create a sound from the bottle but not proving to be very successful.

“Why not?” Once again, it seemed as though your mouth to speak before you could filter your words, though Youngho didn’t seem to mind.

Youngho’s tongue peeked out to wet his lips, shrugging, “never had the time,” he lied, taking another swig from his drink.

If Taeyong heard this, he would definitely recount to Youngho all the times he had to tell Youngho to calm down and just talk to you. But Youngho knew—he felt it, too—that things were different now.

As he looked at you where you sat next to him on the balcony, moonlight casting a glow on you that Youngho wasn’t sure why made him feel sentimental, Youngho knew he was seeing you not as the same person he was two years ago, but more… mature. He felt calm looking at you. The kind of feeling he could only get at home.

Now he was starting to understand what he thought he always knew about love. What he couldn’t get from just love songs alone. Things like what Jaehyun meant by how when he and Taeyong fought sometimes they could go without talking for days after, and each time when they met again, even if it was when he would show up at Taeyong’s doorstep in his dishevelled clothes and talking jibberish, the hug he received in return always felt the same and that was all that mattered.

Looking at you now, as you tilted your head at Youngho with a small smile on your face, wondering why he was looking at you so intently, Youngho knew that that smile of yours was what stayed the same for him. Because whenever he saw it these days, when you talked, in car rides with him, during dinner, it always reminded him that he was home.

Your phone dinged, directing your attention elsewhere momentarily, seeing that you’d received a message from Jaehyun asking if Taeyong was alright.

“Do you ever regret not putting yourself out there more in uni? Like…let’s say, like how Taeyong did?”

You went back to replying Jaehyun’s text saying that Taeyong was fine and asleep, continuing to hum the tune in your head absently as you awaited his answer.

Taking another swig from his bottle, Youngho shook his head, a lazy on his face, “I think I did just the right amount,” he shrugged, bringing his knees up towards his chest and resting his arms on his knees.

“That’s funny,” you huffed, making Youngho’s eyebrows lift expectantly, his forehead creasing lightly as he did so.

“Why?”

You shrugged, your finger moving to trace patterns on the floor of the balcony, “you know, cause right is pretty subjective. I remember how much of a flirt you were in uni, though, that’s for sure.”

Youngho scrunched his nose up, “I was, wasn’t I?” he laughed.

“But you’re not seeing anyone now, right? Weren’t you the one that used to say you wanted to get married early? You know, settle down and all that?”

Youngho turned to you briefly before directing his gaze back to the sky, “maybe if I came back sooner…” he murmured, trailing off. Youngho tried to form patterns with the stars he could see but finding his gaze always gravitating back to stare at the bright moon.

“Do you ever wish you did things differently?” you asked, his confused expression prompting you to continue, “you know, like… pursued anyone you were interested in back then, who knows, you could’ve ended up married by now,” you joked, tensing slightly when he hadn’t seemed to find it as funny as you did.

Youngho shook his head, “If I thought like that, I would’ve been forcing it. And I don’t wanna force anything… especially not with…” Youngho had stopped himself, trailing off into a hum, making you frown.

“Your use of present tense is suspicious,” you mumbled, your gaze searching his face intently, seeing him shrug, his smile growing. You were nervous, a part of you wishing he was referring to you yet at the same time knowing you couldn’t just jump to conclusions in the hopes that your feelings wouldn’t get hurt. Though Youngho’s next statement had only left you with more to interpret.

“Feel free to be suspicious. I think you know that just because I’m not seeing anyone doesn’t mean I don’t... like anyone,” he began, setting his empty bottle down beside him, “and plus, I think that things that are meant to happen will happen eventually,” he told you.

“Like what?” you asked, turning to look at him, something inside your heart stirring at the sight of Youngho, a messy-haired, tired-eyed, soft smiling, pink-cheeked Youngho.

“Us,” he murmured.

You never thought you would end up in this kind of situation again with Youngho, except this time, you were glad you weren’t in some kind of sweaty hormonal party when you saw Youngho leaning closer to you, something about it feeling inevitable.

“Do you think so?” he murmured, the tone of his voice gentle, soft, sending a numbing kind of warmth through your chest, so overwhelmed by the reality of the situation that all you could do was nod at him.

“Yeah, I think so too,” you mumbled, watching as his gaze had flickered to your lips and back to your eyes, his lips parting slightly.

Youngho brought a hand up to the side of your face gently, his thumb brushing against your cheek with a featherlike pressure and his lips were barely inches away when he muttered.

“Can I kiss you?”

Your breath hitched, and Youngho could feel it in the way you tensed momentarily under his touch, receiving your answer when you’d leaned closer to press your lips against his, Youngho not being able to control the smile from his face at the feeling of you relaxing under his touch.

You recalled his words again, maybe if he came back sooner.

Your hand had found its way to grasp his wrist lightly, his skin feeling warm under your touch, and you swore you heard Youngho’s breath hitch at how cold your hands felt.

Youngho’s hand moved to rest over where your jaw met your neck, his grip firmer as he deepened the kiss, feeling his thumb caress your jaw lightly before he pulled away, the warmth from his hand leaving your neck, the slowness with which he did so making it seem so reluctant that you found yourself almost chasing his lips.

Once he’d pulled away, he turned his head to look up at the sky again, “the moon is beautiful,” he breathed.

“Huh?” you blurted a little too firmly, casting a glance behind you in Taeyong’s direction before lowering your volume, “the moon? yeah,” you sat on your hands to refrain from touching your lips or grabbing your bottle to drink more, “yeah….pretty,” you agreed, your mind reeling at why Youngho would suddenly decide to talk about the moon after what he had just done.

Youngho was less calm than he’d let on, his fists clenching at his sides as he resisted the urge to kiss you again, cursing himself inwardly. He hoped he hadn’t overstepped his boundaries, or moved things too fast, but he couldn’t help himself when he’d kissed you.

“I should probably head back, do you want me to bring Taeyong to my place?”

Your forehead creased as you frowned at how casually he was acting, your reactions a little delayed from the sheer shock of what had happened.

“No, no it’s fine. I already told Jaehyun he’d be crashing here for the night,” you told him.

Youngho picked up his drinks, helping you clear the empty bottles and cans into a trash bag before slinging his bag around his shoulder.

Following him wordlessly, you tried to gather your thoughts as you walked him to your door, not sure about what to even say to him, more focused on calming yourself down.

Youngho shot you a smile as you bid goodbye to him from your door.

“See you tomorrow?” he asked.

You’d only realized he was asking you a question when he’d leaned closer, eyebrows raised and an expectant lilt to his smile.

“Yeah!... yeah, see you. Tomorrow.”

That night, listening to the radio broadcast you’d missed from the link Jungwoo had sent you, you listened calmly as the radio DJ tell the ending story,

“When the author, Natsume Sōseki, was a teacher, he told his student to translate something as homework. When the student translated “I love you” into Japanese, he just translated it word-for- word, “I love you.” Since Japanese people don’t say that often, he told the student it would be better to translate it, “The moon is beautiful.” Everyone, do you have someone you want to say this to today? Today as well, night night.”

Your eyes widened, instantly recalling the incident in your balcony, the thought of the conversation you had, the kiss you shared being enough to make you giddy with all sorts of feelings you couldn’t place. Little did you know, Youngho was the same.

===

The day after your date, it was Christmas eve.

Though you had many different visions of how you would be celebrating your Christmas eve this year, you still found yourself in the bakery, listening to the radio show in the shop trying to stall time in the hopes that you wouldn’t have to see Youngho so soon tonight.

You hadn’t sent in a story that day, in your sheer emotional turmoil after kissing Youngho.

And it wasn’t making it any better that Taeyong’s reaction once you’d told him what happened had made you feel even more anxious (“just shut up and date already! He totally likes you, what are you waiting for?”).

Once you heard the radio host of the next show talking about something you really couldn’t bring yourself to pay attention to, you grew increasingly anxious as the time grew closer and closer to the next time you would have to see Youngho. Though you knew you would have to at one point, since you’d already bought him his Christmas gift.

“God, would you stop looking so anxious, you’re making me feel like I have to confess to someone,” Renjun scolded, shaking his head at you.

Shooting him a dirty look, you took off your apron, “easy for you to say, you don’t have to deal with some tall, overly flirtatious being waiting for you outside every day.”

“Believe me, it sounds a lot better than you’re making it out to be,” he told you, bemused. “Look, it’s Christmas! Let the Christmas spirit sink in and stop worrying for once, you’ll be fine. He’s totally whipped.”

As if you weren’t nervous enough, Taeyong was too quick to chase everyone out of the store today, claiming he had something important to attend to, leaving quickly with Jaehyun and Renjun.

Youngho on the other hand, seemed to be the opposite, seeming as though he were intentionally taking things even slower today.

“How was your day?” you tried making conversation with him after his silence made you too anxious, finding the way he shrugged and gave you vague answers to be all too purposeful.

“Boring, nothing I could really look forward to,” he told you, drumming his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat of whatever rock song was playing. You were thankful they weren’t playing some sort of love song that would send you into another bout of anxiousness.

You frowned, “tough day?” you asked. You couldn’t help but try to search his face for any sign that could let you know if he was upset or just tired, or maybe even just messing with you. You decided on the latter when you saw the corner of his lips quirk up in a smirk.

“Better now, since I got to see you,” you made a gagging sound, his laugh bubbling from his throat after you did so.

“Hey, it wasn’t that bad. I thought that line was pretty romantic—” he defended, pulling over to park at his usual spot.

“Youngho,” you began.

He was still laughing while getting out of the car, “—okay, okay, fine. I won’t say it if you don’t want me to say stuff like that.”

“No, that’s not it.” You shut the car door (a little too forcefully), “are you just gonna pretend that nothing happened?”

Youngho’s laugh died down, a soft smile lingering on his face, shaking his head no. You’d barely even noticed that he was holding a bag in his hands.

“Of course not, I was just waiting for when you would bring it up,” he dodged your hit quickly, shoving his other hand into his jacket pocket as you walked to your apartment together.

“What do you mean ‘waiting for me to bring it up’, you could’ve brought it up first,” you sulked, upset that you’d gone through all of that worry for what seemed like nothing.

Raising his arms defensively, Youngho tried to reason, “I figured you needed time, am I wrong?”

You knew he wasn’t, huffing in response, a deep sigh leaving you, “yeah, whatever, you’re right.”

Your steps got slower as you neared your apartment building, wanting to prolong your time with Youngho as long as you could, mustering whatever confidence you had left in you.

“Just so you know, I…don’t want that to just be the end,” you murmured, Youngho leaning over with a hand cupping his ear.

“I’m sorry what was that? You know you really shouldn’t mumble,” he laughed, earning a scowl from you.

You could hear the echoes of Christmas carollers, hoping they wouldn’t reach your street before you were done talking to Youngho.

You shot him a look, stopping in front of your apartment building, “you know what I said, I’m not repeating it.”

Youngho held his hands up in surrender, “okay, okay, sorry. Do you want a hug?”

You figured that wasn’t an option when you felt Youngho wrap his arms around you, your hand that was fishing in your bag for your keys instinctively pulling out to return the hug, leaning into his touch and letting your face get squished against his shoulder, relishing in the comfort until you heard him murmur next to your ear.

“Is that why you didn’t send in a story today, hmm?” he’d said the username you used whenever you sent in stories to the radio show, making your eyes widen, pulling your head away from his chest to look at him in shock.

You were at a loss, only now understanding why you were so affected not only by the voice of the radio host but the words they said, even at Jeno’s revelation that they had sounded similar to him, as if all this while you knew that it was possible (and maybe even hoping it was true) but you were just telling yourself it was a situation that was too good to be true.

“John-d,” you couldn’t help the gasp that escaped you, Youngho bursting into a fit of giggles at the pure horror in your expression. Your hands placed on his chest as you leaned back to get a better look at him.

“Firstly, I’m offended you didn’t recognise my voice sooner. Secondly, you use that username for everything, you know, it’s pretty obvious-”

You narrowed your eyes at him, “so that was really you?”

Youngho nodded, prompting you to continue, “you knew this whole time that it was me sending in those stories?”

Youngho pushed the bag higher on his wrist, interlocking his fingers at the small of your back, nodding at you. You felt a wave of embarrassment wash over you, looking down to shield your gaze from him, only to have him chide you softly.

“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about, frankly it’s what I looked forward to,” he told you. Making your face feel hot under his intent gaze, still not used to being on the receiving end of this serious, sincere side of Youngho you had come to like.

You’d felt him take a hand away from your back, bringing it under your chin to tilt your head up to look at him, his smile growing when you’d met his gaze.

“So…when you said the moon was beautiful the other day…did you mean…?”

Now was Youngho’s turn to cover his mouth, the tell-tale scrunch of his nose and crinkles beside his eyes letting you know he was smiling.

He nodded at you again, pressing his lips together in a firm line.

“Is…uh…..the moon beautiful to you too?” You examined the way his gaze shifted elsewhere out of nervousness, his hands coming back to his sides in case you were uncomfortable.

You watched in endearment as he tucked his thumb under the strap of his bag, his other hand coming up to push his hair from his forehead, making it stick up messily in random places.

Letting out a huff of laughter as you climbed up two steps to be level with Youngho, you decided to use up whatever confidence you had left, pulling him by the hem of his jacket to press a soft kiss to his cheek, you nodded. Pulling away to watch the pink start to rush to his cheeks as he let go of his bag strap, his fists unconsciously clenched at his sides.

You shook your head at his nervous demeanour, the shy smile that he couldn’t help from giving you, and you felt a wave of immense gratitude to the universe for letting you meet him again. Except this time, you were determined not to let this opportunity go to waste.

“Very.”

Youngho’s smile was unlike those you’d seen before, this one was filled with such an unadulterated happiness that you couldn’t help but smile as well, a sudden realisation striking you once you heard echoes of people greeting each other Merry Christmas, figuring now was the best time to give Youngho his Christmas gift to you, though you didn’t know he would beat you to it.

He’d held out the bag he was holding to you, with you only realising he was holding it now, being able to see the clear outline of a bottle within the bag.

“Merry Christmas,” he murmured, making your lips part, accepting the bag from him.

“You got me wine?” you quirked an eyebrow at him, making him purse his lips, giving you a shrug.

“Well, you know, you did say that you liked gifts you could use. And I figured wine would kind of fall under that category.”

You huffed, feeling as though you were smiling too much today, Youngho continuing with his explanation on what kind of wine it was, telling you his reasoning behind choosing it, murmuring things about the sweetness that you were too enamoured with his voice to fully process.

“Youngho,” you stopped him, making his hand come up to grasp the back of his neck in his shyness.

“Sorry, I was rambling, wasn’t I?” he gave you a sheepish smile.

You weren’t sure where your confidence was coming from, maybe it was the sound of the carollers, or the many people wishing each other Merry Christmas in the distance, or maybe it was the knowledge that you wanted nothing more than to keep this night from ending.

“Your present’s in my apartment,” you began, seeing his eyebrows raise in surprise, “and well, I don’t know much about wine but... how about this, you can come in, and we can crack this open,” you held the bag with the wine bottle up, “and you can tell me more about this wine even though I won’t really be listening?” you proposed, a small smile on your face as giggles bubbled from Youngho’s lips.

“That sounds like the perfect evening.”

===

The next day, Christmas day, you had a hard time concentrating on work with Youngho waltzing into the bakery in the afternoon and taking pictures of you and the bakery with the camera you had gifted him as his Christmas present.

“Hey, man, can you smile, this is like gonna be my tenth picture with you just judging me at the back of the shot,” Youngho frowned at Renjun, letting the camera dangle from the strap around his neck, making you laugh, kicking the kitchen door open and beckoning for Taeyong to come out.

“Come on, huddle closer, I want a picture of you guys with your shop,” Youngho spoke and he’d made you and Taeyong take a picture with the backdrop of your shop’s sign, smiling at the result of the picture.

Gesturing with a hand for Renjun and Jeno to step closer to you and Taeyong (even going to the extent of calling Doyoung out of the office to take a picture), all of you threw your hands around each other’s shoulders and posed for the picture.

Youngho leaned over to show you how the picture showed up on his camera, making you smile from how much he seemed to be enjoying his gift.

Taeyong eyed you furtively before reaching a hand towards Youngho, “here, hand me the camera. I’ll take a picture for the both of you.”

Your eyes widened, seeing Youngho already grabbing you to pull you outside to stand at the Christmas tree you were used to seeing other couples posing at, not expecting yourself to end up standing here, and with Youngho, no less.

Youngho wrapped his arms around you from behind, resting his chin atop your head as you smiled for the picture, Taeyong handing the camera back to Youngho and going back into the shop, leaving you and Youngho outside.

“I have to go meet Jaehyun to pre-record for our broadcast tonight, you’re coming for dinner at my parent’s house later, right?” he asked, his hands reaching down to grasp your hands gently.

Giving him a nod, you heard him sigh, “good, my mom’s been bugging me to get you to come over,” he clicked his tongue.

“So you’re not asking me over because you want me to, but because of your mom?” you teased, earning a dramatic gasp from him, his eyes going wide and his mouth falling open.

“Well when you put it that way…” Youngho feigned being deep in thought, earning a groan from you, yet you couldn’t help but laugh along with him.

You were about to bid him goodbye when you saw him frown, a pout forming on his lips.

“Why? What’s wrong?” you asked, concern etched in your tone.

You should’ve known Youngho better by now, especially when his lower lip jut out in a pout, his eyes looking pitiful with no other intention than to make you feel guilty, “no goodbye kiss?”

You flushed, seeing as he was already leaning down, and you turned behind to see if anyone in the bakery was watching you—not knowing that they’d turned away immediately when they saw you turn, obviously—but you took that as a greenlight, getting on your tip-toes to press a soft kiss to his lips.

As if that wasn’t enough, Youngho had reached a hand behind you to rest on the small of your back, pulling you closer so your chest pressed flush against his, his other hand coming up to run his fingers through your hair, making you smile, already beginning to pull away before he could get too carried away.

You stood breathless with your hands clutching at his jacket, shaking your head at him with a smile.

Youngho had a giddy smile on his face as he shook his head at you as well, though for different reasons, “I really don’t know why I didn’t come back sooner.”

You scrunched your nose up, shy at the attention he was giving you, bringing your hands behind you to peel his hands off of you, feeling him swing your hands gently in front of you.

“Go, you’re gonna be late,” you prompted, earning a dismayed groan from him.

“Merry Christmas, baby. See you later!” he said, taking steps backwards as he waved at you, a wistful expression on his face.

Watching him walk away, you thought, maybe this wasn’t a completely changed Youngho in front of you. Before you was Youngho who you both remembered and have come to learn about, both of which you liked equally.

“Merry Christmas, Youngho!” you called with a laugh.

Walking back into the bakery, you knew it was too good to be true that no one was asking you about Youngho. Only when everyone had gone back to doing their own thing, Taeyong in the kitchen and Doyoung in the office, Renjun and Jeno eyed you in amusement.

“I guess it worked out that you called him Babycakes, didn’t it?”

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