Chapter Text
When Minho made the decision to transfer schools and leave Korea, he thought he’d be ready for whatever might come his way.
There had been resistance in the Lee household, with his mother refusing to let go of her only son and his father opposing the upheaval it would bring to the way their family has lived for generations. In the end, it was his grandmother who swayed them.
She accompanied them to the airport, whispering to Minho when he bent down to hug her before he entered the boarding gate.
“Always be honest and stay true to yourself.”
His grandmother’s advice was getting a little bit harder to do these days.
“Hey, Minho.”
Minho looks up from his sandwich and sees Dahyun standing at the opposite side of his lunch table. Her eyes are wide, and she's nervously fiddling with the straps of her backpack and staring at his own tray of food on the table.
“Hi,” he says, and she doesn't reply with anything else, so Minho prompts, “Can I help you with something?”
“Oh! Yeah, I,” she pauses, reangles her body to look at him directly. “So prom's coming up, right?” she says, and Minho has to consciously force his body to remain nonchalant, which sort of defeats the purpose. “My friend was just wondering if you had a date already.”
This is the third time he’s been asked about prom this week, and it’s only Tuesday. “I don't,” he says because it's simple, and because perhaps it won't invite further questions.
It does for Dahyun, apparently. “Why not?”
“Um. I'm not even sure I'll even go?” Minho says, honestly.
Dahyun looks shell-shocked, to say the least. “But why not?” she asks again, and Minho mourns for his sandwich that's still on the table and not sitting comfortably in his stomach.
The thing is, he just doesn't really see the point. He sees his classmates all the time, and he's content to know them outside of whatever grandeur everyone expects from prom. And as great of a dancer as he is, he doubts the kind of dancing they're expected to do is not the kind that he's good at.
Plus, he has enough on his plate already without the added pressure of attending the most highly-anticipated event in his high school.
Minho doesn’t know which answer to give her.
“My parents might visit that weekend,” Minho says, and it’s not entirely a lie. His parents have visited him before. Granted, Minho had known weeks beforehand. His parents don’t really have a penchant for surprises.
Still. Minho doesn’t hold the future. Anything could happen, right?
A few expressions flash across Dahyun’s face, before settling on neutral. “Alright, well, I hope they have a good visit,” she says, just a tinge disappointed.
“Thanks, Dahyun,” Minho says, watching as she walks away and sits at another table, her back to him, before he resumes eating his sandwich.
In hindsight, he should have been prepared for it. He had seen it in plenty of American movies, and he knows it’s inevitable considering he’s studying in a normal American high school. But he really didn’t expect prom to be that big of a deal. He expected it to be just like any other school function, like a pep rally or a variety show. He expected it to be a get-together with his class, with dancing and food and not much else.
But then the promposals started popping up around campus, bringing about some hysterics and several rumors and drama that he’d only overhear from his seatmates during class.
Their homeroom the next day is spent helping the prom committee decorate the venue, which is ridiculous, because it’s not for at least five more weeks. But this year’s committee – of which Hyunjin is a part of, to Minho’s chagrin – seems to have grand plans.
Minho's holding a pack of colored streamers on one hand and a stapler on the other, not quite sure what he's supposed to be doing, where it's supposed to go. He did try to pay attention, but the committee head was so distressed he fired off multiple instructions to a class of aloof seniors before running off elsewhere, so Minho doesn’t know what he expected. He looks to Hyunjin, who is standing on the top rung of a ladder, adjusting a disco ball.
He doesn’t really want to bother him while he’s in a precarious position, so he looks for anyone else in the committee who could tell him what to do. He does a quick scan of the function hall, and it’s littered with more clueless students, which means everyone else from the committee is likely dealing with admin and logistics.
He hears laughter behind him, and turns around to see Chan laughing with Sana while they arrange tables on one side of the hall. They seem to be doing a decent job, as far as Minho could see.
He thinks of going over to them, but stops himself short, getting the sense that he would be interrupting something. They’re not even standing that close to each other, really, but Sana is talking animatedly and Chan’s dimples are out, and Minho would just… rather not.
Chan laughs again, loudly and brightly, and Minho turns back around. He goes back to where Hyunjin’s still tinkering with the disco ball and waits for him to come down.
When Minho gets home, he takes a shower and loiters on the internet for a bit before starting on his schoolwork, as well as the file on his desk he hasn’t worked up the courage to look at for the past few days. He can do it. He just needs a bit of rest and maybe some food before he gets started.
Several cat videos on YouTube later and he finds himself still lying down, unmoving, as the sun puts itself to bed.
Minho groans and closes the rest of his tabs after putting them on his watch later playlist. He doesn’t have the energy to cook himself dinner, and he figures the evening chill wouldn’t be so bad. He puts on a hoodie and pants and makes the short trek down his street to the corner convenience store, which is blessedly open 24/7.
As he steps inside, the bright light wakes him up a bit, and he blinks a few times as he walks over to the aisle with the cup noodles. He picks up his preferred type, which is not as delicious as any of the noodles his mom used to cook back home, but has nonetheless served him well in the past year whenever he needed a quick fix. He walks over to the hot water dispenser, opens the cup, pours hot water into it and covers the lid.
He takes his noodles outside and sits at one of the small plastic tables, his seat facing the street. As he settles, he spots Chan walking towards the store, hood up and hands in his pocket. His cheeks are rosy from the cold.
He turns at just the right moment to see Minho looking at him, and he smiles. Chan motions for him to wait, so Minho does.
He keeps time until the noodles are ready, then he opens the lid, pours the seasoning in, and stirs, but he doesn't start eating. Through the glass wall of the store, he looks at Chan walking around, also with cup noodles in hand as well as an energy drink.
He and Chan aren't really close friends. They met through a group activity in one of their shared classes, and found out they moved to the US at the same time. They also live on the same street, so they can't help but run into each other on the regular.
They don't seek each other out, though. They have different social circles in high school, so they’re hardly seen together on campus.
On the surface, they seem like very different people. Minho prefers to keep a low profile, mostly sticking with his two best friends and engaging in only one extracurricular activity: dance club. He’s quiet and doesn’t act up in class. He has good grades, but he doesn’t recite unless called upon, and he doesn’t volunteer for leadership positions.
Then there’s Chan, who does everything and does everything well, like every Asian parent’s ideal child. He composes and arranges music for the school band and competes for the swim team, all while staying at the top of the class. It shouldn't even be allowed, but somehow, he's also on the student council.
High school students should be annoyed that such a perfect person exists, but all the people in their school know that Chan is kind to a fault, eager to help everyone, taking every opportunity to give the spotlight to someone else.
Everyone knows Chan and everyone likes him, and Minho is no exception.
Minho doesn't even know how he knows so much about him. It's not like he's been watching him throughout the year.
He's just hard to miss, is all.
It became a habit, one they didn’t even consciously develop between themselves, as far as Minho was concerned.
There’s a park between their school and their street, big enough for families to play catch with their pets and even big enough for mini-concerts, on some occasions. A few wooden benches line the grass on the outer side, and a playground takes up the farther corner on the left side.
Minho goes there to clear his head, sometimes, when it’s after dark and it’s quiet. He goes there when he feels claustrophobic and lonely in his small apartment, when he’s sick of staring at a screen all day, when he’s missing home.
A week after he flew over and settled in, bored out of his mind with two days left until classes started, he walked around the neighborhood and stopped at the park.
He had heard the scuffle of footsteps in the vicinity, and looked around to find the source, eyes landing on a broad-shouldered boy walking over to one of the benches on the other side.
Minho vaguely recognized him from orientation, but wasn't sure if he should greet him, if he should even try to get his attention.
But Chan looked up and saw him, smiling immediately. That was the first time Minho noticed his dimples.
It happened again a few weeks later when Minho went for a run, going around the park for a few laps before cooling down at one of the benches. He saw Chan a few minutes on, doing similar laps around the park.
After they got properly acquainted during that group activity, they would keep running into each other, closing the distance as the months passed them by. One night, Chan sat next to him on a bench, not prompting him to speak but not awkwardly silent, either.
Their convenience store run-ins started happening, too.
They shared the same sports class outdoors, and when Minho would take a break on the bleachers, Chan would sit next to him sometimes, only staying for as long as it takes him to drain a bottle of water.
Chan didn’t always start a conversation, but they talked enough during these encounters that Minho considered him a friend. Even from the get go, Chan’s presence never made him uneasy.
While they shared a couple of classes, and while Chan seemed to be friends with the whole student population, he always seemed to hang out most often with his buddies from his own side project, the hip-hop group 3RACHA. Minho doesn't even know how he has time for a side project, but if their late night run-ins are any indication, it's likely that Chan doesn't get a lot of sleep.
It wasn’t surprising. Not really. Chan was just good at everything he did, and Minho had never been inclined to question the hows and whys of it. It just befitted him, somehow.
Chan steps out of the store, now, holding his steaming cup of noodles with one hand and a paper bag on the other. He had pulled his hood back but a beanie remained on his head. He walks towards Minho's table and takes a seat.
“Surprised to see you out so early,” Minho says, stirring his noodles.
Chan chuckles. “Managed to escape prom duties.”
Minho sighs in exasperation, twirling noodles on his chopsticks and blowing on them.
“It’s all so silly. Isn’t it? Of course you probably wouldn't feel that way, you love all those social events.”
Chan tilts his head at him, and he doesn't frown at him, but Minho knows he's said the wrong thing.
“Sorry for assuming that,” he amends, not quite meeting his eyes.
“No, I get it,” Chan says, a corner of his mouth lifting. “Yeah, I told Bambam and the others back home about it, and they felt sorry I couldn't go with them on their senior trip.”
Minho hums. His own friends back home were also preparing to go on theirs.
“Sana has been giving me the look,” Chan adds, and his face doesn’t betray any indication of how he feels about that.
“What look?” Minho teases, smirking at Chan before slurping on his noodles.
Chan rolls his eyes. “You know.” Minho might know. He doesn’t really want to think about it, even more so than he already has.
“Maybe if you demonstrate it.”
“I will do no such thing.”
Minho laughs, and they eat in silence for a minute.
“You’re not seeing anybody, are you?” Chan says after a while, draining the soup from his cup.
He’s surprised by the question, but he’s not ashamed of the answer. “No,” Minho says, fiddling with the label on his bottled water.
Chan looks at him for a while before speaking, and Minho holds his gaze, undaunted.
Then Chan’s face turns resolute, and Minho furrows his eyebrows, before the question comes out of Chan’s mouth.
“Would you like to go to prom with me?” Chan asks, all the lines of his face looking every bit serious, and Minho –
Minho’s jaw drops. His chopsticks are frozen in mid-air, and the noodles wrapped around it start to slide back down to the cup.
“What?”
“At least it’ll get everyone off our backs, right?” Chan says, laughing. He’s laughing, and Minho still hasn’t picked his mouth off of the ground. “You can’t deny it would be nice. And I enjoy your company. It’ll only be one night,” he says breezily, taking a sip of his drink as soon as he’s done talking.
Minho should be irritated at Chan’s confidence. If it were anyone else, he would be walking away right now.
But what would be even more irritating is the possibility of Chan distancing himself if Minho declines his harmless offer. Proposal. Whatever.
And it is harmless. Minho has nothing to lose, because he doesn’t care about what anyone thinks of him, as long as he’s comfortable with the decisions he makes. Maybe that’s what his grandmother meant after all, despite this particular situation being a certain type of farce.
What she doesn’t know won’t kill her, Minho thinks. And it’s just prom. It should really just be like going with a friend to any other school event, except this time in fancier clothes. And in a fancier venue. With slow dancing, possibly.
“Okay,” Minho says, poking at the dregs of his cup noodles, fighting the warmth licking at his ears. “Let’s do it.”
When he looks up, Chan’s beaming at him again, and Minho doesn’t stop himself from smiling back.
After some more idle chatting, Minho stifles a yawn, and Chan stands up and offers his hand. Minho looks at his outstretched hand then up to his face, unresponsive. Chan says, “It’s almost 12:00 am on a school night, let’s go.”
Minho blinks at him. “It is?” Almost midnight? He barely felt the time go by. He takes Chan’s hand and pulls himself up, and Chan releases his hold. They throw their garbage in the bin at the side of the store and move towards the sidewalk, breathing in the chilly night air. Chan pauses before turning right towards his apartment.
“I’ll see you in school,” he says, raising a hand and waving.
“See you,” Minho says, waving back, and they part ways.
Minho’s late for class the next day.
He wakes up to his third alarm in a panic. He rarely ever gets to his third alarm, which means he’ll need to skip breakfast if he wants to make it to school on time.
He doesn’t have the time to process what happened last night, how his arrangement with Chan is supposed to go. He’s still slightly out of it and trying to focus on his lectures until lunch when Hyunjin yells at him from a few feet away at the cafeteria.
“Dude, what the fuck!”
Hyunjin makes his way over and slams his tray down on Minho’s table, and sits across him with urgency.
Minho tries to look as stoic as he can. He knows word travels fast, but he didn’t know it would travel that fast in the space of one morning. “What?”
“You didn’t tell me you and Bang Chan were a thing!” Hyunjin’s eyes are so wide and accusatory, and in normal circumstances Minho would poke fun at him, but he doesn’t feel any such urge at the moment.
“We’re not,” Minho says, the tips of his ears already flaming up. Christ, he thinks, is the cafeteria always this packed?
Hyunjin rolls his eyes. “Cat’s out of the bag. He told Sana you’re going to prom together, and Sana told everyone else in the dance club.”
Minho suppresses the groan that almost escapes his mouth. Of course.
“What’s the big deal?” Minho says, taking another bite of his salad. He doesn’t think it’s a big deal. He hardly thought of it at all in the timespan between last night and this morning. And if that’s because he refused to think about it for the most part, Hyunjin doesn’t have to know. It really isn’t a big deal.
Hyunjin looks at him like he’s just asked why fish swim in water. “The big deal is that you are literally taking the school’s most eligible bachelor to prom.”
“He’s actually taking me,” Minho retorts, because that distinction is important.
Hyunjin’s stare hardens, as if he’s using up all the self-restraint in his body not to whack Minho’s head. “How you managed to get Bang Chan to ask you to prom is completely beyond me.”
“Hey!”
“You don’t even talk! When have you ever hung out, hmm?”
Minho suddenly remembers one night at the park, when he’d told Chan he’d wanted to see what the world was like outside Gimpo, but that sometimes he thinks he’d be willing to give it all back just so he can be with his cats again. Especially that time Dori got sick and he worried himself into a fever.
Chan only listened to him, nodding along to what would probably sound like an ungrateful rant to any other person. You’ll see them again soon, he reassured, once Minho was done talking. It didn’t sound trite, coming from him. Minho thinks Chan was incapable of being anything less than genuine.
“We take Algebra and Physics together,” Minho tells Hyunjin, tamping the memory back into the recesses of his mind.
Hyunjin narrows his eyes. “You barely talk to anyone in our classes.”
“Yeah, well,” damn Hyunjin for knowing him so well, “We were groupmates one time and he was nice.”
“Nice is an understatement,” Hyunjin scoffs, as if Chan’s kindness could offend anyone. He was probably wondering when he’d be on the receiving end of it. To Minho’s knowledge, Hyunjin and Chan haven’t really interacted.
And speak of the devil – Hyunjin gasps as he looks somewhere over Minho’s right shoulder, and Minho turns to see Chan sitting down a few tables behind them, looking back at him. He smiles and waves, and Minho cautiously waves back. The other people at Chan’s table, who look like members of the swim team, rib him for it.
“So it’s true,” Hyunjin says, mouth still open in shock.
Minho rolls his eyes. “Do I look like I would joke about something like this? And you didn’t even hear it from me.”
Chan meets him at his locker, right before their last class of the day.
“What’s up,” Minho says, grabbing his books and putting them in his bag before turning to him.
“You think they can tell it’s fake?” Chan says lightly, without preamble.
Minho stares at him, nonplussed. “I mean, we don’t have to be dating. You just asked me to go to prom with you and I said yes. What’s fake about that?”
Chan’s face smooths over, smile faltering. Minho wants to ask if something is wrong, but he deflects to a joke, sensing the other people around them. “We might as well be making out against my locker if they’re going to stare that hard.”
Chan is blushing, and it’s kind of cute. “They’re probably just jealous.”
Minho scoffs. “Of course, the most popular kid in school is officially off the prom date market.”
Chan ignores that comment and stays quiet for a moment, and Minho thinks he missed something. Why else would they be jealous?
“Are you doing anything after school?” Chan finally asks, after a beat too long.
“I just have dance practice for an hour then I’m heading home,” Minho says. Apart from the dance club, he doesn’t often have plans after school. Sometimes Hyunjin will ask him to help out with one of his extracurricular projects, and sometimes Minho can’t get himself out of it. Hyunjin can be pretty insistent when he needs to be.
Plus – God forbid he forget that fucking file on his desk he couldn’t even look at after getting home last night.
“Can I walk with you, then?” Chan says. His tone is measured but Minho notes the pink tint still spread on his cheeks.
He tries to ignore the weird stutter in his chest. “Why? Do you need to fend off adoring fangirls along that one-kilometer stretch?”
Chan rolls his eyes, but he rubs a hand on his nape, sheepish. “No. I figured, since people are asking about it, we should come up with some talking points so that they won’t catch us faking the whole thing.”
“Again, not faking it.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Fine. Where should I meet you?”
“I’ll meet you outside your practice room at 6:00.”
“Okay.”
The bell rings, and they walk off in opposite directions, towards their respective classes.