Archive of Our Own

Believe it or not, Jaehyun loves people. But he didn’t use to love people—in fact, when he was younger and a little dumber, he was scared of people. And just like how Jaehyun’s other childish traits (wanting the last piece of a dish, growing frustrated with long waits at stoplights) resurface even as he’s older and a little smarter, his anxiousness when confronted with people is still somewhat relevant. The logical half of his brain tells him that it’s ridiculous, that he’ll miss 100% of shots he doesn’t take, that people make life worth living. The other half of his brain tells him that everyone wants him to die. Sometimes, it’s a bit hard to tell which half he should listen to.

When it comes to Jaehyun’s roommate, though? Jaehyun would like to listen to the half of his brain that tells him everyone wants him to die, because he’s 70% sure that his roommate wants him to die. He doesn’t believe in the sort of premonition that says all Seoul people are cold people, but his new roommate isn’t doing a very good job at proving the statement wrong.

You see, it wasn’t originally supposed to turn out this way. Jaehyun had plans to live with his good friend Park Sungho for the rest of his life. Not necessarily because Park Sungho was a joy to be around, but because Park Sungho made him stay tidy, and that was, well, important. Besides that, Jaehyun had known Park Sungho since they were both eight years old and on the same recreational soccer team. When they were adults and sharing an apartment, this translated into playing FIFA together and Sungho fixing all of Jaehyun’s problems for him.

The unfortunate thing is that Park Sungho is much more successful than Jaehyun, which means that three months ago, Sungho packed his bags and moved away to chase corporate dreams or whatever he’d decided to do with his life. Jaehyun, who decidedly did not chase corporate dreams, couldn’t follow, and was left roommate-less in an apartment that was fairly sad without anyone playing FIFA with him (to make matters worse, Sungho took the Playstation with him, which Jaehyun would complain about if Sungho hadn’t been the one to pay for it in the first place).

Before he had hopped on a high-speed train and moved away, Sungho had pat Jaehyun on the shoulder and told him, “Don’t worry, I found a new roommate for you. He’s a good friend of mine.” And Jaehyun had felt a little more fine about the fact that Sungho was leaving because at least Sungho had fixed his problems for him again. In fact, he’d even been a little excited because he loved meeting new people. Then the front door had opened and Sungho’s good friend and Jaehyun’s new roommate had stepped in wearing the coldest expression ever.

“Hi,” Jaehyun had stuttered out first thing.

“Hey,” New Roommate had replied. He hadn’t seemed like he wanted to talk.

The half of Jaehyun’s brain that told him everyone wanted him to die had started ringing. Still, he’d tried again. “So you’re my new roommate, huh? I’m Myung Jaehyun.” And then he’d reached out a hand in greeting even though he didn’t particularly like handshakes.

New Roommate had ignored it. He’d simply dragged his luggage over the doorstep and said, “Lee Sanghyuk. Call me Riwoo.”

Jaehyun did not end up calling him Riwoo, because they didn’t speak to each other again after that. In the three months they’ve been roommates, Jaehyun thinks he’s spoken to Riwoo a total of five times, most of which had been answers to simple questions like, Is this bottle of coconut water expired? Half of it is because Jaehyun is holed up in his room most of the time, ignoring that his dirty laundry is piling up now that Sungho’s gone and slaving away at his shitty not-novel, and the other half is because he doesn’t want to talk to Riwoo. You know, what with Riwoo wanting him dead and everything.

Jaehyun has never considered himself the type of person to give up easily. In fact, he'd like to say that he's fairly stubborn when he puts his mind to something. So you'd think that he'd overcome this momentary belief that Riwoo wants him to die and continue pushing for some sort of connection. But if that were the case, Jaehyun's childish sides would never exist, and his childish habit of being frightened by extremes wouldn't have resurfaced, and he would not be convinced that he and Riwoo could live contact-less for their rest of their time sharing an apartment. Besides, when he tries to be logical with himself, he ends up thinking, There's no point reaching out to someone who doesn't want me to reach out to them, which follows up with, I don't have a good reason for reaching out anyway, which develops into a not-so-logical, If he hates me, I guess I just have to suck it up and pretend like he doesn't exist.

“He hates me,” Jaehyun had said to Sungho over the phone two hours after Riwoo had ignored his handshake. “He wants me dead.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Sungho had replied, voice partially muffled by the high-speed train’s background noise. “Riwoo doesn’t hate people. He doesn’t have the energy for that.”

Jaehyun had fumbled with his phone, glancing anxiously at the doorway in case Riwoo popped up out of nowhere. “He must have enough energy to hate me, because he wants me dead.”

“What did he do, Jaehyun-ah?”

“He ignored my handshake.” Jaehyun squeezed his eyes shut as the vision flashed in his mind. He figured he’d be mortified about that forever. “And he’s so scary. He’s a cold Seoul man, Sungho. He wants me dead. Is it too late to move in with you?"

“You’re ridiculous,” and then Sungho had hung up on him.

Living with Riwoo makes Jaehyun feel like he’s a quivering dog with its tail between its legs. It's not that he never sees Riwoo—that's impossible when it seems as though the latter's work hours are never consistent and Jaehyun has to get out of his no-good, stuffy room—but rather that they never see-see each other, because Jaehyun makes sure that his body is always angled away from Riwoo and Riwoo never looks up from whatever he's working on. The first of the five times they spoke to each other was three days after they started living together, when Jaehyun had mistakenly assumed that Riwoo would be away at work in the daytime. The sight of Riwoo sitting at the kitchen island and clicking away at his laptop keyboard had startled Jaehyun so much that he'd accidentally blurted, "Why are you here?" Riwoo had given him a very odd look at that, a sort of pinched glance that was interpreted by Jaehyun to be a death threat. This theory was further proven when Riwoo didn't ever end up answering. So Jaehyun supposes he should just die already, yeah.

His editor, Taesan, who Jaehyun treats more like a friend than an editor, told him, “This is so dumb. How can you live with someone you don't even talk to?” Jaehyun doesn’t know the answer to that question, but his subconscious mind must, because he’s been living this way for three months and doesn’t plan on changing anytime soon. His half-brother, Woonhak, who Jaehyun has been repeatedly begging to move in with, told him, “You can’t be this scared of someone, Hyung.” But Jaehyun isn't. He just, you know, has very healthy reactions to ideas of people disliking him.

Both individuals are currently sitting at a table with Jaehyun, squished up against each other across from him because they’re ObviouslyNotDating,Hyung,We’reJustReallyClose,Yes,WeSleepInTheSameBed. Whatever that means.

“It’s fine,” Jaehyun is saying. “I just have to finish this novel and then I can move out. Easy.”

“You’re five thousand words into the first draft,” Taesan deadpans. He drums his fingers on Woonhak from where his arm is wrapped around the younger’s shoulders.

“But I have it all planned out,” whines Jaehyun. “That’s why I can’t move right now. All my notes are in my room.”

“You could just clean up and collect your notes properly instead of constantly digging around for them,” suggests Woonhak.

“I don’t want to be hearing this from you, Kim Woonhak. You’re even messier than I am.”

Woonhak frowns. “Am not.”

“Are too.” Jaehyun looks out the window, watching people pass by carelessly, then back to their table, where two plates of untouched tiramisu lay. “Are we going to finish this?”

“I’m off sugar,” says Woonhak, still looking mildly offended at Jaehyun’s accusation.

“No you’re not. I saw you sneak a sip of Taesan’s milkshake four minutes ago.”

“What—hey! That was just a little treat. I’m off sugar, seriously.”

“Fine.” Jaehyun turns to Taesan. “Taesan?”

Taesan shakes his head. “I don’t like tiramisu.”

The two slices of tiramisu stare up at Jaehyun with tears in their eyes. Jaehyun stares back at them guiltily. It’s not that you’re not wanted, he whispers to them in his head, I was gonna eat you guys, but I lost my appetite once I started thinking about my roommate. Out loud, Jaehyun says, “I’ll take these to-go then. It was nice seeing you two again.”

“You better be done with your first draft by the end of next month,” says Taesan. He rises from his seat, tugging on Woonhak’s arm to urge him along, but the latter doesn’t budge.

“I’m kinda concerned,” Woonhak mutters with furrowed eyebrows. “You're telling me you haven't talked to this guy in the three months you've lived together? What happened to being a social butterfly, Hyung?"

Jaehyun feels mildly offended at that, because A) it isn't as if he's met either of them in three months, so what would Woonhak know about his social-butterfly-tendencies that have seemingly disappeared, and B) "You make it sound worse than it is. I don't not talk to him."

"You just said you don't talk to him."

"I meant it in the way where I'm not purposely avoiding him." Jaehyun is avoiding him. "I know he doesn't actually want me to die." Well…. "And it's fine. I'm just doing whatever."

"You beg to move in with me twice every week."

"Can a man not express affection for his brother? What society are we living in?"

"At least try to talk to him," snorts Taesan. "You're going to be living together indefinitely at this point. You can't ignore him forever."

Jaehyun glares at him. "Can't I? It's not as if he's trying."

"You're ridiculous," Woonhak says, sounding scarily similar to Sungho. "I swear, one day you're going to realize you want to get to know him, and this whole conversation will have been in vain."

"Waiting for that day," replies Jaehyun, "'cus it's not coming anytime soon."

When he arrives home, Jaehyun is mulling over how worth-it it is to email Taesan that he's quitting writing and becoming a 9-to-5 office worker. Just like how the thought lacks novelty, the sight of Riwoo scrolling on his phone at the dining table is nothing new. Something familiar crawls up Jaehyun's spine at that—like maybe his new routine consists of locking himself in his room, rethinking his life choices, and ignoring the fact that he shares the apartment space with someone else. Which would be a fairly sad routine, but Jaehyun supposes he's been telling himself he needs some consistency in his life anyway, so. There's that.

The last shred of his conscience whispers that he needs to preserve the take-out tiramisu clutched in his hands. Jaehyun kicks off his sneakers by the door (haphazardly, making for quite the contrast against Riwoo's nicely-aligned dress shoes) and shuffles his way past the dining table into the kitchen. Or, well, he's meant to make it past the dining table, but he doesn't get very far when Riwoo says, "Is that tiramisu?"

Jaehyun freezes. His train of thought comes skidding to a stop; for a moment, he just stands in front of where Riwoo sits like an idiot. A part of him wonders if this is just a new addition to their list of Pieces of Dialogue Required for Co-habilitation, but no matter what his brain comes up with (and that's lots given his imagination), he can't find a reason as to why Is that tiramisu? would be a Piece of Dialogue Required for Co-habilitation. The next assumption is that Riwoo cares to ask unprompted, but that's strange because he'd never bothered to ask anything unprompted before.

And when Jaehyun looks at him—properly looks at him, he means—Riwoo looks like he knows he said something off-script. His expression is pinched in the same way that it'd been pinched back when Jaehyun had said his very stupid, Why are you here?, which would be scarier if Riwoo hadn't been the one to initiate interaction this time around. Now it just feels like they're in an odd stalemate; Riwoo looks like he's three seconds away from taking his question back and Jaehyun's three seconds away from ignoring that this exchange ever occurred.

You see, hours ago, Taesan had said, You can't ignore him forever, and Jaehyun had thought, Watch me, because it was some childish thing to want to prove everyone wrong. Now, though, with some easily-thought-up routine of locking himself in his room, rethinking his life choices, and ignoring the fact that he shares the apartment space with someone else, the other kicking child in Jaehyun cries, I don't want to be boring! Jaehyun unwillingly lets the two screaming children battle it out in his head.

He should not be thinking to break this half-treaty they've developed in the past three months. He should think about letting it go, allowing the question to slip by with a simple answer and feigned ignorance. He should think about proving Taesan and Woonhak wrong, about standing at this stalemate forever until he eventually learns to live nonchalantly just like everyone around him. But the stupid kicking child who doesn't want to be boring wins and Jaehyun's half-forming thought of, If I'm going to live by routine, I get to let go at least once, throws him in a loop and he ends up blurting out, "Um, yeah."

Something about seeking change even when he shouldn't. Something about not wanting to accept things handed on silver platters. He's never been good at listening to himself anyway, which is why he ignores the, YOU SHOULD BE AVOIDING THE MAN IN FRONT OF YOU, and the, YOU REFUSED TO TRY TALKING TO HIM JUST HOURS EARLIER, that spins around at the forefront of his mind. That somehow makes room for even more abrasiveness; Jaehyun continues, "Do you want some? I have two slices."

Riwoo doesn't respond for a while. His gaze drifts from the clear packaging to Jaehyun's face, and he quickly looks away from that. The action doesn't work wonders for Jaehyun's self-esteem, believe it or not. A little, Why do you love creating problems for yourself?, floats around in the imaginary world of his mind. But the stubborn part of him keeps the take-out package extended. One anomaly, he tells himself, just one, and then we can go back to being boring and pretending the other doesn't exist. There's no good reason to talk besides curiosity—he'll shut me down and I'll remember to keep to myself and we'll stick to Pieces of Dialogue Required for Co-habilitation again.

That seems to be the plan up until Riwoo opens his mouth and says, "Sure."

Jaehyun blinks. Sure? Sure. No, sure. Let's go beyond Pieces of Dialogue Required for Co-habilitation. Let's hastily peel off the wrapper of the take-out fork. Let's take a seat on the opposite end of the dining table in a practiced motion as if they've eaten across from each other many times before (spoiler: they haven't eaten across from each other once). It's apart of the one anomaly, Jaehyun tells himself as he blankly watches Riwoo fiddle with the plastic barrier. It's back to normal after this.

But then Riwoo lifts the fork to his mouth, chews through a bite of tiramisu, and brightens. Blooms. Smiles, ear-to-ear, as if there's no place he'd rather be, and how the hell is Jaehyun supposed to go back to normal after that?

Jaehyun wouldn't say he's an expert on mannerisms. Being tuned into emotions isn't the same thing as being able to read body language well. Oftentimes, he's more focused on regulating his own expressions than studying others'. So it's not that he takes time to notice—it's not that he's staring at Riwoo, tracing a path across his features that he'd never taken the time to find—but it's that the way Riwoo looks, smile cracking open in satisfaction, bright and lovely and joyed, draws him in like a moth to a flame, and suddenly Jaehyun's heart is giving way into a stutter. Two stutters. Three stutters. No—his heart is beating entirely too fast.

Oh. Oh.

Shit.

Riwoo isn’t just pretty. He’s gorgeous. He has two prominent moles that Jaehyun never noticed before—one at the corner of his left eye and one just beneath his lower lip—and mono-lids that accentuate his sharper features. His lips dip low in the center but curve upwards at the corners, as if he’s always smiling in a sly, foxy way. And the slope of his nose is just perfectly sculpted. Riwoo isn’t just gorgeous. He’s ethereal.

This is a bad realization to have an hour after you try to convince yourself that one breakaway from your boring routine is enough to keep you satisfied with said boring routine. It's an even worse realization to have when you take it a step further and start considering that Riwoo's smile is something that you want to have in your boring routine. In fact, if you start looking at it from an overly-optimistic perspective (one that could only be possessed by a romance poet), said boring routine might be significantly less boring if you were exposed to Riwoo's bright expression everyday. But this is also a bad realization to have if, during the first time you encountered this expression, you panicked so hard that you blurted out, I have to go to the bathroom!, only to run straight into your room and slam the door shut.

That's two counts of Horrifically Mortifying Memories Involving Riwoo That Jaehyun Will Remember for the Rest of his Life. Spectacular. He was definitely looking for more than one.

In his defense, Jaehyun didn't mean to panic that badly. It's just that there's only so much one can do when they're experiencing the very butterflies-in-stomach feeling that they write about oh-so-often. And realizing that it's real calls for a great deal of reflection, but Jaehyun's never been good at sorting out his thoughts in front of others (especially not those who are the source of his distress), so what else was he supposed to do? Confess his undying love on the spot?

For the past hour, Jaehyun has been making a futile attempt to reason with himself. It would be ridiculous, he reasons, for a romance author to fall in love so trivially when he's written of such grand displays of love and splendid first meetings. There's no way he can fall in love with a roommate he was convinced he'd avoid forever, he reasons, and there's no way he can fall in love over tiramisu.

He tries to be logical. Logically, it's a very bad idea to completely erase everything he'd ever thought of their living arrangement to be. Logically, he shouldn't try to change what's been working for three months already. Logically, he should forget that this ever happened and return to his state of ignoring the fact that he's living with someone else.

But if Jaehyun were even remotely good at thinking logically, he wouldn't be feeling something ugly claw its way into his chest. He wouldn't be actively trying to find some footing in his racing thoughts and started poems. He wouldn't be having these terrible, plaguing visions of Riwoo's eyes squinting in satisfaction, lips stretching around his canine-fangs, practical flowers blooming in his visage. And he wouldn't be thinking about how the feeling of seeing Riwoo's seemingly-cold expression crack into such beauty is a feeling that he wants to experience over and over and over again.

Jaehyun screams.

"What the hell!" yelps Sungho, voice almost peaking over Jaehyun's speaker thresholds. "I literally had my phone on full volume, Jaehyun! What happened to hello? How are you? The least you could do is not scream as a greeting!"

That sobers him up a little. Logical. Jaehyun can do logical. He can most certainly learn a bit about being logical from the most logical person he knows. "I may have fell in love with Riwoo over tiramisu an hour ago," he says, "and now I need you to tell me it's a good idea to buy desserts for him every other night as an incentive for bonding because I spent the past three months avoiding him."

It goes a long time without an answer. Then Sungho, voice colored with incredulity, says, "Are you high? I think you're high," and hangs up.

The first thing Riwoo does when he enters the apartment is shed his coat and fold it onto the couch. Days have gotten colder recently; first snow came three days ago and Jaehyun's been shivering at his desk ever since. Next goes the scarf, hung on the living room's adjustable rack. The rack used to be Sungho's; it didn't follow the latter on his way to chase corporate dreams and was left unused until Riwoo moved in. At least, that's what Jaehyun assumes, because he hasn't ever stopped to notice that Riwoo was using it. He may have known that Riwoo was the type to own and sort such a fashionable assortment of headscarves, coats, and vests, but he hadn't really known known. It seems like most of his Riwoo-information had been assumptions up until now.

The next thing Riwoo does is peel off his winter gloves and set them beside his coat. He runs a freed hand through the strands of his hair (cut short and dyed blond now to where it used to be wine red) before sighing twice like he's waited ages to return home. Then he slowly drops to a crouch and collapses butt-down onto the furry mat placed just in front of the entrance. Jaehyun's pretty sure the only thing stopping him from laying stomach-down is the fact that their mat doesn't cover that length.

Jaehyun supposes he isn't supposed to see this part. He feels a little embarrassed all of a sudden, partially because this is the first time he's witnessed Riwoo's returning-home routine after three months of living together and partially because Riwoo being unaware of his presence is sort of like Jaehyun lying to him. When Riwoo, gaze pinned to his shoes (that haven't been taken off yet) (Jaehyun had assumed that he was the type of person to get everything done as soon as possible; it seems like that was an inaccurate assumption) (he supposes Sungho never had a knack for becoming friends with people similar to him), begins to reach for the phone in his jacket pocket, Jaehyun reluctantly clears his throat. Riwoo's head immediately snaps to him. He looks more than a little mortified to be the subject of Jaehyun's attention.

"Um," says Jaehyun, eloquently.

Riwoo doesn't say anything in return. Jaehyun is about to take that as a sign that he wants him dead when Riwoo finally utters, "Sorry."

That's not what Jaehyun was expecting. "What?"

Riwoo's open mouth closes then, almost as if he'd said something he didn't mean to. But the way his expression shifts into a more hesitant one when he looks back to his shoes does nothing good for Jaehyun's heart. For a moment, watching how Riwoo furrows his eyebrows at nothing in particular, Jaehyun feels like he's the one who's giving mixed signals about hatred.

"I-" Jaehyun starts, and then he's not sure how to finish. It's a game of pick the answer except there's no answer key and a hell of a risk: A) I love you B) I don't think you hate me C) I think I could maybe start to properly be your roommate now that I'm realizing you can make expressions other than the cold one you wore every single time we interacted in the past and D) I bought chocolate croissants. "I bought chocolate croissants."

Riwoo looks up at him. His eyebrow twitches a little—in more of a confused way than a hateful way (at least, Jaehyun thinks), like he's wondering what the purpose of that sentence is. "Okay." He glances fleetingly at his door before he looks back at Jaehyun. Jaehyun knows that glance; in fact, he's usually a big fan of it. It's called the INeedHelp glance, although Jaehyun isn't sure how Riwoo's closed bedroom door is going to help him out in the same way Park Sungho had once helped Jaehyun out. Either way, it looks like Riwoo wants nothing to do with Jaehyun and everything to do with getting the hell out.

Jaehyun can't help the way his stomach churns with that realization. "Just," he says quickly, a terrible, no-good attempt to catch Riwoo's attention again. The word sounds desperate and also a little forceful so Jaehyun blinks, counts to three in his head, and blurts, "I have extra. So. If, if you wanted any. You can have it."

By extra, he may mean that he purposely bought a dozen because he opened the fridge this morning and found no trace of leftover tiramisu, which means that Riwoo had been so unperturbed by Jaehyun's suddenly declaration of, I need to go to the bathroom!, that he'd finished the two slices on his own. It also means that Riwoo has quite the sweet tooth, so no, Sungho, Jaehyun is not high, he did not think of an unreasonable plan, and he did not make unreasonable assumptions. Desserts can most definitely fix the gaping chasm between them.

"Haha," Jaehyun adds awkwardly as if it'll ease the tension. Riwoo doesn't reply, so Jaehyun does the obvious: he rambles. "It's just, not to be presumptuous, but you ate both slices of tiramisu yesterday, which is fair because that cafe's goods are delicious, and I figured that meant you liked desserts too. I have a huge sweet tooth—to the point where it might even be concerning, actually—but I tend to overestimate how many sweets I can actually handle, which is why I bought a dozen of chocolate croissants. Obviously I can't eat twelve chocolate croissants on my own, and I think any dessert tastes terrible after sitting overnight, so I thought I might at least offer. That is, only if you want them. I can also just let them sit overnight and stomach them tomorrow—"

"Sure." Riwoo interrupts. "I'll have one."

Jaehyun tries not to visibly perk up, but he assumes he fails because his hand knocks into his mug (thankfully empty). That makes it very hard to appear normal when he replies, "Cool."

If Riwoo is disturbed by the display of pathetic-ness, he doesn't show it. He's just a bit awkward as he rises from his place on the floor and peels off his shoes (placed neatly by the door, once again a contrast to Jaehyun's own messy shoe-handling). It's almost intelligible when he mutters, "You're right."

Jaehyun blinks. "Huh?"

"I like desserts." Riwoo doesn't look at him as he reaches for a croissant in the box.

"Oh." That's one correct assumption in Jaehyun's book, which is one more than none. So far, his plan is looking slightly less insane than it'd seemed the night before. "Cool." Then, because he doesn't mean to sound like a south-Californian dude-bro, "I guess that's one thing we have in common."

Riwoo glances up at him. Jaehyun winces. He's about to completely change the subject and pretend like he hadn't thrown out entry one in Top Ten Awkward Flirts One Could Use During a Blind Date when Riwoo says, "It's a little hard to tell what we have in common when we rarely talk."

Okay. Truth nuke. Jaehyun winces again. The thing is that Riwoo's tone isn't harsh—he doesn't sound as if he's reprimanding Jaehyun for the latter's avoidance. In fact, if Jaehyun repeats the moment in his head multiple times, he can almost catch a hint of a joking tone. As if Riwoo finds Jaehyun's sentence amusing. As if the fact that this is their first time holding a half-conversation is interesting. Or maybe the more shocking thing is that Riwoo might actually be joking. The very roommate that Jaehyun had thought to be a cold Seoul man is joking with Jaehyun about the very impression that he'd made. What the hell, sure.

Before Jaehyun can come up with an adequate response to that, Riwoo bites into the croissant. Just like the day before, his expression melts into satisfaction as he chews, wide grin, relaxed brows and everything, which obviously works wonders for Jaehyun. He tries not to actively clutch at his chest like he's going into cardiac arrest, but the last part might be half true with the way his heart-rate is steadily increasing.

When Jaehyun blinks back to reality, Riwoo has his expression pulled back together in some sort of not-hatred, not-satisfaction middle ground. Well, manners. Jaehyun fixes himself upright. "Sorry, was I staring?"

Riwoo lowers the croissant-holding hand. "A little."

"Sorry," repeats Jaehyun, now trying to find a way to salvage the situation. "It's a habit of mine. I tend to get lost in my thoughts, and I just—uh, well. It's just that I've never seen you make that face before."

Riwoo lowers the hand even further.

For someone who doesn't usually have a hard time getting what he wants, Jaehyun is doing a fantastic job at fumbling over himself and saying the wrong things. Abort. Abort mission. "Not in a bad way," he hurries to clarify as if that does anything to help his case, "it just got me thinking, and my imagination is a bit wild so I was thinking hard-hard. Again, not in a bad way. You know how it is. Like, it's less about what actually triggered it so I guess I could say it's not actually about you? Or, well—" Fuck. "Not about you making that face. Not that you make a particular face. Not that—I was just—"

"Reflecting on the fact that this is your second time seeing me make a face besides my default one?" Riwoo cuts in. This time, the teasing intention is glaringly obvious even though it's paired with a flat tone. And if it weren't obvious from the sentence alone, Riwoo's lips are curled upwards in a somewhat-wry smile.

Jaehyun feels his throat dry. His heart starts hammering again as if he wasn't already smitten enough. Something about the exchange is so startlingly new that Jaehyun can't help but wonder if every interaction would've gone this way if only he had reached out sooner. But in his defense—well, in his defense, it wasn't as if Riwoo had made it particularly easy before this. Following that train of thought, he ends up blurting out, "Well, you didn't make it particularly easy before this."

Riwoo blinks at him. Then his gaze drifts somewhere off to the side and he takes another bite, this time slower, more deliberate, and his expression does nothing but remain pensive.

That's what tells Jaehyun he's said something wrong. He opens his mouth to backtrack before he realizes he really has no room to backtrack; if anything, he was the one who insisted on avoiding Riwoo, so what right does he have to both accuse him and take back his accusation? Even an apology seems redundant. So basically Jaehyun should just pull out a rocket launcher and blow himself up. After a few beats of silence accompanied only by sounds of chewing, Jaehyun says quietly, "It would be nice, though."

Riwoo looks up at him, a neutral action that doesn't show prying nor a lack of interest.

"Getting to know you," Jaehyun clarifies, and maybe that's too intense for day two of The Change of Plans but when has he ever been good at being dishonest? A little bit of thinly-veiled confessions and crossing-of-roommate-boundaries never hurt anyone.

Riwoo looks away at that. Jaehyun would take it as a sign of rejection if he hadn't picked up on Riwoo's habit of taking time to respond. Sure enough, just moments later, Riwoo replies, "Hm."

Well, 'hm' isn't really a reply, but something about the small acknowledgement has Jaehyun's heart swelling. "Although I guess it's kinda late for that."

There's no clear sign of a 'yes' or 'no' when Riwoo takes another bite of the croissant.

Subsequently, on the second day of The Change of Plans, Jaehyun learns the following about Riwoo from short, somewhat-stilted answers to an influx of questions:

1. The reason why Riwoo sometimes works at home and other times doesn't is because his job is in the field of fashion, hence providing a spontaneous schedule.

2. Only Riwoo's close friends call him Sanghyuk. Jaehyun debates asking if he could belong in that group; he decides not to after three seconds of considering it.

3. Riwoo's favorite dessert is donuts. He tried them once while traveling abroad and has been dreaming about them ever since. (Jaehyun attentively notes that one down.)

4. Riwoo met Sungho through a shared class in college. Apparently, Riwoo hadn't made any moves to befriend Sungho, but Sungho had been very blunt about wanting to become acquaintances. (Jaehyun also notes that down—just something to mull over.)

5. Riwoo does not take interest in films or TV shows but has no issue watching vlogs. If Jaehyun thinks about it harder, he can make out a vague, It's interesting to see people go about their lives.

6. Riwoo does not worry about hair damage when dying his hair. And no, he is not particularly attached to the blond. In fact, he briefly mentions something about wanting to dye it again soon. ("But didn't you dye it just last week?" Jaehyun asks incredulously, and to that Riwoo pauses before answering, "I dyed it a month ago." So it looks like Jaehyun's just been overly attached to avoidance.)

7. Riwoo never needed to split the rent. He only needed a place to live that was convenient. (For a moment, Jaehyun wants to blurt, "Why didn't you move out the moment you realized your roommate was adamantly avoiding you?" but he's not sure he wants the answer to that.)

But the real thing Jaehyun learns is that talking to Riwoo is a game of reading between the lines. So along with what he learns from short, somewhat-stilted answers, he learns the following:

1. Riwoo is not cold. He's a little awkward, maybe, or somewhat shy, but he doesn't have trouble with Jaehyun. He just has trouble talking about himself. (Jaehyun finds that endearing—he fights down a smile throughout the entirety of their mini questionnaire.)

2. For all that he seems to avoid attention, Riwoo sometimes seeks it in the form of witty jokes or particularly engaging anecdotes. It's those moments that catch Jaehyun off-guard; in the span of thirty minutes, there are a grand total of twelve instances where he ends up staring wide-eyed at Riwoo before bursting into laughter.

3. Riwoo has plenty of expressions for Jaehyun to catalogue, each with its own indecipherable meaning. Just when Jaehyun thinks he can put a label on one, Riwoo uses it in a different way, and suddenly Jaehyun's not sure if a quirk of the left brow means This-is-funny or My-interest-is-piqued.

4. There's more to love about Riwoo than just his grin; plenty more, actually, like the way he gets embarrassed when Jaehyun expresses interest in his answer or the way he only smiles once Jaehyun laughs at his joke or the way he doesn't seem to mind that Jaehyun digresses, just gently brings him back on track with a, So about Sungho.

5. Riwoo notices a lot. Jaehyun finds this funny because he's busy noticing a lot about Riwoo. He supposes they're just mutually expanding their books on each other—at least, he hopes they are. He hopes Riwoo cares enough to note down what he notices; a part of him even hopes that Riwoo only notices when it comes to him. (That's improbable, but whatever.)

6. Riwoo does not hate Jaehyun. No—he might not even dislike him. Jaehyun stayed up the previous night going down rabbit holes of I-can't-love-hims and I-can't-not-love-hims, so sleep-deprived and nonsensical rants are a guarantee; combined with his uncanny ability to say the wrong things when presented with the love of his life, it's safe to say he embarrasses himself far too many times. But it's not embarrassing in the same way it'd been during the handshake at the door, because this time Riwoo looks… amused. (That is, if Jaehyun's reading him right. The question of, Am I reading you right or have I been interpreting you wrong and you actually wanted me out thirty minutes ago?, is genuinely a bit too intense for day two of The Change of Plans.)

Jaehyun's not-creepy list of Riwoo's habits ends up looking similar in length to one of his work-in-progress poems. That fact is both vaguely concerning and a little inspiring. He figures one day he'll have enough to write a book out of his love alone.

Three months after they begin living together, Jaehyun and Riwoo exchange phone numbers for the first time. Riwoo's profile picture is a zoomed-in photo of a small white dog. "Daebak," he explains, "one of the two dogs I have back home." Jaehyun replies, "I used to be scared of dogs," and Riwoo smiles, crooked.

It's frankly odd how much their relationship has progressed in a handful of days alone. Jaehyun would say it's because of his constant efforts (sitting on the other end of the couch while Riwoo is watching a video on the TV, digging up old stories to share just because he thinks Riwoo will find them amusing, finding question after question to ask less for the answers Riwoo'll give and more to watch how Riwoo's expression shifts in consideration) but if he's being reasonable, it's probably the desserts.

Now, Jaehyun's never given himself a monthly budget because he's never spent more than what was necessary (something he learned after many, many years of working many, many part-time jobs). But if he did have a monthly budget, he's sure he would've surpassed it by now, given that he's spent way too much on premium desserts these past few days. It's worth it, he always ends up mentally whispering to the packaged goods (a habit he's developed now that the tiramisu-whispering seemed to bring him the good luck of seeing Riwoo smile). He'll be so happy when he eats you.

It's not looking very good for Jaehyun's wallet or heart. But he's somewhat made peace with that in the way where the half-cardiac-arrest feels normal now. Gummy-smiles when Riwoo looks at him with that I'm-surprised-that-this-is-so-good expression come easily. Even writing is going smoother—hell, Taesan's concerned about the pace that he's working at. Five days after the Change of Plans, he called Jaehyun, asking, "Hyung, have you been skipping sleep these past few days? You haven't written this much since April of last year."

So the dessert prices? Jaehyun can shelve that problem away for another time. As of right now, the cost is practically nothing in comparison to the revenue. If revenue counts as Riwoo talking to him and smiling at him and giving him all the more reason to stay smitten. If revenue counts as their relationship growing exponentially in closeness. It's not totally roommates—not quite, but also not quite not quite; so basically they're one less than more, whatever the hell that means—but it's something, and they eat dinner together now, go on digestion walks together now, watch performance videos together now, hovering next to each other with little distance and yet no contact at all.

Jaehyun from two weeks ago may have gone into real cardiac arrest if he saw Jaehyun now. But on the other hand, Jaehyun now has a hard time believing he'd ever lived a routine without Riwoo. The way the latter slips into his life is calculated, pointed, smooth in all the ways that matter. Another hand coming up to rest against Jaehyun's, palm-to-palm, gaps to fingers, a slight warmth in the approaching winter. (Intertwining them is an entirely different matter.)

It's easy in a way Jaehyun had never expected, maybe because Riwoo had given off the impression of anything but easy. A part of him supposes that it had never been that hard; all he'd had to do was try.

He snaps a picture of the dessert display in front of him now, fingers moving on instinct to open his messages with Riwoo. Beside him, Taesan pointedly sighs.

"What?" Jaehyun asks without looking up from his phone. His sent photo lights up with a read symbol. Three dots indicating reply-in-progress appear.

"You really called me out here just to buy desserts for your roommate?" When Jaehyun, eagerly waiting for Riwoo's response, still doesn't look up, Taesan pinches his arm. Jaehyun yelps. "We were supposed to have a check-in on your novel, in case you've forgotten."

"Sorry," Jaehyun replies sheepishly. He reluctantly pockets his phone and reminds himself to apologize to Riwoo later. "They're just such nice desserts, you know? Who can resist sending a picture or two?"

Taesan levels him with a deadpan glare. "Just buy the desserts, Hyung."

They end up sitting at one of the two-person tables by the window, elbows and dessert boxes set on top. Taesan fiddles with his Americano's straw and looks at Jaehyun as if he's waiting for an explanation. Jaehyun stares back at him.

"Well?" prompts Taesan.

"Well, it's been going well," Jaehyun answers obediently. "Good thing I have lots of experience with making friends. It's just that I'm not very experienced with introvert-introverts, and he's basically the introvert of all time, so there's that. It's surprisingly easy, though. I guess introverts open up quicker when they're exposed to things they like. Are you like that too?"

"I'm an E," Taesan says, unamused, "and I was asking about your novel, not your boyfriend."

Riwoo isn't his boyfriend, but sure. "Oh. Yeah. The novel's going alright too."

"Understatement of the century." Taesan tilts his drink in Jaehyun's direction. "Seriously, you haven't written this much in forever. And it's not bad either. It's a bit different than I remember your writing being, but it feels more authentic. Could almost be song lyrics."

Jaehyun perks up. "Really? I feel like it's just been coming natural to me lately."

Taesan looks at him strangely. "…You don't say."

Before Jaehyun can ask him what he means by that, a buzzing sounds from his coat pocket. It only takes a quick glance to have Jaehyun answering as quick as he can. "Riwoo?"

Across from him, Taesan pointedly sighs again, but Jaehyun could care less when the response from the other end of the line is a quick, "Look to your right." And to Jaehyun's right, separated by the cafe's glass window, is Lee Riwoo with a scarf pulled over his head and light snow dusted over his shoulders. He taps the glass twice, phone still held up to his ear, a subtle smile on his face, and Jaehyun feels his heart skip a beat. Taesan, following his gaze, rolls his eyes.

"What are you doing here?" Jaehyun asks when Riwoo makes his way into the cafe and over to their table. He doesn't even try to hide the grin that takes over his face; it's cheeky, probably, because the moments Riwoo initiates contact are rare and all-the-more memorable.

Riwoo shrugs. "I was around this area when you sent me that photo. Thought I'd stop by and say hi."

"Stay," urges Jaehyun. "There's room."

Riwoo glances at the seat Taesan's occupying. Taesan looks back up at him and says, "Hey," in the stilted voice that always appears when he's meeting one of Jaehyun's friends. Riwoo looks half-flustered at that.

So maybe Jaehyun should take back his words. "What I meant to say was that I'm done here." Taesan's gaze snaps back to Jaehyun. He looks mildly offended. "Where are you headed? I'll come with."

Riwoo looks away from Taesan and to Jaehyun instead, blinking. "I was just going to go home. Did you drive here?"

"No, he drove me."

"We can take a walk around this block and head home together then."

"It's snowing outside. Aren't you afraid you're going to catch a cold?"

Riwoo flashes him a cheeky smile. "I taped myself full of hand-warmers today."

Jaehyun needs to slam his head into the nearest wall. Seems like he can't react naturally to Riwoo's smile no matter how many times he sees it. "Always prepared, huh?"

"You know it."

"Then I'd love to go on that walk." Jaehyun rises from his seat, bringing himself to just a few inches above Riwoo. He threads two fingers through the take-out bag's handles and tries to ignore the fact that they're maybe only a foot apart. "I bought two roll cakes too, if you want any right now."

"Maybe later when we're home. Is the bag heavy? I can carry it for you."

Jaehyun shakes his head. "Your hands get cold easily; you should keep them pocketed."

"Very considerate of you," Riwoo muses.

"Only when it comes to you," Jaehyun replies.

"I'll see you later, Hyung," interrupts Taesan with little care. Even without looking, Jaehyun can tell he's mildly disturbed and mildly pissed—but that's not his problem, so whatever. "Woonhak sends you his regards."

Jaehyun nods a little, only glancing back at Taesan when Riwoo looks towards the exit. "Take care," he says, and then he mindlessly follows Riwoo out.

It takes passing three shops in silence for Jaehyun to feel like something is off. Walks without talking aren't abnormal for them per say, but the way Riwoo's eyebrows are drawn together feels purposeful. (Jaehyun would like to say he's an expert on the minuscule changes in Riwoo's mood these days. How accurate that statement actually is is its own topic.) While the streets most certainly aren't empty, they're not busy to the point where Riwoo should be pressed shoulder-to-arm with Jaehyun; if Riwoo's hands weren't tucked into his pockets, his and Jaehyun's might've even brushed.

"Something on your mind?" Jaehyun asks carefully. There's no use trying to hide when he's thinking about Riwoo—that's something he learned these past few days with Riwoo always catching him staring and all.

Almost as if he was waiting for Jaehyun to ask, Riwoo immediately responds, "Who was that back there?"

Jaehyun blinks. Given that they'd gotten so close in just a handful of days, he'd almost forgotten that Riwoo knew relatively little about his personal life. And it isn't as if Jaehyun's vibrant half-real half-made-up stories have assigned names to any of the people involved; probably an oversight on Jaehyun's part to not have introduced them to each other earlier. "That's Taesan," he says now, trying to recall all of the anecdotes stemming from a nameless Taesan. "He's my editor, but I'd say our relationship goes past business."

"Ah." Riwoo doesn't say more than that for a moment. Then, "You're close with him?"

It sounds like more of a statement than a question, but Jaehyun still answers, "Yeah. I guess that's a given since we've known each other for… three years now? He used to be really shy, you know. He still is sometimes—I mean, you saw him back there—but it's a lot better now. He no longer looks at me with those eyes that makes me feel like I've kicked a cat."

Riwoo hums in acknowledgment. "Why aren't you two living together?"

Jaehyun turns to blink at him, but Riwoo doesn't seem to be looking in his direction. "…Why should we live together?"

"Because you're close," Riwoo says. Like it's simple. Like it's obvious.

Jaehyun stares at him a little harder. There's a certain look to Riwoo's face that Jaehyun's never seen before; something uncategorized but vaguely displeased. No, not displeased—maybe annoyed? For what reason, Jaehyun has no clue. All things considered, he's probably responsible in one way or another. "He's busy maintaining a not-relationship with my half-brother, Woonhak. I think I mentioned him a few times. They're supposedly not living together and not dating, but I'm not sure if anyone besides them really believes that." Jaehyun pauses, then continues, "Anyway, I think you're a better roommate than he'd ever be. I'm glad it's you."

"We've been talking for less than two weeks, Jaehyun-ah."

"Doesn't change anything," Jaehyun says cheekily. He watches as Riwoo's expression fractures into a small smile—frighteningly contrasting to the half-annoyance he'd worn just before. "You think so too, right?"

The question is mostly meant to be rhetorical, somewhat of a tease in the way they always throw rhetoric back and forth. In fact, Jaehyun's already turning back to the street view ahead of them when Riwoo murmurs, "Yeah, I do."

Huh. "Huh?"

"I do," Riwoo repeats. He's smiling sheepishly this time, the sort of expression that Jaehyun has learned to categorize as, I-didn't-have-to-say-this-but-I-did-anyway-because-I-knew-you'd-like-it. "I'm glad it's you too." Then, as if he hadn't just dropped a bomb on Jaehyun, he pulls out a hand from his pocket and gently nudges the small of Jaehyun's back to keep him walking.

"Riwoo—" Jaehyun starts, sort of unsure how to finish.

"Sanghyuk," Riwoo corrects. "Call me Sanghyuk."

Jaehyun's mouth snaps shut. His heart leaps into his throat. For the rest of the walk and the drive home, he tries to stop himself from wondering if calling Riwoo 'Sanghyuk' means he's a close friend or something more.

TAETNYANGIE

i don't want to hear from u unless u got a draft we HAVE to edit in person

cus u guys act like a married couple

its disgusting

YOU

who is this about

TAETNYANGIE

who do you THINK this is about

YOU

stop being cryptic?????

TAETNYANGIE

stop being dense?????

Jaehyun's not doing very good at 3am in the morning. He's been stuck on a stanza since the beginning of forever, erasing fragments of words and then rewriting them and then erasing them again (this time not because they don't sound right, but because he stares at them long enough that they begin to look like they're spelled wrong) (which turns out to be false, wasting away at both Jaehyun's time and sanity). When he mistakes his written 'why' as misspelled for the fourth time in ten minutes, he decides he should not be writing. He should probably be fixing some of his problems. A glance at the rotting bread on his desk tells him he's not very interested in that, so maybe he should just be going on a midnight walk.

Motivational 3am stroll is the name he gives it when he maneuvers his way through the piles of clothes on the floor of his bedroom. A friendly walk in the neighborhood. A refresher to jog his creative mind. A meeting-Riwoo-as-Riwoo-walks-out-of-the-hallway-bathroom-and-straight-into-Jaehyun's-shoulder. The last one was not what he planned to call it, but that's what happens.

"Sorry," Jaehyun whispers hurriedly, instinctively placing his hands on Riwoo's shoulders to steady the latter. Riwoo sways a little before his straightens, and then Jaehyun pulls his hands off of him as if burned. Physical contact still feels like a realm they've never explored, which would make Jaehyun currently a violator of personal space. "Sorry," he says again when he thinks of that.

"It's fine." Riwoo rubs at his eyes blearily. Jaehyun knows he stays up sometimes—more often than not, actually—but typically not until this late, given that he's a stickler for making it to any scheduled events on time. It's almost like it's impossible for him to be late to anything, which is a terrible contrast to Jaehyun himself. They had a half-discussion about that that ended in Jaehyun pointing out that they were pretty different people and a resulting too-honest, But I get along with you better than I've gotten along with anyone else. For some reason, Jaehyun can't quite remember what Riwoo's response was.

They hover there in the hallway until Jaehyun realizes with a start that he's still blocking the path to Riwoo's bedroom. "Sorry," he says for the third time as he moves out of the way.

"It's fine," Riwoo repeats. He shuffles past and barely brushes by Jaehyun. He must catch a glimpse of Jaehyun's room as he does so (Jaehyun never leaves his door open—he's afraid some dust-germs of his will infiltrate the living room (he doesn't own a purifier, but maybe he should)), because he pauses in front of the doorway, blinking as he looks inside.

Oh lords. Abort. Abort. It was not Jaehyun's plan to have Riwoo get an eyeful of his bad habits that he'd spent great effort trying not to mention (though he's sure some of them are obvious enough). He wonders briefly if Riwoo is tired enough to simply brush it off, go to sleep, and forget about it entirely, or if Riwoo is awake enough that he'll give that look that Woonhak likes to give Jaehyun: the dreaded, I'm kinda concerned.

Jaehyun reaches for the doorknob and quickly pulls it shut, as if the faster he closes it, the less likely Riwoo is to remember the scene. Riwoo blinks at the door once more, hard, and then sort of tilts his head at an angle facing away from Jaehyun. Jaehyun doesn't know if that's better or worse than an I'm kinda concerned face; he swallows down an unplaced fear and softly says, "Goodnight."

He doesn't hear a Goodnight in response. For a moment, he's sure his master plan of the-quicker-the-better has succeeded; on the other hand, maybe he should've known by now that Riwoo had a knack for surprising him. Tilting his head towards Jaehyun, Riwoo asks, "Are you headed somewhere?"

Huh. "Huh?"

"Are you headed somewhere?" Riwoo says again. This time, he looks up at Jaehyun, inquiring, and Jaehyun's stupid, no-good heart skips another beat. If he weren't so caught-up with digesting Riwoo's question, he would admire Riwoo's sleep-puffy cheeks some more.

"I was going to go on a walk." Trying to leave it vague, Jaehyun adds on, "To clear my mind, you know."

Riwoo nods lightly. Between them, walks are mutually agreed to be useful in some way, though Jaehyun ties it to mental aspects and Riwoo ties it to, well, actual digestive benefits. Which is whatever in the way where Jaehyun tags along on those digestion walks anyway—at least, he does so when Riwoo isn't A) gone for work or B) laying down right after eating because he's 'too lazy to go anywhere'. In any case, it may be slightly strange that Jaehyun's going on a walk at 3am, but not too strange to add onto the fact that his room reflects his disorganized state of life, right?

Or maybe not, because Riwoo's voice momentarily softens when he says, "You shouldn't go out this late at night."

The softened tone makes the back of Jaehyun's neck tingle; he rubs at it as if willing it to go away. "It's just going to be a quick stroll. I'll be back before you know it."

"Jaehyunnie," eases Riwoo, gentle in a way he'd never been before, and Jaehyun practically melts into the wall behind him. "It's cold, probably snowing, and this is the worst time to get sick. You can clear your mind in different ways."

"Like how?"

Riwoo looks to the side, eyes squinting briefly. "Midnight snack."

Jaehyun blinks. "Midnight snack?"

"Those cakes you bought yesterday," explains Riwoo. He fiddles with a thumb's painted nail. "Have a slice. Get your blood sugar up. Then sleep."

"I don't really—it's not a sleep problem though. Just writing."

"This late?"

Jaehyun briefly remembers that hiding his bad habits meant he'd hidden the fact that his sleeping schedule was in the dumps too. He's not sure how he succeeded in gate-keeping sleeping habits from the very person he lived with, but maybe that proves his determination. All that really tells him now is that he should keep working on gate-keeping, which is why he replies, "It is late, isn't it? You should go back to sleep, Sanghyuk-ah."

Riwoo's eyebrows furrow. He can probably recognize Jaehyun's very bad attempt at diverging his attention. "I'll eat with you."

"What? No. You sleep. I'll walk."

"Jaehyun."

"Just one round around the block, seriously. And I'll be quiet when I come back so I don't disturb you. Pinky-promise. Those cakes can hold out for another day anyway."

"Jaehyun-ah."

"Did I wake you up because I was too loud just now? Because I can go to sleep after I finish walking. Just don't worry about me."

"Myung Jaehyun," says Riwoo, sounding awfully exasperated for someone who would rather use witty words than tone emphasis. "You always listen to me, so why not now?"

Jaehyun shuts his mouth. He stares at Riwoo blankly before he whispers, "Sorry."

"Don't be." Riwoo tugs down his fancy pajama sleeves. When he looks back at Jaehyun, his expression's softened once more. He tilts his head towards the living room. "Well?"

For someone who rarely stays up until 3am, Riwoo seems to have decent coherency. He yawns a little while he waits for the water to boil and reminds Jaehyun to grab two forks. He pours just the right ratio of cold-water to warm-water into Jaehyun's mug and doesn't let his grip falter when he brings it to the table. He sits down across from Jaehyun and taps his fingers on the edge of the table in a way that makes it seem like he's only admiring his own nails.

"Thanks," Riwoo says when Jaehyun wordlessly hands him a slice.

Jaehyun spears a piece off of his own. "I shouldn't be eating sweets this late."

"Neither should I. You know how puffy I get in the morning."

"I think it's cute," blurts Jaehyun before he can stop himself. He tries to fix his expression into the typical teasing one immediately afterwards; a part of him knows he's failed. Something in the 3am air makes it impossible.

Riwoo glances up at him. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Hm." And then Riwoo swallows a mouthful of cake and smiles all prettily again. Jaehyun presses his lips into a thin line and tries not to die. "Yah, where do you find all these desserts? They're always so good."

"Social media works wonders."

"Maybe I should finally sign up for Instagram."

Jaehyun tries to picture that. The only mental image he comes up with is a very delusional one of him tagging Riwoo in a soft-launch boyfriend post. "Maybe."

They lapse into silence after that. The comfortable kind, one that's expected at 3am and yet not all that different from the kind they share in more reasonable hours of the day. Riwoo seems to enjoy looking at Jaehyun as he chews through each bite of the cake, which does nothing good for Jaehyun's heart and mind. He finds himself praying that Riwoo won't bring up anything regarding the reason why they're sitting at a table and sharing dessert at 3am in the first place, which obviously ends up being its own sign that his wishes are going to go south.

"You should clean your room sometime," Riwoo says, and it's not really forceful but not really a simple suggestion either; it's some odd, ambiguous in-between that Riwoo seems to excel at.

The statement doesn't make Jaehyun uncomfortable—at least, not in the typical way—but it makes a part of him unsure, like maybe he should consider that Riwoo is uncomfortable. "Probably."

When Jaehyun doesnt elaborate, Riwoo prompts, "What's stopping you?"

See, if it were Jaehyun from weeks ago, he would've had a plethora of reasons to choose from, ranging from laziness to burnout to I-try-not-to-think-about-real-problems-so-I-can-focus-on-not-dying, but now it feels as if all of those things have been turned upside-down on their head. He's not lazy in the same way—it's easy to get up and out of the house if it means hunting down new desserts for Riwoo. He's not burnt out in the same way—it feels like words come easier when there's tangible love just outside his door. And there's more to think about than just real problems and not dying these days—namely, Riwoo, who's staring at him with another expression Jaehyun hasn't catalogued yet. For some odd reason, though, he feels like he can get this one even without prior experience—it reads like: I-care-about-you-and-I-always-have.

"I dunno," Jaehyun ends up answering, and then he laughs a little. "I guess it's just a bit unreasonable since it's so messy and I'm still living in it. It's not going to be cleaned in one day, but I work and sleep in there so there's not much I can do about it, you know? Anyway, it's been fine." Aside from the first statement, every word in his spoken sentence had been false.

Riwoo doesn't answer for a moment. His gaze is pinned onto the cake in that way it fixes itself when Riwoo's considering a solution. Finally: "You could sleep with me."

Huh. "Huh?"

"You could sleep in my room," Riwoo clarifies. "And work in the living room or at my desk. Then you would be able to clean it."

"Oh." Jaehyun's throat dries. "Oh. Um. I mean." What? "I mean, sure. If you'd let me."

Riwoo breaks into a wry smile then, though its a little more hesitant than it normally is. "Just don't know how you've gone three months in that room. It looks like hell on Earth."

That somehow snaps Jaehyun out of his daze. The teasing is familiar, comfortable, something to fall back on. "Sanghyuk," he gasps, mock-offended, "are you implying that I'd be a devil?"

Riwoo shrugs. He lifts another piece to his mouth, and, after finishing, says, "I'm serious."

Jaehyun swallows. "What, about me being a devil?" When Riwoo looks unamused at that, Jaehyun lowers his head in a feeble apology.

"You could even move in tonight." Riwoo stabs into a blueberry that's escaped. "We're both awake right now anyway."

"Are you serious?"

"I just said I was."

"Sanghyuk."

"Jaehyun."

"Just," Jaehyun starts, and his sentence fades out somewhere along the way, lost in What-the-hells. "Isn't it weird?"

Riwoo goes silent for a moment. "Do you think it's weird?"

Maybe, but in a good-weird way, in the way where I hope it's weird so it means it's not just normal to you and I'm not just normal to you and I mean something more. "Not really."

"Then why not?"

What a great question.

Over the course of the next week's nights, Jaehyun discovers the answer to that question: he should not be sleeping with Riwoo because Riwoo makes him feel like he's going back and forth between a teenage girl with a terrible crush and a marathon athlete who's about to go into cardiac arrest.

It starts out fine. By fine, Jaehyun means that he lays a blanket on the floor and just sleeps like that. Which turns out to be not fine in the way where he wakes up with aching bones and terrible eye bags the next morning. When Riwoo catches him massaging his shoulder, he asks, "Not a good experience on the floor?" and what else is Jaehyun supposed to say besides, "I'd rather die than sleep there again"?

Hence, on night two: Jaehyun and Riwoo in Riwoo's bed, a respectable distance between them that Jaehyun was convinced he could keep. The issue is that he's always been a cuddler—in his defense, Woonhak made it easy for him to grow up as a cuddler—so instead of waking up with aching bones and terrible eye bags the next morning, he wakes up with Riwoo in his arms. Talk about a one, two, skip-a-few situation. Jaehyun ends up screaming into his phone once Riwoo leaves for work; Sungho is not very happy about that.

Riwoo never brings it up, nor does he complain. He tells Jaehyun when he's about to go to sleep, reminds him not to stay up too late, and is curled up to the wall by the time Jaehyun makes it into the bedroom. On two out of the seven nights, it turns out that he's not asleep, and he ends up turning to face Jaehyun the moment the latter lifts the blanket up to sneak in. He said the same thing both times: "Feels like the room gets warmer as soon as you walk in." Like what the hell is that supposed to mean? Jaehyun decides he may have been built to be a cuddler, but he was not built for deciphering Ambiguous Words Before Cuddle Sessions (?).

And it isn't as if daytime is any easier, because Riwoo now dedicates a good portion of his time at home helping Jaehyun clean his room. It's less of him doing grunt-work and more of his presence working as an ever-constant reminder. He sits on the edge of the somewhat-disgusting bed and sifts through Jaehyun's box of collected memories in silence. Somehow, that sight is all it takes for Jaehyun to get off his ass and work.

Surprise, surprise—he finishes cleaning within three days. So why has he been sleeping with Riwoo for seven? He has absolutely no clue. And who's going to complain? Not him, that's for sure.

Riwoo doesn't shy away from the fact that he's shy. He also doesn't shy away from admitting that he has close friends besides Jaehyun—after all, if he didn't, there wouldn't exist a group of people who called him by the name 'Sanghyuk'.

In any case, there was never a good reason for Jaehyun to keep this in mind because he and Riwoo made plans alone and only alone or simply hung around in the apartment together. He supposes it still would've been good to note down now that he's opening the apartment door to a novel face that asks for a specific 'Sanghyuk-hyung'.

Jaehyun stands there awkwardly as Riwoo hugs Close Friend, also known as Leehan. Jaehyun hasn't known Leehan for long (met him at the door just minutes ago, actually), but from what he can tell, Leehan seems like both the type of guy who would never be close friends with Riwoo and exactly the type of guy who would be close friends with Riwoo. Which is strange, but Leehan himself is sort of strange (in an endearing way to the point where Jaehyun can tell why Riwoo holds affection for him) so Jaehyun supposes it all works out.

How does Jaehyun know Leehan's strange? Well, three minutes after they met for the first time at the entranceway, waiting for Riwoo to finish washing his face, Leehan leaned in and whispered to Jaehyun, "He likes you."

Jaehyun blinked. "What?"

"Hyung likes you," Leehan whispered again. And then he hadn't elaborated, just moved back like he'd said nothing at all.

"How do you know that?" asked Jaehyun after a brief moment of disbelief.

"'Cus it's Hyung," Leehan replied, smug. "He wouldn't be living here if he didn't like you."

Jaehyun's in the process of blow-drying Riwoo's hair when the latter says, "It's strange. I haven't read your writing before."

Jaehyun pauses in his motions for a brief moment before continuing to card through the strands. "Well, I haven't seen your fashion work before either."

"Hm."

"Hm?" Jaehyun prompts. "Your hair dries so straight. I'm a little bit jealous."

Riwoo shifts his head on Jaehyun's lap. "You shouldn't be. I like your hair."

"Really?" Without waiting for an answer, Jaehyun continues, "My writing is kind of weird sometimes. I don't really show it to other people. Unless it's, like, Taesan, but that's obligatory."

"Hm," Riwoo repeats. This single syllable sounds distinctly unhappier than the previous repetition, so Jaehyun bends down until he can observe Riwoo's expression while still drying his hair.

"What is it?" he asks, pinching at a strand.

Riwoo lets him pull. "Nothing."

"Doesn't seem like nothing."

"Just strange that Taesan's the only person you're close with that's seen your writing. That's all."

Jaehyun blinks. "Is there something wrong with that? He's my editor."

"Your friend more than your editor."

"Yeah, and?" When Riwoo doesn't respond, Jaehyun urges, "And?"

A brief moment of silence. Then, once again, "Nothing," and Riwoo looks down and away this time. The way his eyebrows push together is startlingly familiar to a previous expression Jaehyun had once catalogued—something along the lines of… shyness?

Oh. "Oh!" Jaehyun gets it now. "You're jealous!"

Riwoo purses his lips, which is a tell-tale sign that Jaehyun is right. The latter scrambles to turn off the blow-drier, instead turning his attention to folding himself in half and draping both of his arms around Riwoo's neck. "It's nothing," Riwoo says again, but Jaehyun knows already, so he just laughs this time.

He burrows his head further into the crook of Riwoo's neck and ignores the posture's discomfort, something like butterflies erupting in his gut. "It's sweet," he says into Riwoo's hair (growing out now as Riwoo prepares to dye it a different color) (he asked Jaehyun for his input, but Jaehyun couldn't really pick—in the end, they spun a randomizer wheel together and landed on pink). "I think it's sweet. I like that you're jealous, really."

"Jaehyun-ah," Riwoo warns with no real heat in his voice.

Jaehyun giggles and shakes his head again. The butterflies fly up and away into his lungs. "I'll show you," he says. "I need to now that you're jealous."

(In his Riwoo-jealousy-induced-daze, Jaehyun may have forgotten that a majority of his writing was inspired by concerningly real experiences. So when he reads his own poems over Riwoo's shoulder, he tries not to think about the fact that they could basically be considered hand-written love letters.

"I'm not good at reading poems, but I think they're amazing," is what Riwoo ends up murmuring.

"Thanks," Jaehyun replies, half-wincing, coming down from his high. "The words appear so easily these days. It used to be hard, but—I don't know. Something changed."

Riwoo smiles at him. Jaehyun's not sure why. Still, it ties his stomach into knots.)

TAETNYANGIE

jealous????

over me??????

that's the stupidest thing i've ever heard

YOU

ikr

like how could u even compare to him

TAETNYANGIE

ok. not what i meant.

what i meant was

theres nothing to be jealous of

anyone with eyes can see that ur infatuated w him

YOU

r u fr

like does he know

TAETNYANGIE

at this point

what does he not know about you

It's strange to think that Riwoo didn't use to be kind in Jaehyun's mind. That he used to be cold, unreachable, not someone that Jaehyun would clean up for, would go out for, would dry hair for, would sleep early for. That he used to be someone Jaehyun was convinced he'd never know, someone far-out of his routine, someone not worth the trouble. Nowadays, Jaehyun almost feels like he's the one who's not worth the trouble. And then Riwoo proves that wrong again and again in gentle ways, in kind ways.

"You're a lot nicer than I thought," Jaehyun blurts.

Riwoo looks up from the donut with a bemused expression. "Hm."

"In a good way, I mean," Jaehyun hurries to clarify. He waves his hand to gesture without remembering that he's holding a donut too—subsequently, a few sprinkles fly off. "Just never thought we would be here." Sharing a table together. Sharing sweets together. Sharing home together.

It's silent for a while. Jaehyun bites into his donut and watches a bird fly past their window and thinks about how things have changed from the beginning of winter to the budding of spring.

"You, too," Riwoo says suddenly.

Huh. "Huh?"

"You, too," Riwoo repeats. "You're lovelier than I thought. We're only here because of you. If it were me…" his voice takes on a teasing tone. "We would've stayed how we were back then forever."

"I'm not much better," admits Jaehyun. "I don't do well with meeting new people sometimes. I got scared from the moment you ignored my handshake that first time."

"Did I?"

"Yeah. Thought you were scary and cold after that."

Riwoo laughs. "Sorry. I must've been tired."

"It's alright. I mean…" Jaehyun trails off. "It's easy to get shy. It's easy to think people hate me. I just don't know where to stop sometimes, so I stop before I can even start. But if you saw me, you'd think otherwise, wouldn't you?"

"No," Riwoo answers simply. "Not really. I think being shy suits you. And I think, well. I think it's admirable that you find the strength to push through and appear so extroverted."

"It's not easy."

"I know."

"Usually, I don't even try," Jaehyun confesses.

"But you did for me."

Jaehyun falters. "That's," he starts. He doesn't know how to finish.

Riwoo doesn't try to offer an answer. Instead, he says, "I was scarier back when you didn't know me. Scary and cold."

"Yeah, you were."

"Then why?"

Riwoo doesn't need to elaborate. Jaehyun knows what he means. "Do you want me to be honest?"

"When are you not honest with me?" Riwoo asks. The words should be a tease, but out of Riwoo's mouth they just sound rhetorical, and he's right. Jaehyun is never not honest with him; because really, what does Riwoo not know about him?

"I fell in love with you."

Riwoo smiles, eyes squinting into crescents. "You know, the only reason why I didn't move out was because I thought you were cute."

"Really?"

"What else would have made me stay?"

Jaehyun glances down at his hand. "…Desserts?"

Riwoo levels him with a pointed gaze. "You thought I talked to you for the desserts."

"It seems plausible," Jaehyun protests. "You smile so lovely when you enjoy desserts. The reason why I fell in love with you was because you smiled when you ate tiramisu that first time."

"Only for that reason?"

"And every single one that came after," he clarifies quickly. Riwoo looks more pleased at that. "Either way, it's not as if you said anything about it."

"Is it bad that I wanted to hear it from you?"

It's silent for a long while. Jaehyun feels himself falling in love all over again. "No."

Riwoo smiles in the same way he smiled when he'd taken a bite of that tiramisu the first time. It feels lovelier, somehow, to be the recipient of it—a part of Jaehyun figures that it'd never been about the desserts. Not for him, not for Riwoo. It'd been about each other. "Aren't you going to ask me, too?"

"No." Then, hands sticky with donut glaze and feeling like an awful mix of romanticism and un-romanticism, Jaehyun says, "Can I kiss you?"

"You don't need to ask," replies Riwoo, witty in that way he'd been from the start and Jaehyun wipes his hands, rises from his seat, crosses the room, and kisses him. It's clumsy, a little soft here and too-sweet there, imperfect in all the ways that matter. Jaehyun tastes powdered sugar and chocolate and Riwoo's lip balm because Riwoo always took care of his lips better than Jaehyun. He tastes their differences and their similarities too; the cracks they've carved into each other, the reshaped routines. He tastes the fact that it's a real home now—not a shared apartment or something made up of avoidance and Pieces of Dialogue Required for Co-habilitation but a space to be filled with love.

It's that feeling, curling his fingers into the back of Riwoo's neck, where he knows he's been changed. For the better, yeah, but also for good.

When they pull apart, Riwoo laughs a little. "What is it?" Jaehyun asks dumbly, and Riwoo just keeps smiling, shaking his head, almost disbelieving. In a certain way, Jaehyun gets it—after all, if this were him from months ago, he'd be laughing too. He lets that feeling bubble up inside him until he's laughing too, forehead pressed against Riwoo's, Riwoo pawing at his arm, the two of them, one dining table, one occupied clothing rack, one used bed, one unused, and a home.

"I love you too," Riwoo says that night, still curled up against the wall, having just waited for Jaehyun to sneak into their blankets.

Jaehyun buries his face against the back of Riwoo's neck. "Um. "

"Feels weird?"

"A little."

Riwoo laughs. He shifts around to face Jaehyun. "For me, too," he says, hands resting gently on Jaehyun's back. "I don't think I'm very good at saying it."

Jaehyun mumbles something intelligible in response.

"What was that?"

"I said, it's okay," he lifts his head up and meets Riwoo's gaze. "I've never minded being the one to reach out first. Not if it's you."

Riwoo smiles. "That's right."

Like a heavy sweetness on Jaehyun's tongue, tasting of tiramisu and roll cakes and donuts. Something like home.

("The rom-com of all time," Jaehyun is saying into the phone, spreading out his hands to showcase an imaginary book. "Man falls in love over desserts and bribes love interest using desserts. Just imagine it."

"I'm done, seriously," Sungho says. He hangs up.)