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“No. Absolutely not.”
Renjun doesn’t even look up from his book when he rejects the idea. Yangyang is only a little bit wounded. “Dude,” he says. “I didn’t even tell you the best part.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Renjun says, flicking to the next page. “There’s nothing less appealing to me than pretending to be in a relationship with you, of all people, just for some random YouTube game show.”
“Hey!”
Renjun shrugs. He keeps reading. “Sorry,” he says, not sounding very sorry at all.
That stings. Yangyang tugs on his hoodie so that the material covers his eyes, then slinks down in his seat until the tip of his nose is practically on the same level as the study table they’ve commandeered. The hard, unforgiving plastic of his chair digs into his spine, and yeah, his back is definitely going to hurt later, but probably not as much as his ego.
“Fine,” he mutters, fully aware that he’s sulking and not caring very much. “Be that way. I’ll just ask someone else, and then we’ll see who’s laughing when I win that two thousand bucks.”
“Wait, you’ll do what?”
Yangyang peeks over the edge of the table. Renjun still has his book in his hands, but he’s looking at Yangyang. His eyebrows are raised, meeting in the middle in a little upside down V.
It’s very cute.
“Um,” Yangyang says. “If we win the game, we get, like, two thousand dollars.”
“That’s not what I ‒ ” Renjun stops, then draws a deep breath like Yangyang is testing his patience (he usually is). “Why didn’t you lead with that?”
“I was going to! But then you told me you didn’t want to do it!”
“Well,” Renjun says, finally closing his book. “Now I’m interested.”
Yangyang jabs a finger at him. “Nuh-uh. You said you weren’t going to do it. That there was nothing less appealing. No take backs!”
“Oh my god, are you really ‒ ”
“I’ll ask Hendery instead,” Yangyang decides, leaning into his inherent pettiness. “I’m sure Dejun won’t mind, they can use the money if we win to go on a really nice date ‒ ”
“Please.” Renjun rolls his eyes. “Hendery crumbles under pressure and can’t lie to save his life. Remember your surprise birthday party last year?”
“Fine, then, Shotaro ‒ ”
“Will giggle every time you try to hold his hand and give the game away.”
“Okay, Jeno is still single ‒ ”
“You literally refused to go out with him when he asked you who Dominique Wilkins was, exposing him as, and I quote, ‘a wannabe basketball fan’, which I maintain was a really dumb reason. Face it, you need me.”
Yangyang regrets telling Renjun that. “Do I? Or do you need that two thousand dollars?”
Renjun glares at him, which, rude, and also hypocritical ‒ wasn’t he just saying he wouldn’t do this thing with him?
“If you really want to win this thing, then we’re going to need each other, and no one else.” Renjun folds his arms and leans back in his chair. “C’mon. You need the money just as much as I do.”
Yangyang thinks longingly of the Travis Scott x Air Jordan 1 Lows that he’d put in a reservation for. He’d done it knowing full well he might not have the money by the time the store got them in, and factoring in the resale price... “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”
“Okay then,” Renjun says, just as the librarian pops up over his shoulder like a human-sized Jack-in-the-box. “So are we doing this, or what?”
They get hauled bodily from the library for ‘disorderly conduct’ and ‘violating the sacramental rules of the campus library’ (they were just talking ‒ okay, in the quiet study section, sure, but seriously) before Yangyang can respond. It’s only when they’ve declared studying a bust and vacated to their favourite Haidilao outlet that Renjun pivots back to their earlier conversation.
“Look, if you’re down, I am,” he tells Yangyang over the bubbling soup (half mala for Renjun and half tomato for Yangyang, because not all of them have cast iron stomachs). “We both could do with the money, we know each other really well, and… how hard is it to pretend to be a couple? I think, with a little bit of preparation, we could win. Like, actually fool all of those people and win.”
He dunks a beancurd roll into the soup for two seconds, the same amount of time Yangyang cooks it for, before depositing it on Yangyang’s plate. Yangyang picks it up immediately and stuffs it into his mouth. It’s slightly soggy on the outside, still a little crispy in the middle, and bursts with the flavour of the tomato soup base with each chew — just the way he likes it.
Yangyang swallows before speaking. “Dude, it was my idea in the first place. And not to sound cocky, but ‒ yeah, I think we could win, too.”
The smile that Renjun sends him is beatific. And maybe it’s entirely due to the prospect of the cash prize rather than the chance to pretend to be Yangyang’s boyfriend or whatever, but it’s well worth it to see Renjun light up like that, and Yangyang honestly can’t see himself doing this with anyone else.
Yeah. This is a great idea.
👨❤️👨
“This is a bad idea,” Dejun says bluntly.
Yangyang quickly fires off a series of spells and makes sure his avatar ducks behind a stone wall for safety before answering, “What? Why?”
“C’mon, Yangyang, you know why. Do I really have to ‒ oh shit oh shit oh shit ‒ ”
Yangyang sighs as Dejun’s character gets swarmed by the enemies. They hit him with a series of close-range attacks until his health bar reaches zero, and he disappears from the screen. It’s the third time this round alone.
“Shit,” Dejun hisses for like the thousandth time that day, voice crackling through Yangyang’s headphones. He has thirty seconds before he respawns. “Sorry, sorry ‒ wait, what was I saying?”
“Renjun,” Yangyang reminds him, too busy fending off an attack for anything other than short replies. “Game show. Bad idea.”
“Right. Not just a bad idea. The worst idea. Did you even think it through?”
“Bro, I thought about asking Hendery, Shotaro ‒ goddammit, just die already ‒ Jeno ‒ ”
“How desperate are you for the money that you even considered Jeno?”
Yangyang doesn’t bother dignifying that with a response. “ ‒ but I’m in it to win it. And the only person I could do it with is Renjun. We know, like, everything about each other. He’s the mac to my cheese. Peanut butter to my jelly. My long-lost childhood best friend.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Dejun wants to know. “You met him when you smoked too much weed during freshman week and stumbled into his room, fell asleep on his covers, and then he was too nice to kick you out.”
Technically, Yangyang was drunk off his ass, not high as a kite. And Renjun did try to kick him out, but Yangyang was passed out cold, and Renjun possesses the upper body strength of a ten year old child and couldn’t move him except to roll him to one side so he could squeeze onto the mattress, leading to an extremely awkward conversation the following morning but ‒ whatever.
Details.
“Well,” Yangyang bristles. “He feels like a long-lost childhood best friend.”
“Right. A childhood best friend you just so happen to have feelings for.”
Yangyang chokes on his own spit. Luckily, the game audio of Dejun’s avatar respawning at their base drowns out his sputtering. Still, he’s got to, like, defend his honour, right? Say something witty and intelligent and supported by numerous sources to knock Dejun off his stupid high-horse from where he can apparently see his friends developing feelings for other friends.
“What?” is all he manages to come up with.
“Oh, honey.” Dejun sounds unimpressed, but he sounds unimpressed like ninety-five percent of the time. (Hendery tells Yangyang it’s the Leo energy. Yangyang has no idea what that means.) “It was sad to begin with, but now it’s just sadder that you don’t know.”
“Sad ‒ !”
“You let him take anything he wants out of your closet, and you never ask for them back.”
“I’m just trying to elevate his style, man ‒ ”
“You go to all his open mic nights, even when you have lab early the next morning.”
“That’s called being supportive, don’t be so ‒ ”
“And,” Dejun barrels on, ignoring Yangyang. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but every time you tell a joke or say something funny, you always look at him first to see how he reacts.”
Heat rushes up into Yangyang’s face. Thank god Dejun can’t see him now. “That’s ‒ What are you talking about? I don’t ‒ I don’t ‒ You know what? No. Just, no.”
“Hmmm,” Dejun says in the most infuriating, the most smug, the most ugh tone, and Yangyang wants to reach through the screen and strangle him. “The lady doth protest too much, methinks.”
“What? Dude, is this one of your Twilight references?”
“It’s Shakespeare, you uncultured swine,” Dejun shoots back, volleying off some spells at their opponents. “And it means ‒ yo, incoming on your left, your left ‒ you know what, you can look it up yourself.”
Yangyang fiddles with his game controller long after parrying the enemy away. Protest too much? Him? He’s protesting the right amount, thank you very much. He doesn’t have feelings ‒ feelings! ‒ for Renjun. They’re friends ‒ best friends, sure, and yeah, Renjun is cute in a tiny, I-could-pick-you-up-and-put-you-in-my-pocket kind of way, and Yangyang maybe, sort of finds it endearing when Renjun grabs his arm every time there’s a jump-scare in those terrible horror movies he always makes them watch together ‒
“I’m just saying,” Dejun carries on, oblivious to Yangyang’s mental breakdown. “Maybe you should have sorted out your own feelings before asking Renjun to act as your better half on a show that’s going to be broadcasted to millions of people on the internet.”
“I ‒ ”
Yangyang’s going to say something clever back, okay ‒ he just needs a second to formulate a response ‒ but then his thoughts are interrupted by a loud BOOM.
He jumps as both their avatars are thrown violently into the air and die immediately from a well-timed spell that they both somehow managed to miss. YOU LOSE flashes up on the screen in big, angry red letters and the in-game chat explodes, the opposing players gleefully celebrating their win.
Dejun groans, long and loud, and starts spitting curses. Yangyang knows enough Cantonese to understand exactly what he’s saying, but he tunes it out and thinks about what Dejun had said earlier. In particular, that signing up as a fake couple for a game show is maybe not the best idea, given his alleged feelings for the person making up the other half of said fake couple, which apparently Dejun has deemed more than platonic, and Yangyang guesses Dejun should know, since he’s the one with the boyfriend and all, and okay, Renjun is funny, sweet when he’s not disparaging his intelligence, and yeah, he’d be blind not to have noticed how pretty he looks, so it would make sense that he ‒
Yangyang stops thinking. Honestly. He needs to get better gaming buddies.
👨❤️👨
The day they get the email confirming their participation in the game show, Renjun swings by Yangyang’s room and drops a stack of flashcards onto his lap.
“Ow,” Yangyang complains, the cardstock missing his groin by mere inches. “Watch it!”
Renjun ignores him. He shrugs off his jacket and flops down on the bed next to Yangyang. “Get up, we need to study.”
“Study? Study for what?”
“The game, dummy.” Renjun plucks Yangyang’s phone from his fingers and flips it over, frowning down at the screen. “Why are you on the Wikipedia page for Hamlet?”
Yangyang rushes to sit up, the flashcards spilling from his lap and onto his unmade bed, and snatches his phone back. “No reason,” he squeaks. He’s pretty sure his ears are burning red, though, so he quickly changes the subject. “And why do we have to study for the game again?”
“I told you before, we’ve got to be prepared. Who knows what questions they’ll throw our way.”
“Can’t we just, like, wing it?”
Renjun pauses from where he’s shovelling the flashcards into a neat pile and stares at him over the rims of his glasses. “No, Yangyang,” he says slowly, like Yangyang is dumb, or something. “We can’t just ‘wing it’.”
“Huh? Why not?”
“Have you even watched their videos? They put you in this box ‒ which isn’t even a box, by the way ‒ with a bunch of other contestants, and everyone has to ask each other questions to figure out who’s lying about being a yoga instructor, or a Harry Potter fan, or whatever, and vote them out.”
Yangyang huffs irritably. “Yeah, I know how it works!”
“Okay,” Renjun says patiently. “But in our case, since we’re competing against other couples, and there’s two of us, don’t you think we need to plan what we’re going to say? Memorise facts about each other, so we’re not caught off-guard?”
“Is this what this is, then?” Yangyang gestures to the flashcards with a roll of his eyes. “Introduction to Huang Renjun 101? Please. I know everything there is to know about you ‒ I don’t need this!”
“Okay,” Renjun says, folding his arms across his chest. “Then tell me ‒ what’s my love language?”
He looks at Yangyang expectantly. Yangyang blinks.
“Um,” he says, eloquent.
“See!”
“Dude,” Yangyang whines, flustered. “C’mon, they’re not gonna ask us that. And anyway, how would I know!”
“You should,” Renjun chides. “We’re supposed to be a couple.”
Jesus Christ. Yangyang tugs at his bangs. “Well, it’s not like you know what my love language is.”
“Physical touch,” Renjun says without hesitation. “I know you act like you hate it when people give you hugs, but secretly, you love them.”
Yangyang’s mouth falls open. He did the quiz once, just for shits and giggles, but Renjun’s somehow nailed it right on the head.
“How ‒ how did you know that?”
“Because I pay attention,” Renjun huffs, sounding annoyed, but he looks pleased with himself at getting it right. He paws through the flashcards strewn over the bed until he finds what he’s looking for, shoving it in Yangyang’s face. “And for the record, mine is acts of service.”
That sounds suspiciously like a lie ‒ Renjun has never done an act of service for him in his life ‒ but Yangyang takes the flashcard anyway. “Right,” he says, doing his best to commit the words written on it to memory. “Acts of service. Got it.”
They go back to the basics after that. They agree on their anniversary (the twenty-seventh of July, randomly picked when Renjun scrolls through his calendar until Yangyang tells him to stop) and decide to stick as close to the truth as possible for the rest of their fake relationship (“We met in university,” Renjun recites as Yangyang nods along. “And we’ve been dating since the start of the semester.”). Yangyang even agrees to run through the flashcards Renjun’s prepared, confirming, and in some cases, exchanging essential knowledge relating to their hobbies, family histories, and even ‒ he can practically feel himself turning beet red when he sees the topic ‒ sex.
(“Do we really have to discuss this?” Yangyang asks, holding the flashcard by the corner and at arm’s length like it morally offends him. And maybe it does ‒ he swears he sees the words doggy style written in Renjun’s neat handwriting, and god, now is not the time to unpack how that makes him feel.
“They’re definitely going to ask us about that!”
“Oh my god.”
“Don’t be such a baby ‒ look, if it makes you uncomfortable, and you can just write down your favourite position and I’ll read it later ‒ ”
“Oh my god.”)
Renjun makes them quiz each other until they can both recite facts about their fake relationship flawlessly, even as his eyelids grow heavier and heavier, and his answers start to get punctuated by long, drawn-out yawns. By the time they finish, it’s close to three in the morning, and he looks ready to drop dead.
“Dude,” Yangyang says, shuffling the flashcards into a pile. “You look ready to drop dead.”
“Shut up,” Renjun says, but it lacks his usual bite. He rubs his eyes and they come away looking bloodshot.
Yangyang sets the flashcards aside and nudges Renjun. “Okay, time for bed, mister.”
“Yeah, yeah, I’ll get out of your hair soon enough ‒ ”
“Are you kidding?” Yangyang exclaims. “I’m not letting you go home this late. Just stay over.”
Renjun frowns. “And where am I going to sleep?”
“My bed, duh.”
“Then where are you going to sleep?”
Yangyang shrugs. “The couch, I guess.”
Renjun's frown grows deeper, like the answer upsets him. “That couch is the most uncomfortable thing I’ve sat on.”
“It’s fine ‒ ”
“It’s not fine,” Renjun says. “Your bed’s a double, right?”
“Uh.” Yangyang glances at his bed, not following. “I think so?”
“We can both sleep here, then.”
Renjun wants both of them to sleep here. On Yangyang’s bed. Together. Yangyang’s mind goes blank. “Um ‒ ”
“It’s not like there isn’t enough space,” Renjun says. He’s already slipping underneath the covers. “No reason to fuck up your back when you’ve got a perfectly good mattress here.”
Yangyang sits in stunned, panicked silence as he watches Renjun fluff up one of his pillows. He’s acting so ‒ so normal, almost like it’s perfectly alright to invite yourself into your buddy’s bed and fall asleep there. Is it because Renjun is used to it? Wait ‒ does Renjun sleep in other people’s beds regularly? Or, like, a lot? It would make sense, since he’s being so blasé about this. Whereas Yangyang is clearly on the complete opposite end of the spectrum, since his brain has been short-circuited by the mere possibility of sharing a bed with his best friend. Which he has done before. Once. In freshman year. When he was drunk. And then maybe a couple of times after that, when the movies they were watching were incredibly boring ‒ but they were on the couch, so did that count? Does Yangyang want that to count?
“Turn off the light, will you?” Renjun yawns, setting his glasses on Yangyang’s bedside table. “I can only sleep in total darkness.”
Oh great. He’s already made himself comfortable. Maybe if Yangyang grabbed a spare pillow on the way to turn off the light and crept outside ‒
“Don’t even think about sleeping on your couch,” Renjun threatens, scarily perceptive as usual. “Now hurry up and come to bed.”
He half-glares and half-squints up at Yangyang, who must be just a smudge of beige to him, as if daring him to leave. In spite of that, all Yangyang is struck by is how soft he looks. Renjun’s on the verge of sleep, his sharp, elven features softened by lethargy, eyelashes catching on his cheeks each time he blinks. He’s scooted over to the side closest to the wall, too, with the blankets drawn up to his chin, his dark hair fanning across the baby blue of Yangyang’s favourite pillow. He’s even tucked Yangyang’s Pooh plushie in next to him.
It’s strange, seeing him like this. But the stranger thing is that Renjun doesn’t look out of place in Yangyang’s bed at all.
Yangyang feels all the fight in his body shrivel up and die. “Well,” he says weakly, resigning himself to his fate. “If you insist.”
He goes to turn off the light. After a quick trip to the bathroom, Yangyang shuffles back to bed and lifts up the corner of his duvet to fold himself carefully into the space that Renjun’s left for him. Even with a couple of inches of empty space between them, Yangyang is hyper-aware of everything: the long line of heat radiating from Renjun’s skin; the quiet little huffs Renjun makes as he turns over, trying to get comfortable; Renjun’s presence, warm and heavy but comforting, like a weighted blanket in the dead of winter.
It’s fine, Yangyang tells himself, staring so hard at his ceiling that his eyes start to water. It’s cool. It’s chill. It’s fine. It’s fine. It’s fine.
Renjun’s sigh cuts through the silence like a knife. “Oh my god, do you always breathe so loudly? If any of the other contestants ask us about our pet peeves, you best believe I’m bringing this up.”
Yangyang squeezes his eyes shut, stops trying to breathe so loudly, and prays for sleep.
👨❤️👨
Okay.
So maybe Dejun was right, and this is a bad idea.
For someone who doesn’t sweat a lot, Yangyang is drenched. It’s the nerves, probably, but also the lack of ventilation in this sad excuse of a green room the filming crew had shoved him in. Thank god he opted for one of his baggiest and blackest t-shirts ‒ no one’s going to believe any of his lies if he shows up with pit stains the size of a small country.
“Hey.” Yangyang is jerked out of his thoughts when someone thrusts an ice-cold canned drink into his face. “You look like you’re going to keel over. Drink this.”
Yangyang knows who that someone is and leans away from him. He’s about to say something snarky, but then his eyes travel up and along the outstretched arm, coming to rest on that well-known face, and the words die at the tip of his tongue.
Renjun looks… good. They must have wrangled him into hair and make-up on his way to the vending machine, or something. His hair isn’t stuffed under a beanie like it usually is, instead falling into soft waves framing his face. Renjun’s features are already so delicate ‒ not that Yangyang would ever tell him, he doesn’t want to get pummelled ‒ but like this, he looks like something right out of the pages of a magazine. One of those artsy, pastel ones that sell for fifteen dollars in the store. Also ‒ Yangyang squints. Is that lipgloss?
Renjun takes his bottom lip between his teeth, and Yangyang realises that he only notices because he’s been staring at it. Suddenly consumed by an overwhelming thirst, Yangyang snatches the can up, cracks it open, and drains it in one gulp.
When he finishes, he finds Renjun staring at him, concerned. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah.” Yangyang can feel his stomach churning. He blames it on the coke he’s just chugged. “Just peachy.”
Renjun’s eyebrows knit together immediately. “Okay, everything’s definitely not okay. Are you going to tell me what’s wrong, or am I going to have to pry it out of you?”
How can Yangyang tell Renjun what’s wrong when he doesn’t even really know the answer himself? All he’s acutely aware of is that all of his usual easy confidence has disappeared, and in its place is this weird, foreign feeling that makes him want to climb the walls.
“I don’t know,” he answers truthfully. “I’m just ‒ super nervous, I guess.”
“You don’t have anything to be nervous about,” Renjun says, taking a seat on the other folding chair in the room. “You’re gonna do great in the game.”
“No, it’s not ‒ ” Yangyang stops, then starts again. “I’m pretty sure I know way too much about you and our fake relationship, after all the cramming I did.”
“Then what is it?”
What is it? Yangyang turns the question over in his head, then shrugs. “I think ‒ maybe I’m just scared I’ll say the wrong thing.”
“Like what?”
“I just ‒ ” Whenever Yangyang’s with Renjun, or any of his close friends, he forgets about his crippling shyness, his tendency to shrink inwards to draw as little attention to himself as possible. But being here, in a new environment with tons of strangers around, makes him remember. Yangyang struggles to put it into words, to describe the feeling swirling in his gut, then gives up. “I just have this feeling that, like, something’s gonna go wrong. I don’t know. It’s stupid.”
Renjun knocks their knees together gently. “Hey,” he reprimands. “Only I’m allowed to say that. It’s going to be fine, you’re just in over your head about this. Stop overthinking.”
“I’m not overthinking ‒ ”
“You are,” Renjun says, then flicks him on the forehead. Ouch. “But if you’re still feeling this way and it gets too much, just tell me, and I’ll ask them to stop the filming, alright?”
Yangyang rubs his forehead and looks at Renjun properly. He’s perched on the edge of his seat, looking tidy and proper and entirely unruffled in his button-up and sweater. Damn. Why isn’t he sweating? He’s got more layers on than Yangyang, for goodness’ sake. “We’re about to go up and lie to a bunch of people that we’re a couple. How’re you being so calm about this?”
Renjun raises an eyebrow. Maybe you should have thought about that before you signed us up for this freak show, idiot, Yangyang imagines him saying. But to his surprise, that ‒ or any other equally sarcastic response ‒ isn’t what comes out of his mouth. Instead ‒
“Because I’m with you,” Renjun says simply, looking Yangyang right in the eye. “You have my back; you always do. And I have yours.”
The room feels ten times hotter than it did before. Yangyang looks away, hiding the blush rising on his cheeks. “Oh my god, disgusting, man.”
“Well,” Renjun says, sounding amused. “It won’t be so disgusting if I say this in front of the cameras ‒ they’ll eat that shit right up.”
Before Yangyang can cringe even more, the door to their room creaks open. A crew member holding a clipboard sticks his head in. Yangyang recognises him as one of the guys fiddling with the cameras earlier. “Hey, Renjun and Yangyang? We’re ready for you now.”
“Sure, just give us a second!”
The crew member disappears, and Renjun gets to his feet. Yangyang follows, is right behind him, but just before they’re about to cross the threshold and into the corridor, Renjun stops so abruptly that Yangyang almost walks into him.
“Yo, what ‒ ”
Renjun spins around like he’s forgotten something. “Just one more thing.”
And then he takes Yangyang’s hand.
Immediately, alarm bells start to ring in Yangyang’s head. He glances down at their clasped hands. “What ‒ ”
“There’ll be other people looking long before the cameras start rolling,” Renjun explains. “Better to be safe than sorry, right?”
Renjun’s hand is smaller than his, and warm. Soft, too, probably because of all of the hand cream he lathers on. Is that a weird thing to think about his best friend’s hand? Yes, a voice that sounds suspiciously like Dejun’s says in Yangyang’s head, that is a weird thing to think.
“Um.” Renjun’s staring at him expectantly. His hand, Yangyang realises, fits pretty much perfectly in his own. “Right.”
“Okay, well. Remember ‒ two thousand dollars.” Renjun squeezes his hand. “We can do this!”
Two thousand dollars. Yangyang squeezes back. “Yeah,” he says, and his voice only wavers the teeniest bit. “We can do this.”
👨❤️👨
The gist of the game is this:
“Just to recap, there is a mole amongst you,” the director, a guy who introduces himself as Jungwoo, explains. “In this case, a fake couple. Your job is to try and figure out who it is by asking questions within the allotted time, and to vote them out of the box.”
The box in question, as Renjun had pointed out before, is not really a box. More of an open steel structure with neon lighting bars running up and down the edges, currently shining fluorescent white. Besides Yangyang and Renjun, there are ten other men standing in the box, loosely grouped together in pairs.
“How do we vote someone out?” asks a guy with hot pink highlights streaking through his hair. Yangyang leans over to squint at his nametag. He makes out the word Chenle in sloppy handwriting.
Jungwoo points to the folding table that’s been placed in front of them, set up with writing materials. “Pen and paper, Survivor-style. All votes will be anonymous unless you choose to reveal otherwise.”
Chenle nods. “Nice.”
“How about the cameras?” someone else asks. Yangyang can’t make out his nametag from here, but he sees a cheeky grin and miles of tanned skin on display. Who wears shorts that short in March? “I want them to get my best side.”
Jungwoo laughs and thumbs back at where the camera crew is. “Jaemin and his crew will be dealing with that, don’t worry too much about it. Just enjoy the game! Any other questions?”
There’s a series of nos. They’ll be starting soon ‒ Yangyang feels his nerves pick up again. Renjun must, too, because he shoots him a small, reassuring smile and starts to stroke a thumb up and down the back of Yangyang’s hand. Yangyang has no idea why he hasn’t let go yet (some of the other couples aren’t even touching, and his palm is getting super sweaty), but it’s kind of nice.
“Okay, then.” Jungwoo nods at a lanky guy hovering in the background, who stumbles forward with a paper bag in his hand. “Now, just to remember what you all are playing for ‒ thanks, Jisung ‒ ”
Renjun’s eyes comically widen when he sees what’s in the bag, but Yangyang is probably no better. Holy shit ‒ he’s never seen so much cash in his life. The others likely haven’t, either, and a wave of impressed murmurs ripples through the group. Chenle edges forward, excited, and his partner has to hold him back, his cheeks curving into dimples as he smiles indulgently.
“Just a little incentive,” Jungwoo grins, setting the stack of bills on the table. “Now, are you all ready to start?”
Yangyang’s stomach swoops, but a frisson of excitement runs through him. He nods along with everyone else. Next to him, Renjun is the picture of calm, but his hold on Yangyang’s hand tightens just a fraction, and Yangyang knows he’s raring to go.
“Okay then.” Jungwoo nods at Jaemin, who steadies his camera. “Cameras okay? Sound okay? Alright, quiet on set! And… action!”
👨❤️👨
“Alright, we have five minutes,” a guy in glasses and a fluffy cardigan says once the clock starts, immediately taking charge. “Let’s introduce ourselves and say how we met. You ‒ ” he points at a tall dude rocking shoulder-length blonde hair, who’s standing on the opposite end of the line from where Yangyang and Renjun are “ ‒ go.”
“Um, okay,” Tall and Blonde says. “I’m Johnny, and this is Ten, and ‒ wait, how we met, right?”
“Yes.”
“Well,” Ten interjects, smiling up at Johnny. “It’s kind of a long story ‒ ”
“Give us the short version, then,” Glasses Guy snaps. “We don’t have a lot of time.”
Yangyang raises an eyebrow at his tone. Ten’s fond expression morphs into one of visible irritation. “Whoa, chill, dude. We met at an art class, okay?”
“Great,” Glasses Guy says, already turning to the next couple in line. “Next?”
The guy with the shorts introduces himself as Donghyuck, and his boyfriend is Taeil. Glasses Guy’s name is Doyoung, and he’s married to possibly the most gorgeous man Yangyang’s ever set his eyes on, Taeyong. There’s Chenle and Kun, and then ‒
“I’m Mark,” the guy immediately next to Renjun beams. He reminds Yangyang of a puppy, with his bright-eyed, eager demeanour. A puppy with great cheekbones. “And this is Yuta!”
He smiles, big, and doesn’t elaborate. Yangyang can hear the gnash of Doyoung’s teeth a mile away. “And how did you two meet?” Doyoung prompts.
“Oh! That, right, uh ‒ ”
“We met in Phoenix,” Yuta says serenely, and everyone’s gaze shifts from Mark to him. He’s wearing a tank to show off his numerous tattoos (on his arms, winding up his neck), and has layers and layers of beaded necklaces on. He and clean-cut Mark are definitely the oddest pairing in the room, visually, but Yangyang thinks it’s sweet. “Out by the ocean. I was a surfing instructor and Mark took lessons.”
Dead silence ensues.
“I don’t think there are any oceans in Phoenix,” someone stage-whispers.
“Uh, okay,” Doyoung says, eyeing Yuta suspiciously. “Sure. And you two at the end of the line?”
He means them. Yangyang flushes under the attention and glances helplessly at Renjun, whose face has smoothened out into a pleasant, friendly expression. He’s always been the better liar between the two of them.
“Renjun and Yangyang,” Renjun says, giving a small wave. “We met in college ‒ we’re both still students ‒ and have been dating for six months.”
“Hm, sounds believable,” Johnny comments, giving them a once-over.
“They could just be college friends, though,” Doyoung frowns. “We’ll have to keep an open mind.”
Yangyang finds himself frowning back ‒ they’re holding hands, which is more than he can say for Doyoung and Taeyong ‒ but before he can answer that, Kun interjects with, “How about we go around and say our anniversaries at the same time? The moles would trip up, right?”
Doyoung nods approvingly. “Excellent idea. Let’s start with those two at the end first.”
It’s them again. Yangyang’s mind blanks as Renjun counts them down, but he manages to recall that vital piece of information at the very last second.
“Twenty-seventh of July,” he blurts out, just a millisecond after Renjun does.
It doesn’t go unnoticed. “Yo, he was panicking,” Donghyuck laughs from down the line. “Weren’t you, Yangyang?”
Embarrassed, Yangyang looks down and scuffs the toe of his shoe against the floor. “I’m not very good with dates.”
Renjun sends Donghyuck a Look for that. He lets go of Yangyang’s hand to rub soothing circles in between his shoulder blades. It’s nice; reassuring. “Well, the important thing is that he got it right!”
“Okay, okay,” Doyoung says, ever impatient. “Moving on! Ten and Johnny?”
Everything goes smoothly, no one tripping up, until they’re back to Yuta and Mark.
“Twenty-eighth February,” Mark says.
“Thirty-first October,” Yuta declares at the exact same time, and the group pounces.
“It’s them!” Doyoung cries, tugging on Taeyong’s arm. “They’re the moles!”
“Wait,” Mark says, eyes wide and turning to Yuta, who’s just smiling at the chaos unfolding around them placidly. “Yuta, baby, it was in February, remember!”
“The days and months don’t even sound alike!”
“Well, they’re both kind of at the beginning and tail-end of winter. Maybe they got confused…?”
“How can you confuse February for October?”
Yangyang can hardly believe their luck. He sneaks a glance and finds Renjun fighting back a smile. Renjun catches his eye and sends him a surreptitious wink, then raises his voice to join into the fray. “Oh my god, I can’t believe you guys didn’t even get your story straight before you came here!”
“Guys,” Mark half-whines, half-giggles, as Yuta looks on, unbothered, “it’s not what it looks like ‒ ”
He’s interrupted by a shrill beep, signalling the end of their five minutes, and by extension the end of the first round. Jungwoo shuts off the stopwatch.
“Okay, that’s time!” he calls out. “Can I invite Johnny and Ten to cast their vote first? The rest of you, turn around!”
Yangyang dutifully turns around so his back is facing the table. “Who’re we going to vote out?” he murmurs to Renjun. “The couple beside us? I don’t know what they were up to, there can’t be two moles in the game ‒ ”
Renjun shushes him. “No,” he says out of the corner of his mouth, angling the mic away. “We have to play smart. We should get Doyoung or Donghyuck out.”
He’s right. Everyone else is going after Yuta and Mark now, but Doyoung is aggressive in his questioning and Donghyuck is perceptive, nearly catching Yangyang out earlier. Yangyang nods in agreement, and when it’s their turn to vote, Renjun writes down Donghyuck and Taeil’s names before slotting it into the small basket meant for their votes.
Everyone stands around, waiting nervously, as Jungwoo takes out their votes and flicks through them. “Okay,” he eventually says. “So the couple with the most votes, and the first to be eliminated from this game, is… Yuta and Mark.”
Yangyang breathes out a quiet sigh of relief even though he knew that was the most probable outcome. Renjun takes his hand, squeezing it briefly before letting go, and they send each other small, tentative smiles.
“Aw, man.” Mark’s shoulders slump forward a little, but he waves goodbye good-naturedly. “Well, it was nice to meet you guys!”
“Bye,” Taeyong says sadly as Mark leaves the box together with Yuta, who, in Yangyang’s opinion, looks pretty chill despite basically ruining his chances at winning some cash.
Doyoung isn’t as cordial though; he stares after them with narrowed eyes, then turns his laserlike gaze to the rest of them. Yangyang does his best not to look too guilty and slings an arm over Renjun’s shoulders, but then he feels Renjun tense beneath him. Not wanting to make him feel uncomfortable, Yangyang immediately pulls his arm back with the slightest twinge of disappointment. So much for trying to look casual.
Jungwoo tucks the votes away. “Alright,” he calls cheerfully. “So are we ready for round two?”
👨❤️👨
YUTA & MARK ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
MARK
(laughing)
Dude, what was all that about?
YUTA
What do you mean?
MARK
(still laughing)
The lying, man!
YUTA
I prefer to think of them as unconfirmed truths.
MARK falls out of his chair and slides to the floor, dying from laughter.
YUTA
(to camera)
We came into this not to win, but to be remembered.
MARK manages to haul himself back into his chair. He wipes a tear from his eye.
MARK
Oh my god, you’re crazy, man. God, I love you so much.
👨❤️👨
RENJUN & YANGYANG POST-GAME INTERVIEW
RENJUN and YANGYANG glance at each other.
RENJUN
Yeah. He was insane. He had to go.
👨❤️👨
Again, Doyoung is the first one to open his mouth, and with it comes a stream of incessant questions.
“Do you know your partners’ parents’ names?”
“What did you do on your first date?”
“What is your partner’s love language?”
For that last question, Renjun throws Yangyang a look over his shoulder, as if to say I told you so. They manage to answer that (along with everything else) flawlessly, mostly thanks to Renjun’s foresight in anticipating the kind of stuff they’d be asked. (Yangyang feels the need to point out that he has Renjun’s mom’s number in his contacts, though, and that they’re on a first-name basis ‒ they’re basically homies!)
But, as with all good things, that soon comes to an end.
“Oh, I have a good one!” Doyoung says, snapping his fingers. “When did you realise that you had feelings for each other?”
Yangyang mentally flips through the flashcards he’s memorised and realises with a start that this is a question that they haven’t prepared for. Damn. Trying not to let his apprehension show, Yangyang glances down at Renjun, as if he can somehow telepathically convey the correct answer to him.
Except Renjun’s not worrying, like he is. He’s not even looking at him. Instead, Renjun resolutely stares at the studio wall while he tucks a stray lock of hair behind his ears, and it might just be the make-up or the lighting, but Yangyang swears there’s a light pink dusting Renjun’s cheeks ‒ what on earth’s got him blushing like that now, of all times?
Yangyang’s on his own, then. Shit ‒ what’s a believable and appropriate response? As Kun waxes poetic about some action-packed adventure trip he and Chenle took to Jeju Island, Yangyang scrambles to think of something, anything, but comes up totally blank. He doesn’t remember how he and Renjun got close ‒ Dejun, with his extroverted tendencies, must have been involved, somehow ‒ and can barely remember what he ate yesterday, much less pinpoint any milestones in his and Renjun’s friendship that could be construed as somewhat romantic. Plus, there’s the teeny (big) problem that Yangyang’s never been in love before; he can’t draw on any past experiences now.
So how the hell is he supposed to answer this without coming across as suspicious, or worse, insincere?
Someone clears their throat. Yangyang blinks out of his self-induced haze, and finds that everyone in the group is staring at him and Renjun.
“It’s your turn,” Taeil prompts politely.
Yangyang feels his last brain cell flail around his head, give up, then die. “Oh. Um. Renjun ‒ ”
“ ‒ will go first.”
Yangyang’s half-surprised, half-relieved when Renjun cuts him off smoothly. Honestly, that’s totally fine ‒ he’s simply bought more time to think up a story. Preferably one that isn’t half-assed, and with a modicum of truth.
But then Renjun winds an arm around his waist to pull him flush against his side, and all possibility of coherent thought flies out the window.
“I sing at open mic sometimes,” Renjun tells the wider group. “But they’re usually held on school nights. I was so nervous before my first one, but I didn’t want to bother my friends, so I didn’t tell anyone about it. Somehow, though, Yangyang found out, and he made all our friends go as a surprise, and without telling me in advance. And when I got up on stage ‒ he cheered, like, so loudly, and again after I finished.” Renjun laughs a little at the memory. It’s such a nice sound, throaty and loud where his voice is usually so measured and soft. “It was lowkey embarrassing, but ‒ but it was nice. And ‒ well. Looking down in the audience, seeing his face, front and centre ‒ uh. Yeah. That’s when I think I started to realise I really liked him.”
Yangyang’s rendered speechless. He can’t see his expression since Renjun’s turned away from him, but he sounds ‒ well. Like sunshine. Like he’s got a smile on his face he can’t hold back. Like he’s recalling a fond memory that makes him happy. Yangyang vaguely remembers that night, but that was nearly a year ago. The fact that Renjun remembered and was able to recall it with such perfect clarity… For some reason, this makes Yangyang feel all light and floaty, like he’s a fucking helium balloon, or something.
And then he remembers that, for all intents and purposes, Renjun’s answer is just a lie.
Wow. Holy shit. Renjun is good.
“That’s so sweet,” Ten coos as Yangyang’s metaphorical balloon pops. “Yangyang, was it like that for you, too?”
It was not. Nevertheless, Yangyang hitches a smile onto his face. “It was,” he agrees, resting a hand on top of Renjun’s own where it’s gripping his waist. Legit couples do that, right? “I heard him sing, and ‒ well. With those eyes, and that personality? I don’t know why I didn’t see it sooner.”
There’s a long pause.
“Ugh,” Doyoung complains. “This is getting us nowhere.”
“Dude,” Johnny says, incredulous. “That was so beautiful, and that’s your first response?”
“It doesn’t matter how endearing their story is! They could’ve made it up! In fact, every single one of you could’ve made your stories up!”
Kun steps forward, trying to mitigate. “Okay, well, we could, I don’t know, go around and say what our favourite thing is about ‒ ”
“We don’t have time for that!” Doyoung says through gritted teeth. With all of the jaw-clenching, Yangyang wonders what his dental bill is like. “We have to ask useful questions, practical, real things the moles won’t know about each other ‒ ”
“Actually,” Ten interrupts, arms folded across his chest. “You’ve been asking a lot of the questions. I wonder why that is?”
Donghyuck mirrors Ten’s position, cocking a hip. Yangyang gets the distinct feeling that he’s up to no good. “Yeah, he’s right ‒ is it so you won’t be caught off-guard?”
“I ‒ !” Doyoung sputters. “Didn’t someone else ask that question about anniversaries earlier?”
“So? You’ve been controlling most of the conversation ever since we got in the box,” Donghyuck points out. “You could’ve just, like, been giving the answers to questions you guys agreed on beforehand.”
“We are not the moles!”
“That’s exactly what the moles would say.”
Doyoung looks like he’s about to have an aneurysm. “Fine, then someone ask us a question, and hurry up, because we don’t have a lot of time.”
“Well, I have one,” Kun pipes up. “You said you were married earlier, right? But where are your rings?”
Everyone immediately redirects their gaze to Doyoung and Taeyong’s ring fingers. Just like Kun said, they’re conspicuously bare.
Chenle grins down at his boyfriend and gives him a high-five. “Nice, Kun-ge.”
Doyoung blinks down at his hand, visibly floundering, so Yangyang eggs him on. “Yeah, man, where are your rings? There isn’t even, like, a tan line. You guys could be lying.”
It does the trick. Doyoung inflates like a pufferfish at the prodding. “We don’t normally wear them because of our jobs ‒ ”
“Oho,” Donghyuck smirks, looking around at the remaining couples. “How convenient.”
“ ‒ but we are married! I swear! Yongie, tell them!”
Taeyong looks around at the rest of them, sees their doubtful gazes, and shrugs. “I mean, we are. But I don’t think they’ll believe me on my word alone, Doie.”
“Oh my god,” Doyoung groans, dragging a hand down his face. “Okay, look, what can we do to convince you that we’re married?”
Donghyuck looks as if Christmas came early. “At the same time, tell us how often you guys have sex,” he says, and it’s way too quickly for it to be something he thought up on the spot. “What’s your favourite position? What’s the kinkiest thing you guys have ever done ‒ ”
“Oh my god! I’m not saying all of that on camera!”
“Okay then, guess we’ll just vote you out, mole,” Donghyuck sing-songs back, and Yangyang sees a vein throb dangerously in Doyoung’s temple.
Taeyong runs a hand up and down Doyoung’s back, soothing, and murmurs something that Yangyang can’t catch. It makes Doyoung scowl, but he grumbles, “Okay ‒ okay, fine, but if we say ours, we have to go around the circle and everyone has to say theirs, too. It’s only fair.”
Yangyang glances at Renjun, who pretends to consider before nodding. “Sounds reasonable.”
“I can’t believe I’m doing this,” Doyoung mutters, and then he and Taeyong launch into embarrassingly detailed answers to Donghyuck’s questions. Yangyang would feel sorry for him, but watching Doyoung squirm under the pressure and everyone’s attention when he isn’t even the mole is kind of funny. If the twinkle in Renjun’s eye is anything to go by, he seems to find the whole ordeal as entertaining as Yangyang does.
“ ‒ and that’s it, I’ve answered all your dumb questions,” Doyoung finishes. He’s grown steadily redder and redder throughout his monologue, and now his face is the exact shade of Renjun’s beloved Haidilao malatang. Yangyang didn’t even know that that colour could exist organically in nature. “Now, can someone else please go next? We have to hurry, because ‒ ”
In a moment of what Yangyang considers to be the purest form of irony, the buzzer goes off right there and then, and Doyoung bites back a scream.
👨❤️👨
DOYOUNG & TAEYONG ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
DOYOUNG
Who voted us out? It was Donghyuck, wasn’t it? I bet it was Donghyuck.
TAEYONG
Babe, maybe you should calm down.
JUNGWOO
(off-screen)
Well, as I stated at the beginning of the game, the votes are anonymous, so ‒
DOYOUNG
He had it in for me, didn’t he, Yongie? That little brat. If I catch him outside, I swear to god ‒
TAEYONG
Uh, I think maybe now would be a good time to end the interview.
👨❤️👨
TAEIL & DONGHYUCK ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
DONGHYUCK
(grinning maniacally)
Was he mad? I bet he was mad.
TAEIL sighs affectionately.
👨❤️👨
RENJUN & YANGYANG ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
YANGYANG
I mean, I guess they might have been telling the truth, but ‒
RENJUN
He kept trying to control the conversation. It doesn’t matter if he wasn’t the mole. It was annoying.
YANGYANG
Dude ‒ I mean, babe! You can’t say that.
RENJUN
Why not? I just did.
👨❤️👨
“Good job, us!” Donghyuck cheers after Doyoung and Taeyong have left the box, and Jungwoo’s called cut on round two. “I don’t even know if they were the moles, but whatever, that’s less people to split the pot with.”
“Yes,” Jungwoo says, stepping closer to the box so that everyone can hear him clearly. “About that ‒ now that we’ve gone through two rounds, I’ll give you guys the option to either end the game here, or keep going. But if you do ‒ and you vote out a real couple ‒ then the prize money decreases.”
Everyone seems to be taken aback by this new development. “Wait,” Chenle says. “So the moles are still amongst us?”
Jungwoo’s lips twitch, as if he’s trying to hold back a smile. “I can neither confirm nor deny that. But if you think you voted them out, then you can stop the game now, and split the money between all of you.”
Like clockwork, Yangyang ‒ and everyone else ‒ turns to the money sitting on the table. Yangyang’s math might suck, but even he knows two thousand dollars won’t be a lot when it’s split evenly between eight people.
Johnny speaks up first. “I don’t know. I like to think we got the moles out already.”
“Well, I think we should keep going,” Donghyuck retorts. “I think the moles are still in the box.”
He looks directly at Yangyang when he says this, and Yangyang can’t help but squirm a little under the unsolicited attention. Renjun follows his gaze, and when he realises what’s going on, he pushes Yangyang behind him and stares Donghyuck down defiantly. Yangyang can still see Donghyuck’s narrowed eyes above the top of Renjun’s head, but he appreciates the gesture nonetheless.
“How about this,” Jungwoo suggests. “Let’s take a vote. All in favour of continuing the game?”
Donghyuck’s hand immediately shoots up, followed closely by Taeil, Ten and Chenle. It’s not lost on Yangyang that a person from each of the other couples wants the game to continue. Yangyang and Renjun exchange glances ‒ if they don’t vote in favour, they’ll probably be targeted first ‒ and after a moment, they both raise their hands, too.
Jungwoo nods and moves back to his seat. “Alright then, let’s keep going!”
👨❤️👨
“So, no offence,” Donghyuck says once time starts ticking, “but I have some doubts about you two.”
He waves a hand at Yangyang and Renjun. Yangyang feels a spike of anxiety, unsure of how to respond, but luckily, Renjun answers for the both of them. “Yeah? What doubts?”
“I don’t know.” Donghyuck tilts his head; narrows his eyes. “There’s just something… off. You guys say you met in college?”
“So did you,” Renjun snipes back. “Didn’t you say earlier that you met Taeil in one of the classes he was TA-ing?”
Donghyuck grins, smug. “I did. And don’t change the subject. Out of all of us, you’ve been together for the least amount of time, and for all we know, you guys could just be really good friends.”
“Well, we’ll prove we’re not,” Renjun fires back immediately. Yangyang admires him for it, even if he does kind of want to hold him back, because when it comes down to it, they are just really good friends. “Tell us what you want us to do, and we’ll do it. Anything. Anything at all.”
“Um,” Yangyang clarifies, seeing how Donghyuck’s eyes light up in anticipation. “Anything within reason, of course.”
Donghyuck taps his chin, thinking it over. “Let’s make it real sappy, then. See how intimate you guys really are. How about… you hold each other’s hands, and say something deep to each other? Oh! And you have to look each other in the eye the entire time.”
Renjun scoffs. “Is that all? Fine ‒ Yangyang, come here.”
Is that all? Yangyang shirks away from feelings like the plague. How is he supposed to hold Renjun’s hands and say something sweet and meaningful? While gazing deeply into his eyes like some romantic lead in a bad rom-com? In front of a whole camera crew?
It’s not like he has a choice, though. Conscious of all the eyes on him, Yangyang reluctantly steps out of formation and into the middle of the box. In some absurd replay of earlier, he nearly stumbles when Renjun stops abruptly, spins around and grabs both of his hands.
“You okay?” Renjun asks, eyes searching his expression worriedly. His voice is too soft for the mic to pick up, and just audible enough for Yangyang to hear him. “If it’s too much ‒ ”
Yangyang shakes his head jerkily. He lets go of Renjun’s hands briefly, flexing and clenching his own, trying to stave off the nerves that are causing him to vibrate out of his skin. “I’m fine. Let’s just get this over and done with.”
Renjun catches his hands again, steadying him. Grounding him. “Just breathe. Take all the time you need. Do you want me to go first?”
“Yes, please.”
Donghyuck had said that he wanted something deep. Yangyang has no idea what Renjun’s going to concoct to satisfy that tall order. That personal, touchy-feely brand of friendship ‒ that’s not really them. The foundation of their relationship is bickering, barbs, and the occasional backhanded compliment when one of them does well. All of the stuff they’ve pulled today ‒ Renjun reaching out to touch him, Renjun treating him with care ‒ these are just anomalies, stuff curated for the cameras. So it’s with some trepidation that Yangyang watches Renjun look down at their joined hands, gathering his thoughts.
Then Renjun raises his head, locks eyes with Yangyang, and speaks.
“I guess what I want to say to you is ‒ thank you,” is the first thing he says, surprising Yangyang. “No, I mean it, really. You constantly challenge me, push me out of my comfort zone and make me try new things. Like this.” Renjun looks around the set pointedly, earning him a few laughs from the sidelines. “You have the wildest ideas ‒ I still think coming on this show was one of the craziest ‒ but that’s what I love about you, you know? You make life an adventure, and ever since I met you, I’ve never stopped having fun.”
He readjusts his hold on Yangyang’s hands until their fingers are interlocking. It’s far from comfortable, but every single inch of his hands is pressed up against Renjun’s skin, and Yangyang can’t find it in himself to complain.
“And being with you is just so… easy,” Renjun continues, on a roll. “I don’t have to pretend with you; I can just be myself. You accept me for who I am, you support me in everything I do ‒ open mic nights, that one unfortunate dye job I got, the list goes on. You show me what it’s like to love unconditionally and wholeheartedly, and I just hope that I can do the same for you.”
For the second time that day, Yangyang’s rendered speechless. Even though it’s all an act ‒ and it must be an act, because Renjun would never say all of this aloud willingly ‒ he can’t help but feel himself be swayed by the sincerity shining in Renjun’s eyes. God, just the way Renjun’s looking at him now ‒ Yangyang’s pulse flutters; thunders in his ears. They may be surrounded by people, by filming equipment, lit by the harsh glare of studio lights, but it’s like he’s suddenly got tunnel vision, Yangyang’s world narrowing down to just the two of them and the smile spreading across Renjun’s face, soft and sweet.
Renjun’s the one who’s laid his heart out to bare. Why, then, does Yangyang feel so exposed?
“It’s your turn,” Renjun whispers, and Yangyang’s yanked back to reality. That’s right ‒ that was the whole point of Renjun going first. So Yangyang would have some time to collect himself and plan what to say.
The thing is, maybe he’s known what he’s wanted to say to Renjun all along.
Yangyang studies Renjun carefully. He looks at him ‒ really looks at him. Takes in his open, calm expression. The gentle slope of his nose. His eyes ‒ encouraging, bright, patient.
Yangyang takes a deep breath, shuts up the voices in his head, and, for once, lets his heart do the talking.
“I want to thank you, too,” he starts. “I don’t know why, but I’ve been so… anxious?” He turns the word over in his head, as if gauging its weight, then nods. “Yeah, anxious. And you’ve been taking care of me this entire time, even if you don’t know it. You’re always checking up on me, making sure that I’m okay, that nothing is too overwhelming. You’re always putting my needs ahead of yours, and for that, I’m just so grateful. You…”
God, talking? It’s hard. It doesn’t help that Yangyang can feel his throat closing up, a mild burning pricking the back of his eyes, but he’s not going to cry. He’s not. He’s going to power through this, and say what Renjun deserves to hear.
“You have my back,” he finishes, an echo of what Renjun had said earlier. “And I’ll always have yours.”
It’s cliché. It’s pandering to the masses. It’s the most truthful thing to come out of Yangyang’s mouth this entire shoot.
Renjun doesn’t smile like Yangyang thought he would. Instead, his expression shifts into something subtle. Something tender. It makes Yangyang think of the first beams of sunlight breaking through the clouds. Of coming home after a long day at work, and falling into bed. Of unfamiliar, dangerous, exciting territory.
And then he’s not thinking at all, because Renjun has stepped forwards to embrace him. Yangyang huffs in surprise at the sudden change in position, but his arms automatically go around Renjun’s waist, his fingers stroking the soft knit of his sweater, brushing over the dip in the small of his back. Yangyang sinks into the hug, tension slowly bleeding from his body, feeling Renjun’s warmth all around him. When he tucks his face into the crook of Renjun’s neck, his nose fills with the scent of his perfume. It smells like comfort; it smells like home.
They stay like that for what seems like ages. It’s only when someone from the filming crew coughs that Yangyang remembers where he is. They separate, blushes high on their cheeks, and the rest of the couples regard them with raised eyebrows.
“Well, shit,” Donghyuck finally says, breaking the silence. “I guess the moles aren’t here after all.”
Renjun’s face immediately drops into a scowl. “You were the one who wanted this round, genius. Guess someone legit will be voted off, and it better be you.”
“Okay, okay,” Kun interjects. “Let’s not fight.”
Renjun and Donghyuck ignore him and keep going at it. Ten glances over at the filming crew. “Hey, Jungwoo?” he calls over the bickering.
“Yeah?”
“No questions are off the table, right?”
“Nope!” Jungwoo replies. “Go right ahead!”
“Awesome.” Ten turns back to the group, clapping his hands together to get everyone’s attention. There’s a devilish look on his face, and Yangyang gets the vague feeling that things are about to go very, very wrong.
He’s proven very, very right.
“Since we have some time left, let’s see if the moles ‒ if they’re even here ‒ will kiss each other!”
It takes a second for Yangyang, still punch-drunk by the warmth and smell of Renjun clinging to his skin, to process the words. But when Ten’s meaning finally registers, the dreamlike fog that’s wrapped around Yangyang’s head immediately dissipates, and he feels his heart drop right down to the soles of his beat-up platform Converses.
Oh, they’re fucked.
So, so fucked.
Renjun must realise it, too, because he shuts up mid-sentence and goes perfectly still. Luckily, no one seems to notice, since they’re all busy discussing the mechanics of the kiss.
“Just a quick peck, or…?”
“It’s gotta be a long one. The moles probably won’t do it, right?”
“Why don’t we just leave it up to each couple? The moles will probably be super awkward if it’s their first time.”
“Yeah, let’s do that instead.”
“Okay then! Here goes,” Ten says cheerfully, and then he grabs Johnny’s face and pulls him down.
Yangyang watches as they go down the line towards him and Renjun much like how he thinks people watch natural disasters: with horror, with the inability to look away, and with an impending sense of doom.
Ten and Johnny laugh into their kiss with each other. Kun and Chenle share a quick, chaste peck. Donghyuck dips Taeil in his arms and slobbers all over him.
And then it’s their turn.
When Renjun turns towards Yangyang, his face is the picture of nonchalance, but he’s as white as a sheet. His hand comes to rest on Yangyang’s shoulder, hesitant, like he’s not sure if he’s even allowed, and through his t-shirt Yangyang feels his hand shake.
He’s nervous, Yangyang realises. For the first time during this entire game, and at its most critical point, Renjun’s nervous.
There’s a tug in his chest, almost an ache, and then Yangyang’s body moves of its own accord. He moves into Renjun’s space, one hand coming up to rest on his lower back, the other reaching up to cup his cheek. Yangyang leans in slowly, torturously slowly, giving Renjun plenty of time to back away. When he doesn’t, just stands there, watching Yangyang draw closer and closer, Yangyang stops just a hair’s breadth away. Renjun’s eyes widen ‒ what are you doing? ‒ and it shouldn’t matter, they’ll still have to do this if they don’t want to lose now, but ‒ Yangyang has to ask.
He has to make sure.
“Okay?” Yangyang breathes, the tip of his nose brushing Renjun’s.
Renjun inhales sharply. Gives the tiniest of nods. “Okay.”
That’s all the permission he needs. Yangyang waits until Renjun’s eyes fall shut, then closes the distance between them.
His first thought is that he was right. Renjun is wearing lipgloss. His lips are slightly tacky from it, tasting of artificial strawberries, but they’re warm, so warm, and red and plush and sweet. Yangyang wonders what it would be like to catch his lower lip between his teeth, to bite down on it. Wonders whether Renjun would like it, and ask him to do it again.
Renjun makes as if to pull away, but it’s not enough ‒ it can’t possibly be enough. Yangyang holds him fast, chases his lips, slides his tongue across them. Renjun makes a noise, high and breathy, and for a split second, Yangyang thinks he’s gone too far. He pulls back, fully intending to apologise, but Renjun surges forwards and seals their lips together again. He licks his way into Yangyang’s mouth, coaxing soft, choked-off mewls from him, his hands flying up to tangle with the hairs at the nape of Yangyang’s neck, pulling him closer, kissing him deeper.
Holy shit, Yangyang thinks, head spinning, skin buzzing, heart pounding. Holy fucking shit.
There’s a wolf-whistle in the background, and then a cackle that sounds like Chenle. “Okay, we get it, you’re a couple!”
Yangyang presses his lips to the corner of Renjun’s mouth one last time, long and lingering, before drawing back. It takes a while for his vision to adjust, but when it does, the first thing he sees is Renjun’s red-slick lips. The flush high on his cheeks. The way his eyes flutter open, squinting in the harsh glare of the set lights. Yangyang realises two seconds too late that they’re chest-to-chest, still holding each other tight, and quickly untangles himself.
“Sorry,” he whispers. He isn’t sure what he’s apologising for.
Renjun stares at him for one, two beats. He wets his lips, then presses them together. “Don’t be.”
Something in his tone gives Yangyang pause. He sounds ‒ wistful, a little sad, even. Yangyang blinks, confused, but before he can ask him what’s wrong, Kun clears his throat. “Anyway, can we get back to the game? ”
“Yeah, about that…” Donghyuck looks around the group and then over to Jungwoo. “Look, man, we made a mistake, I don’t think anyone’s the mole here. Can we, like, not vote anyone out this round?”
“That’s not exactly how it works,” Jungwoo says.
“C’mon, man, we’ll just split the prize money! You’ll be giving it out anyway, what’s the difference?”
Jungwoo chews the inside of his cheek, considering. “Well, if it’s unanimous…”
Donghyuck looks around the group; everyone’s nodding their assent. Yangyang manages a thumbs up, too, even though his mind is far, far away from the game, still breathless, still dizzy from the kiss he shared with Renjun. “Yeah, we’re unanimous.”
“Alright, then,” Jungwoo says, slipping out of his director’s chair. “We’ll end the game here.”
He strides over to a row of switches. “If the lights turn green, it means that you won, and you successfully voted the moles out. If the lights turn red, it means the moles are still amongst you, and the moles have won.”
Jungwoo flips a switch, then leans back, watching them with a grin. All of the other contestants hold their breath, looking anxiously at the lights.
“If any one of you are the moles,” Donghyuck mutters under his breath, eyes fixed on the lights, “I’ll be so mad.”
Renjun stifles a giggle at that. None of that earlier melancholy is present; now, he presses into Yangyang’s side, warm and familiar. They share a look, and Yangyang’s almost struck dumb by the smile that seems to have taken over Renjun’s face ‒ brilliant, blinding, and reserved just for Yangyang.
Get ready to win, Renjun mouths.
Then the lights turn red, and all hell breaks loose.
👨❤️👨
KUN & CHENLE ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
CHENLE
I couldn’t believe they were the moles! Did you suspect it was them?
KUN
Nah. That kiss was convincing. And all the nice things they said about each other? Honestly, they deserve the money.
👨❤️👨
JOHNNY & TEN ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
JOHNNY
When they revealed themselves, I was like… damn.
TEN
Right?
JOHNNY
I mean… college friends don’t kiss like that. Do they?
TEN
(shrugs)
I have no clue, but wow, the dedication.
JOHNNY
(shaking his head)
Well-played, you two. Well-played.
👨❤️👨
TAEIL & DONGHYUCK ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
DONGHYUCK
I knew it! I knew it! God damn it! I should have trusted my gut!
TAEIL
Wow, I had no clue! Good for them.
DONGHYUCK picks up a pillow and screams into it.
DONGHYUCK
(muffled)
God damn it!
👨❤️👨
RENJUN & YANGYANG ‒ POST-GAME INTERVIEW
RENJUN and YANGYANG watch the playback of the third round. YANGYANG turns bright pink and looks away when the reel of them kissing plays. RENJUN keeps watching, unfazed and expression blank.
The silence stretches on long after the playback ends.
JUNGWOO
(off-camera, clearing his throat)
So… Congratulations!
YANGYANG
Thanks, man.
RENJUN
Thank you.
JUNGWOO
(off-camera)
Any plans on what you’re going to do with the money?
RENJUN
I’m putting my half in the savings account. Yangyang’s probably going to waste the money and buy some ridiculously expensive sneakers.
YANGYANG
Hey! It’s not a waste, it’s an investment!
RENJUN
It’s true though, isn’t it?
YANGYANG
Yeah, but you don’t have to do me dirty like this!
JUNGWOO
(laughing off-camera)
You guys seem to know each other really well!
RENJUN and YANGYANG share a long look. They each crack a small smile. RENJUN turns back to the camera first, but not before he reaches out to hold YANGYANG’s hand, fingers threading together.
RENJUN
Yeah. We really do.
👨❤️👨
Life goes on normally after that.
They hang out in the library, making sure not to get kicked out. Yangyang drives Renjun to and from home after his open mic nights in his beat-up sedan. When Renjun gets that month’s scholarship allowance, they go to Haidilao and eat their weight in spicy soup and thin strips of pork.
And they absolutely, categorically, do not talk about what happened during the game.
Dejun waits until Renjun’s gone to the bathroom before he turns their biweekly brunch into an interrogation session. “What was that,” he demands, kicking Yangyang under the table. As a result of the assault, Yangyang drops his forkful of lasagna, and of course it lands right in the middle of his white hoodie.
“What the hell, man!”
Dejun ignores him. “Yangyang, answer me. What was that?”
“What was what?” Yangyang asks, dabbing at his front with a napkin.
“That! What was that!”
Yangyang looks up from the tomato sauce staining his hoodie to see Dejun staring at him expectantly, his (admittedly impressive) eyebrows raised. “Bro, you’re making no sense ‒ ”
“The tension,” Dejun finally explains, fed up. “The pressing up against each other’s sides. The making eyes at each other. God, you guys need to get a room!”
Suddenly, the fact that his hoodie may be irreparably damaged isn’t such a big deal anymore. That’s crazy, Yangyang wants to tell Dejun. Or, you’re imagining things.
But he’s not. Over the past month since the game, things have been… weird. They touch a lot more, for one. Yangyang finds himself unconsciously leaning into Renjun’s space whenever they’re together, soaking up his presence the way a cat soaks up heat, and it’s only when he’s already clinging to him that he realises what’s happening. But it’s not like Renjun’s innocent, either. Even with the most ordinary of things, his fingers somehow always manage to catch on Yangyang’s skin. Like the one time he had been driving and Renjun had leaned over the console to compliment him on his necklace, his fingers crooking under the metal chain and brushing against his collarbones. Yangyang had been so distracted he had accidentally run a red light.
Then there are the moments where Renjun looks at him. Not because he wants to get his attention, or because there’s something on his face (Yangyang had checked using his front-facing camera, like, multiple times). Renjun’s just looking at him, maybe a little thoughtfully, and when Yangyang catches him staring, he just smiles, blushes and ducks his head.
Yeah. It’s weird. Nice, but definitely weird.
Dejun’s jaw drops. “Oh my god,” he says loudly, mistaking Yangyang’s silence for horrified shock. “Don’t tell me you didn’t even notice.”
Yangyang shushes him, glancing over his shoulder to make sure Renjun’s still in the bathroom. “Shut up, I’ve noticed! But I didn’t want to say anything, because what if ‒ ”
He stutters to a halt when he realises how he was going to finish his sentence. What if he stops. That’s what he was going to say ‒ not what if I make Renjun uncomfortable? Not what if it’s just harmless clinginess?
No ‒ he’s worried about what will happen if Renjun stops touching him, stops looking at him, stops causing that glowing feeling in his chest that makes him simultaneously want to hide under his blankets and yell from the rooftops.
Dejun stares at him like he’s grown a second head, and Yangyang realises belatedly that he’s said all of that out loud.
“You are so dense,” Dejun says bluntly. “Truly, completely fucking dense. Haven’t you seen the video?”
He’s talking about the game. Jungwoo had emailed him the link when it dropped about a week ago, but between school and this weird thing with Renjun, Yangyang hasn’t had the time to watch it. “No. I mean, I was there. I don’t need to relive it.”
Dejun regards him for a long time, then picks up his mimosa and takes a delicate sip. “Well, I think you should watch it. Some parts are… very enlightening.”
He’s being unnecessarily cryptic (Hendery says he prefers to be called mysterious). Yangyang frowns. “What? Why? Dejun, don’t just drink your mimosa, you’ve had like five of those already! Tell me why you think I should ‒ ”
Yangyang doesn’t get a chance to badger Dejun any further. Renjun returns right at that moment, sliding into his seat next to Yangyang.
He points at Yangyang’s stained hoodie. “Oh, what happened?”
“Dejun happened,” Yangyang grumbles. “Ugh, this was one of my favourites, too ‒ ”
“I have a Tide stain remover pen at home,” Renjun says. “You can come over later and we’ll try to get it out.”
He pats Yangyang’s thigh, right over one of the rips in his jeans and sending little shocks of electricity up Yangyang’s leg, then turns back to speak to Dejun like nothing’s happened.
And if Renjun leaves his hand there for the rest of brunch, hidden from Dejun’s view by the edge of the table, and Yangyang feels like he’s going to physically die but makes no move to remove it ‒ well, that’s nobody’s business but Yangyang’s own.
👨❤️👨
It takes all of twelve hours for Yangyang to cave.
He does his laundry. He finishes his assignments. He even washes up after dinner, a duty which he usually fobs off to Hendery. Eventually, though, Yangyang runs out of excuses, and some time after midnight, he finds himself sitting in front of his laptop with the video opened in a new tab.
If only Dejun hadn’t mentioned the video. It’s his fault, really. If he hadn’t brought it up at brunch, the very existence of the game would have been buried in the recesses of Yangyang’s mind, and the email linking it would have become swamped by an avalanche of the newsletters that Yangyang’s been meaning to unsubscribe to.
But no, Dejun said it was enlightening ‒ very enlightening ‒ knowing full well that Yangyang would have been enticed and curious enough to watch it. Which is an act of manipulation in itself, right? So Yangyang shouldn’t watch it, in case he’s brainwashed into seeing something that maybe isn’t real at all.
Yangyang nods to himself. He sits on his hands. That’s it, then. Dejun can take his enlightenment and shove it up his ass. Yangyang’s not going to watch the video. He’s not.
He’s not.
Yangyang clicks play.
The video is edited well. It’s pretty funny, actually, the editor picking out the most hilarious moments of the shoot and interspersing them with commentary that was filmed after the game from each couple. They even included the bit where Doyoung lost his shit after finding out that he and Taeyong were voted out of the box, and Donghyuck’s gleeful post-game admission that he was one of the persons who voted him out.
Yangyang’s enjoying the video so much that he almost forgets why he’d been putting it off. But then the section for the third round plays, and Yangyang cringes so bad at the soft, emotional piano music playing in the background, overlaid with the sound of his voice ‒ god, does he really sound so nasal? ‒ that he decides to just skip to the end. He catches a couple of seconds of his past self twerking (badly) while Renjun throws bills in his direction, the both of them celebrating their win in the most juvenile way possible, and then the screen fades to black.
Well, that wasn’t so bad. Yangyang sits back in his chair, pleased with himself, yet somewhat confused. Dejun had called him dense. Specifically told him to watch the video. Said that it was enlightening.
The problem is, Yangyang’s no more enlightened than he was ten minutes ago.
Thinking he must be missing something, and unwilling to put himself through the torture of watching him and Renjun act emotional around each other for a second time, he scrolls down to view the comments.
v4l3nt1n3b0i
aw, renjun and yangyang are so cute together… can’t believe they were the moles lol
jung.sungchan
i’m so sad that they weren’t a couple!!!! i cried when they told each other how thankful they were for each other. and that kiss!!! idk they just seemed to get each other!!!! :,( :,( :,(
letswinwin
Producers, are you sure that the moles aren’t a couple? Or at the very least, like each other romantically? I don’t know, these moments just look very sus to me: 8:05, 9:16, 10:39, 11:12.
Yangyang frowns at that last comment. Of course they aren’t a couple ‒ didn’t letswinwin watch the video at all? Out of curiosity, Yangyang clicks on the first timestamp, and the video loops back to the section he had skipped over earlier, the one where he and Renjun are facing each other, holding hands.
He’s about to skip over it again when the image on the screen changes.
It’s a close-up shot of Renjun’s face. Yangyang recognises his voice in the background, overlaid with the piano ballad, telling Renjun how grateful he is for him. He tunes it out, choosing instead to focus on the minute changes in Renjun’s expression ‒ the slight parting of his lips as he listens to Yangyang speak; the way his eyes go from bright to molten to dark; the gradual softening of his features into something pure, something golden. He looks so genuinely fond, so quietly happy, that Yangyang can’t pay attention to anything else, and for a moment, he forgets to breathe.
Then the camera angle shifts, and Yangyang’s own face stares back at him. Except ‒ it looks wholly unfamiliar. There’s no tension in his brows, no pinched expression. Even though he remembers sweating and stressing profusely that day, his forehead is shine-free. In fact, the expression on his face mirrors Renjun’s exactly, and if he didn’t know any better, he would say it looks a lot like ‒ A lot like ‒
Yangyang stops the video. Heart hammering, he scrolls back down to letswinwin’s comment and clicks on the next timestamp.
9:16. Yangyang looks away after their kiss, turning his attention back to the game. While Donghyuck and Jungwoo are talking, Renjun brings a hand up to his mouth, and drags a thumb across his lower lip. Renjun’s eyes never leave Yangyang’s figure the whole time.
10:39. They’ve won. Renjun lies flat on the floor, trying to make snow angels out of the bills strewn across the ground. Yangyang laughs, kneels on the floor, reaches out almost as if he wants to run his fingers through Renjun’s hair. But then at the last second, he falters, and he looks away bashfully, running his fingers through his own hair instead.
11:12. “ ‒ really well!” Jungwoo’s disembodied voice says. Yangyang and Renjun glance at each other. Renjun takes his hand. Here and now, Yangyang feels a phantom squeeze around his hand; around his heart. “Yeah,” the Renjun on-screen says to the camera, smiling; radiant. “We really do.”
Yangyang remains in his chair long after the video stops playing. His laptop screen goes black, left idle for too long. He doesn’t bother jiggling it awake; instead, he stares at nothing in particular, mind going a million miles a minute, letting the full weight of his epiphany sink in.
The touching. The looks. How comforted Yangyang felt. How sincere ‒ how kind, how gentle, how grounding ‒ Renjun was during the game. It all makes sense now ‒ the evidence has literally been caught in 4K.
Dejun was right. All the other couples were right. Hell, even letswinwin was right.
Yangyang likes Renjun.
And Renjun ‒ Renjun likes him back.
👨❤️👨
In hindsight, maybe this wasn’t the best idea.
“Liu Yangyang, it’s two fucking a.m.,” Renjun growls when he finally answers the door. “You’d better be dead or dying, and if not, I’m going to make sure that you are.”
Yangyang doesn’t know what to say to that. All he knows is that Renjun is in his matching Moomin pyjamas, that his glasses are sitting askew on his face, and that the sight makes him want to spontaneously combust.
“I’m not dead, and I’m not dying,” Yangyang says, because he’s nervous, and when he’s nervous, he becomes incapable of intelligent thought. “But I’ve just had an epiphany.”
Renjun blinks. Stares at him for far longer than is polite.
“What.”
“It’s important,” Yangyang says, because it is. “Can I come in?”
“I should just leave you outside and go back to sleep,” Renjun mutters, but he swings the door open to let Yangyang in.
They tiptoe past the living room, the kitchenette and Shotaro’s bedroom ‒ “We have to be quiet, he’s got early practice tomorrow,” Renjun whispers ‒ until they reach the door at the end of the hallway. There’s no light on in Renjun’s bedroom except for the muted white glow of his aquarium sitting next to the desk. Looking at it is soothing, helps to calm his racing thoughts, and Yangyang’s glad that he helped Renjun set it up all those months ago.
“So what is it,” Renjun says, tired, closing the door behind him and flopping down onto his bed. “What’s your big epiphany.”
Yangyang isn’t quite sure where to begin. He kind of wants to sit down, too, just to hide how his legs are shaking, but Renjun is glaring at him through half-lidded eyes, so maybe that’s not the best option right now. Fuck, maybe he should’ve just waited till morning to do this, but Yangyang knows he’d never have been able to sleep in his current state, butterflies in his tummy and a buzzing in his chest, and so he’d decided to make the questionable decision of trudging over in his flimsy cardigan and basketball shorts, feet still in his house slippers, to knock on Renjun’s door and finally say ‒
“You know,” Yangyang blurts out. “I lied, when they asked when I first had feelings for you.”
Renjun looks confused, then mad. Mad and tired ‒ that’s a dangerous combination. “Wait, is this about the game? Did you seriously come here in the middle of the night just to tell me that?”
“Well, yes and no ‒ ”
“Yangyang, I know, everything we said in that game was a lie ‒ ”
“No. Not everything.”
“What are you talking about? Of course ‒ ”
“The things you said,” Yangyang says, stepping forward. “They weren’t lies, were they? You did start to have feelings for me on your first open mic night.”
Renjun blanches. “What ‒ ”
Yangyang takes another step towards him. “You do think I’m fun.”
“I ‒ ”
His knees bump against Renjun’s. “You want to kiss me.”
There’s a long, agonising silence.
Renjun’s got his fists balled up in his sheets. His gaze is fixed somewhere over Yangyang’s shoulder, refusing to meet his eyes, face smoothened out into that blank expression he had on the day of the shoot. At the time, Yangyang had thought maybe Renjun was just disinterested, watching the playback of them kissing in that bored, polite way one does when someone shows a video of their kid at a lame dance recital, or something.
Now, Yangyang knows better.
“Is this your idea of a joke?”
Renjun’s voice comes out low and raspy, like he’s trying to speak past something stuck in his throat. Yangyang reels back, surprised. “What? Renjun ‒ ”
“If so, it’s not funny ‒ ”
“No. No, Renjun, that’s not what I meant at all.”
“Then what did you mean?” Renjun asks, pained, and Yangyang realises with a start that he’s totally gone about this the wrong way.
“Listen.” Yangyang drops to his knees so that they’re at the same eye-level. He doesn’t know what to do with his hands, so, after some hesitation, lays them lightly on Renjun’s knees. “Remember I said that I started to like you when I heard you sing for the first time?”
“That was a lie.”
“The timing was a lie,” Yangyang corrects. He swallows, heart in his throat, and finally lays all his cards out on the table. “But the fact that I like you… isn’t.”
The confession rolls off his tongue effortlessly, sweetly. It feels like a weight’s been lifted off his shoulders. Yangyang’s words hang in the air, suspended, expanding to fill the space between them until there’s no room left for lies or the walls they’ve built around themselves.
Renjun’s expression finally flickers, cycling through confusion, shock, surprise, and what might be hope all in the span of a second. “What,” he whispers.
“You heard me,” Yangyang says. “The first time I realised I liked you was thirty minutes ago, when I watched that video of us in that stupid box, and realised that maybe ‒ maybe I’ve actually liked you all this time, and I was just too much of an idiot to notice.”
“Yangyang.”
“Renjun,” Yangyang parrots back. He can feel himself smiling, but it’s the most serious he’s ever felt. “I like you. I like you so, so much. I don’t know why I didn’t see it sooner, but will you ‒ will you go out with me?”
Renjun’s eyes are shining, shimmering, splendid. Yangyang takes that as a good sign; emboldened, he takes Renjun’s hands in his own. At that, Renjun starts to lean forward, and Yangyang’s heart nearly leaps out of his chest at the prospect of getting kissed by Renjun again. He closes his eyes, sways towards Renjun, eager and waiting, and then ‒
And then Renjun’s hitting him.
Yangyang’s eyes fly open. “Ouch! What the hell?”
“You ‒ couldn’t ‒ think ‒ to ‒ say ‒ that ‒ first?” Renjun cries out, each word with a punch to Yangyang’s shoulder, his chest, his arm, anywhere he can reach.
Yangyang cowers on the ground, arms raised to fend off the attack. “Renjun, I ‒ ”
Renjun grabs the nearest pillow on his bed and throws it at Yangyang. “Did no one teach you how to start a conversation? It should’ve been, ‘Hey, Renjun, I like you’, not, ‘Hey Renjun, I know you like me and here’s how I’m going to make you panic for the next two minutes’!”
“I know,” Yangyang squeaks, dodging a plushie. “I messed up!”
“I seriously cannot believe you sometimes ‒ ”
Yangyang waits for a lull in the assault before lunging for Renjun. There’s a bit of a struggle, Renjun flailing against Yangyang’s hold around his wrists, but he eventually falls limp, and Yangyang says a silent thank you to Dejun for never letting him skip arm day at the gym.
“I know,” he says, soothing and conciliatory, a laugh nearly bubbling out of his chest at how absurd their situation is. He draws Renjun’s hands up to his heart. “I know, and I’m sorry it was such a disaster. You know I don’t think before I speak.”
Renjun glares, but Yangyang knows him well enough to know it’s more for show than anything else. “You’re such an idiot. You know that, right?”
“Ouch,” Yangyang jokes. He deems it safe enough to let go of Renjun’s wrists, one arm wrapping around his back to pull him close, the other reaching up to caress his cheek. “Is this how you treat all of your crushes?”
Renjun’s blush blooms pink in the palm of Yangyang’s hand. “Shut up.”
“Make me.”
“With pleasure,” Renjun bites back, and then he crashes their lips together.
Renjun’s mouth is phenomenal. Everything about him is phenomenal. Yangyang loses himself in the wet slide of their lips, the clever, enticing twists of Renjun’s tongue, the firm line of Renjun’s body pressed against his own. They fall onto the bed, swallowing up each gasp and giggle that escapes from their mouths, hands roaming, reaching, holding each other close.
They make out for what seems like hours. It’s Renjun who pulls away first, hair mussed and mouth swollen. Yangyang feels a rush of affection at the sight, feels fireworks set off somewhere deep in his chest, warmth spreading all the way to his fingertips and down to his toes. A celebration, lighting him up from the inside out.
“Wow,” Renjun breathes. He leans his cheek against Yangyang’s chest, catching his breath. “And to think we could’ve been doing this for a whole year.”
Yangyang combs Renjun’s hair out of his face. He presses an apologetic kiss to his forehead, to his cheek, to the tip of his nose. “I”m sorry it took me so long. I’m sorry it took a game show for me to notice.”
Renjun seeks Yangyang’s hand out like it’s an old habit. And maybe it is ‒ already, the feel and fit of Renjun's hand in his is familiar, their fingers interlocking like two puzzle pieces made for each other: automatically. Easily.
Perfectly.
“Well, you know what they say.” Renjun pulls Yangyang in for one more long, slow kiss, the both of them smiling into it. He tastes like the promise of something new. Something more. Something real. “Sometimes, to get what you want, you gotta fake it ’til you make it.”