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It’s the end of the world, and Jeon Wonwoo is buying flowers.
Not that those two are tangentially related. It is the end of the world, but like, if you were to ask anyone else about it, they’d just look confused. In reality, Wonwoo is just being dramatic about a minor inconvenience, and stubborn about doing something that could possibly fix it (which Mingyu always tells Wonwoo off for). The flowers are just in case Wonwoo actually does something to mitigate the situation. Unlikely, but unlikelier things have happened in Wonwoo’s lifetime this year, and he always likes to be prepared. There’s no use in leaving anything to chance.
His phone blares insistently in his back pocket, demanding attention. The ringtone matches exactly the person calling. Speaking of Mingyu:
“Hey,” Wonwoo murmurs easily into the speaker. “What’s up?”
“Hyung, you better come now. It’s starting already.” Mingyu’s high-pitched nervous whine filters in.
Having been his roommate for nearly two years now, Wonwoo has accurately cataloged a majority of Mingyu noises. This is the tone Mingyu takes when things are one step from going terribly, terribly awry, though how exactly terrible the situation is varies from instance to instance. Last week, when Wonwoo heard it, he’d had to go on his hands and knees to kill the spider Mingyu swore was glaring at him. (“I can’t cook in these conditions!” Mingyu had said defensively, all 187cm of him curled up in a corner of their already cramped kitchen. And well, Wonwoo needed to eat, so he dutifully sighed, picked up a napkin, and went to go find the arachnid.).
“Shit, I thought I had time,” Wonwoo scrambles for his wallet, as the poor florist works with wide eyes and nimble hands to finish arranging his bouquet, one ear listening in on the conversation.
“You know him, he’s always punctual.”
Wonwoo frowns. “Would it kill him to be late, just this once?”
“He’s always been the best of us,” Mingyu sighs, to which Wonwoo has to murmur his reluctant agreement. That much is true. Has always been.
“Thank you,” Wonwoo mouths, handing her change and generous tip.
“Fighting!” The florist clenches both her fists in front of her in obvious support. Wonwoo smiles weakly in return. He’ll need it.
After the shop door closes behind him, and he’s maintained a safe distance away from the storefront, Wonwoo starts sprinting. Flowers be damned.
The sign definitely screams student fundraiser. First of all, there’s haphazard streaks of paint all over, like the person who had been making it forgot they were wielding wet paint in the middle of making it. It hangs wickedly in the wind, tacked on with exactly two pieces of duct tape and held together by sheer determination:
247 KISSING BOOTH
NEED A QUICK PICK ME UP?
PUCKER UP!
Chan beams brilliantly, waving at Wonwoo from where he’s manning the station. “Wonwoo-hyung! You’re here!”
Wonwoo slows down his stride slightly, under the guise of catching his breath, and lets himself bask in the warm light of Chan’s attention. For a moment, for one glorious moment, Wonwoo has all of it, just to himself.
Then Soonyoung cuts in, eyes maniacally alight (Wonwoo knows, with certainty, exactly whose idea this was), presumably to explain something, and blocks Chan from view. Wonwoo scowls. He stalks up to Mingyu, whose mouth is doing a funny twitchy thing.
“Not a word,” Wonwoo mutters, crossing his arms. The flowers survived the brisk jog over here. He’ll have to go back one day, if life ever goes the way he wants it to. Or even if it doesn't. They're really nice flowers.
“I–”
“Not a word.” Wonwoo warns.
Mingyu’s mouth continues to do the funny twitchy thing. “You know, if you stand any closer,” He teases knowingly, “they might think you’re there to partake in the activities, too.”
Wonwoo’s eyes widen in horror. He hadn’t thought –
“Hey, hyung!” Chan pads over to where Wonwoo and Mingyu are standing, looking effortlessly windswept and beautifully flushed, even if Wonwoo knows that just last night – 6 hours ago, in fact – they were up during the wee hours of the night working on their coding project. Chan smiles up at Wonwoo, all of it touching his eyes, and places one hand lightly on Wonwoo’s shoulder.
Just like that, Wonwoo gets a lightning bolt to the heart. The tightness in his chest returns, and with it, the painful ever-present yearning. Wonwoo’s sure it’s written all over his face; the only reason it’s lasted this long is because thankfully, above all else, the universe is merciful – Lee Chan, as beautiful as he is, is also blissfully, totally, and completely oblivious.
Painfully so. But this also works to Wonwoo’s advantage, because he will never, ever tell Lee Chan. So no one (besides Mingyu, who is privy to Wonwoo’s lamentations late at night when he’s got a beer can or two or five in him) will ever know. And nothing in Wonwoo’s life will ever change.
Until today’s intimidating hurdle: Lee Chan is set to man the dance team’s kissing booth. For two excruciatingly long hours, strangers will be paying to give Chan a little kiss. Wonwoo just needs to be on high alert for those two hours, protect Lee Chan from any scumbags that might want to do a little more than what’s being advertised, and then he can go back to living his life. Complain to Mingyu about his love life. Game. Eat some chicken breast. Mope a little. You know, the usual.
Wonwoo paid Kwon Soonyoung for this information, and had it corroborated by Xu Minghao, who was simultaneously endeared and horrified that Wonwoo had been conned out of ten thousand won for such information.
So yeah, there you have it. Lee Chan, the object of Wonwoo's affections for three years running now, will be kissing other people while Wonwoo can do nothing about it because he has been doing nothing about it all this time.
Ergo, Wonwoo's world is ending.
(Could it have been prevented? Yes, possibly, but Wonwoo digresses. It's too early in the morning for self-reflection.)
“Look at all these people,” Chan marvels, completely oblivious to the storm cloud brewing over Wonwoo’s head. It is simultaneously endearing and enraging to see. Not that Wonwoo could ever be mad at Chan. He’s mad at the other people who showed up in line, with thousand won bills looking to get lucky. What a cheap way to get a kiss from someone you thought was cute. How archaic. Who even participates in these kinds of things these days? What happened to meeting people normally? Haven’t these people ever heard of a nice meal? Laughter shared between two souls? Scintillating conversation?
Mingyu, attentive as always — a guard dog on alert — sniffs in disdain as he looks down at Wonwoo. “Stop fuming, hyung. I can feel your displeasure from here.”
He probably doesn't mean for Chan to pick up on it, but Mingyu is — this is coming from a place of deep affection that Wonwoo harbors for his roommate, hidden away in the depths of his heart — for a lack of word, clumsy. He is. Wonwoo doesn’t blame him for it though. Chan hears what Mingyu’s said, and he turns to Wonwoo, concern creasing his brow.
“What’s got you so mad?” Chan asks. The question is posed at the both of them, but Chan searches Mingyu's face, knowing that only he will give Chan a real answer.
"Oh, nothing. Probably still thinking about that last bit of code.” Mingyu fumbles with his smile, but Chan thankfully takes it at face value and doesn’t press any further.
“Yeah, we did call it late last night,” Chan’s face is adorably scrunched in concern as his warm gaze swivels towards Wonwoo. He blows on his fingers before placing them on Wonwoo’s cheeks with a wince at the shock of cold. He moves Wonwoo’s face this way and that before addressing Mingyu sternly. “Did he eat anything this morning? Did you feed him?”
Mingyu is absolutely affronted. “Of course I did! I even made sure he changed before he fell asleep!”
“You make me sound like a baby,” Wonwoo whines weakly. He doesn’t make any move to pull away though, secretly pleased by the attention. Plus, Chan is cradling Wonwoo's face, right now, which is right up there with teaching him how to play video games and reading books together side by side in bed until one of them falls asleep (Wonwoo has very distressingly domestic fantasies about Lee Chan sometimes. It's a side effect of being hopelessly in love with your best friend.).
Both Mingyu and Chan make huffing sounds, before turning to him with identical half-endeared, half-exasperated expressions.
“That’s cause you are.” Mingyu rolls his eyes.
“Hey!”
“Don’t worry hyung, it’s only a couple hours, and then we can go.” Chan pats Wonwoo’s hands. “Fighting!”
Wonwoo barely has the mental capacity to wave goodbye as Chan dashes back to the booth, completely dazed. For a minute, he thinks he’s forgotten his name. Where was he again? Why is he here?
Mingyu sighs. He pulls Wonwoo over to sit down on a bench opposite the 247 Kissing Booth and to continue their stakeout.
“What would you do without me, hyung?”
“If you glare any harder,” Mingyu comments cheerfully, cheeks bulging around the hotteok he’d gotten for himself. “Kwon Soonyoung might really burst into flames.”
“I’m hoping for it,” Wonwoo grumbles, rubbing his hands together in an attempt to keep them warm.
“Just go up there and tell him!” Mingyu knocks a well-muscled thigh into Wonwoo’s much bonier one. “What could go wrong? You guys already spend most of your time together anyways!”
Wonwoo doesn’t have the heart to tell Mingyu that he’s already thought of a thousand different ways Jeon Wonwoo can go up to Lee Chan. Has already run through the litany of ways he can say I love you, you brat, and they all end in Chan telling him, you stupid idiot, you’re my closest friend, I love you, too. However many times he’s envisioned it, it only ever ends the same.
Instead, Wonwoo says the only thing he can. “Stop that, it hurts.”
Mingyu immediately obeys, stilling.
“If all you do is sit and wait, hyung,” Mingyu replies quietly, eyes tracking Chan's movement. “Then someone else might beat you to it.”
Okay. So it really is the end of the world.
Good thing he bought flowers.
“Hi,” Wonwoo says nervously as he walks up to the booth. “This is for you.”
Chan looks down at the bouquet of flowers in Wonwoo’s shaking hands. “We only take thousand won bills, hyung.” His voice is so soft, so apologetic that it makes Wonwoo to swipe them back and go running for the hills.
Mingyu, ever present in Wonwoo’s head, presses him gently. If all you do is sit and wait, hyung, then someone else might beat you to it.
Wonwoo closes his eyes and stands his ground.
“No, I don’t want to pay.”
“If you don’t donate, then you can’t get a kiss. That's how this works, hyung.” Such a stickler for the rules. Wonwoo wants to laugh. God, he really, really likes this loser.
“No, I–”
“Kiss him!” Mingyu bursts out, impatient as always. A flock of birds take off at the sound of his voice, startled. Chan’s smile slips, a little, as he looks past Wonwoo to look at Mingyu. “He wants to kiss you! Wonwoo’s always wanted to kiss you!” Mingyu bellows, cheeks pinkening as more and more passersby stop in their tracks to look at him. Finally, he remembers where he is.
Wonwoo whirls around to glare at Mingyu. “Kim Mingyu, I’m going to stop hunting spiders for you. I’m going to let them bite you, for all I care, you’re 187cm and they’re like less than one percent of that, how scary can they be –”
A small tug at his sweater sleeve gives Wonwoo pause. He whips back around, and there Chan is, smiling back at Wonwoo. Only Wonwoo, and no one else. The feeling is something Wonwoo wants to keep going forever.
“Is that what you want, Wonwoo-yah?” Chan asks, softly.
“Kinda. Well, yeah.” Wonwoo fumbles with his words. When he looks up, Chan is already startlingly close, so close that Wonwoo can count every individual eyelash.
“This okay with you?” Chan is up on his tippy toes, but everything – his body language, tone of voice, even his small, self-satisfied smirk – indicates that he has the upper hand. Well. That’s annoying, and has to change immediately. Wonwoo takes a deep breath and closes the distance, weathering Chan’s small mmf! of surprise with a pleased smile.
When they break apart, Wonwoo knocks his forehead against Chan’s. His heart is singing so loud, he wonders if Chan hears it too. Something about Chan’s answering grin has Wonwoo thinking that Chan might. The sound of loud cheering and clapping filters in through Wonwoo’s ears, followed by lots and lots of wolf-whistles. Wonwoo takes a peek – at the center of it all is a beaming Mingyu, who looks like he might cry.
“I’m going to kill him,” Wonwoo declares.
“Looking at another man already?” Chan huffs a soft laugh, shaking his head. “I’m starting to rethink this whole ‘kissing you’ thing, Jeon Wonwoo. Can I take it back?”
“No,” Wonwoo grumbles childishly, curling his fingers around the nape of Chan’s neck. “No takebacksies.”
The only answer Wonwoo gets is Chan’s soft amused chuckle. “Alright, alright. Okay, you big baby. Fine.”
Chan doesn’t move away. Neither does Wonwoo. Mingyu smiles bright enough for all three of them.