Chapter Text
Truth be told, Hansol isn’t the biggest fan of grocery shopping, but who else is gonna do it? Surely not his good for nothing lazy roommates who think that it’s okay to boss him around just because he’s younger than them. More than once has he come home without the cake mix that Mingyu asked him for because he happened to “forget.”
It’s probably for the best that he goes though, otherwise he would never be leaving the apartment other than when he has to go to classes. Now, one might think that hanging out at the grocery store isn’t the best place for a nineteen-year-old to spend his time at, but the place has its perks. For one, they give out free samples of that cheese that nobody really wants to buy, and who is he to say no to some free cheese? Other than that, Hansol has a fun time sneaking glances at the other shoppers and trying to piece together their life stories just from the things in their cart.
It’s when he strolls into the ‘Confectionery’ aisle that he notices him. It’s a guy around his age, he guesses, who’s also around his height, though maybe shorter. He doesn’t know if it’s just him, but he feels that there’s some sort of weird experience that happens whenever you come across someone your age in the grocery store. Does he maybe feel competitive? Does he want to assert dominance as the superior young adult? Or does he feel camaraderie? Maybe a mix of all of the above? Either way, he finds himself paying extra attention to him.
He’s got short blonde hair and is wearing a pink jumper, and Hansol can’t help but find it a bit endearing. His cart is mostly empty, save for exactly three mangoes, a box of Oreos and a bottle of vodka. Staring at his cart, Hansol feels this weird spiritual connection with it’s contents because same.
The guy’s currently staring at a row of different gummy candies, but he seems torn between which ones to chose. Hansol stares at him for a while, waiting to see what he’ll settle on. Though as the seconds pass, it doesn’t seem like he’ll decide any time soon. Instead of staring at him like a weirdo, Hansol decides to continue with his shopping and pushes his cart.
Another person enters the aisle. A middle-aged man who looks like he might be a dad and he seems like the type of person who would have his shit together. This man, however, doesn’t seem like he has time to waste. He stops near the guy with the pink jumper, doing that thing that you do in stores when you want to look at a section but there’s already someone there so you kinda hover around waiting them to move, except pink jumper guy isn’t moving, and Hansol starts to feel stressed.
Why is he stressing? It’s not like it matters to him whether the man gets his gummy candies. Hansol thinks he’s probably stressed for the pink jumper guy. He wants him to realize that there’s a person there and to move aside, but he’s not moving! Should he do something? God, no. Why would he do anything? He should be minding his own business and go get the Lindt chocolates that Seungcheol asked him for.
And yet, he can’t find it in himself to look away. The more that time passes, the more that Hansol can’t stand watching this. Surely the man would have asked the pink jumper guy to move by now, but they’re both just fucking standing there. Why the hell hasn’t the pink jumper guy decided on the candy yet? It’s been at least a good 3 minutes by now. What the hell is this? And why can’t Hansol just move along?
He decides that the reason he seems stuck there is because pink jumper guy is around his age, and so he feels somewhat responsible for what’s happening. Don’t ask him for the logic behind it, he just feels it. He holds his breath for a few more moments, but when nothing happens he decides that enough is enough.
He walks up to the pink jumper guy and taps his shoulder. “Hey, sorry. Could I please just reach for those Sour Patch Kids over there?” he asks him in the politest way he can.
Pink jumper guy startles upon hearing him, and he turns to look at him with the widest eyes Hansol has ever seen. The man takes this occasion to reach for one of the bags of candies and mutters something under his breath as he walks away.
Hansol should be feeling relieved that he no longer has to witness the painful situation, but he thinks he might have made a mistake because the guy in front of him starts tearing up.
“Hey, are you okay?” Hansol asks him, definitely taken aback but also worried that this might have been his fault.
“Oh god, I’m so sorry,” the guy says as he starts to choke up. Hansol is sure that he can’t remember the last time somebody looked at him with such remorse in their eyes.
“Hey, hey,” he calls gently, hovering his hands around the guy’s shoulders because he kind of wants to comfort him, but he doesn’t know if that would be weird or not. “It’s okay. What are you apologizing for?”
“I just,” the pink jumper guy stutters, but before he can finish his sentence he lets out a huge sob.
Hansol isn’t sure what to do anymore so he decides to just pull the guy into his arms and to soothingly pat his back. After maybe a minute or so, he seems to have calmed down and Hansol lets him go and instead places his hands on the guy’s shoulders.
“Hey man, what’s wrong?” he tries asking again, this time making his voice significantly softer.
“Oh my god, I’m such a mess.” The guy looks up at him with a look of shock, as if he can’t believe that he just cried into a stranger’s arms in the middle of a candy aisle.
“Yeah, I could tell that. One glance at your cart and I already knew that something was up,” Hansol jokes. He’s trying to lighten the mood so that he doesn’t have to see pink jumper guy cry again.
It works and the guy let’s out a small chuckle. “is it that obvious?”
“A bit. What’s your name? I’m Hansol.” He lets go of the guy’s shoulders and gives him some space.
“Seungkwan,” he answers as he looks down and sniffs a bit.
“Alright, nice to meet you Seungkwan.” He smiles at him. “Is there any particular reason you wouldn’t stop staring at those candies for a solid 4 minutes?”
Seungkwan smiles sheepishly and nods a bit. “Yeah, it’s mostly because I’m the most indecisive person I know. I did get, uh, slightly lost in thoughts though,” his voice trails off.
Hansol hums and nods in acknowledgement. “We’ve all been there. Do you want to talk about what’s bothering you? It’s totally fine if you don’t.”
“Oh please, I wouldn’t want to bore you with my life story or anything.” He waves his hand as if to dismiss it.
“Nah man it’s fine. It’s not like grocery shopping is the most thrilling activity out there. We could both do our shopping and you could tell me your story,” Hansol says cheerfully.
Seungkwan smiles shyly at him. “I mean sure, but I warned you.”
They start walking down the aisles and picking up various food items that they need as Seungkwan starts telling Hansol about how he met this person, and they’d been friends for years until recently something bad happened.
“I swear I can’t believe he would do that. You think you know someone and then they just stab you in the back like that!” Seungkwan huffs as he throws a box of Frosted Flakes into his cart.
“So, what exactly did he do?” Hansol’s curious to find out after Seungkwan had told him about how wonderful their friendship was.
“He sent screenshots of our private conversation to someone! Can you believe that?” He turns to Hansol, looking for validation.
If he’s gonna be honest, Hansol has had his fair share of conversations that he’s screenshotted, but clearly this was something of a bigger scale.
“I mean people screenshot convos all the time, but what exactly made this so bad?” he presses, curiosity getting the best of him.
Seungkwan presses his lips into a thin line and seems to contemplate something. “Okay. Well. This might not come as a shocker to you, having seen my mannerisms and all, but I may or may not be kinda gay, alright?”
“Okay. I mean a lot of people are kinda gay.” He thinks about himself and his own sexuality. It wouldn’t be wrong to consider Hansol “kinda gay” as well, though it’s not like he has much experience.
“Right, okay. So, I may be a little bit more than kinda gay. I might be super extra gay. And there might have been a guy who I was super extra gay for, you know?” Hansol nods and lets him continue. “And I may or may not have talked about how super extra gay I am for this guy with my beloved friend. I think you can see where this is going.”
“Maybe? So you’re telling me he took screenshots of your gay convo and sent it to someone?” Hansol offers.
“Bingo. Except it wasn’t just someone. It was the guy that I was super extra gay for,” Seungkwan says angrily as he looks at the back of a Fruit Loops box.
“Oh, shit.” Hansol has to admit that that’s a pretty shitty thing to do. “And what happened?”
Seungkwan bitterly puts the box back down and continues walking. “Well, turns out that the guy is ‘not a homophobe, but’ he doesn’t feel comfortable hanging out with me anymore. Which sucks. Because he was one of the only friends I had. I don’t have that many friends, okay? I had like, four good friends and now the number is down to two.” He shows the number with his fingers. “Except the problem here is that my other two friends are still friends with the backstabber and the ‘not a homophobe.’”
“Oh, so you’re saying that they’re not on your side?” Hansol asks.
“Sort of?” Seungkwan gestures. “It’s like, they think that I’m overreacting and that it’s not that big of a deal. How am I supposed to hang out with people who invalidate my feelings like that? I should have never befriended those fucking heterosexuals.” Hansol laughs at that, and Seungkwan looks back at him with a slightly panicked expression. “Not that there’s anything wrong with being heterosexual,” he tries to say in case he might have offended Hansol.
“Don’t worry, I don’t think I’m a heterosexual,” he says while still laughing a bit.
“Oh thank god, I knew I could trust you, Hansol.” Seungkwan smiles at him. “But yeah. So basically, I guess I don’t have any friends anymore. I feel extremely empty and lonely, which is why I’m here to buy food in order to fill the void.”
Hansol gives him a genuine smile. “Well, if I were you I wouldn’t completely throw those friends away. The ‘not a homophobe’ maybe. Maybe the backstabber too. But you should at the very least talk things out with them. Even if you decide that you should end your friendship with them, it would be good to leave it on the best note possible.”
Seungkwan hums. “I guess you’re right. But why should I make an effort for them when they won’t even bother trying to understand how I feel?”
“That’s a good point. I think that it’s more for yourself than for them, though.” Seungkwan gives him a puzzled look before he continues. “What I mean is that maybe they don’t deserve to have you make that effort, but you’ll be the better person. And in the long run, it would make you feel better, because then you won’t have to carry the weight of a friendship turned sour.” Hansol pauses to take a look at Seungkwan. “You seem like the type of person who’d get petty easily- “
“Gee, thanks,” Seungkwan interrupts sarcastically.
Hansol laughs a bit and continues. “What I’m saying is that the best form of revenge is to become a better person than those who have done you wrong, you know?”
Seungkwan breathes in and thinks for a moment. “I guess you’re not wrong. But my immediate reaction is to throw a pity party for myself and never speak to them ever again.”
“Well, instead of doing that why don’t you go treat yourself and have a good time. After you’re done with that, go talk to them.” Hansol suggests. “I’m sure that after clearing your mind it’ll be a lot easier to talk about things rather than if you were to just spend your time thinking about it and being sad.”
“You know what Hansol? You’re right.” Seungkwan turns to look at him and nods. “I will treat myself, I deserve it.”
“That’s great Seungkwan. I’m glad you won’t be downing that bottle of vodka any time soon,” he says as he points to the bottle in Seungkwan’s cart.
“Oh, well actually I should probably go put most of this stuff back if I’m not gonna be throwing that pity party. Wanna accompany me?”
“Sure.”
They keep walking around the store as Seungkwan insists on putting back the things exactly where he found them, because his mother raised him right and he’s not going to make the job harder for the people who work here. Hansol finds it admirable, and it makes him feel bad for all the times that he’s been lazy and left things here and there in the store. It’s not even a big deal, but Seungkwan makes it feel like it is.
At this point, Seungkwan’s pretty much only got the box of Oreos left and he insists that he at least gets himself that much. “It’s only a box of Oreos, it’s fine. I’m allowed.”
“Hey, I’m not stopping you.” Hansol raises his arms in defeat.
“Good. Even if you were stopping me I wouldn’t have listened to you,” he says and sticks his tongue out at him. “Well, okay, maybe I would have,” he adds in a lower tone after a second.
“What was that?” Hansol teases him.
“I said maybe I would have listened to you,” Seungkwan repeats, slightly exasperated.
“And why’s that?” he asks with genuine curiosity.
“Well, I mean. I don’t know. You just seemed so wise when you were telling me to treat myself earlier. I would have trusted you if you told me to not get the Oreos,” Seungkwan answers shyly.
Hansol smiles and looks at Seungkwan for a bit. “You’re so ready to trust a stranger, you should be more careful, you know?”
“Oh please.” Seungkwan snorts. “I’m not stupid. It’s not like I’m following you into your white van after you’ve promised me some candy.”
Hansol laughs at that. “Yeah? I’ll bet that if I did actually have a white van with candy you’d follow me,” he teases after having calmed down.
Seungkwan looks at him with a genuinely offended look. “That is so not true. Get out of my face.” He snorts and starts walking away.
“Hey, where are you going?” Hansol calls out with a slight pout.
“To pay for these, obviously,” Seungkwan replies as he turns back around, holding up the box of cookies.
“But I still have a few things left to get.” Hansol visibly pouts at him.
Seungkwan stands there, but after a moment he sighs and rolls his eyes. “Fine.” He walks back up to Hansol and drops the box into his cart. “Buy those for me, though.”
Hansol scoffs. “Are you serious?” He turns to look at Seungkwan with a look of disbelief.
“Yup.” Seungkwan smiles at him.
Hansol wants to give him a stern look, but he can’t stop the corners of his lips from quirking up. “Whatever,” he breathes out.
Seungkwan beams at him and they go to find the last of the items on Hansol’s mental grocery list. After having finally payed for all of the groceries, hansol and Seungkwan step outside and all of a sudden Hansol starts to panic a bit. He realizes that their time together has come to an end, and he’s not sure if he’ll ever see Seungkwan again.
Before he gets to say anything, Seungkwan turns to look at him. “Hey, uh. Remember when you said that I should treat myself?” Hansol nods at him. “Right. Well, I actually don’t know what to do for that. Like, I don’t…” He starts to wave his hands, hoping that they’ll explain for him.
“Oh.” Hansol stops to think for a bit. “Well, you could go see a movie, or maybe go to a café or nice restaurant. Maybe go buy yourself some new clothes?” he suggests.
Seungkwan nods but looks down for a bit, looking like he wants to say something. “Well, if I were to do any of those things, it would be kind of lonely if I were to do them alone. So I was wondering if you would-”
“Yeah,” Hansol answers, a bit too eagerly he notes.
Seungkwan looks back up at him with what Hansol thinks may or may not be a slight blush and gives him a smile. “Okay, cool.”
“Is this? I mean. Are you, like? Would that be, like, a date?” Hansol stutters, getting really shy all of a sudden.
Seungkwan’s eyes widen and this time Hansol is pretty sure he’s blushing. “Well, uh. Would you like it to be?” he asks while sounding really unsure of himself.
Now Hansol feels his own cheeks heating up as well. “Yeah, that would be okay.” He avoids making eye contact.
“Alright. Okay. Then let’s go on a date,” Seungkwan says, sounding a bit more confident. They both stand there for a bit before he realizes something. He pulls out his phone and hands it to Hansol. “Give me your number.”
Hansol nods and types it in before handing it back. Seungkwan takes it and seems to be typing something. In a moment, Hansol feels his own phone vibrating.
“There. Now we can text each other to plan things.” Seungkwan seems satisfied with himself.
“Great! So then I’ll text you?” Hansol takes out his phone to save him as a contact.
“Or I’ll text you, doesn’t matter.”
After Seungkwan grabs his box of Oreos, they say goodbye and part ways. Hansol feels a bit sad that they couldn’t spend more time together, but after fully realizing that he has a date to look forward to, he doesn’t feel as bad anymore.
“Dude, what the fuck took you so long?” Seungcheol asks from the couch he’s lounging on as Hansol enters the apartment.
“I haven’t even been gone for that long, though,” he replies with a frown.
“Actually,” Mingyu interrupts, entering the living room from the kitchen. “It usually takes you around 45 minutes or so. Today, you came back after 75 minutes,” he states matter-of-factly.
“Okay, and?” Hansol asks them, slightly annoyed as he takes of his shoes.
“Well, what were you doing?” Seungcheol sits up to properly face his arriving roommate.
“Grocery shopping?” Hansol offers. After taking a look at their unamused expressions, he sighs. “And I may or may not have gotten myself a date. Maybe.”
Both of his roommates gasp. “Hansol Vernon Chwe? Got himself a date?” Mingyu asks in disbelief.
“Hell yeah!” Seungcheol exclaims as he completely stands up to face Hansol. “Oh, man. See I told you that it was good for you! You would have never met anyone if you’d always just spend your time cooped up in here.”
“Yeah, yeah. Whatever.” He waves them off.
“No, not ‘whatever,’ this is great!” Mingyu claps his hands. “Tell me about her, what does she look like? How’d you guys meet?”
“Short blonde hair, was wearing a pink jumper, looked pretty cute,” he states and nods to himself.
“Sounds pretty cute too. Okay and how’d you guys start talking?” Seungcheol presses.
“Well, it started off with me asking him to move over so that I could grab some Sour Patch Kids, then he turned around and started weeping into my arms.” Hansol laughs a bit recalling the ridiculous situation.
He goes to place the grocery bags in the kitchen and then heads back to sit on the couch. He looks up at his roommates to see them slightly confused. Seungcheol sits back down on the couch next to him.
“Wait a minute,” Mingyu says and raises his index finger. “You mean ‘he’ as in a guy?” he asks.
“Uh. Yeah, no. Yeah, it’s a guy.” Hansol nods.
A few silent seconds pass before Mingyu starts shouting. “Holy shit! I Fucking knew it! Coups, I told you so! I was fucking right.”
Hansol looks at Mingyu then back at Seungcheol, his eyebrows furrowed. “What?”
“Uh,” Seungcheol starts. “Well, Mingyu and I may or may not have, you know, speculated about your orientation before?”
“And I was right, whereas our Seungcheolie here was wrong!” Mingyu giggles to himself. He sits down on Hansol’s other side and puts an arm around him.
Hansol is still confused, but he decides that it’s best not to think about it too hard.
“Hansol,” Mingyu starts. “You and I are the same. I knew it. My gaydar is always on point,” he announces proudly.
Hansol blinks at him. “By ‘the same’ you mean…?”
“I mean we’re both not straight,” he clarifies.
“Oh, really? Mingyu, you’re…?”
“I’m gay. Well, mostly gay,” Mingyu answers.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Hansol asks him, slightly upset that his roommate withheld this information from him.
Seungcheol snorts. “Are you kidding me? You’re trying to tell me it wasn’t obvious?”
“Wait,” Hansol stops them. “What about you,” he turns around to face Seungcheol and points at him.
“I’m straight,” he says firmly.
This time it’s Mingyu’s time to snort. “Right, as long as Jeonghan’s not around.”
Seungcheol stares back at Mingyu with a menacing look. “Mind your own damn business how about that?”
Mingyu raises his hands to show that he surrenders. “Anyway, I’m happy our Hansolie finally got a date.” He pets Hansol’s head.
“Yeah, whatever.” Hansol gets up from the couch and starts heading towards his shared room with Seungcheol. “Call me when dinner’s ready.”
Mingyu sighs dramatically. “Kids. They think that their mothers exist solely to feed them and clean for them. Ungrateful brat.”
“I can still hear you, mom.” Hansol laughs as he closes the door behind him.
He plops down on his bed and opens up Twitter. As he’s scrolling, his phone notifies him of a text message. His heart beats a little faster as he opens up Seungkwan’s text.
From: Seungkwan
To: Hansol
so, what were you thinking for our date?
Hansol can’t stop but smile to himself. A part of him was afraid that they would never actually text each other, that their meeting was really just a one time thing.
From: Hansol
To: Seungkwan
hmm well since this is for u to treat yourself lets do something that u wanna do
From: Seungkwan
To: Hansol
I wanna do whatever you wanna do
Hansol sighs to himself and he thinks that of course Seungkwan would be the type to say stuff like that. He’s still smiling though.
From: Hansol
To: Seungkwan
ok well i wanna do whatever would make u happy
After he sends the message he cringes a bit. Was that weird? No, it’s not weird. He’s just being honest. Should he have made a decision though? Is Seungkwan going to think he’s some lame dude who can’t make decisions? To be fair though, it’s not like Seeungkwan is any better, so he calms down a bit.
From: Seungkwan
To: Hansol
Alright. Well I was thinking that we could do all of the things you mentioned. We could start off by going to a café, then shopping, then go to the movies, and then finish off at a restaurant.
From: Hansol
To: Seungkwan
tbh that’s a lot of money to spend in a day, r u sure?
From: Seungkwan
To: Hansol
yeah I know but since im treating myself I don’t see why not. I could pay for your movie ticket if you want? Since I am sorta the one whos dragging you into it
From: Hansol
To: Seungkwan
Nah its fine don’t worry about it, sounds like a plan
From: Hansol
To: Seungkwan
when do you want to do it?
From: Seungkwan
To: Hansol
Are you free tomorrow?
Tomorrow’s a Sunday and Hansol doesn’t have anything better to do. They finalize their plans and he spends some time just rolling around in his bed, giddy with excitement. Hansol realizes that he probably seems like some sort of middle school girl excited for some lame upcoming dance, but he also realizes that there’s nobody around to judge him so he doesn’t mind so much.
The rest of the day goes down as it usually does, Mingyu and Seungcheol ask him some more about Seungkwan and spend some time teasing him. That night, when he’s laying in bed, he finds that it’s a bit harder to go to sleep, excitement and nervousness keeping him up. He tells himself that the sooner he falls asleep, the sooner he’ll get to see Seungkwan again, and with that, he eventually manages to slip into unconsciousness.
Tomorrow will be a good day, he thinks to himself somewhere along the line.