Chapter Text
Screw Mark Lee and his stupid environmental club and stupid “Vote Green” lapel pin and stupid “Save Our Trees” demonstration that blocked the only road that lead out of Donghyuck’s high school.
Donghyuck clicked his jaw, tapping the fingers of his left hand on top of his steering wheel, while Mark Lee transmitted noise through a megaphone. The student body vice president’s mouth was moving, but Donghyuck had learned how to block out whatever he was saying the day they met. The student body president, Jeno Lee, held up a picket sign that said “SAY NO TO DEFORESTATION” in big, red letters. At least, that’s what Donghyuck thought it said; the sign wasn’t wide enough to fit “deforestation” in, so instead of breaking it into smaller parts, Jeno Lee decided to cram it all in, the “deforesta” much bigger than the “tion”. Their sheeple — that’s what Donghyuck, Jaemin, and Chenle called Jeno and Mark Lee’s modest fanclub of twelve — resembled Jeno Lee’s picket sign, squeezing together on the pavement several feet behind them. Donghyuck had half the mind to blame the school district as well for only having one exit, but there wasn’t anything he could do about that at the time.
The clock on his dashboard said it was 4:40, already twenty minutes since Donghyuck left his study session with Jaemin, who’d had to stay for play rehearsal. He was the third car in the line, and judging by the litany of car horns, he wasn’t the only one pissed.
Exhausted, Donghyuck hit his head against the headrest. “God damn you, Mark Lee.” He jabbed the button to release his seatbelt and flung open the door, and the early autumn heat that rushed in only agitated him further. The two made eye contact at the moment Donghyuck slammed his door shut, and Mark Lee came forward, meeting him in the middle. “Donghyuck.”
Donghyuck inhaled slowly, and exhaled just as slowly. Normally, when he did that, he closed his eyes, but he had no intention of making himself vulnerable in the face of an enemy. He put his palms together in a perpendicular gesture that allowed him to imagine he was chopping off Mark Lee’s head. He spoke at a steady, even pace so the jackass would understand. “Listen, flatass. It’s Friday. I’ve endured hell for five days and I just spent an hour and a half talking about Hamlet. I’m tired. I want to go home so I can lay in my bed in peaceful solitude. Maybe listen to music. Shit, I don’t know. However,” Donghyuck stepped closer, now in Mark Lee’s bubble, pointing a finger at the other boy’s chest but not touching him, “a dweeb in a blazer and khaki shorts is preventing me from doing so. How about we do something to rectify the situation?”
Mark Lee raised a thin eyebrow, and Donghyuck had to push down the urge to tell him to fucking use eyebrow gel. And then the kid said, “I’m surprised you know any words that aren’t ‘shit,’ ‘fuck,’ or ‘damn.’”
It was almost cute, Donghyuck thought, the way the guy tried to puff out his chest and be intimidating. As if he’d ever been able to scare Donghyuck off. “And I’m surprised a clown like you got accepted into college. Isn’t the world full of surprises?” Donghyuck leaned in even closer, so they were almost chest to chest, the toes of their shoes touching. Mark Lee’s hand came up to grip the side of Donghyuck’s shoulder in warning, but it only spurred Donghyuck on. “I won’t ask again. Get out of my way, Mark Lee, before I hurt your stuck-up pretty boy face.”
That got the reaction Donghyuck had been hoping for. Mark Lee scowled, pushing Donghyuck’s shoulder as he stepped away, only enough force to make distance between them. He exchanged a look with Jeno, who mouthed something back then turned to address the sheeple. “Let’s move it down to Main Street, everybody.”
The tiny crowd began to disperse. On the way back to his car, Donghyuck brushed his fingers through his caramel-colored hair, knowing people were watching and that the sun would make his tanned skin look brilliant.
“Got stuck in traffic on the way out of school,” Donghyuck griped when he joined Jaemin, Renjun, and Chenle’s group call later that night. He’d stuck true to his word, laid in bed for a couple hours while he listened to his Purity Ring playlist until his friends finally got to their respective homes, Jaemin joining Renjun at the latter’s home. “You’ll never guess—”
“Mark and Jeno’s tree protest?” Renjun said before biting into a celery stick Jaemin had poked the side of his mouth with. “Thanks, babe.”
The couple ignored Donghyuck and Chenle’s groans, which grew louder when Renjun pecked Jaemin on the cheek and Jaemin pulled his boyfriend halfway onto his lap. “Anyway,” Renjun said at the same time that Jaemin said, “You got stuck in Mark’s demonstration?”
“He’s so annoying!” Donghyuck adjusted himself so he was lying on his side, propped up on one elbow. “He was out there in a blazer. An honest-to-god blazer.”
“We know,” Renjun said through Jaemin and Chenle’s giggling.
Donghyuck ignored him. “And khaki shorts! Who wears khaki shorts? Is this a party on Martha’s Vineyard?”
Renjun brought his face close enough to his webcam that he took up his and Jaemin’s whole window. “We know. We saw him at school. But it’s fine, we know you love talking about him. Keep going.”
The three of them snickered when Donghyuck scoffed and rolled his eyes. “I do not. He’s an idiot.”
“An idiot whose name you can’t keep out of your mouth.”
“Shut up, Renjun. Just because you confessed your undying love for Jaemin by continuously insulting him doesn’t mean I like Mark fuckin' Lee.”
Renjun smiled around another piece of celery. “Suit yourself.”
“What even happened to make you guys hate each other?” Chenle asked.
“His conception,” Donghyuck said through gritted teeth.
Jaemin grinned lazily. He’d always thought the feud between Donghyuck and Mark Lee and the undying emotional suffering the student VP’s existence brought Donghyuck were top tier entertainment. “Nothing happened, they’re just fundamentally incompatible. Hyuck’s words, not mine. I personally think they’d get along swimmingly if they just tried.”
Donghyuck spluttered. “ ‘Swimmingly?’ Me and Mark Lee? Renjun, is he okay? Is he running a fever? Is his pulse regular?”
“Anyway,” Renjun said with a roll of his eyes, “are we all still going to Yukhei’s party tonight? Jaemin and I wanna dance.”
Donghyuck picked at his chipped nail polish and pretended to think about it. “And watch Yukhei flirt with Chan and Vernon all night? I’ll pass.”
“Aw, still got a crush on Xuxi?” Jaemin cooed, laughing with Chenle while Renjun gagged and Donghyuck rolled his eyes.
Yukhei was Renjun’s cousin: a senior all-rounder who played basketball, was a drum major in the band, earned straight-A’s, and spoke four languages fluently. He was a good few inches taller than Donghyuck, almost a half foot, and made eighth grade Donghyuck feel small in a good way. To make things worse, he was the friendliest, funniest guy in their school, after maybe Seungkwan. Several years back, Donghyuck would have jumped at the opportunity to hang out with Yukhei, but that middle school crush had long since faded.
“No, I don’t have a crush on him anymore—”
“Ah,” Jaemin said, and Donghyuck really didn’t like the mischief sparkling in Jaemin’s eyes, “that’s right. You like Mark Lee now.”
His friends’ laughter — mostly Chenle’s — mocked him through his laptop speaker. Donghyuck scowled. “I’ll pick you guys up at nine.” He shut his laptop without even bothering to exit the call and flopped back against his pillows with a pout.
Because it was only a quarter past six, Donghyuck figured he had a good half hour to lounge in bed before getting ready. If he was going to go to Wong Yukhei’s party, he might as well look good. Hanging out with Chenle all night while Renjun and Jaemin made out in a corner wasn’t appealing, especially considering Chenle always found his way to the other Chinese exchange students and Donghyuck hardly knew Chinese. Maybe he’d run into Kangmin, the cute, tall boy on the soccer team who sat in front of him in physics and always flirted with him in the few minutes they had before class started.
Outside his room, the front door opened and closed quietly, which meant his dad was home. He listened to the soft patter of his dad’s footsteps and waited for the knock on his bedroom door.
“Come in,” Donghyuck said.
The door cracked open, and his dad’s face poked through. “Hi, baby. How was school?”
“Same old,” Donghyuck said, shifting to make room for his dad to sit on the bed. “How was work?”
“Same old.” His dad smiled. “Irene noona says hello.”
“Tell her I said hey.”
“Will do.”
He looked tired. Donghyuck’s dad worked two jobs; he’d picked up the second right before Donghyuck entered high school and justified it as a way to make sure Donghyuck could go to college without having to take out a big loan. The first was a simple 9-5 accounting position for an airline, the second private and group guitar lessons at the music academy downtown in the evenings. It was actually rare for him to be home before nine o’clock, but once or twice every month he’d come home around six or seven in the evening due to canceled lessons. On those nights, Donghyuck usually stayed home so they could eat dinner together then pop a movie into the player. It was for that reason that Donghyuck almost canceled on his friends, but his dad looked tired enough that Donghyuck knew he’d turn in by eight.
His dad’s smile faltered for a second, and Donghyuck sat up, anticipating bad news. It wasn’t rare for him to worry — especially about Donghyuck — but he was hesitant to say it, which was rare. It meant he was scared of how Donghyuck would react. It was a nauseatingly familiar situation. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
Donghyuck didn’t say anything, hands going numb while a dozen different things his dad could say filled his head. He had cancer. He got laid off. He got a third job. He had some other deadly illness.
His dad took a deep breath and looked at Donghyuck worriedly, and Donghyuck’s first thought was it’s cancer. “I’ve been seeing someone.”
What. Donghyuck stayed silent, which evidently only made his dad more anxious, and he had the tendency to ramble when he was anxious.
“I think I really like him, but I want you to meet him first because it’s important to me that you like him, too. I don’t want to get into anything too serious if you don’t get along. He has kids too, one your age and one a few years older, just graduated college, actually. But I asked if it could just be the three of us, you, me, and him, because I didn’t want to overwhelm you with too many new people at once.”
“Oh,” Donghyuck said, when it didn’t seem like his dad was going to say anything else. His dad’s face fell and Donghyuck’s stomach immediately twisted in guilt. He didn’t want his dad to think he couldn’t have a relationship because of Donghyuck, didn’t want him to be limited because of Donghyuck. “A boyfriend! Wow.”
His dad gnawed at his lip. “Yeah. Is that okay?”
“Yeah! Yeah. It’s okay, of course it’s okay.” Donghyuck grasped onto his dad’s arm with both hands. “Jeez, Dad. I thought you were gonna say you had, like, Stage Four ass cancer or something.”
The exaggeratedly horrified look on his dad’s face almost made Donghyuck laugh. “Ass cancer?”
“Like in your—” Donghyuck shook his head; that was not the point, and he didn’t need that mental imagery “—You have a boyfriend! That’s awesome. When do you want me to meet him?”
Donghyuck watched his dad’s face light back up. “Next weekend, maybe? Saturday night? Here at our house? Are you busy?”
“Probably not.” Not true; Donghyuck was pretty sure he told Jiwoo and Olivia that he would go the mall with them on Saturday, but that could easily be rearranged.
“Okay! I’ll tell him.”
“Cool,” Donghyuck said quietly, hoping he sounded okay. He wanted so badly to be happy for his dad, whose only real family left was Donghyuck, and Donghyuck was happy for him. But no amount of happiness could stop the churning in his gut.
Like always, his dad picked up on Donghyuck’s mood. His voice was gentle. “I’m not trying to replace her. You know that, right?”
Donghyuck could only nod. He dug his nails into his thighs, but soft hands pulled his away and held on tight. They sat there for a minute or two before Donghyuck’s mood lifted a little.
“Renjun wants me to go to his cousin’s party tonight. Is that cool?”
“Sure. Don’t drink and drive. Want me to help you get ready?”
“Uh, no thanks, I think I’m good,” Donghyuck said, recalling the disastrous occasion in which he’d let his dad pick his outfit. “I love you, Dad.”
His dad squeezed Donghyuck’s hands in his. “I love you, too, Hyuck.”