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All it took was Mark barely catching a glimpse of his ex-boyfriend in the crowd of people at the party he was at before chugging a can of beer like his life depended on it and walking up to the first unoccupied and least intimidating-looking guy he saw despite his better judgement and saying, “hey.”
“Hi?” the guy said, seemingly surprised by Mark’s sudden appearance. Which was completely reasonable -- one, because the guy had been staring at his phone for a while and probably didn’t even notice Mark walk up to him, and two, because people didn't usually go up to other people at parties unless they knew them, or unless they were going to try and shoot their shot. Mark definitely didn’t know this guy, nor did he plan on shooting his shot. Well, okay, on second thought, after actually getting a good look at him, maybe-- no, no. He wasn’t here for that.
“Okay,” Mark started off, “this is going to sound really weird, but I just saw my ex and I know he wants to get back together with me, but I don't want to so I've been avoiding him at all costs for like three weeks, which I know is an absolutely horrible thing to do like in general? But especially in this case since his friends are also my friends, but I'm bad with confrontation and very stressed about it, so I know I’ll cave if I see him and probably say yes even though I absolutely do not want to because I have a hard time saying no to him. Anyways, I’m pretty sure I just saw him so, um, could you? Possibly pretend that you're someone I'm interested in, who is also interested in me but we're still unsure if we wanna date yet because I broke up with my ex not that long ago so it would feel too much like a rebound if I did?”
It was only after he had finished speaking that Mark realized maybe he should’ve spent more than thirty seconds it took to walk over actually working on his plan because truthfully, it was a very bad, poorly thought out one. Especially after hearing it leave his own mouth -- it sounded worse. There’s no way any sane person would agree to what he’d just asked for.
He took a step backwards, “actually you know what, nevermind. I'll just--”
“Dude,” the guy said, putting his hand on Mark's shoulder to stop him from walking away. “Are you okay? That was incredibly specific and a lot to unpack. How’d you even get that all out in one breath?”
Mark winced. “Sorry. I can just--”
“No, no,” the guy said quickly, sensing Mark was about to try and make a run for it again, “you’re all good. It’s fine, it’s chill. Just took me a moment to process it all, but yeah, I'm down.”
Mark blinked. Did he hear him right? “What?”
“I'll do it. I'll be your,” he flailed his hand, as if he was trying to think of a proper way to phrase it, “romantically ambiguous person of interest.”
“Seriously?” He was in disbelief. “For real?”
“Seriously, for real,” the guy repeated, nodding.
“Just like that?” Mark asked, suddenly skeptical. “You don’t like, know me or anything, and you’re not even going to get anything out of this. At least, I don’t think you will. I don’t know.”
The guy shrugged. “You seem really stressed about it, and I want to help. College is stressful enough, you don’t need this on top of that too. Also, I’m pretty sure my friends ditched me to go make out with each other since they’re not responding to my texts, so. Really got nothing better to do tonight besides stand here and drink some really bad punch.” He held out his hand, “I'm Yukhei, by the way.”
“Mark,” he said, reaching out to grab Yukhei’s hand and shake it, only to have the other twist his hand and thread their fingers together instead. Mark stared at their intertwined hands for a moment in surprise, only looking back up when Yukhei spoke again.
“So, do you want me to like, hang around you? Hold your hand? Put my arm around your shoulder?” he asked. “You know, casual stuff. Also what does your ex look like so I can tell who he is, if he does try and come up to you. Or us, I guess, since I will be accompanying you from this point forward.”
“Oh, um,” Mark said, chancing another glance back at their intertwined fingers. “Well, to be honest, I didn’t think I’d get this far. So I don’t know? Whatever seems most natural, I guess? And, uh, he’s like the same height as me, has brown hair, and I think he was wearing a white sweatshirt when I saw him earlier?”
Yukhei nodded. “Okay. Short, brown hair, wearing a white sweatshirt.”
Mark frowned. “I’m not short.”
“To me you are,” Yukhei said as he maneuvered their linked hands so he could put his arm over Mark’s shoulder. “Anyways, shall we go get ourselves some drinks, Mark? And you can tell me all about yourself, because if I’m going to be your fake almost-boyfriend-but-not-really, I’m going to be a good one, and that includes being attentive to details about you. And then I’ll tell you about me, because this fake relationship business is a two-way street and we need to have all our facts straight to avoid any potential slip ups. Not that there will be any, but I like to have all my bases covered.”
“Okay,” Mark said as he let Yukhei lead them towards towards the kitchen, dumbstruck.
A couple hours and several drinks later, Mark and Yukhei found themselves standing in a barely lit corner of the hallway upstairs, away from the ongoing party downstairs -- the whole reason they were even upstairs in the first place was a mutual agreement that they both really had to pee. So they decided it was finally time to get in the massive line that spanned down the stairs for the upstairs bathroom, since the toilet in the downstairs bathroom has mysteriously gotten clogged and had been deemed out of order for the time being. After both of them had relieved themselves, they’d decided to linger upstairs for a bit longer to continue the conversation that they’d had while in line for the bathroom, since it was marginally quieter away from all the people and blasting music.
“That really sucks, dude,” Yukhei said.
Initially, Mark hadn’t wanted tell Yukhei anything about his past relationship; he still felt guilty for breaking up with his ex-boyfriend, and felt like if he told someone about it, that they’d think he was just being selfish for not trying to make the relationship work. But Yukhei had coaxed it out of him, curious as to why he was so hellbent on avoiding his ex, and once Mark had started talking about it, it felt like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders.
Mark shrugged his shoulders. “I thought since we were best friends, it’d be a good next step, y’know? I did have a brief crush on him in high school when I was still figuring myself out, but it was practically gone by the time I started college. We grew apart a bit during our year gap from each other. But our friend were dead set on getting us together, so I thought I’d give it a try. All in all, we were good friends, but we were bad lovers. At least, from my side. I tried to make it work, but there’s only so much you can do when you know you don’t love the other person as much as they love you, you know?” He sighed, this time with a certain sadness. “I just wish we could go back to the way we were before, but he’s determined on getting back together.”
Yukhei nodded. “Sometimes that fear of messing up a friendship is completely valid. Been there, done that. I completely understand where you’re coming from.”
Mark stared at his shoes for a moment before taking in a deep breath and letting it out, looking back up at Yukhei. “Okay, that’s enough sad emotions regarding my most current breakup for one night. It happened, and it’s over now, so there’s no use in dwelling on it now. Let’s move onto a new topic, like why the fuck are your hands so big?”
“What?” he asked, bewildered by the sudden topic change.
“I noticed it earlier when you were holding my hand.” Mark tugged on Yukhei’s arm, pulling his hand up into the space between them before putting their hands palm to palm -- Yukhei’s fingers were a whole knuckle bigger than Mark’s own. “Seriously, why are your hands so big?”
“You know what they say about people with big hands,” Yukhei said, bringing his other hand to rest on his chest before continuing wholeheartedly, “big hearts.”
Mark maintained a straight face for approximately two seconds before he dissolved into giggles, his sudden laughter catching Yukhei off guard and causing him to start laughing, too.
“I- I’m,” was all Mark was able to get out, before breaking into another fit of giggles. “I’m pretty sure that’s not how that saying goes, but okay.”
Yukhei’s eyes widened and a faux scandalized expression appeared on his face, “Mark Lee, what are you trying to imply?”
Mark could only laugh more, leaning forward into Yukhei. Yukhei couldn’t help but grin as Mark wrapped his arms around his waist to steady himself, giggling into his chest until he was out of breath. Eventually he pulled himself together, only a few giggled escaping his lips as he looked up at Yukhei.
“My face hurts,” he said. “Stop it.”
“Stop what?”
“I don’t know.” He pulled his hands back from around Yukhei’s middle to rub at his cheeks in an attempt to ease the soreness. “Being you,” he said, not caring to elaborate any more than that. He knew what he meant. But he could feel the other staring at him, so he looked back up at him, fingers still squishing his cheeks. “What?”
Yukhei grinned. “Nothing.” He continued to watch Mark massage his face before asking, “how ya’ feeling buddy?”
“I’m not drunk, if that’s what you’re thinking,” Mark said, dropping his hands from his face.
He held up his hands. “I didn’t say anything.”
“But you were implying it. I just get,” he wiggled his body a little, for emphasis, “a little loose after a bit to drink. But that being said, I am a notorious lightweight and become a more, quote unquote, confident gay when intoxicated, according to my friends. Which, false, because I’m bi, but whatever. Close enough.”
“Yeah,” Yukhei said with a laugh, “I’ve noticed. Like when you grabbed my butt earlier.”
“That was an accident!” Mark immediately defended, face flushing a light pink with embarrassment.
“Sure it was,” Yukhei said in a playfully sarcastic tone, winking at him with a smirk on his lips.
The flush on his face deepened and he hit Yukhei’s chest. “ Shut up,” he muttered, “you'd know if I meant to grab your butt.”
Yukhei ducked his head down slightly. “What was that?”
Mark looked him dead in the eyes, “I said, you’d know if I meant to grab your butt.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah, really.”
“Okay, so how would you, hypothetically, grab my butt, if you meant to?”
“Are you giving me permission to touch your butt?”
“Yes, Mark. I'm giving you permission to touch my butt.”
“You’d really let me touch your butt?” he asked, swaying a little as he leaned back into the taller, resting his hands on Yukhei’s waist.
“I mean, you did touch my butt once already.”
Mark groaned, tilting his head back. He leaned back against the wall instead of Yukhei, but pulled the taller with him by the waist. Yukhei let himself be pulled in, and took a step closer to Mark so he wasn’t just leaning forward.
“Just touch my butt, Mark,” Yukhei said, exasperated.
At Yukhei’s words, Mark took one of his hands from Yukhei’s waist and moved it to his ass, sliding his hand into the back pocket of his jeans before firmly squeezing. As an afterthought, Mark said, “you gotta firmly grasp it.”
“Did you just quote Spongebob?”
“Yeah, and you quoted an entire scene from Parks and Rec earlier, so you don’t get to judge me.”
“Okay, okay,” he surrendered. After a moment, he asked, “how’s the butt?”
“It’s a nice butt,” he said, squeezing again.
“Thank you, for thinking my butt is nice,” Yukhei said, giving Mark a sincere look, “it really means a lot.”
“You’re welcome,” Mark giggled, before a yawn overtook him. He brought his hands up to his mouth, attempting to stifle it, with no success.
Yukhei squinted at Mark. “What was that?”
“Nothing,” Mark said, voice muffled his hands still covering his mouth.
“You can’t be tired already, it’s only,” Yukhei quickly held up his wrist and glanced at it for less than half a second, as if he was checking a watch, “sometime before one.”
Mark fought the sudden urge to yawn again. “Having lectures at eight in the morning have conditioned me to go to sleep early. Like, I only have one lecture at eight this semester but I still wake up every day at six thirty because the routine is just so ingrained in my brain.”
“Damn dude, I refuse to take a class if it starts before eleven. You’re like, the student everyone wishes they could be.”
“I am dead inside,” Mark said monotonously, bringing his hands up to rub at his eyes.
“I bet you are, dude.”
“I’m getting a degree, but at what cost?”
“A lot of money. Your health and mental well-being. So many lost hours of sleep.”
“And all for a stupid piece of paper.” Mark leaned back into Yukhei, dramatically throwing his arms over the taller’s shoulders as he yawned into the front of Yukhei’s hoodie, not bothering to try and stifle it this time.
“You good?”
“Tired,” was all Mark said in response, moving his head to hook his chin on Yukhei’s shoulder.
Yukhei was sure that if he let Mark stand there, arms wrapped around his shoulders and head basically tucked into the crook his his neck, he would without a doubt fall asleep like that; he knew from their conversation beforehand that Mark was prone to falling asleep in anywhere and everywhere when tired enough. He put a hand on Mark’s hip, ready to ask if he really was that tired and wanted Yukhei to take him home when he felt Mark go rigid against him. The arm that Mark wasn’t using to pillow his head against slipped down from around where it was wrapped around Yukhei’s shoulder slid off, his hand grabbing at the sleeve of Yukhei’s hoodie and tugging on it urgently.
“Yukhei. Yukhei,” he said, pulling his head up back from Yukhei’s shoulder, suddenly alert eyes fixed on a point past Yukhei’s shoulder. “It’s-- he--” He looked up at Yukhei with pleading eyes, whispering, “he saw me-- oh god, he’s coming this way.”
Noting how panicked Mark looked, an idea popped into Yukhei’s head. It was a dumb idea, but an idea nonetheless. “Mark, do you trust me?”
His eyes flitted from where they’d been fixed past Yukhei’s shoulder to his face. “What? Y-yeah, I guess? Why?”
Without any further hesitation, he went through with his idea: he kissed Mark.
With his hand on Mark’s hip, he pulled them flush together, before snaking it around his waist and leaning down to capturing Mark’s lips with his own. Yukhei’s eyes were already screwed shut but the time Mark’s own widened in surprise, but they were quick to drop shut when Yukhei pressed forward. He was quick to pull back though, his breath just barely ghosting over Mark’s lips before Mark was wrapping his other arm around Yukhei’s shoulder and twining the two together, tugging the taller even farther down than he had been. He took that as an invitation, licking at the seam of Mark’s lips and swallowing the gasp that he elicited at the action. Mark pushed up onto his toes to deepen the kiss and Yukhei relinquished control, hand coming up to cradle Mark’s jaw as he did as he pleased.
Neither had no idea how long they’d been going at it for, but by the time they parted, a string of saliva connected their mouths and both of their lips were swollen and spit-slick; at some point, Mark’s hand had found its way into the hair at the back of Yukhei’s head.
He took a moment to just staring at Mark, at the curve of his lips and the way Mark’s face had flushed so much, leaving him looking faintly pink in the low light; how pretty his eyelashes looked when he was this close to him, how he could see himself getting lost in those doe eyes that were blinking up at him-- Yukhei pulled his hands back from Mark he’d been burned, flooded with sudden guilt.
“Ah-- sorry, sorry, sorry,” Yukhei quickly apologized, “I should’ve properly asked you first before I did that, like, we should’ve talked about that like we did with the hand holding and stuff, should the situation have arised.” He suddenly blanched, looking over his shoulder -- no one was standing there, or in the immediate area. He looked back to Mark, “but you looked so panicked, and like, who would want to see someone they have feelings for kiss someone else, right? Like, that’s the main conflict for every single teen drama show, right? Miscommunication because the lead is seen kissing the secondary love interest with no context. So I thought--”
Mark put his hand over Yukhei’s mouth. “Yukhei.”
He stopped talking, looking down at Mark with wide eyes.
“It’s fine.”
“Really?” he asked, voice muffled by Mark’s fingers.
He smiled, dropping his hand from Yukhei’s mouth. “Really. If it wasn’t fine, I wouldn’t have kissed back, would I?”
“I-I guess not.” Yukhei rubbed the back of his neck, avoiding making eye contact. He cleared his throat picking a spot just above Mark’s head, “well. Before I was rudely interrupted, I was going to ask if you’d like me to take you home.” Yukhei could see Mark raise his eyebrows in his peripheral vision. “Since you were tired,” he clarified. “No funny business.”
“Okay,” Mark giggled, looping his arm with Yukhei’s. “Take me home.”
Yukhei watched Mark meander around his room -- pull off his shoes and drop them on the floor, throw his phone onto his bed, turn on a string of Christmas lights that he apparently used as an extension cord, take off his jacket and pants so he could put on a sweatshirt several sizes too big and a pair of basketball shorts (to which Yukhei respectfully averted his gaze), spend a whole thirty seconds looking for his phone on his bed before plugging it in, hobble down the hall to brush his teeth and wash his face, before returning and flopping facedown onto his bed -- all from the doorway. When he realized Mark wasn’t going to be getting back up, he flicked off the light switch and began to leave.
He made it all the way to the front door of Mark’s shared apartment (shared with who? Yukhei had no clue) before deciding at the last second -- his hand on the door handle, about to turn it -- that he should fill up a glass with water and get some aspirin for the potential hangover that Mark might have in the morning. He didn’t know how much Mark had actually had to drink, but at his insistence that he was a lightweight, it wouldn’t hurt to just set them out for him out of courtesy. Even if he didn’t wake up with a headache, the water would probably be nice.
It took him a few minutes to find the cabinet with cups in it and locate any kind of painkillers, but eventually he was walking back to Mark’s room, thankful for the Christmas light extension cord providing enough light so that he could set the water and aspirin on Mark’s bedside table without tripping over anything.
As he was about to leave, he felt a tug on the sleeve of his hoodie. He looked down to see Mark’s fingers curled into the fabric. He followed the hand to the body it was attached to, seeing Mark blinking slowly. There were already creases on his face from the comforter. He must’ve briefly fallen asleep, and Yukhei had woken him back up.
“Stay the night,” Mark said softly, clearly trying to fight off the desire to asleep.
Yukhei blinked. Did he hear that right? “What?”
“Stay the night,” he repeated, sounding a tiny bit more awake.
“Are you sure?” he said hesitantly, before echoing Mark’s sentiment from earlier that night. “You don’t even know me, Mark.”
“I know you’re a real good dude,” he said sincerely. “You said earlier that you stay in the dorms on campus right? That’s like, really far. It’s not a good idea to walk all the way there from here at night, that’s how people get murdered. I would prefer it if you stayed alive.” Then he was moving, crawling to the head of the bed so he could pull the comforter over himself instead of just laying on top of it like he had been doing for the past couple of minutes. After he deemed himself comfortable enough under the blankets, he tossed back the corner and patted the exposed area of the mattress. “C’mon.”
Oh. Mark meant stay the night as in stay the night and sleep in my bed, not as in I have a spare couch and/or bed that you can crash on for the night.
“Oh, no, I can just--” sleep on the couch, I don’t want to invade your bed, he started to say, but was cut off by Mark, who was apparently now a mind reader.
“I’m not gonna make you sleep on our janky ass couch when I have a perfectly good mattress right here.” He patted the mattress with more insistence. “Plus I’m pretty sure our couch is broken. It like,” he made a wave motion with his hand, “dips on the left side. I’d offer you Sicheng’s bed, but like, I’m pretty sure he’s in it right now, so. Probably won’t be as nice as sleep with me.” He blinked, then furrowed his eyebrows. “I mean like, sleeping in the same bed as me. Not sleeping with me sleeping with me, but like sleeping with me sleeping with me. Nevermind, you know what I meant.”
“Are you really okay with that? I mean, me sleeping in the same bed as you.”
“Yukhei, your tongue was literally in my mouth earlier. It’s fine. If anything, we’re taking steps backwards.”
He was still hesitant to do anything, feet still rooted to the floor. He could always just turn down the invitation and go home; that was what he was planning on doing anyway, after he assured that Mark got back to his place of residence safe and sound. But like Mark said, his home was a dorm on campus, which was quite far from Mark’s apartment that was somewhere off campus. As if sensing his indecisiveness, Mark reached for his sleeve again, tugging it gently.
“Just get in the bed already,” he said softly, through a yawn. “Oh, wait. You probably want some clothes to change in to, right? Like, shorts or something? Since jeans aren’t very comfortable to sleep in. I don’t know if any of my shirts will fit you, since you’re like-- you’re very,” his eyes traveled from Yukhei’s face momentarily down to his chest and biceps, “muscled.” Yukhei gave him a questioning look; Mark ignored it, releasing the older’s sweatshirt and moving over to make room for him before laying back down. “They’re in the second drawer in my dresser, you can pick whatever ones you want.”
Yukhei nodded, even though his wasn’t sure if Mark could see it. He shuffled across the room to where the dresser was and opened tugged open the drawer, picking the first pair of basketball shorts his hands made contact with. He struggled to get out his jeans, the fabric wanting to stay bunched around his thighs and calves, but managed to successfully escape them without falling over. He pulled the shorts on and decided as he walked back over to Mark’s bed that he should probably ditch his sweatshirt too, otherwise he’d wake up sweating. He nearly tripped over the Christmas lights as he tugged it off but managed to recover and toss his sweatshirt in the general area of where he assumed his pants were. He gently crawled onto the bed, mindful to try and not take up too much space of Mark’s tiny twin bed as settled underneath the comforter and tried to get comfortable.
Once finally settled and stopped moving, Mark rolled his head to look at him and asked, “what is your stance on cuddling?”
“Enjoyable?” he said, unsure tone raising in question at the end. “Is this a trick question?”
Mark hummed out a negative sound. “Just wanted to know, because I’m a cuddler.”
He gave Mark a level look. “I thought we already established this.”
“You know what I meant,” he groaned, rolling over so he was facing the wall.
Yukhei grinned, watching Mark as he settled into a comfortable position facing away from him.
Just when he thought the younger had actually fallen back asleep, he rolled over onto his side so he was facing Yukhei, propping his head up in his hand so he could look down at the older before he whispered, tone serious, “this is really dumb, but would it be completely inappropriate to ask if I could kiss you again?” There was a pause, like Mark was internally debating with himself, before he continued with, “because you’re like, a really good kisser.”
Yukhei scoffed. “You did all the kissing, so I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Mark colored pink, not visible in the low light. “You can say no. I just wanted to ask, since we already kissed, I thought it wouldn’t be that weird to do it again, y’know? Hy- my ex, he was the really touchy type, so like, I’ve been feeling particularly touch-starved as of late since we broke up and I think this might be my last chance to get to kiss someone again for a while.” There was a tiny pause, a moment of realization. “Oh my god, that sounds kinda sad now that I say it out loud. What I’m trying to say is that I’m just really bad at dating and just wanna catch that kiss. Oh my g-- why did I just say that out loud. I’m going to stop talking and go to sleep now. Goodnight, Yukhei.”
“Mark. Mark, it’s fine. You can--” he giggled, unable to contain them, “you can catch this kith .”
“Oh my god, shut up,” Mark said as he practically threw himself on top of Yukhei.
Yukhei could only laugh, full-bodied and bed shaking, wrapping his arms around Mark’s middle.
Mark pressed his hands to Yukhei’s cheeks. “Stop laughing, asshole, I’m trying to kiss you.”
Instead of responding, Yukhei lifted his head up so his lips would meet Mark’s. He lowered his head back onto the pillow and Mark followed, determined to not break the connection. It was something more languid and unhurried than before, like they had all the time in the world; Yukhei licked into Mark’s mouth and Mark sighed, melting into him. If Mark had to compare it to something, Yukhei kissed like honey -- sweet and slow, an unexpectedly overwhelming thing that made him want to keep coming back for more.
Eventually they both became short of breath and pulled away, just far enough that they could still feel each other’s breaths warm their skin.
“Thanks,” Mark breathed.
“No problem,” Yukhei answered.
“Oh, before I forget,” Mark suddenly said, almost falling off the bed as he reached over Yukhei to grab his phone off the nightstand. After securely grabbing it (and successfully not falling off the bed), he dropped back down onto his side of the bed and unlocked his phone, squinting at the screen as he turned down the brightness. He tapped a few things before holding it out for Yukhei to take, the screen displaying a blank contact. “Give me your number,” he said, “I mean, if you want. Sorry, that sounded really pushy.”
Yukhei took Mark’s phone anyway. “I’ll only give you my number on one condition.”
“Which is?”
“One, you give me yours.”
“I mean, that’s generally how communication works, so. Was planning on it. You can just text yourself from my phone.”
“I’m going to. And you didn’t let me finish! Two, you can’t look at my contact name until I text you.”
“That’s dumb. What if I want to text you first?”
“I guarantee that I will be the one to text you first. Like, I’m willing to bet money on this.”
“Okay, fine,” he sighed. “I won’t look at it until you text me.”
“Good,” Yukhei said, twisting so he could plug Mark’s phone back in and return it to the nightstand.
“Alright,” Mark said though a yawn, shifting around before throwing his leg over Yukhei. “All that kissing really tired me out, so I’m going to sleep now. For real this time. Goodnight Yukhei.”
Yukhei draped his arm over Mark, tugging him the tiniest bit closer, “goodnight, Mark.”
(The first time Mark woke up, the sun was just barely peeking in through his blinds, Yukhei’s arm slung around his waist and his head was pillowed on Yukhei’s chest. In the early morning haze, he didn’t take the time to dwell on how warm and content being in this position made him feel and instead, with a tiny smile on his lips, buried his face back into Yukhei’s chest and promptly fell back asleep.
The second time he woke up, Yukhei was gone and the space he had been occupying was cold. From his angle on the bed, he could see Yukhei’s sweatshirt and jeans still in a pile across the room. He must’ve forgotten them when he left. Mark blinked blearily, pushing himself up so he could grab his phone off the nightstand before returning to the accumulated warmth of his comforter -- he cleared most of the notifications in the lockscreen, but when he came to a message from caught this kith ;^) that read told u i’d message u first :^), followed by also did u know u snore he couldn’t help but smile.)