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“Oh, fuck!” is what Kihyun hears coming from his neighbour’s flat, followed by the sound of something hitting the floor.
Kihyun isn’t sure what to make of it. The extent of his conversations with his neighbour are simple ‘good morning’s when they pass by one another on the way out, or a quick ‘goodnight’ here and there on the way back in. He doesn’t even remember his neighbour’s name.
Although Kihyun doesn’t know the layout of his neighbour’s flat, he’s heard a tap running through the wall enough times to guess that it’s a kitchen. Either that or his neighbour spends an unusual amount of time in his bathroom.
From the swearing he’s been hearing over the past half an hour or so, it seems like his neighbour is struggling with something. Maybe he’s trying to cook a new recipe and it’s not going so well. Kihyun can only guess, of course, as he doesn’t have the ability to see through walls. That would be useful.
For the first time since Kihyun started reading his book, it’s silent. “Finally,” Kihyun mutters to himself, turning his attention back to his book. He’s been struggling to focus on the words with all of the noise coming from the other side of the wall.
The silence doesn’t last long. Kihyun makes it through a couple of pages, the story starting to get tense. Interesting. It’s just getting to the good part, and then there’s an angry scream and the book falls to the ground in Kihyun’s shock.
Once his heart recovers, he picks his book up off the floor only to find that it closed during the fall and he’s lost his page. He glares at the wall with all the annoyance he can muster, hoping his neighbour can feel it through the wall even if he can’t see him.
As much as Kihyun would like to continue reading, all of his focus is lost now, as is his place in the book. He chucks the book onto his bedside table in irritation. Then, the tidy part of himself has to move it. Curse his mind for having to have everything so tidy.
He picks his phone up from where it rests. He has a couple of texts from Minhyuk that he should probably reply to, but Minhyuk had taken far too long to reply to Kihyun’s last text, so he can wait a bit longer. Kihyun’s stubborn. Sue him.
His neighbour yells again (it’s “shit fuck balls” this time. He’s getting creative) and Kihyun decides it’s about time to go over there and give him a piece of his mind.
Kihyun rolls off of his bed, slips off his slippers and heads towards the door. He replies to Minhyuk on the way, telling him that ‘no, forks can’t go in the microwave. It’ll explode for fucks sake’ and then pocketing his phone.
Making sure not to forget his keys, he closes his front door and, with a deep breath, knocks on his neighbour’s front door.
From inside his neighbour yells “one second”. A lot of noise follows, including a loud banging sound, and then the door is open and his neighbour is standing there. He looks flustered and stressed. He’s completely covered in flour, it’s even in his hair which is messy and unkempt, like it’s been tugged on repeatedly.
Seeing the state his neighbour is in, Kihyun decides that maybe coming over here to yell at him isn’t he nicest thing to do.
There’s an awkward pause while the two stare at each other.
Kihyun breaks the silence. “Hey,” he starts.
“Hi,” his neighbour replies. He rubs his hands together, flour coating the floor as it falls. “Did you need something?”
“I heard some swearing and banging through the wall.” After he says it, Kihyun starts to feel guilty for coming over just to yell at his neighbour and decides to change his tactic. “I wanted to come over and check you were okay.” He rubs the back of his neck, looking down. “I also wanted to offer my help if you need it. I’m a pretty good cook, even if I do say so myself.”
The tips of his neighbour’s ears go pink. “I’m really sorry for disturbing you.”
Kihyun waves a hand dismissively. “Don’t worry about it.”
His neighbour mutters out a quiet sorry once again. “I could do with some help, if you’re up for it,” he admits. He moves out of the way of the door and opens it wider, allowing Kihyun to enter. As he shuts the door behind Kihyun, he says, “I have a party to go to later and I’m meant to be baking cookies. I’m terrible at baking.” He leads Kihyun to his kitchen. “I’m Changkyun, by the way. I don’t know if I ever introduced myself.”
“Kihyun. Nice to properly meet you.”
Changkyun smiles. “I wish it could’ve been under better circumstances.”
“You’re all good. Although, the flour in your hair does look a bit like dandruff.” Kihyun does his best to cover his laugh with a cough, but ultimately fails and bursts into laughter.
Changkyun looks mortified, but only a few seconds later he’s laughing too. “I can’t believe I got it in my hair,” he manages through the giggles.
Kihyun’s face settles into a smile once he recovers from his laughter. He looks around the room for the first time. To put it bluntly, the kitchen is trashed. There’s flour everywhere, even on the ceiling. (How did he manage to get it up there?) There’s cookie dough—well, what Kihyun assumes is meant to be the cookie dough—on the counter and a baking tray on the floor. There’s so many things he wants to ask about, but he settles for, “How did you get flour on your ceiling?”
Changkyun looks up, eyeing the flour up there like it’s an alien. “I’m not even sure. I was dancing for a bit while I was listening to music, maybe that’s how.”
“Makes sense.” Kihyun looks over to the ‘cookie dough’ again. “Have you ever made cookies before?”
“Do you even need to ask?”
Kihyun laughs. He likes Changkyun, he’s decided, even if he did disturb his reading and the original reason Kihyun even came over here was to have a go at him. “Why didn’t you buy that pre-made cookie dough and just cook that?”
Changkyun pouts. “I did.”
“Then what happened? Because that definitely isn’t cookie dough.”
“Don’t judge me, okay?” Changkyun says, staring at Kihyun.
Kihyun simply raises an eyebrow.
Changkyun stares for a second longer before sighing. “I bought some yesterday but then I woke up at 4am starving hungry and saw the cookie dough and I couldn’t resist it.”
Kihyun lets out a laugh. “You really screwed yourself over with that.”
“Tell me about it. I’m regretting it more by the second,” Changkyun says dramatically.
Kihyun prods the supposed cookie dough, finding it’s rock hard. He has no idea how Changkyun even managed to make such a strange substance. The only ingredients on the counter are the actual ingredients needed to make cookies. “This needs to go. We’re making a new batch.” He picks up the board with Changkyun’s poor attempt at cookie dough on and scrapes it straight into the bin. “Thank god that monstrosity is gone,” he mutters.
“Hey!” Changkyun yells indignantly. “I worked hard on that cookie dough.” He pouts at Kihyun, crossing his arms like a child.
He’s not sure where his confidence comes from, but Kihyun ruffles Changkyun’s hair as if it’s something normal between the two of them. “Don’t worry, kid, I’ll make you the best cookies ever.” As Changkyun still has all of the ingredients out on the counter (even the butter, which definitely should’ve gone back in the fridge), it’s easy to get started on making the dough.
“Kid? There’s no way you’re older than me.”
While weighing out the butter, Kihyun replies, “I’m 25. You’re definitely a kid.”
Changkyun takes too long to reply, so Kihyun looks over only to see him pouting once again. He smirks. “I’m right, aren’t I?”
“No,” Changkyun denies.
“How old are you, then?”
Changkyun replies too quietly for Kihyun to hear him.
Kihyun stares at him blankly.
For a while, Changkyun just stares back, but quickly realises that Kihyun isn’t going to give in. After a sigh, he says, “I’m 22, but I’m nearly 23! I’m not a kid.”
“Sure, kid.”
They’re quiet for a while, the only sound in the room being Kihyun whisking the butter and sugar together. Once he’s satisfied that it’s mixed together properly, he adds in the eggs.
“You’re really good at this,” Changkyun comments.
Kihyun turns to look at him with a smile. “Thank you. I’m really not doing anything that complicated, though.”
They fall into silence again, Kihyun busy focusing on making the cookies while Changkyun watches from the table. Even though they only just properly met, the silence isn’t awkward like Kihyun would’ve expected with someone he barely knows. It feels nice. Domestic, even.
It doesn’t take Kihyun much longer to finish making the cookie dough. He holds it up to show Changkyun, a proud smile on his face. “Now this is cookie dough.”
Changkyun jumps up and swipes a chunk of the cookie dough before Kihyun even has a chance to react and shoves it in his mouth.
“Changkyun!” Kihyun scolds, smacking him over the back of the head with the hand that isn’t holding the cookie dough. “I didn’t make this just for you to eat it.”
He just gets a shit-eating grin in return.
Kihyun shakes his head and turns away from Changkyun to start splitting up the dough into smaller pieces. He does it quickly, wanting to get the cookies into the oven before Changkyun has a chance to steal more of it.
He gets the baking tray into the oven in record time. “Now, we wait,” he announces.
Changkyun’s sitting down on a chair at his table once again, so Kihyun joins him in one of the other chairs.
“Thank you for doing this,” Changkyun says. “I probably would’ve been smacked if I turned up to the party with no cookies after promising that’d I’d bring some.”
“No problem. Like I said, I like baking.” Kihyun fiddles with the edge of a napkin that’s on the table. “What party are you going to?”
“My best friend and his boyfriend hold annual Christmas parties, so I’m just going to that. Everyone always turns up with dates but my lonely ass is going solo once again.”
Kihyun can’t help but laugh at Changkyun’s choice of words. “That’s going to be me when I go to my family Christmas meal. I took my best friend with me once as my plus one but all he did was embarrass me by telling stories my family definitely didn’t need to know, so now I refuse to take him anywhere with me.”
The corner of Changkyun’s mouth lifts in a small smile. “Hit me up with his instagram so I can message him and find out all these embarrassing stories about you, too.”
“Oh, hell no. I can’t ruin my reputation with you this soon.” Before Kihyun can speak again, his phone pings, alerting him to a new message. “Speak of the devil, Minhyuk just text me asking if he can come over for food. I swear he’s only friends with me so I can cook for him.”
“I mean, you just saved my day by baking cookies for me.”
Kihyun doesn’t know what compels him to say it, but he can’t help but blurt out, “I’d bake cookies for you any day you wanted.” His face starts to heat up and he looks away, missing the hopeful look on Changkyun’s face when he does.
Changkyun’s voice is soft when he says, “I wouldn’t mind that at all.”
Kihyun, with his face still burning, looks up at Changkyun to find him smiling at him. He can’t deny that Changkyun is extremely attractive and he’s getting along well with him already. Kihyun is about to speak, invite Changkyun over for dinner or something, when his timer starts ringing, ruining the mood.
He jumps up to go and take the cookies out of the oven, not wanting to let them burn. They’re a golden brown colour, just as they should be. They look appetising and part of Kihyun is tempted to just eat all of them, but he cant. Instead, he uses a spatula to transfer the cookies from the tray to the cooling rack to allow them to cool faster. “We should try one together and leave the rest for your party,” Kihyun suggests, really wanting to see if they taste as good as they look.
Changkyun nods enthusiastically and Kihyun is sure that if Changkyun was a dog he’d be drooling right now.
“We’ll have to let them cool first,” Kihyun says when Changkyun stands up to take one of the cookies.
“But Kihyun,” Changkyun whines.
Kihyun wants to give in, he’s weak for cute boys doing cute things, but he also knows Changkyun wouldn’t enjoy having his mouth burnt, even if it meant he has to wait a bit longer. “Nope. You’ll have to wait.”
“You’re mean.” Changkyun drops himself back into the chair he was sitting in, crossing his arms.
“Yeah. Get used to it.”
Changkyun just sits in his chair and pouts until Kihyun finally takes half of a cookie over to him once it’s cool enough. Holding his other hand under the cookie to prevent any crumbs falling, he holds the cookie out to Changkyun, feeding it to him. As Changkyun eats the cookie, his eyes widen. “This is amazing!” he yells, his mouth still full of cookie.
“Gross. Finish your food before you speak,” Kihyun scolds, tutting at him. “But thank you.”
He feeds the rest of the cookie to Changkyun. Then, he realises he just fed Changkyun and runs away. Well, as far as one can run when they’re still in the same room. To distract himself from his embarrassment, he eats the other half of the cookie that he left for himself. It tastes even better than he hoped it would and Kihyun’s proud of himself for making such amazing cookies, even if Changkyun will get all the credit for them at his party.
“Kiiiiiihyun.”
From the tone of his voice, Kihyun can tell exactly what Changkyun is about to say. “No. No more cookies. They’re for the party.”
“But I want some.” Changkyun is pouting once again. That boy sure knows how to pout.
Kihyun shakes his head. “You can eat them when you’re at the party.”
“Fine. But you’re still mean.”
Kihyun just winks at him. It then hits him that he’s probably overstayed his welcome by now. He said he’d bake the cookies, which he’s done, so there’s really no reason for him to stay. “I should probably go and let you get ready for this party.”
Changkyun doesn’t say anything, just nods, and they walk to the front door together in silence.
It feels awkward now, so Kihyun opens the door, ready to leave, when Changkyun speaks up.
“Hey, Kihyun.”
Kihyun turns back, confused.
“Do you want to be my date to this party?” Changkyun looks terrified, his hands are slightly shaking.
Kihyun feels his mouth drop slightly. “Really?” His voice goes high, unbelieving that Changkyun would want to go on a date with him.
Changkyun nods mutely.
“Well, then, yes. I’d love to.”
The smile on Changkyun’s face when Kihyun agrees to be his date makes his heart skip a beat. “I’m gonna eat all of these cookies as soon as we get there.”
“I don’t expect any less.”