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The cutest thing about Jongdae, Minseok thinks, is that everything about him is so, so sweet.
His sunny smiles are bright, and happy, and sweet. His loud laugh is cheerful and sweet. The scent of his shampoo- green apple- is sweet. The words he whispers to Minseok, when he can’t fall asleep at night, they’re comfortingly so. The looks he gives him. The little gestures that shows he cares. Everything . He even has a stupidly unhealthy sweet tooth.
So it’s no surprise that when he sees a giant box of assorted candies and chocolates, his first thought is Jongdae , and he impulsively spends a ridiculous amount of money on the stupid thing. At least Jongdae will eat it happily.
He comes home to a warm, empty house. Jongdae’s still at work. Minseok thinks they should really sync their work schedules better, but he tucks the box into the back of the cupboard happily all the same.
“It can be a surprise,” he tells Tan, who’s come up to rub her head on his legs. “Don’t tell him, okay?”
She meows at him like she understands. Minseok laughs.
//
Jongdae comes home to a sleepy but happy Minseok, and an equally sleepy Tan in his arms.
“Welcome home,” he mumbles. “Got you a surprise.”
Jongdae hugs him, squishing Tan in between them. “A surprise? What’s the occasion?”
After letting Tan down to the floor, Minseok kisses his cheek. “No reason,” he says, pressing another kiss to his temple. “Just saw it while I was shopping and I thought of you.”
“Ahh, something made you think of me?” Jongdae smiles. He buries his face in Minseok’s shoulder, breathes in his clean scent.
“Everything sweet and happy and cute makes me think of you,” Minseok smiles.
“Min, cut it out.” He pushes Minseok gently, but Minseok pulls him back into a tight hug.
“I’m serious!” he laughs.
They stay in each other’s tight embrace for a long time.
//
He jolts awake in the middle of the night.
He sweats like he’d just been running and there’s leftover terror rushing through his veins, turning his limbs to lead. He can’t remember what he’d been dreaming about, but he still feels the crushing fear like it’s real. Instinctually, he turns to his left.
Minseok is safe and asleep next to him. A relief.
Jongdae doesn’t want to wake him up. Minseok has work tomorrow, and he doesn’t want him to lose any sleep.
Instead, he slowly, carefully gets up and out of their bed, and quietly makes his way downstairs.
He flicks on the kitchen light and opens the cabinet, searching for something sweet- maybe a hot chocolate packet, or something like that to calm him down and help him go back to sleep. But he’s met with a giant, red box of- of what, exactly?
“There’s only one way to find out, right?” he whispers to Tan, who’d been woken up by his journey. She flicks her tail at him.
And when he lifts the lid off the box, he’s met with a treasure trove of chocolates and truffles and almond-covered treats.
“Holy shit, Minseok.”
//
Minseok thinks he may have a sixth, Jongdae-Is-In-Trouble sense, or something like that, because for no reason at all, he’s awake in the middle of the night- and true to his intuition, when he reaches out, the bed is empty. Not cold, like maybe he’s just left. He’s probably downstairs, looking for something to calm him down. Something sweet to help him relax. Maybe hot chocolate, or-
“The box,” he gasps to himself, and he throws the covers off and jogs downstairs.
Jongdae is sitting on the counter, quietly unwrapping the last coconut truffle in the- empty?!- box and popping it into his mouth. He’s bathed in the golden light of the kitchen, and upon noticing Minseok, his head snaps up and he stops chewing.
“Mim-sheok,” he mumbles around the treat.
“Did- did you eat- did you finish the entire box just now? By yourself? In the middle of the night?”
Jongdae swallows audibly. “I had a nightmare,” he says, as if that’s a perfectly reasonable justification.
He shakes his head, but what comes out instead is a light, disbelieving laugh. He comes up to Jongdae anyways, hugs him tight. “What was it about, love?”
He feels Jongdae sigh, a deep rumble in his chest. “I don't know. Don't remember anymore.”
“Well, it’s okay now.”
“Yeah,” Jongdae says into his neck. “You’re here. Tan’s here.”
“The now empty box of sweets is here,” Minseok jokes.
“Sorry.”
“Hey,” he says, “it’s fine. They were for you anyways, remember?” Minseok pulls back and cups Jongdae’s face instead, squishing his cheeks. “I was reminded of your sweetness. The box of sweets reminded me of your sweetness.”
“Funny,” Jongdae smiles.
“Though I wasn’t expecting you to finish it all by yourself in the dead of the night.”
“Yeah, I wasn’t expecting myself to either, but before I knew it…”
“Tan,” Minseok calls out, grinning. “Why didn’t you stop him?”
“Told her to leave me alone,” Jongdae responds for her.
Minseok laughs a real, unsuppressed laugh at that, and it makes Jongdae smile, too, before he reaches out to cup Minseok’s face as well. “Hey.”
“Hey,” Minseok replies.
“Thank you.”
“For? The chocolates?”
“Well, that too, but- for always being there for me. I'm so grateful that you exist.”
Minseok’s smile gets wider. He can’t help it, can’t contain the endless love and patience and care he holds for Jongdae. “Of course, love. I’m always here for you, okay? I’ll always be there. Always, no matter what.”
“No matter what,” Jongdae repeats.
“Yeah. So you can tell me about the dream, or about anything, really, whenever you’re ready, okay? I’ll wait for you.”
Jongdae’s grip on his cheeks tightens, before he realizes what he’s doing and pulls away to let his hands rest on his hips instead. Then he leans in, letting their foreheads rest together. Minseok has to adjust to account for the height difference, since Jongdae’s on the counter, but it’s warm and comfortable all the same. “Just promise to wait for me too, okay?”
“I’ll wait for you no matter how long it takes.”
“Good,” Minseok says, and seals the distance with a sweet kiss.