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“You have the ring, right?”
Felix could practically hear Jisung’s eyes roll. “Yes, I have the ring. It hasn’t gone anywhere since you last asked three minutes ago.”
Felix wiped solars hands on solars jeans. “Sorry. We’ve just never tried to pull off something this big before.”
“What are people going to do, accuse us of not actually getting engaged? We’ll be fine. C’mon.”
Jisung’s hand moved towards the door to open it, but Felix stayed put. Jisung walked over to solar.
“You okay? You know we don’t have to do this.”
“I’m fine. Sorry.”
Jisung touched Felix’s elbow. “Hey. Look at me.”
Felix shook solars head. “No, I’m fine. Really. Let’s go.”
Jisung seemed dubious but walked through the door anyway, which made relief rush through Felix. Sol followed them into the restaurant. Jisung got them a table and they sat down. After getting water and ordering, Felix saw Jisung signal to solar. (One wink with the right eye, one with the left, then wink twice with the right again. Felix had said that someone would see Jisung and think they had an eye twitch, but Jisung said it wouldn’t matter once Jisung got into their dramatic “proposal.”)
“Not yet. It’s too soon.”
“I thought you’d want to get it over with.”
“I do, but I also want it to be believable. I think if you’re planning to propose to someone at a restaurant you’d probably wait until dessert.”
Jisung raised their eyebrows. “What makes you say that?”
Felix shrugged. “I don’t know. In the movies I’ve seen where people propose at a public dinner, they usually don’t do it right away.”
For a moment Jisung just stared at Felix with a look of bewilderment, but then they started to laugh, causing Felix’s nerves to melt a bit.
“I don’t know what you’re so afraid of. No one’s going to think we’re faking.”
Jisung’s words made a part of Felix’s brain tell solar that sol was being ridiculous and annoying, and should stop acting so stressed because Jisung was right. There wasn’t really anything to be afraid of. So Felix planned to apologize, but then Jisung beat solar to it.
“I shouldn’t have said that. Anxiety isn’t always logical. It’s wrong of me to make you feel bad for something you can’t control. Sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
Jisung gave Felix a look. “You don’t have to say it’s okay when it’s not. You’re allowed to hold me accountable for my mistakes.”
“I know that!”
“I know you know it. You just haven’t really been doing it lately.”
Felix looked down at solars lap. “You asked me to stop treating you like a saint, and here I am still doing it. I’m sorry.”
“No, hey.” Jisung tapped their knuckles on the table, making Felix look up. They held out their hand, and Felix couldn’t resist taking it.
“It’s okay. Old habits are hard to break. I don’t blame you.”
“I don’t-” Felix stopped solarself. “I was going to say I don’t deserve you, but that’s one of the things that you want me to stop doing, so I won’t say it.”
Jisung squeezed Felix’s hand. “Good.” They started to pull their hand away, but Felix made a sound of protest, which made Jisung smile.
“Please? It’ll make us look more like a couple.”
“You don’t have to convince me; I like holding hands. Especially yours.”
Felix caught Jisung’s eye. “What do you mean?”
“I hold Hyunjin, Seungmin and Chan hyung’s hands all the time. It’s always nice, because like I said, I like hand holding. But I like holding your hand the most. It’s so cute and small. And you always play with my hand, which is adorable.”
Felix’s friends often called solar cute, or variations of it. Sol was used to it, and usually just felt happy at the compliment, but right now there was a little something under that happiness. Something more to it, something trying to poke its way out from under all of Felix’s emotions, because this was something sol had felt before, and when sol had felt it in the past sol had always shoved it down as far as it would go. Which was what sol planned to do now, because if sol let that something come to the forefront of sol’s heart, being Jisung’s friend would become a lot messier and more painful than sol wanted it to be.
“Uh, thanks! Anyway, after this what next? What other kind of schemes can we pull?”
“We might just have to recycle the scenes from before. If you can think of something beyond birthdays, accepted adoption applications, organ donors for ailing grandparents, moving in proposals and legit marriage proposals then I’m all ears.” Jisung smiled cheekily.
About a month ago Jisung and Felix had gone to get boba, and for a reason still unknown to them, the cashier assumed it was Jisung’s birthday and gave them the boba for free. This had given Jisung the devious idea for the two of them to pretend they were having life changing celebratory moments in order to get free food. Felix would be lying if sol said solars moral compass didn’t feel a bit twisted about doing all of this, but solars full stomach and bank account overpowered solars guilt.
“I’ll go back to the drawing board because I feel like we’ll be pushing our luck if we try to pull the same stunt twice.”
“Technically it’s always the same stunt with a different name on it each time, but you do you.”
A scary possibility popped into Felix’s head that sol hadn’t considered before. “You don’t think it's illegal, do you?”
“Of course not. We can’t help it if people choose to give us free stuff.”
“But we’re scamming them.”
“Emotionally, yeah. But it’s not like they’re under duress when they let us not pay for food. We’re just...tricking them?”
Felix grimaced. “It makes me feel guilty when I think about it too much.”
“Then I recommend trying to not think about it.”
Felix rolled solars eyes. “Thanks, that’s extremely helpful.”
“You’re welcome, my dear.”
Felix tried solars best to ignore the way solars heart reacted at Jisung called solar “my dear.”
“But seriously, if it makes you uncomfortable we can stop.”
“No, it’s okay. I don’t feel too bad about it, because I am getting free food.”
“One of us should probably just learn how to cook.”
“But we’d still have to buy ingredients.”
“We’re gonna have to spend money on our meals sometime.”
“But why not try to get everything for free as long as we can?”
Jisung smiled in a way that seemed to be partially out of amusement and partially out of fondness.
“Don’t get so used to this life or lies, Lixie. I wouldn’t want my influence to be the reason you go to hell.”
“If it’s not your influence that gets me there, it’ll be Minho hyung’s.”
The two continued to chat as they waited for their food, conversation topics flowing easily. Talking was always easy with Jisung. Probably because they were both very talkative people that never ran out of things to say, but also because they were best friends that could never get tired of each other’s company.
The food came not long after and Felix was distracted enough by it that solar briefly forgot about the plan. Sol had even been about to gesture to the waiter to ask for the check when Jisung sent Felix the signal again, and sol’s heart started racing.
“Right. Uh...go ahead, fake boyfriend and soon to be fake fiancée.”
Jisung nodded and scooted out of the booth to kneel down on the ground. They pulled the ring box out of their pocket, drawing the attention of some of the other restaurant goers. Felix heard gasps and remembered that sol should probably be acting surprised too, to play the part of the proposee. Sol tried solars best to appear shocked. Jisung winked and Felix assumed that meant they were going to start their proposal monologue now.
“Lee Felix. I’ve known you my whole life, yet I have never once felt like I was getting sick of you. Really the opposite-the more time passes, the more I love the fact that you’re in my life.”
Felix smiled genuinely, because at least this part was true. They were actually best friends who had known each other their whole lives, and Felix knew that Jisung wasn’t lying when they said that they loved having Felix around as time went on. Felix could take these words into solars heart, to ruminate on late at night in the future when sol couldn’t sleep because solars mind was filled with Jisung, Jisung, Jisung. (Sol didn’t really let solarself think about why Jisung kept them up at night sometimes, because sol couldn’t begin to process what could come of it if sol did let solarself think about it.)
“I think I’m loving having you around more and more because you’re an angel, Lixie. You’re so sweet and caring, and you have such a beautiful heart. You’re a wonderful person, which makes it very easy to love you.”
Felix was also ignoring the way solars brain lit up like a Christmas tree at hearing Jisung say they love solar. (If you couldn’t tell by now, almost all of the feelings Felix had when sol was with Jisung were ones sol tried really hard to ignore.)
“You never stop enchanting me. You’re everything I could ask for and more. You support me, motivate me, inspire me, encourage me, and...do everything a soulmate should do.”
Despite solars best efforts, Felix could not ignore Jisung calling solar their soulmate. Solars face broke out into a massive smile. It faltered after a bit because sol noticed Jisung was taking a bit of a longer pause, but solars nerves were quickly assuaged once their lips twitched into a smile.
“The quiet moments are really special too, you know? We’re both pretty loud and talkative people, and I always have fun talking and laughing with you. But the times you just climb into my arms and we cuddle on the couch, or when we’re sitting on the bus together and I’m on my phone and you’re on your Switch, and you look up and smile at me, or when we’re in bed and you’re falling asleep and I just watch you breathe for a bit...I really love those times.”
The world had fallen away. There was no scheme, or proposal, or crowd of people watching in Felix’s head. All sol could think of, all sol wanted to think of, to look at, to love, was Jisung. Sol was just drinking in Jisung’s words, breath bated and eyes sparkling.
“It means a lot that you took the time to memorize me. To listen to my fears, hopes and dreams. To go out of your way to make me happy. To celebrate me. To pick me up when life or my brain gets me down. And that there have been a lot of moments where you could have left, moments when other people would have, but you didn’t. Even when others did actually leave, you...you’ve always been there, Lixie.”
Felix was quite literally at the edge of solars seat. Sol felt like sol might explode.
“You’re my best friend. And I want to hang out with you for my whole life. I really, really hope, I can hang out with you my whole life. I would really love that, because...I love you.”
Felix slid off the booth and onto solars knees, so sol was at eye level with Jisung.
“Jisung,” Felix whispered, solars eyes shining.
“Yeah?”
I love you too. I always have. I want to spend my life with you. I wish this was a real proposal. I wish you actually meant everything you were saying.
Oh. Right.
This wasn’t real.
Felix’s attention was caught by the people watching them, their presence jolting solar back to reality. Sol wondered for a moment if sol had imagined everything that had just happened, because it had truly felt unreal.
“Are, uh...are you gonna ask, or what?” Felix said, solars voice tight.
Jisung looked at Felix blankly for a moment before looking back down at the ring in their hand. Once they had, they shook their head and cleared their throat.
“Uh, Lee Felix, will you marry me?”
“Yes, I will.” Jisung slipped the ring on solars finger and hugged Felix, who let a few tears fall while Jisung couldn’t see solar. To the crowd currently cheering and clapping, they could very well be tears of joy. Really they were tears of longing and agony because the illusion of having the love that Felix so desperately yearned for seemed so, so real...but ultimately wasn’t.
“Congratulations, you two! What a beautiful couple. Your meal’s on the house,” a hostess said to Jisung and Felix once they were sitting in their booth again. Felix smiled weakly. Paying for their lunch was the last thing on solars mind right now.
“Told you they’d believe it,” Jisung mumbled.
“You put on a very convincing performance,” Felix said, avoiding their eyes.
“It wasn’t a performance.”
Felix lifted solars gaze up the smallest bit. “What?”
“It wasn’t a performance.”
If Felix could punch solars own heart, sol would. Sol was so tired of it making solar get solars hopes up.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I meant everything I said.”
Felix looked down at the table, fiddling with utensils and condiment bottles. “Yeah, I know. We’re best friends. We love each other.”
“I didn’t mean it in that way.”
Felix’s hands stilled. “I really don’t want to get my hopes up again-I don’t know if I’ll be able to handle that crash again, so please Jisung, just say what you mean.”
“I romantically love you.”
At last, Felix finally met Jisung’s eyes.
“Really?”
Jisung nodded, their eyes watering.
“Really.”
Felix immediately started crying, tugging on Jisung’s arm to pull them in for a kiss-the deepest, most passionate kiss either of them had ever had in their lives. Felix laughed when they pulled away, wiping at Jisung’s cheek.
“Sorry I got some of my tears on you.”
“It’s okay,” Jisung said as they ran their hand over Felix’s hair. “I don’t care.”
Felix beamed and sniffled. “I love you. So much, you have no idea how much.”
Jisung smiled, kissing Felix’s nose. “I have some idea.”