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As a nutritional sciences major, Dejun makes sure to always eat healthy. He firmly believes in Meatless Mondays and Tofu Tuesdays and just about every other healthy meal plan that exists in the world. When he buys food on campus, he always goes for salads or soup and sometimes, if he really feels like treating himself, maybe a dessert. Nothing big, just enough for him to sate his sweet tooth and maybe have some left over for his roommate.
But this time, he might have gone a little bit overboard.
To be fair, it’s Yangyang’s birthday today, so Dejun finds himself bringing home an entire chocolate cake, complete with the sprinkles and cherries on top. He doesn’t even know why he decided to buy an entire cake when there were individual slices in the campus market that would probably be a smarter option nutrition-wise, but here he is, carrying this five-pound monstrosity of sugar back into his dorm.
Dejun mentally scolds himself for making such a bad decision. God, what was he thinking ?
The answer is simple: he wasn’t. Dejun got off his 8 AM class and headed directly to the campus market, saw the cake, wanted the cake, and bought the cake.
No thoughts, head empty, want cake.
At least now that he has the cake, his friends can maybe help him eat it before it sits around for too long and starts growing hair.
“Hendery!” he calls as he opens the door to their dorm, balancing the cake in one hand as the other slides his backpack off his shoulder. “Wake up! Get up! You have class in fifteen minutes!”
The room is still dark, the blinds closed and a misshapen lump on the bed opposite of Dejun’s. The lump shifts slightly, but stills after a second, and Dejun sets down the cake on his desk as he makes his way towards the blinds and twist them open.
“Hendery!” he calls again as light floods into their cramped dorm room. “Wake up! You have class!”
The lump on his roommate’s bed shifts again, and a low, tired voice drawls out something that sounds vaguely like “Five more minutes.”
“I bought you breakfast,” Dejun says, and notices with a hint of smugness at how an arm immediately pops out of the mess of blankets. “A banana and yogurt parfait. Eat it before the yogurt gets warm.”
There’s a muffled grumble, before a head pops out of the blankets, followed by a t-shirt-clad torso. Hendery’s hair is sticking up at odd angles, and his angular face is softened by sleep. He turns his head towards Dejun with small, jerky movements that make his neck crack and pop.
“...jun? What time is it?”
“Just past nine. C’mon, you have class to go to.”
Hendery frowns. “It’s online.”
“Yeah, but you still need to not look like a zombie, so c’mon, get up and eat your breakfast,” Dejun says as he brings over his backpack and pulls out the banana and parfait that were stored carefully inside. He sets the food on Hendery’s desk as the boy stumbles out of his covers, almost falling flat on his face as he kicks the blankets away.
“Is that chocolate cake?”
And of course that’s the first thing Hendery notices the moment he’s slightly more awake.
Dejun nods, shuffling out of Hendery’s way as he staggers towards the sink. “Yes. It’s for Yangyang’s birthday, though. Your breakfast is on your desk.”
“Can I have a bite?”
“No.”
“Just one bite. No more than that. Please?” Hendery begs, pouting around his toothbrush.
That’s a trick question. Hendery’s mouth can open large enough to swallow a hamburger in one bite. Dejun knows this firsthand, and they’ve tested it out enough times to establish the fact that Hendery may be part python when it comes to eating.
Also, it’s nine in the morning. Who the hell even eats cake for breakfast?
“Hendery, I told you it’s for Yangyang. You can eat it later.”
Hendery spits out his toothpaste. “Just a teensy bit. You know I need sugar to fully wake up.”
Dejun points at the banana and parfait. “I got you sugar.”
“Just a bit more?” Hendery turns and no, NO—Dejun is NOT doing this at nine in the morning. Hendery’s eyes are blown big and wide in his signature rendition of a puppy, and his lips are pressed into a pout. Dejun swears he sees tears—actual tears!—brimming the other boy’s large, pleading eyes.
“Hendery—”
“One bite? Please?”
“I already told you, no.”
“A little bit.”
“No.”
Hendery’s eyes get bigger, if that’s even possible. A single tear slips past the confines of his eyelids and trails a delicate wet line down his cheek.
And this is where Dejun officially draws the line. He can stand Hendery being whiny just fine. He can tolerate the incessant begging like a pro. Heck, he can even withstand the puppy-dog eyes if he puts his mind to it.
But Hendery crying? That’s not fair.
Foul.
Yellow card.
“Okay, fine. But only a spoonful,” Dejun relents, raising a single finger for emphasis. “One spoonful. No more than that, okay?”
Hendery wipes away the tear and beams, suddenly looking more awake than ever. “Deal!” he agreed, practically skipping over to the cake on Dejun’s desk and popping off the plastic casing in one quick, practiced motion.
Dejun swears he turns his back for one minute. One minute. No more, no less.
But when he turns around again, there Hendery is, holding what could easily be the biggest soup ladle Dejun’s ever seen in his twenty years of existence, with a whole HALF of the cake balanced in its round scoop.
“What the—I said you could have a spoonful of cake!” Dejun shouts indignantly.
Hendery gestures at the large ladle he’s holding. “This is a spoonful of cake.”
Dejun grabs his hair. It’s nine in the morning and he can already feel his brain threatening to explode inside his head. “I meant a REGULAR spoonful!”
“This IS a REGULAR spoonful!” Hendery protests, before opening his mouth so wide Dejun swears his jaw actually unhinges. In one blink, the cake is gone, and it’s just Hendery standing there, cheeks bulging with chocolate icing smudged across his lips and an empty ladle in hand.
“I mean,” Dejun prays to every divine being in existence to keep his soul in his body until he can finish talking to this inhuman breed of...Hendery. “One of my spoons. Like the ones normal people eat food with. Those types of spoons.”
“Ah,” Hendery says once he’s swallowed his mouthful. “You mean measuring spoons.”
Dejun stares at his roommate, then the remnants of the cake on his desk, then back at Hendery again. A flurry of emotions well up inside him, with the most prominent being the urge to perform the Heimlich maneuver on Hendery and hope he throws up the cake before all the sugar rushes to his head.
“Thanks for breakfast, by the way.” Dejun doesn’t even realize that he zoned out for a whole five minutes until Hendery’s voice rings out again. He’s sitting at his desk, still dressed in his pajamas and chomping down the entire banana in one bite. Dejun is now positive the guy’s jaw is double-jointed or something. Nobody should be able to open their mouths that wide.
“Hendery,” he says very seriously. “Are you okay ?”
“I’m fine,” Hendery mumbles around the banana in his mouth. “Why?”
“You just ate half a cake in one bite and swallowed a banana nearly whole. Your class starts in five minutes. What the fuck is wrong with you?” Dejun means it in the best way, he swears. He’s genuinely concerned about how in the exact fuck Hendery can eat so much food in one bite. Especially high-calorie, sugary foods. Like cake. In the morning.
“Well,” Hendery begins, a serene smile on his face. “I’m in college. In the middle of a pandemic. I haven’t been keeping a proper sleeping schedule and I’m probably two weeks behind on my work. My parents are grilling my ass whenever they call and I kind of dread fall break because it means midterms are coming around. Also, I just woke up.” He blinks prettily up at Dejun. “Anything else?”
Dejun says nothing. He doesn’t even know what to say in response to all of that. Does he console Hendery? Wish him good luck on his assignments and class? Remind him that he’s probably late for his class right now? What is he even supposed to say?
Now he knows how Kun must feel, their poor RA. He’ll have to drop by and ask the man how to deal with these sorts of situations sometime later.
‘Sometime’ as in not when Hendery is booting up his laptop for class with chocolate still smudged all over his lips and chugging down the yogurt parfait like it’s an energy drink. Speaking of which, Dejun watches in abject horror as Hendery pulls open one of his drawers and pulls out a can of the stuff, cracking it open and gulping it down like a man dying of thirst.
Dejun cringes. He can feel his blood glucose increase just watching Hendery. Everything the other has eaten is just sugar on top of sugar on top of a potential heart attack.
And he should do something. Hand Hendery a bottle of water so he can hydrate properly, steal his stash of liquid caffeine, buy him a salad—just SOMETHING.
But right now, Dejun’s poor brain is too shocked and it’s way too early in the day for him to try to stage an intervention for his roommate’s objectively horrible eating habits.
All he can do is slowly walk away, back to his own desk with the half-eaten cake still resting on its surface, and Hendery’s industrial-sized ladle threatening to roll off the edge.
Like seriously, where did he even get that thing?
Out of reflex, Dejun’s hands find his phone in the pocket of his jacket, and he pulls it out, snapping a picture of the carnage and sending it Yangyang’s way.
[Duhjun, 9:10 AM]
(image attached)
(XoX)
Not even a minute later, his phone pings with the notice of an incoming message, and Dejun almost dreads reading it.
[Sheepy, 9:11 AM]
dude what even is that
[Duhjun, 9:11 AM]
Well, it WAS ur bday cake
[Sheepy, 9:11 AM]
lemme guess
Donkey face got to it
[Duhjun, 9:11 AM]
He got to it
[Sheepy, 9:11 AM]
lmaooo explains the ladle
srsly what do u see in him?
[Duhjun, 9:12 AM]
Don’t ask
Just accept the fact that I see smthg
And that u now officially only have half a cake
[Sheepy, 9:12 AM]
:(
That loser owes me cake
[Duhjun, 9:12 AM]
Tbh I don’t think it’ll hurt anyone if u 2 ate less sugar
[Sheepy, 9:12 AM]
that’s not fair
it’s my bday
[Duhjun, 9:13 AM]
That sounds like a u problem
Do me a favor and pick up the rest of this cake b4 Hendery eats it all
[Sheepy, 9:13 AM]
do i get the ladle too?
[Duhjun, 9:13 AM]
Fuck it why not
Happy birthday