Work Text:
How easy it is to predict the last remaining working hours at NCT Systems? Just ask Doyoung.
At what should be 5 pm sharp but is closer to 5:30 pm, the impression of subtle annoyance will come knocking at him as most of the team prompts to leave the office in apparent commotion.
Typically, it is the sharply dressed Johnny that heads out first (his client appointments are likely scheduled in the evening), followed by Taeyong with an ice cream cup on one hand and a designer bag on the other (he continues his work at home), then the Dreamies minus Mark and Donghyuck in shits and giggles (Doyoung is baffled why are they on a laughing fit every single time), and Jungwoo with a plastic bag full of instant food, right during Taeil’s quick passive-aggressive note to the developers not to go overtime but to not compromise the sprint deadline, before wearing his headphones and walking out of the premises.
Each of them will come at Doyoung, generally to say that they’re off to go, but mostly to annoy the shit out of him that “you’re going OT again?” or “do you even sleep?” in different versions like a broken record. Doyoung, without a hitch, will either drown the muffled sound of footsteps and the low drawls of murmurs and habitual goodbyes of his officemates with his rapid mouse clicks and keyboard typing, or will give them a quick second to tell them to “get the fuck out of my sight” with a deadpan smile before jumping back to work.
It is always like that for him: ignore the stampede of the office floods going out through the doors, and he’ll have the area on his own to do some productive work for the whole night.
But the soonest he hears a swiveling office chair, a slight grunt due to upper body stretching, and a small baritone mumble of “done, finally” from the adjacent cubicle to his, Doyoung will quickly scan his already overly tidy workspace, swiftly throwing his crumpled post-it notes in the trash and adjusting his keyboard so it’s even more parallel to his screen than it was a second ago.
He dabs this phenomenon as the Jung Jaehyun-induced panic attack.
Even Doyoung is clueless why is he still doing such thing given the fact that it has been years that they are together. Everytime Jaehyun finishes his round of saying goodbye to the rest of the team, his muted thumps making their way to his cubicle with a light tinkle from a lanyard of keys, Doyoung is still caught off-guard, still at the edge of his toes more often than not.
“Hey,” Jaehyun knocks softly on his cubicle divider. “I’m heading home.”
Doyoung, almost habitually, answers with a nod, trying to look as casual as he can while pointing to the sticky note at the lower edge of his extended monitor.
I’m still doing some stuff, don’t wait for me.
Then their eyes will meet.
It’s nearly automatic. Jaehyun will crack a timid smile as he adjusts his dangling backpack to his shoulder, mouthing something like “let me know if you change your mind” before hopping to another cubicle for a little chat (usually Mark or Donghyuck depending who he sees first) and strutting off the office in a swift. Doyoung will then grab his phone, sending Jaehyun a short text to let him know if he’s home, before facing his computer to get everything done and then some.
But there’s something different Doyoung wants to do today. He doesn’t know what came into his mind—or to his feet if he wants to be specific with it acting on its own—as he pads to the front door, interrupting Jaehyun the moment his magnetic ID hits the reader.
“Jaehyun.”
Jaehyun’s heavy-lidded eyes trained on him, his expression a bit calculated. “Why?”
“I’ll be done soon.” Doyoung reaches and wraps his hand tenderly around Jaehyun’s wrist. “Let’s go home together.”
Jaehyun looks around the room before he peers at Doyoung, his face screaming what are you doing? and what if somebody sees us? in visible confusion and slight panic.
Doyoung, shaking his head with his lips thinned on a small grin, unwraps his hands to Jaehyun’s wrist and intertwines his fingers to his.
“Just give me ten minutes. I’m just finishing one ticket.”
Jaehyun, grasping the idea of what he is doing, smiles genuine and wide at him with his crinkling eyes. “Really?”
“Really,” Doyoung nods, acutely aware of the fact that Jaehyun’s lips are less than an inch away from his face. “I mean, only if you’re okay with it.”
“I’m more than okay with it.” Jaehyun grins as he raises his head, intertwining their hands more intimately.
Being drowned with the sound of his pounding heart, Doyoung almost forgot the reality that they’re hazarding in front of the office entrance in an unwanted PDA session if not from the monotonous groan behind his back.
“Oh, God.”
Doyoung turns at his back, seeing Yuta staring at his and Jaehyun’s intertwined fingers.
“Can you…” Yuta waves his burrito like a wand. “Do whatever you are doing on the sidelines and not here on the freaking hallway because nobody wants to see you both eye-fucking each—“
And it dawns on Yuta.
Doyoung slightly tilts his head, anticipating Yuta’s words in formality.
“Hold up. You two are seeing each other?”
It wasn’t a great first meeting for Doyoung and Jaehyun.
Well, for the record, Doyoung is not good at meeting new people.
He believes stereotypes are set for a reason. He sticks with it, going with his nose that what he perceives as an impression is the most objective and the most obvious characteristic the person has in full-blown, total bias. He even has a template ingrained in his mind to set expectations and he sticks with it until that person’s personality goes to a tangent.
That’s why the soonest Taeil called out the tall, pale, young man with the pretty eyes and perfectly sculptured face named Jung Jaehyun to enter their huddle room for a short introduction as their new developer, Doyoung blurted out the first thing that came into his mind without wavering.
“We hired an advertisement model already?”
“Can’t blame you,” Taeil closed the door. “This guy right here looks like he can sell our software even if it cannot do shit yet.”
Taeyong glanced at Doyoung questionably, who has, by that point, already know where he is going.
“He looks like he can’t code decently for his life.”
Taeil physically dragged Jaehyun to take a seat, handing him a pile of documents while cackling uncomfortably with Johnny with their not so great attempt to conceal Doyoung’s hospitality.
“Don’t mind him,” Johnny eyed Jaehyun. “He’s like that to everyone.”
Doyoung scoffed as he crosses his legs, mumbling to himself how he certain he is that this new guy would just be a walking liability. He just can feel in his gut that Jaehyun would be that unreliable, dumbass developer that will delay bug fixes and production but somehow will get away with it because he has that face.
“It’s fine, I get that a lot.” Jaehyun responded. He looked at Doyoung in such unbothered, little smile, it somehow made Doyoung uncomfortable.
“Getting what?” Doyoung blinked. “That you look like you don’t know HTML basics?”
Jaehyun smiled wider, his face even becoming more refined with his newly introduced dimples before murmuring unswervingly. “That I should have a modeling career.”
Doyoung quickly turned to his left, noticing Johnny subtly laughing and nudging Taeil.
“Nice,” Taeyong twirled his pen with his fingers. “I can sense the awesome teamwork already.”
Doyoung leaned back as he lazily rolled his eyes. “Can I just go? I don’t even understand why am I here.”
“It’s because you’re the sole QA,” Taeyong fidgeted his slightly loose tie while staring at him. “Jaehyun needs to know who will give him a headache most of the time.”
“He is going to give you more than a headache,” Taeil patted Jaehyun’s left shoulder. “Like literal throbbing head trauma.”
Doyoung drummed his fingers against the mahogany table. “Frontstabbing me won’t make things any easier for you Taeil.”
“At least spare the new kid.”
Jaehyun stood up, bowing slowly. “Please take care of me.”
It wasn’t supposed to be insulting, but the fact that the new guy looked up to him after bowing in a smile, without any sense of fear, bruised his ego marginally.
“I hate you already.”
“Hey Doyoung.”
Doyoung, with headphones strapped to his head, swivels back and lowers the music volume as he peers up apathetically at Donghyuck. “What?”
Donghyuck robotically lifts a cup of tea and places it beside his monitor. He furrows his eyebrows to the drink that is now sitting on his desk, then right back to Donghyuck that is leaning comfortably at the edge of his cubicle divider.
“What is that?”
“Hot tea. Jaehyun mentioned you don’t drink coffee so—“
“I mean what is that for ?”
Donghyuck gestures to the drink. “I’m giving that to you.”
“Again,” Doyoung glances to his sides. “Why?”
Donghyuck shrugs. “Because I’m a great officemate?”
“You certainly need something,” Doyoung squints, tapping his foot conspicuously. “Or you fucked up a bug fix. Which is it?”
“You seriously need mental help,” Donghyuck grabs the drink back. “This is for helping me and Mark figure things out a while ago.”
Doyoung stares at the cup on Donghyuck’s right hand. “Oh.”
“Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t some sort of friendship token or something,” Donghyuck twirls the cup, scanning its labels. “This is to make things apiece. I hate being indebted to you.”
Doyoung pauses, shifting his gaze to Donghyuck.
“Give me that drink.”
“I’m still reading the labels.”
“You already gave that to me. It’s mine.”
“Alright jeez,” Donghyuck brings the cup down again to his desk. “You are grumpier than my mom.”
Doyoung grabs the drink, watching the white smoke floats above its lid in small paces. He slowly inches the cup towards his lips, feeling the heat touching his nose.
As he takes his first sip, his peripheral vision couldn’t help but make him look to his right. He timidly turns, catching Jaehyun explaining something to Jungwoo modestly whatever is flashed on Jungwoo’s screen.
“Is it hard?”
Doyoung takes another swig from his cup, completely unregistering what Donghyuck just said with his attention glued to Jaehyun.
“I said is it difficult?”
“Huh?” Doyoung mindlessly answers, still staring at Jaehyun.
“Kim Doyoung.”
“What?” Doyoung snaps out of his trance and turns to see Donghyuck that has his shin now plopped to his desk.
“Not that my opinion matters,” Donghyuck bends his head and angles it in the same direction as Doyoung. “But until when you both plan to keep your relationship status an open secret?”
“I already told you,” Doyoung blinks as he shallows his breath. “We are good on where we are at right now.”
“Let’s say that’s true,” Donghyuck looks at Jaehyun. “I just feel that you both deserve making things official official .”
Doyoung contemplates, wanting to arrive to the most logical and reasonable answer that he can give. But he is only able to say what he is certain at the moment.
“I don’t know. Probably.”
Donghyuck nods as he stands up, gearing up to leave him be. “Just reiterating what you said to me before…”
Doyoung swivels back to face his laptop. Oh how he hates trepidation.
“No pressure.”
That cliché love-hate trope is how can Doyoung describe their initial relationship.
(It’s mainly all on Doyoung.)
Doyoung loathed Jaehyun due to the fact that Jaehyun put all of his impression of him down the drain, proving Doyoung wrong in many aspects.
Far from his impression of him being an airhead, Jaehyun is actually highly educated (graduated at Korea University) and a competent developer on the top of that with even an implicit competitive spirit that takes pride with his outputs and ideas (he never misses deadlines and rarely gets code revisions).
But above all, Doyoung hated it the most that Jaehyun can affect him without even trying.
“You mentioned that you’ll have a lunch with me if I, as you quote,” Jaehyun pointed to his laptop screen. “Fix these critical bugs ahead of schedule.”
Doyoung leaned towards Jaehyun’s laptop, seeing all of the bugs he assigned to him set to Done.
“Because I thought you wouldn’t actually make it,” Doyoung looked at Jaehyun. “That’s 10 critical bugs in a week.”
“You think so lowly of me.”
“No I thought of it realistically,” Doyoung scanned the room, looking for a familiar blob of hair. “Did you help him Taeil?”
“Nope,” Taeil called out from his cubicle, leaning back in his chair. “Just approved his PRs. He even made a more efficient code structure.”
Doyoung looked back at Jaehyun that is grinning at him proudly.
“I think he deserves the lunch date.” Taeil commented from afar.
“It’s not a lunch date,” Doyoung answered abruptly while still eyeing the list of bugs on Jaehyun’s laptop. “It’s just a purely QA-Dev lunch out.”
“So it’s a yes?”
Doyoung peered up, and somehow Jaehyun’s eyes are in both crescents.
How can you even say no to that?
“Fine.”
As the clock hits 12:30 pm, Doyoung stands from his seat, measuredly grabbing his lunch bag beside his drawer to his fingers and pulling his ID from the pocket of his leather bag. He grabs his phone from his desk, quickly sending a text to Jaehyun.
Going up now. Will be there around 5 mins.
“Great, you’re still here.”
A voice came from behind, and Doyoung raises his sight to see Johnny towering him with a pack of Chinese fast-food resting on his hands.
“I’ll be having my lunch with the Dreamies,” Johnny tiptoes to check if the cafeteria is empty. “Want to join?”
Doyoung lifts his lunch bag face level. “Eating out. Maybe next time.”
“Okaaay. You’re eating alone?” Johnny checks out his lunch bag from top to bottom. “Wow, you cooked a lot. Aren’t you on a diet? That’s too much to consume for a single person—”
Johnny pauses, realizing midway what’s going on. Doyoung thins his lips, raising his chin.
“OHHH it’s that lunch out.” Johnny craftily grins.
“Yeah,” Doyoung pockets his phone. “He’s already there so, if you may excuse me—”
“Of course of course,” Johnny steps aside. “Give me some of those if you both had some leftovers.”
Doyoung nods timidly, and he heads out to the rooftop.
~o~
Stepping out onto the roof, Doyoung briefly squints at the change of light.
He doesn’t even think for a second on where to go, his feet automatically pivoting to the left and walking towards the shaded corner of the rooftop. There he finds Jaehyun perched on the iron railing, his outline slightly dimmed by the shadows as he watches the city below in silence.
“Jae.”
Jaehyun turns, and Doyoung realizes that the sun is too overrated. There is nothing any brighter than what he’s looking at right now.
“Sorry for making you wait,” Doyoung starts. “I finished the last testing report a bit late and Johnny—”
“It’s all good,” Jaehyun assures him, gently unhooking the bag from his fingers and placing it on the blanket he already set up. “I had the view to entertain me.” Jaehyun sits down, patting the space beside him.
“You didn’t fell asleep this time?” Doyoung kneels beside Jaehyun, taking out small containers of food one by one from the bag.
“I tried,” Jaehyun pulls out the silverware, helping him. “But it’s quite hot in here, I can’t really.”
“Actually I was about to ask you that,” Doyoung opens a box of rice and hands it to Jaehyun. “We haven’t really eaten here for a long time because of the heat, but you suddenly insisted you want to have our lunch at the rooftop today.” He opens another one and puts kimchi on top of it. “I mean, we could have just eaten at the cafeteria.”
“I just remembered,” Jaehyun takes a spoonful of rice with Galbi. “Today is the third year anniversary of our first lunch together.”
“Chew your food before talking, you might choke,” Doyoung points at Jaehyun with his chopsticks. “Really? That’s today?”
Jaehyun nods exaggeratedly, his mouth still full of food.
Doyoung tilts his head. “I can barely recall that.”
Jaehyun swallows the food in his mouth in one go, his brows furrowed. “Wow. And Johnny says you have the best memory among everyone.”
“On my defense,” Doyoung puts his chopsticks down. “You know I’m not really good with dates.”
Jaehyun grabs the container of Gyeran-Mari. “And you’re not good with hints too.”
“Really now.” Doyoung glares at Jaehyun.
“I’m serious,” Jaehyun takes a bite off his food. “Even before I confessed to you, I already hinted that I like you.”
“I’m pretty sure that’s too vague for me to notice.” Doyoung pours some water into his glass.
“First is that time after our first kickoff party,” Jaehyun motions with his hands. “I specifically asked if we can go home together.”
“With Taeyong,” Doyoung fixes his sitting position. “We are basically three at that time.”
“How about when I flirted with you while we were on WCNDT?”
“That’s not even flirting,” Doyoung grabs Jaehyun’s glass to refill his. “That’s annoying the shit out of me because you finished your activity early.”
“I’m basically all over you that day,” Jaehyun finishes his rice box. “How about the time I literally gave you tickets for us to go to Green Film Festival?”
“Oh that,” Doyoung straightens his posture. “That’s on me, I know what you’re trying to do. I panicked at that time, I said no.”
“I can still feel the heartbreak from back then,” Jaehyun clutches his chest dramatically. “Totally ruined my day.”
“I’m more impressed that you can still recall those things,” Doyoung half-chuckles. “You can’t even remember what we had just talked about in our last standup meeting.”
Jaehyun covers the empty container he is holding before answering him softly.
“I can only remember things related to you.”
No one saw them getting together. Not even Doyoung.
He thought Jaehyun is just bullshitting him from the get-go, little by little destroying his sanity with the constant teasing because seeing him suffer is how Jaehyun scratches his satisfaction itch.
But more than that, Jaehyun is everything he is contrary to. The way he needs to deal with unwanted attention perpetually, him living on spontaneity—thriving on surprises and welcoming mistakes, and being laid-back even if the world is burning in front of him, is a complete 180 on how he approaches life: with independence, logic, and a bunch of organizers and calendar reminders.
Still, somehow, one seed of interest is enough to grow a tree of commitment.
“I’m not kidding,” Jaehyun utters. “I’m serious about all of that stuff.”
Doyoung closes the interview room door before facing Jaehyun. “Like what?”
“Like me being onto you.”
Doyoung exhales. “You know I’m not lying when I said I don’t have time for this yet.”
“Yet,” Jaehyun answers. “Does this mean you’re somehow attracted to me too?”
“Jung Jaehyun you know you can easily make someone fall for you if you want.” Doyoung deadpanned.
“And?”
“Liking you is easy, but I don’t know if I’m ready to take it further.” Doyoung pauses. “I am building my career, I provide for my family. You can easily find someone that won’t waste your efforts.”
“You’re not wasting my efforts,” Jaehyun walked closer to him and stopped on a respectful space. “On fine print, you’re saying right now that you like me too, but you can’t entertain it yet.”
Doyoung was speechless.
“Am I wrong?”
“I just…don’t want you to get tired waiting. Find somebody that’s already willing to take you.”
Jaehyun fumbled his pockets. “Do you want me to find someone?”
Doyoung clenched his fist. He looked away, avoiding Jaehyun’s gaze. “Who am I even to stop you? It will hurt like a bitch but of course I cannot—“
“Look at you,” The electricity was noticeable when Jaehyun held his arm. “I don’t want to push you if you are not ready. But please,” Jaehyun took his hand off, restraint visible in his eyes. “Just let me do my thing, okay? If I got tired of it I’ll let you know.”
Doyoung blinked, his heart pounding off his chest. “And if I clearly don’t see this going somewhere, I’ll say it too.”
“But, if you are ready, you will let me know firsthand. Okay?”
“Okay.”
(Time, Doyoung eventually finds out, flies the fastest on the happiest days of his life. He didn’t even notice three months had passed when he finally said ‘fuck it’ and answers Jaehyun back.)
Doyoung decided to keep their current status secret.
“But why?” Jaehyun paused mid-walk, turning to face him in visible confusion.
“Not really a secret,” Doyoung pulled Jaehyun a bit seeing he is at the edge of the road. “Let’s keep it lowkey. We can just do our same routine as if nothing happened.”
Jaehyun brushed the tip of his bangs. “But you don’t want me to say that we’re together.”
“Explicitly, like an announcement,” Doyoung resumed walking, gently dragging Jaehyun closer to him as he is not paying attention to the road and is only staring at him. “If they asked specifically, like, if they name dropped me, if we’re together, then say yes.”
“This is too complicated for me.”
“I know, I’m sorry,” Doyoung turned to Jaehyun. “I just want to act normal at the office. Let’s have them figure it out on their own. We won’t deny it if they found out.”
“Okay I get it," Jaehyun looked back to the sidewalk. "But I don’t trust myself not slipping.”
“It’s alright. If it happens, it’s nothing.”
More than the effort and struggle of keeping things within themselves; surprisingly, they find their inside secret fun.
It's like having mini-quests every day. One day they dare themselves to find the most appropriate space to cuddle (Jaehyun finds this questionably unused fire exit just within their floor). There’s also that instance when they try finding the best camera blindspot to secretly hold hands (good thing Johnny is always out of office due to sales work as his cubicle is a nice location). Most often, it’s beating multiple deadlines before the rush hour for them to go on dinner dates.
Other than that, they go on with their usual routine. It’s almost an effective smokescreen as most of the time, the team is seeing them bicker more than they talk casually.
“The rescheduling feature is still not working,” Doyoung called out the soonest he landed on Jaehyun’s cubicle. “The hand-off is tomorrow.”
“I already told you, I am not able to reproduce it locally,” Jaehyun did a series of clicks, angling his monitor towards Doyoung. “See, it is working on my end. I cannot fix anything that I can’t reproduce.”
“I attached a recording to reproduce it manually on the ticket.”
“Of course I followed that,” Jaehyun switched tabs, displaying a preview of Doyoung’s screen recording. “Still negative.”
“I specifically noted that it’s an intermittent issue.” Doyoung rested his hands on his hips. “Try again until you duplicate it. It’s a critical bug for this release we cannot skip it.”
Jaehyun glared at him. “I literally have tons of bugs to fix, go bother Taeil with a bug that will take eons of run-through to reproduce.”
“Yes, of course,” Doyoung clenched his jaw. “I’ll approach the better one that doesn’t throw these tasks away that easy.”
(They both know that their professional, working relationship is far separate from their personal one. But still, with their every heated argument at the office, they wouldn’t go home without apologizing, sneaking out for a short period to whatever room is empty to hug each other and say whatever they regretted blurting out of spite.)
Taeyong is the first person to know that Doyoung and Jaehyun are together.
Doyoung knows it’s inevitable that no matter how they think they’re doing great keeping their relationship on the low, some will figure it out in the long run. He just didn’t imagine it would be just after a week when Taeyong tells it all to him.
“How did you know...” Doyoung confusedly mumbled before sipping on his iced tea. “About us?”
“You both are doing well hiding it,” Taeyong uttered while slicing his steak. “It just happened that I’m your best friend and I know how you behave.”
“You aren’t the type to gossip so I’m not worried about you.”
“As your boss though, don’t do anything nasty in my office.”
“Do you think we even have time to do that with the deadlines you gave to us?”
“That’s true.”
Aside from Johnny and Taeil that found out about it months after, the next batches of NCT employees that came are clueless as far as Doyoung can assess.
(Minus Donghyuck. Doyoung is perplexed how he managed to connect the dots for some reason.)
It has been more than three years since they’ve been together, Doyoung realizes.
“Kim Doyoung, Jung Jaehyun,” Yuta calls out. “Am I right?!”
Doyoung looks at Jaehyun as Jaehyun nudges him lightly, his cheek hinting with a touch of blush.
“Why are you making this suspenseful?!”
Doyoung knows letting Yuta know is basically announcing everything in the whole office.
But probably that’s what he wants.
Doyoung faces Yuta, his smile in full swing.
“Yes, he’s my boyfriend.”