Archive of Our Own

Summer on the banks brings its fair share of heat, sweat, salt and fish. A terrible combination, truly, only the locals sniff that stuff and don’t faint on sight. A pretty harrowing difference to the sweet waffle cones, burnt marshmallows, and funnel cake wafting through the boardwalk towards sunset, when the ferris wheel lights up in all its neon glory, and the tourists really start to come out. 

But, not the locals. 

No, the locals are another breed of crazy. 

Donghyuck knows this because he’s one of those crazy locals. 

“That’s a riptide, baby. A huge one at that.” Jeno is pointing at the waves that pull back far into the shore, dragging layers of wet sand with them. Wind tears through his voice, but it’s brief enough for the message to get across. 

Donghyuck glances up from where he’s waxing his board, lovingly dubbed ‘Katara’ after the Waterbender in Avatar. “It’s not that big.” He squints, seeing the tell-tale signs of a rip current. A darker patch of water, rippling on the surface some feet away from the shore. He’s lying. It’s definitely too big.  “We’ll ride away from the rocks.” 

Jeno scoffs. “If you want to get in the water with the rip current, be my guest. There’s not a single lifeguard on duty yet, and don’t expect any help from me.” 

“Maybe we should call Jaemin to get on duty a little early today.” Donghyuck tosses his bar of wax to the side, satisfied with his work. He grips his board and stands up, careful of the way the wind knocks it into his shins. 

Jeno digs his out of the sand, where he had propped it up earlier. “If the riptide doesn’t get you, Jaemin will,” he warns, rightfully so. It was barely the crack of dawn, the night giving way to streaks of purple and orange as the sun fought with the horizon to fully rise. Jaemin is probably still sound asleep in the comfort of his home, and Donghyuck knows that if they bother him right now, Jaemin would damn all lifeguard duties to drown them himself. 

Still. Donghyuck is pretty crazy. “I think I choose riptide.” He shoots down the stretch of sand, running parallel to the waves, Jeno’s are you stupid? chasing him down the smooth expanse of wet sand. Cool water pools around his ankles as he races on, surfboard clutched tightly under an arm. There. Donghyuck sees it ahead. Clear, foamy ocean and waves crashing evenly over the sandbreak. The end of the current. 

Donghyuck veers right, splashing further into the water, trusting himself and the ocean from here on out. Once he’s waist deep in, slides up onto his board and paddles. Beside him, Jeno hops onto his board too, and they cross the wave breaks together, tips of the boards peaking up as they glide over each crest. 

When it all stills, and Donghyuck sits on his board, waiting, watching, that’s when he lets everything go. Let himself go. He knows Jeno is floating on his own board a little to the left, aware of the pink taking over the deep blue of the horizon far ahead, where the ocean touches the sky, and feels the perfectly cool water lapping up his thighs and waist. All of that is secondary. 

Right now, it’s Donghyuck, the ocean and the sunrise. 

He senses the wave before he sees it. A gentle calling, or a soft tug, his board bobs silently above the water. Obedience, thrill, mesmerization, Donghyuck follows the call. Paddles out towards the lump of blue surging at him, gauges the size, the force. Donghyuck spins his board around, eyes set on the shore, feeling like it was miles away. His arms cut through the water twice before the board is lifted up and Donghyuck lets the magic happen. 

He launches to his feet, crouched until the wave tells him he’s steady. In one swift movement, Donghyuck kicks his foot back, gives his board some weight, and pivots his board, rising onto bent knees. The water roars and crashes all around him, but he keeps his focus on the prick of light ahead of him, and he glides. Glides like he is spinning on ice. He’s lost count of how many times he’s done this, but his shallow breathing, rapid heartbeats, and the grin splitting his face into two just make him feel like it is his first time all over again. 

The wave eventually dies, and Donghyuck hops off his board and collapses onto the beach just as the sun spills yellow into the light blue sky. He can’t help the giggle that escapes when Jeno drops his board next to his and plops down beside him. “Oh, that never gets old,” he hums, eyes shut with all the content in the world. This is where he belongs. This is his home. 

Jeno sighs out happily beside him, and that’s where they lay, the sun trekking just above the ocean, fading in and out from the scattered clouds. Their peace is interrupted by a familiar nagging, heard from a mile away. 

“Do you want to shrivel up and get wrinkles before you turn twenty-five?” a tired voice groans, standing above them and blocking out the wonderful warmth of the sun. “Skin care is not a joke.” 

Donghyuck doesn’t have to open his eyes to know who it is. “You’re ruining my tan, get out of the way,” he whines. “Katara wants you to move, too.” Donghyuck pats his beloved board.

Donghyuck has his eyes closed, but he can feel Jaemin’s eye roll. “I have news. Get up, you lumps of coal.” 

Now, that has Donghyuck’s attention. He cracks an eye open, letting his vision readjust to the brightness. Jaemin stands above them, shades pushed up his nose, and dressed in the lifeguard uniform of red shorts and a white t-shirt. A whistle hangs loosely from his neck, dangling over Donghyuck as Jaemin shakes Jeno awake. 

“What’s up?” He questions, sitting upright and dusting off the sand clinging to his arms. Beside him, Jeno rolls over with a groan. 

Jaemin sits on Donghyuck’s board, stretching his feet out. “You know the Pipeline contest they hold every year?” 

“Who do you think we are?” Jeno gives him a look. The Pipeline contest. Every surfer dreams about being in the lineup, competing against some of the big names in surf. Donghyuck had spent every single summer keeping up with live footage and updates about the contest for years. Treated it like his very own Super Bowl. 

Jaemin reaches over and flicks Jeno’s forehead, keeping a straight face the entire time. “The city is sending up a few lifeguards to help with the contest.” Jaemin fishes around in his pocket and fans out three tickets. Donghyuck’s jaw drops. “I get to bring two people with me.” 

“No way. No fucking way.” He has to blink a few times to make sure he isn’t hallucinating the tickets between Jaemin’s fingers. “We actually get to go this year?” Despite the competition being held a couple hours away from their little beach town, Donghyuck’s never been able to compete since he wasn’t old enough. But this year was his chance. This year he could be out on the waves, beside his idols, on some of the wildest waves on this side of the country. 

Jaemin grins and Jeno whoops beside them. “Start practicing. I’ve already registered you two.” 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One of the things Donghyuck loves about Jeno, his best friend, his surfing buddy, the first person Donghyuck contacts to do something outlandishly stupid, is that Jeno does not care. He’s got to be the least competitive person Donghyuck knows, even beating out Jaemin who took up the lifeguard position because he’d rather ogle at the surfers from the post than get into the water with them. But, if it comes down to it, Jaemin will play to win. Jeno? Jeno’s just happy to be here. 

Still, even as Donghyuck beats the sunrise every morning to catch some waves and work on some tricks, Jeno’s there the whole time. Sometimes he’ll be on his board with him, other times he’ll refresh Wyatt McHale’s Instagram page to introduce new tricks they could experiment with. 

One particular morning, as Donghyuck and Jeno snack on some crackers, watching the sun peek over the horizon, Jeno nudges Donghyuck. “Dude, look at this.” He tilts his phone away from the sun to avoid the glare. “They’re introducing the competitors on their Instagram.” Jeno swipes through, pausing when his face pops up. 

Donghyuck takes his phone and reads the caption. It’s like a stat box, with Jeno’s face taking up most of the screen and information like his hometown, age, and a little blurb, no doubt written by Jaemin when he registered their names. 

Jeno’s blurb reads, He only acts boring. He’s actually a fun guy and if you’re interested, take him out to ice cream. He’ll say yes. 

Donghyuck swipes and his face is next, with all his information below. Don’t let the innocent smile get to you, he’s a demon on the waves and off ;), his blurb says. 

Jaemin. Trust Jaemin to treat this like a Tinder date. 

He swipes over one more time, landing on another boy who looks to be around his own age. Liu Yangyang. Twenty-one years old, from Sandbridge. You’ll know me as the monster rookie this year. The trophy has my name on it. 

Donghyuck twists his lips to the side. “Get a load of this guy,” he scoffs, passing the phone back to Jeno. “He thinks he’ll take home the trophy.”

Jeno sucks in a breath. “Yangyang? Yeah, he totally could.”

“What?” Donghyuck all but shrieks. Jeno is supposed to back him up! Agree with him that this kid was pompous and snobby and did not deserve the trophy for that alone. 

“Are you serious?” Jeno’s thumbs fly across his screen. “He is the monster rookie. Look.” 

Donghyuck hates to see it, but there Yangyang stands, three gold medals hanging around his neck. The little caption below the photo congratulates him on being a finalist at the Wave Riders contest last year. He frowns, scrolling to another picture. No way. No way. He yanks Jeno’s wrist, holding the phone closer to his face. Is that…Wyatt McHale giving him a hug? The Wyatt McHale? 

Okay, so maybe Yangyang knows what he’s doing. But Donghyuck isn’t the type to roll over so easily. He and Katara will stun everyone at the contest. The Pipeline trophy will come home with him one way or another, and he doesn’t care how badly he’ll have to beat Yangyang. And he’ll get Wyatt’s number while he’s at it. 

Donghyuck stands, carefully balancing his board still lodged in the sand, with one hand, and sets his other on his hip. He stares dramatically into the ocean. “Jeno, we have a trophy to win.” 

“Aw, look, he has a puppy!” 

Donghyuck glances over his shoulder to find Jeno still scrolling through Yangyang’s Instagram page. “Jeno!” It really is just Donghyuck and Katara against the world. 

“Right. The trophy.” Jeno shuts his phone off and smiles sheepishly at Donghyuck. 

“Exactly. The trophy. Eye on the prize here.” 

“But, Hyuck?” Jeno picks up his board and joins him in his dramatic stare-off with the waves. “You’re not going to make this into some weird rival thing, right? 

Donghyuck chuckles warmly. “Jeno, Jeno,” he muses, turning to face him. “When have I ever made anything into some weird rival thing?”

Jeno glares at him in a way that is devoid of any and all amusement. It’s kind of frightening actually, to Donghyuck. “In third grade, you gave the entire class a Valentine’s day card except for Jaemin because he took the last orange popsicle.” 

Donghyuck scowls. “I still gave him a card.” 

“Yeah. A ‘sorry for your loss’ card.” 

“Alright, whatever!” Donghyuck waves his arm around, if only to clear the memory. “This time is different. There is absolutely no rivalry between me and Yangyang.” 

“None?” Jeno prompts. 

“None,” Donghyuck confirms. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Donghyuck decides he’s going to destroy Yangyang. 

Look at him, he seethes, waiting in line to sign in for the competition.Teeth, especially a twin set of sharp canines, so bright, they reflect the white hot sun, warm bleached hair, miraculously still looking soft and shiny even after countless hours of being soaked in salt water. Donghyuck can’t see his eyes through the shades Yangyang has on, but he imagines them to be full of haughtiness and self-absorbing—

“Next!” A heavy sigh. “ Dude . Next.” 

Donghyuck realizes that he’s being called and forcefully tears his gaze away from a laughing Yangyang some distance away. “Hi,” he greets, flashing a grin. Chenle is here to help!, the little white sticker on the boy’s shirt reads. “Chenle?” 

“Don’t just read off my name, you dumbass. Give me yours,” Chenle snaps, one hand typing out sentences on the Mac set up on the plastic table where sign-ins were happening, and the other hand flipping through a stack of papers. Impressive. 

“Lee Donghyuck,” he supplies. “And for the record, I think you should get a new name tag. Maybe one that says, Don’t talk to me, I don’t care about you .” 

Chenle traces a pencil down a list of names before stopping on one and scratching it out. Donghyuck thinks he uses a little too much force than necessary in bolting his name in dark lead. “Oh, yeah, isn’t that what we need,” he mutters sarcastically. “Anyway, Hyuckie—” 

“Hyuckie?” 

“Your first round isn’t until tomorrow morning!” Chenle begins, very obviously forcing out the cheeriness in his voice. “Please take this time to interact with your fellow surfers, and perhaps you’ll even run into some of the judges. As always, your safety and happiness is our priority, so if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to ask!” Chenle leans over in his chair to look past Donghyuck. “Next!” 

“Wait!” Donghyuck plants his hands flat on top of the table. “I do have questions and concerns!” 

Chenle stares long and hard at him. Truth be told, Donghyuck doesn’t have any pressing questions, but something about riling up Chenle tickles him in the best way possible. What can he say, he’s a Gemini through and through. 

“Park Jisung!” Chenle shouts so suddenly, it catches Donghyuck off guard. A tall, lanky boy, with mousy features and a head full of tangled, dark hair hurries to the table, a clipboard in hand. 

“I need you to know that Channel 6 is prepped and ready for filming as soon as you are.” The boy quickly flips through the clipboard. “I believe we’re just waiting on confirmation from WayV News 10, and then we can start with the opening ceremony.” 

Chenle’s features soften for the first time since Donghyuck has arrived at the beach. “You are an angel sent from above,” he says gratefully. Chenle tilts his head towards Donghyuck. “Could you assist our lovely guest with all questions and concerns he may have?” 

Jisung peers down at his coworker. “Isn’t that your job?” 

“I might kill him if I have to do it.” 

Donghyuck frowns. “Guys, I’m right here.” 

Chenle disregards him. “I can’t deal with a murder on the first day, the paperwork would be insane.” He waves a dismissive hand, ignoring the way Donghyuck stares at him, then at Jisung, and then back to him. “Just figure out how to help him. I have to get through the rest of the damn line.” 

Jisung, at least, smiles kindly at Donghyuck. “I’m sorry,” he says quietly, while Chenle hollers next! “Please, come this way. How can I help you?” 

Donghyuck follows Jisung out of the tent, meandering through the crowd mingling and hanging out on the beach. Unwillingly, he catches the head of fading blonde hair, flying back as Yangyang tips his head and laughs into the sky above him. Unwillingly, Donghyuck’s hands close into fists by his side. Where was Jeno to speak some sense into him? Why was the sight of Yangyang enough to send his blood pressure spiking? 

“Would you happen to know a Liu Yangyang?” Donghyuck asks casually, keeping pace with Jisung’s long legs. He keeps his eyes peeled for Jeno and Jaemin who had promised to come back to the beach for the opening ceremony. 

“Oh! Yeah, I know Yangyang,” Jisung says cheerily. “He’s really cool! He gave me his bead bracelet.” He waves his wrist around, and a bracelet made out of colorful, wooden beads clicks noisily as Jisung shows it off. 

Donghyuck sticks his tongue out. Great. Not another member of the Yangyang fanclub. “Okay, but what is he really like?” he prods as they walk by a line of cameras pointed at the ocean, sending waves crashing into the shore one after the other endlessly. They must be the news channels Jisung was talking about earlier. “You know, the things that make him tick. Does he hate children or something?” 

“What? No, Yangyang’s a really nice dude and–” Jisung freezes so suddenly that Donghyuck nearly walks right past him. “I, um, I can’t disclose any other information about the competitors that isn’t on the social media pages,” he recites like Chenle drilled it into his head. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t talk to him yourself.” 

Donghyuck wants to tell him that Yangyang is his sworn rival, and he must do everything in his power to defeat him. The last thing he wants to do is actually talk to the guy. He’s half convinced that he might take a swing if he gets close enough, and the other last thing Donghyuck wants is to be eliminated from the competition. So all feelings must be put on hold. At least until after he scores Wyatt McHale’s number. 

“Listen,” Jisung begins, holding the clipboard close to his chest, “I have to make sure the news agencies are ready for broadcast. But, there’s a bonfire on the beach later tonight. If you’re there, come say hi!” 

Donghyuck nods, smiling at the taller boy. “I’ll catch you later.” Jisung hurries away to deal with the last second preparations and Donghyuck turns his attention back to the bustling beach, searching for his friends. Somewhere, over the heads of all the surfers present, Donghyuck hears the piercing laugh, the one that has already seared itself into his memory, of Yangyang. He grits his teeth and walks far, far, away from the laughter. 

“Dude, where the hell have you been?” He asks, finally catching up with Jeno and Jaemin beneath a lifeguard post two streets down from where the sign-ins are. It’s not as crowded down here, but it has its fair share of surfers and visitors strolling back and forth on the sand. “I’ve been around Yangyang’s fan club for far too long,” Donghyuck grumbles, taking the can of Coke that Jeno offers him. 

“I thought you said you had no problem with Yangyang?” 

“Shut it, Jeno.” 

Jeno clicks his tongue. “At least you weren’t preventing the murder of Mister Na Jaemin..” He glares, directing his annoyance at Jaemin, who simply leans against the lifeguard post with his arms crossed. 

Donghyuck narrows his eyes at Jaemin who was frowning, but he has the unmistakable hint of pink on the tips of his ears. “Oh, no way, dude. He got latched?” 

Jeno nods miserably. “Huang Renjun,” he supplies while Jaemin only gives them the cold shoulder. “He’s another surfer in our age bracket. He climbed out of the hotel’s swimming pool this morning and Jaemin’s had that look in his eyes all day.” 

Donghyuck’s frown deepens. “Shit, dude, not the look. ” 

“I can hear everything you’re saying, you pricks,” Jaemin spits, still holding on to the petulant child act. Or maybe it’s real. Jaemin is a bit of a drama queen. 

Jeno wholly ignores him. “He’s been trying to shoot his shot all day, and Renjun, understandably, has tried to strangle him upwards of six times already.”

“Renjunnie would never do that,” Jaemin huffs, defensively. “He’ll warm up to me.” 

Jeno buries his face into his hands. “He’s on the nickname stage,” he mourns, earning a jab to his ribs by Jaemin. 

“He’ll be at the bonfire tonight, so you guys better be there or I’ll never be your wingman ever again,” he threatens with an accusing finger. 

Donghyuck sips from the can. “Good to know he’s our lifeguard,” he mutters to Jeno. 

There is a sudden thud and bright, stadium lights are slammed on, pointing to a stage heaved up on the boardwalk behind them. The three turn around to watch, but not before Jaemin flicks Donghyuck’s forehead for the comment. 

In typical surfer fashion, the decorations are mediocre at best. Wooden signs with one layer of paint that’s already showing signs of chipping off act as the backdrop, a banner that reads Welcome to the nineteenth annual Pipeline Contest in still wet spray paint hanging from one end of the stage to the other. A line of surfboards stand to the side, various signatures scribbled over the surface. On the other side stands a three tiered trophy, half as tall as Donghyuck himself, glimmering in the stage light. If Donghyuck squints, he can make out a little, golden surfer figurine riding a wave, perched at the top. 

“Hello and welcome everyone to Pipeline!” A familiar voice speaks into the microphone, and Donghyuck brows lift straight up into his hairline as Chenle takes the stage first. With a bright smile and an enthusiastic bounce in his legs, he’s a far cry from the grumpy boy Donghyuck had encountered while signing in. He leans over as Chenle continues to speak, and there’s Jisung, hastily flipping through his clipboard, long fingers blurring with the movement. 

“It is my honor and pleasure to introduce to you a few familiar faces to wish all the contestants well in the coming days. First up, from hometown Vancouver Island, leader of the World Juniors National Surfing Team, Mark Lee!”  

Donghyuck drains the last of his drink, watching a boy with thick eyebrows and impossibly high cheekbones stride up to the stage. He shakes Chenle’s hand with a soft smile and waves to the crowd, the cheers rising to new volume. Must be a fan favorite, Donghyuck thinks. He doesn’t know too much about Mark Lee, though he’s heard his name in passing before. Canadian waters are too cold to surf in and he’s never had any plans to even touch those waves. 

“Next up!” Chenle says in a familiar tone that Donghyuck’s heard before. “From Sandbridge, the Monster Rookie you all know, Liu Yangyang!” 

Donghyuck’s can is crushed in his palm. Yangyang walks up the stairs, with the same blinding smile he had out on full display earlier when the sun was high up above them, this time shining in the bright studio lights. He shakes his head, fixing his hair with a quick sweep of his hand before turning to the crowd. He’s dazzling in the light, waving his fingers and grinning while the crowd whoops and cheers. 

Donghyuck’s eye starts twitching when Chenle announces the final surfer onto the stage. “And all the way from Oahu, Hawaii, winner of Pipeline for five consecutive years, Wyatt McHale!” 

Something about seeing Yangyang and Wyatt shake hands in real time makes Donghyuck swallow back bile.

Mark speaks first, expressing his excitement and eagerness to meet everyone over the course of the next few days. He’s endearing, Donghyuck decides, cute in the way he stumbles over his words a little, and laughs shyly to cover it up. It’s easy to see why the crowd loves him. Jeno most of all. Donghyuck rolls his eyes, shutting Jeno’s open mouth for him when he catches him gawking at Mark for the fifth minute. 

And then Yangyang steps up to the mic, holding it with two hands like he was about to put on a rock show. “Good luck to everyone!” Yangyang says into the mic, his voice high and excited. “I’m honored to be here, among you all, and I hope this friendly competition will unite us all with the love for the ocean and for surfing!” 

The crowd goes wild. Donghyuck stands still, crossing his arms across his chest. God, why was he so likable? So charming and…good with his words. It’s almost admirable how easily he has the crowd under his trance, unable to tear away. It doesn’t help that his legs are nicely toned and the light pink hoodie he has on makes him look so…

Donghyuck shakes his head, instead focusing on the trophy beside Yangyang. That’s his goal. Yangyang won’t stand in the way of him and that trophy. 

It takes most of Wyatt’s final speech and Chenle’s closing remarks to finally get his mind off of Yangyang. It’s also because Jaemin is dragging both him and Jeno by the sleeves back towards the beach, where Donghyuck can make out the smell of smoke in the air, and the soft glow of the flames rising up from the center of a crowd. 

“I’m going to find Renjunnie,” Jaemin says, once he’s dragged the two of them by the giant pile of burning wood and the flames that seem to stretch into the stars above them. “Behave yourselves.” 

“You’re just going to leave us?” Donghyuck all but shrieks. He should have seen this coming. Once Jaemin gets attached, he’s near impossible to convince otherwise. He’s like a parasite. A lovable parasite. 

Jaemin’s already backing away. “I’ll head back to the hotel with you guys! Come find me when you want to go!” And like that, he disappears into the crowd, leaving Donghyuck and Jeno. 

“Well,” Donghyuck sighs, staring into the space where Jaemin was seconds ago. “Do you want to get a drink or…Jeno!” 

Jeno, the bastard, was also inching away, looking more interested at the moon than at Donghyuck’s frown. “Hm?” He asks innocently. “Oh, I’m good on the drinks. Thanks though!” 

“I can’t believe you’re leaving me, too,” Donghyuck pouts, hoping that Jeno would feel a little bad and decide to keep him company. “And after all we’ve been through.” 

“I’m not leaving, Hyuck, I’ll just be…around.” He laughs nervously. “Call me if you need me!” Jeno whirls around and makes a bee-line towards a familiar set of high cheekbones. 

Donghyuck hates his friends. He truly does. With a groan, he trudges through the sand, slipping past clusters of people mingling and socializing, hoping to find Jisung at least. He’d even take on Chenle at this point. He walks by the drinks table, backtracking to help himself to some of the fruit punch. It’s probably spiked, he figures, ladling in the pink liquid. He hopes it is. 

Donghyuck lifts his cup up to his lips, when someone jostles into his shoulder, causing the punch to splash onto his cheek and down his chin. Oh, the water gods are angry at him for sure now. There’s just no way he’s having this much of a shitty day. He grits his teeth before spinning around, paper cup crumpled in his fingers. “Do you need to get your eyes checked or something, asshole? Watch where…you’re…” Donghyuck trails off, very suddenly aware of panicked eyes hovering just inches away from his own. A long, broad nose, and a mouth sloping downwards as dusty pink lips move to form words that Donghyuck is not processing. 

Donghyuck blinks, widening his gaze so much that he’s starting to feel the strain behind his eyelids. 

“Oh, my God, I’m so sorry,” Yangyang says, his voice finally being filtered through Donghyuck’s ears. “I was just…I didn’t even see…” Donghyuck stares, and Yangyang, very unlike the charismatic and profound speaker that was on stage earlier, stares right back. Punch slides down Donghyuck’s cheek, but he makes no move to wipe it away. 

Yangyang notices. For better or for worse, he notices, eyes like dimly lit ember stuttering from Donghyuck’s own to the trickle of sticky punch on his chin, his lips. Donghyuck does not move an inch. His brain has fully shut down and all he can hear is static, pricked in unpredictable moments by Yangyang’s voice. What is going on with him? Why isn’t he responding to anything? 

“Here,” Yangyang breaks out of the trance first, reaching past him to grab a fistful of napkins. His hair is more of a light, strawberry color in the firelight, Donghyuck notices. It’s not as platinum as he thought. And up close, Yangyang has strong features, a structured jaw, flat panes of his cheeks glinting in the fire light, and a pair of lips that always seem to be curled slightly upward. LIke a smirk, but one that he was born with. 

Donghyuck remains frozen as Yangyang dabs away at the punch on his cheeks. There is no skin to skin contact, just the form of his fingers padding away on Donghyuck’s cheeks, but it’s still enough to short-circuit his brain. 

Why is it short-circuiting his brain? Why can’t Donghyuck get a single thought out other than Liu Yangyang is drying the fruit punch off my face ? 

“I’m sorry, I’m like, way more clumsy on land than I am in the water.” He laughs, and it’s more of a giggle than anything else, but it floats through the little space between them, wiggling its way into Donghyuck’s ears. It’s a fight to not flinch. 

Yangyang apologizes again, gently drying the liquid off Donghyuck’s chin. He brushes up against his lips, and that’s when Donghyuck manages to pull himself back into this side of the water. 

He snatches the napkin out of Yangyang’s fingers, cursing at how cold and clammy his hands have gotten. He’s afraid if he speaks, his voice will betray him, and he’d be lying if he said he didn’t feel a strange tightness in his throat. So, instead, to buy himself some desperate time, Donghyuck wipes down his own mouth, with more force than needed. He blinks a couple times, and with all the courage he has left, manages to hiss out, “watch where you’re going.” 

Don’t swing at him, Hyuck. Eye on the prize, He reminds himself silently. 

Yangyang grins, both ends of his lips stretching to either end of his face. “Will do!” he promises. “I’m Yangyang, by the way,” he introduces himself, sticking his hand out. “Lee Donghyuck, right?” 

Donghyuck eyes his outstretched hand hesitatingly, but does not take it. They are rivals, after all. “Yeah. How’d you know?” 

Yangyang retracts his arm, keeping a neutral face. “You’re friends with Jaemin, right? He’s been giving my friend a hard time all afternoon. But, hey,” he continues, ignoring how Donghyuck’s face falls at the knowledge that Renjun is Yangyang’s friend, and the man Jaemin is hopelessly crushing after. There will be words later at the hotel room tonight. “All the power to him. Renjun’s a tough one to crack, but your friend seems pretty determined.”

Donghyuck balls the napkin in his fist. “Tell Renjun he’s free to drown Jaemin at any time he wants.” Yangyang laughs at the bluntness, even though Donghyuck is being over one-hundred percent serious. Why is he laughing? Was it that funny? 

“Is this your first year at Pipeline?” Yangyang asks as Donghyuck tosses his napkin and the crumpled cup away. “I don’t remember seeing you before.” 

“Yep,” Donghyuck says shortly. “Not yours, though, I’m guessing.” Because Yangyang had built a name in the surfing world for himself, but that doesn’t happen unless you play in the big leagues. 

Yangyang shrugs lightly. “First year competing,” he amends. “Turned twenty-one last October.” 

Right. Right. They’re the same age. Which also means Donghyuck would be competing directly against him, in their shared age bracket. A new wave of determination washes over him, thinking about how he’d be the new talk of the show, the new Monster Rookie. 

Donghyuck squares his shoulders. “Then, I will be seeing you at the prelims tomorrow morning.” Where I will ultimately crush you, and become the reigning champion–

Yangyang beams. Donghyuck, for the second time that night, falters. “I look forward to watching you tear those waves apart,” he says, like Donghyuck’s brain isn’t flickering like a broken lightbulb with every word that comes out of his mouth. “Nice meeting you!” Yangyang places his hands on Donghyuck’s shoulders as he scooches past, and he tenses so fast beneath the touch. “Sorry about the punch,” Yangyang winces one last time, and with a final wave, he disappears around the giant pile of burning wood. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“He’s a nice guy.” 

“He’s trying to get into my head.” 

“He’s just a nice guy .” 

“He’s already gotten into your head!” 

Jeno groans, the sound muffled by the pillow he buries his face in. Nearly an hour has passed since Donghyuck had wrangled Jaemin and Jeno back to their hotel room, literally prying their fingers off Renjun and Mark, respectively. Talk about parasites. Donghyuck never thought he’d be friends with two. After a heated discussion about how many butts a person has with Chenle and Jisung, Donghyuck figured it was time to hit the sack. He found Jaemin toasting marshmallows with Renjun, a smaller boy with fox-like features and a face of long-suffering, while Jaemin was very happily snuggled into his side. Jeno was with Mark (predictable), letting Mark pet his head like he was some puppy (unpredictable). 

There was no sign of Yangyang after that. Not that Donghyuck was looking. 

“I thought you said you weren’t going to make this into a rivalry,” Jeno whines, clutching a pillow to his chest. “Why can’t you guys just be friends?” 

Donghyuck pauses in the middle of his skin care routine. “Because, Jeno, this is a competition, and I want that trophy.” Any other reason to hate Yangyang? No. Donghyuck can’t really come up with any other reason to make him an enemy. Maybe if he tries hard enough, he’ll stir up some beef about how healthy his hair looks compared to Donghyuck’s, despite the constant sea water on their scalps.

“It sounds like you just want to beat him,” Jaemin adds, sliding into his sheets on the other bed. Donghyuck had volunteered to take the pull-out, since he had plans on getting up earlier to catch some waves before the contest. 

“That’s an added bonus.” Donghyuck smears the last of the lotion onto his cheeks, and tosses everything into his travel bag. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a competition to win tomorrow.” He zips the bag up with finality and crosses the little hallway, separating the bedroom from the living space. 

“Maybe you have a crush on him,” Jaemin calls, once Donghyuck is nestled nicely into his comforters. 

“Fuck off, Jaemin,” Donghyuck shouts back, brain too tired to even think of those implications. It’s blinked on and off all day today, it deserves some rest from all the parasites in Donghyuck’s life. 

“Fifty dollars says you do!” He pushes one last time. 

And because Donghyuck is this close to smothering a pillow into his best friend’s face, he grunts out a mild, “Deal!” before rolling over and hoping that sleep will take him. It comes to no one’s surprise that it’s not sleep that takes him, but flashes of soft, pinkish blonde hair, a gummy smile, and ghost fingers dancing lightly across his cheeks. 

It only comes as a partial surprise when Donghyuck forces himself out of bed the following morning, sun not even touching the horizon yet, but the sky just beginning to lighten into a soft purple, that the owner of his illusions last night appears before him, sitting comfortably in the sand and waxing his board with long, precise strokes. 

Donghyuck has two options. Turn around and go back to the hotel and pretend he never left the building in the first place. Or, he can suck it up for the sake of the waves and his precious practice time. And if all Donghyuck had was the sound of the waves that morning, he’d be foolish to turn down the perfect swells that dawn brings to the shore. Katara digs uncomfortably into his side. Come on, it’s too good of a morning to pass up , she seems to say. 

Donghyuck can never say no to his Katara. So, sucking it up, it is. 

He takes in a deep breath and marches down the sand dunes, determined to walk straight past Yangyang and paddle as far out into the sea as he can. He gets within ten feet of the water lapping up the gentle slope of the shore when Yangyang catches him. 

“Good morning,” he sings, like he’s been waiting for Donghyuck this whole time. He’s wearing the same pink hoodie from last night, the one that makes him look so soft and huggable. Donghyuck pulls his board in front of him, suddenly aware of his own bare chest. “I didn’t think you’d be an early riser,” he says with a half smile. 

Donghyuck forces out his own smile. “There’s lots that you don’t know about me,” he snips, turning on his heel to make a bolt into the shallows. “Like the way I’m going to beat your ass later,” he murmurs beneath his breath. 

“You really think you can beat my ass?” 

Donghyuck freezes. Shit. He must have not been quiet enough. He glances down at his board. This is all your fault, Katara, he thinks. Taking a deep breath, he turns back around slowly. “What?” 

Yangyang drops his bar of wax and leans back on his hands. “You know, I am the Monster Rookie. I’m not just any surfer.” 

Donghyuck stands a little taller, looking down at Yangyang. “That title won’t be yours forever. And like I said, there’s lots that you don’t know about me.” This time, much more confident, Donghyuck tilts his head with a lazy smile, glad that he was right about them being rivals. “I’m not just any surfer either.” 

He doesn’t wait for Yangyang’s response. Tucking his dear board beneath his arm, Donghyuck races across the last strip of sand, colliding with the water before his body and the ocean move on their own terms. Like hundreds of times before, Donghyuck splashes, paddles, cuts through the waves easily, feeling the breeze comb through his hair, and the saltwater tinging his lips. 

When he finally gets past the wave breaks, he sits on his board, legs dangling into the depths on either side of the polystyrene foam board and watches the horizon for whatever wave the ocean sends him. 

The ocean was never too big for Donghyuck. Or maybe, it really is. Maybe it’s just too big for Donghyuck’s satisfaction, so he narrows it all down to his little world. His board, the next wave, and endless sky above him. It’s enough. No need to think of unexplored depths, nor what creatures may curiously wander into the shallows. This is enough for him. 

Like always, he feels it before he sees it. The gentle pull of the water, the way his board bobs up and down in a new rhythm. Then he hears it. The roar racing towards him from the horizon, the wave that was sent to him . He throws a look over his shoulder, watching the blue water bulge up and over itself, spinning and hurtling closer. 

You and me, Katara. 

Donghyuck welcomes it, sliding down to his belly, paddling ahead, just to reach those five meters of strokes before he feels his board be lifted up by the wave. In one deft movement, Donghyuck pops up to his feet, arms out for balance, and knees bent in an angle that is all too familiar. Water rains down around him, mist arising from where the water slams back down into the surface, all while he shifts his weight, tilting his board, and lets the magic happen. He jerks his body to the side, the board following a second later, and Donghyuck shoots up the lip of the  wave, high enough that his whole board is airborne for a moment. 

Gripping the edge of his board, and making sure his feet stay planted onto the surface, no matter how much air he gained with that jump. He has enough speed and momentum carrying him that in the brief moment his board is no longer touching the ocean, he manages to twist around, a satisfying grin growing on his face as he notices Yangyang watching him from the beach. 

The tip of the board dives back down the curve of the wave, nose reaching the bottom turn up. By the time he rights himself, the wave hits the sandbar and quickly ripples away to a series of smaller waves beating the shore. 

A low whistle, and Donghyuck whips his head up, panting hard from his trip. “Impressive,” Yangyang comments. “You were right, you’re not just any surfer.” He’s shirtless now, smooth chest and dents of muscle proudly on display as he sets a fist on his hip. 

Making every effort to not stare, Donghyuck clicks his tongue, already repositioning his board to head back past the wave breaks. “That trophy is mine, Yangles!” He calls over his shoulder, paddling a little slower to catch his breath properly before the next wave, and not because his rival is standing right there with all that bare skin exposed. No, not at all. 

But, much to his dismay, a long board splashes down beside his, casting water to fly onto his face. “I think it’s only fair that you get to see your competition,” Yangyang says easily, that amused smile never once fading. “And we’ll let the ocean decide who gets the trophy.” 

Donghyuck glares, watching him paddle past him, smoothly sailing over each wave tip and descending over it with practiced grace. You better give it to me, he thinks, pushing his board down beneath a rolling wave. He emerges on the other side, and Yangyang has already set his sights on the next swell. 

While Donghyuck is all smooth glides and calculated twists, Yangyang’s moves are much sharper, more precise yet unpredictable. He surfs at an angle, so Donghyuck sees him race down the curve of the wave, dipping his board down towards the bottom before using the momentum to shoot back up, twisting the back of the board to send a huge spray of water high over the lip of the wave. 

Legs bent at a low angle, toned and coiled, springing up and into action as Yangyang times each dip and each soaring move, until Donghyuck can’t tell surfer apart from the board. Yangyang’s eyes are focused, narrowed in concentration, waiting for the signal from the ocean to begin his next trick, and it goes like this until the water fizzes out and he easily rises over the flat wave and glides back past the wave breaks. 

“I could do this forever,” Yangyang laughs heartily, lazily drifting back towards Donghyuck. 

“Was that your best?” Donghyuck scoffs, because he’s a child and he’ll never admit that Yangyang was totally wicked out there. “My grandma rides better than you.” 

Yangyang clicks his tongue. “The picture I have in my head is not exactly a pleasant one. No offense to your grandma.” 

Donghyuck narrows his eyes. “Offense taken. She’s a wonderful lady.” 

He feels the familiar pull of the water at the same time Yangyang does, and that’s only because they both whip their heads back to the faint line of the horizon at the same time. Far off, collecting power and strength, rises another wave, perfect in its crest, in its rumble. It’s one of those waves that reminds Donghyuck that this is the reason he loves the ocean. 

He stares at the looming swell for a moment longer in silence, aware that Yangyang is doing the same. They exchange a glance. 

“Mine!” They shriek in unison. Donghyuck paddles like hell towards the incoming wave, grunting with the effort, but determined to get to it before Yangyang does. But in a flurry of arms slapping the water’s surface and the spray spilling into Donghyuck’s eyes, Yangyang manages to pull up in front of him, driving the water back into Donghyuck’s face. 

“Hey!” Donghyuck twists away, blinking the salt water out of his eyes. “That’s my wave!” 

Yangyang laughs, giggles. “Not if I get there first!” 

Donghyuck grits his teeth and pushes forward, keeping his eyes on the back of Yangyang’s board, and measuring the beat of his strokes. He’s about to toss another snarky comment at Yangyang when he feels it. The pull. It’s different. It’s too rough, too demanding. Dangerous. 

Donghyuck stops cutting through the waves for a moment, bobbing up and down from the ripples Yangyang creates as he surges forward. That makes sense, Donghyuck reasons, the ripples being sent his way from Yangyang ahead. What wasn’t making sense was the ripples ahead of Yangyang, glimmering in a darker patch of water. 

Realization hits him hard and fast, his stomach dropping. A rip current. On the smaller side, but Donghyuck sees it right in the path between him and the rise of the wave. And Yangyang is heading straight into it. 

“Stop!” he yells over the sound of the ocean. “Yangyang, come back!” Donghyuck surges on, hoping to get within earshot of the other surfer. He glances behind him, back to the shore, and swears beneath his breath. No lifeguard on duty yet. It’s just the two of them. “ Stop !” 

Yangyang throws a bored look over his shoulder. “Come on, Hyuckie,” He whines, “I’m not falling for your distractions.” 

Donghyuck points past him. “Rip current! You’re swimming right into it!” 

Yangyang squints at the words, but flicks his head back around, and Donghyuck sees the recognition in the way his shoulders go rigid. For a long second, he freezes, lifting his head to see the oncoming wave and dropping it again to the rip current on the surface. 

And then he swings his board around and kicks furiously towards Donghyuck. “Paddle parallel to the shore!” He yells, and it’s enough for Donghyuck to adjust the angle of his board and swim . 

Rip currents are a nightmare to begin with, but with the wave pulling on the tide, it’s becoming increasingly hard to get out of the path, no matter how hard Donghyuck swings his arms and kicks his feet. They’re making too little progress, and once their muscles feel the exhaustion, it’ll be a losing battle for the both of them. 

Which gives them one choice. 

Donghyuck, after all, is a crazy local. 

“We’re going to have to catch the wave!” he shouts over to Yangyang, rubbing a hand down his face to wipe away the sea spray. “The current is too strong to ride out on our own!” 

“Are you insane?” Yangyang kicks his board to catch up with Donghyuck. “If that wave takes us under, we’ll never be able to resurface!” He grunts, fighting with the current to not be pulled back. “There’s also two of us, and that’s one wave!” 

If either one of them loses control of their board, and they crash into each other, they’d be as good as lost. There’s a reason why the first rule of surfing is one surfer to one wave. 

Donghyuck glances behind him, feeling his board being swept into the wave. “It’s now or never!” He sets the nose of his board pointing towards shore, towards safety. “Trust me,” he gets out, locking eyes with Yangyang’s own full-blown panicked ones. “Trust me .” 

Yangyang presses his lips into a thin line. “I trust you.” He gives a firm nod and matches his board with Donghyuck’s. “I’ll be on your right.” 

There’s nothing else to do but let the current pull them further away from the shore for a few harrowing seconds. But then Donghyuck’s board rises, being lifted up by the crest of the wave, and he takes the chance to paddle ahead. Stay in front of the lip, and drop down into the barrel. Like he’s practiced a hundred times before. 

The nose of his surfboard tips up to the sky, and Donghyuck shifts his weight down, the board sliding down the face of the wave. Beside him, on his right, Yangyang pops up to his feet, keeping his focus on the shoreline. 

His world is a deep shade of blue, frothy white foam, and glimpses of yellow as Yangyang dips and skates over the surface with his board. Donghyuck rides, full control over his body, and forever thankful the wave is a strong, but gentle one. Bent knees, salt water spraying onto his face, and the shore approaching them quickly, he finally lets loose a breath that had been building up for a long while. 

When the wave hits the shore and foams out onto the bank, Donghyuck and Yangyang drag themselves and their boards up some distance, beneath the shade of a lifeguard tower, and collapse onto their backs, chests heaving and boards coated in sand. 

“Good eye,” Yangyang says weakly, after some time had passed. “I was so focused on the wave, I couldn’t even see it.” 

Donghyuck stares up into the now blue sky, the sun just clearing the horizon. Clouds lazily float by, and for a moment, he pictures himself and his board up there, riding the clouds instead of the water. The sky is too big, he thinks. Too big for just him. That is something to share with someone else. Donghyuck, despite everything like rip currents, tons of water crushing down on you, jagged rocks and slippery stones, has always been too selfish to share the ocean. 

He swallows thickly. “Jaemin is a lifeguard. It’s one of the first things they taught him, and he taught us.” 

“Thanks for warning me,” Yangyang says quietly. “I’m glad you were out there with me.” 

It’s the genuine tone he speaks in, the sincerity that is so blatant in his words, that takes Donghyuck aback. This Yangyang is the same flustered boy he met last night, the one who apologized a million times over for a little bump on the shoulder, the one that had care-free smiles and easy grins with no challenge, no spark of competition in them. The same boy that had dipped in and out of Donghyuck’s brain all night. 

Donghyuck clears his throat, thinking of something snappy to say because that’s familiar territory. He knows how to play that game. “Watch where you’re going, asshole,” He shoots, but the bite isn’t behind his words. 

Yangyang exhales through a smile Donghyuck can hear. “Somehow, I keep bumping into you.” 

There’s a silence that follows that Donghyuck is in no rush to fill. It doesn’t feel awkward, or forced. Just him, Yangyang, and the waves beating into the shore as mercilessly as his own heart thumping wildly in his chest. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Prelims go like this: 

For their age range, five surfers are set to compete, and three would move on to the finals in three days. Each surfing cohort has half an hour to catch a wave and impress the judges watching from land. It’s a mixture of skill and luck, both of which Donghyuck wears like a badge. 

Jaemin drives the jet ski, Donghyuck sitting behind him, and Katara strapped securely to the foam ramp that serves as place for surfers to climb up on to be taken back to shore. Jeno is on another jet ski some distance away, and beyond that, Donghyuck can make out Yangyang, and someone else who he thinks is Renjun. On the other side of him is this new kid, Shotaro, who, like Jeno, is here for the fun and for the dudes (AKA, Donghyuck caught him smooching up another lifeguard. Sungchan, Jaemin later told him his name). 

Jaemin leaves him in the still waves, having crossed the tide breaks, with a kiss on his cheek for luck, because he’s Jaemin. Donghyuck hopes and prays that Wyatt McHale, who is one of the judges for this round, somehow missed that. 

Jaemin will be near-by, following him as he treks across the wave. But for now, it’s just him and the ocean. A familiar dance, a tune he can hum from memory. Except that tune has a new note. Yangyang. Donghyuck did not have a chance to catch up with him after they had parted ways at the beach earlier. And frankly, he might not have thought too much about it. 

Until he heard Yangyang ask Jisung about any other rip currents in the area. 

It’s an innocent question, logical, really, but Donghyuck was there that morning. Yangyang was scared . And with the way he had quieted down considerably all late morning, Donghyuck figures the fear hadn’t quite left him yet. 

Jisung’s answer must have been ‘no’, because here Donghyuck sits, the shore so far away, waiting for the ocean to take over. Some waves begin to roll in, and he makes note of Shotaro bracing himself for it. Donghyuck rises with the tide and easily settles on the other side of the wave, but Shotaro catches it, snaps up to his feet and it’s all Donghyuck sees before the mist of the water blocks his view. 

Renjun takes the next wave, and judging by the way he shoots out of the tunnel created by the curve, Donghyuck guesses he just had the sickest barrel ride ever. He should be thinking of a way to top that. He should be more attuned with the way the tide is moving, the height of the swells, the roughness of the water. 

Instead, Donghyuck looks over to the last two surfers still in the depths. Jeno offers him a cheery wave, but Yangyang doesn’t acknowledge the stare Donghyuck sends his way. He keeps his gaze at the next wave, and Donghyuck can see the calculation in his furrowed brows. 

The next one is his, and Donghyuck watches, gripping the sides of his board. Yangyang makes it to the top of the wave, dropping down the face expertly. He rides it like it’s the easiest thing in the world, swooping and twisting, just barely beating out the point where the lip of the wave curves back down and crashes into the surface. He waits for the trick, the crazy spin, the flip he’ll do high above the surface, but nothing comes. Donghyuck frowns. Why would Yangyang waste a wave like that? He let the opportunity slip so easily between his fingers. 

The mist arises once more and Donghyuck loses sight of him until he hops onto a jet ski, and is towed back to the shore. Donghyuck watches until Yangyang’s figure slides off the jet ski and he runs up the beach, smiling for the cameras and shaking hands with the reporters on the sand. 

He hopes Yangyang isn’t still shaken up from earlier, hopes that it’s not Donghyuck that he’s thinking about. I trust you. Donghyuck hopes with all his heart that Yangyang didn’t lose himself in that moment because of him. He shakes his head, pulling himself back to his reality. It’s all he can afford to hope for right now, because the next wave hurtling towards him is his . 

Donghyuck catches it, rising up over the lip and sliding down. He gets his feet beneath him and he lets go of his control, lets the ocean curl around him, spraying water onto his face and leaving a trail of white foam behind him. He knows what to do, he knows what he’s done to train for this, and Donghyuck shakes off all his worries, sends them all into a mere thought flung somewhere across the sea, and puts on a show. 

He twists his ankles, spinning himself around, gliding like a ballerina with patience and ease. He lets his board take him up the wave before he shifts the weight back onto his toes and shoots back down, a spray of water fanning out above him. He holds onto the wave like salt clings to the sea, moving as one with the force beneath his feet. 

When the wave crashes and Donghyuck is left standing above it, he glances up at the drone flying over his head and blows it a kiss. Even he has to admit, that was some of his best moments out on the water. The perfect wave paired with all his skill. Donghyuck knows he did more than just great. 

“That was amazing, dude,” Jaemin says as Donghyuck hoists himself onto the jet ski. “I think I heard them say they’d have to put you in the top three.” 

He hesitates before asking, “do you know who else they’re putting in the top three?” Yangyang. Did he make it? 

Jaemin tilts his back, and even though he has sunglasses on, Donghyuck can practically feel the amusement coming from him. “See for yourself.” 

Jaemin’s jet ski stalls in the shallows and Donghyuck slides off, greeting the first wave of cameras and reporters. He looks for Yangyang through the gaps of the crowd, but there’s no sign of the familiar yellow board. Donghyuck chews on his lip as he trudges further up the sand. Why is he so worried about him anyway? They had a little scare, but they lived, right? How Yangyang dealt with it shouldn’t be Donghuck’s problem, but…he doesn’t know. He can’t figure out why he cares so much. 

Donghyuck rubs a frustrated hand down his face and sits on his board, behind the line of reporters. Someone passes him a towel and he throws it across his shoulders. I trust you. I’m glad you were out there with me. The words replay in his head, in the same tone as he first heard them. Sincere. Genuine. Real. A layer peeled back to reveal just another surfer in love with the ocean. 

Donghyuck muffles his groan into his towel. He came to Pipeline to win. Not to overthink about some boy he had sworn to be rivals with. He can’t be sitting here, thinking about his wide smile, the passion behind his eyes, how toned his body is– 

“You were totally wicked out there.” 

Donghyuck yelps so loud that some of the reporters look back at him. Chenle laughs loudly when Donghyuck smacks his knee. “Not cool, dude.” 

Chenle only cackles. “Come on, they’re announcing the winners.” 

Donghyuck’s eyes widen, and he scrambles to his feet. Chenle leads him through the crowd, people making room for him to walk through. Donghyuck is half impressed. There’s a huge screen set up with obnoxiously bright white light casting the beach into an irritatingly blinding glow. It would have made sense to use this at night, but hey, Donghyuck figures, squinting up at the screen, beach bums are bums for a reason. 

It begins with third place. Out of a perfect score of forty points, it’s Lee Jeno with a total of thirty-four points. The crowd cheers loudly and even Donghyuck has to laugh. Jeno, who came here for shits and giggles, landing in the finals competition. How very Jeno of him. 

Second place lights up. Thirty-six points. The crowd silences, and Donghyuck stares so hard into the screen that his eyes start to burn. The name flashes. Liu Yangyang. 

Gasps and murmurs are heard over the initial whooping. It could be relief that forces Donghyuck to exhale, or a new burst of nervousness. Because if Yangyang isn’t first – if the Monster Rookie isn’t in first place – then where does that leave him? Did he really let himself be too distracted? Is he wrong for thinking his performance was decent? 

Chenle clings to his arm and the entire beach quiets again, breaths held as they all wait for the first place position. Donghyuck stares again at the screen. Minutes pass, or maybe just a few seconds. His heart in his throat and his lip near torn from all the chewing, Donghyuck watches. 

First place. Lee Donghyuck. Thirty-eight points. 

The beach roars. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The thing about hurricanes is that you really have to live through one to understand the metaphors. The calm before the storm. Standing in the eye of the hurricane. Those are just sayings, but the real deal is always heavier than the metaphor. 

There’s a terrible stillness in the humid air days before a massive hurricane is set to hit the coast. Everything is calm, but unsettling. Some strange, thin line Donghyuck walks during those days because chances are that the rickety, wooden lifeguard post hoisted up on Fourteenth Street won’t be there in three days' time. For now it is, and he must live on knowing that its days are numbered. And when the eye of the hurricane passes, bringing sunlight and a moment of peace, no one seems to remember the rest of the hurricane. The eye lasts about half a day if you’re lucky. And then nature leaves you battling its winds and rains all over again. 

Yangyang is his hurricane. A hurricane Donghyuck is not prepared for. 

After his name shone brightly next to the first place slot, Donghyuck was pushed up onto someone’s shoulders before he could even register what he was seeing on the screen. First place. He was first . Somehow, he had managed to beat out Yangyang by two whole points. 

Somehow, that doesn’t sit too right in his stomach. 

The feeling only grows worse, curdling in the pit of his gut, when a hesitant finger taps his shoulder at the bar later that night. To celebrate the first round of the competition, the biggest bar on the boardwalk opened its doors, and surfers and tourists alike filtered in and out, drink in hand and sand on their feet. 

“Hey,” Yangyang says, softly. He greets the table where Donghyuck is sitting at with Jeno and Jaemin. “I just wanted to say congratulations. Both of you,” he adds on, with a polite nod to Jeno. “You guys were incredible.” 

Jeno, that bastard (again), stays silent, leaving Donghyuck to respond. He shoots Jeno a withering glare that he dutifully ignores. “Thanks, dude. Congratulations to you, too.” He clears his throat, unwilling to spit out an immature comment. Somehow, that doesn’t feel right. “Your wave was wicked. I kind of wish I had picked it first.” Donghyuck laughs awkwardly, pointedly ignoring the way Jaemin smacks his palm to his forehead. 

Yangyang grins one of those grins where his canines are out on full display, and it eases Donghyuck’s nerves. “What can I say, the waves just come to me.” 

Donghyuck smiles into his drink. “Whatever you say, Moana.” 

Jaemin audibly gags and Donghyuck feels heat rise to his cheeks. “Earth to Hyuck,” he drones to get their attention. “Anyway, how’s Renjun? Did he come out tonight?” Jaemin bats his eyelashes at Yangyang. 

“He’s…” Yangyang rubs the back of his neck. “He’ll be okay. Truth be told, he doesn’t even like surfing all that much. He’s much more into paddle boarding, but I made him sign up this year just to keep me company.” 

Jaemin hums in thought. “Paddle boarding, you say.” Donghyuck sees the gears in his head spin and he has half the mind to warn Renjun of the incoming date plans Jaemin surely has already planned out. 

“Right,” Yangyang says, eying Jaemin, who is so lost in his dreamland. “Anyway, I was…um…” He twists his fingers nervously, and all of a sudden, this was the same boy from the bonfire. “I was hoping I could talk to you,” he says, directing it at Donghyuck. 

Calm before the storm. Donghyuck knows it well. 

Logically, Donghyuck could expect a chewing out since he did technically beat out the Monster Rookie. But there’s a certain tenseness to Yangyang that feels more…real. A want, a request, something, that’s been on his mind and is so close to spilling through the cracks. Donghyuck reads all this in the taut lines of his shoulders. 

“Sure,” he says, casually. “I’ll see you guys back at the hotel,” he points to Jeno and Jaemin, whose smiles are a little too big. Parasites, he thinks. 

Yangyang turns to lead the way, and Donghyuck grabs two fries and launches them at his friends’ heads. Satisfaction crosses his grin when they bounce off their foreheads. 

Yangyang leads them out past the gates of the bar, and slopes around to the boardwalk, alive and in full swing with all the nightly activities. Donghyuck can hear a live band drumming away some streets behind them, and the night is lovely enough for families to stroll lightly around, children running in between their legs. 

“So,” Donghyuck begins after a short moment of awkward silence, “I really did enjoy watching you surf today. Not just at the competition.” He really wasn't lying when he watched Yangyang pull off maneuver after maneuver earlier that morning. Something in the way he commanded his board and let the ocean take over was captivating. 

Yangyang tilts his head back towards him, tongue poking his cheek. “You’re not too bad yourself. Your board is really cool, the air move you pulled at the competition was really smooth. Might even say it’s better than mine.” His lips twist to the side. 

“For the record, her name is Katara, and watch your tone around her.” Yangyang snickers and Donghyuck lifts his nose up defiantly. “And of course it was better than yours. I’ve been working on that trick my whole life.” He pokes Yangyang’s side, delighted at the way he squeaks. “Watch out, Monster Rookie. I told you I was coming for your title.” 

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, it’s unbecoming of you.” Yangyang swats at his fingers. 

“Unbecoming of me ?” Donghyuck gestures to himself, from his head to his feet. “I, Yangyang,” he declares dramatically, “am anything but unbecoming. I’ve been set on kicking your ass since I saw your photo on the Instagram post before the contest.” 

“Oh,” Yangyang sings, eyes alight with amusement, “I’ve been on your mind since?” 

Donghyuck lightly shoves him. “Don’t get ahead of yourself,” he parrots with a chuckle. It goes unsaid that he has, in fact, been on Donghyuck’s mind since he saw that picture. And more so in the recent days. And even more so, since this morning. 

I’m glad you were out there with me. 

Donghyuck clears his throat quickly. “So why was I summoned away from my parasitic friends?” He pauses for a moment. “You should really warn Renjun about Jaemin’s plans to take him paddle boarding. Knowing Jaemin, it’s never just paddle boarding.” 

The last time Jaemin said that the three of them would go on a little road trip further south to watch the dolphins, it ended up with Donghyuck seeing eight dolphins (totally cool) and dodging the local fishermen who caught them cracking open White Claws on one of their fishing boats (totally not cool). They left the next day, but not before Jeno made sure they wrote a sincere apology note with all their names on it and tacked it onto the fishing hut’s door. 

“Noted,” Yangyang says with a little salute. Donghyuck thinks that little gesture was endearing as hell, and has to physically stop himself from cooing at him. “I, um, actually brought you out here to ask how you were doing?” He phrases it like he was unsure of the delivery. Like he was battling himself to produce the right string of words, and this was just mediocre at best. “After this morning, I mean,” Yangyang tacks on hastily when Donghyuck glances over at him. 

Unsure on how to go about it, Donghyuck lamely shrugs. “I’m fine. Really. It’s not the first rip current I’ve had to deal with.” He pauses again, peering into Yangyang’s lip tucked between his teeth. “What about you?” He asks hesitatingly. 

“I was a little shaken up,” he admits, staring down at his shoes. The boardwalk lights cast short shadows beneath them, and Donghyuck traces the lumpy one the two of them create. “It’s not my first rip current either, but there was always someone on land who could reach out and help. And in that moment, it was just us, and no one would be able to help, and I would have felt, like, really bad if you couldn’t even compete because I was stupid enough to swim right into one, and–” 

Donghyuck hears it. The slightest waver in his voice. Yangyang’s just rambling by now, but he’s doing it to cover up what would happen if he stopped. 

“Hey,” he interrupts gently, Yangyang trailing off. “Don’t worry about it.” Donghyuck has to bend down a little to meet his eyes from where his head was hung low. “We’re both okay now, right? I think we make a pretty good team.” 

Yangyang’s smile is small and guarded, but Donghyuck is just thrilled to see it again. “Honestly, that’s all because of Jaemin,” he says in a lighter tone. “He learned about them in lifeguard training and taught me and Jeno like, seventeen different ways to get out of one.” 

Yangyang laughs, the sound rising over the waves. “He’s pretty dedicated.” 

“He’s like a parasite. Jeno is too. Don’t get me started on Jeno,” Donghyuck groans, but Yangyang is laughing beside him, and for some reason, Donghyuck keeps going. 

They walk around the boardwalk for another hour, passing the line of hotels and tourist shops and getting into the private homes and their secluded beaches, then they looped back around and made their way back to the bar. Donghyuck tells him of his early days, watching the cooler, older kids surf all day and scraping together enough birthday money to buy his own board and the story of naming his baby Katara. After that, he was unstoppable. If Donghyuck wasn’t beneath his covers at his home, he was probably riding on top of some wave. 

Yangyang shares how he was put into a surfing class but hated everything about it. So he’d spend the morning barely putting in the effort during class, and dragging his board out around dusk to figure it out himself. His first exposure to competitive surfing was a Pipeline contest years ago, and from there, he had signed up for as many as he could, earning him his nickname. 

They’re walking up the half-circle of the drop-off zone of Donghyuck’s hotel. Jeno and Jaemin had already gone up, according to the text in the chat, and Donghyuck half dreads having to interact with them again. 

“Three days until finals,” Yangyang says outside the glass revolving doors. “Have any plans between now and then?” 

Donghyuck shakes his head. “You seem to keep forgetting that the trophy is coming home with me.” He points vaguely in the direction of the ocean. “I’ll be out there.” 

“For three days?” 

“All three days.” 

“What are you, part fish?” 

“Don’t look at me like that when you’ll do the exact same thing.” Donghyuck shoots back. He likes this. This is normal to them, the back and forth, the comfort in knowing that Yangyang could match him easily. Comfortable. That’s what they are. 

“Then I’ll see you out there, fish boy,” Yangyang smiles with a lopsided grin. Donghyuck has a strange urge to reach out and ruffle the other boy’s hair. 

“I’ll beat you to it, Moana.” 

“Sleep well, Hyuck.” 

“Night, Yangles.” 

When Donghyuck turns away, he can’t stop the grin spreading like the Grand Canyon on his own lips. It’s still on his face when he finally reaches his room, and he tries to look bored, he really does, but Jaemin has eyes like a hawk’s and Jeno just knows him too well. 

“So?” Jeno, that bastard (again x2) prompts. He’s on the bed, lying on his stomach with his chin propped up onto his palm like a teenage girl waiting to be filled in on the day’s gossip. 

“What?” Donghyuck feigns, rinsing his hands in the sink. He glances up at himself through the mirror. God, he was practically glowing. Is he being that obvious? 

“Don’t play stupid with us, Lee Donghyuck,” Jaemin snaps, leaning his head around the doorway of the bathroom. “I’ve got fifty dollars on the line.” 

Donghyuck cringes, drying his hands. “That deal doesn’t count, I was barely awake.” 

“The deal counts because you said ‘deal!’. What do you think, Jeno?” Jaemin calls back to the bedroom. Donghyuck jabs a finger into Jaemin’s stomach on his way out of the bathroom, satisfied when the other boy huffs out a dramatic oomf! 

“It’s a deal!” Jeno hollers back. 

Donghyuck is going to commit some sort of crime tonight. He doesn’t know which one, but Lee Jeno will be at the receiving end of it. “It’s not a crush,” he presses, crossing his arms. “He just wanted to check up on me after the whole rip current thing from this morning.” 

“Because that’s an hour long conversation. Right,” Jaemin deadpans, sliding into his covers. Jeno hits the lamp light in the center table and the room goes dark except for the light coming from the living area, where Donghyuck’s things are strewn. 

“Honest!” Donghyuck protests, even though he knows none of this will get into their heads. It’s mostly for his own ego at this point. “We just walked around and talked!” 

“Mmhm,” Jeno hums into his pillow. Donghyuck’s eye twitches. “Get some sleep tonight, Hyuckie. We still have a trophy to bring home.” 

“I will bring the trophy home,” Donghyuck mutters, snatching up his phone from the foot of Jaemin’s bed, and making to storm away to his pull-out. 

But not before he hears Jaemin whisper, “I’m gonna be fifty dollars richer in three days, Jeno.” 

Donghyuck grabs a fallen pillow from the floor and hurtles it with all his might into Jaemin’s face. 

“ Ouch! ” 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another night of a certain surfer paddling in and out of his dreams, Donghyuck decides he needs his equivalent of a cold shower; surfing at the crack of dawn. 

Like always, he silently grabs his board and he’s down on the beach within ten minutes. This time, he’s alone. He smirks to himself. Told you I’d beat you , he thinks. But, this morning feels too off-putting with just Donghyuck out on the ocean. The sky feels too big, the ocean even bigger, on his own. Even though he was just trying to get beneath Yangyang’s skin the other day, he misses the company. 

But with no number to contact the other boy, Donghyuck pulls himself out of the water some time later and thinks about dragging Jeno out here. The sky streaks over his head in pinks and oranges, the bright blue of the day starting to peek through. It isn’t freakishly early anymore, Donghyuck has all the rights to shove Jeno out of bed. He’s in the finals too, whether he likes it or not, and Donghyuck will not be embarrassed by his overgrown puppy friend at the big competition. 

His stomach rumbles and he looks at his empty bottle of Powerade ruefully. He wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but he is stalling. He wanted to be around when Yangyang arrived at the beach, but it was starting to look like he wasn’t coming. After one last look up the small sandy hill, Donghyuck decides it’s time to bother Jeno. 

He tosses out his empty bottle and hikes his board beneath his arm, crossing the boardwalk and the road of tourist shops. The buildings are all painted in various pastel colors, some of the taller ones sporting giant murals of turtles and whales cutting through the sea. In the morning light, the buildings are saturated, pale blues looking more like cobalt and faded yellows brightening to a shade of one of those Sharpie highlighters. The joggers and the dog-walkers begin their daily routines and Donghyuck even pauses to pet a puppy, delighted at how it nuzzles its snout into his palm. 

He waves good-bye to the owners, walking backwards to coo at the puppy one last time. The puppy is still wagging its tail at him when he backs up into something sturdy. Someone sturdy. 

“Sorry!” Donghyuck exclaims, watching where his feet landed so he wouldn’t bump into the stranger again. It doesn’t help that he’s swinging his board around either. “Shit, sorry, dude!” 

“Hyuck!” the stranger yelps, and he catches sight of a head ducking to dodge his swinging board. “Chill out! It’s just me!” Yangyang catches the board before it can whack him across the head and Donghyuck stills. “Hey,” he says, breathlessly. 

Donghyuck blinks. “Hi,” he gets out. “Sorry, there was this puppy and it was so cute, and I should have watched where I was going and–” 

“–Do you want to get breakfast with me?” The words come out so suddenly that even Yangyang looks surprised. 

Donghyuck shakes his head, trying to process the words. “What?” 

A cleared throat. “I mean…would you like to grab some breakfast? With me? If…if you’re not busy.” He gestures to Donghyuck, and Donghyuck is suddenly aware of his wet swim trunks and the floral shirt he had left unbuttoned. Like, totally unbuttoned. Like, his whole chest is out, unbuttoned. 

Donghyuck laughs nervously, trying to be subtle in pulling his surfboard to cover his bare…everything. Did that poor couple see him like this too? Oh man, he really was living up to all the surfer stereotypes. “I’m actually going to go back to the hotel,” he says sheepishly. 

Yangyang’s face fell, and it hits Donghyuck a second later. “I mean to change!” he hurries on to say. “I’d love to have breakfast with you, I’m just really…wet.” He glances down at himself and silently curses. Why’d you phrase it like that, you creep? 

Yangyang probably chose to ignore it. “Oh! Uh…yeah, I’m pretty sure the owners of the diner wouldn’t like their customers creating a mess all over the place.”  

Donghyuck nods like that was the wisest thing anyone has ever said. “Totally.” He looks down the road, the hotels just a few more streets away. “I, um, I’ll put on something dry, and I’ll…uh…” 

“Meet me on the boardwalk? Same street as yesterday?”  

Donghyuck nods, chewing on the inside of his cheek. Is this a date? Does this count as a date? No, right? It’s just…breakfast. Just two surfer friends getting breakfast. On their own. Just the two of them. Not a date. “See you in about fifteen minutes?” 

Yangyang’s lips fall into an easy smile. “I’ll be waiting.” 

Donghyuck waves once, forcing himself to be calm as he walks away from Yangyang, keeping his strides even and his shoulders relaxed. Once he turns the street corner, out of sight, he sprints down the sidewalk, board held up over his head. Fifteen minutes to make himself look presentable. “Please be awake, Jaemin, please be awake,” he begs beneath his breath. 

He darts into the hotel lobby, barely just missing the families that are slowly making their way into the sunshine. A string of apologies and a more careful grip of his board, Donghyuck veers down the hall with the elevators, and slams the button repeatedly until the doors slide open and he does it again with his floor number. Katara glares at him in the elevator. Donghyuck silently promises to catch a few extra waves with her later on. 

Whatever piece of serenity floor number seven was experiencing that early morning was very quickly ruined by Donghyuck, who flung himself down the hall, feet thudding over the carpet. He swipes his room card and stumbles inside all within thirty seconds of leaving the elevators. 

“You gotta help me,” he gasps upon entering. “Did either one of you pack a tux?” 

Jaemin snorts from where he’s folding some clothes. “Why? You got yourself a surfer prom date?” When Donghyuck doesn’t respond, the t-shirt Jaemin is neatly tucking away drops from his fingers. He points at Donghyuck, eyes widening in realization, and Donghyuck realizes just how big of a hole he has dug for himself. “Sweet Jesus,” Jaemin mutters. “You do have a surfer prom date!” 

How Jaemin connects all the dots so quickly never makes sense to Donghyuck. It’s both a blessing and a curse. “It’s not prom, it’s breakfast,” Donghyuck presses, leaning his board against the wall. So it’s still a date? Katara says in all her silent stoicism. He pauses, understanding the implications. “No, wait. It’s not a date. It’s just breakfast.” 

“With who I think it is?” Jeno muses, lifting his messy head from the cover of his bed, bleary eyes blinking too slowly. He’s not even totally awake yet, and this is what gets his brain working again? 

Donghyuck digs through his own luggage. “No,” he says shortly, unwilling to hear the dreaded I told you so. 

“Then who are you trying to find a tux for?” Jaemin crosses his arms and lifts a brow. 

Donghyuck keeps his back turned to him when he says the first name on his mind. “Wyatt McHale. He asked me to grab some breakfast with him. You know, finalist things.” He throws a cheesy smile over his shoulder at that. 

“Wait,” Jeno yawns, rubbing his eyes. “Isn’t there some rule about judges and competitors not being able to–” 

“Well, why didn’t you just say so!” Jaemin crows, effectively interrupting Jeno. Donghyuck is grateful. Less explaining himself this way. But if Donghyuck would just turn around, he’d catch Jaemin throwing a not-so-subtle wink at Jeno, and Jeno barely hiding the realization on his face. “Let’s get you dressed then!” 

Jaemin works his Jaemin magic and Donghyuck is staring at himself in the mirror, dressed in a neat button up shirt, stripes running up and down, over a pair of brown shorts, the shirt tucked in around his waist and the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. Thanks to his surf that morning, his hair was still wet and Jaemin had managed to curl the ends a little by the time it dried. 

“There!” Jaemin steps back from his work, giving Donghyuck one last look over. “All ready for your date – I mean, breakfast with Yang – I mean Wyatt.” He smiles warmly, and Donghyuck, who barely heard him over his own mind whirring at the speed of sound, pats himself down one more time. Wallet? Check. His cards and some cash in his wallet? Check. Phone? 

Donghyuck looks around frantically, knowing he was pressing for time already. “Where the hell did I leave my phone,” he mutters, pulling at the bedding. 

Jeno palms something cool and rectangular into his wandering hands. “Plugged into the charger, stupid. Why are you so…” Jeno shakes his hands in the air, wiggling his fingers. “I’ve never seen you this frazzled before.” 

Donghyuck tucks his phone away and grabs his sunglasses off the tv stand. “I’m not frazzled, Jeno. Remember how I said I was totally going to score his number before we left? Now, how am I going to do that without my phone?” Donghyuck easily leaves out exactly whose number he’s about to score. 

Jeno narrows his eyes. “Whatever, man. It’s not my money on the line,” he mutters. But before Donghyuck can get out a retort, Jaemin claps his hands together. 

“Alright, it’s go time!” He places his hands on his shoulders, and pushes Donghyuck out the door. “Don’t sweat too much or you’ll stain my shirt, and then I’ll really have no choice but to let you drown.” Jaemin wags his fingers with a stern look as he says this, mimicking a kindergarten school teacher. “Have fun! Don’t call us! Just focus on Yang–I mean, Wyatt!” 

Donghyuck, again, barely hears this as he hurries back to the elevators with one final wave back at Jeno and Jaemin watching him with matching smiles. He’s in the elevator when it registers. “Wait, what do you mean don’t call you guys?” The doors begin to slide shut. “And I’m not going with Yangyang!” He squeezes out as Jeno and Jaemin’s faces are finally cut off by the sliding elevator doors.

He finds Yangyang scrolling through his phone, leaning up against the barricade that separates the concrete boardwalk to the sand of the beach. Now that he gets a good look at him, Donghyuck realizes that he’s wearing a loose, black t-shirt, low enough on his neck that his collarbones peek through, and a sandy brown jacket tossed over his shoulders, but left hanging down by his elbows. 

For a moment, Donghyuck stops and stares, watching him from across the street. A strong breeze cuts through the stillness of the moment, the only thing moving between him and the other boy. 

The wind catches and clings to Yangyang’s hair, parting his bangs until Donghyuck can see peeks of his forehead. But then Yangyang tilts his head back, angling his chin upward, so the wind drags its fingers through the soft, strawberry blonde. With his full forehead on display, and a too casual hand brushing his long hair back, Yangyang smiles into the sun, and Donghyuck swears even the waves laugh at him. 

So maybe this whole rivalry thing really is just a cover up for a massive crush. 

Damn. He owes Jaemin fifty dollars

Yangyang catches him from across the street and breaks out into a smile. Donghyuck swallows hard and tries to put on an easy grin. 

“Fifteen minutes on the dot,” Yangyang says as Donghyuck approaches. He slowly looks Donghyuck over. “Wow,” Yangyang breathes, and though his sunglasses are covering his eyes, he can’t deny the strange tint of pink spreading across his cheeks. “You’re like a whole different person from this morning.” 

Donghyuck lightly smacks his arm. “You’re saying that I looked like a goblin this morning?” 

Yangyang starts walking, hands slid into his pockets while Donghyuck follows. “You looked more like a wet dog, if that makes you feel any better.” 

Donghyuck thinks back to the lovely couple he had met that morning and cringes. “Awesome,” he mourns. 

Yangyang casts a glance sideways at him. “Don’t sweat it, it was kind of a cute look.” 

Heat rises up to the tips of Donghyuck’s ears and his tongue suddenly dries up. Cute. Cute. Oh, the sea air was finally getting to him now. Maybe he’s swallowed enough salt water to make him feel so dizzy. He pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “What are we getting for breakfast?” He asks instead. 

Yangyang takes him to a place called Catch 31, a nice, little, sit down brunch restaurant right on the boardwalk, with outdoor seating on the roof to look out over the beach. As Donghyuck takes his seat, he’s silently thankful that he let Jaemin pick his clothes out for him. This place is far too nice for swim trunks and hoodies. 

“Yeah, so, Renjun is totally into Jaemin, but he won’t admit it yet,” Yangyang was saying, sneaking in a bite of his French toast. “And I just know Mark Lee from Canada has a thing for Jeno. He’s not subtle about it at all.” 

Behind him, Donghyuck hears someone choke a little too loudly, and then it’s followed by a loud thwack of them getting smacked. He has a feeling of who they might be, but for his own sanity, he’ll remain ignorant. 

“They’re in luck,” he says, popping a grape into his mouth. “The feelings are all mutual. Once Jeno and Jaemin get attached…” 

“Parasites?” Yangyang grins, and Donghyuck is so happy someone else gets it. 

“Speaking of,” he says, casually, pushing his oatmeal around in the bowl, “I’m pretty sure they’re sitting behind us. Three tables down.” 

This time he hears the sound of two people choking and silverware clattering noisily onto the table. “He knows!” one voice hisses. 

“Shh! Shut up! Put your hat back on!” The other, sounding a lot like Jaemin, grounds out. 

Donghyuck drops his head and groans. “Sorry about them,” he tells Yangyang, who just tips his head back and laughs. There’s really no other poetic way Donghyuck could describe the sound. His laugh is just joy . Uncontained joy, such blatant happiness and eagerness. It nearly brings him to tears. 

Yangyang leans close, hovering over the table, until Donghyuck sees the light splay of freckles across the bridge of his nose. “What do you say we ditch them?” he whispers, the glint of challenge in his eye. It’s there while he’s out on the waves, too. Donghyuck’s seen the challenge before, and usually, he is on the receiving end. But both of them on the same side…well, Donghyuck has never been known to turn down a little mischief. 

“It’s like you read my mind,” he says dreamily. After that, they scarf down the last of their food and try to stay calm and collected as they leave the restaurant. Donghyuck catches Jeno frantically waving down a waiter as he walks out and bites back a stream of laughter. His friends are a lot of things, but being idiots top the list. Idiots, but fondly. 

“Ready?” Yangyang asks as they make their way down to the ground floor of the building. 

“Eat my dust, Yangles.” Donghyuck pushes open the door, tensing his muscles to outrun Yangyang. If their rivalry thing boiled down to a crush thing, at least Donghyuck can still pretend.  “Hey, what’s that over there?” He points in one direction and bolts in the other. 

“Hey!” Yangyang shouts behind him, but Donghyuck darts down the boardwalk, Yangyang’s pealing laughter chasing him down. The sun is out, the sea breeze picks up, and there’s a sense of laziness in the air. Being absolutely care-free, without a single worry, free to do whatever he wants, Donghyuck races down the boardwalk and the ocean follows. 

He finally comes to a stop by the amusement park, pausing to catch his breath and to wait for Yangyang, who jogs up beside him a moment later. “Took you a while,” Donghyuck says, chuckling when Yangyang doubles over to catch his own breath. “Did you lose them?” 

Yangyang nods, still panting, but that glint from the restaurant never once flickers. “I should have led them here after you cheated!” he gasps out, straightening himself. 

“I told you to eat my dust,” Donghyuck sings because it’s so easy to banter like this with him. Behind them, arcade sounds blast through the speakers, signaling the opening of the park. Within a few minutes, people are already entering, children jumping up and down from the excitement and parents with remnants of sleep trying to keep up. 

“Okay, for real this time,” Yangyang says, and suddenly his hand is in Donghyuck’s before Donghyuck can even process what is happening. “A fair game. No cheating.” He tilts his head back towards the park, vendors herding visitors to their carnival games and promises of giant stuffed animals. 

Donghyuck closes his fingers around Yangyang’s hand and quickly speaks, hoping that any awkward tension would quickly disappear. “First of all,” he begins with a judgemental finger, “nothing is fair about a carnival game. Everyone knows it’s rigged.” 

Yangyang gives him a look. “That’s something someone who has never won a giant stuffed shark would say.” 

“Secondly!” Donghyuck continues, shooting him a glare that Yangyang laughs at. “I’d still beat you. Pick any game you want, and I’ll find a way to beat you.” 

“Loser buys milkshakes?” 

Donghyuck uses his other free hand to poke Yangyang’s chest, mind faltering for half a second at how muscled it is. It doesn’t look muscley, how on earth does it feel so…firm? “I think you mean you will buy us milkshakes.” 

“Don’t get ahead of yourself.” Yangyang winks, and then he takes off, but this time, his hand is in Donghyuck’s and Yangyang pulls him through the crowds of the park. Donghyuck is more or less dragged along, trying to keep his giggles from sounding like a toddler in love. Though, half of that statement is true (the love part. Not the toddler part).

The smile drops from his face when they stop and Donghyuck faces a basketball court. Two hoops, two giant bins of basketballs, and a timer that counts the number of hoops made.  “Oh God,” Donghyuck breathes, wishing he had just swallowed his big talk earlier.

Yangyang bounces a basketball a couple times before passing it to Donghyuck, who (shamefully) nearly trips over himself trying to catch it. That is a testament to his basketball skills in itself. He’s terrible at this game. “Let’s play ball?”

Donghyuck presses his lips together. Oh, he really wishes he had just shut up earlier. “Eat my dust, Yangles.” It comes out weaker this time, but he makes up for it by tossing a careless wink into his direction. Yangyang cheeks flare pink for just a second, so fast that Donghyuck would have missed it if he wasn’t already watching him. The buzzer sounds, and they play. 

It goes as well as Donghyuck expects it to go. Yangyang scores about twenty more points than him, even though Donghyuck was leading by two points at the start. It’s whatever. He’ll take his wins in strides. The bitterness in losing dissipates quicker than Donghyuck realizes, because in one second, he’s scowling at a whooping Yangyang, but all it takes is Yangyang racing over to wrap him in a victory hug that the scowl is wiped away. Donghyuck shuts his eyes and pulls Yangyang closer. 

It’s how he finds himself, sitting across Yangyang at a milkshake parlor, themed like every milkshake parlor is designed in a movie set in the 50’s. Red and white stripes on the wall, a ridiculous looking hat on the poor waitress’ head, and jazzy music filters through a jukebox. It smells sticky and almost unbearably sweet, but Donghyuck can’t bring himself to care. Not when Yangyang is animatedly retelling a story of how he nearly missed a morning exam in high school because he was on the beach. 

He speaks with passion, never once dulling his energy or slowing down, but enough to carry a story that captivates Donghyuck. Yangyang’s eyes are so brightly lit, Donghyuck thinks back to the bonfire night. Dimly lit embers dancing in his iris, but in the sunlight slanting through the parlor’s windows, his eyes are more like fireflies, flickering with every blink. 

“Here you boys are!” The waitress comes by with the milkshake Yangyang ordered. Donghyuck had declined one himself, saying that he’s a little lactose insensitive. Which means if he wants precious practice time in the water, he’d need to stay far away from dairy products. But the waitress slides the tall glass across the table with a cheery, “enjoy, sweethearts!”, and Donghyuck takes one long blink. 

The milkshake cup has two, red and white striped straws poking out of the layers of whipped cream and sprinkles on top. 

“They gave us two straws,” Yangyang states the obvious. His gaze flicks back up to Donghyuck’s, an eyebrow raised. “Drink up, mate.” Yangyang leans over the table, his pink lips closing over the tip of the straw. 

Donghyuck swallows. But he can’t look away. “I’m a little lactose intolerant,” he says lamely. 

Yangyang groans, mouth full of birthday cake flavored milkshake. “So am I, but I’m going to have a really bad day if I have to finish all this on my own.” 

Donghyuck lets the smile stretch out. “Trying to sabotage me, Liu?” 

“Wouldn’t dream of it, Lee.” 

Donghyuck wants to. He so desperately wants to meet Yangyang in the middle. It’s the devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other. Do it! Just do it or you’ll regret it later, the devil shrieks. 

The trophy! Think of the trophy! Katara wouldn’t want this! Quit fraternizing with the enemy! The angel pleads. 

Donghyuck thinks he fears regret more. He leans forward, resting on his forearms, and moves close enough to take the other straw into his own mouth. They’re nose to nose. Like that first night, Donghyuck is more or less forced to only stare at Yangyang. The amused curl of his lips, the happy crinkle around his eyes, the freckles looking like stars during a cloudless night. 

Donghyuck knows beauty. He’s out on the ocean enough times to really understand it, the raw power that comes from it. Yangyang…he’s another force entirely. One that Donghyuck is more than determined to tame, but there is magic that radiates, that pulses, with each burst of laughter, each joke that sends them coughing into their fists, each shock of lightning that passes when Yangyang’s fingers pick up Donghyuck’s beneath the table. 

Some forces are never meant to be tamed. 

Donghyuck pulls away from the straw, but keeps Yangyang’s hand in his. “You know I used to hate you?” he blurts out, the only place where he can start to even explain his hurricane of feelings. The calm before the storm has passed. He’s searching for the eye now. Yangyang slowly straightens into his seat, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. Donghyuck takes the puzzled look he’s getting as a sign to explain himself. “Not hate. I really wanted to beat you. I saw you as my rival.” 

Yangyang considers, and Donghyuck holds his breath, hoping that his brain will plan out his next words before he continues to spew it out. What a mess he is. “It’s a competition,” Yangyang finally says. “I get it.”

Donghyuck squeezes his hand beneath the table, letting him know that there’s more. “I still do want to beat you, but not like…not like I used to,” he admits. “I’m actually really happy I get to surf beside you.”

Yangyang’s brows furrow. “Me too, Hyuck, but where is this going?” Donghyuck can detect it, the worry straining his voice, only because it’s the same tension pulling at his throat. They both know where this is going. They both hope for the same thing, but neither can predict. 

Donghyuck loses a breath, keeps eye-contact, and lets his inhibitions run wild. “I really like your company, Yangyang. I know I’ve been seeing you as this obstacle in my way for the better half of this week, but I’m realizing that it’s more of an honor that I get to be surfing beside you.” He glances down at the near empty glass. “And it’s definitely more of an honor that I get to be on this date with you.” He runs the words back over in his head and cringes, staring down at his lap. His inhibitions had run a little too wild. “Only if you want to!” he hastily tacks on. “This can…you know…” 

“I was hoping you’d see this as a date.” 

Donghyuck’s attention snaps up to Yangyang. The other boy is grinning so widely, even the sunlight outside seems to be dimmer. “You…I…you’re not…really?” he stammers. Eloquent. Donghyuck should be a public speaker. 

“I guess I got a little lucky bumping into you at the fire,” Yangyang says shyly, tracing his free finger around the rim of the glass. “I was working up the nerve to come talk to you all day.” He chuckles breathily. “So, taking you out to breakfast and just…hanging out with you outside of the competition has been on my to-do list for so long.” 

Donghyuck’s ears are burning. He stares wide-eyed, mouth hung open and this time, both the devil and the angel on his shoulders shout at him to say something you bumbling idiot! 

“So I’ve been on your mind ever since!” he settles on. Good to know that a one-sided rivalry is an easy thing to fall back on in times of panic. “I knew it!” 

And thankfully, Yangyang picks up on it. “It went both ways! You can’t lie about not thinking about me weeks before the competition!” 

“Using my own words against me, that’s just low,” Donghyuck pouts. 

And that’s how it happens. All because Donghyuck juts his lips out a little too much. Yangyang’s attention drops down to his mouth, and Donghyuck can see them focus on something. “Hang on, don’t move,” Yangyang mumbles. Both of his hands move simultaneously. One reaches out over the table, tugging Donghyuck’s chin closer to him, and the other snatches up a couple of napkins. 

Yangyang moves like he’s in a trance, but Donghyuck can’t help but feel like he’s caught up in the same spell. The eye of the hurricane. The brief moment of peace, when everything in the world stops and everything that is wished for is granted. He watches Yangyang gently dab away whatever bit of milkshake was stuck to his lips. It’s so much like that first night with the punch that Donghyuck has to stifle a laugh to not disturb Yangyang. 

Somehow, I keep bumping into you. Yangyang was right, that day on the beach. Somehow, it was the two of them. Somehow, it’s always been the two of them. 

When they finally make eye-contact, Donghyuck is a little ashamed to say that he looked away first. The eye of the storm passes. Weather continues on as normal, the force unyielding once again. 

Yangyang only exhales through his nose, breaking out of that spell. “Now that you don’t look like a toddler with ice-cream smeared all over his face, do you want to blow through the rest of the tickets?” He holds up a long string of raffle tickets, exchanged with vendors for carnival food and games. They had bought some for the basketball game earlier, but still have a handful left. 

“As long as you win me a stuffed shark,” Donghyuck says, already gathering his things to leave. 

“What, like couples do?” 

“Exactly like couples do.” Donghyuck gets a surge of entertainment at Yangyang who opens and closes his mouth like a fish. If it is that easy to fluster the other boy, Donghyuck’s whole day just got infinitely better. Just to push those buttons, he stands up and with new found courage and confidence, offers Yangyang his hand this time. “What do you say, Yangles? Think you can win me a giant stuffed shark?” 

“I think I could win you the entire carnival, Hyuckie.” 

“I’ll be counting on it.” 

Yangyang takes his hand, fingers fitting perfectly around his knuckles. Donghyuck and Yangyang race through the carnival, hand in hand, laughter like bubbles floating up, up, and away. If Donghyuck pauses and strains his ears, he’d hear the ocean laugh with them. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The days go by like that. Lunches in little hole-in-the-wall restaurants, coffee dates after dinner, early morning surf sessions while they share a Coke and the sunset. It goes like Yangyang’s cackle when Donghyuck loses a flip-flop to a particularly rough wave, and he demanded to be carried back to a tourist shop on Yangyang’s back to buy a new pair. It goes like Donghyuck shamelessly throwing a casual arm around Yangyang’s waist and pulling them together just so he can get a taste of the other boy’s ice-cream. It goes like Yangyang chasing Donghyuck down the boardwalk with threats of shoving the bowl of ice-cream into his nose while Donghyuck thinks it’s the funniest thing that has ever happened to him. 

It accumulates to this point, the two sitting in a ferris wheel’s cart, already on their journey towards the top. It’s around sunset, orange flames taking the sky as the pale, summer blue retreats. Pinks and purples sit low over the ocean’s horizon, promising dusk, then nightfall. 

If Donghyuck looks over the curve of the ferris wheel, he’d see the pier with all its stores and open cart vendors lining up on the stretch of the wood. The water this evening looks more like a faded green, and when the foam floats back into the sea, the whole ocean marbles, swirling in a wonderful mix of sea-green and light blue. 

For a moment, all is quiet and still, the wheel chugging steadily beneath their feet, the air tinged with salt and cotton candy, and Donghyuck’s hand comfortably resting in Yangyang’s own. 

But he couldn’t say the same about Yangyang. The other boy had been chewing on his lip all day, bouncing his knee enough times that the entire cart would shake with the movement. Donghyuck had decided not to press him on it, hoping that Yangyang would open up himself, but they’ve reached the top of the wheel, the machine grinding to a stop, and Yangyang is bouncing his knee again. 

Donghyuck puts a hand over his knee. “Is everything okay?” he asks, gently. 

“Hm?” Yangyang turns from where he was staring out towards the ocean. “Oh! Yeah! Yeah, everything is fine.” He shifts so that he’s completely facing Donghyuck now, taking both of his hands. “I’m just really happy that I got to spend the last few days with you.” 

Donghyuck lifts a brow. “I’m sensing a ‘but’.” 

Yangyang’s eyes widen. “No! It’s true, I’ve been having a blast with you!” 

“Then what’s wrong?” 

Yangyang sucks on his bottom lip. “It’s nothing. It’s a beautiful night, let’s just make the most of it, yeah?” 

“Oh, come on. You can’t say that and expect me to drop it.” Donghyuck leans over to look him in the eye, squeezing his hand reassuringly. “Tell me what’s on your mind.” 

There’s dejection in his voice when Yangyang stares at his fingers in Donghyuck’s hand and utters, “what happens after tomorrow?” 

The finals are tomorrow. And after that… well, Donghyuck’s thought about it too.  “What…what do you want to happen?” he asks carefully, because truth be told, Donghyuck didn’t come to Pipeline just to leave with his crush, but after everything that’s happened this entire week, he thinks it’d be foolish to break off this steady…thing they have. But if he were being really honest, he doesn’t know. 

This week with Yangyang was everything to him, even despite his initial desire to come out on top, and Donghyuck really does like him. A lot. Like Yangyang pointed out a funny looking seagull earlier that day and Donghyuck almost choked over his laughter, a lot. It was his ‘Zendaya moment’, as Jaemin called it, and if Donghyuck knew anything about Tom and Zendaya, it was that they were past selling a relationship for the cameras. Everything that they have, everything that they show and don’t show, is real and genuine, and Donghyuck feels like everything he feels for Yangyang is just as real. 

But if this is all one-sided, if Yangyang didn’t want anything more than being surfer buddies for a week, then how is Donghyuck supposed to live with that? How is he supposed to just move on? How does he make his genuine and real emotions, every thought he has ever spared for Yangyang in the depths of night and in the crests of the waves at dawn, vanish? 

What do you want to happen? One answer might shatter him completely, but Donghyuck doesn’t know what that answer is. 

Yangyang trains his eyes onto where Donghyuck rubs soothing circles into his knuckles. The sea breeze murmurs between them, the waves crashing into shore some million miles away from them, and Donghyuck can’t tear his eyes away from the boy with cheeks as pink as the cotton candy skies high above him. 

Yangyang answers, and it’s something that knocks the wind straight out of Donghyuck’s lungs. “I’ve had so much fun these past few days, Hyuck, and it’s really all because of you. You made me realize this…this magic about you. About us.” Yangyang looks terrified and Donghyuck struggles to strip apart what that means. “I don’t want to ruin anything,” he finally says, and Donghyuck’s brain shuts down into white noise. 

He doesn’t even realize it, but Donghyuck slowly lets go of Yangyang’s hands, opting to slide them into his hoodie’s pockets instead. “What does that mean?” he questions. Was it not obvious? Donghyuck was happy with him. He liked him. Did Yangyang not see any of that? 

Yangyang’s knee bounces again, shaking the whole cart. “I don’t think I could live with myself if I’m the reason everything we have is gone.” There’s sorrow in his voice, loud and clear enough that Donghyuck thinks that the children down by the pretzel cart could hear their whole conversation. 

Then don’t be the reason, Donghyuck wants to scream, but doesn’t. Something threatens to dig its ugly claws into his heart and tear right through it. A clean cut, angled and precise. 

“I don’t want to ruin anything,” Yangyang repeats with a heavy sigh, dropping his head to stare at his shoes. 

“Are you stupid?” 

Yangyang lifts his head so fast, looking like he was slapped. “What?” 

“I don’t understand.” Donghyuck pinches the bridge of nose, willing the hurricane to stop swirling around at top speeds in his head. Where his heart threatens to fall in one fell swoop, his brain swims. “You don’t want to ruin what exactly? Everything we’ve done this entire week?” He gestures to nothing behind him, the wind at the top of the ferris wheel pulling at his hair strands and blowing them into his eyes. “Everything that we’ve built for ourselves? Not just you and me, but us? ” 

Yangyang blinks, back pressed against his side of the cart. 

Donghyuck forces his voice to come back down to some semblance of a normal volume. “Did you ever think…” He pauses. “Did you ever even realize…” Realize what? That he was head over heels into him? That the whole rivalry thing was just a cover-up for an awfully short summer fling? Was that all Donghyuck was? Pathetic. He is being pathetic.  

Yangyang blinks again, but he leans forward this time, searching his face for the answer which had to be plastered all over Donghyuck’s features. “Realize what, Hyuck?” he whispers. 

Donghyuck presses his lips together. The cart jerks beneath his feet, and he’s more than grateful that the ferris wheel was finally spinning again, beginning their descent. “Nothing,” he hisses. “You didn’t realize anything.” He leaves it at that, one last glimpse at Yangyang’s face shattering the same time his heart is neatly split into two. 

Liquid nitrogen would have been warmer. 

Donghyuck doesn’t wait for Yangyang when their cart finally reaches the bottom, and the poor ticket collector who runs the ferris wheel barely gets the door open before Donghyuck shoulders his way past, making to storm out of the amusement park. He’s probably overreacting, but he was just so sure they both wanted the same thing. It was pathetic of him to really believe that. Pathetic. Pathetic. Pathetic. It is a very loud word that clatters around noisily. 

“Hyuck, wait!” Yangyang scrambles after him but Donghyuck keeps his back to him. “I didn’t mean it like that!” 

Donghyuck whirls, deciding to let the hurricane in his head take over. “It’s fine, Yangyang,” he says, frustration threatening to release the overflowing pools in his eyes to spill. “It’s fine. I should have known.”

Yangyang staggers to a stop, leaving a distance between them. “Know what?” he asks, hurt crossing his eyes for a moment, before his brows furrow. 

Donghyuck exhales shakily. Does Yanyang really not get it? “The Monster Rookie. You have this whole competition at your fingertips. Everyone knows this would be your biggest break yet.” Donghyuck taps his chest with a finger and his whole rib cage rattles. “I was just strung along for the ride, right? These past few days weren’t even real to you.” 

Yangyang’s mouth swings wide open and Donghyuck has to bark out a laugh at the audacity. “What are you talking about? Are you hearing yourself?” 

“I don’t know what you’re afraid of ruining. Maybe you didn’t want to ruin this game you’ve pulled me into. Maybe you didn’t want to ruin the attention I was giving you.”

“Hyuck, that’s enough.” 

Donghyuck barely hears it. The storm only swells and swells, battering winds, water surges, a race against time. “And you were blind to it all. You couldn’t even see how real it was to me.” 

“That’s not fair, Hyuck,” Yangyang says, and somewhere behind him, the neon lights turn on for the night, casting a motley of purples, greens, and pinks all over them. “You’re getting it all wrong.” 

“It’s fine. ” Exhaustion trickles through Donghyuck’s veins and he wants nothing else but to sleep until the void of the ocean swallows him whole. “Good luck tomorrow. I really hope you win.” He means it this time. Everything will return to what it was like before all this and maybe Donghyuck can find some impossible way to erase this whole competition from memory. 

He turns away, feeling Yangyang bear his eyes into his back. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Donghyuck handles it poorly. 

He’s sitting beside a pile of used tissues, a pint of Ben and Jerry’s melting in his lap while Sally slaps Harry at Jess’ and Marie’s wedding on whatever channel was playing When Harry Met Sally, when the door to his hotel room flies open. 

“What the hell did you do?” Jaemin shrieks, stomping inside, Jeno right behind him. 

Donghyuck groans, sliding his pint of ice cream onto the table and tossing the blanket over his head. Maybe if really, really, believes in the ‘if you can’t see them, they can’t see you’ idea, they’ll leave him alone.

“Renjun and I were just enjoying some tacos on the boardwalk and you’ll never guess who came up to us and started crying onto Renjun’s shoulder!” Jaemin, for his part, seems more disappointed that his date night was ruined than the larger problem at hand. 

“He cried?” Donghyuck asks, voice muffled by the blanket over his head. 

“Mark freaked out when Yangyang called him,” Jeno adds from somewhere in the room. “Like, Mark Lee. Mark Lee who got stung by a jellyfish at nationals and still came out in first place. He freaked out. So what exactly did you do?” 

Donghyuck hears the click of the tv being shut off. A second later, the blanket over his head is slid off, discarded to the floor by Jeno while Jaemin peers at him with a million questions in his eyes. Donghyuck glares as angrily as he can, going from Jeno to Jaemin, and then back to Jeno. Neither back down an inch. 

Parasites. Right. 

He tells them. Everything that was said at the top of the wheel to everything said below under the glow of neon lights. He can’t really bring himself to look his friends in their eyes, knowing that there was a pretty decent chance that he blew something out of the water that he shouldn’t have. And, he technically did ruin his friends’ night out too. 

He apologizes for that at the end, rubbing the back of his neck. For a moment, neither say anything, only exchanging a single, long glance. Words unsaid filter between them but Donghyuck can’t figure it out. 

Finally, it’s Jeno who narrows his eyes at him. “You have to talk to him again. You have to tell him what you really feel.” 

Donghyuck huffs. “I did. He just doesn’t feel the same.” 

“No, you idiot,” Jaemin says this time, sounding a little angry. “You have to tell him and then you have to listen. ” 

“I–” Donghyuck sputters. “He said everything that needed to be said!” 

“Neither of you were being honest,” Jaemin points out. 

“How would you know?” he whines miserably. 

Jeno crosses his arms across his chest. “Mark once told me that Yangyang sets an obnoxious amount of alarms to make sure he gets up early enough to meet up with you for your morning surfing sessions.” 

Donghyuck blinks, unable to wrap his mind around Jeno’s words. Yangyang…making the effort to catch up with him at the ungodly hours of dawn? For him ? Sometimes, when the water crashes onto the shore too roughly, it tears apart the wet sand below. The entire shallows turn into this swirl of dark sand and it’s not until a stronger wave clears it all out. Donghyuck’s head sort of feels like that swirly sandy water right about now. 

“Renjun has complained on more than one occasion that Yangyang hogs their bathroom because he’s, and I’m quoting here, hell-bent on impressing the cool surfer from the Banks. ” Jaemin frowns. “Those weren’t even Renjun’s words. I was quoting Renjun, who was quoting Yangyang.” 

Yangyang said those things about him? His world comes o a screeching halt. Oh. Oh. Donghyuck fucked up. Fucked up big time. “Give me that pillow over there,” he says listlessly, pointing to a fallen pillow by the tv. 

Jeno looks confused but hesitatingly brings him the pillow. Donghyuck wastes no time in shoving the pillow into his face and unearthing a scream that had been building up at the core of his chest for a few hours now. The bigger wave just crashed. All that sand rotting away in Donghyuck’s head and heart are swiftly and cruelly wiped away. 

Jaemin pats him gently on the back while he gets it all out. “There, there,” he says soothingly. “We all mess up sometimes. You’re just…another level of stupid.” 

“ Jaemin, ” Jeno scolds. 

“Right, right, sorry.”

Donghyuck lifts his head from the pillow, not caring that his whole head is in utter disarray. “What am I supposed to do? How do I fix this?” he asks frantically, clutching the pillow to his chest. “Oh my God, I was such an asshole.” Everything he had said on the ferris wheel was so out of pocket, and he didn’t give Yangyang a chance to explain himself. He jumped from one conclusion to another and barely gave himself or Yangyang a moment to sift through the murky sand. 

Jeno runs a hand through his hair. “Nothing for tonight. I think you should give him some space. It sounded like he took it really hard.” 

Guilt whacks Donghyuck across the head, and it’s a hundred percent deserved. “Tomorrow are the finals,” he says a bit mournfully. Their last day before they have to leave. 

“It’ll probably be for the best if you catch him before the contest,” Jaemin advises. “It’ll give you both a clear head before you have to compete.”

“What happens if I don’t ever see him again after tomorrow?” Donghyuck’s voice had dropped, barely audible over his lips pressing into the pillow. “What if I messed it up too badly and I can’t fix this?” 

“You’ll both fix it,” Jeno says, with promise in his voice. “You both want the same thing, but…sorry, Hyuck, you guys are just really stupid.” 

Donghyuck chucks the pillow straight into Jeno’s face and it earns him a little satisfaction, seeing Jeno’s smile drop into a scowl. With nothing else to do and all other plans for the night coming to a standstill, the three of them fit themselves onto the couch, rewinding When Harry Met Sally, and finishing all of Donghyuck’s ice cream for him. 

Donghyuck doesn’t sleep a wink that night, and unlike the nights before, it isn’t because Yangyang’s on his mind, teasing him in his dream, holding his waist a little closer to his own, and soft lips ghosting down his bare neck. Tonight was silent. That’s what keeps him up. 

The thing about surfing is that there’s never a quiet moment. It’s Donghyuck and the sea, but it’s loud. Ferocious. A force to be tamed. It chants his name, draws him further and further out into the depths, into the unknowns, and Donghyuck listens. He hears it all and he delights in every sound, every command that comes from the waves glinting in moonlight or in sunlight. 

For silence to thunder in his head, not even the steady command of the ocean thrumming in his veins, it’s unnerving. Donghyuck rolls over to his side with a sigh, pulling his sheets up to his chin and curling his legs in. Jaemin’s soft snores come from the other room, and the moonlight spears down on Donghyuck through a crack in the curtains. 

Is Yangyang watching that same moon? Is he up too? Thinking of all the things said and unsaid? Donghyuck plays the conversation over and over again in his head like a theatrical show, and every single time he walks out of the theater with his heart cleaved into two parts. 

The ocean laughs at him. Bitter. Ugly. They used to be one, but Donghyuck feels so out of himself tonight that he’s convinced that he’s alone. And it’s all his fault. 

A cold drip of water slides out of the corner of his eye while he stares up at the moon from the crack of the curtain. He might have messed it up beyond repair. He might have said every wrong thing that could have been said, and maybe the ocean will laugh at him forever. But he can’t go on without trying to mend the broken bridges first. After that…Donghyuck sniffles and rolls back over, squeezing out a few more tears before his brain shuts down for the night. 

After that, he’ll just be happy that at least they’re watching the same moon. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Finals morning is a blur. Donghyuck isn’t sure whose hand he’s shaking or who’s giving him a pat on his shoulder with a quick good luck out there! 

Jaemin was already called away for lifeguarding duties, decked in his red shorts and white t-shirt. He gave Donghyuck one last comforting look over the edge of his sunglasses before he left to get geared for his jet ski. Like before, the surfers will be towed out past the wave breaks, and after their wave, they’ll be towed back to shore.

Jeno had gone ahead with plans to meet up with Mark before their round started. He had told Donghyuck to do the same, but unlike Jeno and Mark, who are very much still on talking terms, Donghyuck can’t say the same about himself and Yangyang. 

The wind kicks up, sending the umbrellas tilting over and the sand pelting into his bare legs. He grimaces, turning to face the direction of the wind and pushing up his sunglasses to avoid sand getting into his eyes. He’s not sure why he bothered with the sunglasses anyway. It’s a cloudy day, the beginnings of a storm brewing some hundred miles off the coast. The water is rougher too, the white tip kind of waves that the big wave surfers like to tackle. The Nazare wave riders. The Jaws Contest riders. In short, even these kinds of waves intimidate Donghyuck. They’re much harder to control, to tame. Too much unpredictability. 

“Hyuck!” Chenle flags him down from the side of the stage similar to the previous set up. They’d award the winner here later on in the day, and the trophy sits on the wood, bright and gleaming, watching Donghyuck’s every single move. “You’ve got interviews in about fifteen minutes,” Chenle tells him when he arrives, flipping rapidly through a binder. “Take Third and Fourth street news. Jeno’s got some of Fourth and Fifth, and Yangyang has First and Second.” 

Donghyuck perks up at that. “Yangyang is already here?” 

Chenle stops flipping through the binder. “Check in for all finalists was thirty minutes ago. You were just late.” He pokes Donghyuck’s stomach viciously. “Making my life harder,” he grumbles, responding to an explosion of messages lighting up his phone. “Can you find your way to Third and Fourth or do I have to wrangle Jisung to help you?”  

“No, no,” Donghyuck says, already twisting around, looking for the familiar mop of soft blonde hair and freckled face. “I can find it.” He hears a familiar laugh come from one direction and turns to it, searching the faces for a specific one. 

“Hyuckie?” 

“Yeah?” No, not Yangyang. Donghyuck could have sworn he had heard it from over there. 

A hand grabs the back of his shirt and pulls, causing him to nearly lose his footing. “Third and Fourth is that way,” Chenle says, pointing in the opposite direction. He peers up at him, and Donghyuck makes a point to not look him in the eye. “I think I’m going to get Jisung.” 

“What? Why?” Donghyuck whines as Chenle begins rapidly typing out a message onto his phone. “I can find it on my own!” 

Chenle shakes his head, swiping away on the messaging app. “You’re out of it. You look like a kicked puppy, and that’s terrible for competition day.” Chenle, without warning, reaches up and sweeps Donghyuck’s hair to the side, dusting off his shirt and smoothing out the wrinkles. “So, for the sake of my reputation, put your big boy pants on, figure out why you’re so out of it, and don’t sound like an idiot in front of the cameras. Okay?” 

“I came as soon as your message was sent,” Jisung pants out of nowhere. “What’s going on? Why isn’t he at Third and Fourth?” He runs his eyes up and down Donghyuck, still fighting to catch his poor breath. 

“His head’s in the sand,” Chenle tells him dryly. “Could you take him there? Make sure he’s standing in front of the cameras before you leave.” 

Donghyuck rolls his eyes. “What are you, the guard?” 

“Can’t have you escaping, Hyuckie. You’re in the top three now, people have their eyes on you. You can’t have whatever is messing with your head show right now. And,” Chenle smiles sweetly at him, too sweetly. “I’ll throw you to the sharks if you make me look incompetent.” 

Chenle storms off, a phone call already connected and pressed up to his ear. Donghyuck watches him go, worry picking at his insides. “He…he can’t actually throw me to the sharks, right?” 

Jisung leads the way, head buried into his own iPad. “I wouldn’t test that theory. I’m pretty sure he’s friends with the shark feeders at the aquarium.” 

Donghyuck clamps his mouth shut. He’s no good apologizing to Yangyang if his entire torso is in the mouth of a Tiger Shark. That threat doesn’t seem too far off from reality. 

“Can I ask you a question?” Jisung begins, tapping a green button on the iPad before swiping it off. 

“Yeah, I guess,” Donghyuck says glumly, kicking a rock away from him. 

“I…I don’t want to pry, but I’ve never seen you this…down before. I mean, you were on top of your game at prelims and the whole crowd was chanting your name, and you ate it up.” Jisung slows so he can let a moping Donghyuck catch up. “What happened?” 

Donghyuck blows out a heavy sigh. “Have you ever had the greatest week of your life, only for all of it to go up in flames in one day?” 

Jisung scrunches up his nose. “When I was a freshman, Chenle and I went to every milkshake shack on the boardwalk for a week, but it was only after day five that we both realized that we’re a little lactose intolerant.” 

Donghyuck can’t help but laugh, and Jisung beams, knowing he got him to crack a smile. “Not like that, Sungie.” Donghyuck playfully pushes him. “Like…” He thinks of the right way to phrase it. “Like it went up in flames because it was your fault, and it didn’t only hurt you, but it hurt someone you really care about.” 

“Oh,” Jisung says slowly. “No, I guess not, then. But,” he adds with a little smile, “it sounds like you really care about the other person. Enough to make things better between you two.” 

“I do, Jisungie. I really do care about him.” Up ahead, Donghyuck sees the reporters speaking quickly to their cameramen, mics already in hand. “I just wish I didn’t say those things,” he says, softly. 

Jisung places a hand on his shoulder and squeezes. “If you care enough, and I think you do, then chances are he cares enough too.” It might be an accident or intentional, but Jisung flicks his eyes to his right, and Donghyuck follows his line of sight. 

Yangyang. He’s already smiling for the cameras, shoulders pushed back and surfboard neatly tucked beneath his arm. It’s only because Donghyuck is staring that he realizes the tenseness in his muscles, how forced the smile is appearing, very much unlike the bright and unapologetic grins Yangyang has tossed in his direction too many times to count. Chances are he cares enough too. Donghyuck can only hope for that helplessly. 

“Good luck!” Jisung wishes and before Donghyuck can get his attention again, Jisung is gone, iPad alive and whirring in his hand. And before he can even glance over at Yangyang again, a mic is thrusted into his face and a flash goes off, and Donghyuck is live. 

Finding and cornering Yangyang proves to be more difficult than Donghyuck could have predicted. It’s almost like a game of hide and seek. Yangyang would disappear for long minutes and just when Donghyuck finds him, he dips into another crowd to vanish again. Clearly, Yangyang is avoiding him, but Donghyuck can’t really blame him for that. 

Too soon the megaphone blares out the start of the competition and Donghyuck is being jet skied past the mounting waves. His board is strapped down to the side of the jet ski, but the water is choppier, rougher, that even Jaemin, who is driving them out, grunts a little with the effort of keeping his grip on the vehicle. Donghyuck instinctively reaches down and presses down on the straps holding his board, hoping Katara won’t be battered too much. 

Somewhere, across the mist and white foam, Yangyang is also being towed. Donghyuck wishes he had the guts to just go up to him before the contest. He wishes he could have loudly and boldly apologized to anyone and everyone, and maybe Yangyang would have heard and forgiven him, or not, but at least the bridge he is trying to fix had the foundation laid down. Most of all, Donghyuck wishes he had just paused that day on the ferris wheel and not let his emotions run off without him. 

“Watch out for the rocks!” 

Donghyuck startles, coming back to his reality of cold water pelting into his bare legs. “What?” 

“I said watch out for the rocks!” Jaemin yells over the engine of the jet ski. “The tide is pulling the waves closer to the rock strip. Ride to shore before you get caught in that current.” 

Donghyuck swallows. Maybe it’s because he’s uneasy about the whole Yangyang situation, but there’s a new level of worry underlined with every wave they crash through. The water is too rough. Too chaotic. Donghyuck and the ocean have a communication system on good days, but it’s near radio silent right now, and it has him chewing on his bottom lip. 

It’s not impossible. Some would say that rougher waters bring the better waves, and it wouldn’t be the first time Donghyuck has dragged his board into the tumultuous waters, but the only difference is that there is a looming figure just a few feet away that is there to remind Donghyuck of the loud silence he heard last night. To remind him of the terrible silence that the ocean left him with. Donghyuck can’t go through that again. Not when it matters so much and so deeply to him. 

“Listen, Donghyuck,” Jaemin says sternly as Donghyuck slips into the water, the board beneath him, bobbing up and down. “All things aside, it can get a little risky out there. I need you to focus on the ocean and we’ll deal with…land things on land.” 

Donghyuck wipes his face down with the back of his hand. “Keep an eye out for me.” 

“Be careful,” Jaemin says with a nod, and he pulls the jet ski some distance away. And there, just on the other side, is Yangyang, sitting on his board, squinting back to the shore. 

Good luck, Yangles! It’s right there on the tip of his tongue, threatening to erupt from his throat. But not yet. First, he needs to talk to him. And the only way he can make sure he catches Yangyang before he eludes him for another day is to ride the first wave. 

Donghyuck takes in a deep breath, smelling the salt air, the tangy scent of the ocean. He grips the sides of his board, his paradise stretched out on seven and half feet of polyurethane, and focuses on the sway of the water. The quicker pushes and pulls, not kind or gentle, but far more commanding. Screeching. A full force swirling and swirling beneath him. 

He feels it. The drawback of the surface, the height of the wave. 

This one. He’ll ride this one wave, finish the contest, and wait for Yangyang to arrive at the shore and he’ll let his heart sew itself back, jagged and messy, but he’ll make sure it’s whole again. Both his and Yangyang’s. 

Donghyuck slides down to his belly, eyes focused on the pinprick of sand and the spectators watching from the beach ahead. The pull is stronger, Donghyuck can feel it. Even Katara, his most prized possession, feels foreign beneath him. The swell is faster, more uncontrollable, but he can’t miss his one last chance to fix things. This is the wave. This has to be the wave. 

“Hyuck?” A voice calls to him from somewhere, and for a split second, he thinks it’s Yangyang’s voice, but the swell is beneath him, white tipped caps surrounding him and Donghyuck is on the move. 

“No! Hyuck, not this one!” 

Donghyuck doesn’t hear it. Like a million times over, he lets the ocean do the work for him. The wave rises, Donghyuck shifts his weight, the board tips forward and he’s in. He glides, arms stretched out for balance, balanced comfortably on his knees. The board cuts across the surface, water sprays onto his lips, and Donghyuck crouches, picking up speed and launching up the wall of the wave. His board kicks up over the lip and he zooms back down near the base, straightening to lose some of the speed. 

“Hyuck, the rocks!” 

The voice. Yangyang’s voice. Donghyuck blinks. The rocks. The rocks. 

A flash of slate grey, dark blue water beating the edges and white foam trailing slowly behind. He went the wrong way. He didn’t fall out of the wave soon enough. Shit. Shit. Donghyuck drops low, hoping to catch the lip of the wave again, hoping to gain the momentum to lurch up and over it, but the water was already curling in on itself. 

Donghyuck forces the panic back down his stomach, wills his heart to stop beating so fast. Time moves so slowly and several things happen at once. His board dips too low, the wave thinning and becoming shallow as it begins to die. It breaks the surface and Donghyuck is about to tip over, at the mercy of the wave and the incoming rocks. But not before he hears a shrill panicked shout come over the megaphone from shore. Not before he feels a jet ski come tearing across the surface of the water. And he doesn’t feel himself go under, the board knocking against his head, before he sees Yangyang paddling like hell towards him. 

Towards the rocks. Did he have a death wish? Donghyuck’s apology would be utterly useless if they both got caught at the rocks. Don’t be so reckless, Yangles. Donghyuck is the reckless one. He’s always been the reckless one. Donghyuck the crazy local. He always knew it’d catch up to him one day.  

Donghyuck’s vision finally goes black. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The natural thrum of the ocean isn’t there when his lashes twitch and his eyes flicker. It leaves a hollow feeling, like the missing puzzle piece. Instead, his head throbs. A lancing, steady beat that has him groaning as he pries his eyes open. He’s on some cot, like a makeshift bed that is wildly uncomfortable, but enough to hold him. The emergency tent, he realizes. 

That’s good. Whatever happened out there wasn’t serious enough to warrant a trip to the actual hospital. Which then begs the question: what happened out there? 

Donghyuck pulls himself up with a wince, pressing a hand to his head. 

“Woah, dude. Take it easy, alright?” 

Donghyuck freezes, every inch of him locking up at the sound of his voice. He bites his tongue as he turns to the source. 

“You hit your head really hard,” Yangyang says, and then his hands are gently pushing Donghyuck back down against the pillows. Yangyang’s hair is still damp, hanging limply over his forehead, and his face is still freshly flushed from…

“What were you thinking?” Donghyuck nearly explodes, the memories coming back in flashes, letting him piece the story together one by one. Jaemin’s jet ski spearing over the wave, panicked shouting from the shore, and Yangyang, somehow catching the next wave to come to him. “Swim towards the rocks? Are you stupid?” 

Only after the words leave his mouth does the parallel set in. He had said those same words back on the ferris wheel. He has to mentally slap himself. But aside from a muscle in Yangyang’s jaw feathering for a moment, he shows no response to the call back. “I should ask you the same thing,” he says, evenly. “You were supposed to dive in before you got caught in the current.” 

Donghyuck sinks further into his pillow. The only reason he took that chance, that risk, was so that he could force himself to talk to Yangyang afterwards. He glances over at the boy watching him intently from the chair beside the bed. Well. Looks like he gets to talk to him now, whether he is ready for it or not. The strain is pulled taut between them though, and Donghyuck knows he needs to let go of his side first, but no amount of convincing will make it easier for him. 

“That was a bad wave, Hyuck. Every surfer who has ever been on a wave could have seen it from miles away and would have skipped it.” Yangyang leans forward, bracing his elbows on his knees. “You knew it was a bad wave. Why did you ride it?” 

Chances are, he cares enough too. Jisung’s words that Donghyuck grasps onto, wishing with every fiber of his body that it rings with some truth. He picks at a thread over the sterile blanket over his legs. “I wanted to beat you,” he mumbles. Yangyang looks like Donghyuck is speaking a different language. “Not like that!” Donghyuck hurries on to say. “I…I wanted to get to shore before you did.” 

“Why?” 

All the courage, all the bravado, Donghyuck had mustered up before going into the water deflates like a loose balloon. It seeps out of his body in waves, leaving exhaustion, guilt, and a heart cleaved into two. All Donghyuck has for him is the unraveled version of himself. Donghyuck, the crazy local. 

He inhales, dropping the thread he was playing with. “I wanted to apologize,” he says, lifting his eyes to hold Yangyang’s own. Yangyang waits patiently, but he sits at the edge of his seat, leaning over as much as he can. “I’m sorry for everything I said yesterday. I’m sorry I jumped to all the wrong conclusions without listening to you. I’m sorry for thinking you were this terrible person who never cared about me when that shouldn’t have even mattered, because at the end of every single day, I cared enough about you.” 

Words spill like the steady sunrise Donghyuck witnesses every morning, coating the entire world in a wonderful gold. There is nothing he can do to stop the sun from rising, and there is nothing anyone can do to stop Donghyuck taping his heart back with unfiltered words and a terrible headache that promises not to go until he’s done his part. 

“I didn’t even know it, but I cared about you. I wanted to see you smile. I watched out for you everytime you and I were out on the water. I hoped you liked the restaurants I picked out for us, and, most of all, I hoped you felt the same way.” Outside the tent, wind billows in one strong gust, flapping the edges before it settles and prepares for the next blow. It wholly ignores the two boys inside the tent. Donghyuck kind of wishes they had this talk out there, with the storm slowly picking up. But, it’s better this way. No distractions. Just Donghyuck and his words he can’t take back. 

Yangyang finally shows a shaky smile, eyes crinkling with the gesture. “I guess I owe you an apology too.” 

Donghyuck’s brows lift and he clutches the blankets around him. “You? What for? 

“That wasn’t the greatest way to tell you that I wanted this to keep going.” 

It really shouldn’t have shocked Donghyuck, but his mouth swings open anyway. “You…you really mean that?” I wanted this to keep going. Not I hoped. Or I thought about it. He wanted it. Yangyang wanted him. Pressure begins to build behind his eyes at the revelation, heavy and straining, but Donghyuck doesn’t try to stop it.  

Yangyang giggles, and the final bandaid on Donghyuck’s heart seals over and whatever disaster he had created leaves like a receding wave, disappearing back into the void of the ocean again. “I meant all of it, Hyuck. Everything.” 

“Everything?” 

“I meant it when I told you that you were brighter than any sunrise I had ever seen. I meant it at the arcade that one night, that I could never grow tired of your laugh.” Yangyang tips the chair forward, enough to slowly reach out and clasp onto Donghyuck’s hand. His fingers latch perfectly onto the molds of Donghyuck’s knuckles, warm and enticing. 

“And I mean it right now when I tell you that you are the greatest thing to ever happen to me. And that I want to see more sunrises with you even if they will never compare. I want to catch the biggest and wildest waves and trust that you have my back the whole time. I want more diners, to share more milkshakes with two straws, and I’ll win every stuffed shark we come across for you.” 

Donghyuck’s throat locks up and when the first tear wells up in his eye, he really can’t do anything to stop it, or the ones following, from falling down his cheek. “Sorry,” he sniffles, wiping at his face, “I got some…sand in my eye.” 

Yangyang laughs, canines in full view as he takes Donghyuck’s other hand. “I was waiting to see who would be the first to say it. Knowing you, I figured you’d want to say it first.” 

“No, you go ahead,” Donghyuck hiccups, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. 

“Okay, then,” Yangyang agrees, amusement dripping from his voice. “But you have to look at me when I say it.” Deft fingers wrap around Donghyuck’s chin and lift his wet face up to meet his. Yangyang has to tilt his head a little, but he says, “I like you, Hyuck. I like you more than I like milkshakes with two straws. I like you more than t-shirt weather, and lazy Sunday afternoons.” 

Donghyuck weeps. He doesn’t even know why he’s being this emotional about it, but he can’t help himself. Yangyang has so much love to give to him, and Donghyuck has the privilege of basking in it. Of claiming it. And to think that he nearly lost it…well, he must love even harder then. 

“You’re so cheesy,” he says, drying his face with a wet chuckle. 

“Think you can do better?”

“Yangyang, I like you more than Katara.” 

“Don’t push it, now.” 

They laugh, smiling through the worries and fears that eventually melt totally away. Love him even harder. Donghyuck thinks he can do that. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jeno wins Pipeline. 

It all boiled down to the fact that Donghyuck did catch a wave before he ran into the rocks, and Yangyang, in his crazed attempt to reach him, also caught a wave, so the judges counted that. Donghyuck’s injury (if you could call it that. Renjun told him that a shark attack was more respectable. Which is kind of true. What sort of surfer rides the worst wave sent his way, and rides that terrible wave into some rocks? Donghyuck. That’s who) was minimal. A little bump on his head to show for his recklessness, but he wasn’t even concussed. So, all things said and done, the judges pulled the points together and Jeno came out winning. 

Chenle gave him an earful about his accident later. “I told you to not make me look like an idiot! And what did you do? Ride into the damn rocks!” 

Donghyuck only scooped the boy into his arms and squeezed the daylights out of him. “I brought you more coverage. Be grateful.” 

Chenle called him an oaf. Donghyuck took it as a compliment. 

Donghyuck whooped the loudest at the ceremony later on, a stunned Jeno receiving a large bouquet of flowers in addition to the giant trophy. He struggles to balance them all in his arms, while sporting an award winning smile, and then Wyatt McHale tosses Jeno up onto his shoulders with a happy shout. 

That part makes Donghyuck a little bit jealous, but at the end of the day, he catches Mark sneaking a kiss onto Jeno’s cheek at the final bonfire. To keep his mouth shut about it, Jeno delivers Donghyuck Wyatt’s number. 

So that’s where he finds himself. Sitting on a log with the fire roaring in front of him. Yangyang’s legs tangled with his as they scooch over to let Mark and Jeno bring a box of drinks from the open bar back on the boardwalk. Their knees bump and Donghyuck takes it as a sign to pull Yangyang by his waist until their sides touch. Yangyang huffs out a small laugh and only rests his head onto Donghyuck’s shoulder. Donghyuck’s heart soars . 

“No, you don’t understand,” Renjun was saying, getting riled up by Jaemin with his classic shit-eating grin. “Air fryers are the next big thing. They’ll change your life.” 

“I think you changed my life,” Jaemin says dreamily, earning a groan from Renjun. 

“Tell your friend I’ll push him off the pier,” Renjun tells Donghyuck angrily, but it only sets Jaemin off again, pulling the surfer onto his lap and kissing his ear. In the love wrestling, Renjun manages to free an arm and points a vicious finger at Donghyuck and Yangyang. “Traitors. All of you. I’ll remember this.” 

Chenle cackles from the opposite log, his phone out, snapping pictures left and right, causing Renjun to drop his head in defeat. It was strange to see him without a binder or an iPad in his hand, hustling to set everything in order, but Donghyuck quickly learns that he’s wicked. Jisung is an angel that is the only reason Chenle hasn’t set the whole ocean on fire yet. Or maybe he’s actually the devil incarnate. Donghyuck catches him slipping Chenle another bottle of beer on more than one occasion. 

“Dude, he’s got a point though,” Mark picks up. “Air fried waffles are, like, the best thing ever.” 

The scandalized look on Renjun’s face sends Donghyuck into a fit of laughter. He can’t stop when he realizes that Mark isn’t joking about air frying frozen waffles. Jeno mutters a quiet “Canadaians,” beneath his breath and promises to take Mark to a proper place for waffles. 

“Waffle House,” Yangyang supplies and Jeno takes the scandalized look, sending everyone into bouts of laughter, leaving them all in stitches. 

Despite all that, Renjun remains in Jaemin’s lap, eventually calming down and exchanging quiet words with each other. Mark and Jeno clink cans together, taking stupid photos with the trophy posted up in the sand. Chenle and Jisung have a moment? Donghyuck can’t tell, but Jisung’s knocked out, head on Chenle’s lap while Chenle runs his hand through his hair gently, a proper, real smile picking at his lips. 

And Yanyang clings to his arm, slowly massaging his shoulder. The embers dance up into the sky, the party rages on behind them, and Donghyuck feels the sand between his toes and Yangyang’s soft hair brushing up beneath his chin, and basks in the coolness of the sea air tugging its fingers through his body. 

Some forces are never meant to be tamed. Donghyuck thinks he’s figured out the intricacies of the ocean, the crests of the waves, the sparkle and glint of the surface at sunrise, the raw power of it all. The force lightly dozing off on his shoulder is a force he hasn’t tamed yet, and for once, he’s happy knowing he’ll never succeed at it. 

“I’m excited for the rest of summer,” Yangyang mumbles with his eyes still shut. 

Donghyuck smiles even if he can’t see it. “Why? Got any plans?” 

“Milkshakes, sleeping into the afternoon, more nights like this.” Yangyang sits up, turning to face Donghyuck. “I don’t think I need anything else.” A hand comes up and trails around Donghyuck’s neck comfortingly. “I’m only an hour and a half away.” 

There it is. It’s their last night at the competition. Donghyuck doesn’t know when he’ll see Yangyang again, and that is a thought he kept pushed to the far corners of his mind. “Promise you’ll drive down every single weekend.” Donghyuck holds up a pinky. “If you don’t, I’ll be at your doorstep and force you to get shakes with me.” 

Yangyang wraps his pinky around Donghyuck’s. “Promise.” 

For a moment, everything stills. Donghyuck peers into Yangyang’s starry eyes, the reflection of the fire acting like the waves he knows well, lifting and dropping with every blink. He’s acutely aware of Yangyang’s hand on his cheek, their proximity, and maybe if he strains his ears just a little, he’ll hear two hearts thumping at irregular speeds. 

“Can I…can I kiss you?” He says, not even noticing the words that he was thinking came out of his mouth. “You know, to seal the promise.” 

Yangyang sharply inhales a breath, those eyes gleaming. Donghyuck’s gaze drops down to his lips, and all he’s waiting for is the answer. 

“As long as this kiss is a promise of many more.” And before Donghyuck can register the words in whatever ecstatic daze he is in, Yangyang closes the space, tilting his head, and their lips meet in the middle. 

Donghyuck kisses him slowly, gently, just like a perfect first kiss, but with enough resolve to let Yangyang know, yes, he does promise many more kisses. Donghyuck laughs into the kiss and Yangyang sports his own shy smile, dropping his head back down to Donghyuck’s shoulder. “Oh stars, ” Donghyuck begins, falling backwards off the log until their backs rest against sand, and their legs dangle towards the fire. Fingers laced together, Donghyuck stares at the outline of Yangyang’s face. “You are so lovely, I’m so glad you exist.” 

Yangyang rolls over to press a soft kiss on his cheek and the warmth in Donghyuck’s chest explodes into a million pieces, shooting out to the tips of his hair, to the soles of his feet. “You don’t know how excited I am to have you be a part of my life,” he tells him, fingers tightening around Donghyuck’s hand, and oh how wonderful of a privilege it is to give this boy so full of sunshine, brimming with endless possibilities and trust, Donghyuck’s entire heart. 

“That’s two promises, Hyuckie,” Yangyang says lightly, watching the stars high up above them. “I’ll hold you to them.” 

Three, Donghyuck thinks to himself. He promises to visit, to give more kisses, and to love Yangyang with the force of a tidal wave crashing over them.