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It all started with Sunghoon's lame jokes.
Sunghoon has always had a different humor from the rest of their friend group. He has a strange liking for bad jokes. They're really stupid, lame jokes, sometimes even downright horrendous. Jongseong would smack him over the back of his head for those most of the time, that is if Jungwon wouldn't get him first.
But because it's Sunghoon telling them, Jongseong somehow finds himself laughing at his dumb dad jokes more often than not. Sunghoon, who tells jokes to lighten the mood or diffuse a situation. Sunghoon, who tells jokes to make Jungwon smile after his break up. Sunghoon, who tells jokes to have Sunoo's displeased expression turned towards him instead of Riki, who accidentally broke Sunoo's favorite perfume bottle by playing with a baseball in the apartment.
Sunghoon, who is his roommate. Sunghoon, who sings too loud in the shower. Sunghoon, who has a funny laugh. Sunghoon, who teases the hell out of Jongseong.
Sunghoon, who brightens his day.
It escaped Jongseong at first. But then he had a bad day— work was shitty, the weather was shitty, he had a fight with his mother which was also shitty. Jongseong just wanted to go to sleep so this shitty day would be over.
But then Sunghoon came home from work with a bag of takeout and a bunch of different corn snacks for Jongseong. They both sat down to eat while watching some random drama that was playing on TV. And Sunghoon couldn't shut his mouth the whole time, adding insignificant comments, making fun of the characters, cracking stupid jokes that had Jongseong tearing up from too much laughter.
He'd told Sunghoon while wiping away the wetness in the corner of his eye, "Your stupid jokes made my day, Sunghoon-ah."
The look on Sunghoon's face is still clear in his memory—surprised at first, then it melted into something earnest, happy, proud, and just a little bit bashful.
The next day, when Jongseong opens his laptop to start working, there is a post-it note stuck on his screen.
"I cut myself shredding cheese. I wanted to blame someone else, but then I remembered…With grate power comes grate responsibility."
At first Jongseong is confused and a little bit worried reading the first sentence in Sunghoon's writing. By the end of the note, he is face-palming, groaning in defeat because it actually made him smile.
This was the beginning of their post-it note routine. Every morning when he opens his laptop, he is greeted by a joke, cutely written in Sunghoon's neat handwriting.
"What did Newton think when he discovered gravity?
Shit is about to go down."
Jongseong smiles.
"What do you call a group of men waiting for a haircut?
A barbercue."
Jongseong giggles.
"What did the blanket say when it fell off the bed?
Oh sheet!"
Jongseong snorts. Very loud and ungraceful but thankfully no one is around to hear it.
"What did the sushi say to the bee?
Wasabi."
Jongseong laughs so hard he falls off the chair. Later, when Sunghoon walks in the apartment with an expectant smile on his lips, Jongseong will pretend the joke was only decent. Although by the way Sunghoon's smile widens, he doesn't buy the act.
The post-it note jokes keep going for a few weeks. Jongseong's gotten so used to starting his day with a good laugh that he doesn't expect it at all when instead of a dad joke, the post-it note reads "You're beautiful, Jongseong-ah." And when he says that he didn't expect it, he really means it because Jongseong literally drops the cup of coffee in his hand from the shock.
By the time Sunghoon comes home, the floor is squeaky clean. Jongseong is mindlessly watching a cooking show on TV. He greets him as usual, acts completely normal. Sunghoon doesn't say anything out of the ordinary either. When they're both in the kitchen, Jongseong washing dishes and Sunghoon cleaning up the table, Sunghoon sees the broken cup of coffee in the trash and raises an eyebrow. Jongseong ignores it, the way he also ignores the amused quirk of Sunghoon's lips.
The compliments post-it notes don't end there. Jongseong would say he misses the jokes, only to take his mind away from the fact that he's a flustered mess after reading every beautiful thing Sunghoon has to say about him. It's jarring, how much it affects him. He can't concentrate during work, can't look Sunghoon in the eye when the other gives him that knowing smile. Jongseong doesn't mention it and Sunghoon doesn't either, clearly waiting for him to react in some way.
But at some point Sunghoon gets tired of waiting.
It's the first time the note holds a question that doesn't end in a stupidly funny answer.
"Will you go out to dinner with me tonight?"
The stupidly funny answer to this would be Jongseong's reaction—he abruptly closes the laptop, a little too harshly but anything to get the note out of his sight, and screams. It's something between a shocked and a horrified scream. A few minutes later, when he’s calmed down (read: Jungwon talked him out of a disastrous meltdown), he realizes that his reaction had been a bit overdramatic. But you can't blame him, he's tried to ignore the clear signs Sunghoon has been giving him for the past few weeks—the tender looks, the gentle touches, the soft teasing, the fucking post-it notes. He's tried to ignore the growing warmth in his chest, the inevitable feelings making a home in his heart, the infuriating desire to kiss Sunghoon silly every single time the man stares at him a bit too long.
This time when Sunghoon arrives home, Jongseong is waiting for him on the couch, dressed in the most chic outfit he could pull out of his closet.
Sunghoon greets him normally, then does a double take, finally acknowledging the situation.
"Hi," he breathes out, repeating his greeting, eyes blown wide.
"Hey." Jongseong stands up, slowly making his way towards his roommate, loving the way Sunghoon's starstruck gaze isn't leaving him even for a second.
"Do you really want to go?" Sunghoon sounds completely dumbfounded. Jongseong would laugh, if he didn't find him so cute, with his eyes so adorably big and his perfect eyebrows slightly scrunched. "You know what that invitation meant, right?"
Jongseong can't help but roll his eyes. "I'm very much aware." He softens the sassy tone by adding a gentle smile.
Sunghoon breaths out a small laugh, incredulous. Then with a newfound determination, he nods. "I'm gonna change quickly and we can go."
Jongseong didn't expect the date to be really impressive. No offense to Sunghoon, but they've known each other for years. They literally live together. They've seen each other date other people. One of the excitements of going on first dates was getting to know each other, and Jongseong thought he knew everything there is to know about Sunghoon.
But that didn't end up mattering. Jongseong didn't realize that his entire view of Sunghoon has changed now that he finally stopped ignoring his feelings. He sees him in another light—the gross, lovey-dovey, heart shaped reflector light brought by actually going on a date with him. Jongseong wants to smack himself right now but he's too busy smiling like a fool the entire time. And he sees the same smile reflected on Sunghoon's terribly gorgeous face.
He might throw up from how sweet the entire date was. And how giddy he feels when they go back home, hand in hand. And how fucking lightheaded he feels as Sunghoon kisses him right against the door of their apartment.
A lot of things change after that.
But one thing stays the same—the post-it notes.
He keeps opening his laptop to cute messages from Sunghoon that make his face split into a sickening, lovestruck grin.
The messages vary—from compliments, to stupid pick-up lines, to sweet nothings.
However, there's another one that catches him off guard and makes him go crazy the entire day.
"I can still feel your soft skin underneath my fingertips. I can still feel your lips against my own. I can still feel your teeth leaving marks on my skin. You drive me crazy, Park Jongseong."
Jongseong chokes on his coffee when he reads it. And it takes him about five minutes of incessant coughing to get his breathing back to normal.
Sunghoon is rewarded that night with the most passionate kiss they've ever shared and the most mind-blowing blowjob of his life.
Things have changed, but at the same time they're still Sunghoon and Jongseong. They still bicker about household chores (and almost everything else), Sunghoon still teases the hell out of him, Jongseong still insists his jokes are dumb despite laughing at them.
It's been months of dating and things are well. Sunghoon is still writing post-it notes. Some are still sweet, some are a little braver and dirty. Jongseong got used to them all, nothing can surprise him anymore.
Except the one that comes on one random morning, when Jongseong barely gets himself out of bed, the tendrils of sleep still tugging on his eyelids.
He barely takes in the note, rips it off his screen and almost puts it to the side to read it later, too tired for it. But he stops himself, one word catching his attention. His heart does a weird flip in his chest and he gasps.
It's the shortest message that has been written so far on these notes, yet the impact it has on Jongseong is immense.
There, written in Sunghoon's handwriting, is a simple "I’m in love with you." There's a messily drawn heart next to it that Jongseong knows Sunghoon cringed at after drawing it, yet still left it there because he knew it would make Jongseong smile.
His chest is filled with so much warmth that he thinks he will explode if he has to wait until this evening to let all these feelings flow out of him.
When Sunghoon enters the apartment too many hours later, he's greeted with an armful of his boyfriend, clinging onto him as Jongseong wraps around his body like a koala. Sunghoon doesn't get to ask questions before he's silenced with a deep, slow kiss that draws all the air out of his lungs. Sunghoon makes a high noise that has Jongseong deepening the kiss even further, biting and licking into his mouth until Sunghoon stumbles backwards, his back hitting the hard metal of the door.
"I’m in love with you, too, you idiot," is whispered on the seam of Sunghoon's lips, a tender breath before Jongseong dives back in with renewed fervor.