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It’s Christmas day and Sieun can hear the rapping on his front door come in their typical hyper bursts. It starts off soft with a melodic, “Sieun-ah~” being called from outside. It quickly turns aggressive. He walks over to the door, homework assignment abandoned on his desk as he restrains himself from rolling his eyes. He knew this was bound to happen.
On the other side of the door stands an impatient Suho dressed in a bright red puffer jacket bearing a crudely wrapped gift hidden underneath his arm. Both of his shoes are untied, showing his haste in getting here. Despite, it being 2 p.m. on Christmas day, he wouldn’t have arrived so late in the day unless he had just woken up- which he had. His messy hair and untamed cowlick being the giveaway.
The front door creaks open just as Suho’s palm raises for his 4th set of knocking. Sieun’s face is completely unimpressed as he takes Suho in. He cocks an eyebrow unamused as he stares up at the other boy with an expectant look to whatever chaos he’s brought with him today. But that’s where Sieun is truly blind. This boy doesn’t have a predictable bone in his body.
Without so much as a greeting, he rushes into the apartment, kicks off his shoes, pushes the present into a shocked Sieun’s hands, runs into his bedroom, and closes the door. Just as Sieun gets his bearings, he closes the front door and pads over to his room softly, confusion evident on his face. The floorboads croak under his weight. “Suho?” He asks outside the door, hand reaching for the knob. As soon as he tries to open it, he hears the click of the lock. “Get out of my room.” He states.
To any other person, he’d sound blank and empty, his voice as monotonous and void as his expressions. But Suho could hear the tinge of curiosity and that was all he needed to be spurred on. There was an odd minute of silence, Sieun growing more and more curious as he stood quietly outside of his own bedroom door waiting to be let in. He could hear shuffling inside, grunts, and a few hard footsteps that sounded like Suho had almost fallen a couple times. And then the door unlocked.
When Sieun opened the door, he wasn’t sure what he was going to find. But as his eyes trailed over the starfish-stood Suho, he had to blink repeatedly to keep himself in control. Suho stood, arms and legs spread wide. A lame Christmas light necklace blinking fast festive colors hung down over his chest. He wore lipstick red nose painted hurriedly on his face, the circle uneven over the bridge of his nose. A tall antler headband with two cheaply tied bows and jingle bells on them shook as he steadied himself. And, from his neck down to his ankles? A brown onesie that on closer inspection was, in fact, meant to be a reindeer. He smiled brightly, teeth baring as Sieun loosened the grip on the box in his hands. Sometimes.. There were simply no words.
“Merry Christmas. Now open your present.” Suho rushed out, his chest rising and falling out of breath.
Sieun blinked again before looking down. He hadn’t opened a Christmas present in years. His fingers slipped under the tape on the sides, ripping the paper slightly. His lips tightened, tape seemed to be placed everywhere except where it needed to be. The elf-printed wrapping paper fell off and clung to the bottom of the shoebox with a stray piece of what appeared to be double-sided tape. As he opened the lid, his face grew tighter. Inside was a neatly packed box of assorted homemade cookies, an envelope with a bunch of doodles and crude handwriting on it, and a bright green shirt. His eyebrows furrowed. He reached in to pull it out. As he held it out in front of him, it unraveled. Greens, reds, and white all mixed in a hideous combination that made a quick exhale leave him. It was an elf onesie.
In front of him, Suho’s grin grew twice as big. His eyes turned to crescents as he watched Sieun avoid his gaze. He refused to move from his starfish pose. “Well?” He asked with a strained voice. “Put it on.” His hands shook, his body tensed.
Sieun shook his head slowly. Face as blank as he could force. “No.” His lips quirked up despite himself. He, too, grew tense.
“Please?” Suho asked, seemingly even more out of breath.
Sieun shook his head again, this time just a bit faster. “No.”
“Please?” Suho asked again, abs tensing as he willed himself not to start crying.
“No..” It came out barely a whisper. Sieun looked up at him with the tightest of smiles.
“P-Please-“
“Suho.”
…
Later, they sit on the couch side by side, Suho’s lipstick nose smeared and antlers discarded somewhere. A bowl of popcorn resides between them that Suho nearly knocks over every time he reaches to grab some, his other arm strewn across the back of the couch lazily. Sieun wears the monstrosity of a onesie, the legs just a bit too long for him. A throw blanket loosely covers their knees and they chat inbetween commercials of the old foreign film they watch. Suho has to bite back his “Santa’s Little Helper” comments. Sieun has to restrain himself from kicking Suho out. And of course, they laugh when their holiday film turns out to be a horror. One quiet, one loud.
The cookies from Halmeoni are long gone and the card sits opened on Sieun’s desk. During one of Suho’s bathroom breaks, he sneaks a quick read of it. Inside is scrawled drawings of the two of them fighting “bad guys”, stick figures being Suho’s media of choice for his artistic endeavor. In the corner is a paragraph, one filled with typos.
I know we only met earlier this year, but you should know that Halmeoni thinks you’re my best friend. She’s expecting you to come over more often especially after making you cookies. Don’t disappoint her.
Thanks for being the best part of my year.
It was enough to make him smile. When Suho got back out of the bathroom, he had about a million questions as to what possibly could have made him so happy. He never said. They simply moved on.
The rest of the night was spent in a soda-induced blur. Between the sugar overload and the Wii Sport’s “deathmatches” Suho passed out early. He laid in Sieun’s bed curled up with his gift- a cheap polar bear plushie that Sieun had found in a children’s store across the street from his after-school academy. Despite his coziness, his freehand, the one that didn’t have a death grip on his favorite gift ever, was wrapped firmly around Sieun’s. It was his way of “staying warm” he said. And who was Sieun to deny him? He had never been able to say no to him before. Why start now?
The end lmao