Chapter Text
It’s three AM and Kyungsoo is halfway through highlighting the second law of thermodynamics when Park Chanyeol comes trotting up to his nice, quiet table in the nice, quiet corner of the library, and slams a can of Starbucks Doubleshot Energy Mocha drink on the table with the ferocity of ten semi-finalist dance moms. Why he’s studying at buttfuck o’clock, Kyungsoo has no idea; why Chanyeol has clearly just woken up—five-day hoodie with the university’s emblem, bed head and puffy eyes—purely to annoy him, Kyungsoo doubly has no idea.
“What,” he says, without looking up from his notes, “do you want?”
Chanyeol clutches at his chest in mock-offence. Damn, Kyungsoo’d hoped he’d real-offended Chanyeol. Maybe then he would screw off and leave Kyungsoo alone.
“What makes you think I want something from you? Can’t I visit my good ol’ buddy Kyungsoo without having ulterior motives?”
At that, Kyungsoo looks at him and raises his left eyebrow in an arc more elegant than Stephen Curry’s eighteenth shot in the 2013 New York Knick’s game.
“Goodbye,” he says. Order has become disorder. Blue seems like a good colour for the third law.
“No, wait!” Chanyeol says hurriedly. “I have. Um. Something to ask.”
He drops himself into the empty seat opposite Kyungsoo’s and slumps down, looking all too tired of whatever shit is going down in his life that Kyungsoo could literally not give one goshdarned wankstain about because 3.8 GPA, harsh truth about reality crashing down on him, crippling fear of becoming a hobo, or worse yet, the victim of Joonmyun’s charity, et cetera. It’d better not be a favour because Kyungsoo really doesn’t want to use his Please Leave Right This Instant or This Pen Will Go Straight Up Your Rectum and I Really Like This Pen face, and him and Chanyeol? They aren’t really friends anyway. Kyungsoo is like the guy Chanyeol hangs out with when everyone else is busy and he’s already gotten three stars on all the Grand Prix cups in Mario Kart 1 to 8 for the fifth time. Chanyeol is like the guy Kyungsoo is forced to hang out with when everyone else is busy and Chanyeol’s gotten bored of playing through all the Mario Kart games for the fifth time. And he’s also the same guy that Kyungsoo regularly bangs on a biweekly basis.
Okay, so they’re not friends. But they’re friends-with-benefits. Except not really. They’re more like…enemies-with-benefits? Except they’re not really like that either, because Kyungsoo hates a million and one things about Chanyeol but, ugh, he doesn’t hate Chanyeol. They’re more like I’d-rather-get-bitten-by-a-vampire-and-become-immortal-whilst-shoving-a-screwdriver-up-my-anal-passage-for-the-rest-of-the-eternity-I’m-doomed-to-live-only-that-sounds-kind-of-painful-so-you’ll-have-to-do-with-benefits because Chanyeol is what society calls ‘a waste of space and also an utter piece of shit’, but he has a nice dick.
It starts when everyone in their mutual friendship group starts this massive circlejerk of being in cocksucking shenanigans with each other and Jongdae bounces off to China on a cultural exchange trip. The last words Kyungsoo had said to Jongdae when he’d seen Jongdae off in the airport were, “This is awfully expensive way to find out that being a Chinese cumdump is the same as being a Korean cumdump,” and Jongdae had punched him squarely on the nose by the seating area before blowing him a kiss from the check-in queue. Kyungsoo’s nose is still a little crooked. He wears it like a war trophy, which goes well with his patented Awkward Fifth Wheel look.
Somewhere between the first month of that happening and Kyungsoo eating his first ever Pop-Tart, which Jongdae’s Chinese-Canadian friend-exchange-dudey-thing gives him as a peace offering, everyone ditches both Chanyeol and Kyungsoo to have a huge, jizz-filled orgy or something, like fuck if Kyungsoo knows because why else would everyone coincidentally have an excuse to bail on movie night all at the same time? They watch through The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, three of the Die Hards and ten minutes into the fourth, Chanyeol puts the television on mute and says, “Wanna watch something else get hard?”
In hindsight, Kyungsoo thinks that this had just been an incredibly, long-winded game of Hide the Sausage and someone had figured that one of them ought’ve won by now.
“And why would I want to do that?” says Kyungsoo. His mouth dries up. Chanyeol looks hot in dark when Kyungsoo can’t see his smug bitch-face.
“Because I’m gonna suck your dick, dude.”
“And why would I let you do that?”
“Well, for starters, I like sucking dick,” says Chanyeol. Oh, and this is also how Kyungsoo finds out Chanyeol is gay, which is like the biggest fucking surprise of the century because hitting on girls and actually getting their numbers for some inexplicable reason Kyungsoo cannot fathom is like breathing to Chanyeol. “And for seconders,” he leans forward and waggles his eyebrows, “I’m really good at it.”
Kyungsoo says, “No, fuck off, as if I would ever let those beaver-teeth near my wang,” and Chanyeol cries from the immense sadness at the rejection from having a taste of Kyungsoo’s delectable manmeat and all is good with the world.
Oh, wait. He doesn’t.
He actually mumbles out, “Okay,” and Chanyeol sucks his dick, which he will not graphically describe because that is much too explicit for this rating, and all is good for about twenty seconds in the afterglow and Chanyeol’s wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, and for some even more inexplicable reason, things get better when Kyungsoo jacks him off and Chanyeol comes over Kyungsoo’s fist with a face Kyungsoo still jerks off to in the shower to this day.
But Kyungsoo digresses.
A quick recap after that tangent: buttfuck o’clock, disruptive Chanyeol, Chanyeol wanting to ask something and being weirdly nervous, cue long flashback. If Kyungsoo’s life were a three-hundred page epic memoir, he would’ve just saved you five seconds of scrolling up. You’re welcome.
“Spit it out,” says Kyungsoo when Chanyeol’s still hesitating. “I don’t have time for this.”
“Okay, jeez, calm down. Your blood pressure’s higher than—“
“Say the fucking thing,” Kyungsoo says, pairing it with a glare to make it extra effective. It works.
Chanyeol sighs and slings an arm over the back of his chair. Oh, sweet holy lord, even that irritates Kyungsoo because Chanyeol looks like some 1950s greaser dude and Kyungsoo cannot believe he has let this guy dingledongle him before.
“Here’s the deal. Basically, my cousin’s having her wedding next weekend and I RSVP’d with a plus-one because. Spur of the moment. Gotta live life on the edge, y’know? Be spontaneous and shit. I don’t know. I guess I just didn’t want to seem like a lame, loner loser who sits by himself at the kiddie table whilst everyone else is mackin’ it over the cake.”
“You don’t seem like a lame, loner loser,” Kyungsoo interjects. “You are a lame, loner loser.”
Chanyeol kicks him under the table. Worth it.
“Anyway, I don’t actually have a plus-one, so I freaked out for a bit, right? Like, oh shit, everyone’s gonna expect me to turn up with my girlfriend because they still think I’m straight and not single, but then Baekhyun was like, dude, this is the perfect opportunity to kill two spiders with one stone because I like birds. Birds are the shit. So. Yeah. Um. Wanna be my plus-one and, uh, whilst you’re at it, be my boyfriend?”
“Uh huh,” says Kyungsoo. “And you thought three AM would be the best time to ask me that.”
Now Kyungsoo remembers why he studies at buttfuck o’clock. This is exactly the reason why Kyungsoo only takes night classes and has pretty much embarked on his journey to become a nocturnal creature of the night who studies at dead hours in the morning: to avoid people like Chanyeol coming up to him and splashing coffee over his flashcards and spewing inane drivel whilst he is trying to maintain his 3.8 GPA.
“Three AM is the best time for doing shit you’re not gonna chicken out of because you're too tired to realise how dumb of an idea it is,” Chanyeol says wisely. “So, how about it? Be my boyfriend?”
The tips of his ears are red. Kyungsoo deliberately thinks that it’s not cute at all, not in this universe and not in any parallel universes ever to exist ever.
“Okay, one question,” he says.
“Shoot.”
“Why on this filthy, moron-infested planet would I want to be your boyfriend?”
“Oh,” says Chanyeol. He grins and absentmindedly scratches the scar on his arm that he’d told Kyungsoo he’d gotten when he was six and had fallen off the swings in the park after the eighth time they’d fucked and Kyungsoo had stayed ‘til the morning. His teeth shine in the artificial library lighting because he uses crappy whitening toothpaste for his Colgate smile, but at least Kyungsoo knows him enough to know that it’s fake. His eyes don’t crinkle up into mismatched crescents like they usually do, and his voice sounds flat when he says, “Haha, yeah, I guess you’re right. I’ll get going, then. You’ve got your 3.5 GPA and stuff to get on with.”
He stands up and pulls his hood over his head as he pushes the chair back under the table and begins to walk to the exit. Kyungsoo knows a lot of things, from every single character Sugita Tomokazu has voiced to every element on the Periodic Table. He doesn’t know how a six-foot gangly boy with ridiculously defined biceps can look like a tiny, kicked puppy. Goddammit. He knows where this is going. He cannot stop it from going. It’s going. It’s goddamn freakin’ going.
“Come back. I didn’t say no,” says Kyungsoo. "And it's 3.8, actually."
Chanyeol whips around quickly and looks at Kyungsoo hopefully.
It’s gone.
“Sit down, you look like a dork,” Kyungsoo says. Damn his weak spot for tall gangly boys with stupidly firm biceps!
Chanyeol is smiling for real as he sits back down, lopsided and unrestrained. “I don’t look like a dork,” he says. “I am a dork.”
“Preach it, sister,” Kyungsoo says. “So, hypothetically, if I agree, what do I get out of this deal? Entice me. I am not doing this for free.”
“My everlasting love and affection?” Chanyeol suggests.
“Beep-boop, wrong answer, game over, goodbye.”
“Fine,” says Chanyeol. “My entire Friends box set.”
“You’re letting me borrow it? I could stream that shit for free on Jongdae’s Netflix within this month before his free trial ends if I wanted to watch it.”
“No.” Chanyeol leans in and lowers his voice as he whispers conspiratorially, “I’m letting you have it. Ah, the things I do for love.”
“…Oh damn, I can’t say no to that,” says Kyungsoo. “Fine.”
“Fine what?”
“Fine, I’ll be your stupid boyfriend-slash-plus-one or whatever, god, Jesus fuck,” says Kyungsoo.
Chanyeol lets out a loud whoop and a cheer. The weird dog kid in the year below, Jongin, throws an eraser at Chanyeol’s head. Chanyeol stops whooping and cheering, but he doesn’t stop grinning. “Okay, cool. That’s cool. I’m cool. Cool. As ice. As leftover pizza from the fridge. As—“
“Oh my god, shut up,” says Kyungsoo. “Out of curiosity, why didn't you just ask Baekhyun to go with you or something? I’m sure he’d love the free food because he’s a freeloading little shitbag.”
“Why would I ask Baekhyun?” says Chanyeol. He has his Confused Puppy face on, which makes Kyungsoo feel the least violent rage out of all of Chanyeol’s puppy faces. “Besides, he has a girlfriend.”
“Yeah, but he’s, like, your best bro. I’m sure he would’ve gone with you as a favour or something.”
“But I don’t like him…?”
Chanyeol looks at Kyungsoo. Kyungsoo squints at Chanyeol. He left his glasses in his apartment.
Oh my tittyfuck, thinks Kyungsoo. Chanyeol is beyond stupid. He has transcended levels of stupid and established a whole new level of stupid. Stupidity on the astral plane, if you will. Stupidsville, population: one. Chanyeol is probably just doing this to fuck with him and this time, unlike all the other one-too-many times, it’s metaphorical. Kyungsoo simultaneously facepalms and takes the zeroth law’s highlight virginity with his big, red throbbing Stabilo Boss Original.
“Ugh, whatever,” he says. “Just get out of here already. If I have to look at your horrid visage any longer, I fear I may have to gouge out my retinas with my own bare hands.”
Chanyeol salutes him at the door and hollers across the room, “Laters, babe. I love you, honey. See you at home, my darling. Don’t forget the supplies! It’s gonna be a long night. Don’t be stingy with the lube!”
It echoes. Of course it fucking echoes. All Kyungsoo can hear for the next five minutes is, Don’t be stingy with the lube! Don’t be stingy with the lube! Don’t be stingy with the lube…with the lube…the lube…lube…
He sinks into his seat in mortification and turns bright red when Weird Dog Boy winks at him, but he still can’t stop the smile from creeping onto his face.
He fucking hates Chanyeol.
Kyungsoo forgets about the deal he has made with the Devil all the way up to the evening a few days before the wedding when he’s cooking spaghetti for dinner. His life is relatively and suspiciously peaceful until six forty-eight PM when his phone bleeps and Kris, the exchange student, jumps out of his skin in the conjoined living room. It’s kind of funny because he’s, like, taller than Chanyeol with these angry eyebrows Kyungsoo is ninety-nine percent sure are inhabited by an undiscovered species of small animal, but he’s so…twitchy. Like a frightened little deer. Kyungsoo is not that scary. Well, maybe he is. All his clothes are internationally shipped from Hot Topic.
“It’s just my phone,” says Kyungsoo, smiling reassuringly.
Kris half-smiles back and turns to his laptop again where Kyungsoo knows he’s writing homoerotic slash fiction about some Chinese celebrity called Z.TAO. It is something Kyungsoo wishes he never knew. He regrets the day he’d gotten curious about why Kris never lets anyone look at his laptop and sneaked onto it whilst Kris was showering. He knows the horrific truth now.
Kyungsoo turns the heat down and checks his message. Oh god, it’s from Chanyeol. Hell is real and Kyungsoo is burning in its fiery depths whilst his heart rate kicks up a few notches unintentionally and he feels warm in his stomach as he remembers the Thing. Why are his body parts betraying him like this!? He treats his body like a temple. Albeit an abandoned, rundown temple in the outskirts of nowhere, but still a temple. This is treason of the highest degree.
hey babe don’t forget to rent a tux! or i guess if you already have one don’t rent one haha, it reads, along with ‘deets’ about the time when they’re going to set off. Apparently, Chanyeol has a “thing” beforehand so Kyungsoo will have to trek the ten blocks from his apartment to Chanyeol and Baekhyun’s dorm on campus and wait for him there before Chanyeol drives them both to the wedding. Trust him to make things unnecessarily complicated like that. At the end of the text, Chanyeol has added a few xoxox kisses for ironic purposes and Kyungsoo rolls his eyes.
He replies with, OK, and goes back to cooking. He chops up the frankfurters and does not heed the gentle heating instructions on the packet, instead tossing them in the pan with the aggression and fury of adult Simba when he found out Scar intentionally killed Mufasa and bitchslapped that fucker off the cliff.
“Hey, dinner’s on the table, okay? Just eat it whenever,” he says to Kris as he takes his own plate into his room and checks his Skype on his laptop. Thank god Jongdae is online. He might be insufferable in real life as a roommate, but he is Kyungsoo’s romantic confidant and the only person who knows that Kyungsoo and Chanyeol have touched each other’s censored parts. Not because Kyungsoo intentionally told him—as he predicted, Jongdae finding out has only led to his embarrassment and humiliation, which was precisely what Kyungsoo was trying to avoid—but because after Chanyeol kept coming out of his room with a limp and a dumb grin on his face, Jongdae caught on. And thus began many months extremely personally intrusive questions and harassment about the sordid details of their illicit love affair.
Apparently, Jongdae has the same idea as him because Jongdae is calling him first, and Kyungsoo clicks on the green button to accept, letting his lips curl up when he sees his best friend on screen, in his pyjamas and wrapped up in a blanket. He misses Jongdae, even though Jongdae is an awful human being, because Kyungsoo’s sort of awful too. Jongdae listens to him complain and whine about how everything in this world is terrible and how everything pisses him off and Kyungsoo misses having a roommate that actually talks to him and isn’t constantly terrified to be in his presence, even if that roommate likes making sexual innuendos way too much and leaves his socks everywhere.
“CONGRATULATIONS!!!!” yells Jongdae, producing a party popper from the swathes of his comforter and popping that party.
“You don’t have to shout, you know,” says Kyungsoo, wincing because he has headphones on as to not disturb his weak-hearted Chinese-Canadian friend.
“No, I do!” Jongdae says. “My two best friends are now in amorous cahoots with each other! Yay! At last, after three million years!”
“So he already told you, huh? Ugh, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” says Kyungsoo. “I can’t believe he asked me to be his fake boyfriend just to go to his stupid wedding. I can’t believe I agreed. I’m so stupid. This is stupid.”
“Wait, what? Fake boyfriend?”
“Uh, yeah? I mean, he did say he didn’t want to look like a loser in front of his family, so I guess he just wants me to make him look good or something, as arm candy. I just don’t get why he asked me. He could’ve asked literally anyone else. What about Minseok? Minseok’s a way better choice. He smiles at people. Chanyeol knows I’m just going to glare at everyone and shove hors d'oeuvres into my pockets.”
“Oh,” says Jongdae, and then, “oh,” in realisation like he’s finally managed to get something through that thick skull of his. “Oh, I see. This is great, holy shit.” Kyungsoo scowls at him. Jongdae clears his throat and wipes the smarmy look off his face, though Kyungsoo can tell he is trying really hard not to smirk. “Sorry. I mean, oh no, this sucks. Want to talk about it?”
“No,” says Kyungsoo. “Feelings suck. Feelings are the chlamydia of the brain.”
“All that talk about being a slut for knowledge has come to bite you in the ass,” Jongdae replies, amused. “Tell me more.”
Kyungsoo groans and has to physically stop himself from smooshing his face into his spaghetti. “I don’t know. I just. I have these feelings! And I don’t like them!”
“I can tell that we’re going nowhere with this. Okay, uh. Have you ever considered that why you’re having feelings about being Chanyeol’s fake boyfriend is, ipso facto, a sign of your—ah, how do I put this without you using my air miles and hopping on the first plane here to punch me?—romantic inclination towards him?”
“Implying…?”
“Implying that you like him so you don’t just want to be his fake boyfriend for one day. You want to be his real boyfriend for many, many days until you grow old together and tend to the daffodils outside your old people’s bungalow in case you fall down the stairs and you can’t get up.”
“Hmm,” says Kyungsoo. “Have you ever considered that ipso facto fuck you?”
“I would love you to, if the prayers to the deities Chanyeol keeps screaming through my walls are any indication of your sexual prowess, but alas! Our tryst may never bloom into fruition as our hearts are countries apart.”
“Oh my god, fuck you. Fuck you so much. Fuck you with your stupid Chinese-Canadian friend’s massive unlubed cock.”
“What can I say? I love the D and the D loves me,” Jongdae says.
“I can’t believe people like you are allowed to breed.”
“That is why I am gay, my dear,” says Jongdae, winking. “Besides, if you actually fucked me, I think Chanyeol would throw a tantrum.”
“Why would he do that?”
Jongdae smiles knowingly. “Why do you think he would do that?”
“Don’t answer my question with another question.”
“Why can’t I answer your question with another qu—“
Kyungsoo hangs up.
He just wanted some Helpful Advice and now his mood has gone rapidly downhill. He forgot how insufferable Jongdae’s bullshit was. He isn’t an idiot. Jongdae is implying that he likes Chanyeol. Which is, okay, fine, true. At first, Kyungsoo had been all like, I like the dick, but not anything else attached to the dick, which quickly became, I like the dick and I guess his arms are really nice too, which became, I like the dick and I guess he’s kind of funny when he’s not being an ass, which became, I like the dick and he’s kind of funny even when he’s being an ass, which eventually became, I like him. And his dick. But Chanyeol is different. Chanyeol is an asshole and he doesn’t do this relationship stuff. Because he’s hot, he knows girls and boys alike will flock to him. Because he’s hot and he’s smart and he’s funny and he’s good at sports and has an amazing smile that will do things to your heart even if it’s stone cold like Kyungsoo’s, everyone is at least a tiny bit attracted to him. He strings guys on and has one night stands and flings and Kyungsoo has seen it happen.
He thinks perhaps the reason why he feels…uneasy about being Chanyeol’s anything is because he’s scared of becoming another tool in Chanyeol’s long line of faceless guys he fucks because he can. And maybe even more so because on some level, with them being friends-with-benefits, his face is already blurred out in Chanyeol’s mind. And isn’t it just so coincidental that Chanyeol is asking for something more when his cousin’s wedding is right around the corner, when it’s good for only him?
And even if Jongdae is saying that Chanyeol likes him, does that really matter? Because doesn’t Chanyeol like everyone? And perhaps, the truth is, Kyungsoo is just mad because on some level, right from the start, he knew this would happen, and he let it run away from him like everything else, and now he’s just grasping onto the what ifs and hoping for the impossible. Because in the end, wasn’t Kyungsoo just convenient? When everyone else had each other, and only him and Kyungsoo were left, didn’t he just feel sorry for Kyungsoo and let the small, lonely guy fuck him because he pitied him? Killing two birds with one stone, Chanyeol had said. Because doesn’t he just act like life is a big game and getting the angry dude who hates everyone to go with him to a wedding is like some special medal achievement?
Oh shit.
Oh table-flippin’-shit.
Kyungsoo is so screwed.
Suddenly, Kyungsoo doesn’t feel hungry anymore. Jongdae’s chat window flashes on his screen. He’s offline, but his last message reads, think about it. but don’t think about it too hard. you’ll end up doubting yourself. i’ll ttyl, can’t type anymore, got lube on my keyboard, time to get rawed by some hot daddy dick. love you <3 Kyungsoo does feel a little bit better as he rolls to his door in his desk chair because fuck walking, and gets up to put his plate in the kitchen. Kris is sitting at the table, eating ice cream, and even sitting, he seems like a giant. He offers Kyungsoo a gummy smile and tentatively pats Kyungsoo’s head.
“Everything okay?” he asks. “You look…” He pauses, trying to think of the Korean word for whatever he’s thinking. “Um. Worried?”
“I’m fine,” says Kyungsoo. “Or I will be. I just need time to get over myself, I guess.”
“Oh,” says Kris. “Good luck? Um. Use protection. And stuff.”
If the scared exchange roommate is talking to him and giving him advice on how to have safe sex, then Kyungsoo is majorly capital-S Screwed.
God, he’s such a fuckup.