Chapter Text
To make a little extra cash, Riki accepts Sunoo’s offer to help deliver valentines day gifts. In the process, he ends up playing match maker to break up two toxic matches, and ends up accidentally in the middle of a relationship he’d never planned to be a part of.
♡ˎˊ˗
If you don’t say yes to Sunoo I’m going to make sure Atiri books out the dance room to me for the entire semester so you can’t practice.
Sunghoon is an evil, evil man. But his threat wasn’t nearly as graphic or terror inducing as Sunoo’s, which led him to now, riding his bike across campus while wearing a heart-covered sweater, pink bows tied around the basket, and stacks of gifts in said basket.
You have two sisters. There are videos of you dancing in Konon’s dress on the internet–this is not the worst thing you have gone through. He reminds himself as he parks his bike in front of the library. He nearly passes out when he grabs the lock from the bottom of the basket just to find that Sunoo replaced it with a heart shaped one.
He grabs the wicker basket out of his bike basket, squaring his shoulders. It’s simple–get in, hand over two boxes of chocolates, get out. That’s what Sunoo said, at least. The worst part is the fact that he’s been puked on by a unicorn and his entire pride has been wounded. Actually handing them the chocolates is nothing.
He’s got a picture of both of the guys, and all he has to do is walk up, ask them their names, hand over the boxes, and get out of dodge so their partner can woo them.
Jongseong is easy to find in the cafe with his partner, who is talking animatedly until he sees Riki and then goes mute as he approaches.
“Are you Jongseong?” Riki asks, and the man turns in confusion, taking in the heart sweater and basket.
“I am.” Riki nods, then pulls out one of the boxes of chocolates and hands it over.
“Happy Valentine's day, from your beloved.” He cringes at the stupid line, and leaves as quickly as possible.
He catches Jaeyun on one of the upper floors with his headphones in, typing on his laptop. He notices Riki–who wouldn’t? He’s a walking blush– before he’s there, and takes a headphone out when he stops at the edge of the table.
“Are you Jaeyun?”
“Uh, yeah. Most people call me Jake. What’s up?” Riki pulls out the second box of chocolates, handing them over.
“Happy Valentine’s day, from your beloved.” Jake furrows his eyebrows like he’s confused, then opens the box of chocolates and goes still. Riki is about to ask if there was something wrong with it when a commotion stirs behind him.
“Sim Jaeyun! How dare you send a Valentine to my boyfriend!” Jongseong’s partner is speed walking up to the table. Jake drops the chocolates, and Riki realizes–the card inside has Jongseong <3 written on it, and he can only assume that Jongseong’s had Jaeyun’s name on it.
Jongseong’s partner sees the other card and gasps, spinning around on Jongseong, who is only just catching up carrying both of their bags. “You cheat! I asked you if there was something between you two, and you kept telling me that you were over him!”
Jongseong is pale, but not nearly as pale as Riki, who realizes that he may have just accidentally broken up two relationships by switching chocolates.
“Over me?” Jake asks, eyes wide.
Riki clears his throat. “I think I got these mixed up. Jaeyun–Jake, yours was supposed to be from Emily?” Jake nods dazedly, eyes not leaving Jongseong.
“And I’m assuming you were the one that ordered these?” Riki points out the box on the desk. The partner freezes, going pale.
“What did you mean, over me?” Jake asks again. Riki feels like he’s just been placed in the middle of a k-drama.
“That’s not important–” The partner backtracks.
“Don’t act like you didn’t know I was in love with you, Jake.” Jongseong’s face is set, jaw clenched tight. “I followed you around for years, waiting for you to notice.”
“Was–in the past. Let’s go, Jongseong.” His partner tries again, regret forming in his eyes as he sees where this has gone.
“I’ve loved you since we were kids, Jay.” Jake whispers. Riki doesn’t know whether to curl up in guilt and embarrassment or to swoon.
Jongseong’s jaw relaxes, mouth slightly open in shock. His partner wilts. Riki feels for the guy–a minute ago, he was justified.
“Whatever. Have a good life together. Everyone called it anyway.” He sighs, walking away dejected. The other two in front of him are staring at each other like they’re seeing new worlds. Riki feels bad for the other guy, if this is how they’ve looked at each other the entire time.
“I’m just going to–” Riki points toward the exit, and leaves hastily.
He feels bad for poor Emily, wherever she may be.
♡ˎˊ˗
Riki descends on the nice restaurant with little regard to the hostess who tries and fails to stop him. Sunoo and Sunghoon are staring at him incredulously. Sunghoon doesn’t even argue when Riki pulls up a seat at the table. He doesn’t even say hello, immediately launching into the first chaos of the day.
“You broke up two couples by accidentally switching the gifts?” Sunoo asks, eyes alight with gossip.
“I exposed a decade of pining between two friends who were dating other people who already thought something was going on between them.” He groans, head in his hands. “I didn’t even know until I was delivering the second one and the first couple showed up. His boyfriend broke up with him after screaming, and the other one’s girlfriend wasn’t even there–it was weird.”
Sunghoon laughs. “Who’s the new happy couple?” He asks, taking a sip of water.
“Park Jongseong and Sim Jayun.” The water ends up down the wrong pipe, but Riki could care less. Sunoo doesn’t take his eyes off Riki as Sunghoon drinks more to try to swallow it down.
“You’re shitting me! I knew it!” He celebrates. “Well, at least it was just–”
“No. It was not just that.” Riki groans. Sunghoon catches his breath, eyes wide. “Heeseung and Jungwon…They’re both trying to date me.”
♡ˎˊ˗
After that, Riki is extra careful to deliver the next boxes after double checking the contents. When it gets down to the last two in his basket when he arrives at the dance studio, he knows exactly who they’re going to.
He changes into his clothes that he left in the locker room, then quickly checks that the coast is clear before shoving them into Heeseung and Jungwon’s respective lockers. When he shuts Jungwon’s, he jumps a foot in the air at the other boy’s sudden appearance.
“Riki…” He sighs, opening the locker and grabbing the box of chocolates. Riki’s shoulders are close to his ears, trying and failing to play it cool
“They’re from hyung.” Riki insists. “Open the box and look.” Jungwon doesn’t.
“And I’m guessing the other ones in his locker are from me?” Riki’s ears are red as he ignores him. “Hyung and I’s problems are between us, Riki. You don’t have to worry about them.” Jungwon reminds him, and Riki wilts.
Heeseung and Jungwon are Riki’s favorite couple–with full offense to Sunoo and Sunghoon, who usually use their relationship as a way to gang up on Riki. When he moved from Japan, they’d already been together, taking him under their wing as the other top dancers in the program, celebrating his wins even as he rose above them on the rankings. They were kind of like his first host family, and he’s attached to them as such.
Then, three or four months ago, they started to argue. Riki hadn’t noticed at first–it was around the time that he was doing a lot of solo work for the program and going home to his own apartment late at night. Then they started showing up to practice without each other. One of them would take him to dinner without the other.
And then he started to notice the tension, the lack of communication, the way they avoided parts of the room if the other was there.
“Just a rough patch, Riki.” Heeseung had promised. “Don’t worry about it.”
“There are just things we’re trying to work through. There are just a few things we’re disagreeing on.” Jungwon insisted. “Just leave it to us.”
And Riki is trying, except he doesn’t know if they’re trying. So what if he bought them Valentine’s gifts from each other? They’re still technically dating.
Riki flees the changing room when Heeseung appears around a corner, ignoring the confused noises that follow.
Practice goes smoothly–Heeseung and Jungwon always get along during the actual practice part, but they even talk more on the sides this time, and Riki feels self-satisfied. Everyone else seems to notice the change too, the room’s icy tension thawing as hours pass.
Riki has just changed back into casual wear–not the god forsaken sweater he’s got wadded up in his bag–when Jungwon and Heeseung walk into the changing room.
“Riki, can you talk for a sec?” Jungwon calls, and Riki tenses. Why would they both need to talk to him?
He sets his bag down. “What’s up?” Heeseung and Jungwon are looking at each other, communicating with their eyes. Jungwon leans against the lockers while Heeseung sits across on another bench, arms wrapped around himself.
Did I manage to break up another relationship with chocolates? Is the first thing that comes to his mind.
“I know you’ve noticed we’ve been arguing for the past couple of months. And I’m sorry it’s affected you probably the most other than us.” Heeseung starts. Riki’s going to throw up. He should have picked flowers or a date night coupon. “Our arguments…They’ve been, well.”
“They’ve been about you.” Jungwon finishes when Heeseung takes too long. Riki’s blood runs cold.
“I’m sorry–” Riki immediately starts, stomach dropping from under him. He’s already standing, and torn between running away and falling to his knees and promising to fuck off forever.
“I told you he would panic if you threw it on him like that. Riki, it’s okay, that’s not what he meant–”
Riki can barely hear him. “Just tell me how I can fix it–I can leave you alone, I thought the chocolates would–” Lips on his shut him up.
Jungwon glares at Heeseung, and Riki could pass out. Jungwon opens his mouth, and Riki expects him to yell.
“You hypocrite! I thought you said that was too forward if I did it, and here you are taking it away from me,” He huffs, turning to Riki. “We both like you–a lot. And want you to date us, but neither of us agree on what the best way is to ask you.” Then, Jungwon pulls him in for another kiss.
♡ˎˊ˗
The hostess, who has been standing and waiting with security to kick him out, coos.
The security guard looks interested in the story too, while Sunghoon and Sunoo look like they’re a moment away from passing out themselves.
“So, what did you say?” Sunoo bursts. It should be a disturbance, but half of the restaurant has been tuned into the conversation from its beginning. There’s nothing to make you feel your best on Valentine’s day than someone else’s failures.
Riki–well. He didn’t say anything.
“I came straight here.” Riki answers, suddenly feeling sick.
“You did what?” The security guard asks.
“They both kissed me, then I turned and ran here.” He puts his face in his hands. The murmurs around them pick up, and Riki reaches for his phone only to realize he left it behind.
“Kick him out.” Sunoo insists to the security guard. “Go and fix this, you beautiful, dumb man, before you ruin two more Valentine’s days.”