Work Text:
Normally when people have problems or dilemmas or whatever, they tend to ask their friends about it. It’s a pretty typical thing to do, especially when you’re a confused 17-year-old and there’s no way you can go ahead and ask your older sister or god forbid, your mum. And, it’s not that Taeyong doesn’t love his friends, or trust them, or anything like that… It’s more of the simple fact that (1) Dongyoung is the spawn of Satan, (2) Jaehyun and Sicheng would probably make the problem worse and (3) Well. Yuta is the problem, so there’s no point looking into that either.
And it’s not like, a simple problem he can just Google the answer to or anything like that. It’s a… complex conundrum involving changes in human behaviour and potential transitions into unexplored social territory and…
It’s complicated. And also pretty fucking terrifying.
So he blogs about it.
darjeelingy
I think I might like somebody
I don’t know
He’s… a close friend and I feel weird
What do I do…?
His blog is relatively impersonal with barely anything on there to really confirm his identity, and he’s not sure if anyone’s even going to reply anyway because it’s not like his blog is some famous one with a loyal following.
It’s really one of those 2am panic posts that you write to make yourself feel better because at least you’re telling someone, even if it’s going to result in the same thing that would happen if Taeyong had yelled about his problem-issue-thing right into The Void.
Not that he wants to be dramatic or anything, but hey, at 17, there really isn’t much else he feels stressed about other than the occasional C in Math and the annoying red blemishes that appear every now and again on his cheeks. It’s a little disconcerting how much time he spends just thinking about the fact that he’s been feeling sort of… strange? About his best friend of 70 million years, who’s seen him through his absolute worst and vice versa. Admittedly, Googling ‘how do I know if I have a huge crush on my best friend?’ and ‘I think I’m gay for my best friend help’ probably will not go down in history as his best moments, but this sudden overflowing geyser of feelings has been a real cause for concern.
He feels extremely exhausted after mustering the courage to type out that one post (if I post this, it means this whole thing is Real), so he shuts his Macbook, shoves it under his pillow and promptly falls asleep.
It’s only a decent week and a half before he’s free enough to spend time scrolling through tumblr. Between volleyball practice and student council and that one Math test he fucked up because stupid Dongyoung had borrowed his calculator and forgotten to change his Stats settings back to normal, he just hasn’t had the time. Finally there’s a Wednesday afternoon that pours with rain so volleyball training is cancelled and he shuffles into the house before 3pm with soggy canvas school kicks and his fringe dripping (he had forgotten his umbrella). He takes a warm shower and towels his hair before making himself some tea and logging on.
He doesn’t actually remember his post until he sees the little number ‘3’ hovering over the inbox icon, and he feels kind of surprised that he even got replies. The most recent is an anonymous message asking if he’s bisexual or whether he’s into girls as well, which he just deletes because it’s obviously completely irrelevant and doesn’t help him at all.
The next two are from the same person.
mountain26 asked:
whoa is it weird that i know EXACTLY wat ur talkin abt
mountain26 asked:
im totally gay for my best friend weve been friends for like 5 years now and hes LIKE AN ETHEREAL ELF hes so soft sigh u know sometimes it seems like im the one who sticks up for him but rly hes the one who looks out for me n stuff like all the time hes my bestest friend ever ajdkdfshfehdksjdfkjsdkfjwikjdfrsn hel p (╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻
Taeyong blinks, reading over the messages twice. They aren’t exactly helpful, but at least mountain26 understands his predicament. The flipping table emojicon in particular is something Taeyong feels like he relates to on a spiritual level. He clicks on the link to mountain’s blog and finds no personal information— just a clusterfuck of memes and anime photosets and funny text posts.
Deciding it can’t hurt, he navigates to mountain’s ask box and leaves a short reply:
You should tell him. He seems like a good guy, especially if he’s always looking out for you. I’m sure he’ll understand and be kind about it at the very least. Good luck.
Within minutes, Taeyong hears a faint ‘pop!’— mountain’s sent him a direct message.
mountain26
WOULD U DO IT THO… WOULD U TELL UR CRUSH…
Taeyong swallows. The thought alone makes his palms twitch nervously.
darjeelingy
…no
mountain26
EXACTLY ITS TOO SCARY
Taeyong sighs again. He seems to be doing that a lot lately.
darjeelingy
Yeah. I don’t know what do to. Keeping quiet is kind of maddening but the thought of being honest kind of makes me want to throw up.
mountain26
right… I dont want to stop being friends w my friend. I dont want to fuck up our friendship, u feel? Tho im p sure that wouldnt happen. My friend is a literal angel. Im just scared af lol
darjeelingy
I wouldn’t call my friend an angel
darjeelingy
but i guess it's the same for me.
Taeyong chews on his bottom lip. Everything he’s said to mountain so far has been the complete truth, but there’s still this fear that this friendship he values above all things could get destroyed.
His worrying is interrupted by another pop sound— I think we should just do it, mountain says. SEIZE THE DAY.
Taeyong wonders with mild dread if he might be conversing with Youngho from the basketball team who goes around school blasting Soulja Boy in the corridors and telling people to ‘get lit’, but banishes the thought immediately.
What are the odds? He laughs to himself, feeling strangely hysterical. It’s tumblr. I’m probably talking to someone at least in a different district.
mountain26
ARE U THERE
mountain26
ARE WE DOING THIS
mountain26
TMR LET’S JUST ASK THE PERSON OUT
Taeyong reads the messages once over. Reads them again. Scrubs his hands through his hair. This… is probably a terrible idea. And yet… he feels oddly supported, as though he’s got someone jumping off a cliff into an abyss of unending doom with him. It’s almost touching.
darjeelingy
alright
Seize the day, mountain had said. Taeyong nods to himself. He should just suck it up and go for it.
And if he fails, well, it’s not as if he can’t lie or make something up.
“You’re just a bunch of computer codes,” Taeyong says to his laptop screen, squinting at mountain’s tiny little Totoro icon. “And this is just tumblr.”
Now, it’s not as though Taeyong doesn’t intend to honour the decision him and mountain came to last night. It’s not that at all. He really does walk into school with a refreshing (yet mildly nauseating) sense of purpose the next morning. It’s just that… it’s all a little difficult when the receiving end of said purpose seems to be avoiding him like the plague.
Yuta comes in ten minutes late for their first period Chemistry lesson, sliding sheepishly into his seat and pulling out his book without sparing a glance for his seat partner, and when the lesson ends, he rushes off to the bathroom before Taeyong can get a single word in, and doesn’t return until the start of the next period, by which time their teacher has already come in and put the slides up on the projector.
He seems nervous and distracted and it’s as though he’s trying his hardest not to make any eye contact with Taeyong at all cost. Finally, when the lunch bell rings, he pulls his bento box out from under his desk and looks at Taeyong for the first time since the school day started a whole four hours ago.
“Roof?” he says, getting up, out of his seat. Taeyong nods, grabbing his own lunchbox out of his bag and following. The silence between them as they climb the stairs up to the roof feels a little strained, but that could just be because Taeyong is so confused about what the hell was going on before. He doesn’t remember the last time they’d gone that long without talking while sitting next to each other, and there aren’t any signs that there might be something wrong with his friend’s mood, leaving Taeyong totally stumped.
When they reach the rooftop, they slump down in their usual spot against a wall facing the school’s front yard. It’s unsurprisingly empty— the third years have the latest lunch period and most of them choose to spend it in the classrooms studying or escaping the unforgiving summertime heat— and the silence between them continues as they unpack their respective lunches.
Finally, Taeyong decides to speak up.
“Is everything alright?”
“Hey, are you—”
Yuta smiles slightly. It’s like the urge to break the silence was telepathic. “You can go first.”
“Is everything alright?” Taeyong repeats his question. “You’re being kind of quiet.”
The other boy goes mildly red, eyes widening. “Fine!” he says, too fast and too loud. “I just… overslept. I was up late. I’m really tired so I’m concentrating super hard on concentrating.”
Taeyong smiles to himself at that. Typical.
“You’ve been weird the whole morning. I was worried,” he admits.
Instead of shooting Taeyong a signature wide grin and making a joke about monopolising his attention, Yuta seems to go even redder.
“I… um. I want to go to that new coffee shop in Hongdae! My sister says they have good waffles,” he blurts out, staring intently at his rice.
Taeyong blinks at the random, yet completely convenient change of topic. “Uh… Sure? Do you want to go after school?”
“Yeah,” Yuta nods. “We can’t tomorrow ‘cause of volleyball.”
“Okay,” Taeyong agrees.
While Yuta goes back to his bento, seemingly placated, Taeyong wonders if this ironic coincidence would constitute a date and if he’s fulfilled what he agreed he would do. Probably not, he thinks regretfully. He wasn’t even the one who initiated it. He sucks in his cheeks in dissatisfaction.
“Can we go to the bookstore after that?” he tries to come off as casual.
The Japanese boy hums in assent, smiling as best as he can with his cheeks full of rice, and Taeyong gives himself the tiniest of nods.
Mission accomplished.
Well, kind of.
The waffle date thing actually goes pretty well, if Taeyong doesn’t say so himself.
They get the train down to Hongdae and manage to grab a seat in the small corner shop, which is actually really nice and thoroughly date-y. The place smells like vanilla, cinnamon and tea, and the lights are warm, painting the sitting room in a pleasant, muted orange glow. They get a waffle each with a scoop of ice cream (strawberry for Taeyong, matcha for Yuta) and sit in the back of the room at a tiny wooden table. The shop really is quite small, and so are the tables, forcing them to sit with their knees pressed together. Taeyong fingers tremble slightly as he cuts up his waffle, trying to focus on the fluffiness of the dough or the smoothness of the ice cream or the paintings on the wall— anything but the warm press of Yuta’s knees squeezed against his own, because that kind of makes him feel like he’s about to have a coronary and suffocate all at the same time.
Yuta demolishes his waffle with his usual enthusiasm for all things edible and delicious, and it feels like any other after school hangout they’ve had together; laughing at each other’s jokes, talking about their sisters, wondering what they’re going to do over the weekend.
It’s stunningly normal, if Taeyong doesn’t think of the word date a hundred thousand times a minute.
It’s stunningly normal, but he wants to sit there like that forever.
He blanches in his head at the cheesy thought.
I am well and truly fucked, he thinks to himself as he watches Yuta raise a forkful of waffle into his mouth, mesmorised by the faint rose colour of his bottom lip. Well and truly.
And as if all that isn’t enough, when they’re at the bookstore, Yuta wanders over from the comic section while Taeyong is flipping longingly through a copy of Goodbye Tsugumi.
“I’ll get it for you,” he says, grinning all wide and earnest. “Since your birthday is soon.”
Taeyong’s stomach feels like it’s filled with an army of really angry worms.
“You don’t have to,” he protests, hoping his face hasn’t gone as red as he feels.
Yuta shrugs. “I was going out of my mind wondering what I was going to get you, anyway, so this is a huge relief. If not for this, I probably would’ve ended up getting you an apple or something,” he jokes.
Taeyong forces himself to roll his eyes in response, but really, he just wants to sit in a corner and try to remember what normal respiratory functions are supposed to feel like. It’s almost cruel how perfect this is— it’s probably what people who are actually dating do together, which, haha! Taeyong and Yuta are not doing.
On the bus ride home, Taeyong exhales raggedly through his nose (because letting out a lovesick sigh would be the final blow to the little dignity he has left) and thinks furiously about uncomfortable things like calculus and spiders and his sister braiding his fringe and absolutely not about the disgustingly good not-date he just had with his best friend whom he is definitely not seriously in like with.
Fuck this, he chants in his head. Fuck this so much.
mountain26
we went out but I dont think he knew it was a date
mountain26
fuck this im taking a nap
Taeyong flicks through mountain’s messages when he gets home.
His sentiments exactly.
There are some good things that come out of suffering, he supposes, because over the few weeks they spend chatting, him and mountain strike up what feels like a proper friendship that goes beyond 1am rants about their spectacularly unfortunate love lives.
The other boy also plays volleyball, so they spend a fair amount of time discussing volleyball-related things, and they even have similar taste in music and films and random stuff like ice cream flavours and dream vacations and Sherlock conspiracy theories. They still don’t exchange any information because the thought of being exposed makes Taeyong especially uncomfortable, all of which he tells to his new friend, who respects this request completely
He tells mountain about Yuta (whom he refers to as Shun because he’s a Studio Ghibli maniac and a massive sap) and the other boy tells him about his own crush (Kageyama, ‘cause he’s kind of stoic and has shiny black hair and plays setter, mountain says) whom he sits next to in class and watches a ton of movies with and who always has his back. Being with him feels like suffocating but kind of in a good way, mountain sends one afternoon after school and Taeyong sighs, knowing exactly how that feels.
He flushes bright red as he sits on his bed at 2am, fingers flying across his keyboard as he admits things to mountain that he’d never in a million fucking years EVER say to anyone aloud: that Yuta has an incredible smile that is so bright, Taeyong feels kind of dazed whenever he sees it; how his friend is sensitive and tells stupid jokes; how he wants more than anything to reach out and thread their fingers together when they walk to the train station early in the morning when the wind is soft and the sky is still a pale, muted blue and Yuta looks so warm and sleepy he can barely see where he’s going as he blearily squints through the streets, not quite awake.
That’s disgustingly adorable, mountain tells him, and Taeyong’s face burns.
mountain26
Just go for it!!!!!!!!!!
mountain26
ur friend sounds like he likes u too idk u should just make a move or sth
mountain26
i mean idk IDK I feel like if I were him Id wanna know u feel??
Taeyong frowns, rubbing his hands through his own dark hair, frustrated.
“It’s not that simple,” he says miserably into the dark, flopping back into his pillow.
mountain26
go for it... u can do it
Taeyong gives himself three days to mope about before he grits his teeth and listens to his internet friend.
It’s nothing ground-breaking and Taeyong knows that Yuta doesn’t have the slightest clue this is meant to be a date.
Let’s watch something, he’d asked after school, and Yuta had just nodded in agreement and followed Taeyong back to his place. They do this fairly often, switching between their apartments, but Yuta is always insistent that he likes Taeyong’s place better, because there, he can lie about on the couch away from the teasing and harassment from “the witches” (his sisters).
Taeyong’s sister is away for college and his parents are both overseas for a conference, so it’s just the two of them in the flat for the day. Taeyong turns the air-conditioner in the living room on and Yuta whines about being hungry, so they change out of their uniforms (Taeyong’s got a corner in one of his dresser drawers meant specially for Yuta since he comes over that often) and shuffle into the kitchen to retrieve some sustenance.
The Japanese boy is impatient, though, so they end up boiling some instant ramyun with extra rice cakes and sausage. Yuta fries himself an egg (the only culinary task he is capable of performing) and Taeyong pours out some juice and they end up slotted together in between the couch and the coffee table, blowing over their hot noodles and arguing half-heartedly over what to watch.
“We’ve seen Death Note like a hundred times,” Yuta whines, knocking their knees together.
Taeyong ignores the treacherous seizing of his chest muscles in favour of rolling his eyes and retorting, “You say that, but you’re just going to put Totoro on for the billionth time.”
They bicker back and forth before finally deciding on something (it never really mattered in the first place) and settling back against the couch to pay attention. They get through a handful of films before the Japanese boy falls asleep, head coming down to rest in the crook of Taeyong’s neck.
Yuta’s fine, brown hair tickles the skin at Taeyong’s collarbone and he’s close enough that Taeyong can smell the faint scent of his citrusy shampoo. He breathes in deeply, savouring the moment. If he keeps very, very still and closes his eyes, he could pretend for a second that this was all real and intentional and exactly how he wished it would be.
He wakes Yuta up after about an hour, though, shoulders and neck stiff from the extra weight. After a quick shower and teeth clean, Yuta falls right back asleep on the spare mattress they’ve pulled out from Taeyong’s bed, breathing quietly into the pillows, hair fanning messily.
Taeyong listens to his friend’s even breathing as he pulls up a tumblr tab on his laptop and opens his conversation with mountain.
I’m in love with him, he types and hits send. We’ve been friends since we were 12 and he’s totally annoying and I’m in love with him.
He doesn’t sleep till early the next morning.
There’s torrential rain one day after volleyball practice and they’re stuck— there’s no shelter between the school gate and the bus stop where’ve got to catch the bus to the train station.
“This is so stupid,” Yuta groans, swiping the bus schedule app. “If we miss this bus, the next one only comes in forty-five minutes because of slow traffic and we’ve already walked all the way down the hill. I don’t want to climb back up with all my volleyball stuff.”
Ugh, Taeyong thinks. He really doesn’t want to be stuck here for another hour. His feet and arms ache from practice and his fringe is matted with sweat. He’s also got a mountain of History homework waiting for him when he gets home and his shoes are beginning to fill with water and squelch uncomfortably.
In the distance, Taeyong can see their bus approaching. Fuck it, he thinks.
“Let’s just go,” he yells over the sound of the downpour, and without thinking, grabs the other boy’s hand and runs.
They’re soaked to the bone when they reach the bus stop, just before the bus arrives. The situation seems to catch up to them, and Yuta pulls his hand back like he’s been burned.
“I need to get my card out,” he says lamely, not quite meeting the other’s eyes.
Taeyong’s stomach twists painfully.
The bus is crowded when they get on, everything is sopping wet and Taeyong can barely blink the water out of his eyes before more is dripping down from his hair. He feels hot with shame as he thinks about the look on his friend’s face when he separated their hands and briefly considers getting off the bus to wallow in his own despair.
Taeyong’s never been rejected before but this sort of feels like it might be just that.
darjeelingy
love is the worst thing ever I quit
mountain26
rofl me
mountain26
i think I fucked up today too
mountain26
why r we so tragic
darjeelingy
wish I knew
mountain26
maybe we should meet up and suffer together
Huh, Taeyong thinks.
It turns out they’re both in Seoul, which makes Taeyong mildly anxious. Christ. What if he really has been talking to Youngho from the basketball team?
The thought makes him even more nervous, so he says he’ll think about it, shuts his laptop and goes to sleep.
“Hey, noona?” he asks his sister after dinner a couple of nights later, leaning against her doorframe. “Have you ever met online friends in real life before?”
Taehee looks up from her laptop in surprise.
“Mm,” she nods. “I’ve met a couple of tumblr friends before. Why?” she grins lecherously. “Are you internet dating?”
“No!” he protests hotly, sending her the best scowl he can muster. Older sisters are so annoying.
His sister continues to laugh at his frustration, shaking her head. “You’re so cute,” she coos. “Is there some internet friend you’re trying to meet up with, then?”
“Yeah,” Taeyong admits, mildly embarrassed. “We… want to play volleyball,” he improvises. “I found out he lives in Seoul too.”
Taehee hums thoughtfully. “Well, if you’ve been talking a few months and he seems more than just ‘decent’ then you could give it a shot? If you’re worried he might be like the craiglist killer or something then arrange to meet somewhere crowded where you can pretend not to be there if you have to,” she advises.
“Okay,” he nods, grateful. “Thanks, noona."
“No problem, kiddo,” she winks.
They arrange to meet a few days later at a coffee shop in Yeouido. It’s been a weird couple of weeks since that rainy day and Taeyong’s been a bit on edge. He feels like his friendship with Yuta has changed slightly; he’s been more hesistant and they’ve been a little more distant, but he can’t bring himself to talk about the problem for fear of being horribly and unknowingly rejected.
He’s restless as he enters the shop, fifteen minutes early (nerves, Taeyong curses in his head, are his worse enemy) and picks a table in the front corner, not quite hidden but not blatantly visible either. He briefly wonders what mountain will look like and sound like in real life and thinks about what he’s going to say when they finally meet.
He fiddles with his phone for a bit to pass the time, looking up occasionally to see if there’s anyone who looks like they might be looking for someone.
And then, to his complete and utter horror, with two minutes to go, Yuta walks into the shop, reading something on his phone and picking a table in the back.
Fuck, Taeyong curses frantically to himself, dropping his head and praying he hasn’t been seen. He shifts his chair around to hide his face, instead facing the window and silently wills the universe to let him sit there undiscovered. He waits ten minutes past 4 for mountain, but the other doesn’t seem to arrive. Another ten minutes pass, and Taeyong can’t stand it anymore– can’t bear to sit there, hiding from his best friend— so he slides his cap on and leaves, tossing his empty drink cup into the trash on his way out.
darjeelingy
did something happen?
mountain26
no dude! i was there! Right on the dot at 4.
mountain26
guess we missed each other :/
darjeelingy
guess so
mountain26
sigh
Mountain doesn’t say anything for the next couple of minutes, so Taeyong shuts his laptop at that. He rolls around on his bed for a bit, cursing his bad luck, before getting up and pulling out his school stuff. Life as he knew it might be ending, but Jung-ssaem the Math teacher never has any sympathy for anyone. He falls asleep right after finishing his assignment, totally exhausted from the savagery of his assignment.
It’s only the next morning when he wakes up, slightly earlier than usual that he goes back on tumblr (it’s become a habit) and notices an unread message from the night before.
mountain26
I think kageyamas mad at me. Idk. It was raining really heavily and I did something stupid and now its kind of weird.
Taeyong blinks. Reads the message again. Reads it a third time. Shuts his laptop and sets it aside.
“Oh,” he whispers to himself.
Taeyong doesn’t see Yuta for the first four periods of the day because of their different electives, so he sends the Japanese boy a text asking him to meet him at their spot on the roof during lunch.
When the bell rings, he climbs the stairs up to the roof two and a time and, chewing on his lip nervously as he waits. The tension is thick when Yuta steps out, sliding down to join Taeyong on the floor. He looks guilty and uncertain, which makes this whole thing even harder than Taeyong thought it was going to be in the first place.
His heart is out of control in his chest, and this time he definitely feels like he’s seconds away from vomiting all over the floor. His mouth is dry and he can’t think of anything rational to say as they stare at each other, not quite knowing what to say. Finally, Taeyong can’t bear it any longer and, giving up on trying to form sentences in his head, he looks up at his friend and blurts out, “Why did you pull your hand away?”
Yuta flushes.
“I…” he trails off. Squeezes his eyes shut.
“I was nervous,” he continues. “Because I’ve wanted to hold your hand for like forever now, but then I felt like it might be weird... So I kind of panicked and... let go. I'm sorry,” he says in a rush.
Taeyong’s face flames. “I want to hold your hand too,” he says quietly. “And,” he swallows, totally embarrassed, “I want to stop going on non-dates and go on real dates, because… I like you,” he finally admits.
“It feels like I’m suffocating, but kind of in a good way,” he quotes at Yuta, fingers trembling.
He watches carefully as his friend’s eyes go wide in recognition. Watches carefully as his lips spread into a grin wider than he’s ever seen before.
And then he stops watching and stops breathing altogether because Yuta is leaning in, resting his palms on Taeyong’s shoulder and slotting their lips together. Neither of them have kissed anyone before, so Taeyong has no idea how this is supposed to feel, but his heart keeps slamming against his chest and his head feels light and nothing has felt more amazing than how Yuta’s smile feels against his mouth when he can’t hold it in any longer.
They pull apart and Yuta dissolves into laughter, resting his forehead against Taeyong’s shoulder and laughing into his school shirt. Taeyong can’t stop smiling (he absentmindedly wonders if maybe his face might be broken or something) and the whole thing is so embarrassing he feels like he may just die or combust right there and then.
And then Yuta is looking up and kissing him again, firmer this time, and Taeyong can’t really bring himself to think much at all.
“You’re so cheesy,” Yuta grins, scrolling through the tumblr messaging app on his phone. “You even think I’m cute in the morning. You described the scenery. I swear you stole that from a shoujo manga.”
They’re lying on Taeyong’s bed after school, lounging about with hands linked together.
“Shut up,” Taeyong grumbles, face going red as he thinks back to all the horrible, cheesy stuff he did in fact say.
“It’s okay,” the other boy smiles, lowering his phone and turning to bury his face in the crook of Taeyong’s neck. “It was sweet. I was mildly jealous when I didn’t know it was you.”
“Jealous?” Taeyong repeats.
Yuta hums. “Some guy had tumblr user darjeelingy saying all those nice things about him and I just had the most pathetic love life ever. Totally jealous.”
This makes Taeyong smile. “Yeah, well. That was only because I didn’t know it was you. Don’t get your hopes up now.”
Yuta awws exaggeratedly. “But you totally want to hold my hand and go on dates with me,” he teases.
“I suppose that’s what people who are in love with their stupid best friends tend to want,” Taeyong says sincerely.
“Yeah,” Yuta replies, and Taeyong can feel his grin blooming against his neck. His heart is hammering again, and his palm feels mildly clammy, but as though he were reading his thoughts, Yuta only tightens his grip.
“I suppose so.”
mountain26
hey
mountain26
hey
mountain26
i love you
mountain26
♡＼(￣￣▽￣)／♡
darjeelingy
please stop messaging me here
darjeelingy
...
darjeelingy
love you too