milk & honey
» Milk & Honey Kyuhyun/Donghae. College AU. 2780 words.
In Kyuhyun's eyes, love is a farce; but it's what keeps Donghae living.
A/N: THIS IS TO MAKE UP FOR THE FAILURE THAT WAS XENOPHOBIA PART 4 ORZ.
I wrote this especially for hunni23, because she asked so sweetly. This is stylistically different from my norm. The pictures are supposed to set the mood of the section.
SONG: LOVE THE WAY YOU LIE (mashup) - SAM TSUI
Every weekday morning at eight, he hears the same words ("Hi! Welcome to Dunkin' Donuts, what can I get for you?") and every weekday morning at eight, he repeats the same thing back. ("Just a small black coffee with one sugar.") There are no arguments, no troubles (aside from the occasional spill) and the only question he's ever asked is, "Anything else?"
He's taken aback when a bright-eyed boy, presumably a few years older than he and with eyes that should belong to a newborn labrador, shows up on the other side of the counter with an large iced coffee that looks like it's 90% milk and slides it to him.
"Um," Kyuhyun blinks a few times, pointing a finger accusingly at the too-big and not-steaming cup. "I ordered a small hot black coffee with one sugar."
"Learn to live a little," The guy says, whose name tag reads Hae, and he flashes the perfectly-alined pearls in his gums. Kyuhyun blinks once, twice, three times before taking a long sip -- it's sweet, but not disgusting, creamy, with a weird sort of autumn-y feeling to it.
"Excuse me," He asks; the guy looks up from wiping down the latte machine. "What exactly is this?"
The guy smirks. Victory. "Large iced coffee with milk, sugar and two shots of pumpkin."
Kyuhyun stares from him to the waiting drink and takes another sip; he decides he likes it.
Kyuhyun slurps his way through his calculus class, the pumpkin syrup causing his mouth to thicken and stick together as if he had smeared peanut butter inside. He attempts to jot down what the professor's saying but calculus is just not catching his attention; he doodles apples and leaves instead.
A small hand is suddenly on his paper, writing a message.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" It reads, the symbols bubbly and curvy. Feminine. "This is the first time I've seen you not jizzing yourself over mathematics."
Kyuhyun smirks. "Are you kidding me?" He scribbles. "I am completely aroused by the limits of functions."
"Not as aroused as you are over that coffee," The hand writes. "Did Jesus jizz in it or something?"
He slides the coffee to his left; Sungmin takes a long sip and lets the liquid settle in his mouth momentarily, analyzing its taste before swallowing. He grimaces.
"That is repulsive," He hisses a little too loudly and the professor shoots them a glare; he lowers his voice to a harsh whisper. "How can you even drink that? I feel like I just swallowed mud."
Kyuhyun chuckles, taking back the offensive drink. "Learn to live a little, Min."
The line is out the door when Kyuhyun goes back on Saturday; business men chatting busily on their blackberries, old women wanting their daily dose of decaf tea and teenage girls unsure of what disgustingly fruity flavor coolatta they want. He checks his watch, 8:11 AM. He has nineteen minutes before calculus.
He waits for five minutes and the line moves approximately three centimeters. He checks his watch impulsively, the ticking of the second hand thrumming in his mind and he's starting to feel claustrophobic. He looks over the counter and meets two chocolate-brown puppydog eyes that grin at him and tell him to go sit down and wait a few minutes; he doesn't argue.
The worker sits across from him at the table in the back of the store ten minutes later, sliding an iced coffee across the surface. Kyuhyun's reflexes are a second too slow; he snatches it just before it would have plummeted over the edge. The worker grins. Kyuhyun liked the fact that he actually resembled a puppy.
"I'm Donghae."
"Kyuhyun."
"Listen," Donghae licked his lips tentatively, folding his hands on the table. "I'm off in ten minutes. If you're not busy...we should do something."
A wave of panic washes over Kyuhyun; he is at a crossroads. He is normally a rock in situations like these: stead-fast, immovable. Responsible. He checks his watch: 8:24. If he leaves now and books it, he can make it in time.
He takes a drawn-out sip of his coffee.
Donghae holds a polo up to his chest, alluding that he is wearing it. It's pink.
Kyuhyun blinks a few times before speaking. "Why."
"I dunno, it's cute," Donghae says. He throws words like 'cute,' 'adorable' and 'precious' around like nothing. "I think it would show off my pecs."
Kyuhyun snorts. "You sound like Sungmin -- 'as manly as a man, yet as gentle as a woman.'"
Donghae gasps and slaps his shoulder; a guaranteed bruise. "You know Sungmin? Lee Sungmin?!"
Kyuhyun rolls his eyes. Of course they would know each other. "None other."
"He was my neighbor when I first moved here. He would kick my ass all the time with his martial arts shit," Donghae's eyes had this child-like twinkle that made Kyuhyun nervous. He was too easy to read. "So, Kyuhyun...you go to Kyunghee, correct."
"Mhm."
"What are you majoring in?" Donghae asks, seemingly paying more attention to a pair of black ripped jeans than to Kyuhyun's answer.
"Computer Engineering, minoring in Psychology and Law."
Donghae makes a disgusted face; he grabs the jeans and slings it over his arm. "How mundane."
"Excuse me," Kyuhyun snaps, crossing his arms against his chest, much like a child put in Time Out. "Sorry I don't major in something exciting. What about you, huh? I bet you're majoring in something like Nuclear Engineering or Oriental Medicine."
"Actually," Donghae smirks, once again victorious (at least in his own eyes.) "I don't go to school."
Kyuhyun furrows his brow, curious; Donghae doesn't notice, though, so Kyuhyun figures that it isn't his place to ask. "I really like those jeans."
In Kyuhyun's eyes, love is a farce; a name for the simple phenomenon that occurs in your body after a certain age, where your hormones are thrown out of whack and the haunting fear lingers in your mind that you will forever be alone if you don't find a companion. It is nothing driven by fate or destiny or God or anything of that sort. You simply decide on someone whom you are able to sufficiently function with so that you won't die miserable and lonesome.
He realizes this one night on his way home from the library; it's early March, because the air is bitter but there is no indication that snow had been recently present. He passes under dead trees wrapped in neon Christmas lights, their glow illuminating the patterned sidewalks and casting an almost sickly-purple pallor on those below. He spies a couple a few yards ahead of him, hands intertwined and voices sweeter than Halloween candy. They chatter incessantly and use pet names that make Kyuhyun nauseous and he can't help feeling like the entire ordeal seems so forced, so fake and scripted, as if it were a romance movie instead of real life.
He decides being alone forever is much better than having to fake emotion; although he isn't really one to talk, because he has never felt emotion even remotely close to love, anyway.
"How can you not believe in love?" Donghae asks one night, a month later. How the subject was brought up, Kyuhyun wasn't exactly sure -- perhaps because a mutual friend, Heechul, had just been ever-so-eloquently dumped by his long-term boyfriend, Hankyung, via text message. "Love is like oxygen."
"Love is so cliché and outdated," Kyuhyun replies with a huff. They were on their way back from the library to Kyuhyun's dorm, where an impatient Sungmin lays in waiting. "Half of marriages today end in divorce, anyway."
Donghae rolls his eyes and exhales harshly. "That's just math. Statistics. Numbers. Numbers and formulas can't calculate love."
Kyuhyun dislikes the fact that Donghae frequently seems to have the upper hand in their conversations.
He changes the subject. "So tell me...why aren't you in school?"
Donghae smirks, but not with arrogance like most people. It was more like disappointment. "Well...I wanted to go to a college in New York City and major in Dancing. I didn't get in, so I was just kind of like, fuck it. If I can't go to the school I want and major in what I want, I'd rather work my ass off at Dunkin' Donuts and dance on my own."
Kyuhyun pauses, frozen in his spot. He's not sure how to react; he never realized that Donghae actually had dreams and aspirations, he simply assumed that he was a lazy college drop-out with no ambition. Donghae turns around and tilts his head to the side, like a dog.
"What?" He asks. Kyuhyun smiles.
"You look like a dog when you do that."
There is some quick scribbling, followed by an exasperated groan and the ruffle of papers being thrown into the air.
"What," Kyuhyun asks in monotone from the couch; he is playing Starcraft and doesn't feel like being interrupted by one of Sungmin's tantrums.
"I can't focus on fucking calc," Sungmin groans from the floor, head laid on top of his textbook as his eyes follow the ceiling fan. "Tell me about your love life."
"What love life?"
"The one you have with Donghae."
Kyuhyun looks away from the laptop; Sungmin props himself up on his elbows.
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Well," Sungmin begins, flipping his bangs (that need to be trimmed, he makes a mental note of) out of his line of vision. "You two seem to be together almost constantly."
Kyuhyun furrows his brow and blinks. "I don't date. You know this."
Sungmin snorts. "Well, he seems to be really into you. And you guys are so good for each other. You're like milk and honey -- you're extremely bland and he's disgustingly sweet, but when put together you guys could be delicious. Maybe you should give it a shot."
"Love isn't real, Sungmin."
"Well, neither is Starcraft," the older boy retaliates. Kyuhyun's eyes flicker. "That doesn't stop you from being obsessed with it."
Kyuhyun stares for a moment, then turns back to his game; nobody is on his side anymore.
There is a tradition in Seoul. Couples from all over travel to Namsan Park every day, tiny padlocks in hand with messages of love scribbled all over their surface. It's said that couples who write messages on these padlocks and hook them onto the fence at the base of the N. Seoul Tower will be together forever. Kyuhyun had never heard of this tradition until he met Donghae, whose dream of the moment seemed to be having someone to write a message for.
"That is the dumbest thing I have ever heard of," Kyuhyun snips as they climb up the hill towards the tower.
"No, you're just the Ebenezer Scrooge of Love," Donghae says, swinging a neon-blue padlock on his pinky. "If it's so dumb, why are there thousands of these things up here?"
"Because society is driven by desperate saps like you," Kyuhyun chides, nudging Donghae in the side; Donghae is suddenly four years old and sticks his tongue out.
At the top of the hill, the duo approach the padlock-covered fence and begin reading some messages -- "Dear insert boy's name here, Our love will last a lifetime! Saranghae~ Girl's Name" seemed to be the norm, although there were a few that simply had two names inside a heart and one even confessed someone's love for their cat.
"Well," Kyuhyun says, dropping the cat-lover's lock. "Seems like Heechul and Heebum will be together forever." Donghae laughs, the sound ringing like chimes in Kyuhyun's ears as he continues to read.
After five minutes, he looks over to see Donghae's back turned and hunched. "What are you doing?" Donghae looks at him for a split second, flashes his pearly whites, then hunches back over; Kyuhyun peeks over his shoulder to find him scribbling something on the lock. "What are you writing?"
Donghae shrugs Kyuhyun off, a face-tearing grin painted on his face; Kyuhyun's stomach flips a few times as Donghae holds the lock in front of his face:
To Kyuhyun,
It's a shame you don't believe in love, but that's alright. I'll be your friend forever, okay?
Love, Donghae.
He enters the combination in seconds, then hooks it on an empty link and locks it, sealing the deal. He smiles at Kyuhyun with a warmth that he had never received from anyone before, and suddenly he realizes that having Donghae in his life forever probably was a good thing.
In Kyuhyun's eyes, love is a farce. It is scientifically proven to be nothing more than pheromones, hormones...some sort of mones in your body that his brain can't seem to grasp, but you get the picture. There is no such thing as fate, coincidence, destiny or even chance meetings. It is all science; science and the fear that society seems to harbor.
In Donghae's eyes, love is oxygen. It is a vital source of mankind's -- no. It is a vital source of all living creatures' survival. There is a reason there are so many songs are written about it -- All You Need Is Love. Crazy Little Thing Called Love. And of course, let's not forget I Will Always Love You, something that Heechul's friend Zhou Mi had a tendency to belt out during drunken karaoke sessions. To Donghae, love is one of the few things that is both worth living and dying for.
Kyuhyun takes a large gulp of his soda, staring into Cheonggyecheon, hypnotized by the flow of the water and the way the lights from the buildings that enveloped them refracted and broke on the surface. Donghae was seated beside him, downing his energy drink in a shorter time than is probably healthy; when finished, he lets out a rather loud belch and sighs.
Kyuhyun stares at a particular fragment of light that resembles a padlock and his heart rate jumps. He turns Donghae's message over in his mind, picking it to pieces and analyzing its every possible meaning -- did he love Kyuhyun, or was he just fucking with him because he had such an aversion to the very mention of a relationship?
"Donghae."
"Hmm," The older boy answers, leaning back on his elbows. Kyuhyun notices that his fingers are trembling.
"Are you..." He pauses, catching his breath; inhale, exhale. "Are you in love with me?"
Donghae hoists himself back up, analyzes Kyuhyun's face. It makes him even more nervous. "I don't know."
"You don't know," Kyuhyun repeats.
"Nope," Donghae stretches his arms. "I like you. I like you more than a friend. But I don't know if I'm in love with you."
Kyuhyun nods slowly; more than a friend. What the hell does that even mean?
"Why? Do you want me to be?" Donghae hikes an eyebrow. Kyuhyun swallows hard, finding it necessary to look away; he stares at his hands instead.
"Sungmin told me something the other day," He says feebly. His brain is beginning to get really fuzzy and his tongue seems to be acting on its own; he hates when he doesn't have control of his own body. "That you and I are like milk and honey. Two extremes. While they're not always appetizing on their own, when they're put together, they're perfect." He feels the blood rush from his brain to his cheeks, settling there. Donghae blinks a few times.
"I don't...I don't get it."
"I want to believe in love," Kyuhyun whispers, his brain screaming at him that he's acting irrational. Embarrassment floods over him that he's even speaking like this. "I want you to help me believe."
That dorky smile spreads across Donghae's face and Kyuhyun's stomach flips over; he stays perfectly still as Donghae slowly closes the space between them, pressing their lips together.
The following day, Kyuhyun made the trek up to the base of the N. Seoul Tower; next to a certain blue padlock, he places a small silver one with an engraved message:
Donghae,
You make me feel things that shouldn't exist. I don't mind, though.
Love,
Kyuhyun.
THE END.
In Kyuhyun's eyes, love is a farce; but it's what keeps Donghae living.
A/N: THIS IS TO MAKE UP FOR THE FAILURE THAT WAS XENOPHOBIA PART 4 ORZ.
I wrote this especially for hunni23, because she asked so sweetly. This is stylistically different from my norm. The pictures are supposed to set the mood of the section.
SONG: LOVE THE WAY YOU LIE (mashup) - SAM TSUI
Every weekday morning at eight, he hears the same words ("Hi! Welcome to Dunkin' Donuts, what can I get for you?") and every weekday morning at eight, he repeats the same thing back. ("Just a small black coffee with one sugar.") There are no arguments, no troubles (aside from the occasional spill) and the only question he's ever asked is, "Anything else?"
He's taken aback when a bright-eyed boy, presumably a few years older than he and with eyes that should belong to a newborn labrador, shows up on the other side of the counter with an large iced coffee that looks like it's 90% milk and slides it to him.
"Um," Kyuhyun blinks a few times, pointing a finger accusingly at the too-big and not-steaming cup. "I ordered a small hot black coffee with one sugar."
"Learn to live a little," The guy says, whose name tag reads Hae, and he flashes the perfectly-alined pearls in his gums. Kyuhyun blinks once, twice, three times before taking a long sip -- it's sweet, but not disgusting, creamy, with a weird sort of autumn-y feeling to it.
"Excuse me," He asks; the guy looks up from wiping down the latte machine. "What exactly is this?"
The guy smirks. Victory. "Large iced coffee with milk, sugar and two shots of pumpkin."
Kyuhyun stares from him to the waiting drink and takes another sip; he decides he likes it.
Kyuhyun slurps his way through his calculus class, the pumpkin syrup causing his mouth to thicken and stick together as if he had smeared peanut butter inside. He attempts to jot down what the professor's saying but calculus is just not catching his attention; he doodles apples and leaves instead.
A small hand is suddenly on his paper, writing a message.
"What the fuck is wrong with you?" It reads, the symbols bubbly and curvy. Feminine. "This is the first time I've seen you not jizzing yourself over mathematics."
Kyuhyun smirks. "Are you kidding me?" He scribbles. "I am completely aroused by the limits of functions."
"Not as aroused as you are over that coffee," The hand writes. "Did Jesus jizz in it or something?"
He slides the coffee to his left; Sungmin takes a long sip and lets the liquid settle in his mouth momentarily, analyzing its taste before swallowing. He grimaces.
"That is repulsive," He hisses a little too loudly and the professor shoots them a glare; he lowers his voice to a harsh whisper. "How can you even drink that? I feel like I just swallowed mud."
Kyuhyun chuckles, taking back the offensive drink. "Learn to live a little, Min."
The line is out the door when Kyuhyun goes back on Saturday; business men chatting busily on their blackberries, old women wanting their daily dose of decaf tea and teenage girls unsure of what disgustingly fruity flavor coolatta they want. He checks his watch, 8:11 AM. He has nineteen minutes before calculus.
He waits for five minutes and the line moves approximately three centimeters. He checks his watch impulsively, the ticking of the second hand thrumming in his mind and he's starting to feel claustrophobic. He looks over the counter and meets two chocolate-brown puppydog eyes that grin at him and tell him to go sit down and wait a few minutes; he doesn't argue.
The worker sits across from him at the table in the back of the store ten minutes later, sliding an iced coffee across the surface. Kyuhyun's reflexes are a second too slow; he snatches it just before it would have plummeted over the edge. The worker grins. Kyuhyun liked the fact that he actually resembled a puppy.
"I'm Donghae."
"Kyuhyun."
"Listen," Donghae licked his lips tentatively, folding his hands on the table. "I'm off in ten minutes. If you're not busy...we should do something."
A wave of panic washes over Kyuhyun; he is at a crossroads. He is normally a rock in situations like these: stead-fast, immovable. Responsible. He checks his watch: 8:24. If he leaves now and books it, he can make it in time.
He takes a drawn-out sip of his coffee.
Donghae holds a polo up to his chest, alluding that he is wearing it. It's pink.
Kyuhyun blinks a few times before speaking. "Why."
"I dunno, it's cute," Donghae says. He throws words like 'cute,' 'adorable' and 'precious' around like nothing. "I think it would show off my pecs."
Kyuhyun snorts. "You sound like Sungmin -- 'as manly as a man, yet as gentle as a woman.'"
Donghae gasps and slaps his shoulder; a guaranteed bruise. "You know Sungmin? Lee Sungmin?!"
Kyuhyun rolls his eyes. Of course they would know each other. "None other."
"He was my neighbor when I first moved here. He would kick my ass all the time with his martial arts shit," Donghae's eyes had this child-like twinkle that made Kyuhyun nervous. He was too easy to read. "So, Kyuhyun...you go to Kyunghee, correct."
"Mhm."
"What are you majoring in?" Donghae asks, seemingly paying more attention to a pair of black ripped jeans than to Kyuhyun's answer.
"Computer Engineering, minoring in Psychology and Law."
Donghae makes a disgusted face; he grabs the jeans and slings it over his arm. "How mundane."
"Excuse me," Kyuhyun snaps, crossing his arms against his chest, much like a child put in Time Out. "Sorry I don't major in something exciting. What about you, huh? I bet you're majoring in something like Nuclear Engineering or Oriental Medicine."
"Actually," Donghae smirks, once again victorious (at least in his own eyes.) "I don't go to school."
Kyuhyun furrows his brow, curious; Donghae doesn't notice, though, so Kyuhyun figures that it isn't his place to ask. "I really like those jeans."
In Kyuhyun's eyes, love is a farce; a name for the simple phenomenon that occurs in your body after a certain age, where your hormones are thrown out of whack and the haunting fear lingers in your mind that you will forever be alone if you don't find a companion. It is nothing driven by fate or destiny or God or anything of that sort. You simply decide on someone whom you are able to sufficiently function with so that you won't die miserable and lonesome.
He realizes this one night on his way home from the library; it's early March, because the air is bitter but there is no indication that snow had been recently present. He passes under dead trees wrapped in neon Christmas lights, their glow illuminating the patterned sidewalks and casting an almost sickly-purple pallor on those below. He spies a couple a few yards ahead of him, hands intertwined and voices sweeter than Halloween candy. They chatter incessantly and use pet names that make Kyuhyun nauseous and he can't help feeling like the entire ordeal seems so forced, so fake and scripted, as if it were a romance movie instead of real life.
He decides being alone forever is much better than having to fake emotion; although he isn't really one to talk, because he has never felt emotion even remotely close to love, anyway.
"How can you not believe in love?" Donghae asks one night, a month later. How the subject was brought up, Kyuhyun wasn't exactly sure -- perhaps because a mutual friend, Heechul, had just been ever-so-eloquently dumped by his long-term boyfriend, Hankyung, via text message. "Love is like oxygen."
"Love is so cliché and outdated," Kyuhyun replies with a huff. They were on their way back from the library to Kyuhyun's dorm, where an impatient Sungmin lays in waiting. "Half of marriages today end in divorce, anyway."
Donghae rolls his eyes and exhales harshly. "That's just math. Statistics. Numbers. Numbers and formulas can't calculate love."
Kyuhyun dislikes the fact that Donghae frequently seems to have the upper hand in their conversations.
He changes the subject. "So tell me...why aren't you in school?"
Donghae smirks, but not with arrogance like most people. It was more like disappointment. "Well...I wanted to go to a college in New York City and major in Dancing. I didn't get in, so I was just kind of like, fuck it. If I can't go to the school I want and major in what I want, I'd rather work my ass off at Dunkin' Donuts and dance on my own."
Kyuhyun pauses, frozen in his spot. He's not sure how to react; he never realized that Donghae actually had dreams and aspirations, he simply assumed that he was a lazy college drop-out with no ambition. Donghae turns around and tilts his head to the side, like a dog.
"What?" He asks. Kyuhyun smiles.
"You look like a dog when you do that."
There is some quick scribbling, followed by an exasperated groan and the ruffle of papers being thrown into the air.
"What," Kyuhyun asks in monotone from the couch; he is playing Starcraft and doesn't feel like being interrupted by one of Sungmin's tantrums.
"I can't focus on fucking calc," Sungmin groans from the floor, head laid on top of his textbook as his eyes follow the ceiling fan. "Tell me about your love life."
"What love life?"
"The one you have with Donghae."
Kyuhyun looks away from the laptop; Sungmin props himself up on his elbows.
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Well," Sungmin begins, flipping his bangs (that need to be trimmed, he makes a mental note of) out of his line of vision. "You two seem to be together almost constantly."
Kyuhyun furrows his brow and blinks. "I don't date. You know this."
Sungmin snorts. "Well, he seems to be really into you. And you guys are so good for each other. You're like milk and honey -- you're extremely bland and he's disgustingly sweet, but when put together you guys could be delicious. Maybe you should give it a shot."
"Love isn't real, Sungmin."
"Well, neither is Starcraft," the older boy retaliates. Kyuhyun's eyes flicker. "That doesn't stop you from being obsessed with it."
Kyuhyun stares for a moment, then turns back to his game; nobody is on his side anymore.
There is a tradition in Seoul. Couples from all over travel to Namsan Park every day, tiny padlocks in hand with messages of love scribbled all over their surface. It's said that couples who write messages on these padlocks and hook them onto the fence at the base of the N. Seoul Tower will be together forever. Kyuhyun had never heard of this tradition until he met Donghae, whose dream of the moment seemed to be having someone to write a message for.
"That is the dumbest thing I have ever heard of," Kyuhyun snips as they climb up the hill towards the tower.
"No, you're just the Ebenezer Scrooge of Love," Donghae says, swinging a neon-blue padlock on his pinky. "If it's so dumb, why are there thousands of these things up here?"
"Because society is driven by desperate saps like you," Kyuhyun chides, nudging Donghae in the side; Donghae is suddenly four years old and sticks his tongue out.
At the top of the hill, the duo approach the padlock-covered fence and begin reading some messages -- "Dear insert boy's name here, Our love will last a lifetime! Saranghae~ Girl's Name" seemed to be the norm, although there were a few that simply had two names inside a heart and one even confessed someone's love for their cat.
"Well," Kyuhyun says, dropping the cat-lover's lock. "Seems like Heechul and Heebum will be together forever." Donghae laughs, the sound ringing like chimes in Kyuhyun's ears as he continues to read.
After five minutes, he looks over to see Donghae's back turned and hunched. "What are you doing?" Donghae looks at him for a split second, flashes his pearly whites, then hunches back over; Kyuhyun peeks over his shoulder to find him scribbling something on the lock. "What are you writing?"
Donghae shrugs Kyuhyun off, a face-tearing grin painted on his face; Kyuhyun's stomach flips a few times as Donghae holds the lock in front of his face:
To Kyuhyun,
It's a shame you don't believe in love, but that's alright. I'll be your friend forever, okay?
Love, Donghae.
He enters the combination in seconds, then hooks it on an empty link and locks it, sealing the deal. He smiles at Kyuhyun with a warmth that he had never received from anyone before, and suddenly he realizes that having Donghae in his life forever probably was a good thing.
In Kyuhyun's eyes, love is a farce. It is scientifically proven to be nothing more than pheromones, hormones...some sort of mones in your body that his brain can't seem to grasp, but you get the picture. There is no such thing as fate, coincidence, destiny or even chance meetings. It is all science; science and the fear that society seems to harbor.
In Donghae's eyes, love is oxygen. It is a vital source of mankind's -- no. It is a vital source of all living creatures' survival. There is a reason there are so many songs are written about it -- All You Need Is Love. Crazy Little Thing Called Love. And of course, let's not forget I Will Always Love You, something that Heechul's friend Zhou Mi had a tendency to belt out during drunken karaoke sessions. To Donghae, love is one of the few things that is both worth living and dying for.
Kyuhyun takes a large gulp of his soda, staring into Cheonggyecheon, hypnotized by the flow of the water and the way the lights from the buildings that enveloped them refracted and broke on the surface. Donghae was seated beside him, downing his energy drink in a shorter time than is probably healthy; when finished, he lets out a rather loud belch and sighs.
Kyuhyun stares at a particular fragment of light that resembles a padlock and his heart rate jumps. He turns Donghae's message over in his mind, picking it to pieces and analyzing its every possible meaning -- did he love Kyuhyun, or was he just fucking with him because he had such an aversion to the very mention of a relationship?
"Donghae."
"Hmm," The older boy answers, leaning back on his elbows. Kyuhyun notices that his fingers are trembling.
"Are you..." He pauses, catching his breath; inhale, exhale. "Are you in love with me?"
Donghae hoists himself back up, analyzes Kyuhyun's face. It makes him even more nervous. "I don't know."
"You don't know," Kyuhyun repeats.
"Nope," Donghae stretches his arms. "I like you. I like you more than a friend. But I don't know if I'm in love with you."
Kyuhyun nods slowly; more than a friend. What the hell does that even mean?
"Why? Do you want me to be?" Donghae hikes an eyebrow. Kyuhyun swallows hard, finding it necessary to look away; he stares at his hands instead.
"Sungmin told me something the other day," He says feebly. His brain is beginning to get really fuzzy and his tongue seems to be acting on its own; he hates when he doesn't have control of his own body. "That you and I are like milk and honey. Two extremes. While they're not always appetizing on their own, when they're put together, they're perfect." He feels the blood rush from his brain to his cheeks, settling there. Donghae blinks a few times.
"I don't...I don't get it."
"I want to believe in love," Kyuhyun whispers, his brain screaming at him that he's acting irrational. Embarrassment floods over him that he's even speaking like this. "I want you to help me believe."
That dorky smile spreads across Donghae's face and Kyuhyun's stomach flips over; he stays perfectly still as Donghae slowly closes the space between them, pressing their lips together.
The following day, Kyuhyun made the trek up to the base of the N. Seoul Tower; next to a certain blue padlock, he places a small silver one with an engraved message:
Donghae,
You make me feel things that shouldn't exist. I don't mind, though.
Love,
Kyuhyun.
THE END.