orange boy.
Orange Boyorange boy.
Oranges. To Baekhyun, they smelled weird – in a good way – the way the strong smell ran through his nose, made him sneeze as if he was allergic to them. At first he didn’t like them. He said he preferred sweet fruits, like strawberries (even though they were sour as well). He didn’t like the expression he made when he ate oranges – though to be honest, he looked like a cute puppy, consdering how he shut his eyes tightly and murmured about the sour taste.
There was a reason why Baekhyun began eating oranges, always dragging himself to the marketplace and did his best to look the most presentable as possible. Heavy black eyeliner around his eyes, the finest jacket he owned which was actually on sale and his light blue topsiders in finest quality (according to him), but they were already starting to get worn out.
“You must really be in love,” his best friend, Kyungsoo, said as he applied the black eyeliner around Baekhyun’s right eye. “And you don’t even know his name.”
Baekhyun pouted, feeling the movement of the eyeliner pen draw around his left eye. “He sells oranges and sometimes he would wear glasses and smile to his costumers,” was what he used to answer.
“That is so little information, Byun Baekhyun...” Kyungsoo bit his bottom lip as he had started to draw on Baekhyun’s left eye.
“Oh well, he’s handsome and you should have heard his voice!” Baekhyun sounded way too excited.
“Baekhyun and his orange boy,” Kyungsoo teased and finished drawing thin lines around Baekhyun’s eyes. “You really should make a move soon. Your apartment smells like oranges, it is filled with oranges, decorated with oranges and who knows if your wall will become orange soon. Your apartment is so orangey, Baekhyun.”
To be honest, Kyungsoo should have just shut his mouth up when his apartment was filled with Pororo things – Pororo curtains, Pororo pillows, Pororo plushies and you name it. One would have thought that Kyungsoo lived in a kindergarten. Instead of oranges, Kyungsoo’s apartment was filled with Pororo, decorated with Pororo and who knew when he decided to get a Pororo wallpaper. He even had a fake tattoo of Pororo’s penguin face on his left arm. Kyungsoo would fit perfectly in a kindergarten. The worst thing was that his boyfriend loved the tattoo on his arm. Jongin, that bastard.
Baekhyun shivered at the thought.
He first caught the orange boy about two months ago, in the middle of June in the busy marketplace of Seoul. Baekhyun wasn’t planning on buying oranges at all – in fact; he was out to buy strawberries, because they weren't sour at all. Luckily or unluckily for him, the strawberries were beside the oranges. Baekhyun had his eyes glued on the red, tasty-looking strawberries and asked if he could taste one. And he did with a grin on his face. Baekhyun closed his eyes (he didn’t have any eyeliner on) and loved the sweetness that filled his mouth.
So delici–
“Would you like to try an orange?” The voice was dark and interrupted Baekhyun’s oh-so-lovely-strawberry-moment.
And he frowned, angry at the sudden interruption. He opened his eyes, just to be taken aback and the frown was gone now. He met his eyes, creepily huge but somehow to Baekhyun, they were attractive. There was a huge grin on his face and Baekhyun had to raise his head, because the guy was tall, and he was not. Relationship goals, his mind screamed. Baekhyun began to wonder if he really was the one who owned that dark voice, because they – as in his cute face and dark and manly voice – didn’t fit at all. Baekhyun decided that the boy was handsome and awfully attractive.
Strawberries were thrown away. His head was filled with the boy, then oranges, and again, the boy. “Sure,” Baekhyun said and took the orange boat from the other’s hand.
Sour. Baekhyun closed his eyes tightly – murmuring about the sour taste in his mouth – and couldn’t stand still as he was tapping his feet wildly, unbeknownst of how he probably looked like a little kindergarten boy. Compared to the taste of the strawberry, this was definitely not the fruit he liked. But the orange boy gave it to him, and who could resist the orange boy?
Baekhyun felt a hand on the top of his head, and the word “cute” came out of the other’s mouth. The word rang in to Baekhyun’s ears. Baekhyun froze at the touch, opening his eyes slowly and coughed. He didn’t know but tints of red shades were visible on his cheeks. Their eyes met again and Baekhyun felt himself slowly but surely developing a crush on the orange boy. Baekhyun threw the orange boy a smile, a stupid one.
That day, for the first time, Byun Baekhyun forgot about the strawberries and exchanged them for oranges – or to be more exact – the orange boy.
“I’d like to buy your oranges,” Baekhyun had said.
It was as if Cinderella's fairy godmother came to visit, because Baekhyun’s apartment wall suddenly became orange, after failing once again to ask for the orange boy’s number or at least his name. Kyungsoo’s eyes widened (even more than they already were) as he entered Baekhyun’s place. He was silent for a moment, already wanting to palm his face and say that he was right. Baekhyun’s apartment was orangier than ever. If only Baekhyun knew that Kyungsoo’s apartment wall was full of Pororo’s penguin face by now.
No wonder they were best friends – best friends think alike.
“When I said make a move, I was not talking about your apartment,” Kyungsoo said – his wide round eyes looking around as if he couldn’t recognize his best friend’s apartment. What a hypocrite.
Baekhyun didn’t say anything and smiled instead. It wasn’t a happy smile – but more like a smile that said, “I am a coward and I only want to imagine.” After almost two months passing by, Baekhyun still didn’t make a move and the summer was soon over – which meant that the orange boy would stop selling oranges, and Baekhyun didn’t want him to stop selling oranges.
“You should have at least gotten his number or his name,” Kyungsoo was already in the kitchen, skillfully peeling an orange while looking at Baekhyun with his gigantic wide eyes. “What happened this time?”
Baekhyun puckered his lips, before he buried his face on the kitchen table. “I was going to ask for his name, but then I got stuck...” He murmured.
“You always get stuck! Next time, I am going to join you!” Kyungsoo frowned slightly.
“No, you will humiliate me, you evil Pororo worshipper!”
Kyungsoo was silent as he shoved an orange boat in his mouth.
“I am just going to die with the oranges, Kyungie!” Baekhyun groaned.
Kyungsoo shook his head and shoved an orange boat inside Baekhyun’s mouth. “Then die.”
Unfortunately for Baekhyun, he didn’t die.
It was about three days before August ended that Baekhyun finally kicked himself mentally. This time, he didn’t have eyeliner around his eyes nor did he wear the best jacket the ever owned, but the shoes were still those light blue topsiders. Baekhyun was nervous – not like he wasn’t nervous at the previous times he went to see the orange boy – but he was more nervous today.
“Believe in yourself. Come on, Baekkie. You are cute and if I weren’t that gay and was into topping, you and I would definitely be in your bed right now. But Jongin… he’s just the God.” Kyungsoo had said the day he visited while peeling another orange, and Baekhyun couldn’t help but cover his ears. Such a shame he still heard what Kyungsoo was blurting out. Baekhyun totally thought that Pororo was Kyungsoo’s God – apparently not anymore, thanks to a someone.
Baekhyun was hesitant, but this was the last time he would possibly see the orange boy if he didn’t ask for his number. There he was, standing in front of the orange boy’s orange stall. For almost two months, Baekhyun had failed to grab his name and his number. Still, he went to the marketplace just to meet a stranger and secretly admire him.
“Hey,” the orange boy said with his perfectly huge grin and waved at him.
Baekhyun’s heart began to beat fast – oh he was such a softie. He loved how the orange boy would greet him with his creepy grin, though it was beautiful to Baekhyun. It did upset him a little that the orange boy didn’t once ask for his name, since he practically was a regular customer by now or just a fallen in love puppy, who forgot about the strawberries and fell in love with the orange boy.
“H-Hey...” Baekhyun called back, his voice shaky and horrible.
“How’s my lovely costumer doing in this wonderful weather?” The orange boy said, still with a grin on his face.
The weather was not really that wonderful. It was drizzling and the reason for Baekhyun’s eyes.
“Good,” Baekhyun managed to smile at his best.
“You are cuter without the eyeliner thing…”
Baekhyun wanted to die more than ever. It would even be okay if he was thrown oranges at by Kyungsoo until he died. The orange boy had just called him cute without the eyeliner. He gulped slightly and forced a smile, before carefully picking a few oranges and setting them on the market scale. Today Baekhyun felt like buying all of the orange boy’s oranges – just because he was called cute. Kyungsoo would have face palmed completely by now.
It was silent, but Baekhyun felt the boy’s eyes gazing him – following his hand as they felt the oranges.
“Is it that hard for you to ask for my name?” The orange boy said softly, followed by a chuckle.
Baekhyun froze, his hand squeezing an orange tighter than he should. He didn’t want to look up and me the mesmerizing eyes of the tall orange boy – no, it was just too dangerous now. It was too sudden. Baekhyun was completely taken aback. His heart was beating even faster – he was nervous and he gulped again, a deep one and Baekhyun was sure the orange boy could hear it.
“Really, your friend was here yesterday.” He continued, “Kyungsoo? I am sure that was his name. Anyways, he brought his boyfriend with him and I swear they looked like milk and honey – you know the skin color…” He chuckled and scratched the back of his head – trying so hard not to be awkward, because Baekhyun was still taken aback and he was frozen like a statue, and orange boy didn’t know what to do.
Baekhyun closed his eyes tightly and cursed Kyungsoo so much in his head.
“Your friend and his boyfriend told me about your apartment,” The orange boy smiled.
Baekhyun was boiling and he was sure the orange he held on tight to, was about to explode. Die, Kyungsoo, die.
“But I think it’s cute, really.”
Baekhyun didn’t know if he was supposed to just stand there and listen to the orange boy, babbling about his apartment or what else Kyungsoo had told him. He just wanted to find Kyungsoo, throw an orange at his face and murder his one and only Pororo plush placed in his bed.
“Baekhyun?”
The orange boy calling out his name felt like seventh heaven or the eighth or ninth or even tenth – if they just existed. He loved it way too much, that standing there the whole day would be totally fine to him. He could even freeze to death, because right now his ears were burning, and so were his cheeks. But then, how did the orange boy even know his name? Do Kyungsoo.
And so, Baekhyun looked up – slowly and hesitantly leading his eyes to meet the orange boys’ mesmerizing ones. His heart fluttered so badly and everything was just dreamy – so white and sparkly, despite the gloomy weather that the orange boy had called wonderful. And then Baekhyun knew it was over when the orange boy smiled at him.
“My name is Park Chanyeol, and it is nice to meet you, Baekhyun.” Chanyeol said reached out his hand.
In the end, Baekhyun had to thank the evil Pororo worshipper, Kyungsoo, after all.
It didn’t take a long time before Baekhyun learnt that the orange boy went to the same school as him. It didn’t take him a long time before he learnt that the orange boy, actually also liked strawberries more than oranges. It didn’t take a long time for them before they went on dates, held hands for the first time and slowly but suddenly fell for each other. It also didn’t take a long time for Baekhyun to realize that Kyungsoo’s wall was full of Pororo’s face, but fortunately, that was definitely another story.
What took the longest time for Baekhyun to learn was that the orange boy’s name was Park Chanyeol and not the orange boy, but somehow once in a while, Baekhyun will always think of oranges when he thinks of Chanyeol.
Comments