They end the night a little half-heartedly. There’s something left unsaid on the edge of Mingyu’s lips and Minghao turns back to look at him in his doorway before he ducks into his car; something that he had never done before. For the next few hours, Mingyu will pin all his mixed feelings on the sushi being an aphrodisiac; blaming the airy feeling in his stomach on the raw fish being bad. He’s fine.

          What’s going on.

          Sunday’s clouds hold the promise of rain. They’re stacked thick and dark, so Mingyu asks if Minghao wants to come over early before it starts pouring. Unfortunately, Minghao can’t. His students requested an extra session since they have their own Winter league competitions coming up and Minghao submitted because he knows his teaching efficiency has been subpar.

          “That’s okay.”

          Minghao hesitates before responding, “If you wanna call today off, we can.” The static in the receiver feels louder than normal today, “I’m sure you’d like to have a weekend to yourself.”

          “Nah, my weekends are pretty vacant. If you’re up for traversing in the rain, come over.” Mingyu weighs his words, hot-potato-ing them between different sects of his brain and juggling them on the tip of his tongue, but goddammit if Minghao can look at him like that then he can say something a little ballsy too, “I want to see you.”

          “You want to see me?” Minghao laughs. He guesses the dancer took his words as sarcasm, a joke. It doesn’t hurt, but it doesn’t sit right, “My, my, Mingyu. I never thought I’d see the day.” Mingyu doesn’t know how to respond. The spot on his couch is starting to get uncomfortable and his legs are starting to feel restless, “I’ll see you after work.”

          “At 4?”

          “Sure.” Minghao mumbles something off to the side, probably to his students, “What do you want to eat?”

          “Surprise me.” There’s a short string of curses over the line that makes him laugh. Minghao shouldn’t have to surprise him. Going back to Celestia’s or one of the other restaurants was more than enough.

          “I’ll make you regret those words, Mingyu.”

          When Minghao shows up at 4 with an early dinner, the real surprise is that he’s soaked. He apologizes continuously as Mingyu ushers him in and out of the rain, taking the dripping plastic bags of food out of his hand and plopping them on the counter before grabbing a spare towel from the hallway cabinet. It’s one of those times that he moves without thinking; as if it was just second nature. Minghao’s taking off his shoes, balancing on one foot in the doorway, shutting the door behind him with one hand and using the other to steady himself against the wall. Mingyu covers his head with the towel and rubs it into his hair, akin to the method you’d use to dry a dog. He’s never dried another person before, only the shelter dogs that he sometimes washes, but Minghao’s not complaining even though Mingyu’s roughing him up. He doesn’t move until a loose string form the towel gets caught on his ear and he slaps Mingyu’s arm for him to stop and to detangle himself.

          “Do you want me to throw your jacket in the dryer?” Mingyu realizes that he’s not being very professional and takes a step away from the dancer. He lets Minghao stand back up to his full height and towel his own hair off. As if on cue, the sky stops flooding the streets once Minghao’s inside. That’s just painful irony.

          He tugs on the wet sleeves of the grey hoodie; the fabric has a death grip on his arm. He tries the other side with no luck, “It’s okay, I’ll just let it sit over here. I don’t want to stain your other clothes.” That’s just the Minghao way of saying ‘I don’t want to burden you.’ He crosses his arms and tries to pull the hoodie over his head, but the sticky fabric tugs his shirt along with it, riding up on his stomach. Reflexively, Mingyu reaches forward to tug the white t-shirt down, but Minghao can’t see and ends up punching him in the face, “I’m so sorry, are you okay?”

          “Yeah, no, no, I’m fine.” Mingyu rubs his cheek.

          Minghao’s hair is all over the place. One of his longer earrings is caught in one of the studs and—much to Mingyu’s dissatisfaction—the water had seeped through his hoodie and into the top of his white shirt. It’s now clinging to his chest and collarbones, leaving little to the imagination. Well, at least he doesn’t have his s pierced.

          “Here, the dryer’s empty anyway.” He offers a hand out for the jacket that is begrudgingly handed over with cold hands. Mingyu takes it to his laundry room and tosses it into the dryer along with a couple scented sheets, then instead of going back to the living room, he ducks into his own room, rummaging for the smallest t-shirt he has, “Do you want to change? You’re going to catch a cold like that.”

          “Thanks, mom.” Minghao takes the shirt and strips off his own. Wanting to give Minghao a little privacy, Mingyu busies himself in the kitchen, surprised to see Chinese takeout being the dinner tonight. It’s not anything special, just your standard fast food; chow mein, pork buns, hot and sour soup, general’s chicken, broccoli beef, rice, and very-un-Chinese fortune cookies.

          Mingyu finally looks up after tossing the plastic bags into his drawer of plastic bags. Minghao looks better in that shirt than he does. It’s just some pastel-pink t-shirt, ombréd into white with a sky-blue pocket. He would wear it, but it’s also a size and a half too small and if there’s one thing that Mingyu hates wearing more than wet socks, it’s clothes that are too tight. It never suited Mingyu. If he’s honest, it doesn’t really suit Minghao either. Maybe it’s just the fact that he likes seeing Minghao accepting his gestures that gaslights him into thinking that he looks nice.

          Their dinner passes quietly. Minghao explains that this was the only restaurant that was fast and close to the studio. Mingyu regrets not asking him what time he was off today (it was 3:30). Minghao had to rush to get takeout and then speed across town to show up on time. The food isn’t bad, it’s actually pretty good and reminds Mingyu of his broke college days, but it there’s something missing.

          “Sorry if the food isn’t top tier.” Minghao shovels another bite into his mouth.

          Mingyu takes a drink. Getting ten varieties of tea the other day was a better idea than he expected. Minghao’s sipping on chrysanthemum and he’s scalding his mouth with green, “It’s perfectly fine.”

          “I would have ordered something more traditional, but I didn’t know if you’d like it. Most of my American friends don’t really like the legit stuff.”

          “Oh, same here. They can’t stand the spice or get squeamish when they’re presented with bones or a whole fish. Like where do they think food comes from?”

          “I know right?” Tonight’s conversation is more wholesome than anything Mingyu could have ever hoped for. While their town had a proportionately large Asian population compared to the towns around them, it was still hard to blend their at-home Asian heritage with their friends at school. While Riverside had a majority of Caucasian students—where kids of ethnic minorities struggled to form their own cliques—, Oakdale was much more diverse. Students came from every walk of life and it wasn’t too hard to share similarities between cultures. Coming to lunch with snacks that were never in English was something they sometimes got unwanted attention for—not to mention the times it was something less ‘normal’ like shrimp chips or dried squid, but it wasn’t a far stretch for some of his other friends.

          Minghao points out how he and Eugene Chavez (his former neighbor and tennis team captain) had spent an entire lunch period talking about how lo mai gai was essentially a Cantonese version of a tamale. It was mind-blowing at the time; less so as they grew and saw more of the world. Minghao tells Mingyu about all the really amazing fusion restaurants and food trucks he had seen and tried in the city. Everything from vegan sushi burgers to bratwurst with spiralized potato dipped in cheese-corn. Kimchi in mashed yams was a fail, but everything else sounded mouth-watering. When asked, Minghao admits that he doesn’t care too much about traditional food. He loves it, but he gets tired of it quickly. What he does enjoy is trying new things, putting pieces of things together in ways they were never meant to be and seeing what the result is. He talks about how the spaghetti tacos he tried for his fifteenth birthday were both good and terribly messy and how he and Ian Wang decided to dissect a burrito and shove pickled daikon and charsiu into it.

          “It would have been good if we took out the beans.”

          “Sure, Minghao, sure.”

          Apparently, his love of weird food combinations followed him through college and to work because he rattles off another tale of how he and Jun had drunk too much one night and made the choice to eat congee with 7-11 junk food. That was also ‘good’. He says that when he and Soonyoung first met, they ate a lot of Korean food since Wonwoo often brought some authentic stuff from restaurants in the city. At first, the idea of cold noodles sounded interesting, but Minghao didn’t seem to understand that naengmyeon was what it was. He ended up not liking it in the slightest. But he did later combine spring rolls with bulgogi and that was ‘good’.

          He asks if Mingyu’s ever tried any good combinations and Mingyu has to dig, really dig, for any example in his memory. Mingyu is the type to dwell in the past and likes the tradition of foods and how they came to be. He can’t say he’s tried too many combinations cross-culturally. He usually goes out to eat specific things.

          “Even something simple, like purple rice and marinara-”

          “Are you telling me you just dumped some marinara into your rice-”

          “Hey, it works for jambalaya and Spanish rice, it should work with bibimbap.”

          “Minghao, no.”

          “It was like a little shrimp, a little chicken, cucumber, bell pepper, Creole seasoning, sesame seeds, rice-”

          “Minghao, no.”

          “Mingyu, yes.”

          “Did it turn out?”

          “I- well- I should have warmed it up and let it sit, but it was- it was okay.”

          Is this bonding?

          They’re not talking about high school, just school. They aren’t talking about high school life, just life. And it’s so ing nice. This is the kind of conversation that Mingyu had unknowingly craved. Sure, his Korean-American co-workers could have probably humored his rants about weird snacks, but none of them were as forward as Minghao. In reality, this is probably the most that he’s ever heard Minghao say in a single sitting. They just talk and talk and talk. Mingyu doesn’t mind if he’s taking the backseat for most of the night. Minghao’s sure to ask him questions often, but Mingyu’s letting him steer the conversation wherever he wants.

          Most of it revolves around food and how being broke in college sparked his resourceful nature. Mingyu has to agree; combining random in the cafeteria in order to keep it interesting was the bane of his freshman dining experience. He even resorted to eating Cinnamon Toast Crunch with Sunny D, to which Minghao shrugs and says he’s done Cheerios with a Caprisun. Minghao says that he lived off of ramen so hard that he can’t even look at the Maruchan stuff without wanting to gag. Shin Ramyun is tolerated, but most instant noodles are a turn-off.

          Mingyu laughs. Minghao laughs.

          From the outside looking in, they look like old college buddies catching up over tea and takeout. From the inside looking out, Mingyu sees them getting along better than he’d ever expected. He never thought about having Minghao in his kitchen as both a patient and a friend.

          Oh, the F word.

          Did he just admit to the F word?

          “It’s getting late,” Minghao laughs and looks at a text, “My roommate is wondering where I am.”

          Without realizing it, they’d talked for nearly six hours. They’re both going to regret it in the morning when their voices and throats are exhausted, but in Mingyu’s book, it is well worth the strain. This is more than he’s ever talked at once. The longest conversation to date is probably a three-hour Skype call he had with Jungkook the Christmas after he moved to New York and most of that was due to poor connection. Talking with Minghao felt like talking with a better version of himself.

          They barely touched on exercises and all Minghao managed to complete between changes in subject were his stretches, but he seems to be feeling quite good. It had started raining again; pouring really. Mingyu’s apartment is filled with the greasy smell of generic Chinese takeout, but the only thing he’s left with is a craving. He wants to talk more, he wants to learn more. He wants to try Minghao’s weird pseudo-recipes and tell him about his experiences in the kitchen; about how many pastries he’s burned and how he once lit a spatula on fire over an electric stove.

          “I’ll walk you to your car.” Mingyu picks up the black umbrella he has by the door, “Sorry, we didn’t get very far in terms of fixing your knee today.”

          “That’s okay. It was nice just talking with you for once.” Minghao fiddles with his earring before putting on his shoes. By the time he’s done, Mingyu’s already got the door open and is standing outside under the awning. He takes a step back inside, to pull Minghao to his feet. He probably doesn’t need the help, but he takes Mingyu’s hand anyway.

          When Minghao steps out of the door, he turns to push Mingyu back in and stop him from following him. The air is frigid, gusting by them and sending the rain right up to Mingyu’s doorstep.

          “Stay inside, it’s cold.”

          Minghao has big hands and strong arms, but he’s certainly not pushing that hard against Mingyu’s shoulder. He just wants Mingyu to stay toasty and dry inside. The gesture only prompts Mingyu’s stubbornness. “It’s fine, it won’t be too long.” Minghao sighs, shakes his head, and takes his hands back.

          The walk back to Minghao’s car parked over on the street is short, but their paces are slow. There’s only a little room between them as the umbrella was clearly made for one. Their shoulders bump every few steps with their other shoulders catching the rainwater that trickles off the umbrella’s spokes. Mingyu never had a need for an umbrella that could hold any more than that. So, he holds it out to his side, shielding Minghao from the rain because he supposedly gets sick easily. The wind-chill makes it feel like it’s below freezing tonight.

          “Stop that.” Minghao pushes the umbrella back towards Mingyu.

          “Stop what? You’re going to get wet.” Mingyu muscles the umbrella back over the dancer.

          Minghao sighs and continues walking after another failed shove. Mingyu’s persistent when it comes to being nice, “You’ll regret it.”

          When they arrive at Minghao’s car, Mingyu holds the umbrella over the open door so that he can get into the driver’s seat. The dancer looks up at him and his 6’1” self, eyes locked onto some detail of Mingyu’s face. He looks expectant, but also impatient and a little judgemental. He has half a mind to wonder if there’s sauce on his cheek or something, “Drive home carefully.” Minghao nods and waits for Mingyu to back up before he shuts his door.

          Mingyu retreats to the pavement in front of his complex to make sure Minghao gets back on the road okay. It’s just customary for him. Yeah, he might be a little soaked, but his apartment, his shower, and his dryer are a 30 second walk away, “Good night, Mom!” Minghao half-yells as he gets back on the road. By the time Mingyu realizes that Minghao’s jacket is still sitting in his dryer, he’s out of earshot and can only wave goodbye.

          In the most platonic way possible, Minghao still has his shirt and he still has Minghao’s clothes.