A/N: don't forget, black lives matter! go to blacklivesmatter.carrd.co for more information and things you can do to contribute to the movement. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On a cloudy San Francisco summer day, Mark and his six friends decided to take a trip to Haight street. 

"I've never actually been," Renjun admitted while they were on the bus over. 

"Me either," Mark added. 

"Seriously?" Jaemin cried. 

"I know you guys will love it. It's one of my favorite places in SF," Donghyuck said. 

Jeno ushered them all towards the door and they stepped off of the 7 bus. Mark looked at the busy streets, shops lining the sidewalk. It smelled like incense and weed and food, and it immediately reminded him of Donghyuck. 

"Let's go in here," Chenle spoke excitedly, gesturing to a store immediately to their right. The windows had mannequins dressed in all tie dye, and the store was painted with swirling sixties style rainbow patterns. They stepped inside, Jeno and Jaemin grabbing hands as the clerk greeted them. 

Out of curiosity, Mark stepped over to a t-shirt and looked at the price. He immediately grimaced and Donghyuck stepped beside him. 

"Holy ," Donghyuck whispered, looking over Mark's shoulder. 

"Sixty bucks for a t-shirt? I could just tie dye a top myself," Mark whispered back. Donghyuck chuckled, and they left the shirt alone. 

As Jaemin and Jisung scoured over the tie dye booty shorts, Mark and Donghyuck pretended to look at clothing and tapestries around the store. 

"The haight was the center of the hippie movement. Like, summer of '69 happened here, you know?" 

"Really?"

Donghyuck nodded. "That's why all the stores sell hippie and weed stuff." 

The other quickly got bored and the group left the shop, walking a few paces into another store at Jeno's insistence. The walls were painted purple and lined with themed t-shirts, and the counter was a plexi-glass case with weed paraphernalia inside. Jeno immediately started talking to the clerk, and Mark peered through the plexi-glass. 

In the cases were all different sorts of pipes, bongs, and other things Mark didn't know the name for (but had seen Jeno use). Even though Mark knew their use he had to admit the glassware was exquisite; the different colors were bright and intertwined beautifully with each other. Still, he made a face just looking at the bongs, remembering that horrible night just a few weeks ago. 

"Barfy," Renjun whispered in his ear. 

"Hey!" Mark whined, just as Jaemin beckoned them out of the store. 

"Now I'm really broke," Jeno mumbled as he put the blue pipe he'd just bought into his bag. The others looked at him for an explanation. "I had to pay for new windows for my mom's car." 

", dude, I'm so sorry," Donghyuck said. 

Jeno sighed back. "I had to get this pipe anyway. Those ing theives took my old one." 

After that, the group made their way through the thrift stores and crystal shops down Haight street. They stopped at a little hole in the wall coffee, Mark buying a drink called the "Audrey Hepburn" (which happened to be the best coffee he'd ever tasted). 

As they finished getting their drinks and starting walking further down, Chenle gave Jaemin a worried look. 

"What exactly...is that?" he asked, gesturing to Jaemin's drink. 

"Large Americano, no water, just ice, with four extra shots."

"How the are you not dead?" Renjun asked. 

"Because Jeno only lets me drink it twice a day." 

"Twice a day?" Chenle cried. "Even that seems excessive." 

"Twice a day is the best I can get," Jeno explained, wrapping his arm around Jaemin's waist. Jaemin momentarily leaned on Jeno's shoulder before giving him a smile and walking with him. 

"Oh! There's Amoeba," Donghyuck said excitedly. "Can we go in?"

"Of course; I wanna check out the records anyways," Jeno answered. 

The group crossed the street and walked into the store, one of the biggest Mark had seen in the Haight so far. It was definitely a store for used records and CDs and it had a distinct smell, not necessarily bad but he couldn't quite place it. They had to keep their bags in cubbies and give them to the attendants before moving any further inside, so as the others gave up their bags Mark looked around. 

The store seemed to stretch on vast, row after row of CDs and records mostly organized by genre (Mark distinctly noticed no pop music section). The speakers were playing a song Mark didn't know but Donghyuck was mouthing the words to. There were t-shirts and books and patches for denim jackets off in the corner, and Mark all at once felt very out of place. 

"I'm looking for a certain band..." Donghyuck mumbled to Mark as the others split up around the store, sifting through its vast collection. 

"Which one?"

"Bikini Kill." Mark cocked his head. "Oh, they're a riot grrl group. Nineties feminist punk. They're my faves and I’m always on the hunt for their CDs." 

"You have a CD player?" Mark asked with a laugh. 

"Yeah. I know, I know, records are cooler and spotify is way more convenient, but CDs are the in best. I have a whole collection at my house." 

"Seriously?" 

Donghyuck nodded. "Not to brag, but I have every Nirvana CD plus the MTV unplugged session and a couple of their concert CDs." He laughed briefly. "Not that I'm one of those kids who thinks they're cool just for listening to Nirvana though." 

But Mark kinda did think he was cool for it; his music taste was pretty much limited to whatever was popular in rap and top 40 hits. 

"Anyways....right, Bikini Kill." Donghyuck turned to Mark. "Don't you wanna look around?"

"Nah, I'll stay with you," Mark responded. He didn't know what he would do here alone, and anyways, he didn't really wanna leave Donghyuck's side. He found Donghyuck’s love of older and less well known music very attractive, to say the least. 

Donghyuck grinned and grabbed onto Mark's wrist, turning him perfectly pink as he led him to the back of the store. They passed by the rock clearance and metal and opera until they got to the punk section. Donghyuck hummed, searching for the letter B amongst the labels as Mark looked around some more. The walls were covered in posters, from Biggie Smalls to the Beatles to Kurt Cobain, all watching him watch Donghyuck. 

Donghyuck grinned and gasped quietly and Mark looked at him. "They actually have some of their ! Usually they're sold out." He flicked by the CD cases, the plastic making a soft clicking noise with every one he passed by. 

"Already have that one, already have that one..." He repeatedly mumbled, until finally pulling out a copy. 

"Ah, ," he said loudly. 

"What?"

"It's new. I mean, not like new-new, but the plastic's still on it."

"And that's a bad thing because...?"

"Then it's priced as new. Twenty bucks instead of five bucks." Donghyuck disappointedly put the CD back and looked around. 

"I'm gonna go find Jaemin; he has good taste in music," Donghyuck said, but Mark stayed still when Donghyuck started to move. "Are you coming with?"

"I'll find you in a minute," Mark said. "I-I think I see a band my dad's mentioned and I wanna look at it."

Donghyuck nodded and gave him a once over, grinning and looking around the store. As he began to walk away Mark immediately went back to the Bikini Kill section, grabbing the CD Donghyuck had put down before. He sighed, stuffing it into his pocket. He didn't know why he'd lied to Donghyuck or why he was doing this at all; he guessed love just did crazy things to people. 

He looked around the store, making sure all his friends were busy before he entered the very short line, paying for the CD. He shoved it deep into his pocket and walked over to where Donghyuck and Jaemin were looking through records. 

"You don't even have a record player," Donghyuck said. 

"Can't I get them for the aesthetic?" Jaemin responded, then sighed. "Fine, you're right, I'm broke, let's go before we buy the whole damn store."

"Or before Jeno blows the rest of his college fund," Donghyuck responded as they all giggled, looking for the others to leave. Donghyuck grinned as soon as he noticed Mark was back. 

"Hey, you," he said softly, grinning at Mark. Mark blushed and averted his eyes shyly as Donghyuck gave him that look that never failed to make the butterflies flutter in his stomach. 

"Stop it, lovebirds, let's go," Renjun responded, tugging them out the door. 

They got their bags back and smiled at each other, still sipping their drinks. 

"Wanna chill for a while at hippie hill?" Jaemin asked. Everyone agreed, despite the fact that Renjun, Chenle, and Mark didn't know what hippie hill was, and followed behind the others. They crossed the street and stepped into the entrance to Golden Gate Park, the pathways lined with the homeless and people trying to sell them drugs. Still, it was beautiful, and nobody bothered them when they politely declined the drugs. Their surroundings got darker and darker as the trees grew thicker, but once they passed through a very shady tunnel everything was perfect. 

The grass was green and trimmed for age and ages into the distance, a small path weaving its way through the greenery. To the right was a hill, which Mark assumed was the hippie hill in question, with people laying down on the side facing them. There were couples and friends and people by themselves, and people reading and listening to music and smoking, and even though cops showed up every so often they didn't seem to care. On the way over, Jeno had explained they were looking for people doing harder drugs than just . 

At the bottom of the hill was a group of twenty people, dressed in that typical hippie style, long hair and peasant skirts flowing. They danced in a circle and played the bongo drums, and the people around watched or joined in or just listened, their eyes towards the sky. Mark would've laughed at the ridiculousness of it all but it was so relaxing, so atmospheric, that it didn't feel out of place at all. 

The seven boys took their seats on the grass, sipping their drinks for a moment. Chenle and Renjun laid down altogether, and Jaemin nestled himself in between Jeno's legs. Donghyuck was about to turn to Mark, however, when Jisung grabbed him by the arm. 

"I haven't drawn you yet," he said, pulling Mark a bit off to the side so he could concentrate while Donghyuck looked on forlornly. "You're the only one I haven't gotten to."

Mark nodded and Jisung took a hit off his juul before opening up his notebook, starting to sketch. Things were silent for a while, as Jisung was always quiet and Mark was always awkward with people he didn't know that well (and sometimes even with people he did). 

Mark sighed contentedly, simply listening to the bongo drums and the noise of Jisung's pencil scratching the paper. He kinda wished he was with Donghyuck at that moment, but at the same time it was nice to be able to think about all of this in the cool breeze. Think about how cute Donghyuck was, how cool, how smart, how--

"Is that a Bikini Kill CD?" Jisung asked. Mark flushed and realized the CD had started to slip out of his pocket. He simply nodded, stuffing it back inside. " whipped. That's one of my favorite albums of theirs," he said more to himself than Mark. Mark hummed back, just uncomfortably enough that Jisung would notice something was off. "Did Hyuck introduce you to them? I know he was looking for that specific CD--" 

When Mark flushed even further, Jisung realized what he had done and stopped in the middle of his sentence. "Oh..." he mumbled, pausing in his sketching to do that little head tilt-wince thing he did sometimes, the physical representation of the phrase 'oof'. 

"Are you guys together?" Jisung asked very quietly. 

"N-no...." Mark stuttered back, then sighed. "It was stupid of me to buy it. I don't even know when I'll give it to him without looking like a total stalker or someone who's obsessed with him." 

"He won't think that," Jisung responded, looking up at Mark briefly before sketching. "If you give it to him, he'll just know you like him. Does that scare you?" 

Mark nodded shyly and Jisung hummed. "How much?" 

Mark sighed and chuckled with embarrassment. "I'm crazy about him," he admitted, not sure why he was spilling his guts to this soon to be senior he didn't know that well. 

Jisung didn't say anything for a long while. "I don't get it. He's crazy about you too; why aren't you two together already?"

"He is?" Mark asked with genuine surprise. Jisung gave him a 'duh' look in response and waited for Mark to give him a real answer. 

Mark sighed, again. "I-I guess I'm just afraid. Of a lot of things." 

"Don't be," Jisung said simply. "You're eighteen. Live a little." He suddenly shut the notebook and gave Mark a small smile. 

"Is it done?" Can I see it?" 

"No way. Now go back and cuddle with your mans." 

"He's not my mans!" 

Jisung gave him another 'duh' look. Mark giggled and went back to Donghyuck, maybe just sorta kinda a little bit wishing Lee Donghyuck really was his mans.