final; “always late”

I confess, I messed up

Dropping “I’m sorry” like you’re still around

Henry yawns, stretching his arm with a sleepy smile on his face. He tumbles off the couch and lands on the ground, picking himself up and glancing at the clock with half-lidded eyes, still partially asleep.

Seven-thirty. Nothing like an hour-long nap.

…

“SEVEN-THIRTY?!” Henry yells, practically jumping out of his skin with the way he’s panicking. He stares at the clock with wide eyes for a moment longer, praying for time to go backwards, or that he was reading the numbers wrong, or dreaming, because , Amber was going to kill him for being late.

He has one arm through a collared shirt and another is messing with a tie around his neck and really, at this point he could care less if someone saw him running - tripping, rather, ‘cause he’s only got one shoe on and it’s pretty hard to get the other on when he’s trying to find his car - and hoping to all hell that Amber doesn’t rip his guts out tonight.

“Oh man, oh man, oh man,” he whimpers as he speeds out of the parking lot. “, she’s gonna kill me..”

Please, he prays. Amber, I’m sorry, please-pretty-please don’t kill me.

And I know, you’re dressed up

“Hey kid, you’ll never live this down...”

The party Lee Soo Man’s hosting for SM Town idols starts at 7PM. Henry’s already late by half an hour, plus the half hour he needs just to get to the building in the first place makes Henry a full hour late. He may as well kill himself now, before Amber does it for him in a much, much more painful way.

He had begged and begged and begged her to go to the damn thing, and now he’s showing up late. She was probably in a dress too, thanks to Krystal, and while he might have considered that a lucky sight for him to see, it was only going to make her even more grumpy.

Oh man, he’s gonna miss life.

The car screeches into the parking lot and he slams the door shut, running up to the door. He skids to a stop in front of the ballroom doors and fixes his hair, taking  a deep breath and trying to calm himself.

Whispering one more prayer, he opens the door cautiously and heads inside. Heechul spots him first, and the smirk that’s forming on his face is all Henry needs to know that he is so, so screwed.

“Scared, Henry?” the man teases. “‘Cause you should be.”

Henry glares at him and manages to ask where Amber is, and Heechul directs him towards a group of girls - f(x).

“She’s been third-wheeling Vic and Zhou Mi all night. You’re so ing screwed, kid.” Heechul says, as though Henry doesn’t already know. Throwing him a grin, Heechul saunters off with a glass of wine in his hand and a permanent smirk on his face.

And now, Henry would have been more terrified, but for a moment he’s stopped breathing, staring at Amber in a dress with her innocent eyes looking around as she shuffles her feet, awkwardly standing beside Victoria.

“Oh, wow,” Henry manages to get out when he can breathe again. He repeats the words, because quite frankly, he can’t seem to remember the rest of the English language, or the other three languages he knows, either.

It takes him awhile to think coherently again.

And you’re just the girl all the boys want to dance with,

I’m just the boy who’s had too many chances

When Henry figures out how to do things normally again, he starts heading towards Amber. Just as he reaches her, Key steps up and slings an arm around the girl, oblivious to Henry. She offers Key a smile.

“Since Henry’s still not here, you want to dance with me instead? You gotta have at least one dance tonight,” Key smiles, and she lets out a small laugh, staring at the ground. Henry swears she’s blushing, and he doesn’t really like Key’s arm around her, or the idea of the two dancing, or just Key being near Amber in general.

Henry scowls and when Key lowers his hand to grab Amber’s, tugging her towards the dance floor, Henry immediately intrudes, forcing their hands apart.

“Amb--”

I’m sleeping on your folks’ porch again, dreaming

She said, she said, she said, “why don’t you just drop dead?”

Henry isn’t sure if the noise that comes out of his mouth is even human, because wow, that ing hurt and plus Amber’s glaring at him and delivering another hard punch to his chest and it’s all Henry can do to keep from crying out in pain.

“Sorry,” he squeaks out and Amber lifts her hand and this time Henry manages to dodge her next hit, still rubbing his other two sore spots.

“Do you even know how late you are?” She says through clenched teeth, and Henry finds it kind of funny that she’s scarier (for some reason) in a dress.

He pouts a little, trying to pull off the puppy-dog trick. “I’m really sorry?”

It obviously doesn’t work, because now his arm hurts twice as much as it did before and he’s pretty sure he’s going to be bruising tomorrow.

“Don’t even try, Henry. I’m in a dress. I’ve been here for an hour waiting for your sorry when I didn’t even want to be here in the first place!” Amber fumes, but it’s kind of cute and Henry wonders if somehow the alcohol is already affecting him, even though he didn’t have any yet.

“Yeah, Henry,” Donghae joins in, throwing his arm around Amber’s shoulders. Henry wonders why everyone is so touchy with her, and where the hell Donghae came from in the first place and how maybe he should just go back to said place, like, right now.

“How could you be late? You’re her date, kid.” Donghae glares pointedly at Henry but the look is lost on him, because the only thing Henry’s thinking about are the words “date” and “Amber,” plus the way she suddenly lights up a bright red color that Henry didn’t think was capable of forming on Amber’s cheeks.

He might have noticed Jonghyun joining in with Donghae, but doesn’t really care, because Amber stopped yelling at him and is instead elbowing Donghae to shuttheuphyung but it’s in English and Donghae doesn’t understand a word.

I don’t blame you, for being you

But you can’t blame me for hating it

“I’m really sorry,” Henry says later, when Donghae is finally detached from Amber and Jonghyun’s passed out on top of Key, who looks halfway between amused and irritated.

Amber huffs and shoves his shoulder, and Henry frowns. “Are you really mad at me?” he asks, but she ignores him and instead turns the other way, engaging in a conversation with Onew, who looks surprised but willing.

Henry wonders how much chicken he can steal from Onew in a year.

So say, what are you waiting for? Kiss her, kiss her--

Henry’s just about had enough when another hour has gone by and Amber is still ignoring him. Now she’s talking to Kris, who has a warm smile on his face and she looks just a little bit tipsy and she’s giggling at everything Kris says, and Henry kind of hates that.

“Amber,” he tries again, this time a little more forcefully as he tugs on her arm, making her turn towards him. He guesses she’s a little more than just tipsy because she slips and falls into his arms, her hands grabbing onto his dress shirt and tugging him a little closer and he can’t seem to remember how to breathe, because wow, Amber’s really pretty tonight and her cheeks are kind of flushed and--

It takes one small accidental bump from Sulli and suddenly Henry’s lips are on Amber’s, and it doesn’t really matter if Henry can’t think clearly anymore when Amber’s kissing him back and gripping his tie and pulling him just that much closer.

Henry doesn’t know how many times he’s dreamed of this, but he’s damn glad it’s happening.

I set my clocks early ‘cause I know I’m always late.

Amber pulls away first, her cheeks slightly redder than before. She bites her lips and looks away, but her hands are still holding onto his tie and shirt, and he can’t help the stupid grin that’s forming on his face.

He ends up leaning down to kiss her again, ignoring the hooting in the background and even though she tries to push him away, it’s useless. Even if she punches hard, he’s still stronger than her, and just to boost his ego, he’d like to think that it must be a bit distracting to her that he’s the one kissing her.

When he finally lets her go, she looks up to meet his eyes, ready to scold him, but he beats her to it.

“I’m sorry for being late,” he says a little breathily, and she gives up, rolling her eyes and smiling.

“It’s okay,” she laughs. “But next time you’re late, I’m not kissing you.”

He smirks. Partially because he’s glad that she can confirm a relationship just like that, and partially because he knows she’s lying.

“We’ll see.”

(Later on, Amber asks him why he didn’t just ask one of his hyungs to wake him up on time, and Henry smiles sheepishly back at her.)

(He avoids getting hit though, when Heechul - who’s a little too drunk - runs by, screaming “HENBER” before getting tackled and hauled out the door by half of Super Junior.)

uh hi

i hope you liked it

not my usual style so erm

c: