It's been a month since the twins left.

Sungmin's work was still piling and he was still coming home late a lot, or bringing home some work, so Heechul really had not had much time to spend together with Sungmin, except on the weekends where Sungmin would gladly put aside his work to make time for his lonely hyung.

They had gone to Jungmo's band's live performance one Saturday night (Sungmin apologizing profusely to Jungmo for hurting him that time, and after Jungmo waved it off they were back to friendly terms). On another weekend, they went visiting Sungmin's parents in Ilsan and spending the night there. Next, Sungmin took Heechul to a wall-climbing spot in town and continued with another physical activity of a late night futsal game with Sungmin's old college friends (after which Heechul's muscle were screaming and his whole body was sore for the following week).

As a revenge, Heechul took Sungmin to his high-school reunion on the next weekend, but only regretting it later because most of his single friends were all over Sungmin and Heechul wasn't used to feeling so jealous about it, and he couldn't do anything about it either because he couldn't claim Sungmin as his. Not yet.

Heechul felt like cursing all the waiting he had been doing.

.

That particular weekend, though, he spent it at home with Sungmin. When Heechul said he was too lazy to go out for lunch, Sungmin had suggested cooking something simple and Heechul had helped him out without being asked. He spent all lunch time paying extra attention to the way Sungmin ate while he robotically put food into his own mouth. Result of that was the building urge to kiss Sungmin's pouty lips, but Heechul could still hold himself back (barely).

That same afternoon; they bathed Heebum with quite some difficulties because the cat decided to be helpful (or not helpful?) by being a super rebel and caused his two masters to be drenched from head to toe by the end of the bathing session. Heechul got a delicious view of Sungmin's broad, smooth and milky back, and saw the way the muscles flexed when Sungmin took his wet T-shirt off his head and threw it to the hamper. His imagination had only started to run wild when a towel thrown into his face brought him back to the real world.

“Why are you spacing out?” Sungmin had asked him so innocently Heechul couldn’t believe that his pumpkin was really that dense. Hadn’t he seen how Heechul devour him with his eyes? But then again, Sungmin had probably stopped entertaining the idea that Heechul might be interested in him that way since a long time ago, so even though Heechul was obviously emanating a predatory aura it would still just pass as a normal hyung-is-only-being-playful act.

Then they went out for a rather early dinner. It was a ten minutes walk to the family restaurant nearby. They visited the place a few times before, and as the young waitress came up to their table to take their order, Heechul was reminded of how this woman had been very attracted to Sungmin. She always talked differently when it came to Sungmin, also with exaggerated body language that was so obvious to everyone seeing it. Sungmin has always been unaffected by her advances. Heechul knew now that it was because he had never been interested anyway.

Heechul mentioned his order of sundubu jjigae and had to refrain himself from shoving the woman out of his sight as he had to watch her flirt with Sungmin. His pumpkin had ordered bibimbap and a glass of iced tea, but the waitress kept offering other things in the menu and Sungmin just kept politely rejecting the offers. Heechul couldn’t believe that he used to let it happen and only watch amusedly, and even teased Sungmin about it afterwards.

Definitely not now. Never, from now on.

“I’m very hungry. Can you just… get back to work and bring us what we ordered?” Heechul found himself saying snappily.

The waitress stuttered for a few seconds, and then quickly excused  herself.

Sungmin exhaled in relief.

“You do know that she wasn’t only being friendly, right, Pumpkin? You should let her know you’re not interested. It’s annoying to see her pestering you like that,” Heechul frowned.

Sungmin stared at him for a while, and then nodded. “I know. I just don’t know  how to tell her to stop without being rude,”

“Hmph, then I will tell her for you,”

Sungmin’s eyes went wide, “Exactly how are you planning to—”

“Shush. Leave it to me.”

Before Sungmin could say anything else, Heechul stood up and strode up confidently to the waitress who had just got back from the kitchen to pass on their orders.

“Excuse me, Miss,” Heechul started, deliberately loud so Sungmin could hear him from a few tables down.

The waitress looked a bit intimidated, probably still a bit shocked at Heechul’s earlier snappy words. “Yes, can I help you, Sir?”

“We forgot to order something. One serving of deokbokki, please. My boyfriend really loves that.” Heechul said cheerfully, while jerking his thumb back at Sungmin.

The waitress gasped at the casually delivered information, and collected herself soon enough, impressively. She went back to the kitchen and Heechul returned to their table with a triumphant smile etched on his face.

Sungmin looked up at him and Heechul didn’t miss to see the blush adorning his cheeks. He chuckled, and ruffled Sungmin’s hair affectionately before settling back to his seat across Sungmin’s.

“Hyung, that was…”

“That was simple, wasn’t it?” Heechul grinned. “Bet you didn’t see that one coming, huh? But I’m sure it’ll work.”

Sungmin laughed, “We’ll see,”

It did work. When she came back with their orders, the waitress only politely wishes them a good meal and quickly retreated. Heechul wiggled his eyebrows at Sungmin and the latter only chuckled at that.

+

On their way back, Heechul dragged Sungmin to the video rental and they borrowed a couple of DVDs.

Movie night, that was the plan.

Heechul set the DVD on the player in their living room while Sungmin go grab more pillows from his room.

“What are we watching?” Sungmin asked, dumping the pillows on the sofa and started to make himself comfortable amongst them.

“Some fluffy animation,” Heechul answered, looking over his shoulder to where Sungmin was already seated. He grabbed the remote, turned off all the lights in the room, and slowly walk back to the sofa, pondering about where to sit. Decided, he forcefully pulled the pillow Sungmin was hogging, and before Sungmin could protest, he squeezed himself right beside Sungmin and pulled the surprised man to him.

“Hyung?” Sungmin asked, his shaking voice muffled since Heechul’s pull resulted in him planting his face on Heechul’s shirt-clad chest.

“Why are you still surprised? I thought by this time you would be used to cuddling with me?” Heechul said, chuckling and tightening his hold around Sungmin’s shoulder. “Movie’s starting!”

Sungmin was very still, and Heechul was starting to get worried that he was being too bold or too sudden.  Though, was it really? For Heechul, not dating anyone for more than a month was quite a record, and he thought Sungmin should've realized it. Heechul had dropped hints everywhere and everytime he could. The cuddles, the kisses on the cheeks, backhugs, et cetera, et cetera. He also frequently picked Sungmin up from work whenever their schedule allowed. No matter how casual Heechul had been with Sungmin before he realized his feelings, he was sure this much of special attention should've told Sungmin enough.

And yet, Sungmin was always like this, getting tense everytime Heechul would initiate a cuddling session. Heechul's patience was wearing thin. Thinner each day. He felt like he would just snap sometimes, when Sungmin did an actually innocent gesture, but Heechul's brain would translated it as something very, very sensual. It was corrupting his mind.

Sungmin was still tense by the time Heechul finished mulling over those things, and he considered withdrawing his confining arm around Sungmin's shoulder.

Maybe it was, indeed, still too much for Sungmin, he thought.

And then Sungmin shifted. Only his head, so that his head was half lying on Heechul’s upper arm, and next he s an arm around Heechul’s tummy.

Heechul felt warm and happy. He looked down, discreetly trying to see Sungmin’s expression.

The only light source in the room was the from the monitor, and Heechul watched as the ever-changing colors fall upon Sungmin’s face, dances in the reflections of his eyes. A soft contented smile was there, and Heechul knew he was on the brink of ruining his own carefully constructed plan to make Sungmin confess, because right then and there, all he wanted was to whisper those words to Sungmin’s ears:

“I love you.”

.

“What did you say, Hyung?” Sungmin looked up, disbelief written all over his face.

Heechul opened his mouth, yet no words could come out. Did he really just say those freaking words out loud?

Sungmin scrambled up, sitting properly and waiting for a confirmation from Heechul with perpetually wide eyes and visibly tensed jaw.

“Did you just… say that you love me?” Sungmin’s voice was steady, but his lips were trembling.

His perfect, beautiful lips.

Heechul gulped.

Oh, screw it all, he thought, throwing all caution to the wind.

Without any more words, he grabbed the back of Sungmin’s head and swiftly covered those tempting lips with his own.

.

.

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(tbc)

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a/n:

sorry for the short update! was planning to end it in one update but time isn't on my side, currently. So there will be one more part to this short series ^^