“The first time I fell in love was long ago...” Kyungsoo clears his throat as he realizes that he trailed off, too intent on examining the pronunciation of the next line of the song he had scrawled in the margins of the paper he held in his hand.  “Sorry. I’ll start over.”

He looks up from his lyric sheet at Jongdae, who’s perched on the edge of the chair next to him in their small practice room, but Jongdae isn’t looking at him, too busy studying his own notes with an expression on his face that Kyungsoo can’t quite interpret. It’s always a little hard to tell when Jongdae is actually smiling. His perfectly bowed lips seem to be permanently turned up slightly at the corners.

“It’s okay,” Jongdae says finally. “Can we start from here instead? I want to work on this last verse a little more.” He points to a place near the bottom of the page.

Kyungsoo’s eyebrows crinkle together as he leans over to look. He nods, taking a quick drink of water as Jongdae begins singing his part.

“You’ll never know what it’s taken me to say these words...”

Jongdae is singing with his eyes closed, as he sometimes does. Their faces are practically close enough together for Kyungsoo to count his eyelashes.

“...and now that I’ve said them, they could never be enough...”

Kyungsoo hurriedly looks back down at the lyrics so as not to miss his line again.

“As far as I can see, there’s only you, and only me.”

As they reach the last line of the song, Kyungsoo tries closing his own eyes this time, focusing on staying on pitch as Jongdae harmonizes with him. He cuts off the last note a little early when he notices that he’s the only one left singing and his eyes fly back open.

“Kyungsoo,” Jongdae says quietly. “Can you look at me?”

“I am looking at you,” Kyungsoo answers teasingly.

The perma‐smile on Jongdae’s face is still there, and Kyungsoo isn’t sure, but he thinks it stretches just a little wider than usual. “I mean...can you look at me, when we sing that line together?”

Kyungsoo takes a small breath and sings it softly. “The last time I’ll fall in love...”

“Yeah, like that.”

They sing it together just once before Kyungsoo closes his eyes again. He knows that Jongdae is smiling when he kisses him.