“I’m not sure if I can trust you on this.”

Hyukjae looks up from his lunchbox of … unidentifiable things and smirks at Donghae from across the lunchroom table.

“Of course you can,” he says as he mixes his meal thoroughly with his chopsticks. “Bet you would even thank me afterwards.”

“No, thank you,” Donghae makes a face. “I’m thanking you now. No need to try and feed me that … because it looks weird and disgusting.”

“This is not ,” Hyukjae frowns. “Does it really look like to you?”

“Well, no, but why are we talking about during lunch?”

“You said the word first.”

Donghae wrinkles his nose and moves to stand up. Hyukjae places a hand over his wrist. “Seriously, try it.”

“Hyukjae, no.”

“I swear,” Hyukjae almost whines. “I swear you’d like it. This is my ing masterpiece of a meal, you can’t not like it.”

Donghae narrows his eyes at the older boy’s lunch box, unknowingly making a disgusted sound as he stares at the creamy gooey clumps mixing with white sticky rice. “Can you at least explain to me what the hell is in it?”

“Tuna. Egg. Cheese. Mayonnaise.”

“Gross,” he winces. “They’re all good food individually Hyukjae, you don’t just mix all of those up! You’re practically asking for a bad stomach.”

“One, not gross. Two, I’ve eaten this a load—I mean a lot of times before. I didn’t get any bad stomach,” Hyukjae firmly says. “Come on, Donghae, one bite. If you don’t like it I’ll do one thing you ask of me. Anything.”

“Huh,” Donghae raises a brow. “You’re that confident?”

“Yep.”

He warily looks around.

All of these people don’t even give a . If he truly dies of food poisoning they will just pat Hyukjae on the back and congratulate him for a job well done in eliminating the ultimate source of the gay disease. In fact, they might actually be really anticipating him to fall over after eating a spoonful of Hyukjae’s … abnormal concoction. After all, it’s him who stole Hyukjae away from the grand Table for Popular Students. And those Popular Students are not pleased at all.

They are all sending menacing glares towards Donghae’s direction, and he could almost hear their voices inside his mind.

You’re gonna pay for this, gay freak.

He simply rolls his eyes.

“Fine. One bite.”

Hyukjae grins, all teeth and gums and radiating brilliance that makes Donghae squint—note to self: wear shades around Hyukjae, you never know when he will attack you with his smile—before handing over a spoonful. Donghae warily takes the spoon, eyeing Hyukjae sternly and bringing it close to his lips.

He sniffs on it a little. It doesn’t smell bad. Good start.

“Go on,” Hyukjae urges.

And so Donghae does. With great hesitation, he stuffs himself with the tuna-egg-cheese-mayonnaise thing and chews.

And Christ, he did not have to leave the lunch table at all.

Hyukjae had to suffer the consequences of sharing his meal with a hungry Donghae. He promises to bring another lunchbox tomorrow.

-

A crush.

That has to be it.

That’s the only acceptable, reasonable explanation as to why Donghae now finds himself always so excited to go to school in the morning, when in the past few years he’s been dreading it because of those s. It must be the only reason why he’s sad when it’s time to go home already, because it’d be another night of waiting, and he hates waiting. Hates waiting for tomorrow, hates having to wait for hours to see that perfect face again.

Most of all, he hates the weekend. Because it means no school, and while he used to absolutely love it because he gets to sleep in and avoid people who aren’t his parents, he now loathes it with a passion.

No school means no Hyukjae.

Crazy, really.

God knows how hard he denied this, how hard he tried to stop himself from ending up like this. He can’t like Hyukjae that way. The guy’s straight. He still has his girlfriend who has never-ending issues, and he’s still thinking of the stupid cheating thing even though Donghae smacked his head already and told him to stop considering it and consider breaking up instead.

Hyukjae is considering it.

But that doesn’t mean Donghae can go and prance and twirl around happily when Hyukjae officially becomes single. It’s not like he stands a chance.

And so he settles for a crush.

It’s harmless. Just a little bit of physical attraction, admiration, nothing more, nothing less. It couldn’t possibly hurt him. He couldn’t possibly let it hurt him. Donghae’s had more than enough of that. He can’t risk it.

So a crush it is.

Donghae has a little bit of a crush on Hyukjae. And he’s going nuts because it’s Sunday and he can’t see his blindingly bright smile today, can’t hear his stupid jokes and his soothing voice, can’t eat his weird but strangely delicious tuna-egg-cheese-mayonnaise thing, can’t see his nice handwriting in blue ink.

He stares at the clock and sighs.

Eighteen more hours ‘til school time.

-

How was your weekend?^^

I was going insane not seeing you.

Fine. Kinda boring though. What about you?

I think I only slept. I guess you could say it was boring as well. Are you usually bored during weekends?

Only ever since I started having a crush on you.

Yeah… Sometimes I go out with mom and dad, though they were kinda busy this time.

Want to hangout sometime? I mean, when you don’t have anything else to do of course.

Yes, god damn it, YES.

Yeah sure.

Give me your number.

yes. Donghae writes it down. He gets Hyukjae’s number in return.

He finds it rather difficult to stop himself from grinning so widely throughout the day.

-

Apparently, although Hyukjae has officially left the Table for Popular Students, a lot of kids still liked him. And since they liked him, they looked up to him as a role model. A trend-setter. And the new trend is befriending Donghae.

Donghae’s eye twitches when a freshman goes up to him, all smiles and cheerful aura.

“Hi Donghae-hyung! I’m Ryeowook! Can we be friends?”

“Er… no,” he answers awkwardly before rushing back to class. Ugh, humans.

Hyukjae is waiting for him by the doorway, giving him a confused look before turning his eyes towards the crestfallen freshman. “What did you do?”

“I rejected his offer of friendship,” Donghae states coolly, walking past Hyukjae and plopping on his seat, arms folded in disbelief. “They suddenly pay attention to me now? Because I’m friends with you, Mr. Popularity? Ha, incredible.”

Hyukjae sits next to him and gives him a worried glance. He is about to speak, but the teacher beats him to it. Class starts and so does their everyday note-passing.

Are you okay?

Yeah. Don’t worry.

Why did you reject his offer of friendship?

Because.

Alright, if you don’t want to talk about it. But I’m here, okay? If you need someone who’ll listen.

…I’ll think about it. Thanks though Hyukjae.

It’s nothing. We’re friends, right?

Yeah… still, thanks. ^^

Friends.

Of course that’s what they are. That’s all they are. And yet Donghae couldn’t bring himself to really tell Hyukjae everything there is to know about himself. Hyukjae already knows about him being gay, being taunted and mocked, being looked down upon and being called a freak. But he doesn’t know the rest. He doesn’t know of the secret and not-so-secret ex-boyfriends. He doesn’t know of how Donghae became depressed, how he cried himself to sleep every night, closed in upon himself, retreated so far into his own shell of solitude until no one saw him and bothered him anymore.

Hyukjae doesn’t know that he’s the only one so far, the only one that Donghae had somewhat allowed to get in, the only one he ever stepped out of his shell for, the only one he broke his own pledge for.

And it’s making things so damn hard.

Because it’s just supposed to be a crush. Nothing more. Nothing less.

But day by day, it’s getting harder for Donghae to keep it that way.

-

I’m breaking up with her. Tonight.

Oh. OH. ABOUT TIME ! WHAT HOW WHERE WHEN !!!!!

I don’t know. I’ll call her I guess. Tell her it really isn’t working anymore—hasn’t been working even before I left Seoul.

You’re doing it on phone?

Yeah. Not like I can go to Seoul anytime soon.

Makes sense… I do hope it turns out well. I mean, that she doesn’t go bat on you.

If she does, she’ll just give me more reasons to break up with her. Nothing she says will change it anyway. I’ve decided.

Okay. At least you’re not considering cheating anymore. As much as she’s crazy and has a lot of issues, she still doesn’t deserve that.

You’re right. Thanks for smacking some sense into me. Although to be honest, even if I often mentioned it, I didn’t really have anyone to cheat with…OTL

Donghae hesitates for a moment before scribbling down his answer.

You said you had another person that you liked.

Yeah but I don’t think that person would like me back.

Why the hell not.

They’d be so ing stupid not to.

I… I don’t know. I think that person only sees me as a friend.

They must be crazy. You’re crazy too. Do you have any idea how popular you are? You’re probably #1 on the most wanted list of all our neighboring all-girls schools. Even in co-ed schools.

Those don’t matter though. In the end, I’m probably still friendzoned.

Who is this girl anyway??? What kinda girl friendzones Lee Hyukjae

Um… I’ll tell you next time.

Fine.

I’ll call you. After I talk to her.

Okay. Good luck~

Thanks Hae^^

-

He does call that night.

And Donghae tries not to sound too excited, or too worried, or too caught up in his own flurry of mixed emotions as he speaks. “How was it?”

“Fine,” Hyukjae says. He sounds okay. Okay not in the sense that he sounds as he always does. There’s a little bit of strain in his voice. But not so much that it could still be considered okay. “Easier than expected. She’d seen it coming, but she still cried anyway and begged me to stay. After I told her I liked someone else, she cried more but let it go. I—I kinda feel bad.”

“Of course you would,” Donghae says, voice soft and reassuring. “It’s okay. You did what had to be done. Like you said, she’d seen it coming. It would’ve happened sooner or later.”

“It wasn’t working out but I didn’t want to hurt her,” Hyukjae whispers. “I didn’t want to like someone else either while I was with her. I just—it’s something that couldn’t be helped, you know?”

“I know. I’m sure she knows that too,” Donghae wishes he could be there. Comforting Hyukjae, rubbing his back in warm circles and letting him rest against his shoulder. “It’s okay, Hyuk.”

He hears him exhale deeply, hears a shuffling noise and then a low hum. “Thanks, Donghae. For listening.”

“It’s nothing,” he smiles, only for a fraction of a second. “We’re friends, right?”

Hyukjae is silent for a moment. “Yeah.”

When they hang up, Donghae sighs dramatically and falls onto his bed. He accidentally swats his wrist against his headboard and cries out in pain.

-

Are you busy this weekend?^^

Keep calm, Donghae. Don’t smile yet. If you do, it better not ing break your entire face.

Not really. Unless mom and dad have some surprise going on but I don’t think so. I’m too old for that. What’s up?

Wanna hangout? I’ve got some movies rented out.

Sure.  I’ll just come over then?

Yep ^^ I’ll cook your favorite, Hyukjae special. ^_____^

It’s the tuna-egg-cheese-mayo concoction, which Donghae nicknamed Hyukjae special.

YAY !! Teach me how to do it?

Sure. ^^

-