“No, Mom I - No, I really love and appreciate you…. For the twelfth time nothing is wrong! ... No, Ryeowook is not making me do this! Mom-!”

Ryeowook laughed beside him. Swiftly bending down, he pulled the phone away from Kyuhyun’s ear.

“Believe him Ms. Cho. After a day with the mechanical baby he’s getting whole new perspective on the parenting experience.”

Kyuhyun stuck his tongue out and yanked back the handheld, irritated at the interruption. Pressing the receiver to his ear, he frowned.

“What do you mean ‘what I put you through!?’ I was great baby!” 

They went back and forth for another twenty minutes during which Ryeowook lay out on the makeshift bed, amusedly watching Kyuhyun. The younger was having great trouble getting his mom to believe him.

“Yes, mom, I love you very much,” he said while glaring at the smaller, “…. I’m your son! My word shouldn’t need to be verified! … Yes, Ryeowook agrees. Okay, bye.”

Tossing the phone away, Kyuhyun huffed in annoyance, “Gosh! You call a mom to say ‘I love you’ and she thinks you’ve set the house on fire!”

Ryeowook flashed him a cheeky grin. “Gee, now why on earth she would think that?”

“It was one time!” Kyuhyun defended as if one time wasn’t bad enough. “And I say the words about once a year. You’d think she would take this and run.”

To that Ryeowook could only sigh, “No, no, you’re right, Kyuhyun. You mom is just so haughty for not accepting these few drops of appreciation her prodigal son tried to give her.”

“Shut up,” Kyuhyun snapped, “I say thank you all the time.”

Instead of agreeing like a decent boyfriend, Ryeowook dissolved into snickers.

Kyuhyun scowled as the high-pitched laughter filled the room. So much for best-friend’s support.

Kyuhyun had never been so grateful to hear the doll cry. Stomping past his giggling boyfriend, Kyuhyun lifted the doll to stick the bottle in its mouth. The cries stopped immediately and were replaced by soft ling sounds. Huffing, Kyuhyun tried to block out Ryeowook’s laughter. The one time he needs the screaming, it fails. Even when the laughter subsided he refused to look over.

So what if he didn’t say it all the time? Or ever? Words were just words. Every time he said them they sounded awkward as hell and insincere on top of that. No, if he just showed the actions the meaning would be clear. That didn’t make him a bad son.

Kyuhyun ignored him when Ryeowook called his name. With his back to that traitor, Kyuhyun was determined to be angry. The doll’s babbles grew louder in the silence and he heard Ryeowook shuffling behind him.

Suddenly, a warmth pressed across his back as small arms wrapped him in a hug. He froze. “I would have believed you,” two soft lips mumbled against his neck. Before Kyuhyun could react Ryeowook had already released him and walked away.

“I’m going to take a shower. You finish your homework,” he called, disappearing into the hallway.

Kyuhyun watched him go, heart beating erratically. Well, there went his anger.

“Dammit,” Kyuhyun whined. It wasn’t fair. Ryeowook could make everything go away just like that and now he couldn’t even remember why he’d been mad. Well he could, but it seemed stupid now.

Was it bad to depend on actions? They spoke way louder than words. But was he depending on them for the wrong reasons?

“I love you. I love you. I love you.” Kyuhyun frowned. The words were no less awkward when whispered to himself.

The doll gurgled as it bounced in his arms. He jumped, nearly forgetting that it was there. For a brief moment he wondered if it thought he was talking to it. Then he shook his head, obviously exhausted.

But for good measure, he glared at the doll. “I do not love you,” he said. Then he returned to repeating the words in his head where they belonged.

In a little over five minutes, the doll giggled in its hair-raising fashion. Wary but relieved, Kyuhyun set it back into the carrier. Quick crying sessions meant many crying sessions. But then, there was always probability.

Dropping on the sofa, Kyuhyun let out a sigh. It’d been a long day. His muscles relaxed into the cushions and it seemed a good portion of them shut off. So maybe a very long day.

If only it were over.

Grabbing a pencil from the table, Kyuhyun started on the calculus that was due in two days. Ten minutes later and one problem completed, Kyuhyun was ready to die. Math had never been this hard.

“Hey, Kyuhyun,” came Ryeowook’s voice from the hallway bathroom, “do you have any sweats I could borrow?”

“Of course! Give me a second!” Thankful for the distraction, Kyuhyun scrambled to get to his room.

Now honestly, Kyuhyun was a smart guy. Anyone could see that. He was calculating, logical, and possessed enough common sense to cure teenage stupidity. Maybe it was just the exhaustion or maybe it was what Ryeowook said earlier, but for whatever reason there was a major disconnect in Kyuhyun’s mind between what his boyfriend asked for and why he asked for it. Unfortunately for both of them, the request was for clothing. And it did not dawn on Kyuhyun until he swung open the bathroom door to face a damp, fresh-smelling Ryeowook. In a towel. Half-. That maybe he should have knocked first.

Stretched over the bathroom sink and reaching inside the cabinet, Ryeowook stared wide-eyed at his boyfriend.

“Um…hi?”

Kyuhyun was frozen in a stare.

 “K-Kyu?”

He probably should have stopped staring. He should have stopped staring a long time ago. Like ten seconds ago. Now eleven. Twelve. Thirteen.

“Kyuhyun?”

So there were two options. Throw the clothes and run or just run. There was also the third option of continuing to stare at Ryeowook’s body and wondering how such a thin and lean frame could feel so soft when enveloped in your arms while the sane part of the brain screams at you to pick option one or two. Guess which one he chose.

Eventually, after being made sufficiently uncomfortable, Ryeowook slowly pulled back from the bathroom sink. Blushing furiously, he walked up to his boyfriend, took the clothing out of his hands, and gently nudged him into the hallway. It wasn’t until the door closed in his face did Kyuhyun register what had happened.

And then Kyuhyun was stuck choosing between jumping out the window and throwing himself down the stairs.

***

When Ryeowook came back out, fully dressed, he found a Kyuhyun-length lump buried under a massive pile of blankets. It appeared he’d gone with the suffocation route.

Sighing, he treaded over and yanked the covers off.

“Augh!” Kyuhyun covered his face with a pillow, “Don’t look at me!”

“Don’t look at you!?” Ryeowook snapped, “Considering you just got a pretty good look at me I should get to look at you all I want! Seriously, don’t you knock?”

“It’s my apartment; I never need to knock!” Kyuhyun cried, face still shoved in the pillow.

With a huff, Ryeowook ripped the cushion out of his hands. Almost immediately Kyuhyun’s eyes went from his face to his torso causing Ryeowook to blush cherry red.

“Stop that!” he demanded.

Kyuhyun looked up, grimacing apologetically.

“Ugh!” Ryeowook threw himself face-first onto the bed sheets, thoroughly confused for the night. “I cannot believe you did that Kyu! You don’t just barge in on someone after they just finish showering!”

“I’m sorry.”

“And you ogled me for like two minutes! Don’t you have any decency?”

“Really sorry.”

Ryeowook let out another cry of frustration which was muffled by the pillow under his face. Kyuhyun didn’t respond to any of that. After a second, Ryeowook sighed, “You’re staring at my aren’t you?”

“It’s a cute .”

“Kyuhyun!” Ryeowook whined, flipping around to whack him with the pillow.

“Hey, hey!” Cringing from the cushion attacks, Kyuhyun held up his hands in defense. “I said I was sorry; it’s not like I can take it back.”

Ryeowook pouted, “But it was weird!”

“So, because it was ‘weird’ I can take it back? C’mon on Wookie.” Kyuhyun reached out his arms but the smaller backed away. Kyuhyun sighed, “Please, Ryeowook. Me walking in on you was a total accident.”

Ryeowook snorted.

“It’s true!” Kyuhyun asserted. Exhaling, he scooted over to his boyfriend. “Listen,” he said, draping an arm over his shoulder, “I know it’s hard to believe, but I too have moments of complete and utter stupidity. It’s okay if you haven’t realized this as I have worked very hard to keep it a secret, but sometimes I make mistakes and not knocking was one of them.”

At the sincerity of the apology, Ryeowook relented a little, some of the tension leaving his body. But then he frowned. “Wait, you’re not ashamed because you saw me half-?”

Kyuhyun looked bewildered, “Why would I be ashamed to see you half-? We’re dating. Plus, you are really hot.”

Ryeowook’s choked in disbelief. With his jaw dropped open he smacked his boyfriend on the chest, “I can’t believe this! You were more upset about the fact that you forgot to knock than the fact that you completely embarrassed me?”

“Well, no,” Kyuhyun frowned, rubbing his chest. “I was worried that you would think I was a ert who tried to barge in on you half-. I want you to know that it was a completely honest mistake and that I greatly respect your boundaries. Though I kind of wish I’d reacted a little better than a freshman who’d never been in the locker rooms.”

Ryeowook chuckled, “I’ll say. You were like a deer in headlights.”

“Well, you are blindingly attractive so that’s a fitting analogy.”

Ryeowook scoffed as he leaned into Kyuhyun. Wrapping an arm around his waist, the taller dragged his boyfriend down onto their makeshift bed. The smaller fully relaxed into the embrace and nuzzled Kyuhyun’s chest as he pulled a blanket on top of them.  

After a few minutes, Kyuhyun could feel the smaller’s breathing steady out as he lay curled in his arms, soft as ever. And Kyuhyun smiled, perfectly content with that moment.

I'm really sorry about not updating for two weeks. This chapter was just to help get over writer's block so ... yeah it's not much. 

It'd still be cool if you left comments!