Lay thought that a chapter wouldn’t start with him asleep for sure he was caught up on his sleep but when he opened his eyes and saw Suho smiling gently at him, all he could do was groan and roll over. Behind Suho, Sehun and Kai rolled their eyes and continued to warm up.

“Lay, it’s 9:45, and Xiumin said you have a class at 10.” Suho reminded him. “Come on.”

“Sorry. I thought I caught up on my sleep.” Lay mumbled. Which was true. He had spent all of Sunday sleeping, locking his door so Tao wouldn’t bother him. He suspected Kris did the same thing because when he woke up, Tao full-on slapped Kris in the face before refusing to speak to either of them.

“No worries. I actually wanted to ask you something, but I couldn’t find you.” Suho waited for Lay to roll over and sit up expectantly. “So… Um… What time does your class end?”

Lay blinked at him slowly. “You were looking for me… to ask me when my class would end?”

Suho laughed nervously. “Actually, there’s a follow up question too.”

“Oh?”

“He wants to take you out to lunch, hyung.” Kai cut on exasperatedly, rolling his eyes again at Suho, who made an undignified noise. Lay turned red.

“Oh, well, I’m sorry but-” He tried to explain but this time it was Sehun’s turn to cut in. Dramatically.

“I gave up my lunch with him for this, you sticky sappy lover boy. Be grateful.” He whined. Another undignified noise came out of Suho as he gestured to his dongsaengs to kindly shut up.

“I’d love to have lunch and chat, really.” Lay giggled. “But I promised my neighbor I’d go for boba tea with him.”

“Boba tea?!” Suho shushed the youngest, who still had a frightening blank expression on but he now had a threatening glimmer in his eyes as he leaned forward. Lay scooted back a little. “I love boba tea.”

Kai clucked his tongue and shook his head. “You’re not supposed to mention BT, hyung.”

“Shush now, Kai.” Sehun snapped, then turned back to Lay. “Let’s say Suho and I join your little bubble tea outing-”

“Sehun!”

“-and we can all hang out and meet this bubble tea neighbor of yours.” Sehun gave Suho a look. Suho replied with another undignified whale noise. Everyone wondered when Suho’s tongue would return.

“He’s actually a writer. Um, my neighbor.” Lay said. “I don’t really mind a few more people joining us. Kai-?”

“I’ve got another class, hyung.” Kai smiled. “Thanks for the offer.:

“Lay, class.” Suho whispered. Lay widened his eyes as he realized they had been talking for a while and he had five minutes to get to class. He dashed out with a wave.

“Where are we meeting him, hyung?” Sehun asked. “He never told us where or when.” Suho shrugged.

“You’re never going to get into his pants, you know.” Kai commented. Suho turned bright red.

“I’m not- I- ah- um-” He stuttered. Xiumin chose to walk in then, raising an eyebrow at Sehun’s huge grin and cackling, Suho frozen on the spot, and Kai checking his nails boredly.

“What happened?”

Lay got a text from Xiumin five minutes later, saying to meet the two dancers outside SM after class. He groaned and put his head on the desk.

An hour later, Lay found Sehun bouncing excitedly outside the studio with Suho. They both wore jackets over their dance clothes and Suho’s hair was sticking everywhere, small pink lips pursed in irritation as Sehun jumped around.

“Luhan, my neighbor, will be here soon.” Lay told them as he walked up to them. Suho dropped the irritated look and smiled.

“Okay. How was your class?” He asked. Lay shrugged.

“Educational. Some kid spilled guts all over the floor.” Seeing Suho’s expression, he quickly added, “Not his own! We were dissecting major organs of a pig.”

Suho nodded slowly. “Close relations to a human then?” He asked hollowly. Lay giggled.

“Only somewhat.” He replied as Luhan walked up to them, giving Suho and Sehun a strange look.

“Lay, sorry I’m late. My English teacher just would not stop talking.” He explained. Lay nodded in understanding.

“That’s fine. I have some friends, that um, wanted to join us?” Lay gestured to Suho and Sehun.

“Hi, I’m Suho. It’s nice to meet you, hyung.” Suho bowed quickly at Luhan. Luhan smiled and greeted him. Lay turned to Sehun, who had stopped bouncing and was transfixed on Luhan. Lay elbowed him and his face twisted in confusion.

“How are you friends with Lay?” He blurted out.

Luhan frowned. “Yah! This one is so disrespectful! I take classes with his roommate, and I’m his neighbor, you idiot.”

“But you look twelve.” Sehun stated bluntly. Suho’s mouth gaped open and Lay snorted. Luhan’s frown was more of a look of disgust.

“I am very manly, thank you very much.” Luhan retorted. He turned to Lay. “Right Lay?”

Lay’s snort became a case of giggles. Luhan stared helplessly as Lay leaned on Suho for support. “Wow. Thanks for your support.”

Lay grinned back sheepishly.

The talk gradually turned to small things as Lay explained exactly how the kid in his class managed to spill the entire tub of guts onto the floor and Luhan tried his best to stay away from Sehun, who tried his best to stay close to Luhan.

“What are you doing?” Lay whispered to him at one point. Sehun looked at him directly, grabbing his shoulders.

“You never said how cute your neighbor is, hyung.” He said seriously. “He’s cute and he likes bubble tea. I think I’m in love.”

“You called him twelve, Sehun.” Lay furrowed his eyebrow. Sehun shrugged and let go of Lay, running up to an annoyed Luhan. Lay stared at them, a little lost. Suho noticed.

“Come on, Lay.” Suho smiled and gently tugged on Lay’s hand. Lay let himself be pulled along and watched Sehun and Luhan bicker.

“Sehun likes him.” Lay stated to Suho. Suho nodded, glancing at the two as they walked.

“He’s a good kid.” Suho reassured him. “Well, somewhat. You know. I can understand if you’re concerned for your neighbor.”

“I’m more concerned about Sehun, if that’s what you’re thinking about.” Lay said, turning to look at Suho. “Luhan’s a bit… aggressive.”

“Oh.” They walked in silence for a bit before catching up to Luhan and Sehun, waiting outside the bubble tea shop. Luhan looked at Lay strangely, gesturing at Lay and Suho’s still-intertwined hands. Lay quickly let go, ignoring the look Suho gave him. Luhan smirked knowingly.

“Tao was right.” He whispered. “He is cute, Yixing!”

“Oh my god, no.” Lay groaned. “Stop it with that already. He’s straight!”

“What’s going on?” Sehun asked confusedly. Luhan stared determinedly at Lay before whirling around and grabbing Sehun by the arm.

“Grab a table for us!” Luhan called to them, pushing through the doors with Sehun in tow. Lay turned to Suho, who had a contemplating look on his face.

“You do that a lot.” He said.

“What?”

“Switch between Korean and Chinese when you want to talk about something private.” Suho replied as they took a seat at a booth inside the cafe. “Sometimes I feel like you’re talking about me.” He joked.

Accurate, Lay thought, before replying with a laugh, “Don’t worry about it. My friends just like to poke fun at me. They think it’s great that I’m talking to other people because they have this belief that I don’t talk to anyone.”

“I see.” Suho nodded. He looked over at the counter, where Luhan and Sehun were bickering in front of an uncomfortable cashier. “Um. Does Luhan know what we want?”

“Oh.” Lay smiled. “He’s really good at guessing someone’s favorite flavor. Even if they’ve never tried it before. Don’t worry.”

Suho looked unconvinced, so Lay quickly added, “Plus, Sehun’s with him so he probably knows what you might not like. In fact, that’s probably why they’re currently arguing.”

Suho giggled, and Lay stopped for a second because Suho’s giggle was breath-catching. Suho smiled at him, and Lay’s brain kind of fizzled. Was Suho straight?

Sehun happily bounded over with a chocolate-flavoured boba tea and handed Lay a mango-flavoured one, breaking him out of his train of thought, before sitting next to Suho.

“We got cake.” He said happily as Luhan walked over, balancing two coffee-flavoured bubble teas and two slices of chocolate cake.

“Sehun, can you please get the other cake.” Luhan sighed. Sehun sulked, but went off. Luhan handed one of the teas to Suho. “I’m guessing you’re a coffee person like me?”

“That’s right.” Suho said in amazement. He took a tenative sip and smiled. “This is amazing. Thank you.”

Luhan beamed triumphantly. Sehun returned with the final plate of cake and sat back next to Suho. There were two slices of chocolate cake decorated with small chocolate flowers and one strawberry cake with whipped cream. Lay glanced at Luhan and knew immediately what he was thinking.

“They only had one slice of strawberry left.” Luhan said calmly as he took a bite of his chocolate cake. Sehun was happily munching on the other. “I guess you’ll have to share.” Something about Luhan’s smirk made Lay suspect there was an entire plate of strawberry cake at the counter.

“You can have it. I’ll go buy another snack.” Suho made a move to get up, but Sehun blocked him. On the other side, Luhan was shoving Lay back into his seat.

“Just split it. It’s a waste of money.” Sehun said, staring at his hyungs carefully. Both Lay and Suho’s cheeks heated up.

Luhan turned to Sehun and struck up a conversation about music, completely dropping the original topic. Lay quietly sipped on his mango tea. “Let’s just split it.” He suggested. Suho agreed quietly.

They slowly ate the cake, not really trying to think about it, which worked once they got distracted by yet another argument between Luhan and Sehun.

“Hey, we should do this again.” Lay said offhandedly. “Maybe with Kai and maybe without my idiot friend here.”

Luhan punched him mid-argument. Lay laughed good-naturedly and looked at Suho. Suho had stiffened when Lay first suggested it, but he was now regarding Lay with a relaxed look.

"You'd have to give me your number then." Suho replied. "So that Xiumin doesn't have to walk into the room seeing everyone causing chaos."

"You guys caused chaos?!"

"They were laughing at me. You should still give me your number."

Lay would be lying if his heart didn't skip a beat just then. "Okay." He said, digging out his phone. Suho typed his information in and handed his phone back.

"I texted myself." He said as they heard another phone beep. Lay nodded, looking down at Suho's number displayed on his phone. He let his finger hover over the 'edit' button, indecisively. Finally, he saved the number as 'Suho <3' and slipped his phone back into his pocket, praying that it was the right idea. They smiled at each other.

Lay hoped that 'next time' would come sooner than he expected.

*cries* This chapter is longer than I thought. Think of it as making up for not updating in a while.

xoxo Lucy Louis Lee