"Another trip?" Donghae groaned, throwing his suitcase on the ground dramatically.

I rolled my eyes, giving him a look. "It's senior year, Donghae. Everyone takes a load of trips senior year. It's supposed to be fun."

He frowned. "I think it's fun, I just hate packing and unpacking. We're so close to graduation, though. It's like, holy . I'm almost done with school."

"Until college," I added, looking over at him as I packed my clothes for tomorrow's trip to the Islands. I hear it's beautiful, but I've never gotten the opportunity to go somewhere tropical.

"Ugh," Donghae sighed, putting his head in his hands. "I don't even know what I want to do with my life."

I gave Donghae a worried look, approaching him slowly. "Are you crying?"

"No," he whined, sniffling, which told me he was actually crying. 

I wrapped my arms around him, holding him close to me as his shoulders shook. "What's got you so upset, love?" I asked, his hair.

"It's just stressful, you know? School's a month from being over and I haven't even applied for college or anything. I don't know what I want to do with my life without upsetting my father," he ranted, wiping viciously at his eyes.

I kissed the top of his head, squeezing him tight. "Listen, I don't care what you're father thinks or what you're going to do with your life. I'm going to be there with you through it all, Donghae. You're never going to be alone again. Unless I die."

He gave me a horrified look, his jaw slack and his eyes wide. "But I'm not going to die!" I corrected quickly, realizing my mistake.

He laughed through the tears, shoving my shoulder. "You're such an idiot sometimes."

"But you love me," I assured him, smirking.

"Sadly, I do," he admitted, an amused look of his own quirking on his face as he pecked my lips lightly. 

"Now pack," I demanded, grinning.

"Yes, Daddy," he joked, sighing dramatically as he began to pack for our trip.

______________________________________

"It's beautiful," I whispered as we took a boat out to our location, coasting on the crystal blue water. "And ing hot."

Donghae laughed, rolling his eyes. "It's not hot, it's humid."

"Whatever it is, I'm sweating like a dog," I panted, wiping my forehead. If it wasn't so beautiful here, I'd be pissed.

"You're way too well accustomed to Korea, my dear," he told me, patting me on the shoulder.

The spring retreat was an even smaller group of people with only 15 attending. There were nine rooms in the beach house we'd rented out, two beds per room and two rooms with three beds.

Five separate boats were taking students and the same two chaperones to our house, which I was excited as to see. A beach house. I'd never honestly been to the beach. 

We were the first people to arrive at the house, quickly running into the house and searching for the best room. Donghae and I found a two bedroom room on the second floor with an ocean view that was to die for. 

"Damn," Donghae breathed, looking out of the large window that had a window seat on it.

One of the bedspreads was orange with yellow pillows, the other yellow with orange pillows. It was so tropical, beachy, and clean that I couldn't help but just...want to go dive in the water.

"Okay," a teacher said, walking into our room. Donghae and I snapped our heads toward her curiously, momentarily stalling our inspection of the room. "The boat driver said not to wear anything shiny in the water because there's been barracuda's spotted and they like shiny things."

I gulped and glanced over at Donghae, a worried look on my face. I wasn't going to get eaten alive, right? "Okay, thank you," Donghae replied, sending her a quick, polite smile while I unpacked and got settled.

"We're going to that bonfire thing tonight, right?" I asked, putting up the last of my things.

"Yeah, I think it'll be cute. Don't you?" he commented, setting his suitcase on his bed.

"If by cute you mean romantic, then yes that's what I was thinking also."

Donghae shot me a small grin, rolling his eyes. "Possibly not as romantic as the Eiffel tower dinner, but I suppose."

"When do you want to go down to the beach?" I asked Donghae, helping him unpack his things next. 

"Whenever is fine," he replied nonchalantly, like the beach was nothing.

"Okay, well I've never been to the beach before," I hinted, telling him that I really would like to go as soon as possible. 

The good thing about this trip was that Ali was here. She hadn't been able to go to France since she wasn't a senior, but she was ready for the school's spring retreat that she'd somehow managed to sneak her way into this one.

"You haven't?" Donghae asked, his blue eyes sparkling with surprise. "Mr. I've been all around the world has never been to the beach?" 

"Don't tease me about it," I whined, pushing his shoulder lightly. "Just take me to it."

"Fine," Donghae grinned, about to leave the room.

"Donghae," I called, signaling his return. "You do realize that you're fair skinned and you need sunscreen. You'll be a lobster if you aren't careful."

"Hm," he commented, spinning around to face me. "You have to wear sunscreen too."

I bursted with laughter. Donghae had tried to apply sunscreen to his face and left various globs of white on his face from places he'd failed to rub in. "I will. After you finish completely applying yours," I joked, rubbing it in for him with my thumbs.

His cheeks were red beneath my hands, embarrassed for some reason. "Put yours on now," he whined, desperately wanting the attention off of him.

Once we both had sunscreen applied and we'd taken off our shiny items because I didn't want to get eaten, we headed to the beach. Unfortunately, shiny includes the necklace I'd gotten Donghae.

"Wow," I breathed as sand squished beneath my toes. "So this is what sand feels like."

Donghae giggled, tugging on my arm until we got to the shoreline. "And this is what wet sand feels like, and beyond this point that's what water feels like."

"Those waves are gigantic," I commented, worry settling in.

"Yeah, I've never seen waves quite so large but it says it's a green flag day so these must be normal around here." 

"Green flag day?"

"Yes," Donghae started, looking at me like I was dumb. "Green means small waves, yellow is cautionary, and red is large, dangerous waves. Two red flags means it's not very safe to swim in, possibly because of stormy weather, and purple flags mean that there's marine life very close to the shore. Such as jellyfish."

I nodded. "So these huge waves are supposed to be the green kind?"

Donghae laughed at my cluelessness, kissing me on the cheek as he gripped my hand. "Apparently. Are you ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be," I mumbled, hesitantly following after Donghae. Well, I didn't have much of a choice. He was practically dragging me into the water.

I looked down, seeing my feet below me in the water. It was so crystal clear that as waves rushed, I saw tiny shells fly around before settling back into the sand. It was beautiful, but were the waves going to murder me?

Donghae kept pulling me out until I was waist deep in the water. I was nervous because along the horizon you could see a huge wave brewing. Not as large as some of them I've seen so far, but I was still nervous as .

One of Donghae's arms gripped around my waist, an encouraging smile on his face as he sensed my nerves. "Just hang onto me," he told me, "And if the wave gets you, it'll just push you back to shore. Or take you with the current. And if it does that, don't swim towards the beach, swim parallel with the shore until the current ends."

"That's a lot to take in right before I get pounded with water," I replied, my voice raising a few octaves with panic.

"You'll be fine," Donghae assured me, placing a small kiss to the corner of my lips as the wave drew closer and closer.

Suddenly, it was above me. I stared up at it in awe until Donghae twisted me around and told me to face the shore so that it didn't hit me in the face. Probably a good idea.

Water slammed against my back before my footing slipped, something I hoped was supposed to happen. I went tumbling under the water, trying to grip at Donghae as my vision ed up. When I surfaced, I gasped for air before being shoved down again, flailing wildly. Although I could've easily stood in the depth of the water, the strength of the wave held me down.

I came up from the water, wiping at my eyes and coughing. Donghae's arms found my waist again as we now stood thigh deep in the ocean, drenched.

"That water tastes like ," I hissed, spitting in attempts to get the horrible taste out of my ing mouth.

"It's salt water, Eunhyuk. Of course it's going to taste terrible."

______________________________________________________________

"This is peaceful," I commented, looking upon Donghae and I's surroundings. The other fifteen students, along with some other vacationers our age, were down at the beach. A large bonfire had been starts considering it got a little cool at night.

Music was playing softly from a tiki bar that, much to Donghae's dismay, he couldn't legally drink from considering he wouldn't be of age until next month.

Everyone had been given a flower necklace, like we were at a Hawaiin party or something, even though we weren't, but I just played along. Donghae had his on his head, pink flowers making him look so gay, but it was still cute.

The music was soft and low, and as the night confined the previous sounds of laughter were silenced as people slow danced. Donghae and I, however, were just sitting on one of the logs around the bonfire, our hands linked as we gazed upon the fire.

"My face is burning the up," Donghae remarked, ruining the moment as he tore his hand from mine to hide his face from the fire.

"Let's go dance then," I suggested, looking upon a few other people who were doing so.

Donghae pondered it for a second before the fire crackled, making his decision for him. "Okay," he said quickly, standing me up and pulling me with him to a spot near the tiki bar.

He faced me, his arms tightening around my neck as my own arms wound around his small waist. Our foreheads rested together as we looked into each others eyes under the stars. We weren't really dancing. We were just kind of swaying, lost in a cloud of love.

If this was lost I didn't even want to be found.

"Is it really dramatic to say that you mean everything and more to me?" I said, biting gently on my bottom lip.

Donghae gave me a sly look before replying, "Is it cheesy as for me to say that I don't think I can live without you?"

I laughed lowly, my lips meeting his in a quick, sweet kiss. "It's definitely cheesy as ."

"But I meant it though," Donghae said seriously, his lips quirking up in a small smile. 

"I agree with you. I went a summer without you being mine and I drove myself crazy. I never want to feel that again."

"You don't have to, Eunhyuk," Donghae assured me, his fingers playing with the hair on the back of my neck. "I promise."

I smiled, relief washing through me as I felt safe for once in my life. Like, with Donghae, I was invincible and nothing could break me. I felt complete.

I brushed my lips against his, gazing into his eyes as we continued swaying.

"You know what we should do?" Donghae whispered, his lips so close that they ran against mine as he spoke.

"What?" I whispered back.

"We should make love on the beach later tonight."

I frowned. "Wouldn't that be all sandy everywhere?"

Donghae sighed, his cheeks noticeably pink even in the moonlight. "I was trying to be romantic," he mumble, awkwardly, looking away.

I curled my fingers under his chin, forcing him to look at me. "You were trying to be romantic?" I questioned, smiling.

"Well usually you're the romantic one and I figured you would mention something romantic to do but you haven't yet so I spoke up and-"

I cut his rant off with a tender kiss, earning a surprised noise from Donghae as he sighed against my lips. "I'm sorry, I didn't realize," I apologized, my fingers his cheek.

"It's fine. Forget about it. It's not on my bucket list or anything," he said dramatically, sighing loudly for emphasis.

I chuckled at him, rolling my eyes. "I'd love to make love to you on the beach, Donghae."

He grinned, happily pressing his lips to mine. "I love you, Lee ing Eunhyuk."

I held him close, warmth spreading through every fiber of my being. I never wanted to be without Donghae. "I love you too, Lee ing Donghae."