While Sehun gave Baekhyun the obligatory house tour, the sky outside grew darker. It'd soon be time for them to leave. Baekhyun quickly set up a few books and papers on a table in the study and sat down next to Sehun.

"I still don't think I needed to bring this stuff", Baekhyun glanced over at countless hours of his notes and the books that he blamed for his shortness of breath earlier.

"You don't know my father. He'll definitely ask and probably won't believe. I have to resort to photographic evidence to convince him of anything".

Baekhyun nodded ever-so-slightly in understanding.

"Okay", Sehun murmured to nobody in particular, "Say cheese!".

Baekhyun did not say cheese, instead he looked up at the camera and smiled a very tolerant smile while Sehun tried his hardest to look polite with small smile that said 'I'm trying to study. It's really boring, and I don't understand everything, but I'm being polite to Baekhyun and I'm trying'.

"I think we nailed that", Sehun dropped his forced expression and started taking pictures of the notes on the table.

"Are you sure? What will you do if he asks for another one?"

Sehun stopped his mini photo shoot.

"It'd probably be for the best if we took a few more".

"Agreed".

This time they took a few more photos. Different sections of notes and different organisations of the books for each one. Eventually they stopped with the serious expressions and started playing around with the filters. Sehun now had a collection of photos of him and Baekhyun on his phone that he'd look at and smile at later.

"B-Baekhyun look, m-my head is- is-", Sehun's laughter broke off his sentence. His face was morphed on the screen and he somewhat resembled an alien.

"I don't see any changes", Baekhyun pretended to look closer, "Nope, can't see anything different".

Sehun's laughter didn't stop as he turned the screen to Baekhyun, giving him an alien shaped head.

His laughter was contagious - and the filter was kind of funny - soon Baekhyun found himself joining in.

What was meant to be a 10 minute pretend study session turned into a half hour photo shoot and before they knew it, it was time to go.

"Oh god", Baekhyun groaned, the amusement still in his voice, "My stomach hurts from laughing too much".

"Mine too. Who knew studying could be so much fun?".

Studying has never been this much fun, Baekhyun thought.

The curtains had been drawn all over the house and Sehun and Baekhyun were expected to go to bed. He was only here to help Sehun study after all.

"So", Baekhyun whispered to Sehun once they were in his room and the staff had gone to bed, "How are we doing this?".

Sehun couldn't help but grin, Baekhyun was making this feel like an elaborate heist and sneaking out hadn't quite had this kick to it before.

"Do you want to go out of the window?", Sehun asked him, only half joking.

Baekhyun looked alarmed, "Excuse me? The window? Of your bedroom? The one we climbed a million stairs to get to?".

"That's the one".

"Absolutely not", Baekhyun's voice cracked a little as he spoke.

"Then we'll have to sneak out the boring way".

"And what way is that?", Baekhyun was back to whispering and Sehun felt an obligation to whisper back.

"Down the stairs, through the corridors and out the back door. Then, we'll very sneakily get in the car and go".

"Won't they hear the car? Or catch us on camera? What about alarms?".

"I've got that all covered, don't you worry".

"I am worrying!"

"I know what I'm doing, just trust me this once?".

Despite his worrying, Baekhyun did trust Sehun, surprisingly.

After Baekhyun spent a moment mentally preparing himself, they descended Baekhyun's favourite stairs and made their way through the darkened house. Sehun knew where every turn, every step and every breakable item was. Baekhyun, however, did not and he found himself sticking very close to Sehun.

"Isn't this fun?", Sehun whispered to him. He was standing so close to him that Baekhyun doubted anyone else would have heard. Regardless, he shushed Sehun and concentrated on sneaking.

This is kind of fun, Baekhyun supposed, in a heart-racing, I can't wait till this is over and then I can actually be excited about it kind of way.

When they reached the back door, Sehun carefully opened the panel on the wall and pressed a few buttons. Baekhyun guessed that he was disabling an alarm.

"When I say go", Sehun whispered as quietly as he could to Baekhyun, "We have to run".

"Run where?", Baekhyun glanced through the glass of the back door and frowned.

Sehun leaned over and looked out of the glass too. The path that they would take was shrouded in darkness and without knowing it was there, Baekhyun would struggle to find it.

"Just follow me".

And with that, Sehun pressed the keypad a few more times and grinned.

"Go".

Baekhyun pulled the handle down on the door and rushed out, followed by Sehun who quickly closed it behind him.

Before even stopping to think about it, Sehun carefully took Baekhyun's hand and guided him in the direction of the back path. Baekhyun ran with him, glancing back at the house like a swarm of security guards were about to chase after them. Not that Sehun had a swarm of security guards watching over his house, or that anybody would particularly care if they saw them leave.

Despite, or rather, because of the nerves and adrenalin inside of him, Baekhyun started to laugh. Sehun was laughing under his breath too, as much as he could laugh when he was running.

They soon reached the end of the back path and encountered what looked like a gate. It was hard to tell. Sehun slowed down and Baekyun followed suit. His finger's tightened their grip on Sehun's and he glanced back towards the house once more for safe measure. Eventually the gate - it was indeed a gate - opened and they were off the property within seconds.

Sehun's not-so-surprisingly nice car was parked up the road and they walked towards it at a leisurely pace. There were street lamps out here and now that they could see clearer, there was no need for Baekhyun to cling to Sehun's hand. Baekhyun told himself that it must have been because he was so wrapped up in sneaking out that he'd forgotten what he was doing. Sehun on the other hand, was very much aware.

"We... did it", Baekhyun panted and rested his free hand on the roof of the car when they reached it.

"We did it", Sehun repeated, not particularly caring that there'd be a Baekhyun-sized handprint on his nice clean car, "Go us. Total ninja material".

"I... wouldn't quite... say that b...ut...", Baekhyun glanced up at Sehun, "Go us".

It was when Baekhyun was walking over to his side of the car that he finally realised they were still holding hands - although his subconscious screamed at him that he was well aware the entire time - and he quickly let go. Sehun silently wiped his tingling palm on his jeans before getting in the car himself. 

* * *

The car journey consisted of a very excited Baekhyun jumping around in his seat, a playlist consisting of OXE's new album and a couple of their older, but good songs, and the two of them singing along to the words. They were tone-deaf but they didn't care; they were having fun. 

Luckily for them, OXE weren't well enough known that they struggled for parking. It also helped that there was a multi-storey car park right next to the venue and they didn't have to walk far.

As they approached, Baekhyun eyed the queue at the door apprehensively. From their tired faces and slightly windswept appearance, it looked like they'd waited for hours.

"Should we have gotten here earlier?".

Sehun glanced at Baekhyun out of the corner of his eye, "Did you even look at the tickets?".

Baekhyun shook his head, "Not closely. Did I need to?".

"The 'V.I.P' at the top is kind of hard to miss. They only sold 20 in total".

"And that means...".

"Our queue won't be long".

"So I won't need to sit on your shoulders to see the stage?".

"You're more than welcome to... but I don't think it'd be necessary".

Baekhyun gave Sehun a look that said 'you wish' before being ushered to join a smaller, out of sight queue. Sehun wasn't sure why he'd wish for an achy back and shoulders. Baekhyun would be the only one benefiting from that.

"Oh, before I forget", Sehun began to rummage around in his bag, "This is for you".

"For me?", Baekhyun peered at the bag curiously.

Sehun pulled out a box and opened it himself before handing the mysterious item to Baekhyun.

"It's-"

"A light stick", Baekhyun finished for him, taking the gift from Sehun carefully, "I-".  Baekhyun's words faltered, it probably seemed like a small gift but for some reason it meant a lot to Baekhyun.

"You didn't have to get me this", Baekhyun looked up from the light stick with gratitude shining in his eyes.

Sehun smiled that ever so gentle smile that Baekhyun had found himself growing fond of, "I know, but I wanted to".

Baekhyun looked down at the light stick once more and tested it. It was a surprisingly bright beige-ish white and it was heavier than he thought it'd be. He turned it off to save the battery.

"Are you trying to buy my friendship?", Baekhyun joked, eager to distract his stupidly sensitive emotions.

Sehun's eyebrows rose, "Not at all".

Baekhyun started to respond before Sehun continued.

"I'm trying to buy your love".

Whatever Baekhyun was going to say evaporated in his mind.

"What?", he spluttered inelegantly instead. How could he respond to that?

Sehun winked at Baekhyun and he barely caught it in the dimly lit night.

"Just kidding. I wouldn't do that. It's a completely no-strings-attached gift. Consider it a thank you for agreeing to tolerate my company tonight".

Baekhyun turned away from Sehun and he was sure his cheeks were burning brighter than light stick he held in his hands.

"Thank you, I think".

Can you tell I like Baekhyun getting flustered bc of Sehun. Baekhyun's tying to resist the cheese. The cheese will get you, Byun Baekhyun. 

Anyway, I feel like I could have written this chapter a whooooole lot better but this is what I got. Eh... I can always rewrite after I suppose! Idk. Regardless, I hope that you guys, unlike me, liked this chapter and that you look forward to the sleepover in the next!

Not that they haven't slept in the same room before. But. This time is on purpose. Also, hasn't it been quite some time since Sehun's last prank? [Insert winking face here].

Thank you soooo much for reading, commenting, subscribing & upvoting!! You guys somehow always manage to make my day ^^ <3

Oh, one last thing, do you guys think the chapters are too short? 1500 words doesn't seem like that much now.