Baekhyun walked Jihae back to her house that night without so much as a word or thought of complaint. In fact, he wouldn’t have had it any other way given the events if the day. Yes, this morning had been scary. And yes, he had wasted his entire Saturday sitting in a hospital waiting room twiddling his thumbs and talking to grannies about their haemorrhoids, but from when Jihae had woken up until now, he was glad that he was with her. In comparison to how she had been around him, now she was so different. She smiled, made attempts at teasing, and even laughed at some of his not-so-dumb jokes. And that made him feel special; it made him feel genuinely wanted. It was a nice feeling.

“Favourite colour?” he quizzed her as they dawdled along the road, neither one in much of a hurry.

“That depends which season it is.”

“Why does it depend what season it is?”

“Because different colours look better in different seasons.”

Baekhyun let out a light bark of laughter, tickled by the girl’s words. “So what’s your favourite in spring?”

Jihae paused, then smiled and looked at the trees as they walked past them. Even though it was dark, it was obvious what the girl was thinking of. “Green.”

Nodding, Baekhyun also looked to the trees.

“What’s your favourite?” she asked him back, feet scuffing lightly in her worn trainers.

“Green.”

Jihae immediately shot him a suspicious look, one that said she knew he was toying with her.

“What?” Baekhyun shrugged innocently. Green actually was his favourite, had been ever since the ripe age of ten.

Not saying anything but continuing to eye him suspiciously, Jihae hummed along disbelievingly.

“What?” Baekhyun repeated, this time sounding very defensive. “Green is my favourite colour – and not just in spring either. So, really, who’s the copycat around here?”

“Sehun does that to girls too,” Jihae replied coolly, not even missing a beat as she shrugged lightly as if all boys were as playboy-ish as Sehun. “He says pink’s his favourite more times than not.”

Baekhyun scoffed. “Well, of course he does. He’s like a walking chat-up line.”

Jihae let out a snort of amused laughter at that. “He’d be angry if he heard you saying that,” she mused, but nonetheless looked tickled by Baekhyun’s words.

Baekhyun knew the girl was right. And he really didn’t need to be in any less of the boy’s favour than he already was. “Don’t tell him I said that.”

Looking up to him with eyes that were halfway between playful and evil, Jihae purred impishly, “I bet he would just love to hear it.”

Face falling at the very real possibility that he could potentially be dealing with a very angry Sehun come Monday morning, Baekhyun swooped around in front of Jihae so that they were now both at a standstill. “Fine, let’s make a deal then,” he bartered seriously, sticking out his pinkie like it was a life or death matter. Jihae stared at it expectantly, no doubt guessing his next words. “Pinkie promise you won’t tell him I said that.”

Jihae hesitated before an almost triumphant smirk lifted her lips, then held out her pinkie but didn’t let Baekhyun take it just yet. “Ok. But only if you don’t tell him about me collapsing.”

Screwing up his face, Baekhyun drew his pinkie away a little as if he didn’t trust her. “That doesn’t seem like a very good deal. He should really know.”

Biting her lip, Jihae stretched her pinkie out towards Baekhyun a little, inching it closer and closer until they were almost touching. “I just don’t want you to be the one to tell him.”

That didn’t seem unreasonable to Baekhyun, but he still wanted a more solid answer. “So you’ll tell him? And your parents?”

Jihae sighed irritably, huffing a little. “I’ll get to it.”

Baekhyun smirked at the sight of her puffed out cheeks, then hooked his pinkie around hers gently and shook it. “I’m going to be checking that you do.”

Upon arrival at Jihae’s house, it became apparent that neither of her parents were home yet from the lack of lights on inside the house. But then again, the pair could probably have guessed that her parents weren’t home yet because of the lack of search party for Jihae during her unexpected absence.

“Thank you for everything today,” Jihae said, smiling up at Baekhyun happily.

Baekhyun still couldn’t quite get used to the change in Jihae since he first met her, but all he knew was that he wanted to see her smiling like that at him more often. She was really rather pretty when she did so.

“You don’t have to thank me,” Baekhyun replied, smiling down at the girl warmly. He hoped that she grasped just how sincerely he meant that, though somehow he didn’t think she would.

“I guess I’ll see you on Monday then,” Jihae said, turning to leave.

The moment she did however, the doctor’s words rang through Baekhyun’s head: she wasn’t supposed to be left alone.

“Wait, wait, wait,” he chattered, stepping around in front of her to block her path. “Call one of your friends over.”

“What?” she frowned a little.

“You’re not supposed to be left alone tonight – doctor’s orders.”

Jihae went to step around him, slightly raising an eyebrow.

“I’m serious, Jihae. Just call one of your friends, ok?”

Whirling back to face him, Jihae shot him a look that said you aren’t funny, then Baekhyun realised what he had just said to the girl with approximately two friends in the world, one of them being Baekhyun.

“Call Sehun,” Baekhyun insisted, trying to clear up his mistake.

“He’s busy.”

“What could he be doing that is so important that he can’t stay over at his best friend’s house for the night?”

“Meeting his girlfriend’s parents.”

“I’m sure if you called him he would come over.”

“I’m not going to do that.”

Baekhyun scoffed. “Why not?”

“Because Sehun is important to me, and this is important to him. So I’m not going to ruin it for him. I know I’m probably not the more tuned-in person on this planet but I know how bad it will look if I call him away from something like that.”

Ok, so maybe Baekhyun could see her point. That would look pretty darn bad for another girl to call him up whilst he was with his girlfriend. Baekhyun was pretty sure the word for that was ‘booty call’, though he didn’t class himself as an expert in any way.

“Well, what about that Lay guy?”

Jihae stared at Baekhyun for a moment, then her brow furrowed a little. “Who?”

“Lay. You know… about my height, dark hair, dimples… ”

Still, Jihae gave him a rather vacant look. “I don’t know anyone called Lay.”

“Of course you do. He was at the hospital visiting you earlier but you were still out of it.”

Jihae’s brown creased even more. “But I really don’t know anyone called Lay.”

“Anyway,” Baekhyun went on, shaking his head a little at her obliviousness. “The point is, you can’t stay on your own for the next few days.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“You won’t.”

“I will.”

“You won’t.”

Silence.

The pair stared at one another for a long moment, neither wanting to be the one to break the gaze by blinking first.

It was Baekhyun who lost with a defeated sigh. “What about Sehun’s parents? Couldn’t you stay at theirs tonight?”

Jihae went silent then, thinking about it. “But how could I explain it to them?”

To this Baekhyun didn’t really have an idea since the whole idea was to keep an eye on her, and if they didn’t know about it then it was unlikely that they would be able to do that.

He took in a long and measured breath, unsure if