Why did so many people subscribe without even a single chapter?? Oh my gosh, this blew up! I'm honestly so shocked and I feel like I'm going to let you all down with how this turns out!

I didn't even mean to not update in like, two weeks. I had part one done before I ever even posted the forward but didn't want to upload because I feared something in part two wouldn't add up with it. But then I got literally K.O.ed by school and technically I'm REAAAALLLYYY supposed to be working on three projects right now yet I can't even work when this is the last day I have. I'm awful. So part two isn't actually all that close to being finished yet. It certainly doesn't help that it's a lot longer than part one...

I sincerely do hope you enjoy, though. :)

    Thirteen bodies formed a haphazard circle around Seungcheol’s living room. Roughly half layed sprawled out across the floor while the rest squished together on the furniture. Various food and drinks were scattered all over the place.

    “Um…” Wonwoo started hesitantly. His eyes carefully scrutinizing the other individuals in the room. “Soonyoung,” he decided, his eyes locking onto the boy curled up with Chan on one of the two recliners. “Truth or dare?”

    Soonyoung smiled, “I’ll go with truth this time!”

    Wonwoo leaned back at that, everyone watching as he tried to think of a question. “Alright then... remember that one time a few months ago you and me spent the night at Seokmin’s house and we made you drink that really nasty smoothie concoction? The one with the garlic and gummy worms and stuff in it?”

    Soonyoung’s eyes widened as he seemed to understand what Wonwoo was going to ask. He opened his mouth to stop the other but Chan noticed and put his hand over the older’s mouth.    

    Wonwoo continued, “Did you or did you not spit it out into Seokmin’s soup when he left the room and then go into the bathroom, use HIS toothbrush to brush your teeth, AND THEN give me fifteen thousand won in order to keep my mouth shut?”

    Seokmin let out a pterodactyl screech from his spot on the couch as the ten other boys burst into laughter and exclamations of disgust. “Soonyoung, you did not! That’s so gross, man! What the heck?? I ate that soup! And brushed my teeth with that toothbrush!” he let out gagging noises, kicking his feet up and down where they rest in Hansol’s lap.

    “That’s not even a proper truth! All you did was out me! And we had an agreement too!” Soonyoung picked up an empty cup from the coffee table in the center of the circle and chucked it in Wonwoo’s direction. It wasn’t a good throw, though, and ended up hitting Jisoo right in the nose. Said boy yelled out in surprise and had everyone else laughing all over again.

    “It so is a valid truth! He asked if you did or didn’t do it! We need confirmation!” Jeonghan cut in. “Plus,” he added, “no secrets should be kept from the rest of us. We should know about everything. It’s like, the sacred friendship rules of this group.”

    “Well, I can’t exactly deny it, now can I? Fine! I admit to my crimes! But that’s what you get for making me drink that slop.” Soonyoung pointed an accusing finger at Seokmin, to which the other raised his hands in surrender. They all started another round of laughter.

    As the commotion came to a close, Soonyoung peered around at them, carefully choosing his target for the next round. As much as he’d like to get revenge on Wonwoo, he wasn’t allowed since the other had just finished a turn. Instead, he found his victim to be the boy sitting on the carpet in between Junhui and Mingyu, innocently smiling along with the others. Perfect.

    “Minghao!” he called out, gaining everyone’s attention. “You’re next! Truth or dare?”

    Only pausing for a second, Minghao responded with a declaration of “Truth!” that had everyone else groaning.

    “You always choose truth!” they all seemed to shout out. Jihoon even went as far as tossing a jelly bean at him.

    “You have to do a dare this time! No exceptions!” Seungkwan said, earning nods of agreement from the others.

    Minghao huffed and pouted. They shouldn’t offer truth if they won’t let me take it. But grumbled out a “Fine” anyway.

    The others let out a collective cheer and Soonyoung let out what sounded like a squeal as he started debating what dare to give. The others threw out suggestions like, “Make him dunk his head in the toilet!” to which Seungcheol quickly shot down on the terms of it being ‘cruel and unusual punishment’. Mingyu shot back that that was the whole point of the game.

    It seemed Soonyoung already had something in mind, though, as he clapped his hands and cackled devilishly, effectively quieting everyone else down. “Minghao~” he sang out, and right then Minghao knew that whatever the doofus had come up with would have him royally screwed. The others seemed to know this too as they all leaned forward in anticipation.

    “You’ve never kissed anyway before, right?” The boys immediately broke out in another ruckus and Soonyoung raised his hand to gain back their attention. He acted so serious in that false manner of his that made Minghao’s skin crawl.

    “I am so not kissing you.”

    “Oh, it’s not me I want you to kiss.” Soonyoung stated casually, his hand smoothing over the fabric on the chair’s arm. “It’s Junhui.”

    All the other boys lost it as they started making a horrendous din consisting of hooting, hollering, and laughing. Minghao’s eyes widened and out of the corner of his eyes he could see Junhui next to him sit straight up and look at Soonyoung in interest.

    “What? Why me?” he asked, showing more genuine curiosity than anything else.

    Soonyoung feigned gasping and continued in a tone as if it were obvious. “Poor baby Minghao is already sixteen and has never kissed anyone before! You’ve had so much experience kissing people Jun, I thought ‘What better way for Minghao to learn how to kiss than from his expert kisser of a best friend?’ And this way we all get to witness such a special moment!”

    “I’m only sixteen! It’s not that weird to not have kissed anybody!”

    Soonyoung his teeth. “Maybe not. But the rest of us already have. Even Chan. We’re only looking out for you.” In Minghao’s mind, that was totally unfair considering the only reason Chan had kissed somebody was because when he was in the sixth grade, seventh grader Jihoon had made a deal to give his cupcake to a girl only if she chased the youngest boy down in the gym and gave him a big smooch while the cupcake frosting was still smeared all over .

    Luckily, Jisoo had enough sense to step in, “Guys, first kisses can be really important to someone. They shouldn’t just be thrown around all willy-nilly.”

    Minghao let out a sigh of relief and for a second thought the idea was being vetoed...only to have Jisoo continue a second later, “...which is why I think it’s a great idea for Minghao’s first kiss to be Junhui. You guys are best friends, and Junhui knows what he’s doing, right?”

    Jun shrugged, “Yeah, I guess I do.”

    Minghao turned to look at him in shock, “You’re okay with this?”

    The response was just a smirk and a wink. Okay ew, what was that supposed to mean?

    Nobody else seemed to have any objections to the idea. Looking to the oldest in the room, Seungcheol just gave a helpless smile and mouthed to him, “A dare is a dare.”

    “Okay!” Soonyoung rubbed his hands together. “Rules: I want this to be a good, proper kiss. No simple pecks or any of that lame stuff. It has to be longer than ten- no, TWENTY seconds and there has to be movement. Also tongue.” The others all started screaming hearing that and Mingyu took to repeatedly hitting Minghao on the arm. Jun slapped his hand over his mouth to muffle his snickering.

    Minghao himself, however, was taken aback. “What does a tongue have to do with kissing?” he asked, but that only seemed to result in louder screaming.

    “HE DOESN’T EVEN KNOW WHAT FRENCH KISSING IS.”

    “IS IT EVEN LEGAL TO TAKE AWAY THIS INNOCENCE FROM HIM?”

    “HE’S WAY TOO INNOCENT. WE HAVE TO RUIN IT.”

    “MOST OF US HAVEN’T EVEN FRENCH KISSED. SOONYOUNG, WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS TO THE POOR CHILD?”

    Soonyoung raised his hand to restore the order. “I’ve made the rules and my decision is final. Now, that being said,” he made a grand gesture of waving his hand at Minghao and Junhui, “the stage is yours.”

    Minghao was appalled at the fact that his friends had turned him into their sick form of entertainment and he really wished they hadn’t lost interest in the television an hour beforehand. Maybe then he would’ve never been put in this situation. But he was at a loss as Jun grabbed him by the arms and turned Minghao to face him. They made eye contact and for a second, Minghao almost felt reassured because he trusted his best friend to not let anything get out of hand, key word being almost. That feeling faded when Jun leant a bit closer and Minghao remembered what was about to happen and came to the realization that he probably needed new friends. And a better best friend.

    He hadn’t even registered Jun was still closing in until he saw the other flash him a brace-filled smile and blurted out a “Wait, I’m not rea-” but it was too late.

    It was weird how his eyes closed as soon as Junhui’s mouth touched his and it was really weird how the other eleven boys in the room became dead silent. Not a single sound was made. But it was really really weird how the panic he felt just moments before suddenly dissipated.

    It was no secret Jun was a bit of a casanova. While the others took a liking towards choir, or band, or sports, or videogames, or browsing the Internet, or even sleeping, Jun found his hobby in dating. And by association- kissing. It had become somewhat of a regular occurrence for them to stumble upon Jun making out with another student at school. He sometimes would even jokingly kiss his friends just to get everyone laughing. But never had he kissed Minghao, not on the lips anyway.

    Even though Minghao magically no longer felt like exploding, he still had absolutely no idea what to do. So he just awkwardly sat there for what felt like ages as Junhui moved his mouth against his own. He felt as both their braces and teeth repeatedly clacked together. From somewhere across the living room, he heard a snort and no doubt it was Seungkwan, that jerk. But his attention was stolen when he felt Jun bite his bottom lip. His first instinct was to open his mouth a bit out of surprise but instantly regretted it when something wet and slimy entered it. What.Is.That. Minghao lost all cool when he felt it move and touch his tongue.

    Jerking backwards and opening his eyes, he heard Jun grunt and immediately found a few things very wrong. First of all, the slimy thing that touched his tongue was actually his best friend’s tongue. And he would’ve cried out as to how weird that was if it wasn’t for something else amiss. Their mouths were still attached. And he found another foreign object invading his mouth as well. This one also wet and slimy but much thinner and smaller. To Minghao’s horror, his braces had hooked together with Junhui’s. The metal brackets had somehow gotten caught while they were kissing. And to make matters worse, both of them had been wearing rubber bands. And the thin, slimy thing now in Minghao’s mouth...was one of Jun’s snapped rubber bands. The snapping had somehow further worsened the dilemma by getting entangled together. And okay now come on, how was that even remotely possible?

    Minghao raised his gaze up to Junhui’s only to find the older staring right back, just as stunned as he was himself. For a second, he had forgotten about his other friends until Hansol broke what was apparently a bewildered silence.

    “Holy , that’s awkward.” And then the others were guffawing all over again.

    Jun tried to pull back only to have another band snap and recoil into his face. He let out a noise of surprise and Minghao actually felt like dying. He whined as Jun tried to ask the others for help but failed miserably trying to form words.

    “Oh my gosh, are you guys actually stuck?” Wonwoo wheezed. None of them seemed genuinely concerned over the problem.

    Minghao made a frustrated noise to confirm they indeed couldn’t separate and he had no idea how to handle this. A few of his better friends crawled over to take a look while some continued looking on in morbid fascination. Chan had wanted to try and help but halted at the suggested idea of putting his hands in their mouths because he didn’t want to have their saliva on him. Jisoo stepped in after that without complaint and attempted to take out the bands for them, but found the rubber string tied in several different gruesome and soggy knots.

    “How did you even get it messed up this bad? Like, Jun, what were you actually trying to do? Because I don’t think this would even be possible unless you meant to do it.” Jeonghan inquired, peering at them from over Jisoo’s shoulder.

    Unexpectedly, Jun gave what might’ve been a chuckle and shrugged, his mouth curving into a smile against Minghao’s. That resulted in him getting punched in the gut. What did I do to deserve this? Minghao wailed internally.

    “Um, guys?” Jisoo began, acting worried for the first time since the whole thing started. “You’re really stuck. I don’t know what to do other than cut the rubber bands with scissors and then go ask Seungcheol’s mom for help.” He got up and went into the kitchen to get the scissors.

    Minghao yelled out in protest and heard Seungcheol’s claims of disapproval as well. “How the heck am I supposed to explain something like this to my mom?”

    “Just tell her the truth.” Seokmin said like it was obvious.

    Seungcheol gaped at him. “I can’t! This is so awkward. My mom can’t know we do stuff like this!”

    Seungkwan scoffed, “Yeah because things like this happen on a regular basis. Dude, just go get your mom. She’s pretty chill anyway.”

    “...Fine. I’ll be right back.”

    Minghao screamed the best he could.

    Explaining the situation was indeed very awkward. Especially since all Seungcheol did was go upstairs into her hobby room and tell her they had ‘a little problem and needed helped’. She had followed him downstairs only to walk in on most of them huddled together looking at something and a few sitting down away from them sniggering. When they took note of her presence in the room, slowly they disbanded and revealed seventeen year-old Wen Junhui and sixteen year-old Xu Minghao with their mouths connected. Eighteen year-old Hong Jisoo stood in front of them and he was holding her best pair of scissors a little too close to the two boys’ faces to be safe. No one said anything as they all stared at the only proper adult.

    She cleared and asked in a soft voice, a gentle smile on her face, “What’s going on here?” Somebody coughed.

    “We were just...we were playing truth or dare and…” Kwon Soonyoung fumbled over his words. Seungcheol’s mother quirked an eyebrow.

    Lee Jihoon piped up, “They were dared to kiss and now their braces are caught. We cut the rubber bands but the brackets won’t come apart.”

    “Oh.” The woman glanced at her son who could only offer a sheepish smile. “Well, let me take a look.” Approaching them, Jisoo backed away while Minghao closed his eyes out of humiliation. He couldn’t face anyone anymore. As Mrs. Choi leant down beside him, he prayed for the Grim Reaper to take him away.

    “I don’t know what to tell you boys. You’re in a tough situation. The only thing I can think to do is take you to the orthodontist.” Both unfortunate boys attempted to speak but it came out as garbled noises.

    The others watching were surprisingly quiet as the situation was assessed...until Seungkwan whispered out, “Oh my gosh, this is the best day of my life.” And then raised his voice as he yelled, “You mean they have to go out in public like this??” The tension was broken and everyone started talking.

    Minghao wanted to cry. Other people would have to see this. Other people would see him. But as much as he wanted to refuse, to go hide, he couldn’t because he was stuck and no one knew how to fix it.

    That’s how Minghao and Junhui ended up, with great effort, being ushered out of the house, into Mrs. Choi’s car, and to the orthodontist office. Despite the woman’s wishes, the others begged to go as well and so they piled into her minivan as well as Jeonghan’s truck.

    Walking into the waiting room of the orthodontist’s office was indescribably awful. Especially so since, naturally, it had to be packed with people. In shame, Minghao had pulled up his hood and kept his eyes shut tight. One glance at all the looks they were receiving and he felt sick. He really wished he could shut his ears as well because he heard a good number of scandalized comments from the other patrons in the office. It certainly didn’t help that his wonderful friends had taken to snapping photos of the two. The boy really wondered how Junhui had seemed relatively neutral about the whole ordeal, but he quickly tossed the thought aside; concluding that his best friend had probably been caught under worse circumstances. He didn’t want to imagine what kind.

    It wasn’t until one of the assistants had ushered them into a back room to wait, all the while shooting them sympathetic yet knowing looks, did Minghao start to tear up. If this was the best day of Seungkwan’s life, then it was definitely the worst of his. He didn’t even want to be kissed and now look where it had gotten him.

    Junhui brought his hand up to Minghao’s face, cupping it and wiping away the tears. They couldn’t exactly talk but the message was simple enough. Everything’s fine, it’s no big deal. But to Minghao it was. It was so typical of Jun to only be sympathetic when no one was around as a witness. He had a reputation he wanted to upkeep and sometimes Minghao really wondered how they were even friends, let only best friends. However, his irritation wasn’t enough to push Jun away as he pulled him into a hug. The fact that their braces were still hooked was, though.

    It was inevitable the orthodontist would ask questions when he walked in. And Minghao’s embarrassment only heightened from it. He couldn’t even speak to defend himself. But Junhui was laughing.

    It had taken the man about twenty minutes to release them and fix the metal in both their mouths. The whole time he tried to maintain conversation saying things like, “Now what have we learned today?” and “I do hope you don’t get as excited next time.”

    When he declared he was finished and exited, the two were left behind. Neither moved nor made a sound for a second before Junhui stated, “You know, that was pretty hot.” His lips curled into a suggestive smile and his eyebrows rose up. “I’d totally do it again if you wanted to.”

     Minghao instantly grabbed onto Jun’s shoulder-length hair and pulled as hard as he could, then promptly marched out of the room. Junhui cried out in pain but followed suit nonetheless, telling him not to be so angry. Minghao ignored him.

    He tried his best to turn the Walk of Shame through the waiting room into a walk of confidence, but failed miserably when everyone’s attention was on him the second he came in. With his head down, he shuffled up to Mrs. Choi and latched onto the back of her jacket, burying his face in it. She was a nice and understanding lady. Nicer than anyone else. She asked no questions but only reached behind her to pat him on the head.

    Despite a few quips from the others, not much was said about it and they made their way back to the cars. Minghao crawled into the very back of the minivan and after buckling up, curled up into a little ball and covered his face with his hands. At this point he just wanted to go home.   

    He heard two people arguing in hushed voices outside of the car and suddenly a loud, “I don’t think he wants to talk to you right now, Junhui.” And then somebody was sitting in the seat beside him, rubbing his back and apologizing repeatedly. Jisoo.

    The older promised to never let the others force him into doing anything he didn’t want to ever again and that they didn’t mean any harm. Everybody else in the car didn’t say anything and although he knew this was definitely not the last time he’d hear about it, he was glad that it was over.

    It was then, on the car ride back, that Minghao came to a few conclusions. One, he definitely needed new friends. Two, braces were contraptions of doom. Three, Soonyoung was at the top of his hit list. And lastly,

         Truth or Dare was the worst game ever.

    Unbeknownst to him, the dare Soonyoung had given was not on a whim and the conversation going on in the other vehicle pertained to exactly that. They were meddling little rats. And they loved to give Minghao ‘harmless’ pushes in the right direction. But all's fair in love and war, right?