He missed the bus. Jongdae missed the freaking bus because he forgot to brush his teeth before bed the night before and was not about to venture out in public without cleaning his mouth at least once in 12 hours. (Even though his morning breath might have been a nasty treat for any SantaCon participants he ran into. Jongdae would have enjoyed that, honestly. As it was, the only person he’d so far repulsed with it that day had been Luhan—after the Chinese boy had complained about Jongdae’s return and Jongdae had breathed quite vindictively right into his roommate’s face.) That desperate need for some modicum of cleanliness was coming back to bite Jongdae in the now, though, as he stood shivering at the bus stop, surrounded by the very drunken idiots he’d planned so diligently to avoid.

Life . SantaCon . Baekhyun – (Jongdae hated himself for finishing that thought.)

Jongdae was—thankfully?—distracted from those thoughts by a trio of barely clothed elves; he wondered if they were all dating one another like his friends might soon be and reflexively clutched the gift he’d retrieved on Baekhyun’s behalf a little closer to his body. (He hoped that not every set of three humans he saw together would instantly remind him of his three friends and whatever it was they had going on. Perhaps it was just a phase that Jongdae would get over once he got used to the sight of Baekhyun, Chanyeol, and Kyungsoo being together together. Please, God, let it just be a phase—Jongdae didn’t want to spend any more time considering the intricate details of their ual relationship than he needed to.)

A bus that wasn’t the university shuttle he was suffering through the cold to wait for passed by a little too closely and Jongdae barely had enough time to jump backward. He narrowly avoided hitting the poor excuse for elf women but in his conscious avoidance of their bodies, he barreled into someone else’s. The person who caught him had strong arms; Jongdae could feel his or her muscular shape even through both of their winter coats. He was probably male, though, since there was no soft cushion of a female chest pressing into Jongdae’s back and the quiet “Oof!” the stranger emitted when Jongdae tried to get away and accidentally stepped on his foot was a pleasant tenor. Jongdae wasn’t at all surprised, then, when he turned around to mutter a quick apology before just walking to meet his friends, and saw a guy probably a little younger than himself standing before him.

What was surprising about the person with whom Jongdae had accidentally collided was that he was covered in just about as much fabric as the three y (or trying to be) elves from earlier. (Maybe even less.) For one thing, the man was completely shirtless under his open coat; Jongdae was trying not to stare too obviously but he thought he glimpsed a brush of dark hair trailing into the guy’s pants. (Which were actually the sorriest excuse for pants Jongdae had ever seen. Shorts might have been a better word, except they technically did go all the way from the other man’s waist to his ankles. There just also happened to be long slits on both of the outside seams which bared much of the man’s legs to the world.) He had something like a Chippendales bowtie around his neck, too, only it was more like a choker or a collar with a jingling bow attached at the center. Jongdae, who’d been trailing his eyes down from the hair on the man’s abdomen and then back up slowly to the man’s face, gulped at the sight. The outfit was made complete with a pair of antlers attached precariously to a bright red headband that matched the spot of red on the tip of the man’s nose.

(y, stripper Rudolph, Jongdae surmised. He couldn’t handle this; clearly the world hated him.)

“Sorry,” he barely managed to squeak out. Jongdae was studiously avoiding the stranger’s, well, everything, as he apologized, and apparently he was pretty obvious about it because the guy actually called him out for it. (The nerve.)

“Don’t apologies usually involve eye contact?” The stranger asked. Jongdae met his eyes then, and instantly regretted it. Even in New York, all of Jongdae’s friends were Korean, like him, and all of them had brown eyes, like him, but he’d still never seen eyes like this guy’s before. He was Asian too, as it turned out, but his gaze was like molten hot chocolate with whipped cream and crushed peppermint candy on top—exactly how Jongdae’s mom made it for him whenever he went back to Seoul for Christmas.

“Sorry,” he said again, swallowing hard against the sudden longing he felt for home. Strangers weren’t supposed to make him feel like this, especially not ones who so clearly enjoyed Jongdae’s least favorite holiday/non-holiday of the year. The man just shrugged, seemingly appeased, so Jongdae offered a final “Sorry” as he walked away, glad the encounter was over.

He was so ready to complete this stupid delivery and get back home. The kimchi was sounding particularly delicious right about then; it’s what Jongdae imagined he was tasting when he passed a long line outside a bar a few doors down from the bus stop and some girl tripped the contents of her beer mug onto Jongdae’s face and into his hair. He caught a glimpse of the shuttle driving by as he tried using his soaked scarf to wipe the sticky alcohol off his face before it could dry, and that was it for Jongdae. Completely defeated by SantaCon, Jongdae sunk to his knees on the disgusting, cold, beer-covered sidewalk; the future of Baekhyun, Chanyeol, and Kyungsoo’s relationship would have to go on without him because he just couldn’t deal anymore, not today.

Jongdae was more than prepared to wallow on his knees until he felt better, so he wasn’t ready for familiarly strong arms to lift him off the ground, pulling Jongdae into his bare chest for the second time that day. Jongdae practically squawked at the invasion of his personal space, but was soon thankful when a large group of freshmen Jongdae recognized from when he’d helped out with orientation stampeded past. They were heading for the same line that had given Jongdae his beer shower and would have happily run him over in their eagerness if the other man hadn’t been so quick to move him.

“I get that you like my arms around you,” Chippendales Rudolph joked, his face contorting into a smile that looked out of place for some reason. (It seemed like the man didn’t often find things amusing. Jongdae disliked people like that. Life was a gift—except for the one day a year of SantaCon—why not appreciate it?) “But risking your life for a back hug twice in five minutes seems a little much.” He grinned at Jongdae more comfortably this time and winked. “You could have just asked.”

Jongdae groaned. Why was the stripper boy so freaking cute? Jongdae didn’t want anything to do with SantaCon—didn’t want to like anyone that had anything to do with SantaCon—but Rudolph here was doing a pretty good job of changing that. (And singlehandedly in the face of more than one recent, SantaCon-related, unfortunate event, too.)

“I’m Sehun,” Rudolph introduced himself after a long beat during which time he’d clearly expected Jongdae to respond to his flirting in kind, but didn’t seem too put out when Jongdae said nothing. “Get a drink with me?”

Shaking his head vehemently, Jongdae caught a flicker of disappointment in Sehun’s confident expression. He gestured first to the curling lines of wasted people outside every bar on the block, and then to where the cold beer was flattening his hair into unattractive clumps. “Not today, at least,” Jongdae amended. That made Sehun grin so broadly that his eyes crinkled at the edges and the touch of red on his nose practically glowed. (Or maybe Jongdae was imagining things? Regardless, the idea fit with Sehun’s Rudolph costume, so Jongdae wasn’t going to dwell on that.)

"I'm Jongdae." He grinned too.

It's February. Why am I still writing Christmas things?! Also, this is finished, because I like open-ended things, because Baekhyun, Chanyeol, and Kyungsoo don't really need help getting together, and because, well, it's February.