Otabek Altin could be considered a sweet boy if you ask his parents. He would definitely be a nice guy if you ask the people around him. Maybe a little shy, maybe a little quiet, a bit stoic at times; sure. Other than that, he was also on the diligent side of things. University life has begun to take its toll on the 18 year old, especially since he was nearing the end of his year's first semester. That always meant an onslaught of exams, reports, and lots and lots of papers; all of which went hand in hand with coffee, and late night snacking.

That night, even his dorm mate Phichit was staying up late for his final paper. There were empty cans of soda all around the older boy, since he wasn't a fan of coffee. A bag of chips was on the floor, long empty of its contents since it was shared by the two as they sat side by side at the dining table their dorm had. They started close to 8PM, sometime after dinner. It was currently almost 1AM.

Otabek was typing away at his laptop, eyes focused on the screen. He would shift from window to window, tab to tab, reading on information before he would begin to type again. University life was a tedious life. It required a lot of time, effort, and well... money.

"Let's order pizza," Phichit suggested as he stopped typing. He stretched his arms out and gave a relieved sound afterwards. "I need more energy to work on this. Plus, I dunno about you, but I am starving. There's this 24/7 store called Grand Prix Pizza that Viktor was talking about."

"Are we sharing the bill?" Otabek asked calmly, still keeping his eyes on the screen and his fingers on the keyboard.

Phichit shrugged, "sure, man. We're sharing the pizza anyway."

He got up from his seat and stretched some more, moving his body side to side to get rid of the soreness he got from sitting for so long. Phichit disappeared into his room for a moment, before coming out with his phone in his hand. He returned to his original seat and put the phone on loud speaker.

As it was ringing, Phichit lightly poked Otabek's shoulder, making the latter stop typing.

"You order please. I'll take anything."

Otabek only had to look away from the laptop screen for a second, and already his eyes felt the fatigue of staring at it for five hours straight. The piles of papers had been torture even for the hardworking boy. He glanced at the phone to see if it had connected to the pizza place yet. He wasn't even sure what to order at Grand Prix Pizza but figured every pizza place had more or less the same menu anyway. Pork cutlet pizza sounded good. He yawned just as the ringing stopped, and a girl’s voice came from the other line.

"Hello, thanks for calling Grand Prix Pizza! It's 1:30AM and I'm guessing you're a university student. What's your order?"

It took a moment for Otabek to process what was being said to him. He did have time to wonder why the voice on the other line sounded so cheerful though. She was right on both counts: it was 1:30AM and Otabek was a university student. A really dazed university student.

"Yeah, uhm, do you guys serve pork cutlet pizza?"

"Sir, have you ever been here before?"

Otabek blinked and glanced at Phichit in case his dorm mate has, but the other boy shook his head as well.

"No," he answered cautiously, and heard an exaggerated gasp on the other end.

"That explains it then! Grand Prix Pizza has everything!" She paused to chuckle. "So one regular sized pork cutlet pizza? No other toppings?"

"Yes," Otabek replied just as he decided to start working on his paper again, eyes scanning through the words on the screen.

"That would be 975 yen," the voice on the other end said. "We'll have somebody text this number, and then kindly text back with your exact address please."

"Okay."

"Thank you, please order again! Bye!"

"Sure, thanks, bye, I love you."

Otabek froze.

Phichit began laughing beside him, muttering something like "those aren't your parents, dude!"

"I love you, too," the pizza girl chirped, before laughing herself. "Really working hard on those all-nighters, huh?"

"I'm so sorry," Otabek gushed out immediately, all thoughts of doing his paper flying out of his mind as he stared at the phone in horror. "I didn't mean to say any of that. Oh, well, okay I meant to say thanks and goodbye but not the I love you bit, not that I hate you or anything since I barely know you, but--"

He was interrupted by Phichit snapping his fingers in front his face. That, and by the laughter he continued to hear on the other line.

"I'm sorry," Otabek repeated. He could feel his face flush with embarrassment, and was thankful everything was happening through a phone call and not in person. That would have been so much worse.

"It's fine," the pizza girl replied smoothly. "Effects of no sleep and all that, yeah? I hope the pizza helps."

Otabek sighed in relief because the complete stranger he just said I love you to didn't seem to mind much.

"Yes. Thanks again."

"It'll be there soon. Bye!"

Phichit tapped on the end call button before Otabek could accidentally say anything again.

The younger boy groaned, "I can't believe that just happened."

"Way to go confessing to the pizza girl," Phichit teased as he was typing away on his phone. Most likely the address. "Wait till the other guys hear about this."

Otabek pushed away the thoughts of what their other friends' reaction would be to his moment of shame. He already predicted laughter. Lots of laughter. At least the pizza girl took it well. He figured there could have been a lot more terrible scenarios that could have happened instead of the situation with the pizza girl being a too cheerful girl who went along with it. He was glad for that.

There came a knock on the door some time later, and Otabek was the one who answered it.

"One regular bacon and cheese pizza," the delivery boy (his nametag said Yuuri, Otabek noticed) read off the receipt before glancing up. "For 'the boy who said I love you' apparently?"

Otabek's face heated up again as he awkwardly took the pizza.

"Lei enjoyed the call," Yuuri said casually, grinning a little.

Otabek couldn't find a proper reply to that, deciding instead to just hand the boy the money and say his thanks. He did take note of the name Lei however. Well, at least he now knew who to completely avoid if ever he ends up at Grand Prix Pizza. He was already certain that one instance of total embarrassment was enough, thank you.

"Pizza for us," Otabek announced as he carried it to the table. Phichit immediately opened it as Otabek settled himself back down on his chair, ready to work on his paper again. Until Phichit laughed, that is.

"That's sweet," Phichit cooed as he pushed the open box towards Otabek, who peered in. His mouth fell open in surprise.

Apart from the regular pork-infused cheese overload the pizza had, there was also bunch of pork toppings shaped carefully to resemble a heart, with an extra little smiley face in the center of the heart. For a split second, Otabek wondered if this was technically considered extra toppings, before he realized that that really wasn't the important part of the matter at hand. He felt his face heat up again just from the sight of it.

"I feel like this pizza should only be for you now," Phichit continued, earning a light shove on the shoulder.

"Eat and shut up, Phichit," Otabek commented, taking a slice of pizza, not seeing how Phichit's face lit up at that.

"I guess you can say you stole a pizza her heart."

Otabek groaned and attempted to push the laughing Phichit off his chair with his pizza-free hand. He was never going to hear the end of this.