finally we get a glimpse of what youngjae feels

“See? I've taken you home safe and sound” Youngjae stopped the car in front of Jongup's mansion.

“Yeah, after going around the parking lot like idiots in the rain” Daehyun got out of the car and gave him the stink eye “If I get sick…”

    “For the thousandth time, nobody can get a cold from the rain” Youngjae said and drove away.

    Daehyun wanted to take off his wet clothes and have a long hot bath, he rushed into the house and went straight to the stairs, however, the noises from the kitchen got his attention. He headed to the kitchen and found Jongup soaked wet from head to toe and a picnic basket soaked wet as well on the table.

    “Jongup!!! The picnic… I forgot… Why didn’t you call me?”

    “Why didn’t you call me?” Jongup replied with the same question and Daehyun didn’t have words “I waited for you for over an hour and you didn’t show up, it was clear that you didn’t want to be with me”

    “It’s not that…” Daehyun was about to say he was with Youngjae, but he shut up, since that answer was going to hurt Jongup more than he already was.

Chapter 54: Hot and Cold 2

Daehyun brought a picnic to Jongup’s work to show him how much he wanted to be with him, but when he got to Ego, there were no signs of the young photographer, so he went to Himchan, the stylist always knew everything.

    “Where’s Jongup?” Daehyun asked as soon as he set foot inside the studio.

    “Hello to you, too, Daehyun” Himchan crossed his arms and looked at him with a sour face.

    “Are you still angry with me? I already apologized for letting a nobody dye my hair instead of you!”

    “I’m still angry with you because you behave like we aren’t friends anymore, what happened to keep in touch?”

    “I’ve been busy”

    “You seem to have plenty of time for Jongup” Himchan said, jealous “I get it, you don’t need me now that you don’t have to play dress up”

    “It’s not that, you’re a dear friend to me, with or without Dasom I still need you”

    “And you’ve brought me this picnic?!”    

    “It’s for Jongup”

    “He’s out of town on a photo-shoot”

    “Then it’s yours” Daehyun gave him the basket.

    “I hope it’s low-fat, I’m on a diet” Himchan said and a young woman came in the studio…

    “Good morning” she said and Daehyun recognized her voice without even having to turn to see her “I'm Song Minjae”

    “You’re the new model?” Himchan asked.

    “Yes, Youngjae oppa told me I could start today”

    “When did he say that?” Daehyun asked, curious.

    “Daehyun!!!” Minjae said in surprise “Youngjae oppa told me I could be the cover of next month’s Ego at the party!!! I'm so happy you invited him!!!”

    “You know each other?” Himchan asked.

    “Yes” they said in unison.

    “Cool” Himchan shrugged “I’m the main stylist”

    “I know, Kim Himchan, the best stylist on earth”

    “Oh my God, I already like you more than Dasom”

    “I'm really happy for this chance. I'm a singer, you know, but it's hard to get gigs when you're nugu, so you can’t imagine how grateful I am for being the new face of the most renowned fashion magazine ever!!!!!! I’ll have many opportunities as singer from now on!!!!!” 

    “Where can I find Youngjae oppa? I haven’t thanked him enough for giving me this opportunity, I want to thank him again”

    “He hasn’t come to work today, he’s at his apart…”

    “What?! Why?!” Daehyun cut him off abruptly “I thought he’s fine…”

    “He is” Himchan said “I don’t know what you did when you went to see him, but next day he was his old happy self”

    “I didn’t do anything” Daehyun didn’t want to take credit for Youngjae’s well-being, after all it was his fault to begin with that the younger isolated himself form the world. Himchan raised one eyebrow, he knew that there was something between the two of them, but didn’t want to say anything if they weren’t ready to tell.

    “Don’t worry, he just caught a cold” Himchan said, patting him on the back.

    “Yeeeeeeeeeeessssssssssssss!!!!!!!!” Daehyun screamed in extreme joy.

    “This isn’t the reaction I expected”

    “I’m so happy!!!!! He said people can’t get sick from the rain, but he’s sick!!!!!!! I win, I win!!!!!!! And I have to go to him and laugh at his face!!!!!!!!!”

Daehyun still had Himchan's key to Youngjae's apartment; he didn't ring the doorbell and just went in. The hall was clean and tidy, very different from the other day where there were garbage bags everywhere and even a giant rat, the very thought of that gave him goosebumps. “Aaaaah!!!” Daehyun startled as he heard Youngjae yell in frustration. Concerned, he followed the screams and ended up in the kitchen and before he could say anything, something hit him in the eye (Youngjae was making plum juice and forgot to put the lid on the blender and the plums started to fly out everywhere, one of them hit the elder’s eye)

    “Turn that off!!!” Daehyun yelled as another plum flew to him, though this time he was fast enough to dodge it. Youngjae obeyed and turned the blender off.

    “Are you ok?”

    “I think so” Daehyun said, rubbing his eye.

    “Don’t do that, it’ll make it worse”

    “What do you know?” Daehyun pouted and looked at him with his good eye.

    “What are you doing here anyway?”

    “I came to rub my I told you so in your face, Mr. nobody can get sick from the rain!!!”

    “You came all the way to do that?”

    “Yes!!!” Daehyun said and showed him a plastic bag “And to bring you meds like the first time we met, remember? You showed up at the apartment where I lived with meds for… Dasom… She wasn’t there… I was… I had the flu and you stayed with me…”

    “That wasn’t the first time we met” Youngjae scowled “The first time we met it was at the newspaper where you work. You wore a mouth mask and for some weird reason I still don’t know, you hit me with a mop” (Chapter 7: Honeymoon)

    “I had forgotten…”

    “I'll never forget that mop taste” Youngjae said and sneezed a number of times, then he grabbed more plums from the plate and put them in the blender.

    “Go rest, I'll make the juice”

    Youngjae didn’t argue, he was too exhausted, plus, his throat hurt so much he couldn’t even speak without feeling like someone was slashing his throat. He sighed and dragged his feet to his room.

Daehyun made the juice and took it to Youngjae’s room, it was his first at his room. It was big with a large window covered by a gray curtain, there was a mini living room with a crystal coffee table, a yellow couch and a pair of chairs of the same color, there was also a TV in front of the king-size bed where Youngjae was lying, sneezing and blowing his nose over and over.

    “You’re really sick” Daehyun said, handing him the glass of juice.

    “Why would I fake it?” he said with broken voice “I want seaweed soup”

    “I'll call the nearest restaurant” the blond took out his cellphone.

    “I WANT YOU TO MAKE THE SOUP”

    “Why?”

    “It's your punishment for coming to laugh at me, now it's your responsibility to take care of me until I get better”

    “How do you want me to make the soup? There’s nothing in your fridge”

    “Go to the store” Youngjae said, drinking the juice “and I want chocolate ice cream, strawberry cake and worm gummies too”

    “With seaweed soup? You can get stomachache”

    “I ALSO WANT YOU TO MAKE SPICY FRIED CHICKEN”

    “You gotta be kidding me”

    “Look who’s laughing now” Youngjae said and burst in laughs.

Daehyun got everything Youngjae wanted and cooked the damn soup and fried the damn chicken as he wanted, so imagine how upset he was when he found Youngjae snoring in deep sleep.  

    “Maybe I should let you sleep” Daehyun said and then shook his head “Never!!! Not after you made me spend hours in the kitchen!!!” he yelled into Youngjae's ear and grabbed a pillow to hit him “Wake up or I'll drop the soup on you!!!”

    “What the...” Youngjae opened one eye and saw Daehyun hitting him with a pillow.

    “Did I wake you up?” Daehyun said before hitting him one last time “Your seaweed soup and spicy fried chicken are ready” he pointed at the coffee table with the bowl of soup and the plate of chicken.

    “You really cooked? I was joking”

    Daehyun yelled in frustration, he grabbed the pillow to hit him again, but Youngjae climbed out of bed and went to the table, sat on the floor instead of the couch and admired the food in wonder and then he laughed.

    “Don’t laugh, you , it took me a lot of time to season the chicken”

    “I laugh because I'm very happy that you made this for me”

    If Daehyun still had feelings for Youngjae, he’d be blushing hard, but since he didn’t anymore, he just sat down by his side on the floor and turned the TV on and channel surfed lazily, there was nothing interesting to watch, he sighed and turned his head to Youngjae and to his surprise, the black-haired man was staring at him instead of eating.

    “Don’t tell me you aren’t hungry anymore, I even burned myself frying the chicken” the photographer said as he showed the younger his right hand with a little burn on.

    “Sorry” Youngjae reached out to take his hand, but Daehyun pulled away, he didn't want to have feelings for him again, not after all the pain he went through.

    “Just eat everything or I’ll kill you” he said and turned his head back to the TV and kept changing channels until he saw a special on dolphins “I played with a baby dolphin the other day” Daehyun said with pride and smiled as he thought of swimming with dolphins with Jongup.  

    “I know, I saw the pics on your phone”

    “You checked out my phone?”

    “Aha” Youngjae nodded “I saw every pic of you and Jongup, you seem to have a lot of fun with him... swimming with dolphins, stargazing, watching movies, walking Ganji, having picnic at Han River, flying kites, ice skating, clubbing, dancing, singing, cooking, hiking, drinking, going to lives, throwing parties, lazing around on the couch...”

    “What else did you see?” Daehyun cut him off as fear invaded him, did Youngjae see he was Dasom?

    “Just the pics” Youngjae shrugged “I stopped after that, I feared I could find a video of you two having ”

    “Don't be a ert” Daehyun said “Me and Jongup are just friends”

    “You two live together and do everything together like Siamese, are you telling me you haven't even kissed?”

    “Why would we kiss? We’re just friends” Daehyun blushed as he remembered the time he almost kissed Jongup. Youngjae saw that and felt a little pain in his chest, the man in the pics should be him, not Jongup. The one living with Daehyun should be him, not Jongup. The one doing things and having fun with Daehyun should be him, not Jongup. But he messed up, he concealed his feelings when Daehyun confessed to him and now he had nothing.

    Daehyun didn't love him anymore, he said that wasn't even love, just an infatuation, Youngjae said it was ok, but deep down he was dying, and what he wanted the most was Daehyun to love him again, but maybe it was impossible because he could see how happy Daehyun was with Jongup, he could see the sparkle in his eyes everytime he mentioned Jongup...

    “Stop talking nonsense and eat” Daehyun snapped him out of his thoughts.

    “Yeah, I’ll eat everything or you’ll kill me”

    “You bet I will” Daehyun forgot to keep his distance and leaned forward and rested his head on Youngjae’s shoulder and chuckled.

    Maybe it wasn’t too late, Youngjae thought as he leaned down, sniffed his sunflower hair, it smelled sweet and felt soft, he loved Daehyun so much he brushed his lips with his forehead and then he looked down at his plump lips and was seized by the urge to just kiss him, but he bit his lower lip and pushed him away gently, he was afraid to kiss him now that he didn’t like him anymore, the last thing he wanted was to freak him out, besides, it was going to be hard to explain why he suddenly loved him if weeks ago he loved Dasom with the very same passion and desire.

    “Sorry” Daehyun said as he felt stupid for pulling himself so close to Youngjae, it was clear that he didn’t like the closeness, that’s why he pushed him away, didn’t he? Youngjae didn’t say anything, he just counted to ten, trying not to kiss him and then he said:

    “Do you want to play with my panda?”

    “Is it... a ual thing?”

    “No!” Youngjae blushed “I adopted a baby panda recently, he lives in Seoul Grand Park, I haven't seen him yet, do you want to go with me and see him and play with him?”

    “I've never been to Seoul Grand Park!” Daehyun said, both excited and happy “Can we go on Saturday or Sunday? I have work on weekdays”

    “Saturday it is”

jongup took daehyun to his first live and youngjae, to his second live, jongup got him a baby dolphin and youngjae, a baby panda… so youngjae’s plan is to do what jongup did to get his man back…