“Here’s a toast for my Oinky for successfully cheating his way to the top!”

They were at the rooftop of Chanyeol’s house, sitting on top of a comforter under the starless night sky. This night is a bit different than their usual Saturday night picnic. Baekhyun insisted that they should at least celebrate the fact that they are now turning seniors, and he actually did bring a comforter that’s twice his size and carried it all the way to the fourth floor (they usually just use Chanyeol’s laundries to sit on), and so Chanyeol did his part and cooked noodles for the both of them (“That’s just instant noodles, Yeol. I told you to at least exert some effort. This is a date.” “It’s the thought that counts, you ungrateful .” “You could’ve just brought ice cubes, they’re better—“ “Shut up, weirdo.”) instead of their usual snack aka hard-boiled eggs.

“Excuse you, I did not cheat!” Chanyeol slurps on his noodles.

Baekhyun wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “Don’t leave your sentence incomplete—”

“That often! It was just one time! And it’s not like you don’t!” Chanyeol cuts him off and glares at him with a pout.

“Sure I do.” Baekhyun chuckles and teasingly flicks his forehead. “The only difference is I’m not the rank 1.”

“But you’re the second.”

Baekhyun not-so-lightly punches his right arm. “Just so you know, I only cheated twice this year.”

Chanyeol raises an eyebrow. “And how is that an achievement?”

“It wasn’t.” Baekhyun smirks. “But my name can be seen just below yours on the list and that’s enough to make you happy because you’re a girl like that.”

Chanyeol rolls his eyes at the conceited remark. “You are such an . I wouldn’t date you if I were a girl.”

Baekhyun shrugs with a wide smile. “Does that mean I stand a chance since you were born with a ?”

Choking on his noodles, Chanyeol turns to look at Baekhyun with wide eyes, but that seems to be his biggest mistake because everything suddenly stops and all he could see is Baekhyun’s moonlit face and gentle smile and shining eyes and how Chanyeol’s so in love with him ever since but he would never want to risk what they have now and so he denies the fast beating of his heart every time he’s with Baekhyun because he doesn’t want this to go wrong.

Yet as he looks at Baekhyun’s eyes, he thinks that maybe, hopefully, he isn’t the only one who wants something more, but that doesn’t mean he’s not scared anymore, because he is. And with Baekhyun getting his hopes up without a tiny bit of assurance, he just got more scared than he already is. “Baek… are you—“

“I was just kidding, relax.” Baekhyun interjects with a forced laugh that Chanyeol would have had noticed if he wasn’t just too fixated on the sound of his heart breaking. “Right, as I was saying,” He claps his hands and Chanyeol subtly flinched at the sudden enthusiasm. “here’s a toast for our future pediatric surgeon.”

“Ah,” Chanyeol lets out a bashful smile because Baekhyun seems to be really proud of him. “but we don’t even have wine—oh god I forgot the drinks!”

“Didn’t you hear me?” Baekhyun reaches for his hand and opens his palm. “I said toast.”

“What—oh. Really, Byun Baekhyun?”

Chanyeol covers his face out of secondhand embarrassment when he sees Baekhyun pulling out a zipper storage bag from his pocket. He slides the zipper open and takes three small slices of garlic bread out of the plastic, then he puts them on top of Chanyeol’s palm. “There.” He closes Chanyeol’s hand and taps it twice. “Three for ‘congratulations.’”

Chanyeol chokes on a laugh. “W-what the absolute is—“ He couldn’t help but to lie down as he cackles. He laughs for a whole minute before he calms down. “I honestly did not get the punchline and I honestly do not know why it sounded so funny to me, but I’m giving you an A for that.”

“A? For effort?” Baekhyun wiggles his eyebrows.

“No, for airport. Pfft.” He didn’t hear Baekhyun sigh because he was busy laughing at his own “joke”.

“Chanyeol-ah,” Baekhyun calls him in a soft voice, and Chanyeol immediately stops when he senses the latter’s seriousness. “I have something to tell you.”

Chanyeol’s heart was beating so fast when he answered, “W-what is it?”

Baekhyun places both hands on his shoulders and stares directly at his eyes. “No matter what they say, always remember that you are not a mistake, and that you are really special, and that you are beautiful in God’s eyes—“

He pushes Baekhyun away from him with a groan. “ing hell! You scared me! I thought you were going to say something serious!”

Baekhyun chuckles. “One’s self-worth is of utmost importance. I needed to reassure you that you are beautiful in your way because God makes no mistakes—“

“I swear to God, Byun Baekhyun, go Lady Gaga on me and I’ll kill you.” Chanyeol shoves a toast into Baekhyun’s mouth. “And for your information, I know that every part of me is beautiful, you didn’t have to say it. But if you insist then—”

Baekhyun takes a toast from Chanyeol’s hand and shoves it into the latter’s mouth as well. “Nevermind. I take everything back. You’re an ugly piece of .”

“Well, excuse you—pfft.” Chanyeol struggles to contain his laughter. “Everyone wants a piece of this .”

“Hah.” Baekhyun wrinkles his nose and laughs. “What are you talking about because I don’t see one.”

“Don’t worry,” Chanyeol smirks. “You’ll be eating it one day.”

Baekhyun shakes his head and sighs. “I’m so tired of being the man of your wet dreams.”

“W-what—how—I-I don’t even dream about you!” Chanyeol splutters as his whole face turns red.

“Sure you don’t.” Baekhyun sticks his tongue out and both of them laugh at the childish gesture.

They stayed silent for a while to finish their food and it made Chanyeol think if he could live without this. He asks himself if he can manage to be happy without Baekhyun teasing and annoying him every second—if he can still manage to be happy without Baekhyun now that he had known him.

He doesn’t think he can, because just by imagining Baekhyun doing those to someone else—being happy with and because of someone that’s not him makes his chest constrict and he doesn’t want that to happen. He needs to be the only one in Baekhyun’s eyes. He needs to make Baekhyun his. He needs to make Baekhyun—

“Marry me.”

His eyes were twice as wide as Baekhyun’s after hearing what he just said because he wasn’t supposed to say it out loud. Chanyeol can feel his cheeks burning. “T-that song got stuck o-on my head because Chaeyoung doesn’t seem to have discovered that thing called next button yet and the walls in this house are just thin. Ha—haha.” Why, it’s partly true though, Chanyeol defends himself in his mind.

”Aw,” Baekhyun coos. “That’s cute.”

“Believe me, it’s not.” Chanyeol sighs. “Especially when she wails because ‘Baekhyun oppa will never sing this to me eeengk’.”

Baekhyun bites his lower lip and plays with his fingers. “About that… I... I’m sorry.”

“Come on,” Chanyeol hits his arm lightly. “It’s not like she’s the first person you rejected. I mean, you basically rejected half of the school’s population.”

Baekhyun is still not looking at him when he answers, “She’s your sister.”

Chanyeol raises an eyebrow and no, he’s not jealous. “So? Should she receive some kind of a special treatment from you just because she’s my sister? That’s unfair.”

“Shh! She might hear you. And,” Baekhyun unconsciously makes a tiny pout. “I know. I’m sorry.”

“She’s at her friend’s house tonight, probably busy painting each other’s nails—hey.” Chanyeol covers Baekhyun’s entire face with his palms. “Stop that. You’re making me feel guilty.”

 “Hm shmrshf.” I’m sorry.

“Stooop!” Chanyeol whines, kicking his legs like a child. “I told you to stooop!”

Baekhyun moves Chanyeol’s hands away from his face. “Alright, alright. Your hands stink, you know.”

“I know. I did the five knuckle shuffle before you came and I didn’t wash my hands.” Chanyeol guffaws at Baekhyun’s pale face.

“Wha—what the ,” Baekhyun looks violated. “Did you really?”

Chanyeol fakes a gasp. He wipes a nonexistent tear under his right eye and fans himself with his right hand. “You think so lowly of me. I can’t believe you.”

Baekhyun stifles his laugh. “You act like a 45-year old lady with a large pink feathery hat and a gooey vuitton.”

Chanyeol has his eyebrows furrowed. “A gooey wha—“ This time, Chanyeol gasps for real, with his cheeks flushed that can still be seen even in the dark. “You really think I do that—that kind of t-thing?!”

Baekhyun shrugs. “Eh, don’t you? I do it like every—“

“Ah!” Chanyeol squeaks and covers Baekhyun’s face with his hands again because what the ? How could he talk about it so casually like it’s a normal topic? “I don’t know if I should feel flattered at the fact that you’re finally opening up to me, but let’s please not talk about this again.”

Baekhyun takes Chanyeol’s hands away from his face and kisses the back of his right hand. “But you started it, princess.”

Chanyeol’s heart beats rapidly at both the name and the action and he pulls his hands away from Baekhyun’s. “I-I shouldn’t be the girl here.”

“You really shouldn’t be,” Baekhyun smiles at him. “Because then you wouldn’t date me, right?”

Chanyeol’s heart started beating wildly again and this time he couldn’t breathe properly. He isn’t dense. He understands the hints Baekhyun has been giving him these past few weeks. But he doesn’t want to believe in them just yet, because he really, really likes Baekhyun. It took him years to gather the courage to talk to Baekhyun, and he doesn’t want to lose everything they have now just because he can’t control his feelings anymore.

But what Baekhyun is doing right now… it should mean something, doesn’t it? Maybe this isn’t just a joke for Baekhyun. Maybe he actually does stand a chance with him.

Maybe… maybe they could be something else. Maybe they could be something more than what they are now.

“Why?” Chanyeol answers after a long time. Hesitantly, he turns his head to look at Baekhyun in the eyes. “Would you ask me out if I were a girl?”

He had always dreamt of having this kind of conversation with Baekhyun since seventh grade. He was young back then, and he just wants to know why his stomach feels funny whenever his eyes catch a sight of Baekhyun across the classroom, or why his mood is dampened whenever Baekhyun would borrow a pen from their classmates and not from him, or why a sting is present in his chest when that Do guy is automatically partnered with him during projects just because they’re seatmates, or that time when he didn’t know why he wanted to shout so badly at their teacher for not making him sit beside Baekhyun just because B is far from P in the alphabet when it’s almost just the same in Hangul.

But that’s not the question anymore. Now, three years later, he only wanted to ask Baekhyun if his stomach also feels funny when he’s with him, or if he feels mad when Chanyeol is with someone else, or if he also wanted to be with him every second of the day.

Chanyeol had a lot of questions to ask Baekhyun back then, but now, he just wants to know if Baekhyun feels the same.

“Why?” Baekhyun asks, staring back at him with a smile.  “Would you change your mind and date me if I say I would?”

Chanyeol smiles back at him, and for the first time, Chanyeol doesn’t feel lost. For the first time, Baekhyun’s eyes held certainty, and it is more than enough for Chanyeol to know that what he’s about to say is not something he will regret.

“Yes.”

Baekhyun reaches for his hand, intertwines it with his, and then he places it on top of his left chest. “Then that’s my answer as well.”

Chanyeol pulls his hand away from Baekhyun, and pushes him down the comforter. He lies down beside him and places his head on top of Baekhyun’s left chest instead, closing his eyes as he listens to the rhythm of the heart that is beating just as fast as his own. “Yes?”

Baekhyun kisses the top of Chanyeol’s head. He holds him close with his left arm while he puts his other hand below his head as a makeshift pillow. With a wide smile and a wildly beating heart, he closes his eyes.

“Yes.”