I don't exactly know what this is but I had fun writing it.

I most probably will continue it but for now, this is all I got.

— — —

Wednesday afternoon was Brian’s least favourite time of the week because it was the day where he got three of his hardest classes this semester, all lined up back to back, ready to punch him right on his brain, all the way from 8AM through 4PM. That’s why it has become a habit of his to always come to his campus’ coffee shop after class, to get his dose of sugary drinks — whatever he was in the mood to drink that day — just to boost his energy a little bit.

Brian had just finished ordering his drink — he’s currently craving for a cup of hazelnut hot chocolate — and standing idly by the pick up area, waiting for his drink to be prepared. The coffee shop wasn’t busy, as how it usually was every Wednesday afternoon, since the lunch rush hour had past and the rest of campus were either already back in the classroom for afternoon class or gone home already.

“One hot hazelnut hot chocolate for Mr. Younghyun!”

Brian heard his Korean name being called so he picked up his drink and tasted it before deciding that it was perfect, exactly how he ordered it. He has just finished tasting his drink and was about to move towards the exit of the coffee shop when he saw a familiar face entered.

Terry?

Brian’s mind instantly raced for a million miles per hour. He kept questioning why was Terry there, but most importantly, how could he escape before Terry saw him because… Well, Brian hasn’t talked to Terry for a year and considering what happened a year prior, there was no way the situation wouldn’t get super awkward for Brian, should Terry greeted him. And Brian Kang just really, really hated being involved in an awkward situation.

Running out of ideas (and time) to escape — especially since Terry had somehow noticed that Brian was there despite the latter’s best effort to lay low — Brian looked around to see if any of his friends were in the God damn coffee shop. Unfortunately, he found none. What he saw instead was a boy with fluffy brown hair and gold-rimmed glasses, sitting alone listening to some music on the corner table. An idea instantly popped up in his mind and he decided to just go with it, even though Brian was one hundred percent sure that it wouldn’t end up well.

Still, he had no other choice.

So Brian took his cup and strode along towards the lone boy’s table, took a seat right across the said boy and tapped hurriedly on his arm. The touch instantly alarmed the boy and caused him to look up, seemingly didn’t realise beforehand that someone had taken a seat right across him. The boy stared at Brian for several seconds. He was about to open his mouth when Brian beat him to it and whispered,

“Please help me and just play along.”

The boy’s left eye twitched repeatedly at Brian — Brian wasn’t sure if it was the boy’s habit or if he was doing it on purpose — but the boy stayed silent and just kept staring at Brian’s face. He got his own face on neutral, he didn’t seem to be panicked nor annoyed. If anything, Brian guessed that the boy was probably confused. Though he didn’t say nor do anything, and the only emotion apparent on his face was his twitching eye — Brian still didn’t understand what that indicated though.

After what it seemed like forever for Brian — it was actually only thirty seconds max — the boy simply nodded at Brian’s request and stayed silent, seemingly waiting for whatever would happen next.

And not long after, just as Brian predicted, Terry did follow him to the table.

“Brian.”

Brian heard his name being called by his friend so he tried his best to fake a surprise, as if he didn’t know already who called him.

“Terry?” He faked a surprised laugh, “Long time no see, man. How are you?” Brian internally cringed at how obviously fake his tone was but he really had no idea what to say to someone whom just a year prior was your best friend.

Terry softly smiled at him, “I’m good, Brian. How are you?”

There was so much baggage loaded in that simple question and Brian could literally feel that. Though he chose to just dismiss it and simply replied, “I’m great. Of course.”

Terry switched his attention towards the other boy on the table and sent a questioning gaze towards Brian. “And may I know who this is?”

Upon hearing the question, Brian nodded and contemplated whether he should still proceed with his idea. But then again, he had already half-way through it just by taking a seat across the boy and asked him for help. And the boy (kinda) agreed to it too, so… why not.

So Brian stared at the boy sitting across him and desperately pleaded through his eyes while carefully saying, “He’s… my boyfriend.”

In a split second the sentence left his mouth, Brian realised something. He didn’t know the boy’s name. How was he supposed to introduce this unknown boy as his boyfriend if he himself didn’t know his name? Brian’s mind was reeling, trying to come up with something to say next when he saw the neutral expression that the boy had been retaining since earlier turned into a half-smirk-half-smile.

“Hi, I’m Bri’s boyfriend, Park Jaehyung. You can call me Jae.”

The boy, who turned out to be called Jae, said confidently while holding out his right hand towards Terry. At the same time, Brian almost choked at the scene unfolding before him because; 1) That nickname “Bri” literally came outta nowhere; and 2) How the did he get so lucky that this Jae guy turned out to be considerate enough to actually play along with him instead of freaking out.

Terry shook Jae’s hand and nodded, “I’m Terry, Brian’s… friend. Nice to meet you, Jae.” He said lightly and shifted his attention back to Brian. “It’s nice to know that you’re doing well, Brian.” He softly smiled at Brian again. “Well, I need to get going. We’ll catch up some more later, okay. See you around.”

Terry left not long after and as soon as Terry was out of his sight, Brian left out a long sigh of relieve. He noticeable relaxed that he slumped against his chair while sipping on his cup, seemingly forgetting all about Jae… Until he heard his newly found nickname being used again.

“Hello? Jae to BriBri?” 

Jae called while waving his hand in front of Brian’s face, trying to get to latter’s attention. This successfully pulled Brian out of his trance.

“I am so sorry about this whole thing,” Brian hastily said, realising that he hadn’t properly thank Jae nor explained anything to him. “But also, thank you so much. I didn’t think you’d play along.” He smiled sheepishly towards the other boy sitting across him. “Seriously, man. Thank you.”

Jae shrugged, “Nah. It’s no biggie. Though maybe you can start thanking me by explaining what the hell was that.” He chuckled and held his right hand on a fist in front of his mouth, as if trying to contain his own laugh. “I think you owe me that much, Bri.”

“I’ll explain it to you.” Brian started. “But first, I do have a question about that nickname, actually.” He finally voiced, “Why?”

“What? BriBri?” Jae asked Brian and got a nod as an answer.

“Well, he called you Brian. And if I were to act as your boyfriend, I should at least call you with a special nickname or something. Besides, boyfriend or not, I like that nickname.” Jae shrugged again, as if giving a nickname to someone he’d just met was something that he regularly did.

“You give me a nickname to your liking even when we haven’t introduced ourselves to each other?” Brian questioned again, voice laced with amusement because Jae seemed to be an interesting person, based on how he reacted to this whole fake-boyfriend thingy.

Jae stared pointedly at Brian, “Was it really my fault though that we haven’t introduced ourselves to each other?” When Brian didn’t answer his rhetorical question, Jae just grinned, “Thought so.”

“Okay, I see your point.” Brian laughed, “I’m Kang Younghyun. Or Brian. Or even BriBri. Whichever you prefer.”

Jae nodded while retaining the grin he got on his face since earlier, “Well, I think you heard my introduction earlier to your friend. I’m Park Jaehyung. Usually goes by simply Jae. And yes, I’ll definitely call you BriBri.”

— — —

“So what do you want to know?” Brian finally asked Jae, because he did owe Jae at least an explanation, after making the latter as his own fake boyfriend without permission.

Jae smiled lopsidedly, “Maybe start with who that was? And why were you freaking out meeting him here.”

“That was Terry,” Brian started. “Well, I guess you’ve already known his name from earlier. He was my best friend from high school in Canada.”

“Oh, you’re from Canada, huh. That explains the English.” Jae nodded to himself. “Why the freak out, though?”

Brian sighed before continuing, “I liked him.”

“So a year ago, I got accepted into this university. Of course, I need to move here to South Korea to be able to properly attend uni. So that’s why I decided that on the day before I moved here, I would confess to him… and I did.”

“What happened then?”

“I got rejected.”

Jae paused for a second, before carefully worded out his next question, “Was he harsh about it?”

“He really wasn’t, and that’s the problem.” Brian sighed again. “He said that he only saw me as his little brother and didn’t feel about me that way. But as I was being my big idiotic and immature self, I had the audacity to blame him for making me fall for him. The rest of the story was that I moved here the next day, he tried to contact me several times after I moved here, and I kept ignoring him since I was too ashamed. Not so much about the confession, but about the way I reacted to his rejection.”

Jae just blinked at Brian’s story but he didn’t say anything. Brian guessed it was because the former didn’t know how to react to his story. Brian was about to open his mouth to say something, when a question left Jae’s mouth.

“Do you still like him?”

Brian thought for a moment. The question Jae had just asked him was a personal one and he felt like that he should’ve felt offended because the other boy was being too intrusive, as they were practically stranger to each other. But weirdly, Brian didn’t mind it one bit because talking to Jae was surprisingly easy and it had been awhile — it had been a year — since he had someone this easy to talk to.

“I don’t know.” Brian finally answered, “But I don’t think so? I mean… I remember vividly how I used to feel when I think about him, even after the rejection. But earlier when I saw him, those butterflies weren’t there anymore.”

The more Brian explained, the more he internally realised how he had been over Terry for quite awhile. He didn’t seem to realise that before this very moment.

“What did you feel then?”

Jae threw another question at Brian, which successfully made the latter to think. Brian couldn’t find any other adjective to describe what he felt earlier other than…

“Dread.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Brian exasperatedly stated, “It’s awkward! How would you feel if you’re me?”

“I don’t know how would I feel if I were you, because I’m not you, BriBri.” Jae stated flatly. “Though I kinda pity your friend now.”

“Hey!” Brian pouted, “You don’t know him and you take his side?”

Jae chuckled at the other’s reaction, “To be fair, I barely know you either.”

Brian sighed for the third time in a span on ten minutes, “Fair point.”

“Besides,” Jae continued, “From your story, it is kinda clear that you’re in the wrong here, man. Wouldn’t apologising to him be a better solution than… Uhm… Let’s say… Dragging a stranger into this whole situation and told Terry that the said stranger is your boyfriend?”

Jae now got a teasing smile plastered on his face and it one hundred percent annoyed the hell outta Brian.

“Yah!” Brian retaliated, “I was running out of ideas, okay. Stop teasing me about that!”

Jae raised his eyebrow, the half-smirk-half-smile re-appeared on his face.

“Yah? We’re practically strangers, you know. You don’t even know if I’m the same age as you or not. Where’s your manner, BriBri.” Jae teased again, this time he’s faking a hurt expression although it was only for several seconds before it was replaced back with a smile.

“.” Brian realised, “Please tell me you’re not my senior.”

“Weeeelllll…….” Jae pretended to think. “Since you said you started attended this uni just last year, that would pretty much set you as my junior. Which probably would also mean that I am older than you.” Jae grinned again, “Start calling me hyung, kiddo.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Brian gave Jae a stank face, which was only responded by a smug smile by Jae. So in the end, Brian just rolled his eyes and complied.

“Okay, Jae hyung. There. Happy?”

“Very.”

Jae grinned and Brian laughed. It was amazing to Brian how there wasn’t seem any awkward air between them at all, despite the fact that they’ve just known each other for a mere hour. It was almost like they had been friends for such a long time, because it was so easy for them to slip into a friendly banter, despite knowing closer to nothing about each other.

Brian liked that.

“Really though, hyung.” Brian started again when his laughter died down, finding himself liking the whole calling Jae as hyung thingy. “Thank you. I wasn’t too sure if you would play along but you actually did. I was stunned.”

“If it made me as the knight in shining armour to someone, then why the hell not.” Jae nodded to himself, expression way too serious for the amount of ridiculousness contained in the sentence he just said.

It made Brian snorted.

“Does that make me the damsel in distress?”

Jae tilted his head, thinking. “I guess you’ll look pretty in a gown too. So… why not.”

This successfully made Brian laughed out loud, to the point that some other customers in the coffee shop were looking at them.

“You’re ridiculous, hyung.”

“Not as ridiculous as someone who one-sidedly claimed me as his boyfriend though.”

Brian pouted again. He was about to retort back when Jae’s phone light up with a message from Jae’s professor.

“Oh .” Jae read the message, “Duty’s calling.”

He hastily gathered his belongings and dumped it all on his backpack. He then stood up and without warning, ruffled Brian’s black, already messy hair.

“Thanks for the story, BriBri. If you ever need your knight in shining armour again, just call me.” He then ran towards the exit of the coffee shop after waving a cheerful, “Bye, Bri!”

Brian didn’t even get to say anything because he was too stunned by the sudden contact from that hand that had just messed his hair. And what the did Jae mean by call him? They didn’t even exchange any contact number or anything……… Until Brian saw a piece of tissue paper placed gently beside his cup of (now lukewarm) hot chocolate. On it he saw a scribble of phone number and short message of, ‘See you around, boyfriend!’ which made him chuckle because it was such a cheesy thing to do, yet Brian found himself liking it.

Brian smiled to himself. This had been such a weird day.