Things start going downhill when Mark’s mom gets called in for a last minute shift at the hospital.

“It’ll be fine,” she tells him, pressing a hand against his hair. “Johnny can take you!”

Mark groans. Johnny’s mostly fine, as older brothers go, but he’s a ty driver. Also, Mark sort of wanted someone to hold his hand while it happened. Johnny won’t do that for him. And Mark doesn’t want to hold his brother’s hand anyway.

His mom shoots him a look when he tries to really protest and blows him a kiss over her shoulder as she heads back downstairs.

“Mark,” she yells, “Donghyuck’s on his way up! Keep that door open!”

Mark rolls his eyes because yes, yes, he knows the rules. Door open. No hanky-panky.

Not that Hyuck would, not with Mark.

And not that Mark wants to or anything. That would be crazy…

Okay, fine, yes. Hanky-panky with Lee Donghyuck would be the greatest thing that ever happened to Mark. He could die happy at 16 and never have to get his wisdom teeth out.

If only.

Johnny calls for him before Donghyuck makes it to Mark’s room and when Mark scrambles out onto the second-floor landing, Donghyuck shoves a camera in his face. Mark is literally close enough to kiss the lense which, gross. He does not do that.

Instead, Johnny says, “Welcome to another episode of JCC! Today Baby Mark becomes a man!”

Donghyuck snorts from behind the camera, still way too close, and mutters something rude about Mark’s ity. Mark whines about being bullied and Johnny clarifies for his 2.5 viewers—“Screw you, baby bro, the internet loves me.”—that Mark will not be losing his ity today but will, in fact, be getting his wisdom teeth out.

“As you know, I recovered like a boss with mine,” Johnny shares smugly, “so we’ll see how Mark handles it.”

“Like a baby,” Donghyuck coughs.

Mark hits him and they swat at each other all the way to the car. They have to stop during the actual driving, mostly because Johnny behind the wheel can put the fear of God in an atheist, but they start bickering again as soon as they get to the dentist.

“I swear to god, Hyuck,” Mark growls. He’s got an arm around Donghyuck’s neck and is pinching his friend in the side. “If you film me while I’m high, I will cut up your Shinee poster.”

Donghyuck gasps, outraged. “The signed one?! You wouldn’t.”

Mark puts on his best meme face and says, dead serious, “Try me, .” Sadly, the effect is ruined when Donghyuck the inside of his elbow and Mark squeals, letting go.

“I’m surrounded by idiots,” Johnny tells the camera, and the receptionist.

She’s pretty nice, for someone who does the devil’s work, and she does her best to make Mark feel comfortable. Even the Devil himself is nice actually. He smiles and introduces himself as Dr. Lee Sooman, conveniently a friend of Mark’s mom.

“From church,” Dr. Lee tells him. After that Mark feels a little bad about calling him the Devil.

Before they knock him out, Mark makes sure to threaten Donghyuck one more time. Just in case, you know.

The next thing Mark sees is the open door of his own bedroom and it weirds him the out.

“What the actual hell?” He whispers, bewildered. He winces when his mouth throbs and he remembers that he just had major surgery.

“Shut up,” Donghyuck, apparently in bed next to him, mumbles sleepily. “You did not have major surgery, you loser. Go back to sleep.”

Mark squeaks, surprised. (But also now everything makes sense? Hello, open door.) Then, when he remembers waking up from the procedure and coming home, he smacks Donghyuck’s shoulder when something particular comes back to him.

“You ! I’m totally coming for that poster!”

“Can’t,” Donghyuck tells him smugly. “I hid it.”

Mark groans, in pain and embarrassment, and wonders, not for the first time, why he has to be in love with such an .

“You’re such a ,” he tells his best friend.

“Ah ah ah,” Donghyuck protests lightly, eyebrows raised. “That’s no way to talk to your ‘ing big eternal crush of five-eva,’ now is it?”

“What. The. Actual. Hell.” is all Mark manages. His face feels like it’s on fire—though that could just be swelling? He’s also sputtering, which is 1) no attractive, and 2) producing way more spit than usual what with him unable to feel his mouth.

“Don’t be gross,” Donghyuck says. “Nobody wants to kiss a slobbering puppy.”

Mark flops onto his back and closes his eyes, exasperated. “You literally call me puppy all the time,” he points out. “And I’m older than you.”

“Puppy,” Donghyuck murmurs, suddenly much quieter and closer than he was before Mark closed his eyes. “Did you miss the part where I said I wanted to kiss you?”

“That’s not what you said,” Mark says stubbornly, his lips turned down in as much of a pout as he can manage.

Donghyuck huffs. “It’s what I meant.” Mark doesn’t have to have his eyes open to know that Hyuck is crossing his arms over his chest and rolling his eyes. Mark just knows Donghyuck that well.

“If it’s what you meant,” Mark whispers, turning to face Donghyuck, eyes still closed, “why didn’t you just say it?”

He can feel Donghyuck’s breath on his face, warm and wet, and he’s sure the anticipation is going to kill him.

“Well?” he prods, after half a minute passes and nothing happens. He opens his eyes and Donghuck is literally right there, staring at him in that earnest, amused way he always does.

“I’m not going to kiss you when you can’t feel it, puppy,” he tells Mark, uncharacteristically gentle. Instead, he stretches his neck—he’s so graceful and gorgeous, Mark can’t even—and presses a kiss against Mark’s forehead.

“You’re my ‘ing big eternal crush of five-eva’ too, you know,” Donghyuck says, some time later after he’s tucked his face into Mark’s neck and wrapped Mark’s arms around his waist. (Mark, still in shock, is mostly useless during all of this, though mentally he is very enthusiastic.) “I’ve liked you longer than you’ve liked me, probably.”

“Not possible,” Mark mumbles, already falling asleep again.

“Try me, ,” Donghyuck replies.

A few hours later, Mark’s mom finds them still curled up together on Mark’s bed, open door be damned. She’ll sit them down later for “The Talk,” but for now she pulls Johnny from his room and has him take a picture. He takes a video instead.

“This concludes today’s episode of JCC,” Johnny whispers into the camera. He waggles his eyebrows obnoxiously and adds, “Looks like baby bro became a Man for real today. Get it, bro!”

The last shot Johnny gets before he ends the video is of Donghyuck’s finger as it rises above Mark’s head to flip Johnny off.

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A/N: Marked as complete (because it technically is), but subscribe and keep an eye out for bonus content coming up in the next few days!

BC 1: The actual confession
BC 2: Mark writes an ode to Donghyuck instead of a history essay. While high on pain meds. It's great.