"Today is the day," Jongdae tells himself in front of his bedroom mirror, "you're handsome, funny, caring, intelligent--" 

"Intelligent?" His roommate, Byun Baekhyun, can be heard scoffing from the other room. "Lying to yourself won't help you." Jongdae runs a hand through his hair before letting out a long sigh afterward. Baekhyun was a little , but he wasn't necessarily wrong. Jongdae had done this at least a hundred times and still wasn't able to get it right. "At least you'll have an excuse to finally stumble into his bakery and not look like a creep like usual." 

"Be nice." Another voice threatens from the same room. Jongdae sighs once again. "Just don't come back home with chocolate again. It's embarrassing for all of us." The voice belongs to his other roommate, Do Kyungsoo.

"But mostly for you." Baekhyun chimes in again. 

"Junmyeon likes chocolate cake." Jongdae comments before stepping out of his bedroom and into the living room where his two roommates are. Their third roommate, Kim Junmyeon, had a birthday rapidly approaching and Kyungsoo didn't feel like baking much this year. Normally every year he bakes a cake, but when asked about it he simply went, "buy it yourself you lazy fu--"

"I can't believe you really go to that bakery every day and come home with chocolate. Does that cute baker even know you're allergic to chocolates?" Baekhyun has a smug look on his face as he leans back into their worn couch, kicking his feet up on their equally worn coffee table. Kyungsoo swats at his feet with his hands until Baekhyun puts them back on the floor. 

"Clearly not or he wouldn't be giving them to Jongdae every day, now would he?" Kyungsoo responds as he scrolls through his phone. 

"Hey, you never know, maybe he does know and he's just aiming to kill him." Baekhyun sends a playful wink Jongdae's way. His roommates were really...something else. He taps his foot nervously against the tiled floor as he checks the watch on his wrist. He wasn't even sure why he was checking the time considering he was in absolutely no rush. He had off work today and no plans for the day. 

"I doubt that. Jongdae and Minseok seem to get on quite well, at least from what I've been able to tell when I went to the bakery to pick up some ingredients. He had such nice things to say about you, Jongdae." Kyungsoo smiles warmly as he speaks, as if to reassure him. You see, Jongdae had one goal in mind today. And that goal was to confess his feelings to a certain bakery owner, Kim Minseok, or at the very least ask him on a date. 

Jongdae has been stopping by the bakery nearly every day after work for the last two months, and while he could hold a decent and lengthy conversation with the owner of the bakery, he still felt shy and overall like a total loser whenever he was around the other. It was frustrating, to say the least. Regardless, his roommates were fully expecting Jongdae to come back with at least the man's phone number. 

"Well, I guess I'll be heading out now. Um, just chocolate cake for Junmyeon, right?" He was stalling. He really didn't want to go to the bakery; his stomach was already in knots just at the mere thought of approaching Minseok. 

"Junmyeon doesn't want chocolate this year, remember? He wants you to be able to eat the cake too." Kyungsoo hums while putting his phone down on the coffee table. "He mentioned something about lemon cake with a thin vanilla icing. I think he wants fruit slices on the top too. I can text him to reconfirm, but I think he might get suspicious." 

"Suspicious? It's not like you haven't baked him a cake for the last four years. I'm sure he's caught on by now." Kyungsoo rolls his eyes at Baekhyun's comment.

"The element of surprise is still exciting." 

Jongdae's sitting in his car in the parking lot of the bakery. He stares down at the list Kyungsoo scribbled down for him, listing each thing he'd think Junmyeon would want on the cake, how he'd want it to look, if it should be a two or three tiered cake. Jongdae was starting to wonder why Kyungsoo didn't just make him another cake again. Maybe it was a part of his plan to get him to stop coming home with dozens of chocolates he couldn't eat. 

He lets out a shaky sigh and turns off his car, popping the door open after. He casually steps out and makes sure to straighten the collar of his shirt before looking around anxiously. Why did the man have to be so damn intimidating? If he was lucky Chanyeol wouldn't be on shift today. 

A familiar chime of a bell rings above his head as he pushes the door open, a sheepish smile forming on his lips when Chanyeol waves to him from behind the counter. Maybe Minseok wouldn't be around today. Maybe the universe would give him a break--

"Good morning, Jongdae!" Jongdae nearly chokes on thin air when the owner of the bakery walks out with flour covering his brown apron. He wipes his hands on the fabric, a toothy grin on his lips as he walks out from the back. "You're not usually a morning person." He comments when noticing the time of day it was. Jongdae had a habit of coming in right before closing. It was when he got off work. 

"Hi, Minseok." He feels flustered just by saying the name. "Well, I'm off today, you know, so I figured that maybe I'd just stop by." Even just saying that sentence felt excruciating to him. It's like he couldn't even breathe. How did he do that? 

Minseok, the owner of the bakery, nods his head in understanding. His straight hair was already a mess with strands sticking out in random places. Jongdae figured he must have had a lot of orders already put in. Chanyeol does have a habit of complaining about how busy they've become recently. He's pretty sure he got this job for the sole purpose of slacking off. "It's nice to see you when I'm still wide awake." Jongdae blushes at this and smiles down at his feet. Wide awake? Did that mean he usually didn't notice the effort he put into his appearance when visiting him after his work shift ended? In that case-- oh god. He looks anything but dressed to impress and he's terrified Minseok's going to realize just how ugly he is. Especially if he's looking at him in a new light. 

"Well, I barely, I rushed over here you see--" He can see Chanyeol chuckling in the corner of the shop as he tidies empty tables, cleaning up any trash that's left on them or on the floor. Damn him. He'd have to scold him later once Minseok wasn't around. He met Chanyeol before he actually met Minseok. The first time he came into the cafe Minseok had the day off, so he was under the impression that Chanyeol owned the small shop tucked away in a quiet corner of the town. He got along well with Chanyeol, it turns out the two attended high school together and briefly reminisced the days before they had bills to pay.  

Chanyeol was a pretty decent guy, that is until he found out that he had a not-so-subtle crush on his coworker. The teasing was relentless, it was almost as bad as Baekhyun harassing him if he finally gathered up the courage to talk to him. Jongdae, though he had nothing against Chanyeol, hoped he would walk into the shift where Chanyeol wouldn't be around just because he made Jongdae even more nervous to talk to Minseok. Could he be blamed? He had a hard time talking to Minseok when it was just the two of them-- how on earth was he supposed to when he could feel Chanyeol's beady little eyes on him from across the store? 

"You rushed over?" There's concern in Minseok's tone and Jongdae immediately regrets his choice of words. He didn't normally have this difficult of a time talking to Minseok, but the thought of confessing or asking him on a date was psyching him out more than he'd like to admit. "Was something wrong?"

"Uh," Jongdae feels like jumping into a hole and dying, "no, I just, uh--"

"He heard we were running low on his favorite kind of chocolates." Chanyeol chimes in from his spot as he cleans an already cleaned table. "I messaged him on KakaoTalk this morning. Told him to grab some while they're still left." Chanyeol knew Jongdae was allergic to chocolate, it was one of the many reasons he liked to tease Jongdae whenever he came in to attempt to get closer to Minseok. But still, he was helping him out and Jongdae appreciated that because wow, was he certainly going to crash and burn without his help. 

"Oh, you guys have each other on KakaoTalk?" There's something to Minseok's tone and a devious smile on Chanyeol's lips that Jongdae can't quite point out himself. 

"That's not important. What's important is that this man is in some serious need of chocolate! Minseok, don't let the poor boy starve." Minseok smiles brightly and nods his head, waving his hand in the air.

"Of course. Once these are out," he disappears behind the counter and heads to the back, his voice fainter, "we'll be out for a while." Tragic, Baekhyun really likes those, Jongdae thinks to himself. 

Chanyeol looks over to Jongdae and just shrugs. "Sorry." He mouths before moving to another table to clean. 

"But don't worry, I'll make sure to make them as soon as I have all the ingredients ready again." Jongdae can't help but feel shy from the way Minseok smiles at him. He places a small box of chocolate macarons on the counter in front of him. "There's nine in here. I'm sorry I can't give you the usual ten or twelve, but we're running low." He smiles sheepishly as he slides the box across the counter and toward Jongdae. "But, uh, did you want to say something?"

Jongdae snaps out of his gaze and looks up at Minseok. "What?"

"You look like you wanted to say something." Minseok laughs before shaking his head. "Well," he leans over the counter so that he can whisper to Jongdae, "don't tell Chanyeol, but I'll let you have these for free since you're my favorite customer." Jongdae feels his cheeks instantly heat up and he has a hard time keeping eye contact with the baker. 

"Are you sure?" He asks hesitantly, fiddling with the watch on his wrist. "I wouldn't want to inconvenience you, especially if you're running low on these, I should really pay, honestly--"

"Jongdae," Jongdae feels a swarm of butterflies come alive in the pit of his stomach, "just take the macarons." He laughs quietly. "It's not a big deal. I'll see you tomorrow, okay?" Jongdae nods clumsily and takes the box from the counter, heading out the door afterwards.

Okay, so maybe today wasn't a huge failure.

"That was such a ing failure." Baekhyun snorts when Jongdae drops the box of chocolate macarons on the coffee table in front of the two who are sitting on the same worn couch. "Ah, seriously, Junmyeon's birthday is right--"

"Baekhyun, Junmyeon's just down the hall. Lower your voice or shut up." He rolls his eyes and scrunches his nose as Kyungsoo scolds him quietly. 

"But they're seriously running out of these?" Baekhyun whines even louder and Kyungsoo whacks the back of his head. "Is there even a point of you going back to the bakery once they're out? Like, seriously. Is there?" 

"Uh, to see Minseok? And I can't eat chocolate, so it disappearing has no direct impact on my life." He snorts as he sits on the end of the couch so he doesn't have to be right next to Baekhyun. 

"Yet you only come home with chocolate, and not the man who makes them." 

Jongdae chokes on air once again, shooting Baekhyun the nastiest look he could muster in the midst of choking. "I'm just saying, you need to make your move before someone else does." Baekhyun warns while Kyungsoo leans back in his seat next to him, muttering an, 'oh god, not this again.' "I mean think about it, just how many customers does this Minseok guy have anyway? And each day? I'm sure you can't be the only one who finds him attractive." Kyungsoo only shakes his head as Jongdae inches closer to hear more of what he has to say. 

"What do you mean?" He asks almost timidly. 

"Well, how do you know you aren't his only admirer? What if someone else is scheming to get his attention? What if it's a woman?" 

"A woman?" Jongdae nearly shouts. "I never thought of that. Oh god."

Kyungsoo gives the two a look of distaste. "There's worse things than a woman."

"Not when they're after Jongdae's man. For all we know he's straight. He could even be biual. Then what? Fair playing ground. A woman will steal Jongdae's man." Kyungsoo knows Baekhyun's only ing with Jongdae now, but the latter doesn't seem to realize this. The expression on Jongdae's face is almost comical; the man looks like his third eye just opened. "Now do you understand why it's so important you get his number?"

"And Junmyeon's cake." Kyungsoo adds.

"But mostly the number. Kyungsoo can always make his cake if you don't--" Another whack to the back of his head. "Okay. And also the cake. So, Jongdae," Baekhyun takes a moment to straighten up in his seat, "what are you going to do? Are you going to win the date of your life with the man of your life?"

Jongdae grows flustered at this and shyly nods his head. "But, what if he says no?" Baekhyun freezes for a brief moment, almost as if he didn't even consider that possibility. 

"Well, then I guess you'll just be alone forever." 

"For sake, Baekhyun!" However, Baekhyun dodges and jumps up before Kyungsoo can hit him once again. "Do you want him to never ask him out? My god, you'll have him fearing rejection for the rest of his life." He turns his attention from Baekhyun and places it on Jongdae. "The worst that will happen is that he'll refuse, but that just means you have someone even better waiting for a future date with you." Jongdae smiles slightly at this, feeling more relieved than he was just seconds ago. 

"Like Kyungsoo or Junmyeon." The smile is off both Kyungsoo and Jongdae's faces now. 

"Talk to Minseok after work tomorrow. And please, at