Warning(s): cursing, fluff, some cheesy
Length: 12.3k words

  07: Publication  

[ 1 ]

 

 

The first day back at school after a long break was always the hardest. It meant the start of a new semester, and the start of a new semester always felt like landing on square one. Although this was the last time Miyoung would do it as a high school student, she couldn’t muster up a single gram of caring. She just wanted to throw her books and pencils in the air and run out of the building saying that no one could force her to attend class if she didn’t feel an inclination to participate any longer. Of course, that would disappoint everyone—especially Baekhyun—so she sighed as she walked up the stairs and into that familiar classroom.

 

Baekhyun was already sitting at his desk and leaning over the planner he kept for the class. It felt like seeing him for the first time. He was wearing his glasses instead of his contacts, and Miyoung swore he wore that same tweed jacket as he did on the first day of the year.

 

“Good afternoon, Mr. Byun,” Miyoung said with a smile to catch his attention. Baekhyun would barely tilt his head upward, but Miyoung could still see his smile.

 

“Good afternoon, Miyoung. How was your break?”

 

Miyoung stifled back a giggle. That was right; it was of utmost importance that they maintained a professional relationship in public. “It was fine, thank you,” Miyoung would answer. “I just wish it lasted a little longer, but then again, I always do.”

 

The class session that day was uneventful, but with Baekhyun, nothing was ever that bad. Even if the start of a new semester felt a little like starting over, it also felt like starting from the beginning when nothing was so complicated—when Miyoung was only a poor girl with a hopeless crush on the handsome English teacher. Still, Miyoung wouldn’t trade it all for the world. Despite the looming fact that Jieun could tell anyone or everyone about Baekhyun’s relationship with one of his students, nothing suggested that the times would be terrible.

 

For that, Miyoung rejoiced. Nothing could be terrible as long as she had Baekhyun by her side.

 

 

[ 2 ]

 

 

On the first Wednesday of the last semester of high school, Miyoung decided that she didn’t want to spend another minute cramped in that small study room with Baekhyun. As much as she liked being able to hear his individual breaths, she liked the thought of holding his hand and going out for a stroll in a park. Of course, she wouldn’t be able to actually do that—risk of getting caught and all. However, her family did have a large backyard that was walled off and surrounded by tall trees that secluded the area from prying eyes. While it wasn’t a park, it could work.

 

“Baekhyun,” Miyoung proposed as she finished the last paragraph of her journal, “I want to go out for a walk.” Baekhyun opened his mouth, but she kept on talking. “My parents won’t be home until 8 tonight, and I have a perfectly fine backyard.”

 

“I was going to say to bring a jacket since it’s cold outside, but okay.”

 

Miyoung grinned and practically squealed in joy. “I don’t need a jacket. I have you. Now let’s go!” Baekhyun laughed as she grabbed him by his tie.

 

“Easy, Miyoung. I’m right behind you.”

 

As Miyoung escorted Baekhyun to her yard, she passed by Doyoung and his girlfriend Chaeyoung. Miyoung was almost too excited to stop and say hello, but there was something unsettling about their frowns and tightly joined hands that made her stop in her tracks. She was always close to Doyoung when she was growing up, and that meant that she could tell when he upset. This was one of those times. Was Chaeyoung breaking up with Doyoung? Perhaps it was the other way around—was Doyoung breaking up with Chaeyoung?

 

“What’s going on?” Miyoung asked as she released Baekhyun’s tie. “Are you okay, Doyoung?”

 

Doyoung didn’t even bother to look at her or give her a sassy remark. “Yeah,” he said breathily. “I’m fine.” He said nothing else, and Chaeyoung could only give a subtle nod.

 

“Um,” Miyoung dragged out the syllable. She looked up at Baekhyun who looked back at her with equal concern. “You’re not fine,” Miyoung concluded as she placed her gaze upon her brother’s slouching form. She wasn’t as good as a liar as he was, she didn’t have to be to know that there was something about that wasn’t right. “What’s wrong?”

 

“Nothing,” Doyoung mumbled, still refusing to look at her.

 

“Doyoung,” Chaeyoung whispered in that beautiful accent she possessed, “we should tell her. She’s your sister. Besides,” as if Chaeyoung’s voice couldn’t get softer, it did, “you already told Baekhyun.”

 

“Baekhyun?” Miyoung snapped her head backwards to look at him, but he didn’t return her gaze, and she immediately grew frantic. It was one thing to be kept out of a secret, but it was another to be kept out of secret apparently held between her brother and her boyfriend. “Baekhyun,” Miyoung’s voice trembled, “what is she talking about? Do you know something that I don’t?”

 

Baekhyun carefully eyed both Doyoung and Chaeyoung before placing his firm gaze on Miyoung’s. “Maybe we should sit down and hear your brother out.”

 

“No, I can’t do this,” Doyoung stammered. “I can’t.” He kept his head low and shook it. “Don’t make me do this, guys. Please don’t.” Miyoung frowned as she listened closely to her brother’s voice. It sounded like he was on the verge of weeping—something he hardly ever did. “I can’t do this. Chaeyoung, I can’t.”

 

“Would you like me to tell her then?” Chaeyoung’s voice trembled like Doyoung’s, and she was actually crying, but she kept her head held high. “I’ll do it, okay?” When Doyoung didn’t answer, Chaeyoung looked over at Miyoung. The two of them were wordless for a moment, and Chaeyoung opened and closed her mouths several times before sound actually came out. “I-I-I’m pregnant,” Chaeyoung whispered, “and it’s your brother’s.”

 

Miyoung stood upright, but before she knew it, her knees buckled. Fortunately, Baekhyun was standing by her side to hold her before she could fall. Still, the news hit her hard. Park Chaeyoung, the heir of a rival company, was pregnant—with her supposed enemy’s child. Kim Doyoung was the father. It was so bizarre and sudden that Miyoung felt as if she could throw up at the news. Immediately, a million things ran in her head. What was Doyoung going to do? What was Chaeyoung going to do? What would their fathers do? What hell would even happen after something like this?

 

Baekhyun’s voice brought her out of her shock. “Miyoung, sit down,” he commanded, and she sullenly walked over to a chair by the dining table.

 

“I…” Miyoung struggled to find the right words. Her vision was spiraling. The thought of what their father would do terrified her. Their father already treated Doyoung harshly enough since he had defied the will of the family legacy at a young age. She couldn’t imagine what their father would do now. “Doyoung, what the actual ?” Miyoung couldn’t even keep clean. “What are we going to do?”

 

“I don’t know,” Doyoung said. His nose was muffled, indicating that he had started crying as he kept his head lowered. “I wish I did, but I have no ing clue, okay?”

 

“For now,” Baekhyun spoke up, “the two of you,” he eyed Doyoung and Chaeyoung, “have to decide and agree upon a plan together.” Baekhyun paused and took a sharp intake of breath. “This is your life and not mine, so I’m not going to advise you to do anything specific,” Baekhyun pauses to look at the couple in the eyes, “but I do want the both of you to decide on doing something you know you want to do—not because you feel obligated.”

 

“It’s hard, though,” Doyoung said with a groan. “I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. I’ve barely just graduated from college. I—” He chokes out a garbled sob. “I’m ed.”

 

“You’re not,” Baekhyun insisted. “You will get through this as long as you go into it united. You understand?”

 

“I understand.” Doyoung nodded, but his face was still troubled. When Miyoung looked at his hands, he was trembling to even keep them folded. “I just… I don’t see this working out well. I mean, I have no idea how to even take care of myself properly.” His face grew more anxious, and Miyoung felt her heart drop at the very thought of his coming predicament. “How am I supposed to take care of a family? I—” He cut himself off to shake his head.

 

“You’ll learn as you go.” Baekhyun patted him on the back. As for Chaeyoung, he simply raised a brow. “When it comes to parenthood, you have to keep each other strong. It’s not something you can split fifty-fifty. It’s more of a hundred-hundred effort.”

 

Doyoung raised his head to look at Baekhyun quizzically. “You seem to know a lot about this.”

 

Baekhyun grinned as his cheeks turned into a soft hue of rouge, seemingly flustered by the implication of Doyoung’s statement. “I grew up in a household with a lot of love,” he began, “and I’ve overseen many cases where that wasn’t the instance. I know how to differentiate between good and bad parenting.”

 

Seems about right, Miyoung thought to herself. That’s why he’s so good with advice.

 

“Do you think we’ll make good parents?” Chaeyoung asked with a slightly cynical tone. “All mine ever did to me was force me to do things I didn’t want to do.”

 

“Yes,” Baekhyun replied slowly. “You might not be able choose the circumstances of your child’s upbringing, but you’re definitely more than able to choose how you want to treat them despite those circumstances.”

 

Miyoung stared up at Baekyhun with admiration that was he even attempting to answer something as emotionally provocative as Chaeyoung’s question. He was 30, 12 years older than Miyoung, but he wasn’t old and weeping with wisdom. Somehow, he managed to hold his footing and answer with something deeply profound—heart-tugging, even.

 

“Uh, wow,” Chaeyoung stammered. “That’s…really good advice.”

 

“That I hope you take.” Baekhyun raised his brows. He then cleared his throat and stood up. “We’ll leave you two to talk, okay?” He reached for Miyoung’s hand which she placed in his. “This is a really important discussion for you two, and I think you need to have it alone.” Chaeyoung and Doyoung exchanged looks before nodding in silent agreement. “We’ll go then.”

 

Baekhyun and Miyoung walked past the couple and outside to her backyard. She had a skip in her step, but she couldn’t bear to walk with a smile after hearing Doyoung’s revelation. He was going to be a father, and she was going to be an aunt. How strange was that? Worse of all, Chaeyoung—and Miyoung still couldn’t get her mind wrapped around this—was going to be the mother of Doyoung’s child. Never in a thousand years would Miyoung have predicted this to happen. After all, it was a scenario with more disastrous outcomes than good ones. What she was going to do with this information, she didn’t know, and it caused her heart to beat anxiously.

 

There was a porch swing outside, and Miyoung chose to sit there, so Baekhyun followed. Her feet didn’t touch the ground, but his did, so he pushed it for the two of them. Though wordless, Miyoung was comfortable in the unspoken dialogue between them.

 

“Can you imagine having children?” Miyoung asked after a bit of silence. She shuddered just thinking about it. Although she loved children and taking care of them, she couldn’t imagine herself having one to look after for the next 18 or 20 years. In her heart, she still felt like a child despite the fact that she was 19 now. “Imagine having a baby,” Miyoung said, nearly gagging. “That’s…horrendous. Imagine being responsible for raising a complete .”

 

Baekhyun chuckled breathily and squeezed her hand. He pushed against the ground with a foot, enabling the porch swing to rock again. “Do you think of having children in the future?” he inquired. “Or do you only think about the possibility of raising a jerk of a human being?”

 

“Well, I’m still a child at the bottom of my heart,” Miyoung replied with a shrug. “I don’t really think about it.” She narrowed her eyes as she looked at Baekhyun’s tranquil expression. “But you’re in your 30s. You’ve probably seriously thought of having children, haven’t you?”

 

“I have.”

 

Miyoung was impatient. “And? Would you ever want some?”

 

“Yeah, of course,” Baekhyun answered rather calmly. He even had a slight, barely-there-but-is-definitely-there sort of smile on his face.

 

On the other hand, Miyoung made a face and feigned sickness. She couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to willingly to subject themselves to years of torture. As much as she loved children, she only loved them when she knew that she could hand them back to the parents. Her experience with babysitting her cousins taught her a lot of things, and one of those important lessons was that temper tantrums were an actual, horrible thing that happened in real life—and not just the movies.

 

“I won’t ask any more about children,” Miyoung announced. “I don’t even want to think about Doyoung’s problem. It gives me a headache.”

 

“That’s right. Think about school first.”

 

“Actually, I want to think about us.”

 

“What’s on your mind, M’young?” Baekhyun released his grip on her hand to wrap his arm around her shoulders. He pulled her in closer, allowing her to feel nearly the full brunt of his body’s warmth. Instinctively, Miyoung rested her head against him and smiled at the simple intimacy between them—well, that and the way he pronounced a lazy version of her name.

 

“It’s just weird to think about us sometimes, you know? There’s a lot of uncertainty. It worries me sometimes,” Miyoung confessed. “This could all end,” she snapped her fingers, “like that.”

 

“Don’t think about it that way,” Baekhyun said before kissing her on the head. On the head. Miyoung felt his lips touch her hair beautifully and almost melted at the softness of the gesture. “You know what I think about when I think about us?” Miyoung shook her head as best as she could. “As cringeworthy as it can be, I think about all the cute, dumb stuff couples do, and I think about us doing it.”

 

“Like getting matching shirts?”

 

Baekhyun snickered. “Exactly like getting matching shirts.” He sighed rather dreamily, and the warmth of his breath whispered to Miyoung that what he was saying was genuine to what he felt. “I really wish I could take you out without having to worry about someone seeing.” Miyoung blushed and laughed nervously. She had been wishing the same thing as he had. “I want to find one of those photobooths and take weird, funny pictures with you.” Baekhyun hummed, undoubtedly picturing the scenario in his head. “I wish we didn’t have to hold back so much.”

 

“When I graduate from high school, we won’t have to.”

 

Surprisingly, Baekhyun took a sharp intake of breath. “It’s not as simple as that, Miyoung. We have to wait longer. Do you know how suspicious it would be if we made ourselves public that quickly?”

 

“No, but—”

 

“There’s no but’s here, M’young. If we rushed that process, so many heads would turn, and that wouldn’t be a good thing for the both of us.” The truthfulness of Baekhyun’s words caused Miyoung to whine, but rather than scolding her or lecturing her, he kissed her on the head again and spoke in an even, calm voice. “Don’t start whining on me. You’re 19 now. You’re an adult. You’re not a child nor are you a baby.”

 

“I’d rather be a baby than an adult,” Miyoung said as she wrinkled her nose. “I wouldn’t have to be worried about all sorts of things. I’d just sort of lay in a crib, cry, and have people bring me food.” Miyoung grinned mischievously. “Babies live a fantastically lazy life, and I’m all for that.”

 

“Well, at the rate you’re going, you still are a baby.”

 

Miyoung gasped and pulled away to glare at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?” she demanded, but Baekhyun only laughed at her. She pawed at his chest and whined for him to tell her what he meant, but he wasn’t relenting; he kept laughing to himself. It was only when she gave up and started sulking that Baekhyun gave in to her desires.

 

He whispered into her ear, “You whine a lot…baby.”

 

If hearts could dance, hers just did.

 

 

[ 3 ]

 

 

Miyoung didn’t feel like doing much of anything today. After receiving the shocking news of Chaeyoung’s pregnancy two afternoons ago, she only sought to distract herself from how scary the real world was. She had been immersing herself in more poem books, but that quickly got old. Luckily for her, she had Baekhyun. Not only was he the perfect distraction, he was a good one—meaning, he could make her forget everything that was wrong or could go wrong. The best part was that he didn’t even have to try; all he had to do was exist in front of her, and she’d find something about him that could render her utterly thoughtless.

 

As Miyoung waited for Baekhyun to finish checking her essay for errors, she eyed him with a careful gaze. Traversing his physical beauty without getting trapped in one of its wonders was always a difficult feat. Since it was warm inside her home, he had taken off his coat and rolled his sleeves up to his elbows which revealed veiny forearms that rippled when he wrote something on her paper. But Miyoung quickly looked past that. Her eyes loved to trace the outline of his broad shoulders perfectly framed by his shirt, but they soon quickly grew bored of sliding down that familiar slope. So, her eyes fell upon his face.

 

While Baekhyun graded Miyoung’s papers, he always made sure to keep his expression blank (in order to prevent her from panicking due to a bad mark), but that didn’t stop him from moving his lips as he read passages. The placid stillness of his face still only encouraged Miyoung to start drawing imaginary lines between the moles on his face. (There was also an eyelash on his cheek, but he unfortunately scratched it off.) She’d draw polygons and other geometric designs between those dots until she grew bored. At that point, her eyes fell onto the center of his face where she focused on another feature: his nose. That pretty, boopable nose with two moles on the bridge.

 

Boop.

 

Miyoung stifled back a giggle when she recalled that word: boop. Doyoung had told her she was wasting her time on the Internet when he saw her scrolling aimlessly on her laptop, but Miyoung disagreed. She had found a video online where a little girl tapped the nose of a small corgi puppy. The caption read “boop,” and the rest was history; Miyoung taught herself a new word that could properly describe what she wanted to do to Baekhyun’s nose.

 

The longer she stared at his nose, the more she thought about the times it had touched hers when they kissed. She remembered it very distinctly for some reason; she remembered how Baekhyun had poked her cheek with nose before kissing her on the jaw when she had pouted and whined. Now, Miyoung was wondering what that nose would feel like under her fingers. Its rounded tip was right there and ready for her to boop. Baekhyun’s gaze was sweeping across her papers, so he wouldn’t notice.

 

“Boop,” Miyoung whispered as she booped Baekhyun’s nose with her finger.

 

Baekhyun froze, and his eyes slowly made their way up to Miyoung’s hand. Miyoung only giggled when his eyes crossed to look at what she had done. “Miyoung…what,” he mumbled.

 

“Your nose,” Miyoung said with a grin, “is so boopable.”

 

“Boopable?” Baekhyun moved Miyoung’s hand away from her face and looked at her with confusion. His expression quickly shifted to one of understanding, and he chuckled at the realization. Then his chuckle turned into a laugh that filled not only the room, but Miyoung’s heart. “Boopable,” he repeated. “I’m guessing that you’ve been using social media to expand your vocabulary.”

 

“Yeah, of course,” Miyoung beamed. When she had told Doyoung about that word, all he did was stare at her like she was crazy. In a way, she was crazy, but Baekhyun never looked at her like that. He only looked at her with amusement and pride. After all, she was learning. She reached over to Baekhyun’s nose again. “Boop.”

 

“Okay, okay,” Baekhyun said. He brought her hand down from his face once more and then intertwined their fingers together. He had a bright smile as he squeezed her hand gently. “I’ll let you boop my nose as much as you want so long you only make one mistake on your paper. Deal?”

 

“Deal,” Miyoung agreed. She looked down at their intertwined hands as Baekhyun continued to scan her paper. He was holding her with his left hand—the hand that had a cute mole on its thumb. It would cause Miyoung to grin. There was simply too much about Baekhyun that distracted her.

 

When Baekhyun finished reading through Miyoung’s papers, she looked at him expectantly.

 

“Well?” she asked. “Did I make any mistakes?”

 

“There was a few,” Baekhyun replied, and Miyoung felt herself slouch slightly in her seat at the defeat. “But,” Baekhyun started, “I’m nice. I’m not going to forbid you from ‘booping’ my nose if you want to.”

 

At that, Miyoung sprung up in excitement. Without warning, she reached over and bounced her finger on Baekhyun’s nose repeatedly until he laughed contagiously. His eyes turned into a curved, crescent-like lines as he laughed, and it only made Miyoung laugh. Soon, the room overflowed with their laughter, and Miyoung nearly fell out of her chair at the pure ridiculousness of the situation. Fortunately, Baekhyun grabbed her by the arm before she could actually fall.

 

“You find the strangest things funny,” Baekhyun said when he regained his composure.

 

“Can you blame me?” Miyoung blushed as she averted her gaze from Baekhyun’s. In the midst of their harmless fun, she had started thinking of what it would be like if she kissed Baekhyun on his nose.

 

Baekhyun noticed her reddened cheeks almost immediately. “What is it?” he asked.

 

“May I kiss your nose?” Miyoung asked quietly but bravely. The longer she spent with Baekhyun, the more she had grown comfortable with asking him questions that pertained to their relationship. There was nothing that was awkward at this stage, but she still felt shy to be brave in this way. Although she knew that Baekhyun would never make her feel terrible for wondering or asking things, she still felt like he might. After all, he was human, and that meant her bizarre questions could cause him to raise his brows or frown.

 

But Baekhyun only smiled. “Go ahead.”

 

With a hum of excitement, Miyoung leaned forward and hovered her face by Baekhyun’s. They made eye-contact for only a few seconds before Baekhyun closed his eyes in expectance of her kiss. Miyoung, of course, wouldn’t kiss him right away. She would look at those closed eyes of his and allow her heart to swell with just a tad bit more of endearment before finally placing her lips on that perfectly boopable nose.

 

Baekhyun let out a breathy chuckle.

 

 

[ 4 ]

 

 

Baekhyun always felt Miyoung’s gaze on his skin. She didn’t know he could know, but he did. And when he did, he always brought it up with her. “You keep staring at me,” he said, interrupting the silence on one Friday afternoon in late January. “Why? Is there something you’re concerned about?” He arched a brow and tilted his head. “Did you not prepare for this essay as much as I instructed you to? Hm?”

 

“Of course not,” Miyoung answered. “I just like looking at you while you’re grading everyone else’s papers. It gives me insight as to who I have to worry about taking the top spot of the class.”

 

“Ah, I see.” Baekhyun chuckled to himself. “Want to come see Kim Sunwoo’s essay? He did a good job.” Miyoung nodded, eager to get the inside scoop on her peers, and tried to rearrange the position of her chair to see better, but Baekhyun just patted his thighs. “No, come here. It’s a better view.” With reddened cheeks, she did as he instructed and sat on his laps. “See?” Baekhyun laughed breathily as he wrapped one arm around her waist. “Isn’t that better?”

 

“A lot better,” Miyoung murmured. She pointed at Sunwoo’s paper. “So, Sunwoo’s a quiet guy. Should I really be worried about him?”

 

“Just because someone’s quiet, doesn’t mean that they’re not a threat.” Baekhyun grabbed a blank sheet of lined paper from one of his folders and placed it by Sunwoo’s hardly-marked essay. “Since you’re here and you’ve already spent a good half-hour pining for me from across the table,” Miyoung bit the inside of her cheek at Baekhyun’s teasing, “I want you to take his introductory paragraph and revise it so that it’s better.”

 

“But you didn’t leave any marks for corrections or suggestions.”

 

“That doesn’t mean it can’t get better, Ms. Top-of-the-Class.” Baekhyun placed a pencil in front of her, and she reluctantly picked it up. “Now get going. If you’re as good as you think you are, then this shouldn’t be a problem.”

 

Miyoung, not wanting to back down from a challenge, clenched the pencil and started writing. Her hands were shaky, and Baekhyun was definitely not trying to make himself useful when he leaned his chin on her shoulder. She could feel the cool rim of his glasses on her temple and the warmth of his arms pressing against the tiny sliver of bare skin on her waist where her shirt had ridden upwards. But as distracting as it was, Miyoung was not about to prove to him that he could easily disconcert her from the task at hand—so she trudged forward.

 

After rewriting Sunwoo’s lengthy paragraph, Miyoung placed her pencil on the table with a satisfied hum. “There, I did it.”

 

“Good job,” Baekhyun said, pulling his head back from hers. “You deserve a reward, M’young.” He leaned in for a kiss, and to Miyoung’s own surprise, she pulled away and frowned at him. Of course, he returned her frown with his own. After all, she was Miyoung. Since when had she ever refused anything from him—especially a kiss? The answer was never, and the two of them had to be equally surprised as the other. “You don’t want to kiss me?” Baekhyun asked incredulously while he raised a brow. “Really?”

 

“You didn’t even check my paper.”

 

Baekhyun shrugged. “I don’t have to. I read it as you wrote it.”

 

“But you still have to evaluate it, no?”

 

“Miyoung, baby,” Baekhyun stated her name with a firm voice but chose to soften it at baby, “you can kiss me or you can climb off my lap.” He raised a brow. “The choice is yours.”

 

Miyoung only grinned. “That’s not a very difficult choice to make,” she whispered before leaning forward to kiss Baekhyun. He gladly captured her lips in his, and what was to be an innocent tutoring session quickly turned into a hotter one.

 

Baekhyun had hardly ever kissed her in this specific way. Miyoung couldn’t exactly describe it in all of its profoundness, but there was something unique in his everyday kisses that showed his care for her. In the majority of the occasions they had kissed, her lipstick or lip gloss never found its way off the boundaries of her lips; he was always too attentive about a detail like that, yet she felt him relinquishing that care for detail now, when she felt her lip gloss on parts of mouth where they shouldn’t have been. He was usually a gentle, warm man who preferred to kiss her words rather than his lips, and as exquisite as that was, there was something ardently bewitching by this tender roughness, this controlled demolition of all sensibility when he didn’t care about messing up her makeup.

 

However, Miyoung really didn’t care. She felt like she was actually Baekhyun’s girlfriend and not his student. She felt like she was in one of those Hollywood movies—particularly in one of those scenes where the lead actress is kissing the lead actor’s in a lustrous scene meant to depict love and glamor. But it had to end because sometime later, someone opened the door to the study room. Miyoung wasn’t fazed by it, though. It could only be her brother, after all.

 

“Jesus Christ,” Doyoung’s voice exclaimed, causing Miyoung to draw away from Baekhyun. When she did, she immediately saw her brother’s disgusted face. “Is this what you do when he comes over to ‘tutor’ you? You do your homework sitting on his lap?”

 

“We finished early, actually,” Baekhyun answered for the flustered Miyoung. “It’s only 7,” he continued rather coolly, “do you need anything?”

 

“Well, I made dinner,” Doyoung started, “but the two of you can eat each other for tonight, if you want.”

 

“Doyoung!” Miyoung exclaimed in embarrassment, but Baekhyun didn’t seem to share her same agitation; he simply laughed and patted her reassuringly on the leg.