(Youngjae's Perspective)

Daehyun had thought those cookies were excellent, so score one to Youngjae. Minus that score when he realized he probably just thought it was a friendly gesture to pay him back for the chicken soup, vapor rub, and tea. Add two tallies to the Youngjae is hopelessly gay chart for the two reasons he'd gone weak in the knees when they'd spoken yesterday.

A tally for each wobbly knee!

One, because he'd been able to see Daehyun's smile not covered by a mask and also not influenced by alcohol, and it made Youngjae's heart flutter. Two, because Daehyun's makeup was flawless. Which also made Youngjae's heart hammer in his ribcage. How he'd been able to speak was completely beyond him, and he thankfully hadn't made a fool of himself!

Despite what Youngjae considered blatant flirting, he got the impression that it wasn't being taken that way. If the look on Daehyun's face was anything to go by, he'd probably just thought Youngjae was being nice. Which he wasn't completely wrong, but Youngjae had definitely said his words with the intention to woo.

'Maybe I wasn't being obvious enough?'

With that thought in mind, Youngjae called up Jaebeom and asked him to meet at the coffee shop this morning. It was Youngjae's day off, but it was the best meeting place. He prepared for his friend to give him a hard time like he always did as he joined his friend at a table with some coffee.

“So, I need your help,” Youngjae started as he slipped into the seat across from him.

“Geez, not even a greeting. Must be serious,” he commented as he took a quick sip of his own drink. “What can I help you with, my dear?” Jaebeom wondered with a bit of a smirk. Youngjae internally rolled his eyes at the nickname that he'd been called since they were kids, but he wasn't actually bothered by it.

Im Jaebeom was a man who'd experienced Youngjae's many firsts. First crush, first date, first love, first intimate night, first ex... They didn't part on bad terms, just decided boyfriends wasn't the type of relationship they wanted. So they slipped back into being best friends like they had been for most of their lives.

“I need tips on how to be more obviously dominant.” Youngjae drummed his fingers against the tabletop as he blew on his coffee to cool it down.

“Dominant...” Jaebeom said with a bit of a questioning tone.

“Yeah, yeah!” After a sip from his drink, Youngjae asked, “Have any advice for me?”

His eyebrows twitched together slightly as he hummed, gulping at his own drink while he thought. With a firm nod, he looked at Youngjae with a determined glint. “Well, you gotta eat,” he answered firmly.

“I have to... eat.” When Jaebeom only nodded in response, Youngjae quirked a brow up at him, not sure of where he was going with that train of thought. Did particular types of food make a person more dominant? “What do I have to eat?”

Jaebeom shrugged. “Maybe like, a chicken leg or something,” he said, brushing off the comment with a wave of his hand. “But you gotta like... tear into it with your teeth and-” He pretended to hold a chicken leg in his hand as he stared fiercely, and Youngjae felt strangely intimidated. “-and Youngjae, this is the most important part. You gotta make eye contact,” he paused, demonstrating the process by taking a pretend fierce bite from the pretend chicken leg he held in his hand while staring into Youngjae's soul. “The best way to assert your dominance is to make eye contact while eating-”

“That's not what I meant, Jaebeom,” Youngjae groaned, dragging his hands down his face. “I'm not looking to assert my dominance, I just need to be more dominant! You were the dominant one when we were dating, so I figured you could give me some tips or something!”

“Oh.” Jaebum leaned back in his chair and finished off the last of his drink. “Don't think you need to worry about that, Youngjae. Aren't you a switch? Certainly you know that you just gotta stick it in rather than have it-”

“I also didn't meant it in that sense, .” Youngjae planted his forehead onto the table and let out an exasperated growl.

Jaebeom laughed and poked at Youngjae's shoulder. “Alright, my dear, I'm done giving you a hard time. Now I'm gonna guess you've got a crush on some guy?” He propped his face in one of his hands and ruffled Youngjae's hair with the other.

“Yeah...” Youngjae grumbled as he leaned up and sipped at his drink. He doubted that Jaebeom was actually done giving him a hard time, especially since he didn't have any further explanation. So Youngjae gave that further explanation as best he could.

Explaining his plight since New Year's had Jaebeom cracking up.

“You started the new year being a disaster gay! You're cursed for the entire rest of the year, my dear!” Jaebeom teased in the midst of his laughter, holding one of his sides.

“You said you were done giving me a hard time, Jaebeom!” Youngjae flopped dramatically back onto the table with a whine.

“I was! Then you sprung that on me, how can I not?” he wondered, covering his mouth with his free hand.

Youngjae squinted. “If you're covering your face to hide your giggling, then there's no point! I can still hear you!”

“You're such a disaster, Youngjae!” Jaebeom cackled.

“I can't help it!” he pouted. “I can't help that my heart does this thing when I've got a crush! It's like a tiny little squirrel up in a tree that's grabbing him some acorns, minding his own damn business when a dog comes bounding up and starts barking at him excitedly, scratching at the tree because he can't actually climb it and yes, I'm both the squirrel and the dog in this situation,” Youngjae rambled, pushing himself up from the tabletop with a groan and tipping back the last of his drink.

“Hell, you may as well be the tree and the acorns, too,” Jaebeom chuckled. At the glare Youngjae shot him, he held up his hands. “Okay, okay! So let me get the facts as straight as they can be in this gay situation. The man you have your eyes on isn't noticing your advances.”

“Correct.”

“And you want him to notice without you having to explicitly state your interest in him.”

“Correct.”

Jaebeom hummed in thought, crossing his arms and furrowing his brows. Then he tilted his head to the side. “Are you sure he even likes guys?” he wondered.

That... hadn't crossed Youngjae's mind.

“He doesn't have a problem with me being gay, so like... I thought that, if anything, he was biual?” Youngjae's voice raised in pitch and tapered slightly as he finished speaking. 'It would be my luck that he's straight while I'm falling all over myself trying to get him to notice me!'

“That doesn't necessarily mean he's into guys,” Jaebeom pointed out. “What you gotta do is find out his relationship preferences. Once you get that information, you can determine whether or not to continue your pursuit.”

“My pursuit? I'm not a cop after a criminal, Jaebeom.”

He shrugged and ignored the comment. “It's either talk with him and covertly learn his preferences without outing your interest in him, or keep on barking yourself up a tree while not knowing whether or not he'd ever see you the way you want him to,” he reasoned. “It's up to you, my dear, but I recommend the former. It'll be easier on you that way.”

Jaebeom had a point. There'd be no use in trying to woo Daehyun if he held no interest in a same gender relationship. Now Youngjae just had to figure out how to broach the topic to him so he could determine whether to pursue friendship or something else.

--

Youngjae planned to invite Daehyun over before he went to work at 4, but that hadn't been the case today. When Youngjae had texted his invite around noon, it took Daehyun a bit to respond and say he was already at work, but he could drop by afterwards if that was acceptable. Of course it was acceptable, so Youngjae was waiting until Daehyun got off work at 5.

While he was getting his thoughts together, he worked on a composition request. It was extra cash, so he wasn't going to pass it up. Even if he wanted to tell this particular client to shove their condescending attitude down a sewer.

A few gentle knocks sounded on the door in the middle of piano time. Sighing out his mild frustration, Youngjae dragged himself up and stretched, thankful for a break. With Daehyun here, he'd be setting the composition to the side to work on tomorrow. He didn't want his frustration to seep into anything else.

Unfortunately, Daehyun caught on to the inner annoyance as soon as Youngjae answered the door. “You seem upset- Did I interrupt your flow? I'm sorry, I-I can come back after you're done...” He his lips nervously as his fingers began to scratch at his rosy cheeks, likely reddened from walking in the cold temperatures.

“Daehyun, I invited you over,” Youngjae pointed out as he motioned for him to come in. He thankfully did, and Youngjae further clarified, “I'm not upset at the interruption. It's what I was working on that was frustrating me. A break will do me good.” Despite saying he was taking a break, he still sat back down in front of his piano. It was still piano time, after all.

“What you're working on?” Daehyun inquired, looking aimless as he fiddled with his fingers in front of him.

Youngjae stretched his arms and noted his lost glance, like figuring out where to sit was the biggest decision of his life. “Yeah, I do compositions for extra money,” he sighed. He tapped one of the piano keys and said, “Pull yourself up a chair.”

“Okay...” Daehyun grabbed one of the chairs from the dining table and carried it to sit next to the piano bench rather than drag it across the floor. Whether this was because he didn't want to make a lot of noise or if it was habit, Youngjae wasn't sure, but it wouldn't have made noise because he had those pads on his chairs, unlike the neighbours in 103. “You don't sound very happy about it,” he commented as he sat down carefully.

“I'm-” Youngjae paused, pressing some of the piano keys mindlessly. Playing always helped him formulate his thoughts, so his fingers ended up flowing out a tiny tune that didn't require him to look at music sheet while in conversation. “I guess I'm not.”

Daehyun's eyes slipped closed as he listened to the melody. “Then why do you do it?” he wondered softly.

“I told you, for the extra money.”

“No, That's... not what I mean,” he muttered with a muted clear of his throat, like he didn't want to come off as intimidating. Youngjae had thought he was the last intimidating person in existence, but now he was sure that title belonged to Daehyun. He probably couldn't even intimidate a kitten. “You told me that if it's not something that makes you happy, then it's not worth your time.”

Youngjae's fingers stilled, and he stared down at the keys underneath his fingertips. “I did say that.”

Much to Youngjae's delight, Daehyun began to press at the keys in front of him, albeit hesitantly. With a nervous of his lips and his eyes trained on his fingers, he said shakily, “It's good advice. It helped me...”

It took his brain a minute to snap out of it. The tune Daehyun played was soft and gentle, like him. But there was a tinge of sadness in it as he slowly pushed the keys in, either out of hesitance to continue playing or because he wasn't certain if he was remembering the tune correctly. When Youngjae processed the words he'd been told, he raised his brow. “It... helped you?”

He barely nodded, and there was a faint smile tugging at the corner of his lips as he admitted, “I dropped out of medical school yesterday.”

'So my words really did stick him and help him out?' It was flattering to have had such an impact on him, but Youngjae was curious. “What will you do now then?”

“I don't know, but... I've got plenty of time to figure it out. I'll probably end up working at Shortstub's the rest of my life, though,” he answered softly. “That's not a bad thing! I like it there... My parents aren't happy, but-” He audibly gulped, shaking his head to himself before his fingers stilled. Clearly, this struck at a chord in him. “You seem like the kind of guy who'd follow your own advice.” Daehyun's fingers dropped from the piano, and he folded his hands gently in his lap before looking in Youngjae's direction.

“I'll give it some thought,” Youngjae decided, mirroring the response he'd been given the other day.

There wasn't much thought to be given on the topic, though. Daehyun had a point, and Youngjae determined that once he was done with the composition he'd accepted today, he'd only play for himself and those who wanted to listen.

Well, the rest of the apartment complex except for Daehyun and possibly Zelo and Jongup didn't want to listen to Youngjae play for three hours straight almost every day, their notes on and slipped under the door proof of that. But that hadn't mattered to him before, and it certainly didn't matter to him now!

Now he just needed to figure out how to broach what he'd discussed with Jaebeom this morning to Daehyun. To help formulate his thoughts, he reached into his music sheet filing cabinet and pulled out a folder to grab a few songs. After setting them up on the music rack and cracking his knuckles, all loud pops that had his fingers feeling less cramped, he began to play in the hopes that he could find the words.

What he didn't expect was for Daehyun to start quietly singing along, words so low that they could easily be mistaken for hums.

Youngjae's heart skipped a beat, and his breath caught in his lungs. 'Oh damn, this is actually happening. This is such a fantasy, but it's actually happening!' As the song progressed, he gradually became less muted to the point where words could actually be made out. Daehyun put such raw emotion into them that Youngjae could feel it in his bones.

How in the world was he supposed to formulate his thoughts now?

His throat was parched by the time the song was done, and as soon as the last note was done being drawn out, Daehyun snapped back into himself. He began to scratch at his cheeks nervously, eyes widened as his fingers trembled. “I-I'm sorry, I forgot myself for a moment there...” he apologized, the pitch in his voice high but muted.

Youngjae stared at him, baffled. “Forget more often then,” he blurted out. 'Wait, I need to explain my blunt reaction somehow, !' “I mean, your voice is amazing, so it's really flattering that you sang along.” 'Flattering? It's a fantasy come true, but I can't just say that!'

His brows twitched a bit in confusion, his thick lips pursed out slightly. “Thank you,” he said quietly. Daehyun's fingertips moved against his cheeks again as he his lips. “It's... been a while since I've really... sung? Other than New Year's, I um... haven't really sung in a few years.”

“I never would have guessed.”

“That's nice of you to say, Youngjae,” he said as he folded his hands in his lap again and stared at them. “You say such nice things to me, and I don't understand why.”

So the flirting had gone over his head like Youngjae had thought. “Should I not?” he wondered hesitantly. He was hit with pangs of uncertainty alongside flashbacks of being told he came off too strongly. 'Am I saying things that are making him uncomfortable?' Youngjae panicked. 'If that's the case-'

“It's not that, um... I just-” Daehyun hummed to himself a bit, lips pressing into a line. “I'm just curious about it.”

'So I haven't made him uncomfortable. Good!' Youngjae let out a sigh of relief he hadn't even known he'd been holding. “I'm only saying what I think,” he answered, turning his attention back to the music sheets. Daehyun made a noise to confirm that he'd heard, and Youngjae flipped to the next song in his queue.

This didn't appear to be a song Daehyun knew, though, so Youngjae was left to his own thoughts while Daehyun lightly swayed in his chair. Jaebeom's words from this morning rung in his head alongside his contemplations.

What you gotta do is find out his relationship preferences.

As he continued pressing at the piano keys, Youngjae began, “So, you said the other day that you didn't have a problem with gay people, right?”

“Right...” Daehyun confirmed slowly.

“Does that mean you're also gay, or do you just support it?” Youngjae kept his focus on the music sheet, but he caught the crinkle of Daehyun's brows from his peripherals. “You don't have to answer if you don't want to. I'm just curious.”

“You answered me, so it's only fair that I answer you,” he decided. His response was slow, as if he were choosing his words carefully. “I don't think love should be restricted to gender. I've only ever been with a girl, though...” He paused, and from the corner of Youngjae's eye, he saw Daehyun's fingers raise up to his cheeks. “What's it like to be with a guy?”

“Depends on the guy,” Youngjae offered. “Some guys are great and others are hell on earth.” Not that Youngjae had any experience with the latter type. He never went after or accepted advances from guys who gave him bad vibes. “I imagine it's the same as being with a woman, except for it's a man.”

The closest Youngjae had to being with a girl was when his parents conned him into meeting one. Back before he made sure to clarify whether or not the visit they invited him down for was to see them or meet a girl 'he was sure to like'. He'd only managed to get along with one of those girls, that person being Jieun. They'd become friends because of that, and he eventually helped her out in introducing her to Yongguk!

Daehyun shrugged. “I... guess it's the same both ways. People are people, after all,” he sighed as he maneuvered to sit on his hands.

Nothing else was spoken on the subject, just a silent agreement that people can be great or terrible no matter what gender they are. Piano time went on with Daehyun occasionally humming along to the tunes he knew. While it wasn't as heart stopping as his singing, just hearing his voice harmonizing with the keys was enough to have Youngjae's breath catch in his throat every so often.

After Daehyun left, Youngjae came to the reluctant conclusion that he should only pursue friendship. While he did show a curiosity in same gender relationships, that didn't necessarily mean he was interested in one himself. Youngjae did his best to mask the disappointment in his heart, but figured it was probably for the better.

If he wasn't so uneasy about being upfront with his feelings, then maybe there'd be a chance. But he couldn't risk his heart being broken like that again. So hints were the best he could do so at least he'd know things were reciprocated going into it.

Not that it's worked for him since he started doing this. But he'd rather be alone than force someone to be with him.

--

A/N:

This just in: local gay continues to be a disaster, will probably continue to do so. More details to come as they arise.

Originally, I spelled Jaebeom's name as Jaebum because that's what I've seen other people do. But when I was looking up a reference picture for him, I came across the fact that it's technically spelled Jaebeom, so that's how I'm going to spell it. My fingers will hate it, though. I had to do find and replace for Jaebum to Jaebeom by the time I was done with this chapter just to make sure I'd spelled it correctly.

Introduced: Jaebeom