“I know how romance works,” Hyukjae says, the palms of his hands flat on the table. “I’ve seen You’ve Got Mail.”

Heechul opens his mouth.

“Yeah, okay, forty minutes of it. While I was getting my tires changed. Point is—”

“You’re a disaster, hyung,” Kyuhyun adds before Heechul can start spewing nonsense, and Hyukjae scoffs. “Remember when Hyoyeon asked you out last year and you thought she was asking you to help her find the bathroom on the second floor?”

Hyukjae glares at him. “Yes, but—”

“And you brought her there.”

“Yeah, fine, but—”

“You are not qualified to confess to Jongwoon,” Heechul concludes, looking at him as if he just put his child in their place after finding out they stole cookies from the kitchen. “I don’t even want to begin thinking about how you were planning to do that.”

Hyukjae glares at his empty glass. “I was just going to tell him.”

“What exactly were you going to tell him?” Donghae joins in after a few seconds of calculated silence.

Honestly, Hyukjae had forgotten he was there. This whole thing just seems really overkill for the situation. Like, fine, maybe Hyukjae isn’t the most delicate person on Earth. So sue him. And yeah, maybe sometimes he’s clueless. He realized he likes his roommate and friend of years and years, though, didn’t he? That has to count for something.

It doesn’t matter if it took him six months and three mental breakdowns which made him lose his mind for half of his finals and it was a complete disaster and he almost flunked one. What matters is the result.

Heechul’s eyes narrow. “What were you going to tell him?”

“I don’t know,” Hyukjae grunts. This is deeply offensive. He hasn’t felt this offended since that time Jongwoon dared to insinuate Hyukjae forgot his birthday. He just woke up late that day, okay? “Hey. I like you. Something like that. Short and easy.”

Kyuhyun leans back in his chair. Hyukjae suspiciously notices all the coffee disappeared from the table. He kind of needed that to face Jongwoon, but fine. He’ll have to improvise with what he has.

“I’ll just have to believe you won’t follow it up with something like, I want you to pound me like British currency?”

Donghae bumps his shoulder against Heechul so vehemently they almost end up on the floor together.

“What?” Heechul barks at him, pushing him to the opposite side.

“Not even Hyukjae would stoop that low,” Donghae says, holding on to the table for dear life. “Like, that was borderline psychotic.”

Heechul flips him off. “Got a problem with it?”

“Many of them, actually,” Donghae fires back.

He inhales, probably ready to go through the list of everything Heechul has ever done wrong in his life. Kyuhyun plants his hand across Donghae’s mouth and ignores his curses.

“Hyung,” he says, looking directly into Hyukjae’s eyes. It’s quite jarring, actually. Kyuhyun has a very peculiar way of staring at people’s souls. Hyukjae stares back, because you’re never going to catch him slipping. “Give me the punchline you were going to use.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything.”

Kyuhyun keeps staring at him.

Hyukjae stares back.

“Can I have your picture so I can show Santa what I want for Christmas?”

“That’s disgusting.” Kyuhyun raises both eyebrows at the same time. Somehow. Heechul scoffs in the background. “Don’t even try saying that.”

“Actually, you know what—” Donghae starts to say, but stops when Heechul glares at him so viciously you’d think he killed a bird with his car. “Sorry.”

“What?” Hyukjae turns around to face Donghae. “It wasn’t that bad, right? I googled it! It was the top-rated line on some website!”

“What was the website’s name?” Heechul’s nostrils flare up. It’s a spectacle, quite honestly. Hyukjae would have taken a picture of it under different circumstances. “cheesypickuplines.org?”

Hyukjae blinks at Heechul’s outraged expression. “Actually, now that I think about it…”

“Hyung!” Kyuhyun exclaims, kicking his leg under the table. Ouch. Hyukjae had slammed into the door of his room in that exact same spot not even two days ago. It hurts. “See? You’re terrible. He’s gonna run out of here screaming.”

“I mean,” Donghae attempts again, and Heechul shuts him up with another glare.

“This won’t do,” he says, now looking weirdly contrived. Seriously, why is everyone being so annoying about this? It’s just Jongwoon. The same person who put Cheetos up his nose once. Hyukjae sniffs. That was cute. “We need something else.”

“Well, do it quickly,” Hyukjae says, as emotionless as he is sarcastic. Quite frankly, he didn’t ask for this. Maybe he’s a bit—just a bit—dumb when it comes to romance, but he’s not a child, all right. “Jongwoon will be here any minute now.”

“Jongwoon what and where and when?” Kyuhyun screeches, effectively waking up the whole room. An annoyed student sends them a dirty glare. Hyukjae would feel bad for him, really, but why would you study at a coffee shop in the late afternoon? Go home already. Late night study sessions are library business. “You were gonna tell him now?”

Hyukjae shrugs. “Yes?”

“Here?” Kyuhyun screeches again. Hyukjae can smell the owner starting to get mad from fifteen steps away. “Why?”

“Don’t yell.” Hyukjae’s eyes narrow, and his first thought is what now. “Because I had it planned out, but then you guys decided to meddle.”

“Your plan .” Kyuhyun slumps back down on his chair. Donghae coughs. “What?”

“Have you stopped for a second to think that maybe Jongwoon wouldn’t mind?” Kyuhyun raises an eyebrow. Hyukjae smirks automatically. Finally, someone is on his side. He knew he could trust his beloved best friend— “Seeing as they’re both completely nuts and all that.”

“Yah!” Hyukjae exclaims, instantly forgetting any nice thought he might have had about this traitor in front of him. Nuts? How dare he—

“Shut up, Hyukjae,” Heechul cuts his unborn rant off before it can even start. “Donghae isn’t completely wrong.”

“Yes, he is,” Kyuhyun screeches for the third time. “Have you even asked him out on a date? What did you tell him? He probably thinks you’re luring him here with coffee to copy his homework.”

“Okay, first of all, I haven’t copied his homework since high school,” Hyukjae says, because that was more or less three years ago, and they didn’t even choose the same major, so what would Jongwoon know about his homework, and because Kyuhyun is the devil. Put quite simply. “Second of all, if I called this a date, I would’ve ruined the surprise.”

“What surprise,” Heechul grunts in the background. “He wouldn’t have believed you anyway.”

Hyukjae raises an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”

“You do kinda about it, to be fair,” Donghae adds, cautious, as if he’s still scared Hyukjae will jump him. And he’s right to be scared. Jumping Donghae looks extremely tempting at the moment. “To an extent.”

“I literally have no idea what you idiots are yapping about.”

“Do you or do you not tell him you love him every single time he does anything remotely nice for you?” Heechul clears his throat, then stares right into Hyukjae’s eyes. “Then his face goes red, you laugh to yourself and say he’s oh so adorable, and he’s forced to sweat out his gay panic away from you with the excuse he has to go to the bathroom.”

Hyukjae pauses. Donghae’s mouth is a thin line of despair.

“Is that why he’s been peeing so much?”

“Oh my God,” Kyuhyun exhales, thumping his head against the table. Heechul shakes his head. Donghae pats Kyuhyun’s back. “I can’t believe this is what I have to deal with.”

“How was I supposed to know?” Hyukjae blurts, the panic starting to settle in. Are they ing with him? Is that what’s going on? “I’ve always done it. Even before my awakening.”

Donghae lets out a heavy sigh. “And you don’t see anything wrong with that?”

“No?” Hyukjae tries.

“Sometimes I’m ashamed of calling you my best friend,” is Donghae’s diplomatic response.

“I—”

“And, and you’re always teasing him about all sorts of things,” Kyuhyun continues with even more determination, as if there’s anything in it for him at all. “Like, how he color codes his