It isn’t anymore a surprise the next morning that Baekhyun is flat on his bed, looking tired as his cell phone rings endlessly.

His roommate here in the dorm gets up and throws it to him without hesitating, stirring the man awake. “Yah, Chanyeol-ah!”

“It’s been ringing for ages, dude. It’s your wife,” he says before snickering out of the room.

He gets up lazily and answers, “Yeah?”

“Baekhyun-oppa,” because she has started using the oppa now. “Where are you?”

He yawns before immediately realizing he has taping today. “Oh my god, today’s the day isn’t it?”

She laughs. “You idiot, I can’t believe you forgot. Get your here, everyone’s getting impatient. You can drive already, right?”

“Better than you don’t worry,” he jokes, rubbing his neck and getting out of bed. “You live within the Gyeonggi province, don’t you?”

“She must be drawing to get the nervousness out of her.”
“Baekhyun looks like he’s going to perform on stage in front of a million crowd.”
“They’re definitely scared.”

The door opens for them, a younger man about his height answers it and bows his head, and yelling by his shoulder, “Mom, noona’s here!”

Baekhyun inhales deep and IU notices this so she slips her hand into his as they enter her home. “It’ll be all right. They’re not going to bite.”

He smiles at her coolly which gives away the lie. “I’m fine, really. Don’t worry.”

She giggles brightly before her own parents coming from the other room, her mother ahead followed by her husband, dawdling by the staircase. Beaming, she runs to her mother first, hugging her tightly then extending her arm to her father.

When the attention falls on him, Baekhyun automatically bends his body to a full 90 degree, arms by his side and at once adding, “Good morning.” IU parts from her parents and stands proudly beside him.

“We’ve been watching you on TV,” says her father enthusiastically. “It’s so glad to finally meet my son-in-law in person.”

He grins, still nodding and shaking their hands. “Yes, it’s wonderful meeting her parents. She really takes after you two.”

“Jieun’s really pretty, isn’t she?”

Baekhyun eyes his wife in the most surprised manner, and then she leans to him, punching his chest. He ends up chuckling and putting an arm over her shoulder. “Of course she is.”

*

Her father seemed very nice. 
(sighs) To be honest, (smile) I thought I was going to die. I now realize how difficult this stage of marriage is, when you go and visit her family yourself and you can’t help but try to be perfect because you’re afraid they’re going to tell you you can’t marry their daughter (laughs). But I was so happy he was nice to me. Jieun helped a lot.
(PD: Calling her by her first name, now?) Her mother insisted that I do so, and it feels weird but I like... (smiles) I like calling her Jieun. It stages up the level of relationship we have.

He says he likes calling you Jieun. 
(pouts) I don’t have a nickname for him, so that’s disturbing me a little. I thought of it once and asked myself if Bacon was fine but fans already call him that. I want a nickname that I can only use on him like how he’s the only one, aside from my family that uses Jieun (smiles).
(PD: Special names, and so do you consider him as family since he uses Jieun instead of IU)(laughs) Aigoo, he is my husband.

They sit together in the round table, Baekhyun between her and her younger brother who is two years younger than her as the parents are across them. They have fish for lunch and he can’t stop bowing his head in thanks and grinning his usual grins that IU puts her hand on his arm and he turns to her at once, a little to fast also that her eyes widens at the centimeters that keeps them parted.

“Yes?”

“Relax, okay?” she whispers too softly that not even the camera can hear.

“Oh whispering while having lunch.”
“Can we zoom in more on them? We can’t hear them.”

He nods, smiling and inhaling before taking a piece of his kimbap and feeds her, which she immediately takes a bite from. Her brother starts coughing as her mother beams at them.

“So... where did you grow up from, Baekhyun?”

He gulps, before looking at IU for backup. “I... I grew up in Bucheon, not far from here.”

“Finished high school?”

Proudly he bobs his head. “Yes, in a boys school, apparently.” She looks at him incredulously, their eyes meeting in a quick spark.

Her father laughs. “Jieun graduated from a girls school.”

“Anything else while you two are married? How does it feel having our lazy daughter?” questions her mother as IU scowls.

He chortles, covering his mouth with the back of his hand. He turns to his left and sees her, waiting there again to hear what kind of remarks it is. “I think she’s a wonderful wife. I want to take care of her all the time.” She bursts into laughter, poking his shoulder for it.

“You should go to college together,” suggests her father. IU continued refusing. “After all this fame thing.”

“That’s a wonderful id--- ” by his lap something hurts, a part of his skin pinched, so he bites his lip and shakes his head. “If Jieun ever wants to go to college, I will go with her.”

“Promise us,” says her mother and his eyes widen. That isn’t part of the script.

“I’ll try to do my best.” He leaves it as that.

The cameras switch off and it ends from there the episode but the two continue to talk in whispers, smiling and sharing jokes among themselves. After an hour or more, he starts helping to keep the kitchen tidy, getting the plates into the sink and the rest over there.

“You don’t have to, you know,” says his mother but he still insists because he doesn’t feel like sitting alone in the living room with her dad.

“That’s all right. Jieun and I will be washing the dishes,” he adds politely.

“They’re not filming anymore so it’s really not a problem.”

Baekhyun grins. “That’s okay, umma. I really want to help."

POSTER CREDITS: omithoalum@PRIMROSE