“HYUKJAE!” Donghae slams open the sliding door that also happens to be the entrance to Hyukjae’s sacred room.

            “What?” An irritated reply greets him. Hyukjae is lounging on his bed with his feet on a Nemo plushie.

            “I want to fall in love!”

            Hyukjae chokes on the strawberry hard candy in his mouth. Donghae thumps him on the back.

            “Gah – That’s just making me choke moreeeaghhghghg.” Hyukjae curls up in a fetal position as he hacks up his phlegm and Donghae, unhelpfully, thumps him even harder.

            After Hyukjae’s face color is back to normal (“No longer blue, yay!” Donghae says), he turns his twitching face to his best friend.

            “What did you mean, you want to fall in love?”

            “Exactly what I said.” Donghae’s eyes has a manic gleam in them, and Hyukjae is more than scared.

            “And pray tell, why?”

            “It’s the new fad in our society, you know. I heard that falling in love is a wonderful feeling. It also makes you see rainbow unicorns and sparkling screen tones!” Donghae is waving his hands around excitedly, although Hyukjae cannot, for the life of him, understand the strange hand gestures he is making.

            “…You were reading my sister’s shoujo manga again, weren’t you?”

            “I find them very educational on matters of love.”

            “Right. I’m just going to wait for this strange phase of yours to pass.”

            “No, no! I’m perfectly serious about this, Hyukkie. And you’re going to have to help me fall in love.”

            Hyukjae is backed to the corner of his bed as Donghae clutches his shoulders in a vice-grip.

            “I’ll buy you strawberry milk for the next two months if you help me,” Donghae sing-songs.

            “…Fine. But I know I’m going to regret this.”

            “You what?”

            “I’m going to fall in love,” Donghae says again. He is greeted with blank stares from all around the lunch table.

            “What?” Everyone else choruses at the same time.

            “Are you guys deaf?” Hyukjae asks.

            “No, seriously. What do mean you’re going to fall in love?” Yesung individually pipes up.

            “LOVE. The fluffy, butterfly-ish feeling. You know, love,” Donghae elaborates.

            “…”

            Suddenly someone at their table keels over laughing like a hyena. Of course, only one person could do that.

            “Wait,” Heechul gasps, “You mean you two aren’t together?”

            “Huh?” He is rewarded with two blank faces from Donghae and Hyukjae.

            “This is simply priceless. Like, more priceless than that stupid commercial with that priceless tagline – “ Heechul keeps on going.

            “Wait, what?” Someone else finally catches on. It is, unexpectedly, Youngwoon. “You mean you guys aren’t dating each other?”

            Now Donghae and Hyukjae are sending panicked looks at each other.

            “Since when were we dating?” Hyukjae’s voice turned into a squeak at the last word.

            The whole cafeteria (or what feels like the whole cafeteria, at least) turns to them in disbelief. A silence descends.

            Chaos finally erupts. Girls are screaming with joy mixed with wails. It is kind of hard to explain, because Hyukjae can’t even understand what’s happening.

            “Eunhae isn’t real?” One girl hyperventilates, and then passes out.

            “Eunhae?” Donghae turns to Hyukjae. “What the hell is that?”

            Hyukjae just blushes and remains silent.

            “So who are you planning to fall in love with?” Hyukjae asks. He twiddles his thumbs, gazing at a tree outside the school window as if it’s the most interest thing in the world. After school activities are going on right now, but they’re just lazing around even though they should be practicing for their dance team.

            “…I didn’t get up to thinking about that part yet,” Donghae says. He gets a slap to the back of his head. “Ouch! I’ll get you for that, Hyukjae.”

            “What? How can you not know? How can you fall in love if you don’t have a person to love?”

            Donghae runs his hand contemplatively over his face. He’s hoping he looks cool doing that, but really, he just kind of looks like he is wiping his face from dirt and sweat. Hyukjae deigns not to comment.

            “Fine. I’ll just pick someone right now.” Donghae squeezes his eyes closed and extends his arm out randomly.

            “Yah! You almost poked my eye out!” An unfamiliar student snaps at him. Donghae opens his eyes again and grins.

            “Found you!”

            The student, however, has already rushed on forward. Hyukjae watched him walk away.

            “…I think I know him. Wait. Yes, I definitely do. That was Lee Sungmin, wasn’t it?” Hyukjae says.

            “He looks cute.” Donghae nods. “Yes, I shall fall in love with him.”

            Hyukjae just gives him this deadpan look. “You know that you can’t really force yourself to be in love with someone, right?”          

            Donghae smirks. “Watch me.”

            “Why. Out of all of the things you could’ve done, why this?” Hyukjae is uncomfortably smushed against a library shelf next to Donghae.

            Donghae adjusts the binoculars on his face.

            “Well, you know how the main character in a manga always observes her crush? Same idea,” Donghae chirps.

            “I don’t think this is the same thing.”

            Donghae slams his hand kind of painfully on Hyukjae’s cheeks in order to make him stop talking.

            “See, if I observe Sungmin like this, I will eventually develop feelings for him. Hopefully,” Donghae says.

            “No, Donghae. You’re not observing. You’re stalking him.”

            “Stalking? How could you accuse me of such a thing?” Donghae looks so innocent but Hyukjae is opening his mouth to object again. However, Donghae is suddenly tugging Hyukjae’s arm. “The target is moving! Go, go, go!”

            “So?” Hyukjae is catching his breath at a nearby lamppost after they have managed to follow Sungmin all over the city (seriously, Sungmin is a lot busier than both of them thought he was). “Any feelings yet?”

            “I thought I felt something when he was flipping someone over his head during his tae kwon do practice.” Donghae pauses. “Although maybe that was just fear. God, that was really something.”

            “Right? He looks so sweet and innocent on the outside, but then he just beats someone up without blinking an eye.” Hyukjae shudders.          

            Both of them look off into space (actually, to random passerbys, they see two teenage boys gaping at the moths flying around a lamppost, but that’s not the point) as their minds flashback to the terrifying scene of Sungmin throwing a guy twice his size to the wall.

            “…Maybe it’s not a good idea to keep stalking him,” Donghae says.

            “Hah! So you admit it!” Hyukjae crows.

...Whut did I just write? O_O lol.