**This chapter contains mild ual content/references (skip the last section to avoid)

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            We did just that, met at the grocery store the following hour. The minute I saw him it was like my perception of him had been altered by what I had done in private—every time his pitch went up at the end of his sentences, that way it did when he would draw out his syllables in a mock-whine, my heart seemed to beat a little faster. His teasing smile was addictive. Everything about him seemed curious to me in a brand new way. I was mesmerized by him, and everything he said—no matter that he was making fun of me all the while—captured my interest. I was completely arrested by him…

            “Messy, what are you doing?” he said just then.

            “Hm?” I snapped out of it long enough to say.

            “I said olive oil. You brought back sesame oil. Are you stupid?”

            My cheeks fall pink. “Uh… yeah…”

            He flicked my forehead. “ ‘Yeah’? Yah~! That’s not something you should admit. Where’s your head today?”

            “I don’t… I don’t know. I’m fine. Really,” I say, forcing a smile that only comes out awkward. I am trying my best to avoid eye-contact with him. His intuitive powers are too formidable; I don’t want him to figure me out. I don’t want him to know that I’ve thought about him in a ual way—but even the act of hiding this secret makes me blush all the more.

            “You are so weird, Messy,” he says. “Come on, let’s get the rest of the stuff on the list. The right stuff, okay?”

            “Ne.”

            “Well? Go on,” Key says, handing me the bottle of sesame oil. “Take this back.”

            I nodded. “Ne.”

            "And get white wine, not red!" I heard him shout behind me.

           "Ne~!"

            “Tch. So weird…”      

* * *

            When we got back to the apartment, five filled bags later, Key went directly into the kitchen and started prepping like a culinary master. I helped taking the groceries out of the bags and handing him ingredients as he needed them, but mostly I wanted to watch him as much as possible. He’d brought an apron with him which, because of the cute pattern on the fabric, made him seem better housewife material than me—and it hit me then that it looked like he was the one making a meal for his yeobo and not me.

            “What can I do?” I finally ask, even though I preferred to watch him instead.

            “You? Anything that doesn’t involve sharp edges should be fine."

            I stick my tongue out at him. “I can handle a knife. What do you need cut?”

            “Please. You’ll end up hurting yourself—or worse, me. You can… here,” he said, handing me two onions, “peel these.”

            “I can cut them too…”

            “Do you know how?”

            “I’m not an idiot…”

            “No?” he smirked.

            “Ottoke~ you’re so mean to me today…” I pouted, though I really didn’t mind. Not one bit. Especially when he smiled at me—that smile. That beautiful, delicious, warm smile that spoke to me all the kind things he had a hard time formulating with his words.

            I took the onions obediently and began to work my way around the skin before cutting (sloppily) into the firm flesh. Immediately my eyes began to tear, and the more I sliced into it the more they burned, until eventually a few vagrant tears began to fall. Like an idiot, I rubbed my eyes with my hand—the same one I’d used to hold the onion stationary, so that now I had only made the stinging sensation worse than before.

            I dropped the knife on the counter. I was trying not to cuss, but it was hard.

            “Messy! What are you—” Key had only just seen that I was in pain and rushed over, pushing me to the sink, where he eased my hands off my face and placed them under the steady stream of cold water.

            “Wash them,” he directed, “quickly.”         

            I did. Meanwhile, Key took a washcloth and ran it under the faucet.

            “Now splash the water on your face.”

            I did that also. It was helping. Key wrung the washcloth over the sink and then put it over my eyes so I couldn’t see anything. The rest of my senses, however, had only been heightened. Given our close proximity, I could smell him; smell the floral scent of his perfume, his lotion and facial cream. It was only then, once the sensations in my eyes began to subside, that I felt his body behind mine; a new and different sensation then surfacing, one much more pleasant but terrifying all at once. Close like this, the contours of our bodies fitting so perfectly into the other, I felt paralyzed. There was no space to part us; his cheek against mine, his arms reaching around my shoulders, his chest pressed into my back and, being that he was taller than me, his hips seemed to fit into the small of my back like a missing puzzle piece, his pelvis aligned most seductively with the curve of my backside. It seemed, in this moment, that we were made to be complete each other this way, made to go together—and I felt my legs grow weak upon the realization of it.

            “Kibum…” I mutter, voice quiet and sparse. I didn’t want to say or do anything stupid, but for some reason I felt a great intense need to say his name that very second, as if the word was suffocating me from the inside.

            “Hm… ne?” he said softly in return. “Is it okay?”

            I know he’s talking about the damn onions. I just know it. But, for a second, I allow myself to imagine a more sensual meaning before giving into the reality of the situation. “Much better now. Thank you.”

            “Babo…” he said endearingly. “I knew onions would be too hard for you.”

* * *

            The rest of the afternoon went well, but mostly because I let Key do the majority of the work, just like he wanted.

            “Why did you choose this?” I eventually ask. I was sitting on the counter, legs crossed and swinging off the side.

            “Hm? Don’t you know? Jong loves chicken piccata,” he finally said.

            I didn’t know. I didn’t know at all. “Since when?”

            “Tch. Since always.”

            I was frowning now. How did I not know something so simple about my best friend? “Oh…”

            “Don’t look so down. Apparently there’s a lot of things to learn about each other still. That’s a good thing, since you’ll be spending the rest of your lives together,” he chuckled. “Otherwise, it’d just be boring.”

            A lot of stuff, indeed…

            “Say, Bummie…” I start, against my better judgment. I was curling my fingers around the edge of the counter as if holding on tighter would give me some kind of courage to ask what I really wanted to. “What… what was your friendship like in high school?”

            “Hm?” he replied as he stirred the pot on the stove. “What do you mean?”

            “I mean… can you tell me about it more? Like, the things you did together and stuff?” I left it ambiguous enough; I couldn’t outright say it.

            “What does any friendship look like?” he shrugged. “That’s how we were.”

            “That’s too boring. I want like a funny story or something, or…”

            “Or…?”           

            “I don’t know. Maybe a secret you guys shared?”

            “If I told you, it would hardly be a secret,” Key laughed, and then turned to point the wooden spoon at my face. “Are you asking me to betray his confidence?”

            I shook my head. “Ani~ nothing like that!”

            I knew he was only teasing me, but still, I felt guilty at the insinuation.

            “In twenty minutes, you need to put in the butter and the capers. Can you handle that?”

            “Yes,” I nodded. “Easy enough.”

            “Pfft. Easy like onions.”

            “Wait, are you—are you leaving?”

            “Of course I’m leaving. You don’t expect me to stay for your big night, do you?”

            “Big night? What big night?"   

            “Oh, please. I know what this is. You’re making a dinner.”

            My face was completely red. “Key! What! I—how do you—?”

            “Don’t be embarrassed. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to please your man, is there?”

            Kibum’s cursed intuition was a force to be reckoned with.

            “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I lied.

            “Don’t you? Hm. Okay. Whatever, Messy. Just—if you want my advice—don’t eat too much. It’ll… only make your anxiety heavier. Ne?”

            I was too busy looking at the floor to notice his playful expression. He was enjoying this conversation, though I didn’t know why.

            “It’s just… we haven’t… and I thought…”

            Key threw up his hands. “Ew, I don’t want to know.”

            “Hey, you just said it was nothing to be embarrassed over!”

            “That’s right—doesn’t mean I want to hear the details though.”

            “Now who’s the weird one?” I say with a sniff, privately wondering how “gross” heteroual experiences would be to a gay man. In my head it made sense, but in my heart, I still felt unsettled. Part of me wanted him to be interested. Part of me wanted him to . But these things I wouldn’t admit to myself until much later.

* * *

            “Woh, what the heck? It smells amazing in here,” I hear the voice of the love of my life ring out from the entryway.

            I run to meet him, wrapping my arms around his neck and planting a small peck on his lips. “Hi, I love you, how was your day,” I say all at once, my words exploding off my tongue. I was nervous. Nervous and guilty—and I didn’t know how to handle, or remedy, either one.

            “Squishy?” he smiled. “What’s all this? I’ve never seen you like this before… you’re—you’re glowing.”

            I kiss him again. “Hungry?”

            “Starving…”

            “I have a surprise for you,” I say, leading him by the hand into the dining room where the plates had already been set meticulously—by Key. The pot was also sitting there, the ladle beside it, so that after Jong sat down in his usual chair, I began to scoop a generous helping onto his plate, smiling all the while, watching as his expression turned from one of confusion to surprise.

            “You made this?”

            “Of course,” I answer, pouring him a glass of wine next. “Well, sorta…”

            “Sorta?”

            I put a smaller portion on my plate and sat down beside him. “I mean, Key helped. Okay, he did most of it.”

            “Key was here?”

            I nodded. “Yeah, he really is talented in so many ways~! We should start calling him ‘almighty.’ ”

            “Key was here?” he repeated. He hadn’t touched his food yet.

            “Well… yeah. What’s the matter? I thought you loved chicken piccata… you haven’t even tried it yet. I promise my efforts were minimal, so it should taste good.”

            Jonghyun put down his silverware. “I’m not hungry.”

            “Hm? You said you were starving just a minute ago…”

            “I said, I’m not hungry!”

            “Um… okay… did you have a bad day, yeobo?”

            “I—ugh, Raina, I’m sorry. Really.” He picked up his fork again. “This is all so sweet of you.”

            “I wanted to do something nice for you, Jong. You’ve been so stressed out lately, and I—well, I… I have another surprise for you when you’re ready.”

            “Oh?” he asked, interest barely piqued. 

            “Something a little like dessert…”

            “Hm.”

            I can see that it’s going to take more than my pathetic attempt at innuendo to get the message across. “But only I will be the one tasting it, if you know what I mean…”

            “Hm?” It was clear that he didn’t. Why would he? We'd never done anything remotely like this. He was used to his non-ual wife-to-be...

            I got up from my seat and stood behind him, wrapping my arms around his neck so that I could bend down to, after kissing his neck a few times, whisper in his ear, “I want to taste you for dessert…”

            I felt Jonghyun’s body go stiff, and though I couldn’t see his face, I knew it was suspended in shock.

            “Ra-raina… what?” was all he could manage.

            “You still don’t understand?” I pouted. 

            “No, I… I think I do…” he said in a breathy whisper. “But I’d love for you to show me if I’m right…”

            I pushed his chair away from the table and got down on my knees in front of him, parting his legs with my hands. “Something like this?”

            “Please, dear god, yes…”

            I like that he is turning into the male form of putty at the mere hint of service; it’s endearing somehow, sweet. He’s quite attractive in his suit and I take my time toying with the seam before ping his pants. I don’t know what’s given me this strange bout of confidence, but for some reason this seems to come naturally. Easily. I realize that my heart is beating fast, but not because of nerves, as much as excitement…

            I see him for the first time. Him. I’ve never actually seen a man like this before so close. It’s weird but enticing. I don’t really know what to do with it, but like watching him respond so sensitively to my every touch. I can see his face twist immediately, as if the simple of my finger was the most exhilarating thing he’d ever felt. Really? So sensitive?

            “R—”

            He’s beyond words now. How is this thing so easily pleased? I see that its leaking a little and wonder if this is normal. I assume so; I don’t want to ask because I don’t want to look stupid. I feel compelled to lean in and taste it, surprised to find that it really doesn’t have much of a taste at all.

            This really isn’t so bad, I think. I don’t know why I assumed anything else.

            I decide to jump in to the metaphorical pool, feet first: I opened my mouth slightly and took the tip inside, surprised when he buckled his strong body in defeat, and even more surprised when, after I took more of him, he grabbed my head for support and moved to a sensual rhythm I’d never in my life experienced first hand.

          I can tell it’s extremely pleasurable for him. I can tell he’s surrendered to a state of bliss I have never felt at the effort of another. It mesmerizes me, charges me, but the more I hear him, the faster we move together, the harder it becomes to push a certain image out of my head. Becomes harder to avoid the nagging whisper of a truth I did not want to confess:

         The person I was really thinking of doing this to—the person I really wanted—was Key…