After weeks of barely making it on time, Jongdae decides to go straight to the biochem building after his Thursday voice lesson, and ends up overshooting his goal of being on time and arrives early. He plops himself down on a bench in the entrance hall and pulls out his laptop to while away the extra time. He barely finishes typing in his password when he startles at a voice saying his name.

“Hi, Jongdae.”

He looks up to see Joonmyun smiling at him, eyes crinkling good-naturedly from behind a pair of black-rimmed glasses and Jongdae almost falls off the bench.

“Oh, hi, Joon--er...” he responds awkwardly when he can’t decide how to address the TA.

“You can call me hyung, you know. Or just ‘Joonmyun,’ if we’re alone,” Joonmyun answers the unasked question and Jongdae feels like he just won one of those sweepstakes that nobody ever wins. “You’re early today,” he points out, bringing Jongdae back from the fantasies that had been drawn out at the fact Joonmyun had given him permission to drop honorifics.

Jongdae just nods, staring at the boxes Joonmyun is carrying rather than looking him in the eye. “Hey, if you’re not busy and you don’t mind...do you want to give me a hand with these?”

Jongdae practically leaps off the bench. “Sure,” he agrees, stuffing his laptop unceremoniously back into his bag and taking the box on top of the stack into his own arms.

“Thanks.”

They settle into silence as they make their way down the hall. Jongdae eyes the TA’s hair, which is gelled up today rather than tousled over his forehead as it was last week. “Your hair looks different today, hyung,” Jongdae ventures to say.

Joonmyun looks at him with something like surprise. “Is it a good ‘different’?”

Jongdae’s cheeks feel a little warmer as he replies, “Yeah. I like it.”

“Really? Thanks.” Joonmyun smiles at him again and Jongdae feels like the floor tiles have been replaced with fluffy clouds as he nods, returning the smile the best he can with a small one of his own.

Joonmyun faces forward again. “My girlfriend did say I look like the leader of a boyband,” he says suddenly.

Jongdae almost stops in the middle of the hallway. It’s only muscle memory that takes over as his legs continue to move. He laughs along with him, despite the feeling that the proverbial clouds he was walking on a second ago have disappeared and now he’s just proverbially free falling. He doesn’t know what he had been expecting. Joonmyun is older, very intelligent, very attractive, and very likely not even interested in men. He decides to blame Jongin. And Baekhyun. And simply his life being what it was.

Jongdae’s smile is a little more forced this time as he sets the box down on a lab bench. Joonmyun looks at him carefully for a moment as students begin to file in. “Thanks for the help.”

“No problem,” Jongdae says mechanically, and moves to sit next to Sehun, who’s becoming somewhat of a permanent fixture for a lab partner in this class.

Jongdae walks heavily to his friends’ apartment afterward, and Baekhyun opens the door in his underwear. “Oh hey, come in. I’m just gonna put on some pants.” He darts back to his bedroom and Jongdae lies down on the kitchen floor; he knows it’s a weird habit but the coolness of the tiles is soothing against his cheek. He closes his eyes as if it will somehow block out how dumb he feels for assuming Joonmyun was single, and especially for caring that he’s not. After barely a minute, the door opens again and Jongdae surges back to reality.

“Baekhyun-hyung!” Jongdae winces at the sound of Kyungsoo’s alarmed shout, but doesn’t open his eyes.

“Yeah, I’ll be right there,” he hears Baekhyun call back from his room.

“Baekhyun, there’s an unconscious Jongdae on the kitchen floor!”

“Oh. Yeah. That tends to happen.” Baekhyun’s voice sounds closer now. Jongdae scrunches his eyes closed tighter.

“Are you sure he’s okay?” asks a low voice Jongdae recognizes as Jongin’s.

“No, he’s probably not okay. He only does this when he’s upset.” Jongdae feels a socked foot nudge him in the side. “What happened, Jjongie?”

“Don’t,” Jongdae protests feebly as Baekhyun grabs hold of his arms and yanks him up off the floor. He only succeeds as far as pulling Jongdae into a sitting position. “I’m an idiot, that’s what happened.” Jongdae lets his head thunk back against the door of the fridge as Baekhyun slides down to the floor next to him, Kyungsoo still looking on in bewilderment from behind the counter next to Jongin. “Joonmyun has a girlfriend.”

Baekhyun immediately stands up again in shock. “What? That’s impossible.”

Jongdae shakes his head. “He clearly said ‘my girlfriend.’”

“But--”

“I can’t believe I thought I had a chance even for a second. I’m so pathetic,” Jongdae groans, sprawling out on the floor again in front of the fridge.

Baekhyun sighs. “You’re not pathetic, Jjongie, I’m sorry. I really hadn’t considered--”

“Not your fault,” Jongdae mumbles into his folded arms.

“Well...maybe you’ll feel better if I make dinner,” Kyungsoo offers. “But to do that, I need to get to the fridge.”

Jongdae sighs and drags himself into a chair as the door opens to finally admit Chanyeol, who takes one look at the four of them and says, “Let’s go out tonight.”

When no one looks immediately enthused, he urges, “Come on. It’s Thursday. No one has classes tomorrow, right?”

“I have chem lecture tomorrow,” Jongdae says.

Chanyeol pouts momentarily, then says, “But you’re gonna come with us anyway, right?”

“Okay,” Jongdae agrees resignedly. He’s well-used to being a third wheel to Baekhyun and Chanyeol (which he hears was previously Kyungsoo’s job, too) and assumes being the fifth wheel to all four of them shouldn’t be much different.

Hours later he’s sandwiched in between Jongin and Kyungsoo in the back seat of Chanyeol’s car, trying to avoid accidentally getting punched in the face by one of them as they attempt to choreograph a full out dance to every song that comes on despite sitting there with their seatbelts on. It’s a blessing when the car finally stops outside the most popular local club.

Kyungsoo and Jongin melt into the dance floor almost immediately, leaving Jongdae attached to Baekhyun and Chanyeol. “How about a drink?” Chanyeol suggests. “I’ll buy.”

Jongdae follows the pair over to the bar. Truthfully he doesn’t drink much and he isn’t much of a dancer, either. He mainly accompanies his friends to these places just so he isn’t left out.

He settles into a seat next to Baekhyun, who is scanning the room with a look on his face that makes Jongdae a bit nervous. “You look like you’re plotting something,” Jongdae comments. “Should I be worried?”

“Not unless you find the idea of me finding a very attractive guy for you to be worrying,” Baekhyun replies.

“Slightly...” Jongdae responds as Chanyeol practically shoves a glass into his hand.

“What about him?” Baekhyun says as his eyes lock onto some point at the opposite end of the bar. “The one with the reddish brown hair.”

Jongdae follows his line of sight and freezes with his glass halfway to his lips. “That’s Joonmyun!” He slams the drink back down on the counter and Baekhyun looks at him, confused. “My TA,” he clarifies, realizing he hadn’t actually mentioned Joonmyun’s name before.

“Really? Where?” asks Jongin, suddenly appearing behind Chanyeol along with Kyungsoo, already sweating and out of breath.

Jongdae points as if in a daze and Jongin swipes Jongdae’s drink off the counter and sips it. “Hey, I didn’t buy that for you,” Chanyeol chides, shoving Jongin who narrowly avoids splashing the contents of the glass onto Kyungsoo.

“Wow, Jongdae. You didn’t tell us he looked like the leader of a boyband,” Baekhyun comments and the others refocus their attention on Joonmyun.

“What’s he doing here?” asks Chanyeol, eyes widening almost comically. “Doesn’t he have like...papers to grade or something?”

Jongin shrugs. “He can’t be more than a couple years older than us. Maybe he wants to have a life too.”

“Do you think he’s here with his girlfriend?” Baekhyun ponders.

“Doesn’t...look...like it,” Jongdae chokes out as he sees Joonmyun shift back a little, revealing the man sitting next to him, whose fingers are intertwined tightly with his.

“Oh...” Baekhyun’s mouth falls open as the man leans in closer, unmistakably pressing his lips to Joonmyun’s. “Oh. Well then...”

Jongdae feels everyone’s eyes on him but he can’t seem to derail his own line of sight from Joonmyun. The kiss is quick, but to Jongdae, it seems to happen in slow motion. The other man pulls away and smiles, a dimple forming in one cheek that’s visible even from this distance, and he and Joonmyun stand up together.

Baekhyun is saying something else but Jongdae doesn’t hear it as Joonmyun turns around and ends up looking directly at Jongdae from across the bar. Jongdae knows he shouldn’t make eye contact--he should flick his gaze to some random point in the distance, act like he never noticed Joonmyun, but he can’t look away as the man next to him wraps an arm around his waist and they disappear into the crowd.

“I....what just happened?” Jongdae manages after what feels like hours but was probably only two seconds.

“I don’t think his girlfriend’s going to be too happy about that,” Kyungsoo says, still watching the spot where Joonmyun had been standing.

----

Jongdae wakes up slowly, not quite registering where he is until his hand clutches at something velvety and he remembers Baekhyun’s banana-pillow. He blinks his eyes open and scrabbles around the couch cushion for his phone, which informs him that he has about three minutes before he has to wake up to make it to chem on time. Determining that it won’t be any easier to get up three minutes from now, he switches his alarm off and tiredly tosses back the blanket Kyungsoo had given him for the night.

“Oh, good morning,” Kyungsoo’s voice calls softly from the kitchen. Jongdae looks over and a crown of black hair peeks over the counter. “Do you want some coffee?”

Jongdae gratefully accepts a mug and slides into a chair across from Kyungsoo. “Why are you up so early?”

Kyungsoo shrugs. “This is when I always wake up. I can’t really help it...I have a really strict internal clock or something.”

Jongdae laughs. “Lucky.” 

“It’s not always such a good thing,” Kyungsoo continues, setting down a mug of coffee for himself. “Sometimes I wish I could sleep in, not always be the first one awake.” There’s a short silence while his eyes dart briefly to the bedroom where Jongin is assumedly still asleep behind the closed door.

“I envy you anyway,” Jongdae says. In more ways than one, he adds silently, thinking of the way Jongin looks like he has the whole world in his arms when he holds Kyungsoo and kisses him and how he can’t seem to take his eyes off of him for too long, even when they’re part of a larger group.

Kyungsoo hasn’t mentioned anything that happened the day before or last night, but Joonmyun is all Jongdae sees in his barely-awake brain and he hardly notices he’s giving Kyungsoo the unsolicited narrative of his thoughts. “I feel...almost...betrayed or something, and I don’t even know why. This is ridiculous. I’m ridiculous.” Jongdae gulps his coffee, not caring that it’s still slightly too hot to drink comfortably. “I’m not supposed to feel this way about someone I had no chance with in the first place.”

Kyungsoo wraps his hands around his mug and smiles like someone a lot older than he is. “I think we rarely like the people we’re supposed to like, hyung.”

Jongdae the sugar off his lips. “Truer words were never spoken.”

“What I’m saying is...that’s not always a bad thing.”

Jongdae raises an eyebrow. “Are you sure?”

“I can’t make any promises, but I will say this: I am the only sensible one in this apartment. Or, well...Baekhyun can be serious when he wants to be, but that’s rare.”

Jongdae laughs. He stands up and gets ready quietly, so as not to disturb everyone who’s operating on a normal college student’s sleep schedule.

He slips out the door and makes it to the lecture hall just as the professor is pulling up her first powerpoint slide. He scrawls notes into his spiral-bound without really comprehending anything he’s writing. There might as well be a slide show of his recent memories up on the screen, because he can’t stop picturing Joonmyun kissing that other guy, who he was possibly dating or cheating on his girlfriend with or any number of other explanations. He eventually gives up on taking notes and rests his cheek tiredly on his fist as the professor drones on about molecular polarity. Why music majors are required to take lab sciences he will never understand. Only when she mentions something about a test does he snap back into focus.

“Hey, Sehun-ah.” Jongdae prods the freshman sitting next to him with the eraser end of his pencil. He looks up at Jongdae with sleepy eyes of his own. “Do you get how to do this?”

“Not really,” he admits and Jongdae’s panic rises. He had come to depend upon the younger boy to explain the concepts Jongdae misses during all his fits of daydreaming. “I was planning to go to office hours today for extra help.”

“Maybe I’ll go with you then?” Jongdae suggests, and Sehun nods in approval.

The professor doesn’t open her office until later in the afternoon, and it being a Friday, the entire academic side of campus is practically deserted by the time Jongdae goes to meet up with Sehun in the biochem building.

The younger boy complains about the unfavorable time slot as they traipse through the halls. Jongdae just nods in agreement as they reach the door of the office and Sehun steps inside first.

“Hi! Sehun, is it?” Jongdae hears a familiar voice ask Sehun and his whole body tenses.

He freezes in the doorway and Sehun looks back at him and his head as if to ask if he’s okay. Jongdae forces his legs to move the rest of the way into the room, but it suddenly feels like he’s trying to walk on top of a speeding train.

“Oh, hello Jongdae,” Joonmyun says when he enters fully. Jongdae offers a tight smile. “Well, I’m responsible for office hours this afternoon, so feel free to ask me any questions you may have and I will do my best to help you!” he says as if he rehearsed the line. Jongdae wouldn’t be surprised if he did. The thought threatens to make him laugh out loud and Jongdae wants to slap himself.

Sehun immediately launches into a complex discussion about atoms and molecules that Jongdae can barely follow, but he manages to scribble down the solutions whenever Joonmyun goes over a type of problem he doesn’t understand. He makes it a point to keep his gaze fixed on his notebook or Sehun and not Joonmyun, but can’t seem to stop his eyes from roaming now and then. As usual, Joonmyun is dressed more formally than the sweatpant-wearing crowd Jongdae is used to seeing. Today he has on a black sweater with the collar of the plaid shirt he’s wearing underneath peeking out at the top. His hair is parted to the side, silky reddish bangs swept down over half his forehead. Jongdae wants to reach out and smooth his fingers over them, but instead he bites down on his lips and writes out another problem.

“Does that help?” Joonmyun asks when Sehun has exhausted his list of problems he wanted explained and he nods gratefully. “What about you, Jongdae? Any other questions?”

Jongdae starts at being addressed directly. Up until now, he had mostly been observing. “Oh, um, no, I mean, I think that...um, helped. Thanks.” Sehun looks at him strangely and Jongdae tries to smile in what he hopes seems like a natural way.

Jongdae is first to leave the room. “Could one of you hold the door? I just have to bring these to the TA office,” Joonmyun says and Jongdae turns around as Sehun holds the door open for Joonmyun who’s once again carrying several boxes with a stack of papers balanced unsteadily on top.

The three of them enter the hallway and Sehun practically skips through the building at the prospect of his long-awaited weekend freedom. Jongdae has half a mind to do the same but he turns guiltily around again when he’s nearly at the end of the hallway.

“Do you want me to carry something?” he asks Joonmyun hesitantly.

“Thanks, but it’s ok. This is what I get paid for, after all.” The stack of papers promptly slides off of its box and litters the hallway with data tables. Joonmyun sighs. “On second thought, maybe I could use some help.”

Jongdae wordlessly bends down to scoop the papers back up into a neat stack, sticking them under his arm and following Joonmyun to the TA office. “Where do these go?” Jongdae asks when he sets foot in the room.

“Just on the desk is fine for now. Thank you,” Joonmyun says, tone oddly formal. He lowers the boxes to the floor before sliding them into their places on the shelf. 

Jongdae sets the stack of papers carefully down on the desk and heads back to the door.

“I know that you saw me last night, Jongdae.”

Jongdae stops walking, the elephant in the room finally recognized. “Don’t worry hyung, I won’t tell your girlfriend you kissed a guy,” he says dryly. “Although, homoism is becoming something like a trend lately. She might like it.”

Joonmyun straightens up and turns to face him. He’s sure that he just crossed some line and worries fleetingly that he’s about to get yelled at, but the seconds tick by and he doesn’t. He’s struck by the urge to apologize and promise to mind his own business and sprint out the door and switch to another chem class until he looks at the line of Joonmyun’s throat as he swallows, making his Adam’s apple bounce nervously and, Jongdae admits, attractively. His voice is surprisingly calm when he replies. “That guy you saw me with is a friend who I know very well. He had a few too many drinks last night. That’s all it was. I didn’t...reciprocate.”

Jongade bites his lip, unsure if he believes that. “Oh.”

“Also...I don’t have a girlfriend. I made that up.”

The sentence lands heavily on Jongdae’s ears. “Oh,” he says again, ‘oh’ seemingly the only syllable he’s capable of pronouncing at the moment. “Then...” he can’t quite formulate the question he wants to ask, thoughts blooming too quickly for him to latch onto just one.

Joonmyun holds his gaze on Jongdae, looking as if he’s undergoing some sort of internal conflict. Jongdae just stands there and fidgets with his hands in front of his body, waiting for some kind of further explanation. He starts to wonder if the conversation is over and he should leave, but the way Joonmyun is looking at him is magnetizing and it makes him stay where he is. “Honestly, I really shouldn’t even be saying this, but...I was attracted to you,” Joonmyun says finally.

The confession hits Jongdae like a rogue frisbee. Inside he feels like a sweepstakes winner again and he struggles not to let it show, vaguely aware of how easily Joonmyun’s opinion of him manipulates his emotions and hating himself for it. Schooling his face into the most neutral expression he can manage, he asks suspiciously, “‘Was?’ As in...past tense only?”

“N-No. Present tense applies, too.” Joonmyun looks at the floor. “You’re always helping me out, and you’re really...I just...I don’t know...I’m sorry.”

This time Jongdae loses the fight against the smile that pushes its way across his face. “Then why’d you lie?”

“I lied because...I was worried about getting too close to you,” Joonmyun answers after another long pause.

“But...” Jongdae starts and then trails off, unsure of where he was even planning to go with that sentence, it being more an expression of his disbelief than anything actually coherent.

“So now you know.” Joonmyun sighs. “If you want a restraining order, I--” he cuts off as Jongdae edges closer and takes one of Joonmyun’s trembling hands in his own.

“Hyung, stop,” Jongdae says. “I don’t want a restraining order.”  Joonmyun in a breath as Jongdae smooths his fingers through his hair like he’s been wanting to for more than a month. “I like you.”

Joonmyun’s lips are supple, warm as Jongdae meets them softly with his, and he feels something zip in his chest when Joonmyun doesn’t pull away. He slowly presses back against Jongdae, his lips parting to tenderly caress his own. Jongdae takes a chance and slides his tongue past the seam of his mouth, resting his hands lightly on the sides of Joonmyun’s arms. His eyes flutter open as he feels Joonmyun start to pull back, drawing him out of the fantasy he felt like he had fallen into when they kissed. The softened edges of his dream world begin to harden again as he realizes they’re still in an office and that technically, they’re not supposed to do this.

“Jongdae...this is a conflict of interest...we can’t...” he says weakly.

Jongdae drops his hands to his sides and takes a step back. “I know.”

“Then...I guess...we should...” Joonmyun says haltingly. His voice sounds like it might crack.

His lips are rose petal red and Jongdae just wants to kiss them again, so he does. The second kiss wastes no time in letting the edges of Jongdae’s world go hazy again, his lips parted against Joonmyun’s and tasting him with the fervor of someone who should hold back but knows that he won’t. Joonmyun shifts so his back is flat against the wall and Jongdae slips a hand into his hair again, less gentle this time. The locks are satiny under his fingers and he presses their bodies a little closer, nudging a knee between Joonmyun’s thighs. He makes a quiet breathy noise that Jongdae catches in his mouth and holds on his tongue as he affixes his lips to Joonmyun’s neck, pressing a tiny open-mouthed kiss to his Adam’s apple. Joonmyun’s hands slide over Jongdae’s shoulders, down to the small of his back to grip at his hips and tug him forward just a little more when their lips join again. Joonmyun’s tongue is slick against Jongdae’s, deepening the kiss further and Jongdae’s nerves are whirring when they finally break apart. He rests his forehead lightly on Joonmyun’s as he searches the older’s darkened eyes.

“What about...the conflict of interest?” Jongdae murmurs, a little short of breath.

“In my defense...” Joonmyun replies lowly, “I don’t grade your papers. Professor doesn’t trust me with that, I guess.”

Jongdae tilts his head back up and smiles.

“Still, though,” Joonmyun says, removing his hands from Jongdae’s hips, “we shouldn’t be, um...making out in here.”

“Right...” Jongdae agrees reluctantly, trying to regulate his breathing again. He steps back, clearing his throat in the now somewhat awkward silence.

“I hope you didn’t forget your promise, because I have a song request,” Joonmyun says quietly.

When Jongdae looks up at him, his cheeks are tinted with pink and he can’t help but chuckle at how adorable he looks when he’s embarrassed. It pulls a smirk onto his lips. “I didn’t forget. What can I sing for you, hyung?”

Joonmyun pauses. “Do you know...4men, Baby Baby?”

Jongdae doesn’t even offer a reply before he launches into the first verse of the song.

“I didn’t know the reason why I changed

I thought about it for a long time

After I met you, I think I changed a lot

As I hear this song...”

He glances nervously at the door and stops there, in case a professor or a staff member should walk by and ask why the hell there’s a kid singing a power ballad at the top of his lungs in the biochem TA office. He looks back at Joonmyun, who has his hands stuffed into his pockets with a kind of mystified expression on his face.

“Jongdae...” he exhales harshly. “That was...your voice is...” he trails off, apparently unable to find appropriate adjectives. “Wow,” he concludes. “I don’t know why you’re not famous.”

Jongdae laughs. “You know, my friend Baekhyun actually said you look like the leader of a boyband.”

“Oh?” Joonmyun raises his eyebrows. “And is he right?”

“Why are you asking? Your imaginary girlfriend apparently agrees.” Jongdae continues to dissolve into laughter.

Joonmyun looks embarrassed again. “Why’d you only sing the first verse?” he bursts out. “I assumed you promised me a whole song,” he says, suddenly looking concerned as he finally finishes shelving all the boxes.

Jongdae heaves his bag off the floor and slings it back over his shoulder. “That was a demo.”

“But...” Joonmyun pouts as Jongdae moves over to the desk and scrawls nine digits onto a sticky note.

Jongdae presses the paper into Joonmyun’s hand and closes it into a fist. “If you want the full version, you’ll have to call me at the end of the semester.”

___________________________________________________________________________________________________________

A/N: YEP I WON'T LIE, i'm still not over that time chenchen sang baby baby. I LOVE THAT SONG ♡

Thanks for reading you guys! I absolutely cherish every nice comment ;w;