Learning sign language was going to be a lot more difficult than I thought, and I figured it was going to be pretty hard anyways. Of course I'd done my research, so I had a general idea of what I'd gotten myself into, but I also knew it was going to take time.

Tuesday morning I was actually awake before noon so I could make it to my class on time while still maintaining my fabulousness. I was wearing an outfit that I'd worn before, which isn't something I usually did, but I was saving my perfect clothes for later, when I was with Jiyong. The date and session were scheduled perfectly so I had just the right amount of time to get home, fix my hair, eat something that resembled food and be at Jiyong's apartment on time.

When I arrived at the community center twenty minutes earlier than I had originally planned, it was nice to know that I didn't waste my valuable time meeting other people taking the class, but instead filling out useless papers about my health, address, preexisting conditions, and so on. By the time I was done filling out the unnecessary papers, there were only five minutes left until the class started, so I made my way to the room it was in, which the receptionist told me was right down the hall.

There were a few people already in the room, none of them looking over the age of 30, and a kind looking woman walked over to me. She seemed very soft-spoken and was probably 25 years old.

"Hello, you must be Seunghyun," she said quietly and I nodded. "I spoke with you on the phone, right?"

"Yes, and I made sure to bring my hands with me." I even painted my nails a nice shade of silver. I figured that if I was going to be signing something I might as well make my hands look nice.

She laughed with a broad smile. "That's good to hear," she said. "I'm Mrs. Rivers but I tell everyone to call me Ms. Laura."

"That's a lovely name." Yeah, I was putting the charm on and I could tell it was working by the way she was smiling at me. First impressions were always important.

"Oh, you're going to be a great addition here," she said genuinely. "The class hasn't been around for very long so you haven't missed much, but I'll go over some things today; just in case."

"I really appreciate it."

"So Seunghyun, why did you decide to start learning ASL?"

"My boyfriend is deaf," I said nonchalantly. "It would just make a lot of things easier."

"That's sweet," she said. "Well let's begin, shall we?"

Ms. Laura moved to the front of the room and everyone got into a small circle, with me following suit. She explained that I was new and went over a few things. "First and foremost, ASL, or American Sign Language, has a strange syntax to it, like any other language. By the time this course is over you're going to sound like Yoda." That made me smile, along with some other people. "Also, prepositional phrases don't exist here, along with certain words. For example, if you wanted to say 'I went to church with my husband' and used the exact signed words, it would translate into 'I past go church with my boy-marriage.' And I don't know about you, but that doesn't make any sense to me."

She went on to explain that learning the alphabet first would be the most helpful thing to do when trying to learn ASL. Thankfully, I already had that down and was hardly listening when she went over them, only paying attention to the ones I weren't completely sure of. The rest of the session was spent learning common signs, going over the alphabet, and having an occasional daydream about something cute Jiyong did. I learned more in that day than I had over weeks of random Google searches, and I stored it into my mind for when I planned to surprise him. Ms. Laura was pretty ing cool, and I liked the hands-on way she taught. The rest of the class seemed to like her too and I thanked her many times over before leaving to go back home so I could fix my hair/outfit.

I knew Jiyong liked it when I kept my hair down, so I straightened it and went to work on my makeup instead, trying to highlight my eyes as much as possible without looking like a drag queen. My outfit was already picked out, I'd gotten it together the night before, so I had a gay moment and turned my radio on the pop station while I got everything together, creating a wild, colorful montage.

"Oh baby will you honk the night?" I sang along with Shakira, making my voice nasally like hers. "My hips don't lie and you know that I'm so fly. Well those aren't the lyrics, but I can't understand this with the nice hips." Screw correct lyrics; it's not like anyone knew what she was saying anyways.

Once my eyes were sparkling and my lips had just enough watermelon gloss on them to look kissable, I turned to Charlie, who was lying on my bed, and asked him what he thought. He just tilted his head to the side and blinked, but he didn't bark like a mad dog or walked away so I accepted it as an enthusiastic 'You look fabulous!' and went to get my date clothes on.

The final ensemble was rather bright, consisting of my silver nails, high-top Converse, and open, short-sleeved button-down shirt with a white tank top underneath along with white skinny jeans that made my look divine. Conceited or not, I knew I looked good and hopefully Jiyong would like it too.

_______________________________
 

I held another up shirt against Jiyong's delicate frame and watched him wrinkle his nose, signing the word 'bad.' It was one of the few I really knew, along with its opposite 'good' but he really didn't have to sign them for me. I could tell what he thought just by the look on his face. Even though I really liked the shirt I picked out for him, maybe it was too over the top or something, so I hung it back up and let him choose a different one.

We hadn't been in the mall for very long, yet I was beginning to feel like it was almost hopeless. As much as I liked Jiyong's hoodies, tattered jeans, and fingerless gloves, it wouldn't hurt him to try on something that made him look even better than he already did, but almost everything I tried to get him to wear he ended up hating. All I was trying to do was enhance his already enthralling beauty so everyone else would get to see how great he looked while I got to say 'He's mine.' Was that too much to ask?

Jiyong came back to me a moment later, holding something that was either dark gray or light black or dirty white. I couldn't tell.

No shades, darling. Color only.

Why?

Do I need to go on about that again?

He sighed, shaking his head, and I frowned. I was torturing him, I could tell, and I still hadn't found a nice middle ground that satisfied my need to make his eyes light up and his need to feel comfortable in his own skin. It was a challenge I was willing to take on, so I grabbed his hand, determined, and led him to a row of red shirts. I would find something that made both of us happy if it was the last thing I did.

While I was wondering whether a darker red, lighter red, or pinkish red would look the best on him, I felt Jiyong slip his soft hand into mine. I welcomed the feeling and used it to pull him closer to me, still trying to find him a nice shirt. I finally found one that was the exact shade of red that satisfied me, I handed it over to him. The pale man actually nodded and, my god, he smiled a real smile that I quickly returned, draping the shirt on my forearm for him to try on later. There were a few other good ones in that row, and I even found a black patterned one that was acceptable.

Almost all of the ones I picked out Jiyong agreed to try on, except for the one he found glitter on. That may or may not have been because I was trying to trick him into wearing it, just to see what it looked like; no I don't know why he even got that idea in the first place, silly boy.

I made him try them on in a certain order, going from my least favorite to my favorite so the anticipation built up. It wasn't surprising to find out that he looked good in all of the shirts and the few jeans we agreed on, but when he got to my ultimate favorite I may have died from containing a . The jeans were dark and more fitted than what he usually wore, and the dark red, long-sleeved shirt had nice white linings that accentuated his slim body was just tight enough to be y without it looking like he was trying too hard, and his eyes absolutely blazed with something I hadn't really seen before - He was confident.

I really like this one.

So do I.

The way he blushed when my eyes raked over him made me inwardly smile at his adorable awkwardness.

We spent the rest of our time at the mall debating what accessories went with Jiyong's outfits, eventually deciding that less is more and giving him simple chains to wear around his neck instead of something too flashy. When it came time to pay, however, Jiyong argued that I took on quite a challenge and certainly didn't need to pay for it. I countered him by saying that it was worth it because I got to look at him in his glorious new outfits but he didn't let it go until we concluded that it would be best to go half and half. He was such a gentleman about it.

It was about five o'clock by the time I dropped Jiyong off at his apartment. Of course, I walked him to the front door and gave him a very long kiss goodbye. I was going to go to the bar to see if Seungri and Bom needed any help after that, but then Jiyong invited me inside and all thoughts of leaving were utterly destroyed. Jiyong had a way of alluring me without knowing it himself, and the sweet, innocent look in his eyes made various parts of my body stop working correctly, including my legs, brain, and heart.

I followed him inside and up to his apartment, where he insisted on making me dinner to thank me for dealing with such a 'fashion disaster' as he called it. He let me watch him cook us a spaghetti dinner and I felt oddly warm and fuzzy, like I'd just read a multitude of cheesy romance novels. Jiyong was so cute, letting me taste the sauce he was using and smiling lopsidedly at me the whole time. He really didn't have to cook if he didn't want to, and I told him that, but he insisted and who was I to tell him no?

We had a lovely, quiet, TV-lit dinner with the occasional spaghetti sauce kiss here and there, and whatever he put in that sauce was delicious. Jiyong actually asked me if it was okay, as if the image of me scarfing it down wasn't enough to tell him that yes, it was okay, more than okay. I snuggled up next to him on his couch after we'd both finished eating, letting my body melt into his like it always did.

In no time, I'd captured his lips in mine in a way that our goodnight kiss hadn't satisfied, and sighed against his mouth. There was nothing I could think of doing that was better than kissing Kwon Jiyong, in his house, after he made me dinner. If that's not a good day, then I don't know what is.

We kissed for a long while and then just sat there talking for even longer. We talked about what it was like for him when he came out his last year of high school  -

It wasn't awful, just weird. First I was the deaf kid, and then I was the deaf gay kid.

We talked about how dogs ruled.

Charlie is so great. He's like a little me, only cuter and furry.

We talked about how gay marriage being illegal was completely ridiculous.

Haven't we already been over this with black people? Conservatives need to get over themselves.

I know, and besides, what's the worst that could happen?

I heard someone say that if everyone legalized gay marriage it would be like allowing people to marry dogs.

That doesn't even make sense.

Exactly.

We talked about whether avocados were fruits or vegetables.

They have a pit, like peaches, why would they be vegetables?

They're green.

Grapes are green. So are limes. And apples.

But cucumbers are green and they're vegetables.

Seunghyun, cucumbers are fruits.

No way.

I'm going to Google it.

We talked about nothing but still managed to cover most of the things we wanted to know about each other. I loved talking to him as much as I loved kissing him, even more if you could believe that. For someone who was so introverted, Jiyong was a really interesting person with such a strong personality that I was surprised no one else had snagged him yet. I was glad I'd gotten to him first though.

It was starting to get late, close to midnight, when I suggested that I go home and I was about to get my things when Jiyong tugged me back towards him, biting his lip. He had something he wanted to say and looked nervous, much different from the confidence he had earlier.

Will you stay tonight?

A/N: Sooooooooooooooooooooooo....what do you think? hehe comment, vote and subscribe, all those good things hehe.
ps- a big big big shout out to lapetitemort and atenais for always commenting and making my day. And to everyone who's been reading and commenting as well, thank you so so much!^^ //bows
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