At half past nine, after making sure that Taemin was already asleep and that Key wasn’t attempting an escape through the window, Onew finally got some time to himself. Trying to take advantage of it, he settled down with all his things in the dining room once again. The house was quiet so Onew had nothing to distract him from his last-minute revision (that most would say he didn’t need.)

For a long time, it was just like that. Silence, reading, a car speeding past the house every once in a while, reading again, checking the time. Nothing much was happening until Onew heard a creak in the stairways. It was a faint sound that Onew chose to ignore. Moments later, he heard some rattling sound near the front door and he immediately sprang onto his feet. He knew that Mrs. Kim kept baseball bats all around the house for easy access in the case of burglary. Finding one near the kitchen, he picked it up, carefully heading towards the dark living room.

Onew didn’t know what to expect really because if there was any break-in, the alarms would have been set off already. Then, what was the noise? He turned around a corner, staying close to the wall as he was unable to see anything in the darkness. He was only reaching the wall with all the switches when all of a sudden, a movement caught his eyes.

Everything that happened next, happened extremely fast. Onew caught sight of a human figure moving away from the door and started after it, shouting for it to stop. But before he could even reach it, he was run into by someone else from the back and Onew found himself pinned flat to the floor the very next second, the baseball bat far out of his reach.

“Let me go! I’ve already called the cops!” Onew lied, trying to scare the burglar (or burglars) away. He struggled hard to be released but the hold on him was too strong.

“No, you haven’t. You’re lying…” the man behind him said.

“Shut up, man. Just keep him down from doing anything stupid…” the other man said from somewhere else in the room. The lights in the living room came on just then and Onew could see Key’s feet coming down the stairs from where he was pinned down.

“Key, run!”

“What?” Key came to a stop at the foot of the stairs, backing a little before another pair of feet appeared in Onew’s vision.

“Key, get away! Take Taemin and call for help!” Onew shouted out desperately, trying to shake the man on his back off.

“Hyung! Help-” Key screamed out before his voice became muffled, his feet suddenly disappearing out of his vision. Onew was forced onto his feet then, his hands held tightly together at the back no matter how much he thrashed around to be released. He only stopped when he noticed the other masked man carrying Key on his shoulder over to where he stood.

“Stop fighting us or someone will get injured!” the man said, putting Key down (more like throwing him at Onew) before he staggered back. Onew’s hands were released and he wanted to make a run for the alarm, but he was stopped by the voice of the shorter burglar.

“Move and I will shoot you!” he barked, pointing the gun straight at Onew. He has always seen it only in the movies, but standing there, facing the end of the barrel like this- it was a fear like nothing else.

“No! You will have to go through me first!” Key said, jumping heroically before Onew, only to be pushed aside by him. No one’s getting shot today. Onew tried to assess the two masked men in front of him, to see if he could take them if they somehow got the gun away. Maybe. But it was too risky.

“We’re gonna tie you two up together…” the taller one said, moving towards them with a rope in his hands.

“Great, man. Why don’t you just tell them all our plans while you’re at it?” the other man said. Onew heard Key heave a sigh. He turned to check if Key was alright. He seemed to be. In fact, he seemed to be pretty alright to be in the situation. Or was he just shutting down in panic?

“You. Get closer to him!” the man with the gun ordered Key. Key took one step closer so that they were standing arm-to-arm.

“Closer! Hug him!” the man shouted suddenly, making all the others in the room jump. Key shot the man a glare, sidestepping behind Onew and wrapping his arms around his waist loosely. The other man immediately came up to start tying them up.

Onew watched perplexed as the man struggled with the ropes. The other man came to help, switching places after throwing certain colorful words at him. There is something fishy about all of this. Something so fishy.

“And a handcuff to secure this…” the man said, fastening the metal links to Onew’s left hand and Key’s right on Onew’s stomach.

“You two are ing geniuses, aren’t you?” Key commented drily. Onew elbowed Key on the side a little, chastising him for his brash words. They still had a gun, after all. It is never wise to play with fire like that. He couldn’t understand how Key could be so calm-

Wait a second.

“Key what’s going on?” Onew asked, eyeing the two burglars who had gotten into a serious conversation just a few moments ago. Now that Onew voiced the question though, their attention returned to them.

“We’re being taken hostage in my house, hyung…” Key answered, sounding a little distressed although Onew didn’t believe that it was because of the situation.

“Key, answer me properly! What the hell is going on?”

“Exactly what you see!”

“You two, quit it!” someone shouted. Onew ignored it and tried to crane his head as much as possible to look at Key.

“You’re not scared one bit! What’s going on? WHO ARE YOU TWO?!” Onew burst out, his assumption only being proven right with each passing second as he watched the burglars exchange a scared look. Onew couldn’t take it anymore. He charged forward, pulling Key together with him, coming to an abrupt stop when he heard Taemin’s voice.

“Whuzz goin on? Hyung?” the little boy asked, climbing down the stairs one at a time while rubbing his eyes. He walked right up to the shorter burglar, eyebrows furrowed a little.

“Jonghyunnie hyung?”

The burglars began to panic, hiding behind one another. Taemin seemed to think of it as a game and he began chasing after the both of them. Onew stood there, dumbstruck and completely overwhelmed.

“Stop it, Taemin! You two… DIMWITS! I give you one task. ONE SIMPLE TASK!” Key bellowed, right into Onew’s ears and just like that, everything became clear.

“Get. Us. Out. Of. These. Binds…” Onew said, having reached his patience’s end.

“Hyung… I-“ Key began.

“NOW!”

A whole lot of chaos later, Onew and Key stood facing the two young delinquents that ‘broke in’ to the house earlier that night, still handcuffed together although the ropes were gone.

“So what you’re telling me is that you hired two of your friends to break into your house, to threaten to shoot you, just so that you could spend a few hours bound to me? Let me ask you this, Key. How on earth is any of that romantic? HOW?!”

Key simply shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, avoiding Onew’s eyes.

“What were you thinking, Key?!” Onew chastised.

“Actually we didn’t break in. Key let us-“

“I wasn’t talking to you…”Onew barked at the other two.

The two boys sitting on the couch shrank even smaller into the couch. They were fifteen-year-olds with a water gun in their hands. How did Onew let himself be fooled by all that?!

“I just wanted to have your attention for a while…” Key mumbled under his breath. Well, he achieved what he wanted, he had all of Onew’s attention now. He lifted his right hand to his face, trying to rub the stress away.

“And you two! You mean to tell me that you used a standard, quality approved police handcuff on innocent people without at least checking if you had the key…”

“This one’s completely his fault. He was in charge of the cuffs…” the shorter boy, the one that Taemin had identified, said.

“I did have the key until we walked in…” the taller boy defended himself.

“Are you sure? You’re so forgetful these days, Ho…”

“I didn’t forget! It was right there in my back pocket…”

“Actually I can attest to that ‘cause I think I felt it when I was feeling him up earlier…” Jonghyun said, directly to Onew.

Onew tried to breathe calmly. It was so hard to push Onew to this level of rage but Key always managed it with no effort whatsoever. This time had been a grand evidence of just how much Key drove him up the wall.

“I don’t know what you’re going to do, but I want you two back here with the key before Mrs. Kim gets home. And when she does come home, all three of you are going to give her an elaborate explanation of what you did. Understood?”

Perhaps it was years of babysitting or videogaming, but Onew felt like he was good at this military-man-practicing-discipline business. It seemed to work too. The boys were up and out of the house before Onew could say ‘Go’.

With that out of the way, Onew went to pick up Taemin in the dining hall, where he had left him with a glass of milk and some cookies. He picked up the energized boy (thanks to the extra sugar and extra ‘playtime’) with his free hand, carefully balancing him as they walked up the stairs. Key followed wordlessly, what might be a first time occurrence in the boy’s life. He has never been this quiet. He has always had something to say. But for the first time, maybe he understood that he had gone a little overboard.

Okay. A lot.

Putting Taemin to bed this time was harder because the boy insisted on him to not only stay, but also to lie down with him. Somehow they managed to fit all three of them on the bed with Taemin being the little bundle of energy between them.

“Hyung, tell me a story! Tellmetellmetellmetellme!” he insisted incessantly until Onew gave in and started on his own made-up story to keep it interesting for Taemin. Key never spoke a word to interrupt him or anything. Onew kept talking even after Taemin had settled on his chest with a thumb in his mouth because he was still tossing around restlessly. After a few minutes of this and Onew starting to lose creative juices to keep his story going, Key finally stepped in, carefully pulling Taemin over onto his side, holding him close and blowing gently against his ear. That seemed to do the trick. Taemin stopped squirming and finally fell asleep.

Relieved, Onew was just about to get up off the bed when he remembered that he was still tied up to a certain someone. To a bratty certain someone that looked so… Onew’s breath caught in his throat, watching Key smiling down at Taemin; the boy was stubborn to not let his thumb be pulled out of his mouth even in sleep. Their eyes met and Onew was caught completely off guard. He had to look away, clearing his throat somewhat awkwardly before turning to Key again to sign to him his intentions of leaving.

Key had fallen silent again outside the room. He even tried to keep as much distance away from Onew, at least as much as he could avoid touching with the handcuffs on.

“Well, I’m just… going to study… I guess. You’ll just have to put up with it ‘cause you got yourself into this…” Onew said, leading the way to where his books were.

“Hyung, I’m sorry…” Key said, almost too soft to hear.

“What?” Onew asked, enjoying this too much. All those times being patient with Key’s nonsensical attempts at wooing him for the past year thinking that this moment would never come because of how proud the boy was, it was finally paying off!

“I said I’m sorry, hyung…” Key repeated a little louder.

“For what, Key?” Onew teased further.

“For trying to trick you like that…”

“So you’re sorry for what?”

“I’m sorry for trying to trick you, alright?” Key was pouting now, his head bowed sadly. Onew’s attention was drawn to the boy’s lips instantly and he felt this very deep urge to keep staring at it.

He saw those rosy buds utter something, but he wasn’t sure what because he hadn’t been paying attention.

“What?” Onew asked, looking away pointedly.

“Are you mad at me?” Key repeated himself.

“I… Yes… A little… Imagine what would’ve happened if I had really called the cops and they got here only to find out it was all a prank? What would you mother do then?” Onew said, trying to knock some sense into the boy. It seemed to work because Key’s head only bowed lower, hiding his face from Onew.

“I’m… sorry…” Key said, his voice sounding like he was about to cry, reminding Onew just how old this boy was and just how immature he was. So young and innocent no matter how much he tried to be otherwise. This is the Key that Onew had always loved the company of, as rare as that has been.

“It’s alright, Key. As long as you’ve learnt your lesson…” Onew said, ruffling Key’s hair with his free hand before guiding the other to sit down. His plan had been to study, true. But he doesn’t think he can do that with this Key beside him. So he thought he’d at least pretend. To give him something to do instead of twitch about awkwardly.

“Hyung, Jonghyun and Minho, they were only trying to help me… It was all really my fault… Would you… Can you please let them go? Just this once? I’ll take all the blame for it…” Key asked after a while, sliding Taemin’s unfinished mug of milk to him as if it was some peace offering. Onew pretended to think it over, exaggerating it.

“Hyung…” Key whined.

“Alright… alright… But you do realize that as long as we’re cuffed like this, I can’t save them right?”

“They’ll find the key, I promise. Don’t worry!” Key said, all excited again and forgetting about the cuff as he lifted his right hand to draw a cross over his heart. Onew laughed at Key’s shock when an extra limb followed his movement unexpectedly.

“Why, Key? Why me?” Onew asked, without even thinking. He turned red immediately after because he realized that he might not want to hear the answer after all. Key wasn’t doing any better himself.

“You’re just so… smart… And kind… And nice to everyone…” Key listed, looking down at the table. Without even making a conscious decision to, Onew found himself seeking out Key’s hand, interlocking their fingers.

“Is that all?”

Key seemed to be hesitating a little, chewing on his lower lip again.

“You… you’re also… kinda…sorta… beautiful…”Key finally said, flushing pink from the neck above. Onew’s heart seemed to experience a squeezing sensation from watching Key’s adorable confession.

“Just kind of?”

“Okay very!”

Onew laughed out loud at this.

“You’re cute, Key…”

“No, I’m not! I’m a grown up adult. I’m manly...” Key began to say, before Onew stopped him with a squeeze of their connected hands.

“I like cute Key…”

Key looked up at him in shock. Onew thought that this was as a good a time as any other. So why not just go for it?

“I also like honest Key, Taemin’s loving brother Key, dreamy Key, dancing Key, burning eggs Key and even to my own surprise, bratty teenager Key. Although I believe that you still have to work on the y Key ‘cause he’s just hilarious to me…”

The mood was lifted just like that. Key couldn’t even hide his grin while Onew tried to act as mature as he could about this. He could almost hear Key’s young heart fluttering. Or maybe that’s his own. Love is still too big a word for someone inexperienced as Key, especially to feel for someone that was four years older than him. But Onew thought that maybe in a few years time, they could work up to it. It seemed like a very promising idea.

“We’re sorry, Key! We searched everywhere! We could not find it!”

“Yeah, we went everywhere possible and-“

Jonghyun and Minho chose the perfect moment to come in and burst the bubble of peace. Key groaned almost painfully with his head on the table.

“You were out there for almost two hours! You couldn’t even find an alternative solution? Like a spare key or something??” Onew asked, looking down at his handcuff helplessly.

“Ummm… Yeah… Actually no, we didn’t…” Minho said, scratching the back of his head.

“Well, what do you suggest we do then?”

A very loud silence followed that question because that was the question of the hour now. Key’s mother will be back any moment now. What would she think if she saw her son cuffed to the babysitter? Oh god…

“Seriously Minho, try to think where it could’ve gone!” Key finally burst out.

“I’m telling you Key! It was in my back pocket. And then gone!”

“Did someone take it then?”

“The only person that’s touched my tonight is Jonghyun! And Taemin. It’s nowhere-“

“Wait, Taemin?! Oh my god, Taemin! Of course!” Key said, his eyes widening in shock as he dragged Onew off after him to run up the stairs.

“How was your night, Mrs. Kim?” Onew greeted the woman of the house when she returned home at half past one. She looked extremely tired because of how late it was. But fortunately for Key and Onew, that meant that they had had enough time to free themselves from their trap (the key had been in Taemin’s pocket the whole time), get both Minho and Jonghyun out and to erase all evidence of everything that had happened that night.

“It went really well, thank you for asking, Onew. Key, why aren’t you asleep yet?” she asked as she passed Key on the couch, ruffling his hair up before planting a kiss on his forehead. Key made a face at that that Onew simply had to laugh at.

“I was just keeping hyung company…” Key answered, getting off the couch and following Onew to pack up all his things to leave. They’d spent the whole time watching TV (holding hands and avoiding each other's eyes) and Onew had forgotten to pack it all up earlier. He watched Mrs. Kim walk out of the kitchen with a glass of water in her hands.

“Did the boys behave Onew? Especially this one…”

“Yes, they did, Mrs. Kim…” Onew answered, watching Key throw a warning glare to his mother to not embarrass him.

“Are you sure? Key wasn’t any trouble at all?” she asked suspiciously.

“No, ma’am. They were perfect little angels…” Onew said, avoiding Key’s eyes on purpose.

Mrs. Kim seemed impressed, giving Key a pat on his shoulder after passing Onew his payment for the night.

“Mom, I’ll just send him off…” Key said, obviously impatient to get away from his mother. Onew wished the woman his farewells before following Key to the door.

Outside, after the door was shut, the atmosphere somehow returned to the one that had surrounded them at the dining table during their… confessions? Key had his hands clasped at the back, rocking back and forth on his feet anxiously while Onew simply looked at him, not knowing what to do.

“Well…” Onew began.

“Well…” Key imitated, teeth sinking into his lower lip.

“Bye, Key…” Onew finally managed, taking steps backwards because otherwise he would never leave.

“Bye, hyung…” Key called after him, smiling just a little shyly. Onew turned around then, walking away before he was tempted into anything.

“Go home safely, hyung!” Key called out again, just when Onew had reached his bicycle. Something just snapped inside him with those words. He dropped his bag beside his bike, turning back and running to Key, not giving himself even a moment to think before he was right in front of Key, cradling his face with a hand as he leaned in for a kiss.

It didn’t even last for a few seconds but it felt like an eternity and still not enough. When he pulled away, Key had this shell-shocked expression on that made Onew laugh again.

“I’m sorry I stole your first kiss, Kibum…” Onew whispered to Key, kissing the tip of his nose once before letting go. He found Mrs. Kim standing at the doorway behind Key, arms crossed and an eyebrow raised.

“I expect a formal introduction next time, young man…” she said sternly, before cracking into a friendlier smile. Onew nodded reverently, smiling back politely, something that was really easy to do in his elated state. He jogged back to his bike, not hearing Key’s reply until he was already cycling away.

“That was not my first kiss! I’ve had plenty of kisses! I’m an experienced kisser!”

(A/N) The end! Ta-da!!!! XD Thank you for reading!!! <3