--

“For the last time, Donghae, you are not feeding our baby.” Eunhyuk gathers all the strength he has left to roll his eyes. It’s bad enough having to get up and make the baby formula in the middle of the night since Yuki decided to wake them up with her screaming, but when Donghae once again insists that it’d be easier if he just feeds her, Eunhyuk swears he’s almost going to lose it.

“Why not?” his partner asks indignantly, as if this were the first time they’re having this conversation.

“‘Why?’ Because it’s weird and creepy and you’re a man, which means you don’t have s or milk.” He says, though Donghae won’t have any of it.

“Oh, what’s the big deal?” he asks.

“Donghae, I’m not having this conversation with you again.” He checks the formula to see if it’s too hot. When he decides it’s fine, he goes to their daughter’s room to feed her and Donghae follows suit, arguing with him all the while.

“Oh, come on,” he says, “it’s okay for you to on my s, but not for the baby?”

Eunhyuk stops right in front of the baby’s room and turns to look at his wife, his face blank and serious. “That’s it. You are never going anywhere near our baby ever again.”

He shuts the door to prevent Donghae from going in with him, but he’s too tired to lock it so Donghae comes in anyway. “Hyukjae, you’re being too uptight about this. feeding is a natural thing.”

“Not if it’s someone with a doing it.” Eunhyuk flinches a little when he realizes he just said ‘’ in front of their week-old daughter. “Look, Donghae, if you want Yuki to be fed so badly, then get Suzy to put her milk in a bottle.”

“That’s gonna be one awkward conversation, but fine.” Donghae seems perfectly okay with this suggestion and leaves. Eunhyuk wishes he had thought of saying it sooner.

--

When Heechul kisses Gunhee goodbye and leaves for work in the morning, he dreads the rest of the day like usual, but today he realizes that he’s got double the reason to hate his job. The school’s vice principal, Leeteuk, or Jungsoo as Heechul’s referred to him ever since they drunkenly hooked up at a faculty party, informed him a few weeks ago that they were going to find an assistant for him in class. Just to help out and do the stuff that Heechul has no patience for—that kind of .

Jungsoo texted him last night and said that they found someone. Heechul is definitely not looking forward to some stranger hanging around while he teaches (or tries to teach) art to his students. Unless he’s cute. Then they may be able to compromise.

A few minutes before class starts, Jungsoo comes in to introduce him to his new assistant. He goes on about how he’s a former student and once he heard that he’s going to be around Heechul all the time, he was beyond excited and some other things that Heechul didn’t hear (he’s learned to drown out Jungsoo’s talkativeness a long time ago). Finally, Heechul tells him to bring the er in. If he had known who it was, he would have used a much harsher word than ‘er’.

“Hi Chullie!” Sungmin hops in—Heechul almost doesn’t recognize him since he’s wearing boy clothes—and kisses his cheek. “Looks like we’re going to be working together? Isn’t that fabulous?”

Heechul doesn’t have to look in Sungmin’s eyes to know that the little plans to make this experience for him anything but fabulous. “Dear God, please tell me you’re joking.”

When he realizes this is really happening, he stands up and decides he has a bone to pick with someone.

--

“Why do I have a feeling you’re responsible for this?” Heechul barges in the Math teacher’s room, while he’s in the middle of class for God’s sake, and confronts him. None of the students look surprised—Heechul usually has a temper tantrum like this at least once a day. “I swear, Cho, you are dead meat to me.”

Kyuhyun smirks and continues to write formulas on the board. “Do you realize you’ve been saying that to me for the last some-odd years and nothing ever happens?”

“What’s the big idea bringing your wife to our workplace? Isn’t it enough that he torments me on a daily basis? Now he has to bug me while I’m working too?” he complains, even more upset that Kyuhyun is taking this so lightly.

“Oh, shut up, you love Sungmin.” Kyuhyun dusts the chalk off his hands. “And so do I. Which is why I got him this job. He wants to work, Heechul, and if working means getting on your nerves every minute, then so be it.”

“There you are.” Sungmin comes in, having lost Heechul when the latter stormed off in such a huff. “Hi Kyu,” he kisses his husband’s cheek, “Working hard?”

“Hardly working.” He laughs at his own joke. He’s been wanting to say that for a long time now. “How’s your first day so far?”

“I wouldn’t know. The teacher fled as soon as he saw me.” He says, throwing Heechul a look. “I guess I have that effect on people.”

“Not on me,” Kyuhyun tugs on Sungmin’s necktie and pulls him closer so their chests are touching. “The only effect you have on me is in my—”

“If you two in front of the whole class, can I report you two so you can both get fired?” Heechul asks, grinning eagerly. The couple both give him their nastiest glares, but he makes a point. Kyuhyun had completely forgotten that he was in the middle of teaching a class.

Clearing his throat and trying to fix his chair in a position that would hide the growing tent in his crotch, Kyuhyun is just about to say something to his students, but they beat him to it.

“Mr. Cho, is this your boyfriend?”

“Is this going to be on the test?”

“Mr. Cho, are you a top or a bottom?”

Sungmin actually almost chokes at that last one.

As he stares into those lifeless eyes on his students, Kyuhyun begins to realize that none of these kids would care if he ran out with Sungmin and disappeared for fifteen minutes, and so he just does that, ultimately leaving them in Heechul’s hands.

“Cover for me.” He tells the annoyed art teacher.

Heechul stands there awkwardly for a minute, before muttering a few words, most of them curse words, and slowly making his way out of the room to get away from all the teenagers’ emotionless eyes. Have teenagers always been this creepy?

--

Eunhyuk has just finished packing all the things Yuki is going to need when they drop her off at Suzy’s when Donghae comes in and waves a bottle of milk at him. “Here. I tasted it and it’s cooled down a bit. Yuki likes it this way.”

“Oh, you made the formula?” he asks, smiling as he takes the bottle from him. “Did you follow the instructions I have posted on the refrigerator door?”

 “No, this is from Suzy’s s.” Donghae reveals, making Eunhyuk squeak and drop the bottle on the carpeted floor in horror. Fortunately it’s still intact when Donghae picks it up.

“You could’ve worded that a little more nicely.” Eunhyuk grimaces and takes out a baby wipe to use on his tainted hands. “I’m not touching something that came from Suzy’s lady parts. You feed the baby.”

Donghae rolls his eyes. “I don’t get you, Hyukjae. You can touch and look at lady parts, but you’re such a wimp when it comes to touching something that comes from them.”

“For the record, the one time I had with a woman, I didn’t even touch her that much.” Hyukjae says, still grimacing. His expression suddenly changes when he realizes what Donghae had just said a few seconds again. “Wait a minute, did you say you tasted it?”

Donghae fixes Yuki’s blanket before feeding her. He simply shrugs at his husband’s question. “Yeah. Why?”

“Oh my God, Donghae, ew, ew, just ew, oh my God.” Eunhyuk’s fingers are literally curling in disgust. “Donghae, why would you do that? That’s Suzy’s milk. It came from her s. Oh my God, are you crazy?”

“Am I crazy? You’re the one who’s freaking out over nothing.” Donghae says. “It’s milk, Hyukjae. Natural milk. It’s as natural as the milk that comes from cows’ otters—which is kind of like their s, if you think about it.”

“You are so ruining milk for me.” Eunhyuk shuts his eyes and rubs his temples. “Did you tell Suzy that we’re dropping Yuki off later tonight?”

“Yes, I told her we’d be there at 8 o’clock sharp, so shower fast, okay?” Donghae coos at his daughter’s adorableness. He wipes some milk that drips on her chin with his thumb. “She is so freaking adorable, Hyukkie. Only we can make something as adorable as this.”

“Well, technically speaking, only one of us made that. Yuki is half one of us and half Suzy.” Eunhyuk says and bites his lip, as he had just stated a fact that makes them both quite depressed.

“Do you have to ruin everything, Hyukjae?” Donghae asks, exasperated. “Can’t we just pretend that Yuki is all us and that Suzy is nowhere in the picture?”

“How can I when you’re feeding our baby her milk?” he says dryly. Annoyed, Donghae clucks his tongue at him.

“You know what, let’s not bicker.” Eunhyuk cups Donghae’s face, smooshing it until his lips are sticking out like a big blowfish. “Tonight we’re going to have our first free night alone since forever and we shouldn’t be arguing.”

“You started it.” He says, his words all muffled because Eunhyuk is still cupping his cheeks.

“Oh, shut up.” He leaves a kiss on his puckered lips before letting go. “I’m gonna go hop in the shower now. Don’t forget to tape the dramas so we can watch them when we get back.”

“Hyukjae,” Donghae calls before the older man can step out of the room, “when did we become like this? When did we become so…boring?”

“What?” he asks, brows knitting together.

“Look at us. All we talk about is baby stuff and taping dramas—we used to be fun and—and spontaneous.” He says, cleaning up after Yuki has finished her bottle. “What happened to us?”

“Well, we’re old.” Eunhyuk shrugs. “Maybe not that old, but we’re certainly not teenagers anymore. We’ve matured. Well, I’ve matured anyway; you, on the other hand, still cuddle with your stuffed Nemo instead of your husband.”

“In my defense, at least Nemo doesn’t elbow me in his sleep.” Donghae sticks his tongue out, further proving Eunhyuk’s point. Before he tries to leave again, Donghae brings up something that’s been nagging at him for a while now. “Hyukjae, do you realize it’s been…well, I don’t want to go into specifics, but it’s been a while since we were…you know, intimate.”

“Why are you saying intimate instead of se—”

“Shh! Do you really want to corrupt our baby’s ears before she can even hold her own head up?”

Eunhyuk admits he has a point. “Donghae, it hasn’t been that long. The last time was…well…oh god, it has been a while, hasn’t it?”

“I didn’t think it was possible but,” Donghae puts his hand on Eunhyuk’s shoulder, as if he were delivering bad news, “I think we hit a dry spell.”

Eunhyuk sticks his lips out, not really puckering but more like pouting—dear god, Donghae hasn’t seen him pout like this since high school—and draws near enough to breathe on Donghae’s neck. “Come on, now, this isn’t a dry spell. This is being adults with a baby. This is parenthood.”

Donghae lightly pecks Yuki’s forehead before turning all of his attention to his husband. “I am actually very surprised you’re holding up so well. In high school, you wouldn’t have lasted this long without getting laid.”

“I know, I’m growing up.” He grins proudly. “Don’t worry, babe, we have plenty of time to catch up on all the y times we lost later tonight. Put on your best suit, okay?”

“My birthday suit?”

“That’s right.” Eunhyuk smirks and kisses his nose. “Okay, I’m gonna go shower now.”

Donghae stops him again just as he’s out the door. “Hyukjae?”

“What now?” he returns, looking slightly peeved.

“What did we used to talk about? You know, before we had a baby?” he asks as he starts putting away Yuki’s things.

Eunhyuk genuinely thinks about it for a minute, before shrugging, stumped. “I have no idea.”

--

There are people like Eunhyuk and Donghae, who have vastly matured (though not completely) since high school, and there are people like Sungmin and Heechul, who are still the same people they were six years ago. Whether or not that’s a bad thing is still up for debate.

“Ew, Donghae tasted Suzy’s milk.” Sungmin says, scrunching his nose at the very informant text message he just received from Eunhyuk.

“Ew,” is Heechul’s immediate response, followed by, “What did it taste like?”

“Hang on, let me ask.” Sungmin presses some keys on his phone, eyebrows knit together in concentration. Approximately thirty seconds later, Sungmin’s phone dings and he opens the new message. “He says it tastes like normal milk, but a little bitter. He also says we should definitely try it sometime.”

“How about no.” Heechul deadpans, busying himself by filing his nails. “Speaking of Suzy, have you noticed how she’s killing herself trying to lose those last few pregnancy pounds? I almost feel sorry for her.”

“Are you sure those are just pregnancy pounds? Or is it all the chocolate she kept—ah, correction, keeps eating?” Sungmin shakes his head, clucking his tongue. “Everybody knows it’s the latter. Judging by how badly she craved chocolate, I think it’s safe to say that Donghae’s the father. You know how much he loves chocolate.”

“By your logic, Gunhee is the father.” Heechul is quick to refute his friend’s theory. He all but blows a raspberry right at his fac. “Come on, that’s too weak. Everybody loves chocolate. We have to wait a few more years to really determine who the father is. But if that kid doesn’t develop double eyelids before she’s five, then she’s definitely Eunhyuk’s.”

Sungmin rolls his eyes—what else is new? “Let’s just wait and see if she has a brain.”

“How would that be of any help? Neither of those idiots have any brains.” Heechul turns to his class, who are all listening obediently. “I hope you’re all taking notes. This counts as an assignment.”

As Sungmin watches the whole class scribble on their notebooks, just as their teacher told them to, he realizes that this job may be easier than he thought (not that he thought it would be very difficult though). “Wow, you’ve really lost your passion for this job, haven’t you?”

“I don’t think I ever had any passion to begin with.”

“At least when you were teaching our batch, you acted like an actual teacher. Now you just grade kids by how good-looking they are.”

“You know about that?” Heechul’s eyes widened at being caught red-handed. But he was quick to save face as he cleared his throat. “Hey, who says I wasn’t already doing that before?”

Sungmin gasped, offended, “Is that why you gave me such a low grade?”

“Consider yourself lucky.” He laughed. “I gave Hyukjae an even lower grade.”

“And Siwon got the highest?”

“For the first half of the semester, yes.” He admitted casually. “But after we broke up, his grades took a little dive. Donghae’s grades however started to improve rapidly.”

Before Sungmin could whine about that revelation, a student in the class raised his hand and voiced out a good question.

“Mr. Kim, who’s Siwon?”

Another one added, “Were you dating a student?”

Heechul’s face paled. Sometimes he forgets that he shouldn’t talk too much or else he might end up in jail or something. “Um, no. If you could all just completely forget what you heard or what you think you heard a minute ago, that would be fantastic, thanks.”

Sungmin spotted a girl in the back staring at him with a look that he can’t quite recognize. “Chullie, why is that girl making googly eyes at me?”

Heechul took one look at said girl, and that was enough for him to make a deduction. “Haven’t you ever seen a schoolgirl with a crush before?”

“Only Hyukjae. And myself.” He says. “Jesus Christ, she’s waving.”

“Well, don’t have a panic attack. It’s just a silly teenage girl.” He says with a chuckle. “Don’t tell me you’re scared.”

“I’m not scared.” He scoffs, though the sweat on his forehead says otherwise. “So I suppose this means both boys and girls find me attractive.”

Heechul grimaced. “No, only Kyuhyun and only one girl finds you attractive. Period.”

“That’s still one more girl than you.”

“Hey, I’ll have you know that I’ve had a lot of female students show interest in me before.” He claims. “I enjoyed the adoration, not that I encouraged them.”

“Liar, liar,” he croons as he takes out the seating chart from the desk drawer. “Let’s see…oh, it says here her name is…Kim Saeun?”

“Saeun? Oh God, she has a reputation of…well…”

“Reputation of what?”

“Well, let’s just say the faculty members call her the ‘second Sungmin’.”

One of his eyebrows rise. “So she’s a ? Is she a good one?”

“You tell me.” He points his chin towards the student coming up to their desk with a wide grin on her face.

“Hi, I’m Saeun!”

“Hi, I’m terrified. Bye.”

Sungmin flees, and Heechul laughs. Heechul knew the self-proclaimed diva would freak.

--

“Wait, what do you mean you’re going out with her?” Heechul asks as he and Sungmin settle on a table by the window. “She’s a student.”

School has ended, which means Heechul and Sungmin are off work for the day, and they decided to get some coffee before going home. Six years ago, they would’ve stopped for a couple of milkshakes, but seeing as they’re older now, their tastes have matured (though both of them lace their coffees with way too much sugar). Kyuhyun has to stay late to check a couple of papers anyway and Sungmin was not willing to just sit and watch as he did such a boring task.

“You’re one to talk.” He says, shaking the packet of sugar in his hand. “You used to go out with us all the time when we were students. Don’t even get me started about Siwon.”

Heechul frowns at the not-so-subtle jab, but doesn’t ponder on it too much. “But I thought Saeun terrified you.”

“She did. But during lunch, she cornered me in the hallway, and she wouldn’t shut up, and then I realized that she reminds me of…well, me. She’s like a little me. Only she needs more training in the area. I guess you could say she’s my -in-training.”

Heechul doesn’t quite know what to make of that. “Congratulations?”

“Thanks.” He grins—and it wasn’t the cheeky or devious kind of grin that he sees so often on Sungmin’s face. It’s a genuine, excited grin. “I can’t wait to tell Kyuhyun the great news.”

“That you have a girlfriend?”

“That I’m a mentor.”

--

“Sungmin got a -in-training. I’m so jealous.” Donghae says with a very big, very childish pout on his face as he reads the text on his phone. He repeatedly swats his husband’s arm while he’s driving just to get him to empathize with him.

“A what?” Eunhyuk asks, taking his eyes off the road for a quick second to look at him strangely.

“A -in-training, Hyukjae.” He continues to gripe. “He has one and all I have is a baby and a deadbeat husband. Phooey.”

Eunhyuk doesn’t take too kindly to that ‘deadbeat’ part. “Well, I’m sorry God inflicted such hideousness on your life. Remind me to talk to him about that when I include you and Yuki in my prayers tonight.”

“You’re being sarcastic again.” He says, scowling.

“And you’re being Captain Obvious again.” He smirks and pulls up in front of Suzy’s house. “Oh, stop looking at me like that. We’re here.”

“I’ll get Yuki, you get her stuff.” Donghae says as he unbuckles his seatbelt. “Get ready, Hyukjae. This is it—we’re leaving our baby in her mother’s hands. Isn’t this kind of exciting in a way?”

“Actually, it feels kind of sad.” He admits as he slings the handle of Yuki’s baby bag over his shoulder.

“I know, I was bluffing.” He’s just relieved that Hyukjae feels the same way. “I don’t think I can do this, Hyukkie. I can’t leave our baby.”

“I don’t think I can either.” He sighs, leaning against the car as they contemplate on what to do next. “But we already made it all the way here.”

“Do you think it’s too late to cancel?” he asks, finding it very hard to take his eyes away from Yuki’s sleeping face. “I know we have to learn to be apart from her, but that time doesn’t have to be now, does it?”

“No.” Hyukjae smiles and kisses Donghae’s forehead. “Come on, let’s go back home. We can make some hot cocoa and curl up on the couch with Yuki to watch TV.”

Donghae puts their daughter back in her baby seat. “That sounds like heaven.”

--

Sorry I took so long with this one, guys :c had a really bad case of writer’s block, which I still haven’t completely overcome yet. I apologize for the lackluster writing ㅠㅠ