Jongdae was rudely awakened by somebody springing onto his bed, instantly making him aware of the head-splitting headache that he had been sensibly trying to sleep off. “For god’s sake, Baekhyun,” he groaned, not bothering to turn around to check who the intruder was because he only knew one person who was that inconsiderate.

“Look at this,” Baekhyun said, holding up his phone in front of Jongdae’s face.

“I’m trying to sleep-”

“Shush.”

“I need to say something,” a very familiar voice said. . Jongdae stared at the drunken idiot making a complete fool of himself on the screen, quickly searching his fuzzy mind for bits and pieces of whatever he could recall from last night. He didn’t actually-

“I’m the idiot who fell in love with him,” the moron on the screen said, making Jongdae gape at him in stunned despair. He spent the next few minutes watching his 2D self dig his own grave while he silently chanted a prayer for the earth to open up and swallow him whole. If the grave he dug himself last night hadn’t reached China yet, that was.

“What do you think?” Baekhyun asked when the video ended, presumptuously lying himself down beside Jongdae on the bed.

Jongdae groaned in response, rolling onto his side to face away from Baekhyun, cradling his head as he tried to force himself to think of a way to fix his colossal slip-up despite the pounding headache that was from more than just a hangover now.

“Three years though,” Baekhyun said, chuckling to himself. He poked at Jongdae’s back. “Is this why you were turning puritan? Did love make you frigid?”

Jongdae elbowed roughly whatever he could reach, which felt like Baekhyun’s arm. “ off.”

“Hey, I was kidding,” Baekhyun said, sounding genuinely surprised.

Jongdae lightly massaged his forehead with the heels of his hands, exhaling a long breath as he tried to muster enough patience to deal with this situation. “Sometimes I can’t tell if you’re unbelievably spiteful or just plain stupid.”

There was a momentary pause before he felt Baekhyun shifting on the bed, possibly to face his back judging from the proximity of his voice. “I’m an . A complete douchebag. You know that better than anyone else.”

Jongdae sure as hell did but that wasn’t his main concern right now. “About what I said-”

“You were drunk,” Baekhyun interrupted.

Everything could be solved with a simple brushing off, according to Baekhyun’s logic. They could always blame the alcohol, or the drugs, or the hormones, something none of them supposedly had any control over so they would never have to take responsibility for anything. Jongdae should have known Baekhyun well enough by now to know that last night wouldn’t even leave the slightest dent on him.

“We all say stupid things when we’re drunk,” Baekhyun continued. “I mean, how many times have I told you I love you?”

Apparently Jongdae didn’t have to claw his way out of his self-dug grave; Baekhyun was shovelling the earth off for him. “Once.”

There was a slight pause. “It was a rhetorical question, but okay.”

“But you weren’t drunk,” Jongdae added.

Baekhyun shifted to rest his chin on Jongdae’s arm. “Are you talking about that imaginary conversation you had with me when I was high?”

“When you were half-asleep,” Jongdae said, nudging Baekhyun away so he could turn to lie on his back. “And I know for a fact that it happened.”

Baekhyun plopped his head back down on the pillow. “Was that really the only time I told you I love you?”

Jongdae nodded. “You didn’t word it in the nicest way either.”

“What did you say I said again?” Baekhyun asked, chuckling at what he remembered. “Didn’t I say I love you for me or something?”

Jongdae frowned. “My less one-track minded interpretation is that you love me for being stupidly servile.”

“Stupidly servile,” Baekhyun repeated, obviously amused. “But you’re not.”

“I think my drunk self really drove it home.”

“Tell it to my face,” Baekhyun said, rolling over to prop himself up on his arms so he could face Jongdae directly. “Tell me that you don’t like sleeping with me and you don’t want to be my go-to toy anymore.”

Jongdae mulled that over before shaking his head. “I’m not your toy. I’m your friend. I can’t not want to be something I’m not in the first place.”

“Precisely. We work on a barter system. I do what you want and you do what I want. If you’re stupidly servile, then so am I.”

“The stupid part is indisputable though,” Jongdae said, slapping a palm over his eyes as he remembered what brought Baekhyun to his room. “How many people saw that?”

“Saw what?”

“Me subjecting myself to ridicule.”

“I don’t know, let’s check the view count,” Baekhyun said, lying back down on the pillow and holding his phone up to look at the screen.

Jongdae felt his blood ran cold. He was simply asking how many people were at the party. “What view count?”

“On YouTube,” Baekhyun said, looking at his phone. “More than a hundred. That’s not too bad for a few hours.”

“I thought that was your video,” Jongdae said, moving to sit up in his shock but quickly returning his head to the pillow when the monster headache he had almost grown accustomed to threatened to hit him with full force, making him groan.

“Why would I record that?”

Jongdae waited for his newfound nausea to subside before responding. “Then where the hell were you?”

“Watching the show. Where else do you think I’d be?”

“Behind the camera,” Jongdae said pointedly.

“Nah, that wasn’t me.”

“Who was it then?” Jongdae asked, holding a hand out to Baekhyun.

Baekhyun gave the phone to him. “I don’t know.”

“Gay Asian guy drunk love confession at bar?” Jongdae spluttered, reading the video title. “That offends me more than it should.”

“It’s kind of funny though,” Baekhyun said, chuckling. “That’s all you’re reduced to on YouTube.”

“Please don’t tell me you came up with it.”

“No, I really didn’t post that video. Your name’s not in there but mine is. That can’t be good for my employability.”

“Yeah, your future employers would definitely look up a video of some drunk guy rambling at a bar.”

“Read the description. Apparently the drunk guy was confessing to some manwhore called Byun Baekhyun.”

“I guess you got the short end of the stick,” Jongdae said, frowning as he read the description of the video. “This is completely uncalled for.”

“Doesn’t bother me. It might bother my potential employers but-” Baekhyun gave an indifferent shrug.

“Did you piss someone off last night?” Jongdae asked, passing the phone back to Baekhyun. “Or did we both piss off someone who knows you but doesn’t know me?”

“I think everybody knows me after you announced my name to the world,” Baekhyun pointed out. “I don’t think it’s anything personal though. Someone probably uploaded that video just for kicks.”

“Someone who needs a life,” Jongdae muttered. “What happened last night anyway?”

“Other than your heartfelt confession?”

“What happened after I hurled on Chanyeol?”

“We left,” Baekhyun said simply. “Yixing didn’t want to risk you puking on anything else.”

“Is that all? I didn’t say anything stupid on the way home?”

“No, the other guy was keeping you in check.”

“What other guy? Tao?”

“No, he didn’t want anything to do with us. I’m talking about the champagne guy.”

Jongdae looked at him. “Your rando.”

“Yeah.”

“You got a rando last night.”

“Yeah.”

“After I literally confessed my guts out.”

“Drunkenly. Just because you did something doesn’t mean that my life has to stop.”

Jongdae nodded. What did he expect? At least Baekhyun wasn’t sleeping with weirdoes that he came across at god knows where. “Did you like him?”

“Yeah, he was nice. A bit vanilla though.”

“I thought you like vanilla.”

“No, you like vanilla,” Baekhyun said, throwing Jongdae a sideways glance. “That’s the downside of our barter system.”

Jongdae paused, recollecting one of their conversations from last night. “Did you cheat on me for the same reason that you cheated on your druggie ex?”

“No, Yixing asked me to sleep with him. You know that.”

“So if he didn’t then you wouldn’t have.”

Baekhyun shrugged. “He did, so that’s irrelevant.”

“I want to know what your standard is.”

Baekhyun eyed him contemplatively before propping himself up on one elbow. “You mean you want to sleep with me.”

“No, I’ve done that enough times.”

“But it’s been a while.”

“No,” Jongdae repeated, recognizing the look Baekhyun was giving him. He wished he could find that on-off switch on Baekhyun and set it to off forever. “I thought you had your rando last night.”

“He didn’t stay the night.”

“Huh. Now I really do feel like a toy.”

Baekhyun watched him for a while longer before settling back on the pillow. “When was the last time we did it? I can’t even remember.”

“When you were sleeping in my room. A few days before you told me you love me.”

“I can tell that’s a pivotal moment in your life, but toy my . We don’t even have .”

“And why is that?” Jongdae asked.

Baekhyun gave him an odd look. “Because you fell in love with me?”

“You haven’t been coming on to me like you used to,” Jongdae pointed out, unperturbed by the obvious dig. “I don’t mean that I want to sleep with you. I’m just wondering because it ended so abruptly.”

Baekhyun returned his gaze to the ceiling, seemingly deep in thought. After a long pause, he gave a soft sigh. “The idea of you sleeping with who I think you think I am offends me too much for it to be a regular thing.”

Jongdae stared at him for a full second before starting to laugh, forgetting for a moment that he was supposed to feel like run over , both mentally and physically.

Baekhyun frowned. “What’s so funny?”

“You,” Jongdae said, his laughter dying down to chuckles. “Can you get me that painkiller your ex gave you?”

“Why? What do you need it for?”

“I have a massive headache.”

“I can’t tell at all,” Baekhyun said, getting off the bed. “But now do you see why I liked that hippie?”

“Why?”

“He gave me the most practical gifts.”