Yifan’s mother was not helping with the wedding.

That was it. It was not going to happen. Chanyeol was not about to take the backseat on his own wedding, the event that he was already planning to tell everyone for as long as he could talk; it had to be perfect, and it was going to be done his way. Not by some old hag who met him four months ago and thinks she knows what’s best for him.

“Chanyeol, she wants to. Just let her help,” Yifan hissed in his ear. They were tailing the wedding planner Chanyeol hired, who was walking ahead in a mint green suit and pearly white loafers, making big hand gestures and muttering to himself about décor. One of Chanyeol’s hands was locked in Yifan’s bigger one, his other hand was curled into a fist in his jeans pocket.

“No. She wants everything blue. I hate blue.” Chanyeol was speaking in a whisper, not wanting Baekhyun to realize they were arguing. “Like she takes sick pride in your off-the-beaten-path uality.”

Baekhyun turned to them, he arms spread out wide, and smiled brightly, making Yifan lean his head away from Chanyeol’s, and therefore stalling the argument for later. “What do you think about carnations?” he asked. “They come in whites and oranges and reds, it would be great for your color scheme, doll.” He directed the questioning at Chanyeol, waving his hand behind him to indicate where bouquets could go.

“Aren’t carnations really… fluffy?” he asked, trying to imagine the flower. “And I was thinking more of flower assortments, like looking into a florist and selecting three or four different flowers.”

Baekhyun nodded and brought a manicured hand up to his chin. “Right, right… Are you two pronouncing your vows under an arch? Or just a stunning backdrop? Because there is this place downtown”—he made a noise that sounded like a ual moan of pleasure—“darling, you would love it. I’ll take you there.”

Baekhyun walked forward and started to herd them out of the villa. “But before we leave, is it a go on this place? I think it’s absolutely fabulous.”

“I don’t know.” Chanyeol’s tone was sassy. “Would your mother approve?” Chanyeol asked Yifan.

Baekhyun kept his smile, but flicked his eyes between the two of them. “You know, let’s put a pin in it,” he said, effectively cutting Yifan off, who opened his mouth for an angry retort. “It’s a difficult decision, anywho.”

Chanyeol gave Yifan stank eye as Baekhyun ushered them out of the beautiful room.

“Ah, Jongdae. Honey, you have to meet my new friends!” Baekhyun led them into a shop downtown that was decked out with beautiful silk fabrics and flowers that smelled like very strong, but pleasant, incense. Yifan closed the door after them and looks around, reaching out to brush his fingertips over a bright yellow fabric.

A man about Baekhyun’s height, with chiseled cheekbones and beautifully shaped lips came out from behind a counter, in chic black pants and a white dress-shirt. “New friends you made after the two you brought in earlier?” he asked Baekhyun in a teasing tone, making Baekhyun’s cheeks glow pink. “I think you’re abusing the ‘bring a friend, get a discount’ deal.”

Chanyeol looked between them and smiled a little. Jongdae turned his attention from Baekhyun to the two of them. “Very well, introduce me please,” Jongdae chimed and gave each of them a charming smile.

“This is Chanyeol.” Baekhyun motioned toward Chanyeol with a gallant wave of his hand. He did the same wave to Yifan. “And…” Baekhyun snapped his fingers. “And his fiancé.” Yifan flushed in embarrassment and annoyance, and Jongdae chuckled.

“Well, Chanyeol and Fiancé, what colors were you thinking? I tailor suits, dresses, I string arches, I make wonderful décor, all for a small fee of two thousand dollars and an invitation to the wedding.” Jongdae clasped his hands together and looked between them expectantly.

Chanyeol choked, and Yifan looked between Jongdae and Baekhyun with squinted eyes. Baekhyun’s original payment proposal was thirty-five hundred dollars and an invitation to the wedding.

“Do you two work together?” Yifan asked at the same time Chanyeol asked, “Do you have a portfolio we can see?”

In response, Baekhyun winked at Yifan and Jongdae smile and opened his arms. “Of course! Come, come.”

In the back room, there were at least six different sewing machines of different sizes, and cube bookshelves lined with stocks of fabrics and several other materials. Chanyeol looked around in interest before Jongdae seated him and Yifan in chairs and put a massive book in front of each of them. Eagerly, Chanyeol started flipping through, seeing sketches and measurements and notes, and then on the next pages, pictures of the finished suit on the wire model, and then the picture of the man himself wearing it. Chanyeol felt his smile widen as he looked at wedding dresses and everything, getting more excited by the second. He looked over at Yifan who had a pained smile on his face.

Yifan’s book was full of selfies.

“Excuse me, why are there…” Yifan motioned to his entire book. Jongdae turned from where Baekhyun was whispering something into his ear (that was making him blush).

“Hm, what, dear?” he asked and then peered at the book. “Oh! Because they’re happy customers.” Yifan nodded and turned another page, seeing a woman in her wedding dress with make-up running down her face.

“What about her?” he asked skeptically.

“Nerves, dearie. She was so nervous, but such a sweetheart.” He put a hand over his chest and closed his eyes at the memories. Yifan eyed him.

“Uh huh. So—” Chanyeol cut Yifan off.

“We get all of the services we want for two thousand dollars?” he asked.

“And an invitation,” Jongdae reminded.

“Yeah, that, but two thousand?”

“Two thousand.”

Chanyeol sat up straighter and kicked Yifan’s ankle under the table, silently telling him to do the same. “We’re marrying in September. What can you do for a fall wedding?”

Chanyeol flopped on top of Yifan after he finished his shower, letting his head fall into the crook of Yifan’s neck before he groaned. Yifan tugged the covers over them and his fingers up Chanyeol’s spine.

“How much you wanna bet Jongdae and Baekhyun are ing?” Yifan asked.

“No need to bet, we already know,” Chanyeol replied with a small laugh, his voice muffled by Yifan’s skin. Yifan chuckled and nodded.

“Hey, sorry about earlier. I’ll talk to my mom.” Chanyeol smiled against Yifan’s shoulder and kissed the skin.

“Thanks.”

They stayed quiet for a while. Then Yifan spoke up. “We’re still going black suits right? I’m not sure how I feel about orange—”

“When was the last time we talked about anything other than the wedding?” Chanyeol interjected, lifting his head. He put his arm over Yifan’s chest and set his chin on his wrist, gazing at Yifan’s tired face.

“Mm, I don’t know,” Yifan responded and lifted his own head to kiss Chanyeol’s nose. “My cousin got a cat. It’s this really really tiny Persian kitty, and I think it hates him,” he started, trying to initiate a non-wedding related conversation.

“I saw that on Facebook,” Chanyeol replied and rolled off of Yifan, lying next to him. “Sehun and Jongin got back together again.”

“I saw their Instagram updates,” Yifan responded with a yawn. “Demi Lovato has another tour going on.”

“Read her tweets.” Chanyeol put an arm over his eyes. “Apparently Republicans are taking over California.”

“Tumblr,” Yifan responded and then laughed. “Well , we’re boring now,” he added and turned his head to face Chanyeol, who was smiling widely.

“I think black suits, with festive ties and pocket squares.” He replied to Yifan’s earlier suggestion with a small laugh.

“We can’t even last five minutes,” Yifan expressed, still laughing to himself.

“What do you mean I can’t help with the wedding?” Yifan’s mother demanded, almost shrieking. “You’re my son!”

“Ma, I just, we just, Chanyeol wants—”

“It’s your fiancé isn’t it? I warned you about him! He’s not good enough for you, Yifan. I can see it in his eyes”—she, rather intimidatingly, gestured toward her own eyes—“that boy just wants your money!”

“Mom!” Yifan yelled back, waving his arms. “Chanyeol wanted me to make the decision,” he lied, “and I thought we’d do it on our own. If you’re going to be a ”—a betrayed gasp from his mom—“then don’t even bother coming!” Yifan turned and stomped out of his mom’s house.

Cake testing, Chanyeol decided, was his favorite thing in the world. People brought him slices of delicious cake and asked him to eat it all! He was in heaven!

“What do you think about a marble cake with maple frosting?” Jongdae asked from across the table. Chanyeol cracked an eye open and looked passed his own piece of Devil’s Food Cake and looked at Jongdae. For some reason, he had to tag along with everything now, because he had to be inspired (cue sparkles and jazz hands).

“Maple frosting sounds good.” It was Yifan who answered, which surprised Chanyeol, because he was about to say the same words, but then they didn’t come out of him. He covered his surprise by taking another bite of cake.

“What about white cake with it then? With the right filling, it can be quite festive,” Baekhyun interjected from his place to Jongdae’s right.

“What filling goes with maple?” Chanyeol asked after he swallowed his bite.

“Strawberry?” Jongdae.

“Raspberry.” Yifan.

“Spice cake with maple buttercream frosting as both topping and filling.” Baekhyun.

Chanyeol pointed his fork at their wedding planner, nodding. The rest of them nodded with him. Baekhyun turned to grab the attention of a lady at the counter, but Jongdae stomped on his foot, making Baekhyun shriek in pain and betrayal before muttering about no respect for suede. His suit today was pastel pink and soft yellow.

“We should finish the cake first, they might take it away when we make a decision,” Jongdae told him, and soon they were all nodding at Jongdae as they dug into their cake.

Back in the site they unofficially decided would be theirs, Chanyeol and Yifan were leaning against a far wall and watching as Jongdae practically twirled around the room, singing. Yifan turned to Chanyeol and muttered in his ear. “If any of our decorations are sparkly, I’m going to make an ugly face in the selfie.”

Chanyeol let out a small laugh and put his fingers over his lips. “I might not even be in the selfie,” he responded, making Yifan chuckle and return his eyes to Jongdae, who stopped twirling and had a notebook out. He was looking at the far wall, which had windows lining the white wall, and sketching it. He was still singing.

“Are we hiring a wedding singer for the reception?” Chanyeol asked. “Or a band?”

“I think Joonmyeon, Yixing, Lu Han, and Minseok are a string quartet now,” he responded. Chanyeol laughed.

“Weren’t they a rock band two months ago?”

“And before that, they swore they were acapella.”

“You have hella weird friends,” Chanyeol with a laugh.

“So do you,” Yifan retorted, watching as Jongdae pranced to another wall and started sketching that.

“Which of my friends are weird?” Chanyeol demanded.

Yifan motioned out toward Jongdae, and then to Baekhyun, who was rearranging chairs for the fifth time, skipping around in a baby blue suit.

“They aren’t my friends.” Chanyeol scoffed lightly.

“They think they are.”

“They’re just as much your friends as my friends,” Chanyeol protested.

“Oh please,” Yifan snorted. “They call me Fiancé, and they call you Chanyeol, Dear, Darling, Doll, and I think Baekhyun called you Sweetums once.”

“It’s not my fault I’m cuter than you,” Chanyeol said with a laugh, observing their hired staff. Yifan put his arm around Chanyeol’s waist and hummed.

“Seat them on either side of my mom,” Yifan said with an evil laugh. “Oh, she’ll hate that.”

The planning was almost done, much to everyone’s relief. (Except maybe Baekhyun’s, Yifan thought he saw him sniffling earlier as they went over finalizing most of the plans.) They had used up fourteen thousand dollars of their budget of fifteen. Yifan was checking things off and calculating numbers, and Chanyeol was hunched over a large piece of poster board that had circles drawn out around the paper, and then a large, rectangle at the top.

Most of the spots had names, but Chanyeol had erased and written over it so many times that in places it was difficult to see.

“Are you sure you want Sehun as your best man?” Yifan asked Chanyeol, glancing over at him as he ran his fingers through his hair and muttered to himself.

“Yeah, he was there when I proposed, remember?”

“That’s my point. He’ll probably snicker all through our vows too,” Yifan expressed and groaned before thinking of vows and groaning again. “Did you write your vows yet?”

Chanyeol looked up at him, slightly offended. “Baby, I wrote my vows the night after I proposed.” Yifan laughed and then realized Chanyeol wasn’t kidding, and slowly faded his laugh out.

“Oh, yeah, well”—he cleared his throat—“so did I.” Chanyeol half smiled at him.

“You might cry when you hear mine. Just like you did when I proposed~” he teased and eye-smiled, looking back at the seating arrangements. Yifan shoved Chanyeol’s shoulder.

“We promised not to bring that up anymore!” he protested with bright red cheeks. Chanyeol laughed and turned to Yifan, crudely imitating his cry face, and taking gasping breaths as he pretended to wipe his eye.

“Oh… my… God… Chanyeol… yes… yes, oh my God,” Chanyeol mimicked before bursting out in laughter, holding his stomach. “You were so cute!”

Yifan banged his forehead into the table, with a loud noise that sounded somewhere between a duck dying and a whine.

“Hey, Lu Han.” Yifan slid into Lu Han’s garage, where the man in question was sitting on a sofa shoved to the side, and Minseok, Yixing, and Joonmyeon were sitting on the floor playing Slap Jack.

“Hey, Yifan. Come to join us at last?” he asked and winked.

“What no.” He shook his head, and then his hands. Yixing looked up at him and also winked. Yifan pointed at him. “No.”

“Then what?” Lu Han asked with a small, chiming laughter.

“Well, Chanyeol and I haven’t hired music and I was wondering if you guys wanted to play?” he asked, running his hands through his hair. Joonmyeon laughed, and Minseok snorted.

“Play?” Lu Han reiterated and got off of the sofa, going to stand roughly in the center of the garage. The rest of the men joined him. “We don’t play.” Minseok shook his head, Yixing wagged his finger. “We dance.”

Before Yifan even knew what was happening, Sistar’s Touch Ma Body started playing and they all started dancing. He was in his car and on the road faster than he thought humanly possible.

A month and a half later, Baekhyun showed up at their house with a rusty orange suit and a black tie, with matching black loafers. He smiled at Chanyeol’s halfway styled hair and his shirt that was buttoned in all the wrong buttons.

“I’ve come to offer my services a last time,” Baekhyun told him and slid into the apartment without invitation. He looked around, clicked his tongue, and then motioned for Chanyeol to follow him. Chanyeol closed and locked the door and followed the man through his own home and into the bathroom (he didn’t know how Baekhyun knew where it was).

“Where’s Tall, Dark, and Handsome?” Baekhyun asked and started to fix Chanyeol’s shirt, easily buttoning and straightening. It took Chanyeol a moment to realize he meant Yifan.

“Oh, um, his mom’s,” he replied, handing Baekhyun a swirly patterned, autumn colored tie. Baekhyun flipped Chanyeol’s collar up, after Chanyeol leaned down, and started to expertly tie the tie.

“He having second thoughts?” Baekhyun asked. Chanyeol wondered if this was what it was like to have a hairdresser.

“No, he’s, uh, Yifan is getting ready over there, so we don’t see each other before the wedding,” he elaborated, allowing Baekhyun to push him down to sit in the toilet. He grabbed a hairdryer and started to fix Chanyeol’s hair.

“Good, because I sent Jongdae over there to help him.”

Chanyeol couldn’t even be surprised.

“Fiancé, darling, sit still. I’m only trying to help you,” Jongdae insisted, trying to stick the curling iron in Yifan’s hair. Yifan moved his head away.

“I don’t want my hair curled for my wedding!” he protested.

“I’m not curling, I’m fluffing,” Jongdae said, exasperated. “Sit still or I’ll burn your ear,” he threatened after Yifan dodged him again. Almost immediately, Yifan went still. Jongdae smiled sweetly and started the fixing process.

He fluffed and sprayed Yifan’s hair, and was helping him tie his dark crimson tie when Yifan’s mom pounded on the door. “Yifan! What are you doing in there?” she hollered. Yifan huffed.

“Getting ready, Ma!”

“With another man I haven’t met?”

Jongdae’s lips quirked up.

“Go away, Ma!”

Jongdae finished the tie and got Yifan’s black jacket, brushing it off. Before handing it to Yifan.

“Open this door!” she demanded. Jongdae stared at the door.

“You said she’s how old?” he asked as Yifan slipped the jacket on.

“Fifty-seven,” Yifan reminded him, letting Jongdae fix his collar.

“She has the lung capacity of a wailing toddler,” Jongdae muttered.

Yifan decided he liked Jongdae.

“So are you going to like, cry again?” Sehun asked Yifan boredly, leaning against the door to the wedding hall, waiting for everyone to settle down and his cue to go in. He was holding a bouquet of daisies, carnations, and some other flowers Yifan didn’t recognize. Chanyeol was in charge of flowers.

“No,” Yifan protested gruffly. Sehun cracked a smile.

“For your sake, I hope your eyeliner’s waterproof,” he teased before pushing himself off the wall and walking down to the other door, which Chanyeol was going to enter through. Yifan closed his eyes for a brief moment.

“Good luck, remember that it’s not a weakness to read your vows from your card, and, uh, put the ring on the left hand,” Jongdae started saying by his shoulder, startling Yifan. Jongdae brushed Yifan’s suit again before nodding and sniffling. “Ah, weddings are so beautiful.”

Baekhyun showed up out of nowhere, and the two went through the doors to find their seats, their orange and brown suits complimenting each other perfectly.

Chanyeol was freaking out. One of his shoes was tied slightly tighter than the other, neither Sehun, Kyungsoo, nor Chanyeol could find Jongin, Baekhyun said the band still hadn’t checked in yet, and the wedding was going to officially start in ten minutes.

“Calm down, dude, just, like, take a chill pill, yeah?” Sehun put his hands on Chanyeol’s shoulders. “Jongin’s probably taking a dump or something.”

“I checked the bathroom.”

“He’s probably helping old ladies into their seats,” Sehun said in the same tone as his previous statement. “If he’s not here in time, who ing cares? He’s not that cool anyway.”

“But Yifan has three groomsmen, it wouldn’t be balanced.”

“So kick the Chinese boy off the stand. Boo hoo.”

“Which one?”

“Whichever ing one is on the edge, I don’t know, they both look the same.”

Kyungsoo came jogging back, tugging Jongin by his ear. “Found this motherer trying to flirt up some waitress.”

“Some waitress?” Sehun demanded and turned to Jongin. “Why the were you, like, flirting when one: you’re at a mothering wedding, and two: you’re mother ing taken?” Sehun said the last part slowly, eyeing Jongin.

Jongin swallowed hard. “I uh, she flirted with me first!” Jongin tried to save himself, throwing his hands up in surrender. Sehun clenched and unclenched his teeth.

“I’m not going to hit you because I’m at a wedding right now,” he said slowly, making direct eye contact with Jongin and fixing his blazer. “But when we get home, you will pay for ‘some waitress.’”

Chanyeol and Kyungsoo watched nervously. Jongin was about to say something else, but Baekhyun came over. “You’re about to go in. The doors will open when it’s time. Good luck.”

Baekhyun skipped away to go tell Yifan the same thing, and then disappeared into the large room.

“I promise to bring you chicken soup when you’re sick, to laugh when you laugh, to not get angry at little things, and to kill all of the spiders,” Chanyeol started, looking right at Yifan. “I’ll clean the bathroom every Saturday like you want me to, and talk out disagreements when we have them.” He clasped his hands in front of him. “I promise to be the best version of myself and help you be yours. And most of all, I promise to love you.” Chanyeol finished and got a ring from Sehun, holding it in his hands.

“Wu Yifan, do you accept this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?” the priest asked.

Yifan fought down the bubble in his throat, which was easy to do when he wasn’t talking. But when he said “I do,” it came out all choked and a tear rolled down his cheek. He could practically feel Sehun’s smirk. Chanyeol smiled wider and slid the ring on Yifan’s finger.

“I, um, uh, I—I,” Yifan took a deep breath. “I promise to alert you when there’s a spider and provide you with tissues, to come home on time from work, to always check in. I promise not to lie except for when it’s really necessary, and to—” He wiped another tear from his cheek and took a shaky breath. “And yeah. I love you, dude.”

Sehun let a small snicker leave his mouth and then covered it up with a small cough. Yifan didn’t look at him.

“Park Chanyeol, do you accept this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“I do.”

Yifan almost dropped the ring when his best man, and only non-weird (almost) friend, Tao, handed it to him, and he almost put it on Chanyeol’s middle finger, but Chanyeol shifted his hand so it was pushed onto the right one. Another tear fell.

“I now pronounce you husband and husband. You may kiss the groom,” the priest announced.

They kissed, and it tasted like salt.

Tao was telling Baekhyun about how every time he feels sad, or depressed, he gets another piercing. He was relaying each and every story to them, and Yifan’s mother looked absolutely horrified. Yifan made sure to point that out to Chanyeol, who couldn’t help but laugh. Sehun was on Chanyeol’s right, but he leaned over Chanyeol’s lap to make fun of Yifan, and Chanyeol couldn’t decide whether he was okay with that or not.

When all of the food was eaten, Chanyeol lightly tapped his knife on his champagne glass and stood up. All attention was on him. He smiled brightly.

“Thank you, all of you, for coming.”

MASTERLIST