Song: I Must Be Dreaming by The Maine (If you squint… it’s more of a tone thing, and how the song makes me feel, which is an odd mix of cute and romantic and silly)

Pairing: Kaisoo

Word Count: ~1200

Requested By: Cornerstone

---

“Kyungsoo, where are you?”  I called through the house as I walked through the front door after parking the car on the driveway.  Usually he’d be there to greet me, brushing my hair aside and offering me a smile and a warm “welcome home” with smells of whatever he had already started cooking after he got home from his own job at the elementary school filling the house, but he was nowhere in sight.

“Kyungsoo?” I repeated, walking down the hallway a few steps until a heard a thud coming from above me.  I looked up at the ceiling as another thud occurred.  I let out a sigh.  I knew where he was.

I turned and headed into the room to the left, nodding at the sight that greeted me.  The ladder that led to the attic upstairs was down.  Kyungsoo was up there, doing what though, I had no idea, but whatever it was, it was sounding like it was involving a lot of heavy lifting and moving of boxes.

“Kyungsoo,” I called up the ladder, “What are you doing?”

There was another thud before his voice called out to me.  “Jongin, is that you?”

“Who else would it be?”  I responded as I started up the ladder, head popping through the hole in the ceiling as I looked around the attic in search of Kyungsoo’s face.

“Great, then you can help.”  Kyungsoo responded as his head popped out above a stack of boxes and Rubbermaid tubs. 

“Help with what?”  I asked, slightly wary.  Some of those boxes looked familiar.

“With getting all the decorations downstairs.  It’s almost Christmas.”  Kyungsoo responded as if it was obvious.

I sighed. “Kyungsoo.  It’s still November.” 

“So?  Go back down the ladder so I can hand this stuff down to you.”  He responded.

“Kyungsoo,” I repeated, “It’s NOVEMBER.”

“And I’m telling you it’s time to decorate the house.  Now go back down that ladder so I can hand you this.”  Kyungsoo leveled a stern gaze in my direction.  Clearly this wasn’t up for debate even if it was insane.

I moved back down the ladder.  “Okay, hand them down.”

I heard some pushing and sliding of boxes along the floor before Kyungsoo’s smiling face appeared above me.  “Thank you.  And remember to be careful.  We can’t have you putting your back out again.”

“Could you please call it something else?  Only old people put their back out.”  I complained as my hands gripped around the first tub Kyungsoo was lowering through the ceiling, taking a moment to adjust to its weight before finishing my way down the ladder and setting it on the floor.

“What would you rather I called it then?”  Kyungsoo asked as another box appeared.

“I don’t know.  You could just say I hurt it or something.  Just not “put out”, please.”  I set the next box on the floor and reached up for the third.

Kyungsoo laughed.  “Aright.  Are you ready for the tree?”

“Tree?  You’re really getting down the tree?”  I had been hoping we’d at least be sticking to knickknacks like snow globes or something, not going all in.

“Of course,” Kyungsoo responded, face appearing again as he cocked his head to the side, “How can we decorate for Christmas without the tree?”

I sighed.  “Fair enough.  Send it down.”  I didn’t really understand how I was becoming the crazy one when we were decorating for Christmas while it was still November, but apparently Kyungsoo seemed to think I was.

“Great, catch.”  The long bag began to slide down the ladder.  I caught the edge and guided it down to the floor.

“What else is left?”  I asked as I dragged the bag towards the ever growing pile on the floor. 

“There’s just a few more boxes,” Kyungsoo reassured as another box appeared through the ceiling, and I thought over the pile Kyungsoo had been behind before.

A few more?  More like at least ten.

---

Once all the boxes were down, Kyungsoo crawled down the ladder from the attic with a smile.  “Thanks for all the help.”  He said as he reached out to pull me into a hug.  I hugged him back before glancing over at the pile of boxes we had assembled.

“Are you going to make me put all that up tonight?”  I asked.

Kyungsoo squeezed me tighter before pulling back with a smile.  “I told you last year, the whole point is that we put it up together.”

I nodded in understanding.  “I know that Soo, but it’s still November.  Why are we doing it now?”

Kyungsoo laughed as he broke apart from me and moved to grab the edge of the bag for the tree.  “Because, this is going to be one of the last chances for us to do it.  Grab that edge for me?” He asked as he nodded towards the floor.

I knelt down and grabbed it, helping him to move the tree into the living room corner where we would be setting it up.  “What does that mean?  We have most of December, and what’s left of November, to do it.”

Kyungsoo shook his head.  “No we don’t.”  He responded stubbornly as he knelt down and ped the bag, grabbing the parts of the base and trunk as I began to sort the tree limbs by color.

“And why not?”

Kyungsoo sighed as he looked at me.  “How is it that you don’t even know your own schedule?”

My eyes widened, “What?”

“We’re out of town this weekend to visit your parents.  Then on Monday, performances for The Nutcracker start.  Have you forgotten that you’re kind of in that?”

I blinked.  Well, no, I hadn’t forgotten, but, “I won’t be performing every night.”

“No, but you’ll be busy, and when you aren’t, you’ll be tired.  Not to mention that I’ll be putting the finishing touches on the kids’ winter concert and working late too.  Neither of us will have the energy to do this then.  At least not while we can actually enjoy it, and then, again, what would be the point?”  He asked, turning to me to hold out a hand for the branches I had been sorting so he could start slotting them into the posts that formed the spine of the tree.

I didn’t hand one to him.  Instead, I just stared.  He wasn’t wrong, but I definitely hadn’t been putting that much thought into our schedules for the coming weeks.  Clearly, Kyungsoo had.

“What?  Did I get some of it on my face?”  He asked, raising a hand to see if any green pieces of the tree had landed there.

I sighed and moved towards him, kissing his lips before I returned to my spot on the floor and handed him a branch. 

“What was that for?”  Kyungsoo asked as he took it from my hand.

“For being crazy and kind of amazing at the same time.”  I responded simply as I continued to hand him branches.

Kyungsoo laughed.  “Is that a good thing?”

“The best,” I assured as we stood from the floor to work on pushing in the higher branches.

“Does that mean I’m forgiven for wanting to decorate in November?”  Kyungsoo asked we finished and began to pull apart the branches, spreading out their wire limbs to create the illusion of a tree that was full.

“Yes, but, even if next year there are perfectly logical reasons to decorate in October, I refuse.”  I said as we pulled back to survey our work.

Kyungsoo laughed at my words.  “Of course.”

---

I graduate from grad school today.  Yay!