A penguin meets a giraffe: Chanyeol Birthday Fic!

It's has been three sunrises and sundowns since the giraffe saw his little penguin friend and the long neck giant is beginning to worry. Chanyeol stood underneath Kyungsoo's favourite, now also his favourite marula tree and chews at the leaves absentmindedly. Since they've expressed their love for each other, the giraffe and penguin were inseparable. Everyday they'd meet under the marula tree and talk, and sometimes Chanyeol would also give Kyungsoo a ride on his back as they strolled across the savannah. Steadying himself with his flappers against the giraffe's slender neck, Kyungsoo would gawk and squawk at all the things he has never seen before. Occasionally Jongdae and Baekhyun would also join their little excursions and the four friends would frolic through the tall grass. Well technically, the three of them would frolic and the little penguin would just waddle and hop around in excitement. Chanyeol thought his life was good; he has his friends, his herd, his male group, and Kyungsoo. However at this moment, he thinks his life is less good because Kyungsoo has left him, even though today is his birthday.

Most giraffes don't celebrate birthdays, but Chanyeol is not any giraffe. He's the giraffe who is friend with Jongdae the beagle, who knows the human ways and love. Since Jongdae told his friends about Luhan coming over to celebrate Sehun's 'birthday', the four friends decided that they will help each other celebrate birthdays too.

"What's a birthday?" Kyungsoo asked curiously, blinking his little beady eyes while perched on his favourite rock as usual.

Jongdae flapped his ear and answered proudly. "Birthday is a day when you gather with friends you treasure and love, and you celebrate the day you were born on."

"Wow that sound like so much fun!" Chanyeol swayed his long neck back and forth, showing his happiness from where he was seated. He always remained seated now when he talked with Kyungsoo because the small penguin told Chanyeol he really likes the giraffe’s eyes when he talked. "So when does one have this birthday? Can it be every day? Can we have a birthday every day??" The giraffe got increasingly excited as he spoke. Across from the giraffe, Baekhyun shared his tall friend's excitement and howled loudly while wagging his tail.

"No, no, that's not how it works," Jongdae barked, interrupting Baekhyun's howling, "Sehun has his birthday every thirteen moon cycles. I've counted it!"

Kyungsoo bobbed his head up and down in understanding. He trusted Jongdae’s words because the little penguin thinks Jongdae is a human expert. He was right about love, so Kyungsoo was sure he was also right about birthdays too; the special event must happen every thirteen moon cycles.

Since all of them do not actually know which day they were born on, they agreed that they'd each take a moon phase to be their birthday. Chanyeol being the biggest and one with the brightest disposition will have his birthday on the day of full moon and Kyungsoo being the smallest and the one with darkest eyes will have his birthday on the day of new moon. Baekhyun claimed the day of the first quarter moon and Jongdae chose the third quarter. Today is the first full moon since they’ve set their birthdays so it’s also Chanyeol’s birthday. But Kyungsoo was nowhere to be found and Chanyeol feels really sad. He thought he would finally see his small friend underneath their favourite marula tree today, yet here he is all alone, chewing begrudgingly on the leaves in the absence of the African penguin.

The giraffe stops eating when he notices Jongdae and Baekhyun running towards him, both with something clenched in their mouth. They’ve also agreed to get each other ‘presents’, which Jongdae described as something you give to the one having the birthday. Upon closer inspection, Chanyeol sees that Baekhyun has something round with a flat front piece in his mouth while Jongdae has something black shaped in two circles connected by a line. The canines drop their presents on the ground and greet Chanyeol cheerfully.

“Happy birthday Chanyeol!” Jongdae barked brightly. Next to the beagle, Baekhyun echoes his friend’s enthusiasm. “Happy, happy birthday, Chanyeollie!! Look at the presents we got you!” He picks up his present by its flat front and motions Chanyeol to lower his head. Obediently the giraffe lowers his head to the same level as Baekhyun and the wild dog plops the round object on top of Chanyeol’s head.

“It’s a hat,” Baekhyun explains, “I see a lot of humans wear it and I think it’d be funny if you wear one, so I stole this one from a human near my nest.” The wild dog bared his teeth slyly. Chanyeol was about to ask what ‘stole’ meant but stops when he saw the disapproving look on Jongdae’s face. It’s probably something not good and the giraffe decides he will ask another day. He’s already sad today so he doesn’t want to hear more bad things. However, he is thankful for Baekhyun’s present, even if he ‘stole’ it from other humans.

Next, Jongdae already with his present in between his teeth, also mentions Chanyeol to come closer and pushes his strange looking present to sit on the giraffe’s snout. The two circles frame around Chanyeol’s large eyes and the two sticks extending from the side of the circles rested on top of Chanyeol’s ear, supporting the entirety of the present to stay on the giraffe’s face.

“Mine is called glasses,” Jongdae explains, “I don’t know why humans wear it but Sehun looks nice with them. So when I found a pair underneath the couch,” the beagle glances meaningfully at the wild dog but the latter animal just ignores and scratches the back of his ear with his hind leg, “I thought you’d look nice with it too.” Both Jongdae and Baekhyun tilts their head and inspects the giraffe’s new look. “Yah you do look nice with it. The hat suits you well also.”

“Aw, thanks friends! I love these presents!” Chanyeol responds merrily with starry eyes. Gingerly he raises his neck and tries to get used to the feeling of his two presents. He wishes he’s standing by the river right now so he could get a look at himself. But he trusts his friends’ opinion, and he also doesn’t want to leave just in case Kyungsoo comes back. Baekhyun and Jongdae watches carefully as the giant awkwardly moves about with his new hat and glasses. They could tell Chanyeol is feeling sad because Kyungsoo has been missing for three days already. Baekhyun ran across the savannah and even to the nearest human village yesterday in hopes of finding the small penguin, but all he found was the hat. Jongdae too searched every corner of Sehun’s small wood house and surveyed across the beach for Kyungsoo but with no avail. At one point Sehun also joined Jongdae in his search for the penguin yesterday, but ended up comforting the beagle with tender belly rubs when both human and dog came home empty-handed. The wild dog and beagle hoped that their presents would cheer Chanyeol up, and although the giraffe does look genuinely happy with his birthday presents, Jongdae and Baekhyun could not completely dissipate their giant friend’s sadness.  

All of a sudden, the canines perk their ears and turn to look at Chanyeol with shiny eyes and wiggling tails. Curious but also a little alarmed, Chanyeol asks the two what happened.  

“Kyungsoo’s back!” Jongdae barks happily, “I just heard Sehun calling him!” He quickly follows Baekhyun who already started to make his way towards the small wood house’s backyard, and Chanyeol chases after them, carefully not to drop his presents. When the three animals made it to the white picket fence enclosing the human’s backyard, Chanyeol could hear Sehun’s excited voice calling the small penguin’s name from inside the house. The next second, Kyungsoo waddles through the door with something flat and white in his beak. The small penguin flaps his flippers at the sight of the giraffe and he lets out a muffled braying call.

“Happy birthday Chanyeol! I made it back in time with your present!” Chanyeol stares shockingly at the small penguin. He doesn’t know if he’s feeling mad at Kyungsoo for being away for so long or if he’s happy that Kyungsoo is now back and with a present! In the end he decides to just be glad and content that his small friend is back by his side again. Wasting no time, Kyungsoo passes through the fence and hops over to Chanyeol, who sat down and lowered his neck so he could get a proper look at his small friend as well as the present. The penguin drops the shiny white piece from his beak to the ground and nudges close to the giraffe.

“Chanyeol, remember last time we talked about the ocean, you asked me what a shell looks like?” Kyungsoo speaks in a soft voice and Chanyeol’s eyes begin to widen. “Well, this is a shell and I got it for you from the bottom of the ocean! Sorry I took so long, but I wanted to find the shiniest and prettiest shell for your birthday present. Before I knew it, the sun rose and lowered three rounds and so I rushed back,” the penguin looks straight at Chanyeol’s watery eyes, “I hope you will like it. I love you and I want you to have the best shell for your birthday!”

No longer able to hold back the bubbling feelings in his heart, Chanyeol the small penguin and shouts happily. “I LOVE IT! I love you too Kyungsoo and thank you so much for such an amazing present! I love the shell, it’s so pretty. It’s the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen! Really!” Next to the giraffe, Jongdae and Baekhyun howl in celebration and prance around their friends. They are also glad Kyungsoo is finally back because now Chanyeol will be happy again. Snapping back from the shock of being by Chanyeol, Kyungsoo waddles up to the giraffe and nuzzles against the giant animal. He was afraid he might not make it back on the day of the full moon, but he was glad he walked all of last night and made it back in time. Sure the little penguin feels really tired right now, but seeing how happy the giraffe is with his present, Kyungsoo thinks it’s all worth it.

Just then, Sehun approaches the four animals with things in his hands and they all watch the human in surprise. ‘The human crossed over his picket fence!’ Baekhyun wants to shout but remains silent and in alert, carefully watching the human’s every move as he retreats slightly. As if noticing Baekhyun’s intense eyes on him, human Sehun drops to his knees to show submission and crawls slowly towards the penguin and giraffe. Jongdae toddles over and welcomes his owner enthusiastically and Kyungsoo also peaks Sehun lightly on his hand, showing the human he acknowledges his presence. Sehun pats Chanyeol lightly on his neck while laughing quietly at the giraffe’s appearance, and pets Kyungsoo on his small head. (‘Are those my glasses??’ Sehun wonders.)  Then he points at the shell and spoke up in his human language. Kyungsoo looks questionably at Jongdae, waiting for a translation.

“I think he wants to help you?” Jongdae answers tilting his head, “Actually I don’t know what he wants but it’s Sehun! He’s never anything bad before.”

Kyungsoo considers Jongdae’s words. Sehun has always been really nice to him, so there’s no way he would want to take Chanyeol’s present right? Chanyeol also watches his present on the ground nervously. If Sehun tries to take away the shell Kyungsoo got for him, he will just thrash the human with his neck, the giraffe thinks. Noticing no visible aggression, the human gently grabs the shell. In the background, Baekhyun bares his teeth and begins to growl menacingly. He will make sure the human does not walk away in one piece if he runs away with the shell.

Quickly, the human punctures a small hole on the shell with the ‘tools’ in his hand, Jongdae explains in space of his human, and strings a white line through the hole. “It’s a necklace!” the beagle exclaims and the other three animals eye him warily.

“What’s a necklace?” Kyungsoo asks as Sehun the human gestures Chanyeol to come closer. Hesitantly, the giraffe moves closer and lowers his head. The human places the ‘necklace’ around Chanyeol’s neck.

“It’s something you wear. Now you don’t have to worry about losing Kyungsoo’s shell!” Jongdae replies quickly and Sehun’s face, expressing his gratitude towards his human for being so brilliant and being so nice to his friends. The human lets out a high-pitched giggle. The other three friends look quietly at the shell hanging around at the base of Chanyeol’s neck. ‘Sehun is so smart!’ Kyungsoo thinks in awe. Turning to face the human, Kyungsoo pecks lightly again on Sehun’s hand, also showing his gratitude. The human smiles at the small penguin, then he giggles once more at Chanyeol’s human-like appearance because of his presents and rubs Jongdae’s head lovingly. Lastly, he nods to Baekhyun, got back on his feet and returned quickly into the enclosure of his white picket fence.

After Sehun disappeared into his little wood house, taking the little black box he has placed on top of the fence earlier with him, the four animal friends gathered together to cheer for Chanyeol’s birthday again. Chanyeol is so very happy about his birthday and the presents he got from everybody, especially the shell from Kyungsoo. He thinks his life is good again as he makes his way to the marula tree with Kyungsoo on his back. Once they reach below the tree, Chanyeol settles himself into the grass and Kyungsoo perches on his favourite rock. The two animals nuzzle against each other and watches as Jongdae and Baekhyun chased each other in the distance. Life is wonderful, Chanyeol thinks; he’s got his friends, his herd, his male group, and most importantly, he’s got Kyungsoo, his little penguin. 

FIN.

Author's note: Happy Birthday Chanyeol! Couple of people have asked for more stories between giraffe-yeol and penguin-soo, so wrote this extra in celebration of the happy virus' 23rd birthday. I hope you guys will like it and if you haven't had a chance to check out my other stories, please do so! (I especially recommend the new chapter for Winter Short Stories. It has baby soo and appa Insung in there kekeke)