The class was packed full and Tao wondered if he’d made a mistake taking this class. It had just been for fun, an extra class to get his credits high enough to be considered a full-time student. It’s not like Tao knew anything about creative writing. Sure, he liked to throw down a couple poetic lines like a rap every once in a while, but he certainly had never written a short story. Yet there he was, sitting in a short story class. It was okay though, he’d make it through. If there was no one on the waiting list, he would stay. He’d feel guilty taking someone else’s spot otherwise.

Tao had taken a seat closer to the door, just so he could leave faster at the end. He didn’t know anyone at all. Hell, he wasn’t even an English major. He was a Kinesiology major and those two majors certainly didn’t overlap (except for the occasional kid who took a random exercise class). He didn’t even know if he fit in.

But as the other students filed into the classroom (Tao had been over thirty minutes early), he found that he looked more like he belonged here than in his own department. There were a few colorful students, with fun colored hair or strange styles of dress, which made Tao feel like he was meant to be there a little.

Tao’s own hair was a shade of purple, not dark enough to be eggplant, but not light enough to be lavender. It was a little fluffy that day, since he hadn’t bothered to style it as much as usual, though he obviously still looked good, because he was Tao. He wore a pair of gray skinny jeans and a white tank top, a black coat thrown on over it all to keep him warm from the somewhat chilly, overcast weather that had been present when he woke up. He wore various silver earrings in his ears and his favorite pair of red shoes. To say Tao didn’t look good was an understatement, but also to say that he didn’t stick out like a sore thumb was just plain stupid.

Despite that, no one seemed to give Tao a second glance. They all sat in their own seats, either keeping to themselves or quietly conversing with someone they knew. Tao felt like he belonged, but didn’t at the same time.

By the time the class had filled up and Tao was considering running away, their professor came in with another student following him. Tao felt his heart skip a beat as he laid eyes on the student. He’d never seen anyone so…so perfect before.

The guy was tall, taller than Tao even, which he didn’t find all that common, and was mostly legs. His skin was clear from blemishes and his features were to die for. His left eyebrow had two slashes in it and from what Tao could tell he had dark brown hair. He was dressed in a fedora, which covered all of his hair, signaling it was rather short, and a pair of blue jeans that sagged just a little and a gray sweatshirt that had a graphic of a bear on it. His shoes looked gigantic and were Air Jordan’s, a favorite of Tao’s. His backpack hung off of one shoulder, a little red Angry Bird keychain hanging off one of the zippers.

Tao was trying not to drool over the perfect specimen in front of him. Said perfect guy found a seat near the table that the professor was setting up on. Tao was so busy staring at him, he didn’t notice the person trying to pass him the syllabus five minutes later until it was shoved into his face. With a blush, Tao accepted the stack of papers and grabbed one for himself before passing it on.

“Why don’t we have someone say a little about themselves?” the professor, a Kim Junmyeon, suggested with a smile.

He motioned to perfect boy and Tao straightened up a bit.

“I’m Kris Wu. I’ve published a collection of poetry and short stories,” he said, face rather stoic and voice deep.

Tao his lips, practically salivating on his desk. No one in the class aside from him seemed to be impressed. They went around the circle, introducing themselves, all sorts of facts being thrown out—like a girl named Hyoyeon, who talked about how she’d beat up a guy once, and Heechul, who talked about the types of fiction he specialized in (Tao would have to look it up online after class). They reached Tao then.

“H-Hi…I’m Tao Huang…I’m not an English major, so I thought this class would be fun to try out?” he said unsurely.

The whole class stared at him and Tao shrank a little in his seat.

“Welcome to the class, Tao. We look forward to reading your work,” Mr. Kim said.

Tao nodded, looking down at his syllabus. He probably didn’t get off to a good start now. He glanced over towards Kris, gauging his reaction. The other young man didn’t seem to notice him at all, too busy looking over the syllabus diligently.

Class was dismissed not long after and Tao trailed down the hall listlessly, watching as the fedora disappeared down the hall ahead of him.

Tao was amazed by the quality of his classmates’ work. He’d found Heechul’s fiction online. Tao had only made it halfway through a story before he’d had to excuse himself to the bathroom. He’d then stumbled upon a few other classmates’ stories—Hyoyeon, Minseok, and Irene. Everyone was so good. And after some digging, Tao found a copy of Kris’s work and bought it for five dollars.

Over the weekend, he read the entire thing. He thought Kris was a genius, especially through poetry. Tao kept sighing sweetly over every word.

“What the actual hell are you sighing about? Seriously,” his roommate, Sehun, said from across the room.

“I’m reading.”

“Then shut up. People read silently.”

Tao glowered at him. “Shut up, Sehun! I found my soul mate. I have to sigh over his perfection.”

Sehun snorted, keeping to his own desk. Tao knew he was probably rolling his eyes and silently wished that they’d get stuck like that.

Tao walked with Sehun on campus, heading for their classes. Sehun was eating a fruit bar as they walked. Tao was carrying his things, not particularly looking at anything.

“Hey, do you want to like go to a club tonight or something?” Sehun asked, still chewing.

“I guess?”

“We need something new to do.”

“For reals…”

At that moment, Tao saw perfect Kris. How did Tao recognize him halfway across the quad when he’d only seen him maybe six times? Because Tao was in love.

Kris was dressed relatively the same as the first day they’d seen each other, but he had on a slouchy beanie as opposed to a fedora and some black circle shaped sunglasses. He was chatting with some other people, standing there slouched, a hand in his pocket.

Tao didn’t mean to, but a sigh fell from his lips. He sounded dreamy, his eyes focused on the other man.

“Tao, what are you? Hey, watch o—”

Tao walked straight smack into a display of sunglasses that a seller had out for sale. He fell back with a loud yelp. When he opened an eye, he could see Sehun laughing hysterically over him. He glared pointedly, though he looked pretty silly with his own sunglasses hanging half off his face and one leg up in the air from being caught on the display.

“Some friend you are,” he grumbled.

Sehun offered him a hand, still laughing. “S-Shut up.”

Tao stood and dusted himself off, fixing his sunglasses, which were now bent. He apologized to the seller, but luckily nothing had been damaged, so he didn’t need to pay any money. Tao took his things from Sehun, who’d picked them up while he was talking to the seller.

“Okay, so what distracted you so bad you ate it with a sunglasses display?” Sehun asked.

“I…I saw…” Tao flushed a little.

“Oh, is it your soul mate?” Sehun teased, poking Tao’s side.

The purple-haired young man said nothing, continuing walking. He looked toward the spot where Kris had been, which luckily he was still there, though he’d switched who he was talking to. Sehun followed his line of sight.

“The tall guy?”

Tao nodded.

“He’s attractive,” Sehun said with a nod, “But that guy he is talking to is cuter.”

Tao looked at the said guy. He was shorter, dressed in a hoodie and a pair of jeans that were rolled up to be capris. His backpack was of the MCM brand and he stood comfortably, talking to Kris. Tao felt a tad jealous. The guy seemed comfortable with Kris and Tao wished he could be comfortable with the other man.

“Go say hi,” the younger said, nudging Tao, “Introduce me.”

“N-No! I’ve never even spoken to him.”

“You have to talk to him at some point if you want to get with ’im.”

“Please stop talking like that.”

Sehun stuck his tongue out at Tao, then looking at the clock that was nearby. “I have class. See ya. Get the cute guy’s number for me.”

Tao stood there, holding his books, watching as Sehun ran off. He sighed, wondering what he should do until class started.

“Hey. Tao, right?”

Tao froze, then turned slowly to look up. Kris was standing right beside him, chest almost against Tao’s arm. The young man felt like he should start hyperventilating, but he certainly didn’t want Kris to see him looking like a fish choking out of water.

“Y-Yeah…” Tao managed out, “I’m Tao. That me.”

He turned bright red as he realized that he hadn’t even formed a proper sentence. Kris just seemed to smirk, glasses slid down his nose so Tao could see his brown eyes, which he wanted to stare endlessly into, but now probably wasn’t the time.

“How’s your first story coming?” Kris asked, seeming to disregard the boy’s screw up entirely.

“O-Oh, uh…I haven’t started yet, to be honest.”

Kris lifted a thick eyebrow at him and Tao looked down at his arms before back up at him.

“This is my first time…I don’t really know what to do.”

The taller seemed to brighten then. “Oh, yeah? I could give you some pointers.”

“I’d love that!”

Tao tried not to sound too eager, but it was obviously eager. Kris turned around and motioned for the smaller to follow him. Kris plopped himself down on the concrete edge of the planter and patted the spot beside him. Across from them, the guy from earlier was seated and had a guitar out on his lap.

“Tao, this is Zhang Yixing,” Kris said.

Yixing smiled, dimple showing and pick in his mouth. Tao was slightly surprised at how angelic the guy seemed, though he looked a little high. Tao gave him a small smile and then turned to Kris, who had gotten out a notebook and pen.

“So, what do you want to know?”

“Where should I start?”

Kris laughed. “You’ve never written anything at all?”

Tao shook his head. “Not really. I think maybe once in high school.”

“Do you know how to format a story? That’s pretty important.”

“I think I know the basics. They’re similar to writing papers.”

“Just about, yeah. One thing to remember is when you have someone talking use quotations and they get a new paragraph.”

Tao pulled his phone out and pulled up his notes. He quickly typed what Kris had told him into the note. He then looked at Kris again.

“Okay. Please continue.”

“Well, there are basically three parts to a story. A beginning, middle, and end. Some people like to use a slightly more detailed way to block out a story. It’s really common in film.”

Kris sketched out a diagram quickly. Tao typed out the shape as best he could, formatting it kind of weird so it would resemble the strange pyramid-like shape with the labels.

“So, an exposition is basically the set up. Where you learn the basics and find out the overall problem. Got that?”

Tao nodded, typing as fast as he could. Kris smiled beside him, watching at the diligence Tao was exuding.

“Alright. So, what you should do is think of a basic plot. Come up with a beginning, middle, and end. Then flesh out some easy stuff. Like what will your conflict be, what will your characters’ names be? That’s your exposition, to show all of that.”

Tao nodded.

“Then basically you go from point A to point B. The rising action is how you reach the , which is the high point of the story. That’s usually where all the important stuff in the story happens. From there you have falling action and the resolution to tie up the loose ends in the story.”

Tao found himself laughing. Kris smiled warmly at him and Tao swore he’d never felt more enamored with someone.

“Does that help at all?”

The younger nodded, looking over his notes on his phone. As he was switching hands on his phone, Tao realized the time. He was already ten minutes late to class and it wasn’t a day he should miss the lectures.

“Oh my god!” he yelped.

Kris widened his eyes as Tao shot up.

“I’m late for class! I’m sorry. Thank you for your help!”

He gathered up his things and took off running before he could even properly say goodbye. He didn’t even look back to see if Kris was watching him.

Two weeks were left until Tao’s short story was due and he still hadn’t thought of anything. He was waiting for inspiration to hit him. He didn’t want to crap out a story the night before it was due and turn in his worst. Sure, sometimes his procrastination on papers would turn out in his favor, but he felt he wouldn’t have as much luck with creative writing. You had to actually sound semi-creative.

He lay on his bed, rubbing his hands over his face. He kicked his legs wildly out of frustration.

“I swear to god, Tao. Knock it off. I’m trying to write an essay,” Sehun said, turning around to look at him.

“Why do you never feel sympathy for me?” Tao demanded.

“Why should I?”

Tao grabbed his stuffed panda and threw it at Sehun’s head. The younger teen growled and threw the panda back. When Tao got it back, he cuddled it to his chest.

“I don’t know what to do…”

“Go walk around for some inspiration. And leave me so I can write in peace.”

Tao pouted. “You .”

After a while, Tao did get up and leave the room. He went to walk around campus, his hands stuffed in the pockets of his sweatshirt. He wished he could get some sort of inspiration. But what? What did people write stories about normally? Everyone else in his class was so creative. Had they all just come up with it or was it based on reality? Tao had no idea.

He stopped at the on campus coffee shop, a Starbucks (Tao’s fave), and got a large coffee to tote around on his walk. He then walked slowly, glancing towards the spot he’d sat at with Kris that day. It had been a few weeks before and Tao hadn’t seen Kris outside of class until now. He wondered if that would be the only time he’d speak to Kris outside of class.

Tao began to wonder when Kris would turn his story in. They’d read Hyoyeon’s story already, a story about a girl who was running from the cops and kicked the out of a gang leader, and Heechul’s story had been turned in but not distributed to the class. The professor mentioned it being too inappropriate. Currently, Tao needed to read and critique two more stories, one by Minseok and another by a girl named Fei. Tao had started on Fei’s story already, and it seemed relatively interesting.

As Tao walked around, trying to think of anything to do, he heard music. Looking around for the source, he found Yixing nearby playing his guitar. Sehun was still mad at Tao that he hadn’t gotten Yixing’s number. Tao figured what the hell and walked over to the musician.

Yixing grinned at him as he walked up, not bothering to stop playing the guitar. Tao sat down on the planter edge beside the guitarist. Yixing finished his song before lowering his guitar into the case.

“Tao, right?”

“Yeah. You’re Yixing.”

“I am, I am,” Yixing said with a small laugh.

“Sorry we didn’t talk last time.”

“That’s okay. Kris wanted you all to himself. He certainly loves talking about writing.”

“He does, doesn’t he?” Tao said, chuckling.

“What brings you out today?”

“I’m trying to think of something to write about. I’ve never really written a short story before, so I don’t know what to do.”

“Well, what do you like?” Yixing asked, closing his guitar case.

“Umm…sports?”

“Write about that. The biggest advice I’ve always heard about writing is write what you know.”

“Write what I know, huh?” Tao mumbled, sipping his coffee.

“You’ll figure it out, Tao. Good luck.”

“Sure. Nice to see you again.”

Yixing stood and picked up his guitar case. “Sorry to rush off. I have a study group to get to, unfortunately.”

“Oh, umm…could I ask a favor?”

“Hm?”

“Could I get your number…?”

Yixing laughed. “Sure.”

He rattled off the number quickly and Tao put it in his phone. He was a little concerned that Yixing gave it to him so easily, but was thankful.

“Send me a ‘hi’ text.”

“Sure. Thanks!”

Yixing gave him a wave before rushing off. Tao sighed softly, watching him go. He looked down at his coffee cup.

“Write what you know…write what you know,” he mumbled to himself.

He decided to walk some more, brainstorming what he knew. What did he know? He knew about sports, mostly basketball. Being a Kinesiology major made it that he was familiar with most sports though, but Tao really liked basketball. Maybe he could go play some hoops to take his mind off of his dilemma.

Tao went down to the courts, finding that the court already had someone there. He was about to turn around and leave before he realized who it was.

It was Kris. Handsome, tall Kris. He wore some sweatpants and a t-shirt, his hair showing for once. He had very short hair, barely able to make a mohawk.

Tao found himself pressed up against the fence, watching him. God, Kris looked good playing basketball. The young man wondered why he found himself constantly wanting to drool when he looked at the other man.

Kris stopped for some water and Tao decided he should be bold and get out there. He entered the gate, going over to the other.

“Hey. Want an opponent?”

Kris spun around, choking on his water a bit. He sputtered, before wiping at his lip.

“Hey, Tao. What are you doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing,” Tao said with a cat-like smile.

Kris laughed. “Just playin’ some hoops by myself. This is the closest court to my house.”

“You live near campus?”

“Yeah,” he said with a nod.

“Do you want to play with me? It’s not often I find a willing partner.”

Kris sputtered again, choking on his water a second time. Tao giggled at his own word play and the taller looked at him with a small half smirk. Tao grabbed the basketball.

“Let’s go one-on-one!”

Kris laughed and put down his water, bounding out to where Tao was. Tao began to dribble, then made a run for it. The taller man was quick though and kept on him. The smaller faked a left before going right, managing to trick Kris for a split second. Kris was actually quite quick and nimble, keeping up with Tao in strides. While Kris was near the average size of a basketball player, he didn’t seem like he knew his own size from Tao’s observations. He’d knocked into the desks frequently during class times.

Tao managed to make a shot, but it rebounded and Kris caught it. Tao realized the basketball almost fit in Kris’s hand and that kind of terrified him. Kris made his way around Tao and when he reached the three point line, immediately made a shot with perfect form. Tao gaped and froze in shock as he watched the basketball sail through the air and into the basket.

“Oh my god…How did you…?”

Kris grinned, looking at Tao. “I played basketball for years in school.”

“That was amazing! How come you’re not professional?”

The taller man bent and tapped his own knee. “Messed this up and ruined my chance. Good thing I had a backup plan, huh?”

Tao nodded. “That’s too bad, but I’m super impressed.”

Kris laughed. “Let’s go, pretty boy.”

The purple-haired boy blushed, but he followed Kris.

After they played a few rounds, Kris and Tao went to get coffee together. They talked about writing and basketball, before moving on to talking about themselves. Kris was only a year ahead of Tao in school, despite being three years older. He’d lived in Canada for a large part of his life and that’s why he spoke English so well. (Tao could listen to Kris speak English for hours. Did he have that kink for people speaking foreign languages to him?) Tao told him about his hometown, how much he loved the beach, and mentioned Sehun. He also mentioned how much he liked pandas. They talked for hours, until the baristas were looking at them angrily, quietly demanding they go home so they could close.

“Wow. It’s already like ten. I didn’t realize how late it was!” Kris said as he stood up, stretching.

Tao watched for that tell-tale peek of skin from the shirt raising with the stretch and he resisted the urge to squeal. Kris was so fine. The younger got up after him, smiling.

“Sorry for taking so much of your time,” Tao said.

“It’s okay. It was payment for all my writing advice I gave you. How is that coming, by the way?”

The two of them walked toward the exit. Tao sighed.

“I’m still having trouble. I just don’t know what to write about yet.”

“You could try looking up prompts on the ’net. Do some exercises.”

“O-Okay. I’ll check it out.”

“When is your story due?”

“Two weeks from yesterday.”

“Oh, really?” Kris seemed to brighten up. “I’m turning mine in that day too.”

Tao wasn’t sure if he should be excited or feel nervous that he and Kris would be going on the same day.

“Well…good luck.”

“You too. You’ll get it. Don’t worry,” Kris said.

They bid one another goodbye and Tao went back to his dorm alone, relishing in the warm feeling in his chest the whole way.

That night, Tao dreamed. Oh, he dreamed a dream.

Tao was back in high school and he was in the locker room of the gym. He wore a basketball uniform, the number 68 on the back (Tao’s favorite numbers). It looked like he was getting ready for a game. As he put his shoes on, other members of the team appeared, mixing people he’d known in high school and people from college. All of a sudden, he heard a loud voice call.

“Let’s get out there, guys! We can do this!”

Tao followed the other members of the team out of the locker room and at the door, he caught sight of Kris. He wore the jersey of double zero and he looked fantastic in a basketball uniform. Even though this was the first time Tao had seen him in the dream, he knew immediately Kris was the captain of the team. Just before he went out the door, Kris caught him by the shoulder.

“You’ll do great out there,” he said, a smile playing along the edges of his lips.

Tao smiled up at him. “We only need you to do well in the game.”

“I’m counting on you too, though.”

“I can do anything with you as my captain.”

What the hell am I watching? Tao thought. It was like watching a movie, but they were using his face for everything.

Kris leaned in and pressed a kiss to the edge of Tao’s lips. Tao looked at him, longing in his eyes.

“Someday…right?”

The captain merely nodded, squeezing the smaller’s shoulder before pushing him out the door.

All Tao could see was white, like a fade in and out in a film. Then he could see him and Kris sitting together on a bench by the river. It was winter by the looks of the weather and the fact that the two were wearing thick coats. Their hands sat between them, pinkies linked subtly beneath the long sleeves of their coats. It was a melancholic scene.

Tao could feel a heartbreak he’d never experienced in real life. The idea of a forbidden love, unaccepted by the people around them and having to hide the feelings they had for one another. But only one of them was afraid of the future, even more painful for the one that wasn’t. It made him ache and want to cry. He could only imagine such pain.

The scene changed again. It was of a dark bedroom, hard to see anything aside from the outline of bodies. Tao and Kris were obviously the ones there. They were kissing, hands on one another. It was incredibly and intimate as the two began to strip, whispering words of love and adoration to one another.

Tao woke up to a wet feeling. He lifted up his blanket and looked down.

“.”

Tao spent his Saturday writing down his dream. He wrote out what he could distinctly remember on notecards and set them in an order of sequences. He made sure to set the love scene not in the lineup. He looked at what he had and found that it was mostly a middle. Tao then wrote out his cards on the characters. For his own self, he picked the name Edison, because he was oddly fond of it. For lack of creativity, he named the character based off of Kris Christopher. He then spent a while thinking of their history, how he could get to the basketball scene.

Once he’d outlined it all, Tao set to work writing the story fully and it took him nearly a week to get it all out, getting stuck on wording decisions and difficulty with transitions. He was then left another few days to tweak the story, fix up his word choices, check his spelling and punctuation.

In the end, he had a story he was semi-proud of. He could only hope Kris couldn’t tell the story had a little bit of him in it. The story was of Edison and Christopher, two boys who met in high school on the basketball team. Christopher was Canadian, but he fit in perfectly and he’d been the captain almost his entire time he was on the team. Edison was a confidently out gay boy, a few years younger than Christopher. The two had become close by being on the team together, Christopher having mentored Edison during training. Christopher realized he liked Edison a lot more than a friend and he had trouble dealing with it, not willing to come out of the closet in fear of ruining his future as a basketball player. He couldn’t risk his future. But Edison understood, even if he was sad, and they kept their relationship secret for a very long time. Tao left the story on a cliffhanger of whether Edison and Christopher would end up together after high school, because their paths were going different directions. He’d titled it “Yesterday”.

The story had everything in it he felt he knew though. Being gay, basketball, and…his feelings for Kris. Sure, Edison’s feelings for Christopher were much more intense than Tao’s were for Kris, but they could get there one day, if he had long enough. He could love Kris eventually if he made it that far. But Tao couldn’t ignore the inspiration he’d been given. He felt he’d done enough to hide who they were, by changing their hair colors and circumstances.

The day of class, Tao walked in with his copies of his story. He deposited them on the front table and quickly went to sit in his usual desk. Kris came in when it was almost time for class to start, carrying his own copies. He set them beside Tao’s before seating himself beside the other.

“How’d you do?” he asked.

Tao shrugged. “I…think I did okay.”

“Can’t wait to read.”

Kris winked at him and Tao smiled, feeling his cheeks turn a little pink. He could only hope that Kris would enjoy his story, think it was good.

As class went by and they discussed the previous stories that had been turned in, Tao’s mind was off thinking about other things. He wondered if Kris was even gay. He’d never considered the idea of if he was or not. He’d just focused on the fact that he liked Kris.

“Hey, you alright?” Kris asked as they were packing up.

“Hm? Oh, yeah, I’m fine. I was just a little distracted today.” Tao stretched a bit. “Tired from working on my story ’til late. I wanted to make sure it was perfect.”

Kris laughed and nodded. “I get that. I’m gonna go take a nap until my next class. Want to join?”

“Where do you nap?”

“In the grass while Yixing plays guitar.”

Tao vaguely remembered he still hadn’t given Sehun Yixing’s number. He should probably do that soon. Maybe it could help take Sehun’s mind off his midterms.

“Sounds like fun.”

Tao followed Kris from the class out to the quad. Luckily, it was sunny out. Yixing was easy to find, always being the source of music. Kris pulled a blanket from his backpack and spread it out before flopping down on it. Tao settled beside him, greeting Yixing with a nod, which earned him a dimpled smile in return.

Kris made a pillow out of his sweatshirt and lay his head on it. He placed his hat over his face. Tao laughed a bit, but put his backpack on the ground and lay his head on it. He fell asleep, body facing Kris, hoping he’d be able to get a little bit of shut eye. He felt he deserved a nap.

When Tao had woken up from his nap, Kris was already gone. Yixing had still been there though and Sehun had shown up at some point. He and the guitarist seemed to be hitting it off, to the delight of Tao. The younger was disappointed Kris wasn’t there, but he couldn’t get hung up on it. They had their own schedules. Tao had bid the two boys good day and went back to his dorm to get to work on his homework for the weekend.

It was Saturday night when Tao got out Kris’s story to read. It was called “There is a Place”. Tao took a deep breath before he began to read.

There once was a place, where a very unusual friendship took place. There was the panda, Zi, and the dragon, Yifan. Zi was a cute and precious panda, with average black markings. He was round and cute with puffy little eyes that could only be described as endearing. He really loved cell phones from the human world and his favorite past time was taking pictures. Yifan was a somewhat grumpy, yet dashing dragon. He was big and strong with deep red scales. And while Yifan liked to act all big and bad , he was really fond of Zi. Even though he pretended he didn’t like it, he really liked when Zi wanted to take pictures with him.

The two were unlikely friends and many of the animal peoples did not accept their friendship. They thought it was unnatural to be friends across species, but Yifan didn’t care because he loved his friend more than anything in the world. They particularly enjoyed the human sport of basketball. Though it was sort of difficult for the two to play, what with Zi being adorably round and not so fast and Yifan being long and overly skilled, they still had their fun.

Tao put the story down. He then picked it back up and read the beginning again. His eyes widened. Was Kris’s story…about him and Tao? But in animal form? He then proceeded to read the rest of the story. It was quirky and weird (much like the rest of Kris’s writing, to be honest). It told the adventure of Yifan having to help Zi make a float for a festival that the pandas were having. It focused on the unity of cultures in their land and along the way, Zi taught Yifan about the true meaning of love. In the end, Yifan confessed his love for Zi, despite their species being different and pledged to be together forever. The ending was of them going off into the sunset together, somehow holding hands (the mental image was weird, but Tao was beyond fully caring).

He set the story down on his bed, staring at his wall. What did this all mean? Was the story about him and Kris? Was he overthinking things? Did Kris like him? He was now annoyed that he’d never gotten Kris’s phone number. He needed to know the answer then and there. But he’d have to wait.

Tao threw himself back and began thrashing, yelling lowly. The door to the room opened at that very moment.

“Seriously, Tao, can you ever shut up?” Sehun said.

The following Tuesday, Tao arrived to class at the same time he always did. Twenty minutes early. To his surprise, Kris showed up five minutes after him, completely unusual for him, who typically rolled in two minutes before class would start.

“Hey,” he greeted softly.

Tao tried to control his beating heart, admiring the way Kris was dressed that day. He wore his fedora, a long sleeve shirt, and a pair of jeans. Tao found it funny that they semi-matched, Tao in a button down and jeans.

“Morning,” Tao managed to say.

“So, I…uh…read your story.”

“Yeah. I read yours too.”

They both stared at each other and Tao finally noticed the way Kris was standing. He was standing up straighter than usual, hands shoved in his pockets, but his shoulders were leaning towards Tao. His eyes looked nervous. Tao wondered if he looked equally as nervous to the taller man.

“Shot in the dark, but…is Zi supposed to be me?” Tao suddenly said.

Kris turned red, even the tips of his ears, and Tao couldn’t help smiling.

“Kind of, sort of…I guess.”

“How did you know I love my cell phone?”

“Lucky guess.”

Tao silently cursed his transparency when he came to phones. He was sure he’d probably mentioned it when they’d talked before and had probably kept pulling it out.

“Your story was fantastic,” Kris said then, “I can’t believe you’ve never written anything before. But I couldn’t help feeling like…Christopher was me. A little.”

Tao nodded a couple of times, looking down and shifting his feet.

“He might have been, kind of, sort of, inspired by you, I admit.”

“So…I wouldn’t be completed misguided if I asked if you wanted to get dinner sometime?”

The smaller smiled up at Kris, relaxing his stance, which made Kris relax as well.

“I’d really like that, Kris.”

Kris smiled.

When they went into the classroom, they sat next to each other. All throughout class, they sat with their pinkies linked between their desks, oblivious to their class’s critiques.