1.
Something is different about Riki.
Sunoo wouldn’t consider himself an expert on him by any means–though he probably should be, given they’ve been friends since high school–but he can just tell. He’s heard people always act differently after exchange, as if they were suddenly the most cultured people ever and everyone else hadn’t truly lived, or whatever, but Riki isn’t like that.
Sure, he got slightly tanner after 6 months under the Australian sun; and his hair grew a bit longer, looking distinctly more mullet-like than it had the last time Sunoo saw him; and his English pronunciation has a strong Australian lilt to it now. But he’s not obnoxious about it.
He’s just–he’s just different.
“Are you just gonna sit there, or are you gonna help me unpack?” Riki asks, glaring at Sunoo from where he’s perched on Riki’s bed, doing exactly as he’d said–watching him unpack.
“I helped you carry your stuff up!” Sunoo protests, ignoring the way Riki rolls his eyes so hard it looks like it hurts. “That should get me roommate of the year award, honestly. Jungwonie’s not even here.”
“He’s got class and he said he’d treat me to lunch later,” Riki points out. “That trumps carrying my lightest bag to the door and then bothering me while messing up my bed.”
“I’m keeping you company! Didn't you miss us?”
“Whatever, hyung,” says Riki, but he’s clearly biting back a smile and he doesn’t ask Sunoo to do any more manual labour, so Sunoo considers it his win.
They spend the next hour like that; Sunoo lounging on his bed, rehashing campus gossip that Riki technically missed, but basically knew anyway because Sunoo texted him all the time. Jungwon had gotten asked out by one of the new members of the dance club, who he’d politely rejected at the time, but they almost always had dinner after practice, so maybe Jungwon was a big fat liar and actually had a cute little boyfriend now.
Then there was Jay, who’d also tried to work up the courage to ask out his long time crush, with minimal success. Sunoo didn’t understand what the big deal was–Yunjin was so nice! She was a barista at their campus cafe and always gave Sunoo extra whipped cream without ever charging him. Anyway, they had a betting pool going now on if (and when) Jay would get his sh*t together, so they needed to include Riki now that he was back.
Okay, so maybe Sunoo only cares about dating gossip. Whatever. That was his right!
“Things are still up in the air with Sunghoon-hyung and Heeseung-hyung, but I think they’re finally getting somewhere. Like, Heeseung-hyung always walks Sunghoon-hyung to his lectures, even though he has to run across campus for his classes after, and–” Sunoo pauses mid-ramble, looking up to make sure Riki is paying attention.
As expected, he’s not.
Instead, he’s meticulously folding his clothes, treating each one with more care than he does anything else he owns. Riki has always been obsessed with fashion, though Sunoo kind of thinks he got it from Jay. It’s cute and all, but Sunoo hates shopping with them, because they take forever, and Riki’s style is diametrically opposed to his so they never go to the same stores anyway.
He does take note of a nice hoodie though, which is odd, because Sunoo usually doesn’t like any of Riki’s clothes.
“Is that new?” Sunoo asks, gesturing to the hoodie Riki is folding. It’s black, with an abstract, almost flower-like pattern all over it. Sunoo is already planning on how to steal it. Maybe when Riki is in class.
Riki holds it to his chest protectively, glaring at Sunoo as if he can read his mind. “Maybe. But you can’t borrow it.”
“Why not?” Sunoo whines. “It’s cute! And we’re friends. Friends share clothes. You borrow Sunghoon-hyung’s sweaters all the time.”
“Not this one, though,” mumbles Riki almost shyly. “It’s–it’s Jake’s. So. No touching, okay?”
A few things happen after that in quick succession.
First: Riki blushes. Like, a real, true, pink blush, that spreads across his cheeks all the way to the tips of his ears. He never blushes.
Second: Sunoo screams.
“Jake?! Who the hell is Jake?” Sunoo screeches rather dramatically, much to the dismay of their neighbours. Someone bangs on their shared wall, but he pays them no mind. “Did you get a boyfriend in Australia?”
Riki, still bright pink, only shrugs. “Maybe.”
“No you didn’t,” Sunoo refutes instantaneously, coming to his senses. “You’ve never mentioned him before. We talked, like, every week. You would’ve told me.”
“I knew you’d overreact, like you are right now,” says Riki, shrugging again and fiddling with that damn hoodie.
Sunoo doesn’t even want to borrow it anymore, if this is the lengths Riki is willing to go just to keep it from him. Making up a boyfriend is a new low, even for him.
“I’m not overreacting,” Sunoo says, decidedly overreacting. He takes a deep, steadying breath, when Riki doesn’t let up. “I–okay, fine. I’ll bite. Who is this Jake guy that you’re dating, then? What does he look like?”
Riki brightens considerably, looking the most excited Sunoo has ever seen him. That’s saying something, because Sunoo’s known him since he was 14–he was there when Riki became leader of their high school dance club; when he got accepted into Jay’s university, now their university; when he fought for barricade at a SHINEE concert and got noticed by Key.
Apparently, this Jake guy (who Sunoo isn’t convinced is even real, at this point) trumps all of that. It’s incredibly unsettling.
“He’s really cute, hold on,” Riki says with a giggle–a giggle, for crying out loud! They’ve entered an alternate dimension. This has to be a prank.
Riki carefully places the hoodie in one of his drawers before climbing up onto his bed, nudging Sunoo over. “Here’s his Instagram,” says Riki, brandishing his phone enthusiastically. “We met at uni. He was my English tutor for a bit, we got closer, and now here we are. Anyway, isn’t he cute?”
He’s something, alright.
He’s @jake.sim, Jakey, 22 | UQ 🔥, tiktok.com/@jakeyyy, 100k followers, to be exact.
His feed is exactly what Sunoo expects of the average young, hot Australian guy–shirtless photos of him at the beach, with blonde, windswept hair; a bright, pearly white smile; and a dog that looks like it came straight out of a commercial. A few stylish mirror selfies, too, for good measure.
He’s cute, yes, and absolutely out of Riki’s league. He’s an influencer, for god’s sake. Sunoo knows what’s happening almost immediately.
“Oh, I see,” he says sagely. He places a hand on Riki’s, forcing him to drop his phone so Sunoo can hold both of his hands tightly. “It’s okay, Riki-yah. You don’t have to lie to hyung like this.”
Riki grimaces at him, snatching away his hands. “What are you talking about–”
“It’s okay,” Sunoo repeats dramatically, ignoring his protests. It all makes sense now. “I’m not judging you. If you had to form an intense parasocial relationship with a hot, older, Australian influencer to cope with how lonely exchange was without your hyungs, that’s okay–”
“Jake is my boyfriend,” Riki says emphatically.
“He has 100k followers on Instagram and a tiktok link in his bio. He only follows one account, and it’s his dog,” replies Sunoo, as if that explains everything. Which it does. This is ridiculous. Riki is not dating this guy.
Riki shrugs, but he looks a little proud, too.
Oh, god. The voices. They’ve gotten to him. Sunoo was like this too, once, when he was 15 and convinced Kim Taehyung was in love with him, and that he’d invite Sunoo backstage after his concert and they’d live happily ever after. His older sister had to stage an intervention.
“Well, Jake’s pretty popular on campus,” Riki says matter-of-factly. “He’s in a lot of clubs and stuff. And he does those, like, a day in my life tiktoks on his account. We filmed a bunch of dance challenges at some point, but never posted them. They’re probably still in his drafts, actually.”
“Right. That makes sense, because he’s an influencer,” Sunoo says slowly, ignoring the last part for his own sanity. “I’m not seeing where you fit into the equation here.”
“Well. I’m his boyfriend.” Riki picks up his phone again with a grin. “I actually got pretty good at the whole Instagram boyfriend thing too. Wanna see which pictures I took?”
Sunoo presses his lips together in an admirable, uncharacteristic show of restraint.
He’s going to choose peace today. That’s the best course of action, he’s decided. There’s no point in fighting over this. He hasn’t seen Riki in 6 whole months, and they are actually friends, despite everything. Sunoo’s missed him, in all his ridiculous, gangly, perpetual-teenage-boy glory. He’s not going to rain on his parade now.
He can do that tomorrow.
Besides, Riki is too busy admiring his “boyfriend” (heavy on the quotation marks) to listen to Sunoo, anyway.
•••
2.
“Sorry I couldn’t help you unpack earlier,” Jungwon says, watching in amusem*nt as Riki glares at his laptop like it’s personally offended him.
They’d just come back from Jungwon’s promised lunch and were now settled at their usual table in the library. It had been a lonely 6 months without his usual study partner, honestly. Not that Riki was a particularly good one, since he notoriously hated studying, but Jungwon enjoyed his company all the same.It was too quiet without him. But now, thankfully, Riki is back. Sitting across from him, headphones slung around his neck, blaring Mitski so loud even Jungwon can hear the melancholy drone of My Love Mine All Mine, looking like he’d rather die than do his Art History readings.
So, business as usual.
Jungwon still feels kind of bad about this morning, though. “I wanted to skip, but we had a quiz today. I’m barely passing this class, so–”
Riki waves him off easily. “Don’t worry about it, hyung. You bought lunch. Anyway, Sunoo-hyung was there,” he snickers, rolling his eyes good-naturedly. “Not that he was helpful, but I wasn’t alone.”
Jungwon laughs along with him, but the mention of Sunoo reminds him of an odd text he’d received right before lunch. Something about Riki’s hot, Australian influencer-tutor-imaginary-boyfriend. Sunoo’s texts are almost always nonsensical, but that was a bit much, even for him.
Jungwon is curious, though. Sue him.
“I’m glad you’re settling back okay, at least,” he says casually, easing into it. “How was Australia, though? You kept us updated on all the fun stuff–” not all of it, apparently. “–but were your classes okay? Studying?”
Riki shuts his laptop entirely, eager for the distraction and evidently not any more interested in studying than he had been when he left.
Well, that answers that question.
“Classes were actually okay, once I got used to it,” Riki says, leaning his chin on his palm. “Like, that’s what I was learning English for in the first place, y’know? And my professors were pretty nice. It was more my conversational English that sucked. Socialising and all that. I had a tutor, though.”
“A conversational English tutor?” Jungwon asks, raising his eyebrows. Was this what Sunoo was talking about?
Riki blushes lightly. Shyly. Nishimura Riki. Shy and blushing. Jungwon blinks rapidly, as if that will dispel the obvious mirage in front of him, but it doesn’t.
“Well, no. Jake was just my normal English tutor. He’s a couple grades above us, but he works part time at the Student Centre. We got close, or whatever,” Riki rambles on, fidgeting with his fingers. “Dating him helped a lot with the conversational English thing. And socialising.”
“You dated your English tutor?” Jungwon hisses, incredulous.
“Still am, currently.” Riki corrects. “But he stopped being my actual tutor after a couple months. Once I got used to things, he couldn’t help much with my other subjects. Who would’ve thought, a physics major not knowing sh*t about arts.”
“He’s a physics major?!” Sunoo had mentioned no such thing.
That settles it. Riki is definitely not dating this guy.
And, look. Jungwon loves Riki, he really does. He’s one of his best friends. He’s funny, an insane dancer, incredibly creative, capable of things Jungwon could never do, but–
But Riki doesn’t even know where the science building is on their campus. He refuses to learn. He’s like one of those arts kids who are deathly allergic to STEM majors, in general. Jay studies business, and even that is cutting it close, in his eyes. Riki only lets it slide because it’s Jay, who he’s known since he was ten.
Also, according to Sunoo, Riki almost failed high school science, because the only classes he cared about were Art and P.E.
Maybe Riki was abducted by aliens in Australia and they sent back a slightly off replacement.
“Yeah, Jake’s really smart,” Riki grins, puffing up with pride on Jake’s behalf. “He plays sports, too! We played heaps of baseball. He’s not as good as me, obviously, but he’s the only one that could actually catch my pitches.”
Jungwon doesn’t buy it. “And he had time to date you, in between all of that?”
“Yeah, he did,” Riki sighs dreamily.
Oh my god, Sunoo-hyung was right, Jungwon suddenly realises. Riki has gone crazy.
“Riki-yah,” he says slowly, chewing on his next words. He feels kind of guilty for what he’s about to say next, but someone has to ask. “This isn’t about Heeseung-hyung, is it? Because if it is, you really don’t have to worry! We aren’t even sure he and Sunghoon-hyung are actually dating yet, but–”
“What? No, what does he have to do with any of this?”
Riki sounds so genuinely confused, it almost makes Jungwon second guess himself. But he’s always been a little slow on the uptake with the emotional stuff. Maybe he doesn’t even know he’s doing it.
Jungwon clears his throat lightly. “Well, y’know, because you liked Heeseung-hyung for a while.”
“I thought we agreed to never bring that up again,” Riki groans, burying his face in his hands. “Freshman year was a low point for me, okay?”
“I’m just saying! You’ve done weirder things. Didn’t you date Taki for like, a week, because you thought you saw Heeseung-hyung on a date? But it turns out he just had a group project with her, and Jay-hyung actually liked her–”
“Like I said! Low point,” Riki interrupts loudly, garnering some death glares from people in the library actually trying to study. He rolls his eyes at them, but lowers his voice anyway. “Whatever. Taki and I are cool now. And I’ve grown since then. Matured.”
“Making up a fake boyfriend isn’t very mature,” says Jungwon pointedly.
“Jake isn’t fake,” Riki laughs, like they’re in on the same jokes. “Do you want to see pictures of him, or something?”
Jungwon expects the reveal of the infamous Instagram account, but Riki pulls out something much more damning–a whole album of pictures of this guy on his camera roll, surreptitiously titled ‘🐶’.
There are a few photos of a dog, Jungwon will give him that–a friendly-looking border collie, with a sweet, dopey smile–but it’s mostly Jake.
Jake shirtless at the beach, squinting against the sun, blonde hair artfully tousled like it’s a photoshoot; Jake at a library, head bowed in the classic university student God-help-me-please prayer pose, black-rimmed glasses slipping down his perfect-looking nose; hell, even Jake holding up a fish, a goofy, blinding grin on his face, wearing a stupid hat that says women fear me, fish want me.
Maybe it’s just because this guy is freakishly photogenic, or Riki has great photography skills, but every picture looks like something you’d find in an influencer's perfectly curated Instagram photodump. Or on Pinterest, if you searched up Australian model boyfriend pics. Or even on Tinder, which doesn’t seem very characteristic of Riki, but hey–desperate times.
“Fine, so he’s a real guy,” Jungwon acquiesces, pushing Riki’s phone away from his face. Jake is nice to look at, sure, but Riki’s got hundreds of photos in there. They don’t have all day. “Being your boyfriend is a different thing, though.”
“Well, he is. Don’t know what else to tell you,” Riki shrugs, going back to his phone and swiping through the pictures for his own entertainment. His smile grows, almost subconsciously, and he even starts humming under his breath.
Jungwon is absolutely baffled. The power of a celebrity crush, he supposes. Jungwon’s got his own album full of Jungkook photos that he scrolls through whenever he needs a pick-me-up, so maybe he can’t judge.
At least he’s honest about his delusions, though.
It’s quiet for a while as Jungwon goes back to studying and Riki continues staring at photos of Jake (who is not his boyfriend, Jungwon decides) until Riki apparently gets a call.
“Oh, I gotta take this, it’s Jake,” he says, pulling his headphones over his ears and getting up from his seat. “I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Sure it is,” mutters Jungwon derisively, but Riki is already gone, booking it out of the library so he can talk to his imaginary boyfriend. Amused, Jungwon sets a timer to see how long Riki will pretend to be on the phone.
But by the time he needs to leave for his next class, Riki is still “on the phone”. It’s been almost an hour. Even in the alternate universe where Jake was his boyfriend, what could they possibly be talking about for that long, in the middle of the day? Did they miss each other that much?
Well, in this timeline–aka, reality–Jungwon appreciates Riki’s commitment to to the bit. Who knows, maybe he’ll even play along, if that’ll make him happy.
•••
3.
When Riki loses yet another round of MLB The Show–his latest video game fixation that he’s been begging to play since he got back–Heeseung knows something is seriously wrong.
“That’s 6-1,” Heeseung says carefully, like he’ll potentially set Riki off if he speaks any louder. “Do you want to play another round?”
Evidentially, it doesn’t matter how gentle his tone is: Riki implodes either way.
He groans loudly, tossing the controller to the side and burying his face in one of Heeseung and Sunghoon’s couch plushies. They don’t have pillows–it didn’t seem worth the money when they first moved in, since they could be stocking up on ramen, instead–but their friends came over so much that Heeseung started demanding one plushie per person, as some kind of downpayment.
Riki is violently clutching the Piplup squishmallow (Sunoo’s contribution, after they’d all collectively gone through a Pokémon phase again) that Heeseung has fondly dubbed Sunghoonie in his head. Piplup usually sits atop the stack of Sunghoon’s old dumbbell plates holding down their creaky floorboards, but Riki has commandeered him today.
Heeseung resists the urge to replace it with something else. Maybe the duck–Jay bought it specifically because it looked like Riki, after all, so it was unofficially Riki’s every time he came over. He’d even drawn puma spots all over it with permanent marker, much to Jay’s horror and everyone else’s amusem*nt.
But he digresses. Riki is still yelling into Piplup, so Heeseung can’t exactly swap them out now.
Heeseung waits him out, and after a few more moments, Riki emerges from Piplup’s soft belly with a dramatic huff. His hair sticks up in every direction and Heeseung instinctively reaches up to smooth out the dark strands, fussing over him until he looks somewhat presentable again.
“Everybody has off days, Riki-yah,” he says, trying to bite back a smile. If Riki is actually upset, Heeseung will take it seriously, but teenage petulance just looks so cute on him. “It’s not that serious. We can play a different game, if you want. FIFA? Or we could go down to the basketball court?”
Riki rolls his eyes, swatting Heeseung’s hands away when he’s had enough of being babied. “It’s not about the game, hyung. I already know I’d smoke you if I was in a better mood.”
Heeseung frowns. “Is everything okay?”
Riki’s classes are fine, from what he knows. It must be tough settling back in after going on exchange, but Riki mentioned earlier that his professors offered their office hours if he really needed it. So, he’s managing, at least. And the dance club was going well, according to both Riki and Jungwon. He’d gotten quickly acquainted with the new members, and he could learn choreography in about 5 minutes flat, so it definitely wasn’t that.
“Hyung,” Riki finally says. “I’ll tell you what’s wrong, but promise you won’t make fun of me.”
“I would never, Riki-yah. What’s the matter?”
Riki huffs, holding Piplup tight to his chest, curled up in his corner of the couch. He’s too tall to fit like this, but he tries his absolute best anyway, and Heeseung is struck again with the realisation of how young he looks.
He’s not a kid anymore, and he hasn’t been for a while–certainly not after he managed to survive 6 months alone in a foreign country, speaking a language that wasn’t his first, or even his second. But still, sometimes Heeseung looks at him and sees that young, wide-eyed freshman, clinging to Jay’s side like he was his lifeline.
“This is gonna sound so stupid, but, like–” Riki begins, cutting himself off, pouting, and then shaking his head. “Whatever. The game reminded me of Jake and I miss him right now, so. It was hard to concentrate. We played heaps of baseball together, real life and this game. I beat him every time, though. We went 13-1 one time and–”
“Jake?” Heeseung interrupts, just to clarify. He wracks his brain, trying to remember if Riki had mentioned anyone named Jake before, but he comes up empty.
Riki blinks, taken aback. “Yeah. My boyfriend. From Australia. I never told you? I swear I did, but maybe I forgot. It’s been a chaotic couple of weeks.”
Boyfriend from Australia?!
Suddenly, bits and pieces of random conversations he’s had with Sunoo, and then Jungwon, come back to him. Riki’s alleged fake boyfriend. They’d mentioned something about an influencer? Definitely hot. And blonde. Was he a Physics tutor, and an English major? Or Physics major, English tutor?
Heeseung has been a little preoccupied in his own personal life lately, everything else is mostly a blur.
“Your boyfriend?” he repeats, trying not to sound too disbelieving, but probably failing miserably. “The hot, smart Australian influencer?”
Riki perks up. “Oh! So I did tell you about him?”
“Not exactly. But Sunoo and Jungwon did mention you were… fixated? On some Jake guy. A celebrity crush kind of thing.”
“They would put it like that,” Riki scoffs, rolling his eyes, but he doesn’t sound too upset by it.
He already seems better than just a few minutes ago, so maybe he just needed to rant. Heeseung doesn’t get how you can miss a celebrity crush this intensely, and the whole baseball thing seems oddly specific, but what does Heeseung know about relationships, or crushes, anyway?
(Nothing, if his life at present was anything to go by.)
Maybe it was an elaborate metaphor or cover up for something. Riki doesn’t normally talk in circles, and Heeseung doesn’t want to assume, but–
“And no, I’m not making Jake up because I’m hung up on you,” Riki deadpans.
Heeseung jolts in surprise, his eyes widening comically as if he just got caught. He did, in a way, though he hadn’t even finished the thought yet.
“Jungwon-hyung already asked,” continues Riki, answering Heeseung’s unspoken follow-up question. “You’re all being super dramatic, by the way. Like, whatever, I had a teeny, tiny crush on you in freshman year, but it wasn’t that serious.”
“Okay, ouch,” Heeseung winces, oddly hurt by his delivery, more than the sentiment itself. “Is the thought so appalling now?”
“You mean now that I have a boyfriend, and you’ve still got–I don’t know, whatever you’ve got going on with Sunghoon-hyung?” Riki rolls his eyes, officially back to his defiant, bratty self. “Yes, hyung, it is.”
Heeseung punches him in the shoulder. Riki smiles.
At least they can joke about it now. He couldn't have reciprocated Riki’s feelings, given that he’s liked Sunghoon longer than he’s even known Riki, but he’d thought the crush had been sweet. He’ll probably make someone very happy one day.
Just, you know, not the hot Australian influencer none of them have ever met before. Or even believe Riki knows.
But that’s neither here nor there.
“Sunghoon’s coming home from training soon, and he’s bringing takeout,” Heeseung decides to say instead. A deflection and a peace offering. “He’s been craving Chinese, so it’ll probably be that today. Wanna stay for dinner?”
Riki shakes his head, checking the time on his phone. Heeseung catches a glimpse of his lockscreen: a smiling blonde guy with his face pressed into the fur of a large, also smiling, dog. The elusive Jake, maybe. Boyfriend status still pending.
“Can’t stay, sorry hyung,” Riki says with an apologetic smile. “I gotta get back soon. Jake and I always FaceTime before dinner, ‘cause it’s the only time he’s free on Thursdays.”
“You… do?” Heeseung asks, brows furrowed.
“Yep. It’s in my calendar and everything,” Riki nods, standing up and gathering his things.
Heeseung watches him with a kind of morbid fascination. Maybe this is an elaborate prank, after all.
His calendar? Come on. Heeseung is pretty sure Riki doesn’t even have his exams in his calendar. He's not convinced Riki even uses one.
Riki pays his sudden silence no mind, too preoccupied with fixing up the plushies his mild outburst had disturbed. He places Piplup carefully back on the couch, lined up next to Jay’s duck-turned-puma, Jungwon’s green brachiosaurus with a wringed-out neck (courtesy of his cuteness aggression), and the IKEA golden retriever Riki left here before he went on exchange.
He smiles fondly, suddenly, patting the dog. “Oh hey, Jake has a dog, actually. What are the chances?”
Heeseung gapes at him. Is this real? Maybe it is. He has too many details. “He… does?”
“Uh-huh. Layla. Not a golden retriever, but she kinda reminds me of one. She’s huge, but she’s scared of other dogs, it’s so cute. She liked me a lot, though. Maybe ‘cause we played catch so often,” Riki rambles, evidently in a better mood than he had been for most of the afternoon. “I’ll show you pictures some other time, hyung. See you later!”
“I–see you?” Heeseung replies, a little dazed. Riki waves at him without turning back, rushing out the door with his shoes still only half on. “Yah! Put your shoes on properly. Get back safe! Text me when you’re at your dorm!”
Riki doesn’t respond, but Sunghoon does.
“Hey, I’m home. Riki just ran past me in the hallway. Is he okay?” Sunghoon calls out from the entryway, sounding confused.
Heeseung can’t see him from the couch, but he’s probably doing that cute thing where he furrows his eyebrows and tilts his head, like a puppy.
Jesus. Get a grip, Lee Heeseung.
(The voice in his head sounds suspiciously like Jay, which is just unsettling on so many levels.)
“He’s fine,” Heeseung replies when Sunghoon enters the living area. His hair is a little dishevelled, the short strands windswept like he’d been rushing on the way back. Heeseung resists the urge to smooth them down like he had Riki’s. “He’s just rushing home to talk to his boyfriend. Allegedly.”
“Ah, that. Jungwonie mentioned it. You don’t think he’s real?”
Heeseung purses his lips, making a doubtful noise. “I have my suspicions. Or concerns, I guess. I just–he never told us about him while he was gone, you know? He tells us everything. It’s weird, isn’t it?”
“I thought Jay was the Riki-dad here, not you.” Sunghoon huffs out a quiet laugh. Then, he lifts up the bag of promised takeout, smiling in a way that settles something bone-deep inside Heeseung. “Want to talk about it over dinner?”
•••
4.
Sunghoon is Switzerland.
About the Riki thing, he means. He almost failed World History in high school, so maybe the analogy doesn’t quite land, but whatever. He’s Switzerland–carefully, quietly neutral.
Sunghoon loves his friends, but they can be a little dramatic and nosy, especially when it comes to each other’s lives. He supposes that’s what friends are for, but even after a few years, he’s still adjusting to having this many. His university life is a far cry from the lonely, competitive figure skater track he’d been on up until high school, but he quite likes it. Sure, he’s still skating too, but not so much that he can’t live the rest of his life anymore.
Anyway, point being: he cares about Riki, and he’s just glad he had a good time abroad. If he managed to get himself a hot Australian boyfriend in the process, then good for him. He’s certainly doing better than Sunghoon in that department.
And if he was pulling an elaborate, weeks-long prank on all of them? Well. He’s been gone for 6 months. That was his right, too.
“Let me guess, hyung. You think Jake is fake, too?” Riki says, apropos nothing, in between hasty bites of bungeoppang.
Sunghoon is treating him today, just the two of them. They do this at least once a week, whenever their training schedules line up and Sunghoon’s done with skating, just as Riki is finished with dance club. When they first met, they actually bonded over all that–their shared passions, the unrealised childhood dreams, learning how to live with it and love it again now, in new ways.
Maybe that’s why it’s easy for them to talk about anything, in these moments. It’s nice to feel trusted. Dependable. Sunghoon doesn’t even mind the sweet, snack-shaped dent Riki always leaves in his wallet in the process.
“I never said that,” Sunghoon replies. After everything Heeseung had told him, Sunghoon supposed it was just a matter of time before Riki brought Jake up. He blows softly on his own pastry, letting it cool a little. “I’m sure Jake is a real person.”
Riki eyes him suspiciously from his side of the park bench. “Just not my boyfriend?”
“I never said that, either.”
“Well, I need your advice, so humour me for a second, okay?”
Sunghoon’s eyebrows raise a little. “Mine? Not Jay’s?”
Riki clicks his tongue and shakes his head dismissively. “I’ll ask him later. He’ll get all emotional and dramatic if I ask him about this now. Like, what if he cries, y’know?”
“What could Jay possibly be that dramatic about–” Sunghoon catches himself. Jay was dramatic about everything, really. “–okay, dumb question. But related to you. You’re not getting married, are you?”
“What? No!” Riki says quickly. Then, much quieter, so quiet Sunghoon barely catches it: “Well, not yet, anyway.”
“What?!”
“But I’m thinking of moving out of the dorms next year!” Riki continues loudly, distracting Sunghoon from the whole marriage thing for a moment. “You live with Heeseung-hyung off campus, so I was wondering what that’s like. You know, living with your boyfriend.”
Sunghoon blinks rapidly, his brain running in overdrive processing the onslaught of information. Riki just stares at him expectantly, polishing off the last of his food while he waits, and eyeing Sunghoon’s own. “Are you gonna eat that, hyung?”
Dazed, Sunghoon hands it over with little protest.
“I–where do I even start,” he mutters to himself. Sunghoon decides to correct the most pressing misinformation first. “Heeseung-hyung isn’t my boyfriend.”
“Sure he’s not,” Riki drawls sarcastically, rolling his eyes. He wisely decides not to push Sunghoon any further on it, though, which he appreciates.
Then: “Why do you want to move out? You’ve got a good thing going with Jungwon and Sunoo, don’t you?”
Riki hums, fiddling with the pastry wrapper absentmindedly. He folds it in on itself a few times, avoiding Sunghoon’s gaze shyly. “Jake’s thinking of doing his post-grad here and maybe moving long term, if the internship he’s looking at pans out. I guess he could always move in with his dad. But if he doesn’t, he’d need a roommate, right?”
Sunghoon just gapes at him.
Okay. So Jake is his real boyfriend, then.
“Do you think that’s moving too fast, though?” Riki continues, his voice growing quieter and more timid. He curls in on himself a little, retreating further into the black hoodie he has on. “Maybe. I’ve never done this before. Like, it’s that serious to me, y’know? I like him a lot. But what do you think?”
Sunghoon thinks he is not at all equipped for giving romantic advice, if his life is anything to go by.
He’s been pathetically pining for his roommate for years, who was also one of his closest friends, who knew him in a way no one else did. Honestly, he’d rather die than lose Heeseung because of his feelings. Sunghoon is prepared to repress them for the rest of his life if he has to; and he probably will, because he can’t imagine not liking Heeseung, but he also can’t imagine being brave enough to do anything about it.
Damn. Maybe Riki should ask Jay about this instead. Even if he does get all emotional and dramatic.
“Have you talked to Jake about it?” Sunghoon says instead, because he’d like to hope Riki would do as he says, not as he does.
Besides, Riki has never been so serious about someone before. Not even when he had that crush on Heeseung, which Sunghoon honestly found kind of cute. There's something even more endearing about his sweet, boyish earnestness now.
Jake must really be something, if he’s bringing out this side of Riki.
“No, I haven’t mentioned it yet,” mutters Riki. “I didn’t want to add to his stress about it. He doesn’t even know if he’ll get in yet. I mean, I know he will, he’s the smartest guy I’ve ever met, no offence to you guys, but–”
“But you should talk to him, if something is on your mind,” Sunghoon interjects firmly.
He doesn’t take offence, either; half of them thought Riki was lying about a long distance boyfriend he apparently wants to move in with next year, so maybe they really are just a bunch of idiots. Hopefully Jake will raise the average IQ of their little group, when they inevitably meet him.
Riki remains quiet, and Sunghoon sighs. “Look, Riki-yah, if he’s as great as you say he is–”
“He is!”
“–then he’ll want to listen to you, if you’re worried about something. Doesn’t matter what it is. That’s what boyfriends are for, right?” Sunghoon says pointedly. “Among other things, I guess.”
(Sunghoon decidedly does not think of shared dinners every night; or quiet, deceptively serious talks on sh*tty couches; or rushing home because you have someone you want to come home to; or anything of the sort.)
Riki studies him for a moment, searching his face for any kind of doubt. He must be satisfied with whatever he finds, because he nods resolutely. “You’re right, hyung. Thanks.”
“I am?” Sunghoon asks dubiously. “I mean, of course I am. I’m your hyung. And I know you, Riki-yah.”
Riki balls up the last of his rubbish, shoving it into his pocket with a laugh. “You sound just like Jake. You guys would get along, I think. He reminds me of you in some ways.”
“How so?” Sunghoon asks, curious.
Riki grins. “You’re both weirdly obsessed with fishing, but very bad at it.”
“So are you! And so is Heeseung-hyung!” Sunghoon exclaims indignantly. “And I am not bad at it. You take that back. I don’t know about Jake yet, but I’m better than both of you, at least.”
“The four of us should go fishing when Jake visits. We’ll see who’s the best then,” says Riki, laughing at Sunghoon’s passionate outburst. “Hey! It’ll be like a double date. We can go camping, too. It’s better to fish for ssogari at night, isn’t it?”
“Heeseung-hyung and I aren’t a couple,” Sunghoon deadpans.
But he doesn’t hate the idea–of fishing and camping, he means. Obviously. He does like it a lot; he used to fish with his dad when he was a kid, before skating took up most of his time. Then, when he met Heeseung, they’d randomly bonded over it and would always make jokes about going out to fish, staying up all night to catch them and making maeuntang after. Every time they went grocery shopping, Heeseung would say, don’t we need gochujang?
Sunghoon would crack a smile, teasing him about only ever thinking about fishing, but he’d always indulge him right after and start looking for more ingredients they’d need, like green onion or something.
That probably doesn’t help his case with the not a couple thing, so Sunghoon doesn’t mention it.
“Right, of course. You keep telling yourself that, hyung.” Then, Riki abruptly stands up, dusting himself off. “Anyway, let’s go. I wanna get tanghulu.”
Sunghoon follows him with minimal protest. He feels a little indulgent today. “Sure. Just don’t tell Jay that I let you have dessert before dinner. He’d kill me.”
“Jay’s not my dad,” Riki says with a petulant, distinctly teenager-like eyeroll. It’s cute.
“Really?” Sunghoon asks dubiously.
Riki pauses, then tilts his head slightly, squinting his eyes in thought. Like he’s trying to remember what’s on his birth certificate. “Not legally, anyway.”
Sunghoon laughs raucously, already imagining the parental scolding they’d both get if Jay found out about today’s little escapade. “Honestly, I really don’t think Jay gives a f*ck about legalities.”
•••
5.
Jay does not care about the law.
If Riki was on trial for any sort of crime, Jay would hire him the best defence attorneys his family’s money could buy, and then some, and then probably try to bribe the judge while he was at it. If Riki needed him to hide a dead body, he’d be digging a hole in his own backyard before he finished asking, no questions asked.
So, when Riki tells Jay, I’ve got a boyfriend now, he’s from Australia, Jay believes him, no questions asked.
He actually first mentioned Jake in passing over the phone, back when he was still on exchange. My tutor is pretty cute, hyung. How do you say ‘can I have your Snap’ in English? We didn’t cover that in class.
Jay thought he was just messing with him at the time, mostly because he’d raised Riki better than to ask for someone’s Snapchat instead of their number, like a civilised, respectable adult.
But eventually, more seemingly innocuous, but actually quite damning in hindsight, questions started coming: which shirt is giving, like, boyfriend material? Do other guys count baseball games as dates too? What does it mean when someone ruffles your hair and calls you cute, but they’re not you, or Heeseung-hyung, or something?
They were sporadic and strange enough for Jay to still think Riki was teasing him. None of the other guys mentioned anything, so Jay assumed it was just his own special brand of torture, because Riki knew he hated missing out on developments in his personal life. Freshman year notwithstanding, this would’ve been Riki’s first real crush since then, and it would’ve killed Jay to not witness it.
Jay may as well be on his deathbed right now.
He’s had a few weeks to process the news, at least. Riki told him as soon as he got back, on the way back from the airport. A bold move on his part. He’s just lucky Jay hadn’t crashed the car and he had to book it to class right after, so Riki escaped the primetime interrogation window relatively unscathed.
Instead of Jay’s grilling, Riki got Sunoo instead, who thought he was delusional, so it’s hard to say which was worse.
But Jay has always believed Jake was real, and that he was Riki’s boyfriend. That doesn’t mean he’s okay with it, though.
“So when do I get to meet Jake, again? Or at least online meet him. You know, actually talk to him instead of just always hearing about him.” Jay asks, dutifully stirring the pot of curry bubbling on his stovetop.
He always cooks way more than they need, even when it’s just the two of them for dinner, so Riki can take some back to the dorms and be free of instant ramen for another few nights.
Riki hums noncommittally from where he’s seated at Jay’s kitchen bench. He’s only half listening, probably texting Jake, or something like that.
“One day,” he finally says. “If you’re cool about it.”
Jay rolls his eyes with a derisive huff. “I’m cool about everything.”
“You cried at my high school graduation. My parents didn’t even cry.”
“You worked hard!” Jay protests, looking up to meet Riki’s amused gaze. “It was an important milestone. People can cry at those things. And you know I’m allergic to flowers. There were a lot there.”
Riki raises his eyebrows. “And when I got accepted into university–”
“Same thing! I was proud of you!”
“–but didn’t want to move in with you, because I wanted the full dorm life experience?”
Jay stops stirring, turning his full body to Riki and placing his free hand on his hip. “Oh, come on. Cut me some slack. That was hard! You grew up too quickly.”
“Again, my parents didn't even cry when I moved out.”
“Your mum got kinda teary-eyed, though,” Jay points out weakly. He’d been the one to share his tissues with her on Riki’s move-in day. She had been emotional, until she saw how much more emotional Jay was, and then she was just amused, ruffling his hair and making him promise to take care of Riki on campus, too.
Riki shakes his head with a sigh. “Not the point, hyung. Do I even need to mention how you didn’t want me to go on exchange in the first place? And you’re telling me you’re going to be cool when you meet Jake?”
The kitchen timer goes off, signalling their curry is done, which saves Jay from answering. He turns back to the pot, switches off the heat, then starts scooping enough for the two of them into a serving bowl.
“Set the table, would you?” Jay says. “Rice, too.”
Riki’s response is incoherent and mumbled, but it’s followed by the familiar clang of dishware, which is good enough for Jay.
They drop the Jake conversation thread for the first half of dinner–Riki is always ravenous after a full day of classes, and Jay respects the sanctity of the dining table. They eat in companionable silence for a little while, until Riki suddenly stops, swallowing thickly before he looks up at Jay with wide, imploring eyes.
“I just–” he begins, notably more serious than before. “I don’t want to scare him away.”
“I’m not going to scare him away, Riki-yah,” Jay replies reassuringly. They both know he’s kind of lying. He’d want to scare Jake a little, just to make sure he deserved Riki. Testing his mettle, and whatnot. But also: “I’m probably not the one you have to worry about, anyway. There are a few idiots who still think he’s a figment of your imagination.”
Riki rolls his eyes, cracking a small smile. “That’s whatever. I don’t really care about all that. It’s pretty funny, actually, but–” he averts his gaze suddenly, looking rather intensely at the messy, haphazard photo wall Jay knows is behind him.
Jay became obsessed with photography in high school, while Riki was still in middle school. Some of the photos were from that time: blurry Polaroids of a much shorter, younger Riki, with electric blue braces and almost exclusively wearing SHINEE merch. He’s with a younger Jay in a lot of those, with thick-rimmed glasses and fuller cheeks.
Most of them are more recent, though. Cherry blossoms near the Business building, on an unsettlingly quiet spring day, because Riki was in Australia. All of them huddled on Heeseung and Sunghoon’s sh*tty couch, their legs too long to fit comfortably, shaky because Jay hadn’t perfected the self timer function on his new film camera.
It’s still a tight squeeze now, but Jay is pretty confident in their ability to fit at least one more person. So long as he isn’t unreasonably tall, like Riki. Which Jake definitely wasn’t. In the few photos of them only Jay has seen, he looked tiny in Riki’s arms.
It was a little disorienting, actually.
Before all this, Jay thought of Riki as a kid for so long, his little dongsaeng. But there he was, towering over his boyfriend, a possessive arm curled around his shoulder at some house party, or back-hugging him at the beach, shirtless and half covered in sand.
He looked happy, though. Effervescent in a way Jay has never seen before.
“But what?” Jay asks gently, when Riki doesn’t continue his sentence.
Riki’s eyes are still trained on the wall. His cheeks are a little pink and his voice is so quiet, Jay almost misses it. “I don’t know what I’ll do, if you don’t like him.”
Jay doesn’t cry. Really, he doesn’t. His allergies just act up a little and his eyes get watery, even though there are no flowers, or cats, present at the table.
“Of course I’ll like him,” Jay replies after a beat. “If you like him this much, then that’s enough for me.”
Riki blinks rapidly. He’s not crying either, obviously. “You don’t even know him,” he mutters almost petulantly.
“I know everything I need to.”
Here are the facts Jay knows about Jake Sim: he’s Korean-Australian, he’s blonde, he majors in physics, he’s a part time student tutor, part time campus influencer, and he’s Jay’s age. Riki never calls him hyung, though. Says it feels too weird now, when there was nothing like that in Australia.
There are at least three of his hoodies in Riki’s weekly outfit rotation at all times. He has a dog that Riki misses, almost as much as he misses Jake himself. He’s better at catching than he is pitching, and absolutely horrible at MLB The Show. He loves to fish, though he was successful only a handful of times when he took Riki. He used to write Riki cute, stupid notes during their tutoring sessions, and Riki still keeps his favourite one, with the misspelt Korean, in his wallet.
(Jay had discovered that last fact a couple days ago, when he was helping Riki clean out his room. There was a whole stack of them in his drawer, all in English except the one Riki revealed he kept in his wallet. Jay hadn’t read any of them, but the blush on Riki’s face was telling enough.)
But really, the only fact that matters is this: he makes Riki happy.
“Jake’s thinking of coming to Korea in December, since his final exams end late November. He’ll probably be here most of winter break, staying with his dad and stuff,” Riki says quietly. He’s trying to be casual about it, Jay can tell, but his lips tick upwards, like he’s trying to hide an excited grin. “You can meet him in person then. If you want.”
Jay hums, pleased. “He’ll be here for your birthday, then? And the end of year showcase?”
Riki’s smile blooms slowly–shy, but bright. His eyes disappear for a moment, sweet little half-moons that remind Jay of when Riki was ten.
The first time Riki smiled at Jay after he moved to his neighbourhood, right across the street, was when Jay spoke in Japanese to him. He’d started practising as soon as their family had introduced themselves–Riki had been so small, quiet and shy, a complete stranger to the country and the language.
Jay had taken it upon himself to learn the most basic Japanese phrases to introduce himself, then work his way up from there. He was practically fluent now, and Riki had been stuck to him like glue ever since.
Well, until Australia. And Jake.
Riki has that same bright, boyish smile now, thinking about Jake coming to visit. “Yeah, hopefully. If everything works out.”
“It will,” Jay nods reassuringly. “Will you let me vet him beforehand, at least? Before we invite him into our home?”
“I don’t live here,” Riki points out.
“Well, you’ve got your own set of keys, and you’re sitting at my table, eating my food, so–”
Riki groans, but he's still smiling, just a little. “Geez, fine. You can join one FaceTime call before he visits. Only for a bit, though. He’s got some big research thing so he’s pretty busy these days, and I can’t have you monopolising my Jake time–”
“Your sacrifice is duly noted, thank you. Now finish your food, before it gets cold,” Jay cuts in with a laugh. “Your parents text me every week to ask if you’re eating well, you know? Don’t make me lie to them.”
Riki rolls his eyes. “You never lie to them, even when you should,” he says petulantly, though he does clean his plate of any remaining curry. “Don’t tell them about Jake yet, though. Or my sisters. I’m working on it.”
“Are you, really?” Jay snickers. “Because you didn’t even tell them about going on exchange until you’d already applied, gotten accepted, and booked tickets. How far are you going to go with Jake before you introduce him to your family? Moving in together? Marriage?”
Jay is joking. He’s so, obviously, joking. He’s being dramatic and facetious and Riki is supposed to laugh along with him, say no, hyung, don’t be silly, and then move on.
He does no such thing. Not one errant chuckle. Riki purses his lips, averting his gaze with a suspicious sounding hum.
Jay’s eyes widen comically large, almost popping out of their sockets. His voice is low and dead serious. “Riki-yah. You’d tell hyung if you were getting married, right? Right?!”
•••
+1
Jake would never tell Jay this, ever, but he almost thought he was Riki’s boyfriend.
Or at least a very intense, devoted admirer.
Obviously Jake doesn’t think that now, but for that one very brief moment, he kind of did. It was the circ*mstance, okay? Don't hold it against him. Anyone could’ve gotten confused.
Jay had sent Riki a fancy bouquet of black roses and expensive perfume back in May, while he was still in Australia. They were presents for Korean coming-of-age day, which Jake didn’t even know existed until then. He and Riki were already dating by that point, though it still felt fresh and new, so it had been a shock to show up at Riki’s dorm and find some very romantic-looking deliveries by the door, evidently not from him.
It had resulted in a rather amusing conversation, with Riki frantically reassuring him that no, there was no devoted, secret admirer back in Korea. It was just Jay, who was like his dad, basically. Or mum. It depended on the day.
Honestly, I’m surprised this is all he did, Riki had said afterwards, with a fond, almost sad laugh. I thought he was going to fly out here for it, somehow. He’s got exams, but he was upset he couldn’t celebrate it with me. This kind of thing meant a lot. To Jay-hyung, obviously.
Riki had sounded like the upset one that day, and Jake ended up skipping the rest of his classes to celebrate with him instead. Not that he knew what traditional coming-of-age celebrations entailed, but drunken Billiards at their campus bar and sneaking into the athletic centre afterwards for a swim seemed as good as any.
It was the first time he’d ever done anything like that in years, and Felix nearly declared him missing when he hadn’t shown up to their Applied Physics lecture, but it had been worth it. For Riki’s smile, bright and boxy and sweet, even in the dark, even half-submerged in water, even pressed against his–
Well. Anyway, it worked out for the better, and fast forward some months, Jake was the one flying out for Riki. Over 10 hours, to another country, just to see Riki on his birthday.
Sans the roses though, because that wasn’t really their thing. But Jake had brought the old bottle of Aquaflor Riki left at his place all those months ago, after he switched his perfume to the one Jay got him. It’s still in his suitcase back at his dad’s, mostly because Jake’s weirdly attached to it and it felt wrong to leave it at home.
Completely irrelevant to the matter at hand, but he misses the comforting scent right now, as he loiters in front of Jay’s apartment and hesitates to press his doorbell.
Jake is here alone, which is the main problem. He’s supposed to be with Riki–dramatically reuniting after months and all that, right before his birthday this weekend–but he had an exam today, then an important dress rehearsal for his dance showcase. They could’ve just met up tomorrow, but Jake wanted to see Riki now, so he decided to come by tonight.
But Riki’s practice was running late. Because the universe hated Jake Sim, and wanted to keep him away from his cute boyfriend who he’s missed so dearly all this time.
Riki had sent a flurry of frantic, apologetic texts, then Jay’s address, so Jake wouldn’t have to wait on campus alone. I’ll let him know you’re coming over! Some of my other hyungs might be there too, so you can finally meet them!!
That was nearly twenty minutes ago. Jake stares at the door, unmoving, with the sinking feeling that entering would be like willingly throwing himself into the lion's den.
He’s never been self sacrificial, but–f*ck. He’s already here. It had been such a pain navigating the subway route from his dad’s house to Riki’s campus, then to Jay’s place. He wasn’t about to just leave and explore an area he didn’t know, in a foreign country he only visited every few years, at best. His dad was usually the one making the trip to Australia.
Sure, Jake’s conversational Korean was impressive for someone who only spoke it with his parents, and occasionally his boyfriend, but everything else could use some work. All his Physics-related vocabulary didn’t seem very useful for meandering about the neighbourhood and interacting with strangers, either.
“I can hear you thinking from the other side of the door, you know,” an amused, muffled voice calls out. In English, too.
Jake jumps in surprise, swearing loudly. “Holy sh*t, what the f*ck?!”
There’s a sound of someone fiddling with the lock, then the door swings wide open to reveal a face Jake’s only seen in pictures and that one brief, but intense, interrogation over FaceTime.
“Riki texted me ages ago. How long have you been standing there?” Jay asks. He’s got an American accent, which explains some of Riki’s initial English pronunciation, actually.
He’s also weirdly more intimidating in person–sturdy build, sharp jawline, dark eyes narrowed at Jake, sizing him up. Jake tries to remember that this is the same softie who sent Riki flowers and perfume from across the world, who has doted on Riki since they were kids.
That makes it kind of worse.
“Um. A while,” Jake belatedly replies.
“Right,” Jay drawls, raising his eyebrows. “Well, do you want to come in? Riki and Jungwon will probably be back from rehearsals soon, but everyone else is here.”
“Everyone else?” Jake’s voice is embarrassingly high. He’s almost glad Riki isn’t here to witness this, then he’s right back to missing him.
Jay hums. He looks like he wants to laugh at Jake so badly, but he’s holding back for the sake of niceties, which, again, makes it worse. Jake swears he’s usually much cooler than this.
“Yep. Heeseung-hyung, Sunghoon and Sunoo. Riki’s told you about them, right?”
Technically, yes. Jake got a refresher course over FaceTime just last week, with photos and everything, but warned him would be more accurate.
My hyungs are a bit weird, but they’re good guys, I swear! Just don’t let them scare you off. I’m not letting you go, so you’re just gonna have to get used to them. Unfortunately.
At the time, Jake just thought Riki was cute, and he hadn’t registered much else.
But the warning was evidently very necessary, when the first thing Jake is greeted with is someone yelling, “Jake-dot-Sim, 100k Instagram followers?!”
The voice is high and shrill, projecting easily over the low hum of whatever show is playing on TV. Three sets of heads turn towards Jake, and he has about two seconds to process the new faces before the same person–Sunoo, Jake guesses–is yelling again. “You’re real!”
Jake blinks rapidly, frozen in the middle of Jay’s living room. He’s not even sure what language he’s speaking, when he says, “I–yes? I am?”
“Sorry about him, he’s got a really active imagination. Too many K-dramas, y’know?” Jay mutters in English, presumably so the rest of them can’t understand. Then, switching back to Korean, he addresses the room. “Guys, this is Jake. Riki’s boyfriend.”
There’s an explosion of noise.
Sunoo screams again–a loud, overly dramatic, gasping one–which Jake supposes he should start getting used to.
Someone else (Jake is almost certain it’s Sunghoon, this time) slaps the shoulder of the person next to him, and says, “I told you he wasn’t being delusional, Heeseung-hyung!”
Well. The third guy is Heeseung, then. So he technically remembered them all correctly. Riki would be proud.
Heeseung rubs his shoulder with a wince. “I never said he was delusional. I just had some very reasonable doubts, planted in my head by Jungwon and Sunoo–”
“We didn’t plant anything in your head! I was just giving you a fair warning! It really did seem like he was pulling a prank on us at the time–”
“Um, hey? Still standing right here?” Jake interrupts, waving awkwardly. “And definitely not a prank.”
“And he speaks Korean!” Sunoo gasps, his eyes bright. “Wow, Riki. You sure know how to pick ‘em. Hot, popular, smart, bilingual…”
“Ignore him, please. Sorry about all that,” Heeseung says apologetically. “It’s nice to meet you, Jake-ssi. I’m Heeseung. You can call me hyung, if you want. Any friend of Riki’s is one of ours–or boyfriend, I mean. Sorry. Just getting used to it.”
His smile is so welcoming, his tone so awkwardly, charmingly bashful, that Jake almost forgets about the reasonable doubts he apparently had about Jake’s literal existence. Almost.
“Nice to meet you too, and, uh–just Jake is cool. My Korean’s alright, but I’m not really used to all the formalities and stuff,” Jake replies, almost in a daze. “But, yeah. Definitely his boyfriend. Unless something has changed in the 20 minutes since I last talked to him, but I really hope not.”
“Riki’s told us a lot about you,” Sunghoon chimes in. “We’re glad you’re here. And real. I’m Sunghoon, by the way.”
Jake laughs nervously. “Only good things, I hope.”
“Too good, really,” chuckles Sunghoon, like they’re in on the same joke. Jake will have to ask Riki about it later.
“Well, since everybody else did it, I’m Sunoo–and, okay, look, I’m sorry I thought you were fake!” Sunoo exclaims, clambering off the couch and sliding up to him with an earnest, apologetic smile. “You just seemed way out of his league when Riki told me about you, and he's played stupid pranks on me since high school, so a fake boyfriend didn’t seem totally impossible.”
Jake bites back a smile. “It’s okay, really. Honest mistake–” well, no, not really, but now that he’s gathered his bearings a bit, it was a funny joke. Jake can appreciate a good bit. “You thought I was out of his league?”
Sunoo shrugs, looking to the rest of them for backup. “I mean, look at you. No offence to Riki.”
Jay finally decides to join the conversation with an affronted scoff, offended on Riki’s behalf, which makes them all laugh. Jake doesn’t even have it in himself to be offended, because, well, look at him? Look at Riki.
Riki, with his sharp, piercing gaze, and his impossibly long legs, and his bright, boyishly charming smile, and–
“I had a crush on him as soon as I met him,” Jake admits.
Well, the moment he first saw him would be more accurate.
Riki was hard to miss, that first morning back in February: distractingly tall, sharp features, gorgeous, dressed in a stylish leather jacket that was now semi-permanently in Jake’s possession.
He was circling the Arts building like a wide eyed, lost puppy, and Jake could only catch a quick glimpse of him before he had to sprint to class. Still, he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about that new face all day.
And he must’ve been new–between the volunteer work Jake usually did during orientation week and all the clubs, he knew almost everyone on campus. He certainly would’ve remembered meeting a guy who looked like that.
Later that afternoon, Nishimura Riki, a new exchange student from Korea, turned up at the Student Centre looking for an English tutor. Jake profusely thanked the universe for his luck.
“Don’t tell Riki that, though,” Jake belatedly adds. “He still thinks he slowly won me over with, like, hard work and persistence and really great flirting skills. He’s very proud of it.”
Sunoo squeals, miming a zipping his lips action. “Shut up, that’s so cute! I won’t tell him, I swear. I’m saving that for my speech at your wedding.”
Jay makes a wounded, dying sound, and Jake almost chokes, going bright red, but he also realises he doesn’t even mind the idea. He certainly has no plans of breaking up with Riki, well, ever. And this whole thing would make for a pretty funny speech, which Sunoo seems well-prepared for, so at least their wedding crowd would be entertained.
That might be jumping the gun a little, though. They actually need to see each other again first.
Before either Jake (or Jay) can properly respond, there’s commotion by the front door. Excited, overlapping voices, and a particularly distinct one Jake has spent the last few painful months only hearing over the phone.
“Jay-hyung! We’re here, where’s–Jake!”
Riki barrels into Jake with all the force and enthusiasm of a large dog who still thinks he’s a puppy. Jake barely sees him–just a quick flash of his bright, boxy grin, and his smiling eyes–before Riki tackles him into a fierce, long overdue hug. They almost topple over with the force of it, but Jake instinctively holds Riki steady by the waist, so they don’t.
“Hi. Missed you,” Riki mumbles softly, the words hidden into the crook of Jake’s neck. He presses himself closer, wraps his arms around Jake and squeezes so hard, he’s breathless for a moment.
“Missed you too, you big baby,” Jake wheezes, squeezing Riki right back. As tall as Riki is, there are moments like this where he’ll make himself small just for Jake, folding himself over, curling snugly into Jake’s chest. He loves it. “My baby.”
Riki pulls back slightly, straightening up to his full height. With the way he towers over him, Jake braces himself for the inevitable teasing, but Riki just glances down at him with such overwhelming sweetness. He’s always doing that–looking at Jake as if he’s seeing him for the first time.
“Baby?” Riki repeats with a low, fond laugh. “I’m so much taller than you, though?”
Jake rolls his eyes and scoffs. Typical.
He doesn't even get a chance to respond, before Riki is moving his hands to cradle his face and leaning down to kiss him.
Any thoughts Jake has of chastising Riki for being such a brat evaporate instantly, which was probably Riki’s goal. The kiss is sweet and slow, but certainly not chaste. Jake has missed this. He missed Riki. Nothing else exists to him in this moment except for Riki, and his soft lips, and the positively maddening way he smiles into the kiss, and how right it feels to hold him again, and be held by him, until–
“Oh my god! No, what the f*ck, not under my roof, absolutely not–”
“Jongseong-ah, relax–”
“Ignore him, he’s not the boss of me,” Riki quickly mumbles against Jake’s lips. He’s put barely a centimetre of distance between them just to say that, but the gap is closed again almost instantly.
If the choice is between making out with his boyfriend, or listening to Jay, it’s the easiest one Jake’s ever made. His first impression was already pretty abysmal–might as well desecrate his living room, while he’s at it.
Distantly, Jake hears someone exclaim, “Wait! He’s real?!”
Then, a collective groan. “Yes, Jungwon. Keep up!”
•••
Bonus: +2
Something is different about Riki.
He’s noticed it about himself too, even without everyone pointing it out. But it’s for the better, he thinks. Loving Jake makes Riki better in a lot of ways. Happier, for starters.
It’s not like his life was horrible before, or that he was coming back from exchange as an entirely changed, more worldly guy, or whatever. He had a perfectly fine life–a great group of friends, who were a little loud and plenty nosy, but he loved them, though he’d never say that. He enjoyed his studies for the most part, even if the readings were a little dull sometimes. He had dance–he’s always had dance in one way or another, since he was three, and probably until the day he dies.
But he didn’t have Jake. And now he does, and everything feels better for it. Brighter, somehow, because Jake was the kind of guy who made everything warm and easy.
Riki didn’t even have time to be lonely on exchange. He had been worried about it before he left; that it was a mistake, that he wouldn’t be able to adjust, that he’d get nothing from it. But then he’d met Jake his first day on campus, and Riki had stuck to him ever since.
It was just–easy. Jake was friendly, sweet, and patient. He knew Korean too, so it was like a piece of home, of all Riki’s hyungs, was still with him. And they just clicked.
First it was all the tutoring sessions, where Jake would always write stupid, cute, encouraging notes on all his papers; then Jake would treat him to lunch, because he was new to the area, obviously; and Riki would ask him if he had plans on the weekend, because he wanted to explore the city, but he couldn’t possibly do it alone.
Then they’d play baseball together in breaks between classes; or video games at Riki’s dorm, for so long that Jake would just sleep over, his small frame curled tightly into Riki’s chest, right against his rapidly beating heart; and then Jake would take him to a friends party, dancing and flirting all night, until they were suddenly kissing in someone else’s backyard.
They did a lot in those 6 months. Every memory Riki has of Australia is coloured with Jake, in warm, vibrant strokes. Every place has traces of him. His bright smile, backlit by the setting sun on the beach. His quiet sigh, pressed sweetly into Riki’s neck, in some dusty, abandoned corner of the library. His cute, frustrated groan at the pier, when his fishing line snapped again. His giddy, excited laugh, sneaking into their campus’ pool at midnight.
Jake hadn’t cried at the airport when he dropped Riki off with a long, crushing hug, and an even longer kiss. Neither had Riki, because he knew they’d come back to each other, one way or another.
Riki had crossed an ocean and found Jake by chance, and then Jake crossed it to come right back to him. And Riki wanted him to stay, so badly.
“What are you thinking so hard about, hm?” Jake asks, poking Riki’s temple. “I can hear the gears turning. You’ll hurt your pretty little head.”
“Nothing,” Riki replies, snatching Jake’s hand mid-air and pretending to bite it, just to make him laugh. It works like a charm. “Just glad you’re here. Glad it’s real.”
Jake is still laughing when he says, “Of course it’s real. I’m real. I still don’t know what your friends were talking about, earlier. That was a prank, right? They didn’t actually think that I didn’t exist?”
Riki nods absentmindedly, a little too busy staring dreamily at Jake to really register what he’s saying anymore.
All that matters to him now is that Jake is here. In Korea, in his lap, in his bed. He’d kicked out his roommates for all the trouble they’d put him through recently, and he wasn’t about to let this chance go to waste.
“Whatever you say, beautiful,” Riki mumbles, only half joking, before moving up to kiss Jake’s neck. He already had to endure months of absurd teasing from his stupid hyungs, he deserved this. “They’re not that dumb, they have more faith in me than that, etcetera. Let’s stop talking about them now–”
“Riki!” Jake laughs, batting his shoulder lightly, pushing him back down. “I’m being serious!”
Riki groans petulantly, pulling away just a little. “Fine, they are that dumb. I swear I tried to tell them you were real, showed them pictures of you and everything…”
In all fairness, he definitely could’ve tried harder, if he really wanted to. A simple phone call probably would’ve cleared things up, or even a single photo of them together. But those things were all his–Jake’s time, their memories. Riki loved talking about him and showing him off, but he didn’t want to share.
It's why he held off telling anyone for so long. His hyungs would’ve been a thousand times more annoying about it, had they actually known and believed him in the first place.
They’d proven him right earlier tonight, with that whole debacle at Jay’s place–it had taken an unreasonably long time for them to let Jake and Riki leave, once things had settled down. They were unsubtly interrogating Jake at first, and then they’d all fallen for his charms, enchanted by his cute, witty, puppy-like personality. Obviously. Riki expected nothing less.
But Jake was his. And Riki could be very persistent, when he wanted something.
He smirks, leaning close to Jake’s face again. “I guess they just thought you were too good to be true. Which is fair. I mean, look at you. Even I sometimes wonder if I dreamt you up.”
Jake makes the most horrified expression, but he’s bright red, flushed all the way down to his chest, which Riki can see peeking through the low cut of his shirt. Jake in his clothes–as it should always be. Unless he wasn’t wearing any. That was a different story.
“Oh my god, you’re a menace,” Jake hisses, still blushing furiously. “Don’t say things like that–and stop looking at me like that! What if your roommates come back and you’re over here looking like you want to eat me?”
“Well, then that’s what they get for not believing me,” Riki replies flippantly. Jake laughs, something high and sweet; Riki’s absolute favourite sound. He's so cute. Riki wants to scream.
They don’t do much more talking after that. Riki is too busy committing all of him to memory, while he can.
Honestly, the situation is a bit ridiculous. If Riki was one of his hyungs, he probably wouldn’t have believed himself at first either. Who comes back from student exchange with a serious, long distance boyfriend, anyway? Or a boyfriend, period.
Jake is Riki’s first real boyfriend, too, if you don’t count that awkward, week-long relationship with his classmate in freshman year. To add, he’s nice, and smart, and the hottest guy Riki’s met in his life, and played baseball with Riki every time he asked.
So, he’s perfect and they’re going to get married in the spring, basically.
He’s not even joking. Riki is an obsessive, one-track kind of guy. They haven’t even been together for a year yet, they don’t even live in the same country right now, but Riki will marry him. He’ll have to consult good old Naver to figure out the logistics, but whatever. They’re going to elope. They’ll go to a courthouse.
Well, actually–Jake deserves a nicer ceremony than that. They’ll just have one afterwards.
And he’s not going to tell anyone until they’re already married.
(Except for Jay. He’d cry if he wasn’t part of Riki’s wedding. He can walk Riki down the aisle.)
