Beneath Doyun’s palm, he could feel Eunho’s lips curl into a smirk. It was a smile full of certainty and confidence. Eunho’s face — with its straight, sharp nose bridge and a jawline of firm, clean angles — had no soft edges anywhere. Except for his lips. The pillowy softness of them felt unfamiliar against his palm, and Doyun pulled his hand away from Eunho’s face.
“I’m not lying. Hey, why are you staring at me like that?”
“Because you’re good-looking.”
Doyun snorted at Eunho’s words. He’d heard compliments like “not a single flaw in any of his features” or “takes after his mom — for a boy, he turned out pretty” before, but the word handsome had never really applied to him.
Coming from Eunho — who was, by anyone’s standards, classically handsome — the word felt less like a compliment and more like teasing.
“When you say it, it just feels like an insult. Ugh, I’m hot, don’t touch me….”
His skin was fair and he gave off a cool sort of aura, but Eunho’s body temperature had always run high. In the dead of winter, even Minjun and Suhyeok would hold out their hands and ask Eunho to warm them up. Not that he ever obliged.
“…You’re hot?”
“…….”
Doyun nodded instead of answering. Every time Eunho touched his forehead or cheek, the warmth transferred over and made him flushed. Whether it was because he was feeling relaxed, or because the hand resting against him was warm, drowsiness crept back in. Doyun closed his eyes for a moment, and Eunho spoke in a low voice.
“Doyun.”
“What.”
“It’s already past 10. You were sleeping so soundly I couldn’t bring myself to wake you…. You want to sleep more?”
At Eunho’s soft words murmured right against his ear, Doyun’s drowsy eyes snapped open.
“What? You should’ve woken me up. Actually, no — I wasn’t expecting you to wake me anyway. But why didn’t my alarm go off?”
“Just cancel your plans…. You’re tired, we came all the way out here.”
Eunho kept whispering in a gentle voice, let’s just go back to Seoul tomorrow, but Doyun shook his head firmly.
“We literally just played around the whole time, what’s there to be tired about. Is my laundry done yet?”
“Oh, the laundry’s not done yet. Hmm…. I have an extra t-shirt, do you want to wear that and head out?”
At Eunho’s words, Doyun fell into thought for a moment. The white t-shirt Eunho had bought at the mart yesterday was too thin — it’d probably be cold to wear outside.
“Sorry, I’ll borrow it just for today then. But what about the t-shirt I dropped off? Do I have to just leave it here…. It’s one of my favorites.”
“I’ll pick it up for you later. Wait here then. I’ll go to the car real quick.”
At Eunho’s words about going to the car, a small sigh of relief escaped Doyun. Eunho stood up and grabbed the car keys off the table. He let out a sigh deeper than Doyun’s, then walked out of the hotel at an unhurried pace.
The door clicked shut. Doyun counted a few seconds in his head before finally sitting up. He carefully pulled back the blanket and looked down at himself. The front of his dark-colored underwear had turned an even darker shade. He scrunched his face slightly and shuffled his way to the bathroom. It wasn’t enough to be called a full wet dream, but it was definitely damp.
At the sink, he dampened just the affected area of the underwear slightly with water and dabbed it clean, then dried it with a hair dryer. The thin fabric stiffened up quickly under the hot air. Unpleasant, but there was nothing else to be done. Doyun pulled his underwear back on and came out of the bathroom.
“Here.”
Eunho was already back from the car, holding a t-shirt. He tossed it lightly over to Doyun. Doyun caught it, unfolded it, and his expression began to slowly crumple. The color of the shirt was the first problem. The bigger problem was that it was covered in flashy prints and English phrases, leaving nowhere for the eye to rest.
“…You actually spent money on this?”
He’d almost cursed out loud as he slowly read through words like Kill and Hell.
“Yeah.”
“Well…. I appreciate the thought. I’ll definitely give it back.”
Doyun looked down at the skull printed across his stomach and made a silent vow — several times over — that he would absolutely, positively return it. Eunho watched him and gave a little shrug. His throat was visibly bobbing, like he was holding back a laugh.
***
Doyun, dressed in the multicolored skull t-shirt plastered with aggressive words and phrases, waved at Suhyeon as he spotted him approaching from a distance. Having exchanged messages with him almost every day, Doyun had developed a sort of natural warmth toward him, and knowing he was a junior from the same department made it easy to feel at ease around him. Suhyeon approached and greeted him with a polite bow at the waist.
“I honestly wasn’t sure you’d reach out — I’m really grateful.”
“Grateful for what, come on…. You left me a message thinking I wouldn’t reply?”
The formal bow and careful speech made Doyun feel a little awkward. It felt like just yesterday that he was a freshman himself, but now he felt like some immense senior figure.
“Yes, this is actually the first time I’ve ever left a message for someone like that. I was honestly really nervous.”
Now that he knew Suhyeon was an alpha and was looking at him through that lens, the differences from non-secondary-sex types were clearly noticeable. He wasn’t as tall as Eunho, but he was still considerably taller than Doyun himself. His well-built frame and classically handsome features made the alpha traits unmistakable. It was enough to make Minjun’s comment about the whole department going crazy over him completely understandable. Still, it wasn’t quite the same level of shock as seeing Eunho for the first time.
“I don’t really show up to department activities much, so I had no idea you were a junior. Otherwise I would’ve treated you to a meal ages ago.”
Doyun gave Suhyeon a light pat on the shoulder with a smile. It was his way of being friendly, but Suhyeon reached up with his other hand and touched the shoulder Doyun had just patted, then continued with a slightly flushed face.
“Just getting to eat together with you is an honor. What would you like to eat? Is there anything you prefer?”
“Just…. rice? I haven’t eaten properly today so I want something filling. Do you know anywhere good around here? My treat.”
“No, I’m the one who suggested eating first. If you have time, how about eating somewhere outside of campus?”
Doyun didn’t want to venture outside in this eye-searing t-shirt, but since he’d offered to pay, he couldn’t exactly insist they eat on campus. If he’d brought his bag, he could’ve at least covered part of the shirt, but Eunho had said he’d bring it later, so Doyun had come out with nothing but his card wallet.
“Fine, let’s go eat somewhere outside. Oh, and you can talk casually with me. Your name is kind of similar to my friend’s. My friend is Song Suhyeok, so I call him Songsseok — I’ll call you Songsyeon from now on, yeah?”
“Sure. Call me whatever’s comfortable for you.”
Suhyeon smiled as he answered.
***
Lunch ended up being paid for by Doyun after all. Suhyeon insisted that since he’d been the one to suggest meeting first, he should be the one to pay, but Doyun was firm.
With a quiet tsk and a “Who’s the senior here,” delivered with just enough casual authority, Suhyeon couldn’t push back any further. Instead, Suhyeon paid for dessert. The two of them each had an ice cream in their mouths as they started walking toward Doyun’s apartment.
As they talked about classes, Doyun found out that Suhyeon was currently enrolled in a class Doyun had taken last semester. He wasn’t particularly close with his peers or upperclassmen in the department, but he had some old exam materials he’d gotten through Minjun, and he decided to pass them along to Suhyeon. Since neither of them had any plans right now, they decided to swing by Doyun’s place on the way to hand them over.
“So where did you do your language program?”
“New York.”
Exchange programs had been Doyun’s biggest topic of interest lately, so the conversation naturally flowed toward exchange programs, language study abroad, English scores, and the like. Suhyeon had taken a leave of absence last semester and just returned from a language program.
“Ah, if I’d finished my scores earlier, I could’ve already gone this semester — I just wasted time without doing much. How long were you there?”
“I took a leave of absence, and with the breaks on either end it came out to about eight months.”
“If it weren’t for the military, I would’ve just gone for a full year. Going for just one semester feels like a waste. The flight cost is the same either way.”
Doyun took a bite of the ice cream he’d been letting melt on his tongue. He’d talked it over with Eunho yesterday and had settled on putting Chicago as his first choice. He’d looked up six-month open-return flights and was a little disappointed to find they weren’t that much cheaper than one-year open tickets. Just then, Suhyeon — who had been listening — stopped walking and turned to Doyun.
“Huh…? The military? You’re enlisting?”
“Yeah, why?”
Suhyeon stared at him with wide eyes, visibly startled. Unlike Doyun, whose ice cream was still more than half-eaten, Suhyeon was left holding nothing but the wooden stick.
“Aren’t you an ome—, I mean, aren’t you a secondary type? Then you’d be exempt. Or are you volunteering?”
“Me? No. I’m a beta.”
