Dandelions ⭒ Jaywon

7. seeing you

Throughout the days, a question plagued Jungwon and Jay’s mind.

“What are we?”

They hadn’t officially begun dating, and they never referred to each other as boyfriends. But every morning, they woke up, tangled in the sheets, peppering kisses on each other’s faces. They spent weekends without so much as an inch of gap between them, just resting on each other’s lap, shoulder or chest while scrolling through their phones, or on dates to the dandelion field.

Every now and then, one of them would begin to bring up the question.

“Jay?”
“Yes?”
“What… what are…”
“What are what,” the older laughed, ruffling Jungwon’s hair.
“What are… the chances of rain today?” Seriously, Jungwon? Is that really the only thing you could think of? The younger boy slapped himself mentally.
“Odd question, but I don’t think they’re very high.”

And sometimes it was the other way round.

“Jungwon?”
“Yeah?”
“Are we… we…”
“Are we what?” the younger boy smiled.
“Are we going to watch a movie tonight?” Jay, you have no balls.
“Sure we can. You pick.”

This conversation would go nowhere. Ever.

Until one day, it did.

Just… not how they’d expected it.

One random, lazy Friday night, Jungwon was in the shower, ready to go to bed soon. He felt… weird. He didn’t know what came over him, but he didn’t like this feeling. The absence of butterflies in his stomach when he was around Jay.

He loved Jay. So much.

But things… things didn’t feel the same.

Jungwon got out of the shower while drying his hair, and smiled when he made eye contact with Jay. But it wasn’t a smile that made his cheeks ache from how bright it was.

Seeing Jay there in his comfy blue t-shirt just waiting for the younger to arrive so he could smother him with cuddles broke his heart. Reluctantly, he climbed into the sheets and made himself comfy in the soft mattress next to Jay. Almost instantly, Jay’s arms wound around the smaller boy’s waist, and the latter froze. Sensing the tension in Jungwon’s body, Jay retracted his hands and asked, “What’s the matter, Jungwon?”

“Nothing,” the younger boy mumbled as he turned away.

Jay decided against asking any further, so he switched off the lights and attempted to fall asleep. “He must just be tired,” Jay thought to himself as he shut his eyes.

Jungwon, however, lay awake, bathed in the mellow light from one of the street lamps in the city, feeling immense regret for the past few moments. He wanted to turn and apologise, but how? He didn’t feel that same fluttery attraction he did. Was he falling out of love with the one person who loved him, and loved him right?

No. It couldn’t be.

It was just the stress of them not making things official that was frustrating Jungwon to the point where he wanted to scream and hate Jay.

But he couldn’t.

Because he loved Jay to bits, to the extent that he would give up his life to see Jay happy. He would willingly spend sleepless nights caring for Jay if he was sick, spend long tiring days just making him feel better if he was going through a low, and spend hours listening to him vent about shit that weighed him down. He wanted to be Jay’s backbone, the cushion for his heart and the trampoline that caught him when he fell, and pushed him back up higher. His love overpowered his urge to hate. And thank goodness for that.

Jungwon turned around to face the older boy. “Jay?” he called.
“Hm?”
“I… um…” He simply couldn’t form words.
Jay chuckled softly, but sadly. “You what?”
“I love you. And I kinda wanted to ask you something.”
“I love you too, and sure, go ahead.” Suddenly both were alert.
Jungwon began speaking quickly and awkwardly: “Well so I’ve kinda been wondering because you know, we’ve been with each other for a while and things are going smoothly if you know what I mean and we seem to have a special feeling for each other kinda…” Special feeling? What the fuck Jungwon? “I was thinking maybe we could start seeing each other, you know?”
“But we see each other every day—”
“Oh, you dumbfuck that’s not what I mean!” Jungwon laughed at Jay’s cluelessness and also sighed, tears forming in his eyes from. “I mean I want to be able to call you mine in front of people and I want us to basically be how we are but I want there to be certainty to that which reinforces that you are mine and I am yours and there is no other way about it and I want us to go on dates as proper boyfriends. Officially. Romantically. If you’re okay with that—”

His long sentence was cut off by a pair of lips on his. Jay had turned around and wrapped his arms around Jungwon’s waist, pulling him close such that no bit of gap remained between their bodies. Jungwon was startled at first considering this was his first kiss with Jay and it happened so unannounced, but of course, he kissed back with no hesitation whatsoever. His hands found their way to Jay’s black t-shirt, and picked up fistfuls of the fabric. Jay’s hands travelled upwards, cradling Jungwon’s neck and twirling the ends of his silky hair. Their lips seemed to fit perfectly together, like pieces of a puzzle, and move perfectly in sync like ballet dancers. Jungwon pulled Jay even closer by the shirt, while Jay’s hands traced the sides of Jungwon’s neck and cupped his face. The pads of his hands felt warm and soft against the younger boy’s cheeks and he melted into his touch, wrapping one of his legs around Jay’s body. They kissed fervently until their lips swelled and their lungs ached for a breath of air.

They pulled back together, and shared a long, electric look between them. Jungwon’s look was that of anticipation and relief, in some sense, and Jay’s was of pure exhilaration. And also relief, to some extent.

“I’m assuming that’s a yes?” Jungwon smiled, feeling the weight lift off his heart.
“Of course,” Jay responded, pecking Jungwon on the nose.
“I’m sorry if I’ve been acting distant, it’s just I needed to find a way to say this plainly,” Jungwon apologised, shutting his eyes and kissing Jay on the lips once more. Now that he'd done it once, he wanted to do it again and again.

Dalhyun was right. He wasn't like other guys. He would squirm and force himself to kiss back when the others had tried to kiss him. But with Jay, he wanted more, and felt empty when Jay pulled away.

And suddenly, the butterflies were back. If anything, Jungwon had learnt a lesson from this. He learnt that leaving things unsaid, letting things build up would eventually snowball and avalanche on you.

And thank god the butterflies were back, because that’s what completed them.