patisserie d'amour | seungin | stray kids

8. blind date

FELIX

I'm here, and I'm going to finish this shit once and for all. I'm physically tired of Seungmin denying his feelings for Jeongin. I feel bad for the boy who's evidently trying to hard to win his affection.

"I'm telling you, it's not possible for me to like Jeongin like that! We've not known each other for that long, so you can't call it feelings!" He sounds more like he's trying to convince himself.

"Dude, love is an anytime, anywhere thing. There's no time frame for you to like someone," I say, just as the doorbell rings. I open the door, finding myself face-to-face with the guy giving my best friend a hard time.

"Yang Jeongin, we finally meet," I say, sticking out my hand for him to shake. He shakes it with uncertainty, thousands of questions running in his mind.

"You again? Wait, how do you know my name?" He replies. Tch, rude.

"Again? But you guys are meeting for the first time, right?" Seungmin asks.

"Yeah, I just remembered seeing you guys having dinner together the day before the trip," he replies, a hint of sourness laced in his voice. It made sense. He was jealous.

"Ohh, so that's the deal with you. Don't worry. I'm just his best friend, he's all yours. I'm Felix, nice to meet you unless you break his heart," I offer my hand again after a formal introduction, giving him an overly sugary smile which was obviously a warning not to mess with Seungmin.

"O...kay? Why is your best friend kinda scary?" Jeongin whispers to Seungmin, and I laugh.

"Relax, I'm just messing with you," I say, patting his back and inviting him to sit down on the couch with me as Seungmin goes to the kitchen to get something.

"Listen, I have a plan. You're going on a date with Seungmin," I say in a low voice so that Seungmin wouldn't hear me.

"I am???" Jeongin asks with wide eyes, not believing my words.

"You will be. I'm sick of you guys not making any moves so I'm doing it for you. You can thank me later."

"Wait, how am I just supposed to go on a date with him without asking him out?"

"Don't worry, my friend, I'm going to sort that out for you. All you need to know is that you should be dressed up real nice by 7:30 tomorrow. I'll text you details later, so give me your number," I give my phone to him to enter it.

"Why are you helping me, though?" He asks.

"Because you guys are so obviously down bad for each other and I have to listen to him deny it a million times like his life depends on it. Just get together already!" I say, exhausted.

"I mean, he's not really showed any signs of liking me back. What if he doesn't show up?" Wow, these two are so oblivious, they're perfect for each other.

"He stayed up the whole night making all that stuff for you for your trip. Do you know that he was literally puking his ass off after we had dinner and I had to rush him to the ER to get him checked? And guess what, his dumb ass still pulled an all nighter to do that for you. He's not playing about you, Jeongin. He just doesn't realize it," I reveal to him, and an expression of guilt washes over his face.

"I didn't know that..."

"I know that look, don't feel bad about it. He's always been like this, working hard and never listening to others even if it's for his own good. I somehow got him to start sleeping atleast six hours everyday, which is a major achievement in like, five years of our friendship, so you get what I mean."

We hear footsteps approaching from the kitchen, and we quickly act like we're on our phones to not look suspicious.

"This is your cue to leave," I say to him.

"But I just got here-"

"I need time to convince Seungmin, idiot. Now go!"

"Sorry guys, I had to take the chicken out of the oven. Where are you going?" He asks, seeing Jeongin get up from the couch.

"I uh...," he fumbles, and I give him a stern look from the side.

"They need him at the bar," I say, covering up for him. Why am I always doing things for everyone?

"Yes, exactly! They've got a huge group coming in and they're short on staff today, so I need to fill in for them. See you tomorrow!" He says, running out of the door before anything else could be said. This boy honestly sucks at acting.

"I didn't even ask him how his trip went."

"Doesn't matter. Hey, you're free after work tomorrow, right?

"Yeah. Why?" He asks.

"Okay, we're going on a double date tomorrow." His eyes almost pop out of their sockets when I say that.

"Woah, what? Double date? With whom? Are you seeing someone? Why should I go?" He bombards me with questions and I wave my hand dismissively.

"It's a blind date and it's final that you're coming. It's not like you like Jeongin that it's going to make you feel like you're cheating by going or something," I say to provoke him, rolling my eyes. Well, its not exactly a blind date. I asked Changbin to tag along and pretend to be my date. He looks at me in confusion, visibly wondering why my attitude towards the whole situation suddenly changed.

"...okay." Good lord, his ego is fatter than his ass. He's going to be that stubborn about it?

*

"This is the one." I take out a white dress shirt with some embroidery and a pair of black trousers to go with it. It probably doesn't sound that fancy but that's the most extravagant thing Seungmin is willing to wear, which isn't a lot. And of course, he couldn't think about his outfit until we had one hour left for the date.

He slips into the shirt wordlessly, buttoning it up and rolling up his sleeves. I knew it was torturing him inside to be doing this and 'betraying' Jeongin, but he silently accepted his fate instead of speaking up.

"Look here," I say, getting out his blow dryer and styling his hair so that his forehead was showing, instead of his usual downward combed hair. His forehead really needs to the see the light of day sometimes.

"Isn't this a bit too much?" He says as I finish up with him.

"No, you look great. Now let's go, or else we'll be late," I say, dragging him out of the house. He really did look good, and I just know that Jeongin's still probably touching up his outfit because he wants it to be perfect.

But for too long, unfortunately. He arrived at the restaurant fifteen minutes after we did, and Seungmin was almost thrilled to think that his date had ghosted him.

"I'm here I'm here sorry!" Jeongin says, running to our booth. I'm pleasantly surprised to find that he's holding a bouquet of flowers since he didn't come off as much of a romantic person to me.

"Jeongin? What are you doing here?" Seungmin says, pale as a sheet of paper. He looked exactly like someone who got caught red handed cheating on their partner.

"Well...I'm here on a date," Jeongin replies, handing him the bouquet. His eyes widen in realization as he accepts them, not so secretly blushing at the gesture.

"Annnnd my work here is done," I say to myself, getting up from the chair as Changbin does the same.

"What? I just got here. You didn't even have anything yet," Jeongin says, looking at me in panic. He wasn't expecting me to actually leave them alone.

"That was the plan all along, kid. You know what to do from here," I wink at him before leaving the place.

"Alright, I'm starving. Where do you wanna eat?"