Deer Luhan, With Love

26

*****WARNING: DOUBLE UPDATE!  GO READ CHAPTER 25 FIRST!*****

Chapter 26 – In Which We See the New Year In

Deer Luhan,

To be honest, I’d still swap a drunk one of my university mates for a drunk Chen any day.  He’s irritating as f*ck when he’s wasted, but it’s kind of adorable and funny.

Leigh

The night almost started badly the moment we stepped out of the high-rise building the dorm was in, Tao hiding the electric blue streaks in his hair under a beanie.  Kris, now the colour of a normal human being, slung an arm around my shoulder.

“Right, Luhan, this is your territory.  Where do you reckon we should go first?”

I looked up at him in alarm, my mind going blank.  Kris had been perfectly comfortable suggesting a couple of bars just around the corner the last time we’d been out, so I didn’t see why I was supposed to be calling the shots.  And also, how in the name of anything on earth was I supposed to be able to suggest a decent place to go drinking when I’d only left the dorm three times since I’d arrived?

“We could always go to the usual place—” Xiumin proposed with a quick glance at me, and I nearly melted in relief.

Until Kris turned to him with a scowl.  “It’s f*cking New Year’s Eve: we need a line-up of at least four decent places to go to before we turn in.”

I was kind of annoyed Kris hadn’t at the very least given me prior warning, say, when he’d turned up with the plea for me to go to the dermatologist, so I could have asked Luhan for advice, and I reached into my pocket for Luhan’s phone to complain about the short notice.

It was only when I was holding it in my hand that I remembered I’d transferred the list of Important Places to Luhan onto the phone just in case I needed them.  I opened it up and saw that the one right at the top was the dermatologist.  Whoops.  Right below that was a name he’d starred as his favourite restaurant.

I went into the messaging app.

If you’d told me earlier, I could have booked tables, I wrote.  And your left ear is still orange, by the way.

Kris looked embarrassed when I showed him and he ducked away to fix his ear.  I puffed out my cheeks and returned to the list.  Xiumin and Lay came and peered over my shoulders.

“That one,” Lay murmured in my ear, catching the scrolling screen with his thumb and pointing to another starred restaurant halfway down the list.  “We’ve been there before – Lu— uh, you’re kind of a special customer there, so you can ring up and get seats any time.  We’ll go there for food.”

“Lay,” Xiumin muttered back to him, “she can’t talk.”

Lay plucked the phone out of my hand and went to the contacts list.  “I’ll ring.  Look for bars while I do that.”

I tugged on his sleeve as he prepared to make the call, and Xiumin scoffed and snatched the phone back for me.  “We can’t do that while you’re ringing them!  Here, take down the number and call from your phone.”

“Jeez, this is taking ages,” Chen grumbled with a loud yawn.  I looked up at him and pointed towards Kris with an unamused expression.  Kris held his hands up.