Sometimes Sweetly, Sometimes Achingly

Chapter 6

“What?!”

Ten beamed. He did a little spin on top of his chair before settling down and showing off his ring. “Literally same. That was my first reaction when it happened,” Ten said.

Jongdae rushed over to examine the silver band. “Goddamn,” he whistled lowly. “This looks twice as expensive as the one I got for Sunyoung.” With an awkward laugh, he added, “Please don’t tell her that.”

“Don’t tell who what?” Sunyoung, who’d just entered the staffroom, asked curiously.

Jongdae jumped in fear. “Oh, uh, that’s just…well, Tennie’s engaged!” He exclaimed, running over and hugging his fiancée in an effort to distract her.

Sunyoung gasped. “Really? Can I see your ring?”

Before she could get closer, Jongdae hurriedly led her out of the room, making up some excuse about needing her help to arrange his studio.

Doyoung raised an unimpressed brow. “When I first met Jongdae-hyung, I thought he was pretty normal. Now I see he’s really not,” he remarked.

Jungwoo slapped him lightly across the shoulder. “Forget that, Ten-hyung’s getting married!” He turned to Ten with excitement shining in his eyes. “How did Johnny-hyung propose? Was it romantic?”

Everyone leaned in close to listen.

“Well,” Ten suddenly sounded uncharacteristically shy. “He asked me to go over to the bar last night, so I did. When I got there it was almost full but then everyone just went silent. Then Hansol-hyung—one of the bartenders—told me to stand on the bar and even though I was really confused I did it anyway. And then Johnny just got up too and proposed and I think I screamed but I’m not really sure,” Ten covered his pink face in embarrassment.

“Aww,” Taeyong cooed, reaching over to hug his best friend. “That’s adorable, Tennie. Congratulations.”

Baekhyun’s eyes watered up. “Beautiful,” he sniffled. “I hope Chanyeol’s proposal can be just as cute.”

Kyungsoo snickered. “First you’ve got to see if he actually wants to marry you.”

“We’ve been together for seven years! He’d better want to marry me!”

Jungwoo sighed dreamily. “I hope Lucas wants to marry me.”

It was Doyoung’s turn to laugh. “Woo, you’ve been together for like, two weeks. Marriage is a bit too far in the future, isn’t it?” He pointed out.

“It’s never too early to start planning!” Jungwoo insisted.

Ignoring the steadily rising chaos, Ten turned to Taeyong. The former’s eyes still shone with giddiness as he said, “Tae, you’ll be my best man, right? Yuta’ll be mad but it doesn’t matter because you’re my real best friend.”

A wide smile immediately broke across Taeyong’s face. “Of course I will, Tennie!”

“I’m assuming you heard the big news,” Jaehyun remarked as Taeyong climbed into the car.

Taeyong gaped. “You knew?”

Jaehyun snorted. “You think Johnny could come up with that? I had to plan the whole proposal for him.”

“For someone so angsty you’re quite the romantic, aren’t you?” Taeyong blurted out the first thing that came to mind. Only once the words were said did he realize the implications of his statement and blushed.

“I guess,” Jaehyun shrugged, seemingly unaffected by Taeyong’s blunder. “Proposing really doesn’t seem that hard. Once they see a ring they won’t care how good or bad the setup is.”