#we love this trope at least i do

LIVE

maybe the heat has gotten to chenle
when he sits down on the last step of the long staircase nestled between your building and the twenty four hour grocery store
the stairs lead up to the next block, where you can hear the vague sounds of kids playing on the street. one of the voices might be haechan, he’s shouting for someone to come back
but you look at chenle and he’s looking at his knees
freshly bruised from where he and jisung both fell off their bikes a couple days ago, it’s starting to scab and he looks like he’s trying not to pick at it
“sorry, you want me to do what?”
“don’t make me say it again.”
he mutters and he won’t look at you
you know even if you ask him too - he’s probably the most stubborn person you’ve ever met - he won’t
“no, i didn’t hear - well i did, but i mean - you’re crazy.”
“you can just say no.”
he shifts his gaze from his knees up to the sky and then after you wait patiently for another minute he finally does look at you
“do you really hate the idea of it?”
“it’s not that. it’s just…….if you really like this person, you should just fall into it naturally with them. you shouldn’t have to practice - you should just do it when it feels right.”
his mouth twitches like he’s about to scowl and roll his eyes and stomp away
because that’s what he does when things don’t go his way but instead he just stares at you and says;
“i won’t know what feels right until ive at least tried it.”
you should argue back, you and chenle are notorious for always bantering and quarrelling and leaving all of your friends either annoyed or doubling over with laughter
but you can’t think of something witty to say. something at least convincing because he makes a point
but also
how is he not embarrassed to ask me of all people that?
sighing, you’re the one who looks away and over your shoulder up the stairs
no one is around - their voices are - but they’re distant and chenle is close
so close that bruised knee of his could brush yours if he just inched a little to his left
“fine.”
you give in and turn your shoulders back toward him
“you might as well practice with me, anyone else and you might actually catch another crush on top of the one you have now.”
chenle half smirks and you don’t register the emotional shift in the light brown of his eyes
you just think he’s going along with your joke - well not really a joke, more like a statement
and that’s how you end up leaning in, one hand on the stairs as if to keep your balance even while sitting down
and the other on the side of chenle’s cheek
you hover just a moment before you kiss him - a split, wordless millisecond of hesitation - and then you let your lips gently press to his
it isn’t even a real kiss but it is the first moment of the rest of a summer you never expected
of course, you and chenle tell no one about this weird, awkward, beyond the boundaries of friendship thing you are doing
mostly because if you did haechan and jaemin would not let it go, not until you were all rolling in your graves and jisung would probably be scarred with crippling doubt of where every friendship of his stood
so you only naturally have to sneak around
chenle is a good liar though, well better than you who has trouble even looking renjun in the eyes when chenle says you and him have to leave a little earlier from the backyard barbeque someones throwing because oh right, you forgot your allergy medicine at home and chenle promised some old lady across the street he’d feed her cat while she was on holiday
they’re half-assed, badly timed lies but it is summer
and if you and chenle don’t want to have fun with the rest of the group then so be it
you guys just get teased and called debbie-downers and then you’re home free
well home free in a sense that you know have some time to sit on the rug of your bedroom and kiss
for the sake of learning
“where do i put my hands?”
chenle asks one time and you move instinctively to put one of his palms on the side of your waist.
that’s where i like to be held-
you drop his hand as soon as the thought crosses your mind and stutter out
“well, that’s more a question for your crush. different people like it in different places.”
he nods and thinks for a second
“we’ve only kissed a couple of times but i think i like putting my hand on your waist.”
his palm ends up just where you had wanted to lead it and when a little swell of butterflies flutters in your stomach at the fact, you quell the feeling and shove it deep deep deep down
this persists throughout the weeks, and each time you try and introduce chenle to a tier higher of kissing, if that makes sense
you’ve got down the leaning in, the hand position, the tilting your head, the emergency breath mints, the lead up or lead out, the avoid nose smashing or teeth clanking and then there’s only really one last thing you can graduate too and it’s
“tongue?”
you almost hark on the ice-cream sandwich you’re eating when jaemin says the word
“yeah, he got his tongue pierced. are you ok?”
renjun turns his long gaze to you, the poor ice-cream melting all over the wrapper and on your fingers
“fine, yeah, it’s just - super hot. i think im gonna go home and lay under the ac.”
your eyes go from renjun to jaemin to chenle who gives a little nod and stands up from his side of the table with a groan
“sorry guys, i got a text from my mom. i gotta go now too.”
no one says anything. renjun taps his fingers and doesn’t look away from you as jaemin tries desperately to convince you both to stay and when you both say no he sticks his tongue out and asks you a question that you thought would sooner come out of anyone elses mouth
“are you two like hooking up behind our backs or something, you’re always gone when we’re having the most fun!”
you think you might really fall over - renjun, sure you could have seen him figuring it out. haechan - definitely. even jeno……but
jaemin?
“what? like i’d ever hook up with them.”
chenle’s voice comes out, high and mocking
it’s pretty good and you almost believe it for a second - turn around and tell him hey, you’ve been making out with me this whole entire month so if you want to end up practicing on a stuffed animal back home you better take that back!
when you realize - right, he’s covering up
you scrunch up your nose and chuck the icecream into the trash
“right, like id ever let him touch me.”
jaemin is convinced, he goes back to laughter and obliviousness, but renjun chuckles when you pass by and the undertone of it makes you shake even in the heat
“renjun knows.”
you and chenle are not in your room for once, you’re outside in a small park that’s been abandoned as the summer moon switches places with the summer sun
chenle is swinging back and forth and you’re leaning against the side of the swing set nervously biting your lip
“he gave me a look when we left.”
“are you going to teach me it by the way?”
“teach you what?”
you hear the swing come to a stop and he stands up, you don’t know if now the summer heat is getting to you
because when you look at him he looks different
he looks handsome, not just cute and sweet like you’re used to seeing him - all round faced and smiley - he’s gotten taller and is still so naturally thin it brings out the defining cuts of the sharper parts of his face
you look away immediately when you start cataloging all of this in your brain
people only do that with people they like, you don’t look at your friends and start painting their best features in your head like a psycho …….. ok not a psycho but someone that’s…..that’s in ……
“you know, how to actually kiss. not little pecks or whatever, like actual deeper kissing.”
it is obvious what he’s asking and you are pretty sure it’s just his drive to be better at all this for that person he likes
but you feel shy about it, even a little uncomfortable with the idea of being slightly closer to someone who is using you as what could be compared with a scientific mannequin
a how-to user guide, a one time trial period
you feel light headed and when chenle comes into your personal space and reaches out to hold you, you jerk back
“stop - wait.”
he listens
“w-who do you even like, you never told me.”
“why’s that important?”
his eyes widen a little and you are racing through a hundred different excuses and reasons to prolong this conversation
“well i want to know. i mean, i mean everything we practiced you’re going to use with them so i just i guess i feel like im at least entitled to know that.”
“it’s a secret, it doens’t matter either way.”
“do i know them?”
chenle frowns, “no. they don’t live near here. anyway are you ok why-”
you walk backwards, up until your back hits the fence that runs around the little park
chenle’s ticked off look turns into genuine concern and he stops a couple of feet from you and asks this time if you’re really ok, if you don’t want to do this anymore than that’s all you have to say-
he’s speaking, in almost something akin to a whisper, and the sound along with the dawning of the evening makes you remember that first kiss you gave him on the stairs
his bruised knee, haechan’s voice in the distance, the long steps leading up to the entire world and away from chenle
if you really had felt nothing for him but friendship, you would have gotten up and told him to stop playing around
you would have trotted up those steps and joined everyone else
you would have never leaned in and kissed him first
but you had and the secret that you’d stowed as far back in your heart as possible had slowly, with each day of this summer, been pulled out and out and out
and now it was big and shining and the only thing you could think about anymore
i like chenle
and everytime he kisses me
he’s thinking of someone else
“i can’t, i can’t do that with you.”
you finally find the words and then clutch your fingers into fists at your side when chenle gives you a sad look you almost never see him wear
“it’s not that i don’t want to, i do. i want to. and not to help you learn or whatever but because i really just……..want to.”
that sad look is turning into something you’re too scared to look at - but you know he’s following your train of thought now
“and you should want to do that with the person you like, not a replace-”
“it’s you.”
he cuts in before you finish your sentence and like a train going at full speed you brake and everything crashes in at once
“-ment……sorry, what?”
“it’s you. you’re the person i like.”
“but- you - practice- you - what?”
the starstruck look on your face makes chenle laugh and you can’t believe the audacity, buy you also want an answer so when he wipes away his chuckling he nods
“it was you all along. do you think i’d ever want to spend days making out with someone i didn’t like?”
when you had thought something had been wrong with him on the day he’d asked you to do this the first time, you really had thought either he’d gotten heatstroke or been brainwashed
it was so unlike chenle to 1) admit he needed to practice something and 2) want to practice it with someone he wasn’t at least fond of
so really, maybe something had been wrong with you, when you had failed to see that his whole plan this time was
“you just wanted an excuse to kiss me all summer?”
he shrugs and grins, “it was nice right?”
you can’t argue or lie or disagree - it was nice - and now you’re standing here in this park with no one around and you think maybe you shuold teach chenle the last and final thing about kissing
so you finally let him come closer and with his hand on your waist, just where you like it, he leans in again
but just before you do anything else you pull back and mumble
“jaemin is going to freak out when we tell him he was right, we have been sneaking out around behind everyones back to make out.”
“yeah but renjun definitely knows right?”
you nod, right, maybe that’ll soften the shock for everyone
(it doesn’t)
and sometimes you also get another wave of shock, even after dating chenle for so long
not much has changed - you still like to push each other and tease and pretend like you aren’t head over heels in love with each other
if only because that’s one way to show that you are, in fact, very much attached
and because even when you kiss in front of the group - jaemin still says it blows his mind
the only person who keeps reminding everyone that he saw this coming, even before you and chenle spent that summer locking lips
is renjun who looks at you and chenle and is like, “one day ill probably be helping plan their wedding.”
you and chenle look at each other and pretend to gag, wedding? no way? to each other? you’d both rather die!
and then you grin and kiss and tickle noses and disappear into a bubble of your own
every time you get to be alone though you whisper against his cheek that you love him, he knows exactly how to make you happy
and he reminds you hey - you taught me everything i know, that one summer all that time ago.

#we love this trope at least i do #nct scenarios #nct au #chenle scenarios #chenle au #nct dream scenarios #nct dream au #chenle #nct imagines #nct dream imagines #chenle imagines #happy birthday kiddo #zhong chenle au #nostalgicau

@warmau

Fri, 04 Dec 2020 00:56:20