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Jeno loves his boyfriend, he really does, but even he admits that Jaemin can be a bit of an oblivious walnut.
Considering it took five dates after Jeno asked him out for his already-boyfriend to even realize that they were dating in the first place, Jeno figures he shouldn’t be too surprised.
The benefit to Jaemin’s astounding lack of situational awareness is that he’s also relatively low-maintenance, content to live in the moment with no expectations. He is not a man with a plan, and he is perfectly happy that way.
Jeno, however, is a man with a plan. He is fond of grand gestures, a true romantic at heart. He’d meticulously planned their first date(s), after all, and continues to love wooing his boyfriend, even if said boyfriend has no idea what is happening most of the time.
That’s why, this year, the first year they’re spending Christmas together as an official couple after half a year of dating, he is determined to have the most Hallmark-perfect holiday - complete with a major love confession in the delicately-falling snow and dramatic leg-popping during the climax of a long awaited-for kiss. Knowing his boyfriend would be happy to just get wasted and play footsie like they do every other night to the horror of anyone unlucky enough to be around, Jeno decides that it’s up to him to orchestrate if he wants a feel-good (and not just touchy-feely) holiday. Though he probably can’t materialize a snowstorm out of sheer will, he nevertheless has a full childhood of watching and re-watching every sappy Christmas classic out there and feels adequately prepared to host a successful sap fest.
“You’re ridiculous,” Donghyuck quips from where he’s lazily perched atop Jeno’s bed, watching him as he calls upon every last centimeter of his height to hang a (admittedly poorly-taped) bough of mistletoe to the top of his bedroom door.
“It’s not ridiculous, it’s romantic” Jeno rebuffs immediately, calves straining as he crudely slaps tape on another part of the falling branch. “This is the season of love and I just want to make it more special.”
“‘Season of love,’ huh?” He can feel Donghyuck smirking, even if he can’t see him. “So it’s special just because you’re finally gettin’ some after being blue-balled the other 51 weeks of the year?”
The mistletoe pulls loose from its shoddy tape bindings and smacks Jeno square in the face. “Wha-I’m not being blue-balled,” he sputters, nearly spitting out a leaf. “Don’t make it all about sex.”
“You’re the one literally hanging mistletoe above the door of your bedroom . Anyone can see that this is pretty pervy, Jen.”
“It’s not,” Jeno rebukes hotly, doing his best to ignore the taunting lilt to Donghyuck’s voice as he fumbles to tape the bough up again. “This is completely innocent. I’ll have you know that mistletoe is best hung above doors, as per every reputable holiday movie ever, so you’re the one giving it dirty connotations.”
Donghyuck’s eyes gleam dangerously as he prepares to no doubt rip Jeno a new one, but it just so happens that the young’uns choose that exact moment to come strolling down the hall, both of them actively chomping away on what look to be suspiciously black Korean corn dogs.
“Whoa” Chenle exclaims, removing the stick clamped between his teeth to flit his eyes between Jeno’s frustrated expression, the top of the door, and Jeno’s unfortunately exposed midriff as he stretches to reach the top of it. “You’re hanging mistletoe above your bedroom door?”
Jisung stops nibbling on his corn dog as well. “That’s pretty pervy” he says somberly, scrunching up his face. “Hyung,” he tacks on, like an afterthought.
Jeno sighs, coming off his tiptoes to the sound of high-pitched laughter ringing out behind him.
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Given that his bedroom is maybe a bit too suggestive after all, Jeno wonders if hanging it over his boyfriend’s bedroom instead would make it less pervy.
“It doesn’t” comes the deadpan reply over his left shoulder, Renjun retreating back down the hallway like a benign ghost with a steaming cup of instant ramen clasped firmly in his hands.
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Jeno has found the perfect place. It’s neutral, accessible, and regularly frequented by his desired target. He even timed it for when he knows the other members will be sleeping in after a late night of gaming, Jaemin usually being the first to rise as the self-designated mother hen of the group to make the young’uns breakfast. It’s perfect, and all Jeno needs to do is be there when the timing is right.
He wakes at the first sound of his alarm, leaping out of bed to hustle down the hall to rinse his mouth and remove the crusties from his eyes, trotting back to his room to perch back on his bed and scroll social media as he waits for the telltale sound of sizzling. When it finally comes nearly a half hour later, he again leaps off the bed and skips down the hall in the opposite direction.
“Babe~“ he sings happily, finally rounding the corner.
But it’s Mark-hyung standing in the kitchen, donning Jaemin’s signature yellow apron with a massive Ryan chibi on the front, wielding an oily spatula and looking just as lost as Jeno feels. There’s a pan of...something...on the stove, sizzling wildly and turning ominously darker as the seconds pass. Mark raises an eyebrow at Jeno’s intense look. “Uh...morning?”
“What are you doing here?” Jeno questions immediately, before remembering his manners. “Hyung.”
Mark’s brows furrow, looking confused. “I stayed the night. I texted the group chat, remember? Hyuck drank too much and wanted to cuddle with Renjun so Jaemin went to sleep with Jisung.”
The nonsensical words funnel in one ear and out the other before Jeno’s ‘Dream speak’ filter finally activates, reading between the lines and occasionally filling in words until they make some sense and he can conjure up a patchy recollection of the night before. “Oh yeah,” he mutters, remembering. “When Jaemin and I got back they were already gaming. I didn’t realize Hyuck was here, too. Jaemin must’ve joined them when I knocked out. That doesn’t explain why you’re here, though? You don’t even game, at least, not well.”
Mark doesn’t even blink at the diss because he can’t argue with fact. “Renjun texted me to ‘save’ him late last night, which means Hyuck must’ve succeeded in his cuddle attack. When I got here they were already asleep, however, so I took the couch but the sun streaming into the living room woke me up early so I figured I might as well make something.”
Jeno points at the ‘something’ in question, which is now emitting an increasingly-threatening plume of thick smoke, causing both him and Mark to jerk into action as they spend the next ten minutes furiously fanning the air in a futile attempt to clear it, all the while scooting the pan around and staring worriedly at the blackness inside it.
Mark looks forlornly at the lumpy mass, which appears to have gone sentient and is now attempting to take over the entire pan. “Aww, there go the fried eggs.”
Jeno runs to crank open the window even though it’s deadass the middle of December, squinting his eyes against the icy morning breeze that shoots in and rattles the kitchen. “With all due respect, hyung,” he wheezes, sniffling, “I don’t think that qualifies as eggs, anymore.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right” Mark agrees, giving his creation one last mournful look before shrugging and upending it straight into the trash. “Guess we’ll just order in.”
There’s the creak of a door and sound of footsteps resounding in the hallway as Jaemin wanders into the room, sauntering over to peck Jeno on the cheek. “I thought I’d woken up to overcast skies but turns out it’s just another one of hyung’s experiments again. It’s really impressive how you always manage to bring clouds indoors, hyung.”
Jaemin looks up at the end of his statement, no doubt inspecting the ceiling for soot and Jeno perks up, also tilting his head up excitedly to ask if his boyfriend notices anything different. Before he can ask though, Jaemin abruptly sneezes, jerking his head back down to sniffle at the cold draft still wafting through the kitchen. “Ugh, let’s give it another minute and then close the window, the winds are too strong” he whines, burrowing into Jeno’s shoulder and rubbing his nose against Jeno’s neck affectionately.
Jeno jerks his head back up, searching for the piece of mistletoe that he’d painstakingly attached to the smoke detector but finding nothing but lingering gray wisps from Mark’s well-intentioned but poorly-advised jaunt into adulthood, the small bough having likely been blown away by the draft and now swept into some unknown corner of their dorm.
“Welp, Jaemin announces resolutely, smacking his lips from where he’s still nestled comfortably into Jeno’s side. “Let’s order in.”
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Jeno figures he’ll go traditional, and hang it over their dorm’s front door. That way, he can take Jaemin out on a bike date during the day and come back to a romantic end to their evening.
Jaemin is initially reluctant but willing to be coerced from his aggressive fruit harvesting in Animal Crossing to accompany him out with the promise of food, and they go for their usual bike ride along the Han river before stopping for lunch at the mobile ramen stand at which they had one of their first dates (which Jaemin, of course, did not realize was a date at the time), now such regular customers that the wizened old shop owner starts prepping their orders as soon as he sees their distinctive bikes rolling down the street. It takes a good hour to scarf everything down and recover enough to stand again, biking leisurely with full bellies between the parks in Seoul, stopping every now and then to take some personal pics as well as snap some selfies for the ‘gram before finally heading back to the spot along the river where they’d had their first kiss and watch the sunset as their hands intertwine, heads leaning increasingly closer as their breaths intermingle until-
“Jeno,” Renjun’s voice comes tinny but firm from his phone, “you better come and address this situation you caused. Mark and his menace have been stooped on the front door for hours. They’re scarring the kids, who can’t go out for fear of hurting their young, nubile eyes. You have twenty minutes.”
The call clicks ominously. Jaemin still looks as if he doesn’t have a care in the world, completely living up to his idol image of a dream prince for hundreds of thousands, maybe even millions of fans from all around the world as he leans against the railing, hair dancing softly in the breeze as he alternates between watching the waves lapping languidly below and regarding Jeno fondly.
Jeno would rather dance upside down on a hoverboard for the rest of his life rather than disrupt the soft expression in Jaemin’s eyes but even if the saying is ‘happy wife, happy life’ (boyfriend, in his case), Jeno knows that he won’t have any life if he dares to keep Renjun waiting any longer. He didn’t ask why the other boy couldn’t shoo the lovebirds away himself, but he has a feeling it’s because his usually-friend, soon-to-be-hitman wants him to suffer just as much as he has. Given the bluntness of the call, Renjun must’ve really been putting up with it for who-knows-how-long, maybe even as long as when Jeno first hung the bough up early this morning.
Taking one last look at the rays of golden light reflecting in his boyfriend’s large, molten eyes, he grips the other boy’s hand firmly.
“Time to go,” he says, giving one last, longing squeeze before turning around to haul ass towards their bikes.
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Breaking up Markhyuck is just as awkward as expected. Mark is embarrassed, Donghyuck is unapologetic, Jaemin is confused when Jeno shoos him straight into the dorm before it all goes down, and Renjun is unsurprisingly vindictive but weirdly self-satisfied.
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Jeno gives up.
It’s fine, he reasons, he and Jaemin kiss all the time, the last of which happened only five minutes ago before his boyfriend fell asleep during their fifth rewatch of ‘The Avengers.’ So what if he doesn’t get his sappy under-the-mistletoe, magical-only-to-you, bubble-of-love moment from every holiday Hallmark movie ever? He is an adult, in an established relationship, with someone he loves and who loves him back just as fiercely.
He’s happy, and that’s all that matters.
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The day of Christmas they spend with their respective families, but they always reserve a day in the week prior for their 7 Dream family. It’s tradition now for them to spend a day all together, no different from the other days they already spend together (both for schedule and for shits) but now just with the air of tradition.
Mark and Donghyuck stop by early, loaded with gifts not only from them but from all the hyungs at 127, the maknaes (and Jaemin) practically pawing at them with excitement as the presents are doled out, Renjun grumbling and rolling his eyes in the background but still whipping out his phone to record everything at the first sound of paper tearing.
As per tradition, Mark is gifted with an obscene amount of ketchup that draws out the world’s largest long-suffering sigh, Chenle is screeching and shaking Jisung over the pile of actually-cool gifts that they’ve received, Renjun rolls his eyes at the mountain of Moonmin-shaped merch that everyone knows he’ll orbit around for the rest of the day, and Jeno cradles accessories for his beloved bike like a newborn child. When Jeno just can’t wait any longer and nearly sprints out of the room to go try them out, he is stopped by a firm grip on his wrist paired with a scheming look on his boyfriend’s face.
“I have something for you, later” Jaemin promises with a wink, to a resounding chorus of cooing, groaning, and a loud grunt from what sounds like Mark being pounded to death.
They conclude gift opening by ordering a feast from every restaurant within delivery distance, eating as much as you would expect from seven healthy boys who sweat buckets in 8-hour dance practices every other day. And yet, despite their valiant efforts and babying (bullying) of Jisung to eat twice as much as the rest of them, they’re still barely able to make it through half of it - dozens of leftover containers strewn all around the living room that they’ll shove in the fridge and then forget about until Jaemin cleans it out a week later. Cleanup duty purposely forsaken until one of them inevitably cracks and can’t take the mess anymore, the rest of the day is spent lazily lounging around playing Mario Kart which somehow devolves into Donghyuck and Chenle trying to out-shout each other.
Despite the never-ending taunts and heated verbal warfare, Donghyuck is surprisingly the first to call it a night, eyes a little unfocused from the soju they cracked open not five minutes after turning on the game. Half-hanging off Mark (though more for affection than for help), he exaggeratedly lopes over to every member and leaves a sloppy kiss on their very reluctant faces before finally flouncing out the door, exasperated but fond boyfriend in tow. Renjun disgustingly wipes his face before also calling it a night, scooping up all of his Moonmin merch lovingly before retreating to his room to pack for going home the next day. Chenle and Jisung take one look at Jaemin and Jeno steadily gravitating closer to each other on the couch and jointly make the executive decision to bounce as well, calling out a hasty good night before trotting off down the hall.
No sooner than Chenle’s dolphin laugh has receded to human decibels than Jeno suddenly finds himself with an armful of boy in his lap.
Jaemin smirks at him from above. “So, guess it’s just the two of us now” he purrs, arms looping suggestively around Jeno’s neck.
Jeno grins back innocently. “Guess so.”
“Wanna take this somewhere more...private?”
“Isn’t it just the two of us here?”
Jaemin laughs at Jeno’s exaggeratedly wide eyes, sliding off to pull Jeno up with him. “You know what I mean.”
He leads Jeno down the hall, passing by his own room to stop outside of Jeno’s room, hands intertwined. Jeno stops as well, waiting for Jaemin to go in first but his boyfriend continues to stand just outside the door, a mischievous look on his face.
“Uh, you can go in” Jeno reassures, not sure why he now has to issue a formal invitation given how casually they always barge into each other’s rooms, even before they started dating.
(Unless his boyfriend has suddenly become a vampire, which would be weird but not altogether unwelcome).
“Not yet,” Jaemin insists. “Notice anything different?”
Jeno scrunches his face up in confusion at the intense look in Jaemin’s eyes, studying the other boy’s face closely. “Uh...no. You look handsome, as always.”
“No, no,” Jaemin chides while laughing, and the soju must’ve really gone to Jeno’s head because he can swear that his boyfriend’s eyes are twinkling. “Look up.”
Jeno gives another confused look before doing as he’s told, squinting his eyes in the dim light of their hallway to take in their even-darker ceiling. It takes far too long to the point where he swears he can hear the other boy sigh, but Jeno finally notices the faintest bit of something dangling over his doorway. It’s small but clearly not supposed to be there, with a jagged shadow and the tiniest bit of light reflecting off a circular cluster within.
Mistletoe, he realizes belatedly, eyes widening in realization. A bough of it hung in almost the exact same spot he’d been trying, and failing, to hang it from a week prior, now firmly attached to the top of the doorway with obvious skill and precision. It’s not the clump he had been struggling with all week either, this one unmarked and pristine with none of the tape marks from Jeno’s pitiful attempts.
Jeno looks back down. “Is that mistletoe? You hung that there? Why?”
Jaemin smiles, his pearly whites somehow managing to be blinding even when there’s little to no light to reflect off of them. “I’m supposed to be the oblivious one in this relationship, remember?”
Jeno’s eyes widen further. “Donghyuck told you, didn’t he?”
Jaemin’s brows furrow. “Told me what?”
“About the mistletoe...I’ve been trying to get you under it all week.”
The other boy’s eyebrows shoot up. “You’ve been trying to get me under mistletoe all week?”
“Yeah! Wait, so if you had no idea, that means...” Jeno lets out a disbelieving laugh. “We’re a couple of saps, aren’t we?”
“Definitely,” Jaemin agrees, looking like he doesn’t know what’s going on as per usual but rolling with it anyways. “That’s what happens when you’re in love, I guess.”
He claps Jeno on the shoulder, and Jeno is offended at the bro gesture for all of two seconds before he feels a soft squeeze and the fond eyes looking into his. “And I am, I mean. I love you, Lee Jeno.”
Jeno tries really hard not to look or do anything embarrassing but he’s pretty sure his unusually warm face has already missed the memo. Whatever expression he’s making, it causes the megawatt smile to surface again so he figures it can’t be too ugly, at least.
He swallows, knowing he’s kidding himself by blaming soju for the dryness of his throat. “I love you too, Nana - Na Jaemin. Even before you knew it yourself, and you’re right, you’re definitely the oblivious one in this relationship except this time because I-“
His words are swallowed by soft lips on his, familiar and full of feeling. It’s not nearly as heated considering what they’ve gotten up to behind closed doors in the dorm (and sometimes the practice rooms, to their members’ dismay), but it’s no less exciting or meaningful. He feels light as air despite the twenty pounds of food still churning in his stomach, face flushed and nerves tingling and definitely not from the alcohol.
Jaemin reaches up to cup Jeno’s cheek, his other hand coming down to gently wind around Jeno’s waist. Jeno sighs happily and experimentally pops his leg up but promptly bangs his ankle against the door frame, causing them to break apart as Jeno wheezes painfully and Jaemin hacks like a truck backfiring. Pearly whites back on full display, he finally recovers enough to reach down and sweep a whining Jeno straight off his feet, backing slowly into the bedroom at last.
It’s not exactly the perfect Hallmark moment Jeno expected, but the moment still could not have been any more perfect. Not because of the mistletoe hanging above, but because of the person he has underneath.
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mochiesung: hey hyung can u remove the mistletoe from over ur door
mochisung: ur room is on the way to the bathroom
mochisung: we keep passing it and my lips are getting dry
jenojam: oh yeah, sure
jenojam: don’t need it anymore anyways haha
jenojam: wait
jenojam: hmm?
jenojam: hmm???????????????????
jenojam: why are YOUR lips dry?
jenojam: ??????????????
jenojam: who are you kissing?????????????
jenojam: Jisung????????????