we are inevitable | jakehoon

three.

A proper system has established itself between them, since they were younger. Jake's birthday comes first, so he starts counting first. He's in charge of the odd-numbered trees, and Sunghoon is in charge of the evens. They count out loud to keep track on their way home.

One two, three four, five six. Fifty-two trees to Sunghoon's house.

"I can't believe you still remember that," Jake laughs. "Didn't that come about when we were, what, ten? When we couldn't figure out the street signs so we had to rely on trees?"

"Well, after all these years, the street signs are all different, but the trees are still the same," Sunghoon points out. "What does that say about the reliability of man and nature?"

"It says you should learn to read street signs."

"You're making it sound like I can't, you twat."

─

There are some things you just have to do sometimes. One of these is pretending not to know your friends are throwing a surprise party for you. You just pretend you don't know, even if your best friend is so bad at keeping secrets that it drives you insane watching him try not to smile when he asks you whether you're free tonight, on the 7th of December.

"I am," Sunghoon says calmly. "Is there something going on?"

It's almost like a game; they push back and forth, never touching, waiting to see who'll crack first.

"Nothing," Jake answers quickly. "Just wondered if you want to come over to my house tonight."

"Oh, I don't know about that. I have curfew at nine." Sunghoon is good at the birthday game. He wonders idly if there's a proper name for it, as Jake formulates his response.

"Try asking your mother," Jake responds. "Maybe she'll let you off this one time."

Sunghoon's mother does, in fact, lift his curfew, just for tonight.

His parents aren't bad at the birthday game too, he supposes. They think he doesn't see the big paper box with the cake store's name emblazoned on the side, pushed all the way back in the fridge, or the red-and-blue wrapping paper scraps his mother hurriedly clears off the table as he steps into the house. To his credit, he is good at pretending he really doesn't.

There's a visitor to the house just as Sunghoon finishes his shower. He hears the bell ring from downstairs, but there isn't enough time for him to dry himself off and peek out his bedroom window. His hair is still dripping wet when his bedroom door slams open.

"Could have waited for me to put on clothes, honestly," Sunghoon complains, but he's smiling. "Why am I seeing you so many times a day?"

"I had to talk to you before you came over," Jake says, still catching his breath. Sunghoon wonders if he ran the entire eighteen trees' distance from his own house. "It's kind of important, I guess."

"Okay," Sunghoon answers, sitting back on the edge of his study table. "What is it?"

This is still the birthday game. The stakes are different, but it works the same. They push and pull like magnets, and see who lets go first. Sunghoon has yet to ever lose.

"Ah..." Jake buries his hands in his face. "This is terrible. My hands are sweaty."

"Would you like to wash your hands?" Sunghoon holds back his laugh as he gestures to the bathroom door, still ajar, faint steam from the residual warmth of his shower still dissipating into his room.

"No, I'd rather throw my hands out the window. Or my entire body out the window. I'm going insane-"

"Are you sure you want to go insane next to my door?" Sunghoon asks. He's just being a shithead at this point, but it's funny enough to be justified. "That's not safe. You might hit your head on my door. Do you want to sit down on the bed and go insane there instead?"

"You are the most irritating person I've ever met," Jake throws back. "God, let me just get it over with. Sunghoon, I like you."

"Yeah, I like you too."

"No, I don't think you know what I mean-"

"I know what I meant," Sunghoon answers. "Do you know what you mean?"

"I mean I like you. Not friends. I can't think of the word for that right now." Jake honestly looks like he's about to cry over there by Sunghoon's bedroom door.

"I like you too," Sunghoon repeats. "Not friends. I know the word for it, though. It starts with G and rhymes with 'day'."

"I'm happy about the first part," Jake says. "Not sure what to feel about the second."

Sunghoon smiles as he closes the distance between them and presses his lips to Jake's. The heat radiating off the older boy's body from his eighteen trees' worth of running is mild discomfort against Sunghoon's bare skin, but he doesn't mind enough to pull away. As the world quiets away around them just for those few seconds, he reminds himself with triumph that all technicalities considered, he has still yet to break his winning streak on the birthday game.

Though in this case, he supposes he can make an exception. Just this one time, there are two winners.

Sunghoon swipes the dripping hair out of his eyes as he pulls away. "You know what, maybe the moment would have been cuter if you'd let me put my clothes on first."

"You would have been a little shit with or without clothes on."

"Well, you're not wrong."

They head over to Jake's house after he dries his hair. Sunghoon's mother, as it turns out, has been roped in since the start, and permission has already been given for him to spend the night at Jake's.

"Surprise!"

Half of his softball team and half of the student council spill out from behind various pieces of furniture the second they open the door, and suddenly, Sunghoon forgets every emotion that isn't happiness. Jake nudges him from behind to step over the threshold, and someone brings out a chocolate cake from the dining room, with bright icing in clean, even script.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SUNGHOON
and happy 0th anniversary

"You had a cake prepared and all?"

"Well, if you said no, the plan was to scrape off the second line there."

"I still have time to change my mind, don't I?" Sunghoon jokes. "Scrape it off, scrape it off now."

"Shut up and cut your stupid cake."