"So, did you get any bitches at the bar?"
Donghyuck didn't want to be annoying first thing in the morning, but there was no way he would ignore this. If Jeno was at such a place yesterday and knowing how clueless he was, he might have got someone to spend the night with.
"No," Jeno chuckled, and reached for the bottle of mineral water at the top of the shelf. "Why?"
They were shopping.
"Hyung?" Donghyuck looked over his shoulder to meet Mark's eyes.
"No, he had no one around," the latter sighed, already getting irritated.
"Oh, really?" the brunette raised his eyebrow. "So weird. I feel like you're teaming up against me."
"Are you that insecure?" Mark barked. "Why would we lie?"
"Cause a whole baseball team was at the bar, and no one tried to hit on you," Donghyuck retorted, glaring at the senior.
"They did, but we ignored them," Jeno sighed. "We stayed together all evening."
"That's kinda gay, you know. With all the beautiful women around and you're both staying together..."
"Shut up," Mark's face flushed.
"We talked about lots of things," Jeno said, ignoring their obvious argument. "Mark told me about his future."
Donghyuck didn't know if he should pretend that he heard it for the first time or not. However, since Jeno spoke about it as if it was a piece of new information, the brunette acted confused.
"And what about it?"
"Suicide."
"Gosh..."
"He's dead at that time, and I'm... I'm engaged to a woman."
Hearing this made Donghyuck feel uneasy. You see, Jeno always promised to love him eternally, and he was the one who was dying to get back into their former relationship. Of course, many things must've happened in the future for it to be this way, for example, Donghyuck disappeared, shut himself down, and no one had heard about him. So, Jeno moved on. But Donghyuck, with a mind of a 2022 guy, thought that this was unbelievable. Jeno loved him with all depth of his heart, so a single thought about some woman made the brunette mad.
"Do you think... you're happy?" Donghyuck asked carefully.
Jeno shrugged his shoulders.
"I don't know. Maybe? But I'm also happy right now."
"Can I get this?" Noram chirped, appearing out of nowhere and pushing a milk drink into Donghyuck's face.
"No, put that back."
Jeno must've sensed Donghyuck's anxiety. He went closer and, holding his boyfriend's hand, put a supportive amount of pressure.
"You don't have to worry. In a few months, future you ran away with no trace. I must've thought I lost you. But even when I'm engaged, I keep coming to you, right?"
"Right. And you're even lending me money," Donghyuck smiled.
"I care about you. Always will."
"Quit chit-chatting," Mark cleared his throat. "Noram just stole that drink."
"Gosh," Donghyuck rolled his eyes. "Bad habits die hard on this kid."
⌛
Since the end of the month was near and soon they'd do a paternity test, Donghyuck started to think about stuff himself.
After a few months, he knew he would gain weight and it would be noticeable. The only way to stop people from noticing, as he still found it embarrassing, had to be an academic leave. But in his university, people on academic leaves weren't allowed to live in dorms. Either they were on other programs, in hospitals, returned home, or started working somewhere, so the dorm wasn't needed.
That was what scared Donghyuck. He didn't have a place to stay. He didn't want to return to his parents. They would ruin his plans! They'd do anything to make his life better and might force him to get rid of Noram.
He shared these concerns with Jeno when they met up the next morning. His boyfriend, too, got stressed over this. Neither of them had enough money to rent somewhere else.
"Okay, let's just not think about this yet," Jeno sighed. "The dorm is still yours, so you'll be fine. And soon, we'll have the Christmas holiday, then a month for exam retaking. So, two months with no worries."
Jeno was right. During the Christmas holiday, many students will leave, and only a few will remain, so Donghyuck could easily live with Noram and stop fearing for him getting noticed. Then the month for exam retaking as well as all the project presentations. Students may return, but others may not. Donghyuck didn't have any of these things planned, therefore he could calmly live in his dorm.
"Right," Donghyuck smiled. "Maybe even third."
Jeno nodded, "You don't have to worry so much."
"Thanks. I feel way better."
Later that day, they met Mark in a cafe. Donghyuck made sure to buy Noram something sweet to keep him entertained as the three stared at the boy's laptop screen, analyzing the prices.
"We got a discount because of logging in," Donghyuck explained. "Now's the price only 1,200. "
"Way better than before," Mark laughed sarcastically as the price barely changed.
"And how much do we have now?" Jeno asked, reaching for his wallet.
He put down 200, and Donghyuck did the same. But then he also added Future Donghyuck's money which was exactly the same amount.
"600 dollars," Jeno said, looking at Mark. "Don't push yourself. You can also add 200 dollars and―"
"I'll just end this and add another 600," Mark shook his head, interrupting Jeno.
"No, bro. That's just too much. It's your scholarship!"
"A lot still remains. I'm fine, bro."
Just kiss already.
Mark left the cafe to go to the ATM across the street. Jeno and Donghyuck sat there in silence, scrolling and reading further information on the DNA center page. Only then did the two notice that there were several options for non-invasive prenatal paternity testing. One was legal, and another one―was called non-legal.
"What's the difference?" Jeno asked in confusion, and Donghyuck could agree with this as they were just too stupid for this.
"Wait," Donghyuck scrolled down until they found a table with all the information. "We're taking a legal one," he stated after he read.
"It'll cost more."
"It sure will, but at least we'll have "court-admissible paternity test results" with all the names, which means no one would run away from me," Donghyuck laughed sarcastically.
Mark returned, and they introduced him to what they found. Surprisingly, the senior didn't oppose that the price suddenly went higher. Instead, he teamed up with Donghyuck and said a legal one would be more informative.
"Whatever," Jeno gave in.
As they got all the information, they returned to Jeno's car and then called the center. They got accepted but were told to wait since it was too early to do the test. After the call ended, Donghyuck turned on to check on a calendar and, counting the days, he noticed that they could do the test as late as the 22nd of December. Almost the time they should return Noram.
"We're really new to this. We got all the money, although it's too early," Jeno couldn't help but chuckle.
"That's fine. Less worrying when that time comes," Mark said.
Now Donghyuck understood the letter from his future self. Since there was a lot of time left until he could the test, he wanted Donghyuck to build stronger relationships with these two.
⌛
Donghyuck's life was quite calm as December started. He had a few performances in the first week as all of the students were gathered in the hall to listen to Christmas carols right before exams. He knew that somewhere in the audience there were Jeno and Noram, watching him, and, somewhere between all the singers, was Mark.
After the performance, they all went to a restaurant together, running into other students. Most of them didn't trigger Donghyuck until he saw Renjun and Jaemin. The sight of the two frightened Jeno and Mark as well. All three suddenly turned moody, which, of course, left Noram confused.
"What happened?" Noram asked.
"Should we just leave?" Donghyuck whispered. "We haven't ordered yet."
"No, let's stay. We won't attract their attention this way," Jeno mumbled, avoiding looking around.
"They already saw you the moment they stepped inside," Mark hissed. "Let's just stay in place."
"Who saw us?" Noram asked innocently.
"Uncle Renjun and Jaemin," Donghyuck said dryly.
"Can I say hi to them?"
"No," all three of them said at the same time.
Noram flinched and stared at each of them in confusion.
"We got into an argument, remember?" Donghyuck rubbed Noram's shoulder. "Uncle Jaemin called me bad names..."
"Oh, yeah!" the kid nodded. "He said you're a manipulative whore."
Donghyuck closed his eyes and took a deep breath, avoiding looking at people around them who most likely just heard what the kid said.
"Right," he then faked a laugh. "That's exactly what Jaemin said."
He then looked at Mark and Jeno across the table to check their reactions. Jeno appeared uneasy, meanwhile, Mark was smiling.
"What?" Donghyuck said cheekily, glaring at the senior.
"He didn't lie."
Instead of trying to deny it, Donghyuck played along.
"Well, obviously, 'cause you ended up in my trap too."
"Stupid."
"Stop it," Jeno rolled his eyes.
"Bastard."
"Shut up."
"Okay, religious fanatic."
"Fag."
"Virgin ass."
"Perv."
"Tiny dick."
Gasping and shooting Donghyuck an icy glare, Mark turned to Jeno, "He's lying. It's not tiny."
"Could both of you stop it?" Jeno hissed. "Noram is listening to every single word, and I'm sure you just expanded his vocabulary."
"Noram, erase everything you just heard from your memory," Donghyuck sighed. "Okay?"
The kid nodded, but it was obvious that bad words got stuck in his head.
They stayed in the restaurant, watching every person leaving to know when Renjun and Jaemin went out. But the two didn't rush as if waiting for them to leave first too. That's how they spent quite a lot of time eating with nothing to talk about anymore.