Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"Why don't you go instead?"

"I swear I'd do that but I have to meet up with Minho."

"if you had that much time to call me up and bring me here at your door, then you could've already walked Felix to the daycare."

Jisung groaned in frustration, "Please, Binnie! This is the last favor I am asking you, ever."

"Never heard of a more shameless lie than this." Changbin deadpans while crossing his buff arms.

"Okay, okay. The last favor I am asking you, this month." Changbin still glares, and the other sighs. "... This week."

"Now, that sounds believable."

Walking down the streets, Changbin holds 4-year-old Felix's tiny hand, walking him to the daycare which is two or three streets away.

Although the little peaceful walk with the kid is nice, Changbin's mood is quite the opposite.

Changbin usually likes to help his friends and do them favors, but in this case, Jisung was just lazy. Jisung's mother had to go to work earlier than usual today so she asked her son to drop his toddler brother Felix at the daycare, but since Jisung had to meet Minho, so he passed the task to Changbin.

Jisung should be thankful that the older was kind enough not to beat him up, especially from a person who works out religiously like Changbin, he's literally a gym trainer.

Felix's little lulls interrupt Changbin's angry thoughts. Right, all that matters in this whole situation is Felix arriving at the daycare safely, his day shouldn't be ruined because some careless sibling decided to neglect his responsibilities.

Before he could even realize it, he and the kid are about a couple of meters away from the daycare gate. The small building is decorated with all sorts of bright colors and cute animal mascots. And to be frank, Changbin feels too old to enter such a place as a 27-year-old-guy, nevertheless, he still enters, taking a deep breath while doing so. He could feel Felix's small steps becoming more bouncy, indicating the excitement growing in him as they're in the stepping further and further into the colorful building.

Walking into the reception, getting permission to enter. His dark clothes contrast the colors of his surroundings as he walks further, and his confident steps echo. Reaching the door leading to the main hall. He can hear children giggling from the other side. Not waiting any longer, he starts knocking softly.

A loud, high-pitched child's voice on the other side of the door scares the shit out of Changbin, taking him off guard.

"Me, me, me! I'm gonna open the door!"

"No, I'm the one who's open!"

"It must be Felix!"

"Keep quiet, kids! I'm gonna open the door." a euphonious voice speaks behind the door, which seems to be an adult's voice.

Finally, The door opens, but to a pretty young adult, with onyx-colored hair and sharp eyes and faint yet adorable dimples, wearing a pink apron with a cartoon-ish fox printed on it, literally the prettiest daycare teacher you could ever meet. Changbin didn't know why but as soon as his eyes falls on the guy his heartbeat immediately accelerates. Normally, his heart doesn't react that hard even when he sees pretty people too.

Both of them stare at each other for a couple of seconds until the guy in the apron switches his gaze to the little kid standing beside Changbin.

"Felix! How's our sunshine doing today?" he asks in the sweetest voice, a beautiful smile is drawn on his face.

"Ve~ry great! I missed you so much Mr. Jeongin."

Then Felix jumps to clutch onto his teacher's shoulders, so the latter can lift him and carry him like he's his son.

"Me too, Lixie." Jeongin responds fondly. His gaze traveling back to Changbin's, the shorter still having no clue why his chest tightens when he looks at the young man.

"Are you Mr. Jisung? Your mother told me about you bringing Felix today."

"A- Actually, I'm not Jisung. I'm his friend, Changbin. Jisung is really busy and stuff."

'Why the heck did I stutter?' he screamed inwardly.

"Oh, it's okay! Thank you for bringing Felix safely."

"Yeah... no problem."

They stand just like that for a whole minute, the awkward silence falling upon them, with the children staring at them curiously. interestingly, in contrast to what happened just minutes ago, the children are silent too. That doesn't help the acceleration of Changbin's heartbeat though, in fact, it makes it worse. Palms are sweating already.

"Umm... Do you have anything else to say, Mr. Changbin?"

"Me? Uh..." Changbin searches in his brain for anything smart to say. "I'm- Uh, your apron looks... nice."

as expected, he fails miserably...

Changbin never felt the urge to disappear from here any stronger than now. What the heck did he just say?!

"Oh... Thanks."

Seeing the young teacher scratching his own earlobe reflexively, averting his gaze —apparently from the suddenness— is enough to make something inside of Changbin explode.

Deciding to wrap it up and leave the scene right now before he can humiliate himself even further. He gives Jeongin and the bunch of toddlers and preschoolers around him his goodbyes before walking away almost in a hurry, stumbling once in the process, finally exiting the building.

He walks a few meters away from the daycare, but his heart is still beating fast. Groaning in frustration and embarrassment, he has never been in such an awkward situation like this before which makes him so frustrated and quite mad at himself. He definitely looked like an idiot just now.

Before his emotions overwhelm him more, he clears his dry throat and breathes deeply a couple of times. But the technique barely worked.

He then sits on his haunches, sighing while burying his head in his hands before grabbing his phone from his pocket, proceeding to make a call.

[Ringing]

...

[The other party picks up]

"Hello?"

"Yeah."

And Changbin can hear a sigh from the other party.

"... Look, Binnie, I get that you're mad at me but I just-"

"I'm not."

"Huh? Then why are you calling me?"

"...Jisung, Can I ask you a favor?"

"Yeah..? What is it though?"

.

.

.

.

.

"Can you let me drop Felix at the daycare next time too?"

Chapter Text

Changbin will admit it.

He actually likes Felix's teacher, Jeongin, like, a lot.

That the way he'd do anything for this man even if Changbin finds it embarrassing or annoying maybe says something.

For over a month now, he'd been escorting Felix to the daycare almost every day, taking him back home too. To the point he began to feel like Felix's personal assistant or bodyguard and Felix became his young master of some sort.

And to be honest, Jisung was more than happy because of that, it's not that he doesn't like his little brother, he's ready to take responsibility for him again at any time. (although he never took it in the first place.)

Since his mother liked how smooth things went when she asked him to drop Felix at the daycare the first couple of times, she decided to just leave that matter to Jisung, who in return, leaves it to Changbin. And that was kinda sad how the little kid was being tossed around between his mother and his sibling, ending up with Changbin instead. He really wants to (gently) punch his friend sometimes, But he can't.

Why?

Because Changbin never complained. In fact, he really liked the couple of minutes he got to see the teacher every day. And The time he spends with the little kid too.

One day, Changbin was at the daycare and got dragged inside the colorful classroom as he was about to pick Felix up home earlier than usual. He had the children asking him all sorts of random stuff.

"Changbin-hyung! Do you know how to do a cartwheel? or a backflip?" a kid asked.

"Binnie-hyung! Can we play pirates and sailors?"

"Changbin-oppa! What do you work?" a little girl asked with big eyes filled with curiosity.

"He's a gym trainer, Areum. Binnie-hyung, Show them your huge muscles!" Felix demanded in enthusiasm.

"Gym trainer? What's that?" another kid asked.

"He keeps yelling at people to exercise better until they drop from exhaustion." Felix explained with his expertise in gym... stuff. It took Changbin off-guard how Felix views his job.

"That sounds scary," she muttered to herself in concern, which broke the gym trainer's heart. Should he consider this as a defamation?

With all those toddlers and pre-schoolers surrounding him shouting all kinds of questions at him in explosive enthusiasm, he could feel a headache starting to form at the back of his head.

The only thing that kept him sane during this whole mess was Jeongin's amused face and his small chuckles here and there. He clearly knows Changbin's suffering at the moment, meanwhile, the teacher is really enjoying himself in the corner. Giggling at how confused and clueless Changbin is with children. But to Changbin, Jeongin looked absolutely beautiful nonetheless, he could stare at his smile forever, not even joking.

At that moment, Changbin came to the realization that if it wasn't for the teacher's presence, he wouldn't have been in this situation, making fun of himself in front of him and the bunch of the kids. He just wanted to impress the man with his amazing skills in handling kids, although he totally failed at that.

He definitely doesn't see himself in such situation if you asked him before this whole thing, but here we are! Who could've imagined?

But people do foolish things for the people they like, right?

He actually didn't really mind the situation he put himself in that much, he's glad that he got to spend a few more minutes with his crush. Migraines come and go but such a chance might never come back, yeah? Grabbing the chance with both his hands and teeth.

This moment reminded him of the excitement in his heart when he first saw the teacher, and whenever he steps foot inside the daycare building with Felix in hand. Even now, he haven't noticed his heart was beating all the time he was eyeing the teacher who's giggling at him, he himself couldn't help grinning.

"Hyuuuung!"

The high-pitched voice violently burst his bubble of thoughts, bringing him back to reality.

"Binnie-Hyung, come o—on!" the kid tugged his jacket.

The children's noises became so deafening to his ears as he tried to answer every question and respond to every demand. Children are really difficult to deal with at all, especially in bundles.

As soon as Jeongin noticed that the shorter gave up on dealing further with the kids he quickly began to tell that kids to quiet it down.

"Okay, kids. I think we've troubled Hyung enough for today, right? He has other important work to do."

Jeongin made a fake frown when he was faced with the kids whining and protesting, indicating that he's being serious and not any sort of puppy eyes will work on him.

And it was a success. After that, he smiled again as he began to ruffle their heads. "It's okay, sweethearts. He can come and play with y'all another time." He assured in a warm tone.

They were just small gestures, but they were so endearing to see. The way he treated children was the opposite from Changbin, he really fits his role as a teacher and a carer for kids.

Jeongin then proceeded to head to the classroom door, opening it for Changbin. The well-built guy stepped outside the noisy room at a fast pace, too obvious that he's on his limit. Letting a sigh of relief when he's finally a meter away from that hell of a room. He could swear that if he stayed there a minute longer he'd start hearing ringing in his ears.

His heart jumps a bit when he saw the teacher going outside the room as well, closing the door behind him in the process as he leaned against it, both arms behind him, his posture was relaxed.

"Sorry for the mess I got you into just now."

"Doesn't seem like it, with you all giggly a few seconds ago." talked back in a lighthearted manner. His reply drew out a titter from the younger.

"Couldn't help it, it was hilarious seeing you so clueless and desperate with the children."

"True. But not gonna lie, after all of that, you deserve a raise. That's a one hectic job." He puffed an exhausted sigh afterward, which drew out another chuckle from the younger male.

Well, since Changbin had been in charge of delivering Felix at the daycare for some time now, he absolutely had numerous random little talks with Jeongin here and there. Their conversations became smooth eventually. Their close age played a significant role in that too, making being casual around each other much easier. Jeongin in fact, is a very casual guy and easy to talk to, so that's a bonus.

You can say that they're in the middle of their acquaintances-to-friends transition. Despite not even having each other's numbers.

As soon as they finished their lighthearted casual talk, Jeongin went to open the door behind him again, calling Felix's name.

"Lixie! Pick up your stuff, Mr. Changbin is waiting for you outside."

Changbin could swear that something shifts in his heart' rate whenever the young teacher says his name. He hopes that it's not some sort of kink, he thought half-jokingly.

The freckled little boy nods enthusiastically and ran towards the door in bouncy steps with his tiny backpack in hand, giving his bye-bye's to his friends behind. Changbin couldn't help but smile at how adorable the child is.

Felix gave his teacher a big hug even though his height barely reached the other's thighs. Jeongin patted on his head in return and started helping the boy wear his backpack correctly.

Changbin took the kid's hand in a gentle hold as they started walking away.

"Make it home safely." Jeongin said, and Felix responded with a wave, with Changbin following suit.

Later that day, when Changbin went to the gym, everyone felt like he's gone into beast mode, not in a bad way, though. It meant that he worked harder than usual in coaching others in his gym (yeah, he built his own gym), his guidance was more enthusiastic and intense, and he literally was booming with energy that his clients fell from exhaustion, guess Felix wasn't entirely wrong about what he said earlier.

Not only that but the guy did cardio for more than an hour. What did he eat this morning? They could swear that they were seeing an aura of burning flames around the man.

He ignored all stares he got from the people in the gym when he reached his 65th squat with 80kg weight. Ignored them all, especially his best friend, Chan. He only focused on what he was doing at the moment.

It was when they finished and closed the gym for the day that his friend started addressing it.

"Man, you went all out today. What happened?"

The real answer was in fact the opposite of what Chan assumed it to be. It was not like Changbin was angry or venting his anger into the exercises.

He was actually too excited or maybe even anxious after he realized that he has completely fell for Jeongin and that he needs to do something about it. So for the sake of not going insane, giving his all today till his mind is too tired to think about the pretty teacher seemed like a good idea.

He doubted that he could tell Chan about his crush, though. At least not yet. He decided not to answer, which made Chan confused even more.

"Then, how about getting some drinks?"

"Sounds nice."

And it was a mistake, 'cause not even two gulps in, and Changbin ended up spilling everything to Chan. Who in return had nothing useful to say. Like, when Changbin told him that Jeongin works as a teacher in a daycare, his only comment was that he was going to be "a high-quality malewife." Like, what changbin is supposed to do with that information? Other than the possibility of having it running a marathon in his head all night.

Anyway, none of his tipsy friend's shameless advice was going to be acted upon. Changbin actually came out with nothing useful from his friend, other than venting and getting it all out of his system maybe.

But it was just the start, he's going to do his best to get Jeongin and tell him about everything in his heart. He needs to do something at least, if he's going to see that man almost everyday. And Changbin knew that It was only a matter of time.