Duan picked Jun up after class the way he always did now.
Jun came out of the building and found him already there, waiting with the easy patience of someone who had nowhere else to be. They fell into step without saying anything and headed toward the cafeteria.
The rest of the group was already seated and loud.
They slid into their usual spots. Jet was mid story, chopsticks going, Dom already laughing before the punchline. Fah was eating with the calm of someone who had learned to exist alongside chaos. Chawin was quietly protecting his plate.
Jun sat. Duan reached over without looking and added to his bowl from the shared dishes.
Jun looked at the extra food.
Said nothing.
They were halfway through lunch when a voice came from beside the table.
"P'Duan?"
Everyone turned.
A girl stood there holding her bag strap with both hands, eyes fixed on Duan, first year written all over her. Pretty. Nervous. Working very hard to look like she wasn't nervous.
"Hi," Duan said with his usual warmth.
"I'm Cherry." She smiled shyly. "First year. Media Arts."
"Hi Cherry."
Her fingers tightened on her strap. "Could I have your Instagram?"
Jet made a sound. Dom made a worse one.
Jun looked at her. Looked her over once, unhurried. Looked back at his food.
"I'm really flattered," Duan said, kind about it the way he was kind about everything. "But I'm sorry. I can't."
Cherry's smile dropped slightly. She nodded and walked away quietly.
Dom and Jet turned on Duan before she'd fully cleared the table.
"She came all the way over here—"
"Did you see how nervous she was—"
"Guys." Duan pointed at both of them. "Leave it."
They didn't leave it. The teasing went back and forth and the table got loud and everyone was laughing. Jun ate and said nothing and watched Duan try to defend himself with the expression of someone who found the whole thing more exhausting than it was worth.
---
They were finishing up when Duan's phone buzzed.
He checked it and looked at Jun. "I can't walk you today. P'Yim needs help with something." He picked up his bag. "Sorry."
"Go," Jun said. "I'm fine."
Duan smiled and jogged off.
---
P'Yim was waiting at the entrance of the Media Arts faculty when Duan arrived, already scanning the path for him. The moment she spotted him her face lit up.
"There he is." She grabbed both his arms the second he was within reach. "My savior. My absolute savior."
Duan laughed. "P'Yim what's going on?"
"Enrollment campaign. Our original model cancelled last minute and I have been—" she pressed a hand to her chest, "—Duan I have been losing my mind since this morning."
"Okay okay. What do you need me to do?"
"Just show up and look like that." She gestured at his face. "Which you do automatically so you've already done most of the work." She steered him through the door with both hands on his shoulders. "Posed shots, some behind the scenes content, nothing complicated. An hour at most."
"I can do that."
"I know you can." She squeezed his shoulders. "You're so good. Has anyone told you that recently?"
"You literally just told me."
"Well it's still true." She pushed the studio door open and steered him through. "Okay so the team is already set up, makeup is ready, we just need to—"
She stopped.
Duan stopped beside her.
Across the studio, standing near the makeup station already half ready, was Cherry.
She saw him at the exact same moment.
Her face went completely red.
She lifted her hand and waved. Cheerfully. Perhaps more cheerfully than the situation required.
Duan lifted his hand back.
Yim looked between them with the sharp eyes of someone who had just noticed something interesting. "Do you two know each other?"
"We've met," Duan said.
Yim's eyebrows went up and then she smiled the smile of someone filing information away for later. "Good. That makes my life easier." She gave Duan a little push toward the makeup chair. "Sit down, let's get you sorted. Nong Bai—" she called to the makeup artist, "—his face is already doing most of the work but make sure the camera catches everything."
She fussed over the lighting, adjusted something on the setup, came back and squeezed Duan's cheek once with two fingers.
"So cute," she said, shaking her head like it personally inconvenienced her, and walked off to argue with the photographer about angles.
Duan smiled at his reflection.
Cherry settled into the chair beside him.
Her eyes found him in the mirror every few minutes. He smiled back politely the first time and then looked at his own reflection and let the makeup artist do her work.
The shoot itself moved quickly. Yim ran it the way she ran everything — efficiently, warmly, correcting with one hand and complimenting with the other. She moved them around the frame, adjusted angles, called out directions.
At some point she put them together for the behind the scenes content. Cherry took a small step closer than the shot required. Duan stood where he was told.
"Perfect," Yim said, checking the screen. "That's exactly what I needed."
She walked Duan to the door herself when it was over, arm through his like they were old friends, which they were.
"You saved my life today," she said. "I'm serious. I owe you dinner."
"You don't owe me anything P'Yim."
"Dinner," she said firmly. "Don't argue with your senior." She let go of his arm at the door and pointed at his face one last time. "Genuinely so cute. Go."
Duan laughed and went.
---
Jun's lecture had just wrapped up.
He checked his phone as the lecturer walked out. A message from Duan — *almost done, coming to pick you up soon.*
He put his phone down.
Jet dropped into the seat beside him. "Lunch later?"
"I have somewhere to be," Jun said.
Jet gave him the smile he gave when he knew something. Jun pushed his face away.
A classmate walked back into the room and stopped in front of Jun's desk.
"Have you seen your lover boy?"
Jun looked up. "What?"
The classmate held out his phone.
It was a video on someone's story. Studio setting, soft lighting, behind the scenes by the look of it. Duan standing with his arm around a girl's shoulder, both of them facing the camera. The girl was Cherry. She was looking at Duan considerably more than she was looking at the lens.
Jet leaned over and looked at the screen. The smirk that came onto his face was slow and deliberate. "You've been acting so hard to get for months," he said. "Keep going like that and someone's going to steal your man before you even decide if you want him."
Chawin reached over and smacked the back of his head.
"It's probably just work," Chawin said, looking at Jun carefully.
Jun took the phone from the classmate and watched the video again from the beginning.
"It's just work," he said.
He said it evenly. Calmly.
He handed the phone back and started packing his things.
"You leaving already?" Jet said.
Jun picked up his bag and walked out.
---
Duan was outside.
Leaning against the wall with an iced Americano in his hand, right there, like he hadn't just spent the last hour on the other side of campus. He smiled when he saw Jun coming and held the coffee out.
Jun took it and kept walking.
"Movie later?" Duan said, falling into step. "There's something good showing."
"No."
A beat.
"Did you want to do anything later or—"
"No."
Duan went quiet. Jun could feel him looking.
"Is something wrong?"
Jun stopped.
He turned around slowly and looked at Duan with an expression that gave nothing away.
"I don't know," he said. "Is something wrong?"
Duan stared at him. "I'm asking you."
Jun held his gaze for a moment.
Then he turned and kept walking.
---
The drive was quiet in a way that had never happened between them before. Not the warm easy quiet of the car after class. Something underneath it with an edge. Duan kept both hands on the wheel. Jun looked out the window. Ten minutes felt considerably longer.
Duan carried his bag up without being asked.
Jun let him in. Dropped his things. Duan set the bag by the desk and turned around.
"Are you still coming this weekend?" he asked. "To my parents."
Jun looked at him. "I don't know."
Duan went still. "You already said you would."
"I know what I said."
"Then what changed?"
Jun looked at him steadily. "You might be weighing your options. I don't want to be in the way."
"Weighing my—" Duan stopped himself. Started again more carefully. "Jun. What does that mean."
Jun said nothing.
"Are you upset with me?"
"No."
"Because it feels like—"
"I said no." Jun held his gaze. "There's no reason to be upset."
The room was quiet.
Duan looked at him for a long moment. Jun looked back and kept his face exactly where he had put it.
Duan picked up his bag.
"Okay," he said. Just that. Quietly.
He walked to the door. Stopped with his hand on the frame.
"Goodnight Jun." Same warm voice. No edge anywhere in it. "Get some rest."
The door clicked shut.
---
Jun sat on the couch for a long time without moving.
The tight feeling in his chest hadn't gone anywhere. He'd been waiting for it to loosen since he walked out of that lecture room and it hadn't.
It was just a video. He knew that. He'd told himself that twice already in front of other people and he was still telling himself now in an empty room which probably meant something he wasn't going to look at directly.
Duan had turned her down. At the table. Without hesitating.
Jun knew that too.
He looked at the bag by the desk. The Americano on the counter going warm. He hadn't asked for either of those things. He never asked and Duan just — knew. Had always just known.
He got up before the thought finished forming.
The bathroom. Cold water. He turned it all the way down and stood under it and focused on that instead — just the cold, just his breathing, just the specific discomfort of it.
Not the look on Duan's face when he'd said *okay* and picked up his bag.
Not that.
---
His phone was on the counter when he came out.
*Reached home safe. Rest well tonight. Goodnight Jun.*
He read it standing there with his hair dripping.
Something moved in his chest that he didn't have a name for and wasn't going to look for one.
He put the phone down and went to bed.
He didn't sleep well.