Chapter Text
"I didn't mean to, I swear."
"Hyuck, you are so dead."
"It was an honest mistake, I'm sure Doyoung would understand."
He looks at the figure peacefully sleeping on the bed and gulps. Donghyuck was in fact - not sure. I'm so dead.
Before anyone says anything, Doyoung would like to make it clear to everyone that from today onwards, his younger brother is no longer related to him in any way and will soon be erased from his will. Doyoung shall have full custody of their cherished owl and his decision is final. No amount of apologies will change his mind.
Let's keep that in mind.
"You're telling me.." Doyoung starts, headache momentarily forgotten as he tries to process what his brother just told him. "Instead of sending him the list like I told you to, you sent Taeyong the other letter?"
"Accidentally. I accidentally sent Taeyong the wrong letter because I was drunk and got confused." Donghyuck corrected. It's important to emphasize those words, they might just be the only things keeping him from being turned into a ferret.
"And the letter you accidentally sent when you were drunk and confused was the letter that I wrote last night?"
"That exact one."
"Now, while the list you failed to send is still on my desk, our owl may have already delivered the letter that wasn't meant for Taeyong?"
"But it was addressed to him. That's why I thought that I had the correct letter. The paper had his name written at the top with your handwriting, so I just assumed that it was the letter you wanted me to send. I really didn't know."
Doyoung takes a deep breath and turns his head to look outside the window. He wonders if anyone would hear Donghyuck scream from the Ravenclaw tower if Doyoung lets him hang upside-down from the ceiling.
I am so dead.
-
You see, last night was fun.
Donghyuck and Renjun (Donghyuck's boyfriend) managed to sneak in a couple of alcoholic drinks into Hogwarts at the start of the term. They were able to hide it for a whole month before Doyoung discovered a box while looking for his tie and happened to look under his bed.
Yes, the couple hid the box where they kept the alcohol under Doyoung's bed because they both knew Doyoung never, never, looks under his bed. Also, nobody ever inspects the Head Boy's room. The only person they had to look out for was Doyoung. Unfortunately for them, a lost tie sold them out.
Under Doyoung's strict watch, he told them that the drinks were not allowed to leave the four corners of his room and if they were to drink, it was only if Doyoung was there to 'supervise'.
(As the Head Boy, Doyoung got the sweet perk of having a room all for himself. It's not a massive space, but it's comfortable enough for him and the two younger boys who liked to crash in his space often. Renjun aims to be Head Boy as well just for the private accommodation.)
Doyoung only let them take out and share one bottle of the drink the first time. That was nearly a month ago. Last night, he gave them permission to drink for the second time, and told them they were allowed to get drunk out of their minds.
Mainly because he wanted to do the same, but also because he wanted to congratulate the two for doing better than he thought as newly-appointed Prefects. Renjun for Ravenclaw, and Donghyuck for Slytherin.
Donghyuck accepted the generous offer of getting blackout drunk happily, but Renjun was a bit more skeptical about Doyoung's sudden decision. It wasn't like Doyoung to encourage getting drunk on a school night, after all.
Also, his eyes were red and puffy, the tip of his nose was pink, and Renjun's sure Doyoung had tear-stained cheeks. Saying Renjun was suspicious would be an understatement.
He wanted to ask Doyoung what happened but turns out he didn't have to, almost two bottles empty and Doyoung started talking about the real reason why he thought the night called for alcoholic drinks.
Doyoung was sitting cross-legged on the floor with his back against the bed when Donghyuck placed his head on Renjun's shoulder, the action making Doyoung look at the pair oddly.
It wasn't odd in a way that it looked creepy or anything, it was odd in the way that he wore an expression of a kid who desperately believed in Santa but their parents pulled out a documentary painting Santa as non-existent and only existed as a party trick. Yeah, the look Doyoung wore was odd.
"You look good together." Doyoung said, looking at the couple for another second before tilting his head up to look at the solid-colored ceiling.
"Jealous?" Donghyuck, still in a festive mood, teased his brother.
Renjun began to laugh, but stopped short when he realized that Doyoung had sincerely answered Donghyuck's question. Albeit so quietly that he almost thought that he only imagined Doyoung saying, "Yeah, I am."
Renjun looked down at his boyfriend, Donghyuck didn't seem to notice the shift in his brother's mood.
Earlier, Doyoung hurriedly washed his face and came skipping into his room with a bright smile. It would've been a really pretty sight if only his voice didn't tremble so much whenever he spoke. As the night progressed, however, he started getting quieter and quieter until only Donghyuck and Renjun's voices filled the room. Renjun noticed, of course, he was the most sober person in the room.
"I told you, I can set you up with a friend of mine so you could stop moping about not having a partner." Donghyuck tried to help.
He'd been telling his brother that he knew a couple of people that were interested and would take him on a date in a heartbeat, all Doyoung had to do was give him the go signal. Doyoung never did though, he always said he had no time to meet new people.
Which was too bad, actually. Gryffindor's quidditch captain, Jung Jaehyun (a great guy in Renjun's books and there's barely anyone on that list), personally approached Donghyuck to say that he was interested in his older brother. Still, Doyoung said no.
"Do it. Set me up with someone so I can stop moping."
That sobered up Donghyuck a bit.
He looked at Renjun, tilting his head in confusion. Renjun shrugged, he didn't know what was running through Doyoung's mind either.
"Okay. I'll.. set you up with someone." Donghyuck said, quite unsure with his brother's decision. Doyoung never expressed any interest in dating, what changed?
Before he could ponder on that thought more, Doyoung left his spot on the floor and went to his writing desk, taking out a spare parchment and quill from the drawer. This might be the last time he'd be doing this, this should be the last time that he does this.
While Donghyuck has the habit of randomly singing at the top of his lungs whenever he got extremely drunk, Doyoung has a habit of writing letters when he's at the last stretch of being sober.
Others declare drunk truths, others send drunk messages, Doyoung writes drunken confessions. Letters that he never allows to be seen by anyone but his sober self. The other boys in the room knew this, so they let him be.
(The first and last time Donghyuck jokingly tried to see what Doyoung was writing, he got his legs stuck to each other for almost a whole day. It was funny seeing him try to chase Doyoung around the house while having to hop. He had to call Renjun to ask for the counter-spell. Fun times.)
My dearest Taeyong, Doyoung wrote on the top left corner of the parchment.
Normally, words would come easy to him and he'd have written at least three things to compliment Taeyong about already, but the quill strangely felt heavier on his hand now and words crashed and clashed against each other in his head.
He doesn't think he's that drunk yet, he's not sure why he can't seem to find the right words to write aside from declaring Taeyong as his dearest.
Should he greet him first? Talk about the weather, perhaps? No, Taeyong would find that weird. Most of the letters Taeyong received from his friend started with playful jabs and insults, a 'Hi, the moon looks quite pretty tonight, don't you think?' wouldn't make sense.
So, insults it is.
Of all the people that I've met in my life, I find you the most annoying.
There. Nice and sweet and more like Doyoung.
This will be the last time I will ever let myself write about you, and tomorrow morning, I'll be sober and see you as nothing but a friend. Your annoying laugh will no longer be music to my ears, your smile will no longer brighten up my day, your stupid face will no longer be what I look for first thing in the morning and think of at the end of the day. I will no longer be yours and I will not care how many dates Donghyuck set me up on, I will let myself enjoy each one and not think about you.
Tomorrow morning, you will be the same Taeyong that messes up during Transfiguration and I'll be a different Doyoung. I'll be the Doyoung that would be genuinely happy to see you go on dates instead of the Doyoung that I am now, sad and jealous. I'll be the Doyoung that would push you to continue looking for love and be sincere about it instead of the Doyoung that I am now, the one that tells you to continue looking but deep down hopes that you won't. I'll be the Doyoung that is nothing but a friend.
Doyoung paused. He felt strange looking at the parchment, like he was bidding farewell to a friend that he had been confiding his worries to for years. Maybe because it is, it is a farewell.
Perhaps he'll have to burn all the secret letters tomorrow. He should do that.
Picking up his quill, he wrote again:
Thank you for letting me feel an admiration this intense, you have no idea how much your presence alone grounded me. Thank you for holding my hand when I need it the most, thank you for staying when I push everyone away.
I'm getting drunk and sleepy, but before I leave, have I told you how in love I am with you?
Yours,
Doyoung
Writing the last sentence made Doyoung smile sadly. Even on paper, he couldn't even properly and directly tell Taeyong how much he loved him. In the end, Doyoung remained careful. Scared.
He set the quill down and turned to look at the other people in the room, Donghyuck and Renjun seemed to be in an intense discussion of where the Marauder's lost map could be, they didn't even look up when Doyoung headed to his bed.
Doyoung will clean up the bottles tomorrow, for now, he wants to sleep.
"Hyuck, don't forget to stop by the owlery and give Errol (their owl) the list of ingredients on your way back. I put it on the desk. Tell Errol it's for Taeyong."
Donghyuck doesn't understand why Doyoung couldn't just hand Taeyong the letter himself when they meet tomorrow.
"Sure, sure, got it." Donghyuck gave him an 'okay' sign without looking away from Renjun, opening his last bottle for the night.
-
That bottle of alcohol became the problem.
Donghyuck had so much to drink that when Renjun excused himself to get a glass of water, he stood up and almost tripped three times before he safely made his way to Doyoung's desk. Donghyuck wouldn't say he was that drunk, but he was close.
"Letter.. letter.." Donghyuck mumbled, squinting his eyes to find a parchment with Taeyong's name on it.
"Aha! Must be this one." He picked up the parchment closest to the quill and held it close to his face, Doyoung wrote in fancy calligraphy and the swirls were starting to hurt Donghyuck's head, so he made no effort to read past the first line.
"My dearest Taeyong.. this should be it."
When Renjun returned, Donghyuck had already rolled up the parchment and tied a bow around it. Errol was more than happy to receive a treat from Donghyuck and deliver the letter.
-
So, that happened.
Donghyuck and Renjun wondered why Doyoung wasn't at the dining hall for breakfast and took it upon themselves to check up on him. Doyoung gets terribly hungry after a night of drinking, Renjun knows that much from experience when he visited the brothers' house during Christmas break.
Donghyuck entered the room and found his brother still asleep, the traces of last night still in the room. There were bottles on the floor, the stack of books on the floor that Donghyuck almost tripped on was still there, the top of the desk still had a parchment and a quill.
Renjun, the angel, frowned as he looked around the room and the boy on the bed.
"He'll suffer from a really bad headache if he doesn't eat and drink medicine soon. Why don't you clean up a bit while I fetch him some food from the kitchen?"
"Why do I have to clean up?" Donghyuck whined, but Renjun wasn't having any of it.
"He takes care of your lazy butt when you get bad hangovers and makes you tea every other day. Consider this as a payback."
Donghyuck hates how his boyfriend actually made sense. Doyoung had always been the one to take care of him, Donghyuck doesn't even remember the last time he bought Doyoung his favorite treat from Honeydukes.
"Fine."
When Renjun left and Donghyuck put the bottles back on the box under Doyoung's bed (they can't risk throwing the bottles out, the caretakers of the school would know it's alcohol. They always know), he moved to Doyoung's desk.
Usually, Doyoung's desk would be tidy and every sheet of paper would be put back inside the drawer before he slept. But last night, Doyoung just left it all there, even his quill wasn't stored away. Donghyuck found that weird.
He picks up the quill and the parchment.
Before anyone thinks otherwise, Donghyuck would like to defend himself and say that he's no nosy boy in normal circumstances. However, Doyoung behaved oddly last night and he's concerned. Just a concerned younger brother, that's all.
Donghyuck steals a glance at the boy sleeping on the bed. "Just a peek, Donghyuck. Just a peek."
Then, he looks at the parchment on his hand.
He had always been curious about the letters his older brother wrote whenever he got drunk, because who does that? Maybe if he reads this one letter, his curiosity will finally leave him.
On his hand was the letter, the parchment looked the same as every parchment Doyoung's ever used, but this one had a list written on it.
A list.
"To Taeyong," the first line said. The list, or as Donghyuck realized in horror - the ingredients list, was the list Doyoung told him about. "You'll be needing these:
Ashwinder eggs
Squill bulb
powdered common rue
Tincture of thyme.."
Surely his brother wasn't writing down ingredients whenever he was drunk, right? His brother may be strange sometimes, and is fond of lists and everything related to organization, but this doesn't make sense.
Then, a thought dawned on him.
Whatever his brother liked to write under the influence of alcohol, he had accidentally sent it to Taeyong.
Oh Donghyuck is so dead.
What if Doyoung wrote down an embarrassing story of Donghyuck? What if the letter contained Doyoung's confession of being the one to step on their neighbour's (annoying) gnomes back at the village? That old lady works at the Ministry, what if Taeyong tells her about Doyoung's crime and he gets summoned?
"I brought food, wake him up now."
"How about we just.. don't wake him up."
"What do you mean? He has to eat." Renjun raised an eyebrow at his boyfriend, nudging him aside so he could put the tray of food on the now-tidy desk.
"Jun, I need to tell you something."
When Donghyuck looked back up at Renjun after confessing his mistake, Donghyuck thought his own boyfriend would kill him first before Doyoung could. Renjun and Doyoung acted like the same person sometimes.
"You are so dead."
"It was an honest mistake, I'm sure Doyoung would understand."
He looks at the figure peacefully sleeping on the bed and gulps. Donghyuck was in fact - not sure. I'm so dead.
"Doyoung, I'm really sorry." Donghyuck apologized again when Doyoung was about to close the door to his room. "I learned obliviate! I can make Taeyong forget whatever you wrote there, just say the word!"
After coming to terms with the fact that the letter had probably reached Taeyong already, Doyoung told the younger boys to exit his room so he could prepare for the day. It's too late to rush for his first class, he might as well take the time to eat slowly and take a nice long shower. Also, he needed to think.
He didn't tell them what he wrote on the parchment, he just said it was a private matter. He'd rather die than let anyone else know that all these years, he'd been hiding unreciprocated feelings. He'd rather not have anyone pity him.
"There's no need, Hyuck. Just forget about it." He said.
He knew Donghyuck, as much as he liked playing pranks, would never go that far. It was an honest mistake as his younger brother said.
"You'll be late for class, go on. I'll meet you at lunch."
-
He sat on the edge of his bed, head between his hands and a blank look on his face. Not only is his head and his throat hurting from the amount Ogden's Old Firewhisky he drank last night, he also has the letter to think about.
The letter. That piece of parchment that held his confession. It's now in Taeyong's hands.
"Fuck." He leaned back until his body hit the bed, the same plain ceiling looking back at him. How am I going to face him now?