Archive of Our Own ^beta

The dough is lumpy, again. Taki sighs. He didn’t anticipate it being this hard to bake. Cooking feels so intuitive, creative, freeing. He loves the way he can add sugar or lemon to make a flavor brighter, to make it pop, the way he can experiment with spice and salt and heat to fuse a dish together. He remembers what K had told him, as they prepared their barbeque feast on the night cruise a few months back. Such a romantic idea for a group outing. He wouldn’t expect anything less. It makes sense that you like cooking, Taki, K had said. A lot of creative people love to cook. 

Taki doesn’t really feel creative, that often, because a lot of being an idol is doing what you’re told. The stylists, the producers, the choreographers, they’re the creatives, and Taki is just their puppet, dangled lovingly by strings. K is properly creative. He choreographs their dances, knows how to tell a story with his body to music as if he’s writing poetry. Taki wouldn’t be surprised if he writes poetry, too, because he’s so good with words. He knows EJ likes to write, and sometimes Jo. He’s never seen K do it, but maybe he does, and Taki doesn’t know. Sometimes he wonders how much of K exists that he doesn’t know, even though they’re together almost all the time. Taki didn’t really know about K’s friendships outside of the group. He didn’t know he had an idol friend close enough to plan a New Year’s trip to Paris with, to say the least. When K told him, he grinned and clapped and said, wow, amazing! like he always did to every good bit of news K shared with him. And then he told K about his own New Year’s plans to see his family, and his childhood friends, and tried to shake off his sense of envy and unease.

“Is four days the longest we’ve been apart?” K had asked him, softly, cupping his chin in his big, warm palm.

“I guess,” Taki mumbled, noncommittally, even though he knew it certainly was.

“I’ll send you pictures. And you have to show me everything you cook, okay? Don’t lose your focus. Your hobbies are important, and you’re becoming really amazing at it, you know?”

K squeezed his cheeks, and the compliment melted into Taki’s stomach like warm butter.  

Taki knows he has a knack for it, but he’s not on K’s level. Not at all. K cooks like it’s art. The first time Taki watched him crack an egg with the long, graceful fingers of one hand and slide it into the frying pan he felt like he was watching a pianist play a sonata. K cooks with the same finesse with which he does everything else. His entire body is made of rhythm. Sometimes Taki can’t understand how he has the same skeletal structure as everyone else. It feels like K is some other kind of being, entirely. Something ethereal. Sometimes he feels like K is his guardian angel. Sometimes he worries K is going to disappear, if he senses Taki doesn’t need him anymore. 

For the most part, Taki always just feels human. Sometimes he feels like a golem, a mound of clay, molded and modeled since he was barely a teenager, into someone that people want to adore. He likes being adored. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t be an idol. He would probably have gone to culinary school, and opened up an Italian restaurant, since it’s his favorite. Or a French one. He wants to learn French cuisine next, because it’s K’s favorite. He wants to learn how to cook all of K’s favorite foods. 

“I’m going to have to learn how to cook everything I eat”, K had said, as he flipped through a Parisian restaurant guide, Taki curled up beside him on the couch, a few weeks before the highly anticipated trip, “So I don’t have to miss it when I’m back. Who knows when I’ll get to go again?”

Will you take me with you, next time? Taki had wanted to ask, but he didn’t. 

“What are you most looking forward to eating?” Taki had asked instead, rubbing his forehead on the soft, wool sleeve of K’s shirt.

“Honestly? Probably croissants. I know that’s not very exciting, but I want to know how they really taste. And they’re so hard to make. Did you know, Taki…” K had started, launching into the melodic, monologuing way he so often speaks, that Taki loves to listen to, “...croissants need to be made with butter that is just the right temperature. It can’t be too cold, or the croissant will be hard, and not flaky at all. But if the butter is just a hint too warm, it’ll melt and ooze out of the dough, and you just end up with bread, like brioche. And you have to let the dough rest for just the right amount of time, too, or it’ll be flat. Or chewy! Chewy croissants are the worst. I don’t think any of the croissants in Paris will be chewy…” 

While K kept up his stream of consciousness, a one-man show just for Taki’s ears, he had reached up to touch Taki’s cheek, out of habit, squeezing it softly. Taki imagined he was croissant dough, being handled just as carefully and lovingly. If K baked him, he’d come out perfect.

Taki squishes the dough in his hands a little more, trying to see if it's salvageable. It’s not. He can keep trying. K had left for his flight right after Ekiden, and will be in Paris for 4 days. He has 4 days to learn how to make croissants. He imagines the look on K’s face when Taki serves him a freshly baked croissant, warm from the oven. The way his eyes will go wide. The way K will beam at him. The way K will tell him he’s incredible, amazing, a genius, the way he always does when Taki succeeds at something. K’s flight lands at 3pm, local time. He told Taki he’d text him when he gets to the hotel, and call him if he’s still up, so Taki will be up. He’s tired, so tired, but he’ll be up. He has 3 more hours before midnight in Tokyo, before 4pm in Paris, when he surmises K would be settling in, unless he makes plans with his friend, and can’t call anymore. It’ll be his first afternoon in Paris, after all, so it would be understandable if he doesn’t want to spend his precious little vacation time talking to Taki on the phone, when he’s talked to him everyday for the last 6 years. But he said he would call, so Taki will be up. 3 hours is enough time to toss this dough and try again. Croissants are hard, but he’s learned harder things in much less time, and when he gets this right, K is going to be so proud of him. 

The next batch isn’t much better than the first, because Taki struggled to properly fold the butter in, and it was chunky and the layers were so uneven. He searches through some croissant making videos on YouTube to try to figure out the problem, and decides to try shredding the butter in, instead. The lamination goes more smoothly, and he’s able to get them shaped, sliced, and rolled, but he watches through the door of the oven as all of the butter melts out through the bottom, and they wilt into pathetic, flat, moons. The butter is too warm, at this point, and he doesn’t have any other sticks in the refrigerator, so he puts what remains back inside and starts to clean up the kitchen. When the counters are clean and the garbage bags full of raw dough are removed from the kitchen so Maki doesn’t yell at him, he glances at his phone. K should be landing in around 10 minutes. Taki makes his way to the bathroom for a quick bath before he gets settled into bed. 

At 11:43, Taki’s phone dings.

I’m in Paris!!!! I’m at the hotel. Are you asleep?

Taki replies that he’s not, and his phone rings a few moments later. He swipes to answer, and cups the phone to his cheek, turning onto his side, blocking his other ear with the pillow. He wants K’s voice to be the only thing he hears.

“Hi,” K’s soft voice comes through, always sweet on the phone. It’s surprising that they’ve talked on the phone as often as they have, when they haven’t been separated, all that often. 

“How’s Paris?” Taki asks.

“From what I’ve seen from the car window, it’s pretty. It’s sunny out, and not too cold today. And they gave us champagne on the plane, so I knocked out almost immediately. I got a longer sleep than I feel like I’ve gotten in 3 months, although I missed all the in-flight meals.”

“You should eat, K-hyung.” 

K scoffs playfully, “I’ll be eating. We ordered room service right before I texted you. I ordered 3 separate entrees because I couldn’t choose.”

“And you’re probably going to eat it all, and it’ll just melt off you, somehow.” 

“That’s not true. It just gets absorbed differently. Everything I eat grows my ego.”

Taki laughs, then yawns, can’t suppress it. He hopes K doesn’t notice.

“I didn’t ask you what you wanted yet, as a souvenir. Any ideas?” 

“I don’t know, something cute, I guess. Something…that makes you think of me.” 

“Hmm, well that’s a lot of things”, K lilts. The phone suddenly feels so hot on Taki’s cheek. 

“Something…soft”, Taki murmurs, clutching one of the plush toys K got him years ago to his chest, yawning again, bigger this time. 

“You sound like you’re falling asleep”, K murmurs, his soothing voice only lulling him further.

“Hm”, Taki murmurs, neither affirming nor denying, brushing his lips against the plush.

“If you’re going to sleep, then you have to say goodnight properly”, K chides gently.

“Don’t wanna”, Taki replies. K laughs.

“Why don’t you want to say goodnight?”

“Cause if I say goodnight, you’ll hang up”, Taki replies in a sleepy whisper, “But if I never say it, you’ll stay on the phone with me.” 

K laughs again, a sound like ringing bells. 

“When did you get so coy? That’s a line to use on our fans, not on me. Goodnight, Taki.”

Taki says nothing, hoping that maybe K will understand that he’s not trying to be coy, not joking around. That he doesn’t want to get off the phone. That he doesn’t want K to be so far away.

Taki hears a door open in the background, voices talking. He imagines their room service has arrived, and K will be sitting down to a lavish hotel meal with his lucky friend who got to spend K’s only vacation in 3 years with him in Paris. Taki clutches the plush toy tighter to his chest. 

“Say it back, so I can go”, K requests gently, and Taki doesn’t want to be obstinate, doesn’t want to make K worry over him, especially when they’re far apart. He knows he should be grateful that K has given him this time at all.

“Goodnight, K-hyung”, he murmurs.

“Love you, Taki.”

K doesn’t give him a chance to say it back before he hangs up. The silence in Taki’s ear afterwards fills the entire room, and smothers him to sleep.

~~~~

Taki wakes up at 11 to his phone buzzing with incoming texts. He rolls over to snatch it off the charger, blinking his bleary eyes at the screen. 35 unread texts from K. 

He opens their messages to photos of bakeries, boutiques, pigeons, fountains, parks, cars, selfies, ducks, a video of a stylish woman on a bicycle, a zoomed video of the Eiffel Tower in the distance, a video of the sky, a video of a tiny duckling in the grass. 

Found you, K wrote. So cute. 

 Taki stares at the message screen, his thumbs held frozen over the keyboard. Another text comes in.

I can’t sleep. Probably from the jetlag. 

I need Taki cheeks to relax. I’m going through withdrawal. 

Taki~

I can see you reading my messages. 

Taki~ 

Don’t ignore me~

You okay?

Taki stares at the little bubble that shows K is still typing. The bubble disappears, then comes back again. Once, twice more, and he gets a new message. 

I miss you. 

Taki’s thumbs stay frozen over the keyboard until the screen goes black.

— Paris, 3:24AM — 

K drops the phone down on the pillow next to him with a sigh and turns to face the window. The glow of the city comes through, illuminating the hotel room, the stark whiteness of the walls and the sheets. It’s too bright, and K is too awake, and he’s thinking too much. 

Sometimes Taki gets like this. When K’s too harsh with his corrections, or goes a little too far with his teasing. Did he go too far? But he wasn’t teasing. He misses Taki, a lot. He misses his cheeks and his laugh and his warmth. And he can’t prove it, but he knows Taki is a little mad at him. K really doesn’t like it when Taki is mad at him. And for Taki to be mad at him now, when he’s so far away, he can only think of one reason why.

And it would’ve been so easy to ask Taki to go to Paris with him. Taki had already told him he wanted to travel together, and K had even said in an interview that if he got the chance to take a vacation, it would be nice to go with Taki somewhere.

So how come when it came time to make all their New Year’s travel plans, he spread his Paris travel guides across the table, and asked Sano instead? 

He checks his phone again. Nothing. He sighs. He knows he’ll get a response, later, when Taki comes out of whatever funk he’s put himself in. Or whatever funk K has put him in, inadvertently. Taki’s sensitive to the things he says and does. And K knows this, and usually can ease the tension, if he hugs Taki, or rubs his cheeks, or ruffles his hair. When Taki goes icy, K knows how to melt him. But he can’t, from almost 10,000 kilometers away. Why did he think that he couldn’t take him? The reasons which had seemed very concrete and infallible now felt flimsy and awkward. He runs through them. 

First reason. It would’ve seemed like favoritism for him to travel with only one member of the group. But Nico and EJ are galavanting around Hawaii, and no one is batting an eye. 

Second reason. Taki’s mother asked him about Taki’s plans for New Year’s. Asked him. She didn’t ask Taki, because she hates burdening her son with anything, and instead K receives all of her worries and anxieties. And it’s fine. It’s not a burden, because looking after Taki’s well-being is second nature to him by now. But he understood what she was really asking. Will Taki be with me, or with you? And K couldn’t bring himself to tell this poor woman that no, actually, he was going to keep Taki all to himself, again. He was going to whisk him off to Paris. So K decided that Taki needed time with his family, when that was really something Taki should’ve had a chance to decide for himself. He’s not Taki’s keeper, even if he wants to be.

Third reason. He was scared. He was scared of having to pretend a trip to Paris with Taki would mean the same thing as a trip to Paris with his industry friend, when he knew very well it wouldn’t. He was scared of it becoming obvious. He was scared that somehow climbing the Eiffel Tower with Taki would expose his innermost thoughts, and wants, and when they reached the top, Taki would somehow be aware of the true depth of his affection. 

His phone buzzes. 

He fumbles to swipe it open rapidly. The reply consisted of just two things. A heart-hand emoji, and a croissant emoji. K waits for Taki to send something else, but nothing comes. 

He’ll wait for Taki to finish thawing out. At least he got a response at all, even if it’s weird and cryptic. Taki usually tries to be straightforward with him, when he’s ready to talk. And K is usually good at waiting until he’s ready, because usually he can at least see Taki, and keep watch over him, even if they need a little space. 10,000 kilometers is a lot of space. A lot of hours between them. Once K finally gets pulled into sleep, and wakes up, Taki will probably be in Nara, surrounded by deer. K thinks about Taki’s short fingers holding out a treat, getting licked over by a deer’s warm tongue. He thinks about the faces Taki will make, one of surprised delight, then confusion as he frantically runs in a circle looking for somewhere to clean his hand. He thinks about how the waving would bring over more deer, and Taki would be surrounded. He smiles at the image. Of how cute Taki will look in his long black coat, circled by deer, like some kind of dark forest wizard. Of how happy he’ll be to touch their soft fur.

K wishes he could talk to animals. He’d send the deer of Nara a message, tell them to let Taki know he’s thinking of him. That he’s sorry. That he’ll take him to Paris next time. That it’s a promise. 

~~~~

Taki is on the bullet train to Nara. His family is already there, but he had to figure out a different schedule with his manager to make the trip possible. Vacation or not, he still has responsibilities to fulfill, but he enjoys it. He likes feeling useful, responsible, and grown up. Sometimes they offer to let him turn down work, but he never does, even if it gets tiring. K has way more responsibilities than he does, and never bats an eye, never seems tired, so Taki can do it, too. 

The electrical wires and hedges and mountains are blurring into a soupy stream of grey and green, and his stomach flip-flops a little bit with the speed. It’s the first time he’s taken the bullet train by himself, which doesn’t really compare at all to the anxious feeling of taking an airplane alone to Korea at 14, but he feels nervous all the same. He’s not used to being alone, nor is he used to being on vacation. He watched as K planned his trip to Paris, pouring over guidebooks and websites, asking his manager to contact stores and restaurants to get reservations, feeling strange. Taki wanted his first experiences of Europe to be on tour, with the whole group, so it’s not like he was jealous, exactly, not like he wanted to go. He just…didn’t want to be left alone, either. That feels like a ridiculous thought.

He’s 20 now. He’s been 20 for months. And he’s more mature and grown up than K was at 20, he always tells him so. He has no problem being independent and doing things alone. He’s very in charge of his life, even though his life mostly belongs to his company. He likes being 20. He likes that he can order a drink, and that he no longer has to deal with the complications of being a minor in a debuted idol group. He likes that he feels closer in age to his hyungs, even though the gap actually remains the same. He likes that K will speak with him about more varied topics, seems to trust him with more. He likes being seen as mature, and reliable. He likes not being watched so carefully. 

But sometimes he really misses being 14, because when he was 14, it was expected that he didn’t want to be alone, and K didn’t leave him. It was expected that he wanted to follow his hyung around, and pester him and cuddle him all the time. It was natural that K found him adorable. How long will he be able to pester K, and cuddle him, before it’s weird? Will K still think he’s adorable, even when he’s all grown up? 

Other times, he wishes he was older than K. He wishes he could’ve watched K grow up, could’ve cooed at him and called him cute. He wishes K would watch him the way he sometimes watches Fuma, when Fuma’s doing something sexy like pulling his shirt up or ripping it off. The way K will smirk and whistle. K always tells Taki to zip up when he’s showing too much skin. Taki wants to know what it feels like to have the power to make K swallow audibly and lose his focus just by rolling his hips. Taki wishes he could make K feel the way K makes him feel. 

He had gotten himself some breakfast pastries to eat, but he doesn’t have much of an appetite, so he’s picking at his croissant, inspecting its flakiness, because if he’s not going to eat it he can at least use it for his research, or something. He’s trying to grasp how the baker got the center to remain so light and moist while the outside is crisp, firm, golden and perfect. He can understand why K likes croissants. They’re complex and beautiful and unique, like he is. Taki feels like a slice of white bread. Unintimidating, familiar. Easily loved, in its simplicity. I like how easy you are to understand, K had told him, once, and so Taki takes all his complicated feelings and pushes them down. He doesn’t want to burden K with the parts of him that aren’t as simple, aren’t as easily lovable. Taki likes being the comforting, familiar, slice of white bread that K can chew on when he’s had enough of the plethora of fancy feasts he receives.

After sending the emojis, K hadn’t texted him anything else, and Taki had felt a little guilty. It’s just that Taki was overwhelmed, with all the photos, and the questions, and the I miss you. Taki didn’t know what to do with his feelings, and he certainly couldn’t put them on K, so he had put his phone away and tried again to make croissants, rolling, cutting, layering, butter, dough, butter, dough, rolling more, smushing his own messy thoughts in between the layers, trying to flatten them out. In the oven, they at least rose into fluffy croissant shapes, although they were too pale on the bottom and too crisp on the top. 

Still, he was getting closer, which helped him feel a bit better, and so he had texted K again. 

I’m going to Nara tomorrow!

I’m going to feed the deer lots of snacks & make them my friends.

What did you eat today? 

And while Taki was sleeping, K had replied. He had wished him a good trip, and sent him a photograph of his latest Parisian meal, detailing the different kinds of meats and cheeses that came with his charcuterie board. Eyes still filmy with sleep, drool still wet on his pillow, Taki had asked which cheese he liked the best, but the timing was off, and now, idle on the bullet train, when he pulls out his phone for the twelfth time in an hour and checks their messages, it still shows as unread. 

The melody of the train catches his attention, signaling his arrival to Nara in the next 10 minutes. He stretches and decides to take a bite of the croissant, just to get something in his stomach. It looks better than it tastes, and was probably made with margarine instead of butter, because it’s lacking a richness that a real croissant should have. Taki imagines that the croissants in Paris must taste like they were made with butter churned in gold. The croissants he makes K need to taste like that.  

His family is waiting for him outside of the ticket gate, and he feels the tension ease when he sees them. He always has a nervous trepidation before their reunions, because he still feels somewhat guilty for making his mom worry so much when he was training, so far from home. He knows she didn’t contact him that much because she didn’t want to bother him, or interrupt his training. She held her worry in her chest like a heavy stone, trying to stay afloat, while she let Taki swim away in an open, vast sea of possibility.

If Taki had known how sad she was, he wouldn’t have been able to do it. He would’ve given up, and gone home. She barely contacted him, because it would’ve all spilled out. He didn’t know it at the time, but she contacted K instead, and so K held the weight of his mother’s loneliness for him so that he didn’t have to. K held a lot for him. A lot of pain, and anxiety, and gratitude, and love. Taki tried to be careful that it wasn’t too much, that all of his feelings didn’t spill out at once, and bury K under their weight. 

The cab ride to the hotel is quiet, and their suite is beautiful and airy. It faces the south, and the sunlight is streaming in. There’s a view of the mountains, and the deer park. Taki looks out the window and tries to imagine what it would be like to see the Eiffel Tower in the distance, or the Arc de Triomphe. He imagines standing on a hotel balcony, pointing it out excitedly, K behind him, ruffling his hair. Taki can sometimes get so lost inside his head that everything else fades away. He can hear K’s breath on his neck. He can smell K’s sweet, clean scent wrapping itself around him. He can feel his warmth. When Taki gets lost in a dreamworld, he always starts to feel too hot. He hardly wears shirts anymore, because he sweats right through. K is always trying to button him up and get him properly dressed, but that only makes the heat worse. He presses himself up against the cool glass of the window, squishing his cheek against it. He wonders if K is sleeping. His sister catches him pressed up against the window, breathing against it and fogging it up. She calls him weird, and tells him they’re going to go and greet the deer. 

The deer walk with a grace and style that makes Taki think of K immediately. One walks over to him, stopping close. Taki didn’t buy anything to feed them with, yet, and he holds out his empty hands in apology. The deer doesn’t move, looking at him with big, soft eyes. The deer’s fur is a rich, oak brown, like K’s hair. It’s a warm, regal color, stylish and mature. Taki has tried browns, and beiges, but none of them made him look quite as sophisticated as K. He’s just not the sophisticated type. He doesn’t like all of the same sophisticated things as K does, like perfumes, although he loves scents. He loves the scent of fresh pastries, and blueberry smoothies, and fresh towels. He loves the scent of autumn leaves, and chopped garlic, and toast. He loves the scent of new hotels. He loves the scent of a freshly mopped stage. He loves the scent of K’s hugs. But these are not perfumes, so Taki doesn’t talk about them with K. 

The deer is still watching him, and somehow its gaze seems sympathetic. There are no other deer around Taki, just this one. It puffs out a breath, stomps, and darts its tongue out to the right, just slightly, like K does when he’s doing his signature pose. Maybe K sent him a deer to watch over him while they’re apart. He pulls out his phone to take pictures, and sees 5 unread texts. He must not have felt the vibration through his thick coat pocket. 

I liked the comté. It’s really nutty and savory. 

I’ll get some from Arté for you to try, when I come back. 

Are you in Nara already?

Say hi to everyone for me.

Including the deer. 

He snaps photos of the deer and thinks about sending them to K, thinks about the video of the duckling K had sent him the day before. Found you, he had said. Like he was looking for Taki in everything. It was so easy for him to show Taki his affection. Maybe because it didn’t hold the same weight. Taki opens his Weverse direct messages instead.

K-hyung is here, he types out, should I show you?

He waits a few seconds, and when he can see replies pouring in, he sends a picture of the deer. 

Hahaha

Isn’t it cute? 

It’s so stylish. 

It’s better this way, easier, than sending K a picture and writing, “this made me think of you”. 

Because really it’s, everything makes me think of you, and that’s not something Taki feels ready to say.

~~~~

After a one night stay in Nara, they all leave back to Taki’s childhood home. Taki’s mother asks him if there's anything he’d like to cook with her. She’s always sending him recipes now, and he’s perfected a lot of the recipes that remind him of his childhood. His mother usually makes Japanese staples, but Taki thinks she would be up for a challenge.

“I want us to bake croissants”, he requests, “I’m trying to learn how to make them.” 

“I see”, she murmurs, “I’m sure K-kun will be very impressed.” 

Taki fishes through the cupboards to find the flour and mixing bowls, saying nothing.  

Before they begin mixing together the dry ingredients, Taki’s mother puts the butter knife in the freezer. 

“This will help keep the butter cool”, she says, “so they don’t go bready.”

Taki doesn’t ask how his mother knows how to make croissants, how she seems to know how to do everything. She’s kind of like K, in that way. Or K is kind of like a mother.

They get the croissants layers, sliced, and rolled into perfect crescent moons. Taki writes down notes in his phone of the things his mother did that he hadn’t thought of, for when he tries again to make them on his own.

Taki peers through the oven door, watching as they puff up in the oven and turn golden brown. The whole kitchen smells like butter. He’s smiling at the oven door, cooing excitedly at the possibility of success.

“You’re an odd one, but you sure are sweet”, his mom whispers. When Taki glances up at her, she’s looking at him with so much affection it makes him go red. 

K looks at him like that, too. 

The croissants come out well. They’re flaky and soft and rich. Practice makes perfection, but now Taki knows he’s going in the right direction, and he feels certain that he will make croissants worthy to feed K. 

After dinner, everyone ventures to the local bath house, and Taki spends a long time in the sauna, sweating until he’s exhausted, so he can curl up in bed and go to sleep quickly, so it can be tomorrow that much faster. The day K comes back.

He’s about to fall asleep when his phone dings.

Are you awake? Wanna talk?

Taki fights the pull of sleep and calls K. 

K starts in with his melodic musings before he even says hello. 

“So, you wanted me to find something that makes me think of you. But it’s a little hard, Taki, because everything makes me think of you, you know?”

Taki doesn’t know how to respond to those words, words that rest hidden inside his own heart, spoken aloud so easily. 

“And I can’t bring all of Paris back in my one suitcase.” 

“Then why…” Taki pauses. 

“Mm?” K encourages, so gently, so sweetly. Always so soft and doting. It makes Taki’s stomach twist up into bread knots. 

Why didn’t you just take me with you?

 He doesn’t want to ask that. He doesn’t want to ask anything. He wishes he was a baguette, quiet and easy to manage. K could buy him from a bakery and tote him around lovingly, taking little nibbles throughout the day.

“Are you still there?” K asks softly. 

“Then why don’t you buy another suitcase, then?” Taki murmurs, and K laughs, bright and full, and Taki thinks the ringing of the bells at Notre Dame must sound so dull in comparison. 

“So to help me make a choice, I need you to choose one of the following, Okay? I’m not gonna tell you why. Just pick one. Ready?”

“You really love games, don’t you?”

“Shush, or you get nothing. Ready?”

“Ready.”

“A macaron, a croissant, or a strawberry tart?”

Taki doesn’t need a lot of time to think. 

“A croissant.” 

“I knew it!” K laughs giddily, “I know you so well, don’t I?” 

“You do.” 

“Because I love you, a lot. You know that, right?” 

“I know.”

“Are you mad that I didn’t ask you to go to Paris with me? I…Taki, I really wanted us-”

“A little”, Taki interrupts, “But…I’m not mad, so much as…I just…don’t…it’s hard when you’re gone. I just miss you, that’s all.” 

“I miss you too. This is the longest we’ve been apart in 6 years, huh?” 

“Yea, I guess so.” 

“I know so. I don’t like it. I don’t want to leave you again.” 

Taki laughs, “That’s impossible. We’re gonna start having more separate schedules, and separate lives, and-”

“No”, K interrupts, before repeating, softly but firmly, “I don’t want to leave you again.” 

Taki’s face heats up. He realizes he’s been holding his breath, and yawns to take in oxygen. He can hear the bustling sounds of busy streets in the background, surmises K must be walking around. He yawns again.

“Are you going to fall asleep?” K asks gently. Taki debates lying, decides against it. K would know, anyway.

“Yea, probably. I’m really tired.” 

“You can go to sleep, then,” K soothes.

He doesn’t make Taki say goodnight, and he doesn’t hang up the phone. Taki falls asleep listening to the unfamiliar street sounds of Paris, and the familiar sound of K breathing.

~~~~

K is scheduled to land at 11:40PM, Tokyo time. Taki makes plans to go to Tokyo Disney with a childhood friend during the day, and leaves his evening free so he can bake, so that they’ll be warm and fresh when K gets in. He buys a cute pig hat and sends selfies to Weverse, and to K. 

Cute. A baby chick dressing up as a pig. 

Taki never really thinks too deeply about his representative animal, has no thoughts one way or the other about being a baby chick. But he likes when it makes him feel like something small and precious that K could cup in the palms of his soft, warm hands. 

When Taki gets back to the dorm, he feels energized and ready, giddy with the thought that he'll see K in a few hours. He'll see his smile, and smell his K-smell, and feel the way he squeezes his cheeks just right. He gets his ingredients lined up along the counter top, and opens up the notes from his mom. He puts the butter knife in the freezer. He has a feeling these croissants will be perfect.

And when K gets home, a plush croissant with a little smiley face in his arms, Taki shrieks and crushes the plush toy between their chests, wrapping his arms around K and squeezing tight, getting flour all over his fancy, expensive coat. 

“I’m back” K laughs, cupping his cheeks, smiling at him so achingly fondly that Taki thinks it might burn him up.

“Welcome back”, Taki murmurs, leaning into the feeling of K’s soft, warm hands on his face, like he's been starving for it. K's squeezing at him like he might feel the same. Taki clears his throat, looking up at K.

“I made you something.” 

~~~~

Taki watches the way K chews. He knows the richness of the butter is expanding, morphing into a perfect blend of savory sweetness. He knows the flaky softness is caressing the inside of his cheeks. He knows it tastes perfect. K’s eyes are wide with admiration, and Taki is a warm oven. 

“Taki…this is incredible”, he moans in awe, his mouth full, “You’re incredible, truly.” 

K takes another bite, chewing slowly, his face a picture of absolute bliss. “This is so good…I won’t have to go to Paris again anytime soon. I have my own Parisian chef right here, don't I?" Taki is a match, struck on a tinderbox. K shoves the rest of the croissant into his mouth, chewing with a face of pure bliss.

“It’s so good…and you did this just for me? God, I love you so much”, he sighs out around his bite, and Taki is an open flame. 

He pulls Taki in close, squeezing him, pressing their cheeks together. Taki can smell the butter, and the distinct, familiar K scent, richer and more mouth-watering than anything else he knows. Against his cheek, where their faces are pressed tightly together as K chews, Taki can feel the way K’s teeth move up and down. K sighs again, leaning into Taki, letting Taki feel his full weight. It feels good. K’s fingers move up and down Taki’s back, under his soft, loose shirt, and they’re hot against his skin. He feels K’s breath against his ear. It’s hot, too. Taki knows the flaky bread is melting, the butter laying itself to rest on the warmth of his tongue.

He wonders what it feels like to be inside of K’s mouth. He wonders if K took a bite out of him, if he would melt the same way.

K turns, slightly, and he brushes his buttery lips against Taki’s cheek, pressing softly, kissing along the skin like he’s glazing him, preparing him to be consumed. Taki will sink into his stomach, gladly.