You like tangerines. Jisung likes you. Someone is hiding citrus fruit in your apartment.
Finals are brutal. Winter is cold. And you’re not ready to admit that you already know who it is.
Tasting notes: soft-baked fluff • college au/campus cafe special • slow-brewed friends to lovers • notes of bright seasonal citrus • served warm at ~1.5k words
Part of my NCT Dream x Candy Series: Each song, one member, one wintery first love. Up next: Jeno x Take My Breath.
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You first find a smiley-faced one on your desk. The black marker’s wobbly smile drawn on the orange fruit is at once amusing and a little creepy-looking. With winter fast approaching, the days are getting short, and with semester finals looming too, the stress is piling up. So you quickly peel the tangerine and pop a segment in your mouth, appreciating the unexpected sweetness. It’s stupid, but it feels like someone checked in on you quietly.
The next few days, though, you start to think it has to be a prank. Someone has hidden tangerines in every corner of your apartment while you were out studying in the stacks or something. You find one tucked inside a pot when you go to boil water for ramen. Another turns up inside your medicine cabinet when you reach for your toothpaste. They keep popping up everywhere.
You’d mentioned once that you liked tangerines. Who had paid that much attention?
You ask one of your housemates, Jaemin, about the mystery citrus gifts but he shrugs.
“Oh, actually, here’s one more. I found it on my printer.”
This one has crossed eyes drawn on. Hmm. Either he really didn’t know or he was keeping mum about it.
You place it back on the printer and snap a photo to text Jisung. Your phone lights up almost immediately with a response, and you feel a bubbly excitement rising in your chest.
jisunggongwon: nice orange
shootingstar_: it’s a tangerine!
jisunggongwon: aren’t oranges and tangerines the same thing
shootingstar_: NOOOO!!! when are you going to learn your fruits and vegetables? you can’t tell citrus apart, but you can explain carbon cycles??
jisunggongwon: yeah, and one of those topics is important for finals. want me to come over?
shootingstar_: yes pls
You laugh to yourself and pause over the study guide you’ve been trying to annotate. Jisung is the best at explaining complicated concepts and has probably saved you from failing a couple of classes. He makes you feel like you can ask anything and figure it out together, not just for academics but for whatever you’re going through.
You’ve known Jisung for only a year, but he’s slipped into your routines so easily you sometimes forget there even was a before. Though recently, you’ve caught yourself reacting more when Jisung gets close to you. The other day at the library, your stomach did flips when he accidentally dropped his pen and leaned into your space to pick it up. His fluffy hair brushed your side and the faint scent of his shampoo stood out more than it should have. It surprised you how much you noticed. You’d been that close to him before without thinking twice.
Before you know it, it’s getting late and freezing cold, so you make sure Jisung bundles up before you push him toward the door. He could’ve stayed over like he had a couple times prior, but honestly, you know it would've been too distracting for you. Today, it happens again when he gets very focused on showing you something on his iPad and presses his arm into yours. His voice is soft, and low, and rumbly… You shiver, and it’s not because of the lame 100-plus-year-old heating system underperforming.
After Jisung heads home, you are glad to find a different distraction in the form of two more tangerines. On the bookshelf. Instead of smiley faces, these have scribbled letters on them.
You share the fruit as a midnight snack with your housemates because you’ve eaten so many you’re afraid your pee is going to turn orange. Chenle tosses one of the tangerines up in the air and Renjun steals it from him, turning it over and placing it next to the other one.
“So, I and U. Maybe your secret admirer is from IU… International University?”
“Maybe your secret admirer is getting you IU tickets for Christmas.”
“Maybe your secret admirer needs you to fix the Instruction Unit of your CPU.”
“Maybe your secret admirer is Indiana Uones.”
“Maybe it’s not IU, but UI, and your secret admirer would like you to improve your user experience.”
“No, that’s UX! User interface is like layout and typography.”
You sigh and bury your face in your hands.
“Please shut up and eat the free fruit.”
A dozen odd smiling-tangerine discoveries later (some of them are a bit shriveled because they dried in the time you didn’t find them), your papers are turned in, group projects finished, and the last test finally behind you. You scream in relief as you flop onto your bed, and then scream for another reason. You’ve landed on a small, spherical object, which drops to the floor and starts rolling away.
A tangerine.
This one has a heart drawn on it, though it’s so sloppy it could’ve easily been a circle or a blob. It dawns on you then.
That messy handwriting.
You’ve seen it a million times trying to decipher his notes, usually ending up having to ask him to just read them aloud to you. How did you not connect the dots?
Now that you think of it, it wasn’t so much obvious, but consistent. Jisung comforting you without judgment when you dramatically cried about losing your favorite umbrella, which he found later at his place. Jisung writing notes of encouragement for you at the bottom of Google Docs that had nothing to do with the assignment. Jisung staying up with you, staying with you, even when he didn’t have to. You just tended to explain away his sweetness as part of his general character.
The tangerines weren’t jokes. They were thoughtful. A little clumsy and ridiculous, sure, but always showing up for you when you needed it.
You run across campus to where you’d promised to meet up to get some celebratory cupcakes for the end of term. Jisung is already sitting at the empty bus stop bench waiting for you, and he looks so handsome you almost forget what you were about to say.
“You. You’re the reason my fingers are all dry and powdery from peeling so many tangerines!”
“Well, you said they’re your favorite.” He stands, and you start walking towards the Neo City Cafe a couple blocks down, as if this is the most normal conversation ever.
“What’s with the creepy faces on them then?”
“They’re supposed to be smiles,” he says, running a hand through his hair, suddenly a bit shy. “You know… to cheer you up.”
You admit the idea is pretty cute, even if the execution was not all ideal. You soften and slow your steps, now that you’ve confirmed it was him. “Th-Thanks, Jisung. And uh, I- I think I got your message.”
“And…?” You see him swallow, trying to hide his nerves too. He leans in towards you, and your heart does somersaults.
“And… I circle-blob-thing you too?”
Jisung tilts his head back to laugh and then does this terribly loserly (but cute) fist pump action like “yes!!!” to himself. You’re too happy to care.
“May I?” He asks.
You follow his gaze to the space between you, where your hands hang side by side. You give him a small nod. He reaches for your hand and slips it into his jacket pocket, and you burst out laughing when your fingers meet something smooth and round. He literally has a tangerine in there.
With the coordination only a dancer could have, he pulls you closer, wraps your arm behind his back, and tucks your hand into his other pocket, so you’re snug and hugging him from the side. He holds your hand there, and your cheeks heat up from how cheesy but comforting it feels. You love that he’s way more bold and suave with you than his seemingly shy exterior usually lets on.
“You could’ve just asked if you wanted me to wrap my arms around you. I feel like you’ve been baiting me with food like an animal.”
“I dunno,” he says lightly. “It worked though, right?”
You lean into him, and his eyes crinkle into crescents as he flashes a rare smile.
“Wait,” you say suddenly. “What does the orange in your other pocket say?”
“It’s a tangerine, babe.” Your mind short circuits for a moment because you’re not used to the pet name. He pulls it out of his pocket, and this one has a bunch of scribbles over it.
You try very hard to read the words he has crammed onto the tangerine peel. “I’m panning — planning — on hiding — holding — your hand. Next. Seeeason. Too?”
He gives your hand a squeeze.
Your brain finishes translating his hieroglyphics. “I’m planning on holding your hand next season too. Jisung, are you saying you want to be a couple for only the winter and spring?!”
“Wha-wait, no! It’s supposed to be poetic!”
“Also, how many oranges did you hide? I don’t want to keep finding them rotting and rolling in my apartment for the rest of the school year.”
“They’re tangerines,” he insists, unfazed by your eye roll. “And I don’t remember how many I hid. I mean, there might be some more in your bed and I can help you find them if you let me come over—”
“Jisung Park!!”
He grins and you can’t help but smile too.
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Author’s note: Thank you for reading! 🍊Hope this makes you smile, and that you find your own sweet tangerines (or oranges).
