Characters: Minghao, reader
↬ Minghao gets his wisdom teeth removed and you’re left to deal with aftermath.
Minghao felt the floor tilt beneath his feet, like the ground was being swiped from underneath his black converse sneakers. All of a sudden, the world around him did a somersault and he landed onto the ground, the carpeted floor cushioning his fall and preventing him from getting a concussion. Though hopping out of the seat and wobbling to the common waiting room once his dentist excused herself – Minghao wondered if perhaps she had suddenly gotten the urge to visit the restroom – once seemed like a great idea to his giddy brain, he was beginning to doubt his previous intuition.
“Ow,” A sharp sting shot up his forearm as he winced, attempting to hoist himself into a sitting position but failing terribly due to the fact that his head felt like it was filled with lead. His surroundings were still spinning rather quickly for some reason, so he laid back down onto the carpet and wondered if it was going to stop anytime soon, deciding to wait until the feeling of his head being too overwhelmingly heavy for his body ceased, and he could walk properly without crashing to the ground once more.
The carpet doesn’t seem so bad anyways, he thought contently, it even smells fresh and new. And it’s fluffy too. Oh, that rhymed!
He then reached up to poke his numb, swollen cheeks, wondering why on earth he couldn’t feel anything other than a tingly, odd sensation there. There were two wet gauze pads lodged in the back of his mouth, making Minghao feel like an overfed chipmunk of some sort. His hands itched to yank them out of his mouth, but a distinct memory of his dentist strictly warning him not to remove it yet resurfaced from the depths of his hazy mind, causing the poor boy to sigh rather sadly. His fingers travelled down to his lips and he pinched them, but was unable to feel the signature slight prick of pain that came with the action.
Are my lips still there? he thought anxiously, pressing his hands to his mouth, patting his face in an attempt to locate his apparently missing lips.
“Hao, why are you lying on the ground?” A familiar face appeared in his field of vision, interrupting his intense task of finding his lips, distracting him momentarily as he squinted, willing the fog in his vision to clear.
“Y/N!” He cheered once his sluggish mind decided to catch up, the China-native lighting up like a child on Christmas day with recognition as he grinned brightly up at the sight of his friend.
“Hi,” she chuckled, crouching down beside his sprawled-out figure, delivering a playful bonk to his nose. It scrunched up in response as bubbly giggles spilled from Minghao’s lips.
“Hi! What a coincidence! Are you here to get your teeth out too? My mouth feels weird. I can’t feel my lips, I think they’re missing,” he blurted animatedly, his word filter seeming to have taken a self-declared holiday. His voice was a string of messily pronounced words and uneven syllables, wobbly tone morphing into a more solemn one when he uttered the last part seriously to her, and she had to swallow a burst of amused laughter.
“Um, no, I’m here to pick you up, silly. And your lips are right here, don’t worry,” she replied, amused as she lightly tapped his slightly swollen, pale pink lips with a finger. Though she was completely aware of the side effects of medicinal drugs administered during wisdom teeth removal procedures, she couldn’t help chuckling endearingly at the sight of the usual sensible Minghao being reduced to a loopy, disorientated mess by a dentist surgery.
“Really? But I can’t feel them!” he exclaimed, wide eyes staring up at her with genuine puzzle, eyebrows furrowing, and she resisted the urge to pinch his cheeks (it would probably be a very bad idea to do so, and she wisely kept her hands to herself) and coo at how adorably he wore the look of confusion.
“They’re there, trust me,” she assured, “Now why don’t we get you home? You can sleep in your bed instead of on the floor.”
“But it’s nice here. It’s really fluffy, see? Touch!” he insisted, reaching for her hand and dragging it back and forth on the carpet to prove his point.
“Yes, Hao, I can see that. But do you really want to nap on the public floor, where possibly hundreds of people have stepped on with their dirty shoes?”
His eyebrows furrowed as he considered this slowly, the gears in his drugged mind taking triple its usual time to turn and process information.
“I like shoes,” he concluded with a happy nod, clearly having zoned in on the word ‘shoes’ and conveniently disregarding the rest.
“Look, aren’t my shoes nice?” he pointed at his own denim sneakers with a giddy smile. He reached down, attempting to grab a hold of his footwear while in his lying position, but finding it extremely challenging due to the fact that his legs were ridiculously long and he couldn’t seem to find the appropriate position to optimize his flexibility. Clumsily clutching his leg as he stretched out his fingers, he managed to snag his left sneaker, proceeding to shimmy it off his foot – exposing a pair of pastel blue socks, sprinkled all over with little splotches of rather aesthetically-pleasing pineapples.
He handed her his shoe, doe-eyes widened expectantly, as if encouraging her to take his black sneaker. When she made no move to retrieve it, merely staring at him with a confused gaze, he asked, “Don’t you like my shoe?”
“Aren’t my shoes pretty?”
“Sure?” she wasn’t sure where did was going.
“Do you want it?” he asked once more, holding out his sneaker to her, as if it were the most normal thing in the world to randomly offer one’s shoes to someone for no reason. Incredulity and amusement fought for dominance in the look she directed at him, and she bit back a snort of laughter.
“No, thanks. I don’t think it’ll fit me. You keep it.”
He considered this, his gaze flickering to her feet, encased in a pair of sleek black boots – yes, they did appear much smaller than his, he observed with a queer mixture of dismay and awe.
“Your feet are tiny,” he commented in amazement, staring at them as if they were the most fascinating thing he had ever seen.
“So I’ve been told. Put your shoes back on, Hao, we’re going home,” she ordered, though the grin on her lips betrayed her commanding tone, proceeding to give him a small bop on the nose. He giggled, nodding sloppily, his body curling up once again like some sort of inflexible millipede as he tried shoving his foot back into the footwear.
“Here, let me help you,” she sighed somewhat fondly when his lips twisted up into a little pout at his failure to put his shoe back on – Minghao reassembled a starry-eyed child in his drug-induced state, his odd antics rather amusing and adorably child-like, making it impossible for her usual impatient streak to rear its head at him. Helping the boy into a sitting position and making sure he did not fall over, she pulled his sneaker back over his foot and secured its laces, feeling awfully like a mother tending to a clumsy child who miraculously managed to lose a shoe whilst playing.
“Y/N,” he whispered as he beckoned her closer with a flick of his hand, as if he were about to indulge her in some enormous secret. Despite the arising inkling that it was nothing of such sort, she decided to humour him anyways, leaning in so he could mumble right into her ear.
“My foot felt so cold without my shoe. But now its warm again!” he murmured with an excited nod, wriggling his toes in awe, as he wore an expression that suggested she had just handed him the sun. She couldn’t help the grin that tugged on her lips at his statement despite the absurdity of his statement, rolling her eyes half-heartedly.
“You’re welcome. Now let’s go.”
A few minutes of persuasion and persistent convincing saw his relent, and he allowed her to haul him up without putting up a struggle. Her small victory was cut short when a pair of lanky arms wrapped affectionately around her shoulders, and the tall boy pulled her into a sloppy hug, resting his chin onto the top of her head.
“Hao, what are you doing?”
“You saved my foot from frostbite, so I need to thank you with a hug,” he stated simply – like it was the most obvious thing in the world, even babies would have gotten it – tightening his hold slightly as he nuzzled his cheek into her hair.
“That’s cute, but it’s a little difficult to walk,” she chuckled despite her previous efforts seeming as if they had been bounced back to square one.
“Oh, sorry,” he apologised sheepishly, but still refused to release her from his arms, only loosening his grasp as if it were a wonderful solution to her current problem of being unable to walk. Not having the heart to break free from his warm hug and possibly send him to fitful tears, she allowed him to cling to her like an extremely devoted baby koala as she made her way out of the dental clinic, choosing to ignore the amused glint in the dentist’s eyes when she turned to thank her politely.
“Thank you!” Minghao echoed cheerfully, waving frantically at the dentist. He was confused when the lady laughed, his mind churning with puzzlement as he wondered why the dentist appeared so amused. He didn’t think there was anything particularly entertaining about rows and rows of teeth or the shiny silver tools she fixed them with. Minghao’s brain seemed to have awakened slightly from its previous daze, and it began whirring busily as it conjured up a series of possibilities that could have caused her amusement. Maybe the dentist had extracted a gold tooth – he imagined it would be a pleasant change from the usual rows of pearly, boring white. Perhaps she was so utterly impressed by his sense of humour and his impeccable acquiescence while she worked at his teeth. Or perhaps, just perhaps, could she have been laughing at his teeth?
A cocktail of horror and embarrassment bubbled in the cauldron of his stomach at the thought of his precious teeth becoming the laughing stock of the entire dental clinic – how mortifying! A hot blush suffused up his cheeks, saturating it with a rosy red as he buried his face in his hands, whining incoherently. So engrossed in the world of his jumble thoughts was he, that he failed to notice they had arrived at Y/N’s car – to which she was pleasantly surprised with his lack of resistance when she wriggled out of his grasp and eased him into the passenger seat, strapping the seatbelt over him easily.
By the time Minghao decided to resurface from his own little universe, the sterile, white building of the dental clinic was long out of sight, and they currently appeared to be stuck in traffic, bright red lights from the rear bulbs of the vehicle in front invading his vision.
“Y/N!” he called to grab her attention, and when she responded with a quick questioning glance to let him know he had successfully hailed it, he asked glumly, “Are my teeth funny?”
“What? Why would you ask that?”
“The dentist lady laughed at me earlier,” he muttered, a petulant edge creeping into his tone as a pout laced itself onto his lips. Shooting him another glance of disbelief, she had to choke back a rising laugh that threatened to rise from the depths of her stomach when she noticed his uncanny resemblance to a moody, sullen chipmunk – she did not want to risk evoking further sulkiness if he suspected she was supposedly ‘laughing at his teeth’.
“She wasn’t laughing at your teeth, dummy. Stop touching them, your teeth are fine,” she managed to say with a straight face.
“How did you know I was touching them?” Minghao’s tone suggested he was baffled by her apparent superpowers.
“I can see you doing it.”
“She wasn’t laughing at your teeth, you know?” she repeated once more when she caught his disgruntled expression from the corner of her eye.
“Really?” his large eyes were dark, chocolate pools of innocence, pure child-like hopefulness swimming in their rich brown swirls as he blinked curiously.
He seemed satisfied with her reply, beaming brightly.
“You have nice teeth too,” he felt obliged to return, his voice coloured with a sincere, misplaced graveness that sounded as if he were reciting a grim oath rather than throwing her a sweet compliment.
The remainder of the trip back to Minghao’s apartment was filled with the said boy fumbling with the radio for about half the duration of the car ride (he claimed he could not find a station worth listening to, as they refused to play ‘his jam’ and his reasonable explanation for this was that the universe was out to get him), off-key belting of lyrics that soon turned into flat-out yelling and the occasional random, peculiar questions courtesy of the drugs present in the his system. By the time they arrived at the 20-storey building, Y/N was almost certain the dull throb that had developed in her temples was going to worsen as the day progressed; her ears seemed as if they were about to shrivel up and drop off her head like a leaf in autumn.
If the car ride was a struggle, the process of hauling Minghao up to the 7th floor was torture – and it didn’t help that he couldn’t seem to stop swaying unsteadily on his feet, nearly tripping over thin air and ending up plummeting face down onto the ground had she not caught him first. He then resumed his previous position of attaching himself tightly to her like some kind of overenthusiastic starfish, leaning the entirety of his weight onto her smaller frame as they made their way to his apartment.
She was sweating profusely by the time she dumped Minghao ungracefully onto the sofa of his living room, her back beginning to ache at the effort.
“Are you ok?” he asked, blinking innocently at her as she caught her breath, as if he was not the culprit who had caused her exhaustion. His expression morphed into one of utmost befuddlement when she gave him a half-hearted glare, sinking down onto the sofa beside him.
She then reached to yank his shoes off, but was stopped when he yelped abruptly, “Why are you taking my shoes?”, causing her to jump about 5 feet into the air in fright.
“So you don’t get dirt all over the place,” she deadpanned once she recovered from her shock, sensing that she was about to face another round of Minghao’s whiny stubbornness. He seemed appalled by the concept of removing his sneakers – and she suspected it had something to do with the conversation that went down at the dentist’s.
“But I want to wear them,” he said stubbornly, his pink lips curving into a pout once more, tucking his legs into his chest as if to hide his shoes from her, his poor attempt to prevent her from removing them. She rolled her eyes, trying to discretely inch closer to him while doing so. Seeming to have suddenly understood her intentions, Minghao hopped off the couch in one swift motion, clearly aiming to escape from her evil plans to remove his shoes. Except he didn’t quite get to carry out his plan, as he then proceeded to trip over thin air and tumble to the ground, landing with a muffled ‘oof’.
She took this opportunity to tear his sneakers from him feet, bringing them to the shoe rack by the door as she promptly ignored the whines that followed.
“You’re mean!” he huffed childishly, remaining lying on the ground, awfully reassembling an overgrown kid throwing a temper tantrum.
“You’re a… a…” he had trouble coming up with an appropriate insult to nail her with, struggling to catch one in the muddled mess that was his mind, finally settling with, “You’re a butt!”. He looked pretty self-satisfied with his word choice, giving her a smug look.
“You wound me,” she replied flatly.
“Good to know,” her nonchalant responses were splashed with a hint of her usual sarcasm that Minghao didn’t seem capable of processing in his current state of mind. He was intrigued by the indifference in her tone, misinterpreting it for bitter coldness or anger. She failed to notice this as she plopped herself down onto the sofa with a sigh of relief – she could finally sit.
“Are you mad?” he said worriedly, getting onto all fours and crawling up to her, climbing onto the couch clumsily. He leaned closer to her when she shook her head, curious as to how he came up with this – though she wasn’t quite sure why his doe-eyes appeared to be meticulously studying her features as if they were some kind of abstract painting displayed in the museum that he couldn’t quite figure out. Despite this, she couldn’t help the smile that twitched on her lips, a burst of endearment brewing in her chest at the childlike question.
Just when she felt tempted to break his intense stare by snapping her fingers in front of his face, he promptly plopped his head onto her lap, smiling up sweetly at her. Her eyes widened considerably at the unexpected action – Minghao wasn’t exactly what she would call an openly affectionate person. In fact, he was usually rather shy and reserved when it came to physical affection, and would rarely initiate it. But here he was, head propped in her lap, those round, brown eyes staring at her expectantly.
At the questioning arch of her brow, he pointed to his own light brown hair, a hopeful expression tugging on his features. Not understanding his actions, she wondered if he was perhaps aware that she was ticklish – whenever he moved his head (which was a lot), the fine strands of his silky hair would lightly brush against her skin and trigger her innate urge to squirm at the ticklish sensation.
“What?” she asked, confused.
He didn’t answer, only wriggled around attempting to locate her hand. By some magical means, he managed to find it, then proceeded to guide it towards the crown of his head, as if wordlessly demanding to be given a scalp massage. She complied, gently running her fingers through his raven hair, soft and smooth under her touch. He visibly relaxed, tension in his muscles leeching away as he sighed contently, a smile present on his lips.
“Mm… feels nice,” he murmured happily, repositioning himself to find a more comfortable position on the sofa (due having overly long limbs, his socked feet stuck out from the end of the couch, and Y/N found it mildly amusing). They remained like that for a while, until a mewling yawn escaped his lips, breaking the cosy blanket of silence that had settled gently over their shoulders. He stared up at her through half-lidded, unfocused eyes as sleep begun to tighten its hold on him.
Something nagged at the back of her mind, a piece of information that she couldn’t quite conjure up at the moment, yet knew it was something that held utmost importance, and she racked her brain for it.
“Wait, before you fall asleep, remove the gauze in your mouth,” she blurted upon recollecting this vital fragment of memory, the dentist’s advice drifting back into her mind – Minghao was to replace the gauze pads in his mouth with fresh ones every hour or so until the bleeding stopped, and she was pretty sure an hour had passed since then. At his irresponsiveness, she gently poked his forehead to prevent him from succumbing to slumber, earning herself a whine from him.
“What?” he moaned grumpily, a sulky edge creeping into his tone as he reluctantly opened his eyes to peer at her, clearly disgruntled to be denied sleep.
“Replace the gauze in your mouth,” she repeated, reaching for her shoulder bag that had been conveniently strewn across the coffee table within arm’s reach because Minghao did not seem too keen on moving his head from its makeshift pillow – this resulted in lots of pain in multiple parts of her body due to her lack of flexibility. She had shoved a packet of sterile gauze pads from the dentist into her little bag earlier, and now retrieved two pieces, handing them to him.
It took a crapload of willpower for her to allow Minghao to spit two blood-soaked balls of wet gauze into her gingerly cupped hands (because he nearly decided that it was fine to spit it onto the carpeted ground, and she wasn’t going to be responsible for cleaning that up), but eventually she managed to compose herself with the assurance that there were wet wipes in her bag.
Minghao was oblivious to her internal crisis, sloppily sticking the gauze pieces into his mouth, struggling as the numbness in his cheeks prevented him from identifying the exact area to position the pads. Looking up to her for help, his features involuntarily scrunched up into a small frown when she failed to pay him attention, too busy cleaning up her hands with wipes and chucking the used gauze into a plastic bag she had magically produced from that little bag of hers – it mystified him as to how such a tiny bag could contain so much. He decided to wait patiently until she was done (I am such an angel, he thought, feeling rather pleased with himself) so she could focus her entire attention on his latest problem.
“You good?” she asked once she was finally done, having felt his persistent gaze on her.
“No – I don’t know where to put it,” he told her blatantly, reassembling a child who has misplaced the instruction manual for his latest Lego set and was now stranded in an abyss of befuddlement.
“Just shove it to the far end of your mouth,” she instructed, gently taking his hand that had clutched a piece of gauze and guiding it to right where his gum was still persistently oozing with blood. He beamed at her gratefully once both gauze pads were snugly tucked into his mouth, allowing her to take his hands and clean them off with a wipe, enjoying the light floral fragrance they emitted.
“Can I sleep now?” he questioned, another yawn forcing its way up his throat.
“Yes, you can,” she chuckled at his naive question, fondness tickling her heart when he gave a quiet cheer, burrowing his face into her lap as his eyelids fluttered shut. Absentmindedly brushing the fine strands that had fallen over his forehead away, her fingers wove themselves into his hair, gently playing with the short locks until his breathing evened out. Her fingers travelled down to gently outline the smooth slopes of his face – sleep had a way of softening his features, a peaceful tranquillity cast over him. Minghao was both enchantingly winsome and irresistibly adorable; a beautiful, endearing being.
When Minghao awakens up from his nap, an agonizing throb would begin to materialize in his cheeks as the drug the dentist dosed him with wore off, and this would most likely result in a series of cursing, followed by days of whining. She reckoned there would also be an extremely entertaining session of him squealing in embarrassment and trying to hide his face in some pillow when she relayed the entire process of taking him home and having to fight him to take his shoes off.
A mischievously little smile snuck its way onto her lips at the thought.
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