Pairing: Ryul X Y/n
Fandom: LNGSHOT
Rating: 15+
Word Count: ~1,500 words
Notes: College AU, Besties to lovers
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Summary
Y/n only meant to reply to a message. She didn't expect to find three years' worth of love waiting in Ryul's camera roll.
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The first thing Y/n noticed about Ryul was that his phone battery was always hovering somewhere between one and five percent. It didn't matter if it was eight in the morning or midnight after a five-hour study session—his phone was perpetually dying. The second thing she noticed was that he never let anyone else use it.
"You know one day that's going to shut off forever," she said, nudging his shoulder with hers as they crossed the campus courtyard, two takeaway coffees balanced carefully in her hands.
"It builds character," Ryul replied, taking one cup from her with an unapologetic grin.
She rolled her eyes so dramatically that he laughed, the familiar sound warming the chilly autumn morning. They'd been doing this dance for nearly three years—meeting before class, sharing coffee, arguing over absolutely nothing, and somehow ending up together for every meal without ever making plans.
Everyone assumed they were dating.
Neither of them ever corrected anyone.
Mostly because explaining their friendship took longer than simply smiling and changing the subject.
By the time finals arrived, the library had become their second home. They occupied the same corner table every evening, surrounded by empty coffee cups, highlighted textbooks, and enough sticky notes to wallpaper a bedroom.
Ryul disappeared to the café downstairs to buy snacks while Y/n stayed behind, pretending to revise but mostly staring blankly at the same paragraph she'd read four times.
His phone buzzed across the table.
Without thinking, she reached over, unlocked it using the passcode she'd known since first year—her birthday—and typed a quick reply.
"We'll send the presentation tonight."
She was about to lock the screen when her thumb slipped.
Rows of pictures filled the screen.
There was one of her asleep in the library with a textbook covering half her face. Another showed her laughing so hard she'd spilled bubble tea down the front of her jumper. One captured her sitting by the campus lake, completely unaware that anyone was watching, sunlight catching the edges of her hair.
A blurry picture of her chasing pigeons because she'd insisted one looked "lonely."
Another of her wearing one of Ryul's oversized hoodies while eating instant noodles at two in the morning.
One of her concentrating during a lab, biting absent-mindedly on the end of a pen.
Another taken through a rain-speckled café window as she smiled at something outside.
Every photo felt... gentle.
Like whoever stood behind the camera wasn't trying to catch her looking beautiful.
They were trying to remember her exactly as she was.
Her smile slowly faded as she noticed the dates.
The beginning of second year.
The very first photo showed her standing in front of the campus map with an expression that screamed I have absolutely no idea where I'm going.
She'd turned around to ask a stranger for directions.
That stranger had been Ryul.
There were thousands of photos.
"What're you looking at?"
His voice came from behind her.
Ryul stood frozen by the table, two packets of crisps dangling forgotten from one hand. His gaze dropped immediately to his phone in hers.
The colour drained from his face.
"You've been taking pictures of me?"
He rubbed the back of his neck, suddenly fascinated by the carpet.
"I know how bad that sounds."
"It sounds a little bad."
"I wasn't hiding in bushes or anything."
Despite everything, she laughed.
He let out a nervous breath.
"You do these little things."
"You scrunch your nose whenever your coffee's too hot."
"You always stop to pet cats, even when you're running late."
"You dance when you think nobody's looking."
"You laugh before you've finished telling your own jokes."
His shoulders lifted in a helpless shrug.
"I didn't want to forget those moments."
Y/n looked back down at the gallery.
There was a picture from last winter.
She'd fallen asleep in the library after pulling an all-nighter.
She vaguely remembered waking up with Ryul's scarf wrapped around her shoulders.
She hadn't realised he'd taken a photo before covering her up.
Another picture showed her sitting on the floor of his flat after failing a difficult exam, wrapped in a blanket while holding a mug of hot chocolate.
She'd thought he'd been making tea in the kitchen.
He'd quietly captured the moment she'd finally smiled again.
She felt her chest tighten.
"You really took all these?"
"I wasn't planning on you ever seeing them."
His voice became barely audible.
"...you're my best friend."
"If I told you how I felt and you didn't feel the same..." He smiled sadly. "I'd lose my favourite person."
Students around them continued typing, turning pages and whispering over revision notes, completely unaware that her world had quietly shifted.
She unlocked her own phone.
For a long moment he simply stared.
Then his eyebrows slowly climbed.
There were hundreds of photos of him.
Ryul asleep on the train.
Ryul reading by the lake.
Ryul cooking instant noodles in his tiny student kitchen.
Ryul laughing so hard he'd nearly fallen off a picnic blanket.
Ryul holding flowers he'd secretly bought for his mum.
Ryul standing under cherry blossoms during second year.
Ryul looking at her instead of the fireworks everyone else had been watching.
"I guess I started because I wanted to remember all the little things about you too."
For a second they simply stood there, both holding each other's phones.
Then Ryul laughed—a quiet, disbelieving sound that made her heart ache.
"I've loved you since second year."
"I've loved you since first."
"You were just a little slow."
"I spent over a year trying to convince myself you only saw me as a friend."
He let out a dramatic sigh of relief.
"You nearly gave me a heart attack."
"I think this is a medical emergency."
"I've been wanting to kiss you for approximately..." He glanced at his watch. "...six hundred and thirty-eight days."
"You are absolutely impossible."
"Can I kiss you?" he asked, suddenly serious.
The nervousness in his eyes melted the last of her hesitation.
"You've waited this long," she whispered. "I think you've earned it."
It felt less like fireworks and more like coming home after a long journey.
When they finally pulled apart, both of them were smiling so hard their cheeks hurt.
"I can't believe this," Ryul murmured.
"You've been carrying around pictures of me too."
"You have over three thousand."
He looked mildly offended.
"Three thousand, two hundred and fourteen."
"They're organised by month."
"And yet," he said, taking her hand for the first time, "apparently I'm your nerd."
She intertwined their fingers.
Outside, the autumn leaves drifted across campus exactly as they always had. Students hurried between lectures, coffee in hand, completely unaware that two best friends had quietly fallen into the love everyone else had assumed they'd been living all along. From that day on, Ryul still filled his camera roll with candid photos of Y/n—only now, whenever she caught him smiling behind the lens, she smiled back instead.
