"Must I say it? I already—all but have—"

"- you don't have to say anything you don't want to but - what I would like to do with this gift you are trying to give me depends on why I have it."

"Because I like you. Because I—when we 'see where we're at', I want you to look at where we're at and decide that it's a good place and that you want to stay there. Because I got—so stupidly jealous of Sparkler—"

"- oh no, oh my god, Jaeha, he's nothing to me."

"I know that now! But the thought that—you know. This is too embarrassing to say."

Pet pet pet.

Jaeha squeezes Haru closer. He's maybe clinging a bit. "And I realised that—I might get out of the hole in a week and a half. I'm getting guided really fast and—and if I'm right that I can—be him, be the guy of your dreams—or something like him—then I want to. At the end. When you're—okay with the idea of maybe looking at me."

"Well, I last updated those dreams when I was seventeen, so you might need to give me a minute."

...okay that was probably not literally the best possible thing Haru could have said here but Jaeha is coming up blank on better ones. Haru does not need esper superhearing to hear the way his heart is hammering in his chest like crazy.

"Take as long as you need, Haru-ya."

Thoughtful snuggles. Then, "Are you going to panic about it if I actually go do this in my office into a notebook? - possibly after my next dungeon?"

"...I don't think so." He really doesn't!!! That was, like—he's not even sure what he'd been expecting but right now he's just tapdancing in his own head because Haru is taking him seriously and will think about it and he isn't lost, he hasn't lost, he's not the king of losers anymore— "I mean, I won't," he says, with more certainty. "Sorry, I—was right, wasn't I, that it was—not the best time—"

Smooch. "If I'd made you put it off would you have chickened out?"

"Not... altogether... But it might have taken me another day or two."

"Oh, well, that would've been okay, maybe I should've let you. I was very curious though." Smooch.

Heeeee has the best Haru whom he gets to kiss and it might all work fine he's gonna get guided and—

(—a hiccup in this process, a feeling he's not feeling, a thought he's not thinking—)

—Haru will like him and be with him!!!!

Kisses! Kisses are very good.

After his fourth dungeon, and dinner, and having some sense fucked into him, Haru goes off to be with his notebooks and comes back with a list.

"Obviously the interpretation of any given item is more important than the words I chose to condense the concept I had in mind, so, like, obviously ask for clarification early and often when editing your brain to someone else's spec."

Highlights of the list include "intellectually lively" and "scrupulously ethical" and "if we are going to do monogamy or something that closely approximates it till one of us needs a blood transfusion might as well do it in style".

Haru! Gave! Him! A! List! He loves it deeply he is going to memorise this list and he is going to match it perfectly (—another hiccup—) and "Is this a joking way of saying you want a fancy wedding or...?"

"I am not getting engaged to you right this second, you ridiculous romantic. But speaking purely hypothetically my pre-awakening notebooks contain the occasional rumination on the virtues of autumn in British Columbia, the leaves are incredible."

"I am not getting engaged to you right this second either! I am just asking for clarifications. So, intellectually lively, have I been on the right track recently with looking up things I think you'll like and discussing them with you, do you wanna critique my approach..."

"You've been doing great on that front, though of course if you were faking being ticked off about the stats in that one paper you may need to course-correct for sustainability reasons."

"...I wasn't faking it but I did acquire that opinion by—putting it there. You know? But the stats were incredibly sloppy and I felt like believing the opposite of what that paper was saying out of spite—"

Mwah. "Sounds solid to me."

Eeeeeee he has a list and he's going to follow the list and he was actually pretty much following it already (—hiccup—) because he guessed right about the boy of Haru's dreams in a lot of aspects but he will now be able to get a PERFECT SCORE in BEING HARU'S BOYFRIEND.