(keep me) engraved in fire on your heart
Prompt#: 010
Title: (keep me) engraved in fire on your heart
Word Count: 5056
Side Pairing(s): Baekhyun/Kasper (Kim Taewoo)
Rating: Explicit/NC-17
Warning(s):[click to open]Infidelity, dubious consent
Disclaimer: The celebrities' names/images are merely borrowed and do not represent who the celebrities are in real life. No offense is intended towards them, their families or friends. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this fictional work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: How relationships fall apart, and keep falling.
Author's Note: Bless the mods and their infinite patience. This prompt was challenging to write but I gave it my best shot, and hopefully I did it justice. Thanks for reading!
“All I am is your lover, and nothing lasts forever.”
(Beth Nugent, City of Boys)
“Were you ever happy?”
Taewoo’s hair flops over his forehead, weighed down by sweat in the roots, as lifeless as his eyes are not. Looking into his eyes, only his eyes, Baekhyun can almost believe that Taewoo is a kind person. His eyes are like Chanyeol’s - dark brown and overflowing with light, when he’s in a good mood.
His eyes are kind but his words are not, Baekhyun thinks. He shifts, and the sheets tangle around his legs, pulling Taewoo closer to him.
“What kind of question is that?” he asks.
“I’m curious,” says Taewoo, not taking the hint. Or maybe he heard the hint and chose to ignore it. “Were you ever happy with him?”
“I’m still - you’re implying I’m not happy.” Baekhyun rolls over, looking at the ceiling and then the wall. Nowhere else.
Chanyeol had been the one to announce the news first, bursting into his room unannounced - not that people needed for their significant others to be announced, but wouldn’t ritual be nice now and then, thinks Baekhyun, some rules to keep people in place so they didn’t run roughshod all over you, as Chanyeol did without thinking. “Kasper-hyung,” he shouted, the walls shaking. “He’s back.”
“I know, he came to our dance practice this morning.”
“He says he was in LA,” Chanyeol was ecstatic, bouncing up and down. His unzipped sweatshirt tumbled down to expose his bare shoulders and chest, acres of sun-browned skin still flushed with post-workout glow. “Teaching dance.”
“Good for him.”
“I asked if he’d ever been to Hawaii, and he said no,” said Chanyeol. “Isn’t that weird? He travels so much.”
Maybe a good thing he hadn’t been, Baekhyun wanted to say. Hawaii was special to him now, special to him and Chanyeol. Hawaii was where they’d finally not needed to hide; within the confines of their hotel, anyways. Where they didn’t have to sneak around like children anymore, where he could wake up next to Chanyeol in the middle of the day and trace patterns over Chanyeol’s shoulder blades while he mumbled in his sleep.
If he looks at the ceiling and the wall, at the blank white space where Taewoo has neglected to decorate, he can almost pretend that he’s still in that hotel room in Honolulu. Not here, with Taewoo-slash-Kasper. What do you call an ex-boyfriend that you’ve now slept with again, even while you’re dating his replacement?
“I’m not unhappy,” Baekhyun tells the wall, trying to prove a point.
“Happy people don’t cheat,” says Taewoo, pressing a kiss to Baekhyun’s shoulder. His mouth is damp and hot, and his lips linger when any kiss should be long done.
Taewoo’s walls are blank and white, no hint of personality. He hadn’t had time yet. He’d moved in last month, slowly inching closer into Baekhyun’s life - a dance class here, a new appointment there - slowly inserting himself back into the rhythm of SM Entertainment’s innumerable training routines until he was another ordinary cog in the machine, an indispensable asset to the company, and then he’d proceeded to slowly insert his way back into Baekhyun’s life. Digging deep and finding the places that hurt, squeezing into the spaces in Baekhyun’s atrophied heart.
“You’re all tense now,” Taewoo whispers into his ear. “Relax.”
His hands skim up Baekhyun’s thighs, and soon Baekhyun has no words left to protest with.
-
Four weeks ago
It’s practically dawn when Baekhyun arrives to the SM practice rooms, but there’s already someone warming up inside. Not Jondgdae or Minseok, so it’s probably one of the dance instructors. He moves like one, certainly, transitioning from fluid movement to sharp stances with lethal precision. And his warmup leaps remind Baekhyun of a panther, stalking its pray with deadly grace. Wearing running leggings and a baggy sweatshirt doesn’t deter from the effect at all.
Baekhyun mutters a hasty greeting as he ducks inside the doorway. The man in the athletic leggings nods, and walks to the other corner of the room, repeating his leaping exercise. The hood pulled over his head is reminiscent of Chanyeol. The height, too.
The dance instructor’s hood begins to slip mid-jump, and it comes off completely as he finishes in a set of balletic spins, stopping after he’s finished crossing the full diagonal of the dance floor. He has dark hair, trimmed in a neat bowl cut, and there is a familiarity to the curve of his eyes and the bow of his lips. Too late, the memory comes to Baekhyun - this is a man who shouldn’t be here, is too dangerous to be this close -
“Byun Baekhyun,” he says. “They did say you were in my teaching group.”
“Kasper,” Baekhyun replies. “I didn’t know you were back. From America.”
“I’ve been in Seoul for weeks, but SM didn’t call me in until now.” He scratches the back of his neck, gangly and awkward now that he is no longer in motion. “And why the formality? I’m Taewoo, Baekhyunnie. Kim Taewoo.”
“I know who you are.”
“Your teammates will be here soon,” says Kasper, turning to the mirror. He lifts his heel behind him in an easy quad stretch. “We should pretend to be nice with each other, right?”
Baekhyun folds his arms across his chest. “All you care about is your image.”
“No, no. That’s not what I meant.” The shade of a smile flits across Kasper’s face. “You’re the idol with the image, besides. Don’t lecture me.”
“I swear, you’re insufferable -”
“Let the past go, Baekhyunnie. I’m here, I’m teaching you the new choreo, and I’m not going anywhere.” How is his expression so earnest? “Let’s be professional, can we agree on that?”
As if on cue, the door opens again, and Jongdae’s loud laughter filters in. Baekhyun retreats, muted. He watches Kasper greet everyone with his easy, shy smile, and feels his stomach slowly knot in anticipation.
“I feel like there are two of you,” he tells Taewoo afterwards, when the others have gone. “Kasper is nice and quiet and just teaches people to dance. But Kasper’s a mask for Taewoo.”
“And who is Taewoo?”
Baekhyun stares at him, dead straight into his eyes. “That’s the selfish piece of shit who broke up with me last year, during the hardest time in my life. When I was being witch-hunted by the fans for supposedly dating Taeyeon-sunbaenim.”
“And I’ve told you, I’m sorry about that.” A flash of Kasper flickers in Taewoo’s eyes. “I truly am.”
“I don’t need your apologies now.” Baekhyun frowns at him. “And besides, you should be apologizing to her. The only reason we were even pretending to date in the first place was because I was actually dating you.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” Taewoo reaches out and ruffles his hair. It’s not an unwelcome gesture. “I guess I have a confession to make, then. I broke up with you because - because I was afraid that we were going to be found out. Our relationship, I mean. You had so many people following you around, making theories - don’t look at me like that, fine, I read some of them. I wanted you to live your life without dragging my weight around.”
“Taewoo,” Baekhyun starts.
“Call me hyung,” says Taewoo. “We’re supposed to pretend that we’re friends.”
-
Three weeks ago
Chanyeol packs like a hurricane. He upends things into his suitcase without folding, smoothing out the lumps before zipping everything up, using the weight of his torso to compress it all into one tight package.
“You’re going to wrinkle everything you own,” says Baekhyun.
“It was wrinkled to begin with!”
He’s wearing his standard airport outfit, too. Sloppy black shorts and sneakers, and a purple hoodie emblazoned with loud red text reading ‘Sexual Fantasies.’ They’ve had to censor it before, when Chanyeol wore it on broadcast. Baekhyun remembers one of the makeup artists coming up and taping up the front, a disapproving furrow between her eyebrows.
Chanyeol sees him staring at his sweatshirt, and waggles his eyebrows. “Something you’d like to share?”
“No,” he says, and flinches away when Chanyeol reaches out and touches his elbow.
“Relax,” says Chanyeol, his voice softening. “It’s only two weeks.”
“Why do they need you for two weeks? You could record it here -”
“I could,” Chanyeol says, patient as ever. “But it’s better if I record it there. It’s not my project, I’m just a feature. And this is a big deal. An American group -”
“I know, I know.” Their manager hadn’t shut up about it, when the EDM group had reached out to them and asked if Chanyeol could do a rap feature. Lots of grand promises about American exposure and creative opportunity. Empty words.
“Besides, you’ve also got a debut to work on.” Chanyeol stands his suitcase upright, and frowns as it begins to lilt to one side. “How’s that going?”
“We’re done recording the album,” Baekhyun answers. “It’s just the dance.”
Chanyeol nods. “I’ve seen Kasper-hyung dance a demo. It looks hard.”
Kasper, incidentally, is eighty-percent of why dance practices are the most difficult thing he’s ever faced. During regular practice, he is Kasper, always there to help, a kind word of encouragement on his lips for everyone. After hours it is Taewoo who pulls Baekhyun aside and puts him through his paces, adjusting each and every position and pose until they are seared into Baekhyun’s muscle memory.
Chanyeol doesn’t know the exact details of why Baekhyun spends so long at dance practice, and for his part, Baekhyun has no intention of telling him, at least not in these precious few hours before Chanyeol leaves his side. It’s only two weeks that he’ll be gone. Only two weeks.
He reaches out and Chanyeol meets him halfway, enclosing him in the circle of his arms. Baekhyun buries his face against purple cotton and breathes in. Chanyeol smells like boy; he smells like the little basement office where he sits with his keyboard and bangs at his keyboard, and he smells like coffee and shampoo and sweat.
“What am I going to do without you?” Baekhyun murmurs, his voice muffled by Chanyeol’s sweatshirt.
“You’re going to work hard,” Chanyeol says. “You always have. And I’ll see you soon.”
-
Two weeks ago
“You sure you don’t want to do that one more time?”
Baekhyun raises an arm from the floor. “This is all I can move.”
He rolls onto his side. The wooden flooring in the practice room is cool, against his very warm face. Taewoo plops down on the floor beside him and lies down as well, his chest moving up and down, up and down.
“We should take a photo,” Taewoo says, suddenly. “I ought to let people know I’m working for SM again.”
Taewoo nods and reaches for his phone. They take a selfie together, lying on the floor flushed with the results of their workout, Taewoo smiling, Baekhyun glancing at the camera with a contemplative look on his face.
“Good for business?” he turns to ask, blinking in surprise as Taewoo presses the shutter one more time. “Did you take another one?”
“Oh, I should post this. This is good.”
“Let me see!” He grabs at Taewoo’s arm, but Taewoo is bigger and stronger, and he squirms out of Baekhyun’s grip like an eel. They wrestle on the floor, a match that Baekhyun wins when he pins down Taewoo with all of his body weight and throws himself at Taewoo’s outstretched hand.
“Got it,” he gasps, before noticing that Taewoo has gone eerily silent. “Hey, are you -”
“Move your leg,” hisses Taewoo, and Baekhyun realizes that in the process of winning, he’s sitting astride Taewoo’s right thigh, with his knee jammed up between Taewoo’s legs. They extricate themselves uncomfortably, Baekhyun rolling to one side, Taewoo sitting up and pulling at his hair until it falls neat across his forehead again.
“Sorry,” says Baekhyun. As further apology he gives Taewoo’s phone back. “I didn’t delete the photo.”
“I wasn’t going to post it anyway.” Taewoo takes his phone back and slips it into his pocket, and Baekhyun follows the movement of his hand, his eyes tracing across the seam of Taewoo’s sweatpants, to an unmistakable outline just to the left of the seam.
Taewoo coughs. Baekhyun tears his eyes away.
“I’m sorry,” he says, and starts getting to his feet -
Taewoo grabs him by the sleeve, and pulls.
Falling is so easy, thinks Baekhyun. At the beginning of the fall, there is a moment when resistance is still possible, but once the trajectory has been set and the course begun, no force could pull you out of gravity’s well. There is a moment, a second’s worth of time for a choice - to fall or not to fall - and at the end of it there is someone tall and warm to catch him, but it is not Chanyeol, though the sensation of being held in these arms is so familiar and alien all at once. Falling here was so easy, it might have been predestined all along.
-
One week ago
He can feel Taewoo’s eyes drilling into the back of his head when he gets down onto his knees. It’s Taewoo, not Kasper. Kasper would be sleepy and sweet and ask him how he was doing. Taewoo is the one who cards his fingers through Baekhyun’s hair and demands, in a voice like silk-on-gravel, that Baekhyun put his pretty little mouth to good use.
“You’re thinking,” Taewoo gently raps his foot against Baekhyun’s calf. “Don’t think.”
Right. Baekhyun reaches out and tugs Taewoo’s sweats down, exposing his very erect cock. It’s slick with precum already, so he starts at the base and licks a long stripe up with the flat of his tongue, pausing at the base of the frenulum. Taewoo is looking at him like there’s nothing, nobody else in the world, and he basks in it. The attention makes him feel wanted, needed, loved.
Don’t think. He opens his mouth just enough to take the tip of Taewoo’s cock between his lips, sucking and swirling his tongue over the tip. Tasting salt at the back of his throat, the scent spreading everywhere, like the ocean but earthier.
“You look so good like this,” Taewoo says. His voice is so low, a bass note rumbling down through his chest. “Like you were made to suck cock.”
Fuck you, Baekhyun almost says. He stops himself at the last minute, and instead takes more of Taewoo’s length into his mouth, stopping just at the back of his throat.
“That’s right,” Taewoo says, as Baekhyun begins to steady his rhythm. “Focus on the task at hand, there you go.”
Baekhyun is getting there. He takes his right hand off Taewoo’s knee and starts jerking him off, matching strokes between his grip and his lips. A trancelike state, just bobbing up and down. He takes more and more with each downward stroke, and is rewarded by a quickening in Taewoo’s breathing and the softest groan. The sound encourages him to go even further, almost there, so close - he opens his jaw wider and lowers, relaxes his tongue at the base and moans himself, but mercifully Taewoo says nothing. He’s probably enjoying it, Baekhyun thinks, feeling wetness collecting on his lashes.
His jaw is going to be sore tomorrow, but tomorrow’s just more dance practice, so it’s not like anyone will notice, or care.
“Can you do it?” Taewoo groans. He tangles his fingers in Baekhyun’s hair again, and the touch is a shot of morphine dumped in his veins. He wants this, he wants Taewoo to feel good, to praise Baekhyun for serving him so well.
Baekhyun tries - he tries hard, he really does - and thinks of a band loosening at the back of his throat. Relaxing instead of pulling apart. He stretches his neck forward and straightens the angle, until Taewoo’s cock fills the back of his throat and thrusts further in, until his nose is buried in the trail of black-brown hair at the base of Taewoo’s cock and there is nothing in his vision or any of his senses, for that matter, except Kim Taewoo.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” Taewoo whispers. “Good boy.”
Baekhyun comes up for air, gasping for it, then attempts again. Five seconds, but he can hold it longer than that. He deep throats Taewoo’s cock twice more before the hand in his hair tightens into a vise grip, and Taewoo is thrusting up into his mouth with short snaps of his hips.
“I’m - I’m gonna come,” Taewoo gasps. “I’m gonna -”
Baekhyun holds still, or tries to, while Taewoo fucks his face in uneven strokes, holding his jaw open so his mouth can be used. Holds till the telltale pulsing in the base of Taewoo’s cock begins, and then he’s spilling down Baekhyun’s throat. Pearly drops spill out the corners of Baekhyun’s mouth, running down his chin in little trickles.
“Can you swallow?”
It’s already filling up the back of his throat, he has no choice. There’s a film left on his tongue and white on his chin, though. Baekhyun knows he’s a mess, with tears tracking down his cheeks and his mouth smeared with semen and saliva, dripping in a slow cold trail down his neck. He waits for his satisfied lover to pull him up again, to settle on his lap and pay attention to his own aching cock.
“You’re amazing,” Taewoo whispers in his ear. His finger make quick work of Baekhyun’s belt and zipper, and the sensation of Chanyeol’s fingers around him is blessed relief that can’t be put into words. “I wish I took a picture. You looked like a fucking mess - you know what, you still do. You made yourself filthy for me, didn’t you?”
Baekhyun whimpers. He leans his forehead against Taewoo, burying his face in the crook of his shoulder for the second time today. He’s supposed to be voiceless, then. To listen to Taewoo talk dirty in his ear until he comes.
“Imagine if someone walked in here right now,” Taewoo says. His tone is soft, casual, like the idea doesn’t matter all that much. Just a thought exercise. “If they came in and saw this. All they’d see is you, your face covered in my cum. Begging me with your moaning like you’ve lost your fucking mind. What do you think of that?”
“Ah,” Baekhyun pants into Taewoo’s shoulder. “H-ah.”
“Pretty little thing,” Taewoo sighs. His rhythm slows to a tortuous slowness but he squeezes on every upward pull, like he’s trying to milk Baekhyun’s orgasm out of him. “Poor, pretty little thing.”
He kisses Baekhyun, and even his tongue in Baekhyun’s mouth is overpowering. “Look at me,” Taewoo demands. “Baekhyun, look at me.”
Through hazy, wetted eyes, Baekhyun manages to. His mouth is open, he knows. He can’t hear himself anymore, not with the blood pounding a drumbeat in his head and between his legs. The image blurs - Taewoo into Kasper, Kasper into Chanyeol. They have the same voice, the same face, and they want something from him, they all want things and there is only so much of himself he has left to give.
“You can come,” Taewoo says. “Baekhyun.”
Baekhyun’s vision clears enough to see Chanyeol’s face. His lips are dark red, and his pupils are two black circles, blown wide with lust.
“Come for me.”
-
The morning after
“You look like shit,” Minseok says, leaning against Baekhyun’s makeup table. His shirt is tucked in sloppily, and he accepts a pair of suspenders from a passing coordi-noona with a nonchalance that completely ignores the chaos around them. “Did you sleep?”
“Good morning to you too,” Baekhyun answers. He looks at Minseok, or tries to. The girl working on his hair tsks and flicks him on the back of the neck, and he hastily looks back at the mirror. “God invented undereye concealer for a reason.”
Minseok snorts. “You’ve been avoiding Chanyeol.”
“I’ve been avoiding everyone who doesn’t work on things that are CBX-related.” Baekhyun throws up his hands, in lieu of shaking his head - otherwise the girl will flick him again. “Why are you giving me so much shit about it? You’re doing it too.”
“Not like that,” Minseok counters. He glances at the hairdresser, who suddenly has to take a bathroom break. Baekhyun swallows.
“It’s just, well. The two of you are still dating, right?”
It breaks his heart that Minseok has to come right out and ask it. All around them the room is loud, and between the two of them the silence shrinks their little microcosm into a pinpoint, and he realizes all of a sudden that Minseok is uncomfortably close, gazing at him with eyes that say nothing whatsoever.
“Of course,” Baekhyun answers, hoping that his voice is steady.
“Right.” Minseok squints at him, looking for something. “Of course.”
Baekhyun reaches up. “Is there something on my face?”
A smile cracks across Minseok’s lips. “Only makeup.”
He takes a leaning seat against Baekhyun’s chair, a warm solid weight against his arm. “We wear a lot of masks, you and I. For the fans, for our families. For ourselves.”
“Mm.” It’s not quite clear where Minseok is going with this yet, but Baekhyun can smile and nod, smile and nod. “Sure.”
“But it’s important to remember who you are underneath it all,” says Minseok. “Have you heard of method acting?”
Baekhyun nods.
“That’s who we are, only our performance isn’t filmed, it’s lived. Every second we spend outside is spent performing. That’s why, in private, it’s important to find some time to be true to yourself.” Minseok pats him on the head, ruining his fluffed hair. “It’s like a muscle. If you forget to exercise it, it withers away.”
-
One week after
“It feel like it’s been forever,” says Chanyeol, his voice blossoming from deep within his chest. “Hasn’t it?”
“It has been forever,” Baekhyun corrects him. He leans back on the pillows, arching his back. “So? You’re going to make me wait a little longer?”
Chanyeol skates fingers down Baekhyun’s chest, circles his navel, and dips lower until he is gently cupping Baekhyun through his boxers. “You think you could wait?”
“N-no-hnngh.” Chanyeol’s touch is gentle, his fingers feather-light. For someone so prone to breaking things, he is surprisingly delicate tonight. Baekhyun surges up, wanting more of that warmth, but Chanyeol is gone.
“Hmm?” Baekhyun opens his eyes.
“I’m looking for something. Wait a sec.” Chanyeol is back, a long strip of black silk in his hands. “I wanted to try this.”
He kneels down and motions with it in front of Baekhyun’s face. “What do you think?”
“It’s a blindfold,” says Baekhyun, stating the obvious.
“It is.”
“I didn’t know you were interested in this kind of thing.”
“Wanted to spice things up.” Chanyeol flicks it, sending waves rippling across the black surface. “So?”
“Give it here.”
Baekhyun takes the fabric and tries to tie it behind his own head, but his fingers keep slipping on the knot, and it slips down his nose every time he tries to lie down. Reduced to giggles and tears, Chanyeol eventually gets up to help him, adjusting the knot until it’s just snug enough to sit over his hair without falling.
“I’m here,” Chanyeol says, and now Baekhyun is forced to find him with his hearing alone. “Baekhyun?”
“Yeah?”
“Lie down.”
“Is this a game?”
“The rules are pretty simple,” Chanyeol pulls his limbs around and positions him like a rag doll until he is lying comfortable on his back, his legs spread and curled loosely around a kneeling Chanyeol. “You just have to listen to me, and do what I tell you to do.”
“Ok.”
“Touch yourself.” Chanyeol’s voice drops low. “Go on.”
Baekhyun isn’t sure if he’s supposed to make a show of it, and he tries at first, hissing and biting his lip when he palms his cock and drags his fingers down his shaft. But that gets boring quickly, especially when there’s no response from Chanyeol, and he can’t see the look on his face. With the blindfold on, it’s easy to imagine different people, different faces there. It could be Taewoo watching him, and Taewoo wouldn’t be so kind. His cock jumps in interest, and Baekhyun flushes bright red, a little gasp escaping his lips.
“What are you thinking about?” rumbles Chanyeol.
“About you,” bites out Baekhyun, and the guilt makes him even harder.
“Need any help?”
“Kiss me,” gasps Baekhyun. Kiss me so I know it’s you and not my imagination. “Please, something - don’t ignore me.”
Chanyeol leans down and takes Baekhyun’s lower lip between his teeth, leaving a gentle bite and then kissing him keeper, like he’s trying to eat Baekhyun up. Teeth everywhere, Chanyeol nipping at his lip again - Baekhyun swallows his saliva and tastes salt and rust. He inhales when Chanyeol moves aside and begins leaving bites down his throat, panting through burning, swollen lips and taking a handful of Chanyeol’s hair by the roots.
“Don’t leave marks,” he whines. “They’ll see -”
“You can do better than that,” growls Chanyeol against his throat, leaving the lightest of kisses. “Touch yourself, come on.”
“I’m - I’m doing it.” Without sight the spaces in his mind fills in Taewoo for Chanyeol, their features so different and yet the same. He groans as Chanyeol’s large hand covers his own, calluses rasping against his thin-boned fingers. Chanyeol jerks him off hard and fast, setting a punishing rhythm that Baekhyun can’t keep up with, can’t hold onto -
“I’m gonna come,” he tells Chanyeol. “I’m gonna, I’m gonna -”
Chanyeol takes his hands away. Baekhyun hisses through his teeth and moans deep in the back of his throat, so close and so wound up and teetering on the brink. He begins to stroke and is interrupted by Chanyeol, who seizes his wrists and pins them up above his head.
“Chanyeol?” he asks, uncertain. “Chanyeol, please -”
Cold, slick fingers press against his entrance and enter, unceremonious, two breaching him and knocking the breath from his chest. Baekhyun sobs, the sudden stimulation too much to bear, when Chanyeol twists his fingers and curls them up to find that spot inside him, his lower abdomen singing in dull pleasure as Chanyeol massages his fingertips over it in tiny, tiny circles. With his other hand he has Baekhyun’s wrists still held above his head. Helpless, able to do nothing but submit to the whims and movements of another.
“You like this,” Chanyeol says. “You’re really getting off on this.”
Baekhyun whimpers, incoherent. He’s close again, and teetering, and about to come - he should tell Chanyeol but all that comes out of his mouth is sound, warbling and atonal.
“You never used to get off on this,” says Chanyeol. “I’d ask, and you would say no.”
“Chan - haaah.”
“What changed?”
Baekhyun tenses, tears gathering at the corners of his eyes, his thighs trembling. Chanyeol stops moving again. His fingers slow and still inside Baekhyun, but keep him spread open.
“What changed?” Chanyeol repeats.
“Nothing, please, Chanyeol.”
“Something changed,” says Chanyeol. “You’ve changed.”
Baekhyun sobs.
The blindfold is hot. Silk traps heat, sticking to his skin whilst sweat runs off his forehead.
“Am I worse than he was? Well?” Chanyeol crooks his fingers upward and massages, and Baekhyun feels himself arch off the sheets; he doesn’t hear his own cry but he can feel his mouth open, his throat burned raw by the sound. “Tell me. Use your words, aren’t you always so talkative?”
He withdraws his fingers and lets Baekhyun go, leaving him a twitching, leaking mess. While Baekhyun scrabbles at the blindfold over his face he can hear the sound of Chanyeol prepping himself, the telltale crinkling of foil. He wants to move but he’s exhausted, and he doesn’t even manage to lift the silk before Chanyeol is back. He lifts Baekhyun by the hips and lines himself up, entering none-too-carefully, and the stretch and the burn are familiar, and this is what he remembers best, the way that he and Chanyeol fit together so well -
Arousal in the pit of his stomach again, uglier this time, an ache coiling that blurs the line between pleasure and pain. Baekhyun reaches up and grips Chanyeol by the shoulders, pulling himself upward so that he is facing Chanyeol, pressing his face against his chest. The thrusts are methodical and deep, each one pushing him closer to the wall.
The blindfold slips off his face. Chanyeol’s mouth is a tight line, his bangs slick with sweat. There was nothing ever so beautiful in the world, thinks Baekhyun, and how could he have ever forgotten. He strokes his fingers down the long line of Chanyeol’s cheekbones and gazes at the ceiling when Chanyeol’s breath grows erratic, his rhythm stuttered, and holds him tight when he comes, wordless.
-
“How did you know?” whispers Baekhyun.
Chanyeol smiles, a sad smile that shatters whatever composure Baekhyun had left. “You’re bad at lying, but also you could never hide anything from me. And I could never hide anything from you.”
The sheets between them are damp, the scent of sex thick in the air - they’ll have to do laundry sneakily, to make sure no one else in the dorm finds out. Chanyeol twists away from him, but the sheets twist and bring them closer together.
“I missed you,” says Baekhyun. “A lot.”
“You missed me,” says Chanyeol. “So much that you went to see…”
Kasper’s name hangs between them like a weight.
“I haven’t just missed you for two weeks,” answers Baekhyun. “I’ve been missing you for months and months before that.”
Before CBX there were the concerts, and before the concerts there was the concert prep, and during the concert prep there was the album, and before the album there was the album prep, and so on - the months blur in his memory, and he can’t pinpoint a beginning or an end to this rift between them, this disquiet, but eventually it had come to grow so wide between them that no amount of time spent in physical proximity could mend it.
All this hangs between them, unsaid. Like a weight.
“I know,” says Chanyeol. “I know.”
Title: (keep me) engraved in fire on your heart
Word Count: 5056
Side Pairing(s): Baekhyun/Kasper (Kim Taewoo)
Rating: Explicit/NC-17
Warning(s):[click to open]Infidelity, dubious consent
Disclaimer: The celebrities' names/images are merely borrowed and do not represent who the celebrities are in real life. No offense is intended towards them, their families or friends. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this fictional work. No copyright infringement is intended.
Summary: How relationships fall apart, and keep falling.
Author's Note: Bless the mods and their infinite patience. This prompt was challenging to write but I gave it my best shot, and hopefully I did it justice. Thanks for reading!
“All I am is your lover, and nothing lasts forever.”
(Beth Nugent, City of Boys)
“Were you ever happy?”
Taewoo’s hair flops over his forehead, weighed down by sweat in the roots, as lifeless as his eyes are not. Looking into his eyes, only his eyes, Baekhyun can almost believe that Taewoo is a kind person. His eyes are like Chanyeol’s - dark brown and overflowing with light, when he’s in a good mood.
His eyes are kind but his words are not, Baekhyun thinks. He shifts, and the sheets tangle around his legs, pulling Taewoo closer to him.
“What kind of question is that?” he asks.
“I’m curious,” says Taewoo, not taking the hint. Or maybe he heard the hint and chose to ignore it. “Were you ever happy with him?”
“I’m still - you’re implying I’m not happy.” Baekhyun rolls over, looking at the ceiling and then the wall. Nowhere else.
Chanyeol had been the one to announce the news first, bursting into his room unannounced - not that people needed for their significant others to be announced, but wouldn’t ritual be nice now and then, thinks Baekhyun, some rules to keep people in place so they didn’t run roughshod all over you, as Chanyeol did without thinking. “Kasper-hyung,” he shouted, the walls shaking. “He’s back.”
“I know, he came to our dance practice this morning.”
“He says he was in LA,” Chanyeol was ecstatic, bouncing up and down. His unzipped sweatshirt tumbled down to expose his bare shoulders and chest, acres of sun-browned skin still flushed with post-workout glow. “Teaching dance.”
“Good for him.”
“I asked if he’d ever been to Hawaii, and he said no,” said Chanyeol. “Isn’t that weird? He travels so much.”
Maybe a good thing he hadn’t been, Baekhyun wanted to say. Hawaii was special to him now, special to him and Chanyeol. Hawaii was where they’d finally not needed to hide; within the confines of their hotel, anyways. Where they didn’t have to sneak around like children anymore, where he could wake up next to Chanyeol in the middle of the day and trace patterns over Chanyeol’s shoulder blades while he mumbled in his sleep.
If he looks at the ceiling and the wall, at the blank white space where Taewoo has neglected to decorate, he can almost pretend that he’s still in that hotel room in Honolulu. Not here, with Taewoo-slash-Kasper. What do you call an ex-boyfriend that you’ve now slept with again, even while you’re dating his replacement?
“I’m not unhappy,” Baekhyun tells the wall, trying to prove a point.
“Happy people don’t cheat,” says Taewoo, pressing a kiss to Baekhyun’s shoulder. His mouth is damp and hot, and his lips linger when any kiss should be long done.
Taewoo’s walls are blank and white, no hint of personality. He hadn’t had time yet. He’d moved in last month, slowly inching closer into Baekhyun’s life - a dance class here, a new appointment there - slowly inserting himself back into the rhythm of SM Entertainment’s innumerable training routines until he was another ordinary cog in the machine, an indispensable asset to the company, and then he’d proceeded to slowly insert his way back into Baekhyun’s life. Digging deep and finding the places that hurt, squeezing into the spaces in Baekhyun’s atrophied heart.
“You’re all tense now,” Taewoo whispers into his ear. “Relax.”
His hands skim up Baekhyun’s thighs, and soon Baekhyun has no words left to protest with.
-
Four weeks ago
It’s practically dawn when Baekhyun arrives to the SM practice rooms, but there’s already someone warming up inside. Not Jondgdae or Minseok, so it’s probably one of the dance instructors. He moves like one, certainly, transitioning from fluid movement to sharp stances with lethal precision. And his warmup leaps remind Baekhyun of a panther, stalking its pray with deadly grace. Wearing running leggings and a baggy sweatshirt doesn’t deter from the effect at all.
Baekhyun mutters a hasty greeting as he ducks inside the doorway. The man in the athletic leggings nods, and walks to the other corner of the room, repeating his leaping exercise. The hood pulled over his head is reminiscent of Chanyeol. The height, too.
The dance instructor’s hood begins to slip mid-jump, and it comes off completely as he finishes in a set of balletic spins, stopping after he’s finished crossing the full diagonal of the dance floor. He has dark hair, trimmed in a neat bowl cut, and there is a familiarity to the curve of his eyes and the bow of his lips. Too late, the memory comes to Baekhyun - this is a man who shouldn’t be here, is too dangerous to be this close -
“Byun Baekhyun,” he says. “They did say you were in my teaching group.”
“Kasper,” Baekhyun replies. “I didn’t know you were back. From America.”
“I’ve been in Seoul for weeks, but SM didn’t call me in until now.” He scratches the back of his neck, gangly and awkward now that he is no longer in motion. “And why the formality? I’m Taewoo, Baekhyunnie. Kim Taewoo.”
“I know who you are.”
“Your teammates will be here soon,” says Kasper, turning to the mirror. He lifts his heel behind him in an easy quad stretch. “We should pretend to be nice with each other, right?”
Baekhyun folds his arms across his chest. “All you care about is your image.”
“No, no. That’s not what I meant.” The shade of a smile flits across Kasper’s face. “You’re the idol with the image, besides. Don’t lecture me.”
“I swear, you’re insufferable -”
“Let the past go, Baekhyunnie. I’m here, I’m teaching you the new choreo, and I’m not going anywhere.” How is his expression so earnest? “Let’s be professional, can we agree on that?”
As if on cue, the door opens again, and Jongdae’s loud laughter filters in. Baekhyun retreats, muted. He watches Kasper greet everyone with his easy, shy smile, and feels his stomach slowly knot in anticipation.
“I feel like there are two of you,” he tells Taewoo afterwards, when the others have gone. “Kasper is nice and quiet and just teaches people to dance. But Kasper’s a mask for Taewoo.”
“And who is Taewoo?”
Baekhyun stares at him, dead straight into his eyes. “That’s the selfish piece of shit who broke up with me last year, during the hardest time in my life. When I was being witch-hunted by the fans for supposedly dating Taeyeon-sunbaenim.”
“And I’ve told you, I’m sorry about that.” A flash of Kasper flickers in Taewoo’s eyes. “I truly am.”
“I don’t need your apologies now.” Baekhyun frowns at him. “And besides, you should be apologizing to her. The only reason we were even pretending to date in the first place was because I was actually dating you.”
“Don’t you think I know that?” Taewoo reaches out and ruffles his hair. It’s not an unwelcome gesture. “I guess I have a confession to make, then. I broke up with you because - because I was afraid that we were going to be found out. Our relationship, I mean. You had so many people following you around, making theories - don’t look at me like that, fine, I read some of them. I wanted you to live your life without dragging my weight around.”
“Taewoo,” Baekhyun starts.
“Call me hyung,” says Taewoo. “We’re supposed to pretend that we’re friends.”
-
Three weeks ago
Chanyeol packs like a hurricane. He upends things into his suitcase without folding, smoothing out the lumps before zipping everything up, using the weight of his torso to compress it all into one tight package.
“You’re going to wrinkle everything you own,” says Baekhyun.
“It was wrinkled to begin with!”
He’s wearing his standard airport outfit, too. Sloppy black shorts and sneakers, and a purple hoodie emblazoned with loud red text reading ‘Sexual Fantasies.’ They’ve had to censor it before, when Chanyeol wore it on broadcast. Baekhyun remembers one of the makeup artists coming up and taping up the front, a disapproving furrow between her eyebrows.
Chanyeol sees him staring at his sweatshirt, and waggles his eyebrows. “Something you’d like to share?”
“No,” he says, and flinches away when Chanyeol reaches out and touches his elbow.
“Relax,” says Chanyeol, his voice softening. “It’s only two weeks.”
“Why do they need you for two weeks? You could record it here -”
“I could,” Chanyeol says, patient as ever. “But it’s better if I record it there. It’s not my project, I’m just a feature. And this is a big deal. An American group -”
“I know, I know.” Their manager hadn’t shut up about it, when the EDM group had reached out to them and asked if Chanyeol could do a rap feature. Lots of grand promises about American exposure and creative opportunity. Empty words.
“Besides, you’ve also got a debut to work on.” Chanyeol stands his suitcase upright, and frowns as it begins to lilt to one side. “How’s that going?”
“We’re done recording the album,” Baekhyun answers. “It’s just the dance.”
Chanyeol nods. “I’ve seen Kasper-hyung dance a demo. It looks hard.”
Kasper, incidentally, is eighty-percent of why dance practices are the most difficult thing he’s ever faced. During regular practice, he is Kasper, always there to help, a kind word of encouragement on his lips for everyone. After hours it is Taewoo who pulls Baekhyun aside and puts him through his paces, adjusting each and every position and pose until they are seared into Baekhyun’s muscle memory.
Chanyeol doesn’t know the exact details of why Baekhyun spends so long at dance practice, and for his part, Baekhyun has no intention of telling him, at least not in these precious few hours before Chanyeol leaves his side. It’s only two weeks that he’ll be gone. Only two weeks.
He reaches out and Chanyeol meets him halfway, enclosing him in the circle of his arms. Baekhyun buries his face against purple cotton and breathes in. Chanyeol smells like boy; he smells like the little basement office where he sits with his keyboard and bangs at his keyboard, and he smells like coffee and shampoo and sweat.
“What am I going to do without you?” Baekhyun murmurs, his voice muffled by Chanyeol’s sweatshirt.
“You’re going to work hard,” Chanyeol says. “You always have. And I’ll see you soon.”
-
Two weeks ago
“You sure you don’t want to do that one more time?”
Baekhyun raises an arm from the floor. “This is all I can move.”
He rolls onto his side. The wooden flooring in the practice room is cool, against his very warm face. Taewoo plops down on the floor beside him and lies down as well, his chest moving up and down, up and down.
“We should take a photo,” Taewoo says, suddenly. “I ought to let people know I’m working for SM again.”
Taewoo nods and reaches for his phone. They take a selfie together, lying on the floor flushed with the results of their workout, Taewoo smiling, Baekhyun glancing at the camera with a contemplative look on his face.
“Good for business?” he turns to ask, blinking in surprise as Taewoo presses the shutter one more time. “Did you take another one?”
“Oh, I should post this. This is good.”
“Let me see!” He grabs at Taewoo’s arm, but Taewoo is bigger and stronger, and he squirms out of Baekhyun’s grip like an eel. They wrestle on the floor, a match that Baekhyun wins when he pins down Taewoo with all of his body weight and throws himself at Taewoo’s outstretched hand.
“Got it,” he gasps, before noticing that Taewoo has gone eerily silent. “Hey, are you -”
“Move your leg,” hisses Taewoo, and Baekhyun realizes that in the process of winning, he’s sitting astride Taewoo’s right thigh, with his knee jammed up between Taewoo’s legs. They extricate themselves uncomfortably, Baekhyun rolling to one side, Taewoo sitting up and pulling at his hair until it falls neat across his forehead again.
“Sorry,” says Baekhyun. As further apology he gives Taewoo’s phone back. “I didn’t delete the photo.”
“I wasn’t going to post it anyway.” Taewoo takes his phone back and slips it into his pocket, and Baekhyun follows the movement of his hand, his eyes tracing across the seam of Taewoo’s sweatpants, to an unmistakable outline just to the left of the seam.
Taewoo coughs. Baekhyun tears his eyes away.
“I’m sorry,” he says, and starts getting to his feet -
Taewoo grabs him by the sleeve, and pulls.
Falling is so easy, thinks Baekhyun. At the beginning of the fall, there is a moment when resistance is still possible, but once the trajectory has been set and the course begun, no force could pull you out of gravity’s well. There is a moment, a second’s worth of time for a choice - to fall or not to fall - and at the end of it there is someone tall and warm to catch him, but it is not Chanyeol, though the sensation of being held in these arms is so familiar and alien all at once. Falling here was so easy, it might have been predestined all along.
-
One week ago
He can feel Taewoo’s eyes drilling into the back of his head when he gets down onto his knees. It’s Taewoo, not Kasper. Kasper would be sleepy and sweet and ask him how he was doing. Taewoo is the one who cards his fingers through Baekhyun’s hair and demands, in a voice like silk-on-gravel, that Baekhyun put his pretty little mouth to good use.
“You’re thinking,” Taewoo gently raps his foot against Baekhyun’s calf. “Don’t think.”
Right. Baekhyun reaches out and tugs Taewoo’s sweats down, exposing his very erect cock. It’s slick with precum already, so he starts at the base and licks a long stripe up with the flat of his tongue, pausing at the base of the frenulum. Taewoo is looking at him like there’s nothing, nobody else in the world, and he basks in it. The attention makes him feel wanted, needed, loved.
Don’t think. He opens his mouth just enough to take the tip of Taewoo’s cock between his lips, sucking and swirling his tongue over the tip. Tasting salt at the back of his throat, the scent spreading everywhere, like the ocean but earthier.
“You look so good like this,” Taewoo says. His voice is so low, a bass note rumbling down through his chest. “Like you were made to suck cock.”
Fuck you, Baekhyun almost says. He stops himself at the last minute, and instead takes more of Taewoo’s length into his mouth, stopping just at the back of his throat.
“That’s right,” Taewoo says, as Baekhyun begins to steady his rhythm. “Focus on the task at hand, there you go.”
Baekhyun is getting there. He takes his right hand off Taewoo’s knee and starts jerking him off, matching strokes between his grip and his lips. A trancelike state, just bobbing up and down. He takes more and more with each downward stroke, and is rewarded by a quickening in Taewoo’s breathing and the softest groan. The sound encourages him to go even further, almost there, so close - he opens his jaw wider and lowers, relaxes his tongue at the base and moans himself, but mercifully Taewoo says nothing. He’s probably enjoying it, Baekhyun thinks, feeling wetness collecting on his lashes.
His jaw is going to be sore tomorrow, but tomorrow’s just more dance practice, so it’s not like anyone will notice, or care.
“Can you do it?” Taewoo groans. He tangles his fingers in Baekhyun’s hair again, and the touch is a shot of morphine dumped in his veins. He wants this, he wants Taewoo to feel good, to praise Baekhyun for serving him so well.
Baekhyun tries - he tries hard, he really does - and thinks of a band loosening at the back of his throat. Relaxing instead of pulling apart. He stretches his neck forward and straightens the angle, until Taewoo’s cock fills the back of his throat and thrusts further in, until his nose is buried in the trail of black-brown hair at the base of Taewoo’s cock and there is nothing in his vision or any of his senses, for that matter, except Kim Taewoo.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” Taewoo whispers. “Good boy.”
Baekhyun comes up for air, gasping for it, then attempts again. Five seconds, but he can hold it longer than that. He deep throats Taewoo’s cock twice more before the hand in his hair tightens into a vise grip, and Taewoo is thrusting up into his mouth with short snaps of his hips.
“I’m - I’m gonna come,” Taewoo gasps. “I’m gonna -”
Baekhyun holds still, or tries to, while Taewoo fucks his face in uneven strokes, holding his jaw open so his mouth can be used. Holds till the telltale pulsing in the base of Taewoo’s cock begins, and then he’s spilling down Baekhyun’s throat. Pearly drops spill out the corners of Baekhyun’s mouth, running down his chin in little trickles.
“Can you swallow?”
It’s already filling up the back of his throat, he has no choice. There’s a film left on his tongue and white on his chin, though. Baekhyun knows he’s a mess, with tears tracking down his cheeks and his mouth smeared with semen and saliva, dripping in a slow cold trail down his neck. He waits for his satisfied lover to pull him up again, to settle on his lap and pay attention to his own aching cock.
“You’re amazing,” Taewoo whispers in his ear. His finger make quick work of Baekhyun’s belt and zipper, and the sensation of Chanyeol’s fingers around him is blessed relief that can’t be put into words. “I wish I took a picture. You looked like a fucking mess - you know what, you still do. You made yourself filthy for me, didn’t you?”
Baekhyun whimpers. He leans his forehead against Taewoo, burying his face in the crook of his shoulder for the second time today. He’s supposed to be voiceless, then. To listen to Taewoo talk dirty in his ear until he comes.
“Imagine if someone walked in here right now,” Taewoo says. His tone is soft, casual, like the idea doesn’t matter all that much. Just a thought exercise. “If they came in and saw this. All they’d see is you, your face covered in my cum. Begging me with your moaning like you’ve lost your fucking mind. What do you think of that?”
“Ah,” Baekhyun pants into Taewoo’s shoulder. “H-ah.”
“Pretty little thing,” Taewoo sighs. His rhythm slows to a tortuous slowness but he squeezes on every upward pull, like he’s trying to milk Baekhyun’s orgasm out of him. “Poor, pretty little thing.”
He kisses Baekhyun, and even his tongue in Baekhyun’s mouth is overpowering. “Look at me,” Taewoo demands. “Baekhyun, look at me.”
Through hazy, wetted eyes, Baekhyun manages to. His mouth is open, he knows. He can’t hear himself anymore, not with the blood pounding a drumbeat in his head and between his legs. The image blurs - Taewoo into Kasper, Kasper into Chanyeol. They have the same voice, the same face, and they want something from him, they all want things and there is only so much of himself he has left to give.
“You can come,” Taewoo says. “Baekhyun.”
Baekhyun’s vision clears enough to see Chanyeol’s face. His lips are dark red, and his pupils are two black circles, blown wide with lust.
“Come for me.”
-
The morning after
“You look like shit,” Minseok says, leaning against Baekhyun’s makeup table. His shirt is tucked in sloppily, and he accepts a pair of suspenders from a passing coordi-noona with a nonchalance that completely ignores the chaos around them. “Did you sleep?”
“Good morning to you too,” Baekhyun answers. He looks at Minseok, or tries to. The girl working on his hair tsks and flicks him on the back of the neck, and he hastily looks back at the mirror. “God invented undereye concealer for a reason.”
Minseok snorts. “You’ve been avoiding Chanyeol.”
“I’ve been avoiding everyone who doesn’t work on things that are CBX-related.” Baekhyun throws up his hands, in lieu of shaking his head - otherwise the girl will flick him again. “Why are you giving me so much shit about it? You’re doing it too.”
“Not like that,” Minseok counters. He glances at the hairdresser, who suddenly has to take a bathroom break. Baekhyun swallows.
“It’s just, well. The two of you are still dating, right?”
It breaks his heart that Minseok has to come right out and ask it. All around them the room is loud, and between the two of them the silence shrinks their little microcosm into a pinpoint, and he realizes all of a sudden that Minseok is uncomfortably close, gazing at him with eyes that say nothing whatsoever.
“Of course,” Baekhyun answers, hoping that his voice is steady.
“Right.” Minseok squints at him, looking for something. “Of course.”
Baekhyun reaches up. “Is there something on my face?”
A smile cracks across Minseok’s lips. “Only makeup.”
He takes a leaning seat against Baekhyun’s chair, a warm solid weight against his arm. “We wear a lot of masks, you and I. For the fans, for our families. For ourselves.”
“Mm.” It’s not quite clear where Minseok is going with this yet, but Baekhyun can smile and nod, smile and nod. “Sure.”
“But it’s important to remember who you are underneath it all,” says Minseok. “Have you heard of method acting?”
Baekhyun nods.
“That’s who we are, only our performance isn’t filmed, it’s lived. Every second we spend outside is spent performing. That’s why, in private, it’s important to find some time to be true to yourself.” Minseok pats him on the head, ruining his fluffed hair. “It’s like a muscle. If you forget to exercise it, it withers away.”
-
One week after
“It feel like it’s been forever,” says Chanyeol, his voice blossoming from deep within his chest. “Hasn’t it?”
“It has been forever,” Baekhyun corrects him. He leans back on the pillows, arching his back. “So? You’re going to make me wait a little longer?”
Chanyeol skates fingers down Baekhyun’s chest, circles his navel, and dips lower until he is gently cupping Baekhyun through his boxers. “You think you could wait?”
“N-no-hnngh.” Chanyeol’s touch is gentle, his fingers feather-light. For someone so prone to breaking things, he is surprisingly delicate tonight. Baekhyun surges up, wanting more of that warmth, but Chanyeol is gone.
“Hmm?” Baekhyun opens his eyes.
“I’m looking for something. Wait a sec.” Chanyeol is back, a long strip of black silk in his hands. “I wanted to try this.”
He kneels down and motions with it in front of Baekhyun’s face. “What do you think?”
“It’s a blindfold,” says Baekhyun, stating the obvious.
“It is.”
“I didn’t know you were interested in this kind of thing.”
“Wanted to spice things up.” Chanyeol flicks it, sending waves rippling across the black surface. “So?”
“Give it here.”
Baekhyun takes the fabric and tries to tie it behind his own head, but his fingers keep slipping on the knot, and it slips down his nose every time he tries to lie down. Reduced to giggles and tears, Chanyeol eventually gets up to help him, adjusting the knot until it’s just snug enough to sit over his hair without falling.
“I’m here,” Chanyeol says, and now Baekhyun is forced to find him with his hearing alone. “Baekhyun?”
“Yeah?”
“Lie down.”
“Is this a game?”
“The rules are pretty simple,” Chanyeol pulls his limbs around and positions him like a rag doll until he is lying comfortable on his back, his legs spread and curled loosely around a kneeling Chanyeol. “You just have to listen to me, and do what I tell you to do.”
“Ok.”
“Touch yourself.” Chanyeol’s voice drops low. “Go on.”
Baekhyun isn’t sure if he’s supposed to make a show of it, and he tries at first, hissing and biting his lip when he palms his cock and drags his fingers down his shaft. But that gets boring quickly, especially when there’s no response from Chanyeol, and he can’t see the look on his face. With the blindfold on, it’s easy to imagine different people, different faces there. It could be Taewoo watching him, and Taewoo wouldn’t be so kind. His cock jumps in interest, and Baekhyun flushes bright red, a little gasp escaping his lips.
“What are you thinking about?” rumbles Chanyeol.
“About you,” bites out Baekhyun, and the guilt makes him even harder.
“Need any help?”
“Kiss me,” gasps Baekhyun. Kiss me so I know it’s you and not my imagination. “Please, something - don’t ignore me.”
Chanyeol leans down and takes Baekhyun’s lower lip between his teeth, leaving a gentle bite and then kissing him keeper, like he’s trying to eat Baekhyun up. Teeth everywhere, Chanyeol nipping at his lip again - Baekhyun swallows his saliva and tastes salt and rust. He inhales when Chanyeol moves aside and begins leaving bites down his throat, panting through burning, swollen lips and taking a handful of Chanyeol’s hair by the roots.
“Don’t leave marks,” he whines. “They’ll see -”
“You can do better than that,” growls Chanyeol against his throat, leaving the lightest of kisses. “Touch yourself, come on.”
“I’m - I’m doing it.” Without sight the spaces in his mind fills in Taewoo for Chanyeol, their features so different and yet the same. He groans as Chanyeol’s large hand covers his own, calluses rasping against his thin-boned fingers. Chanyeol jerks him off hard and fast, setting a punishing rhythm that Baekhyun can’t keep up with, can’t hold onto -
“I’m gonna come,” he tells Chanyeol. “I’m gonna, I’m gonna -”
Chanyeol takes his hands away. Baekhyun hisses through his teeth and moans deep in the back of his throat, so close and so wound up and teetering on the brink. He begins to stroke and is interrupted by Chanyeol, who seizes his wrists and pins them up above his head.
“Chanyeol?” he asks, uncertain. “Chanyeol, please -”
Cold, slick fingers press against his entrance and enter, unceremonious, two breaching him and knocking the breath from his chest. Baekhyun sobs, the sudden stimulation too much to bear, when Chanyeol twists his fingers and curls them up to find that spot inside him, his lower abdomen singing in dull pleasure as Chanyeol massages his fingertips over it in tiny, tiny circles. With his other hand he has Baekhyun’s wrists still held above his head. Helpless, able to do nothing but submit to the whims and movements of another.
“You like this,” Chanyeol says. “You’re really getting off on this.”
Baekhyun whimpers, incoherent. He’s close again, and teetering, and about to come - he should tell Chanyeol but all that comes out of his mouth is sound, warbling and atonal.
“You never used to get off on this,” says Chanyeol. “I’d ask, and you would say no.”
“Chan - haaah.”
“What changed?”
Baekhyun tenses, tears gathering at the corners of his eyes, his thighs trembling. Chanyeol stops moving again. His fingers slow and still inside Baekhyun, but keep him spread open.
“What changed?” Chanyeol repeats.
“Nothing, please, Chanyeol.”
“Something changed,” says Chanyeol. “You’ve changed.”
Baekhyun sobs.
The blindfold is hot. Silk traps heat, sticking to his skin whilst sweat runs off his forehead.
“Am I worse than he was? Well?” Chanyeol crooks his fingers upward and massages, and Baekhyun feels himself arch off the sheets; he doesn’t hear his own cry but he can feel his mouth open, his throat burned raw by the sound. “Tell me. Use your words, aren’t you always so talkative?”
He withdraws his fingers and lets Baekhyun go, leaving him a twitching, leaking mess. While Baekhyun scrabbles at the blindfold over his face he can hear the sound of Chanyeol prepping himself, the telltale crinkling of foil. He wants to move but he’s exhausted, and he doesn’t even manage to lift the silk before Chanyeol is back. He lifts Baekhyun by the hips and lines himself up, entering none-too-carefully, and the stretch and the burn are familiar, and this is what he remembers best, the way that he and Chanyeol fit together so well -
Arousal in the pit of his stomach again, uglier this time, an ache coiling that blurs the line between pleasure and pain. Baekhyun reaches up and grips Chanyeol by the shoulders, pulling himself upward so that he is facing Chanyeol, pressing his face against his chest. The thrusts are methodical and deep, each one pushing him closer to the wall.
The blindfold slips off his face. Chanyeol’s mouth is a tight line, his bangs slick with sweat. There was nothing ever so beautiful in the world, thinks Baekhyun, and how could he have ever forgotten. He strokes his fingers down the long line of Chanyeol’s cheekbones and gazes at the ceiling when Chanyeol’s breath grows erratic, his rhythm stuttered, and holds him tight when he comes, wordless.
-
“How did you know?” whispers Baekhyun.
Chanyeol smiles, a sad smile that shatters whatever composure Baekhyun had left. “You’re bad at lying, but also you could never hide anything from me. And I could never hide anything from you.”
The sheets between them are damp, the scent of sex thick in the air - they’ll have to do laundry sneakily, to make sure no one else in the dorm finds out. Chanyeol twists away from him, but the sheets twist and bring them closer together.
“I missed you,” says Baekhyun. “A lot.”
“You missed me,” says Chanyeol. “So much that you went to see…”
Kasper’s name hangs between them like a weight.
“I haven’t just missed you for two weeks,” answers Baekhyun. “I’ve been missing you for months and months before that.”
Before CBX there were the concerts, and before the concerts there was the concert prep, and during the concert prep there was the album, and before the album there was the album prep, and so on - the months blur in his memory, and he can’t pinpoint a beginning or an end to this rift between them, this disquiet, but eventually it had come to grow so wide between them that no amount of time spent in physical proximity could mend it.
All this hangs between them, unsaid. Like a weight.
“I know,” says Chanyeol. “I know.”